Neural networks

So yeah, this is the topic I´m working on now. Sounds pretty cool doesn´t it?

In fact, Neural Networks is an optional course in computer engineering. And it is so, optional, so many many will miss it. It´s a pity, though others will consider it a salvation.

What is this stuff? Well, Neural networks is a relatively modern branch derived from AI (Artificial Intelligence yo, dummies). In a sentence: It´s the computational representation of human brain. But this definition is way too far from what a human brain really is, since we do not know anything about human brains yet, or at least not as much to create a 'bionic' copy of it, and make it work out.

Aside, it´s been possible to emulate the behavior of a biological neuron. You know, the electrical pulses between connections, and that chemical substance in between where knowledge is somehow stored. (Remember from the school?). So if a neuron can be emulated, then a whole bunch of them can be emulated creating subnets, nets and so forth. The drawback is the human brain is formed by millions of millions of these little things... Up to now, computers cannot store a representation of an entire human brain network. (Not unless we tile the entire planet with ram memory slots and connect each other to finally reach a mother board).

As far as I know neural networks are used to pattern detection, imagery, function approximation and error detection in industrial processes. Real application are Cancer detection, missile targeting, or character recognition.

Playing around with them under Matlab environment (You engineers should know about the program) tought me they are pretty powerful tools. Basically it´s like raise a little brain as baby, teach it with some kind of data (Images of lung cancer, for example) and then try its response inputting a testing parameter (A new lung cancer image) and see if the network has learned something. It usually does!!

All right, enough engineering for today. Listen to some punk, it will cheer you upright to heaven... ;)

Highway Donkey

Today, my message is clear and punctual.

"I´m not going down the highway
I've got the might to stop and turn around before it's too late

Instead I'm slowly going my way
If I don't reach the top I still have loads here I appreciate"

No sense at all, part II

Sparring some minutes more, thinking deeply about what had happened, I decided to flee. My clothes turned dry as I walked. The sun rose high by then, and I was even getting a little suffocated in the end. I went in the town, turned couple of corners and found myself walking down my street.

No one on sight. The less crowded the better, I said. If someone saw me like that: wet-dry, dry-wet, I would have been a nice topic to talk about during the endless summer afternoons with some neighbors in a bench in shade.

I was about to get to my door, when the purple blue door at front opened. Terah came out talking with someone inside,and shut up when could take a glance at me. She frowned and smirked like saying "Boy, you'll never change". Terah was an old girlfriend, well, at least we both thought we were "together" four years ago. Our relationship ended after accomplishing a stupid chain of childish kisses, shamefulness and impetuous making-outs in the dark, afar others' glances. She was gorgeous, her body slender and curvy. Her breasts perfect. I usually come to her in my mind, but only seeking for old memories that could turn me on, just for the pleasure of imagining she was still mine.

Anyway, I did not say much and enter. My heart almost bumped out my chest.

There it was, on the kitchen table, in the perfect middle of it like saying "ey! how is it going": The earring of the cliff.

It took me a while to come around again. First blinking in a frenzy, then rubbing eyes attempting to figure out what the heck was going on...
I got closer, step by step, my eyes fixed on the object that almost killed me atop that damned cliff. A feeling of distrust invaded me. My feet pinned to the floor. The thought injected into my brain like an acid jab between the eyes: "Look what happened on the cliff when you tried to pick the thing up. You almost got killed! Why it should be different this time?". My hand backed off slowly. In the distance, I squinted at the object. That couldn´t be true. Someone might be pulling my leg... till the point of murdering me.

An odd snap flew from the stairs. From where I was standing I couldn´t see' em since the inner kitchen door was ajar. I snapped at the door knob. I was not alone at home.

Simplest RPG ever... cards!!

Today, I've got a good topic which deserves a mention here, at my blog :)
It has to be with RPG (Rol playing games) and cards, two things usually bound together. (Mental note, talk about RPGs in another post, though maybe I'll need four or five... ).

We all know that some RPG's develop their own cards in order to make them playable, and easier than their older brothers based on complex rules written in manuals.

I thought the simplest form of RPG was "playing a role", or just "being an actor", both typical games at early ages. But that doesn't involve chances or mishaps, as though dices determine, for instance.

Today I hit on an idea while playing cards with my little cousin. We pretended that she was reading my future over cards, simply taking out one from the deck and making up the story. As you may know, the main aces on the Spanish deck are Coins, Clubs, Swords and Cups (weird, I know). Well, my "fortuneteller" took in mind the following assets:

Coins: Fortune, money, reputation, good stuff
Cups: lust, leisure, laziness, pleasure, drunk as hell
Clubs: beat-ups, violence, bad things to me
Swords: Kind of a mixture between pointed objects and Chinese acupuncture, but in the end they represented the law, justice, the cops.

We ended up making the story of my life, beginning earning money but balancing it by frittering away the income in nightclubs and drinks, followed by starting out a business consisting on a sect of depraved members, wherein new guys never stopped to join in. That enriched me, and my life turned into a mafia dog-eat-dog style whose end was hardly predictable. However the police came after me, busting the entire association down into jail.

The cool thing is we two got a nice flying-free moment laughing at our own inventions, with the add-up of depending on the randomness of discovering new cards each time, and using their value (1 to 12) to deem the impact of it.

Just like RPG at its simplest essence!!

King's wisdom

The following text was created during my stay in Burlington, VT USA. It describes how an elf king feels at the verge of battle against Melkor's forces, on an fictional place and moment. Quite influenced by Tolkien's books, but also by a folk-metal band called Elvenking. Enjoy.

As part of the ancient world,
as good being amongst all creatures
I daresay no evil harms me
no ghoulish thought has ever taken
place in my mind, though I've not the
need of beholding such inexistent weakness,
neither of my sons shall be vanished to that doom
since gods bestowed my rage of elvish nature

Then when time to fight arrives, and
weapons must be released from their sheaths,
this beloved pride of race comes to me,
like sunshine after storm, making my eyes and
my spirit bright in a magic whirl of purity
which neither dirt nor darkness may bind.

At the border of the barren skirt, where battle
shall be delivered, I hand the hilt of my long sword
'Aelah inne', sister of ancient elven smiths, given as memory
of old and keeper of all the good things on earth, which
one simple touch to her makes me feel that no fear or worrisome
can chase me down.

There they come, wrapped about darkness and terrible evil,
running over the fallen, cracking, thumping, as mass of tort through the gorge.
Melkor's offspring, born to slay, to torment and overwhelm
elves and men, whose end is to finally dip us in death and sharp sorrow,
now I say: "You shall not pass through this point while I'm standing
on my feet, because no wicked creature has ever crossed the frontier
of my parent's realms in which evil has no further concealling.
My sword is eager to know of those bold enough to face her.

Time to war is upon us, brothers"
Soldiers turned arround to gaze at me, less fear within their eyes.
"for the death oath that bound us since our birth, for all the beautiful
things of this world that you love and that love you with same devotion,
For our women, now praying hard skywards to our safety, and for Arda and the Valar,
our gods, who give these prayers back in truth. For our honor, duty and own lifes,
now I claim you, brothers: To battle!"