Year: 2014

Hat tip to @TiffanyJenkins for the link to this BBC Future Proofing episode on The Singularity.

(Holding post for now: Will miss tonight due to MeetUp engagement, but will review when I get to listen on iPlayer later.)

FYI – My prejudiced position is that all the talk about the impending Singularity is premised on a “too mechanistic” misunderstanding of the true computational nature of mind and intelligence. I say AI will be achieved when it evolves to be Real-I. (Need to dig up relevant blog links.)

Rough Notes whilst listening:

Computing power = smartness ? Hmmm.

Exponential human development – quartering time-base since homo-sapiens – OK. Predicts 2030-ish Omega point. If (that is IF) computers overtake human intelligence at that point, then by 2045 they will be billions of times more intelligent. Not sure computational power is the main driver of that cycle, but …

(Personally – I still believe in the three human generations timescale of technology development, ~80 year cycles in their actual effect on how humans live. Kondratiev / Kuhn etc. Interestingly 2030 is about the cusp of the next wave.)

Ray Kurzweil (now Eng Dir @ Google) – it’s about Language, the Turing Test. Zzzzz.

IBM “Watson” – “more” natural, sure. Anthropomorphic interactions (saying thanks), sure.

Humans do have advantages over robots – creativity, problem solving, emotional intelligence, dexterity, flexibility, etc. Doh! that’s what makes us humans as opposed to Accounting PhDs. Sure technology will automate the boring bits. Accounting however is a very complex human game – a million miles from arithmetic computation. Can’t see any robot playing “Tabletop” – the level-slipping analogies of creative problem solving.

Still (@24:10) only talking about “digital” computers and algorithms. Fast and accurate is not the point of human intelligence. Additive is the key – human intelligence will exploit ever more powerful tools.

(Interesting both presenters wrong in detecting human vs machine composed music. Second was clearly “formulaic” – metronomic – time-base-wise. Hard to prove now, proves nothing anyway, but I made the right choice. Not sure whether we were dealing with recordings or if both compositions machine-played?)

The Meta-aspects of humans, standing back to reflect on humanity. (Meta is the level-slipping in Tabletop.)

Ultimate conclusion is humanity – and human intelligence – is more than “machine” AI.

Agree. This is why I say AI can and will evolve, but it will only approach the intelligence of an intelligent life-form like humans, when it evolves to be an intelligent life-form itself. Real-I. (On evolutionary timescales.) Nothing special about humans here – any similarly intelligent life-form will do, we just happen to be the encumbents around here.

So long as AI workers have digital computers as their “computation” model of human brains (let alone minds) they’ll be severely hampered in getting AI to develop that way. Human intelligence does of course exploit “algorithms” to save time and brain power from the boring bits, free to do the creative “slipping”.

This is being reported everywhere. The irrelevance of CMB polarisation patterns relative to background noise and interference from space dust. No longer clutching at straws to support inflation-driven hacks to explain cosmic evolution since the big bang and, by rights, casting fresh questions over the nature of cosmic origins themselves. Here’s hoping common sense prevails, and good scientists ask the scientific questions. (Like Mersini-Houghton for example.)

Neatly summarised on FB by Rick Ryals:

If you project the expansion of the universe backwards without *pre-assuming* that you have to go all the way to an infinitely dense initial singularity in order to have a big bang, then inflationary theory becomes un-necessary as the most natural solution falls out… A universe with pre-existing volume had a big bang.

No more flatness problem, no more horizon problem… etc… duh.

Ironically, the same day UK science’s poster-boy is aired being interviewed by Jim Al Khalili in The Life Scientific, claiming he supports a multiple (parallel) “multiverses” view. [Text here – (*) even Schroedinger’s damn cat. Aaaaaggghhh!!!.] I do wish scientists would leave metaphysics to the philosophers, or at least (as Jim clearly does) acknowledge that some of the questions really are not in the realm of science. Why? Because if scientists actually did their real jobs, instead of playing stand-up politics with the media and their funding sources, they’d notice there is good scientific evidence for multiple sequential “universes” separated cyclically in time and furthermore, universes that don’t depend on the inflation hack. Nor do they depend on the brainless cop-out that if we can’t fit our flawed story to the cosmos as a whole, we’ll posit an infinity of possible universes where our politically-motivated guesses might just happen to be true in one of them. Scientists ought to have to pass some kind of test before being let loose with the kind of thought experiments used by philosophy. Stands to reason, dunnit?

As Haidt said (previous post) – science is untrustworthy because (too many) scientists spend their time playing-politics and issue-campaigning instead of doing science. Scientists are no more to be trusted than politicians or theologians, and only philosophers seem to appreciate that problem. Honest a-political scientists can of course understand the physical problem, if they put their minds to it, rather than their political defenses.

[(*) Post Note – literally many worlds, multiple parallel (independent) universes, is a thought experiment, nothing to do with physics – if the physics of two different worlds are related in anyway, they are part of the same world, possibly an inadequately explained part of the world, but the same world. Uncertainty of, or superposition of, multiple possible states in this world is a reflection of the difficulty agreeing explanations at the boundaries of physics knowledge about the world – unfinished work of physicists. Multiple universes in the sequential sense is something entirely different, cyclical aeons in the same world, same universe, but with (most of) history reset at each new big bang.

The mechanism is actually a lot easier to understand says Rick Ryals:

When you make a particle pair from vacuum energy you leave a real hole in the vacuum. This increases negative pressure and causes the vacuum to expand. The positive gravitational effect of the newly created massive particle offsets the increase in negative pressure so the “flatness” of the universe is fixed. Ripping out huge chunks of the vacuum structure to make particles with causes the vacuum to “thin” as tension between the vacuum and matter increases. Eventually this process will compromise the integrity of the forces that bind the universe and… BOOM… a universe with pre-existing volume has *another* big bang.

And, Neil Turok, betting against gravitational waves in Scientific American.]

Interesting Boyarsky Lecture at Duke, from Jonathan Haidt – who I’ve read and reviewed very positively before – which he opens by contrasting liberal unconstrained view of morality with the need for institutional constraints. And immediately nails his colours to the more conservative “centrist” mast than the vast majority of his liberal academic, medical scientific, audience.

Hat tip to Stephen Law on FB for the link.

Excellent, after a full viewing. The ultimate message is that we share most values, but our views become skewed or imbalanced by making one value “sacred” above all others, immune from any trade-offs. And the sacred choices are mostly partisan, defended vs the mad, irrational perceived opposition, liberal vs conservative at any given point in time, but environmental changes over time mean that the sacred priorities evolve. Or rather they should evolve, but become even more imbalanced by the reaction to the opposition. On the science front, the problem is scientists (the humans) are politicised on the liberal side of the balance. Hear, hear.

Definitely worth watching in full, despite the US-centric agenda.

Good to see a piece on the new computing element of the UK school curriculum, where it is more than simply a “coding” skill for immediate employment. Stuart Dredge in the Grauniad quotes Bill Mitchell of the BCS.

He says it’s “thinking about thinking”, and you can do with bits of string and card and lots of running around, without going anywhere near a computer. It can be inspirational. Hear hear. Computation is something as fundamental in this world as say physics, understanding of which is highly transferable knowledge, as I’ve mentioned several times, last time here in The Year of Code.

[Post Note : A little scare-mongering.]

Met and heard Bob Churchill of IHEU talk to the CLHG at Conway Hall last night, with an audience of 60-odd.

His provocative title “Your Humanism is a Thought Crime” left out the implied … in certain parts of the world where religious freedom is not recognised, or is actively suppressed whether by legal arrangements or by cultural taboo. His first and recurring clarification is to note that the expression Religious Freedom is a selective contraction of a much more comprehensive UN Human Rights declaration on:

Freedom of thought, expression and belief
including religious and non-religious belief.

His presentation was in two parts; Firstly, to describe and update us on the work of the many (hundreds of) international humanist groups under the IHEU umbrella, and the many examples of specific cases and countries where campaigns to help those individuals and groups subjected to discrimination and much greater lethal risks. The examples and statistics are mind-boggling in scope and variety, and the most comprehensive account of these forms the basis on the annually updated Free Thought Report (which Bob edits). The second was to focus specifically on the direct first-hand lobbying activities of IHEU and other humanist NGO’s in support of ongoing UN proposals for new and amended motions and declarations. (Be great to share the slides, Bob.)

The amount of work evident in these combined activities was and is immense – impressive and indeed inspiring. Even as an avid follower of such human rights issues and cases reported in the media, you couldn’t hope to appreciate the total scope without the IHEU work done to report them all under one umbrella. From the IHEU perspective, Humanism is as broad a church imaginable: “The global umbrella organisation embracing Humanist, atheist, secularist, skeptic, rationalist, lay, ethical, cultural, free-thought and similar organisations, worldwide since 1952.” To be whole-heartedly commended and supported.

In the Q&A, and ongoing discussions late into the evening, Bob responded to two lines of questioning amongst others:

Given the very general nature of the human rights freedoms, and the range of issues of nation, race, age, gender, sexual-orientation as well as religious and non-religious beliefs generally, how is the “Humanism” message made distinct compared to the many campaigning organisations in this broad libertarian, humanitarian sphere – such as Amnesty International it was suggested.

And secondly, given that the focus in sheer weight of example cases was religious – predominantly Moslem – suppression of freedoms, how is Humanism establishing and arguing for alternatives to the underlying fundamental tenets of specific religious beliefs.

Joining the dots between those two issues; Humanism, despite the impressively huge amount of campaigning and success against violation of general freedoms of belief and expression, it has done so largely under an anti-religion banner, often under the God vs Science wars” or, BHA specifically, secular moves to eliminate faith-based activity from any (UK) state organs. The focus has been to criticise, attack and ridicule the more “irrational” and dogmatic aspects of religious belief or otherwise exclude it from the domain. Other than some “scientific” & “democratic” forms of rationality, is Humanism doing enough to establish the nature and values of “good” Humanist beliefs, in the vacuum left behind where established religious-based moral law has withered or is otherwise being progressively swept away? The process of getting our own Humanist house in order, as it were.

Bob, from his perspective as both philosopher and campaigner, articulated a sophisticated and informed response. In summary: Firstly, we can’t be simplistic about the myriad interconnected issues. And even where we are able to propose appropriate responses, policies and values, there remain complexities in their communication. Even in the no-brainer clear cut cases, with an obvious wrong to be put right,  there remain many tactical subtleties of both communication and action depending on the short and long term risks to the individuals involved. But in general, many levels from particular campaign messages and actions to more general intellectual debate and conversations, mediated and un-mediated.

Hear, hear. And, in many ways, this represents the fear that drives the agenda here on Psybertron. In this world of ubiquitous communications, it’s all too easy to allow the focus on clear-headlines needed to pursue the clear-cut no-brainer campaigns, to crowd out the tougher, subtler conversations that are also necessary.  It’s a truism that real values are reflected in how individuals act and govern their actions in practice, and that policies and manifestos expressing aims and values, however carefully drafted, can remain theoretical. But, like The Free Thought Report, agreed and published policies and processes for addressing the real complexities of the issues, are a resource for justification and validation of action by all involved.

Impossible to be comprehensive and conclusive within the constraints of the evening, and a blogged report like this, but all in all a very encouraging conversation pointing in all the right directions.

At least it will if our all-pervasive PC standards of objectivity and democratisation give engaged judgement a chance. A talk by Tiffany Jenkins on BBC Four Thought. An important plea picking up on one point of Grayson Perry’s Reith Lectures.

In reviewing The Muslims are Coming! by Arun Kundnani, Andrew Copson writing in the New Humanist finds that whilst he supports the warnings against prejudice, the message falls short on the part the religion itself plays in Islamic extremism. He adds this point of his own:

There is a confidence imparted to a person by religious ideology that can motivate excessive violence, and the intellectual and ideological content of religion needs to be considered in any full analysis.

Of course he’s right. But there are moral distinctions to be made between “attacking” extremism and “critically debating” religion. The fact that ideological confidence can motivate violent extremism is no premise to assume that it does in anyone who identifies with any given religion. Considerate analysis must include respect for those who find value in religion, something far from ideology and a million miles from condemning violent extremism.

Mentioned a couple of times recently since reading Nagel’s most recent (2012-ish ?) Mind and Cosmos, that I’d felt the need to go back to some of his earlier work of which I was aware by reference and quotation, but had never properly read.

So, I’m reading The View From Nowhere (1986), and despite so far reading only the introduction, I’m already full of quotes I feel the need to share. Another of those I (wish I) could have written myself:

[The process of progressive objectification] will not always yield a result, and sometimes it will be thought to yield a result when it really doesn’t; then as Nietzsche warned, one will get a false objectification of an aspect of reality that cannot be better understood from a more objective standpoint. Although there is a connection between objectivity and reality [….] still not all reality is better understood the more objectively it is viewed.

Appearance and perspective are essential parts of what there is, and in some respects they are best understood from a less detached standpoint. Realism underlies claims of objectivity and detachment, but it supports them only up to a point.

The internal-external tension pervades human life, but is particularly prominent in the generation of philosophical problems. I shall concentrate on four topics: the metaphysics of mind, the theory of knowledge, free-will and ethics. But the problem has equally important manifestations with respect to the metaphysics of space and time, the philosophy of language and aesthetics. In fact there is probably no area of philosophy in which it doesn’t play a significant role.

The subjectivity of consciousness is an irreducible feature of reality – without which we couldn’t do physics or anything else – and it must occupy as fundamental a place in any credible world-view as matter, energy, space, time and numbers. [….] I believe it is already clear that any correct theory of the relation between mind and body would radically transform our overall conception of he world and would require a new understanding of the phenomena now thought of as physical. [….] The good, like the true, includes irreducibly subjective elements.

This is in some respects a deliberately reactionary work. There is a significant strain of idealism in contemporary philosophy, according to which what there is and how things are cannot go beyond what we could in principle think about. This inherits the crude appeal of logical positivism [….]. Philosophy is also infected by a broader tendency of contemporary intellectual life: SCIENTISM. Scientism is actually a special form of idealism, for it puts one type of human understanding in charge of the universe and what can be said about it. At its most myopic it assumes that everything there is must be understandable by scientific theories of the kind we have developed to date – physics and evolutionary biology being the current paradigms – as if the current age were not just another in the series [of ages of understanding].

Precisely because of their dominance, these attitudes are ripe for attack. Of course some of the opposition is foolish; it can degenerate into the rejection of science – whereas anti-scientism is essential to the defence of science against misappropriation. [….] Too much time is wasted because of the assumptions that methods already in existence will solve problems for which they were not designed.

Emphases are mine. I hadn’t realised “scientism as infection” was a Nagel concept. I’d thought it was absolutely mine – magic! Objectivity is much simpler to handle so is easier to communicate – the memetic effect:

[….] a persistent temptation to turn [intellectual pursuit of understanding]
into something less difficult and more shallow than it is.
[Whereas] it is extremely difficult.

Or, as I would put it “just complicated enough” to be at risk from simplistication.

[Post Note : where did I see another recent reference to the concept of “just complicated enough” ?]