danieldwilliam

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• Commented on Schroedinger's Kingdom: the Scottish Political Singularity Explained
  That's an interesting take on the post Yes party landscape. The risk of the party of government being co-opted by business (or other organisational) interests is certainly a genuine one. (One reason why I prefer STV to AMS.)...
• Commented on Schroedinger's Kingdom: the Scottish Political Singularity Explained
  There was a question upthread about what happens to the SNP in the event of a Yes vote. I think the question is more usefully re-framed as what happens to the Scottish Labour Party. Both the SNP and Scottish Labour...
• Commented on Schroedinger's Kingdom: the Scottish Political Singularity Explained
  Like Charlie I’d prefer Devo Max or Devo Lots but it’s not on the ballot and I don’t really trust the unionist parties who will be in government in Westminster to provide it. So, I’m voting Yes. For, I think,...
• Commented on Schroedinger's Kingdom: the Scottish Political Singularity Explained
  Like Charlie I’d prefer Devo Max or Devo Lots but it’s not on the ballot and I don’t really trust the unionist parties who will be in government in Westminster to provide it. So, I’m voting Yes. For, I think,...
• Commented on The prospects of the Space and Freedom Party reconsidered in light of the crisis of 21st century capitalism
  Why would you go to the trouble of building nuclear aircraft (not to mention the considerable risk) when the cost of synthetic kerosene makes only a marginal difference to the affordability of air travel using existing technology?...
• Commented on The prospects of the Space and Freedom Party reconsidered in light of the crisis of 21st century capitalism
  At a plant size of 5GW you’d really want grids larger than the UK. A pan-European grid would have a 5GW fusion plan at about 1% and it should be able to cope with one of them tripping out....
• Commented on The prospects of the Space and Freedom Party reconsidered in light of the crisis of 21st century capitalism
  I get paid to have exactly that headache....
• Commented on The prospects of the Space and Freedom Party reconsidered in light of the crisis of 21st century capitalism
  I think the UK tax system already works pretty much as you would have it because of personal allowances and the fact that the tax rates are marginal....
• Commented on The prospects of the Space and Freedom Party reconsidered in light of the crisis of 21st century capitalism
  I wonder, very tentatively, if changes in technology around physical robots, 3-D printing, machine intelligence and the storage and transmission of data erode the value of capital by reducing the returns to capital due to increased competition between capital holders....
• Commented on The prospects of the Space and Freedom Party reconsidered in light of the crisis of 21st century capitalism
  As an alternative to getting the hyper-rich to pay at gun point for fusion or colonisation of Venus I’d suggest a cure for cancers. It would be immediately useful in that putting several extra billions a year into research for...
• Commented on A hypothesis
  Responding the couple of posts about landing the plane in Australia. I used to live in Australia and spent about six months living in Darwin when I was a kid. So please take the following with a pinch of salt...
• Commented on The revolution will not be hand-stitched
  I don’t think you are missing anything on the techical side or the associated economics. I wonder about the timescales. I’m wondering if nations with large numbers of garment workers and which are in the process of transitioning from low...
• Commented on Making history personal
  They don't let you in to the buildings of Skara Brae but equally, they don't actually guard them after about half four in the evening and they do expect you to retrieve your own toddlers if they fall in....
• Commented on Making history personal
  The oldest building I have ever slept in is probably the farm house of a family friend which was 17th century. The oldest building I’ve ever been in was probably one of the Neolithic sites in Orkney. Skara Brae, Maes...
• Commented on A deceptively simple question
  There are also a number of thermal plants that have black-start capabilities, for which they are paid a modest fee by NG....
• Commented on A deceptively simple question
  I think the economic impacts are small. Economically making self-driving cars are a subset of being good at making things and making computers work. So it doesn’t change the relative value created in any particular economies much. It’s a bit...
• Commented on A deceptively simple question
  I’ll have a punt at a geopolitical impact. Building on the weaponisation of small self-driving (or self-moving) drones and a comment about mobile landmines I wonder if the same technology used for self-driving cars might give terrorists / freedom fighters...
• Commented on A man walks into a bar
  On reflection that makes perfect sense. I recall hearing on the radio some years ago about farmers who had been crushed against fences by cattle....
• Commented on A man walks into a bar
  Looks like horses might be more dangerous per capita than dogs, by a long way. Population of dogs circa 8.5m. Deaths from dog bites in 2009, 5, 1 death per 1.7m dogs. Horses are a little fuzzier. Estimated population of...
• Commented on Parasites
  I’m going to go for the tobacco plant, Nicotinia Tabacum. I think it has crossed the line from self-defence and become a major parasite on human beings....
• Commented on Deeply annoying realization ...
  I think the transaction costs of tracking back every single piece of IP to the orginator might be significant i.e. significantly more than just saying to folk – have some free stuff....
• Commented on Crib Sheet: Halting State
  Do you think Halting State would be suitable to be turned into a television series?...
• Commented on In the pulp
  Happy to help with that if that is, um,helpful....
• Commented on In the pulp
  Also, someone a few blog posts back recommended Constellation Games by Leonard Richardson. It might well have been Charlie. Whomever it was – thanks – I’m really, really enjoying. I’ve laughed out loud and annoyed my wife by staying up...
• Commented on In the pulp
  How splendid. I’ll be looking forward to reading that on my summer holiday. What do you do with the author copies? I mean I assume you gift them to friends and family and folk who have helped out in some...
• Commented on Crib sheet: Singularity Sky
  Singularity Sky was the first of your books I bought. I really enjoyed. I liked the tongue in cheek yet with serious thought approach to space opera. I tracked down Iron Sky as soon as I could. I enjoyed Iron...
• Commented on Grand Guignol Tropes
  Greg.Tingey @61 re @52 The Grand Guignol was a small Parisian theatre which sounded a touch Gothic to me....
• Commented on Grand Guignol Tropes
  A celebrated science fiction author, well known for discussing the implications of artificial intelligence in his fiction and for using macabre, nay Gothic black humour sets up a blog where there are often discussions about hard take off singularities and...
• Commented on Changing my mind on nuclear disarmament
  In the event of nuclear war my mum, a radiologist, was on some list to go and do something in some bunker somewhere. Which was ironic as she was an activist in the campaign against nuclear weapons. She used to...
• Commented on PSA: Ignore the news
  Greg.Tingey @72. What would I do? I’d like to think that I would try to stay alive whilst I worked myself into a genuinely stable situation personally and then was able to either effect some form of gradual economic reform...