Is this invoking a practical application of the old "Million Monkeys with Typewriters" metaphor? Beautiful!

I don't see any reason why this can't happen with other things. You just need to construct an accurate interface that people can play with. I doubt Spore gives any insight into biology (other than that most players, if given Deistic powers, would create planets composed solely of sentient penises) whatsoever, for instance. This sort of thing, on the other hand, looks like it would be totally over the head of the average Joe.

The reason this worked rather than just brute force computation is because protein folding efforts benefit from having a certain intuition for how proteins structure themselves that you just can't program into a computer.

For a lot of other scientific problems, you don't have the same benefit from intuition. It's just grinding out results from inputs.

http://www.galaxyzoo.org/
http://mps-expenses.guardian.co.uk/
http://phylo.cs.mcgill.ca/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia

Too much data + too few scientists + people bored and randomly clicking shit = SUCCESS!!!

I'm actually working on a few projects like these. Lots of resistance from the incumbents ("no one has time for that!" and "no one will want to participate!" or "who actually cares about this?!") but idgaf science man.

>>3885
"idgaf science" is actually a good term that deserves the recognition that this phenomenon defines. Millions of bored and interested people just looking to play with shit. That also happens to serve a positive scientific purpose.

My only issue with this kind of mass use is I'm afraid that eventually people will realize these advancements and this research will just go to saving billionaires the price of investing in researchers or scientists, who'll then patent medicines that don't make us any healthier but deal with the symptoms of a disease.

I've tried this and Phylo, but can't say I have any aptitude for either.

My 3D problem solving isn't great and with Phylo, I seriously can barely conceive how anything would be more efficient that just smashing everything into the sides. The fact that they give you a time limit is super-fucking annoying too. Not everyone works best under pressure.

>>3886

>treating symptoms, not causes

Are you ready for a like 10,000,000 page response on the huge clusterfuck going on right now in multiple fields of biological, social, and behavioral science regarding this issue?

Because I have like 9 of them.

>>3888

Ah yes, because clearly the best method to remedy the cause is to simply exterminate all of mankind. See? No more sick people. Ever again.

>>3889

The problem isn't treating symptoms per se, it's when "there is a symptom, therefore this is the cause" that's filling modern medicine and therapy with completely unscientific and entirely possibly harmful junk.

>you have ["disease," "disorder," "syndrome"]!
>ok, what makes you say that?
>because you exhibit [generic symptom]!
>ok, but why?
>because...you have ["disease," "disorder," "syndrome"]!
>uh, ok...are there any isolated genetic precursors?
>no
>are there any consistent physiological/biochemical differences between those diagnosed with ["disease," "disorder," "syndrome"] and those not?
>no
>then...what?
>HOW CAN YOU NOT BE GETTING THIS YOU MUST HAVE ["disease," "disorder," "syndrome"]!TAKE THESE DRUGS GET THIS SURGERY BUY THIS BOOK

Giving a "medical" diagnosis with a 100% absence of a medical cause is HORSE SHIT, yet somehow this persists.

>>3893
Most of that is being done not by doctors, but by writers/publishers, drug companies, Internet Psychiatrists, and hypochondriacs.

>>3888
I would like to read the one where intelligent people with credibility in the field go on Intellectual Rampages™ on the issue, sure.
It might be a little cathartic, because sometimes I lay in bed and stare at the ceiling, just angry rich people can harvest publically available research, rush to the patent office, compromise the field of medicine and make their bread in pitching crap to sick people.

>>3895
>wishes the corps would fund more antibiotics instead of methylating viagra again.
>Image related

>>3899
Not even just that. I'd like if we pumped more money into stem cell research, now that we have 'moral quandry free' ways of harvesting and farming them from fat cells, your own skin cells, your own nasal-something cells, and farm them from your own blood.

I'd like if we'd put all the money we put into new medicines into researching and studying the ways one fucking wrong gene can turn a normal person into a pathetic puddle of human sick. I'd like if we'd stop getting heartbreaking human conditions like this. http://isites.harvard.edu/fs/docs/icb.topic965832.files/Lesch_Nyhan_New%20Yorker.pdf

Instead we have the field of pharmacology keeping us on an island to suck as much blood as possible in the name of business, but not medicine.

>>3900
>Instead we have the field of pharmacology keeping us on an island to suck as much blood as possible in the name of business, but not medicine.

Dude.

Shut.
Up.

I know people who study pharmacology and I have met and talked with people who dedicated their lives and careers to the science. And I can tell you that you could not be farther from the truth here. I find your cynicism incredibly offensive and completely unfounded.

>>3901
Yeah, blame the guys who hold the purse strings, not the guys actually doing the work.

>>3903
It seemed to me that that was implicit in what Ram was saying.

>>3900

That's messed up. Hopefully genetic reprogramming can fix something like that someday.

>>3901

I doubt you know everyone in the field. Personally, I see problems where a company or institution develops and markets a new drug that doesn't work as well as ones that have already existed for years. Less effective, more side effects, etc. That's what makes it seem like at least some drug researchers are just in it for the money. I don't know about the guy you replied to, but for me, don't take it personally. Of course there are plenty of good, selfless people in the field; there wouldn't be half as many obscure drugs without their good work.

>>3901
And knowing some noble miners doesn't excuse the fact their bosses use strip mines and don't care where the shit goes. The workers and actual muscle may sometimes be in it for noble causes, but the guys cashing the big money only care about keeping the money coming.

What I'm saying is we've milked the titties of public research and turned it into perpetual 'treat the symptom, ignore the cause' medicine long enough.

Partially why I find protein folding so interesting. Because if enough of it gets done, maybe it'll speed up the process of actually finding cures.

Ninja. Hay Ninja. Ninja. Ninja. Hay. Ninja. Ninja.
Hay.
Ninja.
Hay Ninja.


post links to articles talking about doctors raging over the current system, plz.