Re: [FRIAM] DOH!

[gepr]

On Jul 6, 2015 7:29 PM, "Marcus Daniels"  wrote:
>
> Usually the best way to develop a motor skill, or a particular kind of
fitness, is to do that thing.

That's not strictly true. While it's true that you can't get good at some
skill without doing it, it's also true that doing only that thing,
overtraining on one activity, will make you worse at it.

> I know how to drive, ...
>
> So in answer to my question, "Why would I want to play a game, instead of
other things I do", the answer is, for me, I would not.

You may have missed the age related aspect of my response. Yes you know how
to drive. So does my 89 year old mother. But she never exercised her skills
outside of driving. Had she done so, her range of competence at driving
would have been larger.

So I answered your question, I think. You would want to play the games that
exercise your faculties so that you get better and retain those faculties.
I'm not claiming any arbitrary video game will do that. (I've heard
Luminosity isn't what they claim. ;-)  But maybe some would help you stay
competent at some things longer than you would otherwise be competent. Or
maybe it's a huge waste of time. Hell, I don't know.

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Re: [FRIAM] Greek Crisis & Philosophy

[Nick Thompson]

Marcus, 

 

Perhaps!  Everything I hear suggests that even tho withdrawals are limited to 
60 bucks a day, the Greek banks will go down this week.  Am I missing 
something?  I assume that a lot of people are going to starve, die of heat 
stroke in buildings that weren’t designed for no air-conditioning, in hospitals 
that don’t have antibiotics, etc. etc.  I assume there will be a blossoming of 
far right and far left parties.  Rioting, and bloodshed?  Why WOULDN’T there 
be?  What do you know that I don’t know? 

 

Think of what might have happened in post WWII Germany without the Marshall 
Plan.  

 

N

 

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

  
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

 

From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Marcus Daniels
Sent: Monday, July 06, 2015 11:16 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Greek Crisis & Philosophy

 

“Anybody who lived through wwII knows that a heap of trouble can follow when a 
whole people is thrown to the dogs, as was the German population after WWI.   
Or for that matter, the American South after the Civil War.   I am hoping for a 
positive response from the EU at this point.”

 

Could Greece better grow its economy with autonomy?   Is it the same thing as 
being thrown to the dogs?

 

Marcus

 


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Re: [FRIAM] Greek Crisis & Philosophy

[Nick Thompson]

Gary, 

 

Yes.  Sorry.  I did know all of that.  I just couldn’t make the metaphor work.  
I suppose a parallel could exist in the fact that most of the states that would 
wish to secede from our union are in fact heavily bankrolled by it.  I am 
probably working too hard at this.  I take metaphors very seriously.  

 

N

 

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

  
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

 

From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Gary Schiltz
Sent: Monday, July 06, 2015 10:44 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Greek Crisis & Philosophy

 

The term “states' rights” refers to the fervent belief, especially among 
conservatives in the USA, that US states are granted by the US Constitution a 
large amount of autonomy from the US federal government. A corrolary to this is 
that the US federal government should have very limited powers, and that the 
majority of power is vested in the individual states. This type of conservatism 
has a large hold over the American South, thus my earlier tongue-in-cheek 
message about Mississippi and Alabama printing their own money with confederate 
flags on them. I have assumed that whoever started this thread was drawing a 
parallel between the (states as part of the USA) and  (Greece as part of the 
European Union). Greece has basically told the EU to go screw itself, as it 
can’t make its loan repayments on time.

 

Come on Nick, I know this stuff and I live in a South American country. Y’all 
need to get out more, maybe go to a square dance or do a little cow tipping. 
JUST KIDDING

 

On Mon, Jul 6, 2015 at 9:06 PM, Nick Thompson mailto:nickthomp...@earthlink.net> > wrote:

To be absolutely honest, I don’t know what The EU now faces "state's rights". 
Means.  Can somebody explain?  

 

N

 

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

  
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

 

From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com 
 ] On Behalf Of Alfredo Covaleda Vélez
Sent: Monday, July 06, 2015 1:04 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Greek Crisis & Philosophy

 

 

 

2015-07-06 11:46 GMT-05:00 Owen Densmore mailto:o...@backspaces.net> >:

I love the No vote. The EU now faces "state's rights".

 

 

Where I have seen this before?

 

Just fill the blank: The  __ now faces "state's rights". 

 

 

 

 

   -- Owen

 

On Sun, Jul 5, 2015 at 7:23 PM, Marcus Daniels mailto:mar...@snoutfarm.com> > wrote:

When it comes to U.S. revenue vs. spending, perhaps some states in the red (as 
opposed to red states!) should worry about getting cut off by Washington?  Now, 
New Mexico has a certain amount of visibility to Washington, but what about 
Mississippi, Alabama and Kentucky?  One might imagine North Dakota could turn 
it around with fracking tax revenue.One can imagine that Greeks probably 
don’t like being treated like Kentucky.   I’m sure Kentucky is nice,  and they 
wouldn’t like to switch to their own currency.  Or maybe they would! 

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_taxation_and_spending_by_state

 

From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com 
 ] On Behalf Of Robert J. Cordingley
Sent: Sunday, July 05, 2015 5:06 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
Subject: [FRIAM] Greek Crisis & Philosophy

 

As part of my continuing search for understanding how the world works and the 
role of philosophy... 

1st question: It's been pointed out in a recent Washington Post article 

  that the fundamental problem in the current Greek crisis was epitomized in 
Monty Python's the Philosopher's Football Match (Wikipedia 
  / Youtube 
 ) between Greece and Germany. Is 
it true?

2nd question, why does it seem that such a sketch works in the UK but never in 
the US?

Robert C

-- 
Cirrillian Web Development
Santa Fe, NM
http://cirrillian.com
281-989-6272   (cell)

 


FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com

 



FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com





 

-- 

Agrónomo, IT, Candidato a MSc en Desarrollo Sostenible y Medio

Re: [FRIAM] Greek Crisis & Philosophy

[Marcus Daniels]

“Anybody who lived through wwII knows that a heap of trouble can follow when a 
whole people is thrown to the dogs, as was the German population after WWI.   
Or for that matter, the American South after the Civil War.   I am hoping for a 
positive response from the EU at this point.”

Could Greece better grow its economy with autonomy?   Is it the same thing as 
being thrown to the dogs?

Marcus


FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com

Re: [FRIAM] Greek Crisis & Philosophy

[Gary Schiltz]

The term “states' rights” refers to the fervent belief, especially among
conservatives in the USA, that US states are granted by the US Constitution
a large amount of autonomy from the US federal government. A corrolary to
this is that the US federal government should have very limited powers, and
that the majority of power is vested in the individual states. This type of
conservatism has a large hold over the American South, thus my earlier
tongue-in-cheek message about Mississippi and Alabama printing their own
money with confederate flags on them. I have assumed that whoever started
this thread was drawing a parallel between the (states as part of the USA)
and  (Greece as part of the European Union). Greece has basically told the
EU to go screw itself, as it can’t make its loan repayments on time.

Come on Nick, I know this stuff and I live in a South American country.
Y’all need to get out more, maybe go to a square dance or do a little cow
tipping. JUST KIDDING

On Mon, Jul 6, 2015 at 9:06 PM, Nick Thompson 
wrote:

> To be absolutely honest, I don’t know what The EU now faces "state's
> rights". Means.  Can somebody explain?
>
>
>
> N
>
>
>
> Nicholas S. Thompson
>
> Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
>
> Clark University
>
> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
>
>
>
> *From:* Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] *On Behalf Of *Alfredo
> Covaleda Vélez
> *Sent:* Monday, July 06, 2015 1:04 PM
> *To:* The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
> *Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] Greek Crisis & Philosophy
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> 2015-07-06 11:46 GMT-05:00 Owen Densmore :
>
> I love the No vote. The EU now faces "state's rights".
>
>
>
>
>
> Where I have seen this before?
>
>
>
> Just fill the blank: The  __ now faces "state's rights".
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>-- Owen
>
>
>
> On Sun, Jul 5, 2015 at 7:23 PM, Marcus Daniels 
> wrote:
>
> When it comes to U.S. revenue vs. spending, perhaps some states in the red
> (as opposed to red states!) should worry about getting cut off by
> Washington?  Now, New Mexico has a certain amount of visibility to
> Washington, but what about Mississippi, Alabama and Kentucky?  One might
> imagine North Dakota could turn it around with fracking tax revenue.One
> can imagine that Greeks probably don’t like being treated like Kentucky.
> I’m sure Kentucky is nice,  and they wouldn’t like to switch to their own
> currency.  Or maybe they would!
>
>
>
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_taxation_and_spending_by_state
>
>
>
> *From:* Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] *On Behalf Of *Robert J.
> Cordingley
> *Sent:* Sunday, July 05, 2015 5:06 PM
> *To:* The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
> *Subject:* [FRIAM] Greek Crisis & Philosophy
>
>
>
> As part of my continuing search for understanding how the world works and
> the role of philosophy...
>
> 1st question: It's been pointed out in a recent Washington Post article
> 
> that the fundamental problem in the current Greek crisis was epitomized in
> Monty Python's the Philosopher's Football Match (Wikipedia
>  /
> Youtube ) between Greece and
> Germany. Is it true?
>
> 2nd question, why does it seem that such a sketch works in the UK but
> never in the US?
>
> Robert C
>
> --
>
> Cirrillian Web Development
>
> Santa Fe, NM
>
> http://cirrillian.com
>
> 281-989-6272 (cell)
>
>
>
> 
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
>
>
>
>
> 
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
>
>
>
>
>
> --
>
> Agrónomo, IT, Candidato a MSc en Desarrollo Sostenible y Medio Ambiente
> +57 3154531383
>
> 
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
>

FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
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Re: [FRIAM] DOH!

[Marcus Daniels]

"Let's say you wanted to, I don't know, _drive_ or maybe juggle ... or simple 
play flag football with your grandchildren.  It seems like multiple object 
tracking exercise might help.  "

Usually the best way to develop a motor skill, or a particular kind of fitness, 
is to do that thing.  

In retrospect, the original question I was asking was a selfish question.  It 
should have been "What's in it for me to be a gamer?"  But generally people 
didn't know my values, and then told me about their values.  Ok.I know how 
to drive, I don't have grandchildren, don't want to play flag football, and I 
have no interest in juggling.  

So in answer to my question, "Why would I want to play a game, instead of other 
things I do", the answer is, for me, I would not.  

Marcus


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Re: [FRIAM] Greek Crisis & Philosophy

[Nick Thompson]

To be absolutely honest, I don’t know what The EU now faces "state's rights". 
Means.  Can somebody explain?  

 

N

 

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

  
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

 

From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Alfredo Covaleda 
Vélez
Sent: Monday, July 06, 2015 1:04 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Greek Crisis & Philosophy

 

 

 

2015-07-06 11:46 GMT-05:00 Owen Densmore mailto:o...@backspaces.net> >:

I love the No vote. The EU now faces "state's rights".

 

 

Where I have seen this before?

 

Just fill the blank: The  __ now faces "state's rights". 

 

 

 

 

   -- Owen

 

On Sun, Jul 5, 2015 at 7:23 PM, Marcus Daniels mailto:mar...@snoutfarm.com> > wrote:

When it comes to U.S. revenue vs. spending, perhaps some states in the red (as 
opposed to red states!) should worry about getting cut off by Washington?  Now, 
New Mexico has a certain amount of visibility to Washington, but what about 
Mississippi, Alabama and Kentucky?  One might imagine North Dakota could turn 
it around with fracking tax revenue.One can imagine that Greeks probably 
don’t like being treated like Kentucky.   I’m sure Kentucky is nice,  and they 
wouldn’t like to switch to their own currency.  Or maybe they would! 

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_taxation_and_spending_by_state

 

From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com 
 ] On Behalf Of Robert J. Cordingley
Sent: Sunday, July 05, 2015 5:06 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
Subject: [FRIAM] Greek Crisis & Philosophy

 

As part of my continuing search for understanding how the world works and the 
role of philosophy... 

1st question: It's been pointed out in a recent Washington Post article 

  that the fundamental problem in the current Greek crisis was epitomized in 
Monty Python's the Philosopher's Football Match (Wikipedia 
  / Youtube 
 ) between Greece and Germany. Is 
it true?

2nd question, why does it seem that such a sketch works in the UK but never in 
the US?

Robert C

-- 
Cirrillian Web Development
Santa Fe, NM
http://cirrillian.com
281-989-6272   (cell)

 


FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com

 



FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com





 

-- 

Agrónomo, IT, Candidato a MSc en Desarrollo Sostenible y Medio Ambiente
+57 3154531383


FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com

Re: [FRIAM] [EXTERNAL] Re: DOH!

[Curt McNamara]

http://m.gapminder.org/videos/200-years-that-changed-the-world/

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-decline-of-violence/

Curt
On Jul 6, 2015 6:02 PM, "Parks, Raymond"  wrote:

>Human behaviour is human behaviour and it has not changed in 50,000+
> years.  Humans act in their own self-interest at many levels - see Maslow's
> Hierarch of Needs.  The purpose of civilization is to allow humans to
> behave the way they will behave with as little destructive collateral
> effects as possible.  Sometimes, the structures of a society and government
> are enough to control the behaviour - sometimes more force is necessary.
> The key is to apply as little force as is necessary and to be perceived as
> applying the force fairly (not necessarily equally).
>
>Unfortunately, society and government are made up of humans and they
> will find ways to use what power is allotted to them by other humans in
> ways that are advantageous to themselves.  History shows that no matter how
> idealistic and utopian the original goal of a society or government it will
> be changed by the humans in charge to give themselves advantage.  The
> purpose of the US constitution is to pit these humans against each other so
> that their pursuit of self-interest will be in conflict with others in
> government.  The intent of the writers was that each group would prevent
> the others from gaining enough power to be destructive - thus the
> separation of powers into three branches of government.
>
>Humans also tend to form groups and place the survival of the group as
> more important than the survival of other groups.  When the group rises to
> the status of a nation-state or boundary-crossing movement (usually
> religious), the groups can get into conflict.  This is a fact of the human
> condition.  The best prepared group will survive these conflicts.  War
> games are one of the methods of preparing.  I understand your plea  and I
> sympathize - but history proves that we can't all just get along.
>
>  Ray Parks
>
>
>  On Jul 6, 2015, at 1:31 PM, Gary Schiltz wrote:
>
>  It’s such a shame that we still “can’t all just get along”, and
> instead keep developing more and more advanced ways of subjugating
> each other, killing and terrorizing. The liberal vs. conservative
> noise in the USA got me thinking a lot about this. When I moved to EC,
> the previous 8 years of BushCo had moved my politics pretty far left,
> to the point that I was quite happy with Correa’s victory. Now, after
> seeing the extent to which the past corruption has been merely
> legitimized (pushed upward), I’m not so sure where I stand. It seems
> to me that a lot of human history is some variation of the theme of
> "you have more than I have, that’s not fair, so I’m going to take some
> (all in some cases) from you.” There’s a lot to be said for that. If
> we didn’t have such strong strucutres in place (governments, social
> norms), we would each have just about what we could defend against our
> neighbors. The problem is that governments, especially in conjunction
> with philosophies and religions, can legitimize quite a range of
> behaviors, and our war games (real and otherwise) just enforce this.
>
> On Mon, Jul 6, 2015 at 12:40 PM, Parks, Raymond 
> wrote:
>
> You are venturing into the world of serious games.  Humans have always
>
> played games to sharpen intellect, gain skills, refine tactics, understand
>
> the ramifications of strategy, and entertain themselves.  I'm currently
>
> helping to author a paper about the security requirements of serious games,
>
> so this subject is fresh in my mind.
>
>
>  As hunter-gatherers, humans allowed their children to play hide and seek,
>
> use child-sized weapons, and hunt small game.  These were practice games
> for
>
> adulthood.
>
>
>  This concept of transforming necessary military skills and learning them
> by
>
> games, either as children or later as adults, has continued throughout
> human
>
> history.  In the 1800s, the Prussians added to the physical games with
>
> tabletop (or sandtable top) intellectual games that abstracted military
>
> units and allowed future officers to play without having to use real
> people,
>
> animals, and supplies.  That game was called Kriegspiel and has continued
> to
>
> evolve to this day.
>
>
>  Chess is sometimes considered the original Kriegspiel.  Most historians
>
> agree it is derived from Chaturanga, invented in the Gupta Empire somewhere
>
> between 280 and 550 CE.  Modern chess was formalized from the derivative of
>
> shatranj (Muslim version from the original) in about 900-1000 CE in
> southern
>
> Europe.  As a game, chess trains the player to think ahead, understand the
>
> consequences of their actions, and generally improves the mind.
>
>
>  In the age of Industrial Warfare new weapons, new logistics, new
>
> transportation, new communication methods, and the sheer size of armies
>
> required games to understand the bitter lessons learned in 

[FRIAM] WERE: DOH!

[Vladimyr Burachynsky]

Glen and others,

We have all  known for a long time that 
this is generally  true about mankind.
We are not supposed to speak about such truths.
So we Keep inventing smart machines to avoid using people who can not be 
trusted.
We may claim to be protecting the Children or symbols or something but we 
rarely admit we are trying to exclude the stupid.

The fact is most people are content with possession of a Smart Slave that they 
assume they can control by virtue of inheritance, money, skin colour ,or 
religion.
Such  people so endowed have no personal need to do anything.
Even if they had the desire they are unable to make any progress on their own.

They control people and if they can't , then they are afraid of the 
uncontrollable and start 
violence having no other option, carry a big stick and beat the brains out of 
the opposition.
 So we try and outwit the Control Freaks. I take it many out there are actually 
able to connect
their own devices without a professional assistant.
Not as hard as it sounds.

So I cheered the Greeks for having the courage to say NO to Brussels.
Let us hope no one tries to cheat and reaches for the stick.

Quite honestly, once they became consumers they decided their fate by 
self-selection and denial.
Our role is to keep up appearances so that they can affect to have control;  
but where is it applied... definitely 
they don't have control over  the Real World. Nothing is so terrible and 
ferocious as the Truth.

A visitor to my digs told me of his strategy to deal with the abundance of 
bears where he lives.
He talks to them in Polish , or English. He remains calm and rides his bicycle 
past 
while searching for the ever elusive Boletus edulis. He has a small cottage in 
North-west Ontario near the American border. The bears control access to the 
local landfill site, they no longer forage as in the old days.
So the bears are now taking the easy road just like civtlized man.

The bear has other quests that don't include mushrooms. He does  not have time 
for a bald man that babbles in several tongues.

The world is large enough for civility between neighbors . Whether they are 
bald or hirsute wearing shorts in mosquito season. 
But not, I fear, for control freaks who demand everything.
Even the bears do not reach that far.
 My Polish friend has realized that knowledge can reduce his fear and left with 
a number of my taxonomy texts on Mushrooms  ,grinning from ear to ear, but I 
cautioned him not advertise the fact that he eats wild mushrooms
to the less enlightened who image him weird and fearful already.
Perhaps he is another Joseph Conrad in waiting. We shall see...
Knowledge calms the fearful heart and strengthens our courage.

vib

-Original Message-
From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of glen
Sent: July-06-15 2:08 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] DOH!

On 07/06/2015 11:10 AM, Marcus Daniels wrote:
> At some point won’t these behaviors too be mastered by machine learning?   
> Obviously, I’m not just taking on gaming here, I’m taking on the idea that 
> people ought to master narrow “skill sets” at all.Ok, so a gamer can 
> track 7 objects instead of 3.   Machines could track hundreds or thousands.  
> Better to design the machine, no?

Arbitrary google response:

   Age-related differences in multiple-object tracking.
   http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15746018

Let's say you wanted to, I don't know, _drive_ or maybe juggle ... or simple 
play flag football with your grandchildren.  It seems like multiple object 
tracking exercise might help.  It's a bit silly to suggest such skills are 
always "narrow".

I had an interesting discussion the other day.  A friend suggested she _needed_ 
a personal trainer in order to exercise, that without the trainer, she would 
neither be motivated nor know what/how to do various exercises.  She used this 
"disability" of hers to argue that she doesn't get much out of yoga (the 1 or 2 
times she tried it, heh).  I can't really sympathize much with her position.  
The point of exercising is to consistently _try_ things ... to poke around and 
see how/if you could do it slightly differently.  Having another person tell 
you what/how to do something is way less rewarding than learning how to do it 
yourself ... even if all we're talking about is twirling a coin between your 
fingers.  (Sure, if you're really really good at something and you want to be 
much better, then you need a trainer to sqeeze out that hidden performance, but 
not at the amateur level.)  For the exact same reason, running on forest trails 
(as opposed to treadmills or in circles on a rubber trac
k) is actually a very "broad" skill.  And it's a very handy one.

Is it better to build a robot that can run on forest trails?  No.  That would 
be very cool.  But having your robot run around the mountain isn't near as 
rewarding as doing it yourself.  Is it better to build a robot to run

Re: [FRIAM] [EXTERNAL] Re: DOH!

[Parks, Raymond]

  Human behaviour is human behaviour and it has not changed in 50,000+ years.  
Humans act in their own self-interest at many levels - see Maslow's Hierarch of 
Needs.  The purpose of civilization is to allow humans to behave the way they 
will behave with as little destructive collateral effects as possible.  
Sometimes, the structures of a society and government are enough to control the 
behaviour - sometimes more force is necessary.  The key is to apply as little 
force as is necessary and to be perceived as applying the force fairly (not 
necessarily equally).

  Unfortunately, society and government are made up of humans and they will 
find ways to use what power is allotted to them by other humans in ways that 
are advantageous to themselves.  History shows that no matter how idealistic 
and utopian the original goal of a society or government it will be changed by 
the humans in charge to give themselves advantage.  The purpose of the US 
constitution is to pit these humans against each other so that their pursuit of 
self-interest will be in conflict with others in government.  The intent of the 
writers was that each group would prevent the others from gaining enough power 
to be destructive - thus the separation of powers into three branches of 
government.

  Humans also tend to form groups and place the survival of the group as more 
important than the survival of other groups.  When the group rises to the 
status of a nation-state or boundary-crossing movement (usually religious), the 
groups can get into conflict.  This is a fact of the human condition.  The best 
prepared group will survive these conflicts.  War games are one of the methods 
of preparing.  I understand your plea  and I sympathize - but history proves 
that we can't all just get along.

Ray Parks


On Jul 6, 2015, at 1:31 PM, Gary Schiltz wrote:

It’s such a shame that we still “can’t all just get along”, and
instead keep developing more and more advanced ways of subjugating
each other, killing and terrorizing. The liberal vs. conservative
noise in the USA got me thinking a lot about this. When I moved to EC,
the previous 8 years of BushCo had moved my politics pretty far left,
to the point that I was quite happy with Correa’s victory. Now, after
seeing the extent to which the past corruption has been merely
legitimized (pushed upward), I’m not so sure where I stand. It seems
to me that a lot of human history is some variation of the theme of
"you have more than I have, that’s not fair, so I’m going to take some
(all in some cases) from you.” There’s a lot to be said for that. If
we didn’t have such strong strucutres in place (governments, social
norms), we would each have just about what we could defend against our
neighbors. The problem is that governments, especially in conjunction
with philosophies and religions, can legitimize quite a range of
behaviors, and our war games (real and otherwise) just enforce this.

On Mon, Jul 6, 2015 at 12:40 PM, Parks, Raymond 
mailto:rcpa...@sandia.gov>> wrote:
You are venturing into the world of serious games.  Humans have always
played games to sharpen intellect, gain skills, refine tactics, understand
the ramifications of strategy, and entertain themselves.  I'm currently
helping to author a paper about the security requirements of serious games,
so this subject is fresh in my mind.

As hunter-gatherers, humans allowed their children to play hide and seek,
use child-sized weapons, and hunt small game.  These were practice games for
adulthood.

This concept of transforming necessary military skills and learning them by
games, either as children or later as adults, has continued throughout human
history.  In the 1800s, the Prussians added to the physical games with
tabletop (or sandtable top) intellectual games that abstracted military
units and allowed future officers to play without having to use real people,
animals, and supplies.  That game was called Kriegspiel and has continued to
evolve to this day.

Chess is sometimes considered the original Kriegspiel.  Most historians
agree it is derived from Chaturanga, invented in the Gupta Empire somewhere
between 280 and 550 CE.  Modern chess was formalized from the derivative of
shatranj (Muslim version from the original) in about 900-1000 CE in southern
Europe.  As a game, chess trains the player to think ahead, understand the
consequences of their actions, and generally improves the mind.

In the age of Industrial Warfare new weapons, new logistics, new
transportation, new communication methods, and the sheer size of armies
required games to understand the bitter lessons learned in wars.  These
games were physical games to learn how all of these factors interact in the
physical world before they could be abstracted to the tabletop as
Kriegspiel.  As late as the buildup to the US entry into WWII, the Army held
huge maneuver exercises in the South to practice and understand how war was
already being fought in Europe.

Those large, physic

Re: [FRIAM] [EXTERNAL] Re: Greek Crisis & Philosophy

[Parks, Raymond]

Nick,

  Owen's post actually made me think of the beginnings of the War Between the 
States rather than the aftermath - someone would have to win for there to be an 
aftermath.

  The EU is more like the original thirteen colonies' Articles of 
Confederation, so I would expect that states' rights would not be a break-apart 
or civil war issue.  If it does become an issue, there may be political 
pressure to force retention of the rebellious states (and I expect that other 
states on the path of Greece will join them).  The big difference would be that 
an EU Civil War would not be an industrial war like the American Civil War - it 
would be a war among the peoples, primarily in cyberspace, and would be 
leveraged by Russia to increase their influence in the former Warsaw Pact as 
well as Greece.  Normally, I would expect Turkey to take advantage of the 
weakness of their traditional enemy, but Turkey itself is having a low-key 
civil war between the Islamists and the Ataturk-style secularists.

Ray Parks
Consilient Heuristician/IDART Old-Timer
V: 505-844-4024  M: 505-238-9359  P: 505-951-6084
NIPR: rcpa...@sandia.gov
SIPR: rcpar...@sandia.doe.sgov.gov (send 
NIPR reminder)
JWICS: dopa...@doe.ic.gov (send NIPR reminder)



On Jul 6, 2015, at 3:19 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:

O

Anybody who lived through wwII knows that a heap of trouble can follow when a 
whole people is thrown to the dogs, as was the German population after WWI.   
Or for that matter, the American South after the Civil War.   I am hoping for a 
positive response from the EU at this point.

N

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
Clark University
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Owen Densmore
Sent: Monday, July 06, 2015 12:46 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Greek Crisis & Philosophy

I love the No vote. The EU now faces "state's rights".

   -- Owen

On Sun, Jul 5, 2015 at 7:23 PM, Marcus Daniels 
mailto:mar...@snoutfarm.com>> wrote:
When it comes to U.S. revenue vs. spending, perhaps some states in the red (as 
opposed to red states!) should worry about getting cut off by Washington?  Now, 
New Mexico has a certain amount of visibility to Washington, but what about 
Mississippi, Alabama and Kentucky?  One might imagine North Dakota could turn 
it around with fracking tax revenue.One can imagine that Greeks probably 
don’t like being treated like Kentucky.   I’m sure Kentucky is nice,  and they 
wouldn’t like to switch to their own currency.  Or maybe they would!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_taxation_and_spending_by_state

From: Friam 
[mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf 
Of Robert J. Cordingley
Sent: Sunday, July 05, 2015 5:06 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
Subject: [FRIAM] Greek Crisis & Philosophy

As part of my continuing search for understanding how the world works and the 
role of philosophy...

1st question: It's been pointed out in a recent Washington Post 
article
 that the fundamental problem in the current Greek crisis was epitomized in 
Monty Python's the Philosopher's Football Match 
(Wikipedia / 
Youtube) between Greece and 
Germany. Is it true?

2nd question, why does it seem that such a sketch works in the UK but never in 
the US?

Robert C

--

Cirrillian Web Development

Santa Fe, NM

http://cirrillian.com

281-989-6272 (cell)


FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com


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Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
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Re: [FRIAM] Greek Crisis & Philosophy

[Nick Thompson]

O

 

Anybody who lived through wwII knows that a heap of trouble can follow when a 
whole people is thrown to the dogs, as was the German population after WWI.   
Or for that matter, the American South after the Civil War.   I am hoping for a 
positive response from the EU at this point.

 

N

 

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

  
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

 

From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Owen Densmore
Sent: Monday, July 06, 2015 12:46 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Greek Crisis & Philosophy

 

I love the No vote. The EU now faces "state's rights".

 

   -- Owen

 

On Sun, Jul 5, 2015 at 7:23 PM, Marcus Daniels mailto:mar...@snoutfarm.com> > wrote:

When it comes to U.S. revenue vs. spending, perhaps some states in the red (as 
opposed to red states!) should worry about getting cut off by Washington?  Now, 
New Mexico has a certain amount of visibility to Washington, but what about 
Mississippi, Alabama and Kentucky?  One might imagine North Dakota could turn 
it around with fracking tax revenue.One can imagine that Greeks probably 
don’t like being treated like Kentucky.   I’m sure Kentucky is nice,  and they 
wouldn’t like to switch to their own currency.  Or maybe they would! 

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_taxation_and_spending_by_state

 

From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com 
 ] On Behalf Of Robert J. Cordingley
Sent: Sunday, July 05, 2015 5:06 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
Subject: [FRIAM] Greek Crisis & Philosophy

 

As part of my continuing search for understanding how the world works and the 
role of philosophy... 

1st question: It's been pointed out in a recent Washington Post article 

  that the fundamental problem in the current Greek crisis was epitomized in 
Monty Python's the Philosopher's Football Match (Wikipedia 
  / Youtube 
 ) between Greece and Germany. Is 
it true?

2nd question, why does it seem that such a sketch works in the UK but never in 
the US?

Robert C

-- 
Cirrillian Web Development
Santa Fe, NM
http://cirrillian.com
281-989-6272   (cell)



FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com

 


FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
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Re: [FRIAM] [EXTERNAL] Re: DOH!

[Gary Schiltz]

It’s such a shame that we still “can’t all just get along”, and
instead keep developing more and more advanced ways of subjugating
each other, killing and terrorizing. The liberal vs. conservative
noise in the USA got me thinking a lot about this. When I moved to EC,
the previous 8 years of BushCo had moved my politics pretty far left,
to the point that I was quite happy with Correa’s victory. Now, after
seeing the extent to which the past corruption has been merely
legitimized (pushed upward), I’m not so sure where I stand. It seems
to me that a lot of human history is some variation of the theme of
"you have more than I have, that’s not fair, so I’m going to take some
(all in some cases) from you.” There’s a lot to be said for that. If
we didn’t have such strong strucutres in place (governments, social
norms), we would each have just about what we could defend against our
neighbors. The problem is that governments, especially in conjunction
with philosophies and religions, can legitimize quite a range of
behaviors, and our war games (real and otherwise) just enforce this.

On Mon, Jul 6, 2015 at 12:40 PM, Parks, Raymond  wrote:
> You are venturing into the world of serious games.  Humans have always
> played games to sharpen intellect, gain skills, refine tactics, understand
> the ramifications of strategy, and entertain themselves.  I'm currently
> helping to author a paper about the security requirements of serious games,
> so this subject is fresh in my mind.
>
> As hunter-gatherers, humans allowed their children to play hide and seek,
> use child-sized weapons, and hunt small game.  These were practice games for
> adulthood.
>
> This concept of transforming necessary military skills and learning them by
> games, either as children or later as adults, has continued throughout human
> history.  In the 1800s, the Prussians added to the physical games with
> tabletop (or sandtable top) intellectual games that abstracted military
> units and allowed future officers to play without having to use real people,
> animals, and supplies.  That game was called Kriegspiel and has continued to
> evolve to this day.
>
> Chess is sometimes considered the original Kriegspiel.  Most historians
> agree it is derived from Chaturanga, invented in the Gupta Empire somewhere
> between 280 and 550 CE.  Modern chess was formalized from the derivative of
> shatranj (Muslim version from the original) in about 900-1000 CE in southern
> Europe.  As a game, chess trains the player to think ahead, understand the
> consequences of their actions, and generally improves the mind.
>
> In the age of Industrial Warfare new weapons, new logistics, new
> transportation, new communication methods, and the sheer size of armies
> required games to understand the bitter lessons learned in wars.  These
> games were physical games to learn how all of these factors interact in the
> physical world before they could be abstracted to the tabletop as
> Kriegspiel.  As late as the buildup to the US entry into WWII, the Army held
> huge maneuver exercises in the South to practice and understand how war was
> already being fought in Europe.
>
> Those large, physical games still take place, but as computers have become
> more and more important parts of the military, the games have added
> computers.  These computers have themselves effectively created a fifth
> domain for military conflict (after Land, Sea, Air, and Space) which most
> authorities call Cyberspace.  The interesting aspect of this is that,
> increasingly, the other domains are being abstracted into Cyberspace.  A
> pilot might either fly a physical airplane as part of an exercise or they
> may fly a simulator.  Either way, their actions are translated to a
> scorekeeping mechanism that is automated.
>
> There is an interesting trend within the videogame community where players
> create modifications of the game they love playing.  I get Amazon Local
> emails because of my Prime membership, and one offer I have seen a lot,
> recently, is a course to teach a child how to create mods for Minecraft.
> Modding Minecraft involves learning Java, understanding the data storage
> scheme of the game, and understanding the "physics engine" of Minecraft.
> This all translates to skills useful in programming and software systems
> engineering.  Mods for other games are similiar in nature.
>
> The bottom line here is that games have been one of mankind's way of
> learning and researching for a very long time.  Some games are more valuable
> for learning specific things while others are more entertaining.  Just as
> not everybody needs and wants to do "productive" work, not everybody needs
> and wants to play strictly serious games like agent-based simulation (yes, I
> am saying that many of the folks on this list are playing games in their
> work and research).  There is a spectrum of entertainment that describes
> games - some games are strictly business and some games are a little
> business with l

Re: [FRIAM] DOH!

[glen]

On 07/06/2015 11:10 AM, Marcus Daniels wrote:

At some point won’t these behaviors too be mastered by machine learning?   
Obviously, I’m not just taking on gaming here, I’m taking on the idea that 
people ought to master narrow “skill sets” at all.Ok, so a gamer can track 
7 objects instead of 3.   Machines could track hundreds or thousands.  Better 
to design the machine, no?


Arbitrary google response:

  Age-related differences in multiple-object tracking.
  http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15746018

Let's say you wanted to, I don't know, _drive_ or maybe juggle ... or simple play flag 
football with your grandchildren.  It seems like multiple object tracking exercise might 
help.  It's a bit silly to suggest such skills are always "narrow".

I had an interesting discussion the other day.  A friend suggested she _needed_ a 
personal trainer in order to exercise, that without the trainer, she would neither be 
motivated nor know what/how to do various exercises.  She used this 
"disability" of hers to argue that she doesn't get much out of yoga (the 1 or 2 
times she tried it, heh).  I can't really sympathize much with her position.  The point 
of exercising is to consistently _try_ things ... to poke around and see how/if you could 
do it slightly differently.  Having another person tell you what/how to do something is 
way less rewarding than learning how to do it yourself ... even if all we're talking 
about is twirling a coin between your fingers.  (Sure, if you're really really good at 
something and you want to be much better, then you need a trainer to sqeeze out that 
hidden performance, but not at the amateur level.)  For the exact same reason, running on 
forest trails (as opposed to treadmills or in circles on a rubber trac
k) is actually a very "broad" skill.  And it's a very handy one.

Is it better to build a robot that can run on forest trails?  No.  That would 
be very cool.  But having your robot run around the mountain isn't near as 
rewarding as doing it yourself.  Is it better to build a robot to run in 
circles on a rubber track?  Yes, absolutely.  I see zero benefit from having 
humans do that, much less rewarding the fastest ones with medals. 8^)

--
⇔ glen


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[FRIAM] Local Carpenter/Contractor?

[Owen Densmore]

My casita's porch is needing help .. some wood rot. Not sure if structural
or cosmetic work is needed.

I also have a second job: sealing all the external wood work.

Any recommendations for a carpenter/contractor for this sort of work?

Thanks!

   -- Owen

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Re: [FRIAM] Greek Crisis & Philosophy

[Gary Schiltz]

Ain’t got no idear, Alfred'a. Could’a been over in that there country
called ‘Merika. Maybe next they will print their own money in
Mississippi and Alabama. They could even print a confederate flag on
it.

On Mon, Jul 6, 2015 at 12:04 PM, Alfredo Covaleda Vélez
 wrote:
>
>
> 2015-07-06 11:46 GMT-05:00 Owen Densmore :
>>
>> I love the No vote. The EU now faces "state's rights".
>
>
>
> Where I have seen this before?
>
> Just fill the blank: The  __ now faces "state's rights".
>
>
>
>>
>>
>>-- Owen
>>
>> On Sun, Jul 5, 2015 at 7:23 PM, Marcus Daniels 
>> wrote:
>>>
>>> When it comes to U.S. revenue vs. spending, perhaps some states in the
>>> red (as opposed to red states!) should worry about getting cut off by
>>> Washington?  Now, New Mexico has a certain amount of visibility to
>>> Washington, but what about Mississippi, Alabama and Kentucky?  One might
>>> imagine North Dakota could turn it around with fracking tax revenue.One
>>> can imagine that Greeks probably don’t like being treated like Kentucky.
>>> I’m sure Kentucky is nice,  and they wouldn’t like to switch to their own
>>> currency.  Or maybe they would!
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_taxation_and_spending_by_state
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Robert J.
>>> Cordingley
>>> Sent: Sunday, July 05, 2015 5:06 PM
>>> To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
>>> Subject: [FRIAM] Greek Crisis & Philosophy
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> As part of my continuing search for understanding how the world works and
>>> the role of philosophy...
>>>
>>> 1st question: It's been pointed out in a recent Washington Post article
>>> that the fundamental problem in the current Greek crisis was epitomized in
>>> Monty Python's the Philosopher's Football Match (Wikipedia / Youtube)
>>> between Greece and Germany. Is it true?
>>>
>>> 2nd question, why does it seem that such a sketch works in the UK but
>>> never in the US?
>>>
>>> Robert C
>>>
>>> --
>>>
>>> Cirrillian Web Development
>>>
>>> Santa Fe, NM
>>>
>>> http://cirrillian.com
>>>
>>> 281-989-6272 (cell)
>>>
>>>
>>> 
>>> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
>>> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
>>> to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
>>
>>
>>
>> 
>> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
>> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
>> to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
>
>
>
>
> --
> Agrónomo, IT, Candidato a MSc en Desarrollo Sostenible y Medio Ambiente
> +57 3154531383
>
> 
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com


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Re: [FRIAM] [EXTERNAL] Re: DOH!

[Marcus Daniels]

"A pilot might either fly a physical airplane as part of an exercise or they 
may fly a simulator.  Either way, their actions are translated to a 
scorekeeping mechanism that is automated."

At some point won't these behaviors too be mastered by machine learning?   
Obviously, I'm not just taking on gaming here, I'm taking on the idea that 
people ought to master narrow "skill sets" at all.Ok, so a gamer can track 
7 objects instead of 3.   Machines could track hundreds or thousands.  Better 
to design the machine, no?

Marcus

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Re: [FRIAM] DOH!

[glen]

On 07/06/2015 10:52 AM, Curt McNamara wrote:

http://blog.ted.com/7-talks-on-the-benefits-of-gaming/



In the lab, Bavelier and her team measure the impact of gameplay on the brain. 
While your mom might have told you that staring at screens will wreck your 
eyes, Bavelier’s lab actually found that playing 5 to 15 hours a week of video 
games correlates with better vision — and the ability to see more detail in the 
context of clutter.


Interesting coincidence.  Periods when I do play (almost exclusively console), 
it's usually about 8-10 hours/week, perhaps split over 2-3 days.  That's about 
all it takes before I'm sated.  Turn based strategy games keep me involved for 
longer per playing episode.  Action games tire me out (bore me) quicker.  
Social games (like WoW) mostly just irritate me because ... well, people are 
still people, even if they're dressed up as Orcs.

I do sympathize with Marcus' lament about exploring FSMs.  Social games are 
non-finite.  And the good ones are nonlinear, as well.  If I could only play 
exclusively with bots, instead of those irritating people. 8^)

--
⇔ glen


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Re: [FRIAM] [EXTERNAL] DOH!

[Curt McNamara]

http://blog.ted.com/7-talks-on-the-benefits-of-gaming/

   Curt

On Mon, Jul 6, 2015 at 12:47 PM, Parks, Raymond  wrote:

>  It is fascinating seeing business evolution in action.
>
>  A lot of the AAA game companies seem to be struggling with maintaining
> their size and advantages compared to smaller and/or more recent players.
> The big organizations have evolved from their nimble and inventive past to
> become lumbering and risk-averse.  They grew to take advantage of economies
> of scale only to find that they needed to avoid changing their formula for
> success or risk losing the scale of their economy.  There are parallels in
> other business domains, which now that I think about it, are all in the
> entertainment business - publishing, television, and movie-making.
>
>  Ray Parks
> Consilient Heuristician/IDART Old-Timer
> V: 505-844-4024  M: 505-238-9359  P: 505-951-6084
> NIPR: rcpa...@sandia.gov
> SIPR: rcpar...@sandia.doe.sgov.gov (send NIPR reminder)
> JWICS: dopa...@doe.ic.gov (send NIPR reminder)
>
>
>
>  On Jul 3, 2015, at 7:54 PM, Gillian Densmore wrote:
>
>  Well the game world drama continues- hmm only time will tell what this
> meens:
>
> http://biz.yahoo.com/e/150702/atvi8-k.html
>
>  In case others don't know:  this has been a terrible year for Activision
> and Blizzard
>  (Aka WOW, Heroes of the Storm, Destininy and of course Call of Duty.)
>
>  Blizzard in 6 months has seen it's top Project Managers leave to Atari,
> and Bioware and 3 weeks ago Blizzards COO quit to go to a unknown
> competitor speculated to be Red Dawn (God of Wars)
>
>  Activision's COO is rumoured to be quitting for  Gearbox. (Borderlands
> series)
>
>  As I don't know how many on Wedtech are gamers or Org Psych Wonks.
>  I've been keeping tabs on this as I'm a gamer (so what) and into
> webdesign-
>  Plus i'm  curious what other peoples opinions are.
>
>  Might be worth waching as a live case of complexity (kind of), how does
> this play out can the various people involved get  the company back on
> track and if so how.
>
>  
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
>
>
>
> 
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
>

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Re: [FRIAM] [EXTERNAL] DOH!

[Parks, Raymond]

It is fascinating seeing business evolution in action.

A lot of the AAA game companies seem to be struggling with maintaining their 
size and advantages compared to smaller and/or more recent players.  The big 
organizations have evolved from their nimble and inventive past to become 
lumbering and risk-averse.  They grew to take advantage of economies of scale 
only to find that they needed to avoid changing their formula for success or 
risk losing the scale of their economy.  There are parallels in other business 
domains, which now that I think about it, are all in the entertainment business 
- publishing, television, and movie-making.

Ray Parks
Consilient Heuristician/IDART Old-Timer
V: 505-844-4024  M: 505-238-9359  P: 505-951-6084
NIPR: rcpa...@sandia.gov
SIPR: rcpar...@sandia.doe.sgov.gov (send 
NIPR reminder)
JWICS: dopa...@doe.ic.gov (send NIPR reminder)



On Jul 3, 2015, at 7:54 PM, Gillian Densmore wrote:

Well the game world drama continues- hmm only time will tell what this meens:

http://biz.yahoo.com/e/150702/atvi8-k.html

In case others don't know:  this has been a terrible year for Activision and 
Blizzard
(Aka WOW, Heroes of the Storm, Destininy and of course Call of Duty.)

Blizzard in 6 months has seen it's top Project Managers leave to Atari,  and 
Bioware and 3 weeks ago Blizzards COO quit to go to a unknown competitor 
speculated to be Red Dawn (God of Wars)

Activision's COO is rumoured to be quitting for  Gearbox. (Borderlands series)

As I don't know how many on Wedtech are gamers or Org Psych Wonks.
 I've been keeping tabs on this as I'm a gamer (so what) and into webdesign-
Plus i'm  curious what other peoples opinions are.

Might be worth waching as a live case of complexity (kind of), how does this 
play out can the various people involved get  the company back on track and if 
so how.


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Re: [FRIAM] [EXTERNAL] Re: DOH!

[Parks, Raymond]

You are venturing into the world of serious games.  Humans have always played 
games to sharpen intellect, gain skills, refine tactics, understand the 
ramifications of strategy, and entertain themselves.  I'm currently helping to 
author a paper about the security requirements of serious games, so this 
subject is fresh in my mind.

As hunter-gatherers, humans allowed their children to play hide and seek, use 
child-sized weapons, and hunt small game.  These were practice games for 
adulthood.

This concept of transforming necessary military skills and learning them by 
games, either as children or later as adults, has continued throughout human 
history.  In the 1800s, the Prussians added to the physical games with tabletop 
(or sandtable top) intellectual games that abstracted military units and 
allowed future officers to play without having to use real people, animals, and 
supplies.  That game was called Kriegspiel and has continued to evolve to this 
day.

Chess is sometimes considered the original Kriegspiel.  Most historians agree 
it is derived from Chaturanga, invented in the Gupta Empire somewhere between 
280 and 550 CE.  Modern chess was formalized from the derivative of shatranj 
(Muslim version from the original) in about 900-1000 CE in southern Europe.  As 
a game, chess trains the player to think ahead, understand the consequences of 
their actions, and generally improves the mind.

In the age of Industrial Warfare new weapons, new logistics, new 
transportation, new communication methods, and the sheer size of armies 
required games to understand the bitter lessons learned in wars.  These games 
were physical games to learn how all of these factors interact in the physical 
world before they could be abstracted to the tabletop as Kriegspiel.  As late 
as the buildup to the US entry into WWII, the Army held huge maneuver exercises 
in the South to practice and understand how war was already being fought in 
Europe.

Those large, physical games still take place, but as computers have become more 
and more important parts of the military, the games have added computers.  
These computers have themselves effectively created a fifth domain for military 
conflict (after Land, Sea, Air, and Space) which most authorities call 
Cyberspace.  The interesting aspect of this is that, increasingly, the other 
domains are being abstracted into Cyberspace.  A pilot might either fly a 
physical airplane as part of an exercise or they may fly a simulator.  Either 
way, their actions are translated to a scorekeeping mechanism that is automated.

There is an interesting trend within the videogame community where players 
create modifications of the game they love playing.  I get Amazon Local emails 
because of my Prime membership, and one offer I have seen a lot, recently, is a 
course to teach a child how to create mods for Minecraft.  Modding Minecraft 
involves learning Java, understanding the data storage scheme of the game, and 
understanding the "physics engine" of Minecraft.  This all translates to skills 
useful in programming and software systems engineering.  Mods for other games 
are similiar in nature.

The bottom line here is that games have been one of mankind's way of learning 
and researching for a very long time.  Some games are more valuable for 
learning specific things while others are more entertaining.  Just as not 
everybody needs and wants to do "productive" work, not everybody needs and 
wants to play strictly serious games like agent-based simulation (yes, I am 
saying that many of the folks on this list are playing games in their work and 
research).  There is a spectrum of entertainment that describes games - some 
games are strictly business and some games are a little business with lots of 
entertainment.  Entertainment can be necessary to entice players to the game to 
learn.  Sometimes, the entertainment becomes the primary goal of the players 
and any learning is purely happenstance.

Personally, I like games because they help me hone my bad guy skills.  In a 
very few cases, I learn new real-world attacks from the game content, usually 
from seeing other people try things that I assumed would not work.  More often, 
I figure out how to use the game functions to win more easily - something that 
equates directly to using a system with computers to attack itself.  
Occasionally, I learn how to break the computer program behind the game in a 
way that works for non-game computer programs.

Ray Parks
Consilient Heuristician/IDART Old-Timer
V: 505-844-4024  M: 505-238-9359  P: 505-951-6084
NIPR: rcpa...@sandia.gov
SIPR: rcpar...@sandia.doe.sgov.gov (send 
NIPR reminder)
JWICS: dopa...@doe.ic.gov (send NIPR reminder)



On Jul 5, 2015, at 9:44 PM, cody dooderson wrote:

This is a very interesting subject. I often wonder if Im doing anything useful 
for society and/or the universe. I think t

Re: [FRIAM] Greek Crisis & Philosophy

[Alfredo Covaleda Vélez]

2015-07-06 11:46 GMT-05:00 Owen Densmore :

> I love the No vote. The EU now faces "state's rights".
>


Where I have seen this before?

Just fill the blank: The  __ now faces "state's rights".




>
>-- Owen
>
> On Sun, Jul 5, 2015 at 7:23 PM, Marcus Daniels 
> wrote:
>
>>  When it comes to U.S. revenue vs. spending, perhaps some states in the
>> red (as opposed to red states!) should worry about getting cut off by
>> Washington?  Now, New Mexico has a certain amount of visibility to
>> Washington, but what about Mississippi, Alabama and Kentucky?  One might
>> imagine North Dakota could turn it around with fracking tax revenue.One
>> can imagine that Greeks probably don’t like being treated like Kentucky.
>> I’m sure Kentucky is nice,  and they wouldn’t like to switch to their own
>> currency.  Or maybe they would!
>>
>>
>>
>> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_taxation_and_spending_by_state
>>
>>
>>
>> *From:* Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] *On Behalf Of *Robert
>> J. Cordingley
>> *Sent:* Sunday, July 05, 2015 5:06 PM
>> *To:* The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
>> *Subject:* [FRIAM] Greek Crisis & Philosophy
>>
>>
>>
>> As part of my continuing search for understanding how the world works and
>> the role of philosophy...
>>
>> 1st question: It's been pointed out in a recent Washington Post article
>> 
>> that the fundamental problem in the current Greek crisis was epitomized in
>> Monty Python's the Philosopher's Football Match (Wikipedia
>>  /
>> Youtube ) between Greece
>> and Germany. Is it true?
>>
>> 2nd question, why does it seem that such a sketch works in the UK but
>> never in the US?
>>
>> Robert C
>>
>>  --
>>
>> Cirrillian Web Development
>>
>> Santa Fe, NM
>>
>> http://cirrillian.com
>>
>> 281-989-6272 (cell)
>>
>>
>> 
>> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
>> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
>> to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
>>
>
>
> 
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
>



-- 
Agrónomo, IT, Candidato a MSc en Desarrollo Sostenible y Medio Ambiente
+57 3154531383

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Re: [FRIAM] Greek Crisis & Philosophy

[Owen Densmore]

I love the No vote. The EU now faces "state's rights".

   -- Owen

On Sun, Jul 5, 2015 at 7:23 PM, Marcus Daniels  wrote:

>  When it comes to U.S. revenue vs. spending, perhaps some states in the
> red (as opposed to red states!) should worry about getting cut off by
> Washington?  Now, New Mexico has a certain amount of visibility to
> Washington, but what about Mississippi, Alabama and Kentucky?  One might
> imagine North Dakota could turn it around with fracking tax revenue.One
> can imagine that Greeks probably don’t like being treated like Kentucky.
> I’m sure Kentucky is nice,  and they wouldn’t like to switch to their own
> currency.  Or maybe they would!
>
>
>
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_taxation_and_spending_by_state
>
>
>
> *From:* Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] *On Behalf Of *Robert J.
> Cordingley
> *Sent:* Sunday, July 05, 2015 5:06 PM
> *To:* The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
> *Subject:* [FRIAM] Greek Crisis & Philosophy
>
>
>
> As part of my continuing search for understanding how the world works and
> the role of philosophy...
>
> 1st question: It's been pointed out in a recent Washington Post article
> 
> that the fundamental problem in the current Greek crisis was epitomized in
> Monty Python's the Philosopher's Football Match (Wikipedia
>  /
> Youtube ) between Greece and
> Germany. Is it true?
>
> 2nd question, why does it seem that such a sketch works in the UK but
> never in the US?
>
> Robert C
>
>  --
>
> Cirrillian Web Development
>
> Santa Fe, NM
>
> http://cirrillian.com
>
> 281-989-6272 (cell)
>
>
> 
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
>

FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
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Re: [FRIAM] DOH!

[Roger Critchlow]

I caught the cat sitting on the bathroom counter watching the faucet drip
the other day.

-- rec --

On Sun, Jul 5, 2015 at 10:40 PM, Marcus Daniels 
wrote:

> Nick writes:
>
> "It seems to me that in the discussion we are having, the word
> "entertainment" cannot go undefined.  How do you tell the difference
> between entertainment and productive work you enjoy.  That it makes a
> profit?"
>
> Suppose individuals are represented by nodes on a graph, each positioned
> in some high dimensional space (subjectively defined, but such that they
> can all be projected onto a higher dimensional space by some oracle).   A
> definition of useful is the ability to move from one place in the space to
> another or to strengthen or weaken connections to others.   A connection on
> the graph could by any sort of transformation that occurs to one node given
> a change in the other.   One way to move is to be attached to another set
> of individuals that are already moving.   Such a set might be, say, a
> business.To be attached to that set might involve participating in a
> class of moves relative to other nodes not in the set, say, the customers
> of that business.These coordinated actions would be profit motivated
> actions, or more generally social transactions.   Similarly, there can be
> the opposite relationship of customer seeking a service (here
> entertainment).Some types of transformations ai
>  m to create other coordinated moves, such as a fabric of connections
> amongst nodes representing theological constraints, criminality,
> governance, and so on.
>
> I'm talking about another kind of useful which is movement in a subjective
> space that is not constrained, or is only minimally constrained, by the
> edges in the graph.   Movement in this space mostly does not change the
> configuration of the graph, but the nodes nonetheless move.   Useful is not
> defined in terms of a particular graph transformation, but in understanding
> how to navigate the new dimensions without the pulling and pushing from
> other nodes.   Given the possibility of collisions in the higher
> dimensional space, there's the possibility of a new social network forming
> there.
>
> Productive work can be defined socially, in terms of the graph
> transformations (one case being profit) or it can be defined privately or
> semi-privately by the subset of nodes that define their state in terms of
> dimensions not yet influenced by the various social fabrics.
>
> Marcus
>
> 
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
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>

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