Y
HN Search
Hacker News Search
new
|
comments
|
top
|
jobs
gene-h
searching PlanetScale…
1.
▲
2.
▲
3.
▲
4.
▲
5.
▲
6.
▲
31 ms
·
271.
▲
by
gene-h
9y ago
>Japanese robots are meant to look perfect. Russian robots are meant to look terrifying. American robots are meant to explore new algorithms or technologies. European robots are mostly meant to build cars. Well that's a somewhat dis
272.
▲
by
gene-h
9y ago
You can actually buy commercial products that are powered by sound. Sound is actually a pretty great power source for wireless sensor nodes that monitor loud pieces of machinery. Sure, you don't get much power, but for a sensor node yo
273.
▲
by
gene-h
9y ago
>Our discovery is that every region of the neocortex learns 3D models of objects much like a CAD program. Citation needed. If this was the case, certainly we'd have some experiments that show this? Especially since every part of the
274.
▲
by
gene-h
9y ago
Now it's a cool toy, but there might be more practical applications for a 4D rigid body physics engine. Some materials design approaches[0] involve iterating through shape space to determine what shape a particle should be to get it to
275.
▲
by
gene-h
9y ago
Having to get rid of toxins is a rather interesting problem to have when making plastic foam. Saxitoxin, a toxin produced by some algal blooms, is amazingly dangerous with LD50s of 5.7 μg/kg[0]. It's even been estimated that 50 μg
276.
▲
by
gene-h
9y ago
George Hart made STL files for 3d projections of a number of 4d objects[0]. Some 3d printers include them as example prints One place I know even used Hart's 3d projection of 120 cell as a standard test print. It has a bunch of thin co
277.
▲
by
gene-h
9y ago
Reminds of a genetic algorithm that was made to optimize lego structures[0]. One of the most notable results of this was optimizing for a structure as long as possible with a single support. What they got was a 2 meter long organic looking
278.
▲
by
gene-h
9y ago
AlphaGo has won one game out of three so far, it's not over yet.
279.
▲
by
gene-h
9y ago
That's cool, but how many adhesion cycles does it last? One problem with these gecko-style adhesion systems is that eventually the hairs get clogged up with debris within a few cycles. This doesn't offer much advantage over regula
280.
▲
by
gene-h
9y ago
" so our robots are initially being controlled from Colombia." There was a sci-fi movie about that[0]. In short a wall gets built between the US and Mexico, and telerobots controlled by workers in Mexico start being used for the j
281.
▲
by
gene-h
9y ago
You should probably visit your local library. My local library runs a makerspace, where people can check out equipment, arduinos, and use 3d printers. In addition, our local library cards allow us to bypass paywalls for news sites, scientif
282.
▲
by
gene-h
9y ago
This is fucking dumb, and I am absolutely ok with this. The fact that we are able to do these 'dumb' and silly applications is a good sign. It shows that the field has advanced to the point where it is cheap enough to do these &#x
283.
▲
by
gene-h
9y ago
Now the question is, do human quadcopter pilots have the same problems running into glass? Although birds tend to be bad at handling 'glass environments'
284.
▲
by
gene-h
9y ago
I wonder how well the learned policy generalizes to other environments. Places like an art gallery, outside, or a cave. Could the network have learned something fundamental about monocular vision? It would also be interesting to see if the
285.
▲
by
gene-h
9y ago
Perhaps one could prevent this by restricting said apps from using any frequencies above a certain bound.
286.
▲
On the Impossibility of Supersized Machines
(arxiv.org)
44 points
by
gene-h
10y ago
|
28 comments
287.
▲
by
gene-h
10y ago
It's a shame that the trend in increasing rover size probably won't continue. If scaling does continue, we might expect to have rovers the size of monster trucks on Mars by 2030.
288.
▲
by
gene-h
10y ago
My money is on it being an air battery, in the paper they commented: "The charge and discharge voltages show a good coulombic efficiency over 1000 h; the cycling was continued beyond 46 cycles despite an imperfect seal of the cell. &qu
289.
▲
by
gene-h
10y ago
You are referring to the threat of trawling nets yes? So the idea presented in the paper is to use these things as anchors for wind turbines, it would not be a very good idea to go trawling through an offshore wind farm. Of course in either
290.
▲
by
gene-h
10y ago
The paper cites a depth of 700 meters too for either system. Compression happens to be concrete's best operating mode.
291.
▲
by
gene-h
10y ago
I saw a talk from MIT professor who came up with a similar idea[0]. Using spheres seemed like a pretty good idea on paper, but when they started doing the cost analysis they found that it would be cheaper to use cylindrical pipe. Even thoug
292.
▲
by
gene-h
10y ago
Sure, the fiber itself maybe cheap, but processing that fiber into different shapes still costs a fair amount of money. Carbon fiber layup is still a fairly labor intensive and somewhat wasteful process.
293.
▲
by
gene-h
10y ago
1.9 kilowatts is a sizable amount of power. In comparison a DJI phantom 4 consumes about 175 watts[0]. One could probably keep a decently large drone in the air indefinitely. [0] http://www.drone-world.com/dji-phantom-4-specs
294.
▲
by
gene-h
10y ago
Well if one modifies the channel state information in an unpredictable manner while performing sensitive operations, it becomes very difficult to extract any information. The simplest way to do this might be to fidget. Use one hand to type
295.
▲
by
gene-h
10y ago
The attack presented in this paper relies on the user connecting to the wifi hotspot. This is necessary so that they can figure when a sensitive operation is happening. Without this information, it is difficult to determine if the user is i
296.
▲
by
gene-h
10y ago
Doc Brown was probably right: "that in 1985, plutonium is available in every corner drugstore," in the Soviet Union at least.
297.
▲
by
gene-h
10y ago
They didn't confirm metastability. Converting it back to molecular hydrogen is trivial even if it's metastable. If it's not metastable, remove pressure. If it's metastable, one just needs to wait, but the process can be
298.
▲
by
gene-h
10y ago
It hasn't been confirmed yet[0]. Their evidence so far is that they saw something shiny in the diamond anvil. The shiny thing may not necessarily be metallic hydrogen, and could just be the coating. There are also questions that they r
299.
▲
by
gene-h
10y ago
NASA has successfully tested electric motors at venusian ambient conditions[0]. Also, the atmosphere isn't corrosive at the surface. It's much too hot for sulfuric acid there. [0] http://www.techbriefs.com/component
300.
▲
by
gene-h
10y ago
NASA is investigating a solar/wind powered land sailing rover: https://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/201500... High temperature electronics are really what makes this possible
More ›