Month: October 2018

Jonathan Gitlin

The Kia Stinger was one of the most hyped cars in recent years, and deservedly so. With the rest of the world going crossover crazy, Kia decided that what the market needed was a stylish four-door GT car that put an emphasis on driving enjoyment without breaking the bank.

And it certainly delivered; in particular, the rear-wheel drive V6 Stinger GT offered more fun than cars twice its price. But initially we only got to test the range-topping models at the launch; a few months later, I happily arranged a week with a more pedestrian version.

Enlarge / Who doesn't love some new Windows? (credit: Peter Bright / Flickr)

The Windows 10 October Update, version 1809, is now available for Windows 10 users.

As is traditional, Microsoft will be doing a staged rollout, using machine learning to better detect issues and incompatibilities while offering the update as quickly as possible to as many Windows 10 users as possible.

The update will soon be delivered automatically over Windows Update, but if you don't want to wait, performing a manual check for updates will fetch and install the update immediately (as long as your system isn't known to be incompatible). Microsoft has been attempting to make the automatic updates less annoying, for example by not updating when the machine is idle only for a short time, and advising laptop users to leave their machines plugged in overnight so that it can update without interrupting them.

Enlarge / "There is no spoon. You have to ask the waiter to bring you one." (credit: Warner Bros.)

Below you’ll find the second installment of the After On podcast interview in which UC Irvine quantitative psychologist Don Hoffman presents his wildly counterintuitive theory on the nature of reality. Please check out part one if you missed it. Otherwise, press play on the embedded player, or pull up the transcript—both of which are below.

Hoffman and I open this episode by discussing his take on space-time. He refutes the notion that space itself existed at all before consciousness. “Space is something that you create right now,” he says. “It's a data structure that you create for data compression and error correction” to maximize your understanding of fitness payoffs in your environment. The same is true of 3D objects. Hoffman essentially believes that if you’re alone in a room with a chair, that chair ceases to exist when you look away from it.

The bottom line is that the physical objects populating our world are just “icons.” As noted in yesterday’s piece, Hoffman likens them to the trashcan thumbnail on your computer desktop. That doesn’t mean you can safely step in front of an SUV on the logic that it’s a harmless visual construct. Hoffman says that while he doesn’t take our world of “icons” literally, he does take them seriously. He avoids stepping in front of cars for the same reason we all avoid putting precious work in the Trash folder and then clicking delete. Although there’s no actual blue trashcan hiding within your computer, you ignore the icon’s significance at your peril!

Welcome to another edition of "War Stories," where we coerce developers into talking about problems that almost kept them from making the games that made them famous. We've previously chatted with the likes of Ultima's Lord British, Thief's Paul Neurath, and Stardock's Brad Wardell. Today's video takes us across the Atlantic to Eastern Europe, to the offices of Croatian developer Croteam—the folks who brought us the classic FPS Serious Sam.

Serious Sam is a fast-paced explosion-fest, filled with Duke Nukem-esque one-liners and gibs galore. Released way back in 2001, the first game spawned a bloody dynasty that continues to this day and even has a new entry coming next year—hopefully).

It seems obvious in hindsight that the game would be a hit, but Croteam had a difficult time bringing it to market—in fact, although the developers spent a lot of time crafting and polishing a single-level demo that showed off the best they had to offer, they couldn't even get a publisher to call them back.

Enlarge / Radiation: it might not be that bad. (credit: Getty | Mitchell Krog)

The Environmental Protection Agency is moving forward with a vaguely worded proposal that may lay the groundwork to zap current federal regulations on low-dose radiation exposures.

Today, Wednesday, October 3, the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works is holding a hearing to discuss the proposed rule, titled Strengthening Transparency in Regulatory Science (PDF), which the agency first introduced in April.

Though the proposed rule does not explicitly mention radiation exposure regulations, a press release from the agency announcing the proposal makes clearer the agency’s intentions, the Associated Press first reported. The release quotes toxicologist Edward Calabrese of the University of Massachusetts, saying:

Enlarge (credit: Getty Images | eccolo74)

Cities are planning to sue the Federal Communications Commission over its decision to preempt local rules on deployment of 5G wireless equipment.

Seattle Mayor Jenny Durkan and City Attorney Pete Holmes yesterday said their city intends to appeal the FCC order in federal court. Seattle will be coordinating with other cities on a lawsuit, they said.

"In coordination with the overwhelming majority of local jurisdictions that oppose this unprecedented federal intrusion by the FCC, we will be appealing this order, challenging the FCC's authority and its misguided interpretations of federal law," they said in a press release.

Enlarge / The source of the leak on the International Space Station. (credit: NASA TV)

A thorough Russian investigation of a leak that occurred in August in the orbital module of a Russian Soyuz spacecraft, which is attached to the International Space Station, will not be completed until November. But this week, the head of the Russian space agency Roscosmos reignited controversy about the leak with some comments during a television appearance.

A preliminary investigation, according to Russia's chief spaceflight official, Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin, "concluded that a manufacturing defect had been ruled out which is important to establish the truth." So if it wasn't a manufacturing defect, then what was it? As Rogozin did not say, this re-fueled speculation in some media reports that the hole was intentionally drilled by NASA astronauts in space. This theory is nonsensical, but it appears to play well to Russian audiences.

After these latest comments and with an imminent Soyuz spacecraft launch on October 11 that will carry NASA astronaut Nick Hague to the International Space Station, the US space agency felt the need to put out a new statement on Wednesday. It reads:

Enlarge / GM workers assembling a test car for Cruise. (credit: Cruise)

Honda is investing $750 million in Cruise, the self-driving car startup whose majority shareholder is General Motors. The deal values Cruise at $14.6 billion. The deal is important for Honda because until now it has been a laggard in the race to build self-driving cars.

Honda also said on Wednesday that it plans to invest $2 billion over the next 12 years to develop and manufacture self-driving cars based on Cruise's software.

"Honda will work jointly with Cruise and General Motors to fund and develop a purpose-built autonomous vehicle for Cruise that can serve a wide variety of use cases and be manufactured at high volume for global deployment," Honda said in a press release.