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<< what’s in a word but disposable reminiscence >>


A suggested (new-ish) word that perhaps could use more exposure is

nonconsensuality

It hints at entropy within human relations and decay in acknowledgement of the other (which one might sense as an active vector coming from compassion). Such acknowledgement is then of the entirety of the other and their becoming through spacetime (and not only limited to their observable physical form or function).

It is however, secondly, also applicable in thinking when acting with treatment (of the other and their expressions across spacetime), with repurposing, and in the relation in the world with that what one intends to claim or repurpose.

Thirdly, this word is perhaps surprisingly also applicable to synthetic tech output. One could think about how one group is presented (more than an other) in such output without their consent (to be presented as such). Such output could be an artificially generated visual (or other) that did not exist previously, nor was allowed the scale at which it could be mechanically reproduced or reiterated into quasi infinite digital versions.

Fourthly, through such a tech-lens one could relate the word with huge databases compiled & used to create patterns from the unasked-yet-claimed other or at least their (creative, artistic or other more or less desirable) output that is digital or digitized without consideration of the right to be forgotten or not be repurposed ad infinitum.

Fifthly, one could argue in nurturing future senses of various cultural references, that could be considered to also be applicable to those (alienated) creations of fellow humans who have long past, and yet who could be offered acknowledgement (as compensation for no longer being able to offer consent) by having (in a metadata file) their used work referenced.

As such I wish I could give ode to they or that what came before me when I prompted a Diffusion Model to generate this visual. However I cannot. Paradoxically, the machine is hyped to “learn” while humans are unilaterally decided for not to learn where their work is used or where the output following their “prompt” came from. I sense this as a cultural loss that I cannot freely decide to learn where something might have sprouted from. It has been decided for me that I must alienate these pasts without my consent whether or not I want to ignore these.

—-•

aiethics #aiaesthetics #aicivilization #meaningmaking #rhizomatichumanity

Post scriptum:

Through such cultural lens, as suggested above, this possible dissonance seems reduced in shared intelligence. To expand that cultural lens into another debated tech: the relation between reference, consent, acknowledgment and application seems as if an antithetical cultural anti-blockchain: severed and diffused.


text | wondering, thoughts of the wise old woman

The Certainty of Tendencies


We might tend to react to surface-level events, mainly to that what we observe: a sensation, a behavior, a used tool, a tool (i.e. a technology) enforcing a usage through a structured protocol, a reaction following a poke, a way of doing something as it has “always” been done; or an impulsive disruption thereof.

We might tend to not distinguish one attribute from another, beyond a habitual, rudimentary granularity of discriminations: “that’s white; that’s black; eh is this white or black, let’s call it gray, no let’s ignore it”.

We might tend to frivolously organize ideas in superficial coherence yet, might simultaneously tend to fail to acknowledge the holes in that professed integrity of their organization: such as this text, or that company’s operation.

We might tend to reference these combined ideas, over and again, almost feverishly wanting to increase their legitimacies.

Or we might tend to be unable to perceive, let alone embrace: ambiguities, uncertainties, or blatant contradictions within these coagulated ideas.

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While we might tend to enforce #mcoherence and clear-cut unity, we simultaneously tend to deny ourselves seeing evolving relations between ideas that do not fit our comfort, found in the prefabricated organization of such ideas, as they were presented to us over our formalizing and conforming years. As such we seem too tied up to innovate. Is that a lack of sub-surface learning? Or, is that a lack of, not only metaphorical, mental space or breathing space, to allow one to reflect, reconsider and adapt?

This then allows us to possibly tend to retire from looking at the previously combined ideas via different perspectives: why they were combined, how they are kept together or how they could be perceived by using parameters as lenses (i.e. using conflicting ideas or seemingly unrelated ideas), how they maintain failures and how they do, or do not, answer wants-yet-not-needs, why and how these interwoven ideas could, or need, to be innovated upon.

We might tend to superficially innovate some ideas if the neighbors, on most sides around our ideas’ habitat, seem to have done so.

…and then we tend to act, almost compulsively, upon these concoctions of ideas.

These might be tendencies, not certainties: that too we tend to overlook.

text | wondering, thoughts of the wise old woman

Dadalus, Icarus, Monty, Disney & Verses


Should the Multiverse follow the reality of laws of physics, deities, of Monty or laws of Disney?

One compared with the other: which one would create more or less experiences of unethical proportions & augmented alienating disconnect? The physically dropping of the ball, the cartoonish fall, the proverbial drop of the ball, Icarus’ fall as a ball or a bold dropping, as the character in Monty Python’s sketch, stepping out of the board meeting’s window as the solution to negotiation? Free Guy’s ball? A link between physics & ethics

One might ponder how it is that physical reality might create unethical virtual spaces

Somehow my intuition screams at me that this is so obvious that it should not be questioned. I am in luck though. I am not an expert on ethics, nor on falling with little physical consequence. I have limits, you see

Let’s take the biologist J.B.S. Haldane, as our guiding rail. He gore-ishly premonishened it in 1926: “You can drop a mouse down a thousand-yard mine shaft; &, on arriving at the bottom, it gets a slight shock and walks away, provided that the ground is fairly soft. A rat is killed, a man is broken, a horse splashes. For the resistance presented to movement by the air is proportional to the surface of the moving object. Divide an animal’s length, breadth, and height each by ten; its weight is reduced to a thousandth, but its surface only to a hundredth. So the resistance to falling in the case of the small animal is relatively ten times greater than the driving force”

This idea opens up a can of worms. A meeting, in physical reality, with a less-than-humane boss, might result in fists flying or cups hurdling. Will the unethical abuse, supported by the physical laws, exist in a multiverse’s boss-fight? Or, will the laws be artifiwashed, virtuwashed, realwashed?

The latter could mean that reality will be claimed but something will feel ever so slightly off. Perhaps this will be in the manner of Disney’s sensibility of telling the story of the real by making an object bounce in a most exuberant manner & deformation, so for the audience to sense reality ad absurdum

Besides those of physics we could consider the more fluid laws of biology. Will the ideal multiverse have completed the eradication of species’ diversity or will its creator have “an inordinate fondness of beetles, ” to continue quoting Haldane. If not for beetles, how many stars will one be able to see in that imagined version of the multiverse?

Trivialities, you say? Then let us debate the designed environments & how minimalist, open or maximalist & cubicled one’s physical monoverse should compare to maximized performance in its multiverse counterpart

Russell, in reponse to Haldane’s 1924’s Daedalus, felt compelled that science could be used to “promote the power of dominant groups, rather than to make men happy. Icarus, …, was destroyed by his rashness.”

pila proiectus est

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Epilogue — …and for the poetic justice of it all:

“What are his nets and gins and traps; and how does he surround him With cold floods of abstraction, and with forests of solitude, To build him castles and high spires, where kings and priests may dwell” (William Blake, Visions of the Daughters of Albion via Ludlow, 2007)


References:

“Free Guy”(2021). https://www.wired.com/story/would-the-free-guy-inflatable-bubble-protect-a-real-person/

Ludlow, P. & Mark Wallace. (2007). “The Second Life Herald. The Virtual Tabloid that Witnessed the Dawn of the Metaverse.”

Haldane, J. B. S., & Dronamraju, K. R. (1963). Book reviews: “The Truth about Death”. Journal of Genetics, 58(3), 450–464. doi:10.1007/bf02986312 

Haldane, J. B. S.(1926). On Being the Right Size. https://www.phys.ufl.edu/courses/phy3221/spring10/HaldaneRightSize.pdf

Haldane, J. B. S. (1924, 1928) Daedalus; or, Science and the Future.

Russell, (1924). Icarus or The Future of Science

The latter two might also be of interest to those open to contemplate transhumanism and the likes.

text | wondering, thoughts of the wise old woman

The Monoverse: a Never-singular Institute


one could find metaphorical keys to open visualized doors, and activate figurative wobbly wormholes, into proverbial parallel universes, of meaning-making fabric, that might ever so probabilistically, prop-up one’s monoverse/universe of models of thinking; only as if being those “…secretive sides of our nature”

Without the proper keys (imagined by oneself & the many ‘other’) it could make it perceived as impossible to be(come) who one “is” in some of that collection of meaning-making universes, which one might refer to as the ‘social’. The latter is a subset; a noticeable one yet, still a subset

The opening of proverbial doors is not so much an escapism but rather an airing out of stuffiness in one’s thought without having to throw out (while, by less than snap-of-finger, it is an option to simply let go) the proverbial meaning-clinging furniture: a letting in of a breeze of “what ifs” without having to deconstruct one monoverse/universe for another —simply reinstitutionalizing fabric for another patterned fabric

‘Institutions’, of which, e.g., ‘professionalism’ could be one of, are as boxes; are as “monoverses”

These monoverses are examples of what imaginatively could be vast universes (expanding, shrinking, big banging) with surprising metaphorical physical laws

At times, various monoverses are claimed to be incompatible. Yet the act of claiming is the act of entering yet another monoverse, known as Claim-of-Falsity-or-Actuality, and there to hold one’s ground: the falsification or reinforcements of “boundaries”

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The monoverses, as if wobbly boxes, are found to be silent & beautiful, to those holding the packaging tape; they (“they” is the non-conspiratorial “they” and includes the “you” and the “I”) might be ignoring the imaginable spaces in-between

The interesting (and dare I say, the nurturingly #humane) about these proverbial keys, universes, propping-up one’s monoverse, are not the “keys”, nor the “universes” themselves

The interesting is the in-betweens; those mental spaces in-between the pseudo-quantifiable role, act, persona, character, institution, as if clean datasets

The in-betweens are not revolutionary since they can only exist by not negating, diminishing, ignoring or debasing that what is enabling to be in-between of. That stated, the borderlines are negotiated; feverishly and infinitely

The institutional, the professional & so on, can be dynamically experienced & do not always have to be, as we are experiencing, in the here & now, with this who nor what

‘Ephemerally-adapt’: a new compound word that could be implying the opening of those so-called doors or imagined windows, and letting it imaginatively breeze a bit; only then, and due to whatever impetus toward whichever aim (if any identifiable one at all), could one perhaps imagine of what a healthy, humane multiverse might be.

text | wondering, thoughts of the wise old woman

Dialogue… ever so timely; again and still:


“…[there is] a growing recognition that the complex problems our organizations and societies face, demand a deeper listening and a more open communication than has been the norm…

…foster reflectiveness…

…allowing multiple points of view to be. Our habits are so strong to defend our view, to agree with views that correspond… to disagree with views that differ…

…’The thing that mostly gets in the way of dialogue…is holding to assumptions and opinions, and defending them…

…We do not know how to live together in a changing world. We only know how to live based on truths from the past…

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…when one human being tells another human what is ‘real,’ what they are actually doing is making a demand for obedience…”

Peter M. Senge. Society for Organizational Learning and MIT (January 13, 2004) as a Preface to David Bohm’s Routledge Classic reprint of his 1996 “On Dialogue”. A text introducing practical tools for thinking and listening together, with diversities.


text | wondering, thoughts of the wise old woman

“PSYCHOLOGICAL capital”

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“…, we live in the age of psychological capital, where who you are is what should matter most. Knowledge and expertise are still important, but your ability to think, create, be curious, and empathize with others, is more important especially in leadership roles because machines will struggle to automate these abilities (though there is no doubt their designers will try).” (Fast Company, 20 July 2021)

As a (human) being with “psychology” and some interest in “capital” ;-p , such writing is interesting to me.

It activates more questions and (immature) reflection, some of which I feel many other human beings too, with their psychology and capital, are asking in one or other (more eloquent) form. I have no clear answers yet. Perhaps you have some ideas and wish to add some value.

Read some of the questions that rolled into my consciousness, as merely passing phenomena:

Would now the “psychological” become even further commodified by considering “psychological  capital” as a servicing in the happiness industry, mindfulness centers, and self-improvements in search for “true self”, etc.?

Shall this redirection be in analogy with how knowledge has historically been a coveted property of or by the happy few (e.g. historically in the hands of religious institutions and its initiated; later in the form of publishing houses and “Orphan Works” ; even later in forms of data hoarding and academic gatekeeping mechanisms such as payment walls)?  (With the exception of the digital / digitized knowledge, offered under such constructs as the Creative Commons licenses)

Would it be accessible by more than only those with time, funds and perceived credibility? 

Would such scenarios then best service a similar set of happy few or maximize entire teams, communities, societies and species within and beyond their competitiveness of their perceived markets or jungles?

Might it just be that some applicable steps to action could be found in sources that are, or that reference sources that are, several thousands of years old?

If so, could such sources perhaps be Daoist & Buddhist (& to some extent perhaps debatably Confucian) in nature & methodological praxis?

Over time and space, an increasing number of individuals and communities seem to have explored a mapping of “psychological capital” (under different nomenclatures) with Daoist (rhizomic) praxis, Buddhist methodology (without having to move into “religious” metaphysical interpretations), perhaps Confucian governance, a Shamanistic ritual of moving within a larger context of natural worlds, or an Abrahamic-Good Samaritan considerateness. 

Each of these seem to be allowing a *friendliness* with the lesser-known (non-)human “other”. 

Each of these are in some attributes and processes considering compassion, the impermanences (i.e. transformation, changes, fluidities, ambiguities or innovations), questioning the singular, polarized “self”.

These methodologies seem to have been offering a willingness to embrace some complexities via profundity or contextualization,  as opposed to  their hyped versions or the commercialized search for “true self” or “happiness” as if unchanging collectibles into one’s psychological wallet. 

Would these be applicable to those who might be struggling with an obsession for over-simplicity, yearning for quick-fixing hypes, while understandably being driven by biases; as every one of us is? 

Could such hesitance towards a practical aggregation of methodologies perhaps be influenced by Eurocentrism, dualistic hyper-individualism, narrow forms of professionalism or other understandable reductionist lenses, such as hints of xenophobia or a lack of a kind of co-reflective due-diligence?  

Could a search for methodological application (with or without a focus on hierarchical and rhizomic ritual) and with a duty-of-care, when looking into existing sources, prevent one from hubris and the reinvention of the proverbial wheel; over and over again? 

Is it too superficial that these would be methodologically considered, and not necessarily be applied through nationalist, philosophical nor religious filters & ontologies? 

Could HR, consultants, Professional Development trainers, academics focusing on ethics, or (professional) community leaders transcode these well-established methodologies with an intent toward a practical ethical & compassionate action plan; though while maintaining a holistic consideration? 

Would such approach be sufficiently accepted (ie scaleable) as practical & not dismissed as idealistic or offensive to one’s cultural & economic frameworks?

Would integrity in such processes still be utopian while actually measurably scientific: without cutting corners, without ill-willed ulterior motives or with reduced hyper-capitalist motives; while making a living in a market setting can still be practiced?

If so, could this then be introduced at a youngest learning age & be continued throughout one’s life-long learning, while collectively being supported to apply these in co-workable practice?

Who is picking up this gauntlet as we speak? 

Sources:

https://www.linkedin.com/posts/antoinette-weibel_why-its-better-to-stop-searching-for-your-activity-6824632764273324032-MUvC

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=zOJgMK21-tk

https://www.fastcompany.com/90656628/how-to-spot-the-warning-signs-of-an-insecure-leader-and-how-to-work-with-one?cid=eem524:524:s00:08/01/2021_fc&utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=Compass&utm_campaign=eem524:524:s00:08/01/2021_fc

header image: “”re-become” . digital sketch . animasuri’21

Letters from Aliens to Aliens, text | wondering

I’m not A Virus; I can’t Breathe; I TOO am a Berliner; We come in peace, …and you?

Or, …do we really need an alien invasion to allow a halt to the mind-numbing cynical slapstick of horror and fear?

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Anecdotes, events or histories are important to humanize; …or the opposite. They are deeply touching so they mobilize in various ways; yet, at times, in opposing directions…

Anecdotes can offer seeming clarification (as if real-life metaphors or analogies, at times looping meaning into conscious stomach-turning absurdity). They could clarify or at least unveil a deeper-lying problem. Anecdotes can do this aided by various lights and focuses; …some persisted “clarifications” are not so conducive nor sustainable.

Anecdotes can pull and push; ease and slap; silence and amplify. Anecdotes are felt as mine not yours, unless you’re in and not out.

Anecdotes do seem to work in narrowly strengthening the cohesion, within one bubble, against the next or against the other.

It is seemingly so since an anecdote’s force is defined by the mechanisms of whether we want to (or can) find, or offer, meaning-giving ; for the good or the bad and anything in-between its polarizing power. Anecdotes are like potent meaning-giving positive feedback loops with no singularly positive outcomes.

Their effects echo, ever so distorted yet, lasting. However, do we want to see their depth and breadth? Many seem to want to refuse, stubbornly.

Yes, anecdotes are lasting whether or not we (wish to) see their more abstract systemic mechanisms at work, which are reoccurring in any of these same anecdotes, irrespective of the specifics of one or other confronting , kick-inducing or shocking event.

If, however we were not to see beyond 1 event or that 1 sour apple or the next 1 bad apple, how may examples would we need before the proverbial aha-erlebnis could be shared by enough leading (and less leading) voices?

When would the one breath-taking anecdote be transcended and aid our discernment and actions into a next level of human development?

If that moment were to come along… How about us developing into humans that are slightly more sharing, considerate, insightful, inclusive, empathetic, emotionally mature yet rich, patient and problem-solving rather than problem-recreating?

How about moving towards wanting to become wise? (psst, have a look at the meaning of ‘sapiens’ in our species’ taxonomy).

How many kills do we need? How many viruses do we need in other or your locations? How many teases, pokes, dismisses and growls do we need? How many “I’m with you’s” do we need? How many warnings or how much finger-pointing do we need? How many far-fetched yet unresolved conspiracies or bile-laden debasements do we need before we see there is no worse conspiracy but the ones we inflict upon ourselves?

Even if an alien spaceship were to hover over a metropolis, under our present-day mindsets, some human individual would seemingly be able to find a way to blame and use another human into some convoluted and perverted strategizing, catalyzed by a good doze of distrust and short-minded, linear, negative manipulations. When will it be enough? How about,… now.

[read with a tone of irony] We are a species that is very resilient and formulaic-creative. We loop the same thing over again into enforced and accepted meaning. We are a species that enjoys bumping over the same stone again and again and again. One might reluctantly want to shout: “show me that ‘new normal’, please! Where is it, beyond the veil of a mask or a missing hug?”

Do you easily want one or other excuse you can hide behind? You will find it. Do you want easy access to one or other fear-inducing tool which you can project outwardly? You will find it. Do you need a bed-time story to paint the other as negative, debased and too different from you? You will find it.

But, tell me dear fellow human, where then reaches your innovation? How far beyond the surface of your smooth digital touch screen? To the delegation of your smartness to a database? Perhaps all the way to the digital version of your eagerly mined bills and coins?

An anecdote in forms of story, event or technology needs a higher resolution; a finer and deeper nuance. It needs an added realization and willingness to identify complexity, inter-relations, associations, contexts and systems. We need to move onward and upward by innovating cognitively, around that 1 or other human output, that 1 utterance and the next 1 act and the next, and the next.

It is not because I am small that anything larger than my own experience or my own anecdote, does not exist. There is more. Yes, there is even more we don’t know that we don’t know; …know that. It might aid in making you a bit more humble.

We can move, perhaps with falling, into a systematic learning-process that could answer systemic, thus process-driven and larger issues, lying at the foundation of your or my anecdotes.

One can device or uncover the blueprints and pragmatics of a systematic learning-process to a sustainable co-existence, a co-creation and a shared consciousness (one away from a willing and blinding “ignorance” into a willing actionable awareness with shared directional sight). It is one that needs to be approached methodologically, systematically and pedagogically; with care and reflection.

It is one that can allow for the individual in considerate interaction with the collective human existence adapting, yet set in a far larger context of change. It’s ok, it’s daunting, it’s life, but then we might just perhaps be truly in it together (oh…, you thought we are now?).

This is not mitigated even while a noticeable-some aren’t thinking nor acting as such; which is contradictory and perhaps counterproductive .

It needs to be done by also going deeper than any symptoms of that deeper dynamic and systemic issue, associated with the human output (e.g. an anecdote in utterance, act or technology).

A reset or augmentation or a truly disruptive paradigm shift in humanity (which is not but the sum of the parts of its output alone) could and perhaps should also go beyond the initial labeling of “the other” (i.e. those not “in the know”) an act which otherwise, if not methodologically gone beyond, might stay at the level of “mud-throwing”, debasing or instigating of negative sentiment or much worse.

For instance, among many moreresources, Cognitive Biases need to be identified (this is being done) and addressed (could be done with more method). These are beyond one individual, one community. These are transnational and fundamental to communal, geopolitical or other strategizing or forecasting. These resources are being interconnected by some initiatives yet more implementation within online and offline learning services need to be undertaken.

The broadest sense of “Literacy”, e.g. in relation to applications and interactions of skilled-up emotional intelligence need to be implemented. For this, anecdotes, such as technological output, stand in function of humanity (not the other way around).

Media literacy needs to be built into this and growth-mindset or imaginative skill-sets, leading to increased ability to adapt in complexities and diversities need to be nudged forward. The scientific methodology can and should be intertwined.

Conversation skills and how to construct a narrative must be made aware. Active Listening skills are quintessential . The latter to me is about knowing how to process input: internal(ized) imagination, making, creativity and innovation (within oneself). This is as of use and as practical as “output skills”: externalized imagination, making, creativity and innovation (from oneself). (psst, no worries, neither I am good at these. We’ll learn together yet, at our own individual pace).

And these superficial items too, mentioned here previously, are but the surface as are the (important and at time shocking) anecdotes.

To enable such paradigm shift, as an in-depth humanity 2.0, investment is needed (monetary and also other). It is needed trans-nationally (or rather, “meta-“). I’m (still) ignorant and naive about these yet, intuitively, I do sense a need for this to be urgently considered. I do realize that, in our traditional thinking, what I wrote here is painful, irrational and to some laughable to state, especially now.

The answer and the manner of answer to the above attributes and the associated questions (which and how questions are asked) will be unveiling as to the insight, readiness and willingness of our species or at least of its front-stage voices (to think beyond the immediate or instant proverbial yet petty knee-jerk reactions).

There are actors already active in the world, aiming to offer uplifting method, process and solutions to the above lament.

Let us identify them better, mobilize them, give them an enabling platform rather than the continuous mind-numbing, impatient, cynical slapstick of horror, hate and fear.

header image:

“El Hombre” . photo-edited digital sketch . –animasuri’20 yes.

later add-ons, corroborations, examples and more:

text | wondering, The field of AI

The Field of AI (part 02): A “Pre-History” & a Foundational Context.

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last update: Friday, April 24, 2020

URLs for A “Pre-History” & a Foundational Context:

  • This post is the main post on a Pre-History & a Foundational context of the Field of AI. In this post a narrative is constructed surrounding the “Pre-History”. It links with the following posts:
  • This post is a first and very short linking with on Literature, Mythology & Arts as one of the foundational contexts of the Field of AI
  • The second part in the contextualization is the post touching on a few attributes from Philosophy, Psychology and Linguistics
  • Following one can read about very few attributes picked up on from Control Theory as contextualizing to the Field of AI
  • Cognitive Science is the fourth field that is mapped with the Field of AI.
  • Mathematics & Statistics is in this writing the sixth area associated as a context to the Field of AI
  • Other fields contextualizing the Field of AI are being considered (e.g. Data Science & Statistics, Economy, Engineering fields)
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The Field of AI: A “Pre-History”.

A “pre-history” and a foundational context of Artificial Intelligence can arguably by traced back to a number of events in the past as well as to a number of academic fields of study. In this post only a few have been handpicked.

This post will offer a very short “pre-history” while following posts will dig into individual academic fields that are believed to offer the historical and present-day context for the field of AI.

It is not too far-fetched to link the roots of AI, as the present-day field of study, with the human imagination of artificial creatures referred to as “automatons” (or what could be understood as predecessors to more complex robots).

While it will become clear here that the imaginary idea of automatons in China is remarkably older, it has been often claimed that the historic development towards the field of AI, as it is intellectually nurtured today, commenced more than 2000 years ago in Greece, with Aristotle and his formulation of the human thought activity known as “Logic”.

Presently, with logic, math and data one could make a machine appear to have some degree of “intelligence”. Note, it is rational to realize that the perception of an appearance does not mean the machine is intelligent. What’s more, it could be refreshing to consider that not all intelligent activity is (intended to be seen as) logical.

It’s fun, yet important, to add that to some extent, initial studies into logic could asynchronously be found in China’s history with the work by Mòzǐ (墨子), who conducted his philosophical reflections a bit more than 2400 years ago. 

Coming back to the Ancient Greeks: besides their study of this mode of thinking, they also experimented with the creation of basic automatons.

Automatons (i.e. self-operating yet artificial mechanical creatures) were likewise envisioned in China and some basic forms were created in its long history of science and technology.[1] An early mentioning can be found in, Volume 5 “The Questions of Tang” (汤问; 卷第五 湯問篇) of the Lièzǐ (列子)[2], an important historical Daoist text.

In this work there is mentioning of this kind of (imagined) technologies or “scientific illusions”.[3] The king in this story became upset by the appearance of intelligence and needed to be reassured that the automaton was only that, a machine …

Figure 1 King Mù of Zhōu, who reigned a little more than 2950 years ago ( 周穆王; Zhōu Mù Wáng ) , introduced by Yen Shi, is meeting an automaton (i.e. the figure depicted with straighter lines, on the top-left), as mentioned in the fictional book Lièzǐ. Image retrieved on March 5, 2020 from here
Figure 2 Liè Yǔkòu (列圄寇/列禦寇), aka the Daoist philosopher Lièzĭ (列子) who imagined an (artificial) humanoid automaton. This visual was painted with “ink and light colors on gold-flecked paper,” by Zhāng Lù (张路); during the Míng Dynasty (Míng cháo, 明朝; 1368–1644). Retrieved on January 12, 2020 from here ; image license: public domain.

Jumping forward to the year 1206, the Arabian inventor, Al-Jazari, supposedly designed the first programmable humanoid robot in the form of a boat, powered by water flow, and carrying four mechanical musicians. He wrote about it in his work entitled “The Book of Knowledge of Ingenious Mechanical Devices.”

It is believed that Leonardo Da Vinci was strongly influenced by his work.[4] Al-Jazari additionally designed clocks with water or candles. Some of these clocks could be considered programmable in a most basic sense.

figure 3 Al-jazari’s mechanical musicians machine (1206). Photo Retrieved on March 4, 2020 from here; image: public domain

One could argue that the further advances of the clock (around the 15th and 16th century) with its gear mechanisms, that were used in the creation of automatons as well, were detrimental to the earliest foundations, moving us in the direction of where we are exploring AI and (robotic) automation or autonomous vehicles today.

Between the 16th and the 18th centuries, automatons became more and more common.  René Descartes, in 1637, considered thinking machines in his book entitled “Discourse on the Method of Reasoning“. In 1642, Pascal created the first mechanical digital calculating machine.

Figure 4 Rene Descartes; oil on canvas; painted by Frans Hals the Elder (1582 – 1666; A painter from Flanders, now northern Belgium, working in Haarlem, the Netherlands. This work: circa 1649-1700; photographed by André Hatala . File retrieved on January 14, 2020 from here. Image license: public Domain

Between 1801 and 1805 the first programmable machine was invented by Joseph-Marie Jacquard. He was strongly influenced by Jacques de Vaucanson with his work on automated looms and automata. Joseph-Marie’s loom was not even close to a computer as we know it today. It was a programmable loom with punched paper cards that automated the action of the textile making by the loom. What is important here was the system with cards (the punched card mechanism) that influenced the technique used to develop the first programmable computers.

Figure 5 Close-up view of the punch cards used by Jacquard loom on display at the Museum of Science and Industry in Manchester, England. This public domain photo was retrieved n March 12, 2020 from here; image: public domain

In the first half of the 1800s, the Belgian mathematician, Pierre François Verhulst discovered the logistic function (e.g. the sigmoid function),[1] which will turn out to be quintessential in the early-day developments of Artificial Neural Networks and specifically those called “perceptrons” with a threshold function, that is hence used to activate the output of a signal, and which operate in a more analog rather than digital manner, mimicking the biological brain’s neurons. It should be noted that present-day developments in this area do not only prefer the sigmoid function and might even prefer other activation functions instead.

[1] Bacaër, N. (2011). Verhulst and the logistic equation (1838). A Short History of Mathematical Population Dynamics. London: Springer. pp. 35–39.  Information retrieved from https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007%2F978-0-85729-115-8_6#citeas and from mathshistory.st-andrews.ac.uk/Biographies/Verhulst.html  

In 1936 Alan Turing proposed his Turing Machine. The Universal Turing Machine is accepted as the origin of the idea of a stored-program computer. This would later, in 1946, be used by John von Neumann for his “Electronic Computing Instrument“.[6] Around that same time the first general purpose computers started to be invented and designed. With these last events we could somewhat artificially and arbitrarily claim the departure from “pre-history” into the start of the (recent) history of AI.

figure 6 Alan Turing at the age of 16. Image Credit: PhotoColor [CC BY-SA (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0)] ; Image source Retrieved April 10, 2020 from here


As for fields of study that have laid some “pre-historical” foundations for AI research and development, which continue to be enriched by AI or that enrich the field of AI, there are arguably a number of them. A few will be explored in following posts. The first posts will touch on a few hints of Literature, Mythology and the Arts.

[1] Needham, J. (1991). Science and Civilisation in China: Volume 2, History of Scientific Thought. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University.

[2] Liè Yǔkòu (列圄寇 / 列禦寇). (5th Century BCE). 列子 (Lièzǐ). Retrieved on March 5, 2020 from https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/7341/pg7341-images.html  and 卷第五 湯問篇 from https://chinesenotes.com/liezi/liezi005.html   and an English translation (not the latest) from  https://archive.org/details/taoistteachings00liehuoft/page/n6/mode/2up  

[3] Zhāng, Z. (张 朝 阳).  ( November 2005). “Allegories in ‘The Book of Master Liè’ and the Ancient Robots”. Online: Journal of Heilongjiang College of Education. Vol.24 #6. Retrieved March 5, 2020 from https://wenku.baidu.com/view/b178f219f18583d049645952.html

[4] McKenna, A. (September 26, 2013). Al-Jazarī Arab inventor. In The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica. Online: Encyclopaedia Britannica Retrieved on March 25, 2020 from https://www.britannica.com/biography/al-Jazari AND:

Al-Jazarī, Ismail al-Razzāz; Translated & annotated by Donald R. Hill. (1206). The Book of Knowledge of Ingenious Mechanical Devices. Dordrecht, The Netherlands: D. Reidel Publishing Company. Online Retrieved on March 25, 2020 from https://archive.org/details/TheBookOfKnowledgeOfIngeniousMechanicalDevices/mode/2up

[5] Bacaër, N. (2011). Verhulst and the logistic equation (1838). A Short History of Mathematical Population Dynamics. London: Springer. pp. 35–39.  Information retrieved from https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007%2F978-0-85729-115-8_6#citeas and from mathshistory.st-andrews.ac.uk/Biographies/Verhulst.html

[6] Davis, M. (2018). The Universal Computer: the road from Leibniz to Turing. Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press, Taylor & Francis Group

text | wondering, The field of AI

The Field of AI (part 01): Context, Learning & Evolution

One could state that Artificial Intelligence (AI) methods enable the finding of and interaction with patterns in the information available from contexts to an event, object or fact. These can be shaped into data points and sets. Many of these sets are tremendously large data sets. So large are these pools of data, so interconnected and so changing that it is not possible for any human to see the patterns that are actually there or that are meaningful, or that can actually be projected to anticipate the actuality of an imagined upcoming event.

While not promising that technologies coming out from the field of AI are the only answer, nor the answer to everything, one could know their existence and perhaps apply some of the methods used in creating them. One could, furthermore, use aspects from within the field of AI to learn about a number of topics, even about the processes of learning itself, about how to find unbiased or biased patterns in the information presented to us. Studying some basics about this field could offer yet another angle of meaning-giving in the world around and within us.  What is a pattern, if not an artificial promise to offer some form of meaning?

It’s not too far-fetched to state that the study of Artificial Intelligence is partly the study of cognitive systems[1] as well as the context within which these (could) operate. While considering AI[2], one might want to shortly consider “context.”

Here “context” is the set of conditions and circumstances preceding, surrounding or following a cognitive system and that related to its processed, experienced, imagined or anticipated events. One might want to weigh how crucial conditions and circumstances are or could be to both machine and human.[3]  The field of AI is one of the fields of study that could perhaps offer one such opportunity.

A context is a source for a cognitive system to collect its (hopefully relevant) information, or at least, its data from. Cognitive Computing (CC) systems are said to be those systems that try to simulate the human thought processes, to solve problems, via computerized models.[4] It is understandable that some classify this as a subset of Computer Science while some will obviously classify CC as a (sometimes business-oriented) subset of the field of AI.[5] Others might link this closer to the academic work done in Cognitive Science. Whether biological or artificial, to a number of researchers the brain-like potentials are their core concern.[6]

As can be seen in a few of the definitions and as argued by some experts, the broad field of AI technologies do not necessarily have to mimic *human* thought processes or human intelligence alone. As such, AI methods might solve a problem in a different way from how a human might do it.

However similar or different, the meaning-giving information, gotten from a context, is important to both an AI solution as well as to a biological brain. One might wonder that it is their main reason for being: finding and offering meaning.

The contextual information an AI system collects could be (defined by or categorized as) time, locations, user profiles, rules, regulations, tasks, aims, sensory input, various other big to extremely huge data sets and the relationships between each of these data sets in terms of influencing or conflicting with one another. All of these sources for data are simultaneously creating increasing complexities, due to real-time changes (i.e. due to ambiguity, uncertainty, and shifts). AI technologies offer insights through their outputs of the *best* solution, rather than the one and only certain solution for a situation, in a context at a moment in spacetime.

The wish to understand and control “intelligence” has attracted humans for a long time. It is then reasonable to think that it will attract our species’ creative and innovative minds for a long time to come. It is in our nature to wonder, in general, and to wonder about intelligence and wisdom in specific; whatever their possible interlocked or independent definitions might be(come) and whichever their technological answers might be.

In considering this, one might want to be reminded that the scientific name of our species itself is a bit of a give-away of this (idealized) intention or aspiration: “Homo Sapiens.” This is the scientific name of our animal species. Somewhat loosely translated, it could be understood to mean: “Person of Wisdom”. 

In the midst of some experts who think that presently our intelligence is larger than our wisdom, others feel that, if handled with care, consideration and contextualization, AI research and developments just might positively answer such claim or promise and might at least augment our human desires towards becoming wiser.[7] Just perhaps, some claim,[8] it might take us above and beyond[9] being Homo Sapiens.[10]

For now, we are humans exploring learning with and by machines in support of our daily yet global needs.

For you and I, the steps to such aim need to be practical. The resources to take the steps need to be graspable here and now.

At the foundation, to evaluate the validity or use of such claims, we need to understand a bit what we are dealing with. Besides the need for the nurturing of a number of dimensions in our human development, we might want to nurture our Technological Literacy (or “Technology Literacy”).[11]

A number of educators[12] seem to agree that,[13] while considering human experiences and their environments, this area of literacy is not too bad a place to start off with.[14] In doing so, we could specifically unveil a few points of insight associated with Artificial Intelligence; that human-made technological exploration of ambiguous intelligence.

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[1] Sun F., Liu, H., Hu, D.  (eds). (2019). Cognitive Systems and Signal Processing: 4th International Conference, ICCSIP 2018, Beijing, China, November 29 – December 1, 2018, Revised Selected Papers, Part 1 & Part 2. Singapore: Springer

[2] DeAngelis, S. F. (April 2014). Will 2014 be the Year you Fall in Love with Cognitive Computing? Online: WIRED. Retrieved November 22, 2019 from https://www.wired.com/insights/2014/04/will-2014-year-fall-love-cognitive-computing/

[3] Desouza, K. (October 13, 2016). How can cognitive computing improve public services? Online Brookings Institute’s Techtank Retrieved November 22, 2019 from https://www.brookings.edu/blog/techtank/2016/10/13/how-can-cognitive-computing-improve-public-services/

[4] Gokani, J. (2017). Cognitive Computing: Augmenting Human Intelligence. Online: Stanford University; Stanford Management Science and Engineering; MS&E 238 Blog. Retrieved November 22, 2019 from https://www.datarobot.com/wiki/cognitive-computing/

[5] https://www.datarobot.com/wiki/cognitive-computing/

[6] One example is: Poo, Mu-ming. (November 2, 2016). China Brain Project: Basic Neuroscience, Brain Diseases, and Brain-Inspired Computing. Neuron 92, NeuroView, pp. 591-596.  Online: Elsevier Inc. Retrieved on February 25, 2020 from https://www.cell.com/neuron/pdf/S0896-6273(16)30800-5.pdf  . Another example is: The work engaged at China’s Research Center for Brain-Inspired Intelligence (RCBII), by the teams led by Dr XU, Bo and Dr. ZENG, Yi. Founded in April 2015, at the CAS’ Institute of Automation, the center contains 4 research teams: 1. The Cognitive Brain Modeling Group (aka Brain-Inspired Cognitive Computation); 2. The Brain-Inspired Information Processing Group; 3. The Neuro-robotics Group (aka Brain-Inspired Robotics and Interaction) and 4. Micro-Scale Brain Structure Reconstruction. Find some references here: bii.ia.ac.cn

[7] Harari, Y. N. (2015). Sapiens. A Brief History of Humankind. New York: HarperCollings Publisher

[8] Gillings, M. R., et al. (2016). Information in the Biosphere: Biological and Digital Worlds. Online: University California, Davis (UCD). Retrieved on March 25, 2020 from https://escholarship.org/uc/item/38f4b791

[9] (01 June 2008). Tech Luminaries Address Singularity. Online: Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE Spectrum). Retrieved on March 25, 2020 from  https://spectrum.ieee.org/static/singularity

[10] Maynard Smith, J. et al. (1995). The Major Transitions in Evolution. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press  AND Calcott, B., et al. (2011). The Major Transitions in Evolution Revisited. The Vienna Series in Theoretical Biology. Boston, MA: The MIT Press.

[11]  National Academy of Engineering and National Research Council. (2002). Technically Speaking: Why All Americans Need to Know More About Technology. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press   Online: NAP Retrieved on March 25, 2020 from https://www.nap.edu/read/10250/chapter/3

[12] Search, for instance, the search string “Technological Literacy” through this online platform: The Education Resources Information Center (ERIC), USA https://eric.ed.gov/?q=Technological+Literacy

[13] Dugger, W. E. Jr. et al (2003). Advancing Excellence in Technology Literacy. In Phi Delta Kappan, v85 n4 p316-20 Dec 2003 Retrieved on March 25, 2020 from https://eric.ed.gov/?q=Technology+LIteracy&ff1=subTechnological+Literacy&ff2=autDugger%2c+William+E.%2c+Jr.&pg=2

[14] Cydis, S. (2015). Authentic Instruction and Technology Literacy. In Journal of Learning Design 2015 Vol. 8 No.1 pp. 68 – 78. Online: Institute of Education Science (IES) & The Education Resources Information Center (ERIC), USA. Retrieved on March 25, 2020 from https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1060125.pdf


IMAGE CREDITS:

An example artificial neural network with a hidden layer.

en:User:Cburnett / CC BY-SA (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/) Retrieved on March 12, 2020 from https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e4/Artificial_neural_network.svg


Letters from Aliens to Aliens, text | poetry, text | wondering

The Universe as a Collective Memory; as a Collective Narrative

The perceived universe is a history. One’s perceived thoughts are a history. Each inevitably lie in a past; one slightly longer distanced in timespace then the other.

As a child, and still today, I imagine(d) that some attributes that make up interstellar space could function as memory banks for our collective (and individual) information (knowledge, anecdotes, personal stories, that evasive theory or elegant formula, that silly cat video and so on).

As a child, and still in my today’s naivete, I envision(ed) that the information could be encoded onto radiation, onto waves (of light or which ever), used as carrier waves, carried for eternity (or until the next Big Bang) at the speed of near-to-light, across the galaxies, as our echoes of who and what we once were with one another. …Yes, one might prefer to be more cautious, just in case there is that space-faring parasitic yet intelligent species out there. Though, this might be more telling of how we reflect upon ourselves as a species and how we have been perceiving how we (should) relate to other species around us (and vice versa) rather than being about that hypothetical non-terrestrian.

Some might pose that vision without action is delusional. However, I beg that nuances do exist. One can envision something and can, at the least, be exhilarated or rejuvenated when seeing that somehow similar visions are brought to execution by others. Then such delusional self shifts to becoming a meaning-full self. This occurs through a positive psychology of interconnection with that unknown other, by means of the unintended gift of meaning, or hope, through proxy. That is somewhat what stories do; both fictional or less fictional ones.

I have seen the nascence of DNA computing and information storage on DNA , allowing for enormous capacity and durability. I discovered this through the media I browsed.

I have seen the mentioning of 5D data storage through some kind of glass imprinting of information, of even more impressive proportions. This is achieved at a nano-scale, by means of a dense laser beam of sorts.

I have observed reports about initiatives of databases and storage-redundancies on- and off-planet; not only of stories and information but also of flora’s “story” in the form of seed banks. Who’s and what will (not) be stored?

I have heard of research towards brain implants aimed at increasing memory capacities within an individual

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I have seen initiatives where common individuals can record their common stories of a lifetime for themselves and with others to enjoy and be touched by: a mother about her son; a person about a lost love; that common story that makes us daringly, beautifully and yet frailly human in-between one another.

I also encountered questions of the “right to be forgotten”. In extension to that, it has been said that for instance on LinkedIn an increasing percentage of profiles are of deceased individuals and that in a not too long a near future that can easily reach up to 20% (I will want to verify this). I am equally thrilled about this in associated with the sensation of the echoes of humanity as portrayed in the opening paragraph. Why should one or more of one’s story (not) be stored?

This then in turn entangles with concepts of “privacy”, “freedom of speech”, “secrecy”, “intimacy”, “trust”, “ownership of information”, “the right to perform or distribute”, and many more. Does storage dismiss the story thought or the story hushedly stumbled and stuttered in private settings of the fleeing moment and among those who are trusted? Is there your poetry in the ephemeral, the passing?

I also hear about some who ponder whether or not more and faster (information) is unequivocally better.

Either way, I distill a tautology: we are story keepers, story tellers and maybe more so, story hackers; irrespective of whether we like, want or agree with their content or not. That brings us to meaning-giving, meaning-taking and meaning-maintaining or meaning-alteration.

I wonder, …

I wonder, besides one’s intentions with a story and those intentions being different from the perceptions of a story –which in turn can be seen as an example of the process of “meaning-alterations”– is wanting to be forgotten the ultimate alteration of meaning? Has intention the upper-hand to perception? Has one infinite ownership over one’s story? Could one, should one and how could one ensure the intended meaning of a story over time? Is this the human tragedy or playful dance between the individual and the collective as portrayed in stories over space and time and imagination (i.e. meaning-alteration; since perception is the processing of a story through filters such as one’s imagination)? [if you are wondering how I am making these statements and assumptions as to how someone might process a story: while anecdotal, last I checked I am human and I process stories through imagination and other cognitive mechanisms].

This post will function as a repository of these and associated initiatives or considerations by others. If I find them I will post URLs here.