Posts by Doctor Syntax 40432 publicly visible posts • joined 16 Jun 2014
"Except that the OpenAI board thought they'd sling Altman under the bus, and be left holding all the cards, and laughing all the way to the bank...I can't see the board of OA having a future with that company"
If they really didn't give thought to the possible downside would they have a future at board level at any other company?
Even so, it's abysmal coding around an "Are you sure" prompt.
I remember a similar condition applied to an X-ray detector in an electron microscope - the detector liquid notrogne supply shouldn't be allowed to boil dry. The thought occurred that if exposure to room temperature would destroy it did that mean it had ben manufactured under cryogenic conditions?
Definitely not. He was a well-regarded defence lawyer with a self-deprecating sense of humour. I certainly regarded him well after he eventually objected to the prosecution leader cross-examining* his own witness, namely me.
* No way was I going to put any great weight on hair comparison as he wanted me to do. I could never understand why the FBI lab seemed to make a big thing about hair comparisons; years after I read an article proving that their evidence was unreliable.
Slight problem with that being that after nearly 40 years I can't remember the names - in fact I'm not sure I even knew all of them by name.
The names that stick in the mind were the really bright ones such as the one who managed to shuffle the order of his witnesses so as to ensure a key witness was called the next day. He knew the defence leader had to appear in another case and reckoned the junior was one of those who wouldn't be up to asking questions. Possibly the junior in question was the previous owner of the house of one of my colleagues who kept getting debt-chasing letters addressed to him.
"you had to take a 1 hour training session from the office manager"
Somehow that reminded me of the time when you had to pass the chief technician's test to drive the departmental mini. He was a bit deaf and had obviously been used to driving cars with bigger, slower revving engines. He didn't know the engine was really labouring when he drive it and he complained about people changing up too late.
"Not a Microsoft Windows Issue"
I think it is. Prior to Microsoft putting Close there it used to be the button on the left hand end of the title bar along with the system menu so it wasn't going to be clicked in error that way. As a consequence a lot - maybe all - software released prior to that didn't have a safety dialog because they didn't need it.
I've come to the conclusion that anyone who wants to change a user interface feature just because they can should first have some interface in their daily life changed, say their car steering set to work the other way round or the brake and accelerator pedals swapped.
Good idea. I can always use my old address in Lisburn - Oh, I forgot. I don't need to. My only bit of kit which dual boots int0 Windows* won't go beyond 10 anyway.
* I keep it mostly to remind myself of what I'm missing and reassure myself I made the right decision years ago. Tomorrow I'll maybe run this month's patches and marvel at how long it takes and how many times it reboots.
But if we didn't have a minister for AI some other minister might rush to regulate it and then where would we be? Instead we have a department that can evaluate the options and in fulness of time take the appropriate decision. Probably not to do anything because then you can't be blamed for the results of what you did do.
As far as I can make out his qualifications are that his family owned the Daily Telegraph for 60 years, his father was science correspondent there and wrote a book about AI several decades ago, he himself has been interested in AI & sci-fi since about age 5, he has an MBA from Carnegie-Mellon and was a management consultant. In terms of ministers responsible for science and technology over the years that seems to make him a high-flier.
On the other hand, for defined benefits schemes HMRC instructed employers to take a contribution holiday because schemes were seriously over-funded.
Then Brownomics introduced rampant inflation to increase the liabilities and low interest rates to decrease funds' ability to pay (interest declared here) and defined benefits schemes were closed to new members because they were now grossly underfunded. Whoever made the original decision would, of course, remain oblivious to this as HMRC pensions, like those of all Civil Servants (interest also declared here) was, at least back then, essentially a Ponzi scheme underpinned by the taxpayer.
"If anyone can explain and give an example of the actual difference in handling between 'OFFICIAL' and 'OFFICIAL-SENSITIVE' please let me know."
Sir Humphrey might have expressed it as "OFFICIAL means everybody knows. OFFICIAL-SENSITIVE means only the Russians know."
It would need updating for the post-Cold War era - s/Russians/Chinese/
The Register 
Biting the hand that feeds IT
Copyright. All rights reserved © 1998–2025
