Category: Science & Tech. | Page 5

485 – Ghost in the machine? / Just Right year-end review

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Dec 292016

As 2016 draws to a close, we would like to thank you, our listeners, for making 2016 Just Right’s greatest single year in audience growth. 2016 was Just Right’s first year as an independent weekly radio broadcast and podcast, free from the constraints of the politically-correct university environment in which the show originated.

Our on-line listener statistics for the 2016 tell a remarkable story: Over the past year alone, visits to our web site have increased from a few hundred per day in 2015 to an average approaching 2000 per day. “Unique visitors” to our site have increased from an average of 2000 per month to 15,000 per month. And with each passing month, thousands more are added to these numbers.

Considering that Just Right is produced only once a week, the growth in the number shows downloaded over the past year is significant. In 2015 Just Right’s bandwidth traffic of 848 gigabytes represents approximately 12,110 show downloads, while in 2016, bandwidth traffic (to Dec 21) of 4.6 Terabytes represents a minimum of 65,242 show downloads. That’s a growth rate exceeding 500% over the past year alone, and the numbers show no signs of slowing down. Continue reading »

484 – Artificial intelligence gathering | Christopher Essex

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Dec 222016

Is “artificial intelligence” (AI) really an artificially stupid topic? Is there even such a thing as “artificial” intelligence, or are we just playing with words?

The answers are not as straightforward as one might at first glance assume. Indeed, assumptions may well determine the outcome of a tautology that would have us chasing our own tales of intelligence.

Join us for a real intelligence gathering, together with our in-studio guest Professor Christopher Essex of Western University’s Department of Applied Mathematics. It’s a discussion about the pitfalls and promises of what has come to be called “artificial intelligence,” and why the discussion itself has as many pitfalls as its subject.

The circular debate between “real” and “artificial” intelligence may simply be caused by assuming that the latter refers to some form of “artificial human.” It cannot. “Intelligence,” however defined, is an unreal concept when used in the attempt to distinguish between man and machine. Continue reading »

476 – Climate change’s CO2 diversion | Dave Plumb

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Oct 272016

Are you skeptical about climate change and CO2? If so, consider yourself in denial. At least that’s how proponents of “carbon pricing”, “carbon taxes,” “carbon trading” and of all the other variants of carbonated climate politics have framed the debate.

Having thus dismissed “climate change deniers” as both irrelevant and morally deficient, no further discussion is warranted. The debate (which never occurred) is closed. The “science is settled.”

What those who say “the science is settled” really mean is that “the Politics is settled, and we’re going ahead with our political agenda no matter what science has to say about it.”

What those who say “the science is settled” also really mean is that “science” is irrelevant to them. Since science and knowledge are never “settled,” to suggest otherwise is clear evidence of just how wrong those who utter such nonsense really can be.

Ironically, in labeling the skeptics “deniers”, it is the accusers who are the active deniers.
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460 – Exit-stential threats / A new soviet? / The 7.9% solution / Anti-ideal, logically speaking

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Jul 072016

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 59:42 — 68.5MB) | Embed

APPLYING THE 7.9% SOLUTION TO BRITAIN’S EXIT-STENTIAL THREATS

On today’s Just right, more on the ‘exit-stential’ threats created by Britain’s vote to leave the European Union: Is it fair to contrast the values of those on either side of the vote by comparing the juvenile behaviour and irrational fears of the one side with the mature, confident, and rationally persuasive arguments of the other? Or is it even fair to ask that question?

Post-Brexit vote reactions on either side of the original debate are still running at an emotional high.

And while most attention is currently on Britain, what of Europe’s future in a smaller EU? Is it possible that Europe could evolve into a new ‘soviet’? Continue reading »

447 – Guest: Dave Plumb – Author of Climate Hope

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Apr 072016

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 59:42 — 68.5MB) | Embed

Topics:
00:03 Tips and points on climate change: Climate Hope, climate change, antidote to CO2 terrorism, where’s the hope, human impact on climate, climate history, more CO2 needed – not less, relevancy of carbon dioxide content, tipping points, life as the planet’s modifier, science vs politics on climate change, media bias, creating a discussion, lack of balanced reporting
15:10 Assault on battery: the Jacobson Plan, total conversion to renewable energy, five sources of energy, batteries for energy storage, fossil fuel energy density, skyrocketing energy costs, Green Energy Act, the real cost and price of electricity, battery disposal and re-cycling
29:25 Venus fry trap: A Venus inferno for planet Earth, sister planet, envisioning the planet Venus, no similarities between Earth and Venus, a brief history of Venus and Earth, water vapour greenhouse effect on Venus, sequestered carbon, CO2 as consequence – not cause, Jurassic Period – the time of earth’s life
43:10 Nature to be commanded: natural changes, overcoming and controlling nature, man’s relationship to nature, the resiliency of life, agenda of wealth-redistribution, time perspective, Milankovitch Cycles, conditions of glaciation, the four predators 59:42 END

440 – Legal ease / Feminist protection racket / The gravity of gravity / Rand crater

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Feb 182016

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 59:42 — 68.5MB) | Embed

Topics:
00:03 Legal ease: Christie Blatchford on feminism and the Ghomeshi trial, challenging the ‘women never lie’ myth, the Bill Cosby connection, feminist politics in the police department
16:50 Feminist protection racket: Woman first person second, Jian Ghomeshi’s lawyer Marie Henein, feminist Megan Walker, protecting women from being held accountable for their actions, lawyer Phil Millar, the polarization of public opinion on Ghomeshi,
34:55 The gravity of gravity: gravity wave breakthrough, LIGO, disturbance in fabric of space-time, practicality of gravity waves, Einstein’s theory confirmed, global positioning technology
50:05 Rand’s crater: The naming of Uranus, naming the craters on Venus, public input to naming planet features, Robert’s 25-year-old submission to name a crater on Venus after Ayn Rand, Rand Crater 59:42 END

415 – Guest: Andy Janson, Entrepreneur, Inventor, Science and Technology Futurist

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Aug 272015

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 57:48 — 66.3MB) | Embed

Topics:
00:07 Hydrogen bombed: hydrogen as fuel, hydrogen storage device, fears of hydrogen, water as fuel, OPG’s plan to bury nuclear waste, Deep Geologic Depository, introducing uranium
16:05 Nuclear wasted: from uranium to lead, disposing nuclear waste – identifying the problem, nuclear submarine storage, nuclear reactors being built around the world
28:35 Nuclear new clear vision: new proposals for eliminating nuclear waste, ASAT (anti-satellite), one way trip to the sun, Fulton device, Gerald Bull, Thunder Well, hypersonic shock wave, an irrational one hundred thousand year contract
44:10 An elevating future: uranium’s future potential, nuclear waste as fuel, liquid fluoride salt, irrational nuclear waste burial expectations, space elevator, financing the true disposal of nuclear waste 57:48 END