Science & Tech

Freedom of thought and open-source software (lecture by Eben Moglen)

July 28, 2012
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Eben Moglen, professor of law and legal history at Columbia University, as well as founder, Director-Counsel and Chairman of Software Freedom Law Center and long-term supporter of organizations like the Free Software Foundation, is a lecturer and free software/open-source advocate. Though the following lecture and interview only covers so much, they do serve as a good introduction to his extensive body of work. Why Freedom of Thought Requires Free Media and Why Free Media Require Free Technology This lecture was held during the Re:publica 2012 conference in Berlin. It describes in detail why the current societal model, in which proprietary…

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Recent thoughts on the climate crisis

June 27, 2012
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A small sample of some the important things that have been said recently on the state of the climate crisis and the failures of political leaders to address the root causes or even acknowledge the seriousness of the problem: 1. Democracy Now interview with Bill McKibben (environmentalist, author, founder of the remarkable grassroots climate campaign 350.org) 2. Approaching a state shift in the Earth’s biosphere (ground-breaking article in Nature written by over 20 environmental scientists) 3. Is humanity pushing Earth past a tipping point? (a simplified, less technical summary of the aforementioned article in Wired magazine) 4. Democracy Now interview…

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Augmented and bot-mediated reality

June 13, 2012
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While Google’s  Project Glass has recently generated quite a stir with the possibilities of augmented reality, the idea is not exactly new.  In the 1990’s MIT Cyborgs carried around huge backpacks stuffed with computer hardware to remain connected to the digital world via their clunky screen-goggles. Sherry Turkle, an MIT researcher herself, discusses them in an article entitled “Always-on/Always-On-You: The Tethered Self,” which analyzes how augmented reality transforms human interaction into a world in which people are ensnared in round-the-clock digital social networks. Yet the official description for the Google’s Project Glass is just as optimistic as Turkle’s analysis is cynical: We believe technology…

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Connected, but alone? (lectures by Sherry Turkle)

April 11, 2012
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In this lecture, Sherry Turkle turns her attention to the world of social media and sociable robots. As she puts it, these are technologies are the “architect of our intimacies.” In her most recent book, Alone Together: Why We Expect More From Technology and Less From Each Other, Turkle argues that the social media we encounter on a daily basis are presenting us with a moment of temptation. Drawn by the illusion of companionship without the demands of intimacy, we confuse postings and online sharing with authentic communication. We are drawn to sacrifice conversation for mere connection. Turkle suggests that…

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Move over SOPA & PIPA: Here comes CISPA (by Anne Sewell)

April 6, 2012
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In the wake of SOPA and PIPA, there is yet another terrifying bill on the table. The Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act (or CISPA for short) which is currently being discussed by Congress.   In Washington, Congress is discussing the best way to avert the ongoing cyberattacks and some legislators have put forward a new act which, if it passes Congress, will allow the government access to personal correspondence of any person of their choosing.   Much like the Big Brother tactics in the United Kingdom recently, this bill will likely cause an outcry of condemnation and criticism, as…

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The corporate titans take on the Internet (by Peter Frase)

March 16, 2012
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The fight over copyright is not a struggle between capital and labour, but one between different factions of capital. New York, NY – American politics is riven by an increasingly contentious debate over the status of intellectual property, especially copyright. On one side are those who argue that tougher enforcement of IP is desperately needed to protect the rights of creators, promote innovation, preserve jobs, and ensure economic growth. Opposing them are those who argue that the draconian enforcement of intellectual property rights will only curtail free speech and stifle economic activity, while entrenching the profits of a small class of…

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The future of meat

February 28, 2012
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Over at Gizmodo there is a brief article entitled “The Future of Farming is Brain-Dead Chickens?” about a provocative art project created by an architecture student at the Royal College of Art. The project is described as follows: Architecture student André Ford has presented a very radical solution to increase the efficiency and humaneness in raising poultry. Under his plan, birds would have their frontal cortexes surgically severed, rendering the animals permanently unconscious with no zero sensory input while maintaining their lower brain functions—breathing and such—so that they continue to grow. The form and function of a chicken plant would change…

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The ethics of internet piracy (by Peter Singer)

February 25, 2012
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Recently an article by Peter Singer was published by project-syndicate, discussing the ethics of internet piracy.  While the whole article is absolutely worth reading, here are a few paragraphs that seem to catch the essence: If I steal someone’s book the old-fashioned way, I have the book, and the original owner no longer does. I am better off, but she is worse off. When people use pirated books, the publisher and the author often are worse off – they lose earnings from selling the book. But, if my colleague had not sent me the book, I would have borrowed the…

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Cancer and economic development

January 12, 2012
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The World Cancer Research Foundation has published a ranking of countries in terms of cancer rates. The list, and a brief discussion of it, can be found in this article published in the Guardian. Interestingly, the top twenty positions on the list are dominated by OECD nations and the full list suggests a fairly strong correlation between cancer rates and a country’s level of economic development: in general (and with few exceptions, such as Singapore), the greater the level of economic development in a country, the higher the incidence of cancer in the population.   There is already an abundance of…

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The internet filter bubble

January 7, 2012
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Thanks to Google’s search engine we now have the ability to retrieve instantly a massive amount of information on virtually any topic or any question we might have. On the surface, it seems that we are all better informed and more knowledgeable as a result of Google.  But are we? Consider the fact that Google recognizes  users and collects information on their digital behavior–their favorite searches, articles they have read on Google news, and even their choice of words.  Everything is recorded, the pattern is analyzed, and a user profile is created. Then, when you perform a search, Google tries to find…

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Anonymous exposes the pedophiles

November 1, 2011
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Apparently the latest Operation Darknet by the (in)famous Hacker Collective Anonymous, known for its support of the whistle-blower platform Wikileaks and the Occupy Movement, took matters into their own hands and succeeded where the police and FBI failed. During Operation Darknet Anonymous hunted for darknets (hidden networks only visible for their members) and this time revealed one of the biggest sharing platforms for child pornography ever discovered. Staying true to their manifesto, they published all user data they could unveil and subsequently killed the platform. This case is especially interesting because one of the main mantras and characteristics of the group Anonymous was broken…

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