4,607 research outputs found

    The new path of law : from theory of chaos to theory of law

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    From chaos to chaos theory, from the primordial perception of the world as disorderly to the scientific research of disorder a long distance has been covered. This path implies openness of mind and scientific boldness which connect mythological perceptions of the world with philosophical and scientific interpretations of phenomena throughout the world in a quite distinctive way resting on the creation of a model and application of computing. Owing to this, for the first time instead of asking What awaits us in the future? we can ask What can be done in the future? and get a reliable scientific answer to the question

    Gaming security by obscurity

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    Shannon sought security against the attacker with unlimited computational powers: *if an information source conveys some information, then Shannon's attacker will surely extract that information*. Diffie and Hellman refined Shannon's attacker model by taking into account the fact that the real attackers are computationally limited. This idea became one of the greatest new paradigms in computer science, and led to modern cryptography. Shannon also sought security against the attacker with unlimited logical and observational powers, expressed through the maxim that "the enemy knows the system". This view is still endorsed in cryptography. The popular formulation, going back to Kerckhoffs, is that "there is no security by obscurity", meaning that the algorithms cannot be kept obscured from the attacker, and that security should only rely upon the secret keys. In fact, modern cryptography goes even further than Shannon or Kerckhoffs in tacitly assuming that *if there is an algorithm that can break the system, then the attacker will surely find that algorithm*. The attacker is not viewed as an omnipotent computer any more, but he is still construed as an omnipotent programmer. So the Diffie-Hellman step from unlimited to limited computational powers has not been extended into a step from unlimited to limited logical or programming powers. Is the assumption that all feasible algorithms will eventually be discovered and implemented really different from the assumption that everything that is computable will eventually be computed? The present paper explores some ways to refine the current models of the attacker, and of the defender, by taking into account their limited logical and programming powers. If the adaptive attacker actively queries the system to seek out its vulnerabilities, can the system gain some security by actively learning attacker's methods, and adapting to them?Comment: 15 pages, 9 figures, 2 tables; final version appeared in the Proceedings of New Security Paradigms Workshop 2011 (ACM 2011); typos correcte

    The (In)Difference engine: explaining the disappearance of diversity in the design of the personal computer

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    At the time of writing there is a clear perception of all office computers as being more or less identical. Discussion with users entails repetitive rhetoric as they describe a landscape of boring beige boxes. The office PC is indeed a ‘clone’ - an identical, characterless copy of a bland original. Through the exploration of an archive of computer manufacturer’s catalogues, this article shows how previous, innovative forms of the computer informed by cultural references as diverse as science fiction, accepted gender roles and the discourse of status as displayed through objects, have been systematically replaced by the adoption of a ‘universal’ design informed only by the nondescript, self-referential world of office equipment. The acceptance of this lack of innovation in the design of such a truly global, mass-produced, multi-purpose technological artefact has had an enormous effect on the conception, perception and consumption of the computer, and possibly of information technology itself. The very anonymity of the PC has created an attitude of indifference at odds with its potential.</p

    From the end of Unitary Science Projection to the Causally Complete Complexity Science: Extended Mathematics, Solved Problems, New Organisation and Superior Purposes

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    The deep crisis in modern fundamental science development is ever more evident and openly recognised now even by mainstream, official science professionals and leaders. By no coincidence, it occurs in parallel to the world civilisation crisis and related global change processes, where the true power of unreduced scientific knowledge is just badly missing as the indispensable and unique tool for the emerging greater problem solution and further progress at a superior level of complex world dynamics. Here we reveal the mathematically exact reason for the crisis in conventional science, containing also the natural and unified problem solution in the form of well-specified extension of usual, artificially restricted paradigm. We show how that extended, now causally complete science content provides various "unsolvable" problem solutions and opens new development possibilities for both science and society, where the former plays the role of the main, direct driver for the latter. We outline the related qualitative changes in science organisation, practice and purposes, giving rise to the sustainability transition in the entire civilisation dynamics towards the well-specified superior level of its unreduced, now well understood and universally defined complexity

    Theological Implications of the Simulation Argument

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    Nick Bostrom’s Simulation Argument (SA) has many intriguing theological implications. We work out some of them here. We show how the SA can be used to develop novel versions of the Cosmological and Design Arguments. We then develop some of the affinities between Bostrom's naturalistic theogony and more traditional theological topics. We look at the resurrection of the body and at theodicy. We conclude with some reflections on the relations between the SA and Neoplatonism (friendly) and between the SA and theism (less friendly)
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