Also genius Gabby. If only we had realised we were working on ALlan's Intelligence all along! This explains why our machines throw darts at German ladies and the high level of our coffee budget, Lovely spot. We once had a typewriter with a broken 'l' key and used the capital 'i' instead. Did you know an Englishman beat the German held joke telling record (21) with 26 in a minute? I would laugh if you had a sense of humour, rather than cunning plan to get the record back ... and I may contact the United Nations to get dots put on capital 'i's.
There was, of course, knowledge before humans, a point elaborated by John Searle. Socially constructed knowledge is still generally claimed by social constructivist authors. On Monday, March 9, 2015 at 2:59:39 PM UTC, Gabby wrote: > > I have defined Allan (Al, if you prefer the short form) as the intelligent > agent who wants to see his idea of Soul sort of fleshed out. Why not? > Building a project glossary is not so unusual. Allan seems to be most > interested so might as well let him start a test ballon in which he tries > to identify his idea of soul in what we say and put his findings in an > extra thread or extra glossary software, if he wishes. We could give him > feedback and make suggestions for alterations and in the end have a product > called "Allan's Soul Dictionary (ASD)" and would all be happy ever after... > > Am Montag, 9. März 2015 schrieb archytas : > > Of course, one cannot get far in AI without defining what an intelligent > agent is. Maybe AI is soul, seeking to free itself from our biology or > Gabby's stuck time loop? > > On Monday, March 9, 2015 at 2:29:39 PM UTC, archytas wrote: > > So could you. Even my machines have a 'this didn't work before' routine > and 'try something else'. Would a reboot help? > > On Monday, March 9, 2015 at 2:10:18 PM UTC, Gabby wrote: > > But you could help to build a repository of meaningful content for the > soul, at least in our context here. This is what I suggested before. If you > want to, I can go back and find that posting for you. > > Am Montag, 9. März 2015 schrieb : > > Primate chatter makes more sense. > > I have little to no doubt that you can create a program or programs to > mimic human behavior. Hopefully eliminating poor behavior in getting hung > up in endless loops . .. which can be of great advantage.. at the same time > it can get trapped in loops from which it can not escape making the same > error endlessly.. another human trait. > > Just because you can mimic human thinking and logic flawlessly. The real > problem is is logic can not create a soul.. probably because so little is > known or understood.. to me that is the major problem with Artificial > intelligence. > > > تجنب. القتل والاغتصاب واستعباد الآخرين > Avoid; murder, rape and enslavement of others > > -----Original Message----- > From: archytas <[email protected]> > To: [email protected] > Sent: Mon, 09 Mar 2015 1:58 PM > Subject: Re: Mind's Eye Re: Götterdämmerung > > One of the missing themes in social epistemology is that people might have > already worked out the 'great theory of coerced oppression' themselves. > The theory then just tells everyone what they knew from experience. Huge > numbers of people think the stuff naive in the face of obvious power. We > then kow-tow like dogs in a pack or chimps under the alpha (a 'political > appointee'). Teaching is a kind of suppressing fire in this view. A lot > of biological metaphors make sense here. Insect consensus, the ability of > parasites in control, leadership bringing sex and huge biological change - > and I defy anyone to listen to primate chatter without recognizing > Parliament. > > Windows 7 comes in home, professional and ultimate. Any disk version you > buy actually has all the versions on it and a small bit of program gives > you access to all versions (but you still need the MS product key to > activate). Humans may be held in something like this condition, switched > off from Molly's higher planes. One sees this all over the plant and > animal world, plus cascade genetics and the managing HOX genes (snakes > could have legs etc) - some developmental switch makes most of the > difference, not the actual genes. Bees can actually reprogram themselves > between nurse and forager. > > I do sometimes wonder if we could bring human change by identifying the > micro-organism that rules us, like drunken ants staggering to their doom at > lunar noon under fungal influence! Habermas ain't the antidote, though he > does tell us someone else has thought some of it through as we might have > guessed. I think machines can help much more than we admit. Though we > also separate the machines from matters like love and caring for a deaf > child. > > On Monday, March 9, 2015 at 11:18:21 AM UTC, Molly wrote: > > Cheers, Francis, to all the mad stuff you are doing! > > On Sunday, March 8, 2015 at 10:34:26 PM UTC-4, frantheman wrote: > > Don't worry, Neil, I haven't sold out and swallowed the academic bait with > hook, line and sinker! There is, as you often and rightly point out, an > immense amount of waffle in the whole academic business, frequently > clothing platitudes, or very small ideas in pages of obfusticating > gobbledegook, all of it referenced with hundreds of footnotes to show > everyone how clever and diligent you are. > > But, as I mentioned earlier, I have - after a break of nearly 30 years - > once more formally engaged with the academic world, and am just finishing > the first semester of a Masters programme in cultural studies. However I'm > fortunate that I have no great ambitions to make a career out of it, nor am > I compelled to do so. I still work at an honest job to make a living, > though I have been able to cut down my working hours to the extent that I > now get by with doing eight night-shifts per month, looking after four > chronically seriously ill children. - - > > - - (short pause in writing this to detach a seven year hellion from her > respirator and monitor so that she can go to the bathroom, followed by a > discussion in sign-language (she's deaf), making it clear to her that she > must go back to sleep as it's only two thirty in the morning and she has to > go to school tomorrow. She may have many health issues, but for all that > she's a typical seven year old, with an infinite capacity for negotiation > about stuff she doesn't feel like doing) - - > > - - Furthermore, I am immensely fortunate to live in a country where third > level education - at state universities (and the *Fernuniversität Hagen > <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FernUniversit%C3%A4t_Hagen> *is a fully > recognised state university on the Open University model) is nearly > completely free - it costs me € 300 per semester ... read it and weep, > American readers! Now that my daughters are independently earning their own > living,I've no one to look after except myself, which makes it all > financially possible without having to go into horrific debt or live on > bread and water in an unheated garret. > > Cultural Studies is an unusual beast. It was invented around thirty to > forty years ago by Literature Departments to stave off their widely > perceived danger of drifting into terminal irrelevance and extinction. In > Hagen it's organised jointly by the (German) Literature Department and the > History Department (which identifies strongly with a sociological approach > <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bielefeld_School> to history and regards > Max Weber as being only marginally inferior to God). As someone embarking > on this intellectual journey, I do feel a certain need to try to identify > my own particular standpoint with respect to all the diverse > intellectual/academic directions, currents, schools and outlooks which one > encounters in this area. All the more so as the specific subject of the > Masters programme glories in the title "European Modernity." Sort of, > "everything you wanted to know about the past two hundred and fifty years > but were afraid to ask ... or answer." > > The more I read in this whole area, the more I find myself being > stimulated and excited by the various *turns *in postmodernist thinking. > Lyotard's scepticism regarding metanarratives (which you mentioned) echoes > with me, as does a lot of stuff that Frederic Jameson writes - his analyses > of particular works of modern architecture are great. Of course there's an > awful lot of pretentious academic wanking around too, but at the moment I'm > still at the stage of enjoying having my mind and concepts extended. If > only there weren't such annoying things such as exams and reaserch papers > (I'm currently trying to finish one on the protoindustrial development of > the textile industry in the Duchy of Berg > <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bergisches_Land> from 1700 to 1820 ... > yawn!), but that's the price I have to pay for getting formally involved in > the academic business once more. > > Of course I'm not going to save the world with any of this, but there is a > great feeling of liberation in studying just for fun. And I can now once > more officially regard myself as a student, which means I don't have to get > up early in the morning if I don't feel like it. And maybe do all kinds of > other mad stuff ... > > Am Sonntag, 8. März 2015 13:07:42 UTC+1 schrieb archytas: > > I suppose the collected works of Habermas and Luhmann would be about the > size of a big wardrobe. I am not a believer, though find Habermas very > tempting, "Descartes" (thought of in a long line that might include Molly > and Orn) is about the pursuit of truth and this continues in social > epistemology, dropping the solus ipse to a considerable extent - we > certainly no longer hew to rigid introspectionism - though we can ask 'did > we ever'? Molly and Orn don't work as people like that, though stand up > well as examples of people trying for something I have deep respect for > (there are some key epistemic issues in this - resolvable I think in terms > of people who want peace and justice). > > "Whereas Descartes thought that truth should be pursued only by the proper > conduct of "reason," specifically, the doxastic agent's own reason, social > epistemology acknowledges what everyone except a radical skeptic will > admit, namely, that quests for truth are commonly influenced, for better or > for worse, by institutional arrangements that massively affect what > doxastic agents hear (or fail to hear) from others. To maximize prospects > for successful pursuits of truth, this variable cannot sensibly be > neglected." > > This paragraph could do with some Chris-style 'stripping for > translation'! Doxastic agents! It is surely 'bleedin' obvious' we are > people of cultures. At risk of Gabby's wrath, I will mention again these > cultures are Bacon's Idols. Feminism is a good example of a social > epistemology in bringing out the male domination of control fraud > knowledge. > > The message, eventually, after reading several wardrobes,, is that we are > largely being being had through culturally transmitted control frauds. The > questions really concern how we could do something better and how we can > tell people they are being conned (a very difficult matter). Debates on > epistemology that people can't understand, framed in academic ways of > making livings, involving complex literacy and numeracy, hardly form > anything easily translatable - the ways of making academic livings also > control frauds. > > If one looks at a small area like forensic science, where on might assume > well understood science would produce easily translatable facts, we get a > lot of human corruption. The proper function of forensic science is to > extract the truth. This function, unfortunately, is not well served by > current practice. Saks et al. (2001: 28) write: "As it is practised today, > forensic science does not extract the truth reliably. Forensic science > expert evidence that is erroneous (that is, honest mistakes) and fraudulent > (deliberate misrepresentation) has been found to be one of the major > causes, and perhaps the leading cause, of erroneous convictions of innocent > persons." One rogue scientist engaged in rampant falsification for 15 > years, and another faked more than 100 autopsies on unexamined bodies and > falsified dozens of toxicology and blood reports (Kelly and Wearne 1998; > Koppl 2006, Other Internet Resources). Shocking cases are found in more > than one country. > > Kelly, J. F. and Wearne, P. (1998), Tainting Evidence: Inside the Scandals > at the FBI Crime Lab, New York: The Free Press. > Koppl, Roger (2005), "Epistemic Systems," Episteme: A Journal of Social > Epistemology, 2 (2): 91–106. > > We are affected by this in very practical ways. My contention is most of > the problems could be brought to obvious light. We are 'allowed' the > epistemological, but not practical action. Francis' hammock is in the > right place, the metaphor replete with the quiescence involved in framing > oneself as an academic (which Francis obviously isn't in the best sense I > can mean that). I once 'fitted up' a paedophile for other crimes - he had > committed them, so technically it wasn't a fit up. The institutional and > legal barriers were too big to fight and still are. It got him off the > streets for a couple of years, though he continued after release. Ugly Ray > Terret has just been retrospectively convicted and given 25 years. One > might think we could address the issues of social epistemology through > practical examples everyone can grasp. Indeed, Kopl tries. Yet the > ideologies of soaked-up knowledge, various COWDUNGS (conventional wisdoms > of dominant groups) make this an act of heretic courage. There are still > people who can't take the idea that, say, if born in the Muslim world they > would be Muslim. > > In the West we are dominated by neo-liberalism and economic blather. Even > if we vote to change this, as the Greeks just have, what can any > politicians do confronted with the 'smoke filled rooms' they enter off the > corridors of power with warnings that anything other than austerity will > lead to disaster? Economics is largely a lie through which dominance is > exerted and the West (now largely under the US military umbrella) 'stays > ahead' - and who sensibly would not want this shield against even worse > domination from elsewhere? > > There have been people talking about positive money, democratic foreign > policy and radical democracy for more than 100 years. Yet in politics we > get to vote for main parties making jawbs-groaf promises within > neo-liberalism, corrupt banking and utterly false notions on how growth is > achieved and what it should be. The real dialogue is made invisible, and > Francis' hammock, if right in immanent academic consideration, is part of > bearing witness before the crash. I'm not suggesting Francis is doing this > > We need to think global and beyond. Yet look what globalisation has done > so far and what we fear leaders will do whatever they spout. > > On Sunday, March 8, 2015 at 2:35:19 AM UTC, frantheman wrote: > > Sheldon Cooper of *The Big Bang Theory *justifies his claim always to be > right thus: "If I were wrong I would know it!" > > Am Sonntag, 8. März 2015 02:25:40 UTC+1 schrieb frantheman: > > What a wonderful overview, Neil! I envy your capacity to cook down the > huge amount of controversy involving epistemology, sociology, ideology, > modernism and post-modernism into a few comprehensible paragraphs. > > > > Personally, I find myself suspended between the kind of modernism proposed > by Habermas and the various post-modernist critiques of it. Not always an > easy (or consistent) position, I'm trying to figure out a way to construct > a hammock on the basis of this suspension which allows me to comfortably > swing from one to the other as I please. And didn't someone once comment > that consistency is the privilege of small minds? > > > > If critical theory has established anything, it's that the old > metaphysical arguments about ontology and "das Ding in sich" are just a > waste of time. We can't ultimately get out of our skins; our knowledge is > *human *knowledge, worked out and communicated in *human *terms, and as > such it will always have a cultural and societal framework. Such frameworks > are dynamic, interacting with each other, growing, changing ... organic > really - which is no wonder, given that humans are organic beings. "Pure" > rationality is a chimera, because as humans we can only think in human > categories. Should we ever encounter aliens, I suspect that the > intercommunication would be difficult, frustrating and endlessly > fascinating, because they might very well structure > > ... -- --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups ""Minds Eye"" group. 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