Messages

1321

Off Topic / Faster than light

« on: March 07, 2005, 11:50:10 AM »

It travels at the same speed for all observers.  It has been tested in numerous experiments, and the whole general theory of relativity has been done to incorporate this observation into physics.

I say it's just a bug.  whoever was coding our universe just forgot to apply newtonian physics to light :)

1322

Off Topic / Genesis, 2001, and Darwin

« on: March 07, 2005, 11:46:19 AM »

This is off-topic board.

1323

Off Topic / Faster than light

« on: March 06, 2005, 11:46:04 AM »

3) They move you through space and through time.  After all, these two are tightly linked together.

1324

Off Topic / Faster than light

« on: March 05, 2005, 11:25:02 PM »

I doubt special theory of relativity even considers things like wormholes.  Besides, if wormhole moves an object instanteneously in space, it would also move it in time.  So the dude that goes through wormhole will travel in time and may not necessarily be older than his twin.  Maybe going through wormhole will throw him back in time many years.

1325

Specialization, Metabolism, Digestions and Env Grid / Photosynthesis

« on: March 05, 2005, 11:20:25 PM »

OK, I'm back from Hawaii and I have read this whole post (I made a list of all people who made fun of me  :devil: )

Specialization:  It is completely explained by two things.

One is that DNA defines function.  The more potential functions you want to have, the more DNA you need.  You cannot acquire functions during your lifetime, only through mutations.

Two is that almost no organism is using all its potential functions.  It uses those that are necessary in environment it lives in.  Potential functions get better and better every time you use them.  If you don't use a function, the DNA for that function is turned off at first and later it is labeled as not-used and is turned off more and more.  Kind of like light in your house.  First you can turn off the light with the switch, then after a while you can disconnect entire house and then later you can shut down the power plant.  If all of a sudden you want to turn the light on - you have to go back all the way to power plant, turn it on, connect your house and flip the switch.  On the other side, if you don't need light now, but want to have the ability to quickly turn it on later, then you have to keep the whole system going, even though you don't actively use it.

Now back to DBs:  Genes define function in DB, so here we are set.  But turning genes on and off is very easy in DBs and right now it does not matter how often you used that gene.  What we need is a system that would allow genes to get more efficient when they are used often at the cost of getting less efficient in functions that are not used.  The system should also allow some genes to be not used, but kept reaady to go (at some cost).  If we do that, we have specialization.  It is really that easy and there is no need to come up with more complicated systems.

1326

Specialization, Metabolism, Digestions and Env Grid / Numsgil's Super Cool Specialization System

« on: March 05, 2005, 11:00:41 PM »

In general I like this idea, because it mirrors my idea of specialization.  What I don't like is things like

15000 energy to enable a mechanic, 10000 energy to disable and several hundred cycles for the changes to take effect

It's just too... artificial.  The "turning on/off" needs some more thought.  My vote would be to count how many times a given mechanic is used and set a counter for that.  The more you use something, the easier/cheaper it gets.  So that using .up would increase the counter for ".up", but also for the whole "movement".  Kind of like what Nums had with hierarchy of muscles.

1327

Off Topic / Faster than light

« on: March 05, 2005, 10:51:56 PM »

Well, the whole point of special theory of relativity is that "instanteneous" events are not possible, because no two observes can agree on when a given event occured.  Instanteneous would mean that they did agree.

1328

Suggestions / Physical Sizes

« on: March 05, 2005, 10:22:00 PM »

I am reading through all the posts.

Bad idea with phosphates.  These are not building blocks in any sense and their realease doesn't reflect the metabolism.  You split ATP - make AMP and two Ps.  But you don't throw away these Ps - you'll need them to make ATP again.  And cell uses them up almost immediately - there is almost no free phosphate in the cell - it is all in form of ATP.
Nitrogen compounds is another story entirely - every time you pee, you release all the extra urea (thus the name urine), which is the safest way to throw away extra nitrogen.  Nitrogen is an essential block of proteins (and nucleic acids, but it is less important now).  You eat proteins - you convert their energy to fat - extra nitrogen appears, you need to get rid of it.  As true to concept of waste as it can be.  And as I said before - nitrogen compounds are extremely important for plant life.

1329

Suggestions / Physical Sizes

« on: March 05, 2005, 09:39:49 PM »

How about real life approach?
Shells don't make much sense untill you cover most of the body with it - imagine a turtle with only half a shell :)  No protective effect.  Also, a thin layer is not much help.  We can make it so that shell is almost not effective in small amounts, but its effects increase as you collect more of it.  By that time it will contribute to mass so that it will slow down shell-making creature.  And remeber - it is pretty costly to make shell and you can't recover energy back from it.
Also, in real life many of shell-creatures can't grow beyond their shell size - they have to throw the old shell away and start a new one if they need to grow bigger.  Something like that can be implemented (but it is a whole different idea).

Did you notice the "need waste" for proteins?  What do you think?  I basically decided to equate waste to simple nitrogen-containing compounds.  Building proteins requires nitrogen, destroying them - releases it.  For many plants nitrogen is an essential nutrient.  And in the ocean, nitrogen-containing compounds are the limiting factor for growth of plankton.

1330

Suggestions / Physical Sizes

« on: March 05, 2005, 07:08:56 PM »

I decided to use single buildng blocks for each kind of energy carrier to get these estimates.
Well, it goes like this:
Molecular weight (MW) of 16-carbon fat is ~270
MW of glucose (6-carbon) is ~180.  
MW of amino acids varies between 100 and 200.

So, they are all on the same order of magnitude to begin with.
But carbs and proteins (proteins to a less extent) are surrounded by molecules of water (each MW ~20).  It is hard to estimate how many water molecules are required to maintain glucose and proteins in addition to water already present in the cell.  But 5-10 seems like a reasonable number.  So in the end they are not that different to bother and distinguish.  

If shell is made from proteins (like turtle's) or carbs (all insects), then it is reasonable to assume it will weigh (per molecule) somewhat less than regular carbs or sugar (because it lacks water).  But do we want to bother with that?  I say no.  If shell is made from silicone, then it will be heavy of course, but there it is hard to define a buiding unit.

So, I decided to keep it simple and just make them all equal.

1331

Suggestions / Physical Sizes

« on: March 05, 2005, 05:01:35 PM »

Here is another way to look at the proposed system:

Let's say three bots have 30,000 energy each.

Bot 1 puts it all in carbs.  It makes 750 carbs.

Bot 2 puts it all in fat.  It makes 150 fats.

Bot 3 puts it all in protein.  It makes 150 proteins.



Bot 1 is 5 times heavier than the other two.  It is also 5 times bigger in size than bot 2 and is 25 times bigger than bot 3.  Being so haevy and huge it makes it almost impossible for this bot to move.  This is your typical plant.

Bot 2 is intermediate in size.  It is hard for it to move.  It mostly sits around and eats.  But it can extract a lot of energy from it's fats, so if necessary it can run at high speed, but it costs a lot.  This is your typical fatty grazer.

Bot 3 is compact and it is very easy for it to move (all that muscle makes it especially cheap).  On the other side it is heavy enough to deal quite a damage to other bots (if shots are proportional to mass).  It can only extract small amount of energy from degrading protein, but it is enough to run around and hunt.  This is your predator.

Makes sense?

1332

Suggestions / Physical Sizes

« on: March 05, 2005, 04:36:41 PM »

Oh shoot, I almost missed this post! :)

Here is how I think it should be.  It is loosely based on real biology:

Energy to make stuff:
200 energy = 1 fat = 5 carbs = 1 protein = 1 shell = 1 slime
(note: protein creation needs waste in 1:1 ratio)

Energy during utilization:
150 energy = 1 fat= 5 carbs = 10 proteins
(note: shell and slime cannot be utilized to get energy)
(note: protein utilization produces waste in 1:1 ratio)

Mass
1 fat = 1 carb = 1 protein = 1 shell = 1 slime
(note: I know it is not intuitive, I was surprised myself)

Size:
1 fat = 1 carb = 5 protein = 20 shell = 1 slime

I'll keep this post as a reference and will update when we agree on changes.

1333

Off Topic / Faster than light

« on: March 05, 2005, 03:29:05 PM »

each of them will see that the other is aging slower

I think I just came up with a good example how this can be and not be a contradiction.  Imagine two guys standing on sphere, but they don't know they are on a sphere.  They come close to each other and measure up - both are six feet tall.  Then they move apart.  They use instruments to measure each other's height.  Due to the curvature of the sphere it will appear to both of them that the other person is getting shorter.

This situation does not exactly replicate the situation with twins, but I just tought that it gives a good example that sometimes reality depends on your point of view.

1334

Off Topic / Faster than light

« on: March 05, 2005, 01:06:41 PM »

No, PY, it is exactly the same situation.  If these two guys are observing each other from distance, each of them will see that the other is aging slower (first part of twin paradox scenario).  There is no contradiction.  But if they want to get together and compare their observations right next to each other, then at least one of them will have to brake and reverse direction.  At that point, it will look to that guy (who is braking and then accelerating) that his twin suddenly grew very old.  The simmetry is broken, because they are not in innert systems anymore.  Read that website, it does explain the whole thing pretty well and is quite short to go through in 15 minutes :)

1335

Off Topic / I found some pictures of Shvarz

« on: March 04, 2005, 01:45:31 PM »

For anyone interested it would be just a matter of time and effort anyway, so here are some more pictures of me: http://www.livejournal.com/users/shvarz/16563.html
These are about a year old.

By the way, I'd be quite interested in seeing faces of fellow DB-maniacs.  So post your pics here!