Forever Becoming

Who's steering the ship?

Once, the fate of the human race might have been in the hands of the well-adjusted, the social ones, the masters of emotion. Now all that is getting upgraded.

[Richard Powers]
The Overstory, p. 121

If you spend your key formative years on a screen the autism gene is far more likely to be activated.

[Dave Snowden]

'Sensemaking & Complexity, Dave Snowden'

Technics is eternal and immortal like God the Father, it delivers mankind like God the Son, and it illumines us like God the Holy Ghost.

And its worshipper is the progress-philistine of the modern age which runs from La Mettrie to Lenin.

[Oswald Spengler]

Man and Technics, p. 67

“Science Explores, Technology Executes, Mankind Conforms”—the motto of the 1933 Chicago World’s Fair—was for all practical purposes the battle cry of the managerial aristocracy.

[John Michael Greer]
'Tomorrowland Has Fallen!'

If the immediate need of the State is to pay some attention to the existence of the earth, there really seems no reason why the eyes of the schoolmasters and schoolboys, staring at the stars, should not be turned in the direction of that planet.

At present we have education, not indeed for angels, but rather for aviators. They do not even understand a man’s wish to remain tied to the ground. There is in their ideal an insanity that may truly be called unearthly.

[G. K. Chesterton]

The Outline of Sanity, p. 110

It is very easy to fall into the notion that if the new is viable, then there must have been something wrong with the old. This view, to which organisms already suffering the pathologies of over-rapid, frantic social change are inevitably prone, is, of course, mostly nonsense.

What is always important is to be sure that the new is not worse than the old.

It is still not certain that a society containing the internal combustion engine can be viable or that electronic communication devices such as television are compatible with the aggressive intraspecies competition generated by the Industrial Revolution.

Other things being equal (which is not often the case), the old, which has been somewhat tested, is more likely to be viable than the new, which has not been tested at all.

[Gregory Bateson]
Mind and Nature, p. 194-5

Are we heading toward a future where the barriers between linear and interactive entertainment come down?

Hmm, I don't know, I've not given it a lot of thought. I suppose you will get some form of convergence when the act of watching games is sufficiently fun. And we're getting closer to that. Games like LA Noire and Max Payne are pretty fun and spectacular to watch. A lot of people have said to me that they love playing LA Noire with their partners – that is a baby step toward convergence. Certainly there are areas of the multiplayer mode that are moving in a similar direction.

But again, we're so focused on what we have to do this week, this month, we don't have the time to think about that.

My job is to get the bloody game done and survive in the process. People often ask why don't you go to games conferences – we don't have the bloody time! This is relentless!

Grand Theft Auto 5: Rocktar's Dan Houser on Los Santos and the future

Innovations become irreversibly adopted into the on-going system without being tested for long-time viability; and necessary changes are resisted by the core of conservative individuals without any assurance that these particular changes are the ones to resist.

Individual comfort and discomfort become the only criteria for choice of social change and the basic contrast of logical typing between member and the category is forgotten until new discomforts are (inevitably) created by the new state of affairs.

Fear of individual death and grief propose that it would be 'good' to eliminate epidemic disease and only after 100 years of preventive medicine do we discover that the population is overgrown. And so on.

[Gregory Bateson]
Mind and Nature, p. 238

Levy has very little time for jokes. Or, it turns out, for philosophy.

“Are humans machines?” I ask him. He tells me he’s learned not to try to answer philosophical questions.

Ethics, however, he’s interested in. “People ask: is it cheating? Only if women using vibrators are cheating. Will sex workers be put out of business? It’s possible.” What about bigger issues though – what about sex and empathy? And: can a robot consent? “When AI advances, robots will exhibit empathy. People will feel towards them as they do towards animals.”

Sex, love and robots: is this the end of intimacy?

It is hard for us to break out of this circle of increasing needs because our age is remarkably preoccupied with the vision of continually improving means rather than saving ourselves trouble by reflecting on ends.

The difficulty is to […] criticise properly the various visions constantly arising in us. We need to compare those visions, to articulate them more clearly, to be aware of changes in them, to think them through so as to see what they commit us to.

This is not itself scientific business, though of course scientists need to engage in it. It is necessarily philosophic business (whoever does it) because it involves analysing concepts and attending to the wider structures in which those concepts get their meaning. It starts with the fuller articulation of imaginative visions and moves on later to all kinds of more detailed thought, including scientific thought.

That is why all science grows out of philosophical thinking - out of the criticism of imaginative visions - why it takes that criticism for granted and always continues to need it.

All science includes philosophic assumptions that can be questioned and those assumptions don't stop being influential just because they have been forgotten. They lie under the floorboards of all intellectual schemes. Like the plumbing, they are really quite complicated, they often conflict, and they can only be ignored so long as we don't happen to notice those conflicts.

[Mary Midgley]
Science and Poetry, p.49, 50

The people who say that artificial intelligence is not a problem tend to work in artificial intelligence.

Many prominent researchers regard Bostrom’s basic views as implausible, or as a distraction from the near-term benefits and moral dilemmas posed by the technology—not least because A.I. systems today can barely guide robots to open doors.

Last summer, Oren Etzioni, the C.E.O. of the Allen Institute for Artificial Intelligence, in Seattle, referred to the fear of machine intelligence as a “Frankenstein complex.” Another leading researcher declared,

“I don’t worry about that for the same reason I don’t worry about overpopulation on Mars.”

The Doomsday Invention: Will artificial intelligence bring us utopia or destruction?

“He was ultra-consistent,” Daniel Hill, a British philosopher who befriended Bostrom while they were graduate students in London, told me. “His interest in science was a natural outgrowing of his understandable desire to live forever, basically.”

Bostrom has written more than a hundred articles, and his longing for immortality can be seen throughout. In 2008, he framed an essay as a call to action from a future utopia. “Death is not one but a multitude of assassins,” he warned. “Take aim at the causes of early death—infection, violence, malnutrition, heart attack, cancer. Turn your biggest gun on aging, and fire. You must seize the biochemical processes in your body in order to vanquish, by and by, illness and senescence. In time, you will discover ways to move your mind to more durable media.” He tends to see the mind as immaculate code, the body as inefficient hardware—able to accommodate limited hacks but probably destined for replacement.

[...] The view of the future from Bostrom’s office can be divided into three grand panoramas. In one, humanity experiences an evolutionary leap—either assisted by technology or by merging into it and becoming software—to achieve a sublime condition that Bostrom calls “posthumanity.” Death is overcome, mental experience expands beyond recognition, and our descendants colonize the universe.

The Doomsday Invention: Will artificial intelligence bring us utopia or destruction?

“I think political systems will use it to terrorize people,” Hinton said. Already, he believed, agencies like the N.S.A. were attempting to abuse similar technology.

“Then why are you doing the research?” Bostrom asked.

“I could give you the usual arguments,” Hinton said. “But the truth is that the prospect of discovery is too sweet.” He smiled awkwardly, the word hanging in the air—an echo of Oppenheimer, who famously said of the bomb,

“When you see something that is technically sweet, you go ahead and do it, and you argue about what to do about it only after you have had your technical success.”

The Doomsday Invention: Will artificial intelligence bring us utopia or destruction?

Perhaps the most radical of his visions is that superintelligent A.I. will hasten the uploading of minds—what he calls “whole-brain emulations”—technology that might not be possible for centuries, if at all.

Bostrom, in his most hopeful mode, imagines emulations not only as reproductions of the original intellect “with memory and personality intact”—a soul in the machine—but as minds expandable in countless ways.

“We live for seven decades, and we have three-pound lumps of cheesy matter to think with, but to me it is plausible that there could be extremely valuable mental states outside this little particular set of possibilities that might be much better,” he told me.

The Doomsday Invention: Will artificial intelligence bring us utopia or destruction?

The fascination with talking to a computer that could answer any question was always there for me.

[Amit Singhal]
Head of Google Search

In his view, public alarmism over AGI obscures the great potential near-term benefits and is fundamentally misplaced, not least because of the timescale.

“We’re still decades away from anything like human-level general intelligence,” he reminds me. “We’re on the first rung of the ladder. We’re playing games.”

[Demis Hassabis]
Deep Mind Technologies (owned by Google)
The superhero of artificial intelligence: can this genius keep it in check?

Survival is not the principal motive for extending control […] technicians and scientists carry on their work largely as a surrogate activity; that is, they satisfy their need for power by solving technical problems.

They will continue to do this with unabated enthusiasm, and among the most interesting and challenging problems for them to solve will be those of understanding the human body and mind and intervening in their development.

For the “good of humanity,” of course.

[Ted Kaczynski]

Industrial Society and its Future, 164

In reality the passion of the inventor has nothing whatever to do with its consequences. It is his personal motivation in life, his personal joy and sorrow. He wants to enjoy his triumph over difficult problems, and the wealth and fame that it brings him, for their own sake.

Whether his discovery is useful or menacing, creative or distributive, he cares not a jot. Nor indeed is anyone in a position to know this in advance. The effect of a ‘technical achievement of mankind’ is never foreseen […] The electrical transmission of power and the discovery of the possibilities of energy from water have depreciated the old coal areas of Europe and their populations. Have such considerations ever caused an inventor to suppress his discovery? Anyone who imagines this knows little of the beast-of-prey nature of man.

All great discoveries and inventions spring from the delight of strong men in victory. They are expressions of personality and not of the utilitarian thinking of the masses, who are merely spectators of the event, but must take its consequences whatever they may be.

[Oswald Spengler]

Man and Technics, p. 67-8

Yin/Yang

The Colour Wheel

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QUALITY - Who are we?

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Types - Diversity - Position - Relations - Communication - Jigsaw - Connection - Devotion - Order -

Chaos

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Part              -              Whole
Mono             -                      Poly
Absolute          -                      Relative

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1. Connection and Separation

A simple colour wheel may only show a handful of colours, and may separate them, each to its own segment. In separating its colours and attributing labels (“red”, “blue”) it speaks to us about types; about how the things of this world can be separated and categorised. Each takes a position within the wheel. We can describe this kind of wheel as Euclidean, Newtonian, or Classical, and can see it as representing order.

A more complex wheel will show all possible colours, each merging into the other. It reminds us that our categorisations and positions can be ‘seen through’, and transcended; and that, in spite of our boundaries, we are all connected. It suggests that perhaps these boundaries are not as definite as we may take them to be; that they are, at bottom, no more than temporary vessels atop a turbulent sea.

However, it also reminds us that without boundaries there are no colours; that it is only through separating things - saying, 'this part is green, this part is red' - that we are able to see them at all. We can describe this kind of wheel as Non-Euclidean, Einsteinian, or Quantum, and can see it as representing chaos.

2. Point of View

Each colour has its opposite, and yet all are contained within the overall Truth of the wheel. No one colour holds the truth, rather each contributes toward something greater than itself.

All earthly truths are dependent upon our viewpoint, which in turn is defined by our intentions or goals. When we are in red, we may think red to be 'true' and green to be 'untrue'; yet when we move to green the truth moves with us. This points toward the idea that all things are true and at the same time untrue, and that our 'truths' are relative: what is true for you may not be true for me.

We can define relative truth as "Things as the highest reason of Man understands them."

Yet some believe that there is a Truth - with a capital 'T' - that transcends both of us, in which our differences are united. This is absolute Truth, and it is not relative, nor contigent upon our individual viewpoint.

We can define absolute Truth as "things as the mind of God knows them."

Thus, when all colours are merged together they produce the pure white of Truth. If any are left out then the picture is incomplete: all are necessary.

3. Relationship

The colours of the wheel sit in relation to one another, merging, mingling and communicating. Thus, the wheel can also be used to think about relationship; the relationship between individuals - colour to colour (opposing, complementing, neighbouring); and the relationship between part and whole.

4. From centre to outskirts

Some wheels combine the principles of separation and connection. On these wheels the centre is the area of greatest overlap, a place of merging and homogeny. As the wheel radiates the separate colours become more distinct - more saturated - the further they get from the centre. At the edge of the circle the colours are less adulterated, and more ‘unique,’ or pure. If the centre is a complex polychromatic synergy, then the outskirts are altogether more ordered and simple.

We can see the centre as the middle path; that is, the neutral point that mediates between opposites. In this sense, the centre is a position from which the entire wheel - and all its various colours - can be seen dispassionately. When we are at the centre we can move freely in any direction, and so all possibilities are open to us. It is a watery place, with nothing certain to lean upon. Here the colours are ill-defined, their boundaries confused, and they merge into one another, producing new combinations. Its indeterminacy makes it a fertile and latent place, from which novel forms can emerge.

The outskirts, on the other hand, are dry places, with solid forms that can be relied upon - red is red, and green is green; and of that much we can be certain. Things here are clearly defined, with strong borders and strict segregation. They are easily seen, grasped, and known. Enduring familiarity is valued over fleeting novelty.

The boldest examples of each colour are found at the edges, suggesting that the further we travel in one direction the more vividly we manifest the particular colour that we’ve chosen (an idea that has an analogue in Carl Jung's notion of individuation). Looked at this way, extremity is synonymous with differentiation and uniqueness.

However, the further we walk a particular path the harder it is to return to the centre. It is easier for those who are not as devoted to see things dispassionately; for those who are not as attached to be indifferent. Inasmuch as we must devote ourselves to a particular colour, then our challenge is being able, when necessary, to see through this colour; to loosen our grip and to return to a place of impartiality.

The centre is the meeting point, the place where real communication takes place. Here is where all colours merge to produce white (all views merge to produce God's view), suggesting that it is here, and only here, that Truth is to be found.

5. One/Many

In view of the larger balance, it is important that red be red, and green be green; and that neither worry too much about their lack of blue, yellow, purple, and so on. In putting forward an argument (i.e. speaking from a position) it may be tempting to try and make our argument as invulnerable as possible, by anticipating and accounting for all of the possible counter-arguments that may assail us.

But if all truths are contingent on our viewpoint, then no single position can ever be truly invulnerable. Inasmuch as assuming a position requires us to come down from the fence and move in a direction, then our position will always be lacking something. After all, one thing cannot be every thing: every point has its counter-point, every argument its detractors.

To choose a direction is to forsake all others. Thus, to the extent that you have an excess of red, you will also, to the same extent, have a shortage of green.

However, the wheel warns us against becoming lost in any one colour, insisting that there are always other ways of seeing and being. It may be tempting to think that our way of seeing the world is ‘correct’ - that our colour is the ‘right’ one. But a glance at the wheel shows us that no one colour is privileged over any other. The holism of the wheel is an antidote to fundamentalism. It encourages both the ‘mono’ and the ‘poly,’ each in good measure.

Whilst sometimes it may be necessary to devote ourselves to one thing - to take the red path and forsake the green - it is important to remember and acknowledge those colours, those ways, that we didn't choose. Whilst red may be the one we favour, green still exists; and, importantly, still has a place, and a voice, within the wheel. It may not be as important to us, but it remains a crucial element in the overall balance. When we deny - or repress - it, we do not make it disappear: we simply reduce our field of vision, making ourselves colour-blind.

Although no one colour has a greater inherent value than any other, there are times when one may be better than another. For instance, if you are wanting to create a calm and soothing atmosphere, it may be that blue paint is a better choice than red. It is our goals that determine the value of things, rather than an inherent value within the things themselves. Thus, how we look at the wheel - the intention that we bring to it, and the stories that we tell about it - determines how we see it.

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Main posts:-
The Colour Wheel
Everything is Connected
Perspectivism
A Higher Power
Separation
Connection
Mono / Poly

Who's steering the ship?

Yin/Yang

The Colour Wheel

Circle / Spiral / Line

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