They're called chauffeurs/personal drivers or taxi cabs.
Posted on 01/06/2003 1:49:39 PM PST by anymouse
The following message is the basis for the 6th Annual Edge Question. I sent individualized emails to the third culture mail list as in the example below, addressed to Steven Pinker, the first participant to respond.
From:"John Brockman"
To: "Steven Pinker" Subject: THE EDGE ANNUAL QUESTION — 2003 Date: Fri, 29 Nov 2002 X-Priority: 3 (Normal) Importance: NormalSteve,
This just in from Washington...
From: "George W. Bush"
To: "John Brockman" Subject: Science Advisor Date: Thu, 21 Nov 2002Dear John,
I appreciate your taking the time to recommend the appointment of Steven Pinker to be my next science advisor and I am pleased to hear of his interest in the position.
I am impressed with the resume of Dr. Pinker which you sent earlier. Could you please ask him to prepare a memo which answers the following question:
"What are the pressing scientific issues for the nation and the world, and what is your advice on how I can begin to deal with them?"
In addition to obvious issues that have dominated the headlines during my first two years in office, I would hope to hear about less obvious scientific issues as well.
I need the memo by the end of December.
Thank you for your help.
Sincerely,
GWB
I wish the above was really an email from President Bush. It is not. It's the set-up for this year's Edge Annual Question — 2003, and because this event receives wide attention from the scientific community and the global press, the responses it evokes just might have the same effect as a memo to the President....that is, if you stick to science and to those scientific areas where you have expertise.
I am asking members of the Edge community to take this project seriously as a public service, to work together to create a document that can be widely disseminated to begin a public discussion about the important scientific issues before us.
Address your memo to the President and very briefly add your credentials (as in the example below). I will post the responses as they come in. Please email your response to me on or before January 1, 2003 for publication the week of January 6th.
I look forward to hearing from you.
Best,
JB
Happy New Year!
John Brockman Publisher & Editor January 6, 2003
p.s. A selection of the responses below were excerpted by The New York Times Op-Ed Page on Saturday, January 4, 2003.
85 responses to date: Ian Wilmut • J. Craig Venter • Steven Pinker • Ray Kurzweil • Gino Segre • Stephen Schneider • Oliver Morton • Rodney Brooks • Seth Lloyd • Denis Dutton • Freeman Dyson • Philip Campbell • Kevin Kelly • Lawrence Brilliant • Mihalyi Csikszentmihalyi • Paul Davies • Robert Shapiro • Jaron Lanier • J. Doyne Farmer • Colin Tudge • Marvin Minsky • George Dyson • William H. Calvin • David Gelernter • Janna Levin • Howard Gardner • Martin Seligman • Richard Nisbett • David Lykken • Alison Gopnik • Marc D. Hauser • Eric R. Kandel • K. Eric Drexler • James J. O'Donnell • Michael Shermer • Daniel Goleman • Richard Saul Wurman • Andy Clark • John Horgan • Roger C. Schank • Nancy Etcoff • Gerald Holton • Judith Rich Harris • Brian Goodwin • Karl Sabbagh • Joel Garreau • Susan Blackmore • Leo Chalupa • Jordan Pollack • David Myers • Ernst Pöppel • Lisa Randall • Stuart Pimm • Eduardo Punset • Lee Smolin • Rafael Nunez • Timothy Taylor • Mike Weiner • Leon Lederman • Bart Kosko • Adam Bly • Randolph Nesse • Terrence Sejnowski • Mary Catherine Bateson • Alan Alda • Cliff Barney • Douglas Rushkoff • Donald D. Hoffman • Steve Giddings • Lance Knobel • Piet Hut • Robert Aunger • Christine Finn • David M. Buss • Beatrice Golomb • Rupert Sheldrake • Delta Willis • Clifford Pickover • Eberhard Zangger • Steven Quartz • Keith Devlin • John McCarthy • Gary F. Marcus • Justin Hall • Stephen Reucroft & John Swain
One could debate whether or not it is the place of the Federal government to sponsor such research (thus taking away the insentive for private research funding), but these are worth discussing.
Somebody has to invent that.
Good question. I look forward to reading the responses, but let me give my best top-of-my-head answer before I read them:
The most pressing issue is how most dramatically to increase the capacity and reduce the cost of portable electrical energy storage.
You can best deal with this by defunding the bloated bureaucracy of the Department of Energy, suspending or redelegating all department activities not directly related to energy policy, and redirecting the savings towards basic research in this area. Furthermore, establish a series of substantial cash prizes for applied technologies that meet well-defined performance benchmarks in this area.
A single, substantial advance in this area has the potential both to advance many of our foreign policy goals, and to create an unprecedented domestic economic expansion.
Considering the US has an aging population that will, at a future time, no longer be able or allowed to drive motor vehicles due to safety concerns, a cheap, reliable, easy-to-use personal transportation system should be sought after. Whether this be a retrofit on existing motor vehicles, or incorporated into new vehicles, the system must be capable of delivering a passenger to any location, in ultimate safety, without any assistance from the occupant.
Such a system could have far reaching implications. Greater efficiency in highway use, allow commuters to conduct business/catch up on personal affairs during commute time, greater safety by removing driver error, and the ability to automatically reroute traffic around accidents or road work.
They're called chauffeurs/personal drivers or taxi cabs.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.