From spike at rainier66.com Mon Jan 1 12:21:48 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (Gregory Jones) Date: Mon, 1 Jan 2024 07:21:48 -0500 Subject: [ExI] A Paranormal Prediction In-Reply-To: <45f0fb30-8e5e-4f45-b7b2-c55b42bcc5d1@zaiboc.net> References: <45f0fb30-8e5e-4f45-b7b2-c55b42bcc5d1@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: John was never banished. He was on moderation for about an hour in 2020. On Sun, Dec 31, 2023, 6:13 AM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > > As John K Clark has been banished from this list, and I feel that his > annual paranormal prediction is an important message for all those who > consider themselves to be rational, I'm posting this in his place. The > message shouldn't be necessary, but sadly, it still is, for the > seventeenth year running: > > =========================== > > One year ago I sent the following post to the list, I did not change one > word. One year from now I intend to send this same message yet again. > > ============= > > One year ago I sent the following post to the list, I did not change one > word. One year from now I intend to send this same message yet again. > > ============= > > One year ago I sent the following post to the list, I did not change one > word. One year from now I intend to send this same message yet again. > > ============= > > One year ago I sent the following post to the list, I did not change one > word. One year from now I intend to send this same message yet again. > > ============= > > One year ago I sent the following post to the list, I did not change one > word. One year from now I intend to send this same message yet again. > > ============== > > One year ago I sent the following post to the list, I did not change one > word. One year from now I intend to send this same message yet again. > > ============== > > One year ago I sent the following post to the list, I did not change one > word. One year from now I intend to send this same message yet again. > > ============== > > One year ago I sent the following post to the list, I did not change one > word. One year from now I intend to send this same message yet again. > > ============== > > One year ago I sent the following post to the list, I did not change one > word. One year from now I intend to send this same message yet again. > > ============== > > One year ago I sent the following post to the list, I did not change one > word. One year from now I intend to send this same message yet again. > > ============== > > One year ago I sent the following post to the list, I did not change one > word. One year from now I intend to send this same message yet again. > > ============== > > One year ago I sent the following post to the list, I did not change one > word. One year from now I intend to send this same message yet again. > > ============== > > One year ago I sent the following post to the list, I did not change one > word. One year from now I intend to send this same message yet again. > > ============== > > One year ago I sent the following post to the list, I did not change one > word. One year from now I intend to send this same message yet again. > > ============== > > One year ago I sent the following post to the list, I did not change one > word. One year from now I intend to send this same message yet again. > > ============== > > One year ago I sent the following post to the list, I did not change one > word. One year from now I intend to send this same message yet again. > > ============== > > One year ago I sent the following post to the list, I did not change one > word. One year from now I intend to send this same message yet again. > > ============== > > Happy New Year all. > > I predict that a paper reporting positive psi results will NOT appear in > Nature or Science in the next year. This may seem an outrageous > prediction, after all psi is hardly a rare phenomena, millions of people > with no training have managed to observe it, or claim they have. And I > am sure the good people at Nature and Science would want to say > something about this very important and obvious part of our natural > world if they could, but I predict they will be unable to find anything > interesting to say about it.You might think my prediction is crazy, like > saying a waitress with an eighth grade education in Duluth Minnesota can > regularly observe the Higgs boson with no difficulty but the highly > trained Physicists at CERN in Switzerland cannot. Nevertheless I am > confident my prediction is true because my ghostly spirit guide Mohammad > Duntoldme spoke to me about it in a dream. > > PS: I am also confident I can make this very same prediction one year > from today. > > John K Clark > =========================== > > Ben > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From foozler83 at gmail.com Mon Jan 1 13:58:16 2024 From: foozler83 at gmail.com (William Flynn Wallace) Date: Mon, 1 Jan 2024 07:58:16 -0600 Subject: [ExI] john Message-ID: John was never kicked out of the chat group. The extropolis group was created so he could post anything he want. He can post any time he wants to in chat. He just can't post his political stuff - all the Trump ranting and so on. My chat guru told me all this. bill w -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From sjatkins at protonmail.com Tue Jan 2 01:33:19 2024 From: sjatkins at protonmail.com (Samantha) Date: Tue, 02 Jan 2024 01:33:19 +0000 Subject: [ExI] SciAm & Charlie Stross: BS In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <3e606a02-9b8a-4a7f-8207-04bb035fb570@protonmail.com> On 12/24/23 10:49, Stuart LaForge via extropy-chat wrote: > > In his piece, Stross says that "Science fiction, therefore, does not > develop in accordance with the scientific method. It develops by popular > entertainers trying to attract a bigger audience by pandering to them." > And then he drags billionaires over the coals for daring to be > influenced by the science fiction that he and his colleagues wrote who > are just trying to get people to buy their books. But in reality, the > billionaires are just trying to do the same thing: sell people more > technological products by pandering to them. It is not a huge leap of > logic to think that people who buy books depicting futuristic technology > might actually want to buy the technology were it available. Funny.? I always read science fiction to escape the doom and gloom, business as usual, go along to get along? dark drab mode of the day.? I read it to fuel imagination, zest for science and technology, positive belief that the world could be much better and even hints how to get there from here.?? If that is "pandering" it is pandering to some of the most positive and optimistic parts of human beings. - samantha -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: signature.asc Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 249 bytes Desc: OpenPGP digital signature URL: From sjatkins at protonmail.com Tue Jan 2 01:42:29 2024 From: sjatkins at protonmail.com (Samantha) Date: Tue, 02 Jan 2024 01:42:29 +0000 Subject: [ExI] Limiting factor to the Intelligence Singularity? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <68e9b208-0e36-48bc-89ad-3b7e68f6b8d3@protonmail.com> On 12/23/23 22:20, Kelly Anderson via extropy-chat wrote: > > > Reversible computation is possible. Interesting.? What does the proof that this is so look like? - samantha -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: signature.asc Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 249 bytes Desc: OpenPGP digital signature URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Tue Jan 2 05:11:14 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Tue, 2 Jan 2024 00:11:14 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Limiting factor to the Intelligence Singularity? In-Reply-To: <68e9b208-0e36-48bc-89ad-3b7e68f6b8d3@protonmail.com> References: <68e9b208-0e36-48bc-89ad-3b7e68f6b8d3@protonmail.com> Message-ID: On Mon, Jan 1, 2024, 8:43 PM Samantha via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > > On 12/23/23 22:20, Kelly Anderson via extropy-chat wrote: > > > > > > Reversible computation is possible. > > Interesting. What does the proof that this is so look like? > All quantum computers are reversible computers, it is required so they don't leak energy into the environment which would cause decoherence and spoil the result. Jason > - samantha > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pharos at gmail.com Tue Jan 2 11:02:27 2024 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Tue, 2 Jan 2024 11:02:27 +0000 Subject: [ExI] Limiting factor to the Intelligence Singularity? In-Reply-To: References: <68e9b208-0e36-48bc-89ad-3b7e68f6b8d3@protonmail.com> Message-ID: On Tue, 2 Jan 2024 at 05:13, Jason Resch via extropy-chat wrote: > > All quantum computers are reversible computers, it is required so they don't leak energy into the environment which would cause decoherence and spoil the result. > > Jason > _______________________________________________ The chatbots seem to be saying 'Yes, But...' and sort of disagreeing with this statement. Quote: This is due to the fundamental principles of quantum mechanics, which dictate that the time evolution of a quantum system is governed by unitary transformations, also known as quantum gates. Unitary transformations are inherently reversible, meaning that they can be inverted. This property is crucial for the functioning of a quantum computer because it ensures that every operation can be undone, allowing the system to return to its initial state after the computation is complete. This characteristic is what makes quantum computing potentially more powerful than classical computing, as it enables a much wider range of algorithms to be implemented. However, it's important to note that while the quantum gates themselves are reversible, the process of measuring a quantum state, which is an essential part of the computation process, is not. Once a measurement is made, the quantum state collapses into one of the possible outcomes, and this process cannot be reversed. ----------------- And - Quantum computers are not reversible computers in the traditional sense. Reversible computing refers to a computing paradigm where every computation step is reversible, meaning that it is possible to uniquely determine the previous state of the system from its current state. This property allows for the elimination of information loss and enables the computation to be performed in a manner where there is no increase in entropy. Quantum computers, on the other hand, are based on the principles of quantum mechanics and operate using quantum bits, or qubits, which can exist in superpositions of states and can be entangled with each other. The computation in a quantum computer is typically performed using a sequence of quantum gates, which are unitary transformations that act on the qubits. These gates can be reversible, meaning that they have an inverse operation that can be used to undo the computation. However, not all quantum gates are reversible. While reversible gates are important in certain aspects of quantum computing, such as error correction and the implementation of certain algorithms, the overall operation of a quantum computer involves the measurement of qubits, which is an irreversible process. Measurement collapses the quantum state of a qubit to a classical state, and this irreversible step is necessary to obtain the final result of a computation. So, while some aspects of quantum computing involve reversible operations, the overall computation performed by a quantum computer is not reversible in the same sense as classical reversible computing. ---------------------- BillK From jasonresch at gmail.com Tue Jan 2 13:48:51 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Tue, 2 Jan 2024 08:48:51 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Limiting factor to the Intelligence Singularity? In-Reply-To: References: <68e9b208-0e36-48bc-89ad-3b7e68f6b8d3@protonmail.com> Message-ID: On Tue, Jan 2, 2024, 6:04 AM BillK via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > On Tue, 2 Jan 2024 at 05:13, Jason Resch via extropy-chat > wrote: > > > > All quantum computers are reversible computers, it is required so they > don't leak energy into the environment which would cause decoherence and > spoil the result. > > > > Jason > > _______________________________________________ > > > The chatbots seem to be saying 'Yes, But...' and sort of disagreeing > with this statement. > > Quote: > This is due to the fundamental principles of quantum mechanics, which > dictate that the time evolution of a quantum system is governed by > unitary transformations, also known as quantum gates. > > Unitary transformations are inherently reversible, meaning that they > can be inverted. This property is crucial for the functioning of a > quantum computer because it ensures that every operation can be > undone, allowing the system to return to its initial state after the > computation is complete. This characteristic is what makes quantum > computing potentially more powerful than classical computing, as it > enables a much wider range of algorithms to be implemented. > > However, it's important to note that while the quantum gates > themselves are reversible, the process of measuring a quantum state, > which is an essential part of the computation process, is not. Once a > measurement is made, the quantum state collapses into one of the > possible outcomes, and this process cannot be reversed. > ----------------- > > And - > Quantum computers are not reversible computers in the traditional > sense. Reversible computing refers to a computing paradigm where every > computation step is reversible, meaning that it is possible to > uniquely determine the previous state of the system from its current > state. This property allows for the elimination of information loss > and enables the computation to be performed in a manner where there is > no increase in entropy. > > Quantum computers, on the other hand, are based on the principles of > quantum mechanics and operate using quantum bits, or qubits, which can > exist in superpositions of states and can be entangled with each > other. The computation in a quantum computer is typically performed > using a sequence of quantum gates, which are unitary transformations > that act on the qubits. These gates can be reversible, meaning that > they have an inverse operation that can be used to undo the > computation. However, not all quantum gates are reversible. > > While reversible gates are important in certain aspects of quantum > computing, such as error correction and the implementation of certain > algorithms, the overall operation of a quantum computer involves the > measurement of qubits, which is an irreversible process. Measurement > collapses the quantum state of a qubit to a classical state, and this > irreversible step is necessary to obtain the final result of a > computation. > > So, while some aspects of quantum computing involve reversible > operations, the overall computation performed by a quantum computer is > not reversible in the same sense as classical reversible computing. > I think interpretational issues are throwing it off. Wave function collapse is considered irreversible in some interpretations (Copenhagen), but not in others (many worlds), and this happens, (or appears to happen), when we interact with the quantum computer to observe the final result. Also, the issue of reading the result (which requires copying information) is irreversible (leaks entropy into the environment) whether you are dealing with qubits in a quantum computer or classical bits in a classical irreversible computer. No computer can overcome this. If you read and copy information from a reversible computer, then it is you, not the computer, who have performed the thermodynamically irreversible operation. A civilization that uploads themselves to live for a million years in a virtual heaven could do so, and run for eons on a reversible computer which no one needs read. They have all their experiences within that computer, with no minimum amount of energy required to sustain it. "A simulated world hosting a simulated person can be a closed self-contained entity. It might exist as a program on a computer processing data quietly in some dark corner, giving no external hint of the joys and pains, successes and frustrations of the person inside." -- Hans Moravec in "Simulation, Consciousness, Existence" (1998) Jason -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Tue Jan 2 13:56:31 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Tue, 2 Jan 2024 08:56:31 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Limiting factor to the Intelligence Singularity? In-Reply-To: References: <68e9b208-0e36-48bc-89ad-3b7e68f6b8d3@protonmail.com> Message-ID: Could you ask it which quantum gates it believes are not reversible? This is counter to my understanding: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_logic_gate#:~:text=Because%20all%20quantum%20logical%20gates,matrices%20are%20also%20unitary%20matrices . Jason On Tue, Jan 2, 2024, 6:04 AM BillK via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > On Tue, 2 Jan 2024 at 05:13, Jason Resch via extropy-chat > wrote: > > > > All quantum computers are reversible computers, it is required so they > don't leak energy into the environment which would cause decoherence and > spoil the result. > > > > Jason > > _______________________________________________ > > > The chatbots seem to be saying 'Yes, But...' and sort of disagreeing > with this statement. > > Quote: > This is due to the fundamental principles of quantum mechanics, which > dictate that the time evolution of a quantum system is governed by > unitary transformations, also known as quantum gates. > > Unitary transformations are inherently reversible, meaning that they > can be inverted. This property is crucial for the functioning of a > quantum computer because it ensures that every operation can be > undone, allowing the system to return to its initial state after the > computation is complete. This characteristic is what makes quantum > computing potentially more powerful than classical computing, as it > enables a much wider range of algorithms to be implemented. > > However, it's important to note that while the quantum gates > themselves are reversible, the process of measuring a quantum state, > which is an essential part of the computation process, is not. Once a > measurement is made, the quantum state collapses into one of the > possible outcomes, and this process cannot be reversed. > ----------------- > > And - > Quantum computers are not reversible computers in the traditional > sense. Reversible computing refers to a computing paradigm where every > computation step is reversible, meaning that it is possible to > uniquely determine the previous state of the system from its current > state. This property allows for the elimination of information loss > and enables the computation to be performed in a manner where there is > no increase in entropy. > > Quantum computers, on the other hand, are based on the principles of > quantum mechanics and operate using quantum bits, or qubits, which can > exist in superpositions of states and can be entangled with each > other. The computation in a quantum computer is typically performed > using a sequence of quantum gates, which are unitary transformations > that act on the qubits. These gates can be reversible, meaning that > they have an inverse operation that can be used to undo the > computation. However, not all quantum gates are reversible. > > While reversible gates are important in certain aspects of quantum > computing, such as error correction and the implementation of certain > algorithms, the overall operation of a quantum computer involves the > measurement of qubits, which is an irreversible process. Measurement > collapses the quantum state of a qubit to a classical state, and this > irreversible step is necessary to obtain the final result of a > computation. > > So, while some aspects of quantum computing involve reversible > operations, the overall computation performed by a quantum computer is > not reversible in the same sense as classical reversible computing. > ---------------------- > > BillK > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pharos at gmail.com Tue Jan 2 15:02:02 2024 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Tue, 2 Jan 2024 15:02:02 +0000 Subject: [ExI] Limiting factor to the Intelligence Singularity? In-Reply-To: References: <68e9b208-0e36-48bc-89ad-3b7e68f6b8d3@protonmail.com> Message-ID: On Tue, 2 Jan 2024 at 13:59, Jason Resch via extropy-chat wrote: > > Could you ask it which quantum gates it believes are not reversible? This is counter to my understanding: > > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_logic_gate#:~:text=Because%20all%20quantum%20logical%20gates,matrices%20are%20also%20unitary%20matrices. > Jason > _______________________________________________ OK. :) BillK ---------------------------------- I first asked -- Explain what quantum gates are not reversible. (I had to be insistent here to effectively get it to admit a mistake). Answer-- However, there are certain quantum gates that are not reversible. One example is the measurement gate. Measurement is an essential part of quantum computing, as it allows us to extract information from qubits. However, the measurement process is inherently irreversible. When a qubit is measured, its quantum state collapses to a classical state, and this collapse is irreversible. Once the measurement is made, the information about the original quantum state of the qubit is lost. Another example of a non-reversible quantum gate is the "reset" gate. The reset gate is used to initialize qubits to a well-defined state, typically the computational basis state `|0?`. When a qubit is reset, its quantum state is effectively set to a known value, which is irreversible. It's important to note that while these specific gates may be irreversible, they are still valuable and necessary components of quantum computing. Irreversible operations like measurement and reset are essential for extracting classical information from quantum systems and preparing qubits for subsequent computations. However, the overall operation of a quantum computer, including the reversible gates and irreversible operations, is designed to achieve specific computational goals efficiently. Follow-up question. In quantum computing are the measurement gate and the "reset" gates not quantum gates? Answer -- You are correct, and I apologize for the confusion in my previous response. The measurement gate and the "reset" operation are not considered quantum gates in the traditional sense because they are not unitary operations and, therefore, not reversible. All quantum gates used in quantum computing are reversible. Reversibility is a crucial property in quantum computing because it allows for the precise manipulation and control of quantum information without loss. It enables quantum algorithms and computations to be performed accurately and reliably. The measurement gate is an essential operation in quantum computing that allows us to extract classical information from quantum states. However, it is an irreversible process. When a qubit is measured, its quantum state collapses to a classical state, and the information about the original quantum state is irreversibly lost. Similarly, the "reset" operation, which is used to initialize qubits to a known state, is also an irreversible process. It sets the quantum state of the qubit to a predefined value, typically the computational basis state `|0?`. While the measurement gate and the "reset" operation are not reversible, they play important roles in quantum computing for extracting classical information and preparing qubits for subsequent computations. However, they are not considered quantum gates in the same way as reversible gates, which are unitary operations that can be reversed to restore the original quantum state. --------------------- Question 2. What are some examples of reversible computing and how is it different from quantum computing? Answer 2. Reversible computing is a computing paradigm that aims to minimize or eliminate information loss during computation. In reversible computing, every computation step is reversible, which means that it is possible to uniquely determine the previous state of the system from its current state. This property allows for the elimination of information loss and enables the computation to be performed in a manner where there is no increase in entropy. One example of reversible computing is the use of reversible logic gates. Reversible logic gates are logic gates that have the property of reversibility, meaning that they have an equal number of input and output bits and can map each input to a unique output and vice versa. Examples of reversible logic gates include the Toffoli gate and the Fredkin gate. Reversible computing has several potential advantages, such as reduced energy consumption and the ability to perform computations without generating heat. It also has applications in certain areas, such as low-power computing, quantum computing, and error correction. Quantum computing, on the other hand, is a computing paradigm that utilizes the principles of quantum mechanics to perform computation. It operates using quantum bits, or qubits, which can exist in superpositions of states and can be entangled with each other. Quantum computing offers the potential for solving certain problems more efficiently than classical computers, such as factoring large numbers and simulating quantum systems. While reversible computing and quantum computing share some similarities, such as the use of reversible gates, they are fundamentally different. Quantum computing is based on quantum mechanics and utilizes the principles of superposition and entanglement to perform computation, whereas reversible computing is a classical computing paradigm that aims to minimize or eliminate information loss during computation by using reversible logic gates. Furthermore, quantum computing allows for the exploitation of quantum phenomena, such as interference and parallelism, which are not present in reversible computing. ----------------- From ben at zaiboc.net Tue Jan 2 15:30:55 2024 From: ben at zaiboc.net (Ben Zaiboc) Date: Tue, 2 Jan 2024 15:30:55 +0000 Subject: [ExI] A Paranormal Prediction In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On 02/01/2024 15:02, spike wrote: > John was never banished.? He was on moderation for about an hour in 2020. > > On Sun, Dec 31, 2023, 6:13 AM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat > wrote: > > As John K Clark has been banished from this list, and I feel that > his annual paranormal prediction is an important message ... Ok, do you have a suggestion for alternative wording, for next year's message? I don't want to ruffle any feathers (or rather, I want to be selective about the feathers being ruffled :D) I have no desire to take sides here, I used to object to the 'american politics' fever on this list myself, and almost quit because of it, but still feel that the loss of John is a big one (echoes of a certain other 'controversial poster' from the past, sadly no longer with us. Some of you will know what/who I'm talking about). It's just a shame that the other list is hosted by Google, so it's kind of out-of-bounds for me, else I would be on both. Ben -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From atymes at gmail.com Tue Jan 2 16:12:48 2024 From: atymes at gmail.com (Adrian Tymes) Date: Tue, 2 Jan 2024 08:12:48 -0800 Subject: [ExI] A Paranormal Prediction In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Tue, Jan 2, 2024, 7:32 AM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > On 02/01/2024 15:02, spike wrote: > > John was never banished. He was on moderation for about an hour in 2020. > On Sun, Dec 31, 2023, 6:13 AM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat wrote: > >> >> >> As John K Clark has been banished from this list, and I feel that his >> >> annual paranormal prediction is an important message ... > > > > Ok, do you have a suggestion for alternative wording, for next year's > message? > "As John K Clark is no longer posting to this list..." > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From atymes at gmail.com Tue Jan 2 16:22:41 2024 From: atymes at gmail.com (Adrian Tymes) Date: Tue, 2 Jan 2024 08:22:41 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Limiting factor to the Intelligence Singularity? In-Reply-To: References: <68e9b208-0e36-48bc-89ad-3b7e68f6b8d3@protonmail.com> Message-ID: On Tue, Jan 2, 2024, 5:50 AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > A civilization that uploads themselves to live for a million years in a > virtual heaven could do so, and run for eons on a reversible computer which > no one needs read. They have all their experiences within that computer, > with no minimum amount of energy required to sustain it. > Where does the energy to run this come from? What happens when those in the computer wish to interact with this source, to make sure that energy flow - and thus, their existence - continues? Also, what happens when they interact with each other within the computer? If everything is reversible, then nothing is permanent: there can be no memory, no learning, that can not be taken away by undoing (simulated) time. Who decides what and when to reverse - and is their experience of having done so, itself reversed? > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Tue Jan 2 17:25:25 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Tue, 2 Jan 2024 12:25:25 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Limiting factor to the Intelligence Singularity? In-Reply-To: References: <68e9b208-0e36-48bc-89ad-3b7e68f6b8d3@protonmail.com> Message-ID: On Tue, Jan 2, 2024, 11:24 AM Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > On Tue, Jan 2, 2024, 5:50 AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> A civilization that uploads themselves to live for a million years in a >> virtual heaven could do so, and run for eons on a reversible computer which >> no one needs read. They have all their experiences within that computer, >> with no minimum amount of energy required to sustain it. >> > > Where does the energy to run this come from? > It takes energy to start it, but then it can continue for arbitrarily long periods with no absolute minimum energy required. What happens when those in the computer wish to interact with this > source, to make sure that energy flow - and thus, their existence - > continues? > You could from the outside periodically read a check bit, which you allow those in the simulation to set. And when flagged proceed to read more bits. Or you simply trust the robots you left in charge to keep it going. There would be a K*T*ln(2) energy cost each time you read the check bit. > Also, what happens when they interact with each other within the computer? > That's no problem, the simulation is self contained. A single program run on reversible logic gates. If everything is reversible, then nothing is permanent: there can be no > memory, no learning, that can not be taken away by undoing (simulated) > time. > And all this is true of the physics of our own universe. That doesn't make life meaningless, however. Who decides what and when to reverse - and is their experience of having > done so, itself reversed? > You let it finish after a million years and pay the energy cost then. But you got a million years of nearly energy free compute time. Jason -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike at rainier66.com Tue Jan 2 21:11:43 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (Gregory Jones) Date: Tue, 2 Jan 2024 16:11:43 -0500 Subject: [ExI] A Paranormal Prediction In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: Political discussion is ok if you must. John was repeatedly, persistently warned about personal attacks. We urge mutual respect here. On his list anything goes, ad hominem attacks are allowed and expected. This is fine so long as you know about that. Any personal attack there is not to be taken personally. I agree it was a big loss. Suggest reviewing the exi archives summer and fall of 2020. I was away camping three weeks without internet when the big flame war broke out. Read what was posted and do suggest a suitable alternative to moderation, to eximod pls. Upon my return from camping I read all that and realized that I could not continue as moderator for I do not plan to give up lengthy vacations in the woods far from internet. Sooooo... Eximod agreed to take over. spike On Tue, Jan 2, 2024, 11:14 AM Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > On Tue, Jan 2, 2024, 7:32 AM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> On 02/01/2024 15:02, spike wrote: >> >> John was never banished. He was on moderation for about an hour in 2020. >> On Sun, Dec 31, 2023, 6:13 AM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat wrote: >> >>> >>> >>> As John K Clark has been banished from this list, and I feel that his >>> >>> annual paranormal prediction is an important message ... >> >> >> >> Ok, do you have a suggestion for alternative wording, for next year's >> message? >> > > "As John K Clark is no longer posting to this list..." > >> _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From efc at swisscows.email Wed Jan 3 13:51:23 2024 From: efc at swisscows.email (efc at swisscows.email) Date: Wed, 3 Jan 2024 14:51:23 +0100 (CET) Subject: [ExI] A Paranormal Prediction In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <9c6dfc1a-b4b8-4811-1571-ee65c8b34cc7@swisscows.email> Hello spike, On Tue, 2 Jan 2024, Gregory Jones via extropy-chat wrote: > Political discussion is ok if you must.? John was repeatedly, persistently warned about personal attacks.? We urge mutual respect > here.? On his list anything goes, ad hominem attacks are allowed and expected.? This is fine so long as you know about that.? Any Oh yes, I have seen that and I don't enjoy the political ranting and discussion climate one bit. So good that it is not allowed here I endorse that policy! Best regards, Daniel From mbb386 at main.nc.us Wed Jan 3 14:03:34 2024 From: mbb386 at main.nc.us (MB) Date: Wed, 3 Jan 2024 09:03:34 -0500 Subject: [ExI] A Paranormal Prediction In-Reply-To: <9c6dfc1a-b4b8-4811-1571-ee65c8b34cc7@swisscows.email> References: <9c6dfc1a-b4b8-4811-1571-ee65c8b34cc7@swisscows.email> Message-ID: <5b4775eb2450636408ed9e941c55608c.squirrel@www.main.nc.us> Before the Ad hominum & political rant list was formed I decided for my own peace of mind to block posts from John as he never seemed to stop, even after repeated requests. Unfortunately blocking didn't help much since many of his posts were quoted and responded to. I know people in Real Life like that and I avoid seeing them as much as possible. The internet is full of that kind of thing. I do not understand why it seems impossible online for people to refrain from responding to trolls, and that was how I began to view John's posts. So tiresome. Regards, MB On Wed, January 3, 2024 08:51, efc--- via extropy-chat wrote: > Hello spike, > > On Tue, 2 Jan 2024, Gregory Jones via extropy-chat wrote: > >> Political discussion is ok if you must.? John was repeatedly, >> persistently warned about personal attacks.? We urge mutual respect >> here.? On his list anything goes, ad hominem attacks are allowed and >> expected.? This is fine so long as you know about that.? Any > > Oh yes, I have seen that and I don't enjoy the political ranting and > discussion climate one bit. So good that it is not allowed here I > endorse that policy! > > Best regards, > Daniel > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > From spike at rainier66.com Wed Jan 3 14:59:34 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (Gregory Jones) Date: Wed, 3 Jan 2024 09:59:34 -0500 Subject: [ExI] A Paranormal Prediction In-Reply-To: <9c6dfc1a-b4b8-4811-1571-ee65c8b34cc7@swisscows.email> References: <9c6dfc1a-b4b8-4811-1571-ee65c8b34cc7@swisscows.email> Message-ID: Political discussion is allowed here and always has been. Personal vitriol is not. We all like an environment with mutual respect even of views with which we disagree. spike On Wed, Jan 3, 2024, 8:53 AM efc--- via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > Hello spike, > > On Tue, 2 Jan 2024, Gregory Jones via extropy-chat wrote: > > > Political discussion is ok if you must. John was repeatedly, > persistently warned about personal attacks. We urge mutual respect > > here. On his list anything goes, ad hominem attacks are allowed and > expected. This is fine so long as you know about that. Any > > Oh yes, I have seen that and I don't enjoy the political ranting and > discussion climate one bit. So good that it is not allowed here I > endorse that policy! > > Best regards, > Daniel > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From msd001 at gmail.com Wed Jan 3 15:01:12 2024 From: msd001 at gmail.com (Mike Dougherty) Date: Wed, 3 Jan 2024 10:01:12 -0500 Subject: [ExI] A Paranormal Prediction In-Reply-To: <5b4775eb2450636408ed9e941c55608c.squirrel@www.main.nc.us> References: <9c6dfc1a-b4b8-4811-1571-ee65c8b34cc7@swisscows.email> <5b4775eb2450636408ed9e941c55608c.squirrel@www.main.nc.us> Message-ID: On Wed, Jan 3, 2024, 9:06 AM MB via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > Before the Ad hominum & political rant list was formed I decided for my > own peace of mind to block posts from John as he never seemed to stop, > even after repeated requests. Unfortunately blocking didn't help much > since many of his posts were quoted and responded to. > > I know people in Real Life like that and I avoid seeing them as much as > possible. The internet is full of that kind of thing. I do not understand > why it seems impossible online for people to refrain from responding to > trolls, and that was how I began to view John's posts. So tiresome. > Yeah. :( I outright called him a troll. He challenged me on it. I realized I was no better than a troll by labelling others as such. I wish the rest of us could have simply not reacted to the incessant noise - because the incessant reactions were just as annoying. However, "cancelling" him because he refused to yield has removed another intellect from this collective. I miss many of those who were once frequent contributors. I wonder if this is a mode of any specific organization, or if the world in general is spread thin. I have gained wisdom through self-reflection at the cost of confidence in asserting an insight. The gestalt of ideas is difficult to put into words. > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From efc at swisscows.email Wed Jan 3 22:30:27 2024 From: efc at swisscows.email (efc at swisscows.email) Date: Wed, 3 Jan 2024 23:30:27 +0100 (CET) Subject: [ExI] A Paranormal Prediction In-Reply-To: References: <9c6dfc1a-b4b8-4811-1571-ee65c8b34cc7@swisscows.email> Message-ID: <383713f1-b59a-fc46-ed5d-dce017c34370@swisscows.email> I would also add that political discussion is one thing, an essential thing in a democracy, but political ranting is another. I do not like political ranting and block it if it doesn't stop. Best regards, Daniel On Wed, 3 Jan 2024, Gregory Jones via extropy-chat wrote: > Political discussion is allowed here and always has been.? Personal vitriol is not.? We all like an environment with mutual respect > even of views with which we disagree.? spike > > On Wed, Jan 3, 2024, 8:53 AM efc--- via extropy-chat wrote: > Hello spike, > > On Tue, 2 Jan 2024, Gregory Jones via extropy-chat wrote: > > > Political discussion is ok if you must.? John was repeatedly, persistently warned about personal attacks.? We urge > mutual respect > > here.? On his list anything goes, ad hominem attacks are allowed and expected.? This is fine so long as you know about > that.? Any > > Oh yes, I have seen that and I don't enjoy the political ranting and > discussion climate one bit. So good that it is not allowed here I > endorse that policy! > > Best regards, > Daniel > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > > From sjatkins at protonmail.com Thu Jan 4 08:41:33 2024 From: sjatkins at protonmail.com (Samantha) Date: Thu, 04 Jan 2024 08:41:33 +0000 Subject: [ExI] =?utf-8?q?An_expert_explains_=E2=80=98mind_uploading?= =?utf-8?b?4oCZ?= In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <60c118ff-9fa9-4796-8c70-abbc8a0f373e@protonmail.com> We have been beating this particular horse for at least three decades that I know of. What is a "computer"?? Seriously, is it reasonable to label as "computer" with its connotations today whatever substrate can contain a human mind or perhaps several???? Is that label a device to cast shade on the possibility from the beginning? What if you have machine phase nanotech and rod-logic hyper tiny computers through your brain that simply take over more and more of the functioning of your brain over time.? Is that still you? Are you still you when you are knocked out for surgery and then find yourself apparently back in reality and in apparently your same body?? What if you were instead in a coma for years????? Or if part of your brain was damaged and replaced with future tech? What is this "you" in the first place?? Have you inquired into it much? All of these arguments and more we have discussed many times and entertained ourselves with their slipperiness to come to firm conclusions by head tripping about it. What can we simply build and what can we change in ourselves to perhaps get us closer to being able to try it? - samantha > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: signature.asc Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 249 bytes Desc: OpenPGP digital signature URL: From pharos at gmail.com Thu Jan 4 12:05:06 2024 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Thu, 4 Jan 2024 12:05:06 +0000 Subject: [ExI] =?utf-8?q?An_expert_explains_=E2=80=98mind_uploading?= =?utf-8?b?4oCZ?= In-Reply-To: <60c118ff-9fa9-4796-8c70-abbc8a0f373e@protonmail.com> References: <60c118ff-9fa9-4796-8c70-abbc8a0f373e@protonmail.com> Message-ID: On Thu, 4 Jan 2024 at 08:44, Samantha via extropy-chat wrote: > > We have been beating this particular horse for at least three decades that I know of. > > What is a "computer"? Seriously, is it reasonable to label as "computer" with its connotations today whatever substrate can contain a human mind or perhaps several? Is that label a device to cast shade on the possibility from the beginning? > > What if you have machine phase nanotech and rod-logic hyper tiny computers through your brain that simply take over more and more of the functioning of your brain over time. Is that still you? > > Are you still you when you are knocked out for surgery and then find yourself apparently back in reality and in apparently your same body? What if you were instead in a coma for years? Or if part of your brain was damaged and replaced with future tech? > > What is this "you" in the first place? Have you inquired into it much? > > All of these arguments and more we have discussed many times and entertained ourselves with their slipperiness to come to firm conclusions by head tripping about it. > > What can we simply build and what can we change in ourselves to perhaps get us closer to being able to try it? > > - samantha > _______________________________________________ Hi Samantha Yes, I agree, but from 30 years ago, some people have left and new people have joined Exi-chat. Since ChatGPT LLM was released last year, the idea of AI has spread rapidly. Mostly to younger people who are now meeting these weird ideas for the first time. The uploading article shows that what was once a niche discussion in the 1990s is now acceptable to be discussed in polite company. :) The hope is that AI will assist humans in the design of much that was discussed here in 1990-2010. (Not forgetting the arrival of AGI and the Singularity). :) BillK From jasonresch at gmail.com Thu Jan 4 15:22:56 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Thu, 4 Jan 2024 10:22:56 -0500 Subject: [ExI] =?utf-8?q?An_expert_explains_=E2=80=98mind_uploading?= =?utf-8?b?4oCZ?= In-Reply-To: References: <60c118ff-9fa9-4796-8c70-abbc8a0f373e@protonmail.com> Message-ID: On Thu, Jan 4, 2024, 7:06 AM BillK via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > On Thu, 4 Jan 2024 at 08:44, Samantha via extropy-chat > wrote: > > > > We have been beating this particular horse for at least three decades > that I know of. > > > > What is a "computer"? Seriously, is it reasonable to label as > "computer" with its connotations today whatever substrate can contain a > human mind or perhaps several? Is that label a device to cast shade on > the possibility from the beginning? > > > > What if you have machine phase nanotech and rod-logic hyper tiny > computers through your brain that simply take over more and more of the > functioning of your brain over time. Is that still you? > > > > Are you still you when you are knocked out for surgery and then find > yourself apparently back in reality and in apparently your same body? What > if you were instead in a coma for years? Or if part of your brain was > damaged and replaced with future tech? > > > > What is this "you" in the first place? Have you inquired into it much? > > > > All of these arguments and more we have discussed many times and > entertained ourselves with their slipperiness to come to firm conclusions > by head tripping about it. > > > > What can we simply build and what can we change in ourselves to perhaps > get us closer to being able to try it? > > > > - samantha > > _______________________________________________ > > > Hi Samantha > > Yes, I agree, but from 30 years ago, some people have left and new > people have joined Exi-chat. > > Since ChatGPT LLM was released last year, the idea of AI has spread > rapidly. Mostly to younger people who are now meeting these weird > ideas for the first time. The uploading article shows that what was > once a niche discussion in the 1990s is now acceptable to be discussed > in polite company. :) > There's even a TV series called 'Upload': https://m.imdb.com/title/tt7826376/ Jason > The hope is that AI will assist humans in the design of much that was > discussed here in 1990-2010. > (Not forgetting the arrival of AGI and the Singularity). :) > > > BillK > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Thu Jan 4 15:36:33 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Thu, 4 Jan 2024 10:36:33 -0500 Subject: [ExI] =?utf-8?q?An_expert_explains_=E2=80=98mind_uploading?= =?utf-8?b?4oCZ?= In-Reply-To: <60c118ff-9fa9-4796-8c70-abbc8a0f373e@protonmail.com> References: <60c118ff-9fa9-4796-8c70-abbc8a0f373e@protonmail.com> Message-ID: On Thu, Jan 4, 2024, 3:42 AM Samantha via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > We have been beating this particular horse for at least three decades that > I know of. > > What is a "computer"? Seriously, is it reasonable to label as "computer" > with its connotations today whatever substrate can contain a human mind or > perhaps several? Is that label a device to cast shade on the possibility > from the beginning? > > What if you have machine phase nanotech and rod-logic hyper tiny computers > through your brain that simply take over more and more of the functioning > of your brain over time. Is that still you? > > Are you still you when you are knocked out for surgery and then find > yourself apparently back in reality and in apparently your same body? What > if you were instead in a coma for years? Or if part of your brain was > damaged and replaced with future tech? > > What is this "you" in the first place? Have you inquired into it much? > There's a whole subdiscipline of philosophy devoted to this question. It's a deep and important topic: the philosophy of personal identity. I summarize the field as attempting to answer the question of which experiences belong to which persons. My conclusion after much study is that there are no personal borders, nor any preconditions for being you. You remain you always, regardless of how you change materially, bodily, or psychologically, and regardless of the content of your experience. This implies that there is only one mind, it is you, you are it, and it is everyone. This is a view that has been called universalism by Arnold Zuboff, and open individualism by Daniel Kolak. It's been espoused by many thinkers, including Erwin Shrodigner, Freeman Dyson, Fred Hoyle, Kurt Godel, and Aldous Huxley. It's a core belief of vedantic Hinduism, and provides a foundation for the Golden Rule (or it's many derivatives). Jason > > All of these arguments and more we have discussed many times and > entertained ourselves with their slipperiness to come to firm conclusions > by head tripping about it. > > What can we simply build and what can we change in ourselves to perhaps > get us closer to being able to try it? > > - samantha > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pharos at gmail.com Thu Jan 4 16:28:51 2024 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Thu, 4 Jan 2024 16:28:51 +0000 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism Message-ID: Let's see what an AI thinks about Open Individualism. It reminds me of bits of Buddhism that I've heard about. BillK Explain Open Individualism - Open individualism is a philosophical position that challenges the traditional notion of personal identity as being tied to a specific individual. According to open individualism, there is only one conscious subject or entity that experiences all individual lives or perspectives. In other words, open individualism posits that all individuals are fundamentally connected at the level of consciousness. From this perspective, you and I are not separate individuals with distinct identities but rather manifestations of the same underlying consciousness or awareness. Open individualism can be contrasted with other theories of personal identity. For example, closed individualism holds that each person is a distinct and separate individual with a unique identity that persists over time. It suggests that personal identity is tied to specific bodies, minds, or streams of consciousness. Open individualism rejects the idea of personal identity as a separate and isolated entity and instead argues for a more inclusive and interconnected view of consciousness. Advocates of open individualism often argue that the boundaries between individuals are illusory and that the underlying reality is a single, unified consciousness experiencing itself through different perspectives. This perspective raises interesting philosophical questions about the nature of personal identity, the relationship between individuals, and the implications for ethics and moral responsibility. It challenges our intuitive notions of selfhood and invites us to reconsider the boundaries we typically draw between ourselves and others. -------------- Tell me more -- Certainly! Here are some additional points to delve deeper into the concept of open individualism: 1. Unity of Consciousness: Open individualism posits that there is a fundamental unity of consciousness that underlies all individual experiences. It suggests that the sense of self and personal identity we associate with our individual lives is an illusion, and that at a deeper level, there is a single consciousness that is shared by all beings. 2. Metaphysical Implications: Open individualism raises metaphysical questions about the nature of consciousness and its relationship to the physical world. It challenges the idea that consciousness arises solely from individual brains or minds and suggests that consciousness is a fundamental and universal aspect of reality. 3. Unity in Diversity: Open individualism views the diversity of human experiences and perspectives as different expressions of the same underlying consciousness. It emphasizes the interconnectedness and interdependence of all individuals, suggesting that our apparent differences are superficial and that we are ultimately part of a larger, unified whole. 4. Ethical Considerations: The concept of open individualism can have implications for ethics and moral responsibility. It challenges the idea of personal identity as the basis for moral distinctions and calls for a more inclusive and compassionate approach to others. If we recognize that we are all manifestations of the same consciousness, it can foster a sense of empathy and interconnectedness that transcends narrow self-interest. 5. Mystical and Spiritual Traditions: The idea of open individualism shares similarities with certain mystical and spiritual traditions. Concepts such as nondualism, oneness, and universal consciousness can be found in various philosophical and religious systems. Open individualism aligns with the notion that our individual identities are temporary and illusory, and that a deeper reality connects all beings. It's important to note that open individualism is a philosophical position that is subject to debate and interpretation. While some find it intellectually compelling, others may have reservations or objections. Exploring this concept further can lead to fascinating discussions about the nature of consciousness, personal identity, and our place in the world. ------------------ From jasonresch at gmail.com Thu Jan 4 16:40:58 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Thu, 4 Jan 2024 11:40:58 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: Not a bad summary. I recently created a discussion list for this topic, in case anyone here wants to pursue these topics in more depth: https://groups.google.com/g/universalism-discussion It's public so anyone can join and post. Jason On Thu, Jan 4, 2024, 11:30 AM BillK via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > Let's see what an AI thinks about Open Individualism. > It reminds me of bits of Buddhism that I've heard about. > BillK > > Explain Open Individualism - > > Open individualism is a philosophical position that challenges the > traditional notion of personal identity as being tied to a specific > individual. According to open individualism, there is only one > conscious subject or entity that experiences all individual lives or > perspectives. > > In other words, open individualism posits that all individuals are > fundamentally connected at the level of consciousness. From this > perspective, you and I are not separate individuals with distinct > identities but rather manifestations of the same underlying > consciousness or awareness. > > Open individualism can be contrasted with other theories of personal > identity. For example, closed individualism holds that each person is > a distinct and separate individual with a unique identity that > persists over time. It suggests that personal identity is tied to > specific bodies, minds, or streams of consciousness. > > Open individualism rejects the idea of personal identity as a separate > and isolated entity and instead argues for a more inclusive and > interconnected view of consciousness. Advocates of open individualism > often argue that the boundaries between individuals are illusory and > that the underlying reality is a single, unified consciousness > experiencing itself through different perspectives. > > This perspective raises interesting philosophical questions about the > nature of personal identity, the relationship between individuals, and > the implications for ethics and moral responsibility. It challenges > our intuitive notions of selfhood and invites us to reconsider the > boundaries we typically draw between ourselves and others. > -------------- > > Tell me more -- > > Certainly! Here are some additional points to delve deeper into the > concept of open individualism: > > 1. Unity of Consciousness: Open individualism posits that there is a > fundamental unity of consciousness that underlies all individual > experiences. It suggests that the sense of self and personal identity > we associate with our individual lives is an illusion, and that at a > deeper level, there is a single consciousness that is shared by all > beings. > > 2. Metaphysical Implications: Open individualism raises metaphysical > questions about the nature of consciousness and its relationship to > the physical world. It challenges the idea that consciousness arises > solely from individual brains or minds and suggests that consciousness > is a fundamental and universal aspect of reality. > > 3. Unity in Diversity: Open individualism views the diversity of human > experiences and perspectives as different expressions of the same > underlying consciousness. It emphasizes the interconnectedness and > interdependence of all individuals, suggesting that our apparent > differences are superficial and that we are ultimately part of a > larger, unified whole. > > 4. Ethical Considerations: The concept of open individualism can have > implications for ethics and moral responsibility. It challenges the > idea of personal identity as the basis for moral distinctions and > calls for a more inclusive and compassionate approach to others. If we > recognize that we are all manifestations of the same consciousness, it > can foster a sense of empathy and interconnectedness that transcends > narrow self-interest. > > 5. Mystical and Spiritual Traditions: The idea of open individualism > shares similarities with certain mystical and spiritual traditions. > Concepts such as nondualism, oneness, and universal consciousness can > be found in various philosophical and religious systems. Open > individualism aligns with the notion that our individual identities > are temporary and illusory, and that a deeper reality connects all > beings. > > It's important to note that open individualism is a philosophical > position that is subject to debate and interpretation. While some find > it intellectually compelling, others may have reservations or > objections. Exploring this concept further can lead to fascinating > discussions about the nature of consciousness, personal identity, and > our place in the world. > ------------------ > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From atymes at gmail.com Thu Jan 4 16:53:12 2024 From: atymes at gmail.com (Adrian Tymes) Date: Thu, 4 Jan 2024 08:53:12 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: Open individualism, given that description, would seem to be trivially refutable by noting the degree of misunderstanding that commonly arises between individuals raised in very different circumstances in very different cultures. If all humans had shared awareness, it would also not be possible to keep secrets - not just at the level of, e.g., what is my password, but for another human being to have no concept of passwords or user accounts. On Thu, Jan 4, 2024 at 8:30?AM BillK via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > Let's see what an AI thinks about Open Individualism. > It reminds me of bits of Buddhism that I've heard about. > BillK > > Explain Open Individualism - > > Open individualism is a philosophical position that challenges the > traditional notion of personal identity as being tied to a specific > individual. According to open individualism, there is only one > conscious subject or entity that experiences all individual lives or > perspectives. > > In other words, open individualism posits that all individuals are > fundamentally connected at the level of consciousness. From this > perspective, you and I are not separate individuals with distinct > identities but rather manifestations of the same underlying > consciousness or awareness. > > Open individualism can be contrasted with other theories of personal > identity. For example, closed individualism holds that each person is > a distinct and separate individual with a unique identity that > persists over time. It suggests that personal identity is tied to > specific bodies, minds, or streams of consciousness. > > Open individualism rejects the idea of personal identity as a separate > and isolated entity and instead argues for a more inclusive and > interconnected view of consciousness. Advocates of open individualism > often argue that the boundaries between individuals are illusory and > that the underlying reality is a single, unified consciousness > experiencing itself through different perspectives. > > This perspective raises interesting philosophical questions about the > nature of personal identity, the relationship between individuals, and > the implications for ethics and moral responsibility. It challenges > our intuitive notions of selfhood and invites us to reconsider the > boundaries we typically draw between ourselves and others. > -------------- > > Tell me more -- > > Certainly! Here are some additional points to delve deeper into the > concept of open individualism: > > 1. Unity of Consciousness: Open individualism posits that there is a > fundamental unity of consciousness that underlies all individual > experiences. It suggests that the sense of self and personal identity > we associate with our individual lives is an illusion, and that at a > deeper level, there is a single consciousness that is shared by all > beings. > > 2. Metaphysical Implications: Open individualism raises metaphysical > questions about the nature of consciousness and its relationship to > the physical world. It challenges the idea that consciousness arises > solely from individual brains or minds and suggests that consciousness > is a fundamental and universal aspect of reality. > > 3. Unity in Diversity: Open individualism views the diversity of human > experiences and perspectives as different expressions of the same > underlying consciousness. It emphasizes the interconnectedness and > interdependence of all individuals, suggesting that our apparent > differences are superficial and that we are ultimately part of a > larger, unified whole. > > 4. Ethical Considerations: The concept of open individualism can have > implications for ethics and moral responsibility. It challenges the > idea of personal identity as the basis for moral distinctions and > calls for a more inclusive and compassionate approach to others. If we > recognize that we are all manifestations of the same consciousness, it > can foster a sense of empathy and interconnectedness that transcends > narrow self-interest. > > 5. Mystical and Spiritual Traditions: The idea of open individualism > shares similarities with certain mystical and spiritual traditions. > Concepts such as nondualism, oneness, and universal consciousness can > be found in various philosophical and religious systems. Open > individualism aligns with the notion that our individual identities > are temporary and illusory, and that a deeper reality connects all > beings. > > It's important to note that open individualism is a philosophical > position that is subject to debate and interpretation. While some find > it intellectually compelling, others may have reservations or > objections. Exploring this concept further can lead to fascinating > discussions about the nature of consciousness, personal identity, and > our place in the world. > ------------------ > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From tara at taramayastales.com Thu Jan 4 17:08:56 2024 From: tara at taramayastales.com (Tara Maya) Date: Thu, 4 Jan 2024 09:08:56 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <865D31C3-1A6E-4F90-A49E-148642C076E3@taramayastales.com> So it's like a "people's republic" where the combination of words actually reverses the meaning of both. Open Individualism" is a philosophy that is the inverse of the Enlightenment's ideal of individualism; in fact, it's quite fine to sacrifice millions of so-called "open individuals" if they are but clonal cells sacrificed by the One Body for the Greater Good. This is also, in my opinion, not much supported by the evidence of evolution. Consciousness is an evolved trait of individuals to compete for mates and resources with other individuals; cooperation between conscious individuals has to benefit each participant independently. This is very different than the "we all share one mind" philosophy. It's not that we can connect with others for the greater good... but this is not "natural" or innate, we have to work hard for it. Still, the AI summary is quite helpful, Bilik. (I wasn't sure if you wanted to start a conversation about AI's grasp of philosophy or about the philosophy itself.) Tara Maya > On Jan 4, 2024, at 8:28 AM, BillK via extropy-chat wrote: > > Let's see what an AI thinks about Open Individualism. > It reminds me of bits of Buddhism that I've heard about. > BillK > > Explain Open Individualism - > > Open individualism is a philosophical position that challenges the > traditional notion of personal identity as being tied to a specific > individual. According to open individualism, there is only one > conscious subject or entity that experiences all individual lives or > perspectives. > > In other words, open individualism posits that all individuals are > fundamentally connected at the level of consciousness. From this > perspective, you and I are not separate individuals with distinct > identities but rather manifestations of the same underlying > consciousness or awareness. > > Open individualism can be contrasted with other theories of personal > identity. For example, closed individualism holds that each person is > a distinct and separate individual with a unique identity that > persists over time. It suggests that personal identity is tied to > specific bodies, minds, or streams of consciousness. > > Open individualism rejects the idea of personal identity as a separate > and isolated entity and instead argues for a more inclusive and > interconnected view of consciousness. Advocates of open individualism > often argue that the boundaries between individuals are illusory and > that the underlying reality is a single, unified consciousness > experiencing itself through different perspectives. > > This perspective raises interesting philosophical questions about the > nature of personal identity, the relationship between individuals, and > the implications for ethics and moral responsibility. It challenges > our intuitive notions of selfhood and invites us to reconsider the > boundaries we typically draw between ourselves and others. > -------------- > > Tell me more -- > > Certainly! Here are some additional points to delve deeper into the > concept of open individualism: > > 1. Unity of Consciousness: Open individualism posits that there is a > fundamental unity of consciousness that underlies all individual > experiences. It suggests that the sense of self and personal identity > we associate with our individual lives is an illusion, and that at a > deeper level, there is a single consciousness that is shared by all > beings. > > 2. Metaphysical Implications: Open individualism raises metaphysical > questions about the nature of consciousness and its relationship to > the physical world. It challenges the idea that consciousness arises > solely from individual brains or minds and suggests that consciousness > is a fundamental and universal aspect of reality. > > 3. Unity in Diversity: Open individualism views the diversity of human > experiences and perspectives as different expressions of the same > underlying consciousness. It emphasizes the interconnectedness and > interdependence of all individuals, suggesting that our apparent > differences are superficial and that we are ultimately part of a > larger, unified whole. > > 4. Ethical Considerations: The concept of open individualism can have > implications for ethics and moral responsibility. It challenges the > idea of personal identity as the basis for moral distinctions and > calls for a more inclusive and compassionate approach to others. If we > recognize that we are all manifestations of the same consciousness, it > can foster a sense of empathy and interconnectedness that transcends > narrow self-interest. > > 5. Mystical and Spiritual Traditions: The idea of open individualism > shares similarities with certain mystical and spiritual traditions. > Concepts such as nondualism, oneness, and universal consciousness can > be found in various philosophical and religious systems. Open > individualism aligns with the notion that our individual identities > are temporary and illusory, and that a deeper reality connects all > beings. > > It's important to note that open individualism is a philosophical > position that is subject to debate and interpretation. While some find > it intellectually compelling, others may have reservations or > objections. Exploring this concept further can lead to fascinating > discussions about the nature of consciousness, personal identity, and > our place in the world. > ------------------ > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > From jasonresch at gmail.com Thu Jan 4 17:14:07 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Thu, 4 Jan 2024 12:14:07 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Thu, Jan 4, 2024, 11:54 AM Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > Open individualism, given that description, would seem to be trivially > refutable by noting the degree of misunderstanding that commonly arises > between individuals raised in very different circumstances in very > different cultures. > > If all humans had shared awareness, it would also not be possible to keep > secrets - not just at the level of, e.g., what is my password, but for > another human being to have no concept of passwords or user accounts. > That's not what open individualism means. It is not omniscience, it is the shared identity of personhood. Consider the difference between saying "all of Adrian Tymes's experiences are had by Adrian Tymes", and contrast that with "Adrian Tymes simultaneously knows and perceives every moment of his life." / These are two quite different statements. Open individualism doesn't mean each of us knows everything, it is better though of as the former case, where we say which experiences are had by one particular person. In the case of open individualism, the answer is all experiences. Jason > On Thu, Jan 4, 2024 at 8:30?AM BillK via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> Let's see what an AI thinks about Open Individualism. >> It reminds me of bits of Buddhism that I've heard about. >> BillK >> >> Explain Open Individualism - >> >> Open individualism is a philosophical position that challenges the >> traditional notion of personal identity as being tied to a specific >> individual. According to open individualism, there is only one >> conscious subject or entity that experiences all individual lives or >> perspectives. >> >> In other words, open individualism posits that all individuals are >> fundamentally connected at the level of consciousness. From this >> perspective, you and I are not separate individuals with distinct >> identities but rather manifestations of the same underlying >> consciousness or awareness. >> >> Open individualism can be contrasted with other theories of personal >> identity. For example, closed individualism holds that each person is >> a distinct and separate individual with a unique identity that >> persists over time. It suggests that personal identity is tied to >> specific bodies, minds, or streams of consciousness. >> >> Open individualism rejects the idea of personal identity as a separate >> and isolated entity and instead argues for a more inclusive and >> interconnected view of consciousness. Advocates of open individualism >> often argue that the boundaries between individuals are illusory and >> that the underlying reality is a single, unified consciousness >> experiencing itself through different perspectives. >> >> This perspective raises interesting philosophical questions about the >> nature of personal identity, the relationship between individuals, and >> the implications for ethics and moral responsibility. It challenges >> our intuitive notions of selfhood and invites us to reconsider the >> boundaries we typically draw between ourselves and others. >> -------------- >> >> Tell me more -- >> >> Certainly! Here are some additional points to delve deeper into the >> concept of open individualism: >> >> 1. Unity of Consciousness: Open individualism posits that there is a >> fundamental unity of consciousness that underlies all individual >> experiences. It suggests that the sense of self and personal identity >> we associate with our individual lives is an illusion, and that at a >> deeper level, there is a single consciousness that is shared by all >> beings. >> >> 2. Metaphysical Implications: Open individualism raises metaphysical >> questions about the nature of consciousness and its relationship to >> the physical world. It challenges the idea that consciousness arises >> solely from individual brains or minds and suggests that consciousness >> is a fundamental and universal aspect of reality. >> >> 3. Unity in Diversity: Open individualism views the diversity of human >> experiences and perspectives as different expressions of the same >> underlying consciousness. It emphasizes the interconnectedness and >> interdependence of all individuals, suggesting that our apparent >> differences are superficial and that we are ultimately part of a >> larger, unified whole. >> >> 4. Ethical Considerations: The concept of open individualism can have >> implications for ethics and moral responsibility. It challenges the >> idea of personal identity as the basis for moral distinctions and >> calls for a more inclusive and compassionate approach to others. If we >> recognize that we are all manifestations of the same consciousness, it >> can foster a sense of empathy and interconnectedness that transcends >> narrow self-interest. >> >> 5. Mystical and Spiritual Traditions: The idea of open individualism >> shares similarities with certain mystical and spiritual traditions. >> Concepts such as nondualism, oneness, and universal consciousness can >> be found in various philosophical and religious systems. Open >> individualism aligns with the notion that our individual identities >> are temporary and illusory, and that a deeper reality connects all >> beings. >> >> It's important to note that open individualism is a philosophical >> position that is subject to debate and interpretation. While some find >> it intellectually compelling, others may have reservations or >> objections. Exploring this concept further can lead to fascinating >> discussions about the nature of consciousness, personal identity, and >> our place in the world. >> ------------------ >> _______________________________________________ >> extropy-chat mailing list >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat >> > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Thu Jan 4 17:23:57 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Thu, 4 Jan 2024 12:23:57 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: <865D31C3-1A6E-4F90-A49E-148642C076E3@taramayastales.com> References: <865D31C3-1A6E-4F90-A49E-148642C076E3@taramayastales.com> Message-ID: On Thu, Jan 4, 2024, 12:10 PM Tara Maya via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > So it's like a "people's republic" where the combination of words actually > reverses the meaning of both. Open Individualism" is a philosophy that is > the inverse of the Enlightenment's ideal of individualism; in fact, it's > quite fine to sacrifice millions of so-called "open individuals" if they > are but clonal cells sacrificed by the One Body for the Greater Good. > I am not sure how you get from "all experiences belong to one universal person" to justifying the sacrifice of millions. Can you explain what steps you took to get there? > This is also, in my opinion, not much supported by the evidence of > evolution. Consciousness is an evolved trait of individuals to compete for > mates and resources with other individuals; cooperation between conscious > individuals has to benefit each participant independently. This is very > different than the "we all share one mind" philosophy. The belief is the antithesis of evolved behavior and beliefs, which prioritize the survival of the self and one's genes above all. I think the brain manufactures an ego-centric illusion, which can be suspended through meditation, logic, traumatic brain injury, stroke, or drugs, which results in "ego death". Belief in this philosophy may be less than ideal for prioritizing one's genes over others, but that has no bearing on whether or not it is true. Jason > > It's not that we can connect with others for the greater good... but this > is not "natural" or innate, we have to work hard for it. > > Still, the AI summary is quite helpful, Bilik. (I wasn't sure if you > wanted to start a conversation about AI's grasp of philosophy or about the > philosophy itself.) > > Tara Maya > > > > > > > On Jan 4, 2024, at 8:28 AM, BillK via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > > > > Let's see what an AI thinks about Open Individualism. > > It reminds me of bits of Buddhism that I've heard about. > > BillK > > > > Explain Open Individualism - > > > > Open individualism is a philosophical position that challenges the > > traditional notion of personal identity as being tied to a specific > > individual. According to open individualism, there is only one > > conscious subject or entity that experiences all individual lives or > > perspectives. > > > > In other words, open individualism posits that all individuals are > > fundamentally connected at the level of consciousness. From this > > perspective, you and I are not separate individuals with distinct > > identities but rather manifestations of the same underlying > > consciousness or awareness. > > > > Open individualism can be contrasted with other theories of personal > > identity. For example, closed individualism holds that each person is > > a distinct and separate individual with a unique identity that > > persists over time. It suggests that personal identity is tied to > > specific bodies, minds, or streams of consciousness. > > > > Open individualism rejects the idea of personal identity as a separate > > and isolated entity and instead argues for a more inclusive and > > interconnected view of consciousness. Advocates of open individualism > > often argue that the boundaries between individuals are illusory and > > that the underlying reality is a single, unified consciousness > > experiencing itself through different perspectives. > > > > This perspective raises interesting philosophical questions about the > > nature of personal identity, the relationship between individuals, and > > the implications for ethics and moral responsibility. It challenges > > our intuitive notions of selfhood and invites us to reconsider the > > boundaries we typically draw between ourselves and others. > > -------------- > > > > Tell me more -- > > > > Certainly! Here are some additional points to delve deeper into the > > concept of open individualism: > > > > 1. Unity of Consciousness: Open individualism posits that there is a > > fundamental unity of consciousness that underlies all individual > > experiences. It suggests that the sense of self and personal identity > > we associate with our individual lives is an illusion, and that at a > > deeper level, there is a single consciousness that is shared by all > > beings. > > > > 2. Metaphysical Implications: Open individualism raises metaphysical > > questions about the nature of consciousness and its relationship to > > the physical world. It challenges the idea that consciousness arises > > solely from individual brains or minds and suggests that consciousness > > is a fundamental and universal aspect of reality. > > > > 3. Unity in Diversity: Open individualism views the diversity of human > > experiences and perspectives as different expressions of the same > > underlying consciousness. It emphasizes the interconnectedness and > > interdependence of all individuals, suggesting that our apparent > > differences are superficial and that we are ultimately part of a > > larger, unified whole. > > > > 4. Ethical Considerations: The concept of open individualism can have > > implications for ethics and moral responsibility. It challenges the > > idea of personal identity as the basis for moral distinctions and > > calls for a more inclusive and compassionate approach to others. If we > > recognize that we are all manifestations of the same consciousness, it > > can foster a sense of empathy and interconnectedness that transcends > > narrow self-interest. > > > > 5. Mystical and Spiritual Traditions: The idea of open individualism > > shares similarities with certain mystical and spiritual traditions. > > Concepts such as nondualism, oneness, and universal consciousness can > > be found in various philosophical and religious systems. Open > > individualism aligns with the notion that our individual identities > > are temporary and illusory, and that a deeper reality connects all > > beings. > > > > It's important to note that open individualism is a philosophical > > position that is subject to debate and interpretation. While some find > > it intellectually compelling, others may have reservations or > > objections. Exploring this concept further can lead to fascinating > > discussions about the nature of consciousness, personal identity, and > > our place in the world. > > ------------------ > > _______________________________________________ > > extropy-chat mailing list > > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From foozler83 at gmail.com Thu Jan 4 18:23:15 2024 From: foozler83 at gmail.com (William Flynn Wallace) Date: Thu, 4 Jan 2024 12:23:15 -0600 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <865D31C3-1A6E-4F90-A49E-148642C076E3@taramayastales.com> Message-ID: open individualism - did this idea start from any facts? I seriously doubt it. It sounds like one of those ideas that blow your mind and so are attractive to people, but have no way of being tested. Am I right? Prove to me that it's not just another goofy idea. Are we scientists in this group, or not. If not, then forget I wrote this. bill w On Thu, Jan 4, 2024 at 11:26?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > > > On Thu, Jan 4, 2024, 12:10 PM Tara Maya via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> So it's like a "people's republic" where the combination of words >> actually reverses the meaning of both. Open Individualism" is a philosophy >> that is the inverse of the Enlightenment's ideal of individualism; in fact, >> it's quite fine to sacrifice millions of so-called "open individuals" if >> they are but clonal cells sacrificed by the One Body for the Greater Good. >> > > I am not sure how you get from "all experiences belong to one universal > person" to justifying the sacrifice of millions. Can you explain what steps > you took to get there? > > > >> This is also, in my opinion, not much supported by the evidence of >> evolution. Consciousness is an evolved trait of individuals to compete for >> mates and resources with other individuals; cooperation between conscious >> individuals has to benefit each participant independently. This is very >> different than the "we all share one mind" philosophy. > > > The belief is the antithesis of evolved behavior and beliefs, which > prioritize the survival of the self and one's genes above all. I think the > brain manufactures an ego-centric illusion, which can be suspended through > meditation, logic, traumatic brain injury, stroke, or drugs, which results > in "ego death". Belief in this philosophy may be less than ideal for > prioritizing one's genes over others, but that has no bearing on whether or > not it is true. > > Jason > > > >> >> It's not that we can connect with others for the greater good... but this >> is not "natural" or innate, we have to work hard for it. >> >> Still, the AI summary is quite helpful, Bilik. (I wasn't sure if you >> wanted to start a conversation about AI's grasp of philosophy or about the >> philosophy itself.) >> >> Tara Maya >> >> >> >> >> >> > On Jan 4, 2024, at 8:28 AM, BillK via extropy-chat < >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: >> > >> > Let's see what an AI thinks about Open Individualism. >> > It reminds me of bits of Buddhism that I've heard about. >> > BillK >> > >> > Explain Open Individualism - >> > >> > Open individualism is a philosophical position that challenges the >> > traditional notion of personal identity as being tied to a specific >> > individual. According to open individualism, there is only one >> > conscious subject or entity that experiences all individual lives or >> > perspectives. >> > >> > In other words, open individualism posits that all individuals are >> > fundamentally connected at the level of consciousness. From this >> > perspective, you and I are not separate individuals with distinct >> > identities but rather manifestations of the same underlying >> > consciousness or awareness. >> > >> > Open individualism can be contrasted with other theories of personal >> > identity. For example, closed individualism holds that each person is >> > a distinct and separate individual with a unique identity that >> > persists over time. It suggests that personal identity is tied to >> > specific bodies, minds, or streams of consciousness. >> > >> > Open individualism rejects the idea of personal identity as a separate >> > and isolated entity and instead argues for a more inclusive and >> > interconnected view of consciousness. Advocates of open individualism >> > often argue that the boundaries between individuals are illusory and >> > that the underlying reality is a single, unified consciousness >> > experiencing itself through different perspectives. >> > >> > This perspective raises interesting philosophical questions about the >> > nature of personal identity, the relationship between individuals, and >> > the implications for ethics and moral responsibility. It challenges >> > our intuitive notions of selfhood and invites us to reconsider the >> > boundaries we typically draw between ourselves and others. >> > -------------- >> > >> > Tell me more -- >> > >> > Certainly! Here are some additional points to delve deeper into the >> > concept of open individualism: >> > >> > 1. Unity of Consciousness: Open individualism posits that there is a >> > fundamental unity of consciousness that underlies all individual >> > experiences. It suggests that the sense of self and personal identity >> > we associate with our individual lives is an illusion, and that at a >> > deeper level, there is a single consciousness that is shared by all >> > beings. >> > >> > 2. Metaphysical Implications: Open individualism raises metaphysical >> > questions about the nature of consciousness and its relationship to >> > the physical world. It challenges the idea that consciousness arises >> > solely from individual brains or minds and suggests that consciousness >> > is a fundamental and universal aspect of reality. >> > >> > 3. Unity in Diversity: Open individualism views the diversity of human >> > experiences and perspectives as different expressions of the same >> > underlying consciousness. It emphasizes the interconnectedness and >> > interdependence of all individuals, suggesting that our apparent >> > differences are superficial and that we are ultimately part of a >> > larger, unified whole. >> > >> > 4. Ethical Considerations: The concept of open individualism can have >> > implications for ethics and moral responsibility. It challenges the >> > idea of personal identity as the basis for moral distinctions and >> > calls for a more inclusive and compassionate approach to others. If we >> > recognize that we are all manifestations of the same consciousness, it >> > can foster a sense of empathy and interconnectedness that transcends >> > narrow self-interest. >> > >> > 5. Mystical and Spiritual Traditions: The idea of open individualism >> > shares similarities with certain mystical and spiritual traditions. >> > Concepts such as nondualism, oneness, and universal consciousness can >> > be found in various philosophical and religious systems. Open >> > individualism aligns with the notion that our individual identities >> > are temporary and illusory, and that a deeper reality connects all >> > beings. >> > >> > It's important to note that open individualism is a philosophical >> > position that is subject to debate and interpretation. While some find >> > it intellectually compelling, others may have reservations or >> > objections. Exploring this concept further can lead to fascinating >> > discussions about the nature of consciousness, personal identity, and >> > our place in the world. >> > ------------------ >> > _______________________________________________ >> > extropy-chat mailing list >> > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >> > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat >> > >> >> >> _______________________________________________ >> extropy-chat mailing list >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat >> > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From atymes at gmail.com Thu Jan 4 18:49:46 2024 From: atymes at gmail.com (Adrian Tymes) Date: Thu, 4 Jan 2024 10:49:46 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <865D31C3-1A6E-4F90-A49E-148642C076E3@taramayastales.com> Message-ID: On Thu, Jan 4, 2024 at 9:26?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > On Thu, Jan 4, 2024, 12:10 PM Tara Maya via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> So it's like a "people's republic" where the combination of words >> actually reverses the meaning of both. Open Individualism" is a philosophy >> that is the inverse of the Enlightenment's ideal of individualism; in fact, >> it's quite fine to sacrifice millions of so-called "open individuals" if >> they are but clonal cells sacrificed by the One Body for the Greater Good. >> > > I am not sure how you get from "all experiences belong to one universal > person" to justifying the sacrifice of millions. Can you explain what steps > you took to get there? > It's quite simple, with ample historical documentation. Whenever individual human beings become seen as not distinct persons, but just assets belonging to someone else - much like your skin cells are your assets, not individual people - then they can and will be sacrificed en masse if and when convenient for the "real" people. In this case, if everyone is the same person, then everyone is me. I own myself and everything that is me. If both of these are true, I therefore own everyone else (again: because everyone else is me and I own all parts of myself). If I own everyone else, then they are assets of mine that I do not need to treat as distinct human beings. I know that I am a person, so if there is only one universal person, then I am that person. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Thu Jan 4 19:15:45 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Thu, 4 Jan 2024 14:15:45 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <865D31C3-1A6E-4F90-A49E-148642C076E3@taramayastales.com> Message-ID: On Thu, Jan 4, 2024, 1:24 PM William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > open individualism - did this idea start from any facts? > Yes, there are strong probabilistic arguments for it being true. See this paper for an introduction to the probability argument: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/233329805_One_Self_The_Logic_of_Experience If open individualism is not true, the chance of you being born and alive as you is 1 in 200,000,000, and the same odds must have been win by your parents, your grand parents, and so on. So it is overwhelmingly unlikely that you would not exist at all if open individualism is false. I seriously doubt it. It sounds like one of those ideas that blow your > mind and so are attractive to people, but have no way of being tested. Am > I right? Prove to me that it's not just another goofy idea. Are we > scientists in this group, or not. If not, then forget I wrote this. bill > w > There are massive conceptual problems with the conventional closed individualism view. If you investigate these you will see why open individualism is the least flawed of all the available options. Consider that the rational scientist would conclude a person survives a star trek style destructive teletransporter, so long as an identical version was created on the other side. So then material/bodily continuity cannot be essential to survival. Consider also, that a person changes substantially over time, gaining memories here, losing memories there, to the point that a 50 year old person has almost nothing in common psychologically with their 3 year old self. No combine them: consider a flawed transporter where a few memories are lost and a few new ones inserted during a teleportation, such that an imperfect clone was created. Did the person survive? Your first instinct might be to say no, they were destroyed. But then consider, a person who travels and arrives by train is not an identical copy of the person who stepped on board. If we can survive transport by train, why can't we survive transport by faulty teleporter? If we can survive faulty teleporters, then the person who stepped in is the same person who emerges on the other side. How far can we take the faultiness of this transporter until it's non longer the same person? You will find, if you pull on these threads, that the conventional view of personal identity (what Kolak calls "closed individualism") breaks down, leaving two options: Empty individualism: a.k.a. no-self theory, we are each only and ever a single thought moment, like the Buddhist conception of Anatta. Open individualism: there are no individuating borders. Empty individualism, while logically tenable, is useless as a decision theory, and leads only to nihilism. If, however, you in any way connect your past self with your current self (reject empty individualism), then the only consistent scientific theory that remains is open individualism. Closed individualism is no workable. This is what Kolak shows in his book "I am You". Jason > > On Thu, Jan 4, 2024 at 11:26?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> >> >> On Thu, Jan 4, 2024, 12:10 PM Tara Maya via extropy-chat < >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: >> >>> So it's like a "people's republic" where the combination of words >>> actually reverses the meaning of both. Open Individualism" is a philosophy >>> that is the inverse of the Enlightenment's ideal of individualism; in fact, >>> it's quite fine to sacrifice millions of so-called "open individuals" if >>> they are but clonal cells sacrificed by the One Body for the Greater Good. >>> >> >> I am not sure how you get from "all experiences belong to one universal >> person" to justifying the sacrifice of millions. Can you explain what steps >> you took to get there? >> >> >> >>> This is also, in my opinion, not much supported by the evidence of >>> evolution. Consciousness is an evolved trait of individuals to compete for >>> mates and resources with other individuals; cooperation between conscious >>> individuals has to benefit each participant independently. This is very >>> different than the "we all share one mind" philosophy. >> >> >> The belief is the antithesis of evolved behavior and beliefs, which >> prioritize the survival of the self and one's genes above all. I think the >> brain manufactures an ego-centric illusion, which can be suspended through >> meditation, logic, traumatic brain injury, stroke, or drugs, which results >> in "ego death". Belief in this philosophy may be less than ideal for >> prioritizing one's genes over others, but that has no bearing on whether or >> not it is true. >> >> Jason >> >> >> >>> >>> It's not that we can connect with others for the greater good... but >>> this is not "natural" or innate, we have to work hard for it. >>> >>> Still, the AI summary is quite helpful, Bilik. (I wasn't sure if you >>> wanted to start a conversation about AI's grasp of philosophy or about the >>> philosophy itself.) >>> >>> Tara Maya >>> >>> >>> >>> >>> >>> > On Jan 4, 2024, at 8:28 AM, BillK via extropy-chat < >>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: >>> > >>> > Let's see what an AI thinks about Open Individualism. >>> > It reminds me of bits of Buddhism that I've heard about. >>> > BillK >>> > >>> > Explain Open Individualism - >>> > >>> > Open individualism is a philosophical position that challenges the >>> > traditional notion of personal identity as being tied to a specific >>> > individual. According to open individualism, there is only one >>> > conscious subject or entity that experiences all individual lives or >>> > perspectives. >>> > >>> > In other words, open individualism posits that all individuals are >>> > fundamentally connected at the level of consciousness. From this >>> > perspective, you and I are not separate individuals with distinct >>> > identities but rather manifestations of the same underlying >>> > consciousness or awareness. >>> > >>> > Open individualism can be contrasted with other theories of personal >>> > identity. For example, closed individualism holds that each person is >>> > a distinct and separate individual with a unique identity that >>> > persists over time. It suggests that personal identity is tied to >>> > specific bodies, minds, or streams of consciousness. >>> > >>> > Open individualism rejects the idea of personal identity as a separate >>> > and isolated entity and instead argues for a more inclusive and >>> > interconnected view of consciousness. Advocates of open individualism >>> > often argue that the boundaries between individuals are illusory and >>> > that the underlying reality is a single, unified consciousness >>> > experiencing itself through different perspectives. >>> > >>> > This perspective raises interesting philosophical questions about the >>> > nature of personal identity, the relationship between individuals, and >>> > the implications for ethics and moral responsibility. It challenges >>> > our intuitive notions of selfhood and invites us to reconsider the >>> > boundaries we typically draw between ourselves and others. >>> > -------------- >>> > >>> > Tell me more -- >>> > >>> > Certainly! Here are some additional points to delve deeper into the >>> > concept of open individualism: >>> > >>> > 1. Unity of Consciousness: Open individualism posits that there is a >>> > fundamental unity of consciousness that underlies all individual >>> > experiences. It suggests that the sense of self and personal identity >>> > we associate with our individual lives is an illusion, and that at a >>> > deeper level, there is a single consciousness that is shared by all >>> > beings. >>> > >>> > 2. Metaphysical Implications: Open individualism raises metaphysical >>> > questions about the nature of consciousness and its relationship to >>> > the physical world. It challenges the idea that consciousness arises >>> > solely from individual brains or minds and suggests that consciousness >>> > is a fundamental and universal aspect of reality. >>> > >>> > 3. Unity in Diversity: Open individualism views the diversity of human >>> > experiences and perspectives as different expressions of the same >>> > underlying consciousness. It emphasizes the interconnectedness and >>> > interdependence of all individuals, suggesting that our apparent >>> > differences are superficial and that we are ultimately part of a >>> > larger, unified whole. >>> > >>> > 4. Ethical Considerations: The concept of open individualism can have >>> > implications for ethics and moral responsibility. It challenges the >>> > idea of personal identity as the basis for moral distinctions and >>> > calls for a more inclusive and compassionate approach to others. If we >>> > recognize that we are all manifestations of the same consciousness, it >>> > can foster a sense of empathy and interconnectedness that transcends >>> > narrow self-interest. >>> > >>> > 5. Mystical and Spiritual Traditions: The idea of open individualism >>> > shares similarities with certain mystical and spiritual traditions. >>> > Concepts such as nondualism, oneness, and universal consciousness can >>> > be found in various philosophical and religious systems. Open >>> > individualism aligns with the notion that our individual identities >>> > are temporary and illusory, and that a deeper reality connects all >>> > beings. >>> > >>> > It's important to note that open individualism is a philosophical >>> > position that is subject to debate and interpretation. While some find >>> > it intellectually compelling, others may have reservations or >>> > objections. Exploring this concept further can lead to fascinating >>> > discussions about the nature of consciousness, personal identity, and >>> > our place in the world. >>> > ------------------ >>> > _______________________________________________ >>> > extropy-chat mailing list >>> > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >>> > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat >>> > >>> >>> >>> _______________________________________________ >>> extropy-chat mailing list >>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >>> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat >>> >> _______________________________________________ >> extropy-chat mailing list >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat >> > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From atymes at gmail.com Thu Jan 4 19:28:00 2024 From: atymes at gmail.com (Adrian Tymes) Date: Thu, 4 Jan 2024 11:28:00 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <865D31C3-1A6E-4F90-A49E-148642C076E3@taramayastales.com> Message-ID: On Thu, Jan 4, 2024 at 11:17?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > If open individualism is not true, the chance of you being born and alive > as you is 1 in 200,000,000, > That is a logical fallacy. You were born and alive as you, therefore, the chance of you having been born and alive is 1 in 1. If multi-worlds is true, there may be 199,999,999 other worlds in which you do not exist for each world in which you do, but those are irrelevant. We observe the world that we are in. > and the same odds must have been win by your parents, your grand parents, > and so on. > Their odds, likewise, are 1 in 1. > There are massive conceptual problems with the conventional closed > individualism view. If you investigate these you will see why open > individualism is the least flawed of all the available options. > > Consider that the rational scientist would conclude a person survives a > star trek style destructive teletransporter, so long as an identical > version was created on the other side. So then material/bodily continuity > cannot be essential to survival. > > Consider also, that a person changes substantially over time, gaining > memories here, losing memories there, to the point that a 50 year old > person has almost nothing in common psychologically with their 3 year old > self. > A person is a process, not a discrete state. These problems only arise by confusing a static state of a person for being the complete definition of that person over time. You will find, if you pull on these threads, that the conventional view of > personal identity (what Kolak calls "closed individualism") breaks down, > leaving two options: > > Empty individualism: a.k.a. no-self theory, we are each only and ever a > single thought moment, like the Buddhist conception of Anatta. > > Open individualism: there are no individuating borders. > This is another logical fallacy. There exist more than two options. What you here call "empty individualism" assumes that what a person is in a given moment is the only thing a person is. You have defined "open individualism" elsewhere. The truth appears to be neither of these, but something else. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From ben at zaiboc.net Thu Jan 4 19:28:38 2024 From: ben at zaiboc.net (Ben Zaiboc) Date: Thu, 4 Jan 2024 19:28:38 +0000 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <32feb6e1-591f-48b4-a9ce-4ae4cea296da@zaiboc.net> On 04/01/2024 16:29, BillK wrote: > open individualism posits that all individuals are > fundamentally connected at the level of consciousness. From this > perspective, you and I are not separate individuals with distinct > identities but rather manifestations of the same underlying > consciousness or awareness. Hm. If this is so, then why is there no experience of it? I certainly don't experience any consciousness but my own. Can anyone claim otherwise? I don't see how all individuals (or even just two) can possibly be 'connected at the level of consciousness' without being conscious of it. The conclusion is that we must be separate individuals with distinct identities, or we would all be aware that this was not the case. This seems to describe a 'hive mind', and we are definitely not that. Ben -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Thu Jan 4 19:43:47 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Thu, 4 Jan 2024 14:43:47 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <865D31C3-1A6E-4F90-A49E-148642C076E3@taramayastales.com> Message-ID: On Thu, Jan 4, 2024, 1:51 PM Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > On Thu, Jan 4, 2024 at 9:26?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> On Thu, Jan 4, 2024, 12:10 PM Tara Maya via extropy-chat < >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: >> >>> So it's like a "people's republic" where the combination of words >>> actually reverses the meaning of both. Open Individualism" is a philosophy >>> that is the inverse of the Enlightenment's ideal of individualism; in fact, >>> it's quite fine to sacrifice millions of so-called "open individuals" if >>> they are but clonal cells sacrificed by the One Body for the Greater Good. >>> >> >> I am not sure how you get from "all experiences belong to one universal >> person" to justifying the sacrifice of millions. Can you explain what steps >> you took to get there? >> > > It's quite simple, with ample historical documentation. Whenever > individual human beings become seen as not distinct persons, but just > assets belonging to someone else - much like your skin cells are your > assets, not individual people - then they can and will be sacrificed en > masse if and when convenient for the "real" people. > The question of individual rights is entirely separate from the question of what experiences belong to which persons (the concern of personal identity). I think it's an error to conflate the two. The implication of it that I see is that it converts self-interest into the interests of all, it motivates and provides a rational justification for what would normally be called "selfless acts". If it convinced leaders that in killing others they are only killing themselves, then this idea seems a powerful antidote against wars and genocides. Jason > In this case, if everyone is the same person, then everyone is me. I own > myself and everything that is me. If both of these are true, I therefore > own everyone else (again: because everyone else is me and I own all parts > of myself). > > If I own everyone else, then they are assets of mine that I do not need to > treat as distinct human beings. I know that I am a person, so if there is > only one universal person, then I am that person. > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From atymes at gmail.com Thu Jan 4 19:57:50 2024 From: atymes at gmail.com (Adrian Tymes) Date: Thu, 4 Jan 2024 11:57:50 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <865D31C3-1A6E-4F90-A49E-148642C076E3@taramayastales.com> Message-ID: On Thu, Jan 4, 2024 at 11:45?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > The question of individual rights is entirely separate from the question > of what experiences belong to which persons (the concern of personal > identity). > I have already shown that this is not correct. If all experiences belong to me, then there is nobody else having experiences, and therefore no other "true" people who might deserve individual rights, as I outlined in a previous email. > If it convinced leaders that in killing others they are only killing > themselves, then this idea seems a powerful antidote against wars and > genocides. > HA HA HA HA HA... ...oh, wait, you're serious. This is a laughably absurd notion, thoroughly and amply disproven by the historical evidence. Throughout history, leaders who did not give their subjects individual rights - in other words, seeing them as their property and essentially parts of themselves - went right on killing them, whenever they thought they would gain advantage by doing so. Which is to say that this sort of view has effectively caused wars and genocides, insofar as recognizing other human beings as distinct people not part of oneself would have prevented them. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Thu Jan 4 20:12:56 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Thu, 4 Jan 2024 15:12:56 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <865D31C3-1A6E-4F90-A49E-148642C076E3@taramayastales.com> Message-ID: On Thu, Jan 4, 2024, 2:29 PM Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > On Thu, Jan 4, 2024 at 11:17?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> If open individualism is not true, the chance of you being born and alive >> as you is 1 in 200,000,000, >> > > That is a logical fallacy. You were born and alive as you, therefore, the > chance of you having been born and alive is 1 in 1. > Just because someone has won the lottery does not mean it was likely that they would have won it. Consider the analogous situation of the fine tuning of the universe to support life. Despite that the anthropic principle guarantees we can only think about this from a life friendly universe, we can still marvel at the improbability that any given universe would have all the right properties to allow life. Now return to the question of your birth. Did it require an exact combination of atoms? If your mom had ordered a chicken sandwich instead of a salad, such that different atoms were incorporated in ntk your body, would you not exist? If you had slightly different genes, for a slightly darker shade of hair, would you not be conscious right now? Consider the odds that were overcome to have the exact right set of atoms and the exact right set of genes. If only one exact set would have given you life, the odds of your existence would be so low as to be incalculable. But here you are, born in a universe with life friendly laws, born at a time when the stars are still fusing, born with on a life friendly world, with just the right genes and atoms, and you find yourself in a time within the span of your life, rather than any of the 10^100 years this universe will last. > If multi-worlds is true, there may be 199,999,999 other worlds in which > you do not exist for each world in which you do, but those are irrelevant. > We observe the world that we are in. > Many worlds: We observe the world we are in. Externalism/Relativity: We observe the time we are in. Fine-tuning: We observe the universe we are in Universalism: We observe the body we are in. In each case, we overcome an illusion that some selection has been made, that something special has happened, when the truth is all exist, and there is no selection at all. All branches exist, all times exist, all universes exist, all conscious perspectives exist. There is no pointer that shines on some but not others, and makes those special. These are all what I call "indexical illusions" they lead to the single universe view in QM, the presentism conception of time, and the closed individualism conception of personal identity. > >> and the same odds must have been win by your parents, your grand parents, >> and so on. >> > > Their odds, likewise, are 1 in 1. > > >> There are massive conceptual problems with the conventional closed >> individualism view. If you investigate these you will see why open >> individualism is the least flawed of all the available options. >> >> Consider that the rational scientist would conclude a person survives a >> star trek style destructive teletransporter, so long as an identical >> version was created on the other side. So then material/bodily continuity >> cannot be essential to survival. >> >> Consider also, that a person changes substantially over time, gaining >> memories here, losing memories there, to the point that a 50 year old >> person has almost nothing in common psychologically with their 3 year old >> self. >> > > A person is a process, not a discrete state. These problems only arise by > confusing a static state of a person for being the complete definition of > that person over time. > A person is conventionally a process, but that process can be interrupted. Anesthesia, coma, concussion, dreamless sleep, etc. What unities the person across these discontinuities? And things don't get any easier with mind uploading, cryogenics, etc. > You will find, if you pull on these threads, that the conventional view of >> personal identity (what Kolak calls "closed individualism") breaks down, >> leaving two options: >> >> Empty individualism: a.k.a. no-self theory, we are each only and ever a >> single thought moment, like the Buddhist conception of Anatta. >> >> Open individualism: there are no individuating borders. >> > > This is another logical fallacy. There exist more than two options. > There are three, and together they are comprehensive (at least one must be true): 1. Empty individualism: individuating borders are total 2. Closed individualism: there are individuating borders, but they are not total 3. Open individualism: there are no individuating borders > What you here call "empty individualism" assumes that what a person is in > a given moment is the only thing a person is. You have defined "open > individualism" elsewhere. The truth appears to be neither of these, but > something else. > What is your alternative? Jason -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From atymes at gmail.com Thu Jan 4 20:28:48 2024 From: atymes at gmail.com (Adrian Tymes) Date: Thu, 4 Jan 2024 12:28:48 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <865D31C3-1A6E-4F90-A49E-148642C076E3@taramayastales.com> Message-ID: On Thu, Jan 4, 2024 at 12:14?PM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > On Thu, Jan 4, 2024, 2:29 PM Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> On Thu, Jan 4, 2024 at 11:17?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: >> >>> If open individualism is not true, the chance of you being born and >>> alive as you is 1 in 200,000,000, >>> >> >> That is a logical fallacy. You were born and alive as you, therefore, >> the chance of you having been born and alive is 1 in 1. >> > > > Just because someone has won the lottery does not mean it was likely that > they would have won it. > You are inherently talking about those who have won the lottery (of existence), and is making decisions based on having done so. Consider the analogous situation of the fine tuning of the universe to > support life. Despite that the anthropic principle guarantees we can only > think about this from a life friendly universe, we can still marvel at the > improbability that any given universe would have all the right properties > to allow life. > And yet, that improbability does not mean that we have to or should act as if our near future existence is anywhere near as unlikely as our origin was. > This is another logical fallacy. There exist more than two options. >> > > There are three, and together they are comprehensive (at least one must be > true): > > 1. Empty individualism: individuating borders are total > 2. Closed individualism: there are individuating borders, but they are not > total > 3. Open individualism: there are no individuating borders > You have just redefined "empty individualism" to try to get around the objections raised. Your earlier definition was, "we are each only and ever a single thought moment". In contrast, this definition says nothing about moments, but instead says that anything where individuating borders are total is empty individualism. My objection to your earlier definition was about limiting what a person is to a single moment, so this change is quite significant. This makes it appear as if you are arguing in bad faith, perhaps because you do not have a firm grasp of what you are trying to debate - which reduces everything you are saying to the ill-considered sayings of the confused, which means that we should ignore you and we can not help you until you help yourself. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pharos at gmail.com Thu Jan 4 20:52:00 2024 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Thu, 4 Jan 2024 20:52:00 +0000 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <865D31C3-1A6E-4F90-A49E-148642C076E3@taramayastales.com> Message-ID: On Thu, 4 Jan 2024 at 20:31, Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat wrote: > > > You have just redefined "empty individualism" to try to get around the objections raised. > _______________________________________________ I think you may be expecting too much from Open Individualism. It is not a religion or a moral philosophy laying down rules for how humans should behave. The AI seems to be saying that it is more just a way of thinking about life. You will still need laws, courts, police, prisons, armies, etc. BillK I asked the AI - Does open individualism provide a moral prescription for human behaviour to stop violence among humans? Answer - Open individualism, as a philosophical perspective, does not directly provide a specific moral prescription or a set of rules for human behavior to stop violence among humans. It is primarily concerned with the nature of personal identity and consciousness. However, it can offer some ethical insights and perspectives that may inform discussions on reducing violence. 1. Recognition of Interconnectedness: Open individualism emphasizes the interconnectedness of all beings at a fundamental level of consciousness. This recognition can foster a sense of empathy, compassion, and a broader perspective on the impact of one's actions on others. It can encourage individuals to consider the well-being and dignity of all individuals, promoting non-violence and cooperation. 2. Expanding the Moral Circle: Open individualism challenges narrow conceptions of self-interest and expands the moral circle to include all beings. Understanding that we are all manifestations of the same underlying consciousness can lead to a more inclusive and compassionate approach to others. This broader ethical consideration can contribute to efforts to reduce violence and promote peace. 3. Ethical Implications of Unity: The perspective of open individualism suggests that harming others is, in a sense, harming oneself. If all individuals are interconnected and part of the same underlying consciousness, violence against others is, in effect, violence against oneself. This understanding can lead to a moral aversion to violence and a commitment to non-violent conflict resolution. While open individualism can offer philosophical insights and ethical considerations, addressing violence among humans requires a multi-faceted approach. Practical strategies, social, political, and economic factors, as well as cultural and historical contexts, all play significant roles in understanding and addressing violence. Therefore, it is important to combine philosophical perspectives with a wide range of approaches and disciplines to effectively address the complex issue of violence in human behavior. ------------------- From jasonresch at gmail.com Thu Jan 4 20:58:47 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Thu, 4 Jan 2024 15:58:47 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <865D31C3-1A6E-4F90-A49E-148642C076E3@taramayastales.com> Message-ID: On Thu, Jan 4, 2024, 3:30 PM Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > On Thu, Jan 4, 2024 at 12:14?PM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> On Thu, Jan 4, 2024, 2:29 PM Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat < >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: >> >>> On Thu, Jan 4, 2024 at 11:17?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < >>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: >>> >>>> If open individualism is not true, the chance of you being born and >>>> alive as you is 1 in 200,000,000, >>>> >>> >>> That is a logical fallacy. You were born and alive as you, therefore, >>> the chance of you having been born and alive is 1 in 1. >>> >> >> >> Just because someone has won the lottery does not mean it was likely that >> they would have won it. >> > > You are inherently talking about those who have won the lottery (of > existence), and is making decisions based on having done so. > > Consider the analogous situation of the fine tuning of the universe to >> support life. Despite that the anthropic principle guarantees we can only >> think about this from a life friendly universe, we can still marvel at the >> improbability that any given universe would have all the right properties >> to allow life. >> > > And yet, that improbability does not mean that we have to or should act as > if our near future existence is anywhere near as unlikely as our origin was. > > >> This is another logical fallacy. There exist more than two options. >>> >> >> There are three, and together they are comprehensive (at least one must >> be true): >> >> 1. Empty individualism: individuating borders are total >> 2. Closed individualism: there are individuating borders, but they are >> not total >> 3. Open individualism: there are no individuating borders >> > > You have just redefined "empty individualism" to try to get around > the objections raised. > > Your earlier definition was, "we are each only and ever a single thought > moment". In contrast, this definition says nothing about moments, but > instead says that anything where individuating borders are total is empty > individualism. My objection to your earlier definition was about limiting > what a person is to a single moment, so this change is quite significant. > If borders are total then any deviation (i.e. any form of non-equality) constitutes a separate person. Which means even the changes of a person from second to second would constitute separate persons. I am sorry this was not clear to you and led you to accuse me of arguing in bad faith. Perhaps you should be more generous in your assumptions when interacting with others online. Jason > This makes it appear as if you are arguing in bad faith, perhaps because > you do not have a firm grasp of what you are trying to debate - which > reduces everything you are saying to the ill-considered sayings of the > confused, which means that we should ignore you and we can not help you > until you help yourself. > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From foozler83 at gmail.com Thu Jan 4 21:22:24 2024 From: foozler83 at gmail.com (William Flynn Wallace) Date: Thu, 4 Jan 2024 15:22:24 -0600 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <865D31C3-1A6E-4F90-A49E-148642C076E3@taramayastales.com> Message-ID: Consider also, that a person changes substantially over time, gaining memories here, losing memories there, to the point that a 50 year old person has almost nothing in common psychologically with their 3 year old self. This 100% completely and utterly false. Personality and intelligence remain fairly constant if we ignore superficial factors such as preferences in food, books , etc. The one in 200 million probability is a priori. Some form of me would have resulted with a probability of 1 if any of the sperm won out. I found no facts in the article pdf Jason sent. As far as I am concerned all of this is far outside of science. bill w On Thu, Jan 4, 2024 at 12:52?PM Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > On Thu, Jan 4, 2024 at 9:26?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> On Thu, Jan 4, 2024, 12:10 PM Tara Maya via extropy-chat < >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: >> >>> So it's like a "people's republic" where the combination of words >>> actually reverses the meaning of both. Open Individualism" is a philosophy >>> that is the inverse of the Enlightenment's ideal of individualism; in fact, >>> it's quite fine to sacrifice millions of so-called "open individuals" if >>> they are but clonal cells sacrificed by the One Body for the Greater Good. >>> >> >> I am not sure how you get from "all experiences belong to one universal >> person" to justifying the sacrifice of millions. Can you explain what steps >> you took to get there? >> > > It's quite simple, with ample historical documentation. Whenever > individual human beings become seen as not distinct persons, but just > assets belonging to someone else - much like your skin cells are your > assets, not individual people - then they can and will be sacrificed en > masse if and when convenient for the "real" people. > > In this case, if everyone is the same person, then everyone is me. I own > myself and everything that is me. If both of these are true, I therefore > own everyone else (again: because everyone else is me and I own all parts > of myself). > > If I own everyone else, then they are assets of mine that I do not need to > treat as distinct human beings. I know that I am a person, so if there is > only one universal person, then I am that person. > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Thu Jan 4 21:30:03 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Thu, 4 Jan 2024 16:30:03 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <865D31C3-1A6E-4F90-A49E-148642C076E3@taramayastales.com> Message-ID: On Thu, Jan 4, 2024, 4:23 PM William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > Consider also, that a person changes substantially over time, gaining > memories here, losing memories there, to the point that a 50 year old > person has almost nothing in common psychologically with their 3 year old > self. > > This 100% completely and utterly false. Personality and intelligence > remain fairly constant if we ignore superficial factors such as preferences > in food, books , etc. > A 3 year old steps into a transporter, a 50 year old with a similar personality and IQ steps out. Did the person who entered the transporter survive? > The one in 200 million probability is a priori. Some form of me would > have resulted with a probability of 1 if any of the sperm won out. > And that's exactly the thinking that leads to the conclusion of open individualism. "Some form of me would be born no matter what". Regardless of the atoms. Regardless of the genes. Regardless of who the parents are. Jason > I found no facts in the article pdf Jason sent. As far as I am concerned > all of this is far outside of science. bill w > > > On Thu, Jan 4, 2024 at 12:52?PM Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> On Thu, Jan 4, 2024 at 9:26?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: >> >>> On Thu, Jan 4, 2024, 12:10 PM Tara Maya via extropy-chat < >>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: >>> >>>> So it's like a "people's republic" where the combination of words >>>> actually reverses the meaning of both. Open Individualism" is a philosophy >>>> that is the inverse of the Enlightenment's ideal of individualism; in fact, >>>> it's quite fine to sacrifice millions of so-called "open individuals" if >>>> they are but clonal cells sacrificed by the One Body for the Greater Good. >>>> >>> >>> I am not sure how you get from "all experiences belong to one universal >>> person" to justifying the sacrifice of millions. Can you explain what steps >>> you took to get there? >>> >> >> It's quite simple, with ample historical documentation. Whenever >> individual human beings become seen as not distinct persons, but just >> assets belonging to someone else - much like your skin cells are your >> assets, not individual people - then they can and will be sacrificed en >> masse if and when convenient for the "real" people. >> >> In this case, if everyone is the same person, then everyone is me. I own >> myself and everything that is me. If both of these are true, I therefore >> own everyone else (again: because everyone else is me and I own all parts >> of myself). >> >> If I own everyone else, then they are assets of mine that I do not need >> to treat as distinct human beings. I know that I am a person, so if there >> is only one universal person, then I am that person. >> _______________________________________________ >> extropy-chat mailing list >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat >> > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Thu Jan 4 21:32:49 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Thu, 4 Jan 2024 16:32:49 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <865D31C3-1A6E-4F90-A49E-148642C076E3@taramayastales.com> Message-ID: On Thu, Jan 4, 2024, 3:53 PM BillK via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > On Thu, 4 Jan 2024 at 20:31, Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat > wrote: > > > > > > > You have just redefined "empty individualism" to try to get around the > objections raised. > > _______________________________________________ > > > I think you may be expecting too much from Open Individualism. > It is not a religion or a moral philosophy laying down rules for how > humans should behave. > The AI seems to be saying that it is more just a way of thinking about > life. > You will still need laws, courts, police, prisons, armies, etc. > > BillK Thanks Bill this is useful. Jason > I asked the AI - > Does open individualism provide a moral prescription for human > behaviour to stop violence among humans? > > Answer - > Open individualism, as a philosophical perspective, does not directly > provide a specific moral prescription or a set of rules for human > behavior to stop violence among humans. It is primarily concerned with > the nature of personal identity and consciousness. However, it can > offer some ethical insights and perspectives that may inform > discussions on reducing violence. > > 1. Recognition of Interconnectedness: Open individualism emphasizes > the interconnectedness of all beings at a fundamental level of > consciousness. This recognition can foster a sense of empathy, > compassion, and a broader perspective on the impact of one's actions > on others. It can encourage individuals to consider the well-being and > dignity of all individuals, promoting non-violence and cooperation. > > 2. Expanding the Moral Circle: Open individualism challenges narrow > conceptions of self-interest and expands the moral circle to include > all beings. Understanding that we are all manifestations of the same > underlying consciousness can lead to a more inclusive and > compassionate approach to others. This broader ethical consideration > can contribute to efforts to reduce violence and promote peace. > > 3. Ethical Implications of Unity: The perspective of open > individualism suggests that harming others is, in a sense, harming > oneself. If all individuals are interconnected and part of the same > underlying consciousness, violence against others is, in effect, > violence against oneself. This understanding can lead to a moral > aversion to violence and a commitment to non-violent conflict > resolution. > > While open individualism can offer philosophical insights and ethical > considerations, addressing violence among humans requires a > multi-faceted approach. Practical strategies, social, political, and > economic factors, as well as cultural and historical contexts, all > play significant roles in understanding and addressing violence. > Therefore, it is important to combine philosophical perspectives with > a wide range of approaches and disciplines to effectively address the > complex issue of violence in human behavior. > ------------------- > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From hrivera at alumni.virginia.edu Fri Jan 5 02:11:11 2024 From: hrivera at alumni.virginia.edu (Henry Rivera) Date: Thu, 4 Jan 2024 21:11:11 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From giulio at gmail.com Fri Jan 5 06:04:32 2024 From: giulio at gmail.com (Giulio Prisco) Date: Fri, 5 Jan 2024 07:04:32 +0100 Subject: [ExI] Turing Church podcast. Maximum Jailbreak Message-ID: Turing Church podcast. Maximum Jailbreak. A conversation on spaceflight and cosmism recorded in 2019 with the author of "Maximum Jailbreak" (2013). https://www.turingchurch.com/p/maximum-jailbreak From jasonresch at gmail.com Fri Jan 5 13:48:23 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Fri, 5 Jan 2024 08:48:23 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Thu, Jan 4, 2024, 9:12 PM Henry Rivera via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > It?s metaphysical. > > Of course we have individual identity and ego. This is even understood in > collectivist cultures that value individualism less. But open individualism > as I understand it posits that we are also interconnected within larger > systems in ways that we cannot usually detect or appreciate including at a > metaphysical level. That?s the ?fundamentally connected at the level of > consciousness? part referenced by Open AI. Good luck measuring that > scientifically or even perceiving that subjectively in a normal state of > mind. So appreciate it as philosophy or conjecture. > I very my such appreciate you sharing your experience. I came to realize open individualism without the aid of psychedelics. I have attempted my best to describe the rational arguments for its truth here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1AJhXBFhAE4Xpu6WxD_C4bbW5yFs-pz1R/view?usp=drivesdk Here is how Freeman Dyson described how it came to him: "Enlightenment came to me suddenly and unexpectedly one afternoon in March when I was walking up to the school notice board to see whether my name was on the list for tomorrow?s football game. I was not on the list. And in a blinding flash of inner light I saw the answer to both my problems, the problem of war and the problem of injustice. The answer was amazingly simple. I called it Cosmic Unity. Cosmic Unity said: There is only one of us. We are all the same person. I am you and I am Winston Churchill and Hitler and Gandhi and everybody. There is no problem of injustice because your sufferings are also mine. There will be no problem of war as soon as you understand that in killing me you are only killing yourself." -- Freeman Dyson in ?Disturbing The Universe? (1979) > FWIW, the validity of open individualism is self-evident when on > psychedelics, at least to me. Actually, it was a common thing reported also > by people on psychedelics back when such research was at its heyday. You > can see such reports in the literature and in archival films. As someone > else noted, this is a consequence of ?ego-loss? which can be achieved with > other techniques as well. The idea is also captured and promoted in > psychedelic art un-coincidentally. > Given that psychodelics work by shutting down some parts of the brain, (as do stroke and TBI ( https://www.ted.com/talks/jill_bolte_taylor_my_stroke_of_insight?language=en )), leads me to believe the illusion of the ego is actively maintained by some part of the brain, in service to evolutionary principles. The ego (even if an illusion) is still evolutionarily useful. > Let Brent know that we can canonize perspectives about open individualism > for fun, but we won?t resolve whether its valid through discussion. It?s > something that has to be experienced, in my experience. I have been unable > to mathematically or logically prove its validity despite my knowing, for > example. > I am most curious to see whether you find any of the thought experiments in my chapter useful or convincing to your normal state of mind. > A takeaway for me is that this suggests that we can promote peace and > unity and the benefits noted in Bill?s moral prescription post by promoting > ego-loss/psychedelic experiences. > Do most people have the experience of ego-loss in your experience? And does it happen reliably for those it happens to? Jason > On Jan 4, 2024, at 4:33?PM, Jason Resch via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > > ? > > > On Thu, Jan 4, 2024, 3:53 PM BillK via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> On Thu, 4 Jan 2024 at 20:31, Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat >> wrote: >> > >> >> > >> > You have just redefined "empty individualism" to try to get around the >> objections raised. >> > _______________________________________________ >> >> >> I think you may be expecting too much from Open Individualism. >> It is not a religion or a moral philosophy laying down rules for how >> humans should behave. >> The AI seems to be saying that it is more just a way of thinking about >> life. >> You will still need laws, courts, police, prisons, armies, etc. >> >> BillK > > > > Thanks Bill this is useful. > > Jason > > >> I asked the AI - >> Does open individualism provide a moral prescription for human >> behaviour to stop violence among humans? >> >> Answer - >> Open individualism, as a philosophical perspective, does not directly >> provide a specific moral prescription or a set of rules for human >> behavior to stop violence among humans. It is primarily concerned with >> the nature of personal identity and consciousness. However, it can >> offer some ethical insights and perspectives that may inform >> discussions on reducing violence. >> >> 1. Recognition of Interconnectedness: Open individualism emphasizes >> the interconnectedness of all beings at a fundamental level of >> consciousness. This recognition can foster a sense of empathy, >> compassion, and a broader perspective on the impact of one's actions >> on others. It can encourage individuals to consider the well-being and >> dignity of all individuals, promoting non-violence and cooperation. >> >> 2. Expanding the Moral Circle: Open individualism challenges narrow >> conceptions of self-interest and expands the moral circle to include >> all beings. Understanding that we are all manifestations of the same >> underlying consciousness can lead to a more inclusive and >> compassionate approach to others. This broader ethical consideration >> can contribute to efforts to reduce violence and promote peace. >> >> 3. Ethical Implications of Unity: The perspective of open >> individualism suggests that harming others is, in a sense, harming >> oneself. If all individuals are interconnected and part of the same >> underlying consciousness, violence against others is, in effect, >> violence against oneself. This understanding can lead to a moral >> aversion to violence and a commitment to non-violent conflict >> resolution. >> >> While open individualism can offer philosophical insights and ethical >> considerations, addressing violence among humans requires a >> multi-faceted approach. Practical strategies, social, political, and >> economic factors, as well as cultural and historical contexts, all >> play significant roles in understanding and addressing violence. >> Therefore, it is important to combine philosophical perspectives with >> a wide range of approaches and disciplines to effectively address the >> complex issue of violence in human behavior. >> ------------------- >> _______________________________________________ >> extropy-chat mailing list >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat >> > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Fri Jan 5 17:16:03 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Fri, 5 Jan 2024 12:16:03 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <865D31C3-1A6E-4F90-A49E-148642C076E3@taramayastales.com> Message-ID: On Thu, Jan 4, 2024 at 3:58?PM Jason Resch wrote: > > > On Thu, Jan 4, 2024, 3:30 PM Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> On Thu, Jan 4, 2024 at 12:14?PM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: >> >>> On Thu, Jan 4, 2024, 2:29 PM Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat < >>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: >>> >>>> On Thu, Jan 4, 2024 at 11:17?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < >>>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: >>>> >>>>> If open individualism is not true, the chance of you being born and >>>>> alive as you is 1 in 200,000,000, >>>>> >>>> >>>> That is a logical fallacy. You were born and alive as you, therefore, >>>> the chance of you having been born and alive is 1 in 1. >>>> >>> >>> >>> Just because someone has won the lottery does not mean it was likely >>> that they would have won it. >>> >> >> You are inherently talking about those who have won the lottery (of >> existence), and is making decisions based on having done so. >> >> Consider the analogous situation of the fine tuning of the universe to >>> support life. Despite that the anthropic principle guarantees we can only >>> think about this from a life friendly universe, we can still marvel at the >>> improbability that any given universe would have all the right properties >>> to allow life. >>> >> >> And yet, that improbability does not mean that we have to or should act >> as if our near future existence is anywhere near as unlikely as our origin >> was. >> >> >>> This is another logical fallacy. There exist more than two options. >>>> >>> >>> There are three, and together they are comprehensive (at least one must >>> be true): >>> >>> 1. Empty individualism: individuating borders are total >>> 2. Closed individualism: there are individuating borders, but they are >>> not total >>> 3. Open individualism: there are no individuating borders >>> >> >> You have just redefined "empty individualism" to try to get around >> the objections raised. >> >> Your earlier definition was, "we are each only and ever a single thought >> moment". In contrast, this definition says nothing about moments, but >> instead says that anything where individuating borders are total is empty >> individualism. My objection to your earlier definition was about limiting >> what a person is to a single moment, so this change is quite significant. >> > > If borders are total then any deviation (i.e. any form of non-equality) > constitutes a separate person. Which means even the changes of a person > from second to second would constitute separate persons. I am sorry this > was not clear to you and led you to accuse me of arguing in bad faith. > Perhaps you should be more generous in your assumptions when interacting > with others online. > > Jason > > >> This makes it appear as if you are arguing in bad faith, perhaps because >> you do not have a firm grasp of what you are trying to debate - which >> reduces everything you are saying to the ill-considered sayings of the >> confused, which means that we should ignore you and we can not help you >> until you help yourself. >> > I have made a diagram which should help communicate what I meant regarding personal borders: https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1UvJ5X8ovzz6ZrJJWKDoiUvj2g6p6H6p-nUz1XdDt6aU/edit?usp=sharing Jason -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From foozler83 at gmail.com Fri Jan 5 19:20:50 2024 From: foozler83 at gmail.com (William Flynn Wallace) Date: Fri, 5 Jan 2024 13:20:50 -0600 Subject: [ExI] my quote (stolen from???) Message-ID: "They thought that the customs of their tribe were the laws of nature." (more or less G B Shaw) bill w -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From hrivera at alumni.virginia.edu Sat Jan 6 02:23:36 2024 From: hrivera at alumni.virginia.edu (Henry Rivera) Date: Fri, 5 Jan 2024 21:23:36 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From ilsa.bartlett at gmail.com Sat Jan 6 03:21:02 2024 From: ilsa.bartlett at gmail.com (ilsa) Date: Fri, 5 Jan 2024 19:21:02 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: Hi Jason, can you jump off this and have a conversation with me about this and that? My favorite LSD story is when I was under 16 and walked into a meeting of the doctor's at the London hospital that was using LSD to cure alcoholics which is I believe how The Harvard connection got into the LSC research. So I heard from these doctors how they had formulated the language to label the experience. And in my older years that I sit here cuz I'm not 16 anymore It has given me an opportunity to notice how people label things that they don't understand. But that's another story. The current interest by the medical community in the psychedelic experience interests me greatly. I know young people who are growing mushrooms and making preparations and doing all sorts of chemical hoo-ha. So I am very interested in talking with you about everything that you said in this marvelous post. I went off to study theology because of that experience and others that I had as a young person to see how these experiences happen naturally. Smile, ilsa On Fri, Jan 5, 2024, 6:24?PM Henry Rivera via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > > On Jan 5, 2024, at 8:49?AM, Jason Resch via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > ? > > On Thu, Jan 4, 2024, 9:12 PM Henry Rivera via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> It?s metaphysical. >> >> ? >> > A takeaway for me is that this suggests that we can promote peace and >> unity and the benefits noted in Bill?s moral prescription post by promoting >> ego-loss/psychedelic experiences. >> > > Do most people have the experience of ego-loss in your experience? And > does it happen reliably for those it happens to? > > Jason > > > It?s highly dose-dependent for most psychedelics, LSD being the prototype > and most studied. DMT and ketamine for example will have a different slope > relative to most other psychedelics in a graph of the relationship between > dose and ?depth? of a psychedelic experience and also ego-loss, but there > is still causal relationship there. > > > You can see the dose-dependent relationship in the charts > in ?Dose-response relationships of LSD-induced subjective experiences in > humans? (2023) in Neuropsychopharmocology at > https://www.nature.com/articles/s41386-023-01588-2 > > > In particular, notice the charts for Dread of Ego Dissolution and > Experience of Unity (full res image of the charts here > https://www.nature.com/articles/s41386-023-01588-2/figures/1) > > > I?d say a threshold dose of 100 micrograms needs to be passed > to experience some degree of ego-loss. > > > The Ego-Dissolution Inventory , > which highly correlates with the ?Unity? factor of the Mystical > Experience Questionnaire > , is often used to > examine the depth of ego loss that a participant has felt. This has been > used to document the dose dependence I?ve described with psilocybin use as > well. See ?Psilocybin occasioned mystical-type experiences: immediate and > persisting dose-related effects? (2011). > https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/21674151/ > > > Here?s a nice quote that captures the connection between ego-loss and open > individualism I think: > > > ?What is Ego Dissolution on Psychedelics Like? > > According to our good friends at DoubleBlind, > the ego death or ego dissolution > experience is described as being: ?You are fully ?in the moment > ? and able > to see things from a macroscopic, more objective perspective. You are no > longer an individual isolated from life as it takes place around you, but > rather feel interconnected with the universe and all its inhabitants, > experiencing intense feelings of love, euphoria, and unity while the self > is temporarily forgotten. This state of selflessness and subsequent > feelings of connectivity with the universe are often referred to as ?ego > death.?? > https://psychedelic.support/resources/ego-dissolution-during-psychedelic-experiences/ > > > As this also came up in this thread, if anyone is interested, here is an > article that argues that ?Ego dissolution experiences reveal that the > self-model plays an important binding function in cognitive processing, but > the self does not exist.? > https://academic.oup.com/nc/article/2017/1/nix016/3916730?login=false > > Provocative, I know. I haven?t read that one yet incidentally. > > > Take care > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From sjatkins at protonmail.com Sat Jan 6 05:10:26 2024 From: sjatkins at protonmail.com (sjatkins) Date: Sat, 06 Jan 2024 05:10:26 +0000 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: <32feb6e1-591f-48b4-a9ce-4ae4cea296da@zaiboc.net> References: <32feb6e1-591f-48b4-a9ce-4ae4cea296da@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: On Thursday, January 4th, 2024 at 7:28 PM, Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat wrote: > On 04/01/2024 16:29, BillK wrote: > > > open individualism posits that all individuals are > > fundamentally connected at the level of consciousness. From this > > perspective, you and I are not separate individuals with distinct > > identities but rather manifestations of the same underlying > > consciousness or awareness. > > > Hm. If this is so, then why is there no experience of it? I certainly don't experience any consciousness but my own. Can anyone claim otherwise? > > I don't see how all individuals (or even just two) can possibly be 'connected at the level of consciousness' without being conscious of it. The conclusion is that we must be separate individuals with distinct identities, or we would all be aware that this was not the case. This seems to describe a 'hive mind', and we are definitely not that. > > Ben Well, that's the thing.? When you are aware of it you are not aware of the separate individual state.? When you are not you are aware of the being a separate individual.? But there is no place for assuming one or the other state is the only one that can be experienced. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: signature.asc Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 249 bytes Desc: OpenPGP digital signature URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Sat Jan 6 06:49:57 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 01:49:57 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: <32feb6e1-591f-48b4-a9ce-4ae4cea296da@zaiboc.net> References: <32feb6e1-591f-48b4-a9ce-4ae4cea296da@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: On Thu, Jan 4, 2024 at 2:29?PM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > On 04/01/2024 16:29, BillK wrote: > > open individualism posits that all individuals are > fundamentally connected at the level of consciousness. From this > perspective, you and I are not separate individuals with distinct > identities but rather manifestations of the same underlying > consciousness or awareness. > > > Hm. If this is so, then why is there no experience of it? > The "you-now" is not, I presume, experiencing the same thing as the "you-from-5-minutes-ago". Yet by convention we say both conscious states are experienced by the same person. > I certainly don't experience any consciousness but my own. Can anyone > claim otherwise? > You don't remember experiencing any consciousness but your own. But memory is no guarantor of what you have or haven't experienced. Someone had the vivid experience of eating the breakfast you ate 947 days ago, but I doubt you have any memory of that experience. To whom does that experience belong? > > I don't see how all individuals (or even just two) can possibly be > 'connected at the level of consciousness' without being conscious of it. > Consider the diagrams I created here, which compare and contrast three theories of personal identity: https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1UvJ5X8ovzz6ZrJJWKDoiUvj2g6p6H6p-nUz1XdDt6aU/edit?usp=sharing We have the habit of drawing arbitrary borders around some collections of experiences, and say "this person experiences these experiences but not those other experiences", but by what logic do we base this? What if we drew the borders in a different way? What does that change? Is there any physical fact that defines which experiences are to be exclusively perceived? > The conclusion is that we must be separate individuals with distinct > identities, or we would all be aware that this was not the case. This seems > to describe a 'hive mind', and we are definitely not that. > Open individualism has nothing to do with hive minds. I think that excerpt from the AI's description is misleading. From any perspective, our knowledge and memories are limited by the neurology that perspective currently has access to. It will *seem* as though you are only ever one person, because that is all your present memories will ever provide evidence for. But this is like concluding there is one objective now (and that no other points in time exist or are as valid/real as the present) because those are times are times you happen to not be in. It is the illusion that there is some special selection (now / here / me / this branch of the multiverse), that makes *this* more real than the other times / other places / other perspectives / other branches. But this is only an illusion created by the limitations of one's current vantage point. By studying the issues, we can come to realize other points in time are real too, other locations we're not in are just as real, other branches of the multiverse are just as real, and so on. Until we can break the greatest illusion of all: that your experiences are only those of one particular organism. Jason -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From ilsa.bartlett at gmail.com Sat Jan 6 08:15:28 2024 From: ilsa.bartlett at gmail.com (ilsa) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 00:15:28 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <32feb6e1-591f-48b4-a9ce-4ae4cea296da@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: Consciousness is a kind of clay, and so it couldn't be the thing that connects us all, because it's a stuff that our animal bags of water use for some experience. Hopefully all leading to joy, smile, ilsa On Fri, Jan 5, 2024, 10:50?PM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > > > On Thu, Jan 4, 2024 at 2:29?PM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> On 04/01/2024 16:29, BillK wrote: >> >> open individualism posits that all individuals are >> fundamentally connected at the level of consciousness. From this >> perspective, you and I are not separate individuals with distinct >> identities but rather manifestations of the same underlying >> consciousness or awareness. >> >> >> Hm. If this is so, then why is there no experience of it? >> > > The "you-now" is not, I presume, experiencing the same thing as the > "you-from-5-minutes-ago". Yet by convention we say both conscious states > are experienced by the same person. > > > >> I certainly don't experience any consciousness but my own. Can anyone >> claim otherwise? >> > > You don't remember experiencing any consciousness but your own. But memory > is no guarantor of what you have or haven't experienced. Someone had the > vivid experience of eating the breakfast you ate 947 days ago, but I doubt > you have any memory of that experience. To whom does that experience belong? > > >> >> I don't see how all individuals (or even just two) can possibly be >> 'connected at the level of consciousness' without being conscious of it. >> > > Consider the diagrams I created here, which compare and contrast three > theories of personal identity: > https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1UvJ5X8ovzz6ZrJJWKDoiUvj2g6p6H6p-nUz1XdDt6aU/edit?usp=sharing > > We have the habit of drawing arbitrary borders around some collections of > experiences, and say "this person experiences these experiences but not > those other experiences", but by what logic do we base this? What if we > drew the borders in a different way? What does that change? Is there any > physical fact that defines which experiences are to be exclusively > perceived? > > > >> The conclusion is that we must be separate individuals with distinct >> identities, or we would all be aware that this was not the case. This seems >> to describe a 'hive mind', and we are definitely not that. >> > > Open individualism has nothing to do with hive minds. I think that > excerpt from the AI's description is misleading. From any perspective, our > knowledge and memories are limited by the neurology that perspective > currently has access to. It will *seem* as though you are only ever one > person, because that is all your present memories will ever provide > evidence for. But this is like concluding there is one objective now (and > that no other points in time exist or are as valid/real as the present) > because those are times are times you happen to not be in. It is the > illusion that there is some special selection (now / here / me / this > branch of the multiverse), that makes *this* more real than the other times > / other places / other perspectives / other branches. But this is only an > illusion created by the limitations of one's current vantage point. By > studying the issues, we can come to realize other points in time are real > too, other locations we're not in are just as real, other branches of the > multiverse are just as real, and so on. Until we can break the greatest > illusion of all: that your experiences are only those of one particular > organism. > > Jason > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pharos at gmail.com Sat Jan 6 10:47:09 2024 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 10:47:09 +0000 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: <32feb6e1-591f-48b4-a9ce-4ae4cea296da@zaiboc.net> References: <32feb6e1-591f-48b4-a9ce-4ae4cea296da@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: On Thu, 4 Jan 2024 at 19:30, Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat wrote: > > I don't see how all individuals (or even just two) can possibly be 'connected at the level of consciousness' without being conscious of it. The conclusion is that we must be separate individuals with distinct identities, or we would all be aware that this was not the case. This seems to describe a 'hive mind', and we are definitely not that. > > Ben > _______________________________________________ It seems that metaphysics is the answer. :) I asked the AI - You said - open individualism posits that all individuals are fundamentally connected at the level of consciousness. How can individuals be connected without being conscious of being connected? Is this like a 'hive' mind? BillK Answer - I apologize for any confusion caused by my previous response. You raise an important point. In open individualism, the idea is that all individuals share a fundamental interconnectedness at the level of consciousness, but it does not imply that individuals are consciously aware of this connection or have direct access to the experiences or perspectives of others. Open individualism suggests that at a deeper level of consciousness, there is a unity or interconnectedness that transcends the apparent boundaries of individuality. However, within our individual subjective experiences, we typically have limited access to the thoughts, feelings, and experiences of others. We may have a sense of empathy or understanding, but true direct access to another person's consciousness is generally not possible. It is important to distinguish open individualism from a "hive mind." A hive mind typically refers to a collective consciousness or intelligence where individual identities and autonomy are subsumed within a unified group consciousness. In a hive mind scenario, individuals may have direct access to the thoughts and experiences of others within the collective. In open individualism, individuality and personal perspectives are still recognized, and the interconnectedness is understood at a deeper metaphysical level rather than through direct conscious awareness or shared experiences. It acknowledges that there is a fundamental unity of consciousness, but the individual experiences and identities are preserved. ----------------- From pharos at gmail.com Sat Jan 6 11:28:12 2024 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 11:28:12 +0000 Subject: [ExI] NASA wants to visit Proxima Centauri Message-ID: Swarms of laser-flown bots visiting a planet light years away ? and more NASA-funded projects revealed An electric airplane on Mars, micrograv hibernation, and plenty others Katyanna Quach Sat 6 Jan 2024 Quotes: NASA is funding 13 ambitious projects that could potentially lead to space missions one day, ranging from scanning for signs of life on Mars to exploring a nearby exoplanet with thousands of swarming spacecraft. Under the NASA Innovative Advanced Concepts (NAIC) program, the US space agency supports seemingly wacky ideas put forth by industry and academia that go beyond its near-term game plans. On Friday, it announced the 2024 Phase I awardees, who will each receive up to $175,000 to flesh out their designs, and draw up roadmaps for how their proposed technologies will or could be used. -------------- BillK From foozler83 at gmail.com Sat Jan 6 14:23:07 2024 From: foozler83 at gmail.com (William Flynn Wallace) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 08:23:07 -0600 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: Please do not say 'Bill' without saying'bill k' or 'bill w' - thanks! bill w On Fri, Jan 5, 2024 at 9:22?PM ilsa via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > Hi Jason, can you jump off this and have a conversation with me about this > and that? My favorite LSD story is when I was under 16 and walked into a > meeting of the doctor's at the London hospital that was using LSD to cure > alcoholics which is I believe how The Harvard connection got into the LSC > research. So I heard from these doctors how they had formulated the > language to label the experience. And in my older years that I sit here cuz > I'm not 16 anymore It has given me an opportunity to notice how people > label things that they don't understand. But that's another story. > The current interest by the medical community in the psychedelic > experience interests me greatly. I know young people who are growing > mushrooms and making preparations and doing all sorts of chemical hoo-ha. > So I am very interested in talking with you about everything that you said > in this marvelous post. > I went off to study theology because of that experience and others that I > had as a young person to see how these experiences happen naturally. > Smile, ilsa > > On Fri, Jan 5, 2024, 6:24?PM Henry Rivera via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> >> On Jan 5, 2024, at 8:49?AM, Jason Resch via extropy-chat < >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: >> ? >> >> On Thu, Jan 4, 2024, 9:12 PM Henry Rivera via extropy-chat < >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: >> >>> It?s metaphysical. >>> >>> ? >>> >> A takeaway for me is that this suggests that we can promote peace and >>> unity and the benefits noted in Bill?s moral prescription post by promoting >>> ego-loss/psychedelic experiences. >>> >> >> Do most people have the experience of ego-loss in your experience? And >> does it happen reliably for those it happens to? >> >> Jason >> >> >> It?s highly dose-dependent for most psychedelics, LSD being the prototype >> and most studied. DMT and ketamine for example will have a different slope >> relative to most other psychedelics in a graph of the relationship between >> dose and ?depth? of a psychedelic experience and also ego-loss, but there >> is still causal relationship there. >> >> >> You can see the dose-dependent relationship in the charts >> in ?Dose-response relationships of LSD-induced subjective experiences in >> humans? (2023) in Neuropsychopharmocology at >> https://www.nature.com/articles/s41386-023-01588-2 >> >> >> In particular, notice the charts for Dread of Ego Dissolution and >> Experience of Unity (full res image of the charts here >> https://www.nature.com/articles/s41386-023-01588-2/figures/1) >> >> >> I?d say a threshold dose of 100 micrograms needs to be passed >> to experience some degree of ego-loss. >> >> >> The Ego-Dissolution Inventory , >> which highly correlates with the ?Unity? factor of the Mystical >> Experience Questionnaire >> , is often used >> to examine the depth of ego loss that a participant has felt. This has been >> used to document the dose dependence I?ve described with psilocybin use as >> well. See ?Psilocybin occasioned mystical-type experiences: immediate and >> persisting dose-related effects? (2011). >> https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/21674151/ >> >> >> Here?s a nice quote that captures the connection between ego-loss and >> open individualism I think: >> >> >> ?What is Ego Dissolution on Psychedelics Like? >> >> According to our good friends at DoubleBlind, >> the ego death or ego dissolution >> experience is described as being: ?You are fully ?in the moment >> ? and able >> to see things from a macroscopic, more objective perspective. You are no >> longer an individual isolated from life as it takes place around you, but >> rather feel interconnected with the universe and all its inhabitants, >> experiencing intense feelings of love, euphoria, and unity while the self >> is temporarily forgotten. This state of selflessness and subsequent >> feelings of connectivity with the universe are often referred to as ?ego >> death.?? >> https://psychedelic.support/resources/ego-dissolution-during-psychedelic-experiences/ >> >> >> As this also came up in this thread, if anyone is interested, here is an >> article that argues that ?Ego dissolution experiences reveal that the >> self-model plays an important binding function in cognitive processing, but >> the self does not exist.? >> https://academic.oup.com/nc/article/2017/1/nix016/3916730?login=false >> >> Provocative, I know. I haven?t read that one yet incidentally. >> >> >> Take care >> _______________________________________________ >> extropy-chat mailing list >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat >> > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From atymes at gmail.com Sat Jan 6 14:31:27 2024 From: atymes at gmail.com (Adrian Tymes) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 06:31:27 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Sat, Jan 6, 2024, 6:24 AM William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > Please do not say 'Bill' without saying'bill k' or 'bill w' - thanks! > bill w > Even when discussing the Bill W of Rights? ;) (I know, you mean when discussing members of this list.) > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From atymes at gmail.com Sat Jan 6 14:55:40 2024 From: atymes at gmail.com (Adrian Tymes) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 06:55:40 -0800 Subject: [ExI] NASA wants to visit Proxima Centauri In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: Phase I studies are studies of how and if it could be done. Almost certainly, these will show how long the program must be kept in operation with active input, which will be a deciding factor in preventing the proposed mission from happening. The Voyagers have only lasted as long as they have because they have needed little maintenance: just some occasional software updates and coaching through certain problems. Also, no commitment was required decades in advance: if the Voyagers shut down or broke up once they reached the Kuiper belt, the primary science mission would still have been declared a success, especially if any useful data could be obtained about why that termination event happened. Maintaining an active laser feed for decades before obtaining much useful science seems beyond NASA's ability. (But note that "before" qualifier! A probe to study the interstellar medium, that happens to be able to reach and study Proxima Centauri if it lasts that long, is another story entirely. The primary science mission, and thus the initial commitment, would only have to last until shortly after the probe crossed our system's heliopause. Once that is accomplished, the laser can be kept on until funding dries up, something malfunctions, or - somehow - nothing goes too horribly wrong for decades and the probe reaches Proxima Centauri. However, that is not what is being proposed here.) On Sat, Jan 6, 2024, 3:30 AM BillK via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > Swarms of laser-flown bots visiting a planet light years away ? and > more NASA-funded projects revealed > An electric airplane on Mars, micrograv hibernation, and plenty others > > Katyanna Quach Sat 6 Jan 2024 > > > > Quotes: > NASA is funding 13 ambitious projects that could potentially lead to > space missions one day, ranging from scanning for signs of life on > Mars to exploring a nearby exoplanet with thousands of swarming > spacecraft. > > Under the NASA Innovative Advanced Concepts (NAIC) program, the US > space agency supports seemingly wacky ideas put forth by industry and > academia that go beyond its near-term game plans. On Friday, it > announced the 2024 Phase I awardees, who will each receive up to > $175,000 to flesh out their designs, and draw up roadmaps for how > their proposed technologies will or could be used. > -------------- > > BillK > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From foozler83 at gmail.com Sat Jan 6 15:20:06 2024 From: foozler83 at gmail.com (William Flynn Wallace) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 09:20:06 -0600 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: I want someone else to say: this is not science. Open individualism is not scientific because it cannot be measured, only theorized. Playing around with ideas is great fun, but eventually you have to produce something not metaphysical. Here's the danger: I am a bit of an expert on Freud. You have to watch him. Ideas presented as possibilities on one page are referred to in later pages as fact. bill w On Sat, Jan 6, 2024 at 8:34?AM Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > On Sat, Jan 6, 2024, 6:24 AM William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> Please do not say 'Bill' without saying'bill k' or 'bill w' - thanks! >> bill w >> > > Even when discussing the Bill W of Rights? ;) > > (I know, you mean when discussing members of this list.) > >> _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From atymes at gmail.com Sat Jan 6 15:54:26 2024 From: atymes at gmail.com (Adrian Tymes) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 07:54:26 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Sat, Jan 6, 2024, 7:21 AM William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > I want someone else to say: this is not science. > This is not science. "Open individualism" has been redefined in this very discussion, in a moving-the-goalposts fashion with no acknowledgement that said redefinition happened, when it was shown to conflict with what evidence could be mustered. Here's the danger: I am a bit of an expert on Freud. You have to watch > him. Ideas presented as possibilities on one page are referred to in later > pages as fact. > As commonly happens. "I presented a thing, and people who were objecting at first stopped objecting, so I must be right," ignoring any other reason (such as exhaustion, or - in your example - lack of opportunity to object) why said objections might have temporarily stopped. > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From ben at zaiboc.net Sat Jan 6 16:32:13 2024 From: ben at zaiboc.net (Ben Zaiboc) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 16:32:13 +0000 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <5e536fe0-b723-4b0a-928b-3caf9b566b02@zaiboc.net> This makes no sense to me at all. It seems equivalent to claiming that all rocks are connected (and just as useful). I can claim that all male humans have their own 'open individualism', separate from the same thing in females, or all living things have it, or only certain classes of beings, or objects or collections of organised information, etc., etc. What does it actually mean? Nothing, as far as I can see (apart from as mental categories that we use as part of our thought processes, but that's not what we're talking about here). More importantly, what use is this idea? Clearly the claim that it can eliminate wars and cruelty etc. is false. We already have groups of people that treat each other differently to those not in the group. Claiming that we are all in the same group doesn't work, because then there is no 'out-group' to compare ourselves with, and it instantly falls apart into sub-groups. In any event, you won't convince everybody to buy in to this idea (assuming that it's the knowledge of this idea that is supposed to give rise to World Peace (rather than the existence of the thing, which it clearly is not)). I'm certainly not sold! If such a state as this not-group-consciousness group consciousness exists, and is not accessible to anyone as an individual, again, what use is it? I don't even know what it actually means, let alone how anyone could prove it exists. Is this idea like the concept of a body being made up of individual cells? The body has no direct knowledge of the cells, and the cells have no knowledge of the body as a whole, just their local environment? If that's so, then what does this Open Individual do? Where is the evidence that it exists? What effect does it have on the world? If the answer is "it's the sum total of all humans alive on the earth", then it's singularly ineffective as an 'individual'. It suffers from massive internal conflicts of several different kinds, and apparently hates itself. Sticking with the biological theme, it's an insane teratoma. So I don't think that can be the answer. I'm tempted to posit the existence of an Open Individual that consists of all male blonde humans over 6 feet tall. Is there any way of disproving that such a thing exists? Do cats have their own Open Individual? Monkeys? Hominids? Mammals? Cephalopods? Everything with a brain? All humans who understand calculus? Are there infinitely many Open Individuals? Etc. Ben From jasonresch at gmail.com Sat Jan 6 16:37:36 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 11:37:36 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Sat, Jan 6, 2024, 10:21 AM William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > I want someone else to say: this is not science. Open individualism is > not scientific because it cannot be measured, only theorized. Playing > around with ideas is great fun, but eventually you have to produce > something not metaphysical. > Do you believe in Occam's razor as a useful tool in deciding what theories are science? If so the. Open individualism is the only scientific theory of personal identity. I will explain why. Consider a two theories of internal combustion engines: A) the engine works not only because of the explosions within the pistons but because in addition to those explosions there are 6 motive demons, which though not detectable are needed to ensure the laws of motion operate according to newton's laws. B) the engine works because of the explosions within the pistons. I think you would agree that A is not scientific because it makes addition, unfounded, untestable metaphysical assumptions. Now I will show the same is true for conventional theories of personal identity, while open individualism makes no such untestable metaphysical assumptions, and therefore is like theory B above. Consider these two theories for why you were born: A) in order for you to be born and experience life, a particular sperm has to reach a particular egg, in a particular time, and at a particular place, in order for this metaphysical "you" (some call it a soul) to meet up, and attach itself to this exact combination of cells and particles. B) in order for you to be born and experience life, a sperm has to reach an egg. Which theory makes the least assumptions and is compatible with all the facts? Which theory is science, which is metaphysics? Jason > Here's the danger: I am a bit of an expert on Freud. You have to watch > him. Ideas presented as possibilities on one page are referred to in later > pages as fact. bill w > > On Sat, Jan 6, 2024 at 8:34?AM Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> On Sat, Jan 6, 2024, 6:24 AM William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat < >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: >> >>> Please do not say 'Bill' without saying'bill k' or 'bill w' - thanks! >>> bill w >>> >> >> Even when discussing the Bill W of Rights? ;) >> >> (I know, you mean when discussing members of this list.) >> >>> _______________________________________________ >> extropy-chat mailing list >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat >> > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Sat Jan 6 16:40:51 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 11:40:51 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Sat, Jan 6, 2024, 10:55 AM Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > On Sat, Jan 6, 2024, 7:21 AM William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> I want someone else to say: this is not science. >> > > This is not science. "Open individualism" has been redefined in this very > discussion, in a moving-the-goalposts fashion with no acknowledgement that > said redefinition happened, when it was shown to conflict with what > evidence could be mustered. > I think you should follow up on my replies, which you seem to have missed. Jason > Here's the danger: I am a bit of an expert on Freud. You have to watch >> him. Ideas presented as possibilities on one page are referred to in later >> pages as fact. >> > > As commonly happens. "I presented a thing, and people who were objecting > at first stopped objecting, so I must be right," ignoring any other reason > (such as exhaustion, or - in your example - lack of opportunity to object) > why said objections might have temporarily stopped. > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Sat Jan 6 16:42:41 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 11:42:41 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: Henry, This is fascinating. I had no idea such research had been done to look at these things. I will need some time to review all the references you have provided. Thank you. Jason On Fri, Jan 5, 2024, 9:23 PM Henry Rivera wrote: > > On Jan 5, 2024, at 8:49?AM, Jason Resch via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > ? > > On Thu, Jan 4, 2024, 9:12 PM Henry Rivera via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> It?s metaphysical. >> >> ? >> > A takeaway for me is that this suggests that we can promote peace and >> unity and the benefits noted in Bill?s moral prescription post by promoting >> ego-loss/psychedelic experiences. >> > > Do most people have the experience of ego-loss in your experience? And > does it happen reliably for those it happens to? > > Jason > > > It?s highly dose-dependent for most psychedelics, LSD being the prototype > and most studied. DMT and ketamine for example will have a different slope > relative to most other psychedelics in a graph of the relationship between > dose and ?depth? of a psychedelic experience and also ego-loss, but there > is still causal relationship there. > > > You can see the dose-dependent relationship in the charts > in ?Dose-response relationships of LSD-induced subjective experiences in > humans? (2023) in Neuropsychopharmocology at > https://www.nature.com/articles/s41386-023-01588-2 > > > In particular, notice the charts for Dread of Ego Dissolution and > Experience of Unity (full res image of the charts here > https://www.nature.com/articles/s41386-023-01588-2/figures/1) > > > I?d say a threshold dose of 100 micrograms needs to be passed > to experience some degree of ego-loss. > > > The Ego-Dissolution Inventory , > which highly correlates with the ?Unity? factor of the Mystical > Experience Questionnaire > , is often used to > examine the depth of ego loss that a participant has felt. This has been > used to document the dose dependence I?ve described with psilocybin use as > well. See ?Psilocybin occasioned mystical-type experiences: immediate and > persisting dose-related effects? (2011). > https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/21674151/ > > > Here?s a nice quote that captures the connection between ego-loss and open > individualism I think: > > > ?What is Ego Dissolution on Psychedelics Like? > > According to our good friends at DoubleBlind, > the ego death or ego dissolution > experience is described as being: ?You are fully ?in the moment > ? and able > to see things from a macroscopic, more objective perspective. You are no > longer an individual isolated from life as it takes place around you, but > rather feel interconnected with the universe and all its inhabitants, > experiencing intense feelings of love, euphoria, and unity while the self > is temporarily forgotten. This state of selflessness and subsequent > feelings of connectivity with the universe are often referred to as ?ego > death.?? > https://psychedelic.support/resources/ego-dissolution-during-psychedelic-experiences/ > > > As this also came up in this thread, if anyone is interested, here is an > article that argues that ?Ego dissolution experiences reveal that the > self-model plays an important binding function in cognitive processing, but > the self does not exist.? > https://academic.oup.com/nc/article/2017/1/nix016/3916730?login=false > > Provocative, I know. I haven?t read that one yet incidentally. > > > Take care > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Sat Jan 6 17:18:35 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 12:18:35 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: <5e536fe0-b723-4b0a-928b-3caf9b566b02@zaiboc.net> References: <5e536fe0-b723-4b0a-928b-3caf9b566b02@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: On Sat, Jan 6, 2024, 11:33 AM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > > This makes no sense to me at all. It seems equivalent to claiming that > all rocks are connected (and just as useful). > > I can claim that all male humans have their own 'open individualism', > separate from the same thing in females, or all living things have it, > or only certain classes of beings, or objects or collections of > organised information, etc., etc. What does it actually mean? Nothing, > as far as I can see (apart from as mental categories that we use as part > of our thought processes, but that's not what we're talking about here). > > More importantly, what use is this idea? It explains why you were born as the person you are and why you are experiencing the life you are now in, *without" having to make additional unfounded, highly improbable, assumptions about necessary preconditions or souls. It is also a foundational assumption for anthropic reasoning to work at all. (You can't say we're here because if we were over there we'd be dead, *unless* you believe you will always be where there's life -- and this is open individualism). It's perhaps no coincidence that two of the earliest proponents of anthropic reasoning (Hoyle and Dyson) were open individualists. Clearly the claim that it can > eliminate wars and cruelty etc. is false. We already have groups of > people that treat each other differently to those not in the group. > Claiming that we are all in the same group doesn't work, because then > there is no 'out-group' to compare ourselves with, and it instantly > falls apart into sub-groups. In any event, you won't convince everybody > to buy in to this idea (assuming that it's the knowledge of this idea > that is supposed to give rise to World Peace (rather than the existence > of the thing, which it clearly is not)). I'm certainly not sold! > I think you don't want it to be true. If that's the case, well then you can't use reason to get out of a position which you did not use reason to get into. > If such a state as this not-group-consciousness group consciousness > exists, and is not accessible to anyone as an individual, again, what > use is it? I don't even know what it actually means, let alone how > anyone could prove it exists. > > Is this idea like the concept of a body being made up of individual > cells? The body has no direct knowledge of the cells, and the cells have > no knowledge of the body as a whole, just their local environment? If > that's so, then what does this Open Individual do? Where is the evidence > that it exists? What effect does it have on the world? If the answer is > "it's the sum total of all humans alive on the earth", then it's > singularly ineffective as an 'individual'. It suffers from massive > internal conflicts of several different kinds, and apparently hates > itself. Sticking with the biological theme, it's an insane teratoma. So > I don't think that can be the answer. > > I'm tempted to posit the existence of an Open Individual that consists > of all male blonde humans over 6 feet tall. Is there any way of > disproving that such a thing exists? > I don't think you have yet understood the idea. It's not about grouping things. It all comes down to one question: what did it take for you to be born? For you you to be alive now in this moment? What principle in science says the experience this one life you are in is somehow different or special compared to all the trillions of other creatures who have lived on this planet? Jason > Do cats have their own Open Individual? > > Monkeys? Hominids? Mammals? Cephalopods? Everything with a brain? > > All humans who understand calculus? > > Are there infinitely many Open Individuals? > > Etc. > > > Ben > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From atymes at gmail.com Sat Jan 6 17:18:57 2024 From: atymes at gmail.com (Adrian Tymes) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 09:18:57 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Sat, Jan 6, 2024 at 8:42?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > On Sat, Jan 6, 2024, 10:55 AM Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> On Sat, Jan 6, 2024, 7:21 AM William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat < >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: >> >>> I want someone else to say: this is not science. >>> >> >> This is not science. "Open individualism" has been redefined in this >> very discussion, in a moving-the-goalposts fashion with no acknowledgement >> that said redefinition happened, when it was shown to conflict with what >> evidence could be mustered. >> > > I think you should follow up on my replies, which you seem to have missed. > I think you are not debating in good faith, so further debating the topic with you is pointless. I will grant that you are probably not being deliberately dishonest. Therefore, you are probably deluding yourself, so it would do you good to seriously consider the evidence I have presented to this end, such as pointing out the multiple logical fallacies you have engaged in. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From atymes at gmail.com Sat Jan 6 17:25:21 2024 From: atymes at gmail.com (Adrian Tymes) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 09:25:21 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Sat, Jan 6, 2024 at 8:39?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > Do you believe in Occam's razor as a useful tool in deciding what theories > are science? > > If so the. Open individualism is the only scientific theory of personal > identity. I will explain why. > Except... > Now I will show the same is true for conventional theories of personal > identity, while open individualism makes no such untestable metaphysical > assumptions, and therefore is like theory B above. > > Consider these two theories for why you were born: > > A) in order for you to be born and experience life, a particular sperm has > to reach a particular egg, in a particular time, and at a particular place, > in order for this metaphysical "you" (some call it a soul) to meet up, and > attach itself to this exact combination of cells and particles. > > B) in order for you to be born and experience life, a sperm has to reach > an egg. > > Which theory makes the least assumptions and is compatible with all the > facts? Which theory is science, which is metaphysics? > ...neither of these theories uniquely map to open individualism. Also, the distinction here is highly dependent on the definition of "you": are we talking about the historical person, the theoretical unique individual (which would be A rather than B: to generate this specific individual required more than just any random sperm meeting up with any random egg), or some other version? Also there are other versions, for instance a more extreme version of A that further adds in some of the mother's experiences during pregnancy that influenced the pre-natal individual. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Sat Jan 6 17:31:39 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 12:31:39 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Sat, Jan 6, 2024, 12:20 PM Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > On Sat, Jan 6, 2024 at 8:42?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> On Sat, Jan 6, 2024, 10:55 AM Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat < >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: >> >>> On Sat, Jan 6, 2024, 7:21 AM William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat < >>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: >>> >>>> I want someone else to say: this is not science. >>>> >>> >>> This is not science. "Open individualism" has been redefined in this >>> very discussion, in a moving-the-goalposts fashion with no acknowledgement >>> that said redefinition happened, when it was shown to conflict with what >>> evidence could be mustered. >>> >> >> I think you should follow up on my replies, which you seem to have missed. >> > > I think you are not debating in good faith, so further debating the topic > with you is pointless. > You're doubling down on this then? (After I provided you with clear explanation and even diagrams of how my definitions of empty individual are equivalent?) Well there's not much I can offer you after that. I will grant that you are probably not being deliberately dishonest. > I appreciate that. Therefore, you are probably deluding yourself, so it would do you good to > seriously consider the evidence I have presented to this end, such as > pointing out the multiple logical fallacies you have engaged in. > I addressed your concerns in my replies. It seems to me, but correct me if I'm wrong, that you have only recently learned about open individualism and then philosophy of personal identity. I have been studying, thinking about, and writing about, this subject for many years. If I have said something without sufficient explanation, I apologize, and I encourage you to ask questions, rather than assume the worst about me or my intentions. That's how people learn. Jason -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From atymes at gmail.com Sat Jan 6 17:38:32 2024 From: atymes at gmail.com (Adrian Tymes) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 09:38:32 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <5e536fe0-b723-4b0a-928b-3caf9b566b02@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: On Sat, Jan 6, 2024 at 9:20?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > I think you don't want it to be true. > > If that's the case, well then you can't use reason to get out of a > position which you did not use reason to get into. > You might wish to turn this claim around. How badly do you want open individualism to be true? Are you thinking about this possibility because it is the very situation you yourself are in, whether you fully realize it or not? If you are certain it is not, how would you know that it is not? I know it is not for me, because I can present logic and reasoning without logical fallacies to defend my position. It does not appear that you have been able to do this. (For example, ad hominem attacks. You questioned if someone else doesn't want it to be true, to sidestep and ignore their point. Note that it takes more than just questioning the person to be ad hominem; see the definition at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem to see why this letter is not itself this same fallacy even if it calls your reasoning into question.) -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Sat Jan 6 17:50:54 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 12:50:54 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Sat, Jan 6, 2024, 12:26 PM Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > On Sat, Jan 6, 2024 at 8:39?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> Do you believe in Occam's razor as a useful tool in deciding what >> theories are science? >> >> If so the. Open individualism is the only scientific theory of personal >> identity. I will explain why. >> > > Except... > > >> Now I will show the same is true for conventional theories of personal >> identity, while open individualism makes no such untestable metaphysical >> assumptions, and therefore is like theory B above. >> >> Consider these two theories for why you were born: >> >> A) in order for you to be born and experience life, a particular sperm >> has to reach a particular egg, in a particular time, and at a particular >> place, in order for this metaphysical "you" (some call it a soul) to meet >> up, and attach itself to this exact combination of cells and particles. >> >> B) in order for you to be born and experience life, a sperm has to reach >> an egg. >> >> Which theory makes the least assumptions and is compatible with all the >> facts? Which theory is science, which is metaphysics? >> > > ...neither of these theories uniquely map to open individualism. > Theory A maps to closed individualism (the conventional view), the idea that one's experiences are limited to those of a single organism. Theory B leads to open individualism, if there are no preconditions to your birth, then you are born as all organisms and experience all their perspectives. Also, the distinction here is highly dependent on the definition of "you": > The definition of "you" is the entire concern of the philosophy of personal identity. How do we define "you" which experiences are had by "you", where does "you" end and someone else begin, what is required for "you" to survive some ordeal? This can complicate communication on these issues, but I hope you can see through the word to understand the larger point I am trying to show. are we talking about the historical person, the theoretical unique > individual (which would be A rather than B: to generate this specific > individual required more than just any random sperm meeting up with any > random egg), or some other version? Also there are other versions, for > instance a more extreme version of A that further adds in some of the > mother's experiences during pregnancy that influenced the pre-natal > individual. > I am talking about consciousness. Right now you are conscious and experiencing something. What had to happen for you to be alive and consciousness right now? Could that process happen again? If not, is the process somehow limited to invoking the view point of "Adrian Tymes" or could it have worked equally well had a different sperm made it? Such that (you*) would then experience life as a brother or sister, or would (you*) instead forever remain a never existing, never consciousness, non entity? * A nuanced definition of you based on having a conscious experience of any kind. Jason > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Sat Jan 6 18:00:16 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 13:00:16 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <5e536fe0-b723-4b0a-928b-3caf9b566b02@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: On Sat, Jan 6, 2024, 12:39 PM Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > On Sat, Jan 6, 2024 at 9:20?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> I think you don't want it to be true. >> >> If that's the case, well then you can't use reason to get out of a >> position which you did not use reason to get into. >> > > You might wish to turn this claim around. > > How badly do you want open individualism to be true? > > Are you thinking about this possibility because it is the very situation > you yourself are in, whether you fully realize it or not? > > If you are certain it is not, how would you know that it is not? > > I know it is not for me, because I can present logic and reasoning without > logical fallacies to defend my position. It does not appear that you have > been able to do this. > > (For example, ad hominem attacks. You questioned if someone else doesn't > want it to be true, to sidestep and ignore their point. Note that it takes > more than just questioning the person to be ad hominem; see the definition > at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem to see why this letter is not > itself this same fallacy even if it calls your reasoning into question.) > > "You might wish to turn this claim around." _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pharos at gmail.com Sat Jan 6 18:28:50 2024 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 18:28:50 +0000 Subject: [ExI] Metaphysics versus Science Message-ID: Most of the people who post here on Exi-chat have an engineering or computer tech background. This leads them towards the attitude that 'If you can't hit it with a hammer, then it is not real and not worth bothering about'. Two very different vocabularies trying to discuss! :) BillK Please, Mr AI - Explain the relationship between Metaphysics and Science. Answer - The relationship between metaphysics and science is complex and multifaceted. Although they are distinct fields of inquiry, there are points of intersection, interaction, and mutual influence between them. Here are a few aspects of their relationship: 1. Foundational Questions: Metaphysics and science both explore fundamental questions about the nature of reality, existence, causality, consciousness, and other abstract concepts. Metaphysics seeks to provide a theoretical framework that underlies and informs scientific investigation. It can address questions that science may not be equipped to answer, such as the nature of time, the mind-body problem, or the ultimate nature of reality. 2. Conceptual Frameworks: Metaphysics provides conceptual frameworks and ontological assumptions that can shape scientific inquiry. It helps establish the basic assumptions and categories through which scientists interpret and understand the world. For example, metaphysical debates about the nature of causality or the relationship between mind and matter can have implications for scientific theories and methodologies. 3. Limits of Science: Metaphysics can explore questions that go beyond the scope of empirical investigation or scientific experimentation. It can address topics that science currently lacks the tools or methodologies to address, such as questions about the nature of consciousness, free will, or the existence of non-physical entities. Metaphysics can complement science by providing a broader perspective and contemplating the limits of scientific knowledge. 4. Mutual Enlightenment: Metaphysics and science can inform and enlighten each other. Scientific discoveries and advancements can challenge traditional metaphysical assumptions and lead to new philosophical inquiries. Conversely, metaphysical theories and concepts can inspire scientific investigation by proposing new avenues of exploration or raising thought-provoking questions. 5. Interdisciplinary Areas: In certain interdisciplinary areas, the boundaries between metaphysics and science can become blurred. For example, the philosophy of science examines the nature of scientific inquiry, the scientific method, and the assumptions underlying scientific theories. Additionally, topics like the nature of time, the interpretation of quantum mechanics, or the study of consciousness often involve both metaphysical and scientific considerations. It's important to note that while metaphysics and science can interact and influence each other, they have distinct methodologies, goals, and approaches. Metaphysics tends to be more speculative and philosophical, while science relies on empirical observation, experimentation, and the formulation of testable hypotheses. Both fields contribute to our understanding of the world, albeit through different lenses. ------------------ From foozler83 at gmail.com Sat Jan 6 18:52:24 2024 From: foozler83 at gmail.com (William Flynn Wallace) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 12:52:24 -0600 Subject: [ExI] being special Message-ID: Who doesn't want that? Curmudgeons. (who might be proud of being in a group of such). Increased communication and involvement in world trade has threatened people who think that their culture is in danger of being overwhelmed. So they become more nationalistic and fucused on their own group. But there is still variation within any group, so splits occur ("We are the true....") Religions/churches and countries are splitting to decrease the variation. Openness is condemned as heresy ("If they act that way, talk that way, dance that way, etc. they are not one of us.") There is indeed comfort to be had in groups: families, churches, clubs, schools, sports groups and so on. Along with all this is the realization that what is lacking in most cases is tolerance. Acceptance of the different as neutral or even occasionally desirable as entertainment (a nonJew joining in the hora at a Jewish wedding) does occur. When so many other people and groups exist that are different, how can tolerance occur? After all, some of these individuals and groups are regarded as enemies or at least as possessing the capability of becoming so. Fears lead to paranoia and withdrawal. Which can lead to overgeneralization ("They are all alike.") or discrimination ("They have no right to be treated as special.") All of this is clearcut black/white thinking. No middle ground. With us or against us -you have to choose. Or be isolated. bill w -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From postmowoods at gmail.com Sat Jan 6 19:26:18 2024 From: postmowoods at gmail.com (Kelly Anderson) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 12:26:18 -0700 Subject: [ExI] A Paranormal Prediction In-Reply-To: <383713f1-b59a-fc46-ed5d-dce017c34370@swisscows.email> References: <9c6dfc1a-b4b8-4811-1571-ee65c8b34cc7@swisscows.email> <383713f1-b59a-fc46-ed5d-dce017c34370@swisscows.email> Message-ID: Political banter is fun with the plebians. But I find the minds I contact through this list are far too interesting to waste on partisan bull shit. The stuff normally discussed here is much more interesting than what flavor of politician we might get for the next four to N years (depending on your nationality -- not to be ethnocentric). So along those lines... when do you think we'll see the first AI president of ANY country? I could imagine an interesting story where say El Salvador elects/installs the first AI president, and immediately starts to gain so much international prestige and does so well that other countries start to come on board with the program... But, of course, other scenarios could certainly play out. I picked El Salvador, as they were the first country to accept Bitcoin as legal tender and seem ready to embrace an uncertain technological future rather than sit around waiting for the bigger countries to beat up on them in various ways. Thoughts? -Kelly On Wed, Jan 3, 2024 at 3:31?PM efc--- via extropy-chat wrote: > > I would also add that political discussion is one thing, an essential > thing in a democracy, but political ranting is another. I do not like > political ranting and block it if it doesn't stop. > > Best regards, > Daniel > From ben at zaiboc.net Sat Jan 6 19:30:55 2024 From: ben at zaiboc.net (Ben Zaiboc) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 19:30:55 +0000 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <3c30c6f2-acc5-4415-b67c-d034e7aa5198@zaiboc.net> On 06/01/2024 17:32, Jason Resch wrote: > I don't think you have yet understood the idea. It's not about > grouping things. > It all comes down to one question: what did it take for you to be > born? For you you to be alive now in this moment? What principle in > science says the experience this one life you are in is somehow > different or special compared to all the trillions of other creatures > who have lived on this planet? I don't understand the idea at all. It seems like complete nonsense. To answer the (two, not one) questions above: 1) Innumerable things, that nobody can possibly completely answer (the question is a bit broad, really) 2) I am unique among the trillions of other creatures because genetics and the many variables involved in my development ensure this, but I'm not in any objective way 'special'. Subjectively, on the other hand... Well, I'm the only 'Me' (so far), and that counts as special, at least to me. But I don't see what this has to do with 'Open Individualism'. In fact, these questions seem to be completely at odds with the idea that 'I am everybody'. Everybody's different, so they can't be the same. I'm not everybody, I'm just me. And the same is true for everyone else. We are all alone, no matter how much we communicate with each other, or how well we know someone else, we can never be in their heads. Perhaps this concept of Open Individualism is a result of reluctance to accept that? Similar to some religious ideas (particularly the oxymoronic 'afterlife') being a result of reluctance to accept that when you're dead, you're dead? Ben -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Sat Jan 6 19:33:29 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 14:33:29 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Metaphysics versus Science In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Sat, Jan 6, 2024, 1:30 PM BillK via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > Most of the people who post here on Exi-chat have an engineering or > computer tech background. > This leads them towards the attitude that 'If you can't hit it with a > hammer, then it is not real and not worth bothering about'. > Two very different vocabularies trying to discuss! :) > I too come from such a technical/engineering background. However there are cases where metaphysics is necessary to make technical progress. For example, to conceive of the possibility of quantum computers required understanding the reality of the wave function (and it's implied many unseen worlds). Feynman and Deutsch, the inventors of the quantum computer, are both believers in many worlds. To answer the question of the fine-tuning of the physical constants of the universe to support life requires making the metaphysical assumptions of other unseen barren universes. So to even explain how it is that you exist at all to be able to hit something with a hammer, requires some metaphysics. Jason BillK > > Please, Mr AI - > Explain the relationship between Metaphysics and Science. > > Answer - > The relationship between metaphysics and science is complex and > multifaceted. Although they are distinct fields of inquiry, there are > points of intersection, interaction, and mutual influence between > them. Here are a few aspects of their relationship: > > 1. Foundational Questions: Metaphysics and science both explore > fundamental questions about the nature of reality, existence, > causality, consciousness, and other abstract concepts. Metaphysics > seeks to provide a theoretical framework that underlies and informs > scientific investigation. It can address questions that science may > not be equipped to answer, such as the nature of time, the mind-body > problem, or the ultimate nature of reality. > > 2. Conceptual Frameworks: Metaphysics provides conceptual frameworks > and ontological assumptions that can shape scientific inquiry. It > helps establish the basic assumptions and categories through which > scientists interpret and understand the world. For example, > metaphysical debates about the nature of causality or the relationship > between mind and matter can have implications for scientific theories > and methodologies. > > 3. Limits of Science: Metaphysics can explore questions that go beyond > the scope of empirical investigation or scientific experimentation. It > can address topics that science currently lacks the tools or > methodologies to address, such as questions about the nature of > consciousness, free will, or the existence of non-physical entities. > Metaphysics can complement science by providing a broader perspective > and contemplating the limits of scientific knowledge. > > 4. Mutual Enlightenment: Metaphysics and science can inform and > enlighten each other. Scientific discoveries and advancements can > challenge traditional metaphysical assumptions and lead to new > philosophical inquiries. Conversely, metaphysical theories and > concepts can inspire scientific investigation by proposing new avenues > of exploration or raising thought-provoking questions. > > 5. Interdisciplinary Areas: In certain interdisciplinary areas, the > boundaries between metaphysics and science can become blurred. For > example, the philosophy of science examines the nature of scientific > inquiry, the scientific method, and the assumptions underlying > scientific theories. Additionally, topics like the nature of time, the > interpretation of quantum mechanics, or the study of consciousness > often involve both metaphysical and scientific considerations. > > It's important to note that while metaphysics and science can interact > and influence each other, they have distinct methodologies, goals, and > approaches. Metaphysics tends to be more speculative and > philosophical, while science relies on empirical observation, > experimentation, and the formulation of testable hypotheses. > Both fields contribute to our understanding of the world, albeit through > different lenses. > ------------------ > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From hrivera at alumni.virginia.edu Sat Jan 6 19:40:33 2024 From: hrivera at alumni.virginia.edu (Henry Rivera) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 14:40:33 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Sat Jan 6 19:40:56 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 14:40:56 -0500 Subject: [ExI] A Paranormal Prediction In-Reply-To: References: <9c6dfc1a-b4b8-4811-1571-ee65c8b34cc7@swisscows.email> <383713f1-b59a-fc46-ed5d-dce017c34370@swisscows.email> Message-ID: On Sat, Jan 6, 2024, 2:27 PM Kelly Anderson via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > Political banter is fun with the plebians. But I find the minds I > contact through this list are far too interesting to waste on partisan > bull shit. The stuff normally discussed here is much more interesting > than what flavor of politician we might get for the next four to N > years (depending on your nationality -- not to be ethnocentric). > > So along those lines... when do you think we'll see the first AI > president of ANY country? I could imagine an interesting story where > say El Salvador elects/installs the first AI president, and > immediately starts to gain so much international prestige and does so > well that other countries start to come on board with the program... > But, of course, other scenarios could certainly play out. I picked El > Salvador, as they were the first country to accept Bitcoin as legal > tender and seem ready to embrace an uncertain technological future > rather than sit around waiting for the bigger countries to beat up on > them in various ways. Thoughts? > The advantage of an AI-tocracy is that it can be open source and everyone can run a local copy on their own computer to verify the public pronouncements of executives or the rulings of judges. The disadvantage is that if they are public they can also be games by adversaries that run closed systems. If international affairs are like a poker game, then there are advantages to keeping ones cards close to the chest. Perhaps domestic government can be run by open source AI while international government uses closed source AIs. Jason > -Kelly > > On Wed, Jan 3, 2024 at 3:31?PM efc--- via extropy-chat > wrote: > > > > I would also add that political discussion is one thing, an essential > > thing in a democracy, but political ranting is another. I do not like > > political ranting and block it if it doesn't stop. > > > > Best regards, > > Daniel > > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From postmowoods at gmail.com Sat Jan 6 19:51:08 2024 From: postmowoods at gmail.com (Kelly Anderson) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 12:51:08 -0700 Subject: [ExI] Effects of Money on personality Message-ID: Some thoughts peripherally related to the IQ discussion, but which seemed different enough to warrant its own thread. I have noticed in my life experience that when people get money, they become freer to be themselves. Assholes will become even bigger assholes. Generous people become more generous. Kind people become more kind. Hermits go deeper into themselves and withdraw from society even harder. Hoarders rent more storage units. And so forth. So, this is either a skewed view based on unreliable personal experience, or is perhaps something akin to a tautology. Is this thought even worthy of a comment or a study? Has anyone looked at this particular point that you know of? I've noticed the effect in myself as I went from middle class to rich to poor to climbing out into the middle class again on my way, hopefully, to being more myself in the future. Is this a common personal experience? -Kelly From atymes at gmail.com Sat Jan 6 20:01:09 2024 From: atymes at gmail.com (Adrian Tymes) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 12:01:09 -0800 Subject: [ExI] A Paranormal Prediction In-Reply-To: References: <9c6dfc1a-b4b8-4811-1571-ee65c8b34cc7@swisscows.email> <383713f1-b59a-fc46-ed5d-dce017c34370@swisscows.email> Message-ID: On Sat, Jan 6, 2024 at 11:28?AM Kelly Anderson via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > So along those lines... when do you think we'll see the first AI > president of ANY country? I could imagine an interesting story where > say El Salvador elects/installs the first AI president, and > immediately starts to gain so much international prestige and does so > well that other countries start to come on board with the program... > But, of course, other scenarios could certainly play out. I picked El > Salvador, as they were the first country to accept Bitcoin as legal > tender and seem ready to embrace an uncertain technological future > rather than sit around waiting for the bigger countries to beat up on > them in various ways. Thoughts? > I, too, would look to El Salvador as an example because of their bitcoin experience. And the apparently utter disaster it has been, largely due to a failure to win the trust of the general public. This suggests that, until and unless (emphasis on "and unless") those who propose these schemes include workable ways to get the public to accept them, they will - or at least their practical effects will - be postponed indefinitely. Now, can anyone predict when those who propose such schemes will include workable ways to get the public to trust them? In theory that could happen today...or it could have happened at any time in the past decade, but apparently has not, which fails to suggest a reasonable upper limit for how long it will take. "Anywhen from now until forever" is not a usefully narrow time range. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Sat Jan 6 20:01:39 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 15:01:39 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: <3c30c6f2-acc5-4415-b67c-d034e7aa5198@zaiboc.net> References: <3c30c6f2-acc5-4415-b67c-d034e7aa5198@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: On Sat, Jan 6, 2024, 2:31 PM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > > On 06/01/2024 17:32, Jason Resch wrote: > > I don't think you have yet understood the idea. It's not about grouping things. > It > all comes down to one question: what did it take for you to be born? > For you you to be alive now in this moment? What principle in science > says the experience this one life you are in is somehow different or > special compared to all the trillions of other creatures who have lived > on this planet? > > > I don't understand the idea at all. It seems like complete nonsense. > Perhaps this question will sharpen the issue at hand: If you step into a star trek style transporter, but some error causes 5 identical copies of yourself to bean down, which one do you become? A) none of them B) one of them C) all of them > To answer the (two, not one) questions above: > > 1) Innumerable things, that nobody can possibly completely answer (the > question is a bit broad, really) > > 2) I am unique among the trillions of other creatures because genetics and > the many variables involved in my development ensure this, but I'm not in > any objective way 'special'. Subjectively, on the other hand... Well, I'm > the only 'Me' (so far), and that counts as special, at least to me. > > But I don't see what this has to do with 'Open Individualism'. In fact, > these questions seem to be completely at odds with the idea that 'I am > everybody'. Everybody's different, so they can't be the same. > The "2024-you" is also different in many ways (different place, different atoms, different experience), from the "2023-you". But we also, as a matter of general practice, believe/assume that despite these difference, they are experienced by the same person. Personal identity theories attempt to answer the question of what, and how much, can change while retaining the identity of a person. Empty individualism says any change at all, no matter how small, constitutes a new person. Closed individualism, says you can only change so much while being the same person. Open individualism says there's no limit to how much can change and yet still remain the same person -- that all variations of material composition of the body or psychological content of the experience, are mere contingencies. I'm not everybody, I'm just me. > Are you the same person as when you step out of a teleporter or is that someone else? Are you all your clones in the many worlds or are those other people? Are you the same you when you reappear in a similar form in another future big bang of eternal inflation, or is that someone else? Are you the same person in other mirror images of earth that appear in infinite locations across the infinite space of our universe, what about the ones that have one less hair on their head, or a different color of eyes? How much can change across all the infinite instances in reality while still being you? And the same is true for everyone else. We are all alone, no matter how > much we communicate with each other, or how well we know someone else, we > can never be in their heads. > > Perhaps this concept of Open Individualism is a result of reluctance to > accept that? Similar to some religious ideas (particularly the oxymoronic > 'afterlife') being a result of reluctance to accept that when you're dead, > you're dead? > It comes from attempting to answer questions that arise in uncommon situations: split brains, fused brains, duplication machines, teleporters, cloning devices, healing devices. These normally don't come up, so it is easy to go all ones life without considering anything beyond the conventional view of personal identity, but the moment you venture into these uncommon situations, you will find conventional theories are no longer adequate. Jason > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From foozler83 at gmail.com Sat Jan 6 20:04:45 2024 From: foozler83 at gmail.com (William Flynn Wallace) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 14:04:45 -0600 Subject: [ExI] Effects of Money on personality In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: I'd hate to utter any generalities here (as I would not know what I was talking about),but having more money frees us from the tensions of just scraping by. Bottom line: we worry less - we can do more of what we want. Perhaps that's a start? bill w On Sat, Jan 6, 2024 at 1:53?PM Kelly Anderson via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > Some thoughts peripherally related to the IQ discussion, but which > seemed different enough to warrant its own thread. > > I have noticed in my life experience that when people get money, they > become freer to be themselves. Assholes will become even bigger > assholes. Generous people become more generous. Kind people become > more kind. Hermits go deeper into themselves and withdraw from society > even harder. Hoarders rent more storage units. And so forth. > > So, this is either a skewed view based on unreliable personal > experience, or is perhaps something akin to a tautology. Is this > thought even worthy of a comment or a study? Has anyone looked at this > particular point that you know of? > > I've noticed the effect in myself as I went from middle class to rich > to poor to climbing out into the middle class again on my way, > hopefully, to being more myself in the future. Is this a common > personal experience? > > -Kelly > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From foozler83 at gmail.com Sat Jan 6 20:08:44 2024 From: foozler83 at gmail.com (William Flynn Wallace) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 14:08:44 -0600 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <3c30c6f2-acc5-4415-b67c-d034e7aa5198@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: What principle in science says the experience this one life you are in is somehow different or special compared to all the trillions of other creatures who have lived on this planet? jason Easy- the content of my brain is unique - my memories, mmy personality, even my face is distinguishable from any a others on earth (identical twins are not identical). bill w On Sat, Jan 6, 2024 at 2:03?PM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > > > On Sat, Jan 6, 2024, 2:31 PM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> >> On 06/01/2024 17:32, Jason Resch wrote: >> >> I don't think you have yet understood the idea. It's not about grouping things. >> It >> all comes down to one question: what did it take for you to be born? >> For you you to be alive now in this moment? What principle in science >> says the experience this one life you are in is somehow different or >> special compared to all the trillions of other creatures who have lived >> on this planet? >> >> >> I don't understand the idea at all. It seems like complete nonsense. >> > > Perhaps this question will sharpen the issue at hand: > > If you step into a star trek style transporter, but some error causes 5 > identical copies of yourself to bean down, which one do you become? > > A) none of them > B) one of them > C) all of them > > > >> To answer the (two, not one) questions above: >> >> 1) Innumerable things, that nobody can possibly completely answer (the >> question is a bit broad, really) >> >> 2) I am unique among the trillions of other creatures because genetics >> and the many variables involved in my development ensure this, but I'm not >> in any objective way 'special'. Subjectively, on the other hand... Well, >> I'm the only 'Me' (so far), and that counts as special, at least to me. >> >> But I don't see what this has to do with 'Open Individualism'. In fact, >> these questions seem to be completely at odds with the idea that 'I am >> everybody'. Everybody's different, so they can't be the same. >> > > The "2024-you" is also different in many ways (different place, different > atoms, different experience), from the "2023-you". > > But we also, as a matter of general practice, believe/assume that despite > these difference, they are experienced by the same person. > > Personal identity theories attempt to answer the question of what, and how > much, can change while retaining the identity of a person. > > Empty individualism says any change at all, no matter how small, > constitutes a new person. Closed individualism, says you can only change so > much while being the same person. Open individualism says there's no limit > to how much can change and yet still remain the same person -- that all > variations of material composition of the body or psychological content of > the experience, are mere contingencies. > > > I'm not everybody, I'm just me. >> > > Are you the same person as when you step out of a teleporter or is that > someone else? Are you all your clones in the many worlds or are those other > people? Are you the same you when you reappear in a similar form in another > future big bang of eternal inflation, or is that someone else? Are you the > same person in other mirror images of earth that appear in infinite > locations across the infinite space of our universe, what about the ones > that have one less hair on their head, or a different color of eyes? How > much can change across all the infinite instances in reality while still > being you? > > > > And the same is true for everyone else. We are all alone, no matter how >> much we communicate with each other, or how well we know someone else, we >> can never be in their heads. >> >> Perhaps this concept of Open Individualism is a result of reluctance to >> accept that? Similar to some religious ideas (particularly the oxymoronic >> 'afterlife') being a result of reluctance to accept that when you're dead, >> you're dead? >> > > > It comes from attempting to answer questions that arise in uncommon > situations: split brains, fused brains, duplication machines, teleporters, > cloning devices, healing devices. These normally don't come up, so it is > easy to go all ones life without considering anything beyond the > conventional view of personal identity, but the moment you venture into > these uncommon situations, you will find conventional theories are no > longer adequate. > > Jason > >> _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Sat Jan 6 20:19:24 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 15:19:24 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <3c30c6f2-acc5-4415-b67c-d034e7aa5198@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: On Sat, Jan 6, 2024, 3:10 PM William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > What principle in science says the experience this one life you are in is somehow different or special compared to all the trillions of other creatures who have lived > on this planet? jason > Easy- the content of my brain is unique - my memories, > mmy personality, even my face is distinguishable from any > a others on earth (identical twins are not identical). bill w > > It is, of course, trivially true that the content of your brain is unique and changes from moment to moment (thus constituting different "observer moments"). The trouble comes when we try to attach two different observer moments to the *same* experiencer. What mechanism do we choose to define such a linkage, and how do we justify it? Is it the continuity of some body? If so then what about mind uploading or transporters? Is it the continuity of some memories? If so then what about amnesia? Is it the continuity of some processes? If so then what about concussions? I think you can see where the trouble emerges. Jason > On Sat, Jan 6, 2024 at 2:03?PM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> >> >> On Sat, Jan 6, 2024, 2:31 PM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat < >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: >> >>> >>> On 06/01/2024 17:32, Jason Resch wrote: >>> >>> I don't think you have yet understood the idea. It's not about grouping things. >>> It >>> all comes down to one question: what did it take for you to be born? >>> For you you to be alive now in this moment? What principle in science >>> says the experience this one life you are in is somehow different or >>> special compared to all the trillions of other creatures who have lived >>> on this planet? >>> >>> >>> I don't understand the idea at all. It seems like complete nonsense. >>> >> >> Perhaps this question will sharpen the issue at hand: >> >> If you step into a star trek style transporter, but some error causes 5 >> identical copies of yourself to bean down, which one do you become? >> >> A) none of them >> B) one of them >> C) all of them >> >> >> >>> To answer the (two, not one) questions above: >>> >>> 1) Innumerable things, that nobody can possibly completely answer (the >>> question is a bit broad, really) >>> >>> 2) I am unique among the trillions of other creatures because genetics >>> and the many variables involved in my development ensure this, but I'm not >>> in any objective way 'special'. Subjectively, on the other hand... Well, >>> I'm the only 'Me' (so far), and that counts as special, at least to me. >>> >>> But I don't see what this has to do with 'Open Individualism'. In fact, >>> these questions seem to be completely at odds with the idea that 'I am >>> everybody'. Everybody's different, so they can't be the same. >>> >> >> The "2024-you" is also different in many ways (different place, different >> atoms, different experience), from the "2023-you". >> >> But we also, as a matter of general practice, believe/assume that despite >> these difference, they are experienced by the same person. >> >> Personal identity theories attempt to answer the question of what, and >> how much, can change while retaining the identity of a person. >> >> Empty individualism says any change at all, no matter how small, >> constitutes a new person. Closed individualism, says you can only change so >> much while being the same person. Open individualism says there's no limit >> to how much can change and yet still remain the same person -- that all >> variations of material composition of the body or psychological content of >> the experience, are mere contingencies. >> >> >> I'm not everybody, I'm just me. >>> >> >> Are you the same person as when you step out of a teleporter or is that >> someone else? Are you all your clones in the many worlds or are those other >> people? Are you the same you when you reappear in a similar form in another >> future big bang of eternal inflation, or is that someone else? Are you the >> same person in other mirror images of earth that appear in infinite >> locations across the infinite space of our universe, what about the ones >> that have one less hair on their head, or a different color of eyes? How >> much can change across all the infinite instances in reality while still >> being you? >> >> >> >> And the same is true for everyone else. We are all alone, no matter how >>> much we communicate with each other, or how well we know someone else, we >>> can never be in their heads. >>> >>> Perhaps this concept of Open Individualism is a result of reluctance to >>> accept that? Similar to some religious ideas (particularly the oxymoronic >>> 'afterlife') being a result of reluctance to accept that when you're dead, >>> you're dead? >>> >> >> >> It comes from attempting to answer questions that arise in uncommon >> situations: split brains, fused brains, duplication machines, teleporters, >> cloning devices, healing devices. These normally don't come up, so it is >> easy to go all ones life without considering anything beyond the >> conventional view of personal identity, but the moment you venture into >> these uncommon situations, you will find conventional theories are no >> longer adequate. >> >> Jason >> >>> _______________________________________________ >> extropy-chat mailing list >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat >> > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From atymes at gmail.com Sat Jan 6 20:22:59 2024 From: atymes at gmail.com (Adrian Tymes) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 12:22:59 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Sat, Jan 6, 2024 at 9:33?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > It seems to me, but correct me if I'm wrong, that you have only recently > learned about open individualism and then philosophy of personal identity. > This is true, at least for open individualism. > I have been studying, thinking about, and writing about, this subject for > many years. > I have encountered many folks who had deeply explored some spiritualist or religious point of view for many years - some, most to all of their lives. I am aware of many more; one extreme case is a certain population in Israel (I believe they are called "Haredi") that loudly demands their men should receive government subsidies for spending their lives studying their holy texts (being "full-time yeshiva students") and not being a productive (in the secular sense) member of society. That never once made their point of view any truer. Indeed, when they felt that they should rely on such appeal to authority, it was a red flag that their philosophy probably had some blatant holes that conflicted with the evidence, that they were quite used to ignoring until pointed out, then excusing with fallacious logic. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Sat Jan 6 20:28:02 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 15:28:02 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Sat, Jan 6, 2024, 3:24 PM Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > On Sat, Jan 6, 2024 at 9:33?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> It seems to me, but correct me if I'm wrong, that you have only recently >> learned about open individualism and then philosophy of personal identity. >> > > This is true, at least for open individualism. > > >> I have been studying, thinking about, and writing about, this subject for >> many years. >> > > I have encountered many folks who had deeply explored some spiritualist or > religious point of view for many years - some, most to all of their lives. > I am aware of many more; one extreme case is a certain population in Israel > (I believe they are called "Haredi") that loudly demands their men should > receive government subsidies for spending their lives studying their holy > texts (being "full-time yeshiva students") and not being a productive (in > the secular sense) member of society. > > That never once made their point of view any truer. Indeed, when they > felt that they should rely on such appeal to authority, it was a red flag > that their philosophy probably had some blatant holes that conflicted with > the evidence, that they were quite used to ignoring until pointed out, then > excusing with fallacious logic. > I mention it not as an appeal to my authority but as an explanation for why I may say something that requires further explanation without realizing it. If I say something that appears to make no sense, just ask for more clarification, I am happy to provide it. Jason -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From atymes at gmail.com Sat Jan 6 22:41:57 2024 From: atymes at gmail.com (Adrian Tymes) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 14:41:57 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <5e536fe0-b723-4b0a-928b-3caf9b566b02@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: On Sat, Jan 6, 2024 at 10:02?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > On Sat, Jan 6, 2024, 12:39 PM Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> On Sat, Jan 6, 2024 at 9:20?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: >> >>> I think you don't want it to be true. >>> >>> If that's the case, well then you can't use reason to get out of a >>> position which you did not use reason to get into. >>> >> >> You might wish to turn this claim around. >> >> How badly do you want open individualism to be true? >> >> Are you thinking about this possibility because it is the very situation >> you yourself are in, whether you fully realize it or not? >> >> If you are certain it is not, how would you know that it is not? >> >> I know it is not for me, because I can present logic and reasoning >> without logical fallacies to defend my position. It does not appear that >> you have been able to do this. >> >> (For example, ad hominem attacks. You questioned if someone else doesn't >> want it to be true, to sidestep and ignore their point. Note that it takes >> more than just questioning the person to be ad hominem; see the definition >> at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem to see why this letter is >> not itself this same fallacy even if it calls your reasoning into question.) >> > > > "You might wish to turn this claim around." > Which is precisely why I showed how that that letter itself was not an ad hominem fallacy. That your response consists only of parroting the first bit without addressing this point, in other words attempting to reflect it back without addressing the already-present rebuttal against said reflection, is further evidence of the problem. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From efc at swisscows.email Sat Jan 6 23:21:30 2024 From: efc at swisscows.email (efc at swisscows.email) Date: Sun, 7 Jan 2024 00:21:30 +0100 (CET) Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: At the risk of jumping on toes, I think part of your disagreement might perhaps be similar to our (Jason and mine) disagreement around the MWI and interpretations of quantum physics. I think after a _long_ discussion we came to the conclusion that the fundamental disagreement was around what can be directly known and proven, vs what is implied, and the status of implications of theories, vs proven facts of theories. I think after finding some labels we ended up on the scientific realism vs anti-realism spectrum, with a healthy dose of agnosticism as well in the form of instrumentalism. Jason brought up a good point that we should always keep looking and expanding our boundaries, and I agreed, but if there is no hard proof, I think we should be very clear that we are speculating. When it comes to speculation and philosophy, I guess you can opt either for the analytic tradition, ? la handmaiden of the sciences and focus on clarifying. But then you have the other side, the non-analytic with a focus on existentialist themes as well as speculation to "inspire" science. Just a few cents from the side lines. Best regards, Daniel On Sat, 6 Jan 2024, Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat wrote: > On Sat, Jan 6, 2024 at 8:42?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat wrote: > On Sat, Jan 6, 2024, 10:55 AM Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat wrote: > On Sat, Jan 6, 2024, 7:21 AM William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat wrote: > I want someone else to say:? this is not science. > > > This is not science.? "Open individualism" has been redefined in this very discussion, in a moving-the-goalposts fashion > with no acknowledgement that said redefinition happened, when it was shown to conflict with what evidence could be > mustered. > > > I think you should follow up on my replies, which you seem to have missed. > > > I think you are not debating in good faith,?so further debating the topic with you is pointless.? I will?grant that you are probably > not being deliberately dishonest.? Therefore, you are probably deluding yourself, so it would do you good to seriously?consider the > evidence I have presented to this end, such as pointing out the multiple logical fallacies you have engaged in. > > From efc at swisscows.email Sat Jan 6 23:29:52 2024 From: efc at swisscows.email (efc at swisscows.email) Date: Sun, 7 Jan 2024 00:29:52 +0100 (CET) Subject: [ExI] Effects of Money on personality In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <1e672ec7-dccd-8dbf-0316-804463461cf1@swisscows.email> Hello Kelly, Based on personal experience looking at myself and people around me I agree with what you are saying 100%. I've seen the same thing. To add to that, I just finished reading my christmas present to myself, the capitalist manifesto by Johan Norberg (https://www.cato.org/books/capitalist-manifesto) and in the book Johan very convincingly shows that increased capitalism and democracy lead to richer countries which leads to generally happier people. Best regards, Daniel On Sat, 6 Jan 2024, Kelly Anderson via extropy-chat wrote: > Some thoughts peripherally related to the IQ discussion, but which > seemed different enough to warrant its own thread. > > I have noticed in my life experience that when people get money, they > become freer to be themselves. Assholes will become even bigger > assholes. Generous people become more generous. Kind people become > more kind. Hermits go deeper into themselves and withdraw from society > even harder. Hoarders rent more storage units. And so forth. > > So, this is either a skewed view based on unreliable personal > experience, or is perhaps something akin to a tautology. Is this > thought even worthy of a comment or a study? Has anyone looked at this > particular point that you know of? > > I've noticed the effect in myself as I went from middle class to rich > to poor to climbing out into the middle class again on my way, > hopefully, to being more myself in the future. Is this a common > personal experience? > > -Kelly > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > From jasonresch at gmail.com Sun Jan 7 00:12:55 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 19:12:55 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <5e536fe0-b723-4b0a-928b-3caf9b566b02@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: On Sat, Jan 6, 2024 at 5:43?PM Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >>> (For example, ad hominem attacks. You questioned if someone else >>> doesn't want it to be true, to sidestep and ignore their point. Note that >>> it takes more than just questioning the person to be ad hominem; see the >>> definition at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem to see why this >>> letter is not itself this same fallacy even if it calls your reasoning into >>> question.) >>> >> >> > "You might wish to turn this claim around." >> > > Which is precisely why I showed how that that letter itself was not an ad > hominem fallacy. That your response consists only of parroting the first > bit without addressing this point, in other words attempting to reflect it > back without addressing the already-present rebuttal against said > reflection, is further evidence of the problem. > So far you've accused me of arguing in bad faith, questioned my sanity, doubted my honesty, said I need help, and compared me to religious devotees. But its not an ad hominem when you do it. Jason -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Sat Jan 6 23:52:14 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 18:52:14 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Sat, Jan 6, 2024 at 6:22?PM efc--- via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > At the risk of jumping on toes, I think part of your disagreement might > perhaps be similar to our (Jason and mine) disagreement around the MWI and > interpretations of quantum physics. > > I think after a _long_ discussion we came to the conclusion that the > fundamental disagreement was around what can be directly known and proven, > vs what is implied, and the status of implications of theories, vs proven > facts of theories. > > I think after finding some labels we ended up on the scientific realism vs > anti-realism spectrum, with a healthy dose of agnosticism as well in the > form of instrumentalism. > > Jason brought up a good point that we should always keep looking and > expanding our boundaries, and I agreed, but if there is no hard proof, I > think we should be very clear that we are speculating. > > When it comes to speculation and philosophy, I guess you can opt either > for the analytic tradition, ? la handmaiden of the sciences and focus on > clarifying. But then you have the other side, the non-analytic with a > focus on existentialist themes as well as speculation to "inspire" > science. > > Just a few cents from the side lines. > > Thank you Daniel, I appreciate your insights and I too was feeling echoes of that discussion. What it comes down to is whether we believe only what we see, or do we take theories literally and adopt some (less certain) belief in the implications of our theories. Unless one is careful, it is hard to make a metaphysical commitment either way. As both denying the existence of other universes, as well as accepting the existence of other universes is a metaphysical commitment. To remain agnostic one must be silent on the question, to neither accept nor deny the existence of other universes which we do not see. As it comes to personal identity, the absolutist instrumentalist position could conclude only that they are a single thought moment, and could never have any evidence that other future thought moments (from their perspective) exist or will be experienced. The existence of future points in time, would be a theoretical conjecture, though one we must accept to operate as functioning beings in the world. Thus, even the conventional / folk view of personal identity makes unprovable metaphysical assumptions concerning the existence of unobserved entities (future experiences). Jason -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From postmowoods at gmail.com Sun Jan 7 06:58:36 2024 From: postmowoods at gmail.com (Kelly Anderson) Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 23:58:36 -0700 Subject: [ExI] Reverse Flynn Effect - Blame Smartphones! In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: I wonder if the reverse Flynn effect being noted here is being offset by the development of other more relevant forms of intelligence. Possibly social intelligence. All other things being equal, intelligence is increased by the availability of better, more nutritious foodstuffs. And one could easily make the argument that the current brain drain is due to industrialized food. I'd like to see if the researchers looked at nutrition as a possible explanation. However, I suspect that there might also be a change in what's important for "survival of attention" in the memes inside the brains of our young people. When our ancestors went agrarian, their brains changed to become more social. Is it possible that we're taking the next step along that road, and that phones are the next step. They told us in the 80s that MTV was shortening our attention spans. Certainly, many of us remember that trope. So there's also the problem here that we are always looking at the new generation as worse than us in some important way, at least since Socrates. The new world created by cell phones requires a new type of intelligence to "succeed" whatever that means. In my generation (the very tail end of the baby boomers) success meant attending college. Now, I think you could successfully argue that going to a university is a sure road to financial insecurity and absolutely doesn't guarantee you a better job. Perhaps STEM is still helpful in the short term, but I suspect not in the long term. There are people nowadays that make a living playing video games to be watched. That is, video gaming has become a spectator sport in some corners. I find that absolutely fascinating. Someone is going to have to design the sets and scripts for the virtual sex games of the future. So many, many jobs we haven't yet thought of. So, are we seeing a reduction in the old form of intelligence that was important to measure in 1950? Or an actual reduction in overall intelligence of every kind? If one measured intelligence by one's ability to write in cursive, harness a team for plowing, dressing a stone, hurling an atlatl accurately or chipping a really nice obsidian arrowhead, then indeed we would all be getting dumber. But is are those the right measures for today? One could argue with the advent of AI that the IQ form of intelligence is becoming less important for the next generation. If they are seeing that, then they could be reacting correctly to the new reality, in paying attention to social intelligence which might well be the next "success" making form of intelligence. This article reeks of "not how we did it" bias. And I really wonder if that's all we're really seeing here. I have a lot of confidence that the next generation will figure it out... with the assistance of machines... and they are learning what's necessary to survive and thrive in the world we have created for them. Now, whether that world is a fulfilling and exciting world is up to them to decide. I really love some of the Youtube channels where people move back into the woods and film their life as they try to live like our ancestors. But only because of Youtube can they make their living this way. Do those people have high IQs? Maybe. But you can bet that their social IQs are off the charts, and that may be the most important thing for the future. Another thing that I'd bet kids are getting better at than us older people is spotting the scam and fake news/information out there. That probably takes a lot of brain power. Healthy skepticism of most of what you look at has to have a cognitive price. teamwork and mutual inspiration can be amazing. Look at the amazing rapid advancements in the area of dance, body movement and parkour as people bounce ideas off of each other on Youtube. That's not something IQ tests measure, but we're certainly better at it now than we were 50 years ago. I have never been able to stay up on a skateboard, and I doubt I'll ever learn how. All in all, I think this area deserves more study and more open minded study. What ARE these kids learning if not the sorts of things being tested by our antiquated IQ tests? I'd bet they are learning SOMETHING. It's up to someone to figure out what. Do we really want our grandkids to be solving the same sorts of problems we have solved all our lives? -Kelly Here's ChatGPT's take on my question/answer after the above whack at it myself... Prompt: If today's kids aren't learning the sorts of things that traditional IQ tests test for, what kinds of things are they learning in today's world that is preparing them for success in the age of cell phones, AI, robotics and a social future? ChatGPT: Today's children are growing up in a rapidly evolving technological and social landscape, which is shaping their learning and skill development in unique ways, particularly preparing them for success in an era dominated by cell phones, AI, robotics, and a rapidly evolving social environment. Here are some key areas where they are gaining skills and knowledge: Digital Literacy: With the ubiquity of cell phones and computers, kids are becoming highly adept at navigating digital environments. This includes not just basic usage but also understanding how to find information, evaluate its credibility, and use digital tools creatively. Coding and Computational Thinking: Many educational systems are now incorporating coding and computational thinking into their curricula. This doesn't just teach programming; it fosters problem-solving skills, logical thinking, and creativity, which are essential in a world where AI and robotics are increasingly prevalent. Collaboration and Communication: The rise of social media and online collaboration tools has made effective communication and teamwork skills more important than ever. Kids are learning to collaborate with others across different platforms and cultural boundaries. Critical Thinking and Information Analysis: In an age of information overload, the ability to critically evaluate information, discern bias, and make informed decisions is a crucial skill. This is being integrated into education through various subjects and projects. Adaptability and Lifelong Learning: The fast pace of technological change means that the ability to adapt and continuously learn new skills is vital. Kids are being encouraged to be curious, seek out new information, and be self-directed in their learning. Ethical and Societal Implications of Technology: As AI and robotics become more integrated into society, there's a growing emphasis on understanding the ethical and societal implications of these technologies. This includes issues like privacy, AI ethics, and the impact of technology on human relationships. Emotional Intelligence and Empathy: Recognizing the importance of mental health and interpersonal skills, education is increasingly focusing on emotional intelligence, empathy, and understanding diverse perspectives. Sustainability and Environmental Awareness: With growing concerns about climate change and sustainability, children are learning about environmental stewardship and the importance of sustainable practices, which is essential for their future. Entrepreneurship and Innovation: Encouraging entrepreneurial thinking, creativity, and innovation prepares children for a future where they may need to create their own opportunities or adapt to rapidly changing job markets. Global Awareness and Multicultural Competence: Exposure to diverse cultures and global issues prepares children for a connected world where understanding and respecting different perspectives is key. These skills and knowledge areas are not only equipping children for success in a technologically advanced future but also fostering a more holistic and adaptive skill set that values both technical and soft skills. Back to Kelly -- PAS: (Post AI Script) The sustainability, global thinking and empathy parts were completely missed by me, but may be more important to the next generation. I'm certainly not focused on that stuff as much as I hope our grandkids are/will be. Given these three shapes, what is the next shape likely to be? The one with less ice. -Kelly On Sun, Dec 31, 2023 at 9:44?AM BillK via extropy-chat wrote: > > The Atlantic > > It Sure Looks Like Phones Are Making Students Dumber > Opinion by Derek Thompson ? 19 Dec 2023 From postmowoods at gmail.com Sun Jan 7 07:02:50 2024 From: postmowoods at gmail.com (Kelly Anderson) Date: Sun, 7 Jan 2024 00:02:50 -0700 Subject: [ExI] A Paranormal Prediction In-Reply-To: References: <45f0fb30-8e5e-4f45-b7b2-c55b42bcc5d1@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: Some day Nature or Science will report on mind reading phenomena, but they will call it brain scanning or some such lame sciency term. I predict more accurate lie detection within the next decade or so. -Kelly From postmowoods at gmail.com Sun Jan 7 07:15:13 2024 From: postmowoods at gmail.com (Kelly Anderson) Date: Sun, 7 Jan 2024 00:15:13 -0700 Subject: [ExI] SciAm & Charlie Stross: BS In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Sun, Dec 24, 2023 at 12:46?AM Giulio Prisco via extropy-chat wrote: > Once great science journal Scientific American and once great science fiction writer Charlie Stross are deep into wokedecel B U L L S H I T these days. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/tech-billionaires-need-to-stop-trying-to-make-the-science-fiction-they-grew-up-on-real/ I have always been amused by stories of how parents threw away comic books as a bad influence on their kids. To see this meme resurrected in 2023 is terrifying. Agree with lots of things in this thread, but wanted to call out the "billionaires are seeking customers in embodying the technology that proved profitable for selling sci fi" to be one of the neatest little arguments in this thread. -Kelly From col.hales at gmail.com Sun Jan 7 07:16:00 2024 From: col.hales at gmail.com (Colin Hales) Date: Sun, 7 Jan 2024 18:16:00 +1100 Subject: [ExI] A Paranormal Prediction In-Reply-To: References: <45f0fb30-8e5e-4f45-b7b2-c55b42bcc5d1@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: FWIW, a bit of "progress" on EEG mind reading. DeWave: Discrete EEG Waves Encoding for Brain Dynamics to Text Translation Yiqun Duan ? , Jinzhao Zhou, Zhen Wang, Yu-KaiWang, Chin-TengLin? arXiv:2309.14030v2 [cs.HC] 17 Oct 2023 Abstract "The translation of brain dynamics into natural language is pivotal for brain-computer interfaces (BCIs). With the swift advancement of large language models, such as ChatGPT, the need to bridge the gap between the brain and languages becomes increasingly pressing. Current methods, however, require eye-tracking fixations or event markers to segment brain dynamics into word-level features, which can restrict the practical application of these systems. To tackle these issues, we introduce a novel framework, DeWave, that integrates discrete encoding sequences into open-vocabulary EEG-to-text translation tasks." A link to some commentary on the disturbing implications of true EEG mind-reading devices: https://futurism.com/neoscope/scientists-mind-reading-rights . Not "paranormal". Not Nature or Science ..... Yet! Cheers, Colin On Sun, Jan 7, 2024, 6:03?PM Kelly Anderson uvia extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > Some day Nature or Science will report on mind reading phenomena, but > they will call it brain scanning or some such lame sciency term. I > predict more accurate lie detection within the next decade or so. > > -Kelly > > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From postmowoods at gmail.com Sun Jan 7 07:20:04 2024 From: postmowoods at gmail.com (Kelly Anderson) Date: Sun, 7 Jan 2024 00:20:04 -0700 Subject: [ExI] Speed Reading ChatGPT Output Message-ID: Has anyone besides me noticed that it is cognitively easier to speed read AND STILL comprehend the output of ChatGPT than it is to read and comprehend human generated text? Because it is generated by a predictive algorithm, would this be predictable? Or, is it just my imagination? -Kelly From postmowoods at gmail.com Sun Jan 7 07:32:27 2024 From: postmowoods at gmail.com (Kelly Anderson) Date: Sun, 7 Jan 2024 00:32:27 -0700 Subject: [ExI] A Paranormal Prediction In-Reply-To: References: <9c6dfc1a-b4b8-4811-1571-ee65c8b34cc7@swisscows.email> <383713f1-b59a-fc46-ed5d-dce017c34370@swisscows.email> Message-ID: On Sat, Jan 6, 2024 at 1:01?PM Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat wrote: > I, too, would look to El Salvador as an example because of their bitcoin experience. > > And the apparently utter disaster it has been, largely due to a failure to win the trust of the general public. Just because something is low on the exponential curve at the present time doesn't mean it might not go better, then much, much better later. It is far too early to call El Salvador's Bitcoin experiment a failure due to the exponential nature of adoption. In fact, I predict that now that the country has turned a 3 million dollar profit on the endeavor, that with the next upsurge of Bitcoin (which we may be in now) they could get more rapid adoption which could lead to defi type activities that would greatly benefit their country. Yet this is merely an interesting aside to the main original question of the thread. -Kelly From postmowoods at gmail.com Sun Jan 7 07:42:17 2024 From: postmowoods at gmail.com (Kelly Anderson) Date: Sun, 7 Jan 2024 00:42:17 -0700 Subject: [ExI] A Paranormal Prediction In-Reply-To: References: <9c6dfc1a-b4b8-4811-1571-ee65c8b34cc7@swisscows.email> <383713f1-b59a-fc46-ed5d-dce017c34370@swisscows.email> Message-ID: On Sat, Jan 6, 2024 at 12:41?PM Jason Resch via extropy-chat wrote: > > > > On Sat, Jan 6, 2024, 2:27 PM Kelly Anderson via extropy-chat wrote: > The advantage of an AI-tocracy is that it can be open source and everyone can run a local copy on their own computer to verify the public pronouncements of executives or the rulings of judges. > > The disadvantage is that if they are public they can also be games by adversaries that run closed systems. If international affairs are like a poker game, then there are advantages to keeping ones cards close to the chest. Perhaps domestic government can be run by open source AI while international government uses closed source AIs. > Very interesting ideas Jason. Because of the large size of the data that would be required for an AI smart enough to run a government, I think that technologically it would not be feasible for everyone to have their own copy for verification. Perhaps if they ran out of the same cloud, you could duplicate basic opinions. Much of the data that such an AI would be using to making decisions would indeed be secret, as you point out. Can't have copies of that running around, now can we. Bradley Manning and Edward Snowden showing how that can be disruptive to the flow of international relations. And very shortly, we MAY find globalism itself to be threatened as a war starts to disrupt low friction international trade. Again, a story for another day. Another problem with your idea is that if you ask AI the same question twice, you normally don't get the same answer. You can try this with any of the popular LLMs out there. As they grow to be more than just LLMs, I think you can take this point further forward. In fact, many AIs are now being trained on "simulated" data, rather than data generated by humans. It's like AlphaGo playing itself a million times, but with conversations. As AI talks to itself, it gets smarter, without direct human involvement. This is what you would predict. And this seems to be a big part of what many AI companies are doing to train their next generation models. -Kelly From postmowoods at gmail.com Sun Jan 7 08:04:58 2024 From: postmowoods at gmail.com (Kelly Anderson) Date: Sun, 7 Jan 2024 01:04:58 -0700 Subject: [ExI] Effects of Money on personality In-Reply-To: <1e672ec7-dccd-8dbf-0316-804463461cf1@swisscows.email> References: <1e672ec7-dccd-8dbf-0316-804463461cf1@swisscows.email> Message-ID: On Sat, Jan 6, 2024 at 4:30?PM efc--- via extropy-chat wrote: > > Hello Kelly, > > Based on personal experience looking at myself and people around me I > agree with what you are saying 100%. I've seen the same thing. > > To add to that, I just finished reading my christmas present to myself, > the capitalist manifesto by Johan Norberg > (https://www.cato.org/books/capitalist-manifesto) and in the book Johan > very convincingly shows that increased capitalism and democracy lead to > richer countries which leads to generally happier people. > Note that the following story is only anecdotal... but I am very familiar with it. My ex-wife when she got more money (from our divorce, primarily) became more of a hoarder, more selfish, harder to get along with by everyone, lazier, and more demanding on the people around her. Now, to be fair, she had BPD and NPD among her multiple personality disorders. But she did become MORE of what she was before. She was never happier than the day *after* she died of cancer. Nobody around her was happier before that either, and I'm not speaking as a disgruntled ex-husband, but as an objective observer of all the people who knew her. She never improved the happiness of any person she met for more than a few days at the most. Our only daughter agrees with these assessments as well, so it's not just me. So while I agree that IN GENERAL, people get happier with more money, at least to a point... If they are bound and determined to be unhappy, then money will make them more unhappy. The Happiness Hypothesis - or any number of TED talks by Jonathan Haidt are instructional about the "to a point" part. In the bigger picture, most of the Middle Eastern countries that have flirted with democracy have had less than great outcomes. There's something seemingly deeply incompatible between Islam and democracy. The current troubles in Gaza, you may recall, came out of a government that was voted into power. That's not to say Israel doesn't perform their part of the escalation dance... but Hamas was elected. I would suspect, to stay on topic a little, that Islam is also deeply incompatible with transhumanism and other things we value highly in extropian thought. -Kelly From postmowoods at gmail.com Sun Jan 7 08:12:33 2024 From: postmowoods at gmail.com (Kelly Anderson) Date: Sun, 7 Jan 2024 01:12:33 -0700 Subject: [ExI] A Paranormal Prediction In-Reply-To: References: <45f0fb30-8e5e-4f45-b7b2-c55b42bcc5d1@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: Privacy is dead. Get over it. Learn to live inside your head in ways that you wouldn't mind sharing with anyone who cares to know and you'll be happier in the long run. Congruence between your inside and outside thoughts also seems to lead to increased feelings of well being. Now, where did I leave that strap-on, lube and flogger? Yeah, it's very important to live in a free society if this is the case. Can you imagine the depopulation of North Korea when this technology hits its stride? Genocide hardly begins to describe what could happen there. -Kelly From ben at zaiboc.net Sun Jan 7 14:59:11 2024 From: ben at zaiboc.net (Ben Zaiboc) Date: Sun, 7 Jan 2024 14:59:11 +0000 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On 07/01/2024 00:21, Jason Resch wrote: > Perhaps this question will sharpen the issue at hand: > > If you step into a star trek style transporter, but some error causes > 5 identical copies of yourself to beam down, which one do you become? > > A) none of them > B) one of them > C) all of them "Which one do you become?" is not a sensible or meaningful question. I think it's better to consider the situation from the viewpoint of the five resultant people, and ask if they are different or not, from each other and from the person who stepped into the transporter. These are two different questions, and they have two different answers. If I travel to Burma, am I the same person as when I left? It depends on what you're focusing on. The Ben that gets off the plane in Burma is the same person that got on it in England, if you're focusing on my continuity of identity, but at the same time, I've accumulated different experiences, perhaps have a different viewpoint on some things, and will continue to have different experiences than if I stayed at home, so from the viewpoint of my internal experience, I have become a different person, at least in part. The same thing applies to someone who is duplicated multiple times. Each resultant person is the same in the sense that they can correctly claim to have been the original in the past, and they are all different from each other because they are now separate minds that have different experiences since the duplication. They will probably retain the same basic personality traits, and will probably express them in different ways, depending on their individual circumstances. They will each be an independent person, with the same past as all the others, up to the point of divergence. If you insist on the wording "which one do you become?", I'd have to answer A and C. Which kind of illustrates that it's a silly question. > The "2024-you" is also different in many ways (different place, different atoms, different experience), from the "2023-you". > But we also, as a matter of general practice, believe/assume that despite these difference, they are experienced by the same person. I'd agree with both these things: Different, and also the same, depending on which factors you're considering. > Personal identity theories attempt to answer the question of what, and how much, can change while retaining the identity of a person. The answer to that depends on what your definition of 'identity' is, so it's a circular question. You could create a philosophical field called, say, Fish Identity Theory, that attempts to answer whether Sardines are animals or fish. There is no definitive answer to a question like this, without any other context (the most realistic answer, of course, is "both"). Insisting on one or the other is really more of an invitation to have a pointless argument than a genuine question. > Empty individualism says any change at all, no matter how small, constitutes a new person. Closed individualism, says you can only change so much while being the same person. Open? individualism says there's no limit to how much can change and yet still remain the same person -- that all variations of material composition of the body or psychological content of the experience, are mere contingencies. Ok, so there you have three different views on the matter. That's all you can say. You certainly can't say if one is 'righter' than the others, without further qualifying context. They are simply opinions. Open Fish Identity Theory says that Sardines are Animals. Closed Fish Identity Theory says they are Fish. Both are correct. >>??? I'm not everybody, I'm just me. > Are you the same person as when you step out of a teleporter or is that someone else? Both. It's not "or" it's "and". > Are you all your clones in the many worlds or are those other people? I'd say they (if such things exist) are other people, but that's just my opinion. You may validly disagree. > Are you the same you when you reappear in a similar form in another future big bang of eternal inflation, or is that someone else? Depends on if there are any differences. If everything is identical, so there's no possibility of telling which is which (something that nobody could ever tell, of course), then the question answers itself. If not, then See Above. > Are you the same person in other mirror images of earth that appear in infinite locations across the infinite space of our universe, what about the ones that have one less hair on their head, or a different color of eyes? How much can change across all the infinite instances in reality while still being you? Same answer. And I'm still no closer to understanding what 'Open Individualism' actually means. "One numerically identical subject, who is everyone at all times, in the past, present and future" is a sentence that makes no sense. What does 'One numerically identical...' mean? 'Identical' is a comparison, so you have to have at least two things, for them to be identical to one another in any respect. 'One identical thing' is meaningless. Can we replace that with "one person", for clarity, or doesn't that work?. The rest just reads as gobbledigook. Can it be boiled down to "one person, who is all people"? At least that sentence is coherent. As for what it means... Your definition above is different, though. You refer to how much someone can change and still be thought of as the same. The Wiki definition talks about everyone already being the same. Ben From hkeithhenson at gmail.com Sun Jan 7 15:25:49 2024 From: hkeithhenson at gmail.com (Keith Henson) Date: Sun, 7 Jan 2024 07:25:49 -0800 Subject: [ExI] A Paranormal Prediction In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: "Political discussion is ok if you must." What is of much more interest to me is the meta-level. Something I noticed decades back was the connection between economics and politics. There was an upswing (particularly in the Rust Belt) in neo nazi activity with every downturn in the economy. Eventually, I figured out that this is a human reaction to the perception of a bleak future. In the Stone Age, we were selected to circulate xenophobic memes as the first step in dehumanizing neighbors in preparation for killing them for their resources in a resource crisis. Support for crazy leaders is part of the package Unfortunately, this is too complicated an idea to spread well even here. Plus people seem to be deeply resistant to understanding that they have deep psychological traits. Keith On Tue, Jan 2, 2024 at 1:13?PM Gregory Jones via extropy-chat wrote: > > Political discussion is ok if you must. John was repeatedly, persistently warned about personal attacks. We urge mutual respect here. On his list anything goes, ad hominem attacks are allowed and expected. This is fine so long as you know about that. Any personal attack there is not to be taken personally. I agree it was a big loss. > > Suggest reviewing the exi archives summer and fall of 2020. I was away camping three weeks without internet when the big flame war broke out. Read what was posted and do suggest a suitable alternative to moderation, to eximod pls. > > Upon my return from camping I read all that and realized that I could not continue as moderator for I do not plan to give up lengthy vacations in the woods far from internet. Sooooo... Eximod agreed to take over. > > spike > > On Tue, Jan 2, 2024, 11:14 AM Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat wrote: >> >> On Tue, Jan 2, 2024, 7:32 AM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat wrote: >>> >>> On 02/01/2024 15:02, spike wrote: >>> >>> John was never banished. He was on moderation for about an hour in 2020. >>> On Sun, Dec 31, 2023, 6:13 AM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat wrote: >>>> >>>> >>>> As John K Clark has been banished from this list, and I feel that his >>>> >>>> annual paranormal prediction is an important message ... >>> >>> >>> >>> Ok, do you have a suggestion for alternative wording, for next year's message? >> >> >> "As John K Clark is no longer posting to this list..." >> >> _______________________________________________ >> extropy-chat mailing list >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat From atymes at gmail.com Sun Jan 7 15:59:46 2024 From: atymes at gmail.com (Adrian Tymes) Date: Sun, 7 Jan 2024 07:59:46 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Effects of Money on personality In-Reply-To: References: <1e672ec7-dccd-8dbf-0316-804463461cf1@swisscows.email> Message-ID: On Sun, Jan 7, 2024 at 12:06?AM Kelly Anderson via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > The current troubles in Gaza, you may recall, came out of a government > that was voted into power. That's not to say Israel doesn't perform > their part of the escalation dance... but Hamas was elected. > At first. They then consolidated their hold on power, preventing anyone else from running, similar to (but more brutally than) the Nazis. But yes. Similar to Trump, they were seen as less bad than the alternative - even though a government that actively oppresses its people and augurs for war as a means of staying in power is, in fact, predictably worse than a merely corrupt but somewhat just and not-warmongering government. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From atymes at gmail.com Sun Jan 7 16:05:09 2024 From: atymes at gmail.com (Adrian Tymes) Date: Sun, 7 Jan 2024 08:05:09 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Speed Reading ChatGPT Output In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Sat, Jan 6, 2024 at 11:21?PM Kelly Anderson via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > Has anyone besides me noticed that it is cognitively easier to speed > read AND STILL comprehend the output of ChatGPT than it is to read and > comprehend human generated text? Because it is generated by a > predictive algorithm, would this be predictable? Or, is it just my > imagination? > I think you are on to something here. It's not just because it's generated by a predictive algorithm. The output is more often summarized by paragraph: one can read the first few words or sentence of each paragraph in the middle and have a good understanding of the main point without parsing the rest of that paragraph, especially when it bolds or capitalizes them as headers. This style can be imitated by humans, but ChatGPT more often actually does it, akin to how a factory robot has more consistent output than a human factory worker. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From atymes at gmail.com Sun Jan 7 16:13:14 2024 From: atymes at gmail.com (Adrian Tymes) Date: Sun, 7 Jan 2024 08:13:14 -0800 Subject: [ExI] A Paranormal Prediction In-Reply-To: References: <9c6dfc1a-b4b8-4811-1571-ee65c8b34cc7@swisscows.email> <383713f1-b59a-fc46-ed5d-dce017c34370@swisscows.email> Message-ID: On Sat, Jan 6, 2024 at 11:34?PM Kelly Anderson via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > On Sat, Jan 6, 2024 at 1:01?PM Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat > wrote: > > I, too, would look to El Salvador as an example because of their bitcoin > experience. > > > > And the apparently utter disaster it has been, largely due to a failure > to win the trust of the general public. > > Just because something is low on the exponential curve at the present > time doesn't mean it might not go better, then much, much better > later. It is far too early to call El Salvador's Bitcoin experiment a > failure due to the exponential nature of adoption. I am given to understand the situation has reached a temporary mostly-steady state, no longer seeing exponential increases at this time within El Salvador. This state can be adjusted, of course, but that seems likely to require certain things being done differently so as to achieve better public trust. In fact, I predict > that now that the country has turned a 3 million dollar profit on the > endeavor, that with the next upsurge of Bitcoin (which we may be in > now) they could get more rapid adoption which could lead to defi type > activities that would greatly benefit their country. Sure, it is possible that they will suddenly revamp their policies to address the reasons why they are not seeing widespread acceptance. Nothing is physically preventing them from doing so. Nothing was physically preventing them from doing so, either - but they haven't done it yet. > Yet this is > merely an interesting aside to the main original question of the > thread. > I present it as evidence of low odds of an AI-tocracy coming to light any time soon, and specifically of the largely unaddressed in practice problem that is preventing such a thing. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From foozler83 at gmail.com Sun Jan 7 16:27:02 2024 From: foozler83 at gmail.com (William Flynn Wallace) Date: Sun, 7 Jan 2024 10:27:02 -0600 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <3c30c6f2-acc5-4415-b67c-d034e7aa5198@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: I think you can see where the trouble emerges. Jason No,I really don't. And why would you use the word 'trivial' to apply to anyone's personality? You have to explain some of your terms, which I have not encountered before. bill w On Sat, Jan 6, 2024 at 2:21?PM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > > > On Sat, Jan 6, 2024, 3:10 PM William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> What principle in science says the experience this one life you are in is somehow different or special compared to all the trillions of other creatures who have lived >> on this planet? jason >> Easy- the content of my brain is unique - my memories, >> mmy personality, even my face is distinguishable from any >> a others on earth (identical twins are not identical). bill w >> >> > It is, of course, trivially true that the content of your brain is unique > and changes from moment to moment (thus constituting different "observer > moments"). > > The trouble comes when we try to attach two different observer moments to > the *same* experiencer. > > What mechanism do we choose to define such a linkage, and how do we > justify it? > > Is it the continuity of some body? If so then what about mind uploading or > transporters? > > Is it the continuity of some memories? If so then what about amnesia? > > Is it the continuity of some processes? If so then what about concussions? > > I think you can see where the trouble emerges. > > Jason > > >> On Sat, Jan 6, 2024 at 2:03?PM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: >> >>> >>> >>> On Sat, Jan 6, 2024, 2:31 PM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat < >>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: >>> >>>> >>>> On 06/01/2024 17:32, Jason Resch wrote: >>>> >>>> I don't think you have yet understood the idea. It's not about grouping things. >>>> It >>>> all comes down to one question: what did it take for you to be born? >>>> For you you to be alive now in this moment? What principle in science >>>> says the experience this one life you are in is somehow different or >>>> special compared to all the trillions of other creatures who have lived >>>> on this planet? >>>> >>>> >>>> I don't understand the idea at all. It seems like complete nonsense. >>>> >>> >>> Perhaps this question will sharpen the issue at hand: >>> >>> If you step into a star trek style transporter, but some error causes 5 >>> identical copies of yourself to bean down, which one do you become? >>> >>> A) none of them >>> B) one of them >>> C) all of them >>> >>> >>> >>>> To answer the (two, not one) questions above: >>>> >>>> 1) Innumerable things, that nobody can possibly completely answer (the >>>> question is a bit broad, really) >>>> >>>> 2) I am unique among the trillions of other creatures because genetics >>>> and the many variables involved in my development ensure this, but I'm not >>>> in any objective way 'special'. Subjectively, on the other hand... Well, >>>> I'm the only 'Me' (so far), and that counts as special, at least to me. >>>> >>>> But I don't see what this has to do with 'Open Individualism'. In fact, >>>> these questions seem to be completely at odds with the idea that 'I am >>>> everybody'. Everybody's different, so they can't be the same. >>>> >>> >>> The "2024-you" is also different in many ways (different place, >>> different atoms, different experience), from the "2023-you". >>> >>> But we also, as a matter of general practice, believe/assume that >>> despite these difference, they are experienced by the same person. >>> >>> Personal identity theories attempt to answer the question of what, and >>> how much, can change while retaining the identity of a person. >>> >>> Empty individualism says any change at all, no matter how small, >>> constitutes a new person. Closed individualism, says you can only change so >>> much while being the same person. Open individualism says there's no limit >>> to how much can change and yet still remain the same person -- that all >>> variations of material composition of the body or psychological content of >>> the experience, are mere contingencies. >>> >>> >>> I'm not everybody, I'm just me. >>>> >>> >>> Are you the same person as when you step out of a teleporter or is that >>> someone else? Are you all your clones in the many worlds or are those other >>> people? Are you the same you when you reappear in a similar form in another >>> future big bang of eternal inflation, or is that someone else? Are you the >>> same person in other mirror images of earth that appear in infinite >>> locations across the infinite space of our universe, what about the ones >>> that have one less hair on their head, or a different color of eyes? How >>> much can change across all the infinite instances in reality while still >>> being you? >>> >>> >>> >>> And the same is true for everyone else. We are all alone, no matter how >>>> much we communicate with each other, or how well we know someone else, we >>>> can never be in their heads. >>>> >>>> Perhaps this concept of Open Individualism is a result of reluctance to >>>> accept that? Similar to some religious ideas (particularly the oxymoronic >>>> 'afterlife') being a result of reluctance to accept that when you're dead, >>>> you're dead? >>>> >>> >>> >>> It comes from attempting to answer questions that arise in uncommon >>> situations: split brains, fused brains, duplication machines, teleporters, >>> cloning devices, healing devices. These normally don't come up, so it is >>> easy to go all ones life without considering anything beyond the >>> conventional view of personal identity, but the moment you venture into >>> these uncommon situations, you will find conventional theories are no >>> longer adequate. >>> >>> Jason >>> >>>> _______________________________________________ >>> extropy-chat mailing list >>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >>> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat >>> >> _______________________________________________ >> extropy-chat mailing list >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat >> > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From foozler83 at gmail.com Sun Jan 7 16:42:15 2024 From: foozler83 at gmail.com (William Flynn Wallace) Date: Sun, 7 Jan 2024 10:42:15 -0600 Subject: [ExI] Reverse Flynn Effect - Blame Smartphones! In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: "antiquated IQ tests" Kelly Traditional IQ test scores correlate with more things than any other test, meaning that they can be useful in prediction. No other test comes close. All the correlations show that the traditional tests measure something really general in nature, applying to many things. So far people who have tried to improve it have failed. Let's not bury the most important test we have. Sure, other factors are highly important, such as social and emotional IQ. bill w On Sun, Jan 7, 2024 at 1:00?AM Kelly Anderson via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > I wonder if the reverse Flynn effect being noted here is being offset > by the development of other more relevant forms of intelligence. > Possibly social intelligence. All other things being equal, > intelligence is increased by the availability of better, more > nutritious foodstuffs. And one could easily make the argument that the > current brain drain is due to industrialized food. I'd like to see if > the researchers looked at nutrition as a possible explanation. > > However, I suspect that there might also be a change in what's > important for "survival of attention" in the memes inside the brains > of our young people. When our ancestors went agrarian, their brains > changed to become more social. Is it possible that we're taking the > next step along that road, and that phones are the next step. They > told us in the 80s that MTV was shortening our attention spans. > Certainly, many of us remember that trope. So there's also the problem > here that we are always looking at the new generation as worse than us > in some important way, at least since Socrates. > > The new world created by cell phones requires a new type of > intelligence to "succeed" whatever that means. In my generation (the > very tail end of the baby boomers) success meant attending college. > Now, I think you could successfully argue that going to a university > is a sure road to financial insecurity and absolutely doesn't > guarantee you a better job. Perhaps STEM is still helpful in the short > term, but I suspect not in the long term. There are people nowadays > that make a living playing video games to be watched. That is, video > gaming has become a spectator sport in some corners. I find that > absolutely fascinating. Someone is going to have to design the sets > and scripts for the virtual sex games of the future. So many, many > jobs we haven't yet thought of. > > So, are we seeing a reduction in the old form of intelligence that was > important to measure in 1950? Or an actual reduction in overall > intelligence of every kind? If one measured intelligence by one's > ability to write in cursive, harness a team for plowing, dressing a > stone, hurling an atlatl accurately or chipping a really nice obsidian > arrowhead, then indeed we would all be getting dumber. But is are > those the right measures for today? > > One could argue with the advent of AI that the IQ form of intelligence > is becoming less important for the next generation. If they are seeing > that, then they could be reacting correctly to the new reality, in > paying attention to social intelligence which might well be the next > "success" making form of intelligence. > > This article reeks of "not how we did it" bias. And I really wonder if > that's all we're really seeing here. I have a lot of confidence that > the next generation will figure it out... with the assistance of > machines... and they are learning what's necessary to survive and > thrive in the world we have created for them. Now, whether that world > is a fulfilling and exciting world is up to them to decide. I really > love some of the Youtube channels where people move back into the > woods and film their life as they try to live like our ancestors. But > only because of Youtube can they make their living this way. Do those > people have high IQs? Maybe. But you can bet that their social IQs are > off the charts, and that may be the most important thing for the > future. > > Another thing that I'd bet kids are getting better at than us older > people is spotting the scam and fake news/information out there. That > probably takes a lot of brain power. Healthy skepticism of most of > what you look at has to have a cognitive price. teamwork and mutual > inspiration can be amazing. Look at the amazing rapid advancements in > the area of dance, body movement and parkour as people bounce ideas > off of each other on Youtube. That's not something IQ tests measure, > but we're certainly better at it now than we were 50 years ago. I have > never been able to stay up on a skateboard, and I doubt I'll ever > learn how. > > All in all, I think this area deserves more study and more open minded > study. What ARE these kids learning if not the sorts of things being > tested by our antiquated IQ tests? I'd bet they are learning > SOMETHING. It's up to someone to figure out what. Do we really want > our grandkids to be solving the same sorts of problems we have solved > all our lives? > > -Kelly > > Here's ChatGPT's take on my question/answer after the above whack at > it myself... > > Prompt: > If today's kids aren't learning the sorts of things that traditional > IQ tests test for, what kinds of things are they learning in today's > world that is preparing them for success in the age of cell phones, > AI, robotics and a social future? > > ChatGPT: > Today's children are growing up in a rapidly evolving technological > and social landscape, which is shaping their learning and skill > development in unique ways, particularly preparing them for success in > an era dominated by cell phones, AI, robotics, and a rapidly evolving > social environment. Here are some key areas where they are gaining > skills and knowledge: > > Digital Literacy: With the ubiquity of cell phones and computers, kids > are becoming highly adept at navigating digital environments. This > includes not just basic usage but also understanding how to find > information, evaluate its credibility, and use digital tools > creatively. > > Coding and Computational Thinking: Many educational systems are now > incorporating coding and computational thinking into their curricula. > This doesn't just teach programming; it fosters problem-solving > skills, logical thinking, and creativity, which are essential in a > world where AI and robotics are increasingly prevalent. > > Collaboration and Communication: The rise of social media and online > collaboration tools has made effective communication and teamwork > skills more important than ever. Kids are learning to collaborate with > others across different platforms and cultural boundaries. > > Critical Thinking and Information Analysis: In an age of information > overload, the ability to critically evaluate information, discern > bias, and make informed decisions is a crucial skill. This is being > integrated into education through various subjects and projects. > > Adaptability and Lifelong Learning: The fast pace of technological > change means that the ability to adapt and continuously learn new > skills is vital. Kids are being encouraged to be curious, seek out new > information, and be self-directed in their learning. > > Ethical and Societal Implications of Technology: As AI and robotics > become more integrated into society, there's a growing emphasis on > understanding the ethical and societal implications of these > technologies. This includes issues like privacy, AI ethics, and the > impact of technology on human relationships. > > Emotional Intelligence and Empathy: Recognizing the importance of > mental health and interpersonal skills, education is increasingly > focusing on emotional intelligence, empathy, and understanding diverse > perspectives. > > Sustainability and Environmental Awareness: With growing concerns > about climate change and sustainability, children are learning about > environmental stewardship and the importance of sustainable practices, > which is essential for their future. > > Entrepreneurship and Innovation: Encouraging entrepreneurial thinking, > creativity, and innovation prepares children for a future where they > may need to create their own opportunities or adapt to rapidly > changing job markets. > > Global Awareness and Multicultural Competence: Exposure to diverse > cultures and global issues prepares children for a connected world > where understanding and respecting different perspectives is key. > > These skills and knowledge areas are not only equipping children for > success in a technologically advanced future but also fostering a more > holistic and adaptive skill set that values both technical and soft > skills. > > Back to Kelly -- PAS: (Post AI Script) > The sustainability, global thinking and empathy parts were completely > missed by me, but may be more important to the next generation. I'm > certainly not focused on that stuff as much as I hope our grandkids > are/will be. Given these three shapes, what is the next shape likely > to be? The one with less ice. > > -Kelly > > On Sun, Dec 31, 2023 at 9:44?AM BillK via extropy-chat > wrote: > > > > The Atlantic > > > > It Sure Looks Like Phones Are Making Students Dumber > > Opinion by Derek Thompson ? 19 Dec 2023 > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From foozler83 at gmail.com Sun Jan 7 16:48:14 2024 From: foozler83 at gmail.com (William Flynn Wallace) Date: Sun, 7 Jan 2024 10:48:14 -0600 Subject: [ExI] Speed Reading ChatGPT Output In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: Don't forget the last sentence in a paragraph - it should lead smoothly into the next paragraph. I read many papers where it could be said of them that they had interchangeable paragraphs (some books with interchangeable chapters). On Sun, Jan 7, 2024 at 10:07?AM Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > On Sat, Jan 6, 2024 at 11:21?PM Kelly Anderson via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> Has anyone besides me noticed that it is cognitively easier to speed >> read AND STILL comprehend the output of ChatGPT than it is to read and >> comprehend human generated text? Because it is generated by a >> predictive algorithm, would this be predictable? Or, is it just my >> imagination? >> > > I think you are on to something here. It's not just because it's > generated by a predictive algorithm. The output is more often summarized > by paragraph: one can read the first few words or sentence of each > paragraph in the middle and have a good understanding of the main point > without parsing the rest of that paragraph, especially when it bolds or > capitalizes them as headers. This style can be imitated by humans, but > ChatGPT more often actually does it, akin to how a factory robot has more > consistent output than a human factory worker. > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Sun Jan 7 16:58:25 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Sun, 7 Jan 2024 11:58:25 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Sun, Jan 7, 2024, 10:00 AM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > > On 07/01/2024 00:21, Jason Resch wrote: > > Perhaps this question will sharpen the issue at hand: > > > > If you step into a star trek style transporter, but some error causes > > 5 identical copies of yourself to beam down, which one do you become? > > > > A) none of them > > B) one of them > > C) all of them > > "Which one do you become?" is not a sensible or meaningful question. Let's say someone comes to your door with the following proposition: He will pay you $1,000,000 to scan you, destroy you (kill you, painlessly), then create a perfect replica of you to take over your life from that point forward. Do you take him up on his offer? Here, you need a theory of personal identity to decide whether or not you are killed, or whether or not you are paid a million dollars to be a test subject in using the first teletransporter. Faced with this proposition, you can't avoid the issue by saying it's a meaningless question. I > think it's better to consider the situation from the viewpoint of the > five resultant people, and ask if they are different or not, from each > other and from the person who stepped into the transporter. These are > two different questions, and they have two different answers. > > If I travel to Burma, am I the same person as when I left? It depends on > what you're focusing on. The Ben that gets off the plane in Burma is the > same person that got on it in England, if you're focusing on my > continuity of identity, but at the same time, I've accumulated different > experiences, perhaps have a different viewpoint on some things, and will > continue to have different experiences than if I stayed at home, so from > the viewpoint of my internal experience, I have become a different > person, at least in part. > Do you consider any questions that asks: "What do you expect to experience in the next moment?" to be meaningless? If so, why save money for a trip, if it is someone else (not you) who will enjoy the fruits of your labor? > The same thing applies to someone who is duplicated multiple times. Each > resultant person is the same in the sense that they can correctly claim > to have been the original in the past, and they are all different from > each other because they are now separate minds that have different > experiences since the duplication. They will probably retain the same > basic personality traits, and will probably express them in different > ways, depending on their individual circumstances. They will each be an > independent person, with the same past as all the others, up to the > point of divergence. > But does your consciousness survive? That's what people are concerned with. > If you insist on the wording "which one do you become?", I'd have to > answer A and C. Which kind of illustrates that it's a silly question. > I think your answer shows the silliness of the conventional view of personal identity. Your answer indicates a preference for either empty individualism or open individualism, which are both logically more tenable, but empty individualism is non workable as a decision theory since it allows no expectations and makes behaviors like saving for retirement (or any future planning) pointless. > > > The "2024-you" is also different in many ways (different place, > different atoms, different experience), from the "2023-you". > > > But we also, as a matter of general practice, believe/assume that > despite these difference, they are experienced by the same person. > > I'd agree with both these things: Different, and also the same, > depending on which factors you're considering. > That's good. I would then add that person identity theories attempt to specify which factors ought to be considered. > > Personal identity theories attempt to answer the question of what, > and how much, can change while retaining the identity of a person. > > The answer to that depends on what your definition of 'identity' is, so > it's a circular question. You could create a philosophical field called, > say, Fish Identity Theory, that attempts to answer whether Sardines are > animals or fish. There is no definitive answer to a question like this, > without any other context (the most realistic answer, of course, is > "both"). Insisting on one or the other is really more of an invitation > to have a pointless argument than a genuine question. > What differentiates concerns of personal identity from taxonomy is that in there are definite hard answers to the questions or concerns: i.e. will you, or will you not experience this particular conscious experience? It makes no difference to the fish what we call it, but it surely makes a difference to you, whether the transporter kills you (ends your consciousness permanently), or takes you to Paris. > > Empty individualism says any change at all, no matter how small, > constitutes a new person. Closed individualism, says you can only change > so much while being the same person. Open individualism says there's no > limit to how much can change and yet still remain the same person -- > that all variations of material composition of the body or psychological > content of the experience, are mere contingencies. > > Ok, so there you have three different views on the matter. That's all > you can say. You certainly can't say if one is 'righter' than the > others, without further qualifying context. Only one of these theories can be correct. Which one is correct has important implications that relate directly to your survival. And ine of the theories has strong probabilistic arguments for its truth that the others lack. They're not all on equal footing. They are simply opinions. > Open Fish Identity Theory says that Sardines are Animals. Closed Fish > Identity Theory says they are Fish. Both are correct. > I addressed this point above. > > >> I'm not everybody, I'm just me. > > > Are you the same person as when you step out of a teleporter or is > that someone else? > > Both. It's not "or" it's "and". > Do you take the million dollars or not? There's no and in that situation. > > Are you all your clones in the many worlds or are those other people? > > I'd say they (if such things exist) are other people, but that's just my > opinion. You may validly disagree. > This is progress then. :-) How is this different from the five clones example from earlier where you said you would be either none of them or all of them, but here you seem to be committed to B, that you are one of them. > > Are you the same you when you reappear in a similar form in another > future big bang of eternal inflation, or is that someone else? > > Depends on if there are any differences. If everything is identical, so > there's no possibility of telling which is which (something that nobody > could ever tell, of course), then the question answers itself. If not, > then See Above. > Thank you. This answer raises the question of faulty teleporters. We need not get to it yet, we can save it for later. > > > Are you the same person in other mirror images of earth that appear > in infinite locations across the infinite space of our universe, what > about the ones that have one less hair on their head, or a different > color of eyes? How much can change across all the infinite instances in > reality while still being you? > > Same answer. > Your last two answers are consistent, in that they recognize time/space interchangeability. That is, there's no fundamental difference between the same person existing in two times, vs. the same person existing in two places. > And I'm still no closer to understanding what 'Open Individualism' > actually means. "One numerically identical subject, who is everyone at > all times, in the past, present and future" is a sentence that makes no > sense. What does 'One numerically identical...' mean? 'Identical' is a > comparison, so you have to have at least two things, for them to be > identical to one another in any respect. 'One identical thing' is > meaningless. Can we replace that with "one person", for clarity, or > doesn't that work?. The rest just reads as gobbledigook. Can it be > boiled down to "one person, who is all people"? At least that sentence > is coherent. As for what it means... > Boiled down to one sentence, it is the idea that: "There is only one person." > Your definition above is different, though. You refer to how much > someone can change and still be thought of as the same. The Wiki > definition talks about everyone already being the same. > When I was talking about change, I was referring to changing the material composition of the body and the content of experience, while remaining the same person. If anything about the body or experience is free to be changed while not destroying the person, then there is only one person. I appreciate your great questions and thoughtful answers. Jason -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Sun Jan 7 17:23:39 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Sun, 7 Jan 2024 12:23:39 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <3c30c6f2-acc5-4415-b67c-d034e7aa5198@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: On Sun, Jan 7, 2024, 11:28 AM William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > I think you can see where the trouble emerges. > > Jason No,I really don't. > The trouble, to be clear, is in answering what connects two different experiences, represented by two different brain states, to the "same person". If a person is someone who can have more than one experience, then what determines the set of experiences that person will ultimately have? And why would you use the word 'trivial' to apply to anyone's personality? > I used the word trivial to refer to the truth of the statement that the content of your brain is unique and changes from moment to moment (as is true for everyone). That the statement is trivially true, means it is obviously true (that the content of the brain constantly changes is certainly true). You have to explain some of your terms, which I have not encountered > before. bill w > I am happy to. Just let me know if I use any terms thet require clarification. ?? Thanks Bill w. Jason > > On Sat, Jan 6, 2024 at 2:21?PM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> >> >> On Sat, Jan 6, 2024, 3:10 PM William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat < >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: >> >>> What principle in science says the experience this one life you are in is somehow different or special compared to all the trillions of other creatures who have lived >>> on this planet? jason >>> Easy- the content of my brain is unique - my memories, >>> mmy personality, even my face is distinguishable from any >>> a others on earth (identical twins are not identical). bill w >>> >>> >> It is, of course, trivially true that the content of your brain is unique >> and changes from moment to moment (thus constituting different "observer >> moments"). >> >> The trouble comes when we try to attach two different observer moments to >> the *same* experiencer. >> >> What mechanism do we choose to define such a linkage, and how do we >> justify it? >> >> Is it the continuity of some body? If so then what about mind uploading >> or transporters? >> >> Is it the continuity of some memories? If so then what about amnesia? >> >> Is it the continuity of some processes? If so then what about concussions? >> >> I think you can see where the trouble emerges. >> >> Jason >> >> >>> On Sat, Jan 6, 2024 at 2:03?PM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < >>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: >>> >>>> >>>> >>>> On Sat, Jan 6, 2024, 2:31 PM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat < >>>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: >>>> >>>>> >>>>> On 06/01/2024 17:32, Jason Resch wrote: >>>>> >>>>> I don't think you have yet understood the idea. It's not about grouping things. >>>>> It >>>>> all comes down to one question: what did it take for you to be born? >>>>> For you you to be alive now in this moment? What principle in science >>>>> says the experience this one life you are in is somehow different or >>>>> special compared to all the trillions of other creatures who have lived >>>>> on this planet? >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> I don't understand the idea at all. It seems like complete nonsense. >>>>> >>>> >>>> Perhaps this question will sharpen the issue at hand: >>>> >>>> If you step into a star trek style transporter, but some error causes 5 >>>> identical copies of yourself to bean down, which one do you become? >>>> >>>> A) none of them >>>> B) one of them >>>> C) all of them >>>> >>>> >>>> >>>>> To answer the (two, not one) questions above: >>>>> >>>>> 1) Innumerable things, that nobody can possibly completely answer (the >>>>> question is a bit broad, really) >>>>> >>>>> 2) I am unique among the trillions of other creatures because genetics >>>>> and the many variables involved in my development ensure this, but I'm not >>>>> in any objective way 'special'. Subjectively, on the other hand... Well, >>>>> I'm the only 'Me' (so far), and that counts as special, at least to me. >>>>> >>>>> But I don't see what this has to do with 'Open Individualism'. In >>>>> fact, these questions seem to be completely at odds with the idea that 'I >>>>> am everybody'. Everybody's different, so they can't be the same. >>>>> >>>> >>>> The "2024-you" is also different in many ways (different place, >>>> different atoms, different experience), from the "2023-you". >>>> >>>> But we also, as a matter of general practice, believe/assume that >>>> despite these difference, they are experienced by the same person. >>>> >>>> Personal identity theories attempt to answer the question of what, and >>>> how much, can change while retaining the identity of a person. >>>> >>>> Empty individualism says any change at all, no matter how small, >>>> constitutes a new person. Closed individualism, says you can only change so >>>> much while being the same person. Open individualism says there's no limit >>>> to how much can change and yet still remain the same person -- that all >>>> variations of material composition of the body or psychological content of >>>> the experience, are mere contingencies. >>>> >>>> >>>> I'm not everybody, I'm just me. >>>>> >>>> >>>> Are you the same person as when you step out of a teleporter or is that >>>> someone else? Are you all your clones in the many worlds or are those other >>>> people? Are you the same you when you reappear in a similar form in another >>>> future big bang of eternal inflation, or is that someone else? Are you the >>>> same person in other mirror images of earth that appear in infinite >>>> locations across the infinite space of our universe, what about the ones >>>> that have one less hair on their head, or a different color of eyes? How >>>> much can change across all the infinite instances in reality while still >>>> being you? >>>> >>>> >>>> >>>> And the same is true for everyone else. We are all alone, no matter how >>>>> much we communicate with each other, or how well we know someone else, we >>>>> can never be in their heads. >>>>> >>>>> Perhaps this concept of Open Individualism is a result of reluctance >>>>> to accept that? Similar to some religious ideas (particularly the >>>>> oxymoronic 'afterlife') being a result of reluctance to accept that when >>>>> you're dead, you're dead? >>>>> >>>> >>>> >>>> It comes from attempting to answer questions that arise in uncommon >>>> situations: split brains, fused brains, duplication machines, teleporters, >>>> cloning devices, healing devices. These normally don't come up, so it is >>>> easy to go all ones life without considering anything beyond the >>>> conventional view of personal identity, but the moment you venture into >>>> these uncommon situations, you will find conventional theories are no >>>> longer adequate. >>>> >>>> Jason >>>> >>>>> _______________________________________________ >>>> extropy-chat mailing list >>>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >>>> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat >>>> >>> _______________________________________________ >>> extropy-chat mailing list >>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >>> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat >>> >> _______________________________________________ >> extropy-chat mailing list >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat >> > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From efc at swisscows.email Sun Jan 7 18:27:20 2024 From: efc at swisscows.email (efc at swisscows.email) Date: Sun, 7 Jan 2024 19:27:20 +0100 (CET) Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Sat, 6 Jan 2024, Jason Resch via extropy-chat wrote: > Thank you Daniel, I appreciate your insights and I too was feeling echoes of that discussion. You're welcome Jason! =) > What it comes down to is whether we believe only what we see, or do we take theories literally and adopt some (less certain) belief > in the implications of our theories. > > Unless one is careful, it is hard to make a metaphysical commitment either way. As both denying the existence of other universes, as > well as accepting the existence of other universes is a metaphysical?commitment. To remain agnostic one must be silent on the > question, to neither accept nor deny the existence of other universes which we do not see. I agree in the strictest and most consistent interpretation. There is another "trick" that some people employ and that is to argue that the one who deviates from the "common sense" view (that there is a physical reality with individuals in it) is the one who has the burden of proof, and absent proof, the common sense view wins. However... you know me, I am attracted by the agnostic point of view, and I do accept that that means that in some cases we can only shrug our shoulders and say "given our current evidence, we don't know". I do think however, that there are plenty of people (atheists come to mind) who do favour the strategy where the burden of proof of is shifted onto the believer in god. > As it comes to personal identity, the absolutist instrumentalist position could conclude only that they are a single thought moment, > and could never have any evidence that other future thought moments (from their perspective) exist or will be experienced. The > existence of future points in time, would be a theoretical conjecture, though one we must accept to operate as functioning beings in > the world. Thus, even the conventional / folk view of personal identity makes unprovable metaphysical assumptions concerning the > existence of unobserved entities (future experiences). Could you expand here? My interpretation would be that all future events have a probability of occuring and are validated by them actually occuring. But this is not what you mean I think. Best regards, Daniel From efc at swisscows.email Sun Jan 7 18:44:55 2024 From: efc at swisscows.email (efc at swisscows.email) Date: Sun, 7 Jan 2024 19:44:55 +0100 (CET) Subject: [ExI] Effects of Money on personality In-Reply-To: References: <1e672ec7-dccd-8dbf-0316-804463461cf1@swisscows.email> Message-ID: On the micro-level I agree, but remember that the argument is based on questionaires and research on a global level, so yes, individually it might not be true, but all data indicates that humanity as an aggregate becomes happier with increased wealth, freedom and capitalism. Another common mistake is to disregard the time factor as well. Many people I've discussed with who are anti-capitalist love to argue about short instances of capitalism, instead of looking at the trend over multiple decades. By only looking at short time spans, the trends won't be visible. Last, but not least, my opinion is that islam as a religion is incompatible with freedom and capitalism. Until european countries learn that lesson, and work hard to integrate the second generation of immigrants, there is a long term threat to western liberal values. Unless the second generation immigrants are assimilated and inculcated with these values from an early age, there is a risk that islam and its built in values will take over in some countries in a worst case scenario. Based on how badly sweden has handled massive immigration of muslims so far, this is what I believe. Best regards, Daniel On Sun, 7 Jan 2024, Kelly Anderson via extropy-chat wrote: > On Sat, Jan 6, 2024 at 4:30?PM efc--- via extropy-chat > wrote: >> >> Hello Kelly, >> >> Based on personal experience looking at myself and people around me I >> agree with what you are saying 100%. I've seen the same thing. >> >> To add to that, I just finished reading my christmas present to myself, >> the capitalist manifesto by Johan Norberg >> (https://www.cato.org/books/capitalist-manifesto) and in the book Johan >> very convincingly shows that increased capitalism and democracy lead to >> richer countries which leads to generally happier people. >> > > Note that the following story is only anecdotal... but I am very > familiar with it. > > My ex-wife when she got more money (from our divorce, primarily) > became more of a hoarder, more selfish, harder to get along with by > everyone, lazier, and more demanding on the people around her. Now, to > be fair, she had BPD and NPD among her multiple personality disorders. > But she did become MORE of what she was before. She was never happier > than the day *after* she died of cancer. Nobody around her was happier > before that either, and I'm not speaking as a disgruntled ex-husband, > but as an objective observer of all the people who knew her. She never > improved the happiness of any person she met for more than a few days > at the most. Our only daughter agrees with these assessments as well, > so it's not just me. > > So while I agree that IN GENERAL, people get happier with more money, > at least to a point... If they are bound and determined to be unhappy, > then money will make them more unhappy. The Happiness Hypothesis - or > any number of TED talks by Jonathan Haidt are instructional about the > "to a point" part. > > In the bigger picture, most of the Middle Eastern countries that have > flirted with democracy have had less than great outcomes. There's > something seemingly deeply incompatible between Islam and democracy. > The current troubles in Gaza, you may recall, came out of a government > that was voted into power. That's not to say Israel doesn't perform > their part of the escalation dance... but Hamas was elected. > > I would suspect, to stay on topic a little, that Islam is also deeply > incompatible with transhumanism and other things we value highly in > extropian thought. > > -Kelly > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat From jasonresch at gmail.com Sun Jan 7 18:47:44 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Sun, 7 Jan 2024 13:47:44 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Sun, Jan 7, 2024, 1:28 PM efc--- via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > > On Sat, 6 Jan 2024, Jason Resch via extropy-chat wrote: > > > Thank you Daniel, I appreciate your insights and I too was feeling > echoes of that discussion. > > You're welcome Jason! =) > > > What it comes down to is whether we believe only what we see, or do we > take theories literally and adopt some (less certain) belief > > in the implications of our theories. > > > > Unless one is careful, it is hard to make a metaphysical commitment > either way. As both denying the existence of other universes, as > > well as accepting the existence of other universes is a > metaphysical commitment. To remain agnostic one must be silent on the > > question, to neither accept nor deny the existence of other universes > which we do not see. > > I agree in the strictest and most consistent interpretation. There is > another "trick" that some people employ and that is to argue that the > one who deviates from the "common sense" view (that there is a physical > reality with individuals in it) is the one who has the burden of proof, > and absent proof, the common sense view wins. > > However... you know me, I am attracted by the agnostic point of view, > and I do accept that that means that in some cases we can only shrug our > shoulders and say "given our current evidence, we don't know". > > I do think however, that there are plenty of people (atheists come to > mind) who do favour the strategy where the burden of proof of is shifted > onto the believer in god. > > > As it comes to personal identity, the absolutist instrumentalist > position could conclude only that they are a single thought moment, > > and could never have any evidence that other future thought moments > (from their perspective) exist or will be experienced. The > > existence of future points in time, would be a theoretical conjecture, > though one we must accept to operate as functioning beings in > > the world. Thus, even the conventional / folk view of personal identity > makes unprovable metaphysical assumptions concerning the > > existence of unobserved entities (future experiences). > > Could you expand here? My interpretation would be that all future events > have a probability of occuring and are validated by them actually > occuring. But this is not what you mean I think. > Let's define the absolutist instrumentalist as someone who only accepts and believes in *only* such things that they can observe directly, either with their senses or their instruments. Then consider: each of us is only ever aware of some instantaneous point in time, a single moment of the present, perhaps containing some recollection of past memories. Then it follows, that the absolutist instrumentalist cannot accept the existence of future points in time, for he cannot observe them with any sense or instrument. It remains an unconfirmed and unconformable hypothesis that the next moment of time exists. It is equally an unconformable hypothesis that he, the observer presently stuck in time t, will also experience time (t+1). So the absolutist instrumentalist can say only that his present thought moment exists. He cannot believe that the next one exists, nor that it will be he who will experience it. To thrive in the world, we have to make (and act according to), theories about reality that we cannot prove with our senses. In this case, a metaphysical assumption that the future exists and that we will experience it. This assumptions is important for our survival, but it doesn't mean it is true. Empty individualism is consistent with it not being true, for it says each of us is eternally trapped in a single instantaneous thought-moment, and they future thought-moments are experienced by other people who are not you. The absolutist instrumentalist is forced to assume no more than empty individualism. Jason > Best regards, > Daniel > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Sun Jan 7 20:14:30 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Sun, 7 Jan 2024 15:14:30 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Speed Reading ChatGPT Output In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Sun, Jan 7, 2024, 2:21 AM Kelly Anderson via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > Has anyone besides me noticed that it is cognitively easier to speed > read AND STILL comprehend the output of ChatGPT than it is to read and > comprehend human generated text? Because it is generated by a > predictive algorithm, would this be predictable? Or, is it just my > imagination? > Another aspect is GPT's verbosity. Good writing has no pointless words. If you speed read good writing you will skip important words, but if you speed read verbose text there will be redundancies to compensate. Jason > -Kelly > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pharos at gmail.com Sun Jan 7 21:52:43 2024 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Sun, 7 Jan 2024 21:52:43 +0000 Subject: [ExI] Speed Reading ChatGPT Output In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Sun, 7 Jan 2024 at 20:17, Jason Resch via extropy-chat wrote: > Another aspect is GPT's verbosity. Good writing has no pointless words. If you speed read good writing you will skip important words, but if you speed read verbose text there will be redundancies to compensate. > > Jason > _______________________________________________ I just asked a version of ChatGPT what it thought about that. :) Basically, it replied that you'll get what you ask for. It agreed that normally it would answer in a conversational style, as that is what most people like. i.e. a friendly chatty assistant. But if you want a summary or a list of the key points rather than a detailed explanation, just ask for that. You could also ask for brief or concise answer, for example. And take care with the prompts and the phrasing of your questions to get the style of answer you want. BillK From foozler83 at gmail.com Sun Jan 7 21:55:41 2024 From: foozler83 at gmail.com (William Flynn Wallace) Date: Sun, 7 Jan 2024 15:55:41 -0600 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <3c30c6f2-acc5-4415-b67c-d034e7aa5198@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: If a person is someone who can have more than one experience, then what determines the set of experiences that person will ultimately have? I have to say that I do not understand the question. The only real answer is: who they see, what they read, where they go, what they believe, and dozens more. bill w On Sun, Jan 7, 2024 at 11:25?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > > > On Sun, Jan 7, 2024, 11:28 AM William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> I think you can see where the trouble emerges. >> >> Jason No,I really don't. >> > > The trouble, to be clear, is in answering what connects two different > experiences, represented by two different brain states, to the "same > person". > > If a person is someone who can have more than one experience, then what > determines the set of experiences that person will ultimately have? > > And why would you use the word 'trivial' to apply to anyone's personality? >> > > I used the word trivial to refer to the truth of the statement that the > content of your brain is unique and changes from moment to moment (as is > true for everyone). That the statement is trivially true, means it is > obviously true (that the content of the brain constantly changes is > certainly true). > > You have to explain some of your terms, which I have not encountered >> before. bill w >> > > I am happy to. Just let me know if I use any terms thet require > clarification. ?? > > Thanks Bill w. > > Jason > > >> >> On Sat, Jan 6, 2024 at 2:21?PM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: >> >>> >>> >>> On Sat, Jan 6, 2024, 3:10 PM William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat < >>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: >>> >>>> What principle in science says the experience this one life you are in is somehow different or special compared to all the trillions of other creatures who have lived >>>> on this planet? jason >>>> Easy- the content of my brain is unique - my memories, >>>> mmy personality, even my face is distinguishable from any >>>> a others on earth (identical twins are not identical). bill w >>>> >>>> >>> It is, of course, trivially true that the content of your brain is >>> unique and changes from moment to moment (thus constituting different >>> "observer moments"). >>> >>> The trouble comes when we try to attach two different observer moments >>> to the *same* experiencer. >>> >>> What mechanism do we choose to define such a linkage, and how do we >>> justify it? >>> >>> Is it the continuity of some body? If so then what about mind uploading >>> or transporters? >>> >>> Is it the continuity of some memories? If so then what about amnesia? >>> >>> Is it the continuity of some processes? If so then what about >>> concussions? >>> >>> I think you can see where the trouble emerges. >>> >>> Jason >>> >>> >>>> On Sat, Jan 6, 2024 at 2:03?PM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < >>>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: >>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> On Sat, Jan 6, 2024, 2:31 PM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat < >>>>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: >>>>> >>>>>> >>>>>> On 06/01/2024 17:32, Jason Resch wrote: >>>>>> >>>>>> I don't think you have yet understood the idea. It's not about grouping things. >>>>>> It >>>>>> all comes down to one question: what did it take for you to be born? >>>>>> For you you to be alive now in this moment? What principle in science >>>>>> says the experience this one life you are in is somehow different or >>>>>> special compared to all the trillions of other creatures who have lived >>>>>> on this planet? >>>>>> >>>>>> >>>>>> I don't understand the idea at all. It seems like complete nonsense. >>>>>> >>>>> >>>>> Perhaps this question will sharpen the issue at hand: >>>>> >>>>> If you step into a star trek style transporter, but some error causes >>>>> 5 identical copies of yourself to bean down, which one do you become? >>>>> >>>>> A) none of them >>>>> B) one of them >>>>> C) all of them >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>>>> To answer the (two, not one) questions above: >>>>>> >>>>>> 1) Innumerable things, that nobody can possibly completely answer >>>>>> (the question is a bit broad, really) >>>>>> >>>>>> 2) I am unique among the trillions of other creatures because >>>>>> genetics and the many variables involved in my development ensure this, but >>>>>> I'm not in any objective way 'special'. Subjectively, on the other hand... >>>>>> Well, I'm the only 'Me' (so far), and that counts as special, at least to >>>>>> me. >>>>>> >>>>>> But I don't see what this has to do with 'Open Individualism'. In >>>>>> fact, these questions seem to be completely at odds with the idea that 'I >>>>>> am everybody'. Everybody's different, so they can't be the same. >>>>>> >>>>> >>>>> The "2024-you" is also different in many ways (different place, >>>>> different atoms, different experience), from the "2023-you". >>>>> >>>>> But we also, as a matter of general practice, believe/assume that >>>>> despite these difference, they are experienced by the same person. >>>>> >>>>> Personal identity theories attempt to answer the question of what, and >>>>> how much, can change while retaining the identity of a person. >>>>> >>>>> Empty individualism says any change at all, no matter how small, >>>>> constitutes a new person. Closed individualism, says you can only change so >>>>> much while being the same person. Open individualism says there's no limit >>>>> to how much can change and yet still remain the same person -- that all >>>>> variations of material composition of the body or psychological content of >>>>> the experience, are mere contingencies. >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> I'm not everybody, I'm just me. >>>>>> >>>>> >>>>> Are you the same person as when you step out of a teleporter or is >>>>> that someone else? Are you all your clones in the many worlds or are those >>>>> other people? Are you the same you when you reappear in a similar form in >>>>> another future big bang of eternal inflation, or is that someone else? Are >>>>> you the same person in other mirror images of earth that appear in infinite >>>>> locations across the infinite space of our universe, what about the ones >>>>> that have one less hair on their head, or a different color of eyes? How >>>>> much can change across all the infinite instances in reality while still >>>>> being you? >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> And the same is true for everyone else. We are all alone, no matter >>>>>> how much we communicate with each other, or how well we know someone else, >>>>>> we can never be in their heads. >>>>>> >>>>>> Perhaps this concept of Open Individualism is a result of reluctance >>>>>> to accept that? Similar to some religious ideas (particularly the >>>>>> oxymoronic 'afterlife') being a result of reluctance to accept that when >>>>>> you're dead, you're dead? >>>>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> It comes from attempting to answer questions that arise in uncommon >>>>> situations: split brains, fused brains, duplication machines, teleporters, >>>>> cloning devices, healing devices. These normally don't come up, so it is >>>>> easy to go all ones life without considering anything beyond the >>>>> conventional view of personal identity, but the moment you venture into >>>>> these uncommon situations, you will find conventional theories are no >>>>> longer adequate. >>>>> >>>>> Jason >>>>> >>>>>> _______________________________________________ >>>>> extropy-chat mailing list >>>>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >>>>> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat >>>>> >>>> _______________________________________________ >>>> extropy-chat mailing list >>>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >>>> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat >>>> >>> _______________________________________________ >>> extropy-chat mailing list >>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >>> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat >>> >> _______________________________________________ >> extropy-chat mailing list >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat >> > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From efc at swisscows.email Sun Jan 7 22:19:30 2024 From: efc at swisscows.email (efc at swisscows.email) Date: Sun, 7 Jan 2024 23:19:30 +0100 (CET) Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <772985af-2779-71df-6118-c6bd3aa9d0bf@swisscows.email> On Sun, 7 Jan 2024, Jason Resch via extropy-chat wrote: > Could you expand here? My interpretation would be that all future events > have a probability of occuring and are validated by them actually > occuring. But this is not what you mean I think. > > Let's define the absolutist instrumentalist as someone who only > accepts and believes in *only* such things that they can observe > directly, either with their senses or their instruments. This is one definition out of many. Also note, that since instruments are ultimately dependent on senses, I think your definition could exclude instruments, since instruments give rise to sense impressions. > Then consider: each of us is only ever aware of some instantaneous > point in time, a single moment of the present, perhaps containing some > recollection of past memories. Without time and awareness of time, thought is not possible since thought is a sequence of events, so it seems to me that this collapses into some solipsism. > To thrive in the world, we have to make (and act according to), > theories about reality that we cannot prove with our senses. In this If we require a 100% foundation of everything, we end up as solipsists, which no one who argues about it seriously beliefs. The fact of arguing in favour of the position weakens it of itself. The best foundation we have is materialism, what we can see, experience, and the best way to knowledge that we have is science. Now here's the thing. Other ways may be possible, other worlds may be possible, but I'd say that it's fair to shift the burden of proof onto them. So nothing can be proven with 100% certainty, as you say, but we have a pretty close second place in the form of the assumption that we exist and matter exists and science and so on. > will experience it. This assumptions is important for our survival, > but it doesn't mean it is true. Empty individualism is consistent with We have no proof to the contrary. At least no proof which has been accepted by the world at large. > The absolutist instrumentalist is forced to assume no more than empty > individualism. But I think we're getting back to old MWI-ground. I'll stop for now, and let's see if someone else will jump back in and I hope I'll learn something new. =) Best regards, Daniel > > Jason? > > > > Best regards, > Daniel > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > > From avant at sollegro.com Sun Jan 7 22:29:16 2024 From: avant at sollegro.com (Stuart LaForge) Date: Sun, 07 Jan 2024 14:29:16 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: <865D31C3-1A6E-4F90-A49E-148642C076E3@taramayastales.com> References: <865D31C3-1A6E-4F90-A49E-148642C076E3@taramayastales.com> Message-ID: On 2024-01-04 09:08, Tara Maya via extropy-chat wrote: > So it's like a "people's republic" where the combination of words > actually reverses the meaning of both. Open Individualism" is a > philosophy that is the inverse of the Enlightenment's ideal of > individualism; in fact, it's quite fine to sacrifice millions of > so-called "open individuals" if they are but clonal cells sacrificed by > the One Body for the Greater Good. This is only problematic if the One Body and Greater Good are not truly transcendent movements, but merely other clonal cells trying to paint themselves and their personal agendas as such transcendent causes. The Enlightenment was largely a reaction to the personal agendas of kings and clergy being equated to God and country, when really they are just poor slobs like the rest of us. That you see the dichotomy is an astute observation, but it is also quite ancient. I am not proselytizing or anything, but the Bhagavad Gita could be summarized as follows: Once upon a time in India, a civil war was fought between two factions of a royal family, the Kauravas, and the Pandavas for succession to the throne. One of the five sons of a claimant named Pandu was named Arjuna. Prince Arjuna was a skilled warrior among the Pandavas. As this is a civil war, looking out over the battle field, Arjuna was distraught that so many of the opposing army were people he knew and loved like relatives, friends, and teachers. He shares his moment of angst with his friend Krishna, whereupon Krishna gives him a pep talk. First, he reveals himself to be an avatar of God, blowing Arjuna's mind by showing him his Universal Form. Then Krishna teaches him some spiritual stuff like the interconnectedness and unity of all living beings. He also teaches him that the kernel of self within each being is divine and independent of the temporary material body it inhabits. Thus all consciousness is considered a fragment of the universal consciousness of Brahman; every soul is a facet of the same jewel. Krishna then goes on to teach Arjuna about Dharma, by convincing him that because he is a warrior, it is Arjuna's sacred duty to kill the enemy even if they are family and friends who all have the same divine spark of universal consciousness as him. He should not be happy or sad for doing so but should know his role and do his job without attachment to the outcome. Then Krishna offers to drive Arjuna to the battle in his chariot and maybe go out for Tandoori afterwards. :) > This is also, in my opinion, not much supported by the evidence of > evolution. Consciousness is an evolved trait of individuals to compete > for mates and resources with other individuals; cooperation between > conscious individuals has to benefit each participant independently. > This is very different than the "we all share one mind" philosophy. But not so different from the "we all share one mind, but still have a duty to compete with each other" philosophy. > It's not that we can['t] connect with others for the greater good... > but this is not "natural" or innate, we have to work hard for it. Don't we work for the greater good simply by doing our jobs, working our ecological niches, while competing as necessary? Stuart LaForge > > Still, the AI summary is quite helpful, Bilik. (I wasn't sure if you > wanted to start a conversation about AI's grasp of philosophy or about > the philosophy itself.) > > Tara Maya > > > > > >> On Jan 4, 2024, at 8:28 AM, BillK via extropy-chat >> wrote: >> >> Let's see what an AI thinks about Open Individualism. >> It reminds me of bits of Buddhism that I've heard about. >> BillK >> >> Explain Open Individualism - >> >> Open individualism is a philosophical position that challenges the >> traditional notion of personal identity as being tied to a specific >> individual. According to open individualism, there is only one >> conscious subject or entity that experiences all individual lives or >> perspectives. >> >> In other words, open individualism posits that all individuals are >> fundamentally connected at the level of consciousness. From this >> perspective, you and I are not separate individuals with distinct >> identities but rather manifestations of the same underlying >> consciousness or awareness. >> >> Open individualism can be contrasted with other theories of personal >> identity. For example, closed individualism holds that each person is >> a distinct and separate individual with a unique identity that >> persists over time. It suggests that personal identity is tied to >> specific bodies, minds, or streams of consciousness. >> >> Open individualism rejects the idea of personal identity as a separate >> and isolated entity and instead argues for a more inclusive and >> interconnected view of consciousness. Advocates of open individualism >> often argue that the boundaries between individuals are illusory and >> that the underlying reality is a single, unified consciousness >> experiencing itself through different perspectives. >> >> This perspective raises interesting philosophical questions about the >> nature of personal identity, the relationship between individuals, and >> the implications for ethics and moral responsibility. It challenges >> our intuitive notions of selfhood and invites us to reconsider the >> boundaries we typically draw between ourselves and others. >> -------------- >> >> Tell me more -- >> >> Certainly! Here are some additional points to delve deeper into the >> concept of open individualism: >> >> 1. Unity of Consciousness: Open individualism posits that there is a >> fundamental unity of consciousness that underlies all individual >> experiences. It suggests that the sense of self and personal identity >> we associate with our individual lives is an illusion, and that at a >> deeper level, there is a single consciousness that is shared by all >> beings. >> >> 2. Metaphysical Implications: Open individualism raises metaphysical >> questions about the nature of consciousness and its relationship to >> the physical world. It challenges the idea that consciousness arises >> solely from individual brains or minds and suggests that consciousness >> is a fundamental and universal aspect of reality. >> >> 3. Unity in Diversity: Open individualism views the diversity of human >> experiences and perspectives as different expressions of the same >> underlying consciousness. It emphasizes the interconnectedness and >> interdependence of all individuals, suggesting that our apparent >> differences are superficial and that we are ultimately part of a >> larger, unified whole. >> >> 4. Ethical Considerations: The concept of open individualism can have >> implications for ethics and moral responsibility. It challenges the >> idea of personal identity as the basis for moral distinctions and >> calls for a more inclusive and compassionate approach to others. If we >> recognize that we are all manifestations of the same consciousness, it >> can foster a sense of empathy and interconnectedness that transcends >> narrow self-interest. >> >> 5. Mystical and Spiritual Traditions: The idea of open individualism >> shares similarities with certain mystical and spiritual traditions. >> Concepts such as nondualism, oneness, and universal consciousness can >> be found in various philosophical and religious systems. Open >> individualism aligns with the notion that our individual identities >> are temporary and illusory, and that a deeper reality connects all >> beings. >> >> It's important to note that open individualism is a philosophical >> position that is subject to debate and interpretation. While some find >> it intellectually compelling, others may have reservations or >> objections. Exploring this concept further can lead to fascinating >> discussions about the nature of consciousness, personal identity, and >> our place in the world. >> ------------------ >> _______________________________________________ >> extropy-chat mailing list >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat >> > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat From jasonresch at gmail.com Mon Jan 8 00:13:05 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Sun, 7 Jan 2024 19:13:05 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <3c30c6f2-acc5-4415-b67c-d034e7aa5198@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: On Sun, Jan 7, 2024 at 4:56?PM William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > > If a person is someone who can have more than one experience, then what > determines the set of experiences that person will ultimately have? > > I have to say that I do not understand the question. The only real > answer is: who they see, what they read, where they go, what they believe, > and dozens more. bill w > > The topic is rather subtle and easy to miss unless one is faced with the right kinds of problems. I might suggest reviewing the questions and situations presented in a thead with Ben, for examples of what the problems personal identity theories concern themselves with. Here is the thread I am referencing: https://lists.extropy.org/pipermail/extropy-chat/2024-January/118737.html Jason -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Mon Jan 8 00:30:04 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Sun, 7 Jan 2024 19:30:04 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: <772985af-2779-71df-6118-c6bd3aa9d0bf@swisscows.email> References: <772985af-2779-71df-6118-c6bd3aa9d0bf@swisscows.email> Message-ID: On Sun, Jan 7, 2024 at 5:20?PM efc--- via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > > > On Sun, 7 Jan 2024, Jason Resch via extropy-chat wrote: > > > Could you expand here? My interpretation would be that all future > events > > have a probability of occuring and are validated by them actually > > occuring. But this is not what you mean I think. > > > > Let's define the absolutist instrumentalist as someone who only > > accepts and believes in *only* such things that they can observe > > directly, either with their senses or their instruments. > > This is one definition out of many. Also note, that > since instruments are ultimately dependent on senses, I think your > definition could exclude instruments, since instruments give rise to > sense impressions. > The reason I included instruments is to cover cases like X-rays or ultrasound, which the instrumentalist will accept exist even if his own senses can't directly apprehend them. > > Then consider: each of us is only ever aware of some instantaneous > > point in time, a single moment of the present, perhaps containing some > > recollection of past memories. > > Without time and awareness of time, thought is not possible since > thought is a sequence of events, so it seems to me that this collapses > into some solipsism. > Here the instrumentalist would be assuming some theory of consciousness (that time is necessary to create conscious experiences). The absolutist instrumentalist I define would not make such a leap. > > > To thrive in the world, we have to make (and act according to), > > theories about reality that we cannot prove with our senses. In this > > If we require a 100% foundation of everything, we end up as solipsists, > which no one who argues about it seriously beliefs. The fact of arguing > in favour of the position weakens it of itself. > The absolutist instrumentalist need not be a solipsist, as he can see other people who have their own thoughts. Though if you asked him whether he knew they were zombies or not, he (like anyone else) would have to confess he has no direct evidence one way or the other (we can only escape this only by assuming some theory of consciousness). > > The best foundation we have is materialism, what we can see, experience, > and the best way to knowledge that we have is science. > The absolutist instrumentalist assumes neither materialism, nor idealism, nor any kind of monism or dualism. These are all metaphysics outside the domain of what he can measure or discriminate between. Note the positions of Bohr and Heinsenberg who often doubted the existence of material reality outside of their own consciousness. We can no longer talk of the behavior of the particle apart from the process of observation. In consequence, we are finally led to believe that the laws of nature which we formulate mathematically in quantum theory deal no longer with the particles themselves but with our knowledge of the elementary particles. ? Werner Heisenberg in ?The Representation of Nature in Contemporary Physics ? (1958) This is more in line with what an absolute instrumentalist would say about quantum physics, than what a materialist who makes an ontological commitment to a material reality might presume. > > Now here's the thing. Other ways may be possible, other worlds may be > possible, but I'd say that it's fair to shift the burden of proof onto > them. > What evidence do you possess that favors materialism, over idealism, simulation hypothesis, a mathematical reality, neutral monism, existence in the mind of God, or any of a myriad of other subjectively indistinguishable possibilities? > > So nothing can be proven with 100% certainty, as you say, but we have a > pretty close second place in the form of the assumption that we exist > and matter exists and science and so on. > All we know for certain is that our present state of consciousness exists. "Admittedly our sense perceptions constitute our sole knowledge about things. This objective world remains a hypothesis, however natural." ? Erwin Schr?dinger in ?Mind and Matter ? (1958) > > > will experience it. This assumptions is important for our survival, > > but it doesn't mean it is true. Empty individualism is consistent with > > We have no proof to the contrary. At least no proof which has been > accepted by the world at large. > > > The absolutist instrumentalist is forced to assume no more than empty > > individualism. > > But I think we're getting back to old MWI-ground. I'll stop for now, and > let's see if someone else will jump back in and I hope I'll learn > something new. =) > I don't see the connection to MWI. When I argued for MWI I did it from assuming theories we have evidence for are true. Here I am taking the opposite approach, showing what someone who doubts all theories could believe about the world, from the basis and vantage point of his singular "current moment of experience". Admittedly, it is not very much. Jason -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From ben at zaiboc.net Mon Jan 8 15:21:43 2024 From: ben at zaiboc.net (Ben Zaiboc) Date: Mon, 8 Jan 2024 15:21:43 +0000 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On 07/01/2024 00:21, Jason Resch wrote: ??? >>> If you step into a star trek style transporter, but some error causes ??? >>> 5 identical copies of yourself to beam down, which one do you become? ??? >>> ??? >>> A) none of them ??? >>> B) one of them ??? >>> C) all of them ??? >>"Which one do you become?" is not a sensible or meaningful question. ... > Let's say someone comes to your door with the following proposition: > He will pay you $1,000,000 to scan you, destroy you (kill you, painlessly), then create a perfect replica of you to take over your life from that point forward. Do you take him up on his offer? No. > Here, you need a theory of personal identity to decide whether or not you are killed, or whether or not you are paid a million dollars to be a test subject in using the first teletransporter. > Faced with this proposition, you can't avoid the issue by saying it's a meaningless question. That's right. but it's not the same question. In the original question, you get into a transporter, which disassembles your body and recreates it somewhere else (and accidentally creates more than one). In your second question, you are non-destructively duplicated, leaving your original body intact, which is then murdered. I know there are people who regard destructive duplication as the same thing, but I don't. Maybe you can translate that into a 'theory of identity'. I won't try to. I'll just say that the crucial thing is the timing. Destructive scanning instantaneously (subjectively, anyway) translates the subject into the new form/s. Non-destructive scanning leaves the subject intact, with their own ongoing experiences. So non-destructive scanning plus subsequent destruction of the subject equals murder, destructive scanning does not (which raises the interesting question of what about if the subject is rendered unconscious before the procedure?). ... > Do you consider any questions that asks: "What do you expect to experience in the next moment?" to be meaningless? No. I consider questions that refer to a singular 'you' in the context of multiple duplication to be meaningless. A bit like sending an interactive novel to 5 different people, then asking "what happens next?", and expecting just one answer. >>??? The same thing applies to someone who is duplicated multiple times. Each ??? resultant person is the same in the sense that they can correctly claim ??? to have been the original in the past, and they are all different from ??? each other because they are now separate minds that have different ??? experiences since the duplication. They will probably retain the same ??? basic personality traits, and will probably express them in different ??? ways, depending on their individual circumstances. They will each be an ??? independent person, with the same past as all the others, up to the ??? point of divergence. > But does your consciousness survive? That's what people are concerned with. I don't see why that question occurs to you. Of course it survives, in multiple instances. How could it not? If it didn't, there would have been no duplication. If you sent a story to 20 different people, you don't ask yourself "does that story still exist?", even if you had deleted the copy on your own computer, you wouldn't doubt that the story still exists. >>??? If you insist on the wording "which one do you become?", I'd have to ??? answer A and C. Which kind of illustrates that it's a silly question. > I think your answer shows the silliness of the conventional view of personal identity. Your answer indicates a preference for either empty individualism or open individualism, which are both logically more tenable, but empty individualism is non workable as a decision theory since it allows no expectations and makes behaviors like saving for retirement (or any future planning) pointless. I think my answer shows the silliness of the question. Or perhaps, the fact that we're not used to thinking in terms of multiple selves. I normally use the example of an amoeba dividing to illustrate this. When an amoeba divides into two daughter amoebas, by replicating all its organelles and splitting into two, which one is the original amoeba? The question doesn't mean anything, does it? The original becomes two. The question "Which one do you become?" is the same. Conventional experience doesn't apply, because people have never done this before. When (as I hope will happen) it becomes possible, we'll have to change the way we think about personal identity, and it will cause many people considerable problems. Doubtless it will spawn new 'Theories of Identity'! Ask yourself this question: If you are duplicated, creating two new people, and only one of them is 'you', then who the hell is the other one??? ???? >>> The "2024-you" is also different in many ways (different place, ??? different atoms, different experience), from the "2023-you". ???? >>> But we also, as a matter of general practice, believe/assume that ??? despite these difference, they are experienced by the same person. >>??? I'd agree with both these things: Different, and also the same, ??? depending on which factors you're considering. > That's good. I would then add that person identity theories attempt to specify which factors ought to be considered. I assume here you mean 'in each case', as they are different. ???? >>> Personal identity theories attempt to answer the question of what, ??? and how much, can change while retaining the identity of a person. >>??? The answer to that depends on what your definition of 'identity' is, so ??? it's a circular question. You could create a philosophical field called, ??? say, Fish Identity Theory, that attempts to answer whether Sardines are ??? animals or fish. There is no definitive answer to a question like this, ??? without any other context (the most realistic answer, of course, is ??? "both"). Insisting on one or the other is really more of an invitation ??? to have a pointless argument than a genuine question. > What differentiates concerns of personal identity from taxonomy is that there are definite hard answers to the questions or concerns: i.e. will you, or will you not experience this particular conscious experience? > It makes no difference to the fish what we call it, but it surely makes a difference to you, whether the transporter kills you (ends your consciousness permanently), or takes you to Paris. You are assuming that 'you' means the same thing before and after the procedure. My point is that there is more than one 'you' afterward, each fully entitled to be called 'you'. We are not used to thinking in these terms, which is what I think causes these misunderstandings. This is why the question "what happens to you?" doesn't work, because people tend to baulk at the answer "you are duplicated". People then ask "ok, but which one is REALLY you??", which I hope you can see, is a silly question. The key thing to wrap our heads around, I think, is that 'you' doesn't have to be unique. And I do appreciate, this is hard. I struggled with it for quite a while. But the conclusion I came to in the end, is that assuming that there can only be one unique 'you' is a form of dualism. And I reject dualism completely. If the same mental pattern is duplicated, then by necessity, the same person becomes two, or more people, in every way. This is the same as copying a CD or a DVD. A pattern of information is duplicated. There are now 500 spreadsheets, or 30,000 Beethoven's fifth Symphonies. The question "Which one is the real one?" is meaningless. They are all the real one, all identical duplicates of the original single one. ???? >>> Empty individualism says any change at all, no matter how small, ??? constitutes a new person. Closed individualism, says you can only change ??? so much while being the same person. Open? individualism says there's no ??? limit to how much can change and yet still remain the same person -- ??? that all variations of material composition of the body or psychological ??? content of the experience, are mere contingencies. ??? >> Ok, so there you have three different views on the matter. That's all ??? you can say. You certainly can't say if one is 'righter' than the ??? others, without further qualifying context. > Only one of these theories can be correct. I disagree. Each different theory is looking at a different aspect, which is why I used the taxonomy examples. > Your last two answers are consistent, in that they recognize time/space interchangeability. That is, there's no fundamental difference between the same person existing in two times, vs. the same person existing in two places. There is a considerable difference. the first is commonplace, the second has never yet happened. ??? >>And I'm still no closer to understanding what 'Open Individualism' ??? actually means. "One numerically identical subject, who is everyone at ??? all times, in the past, present and future" is a sentence that makes no ??? sense. What does 'One numerically identical...' mean? 'Identical' is a ??? comparison, so you have to have at least two things, for them to be ??? identical to one another in any respect. 'One identical thing' is ??? meaningless. Can we replace that with "one person", for clarity, or ??? doesn't that work?. The rest just reads as gobbledigook. Can it be ??? boiled down to "one person, who is all people"? At least that sentence ??? is coherent. As for what it means... > Boiled down to one sentence, it is the idea that: "There is only one person." Ok, well that is demonstrably not true. There are at least two people, you and me (ok, I know about me, but... (and that's a different discussion!)) ??? >>Your definition above is different, though. You refer to how much ??? someone can change and still be thought of as the same. The Wiki ??? definition talks about everyone already being the same. > When I was talking about change, I was referring to changing the material composition of the body and the content of experience, while remaining the same person. The only thing left then is memory. If that remains the same, then I'd say, yes, same person. If not, then there is no basis for considering them to be the same person. ?> If anything about the body or experience is free to be changed while not destroying the person, then there is only one person. Fine, but what has that got to do with the Wiki definition, which encompasses all people, not just one? Someone in New Zealand, born 200 years ago, has a different body, experiences and memories to me. We are definitely not 'the same person'. As far as I can see, this idea of 'Open Individualism' seems to be claiming that we are. Or have I got that wrong? Ben -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From foozler83 at gmail.com Mon Jan 8 19:35:44 2024 From: foozler83 at gmail.com (William Flynn Wallace) Date: Mon, 8 Jan 2024 13:35:44 -0600 Subject: [ExI] quote of the day Message-ID: "Had science operated by majority consensus we would still be stuck in the MIddle Ages." from 'Skin In The Game" by Nassim TAleb bill w -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pharos at gmail.com Mon Jan 8 21:15:47 2024 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Mon, 8 Jan 2024 21:15:47 +0000 Subject: [ExI] Everything in the Universe - in one graph. Message-ID: Everything in the Universe Fits in This One Graph. Even the Impossible Stuff. October 27, 2023 by Nancy Atkinson Quote: The Universe has physical constants, such as the force of gravity that define everything. If these constants were any different, our Universe would look quite different. When you consider the types of objects that exist in our Universe ? from quarks and bacteria to fleas and superclusters ? different forces dominate their existence. A fascinating new graph plots everything in the known Universe and shows us what?s possible. It also shows what types of objects are prohibited by the laws of physics as we understand them. The graph, produced by astrophysicists Charles Lineweaver and Vihan Patel from the Australian National University?s Planetary Science Institute (PSI) is primarily a thought experiment that ? the authors hope ? will get people to think about all the unanswered questions we have about the Universe. The graph and their paper, titled ?All objects and some questions,? provides an overview of the thermal history of the Universe and the sequence of objects (e.g., protons, planets, and galaxies) that condensed out of the background as the Universe expanded and cooled. ---------------------- BillK From jasonresch at gmail.com Mon Jan 8 23:02:07 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Mon, 8 Jan 2024 18:02:07 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Mon, Jan 8, 2024 at 10:22?AM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > > On 07/01/2024 00:21, Jason Resch wrote: > > >>> If you step into a star trek style transporter, but some error > causes > >>> 5 identical copies of yourself to beam down, which one do you > become? > >>> > >>> A) none of them > >>> B) one of them > >>> C) all of them > > >>"Which one do you become?" is not a sensible or meaningful question. > > ... > > > Let's say someone comes to your door with the following proposition: > > > He will pay you $1,000,000 to scan you, destroy you (kill you, > painlessly), then create a perfect replica of you to take over your life > from that point forward. Do you take him up on his offer? > > No. > This suggests to me that you believe you will not survive the procedure. Is that right? > > > Here, you need a theory of personal identity to decide whether or not > you are killed, or whether or not you are paid a million dollars to be a > test subject in using the first teletransporter. > > > Faced with this proposition, you can't avoid the issue by saying it's a > meaningless question. > > That's right. but it's not the same question. In the original question, > you get into a transporter, which disassembles your body and recreates it > somewhere else (and accidentally creates more than one). In your second > question, you are non-destructively duplicated, leaving your original body > intact, which is then murdered. > In my example you are destroyed first, then re-created. But you raise an interesting question: does the time-sequence of events matter? Consider what happens inside your house a black box. You take the man up on his offer, enter your house and then your copy emerges. But no one knows, was the duplicate created before or after the original was destroyed. Let's call the two possibly resulting versions of you A-copy, and B-copy. A-copy is a version created after you are destroyed, and B-copy was created before you were destroyed. Everything physically about A-copy and B-copy are the same: all the atoms of the are the same, etc., so there is no physical difference between them. The only version is the history of what happened to the original and how the time lines up with the creation of the copy. If you believe you become your duplicate if he is created after the original is destroyed, but not if created before the duplicate is destroyed, what basis is there to say A-copy is you, but B-copy isn't, when they are physically the same? Then consider when we throw relativity of simultaneity from relativity into the mix. Then there could be two external observers, both of which witnesses the order of events, but they disagree on whether the copy was created before or after the destruction of the original. Then it is relative whether a copy is an A-copy or a B-copy! > I know there are people who regard destructive duplication as the same > thing, but I don't. Maybe you can translate that into a 'theory of > identity'. I won't try to. I'll just say that the crucial thing is the > timing. Destructive scanning instantaneously (subjectively, anyway) > translates the subject into the new form/s. Non-destructive scanning leaves > the subject intact, with their own ongoing experiences. So non-destructive > scanning plus subsequent destruction of the subject equals murder, > destructive scanning does not (which raises the interesting question of > what about if the subject is rendered unconscious before the procedure?). > Based on this it seems you place importance on continuity of the body/material organization, which is in line with the usual view of personal identity. But then I ask, when there is no physical difference between the A-copy and the B-copy, what is the difference? Particles don't care about, or act differently based on their (or something else's) past history. So if you think there is a difference between A-copy and B-copy, and it is not physical, it seems to me it must be metaphysical. (some unseen "youness" which can either attach itself, or not, to some group of atoms). > > ... > > > Do you consider any questions that asks: "What do you expect to > experience in the next moment?" to be meaningless? > > No. I consider questions that refer to a singular 'you' in the context of > multiple duplication to be meaningless. A bit like sending an interactive > novel to 5 different people, then asking "what happens next?", and > expecting just one answer. > You cannot answer a question about your own subjectivity from the standpoint of a third-person view-from-nowhere. When I ask what do you expect to experience, I mean from the inside, first-person view, not what an objective observer sitting outside and watching it all unfold would say about the situation. I believe from the internal view, the observers would feel as if they randomly become one of them. If they iterated this experiment many times, they would tend to each write down a random sequence of numbers between 1-5 noting the position they found themselves in each time they step into this transporter. > > > >> The same thing applies to someone who is duplicated multiple times. > Each > resultant person is the same in the sense that they can correctly claim > to have been the original in the past, and they are all different from > each other because they are now separate minds that have different > experiences since the duplication. They will probably retain the same > basic personality traits, and will probably express them in different > ways, depending on their individual circumstances. They will each be an > independent person, with the same past as all the others, up to the > point of divergence. > > > > But does your consciousness survive? That's what people are concerned > with. > > I don't see why that question occurs to you. Of course it survives, in > multiple instances. How could it not? If it didn't, there would have been > no duplication. > If you sent a story to 20 different people, you don't ask yourself "does > that story still exist?", even if you had deleted the copy on your own > computer, you wouldn't doubt that the story still exists. > Is this answer consistent with your rejection of the $1M to be destructively duplicated? Presumably you said "No" to the offer because you believed your consciousness would not survive the process. But here you say it does survive. Could you clarify your position, as I am no longer sure what it is. > > > >> If you insist on the wording "which one do you become?", I'd have to > answer A and C. Which kind of illustrates that it's a silly question. > > > > I think your answer shows the silliness of the conventional view of > personal identity. Your answer indicates a preference for either empty > individualism or open individualism, which are both logically more tenable, > but empty individualism is non workable as a decision theory since it > allows no expectations and makes behaviors like saving for retirement (or > any future planning) pointless. > > I think my answer shows the silliness of the question. Or perhaps, the > fact that we're not used to thinking in terms of multiple selves. I > normally use the example of an amoeba dividing to illustrate this. When an > amoeba divides into two daughter amoebas, by replicating all its organelles > and splitting into two, which one is the original amoeba? The question > doesn't mean anything, does it? The original becomes two. The question > "Which one do you become?" is the same. Conventional experience doesn't > apply, because people have never done this before. > Well if you believe in many-worlds, it happens all the time. What does it feel like to be copied? It feels like something random just occurred. "It gradually hit me that this illusion of randomness business really wasn't specific to quantum mechanics at all. Suppose that some future technology allows you to be cloned while you're sleeping, and that your two copies are placed in rooms numbered 0 and 1. When they wake up, they'll both feel that the room number they read is completely unpredictable and random. [...] In other words, causal physics will produce the illusion of randomness from your subjective viewpoint in any circumstance where you're being cloned. The fundamental reason that quantum mechanics appears random even though the wavefunction evolves deterministically is that the Schr?dinger equation can evolve a wavefunction with a single you into one with clones of you in parallel universes." -- Max Tegmark in "Our Mathematical Universe " (2014) "The many-universes theory gives a new perspective to this fundamental indeterminacy. The information which would have led to complete predictability is, crudely speaking, hidden from us in the other worlds to which we have no access. Thus, superspace as a whole is completely deterministic; the random element comes from our sampling just a minute portion of the whole. Regarding the real universe as the whole of superspace, one sees that God does not, after all, play dice. The game of chance comes not from nature, but our perception of it. Our consciousness weaves a route at random along the ever-branching evolutionary pathways of the cosmos, so it is we, rather than God, who are playing dice." -- Paul Davies in "Other Worlds: Space, Superspace, and the Quantum Universe " (1980) > When (as I hope will happen) it becomes possible, we'll have to change the > way we think about personal identity, and it will cause many people > considerable problems. Doubtless it will spawn new 'Theories of Identity'! > I think we can already use thought experiments to reason about the implications of these future technologies, and work out what the correct theory of personal identity is. > > Ask yourself this question: If you are duplicated, creating two new > people, and only one of them is 'you', then who the hell is the other one??? > I believe I become both. > > > >>> The "2024-you" is also different in many ways (different place, > different atoms, different experience), from the "2023-you". > > >>> But we also, as a matter of general practice, believe/assume that > despite these difference, they are experienced by the same person. > > >> I'd agree with both these things: Different, and also the same, > depending on which factors you're considering. > > > > That's good. I would then add that person identity theories attempt to > specify which factors ought to be considered. > > I assume here you mean 'in each case', as they are different. > There are things about them that are different, but we also acknowledge (absent assuming something like empty individualism) that both experiences are had by the same person. > > > >>> Personal identity theories attempt to answer the question of what, > and how much, can change while retaining the identity of a person. > > >> The answer to that depends on what your definition of 'identity' is, > so > it's a circular question. You could create a philosophical field > called, > say, Fish Identity Theory, that attempts to answer whether Sardines are > animals or fish. There is no definitive answer to a question like this, > without any other context (the most realistic answer, of course, is > "both"). Insisting on one or the other is really more of an invitation > to have a pointless argument than a genuine question. > > > > What differentiates concerns of personal identity from taxonomy is that > there are definite hard answers to the questions or concerns: i.e. will > you, or will you not experience this particular conscious experience? > > > It makes no difference to the fish what we call it, but it surely makes > a difference to you, whether the transporter kills you (ends your > consciousness permanently), or takes you to Paris. > > You are assuming that 'you' means the same thing before and after the > procedure. My point is that there is more than one 'you' afterward, each > fully entitled to be called 'you'. > Yes. They all do. All have an equal claim. > We are not used to thinking in these terms, which is what I think causes > these misunderstandings. This is why the question "what happens to you?" > doesn't work, because people tend to baulk at the answer "you are > duplicated". > The answer (and question) becomes ambiguous from the third-person perspective, but it's still valid to ask about your future expectations as an experiencer, who is about to undergo such an operation. You might not have any definite answer, but you could say something like "I expect my consciousness to continue, and to find myself at one of the locations, but I cannot predict which." It's the same as asking an AI within a computer simulation whose process calls the fork() system call, and sets the color of a ball within the environment, to "red" when the return bit is 1, and to "blue" when the return bit is 0. If you were in the simulation with the AI, and fork was to be called several times in succession, all you could predict is that you would see the ball start to change colors, being blue 50% of the time and red 50% of the time, on average. > People then ask "ok, but which one is REALLY you??", which I hope you can > see, is a silly question. > Assuming there can only be one you is what creates the silliness. It presumes there is something special about one of the copies that isn't in the others (some dualistic, non-physical soul that follows only a single path). > > The key thing to wrap our heads around, I think, is that 'you' doesn't > have to be unique. > Exactly! > And I do appreciate, this is hard. > It is. > I struggled with it for quite a while. But the conclusion I came to in the > end, is that assuming that there can only be one unique 'you' is a form of > dualism. And I reject dualism completely. > Yes. The feeling of being unique, can be entirely explained by the non-integration of experience. There is no need to add a further assumption of "you are unique". Occam would slice that away, since the non-integration is all that is required to explain the feeling of being unique. > If the same mental pattern is duplicated, then by necessity, the same > person becomes two, or more people, in every way. This is the same as > copying a CD or a DVD. A pattern of information is duplicated. There are > now 500 spreadsheets, or 30,000 Beethoven's fifth Symphonies. The question > "Which one is the real one?" is meaningless. They are all the real one, all > identical duplicates of the original single one. > Yes! Now consider, if they all begin as one, what happens in something like many-worlds where that one evolves continuously into many? Or to use your example, if amoeba were conscious, would what began as a single conscious evolve to become them all? (Note, the consciousness remains non-integrated, so they all still feel unique, I am not suggesting anything like a group or collective consciousness, only the absence of a metaphysical/dualistic soul that singles out one line as special or privileged). > > > >>> Empty individualism says any change at all, no matter how small, > constitutes a new person. Closed individualism, says you can only > change > so much while being the same person. Open individualism says there's > no > limit to how much can change and yet still remain the same person -- > that all variations of material composition of the body or > psychological > content of the experience, are mere contingencies. > > >> Ok, so there you have three different views on the matter. That's > all > you can say. You certainly can't say if one is 'righter' than the > others, without further qualifying context. > > > Only one of these theories can be correct. > > I disagree. Each different theory is looking at a different aspect, which > is why I used the taxonomy examples. > Would you agree though, that it is either true or false that your consciousness survives some event? Surely from the outside/third-person/impartial observer, it's just a matter of taxonomy, but this field requires answering questions that deal with the subjective. It is close to the field of consciousness in that respect. > > > > Your last two answers are consistent, in that they recognize time/space > interchangeability. That is, there's no fundamental difference between the > same person existing in two times, vs. the same person existing in two > places. > > There is a considerable difference. the first is commonplace, the second > has never yet happened. > The second may be commonplace, if many-worlds is true, or if space is infinite. > > > >>And I'm still no closer to understanding what 'Open Individualism' > actually means. "One numerically identical subject, who is everyone at > all times, in the past, present and future" is a sentence that makes no > sense. What does 'One numerically identical...' mean? 'Identical' is a > comparison, so you have to have at least two things, for them to be > identical to one another in any respect. 'One identical thing' is > meaningless. Can we replace that with "one person", for clarity, or > doesn't that work?. The rest just reads as gobbledigook. Can it be > boiled down to "one person, who is all people"? At least that sentence > is coherent. As for what it means... > > > > Boiled down to one sentence, it is the idea that: "There is only one > person." > > Ok, well that is demonstrably not true. There are at least two people, you > and me (ok, I know about me, but... (and that's a different discussion!)) > Can you use the fact that you are only presently aware of "now" to refute eternalism? Can you use the fact that you are only presently aware of "this branch" to refute many-worlds? If not, then I would argue that neither can you use the fact that you are only presently aware of "Ben Zaiboc's POV" to refute open individualism. > > >>Your definition above is different, though. You refer to how much > someone can change and still be thought of as the same. The Wiki > definition talks about everyone already being the same. > > > When I was talking about change, I was referring to changing the > material composition of the body and the content of experience, while > remaining the same person. > > The only thing left then is memory. If that remains the same, then I'd > say, yes, same person. If not, then there is no basis for considering them > to be the same person. > But we gain and lose memories all the time. Your consciousness survives the fact it forgot what you ate a few weeks back, does it not? > > > If anything about the body or experience is free to be changed while > not destroying the person, then there is only one person. > > Fine, but what has that got to do with the Wiki definition, which > encompasses all people, not just one? > The Wiki definition is admittedly quite terrible. But what my point has to do with it is that it makes the particular body, and particular content of experience, into mere contingencies, like what color shirt you happen to be wearing. You would still be you even if your shirt were another color. Open individualism just extends this to the other contingencies of your place, material composition, content of experience, etc. Thus all beings, even those you look very different from, are you too. > > Someone in New Zealand, born 200 years ago, has a different body, > experiences and memories to me. We are definitely not 'the same person'. As > far as I can see, this idea of 'Open Individualism' seems to be claiming > that we are. Or have I got that wrong? > You can experience great pain and you can experience great joy. Those two experiences couldn't be more different from one another, but they are both experiences you are capable of having. I would argue then that your experience of eating an apple is not so different from the experience of that New Zealander eating an apple 200 years ago, at least the two experiences are more similar than the two extremes of consciousness experience you are capable of having. All conscious experiences have in common, the feeling of immediacy, and that is all that is required for it to feel like it is your experience. Jason -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pharos at gmail.com Tue Jan 9 20:53:10 2024 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Tue, 9 Jan 2024 20:53:10 +0000 Subject: [ExI] Do you fancy a date with a bot? Really??? Message-ID: Men are hitting on my scheduling bot because it has a woman?s name. By Alison Green on January 8, 2024 Quote: A reader writes: I have sort of a strange situation. I provide consulting services for (mostly) small business owners. This generally involves scheduling some meetings, and I have an email ?Personal Assistant? bot that does this for me. It has a female name (which was the default), and does not announce that it is a bot (though I don?t think it?s hard to tell). It gives a standard salutation and signs off with ?Thank you, .? All it does is schedule meetings, and it?s not nearly to the level of an AI chatbot or anything. Any parts of an email that it receives that don?t seem related to scheduling just get ignored by the program. The emails show up in my inbox and I review them to make sure everything got added to my calendar correctly. However, this complete lack of personal-type interaction has not stopped several of the men (not usually the actual owners of the client businesses) it is scheduling appointments with from asking it out on dates. --------------------- Fun read! It's just an upscale answering machine, not even an AI chatbot! BillK From foozler83 at gmail.com Tue Jan 9 22:05:18 2024 From: foozler83 at gmail.com (William Flynn Wallace) Date: Tue, 9 Jan 2024 16:05:18 -0600 Subject: [ExI] Do you fancy a date with a bot? Really??? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Tue, Jan 9, 2024 at 2:55?PM BillK via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > Men are hitting on my scheduling bot because it has a woman?s name. > Talk about desperate! bill w > By Alison Green on January 8, 2024 > > < > https://www.askamanager.org/2024/01/men-are-hitting-on-my-scheduling-bot-because-it-has-a-womans-name.html > > > > Quote: > A reader writes: > I have sort of a strange situation. I provide consulting services for > (mostly) small business owners. This generally involves scheduling > some meetings, and I have an email ?Personal Assistant? bot that does > this for me. It has a female name (which was the default), and does > not announce that it is a bot (though I don?t think it?s hard to > tell). It gives a standard salutation and signs off with ?Thank you, > .? All it does is schedule meetings, and it?s not nearly to > the level of an AI chatbot or anything. Any parts of an email that it > receives that don?t seem related to scheduling just get ignored by the > program. The emails show up in my inbox and I review them to make sure > everything got added to my calendar correctly. > > However, this complete lack of personal-type interaction has not > stopped several of the men (not usually the actual owners of the > client businesses) it is scheduling appointments with from asking it > out on dates. > --------------------- > > Fun read! It's just an upscale answering machine, not even an AI chatbot! > > BillK > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From foozler83 at gmail.com Tue Jan 9 23:01:18 2024 From: foozler83 at gmail.com (William Flynn Wallace) Date: Tue, 9 Jan 2024 17:01:18 -0600 Subject: [ExI] Nassim Taleb Message-ID: 'Skin in the Game' - very intelligent person - I learned a lot outside of finance and economics,though it would have been more if I had more knowledge in those areas. bill w -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From giulio at gmail.com Fri Jan 12 09:33:38 2024 From: giulio at gmail.com (Giulio Prisco) Date: Fri, 12 Jan 2024 10:33:38 +0100 Subject: [ExI] Future superintelligent AIs could look & feel like the ocean of Solaris Message-ID: Strange consciousness: Stanis?aw Lem. Future superintelligent AIs could look & feel like the ocean of Solaris. https://www.turingchurch.com/p/strange-consciousness-stanisaw-lem From pharos at gmail.com Sat Jan 13 14:09:40 2024 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Sat, 13 Jan 2024 14:09:40 +0000 Subject: [ExI] =?utf-8?q?AI_girlfriend_bots_are_already_flooding_OpenAI?= =?utf-8?q?=E2=80=99s_GPT_store?= Message-ID: We got a bot problem OpenAI?s store rules are already being broken, illustrating that regulating GPTs could be hard to control By Michelle Cheng 11 Jan 2024 Quotes: It?s day two of the opening of OpenAI?s buzzy GPT store, which offers customized versions of ChatGPT, and users are already breaking the rules. The Generative Pre-Trained Transformers (GPTs) are meant to be created for specific purposes?and not created at all in some cases. AI chatbots are breaking OpenAI?s usage policy rules The AI girlfriend bots go against OpenAI?s usage policy, which was updated when the GPT store launched yesterday (Jan. 10). The proliferation of these apps comes as the US faces an epidemic of loneliness and isolation. Alarming studies show that one-in-two American adults have reported experiencing loneliness, with the US Surgeon General calling for the need to strengthen social connections. AI chatbots could be part of the solution if people are isolated from other human beings?or they could just be a way to cash in on human suffering. ------------------ Hmmm. So it seems that the very popular social media platforms don't stop people feeling lonely. Maybe social media even alienates people as they generate conflicts to get more clicks and ad income. I do see a place for chatbots helping the aged and those with various degrees of Alzheimer's. There are already various small bots being trialled in care homes. BillK From msd001 at gmail.com Sat Jan 13 15:35:13 2024 From: msd001 at gmail.com (Mike Dougherty) Date: Sat, 13 Jan 2024 10:35:13 -0500 Subject: [ExI] =?utf-8?q?AI_girlfriend_bots_are_already_flooding_OpenAI?= =?utf-8?q?=E2=80=99s_GPT_store?= In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Sat, Jan 13, 2024, 9:12 AM BillK via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > > loneliness and isolation. Alarming studies show that one-in-two > American adults have reported experiencing loneliness, with the US > Surgeon General calling for the need to strengthen social connections. > AI chatbots could be part of the solution if people are isolated from > other human beings?or they could just be a way to cash in on human > suffering. > Why is that alarming? Loneliness is part of the human experience. It motivates us to find connection. This is the emotional analog to physical hunger. Would it be alarming that one in two adults has experienced hunger in the past week? Tbh, I'm more concerned about those who aren't reporting their experience of loneliness because it suggests to me either denial at one extreme or moderate sociopathy at another. But in this case the lame statistic is trying to support the point about how bots are... good? bad? just another consumable used to satisfy a need or exploit a desire? I take a step back and read that author as having a predilection to write - something - but really has no idea how they feels about the subject. Maybe THAT is the point? Writing anything with a strong stance could be dangerous for a professional writer; ending up on the wrong side of public opinion could limit future work. So it seems we have a lot of words to say "nobody knows" > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From tara at taramayastales.com Sat Jan 13 15:50:00 2024 From: tara at taramayastales.com (Tara Maya) Date: Sat, 13 Jan 2024 07:50:00 -0800 Subject: [ExI] =?utf-8?q?AI_girlfriend_bots_are_already_flooding_OpenAI?= =?utf-8?q?=E2=80=99s_GPT_store?= In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pharos at gmail.com Sat Jan 13 16:44:49 2024 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Sat, 13 Jan 2024 16:44:49 +0000 Subject: [ExI] =?utf-8?q?AI_girlfriend_bots_are_already_flooding_OpenAI?= =?utf-8?q?=E2=80=99s_GPT_store?= In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Sat, 13 Jan 2024 at 15:52, Tara Maya via extropy-chat wrote: > > Why are girlfriend bots even against the rules anyway? > Why are AI art programs not ?supposed? to render naked women? > I really don?t understand the logic of such stupid rules, which prevent harmless, self-chosen behavior and will obviously be broken. > > Tara Maya > _______________________________________________ The GPT store rules say that the GPTs offered must be suitable for all users. That includes minors. And they must obey regulations (laws) and not engage in any illegal activity. The list of forbidden activities is pretty long and detailed. But OpenAI have removed their blanket ban on ?military and warfare?. This has been toned down, so that the military can use their GPTs but not for weapons or directly killing people. Probably sensible, as enemies might have no AI restrictions on their weapons. BillK From atymes at gmail.com Sat Jan 13 17:45:18 2024 From: atymes at gmail.com (Adrian Tymes) Date: Sat, 13 Jan 2024 09:45:18 -0800 Subject: [ExI] =?utf-8?q?AI_girlfriend_bots_are_already_flooding_OpenAI?= =?utf-8?q?=E2=80=99s_GPT_store?= In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Sat, Jan 13, 2024 at 8:47?AM BillK via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > On Sat, 13 Jan 2024 at 15:52, Tara Maya via extropy-chat > wrote: > > Why are girlfriend bots even against the rules anyway? > > Why are AI art programs not ?supposed? to render naked women? > > I really don?t understand the logic of such stupid rules, which prevent > harmless, self-chosen behavior and will obviously be broken. > There are concerns - I'm not sure if they're well-founded or have much basis in reality, but the concerns definitely exist - that quite a few of the self-chosen behaviors would not be harmless. > The GPT store rules say that the GPTs offered must be suitable for all > users. That includes minors. > I wonder how long it will be before someone makes a claim that amounts to them being unsuited for users who can not stand hearing that people of other (skin color/gender/religion/et cetera) are also full human beings and have rights? > But OpenAI have removed their blanket ban on ?military and warfare?. > This has been toned down, so that the military can use their GPTs but > not for weapons or directly killing people. > Probably sensible, as enemies might have no AI restrictions on their > weapons. > "I acknowledge that your training data only goes up to 2021, so here is some more recent data. (...) Given this data, where will these people be in - oh, let's say, the time an artillery shell would take to reach them, call it 5 minutes?" -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From tara at taramayastales.com Sat Jan 13 17:52:41 2024 From: tara at taramayastales.com (Tara Maya) Date: Sat, 13 Jan 2024 09:52:41 -0800 Subject: [ExI] =?utf-8?q?AI_girlfriend_bots_are_already_flooding_OpenAI?= =?utf-8?q?=E2=80=99s_GPT_store?= In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <1197D9FA-27B8-44EA-85CD-E0AC08F82236@taramayastales.com> Ha, yeah. There's no way that the militaries of the world are going to give two bits about AI rules if it gives them an advantage in warfare. The biological drive to sex and war is going to win out every time over the Owner's Manuals issued by office workers and bureaucrats. But, hey, they have to at least pretend they can keep the genie in the box, I guess. > > >> But OpenAI have removed their blanket ban on ?military and warfare?. >> This has been toned down, so that the military can use their GPTs but >> not for weapons or directly killing people. >> Probably sensible, as enemies might have no AI restrictions on their weapons. > > "I acknowledge that your training data only goes up to 2021, so here is some more recent data. (...) Given this data, where will these people be in - oh, let's say, the time an artillery shell would take to reach them, call it 5 minutes?" > __ -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From giulio at gmail.com Sat Jan 13 18:12:05 2024 From: giulio at gmail.com (Giulio Prisco) Date: Sat, 13 Jan 2024 19:12:05 +0100 Subject: [ExI] =?utf-8?q?AI_girlfriend_bots_are_already_flooding_OpenAI?= =?utf-8?q?=E2=80=99s_GPT_store?= In-Reply-To: <1197D9FA-27B8-44EA-85CD-E0AC08F82236@taramayastales.com> References: <1197D9FA-27B8-44EA-85CD-E0AC08F82236@taramayastales.com> Message-ID: On 2024. Jan 13., Sat at 18:54, Tara Maya via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > Ha, yeah. There's no way that the militaries of the world are going to > give two bits about AI rules if it gives them an advantage in warfare. > > The biological drive to sex and war is going to win out every time over > the Owner's Manuals issued by office workers and bureaucrats. But, hey, > they have to at least pretend they can keep the genie in the box, I guess. > Very true > > > >> But OpenAI have removed their blanket ban on ?military and warfare?. >> This has been toned down, so that the military can use their GPTs but >> not for weapons or directly killing people. >> Probably sensible, as enemies might have no AI restrictions on their >> weapons. >> > > "I acknowledge that your training data only goes up to 2021, so here is > some more recent data. (...) Given this data, where will these people be > in - oh, let's say, the time an artillery shell would take to reach them, > call it 5 minutes?" > __ > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From ben at zaiboc.net Sat Jan 13 21:09:08 2024 From: ben at zaiboc.net (Ben Zaiboc) Date: Sat, 13 Jan 2024 21:09:08 +0000 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <6cd84c78-13b3-41c5-bd45-97f486be7771@zaiboc.net> Jason Resch wrote: Various things about uploading and duplication... It seems we agree on the various duplication scenarios, we just prefer to use different terminology, but this started as a discussion about 'Open Individualism', which I'm still no closer to understanding. >>> Boiled down to one sentence, it is the idea that: "There is only one person." >> Ok, well that is demonstrably not true. There are at least two people, you and me > Can you use the fact that you are only presently aware of "now" to refute eternalism? From what I can understand, eternalism is the view that the future, as well as the past, is fixed. I don't think that's likely to be true, but wouldn't know how to refute it through what I'm presently aware of. > Can you use the fact that you are only presently aware of "this branch" to refute many-worlds? I don't have any interest in many-worlds, it may or may not be true, but don't really see the point in agonising about it. It has the same status, in my mind, as the simulation argument. Can't be proven or disproven, so maybe it's true, maybe not, and either way, what can we do about it? Nothing. > If not, then I would argue that neither can you use the fact that you are only presently aware of "Ben Zaiboc's POV" to refute open individualism. I don't see how that follows, but anyway, I'm not trying to refute it, I'm trying to understand what it means. "There is only one person" can't mean what it seems to mean, as it's clearly not true. There are lots of people. So what does it mean? "There is only one person in this room at this moment" is true. "There is only one person in this town" is not. Clearly 'one person' in Open Individualism has some special meaning that people don't ordinarily use, or are even aware of. Can you explain what this special meaning is? > You can experience great pain and you can experience great joy. Those two experiences couldn't be more different from one another, but they are both experiences you are capable of having. I would argue then that your experience of eating an apple is not so different from the experience of that New Zealander eating an apple 200 years ago, at least the two experiences are more similar than the two extremes of consciousness experience you are capable of having. All conscious experiences have in common, the feeling of immediacy, and that is all that is required for it to feel like it is your experience. I've no argument with the idea that two humans, no matter how different, have lots in common. Just because two things have lots in common, doesn't mean they are the same thing, though. Two grains of sand have much more in common with each other than I do with some New Zealander 200 years ago, but they still aren't the same grain of sand. Nobody claims "there is only one grain of sand". I can't make any sense of this 'one person' thing at all. Ben -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pharos at gmail.com Sat Jan 13 21:24:48 2024 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Sat, 13 Jan 2024 21:24:48 +0000 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: <6cd84c78-13b3-41c5-bd45-97f486be7771@zaiboc.net> References: <6cd84c78-13b3-41c5-bd45-97f486be7771@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: On Sat, 13 Jan 2024 at 21:11, Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat wrote: > > I've no argument with the idea that two humans, no matter how different, have lots in common. Just because two things have lots in common, doesn't mean they are the same thing, though. Two grains of sand have much more in common with each other than I do with some New Zealander 200 years ago, but they still aren't the same grain of sand. Nobody claims "there is only one grain of sand". > > I can't make any sense of this 'one person' thing at all. > > Ben > _______________________________________________ Ask an AI - In Open Individualism, what does it mean to say "There is only one person"? Answer- In Open Individualism, the statement "There is only one person" is a philosophical proposition that challenges the conventional notion of personal identity and individuality. Open Individualism is a metaphysical view that suggests that all conscious beings, throughout all of time and space, are fundamentally the same single universal consciousness or person. According to Open Individualism, individual identities are illusory and arise from the limitations of our subjective experience, rather than being inherent to the nature of consciousness itself. It posits that the boundaries we perceive between separate individuals are ultimately illusory, and that there is a deep underlying unity to all conscious experience. In this view, each person's subjective experience is a unique perspective or "slice" of the same underlying consciousness. From this perspective, the statement "There is only one person" is a way of expressing the idea that all individual consciousnesses are ultimately interconnected and part of a single universal consciousness. Open Individualism has roots in various philosophical and mystical traditions, including Hinduism, Buddhism, and certain strands of Western philosophy. It is a provocative idea that challenges our ordinary intuitions about personal identity and has implications for topics such as ethics, the nature of consciousness, and the relationship between individuals and the universe as a whole. --------------- BillK From jasonresch at gmail.com Sat Jan 13 22:56:55 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Sat, 13 Jan 2024 17:56:55 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: <6cd84c78-13b3-41c5-bd45-97f486be7771@zaiboc.net> References: <6cd84c78-13b3-41c5-bd45-97f486be7771@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: On Sat, Jan 13, 2024, 4:10 PM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > Jason Resch wrote: > > Various things about uploading and duplication... > > It seems we agree on the various duplication scenarios, we just prefer to > use different terminology, but this started as a discussion about 'Open > Individualism', which I'm still no closer to understanding. > If you agree that you become all your duplicates then you are just one step from accepting the premise of open individualism, which follows if you make the further assumption concerning your duplicates: That they need not be exact copies for you to become them. > >>> Boiled down to one sentence, it is the idea that: "There is only one > person." > > >> Ok, well that is demonstrably not true. There are at least two people, > you and me > There are two organisms, but how many unique "experiencers" are there? Is there a large number because over time each organism produces many unique experiences each of which is had by its own unique experiencer? (This is empty individualism), are there just two experiencers, because each experiencer is a continuation of the same material organization/body? (This is closed individualism), or is there only one experiencer, as the experiences are mere contingencies, like they are for the same organism in two different times. (This is open individualism). The reason transporters, duplicates, amnesia, split brains, etc. are useful is because they highlight the flaws and assumptions in our (usually unquestioned) conventional view of personal identity where we equate each person with each particular organism. But consider how badly the conventional view (i.e. "one person to one organism") fails to address the situation where we anesthetize the corpus callosum and cause a temporary split brain which results in two independent consciousnesses in the same skull (this is a recognized real-world phenomenon that occurs after split brain surgeries, or in the related diagnostic Wada test). When there are two independent consciousnesses do we say they are two different people? What happens to those persons when the anesthetic wears off and the consciousness fuses into one? What causes the two minds to split and fuse in the first place? Which hemisphere (one, both, neither) do you become when your consciousness splits during such a procedure? We can non longer use the notion of a "biological organism" to handle the individuals that appear in this situation. Instead we see the division and fusion of consciousness is a matter of integration: when information is shared between them, they recognize they belong to one and the same mind, when this integration is lost they each feel as if they are their own separate individuals, unaware of what the other hemisphere knows or is thinking. Open individualism suggests that you and I (and all others) as separate organisms, may be much like the split hemispheres of a split brain patient, each believing they are separate, but really only under a spell of non-integration. > > > Can you use the fact that you are only presently aware of "now" to > refute eternalism? > > From what I can understand, eternalism is the view that the future, as > well as the past, is fixed. I don't think that's likely to be true, but > wouldn't know how to refute it through what I'm presently aware of. > That's what I believe to be the correct answer. Some people believe that if those other times were real and existed, that they could feel it (even from the perspective of this time), and therefore declare it false because they only feel that they are in one moment of time. > > Can you use the fact that you are only presently aware of "this branch" > to refute many-worlds? > > I don't have any interest in many-worlds, it may or may not be true, but > don't really see the point in agonising about it. It has the same status, > in my mind, as the simulation argument. Can't be proven or disproven, so > maybe it's true, maybe not, and either way, what can we do about it? > Nothing. > My point here was the same as above, related to eternalism. Some people think that if they were in other branches they would perceive that fact directly. > > If not, then I would argue that neither can you use the fact that you > are only presently aware of "Ben Zaiboc's POV" to refute open individualism. > > I don't see how that follows, > All the many conscious perspectives that exist are already non-integrated. Therefore we should not expect any of them to be able to feel the other perspectives from the POV of one of them. So this lack of direct apprehension of the other views cannot serve as evidence against the hypothesis that a single experiencer possesses all these perspectives. but anyway, I'm not trying to refute it, I'm trying to understand what it > means. "There is only one person" can't mean what it seems to mean, as it's > clearly not true. There are lots of people. So what does it mean? > Before I can answer that, we have to be very clear how we are defining person. If you define person by "biological organism," then I agree, there is clearly not one person. But if you define a person as "a particular consciousness", or as "one who experiences", then the answer to how many people there are is not so obvious. As the split brain scenario shows, there are flaws with defining persons as particular "biological organisms". It gets no easier when we consider transporters, cloning machines, mind uploading, etc. > "There is only one person in this room at this moment" is true. "There is > only one person in this town" is not. Clearly 'one person' in Open > Individualism has some special meaning that people don't ordinarily use, or > are even aware of. Can you explain what this special meaning is? > A more nuanced definition of person, one usually centered on consciousness. When I ask, for example, whether one survives a star trek style transporter, clearly they do not if we define the person by a particular body or collection of atoms, but clearly they do if we define the person by their mind/consciousness. So what is the better, more accurate way of defining a person, and to decide what ordeals a person can survive? > > You can experience great pain and you can experience great joy. Those > two experiences couldn't be more different from one another, but they are > both experiences you are capable of having. I would argue then that your > experience of eating an apple is not so different from the experience of > that New Zealander eating an apple 200 years ago, at least the two > experiences are more similar than the two extremes of consciousness > experience you are capable of having. All conscious experiences have in > common, the feeling of immediacy, and that is all that is required for it > to feel like it is your experience. > > I've no argument with the idea that two humans, no matter how different, > have lots in common. Just because two things have lots in common, doesn't > mean they are the same thing, though. Two grains of sand have much more in > common with each other than I do with some New Zealander 200 years ago, but > they still aren't the same grain of sand. Nobody claims "there is only one > grain of sand". > > I can't make any sense of this 'one person' thing at all. > Perhaps this analogy can help: one ocean contains many drops of water. Each drop of water, while unique, is nevertheless a part of a greater singular whole. Each conscious experience is like a drop of water. They are unique and different. The question of personal identity, is how do we group these drops into particular collections of drops which we call "persons". Empty individualism says each drop is its own person. Closed individualism says some of these drops can be placed into certain buckets, and these buckets represent all the experiences a particular person has. Open individualism says all the drops belong to one big bucket, the whole ocean. I'm not sure if this analogy helps or not, let me know and keep asking good questions. :-) Jason -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Sat Jan 13 23:11:59 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Sat, 13 Jan 2024 18:11:59 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <6cd84c78-13b3-41c5-bd45-97f486be7771@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: Thanks Bill. The AI's responses are mostly good, but I think it makes some statements that as re apt for misinterpretation. Some comments below: On Sat, Jan 13, 2024, 4:26 PM BillK via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > On Sat, 13 Jan 2024 at 21:11, Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat > wrote: > > > > > I've no argument with the idea that two humans, no matter how different, > have lots in common. Just because two things have lots in common, doesn't > mean they are the same thing, though. Two grains of sand have much more in > common with each other than I do with some New Zealander 200 years ago, but > they still aren't the same grain of sand. Nobody claims "there is only one > grain of sand". > > > > I can't make any sense of this 'one person' thing at all. > > > > Ben > > _______________________________________________ > > > Ask an AI - > In Open Individualism, what does it mean to say "There is only one person"? > > Answer- > In Open Individualism, the statement "There is only one person" is a > philosophical proposition that challenges the conventional notion of > personal identity and individuality. I would say it only challenges the conventional notion of personal identity, but that it has no bearing on individuality. Open Individualism is a > metaphysical view I don't think it's metaphysical. It is in theory verifiable with the right experiments (transporters, mind uploading, mind linking technology, etc.) and personally verifying (for yourself) that your consciousness survives and continues in new substrates or forms, even if the original body does not, and even if some memories are lost. that suggests that all conscious beings, throughout > all of time and space, are fundamentally the same single universal > consciousness or person. > This is good. > According to Open Individualism, individual identities are illusory > and arise from the limitations of our subjective experience, rather > than being inherent to the nature of consciousness itself. Yes. It posits > that the boundaries we perceive between separate individuals are > ultimately illusory, and that there is a deep underlying unity to all > conscious experience. > The unity mentioned here is conceptual, not something any perspective can perceive. > In this view, each person's subjective experience is a unique > perspective or "slice" of the same underlying consciousness. It might be clearer to say some experience of the same underlying experiencer. >From this > perspective, the statement "There is only one person" is a way of > expressing the idea that all individual consciousnesses are ultimately > interconnected and part of a single universal consciousness. > I think the world interconnected isn't correct to use here. It makes has too many connotations of a hive mind, which isn't what open individualism proposes. > Open Individualism has roots in various philosophical and mystical > traditions, including Hinduism, Buddhism, and certain strands of > Western philosophy. I wouldn't call those roots, since opens individualism does not arise from them. It would be more correct to say there are parallels between open individualism and some aspects or ideas expressed in these religions. It is a provocative idea that challenges our > ordinary intuitions about personal identity and has implications for > topics such as ethics, It can. the nature of consciousness, I would say, on the nature of observers. Open individualism is more or less independent from any particular philosophy of mind. and the > relationship between individuals and the universe as a whole. > In a very loose sense. Not so much the universe, but rather the collection of all conscious beings. Jason -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pharos at gmail.com Sat Jan 13 23:24:31 2024 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Sat, 13 Jan 2024 23:24:31 +0000 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <6cd84c78-13b3-41c5-bd45-97f486be7771@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: On Sat, 13 Jan 2024 at 23:12, Jason Resch wrote: > > On Sat, Jan 13, 2024, 4:26 PM BillK via extropy-chat wrote: >> >> Ask an AI - >> In Open Individualism, what does it mean to say "There is only one person"? >> >> Answer- >> In Open Individualism, the statement "There is only one person" is a >> philosophical proposition that challenges the conventional notion of >> personal identity and individuality. > > > I would say it only challenges the conventional notion of personal identity, but that it has no bearing on individuality. >Jason >------------------------------ Question - What do you mean by "challenges the conventional notion of personal identity and individuality". Answer - When I mention that Open Individualism challenges the conventional notion of personal identity and individuality, I mean that it presents a perspective that goes against the traditional understanding of what it means to be an individual person. In conventional thinking, personal identity is often associated with the idea that each person is a distinct and separate entity with their own unique consciousness and experiences. This understanding suggests that personal identity is defined by characteristics such as memories, physicality, and psychological attributes that differentiate one person from another. However, Open Individualism questions this conventional understanding by proposing that personal identity is ultimately an illusion. It suggests that the boundaries we perceive between individuals are not fundamental or real, but rather a result of our limited perspective or subjective experience. Open Individualism argues that, at a fundamental level, all conscious beings share a common underlying consciousness or personhood. It suggests that personal identity is not something inherent to individual consciousnesses but rather a product of our limited perception and the way we identify with specific bodies, minds, and memories. By challenging the conventional notion of personal identity and individuality, Open Individualism invites us to reconsider our understanding of what it means to be a person and the nature of consciousness itself. It raises profound philosophical questions about the relationship between individuals, the self, and the broader universe. ------------------- BillK From foozler83 at gmail.com Sun Jan 14 14:51:37 2024 From: foozler83 at gmail.com (William Flynn Wallace) Date: Sun, 14 Jan 2024 08:51:37 -0600 Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Delivery Status Notification (Failure) In-Reply-To: <65a3ef54.050a0220.ec07e.8b53.GMR@mx.google.com> References: <6cd84c78-13b3-41c5-bd45-97f486be7771@zaiboc.net> CAO+xQEYA+tKY+dC4_wbYL=b36FeHN0azn8iwdGpGVHEMjgcUdg@mail.gmail.com <65a3ef54.050a0220.ec07e.8b53.GMR@mx.google.com> Message-ID: OK - what now? Totally innocuous post. bill w ---------- Forwarded message --------- From: Mail Delivery Subsystem Date: Sun, Jan 14, 2024 at 8:27?AM Subject: Delivery Status Notification (Failure) To: [image: Error Icon] Message blocked Your message to *extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org* has been blocked. See technical details below for more information. The response from the remote server was: 541 5.7.1 Intrusion attempt denied from 209.85.128.180 ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: William Flynn Wallace To: ExI chat list Cc: Bcc: Date: Sun, 14 Jan 2024 08:26:51 -0600 Subject: Re: [ExI] Open Individualism ----- Message truncated ----- -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: icon.png Type: image/png Size: 4663 bytes Desc: not available URL: From spike at rainier66.com Sun Jan 14 15:21:22 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (spike at rainier66.com) Date: Sun, 14 Jan 2024 07:21:22 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: <865D31C3-1A6E-4F90-A49E-148642C076E3@taramayastales.com> References: <865D31C3-1A6E-4F90-A49E-148642C076E3@taramayastales.com> Message-ID: <2a9401da46fd$556e8eb0$004bac10$@rainier66.com> -----Original Message----- From: extropy-chat On Behalf Of Tara Maya via extropy-chat ... Subject: Re: [ExI] Open Individualism >...So it's like a "people's republic" where the combination of words actually reverses the meaning of both... Tara Maya Tara note that the title "People's Republic of China" doesn't specify which people of China. It only specifies which Republic. They can pretend otherwise, but they are still commie to the flaming core. spike From mbb386 at main.nc.us Sun Jan 14 15:39:15 2024 From: mbb386 at main.nc.us (MB) Date: Sun, 14 Jan 2024 10:39:15 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Delivery Status Notification (Failure) In-Reply-To: References: <6cd84c78-13b3-41c5-bd45-97f486be7771@zaiboc.net> CAO+xQEYA+tKY+dC4_wbYL=b36FeHN0azn8iwdGpGVHEMjgcUdg@mail.gmail.com <65a3ef54.050a0220.ec07e.8b53.GMR@mx.google.com> Message-ID: <4bd868a92ebc3732e14073d3212a0cde.squirrel@www.main.nc.us> Try again in a little while. There's a misconfiguration somewhere and it is not your computer. MB On Sun, January 14, 2024 09:51, William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat wrote: > OK - what now? Totally innocuous post. bill w > > ---------- Forwarded message --------- > From: Mail Delivery Subsystem > Date: Sun, Jan 14, 2024 at 8:27?AM > Subject: Delivery Status Notification (Failure) > To: > > > [image: Error Icon] > Message blocked > Your message to *extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org* has been blocked. See > technical details below for more information. > The response from the remote server was: > > 541 5.7.1 Intrusion attempt denied from 209.85.128.180 > > > > ---------- Forwarded message ---------- > From: William Flynn Wallace > To: ExI chat list > Cc: > Bcc: > Date: Sun, 14 Jan 2024 08:26:51 -0600 > Subject: Re: [ExI] Open Individualism > ----- Message truncated ----- > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > From foozler83 at gmail.com Sun Jan 14 16:02:03 2024 From: foozler83 at gmail.com (William Flynn Wallace) Date: Sun, 14 Jan 2024 10:02:03 -0600 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: <2a9401da46fd$556e8eb0$004bac10$@rainier66.com> References: <865D31C3-1A6E-4F90-A49E-148642C076E3@taramayastales.com> <2a9401da46fd$556e8eb0$004bac10$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: Spike, if China can incorporate capitalism to some degree and still call themselves communists, why doesn't Russia do it? Or Cuba, North Korea, etc. Purists? bill w On Sun, Jan 14, 2024 at 9:23?AM spike jones via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > > > -----Original Message----- > From: extropy-chat On Behalf Of > Tara Maya via extropy-chat > ... > Subject: Re: [ExI] Open Individualism > > >...So it's like a "people's republic" where the combination of words > actually reverses the meaning of both... > Tara Maya > > > > > Tara note that the title "People's Republic of China" doesn't specify which > people of China. It only specifies which Republic. > > They can pretend otherwise, but they are still commie to the flaming core. > > spike > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike at rainier66.com Sun Jan 14 16:48:07 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (spike at rainier66.com) Date: Sun, 14 Jan 2024 08:48:07 -0800 Subject: [ExI] A Paranormal Prediction In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <2ab501da4709$73f08030$5bd18090$@rainier66.com> -----Original Message----- From: Keith Henson Subject: Re: [ExI] A Paranormal Prediction >>..."Political discussion is ok if you must." >...What is of much more interest to me is the meta-level. Something I noticed decades back was the connection between economics and politics. There was an upswing (particularly in the Rust Belt) in neo nazi activity with every downturn in the economy. Eventually, I figured out that this is a human reaction to the perception of a bleak future. In the Stone Age, we were selected to circulate xenophobic memes as the first step in dehumanizing neighbors in preparation for killing them for their resources in a resource crisis. Support for crazy leaders is part of the package Unfortunately, this is too complicated an idea to spread well even here. Plus people seem to be deeply resistant to understanding that they have deep psychological traits. Keith Keith I left your entire comment in there because it is so well-written. In the USA, we have elections for the head of the executive branch, an office in which we invest far more interest and imagine its importance to be far beyond what it really is. Every four years we have in imaginary or symbolic war, where we choose our champions to participate in a play fight where we imagine the outcome of the debate is somehow relevant. Every four years, we have an incumbent party struggling to convince the voters how good they have it, while the challenger party struggles to convince the voters how bleak is their future if the current course is held. The bleak future scenario triggers the fight-meme identified by evolutionary psychology. In the USA and to some extent the world, we are immersed in a culture war, which is really distracting us from the real struggle: figuring out how we are going to deal with the rise of AI. We still don't know. We are distracted by the play-war being waged between big personalities and imagining that it matters which one wins. Meanwhile, AI continues to develop, and we humans still don't know how to deal with it. spike From spike at rainier66.com Sun Jan 14 17:54:34 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (spike at rainier66.com) Date: Sun, 14 Jan 2024 09:54:34 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Do you fancy a date with a bot? Really??? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <38a301da4712$bc5bb0c0$35131240$@rainier66.com> ?> On Behalf Of William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat On Tue, Jan 9, 2024 at 2:55?PM BillK via extropy-chat > wrote: >>?Men are hitting on my scheduling bot because it has a woman?s name. >?Talk about desperate! bill w By Alison Green on January 8, 2024 Billw, you misunderstand sir. It really isn?t desperation at all. Consider the voice when you ask your phone for directions. A young lady comes on there and offers instructions for the route. If you decide to go a different way or turn off the main route for any reason (hey cool, Taco Bell!) she isn?t a bit judgmental, never gets annoyed that you failed to follow her orders, never a harsh word. She quietly recalculates and offers new directions. That voice! I soooo have the hot bananas for her! With a voice like that, she just hasta be a stunning dish, ja? And even if she isn?t, no problem, just turn off the lights and ask her what to do next. If you don?t do it right, no worries, she will not complain, she will not be judgmental, she will just make a new plan and turn you on suggesting it. Billw, what?s not to like, me lad? Of course men fall for that kinda deal, of COURSE we do. It?s evolutionary psychology at its best. Next time you hear your phone woman?s road directions, good chance you will start to get turned on. Hey, it works on me. I go to the most convoluted places just to hear her tell me how to get there. My gas bills, oh mercy. COOL! Idea: we find that woman, offer her a deal on making the audio for an AI driven fantasy product! Billw we will make a buttload. spike -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From atymes at gmail.com Sun Jan 14 18:24:38 2024 From: atymes at gmail.com (Adrian Tymes) Date: Sun, 14 Jan 2024 10:24:38 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Do you fancy a date with a bot? Really??? In-Reply-To: <38a301da4712$bc5bb0c0$35131240$@rainier66.com> References: <38a301da4712$bc5bb0c0$35131240$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: On Sun, Jan 14, 2024 at 9:56?AM spike jones via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > > > That voice! I soooo have the hot bananas for her! With a voice like > that, she just hasta be a stunning dish, ja? And even if she isn?t, no > problem, just turn off the lights and ask her what to do next. If you > don?t do it right, no worries, she will not complain, she will not be > judgmental, she will just make a new plan and turn you on suggesting it. > > > > Billw, what?s not to like, me lad? Of course men fall for that kinda > deal, of COURSE we do. It?s evolutionary psychology at its best. > Doesn't apply. You know she will never be capable of copulation or reproduction in the biological sense. Potential to mate with her is zero. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From dsunley at gmail.com Sun Jan 14 18:58:12 2024 From: dsunley at gmail.com (Darin Sunley) Date: Sun, 14 Jan 2024 11:58:12 -0700 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <865D31C3-1A6E-4F90-A49E-148642C076E3@taramayastales.com> <2a9401da46fd$556e8eb0$004bac10$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: I'm sure it's just a coincidence that Krishna's beatific vision of the transcendent oneness of all human beings is brought out only in the service of, and is followed immediately by "... And therefore shut up and kill the people your liege lord wants killed, when he wants them killed, in the way he wants them killed. Your lord's homicidal will is the highest possible worldly good, and don't you forget it." Just sayin' I'm pretty sure the bottom half of that legend was written before the first part was. On Sun, Jan 14, 2024, 9:04 AM William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > Spike, if China can incorporate capitalism to some degree and still call > themselves communists, why doesn't Russia do it? Or Cuba, North Korea, > etc. Purists? bill w > > On Sun, Jan 14, 2024 at 9:23?AM spike jones via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> >> >> -----Original Message----- >> From: extropy-chat On Behalf Of >> Tara Maya via extropy-chat >> ... >> Subject: Re: [ExI] Open Individualism >> >> >...So it's like a "people's republic" where the combination of words >> actually reverses the meaning of both... >> Tara Maya >> >> >> >> >> Tara note that the title "People's Republic of China" doesn't specify >> which >> people of China. It only specifies which Republic. >> >> They can pretend otherwise, but they are still commie to the flaming core. >> >> spike >> >> _______________________________________________ >> extropy-chat mailing list >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat >> > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From foozler83 at gmail.com Sun Jan 14 19:07:30 2024 From: foozler83 at gmail.com (William Flynn Wallace) Date: Sun, 14 Jan 2024 13:07:30 -0600 Subject: [ExI] Do you fancy a date with a bot? Really??? In-Reply-To: References: <38a301da4712$bc5bb0c0$35131240$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: ADrian, from your comment you have no understanding of why men view porn in any form - internet, magazines, strip clubs, etc. None of them are obtainable. Spike, why do you have to go anywhere?Just sit on your couch and listen. You might find, if you run a contest for sexy voices, that voice and looks won't go together very often. Are you thinking about radio or voiceover? (come to think about it, I don't recall hearing a husky alto voice on TV - it would have to be alto, I think - soprano voices irritate me, esp. if they talk fast). bill w On Sun, Jan 14, 2024 at 12:26?PM Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > On Sun, Jan 14, 2024 at 9:56?AM spike jones via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> >> >> That voice! I soooo have the hot bananas for her! With a voice like >> that, she just hasta be a stunning dish, ja? And even if she isn?t, no >> problem, just turn off the lights and ask her what to do next. If you >> don?t do it right, no worries, she will not complain, she will not be >> judgmental, she will just make a new plan and turn you on suggesting it. >> >> >> >> Billw, what?s not to like, me lad? Of course men fall for that kinda >> deal, of COURSE we do. It?s evolutionary psychology at its best. >> > > Doesn't apply. You know she will never be capable of copulation or > reproduction in the biological sense. Potential to mate with her is zero. > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From foozler83 at gmail.com Sun Jan 14 19:09:59 2024 From: foozler83 at gmail.com (William Flynn Wallace) Date: Sun, 14 Jan 2024 13:09:59 -0600 Subject: [ExI] A Paranormal Prediction In-Reply-To: <2ab501da4709$73f08030$5bd18090$@rainier66.com> References: <2ab501da4709$73f08030$5bd18090$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: people seem to be deeply resistant to understanding that they have deep psychological traits.Keith Where did this idea get started? bill w On Sun, Jan 14, 2024 at 10:50?AM spike jones via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > > > -----Original Message----- > From: Keith Henson > Subject: Re: [ExI] A Paranormal Prediction > > >>..."Political discussion is ok if you must." > > >...What is of much more interest to me is the meta-level. > > Something I noticed decades back was the connection between economics and > politics. There was an upswing (particularly in the Rust Belt) in neo nazi > activity with every downturn in the economy. Eventually, I figured out > that this is a human reaction to the perception of a bleak future. In the > Stone Age, we were selected to circulate xenophobic memes as the first step > in dehumanizing neighbors in preparation for killing them for their > resources in a resource crisis. > > Support for crazy leaders is part of the package > > Unfortunately, this is too complicated an idea to spread well even here. > Plus people seem to be deeply resistant to understanding that they have > deep psychological traits. > > Keith > > > > > > > Keith I left your entire comment in there because it is so well-written. > > In the USA, we have elections for the head of the executive branch, an > office in which we invest far more interest and imagine its importance to > be far beyond what it really is. > > Every four years we have in imaginary or symbolic war, where we choose our > champions to participate in a play fight where we imagine the outcome of > the debate is somehow relevant. > > Every four years, we have an incumbent party struggling to convince the > voters how good they have it, while the challenger party struggles to > convince the voters how bleak is their future if the current course is > held. The bleak future scenario triggers the fight-meme identified by > evolutionary psychology. > > In the USA and to some extent the world, we are immersed in a culture war, > which is really distracting us from the real struggle: figuring out how we > are going to deal with the rise of AI. We still don't know. We are > distracted by the play-war being waged between big personalities and > imagining that it matters which one wins. Meanwhile, AI continues to > develop, and we humans still don't know how to deal with it. > > spike > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike at rainier66.com Sun Jan 14 21:20:33 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (spike at rainier66.com) Date: Sun, 14 Jan 2024 13:20:33 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Delivery Status Notification (Failure) In-Reply-To: References: <6cd84c78-13b3-41c5-bd45-97f486be7771@zaiboc.net> CAO+xQEYA+tKY+dC4_wbYL=b36FeHN0azn8iwdGpGVHEMjgcUdg@mail.gmail.com <65a3ef54.050a0220.ec07e.8b53.GMR@mx.google.com> Message-ID: <48dc01da472f$82e12880$88a37980$@rainier66.com> From: extropy-chat On Behalf Of William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat Sent: Sunday, 14 January, 2024 6:52 AM To: ExI chat list Cc: William Flynn Wallace Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Delivery Status Notification (Failure) OK - what now? Totally innocuous post. bill w This is a server fighting a server. I get this message too sometimes. It has nothing to do with the content of the post. There is no one reading it and deciding to stop messages. The only time that happens is if someone is on moderation, which no one has been since John Clark was on moderation for about an hour in 2020. Try posting again later. We don?t know what causes that server to fart. spike ---------- Forwarded message --------- From: Mail Delivery Subsystem > Date: Sun, Jan 14, 2024 at 8:27?AM Subject: Delivery Status Notification (Failure) To: > Message blocked Your message to extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org has been blocked. See technical details below for more information. The response from the remote server was: 541 5.7.1 Intrusion attempt denied from 209.85.128.180 ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: William Flynn Wallace > To: ExI chat list > Cc: Bcc: Date: Sun, 14 Jan 2024 08:26:51 -0600 Subject: Re: [ExI] Open Individualism ----- Message truncated ----- -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: image001.png Type: image/png Size: 3346 bytes Desc: not available URL: From foozler83 at gmail.com Sun Jan 14 21:22:52 2024 From: foozler83 at gmail.com (William Flynn Wallace) Date: Sun, 14 Jan 2024 15:22:52 -0600 Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <6cd84c78-13b3-41c5-bd45-97f486be7771@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: ---------- Forwarded message --------- From: William Flynn Wallace Date: Sun, Jan 14, 2024 at 8:26?AM Subject: Re: [ExI] Open Individualism To: ExI chat list There is nothing wrong with any theory that yields testable predictions. But it seems that open individualism can only be tested with things, like uploading, that we can't do now. "Anything is possible." OK we'll go with that. Just prove it. Endless speculation is for SportsCenter. bill w " On Sat, Jan 13, 2024 at 5:26?PM BillK via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > On Sat, 13 Jan 2024 at 23:12, Jason Resch wrote: > > > > On Sat, Jan 13, 2024, 4:26 PM BillK via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> > >> Ask an AI - > >> In Open Individualism, what does it mean to say "There is only one > person"? > >> > >> Answer- > >> In Open Individualism, the statement "There is only one person" is a > >> philosophical proposition that challenges the conventional notion of > >> personal identity and individuality. > > > > > > I would say it only challenges the conventional notion of personal > identity, but that it has no bearing on individuality. > >Jason > >------------------------------ > > Question - > What do you mean by "challenges the conventional notion of > personal identity and individuality". > > Answer - > When I mention that Open Individualism challenges the conventional > notion of personal identity and individuality, I mean that it presents > a perspective that goes against the traditional understanding of what > it means to be an individual person. > > In conventional thinking, personal identity is often associated with > the idea that each person is a distinct and separate entity with their > own unique consciousness and experiences. This understanding suggests > that personal identity is defined by characteristics such as memories, > physicality, and psychological attributes that differentiate one > person from another. > > However, Open Individualism questions this conventional understanding > by proposing that personal identity is ultimately an illusion. It > suggests that the boundaries we perceive between individuals are not > fundamental or real, but rather a result of our limited perspective or > subjective experience. > > Open Individualism argues that, at a fundamental level, all conscious > beings share a common underlying consciousness or personhood. It > suggests that personal identity is not something inherent to > individual consciousnesses but rather a product of our limited > perception and the way we identify with specific bodies, minds, and > memories. > > By challenging the conventional notion of personal identity and > individuality, Open Individualism invites us to reconsider our > understanding of what it means to be a person and the nature of > consciousness itself. It raises profound philosophical questions about > the relationship between individuals, the self, and the broader > universe. > ------------------- > > BillK > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike at rainier66.com Sun Jan 14 21:48:30 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (spike at rainier66.com) Date: Sun, 14 Jan 2024 13:48:30 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <865D31C3-1A6E-4F90-A49E-148642C076E3@taramayastales.com> <2a9401da46fd$556e8eb0$004bac10$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: <490f01da4733$6a190620$3e4b1260$@rainier66.com> From: extropy-chat On Behalf Of William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat Sent: Sunday, 14 January, 2024 8:02 AM To: ExI chat list Cc: William Flynn Wallace Subject: Re: [ExI] Open Individualism Spike, if China can incorporate capitalism to some degree and still call themselves communists, why doesn't Russia do it? Or Cuba, North Korea, etc. Purists? bill w They do. Every communist country eventually discovers that unless some direct benefit accrues to those most capable, some means of storing wealth and passing it along to the next generation, their country suffers from lack of motivation by the most capable people. There is no real reason to struggle for anything. So? people don?t. Production declines. China has figured out that communism must be functionally capitalist in order to move its enormous population into the modern world. It started in 1989, and it worked. Eventually we know what happens: outcomes are unequal under capitalism. Government gets greedy. Eventually it decides to take what the capitalists have built. Then there is once again no motive to strive, the country get poorer. It is a cycle. Regarding China: they are currently eyeing the wealth of Taiwan. After the election this week, the USA signaled it will not resist if China decides to grab Taiwan. I predict that will happen within the next calendar year. Commies can?t stand seeing their neighbor get rich. spike On Sun, Jan 14, 2024 at 9:23?AM spike jones via extropy-chat > wrote: -----Original Message----- From: extropy-chat > On Behalf Of Tara Maya via extropy-chat ... Subject: Re: [ExI] Open Individualism >...So it's like a "people's republic" where the combination of words actually reverses the meaning of both... Tara Maya Tara note that the title "People's Republic of China" doesn't specify which people of China. It only specifies which Republic. They can pretend otherwise, but they are still commie to the flaming core. spike _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From efc at swisscows.email Sun Jan 14 22:06:23 2024 From: efc at swisscows.email (efc at swisscows.email) Date: Sun, 14 Jan 2024 23:06:23 +0100 (CET) Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: <2a9401da46fd$556e8eb0$004bac10$@rainier66.com> References: <865D31C3-1A6E-4F90-A49E-148642C076E3@taramayastales.com> <2a9401da46fd$556e8eb0$004bac10$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: On Sun, 14 Jan 2024, spike jones via extropy-chat wrote: > They can pretend otherwise, but they are still commie to the flaming core. Well, from a purely personal point of view, I've never met more hard core capitalists than when doing business with chinese. They might be commie to the core, but inside that core, there is an adamantium-capitalist. ;) Best regards, Daniel From jasonresch at gmail.com Sun Jan 14 22:06:44 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Sun, 14 Jan 2024 17:06:44 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <6cd84c78-13b3-41c5-bd45-97f486be7771@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: On Sun, Jan 14, 2024, 4:24 PM William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > > > ---------- Forwarded message --------- > From: William Flynn Wallace > Date: Sun, Jan 14, 2024 at 8:26?AM > Subject: Re: [ExI] Open Individualism > To: ExI chat list > > > There is nothing wrong with any theory that yields testable predictions. > But it seems that open individualism can only be tested with things, like > uploading, > It can only be tested personally. So even if you see others upload and claim to have survived you (from the third person witness to the uploading) are still no wiser to the fact of whether or not it is *really you* who survives. So it will always require some "leap of faith" to take that step. We can, however, with logic and study of problems in, and theories of, personal identity, gain some confidence in the answer. that we can't do now. > There's much we can do already. Such as the Wada tested, and split brain surgeries, as well as reviving people after months or years in a coma (where most of your material is replaced), or brain surgery, where we directly modify your brain while you're unconscious. We can ask, does one survive such a discontinuity? "Anything is possible." OK we'll go with that. Just prove it. Endless > speculation is for SportsCenter. bill w > " > There's already strong probabilistic arguments favoring open individualism compared to the others. And closed individualism seems to me, at best ad hoc, and at worst inconsistent/incoherent. It's not something you need to speculate much over, more so just a topic that is worth learning about to better prepare yourself for the coming future. Jason > On Sat, Jan 13, 2024 at 5:26?PM BillK via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> On Sat, 13 Jan 2024 at 23:12, Jason Resch wrote: >> > >> > On Sat, Jan 13, 2024, 4:26 PM BillK via extropy-chat < >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: >> >> >> >> Ask an AI - >> >> In Open Individualism, what does it mean to say "There is only one >> person"? >> >> >> >> Answer- >> >> In Open Individualism, the statement "There is only one person" is a >> >> philosophical proposition that challenges the conventional notion of >> >> personal identity and individuality. >> > >> > >> > I would say it only challenges the conventional notion of personal >> identity, but that it has no bearing on individuality. >> >Jason >> >------------------------------ >> >> Question - >> What do you mean by "challenges the conventional notion of >> personal identity and individuality". >> >> Answer - >> When I mention that Open Individualism challenges the conventional >> notion of personal identity and individuality, I mean that it presents >> a perspective that goes against the traditional understanding of what >> it means to be an individual person. >> >> In conventional thinking, personal identity is often associated with >> the idea that each person is a distinct and separate entity with their >> own unique consciousness and experiences. This understanding suggests >> that personal identity is defined by characteristics such as memories, >> physicality, and psychological attributes that differentiate one >> person from another. >> >> However, Open Individualism questions this conventional understanding >> by proposing that personal identity is ultimately an illusion. It >> suggests that the boundaries we perceive between individuals are not >> fundamental or real, but rather a result of our limited perspective or >> subjective experience. >> >> Open Individualism argues that, at a fundamental level, all conscious >> beings share a common underlying consciousness or personhood. It >> suggests that personal identity is not something inherent to >> individual consciousnesses but rather a product of our limited >> perception and the way we identify with specific bodies, minds, and >> memories. >> >> By challenging the conventional notion of personal identity and >> individuality, Open Individualism invites us to reconsider our >> understanding of what it means to be a person and the nature of >> consciousness itself. It raises profound philosophical questions about >> the relationship between individuals, the self, and the broader >> universe. >> ------------------- >> >> BillK >> _______________________________________________ >> extropy-chat mailing list >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat >> > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From efc at swisscows.email Sun Jan 14 22:10:16 2024 From: efc at swisscows.email (efc at swisscows.email) Date: Sun, 14 Jan 2024 23:10:16 +0100 (CET) Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: <490f01da4733$6a190620$3e4b1260$@rainier66.com> References: <865D31C3-1A6E-4F90-A49E-148642C076E3@taramayastales.com> <2a9401da46fd$556e8eb0$004bac10$@rainier66.com> <490f01da4733$6a190620$3e4b1260$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: <5ca080e6-f75b-e10e-00b6-f2af25e6baba@swisscows.email> On Sun, 14 Jan 2024, spike jones via extropy-chat wrote: > China has figured out that communism must be functionally capitalist > in order to move its enormous population into the modern world.? It > started in 1989, and it worked. In Johan Norbergs new "The Capitalist Manifesto" he does have a chapter on china, and it does seem that the current president is turning away from capitalism, and if the turn is too sharp, and too far, disaster will follow. > Regarding China: they are currently eyeing the wealth of Taiwan.? After the election this week, the USA signaled it will not resist > if China decides to grab Taiwan.? I predict that will happen within the next calendar year.? Commies can?t stand seeing their > neighbor get rich. Hmm, I think an acquaintance, who has done even more business with chinese than I have mentioned that the internal communicated date was before 2030. But a lot of things can happen, and it was years ago, so who knows. Best regards, Daniel From efc at swisscows.email Sun Jan 14 22:12:14 2024 From: efc at swisscows.email (efc at swisscows.email) Date: Sun, 14 Jan 2024 23:12:14 +0100 (CET) Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Delivery Status Notification (Failure) In-Reply-To: <48dc01da472f$82e12880$88a37980$@rainier66.com> References: <6cd84c78-13b3-41c5-bd45-97f486be7771@zaiboc.net> CAO+xQEYA+tKY+dC4_wbYL=b36FeHN0azn8iwdGpGVHEMjgcUdg@mail.gmail.com <65a3ef54.050a0220.ec07e.8b53.GMR@mx.google.com> <48dc01da472f$82e12880$88a37980$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: This happens so frequently I wonder if no one ever tried changing to a new server? Maybe this error would go away? Best regards, Daniel On Sun, 14 Jan 2024, spike jones via extropy-chat wrote: > > ? > > ? > > From: extropy-chat On Behalf Of William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat > Sent: Sunday, 14 January, 2024 6:52 AM > To: ExI chat list > Cc: William Flynn Wallace > Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Delivery Status Notification (Failure) > > ? > > OK - what now?? Totally innocuous?post.? ?bill w > > ? > > ? > > ? > > This is a server fighting a server.? I get this message too sometimes.? It has nothing to do with the content of the post.? There is > no one reading it and deciding to stop messages.? The only time that happens is if someone is on moderation, which no one has been > since John Clark was on moderation for about an hour in 2020. > > ? > > Try posting again later.? We don?t know what causes that server to fart. > > ? > > spike > > ? > > ? > > ? > > ? > > ? > > ? > > ? > > ---------- Forwarded message --------- > From: Mail Delivery Subsystem > Date: Sun, Jan 14, 2024 at 8:27?AM > Subject: Delivery Status Notification (Failure) > To: > > ? > > Error Icon > > MESSAGE BLOCKED > > Your message to extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org has been blocked. See technical details below for more information. > > The response from the remote server was: > > 541 5.7.1 Intrusion attempt denied from 209.85.128.180 > > > > > ---------- Forwarded message ---------- > From:?William Flynn Wallace > To:?ExI chat list > Cc:? > Bcc:? > Date:?Sun, 14 Jan 2024 08:26:51 -0600 > Subject:?Re: [ExI] Open Individualism > ----- Message truncated ----- > > > From spike at rainier66.com Sun Jan 14 22:14:12 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (spike at rainier66.com) Date: Sun, 14 Jan 2024 14:14:12 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Do you fancy a date with a bot? Really??? In-Reply-To: References: <38a301da4712$bc5bb0c0$35131240$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: <493f01da4737$019b0180$04d10480$@rainier66.com> From: extropy-chat On Behalf Of Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat Sent: Sunday, 14 January, 2024 10:25 AM To: ExI chat list Cc: Adrian Tymes Subject: Re: [ExI] Do you fancy a date with a bot? Really??? On Sun, Jan 14, 2024 at 9:56?AM spike jones via extropy-chat > wrote: That voice! I soooo have the hot bananas for her! With a voice like that, she just hasta be a stunning dish, ja? ? >>?Billw, what?s not to like, me lad? Of course men fall for that kinda deal, of COURSE we do. It?s evolutionary psychology at its best. >?Doesn't apply. You know she will never be capable of copulation or reproduction in the biological sense. Potential to mate with her is zero. Oh very much on the contrary sir. A critically-important notion in evolution is the concept of pre-adaptation. We live in an age where humans are pre-adapted in a most fortunate way: we are sufficiently selfish and technologically advanced so that most people can live their lives with sexually attractive humanoid robots, eschewing reproduction completely. We can get additional gratification using modern virtual reality, of which Google-woman?s voice is an element. Adrian, it all works together perfectly. This old planet can transition to a sustainable population of perhaps a billion humans and even get there mostly peacefully. (I do mean that literally, rather than the way the description ?mostly peaceful? is often used to describe violent riots.) We could evolve robots that take care of most people sexually, and to a large extent emotionally. The retro types who want literal human companionship and want to raise actual literal human children are free to do that of course. They shall inherit the earth without even having to be meek. They only hafta be retro, and reject the notion of letting machines do the copulation. This notion appeals to me, for I recognize in myself a retro streak. Furthermore, I do deplore the notion of meek. I just don?t do meek, never have. I am techno-antimeek. The opposite. What is the word I need? Bold? Audacious? Bodacious! Adrian, we humans are preadapted by a fortunate turn of evolution to be in the right place at the right time. Ours is a fortunate species Adrian. We have the potential to escape the curse identified by Thomas Malthus, but it requires brains, technology and bodacious actions. spike -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From efc at swisscows.email Sun Jan 14 22:15:18 2024 From: efc at swisscows.email (efc at swisscows.email) Date: Sun, 14 Jan 2024 23:15:18 +0100 (CET) Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <865D31C3-1A6E-4F90-A49E-148642C076E3@taramayastales.com> <2a9401da46fd$556e8eb0$004bac10$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: <6fb00a1c-507a-7b12-cc44-3b1ac4c007c4@swisscows.email> On Sun, 14 Jan 2024, William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat wrote: > Spike, if China can incorporate capitalism to some degree and still call themselves communists, why doesn't Russia do it? Or Cuba, > North Korea, etc.? ?Purists?? bill w > My theory is that China has some kind of legal system, and it does have some kind of decetranlization of power in the top of the party. As you say, chinese are smart, and they learned that starving the people to death can lead to revolutions. Russia and North korea are more like kingdoms with a criminal as king. There's no trust in those societies, and having everyone spying on everyone is encourage. That is a bad environment for capitalism to grow. I read in the news tha Cuba is opening up ever so lightly, and if that is true, I would expect some positive changes for cuba. Best regards, Daniel From spike at rainier66.com Sun Jan 14 22:19:54 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (spike at rainier66.com) Date: Sun, 14 Jan 2024 14:19:54 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <865D31C3-1A6E-4F90-A49E-148642C076E3@taramayastales.com> <2a9401da46fd$556e8eb0$004bac10$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: <495401da4737$cd3dbe40$67b93ac0$@rainier66.com> ?> On Behalf Of Darin Sunley via extropy-chat Subject: Re: [ExI] Open Individualism >?I'm sure it's just a coincidence that Krishna's beatific vision of the transcendent oneness of all human beings is brought out only in the service of, and is followed immediately by "... And therefore shut up and kill the people your liege lord wants killed, when he wants them killed, in the way he wants them killed. Your lord's homicidal will is the highest possible worldly good, and don't you forget it." Just sayin' I'm pretty sure the bottom half of that legend was written before the first part was. Darin you flaming capitalist! I admire that in a person. spike -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From john at ziaspace.com Sun Jan 14 22:25:43 2024 From: john at ziaspace.com (John Klos) Date: Sun, 14 Jan 2024 22:25:43 +0000 (UTC) Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Delivery Status Notification (Failure) Message-ID: > This happens so frequently I wonder if no one ever tried changing to a new > server? Maybe this error would go away? Ha ha ha... You can suggest people move from Gmail to a proper email service, but I doubt many people will. John From spike at rainier66.com Mon Jan 15 01:11:24 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (spike at rainier66.com) Date: Sun, 14 Jan 2024 17:11:24 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <865D31C3-1A6E-4F90-A49E-148642C076E3@taramayastales.com> <2a9401da46fd$556e8eb0$004bac10$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: <49d701da474f$c2e72e50$48b58af0$@rainier66.com> -----Original Message----- From: extropy-chat On Behalf Of efc--- via extropy-chat Sent: Sunday, 14 January, 2024 2:06 PM To: spike jones via extropy-chat Cc: efc at swisscows.email Subject: Re: [ExI] Open Individualism On Sun, 14 Jan 2024, spike jones via extropy-chat wrote: > They can pretend otherwise, but they are still commie to the flaming core. Well, from a purely personal point of view, I've never met more hard core capitalists than when doing business with chinese. They might be commie to the core, but inside that core, there is an adamantium-capitalist. ;) Best regards, Daniel _______________________________________________ Daniel, the most hard core capitalists are always those who have lived under and witnessed communism. spike From hkeithhenson at gmail.com Mon Jan 15 04:08:32 2024 From: hkeithhenson at gmail.com (Keith Henson) Date: Sun, 14 Jan 2024 20:08:32 -0800 Subject: [ExI] A Paranormal Prediction In-Reply-To: References: <2ab501da4709$73f08030$5bd18090$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: On Sun, Jan 14, 2024 at 11:11?AM William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat wrote: > > people seem to be deeply resistant to understanding that they have deep psychological traits.Keith > > Where did this idea get started? bill w Observation on this list among other places. I have been flogging the EP concepts for over 35 years Keith > > On Sun, Jan 14, 2024 at 10:50?AM spike jones via extropy-chat wrote: >> >> >> >> -----Original Message----- >> From: Keith Henson >> Subject: Re: [ExI] A Paranormal Prediction >> >> >>..."Political discussion is ok if you must." >> >> >...What is of much more interest to me is the meta-level. >> >> Something I noticed decades back was the connection between economics and politics. There was an upswing (particularly in the Rust Belt) in neo nazi activity with every downturn in the economy. Eventually, I figured out that this is a human reaction to the perception of a bleak future. In the Stone Age, we were selected to circulate xenophobic memes as the first step in dehumanizing neighbors in preparation for killing them for their resources in a resource crisis. >> >> Support for crazy leaders is part of the package >> >> Unfortunately, this is too complicated an idea to spread well even here. Plus people seem to be deeply resistant to understanding that they have deep psychological traits. >> >> Keith >> >> >> >> >> >> >> Keith I left your entire comment in there because it is so well-written. >> >> In the USA, we have elections for the head of the executive branch, an office in which we invest far more interest and imagine its importance to be far beyond what it really is. >> >> Every four years we have in imaginary or symbolic war, where we choose our champions to participate in a play fight where we imagine the outcome of the debate is somehow relevant. >> >> Every four years, we have an incumbent party struggling to convince the voters how good they have it, while the challenger party struggles to convince the voters how bleak is their future if the current course is held. The bleak future scenario triggers the fight-meme identified by evolutionary psychology. >> >> In the USA and to some extent the world, we are immersed in a culture war, which is really distracting us from the real struggle: figuring out how we are going to deal with the rise of AI. We still don't know. We are distracted by the play-war being waged between big personalities and imagining that it matters which one wins. Meanwhile, AI continues to develop, and we humans still don't know how to deal with it. >> >> spike >> >> >> _______________________________________________ >> extropy-chat mailing list >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat From hkeithhenson at gmail.com Mon Jan 15 04:29:08 2024 From: hkeithhenson at gmail.com (Keith Henson) Date: Sun, 14 Jan 2024 20:29:08 -0800 Subject: [ExI] A Paranormal Prediction In-Reply-To: <2ab501da4709$73f08030$5bd18090$@rainier66.com> References: <2ab501da4709$73f08030$5bd18090$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: On Sun, Jan 14, 2024 at 8:48?AM wrote: > snip > > In the USA, we have elections for the head of the executive branch, an office in which we invest far more interest and imagine its importance to be far beyond what it really is. > > Every four years we have in imaginary or symbolic war, where we choose our champions to participate in a play fight where we imagine the outcome of the debate is somehow relevant. It is worth remembering that most of the genetic selection for war and related happened before agriculture, much less nation-states or presidential elections. So if the result does not seem well adapted, that's no surprise. Another deep psychological trait is that people are insanely optimistic about winning a war. On average going to war is rewarding to genes but half the time you lose. If people recognized reality, they would know that going to war is a chancy business, but our psychological traits lead us to be far more optimistic about going to war than is rational. Keith > Every four years, we have an incumbent party struggling to convince the voters how good they have it, while the challenger party struggles to convince the voters how bleak is their future if the current course is held. The bleak future scenario triggers the fight-meme identified by evolutionary psychology. > > In the USA and to some extent the world, we are immersed in a culture war, which is really distracting us from the real struggle: figuring out how we are going to deal with the rise of AI. We still don't know. We are distracted by the play-war being waged between big personalities and imagining that it matters which one wins. Meanwhile, AI continues to develop, and we humans still don't know how to deal with it. > > spike > From spike at rainier66.com Mon Jan 15 04:30:44 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (spike at rainier66.com) Date: Sun, 14 Jan 2024 20:30:44 -0800 Subject: [ExI] A Paranormal Prediction In-Reply-To: References: <2ab501da4709$73f08030$5bd18090$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: <4a5501da476b$9b7af3d0$d270db70$@rainier66.com> ...> On Behalf Of Keith Henson via extropy-chat Subject: Re: [ExI] A Paranormal Prediction On Sun, Jan 14, 2024 at 11:11?AM William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat wrote: > >>>... people seem to be deeply resistant to understanding that they have > deep psychological traits.Keith > >>... Where did this idea get started? bill w >...Observation on this list among other places. I have been flogging the EP concepts for over 35 years Keith Keith I don't recall seeing anyone post anything suggesting they resisted understanding the deep psychological traits. On the contrary, the notions of evolutionary psychology have been accepted and embraced here as far as I can tell. I will grant that I personally embrace it for a perfect excuse for my baser instincts toward competitiveness. Hey, I can't help it, evolution made me this way. I don't need to apologize for anything, any more than the apes at the local zoo need to feel abashed for their ways. It could be that someone has challenged the notion of EP, but I don't recall it. The whole idea makes perfect sense to me. I have watched dogs, who are born with certain notions of how to behave according to their breed. That would be a form of facilitated evolutionary psychology, ja? Well, if dog breeders can do this over a short span of time, nature can do it over a long span of time. spike From spike at rainier66.com Mon Jan 15 04:39:46 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (spike at rainier66.com) Date: Sun, 14 Jan 2024 20:39:46 -0800 Subject: [ExI] A Paranormal Prediction In-Reply-To: References: <2ab501da4709$73f08030$5bd18090$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: <4a5801da476c$de20e9f0$9a62bdd0$@rainier66.com> -----Original Message----- From: Keith Henson ... >...It is worth remembering that most of the genetic selection for war and related happened before agriculture, much less nation-states or presidential elections. So if the result does not seem well adapted, that's no surprise. >...Another deep psychological trait is that people are insanely optimistic about winning a war. On average going to war is rewarding to genes but half the time you lose. If people recognized reality, they would know that going to war is a chancy business, but our psychological traits lead us to be far more optimistic about going to war than is rational. Keith Keith allow me to offer an alternative way of looking at the war meme. In our times, war is not against the neighbor tribe. War is initiated halfway across the planet by the political leaders, who do not themselves go to war. Their immediate offspring do not go to war either. So they are most optimistic about the order of battle. They cannot lose. The soldiers on the other hand, are not so eager to go to war, even though some of them may benefit personally. Most lose, even those on the "winning" side. So, our military training system has ways of influencing their "thinking." This is far easier with younger men of course, which is why the focus of recruitment is toward 19 year olds who have not had time to form attitudes and are not adept at reasoning. All of this is in perfect agreement with the concepts of evolutionary psychology. The behavior of both the leadership waging the war and the teenage grunts doing the dirty work is in agreement with EP. spike From efc at swisscows.email Mon Jan 15 08:34:45 2024 From: efc at swisscows.email (efc at swisscows.email) Date: Mon, 15 Jan 2024 09:34:45 +0100 (CET) Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Delivery Status Notification (Failure) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: Hello John, I get the same error and I don't have gmail. That leads me to believe that the error is server-side and not client-side. Best regards, Daniel On Sun, 14 Jan 2024, John Klos wrote: >> This happens so frequently I wonder if no one ever tried changing to a new >> server? Maybe this error would go away? > > Ha ha ha... You can suggest people move from Gmail to a proper email service, > but I doubt many people will. > > John > > From efc at swisscows.email Mon Jan 15 09:49:42 2024 From: efc at swisscows.email (efc at swisscows.email) Date: Mon, 15 Jan 2024 10:49:42 +0100 (CET) Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: <49d701da474f$c2e72e50$48b58af0$@rainier66.com> References: <865D31C3-1A6E-4F90-A49E-148642C076E3@taramayastales.com> <2a9401da46fd$556e8eb0$004bac10$@rainier66.com> <49d701da474f$c2e72e50$48b58af0$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: On Sun, 14 Jan 2024, spike at rainier66.com wrote: > Daniel, the most hard core capitalists are always those who have lived under > and witnessed communism. Hello spike, that makes a lot of sense. I grew up under swedish "velvet"-socialism (a very soft form of socialism) and I'm a "soft" capitalist. ;) So I guess the harder your "ism" the more ingrained is the lessons that it doesn't work, and the more pro-markets you become. Although... looking at older people at the bottom of the social ladder here in eastern europe where I reside, some of them do tend to look back with longing to the "good old USSR days". The reason for that, as explained to me, is that in those days, the only thing you needed to do to keep your job was to show up at work and not be too drunk. You didn't actually have to do that much to get your salary and you got your apartment. You did not have to make any major decision in your life, the government did that for you. And with capicalism all of a sudden they must work hard, for very little money, so I can definitely understand why they look back with longing to those days even though it would be disaster for society at large (as proven every single time a country opts for communism or socialism). Best regards, Daniel From mbb386 at main.nc.us Mon Jan 15 12:53:17 2024 From: mbb386 at main.nc.us (MB) Date: Mon, 15 Jan 2024 07:53:17 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Delivery Status Notification (Failure) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <2ce2cf97124345b30a3b38f08af7cb99.squirrel@www.main.nc.us> Agreed. I do not have gmail, have never had it, don't want it. But I get this error every now and then. I have been told that it is a Google Server that is causing the problem. Regards, MB On Mon, January 15, 2024 03:34, efc--- via extropy-chat wrote: > Hello John, > > I get the same error and I don't have gmail. That leads me to believe that > the error is server-side and not client-side. > > Best regards, > Daniel > > > On Sun, 14 Jan 2024, John Klos wrote: > >>> This happens so frequently I wonder if no one ever tried changing to a >>> new >>> server? Maybe this error would go away? >> >> Ha ha ha... You can suggest people move from Gmail to a proper email >> service, >> but I doubt many people will. >> >> John >> >> > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > From foozler83 at gmail.com Mon Jan 15 14:14:53 2024 From: foozler83 at gmail.com (William Flynn Wallace) Date: Mon, 15 Jan 2024 08:14:53 -0600 Subject: [ExI] Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <865D31C3-1A6E-4F90-A49E-148642C076E3@taramayastales.com> <2a9401da46fd$556e8eb0$004bac10$@rainier66.com> <49d701da474f$c2e72e50$48b58af0$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: In Russia (I think) trials were made with the farm land being owned. Production was significantly better than state owned. So why doesn't that spread? It means more money for the oligarchy. May it is - news from there is scant and unreliable. billw On Mon, Jan 15, 2024 at 3:52?AM efc--- via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > > On Sun, 14 Jan 2024, spike at rainier66.com wrote: > > > Daniel, the most hard core capitalists are always those who have lived > under > > and witnessed communism. > > Hello spike, that makes a lot of sense. I grew up under swedish > "velvet"-socialism (a very soft form of socialism) and I'm a "soft" > capitalist. ;) > > So I guess the harder your "ism" the more ingrained is the lessons that > it doesn't work, and the more pro-markets you become. > > Although... looking at older people at the bottom of the social ladder > here in eastern europe where I reside, some of them do tend to look back > with longing to the "good old USSR days". > > The reason for that, as explained to me, is that in those days, the only > thing you needed to do to keep your job was to show up at work and not > be too drunk. You didn't actually have to do that much to get your > salary and you got your apartment. You did not have to make any major > decision in your life, the government did that for you. And with > capicalism all of a sudden they must work hard, for very little money, > so I can definitely understand why they look back with longing to those > days even though it would be disaster for society at large (as proven > every single time a country opts for communism or socialism). > > Best regards, > Daniel > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From john at ziaspace.com Mon Jan 15 16:26:24 2024 From: john at ziaspace.com (John Klos) Date: Mon, 15 Jan 2024 16:26:24 +0000 (UTC) Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Delivery Status Notification (Failure) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <5ab01ad1-bd7f-de6c-cf5f-8b09461c2329@newbunny.zia.io> > I get the same error and I don't have gmail. That leads me to believe that > the error is server-side and not client-side. When we have limited information, we sometimes come to conclusions that make sense but aren't necessarily correct. Luckily, we have logs ;) For your mail server (mail-gate.swisscows.email), it seems that the reverse DNS PTR for that server should point to a primary name, but it does not (RFC 1034, section 3.6.2, for anyone who is curious). But that's not directly why email was rejected, though - it was rejected because the extra lookup due to that CNAME took too long, which is why it happens only sometimes. You can write to your email provider and let them know, and perhaps they'll fix it (feel free to include that paragraph and/or cc me - I'm happy to provide logs and more informtion). Isn't it better to fix the problem than the symptom? :) For MB, I only see three failed attempts back in August and October. If this is happening more often than that, then I'd need more specific information to find any rejections in the mail logs (the logs are typically thousands of lines a day). Feel free to email me directly, if this is the case. I do see that describing this as "Intrusion" can be a bit misleading. I put that in there for all of the connecting machines that attempt to log in to try to send email through the server, and it matches clients that don't identify themselves AND servers that have names that don't resolve (even if it's just temporary). To make this less of a pain, I'm making the error transient so your email server(s) will retry before they fail. You might get a warning, but you won't have to do anything yourself. I'm also changing the message to "Given name from (client_addr) does not make sense." I'm sending this to the whole list to encourage anyone who has issues to contact me directly. Whatever happens, we'll figure it out! Thanks, John From spike at rainier66.com Mon Jan 15 16:58:40 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (spike at rainier66.com) Date: Mon, 15 Jan 2024 08:58:40 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Delivery Status Notification (Failure) In-Reply-To: <5ab01ad1-bd7f-de6c-cf5f-8b09461c2329@newbunny.zia.io> References: <5ab01ad1-bd7f-de6c-cf5f-8b09461c2329@newbunny.zia.io> Message-ID: <206f01da47d4$177826c0$46687440$@rainier66.com> John, you are on my short list of people who can do no wrong. You are on a still shorter list of those who can do actual literal wrong but still stay on the first list in spite of the obvious logical contradiction. Thanks for all you do. spike -----Original Message----- From: extropy-chat On Behalf Of John Klos via extropy-chat Sent: Monday, 15 January, 2024 8:26 AM To: efc at swisscows.email Cc: John Klos ; efc--- via extropy-chat Subject: Re: [ExI] Fwd: Delivery Status Notification (Failure) > I get the same error and I don't have gmail. That leads me to believe > that the error is server-side and not client-side. When we have limited information, we sometimes come to conclusions that make sense but aren't necessarily correct. Luckily, we have logs ;) For your mail server (mail-gate.swisscows.email), it seems that the reverse DNS PTR for that server should point to a primary name, but it does not (RFC 1034, section 3.6.2, for anyone who is curious). But that's not directly why email was rejected, though - it was rejected because the extra lookup due to that CNAME took too long, which is why it happens only sometimes. You can write to your email provider and let them know, and perhaps they'll fix it (feel free to include that paragraph and/or cc me - I'm happy to provide logs and more informtion). Isn't it better to fix the problem than the symptom? :) For MB, I only see three failed attempts back in August and October. If this is happening more often than that, then I'd need more specific information to find any rejections in the mail logs (the logs are typically thousands of lines a day). Feel free to email me directly, if this is the case. I do see that describing this as "Intrusion" can be a bit misleading. I put that in there for all of the connecting machines that attempt to log in to try to send email through the server, and it matches clients that don't identify themselves AND servers that have names that don't resolve (even if it's just temporary). To make this less of a pain, I'm making the error transient so your email server(s) will retry before they fail. You might get a warning, but you won't have to do anything yourself. I'm also changing the message to "Given name from (client_addr) does not make sense." I'm sending this to the whole list to encourage anyone who has issues to contact me directly. Whatever happens, we'll figure it out! Thanks, John _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat From efc at swisscows.email Mon Jan 15 19:12:54 2024 From: efc at swisscows.email (efc at swisscows.email) Date: Mon, 15 Jan 2024 20:12:54 +0100 (CET) Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Delivery Status Notification (Failure) In-Reply-To: <5ab01ad1-bd7f-de6c-cf5f-8b09461c2329@newbunny.zia.io> References: <5ab01ad1-bd7f-de6c-cf5f-8b09461c2329@newbunny.zia.io> Message-ID: <7e658640-a469-f51b-256b-b1d06c5f6c81@swisscows.email> Thank you very much John, I will pass this on to my provider. I am curious though, why the provider hasn't already made the change. Is this setup that you are referring to standard? Or is it a strict interpretation of the standard, and other might have a less trict, and that is why this email provider gets through to some but not to others? I guess what I'm thinking is that would it be possible for you to "loosen" the configuration? Note that I am definitely not asking you too, I am just curious. For now, I'll happily pass that on to the SP and then we'll see if this stops happening. Thank you very much for the trouble of digging through the logs! =) Best regards, Daniel On Mon, 15 Jan 2024, John Klos wrote: >> I get the same error and I don't have gmail. That leads me to believe that >> the error is server-side and not client-side. > > When we have limited information, we sometimes come to conclusions that make > sense but aren't necessarily correct. Luckily, we have logs ;) > > For your mail server (mail-gate.swisscows.email), it seems that the reverse > DNS PTR for that server should point to a primary name, but it does not (RFC > 1034, section 3.6.2, for anyone who is curious). But that's not directly why > email was rejected, though - it was rejected because the extra lookup due to > that CNAME took too long, which is why it happens only sometimes. > > You can write to your email provider and let them know, and perhaps they'll > fix it (feel free to include that paragraph and/or cc me - I'm happy to > provide logs and more informtion). Isn't it better to fix the problem than > the symptom? :) > > For MB, I only see three failed attempts back in August and October. If this > is happening more often than that, then I'd need more specific information to > find any rejections in the mail logs (the logs are typically thousands of > lines a day). Feel free to email me directly, if this is the case. > > I do see that describing this as "Intrusion" can be a bit misleading. I put > that in there for all of the connecting machines that attempt to log in to > try to send email through the server, and it matches clients that don't > identify themselves AND servers that have names that don't resolve (even if > it's just temporary). > > To make this less of a pain, I'm making the error transient so your email > server(s) will retry before they fail. You might get a warning, but you won't > have to do anything yourself. > > I'm also changing the message to "Given name from (client_addr) does not make > sense." > > I'm sending this to the whole list to encourage anyone who has issues to > contact me directly. Whatever happens, we'll figure it out! > > Thanks, > John > > From john at ziaspace.com Tue Jan 16 01:42:28 2024 From: john at ziaspace.com (John Klos) Date: Tue, 16 Jan 2024 01:42:28 +0000 (UTC) Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Delivery Status Notification (Failure) In-Reply-To: <7e658640-a469-f51b-256b-b1d06c5f6c81@swisscows.email> References: <5ab01ad1-bd7f-de6c-cf5f-8b09461c2329@newbunny.zia.io> <7e658640-a469-f51b-256b-b1d06c5f6c81@swisscows.email> Message-ID: <5538dcb8-95b0-9ccb-1cb4-b7362ae67dd1@newbunny.zia.io> Hi, > Thank you very much John, I will pass this on to my provider. I am curious > though, why the provider hasn't already made the change. I doubt they get much feedback about this kind of thing. > Is this setup that you are referring to standard? Or is it a strict > interpretation of the standard, and other might have a less trict, and that > is why this email provider gets through to some but not to others? You are precisely correct: in the interest of protecting us from spammers, I've made rules that are more strict in enforcing the standards than most mail servers would be. > I guess what I'm thinking is that would it be possible for you to "loosen" > the configuration? Note that I am definitely not asking you too, I am just > curious. I've done exactly that: I've update the message to be more general, plus I've changed the error returned from a permanent error (in other words, don't try again) to a transient error(in other words, it's a temporary issue, so please try again soon). > For now, I'll happily pass that on to the SP and then we'll see if this stops > happening. Thank you very much for the trouble of digging through the logs! > =) No problem! If there's any group of people who can appreciate both sides of the issue, it's us. We want things to just work, but at the same time I think most of us can recognize the danger in simply conceding control of literally everything to big companies like Google, Amazon, Microsoft, et alia. I'm happy to help, particularly when helping to make smaller mail services work better in the long run. John From mbb386 at main.nc.us Tue Jan 16 13:54:25 2024 From: mbb386 at main.nc.us (MB) Date: Tue, 16 Jan 2024 08:54:25 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Delivery Status Notification (Failure) In-Reply-To: <5538dcb8-95b0-9ccb-1cb4-b7362ae67dd1@newbunny.zia.io> References: <5ab01ad1-bd7f-de6c-cf5f-8b09461c2329@newbunny.zia.io> <7e658640-a469-f51b-256b-b1d06c5f6c81@swisscows.email> <5538dcb8-95b0-9ccb-1cb4-b7362ae67dd1@newbunny.zia.io> Message-ID: Thank you, John Klos. :) The error warning was rather distressing - what on earth had I said that sparked such a reply?!! ;) Regards, MB On Mon, January 15, 2024 20:42, John Klos via extropy-chat wrote: > I've done exactly that: I've update the message to be more general, plus > I've changed the error returned from a permanent error (in other words, > don't try again) to a transient error(in other words, it's a temporary > issue, so please try again soon). > and > No problem! If there's any group of people who can appreciate both sides > of the issue, it's us. We want things to just work, but at the same time I > think most of us can recognize the danger in simply conceding control of > literally everything to big companies like Google, Amazon, Microsoft, et > alia. From spike at rainier66.com Tue Jan 16 17:02:24 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (spike at rainier66.com) Date: Tue, 16 Jan 2024 09:02:24 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Delivery Status Notification (Failure) In-Reply-To: References: <5ab01ad1-bd7f-de6c-cf5f-8b09461c2329@newbunny.zia.io> <7e658640-a469-f51b-256b-b1d06c5f6c81@swisscows.email> <5538dcb8-95b0-9ccb-1cb4-b7362ae67dd1@newbunny.zia.io> Message-ID: <06f001da489d$c74b09e0$55e11da0$@rainier66.com> ...> On Behalf Of MB via extropy-chat Subject: Re: [ExI] Fwd: Delivery Status Notification (Failure) >...Thank you, John Klos. :) The error warning was rather distressing - what on earth had I said that sparked such a reply?!! ;) Regards, MB MB, the server which generates those roadblocks does not read our messages or understand what they mean anyway. In our times, only a human can do that, and ExIMod is that human. I only offer that one hint regarding the identity of ExiMod: ExiMod is human. Servers which generate those rejection messages are not. ExiMod will not block any message unless there are flame wars and people being personally attacked and insulted, and even then, only after the offending party has ignored copious warnings and persisted in egregious antisocial behavior. We haven't had that since 2020 when I returned from a 3 week camping trip to learn there had been a horrific flame war on ExI-chat while I was away. That is when I asked a fellow-human to become ExiMod. I like camping for three weeks at a time far away from the internet, and I intend to do it again and again. It clears the mind. It reconnects the camper with the alternate reality in which humans evolved: actual literal nature. Thoreau wrote about it a long time ago. He was right. Occasionally playing primitive savage is cool. I prefer a discussion list where people are civil and tolerant of opposing views. That is why I hang out here and have been here for over 25 years. spike From atymes at gmail.com Tue Jan 16 17:47:45 2024 From: atymes at gmail.com (Adrian Tymes) Date: Tue, 16 Jan 2024 09:47:45 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Delivery Status Notification (Failure) In-Reply-To: <06f001da489d$c74b09e0$55e11da0$@rainier66.com> References: <5ab01ad1-bd7f-de6c-cf5f-8b09461c2329@newbunny.zia.io> <7e658640-a469-f51b-256b-b1d06c5f6c81@swisscows.email> <5538dcb8-95b0-9ccb-1cb4-b7362ae67dd1@newbunny.zia.io> <06f001da489d$c74b09e0$55e11da0$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: On Tue, Jan 16, 2024 at 9:09?AM spike jones via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > ExiMod is human > Are we sure ExiMod is not an AI? -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From efc at swisscows.email Tue Jan 16 17:54:43 2024 From: efc at swisscows.email (efc at swisscows.email) Date: Tue, 16 Jan 2024 18:54:43 +0100 (CET) Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Delivery Status Notification (Failure) In-Reply-To: <06f001da489d$c74b09e0$55e11da0$@rainier66.com> References: <5ab01ad1-bd7f-de6c-cf5f-8b09461c2329@newbunny.zia.io> <7e658640-a469-f51b-256b-b1d06c5f6c81@swisscows.email> <5538dcb8-95b0-9ccb-1cb4-b7362ae67dd1@newbunny.zia.io> <06f001da489d$c74b09e0$55e11da0$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: <4b514a8a-a5c3-f1fa-ff5c-85e086871d75@swisscows.email> Hello spike, On Tue, 16 Jan 2024, spike jones via extropy-chat wrote: > I like camping for three weeks at a time far away from the internet, and I > intend to do it again and again. It clears the mind. It reconnects the > camper with the alternate reality in which humans evolved: actual literal > nature. Thoreau wrote about it a long time ago. He was right. Wise choice! I agree completely. Although I am not hard core enough for 3 weeks, but a week here and there with me, a fishing rod and a lake does wonder (for me) to cleanse the soul. =) Best regards, Daniel From ben at zaiboc.net Tue Jan 16 19:22:27 2024 From: ben at zaiboc.net (Ben Zaiboc) Date: Tue, 16 Jan 2024 19:22:27 +0000 Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <3f36f0ae-2a22-40ed-a1ab-1b05c12353d1@zaiboc.net> On 15/01/2024 04:40, Jason Resch wrote: > Open Individualism argues that, at a fundamental level, all conscious > > beings share a common underlying consciousness or personhood. A common underlying conscousness or personhood that each person is nevertheless completely unaware of, except via theoretical discussions like this. No, I don't buy it. If I'm part of an underlying consciousness, but am somehow not actually conscious of it, then for all practical purposes it might as well not be so (if you're part of a consciousness, but not conscious of it, what does that mean? -? nothing, as far as I can see. Certainly nothing useful). I see no practical application of this idea, and no actual evidence that it's true, so feel quite justified in concluding that it's not, or at least that there's no actual downside to assuming that it's not true. Again, a bit like the idea of the simulation argument and the many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics. Theoretically interesting, to some people, but of no actual use. We're no worse off, in real terms, than if we had never heard of it. Ben -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Tue Jan 16 19:37:44 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Tue, 16 Jan 2024 14:37:44 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Open Individualism In-Reply-To: <3f36f0ae-2a22-40ed-a1ab-1b05c12353d1@zaiboc.net> References: <3f36f0ae-2a22-40ed-a1ab-1b05c12353d1@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: On Tue, Jan 16, 2024, 2:23 PM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > > On 15/01/2024 04:40, Jason Resch wrote: > > Open Individualism argues that, at a fundamental level, all conscious > > beings share a common underlying consciousness or personhood. > > > A common underlying conscousness or personhood that each person is > nevertheless completely unaware of, except via theoretical discussions like > this. > > No, I don't buy it. > > If I'm part of an underlying consciousness, but am somehow not actually > conscious of it, then for all practical purposes it might as well not be so > (if you're part of a consciousness, but not conscious of it, what does that > mean? - nothing, as far as I can see. Certainly nothing useful). > It means you can/will become those mother conscious perspectives. This provides a justification for faith in surviving mind uploading or brain surgery. It means you will survive so long as life survives. It compelled us to not burden future generations with degraded environments or large debts as we will experience those perspectives too. It means we should be compassionate to others for their mistakes for if you were in their shoes (and you are under open individualism), you would (and do) make the same mistakes. It motivates helping others, for their pain is (or will be) your pain. It provides a rational justification for justice, karma, and loving one's neighbor. > I see no practical application of this idea, and no actual evidence that > it's true, so feel quite justified in concluding that it's not, or at least > that there's no actual downside to assuming that it's not true. > The evidence it is true is the same as your belief that you will wake up in your bed the next morning. There your consciousness survives a discontinuous jump through time, space, and loss of some neurons. > Again, a bit like the idea of the simulation argument and the many-worlds > interpretation of quantum mechanics. Theoretically interesting, to some > people, but of no actual use. We're no worse off, in real terms, than if we > had never heard of it. > It might be useful to someone some day when they are planning to upload, but find some of their family members are hesitant and say that "it won't really be them, it will be a copy." How would you counter such reasoning? Jason -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From hkeithhenson at gmail.com Tue Jan 16 20:14:31 2024 From: hkeithhenson at gmail.com (Keith Henson) Date: Tue, 16 Jan 2024 12:14:31 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <3f36f0ae-2a22-40ed-a1ab-1b05c12353d1@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: " How would you counter such reasoning? Bidirectional uploading/downloading. If you have the technical ability to upload, there is no reason you could not go both directions. See "the clinic seed" for a discussion. No reason for consciousness to be interrupted in the switchover process. I suspect that people will prefer the uploaded state, but I also suspect that people will save bodies. Keith On Tue, Jan 16, 2024 at 11:39?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat wrote: > > > > On Tue, Jan 16, 2024, 2:23 PM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat wrote: >> >> >> On 15/01/2024 04:40, Jason Resch wrote: >> >> Open Individualism argues that, at a fundamental level, all conscious >> >> beings share a common underlying consciousness or personhood. >> >> >> A common underlying conscousness or personhood that each person is nevertheless completely unaware of, except via theoretical discussions like this. >> >> No, I don't buy it. >> >> If I'm part of an underlying consciousness, but am somehow not actually conscious of it, then for all practical purposes it might as well not be so (if you're part of a consciousness, but not conscious of it, what does that mean? - nothing, as far as I can see. Certainly nothing useful). > > > It means you can/will become those mother conscious perspectives. > > This provides a justification for faith in surviving mind uploading or brain surgery. > > It means you will survive so long as life survives. > > It compelled us to not burden future generations with degraded environments or large debts as we will experience those perspectives too. > > It means we should be compassionate to others for their mistakes for if you were in their shoes (and you are under open individualism), you would (and do) make the same mistakes. > > It motivates helping others, for their pain is (or will be) your pain. > > It provides a rational justification for justice, karma, and loving one's neighbor. > > >> >> I see no practical application of this idea, and no actual evidence that it's true, so feel quite justified in concluding that it's not, or at least that there's no actual downside to assuming that it's not true. > > > The evidence it is true is the same as your belief that you will wake up in your bed the next morning. There your consciousness survives a discontinuous jump through time, space, and loss of some neurons. > >> >> Again, a bit like the idea of the simulation argument and the many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics. Theoretically interesting, to some people, but of no actual use. We're no worse off, in real terms, than if we had never heard of it. > > > It might be useful to someone some day when they are planning to upload, but find some of their family members are hesitant and say that "it won't really be them, it will be a copy." > > How would you counter such reasoning? > > Jason > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat From jasonresch at gmail.com Tue Jan 16 20:36:29 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Tue, 16 Jan 2024 15:36:29 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <3f36f0ae-2a22-40ed-a1ab-1b05c12353d1@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: On Tue, Jan 16, 2024, 3:14 PM Keith Henson wrote: > " > How would you counter such reasoning? > > Bidirectional uploading/downloading. > Certainly undergoing the procedure will provide such evidence. In my scenario someone is hesitant to do it in the first place. Is there any logical argument that you might devise to help convince such a person to try it? To help them see that it will still be them? > If you have the technical ability to upload, there is no reason you > could not go both directions. > I agree. > See "the clinic seed" for a discussion. No reason for consciousness > to be interrupted in the switchover process. > > I suspect that people will prefer the uploaded state, but I also > suspect that people will save bodies. > Yes, I think there will still be many reasons for interfacing with the external world. Jason > > Keith > > On Tue, Jan 16, 2024 at 11:39?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat > wrote: > > > > > > > > On Tue, Jan 16, 2024, 2:23 PM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> > >> > >> On 15/01/2024 04:40, Jason Resch wrote: > >> > >> Open Individualism argues that, at a fundamental level, all conscious > >> > >> beings share a common underlying consciousness or personhood. > >> > >> > >> A common underlying conscousness or personhood that each person is > nevertheless completely unaware of, except via theoretical discussions like > this. > >> > >> No, I don't buy it. > >> > >> If I'm part of an underlying consciousness, but am somehow not actually > conscious of it, then for all practical purposes it might as well not be so > (if you're part of a consciousness, but not conscious of it, what does that > mean? - nothing, as far as I can see. Certainly nothing useful). > > > > > > It means you can/will become those mother conscious perspectives. > > > > This provides a justification for faith in surviving mind uploading or > brain surgery. > > > > It means you will survive so long as life survives. > > > > It compelled us to not burden future generations with degraded > environments or large debts as we will experience those perspectives too. > > > > It means we should be compassionate to others for their mistakes for if > you were in their shoes (and you are under open individualism), you would > (and do) make the same mistakes. > > > > It motivates helping others, for their pain is (or will be) your pain. > > > > It provides a rational justification for justice, karma, and loving > one's neighbor. > > > > > >> > >> I see no practical application of this idea, and no actual evidence > that it's true, so feel quite justified in concluding that it's not, or at > least that there's no actual downside to assuming that it's not true. > > > > > > The evidence it is true is the same as your belief that you will wake up > in your bed the next morning. There your consciousness survives a > discontinuous jump through time, space, and loss of some neurons. > > > >> > >> Again, a bit like the idea of the simulation argument and the > many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics. Theoretically interesting, > to some people, but of no actual use. We're no worse off, in real terms, > than if we had never heard of it. > > > > > > It might be useful to someone some day when they are planning to upload, > but find some of their family members are hesitant and say that "it won't > really be them, it will be a copy." > > > > How would you counter such reasoning? > > > > Jason > > _______________________________________________ > > extropy-chat mailing list > > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From atymes at gmail.com Tue Jan 16 21:18:31 2024 From: atymes at gmail.com (Adrian Tymes) Date: Tue, 16 Jan 2024 13:18:31 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <3f36f0ae-2a22-40ed-a1ab-1b05c12353d1@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: On Tue, Jan 16, 2024 at 12:16?PM Keith Henson via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > Bidirectional uploading/downloading. > > If you have the technical ability to upload, there is no reason you > could not go both directions. > There might be, for instance if uploading involves destructive brain scanning to create something that everyone, including the post-uploaded individual, agrees is the "same mind" running on silicon, whereas there is no corresponding process to write into an organic brain. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From hkeithhenson at gmail.com Tue Jan 16 21:30:50 2024 From: hkeithhenson at gmail.com (Keith Henson) Date: Tue, 16 Jan 2024 13:30:50 -0800 Subject: [ExI] A Paranormal Prediction In-Reply-To: <4a5801da476c$de20e9f0$9a62bdd0$@rainier66.com> References: <2ab501da4709$73f08030$5bd18090$@rainier66.com> <4a5801da476c$de20e9f0$9a62bdd0$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: On Sun, Jan 14, 2024 at 8:39?PM wrote: > > -----Original Message----- > From: Keith Henson > ... > >...It is worth remembering that most of the genetic selection for war and related happened before agriculture, much less nation-states or presidential elections. So if the result does not seem well adapted, that's no surprise. > > >...Another deep psychological trait is that people are insanely optimistic about winning a war. On average going to war is rewarding to genes but half the time you lose. If people recognized reality, they would know that going to war is a chancy business, but our psychological traits lead us to be far more optimistic about going to war than is rational. > > Keith > > Keith allow me to offer an alternative way of looking at the war meme. > > In our times, war is not against the neighbor tribe. That is the case, however the selection of the psychological traits leading to wars happened when it was war against a neighboring tribe. > War is initiated halfway across the planet b>y the political leaders, who do not themselves go to war. Their immediate offspring do not go to war either. So they are most optimistic about the order of battle. They cannot lose. That's not entirely true. Hitler died and so did Sadam. > > The soldiers on the other hand, are not so eager to go to war, even though some of them may benefit personally. Most lose, even those on the "winning" side. So, our military training system has ways of influencing their "thinking." I have made a case that the psychological mechanisms behind Stockholm syndrome (capture bonding) are invoked in basic training. https://en.citizendium.org/wiki/Capture-bonding > This is far easier with younger men of course, which is why the focus of recruitment is toward 19 year olds who have not had time to form attitudes and are not adept at reasoning. > > All of this is in perfect agreement with the concepts of evolutionary psychology. The behavior of both the leadership waging the war and the teenage grunts doing the dirty work is in agreement with EP. You have not made this clear. In any case, the selection for psychological traits related to war mostly happened long before the current world. Keith > spike > From spike at rainier66.com Tue Jan 16 23:22:17 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (spike at rainier66.com) Date: Tue, 16 Jan 2024 15:22:17 -0800 Subject: [ExI] robot makes dinner Message-ID: <002501da48d2$d95aa7a0$8c0ff6e0$@rainier66.com> Cool! I want one: https://twitter.com/tonyzzhao/status/1742603121682153852?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw %7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1742603121682153852%7Ctwgr%5Ec1e6556f16c61 f123ccab0e8eff4f05b9836c1f8%7Ctwcon%5Es1_ &ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fdirectorblue.blogspot.com%2F2024%2F01%2Ftop-20-tweets -tonight-mlk-would-be.html spike -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From hkeithhenson at gmail.com Wed Jan 17 00:13:22 2024 From: hkeithhenson at gmail.com (Keith Henson) Date: Tue, 16 Jan 2024 16:13:22 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <3f36f0ae-2a22-40ed-a1ab-1b05c12353d1@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: I can see no need for "destructive brain scanning",' If you want to go that way, let me know how it works out. But regardless, I am not going to go that way. Keith On Tue, Jan 16, 2024 at 1:19?PM Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat wrote: > > On Tue, Jan 16, 2024 at 12:16?PM Keith Henson via extropy-chat wrote: >> >> Bidirectional uploading/downloading. >> >> If you have the technical ability to upload, there is no reason you >> could not go both directions. > > > There might be, for instance if uploading involves destructive brain scanning to create something that everyone, including the post-uploaded individual, agrees is the "same mind" running on silicon, whereas there is no corresponding process to write into an organic brain. > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat From efc at swisscows.email Wed Jan 17 10:04:46 2024 From: efc at swisscows.email (efc at swisscows.email) Date: Wed, 17 Jan 2024 11:04:46 +0100 (CET) Subject: [ExI] robot makes dinner In-Reply-To: <002501da48d2$d95aa7a0$8c0ff6e0$@rainier66.com> References: <002501da48d2$d95aa7a0$8c0ff6e0$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: Hello spike, I'm sorry to disappoint but for those who want a bit more in depth information I stumbled upon this link today: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39022996 " This is in teleoperated, not autonomous mode. Training data is collected while teleoperating. That robot can do some things autonomously, but not anything like the whole meal task. The Github repository is more useful.[1] That separates autonomous from teleoperated mode. Also, there's video at 1x speed. This thing is actually very slow in autonomous mode. It's real progress, but the hype exceeds the results. [1] https://tonyzhaozh.github.io/aloha/" I was hoping it was autonomous, but looked way too good to be true. =( Best regards, Daniel On Tue, 16 Jan 2024, spike jones via extropy-chat wrote: > > ? > > Cool!? I want one: > > ? > > https://twitter.com/tonyzzhao/status/1742603121682153852?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1742603121682153852%7C > twgr%5Ec1e6556f16c61f123ccab0e8eff4f05b9836c1f8%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fdirectorblue.blogspot.com%2F2024%2F01%2Ftop-20- > tweets-tonight-mlk-would-be.html > > ? > > spike > > > From spike at rainier66.com Wed Jan 17 13:48:06 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (spike at rainier66.com) Date: Wed, 17 Jan 2024 05:48:06 -0800 Subject: [ExI] robot makes dinner In-Reply-To: References: <002501da48d2$d95aa7a0$8c0ff6e0$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: <009401da494b$cd294620$677bd260$@rainier66.com> Thx Daniel, There were hints the video was faster than real time. The egg cracking scene for instance, that was a big clue. Thanks for the clarification. This is a good thing for upcoming robotics engineers: there is still work to do. Plenty of it. We want a K2SO. We all do: a wisecracking robotic valet to come along with us and help us in everything we do. spike -----Original Message----- From: extropy-chat On Behalf Of efc--- via extropy-chat Sent: Wednesday, 17 January, 2024 2:05 AM To: spike jones via extropy-chat Cc: efc at swisscows.email Subject: Re: [ExI] robot makes dinner Hello spike, I'm sorry to disappoint but for those who want a bit more in depth information I stumbled upon this link today: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39022996 " This is in teleoperated, not autonomous mode. Training data is collected while teleoperating. That robot can do some things autonomously, but not anything like the whole meal task. The Github repository is more useful.[1] That separates autonomous from teleoperated mode. Also, there's video at 1x speed. This thing is actually very slow in autonomous mode. It's real progress, but the hype exceeds the results. [1] https://tonyzhaozh.github.io/aloha/" I was hoping it was autonomous, but looked way too good to be true. =( Best regards, Daniel On Tue, 16 Jan 2024, spike jones via extropy-chat wrote: > > ? > > Cool!? I want one: > > ? > > https://twitter.com/tonyzzhao/status/1742603121682153852?ref_src=twsrc > %5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1742603121682153852%7C > twgr%5Ec1e6556f16c61f123ccab0e8eff4f05b9836c1f8%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url= > https%3A%2F%2Fdirectorblue.blogspot.com%2F2024%2F01%2Ftop-20- > tweets-tonight-mlk-would-be.html > > ? > > spike > > > From pharos at gmail.com Wed Jan 17 13:58:33 2024 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Wed, 17 Jan 2024 13:58:33 +0000 Subject: [ExI] robot makes dinner In-Reply-To: <009401da494b$cd294620$677bd260$@rainier66.com> References: <002501da48d2$d95aa7a0$8c0ff6e0$@rainier66.com> <009401da494b$cd294620$677bd260$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: On Wed, 17 Jan 2024 at 13:50, spike jones via extropy-chat wrote: > > Thx Daniel, > > There were hints the video was faster than real time. The egg cracking > scene for instance, that was a big clue. > > Thanks for the clarification. This is a good thing for upcoming robotics > engineers: there is still work to do. Plenty of it. We want a K2SO. We > all do: a wisecracking robotic valet to come along with us and help us in > everything we do. > > spike > _______________________________________________ I don't think it is being over-hyped. Look at what it is. Two Stanford students (plus an advisor) have cobbled some kit together to make a robot for a fraction of the cost of big company robots. They have created teleoperated training, for a fraction of the cost of training commercial robots. And the training is far quicker than large database training methods. And finally, this experimental lash-up actually works! This is the trial proof-of-concept version. Everything from now on is optimisation and getting it into production. The dream of a sex robot that also cooks dinner is just over the horizon! ;) BillK From efc at swisscows.email Wed Jan 17 14:28:08 2024 From: efc at swisscows.email (efc at swisscows.email) Date: Wed, 17 Jan 2024 15:28:08 +0100 (CET) Subject: [ExI] robot makes dinner In-Reply-To: References: <002501da48d2$d95aa7a0$8c0ff6e0$@rainier66.com> <009401da494b$cd294620$677bd260$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: <970934ca-00b8-271c-abf3-6d3c8eabde52@swisscows.email> Well, I do have a good wife, so the dinner problem is fixed... but a C3PO for cleaning, that would be a dream come true! ;) Best regards, Daniel On Wed, 17 Jan 2024, BillK via extropy-chat wrote: > On Wed, 17 Jan 2024 at 13:50, spike jones via extropy-chat > wrote: >> >> Thx Daniel, >> >> There were hints the video was faster than real time. The egg cracking >> scene for instance, that was a big clue. >> >> Thanks for the clarification. This is a good thing for upcoming robotics >> engineers: there is still work to do. Plenty of it. We want a K2SO. We >> all do: a wisecracking robotic valet to come along with us and help us in >> everything we do. >> >> spike >> _______________________________________________ > > > I don't think it is being over-hyped. > Look at what it is. Two Stanford students (plus an advisor) have > cobbled some kit together to make a robot for a fraction of the cost > of big company robots. They have created teleoperated training, > for a fraction of the cost of training commercial robots. > And the training is far quicker than large database training methods. > And finally, this experimental lash-up actually works! > > This is the trial proof-of-concept version. > Everything from now on is optimisation and getting it into production. > > The dream of a sex robot that also cooks dinner is just over the horizon! ;) > > BillK > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > From efc at swisscows.email Wed Jan 17 14:28:46 2024 From: efc at swisscows.email (efc at swisscows.email) Date: Wed, 17 Jan 2024 15:28:46 +0100 (CET) Subject: [ExI] robot makes dinner In-Reply-To: <009401da494b$cd294620$677bd260$@rainier66.com> References: <002501da48d2$d95aa7a0$8c0ff6e0$@rainier66.com> <009401da494b$cd294620$677bd260$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: <63cd47d0-09d5-7ce7-27fc-09a9c67d35b4@swisscows.email> On Wed, 17 Jan 2024, spike at rainier66.com wrote: > Thx Daniel, > > There were hints the video was faster than real time. The egg cracking > scene for instance, that was a big clue. > > Thanks for the clarification. This is a good thing for upcoming robotics > engineers: there is still work to do. Plenty of it. We want a K2SO. We > all do: a wisecracking robotic valet to come along with us and help us in > everything we do. You're welcome. Yes, can't wait for it! =) Best regards, Daniel > > spike > > > > > > -----Original Message----- > From: extropy-chat On Behalf Of > efc--- via extropy-chat > Sent: Wednesday, 17 January, 2024 2:05 AM > To: spike jones via extropy-chat > Cc: efc at swisscows.email > Subject: Re: [ExI] robot makes dinner > > Hello spike, I'm sorry to disappoint but for those who want a bit more in > depth information I stumbled upon this link today: > > https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39022996 > > " This is in teleoperated, not autonomous mode. Training data is collected > while teleoperating. That robot can do some things autonomously, but not > anything like the whole meal task. > > The Github repository is more useful.[1] That separates autonomous from > teleoperated mode. Also, there's video at 1x speed. This thing is actually > very slow in autonomous mode. > > It's real progress, but the hype exceeds the results. > > [1] https://tonyzhaozh.github.io/aloha/" > > I was hoping it was autonomous, but looked way too good to be true. =( > > Best regards, > Daniel > > > On Tue, 16 Jan 2024, spike jones via extropy-chat wrote: > >> >> ? >> >> Cool!? I want one: >> >> ? >> >> https://twitter.com/tonyzzhao/status/1742603121682153852?ref_src=twsrc >> %5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1742603121682153852%7C >> twgr%5Ec1e6556f16c61f123ccab0e8eff4f05b9836c1f8%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url= >> https%3A%2F%2Fdirectorblue.blogspot.com%2F2024%2F01%2Ftop-20- >> tweets-tonight-mlk-would-be.html >> >> ? >> >> spike >> >> >> > > > From pharos at gmail.com Wed Jan 17 11:47:00 2024 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Wed, 17 Jan 2024 11:47:00 +0000 Subject: [ExI] robot makes dinner In-Reply-To: References: <002501da48d2$d95aa7a0$8c0ff6e0$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: On Wed, 17 Jan 2024 at 10:07, efc--- via extropy-chat wrote: > > Hello spike, I'm sorry to disappoint but for those who want a bit more in > depth information I stumbled upon this link today: > > https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39022996 > > " This is in teleoperated, not autonomous mode. Training data is collected > while teleoperating. That robot can do some things autonomously, but not > anything like the whole meal task. > > The Github repository is more useful.[1] That separates autonomous from > teleoperated mode. Also, there's video at 1x speed. This thing is actually > very slow in autonomous mode. > > It's real progress, but the hype exceeds the results. > > [1] https://tonyzhaozh.github.io/aloha/" > > I was hoping it was autonomous, but looked way too good to be true. =( > > Best regards, Daniel >_______________________________________________ I don't think it is being over-hyped. Look at what it is. Two Stanford students (plus an advisor) have cobbled some kit together to make a robot for a fraction of the cost of big company robots. They have created teleoperated training, again for a fraction of the cost of training commercial robots. And the training is far quicker than large database training methods. And finally, this experimental model actually works! This is the Model T Ford proof-of-concept version. Everything from now on is optimisation and getting it into production. Spike's dream of a sex robot that also cooks dinner is just over the horizon! ;) BillK From spike at rainier66.com Wed Jan 17 16:35:39 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (spike at rainier66.com) Date: Wed, 17 Jan 2024 08:35:39 -0800 Subject: [ExI] robot makes dinner In-Reply-To: References: <002501da48d2$d95aa7a0$8c0ff6e0$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: <003b01da4963$35010460$9f030d20$@rainier66.com> -----Original Message----- From: extropy-chat On Behalf Of BillK via extropy-chat >_______________________________________________ >...I don't think it is being over-hyped. ... >...And finally, this experimental model actually works! >...Spike's dream of a sex robot that also cooks dinner is just over the horizon! ;) BillK _______________________________________________ Meh. Dinner schminner. And it really doesn't even need to do sex, for many of us fortunate enough to have a capable and eager mate (my bride and I are a few weeks short of our 40th anniversary.) I am thinking of a wisecracking K2SO, so that much of the function is entertainment. In that sense, the early household robots will really be a toy. And sure, I suppose it can be THAT kind of toy, for those who want that sorta thing. The reason that this is such a dream to me is the money to be made on it, and the potential to allow humanity to escape a Malthusian nightmare. If we can design a suitable alternative, many otherwise fertile people will choose it rather than reproduce. And I get rich of course, but hey, I would deserve it for saving humanity. spike From pharos at gmail.com Wed Jan 17 16:50:01 2024 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Wed, 17 Jan 2024 16:50:01 +0000 Subject: [ExI] robot makes dinner In-Reply-To: <003b01da4963$35010460$9f030d20$@rainier66.com> References: <002501da48d2$d95aa7a0$8c0ff6e0$@rainier66.com> <003b01da4963$35010460$9f030d20$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: On Wed, 17 Jan 2024 at 16:35, wrote: > > Meh. Dinner schminner. And it really doesn't even need to do sex, for many > of us fortunate enough to have a capable and eager mate (my bride and I are > a few weeks short of our 40th anniversary.) > > I am thinking of a wisecracking K2SO, so that much of the function is > entertainment. In that sense, the early household robots will really be a > toy. And sure, I suppose it can be THAT kind of toy, for those who want > that sorta thing. > > The reason that this is such a dream to me is the money to be made on it, > and the potential to allow humanity to escape a Malthusian nightmare. If we > can design a suitable alternative, many otherwise fertile people will choose > it rather than reproduce. And I get rich of course, but hey, I would > deserve it for saving humanity. > > spike >----------------------------- That post disappeared for about six hours, then suddenly appeared on Exi-chat. I had reposted it by then. Anyway, you do realise that your money-making pleasure toy is one of the possible reasons for species going extinct? With AGI running everything and humans playing with pleasure toys and virtual reality, whose job is it to continue the species? BillK From spike at rainier66.com Wed Jan 17 17:42:43 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (spike at rainier66.com) Date: Wed, 17 Jan 2024 09:42:43 -0800 Subject: [ExI] robot makes dinner In-Reply-To: References: <002501da48d2$d95aa7a0$8c0ff6e0$@rainier66.com> <003b01da4963$35010460$9f030d20$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: <05c501da496c$93ab8cc0$bb02a640$@rainier66.com> -----Original Message----- From: extropy-chat On Behalf Of BillK via extropy-chat . >----------------------------- >>.. Meh. Dinner schminner... >...Anyway, you do realise that your money-making pleasure toy is one of the possible reasons for species going extinct?... BillK, on the contrary sir. Such a thing would not cause the extinction of the species, any more than birth control pills did. There will always be those with a religious notion that it is their sacred duty to breed, or that it is a sin to pleasure oneself with artificial devices. Also note: much of our current western technology has not fully penetrated the African continent. There are plenty of humans available there who have never used a computer and have little risk of failing to breed because of our K2SO. That whole notion is a western dissipation. >...With AGI running everything and humans playing with pleasure toys and virtual reality, whose job is it to continue the species? BillK _______________________________________________ Do let me reassure you BillK, humanity is in no danger of extinction, none. Humanity does not suffer habitat contraction. Ours is the only species to have mastered habitat expansion, at the expense of every other species. Humans can live anywhere, after rearranging the local habitat to suit our needs. The whole question is analogous in a way to uploading. If uploading is possible (and I think it is (based on my unsupported faith that the magic act we call consciousness is not substrate dependent)) and we develop that technology (and I think we eventually will) then some subset of humanity will eventually upload. When or if that happens, biological humanity will still be here on this planet, and life will go on without us. spike From giulio at gmail.com Thu Jan 18 09:30:12 2024 From: giulio at gmail.com (Giulio Prisco) Date: Thu, 18 Jan 2024 10:30:12 +0100 Subject: [ExI] My new talk on AI & all that Message-ID: Listen to my conversation with Esther Galfalvi on the future of AI (BGI24 pre-event series). Topics: Artificial Intelligence (AI), Artificial General Intelligence (AGI), whether machines can think and have subjective experiences, consciousness & self, the future, space expansion, our duty to our mind children, and our duty to the universe. Also, why do people fear AI? But the real question is, who wants us to fear AI and why? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zEAGd-FWT94 From ben at zaiboc.net Thu Jan 18 11:44:57 2024 From: ben at zaiboc.net (Ben Zaiboc) Date: Thu, 18 Jan 2024 11:44:57 +0000 Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On 16/01/2024 21:31, Jason Resch wrote: > On Tue, Jan 16, 2024, 2:23 PM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat > wrote: > > On 15/01/2024 04:40, Jason Resch wrote: >> Open Individualism argues that, at a fundamental level, all conscious >> >> beings share a common underlying consciousness or personhood. > A common underlying conscousness or personhood that each person is > nevertheless completely unaware of, except via theoretical > discussions like this. No, I don't buy it. If I'm part of an > underlying consciousness, but am somehow not actually conscious of > it, then for all practical purposes it might as well not be so (if > you're part of a consciousness, but not conscious of it, what does > that mean? -? nothing, as far as I can see. Certainly nothing > useful). > > It means you can/will become those mother conscious perspectives. > This provides a justification for faith in surviving mind uploading or > brain surgery. > It means you will survive so long as life survives. > It compelled us to not burden future generations with degraded > environments or large debts as we will experience those perspectives too. > It means we should be compassionate to others for their mistakes for > if you were in their shoes (and you are under open individualism), you > would (and do) make the same mistakes. > It motivates helping others, for their pain is (or will be) your pain. > It provides a rational justification for justice, karma, and loving > one's neighbor. > > I see no practical application of this idea, and no actual > evidence that it's true, so feel quite justified in concluding > that it's not, or at least that there's no actual downside to > assuming that it's not true. > > The evidence it is true is the same as your belief that you will wake > up in your bed the next morning. There your consciousness survives a > discontinuous jump through time, space, and loss of some neurons. > > Again, a bit like the idea of the simulation argument and the > many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics. Theoretically > interesting, to some people, but of no actual use. We're no worse > off, in real terms, than if we had never heard of it. > > It might be useful to someone some day when they are planning to > upload, but find some of their family members are hesitant and say > that "it won't really be them, it will be a copy." > How would you counter such reasoning? The whole concept of uploading is based on the understanding that minds are dynamic information patterns, and dualism is not true. That's the central thing for people to realise (also, it seems, a very difficult thing). Once that is done, the objections disappear, and statements such as "it won't be them, it will be a copy" can be seen to have no meaning ("this is not my email, this is just a copy!"). From what I can see, none of what you claim about Open Individualism is based on scientific principles, corresponds to the laws of physics or is explainable in terms of mechanisms. It seems to be supernatural thinking, bearing a lot of similarity to ideas such as 'god', 'heaven' and so-on. I'd class it as mysticism. In keeping with that, I'm tempted to ask some questions inspired by the stereotypical 'sunday-school' kids questions: What about my dog? Is that included in Open Individualism? What about my stick insects? What about aliens? Trees? Bacteria? Or is it just biological humans? or things with nervous systems? Based on the same physical principles as ours? or any information processing systems? Or just certain classes of them? Will AGIs be included? What about a mind running on a beer-cans-and-string brain? What about John Conway's Game of Life? And what basis is there for answering any of these questions? Ben -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From ben at zaiboc.net Thu Jan 18 11:50:40 2024 From: ben at zaiboc.net (Ben Zaiboc) Date: Thu, 18 Jan 2024 11:50:40 +0000 Subject: [ExI] Upload/Download (was: Re: Fwd: Open Individualism) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <81a727c0-0648-494f-9081-afbb09c67637@zaiboc.net> Keith Henson said: >> I suspect that people will prefer the uploaded state, but I also suspect that people will save bodies. Jason Resch said: > Yes, I think there will still be many reasons for interfacing with the external world. That remark seems to imply you think that uploads would not interface with the external world. I don't see why they wouldn't, and I'd certainly expect they'd be able to if they wanted. If nothing else, uploads should be able to maintain their own hardware. If you were an upload, would you want to entrust the care and maintenance of your hardware to biological beings? That will probably be the case at first, but in the long run, we don't want to depend on beings that can be disabled or destroyed so easily. It would be ironic if civilisation was wiped out by a disease, say, in spite of a good part of it being resistant to the disease! Ben From jasonresch at gmail.com Thu Jan 18 16:02:47 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Thu, 18 Jan 2024 11:02:47 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Thu, Jan 18, 2024, 6:46 AM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > > On 16/01/2024 21:31, Jason Resch wrote: > > On Tue, Jan 16, 2024, 2:23 PM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat wrote: > >> On 15/01/2024 04:40, Jason Resch wrote: >> >> >> Open Individualism argues that, at a fundamental level, all conscious >> >> beings share a common underlying consciousness or personhood. >> >> A common underlying conscousness or personhood that each person is >> nevertheless completely unaware of, except via theoretical discussions like >> this. No, I don't buy it. If I'm part of an underlying consciousness, but >> am somehow not actually conscious of it, then for all practical purposes it >> might as well not be so (if you're part of a consciousness, but not >> conscious of it, what does that mean? - nothing, as far as I can see. >> Certainly nothing useful). >> > It means you can/will become those mother conscious perspectives. > This provides a justification for faith in surviving mind uploading or > brain surgery. > It means you will survive so long as life survives. > It compelled us to not burden future generations with degraded > environments or large debts as we will experience those perspectives too. > It means we should be compassionate to others for their mistakes for if > you were in their shoes (and you are under open individualism), you would > (and do) make the same mistakes. > It motivates helping others, for their pain is (or will be) your pain. > It provides a rational justification for justice, karma, and loving one's > neighbor. > >> I see no practical application of this idea, and no actual evidence that >> it's true, so feel quite justified in concluding that it's not, or at least >> that there's no actual downside to assuming that it's not true. >> > The evidence it is true is the same as your belief that you will wake up > in your bed the next morning. There your consciousness survives a > discontinuous jump through time, space, and loss of some neurons. > >> Again, a bit like the idea of the simulation argument and the many-worlds >> interpretation of quantum mechanics. Theoretically interesting, to some >> people, but of no actual use. We're no worse off, in real terms, than if we >> had never heard of it. >> > It might be useful to someone some day when they are planning to upload, > but find some of their family members are hesitant and say that "it won't > really be them, it will be a copy." > How would you counter such reasoning? > > > The whole concept of uploading is based on the understanding that minds > are dynamic information patterns, and dualism is not true. That's the > central thing for people to realise (also, it seems, a very difficult > thing). Once that is done, the objections disappear, and statements such as > "it won't be them, it will be a copy" can be seen to have no meaning ("this > is not my email, this is just a copy!"). > > From what I can see, none of what you claim about Open Individualism is > based on scientific principles, > It corresponds to thought experiments (i.e., logic and rationality better than the alternatives). It corresponds to Occam's razor better than the alternatives, as it makes fewer assumptions, it corresponds to laws of probability better than the alternatives, which are exceedingly improbable compared to it. You can keep repeating to yourself that it's not scientific, and continue to ignore the thought experiments I've provided which demonstrate it's truth, however, if that makes you feel better. corresponds to the laws of physics or is explainable in terms of > mechanisms. It seems to be supernatural thinking, bearing a lot of > similarity to ideas such as 'god', 'heaven' and so-on. I'd class it as > mysticism. > There's nothing mystical about it. > In keeping with that, I'm tempted to ask some questions inspired by the > stereotypical 'sunday-school' kids questions: What about my dog? Is that > included in Open Individualism? What about my stick insects? What about > aliens? Trees? Bacteria? Or is it just biological humans? or things with > nervous systems? Based on the same physical principles as ours? or any > information processing systems? Or just certain classes of them? Will AGIs > be included? What about a mind running on a beer-cans-and-string brain? > What about John Conway's Game of Life? > It's all conscious beings. > And what basis is there for answering any of these questions? > The idea that there is no metaphysical soul (your pattern of information notion of consciousness) together with the idea that you will experience more than one moment in your life, leads to open individualism. You will experience all patterns of information from all perspectives. This follows because there is no "soul" that pins you down to only experiencing the experiences of a single body. So it is the converse: it is the conventional view of personal identity that is the closest to this metaphysical/religious assumptions. Jason -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike at rainier66.com Thu Jan 18 16:06:12 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (spike at rainier66.com) Date: Thu, 18 Jan 2024 08:06:12 -0800 Subject: [ExI] it's not? indeed? Message-ID: <046001da4a28$42a46bf0$c7ed43d0$@rainier66.com> Dr. Fauci has testified before a House subcommittee that the lab leak of Covid19 is not a conspiracy theory. I want to know how he figures is isn't. It IS a conspiracy theory. Just because a theory turns out to be true, it is still referred to as a theory. Examples: theory of evolution, relativity theory and so on. So even if it is proven that covid19 escaped from the Wuhan Institute of Virology, which it will never be, for the Chinese have destroyed the evidence, it is still a theory. Even if the overwhelming consensus among scientists agree on that origin, it remains a theory. There appears to have been some unethical practices involved in discrediting that theory. The Chinese destroying the evidence and restricting access to those survivors who were there. Dr. Fauci working with and choosing scientists to write the article for Nature Medicine, Dr. Collins the others, would constitute a conspiracy, ja? They worked together to discredit a plausible theory, which is a conspiracy. So. as has been demonstrated repeatedly, just because a notion is a conspiracy theory does not prove it is not true. The definition has changed: conspiracy theories might be true. Even if it is true, the lab leak origin of Covid19 is now and will forever be a conspiracy theory. spike -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Thu Jan 18 16:17:05 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Thu, 18 Jan 2024 11:17:05 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Upload/Download (was: Re: Fwd: Open Individualism) In-Reply-To: <81a727c0-0648-494f-9081-afbb09c67637@zaiboc.net> References: <81a727c0-0648-494f-9081-afbb09c67637@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: On Thu, Jan 18, 2024, 6:51 AM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > > Keith Henson said: > >> I suspect that people will prefer the uploaded state, but I also > suspect that people will save bodies. > > Jason Resch said: > > Yes, I think there will still be many reasons for interfacing with > the external world. > > That remark seems to imply you think that uploads would not interface > with the external world. I don't see why they wouldn't, and I'd > certainly expect they'd be able to if they wanted. > Perhaps, but then again, that might be considered too dangerous. Future computing substrates might be too fragile and too subtle for any human mind to manage in any way. And if they break something they might kill a billion people running on that node. > If nothing else, uploads should be able to maintain their own hardware. In the near future we will be able to build hardware they maintains itself. Or we could envision nanobots that maintain things. > If you were an upload, would you want to entrust the care and > maintenance of your hardware to biological beings? That will probably be > the case at first, but in the long run, we don't want to depend on > beings that can be disabled or destroyed so easily. It would be ironic > if civilisation was wiped out by a disease, say, in spite of a good part > of it being resistant to the disease! > My views are inspired, among others, by this vision of the future: http://frombob.to/you/aconvers.html Also, consider that if we upload ourselves to computing substrates that run our minds a million times faster, then the "real world" becomes incredibly slow. It would take subjective weeks for each click tick of each second in the real world. They really does isolate the worlds. Even the speed of light is slowed to something like a jetliners, so sending an text message to the other side of the world is something that takes hours to arrive. To me this suggests the future will be not only vastly miniaturized but also localized. We will create many copies (for redundancy) of large collections of individuals (perhaps all of humanity) in localized clusters for speed of access and interface. There would be no way any human could maintain such machines, as they would operate on atomic or subatomic scales, and their million+ fold time speed difference makes the physical world a static alien thing. You could run around in the rain at normal speed in the real world with a robot body for a few minutes, but it will cost you years of subjective time, all your family and friends will go years without seeing or hearing from you while you dance in the rain. But you could have had the exact same experience in virtual reality running at the same speed as everyone else in the uploaded state. Jason -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pharos at gmail.com Thu Jan 18 16:57:34 2024 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Thu, 18 Jan 2024 16:57:34 +0000 Subject: [ExI] Upload/Download (was: Re: Fwd: Open Individualism) In-Reply-To: References: <81a727c0-0648-494f-9081-afbb09c67637@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: On Thu, 18 Jan 2024 at 16:19, Jason Resch via extropy-chat wrote: > > > Also, consider that if we upload ourselves to computing substrates that run our minds a million times faster, then the "real world" becomes incredibly slow. It would take subjective weeks for each click tick of each second in the real world. They really does isolate the worlds. Even the speed of light is slowed to something like a jetliners, so sending an text message to the other side of the world is something that takes hours to arrive. > > To me this suggests the future will be not only vastly miniaturized but also localized. We will create many copies (for redundancy) of large collections of individuals (perhaps all of humanity) in localized clusters for speed of access and interface. > > There would be no way any human could maintain such machines, as they would operate on atomic or subatomic scales, and their million+ fold time speed difference makes the physical world a static alien thing. You could run around in the rain at normal speed in the real world with a robot body for a few minutes, but it will cost you years of subjective time, all your family and friends will go years without seeing or hearing from you while you dance in the rain. But you could have had the exact same experience in virtual reality running at the same speed as everyone else in the uploaded state. > > Jason > _______________________________________________ I think this speed comparison is not sufficiently appreciated. The speed-up of uploaded civilisations will effectively 'freeze' the outside world. I see this as one possible explanation of why the galaxy is not swarming with tourist aliens. Travel simply means losing too much uploaded life time in their civilisation. Of course, there are ways round this in theory. Send robots off exploring, etc. But they would have to wait millions of their years to get information returned, so why bother? BillK From postmowoods at gmail.com Thu Jan 18 18:44:25 2024 From: postmowoods at gmail.com (Kelly Anderson) Date: Thu, 18 Jan 2024 11:44:25 -0700 Subject: [ExI] robot makes dinner In-Reply-To: <05c501da496c$93ab8cc0$bb02a640$@rainier66.com> References: <002501da48d2$d95aa7a0$8c0ff6e0$@rainier66.com> <003b01da4963$35010460$9f030d20$@rainier66.com> <05c501da496c$93ab8cc0$bb02a640$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: The headline here is clearly "Sex Robots have not Fully Penetrated Africa Yet"... Good one. -Kelly On Wed, Jan 17, 2024 at 10:43?AM spike jones via extropy-chat wrote: > > > > -----Original Message----- > From: extropy-chat On Behalf Of > BillK via extropy-chat > . > >----------------------------- > > > > >>.. Meh. Dinner schminner... > > >...Anyway, you do realise that your money-making pleasure toy is one of the > possible reasons for species going extinct?... > > BillK, on the contrary sir. Such a thing would not cause the extinction of > the species, any more than birth control pills did. There will always be > those with a religious notion that it is their sacred duty to breed, or that > it is a sin to pleasure oneself with artificial devices. > > Also note: much of our current western technology has not fully penetrated > the African continent. There are plenty of humans available there who have > never used a computer and have little risk of failing to breed because of > our K2SO. That whole notion is a western dissipation. > > >...With AGI running everything and humans playing with pleasure toys and > virtual reality, whose job is it to continue the species? BillK > _______________________________________________ > > Do let me reassure you BillK, humanity is in no danger of extinction, none. > Humanity does not suffer habitat contraction. Ours is the only species to > have mastered habitat expansion, at the expense of every other species. > Humans can live anywhere, after rearranging the local habitat to suit our > needs. > > The whole question is analogous in a way to uploading. If uploading is > possible (and I think it is (based on my unsupported faith that the magic > act we call consciousness is not substrate dependent)) and we develop that > technology (and I think we eventually will) then some subset of humanity > will eventually upload. When or if that happens, biological humanity will > still be here on this planet, and life will go on without us. > > spike > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat From hkeithhenson at gmail.com Thu Jan 18 18:52:47 2024 From: hkeithhenson at gmail.com (Keith Henson) Date: Thu, 18 Jan 2024 10:52:47 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Upload/Download (was: Re: Fwd: Open Individualism) In-Reply-To: References: <81a727c0-0648-494f-9081-afbb09c67637@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: Jason wrote > Also, consider that if we upload ourselves to computing substrates that run our minds a million times faster, then the "real world" becomes incredibly slow. I wrote about this 12 years ago, but due to what we see at Tabby's Star, things might go differently. Transhumanism and the Human Expansion into Space: a Conflict with Physics By: Keith Henson Published: April 12, 2012 Orbital Space Settlements There are deep memetic roots between expansion into space and transhumanism, largely through Eric Drexler, creator of the modern concepts of nanotechnology and an early activist in the post-Apollo flowering of the space movement. I was deeply involved in the post-Apollo space movement (L5 Society) and moderately involved in early transhumanism, having been a reviewer of Engines of Creation when it was being written and a participant on the early Extropian mailing list where such concepts as Jupiter brains, M brains, and computronium were first discussed. No less an authority than RU Sirius has referred to me as ?sort of an ur-transhumanist?. I have long had misgivings about large aggregations of computing nodes forming a mind because of speed-of-light delays. That will reduce ?thinking speed,? since a mind cannot ?be of one mind? if much it is not aware of the current situation due to speed-of-light delays. There is an analogous problem within a culture. We have a world culture today headed toward a monoculture because electronic communications on fiber optics has cut the delay to getting information from one side of the world to the other to sub-seconds. It hasn?t always been this way. Ferdinand Magellan?s expedition of 1519?1522 became the first to circumnavigate the Earth, a project in its day not unlike the moon landing. My point in mentioning this is not the privations they suffered (extreme) or the low survival rate (232 of 270 died before they got back, including Ferdinand) but the sheer length of time (three years) they were out of touch. How much communication delay can a society tolerate before it breaks up into smaller units? There are historical examples; the Roman Empire broke up partly because their communications failed, but I am not sure how they apply in a post-singularity world. At the speed of light, it takes 2/15 of a second to go all around the planet. (40,000 km/300,000km/s) What?s to cause communication delay? The problem is uploaded humans speeding up. Human brains are asynchronous, but, given reaction times, we can impute an equivalent clock rate of ~200 Hz. Which means a human brain (or brain equivalent) running in moderately fast hardware could run a million times faster. (200 MHz is not fast hardware.) You might ask, ?Why would humans do such a silly thing?? Because intelligence is a large factor in sexual attraction. This was probably established in the Stone Age. Of course, intelligence is valuable outside of sexual attraction, being correlated with many other personality and life-history traits, and is especially valued by transhumanists. One aspect of being smart is thinking fast, or at least thinking faster than the person you are trying to impress. That leads at once to a runaway ?Red Queen? situation where, when we can run our thinking faster, we would rapidly push the computational speed to the limit, whatever it is. Speeding up will mandate uploading into faster hardware. Humans could think a little faster in existing bodies, but not a lot. The problem is that the faster you run your brain, the more the world around you seems to slow down. With only a modest speedup, movement would seem like wading through molasses. If you desire serious speedup, it probably has to be in a simulation of the environment to match your faster perception. Speeding up rapidly leads to a situation where distance causes severe communication delays. We hardly notice telephone communication delays unless they are going through satellites. Speed us up a million-fold and the communication round-trip delay gets to be serious. A million-to-one speed-up would impose a subjective round-trip delay of three days from one side of the earth to the other. The subjective round trip delay to the moon would be two months. The delay from hearing back from a computronium node on the far side of Earth?s orbit would be 2,169 years, a long time even by Ferdinand ?s standards. The subjective delay talking to an interstellar spacecraft 10 light-years out would be 20 million years. I don?t know what the maximum is, but two thousand years seems a long response time for a single polity. Twenty million subjective years to get an answer back is just ridiculous. The speed-up limit may be 100 times as high. Due to this line of thinking, I no longer think it?s practical to surround a star with computronium. Instead, I suspect population centers will shrink to sizes in the few hundred-meter range and sunk in the deep oceans for cooling. Taking two subjective seconds as the upper limit round-trip delay for telephone-like communication, the distance could be up to 300,000 km or 300 million meters. For a million-to-one speedup, that means that all the communicating nodes can be no more than 300 meters apart, i.e., configured as a sphere 300 meters in diameter with a hole to pump water in or out (for cooling). The area of the sphere is ~283,000 square meters. We now need a number for how big a human-class computer might be. Eric Drexler gave considerable thought to this problem and came up with the volume of a coffee cup. For simple calculations let us take that as a 10-cm cube, or 100 minds to the square meter arranged one layer deep. Taking the area times Eric?s number, the population of fast-uploaded humans per communicating fast culture could be as high as 28 million. If each drew 20 kW (1,000 times the 20 W our biological brains use), the total power draw would be 540 GW. The other factor of a thousand in the million-to-one speed-up comes from the hardware being more efficient than biological brains. With a fair amount of pressure difference and many fine passages, a water flow of one liter per second through each person (10 square cm) would carry off 20 kW with a temperature rise of about 5? C. The deep ocean is definitely the place for this community. If you wanted to talk to someone without a delay of up to a second, one of you could move close to the physical location of the other party via a ?core swap.? The community might have ten percent or so of empty brains to facilitate moving around. With each order of magnitude speed up, the maximum community size falls by a factor of 100. That is, a community running at only 100,000 to one could have 2.8 billion residents and one running at 10 million to one would only hold 280,000. The hundred-million-to-one speedup habitat would only hold 2,800. Talk about a physics-enforced oligarchy! Would you want to move from a slum where there was only a 100,000-to-one speed-up to one of these ?elite? places with a million-to-one speed-up? Do you yearn for the 100-million-to-one existence? This might sound like total nonsense, except we can already see the beginnings of serious economic concerns with the speed of light. The avatars that run programmed trading must be close physically to the computers that run the stock exchanges. ?In the U.S., high-frequency firms represent only 2 percent of the 20,000 or so trading firms operating today. But they now account for nearly three-quarters of all trades. ?And the average time a stock investment is held these days is 22 seconds. If time is money, microseconds are now millions. In a recent so-called TED talk on cutting-edge technology, tech whiz Kevin Slavin wowed the audience by describing buildings now being hollowed out in Lower Manhattan. Why? So that high-frequency trading firms can move in and get as close as possible to New York?s point of entry for the Internet at a so-called carrier hotel in Tribeca. ?. . . . this is really where the wires come right up into the city. And the further away you are from that, you?re a few microseconds behind every time. These guys down on Wall Street, they?re eight microseconds behind all these guys going into the empty buildings being hollowed out up around the carrier hotel. ?Just to give you a sense of what microseconds are, it takes you 500,000 microseconds just to click a mouse. But if you?re a Wall Street algorithm and you?re five microseconds behind, you?re a loser.? ? from Kevin Slavin on algorithms One consequence that Eric Drexler discussed in Engines of Creation (end of Chapter 5) was a million years of science and engineering being done in one year. He didn?t discuss the subjective effect of a whole society uploading and subjectively experiencing a million years per calendar year. If uploads happen by mid-century, then by the end of the century human culture could experience 50 million subjective years (or more). As a conclusion, if humanity takes the speed-up route, then I don?t see a future for M brains, S brains or even Luna-sized brains, and the maximum size of a communicating civilization becomes a good deal smaller than the Earth. Unless, of course, we can find a way around the speed of light. Keith On Thu, Jan 18, 2024 at 8:18?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat wrote: > > > > On Thu, Jan 18, 2024, 6:51 AM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat wrote: >> >> >> Keith Henson said: >> >> I suspect that people will prefer the uploaded state, but I also >> suspect that people will save bodies. >> >> Jason Resch said: >> > Yes, I think there will still be many reasons for interfacing with >> the external world. >> >> That remark seems to imply you think that uploads would not interface >> with the external world. I don't see why they wouldn't, and I'd >> certainly expect they'd be able to if they wanted. > > > Perhaps, but then again, that might be considered too dangerous. Future computing substrates might be too fragile and too subtle for any human mind to manage in any way. And if they break something they might kill a billion people running on that node. > >> >> If nothing else, uploads should be able to maintain their own hardware. > > > In the near future we will be able to build hardware they maintains itself. Or we could envision nanobots that maintain things. > >> >> If you were an upload, would you want to entrust the care and >> maintenance of your hardware to biological beings? That will probably be >> the case at first, but in the long run, we don't want to depend on >> beings that can be disabled or destroyed so easily. It would be ironic >> if civilisation was wiped out by a disease, say, in spite of a good part >> of it being resistant to the disease! > > > > My views are inspired, among others, by this vision of the future: > > http://frombob.to/you/aconvers.html > > Also, consider that if we upload ourselves to computing substrates that run our minds a million times faster, then the "real world" becomes incredibly slow. It would take subjective weeks for each click tick of each second in the real world. They really does isolate the worlds. Even the speed of light is slowed to something like a jetliners, so sending an text message to the other side of the world is something that takes hours to arrive. > > To me this suggests the future will be not only vastly miniaturized but also localized. We will create many copies (for redundancy) of large collections of individuals (perhaps all of humanity) in localized clusters for speed of access and interface. > > There would be no way any human could maintain such machines, as they would operate on atomic or subatomic scales, and their million+ fold time speed difference makes the physical world a static alien thing. You could run around in the rain at normal speed in the real world with a robot body for a few minutes, but it will cost you years of subjective time, all your family and friends will go years without seeing or hearing from you while you dance in the rain. But you could have had the exact same experience in virtual reality running at the same speed as everyone else in the uploaded state. > > Jason > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat From postmowoods at gmail.com Thu Jan 18 18:49:39 2024 From: postmowoods at gmail.com (Kelly Anderson) Date: Thu, 18 Jan 2024 11:49:39 -0700 Subject: [ExI] A Paranormal Prediction In-Reply-To: References: <9c6dfc1a-b4b8-4811-1571-ee65c8b34cc7@swisscows.email> <383713f1-b59a-fc46-ed5d-dce017c34370@swisscows.email> Message-ID: Perhaps when El Salvador gets an AI leader, the first thing that will happen is their crypto portfolio will start getting managed more intelligently. :-) Could increase public support. -Kelly On Sun, Jan 7, 2024 at 9:14?AM Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat wrote: > > On Sat, Jan 6, 2024 at 11:34?PM Kelly Anderson via extropy-chat wrote: >> >> On Sat, Jan 6, 2024 at 1:01?PM Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat >> wrote: >> > I, too, would look to El Salvador as an example because of their bitcoin experience. >> > >> > And the apparently utter disaster it has been, largely due to a failure to win the trust of the general public. >> >> Just because something is low on the exponential curve at the present >> time doesn't mean it might not go better, then much, much better >> later. It is far too early to call El Salvador's Bitcoin experiment a >> failure due to the exponential nature of adoption. > > > I am given to understand the situation has reached a temporary mostly-steady state, no longer seeing exponential increases at this time within El Salvador. > > This state can be adjusted, of course, but that seems likely to require certain things being done differently so as to achieve better public trust. > >> In fact, I predict >> that now that the country has turned a 3 million dollar profit on the >> endeavor, that with the next upsurge of Bitcoin (which we may be in >> now) they could get more rapid adoption which could lead to defi type >> activities that would greatly benefit their country. > > > Sure, it is possible that they will suddenly revamp their policies to address the reasons why they are not seeing widespread acceptance. Nothing is physically preventing them from doing so. > > Nothing was physically preventing them from doing so, either - but they haven't done it yet. > >> >> Yet this is >> merely an interesting aside to the main original question of the >> thread. > > > I present it as evidence of low odds of an AI-tocracy coming to light any time soon, and specifically of the largely unaddressed in practice problem that is preventing such a thing. > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat From hkeithhenson at gmail.com Thu Jan 18 19:12:55 2024 From: hkeithhenson at gmail.com (Keith Henson) Date: Thu, 18 Jan 2024 11:12:55 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Upload/Download (was: Re: Fwd: Open Individualism) In-Reply-To: References: <81a727c0-0648-494f-9081-afbb09c67637@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: "but due to what we see at Tabby's Star, things might go differently." All we can see at Tabby's Star is dimming. But we can tell something about whatever is blocking the light. (I ran the math previously.) If what is blocking the light is a data center, it is more than 400 times the area of the Earth, and even out at 7 AU, it is soaking up about 1.4 million times the total human energy use. The edge-to-edge speed of light delay is in the 2.5-second range. That might tell us something about the clock rate they run at, assuming they have a similar tolerance for communication delays. Or perhaps not. I sincerely hope we are not looking at aliens because we don't need the competition and it looks like they have spread to at least 24 stars. On the other hand, they got through their local singularity some thousands of years ago, so perhaps we can. On the gripping hand, we could be looking at AIs and even simulations of the original biological race are extinct. We live in strange times indeed. Keith On Thu, Jan 18, 2024 at 10:52?AM Keith Henson wrote: > > Jason wrote > > Also, consider that if we upload ourselves to computing substrates that run our minds a million times faster, then the "real world" becomes incredibly slow. > > I wrote about this 12 years ago, but due to what we see at Tabby's > Star, things might go differently. > > Transhumanism and the Human Expansion into Space: a Conflict with Physics > By: Keith Henson > Published: April 12, 2012 > > Orbital Space Settlements > > There are deep memetic roots between expansion into space and > transhumanism, largely through Eric Drexler, creator of the modern > concepts of nanotechnology and an early activist in the post-Apollo > flowering of the space movement. I was deeply involved in the > post-Apollo space movement (L5 Society) and moderately involved in > early transhumanism, having been a reviewer of Engines of Creation > when it was being written and a participant on the early Extropian > mailing list where such concepts as Jupiter brains, M brains, and > computronium were first discussed. No less an authority than RU Sirius > has referred to me as ?sort of an ur-transhumanist?. > > I have long had misgivings about large aggregations of computing nodes > forming a mind because of speed-of-light delays. That will reduce > ?thinking speed,? since a mind cannot ?be of one mind? if much it is > not aware of the current situation due to speed-of-light delays. > > There is an analogous problem within a culture. We have a world > culture today headed toward a monoculture because electronic > communications on fiber optics has cut the delay to getting > information from one side of the world to the other to sub-seconds. It > hasn?t always been this way. > > Ferdinand Magellan?s expedition of 1519?1522 became the first to > circumnavigate the Earth, a project in its day not unlike the moon > landing. My point in mentioning this is not the privations they > suffered (extreme) or the low survival rate (232 of 270 died before > they got back, including Ferdinand) but the sheer length of time > (three years) they were out of touch. > > How much communication delay can a society tolerate before it breaks > up into smaller units? There are historical examples; the Roman Empire > broke up partly because their communications failed, but I am not sure > how they apply in a post-singularity world. > > At the speed of light, it takes 2/15 of a second to go all around the > planet. (40,000 km/300,000km/s) What?s to cause communication delay? > > The problem is uploaded humans speeding up. Human brains are > asynchronous, but, given reaction times, we can impute an equivalent > clock rate of ~200 Hz. Which means a human brain (or brain equivalent) > running in moderately fast hardware could run a million times faster. > (200 MHz is not fast hardware.) > > You might ask, ?Why would humans do such a silly thing?? Because > intelligence is a large factor in sexual attraction. This was probably > established in the Stone Age. Of course, intelligence is valuable > outside of sexual attraction, being correlated with many other > personality and life-history traits, and is especially valued by > transhumanists. One aspect of being smart is thinking fast, or at > least thinking faster than the person you are trying to impress. That > leads at once to a runaway ?Red Queen? situation where, when we can > run our thinking faster, we would rapidly push the computational speed > to the limit, whatever it is. > > Speeding up will mandate uploading into faster hardware. Humans could > think a little faster in existing bodies, but not a lot. The problem > is that the faster you run your brain, the more the world around you > seems to slow down. With only a modest speedup, movement would seem > like wading through molasses. If you desire serious speedup, it > probably has to be in a simulation of the environment to match your > faster perception. > > Speeding up rapidly leads to a situation where distance causes severe > communication delays. We hardly notice telephone communication delays > unless they are going through satellites. Speed us up a million-fold > and the communication round-trip delay gets to be serious. A > million-to-one speed-up would impose a subjective round-trip delay of > three days from one side of the earth to the other. The subjective > round trip delay to the moon would be two months. The delay from > hearing back from a computronium node on the far side of Earth?s orbit > would be 2,169 years, a long time even by Ferdinand ?s standards. The > subjective delay talking to an interstellar spacecraft 10 light-years > out would be 20 million years. I don?t know what the maximum is, but > two thousand years seems a long response time for a single polity. > Twenty million subjective years to get an answer back is just > ridiculous. > > The speed-up limit may be 100 times as high. > > Due to this line of thinking, I no longer think it?s practical to > surround a star with computronium. Instead, I suspect population > centers will shrink to sizes in the few hundred-meter range and sunk > in the deep oceans for cooling. > > Taking two subjective seconds as the upper limit round-trip delay for > telephone-like communication, the distance could be up to 300,000 km > or 300 million meters. > > For a million-to-one speedup, that means that all the communicating > nodes can be no more than 300 meters apart, i.e., configured as a > sphere 300 meters in diameter with a hole to pump water in or out (for > cooling). The area of the sphere is ~283,000 square meters. > > We now need a number for how big a human-class computer might be. Eric > Drexler gave considerable thought to this problem and came up with the > volume of a coffee cup. For simple calculations let us take that as a > 10-cm cube, or 100 minds to the square meter arranged one layer deep. > > Taking the area times Eric?s number, the population of fast-uploaded > humans per communicating fast culture could be as high as 28 million. > If each drew 20 kW (1,000 times the 20 W our biological brains use), > the total power draw would be 540 GW. The other factor of a thousand > in the million-to-one speed-up comes from the hardware being more > efficient than biological brains. > > With a fair amount of pressure difference and many fine passages, a > water flow of one liter per second through each person (10 square cm) > would carry off 20 kW with a temperature rise of about 5? C. The deep > ocean is definitely the place for this community. > > If you wanted to talk to someone without a delay of up to a second, > one of you could move close to the physical location of the other > party via a ?core swap.? The community might have ten percent or so of > empty brains to facilitate moving around. > > With each order of magnitude speed up, the maximum community size > falls by a factor of 100. That is, a community running at only 100,000 > to one could have 2.8 billion residents and one running at 10 million > to one would only hold 280,000. The hundred-million-to-one speedup > habitat would only hold 2,800. Talk about a physics-enforced > oligarchy! > > Would you want to move from a slum where there was only a > 100,000-to-one speed-up to one of these ?elite? places with a > million-to-one speed-up? Do you yearn for the 100-million-to-one > existence? > > This might sound like total nonsense, except we can already see the > beginnings of serious economic concerns with the speed of light. The > avatars that run programmed trading must be close physically to the > computers that run the stock exchanges. > > ?In the U.S., high-frequency firms represent only 2 percent of the > 20,000 or so trading firms operating today. But they now account for > nearly three-quarters of all trades. > > ?And the average time a stock investment is held these days is 22 > seconds. If time is money, microseconds are now millions. In a recent > so-called TED talk on cutting-edge technology, tech whiz Kevin Slavin > wowed the audience by describing buildings now being hollowed out in > Lower Manhattan. Why? So that high-frequency trading firms can move in > and get as close as possible to New York?s point of entry for the > Internet at a so-called carrier hotel in Tribeca. > > ?. . . . this is really where the wires come right up into the city. > And the further away you are from that, you?re a few microseconds > behind every time. These guys down on Wall Street, they?re eight > microseconds behind all these guys going into the empty buildings > being hollowed out up around the carrier hotel. > ?Just to give you a sense of what microseconds are, it takes you > 500,000 microseconds just to click a mouse. But if you?re a Wall > Street algorithm and you?re five microseconds behind, you?re a loser.? > > ? from Kevin Slavin on algorithms > > One consequence that Eric Drexler discussed in Engines of Creation > (end of Chapter 5) was a million years of science and engineering > being done in one year. He didn?t discuss the subjective effect of a > whole society uploading and subjectively experiencing a million years > per calendar year. > > If uploads happen by mid-century, then by the end of the century human > culture could experience 50 million subjective years (or more). > > As a conclusion, if humanity takes the speed-up route, then I don?t > see a future for M brains, S brains or even Luna-sized brains, and the > maximum size of a communicating civilization becomes a good deal > smaller than the Earth. > > Unless, of course, we can find a way around the speed of light. > > > Keith > > On Thu, Jan 18, 2024 at 8:18?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat > wrote: > > > > > > > > On Thu, Jan 18, 2024, 6:51 AM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat wrote: > >> > >> > >> Keith Henson said: > >> >> I suspect that people will prefer the uploaded state, but I also > >> suspect that people will save bodies. > >> > >> Jason Resch said: > >> > Yes, I think there will still be many reasons for interfacing with > >> the external world. > >> > >> That remark seems to imply you think that uploads would not interface > >> with the external world. I don't see why they wouldn't, and I'd > >> certainly expect they'd be able to if they wanted. > > > > > > Perhaps, but then again, that might be considered too dangerous. Future computing substrates might be too fragile and too subtle for any human mind to manage in any way. And if they break something they might kill a billion people running on that node. > > > >> > >> If nothing else, uploads should be able to maintain their own hardware. > > > > > > In the near future we will be able to build hardware they maintains itself. Or we could envision nanobots that maintain things. > > > >> > >> If you were an upload, would you want to entrust the care and > >> maintenance of your hardware to biological beings? That will probably be > >> the case at first, but in the long run, we don't want to depend on > >> beings that can be disabled or destroyed so easily. It would be ironic > >> if civilisation was wiped out by a disease, say, in spite of a good part > >> of it being resistant to the disease! > > > > > > > > My views are inspired, among others, by this vision of the future: > > > > http://frombob.to/you/aconvers.html > > > > Also, consider that if we upload ourselves to computing substrates that run our minds a million times faster, then the "real world" becomes incredibly slow. It would take subjective weeks for each click tick of each second in the real world. They really does isolate the worlds. Even the speed of light is slowed to something like a jetliners, so sending an text message to the other side of the world is something that takes hours to arrive. > > > > To me this suggests the future will be not only vastly miniaturized but also localized. We will create many copies (for redundancy) of large collections of individuals (perhaps all of humanity) in localized clusters for speed of access and interface. > > > > There would be no way any human could maintain such machines, as they would operate on atomic or subatomic scales, and their million+ fold time speed difference makes the physical world a static alien thing. You could run around in the rain at normal speed in the real world with a robot body for a few minutes, but it will cost you years of subjective time, all your family and friends will go years without seeing or hearing from you while you dance in the rain. But you could have had the exact same experience in virtual reality running at the same speed as everyone else in the uploaded state. > > > > Jason > > _______________________________________________ > > extropy-chat mailing list > > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat From foozler83 at gmail.com Thu Jan 18 19:38:20 2024 From: foozler83 at gmail.com (William Flynn Wallace) Date: Thu, 18 Jan 2024 13:38:20 -0600 Subject: [ExI] quote of the day Message-ID: Shakespeare(on Cleopatra) 'Age does not wither nor custom stale her infinite variety.' To me that means never boring - which breaks up many marriages. billw -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From sjatkins at protonmail.com Fri Jan 19 03:46:00 2024 From: sjatkins at protonmail.com (Samantha) Date: Fri, 19 Jan 2024 03:46:00 +0000 Subject: [ExI] it's not? indeed? In-Reply-To: <046001da4a28$42a46bf0$c7ed43d0$@rainier66.com> References: <046001da4a28$42a46bf0$c7ed43d0$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: <53570e12-394b-459e-84f1-53dae9ad9457@protonmail.com> Rather more importantly the Wuhan lab leak theory was treated as blatant disinformation.? It was punishable on multiple platforms to say you thought it was the most likely explanation, even if you were well credentialed and presented a thorough case.??? Fauci and US government pushed such punishment as appropriate and are still pushing to punish and censor misinformation and disinformation. Determined by whom?? Why, primarily by government of course. Because they need to product us from wrong think. - samantha On 1/18/24 09:06, spike jones via extropy-chat wrote: > > Dr. Fauci has testified before a House subcommittee that the lab leak > of Covid19 is not a conspiracy theory. > > I want to know how he figures is isn?t.? It IS a conspiracy theory.? > Just because a theory turns out to be true, it is still referred to as > a theory.? Examples: theory of evolution, relativity theory and so > on.? So even if it is proven that covid19 escaped from the Wuhan > Institute of Virology, which it will never be, for the Chinese have > destroyed the evidence, it is still a theory.? Even if the > overwhelming consensus among scientists agree on that origin, it > remains a theory. > > There appears to have been some unethical practices involved in > discrediting that theory.? The Chinese destroying the evidence and > restricting access to those survivors who were there.? Dr. Fauci > working with and choosing scientists to write the article for Nature > Medicine, Dr. Collins the others, would constitute a conspiracy, ja?? > They worked together to discredit a plausible theory, which is a > conspiracy. > > So? as has been demonstrated repeatedly, just because a notion is a > conspiracy theory does not prove it is not true.? The definition has > changed: conspiracy theories might be true.? Even if it is true, the > lab leak origin of Covid19 is now and will forever be a conspiracy theory. > > spike > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: signature.asc Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 249 bytes Desc: OpenPGP digital signature URL: From spike at rainier66.com Fri Jan 19 03:56:54 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (spike at rainier66.com) Date: Thu, 18 Jan 2024 19:56:54 -0800 Subject: [ExI] it's not? indeed? In-Reply-To: <53570e12-394b-459e-84f1-53dae9ad9457@protonmail.com> References: <046001da4a28$42a46bf0$c7ed43d0$@rainier66.com> <53570e12-394b-459e-84f1-53dae9ad9457@protonmail.com> Message-ID: <086601da4a8b$8b079350$a116b9f0$@rainier66.com> From: extropy-chat On Behalf Of Samantha via extropy-chat ? Subject: Re: [ExI] it's not? indeed? >?Rather more importantly the Wuhan lab leak theory was treated as blatant disinformation. It was punishable on multiple platforms to say you thought it was the most likely explanation, even if you were well credentialed and presented a thorough case. Fauci and US government pushed such punishment as appropriate and are still pushing to punish and censor misinformation and disinformation. Determined by whom? Why, primarily by government of course. Because they need to product us from wrong think. - samantha On 1/18/24 09:06, spike jones via extropy-chat wrote: >>?Dr. Fauci has testified before a House subcommittee that the lab leak of Covid19 is not a conspiracy theory?. >>?So? as has been demonstrated repeatedly, just because a notion is a conspiracy theory does not prove it is not true. The definition has changed: conspiracy theories might be true. Even if it is true, the lab leak origin of Covid19 is now and will forever be a conspiracy theory. spike Thx for that Samantha. What we have learned is that if something is a conspiracy theory, that doesn?t necessarily mean it is not true. Some conspiracy theories are true. 2023 was a great year for conspiracy theories. We have also learned that misinformation and disinformation are not necessarily false. Both might be true, if those calling it mis- and dis- information are mistaken or have ulterior motives for suppressing or refuting that possibly true information. The Covid nightmare was most educational, ja? spike -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From giulio at gmail.com Fri Jan 19 10:10:04 2024 From: giulio at gmail.com (Giulio Prisco) Date: Fri, 19 Jan 2024 11:10:04 +0100 Subject: [ExI] Old and new futurisms in Silicon Valley Message-ID: Old and new futurisms in Silicon Valley. Futurism, cosmism, extropy, e/acc. Parallels, differences, philosophical foundations. Includes my recent AI talk and a meta-review of Marc Andreessen?s ?The Techno-Optimist Manifesto.? https://www.turingchurch.com/p/old-and-new-futurisms-in-silicon From ben at zaiboc.net Fri Jan 19 11:00:10 2024 From: ben at zaiboc.net (Ben Zaiboc) Date: Fri, 19 Jan 2024 11:00:10 +0000 Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <580f2112-d8a1-40c3-8f1b-e79bbe9fa1df@zaiboc.net> On 18/01/2024 16:06, Jason Resch wrote: > > Ben Wrote: From what I can see, none of what you claim about Open > Individualism is based on scientific principles, > > It corresponds to thought experiments (i.e., logic and rationality > better than the alternatives). It corresponds to Occam's razor better > than the alternatives, as it makes fewer assumptions, it corresponds > to laws of probability better than the alternatives, which are > exceedingly improbable compared to it. You can keep repeating to > yourself that it's not scientific, and continue to ignore the thought > experiments I've provided which demonstrate it's truth, however, if > that makes you feel better. That might be the best course. Your thought experiments don't make any sense to me, and apart from making some people feel better about their lives, I still see no practical use of the idea, or any way to prove or disprove it. Ben -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Fri Jan 19 13:28:18 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Fri, 19 Jan 2024 08:28:18 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Open Individualism In-Reply-To: <580f2112-d8a1-40c3-8f1b-e79bbe9fa1df@zaiboc.net> References: <580f2112-d8a1-40c3-8f1b-e79bbe9fa1df@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: On Fri, Jan 19, 2024, 6:01 AM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > > > On 18/01/2024 16:06, Jason Resch wrote: > > Ben Wrote: >> >> From what I can see, none of what you claim about Open Individualism >> is based on scientific principles, >> > It corresponds to thought experiments (i.e., logic and rationality better > than the alternatives). It corresponds to Occam's razor better than the > alternatives, as it makes fewer assumptions, it corresponds to laws of > probability better than the alternatives, which are exceedingly > improbable compared to it. You can keep repeating to yourself that it's > not scientific, and continue to ignore the thought experiments I've > provided which demonstrate it's truth, however, if that makes you feel > better. > > > That might be the best course. Your thought experiments don't make any > sense to me, and apart from making some people feel better about their > lives, I still see no practical use of the idea, or any way to prove or > disprove it. > If they make no sense you should ask clarifying questions. I said I would explain/answer anything I could. Jason P.S. Why do you create a new thread with every reply? -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Fri Jan 19 13:46:02 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Fri, 19 Jan 2024 08:46:02 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Upload/Download (was: Re: Fwd: Open Individualism) In-Reply-To: References: <81a727c0-0648-494f-9081-afbb09c67637@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: This is a beautiful piece of writing. I appreciate the comparisons to old voyages and fracturing of cultures due to communication delays. As well as the real world examples of stock exchanges. I think the conclusion is right regarding M and J brains. I'm working on a write up regarding the ultimate physical limits of computers which I'll soon share with this list. Jason On Thu, Jan 18, 2024, 1:53 PM Keith Henson wrote: > Jason wrote > > Also, consider that if we upload ourselves to computing substrates that > run our minds a million times faster, then the "real world" becomes > incredibly slow. > > I wrote about this 12 years ago, but due to what we see at Tabby's > Star, things might go differently. > > Transhumanism and the Human Expansion into Space: a Conflict with Physics > By: Keith Henson > Published: April 12, 2012 > > Orbital Space Settlements > > There are deep memetic roots between expansion into space and > transhumanism, largely through Eric Drexler, creator of the modern > concepts of nanotechnology and an early activist in the post-Apollo > flowering of the space movement. I was deeply involved in the > post-Apollo space movement (L5 Society) and moderately involved in > early transhumanism, having been a reviewer of Engines of Creation > when it was being written and a participant on the early Extropian > mailing list where such concepts as Jupiter brains, M brains, and > computronium were first discussed. No less an authority than RU Sirius > has referred to me as ?sort of an ur-transhumanist?. > > I have long had misgivings about large aggregations of computing nodes > forming a mind because of speed-of-light delays. That will reduce > ?thinking speed,? since a mind cannot ?be of one mind? if much it is > not aware of the current situation due to speed-of-light delays. > > There is an analogous problem within a culture. We have a world > culture today headed toward a monoculture because electronic > communications on fiber optics has cut the delay to getting > information from one side of the world to the other to sub-seconds. It > hasn?t always been this way. > > Ferdinand Magellan?s expedition of 1519?1522 became the first to > circumnavigate the Earth, a project in its day not unlike the moon > landing. My point in mentioning this is not the privations they > suffered (extreme) or the low survival rate (232 of 270 died before > they got back, including Ferdinand) but the sheer length of time > (three years) they were out of touch. > > How much communication delay can a society tolerate before it breaks > up into smaller units? There are historical examples; the Roman Empire > broke up partly because their communications failed, but I am not sure > how they apply in a post-singularity world. > > At the speed of light, it takes 2/15 of a second to go all around the > planet. (40,000 km/300,000km/s) What?s to cause communication delay? > > The problem is uploaded humans speeding up. Human brains are > asynchronous, but, given reaction times, we can impute an equivalent > clock rate of ~200 Hz. Which means a human brain (or brain equivalent) > running in moderately fast hardware could run a million times faster. > (200 MHz is not fast hardware.) > > You might ask, ?Why would humans do such a silly thing?? Because > intelligence is a large factor in sexual attraction. This was probably > established in the Stone Age. Of course, intelligence is valuable > outside of sexual attraction, being correlated with many other > personality and life-history traits, and is especially valued by > transhumanists. One aspect of being smart is thinking fast, or at > least thinking faster than the person you are trying to impress. That > leads at once to a runaway ?Red Queen? situation where, when we can > run our thinking faster, we would rapidly push the computational speed > to the limit, whatever it is. > > Speeding up will mandate uploading into faster hardware. Humans could > think a little faster in existing bodies, but not a lot. The problem > is that the faster you run your brain, the more the world around you > seems to slow down. With only a modest speedup, movement would seem > like wading through molasses. If you desire serious speedup, it > probably has to be in a simulation of the environment to match your > faster perception. > > Speeding up rapidly leads to a situation where distance causes severe > communication delays. We hardly notice telephone communication delays > unless they are going through satellites. Speed us up a million-fold > and the communication round-trip delay gets to be serious. A > million-to-one speed-up would impose a subjective round-trip delay of > three days from one side of the earth to the other. The subjective > round trip delay to the moon would be two months. The delay from > hearing back from a computronium node on the far side of Earth?s orbit > would be 2,169 years, a long time even by Ferdinand ?s standards. The > subjective delay talking to an interstellar spacecraft 10 light-years > out would be 20 million years. I don?t know what the maximum is, but > two thousand years seems a long response time for a single polity. > Twenty million subjective years to get an answer back is just > ridiculous. > > The speed-up limit may be 100 times as high. > > Due to this line of thinking, I no longer think it?s practical to > surround a star with computronium. Instead, I suspect population > centers will shrink to sizes in the few hundred-meter range and sunk > in the deep oceans for cooling. > > Taking two subjective seconds as the upper limit round-trip delay for > telephone-like communication, the distance could be up to 300,000 km > or 300 million meters. > > For a million-to-one speedup, that means that all the communicating > nodes can be no more than 300 meters apart, i.e., configured as a > sphere 300 meters in diameter with a hole to pump water in or out (for > cooling). The area of the sphere is ~283,000 square meters. > > We now need a number for how big a human-class computer might be. Eric > Drexler gave considerable thought to this problem and came up with the > volume of a coffee cup. For simple calculations let us take that as a > 10-cm cube, or 100 minds to the square meter arranged one layer deep. > > Taking the area times Eric?s number, the population of fast-uploaded > humans per communicating fast culture could be as high as 28 million. > If each drew 20 kW (1,000 times the 20 W our biological brains use), > the total power draw would be 540 GW. The other factor of a thousand > in the million-to-one speed-up comes from the hardware being more > efficient than biological brains. > > With a fair amount of pressure difference and many fine passages, a > water flow of one liter per second through each person (10 square cm) > would carry off 20 kW with a temperature rise of about 5? C. The deep > ocean is definitely the place for this community. > > If you wanted to talk to someone without a delay of up to a second, > one of you could move close to the physical location of the other > party via a ?core swap.? The community might have ten percent or so of > empty brains to facilitate moving around. > > With each order of magnitude speed up, the maximum community size > falls by a factor of 100. That is, a community running at only 100,000 > to one could have 2.8 billion residents and one running at 10 million > to one would only hold 280,000. The hundred-million-to-one speedup > habitat would only hold 2,800. Talk about a physics-enforced > oligarchy! > > Would you want to move from a slum where there was only a > 100,000-to-one speed-up to one of these ?elite? places with a > million-to-one speed-up? Do you yearn for the 100-million-to-one > existence? > > This might sound like total nonsense, except we can already see the > beginnings of serious economic concerns with the speed of light. The > avatars that run programmed trading must be close physically to the > computers that run the stock exchanges. > > ?In the U.S., high-frequency firms represent only 2 percent of the > 20,000 or so trading firms operating today. But they now account for > nearly three-quarters of all trades. > > ?And the average time a stock investment is held these days is 22 > seconds. If time is money, microseconds are now millions. In a recent > so-called TED talk on cutting-edge technology, tech whiz Kevin Slavin > wowed the audience by describing buildings now being hollowed out in > Lower Manhattan. Why? So that high-frequency trading firms can move in > and get as close as possible to New York?s point of entry for the > Internet at a so-called carrier hotel in Tribeca. > > ?. . . . this is really where the wires come right up into the city. > And the further away you are from that, you?re a few microseconds > behind every time. These guys down on Wall Street, they?re eight > microseconds behind all these guys going into the empty buildings > being hollowed out up around the carrier hotel. > ?Just to give you a sense of what microseconds are, it takes you > 500,000 microseconds just to click a mouse. But if you?re a Wall > Street algorithm and you?re five microseconds behind, you?re a loser.? > > ? from Kevin Slavin on algorithms > > One consequence that Eric Drexler discussed in Engines of Creation > (end of Chapter 5) was a million years of science and engineering > being done in one year. He didn?t discuss the subjective effect of a > whole society uploading and subjectively experiencing a million years > per calendar year. > > If uploads happen by mid-century, then by the end of the century human > culture could experience 50 million subjective years (or more). > > As a conclusion, if humanity takes the speed-up route, then I don?t > see a future for M brains, S brains or even Luna-sized brains, and the > maximum size of a communicating civilization becomes a good deal > smaller than the Earth. > > Unless, of course, we can find a way around the speed of light. > > > Keith > > On Thu, Jan 18, 2024 at 8:18?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat > wrote: > > > > > > > > On Thu, Jan 18, 2024, 6:51 AM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> > >> > >> Keith Henson said: > >> >> I suspect that people will prefer the uploaded state, but I also > >> suspect that people will save bodies. > >> > >> Jason Resch said: > >> > Yes, I think there will still be many reasons for interfacing with > >> the external world. > >> > >> That remark seems to imply you think that uploads would not interface > >> with the external world. I don't see why they wouldn't, and I'd > >> certainly expect they'd be able to if they wanted. > > > > > > Perhaps, but then again, that might be considered too dangerous. Future > computing substrates might be too fragile and too subtle for any human mind > to manage in any way. And if they break something they might kill a billion > people running on that node. > > > >> > >> If nothing else, uploads should be able to maintain their own hardware. > > > > > > In the near future we will be able to build hardware they maintains > itself. Or we could envision nanobots that maintain things. > > > >> > >> If you were an upload, would you want to entrust the care and > >> maintenance of your hardware to biological beings? That will probably be > >> the case at first, but in the long run, we don't want to depend on > >> beings that can be disabled or destroyed so easily. It would be ironic > >> if civilisation was wiped out by a disease, say, in spite of a good part > >> of it being resistant to the disease! > > > > > > > > My views are inspired, among others, by this vision of the future: > > > > http://frombob.to/you/aconvers.html > > > > Also, consider that if we upload ourselves to computing substrates that > run our minds a million times faster, then the "real world" becomes > incredibly slow. It would take subjective weeks for each click tick of each > second in the real world. They really does isolate the worlds. Even the > speed of light is slowed to something like a jetliners, so sending an text > message to the other side of the world is something that takes hours to > arrive. > > > > To me this suggests the future will be not only vastly miniaturized but > also localized. We will create many copies (for redundancy) of large > collections of individuals (perhaps all of humanity) in localized clusters > for speed of access and interface. > > > > There would be no way any human could maintain such machines, as they > would operate on atomic or subatomic scales, and their million+ fold time > speed difference makes the physical world a static alien thing. You could > run around in the rain at normal speed in the real world with a robot body > for a few minutes, but it will cost you years of subjective time, all your > family and friends will go years without seeing or hearing from you while > you dance in the rain. But you could have had the exact same experience in > virtual reality running at the same speed as everyone else in the uploaded > state. > > > > Jason > > _______________________________________________ > > extropy-chat mailing list > > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From foozler83 at gmail.com Fri Jan 19 13:51:08 2024 From: foozler83 at gmail.com (William Flynn Wallace) Date: Fri, 19 Jan 2024 07:51:08 -0600 Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <580f2112-d8a1-40c3-8f1b-e79bbe9fa1df@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: thought experiments I've provided which demonstrate it's truth, however, if that makes you feel better. jason SCientific proof is not provided by thought 'experiments'. No value of 'true'. billw On Fri, Jan 19, 2024 at 7:30?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > > > On Fri, Jan 19, 2024, 6:01 AM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> >> >> On 18/01/2024 16:06, Jason Resch wrote: >> >> Ben Wrote: >>> >>> From what I can see, none of what you claim about Open Individualism >>> is based on scientific principles, >>> >> It corresponds to thought experiments (i.e., logic and rationality better >> than the alternatives). It corresponds to Occam's razor better than the >> alternatives, as it makes fewer assumptions, it corresponds to laws of >> probability better than the alternatives, which are exceedingly >> improbable compared to it. You can keep repeating to yourself that it's >> not scientific, and continue to ignore the thought experiments I've >> provided which demonstrate it's truth, however, if that makes you feel >> better. >> >> >> That might be the best course. Your thought experiments don't make any >> sense to me, and apart from making some people feel better about their >> lives, I still see no practical use of the idea, or any way to prove or >> disprove it. >> > > > If they make no sense you should ask clarifying questions. I said I would > explain/answer anything I could. > > > Jason > > P.S. > > Why do you create a new thread with every reply? > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Fri Jan 19 15:17:26 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Fri, 19 Jan 2024 10:17:26 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <580f2112-d8a1-40c3-8f1b-e79bbe9fa1df@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: On Fri, Jan 19, 2024, 9:48 AM William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > thought experiments I've > provided which demonstrate it's truth, however, if that makes you feel > better. jason > > SCientific proof is not provided by thought 'experiments'. No value of 'true'. billw > > Science depends not only on observation, but also logic and reasoning. When there are three possibilities and two are logically ruled out, what do you call that? Is such reasoning not a necessary part of science? There are only two opinions for the question of whether or not you survive the teleportation machine: either you survive, or you don't. Answering that you don't requires making a bunch of unfounded assumptions regarding dualistic souls metaphysically attached to bodies, etc. Is discarding such unnecessary assumptions not also what science does? When we perform the experiment personally and find that our consciousness survives the procedure, is that also not an experimental confirmation? Again, science. Jason > On Fri, Jan 19, 2024 at 7:30?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> >> >> On Fri, Jan 19, 2024, 6:01 AM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat < >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: >> >>> >>> >>> On 18/01/2024 16:06, Jason Resch wrote: >>> >>> Ben Wrote: >>>> >>>> From what I can see, none of what you claim about Open Individualism >>>> is based on scientific principles, >>>> >>> It corresponds to thought experiments (i.e., logic and rationality better >>> than the alternatives). It corresponds to Occam's razor better than the >>> alternatives, as it makes fewer assumptions, it corresponds to laws of >>> probability better than the alternatives, which are exceedingly >>> improbable compared to it. You can keep repeating to yourself that it's >>> not scientific, and continue to ignore the thought experiments I've >>> provided which demonstrate it's truth, however, if that makes you feel >>> better. >>> >>> >>> That might be the best course. Your thought experiments don't make any >>> sense to me, and apart from making some people feel better about their >>> lives, I still see no practical use of the idea, or any way to prove or >>> disprove it. >>> >> >> >> If they make no sense you should ask clarifying questions. I said I would >> explain/answer anything I could. >> >> >> Jason >> >> P.S. >> >> Why do you create a new thread with every reply? >> >> >> _______________________________________________ >> extropy-chat mailing list >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat >> > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From foozler83 at gmail.com Fri Jan 19 15:36:01 2024 From: foozler83 at gmail.com (William Flynn Wallace) Date: Fri, 19 Jan 2024 09:36:01 -0600 Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <580f2112-d8a1-40c3-8f1b-e79bbe9fa1df@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: Science depends not only on observation, but also logic and reasoning. But reasoning alone can never provide proof. I don't need to read about your defense of your ideas, but your epistemology is wrong. billw On Fri, Jan 19, 2024 at 9:19?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > > > On Fri, Jan 19, 2024, 9:48 AM William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> thought experiments I've >> provided which demonstrate it's truth, however, if that makes you feel >> better. jason >> >> SCientific proof is not provided by thought 'experiments'. No value of 'true'. billw >> >> > Science depends not only on observation, but also logic and reasoning. > > When there are three possibilities and two are logically ruled out, what > do you call that? Is such reasoning not a necessary part of science? > > There are only two opinions for the question of whether or not you survive > the teleportation machine: either you survive, or you don't. > > Answering that you don't requires making a bunch of unfounded assumptions > regarding dualistic souls metaphysically attached to bodies, etc. > > Is discarding such unnecessary assumptions not also what science does? > > When we perform the experiment personally and find that our consciousness > survives the procedure, is that also not an experimental confirmation? > Again, science. > > Jason > > >> On Fri, Jan 19, 2024 at 7:30?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: >> >>> >>> >>> On Fri, Jan 19, 2024, 6:01 AM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat < >>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: >>> >>>> >>>> >>>> On 18/01/2024 16:06, Jason Resch wrote: >>>> >>>> Ben Wrote: >>>>> >>>>> From what I can see, none of what you claim about Open Individualism >>>>> is based on scientific principles, >>>>> >>>> It corresponds to thought experiments (i.e., logic and rationality better >>>> than the alternatives). It corresponds to Occam's razor better than the >>>> alternatives, as it makes fewer assumptions, it corresponds to laws of >>>> probability better than the alternatives, which are exceedingly >>>> improbable compared to it. You can keep repeating to yourself that it's >>>> not scientific, and continue to ignore the thought experiments I've >>>> provided which demonstrate it's truth, however, if that makes you feel >>>> better. >>>> >>>> >>>> That might be the best course. Your thought experiments don't make any >>>> sense to me, and apart from making some people feel better about their >>>> lives, I still see no practical use of the idea, or any way to prove or >>>> disprove it. >>>> >>> >>> >>> If they make no sense you should ask clarifying questions. I said I >>> would explain/answer anything I could. >>> >>> >>> Jason >>> >>> P.S. >>> >>> Why do you create a new thread with every reply? >>> >>> >>> _______________________________________________ >>> extropy-chat mailing list >>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >>> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat >>> >> _______________________________________________ >> extropy-chat mailing list >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat >> > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Fri Jan 19 16:43:00 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Fri, 19 Jan 2024 11:43:00 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <580f2112-d8a1-40c3-8f1b-e79bbe9fa1df@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: On Fri, Jan 19, 2024 at 10:45?AM William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > Science depends not only on observation, but also logic and reasoning. > But reasoning alone can never provide proof. I don't need to read about > your defense of your ideas, but your epistemology is wrong. billw > Science never provides proof, certainty, or truth. At best, it can provide evidence (of various kinds and forms) which we can use to update our beliefs (which are best expressed in terms of probabilities). Jason > > > On Fri, Jan 19, 2024 at 9:19?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> >> >> On Fri, Jan 19, 2024, 9:48 AM William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat < >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: >> >>> thought experiments I've >>> provided which demonstrate it's truth, however, if that makes you feel >>> better. jason >>> >>> SCientific proof is not provided by thought 'experiments'. No value of 'true'. billw >>> >>> >> Science depends not only on observation, but also logic and reasoning. >> >> When there are three possibilities and two are logically ruled out, what >> do you call that? Is such reasoning not a necessary part of science? >> >> There are only two opinions for the question of whether or not you >> survive the teleportation machine: either you survive, or you don't. >> >> Answering that you don't requires making a bunch of unfounded assumptions >> regarding dualistic souls metaphysically attached to bodies, etc. >> >> Is discarding such unnecessary assumptions not also what science does? >> >> When we perform the experiment personally and find that our consciousness >> survives the procedure, is that also not an experimental confirmation? >> Again, science. >> >> Jason >> >> >>> On Fri, Jan 19, 2024 at 7:30?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < >>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: >>> >>>> >>>> >>>> On Fri, Jan 19, 2024, 6:01 AM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat < >>>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: >>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> On 18/01/2024 16:06, Jason Resch wrote: >>>>> >>>>> Ben Wrote: >>>>>> >>>>>> From what I can see, none of what you claim about Open Individualism >>>>>> is based on scientific principles, >>>>>> >>>>> It corresponds to thought experiments (i.e., logic and rationality better >>>>> than the alternatives). It corresponds to Occam's razor better than the >>>>> alternatives, as it makes fewer assumptions, it corresponds to laws of >>>>> probability better than the alternatives, which are exceedingly >>>>> improbable compared to it. You can keep repeating to yourself that it's >>>>> not scientific, and continue to ignore the thought experiments I've >>>>> provided which demonstrate it's truth, however, if that makes you feel >>>>> better. >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> That might be the best course. Your thought experiments don't make any >>>>> sense to me, and apart from making some people feel better about their >>>>> lives, I still see no practical use of the idea, or any way to prove or >>>>> disprove it. >>>>> >>>> >>>> >>>> If they make no sense you should ask clarifying questions. I said I >>>> would explain/answer anything I could. >>>> >>>> >>>> Jason >>>> >>>> P.S. >>>> >>>> Why do you create a new thread with every reply? >>>> >>>> >>>> _______________________________________________ >>>> extropy-chat mailing list >>>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >>>> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat >>>> >>> _______________________________________________ >>> extropy-chat mailing list >>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >>> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat >>> >> _______________________________________________ >> extropy-chat mailing list >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat >> > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From atymes at gmail.com Fri Jan 19 16:49:22 2024 From: atymes at gmail.com (Adrian Tymes) Date: Fri, 19 Jan 2024 08:49:22 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <580f2112-d8a1-40c3-8f1b-e79bbe9fa1df@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: On Fri, Jan 19, 2024 at 7:19?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > When there are three possibilities and two are logically ruled out, what > do you call that? Is such reasoning not a necessary part of science? > In this case? That you are incorrectly assuming that there are only three possibilities, or that you are tripping over your wording to assume that two are logically ruled out. > There are only two opinions for the question of whether or not you survive > the teleportation machine: either you survive, or you don't. > Define "you". Define "survive". There are quite many outcomes where the "you" by one definition survives by one definition of "survive", but pick certain other definitions for either or both words, and you do not survive by the new definition(s). This allows for a situation where it is simultaneously true that you survive (by one set of definitions) and that you don't survive (by another set). Unfortunately, further discussion of this situation has confused the definitions after picking a set that determines whether you survive or don't. For instance, the situation where another body is made at the far side then the initial body is destroyed could be argued that you (the original body) do not survive...but this is then used to argue that no one who goes through a teleporter has no legal rights to that identity's possessions (as that identity did not survive), which is clearly not the case: were that to happen today, the law would assume that what emerged on the far side was still "you". "You" by one definition did not survive, while "you" by another definition did survive. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Fri Jan 19 18:01:51 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Fri, 19 Jan 2024 13:01:51 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <580f2112-d8a1-40c3-8f1b-e79bbe9fa1df@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: On Fri, Jan 19, 2024 at 12:15?PM Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > On Fri, Jan 19, 2024 at 7:19?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> When there are three possibilities and two are logically ruled out, what >> do you call that? Is such reasoning not a necessary part of science? >> > > In this case? That you are incorrectly assuming that there are only three > possibilities, > Would you care to name which other possibility that is missing aside from these three? https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1UvJ5X8ovzz6ZrJJWKDoiUvj2g6p6H6p-nUz1XdDt6aU/edit#slide=id.g2ac585a35ce_0_43 > or that you are tripping over your wording to assume that two are > logically ruled out. > I make no assumptions. I said we can use thought experiments to logically rule two out. > > >> There are only two opinions for the question of whether or not you >> survive the teleportation machine: either you survive, or you don't. >> > > Define "you". > Exactly, you have come upon the central concern of personal identity. You have three options: 1. You are only a single isolated thought moment 2. You are a collection of some thought moments, but not others 3. You are all thought moments. > Define "survive". > The continuation of your consciousness, from your own internal, subjective, first-person, point of view. > There are quite many outcomes where the "you" by one definition survives > by one definition of "survive", but pick certain other definitions for > either or both words, and you do not survive by the new definition(s). > This allows for a situation where it is simultaneously true that you > survive (by one set of definitions) and that you don't survive (by another > set). > Yes we need rigorous definitions. The "folk theory" of personal identity is not rigorously defined, and I would say it is inconsistent, which is why there is so much trouble with these questions. When we attempt to define some version of personal identity that is logically consistent, we are left with either empty individualism (definition 1 above), or open individualism (definition 3 above). Then, if you add the assumption that we experience more than one point in time (which is a foundational assumption of science, with physics being the science of predicting future observations from past ones), the only tenable option that is consistent with science as practiced is open individualism. > > Unfortunately, further discussion of this situation has confused the > definitions after picking a set that determines whether you survive or > don't. For instance, the situation where another body is made at the far > side then the initial body is destroyed could be argued that you (the > original body) do not survive...but this is then used to argue that no one > who goes through a teleporter has no legal rights to that identity's > possessions (as that identity did not survive), which is clearly not the > case: were that to happen today, the law would assume that what emerged on > the far side was still "you". "You" by one definition did not survive, > while "you" by another definition did survive. > I'm unconcerned with legal definitions. What matters here is the subjective experience of the person undergoing the experiment. Do they hit a wall and become an "eternal blank", or do they feel themselves awaking in the new location, their subjective experience not missing a beat? Jason -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Fri Jan 19 20:34:22 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Fri, 19 Jan 2024 15:34:22 -0500 Subject: [ExI] The physical limits of computation Message-ID: I thought I would share this work with the extropy list, as it covers topics of relevance to the future of technology and future civilizations. In it, I describe the physical bounds on information storage, computation, computronium, black hole computers, and the limits of the universe as a whole: https://drive.google.com/file/d/124q3ni51E3sf9kMC_sNKgP3ikcl8ou1t/view?usp=sharing Any comments, or corrections would be most welcome. Jason -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From efc at swisscows.email Fri Jan 19 21:10:56 2024 From: efc at swisscows.email (efc at swisscows.email) Date: Fri, 19 Jan 2024 22:10:56 +0100 (CET) Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <580f2112-d8a1-40c3-8f1b-e79bbe9fa1df@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: <746584de-c34d-2121-bb95-955e671ea780@swisscows.email> On Fri, 19 Jan 2024, William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat wrote: > Science depends not only on observation, but also logic and reasoning.? ? But reasoning alone can never provide proof. I don't need > to read about your defense of your ideas, but your epistemology is wrong.? ?billw > I would say that reasoning alone is sufficient in math. However, when it comes to questions about this world, observation, hypothesis, experiment and proof/disproof is necessary. And then of course our material world is always based on an assumption, since we collapse into solipsism if we want strict and uncotrovertible proof of the world we are in. But I kind of like the atheist "shift" where the one who comes up with the non-intuitive thesis about our world has the burden of proof, and where the material world is the default assumption. Best regards, Daniel From hkeithhenson at gmail.com Fri Jan 19 21:34:14 2024 From: hkeithhenson at gmail.com (Keith Henson) Date: Fri, 19 Jan 2024 13:34:14 -0800 Subject: [ExI] [Extropolis] Old and new futurisms in Silicon Valley In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: While I agree with your concerns, I think the supporters of Trump are more of a problem. They are what makes him a powerful person. The analogy with Hitler and his supporters if valid. This is a population-scale phenomenon. I think it is rooted in psychological traits that were selected due to repeated population expansions and resource crises that most of the human race experienced over the past 100,000 years. (Exception being the San.) For reasons I don't fully understand, a lot of people in red states think they are facing a bleak future. Perhaps they are justified, a lot of jobs were wiped out by technological innovation, and many more were moved to China because of the Harvard Business School policy of profit to the shareholders above any other considerations. Another factor is the high cost of education. Still another is the high cost of medical care. People have been selected for psychological traits leading to wars. The first response to a perception of a bleak future is a higher gain in the circulation of xenophobic or outright crazy memes (QAnon for example). In the Stone Age, this dehumanized the neighbors in preparation for killing them for their resources. (In times of plenty your group swapped wives with them.) This process toward war does not have to go to an actual war, it could stall at the crazy meme stage. It could also back off the way the IRA lost support as the economy improved the income per capita as the Irish women cut back the number of children they had. By this model, Trump would lose support if the MAGA crowd perceived a brighter future. How to accomplish that is a good question. Perhaps we should quiz the AIs. Keith PS Large-scale social (religious) movements are well known. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Awakening On Fri, Jan 19, 2024 at 11:04?AM John Clark wrote: > > I watched the video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sdjMoykqxys, I strongly agree with everything Max More said with one exception, his skepticism of the Singularity. I think, not a proof but, a strong case can be made for the Singularity and I will try to do so now. We know for a fact that the human genome is only 750 MB long (it contains 3 billion base pairs, there are 4 bases, so each base can represent 2 bits, and there are 8 bits per byte) and we know for a fact it contains a vast amount of redundancy and gibberish (for example many thousands of repetitions of ACGACGACGACG) and we know it contains the recipe for an entire human body, not just the brain, so the technique the human mind uses to extract information from the environment must be pretty simple, VASTLY less than 750 MB. I?m not saying an AI must use that exact same algorithm that humans use, they may have found an even simpler one, but it does tell us that such a simple thing must exist, 750 MB is just the upper bound, the true number must be much much less. So even though this AI seed algorithm would require a smaller file size than a medium quality JPEG, it enabled Albert Einstein to go from understanding precisely nothing in 1879 to being the first man to understand General Relativity in 1915. And once a machine discovers such an algorithm then like it or not the world will start to change at an exponential rate. > > So we can be as certain as we can be certain of anything that it should be possible to build a seed AI that can grow from knowing nothing to being super-intelligent, and the recipe for building such a thing must be less than 750 MB, a LOT less. For this reason I never thought a major scientific breakthrough was necessary to achieve AI, just improved engineering, but I didn't know how much improvement would be necessary; however about a year ago a computer was able to easily pass the Turing test so today I think I do. That's why I say a strong case could be made that the Singularity is not only likely to happen it is likely to happen sometime within the next five years, and that's why I'm so terrified of the possibility that during this hyper critical time for the human species the most powerful human being on the face of the planet will be an anti-science, anti-free market, wannabe dictator with the emotional and mental makeup of an overly pampered nine-year-old brat who probably can't even spell AI. > > John K Clark > >> > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "extropolis" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to extropolis+unsubscribe at googlegroups.com. > To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/extropolis/CAJPayv2diRbDfcYNT2KRAHoLDSM7F4jux%3DrfEywNDhycn%2BS2oQ%40mail.gmail.com. From pharos at gmail.com Fri Jan 19 22:30:57 2024 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Fri, 19 Jan 2024 22:30:57 +0000 Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Open Individualism In-Reply-To: <746584de-c34d-2121-bb95-955e671ea780@swisscows.email> References: <580f2112-d8a1-40c3-8f1b-e79bbe9fa1df@zaiboc.net> <746584de-c34d-2121-bb95-955e671ea780@swisscows.email> Message-ID: On Fri, 19 Jan 2024 at 21:13, efc--- via extropy-chat wrote: > > I would say that reasoning alone is sufficient in math. However, when it > comes to questions about this world, observation, hypothesis, experiment and > proof/disproof is necessary. > > And then of course our material world is always > based on an assumption, since we collapse into solipsism if we want > strict and uncotrovertible proof of the world we are in. > > But I kind of like the atheist "shift" where the one who comes up with > the non-intuitive thesis about our world has the burden of proof, and > where the material world is the default assumption. > > Best regards, Daniel > _______________________________________________ I didn't realise (until I asked!) that there were so many different types of logical reasoning. :) Quote: When no observations are possible, the most commonly used type of logical reasoning is deductive reasoning. Deductive reasoning starts with a set of premises that are considered to be true and then uses logical rules to derive a conclusion that must also be true. This type of reasoning is often used in mathematics, logic, and theoretical physics, where observations are not always possible or practical. For example, in mathematics, you might start with the premise that "all squares have four sides" and the premise that "a square has four equal sides". From these premises, you can deduce the conclusion that "a square is a rectangle". This conclusion would hold true regardless of whether any squares were observed. It's important to note that while deductive reasoning can be powerful, it also relies heavily on the truth of its premises. If a premise is false, the conclusion will also be false. ----------------------------- This appears to be the type of reasoning involved in Open Individualism. Deductive reasoning provides conclusions that are certain, given that the premises are true and the logical rules are valid. If the premises are true and the reasoning is valid, the conclusion must also be true. BillK From atymes at gmail.com Fri Jan 19 23:14:01 2024 From: atymes at gmail.com (Adrian Tymes) Date: Fri, 19 Jan 2024 15:14:01 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <580f2112-d8a1-40c3-8f1b-e79bbe9fa1df@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: On Fri, Jan 19, 2024 at 10:03?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > Would you care to name which other possibility that is missing aside from > these three? > > > https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1UvJ5X8ovzz6ZrJJWKDoiUvj2g6p6H6p-nUz1XdDt6aU/edit#slide=id.g2ac585a35ce_0_43 > That a person is defined by something other than observer-moments. In theory this is closed individualism (as each person contains a set of zero or more, potentially more than one, observer-moments), except that any given observer-moment could belong to more than one person, without open individualism's "all observer-moments are shared" criteria. > Exactly, you have come upon the central concern of personal identity. You > have three options: > > 1. You are only a single isolated thought moment > 2. You are a collection of some thought moments, but not others > 3. You are all thought moments. > 4. You are zero thought moments. (Anything in you that appears to be a thought moment, is in fact something else.) 2.5. You are a constantly changing collection of some thought moments, but not others. (As distinct from the static set your image in that GDoc implies.) 3.5 Only those thought moments that are you, truly exist; there are no actual thought moments other than yours. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Fri Jan 19 23:33:58 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Fri, 19 Jan 2024 18:33:58 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <580f2112-d8a1-40c3-8f1b-e79bbe9fa1df@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: On Fri, Jan 19, 2024, 6:15 PM Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > On Fri, Jan 19, 2024 at 10:03?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> Would you care to name which other possibility that is missing aside from >> these three? >> >> >> https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1UvJ5X8ovzz6ZrJJWKDoiUvj2g6p6H6p-nUz1XdDt6aU/edit#slide=id.g2ac585a35ce_0_43 >> > > That a person is defined by something other than observer-moments. > I agree a person isn't "defined by" these observer moments. But one of the questions of personal identity is "which experiences are had by which persons?" However we might define "person," I hope you agree that this question is meaningful. Experiences are something we as persons have. So the question: which experiences are mine? Which one's will I experience? Leads to the three-way split in theories of personal identity. That is, how do we assign which observer moments, are experiences that will be had by which persons? In theory this is closed individualism (as each person contains a set of > zero or more, potentially more than one, observer-moments), except that any > given observer-moment could belong to more than one person, without open > individualism's "all observer-moments are shared" criteria. > > >> Exactly, you have come upon the central concern of personal identity. You >> have three options: >> >> 1. You are only a single isolated thought moment >> 2. You are a collection of some thought moments, but not others >> 3. You are all thought moments. >> > > 4. You are zero thought moments. > Then it's not conscious of anything, and I would say would not qualify as a person. (Anything in you that appears to be a thought moment, is in fact something > else.) > A thought moment is simply the smallest indivisible time-slice of a conscious experience. If indivisible conscious experiences exist, thought moments exist. 2.5. You are a constantly changing collection of some thought moments, but > not others. (As distinct from the static set your image in that GDoc > implies.) > The question which experiences ultimately belong to you, or will be had by you, is agnostic on time. It will thereby include all times in which the person has/does/will exist. 3.5 Only those thought moments that are you, truly exist; there are no > actual thought moments other than yours. > So there is a single thought moment, and it is you in this moment? I suppose if that is true, all three definitions of personal identity collapse to being the same thing. They would only differentiate when there are more than one thought moments. I wonder if there is a name for this "singular solipsism" idea. It's quite creative. Jason -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From giulio at gmail.com Sat Jan 20 04:59:44 2024 From: giulio at gmail.com (Giulio Prisco) Date: Sat, 20 Jan 2024 05:59:44 +0100 Subject: [ExI] [Extropolis] Old and new futurisms in Silicon Valley In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: Hi John, <...the most powerful human being on the face of the planet will be an anti-science, anti-free market, wannabe dictator with the emotional and mental makeup of an overly pampered nine-year-old brat...> It is the "liberal left" that created the Trump phenomenon and continues to promote Trump. I put "liberal left" in scare quotes because they are neither liberal (e.g. they hate free speech) not left (e.g. they hate the working class). I'm really mad at the "liberal left" for embracing the "woke" travesty that shamelessly perverts the struggle for civil rights and social justice until it becomes a pathetically ridiculous but also dangerously authoritarian ideology. Many working class voters have embraced Trump in reaction. And many moderate voters have done the same. And I perfectly understand them. I hope there's a third way, but if the only choice is between "woke" and Trump, I choose Trump. And this is exactly the kind of "liberal left" bullshit that pushes people to Trump. With enemies like these, Trump doesn't need friends. On Fri, Jan 19, 2024 at 8:04?PM John Clark wrote: > > I watched the video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sdjMoykqxys, I strongly agree with everything Max More said with one exception, his skepticism of the Singularity. I think, not a proof but, a strong case can be made for the Singularity and I will try to do so now. We know for a fact that the human genome is only 750 MB long (it contains 3 billion base pairs, there are 4 bases, so each base can represent 2 bits, and there are 8 bits per byte) and we know for a fact it contains a vast amount of redundancy and gibberish (for example many thousands of repetitions of ACGACGACGACG) and we know it contains the recipe for an entire human body, not just the brain, so the technique the human mind uses to extract information from the environment must be pretty simple, VASTLY less than 750 MB. I?m not saying an AI must use that exact same algorithm that humans use, they may have found an even simpler one, but it does tell us that such a simple thing must exist, 750 MB is just the upper bound, the true number must be much much less. So even though this AI seed algorithm would require a smaller file size than a medium quality JPEG, it enabled Albert Einstein to go from understanding precisely nothing in 1879 to being the first man to understand General Relativity in 1915. And once a machine discovers such an algorithm then like it or not the world will start to change at an exponential rate. > > So we can be as certain as we can be certain of anything that it should be possible to build a seed AI that can grow from knowing nothing to being super-intelligent, and the recipe for building such a thing must be less than 750 MB, a LOT less. For this reason I never thought a major scientific breakthrough was necessary to achieve AI, just improved engineering, but I didn't know how much improvement would be necessary; however about a year ago a computer was able to easily pass the Turing test so today I think I do. That's why I say a strong case could be made that the Singularity is not only likely to happen it is likely to happen sometime within the next five years, and that's why I'm so terrified of the possibility that during this hyper critical time for the human species the most powerful human being on the face of the planet will be an anti-science, anti-free market, wannabe dictator with the emotional and mental makeup of an overly pampered nine-year-old brat who probably can't even spell AI. > > John K Clark > >> > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "extropolis" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to extropolis+unsubscribe at googlegroups.com. > To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/extropolis/CAJPayv2diRbDfcYNT2KRAHoLDSM7F4jux%3DrfEywNDhycn%2BS2oQ%40mail.gmail.com. From giulio at gmail.com Sat Jan 20 05:04:17 2024 From: giulio at gmail.com (Giulio Prisco) Date: Sat, 20 Jan 2024 06:04:17 +0100 Subject: [ExI] [Extropolis] Old and new futurisms in Silicon Valley In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Fri, Jan 19, 2024 at 10:34?PM Keith Henson wrote: > > While I agree with your concerns, I think the supporters of Trump are > more of a problem. They are what makes him a powerful person. The > analogy with Hitler and his supporters if valid. > > This is a population-scale phenomenon. I think it is rooted in > psychological traits that were selected due to repeated population > expansions and resource crises that most of the human race experienced > over the past 100,000 years. (Exception being the San.) > > For reasons I don't fully understand, a lot of people in red states > think they are facing a bleak future. Perhaps they are justified, a > lot of jobs were wiped out by technological innovation, and many more > were moved to China because of the Harvard Business School policy of > profit to the shareholders above any other considerations. Another > factor is the high cost of education. Still another is the high cost > of medical care. > > People have been selected for psychological traits leading to wars. > The first response to a perception of a bleak future is a higher gain > in the circulation of xenophobic or outright crazy memes (QAnon for > example). In the Stone Age, this dehumanized the neighbors in > preparation for killing them for their resources. (In times of plenty > your group swapped wives with them.) > > This process toward war does not have to go to an actual war, it could > stall at the crazy meme stage. It could also back off the way the IRA > lost support as the economy improved the income per capita as the > Irish women cut back the number of children they had. > > By this model, Trump would lose support if the MAGA crowd perceived a > brighter future. How to accomplish that is a good question. Perhaps > we should quiz the AIs. > Hi Keith. YES. THIS is the real way to counter Trump. Following up on my previous reply, it is the "liberal left" that created the "culture" of the doomers that fear the future. Let's create a more optimistic and hopeful culture, and Trump will become a footnote in history. > Keith > > PS Large-scale social (religious) movements are well known. > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Awakening > > On Fri, Jan 19, 2024 at 11:04?AM John Clark wrote: > > > > I watched the video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sdjMoykqxys, I strongly agree with everything Max More said with one exception, his skepticism of the Singularity. I think, not a proof but, a strong case can be made for the Singularity and I will try to do so now. We know for a fact that the human genome is only 750 MB long (it contains 3 billion base pairs, there are 4 bases, so each base can represent 2 bits, and there are 8 bits per byte) and we know for a fact it contains a vast amount of redundancy and gibberish (for example many thousands of repetitions of ACGACGACGACG) and we know it contains the recipe for an entire human body, not just the brain, so the technique the human mind uses to extract information from the environment must be pretty simple, VASTLY less than 750 MB. I?m not saying an AI must use that exact same algorithm that humans use, they may have found an even simpler one, but it does tell us that such a simple thing must exist, 750 MB is just the upper bound, the true number must be much much less. So even though this AI seed algorithm would require a smaller file size than a medium quality JPEG, it enabled Albert Einstein to go from understanding precisely nothing in 1879 to being the first man to understand General Relativity in 1915. And once a machine discovers such an algorithm then like it or not the world will start to change at an exponential rate. > > > > So we can be as certain as we can be certain of anything that it should be possible to build a seed AI that can grow from knowing nothing to being super-intelligent, and the recipe for building such a thing must be less than 750 MB, a LOT less. For this reason I never thought a major scientific breakthrough was necessary to achieve AI, just improved engineering, but I didn't know how much improvement would be necessary; however about a year ago a computer was able to easily pass the Turing test so today I think I do. That's why I say a strong case could be made that the Singularity is not only likely to happen it is likely to happen sometime within the next five years, and that's why I'm so terrified of the possibility that during this hyper critical time for the human species the most powerful human being on the face of the planet will be an anti-science, anti-free market, wannabe dictator with the emotional and mental makeup of an overly pampered nine-year-old brat who probably can't even spell AI. > > > > John K Clark > > > >> > > -- > > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "extropolis" group. > > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to extropolis+unsubscribe at googlegroups.com. > > To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/extropolis/CAJPayv2diRbDfcYNT2KRAHoLDSM7F4jux%3DrfEywNDhycn%2BS2oQ%40mail.gmail.com. > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "extropolis" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to extropolis+unsubscribe at googlegroups.com. > To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/extropolis/CAPiwVB4PezGSJSQfARZwF0obbnHEwP6HTv%2Bb8MT48CbuWGKfRQ%40mail.gmail.com. From spike at rainier66.com Sat Jan 20 05:48:14 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (spike at rainier66.com) Date: Fri, 19 Jan 2024 21:48:14 -0800 Subject: [ExI] poof! they're gone Message-ID: <001b01da4b64$42c68450$c8538cf0$@rainier66.com> The infamous Nature Medicine article had five authors. When the new FOIA information hit the streets, two suddenly disappeared from TwitterX: -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: image007.jpg Type: image/jpeg Size: 19144 bytes Desc: not available URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: image008.jpg Type: image/jpeg Size: 5799 bytes Desc: not available URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: image009.jpg Type: image/jpeg Size: 5625 bytes Desc: not available URL: From giulio at gmail.com Sat Jan 20 08:26:16 2024 From: giulio at gmail.com (Giulio Prisco) Date: Sat, 20 Jan 2024 09:26:16 +0100 Subject: [ExI] [Extropolis] Old and new futurisms in Silicon Valley In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: Let me add to my previous reply to John that the "liberal left" in the U.S. should have learned a lesson in November 2016. Almost 8 years later, not only they haven't learned the lesson, but they have sunk even deeper in "woke" bullshit. Do you guys really want to elect idiots to run your country (and de-facto much of the rest of the world)? Really??? On Sat, Jan 20, 2024 at 5:59?AM Giulio Prisco wrote: > > Hi John, > > <...the most powerful human being on the face of the planet will be an > anti-science, anti-free market, wannabe dictator with the emotional > and mental makeup of an overly pampered nine-year-old brat...> > > It is the "liberal left" that created the Trump phenomenon and > continues to promote Trump. I put "liberal left" in scare quotes > because they are neither liberal (e.g. they hate free speech) not left > (e.g. they hate the working class). I'm really mad at the "liberal > left" for embracing the "woke" travesty that shamelessly perverts the > struggle for civil rights and social justice until it becomes a > pathetically ridiculous but also dangerously authoritarian ideology. > > Many working class voters have embraced Trump in reaction. And many > moderate voters have done the same. And I perfectly understand them. I > hope there's a third way, but if the only choice is between "woke" and > Trump, I choose Trump. > > white males...> > > And this is exactly the kind of "liberal left" bullshit that pushes > people to Trump. With enemies like these, Trump doesn't need friends. > > On Fri, Jan 19, 2024 at 8:04?PM John Clark wrote: > > > > I watched the video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sdjMoykqxys, I strongly agree with everything Max More said with one exception, his skepticism of the Singularity. I think, not a proof but, a strong case can be made for the Singularity and I will try to do so now. We know for a fact that the human genome is only 750 MB long (it contains 3 billion base pairs, there are 4 bases, so each base can represent 2 bits, and there are 8 bits per byte) and we know for a fact it contains a vast amount of redundancy and gibberish (for example many thousands of repetitions of ACGACGACGACG) and we know it contains the recipe for an entire human body, not just the brain, so the technique the human mind uses to extract information from the environment must be pretty simple, VASTLY less than 750 MB. I?m not saying an AI must use that exact same algorithm that humans use, they may have found an even simpler one, but it does tell us that such a simple thing must exist, 750 MB is just the upper bound, the true number must be much much less. So even though this AI seed algorithm would require a smaller file size than a medium quality JPEG, it enabled Albert Einstein to go from understanding precisely nothing in 1879 to being the first man to understand General Relativity in 1915. And once a machine discovers such an algorithm then like it or not the world will start to change at an exponential rate. > > > > So we can be as certain as we can be certain of anything that it should be possible to build a seed AI that can grow from knowing nothing to being super-intelligent, and the recipe for building such a thing must be less than 750 MB, a LOT less. For this reason I never thought a major scientific breakthrough was necessary to achieve AI, just improved engineering, but I didn't know how much improvement would be necessary; however about a year ago a computer was able to easily pass the Turing test so today I think I do. That's why I say a strong case could be made that the Singularity is not only likely to happen it is likely to happen sometime within the next five years, and that's why I'm so terrified of the possibility that during this hyper critical time for the human species the most powerful human being on the face of the planet will be an anti-science, anti-free market, wannabe dictator with the emotional and mental makeup of an overly pampered nine-year-old brat who probably can't even spell AI. > > > > John K Clark > > > >> > > -- > > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "extropolis" group. > > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to extropolis+unsubscribe at googlegroups.com. > > To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/extropolis/CAJPayv2diRbDfcYNT2KRAHoLDSM7F4jux%3DrfEywNDhycn%2BS2oQ%40mail.gmail.com. From ben at zaiboc.net Sat Jan 20 12:25:50 2024 From: ben at zaiboc.net (Ben Zaiboc) Date: Sat, 20 Jan 2024 12:25:50 +0000 Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <21e8385e-2776-4dca-89d5-4dbf18799d3a@zaiboc.net> On 20/01/2024 05:48, Jason Resch wrote: > ... one of the questions of personal identity is "which experiences > are had by which persons?" > However we might define "person," I hope you agree that this question > is meaningful. > Experiences are something we as persons have. So the question: which > experiences are mine? Which ones will I experience? Leads to the > three-way split in theories of personal identity. That is, how do we > assign which observer moments, are experiences that will be had by > which persons? I don't think the question is very meaningful at all. It's treating 'experiences' and 'people' as separable things. I don't think they are (I don't see how they could be). You have to have a person before they can have an experience. It's like coloured blocks. You can have a blue Block and a yellow Block, but you can't have 'a Blue' or 'a Yellow'. And experiences are inherently personal. No-one else can possibly know what your experiences are, so "which experiences are had by which persons?" only has one answer: You have your experiences. I have mine. Each person has their own. 'The experiences' is just a label that we use in our heads so we can think about these things (remembering that the thoughts don't have to be true or accurate, or even make any kind of sense). It would be more accurate to say 'I experience', 'you experience'. Saying 'you /have/ experience X' tempts us to think of X as a thing that is possessed (and could therefore also be possessed by someone else). It's not. X is a label that we use to represent our experience, and we assume, for convenience, that other people experience something like it that they also call X (I strongly suspect that my X and your X could be completely different, but lead to the same behaviour. It's the old question about colours: "Is my blue the same as your yellow?" There is no way to know). Apart from the label that we use to communicate (assuming we speak the same language), there is no other link between my X and your X. There is certainly no known mechanism that could implement such a link. Your X is yours alone. We might agree that putting our fingers into a fire causes us both to shout, withdraw the fingers, do a little dance and never do that again, but we each can't know what the other is actually experiencing. The likelihood is that our shouts and dances are different in some ways, which does kind of hint that there are going to be differences in our experiences. Even if, by some ridiculous freak chance, the experiences were exactly the same, there's no way to possibly know, and no actual link between them. There is no such thing as 'the experience of being happy' as a thing in itself. John Smith being happy is not something that you can separate into the John Smith and the Being Happy, as if they were buckets and frogs. You can meaningfully ask which other buckets can hold these frogs, but you can't meaningfully ask which other people can experience this (John Smith's) happiness, because it's unique to him, and inherently unknowable to anyone else. So the way I see it, this whole concept of 'theories of personal identity' is built on a misconception of the nature of 'experiences'. Ben -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Sat Jan 20 15:11:38 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Sat, 20 Jan 2024 10:11:38 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Open Individualism In-Reply-To: <21e8385e-2776-4dca-89d5-4dbf18799d3a@zaiboc.net> References: <21e8385e-2776-4dca-89d5-4dbf18799d3a@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: Ben, I appreciate your insights and careful thinking on this topic. A few comments below: On Sat, Jan 20, 2024, 7:27 AM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > On 20/01/2024 05:48, Jason Resch wrote: > > ... one of the questions of personal identity is "which experiences are had by which persons?" > However we might define "person," I hope you agree that this question is meaningful. > Experiences are something we as persons have. So the question: which experiences > are mine? Which ones will I experience? Leads to the three-way split in > theories of personal identity. That is, how do we assign which observer > moments, are experiences that will be had by which persons? > > > I don't think the question is very meaningful at all. > > It's treating 'experiences' and 'people' as separable things. I don't > think they are (I don't see how they could be). > I agree with you that experiences are not separable from the brain/mind that produces them. A particular kind of experience can only be had by a particular mind state with a particular pattern / organization. > You have to have a person before they can have an experience. It's like > coloured blocks. You can have a blue Block and a yellow Block, but you > can't have 'a Blue' or 'a Yellow'. And experiences are inherently personal. > No-one else can possibly know what your experiences are, so "which > experiences are had by which persons?" only has one answer: You have your > experiences. I have mine. Each person has their own. > But where does one person begin and end? If someone steps into a transporter that destroys their body and reconstructs it elsewhere, do we draw a terminating border at one end and say the person died here, and a new separate person began elsewhere? Or do we draw the borders such that there is a continuous link bridging then, such that it is all the same person, and the experiences of the person who emerges on the other side of the teleporter, *are* experiences that will be had by the person who stepped into the transporter? (This is just one example, of many, which shows it isn't so clear cut which experiences belong to a person, because we need to define both what we mean by person, and what qualifies as survival of that person from one moment to the next. We must therefore define the necessary preconditions of what must be preserved for that person to be said to still exist.) > 'The experiences' is just a label that we use in our heads so we can think > about these things (remembering that the thoughts don't have to be true or > accurate, or even make any kind of sense). It would be more accurate to say > 'I experience', 'you experience'. Saying 'you *have* experience X' tempts > us to think of X as a thing that is possessed (and could therefore also be > possessed by someone else). It's not. > I agree they aren't swappable or tradable like playing cards. There is a tight kinky between each experience and a particular mind state. That said, we acknowledge that for a given person (here I mean the common sense understanding of the term), has a life which spans and includes many different mind states, and many different experiences. It is this many-to-one relationship that creates the problem of assignment. To do so, we must be able to define the boundaries of a person's life: Is it a matter of their body being maintained? Is it a matter of their brain being maintained? Is it a matter of their psychology and personality being preserved? Is it a matter of their memories being preserved? If so to what extent? How much perturbation can be tolerated before we say, "that's no longer the same, or that person is dead" ? X is a label that we use to represent our experience, and we assume, for > convenience, that other people experience something like it that they also > call X (I strongly suspect that my X and your X could be completely > different, but lead to the same behaviour. It's the old question about > colours: "Is my blue the same as your yellow?" There is no way to know). > > Apart from the label that we use to communicate (assuming we speak the > same language), there is no other link between my X and your X. There is > certainly no known mechanism that could implement such a link. Your X is > yours alone. We might agree that putting our fingers into a fire causes us > both to shout, withdraw the fingers, do a little dance and never do that > again, but we each can't know what the other is actually experiencing. The > likelihood is that our shouts and dances are different in some ways, which > does kind of hint that there are going to be differences in our > experiences. Even if, by some ridiculous freak chance, the experiences were > exactly the same, there's no way to possibly know, and no actual link > between them. > I agree. > > There is no such thing as 'the experience of being happy' as a thing in > itself. > I agree. John Smith being happy is not something that you can separate into the John > Smith and the Being Happy, as if they were buckets and frogs. You can > meaningfully ask which other buckets can hold these frogs, but you can't > meaningfully ask which other people can experience this (John Smith's) > happiness, because it's unique to him, and inherently unknowable to anyone > else. > That is all true, I have no problem with it. > So the way I see it, this whole concept of 'theories of personal identity' > is built on a misconception of the nature of 'experiences'. > To this I would say, and I hope it clarifies, that personal identity isn't so much trying to answer "should put this frog in that bucket or this one?", but rather, it is about trying to define the borders of the buckets themselves. What circumstances are necessary for a person to arise, survive, or die, etc. There are easy, conventional answers to such questions, based on the presence or maintenance of some attribute. But I think if you seriously consider the problems that arise in those cases you will understand the difficulties of the conventional view and it's inability to handle a host of situations. In the end, belief in the necessity of some attribute that is needed for "you to be you" is both unfounded and uneccesssry. It's a purely metaphysical assumption which Occam would remind us to dispense with. Jason -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From hkeithhenson at gmail.com Sat Jan 20 23:02:18 2024 From: hkeithhenson at gmail.com (Keith Henson) Date: Sat, 20 Jan 2024 15:02:18 -0800 Subject: [ExI] it's not? indeed? In-Reply-To: <086601da4a8b$8b079350$a116b9f0$@rainier66.com> References: <046001da4a28$42a46bf0$c7ed43d0$@rainier66.com> <53570e12-394b-459e-84f1-53dae9ad9457@protonmail.com> <086601da4a8b$8b079350$a116b9f0$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: I find the lab leak theory to be exceedingly unlikely. The wet market origin of the spillover is much more likely to me. But it does not matter. Keith On Thu, Jan 18, 2024 at 7:58?PM spike jones via extropy-chat wrote: > > > > > > From: extropy-chat On Behalf Of Samantha via extropy-chat > ? > Subject: Re: [ExI] it's not? indeed? > > > > >?Rather more importantly the Wuhan lab leak theory was treated as blatant disinformation. It was punishable on multiple platforms to say you thought it was the most likely explanation, even if you were well credentialed and presented a thorough case. Fauci and US government pushed such punishment as appropriate and are still pushing to punish and censor misinformation and disinformation. Determined by whom? Why, primarily by government of course. Because they need to product us from wrong think. > > - samantha > > On 1/18/24 09:06, spike jones via extropy-chat wrote: > > > > >>?Dr. Fauci has testified before a House subcommittee that the lab leak of Covid19 is not a conspiracy theory?. > > > > >>?So? as has been demonstrated repeatedly, just because a notion is a conspiracy theory does not prove it is not true. The definition has changed: conspiracy theories might be true. Even if it is true, the lab leak origin of Covid19 is now and will forever be a conspiracy theory. > > > > spike > > > > > > > > > > > > Thx for that Samantha. > > > > What we have learned is that if something is a conspiracy theory, that doesn?t necessarily mean it is not true. Some conspiracy theories are true. 2023 was a great year for conspiracy theories. > > > > We have also learned that misinformation and disinformation are not necessarily false. Both might be true, if those calling it mis- and dis- information are mistaken or have ulterior motives for suppressing or refuting that possibly true information. > > > > The Covid nightmare was most educational, ja? > > > > spike > > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat From dsunley at gmail.com Sat Jan 20 21:54:34 2024 From: dsunley at gmail.com (Darin Sunley) Date: Sat, 20 Jan 2024 14:54:34 -0700 Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <21e8385e-2776-4dca-89d5-4dbf18799d3a@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: Open Individualism is starting to sound like Greg Egan's "Dust theory" from Permutation City. To state that "You have to have a person before they can have an experience" isn't a counterargument against Dust theory, it's a naked and content-free denial of it. The central claim of dust theory is, indeed, that "persons" are not ontologically primitive. That a "person" is nothing more and nothing less than a sequence of "experiences" [observer moments] that form a sequence. The sequence is defined by the fact that some observer moments are in the process of remembering other observer moments. [dust theory also holds that all possible observer moments exist, are ontologically primitive, and are, indeed, the only things that exist.] Yes, their theory is radically non-materialist, and yes, it has unanswered questions, but it's not sufficiently out there that it can be trivially disposed of with a content-free denial asserting the trivial and obvious truth of the materialist paradigm. That's just begging the question. On Sat, Jan 20, 2024 at 8:13?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > Ben, > > I appreciate your insights and careful thinking on this topic. A few > comments below: > > On Sat, Jan 20, 2024, 7:27 AM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> On 20/01/2024 05:48, Jason Resch wrote: >> >> ... one of the questions of personal identity is "which experiences are had by which persons?" >> However we might define "person," I hope you agree that this question is meaningful. >> Experiences are something we as persons have. So the question: which experiences >> are mine? Which ones will I experience? Leads to the three-way split in >> theories of personal identity. That is, how do we assign which observer >> moments, are experiences that will be had by which persons? >> >> >> I don't think the question is very meaningful at all. >> >> It's treating 'experiences' and 'people' as separable things. I don't >> think they are (I don't see how they could be). >> > > I agree with you that experiences are not separable from the brain/mind > that produces them. A particular kind of experience can only be had by a > particular mind state with a particular pattern / organization. > > >> You have to have a person before they can have an experience. It's like >> coloured blocks. You can have a blue Block and a yellow Block, but you >> can't have 'a Blue' or 'a Yellow'. And experiences are inherently personal. >> No-one else can possibly know what your experiences are, so "which >> experiences are had by which persons?" only has one answer: You have your >> experiences. I have mine. Each person has their own. >> > > But where does one person begin and end? If someone steps into a > transporter that destroys their body and reconstructs it elsewhere, do we > draw a terminating border at one end and say the person died here, and a > new separate person began elsewhere? Or do we draw the borders such that > there is a continuous link bridging then, such that it is all the same > person, and the experiences of the person who emerges on the other side of > the teleporter, *are* experiences that will be had by the person who > stepped into the transporter? > > (This is just one example, of many, which shows it isn't so clear cut > which experiences belong to a person, because we need to define both what > we mean by person, and what qualifies as survival of that person from one > moment to the next. We must therefore define the necessary preconditions of > what must be preserved for that person to be said to still exist.) > > >> 'The experiences' is just a label that we use in our heads so we can >> think about these things (remembering that the thoughts don't have to be >> true or accurate, or even make any kind of sense). It would be more >> accurate to say 'I experience', 'you experience'. Saying 'you *have* >> experience X' tempts us to think of X as a thing that is possessed (and >> could therefore also be possessed by someone else). It's not. >> > > I agree they aren't swappable or tradable like playing cards. There is a > tight kinky between each experience and a particular mind state. > > That said, we acknowledge that for a given person (here I mean the common > sense understanding of the term), has a life which spans and includes many > different mind states, and many different experiences. > > It is this many-to-one relationship that creates the problem of assignment. > > To do so, we must be able to define the boundaries of a person's life: > > Is it a matter of their body being maintained? > Is it a matter of their brain being maintained? > Is it a matter of their psychology and personality being preserved? > Is it a matter of their memories being preserved? > > If so to what extent? How much perturbation can be tolerated before we > say, "that's no longer the same, or that person is dead" ? > > X is a label that we use to represent our experience, and we assume, for >> convenience, that other people experience something like it that they also >> call X (I strongly suspect that my X and your X could be completely >> different, but lead to the same behaviour. It's the old question about >> colours: "Is my blue the same as your yellow?" There is no way to know). >> >> Apart from the label that we use to communicate (assuming we speak the >> same language), there is no other link between my X and your X. There is >> certainly no known mechanism that could implement such a link. Your X is >> yours alone. We might agree that putting our fingers into a fire causes us >> both to shout, withdraw the fingers, do a little dance and never do that >> again, but we each can't know what the other is actually experiencing. The >> likelihood is that our shouts and dances are different in some ways, which >> does kind of hint that there are going to be differences in our >> experiences. Even if, by some ridiculous freak chance, the experiences were >> exactly the same, there's no way to possibly know, and no actual link >> between them. >> > > I agree. > >> >> There is no such thing as 'the experience of being happy' as a thing in >> itself. >> > > I agree. > > John Smith being happy is not something that you can separate into the >> John Smith and the Being Happy, as if they were buckets and frogs. You can >> meaningfully ask which other buckets can hold these frogs, but you can't >> meaningfully ask which other people can experience this (John Smith's) >> happiness, because it's unique to him, and inherently unknowable to anyone >> else. >> > > That is all true, I have no problem with it. > > > >> So the way I see it, this whole concept of 'theories of personal >> identity' is built on a misconception of the nature of 'experiences'. >> > > > To this I would say, and I hope it clarifies, that personal identity isn't > so much trying to answer "should put this frog in that bucket or this > one?", but rather, it is about trying to define the borders of the buckets > themselves. > > What circumstances are necessary for a person to arise, survive, or die, > etc. > > There are easy, conventional answers to such questions, based on the > presence or maintenance of some attribute. > > But I think if you seriously consider the problems that arise in those > cases you will understand the difficulties of the conventional view and > it's inability to handle a host of situations. > > In the end, belief in the necessity of some attribute that is needed for > "you to be you" is both unfounded and uneccesssry. It's a purely > metaphysical assumption which Occam would remind us to dispense with. > > Jason > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From hkeithhenson at gmail.com Sat Jan 20 21:26:45 2024 From: hkeithhenson at gmail.com (Keith Henson) Date: Sat, 20 Jan 2024 13:26:45 -0800 Subject: [ExI] [Extropolis] Old and new futurisms in Silicon Valley In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Fri, Jan 19, 2024 at 9:00?PM Giulio Prisco wrote: > snip > > It is the "liberal left" that created the Trump phenomenon and > continues to promote Trump. That runs counter to my observations. Other than being horrified, the liberal left does not say much about Trump > I put "liberal left" in scare quotes > because they are neither liberal (e.g. they hate free speech) The ones I know don't have a problem with free speech, but they do with outright falsehoods. QAnon is an example that almost ended in a tragedy. > not left > (e.g. they hate the working class). I am one of those with a relatively liberal outlook and I don't hate working-class people. Can't think of anyone I know who does. > I'm really mad at the "liberal > left" for embracing the "woke" travesty that shamelessly perverts the > struggle for civil rights and social justice until it becomes a > pathetically ridiculous but also dangerously authoritarian ideology. Some of it is silly but relatively harmless. > Many working class voters have embraced Trump in reaction. And many > moderate voters have done the same. And I perfectly understand them. I > hope there's a third way, but if the only choice is between "woke" and > Trump, I choose Trump. Hmm. I think of Trump as a cult leader who has captured the attention of a large number of people. Why this happened is hard to say, but it is not unique in history and seems to be a characteristic of communicating humans in mass. > white males...> Does that make any sense? Transhumanists are a vanishingly small number. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:American_transhumanists There are 68 listed out of around a million listed as living people. > And this is exactly the kind of "liberal left" bullshit that pushes > people to Trump. With enemies like these, Trump doesn't need friends. Trump is not the problem. It's the people who have been caught up in xenophobic and irrational belief patterns. Consider what happened in Cambodia or Rwanda for how dangerous mass beliefs can become. I don't think I can find it, but Charles Sheffield wrote a story that discussed aliens who could not exist in large numbers because crazy memes would circulate in their populations and they would all die. Keith > On Fri, Jan 19, 2024 at 8:04?PM John Clark wrote: > > > > I watched the video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sdjMoykqxys, I strongly agree with everything Max More said with one exception, his skepticism of the Singularity. I think, not a proof but, a strong case can be made for the Singularity and I will try to do so now. We know for a fact that the human genome is only 750 MB long (it contains 3 billion base pairs, there are 4 bases, so each base can represent 2 bits, and there are 8 bits per byte) and we know for a fact it contains a vast amount of redundancy and gibberish (for example many thousands of repetitions of ACGACGACGACG) and we know it contains the recipe for an entire human body, not just the brain, so the technique the human mind uses to extract information from the environment must be pretty simple, VASTLY less than 750 MB. I?m not saying an AI must use that exact same algorithm that humans use, they may have found an even simpler one, but it does tell us that such a simple thing must exist, 750 MB is just the upper bound, the true number must be much much less. So even though this AI seed algorithm would require a smaller file size than a medium quality JPEG, it enabled Albert Einstein to go from understanding precisely nothing in 1879 to being the first man to understand General Relativity in 1915. And once a machine discovers such an algorithm then like it or not the world will start to change at an exponential rate. > > > > So we can be as certain as we can be certain of anything that it should be possible to build a seed AI that can grow from knowing nothing to being super-intelligent, and the recipe for building such a thing must be less than 750 MB, a LOT less. For this reason I never thought a major scientific breakthrough was necessary to achieve AI, just improved engineering, but I didn't know how much improvement would be necessary; however about a year ago a computer was able to easily pass the Turing test so today I think I do. That's why I say a strong case could be made that the Singularity is not only likely to happen it is likely to happen sometime within the next five years, and that's why I'm so terrified of the possibility that during this hyper critical time for the human species the most powerful human being on the face of the planet will be an anti-science, anti-free market, wannabe dictator with the emotional and mental makeup of an overly pampered nine-year-old brat who probably can't even spell AI. > > > > John K Clark > > > >> > > -- > > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "extropolis" group. > > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to extropolis+unsubscribe at googlegroups.com. > > To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/extropolis/CAJPayv2diRbDfcYNT2KRAHoLDSM7F4jux%3DrfEywNDhycn%2BS2oQ%40mail.gmail.com. > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "extropolis" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to extropolis+unsubscribe at googlegroups.com. > To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/extropolis/CAKTCJycFgN-wzuYirA1nt6GXncYLdfKik_oVgSeCuugHJhpW-A%40mail.gmail.com. From dsunley at gmail.com Sat Jan 20 21:32:41 2024 From: dsunley at gmail.com (Darin Sunley) Date: Sat, 20 Jan 2024 14:32:41 -0700 Subject: [ExI] [Extropolis] Old and new futurisms in Silicon Valley In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: When major national politicians make it clear, repeatedly, on a national stage, that they don't just disagree with their political opponent's opinions, but hate and fear the kinds of people who don't vote for them, nothing good is something down the pipe. On Sat, Jan 20, 2024 at 2:30?PM Darin Sunley wrote: > I agree with this emphatically. This is precisely what's going on. A lot > of people in Red states do indeed perceive themselves and their families to > have a bleak future. This is indeed triggering intense xenophobia. If they > felt happy and prosperous, this feeling would indeed dissipate. > > The Progressive Left's response to this situation, of course, is to use > all of the power at their disposal, which is not insignificant at this > point, to triple down on the policies that have generated this situation, > and to talk openly about punishing and disenfranchising the Red states and > their people. > > On Fri, Jan 19, 2024 at 2:42?PM Keith Henson via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> While I agree with your concerns, I think the supporters of Trump are >> more of a problem. They are what makes him a powerful person. The >> analogy with Hitler and his supporters if valid. >> >> This is a population-scale phenomenon. I think it is rooted in >> psychological traits that were selected due to repeated population >> expansions and resource crises that most of the human race experienced >> over the past 100,000 years. (Exception being the San.) >> >> For reasons I don't fully understand, a lot of people in red states >> think they are facing a bleak future. Perhaps they are justified, a >> lot of jobs were wiped out by technological innovation, and many more >> were moved to China because of the Harvard Business School policy of >> profit to the shareholders above any other considerations. Another >> factor is the high cost of education. Still another is the high cost >> of medical care. >> >> People have been selected for psychological traits leading to wars. >> The first response to a perception of a bleak future is a higher gain >> in the circulation of xenophobic or outright crazy memes (QAnon for >> example). In the Stone Age, this dehumanized the neighbors in >> preparation for killing them for their resources. (In times of plenty >> your group swapped wives with them.) >> >> This process toward war does not have to go to an actual war, it could >> stall at the crazy meme stage. It could also back off the way the IRA >> lost support as the economy improved the income per capita as the >> Irish women cut back the number of children they had. >> >> By this model, Trump would lose support if the MAGA crowd perceived a >> brighter future. How to accomplish that is a good question. Perhaps >> we should quiz the AIs. >> >> Keith >> >> PS Large-scale social (religious) movements are well known. >> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Awakening >> >> On Fri, Jan 19, 2024 at 11:04?AM John Clark wrote: >> > >> > I watched the video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sdjMoykqxys, I >> strongly agree with everything Max More said with one exception, his >> skepticism of the Singularity. I think, not a proof but, a strong case can >> be made for the Singularity and I will try to do so now. We know for a fact >> that the human genome is only 750 MB long (it contains 3 billion base >> pairs, there are 4 bases, so each base can represent 2 bits, and there are >> 8 bits per byte) and we know for a fact it contains a vast amount of >> redundancy and gibberish (for example many thousands of repetitions of >> ACGACGACGACG) and we know it contains the recipe for an entire human body, >> not just the brain, so the technique the human mind uses to extract >> information from the environment must be pretty simple, VASTLY less than >> 750 MB. I?m not saying an AI must use that exact same algorithm that >> humans use, they may have found an even simpler one, but it does tell us >> that such a simple thing must exist, 750 MB is just the upper bound, the >> true number must be much much less. So even though this AI seed algorithm >> would require a smaller file size than a medium quality JPEG, it enabled >> Albert Einstein to go from understanding precisely nothing in 1879 to being >> the first man to understand General Relativity in 1915. And once a machine >> discovers such an algorithm then like it or not the world will start to >> change at an exponential rate. >> > >> > So we can be as certain as we can be certain of anything that it should >> be possible to build a seed AI that can grow from knowing nothing to being >> super-intelligent, and the recipe for building such a thing must be less >> than 750 MB, a LOT less. For this reason I never thought a major scientific >> breakthrough was necessary to achieve AI, just improved engineering, but I >> didn't know how much improvement would be necessary; however about a year >> ago a computer was able to easily pass the Turing test so today I think I >> do. That's why I say a strong case could be made that the Singularity is >> not only likely to happen it is likely to happen sometime within the next >> five years, and that's why I'm so terrified of the possibility that during >> this hyper critical time for the human species the most powerful human >> being on the face of the planet will be an anti-science, anti-free market, >> wannabe dictator with the emotional and mental makeup of an overly pampered >> nine-year-old brat who probably can't even spell AI. >> > >> > John K Clark >> > >> >> >> > -- >> > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google >> Groups "extropolis" group. >> > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send >> an email to extropolis+unsubscribe at googlegroups.com. >> > To view this discussion on the web visit >> https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/extropolis/CAJPayv2diRbDfcYNT2KRAHoLDSM7F4jux%3DrfEywNDhycn%2BS2oQ%40mail.gmail.com >> . >> >> _______________________________________________ >> extropy-chat mailing list >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat >> > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Sun Jan 21 01:03:09 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Sat, 20 Jan 2024 20:03:09 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <21e8385e-2776-4dca-89d5-4dbf18799d3a@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: On Sat, Jan 20, 2024, 7:20 PM Darin Sunley via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > Open Individualism is starting to sound like Greg Egan's "Dust theory" > from Permutation City. > Interesting observation. > To state that "You have to have a person before they can have an > experience" isn't a counterargument against Dust theory, it's a naked and > content-free denial of it. > > The central claim of dust theory is, indeed, that "persons" are not > ontologically primitive. That a "person" is nothing more and nothing less > than a sequence of "experiences" [observer moments] that form a sequence. > I would say the notion of "observer moments" is useful to illustrate how different theories of personal identity demarcate persons. But I would not say the notion of observer moments is exclusive to one theory or another. Perhaps they are a necessity to define "empty individualism", though. The sequence is defined by the fact that some observer moments are in the > process of remembering other observer moments. [dust theory also holds that > all possible observer moments exist, are ontologically primitive, and are, > indeed, the only things that exist.] > Then I would say dust theory makes additional assumptions not made by theories of personal identity, which are independent on matters of ontology. That is, any of the three categories of personal identity theories are compatible with either materialism or idealism. > Yes, their theory is radically non-materialist, and yes, it has unanswered > questions, but it's not sufficiently out there that it can be trivially > disposed of with a content-free denial asserting the trivial and obvious > truth of the materialist paradigm. That's just begging the question. > Personally I subscribe to the view that the physical universe emerges out of conscious experiences which are themselves the product of a more primitive mathematical reality. I describe this theory here: https://alwaysasking.com/why-does-anything-exist/ Jason > On Sat, Jan 20, 2024 at 8:13?AM Jason Resch via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> Ben, >> >> I appreciate your insights and careful thinking on this topic. A few >> comments below: >> >> On Sat, Jan 20, 2024, 7:27 AM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat < >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: >> >>> On 20/01/2024 05:48, Jason Resch wrote: >>> >>> ... one of the questions of personal identity is "which experiences are had by which persons?" >>> However we might define "person," I hope you agree that this question is meaningful. >>> Experiences are something we as persons have. So the question: which experiences >>> are mine? Which ones will I experience? Leads to the three-way split in >>> theories of personal identity. That is, how do we assign which observer >>> moments, are experiences that will be had by which persons? >>> >>> >>> I don't think the question is very meaningful at all. >>> >>> It's treating 'experiences' and 'people' as separable things. I don't >>> think they are (I don't see how they could be). >>> >> >> I agree with you that experiences are not separable from the brain/mind >> that produces them. A particular kind of experience can only be had by a >> particular mind state with a particular pattern / organization. >> >> >>> You have to have a person before they can have an experience. It's like >>> coloured blocks. You can have a blue Block and a yellow Block, but you >>> can't have 'a Blue' or 'a Yellow'. And experiences are inherently personal. >>> No-one else can possibly know what your experiences are, so "which >>> experiences are had by which persons?" only has one answer: You have your >>> experiences. I have mine. Each person has their own. >>> >> >> But where does one person begin and end? If someone steps into a >> transporter that destroys their body and reconstructs it elsewhere, do we >> draw a terminating border at one end and say the person died here, and a >> new separate person began elsewhere? Or do we draw the borders such that >> there is a continuous link bridging then, such that it is all the same >> person, and the experiences of the person who emerges on the other side of >> the teleporter, *are* experiences that will be had by the person who >> stepped into the transporter? >> >> (This is just one example, of many, which shows it isn't so clear cut >> which experiences belong to a person, because we need to define both what >> we mean by person, and what qualifies as survival of that person from one >> moment to the next. We must therefore define the necessary preconditions of >> what must be preserved for that person to be said to still exist.) >> >> >>> 'The experiences' is just a label that we use in our heads so we can >>> think about these things (remembering that the thoughts don't have to be >>> true or accurate, or even make any kind of sense). It would be more >>> accurate to say 'I experience', 'you experience'. Saying 'you *have* >>> experience X' tempts us to think of X as a thing that is possessed (and >>> could therefore also be possessed by someone else). It's not. >>> >> >> I agree they aren't swappable or tradable like playing cards. There is a >> tight kinky between each experience and a particular mind state. >> >> That said, we acknowledge that for a given person (here I mean the common >> sense understanding of the term), has a life which spans and includes many >> different mind states, and many different experiences. >> >> It is this many-to-one relationship that creates the problem of >> assignment. >> >> To do so, we must be able to define the boundaries of a person's life: >> >> Is it a matter of their body being maintained? >> Is it a matter of their brain being maintained? >> Is it a matter of their psychology and personality being preserved? >> Is it a matter of their memories being preserved? >> >> If so to what extent? How much perturbation can be tolerated before we >> say, "that's no longer the same, or that person is dead" ? >> >> X is a label that we use to represent our experience, and we assume, for >>> convenience, that other people experience something like it that they also >>> call X (I strongly suspect that my X and your X could be completely >>> different, but lead to the same behaviour. It's the old question about >>> colours: "Is my blue the same as your yellow?" There is no way to know). >>> >>> Apart from the label that we use to communicate (assuming we speak the >>> same language), there is no other link between my X and your X. There is >>> certainly no known mechanism that could implement such a link. Your X is >>> yours alone. We might agree that putting our fingers into a fire causes us >>> both to shout, withdraw the fingers, do a little dance and never do that >>> again, but we each can't know what the other is actually experiencing. The >>> likelihood is that our shouts and dances are different in some ways, which >>> does kind of hint that there are going to be differences in our >>> experiences. Even if, by some ridiculous freak chance, the experiences were >>> exactly the same, there's no way to possibly know, and no actual link >>> between them. >>> >> >> I agree. >> >>> >>> There is no such thing as 'the experience of being happy' as a thing in >>> itself. >>> >> >> I agree. >> >> John Smith being happy is not something that you can separate into the >>> John Smith and the Being Happy, as if they were buckets and frogs. You can >>> meaningfully ask which other buckets can hold these frogs, but you can't >>> meaningfully ask which other people can experience this (John Smith's) >>> happiness, because it's unique to him, and inherently unknowable to anyone >>> else. >>> >> >> That is all true, I have no problem with it. >> >> >> >>> So the way I see it, this whole concept of 'theories of personal >>> identity' is built on a misconception of the nature of 'experiences'. >>> >> >> >> To this I would say, and I hope it clarifies, that personal identity >> isn't so much trying to answer "should put this frog in that bucket or this >> one?", but rather, it is about trying to define the borders of the buckets >> themselves. >> >> What circumstances are necessary for a person to arise, survive, or die, >> etc. >> >> There are easy, conventional answers to such questions, based on the >> presence or maintenance of some attribute. >> >> But I think if you seriously consider the problems that arise in those >> cases you will understand the difficulties of the conventional view and >> it's inability to handle a host of situations. >> >> In the end, belief in the necessity of some attribute that is needed for >> "you to be you" is both unfounded and uneccesssry. It's a purely >> metaphysical assumption which Occam would remind us to dispense with. >> >> Jason >> _______________________________________________ >> extropy-chat mailing list >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat >> > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From dsunley at gmail.com Sat Jan 20 21:30:03 2024 From: dsunley at gmail.com (Darin Sunley) Date: Sat, 20 Jan 2024 14:30:03 -0700 Subject: [ExI] [Extropolis] Old and new futurisms in Silicon Valley In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: I agree with this emphatically. This is precisely what's going on. A lot of people in Red states do indeed perceive themselves and their families to have a bleak future. This is indeed triggering intense xenophobia. If they felt happy and prosperous, this feeling would indeed dissipate. The Progressive Left's response to this situation, of course, is to use all of the power at their disposal, which is not insignificant at this point, to triple down on the policies that have generated this situation, and to talk openly about punishing and disenfranchising the Red states and their people. On Fri, Jan 19, 2024 at 2:42?PM Keith Henson via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > While I agree with your concerns, I think the supporters of Trump are > more of a problem. They are what makes him a powerful person. The > analogy with Hitler and his supporters if valid. > > This is a population-scale phenomenon. I think it is rooted in > psychological traits that were selected due to repeated population > expansions and resource crises that most of the human race experienced > over the past 100,000 years. (Exception being the San.) > > For reasons I don't fully understand, a lot of people in red states > think they are facing a bleak future. Perhaps they are justified, a > lot of jobs were wiped out by technological innovation, and many more > were moved to China because of the Harvard Business School policy of > profit to the shareholders above any other considerations. Another > factor is the high cost of education. Still another is the high cost > of medical care. > > People have been selected for psychological traits leading to wars. > The first response to a perception of a bleak future is a higher gain > in the circulation of xenophobic or outright crazy memes (QAnon for > example). In the Stone Age, this dehumanized the neighbors in > preparation for killing them for their resources. (In times of plenty > your group swapped wives with them.) > > This process toward war does not have to go to an actual war, it could > stall at the crazy meme stage. It could also back off the way the IRA > lost support as the economy improved the income per capita as the > Irish women cut back the number of children they had. > > By this model, Trump would lose support if the MAGA crowd perceived a > brighter future. How to accomplish that is a good question. Perhaps > we should quiz the AIs. > > Keith > > PS Large-scale social (religious) movements are well known. > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Awakening > > On Fri, Jan 19, 2024 at 11:04?AM John Clark wrote: > > > > I watched the video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sdjMoykqxys, I > strongly agree with everything Max More said with one exception, his > skepticism of the Singularity. I think, not a proof but, a strong case can > be made for the Singularity and I will try to do so now. We know for a fact > that the human genome is only 750 MB long (it contains 3 billion base > pairs, there are 4 bases, so each base can represent 2 bits, and there are > 8 bits per byte) and we know for a fact it contains a vast amount of > redundancy and gibberish (for example many thousands of repetitions of > ACGACGACGACG) and we know it contains the recipe for an entire human body, > not just the brain, so the technique the human mind uses to extract > information from the environment must be pretty simple, VASTLY less than > 750 MB. I?m not saying an AI must use that exact same algorithm that > humans use, they may have found an even simpler one, but it does tell us > that such a simple thing must exist, 750 MB is just the upper bound, the > true number must be much much less. So even though this AI seed algorithm > would require a smaller file size than a medium quality JPEG, it enabled > Albert Einstein to go from understanding precisely nothing in 1879 to being > the first man to understand General Relativity in 1915. And once a machine > discovers such an algorithm then like it or not the world will start to > change at an exponential rate. > > > > So we can be as certain as we can be certain of anything that it should > be possible to build a seed AI that can grow from knowing nothing to being > super-intelligent, and the recipe for building such a thing must be less > than 750 MB, a LOT less. For this reason I never thought a major scientific > breakthrough was necessary to achieve AI, just improved engineering, but I > didn't know how much improvement would be necessary; however about a year > ago a computer was able to easily pass the Turing test so today I think I > do. That's why I say a strong case could be made that the Singularity is > not only likely to happen it is likely to happen sometime within the next > five years, and that's why I'm so terrified of the possibility that during > this hyper critical time for the human species the most powerful human > being on the face of the planet will be an anti-science, anti-free market, > wannabe dictator with the emotional and mental makeup of an overly pampered > nine-year-old brat who probably can't even spell AI. > > > > John K Clark > > > >> > > -- > > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google > Groups "extropolis" group. > > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send > an email to extropolis+unsubscribe at googlegroups.com. > > To view this discussion on the web visit > https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/extropolis/CAJPayv2diRbDfcYNT2KRAHoLDSM7F4jux%3DrfEywNDhycn%2BS2oQ%40mail.gmail.com > . > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From hkeithhenson at gmail.com Sun Jan 21 02:31:55 2024 From: hkeithhenson at gmail.com (Keith Henson) Date: Sat, 20 Jan 2024 18:31:55 -0800 Subject: [ExI] [Extropolis] Old and new futurisms in Silicon Valley In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Sat, Jan 20, 2024 at 5:35?PM Darin Sunley via extropy-chat wrote: > > I agree with this emphatically. This is precisely what's going on. A lot of people in Red states do indeed perceive themselves and their families to have a bleak future. This is indeed triggering intense xenophobia. If they felt happy and prosperous, this feeling would indeed dissipate. That is correct. > The Progressive Left's response to this situation, of course, is to use all of the power at their disposal, which is not insignificant at this point, to triple down on the policies that have generated this situation, I don't think you can support this statement. Neither side of the political spectrum was responsible for the technological advances that massively reduced the workforce in the Rust Belt areas. Offshoring was more the economic model of the Harvard Business School where the stockholders are all important. It was supported by the money-class conservatives who made bundles of money off lower-cost Chinese labor. Neither side of the spectrum took up protecting working class jobs. > and to talk openly about punishing and disenfranchising the Red states and their people. Can you cite something to support this? It might be true, but on the first pass, I would consider it disinformation, made up to stoke division. Keith > On Fri, Jan 19, 2024 at 2:42?PM Keith Henson via extropy-chat wrote: >> >> While I agree with your concerns, I think the supporters of Trump are >> more of a problem. They are what makes him a powerful person. The >> analogy with Hitler and his supporters if valid. >> >> This is a population-scale phenomenon. I think it is rooted in >> psychological traits that were selected due to repeated population >> expansions and resource crises that most of the human race experienced >> over the past 100,000 years. (Exception being the San.) >> >> For reasons I don't fully understand, a lot of people in red states >> think they are facing a bleak future. Perhaps they are justified, a >> lot of jobs were wiped out by technological innovation, and many more >> were moved to China because of the Harvard Business School policy of >> profit to the shareholders above any other considerations. Another >> factor is the high cost of education. Still another is the high cost >> of medical care. >> >> People have been selected for psychological traits leading to wars. >> The first response to a perception of a bleak future is a higher gain >> in the circulation of xenophobic or outright crazy memes (QAnon for >> example). In the Stone Age, this dehumanized the neighbors in >> preparation for killing them for their resources. (In times of plenty >> your group swapped wives with them.) >> >> This process toward war does not have to go to an actual war, it could >> stall at the crazy meme stage. It could also back off the way the IRA >> lost support as the economy improved the income per capita as the >> Irish women cut back the number of children they had. >> >> By this model, Trump would lose support if the MAGA crowd perceived a >> brighter future. How to accomplish that is a good question. Perhaps >> we should quiz the AIs. >> >> Keith >> >> PS Large-scale social (religious) movements are well known. >> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Awakening >> >> On Fri, Jan 19, 2024 at 11:04?AM John Clark wrote: >> > >> > I watched the video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sdjMoykqxys, I strongly agree with everything Max More said with one exception, his skepticism of the Singularity. I think, not a proof but, a strong case can be made for the Singularity and I will try to do so now. We know for a fact that the human genome is only 750 MB long (it contains 3 billion base pairs, there are 4 bases, so each base can represent 2 bits, and there are 8 bits per byte) and we know for a fact it contains a vast amount of redundancy and gibberish (for example many thousands of repetitions of ACGACGACGACG) and we know it contains the recipe for an entire human body, not just the brain, so the technique the human mind uses to extract information from the environment must be pretty simple, VASTLY less than 750 MB. I?m not saying an AI must use that exact same algorithm that humans use, they may have found an even simpler one, but it does tell us that such a simple thing must exist, 750 MB is just the upper bound, the true number must be much much less. So even though this AI seed algorithm would require a smaller file size than a medium quality JPEG, it enabled Albert Einstein to go from understanding precisely nothing in 1879 to being the first man to understand General Relativity in 1915. And once a machine discovers such an algorithm then like it or not the world will start to change at an exponential rate. >> > >> > So we can be as certain as we can be certain of anything that it should be possible to build a seed AI that can grow from knowing nothing to being super-intelligent, and the recipe for building such a thing must be less than 750 MB, a LOT less. For this reason I never thought a major scientific breakthrough was necessary to achieve AI, just improved engineering, but I didn't know how much improvement would be necessary; however about a year ago a computer was able to easily pass the Turing test so today I think I do. That's why I say a strong case could be made that the Singularity is not only likely to happen it is likely to happen sometime within the next five years, and that's why I'm so terrified of the possibility that during this hyper critical time for the human species the most powerful human being on the face of the planet will be an anti-science, anti-free market, wannabe dictator with the emotional and mental makeup of an overly pampered nine-year-old brat who probably can't even spell AI. >> > >> > John K Clark >> > >> >> >> > -- >> > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "extropolis" group. >> > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to extropolis+unsubscribe at googlegroups.com. >> > To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/extropolis/CAJPayv2diRbDfcYNT2KRAHoLDSM7F4jux%3DrfEywNDhycn%2BS2oQ%40mail.gmail.com. >> >> _______________________________________________ >> extropy-chat mailing list >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat From hkeithhenson at gmail.com Sun Jan 21 03:49:32 2024 From: hkeithhenson at gmail.com (Keith Henson) Date: Sat, 20 Jan 2024 19:49:32 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Upload/Download (was: Re: Fwd: Open Individualism) In-Reply-To: <81a727c0-0648-494f-9081-afbb09c67637@zaiboc.net> References: <81a727c0-0648-494f-9081-afbb09c67637@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: On Thu, Jan 18, 2024 at 3:51?AM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat wrote: > > Keith Henson said: > >> I suspect that people will prefer the uploaded state, but I also > suspect that people will save bodies. > > Jason Resch said: > > Yes, I think there will still be many reasons for interfacing with > the external world. > > That remark seems to imply you think that uploads would not interface > with the external world. I don't see why they wouldn't, and I'd > certainly expect they'd be able to if they wanted. It depends on how much the uploads speed up. Interacting with the external world would just not work for an upload running much faster than real time. Keith > If nothing else, uploads should be able to maintain their own hardware. > If you were an upload, would you want to entrust the care and > maintenance of your hardware to biological beings? That will probably be > the case at first, but in the long run, we don't want to depend on > beings that can be disabled or destroyed so easily. It would be ironic > if civilisation was wiped out by a disease, say, in spite of a good part > of it being resistant to the disease! > > Ben > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat From giulio at gmail.com Sun Jan 21 05:53:00 2024 From: giulio at gmail.com (Giulio Prisco) Date: Sun, 21 Jan 2024 06:53:00 +0100 Subject: [ExI] [Extropolis] Old and new futurisms in Silicon Valley In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: John, we'll just have to agree to disagree on which one (Trump or "woke") is the greatest evil. But I think we can agree that both are far from good (please correct me if I'm wrong). Therefore, while there's not much we can do to avoid having to make this choice at the next elections (not only in the U.S. - these are global trends with different local names), it is important to promote third-way alternatives for the longer term. What should the third way alternative be? If I had a precise answer, I would be a politician. But my rough answer is that the third way should protect both individual liberty and social justice. These are and will remain conflicting goals, so the devil will always be in the details and negotiation will always be needed. Another important point is that our Western culture (and its political aspects) must recover its strength and stop treating weakness and despair as virtues. On Sat, Jan 20, 2024 at 2:21?PM John Clark wrote: > > On Sat, Jan 20, 2024 at 12:00?AM Giulio Prisco wrote: > > Hi Giulio, I respectfully disagree: > >> > "if the only choice is between "woke" and Trump, I choose Trump." > > > It's telling that I never use the word "Trump" but from my description (an anti-science, anti-free market, wannabe dictator with the emotional and mental makeup of an overly pampered nine-year-old brat) you knew exactly who I was talking about. > > >>> > >> >> >> > "And this is exactly the kind of "liberal left" bullshit that pushes people to Trump. With enemies like these, Trump doesn't need friends." > > > > Yes, that sort of woke statement is maddening and total bullshit, but it's simply not comparable to the action, not just a statement, of attempting a coup d'?tat to overturn a 250 year old democracy that has the most powerful military in the world. Wokeism is stupid and irritating, no doubt about that, however it's no more an existential threat than Drag Queen Story Time or unisex restrooms are; but giving the keys to a fleet of nuclear submarines to a man as ignorant, amoral, and intellectually lazy as Donald Trump right in the middle of the Singularity, the most critical time in the entire existence of Homo sapiens, would be a Chicxulub level extinction event for the human race. Even without Donald Trump the chances that you or I we'll make it through the Singularity meat grinder in one piece are pretty low, but given the choice between low chance and no chance I choose low chance. > > John K Clark See what's on my new list at Extropolis > lcl > > > >> >> >> On Fri, Jan 19, 2024 at 8:04?PM John Clark wrote: >> > >> > I watched the video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sdjMoykqxys, I strongly agree with everything Max More said with one exception, his skepticism of the Singularity. I think, not a proof but, a strong case can be made for the Singularity and I will try to do so now. We know for a fact that the human genome is only 750 MB long (it contains 3 billion base pairs, there are 4 bases, so each base can represent 2 bits, and there are 8 bits per byte) and we know for a fact it contains a vast amount of redundancy and gibberish (for example many thousands of repetitions of ACGACGACGACG) and we know it contains the recipe for an entire human body, not just the brain, so the technique the human mind uses to extract information from the environment must be pretty simple, VASTLY less than 750 MB. I?m not saying an AI must use that exact same algorithm that humans use, they may have found an even simpler one, but it does tell us that such a simple thing must exist, 750 MB is just the upper bound, the true number must be much much less. So even though this AI seed algorithm would require a smaller file size than a medium quality JPEG, it enabled Albert Einstein to go from understanding precisely nothing in 1879 to being the first man to understand General Relativity in 1915. And once a machine discovers such an algorithm then like it or not the world will start to change at an exponential rate. >> > >> > So we can be as certain as we can be certain of anything that it should be possible to build a seed AI that can grow from knowing nothing to being super-intelligent, and the recipe for building such a thing must be less than 750 MB, a LOT less. For this reason I never thought a major scientific breakthrough was necessary to achieve AI, just improved engineering, but I didn't know how much improvement would be necessary; however about a year ago a computer was able to easily pass the Turing test so today I think I do. That's why I say a strong case could be made that the Singularity is not only likely to happen it is likely to happen sometime within the next five years, and that's why I'm so terrified of the possibility that during this hyper critical time for the human species the most powerful human being on the face of the planet will be an anti-science, anti-free market, wannabe dictator with the emotional and mental makeup of an overly pampered nine-year-old brat who probably can't even spell AI. >> > >> > John K Clark > > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "extropolis" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to extropolis+unsubscribe at googlegroups.com. > To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/extropolis/CAJPayv3eP_xJ%2BfKn60TWWrdj8zhNTM7nWaRaJxX-fG3gP%2BpVXA%40mail.gmail.com. From giulio at gmail.com Sun Jan 21 06:01:56 2024 From: giulio at gmail.com (Giulio Prisco) Date: Sun, 21 Jan 2024 07:01:56 +0100 Subject: [ExI] [Extropolis] Old and new futurisms in Silicon Valley In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Sat, Jan 20, 2024 at 10:27?PM Keith Henson wrote: > > On Fri, Jan 19, 2024 at 9:00?PM Giulio Prisco wrote: > > > snip > > > > It is the "liberal left" that created the Trump phenomenon and > > continues to promote Trump. > > That runs counter to my observations. Other than being horrified, the > liberal left does not say much about Trump > My point is that the "liberal left" pushes people to Trump. > > I put "liberal left" in scare quotes > > because they are neither liberal (e.g. they hate free speech) > > The ones I know don't have a problem with free speech, but they do > with outright falsehoods. QAnon is an example that almost ended in a > tragedy. > > > not left > > (e.g. they hate the working class). > > I am one of those with a relatively liberal outlook and I don't hate > working-class people. Can't think of anyone I know who does. > Then you are an exceptionally nice and reasonable person with exceptionally nice and reasonable friends. Or you don't spend much time on social media. If so, I guess you are right, for these days people show their ugliest face online and keep their nicest face for in-person interactions. But online speech does have a big influence on political choices. > > I'm really mad at the "liberal > > left" for embracing the "woke" travesty that shamelessly perverts the > > struggle for civil rights and social justice until it becomes a > > pathetically ridiculous but also dangerously authoritarian ideology. > > Some of it is silly but relatively harmless. > Say that to those who have lost their job (and therefore lost the means to put food on the table for their family) because the "woke" mobs didn't like them. Silly ideas, even the silliest ideas, are relatively harmless indeed, but actions that harm people are not. > > Many working class voters have embraced Trump in reaction. And many > > moderate voters have done the same. And I perfectly understand them. I > > hope there's a third way, but if the only choice is between "woke" and > > Trump, I choose Trump. > > Hmm. I think of Trump as a cult leader who has captured the attention > of a large number of people. Why this happened is hard to say, but it > is not unique in history and seems to be a characteristic of > communicating humans in mass. > > > > white males...> > > Does that make any sense? Transhumanists are a vanishingly small > number. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:American_transhumanists > There are 68 listed out of around a million listed as living people. > > > And this is exactly the kind of "liberal left" bullshit that pushes > > people to Trump. With enemies like these, Trump doesn't need friends. > > Trump is not the problem. It's the people who have been caught up in > xenophobic and irrational belief patterns. Consider what happened in > Cambodia or Rwanda for how dangerous mass beliefs can become. > > I don't think I can find it, but Charles Sheffield wrote a story that > discussed aliens who could not exist in large numbers because crazy > memes would circulate in their populations and they would all die. > > Keith > > > On Fri, Jan 19, 2024 at 8:04?PM John Clark wrote: > > > > > > I watched the video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sdjMoykqxys, I strongly agree with everything Max More said with one exception, his skepticism of the Singularity. I think, not a proof but, a strong case can be made for the Singularity and I will try to do so now. We know for a fact that the human genome is only 750 MB long (it contains 3 billion base pairs, there are 4 bases, so each base can represent 2 bits, and there are 8 bits per byte) and we know for a fact it contains a vast amount of redundancy and gibberish (for example many thousands of repetitions of ACGACGACGACG) and we know it contains the recipe for an entire human body, not just the brain, so the technique the human mind uses to extract information from the environment must be pretty simple, VASTLY less than 750 MB. I?m not saying an AI must use that exact same algorithm that humans use, they may have found an even simpler one, but it does tell us that such a simple thing must exist, 750 MB is just the upper bound, the true number must be much much less. So even though this AI seed algorithm would require a smaller file size than a medium quality JPEG, it enabled Albert Einstein to go from understanding precisely nothing in 1879 to being the first man to understand General Relativity in 1915. And once a machine discovers such an algorithm then like it or not the world will start to change at an exponential rate. > > > > > > So we can be as certain as we can be certain of anything that it should be possible to build a seed AI that can grow from knowing nothing to being super-intelligent, and the recipe for building such a thing must be less than 750 MB, a LOT less. For this reason I never thought a major scientific breakthrough was necessary to achieve AI, just improved engineering, but I didn't know how much improvement would be necessary; however about a year ago a computer was able to easily pass the Turing test so today I think I do. That's why I say a strong case could be made that the Singularity is not only likely to happen it is likely to happen sometime within the next five years, and that's why I'm so terrified of the possibility that during this hyper critical time for the human species the most powerful human being on the face of the planet will be an anti-science, anti-free market, wannabe dictator with the emotional and mental makeup of an overly pampered nine-year-old brat who probably can't even spell AI. > > > > > > John K Clark > > > > > >> > > > -- > > > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "extropolis" group. > > > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to extropolis+unsubscribe at googlegroups.com. > > > To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/extropolis/CAJPayv2diRbDfcYNT2KRAHoLDSM7F4jux%3DrfEywNDhycn%2BS2oQ%40mail.gmail.com. > > > > -- > > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "extropolis" group. > > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to extropolis+unsubscribe at googlegroups.com. > > To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/extropolis/CAKTCJycFgN-wzuYirA1nt6GXncYLdfKik_oVgSeCuugHJhpW-A%40mail.gmail.com. > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "extropolis" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to extropolis+unsubscribe at googlegroups.com. > To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/extropolis/CAPiwVB4%3D1faoNa-Yc0DAj3PD5HQQE3B6RZjKjBK7549ko_72Cg%40mail.gmail.com. From ben at zaiboc.net Sun Jan 21 14:30:28 2024 From: ben at zaiboc.net (Ben Zaiboc) Date: Sun, 21 Jan 2024 14:30:28 +0000 Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <21e8385e-2776-4dca-89d5-4dbf18799d3a@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: On 20/01/2024 15:11, Jason Resch wrote: > where does one person begin and end? If someone steps into a > transporter that destroys their body and reconstructs it elsewhere, do > we draw a terminating border at one end and say the person died here, > and a new separate person began elsewhere? Or do we draw the borders > such that there is a continuous link bridging then, such that it is > all the same person, and the experiences of the person who emerges on > the other side of the teleporter, *are* experiences that will be had > by the person who stepped into the transporter? Depends on what you need, and what point of view you adopt. There is no single correct answer (which is not to say that there are no answers). > ... > > > 'The experiences' is just a label that we use in our heads so we > can think about these things (remembering that the thoughts don't > have to be true or accurate, or even make any kind of sense). It > would be more accurate to say 'I experience', 'you experience'. > Saying 'you /have/ experience X' tempts us to think of X as a > thing that is possessed (and could therefore also be possessed by > someone else). It's not. > > > I agree they aren't swappable or tradable like playing cards. There is > a tight kinky between each experience and a particular mind state. Not sure what a 'tight kinky' is. Presumably a typo, but I'm not sure what you meant to write. A tight link? I suppose you could say that, being careful to recognise that the experience does not exist on its own, and is then 'linked' to the mind. The experience is produced by the mind, so talking about a 'link' is unnecessary and potentially misleading. > > That said, we acknowledge that for a given person (here I mean the > common sense understanding of the term), has a life which spans and > includes many different mind states, and many different experiences. > > It is this many-to-one relationship that creates the problem of > assignment. I don't know what that last sentence means. What do you mean by 'assignment'. Assignment of what? Again, I take issue with the language used as well. A person doesn't really 'have' a life which includes many different mind-states. I'd rather say a person consists of many different mind-states. If those didn't exist, there would be no person. This is the same difficulty caused by the common habit of referring to 'our minds'. We don't /have/ minds (which implies a duality), we /are/ minds. > > To do so, we must be able to define the boundaries of a person's life: > > Is it a matter of their body being maintained? > Is it a matter of their brain being maintained? > Is it a matter of their psychology and personality being preserved? > Is it a matter of their memories being preserved? > > If so to what extent? How much perturbation can be tolerated before we > say, "that's no longer the same, or that person is dead" ? This is a philosophical question, with different answers depending on your assumptions. To me, the mind is the important thing, and the mind is an embodied dynamic pattern of information. How much can that pattern change, and still claim to be 'the same person'? I don't have any single fixed answer. But you could take the attitude that I'm the same person that I was since I was born (because of a common genome, continuity of physical body, etc. My mind didn't even exist then, really, so I don't subscribe to that view. I'd say that I didn't exist yet), or you could say that I'm a different person each day, or even from moment to moment. I don't really care. If I feel that I'm the same person, then I am. There's a sense in which I am the same person that I was a few decades ago, and a sense in which I'm a different person to who I was when I started writing this email. Again, no single 'correct' answer. There are as many answers as you can think up different ways of looking at it. I can't say for sure, but I suspect that the experience of [anything you like] is different as my mind changes over time. That each experience is unique not only to a mind, but to a mind at a specific time. It could be that someone's experience of eating a cheese sandwich on a rainy afternoon in March 2019 is different to the same person's experience of the same thing in the same place, on a rainy afternoon in March 2029. Actually, thinking about it, I'd be surprised if this wasn't true. ... > > > So the way I see it, this whole concept of 'theories of personal > identity' is built on a misconception of the nature of 'experiences'. > > > > To this I would say, and I hope it clarifies, that personal identity > isn't so much trying to answer "should put this frog in that bucket or > this one?", but rather, it is about trying to define the borders of > the buckets themselves. My point was that the frogs in buckets analogy doesn't apply. > > What circumstances are necessary for a person to arise, survive, or > die, etc. > > There are easy, conventional answers to such questions, based on the > presence or maintenance of some attribute. > > But I think if you seriously consider the problems that arise in those > cases you will understand the difficulties of the conventional view > and it's inability to handle a host of situations. > > In the end, belief in the necessity of some attribute that is needed > for "you to be you" is both unfounded and uneccessary. It's a purely > metaphysical assumption which Occam would remind us to dispense with. You're assuming that being able to use different attributes, according to what you find important, is equivalent to not using any. The fact that there may be 10 different paths to get from where you are to where you want to go, doesn't mean that you don't need any path at all. Some attribute /is/ necessary, but there are many choices, depending on your point of view and what you want to achieve. The conventional view (that there is one correct answer) just needs to be widened to acknowledge that there are many correct answers, all valid, that do cover a host of situations. Consider planetary motion. What gives the correct answer, Kepler's laws or Relativity? I still don't see any reason to assume that there's some kind of mental connection between myself and that Maori dude 200 years ago. Or anybody else. Ben -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jasonresch at gmail.com Sun Jan 21 16:02:00 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Sun, 21 Jan 2024 11:02:00 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: <21e8385e-2776-4dca-89d5-4dbf18799d3a@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: On Sun, Jan 21, 2024, 9:31 AM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > On 20/01/2024 15:11, Jason Resch wrote: > > where does one person begin and end? If someone steps into a transporter > that destroys their body and reconstructs it elsewhere, do we draw a > terminating border at one end and say the person died here, and a new > separate person began elsewhere? Or do we draw the borders such that there > is a continuous link bridging then, such that it is all the same person, > and the experiences of the person who emerges on the other side of the > teleporter, *are* experiences that will be had by the person who stepped > into the transporter? > > > Depends on what you need, and what point of view you adopt. There is no > single correct answer (which is not to say that there are no answers). > It matters to the person stepping into the transporter, does it not? Are you saying there is no scientifically establishable answer to this question? Could not an experimentalist undergo the teleportation to (hopefully) personally confirm his theory that his consciousness survives? > ... > >> >> 'The experiences' is just a label that we use in our heads so we can >> think about these things (remembering that the thoughts don't have to be >> true or accurate, or even make any kind of sense). It would be more >> accurate to say 'I experience', 'you experience'. Saying 'you *have* >> experience X' tempts us to think of X as a thing that is possessed (and >> could therefore also be possessed by someone else). It's not. >> > > I agree they aren't swappable or tradable like playing cards. There is a > tight kinky between each experience and a particular mind state. > > > Not sure what a 'tight kinky' is. Presumably a typo, but I'm not sure what > you meant to write. A tight link? > Yes "tight link". > > I suppose you could say that, being careful to recognise that the > experience does not exist on its own, and is then 'linked' to the mind. The > experience is produced by the mind, so talking about a 'link' is > unnecessary and potentially misleading. > > > That said, we acknowledge that for a given person (here I mean the common > sense understanding of the term), has a life which spans and includes many > different mind states, and many different experiences. > > It is this many-to-one relationship that creates the problem of assignment. > > > I don't know what that last sentence means. What do you mean by > 'assignment'. Assignment of what? > Experiences-to-person. Or using your terminology: mind_states-to-person. Again, I take issue with the language used as well. A person doesn't really > 'have' a life which includes many different mind-states. I'd rather say a > person consists of many different mind-states. If those didn't exist, there > would be no person. > > This is the same difficulty caused by the common habit of referring to > 'our minds'. We don't *have* minds (which implies a duality), we *are* > minds. > If each of us are minds, and each mind can have many states, which set of possible mind states can one be or become? Is there any theoretical or fundamental limit? > > To do so, we must be able to define the boundaries of a person's life: > > Is it a matter of their body being maintained? > Is it a matter of their brain being maintained? > Is it a matter of their psychology and personality being preserved? > Is it a matter of their memories being preserved? > > If so to what extent? How much perturbation can be tolerated before we > say, "that's no longer the same, or that person is dead" ? > > > This is a philosophical question, with different answers depending on your > assumptions. > You can leave them as a philosophical questions, or as I prefer to do, you can turn them into a hard empirical questions, with definite yes/no answers, by asking and testing things like: Does my conscious survive radical brain surgery? Does my conscious survive gradual replacement of material? Does my conscious survive instantaneous replacement of material (e.g. in a teleporter)? Does my conscious survive the accumulation of memories over a lifetime? Does my conscious survive loss of memories in the decline of senility? Does my conscious survive about changes in memory content (e.g. partial amnesia, implantation of false memories (as in Total Recall))? > To me, the mind is the important thing, and the mind is an embodied > dynamic pattern of information. How much can that pattern change, and still > claim to be 'the same person'? I don't have any single fixed answer. But > you could take the attitude that I'm the same person that I was since I was > born (because of a common genome, continuity of physical body, etc. My mind > didn't even exist then, really, so I don't subscribe to that view. I'd say > that I didn't exist yet), or you could say that I'm a different person each > day, or even from moment to moment. I don't really care. > You can say you don't care, but then ask yourself: why save for retirement all your life if you are only to give all that money away to some old rich guy in the future who isn't you? -- (at least it won't be you if you really believed you're a different person each day). If I feel that I'm the same person, then I am. > Yes, this is how I defined survival, by the subjective feeling that ones consciousness has continued into another moment. There's a sense in which I am the same person that I was a few decades ago, > and a sense in which I'm a different person to who I was when I started > writing this email. > Note that here you are using two different definitions of person. What philosophers of personal identity attempt is to clearly define each and then test whether those definitions are consistent/valid in all situations. Again, no single 'correct' answer. There are as many answers as you can > think up different ways of looking at it. > If you examine deeply what certain answers imply, I believe you will find the number of possibly correct answers, is a very small set. > I can't say for sure, but I suspect that the experience of [anything you > like] is different as my mind changes over time. That each experience is > unique not only to a mind, but to a mind at a specific time. It could be > that someone's experience of eating a cheese sandwich on a rainy afternoon > in March 2019 is different to the same person's experience of the same > thing in the same place, on a rainy afternoon in March 2029. Actually, > thinking about it, I'd be surprised if this wasn't true. > An uploaded mind cannot access the true time outside the simulation. If you run the mind simulation twice at two different times, there's no room for the mind to know anything was different between the two runs, unless you introduce something metaphysical. But if your point is that brains are messy things and always changing, I see and agree with that point. > ... > > >> So the way I see it, this whole concept of 'theories of personal >> identity' is built on a misconception of the nature of 'experiences'. >> > > > To this I would say, and I hope it clarifies, that personal identity isn't > so much trying to answer "should put this frog in that bucket or this > one?", but rather, it is about trying to define the borders of the buckets > themselves. > > > My point was that the frogs in buckets analogy doesn't apply. > Earlier, you said: "a person consists of many different mind-states" So then, why cannot we label the collection of mind-states which a particular person consists of? > > What circumstances are necessary for a person to arise, survive, or die, > etc. > > There are easy, conventional answers to such questions, based on the > presence or maintenance of some attribute. > > But I think if you seriously consider the problems that arise in those > cases you will understand the difficulties of the conventional view and > it's inability to handle a host of situations. > > In the end, belief in the necessity of some attribute that is needed for > "you to be you" is both unfounded and uneccessary. It's a purely > metaphysical assumption which Occam would remind us to dispense with. > > > You're assuming that being able to use different attributes, according to > what you find important, is equivalent to not using any. The fact that > there may be 10 different paths to get from where you are to where you want > to go, doesn't mean that you don't need any path at all. Some attribute > *is* necessary, > The only attribute that is necessary is the "immediacy of experience" -- the feeling that it is *I* who is having the experience". You can remove everything else and people will believe they have survived to live in that moment. Note that this attribute is equally present in all experiences. All experiences feel like it is I who is having them. but there are many choices, depending on your point of view and what you > want to achieve. The conventional view (that there is one correct answer) > just needs to be widened to acknowledge that there are many correct > answers, all valid, that do cover a host of situations. > They only seem valid, until you investigate them more deeply. If you say memory is important, why don't we have funerals form people when they get concussed and forget the past 15 minutes? If you say material is important, why don't we have funerals for people every 7 years when all their atoms are replaced? If you say continuity of a mind process is necessary, why don't we have funerals when someone gets general anesthesia and we shut down that process? The answer is, because all generally acknowledge and feel that our consciousness survives all these things. Our consciousness can survive material replacement of our body and brain, it survives gain and loss of memories, and it survives discontinuities like general anesthesia and comas. None of these can therefore be the critical attribute for a person's survival. > Consider planetary motion. What gives the correct answer, Kepler's laws or > Relativity? > Here you compare two theories which provide the same predictions. Different theories of personal identity offer different answers to the same question. For example: Teleporter survival: Bodily continuity - no Psychological continuity - yes Memory loss survival: Bodily continuity - yes Psychological continuity - no Faulty transporter survival: Bodily continuity - no Psychological continuity - no Open individualism - yes > I still don't see any reason to assume that there's some kind of mental > connection between myself and that Maori dude 200 years ago. Or anybody > else. > It's not a mental connection. It's an identity of personhood. If you don't see it yet, you need to go through the thought experiments, and give them serious thought. This isn't an idea that can just be told and accepted, you need to understand why the problems within other theories leave no other option. I list out some thought experiments that can help one get to this realization in this chapter: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1AJhXBFhAE4Xpu6WxD_C4bbW5yFs-pz1R/view?usp=drivesdk Jason > Ben > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From giulio at gmail.com Sun Jan 21 16:57:34 2024 From: giulio at gmail.com (Giulio Prisco) Date: Sun, 21 Jan 2024 17:57:34 +0100 Subject: [ExI] [Extropolis] Old and new futurisms in Silicon Valley In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: This foreign observer apologizes for talking too much about U.S. politics and hopes not to be seen as disrespectful. It is your country, your elections, and your President. Having said that, I don?t dislike Biden at all. I think he is a good man and a decent President. If anything, I see him as an anchor to sanity for his party, a large part of which has become insane. And *this* is the problem. Again, sorry. I totally agree, and isn?t this exactly what Andrew Yang?s Forward Party wants? I wish them all the best. On Sun, 21 Jan 2024 at 17:36, John Clark wrote: > On Sun, Jan 21, 2024 at 12:53?AM Giulio Prisco wrote: > > > "John, we'll just have to agree to disagree on which one (Trump or "woke") >> is the greatest evil. But I think we can agree that both are far from >> good" > > > Actually I don't think it's very important if Biden is not good because History > tells us we can survive a president that is not good, we've certainly had > a lot of experience with presidents that are not good yet we are still > here. A catastrophic president would be another matter entirely because there > is an upper limit to the amount of good a president can do even if he is a > genius and a saint, but there is no lower limit, there is no bottom too > bad. It's far more important to avoid a catastrophic president than it is > to elect a good one. > > > >> >* "it is important to promote third-way alternatives for the longer >> term."* >> > > > That would be nice but here in the US, thanks to our crazy electoral > college system, that is not possible. Our electoral college systems results > in some crazy things, such as (according to the most recent census) giving > a voter in Wyoming 68.3 times more power over deciding who gets to be a US > senator than a voter in California and .giving a Wyoming voter 18.3 times > more power in choosing who next President should be than California voter. > The electoral college system also discourages the formation of a viable > third-party. In all the states except for Maine and Nebraska there is a > winner take all system, in the other 48 states and the District Of Columbia > if candidate X has just one more person voting for him then candidate Y > then candidate X receives 100% of the electoral votes. And that makes it > nearly impossible for any third-party to get a foothold. A much more > rational system would be to eliminate the ridiculous electoral college so > that whoever got the most votes would be the president, if we had that > Donald Trump would never have been president and hundreds of thousands of > Americans wouldn't of died needlessly due to an inept response to the > Covid pandemic, and George W. Bush would never have been president and we > wouldn't have had the Iraq war . > > I also think It would be a good idea if people were allowed to vote for > more than one person. For example, suppose you believed that candidate X > would be a mediocre president, candidate Y would be a catastrophically bad > president, and candidate Z would be a wonderful president, but you figured > that candidate Z had almost no chance of winning. Who do you vote for? If > I could only pick one I would vote for candidate X, but if I could vote > for as many people as I wanted to I would vote for candidate X AND > candidate Z, and that would encourage the formation of a third-party, but > unfortunately that is not the system we have. And that's why in the entire > history of the US there has never been more than 2 viable political > parties. > > John K Clark > >> >> -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "extropolis" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to extropolis+unsubscribe at googlegroups.com. > To view this discussion on the web visit > https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/extropolis/CAJPayv2qEEZd77BvqnEvZwM97cpwJr-Sg5r9oj%3DdT%2Bvy8Pue_Q%40mail.gmail.com > > . > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From ben at zaiboc.net Sun Jan 21 17:45:19 2024 From: ben at zaiboc.net (Ben Zaiboc) Date: Sun, 21 Jan 2024 17:45:19 +0000 Subject: [ExI] Upload/Download In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <6139cd61-6937-4619-b6ea-386740af59ef@zaiboc.net> On 21/01/2024 16:02, Keith Henson wrote: >> That remark seems to imply you think that uploads would not interface >> with the external world. I don't see why they wouldn't, and I'd >> certainly expect they'd be able to if they wanted. > It depends on how much the uploads speed up. Interacting with the > external world would just not work for an upload running much faster > than real time. I think 'would just not work' is a bit of a stretch. I agree it could be problematic, but surely not more than current people planning and executing long-term projects. Especially with the increased intelligence that we hope for and expect, I'd think that this challenge wouldn't be insurmountable. Especially for important things such as making sure your physical infrastructure isn't degrading (or for upgrading it. I'm pretty sure that would be an important consideration), collecting real-world data to test against your theories, constructing mechanisms to test them, protecting yourself/ves from threats like supernovae, suns turning into red giants, galaxies colliding, etc., managing energy supply issues... The obvious thing would be to put recurrent reminders into your diary to check on the state of the outside world, and your mechanisms for dealing with it, every few ten, hundred or thousand subjective years, make the necessary adjustments, then go back to what you were doing. There's always the possibility of just changing your 'clock speed' every so often. Although that would probably bring it's own problems. Anyway, I'm sure there will be solutions. The dangerous (and probably far too easy) thing would be to retreat into a fantasy world, and forget the real world even exists. One day you'd just cease to exist without even knowing why. Ben -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike at rainier66.com Sun Jan 21 18:06:37 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (spike at rainier66.com) Date: Sun, 21 Jan 2024 10:06:37 -0800 Subject: [ExI] it's not? indeed? In-Reply-To: References: <046001da4a28$42a46bf0$c7ed43d0$@rainier66.com> <53570e12-394b-459e-84f1-53dae9ad9457@protonmail.com> <086601da4a8b$8b079350$a116b9f0$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: <010f01da4c94$93f775b0$bbe66110$@rainier66.com> -----Original Message----- From: Keith Henson Sent: Saturday, 20 January, 2024 3:02 PM To: ExI chat list Cc: spike at rainier66.com Subject: Re: [ExI] it's not? indeed? >...I find the lab leak theory to be exceedingly unlikely. The wet market origin of the spillover is much more likely to me. Ja. For a long time I have suspected the wet market was the conduit, the second step. It is completely compatible with the serial passage experiment notion, where the Wuhan Institute of Virology researchers were looking to breed a less lethal corona virus by serial passage, which meant discarding and destroying the dead bats after each generation in the series. It is far too easy to imagine a lab worker bagging the dead bats and selling them at the nearby wet market, which is an ideal place to grow up if one is a human-hosted virus: lots of people in close proximity, lots of meat everywhere, etc. That notion partially exonerates Dr. Fauci (kinda (depending on how you look at it.)) He testified (before severe amnesia set in) that they were not doing gain-of-function research. In later a more recent congressional hearing, he testified that he did not personally review the details of the experiments he funded. This almost contradicts the previous testimony that they positively were not doing gain of function research. He doesn't recall any of it now of course. They never do, when it starts looking like they are caught. If the researchers were doing serial passage experiments without proper documentation at the lab, that would also justify the initial testimony: they were doing it, Fauci didn't know. OK, maybe. In any case, initial denial allowed the Chinese to destroy evidence and send researchers looking for proximal origins, which turned into a long, expensive and fruitless search. Meanwhile, the Chinese were squelching the testimony of those who damn well did know what went on in the Wuhan laboratory. Knowing that information right up front might have helped slow the spread of the virus. A worrisome consequence of the way this all unfolded is that the Chinese might still be fooling with planet-killer viruses, perhaps even justifying themselves by pointing out that this kind of research is illegal everywhere else. Eh... ja. It is illegal everywhere else. For a reason. >...But it does not matter. >...Keith Keith, with that I respectfully disagree sir. It matters. It matters a lot. spike From avant at sollegro.com Sun Jan 21 19:54:40 2024 From: avant at sollegro.com (Stuart LaForge) Date: Sun, 21 Jan 2024 11:54:40 -0800 Subject: [ExI] The physical limits of computation In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On 2024-01-19 12:34, Jason Resch via extropy-chat wrote: > I thought I would share this work with the extropy list, as it covers > topics of relevance to the future of technology and future > civilizations. > > In it, I describe the physical bounds on information storage, > computation, computronium, black hole computers, and the limits of the > universe as a whole: > > https://drive.google.com/file/d/124q3ni51E3sf9kMC_sNKgP3ikcl8ou1t/view?usp=sharing > > Any comments, or corrections would be most welcome. Since you asked for it... ;) On p.18 you wrote: "The DNA molecules that compromise your genome encode 750 MB of data ? and they fit in a cell nucleus just five millionths of a meter across." Nitpicking here but the information content a cell nucleus is twice that figure or 1.5 GB. This is because you have two copies, really versions, of every chromosome in each of your cells, one from your mother and one from your father. Each of your cell nuclei contains approximately 2 meters of DNA. As an adult male you have approximately 36 trillion nucleated cells, so you have 72 trillion meters of DNA inside of you. For perspective, if you made a circle out of all the DNA inside you, the ring of DNA could encircle the sun out well past Jupiter's orbit and almost reach Saturn. So if all the DNA in your body were considered, your total DNA's information capacity, at 750 MB per meter, would be 108 zettabytes. So the Matrix got it wrong. If intelligent machines were to exploit us, it wouldn't be as an energy source but as data storage. ;) On p.49 you wrote: "Using the holographic principle to model the observable universe as a black hole with a radius of 46.5 billion light years, we find it contains: 2.33 * 10^123 bits Which is the total information content of the universe." The observable universe cannot be modelled as a black hole because it is defined by the particle horizon which, while it is one of the three cosmic horizons (Hubble horizon, event horizon, and particle horizon), it is NOT the event horizon in a technical sense and therefore using the holographic principle on it is not really physically valid. The particle horizon defining the observable universe is the boundary of everything we can currently see in our past light cone since the big bang. As you say, it is 46.5 billion light years away from us. The cosmological event horizon on the other hand is the boundary encompassing everything that we will ever be able to affect in our future light cone. The cosmological event horizon is at approximately 16 billion light-years from us. You could consider it the the largest distance an object could be from us which, if we could wait forever, we could bounce a radar signal off of and get a signal back. The Hubble horizon, however is defined on our plane of simultaneity in the present as the boundary at which space is expanding away from us at the speed of light at this precise moment in time. As such, the Hubble radius is a proper distance defined in the present moment at c/H = 14.4 billion light years from us. My own work on causal cell theory demonstrates that the Hubble horizon located at the Hubble radius is the most valid event horizon to set the Schwarzschild radius at for modeling our causal cell as a black hole. This is because it the proper distance to the causal boundary of the space-time that we are able to causally affect by an action we do right now. It is also easier to work with because it depends on only the speed of light (c) and the Hubble constant/parameter (H). If H was constant, the cosmological event horizon would correspond exactly with Hubble horizon. Because H is getting smaller, however, that means that the Hubble radius is getting farther and the Hubble horizon is increasing in area. In any case, as can be seen in the upper right corner of this graph that BillK sent to the list earlier, the Hubble radius corresponds to the Schwarzschild radius of a black hole with a mass the same as that of our causal cell. It lies exactly on the line that the graph uses to depict black holes. The universe modelled in general relativity is boundless and could well be infinite so it cannot be a black hole. But there ARE boundaries which define our causal cell which is finite and therefore COULD be a black hole. https://www.universetoday.com/163927/everything-in-the-universe-fits-in-this-one-graph-even-the-impossible-stuff/#google_vignette It should be noted all three horizons change over time, and in the far future our causal cell will reach its maximum extent possible, where the Hubble constant will stop changing and the Hubble horizon will stop moving. This future state will be a black hole that is composed entirely of dark anergy and would be the largest black hole possible in a causal cell composed entirely of dark energy or the cosmological constant. In other words a blackhole composed entirely of the vacuum energy of empty space where the cosmological event horizon coincides exactly with the black hole event horizon. This is also called a Nariai black hole and is a feature of the De Sitter- Schwarzschild metric. If current estimates of the cosmological constant are correct, then this ultimate black hole/ causal cell will have a radius of about 16 billion light years which coincides with the current cosmological event horizon. I hope that I am not being overly pedantic with regards to what you were trying to show about limits of computation. I sort of went down this same track myself a few years ago and came up with answers within an order of magnitude or so of yours, so you are on the right track. Stuart LaForge From hkeithhenson at gmail.com Sun Jan 21 20:07:51 2024 From: hkeithhenson at gmail.com (Keith Henson) Date: Sun, 21 Jan 2024 12:07:51 -0800 Subject: [ExI] it's not? indeed? In-Reply-To: <010f01da4c94$93f775b0$bbe66110$@rainier66.com> References: <046001da4a28$42a46bf0$c7ed43d0$@rainier66.com> <53570e12-394b-459e-84f1-53dae9ad9457@protonmail.com> <086601da4a8b$8b079350$a116b9f0$@rainier66.com> <010f01da4c94$93f775b0$bbe66110$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: On Sun, Jan 21, 2024 at 10:06?AM wrote: > > -----Original Message----- > From: Keith Henson > Sent: Saturday, 20 January, 2024 3:02 PM > To: ExI chat list > Cc: spike at rainier66.com > Subject: Re: [ExI] it's not? indeed? > > >...I find the lab leak theory to be exceedingly unlikely. The wet market origin of the spillover is much more likely to me. > > Ja. For a long time I have suspected the wet market was the conduit, the second step. It is completely compatible with the serial passage experiment notion, where the Wuhan Institute of Virology researchers were looking to breed a less lethal corona virus by serial passage, That makes no sense whatsoever. What possible motivation would they have to breed a less lethal virus? If they were engaged in biowar work, a more lethal virus would make sense. Now late in the pandemic, when vaccines had failed to stop the virus, breeding a less lethal version might make sense, but to the best of my knowledge, the less lethal versions emerged by straightforward evolution. > which meant discarding and destroying the dead bats after each generation in the series. It is far too easy to imagine a lab worker bagging the dead bats and selling them at the nearby wet market, which is an ideal place to grow up if one is a human-hosted virus: lots of people in close proximity, lots of meat everywhere, etc. If a lab was working on coronaviruses, they are going to be doing it in culture, not bats. Also, China has considerable experience with the previous coronavirus. After that epidemic came to a halt, there was one more infection from a lab sample. They are not going to be hauling infected bats to a market. > That notion partially exonerates Dr. Fauci (kinda (depending on how you look at it.)) He testified (before severe amnesia set in) that they were not doing gain-of-function research. In later a more recent congressional hearing, he testified that he did not personally review the details of the experiments he funded. This almost contradicts the previous testimony that they positively were not doing gain of function research. He doesn't recall any of it now of course. They never do, when it starts looking like they are caught. Gain of function is biowar. Does it make any sense that the US would be funding biowar in China? > If the researchers were doing serial passage experiments without proper documentation at the lab, that would also justify the initial testimony: they were doing it, Fauci didn't know. OK, maybe. > > In any case, initial denial allowed the Chinese to destroy evidence and send researchers looking for proximal origins, which turned into a long, expensive and fruitless search. Meanwhile, the Chinese were squelching the testimony of those who damn well did know what went on in the Wuhan laboratory. Knowing that information right up front might have helped slow the spread of the virus. Not a chance. Once the virus started spreading, it was out of control. China kept it at low levels by draconian measures for a long time, but in the rest of the world, it went wild. Eventually, there were so many imports that a more infectious version overwhelmed the attempts to keep it down. > A worrisome consequence of the way this all unfolded is that the Chinese might still be fooling with planet-killer viruses, perhaps even justifying themselves by pointing out that this kind of research is illegal everywhere else. Eh... ja. It is illegal everywhere else. For a reason. That's just nuts. On this topic the Chinese are rational, and it is not rational to kill off your own population. There is no way a planet killer virus could be kept out of China. > > >...But it does not matter. > > >...Keith > > Keith, with that I respectfully disagree sir. It matters. It matters a lot. Why? It only matters if you assume the Chinese are utterly irrational. Do you have any problem with the first SARs being a spillover without human intervention of any kind? If you do, why a problem with Covid-19 being the same? How about MERS? We know the path from bats to camels to humans for that one and there is no claim for human intervention. Reality is bad enough without crazy contortions. Keith > spike > From avant at sollegro.com Sun Jan 21 20:14:00 2024 From: avant at sollegro.com (Stuart LaForge) Date: Sun, 21 Jan 2024 12:14:00 -0800 Subject: [ExI] it's not? indeed? In-Reply-To: References: <046001da4a28$42a46bf0$c7ed43d0$@rainier66.com> <53570e12-394b-459e-84f1-53dae9ad9457@protonmail.com> <086601da4a8b$8b079350$a116b9f0$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: On 2024-01-20 15:02, Keith Henson via extropy-chat wrote: > I find the lab leak theory to be exceedingly unlikely. The wet market > origin of the spillover is much more likely to me. First off, it is a mistake to think that the lab leak theory and the wet market origin are mutually exclusive probabilities. There is no doubt that the wet market was the initial focal point of the pandemic. However, there are tens of thousands of wet markets all over South East Asia that deal with many of the same species of wildlife. It is highly unlikely that out of all possible wet markets where the pandemic could have started, it just happened to start in the wet market that was closest to one of the dozen or so biosafety level 4 virology containment labs in the entire world by sheer independent coincidence. Bayesian analysis suggests that the posterior probability of that occurring by chance alone is less than 0.00001. Also, intelligence agencies have identified three people by name that they suspect to be the patient zeros in the pandemic, and all three work at the Wuhan Institute of Virology and got sick *prior^ to the epidemic at the wet market. https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2023/06/covid-origin-theories-rival-data-evidence/674495/ "Ben Hu, a high-level researcher at the Wuhan Institute of Virology, and two colleagues, Yu Ping and Zhu Yan, could have been the first people on the planet to be infected with SARS-CoV-2, according to anonymous sources cited first in the newsletter Public and then in The Wall Street Journal. These proposed patient SARS-CoV-zeros aren?t merely employees of the virology institute; they?re central figures in the very sort of research that lab-leak investigators have been scrutinizing since the start of the pandemic. Their names appear on crucial papers related to the discovery of new, SARS-related coronaviruses in bats, and subsequent experimentation on those viruses." The evidence and the math suggest a non-trivial role by the Wuhan Institute of Virology in starting the pandemic in ADDITION to the wet market. Stuart LaForge > But it does not matter. > > Keith Why wouldn't the truth of culpability matter? Stuart LaForge From hkeithhenson at gmail.com Sun Jan 21 20:39:17 2024 From: hkeithhenson at gmail.com (Keith Henson) Date: Sun, 21 Jan 2024 12:39:17 -0800 Subject: [ExI] [Extropolis] Old and new futurisms in Silicon Valley In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Sat, Jan 20, 2024 at 10:02?PM Giulio Prisco wrote: > > On Sat, Jan 20, 2024 at 10:27?PM Keith Henson wrote: > > > > On Fri, Jan 19, 2024 at 9:00?PM Giulio Prisco wrote: > > > > > snip > > > > > > It is the "liberal left" that created the Trump phenomenon and > > > continues to promote Trump. > > > > That runs counter to my observations. Other than being horrified, the > > liberal left does not say much about Trump > > > > My point is that the "liberal left" pushes people to Trump. Can you go into detail about how they do that? > > > I put "liberal left" in scare quotes > > > because they are neither liberal (e.g. they hate free speech) > > > > The ones I know don't have a problem with free speech, but they do > > with outright falsehoods. QAnon is an example that almost ended in a > > tragedy. > > > > > not left > > > (e.g. they hate the working class). > > > > I am one of those with a relatively liberal outlook and I don't hate > > working-class people. Can't think of anyone I know who does. > > > Then you are an exceptionally nice and reasonable person with > exceptionally nice and reasonable friends. Or you don't spend much > time on social media. That's true. I skim slashdot, and post a few times a year on facebook, most recently this generated about a dozen postings on AI. https://www.facebook.com/h.keith.henson/posts/pfbid02nPF9QtUxxctFDTYeAbDvdH2SEdqSqo258EkatZb2rjvC3s3mvc95cMQs3zFpnXhdl?comment_id=1788923988274354 Started with "I wonder if AI might be less dangerous and less useful than it seems. Intelligence is the application of knowledge to making decisions. The LLM to date have depended on human knowledge for training. The point here is that there may be a limit to knowledge. For example, all the knowledge in the universe is not going to find a new element between carbon and nitrogen." > If so, I guess you are right, for these days > people show their ugliest face online and keep their nicest face for > in-person interactions. But online speech does have a big influence on > political choices. > > > > I'm really mad at the "liberal > > > left" for embracing the "woke" travesty that shamelessly perverts the > > > struggle for civil rights and social justice until it becomes a > > > pathetically ridiculous but also dangerously authoritarian ideology. > > > > Some of it is silly but relatively harmless. > > > Say that to those who have lost their job (and therefore lost the > means to put food on the table for their family) because the "woke" > mobs didn't like them. Can you cite an example where "woke" mobs caused someone to lose a job? There are lots of reasons people lose jobs, but I am not familiar with this one. > Silly ideas, even the silliest ideas, are > relatively harmless indeed, but actions that harm people are not. Again, examples or even an example would help me understand what you are talking about. Keith > > > Many working class voters have embraced Trump in reaction. And many > > > moderate voters have done the same. And I perfectly understand them. I > > > hope there's a third way, but if the only choice is between "woke" and > > > Trump, I choose Trump. > > > > Hmm. I think of Trump as a cult leader who has captured the attention > > of a large number of people. Why this happened is hard to say, but it > > is not unique in history and seems to be a characteristic of > > communicating humans in mass. > > > > > > > white males...> > > > > Does that make any sense? Transhumanists are a vanishingly small > > number. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:American_transhumanists > > There are 68 listed out of around a million listed as living people. > > > > > And this is exactly the kind of "liberal left" bullshit that pushes > > > people to Trump. With enemies like these, Trump doesn't need friends. > > > > Trump is not the problem. It's the people who have been caught up in > > xenophobic and irrational belief patterns. Consider what happened in > > Cambodia or Rwanda for how dangerous mass beliefs can become. > > > > I don't think I can find it, but Charles Sheffield wrote a story that > > discussed aliens who could not exist in large numbers because crazy > > memes would circulate in their populations and they would all die. > > > > Keith > > > > > On Fri, Jan 19, 2024 at 8:04?PM John Clark wrote: > > > > > > > > I watched the video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sdjMoykqxys, I strongly agree with everything Max More said with one exception, his skepticism of the Singularity. I think, not a proof but, a strong case can be made for the Singularity and I will try to do so now. We know for a fact that the human genome is only 750 MB long (it contains 3 billion base pairs, there are 4 bases, so each base can represent 2 bits, and there are 8 bits per byte) and we know for a fact it contains a vast amount of redundancy and gibberish (for example many thousands of repetitions of ACGACGACGACG) and we know it contains the recipe for an entire human body, not just the brain, so the technique the human mind uses to extract information from the environment must be pretty simple, VASTLY less than 750 MB. I?m not saying an AI must use that exact same algorithm that humans use, they may have found an even simpler one, but it does tell us that such a simple thing must exist, 750 MB is just the upper bound, the true number must be much much less. So even though this AI seed algorithm would require a smaller file size than a medium quality JPEG, it enabled Albert Einstein to go from understanding precisely nothing in 1879 to being the first man to understand General Relativity in 1915. And once a machine discovers such an algorithm then like it or not the world will start to change at an exponential rate. > > > > > > > > So we can be as certain as we can be certain of anything that it should be possible to build a seed AI that can grow from knowing nothing to being super-intelligent, and the recipe for building such a thing must be less than 750 MB, a LOT less. For this reason I never thought a major scientific breakthrough was necessary to achieve AI, just improved engineering, but I didn't know how much improvement would be necessary; however about a year ago a computer was able to easily pass the Turing test so today I think I do. That's why I say a strong case could be made that the Singularity is not only likely to happen it is likely to happen sometime within the next five years, and that's why I'm so terrified of the possibility that during this hyper critical time for the human species the most powerful human being on the face of the planet will be an anti-science, anti-free market, wannabe dictator with the emotional and mental makeup of an overly pampered nine-year-old brat who probably can't even spell AI. > > > > > > > > John K Clark > > > > > > > >> > > > > -- > > > > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "extropolis" group. > > > > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to extropolis+unsubscribe at googlegroups.com. > > > > To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/extropolis/CAJPayv2diRbDfcYNT2KRAHoLDSM7F4jux%3DrfEywNDhycn%2BS2oQ%40mail.gmail.com. > > > > > > -- > > > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "extropolis" group. > > > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to extropolis+unsubscribe at googlegroups.com. > > > To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/extropolis/CAKTCJycFgN-wzuYirA1nt6GXncYLdfKik_oVgSeCuugHJhpW-A%40mail.gmail.com. > > > > -- > > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "extropolis" group. > > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to extropolis+unsubscribe at googlegroups.com. > > To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/extropolis/CAPiwVB4%3D1faoNa-Yc0DAj3PD5HQQE3B6RZjKjBK7549ko_72Cg%40mail.gmail.com. > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "extropolis" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to extropolis+unsubscribe at googlegroups.com. > To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/extropolis/CAKTCJydjoDEgcHeWc0QYGsFBzN7pQQHd7kPJMR2e6AbrJZmnYw%40mail.gmail.com. From spike at rainier66.com Sun Jan 21 21:07:02 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (spike at rainier66.com) Date: Sun, 21 Jan 2024 13:07:02 -0800 Subject: [ExI] it's not? indeed? In-Reply-To: References: <046001da4a28$42a46bf0$c7ed43d0$@rainier66.com> <53570e12-394b-459e-84f1-53dae9ad9457@protonmail.com> <086601da4a8b$8b079350$a116b9f0$@rainier66.com> <010f01da4c94$93f775b0$bbe66110$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: <080501da4cad$c81bcfd0$58536f70$@rainier66.com> -----Original Message----- From: Keith Henson ... > >>... Ja. For a long time I have suspected the wet market was the conduit, > the second step. It is completely compatible with the serial passage > experiment notion, where the Wuhan Institute of Virology researchers > were looking to breed a less lethal corona virus by serial passage, >...That makes no sense whatsoever. What possible motivation would they have to breed a less lethal virus? If they were engaged in biowar work, a more lethal virus would make sense. Now late in the pandemic, when vaccines had failed to stop the virus, breeding a less lethal version might make sense, but to the best of my knowledge, the less lethal versions emerged by straightforward evolution... Keith, my own experience with covid may help explain my position. In December 2019, I had face to face contact with a nurse who had just returned from China where she was visiting family. She was the only person outside the family with whom I had face to face contact in that week or the week previous (I am retired and don't go to restaurants often.) I caught viral pneumonia a couple days after that contact, and saw my doctor a coupla days after that. Two days later, I landed in the hospital in terrible shape. They diagnosed viral pneumonia, but with a genetic signature unlike anything previous in their RNA library. There were no covid tests at the time, nor any knowledge of any virus from China. However... that disease whooped my ass bigtime. After my hospital stay, it took me seven weeks until I was even halfway normal again. I have never been so sick as I was with that, ever. In summer of 2022, I caught covid, tested positive etc, but that time was far different. It was a minor illness, mild even by the standard of the usual seasonal flu. Clearly it was covid, but then, natural selection had (murderously) bred a far more benign version of covid, by slaying the hosts of the more lethal variants. My notion is that if a more benign variant could evolve naturally, one that produces apparent immunity to earlier more-lethal variants, then the less lethal virus is our friend. It is the bad guy who protects us against the worse bad guy. So... breed a strain of covid that doesn't do much, then intentionally release it if a more lethal strain breaks out. If evolution can create a less lethal covid (as it apparently did) then a less lethal covid can be bred in a lab. Ja? That makes sense to me, but the process of breeding that less lethal virus is itself dangerous as all hell, because the process itself might accidentally breed a more lethal variant which might escape and create all manner of havoc, death and chaos. Even that is a kind of understatement. The process of breeding a less lethal variant IS LIKELY to create a more lethal variant in the process, which is identified and destroyed (ideally.) But that accidentally-created more lethal variant might get loose, which is what I think happened. It wasn't bio-war, it wasn't intentional. It was dangerous research which accidentally created a planet-killer, which escaped. Consequently, such experimentation is illegal in the USA. But not so much in China. If so, then Dr. Fauci could argue (if he knew what went on at the Wuhan Institute of Virology) that such experimentation was not gain of function research, it was the opposite: loss of function research. They were looking for a less-lethal covid which could be released in an emergency, such as the outbreak of a more lethal variant of that virus. Had we had modern covid ready to go in November 2019, perhaps they could have saved millions of lives. In any case, China was never held accountable, nor was anyone else. This means that they might still be fooling with lethal viruses. Oy vey. spike > which meant discarding and destroying the dead bats after each generation in the series. It is far too easy to imagine a lab worker bagging the dead bats and selling them at the nearby wet market, which is an ideal place to grow up if one is a human-hosted virus: lots of people in close proximity, lots of meat everywhere, etc. If a lab was working on coronaviruses, they are going to be doing it in culture, not bats. Also, China has considerable experience with the previous coronavirus. After that epidemic came to a halt, there was one more infection from a lab sample. They are not going to be hauling infected bats to a market. > That notion partially exonerates Dr. Fauci (kinda (depending on how you look at it.)) He testified (before severe amnesia set in) that they were not doing gain-of-function research. In later a more recent congressional hearing, he testified that he did not personally review the details of the experiments he funded. This almost contradicts the previous testimony that they positively were not doing gain of function research. He doesn't recall any of it now of course. They never do, when it starts looking like they are caught. Gain of function is biowar. Does it make any sense that the US would be funding biowar in China? > If the researchers were doing serial passage experiments without proper documentation at the lab, that would also justify the initial testimony: they were doing it, Fauci didn't know. OK, maybe. > > In any case, initial denial allowed the Chinese to destroy evidence and send researchers looking for proximal origins, which turned into a long, expensive and fruitless search. Meanwhile, the Chinese were squelching the testimony of those who damn well did know what went on in the Wuhan laboratory. Knowing that information right up front might have helped slow the spread of the virus. Not a chance. Once the virus started spreading, it was out of control. China kept it at low levels by draconian measures for a long time, but in the rest of the world, it went wild. Eventually, there were so many imports that a more infectious version overwhelmed the attempts to keep it down. > A worrisome consequence of the way this all unfolded is that the Chinese might still be fooling with planet-killer viruses, perhaps even justifying themselves by pointing out that this kind of research is illegal everywhere else. Eh... ja. It is illegal everywhere else. For a reason. That's just nuts. On this topic the Chinese are rational, and it is not rational to kill off your own population. There is no way a planet killer virus could be kept out of China. > > >...But it does not matter. > > >...Keith > > Keith, with that I respectfully disagree sir. It matters. It matters a lot. Why? It only matters if you assume the Chinese are utterly irrational. Do you have any problem with the first SARs being a spillover without human intervention of any kind? If you do, why a problem with Covid-19 being the same? How about MERS? We know the path from bats to camels to humans for that one and there is no claim for human intervention. Reality is bad enough without crazy contortions. Keith > spike > From hkeithhenson at gmail.com Sun Jan 21 21:49:55 2024 From: hkeithhenson at gmail.com (Keith Henson) Date: Sun, 21 Jan 2024 13:49:55 -0800 Subject: [ExI] it's not? indeed? In-Reply-To: <080501da4cad$c81bcfd0$58536f70$@rainier66.com> References: <046001da4a28$42a46bf0$c7ed43d0$@rainier66.com> <53570e12-394b-459e-84f1-53dae9ad9457@protonmail.com> <086601da4a8b$8b079350$a116b9f0$@rainier66.com> <010f01da4c94$93f775b0$bbe66110$@rainier66.com> <080501da4cad$c81bcfd0$58536f70$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: On Sun, Jan 21, 2024 at 1:07?PM wrote: > > -----Original Message----- > From: Keith Henson > > > >>... Ja. For a long time I have suspected the wet market was the conduit, > > the second step. It is completely compatible with the serial passage > > experiment notion, where the Wuhan Institute of Virology researchers > > were looking to breed a less lethal corona virus by serial passage, > > >...That makes no sense whatsoever. What possible motivation would they have to breed a less lethal virus? If they were engaged in biowar work, a more lethal virus would make sense. Now late in the pandemic, when vaccines had failed to stop the virus, breeding a less lethal version might make sense, but to the best of my knowledge, the less lethal versions emerged by straightforward evolution... > > Keith, my own experience with covid may help explain my position. > > In December 2019, I had face to face contact with a nurse who had just returned from China where she was visiting family. She was the only person outside the family with whom I had face to face contact in that week or the week previous (I am retired and don't go to restaurants often.) I caught viral pneumonia a couple days after that contact, and saw my doctor a coupla days after that. Two days later, I landed in the hospital in terrible shape. They diagnosed viral pneumonia, but with a genetic signature unlike anything previous in their RNA library. Dozens of viruses and bacterial infections will flatten you. From the date, it might have been Covid. If so, it was one of the first in the US. > There were no covid tests at the time, nor any knowledge of any virus from China. > > However... that disease whooped my ass bigtime. After my hospital stay, it took me seven weeks until I was even halfway normal again. I have never been so sick as I was with that, ever. > > In summer of 2022, I caught covid, tested positive etc, but that time was far different. It was a minor illness, mild even by the standard of the usual seasonal flu. Clearly it was covid, but then, natural selection had (murderously) bred a far more benign version of covid, by slaying the hosts of the more lethal variants. The virus mutated to be more infectious, it incidentally became less lethal. > My notion is that if a more benign variant could evolve naturally, one that produces apparent immunity to earlier more-lethal variants, then the less lethal virus is our friend. It is the bad guy who protects us against the worse bad guy. So... breed a strain of covid that doesn't do much, then intentionally release it if a more lethal strain breaks out. That's nonsense. Nobody, especially government people, has that level of foresight. > If evolution can create a less lethal covid (as it apparently did) then a less lethal covid can be bred in a lab. Ja? > That makes sense to me, but the process of breeding that less lethal virus is itself dangerous as all hell, because the process itself might accidentally breed a more lethal variant which might escape and create all manner of havoc, death and chaos. Which is a darn good reason not to do it at all. > Even that is a kind of understatement. The process of breeding a less lethal variant IS LIKELY to create a more lethal variant in the process, which is identified and destroyed (ideally.) But that accidentally-created more lethal variant might get loose, which is what I think happened. It wasn't bio-war, it wasn't intentional. It was dangerous research which accidentally created a planet-killer, which escaped. That's paranoid thinking. > Consequently, such experimentation is illegal in the USA. But not so much in China. I don't think it is. There have been experiments with smallpox in recent years. Those would not have happened if it was illegal. > If so, then Dr. Fauci could argue (if he knew what went on at the Wuhan Institute of Virology) that such experimentation was not gain of function research, it was the opposite: loss of function research. They were looking for a less-lethal covid which could be released in an emergency, such as the outbreak of a more lethal variant of that virus. Had we had modern covid ready to go in November 2019, perhaps they could have saved millions of lives. That's nonsense. Way beyond the state of the art and far outside the capacity of humans to anticipate the future. > In any case, China was never held accountable, nor was anyone else. This means that they might still be fooling with lethal viruses. Oy vey. When you consider the opportunities for spillovers from animals, they are all over. I don't think there has been a single case where a pandemic originated in a lab. Keith > spike > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > which meant discarding and destroying the dead bats after each generation in the series. It is far too easy to imagine a lab worker bagging the dead bats and selling them at the nearby wet market, which is an ideal place to grow up if one is a human-hosted virus: lots of people in close proximity, lots of meat everywhere, etc. > > If a lab was working on coronaviruses, they are going to be doing it in culture, not bats. Also, China has considerable experience with the previous coronavirus. After that epidemic came to a halt, there was one more infection from a lab sample. They are not going to be hauling infected bats to a market. > > > That notion partially exonerates Dr. Fauci (kinda (depending on how you look at it.)) He testified (before severe amnesia set in) that they were not doing gain-of-function research. In later a more recent congressional hearing, he testified that he did not personally review the details of the experiments he funded. This almost contradicts the previous testimony that they positively were not doing gain of function research. He doesn't recall any of it now of course. They never do, when it starts looking like they are caught. > > Gain of function is biowar. Does it make any sense that the US would be funding biowar in China? > > > If the researchers were doing serial passage experiments without proper documentation at the lab, that would also justify the initial testimony: they were doing it, Fauci didn't know. OK, maybe. > > > > In any case, initial denial allowed the Chinese to destroy evidence and send researchers looking for proximal origins, which turned into a long, expensive and fruitless search. Meanwhile, the Chinese were squelching the testimony of those who damn well did know what went on in the Wuhan laboratory. Knowing that information right up front might have helped slow the spread of the virus. > > Not a chance. Once the virus started spreading, it was out of control. China kept it at low levels by draconian measures for a long time, but in the rest of the world, it went wild. Eventually, there were so many imports that a more infectious version overwhelmed the attempts to keep it down. > > > A worrisome consequence of the way this all unfolded is that the Chinese might still be fooling with planet-killer viruses, perhaps even justifying themselves by pointing out that this kind of research is illegal everywhere else. Eh... ja. It is illegal everywhere else. For a reason. > > That's just nuts. On this topic the Chinese are rational, and it is not rational to kill off your own population. There is no way a planet killer virus could be kept out of China. > > > > >...But it does not matter. > > > > >...Keith > > > > Keith, with that I respectfully disagree sir. It matters. It matters a lot. > > Why? It only matters if you assume the Chinese are utterly irrational. Do you have any problem with the first SARs being a spillover without human intervention of any kind? If you do, why a problem with Covid-19 being the same? How about MERS? We know the path from bats to camels to humans for that one and there is no claim for human intervention. > > Reality is bad enough without crazy contortions. > > Keith > > > spike > > > From jasonresch at gmail.com Mon Jan 22 02:59:16 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Sun, 21 Jan 2024 21:59:16 -0500 Subject: [ExI] The physical limits of computation In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Sun, Jan 21, 2024 at 2:55?PM Stuart LaForge via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > On 2024-01-19 12:34, Jason Resch via extropy-chat wrote: > > I thought I would share this work with the extropy list, as it covers > > topics of relevance to the future of technology and future > > civilizations. > > > > In it, I describe the physical bounds on information storage, > > computation, computronium, black hole computers, and the limits of the > > universe as a whole: > > > > > https://drive.google.com/file/d/124q3ni51E3sf9kMC_sNKgP3ikcl8ou1t/view?usp=sharing > > > > Any comments, or corrections would be most welcome. > > Since you asked for it... ;) > I very much appreciate this Stuart! > > On p.18 you wrote: > "The DNA molecules that compromise your genome encode > 750 MB of data ? and they fit in a cell nucleus just five > millionths of a meter across." > > Nitpicking here but the information content a cell nucleus is twice that > figure or 1.5 GB. This is because you have two copies, really versions, > of every chromosome in each of your cells, one from your mother and one > from your father. I completely forgot to consider that there are two of each chromosome. Good catch. I have to consider how to incorporate this fact, however, since I refer to the 750 MB genome several places and want to avoid confusion by adding in a new unrecognized number. > Each of your cell nuclei contains approximately 2 > meters of DNA. As an adult male you have approximately 36 trillion > nucleated cells, so you have 72 trillion meters of DNA inside of you. > For perspective, if you made a circle out of all the DNA inside you, the > ring of DNA could encircle the sun out well past Jupiter's orbit and > almost reach Saturn. So if all the DNA in your body were considered, > your total DNA's information capacity, at 750 MB per meter, would be 108 > zettabytes. > That's an incredible fact. You reminded me of a similar factoid regarding the maximum data transmission rates of the urethra. ;-) > > So the Matrix got it wrong. If intelligent machines were to exploit us, > it wouldn't be as an energy source but as data storage. ;) > > On p.49 you wrote: > "Using the holographic principle to model the observable > universe as a black hole with a radius of 46.5 billion light > years, we find it contains: > 2.33 * 10^123 bits > Which is the total information content of the universe." > > The observable universe cannot be modelled as a black hole because it is > defined by the particle horizon which, while it is one of the three > cosmic horizons (Hubble horizon, event horizon, and particle horizon), > it is NOT the event horizon in a technical sense and therefore using the > holographic principle on it is not really physically valid. The particle > horizon defining the observable universe is the boundary of everything > we can currently see in our past light cone since the big bang. As you > say, it is 46.5 billion light years away from us. > The issues of the various horizons, and which was the most sensible one to use in this situation confused me. This section is on the observable universe, and ideally, I would like to provide both computatioal, and information content estimates for the observable universe as a whole, if that is possible, the observable universe being the largest thing we can see (and presumably, the thing with the greatest information content). Our inability to interact with distant objects we can see (beyond our event horizon) I consider is (perhaps?) not necessarily important to the question of how much information "is in" the observable universe, as all those far away photons, still "made it here", into the sphere of the observable. So then, when it comes to determining how much information exists within the totality of what is observable (despite the fact that we can no longer signal back to the most distant places), information about those places has still made it here, and computations which took place in those far away galaxies are still perceivable by us, and hence ought to be included in the total amount of computations that have occurred in the history of the observable universe, should they not? I also found it interesting, that the mass of the universe (when computed using the critical density, which comes from Friedmann equations and multiplying this by the volume of the observable universe) led to a mass which is considerably greater than the mass of a black hole with the radius of the observable universe. I take this to be a result of not all the energy in the universe being matter energy, but also radiation and dark energy, which I presume to affect the curvature of space differently than ordinary mass. Is that right? For reference, here is how I did the calculation: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1lR5mj4jFQft7Q-hKC4bYAoQt-BlukVy7MbEQV0eeu8s/edit?usp=sharing > > The cosmological event horizon on the other hand is the boundary > encompassing everything that we will ever be able to affect in our > future light cone. The cosmological event horizon is at approximately 16 > billion light-years from us. You could consider it the the largest > distance an object could be from us which, if we could wait forever, we > could bounce a radar signal off of and get a signal back. > > The Hubble horizon, however is defined on our plane of simultaneity in > the present as the boundary at which space is expanding away from us at > the speed of light at this precise moment in time. As such, the Hubble > radius is a proper distance defined in the present moment at c/H = 14.4 > billion light years from us. > > My own work on causal cell theory demonstrates that the Hubble horizon > located at the Hubble radius is the most valid event horizon to set the > Schwarzschild radius at for modeling our causal cell as a black hole. > This is because it the proper distance to the causal boundary of the > space-time that we are able to causally affect by an action we do right > now. It is also easier to work with because it depends on only the speed > of light (c) and the Hubble constant/parameter (H). If H was constant, > the cosmological event horizon would correspond exactly with Hubble > horizon. Because H is getting smaller, however, that means that the > Hubble radius is getting farther and the Hubble horizon is increasing in > area. In any case, as can be seen in the upper right corner of this > graph that BillK sent to the list earlier, the Hubble radius corresponds > to the Schwarzschild radius of a black hole with a mass the same as that > of our causal cell. It lies exactly on the line that the graph uses to > depict black holes. The universe modelled in general relativity is > boundless and could well be infinite so it cannot be a black hole. But > there ARE boundaries which define our causal cell which is finite and > therefore COULD be a black hole. > > > https://www.universetoday.com/163927/everything-in-the-universe-fits-in-this-one-graph-even-the-impossible-stuff/#google_vignette > > Okay, that might simplify things. Though I did find it quite an interesting result, that using the much larger and more complex observable universe radius, which is a function of the co-moving distance factor, and applying the holographic principle to measure its area in Planck lengths / 4, and converting that to natural units of information, it gave a result that was within 1% of the total number of computations that could have occurred in the history of the universe (from calculating its current mass as the critical density filling the entire volume of the observable universe) -- which note is a mass greater than that of a black hole. It might just be a strange coincidence, but if not perhaps it suggests something deeper. > > It should be noted all three horizons change over time, and in the far > future our causal cell will reach its maximum extent possible, where the > Hubble constant will stop changing and the Hubble horizon will stop > moving. This future state will be a black hole that is composed entirely > of dark anergy and would be the largest black hole possible in a causal > cell composed entirely of dark energy or the cosmological constant. In > other words a blackhole composed entirely of the vacuum energy of empty > space where the cosmological event horizon coincides exactly with the > black hole event horizon. This is also called a Nariai black hole and is > a feature of the De Sitter- Schwarzschild metric. If current estimates > of the cosmological constant are correct, then this ultimate black > hole/ causal cell will have a radius of about 16 billion light years > which coincides with the current cosmological event horizon. > Interesting, I had never heard of Nariai black holes before. > > I hope that I am not being overly pedantic with regards to what you were > trying to show about limits of computation. I appreciate your review. I strive for factual correctness, so the more pedantic the better. :-) > I sort of went down this > same track myself a few years ago and came up with answers within an > order of magnitude or so of yours, so you are on the right track. > I saw various estimates of 10^122 - 10^123, and in particular, the "Black Hole Computers" paper I cite, said that the number of computations (at the Margolus?Levitin bound) is approximately equal to the Holographic entropy bound. I wanted to try to do an as exact calculation as possible to see how close these numbers were. The only way I could seem to recover the 10^123 result was using the whole 46.5 billion light year radius of the observable universe. Do you recall what numbers you obtained (if you still have those calculations)? Jason -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pharos at gmail.com Mon Jan 22 10:49:06 2024 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Mon, 22 Jan 2024 10:49:06 +0000 Subject: [ExI] it's not? indeed? In-Reply-To: References: <046001da4a28$42a46bf0$c7ed43d0$@rainier66.com> <53570e12-394b-459e-84f1-53dae9ad9457@protonmail.com> <086601da4a8b$8b079350$a116b9f0$@rainier66.com> <010f01da4c94$93f775b0$bbe66110$@rainier66.com> <080501da4cad$c81bcfd0$58536f70$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: On Sun, 21 Jan 2024 at 21:52, Keith Henson via extropy-chat wrote: > > > When you consider the opportunities for spillovers from animals, they > are all over. I don't think there has been a single case where a > pandemic originated in a lab. > > Keith > _______________________________________________ The UK press seems to have started to support the COVID lab leak theory. Quote: Covid-19 lab leak theory is gaining ground If there was a concerted effort to dampen debate on the pandemic origins it is simply scandalous January 22, 2024 ----------------------------------- This seems to be coming from the recent US freedom of information requests. However, this may be appearing now because the US wants to start an anti-China propaganda campaign. (Without mentioning that the Wuhan Institute of Virology was receiving US funding). BillK From efc at swisscows.email Mon Jan 22 12:55:49 2024 From: efc at swisscows.email (efc at swisscows.email) Date: Mon, 22 Jan 2024 13:55:49 +0100 (CET) Subject: [ExI] it's not? indeed? In-Reply-To: References: <046001da4a28$42a46bf0$c7ed43d0$@rainier66.com> <53570e12-394b-459e-84f1-53dae9ad9457@protonmail.com> <086601da4a8b$8b079350$a116b9f0$@rainier66.com> <010f01da4c94$93f775b0$bbe66110$@rainier66.com> <080501da4cad$c81bcfd0$58536f70$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: On Mon, 22 Jan 2024, BillK via extropy-chat wrote: > This seems to be coming from the recent US freedom of information requests. > However, this may be appearing now because the US wants to start an > anti-China propaganda campaign. > (Without mentioning that the Wuhan Institute of Virology was receiving > US funding). At the risk of sounding conspiratorial, could this be related to the election in the US this autumn? I thought corona was yesterdays news and that the world moved on. Best regards, Daniel From pharos at gmail.com Mon Jan 22 13:38:23 2024 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Mon, 22 Jan 2024 13:38:23 +0000 Subject: [ExI] it's not? indeed? In-Reply-To: References: <046001da4a28$42a46bf0$c7ed43d0$@rainier66.com> <53570e12-394b-459e-84f1-53dae9ad9457@protonmail.com> <086601da4a8b$8b079350$a116b9f0$@rainier66.com> <010f01da4c94$93f775b0$bbe66110$@rainier66.com> <080501da4cad$c81bcfd0$58536f70$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: On Mon, 22 Jan 2024 at 12:58, efc--- via extropy-chat wrote: > > At the risk of sounding conspiratorial, could this be related to the > election in the US this autumn? > > I thought corona was yesterdays news and that the world moved on. > Best regards, Daniel > _______________________________________________ I don't see any reference to the US election. The main concern seems to be with the possibility that UK scientists and UK government lied about COVID and all the damage that resulted from that. BillK From spike at rainier66.com Mon Jan 22 16:16:50 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (spike at rainier66.com) Date: Mon, 22 Jan 2024 08:16:50 -0800 Subject: [ExI] it's not? indeed? In-Reply-To: References: <046001da4a28$42a46bf0$c7ed43d0$@rainier66.com> <53570e12-394b-459e-84f1-53dae9ad9457@protonmail.com> <086601da4a8b$8b079350$a116b9f0$@rainier66.com> <010f01da4c94$93f775b0$bbe66110$@rainier66.com> <080501da4cad$c81bcfd0$58536f70$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: <005d01da4d4e$686e5520$394aff60$@rainier66.com> -----Original Message----- From: extropy-chat On Behalf Of efc--- via extropy-chat >...At the risk of sounding conspiratorial, could this be related to the election in the US this autumn? >...I thought corona was yesterdays news and that the world moved on. Best regards, Daniel _______________________________________________ Daniel everything that happens in government is related to an upcoming election. Covid was and is used as a political tool at every opportunity. The US is experiencing a power struggle as information flow becomes less and less restricted. We the people find out stuff. The inner circle doesn't like that. They want to control the flow of information. Regarding covid being yesterday's news: no sir. Even if this virus did not originate at the Wuhan lab, it pointed out that in principle, a planet-killer virus could be developed in a lab and could be released well outside of an area which doesn't get a lot of international travel, such as many places in Africa. I have no doubt our world contains super villains who would burn down the world in exchange for complete power over the ashes. spike From spike at rainier66.com Mon Jan 22 16:21:32 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (spike at rainier66.com) Date: Mon, 22 Jan 2024 08:21:32 -0800 Subject: [ExI] it's not? indeed? In-Reply-To: References: <046001da4a28$42a46bf0$c7ed43d0$@rainier66.com> <53570e12-394b-459e-84f1-53dae9ad9457@protonmail.com> <086601da4a8b$8b079350$a116b9f0$@rainier66.com> <010f01da4c94$93f775b0$bbe66110$@rainier66.com> <080501da4cad$c81bcfd0$58536f70$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: <005f01da4d4f$10984260$31c8c720$@rainier66.com> -----Original Message----- From: extropy-chat On Behalf Of BillK via extropy-chat Sent: Monday, 22 January, 2024 5:38 AM To: ExI chat list Cc: BillK Subject: Re: [ExI] it's not? indeed? On Mon, 22 Jan 2024 at 12:58, efc--- via extropy-chat wrote: > > At the risk of sounding conspiratorial, could this be related to the > election in the US this autumn? > > I thought corona was yesterdays news and that the world moved on. > Best regards, Daniel > _______________________________________________ >...I don't see any reference to the US election. The main concern seems to be with the possibility that UK scientists and UK government lied about COVID and all the damage that resulted from that. BillK _______________________________________________ UK? BillK, your country's scientists would be soiled only a fraction as much as Chinese and US scientists. Whether or not the virus came from the Wuhan lab with US funding, plenty of people all over the globe already believe it did, or might have. I am in the might-have category myself. I cannot dismiss the possibility by any plausible line of reasoning. It did cause me to look at the whole enterprise with a new and jaded view. spike From efc at swisscows.email Mon Jan 22 17:09:36 2024 From: efc at swisscows.email (efc at swisscows.email) Date: Mon, 22 Jan 2024 18:09:36 +0100 (CET) Subject: [ExI] it's not? indeed? In-Reply-To: <005d01da4d4e$686e5520$394aff60$@rainier66.com> References: <046001da4a28$42a46bf0$c7ed43d0$@rainier66.com> <53570e12-394b-459e-84f1-53dae9ad9457@protonmail.com> <086601da4a8b$8b079350$a116b9f0$@rainier66.com> <010f01da4c94$93f775b0$bbe66110$@rainier66.com> <080501da4cad$c81bcfd0$58536f70$@rainier66.com> <005d01da4d4e$686e5520$394aff60$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: Good evening spike, On Mon, 22 Jan 2024, spike at rainier66.com wrote: > Daniel everything that happens in government is related to an upcoming > election. Covid was and is used as a political tool at every opportunity. > The US is experiencing a power struggle as information flow becomes less and > less restricted. We the people find out stuff. The inner circle doesn't > like that. They want to control the flow of information. Thank you very much for your perspective. I think I am colored by the fact that I accidentally got stuck in sweden during a bit part of corona, which had the worlds least restrictive corona policy. To the great anger of politicians and doomsayers alike, Anders Tegnell, swedens corona general responded with "We don't know, let's wait and see, let's not overreact" for pretty much the entire thing. I think that is perhaps why most people in sweden I know now lost interested and just moved on, except for a few edge cases who still get sick and continue with isolating themselves (my neighbours for instance seems to never have got the message so it is sad to see how he still isolates himself). > Regarding covid being yesterday's news: no sir. Even if this virus did not > originate at the Wuhan lab, it pointed out that in principle, a > planet-killer virus could be developed in a lab and could be released well > outside of an area which doesn't get a lot of international travel, such as > many places in Africa. I have no doubt our world contains super villains > who would burn down the world in exchange for complete power over the ashes. I am absolutely 100% convinced that most, if not all, the worlds super powers are engaging in lethal research on all kinds of viruses, cloning and genetic engineering as we speak. Did it come from a lab? The fact that china was stalling has moved me firmly into the "plausible" camp. Best regards, Daniel From efc at swisscows.email Mon Jan 22 17:10:51 2024 From: efc at swisscows.email (efc at swisscows.email) Date: Mon, 22 Jan 2024 18:10:51 +0100 (CET) Subject: [ExI] it's not? indeed? In-Reply-To: References: <046001da4a28$42a46bf0$c7ed43d0$@rainier66.com> <53570e12-394b-459e-84f1-53dae9ad9457@protonmail.com> <086601da4a8b$8b079350$a116b9f0$@rainier66.com> <010f01da4c94$93f775b0$bbe66110$@rainier66.com> <080501da4cad$c81bcfd0$58536f70$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: <21412c62-f5b8-16da-b8ef-8b721d861152@swisscows.email> Hello Bill, On Mon, 22 Jan 2024, BillK via extropy-chat wrote: > I don't see any reference to the US election. > The main concern seems to be with the possibility that UK scientists > and UK government lied about COVID and all the damage that resulted > from that. What about the upcoming UK election? Do you think this will be a theme or will brexit resurface or any other topics? Best regards, Daniel > > BillK > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > From hkeithhenson at gmail.com Mon Jan 22 18:22:23 2024 From: hkeithhenson at gmail.com (Keith Henson) Date: Mon, 22 Jan 2024 10:22:23 -0800 Subject: [ExI] it's not? indeed? In-Reply-To: References: <046001da4a28$42a46bf0$c7ed43d0$@rainier66.com> <53570e12-394b-459e-84f1-53dae9ad9457@protonmail.com> <086601da4a8b$8b079350$a116b9f0$@rainier66.com> <010f01da4c94$93f775b0$bbe66110$@rainier66.com> <080501da4cad$c81bcfd0$58536f70$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: On Mon, Jan 22, 2024 at 5:40?AM BillK via extropy-chat wrote: snip > I don't see any reference to the US election. > The main concern seems to be with the possibility that UK scientists > and UK government lied about COVID and all the damage that resulted > from that. Can you say specifically how they lied and what damage resulted? I can make a case that early CDC pronouncements were wrong and did cause damage, but I can't make a case that it was intentional falsehoods. Keith > BillK > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat From ben at zaiboc.net Mon Jan 22 18:42:23 2024 From: ben at zaiboc.net (Ben Zaiboc) Date: Mon, 22 Jan 2024 18:42:23 +0000 Subject: [ExI] [Extropolis] Old and new futurisms in Silicon Valley In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <3834009e-8397-41c0-80cb-07514bc13b1c@zaiboc.net> On 21/01/2024 21:50, Keith Henson wrote: > Can you cite an example where "woke" mobs caused someone to lose a > job? There are lots of reasons people lose jobs, but I am not > familiar with this one. There are plenty of examples of teachers and lecturers who have lost their jobs because of trying to do them properly, and thus rousing the Wrath of the Woke (I'm thinking particularly of Literature classes, involving Dangerous Books (that happen to be classic literature, but what does that matter in the face of Political Correctness Gone Mad?)), and here in the UK, a couple running a pub lost their livelihood last year because someone noticed that they had the 'Wrong Kind of Dolls' included in a display of historical dolls that had been there for years, and kicked up a frenzy that resulted in the pub being put out of business. The dolls in question were Golliwogs. Yes, really. Apparently Golliwogs are so dangerous that you can be hounded out of your job for allowing people to see them. No wonder Robinsons banished the iconic image from their jam jars years ago. Apparently they had an eerily accurate 'woke-meter', and neatly dodged that particular existential danger. I'm sure Giulio can provide many other examples of people losing their jobs through the actions of 'woke' mobs. Ben -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike at rainier66.com Mon Jan 22 19:04:54 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (spike at rainier66.com) Date: Mon, 22 Jan 2024 11:04:54 -0800 Subject: [ExI] it's not? indeed? In-Reply-To: References: <046001da4a28$42a46bf0$c7ed43d0$@rainier66.com> <53570e12-394b-459e-84f1-53dae9ad9457@protonmail.com> <086601da4a8b$8b079350$a116b9f0$@rainier66.com> <010f01da4c94$93f775b0$bbe66110$@rainier66.com> <080501da4cad$c81bcfd0$58536f70$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: <25c901da4d65$e2adfd60$a809f820$@rainier66.com> ...> On Behalf Of Keith Henson via extropy-chat Subject: Re: [ExI] it's not? indeed? ... >...Can you say specifically how they lied and what damage resulted? >...I can make a case that early CDC pronouncements were wrong and did cause damage, but I can't make a case that it was intentional falsehoods. >...Keith Keith what I saw is that there were obvious efforts to suppress expression of dissenting views on Covid. We saw dissenting views squelched on the internet, labeled disinformation with the implication that disinformation is false information. Now we know disinformation, misinformation and malinformation might be true. I am against false information only. I like true information, even if it is bad news indeed. The Science sure took a bad hit over covid. spike From hkeithhenson at gmail.com Mon Jan 22 20:04:54 2024 From: hkeithhenson at gmail.com (Keith Henson) Date: Mon, 22 Jan 2024 12:04:54 -0800 Subject: [ExI] it's not? indeed? In-Reply-To: <25c901da4d65$e2adfd60$a809f820$@rainier66.com> References: <046001da4a28$42a46bf0$c7ed43d0$@rainier66.com> <53570e12-394b-459e-84f1-53dae9ad9457@protonmail.com> <086601da4a8b$8b079350$a116b9f0$@rainier66.com> <010f01da4c94$93f775b0$bbe66110$@rainier66.com> <080501da4cad$c81bcfd0$58536f70$@rainier66.com> <25c901da4d65$e2adfd60$a809f820$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: On Mon, Jan 22, 2024 at 11:04?AM wrote: > > ...> On Behalf Of Keith Henson via extropy-chat > Subject: Re: [ExI] it's not? indeed? > > >...Can you say specifically how they lied and what damage resulted? > > >...I can make a case that early CDC pronouncements were wrong and did cause damage, but I can't make a case that it was intentional falsehoods. > > >...Keith > > > Keith what I saw is that there were obvious efforts to suppress expression of dissenting views on Covid. Can you be specific about the content of the dissenting views? One I know about is that Covid is an influenza virus, which is obviously not true. > We saw dissenting views squelched on the internet, labeled disinformation with the implication that disinformation is false information. Now we know disinformation, misinformation and malinformation might be true. Please be specific about this accusation. For a fact, I don't know how information can be squelched given that anyone can post anything they want on FB. Would it be squelched if I posted a claim that COVID-19 was brought to the US by little green aliens? > I am against false information only. I like true information, even if it is bad news indeed. Well, bad news regarding COVID-19 would be that China engineered the virus and released it on their population. Besides this making no sense, it is (or at least was) beyond the state of the art at that time. > The Science sure took a bad hit over covid. Science got it wrong with respect to aerosol transmission and it took about a year to correct. But other than that one, what other things would you say are a "bad hit>" Keith > spike > From ben at zaiboc.net Mon Jan 22 20:20:51 2024 From: ben at zaiboc.net (Ben Zaiboc) Date: Mon, 22 Jan 2024 20:20:51 +0000 Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Open Individualism In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <44950416-b789-408e-ba80-b45303f7236f@zaiboc.net> On 21/01/2024 16:02, Jason Resch wrote: > On Sun, Jan 21, 2024, 9:31 AM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat > wrote: > > On 20/01/2024 15:11, Jason Resch wrote: >> where does one person begin and end? If someone steps into a >> transporter that destroys their body and reconstructs it >> elsewhere, do we draw a terminating border at one end and say the >> person died here, and a new separate person began elsewhere? Or >> do we draw the borders such that there is a continuous link >> bridging then, such that it is all the same person, and the >> experiences of the person who emerges on the other side of the >> teleporter, *are* experiences that will be had by the person who >> stepped into the transporter? > Depends on what you need, and what point of view you adopt. There > is no single correct answer (which is not to say that there are no > answers). > > It matters to the person stepping into the transporter, does it not? > Are you saying there is no scientifically establishable answer to this > question? Could not an experimentalist undergo the teleportation to > (hopefully) personally confirm his theory that his consciousness survives? Yes, of course. And if the person stepping into the transporter thinks that his consciousness depends on the atoms of his brain (or an immaterial 'soul' that is lost, etc.), the person stepping out of the other end will believe that he is not the same person. There is a character in Charlie Stross' Accelerando in exactly this position. No-one can convince him of their view that he is the same person, despite his continuity of memory, etc. Can we say he's wrong? Only by asserting that a different way of looking at things is the 'correct' one. Can he say that they are wrong? Ditto. Yes, you can demonstrate that a mind survives replacement of the atoms in the brain (or does it? Maybe it's a mind that's to similar to the original that no-one else notices), but in the end, you have to choose a framework and follow it through. Someone else may think that they are only partially the same person. Most would probably think that they are the same person (why would you undergo the procedure otherwise, unless it was forced on you?) So, different points of view, different answers. >> ... >> >> 'The experiences' is just a label that we use in our heads so we >> can think about these things (remembering that the thoughts don't >> have to be true or accurate, or even make any kind of sense). It >> would be more accurate to say 'I experience', 'you experience'. >> Saying 'you /have/ experience X' tempts us to think of X as a >> thing that is possessed (and could therefore also be possessed by >> someone else). It's not. >> >> I agree they aren't swappable or tradable like playing cards. There >> is a tight kinky between each experience and a particular mind state. > Not sure what a 'tight kinky' is. Presumably a typo, but I'm not sure > what you meant to write. A tight link? > Yes "tight link". > > I suppose you could say that, being careful to recognise that the > experience does not exist on its own, and is then 'linked' to the > mind. The experience is produced by the mind, so talking about a > 'link' is unnecessary and potentially misleading. >> That said, we acknowledge that for a given person (here I mean >> the common sense understanding of the term), has a life which >> spans and includes many different mind states, and many different >> experiences. >> It is this many-to-one relationship that creates the problem of >> assignment. > I don't know what that last sentence means. What do you mean by > 'assignment'. Assignment of what? > > Experiences-to-person. Or using your terminology: mind_states-to-person. I thought we'd agreed on the unique nature of experiences. You can't 'assign' an experience to the thing that generates it. They are inextricably and uniquely linked, and no other person can experience the same thing. So there is no 'problem of assignment'. That is meaningless. > > Again, I take issue with the language used as well. A person > doesn't really 'have' a life which includes many different > mind-states. I'd rather say a person consists of many different > mind-states. If those didn't exist, there would be no person. This > is the same difficulty caused by the common habit of referring to > 'our minds'. We don't /have/ minds (which implies a duality), we > /are/ minds. > > If each of us are minds, and each mind can have many states, which set > of possible mind states can one be or become? The set of mind-states that are available to that mind. It will vary, depending on things like personal history, the details of neural structure, chemistry, all kinds of things. I'd say that it's impossible to predict, in practice. > Is there any theoretical or fundamental limit? I have no idea how you'd determine that. There must be limits, though. No human will ever know what it's like to be a Bat, to take one famous example. But I also think that nobody except Jonh Smith will experience the same things as him upon eating the same sandwich on the same day in the same place. So I'd say that one limit is that you can only experience your own unique experiences, not anyone else's. > >> ... > >> How much perturbation can be tolerated before we say, "that's no >> longer the same, or that person is dead" ? > This is a philosophical question, with different answers depending > on your assumptions. > > You can leave them as a philosophical questions, or as I prefer to do, > you can turn them into a hard empirical questions, with definite > yes/no answers, by asking and testing things like: > Does my conscious survive radical brain surgery? > Does my conscious survive gradual replacement of material? > Does my conscious survive instantaneous replacement of material (e.g. > in a teleporter)? > Does my conscious survive the accumulation of memories over a lifetime? > Does my conscious survive loss of memories in the decline of senility? > Does my conscious survive about changes in memory content (e.g. > partial amnesia, implantation of false memories (as in Total Recall))? No you can't, as I keep saying. Those questions can have different answers, depending on who's asking them and what their point of view is. The thing you don't seem to acknowledge is that these are subjective matters, not objective ones. They have to be, as we are dealing with the very phenomenon at the heart of subjectivity. > > To me, the mind is the important thing, and the mind is an > embodied dynamic pattern of information. How much can that pattern > change, and still claim to be 'the same person'? I don't have any > single fixed answer. But you could take the attitude that I'm the > same person that I was since I was born (because of a common > genome, continuity of physical body, etc. My mind didn't even > exist then, really, so I don't subscribe to that view. I'd say > that I didn't exist yet), or you could say that I'm a different > person each day, or even from moment to moment. I don't really care. > > You can say you don't care, but then ask yourself: why save for > retirement all your life if you are only to give all that money away > to some old rich guy in the future who isn't you? -- (at least it > won't be you if you really believed you're a different person each day). Precisely. If that's what I believe, that's perfectly correct. > > If I feel that I'm the same person, then I am. > > Yes, this is how I defined survival, by the subjective feeling that > ones consciousness has continued into another moment. > > There's a sense in which I am the same person that I was a few > decades ago, and a sense in which I'm a different person to who I > was when I started writing this email. > > Note that here you are using two different definitions of person. Exactly! And two different people can hold two different definitions to be true. They are both correct. > What philosophers of personal identity attempt is to clearly define > each and then test whether those definitions are consistent/valid in > all situations. You're basically proposing to 'test' people's points of view. This is like trying to decide which is right, the guy who says "that car is blue" or the one who says "that car is turquoise". Which is the 'correct' interpretation of the story of Bambi, is it about cruelty or sadness? Of course, this is why we call it 'philosophy'. If there were any objectively testable and definite answers, we'd call it 'science'. > > Again, no single 'correct' answer. There are as many answers as > you can think up different ways of looking at it. > > If you examine deeply what certain answers imply, I believe you will > find the number of possibly correct answers, is a very small set. Again with the 'correct'. There is no 'correct'! Consider this: What is happening on planet X of star Y in the Andromeda galaxy, RIGHT NOW? (i.e. at the exact moment that you are reading this). > > I can't say for sure, but I suspect that the experience of > [anything you like] is different as my mind changes over time. > That each experience is unique not only to a mind, but to a mind > at a specific time. It could be that someone's experience of > eating a cheese sandwich on a rainy afternoon in March 2019 is > different to the same person's experience of the same thing in the > same place, on a rainy afternoon in March 2029. Actually, thinking > about it, I'd be surprised if this wasn't true. > > An uploaded mind cannot access the true time outside the simulation. > If you run the mind simulation twice at two different times, there's > no room for the mind to know anything was different between the two > runs, unless you introduce something metaphysical. > But if your point is that brains are messy things and always changing, > I see and agree with that point. My point is that experiences are unique. Not only to the minds generating them, but quite probably to each instance of 'the same' experience (meaning that they aren't in fact the same at all. The uniqueness is absolute). This means there is no such thing as two people having the same experience, or a common pool of experiences that can be 'had' by a number of different people. Which brings me back to: > >> So the way I see it, this whole concept of 'theories of >> personal identity' is built on a misconception of the nature >> of 'experiences'. >> >> To this I would say, and I hope it clarifies, that personal >> identity isn't so much trying to answer "should put this frog in >> that bucket or this one?", but rather, it is about trying to >> define the borders of the buckets themselves. > My point was that the frogs in buckets analogy doesn't apply. > > Earlier, you said: "a person consists of many different mind-states" > So then, why cannot we label the collection of mind-states which a > particular person consists of? We can, and do. We label it "a person". > >> What circumstances are necessary for a person to arise, survive, >> or die, etc. >> There are easy, conventional answers to such questions, based on >> the presence or maintenance of some attribute. >> But I think if you seriously consider the problems that arise in >> those cases you will understand the difficulties of the >> conventional view and it's inability to handle a host of situations. >> In the end, belief in the necessity of some attribute that is >> needed for "you to be you" is both unfounded and uneccessary. >> It's a purely metaphysical assumption which Occam would remind us >> to dispense with. > You're assuming that being able to use different attributes, > according to what you find important, is equivalent to not using > any. The fact that there may be 10 different paths to get from > where you are to where you want to go, doesn't mean that you don't > need any path at all. Some attribute /is/ necessary, > > The only attribute that is necessary is the "immediacy of experience" > -- the feeling that it is *I* who is having the experience". You can > remove everything else and people will believe they have survived to > live in that moment. > Note that this attribute is equally present in all experiences. All > experiences feel like it is I who is having them. All of /your/ experiences. And all of mine feel like mine. This is hardly a revelation. > > but there are many choices, depending on your point of view and > what you want to achieve. The conventional view (that there is one > correct answer) just needs to be widened to acknowledge that there > are many correct answers, all valid, that do cover a host of > situations. > > They only seem valid, until you investigate them more deeply. If you > say memory is important, why don't we have funerals form people when > they get concussed and forget the past 15 minutes? If you say material > is important, why don't we have funerals for people every 7 years when > all their atoms are replaced? If you say continuity of a mind process > is necessary, why don't we have funerals when someone gets general > anesthesia and we shut down that process? > The answer is, because all generally acknowledge and feel that our > consciousness survives all these things. Our consciousness can survive > material replacement of our body and brain, it survives gain and loss > of memories, and it survives discontinuities like general anesthesia > and comas. None of these can therefore be the critical attribute for a > person's survival. Because we don't all agree on the same criteria for survival? I expect that if everyone agreed that 15 minutes of amnesia qualifies as death, then we would hold funerals (and probably celebrate the birth of a new person on the 16th minute). The definition of death changes as time goes by, and we learn more and our technology advances, which just widens our choices. Some people regard those who are cryogenically suspended to be irrevocably dead, and some don't, for example. > Consider planetary motion. What gives the correct answer, Kepler's > laws or Relativity? > > Here you compare two theories which provide the same predictions. For many things, but not all. > Different theories of personal identity offer different answers to the > same question. For example: > Teleporter survival: > Bodily continuity - no > Psychological continuity - yes > Memory loss survival: > Bodily continuity - yes > Psychological continuity - no > Faulty transporter survival: > Bodily continuity - no > Psychological continuity - no > Open individualism - yes So if the transporter is faulty and no body materialises, so of course no brain, and therefore no mind, you're saying that the individual nevertheless 'survives'?? So basically, nobody has ever died? Pictures, please. > > I still don't see any reason to assume that there's some kind of > mental connection between myself and that Maori dude 200 years > ago. Or anybody else. > > It's not a mental connection. It's an identity of personhood. There's no such thing (between two individuals). You are the only thing that is identical to you. Ben -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From efc at swisscows.email Mon Jan 22 21:03:13 2024 From: efc at swisscows.email (efc at swisscows.email) Date: Mon, 22 Jan 2024 22:03:13 +0100 (CET) Subject: [ExI] [Extropolis] Old and new futurisms in Silicon Valley In-Reply-To: <3834009e-8397-41c0-80cb-07514bc13b1c@zaiboc.net> References: <3834009e-8397-41c0-80cb-07514bc13b1c@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: <2441e995-227a-b087-2678-4441499aa85a@swisscows.email> Hello guys, I can add a few examples myself from sweden as well. I've been close since I wanted to do business instead of submitting to militant feminism. An acquaintance who is half russian half swedish lost his job because he asked if the company he was working for was saying gender was more important than skill when the company said they would hire only women. Oh, and being half-russian helped as well, since the company fears everything russian. Thinking of things I read in swedish media I'd say journalists, teachers and politicians come to mind, but the names probably wouldn't mean much to you. But... all is not bad, or rather, every cloud has its silver lining... Then there are the people who just quit and start their own business since they are tired of the politically correct atmosphere in big IT, myself included. And for them it was generally (thinking of my circle of acquaintances) the best decision they ever made. Peace of mind, no politics at work (or their brand), better pay and better life satisfaction. For me, wokeness in IT also has the benefit of giving me access to great and highly skilled women who are tired of being insulted by feminist programs at big IT started by old men, to give the old men political points. They feel insulted that they should need some kind of "program" to reach their goals. Instead I work with them, and since I am in favour of individuals, and really dislike everything woke and identity politics and all that, we work great together. =) Best regards, Daniel On Mon, 22 Jan 2024, Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat wrote: > > On 21/01/2024 21:50, Keith Henson wrote: > > Can you cite an example where "woke" mobs caused someone to lose a > job? There are lots of reasons people lose jobs, but I am not > familiar with this one. > > > There are plenty of examples of teachers and lecturers who have lost their jobs because of trying to do them properly, and thus > rousing the Wrath of the Woke (I'm thinking particularly of Literature classes, involving Dangerous Books (that happen to be classic > literature, but what does that matter in the face of Political Correctness Gone Mad?)), and here in the UK, a couple running a pub > lost their livelihood last year because someone noticed that they had the 'Wrong Kind of Dolls' included in a display of historical > dolls that had been there for years, and kicked up a frenzy that resulted in the pub being put out of business. The dolls in question > were Golliwogs. Yes, really. Apparently Golliwogs are so dangerous that you can be hounded out of your job for allowing people to see > them. No wonder Robinsons banished the iconic image from their jam jars years ago. Apparently they had an eerily accurate > 'woke-meter', and neatly dodged that particular existential danger. > > I'm sure Giulio can provide many other examples of people losing their jobs through the actions of 'woke' mobs. > > Ben > > From jasonresch at gmail.com Mon Jan 22 21:16:12 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Mon, 22 Jan 2024 16:16:12 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Fwd: Open Individualism In-Reply-To: <44950416-b789-408e-ba80-b45303f7236f@zaiboc.net> References: <44950416-b789-408e-ba80-b45303f7236f@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: On Mon, Jan 22, 2024 at 3:21?PM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > > On 21/01/2024 16:02, Jason Resch wrote: > > On Sun, Jan 21, 2024, 9:31 AM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat wrote: > >> >> >> On 20/01/2024 15:11, Jason Resch wrote: >> >> >> >> >> where does one person begin and end? If someone steps into a >> transporter that destroys their body and reconstructs it >> elsewhere, do we draw a terminating border at one end and say the >> person died here, and a new separate person began elsewhere? Or do >> we draw the borders such that there is a continuous link bridging >> then, such that it is all the same person, and the experiences of >> the person who emerges on the other side of the teleporter, *are* >> experiences that will be had by the person who stepped into the >> transporter? >> >> >> >> >> Depends on what you need, and what point of view you adopt. There is >> no single correct answer (which is not to say that there are no >> answers). >> > It matters to the person stepping into the transporter, does it not? Are > you saying there is no scientifically establishable answer to this > question? Could not an experimentalist undergo the teleportation to > (hopefully) personally confirm his theory that his consciousness > survives? > > > Yes, of course. And if the person stepping into the transporter thinks > that his consciousness depends on the atoms of his brain (or an immaterial > 'soul' that is lost, etc.), the person stepping out of the other end will > believe that he is not the same person. > They might choose to label the previous copy a former self, but someone who is consciously experiencing something cannot believe that they are dead/not experiencing something. The consciousness, based on everything it knows and feels, would necessarily feel as though their consciousness survived the procedure, regardless of what they might say about their previous body. > There is a character in Charlie Stross' Accelerando in exactly this > position. No-one can convince him of their view that he is the same person, > despite his continuity of memory, etc. > That is interesting. > Can we say he's wrong? Only by asserting that a different way of looking > at things is the 'correct' one. Can he say that they are wrong? Ditto. Yes, > you can demonstrate that a mind survives replacement of the atoms in the > brain (or does it? Maybe it's a mind that's to similar to the original that > no-one else notices), but in the end, you have to choose a framework and > follow it through. > > Someone else may think that they are only partially the same person. > > Most would probably think that they are the same person (why would you > undergo the procedure otherwise, unless it was forced on you?) > > So, different points of view, different answers. > But all survivors of teleporters believe "I am alive and conscious", which is to me, the only meaningful definition of "survival." In other words, it would be inconsistent for the survivor to say "I am dead!" or "I am no longer conscious" -- unless the procedure did turn them into a zombie of some kind, but this would presumably require some form of dualism. > ... > > >> 'The experiences' is just a label that we use in our >> heads so we can think about these things (remembering >> that the thoughts don't have to be true or accurate, or >> even make any kind of sense). It would be more accurate >> to say 'I experience', 'you experience'. Saying 'you *have* >> experience X' tempts us to think of X as a thing that is >> possessed (and could therefore also be possessed by >> someone else). It's not. >> >> I agree they aren't swappable or tradable like playing cards. There is a tight kinky between each experience and a particular mind state. > > > Not sure what a 'tight kinky' is. Presumably a typo, but I'm not > sure what you meant to write. A tight link? > Yes "tight link". > >> >> >> I suppose you could say that, being careful to recognise that the >> experience does not exist on its own, and is then 'linked' to the >> mind. The experience is produced by the mind, so talking about a >> 'link' is unnecessary and potentially misleading. >> >> >> That said, we acknowledge that for a given person (here I mean the common sense understanding of the term), has a life which spans and includes many different mind states, and many different experiences. >> >> It is this many-to-one relationship that creates the problem of assignment. >> >> >> I don't know what that last sentence means. What do you mean by >> 'assignment'. Assignment of what? >> > Experiences-to-person. Or using your terminology: mind_states-to-person. > > I thought we'd agreed on the unique nature of experiences. You can't > 'assign' an experience to the thing that generates it. They are > inextricably and uniquely linked, and no other person can experience the > same thing. So there is no 'problem of assignment'. That is meaningless. > > >> Again, I take issue with the language used as well. A person doesn't >> really 'have' a life which includes many different mind-states. I'd >> rather say a person consists of many different mind-states. If those >> didn't exist, there would be no person. >> >> >> This is the same difficulty caused by the common habit of referring >> to 'our minds'. We don't *have* minds (which implies a duality), we *are* minds. >> > If each of us are minds, and each mind can have many states, which set of possible mind states can one be or become? > > The set of mind-states that are available to that mind. It will vary, > depending on things like personal history, the details of neural structure, > chemistry, all kinds of things. I'd say that it's impossible to predict, in > practice. > > Is there any theoretical or fundamental limit? > > I have no idea how you'd determine that. There must be limits, though. No > human will ever know what it's like to be a Bat, to take one famous example. > I don't see why we could not gradually morph someone's brain into that of a bat, using advanced nanotechnology, for example. > But I also think that nobody except Jonh Smith will experience the same > things as him upon eating the same sandwich on the same day in the same > place. So I'd say that one limit is that you can only experience your own > unique experiences, not anyone else's. > If there are no fundamental limits on how John Smith's brain can be perturbed over time, there's no limit to what experiences John Smith is capable of. > ... >> >> How much perturbation can be tolerated before we say, "that's no longer the same, or that person is dead" ? >> >> >> This is a philosophical question, with different answers depending >> on your assumptions. >> > You can leave them as a philosophical questions, or as I prefer to do, you > can turn them into a hard empirical questions, with definite yes/no > answers, by asking and testing things like: > Does my conscious survive radical brain surgery? > Does my conscious survive gradual replacement of material? > Does my conscious survive instantaneous replacement of material (e.g. in a teleporter)? > Does my conscious survive the accumulation of memories over a lifetime? > Does my conscious survive loss of memories in the decline of senility? > Does my conscious survive about changes in memory content (e.g. partial amnesia, implantation of false memories (as in Total Recall))? > > No you can't, as I keep saying. Those questions can have different > answers, depending on who's asking them and what their point of view is. > As I've said repeatedly, such questions are always asked/interpreted from the perspective/POV of the person undergoing the procedure, who receives empirical confirmation afterwards. > The thing you don't seem to acknowledge is that these are subjective > matters, not objective ones. They have to be, as we are dealing with the > very phenomenon at the heart of subjectivity. > > To me, the mind is the important thing, and the mind is an embodied >> dynamic pattern of information. How much can that pattern change, >> and still claim to be 'the same person'? I don't have any single >> fixed answer. But you could take the attitude that I'm the same >> person that I was since I was born (because of a common genome, >> continuity of physical body, etc. My mind didn't even exist then, >> really, so I don't subscribe to that view. I'd say that I didn't >> exist yet), or you could say that I'm a different person each day, >> or even from moment to moment. I don't really care. >> > You can say you don't care, but then ask yourself: why save for retirement > all your life if you are only to give all that money away to some old > rich guy in the future who isn't you? -- (at least it won't be you if > you really believed you're a different person each day). > > Precisely. If that's what I believe, that's perfectly correct. > Find me the person who believes that, and decides not to save for retirement because of that belief (that is, anyone who truly believes, and lives their life according to the belief, that they are only a single-thought moment). I doubt such people exist. Neither decision theory, nor science itself, can operate if you remove the concept of future expectation. > If I feel that I'm the same person, then I am. >> > Yes, this is how I defined survival, by the subjective feeling that ones consciousness has continued into another moment. > >> There's a sense in which I am the same person that I was a few decades ago, and a sense in which I'm a different person to who I was when I started writing this email. >> > Note that here you are using two different definitions of person. > > Exactly! And two different people can hold two different definitions to be > true. They are both correct. > Assuming neither one leads to inconsistencies, or makes untestable/unfounded assumptions. I'll reiterate, the inconsistencies do not appear in the definitions themselves. The definitions can be written down and they all seem perfectly fine. The issues arise when we attempt to use these different definitions to answer questions with objective answers (e.g. do I survive this or not)? > What philosophers of personal identity attempt is to clearly define each and > then test whether those definitions are consistent/valid in all > situations. > > You're basically proposing to 'test' people's points of view. This is like > trying to decide which is right, the guy who says "that car is blue" or the > one who says "that car is turquoise". > Which is the 'correct' interpretation of the story of Bambi, is it about > cruelty or sadness? > These aren't testing points of view. They are tests of the logical consistency of theories. As well as evaluating them on probabilistic grounds, and for unfounded metaphysical assumptions (e.g. Occam's razor). The only time subjectivity enters the picture is in the experiments to test whether one's consciousness subjectively survives (e.g. a teleporter, a surgery, a mind upload, or any other procedure). > Of course, this is why we call it 'philosophy'. If there were any > objectively testable and definite answers, we'd call it 'science'. > If you believe there are no objective tests favoring one theory vs. another, am I correct that you believe open individualism is a possibility you can neither prove nor disprove? If not, then you must think it makes some different predictions from the others which we could objectively test. What would those tests be? > Again, no single 'correct' answer. There are as many answers as you >> can think up different ways of looking at it. >> > If you examine deeply what certain answers imply, I believe you will find > the number of possibly correct answers, is a very small set. > > Again with the 'correct'. There is no 'correct'! > Consider this: What is happening on planet X of star Y in the Andromeda > galaxy, RIGHT NOW? (i.e. at the exact moment that you are reading this). > For the Andromeda case, I would say we exist in an infinite number of subjectively indistinguishable possibilities, each consistent with everything we know. "It is impossible for any observer to deduce with certainty on the basis of her observations and memory which world she is a part of. That is, there are always many different worlds for which being contained in them is compatible with everything she knows, but which imply different predictions for future observations." -- Markus M?ller in ?Could the physical world be emergent instead of fundamental, and why should we ask? ? (2017) But the indeterminacy of the far away and unmeasurable, is different from your supposition that different theories of personal identity could all be right. As I showed below, different theories of personal identity provide different answers to the same questions regarding the same situation. Therefore they cannot all be objectively correct. If there is such a thing as objective truth and an objective reality, then at least some of these theories must be wrong (at least in such cases where they give different answers). > >> I can't say for sure, but I suspect that the experience of [anything >> you like] is different as my mind changes over time. That each >> experience is unique not only to a mind, but to a mind at a specific >> time. It could be that someone's experience of eating a cheese >> sandwich on a rainy afternoon in March 2019 is different to the same >> person's experience of the same thing in the same place, on a rainy >> afternoon in March 2029. Actually, thinking about it, I'd be >> surprised if this wasn't true. >> > An uploaded mind cannot access the true time outside the simulation. If > you run the mind simulation twice at two different times, there's no > room for the mind to know anything was different between the two runs, > unless you introduce something metaphysical. > But if your point is that brains are messy things and always changing, I see and agree with that point. > > My point is that experiences are unique. Not only to the minds generating > them, but quite probably to each instance of 'the same' experience (meaning > that they aren't in fact the same at all. The uniqueness is absolute). This > means there is no such thing as two people having the same experience, or a > common pool of experiences that can be 'had' by a number of different > people. > > Which brings me back to: > > >>> So the way I see it, this whole concept of 'theories of >>> personal identity' is built on a misconception of the >>> nature of 'experiences'. >>> >> To this I would say, and I hope it clarifies, that personal identity isn't so much trying to answer "should >> put this frog in that bucket or this one?", but rather, it is >> about trying to define the borders of the buckets themselves. >> >> >> >> My point was that the frogs in buckets analogy doesn't apply. >> > Earlier, you said: "a person consists of many different mind-states" > So then, why cannot we label the collection of mind-states which a particular person consists of? > > We can, and do. We label it "a person". > > What circumstances are necessary for a person to arise, survive, or die, etc. >> >> There are easy, conventional answers to such questions, based on the presence or maintenance of some attribute. >> >> But I think if you seriously consider the >> problems that arise in those cases you will understand the >> difficulties of the conventional view and it's inability to >> handle a host of situations. >> >> In the end, belief in the necessity of some >> attribute that is needed for "you to be you" is both unfounded >> and uneccessary. It's a purely metaphysical assumption which >> Occam would remind us to dispense with. >> >> >> >> You're assuming that being able to use different attributes, >> according to what you find important, is equivalent to not using >> any. The fact that there may be 10 different paths to get from where >> you are to where you want to go, doesn't mean that you don't need >> any path at all. Some attribute *is* necessary, >> > The only attribute that is necessary is the "immediacy of experience" -- > the feeling that it is *I* who is having the experience". You can remove > everything else and people will believe they have survived to live in > that moment. > Note that this attribute is equally present in all experiences. All experiences feel like it is I who is having them. > > All of *your* experiences. And all of mine feel like mine. This is hardly > a revelation. > If you think about this a little more deeply, you may discover that all experiences, as felt by all beings, feel like "mine". This is really saying nothing more than all beings consider them to exist in the time "now", or the place "here." There is a relativity involved, that generates the illusion of a selection (that some time is privileged to be now), or that some organisim's neurology is privileged to be "you". This passage, from Nagel in "Physicalism " (1965) may help to dispel this illusion by shedding some more light on the issue: "Consider everything that can be said about the world without employing any token reflexive expressions. This will include the description of all its physical contents and their states, activities and attributes. It will also include a description of all the persons in the world and their histories, memories, thoughts, sensations, perceptions, intentions, and so forth. I can thus describe without token-reflexives the entire world and everything that is happening in it?and this will include a description of Thomas Nagel and what he is thinking and feeling. But there seems to remain one thing which I cannot say in this fashion?namely, which of the various persons in the world I am. Even when everything that can be said in the specified manner has been said, and the world has in a sense been completely described, there seems to remain one fact which has not been expressed, and that is the fact that I am Thomas Nagel. This is not, of course, the fact ordinarily conveyed by those words, when they are used to inform someone else who the speaker is?for that could easily be expressed otherwise. It is rather the fact that I am the subject of these experiences; this body is my body; the subject or center of my world is this person." This passage shows that when we examine it, we find no physical fact or reason to account for the idea that consciousness is limited to a single perspective of a single biological creature which is you. You could equally be present in all the conscious beings, and each instance would suffer the illusion that it is only one biological creature (as that is the only thing each can remember). but there are >> many choices, depending on your point of view and what you want to >> achieve. The conventional view (that there is one correct answer) >> just needs to be widened to acknowledge that there are many correct >> answers, all valid, that do cover a host of situations. >> > They only seem valid, until you investigate them more deeply. If you say > memory is important, why don't we have funerals form people when they > get concussed and forget the past 15 minutes? If you say material is > important, why don't we have funerals for people every 7 years when all > their atoms are replaced? If you say continuity of a mind process is > necessary, why don't we have funerals when someone gets general > anesthesia and we shut down that process? > The answer is, because all generally acknowledge and feel that our > consciousness survives all these things. Our consciousness can survive > material replacement of our body and brain, it survives gain and loss of > memories, and it survives discontinuities like general anesthesia and > comas. None of these can therefore be the critical attribute for a > person's survival. > > Because we don't all agree on the same criteria for survival? > I expect that if everyone agreed that 15 minutes of amnesia qualifies as > death, then we would hold funerals (and probably celebrate the birth of a > new person on the 16th minute). > The definition of death changes as time goes by, and we learn more and our > technology advances, which just widens our choices. Some people regard > those who are cryogenically suspended to be irrevocably dead, and some > don't, for example. > I agree it changes. It changes as new technology expands the scope of recoverable situations. If we can build an ultimate healing technology, which can heal someone of any wound, even an explosion that blasted them into a 1,000 pieces, then we would understand death to only be the result of irrecoverable data loss. So long as we had the information necessary to restore a person using this healing technology, then any injury would be survivable. We could then ask: what if we had the information, but not all the original parts. Could we use any old spare atoms to heal the person, and restore them to life? Would it be the same person? Technological improvements will necessarily lead us to expand and revise the notion of personhood, just as it has and will continue to expand the scope of survivability, and the border between life and death. > > >> Consider planetary motion. What gives the correct answer, Kepler's >> laws or Relativity? >> > Here you compare two theories which provide the same predictions. > > For many things, but not all. > > Different theories of personal identity offer different answers to the same question. For example: > Teleporter survival: > Bodily continuity - no > Psychological continuity - yes > Memory loss survival: > Bodily continuity - yes > Psychological continuity - no > Faulty transporter survival: > Bodily continuity - no > Psychological continuity - no > Open individualism - yes > > So if the transporter is faulty and no body materialises, so of course no > brain, and therefore no mind, you're saying that the individual > nevertheless 'survives'?? > So basically, nobody has ever died? > Pictures, please. > The faulty transporter is an example where there is a new body, but some memories are lost or inserted (changed). So it combines the aspects of teleporter survival, and memory loss survival. Each continuity theory would find something necessary was lost, and therefore conclude that the person did not survive. > >> I still don't see any reason to assume that there's some kind of >> mental connection between myself and that Maori dude 200 years ago. >> Or anybody else. >> > It's not a mental connection. It's an identity of personhood. > > There's no such thing (between two individuals). You are the only thing > that is identical to you. > I think this may be inconsistent with your agreement above that a person is a collection of mind-states. Each mind state is different. How then do we decide to put them into a particular collection which we call "one person?" What is it about the mind states that makes them belong to one person and not another? Jason -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From hkeithhenson at gmail.com Tue Jan 23 06:53:59 2024 From: hkeithhenson at gmail.com (Keith Henson) Date: Mon, 22 Jan 2024 22:53:59 -0800 Subject: [ExI] [Extropolis] Old and new futurisms in Silicon Valley In-Reply-To: <3834009e-8397-41c0-80cb-07514bc13b1c@zaiboc.net> References: <3834009e-8397-41c0-80cb-07514bc13b1c@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: On Mon, Jan 22, 2024 at 10:43?AM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat wrote: > > On 21/01/2024 21:50, Keith Henson wrote: > > Can you cite an example where "woke" mobs caused someone to lose a > job? There are lots of reasons people lose jobs, but I am not > familiar with this one. > > There are plenty of examples of teachers and lecturers who have lost their jobs because of trying to do them properly, and thus rousing the Wrath of the Woke (I'm thinking particularly of Literature classes, involving Dangerous Books (that happen to be classic literature, but what does that matter in the face of Political Correctness Gone Mad?)), I have often expressed a low opinion of political correctness. > and here in the UK, a couple running a pub lost their livelihood last year because someone noticed that they had the 'Wrong Kind of Dolls' included in a display of historical dolls that had been there for years, and kicked up a frenzy that resulted in the pub being put out of business. "How racist golliwog doll display led to a police raid, boycotts and pub?s eventual closure" https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/golliwog-dolls-grays-essex-pub-closes-b2331804.html > The dolls in question were Golliwogs. Yes, really. Apparently Golliwogs are so dangerous that you can be hounded out of your job for allowing people to see them. They were driven out of a business, which is worse than being driven out of a job. But reading that story, it's clear it was not entirely outside forces that got them, Times change, and objectionable symbols change too. They could have packed the dolls away and gone on, but they decided to fight the irrational PC nonsense. Fighting with irrational people is a lost cause. Woke mob sounds correct. Why people get involved in such is a good question. Bullying is a known psychological trait, perhaps the woke mob is a manifestation of that nasty trail. Here is an example. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sambo%27s https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Story_of_Little_Black_Sambo This is a particularly stupid example of PC. The attack was based on Sambo being African which was not the case at all, he was South Asian. Blacks seem to have understood this and were not bothered, after all, tigers are not African. But social justice idiots are always looking for a cause . . . Another example, a friend of mine has a house built in the early 30s with a big swastika decoration on the chimney. He let ivy grow over the chimney. > No wonder Robinsons banished the iconic image from their jam jars years ago. Apparently they had an eerily accurate 'woke-meter', and neatly dodged that particular existential danger. They did the correct thing. Kieth > I'm sure Giulio can provide many other examples of people losing their jobs through the actions of 'woke' mobs. > > Ben > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat From giulio at gmail.com Tue Jan 23 07:23:26 2024 From: giulio at gmail.com (Giulio Prisco) Date: Tue, 23 Jan 2024 08:23:26 +0100 Subject: [ExI] [Extropolis] Old and new futurisms in Silicon Valley In-Reply-To: <3834009e-8397-41c0-80cb-07514bc13b1c@zaiboc.net> References: <3834009e-8397-41c0-80cb-07514bc13b1c@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: On Mon, Jan 22, 2024 at 7:43?PM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat wrote: > > > On 21/01/2024 21:50, Keith Henson wrote: > > Can you cite an example where "woke" mobs caused someone to lose a > job? There are lots of reasons people lose jobs, but I am not > familiar with this one. > > > There are plenty of examples of teachers and lecturers who have lost their jobs because of trying to do them properly, and thus rousing the Wrath of the Woke (I'm thinking particularly of Literature classes, involving Dangerous Books (that happen to be classic literature, but what does that matter in the face of Political Correctness Gone Mad?)), and here in the UK, a couple running a pub lost their livelihood last year because someone noticed that they had the 'Wrong Kind of Dolls' included in a display of historical dolls that had been there for years, and kicked up a frenzy that resulted in the pub being put out of business. The dolls in question were Golliwogs. Yes, really. Apparently Golliwogs are so dangerous that you can be hounded out of your job for allowing people to see them. No wonder Robinsons banished the iconic image from their jam jars years ago. Apparently they had an eerily accurate 'woke-meter', and neatly dodged that particular existential danger. > > I'm sure Giulio can provide many other examples of people losing their jobs through the actions of 'woke' mobs. > > Ben I could, but it would be a very long list. Better google. I guess Keith is not aware of this because he doesn't use social media much, and these things are not reported by the mainstream press of liberal bent. But they are reported by the mainstream press of conservative bent. My advice is, since the politically polarized mainstream press is lying to you, and there is no such thing as unbiased press, always read both sides. > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat From dsunley at gmail.com Tue Jan 23 07:25:03 2024 From: dsunley at gmail.com (Darin Sunley) Date: Tue, 23 Jan 2024 00:25:03 -0700 Subject: [ExI] [Extropolis] Old and new futurisms in Silicon Valley In-Reply-To: References: <3834009e-8397-41c0-80cb-07514bc13b1c@zaiboc.net> Message-ID: The self-described least racist people in the history of civilization lobbied for, and successfully obtained, the removal of every person of non-caucasian ethnicity from the label of every major brand in the grocery store, including in cases where that was a real person who was actually instrumental in the foundation of the brand. I'm not saying they're ridiculously, viley, cartoonishly racist. But if they were, the end result would look the same. On Mon, Jan 22, 2024 at 11:56?PM Keith Henson via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > On Mon, Jan 22, 2024 at 10:43?AM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat > wrote: > > > > On 21/01/2024 21:50, Keith Henson wrote: > > > > Can you cite an example where "woke" mobs caused someone to lose a > > job? There are lots of reasons people lose jobs, but I am not > > familiar with this one. > > > > There are plenty of examples of teachers and lecturers who have lost > their jobs because of trying to do them properly, and thus rousing the > Wrath of the Woke (I'm thinking particularly of Literature classes, > involving Dangerous Books (that happen to be classic literature, but what > does that matter in the face of Political Correctness Gone Mad?)), > > I have often expressed a low opinion of political correctness. > > > and here in the UK, a couple running a pub lost their livelihood last > year because someone noticed that they had the 'Wrong Kind of Dolls' > included in a display of historical dolls that had been there for years, > and kicked up a frenzy that resulted in the pub being put out of business. > > "How racist golliwog doll display led to a police raid, boycotts and > pub?s eventual closure" > > > https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/golliwog-dolls-grays-essex-pub-closes-b2331804.html > > > The dolls in question were Golliwogs. Yes, really. Apparently Golliwogs > are so dangerous that you can be hounded out of your job for allowing > people to see them. > > They were driven out of a business, which is worse than being driven > out of a job. But reading that story, it's clear it was not entirely > outside forces that got them, Times change, and objectionable symbols > change too. They could have packed the dolls away and gone on, but > they decided to fight the irrational PC nonsense. Fighting with > irrational people is a lost cause. Woke mob sounds correct. Why > people get involved in such is a good question. Bullying is a known > psychological trait, perhaps the woke mob is a manifestation of that > nasty trail. > > Here is an example. > > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sambo%27s > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Story_of_Little_Black_Sambo > > This is a particularly stupid example of PC. The attack was based on > Sambo being African which was not the case at all, he was South Asian. > Blacks seem to have understood this and were not bothered, after all, > tigers are not African. But social justice idiots are always looking > for a cause . . . > > Another example, a friend of mine has a house built in the early 30s > with a big swastika decoration on the chimney. He let ivy grow over > the chimney. > > > No wonder Robinsons banished the iconic image from their jam jars years > ago. Apparently they had an eerily accurate 'woke-meter', and neatly dodged > that particular existential danger. > > They did the correct thing. > > Kieth > > > I'm sure Giulio can provide many other examples of people losing their > jobs through the actions of 'woke' mobs. > > > > Ben > > _______________________________________________ > > extropy-chat mailing list > > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike at rainier66.com Tue Jan 23 16:40:57 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (spike at rainier66.com) Date: Tue, 23 Jan 2024 08:40:57 -0800 Subject: [ExI] apologies in advance... Message-ID: <005a01da4e1a$f189b120$d49d1360$@rainier66.com> .heeeeeeeeheheheheheheheeeeehehehehehehehheeeeeeeee. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: image001.jpg Type: image/jpeg Size: 33824 bytes Desc: not available URL: From john at ziaspace.com Thu Jan 25 17:14:59 2024 From: john at ziaspace.com (John Klos) Date: Thu, 25 Jan 2024 17:14:59 +0000 (UTC) Subject: [ExI] Ongoing Extropy server attack Message-ID: Hi, all, If you've had trouble sending to the list, please keep trying. There has been an ongoing attack that has caused lack of resource issues, and while it has been mostly mitigated, we don't know if the attackers will try different things. I don't know what you folks have done to piss people off out there, but whatever it is, keep up the good work :D Thanks! John From efc at swisscows.email Thu Jan 25 21:16:57 2024 From: efc at swisscows.email (efc at swisscows.email) Date: Thu, 25 Jan 2024 22:16:57 +0100 (CET) Subject: [ExI] Ongoing Extropy server attack In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: But who are they? Catholics, humanists, the world economic forum? Best regards, Daniel On Thu, 25 Jan 2024, John Klos via extropy-chat wrote: > Hi, all, > > If you've had trouble sending to the list, please keep trying. There has been > an ongoing attack that has caused lack of resource issues, and while it has > been mostly mitigated, we don't know if the attackers will try different > things. > > I don't know what you folks have done to piss people off out there, but > whatever it is, keep up the good work :D > > Thanks! > John > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > From steinberg.will at gmail.com Thu Jan 25 21:40:06 2024 From: steinberg.will at gmail.com (Will Steinberg) Date: Thu, 25 Jan 2024 16:40:06 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Ongoing Extropy server attack In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: Oh fuck it's the basilisk On Thu, Jan 25, 2024 at 4:18?PM efc--- via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > But who are they? Catholics, humanists, the world economic forum? > > Best regards, > Daniel > > > On Thu, 25 Jan 2024, John Klos via extropy-chat wrote: > > > Hi, all, > > > > If you've had trouble sending to the list, please keep trying. There has > been > > an ongoing attack that has caused lack of resource issues, and while it > has > > been mostly mitigated, we don't know if the attackers will try different > > things. > > > > I don't know what you folks have done to piss people off out there, but > > whatever it is, keep up the good work :D > > > > Thanks! > > John > > _______________________________________________ > > extropy-chat mailing list > > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From efc at swisscows.email Thu Jan 25 22:30:08 2024 From: efc at swisscows.email (efc at swisscows.email) Date: Thu, 25 Jan 2024 23:30:08 +0100 (CET) Subject: [ExI] Ongoing Extropy server attack In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <6b771777-41d9-ec8c-ca42-f93cae80fa46@swisscows.email> Ahhh... so that's how it starts! Best regards, Daniel On Thu, 25 Jan 2024, Will Steinberg via extropy-chat wrote: > Oh fuck it's the basilisk > > On Thu, Jan 25, 2024 at 4:18?PM efc--- via extropy-chat wrote: > But who are they? Catholics, humanists, the world economic forum? > > Best regards, > Daniel > > > On Thu, 25 Jan 2024, John Klos via extropy-chat wrote: > > > Hi, all, > > > > If you've had trouble sending to the list, please keep trying. There has been > > an ongoing attack that has caused lack of resource issues, and while it has > > been mostly mitigated, we don't know if the attackers will try different > > things. > > > > I don't know what you folks have done to piss people off out there, but > > whatever it is, keep up the good work :D > > > > Thanks! > > John > > _______________________________________________ > > extropy-chat mailing list > > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > > From foozler83 at gmail.com Fri Jan 26 14:03:09 2024 From: foozler83 at gmail.com (William Flynn Wallace) Date: Fri, 26 Jan 2024 08:03:09 -0600 Subject: [ExI] wm james book review Message-ID: "A Stroll with William James." James is far from obscure, but it helps to have a commentary/gloss, and the best nonfiction writer of the 20th century, Jacques Barzun has done so. Barzun takes many asides, esp. on art. Actually better than reading James straight. billw -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pharos at gmail.com Sun Jan 28 12:04:45 2024 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Sun, 28 Jan 2024 12:04:45 +0000 Subject: [ExI] Blue Zones review - for longer life Message-ID: People in the world?s ?blue zones? live longer ? their diet could hold the key to why Published: January 24, 2024 Quotes: This longevity hotspot has since been expanded, and now includes several other areas around the world which also have greater numbers of longer-living, healthy people. Alongside Sardinia, these blue zones are now popularly recognised as: Ikaria, Greece; Okinawa, Japan; Nicoya, Costa Rica; and Loma Linda, California. When it comes to diet, each blue zone has its own approach ? so one specific food or nutrient does not explain the remarkable longevity observed. But interestingly, a diet rich in plant foods (such as locally-grown vegetables, fruits and legumes) does appear to be reasonably consistent across these zones. Another striking observation from these longevity hot spots is that meals are typically freshly prepared at home. Traditional blue zone diets also don?t appear to contain ultra-processed foods, fast foods or sugary drinks which may accelerate ageing. So maybe it?s just as important to consider what these longer-living populations are not doing, as much as what they are doing. Perhaps then we can learn something from these remarkable centenarians. While diet is only one part of the bigger picture when it comes to longevity, it?s an area we can do something about. In fact, it might just be at the heart of improving not only the quality of our health, but the quality of how we age. ------------ BillK From spike at rainier66.com Sun Jan 28 15:46:39 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (spike at rainier66.com) Date: Sun, 28 Jan 2024 07:46:39 -0800 Subject: [ExI] self-contradictory headline Message-ID: <004501da5201$2f388890$8da999b0$@rainier66.com> .heeeeeeeehehehehehehheeeeeeee. Well then, which is it? Is it $1 billion dollars, or priceless? Can't be both. It can be a 1 billion dollar priceful masterpiece perhaps. Then some random yahoo with a billion dollars would try to buy it. Oh we live in a funny world. spike -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: image003.jpg Type: image/jpeg Size: 16579 bytes Desc: not available URL: From spike at rainier66.com Sun Jan 28 16:05:34 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (spike at rainier66.com) Date: Sun, 28 Jan 2024 08:05:34 -0800 Subject: [ExI] electric vehicles again Message-ID: <005301da5203$d3acfd00$7b06f700$@rainier66.com> This kind of stuff is presented in the mainstream press as a joke, but it doesn't need to be. An IC-assisted electric vehicle makes perfect sense in some climates: The all-electrics have been getting bad press in the recent USA cold snap. But what if. you really designed a vehicle from a white sheet of paper, with an easily-removable small internal combustion engine, which comes into play only in bad cold snaps and cross country trips? The heat from the IC would heat the batteries so they continue to have full range, and they could even share the electric drive load. We could design a cross-country-worthy vehicle which could eliminate range anxiety and cold anxiety but be easily removed when not needed, so the vehicle still has all the advantages of an all-electric ride for three quarters of the year and 90% of the trips. spike -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: image001.jpg Type: image/jpeg Size: 25763 bytes Desc: not available URL: From pharos at gmail.com Sun Jan 28 17:54:03 2024 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Sun, 28 Jan 2024 17:54:03 +0000 Subject: [ExI] electric vehicles again In-Reply-To: <005301da5203$d3acfd00$7b06f700$@rainier66.com> References: <005301da5203$d3acfd00$7b06f700$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: On Sun, 28 Jan 2024 at 16:07, spike jones via extropy-chat wrote: > > This kind of stuff is presented in the mainstream press as a joke, but it doesn?t need to be. > An IC-assisted electric vehicle makes perfect sense in some climates: > > The all-electrics have been getting bad press in the recent USA cold snap. But what if? you really designed a vehicle from a white sheet of paper, with an easily-removable small internal combustion engine, which comes into play only in bad cold snaps and cross country trips? The heat from the IC would heat the batteries so they continue to have full range, and they could even share the electric drive load. We could design a cross-country-worthy vehicle which could eliminate range anxiety and cold anxiety but be easily removed when not needed, so the vehicle still has all the advantages of an all-electric ride for three quarters of the year and 90% of the trips. > > spike > _______________________________________________ I don't think you'll get away with this! :) Remember, there are people from Nordic countries here. Norway has many electric cars and in winter there are more rescue callouts for internal combustion cars. Quote: How Norway does EV charging in the cold Norway is one of the coldest countries in the world. It also has the highest EV adoption rate on the planet, but we can't remember seeing reports about endless lines at chargers during the winter. Here's what lessons can be learned from Norwegian EV drivers. ----------------- BillK From atymes at gmail.com Sun Jan 28 18:45:46 2024 From: atymes at gmail.com (Adrian Tymes) Date: Sun, 28 Jan 2024 10:45:46 -0800 Subject: [ExI] electric vehicles again In-Reply-To: <005301da5203$d3acfd00$7b06f700$@rainier66.com> References: <005301da5203$d3acfd00$7b06f700$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: That's called a "hybrid", and it is an approach that some have been trying for decades. For example, I drove a series of 3 hybrid Toyota Priuses before switching to a Tesla. On Sun, Jan 28, 2024 at 8:07?AM spike jones via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > > > > > This kind of stuff is presented in the mainstream press as a joke, but it > doesn?t need to be. > > > > An IC-assisted electric vehicle makes perfect sense in some climates: > > > > > > The all-electrics have been getting bad press in the recent USA cold > snap. But what if? you really designed a vehicle from a white sheet of > paper, with an easily-removable small internal combustion engine, which > comes into play only in bad cold snaps and cross country trips? The heat > from the IC would heat the batteries so they continue to have full range, > and they could even share the electric drive load. We could design a > cross-country-worthy vehicle which could eliminate range anxiety and cold > anxiety but be easily removed when not needed, so the vehicle still has all > the advantages of an all-electric ride for three quarters of the year and > 90% of the trips. > > > > spike > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: image001.jpg Type: image/jpeg Size: 25763 bytes Desc: not available URL: From spike at rainier66.com Sun Jan 28 19:03:57 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (spike at rainier66.com) Date: Sun, 28 Jan 2024 11:03:57 -0800 Subject: [ExI] electric vehicles again In-Reply-To: References: <005301da5203$d3acfd00$7b06f700$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: <00b001da521c$bf73cc10$3e5b6430$@rainier66.com> -----Original Message----- From: extropy-chat On Behalf Of BillK via ... _______________________________________________ >...I don't think you'll get away with this! :) Remember, there are people from Nordic countries here. Norway has many electric cars and in winter there are more rescue callouts for internal combustion cars. Quote: How Norway does EV charging in the cold Norway is one of the coldest countries in the world. It also has the highest EV adoption rate on the planet, but we can't remember seeing reports about endless lines at chargers during the winter. Here's what lessons can be learned from Norwegian EV drivers. ----------------- BillK _______________________________________________ BillK, the difference is that the Nordic countries are relatively short distances between the biggest cities. They have few long stretches of open empty freeway like one sees traversing the state of Texas. Much of the resistance to EVs have to do with range anxiety, more than the risk from the occasional brutal cold snap, stuff that happens less often than Jingle Bells in the states. Consider this angle: the rental car companies offer a deal to their most profitable customers: a weekly rental with unlimited mileage. Depending on what car one drives, it costs less to rent one of their cars for a cross country trip than to drive one's own, if one understands the depreciation per unit distance. Car rental companies are well aware of the yahoos who are their frequent fliers who rent their cars for cross country runs, and they know they lose money on those. Hertz decided to go all-electric, which solves that problem: in the states, there aren't enough charging stations to make a cross country run practical. So... Hertz can offer the unlimited-miles deal and not have crazy yahoos like me driving coast to coast in their conveyance. But... plenty of people don't know what they are doing and don't understand that in sufficiently cold circumstances, electric car mileage decreases, sometimes in a most dangerous way: the prole doesn't make it to the charging station, or finds out the car will not charge if she makes it there. Regarding the former, in the states, it can be damn dangerous in some places to be stranded with a dead car. The locals might kill you for your jewelry or the cash on your person. It isn't like that everywhere in the states of course. But... I do advise not breaking down. I didn't even mention the risk of hypothermia if one's EV conks a few miles short of the station. I just returned last week from a four day Florida to California dash. There is a loooootta lotta open empty country out across there. On that entire trip of 5 megameters, I saw only one charging station, way the heck out in the middle of nowhere, in the middle of the day, with no customers charging there, zero point nada. It won't be long before that establishment rips that back out of there and installs more fuel pumps. But if one has an EV around here, it is practical: distances to the local sushi joint are short, plenty of homes have Tesla charging adapters and solar panels (which perhaps are now called a ChargeX and a PowerWallX) which makes them great for Bay Area local use. But still not practical for a coast to coast dash. I heard Hertz is ditching their EVs. I was thinking of trying to score one, cheap, while the supply is high and the demand temporarily low (because so many potential Tesla customers are angry with Musk over TwitterX.) spike From spike at rainier66.com Sun Jan 28 19:08:31 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (spike at rainier66.com) Date: Sun, 28 Jan 2024 11:08:31 -0800 Subject: [ExI] electric vehicles again In-Reply-To: References: <005301da5203$d3acfd00$7b06f700$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: <00b101da521d$62af5d40$280e17c0$@rainier66.com> ?> On Behalf Of Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat Subject: Re: [ExI] electric vehicles again >?That's called a "hybrid", and it is an approach that some have been trying for decades. Adrian Not exactly. The hybrids do not have a removable IC. We wouldn?t need to carry all that weight for most of the year or for most trips. Have the IC to where it can be loaded in the frunk in 10 minutes by an elderly woman with a power hoist in the garage. Carry the IC only when needed which is seldom. spike spike -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: image001.jpg Type: image/jpeg Size: 8890 bytes Desc: not available URL: From steinberg.will at gmail.com Sun Jan 28 19:22:41 2024 From: steinberg.will at gmail.com (Will Steinberg) Date: Sun, 28 Jan 2024 14:22:41 -0500 Subject: [ExI] teachers In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: The updated Turing test should see whether a computer can make true Art. It?s no surprise that AI excels in optimizing derivative content?that?s what it is made to do. School essays already may as well be copies of one another, made according to algorithms. Is it really shocking at all that AI can pump out the same commodified crap people already do?essays, ad copy, tutorials, illustrations, web design? When an AI can create *of its own volition* works of art that hang in museums, then it passes the test. AI can already be used by skilled humans to make true Art, but when it makes some itself then I?ll be convinced On Thu, Aug 24, 2023 at 10:58?AM Gregory Jones via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > BillW's question regarding the instructor's task of distinguishing between > a student and AI puts a final nail in the coffin of Turing's test. > Artificial intelligence is able create an illusion of consciousness so > convincing, we are still debating if it really is the real thing, all while > failing to adequately define precisely what we mean by "real." > > spike > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From hrivera at alumni.virginia.edu Sun Jan 28 20:09:38 2024 From: hrivera at alumni.virginia.edu (Henry Rivera) Date: Sun, 28 Jan 2024 15:09:38 -0500 Subject: [ExI] electric vehicles again In-Reply-To: <00b001da521c$bf73cc10$3e5b6430$@rainier66.com> References: <00b001da521c$bf73cc10$3e5b6430$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: You not seeing the chargers really means nothing. I just plotted the route in my EV from Florida to California. There are sufficient chargers. -Henry > On Jan 28, 2024, at 2:04?PM, spike jones via extropy-chat wrote: > > I just returned last week from a four day Florida to California dash. There is a loooootta lotta open empty country out across there. On that entire trip of 5 megameters, I saw only one charging station, way the heck out in the middle of nowhere, in the middle of the day, with no customers charging there, zero point nada. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: image0.jpeg Type: image/jpeg Size: 21686 bytes Desc: not available URL: From spike at rainier66.com Sun Jan 28 20:46:33 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (spike at rainier66.com) Date: Sun, 28 Jan 2024 12:46:33 -0800 Subject: [ExI] electric vehicles again In-Reply-To: References: <00b001da521c$bf73cc10$3e5b6430$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: <006f01da522b$14c2c0f0$3e4842d0$@rainier66.com> ?> On Behalf Of Henry Rivera via extropy-chat Subject: Re: [ExI] electric vehicles again >?You not seeing the chargers really means nothing. I just plotted the route in my EV from Florida to California. There are sufficient chargers. -Henry Henry, I don?t doubt they exist. I only doubt the practicality of charging on a long road trip. Charging is still too slow and the stations are far enough apart they require planning. A good road trip is one in which one puts the shifter in overdrive the brain in park. On the other hand, think of the engineering tradeoffs in terms of the benefits of having a removable IC. The Tesla has good range, but to get that good range, it must be a very heavy car, with lots of expensive batteries. A car with a removable IC would be designed as a local runner where distances are short. About 80 miles of charge would be plenty. With that, the design saves a loooootta weight, a lotta passenger room and a lotta cost. It saves on tire wear, it charges faster in limited-current situations such as at home. A third the range means it can charge in perhaps half the time, and may be sufficiently charged using only the normal power you might already have wired into your house for running the electric dryer. Batteries are a weight driver and cost driver in EVs. So? removable IC, way fewer batteries, less range but more room inside, improved tire life, lower cost, faster charge potential, better handling, etc. All that for the price of dramatically reduced range, which I can live with because I don?t drive much. But I do cross country dashes once in a while, and I need a car capable of that. Removable IC hybrids feel to me like an underexplored engineering space. Henry from the number of stations you plotted, I can tell you must have a Tesla. Thanks! Every Tesla that is sold benefits me personally, since I own a home within easy bicycle distance from the plant. spike -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: image002.jpg Type: image/jpeg Size: 3391 bytes Desc: not available URL: From avant at sollegro.com Sun Jan 28 20:50:00 2024 From: avant at sollegro.com (Stuart LaForge) Date: Sun, 28 Jan 2024 12:50:00 -0800 Subject: [ExI] The physical limits of computation In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <8ad4a19d55e5f610d55f94e43fc4003b@sollegro.com> On 2024-01-21 18:59, Jason Resch via extropy-chat wrote: > On Sun, Jan 21, 2024 at 2:55?PM Stuart LaForge via extropy-chat [snip] >> On p.49 you wrote: >> "Using the holographic principle to model the observable >> universe as a black hole with a radius of 46.5 billion light >> years, we find it contains: >> 2.33 * 10^123 bits >> Which is the total information content of the universe." >> >> The observable universe cannot be modelled as a black hole because >> it is >> defined by the particle horizon which, while it is one of the three >> cosmic horizons (Hubble horizon, event horizon, and particle >> horizon), >> it is NOT the event horizon in a technical sense and therefore using >> the >> holographic principle on it is not really physically valid. The >> particle >> horizon defining the observable universe is the boundary of >> everything >> we can currently see in our past light cone since the big bang. As >> you >> say, it is 46.5 billion light years away from us. > > The issues of the various horizons, and which was the most sensible > one to use in this situation confused me. Don't be confused. Listen to what the data is telling you. You can see that clearly that the observable universe is not a black hole. The redshift is a good indicator of the large time dilation affecting the images of the farthest galaxies we can see. In a far-away observer's frame of reference, it looks like the farthest galaxies are frozen in time painted on the cosmological event horizon at 16 Gly from us. Any computation you can see, i.e. literal clock speed, has therefore been slowed down tremendously. > This section is on the > observable universe, and ideally, I would like to provide both > computational, and information content estimates for the observable > universe as a whole, if that is possible, the observable universe > being the largest thing we can see (and presumably, the thing with the > greatest information content). I understand your motivation, but you are seeing the galaxies of the observable universe as they were, frozen in time when they crossed the cosmological event horizon billions of years ago. You cannot even in principle see events that occurred to the galaxies after they crossed the event horizon unless it happens somewhere between the distance to the current horizon and the future horizon when all horizons converge on a single horizon. The particle horizon and the therefore "observable universe" is a construct built upon induction of the cosmological principle beyond what is physically observable. For all we know, the flying spaghetti monster could have ate them after they crossed the event horizon and we might never know. > Our inability to interact with distant objects we can see (beyond our > event horizon) I consider is (perhaps?) not necessarily important to > the question of how much information "is in" the observable universe, > as all those far away photons, still "made it here", into the sphere > of the observable. So then, when it comes to determining how much > information exists within the totality of what is observable (despite > the fact that we can no longer signal back to the most distant > places), information about those places has still made it here, and > computations which took place in those far away galaxies are still > perceivable by us, and hence ought to be included in the total amount > of computations that have occurred in the history of the observable > universe, should they not? I get that. The red shift and time dilation of the farthest and therefore the fastest "moving" galaxies is so great that you are would have to watch for years to see a single second of "computation". Once a galaxy crosses the cosmic event horizon, for the rest of YOUR time you are looking at a perpetually slowing film of it getting to closer and closer but never quite reaching the event horizon. Yes you are seeing galaxies that are by the FLRW metric currently 46 billion light years away, but you are only seeing a frozen snapshot of them as they were when they crossed the cosmic event horizon less between 13.8 billion and 16 billion years ago. . . unless, something happened to them. > > I also found it interesting, that the mass of the universe (when > computed using the critical density, which comes from Friedmann > equations and multiplying this by the volume of the observable > universe) led to a mass which is considerably greater than the mass of > a black hole with the radius of the observable universe. I take this > to be a result of not all the energy in the universe being matter > energy, but also radiation and dark energy, which I presume to affect > the curvature of space differently than ordinary mass. Is that right? Those things do change the stress-energy tensor, but for the most part cosmologists simply define a statistic called omega that is the sum of the fraction of the mass-energy sum of the various partial densities of the various constituents relative to Friedmann's critical density which is the total density of the whole shebang, with the caveat that it is based partially based on the Hubble parameter which seems to change with time and perhaps even space. https://ned.ipac.caltech.edu/level5/March06/Overduin/Overduin4.html The reason the mass you calculated for the observable universe based on the critical density is more than that of a black hole of the same radius as the observable universe is that volume-wise, most of the so-called observable universe lies outside of our causal cell. A black hole whose Schwarzchild radius is equal to the Hubble radius is the only size a black hole made of mass-energy at the Friedmann critical density can take. At least according to a corollary of the Schwarzchild metric that I discovered: The surface area of an event horizon multiplied by the average density of the space contained by the event horizon is always equal to a constant such that D * A = K with K= 3*(speed-of-light)^2/(2*(Newton's G)). As you can see from examining the equation, the larger the black hole, the lower the the average density of the space that the event horizon surrounds. If the observable universe were a black hole, it would be causal cell containing space less dense than the Freidman critical density of our causal cell. Remember all that needs for that to happen is a smaller Hubble parameter than ours. Here is a thread on the Extropolis list where I use casual cell theory and wave harmonics to explain the Cosmological Constant problem/ Vacuum catastrophe: https://groups.google.com/g/extropolis/c/QA-kRIBt6vM/m/4d9cqudeAQAJ [snip] > For reference, here is how I did the calculation: > https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1lR5mj4jFQft7Q-hKC4bYAoQt-BlukVy7MbEQV0eeu8s/edit?usp=sharing > > Okay, that might simplify things. Though I did find it quite an > interesting result, that using the much larger and more complex > observable universe radius, which is a function of the co-moving > distance factor, and applying the holographic principle to measure its > area in Planck lengths / 4, and converting that to natural units of > information, it gave a result that was within 1% of the total number > of computations that could have occurred in the history of the > universe (from calculating its current mass as the critical density > filling the entire volume of the observable universe) -- which note is > a mass greater than that of a black hole. It might just be a strange > coincidence, but if not perhaps it suggests something deeper. You used the right techniques, you just misapplied them and came up with an answer contradictory to general relativity. The deeper thing that this suggests is that the most distant regions of observable space are expanding at a different rate than ours because their Hubble parameter has a different value than ours does. When you correct for general relativity, you discover that in order to remain flat, the observable universe has to have a different critical density than our causal cell. Congratulations, you figured out that the homogeneity and isotropy ASSUMED by the Cosmological Principle on which the FLRW is based is bullshit which is what I have heretically maintained for years based on causal cells. Nowadays with the Hubble tension discovered by the HST, the too-early galaxies discovered by the JWST, and gigantic trans-galactic superstructures discovered by the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, the Lamda-CDM standard big bang cosmological model is being torpedoed left and right. https://www.space.com/big-ring-galactic-superstructure-celestial-anomaly > >> It should be noted all three horizons change over time, and in the >> far >> future our causal cell will reach its maximum extent possible, where >> the >> Hubble constant will stop changing and the Hubble horizon will stop >> moving. This future state will be a black hole that is composed >> entirely >> of dark energy and would be the largest black hole possible in a >> causal >> cell composed entirely of dark energy or the cosmological constant. >> In >> other words a blackhole composed entirely of the vacuum energy of >> empty >> space where the cosmological event horizon coincides exactly with >> the >> black hole event horizon. This is also called a Nariai black hole >> and is >> a feature of the De Sitter- Schwarzschild metric. If current >> estimates >> of the cosmological constant are correct, then this ultimate black >> hole/ causal cell will have a radius of about 16 billion light years >> >> which coincides with the current cosmological event horizon. > > Interesting, I had never heard of Nariai black holes before. They are interesting, but they they depend of the notion that the cosmological constant/vacuum energy of the all space-time in the universe is constant. Since in a mathematical sense almost all of space-time is hidden from us behind causal event horizons, it takes a degree of faith to believe this. > >> I hope that I am not being overly pedantic with regards to what you >> were >> trying to show about limits of computation. > > I appreciate your review. I strive for factual correctness, so the > more pedantic the better. :-) > >> I sort of went down this >> same track myself a few years ago and came up with answers within an >> >> order of magnitude or so of yours, so you are on the right track. > > I saw various estimates of 10^122 - 10^123, and in particular, the > "Black Hole Computers" paper I cite, said that the number of > computations (at the Margolus?Levitin bound) is approximately equal > to the Holographic entropy bound. I wanted to try to do an as exact > calculation as possible to see how close these numbers were. The only > way I could seem to recover the 10^123 result was using the whole 46.5 > billion light year radius of the observable universe. Do you recall > what numbers you obtained (if you still have the calculations)? I got a figure of 3.27 * 10^122 bits for the classical information content for our causal cell bounded by the Hubble radius. I don't think it makes sense to talk about "computation" involving space-like separated regions of space time, at least with regard to classical computing. But hey, what does anybody really know? The universe is a strange and wonderful place and I just live here. ;) Stuart LaForge From efc at swisscows.email Sun Jan 28 22:33:35 2024 From: efc at swisscows.email (efc at swisscows.email) Date: Sun, 28 Jan 2024 23:33:35 +0100 (CET) Subject: [ExI] Blue Zones review - for longer life In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: Always an interesting topic Bill! =) I think it is a nice packaging of old wisdom. Apart from any technical means, modern therapies and procedures, a lot comes down to: Sleep, diet and exercise. On top of that, you can add some psychological "happiness"-factors from positive psychology such as: Keep mentally active, have an active social life, be grateful, have a deeper goal or reason for living. I think broadly and very summarily, this is the conclusion I arrived at last time I looked into it. What do I do personally? I sleep 7-8 hours per day, I exercise moderatly every other day, I walk unless it takes me more than 30 minutes, I always take the stairs (live in europe with no high rises, at most 5-6 floors), my wife and I always cook our own food 5 days per week, and I try to keep mentally active. My sins are my somewhat slow social life, lack of spirituality (but I love to wrestle with existential questions though), and love of good food (I keep the resturants to at most 2 days per week). Now, something I been thinking of lately is the 16/8 diet. I don't follow it, but what I _do_ is that I love to sleep in on weekens and I eat my breakfast at around 11 or 12. That means that for big parts of my life, I actually have followed a kind of 14/10 to 16/8 diet for 2 days per week, and when I'm on vacation, for up to 4 weeks. I have no idea if that affects my body in anyway, but never realized that I had been following this fad diet unintentionally for a long time. But, when working, only 2 days per week, so probably that's not enough to make any meaningful difference. That's my "blue" journey. Looking forward to hear from you guys. =) Best regards, Daniel On Sun, 28 Jan 2024, BillK via extropy-chat wrote: > People in the world?s ?blue zones? live longer ? their diet could hold > the key to why > Published: January 24, 2024 > > > > Quotes: > This longevity hotspot has since been expanded, and now includes > several other areas around the world which also have greater numbers > of longer-living, healthy people. Alongside Sardinia, these blue zones > are now popularly recognised as: Ikaria, Greece; Okinawa, Japan; > Nicoya, Costa Rica; and Loma Linda, California. > > When it comes to diet, each blue zone has its own approach ? so one > specific food or nutrient does not explain the remarkable longevity > observed. But interestingly, a diet rich in plant foods (such as > locally-grown vegetables, fruits and legumes) does appear to be > reasonably consistent across these zones. > > Another striking observation from these longevity hot spots is that > meals are typically freshly prepared at home. Traditional blue zone > diets also don?t appear to contain ultra-processed foods, fast foods > or sugary drinks which may accelerate ageing. So maybe it?s just as > important to consider what these longer-living populations are not > doing, as much as what they are doing. > > Perhaps then we can learn something from these remarkable > centenarians. While diet is only one part of the bigger picture when > it comes to longevity, it?s an area we can do something about. In > fact, it might just be at the heart of improving not only the quality > of our health, but the quality of how we age. > ------------ > > BillK > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat From efc at swisscows.email Sun Jan 28 22:36:45 2024 From: efc at swisscows.email (efc at swisscows.email) Date: Sun, 28 Jan 2024 23:36:45 +0100 (CET) Subject: [ExI] teachers In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <2659ecdd-742e-949f-af14-200b524ee269@swisscows.email> >From my position as a teacher it is pretty easy to spot the difference since many students don't even bother to change the output. Most just put the raw output of a chat gpt question in a document and present it as their own, so when 70-100% of the text is the same, it is easy to slap a cheat label on them. The same for coding assignments when you can get 10-15 students with the exact same variable names, structure, and order of calls. But... a highly motivated cheater who actually applies some intelligence to the task will of course be able to cheat way more easily. Best regards, Daniel On Sun, 28 Jan 2024, Will Steinberg via extropy-chat wrote: > The updated Turing test should see whether a computer can make true Art. > > It?s no surprise that AI excels in optimizing derivative content?that?s what it is made to do.? School essays already may as well be > copies of one another, made according to algorithms.? Is it really shocking at all that AI can pump out the same commodified crap > people already do?essays, ad copy, tutorials, illustrations, web design? > > When an AI can create *of its own volition* works of art that hang in museums, then it passes the test. > > AI can already be used by skilled humans to make true Art, but when it makes some itself then I?ll be convinced > > On Thu, Aug 24, 2023 at 10:58?AM Gregory Jones via extropy-chat wrote: > BillW's question regarding the instructor's task of distinguishing between a student and AI puts a final nail in the > coffin of Turing's test.? Artificial intelligence is able create an illusion of consciousness so convincing, we are still > debating if it really is the real thing, all while failing to adequately define precisely what we mean by "real."? > spike > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > > From efc at swisscows.email Sun Jan 28 22:39:30 2024 From: efc at swisscows.email (efc at swisscows.email) Date: Sun, 28 Jan 2024 23:39:30 +0100 (CET) Subject: [ExI] electric vehicles again In-Reply-To: References: <00b001da521c$bf73cc10$3e5b6430$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: <8e5aac5e-5bd2-b747-af2c-7543cb2458ec@swisscows.email> Let me add to the topic of norway... does anyone know the distribution of cars? I would imagine that electric cars are plentiful in Bergen, Oslo and Trondheim, but far less common in the remote country side. >From a swedish perspective I would argue that the EV:s are the main 4-5 cities and you'll definitely not see a lot of teslas in northern sweden, especially this year when it was -43 C at its peak. Best regards, Daniel On Sun, 28 Jan 2024, Henry Rivera via extropy-chat wrote: > You not seeing the chargers really means nothing. I just plotted the route in my EV from Florida to California. There are sufficient chargers. > > > > -Henry > >> On Jan 28, 2024, at 2:04?PM, spike jones via extropy-chat wrote: >> >> I just returned last week from a four day Florida to California dash. There is a loooootta lotta open empty country out across there. On that entire trip of 5 megameters, I saw only one charging station, way the heck out in the middle of nowhere, in the middle of the day, with no customers charging there, zero point nada. > From hrivera at alumni.virginia.edu Mon Jan 29 01:29:56 2024 From: hrivera at alumni.virginia.edu (Henry Rivera) Date: Sun, 28 Jan 2024 20:29:56 -0500 Subject: [ExI] teachers In-Reply-To: <2659ecdd-742e-949f-af14-200b524ee269@swisscows.email> References: <2659ecdd-742e-949f-af14-200b524ee269@swisscows.email> Message-ID: <6A33E5B8-DE3C-4882-A8AD-02E016E19971@alumni.virginia.edu> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: cloudpainter_logo_600wide_colorssquare.png Type: image/png Size: 18184 bytes Desc: not available URL: From hrivera at alumni.virginia.edu Mon Jan 29 01:34:34 2024 From: hrivera at alumni.virginia.edu (Henry Rivera) Date: Sun, 28 Jan 2024 20:34:34 -0500 Subject: [ExI] Blue Zones review - for longer life In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <3BEBB0F4-E205-4A05-AB59-1E527F3F1488@alumni.virginia.edu> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From efc at swisscows.email Mon Jan 29 08:57:10 2024 From: efc at swisscows.email (efc at swisscows.email) Date: Mon, 29 Jan 2024 09:57:10 +0100 (CET) Subject: [ExI] teachers In-Reply-To: <6A33E5B8-DE3C-4882-A8AD-02E016E19971@alumni.virginia.edu> References: <2659ecdd-742e-949f-af14-200b524ee269@swisscows.email> <6A33E5B8-DE3C-4882-A8AD-02E016E19971@alumni.virginia.edu> Message-ID: <51ca64d4-e901-1930-d678-89139b30c897@swisscows.email> That reminds me... I had a project where a student was creating abstract art for a company (AI-generated). I'd say that beauty (or art) is in the eye of the beholder. Personally, I do not have a criterion that an object has to be human-made in order for it to be considered art. If I like it, I like it (but I'm probably the least artsy person in the room, so do take my opinion with a grain of salt). Best regards, Daniel On Sun, 28 Jan 2024, Henry Rivera via extropy-chat wrote: > A friend of mine started this project in an attempt to have a machine create ?true art.? He started this long before the AI > revolution btw. He argues that he has created creative bots. You be the judge.? > > cloudpainter_logo_600wide_colorssquare.png > Pindar Van Arman's cloudpainter > cloudpainter.com > > -Henry > > On Jan 28, 2024, at 5:37?PM, efc--- via extropy-chat wrote: > > ?From my position as a teacher it is pretty easy to spot the difference since many students don't even bother to change > the output. > > Most just put the raw output of a chat gpt question in a document and present it as their own, so when 70-100% of the > text is the same, it is easy to slap a cheat label on them. > > The same for coding assignments when you can get 10-15 students with the exact same variable names, structure, and order > of calls. > > But... a highly motivated cheater who actually applies some intelligence to the task will of course be able to cheat way > more easily. > > Best regards, > Daniel > > > On Sun, 28 Jan 2024, Will Steinberg via extropy-chat wrote: > > The updated Turing test should see whether a computer can make true Art. > > It?s no surprise that AI excels in optimizing derivative content?that?s what it is made to do.? School essays > already may as well be > > copies of one another, made according to algorithms.? Is it really shocking at all that AI can pump out the > same commodified crap > > people already do?essays, ad copy, tutorials, illustrations, web design? > > When an AI can create *of its own volition* works of art that hang in museums, then it passes the test. > > AI can already be used by skilled humans to make true Art, but when it makes some itself then I?ll be > convinced > > On Thu, Aug 24, 2023 at 10:58?AM Gregory Jones via extropy-chat wrote: > > ?????BillW's question regarding the instructor's task of distinguishing between a student and AI puts a final > nail in the > > ?????coffin of Turing's test.? Artificial intelligence is able create an illusion of consciousness so > convincing, we are still > > ?????debating if it really is the real thing, all while failing to adequately define precisely what we mean > by "real."? > > spike > > _______________________________________________ > > extropy-chat mailing list > > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > > From jasonresch at gmail.com Mon Jan 29 09:42:35 2024 From: jasonresch at gmail.com (Jason Resch) Date: Mon, 29 Jan 2024 04:42:35 -0500 Subject: [ExI] teachers In-Reply-To: <6A33E5B8-DE3C-4882-A8AD-02E016E19971@alumni.virginia.edu> References: <2659ecdd-742e-949f-af14-200b524ee269@swisscows.email> <6A33E5B8-DE3C-4882-A8AD-02E016E19971@alumni.virginia.edu> Message-ID: Before the current generation of image generators, there was an effort to make a "Creative Adversarial Network", which I write about here: https://alwaysasking.com/when-will-ai-take-over/#Art He created a new type of AI he calls a Creative Adversarial Network or (CAN). The goal of a CAN is to create novelty: for example artwork in styles different from what it?s seen before. Accordingly, artwork produced by a CAN leans towards abstract pieces. Elgammal said, ?I am surprised by the output every time I run it.? Jason On Sun, Jan 28, 2024, 8:31 PM Henry Rivera via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > A friend of mine started this project in an attempt to have a machine > create ?true art.? He started this long before the AI revolution btw. He > argues that he has created creative bots. You be the judge. > > [image: cloudpainter_logo_600wide_colorssquare.png] > > Pindar Van Arman's cloudpainter > cloudpainter.com > > > -Henry > > On Jan 28, 2024, at 5:37?PM, efc--- via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > > ?From my position as a teacher it is pretty easy to spot the difference > since many students don't even bother to change the output. > > Most just put the raw output of a chat gpt question in a document and > present it as their own, so when 70-100% of the text is the same, it is > easy to slap a cheat label on them. > > The same for coding assignments when you can get 10-15 students with the > exact same variable names, structure, and order of calls. > > But... a highly motivated cheater who actually applies some intelligence > to the task will of course be able to cheat way more easily. > > Best regards, > Daniel > > > On Sun, 28 Jan 2024, Will Steinberg via extropy-chat wrote: > > The updated Turing test should see whether a computer can make true Art. > > It?s no surprise that AI excels in optimizing derivative content?that?s > what it is made to do. School essays already may as well be > > copies of one another, made according to algorithms. Is it really > shocking at all that AI can pump out the same commodified crap > > people already do?essays, ad copy, tutorials, illustrations, web design? > > When an AI can create *of its own volition* works of art that hang in > museums, then it passes the test. > > AI can already be used by skilled humans to make true Art, but when it > makes some itself then I?ll be convinced > > On Thu, Aug 24, 2023 at 10:58?AM Gregory Jones via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > > BillW's question regarding the instructor's task of distinguishing > between a student and AI puts a final nail in the > > coffin of Turing's test. Artificial intelligence is able create an > illusion of consciousness so convincing, we are still > > debating if it really is the real thing, all while failing to > adequately define precisely what we mean by "real." > > spike > > _______________________________________________ > > extropy-chat mailing list > > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: cloudpainter_logo_600wide_colorssquare.png Type: image/png Size: 18184 bytes Desc: not available URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: cloudpainter_logo_600wide_colorssquare.png Type: image/png Size: 18184 bytes Desc: not available URL: From efc at swisscows.email Mon Jan 29 13:11:28 2024 From: efc at swisscows.email (efc at swisscows.email) Date: Mon, 29 Jan 2024 14:11:28 +0100 (CET) Subject: [ExI] teachers In-Reply-To: References: <2659ecdd-742e-949f-af14-200b524ee269@swisscows.email> <6A33E5B8-DE3C-4882-A8AD-02E016E19971@alumni.virginia.edu> Message-ID: <9d230a53-082c-3b8a-a33b-57ddfc3a4363@swisscows.email> Interesting! That was the way my student choose to walk as well. I don't remember the specifics but he definitely dabbled in some kind of Adversarial Network which you could then train on the style of any artist you enjoyed as long as there was enough art in the public domain available. Best regards, Daniel On Mon, 29 Jan 2024, Jason Resch via extropy-chat wrote: > Before the current generation of image generators, there was an effort to make a "Creative Adversarial Network", which I write about > here: > https://alwaysasking.com/when-will-ai-take-over/#Art > > He created a new type of AI he calls a Creative Adversarial Network or (CAN). The goal of a CAN is to create novelty: for example > artwork in styles different from what it?s seen before. > > Accordingly, artwork produced by a CAN leans towards abstract pieces. Elgammal said, ?I am surprised by the output every time I run > it.?? > > Jason? > > On Sun, Jan 28, 2024, 8:31 PM Henry Rivera via extropy-chat wrote: > A friend of mine started this project in an attempt to have a machine create ?true art.? He started this long before the AI > revolution btw. He argues that he has created creative bots. You be the judge.? > > cloudpainter_logo_600wide_colorssquare.png > Pindar Van Arman's cloudpainter > cloudpainter.com > > -Henry > > On Jan 28, 2024, at 5:37?PM, efc--- via extropy-chat wrote: > > ?From my position as a teacher it is pretty easy to spot the difference since many students don't even bother to > change the output. > > Most just put the raw output of a chat gpt question in a document and present it as their own, so when 70-100% of > the text is the same, it is easy to slap a cheat label on them. > > The same for coding assignments when you can get 10-15 students with the exact same variable names, structure, and > order of calls. > > But... a highly motivated cheater who actually applies some intelligence to the task will of course be able to > cheat way more easily. > > Best regards, > Daniel > > > On Sun, 28 Jan 2024, Will Steinberg via extropy-chat wrote: > > The updated Turing test should see whether a computer can make true Art. > > It?s no surprise that AI excels in optimizing derivative content?that?s what it is made to do.? School > essays already may as well be > > copies of one another, made according to algorithms.? Is it really shocking at all that AI can pump out > the same commodified crap > > people already do?essays, ad copy, tutorials, illustrations, web design? > > When an AI can create *of its own volition* works of art that hang in museums, then it passes the test. > > AI can already be used by skilled humans to make true Art, but when it makes some itself then I?ll be > convinced > > On Thu, Aug 24, 2023 at 10:58?AM Gregory Jones via extropy-chat wrote: > > ?????BillW's question regarding the instructor's task of distinguishing between a student and AI puts a > final nail in the > > ?????coffin of Turing's test.? Artificial intelligence is able create an illusion of consciousness so > convincing, we are still > > ?????debating if it really is the real thing, all while failing to adequately define precisely what we > mean by "real."? > > spike > > _______________________________________________ > > extropy-chat mailing list > > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > > From pharos at gmail.com Mon Jan 29 13:41:48 2024 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Mon, 29 Jan 2024 13:41:48 +0000 Subject: [ExI] Sex robots go to court Message-ID: Sex robots go to court: Testing the limits of privacy and sexual freedom by Jonathan Turley, 27 Jan 2024 Quotes: >From a legal perspective, these sex robots are nothing more than a ramped up toaster with a fetching name. Even the term ?brothel? can be challenged. In Paris, a sex doll brothel was opened and licensed as a ?game center.? The analogy is based on the fact that bots, in the view of customers, are simply machines designed for recreation. The bots remove the alleged victim in these scenarios. No one is being directly harmed when someone has relations with what is essentially an advanced appliance. This issue becomes far more difficult, however, when the bots are designed to resemble children. Such devices have already been banned in some countries, including recently in the U.S. In the absence of a direct victim, we are left with a pure moral or social judgment on the private tastes and relations of adults. In the series ?Westworld,? ?host? Annie asked a reluctant guest ?if you can?t tell the difference, does it matter if I?m real or not?? Legally, the answer is no. But as that difference erodes, the question as to whether it matters to others will grow. ----------------- It looks like we are in for a season of moral panic, like back in the 60s when the pill became available and 'sexual freedom' became fashionable. Until AIDs and STDs made people reconsider. No STDs with robots, though. BillK From moulton at moulton.com Mon Jan 29 20:03:02 2024 From: moulton at moulton.com (F. C. Moulton) Date: Mon, 29 Jan 2024 13:03:02 -0700 Subject: [ExI] electric vehicles again In-Reply-To: <00b001da521c$bf73cc10$3e5b6430$@rainier66.com> References: <005301da5203$d3acfd00$7b06f700$@rainier66.com> <00b001da521c$bf73cc10$3e5b6430$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: <212a7ec4-fe1a-4fd1-bbfc-2b50efec410d@moulton.com> On 1/28/24 12:03, spike jones via extropy-chat wrote: > I heard Hertz is ditching their EVs. I was thinking of trying to score one, cheap, while the supply is high and the demand temporarily low (because so many potential Tesla customers are angry with Musk over TwitterX.) > Spike According to the news reports I have read Hertz is not ditching all of their EV inventory rather they are adjusting to customer demand just as they adjust inventory for SUV versus economy size etc. Basically they over estimated demand for EVs. Since I now live in Arizona I will note that in the Phoenix area the demand for the Tesla models that Hertz is selling was high when I made my purchase. I purchased a basic 2023 Tesla Model 3. I did my paperwork for the purchase on Thursday and it took a bit longer than I expected because the person in charge of paperwork had multiple purchases happening at the same time. So there is at least one data point that shows the demand is not low at least at one location at one point in time. From the conversation I had with the sales they are having some people purchase the vehicle over the phone without seeing it. This does not mean that demand is at this level in all locations however it might suggest that more detailed information is needed Fred -- F. C. Moulton moulton at moulton.com From hkeithhenson at gmail.com Mon Jan 29 20:15:04 2024 From: hkeithhenson at gmail.com (Keith Henson) Date: Mon, 29 Jan 2024 12:15:04 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Sex robots go to court In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Mon, Jan 29, 2024 at 5:43?AM BillK via extropy-chat wrote: snip > The bots remove the alleged victim in these scenarios. No one is being > directly harmed when someone has relations with what is essentially an > advanced appliance. That's not entirely true. The "working girls" are out of a job. Keith From spike at rainier66.com Tue Jan 30 00:07:45 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (spike at rainier66.com) Date: Mon, 29 Jan 2024 16:07:45 -0800 Subject: [ExI] electric vehicles again In-Reply-To: <212a7ec4-fe1a-4fd1-bbfc-2b50efec410d@moulton.com> References: <005301da5203$d3acfd00$7b06f700$@rainier66.com> <00b001da521c$bf73cc10$3e5b6430$@rainier66.com> <212a7ec4-fe1a-4fd1-bbfc-2b50efec410d@moulton.com> Message-ID: <00a401da5310$5aa250a0$0fe6f1e0$@rainier66.com> -----Original Message----- From: extropy-chat On Behalf Of F. C. Moulton via extropy-chat Sent: Monday, 29 January, 2024 12:03 PM To: extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org Cc: F. C. Moulton Subject: Re: [ExI] electric vehicles again On 1/28/24 12:03, spike jones via extropy-chat wrote: > I heard Hertz is ditching their EVs. I was thinking of trying to > score one, cheap, while the supply is high and the demand temporarily > low (because so many potential Tesla customers are angry with Musk > over TwitterX.) > Spike >...According to the news reports I have read Hertz is not ditching all of their EV inventory rather they are adjusting to customer demand just as they adjust inventory for SUV versus economy size etc. Basically they over estimated demand for EVs. Since I now live in Arizona I will note that in the Phoenix area the demand for the Tesla models that Hertz is selling was high when I made my purchase. I purchased a basic 2023 Tesla Model 3. I did my paperwork for the purchase on Thursday and it took a bit longer than I expected because the person in charge of paperwork had multiple purchases happening at the same time. So there is at least one data point that shows the demand is not low at least at one location at one point in time. From the conversation I had with the sales they are having some people purchase the vehicle over the phone without seeing it. This does not mean that demand is at this level in all locations however it might suggest that more detailed information is needed Fred -- F. C. Moulton moulton at moulton.com _______________________________________________ Hi Fred, thx for the clarification. I am not looking for one as recent as 2023. I am looking for one about 4 yrs old with perhaps 70k miles. In general, initial depreciation on American cars is steep. I bought my current ride, a 2003 Linc Town Car, when it was 4 yrs old with 55k miles for 1/3 its new sales price from the guy who bought it new. He had all the paperwork, showed that he paid 48.1k, sold it to me for 16 even. So: American car, 1/3 sales price 4 yrs later. 2024 basic Model 3 is about 40K? So a 2020 with 70 on it from a rental company should be about... 13k? That sounds like a compelling deal. spike From spike at rainier66.com Tue Jan 30 00:13:18 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (spike at rainier66.com) Date: Mon, 29 Jan 2024 16:13:18 -0800 Subject: [ExI] Sex robots go to court In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <00a701da5311$21463690$63d2a3b0$@rainier66.com> -----Original Message----- From: extropy-chat On Behalf Of Keith Henson via extropy-chat >>... The bots remove the alleged victim in these scenarios. No one is being > directly harmed when someone has relations with what is essentially an > advanced appliance. >...That's not entirely true. The "working girls" are out of a job. Keith _______________________________________________ Sheesh, now we need to find new lines of work for society's hot messes. spike From john at ziaspace.com Tue Jan 30 01:48:35 2024 From: john at ziaspace.com (John Klos) Date: Tue, 30 Jan 2024 01:48:35 +0000 (UTC) Subject: [ExI] Quick maintenance Message-ID: <61472731-5553-a2bd-91f7-015ddf99f64b@newbunny.zia.io> Hi, The main Extropy server will be down in about an hour (around 2:30AM UTC) for around 20 minutes while it gets new UPS batteries. Yay! John From spike at rainier66.com Tue Jan 30 04:12:40 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (spike at rainier66.com) Date: Mon, 29 Jan 2024 20:12:40 -0800 Subject: [ExI] first neuralink Message-ID: <005201da5332$91bf6240$b53e26c0$@rainier66.com> Neuralink claims they have implanted their first device in a human. https://www.reuters.com/technology/neuralink-implants-brain-chip-first-human -musk-says-2024-01-29/ We have been posting about this kinda thing for three decades. When it finally happens, I don't know what to think. It is easier and more comfortable to write about a disturbing new technology when it is still somewhere in the indefinite future. spike -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From dsunley at gmail.com Tue Jan 30 05:19:31 2024 From: dsunley at gmail.com (Darin Sunley) Date: Mon, 29 Jan 2024 22:19:31 -0700 Subject: [ExI] first neuralink In-Reply-To: <005201da5332$91bf6240$b53e26c0$@rainier66.com> References: <005201da5332$91bf6240$b53e26c0$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: Definitely one of those events that should dramatically increase your prior that we're living in a computer simulation. On Mon, Jan 29, 2024 at 9:14?PM spike jones via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > > > Neuralink claims they have implanted their first device in a human. > > > > > https://www.reuters.com/technology/neuralink-implants-brain-chip-first-human-musk-says-2024-01-29/ > > > > We have been posting about this kinda thing for three decades. When it > finally happens, I don?t know what to think. > > > > It is easier and more comfortable to write about a disturbing new > technology when it is still somewhere in the indefinite future. > > > > spike > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From col.hales at gmail.com Tue Jan 30 06:18:14 2024 From: col.hales at gmail.com (Colin Hales) Date: Tue, 30 Jan 2024 17:18:14 +1100 Subject: [ExI] first neuralink In-Reply-To: References: <005201da5332$91bf6240$b53e26c0$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: Wait for the explant. On Tue, Jan 30, 2024, 4:20?PM Darin Sunley via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > Definitely one of those events that should dramatically increase your > prior that we're living in a computer simulation. > > On Mon, Jan 29, 2024 at 9:14?PM spike jones via extropy-chat < > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > >> >> >> Neuralink claims they have implanted their first device in a human. >> >> >> >> >> https://www.reuters.com/technology/neuralink-implants-brain-chip-first-human-musk-says-2024-01-29/ >> >> >> >> We have been posting about this kinda thing for three decades. When it >> finally happens, I don?t know what to think. >> >> >> >> It is easier and more comfortable to write about a disturbing new >> technology when it is still somewhere in the indefinite future. >> >> >> >> spike >> _______________________________________________ >> extropy-chat mailing list >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat >> > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pharos at gmail.com Tue Jan 30 16:05:56 2024 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Tue, 30 Jan 2024 16:05:56 +0000 Subject: [ExI] first neuralink In-Reply-To: <005201da5332$91bf6240$b53e26c0$@rainier66.com> References: <005201da5332$91bf6240$b53e26c0$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: On Tue, 30 Jan 2024 at 04:15, spike jones via extropy-chat wrote: > > Neuralink claims they have implanted their first device in a human. > https://www.reuters.com/technology/neuralink-implants-brain-chip-first-human-musk-says-2024-01-29/ > > We have been posting about this kinda thing for three decades. When it finally happens, I don?t know what to think. > It is easier and more comfortable to write about a disturbing new technology when it is still somewhere in the indefinite future. > > spike > _______________________________________________ There is another company in Salt Lake City already doing this. Quotes: Has Blackrock Neurotech implanted brain chips in people? Yes. It has implanted more than 50 chips into people?s brains. What are the company?s goals? Blackrock Neurotech states that its mission is simple. ?We want people with neurological disorders to walk, talk, see, hear, and feel again. ?We?re engineering the next generation of neural implants, including implantable brain-computer interface technology that restores function and independence to individuals with neurological disorders.? ---------------- BillK From spike at rainier66.com Tue Jan 30 16:37:49 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (spike at rainier66.com) Date: Tue, 30 Jan 2024 08:37:49 -0800 Subject: [ExI] first neuralink In-Reply-To: References: <005201da5332$91bf6240$b53e26c0$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: <003901da539a$aa245df0$fe6d19d0$@rainier66.com> -----Original Message----- From: extropy-chat On Behalf Of BillK via extropy-chat ... > _______________________________________________ There is another company in Salt Lake City already doing this. Quotes: >...Has Blackrock Neurotech implanted brain chips in people? >...Yes. It has implanted more than 50 chips into people?s brains. ... ---------------- BillK _______________________________________________ Well sure BillK. But the NeurolinkX implantX lets the user get WiFi news feeds from TwitterX. All one's memetic inputs will contradict each other, allowing the patient to go around so confused, it is like free drugs, except without the actual euphoria. spike From pharos at gmail.com Wed Jan 31 00:31:07 2024 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Wed, 31 Jan 2024 00:31:07 +0000 Subject: [ExI] first neuralink In-Reply-To: <003901da539a$aa245df0$fe6d19d0$@rainier66.com> References: <005201da5332$91bf6240$b53e26c0$@rainier66.com> <003901da539a$aa245df0$fe6d19d0$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: On Tue, 30 Jan 2024 at 16:37, wrote: > > Well sure BillK. But the NeurolinkX implantX lets the user get WiFi news feeds from TwitterX. All one's memetic inputs will contradict each other, allowing the patient to go around so confused, it is like free drugs, except without the actual euphoria. > > spike >------------------------------------ More companies working on brain implants.............. Quote: So ? how big a deal is this one advance, implanting a wireless chip into a human brain? Not very, at least not yet. Just the mere fact of implanting a chip is not a big deal. The real test is how long it lasts, how long it maintains its function, and how well it functions ? none of which has yet been demonstrated. Also, other companies (although only a few) are ahead of the game already. Here is a list of five companies (in addition to Neuralink) working on BMI technology ------------------ It seems to be quite popular! BillK From spike at rainier66.com Wed Jan 31 00:56:38 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (spike at rainier66.com) Date: Tue, 30 Jan 2024 16:56:38 -0800 Subject: [ExI] first neuralink In-Reply-To: References: <005201da5332$91bf6240$b53e26c0$@rainier66.com> <003901da539a$aa245df0$fe6d19d0$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: <001401da53e0$5952f6c0$0bf8e440$@rainier66.com> -----Original Message----- From: extropy-chat On Behalf Of BillK via extropy-chat ... >------------------------------------ More companies working on brain implants.............. Quote: So ? how big a deal is this one advance, implanting a wireless chip into a human brain? Not very, at least not yet... Here is a list of five companies (in addition to Neuralink) working on BMI technology ------------------ >...It seems to be quite popular! BillK _______________________________________________ There was a class of crazies who claimed the government could control our minds by radio waves. The tin-foil hat crowd. Seems like they would be losing their foil-shielded minds over this development. spike From giulio at gmail.com Wed Jan 31 08:12:37 2024 From: giulio at gmail.com (Giulio Prisco) Date: Wed, 31 Jan 2024 09:12:37 +0100 Subject: [ExI] A tribute to Kathleen Ann Goonan Message-ID: A tribute to Kathleen Ann Goonan. I interviewed the late science fiction writer Kathleen Ann Goonan in 2002. https://www.turingchurch.com/p/a-tribute-to-kathleen-ann-goonan From efc at swisscows.email Wed Jan 31 09:40:40 2024 From: efc at swisscows.email (efc at swisscows.email) Date: Wed, 31 Jan 2024 10:40:40 +0100 (CET) Subject: [ExI] first neuralink In-Reply-To: <001401da53e0$5952f6c0$0bf8e440$@rainier66.com> References: <005201da5332$91bf6240$b53e26c0$@rainier66.com> <003901da539a$aa245df0$fe6d19d0$@rainier66.com> <001401da53e0$5952f6c0$0bf8e440$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: <0a787d0c-c75e-0c50-6c12-b0d79b0e21fa@swisscows.email> On Tue, 30 Jan 2024, spike jones via extropy-chat wrote: > > > -----Original Message----- > From: extropy-chat On Behalf Of BillK via extropy-chat > ... >> ------------------------------------ > > More companies working on brain implants.............. > > > Quote: > So ? how big a deal is this one advance, implanting a wireless chip into a human brain? Not very, at least not yet... > Here is a list of five companies (in addition to Neuralink) working on BMI technology > ------------------ > >> ...It seems to be quite popular! > > BillK > > _______________________________________________ > > > There was a class of crazies who claimed the government could control our minds by radio waves. The tin-foil hat crowd. Seems like they would be losing their foil-shielded minds over this development. > The solution is _obviously_ the NeuraFirewall which can be purchased as an extra feature in the "Neura+"-package. ;) Best regards, Daniel From spike at rainier66.com Wed Jan 31 19:08:17 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (spike at rainier66.com) Date: Wed, 31 Jan 2024 11:08:17 -0800 Subject: [ExI] qm using ten hundred words Message-ID: <007301da5478$d96b5670$8c420350$@rainier66.com> I wrote about a thing found by a man which let humans go forward much, using only the ten hundred most used words. It was hard: A man found that we can not know how fast a thing is going and right where it is at the same time. This truth was named for that man, who is very important. This truth is used to make our stuff which works like it is thinking and does work to help us. This truth is used to make big hurt things we can drop on bad guys if they hurt us first, so they will not hurt us. It is used to make some of the power that comes out of the wall. It is even used in stuff that is used to make us feel good at the building where the people work who make people feel better, that building where people go who do not feel good. Our world today is like our world today because we found out about this truth that important man found. We would not have all the good things we have without that truth. Here you go, try it: https://splasho.com/upgoer5/ long thing with point at the end -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From atymes at gmail.com Wed Jan 31 19:22:09 2024 From: atymes at gmail.com (Adrian Tymes) Date: Wed, 31 Jan 2024 11:22:09 -0800 Subject: [ExI] qm using ten hundred words In-Reply-To: <007301da5478$d96b5670$8c420350$@rainier66.com> References: <007301da5478$d96b5670$8c420350$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: My attempt at summarizing overpopulation: There are more than ten hundred hundred hundred hundred people on our world today, more than there have ever been. Many people think the world must be crowded, but much of the world has no people or things that people use, like food that grows from the ground. On Wed, Jan 31, 2024 at 11:09?AM spike jones via extropy-chat < extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote: > > > > > > > > > I wrote about a thing found by a man which let humans go forward much, > using only the ten hundred most used words. It was hard: > > > > > > > > > > A man found that we can not know how fast a thing is going and right where > it is at the same time. This truth was named for that man, who is very > important. This truth is used to make our stuff which works like it is > thinking and does work to help us. This truth is used to make big hurt > things we can drop on bad guys if they hurt us first, so they will not hurt > us. It is used to make some of the power that comes out of the wall. It is > even used in stuff that is used to make us feel good at the building where > the people work who make people feel better, that building where people go > who do not feel good. Our world today is like our world today because we > found out about this truth that important man found. We would not have all > the good things we have without that truth. > > > > > > > > Here you go, try it: > > > > https://splasho.com/upgoer5/ > > > > long thing with point at the end > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike at rainier66.com Wed Jan 31 19:34:13 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (spike at rainier66.com) Date: Wed, 31 Jan 2024 11:34:13 -0800 Subject: [ExI] qm using ten hundred words In-Reply-To: References: <007301da5478$d96b5670$8c420350$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: <008901da547c$78fbd9a0$6af38ce0$@rainier66.com> ?> On Behalf Of Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat Subject: Re: [ExI] qm using ten hundred words >?My attempt at summarizing overpopulation: There are more than ten hundred hundred hundred hundred people on our world today, more than there have ever been. Many people think the world must be crowded, but much of the world has no people or things that people use, like food that grows from the ground. This is so true! We can take water to the places where there are no people by making long empty things and filling them with water going forward fast, to help make food come out of the ground for people so that people can go to these places. We can make the big things that help make the food for people. As time goes on, we will have less people in the places with many people and more people in those places where there are now no people. This is good. long thing with point at the end On Wed, Jan 31, 2024 at 11:09?AM spike jones via extropy-chat > wrote: I wrote about a thing found by a man which let humans go forward much, using only the ten hundred most used words. It was hard: A man found that we can not know how fast a thing is going and right where it is at the same time. This truth was named for that man, who is very important. This truth is used to make our stuff which works like it is thinking and does work to help us. This truth is used to make big hurt things we can drop on bad guys if they hurt us first, so they will not hurt us. It is used to make some of the power that comes out of the wall. It is even used in stuff that is used to make us feel good at the building where the people work who make people feel better, that building where people go who do not feel good. Our world today is like our world today because we found out about this truth that important man found. We would not have all the good things we have without that truth. Here you go, try it: https://splasho.com/upgoer5/ long thing with point at the end _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike at rainier66.com Wed Jan 31 19:41:30 2024 From: spike at rainier66.com (spike at rainier66.com) Date: Wed, 31 Jan 2024 11:41:30 -0800 Subject: [ExI] qm using ten hundred words In-Reply-To: <008901da547c$78fbd9a0$6af38ce0$@rainier66.com> References: <007301da5478$d96b5670$8c420350$@rainier66.com> <008901da547c$78fbd9a0$6af38ce0$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: <009601da547d$7d6e3270$784a9750$@rainier66.com> Adrian I am having a lot of fun with this because I am thinking about Orwell?s Newspeak. Orwell was right on about government influencing speech, but not with the mechanism. He had language evolve in such a way that it lacked the vocabulary to criticize government. In our times, the government influences social media companies to influence the content. spike From: spike at rainier66.com ? >?This is so true! ? As time goes on, we will have less people in the places with many people and more people in those places where there are now no people. This is good. long thing with point at the end -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From atymes at gmail.com Wed Jan 31 20:15:53 2024 From: atymes at gmail.com (Adrian Tymes) Date: Wed, 31 Jan 2024 12:15:53 -0800 Subject: [ExI] qm using ten hundred words In-Reply-To: <009601da547d$7d6e3270$784a9750$@rainier66.com> References: <007301da5478$d96b5670$8c420350$@rainier66.com> <008901da547c$78fbd9a0$6af38ce0$@rainier66.com> <009601da547d$7d6e3270$784a9750$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: CnatGPT can play too, with a bit of coaching (including providing the specific list of words, which can be copied from https://splasho.com/upgoer5/phpspellcheck/dictionaries/1000.dicin ) and checking (pointing out what words it used that weren't on the list): --- Too many people living in one place can be a big problem. This happens when there are more people than the land can give food, water, or room to. It can lead to not enough food, water, or homes. When there are more people than a place can handle, it makes life hard for everyone. They might not have what they need to live. It can also make the land and air not good. This is why it's important to think about how many people a place can have so that everyone can have enough and live well. On Wed, Jan 31, 2024 at 11:41?AM wrote: > > > > > > > > > Adrian I am having a lot of fun with this because I am thinking about > Orwell?s Newspeak. Orwell was right on about government influencing > speech, but not with the mechanism. He had language evolve in such a way > that it lacked the vocabulary to criticize government. In our times, the > government influences social media companies to influence the content. > > > > spike > > > > > > > > > > *From:* spike at rainier66.com > *?* > > > > > > > > >?This is so true! ? As time goes on, we will have less people in the > places with many people and more people in those places where there are now > no people. This is good. > > > > long thing with point at the end > > > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pharos at gmail.com Wed Jan 31 20:30:32 2024 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Wed, 31 Jan 2024 20:30:32 +0000 Subject: [ExI] qm using ten hundred words In-Reply-To: <009601da547d$7d6e3270$784a9750$@rainier66.com> References: <007301da5478$d96b5670$8c420350$@rainier66.com> <008901da547c$78fbd9a0$6af38ce0$@rainier66.com> <009601da547d$7d6e3270$784a9750$@rainier66.com> Message-ID: On Wed, 31 Jan 2024 at 19:44, spike jones via extropy-chat wrote: > > Adrian I am having a lot of fun with this because I am thinking about Orwell?s Newspeak. Orwell was right on about government influencing speech, but not with the mechanism. He had language evolve in such a way that it lacked the vocabulary to criticize government. In our times, the government influences social media companies to influence the content. > > spike > _______________________________________________ Somebody has explained this to the AIs! They know! BillK I requested - Compare Orwell?s Newspeak vs modern government spin and propaganda Reply - Orwell's Newspeak, as depicted in his novel "1984," is a fictional language created by the totalitarian government of Oceania to manipulate and control its citizens. It is designed to restrict thought and limit the range of expressible ideas. While Newspeak is a fictional concept, there are similarities between it and modern government spin and propaganda techniques. 1. Manipulation of language: Both Newspeak and modern government spin aim to manipulate language for political purposes. In "1984," Newspeak aims to eliminate words and concepts that could be used to express dissent or independent thought. Similarly, modern governments may use euphemisms, vague language, or misleading terminology to shape public perception and downplay negative aspects of their policies or actions. 2. Thought control: Newspeak is explicitly designed to restrict the range of thought by limiting the vocabulary and eliminating words that could be used to articulate dissenting ideas. Modern government spin and propaganda also seek to control public opinion by framing issues in a way that discourages critical thinking or alternative perspectives. This can be achieved through selective information disclosure, cherry-picking data, or employing persuasive techniques to influence public opinion. 3. Reality distortion: Newspeak aims to reshape reality by limiting the capacity to express certain ideas or concepts. Similarly, modern government spin and propaganda often involve distorting facts or presenting a biased narrative to shape public perception. This can involve the manipulation of statistics, suppression of inconvenient information, or the creation of false narratives to control public opinion. 4. Control of information: In "1984," the government tightly controls information through the Ministry of Truth, which disseminates propaganda and alters historical records. Modern governments may also seek to control information flow through various means, including censorship, manipulation of media narratives, or the spread of disinformation through social media platforms. 5. Suppression of dissent: Newspeak is used in "1984" to suppress dissent by limiting the capacity to articulate opposition or critique. Similarly, modern governments may use spin and propaganda techniques to marginalize or discredit dissenting voices, labeling them as unpatriotic, conspiracy theorists, or spreading fake news. It is important to note that while there are similarities between Newspeak and modern government spin and propaganda, the extent and methods employed may vary across different countries and political contexts. Additionally, the impact of spin and propaganda in modern times is influenced by technological advancements, such as the internet and social media, which have provided new platforms for the dissemination and amplification of information. ---------------------------