Those of you who have read and enjoyed speculative fiction all their lives, take note of this newest development. The J. Craig Venter institute has created the first synthetic self-replicating species whose parent is a computer. It carries the names of its creators and its own web site encoded directly into its DNA.
It is interesting to me that while the endless discussions as to whether or not it would be ethical to create life from scratch were taking place, starting with Mary Shelley’s “Frankenstein”, the scientists were quietly and methodically making it happen.
I offer no opinion on the ethical questions this represents, other than to note the occurrence of one of the most momentous accomplishments in human history. Those who wanted to wait until we’d figured out the ethics of whether or not something like this ought to be done before we, as a species, created a synthetic life form, are going to have to deal with the fact that this particular ship has sailed.
how will it survive this oneFiscal 2016 earnings were disappointing and we addressed specific challenges in certain businesses and worked hard to prepare the company for sustained profitable growth going forward. While overall results were unsatisfactory we did see strong performance at Journeys and Johnston Murphy and we believe that we did what was necessary to position the Lids Sports Group for a stronger future starting this year.Use advanced training techniques for increasing the fat burning hormone HGH. For example, use drop sets on your isolation exercises. Cheap Jordan Shoes Drop sets mean doing one set of an exercise for eight to 10 reps, then immediately lowering the weight and doing another set to exhaustion. Add another “drop” or two to make a double or triple drop set. Lower the weight to a slow six second count on any compound exercise. The micro tears in muscle tissue created by this technique take a lot of extra calories to repair. Do only one NA set per exercise to avoid excessive soreness.SupplementsMany supplements make false statements, many are just a waste of money but a few are good and are worth taking. I believe that some supplements should be taken in order to get effective muscle growth these are:protein, creatine, and aenergy supplement (A product like NO explode which gives you energy and improves circulation).But where cheap China Jerseys the film gets more interesting is where it moves from these issues to the ones that don’t necessarily come to mind first when you think wholesale nfl jerseys about why people who have been incredibly well paid wind up broke. They don’t just spend money buying diamonds and cars (although they buy a nfl jerseys china lot of diamonds and cars). They gamble. They keep having to start over in new cities if they’re traded. They pay high tax rates, and then they pay agents and lawyers. They don’t remember to budget for the off season, especially in the NFL, which pays them week to week anyone who didn’t already know that probably learned it during the NFL lockout, when players who are thought of as extravagantly compensated sought loans to tide them over.Football game predictions websites charge heavily for the services they offer. With Dog Pound Psychic, it works differently. They have a flexible payment option for the users. You can choose amongst the three options offered by DPP website. This allows the user to select a package as per his or her requirement or paying capacity. I can safely say feeling so self conscious has left my confidence in tatters. I hate wearing make up but I currently don want to leave the house without it on. HOWEVER PROGRESS IS BEING MADE! (With some help from a dermatologist and cutting out dairy (waah, except for spontaneous ice creams) and cutting down sugar Cheap Air Jordan 4 (bigger waah but gotta do what you gotta do)).
Damage control is underway. Wang denied speculation that the game’s planned venue, the Beijing Worker’s Stadium, currently under renovation for the Olympics, would not have been ready this summer. I have friends whose spouses have Alzheimer’s. Given research indicating a possible link between football head injuries and Alzheimer’s, one would think that the NFL would want to promote Alzheimer’s Awareness Month each November. Talk to your offensive teammates after every play. This helps you develop a sense for the vulnerability and strength of the defense. It would take an entire summer wholesale jerseys china for you to experience all that the Flathead valley has to offer!Boat rentals and jet ski rentals are available in Kalispell. There is public launch site on Ashley Lake. Fill frozen pop molds with the combo, insert sticks, freeze until solid and garnish with grated dark chocolate. Dr. After the inbound passer steps out of bounds, he has five seconds to get rid of the ball or it is a violation. After made baskets, the inbound passer may run the baseline and move back and forth to make the pass. My wife saw this article the other day, and she started flipping out. She said this is the most blogged New York Times wholesale nfl jerseys technology blog. 11: 6) God is a god of relationships. The more you get to know Him by spending time with Him on a daily basis, the more His power will become manifest in your life and your faith will grow accordingly.. Instead of using a knife block, store cutlery on the wall using a magnetic strip. Find a cutting board that fits over your sink or cooktop so that valuable counter space doesn’t go to waste.. Experts are mixed on what kind of pro the former Notre NFL Jerseys China Dame tackle will be, but some have him rated higher than Tunsil. The 49ers have a ton of picks in this draft, so I expect them to address QB and defense on the second and third day.. Add the beef and pork and, using a wooden spoon or clean hands, stir until combined. Form into 1 1/4 to 1 1/2 inch meatballs. That http://www.cheapoakleys2013.com team was headed by the now world famous Eliot Ness and his incorruptible Untouchables. The second line of attack would be catching Big Al on tax evasion, because apparently even bootlegging outlaws are supposed to pay their taxes. Don’t show up with a fantasy football magazine you picked up on the way over and expect to draft a great team. It was out of date when it hit the newsstand and will cause the other coaches to laugh at you.. That makes Kroenke the second richest NFL owner, after the Seattle Seahawks’ Paul Allen, co http://www.cheapjordan13.com founder of Microsoft. But an obvious question arises: why couldn’t a man who professes his love for his home state pay for a new stadium in St Louis?.
I was very excited to see Photofly from Autodesk – this looked like a fantastic way to quickly model objects and buildings using nothing but photographs and the click of a mouse (and time waiting for some computing to be done on some server someplace to figure it all out and stitch it all together).
So I gave it a whirl – I had a ton of photos from India when I was there, where I had shot panoramas of various historic, legendary buildings and places, and I tried uploading them to the system to see what I’d get back. I was genuinely hoping to get something back.
So I clicked the submit button and waited. And waited. I left the computer on overnight. In the morning, I got up and looked at the screen – still nothing. After after a few more tries, I gave up on the thing and uninstalled it. I figured the technology was possibly a little too new to work very well. Months later after I had gone to SIGGRAPH and been invited to join the Autodesk forums on LinkedIn.com, I found that a lot of other people had had the same problem, made the same assumptions, and had come away empty handed.
Yoda, sitting in the passenger seat of my Fiat 850 Spyder.
Then Ifound the tips pages, which I could swear weren’t there when Firefly was first announced. Now that I have some guidelines on how to shoot, and what it can really do, I’m going to give it another go. I’m really interested to see if it can generated meshes from sculptures, because I started out in the motion picture business doing molds and makeup effects, and no amount of computer simulation can properly replace real world materials. If I can work in real clay and build my digital models based directly on my own sculptures, I’ll have an outrageous advantage.
I still have the molds from the Yoda replica I and my friends Michael Moore (not the director, a different Michael Moore) and Jeff Farley made in 1985, and I’m wondering if somehow I can get Photofly to recreate something approaching the original, either from the molds, or from the latex puppet we built (which after all these years, I still have). Making the Yoda replica was a labor of love, and it would be great to bring him back to life.
Now that I have what may pass for working instructions, I may be able to make some progress.
— Gene Turnbow
how to overcome a rookie mistake in front of millionsThe team confirmed on Wednesday that he would not be able to return this season, after a big scare on Tuesday. He will have to have surgery on his right foot, preventing him from cheap jerseys coming back on the field until next year. A CT scan showed that he suffered a fracture in the same location where he fractured it after the 2011 NFL scouting combine, according to ESPN. Fans certainly freaked out after seeing him go down, knowing that he has been injured before, and that it could be a problem for them.According to this article, most zoophiles experience the first stirrings of their fetish between the ages of 11 and 14, which suddenly explains the success of both Alvin and the Chipmunks movies. Zoophiles don’t draw much of a difference between the affections of a human and an animal and, really, we can’t see much of a difference between a pet and a significant other they both cheer you up when you’re down and they both can be trained to lick your genitals.Exhaustion Prevent seasonal demands and winter festivities by planning ahead and only making time for the important things. Overbooking yourself will add to your stress levels and exhaustion levels leaving you sluggish and sleep deprived. If you are tired you are less likely to workout and eat healthy, sleep deprived individuals often reach for easy meals such as fast food to get their fix.The Best of The BestThere are so many options that it can be overwhelming. I happened to get luck and found the pair pictured to the right on sale at Kohls. I bought two on the spot for my children, after examining them through the packaging carefully. I like the size of the http://www.ray-banbaratas.top eyes, oakley sunglasses which are small and would fit an average six year old well. When I teach swim lessons with younger children that don’t have goggles, I borrow these and they fit perfectly.I’m going to increase the incline. So, this is great working the thighs; I’m going to increase this incline. So, look at my treadmill. I’m actually rising up, so it almost looks like cheap jerseys wholesale I’m walking uphill. It’s still going. So when I’m walking uphill, I’m getting more hamstring, butt, the thighs are still burning, the abs are pulled in, I’m Knockoff Oakleys walking tall. But when it comes to they whys and wherefores, cricketers become all coy, because what they’re doing is illegal, of course, or only a bit legal, say 25 per cent legal, and so they have to give a 75 per cent impression of not doing it. They bounce the ball in from the outfield, or even from infielder to infielder, and when the umpires ask about it, they have to say, oops, slipped. It is reverse spin about reverse swing. In Perth, Australia even kept the ball out of the hands of spinner Nathan Lyon because whatever he was doing or not doing, it was reversing the reverse. Not doing so as not to do; at least Steve Smith could be honest about this.
A simple step drill involves the participant standing in front of the step or elevated object and stepping up with one foot, then the other foot, then stepping down with the Discount Nike Shoes first foot and again with the second foot, as fast as possible. This drill can be performed for a certain amount of time and trains the feet to move quickly in a specific direction. However, this is the exact opposite of what happened. In actuality, the auto industry was actively opposed to the idea, resulting in years of secret development and several firings before the minivan ever saw the light of day.”It has the sex appeal of a station wagon with the gas mileage of a dump truck!”. Knees are straight. Toes are pointed. Meanwhile, the Titans now own six of the top 76 selections. “My phone is still working,” Robinson quipped after trading the top pick. He helps develop sales proposals and responses to request for proposals Discount Nike Shoes (RFPs). He develops and oversees a sales training program for new and existing employees. The last sentence there may be what stands out the most to Bears fans. The Minnesota Vikings won the NFC North last year with an 11 win season, so that would be a great season for the 6 10 Bears that haven been to the playoffs since 2010. Sunday, Peyton Manning will pour all that into a big football game. Will it be his last? A victory and then retirement would be the perfect Hollywood ending. It wasn’t all terrible, all the time. “For the record, my father was an amazing dad when he acted like one,” Angela says. One of the most recent examples of athletic social activism came Sunday. Ahead Cheap Oakleys Sale of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers’ home game against the Chicago Bears, Bucs wide receiver Mike Evans refused to stand for the national anthem in response to Donald Trump winning the presidential election. Determine the size and flying range you’ll need. Light jets ($3 million to $8 million) can take 5 to 8 passengers cheap jerseys wholesale roughly 2,000 miles (3,219 km); midsize executive jets ($9 million to $16 million) can take up to 9 passengers from 2,000 to 3,000 miles (3,219 to 4,828 cheap football jerseys km); and large executive jets ($17 million to $45 million) can carry 12 passengers more than 4,000 miles (6,437 km). Patriots are 12 4 following bye week under coach Bill Belichick. New England remains only team in NFL not to throw interception in 2016. Things are a little rosier for existing homes. Sales climbed 6.5% in December thanks largely to falling prices and growing interest in foreclosed properties.
When your life is a blur of work and driving to and from work and being so tired from work that you don’t even have the energy to sit up and watch television when you get home – when things you thought were being handled for you aren’t being handled at all and it all winds up on your shoulders anyway – you start to lose the meaning of it all. Nothing matters anymore look what i found. You start to wonder why you keep doing it day after day after day with no reward and no purpose, and no joy.
Stop and look around you. No matter what, that tremendous weight of responsibility you carry is only made worse if you forget who you are, what makes you you and why you started down the road you took in the first place. If you can’t remember why you started down that road, and you realize it’s taking you to places you no longer want to go, it’s not too late to turn around, go back up the road a piece, and pick a different one.
Better choose – you only get to travel so many roads in your lifetime. You’d better make each mile count. And on the way, don’t forget to look around and enjoy the things you enjoy. You have a right to it.
Look yourself in the mirror every morning and ask yourself, “If I got to choose what I’d be doing today, would I voluntarily choose to do this?” We’re not guaranteed a tomorrow. Your lifetime might be ninety years – or only thirty-two years, and only one more day after that. Your days are the most precious thing you have.
So it’s not idle frivolity to “stop and smell the roses”. You need to stop and smell the roses once in a while to make sure that the roses are actually still there. And if they’re not, you need to go find some.
My Eagle Talon had decided to commit suicide days before I left on a business trip to India during the month of March of 2008. Blow-by pressurized the cooling system in the car, which manifested by explosively disconnecting the top hose on my radiator. This eventually resulted in the engine seizing up.
So I bought myself a Prius! It was a 2001 model, not the new one, but it was a hybrid and I expected to save so much money on the gasoline that it would come pretty close to paying for itself in the savings on fuel every month. I drive quite a ways to work, about 85 miles a day as a round trip, so it adds up pretty fast.
I got rid of the dead car on eBay, and then started driving the new car.
Here’s what I found out about the Prius:
There’s a common and well founded assumption that the mileage advertised by the manufacturer for any given car is pretty much baloney. Imagine my surprise when I found that the 2001 Prius was supposed to get 50 miles to the gallon, and if you drive the way one drives a hybrid instead of a conventionally powered car, and you have the right tires, and keep them at the right pressure, you can get 50 miles to the gallon on a routine basis! I was in shock, really. I’d never had a car that lived up to the hype. This one does.
Now the down side – repairs are expensive. You really need to have the dealership do the repairs. The car is mainly a computer that happens to be street legal. After two years, I had a problem with the auxiliary battery (not the main one), an air flow meter, and some other engine sensor. Taken all together, these repairs cost me close to three thousand dollars. I was past my 100,000 mile mark on the car, too, so no warrantee help for me for most of it.
At length, I needed new tires too. The special low rolling resistance tires you need to get that 50 miles per gallon turn out to be special order items at most tire shops, and I couldn’t wait around for them. I needed new tires now, so I took tires that gave me about six miles per gallon less fuel efficiency – but I did the math first. The special LRR tiles would have cost me so much more than the tires I ended up with that it wouldn’t equal the cost of the gasoline I’d save.
Goodbye, fifty miles per gallon.
Even so, the car still gets about 46 mpg on average, and I drive a lot, so it’s still a pretty substantial benefit.
Then there’s the little things, like loose trim pieces, and a front driver’s side window that’s making groaning noises where it was nearly silent before. Eventually, I’m thinking to myself, all these little subsystems are going to start breaking, and when a car is this full of electrical and electronic systems, it’s better to sell the thing before that starts happening if you can. So far I seem to be okay, but if things start really falling off of it, I’ll have to move on to the next car.
The big question about these cars was what happens to the main battery after the warranty runs out, and so far, the answer is nothing. And if something did, the main battery is made up of a bunch of little cells, not one big monolithic piece. If one goes bad in theory you could replace the bad one. I haven’t been hit with this so far, and the battery is showing no signs of age after ten years of use. Frankly, I’m more concerned that the seat cushions will wear out.
I wrote this thing ages ago for a commercial project for the now-defunct subsidiary of Sony, Sony Development. We were trying to make a giant pinball machine where you tilted the entire machine to play. To test the physical controller hardware as they worked the kinks out of the design, they needed a little 3D engine to hook up to them so they could see what it would do. So in about a week, I wrote one.
It’s a little odd as engines go in that it loads Lightwave 6.x (or greater) scene and model files and renders them, and then lets you fly a camera around and look at them. It lights the scene according to whatever lights you put in the scene, but all lights are translated as point lights. I never got spotlights or area lights working. It does respect global ambience settings in the scene, though, as well as maintain the hierarchical relationship between all the scene elements (i.e., parenting of scene elements is preserved at runtime.
It eventually ended up being listed in the news section on the now defunct Flay.com, one of the world’s more important Lightwave 3D web sites, and OpenGL.Org also had my listing. I even found a web site in Japan that linked to the original page. Too bad I can’t read Japanese! The engine has been downloaded tens of thousands of times since I posted it after SIGGRAPH 2001.
The engine does do texture maps, but only UV textures, and there are a few ways to apply the textures in Lightwave that don’t actually work. The best approach seems to be to convert whatever conventional texture mapping you might have on your models into UV maps using the “Make UVs” tool in the “Map” toolset in modeler. Since the loader doesn’t handle DMAP chunks, models using cylindrical or spherical mapping need to have the vertices split at the seam, or you’ll get mapping errors.
The source code will compile under either Windows, using Microsoft Visual C++ 6.x or greater, or under Linux using GCC. Yup, it’s cross-platform code!
Download the source code, binaries and sample data here. It’s pretty tiny by modern standards – only 3 megs, even though it includes all the model files and textures and whatnot that you get with it. It’s a fairly modest example of a 3D engine. Once I got the object and scene loaders working, the rest of the engine was done in about five days. It does give some good example code for reading objects in native Lightwave LWO2 format, though. By the way, in the ‘credit where credit is due’ department, I started with the example ‘C’ loader code written by Yoshiaki Tazaki at D-Storm.
Once you’ve gotten it to compile (it shouldn’t be difficult if you know how to use the compiler at all), run it by giving a parameter of either a model file or a scene file. If you give it a scene file as a parameter, it’ll assume all the assets are right there in the same directory with you, even if the scene file says otherwise. If you give it a model file as a parameter, it’ll just load the model file and let you spin it around and look at it from different angles. If you can’t compile the project or don’t want to bother, binary executables are included for both Linux and Windows.
A comment: this project was set up to compile from KDevelop in versions prior to 2.x. If your version is more recent than that, you’re going to have a few problems getting to compile as a project using KDevelop. I’ll may revisit this and make a newer version with new project files (thought I can’t promise when.)
Interestingly, the Linux version runs significantly faster than the Windows version does, even though it’s exactly the same code. I think Linux just works better from the standpoint of interfacing the OpenGL API with the hardware. I know I could do a lot more about optimizing the rendering pipeline, though. Right now the only thing I do is sort the polygons by material; this cuts down on having to use the GL material commands for every single darned polygon, and it sped things up a lot. It’s still not a really quick engine as engines go, but it’s quicker than it first was. I never even implemented tri-strips, and that would have sped it up at least double.
I’ve absolutely got to offer a caveat here as well: I wrote this engine as an exercise, and I stopped before I finished it. There are leftovers and leavings of various ideas in it that I never implemented. The object and scene loading classes themselves are fairly clean, however, and I did my best to keep that functionality as encapsulated as possible so they could be reused by somebody else if needed.
Could I write the same code now? No. If you don’t use linear algebra for 3D for a few years, you forget how. Could I learn to write the same code now? Absolutely. I did it before. I can do it again.
Update: It Runs on a Raspberry Pi
My Raspberry Pi 4 running OpenGL code I wrote over 20 years ago and ported to the Pi in August of 2016. The fastest of these windows is running 120 frames per second, and the CPU is barely warm to the touch.
For a lark, I decided to try compiling this on a Raspberry Pi, and to my great surprise, apart from a small tweak to one of the headers, it worked! Thinking on it, the Raspberry Pi is actually much more powerful than the big bruiser of a desktop machine I developed it on in the first place, yet the computer is no bigger than a pack of cards and draws only about 15w of power. The lightbulb in your refrigerator, if you still have one that isn’t LED based, probably draws more.
A very very small OpenGL engine.
Recent Comments