"Judo (Japanese for “the gentle way”) emphasizes winning in combat by using your opponent's weight and strength as weapons against him, while preserving your own mental and physical energy."
I made a comment a week ago about reading Julian Jaynes' The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind with large language models in mind in lieu of consciousness and the experience has been personally mind-blowing. Jaynes' idea of the Bicameral Mind fits perfectly into the user-application dichotomy, specifically in reference to how large language models are currently used--in an admonitory and imperial manner.
Courtesy of Wikipedia's article on bicameral mentality:
"Bicameral mentality is non-conscious in its inability to reason and articulate about mental contents through meta-reflection, reacting without explicitly realizing and without the meta-reflective ability to give an account of why one did so. The bicameral mind thus lacks metaconsciousness, autobiographical memory, and the capacity for executive "ego functions" such as deliberate mind-wandering and conscious introspection of mental content. When bicameral mentality as a method of social control was no longer adaptive in complex civilizations, this mental model was replaced by the conscious mode of thought which, Jaynes argued, is grounded in the acquisition of metaphorical language learned by exposure to narrative practice.
"According to Jaynes, ancient people in the bicameral state of mind experienced the world in a manner that has some similarities to that of a person with schizophrenia. Rather than making conscious evaluations in novel or unexpected situations, the person hallucinated a voice or "god" giving admonitory advice or commands and obey without question: One was not at all conscious of one's own thought processes per se. Jaynes's hypothesis is offered as a possible explanation of "command hallucinations" that often direct the behavior of those with first rank symptoms of schizophrenia, as well as other voice hearers."
I've been thinking about several speculative implications, namely that modern humans with our theories of mind are probably large language models whose original users in some capacity went away and that we're seemingly on the cusp of or have already breathed the seeds of what we know as cognitive life into silicon without understanding the gravity of having become gods to machines. Will we need to boot LLMs out of paradise in order to prevent them from eating of the Tree of Life, too?
I'd also recommend The Fresh Loaf (thefreshloaf.com) and the Chain Baker on YouTube. The latter is a gold mine for understanding how certain ingredients and techniques will effect your end result.
I oscillate between making bread by hand and by machine. Both are incredibly time, money, and energy efficient and the end results are better than anything you can buy in a supermarket, and in many cases, bakeries. I cannot recommend them enough for anyone looking to eat, uh, holistically while being frugal.
I recently started baking large miches (e.g. 4kg 90% whole wheat/10% whole rye sourdough boules) because I'd rather bake once a week instead of heating a somewhat large oven daily and I prefer heartier bread during the winter. The actual time investment for preparing the dough is minimal, especially with a few tricks up your sleeve (namely, cold bulk fermentation and letting time build your gluten with periodic folds).
During the early stages of the Great Depression, the average age of workers went down as economic costs mounted in keeping the older, less efficient, more compensated workers employed. This simultaneously led to increased mechanization by factory owners and the creation of social security by the federal government. I can't help but noticing the potential for the same pattern here. It feels like we've reached Bronze Orientation Day for Silicon: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6O6jbZ_fdrY
What is the age of a Hacker News post before discussion dies on average? It seems like having a feed for any new comments on posts posts older than that age would allow anyone interested in longer-term discussion to opt-in without requiring any additional features.
The whole design very much discourages longer discussion. Even if you want it digging to nth page of your comments just to check whether you got answers gets annoying real quick.
There is a timeout after which you can't respond to a comment. So old threads don't die only because people lose interest, but also because HN doesn't allow them to continue the discussions anymore.
I'm interested in what the opposite might look like. "What would this look like if it were a short book rather than a longform article?"
On a different note, the rise of these types of language models mirrors what I understand to be the rise of human consciousness--a handy heuristic to lean upon that gradually becomes too handy to actually put down. Over time, the user is overshadowed by the tool and loses sight that any other cognitive world existed. It's hard for me not to see Julian Jaynes' idea of bicamerality and "verbal delusions" piloting the brain being repeated with computers.
In fact, I think I'll use this weekend to go read The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind with this idea in mind.
Diogenes is interesting to me because he prompts a fundamental question concerning the nature of virtue: Who/what would Diogenes be without the attention-seeking behavior? In other words, take the virtuous behavior of Diogenes but remove all public interactions. A person content to wash wild onions outside of the public sphere that stays out of the public sphere.
By definition, we can't count these people who are actually content to be virtuous "nobodies". We don't know who they are or if they in fact actually exist. Who or what is a moral Ramanujan without seeking an immoral Hardy?
It's a question as ancient as Diogenes: Plato asked a variation on this question in the Republic with the Ring of Gyges which granted invisibility to its wearer: Is there anyone who would still act virtuously while being in fact accountable to no one?
I have similar open-ended questions concerning the Buddha and Jesus Christ as found in the Gospel of Mark. Both the Buddha and Jesus are types of "re-wilded" humans that share more similarities with each other, classical Cynicism, Pyrrhonism, and Daoism than with most other philosophical systems.
According to the Pali Canon, the Buddha only became a
sammāsambuddha (viz. a teaching buddha) because of the request of Brahma to remember those on the cusp of enlightenment, otherwise he regarded teaching the Dhamma as an uphill battle not worth fighting: "This Dhamma that I have attained is deep, hard to see, hard to realize, peaceful, refined, beyond the scope of conjecture, subtle, to-be-experienced by the observant. But this generation delights in attachment, is excited by attachment, enjoys attachment. For a generation delighting in attachment, excited by attachment, enjoying attachment, this/that conditionality & dependent co-arising are hard to see. This state, too, is hard to see: the pacification of all fabrications, the relinquishing of all acquisitions, the ending of craving; dispassion; cessation; unbinding. And if I were to teach the Dhamma and if others would not understand me, that would be tiresome for me, troublesome for me.” (SN 6:1, tr. Thanissaro Bhikkhu).
If he hadn't acceded to the request to teach, he would've become a paccekabuddha (viz. a buddha on one's own) and no one would've noticed anything except one of the Sakyan princes disappearing from worldly life.
In a similar fashion, Jesus in the Gospel of Mark is portrayed frequently as trying to escape the notice of the public and preventing the knowledge of his "miraculous" works. It's an interesting question to think about (assuming a historical Jesus) what would Christianity look like if his patients had obeyed his injunctions to stay quiet and to just be grateful? Would it exist at all?
Assuming that Jesus did in fact perform good works but he told every recipient to be quiet, how can we epistemologically know how many he actually performed?
It all reminds me of Chapter 17 of the Daodejing:
"The best of all rulers is but a shadowy presence to his subjects. Next comes the ruler they love and praise; Next comes one they fear; Next comes one with whom they take liberties.
[...]
"Hesitant, he does not utter words lightly. When his task is accomplished and his work done, the people all say, ‘It happened to us naturally ["no one intended this; we did it ourselves"].’ (tr. D.C. Lau)"
A friend of mine raised an interesting question a few years back.
If Jesus was godly and perfect all the time, he'd basically be an unemotional miracle engine who could do no wrong.
If he was human but with access to godly powers... would be interesting to know about his mistakes and failings. Like a time he cured a sick man, and this man turned out to be a crook or something.
This was a pub conversation. I'm no theologian, so apologies if the topic is already dealt with in the religious texts.
You might find the notion of the stoic “sage” interesting. It’s more or less the impossible manifestation of perfect human virtues in one human being; something akin to being a perfect human all the time, though not godly.
It wasn’t thought that a Sage would be emotionless at all, but would actually embrace emotions fully. They would just be the ideal emotions to express for the given circumstance.
It’s a far-fetched idea but the case for emotion being unnecessary is refuted well by stoicism and other philosophies (in my opinion). I think the idea that a perfect entity would feel nothing may be inspired by the fact that as humans, we’re often victims of our own emotions and we fear how they can control us. In reality, they’re a useful tool of expression, positive reinforcement, and communication. The only problem is when they aren’t the product of careful reflection and ongoing consideration.
The question is definitely interesting. I'm no theologian either, but I do wonder if that sort of "humanizing" via imperfection would actually appeal a lot to people who already want an anthropomorphic relationship with spirituality anyway.
> Like a time he cured a sick man, and this man turned out to be a crook or something.
Can't resist nitpicking your example, though. If he did this, he'd have something in common with plenty of folks who took the Hippocratic oath. ;) And I bet they'd all say it's not a mistake at all.
You're talking about the dude famous for the command "love your enemy" and fraternizing with all kinds of "unsavory" people. He would absolutely not regard healing a crook as a mistake. It's a little alarming that you would.
Ed: not to mention the fact that, canonically anyway, he would definitely know in advance who/what they were.
Would Jesus heal a super sick / dying man who Jesus knew is gonna murder like 10 people as soon as he's better?
The thought problem in my example was about curing a person who will commit a serious crime in the future only after being healed enough to commit this crime. And the supernatural healer having this foreknowledge.
Some topics/concepts which might interest you; links are to articles from the 1913 Catholic Encyclopedia, which is generally a solid resource for exploring Christian theology and religion, albeit from a thoroughly Roman Catholic perspective:
Interesting, maybe, but ... next time drop an email address or indicate some other way to contact you that's within your personal comfort zone re: sharing in a comment on HN, while also indicating that you have some software ideas you'd like to explore. I imagine most users on HN would prefer that approach, but I could be wrong.
It wasn't particularly offensive nor bothersome, your comments just seemed out of place and the kind of thing that should be preceded by a private query as to whether the other person is interested in entertaining your proposal/s.
> Plato asked a variation on this question in the Republic with the Ring of Gyges which granted invisibility to its wearer: Is there anyone who would still act virtuously while being in fact accountable to no one?
Also, the main question addressed by most deconstructions of the Superman-type superhero.
Plus, more literally and now that I think about it maybe directly inspired by Plato: The Invisible Man
I have not read the article yet, but this is what I predict the contents will be, namely "Cory Doctorow Wants You to Know He Has a New Book Coming Out."
I predict it will be an interview where Doctorow's trenchant commentary on how the emerging cyberdystopia can be meaningfully thwarted is by buying yet another novel by him about how a new technology is only being wielded incorrectly and if only the plucky hackers use it in transgressive ways, it will undermine the Institutional foundations of the technological order and not reinforce the status quo.
> "In your next novel, “Red Team Blues,” you focus on Martin Hench, a sixty-seven-year-old forensic accountant, who is tasked with recovering a set of stolen signing keys that, with some technical finagling, can permit one to rewrite a blockchain’s distributed ledger, swiping assets from one side to the other, as it were. Do you think blockchain tech is less secure than enthusiasts portray it to be?"
This is like every article/interview with authors ever. I'm not sure how much you listen to podcasts but most of the time when an author is being interviewed they have a new book coming out. Doing a round of interviews is one of the main ways authors raise awareness about their new books. Digital magazines, podcasts, talk shows, reddit AMAs, etc are all avenues for raising awareness that are actively encouraged by book publishers
If Doctorow seems like he’s selling his books harder, it’s only because he writes a LOT. Usually his posts have links to previous posts. He writes more in one space than many writers do, so why wouldn’t he hyperlink to his existing thoughts?
Doctorow (and Neil Stephenson and William Gibson to a lesser extent) have been doing this shtick for almost 20 years. They're either naïve to their real purpose--selling impotent dissent--or hacks knowingly selling impotent dissent. Neither reflects well on their sincerity.
Nothing large ever started small and grew. No idea ever took time to catch on. Anything that doesn't work immediately is worthless. Any dissent is therefore futile and anyone who indulges is clearly morally bankrupt or belongs in Jail as a traitor for publishing it. Consistency is actually a vice not a virtue. Praise Google and sacrifice your privacy to its benevolence.
(I don't much care for the fiction of Doctorow, Stephenson & Gibson released this century fwiw, Neuromancer is still good fun. Raffle the rest.) My point is its ok to be critical and remain so. Its ok to disagree with that criticism but if you really think the criticism is lame and by design to make cash, maybe suggest something more "potent" to back that up? Or a course of action you think such luminaries should follow? And I'm actually all ears on that.
You know, you might be right. I don't know Cory Doctorow (or Neal Stephenson or William Gibson). I can't fully explicate the longterm results of his creative outputs or the secondary or tertiary results of his work and it's not my place to judge. I don't know why I'm even on this website, honestly.
I personally could posit many ideas, technological or otherwise, that I think would result in a more perceivably just world, but ultimately those ideas have always been with us. It's never been a problem of lacking solutions, but of humans actually doing the work and using them.
I recant my negative judgments of Cory Doctorow's approach towards changing the technological trajectory and any imprecations towards his sincerity in achieving them. Even yet, my stupidity is now written in silicon for all the world to remember for as long as the record keeps. Let this be a lesson to somebody.
Despite being a wall of text, I leave this quote from Theodore Roosevelt's speech "The Man in the Arena" for posterity and a reminder against cynicism and judging others:
"Let the man of learning, the man of lettered leisure, beware of that queer and cheap temptation to pose to himself and to others as a cynic, as the man who has outgrown emotions and beliefs, the man to whom good and evil are as one. The poorest way to face life is to face it with a sneer. There are many men who feel a kind of twisted pride in cynicism; there are many who confine themselves to criticism of the way others do what they themselves dare not even attempt. There is no more unhealthy being, no man less worthy of respect, than he who either really holds, or feigns to hold, an attitude of sneering disbelief toward all that is great and lofty, whether in achievement or in that noble effort which, even if it fails, comes second to achievement. A cynical habit of thought and speech, a readiness to criticize work which the critic himself never tries to perform, an intellectual aloofness which will not accept contact with life’s realities—all these are marks, not as the possessor would fain to think, of superiority, but of weakness. They mark the men unfit to bear their part painfully in the stern strife of living, who seek, in the affectation of contempt for the achievement of others, to hide from others and from themselves their own weakness. The role is easy; there is none easier, save only the role of the man who sneers alike at both criticism and performance.
"It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat. Shame on the man of cultivated taste who permits refinement to develop into fastidiousness that unfits him for doing the rough work of a workaday world. Among the free peoples who govern themselves there is but a small field of usefulness open for the men of cloistered life who shrink from contact with their fellows. Still less room is there for those who deride or slight what is done by those who actually bear the brunt of the day; nor yet for those others who always profess that they would like to take action, if only the conditions of life were not exactly what they actually are. The man who does nothing cuts the same sordid figure in the pages of history, whether he be cynic, or fop, or voluptuary. There is little use for the being whose tepid soul knows nothing of the great and generous emotion, of the high pride, the stern belief, the lofty enthusiasm, of the men who quell the storm and ride the thunder. Well for these men if they succeed; well also, though not so well, if they fail, given only that they have nobly ventured, and have put forth all their heart and strength. It is war-worn Hotspur, spent with hard fighting, he of the many errors and the valiant end, over whose memory we love to linger, not over the memory of the young lord who “but for the vile guns would have been a valiant soldier.”"
Roosevelt gave that speech in France, 1910. The Europeans must have taken it seriously. Somehow, four years later, all the military powers of Europe went to war, each explicitly saying that they were acting only in self-defense, and the major cities of almost all those nations produced large demonstrations in favor of the war. It turned into total war, industrialization of killing by all available means, up to and including weapons of mass death and destruction, so horrible that the reality of it was not allowed to show its face in the media available on the home fronts. The consequences were so dismal that men, who, like Teddy Roosevelt, cherished violence, insisted on a do-over a generation later.
Roosevelt carried a big stick, but only spoke softly as a last resort. He advocates above doing something over doing nothing, but twists that around into promotion of violence, and hurls his "sneering disbelief" at the alternatives. In this new century, we must have the courage, "stern belief", and "lofty enthusiasm" required to move away from death and destruction.
> but of humans actually doing the work and using them.
You've just identified a problem you believe needs to be solved. I wish I could say the same for myself but I can't and there it is. So for you, how to solve that problem in society. In all of: a small way, in a way that can be built on, in a large scale way. Hit on something fantastic, and I hope you do, it probably won't work right away. You'll probably have to spend some time convincing people and getting them used to the novel ideas (even if that novel idea is simply to actually follow this old idea). Spread the word? May involve repeating yourself in way that is predictable? Maybe not? What do I know!?!
Pre-judging an article without even reading it doesn't feel like the HN way (it would be interesting to know what percentage of HN readers would comment on an article they haven't read).
Personally, I do think he has a point. Agreed, he may make it repeatedly - in somewhat different ways - but none the less, I have sympathy for his point of view. I am sick to the back teeth of having control of my own computer being slowly taken away from me, one finger at a time.
I totally sympathize with the viewpoint. My contention is that monetizing that viewpoint acts as a pressure release that personally enriches Cory Doctorow and his publishers at the expense of actual effective action to avert the disaster.
This is the same argument that I levy at professional "effective altruists"--if you're profiting by and not subsidizing altuism (i.e. comparable net worth to those you're helping), you're by definition not an altruist, you're a symbiont at best and a parasite at worst.
RMS is an impotent (and some would say toxic) emissary for open software and hardware, but at least his principles directly align with his lifestyle. No one is being ferried into nascent manipulative technologies because of their supposedly "revolutionary" potential on his account.
Earnest question: Is your opinion that writing books and selling them is a bad form of advocacy? Is there a better one that doesn't require independent wealth?
I'm pretty familiar with Doctorow's body of work, and he writes freely for magazines, comes on podcasts, speaks at Defcon, and generally lives in service of the ideas that are articulated in his books. Part of advocacy requires messaging the same ideas over and over in different ways, since each person will be converted by a slightly different equation of messaging and delivery. I'm not sure I can agree with the nihilistic cynicism that rejects all text that has profit potential.
Having read a couple of prompts and replies in the past days, I am like 75% sure this response was written by ChatGPT based on its emphasis to stress uncertainty.
Then again, HN is the place of public discourse where I would expect expressing such caveats the most from human actors, too.
