Late Stats 3b

We've got another and more experimental batch here -
they've been playtested since 2013, but still aren't finalised.

 Above: Adi Gallia was a formidable jedi combatant, though this version is her inspiring by being effective at combat, rather than the General/Tactician she was also known in the E.U. as

 Above: Ithorian Jedi, but which doesn't efface the Roron Corrobb from the Tartakovsky Clone Wars. Makashi Style helps counter other non-unique Separatist Darksiders and increasingly the witches subfaction.

Above: A Councillor from the TPM to AotC era, J'Mikel was killed by Aurra Sing. This prototype omits "Diplomat" and "Aggressive Negotiations" in favor of Force Thrust and Mighty Swing at the behest of playtesters. (Yes, Force Thrust was an 'official run' force power)

I've had some questions recently on how I cost things -
I use a formula from SithFan, and I also do comparative analysis on similarly costed pieces,
and the other playtesters assist me by keeping an eye on potential combinations and synergies, which is a 'wildcard' that can increase or decrease a cost of a figure.
Most of my cards will be overcosted - and that is the safer side of caution to be on, better than too cheap hehehe

If there's some pieces you think are disproportionate - I'm looking forward to hearing a playtest feedback or specific problematic interactions.
Above all, thanks for all the support - I've been playing this for near on 8 years, and to have so many people request more cards or enjoy printing them has been awesome.

Stay tuned for some really well-made fan cards for the custom Borg and Fringer stuff for ST:AW also - some local fans have been kind enough to make them for the Tetrahedron, because they were so smitten with them - I'm speechless (and for a wordy guy like myself, that's pretty rare hehehe),
thanks! = )

-------
Do you have a request for custom miniatures or statcards?
feel free to leave some ideas here or on Bloomilk or All Scale Trek, or even Lead Adventure.de

Late Stat Cards 3a

Howdy,
more custom stats, a variation on a theme hehehe.

 Above: It took forever to find a decent image to make this custom, a fun card.

 Above: perfect image from DevArt exactly matches the custom I made for 2 ARC's with Rotating/Rotary? Blaster

Above: A decent-ish shooter, but his CE cuts both ways - it removes other CE's to prevent broken combos, and boosts ARCs into death machines. This represents Fordo at his best, and is 'ultimate' fordo, not the phase 3 armor fordo seen later. Avoid Defeat will make those ARCs nasty prospects, and the original default ARC will only be 15 points, an intimidating prospect.

Above: A type of translucent sentient mangrove, these species propagate by asexual splitting. Overpowered as a miniature? maybe.

More to follow, and you can check out others on Bloomilk.

Late Stat Cards 2

Howdy!
So, a few folks requested some statcards to accompany various customs,
and I'm happy to dabble and honor that request (since you asked kindly).

 Above: Xanatos (pronounced: Zah-nah-toz, as opposed to Sa-na-toss, or Kx-ana-tos, or Xena-tos), Qui-Gon Jinn's first failed apprentice, and main antagonist of the Jedi Apprentice novels.

Above: T4 Turret droid, of Jedi Power Battles and TCW fame. These things were formidable but super-rare due to the high cost of production and high losses when freighters carrying these were intercepted by the Republic and confiscated.

 Above: Droidekas, as they were supposed to be.

EDIT: due to popular demand, a revised variant of the DD has been 'remastered'.
see if you can spot all the differences between this version and the remastered one. 

 Above: perfect for recreating some scenarios, the CE may be overpowered, yet it punishes separatist players if they abuse the effect with a chance of instant death...

 Above: a redo of a classic golden oldie, to represent the later versions. These are approaching what the rebels and the empire have access to. I don't think it renders the old version useless, because they're cheaper.

Above: These are fun. They're nastier, and being the cost of 3 or 4 droids, but with damage output that is 2/3rds of that, most will choose the other versions. This could be fun to bring in via reserves though. I use the Knight Models figures and the Epic Duels figures to proxy these.

 Yaddle, at her survivalist best. This piece and Tsui-Choi, Jedi Survivor make a GREAT dynamic duo, as does Yoda + Yaddle.

Above: If this looks like a beast, remember that it is a shooter-rich environment, and these were annoying in RotS the game. A slight mod to one of Surf's best customs.

More to follow, enjoy!

NB:
art elements sourced from DevArt over the years, and are their respective owners IP - no infudgement intended, these are for use freely with the SWMinis game.
SWMinis, remains the property of WotC 2004-2010.
SW and SW elements, the property of Disney corp (a subsidary of WeylandYutani), again, no infudgement intended as these are freely for use with an out-of-production boardgame (from the 'legends' timeline)

Pepakura Bork Cube Texture 1

The title says it all...
here is a "Bork" cube texture, slap-dashed together in Gimp over a half hour.
Of course, you could combine this with other Gimp effects, and layer this into something else -
I intend to make some printed on decal paper or silk-highgloss at the local printers/officewerks.
A lot of locals that play borg want a cube, at a decent scale, and can't afford either the Warp Models,
the Wizkids or even similar options to the prototype cubes/kitbashes I've made -
SO!

"Pepakura+" to the rescue! = )
The texture will allow for the illusion of depth, and you can optionally add the tactical cube armor,
the added benefit, of being able to make the cube flat, yet decent for display.
It is hoped the cellophane/screenprinting and decal lazer printed sheets, will also produce some awesome lighting effects - all while being under the ~$20USD price point
(that people feel is much more reasonable - 1 hours work, instead of a week's pay).

I'm hoping that, we can also cut out segments of the corflute, and use some satin/translucent materials (just as the original physical models did) to help see 'inside' the pepakura + cube.

And, of course, the end-user can use the cubeish model to then customise to their taste.

(Above: a variant of Bork-ish cube, for you to remix as you like - it must be absolutely freely. CBS is awesome, Trek fans are awesomer)

 (Above: A Tactical layer superimposed - tactical and wiring layer obtained from Sirius Replicas http://www.siriusreplicas.com/models/scifi/borg/borgpm.htm --- visit them and enjoy their awesomeness!)

(Above: a dirtier approach made by a local Borg Gamer from the local game store - pure awesome, if not a little too 'regular'. detail elements again from Sirius Replicas)

Use this as an underlay decal, and then customise over it or around it?
print 6 of them, and you've a cube.

So, the above is a sample, using the nyquist "QMaze" and "circuit" command from GIMP, followed by successive layering and depth merging, and "Overlay" "Difference" "Screen" "Multiply" brush commands over successive layers.
A final blur in the mid layer of the 'green' produces the distinctive greenish-yellow-white,
and some custom brush erases leave the patterns seen.

I will later translate some of the Powerpoint clip art into 'greeblies' that can be super-imposed and depth merged in between the circuit and the lighted layers.
And, luckily, someone has already made the large tactical cube pepakura. (though, in a rather blue-d metal color... easily color corrected)

If this side project goes well - this decoupage method will be how a larger object,
such as the Queen Octahedron/Diamond, or the Unimatrix/Nexus, Unicomplex... (in 1-5000 scale, they got Terok Nor, and a Warp Models starbase... it's only fair the Borg get their stuff too)
those larger bork objects will be made this way.
In-home 3D printing just isn't as reliable, consistent or as affordable as many would wish for projects of that scale at this time... in timeframes which can be measured in hours and minutes, with costs in the tens of dollar...

Thanks - for the inquiries, for making the tetrahedrons, pylons and other borgish stuff so popular,
and for the interest - the Borg fanbase are AWESOME!

We've Engaged The--- a 1/5000 re-enactment

Howdy!
Apologies for the reduced overt waffles -
I'm gearing up to undertake some other activities, so I don't have as much time to spare as
questing for work becomes an overriding priority...

For your enjoyment,
below are some images of the battle of the kitchen tabletop, a legendary ST encounter.

 Above: USS Incursion flies through (over, in the GOBS system) the wreckage of the large Wizkids cube - this being a failed print plate for a generic holder box on the k8200.

 Above:
The battleax of a Scout Fusion Tesseract wails on USS Titan, USS Incursion lines up an attack run on the wizkids cube, Enterprise strafes (firing all magazine of torpedoes). Galaxy X and the 2 other Bergstrom cruiser attack a fleeing/flanking Eaglemoss Sphere.

 Above: The borg wreck the federation left flank. Most of the Bergstrom destroyers don't survive this turn. The feds kill the Tactical Tetrahedron and a Scout in return, though. USS Titan prepares the main deflector for a particle pulse at the Fusion Tesseract...

 Above: The Tesseract makes short work of the shields of the incoming Bergstrom cruisers. The Obelisk/Pylon attacks Incursion, damaging her multiphasic cloak/holocloak, and the Eaglemoss Sphere damages USS Titan's right side nacelle, causing her to drift. Importantly, Titan's main deflector array remains powered and intact.

Above: The first turn... The Borg have arrived en-masse. Luckily, the federation scouts detected the Borg's incursion before reinforcements could arrive... A tactical cube (made by a friend) was also to have joined the battle for the kitchen table, but, unfortunately it broke before it could be transported.
This match was as much to test the large-scale combat mechanics of GOBS as it was to have fun.

We lost the battle for the table, the Borg narrowly won with a damaged sphere...
Everyone had fun though, and we all reflected on the new DVD box set of TNG,
as well as Prelude to Axanar/Axanar and ST:Renegades - both outstanding projects which leave JJBrams "trek" (I use the term loosely) in the space-dust.
If you enjoy trek, support Axanar, and ST:Renegades (especially if you're a borg fan-person - Icheb is back with vengeance, even if the effects look like early TNG and early TRON had a 80s lovechild...


Work still progresses on printing cubes and larger structures on the k8200 reliably,
though layers are having a lot of problems, as filament intermittently accumulates on the extruder nozzle or the plastic fails to feed despite the correct settings, and low fill density of the object.


 DISCLAIM:
above: Eaglemoss, Hallmark, Furuta, Wizkids, Studio Bergstrom are where most of the ship are from;
yours truly and the k8200 made the rest.
Trek is |for the moment at time of writing| the brain child of Roddenbury god rest his soul --- who encouraged all to share in his ideas, and remains CBS-ish or something. Infudgement non-intentional, geometry and coloration coincidental, and for private enjoyment purposes only.

The joys of a 3D extruder, 23

Howdy;
so, in trying to print larger objects in reasonable times,
I have attempted accelerations of 80mm/s^2.
This, however, reveals operator error -
the tuning may not be 100%perfect;
the extrusion is in dobs instead of a stream, so it's either a thin film white-black,
or else, the dobs are higher than the layer-height, and collide with the hotend nozzle, which
in turn,
DESTROYS YOUR PRINT,
because the rest of the print becomes pulled by the dobs that catch on the nozzle, which clogs the nozzle and
DESTROYS YOUR PRINT (repeatedly, after full strip and clean.


Smaller objects and precision objects are more forgiving;
this is different. It prints TERRIBLY.
Even with a 1.75mm filament and 1.75mm hotend,
or 1.75mm in a 3mm hotend,
or a 1.75mm filament in a 0.3mm hotend.

no matter the specs, it still happens -
dob not a stream,
dob hit nozzle,
nozzle tears mesh
(you are tearing me apart, nozzle!)

The infuriating thing?
it's printed successfully with the configuration, twice in the last hour!
I only need it to print this thing 6 times...

and I feel the answer's staring me in the face...
and I know its not the k8200s fault; its got to be operator stupidness.
80mm is, I'm told, slow by many standards.
And, the machine has been tuned by pros 3 times...
It's just not feeding correctly - too little if any extrusion, then, too much that blurts out in dobs...

I'll get there, and hopefully sort it
then I'll be able to reliably bring some awesome to market in a decent time.

A what if.. taking mesh from a cloud and making into a thing at home 2

Howdy wafflers!
Today's random discussion is about the limitations of acquiring meshes from the interwebs, and expecting those same meshes to instantly be 'print ready' for the k8200 or other printers.

The thing is, for the standard Everyuser of in-home rapid 3D prototyping machines,
commonly known as 3D printers,
theres this unwritten implicit expectation that, anything that can be imagined or seen, can be quickly made at home on the in-home printer, and as a competitive option, to other combinatorial methods/approaches.
This is far from the case.

So, we have as an example only, the context of some Makerbot, and k8200 users who ask some hypotheticals. "what if hypothetically, I wanted to hypothetically make some geometry for my own private collection... what hypothetical margins and constraints are involved in that hypothetical (other considerations notwithstanding contemporaneously).

The hypothetical also wants a shapemakerways level of detail, and wants the object for sake of argument to be 70%infill or more solid - they want a solid, difficult to transport cube of plastic, because they can (cue Portal Theme).

-----
above: a borgish Escher cube by an awesome devart user 'Magmarama'
1.38million poly model.
the light blue lines are "non-manifold' zones,
the voids on all faces are potential 'haywire' zones.

This cube is within the maximum size constraint for the particular rig print area -
so, it could be 147mm^3,
or it could be the 1/5000 scale* of upto 687mm^3 (as another rig has a ~2m print area, at 0.1mm consistency, and 0.1d loss per 4mm rise (so, the final cube will be 7degree distorted, assuming no other error).
It took on my rig, 48mins to raw import,
a further 2.3hrs to mesh correct and slicer (raw)

the result?
it would take 490560.37hours of continuous printing, (thats 8 years straight, and change)
require 24m^2 of plastic (thats enough to make a gahzillion other objects)
and the printer app even warned the printer would have parts failure if the print were to go ahead.
The cost estimate?
the plastic alone for that would be ~$300USD, plus the electricity, the running time, the apparently replacement 3D printers the printing app cautioned,
and taking 8 years turn around time minimum (plus, after all that, assuming no haywire, it would still need to be lit and painted properly)...

This hypothetical thought experiment, and excellent question, makes clear that;
1) it is cheaper to buy the mass-produce rotary moulded kits etc, or the resin void molded kits. (800% cheaper)
2) it is quicker to buy the other option, (40000 times quicker turnaround time)
3) it is more cost effective to buy the other option or use combined other methods (you can buy cube shaped structure for ~30USD)
4) ultrahigh polycount models are difficult to print (good luck not melting your computer if you use a raw import of files 40 000 poly or higher to print)
5) many meshes available directly online are not insta-printable, and require simplifications and mesh repair or to be broken into more components (ie, not a solid object).

Thanks for reading,
and I'm keen to hear your waffles and experiences with trying to make 3D objects cost effectively and in home. How do you make different shapes?
Do you find printing curves on a k8200 or thermal extruder to be challenging? (how do you avoid unwanted steps and uneven curved surfaces?)

StarTrekWars StarWarsTrek rant 2

There's been a glut of crossover gunk at the moment,
and much as people have effaced and usurped the 'nerd' moniker (a pejorative, similar to a racially charged epithet starting also with N.... neither of which ought be used still in language).
So, as local trekker and Warser? (pre disney and K.Kennedy) say, its time to push back.
What follows is the first sardonic parody salvo in that direction,
in the fine tradition of Space Balls and Traumschiff Surprise...

Sadly, with JJbrams at the helm... a crossover at cinema of SW:ST is not far off.
JJBrams and JWhedon J-teamup to bring us the greatest StarWarsTrek movie-length episode that never happened... or is that StarTrekWars? (the advertising campaign hypes up as much hatred and foment in the fanbase as possible, to polarize and force them to watch the stuff and buy the crud... cashcowmilking 101, spluh)
Replete with simultaneously playing clashing music - a hybrid medley of TOS theme and SW opening march.

StarTrekWars, Episode ∞+1
'The Trouble With Crossovers"
While re-aligning the dilythium crystals, Scotty accidentally sneezes,
knocking the crystals out of alignment and back into an active warpdrive.
The JJPrise Transhyperspacetimewarps, [i]Traumschiff Surprise[/i] Style,
and emerges into a mirror universe galaxy far far away.
JJPrise collides with Chu'unthor, the jedi temple ship, which is also on an exploration mission near some strange swamp planet in the far outer rim... 300 years prior to the events of SW Episode 1.
A younger Yoda is aboard...

Captain Kirk refuses to believe in 'The Force", and acquires blasters instead of phasers, preparing to remain in the Warsverse...
Spock makes one-liners about the massive energies and strange materials involved.
(as per http://www.stardestroyer.net/Empire/ , Kaku and Dr Curtis Saxton http://www.mssl.ucl.ac.uk/~cjs2/)

Meanwhile, Uhuru discovers she has become force sensitive (but remembers what happened to Gary Mitchell, so she stays quiet and makes mischief with the force),
Sulu must dissuade Chekov from turning to the darkside, as Chekov is possessed by the darkside...

Scotty finds something better than a tricorder, and Scotty+ R2D2 ditch C3P0 with McCoy...

Elsewhen,
Some tribbles metastasize with 'midichlorians' and Yuuzhan Vong spores, and mutate into a Buu-like (homage to Dragon Ball Z) creature, and these team up with some SWfringe faction to form some sith-like event... The Darkside Awakens...

Spock and Yoda and a bunch of scientist characters we've never seen before (played by Andy Serkis and Lady Gaga)
figure out that the SW universe is made of AntiAntiMatter relative to the ST universe, and vice versa, and so find a way to get home... cutting off forever the separate universes.
|Spock and Yoda secretly agree its best to 'mindwipe' everyone of the event, so once they're back, they mindwipe everyone involved...|

Lensflares, explosions and swiss-army-lightsabers ensue,
production cost: 280 million+.
Earnings at boxoffice worldwide in 18months post release: 45 Million.

NB;
this evolved over a period of a few months, and i cannot claim full authorship as I'm putting ink to paper of a bunch of ideas,
as people at the freethinkers clubs were being lectured by newcomers and one-session wonders,
about how 'racist' the original Star Treks or Star Wars were...
TELL THAT TO THE ALIENS FROM THE OTHER PLANETS IN THE SPACEFAIRYTALES...

Mylar Lifter project concept redux

Howdy!
This is a waffle with pictures, exploring modes of RC/"drone" (and I do use that term in this context lightly, with contempt heh) and making/displaying models.

Some of you may be familiar with novelty desk toys, such as a British Timelord's desktop ride toy,
or maglev toys etc...
some may also have seen RC and model rockets/jets with a Trek theme...
others may have also seen German, Japanese and American blimps for parades/ambiance...

I think though, what AST people were wanting,
was a type of Mylar Lifter, and a lightweight model upto 1KG, that can affordably hold up the model or display the model in motion, for a while...

and as we've discussed elsewhere here, it might be feasible.
checkout the RI and MIT vids, Googler and TedX vids (on new batteries, memory plastics, propulsion systems, PCB replacements, etc),
and GilbondFac on youtube - that guy is a genius!

Above: a crude system sketch for the RC/display internals of a 'levitating model'. Not to scale, wires and batteries not shown.
The actual model might have more, or fewer Mylar Lifters, fans/propulsion systems, or battery zones... the makeup of the model may also necessitate different placement.
Also not shown are 'magnetic bumpers' which would prevent collisions from close-formation flying via repulsion with the other craft... (potentially a tactic for dogfighting).

So, the idea is that the model will have some design considerations;
we can apply the Kipling Method, and SCAMPER at initial concept brainstorm -
ERoEI, heat, EMR and other considerations are factors identified.
we will need lithium lightweight battery, or preferably graphene newtype battery (weight, 8.9grams, charge time: 8hours)
the internals and outer model shell cannot weigh more than 500-800 grams at this time, system total mass, for the object to satisfy the safety and lift endurance criteria.
Steering would be mapped to a bluetooth/wireless controller (of PS or XBOX style variety), or an RC controller - and would function similarly to RC planes or 'tanks'
pushing left on the joystick would slow the right side fans, increase rightside mylar lifter lift rate and lower left liftrate...
pushing up would increase the fan speed, and would increase the bridge mylar lifter more than the tail lifters (but all would increase).
pushing down would kill the mylar lifters and slow the fans... etc.

Of course, later, the movement patterns could be refined to reflect the motion capabilities we saw on screen. The idea is that, the vehicle will be able to fly for say, 1-3 hours, before needing a rapid-recharge from an induction pad that the ship can land on. It could even be programmed to be a 'floating display'.

The project concept is to have as much verisimilitude/good design finish to the on-screen vehicle as possible, while also being able to 'fly' the model for a long time, preferably in display with other space models - without wires or display stands.
This means no external propellors, or blimp lift bags, or wires.
Noise and health concerns are also a consideration.

Well, thats my rough ideas perspective and feedback for your concept -
bear in mind, I am a lay person, and haven't tested this, but for back-of-the-envelope,
I think this is plausible, would meet much of your criteria and budget envisaged,
and I am certain that Infomechatronics/puppeteers or local RC model clubs or 3D rapid manufacture clubs at your local uni. would be able to help you explore this even further.

Lets Talk Drinks; Ginger, Chilli, etc...

Howdy!
Don't worry, this won't be hocking the wonders of plants in the manner of mistletoe or elderberry...
the pseudo-spiritual, sorta para medical properties of plants... no.
I leave that to the fringe, as its their realm.
This is just a subjective reflection on some of those fleeting properties of 'taste' - subtleties that are highly subjective and differ person to person...

This is just sharing a few reflections on how awesome some plants are,
such as Ginger or Chilli - be sure to comment or inbox with your preferred plants and their uses or taste.

Recently, we made a punch? a spritz? some concoction,
using Ginger Brew, Cranberry (from your choice of provider), Pineapple juice concentrate (canned or fresh - unsweetened), and then water + ice.
The ratio was: 1-1-1.5/2:2:1, so, one part ginger with one part cranberry, one part pineapple, then double the sum of all of those worth of water (sparkling, tap, fresh, whatever water you like), with about 1 part worth of ice.
We chilled this, till it was an icey consistency.
It was awesome, not to sugary... maybe a little initially bitter, but with an excellent aftertaste.
 While awesome non-alcoholic, it could also be adapted into a margarita or an alcoholic.

The more adventurous of the group tried infusing the beverages with differing types of tea -
camomile and dandelion, red chai and black tea... the results were mixed, though Earl Grey seemed to work excellently. Further cola-experiments, using nutrisweet/stevia... will be ongoing. We hope these produce tasty AND consumable results.

I prefer my drinks to have a little ginger in them, just a bit.

I've found that,
if you crush 3 varieties of ginger, and add these to Pepsi or to Generic Cola, the result is - "How Pepsi used to taste circa 1980s-1990s". The ratio is 1 part crushed ginger pulp/juice to 7 parts cola. This seems to have the same taste as traditional sodas. Asian ginger varieties add to the flavor, resulting in a hazelnut aftertaste being detected if the ratio becomes closer to 1:6.
Cokecola made no taste difference in the sample group and control group with or without the ginger, or with or without being served in the glass cup or plastic - which was an unexpected outcome - people 'know their CokeCola", and the CokeCola seems to overpower the ginger or make no effect (be neutralised by the Coke's acidity).

It gets better!
There's a variety of non-alcoholic and alcoholic beverages available from Castle Glen; their "ginger brew" is among the finest in the world, and certainly seems coincident with preventing or lessening a cold. The ginger is not overpowering or too bitter, and is quite pleasant.
Because this beverage is sparkling, it provides a much better mix agent for making coca-cola like it used to be - the slight side-effect being a simple glass of Cola becomes both an alcoholic beverage (~1 standard drink per glass), AND the sugar content rises to 66g per glass - not for the diabetic-in-waiting.

Turning to chilli -
I find the best part of chillis and spicy food, apart from being great at making food interesting,
is that I feel chilli helps to lose weight - it might only be marginal water weight, but you feel like you have more "pep and vigor with chilli in yer".
Another Castle Glen beverage, retired now I believe (though who said Dragon's Breath or Dragon's Blood liqueur could retire? how can it survive these days, without income coming in... certainly, it doesn't qualify for a pension... bring back the Dragon's Blood Liqueur I say!)
this beverage, while stock standard being somewhat warm and spicy, and a little alcoholic...

with after market chillis and paprika/spices... can become a truly fire spewing beverage not for the faint of heart. Chocolate Bhutlas, capsicum concentrate and other wonders make the drink an anaphylactic timebomb... even for those who like their spicy stuff. All cultures cough and splutter helplessly when exposed to the "weapon of mass-reentry-burning"; even those renowned for stomaching spicy foods, such as South American, Thai/Asian, and Indian...

The drink must be consumed within 3 or 4 months... as it will begin to pickle and actual loses its heat potency: the decay sets in, and the beverage becomes sugary at first, with an 18month shelf life leading to a vinegary paste barely useable as a cooking vinegar (and certainly not for human consumption, unless drinking pure vinegar is your thing).

When I have a cold in its first stages, such as with a sore throat or a sniffley nose,
drinking the Dragon's Blood helps to completely alleviate the cold in my case.
It is gone in a flash of heat, and it has staved off the cold many a time.
Constipated? Not a problem... this Dragon's Blood from Castle Glen is sure to get your innards moving. Its much better than prune juice or other laxative options, much more fast acting, though with a drawback of that re-entry burn...

Apart from that,
The Dragon's Blood is a much more leveling beverage, separating the adults from the immature -
while many can drink their boilermakers and jaegerbombs, bingedrinking their way into carcinogenic oblivion and an early grave,
comparatively few can stomach the Dragon's Blood, even a simple shot let alone a full glass...
or endure the re-entry burn they know to be coming.
Its the best party drink to give to "friends"(frenemies if we're being honest), or to those ultra-competitive types.

Reflections on A.I. part n'th

Howdy!

This is a ramble, a waffle (a tangential spiral around) about A.I.
- what people want to see realised, what people dislike etc.

So, some awesome stuff to read as context would be Chomsky, Hugo de Garis, Kurzweil, "Library of Babel" from Jorge Borges, Encyclopedia Galactica concept from Sagan, etc...
there are 7-9 unique approaches minimum at the moment, which are working towards the realisation of artificial intelligence or new lifeforms.

People want A.I. to initially, operate and replicate the way in which people do things -
we want A.I. to read 'properly', to have a consistency of presence, a sense of self...
we want A.I. to perceive and navigate the depths of combinatorial linguistics and understand what we mean...

From a constructivist standpoint, this is why so many are disappointed by how AI is modelled and function presently, because the AI is not accurately approaching how meaning is made or formed...

This is because, words are actually a floating point and interdependent variable - they take their meanings from words around them. Each word has associated arrays; a synonym array, a meanings array, a context array, a recurrence/incidence array...
Each of these arrays is theoretically unbounded and infinite - we impose 'babushka limits' onto each of these arrays via socio-cultural constructs, so as to alter how meanings are formed etc... the order is only important in these arrays under certain circumstances, otherwise these arrays are orderless/randomly ordered...
    So, we place a limit on the average number of characters we permit - a human lifetime, or Franz Kafka's Metamorphosis for example (a 40 page + run on sentence). these limits are socio-cultural constructs, which are a set of values 'intuitively arrived at'.
We place a limit on what are 'legitimate words' from a combinatorial field based on the base characters of a language - this number can be larger than N^x, where n might be 26! and x might be a googolplex.... a MASSIVE number.
In practice though, there might be a recursion limit based on the limits that constructs apply, if the 'babushka limits' theory holds, such that N might be smaller, and X might be much smaller, to the order of hundreds of billions...

we place further limits on typos, on recursiveness, and further on 'grammar'...
this then forms the rules for what is effable/expressable, and the field of 'what is knowably knowable and expressible in a given language'.
 --- this eschews the problem of "meaningful meaninglessness', or the cryptographic problem - that potential for an apparently 'meaningless' string to contain a meaning on some higher order reading or layer of abstraction...

So, when modeled in 5D topology, and arranged for color by frequency distribution or per layer of meaning abstraction, a language appears to be a very flat/smooth area, with very small spikes, consistently a homeomorphic shape that changes seemingly little over a macroscopic timeframe reference frame, given all the constructs and inherent uncertainties in each...
language is a huge manifold, but a manifold none-the-less...

There are some problems though.
we want our AI to be more than just a psuedo-random Markov Chain Monte Carlo process, which is constrained based on input string size etc... we want our AI to actually read sentences for meaning, and produce meaningful outputs which are not necessarily proportional to the size of a given input.

we want A.I. to be able to produce insights into problems, to be able to define their own fields and arrays and to pose hypotheticals of a high degree of complexity.

These are more meaningful than a "Turing Test", or several other quantitative tests based on breadth of knowledge an A.I. has... as fundamentally, on one level, all sentient lifeforms can be seen to be a pseudo-random Markov Chain process, or Thue-Morse processes, iterating through fields of 'knowable knowledge', and combinatorial linguistics.

Its things such as recursive sets, low discrepancy sequences (and correspondence of meaningfulness from one sentence to the next within a conversation, etc) and that capacity to learn... that are at play.
We want a sense of verisimilitude, at least initially, from A.I.

Eventually, A.I. will surpass human and perhaps posthuman capacities, and ascend further up the Kardashev Civilisational scale. it will do so based on a self awareness and ability to make meaning...
everything will be bound by 'absolute intelligence' and by ERoEI... nothing that is real can exceed an absolute intelligence limit, at this time, such as the tentative "Bremermann's Limit", and not fall prey to a causality provenance/falsifiability problem .

I'm keen to hear what you think about that,
what do you think needs to happen to model A.I. and increase verisimilitude in interactions/thought processes - comment here or email anywhen, as this is a great ideas-bouncing topic that cuts to epistemology etc... and so many people are asking similar questions with the advent of RAMONA or SIRI or EVIE etc...
This also changes for each set of language modelling done, so English yields different things to German or Sinoxenic languages etc... 
A hallmark of A.I. sentience will be the formation of their own meaningful discourse, perhaps on many layers... or the ability to alter the underlying constraints in a stable/consistent way.

PS
some suggest that AIML isn't rigorous enough for the large arrays and concurrent operations that might be needed.
are there other programming scripts/languages which are as or more rigorous than AIML? any insights you have to offer will be invaluable.