Re: Questions of size...
Tim May wrote: At 7:42 PM + 12/12/00, Ben Laurie wrote: Sampo A Syreeni wrote: On Mon, 11 Dec 2000, Ben Laurie wrote: Chambers defines geodesic as "the shortest line on a surface between two points on it" and that is precisely the meaning in general relativity. No question about it. The term also doesn't mean a whole lot when applied as-is in the many instances it is on this list. As Tim put it, it pretty much equates to "cyberpunkish". Not being subscribed to cypherpunks (has S/R improved?) I will have missed that. Signal happens when good writers contribute good articles. Noise happens in the expected ways. Noise is what the delete key, and filters, were made for. Hmm. So, please send me your noise filter. I could do with one. As you are apparently reading this from the "DBS" list, you are not seeing any of my contributions. Regrettfully, DBS (and DCSB, or Bearebucks, or whatever Bob is calling his list(s)) is not an "open system." The Cypherpunks tried such a censored list a few years ago, and we rejected the approach. The list I'm writing to is not censored, AFAIK. I wrote a large article debunking the "geodesics is about topology" point of view. Others have said similar things. Actually, they're really about geometry, though there are some kinds of topology which can support geodesics (not the standard rubber-sheet kind most people are familiar with, though). For example, a graph can support the notion of a shortest distance between two points, and that is definitely a topological entity. Please don't contribute articles to the Cypherpunks list if you are, as you say, not subscribed. While we don't reject articles by nonsubscribers, as per the above, it is tacky and rude for nonsubscribers to address articles to lists they are not tracking. This is an email, not an article. Is it tacky and rude to copy to a list to which you'd prefer I didn't reply? I think so. Is it polite to include all recipients in a mail to which you reply? I think so. Cheers, Ben. -- http://www.apache-ssl.org/ben.html "There is no limit to what a man can do or how far he can go if he doesn't mind who gets the credit." - Robert Woodruff
Re: Questions of size...
At 9:48 PM + on 12/11/00, Ben Laurie wrote: Chambers defines geodesic as "the shortest line on a surface between two points on it" Thank you. It works in all dimensions, and, thus it's topological, right? Cheers, RAH -- - R. A. Hettinga mailto: [EMAIL PROTECTED] The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation http://www.ibuc.com/ 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA "... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity, [predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'
Re: Questions of size...
At 5:56 PM -0500 12/11/00, R. A. Hettinga wrote: At 9:48 PM + on 12/11/00, Ben Laurie wrote: Chambers defines geodesic as "the shortest line on a surface between two points on it" Thank you. It works in all dimensions, and, thus it's topological, right? Topology is typically not concerned with distance metrics. Doughnuts and coffee cups and all. Geometry is what you're thinking of, presumably. Not as sexy as saying something is "a topologically-invariant geodesic fractally-cleared auction space," but that's what happens when buzzwords are used carelessly. By the way, one topological aspect of a geodesic dome, to go back to that, is that each node is surrounded by some number of neighbors. Applied to a "geodesic economy," this image/metaphor would strongly suggest that economic agents are trading with their neighbors, who then trade with other neighbors, and so on. Tribes deep in the Amazon, who deal only with their neighbors, are then the canonical "geodesic economy." This is precisely the _opposite_ of the mulitiply-connected trading situation which modern systems make possible. So, aside from the cuteness of suggesting a connection with geodesic domes, with buckybits as the currency perhaps?, this all creates confusion rather than clarity. --Tim May -- (This .sig file has not been significantly changed since 1992. As the election debacle unfolds, it is time to prepare a new one. Stay tuned.)
Re: Questions of size...
On Fri, 8 Dec 2000, Ray Dillinger wrote: (RAH might have called it a geodesic political culture if he hadn't got this strange Marxist idea that politics is just an emergent property of economics :-) Just by the way, how widespread is this use of the word 'geodesic'? Not very, I think. It seems it's RAH's specialty. It's quite poetic, actually. Offhand, I'd refer to many of the things I've seen it used for here as 'distributed' or 'fractal'. Is 'geodesic' an accepted term of art for a network or protocol in which all the parts work roughly the same way? Although 'geodesic' does have, through its use in general relativity, some faint echo of 'operates purely based on local information', I think it's a misnomer. People should rather use the term 'distributed' literally, as it's used in computer science. That's the meaning RAH is after, not true? Sampo Syreeni [EMAIL PROTECTED], aka decoy, student/math/Helsinki university
Re: Questions of size...
On Thu, 7 Dec 2000, petro wrote: Mr. Brown (in the library with a candlestick) said: (RAH might have called it a geodesic political culture if he hadn't got this strange Marxist idea that politics is just an emergent property of economics :-) Just by the way, how widespread is this use of the word 'geodesic'? Offhand, I'd refer to many of the things I've seen it used for here as 'distributed' or 'fractal'. Is 'geodesic' an accepted term of art for a network or protocol in which all the parts work roughly the same way? Bear
Re: Questions of size...
-BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE- At 8:46 AM -0800 on 12/8/00, Ray Dillinger wrote: Just by the way, how widespread is this use of the word 'geodesic'? Not especially. :-). Offhand, I'd refer to many of the things I've seen it used for here as 'distributed' or 'fractal'. Is 'geodesic' an accepted term of art for a network or protocol in which all the parts work roughly the same way? As with everything else I know of any use, I stole it. :-). It comes from Peter Huber's 1986 "The Geodesic Network", containing (Huber's?) observation that as the price of switches gets lower, like with Moore's "law", the price of network nodes gets lower versus the price of network lines, and the network changes from a hierarchical network with expensive switches with the most expensive switches at the top to a geodesic one, with most switches tending toward the same price in the aggregate. Huber stole "geodesic" from Bucky Fuller, who in turn stole it from topology, where it means the straightest line across a surface. In three dimensions it's a great circle, for instance, the straightest line across a sphere, which is what "geodesic" translates to literally. Bucky called his domes geodesic, because when you pushed on a point on the dome force radiated out in all directions to the ground. Of course, the internet is the mother of all geodesic networks, right? :-). I've expropriated the word "geodesic" in all kinds of outlandish ways, like a cash settled auction-priced single intermediary (with lots of competing intermediaries, of course, just one between each buyer and seller) internet market is a geodesic market, like my claim that societies map to their communication architectures and thus we're moving from a hierarchical society to a geodesic one, and so on. There's a collection of essays on geodesic markets on http://www.ibuc.com, and pointers there to other rants of mine with the "G" word in them, as well. Cheers, RAH -BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE- Version: PGPfreeware 6.5.8 for non-commercial use http://www.pgp.com iQEVAwUBOjEXhsUCGwxmWcHhAQGDigf+KobTrRn4xHJGvGHKauWEtsH90BVG+tJj Z1hIyFD9O5I6Az5+SNt1SO8dYyBqKwk103GzWmu8Gbm+mUJdgy/dp+Aoxou5nPt/ n/Mi2FVpYnzdnRPRbnE10R6hqeBqWoerjonfhhSbWur3TGJUPsJUdbWKeglaygMW 4eMPGCBNeVUufvvbUcQ5iqkA0nxxa+46XREqtFhKybSzBYaA2LfcHPTRoMbzWM8J c7+uias/tuT75pWo0xUA2vX5p2BQM8yHVrs46gunxBkAk2Lz8Ri7P9Pi2c0jOjwa yyYy32ElXgw0gdR16DupSVw/2tTRtZPFyv664FsT8g+Q7/PsNPYiyg== =fx+a -END PGP SIGNATURE- -- - R. A. Hettinga mailto: [EMAIL PROTECTED] The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation http://www.ibuc.com/ 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA "... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity, [predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'
Re: Questions of size...
At 08:46 AM 12/8/00 -0800, Ray Dillinger wrote: On Thu, 7 Dec 2000, petro wrote: Mr. Brown (in the library with a candlestick) said: (RAH might have called it a geodesic political culture if he hadn't got this strange Marxist idea that politics is just an emergent property of economics :-) Just by the way, how widespread is this use of the word 'geodesic'? It depends on how many hops away from Bob Hettinga you are :-) Thanks! Bill Bill Stewart, [EMAIL PROTECTED] PGP Fingerprint D454 E202 CBC8 40BF 3C85 B884 0ABE 4639
