Re: [FRIAM] AI Musings

[Grant Holland]

Stephen,
Very smart to put my question re: CEOs vs AI to ChatGPT. My question
regarded “medium and long-term” capabilities. Your query to the bot was for
the present time. And yet, nevertheless, I interpret the bot’s response to
you to be, essentially, that there are certain CEO positions that AI
capability can fill right now - with some qualifications. I’d say that’s a
bit disrupting.

On Sat, Apr 1, 2023 at 12:57 PM Stephen Guerin 
wrote:

>
>
> On Sat, Apr 1, 2023, 8:29 AM Roger Critchlow  wrote:
>
>>
>> I tried to get Bard to talk with me about the adjacent possible (AP) the
>> other day.  It agreed that the AP could not be represented as a
>> mathematical set, but it continued to talk about the AP as if it were a
>> set.  So it suggested formulating the AP as a graph, or a tree, or as the
>> states of a dynamical system.  I pushed for a non-set formalism and it gave
>> me fuzzy sets.  I guess I have to try harder.
>>
>
> Roger, Cool. Can you say more about a different formalization you're
> after?
>
> Stu's Theory Of The Adjacent Possible is currently formalized with an
> exponentially increasing set
>
> https://arxiv.org/abs/2204.14115#
>
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Grant Holland
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Re: [FRIAM] AI Musings

[Grant Holland]

Good point, Roger. And any “old buddy” system among the board and musical 
chairs they play with the CEO position would tend to make them hunker down to 
protect their power structure. It might take the stockholders, once they 
finally gain confidence in AI, and see how much money can be saved, to upend 
the status quo.

> On Apr 1, 2023, at 8:29 AM, Roger Critchlow  wrote:
> 
> I think that it depends on having a board of directors/private owner prepared 
> to take their hands off the wheel.
> 
> The main problem would be trolls attempting adversarial prompts.  However 
> comfortable you might get with the ai's ability to handle the day to day 
> affairs, would you ever feel safe from some ai whisperer persuading it to 
> give everything away and become a yogi?  I suppose you have the same problem 
> with meat C-suite officers, too.
> 
> I tried to get Bard to talk with me about the adjacent possible (AP) the 
> other day.  It agreed that the AP could not be represented as a mathematical 
> set, but it continued to talk about the AP as if it were a set.  So it 
> suggested formulating the AP as a graph, or a tree, or as the states of a 
> dynamical system.  I pushed for a non-set formalism and it gave me fuzzy 
> sets.  I guess I have to try harder.
> 
> -- rec --
> 
> On Sat, Apr 1, 2023 at 8:05 AM Grant Holland  <mailto:grant.holland...@gmail.com>> wrote:
> Good point, Cody!
> 
>> On Mar 31, 2023, at 9:16 PM, cody dooderson > <mailto:d00d3r...@gmail.com>> wrote:
>> 
>> While I think that AI could soon handle the managerial part of a CEO's job, 
>> they may have trouble playing golf. It might not matter if the stock is 
>> going up.
>> I am very ignorant about what CEO's do 'though. 
>> 
>> On Fri, Mar 31, 2023, 5:33 PM Grant Holland > <mailto:grant.holland...@gmail.com>> wrote:
>> So what do you think? Are CEOs, CFOs etc. and corporate board members at any 
>> medium or short-term risk of losing their jobs to machine learning? I like 
>> to hear some opinions on this.
>> 
>> Thx,
>> Grant
>> 
>> > On Mar 31, 2023, at 1:21 PM, Gary Schiltz > > <mailto:g...@naturesvisualarts.com>> wrote:
>> > 
>> > A... looking more closely, Grant wrote CxO not QxO. Google quickly
>> > enlightened me on the former. Sorry for the noise.
>> > 
>> > On Fri, Mar 31, 2023 at 2:19 PM Gary Schiltz > > <mailto:g...@naturesvisualarts.com>> wrote:
>> >> 
>> >> I must admit my ignorance here, not aided in the least by a cursory
>> >> Google search: What is QxO?
>> >> 
>> >> On Thu, Mar 30, 2023 at 10:59 AM Grant Holland
>> >> mailto:grant.holland...@gmail.com>> wrote:
>> >>> 
>> >>> Frank,
>> >>> 
>> >>> I'm wondering why no-one seems to raise the specter that AI could start 
>> >>> replacing management personnel. And I’m including CxO’s here; because 
>> >>> I’m not convinced that CxO-ing is rocket science or quantum mechanics. 
>> >>> Think of the billions saved. After all, if machine learning cannot get 
>> >>> good at making better decisions than humans, and constantly improving at 
>> >>> it, I would be very surprised.
>> >>> 
>> >>> Grant
>> >>> 
>> >>> On Mar 30, 2023, at 8:58 AM, Frank Wimberly > >>> <mailto:wimber...@gmail.com>> wrote:
>> >>> 
>> >>> Not particularly relevant to your main point but Raj Reddy, close 
>> >>> colleague of Newell and Simon, once said, "It is easier use AI to 
>> >>> replace a college professor than a bulldozer operator" or words tho that 
>> >>> effect.
>> >>> 
>> >>> Frank
>> >>> 
>> >>> ---
>> >>> Frank C. Wimberly
>> >>> 140 Calle Ojo Feliz,
>> >>> Santa Fe, NM 87505
>> >>> 
>> >>> 505 670-9918
>> >>> Santa Fe, NM
>> >>> 
>> >>> On Thu, Mar 30, 2023, 8:50 AM Prof David West > >>> <mailto:profw...@fastmail.fm>> wrote:
>> >>>> 
>> >>>> The "AI Pause" made national TV news yesterday (long after those on 
>> >>>> this list noted and reacted to it) and that made me revisit a theme I 
>> >>>> have thought about since Newell, Simon, and Shaw created Logic Theorist.
>> >>>> 
>> >>>> Advocates take a caricature (pe

Re: [FRIAM] AI Musings

[Grant Holland]

Good point, Cody!

> On Mar 31, 2023, at 9:16 PM, cody dooderson  wrote:
> 
> While I think that AI could soon handle the managerial part of a CEO's job, 
> they may have trouble playing golf. It might not matter if the stock is going 
> up.
> I am very ignorant about what CEO's do 'though. 
> 
> On Fri, Mar 31, 2023, 5:33 PM Grant Holland  <mailto:grant.holland...@gmail.com>> wrote:
> So what do you think? Are CEOs, CFOs etc. and corporate board members at any 
> medium or short-term risk of losing their jobs to machine learning? I like to 
> hear some opinions on this.
> 
> Thx,
> Grant
> 
> > On Mar 31, 2023, at 1:21 PM, Gary Schiltz  > <mailto:g...@naturesvisualarts.com>> wrote:
> > 
> > A... looking more closely, Grant wrote CxO not QxO. Google quickly
> > enlightened me on the former. Sorry for the noise.
> > 
> > On Fri, Mar 31, 2023 at 2:19 PM Gary Schiltz  > <mailto:g...@naturesvisualarts.com>> wrote:
> >> 
> >> I must admit my ignorance here, not aided in the least by a cursory
> >> Google search: What is QxO?
> >> 
> >> On Thu, Mar 30, 2023 at 10:59 AM Grant Holland
> >> mailto:grant.holland...@gmail.com>> wrote:
> >>> 
> >>> Frank,
> >>> 
> >>> I'm wondering why no-one seems to raise the specter that AI could start 
> >>> replacing management personnel. And I’m including CxO’s here; because I’m 
> >>> not convinced that CxO-ing is rocket science or quantum mechanics. Think 
> >>> of the billions saved. After all, if machine learning cannot get good at 
> >>> making better decisions than humans, and constantly improving at it, I 
> >>> would be very surprised.
> >>> 
> >>> Grant
> >>> 
> >>> On Mar 30, 2023, at 8:58 AM, Frank Wimberly  >>> <mailto:wimber...@gmail.com>> wrote:
> >>> 
> >>> Not particularly relevant to your main point but Raj Reddy, close 
> >>> colleague of Newell and Simon, once said, "It is easier use AI to replace 
> >>> a college professor than a bulldozer operator" or words tho that effect.
> >>> 
> >>> Frank
> >>> 
> >>> ---
> >>> Frank C. Wimberly
> >>> 140 Calle Ojo Feliz,
> >>> Santa Fe, NM 87505
> >>> 
> >>> 505 670-9918
> >>> Santa Fe, NM
> >>> 
> >>> On Thu, Mar 30, 2023, 8:50 AM Prof David West  >>> <mailto:profw...@fastmail.fm>> wrote:
> >>>> 
> >>>> The "AI Pause" made national TV news yesterday (long after those on this 
> >>>> list noted and reacted to it) and that made me revisit a theme I have 
> >>>> thought about since Newell, Simon, and Shaw created Logic Theorist.
> >>>> 
> >>>> Advocates take a caricature (perhaps too strong a word) of human 
> >>>> intelligence, write a program to emulate it and declare the program 
> >>>> "intelligent."
> >>>> 
> >>>> The original conceit: true intelligence was the kind of thinking 
> >>>> exhibited by college professors and scientists. Almost trivial to 
> >>>> emulate (Newell and Simon programmed Logic Theorist on 3x5 cards before 
> >>>> Shaw was able to implement on a computer).
> >>>> 
> >>>> Maybe reading—correctly converting text to sound, like a child—was more 
> >>>> indicative of human intelligence, and Sejnowski created NetTalk. that, 
> >>>> somewhat eerily, produced discoveries of sounds, and errors, and 
> >>>> achieved near perfect ability to "read." Listen to the tapes sometime 
> >>>> and contrast them with tapes of a human child learning to read. Of 
> >>>> course, comprehension of what was read did not make the cut.
> >>>> 
> >>>> State of the art improved dramatically and the caricatures of human 
> >>>> intelligence are more sophisticated and the achievements of the programs 
> >>>> more interesting.
> >>>> 
> >>>> But, it seems to me there is still a critical gap. We can program an AI 
> >>>> (or let one learn) to fly a commercial jet as well or better than a 
> >>>> human pilot—BUT, could even the best of of breed of such an AI pull a 
> >>>> Shullenberger and land on the Hudson River?
> >>>> 
> >>>> Another factor

Re: [FRIAM] AI Musings

[Grant Holland]

So what do you think? Are CEOs, CFOs etc. and corporate board members at any 
medium or short-term risk of losing their jobs to machine learning? I like to 
hear some opinions on this.

Thx,
Grant

> On Mar 31, 2023, at 1:21 PM, Gary Schiltz  wrote:
> 
> A... looking more closely, Grant wrote CxO not QxO. Google quickly
> enlightened me on the former. Sorry for the noise.
> 
> On Fri, Mar 31, 2023 at 2:19 PM Gary Schiltz  
> wrote:
>> 
>> I must admit my ignorance here, not aided in the least by a cursory
>> Google search: What is QxO?
>> 
>> On Thu, Mar 30, 2023 at 10:59 AM Grant Holland
>>  wrote:
>>> 
>>> Frank,
>>> 
>>> I'm wondering why no-one seems to raise the specter that AI could start 
>>> replacing management personnel. And I’m including CxO’s here; because I’m 
>>> not convinced that CxO-ing is rocket science or quantum mechanics. Think of 
>>> the billions saved. After all, if machine learning cannot get good at 
>>> making better decisions than humans, and constantly improving at it, I 
>>> would be very surprised.
>>> 
>>> Grant
>>> 
>>> On Mar 30, 2023, at 8:58 AM, Frank Wimberly  wrote:
>>> 
>>> Not particularly relevant to your main point but Raj Reddy, close colleague 
>>> of Newell and Simon, once said, "It is easier use AI to replace a college 
>>> professor than a bulldozer operator" or words tho that effect.
>>> 
>>> Frank
>>> 
>>> ---
>>> Frank C. Wimberly
>>> 140 Calle Ojo Feliz,
>>> Santa Fe, NM 87505
>>> 
>>> 505 670-9918
>>> Santa Fe, NM
>>> 
>>> On Thu, Mar 30, 2023, 8:50 AM Prof David West  wrote:
>>>> 
>>>> The "AI Pause" made national TV news yesterday (long after those on this 
>>>> list noted and reacted to it) and that made me revisit a theme I have 
>>>> thought about since Newell, Simon, and Shaw created Logic Theorist.
>>>> 
>>>> Advocates take a caricature (perhaps too strong a word) of human 
>>>> intelligence, write a program to emulate it and declare the program 
>>>> "intelligent."
>>>> 
>>>> The original conceit: true intelligence was the kind of thinking exhibited 
>>>> by college professors and scientists. Almost trivial to emulate (Newell 
>>>> and Simon programmed Logic Theorist on 3x5 cards before Shaw was able to 
>>>> implement on a computer).
>>>> 
>>>> Maybe reading—correctly converting text to sound, like a child—was more 
>>>> indicative of human intelligence, and Sejnowski created NetTalk. that, 
>>>> somewhat eerily, produced discoveries of sounds, and errors, and achieved 
>>>> near perfect ability to "read." Listen to the tapes sometime and contrast 
>>>> them with tapes of a human child learning to read. Of course, 
>>>> comprehension of what was read did not make the cut.
>>>> 
>>>> State of the art improved dramatically and the caricatures of human 
>>>> intelligence are more sophisticated and the achievements of the programs 
>>>> more interesting.
>>>> 
>>>> But, it seems to me there is still a critical gap. We can program an AI 
>>>> (or let one learn) to fly a commercial jet as well or better than a human 
>>>> pilot—BUT, could even the best of of breed of such an AI pull a 
>>>> Shullenberger and land on the Hudson River?
>>>> 
>>>> Another factor behind the "hysteria" (sorry for the sexism) over AIs 
>>>> causing massive unemployment is a corollary to the caricaturization of 
>>>> human intelligence. Since the Industrial Revolution, and certainly since 
>>>> the age of Taylorism and the rise of automation; work itself has been 
>>>> dehumanizing.
>>>> 
>>>> If you define human work in terms of what can be done by a computer then 
>>>> it is tautological to claim an AI is intelligent because it can perform 
>>>> human work.
>>>> 
>>>> I was contemplating ChatAIs and quickly realized that my 
>>>> profession—college professor—was one at immense risk of replacement. I 
>>>> would bet good money that a ChatAI could produce, and maybe deliver, 
>>>> lectures far better than any I created in 30 years teaching. And probably 
>>>> most, if not all, of the presentations I made at professional conferences 
>>>> over the years.
>>&

Re: [FRIAM] AI Musings

[Grant Holland]

Frank,

I'm wondering why no-one seems to raise the specter that AI could start 
replacing management personnel. And I’m including CxO’s here; because I’m not 
convinced that CxO-ing is rocket science or quantum mechanics. Think of the 
billions saved. After all, if machine learning cannot get good at making better 
decisions than humans, and constantly improving at it, I would be very 
surprised. 

Grant

> On Mar 30, 2023, at 8:58 AM, Frank Wimberly  wrote:
> 
> Not particularly relevant to your main point but Raj Reddy, close colleague 
> of Newell and Simon, once said, "It is easier use AI to replace a college 
> professor than a bulldozer operator" or words tho that effect.
> 
> Frank
> 
> ---
> Frank C. Wimberly
> 140 Calle Ojo Feliz, 
> Santa Fe, NM 87505
> 
> 505 670-9918
> Santa Fe, NM
> 
> On Thu, Mar 30, 2023, 8:50 AM Prof David West  > wrote:
> The "AI Pause" made national TV news yesterday (long after those on this list 
> noted and reacted to it) and that made me revisit a theme I have thought 
> about since Newell, Simon, and Shaw created Logic Theorist.
> 
> Advocates take a caricature (perhaps too strong a word) of human 
> intelligence, write a program to emulate it and declare the program 
> "intelligent."
> 
> The original conceit: true intelligence was the kind of thinking exhibited by 
> college professors and scientists. Almost trivial to emulate (Newell and 
> Simon programmed Logic Theorist on 3x5 cards before Shaw was able to 
> implement on a computer).
> 
> Maybe reading—correctly converting text to sound, like a child—was more 
> indicative of human intelligence, and Sejnowski created NetTalk. that, 
> somewhat eerily, produced discoveries of sounds, and errors, and achieved 
> near perfect ability to "read." Listen to the tapes sometime and contrast 
> them with tapes of a human child learning to read. Of course, comprehension 
> of what was read did not make the cut.
> 
> State of the art improved dramatically and the caricatures of human 
> intelligence are more sophisticated and the achievements of the programs more 
> interesting.
> 
> But, it seems to me there is still a critical gap. We can program an AI (or 
> let one learn) to fly a commercial jet as well or better than a human 
> pilot—BUT, could even the best of of breed of such an AI pull a Shullenberger 
> and land on the Hudson River? 
> 
> Another factor behind the "hysteria" (sorry for the sexism) over AIs causing 
> massive unemployment is a corollary to the caricaturization of human 
> intelligence. Since the Industrial Revolution, and certainly since the age of 
> Taylorism and the rise of automation; work itself has been dehumanizing.
> 
> If you define human work in terms of what can be done by a computer then it 
> is tautological to claim an AI is intelligent because it can perform human 
> work.
> 
> I was contemplating ChatAIs and quickly realized that my profession—college 
> professor—was one at immense risk of replacement. I would bet good money that 
> a ChatAI could produce, and maybe deliver, lectures far better than any I 
> created in 30 years teaching. And probably most, if not all, of the 
> presentations I made at professional conferences over the years.
> 
> I am still vain enough to think that some of the papers and books I have 
> written are beyond an AI, and certain that no AI could do as well in 
> spontaneious Q&A after a presentation than I.
> 
> Bottom line, I still believe that AI can and does equate to HI, only when 
> some aspect of HI is ommitted from the equation. This is not essentialism, 
> but analogous to the digitization of a sine wave, no matter the finite 
> sampling rate, there is always some missing information.
> 
> davew
> 
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Re: [FRIAM] a little help from my friends

[Grant Holland]

Prof,

I have two specific items to add to your list of qualities:

1. Code should implement a “design to the interface” approach to support 
interchangeability and other qualities.
2. This question: Can AI code generation obviate any requirement for “software 
quality” as we know it?

Congrats on your keynote invitation.

Grant

> On Mar 30, 2023, at 8:10 AM, Prof David West  wrote:
> 
> I am keynoting the International Conference on Code Quality on April 22. It 
> will be speculative and philosophical, but I would like to know "code 
> quality" might mean, is taken for granted to mean, to professional coders. I 
> know what it means for this conference, but would like a broader base from 
> which to launch my flights of fancy.
> 
> davew
> 
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Re: [FRIAM] Looking for an algorithm

[Grant Holland]

Ed,

I would personally find that work interesting.

Thanks for advising us on it.

Grant

> On Nov 4, 2021, at 2:34 PM, Edward Angel  wrote:
> 
> There are some references to using tensor products to solve potential 
> equations that go back to 1964. They involve inverting (division?) of a 
> tensor product matrix. I had some of this in my thesis (1968) and is also on 
> the book I wrote that came our around 1972. I only have one copy left (its 
> pages are turning yellow with age). I can scan those page if you like.
> 
> Ed
> ___
> 
> Ed Angel
> 
> Founding Director, Art, Research, Technology and Science Laboratory (ARTS Lab)
> Professor Emeritus of Computer Science, University of New Mexico
> 
> 1017 Sierra Pinon
> Santa Fe, NM 87501
> 505-984-0136 (home)   an...@cs.unm.edu 
> 
> 505-453-4944 (cell)   http://www.cs.unm.edu/~angel 
> 
> 
>> On Nov 4, 2021, at 2:20 PM, Jon Zingale > > wrote:
>> 
>> Yeah, that direction (multiplying) is the more well tread direction. It is 
>> the inverse problem (division) that I am surprised to see so little written 
>> on. Have you run across much literature on it?
>> 
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Re: [FRIAM] Oliver Sacks on Consciousness

[Grant Holland]

Great citation. Thanks, Frank.

G.

> On Dec 17, 2019, at 2:36 PM, Frank Wimberly  wrote:
> 
> "Since the last third of the twentieth century, the whole tenor of neurology 
> and Neuroscience has been moving towards such a dynamic and constructional 
> view of the brain, a sense that even at the most Elementary levels--as, for 
> example, in the "filling in" of a blind spot or a scotoma or the seeing of a 
> visual illusion, as both Richard Gregory and V. S. Ramachandran have 
> demonstrated--the brain constructs a plausible hypothesis or pattern or 
> scene. In his theory of neuronal group selection, Gerald Edelman--drawing on 
> the data of neuroanatomy and neurophysiology, of embryology and evolutionary 
> biology, of clinical and experimental work, and of synthetic neural 
> modeling--proposes a detailed neurobiological model of the mind in which the 
> brain's Central role is precisely that of constructing categories--first 
> perceptual then conceptual--and VB of an ascending process of "bootstrapping" 
> where through repeating recategorization at higher and higher levels, 
> consciousness is finally achieved. This, for Edelman, every perception is a 
> creation and every memory a re-creation or recategorization.
> 
> Such categories, he feels, depend on the "values" of the organism, those 
> biases and dispositions [partly innate, partly learned] which, for Freud, 
> were characterized as "drives", "instincts" and "affects." The attunement 
> here between Freud's view and Edelman's is striking; here, at least, one has 
> the sense that psychoanalysis and neurobiology can be fully at home with one 
> another, congruent and mutually supportive.  And it may be that in this 
> equation of Nachtra:glichkeit  with "recategorization" we see a hint of how 
> the two seemingly disparate universes--the universes of human meaning and of 
> natural science--may come together."
> 
> ---
> Frank Wimberly
> 
> My memoir:
> https://www.amazon.com/author/frankwimberly 
> 
> 
> My scientific publications:
> https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Frank_Wimberly2 
> 
> 
> Phone (505) 670-9918
> 
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
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Re: [FRIAM] [EXT] Re: A pluralistic model of the mind?

[Grant Holland]

Of course, Heisenberg and Bohr made this point regarding the quantum world. 
Languages are constructed, or emerge, to operate within certain bounds.

Grant

> On Dec 10, 2019, at 12:44 AM, Prof David West  wrote:
> 
> Ineffable!
> 
> There are many things that "cannot be expressed in words."
> 
> There are many experiences "that cannot be expressed in words."
> 
> Perhaps the "words" simply do not exist - or exist at the moment — the 
> vocabulary problem you mention.
> 
> Perhaps the constructs of the language — copulas / the verb "to be" in 
> English, for example — prevent accurate assertions, or mandate unresolvable 
> paradox.
> 
> Perhaps no language with appropriate expressive power is extant. (Unless 
> Nick, in his researchers, has rediscovered the "language of the birds" that 
> Huggin and Munnin used to converse with Odin.)
> 
> Perhaps a 'process of investigative scrutiny' other than the one we commonly 
> use to talk about common things is required; i.e. we simply have yet to 
> invent the appropriate "science."
> 
> Why do limitations in epistemology mandate exclusions from ontology?
> 
> davew
> 
> 
> 
> On Mon, Dec 9, 2019, at 7:40 PM, Eric Charles wrote:
>> Ineffable? 
>> 
>> F it!
>> 
>> I will try for a more thorough reply later,  but the short version is that 
>> no inherently ineffable things exist,  because "exist" and "real" are 
>> awkward ways we talk about the object of those concepts that will sustain 
>> the scrutiny of investigation. For that process to happen,  we have to be 
>> able to talk about the thing being investigated,  i.e. it must be 
>> in-principle effable. If we lack the necessary vocabulary at the moment,  
>> that's a different problem. 
>> 
>> On Mon, Dec 9, 2019, 12:03 PM > > wrote:
>> Dave, 
>> 
>>  
>> 
>> Thanks for this; and thanks, Frank, for forwarding it, else I should never 
>> have seen it.  
>> 
>>  
>> 
>> Well, that’s what I get for labeling my Monism.  Once labeled, monisms 
>> become dualisms.  Let me just say that the experiencer of an experience is 
>> simply another experience.  
>> 
>>  
>> 
>> Isn’t admitting to the ineffable throwing in the towel? 
>> 
>>  
>> 
>> Nick 
>> 
>>  
>> 
>> Nick Thompson
>> 
>> Emeritus Professor of Ethology and Psychology
>> 
>> Clark University
>> 
>> thompnicks...@gmail.com 
>> https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/ 
>> 
>> 
>>  
>> 
>>  
>> 
>> 
>> From: Friam mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com>> 
>> On Behalf Of Frank Wimberly
>> Sent: Monday, December 9, 2019 6:20 AM
>> To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group > >
>> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] [EXT] Re: A pluralistic model of the mind?
>> 
>>  
>> 
>> I think we've gotten somewhere.
>> 
>>  
>> 
>> Frank
>> 
>> 
>> ---
>> Frank Wimberly
>> 
>> My memoir:
>> https://www.amazon.com/author/frankwimberly 
>> 
>> 
>> My scientific publications:
>> https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Frank_Wimberly2 
>> 
>> 
>> Phone (505) 670-9918
>> 
>>  
>> 
>> On Mon, Dec 9, 2019, 4:08 AM Prof David West > > wrote:
>> 
>> Nick,
>> 
>>  
>> 
>> No need to be ill at ease — I do not mean illusory in, or with, any 
>> sense/degree/intimation of dualism.
>> 
>>  
>> 
>> Ultimately, either: I am more of a monist than thou. Or, you are equally a 
>> mystic as I.
>> 
>>  
>> 
>> You cannot speak of Experience without explicitly or implicitly asserting an 
>> Experiencer --->> dualism. If there is an Experience "of which you cannot 
>> speak," or of which "whatever is spoken is incorrect or incomplete;" then 
>> you are as much a mystic as Lao Tzu and the Tao.
>> 
>>  
>> 
>> Because your sensibilities will not allow you to admit your mysticism, I 
>> offer an alternative: you are an epistemological monist but not an 
>> ontological monist. On the latter point; I have already accused you of 
>> believing in an ontological "Thing" other than experience: a human soul or 
>> essence or spirit.
>> 
>>  
>> 
>> My monism is both ontological (except for the myth that infinitely long ago, 
>> and infinitely in the future, there were two things "intelligence" and 
>> "matter") and epistemological (accepting that my epistemology is ineffable).
>> 
>>  
>> 
>>  
>> 
>> davew
>> 
>>  
>> 
>>  
>> 
>>  
>> 
>> On Fri, Dec 6, 2019, at 8:49 PM, thompnicks...@gmail.com 
>>  wrote:
>> 
>> Hi, David,
>> 
>>  
>> 
>> Thanks for channeling me so accurately.  It is a talent to channel what one 
>> does not agree with so faithfully that the person channeled is satisfied.   
>> Thank you for that. 
>> 
>>  
>> 
>> I would have only one ill-ease, about the last part of your version:
>> 
>>  
>> 
>> both equally illusory.
>> 
>>  
>> 
>> I think “illusory” is used here, in your way,

Re: [FRIAM] UC terminates subscriptions with world’s largest scientific publisher in push for open access to publicly funded research | University of California

[Grant Holland]

S’bout time. Thx Tom

On Sun, Mar 3, 2019 at 11:37 AM Tom Johnson  wrote:

>
> https://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/press-room/uc-terminates-subscriptions-worlds-largest-scientific-publisher-push-open-access-publicly
> 
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
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>
-- 
Grant Holland
Santa Fe, NM

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Re: [FRIAM] Transforming the Postsecondary Professional Education Experience -- Campus Technology

[Grant Holland]

That was one of the first Java books I read, too, Frank. It was before 
Sun published any Java programming books, and before I went to work for Sun.


BTW, I believe your b'day is today, Frank. If so, have a great one!

Grant


On 5/5/18 12:52 AM, Frank Wimberly wrote:


I assume a good Python book costs less than the course.  In 1996 I got 
a job re-implementing a large statistical causal reasoning library 
from Pascal to Java.  I bought a book called “Teach yourself Java in 
21 days”.  Within less than that time I had several large programs 
converted.  I barely looked at the Pascal but at pseudocode 
descriptions of the algorithms instead.


Frank

*From:*Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] *On Behalf Of *Marcus 
Daniels

*Sent:* Friday, May 04, 2018 2:02 PM
*To:* The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
*Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] Transforming the Postsecondary Professional 
Education Experience -- Campus Technology


“As a measure of the magnitude of impact of MOOCs so far, one of our 
MOOC specializations in the Python programming language is among the 
most popular offerings on Coursera — I believe that it has reached 
more than a million learners at this point. A significant fraction of 
those learners have opted to sit for an exam to get a certificate in 
Python programming.”


  A person that seeks a Coursera class to learn Python is not 
destined for a career in software development.


“Also, we introduced an Applied Data Science specialization about a 
year ago. That one, though not receiving enrollments at quite the same 
level as the Python specialization, is generating tens of thousands of 
learners per quarter.”


Thousands of learners or thousands of people who create a filtering 
problem for recruiting departments?


Marcus

*From: *Friam  on behalf of Tom Johnson 

*Reply-To: *The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group 


*Date: *Friday, May 4, 2018 at 1:47 PM
*To: *"Friam@redfish. com" 
*Subject: *[FRIAM] Transforming the Postsecondary Professional 
Education Experience -- Campus Technology


Image removed by sender.

Perhaps of interest

Transforming the Postsecondary Professional Education Experience
A Q&A with Thomas A. Finholt
https://campustechnology.com/Articles/2018/04/16/Transforming-the-Postsecondary-Professional-Education-Experience.aspx?s=ct_in_040518&mkt_tok=eyJpIjoiTVRFeE1EVTVPRFJtTWpSaSIsInQiOiJCOGhlK2U2d3l5R3BodGpScFQrUk5MNlNGWnh5Y3EreWtYVnhtWm1MY01DcXkwTWN2OTBxa25oVFdMa3Y0RDd2NklUNGtFMTFWU2ZnM3g0SCtQUE05VWlaaWM1MXRzSld0UWg5WmZVM1prV2hKSWZ3N3RvTTBoTWlVMFJQYlJiZiJ9&Page=1 






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Re: [FRIAM] random v stochastic v indeterminate

[Grant Holland]

Glen,

Actually, I think you are probably right about crossovers! I can see how 
innovation can be attributed to them too. Thanks for pointing that out, 
Glen. (Had crossovers been discovered in '72 when Monod wrote his book?)


But that is because crossovers, too, like mutations, are stochastic. 
Chance strikes again! That really is my larger point.


Moreover, crossover and mutation events do not seem to be causally 
related. I suspect that one is not /caused by /the other. Their 
/relationship/ is also non-deterministic. In fact, one could probably 
use the functional named /conditional entropy /(from information theory) 
to calculate the /degree of uncertainty///around their chance 
relationship. (Or the functional /mutual information/ to measure their 
degree of determinism.) YES, chance and determinism come in degrees. 
That's what stochastic entropy is all about. It measures that degree. It 
measures where on a scale of chance-vs-determinism a particular 
situation (probability space) resides.


Cheers, and thx for the insight.

G.


On 8/12/17 9:49 AM, ┣glen┫ wrote:

This paragraph (for whatever reason) makes progress toward my counter-argument AGAINST 
both Monod-via-Grant and Wagner-via-Jenny.  While it may be true that mutation is 
necessary for innovation, it's insufficient to claim that innovation comes only through 
mutation.  Imagine two point mutations on different genes, in different individuals, 
neither of which (for now) produce a phenotype change (ala "neutral networks"). 
 Then those individuals go on to reproduce for a few generations, passing along their 
respective mutations, never seeing a phenotypic change in their lineages.  But them the 
two lineages mingle to produce an offspring with both mutations, where the 2 mutations 
together produce a phenotypic change.

Can we truly say that the crossover had nothing to do with the "innovation" ... that it 
only preserved the innovation and the mutation caused it?  A neutral mutation can't be considered 
an "innovation", right?


On 08/11/2017 09:05 PM, Steven A Smith wrote:

Yes, a "mutation" to the genome is a change in one or more letters of the code.   A 
"mutation" in the metabolic processes implied by said genetic sequence (a changed 
protein, a modified level of production of an unmodified protein or set of same, etc.) and 
ultimately in the mature phenotype (if the precursors to this are viable enough for a mature 
specimen to arrive?) and beyond that the larger social unit (herd/pack/tribe) that might benefit or 
suffer from the behaviour of the individual experiencing the mutation. Add individuals with a 
mutation in their bone-production that causes extremely large cross-section bones and thick crania 
into the Vikings and you get (what has been hypothesized to be) Berserker warriors who drop into a 
blind rage when their blood pressure rises in response to threat.  As long as they are pointing 
*toward* the enemy when that happens, it is (maybe) highly functional for the group to have you 
around?





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Re: [FRIAM] random v stochastic v indeterminate

[Grant Holland]

Steve,

According to Jacques Monod, chance mutations are the /only /form of 
innovation in living systems.


On p. 112 of  his book "Chance and Necessity" he says "...since they 
[chance mutations] constitute the /only/ possible source of 
modifications in the genetic text,...it necessarily follows that chance 
/alone/ is at the source of every innovation, of all creation in the 
biosphere. [Emphasis is his.]


Geneticist Monod was a winner of the 1965 Nobel Prize in Medicine or 
Physiology.


Grant


On 8/9/17 10:01 AM, Steven A Smith wrote:


Jenny -

What a powerful quote:

/Natural selection can //preserve//innovations, but it cannot
create them./

In my own maunderings about the (continued?) relevance of Free Markets 
and Capitalism, it has occurred to me that the value of said Free 
Markets may well be restricted to the "innovation phase" of 
development.  Once something becomes a (relative) commodity, it seems 
it might be counter-productive to continue the illusion of competitive 
development.  At best it is wasteful and even harmful, and at worst it 
leads to an elevation of "innovation" to marketing and salesmanship.  
This is why we have so many near-identical products on the market 
being pushed on us through the hype of greed and fear when the 
"generic" or "store brand" version is equal or (even) superior 
(certainly in price, but also possibly in quality... lacking the 
colorants and odorants and other embellishments required to 
differentiate one product from the other?).


- Steve

On 8/9/17 8:56 AM, Jenny Quillien wrote:


An excellent foray into such a topic is /Arrival of the Fittest: how 
nature innovates/ by Andreas Wagner.


From the Preface:  the power of natural selection is beyond dispute, 
but this power has limits. Natural selection can /preserve/ 
innovations, but it cannot create them. And calling the change that 
creates them random is just another way of admitting our ignorance 
about it. Nature's any innovations- some uncannily perfect - call for 
natural principles that accelerate life's ability to innovate, its 
innovability.


Dave West turned me onto the book and has promised a discussion about 
how it is relevant to 'evolution' in software. It is certainly 
relevant to Nick's e-mail.


Jenny Quillien


On 8/9/2017 8:47 AM, Nick Thompson wrote:


Hi everybody,

Thanks for your patience as I emerge (hopefully) from post-surgical 
fog.


I figured I best start my own thread rather than gum up yours.

First.  I had always supposed that a stochastic process was one 
whose value was determined by two factors, a random factor AND it’s 
last value.  So the next step in a random walk is “random” but the 
current value (it’s present position on a surface, say) is “the 
result of a stochastic process.”  From your responses, and from a 
short rummage in Wikipedia, I still can’t tell if I am correct or not.


Now remember, you guys, my standard critique of your discourse is 
that you confuse your models with the facts of nature.  What is this 
“evolution” of which you speak?  Unless you tell me otherwise, I 
will assume you are speaking of the messy biological process of 
which we are all a result: -- */The alteration of the design of taxa 
over time/*.   Hard to see any way in which that actual process is 
evidently random.  We have to dig deep into the theory that EXPLAINS 
evolution to find anything that corresponds to the vernacular notion 
of randomness.  There is constraint and predictability all over the 
place in the evolution I know.  Even mutations are predictable.  In 
other words, the randomness of evolution is a creation of your 
imaginations concerning the phenomenon, not an essential feature of 
the phenomenon, itself.


So what kind of “evolution” are you guys talking about?

Yes, and forgive me for trolling, a bit.  I am trying to wake myself 
up, here.


nick

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/ 






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Re: [FRIAM] random v stochastic v indeterminate

[Grant Holland]

Nick,

Re: your queston about stochastic processes

Yes, your specific description "AND its last value" is what most uses of 
"stochastic process" imply. But, technically all that is required to be 
a "stochastic process" is that each next step in the process is 
unpredictable, whether or not the outcome of one step influences the 
outcome of the next. An example of this is the process of flipping a 
coin several times in a row. Generally, we assume that the outcomes of 
two adjacent flips are stochastically (or statistically) independent, 
and that there is no influence between the steps. So, the steps of an 
independent stochastic process are not dependent on their previous steps.


On the other hand, selecting dinner tonight probably depends on what you 
had last night, because you would get bored with posole too many nights 
in a row. And maybe your memory goes back more than just one night, and 
your selection of dinner tonite is affected by what you had for 2 or 
more nites before. If your memory goes back only one night, then your 
"dinner selection process" is a kind of stochastic process called a 
"Markov process". Markov processes limit their "memory" to just one 
step. (That keeps the math simpler.)


In any event, stochastic processes whose steps depend on the outcomes of 
previous steps are "less random" than those that don't, because the 
earlier steps "give you extra information" that help you narrow down the 
options and to better predict the future steps - some more than others.  
So, LEARNING can occur inside of these dependent stochastic processes.


In fact, the mathematics of information theory is all about taking 
advantage of these dependent (or "conditional") stochastic processes to 
hopefully predict the outcomes of future steps. The whole thing is based 
on conditional probability. Info theory uses formulas with names such as 
joint entropy, conditional entropy, mutual information and entropy rate. 
These formulas can measure /how much /stochastic dependency is at work 
in a particular process - i.e how predictable it is. Entropy rate in 
particular works with conditional stochastic processes and tries to use 
that "extra information" provided by stochastic dependencies to predict 
future outcomes.


Re: your "evolution" question... I have been speaking of biological 
evolution.


HTH

Grant


On 8/9/17 8:47 AM, Nick Thompson wrote:


Hi everybody,

Thanks for your patience as I emerge (hopefully) from post-surgical fog.

I figured I best start my own thread rather than gum up yours.

First.  I had always supposed that a stochastic process was one whose 
value was determined by two factors, a random factor AND it’s last 
value.  So the next step in a random walk is “random” but the current 
value (it’s present position on a surface, say) is “the result of a 
stochastic process.”  From your responses, and from a short rummage in 
Wikipedia, I still can’t tell if I am correct or not.


Now remember, you guys, my standard critique of your discourse is that 
you confuse your models with the facts of nature.  What is this 
“evolution” of which you speak?  Unless you tell me otherwise, I will 
assume you are speaking of the messy biological process of which we 
are all a result: -- */The alteration of the design of taxa over 
time/*.   Hard to see any way in which that actual process is 
evidently random.  We have to dig deep into the theory that EXPLAINS 
evolution to find anything that corresponds to the vernacular notion 
of randomness.  There is constraint and predictability all over the 
place in the evolution I know.  Even mutations are predictable.  In 
other words, the randomness of evolution is a creation of your 
imaginations concerning the phenomenon, not an essential feature of 
the phenomenon, itself.


So what kind of “evolution” are you guys talking about?

Yes, and forgive me for trolling, a bit.  I am trying to wake myself 
up, here.


nick

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/ 






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Re: [FRIAM] Future of humans and artificial intelligence

[Grant Holland]

Marcus,

Let me clarify what I meant by saying that evolution is stochastic

By "evolution", I do not mean genetic algorithms. Genetic algorithms 
need not be, but can be, stochastic. Genetic algorithms are/adaptive; 
/but they need not be/stochastically /adaptive. On the other hand, 
biological evolution of life on earth is necessarily stochastically 
adaptive - due to chance mutations.


As Jacques Monod points out in his book "Chance and Necessity", chance 
mutations are the /only/ natural mechanism by which new species are 
created. And it is completely subject to chance. Without this particular 
stochasticicty, there would only ever have been one species on earth, if 
that, and that species would now be long extinct because of its 
inability to adapt.



On 8/8/17 6:43 PM, Marcus Daniels wrote:


Grant writes:


"On the other hand... evolution /is/ stochastic. (You actually did not 
disagree with me on that. You only said that the reason I was right 
was another one.) "



I think of logic programming systems as a traditional tool of AI 
research (e.g. Prolog, now Curry, similar capabilities implemented in 
Lisp) from the age before the AI winter.  These systems provide a very 
flexible way to pose constraint problems.  But one problem is that 
breadth-first and depth-first search are just fast ways to find 
answers.  Recent work seems to have shifted to SMT solvers and 
specialized constraint solving algorithms, but these have somewhat 
less expressiveness as programming languages.  Meanwhile, machine 
learning has come on the scene in a big way and tasks traditionally 
associated with old-school AI, like natural language processing, are 
now matched or even dominated using neural nets (LSTM).  I find the 
range of capabilities provided by groups like nlp.stanford.edu really 
impressive -- there examples of both approaches (logic programming and 
machine learning) and then don't need to be mutually exclusive.



Quantum annealing is one area where the two may increasingly come 
together by using physical phenomena to accelerate the rate at which 
high dimensional discrete systems can be solved, without relying on 
fragile or domain-specific heuristics.



I often use evolutionary algorithms for hard optimization problems.  
Genetic algorithms, for example, are robust to noise (or if you like 
ambiguity) in fitness functions, and they are trivial to parallelize.



Marcus

----
*From:* Friam  on behalf of Grant Holland 


*Sent:* Tuesday, August 8, 2017 4:51:18 PM
*To:* The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group; glen ☣
*Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] Future of humans and artificial intelligence

Thanks for throwing in on this one, Glen. Your thoughts are 
ever-insightful. And ever-entertaining!


For example, I did not know that von Neumann put forth a set theory.

On the other hand... evolution /is/ stochastic. (You actually did not 
disagree with me on that. You only said that the reason I was right 
was another one.) A good book on the stochasticity of evolution is 
"Chance and Necessity" by Jacques Monod. (I just finished rereading it 
for the second time. And that proved quite fruitful.)


G.


On 8/8/17 12:44 PM, glen ☣ wrote:

I'm not sure how Asimov intended them.  But the three laws is a trope that clearly shows 
the inadequacy of deontological ethics.  Rules are fine as far as they go.  But they 
don't go very far.  We can see this even in the foundations of mathematics, the 
unification of physics, and polyphenism/robustness in biology.  Von Neumann (Burks) said 
it best when he said: "But in the complicated parts of formal logic it is always one 
order of magnitude harder to tell what an object can do than to produce the object." 
 Or, if you don't like that, you can see the same perspective in his iterative 
construction of sets as an alternative to the classical conception.

The point being that reality, traditionally, has shown more expressiveness than 
any of our rule sets.

There are ways to handle the mismatch in expressivity between reality versus 
our rule sets.  Stochasticity is the measure of the extent to which a rule set 
matches a set of patterns.  But Grant's right to qualify that with evolution, 
not because of the way evolution is stochastic, but because evolution requires 
a unit to regularly (or sporadically) sync with its environment.

An AI (or a rule-obsessed human) that sprouts fully formed from Zeus' head will 
*always* fail.  It's guaranteed to fail because syncing with the environment 
isn't *built in*.  The sync isn't part of the AI's onto- or phylo-geny.






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Re: [FRIAM] Future of humans and artificial intelligence

[Grant Holland]

Nick,

In science, these three terms are generally interchangeable. Their 
common usage is that they all describe activities, or "events", that are 
"subject to chance". Such activities, events or processes that are 
described by these terms are governed by the laws of probability. They 
all describe activities, events, or "happenings" whose repetitions do 
not always produce the same outcomes even when given the same inputs 
every time (initial conditions). In other words, uncertainty is involved.


However, like most words, these enjoy other usage, meanings, as well. 
For example "random" is sometimes used to mean "disorganized" or 
"lacking in specific pattern". This is a very different meaning than 
"activities that don't always produce the same outcome given the same 
inputs". Consider what a math formula for each of these tow meanings 
wold consist of. One of them would be based on probabilities; but the 
other would involve stationary relationships.


On 8/8/17 5:31 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:


Grant,

I think I know the answer to this question, but want to make sure:

What is the difference beween calling a process “stochastic”, 
“indeterminate”, or “random”?


Nick

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/ 
<http://home.earthlink.net/%7Enickthompson/naturaldesigns/>


*From:*Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] *On Behalf Of *Grant 
Holland

*Sent:* Tuesday, August 08, 2017 6:51 PM
*To:* The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group 
; glen ☣

*Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] Future of humans and artificial intelligence

Thanks for throwing in on this one, Glen. Your thoughts are 
ever-insightful. And ever-entertaining!


For example, I did not know that von Neumann put forth a set theory.

On the other hand... evolution /is/ stochastic. (You actually did not 
disagree with me on that. You only said that the reason I was right 
was another one.) A good book on the stochasticity of evolution is 
"Chance and Necessity" by Jacques Monod. (I just finished rereading it 
for the second time. And that proved quite fruitful.)


G.

On 8/8/17 12:44 PM, glen ☣ wrote:

I'm not sure how Asimov intended them.  But the three laws is a trope that clearly 
shows the inadequacy of deontological ethics.  Rules are fine as far as they go.  But 
they don't go very far.  We can see this even in the foundations of mathematics, the 
unification of physics, and polyphenism/robustness in biology.  Von Neumann (Burks) said 
it best when he said: "But in the complicated parts of formal logic it is always one 
order of magnitude harder to tell what an object can do than to produce the object." 
 Or, if you don't like that, you can see the same perspective in his iterative 
construction of sets as an alternative to the classical conception.

The point being that reality, traditionally, has shown more expressiveness 
than any of our rule sets.

There are ways to handle the mismatch in expressivity between reality 
versus our rule sets.  Stochasticity is the measure of the extent to which a 
rule set matches a set of patterns.  But Grant's right to qualify that with 
evolution, not because of the way evolution is stochastic, but because 
evolution requires a unit to regularly (or sporadically) sync with its 
environment.

An AI (or a rule-obsessed human) that sprouts fully formed from Zeus' head 
will *always* fail.  It's guaranteed to fail because syncing with the 
environment isn't *built in*.  The sync isn't part of the AI's onto- or 
phylo-geny.




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Re: [FRIAM] Future of humans and artificial intelligence

[Grant Holland]

Thanks for throwing in on this one, Glen. Your thoughts are 
ever-insightful. And ever-entertaining!


For example, I did not know that von Neumann put forth a set theory.

On the other hand... evolution /is/ stochastic. (You actually did not 
disagree with me on that. You only said that the reason I was right was 
another one.) A good book on the stochasticity of evolution is "Chance 
and Necessity" by Jacques Monod. (I just finished rereading it for the 
second time. And that proved quite fruitful.)


G.


On 8/8/17 12:44 PM, glen ☣ wrote:

I'm not sure how Asimov intended them.  But the three laws is a trope that clearly shows 
the inadequacy of deontological ethics.  Rules are fine as far as they go.  But they 
don't go very far.  We can see this even in the foundations of mathematics, the 
unification of physics, and polyphenism/robustness in biology.  Von Neumann (Burks) said 
it best when he said: "But in the complicated parts of formal logic it is always one 
order of magnitude harder to tell what an object can do than to produce the object." 
 Or, if you don't like that, you can see the same perspective in his iterative 
construction of sets as an alternative to the classical conception.

The point being that reality, traditionally, has shown more expressiveness than 
any of our rule sets.

There are ways to handle the mismatch in expressivity between reality versus 
our rule sets.  Stochasticity is the measure of the extent to which a rule set 
matches a set of patterns.  But Grant's right to qualify that with evolution, 
not because of the way evolution is stochastic, but because evolution requires 
a unit to regularly (or sporadically) sync with its environment.

An AI (or a rule-obsessed human) that sprouts fully formed from Zeus' head will 
*always* fail.  It's guaranteed to fail because syncing with the environment 
isn't *built in*.  The sync isn't part of the AI's onto- or phylo-geny.




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Re: [FRIAM] Future of humans and artificial intelligence

[Grant Holland]

Pamela,

I expect that they have! And I certainly hope so. I simply have not 
found them yet after some earnest looking. Can you please send me some 
references?? Right now I suspect that the heart of machine learning has 
the pearl, and I'm just now turning there.


And I'm optimistically suspicious that those entropic functionals that 
you find in information theory and that are built on top of conditional 
probability (relative entropy, mutual information, conditional entropy, 
entropy rate, etc.) hold promise...and that at the heart of machine 
learning they lay lurking - or could.


Anyway, thx for the note; and /please/ send me any related referernces!

Grant


On 8/8/17 11:20 AM, Pamela McCorduck wrote:
Grant, does it really seem plausible to you that the thousands of 
crack researchers at Stanford, Carnegie Mellon, Google, MIT, Cal 
Berkeley, and other places have not seen this? And found remedies?


Just for FRIAM’s information, John McCarthy used to call Asimov’s 
Three Laws Talmudic. Sorry I don’t know enough about the Talmud to 
agree or disagree.





On Aug 8, 2017, at 1:42 AM, Marcus Daniels <mailto:mar...@snoutfarm.com>> wrote:


Grant writes:

"Fortunately, the AI folks don't seem to see - yet - that they are 
stumbling all over the missing piece: stochastic adaptation. You 
know, like in evolution: chance mutations. AI is still down with a 
bad case of causal determinism. But I expect they will fairly shortly 
get over that. Watch out."


What is probability, physically?   It could be an illusion and that 
there is no such thing as an independent observer.   Even if that is 
true, sampling techniques are used in many machine learning 
algorithms -- it is not a question of if they work, it is an academic 
question of why they work.


Marcus

*From:*Friam <mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com>> on behalf of Grant Holland 
mailto:grant.holland...@gmail.com>>

*Sent:*Monday, August 7, 2017 11:38:03 PM
*To:*The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group; Carl Tollander
*Subject:*Re: [FRIAM] Future of humans and artificial intelligence
That sounds right, Carl. Asimov's three "laws" of robotics are more 
like Asimov's three "wishes" for robotics. AI entities are already no 
longer servants. They have become machine learners. They have 
actually learned to project conditional probability. The cat is out 
of the barn. Or is it that the horse is out of the bag?
Whatever. Fortunately, the AI folks don't seem to see - yet - that 
they are stumbling all over the missing piece: stochastic adaptation. 
You know, like in evolution: chance mutations. AI is still down with 
a bad case of causal determinism. But I expect they will fairly 
shortly get over that. Watch out.
And we still must answer Stephen Hawking's burning question: Is 
intelligence a survivable trait?


On 8/7/17 9:54 PM, Carl Tollander wrote:
It seems to me that there are many here in the US who are not 
entirely on board with Asimov's First Law of Robotics, at least 
insofar as it may apply to themselves, so I suspect notions of 
"reining it in" are probably not going to fly.





On Mon, Aug 7, 2017 at 1:57 AM, Alfredo Covaleda 
Vélezmailto:alfr...@covaleda.co>>wrote:


Future will be quite interesting. How will be the human being of
the future? For sure not a human being in the way we know.


http://m.eltiempo.com/tecnosfera/novedades-tecnologia/peligros-y-avances-de-la-inteligencia-artificial-para-los-humanos-117158

<http://m.eltiempo.com/tecnosfera/novedades-tecnologia/peligros-y-avances-de-la-inteligencia-artificial-para-los-humanos-117158>


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Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
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Re: [FRIAM] Future of humans and artificial intelligence

[Grant Holland]

Marcus,
Good points, all. I suggest you turn to the Copenhagen interpretation of 
Quantum Mechanics (the "usual interpretation") for musings on your very 
pertinent question about "Why probabilities in the physical world".

Although, I'm sure you have already looked there.
Of course, the Copenhagen guys (Heisenberg, Born, etc.) don't really try 
to answer your question either - opting instead to say that theirs is 
merely a theory, a model. And, of course, they are right.
On the other hand, other physicists (i.e. de Broglie, Bohm, Einstein and 
others) have spent a century trying to defend causal determinism against 
the Copenhagen interpretation. These days the defenders of the faith 
have resorted to philosophy over this issue and are considering the 
"ontic" versus the "epistemic". And yet, Copenhagen is still referred to 
as "the usual interpretation", and when QM is taught today, I think, it 
is essentially Copenhagen or some derivative of it. Perhaps Bell's 
theorem has contributed to the longevity of the Copenhagen perspective.



On 8/8/17 2:42 AM, Marcus Daniels wrote:


Grant writes:


"Fortunately, the AI folks don't seem to see - yet - that they are 
stumbling all over the missing piece: stochastic adaptation. You know, 
like in evolution: chance mutations. AI is still down with a bad case 
of causal determinism. But I expect they will fairly shortly get over 
that. Watch out."



What is probability, physically?   It could be an illusion and that 
there is no such thing as an independent observer. Even if that is 
true, sampling techniques are used in many machine learning algorithms 
-- it is not a question of if they work, it is an academic question of 
why they work.



Marcus

--------
*From:* Friam  on behalf of Grant Holland 


*Sent:* Monday, August 7, 2017 11:38:03 PM
*To:* The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group; Carl Tollander
*Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] Future of humans and artificial intelligence

That sounds right, Carl. Asimov's three "laws" of robotics are more 
like Asimov's three "wishes" for robotics. AI entities are already no 
longer servants. They have become machine learners. They have actually 
learned to project conditional probability. The cat is out of the 
barn. Or is it that the horse is out of the bag?


Whatever. Fortunately, the AI folks don't seem to see - yet - that 
they are stumbling all over the missing piece: stochastic adaptation. 
You know, like in evolution: chance mutations. AI is still down with a 
bad case of causal determinism. But I expect they will fairly shortly 
get over that. Watch out.


And we still must answer Stephen Hawking's burning question: Is 
intelligence a survivable trait?



On 8/7/17 9:54 PM, Carl Tollander wrote:
It seems to me that there are many here in the US who are not 
entirely on board with Asimov's First Law of Robotics, at least 
insofar as it may apply to themselves, so I suspect notions of 
"reining it in" are probably not going to fly.





On Mon, Aug 7, 2017 at 1:57 AM, Alfredo Covaleda Vélez 
mailto:alfr...@covaleda.co>> wrote:


Future will be quite interesting. How will be the human being of
the future? For sure not a human being in the way we know.


http://m.eltiempo.com/tecnosfera/novedades-tecnologia/peligros-y-avances-de-la-inteligencia-artificial-para-los-humanos-117158

<http://m.eltiempo.com/tecnosfera/novedades-tecnologia/peligros-y-avances-de-la-inteligencia-artificial-para-los-humanos-117158>


FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
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Re: [FRIAM] Future of humans and artificial intelligence

[Grant Holland]

That sounds right, Carl. Asimov's three "laws" of robotics are more like 
Asimov's three "wishes" for robotics. AI entities are already no longer 
servants. They have become machine learners. They have actually learned 
to project conditional probability. The cat is out of the barn. Or is it 
that the horse is out of the bag?


Whatever. Fortunately, the AI folks don't seem to see - yet - that they 
are stumbling all over the missing piece: stochastic adaptation. You 
know, like in evolution: chance mutations. AI is still down with a bad 
case of causal determinism. But I expect they will fairly shortly get 
over that. Watch out.


And we still must answer Stephen Hawking's burning question: Is 
intelligence a survivable trait?



On 8/7/17 9:54 PM, Carl Tollander wrote:
It seems to me that there are many here in the US who are not entirely 
on board with Asimov's First Law of Robotics, at least insofar as it 
may apply to themselves, so I suspect notions of "reining it in" are 
probably not going to fly.





On Mon, Aug 7, 2017 at 1:57 AM, Alfredo Covaleda Vélez 
mailto:alfr...@covaleda.co>> wrote:


Future will be quite interesting. How will be the human being of
the future? For sure not a human being in the way we know.


http://m.eltiempo.com/tecnosfera/novedades-tecnologia/peligros-y-avances-de-la-inteligencia-artificial-para-los-humanos-117158




FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe
http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com

FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/
 by Dr. Strangelove





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Re: [FRIAM] [[Narcissism Again]again]

[Grant Holland]

Pamela,

Good points. The arrangement in the US is apparently that the government 
(NSF-sponsored funding, universities, labs. etc.) performs basic 
research so that industry does not have to foot that bill or take that 
risk. Then private industry does the lower risk "applied research" to 
put products into the market.


For those who see this ploy as not exactly "capitalism as advertised", 
but rather a highly subsidized machine - I would say that you are 
connecting the dots properly.


Grant


On 1/28/17 4:53 PM, Pamela McCorduck wrote:
Before we blame any particular technology for what seems like an 
epidemic of narcissism, we ought to remember that the 80s—or was it 
the 70s?—were widely known as the Me Decade. Either way, long before 
social media.


I’m always deeply amused by the libertarians who tell us how wicked 
government interference is at exactly the time they’re making their 
plush livings off a technology that wouldn’t have existed without 
decades (the fifties, the sixties, the seventies) of government 
investment. Would the Internet have happened anyway? Hard to imagine 
private investors sitting still for an investment that wouldn’t pay 
off for almost half a century.


So, drifting afar from a reality base isn’t unknown in Silly Valley.


On Jan 28, 2017, at 2:31 PM, Nick Thompson 
mailto:nickthomp...@earthlink.net>> wrote:


Steve –
Is there any way in which the computer industry has contributed to 
the narcissistic pandemic that is sweeping the world.  Is there 
anything that participants in the computer industry could do tip the 
world back toward a fact-based attractor?
If the answer to that question is no, then I suppose that starting 
that barfight might be your highest and best use.  Let me know which 
bar you are going to, so I can come and watch.

But I think the question is yes.
Nick
Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
Clark University
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/ 

*From:*Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com]*On Behalf Of*Steven A 
Smith

*Sent:*Saturday, January 28, 2017 1:15 PM
*To:*The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group 
mailto:friam@redfish.com>>

*Subject:*Re: [FRIAM] [[Narcissism Again]again]
Toolkit? This rusty old box filled with rusty things that once 
resembled sharp tools and useful fasteners?


I was thinking that if we *all* burned one gallon of petrol *less* a 
month (and everyone "like us") the demand would drop commensurately 
and the cost/value proposition for the pipelines we all love to hate 
would (eventually) drop below a certain threshold.


Similarly, if we *all* made it a point to have one *more* thoughtful 
conversation (not just a rant) with those not already in the choir,  
we might reverse the tide of *ugly* populism and replace it with 
something more human (maybe still a form of populism, but not 
nationalistic/xenophobic/misogynistic?).


If we *all* quit worrying about how the Trump Ascension was going to 
hurt *our* personal context and recognized how it was going to hurt 
(or in some twisted or strange way help) the larger context and then 
only consider how our personal context would be effected in turn by 
the larger context (is a happier, healthier, more informed society 
good or bad for you and your family?  vs can I pay lower taxes, get 
more government services and be afforded less expensive access to 
other resources nominally part of the commons?)


et cetera, ad nauseum

I know I'm preaching (somewhat) to the choir here, time to take my 
own advice and go start a barfight with a Trumpian or something,

 - Steve


Ok Steve,
The only reason to accept responsibility is to Take Charge.
I have been able to think of only one concrete thing that I can do 
with my limited set of skills:  Write Apple and tell them to stop 
calling new products “I-this” and “I-that.”  When are they going to 
release the WE-phone.

You must have something in your tool kit more effective than that!
Nick
Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
Clark University
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/ 

*From:*Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com]*On Behalf Of*Steven 
A Smith

*Sent:*Saturday, January 28, 2017 9:38 AM
*To:*The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee 
Group 

*Subject:*Re: [FRIAM] [[Narcissism Again]again]




What can WE hobbits do?

Scratch our hairy knuckles and indulge in second dinnerses?

Fun aside, I DO appreciate your sentiment here and agree that the 
Narcissist in Chief is at least partly a (focused) reflection of our 
own worst qualities, and *perhaps* if we tend our own garden even a 
little, it will help with the greater picture.


- Candide



Nick
Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
Clark University
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/natura

Re: [FRIAM] Is the new president mentally ill?

[Grant Holland]

Eric,

You make a good point about your concerns being orthogonal to mine.

To my point, though... one of the things that Trump /is/ doing to 
exacerbate my concern is to nominate folks (e.g. the senator from 
Alabama to AG) who have /vowed/ to promote further class 
marginalization, and have demonstrated that such is their propensity and 
commitment - by, for example, supporting the KKK.


Grant


On 1/12/17 12:12 PM, Eric Charles wrote:

Grant, et al.,
I fully understand concern for the effect that electing Trump might 
have on the attitudes of the larger population. I have relatives who 
are, in fact, moving from rural areas, where discrimination was 
already noticeable, to Canada, in anticipation of increased 
discrimination (inspired by what, to them, Trump's victory 
represents). However, I see that as conceptually distinct from concern 
over what Trump himself might do. They are moving due to concerns 
about their local neighbors, not about what might happen in the White 
House or in Trump Towers, and not because they are afraid of Trump 
being kept in proximity to the football.


As for the VP and the cabinet deciding to try to ouster him, that 
seems unlikely, unless he becomes considerably more erratic. The "out" 
provided by the 25th amendment is clearly intended for someone who 
becomes unstable in office. The law requires people the president put 
in place to declare that they no longer have faith in him, which 
implies a fundamental change in the character of the person whose 
agenda they agreed to serve.


The amendment is not intended to remove a narcissistic person, who was 
such when elected, and is still such in office. If it becomes clear 
that he is fundamentally unfit for office, they will turn against him, 
but "unfit" by their standards will mean that he consistently disrupts 
the ability of the party to get things done, not merely that he gives 
erratic press conferences and tweets in the middle of the night. As 
far as general decorum, recall that "whip it out like LBJ" is a 
perfectly valid expression. As far as mental incompetence, recall that 
Regan was pretty far gone by the end of his time, and the people 
around him kept things running fairly well. So long as the party can 
keep things running fairly well despite Trump's flaws, there won't be 
a sufficient number of people willing to sign.


P.S. Out of curiosity, does anyone else know someone actually moving 
as a result of the election?









---
Eric P. Charles, Ph.D.
Supervisory Survey Statistician
U.S. Marine Corps

On Thu, Jan 12, 2017 at 11:57 AM, Grant Holland 
mailto:grant.holland...@gmail.com>> wrote:


Eric,

It looks to me like you are missing what people like myself and
Jochen are very afraid of - the extreme marginalization of certain
classes of people versus other classes of people. And when I say
"extreme", I mean extreme.

I grew up in the American South in the 1950s where lynchings of a
certain class of people still occurred. That culture strictly
forbade the pursuit of social and economic opportunity for that
class, at the threat of beatings and death. And it was justified
via an appeal to Christianity! For example, my mother (I'm a white
guy) took over my Sunday school class in order to teach us (11
year old kids) that racism is Biblically justified. (She failed of
course in her attempt at demonstrating that.)

So I know by experience that the danger of that kind of
marginalization is real. (The propensity for a return to that
world is alive and kicking even today in the deep South.) It is
palpable and I recognize it in today's cultural and political
manifestations.

I know that many of my friends who voted for Trump either think
that I am simply a sore Hillary lover (I'm not really a fan of
hers), or that I'm senselessly paranoid. But I think my fears are
real and even probable. I'm way beyond mere disagreement. (That's
where I was in 2000 when W won.)

And I do not think that Jochen's fears are unjustified. Listen to
him. You don't have to agree, but listen. He comes from a place
that is fresh with the experience, and the consequences, of the
real life manifestations of these phenomena. It happened, and
Jochen knows what the tracks of that animal look like.

Thanks for listening to me!
Grant


On 1/12/17 6:07 AM, Eric Charles wrote:

The comparison of Meryl Streep to Klemperer or von Galen seems
more baffling to me than the original conversation. As some on
social media have been pointing out, she stood in a room full of
like minded people, and spoke their collective mind, with no risk
to her career or her person. She didn't say anything not being
chanted from the rooftops by hundreds of thousands of other
people, and said publically,

Re: [FRIAM] Is the new president mentally ill?

[Grant Holland]

Eric,

It looks to me like you are missing what people like myself and Jochen 
are very afraid of - the extreme marginalization of certain classes of 
people versus other classes of people. And when I say "extreme", I mean 
extreme.


I grew up in the American South in the 1950s where lynchings of a 
certain class of people still occurred. That culture strictly forbade 
the pursuit of social and economic opportunity for that class, at the 
threat of beatings and death. And it was justified via an appeal to 
Christianity! For example, my mother (I'm a white guy) took over my 
Sunday school class in order to teach us (11 year old kids) that racism 
is Biblically justified. (She failed of course in her attempt at 
demonstrating that.)


So I know by experience that the danger of that kind of marginalization 
is real. (The propensity for a return to that world is alive and kicking 
even today in the deep South.) It is palpable and I recognize it in 
today's cultural and political manifestations.


I know that many of my friends who voted for Trump either think that I 
am simply a sore Hillary lover (I'm not really a fan of hers), or that 
I'm senselessly paranoid. But I think my fears are real and even 
probable. I'm way beyond mere disagreement. (That's where I was in 2000 
when W won.)


And I do not think that Jochen's fears are unjustified. Listen to him. 
You don't have to agree, but listen. He comes from a place that is fresh 
with the experience, and the consequences, of the real life 
manifestations of these phenomena. It happened, and Jochen knows what 
the tracks of that animal look like.


Thanks for listening to me!
Grant

On 1/12/17 6:07 AM, Eric Charles wrote:
The comparison of Meryl Streep to Klemperer or von Galen seems more 
baffling to me than the original conversation. As some on social media 
have been pointing out, she stood in a room full of like minded 
people, and spoke their collective mind, with no risk to her career or 
her person. She didn't say anything not being chanted from the 
rooftops by hundreds of thousands of other people, and said 
publically, by prominent celebrities and members of the press every day.


Are we really worried Meryl will be disappeared in the coming weeks, 
and gassed? Are we worried she will be hit with false charges, 
arrested without trial, and have her properties become forfeit to the 
state? Are we even worried she might be blacklisted and never act 
again? And even if she did, are we worried she won't be able to get by 
in this world and support her family with the $75 million she already 
has? Those are honest questions.


Maybe I'm very confused about what "courageous" means. I would 
consider the average BLM marcher, or women's march participant, more 
courageous. They could be attacked by police or counter protesters, 
they could be arrested, they could be fired from their jobs, they 
could become ostracized by their communities, etc. Heck, Jill Stein 
got herself arrested at Standing Rock and hardly anyone seemed to 
notice. I'm not saying Meryl didn't give a good speech, or that it was 
unimportant, but I honestly wonder what risk we really think she faces 
as a result of that speech, which leads us to dub her act so 
courageous, and to compare it to the actions of the other individuals 
mentioned.



---
Eric P. Charles, Ph.D.
Supervisory Survey Statistician
U.S. Marine Corps

On Thu, Jan 12, 2017 at 2:24 AM, Jochen Fromm > wrote:


Meryl Streep reminds me of Clemens August Graf von Galen, who was
one of the few bishops that had the courage to criticize the Nazi
regime. He was a bishop in my hometown Münster near the Dutch
border. In his sermons he criticized that the Nazis were killing
innocent disabled people. The program was named T4. The Nazis let
him live because he was too popular among the people.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clemens_August_Graf_von_Galen


Many other priests and bishops were imprisoned by the Gestapo
 (the secret state police) in concentration camps and died. In St.
Hedwig's cathedral in Berlin many of those are mentioned on
memorial plagues. While it may be futile to resist, those who have
the courage to do it are not forgotten.

It can also help to document the things that are unfolding, the
violations of human rights, the corruption, and the injustice. In
Dresden there was a Jewish professor Victor Klemperer who covered
the actions of the Nazi regime in his diaries and journals. He was
an important witness of all the injustice that happened.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victor_Klemperer


-J.


 Original message 
From: glen ☣ mailto:geprope...@gmail.com>>
Date: 1/12/17 02:07 (GMT+01:00)
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
mailto:friam@

Re: [FRIAM] Is the new president mentally ill?

[Grant Holland]

Steve,

Thanks for your very well-considered response! Very insightful.

Grant


On 1/11/17 9:34 AM, Steven A Smith wrote:

Carter -

I found the article an excellent addition to this discussion.

/Instead of continuing the fruitless "disease" argument, we should
address these questions directly. Taking a determinist
consequentialist position allows us to do so more effectively. We
should blame and stigmatize people for conditions where blame and
stigma are the most useful methods for curing or preventing the
condition, and we should allow patients to seek treatment whenever
it is available and effective.
/

Unfortunately It would appear that blame and stigma are not effective 
with our president elect who is a brand, who is an empire, who is an 
icon of narcissistic abuse of others.  I would also appear that he 
would not accept, much less seek treatment.  I believe this is what 
makes him "Teflon"... his complete denial (or unawareness) of there 
being a problem.   "The right way, the wrong way, the Trump way" 
prevails.  Our new "Narcissist in Chief" is about to take his throne, 
and as long as he has many subjects to worship him, he will remain there.


While "the Donald" IS the imminent delivery mechanism of our 
(potentially devastating) undoing,  it is his myriad supporters from 
many (expected and not) walks of life who might need treatment or 
stigmatization.   The "elites" and "bleeding heart liberals"  would be 
the ones under equal scrutiny about now, had "the Hillary" squeeked 
into office he way the Donald did.


I believe we are a nation (world) at risk of collapsing under our own 
Neuroses.  I offer the Buddhist concept that we all see the world as 
we choose to, roughly in one of the four categories: "World as 
Battleground;  World as Trap;  World as Lover; World as Self".   I 
have aligned myself modestly with the "elites and bleeding hearts" to 
the extent that they tend to choose the latter 2 over the former and 
avoid the "self righteous right" and "knee jerk conservatives" for 
*their propensity* to frame everything as Battleground and Trap.  My 
support of Hillary and Obama broke down where they lapsed too far into 
Battleground/Trap.


I hope that the "Million Woman March" coming up carries more of the 
Lover/Self than the Battleground/Trap.  Women (and many others) have 
good reason to see the Trump Ascendency as a Trap and a Call to Arms, 
but I believe confrontation alone only propagates the problem.


After a bad trauma, radical debridement or cauterization, even 
amputation are often called for.  Ultimately it is the wound/surgery 
aftercare and systemic support that returns the patient to vital 
health.   The "make America Great Again" crowd do not nurture nor 
support, it just isn't in their kit.  The nurturers of our culture 
need to remain ready to do what we do as the self-limiting (but 
possibly huge) damage comes to it's logical conclusion.


Carry On,
 - Steve


http://lesswrong.com/lw/2as/diseased_thinking_dissolving_questions_about/

Seriously, what's the point of diagnosing him?

On Jan 10, 2017 11:55 PM, "Jochen Fromm" > wrote:


I posted this on Google+, since we have a lot of psychologists
here you might be interested too?

Psychologists, therapists and mental health professionals seem to
be fascinated and terrified alike by the new president who has
not only become a brand, but is nothing but a brand:

1. he seems to be a textbook case of a narcissistic personality
disorder

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/richard-greene/is-donald-trump-mentally_b_13693174.html



2. he was elected although he imitates the behavior of an massive
Internet troll

https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-embodied-mind/201701/unified-theory-trump



3. he displays a total lack of honesty and truth-telling
http://www.politifact.com/personalities/donald-trump/


All DSM-5 criteria of a narcissistic personality disorder seem to
be fulfilled. Should we be worried? What do you think? He shows
a clear need for instant retaliation if someone criticizes him,
which is obviously some form a narcissistic rage. It is clearly
more than a self-serving bias, and such a deep personality
disorder is not harmless at all.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-serving_bias


The problem is he is in a position where he can pull the strings
now, as the commander in chief of the most powerful army. The US
has about 2000 nuclear weapons on high alert, and there is a
soldier with the nuclear football following the president at all
times. What could go wrong?
https:/

Re: [FRIAM] Is the new president mentally ill?

[Grant Holland]

Jochen, Nick,

I have the same concerns. Thx for speaking up.

Grant


On 1/11/17 12:11 AM, Nick Thompson wrote:


Hi, Jochen,

I tried a couple of weeks ago to get everybody worried about this and 
nobody bit.  Briefly, in the first few months Trump discovers that he 
cannot do anything domestically because … alas …. of the 
constitution.  He then promotes riots in the streets followed by the 
“reluctant” imposition of martial law.  Or, he turns to foreign policy 
and gets into a lovers spat with Putin and reaches for the football.


The only comfort I have is that I knew people in 2008 and 2012 who 
were as afraid of Obama as I am of Trump, and nothing bad happened.  
Well, nothing bad happened because of Obama.


The problem may be that it’s SO scary that we don’t know where to 
start.  There are demonstrations planned all over the country, locally 
this week, and in Washington after the Inauguration.  While these may 
prevent Trump from doing anything legislatively,  it surely does 
address the existential crisis that lurks beyond these early 
frustrations.


According to the Constitution, the present may be declared incompetent 
by a majority of his senior administration … Cabinet, mostly I think.  
But notice that he has stacked the cabinet with people who are, if 
anything, loonier than he is, so I very much doubt that any of them 
would vote to remove him. Maddis, perhaps, but that’s about it.


Impeachment is a very real possibility, but it takes a lot of time, 
and a crazy President has enormous power to make the country pay for 
trying.


I have a few pro-Trumpers who reassure me that no rational man would 
take the kinds of risks that I fear, that like all bullies he will 
back down when he sees that his tantrums aren’t getting anywhere.  But 
what if he’s not a rational man?  What then?


Nick

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/ 



*From:*Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] *On Behalf Of *Jochen 
Fromm

*Sent:* Tuesday, January 10, 2017 11:55 PM
*To:* The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group 


*Subject:* [FRIAM] Is the new president mentally ill?

I posted this on Google+, since we have a lot of psychologists here 
you might be interested too?


Psychologists, therapists and mental health professionals seem to be 
fascinated and terrified alike by the new president who has not only 
become a brand, but is nothing but a brand:


1. he seems to be a textbook case of a narcissistic personality disorder
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/richard-greene/is-donald-trump-mentally_b_13693174.html

2. he was elected although he imitates the behavior of an massive 
Internet troll

https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-embodied-mind/201701/unified-theory-trump

3. he displays a total lack of honesty and truth-telling
http://www.politifact.com/personalities/donald-trump/

All DSM-5 criteria of a narcissistic personality disorder seem to be 
fulfilled. Should we be worried? What do you think? He shows a clear 
need for instant retaliation if someone criticizes him, which is 
obviously some form a narcissistic rage. It is clearly more than a 
self-serving bias, and such a deep personality disorder is not 
harmless at all.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-serving_bias

The problem is he is in a position where he can pull the strings now, 
as the commander in chief of the most powerful army. The US has about 
2000 nuclear weapons on high alert, and there is a soldier with the 
nuclear football following the president at all times. What could go 
wrong?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_football

-Jochen




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Re: [FRIAM] scraping a web site

[Grant Holland]

Cool move, Glen.


On 1/4/17 11:05 AM, Nick Thompson wrote:


My God, Glen,

*/Freedom/*

Now I have to think what I want to do next.  In some ideal world, I 
would sign up for one of those websites where for not too much money 
you can edit a web site, and bring the old site in and start working 
on it.  But surely life is not that easy, right?


This is amazing.  I never thought I would escape Earthlink.  They have 
the worst help system … the kind where you have to repeat your 
question over and over again.  I am breathing deeply.


Nick

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

-Original Message-
From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of glen ep 
ropella

Sent: Wednesday, January 04, 2017 10:29 AM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group 
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] scraping a web site

Hey Nick,

I went ahead and downloaded your page(s) and put it up here:

http://agent-based-modeling.com/ntnd/nickthompson/naturaldesigns/index.html

Let me know if I've missed anything. I'm happy to help move it wherever.

-glen

On 01/03/2017 08:49 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:

> I am in the uncomfortable position of being bound by threads of steel

> to Earthlink.  Many, MANY, years I go I started a website on

> Earthlink, {http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

> 

>

> }, and put a lot of my writing, and some commentary up on it.  The

> website creation and editing medium (trellix) was pretty good for its

> time, and there are many ways that I find the site quite satisfying.

> But gradually Earthlink has withdrawn its support, and now I am not

> sure I could get in to edit or change it.  Meantime, Research Gate has

> gotten started, and provides a somewhat better place to meet the world

> and archive my stuff.  And also, having the site on earthlink binds me

> to them and their 22 dollar a month fee.  So. …

>

>

>

> I am wondering if there is a way (or a service that would) scrape 
the website and, possibly, dump it into a new and more reliable, more 
website creation medium?  Please, ambulatory knowledge only.  I don’t 
want a people doing deep searches to answer this  question .


--

glen ep ropella ⊥ 971-280-5699



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Re: [FRIAM] probability vs. statistics (was Re: Model of induction)

[Grant Holland]

And I completely agree with Eric. But we can language it real simply and 
intuitively by just looking at what a probability space is. For further 
simplicity lets keep it to a finite probability space. (Neither a finite 
nor an infinite one says anything about "time".)


A finite probability space has 3 elements: 1) a set of sample points 
called "the sample space", 2) a set of events, and 3) a set of 
probabilities /for the events/. (An infinite probability space is 
strongly similar.)


But what is this "set of events"? That's the question that is being 
discussed on this thread. It turns out that the events for a finite 
space is nothing more than /the set of all possible combinations of the 
sample points/. (Formally the event set is something called a "sigma 
algebra", but no matter.) So, an event scan be thought of simply /all 
//combination//s of the sample points/.


Notice that it is the events that have probabilities - not the sample 
points. Of course it turns out that each of the sample points happens to 
be a  (trivial) combination of the sample space - therefore it has a 
probability too!


So, the events already /have/ probabilities by virtue of just being in a 
probability space. They don't have to be "selected", "chosen" or any 
such thing. They "just sit there" and have probabilities - all of them. 
The notion of time is never mentioned or required.


Admittedly, this formal (mathematical) definition of "event" is not 
equivalent to the one that you will find in everyday usage. The everyday 
one /does/ involve time. So you could say that everyday usage of "event" 
is "an application" of the formal "event" used in probability theory. 
This confusion between the everyday "event" and the formal "event" may 
be the root of the issue.


Jus' sayin'.

Grant


On 12/14/16 11:36 AM, glen ☣ wrote:

Ha!  Yay!  Yes, now I feel like we're discussing the radicality (radicalness?) 
of Platonic math ... and how weird mathematicians sound (to me) when they say 
we're discovering theorems rather than constructing them. 8^)

Perhaps it's helpful to think about the "axiom of choice"?  Is a "choosable" element 
somehow distinct from a "chosen" element?  Does the act of choosing change the element in some way 
I'm unaware of?  Does choosability require an agent exist and (eventually) _do_ the choosing?



On 12/14/2016 10:24 AM, Eric Charles wrote:

Ack! Well... I guess now we're in the muck of what the heck probability and 
statistics are for mathematicians vs. scientists. Of note, my understanding is 
that statistics was a field for at least a few decades before it was specified 
in a formal enough way to be invited into the hallows of mathematics 
departments, and that it is still frequently viewed with suspicion there.

Glen states: /We talk of "selecting" or "choosing" subsets or elements from larger sets.  But such 
"selection" isn't an action in time.  Such "selection" is an already extant property of that 
organization of sets./

I find such talk quite baffling. When I talk about selecting or choosing or assigning, I am talking 
about an action in time. Often I'm talking about an action that I personally performed. "You 
are in condition A. You are in condition B. You are in condition A." etc. Maybe I flip a coin 
when you walk into my lab room, maybe I pre-generated some random numbers, maybe I look at the 
second hand of my watch as soon as you walk in, maybe I write down a number 
"arbitrarily", etc. At any rate, you are not in a condition before I put you in one, and 
whatever it is I want to measure about you hasn't happened yet.

I fully admit that we can model the system without reference to time, if we want to. Such efforts 
might yield keen insights. If Glen had said that we can usefully model what we are interested in as 
an organized set with such-and-such properties, and time no where to be found, that might seem 
pretty reasonable. But that would be a formal model produced for specific purposes, not the actual 
phenomenon of interest. Everything interesting that we want to describe as "probable" and 
all the conclusions we want to come to "statistically" are, for the lab scientist, time 
dependent phenomena. (I assert.)



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Re: [FRIAM] probability vs. statistics (was Re: Model of induction)

[Grant Holland]

Glen,

On closer reading of the issue you are interested in, and upon 
re-consulting the sources I was thinking of (Bunge and Popper), I can 
see that neither of those sources directly address the question of 
whether time must be involved in order for probability theory to come 
into play. Nevertheless, I  think you may be interested in these two 
sources anyway.


The works that I've been reading from these two folks are: /Causality 
and Modern Science/ by Mario Bunge and /The Logic of Scientific 
Discovery/ by Karl Popper. Bunge takes (positive) probability to 
essentially be the complement of causation. Thus his book ends up being 
very much about probability. Popper has an eighty page section on 
probability and is well worth reading from a philosophy of science 
perspective. I recommend both of these sources.


While I'm at it, let me add my two cents worth to the question 
concerning the difference between probability and statistics. In my 
view, Probability Theory /should be /defined as "the study of 
probability spaces". Its not often defined that way - usually something 
about "random variables" appears in the definition. But the subject of 
probability spaces is more inclusive, so I prefer it.


Secondly, its reasonable to say that a probability space defines 
"events" (at least in the finite case) as essentially a set of 
combinations of the sample space (with a few more specifications). 
Nothing is said in this definition that requires that "the event must 
occur in the future". But it seems that many people (students) insist 
that it has to - or else they can't seem to wrap their minds around it. 
I usually just let them believe that "the event has to be in the future" 
and let it go at that. But there is nothing in the definition of an 
event in a probability space that requires anything about time.


I regard the discipline of statistics (of the Fisher/Neyman type) as the 
study of a particular class of problems pertaining to probability 
distributions and joint distributions: for example, test of hypotheses, 
analysis of variance, and other problems. Statistics makes some very 
specific assumptions that probability theory does not always make: such 
as that there is an underlying theoretical distribution that exhibits 
"parameters" against which are compared "sample distributions" that 
exhibit corresponding "statistics". Moreover, the sweet spot of 
statistics, as I see it, is the moment and central moment functionals 
that, essentially, measure chance variation of random variables.


I admit that some folks would say that probability theory is no more 
inclusive than I described statistics as being. But I think that it is. 
Admittedly, what I have just said is more along the lines of "what it is 
to me" - a statement of preference, rather than an ontic argument that 
"this is what it is".


As long as we're all having a good time...

Grant

On 12/13/16 12:03 PM, glen ☣ wrote:

Yes, definitely.  I intend to bring up deterministic stochasticity >8^D the 
next time I see him.  So a discussion of it in the context QM would be helpful.

On 12/13/2016 10:54 AM, Grant Holland wrote:

This topic was well-developed in the last century. The probabilists argued the 
issues thoroughly. But I find what the philosophers of science have to say 
about the subject a little more pertinent to what you are asking, since your 
discussion seems to be somewhat ontological. In particular I'm thinking of 
Peirce, Popper and especially Mario Bunge. The latter two had to account for 
quantum theory, so are a little more pertinent - and interesting. I can give 
you more specific references if you are interested.



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Re: [FRIAM] probability vs. statistics (was Re: Model of induction)

[Grant Holland]

Glenn,

This topic was well-developed in the last century. The probabilists 
argued the issues thoroughly. But I find what the philosophers of 
science have to say about the subject a little more pertinent to what 
you are asking, since your discussion seems to be somewhat ontological. 
In particular I'm thinking of Peirce, Popper and especially Mario Bunge. 
The latter two had to account for quantum theory, so are a little more 
pertinent - and interesting. I can give you more specific references if 
you are interested.


Take care,

Grant


On 12/12/16 4:47 PM, glen ☣ wrote:

I have a large stash of nonsense I could write that might be on topic.  But the 
topic coincides with an argument I had about 2 weeks ago.  My opponent said 
something generalizing about the use of statistics and I made a comment (I 
thought was funny, but apparently not) that I don't really know what statistics 
_is_.  I also made the mistake of claiming that I _do_ know what probability 
theory is. [sigh]  Fast forward through lots of nonsense to the gist:

My opponent claims that time (the experience of, the passage of, etc.) is required by 
probability theory.  He seemed to hinge his entire argument on the vernacular concept of 
an "event".  My argument was that, akin to the idea that we discover (rather 
than invent) math theorems, probability theory was all about counting -- or measurement.  
So, it's all already there, including things like power sets.  There's no need for time 
to pass in order to measure the size of any given subset of the possibility space.

In any case, I'm a bit of a jerk, obviously.  So, I just assumed I was right 
and didn't look anything up.  But after this conversation here, I decided to 
spend lunch doing so.  And ran across the idea that probability is the forward 
map (given the generator, what phenomena will emerge?) and statistics is the 
inverse map (given the phenomena you see, what's the generator?).  And although 
neither of these really require time, per se, there is a definite role for 
[ir]reversibility or at least asymmetry.

So, does anyone here have an opinion on the ontological status of one or both probability 
and/or statistics?  Am I demonstrating my ignorance by suggesting the "events" we 
study in probability are not (identical to) the events we experience in space & time?


On 12/11/2016 11:31 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:

Would the following work?

*/Imagine you enter a casino that has a thousand roulette tables.  The rumor 
circulates around the casino that one of the wheels is loaded.  So, you call up 
a thousand of your friends and you all work together to find the loaded wheel.  
Why, because if you use your knowledge to play that wheel you will make a LOT 
of money.  Now the problem you all face, of course, is that a run of successes 
is not an infallible sign of a loaded wheel.  In fact, given randomness, it is 
assured that with a thousand players playing a thousand wheels as fast as they 
can, there will be random long runs of successes.  But the longer a run of 
success continues, the greater is the probability that the wheel that produces 
those successes is biased.  So, your team of players would be paid, on this 
account, for beginning to focus its play on those wheels with the longest runs. 
/*

  


FWIW, this, I think, is Peirce’s model of scientific induction.




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Re: [FRIAM] Dawning of the age of stochasticity

[Grant Holland]

Frank,

Thanks for pointing that out. I had not noticed that. I'm afraid that I 
only know Reuben by reputation - mainly from you and Dean; so, no, I did 
not send it to him; and I'm glad that you did.


Thx,

Grant


On 11/15/16 4:24 PM, Frank Wimberly wrote:


Have you sent this to Reuben Hersh?  I just did so. Sine he is the 
first mathematician referenced that seems appropriate.


Frank

Frank Wimberly
Phone (505) 670-9918


On Nov 15, 2016 4:12 PM, "Grant Holland" <mailto:grant.holland...@gmail.com>> wrote:


Thanks, Glenn. I appreciate your persistence in reading the whole
article.

I think this is an important and timely article, mainly, I must
admit, because it is in my current area of research. I'm working
on a different thread than Mumford but my intention is very
sympathetic to his. And I think you might agree that his main
points are that we are now in the "age of stochasticity" and that
we should now integrate "probability thinking" into the
foundations of mathematics.

To address your questions about the article, let me just suggest
to concentrate on his section 1, "Introduction", section 5,
"Putting random variables into the foundations" and section 7,
"Thinking as Bayesian inference". I think that unless one is a
mathematician, etc. the other sections can be skipped without too
much loss. And even within those sections, Mumford has pretty much
segregated math/logic-speak from plain English; and that one can
usually skip the insider stuff when you want to, and still get the
significance of the article.

Grant

On 11/15/16 1:11 PM, glen ep ropella wrote:


Very cool article, Grant!  Thanks.  I started to get lost on
page 11 with the meta-axioms that give the Bernoulli random
variables. *8^(  It's interesting that the wikipedia page

(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continuum_hypothesis#Arguments_for_and_against_CH

<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continuum_hypothesis#Arguments_for_and_against_CH>)
mentions Feferman's semi-intuitionistic ideas in the same
context as Freiling's argument against the CH.

But I was irritated by his maps from the traditional
subdivisions of math to the primitive elements of human
experience.  The geometry one seems right to me.  But either
he didn't finish explaining the referents of analysis, or I
disagree.  Analysis (to me, of course) is all about
_proximity_, the closeness of any bunch of things. 
Differentiation being about the determination of a locality

and integration being about establishing totalities. Although
it's obvious (hindsight is 20/20) how to get to analysis from
the calculus and from forces.  It doesn't strike me that
forces (and acceleration and oscillation) are the primitive
human experiences referred to by analysis, as a domain.

Also, I don't really agree with the map from algebra to
recipes of action.  To me algebra is about the preservation of
some ... "substance" _through_ transformation.  So, like with
forces giving us (well, Newton and Leibniz) a path into the
calculus, the composition of actions in algebra is a kind of
side effect.  The core of it (to me, a non-mathematician!) is
about the preservation of some quality through equivalence
(and equivalence classes).

Obviously, it would be silly for me to argue with Mumford on
this sort of thing.  But I'm wondering whether you (or anyone
on the list) see these experience correlations more as he sees
them?

As usual, I have no comment on the actual topic of the paper. 8^)

On 11/13/2016 10:21 AM, Grant Holland wrote:

http://www.stat.uchicago.edu/~lekheng/courses/191f09/mumford-AMS.pdf

<http://www.stat.uchicago.edu/%7Elekheng/courses/191f09/mumford-AMS.pdf>





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Re: [FRIAM] Dawning of the age of stochasticity

[Grant Holland]

Thanks, Glenn. I appreciate your persistence in reading the whole article.

I think this is an important and timely article, mainly, I must admit, 
because it is in my current area of research. I'm working on a different 
thread than Mumford but my intention is very sympathetic to his. And I 
think you might agree that his main points are that we are now in the 
"age of stochasticity" and that we should now integrate "probability 
thinking" into the foundations of mathematics.


To address your questions about the article, let me just suggest to 
concentrate on his section 1, "Introduction", section 5, "Putting random 
variables into the foundations" and section 7, "Thinking as Bayesian 
inference". I think that unless one is a mathematician, etc. the other 
sections can be skipped without too much loss. And even within those 
sections, Mumford has pretty much segregated math/logic-speak from plain 
English; and that one can usually skip the insider stuff when you want 
to, and still get the significance of the article.


Grant

On 11/15/16 1:11 PM, glen ep ropella wrote:


Very cool article, Grant!  Thanks.  I started to get lost on page 11 
with the meta-axioms that give the Bernoulli random variables. *8^(  
It's interesting that the wikipedia page 
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continuum_hypothesis#Arguments_for_and_against_CH) 
mentions Feferman's semi-intuitionistic ideas in the same context as 
Freiling's argument against the CH.


But I was irritated by his maps from the traditional subdivisions of 
math to the primitive elements of human experience.  The geometry one 
seems right to me.  But either he didn't finish explaining the 
referents of analysis, or I disagree.  Analysis (to me, of course) is 
all about _proximity_, the closeness of any bunch of things.  
Differentiation being about the determination of a locality and 
integration being about establishing totalities. Although it's obvious 
(hindsight is 20/20) how to get to analysis from the calculus and from 
forces.  It doesn't strike me that forces (and acceleration and 
oscillation) are the primitive human experiences referred to by 
analysis, as a domain.


Also, I don't really agree with the map from algebra to recipes of 
action.  To me algebra is about the preservation of some ... 
"substance" _through_ transformation.  So, like with forces giving us 
(well, Newton and Leibniz) a path into the calculus, the composition 
of actions in algebra is a kind of side effect.  The core of it (to 
me, a non-mathematician!) is about the preservation of some quality 
through equivalence (and equivalence classes).


Obviously, it would be silly for me to argue with Mumford on this sort 
of thing.  But I'm wondering whether you (or anyone on the list) see 
these experience correlations more as he sees them?


As usual, I have no comment on the actual topic of the paper. 8^)

On 11/13/2016 10:21 AM, Grant Holland wrote:

http://www.stat.uchicago.edu/~lekheng/courses/191f09/mumford-AMS.pdf






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[FRIAM] Dawning of the age of stochasticity

[Grant Holland]

http://www.stat.uchicago.edu/~lekheng/courses/191f09/mumford-AMS.pdf

Sent from my iPhone
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Re: [FRIAM] Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

[Grant Holland]

Eric, looks 'real' good. Thx for the link. - g

Sent from my iPhone

> On Dec 29, 2015, at 9:19 AM, David Eric Smith  wrote:
> 
> Right.  
> 
> I thought the point was that you can have propositions that are "true" in the 
> sense of being consistent within the system, but not provable by 
> constructions defined within the system.
> 
> But all this, too relies heavily on what you consider to constitute truth 
> value for propositions (some acceptance criterion more liberal than strict 
> constructivism).
> 
> Also, the incompleteness theorems are a particular property of the indexing 
> of the integers, and their maps to proofs.  I believe there are no 
> counterpart problems within the reals, because the cardinality mismatch is 
> not the same.  A book on this that I have liked is Torkel Franzen's 
> relatively short and pleasant survey:
> http://www.amazon.com/G%C3%B6dels-Theorem-Incomplete-Guide-Abuse/dp/1568812388
> 
> If there are any here who don't like non-constructive notions of truth, there 
> is recent work to find out how much of mathematics can be built only from 
> constructive arguments (I think I have this right).  Perhaps we have 
> discussed it before on this list (getting old and dotty), but a wikipedia 
> summary is here:
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Univalent_foundations
> and the group's webpage is here
> https://www.math.ias.edu/sp/univalent/goals
> 
> All best,
> 
> Eric
> 
> 
>> On Dec 28, 2015, at 1:33 PM, Grant Holland wrote:
>> 
>> Oh yes, it need not be neither. It just can't be both!
>> 
>> Grant
>> 
>> Sent from my iPhone
>> 
>>> On Dec 28, 2015, at 3:29 PM, Grant Holland  
>>> wrote:
>>> 
>>> Glen, Eric,
>>> 
>>> If "reality" is complete, must not then (assuming that it is at least as 
>>> complex as arithmetic), aka Godel, it be also inconsistent?
>>> 
>>> Grant
>>> 
>>> Sent from my iPhone
>>> 
>>>>> On Dec 28, 2015, at 11:23 AM, glen  wrote:
>>>>> 
>>>>> On 12/28/2015 06:30 AM, David Eric Smith wrote:
>>>>> A language that is not even internally consistent presumably has no hope 
>>>>> of having an empirically valid semantics, since evidently the universe 
>>>>> "is" something, and there is no semantic notion of ambiguity of its 
>>>>> "being/not-being" some definite thing, structurally analogous to an 
>>>>> inconsistent language's being able to arrive at a contradiction by taking 
>>>>> two paths to answer a single proposition.
>>>> 
>>>> It's not clear to me that the presumption is trustworthy.  Isn't it 
>>>> possible that what is (reality) does not obey some of the structure we 
>>>> rely on for asserting consistency (or completeness)?  In other words, 
>>>> perhaps reality is inconsistent.  Hence, the only language that will be 
>>>> valid, will be an inconsistent language.  Of course, that doesn't imply 
>>>> that just any old inconsistency will be tolerated.  Perhaps reality is 
>>>> only inconsistent in very particular ways and any language that we expect 
>>>> to validate must be 1) inconsistent in all those real ways and 2) in only 
>>>> those real ways.
>>>> 
>>>> Further of course, inconsistency is a bit like paradox in that, once you 
>>>> identify an inconsistency very precisely, you may be able to define a new 
>>>> language that eliminates it. ... which brings us beyond the (mere) points 
>>>> of higher order logics and iterative constructions, to the core idea of 
>>>> context-sensitive construction.  There is no Grand Unifying Anything 
>>>> except the imperative to approach Grand Unified Things.
>>>> 
>>>> And this targets Patrick's argument against the idealists (e.g. 
>>>> libertarians and marxists).  The only reliable ideal is the creation and 
>>>> commitment to ideals.  Each particular ideal is (will be) eventually 
>>>> destroyed.  But for whatever reason, we seem to always create and commit 
>>>> ourselves to ideals.  Old people tend to surrender over time and build 
>>>> huge hairballs of bandaged ideals all glued together with spit and bailing 
>>>> wire.  Any serious conversation with an old person is an attempt to 
>>>> navigate the topology of their iteratively constructed, stigmergic, 
>>

Re: [FRIAM] Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

[Grant Holland]

Nick,

Good question. Before I answer, lemme introduce some terminology. With 
respect to this discussion about "art", I admit that what I'm really 
getting at is my particular take on the "mythos versus logos" issue - 
with my notion of "art" falling on the "mythos" side.


In my notion of "art", the artist "sends a message" to an "audience" 
(receiver) - just like in information theory. But the difference lies is 
the _focus of interest_ in what happens once the message is received by 
the "audience" of the art. In information theory, the focus is on 
whether the message is received correctly, and associated probabilities 
and entropies. However, in my version of "art" (or mythos), I don't 
start getting interested at the time that the message is recieved. In 
fact, I don't get interested until this received message /evokes/ or 
/arouses/ retained information (memories?) that lies within the mind of 
the audience. Moreover such an evocation must become the focus of the 
attention of the audience (message receiver) before I am willing to say 
that "art has happened". (And, any attention on the part of the audience 
on the initial received message has been dropped at this point.) 
Usually, that evoked information represents an embellishment by the 
receiver and is often much richer than the direct content of the 
received message itself. It is this embellishment that is the focus of 
interest, and intent, of the artist - even though the artist does not 
directly control it.


In such a situation, my interest lies more in the multiple ways that 
these evocations on the part of different "audiences" might be different 
from each other. And I am less interested in how much they are the same. 
So, unlike Shannon, I'm not worried that any kind of "chance variation" 
has occurred across multiple listeners. In fact, as an artist, I am 
/celebrating/ that degree of chance variation rather than trying to 
reduce it - as I would be whenever I am engaging in "logos", such as 
when I am "doing science".


I'm simply saying that I observe such a phenomena taking place right in 
the middle of "artists doing art" - and it interests me. And that is 
what I call an "instance of art". I'm not arguing any particular point - 
only expressing an interest in a phenomenon that I observe.


HTH,
Grant

On 12/28/15 9:08 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:


Thanks, Grant,

I am still a bit confused, perhaps because I don’t really know how to 
play the “information” word game very well.


In information theory, I thought communication was defined as any 
change in the response probabilities of the receiver that was due to 
the content of the message.


So the elicitation of images by a poem, WOULD be the transfer of 
information.


Am I wrong about that?

I guess I am pushing this point because metaphors seem to me to be 
extremely important operators in science.  Take “natural selection”, 
for instance.


Nick

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/ 
<http://home.earthlink.net/%7Enickthompson/naturaldesigns/>


*From:*Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] *On Behalf Of *Grant 
Holland

*Sent:* Monday, December 28, 2015 8:01 PM
*To:* The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group 

*Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] Physicists and Philosophers Debate the 
Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine


Nick,

Ok, I'll giv'er a whirl.

Don't take this as a lexical definition; but rather as my own peculiar 
way of choosing to understand art.


I see art as a form of communication that attempts to arouse or evoke 
information (e.g. imagery) from within the minds of audience members 
to the forefront of the minds of those members.


Generally, in this form of communication, the "audience" is expected 
to be human-like (in a sense that I am unprepared to define at present).


This form of communication is as opposed to "information transfer". 
One way to describe  the difference is that ambiguity is expected, 
even desired, in the former, but eschewed in the latter.


Another difference is that Shannon's theory applies to the latter but 
maybe not so well to the former.


According to this view, science can be, and often is, art.

Anyway, this is the best I can do for now. I hope I have conveyed my 
meaning.


Grant


Sent from my iPhone


On Dec 28, 2015, at 4:02 PM, Nick Thompson <mailto:nickthomp...@earthlink.net>> wrote:


Grant,

Aw. Come on.  Try.  I stipulate that it’s not easy.

N

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
<http://home.earthlink.net/%7Enickthompson/natur

Re: [FRIAM] Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

[Grant Holland]

Nick,

Ok, I'll giv'er a whirl.

Don't take this as a lexical definition; but rather as my own peculiar way of 
choosing to understand art.

I see art as a form of communication that attempts to arouse or evoke 
information (e.g. imagery) from within the minds of audience members to the 
forefront of the minds of those members.

Generally, in this form of communication, the "audience" is expected to be 
human-like (in a sense that I am unprepared to define at present).

This form of communication is as opposed to "information transfer". One way to 
describe  the difference is that ambiguity is expected, even desired, in the 
former, but eschewed in the latter.

Another difference is that Shannon's theory applies to the latter but maybe not 
so well to the former. 

According to this view, science can be, and often is, art.

Anyway, this is the best I can do for now. I hope I have conveyed my meaning.

Grant 

Sent from my iPhone

> On Dec 28, 2015, at 4:02 PM, Nick Thompson  wrote:
> 
> Grant,
> Aw.  Come on.  Try.  I stipulate that it’s not easy. 
> N
>  
> Nicholas S. Thompson
> Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
> Clark University
> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
>  
> From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Grant Holland
> Sent: Monday, December 28, 2015 1:22 PM
> To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group 
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of 
> Science | Quanta Magazine
>  
> Nick,
>  
> Some nebulous one, for sure.
>  
> Grant
> 
> Sent from my iPhone
> 
> On Dec 28, 2015, at 1:34 PM, Nick Thompson  wrote:
> 
> Grant,
>  
> What is the implicit definition of “art” you are running with there?  
>  
> Nick
>  
> Nicholas S. Thompson
> Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
> Clark University
> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
>  
> From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Grant Holland
> Sent: Monday, December 28, 2015 1:51 AM
> To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group ; 
> Owen Densmore 
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of 
> Science | Quanta Magazine
>  
> Mathematics already went through this "crisis of confidence" in the latter 
> half of the 19th century when Lobachevsky and Riemann came up with 
> alternative, non-Euclidean, geometries. The issue that forced this new look 
> at the soul of mathematics was, I believe, the verifiability - consistency, 
> actually - of Euclid's fifth postulate with respect to his other four. This 
> was followed historically by the works of Dedekind and Cantor who engaged 
> naked logic to expose a number of counter-intuitive "truths" of mathematics. 
> The entire hoopla was addressed by Hilbert's program in an attempt to put the 
> matter to rest for once and for all. However, the work of Russell and 
> Whitehead to further Hilbert's program by developing arithmetic from 
> Hilbertian foundations was eventually stymied by Godel, whose work was 
> generalized by Turing. 
> 
> The result of all of this, according to my understanding, is that mathematics 
> ceased to see itself as a "seeker after the true nature of the universe" (as 
> do both science (which physics thinks it owns) and philosophy even today); 
> and began to see itself as a "constructor of logically consistent models, 
> regardless of their verifiability". Verifiability was dropped from the 
> program of pure abstract mathematics, and was left to the "impure" pursuits 
> of physicists, philosophers and applied mathematicians.
> 
> I'm sure someone on this list can set straight my recollections of 
> mathematical history. But I do hold to the point that mathematics addressed, 
> and "kind of" resolved, its own crisis of confidence over its assumed need 
> for verifiability about a century ago. It's conclusion? Forget verifiability 
> and pursue pure mathematics as art - not science.
> 
> Should physics give up its similar insistence on verification (seeking "the 
> truth") - and join the ranks as just another branch of abstract mathematics?
> 
> Grant
> 
> 
> 
> On 12/26/15 9:44 PM, Owen Densmore wrote:
> Abs fab!
>  
> But amazingly, there are fantastic young grad students doing the impossible 
> in this field .. testing at the Planck limits. Often using the universe 
> itself to test its own theories.
>  
> One of my favorites is a stream of matter flowing towards a void in space 
> which suggests "gravity on the other side" .. i.e. a multiverse lump hidden 
> from us but not

Re: [FRIAM] Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

[Grant Holland]

Oh yes, it need not be neither. It just can't be both!

Grant

Sent from my iPhone

> On Dec 28, 2015, at 3:29 PM, Grant Holland  wrote:
> 
> Glen, Eric,
> 
> If "reality" is complete, must not then (assuming that it is at least as 
> complex as arithmetic), aka Godel, it be also inconsistent?
> 
> Grant
> 
> Sent from my iPhone
> 
>>> On Dec 28, 2015, at 11:23 AM, glen  wrote:
>>> 
>>> On 12/28/2015 06:30 AM, David Eric Smith wrote:
>>> A language that is not even internally consistent presumably has no hope of 
>>> having an empirically valid semantics, since evidently the universe "is" 
>>> something, and there is no semantic notion of ambiguity of its 
>>> "being/not-being" some definite thing, structurally analogous to an 
>>> inconsistent language's being able to arrive at a contradiction by taking 
>>> two paths to answer a single proposition.
>> 
>> It's not clear to me that the presumption is trustworthy.  Isn't it possible 
>> that what is (reality) does not obey some of the structure we rely on for 
>> asserting consistency (or completeness)?  In other words, perhaps reality is 
>> inconsistent.  Hence, the only language that will be valid, will be an 
>> inconsistent language.  Of course, that doesn't imply that just any old 
>> inconsistency will be tolerated.  Perhaps reality is only inconsistent in 
>> very particular ways and any language that we expect to validate must be 1) 
>> inconsistent in all those real ways and 2) in only those real ways.
>> 
>> Further of course, inconsistency is a bit like paradox in that, once you 
>> identify an inconsistency very precisely, you may be able to define a new 
>> language that eliminates it. ... which brings us beyond the (mere) points of 
>> higher order logics and iterative constructions, to the core idea of 
>> context-sensitive construction.  There is no Grand Unifying Anything except 
>> the imperative to approach Grand Unified Things.
>> 
>> And this targets Patrick's argument against the idealists (e.g. libertarians 
>> and marxists).  The only reliable ideal is the creation and commitment to 
>> ideals.  Each particular ideal is (will be) eventually destroyed.  But for 
>> whatever reason, we seem to always create and commit ourselves to ideals.  
>> Old people tend to surrender over time and build huge hairballs of bandaged 
>> ideals all glued together with spit and bailing wire.  Any serious 
>> conversation with an old person is an attempt to navigate the topology of 
>> their iteratively constructed, stigmergic, hairball of broken ideals ... and 
>> if that old person is open-minded, such conversations lead to new kinks and 
>> tortuous folds ... which is why old people make the best story tellers.
>> 
>> But I can't help wondering why music is dominated by the young. [sigh]
>> 
>> -- 
>> --
>> ⊥ glen ⊥
>> 
>> 
>> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
>> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
>> to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com


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Re: [FRIAM] Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

[Grant Holland]

Glen, Eric,

If "reality" is complete, must not then (assuming that it is at least as 
complex as arithmetic), aka Godel, it be also inconsistent?

Grant

Sent from my iPhone

> On Dec 28, 2015, at 11:23 AM, glen  wrote:
> 
>> On 12/28/2015 06:30 AM, David Eric Smith wrote:
>> A language that is not even internally consistent presumably has no hope of 
>> having an empirically valid semantics, since evidently the universe "is" 
>> something, and there is no semantic notion of ambiguity of its 
>> "being/not-being" some definite thing, structurally analogous to an 
>> inconsistent language's being able to arrive at a contradiction by taking 
>> two paths to answer a single proposition.
> 
> It's not clear to me that the presumption is trustworthy.  Isn't it possible 
> that what is (reality) does not obey some of the structure we rely on for 
> asserting consistency (or completeness)?  In other words, perhaps reality is 
> inconsistent.  Hence, the only language that will be valid, will be an 
> inconsistent language.  Of course, that doesn't imply that just any old 
> inconsistency will be tolerated.  Perhaps reality is only inconsistent in 
> very particular ways and any language that we expect to validate must be 1) 
> inconsistent in all those real ways and 2) in only those real ways.
> 
> Further of course, inconsistency is a bit like paradox in that, once you 
> identify an inconsistency very precisely, you may be able to define a new 
> language that eliminates it. ... which brings us beyond the (mere) points of 
> higher order logics and iterative constructions, to the core idea of 
> context-sensitive construction.  There is no Grand Unifying Anything except 
> the imperative to approach Grand Unified Things.
> 
> And this targets Patrick's argument against the idealists (e.g. libertarians 
> and marxists).  The only reliable ideal is the creation and commitment to 
> ideals.  Each particular ideal is (will be) eventually destroyed.  But for 
> whatever reason, we seem to always create and commit ourselves to ideals.  
> Old people tend to surrender over time and build huge hairballs of bandaged 
> ideals all glued together with spit and bailing wire.  Any serious 
> conversation with an old person is an attempt to navigate the topology of 
> their iteratively constructed, stigmergic, hairball of broken ideals ... and 
> if that old person is open-minded, such conversations lead to new kinks and 
> tortuous folds ... which is why old people make the best story tellers.
> 
> But I can't help wondering why music is dominated by the young. [sigh]
> 
> -- 
> --
> ⊥ glen ⊥
> 
> 
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com


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Re: [FRIAM] Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

[Grant Holland]

Eric,

I like:

So here, "syntactically internally inconsistent" takes the place of Popper's 
"falsified", whereas "apparently syntactically internally consistent" takes the 
place of Popper's "not yet falsified".  Trying to find a semantics for an 
apparently-consistent formal system takes the place of building empirical 
confidence in claims that in Popper's construction are still eligible to be 
"true".  

Might just work.

Grant

Sent from my iPhone

> On Dec 28, 2015, at 9:30 AM, David Eric Smith  wrote:
> 
> So here, "syntactically internally inconsistent" takes the place of Popper's 
> "falsified", whereas "apparently syntactically internally consistent" takes 
> the place of Popper's "not yet falsified".  Trying to find a semantics for an 
> apparently-consistent formal system takes the place of building empirical 
> confidence in claims that in Popper's construction are still eligible to be 
> "true".  


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Re: [FRIAM] Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

[Grant Holland]

Nick,

Some nebulous one, for sure.

Grant

Sent from my iPhone

> On Dec 28, 2015, at 1:34 PM, Nick Thompson  wrote:
> 
> Grant,
>  
> What is the implicit definition of “art” you are running with there?  
>  
> Nick
>  
> Nicholas S. Thompson
> Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
> Clark University
> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
>  
> From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Grant Holland
> Sent: Monday, December 28, 2015 1:51 AM
> To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group ; 
> Owen Densmore 
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of 
> Science | Quanta Magazine
>  
> Mathematics already went through this "crisis of confidence" in the latter 
> half of the 19th century when Lobachevsky and Riemann came up with 
> alternative, non-Euclidean, geometries. The issue that forced this new look 
> at the soul of mathematics was, I believe, the verifiability - consistency, 
> actually - of Euclid's fifth postulate with respect to his other four. This 
> was followed historically by the works of Dedekind and Cantor who engaged 
> naked logic to expose a number of counter-intuitive "truths" of mathematics. 
> The entire hoopla was addressed by Hilbert's program in an attempt to put the 
> matter to rest for once and for all. However, the work of Russell and 
> Whitehead to further Hilbert's program by developing arithmetic from 
> Hilbertian foundations was eventually stymied by Godel, whose work was 
> generalized by Turing. 
> 
> The result of all of this, according to my understanding, is that mathematics 
> ceased to see itself as a "seeker after the true nature of the universe" (as 
> do both science (which physics thinks it owns) and philosophy even today); 
> and began to see itself as a "constructor of logically consistent models, 
> regardless of their verifiability". Verifiability was dropped from the 
> program of pure abstract mathematics, and was left to the "impure" pursuits 
> of physicists, philosophers and applied mathematicians.
> 
> I'm sure someone on this list can set straight my recollections of 
> mathematical history. But I do hold to the point that mathematics addressed, 
> and "kind of" resolved, its own crisis of confidence over its assumed need 
> for verifiability about a century ago. It's conclusion? Forget verifiability 
> and pursue pure mathematics as art - not science.
> 
> Should physics give up its similar insistence on verification (seeking "the 
> truth") - and join the ranks as just another branch of abstract mathematics?
> 
> Grant
> 
> 
> On 12/26/15 9:44 PM, Owen Densmore wrote:
> Abs fab!
>  
> But amazingly, there are fantastic young grad students doing the impossible 
> in this field .. testing at the Planck limits. Often using the universe 
> itself to test its own theories.
>  
> One of my favorites is a stream of matter flowing towards a void in space 
> which suggests "gravity on the other side" .. i.e. a multiverse lump hidden 
> from us but not by gravity.
>  
> Why is there Something, not Nothing gets to be fascinating when the big bang 
> was sparked by less than a tea-spoon of matter, or so it is thought nowadays.
>  
>-- Owen
>  
> On Sat, Dec 26, 2015 at 8:59 PM, Tom Johnson  wrote:
> Something to keep you occupied until New Years Day.
> 
> https://www.quantamagazine.org/20151216-physicists-and-philosophers-debate-the-boundaries-of-science/
> 
> ===
> Tom Johnson - Inst. for Analytic Journalism
> Santa Fe, NM 
> SPJ Region 9 Director
> t...@jtjohnson.com   505-473-9646
> ===
> 
> 
> 
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
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Re: [FRIAM] Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

[Grant Holland]

I've gotta give you that one, Frank! And fortunately you are right. After all, 
mathematicians make their living by selling mathematical trinkets to 
unsuspecting physicists for promoting their quests for TRUTH (and the American 
way).

What I'm  saying is that, since Hilbert's program, empirically-observable 
validity is no longer the acid test for mathematical acceptability or, even 
prudence. (Although Hilbert Space (attributed I believe to von Neumann) is 
still going for top dollar.)

Grant

Sent from my iPhone

> On Dec 28, 2015, at 10:01 AM, Frank Wimberly  wrote:
> 
> Students of relativity should be happy that mathematicians pursued their 
> interest in "unverifiable" non-Euclidean geometry.
> 
> Frank
> 
> Sent from my Verizon Nexus 6 4G LTE Phone
> (505) 670-9918
> 
>> On Dec 28, 2015 1:51 AM, "Grant Holland"  wrote:
>> Mathematics already went through this "crisis of confidence" in the latter 
>> half of the 19th century when Lobachevsky and Riemann came up with 
>> alternative, non-Euclidean, geometries. The issue that forced this new look 
>> at the soul of mathematics was, I believe, the verifiability - consistency, 
>> actually - of Euclid's fifth postulate with respect to his other four. This 
>> was followed historically by the works of Dedekind and Cantor who engaged 
>> naked logic to expose a number of counter-intuitive "truths" of mathematics. 
>> The entire hoopla was addressed by Hilbert's program in an attempt to put 
>> the matter to rest for once and for all. However, the work of Russell and 
>> Whitehead to further Hilbert's program by developing arithmetic from 
>> Hilbertian foundations was eventually stymied by Godel, whose work was 
>> generalized by Turing. 
>> 
>> The result of all of this, according to my understanding, is that 
>> mathematics ceased to see itself as a "seeker after the true nature of the 
>> universe" (as do both science (which physics thinks it owns) and philosophy 
>> even today); and began to see itself as a "constructor of logically 
>> consistent models, regardless of their verifiability". Verifiability was 
>> dropped from the program of pure abstract mathematics, and was left to the 
>> "impure" pursuits of physicists, philosophers and applied mathematicians.
>> 
>> I'm sure someone on this list can set straight my recollections of 
>> mathematical history. But I do hold to the point that mathematics addressed, 
>> and "kind of" resolved, its own crisis of confidence over its assumed need 
>> for verifiability about a century ago. It's conclusion? Forget verifiability 
>> and pursue pure mathematics as art - not science.
>> 
>> Should physics give up its similar insistence on verification (seeking "the 
>> truth") - and join the ranks as just another branch of abstract mathematics?
>> 
>> Grant
>> 
>> 
>>> On 12/26/15 9:44 PM, Owen Densmore wrote:
>>> Abs fab!
>>> 
>>> But amazingly, there are fantastic young grad students doing the impossible 
>>> in this field .. testing at the Planck limits. Often using the universe 
>>> itself to test its own theories.
>>> 
>>> One of my favorites is a stream of matter flowing towards a void in space 
>>> which suggests "gravity on the other side" .. i.e. a multiverse lump hidden 
>>> from us but not by gravity.
>>> 
>>> Why is there Something, not Nothing gets to be fascinating when the big 
>>> bang was sparked by less than a tea-spoon of matter, or so it is thought 
>>> nowadays.
>>> 
>>>-- Owen
>>> 
>>>> On Sat, Dec 26, 2015 at 8:59 PM, Tom Johnson  wrote:
>>>> Something to keep you occupied until New Years Day.
>>>> 
>>>> https://www.quantamagazine.org/20151216-physicists-and-philosophers-debate-the-boundaries-of-science/
>>>> 
>>>> ===
>>>> Tom Johnson - Inst. for Analytic Journalism
>>>> Santa Fe, NM 
>>>> SPJ Region 9 Director
>>>> t...@jtjohnson.com   505-473-9646
>>>> ===
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
>>>> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
>>>> to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> ==

Re: [FRIAM] Physicists and Philosophers Debate the Boundaries of Science | Quanta Magazine

[Grant Holland]

Mathematics already went through this "crisis of confidence" in the 
latter half of the 19th century when Lobachevsky and Riemann came up 
with alternative, non-Euclidean, geometries. The issue that forced this 
new look at the soul of mathematics was, I believe, the verifiability - 
consistency, actually - of Euclid's fifth postulate with respect to his 
other four. This was followed historically by the works of Dedekind and 
Cantor who engaged naked logic to expose a number of counter-intuitive 
"truths" of mathematics. The entire hoopla was addressed by Hilbert's 
program in an attempt to put the matter to rest for once and for all. 
However, the work of Russell and Whitehead to further Hilbert's program 
by developing arithmetic from Hilbertian foundations was eventually 
stymied by Godel, whose work was generalized by Turing.


The result of all of this, according to my understanding, is that 
mathematics ceased to see itself as a "seeker after the true nature of 
the universe" (as do both science (which physics thinks it owns) and 
philosophy even today); and began to see itself as a "constructor of 
logically consistent models, regardless of their verifiability". 
Verifiability was dropped from the program of pure abstract mathematics, 
and was left to the "impure" pursuits of physicists, philosophers and 
applied mathematicians.


I'm sure someone on this list can set straight my recollections of 
mathematical history. But I do hold to the point that mathematics 
addressed, and "kind of" resolved, its own crisis of confidence over its 
assumed need for verifiability about a century ago. It's conclusion? 
Forget verifiability and pursue pure mathematics as art - not science.


Should physics give up its similar insistence on verification (seeking 
"the truth") - and join the ranks as just another branch of abstract 
mathematics?


Grant


On 12/26/15 9:44 PM, Owen Densmore wrote:

Abs fab!

But amazingly, there are fantastic young grad students doing the 
impossible in this field .. testing at the Planck limits. Often using 
the universe itself to test its own theories.


One of my favorites is a stream of matter flowing towards a void in 
space which suggests "gravity on the other side" .. i.e. a multiverse 
lump hidden from us but not by gravity.


Why is there Something, not Nothing gets to be fascinating when the 
big bang was sparked by less than a tea-spoon of matter, or so it is 
thought nowadays.


 -- Owen

On Sat, Dec 26, 2015 at 8:59 PM, Tom Johnson > wrote:


Something to keep you occupied until New Years Day.


https://www.quantamagazine.org/20151216-physicists-and-philosophers-debate-the-boundaries-of-science/

===
Tom Johnson - Inst. for Analytic Journalism
Santa Fe, NM
SPJ Region 9 Director
t...@jtjohnson.com  505-473-9646

===



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Re: [FRIAM] The Attack on Truth - The Chronicle of Higher Education

[Grant Holland]

Glen,

I like it. Very well put.

Grant

On 6/9/15 9:56 AM, glen wrote:

Statistics is one tool.  I'm not sure it's the most powerful tool, though.  I tend to think the 
best tool is ... well, it goes by many names.  One name is "active listening" ... 
"empathy" ... etc.  The technique is well known to all of us (well unless we're autistic 
or psychopathic).  When you hear someone say something that just sounds wrong, there are 2 basic 
steps:

1) find out why you think they're wrong (including the statistics that surround 
any of the facts involved), and
2) try to figure out what the speaker _really_ means by whatever nonsense 
they're spouting.

Since I don't believe our thoughts are very accurate at all, I have no problems 
empathizing with someone who spouts (apparent) nonsense.  I do it myself on a 
regular basis.  I try not to.  But it's difficult.  In fact, the reason I find 
purposeful nonsense (including climate denial or chemtrails, but more like 
chatbots) so cool is because of the accidental nonsense in which we bathe.



On 06/09/2015 08:36 AM, Grant Holland wrote:

Righto. So what we do is put a measure on "how much confidence" we have. Statistics gives us some 
tools for that - namely the "moment functionals" (mean, variance, skewness, etc.); and information 
theory gives us some more general tools for that - entropy and the other entropic funtionals. So maybe it's a 
mixture of the relative and the absolute. Maybe we've moved up to the "junior" level?

Grant

On 6/9/15 9:14 AM, Nick Thompson wrote:

Correct.  Nothing is certain.  We've known that since Kant.  NOW what?  That
there are no certain facts does not imply that some facts are not more
enduring and useful than others.  We need to get beyond the sophomoric
revelation that "everything is relative."




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Re: [FRIAM] The Attack on Truth - The Chronicle of Higher Education

[Grant Holland]

Nick,

Righto. So what we do is put a measure on "how much confidence" we have. 
Statistics gives us some tools for that - namely the "moment 
functionals" (mean, variance, skewness, etc.); and information theory 
gives us some more general tools for that - entropy and the other 
entropic funtionals. So maybe it's a mixture of the relative and the 
absolute. Maybe we've moved up to the "junior" level?


Grant

On 6/9/15 9:14 AM, Nick Thompson wrote:

Correct.  Nothing is certain.  We've known that since Kant.  NOW what?  That
there are no certain facts does not imply that some facts are not more
enduring and useful than others.  We need to get beyond the sophomoric
revelation that "everything is relative."

n

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
Clark University
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

-Original Message-
From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Grant Holland
Sent: Tuesday, June 09, 2015 10:37 AM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group; glen e. p. ropella;
Frank Wimberly
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] The Attack on Truth - The Chronicle of Higher Education

I agree with Glen. Simply look at a basic statistics course. There we learn
the idea of "confidence intervals". You don't really ever "prove"
anything in statistics. Rather you may be able to "gain confidence"
based on probabilities - along with your previously established "tolerance
for maybe being wrong". The whole scientific method eventually comes down to
"statistical inference". The best we can do is "infer" - not "know".

Then consider the plight of deductive logic. There we are presented with the
laws of thought. But those laws can only be put to work once they have been
given a set of "assumptions" (axioms, hypotheses, etc.) to work on. The
whole edifice depends on having started with the "correct"
assumptions. But the laws of thought do not tell you how to select those.

"Jes sayin'"

Grant

On 6/9/15 4:10 AM, glen wrote:

I enjoyed both the article and others' reactions to it, especially Grant's

distinction between determined vs. determinability.  My own reaction was one
slightly tinged with nausea.  Yes, it is lamentable when one's ideas, one's
ideology, allow(s) one to deny "truth" (new evidence).  But it is that very
same thing that allows one to lament the denial of truth.

McIntyre seems to be just as willfully ignorant as those he accuses,
by assuming

a) there _exists_ a singe, One True Truth, and
b) we (all of us or an in-group few of us) can approach that Truth.

The point has been made most clearly by Orgel's 2nd Rule:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orgel%27s_rule .  Why is it that we think that
what we think is better (or more real, or more effective, or more ...
whatever) than what _is_?  Why is it that we think so intently about what we
think?  We're like a bunch of navel-gazing drug addicts, thinking intently
about our own thoughts while the world moves on around us.

There's a kind of circularity to McIntyre's lament (as well as other

truthers who continually lament the "truthers" -- 9/11 or whatever, or the
deniers that continually complain about the "deniers" -- climate change or
whatever).  The most frustrating instance of this circularity is the
escalation to absurdity exhibited by the ongoing co-evolution between
"social justice warriors" and "political correctness freedom fighters" (for
lack of a better term).  At some point, the frequency of the circular back
and forth out paces the recovery time needed by my "outrage neurons".

At some point, all the finger-pointing, all the childish "yes it is" "no

it's not" "yes it is" back and forth makes me wish people like McIntyre
would soften their own rhetoric just enough to exhibit more self-doubt and
less other-doubt.  it would have been more palatable if, e.g., he'd ended
the article with "I do my best, but often fail respect the truth." ... or
something of that sort, rather than ending with the implication that he's
_always_ capable of respecting the truth and knows full well that he always
infallibly does, especially right now in this article.

But, as Russ points out, other-doubt is profitable, while self-doubt is

not.

-glen

On 06/08/2015 06:19 PM, Frank Wimberly wrote:

Philosophy haters do not read the linked article.  It mentions Andy

Norman.  He is a member of the faculty at Carnegie Mellon, in the department
where I used to work.  My daughter was a friend of his when they were in
high school in the 1980s.  I am old.

Frank

http://m.chronicle.com/article/The-Attack-on-Truth/230631/

Re: [FRIAM] The Attack on Truth - The Chronicle of Higher Education

[Grant Holland]

I agree with Glen. Simply look at a basic statistics course. There we 
learn the idea of "confidence intervals". You don't really ever "prove" 
anything in statistics. Rather you may be able to "gain confidence" 
based on probabilities - along with your previously established 
"tolerance for maybe being wrong". The whole scientific method 
eventually comes down to "statistical inference". The best we can do is 
"infer" - not "know".


Then consider the plight of deductive logic. There we are presented with 
the laws of thought. But those laws can only be put to work once they 
have been given a set of "assumptions" (axioms, hypotheses, etc.) to 
work on. The whole edifice depends on having started with the "correct" 
assumptions. But the laws of thought do not tell you how to select those.


"Jes sayin'"

Grant

On 6/9/15 4:10 AM, glen wrote:

I enjoyed both the article and others' reactions to it, especially Grant's distinction 
between determined vs. determinability.  My own reaction was one slightly tinged with 
nausea.  Yes, it is lamentable when one's ideas, one's ideology, allow(s) one to deny 
"truth" (new evidence).  But it is that very same thing that allows one to 
lament the denial of truth.

McIntyre seems to be just as willfully ignorant as those he accuses, by assuming

   a) there _exists_ a singe, One True Truth, and
   b) we (all of us or an in-group few of us) can approach that Truth.

The point has been made most clearly by Orgel's 2nd Rule: 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orgel%27s_rule .  Why is it that we think that 
what we think is better (or more real, or more effective, or more ... whatever) 
than what _is_?  Why is it that we think so intently about what we think?  
We're like a bunch of navel-gazing drug addicts, thinking intently about our 
own thoughts while the world moves on around us.

There's a kind of circularity to McIntyre's lament (as well as other truthers who continually lament the "truthers" -- 
9/11 or whatever, or the deniers that continually complain about the "deniers" -- climate change or whatever).  The 
most frustrating instance of this circularity is the escalation to absurdity exhibited by the ongoing co-evolution between 
"social justice warriors" and "political correctness freedom fighters" (for lack of a better term).  At some 
point, the frequency of the circular back and forth out paces the recovery time needed by my "outrage neurons".

At some point, all the finger-pointing, all the childish "yes it is" "no it's not" "yes it 
is" back and forth makes me wish people like McIntyre would soften their own rhetoric just enough to exhibit more 
self-doubt and less other-doubt.  it would have been more palatable if, e.g., he'd ended the article with "I do my 
best, but often fail respect the truth." ... or something of that sort, rather than ending with the implication 
that he's _always_ capable of respecting the truth and knows full well that he always infallibly does, especially right 
now in this article.

But, as Russ points out, other-doubt is profitable, while self-doubt is not.

-glen

On 06/08/2015 06:19 PM, Frank Wimberly wrote:

Philosophy haters do not read the linked article.  It mentions Andy Norman.  He 
is a member of the faculty at Carnegie Mellon, in the department where I used 
to work.  My daughter was a friend of his when they were in high school in the 
1980s.  I am old.

Frank

http://m.chronicle.com/article/The-Attack-on-Truth/230631/




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Re: [FRIAM] The Attack on Truth - The Chronicle of Higher Education

[Grant Holland]

Thanks, Frank. Great article.

This is reminiscent of the philosophical issue of the ontological vs the 
epistemological that has been all over quantum theory for some time now. 
This is the whole issue raised by the uncertainty principle. In quantum 
theory it seems to be framed by the question of "what exists?" (the 
"ontic") vs "what can be know?", or "what can we reliably measure" (the 
"epistemic"). This issue is address in QM by "the quantum theory of 
measurement", and is a basic topic in QM. There's a very good article on 
this by a philosopher of science investigator named Harald Atmanspacher, 
entitled "Determinism is Ontic, Determinability is Epistemic". It can be 
obtained here from the PhilSci Arhive web site. 



Good reading,
Grant

On 6/8/15 7:19 PM, Frank Wimberly wrote:


Philosophy haters do not read the linked article.  It mentions Andy 
Norman.  He is a member of the faculty at Carnegie Mellon, in the 
department where I used to work.  My daughter was a friend of his when 
they were in high school in the 1980s.  I am old.


Frank

http://m.chronicle.com/article/The-Attack-on-Truth/230631/

Sent from my Verizon 4G LTE Phone
(505) 670-9918




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Re: [FRIAM] [ SPAM ] Map of the complexity sciences

[Grant Holland]

Excellent. Thanks, a bunch, Glen.

Grant

On 5/27/15 5:38 PM, glen e. p. ropella wrote:


http://www.scimaps.org/maps/map/map_of_complexity_sc_154/detail

What I found most interesting was the little street view dude... and 
that there are pictures located on the map!






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Re: [FRIAM] [ SPAM ] RE: clinical diagnosis of [a]theism?

[Grant Holland]

One either knows the answer (to whatever question) or one doesn't. You 
actually know that God exists, or you don't know. Pretending that you 
know when you don't is...well...pretense.  Accepting that you don't know 
when you don't and keeping an open mind usually leads to less self delusion.


I see no reason to adopt an idea as a belief when you know damn well 
that you don't know whether it is true or not. This goes for atheism as 
well as theism or any other idea.  FWIW I think that pretending to know 
when I don't - one way or the other - is simply unnecessary, fruitless 
and self-deluding.


Grant

On 1/27/15 3:35 PM, Frank Wimberly wrote:

Well said, Vladimyr.

Frank


Frank C. Wimberly
140 Calle Ojo Feliz
Santa Fe, NM 87505

wimber...@gmail.com wimbe...@cal.berkeley.edu
Phone:  (505) 995-8715  Cell:  (505) 670-9918

-Original Message-
From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Vladimyr
Burachynsky
Sent: Tuesday, January 27, 2015 2:26 PM
To: 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group'
Subject: [FRIAM] [ SPAM ] RE: clinical diagnosis of [a]theism?

To Marcus and Group,

If there are multiple points of view of any event, which one of the many can
be true, or are  all true in some respect?
If every view point is contaminated by default belief/delusion  how can we
decide which is true?
Consensus or democracy seems appealing but it is a very simple matter of
numerical superiority with no better a chance of being right.
The collective opinion is reduced to one and gains nothing by addition.
Parallax is the simplest such example, left eye versus right eye and the
brain merges the disparate 2D images into a 3D mapping.
We could decide to blind one eye in favour of the other but then the value
of the map is compromised.

Control Freaks would prefer their working eye or viewpoint to be the only
one ever considered. So the control freak must annihilate all contradiction
and be elevated in the esteem of the group ( whose opinions have also been
squashed as the admission price) .

Harris may simply be indulging in a manoeuvre to appear as an "authority"
and enrich himself at the expense of a naïve group. Quite Normal.
But none of that makes him right but only wealthier than some.

There is something so medieval about pitting an atheist against a believer
in an arena each using bludgeons to assert their position.
Well if both are deluded in some manner there will never be truth , who so
ever gets the killing blow in first conflates assassination with the victory
of his argument. ad hominem fallacy

Everyone seems to assume that one is either a Believer or  an Atheist as if
there are only two possibilities. As a "judge", neither side can force me to
adopt certain limitations, or petitions. If the judge is outside of any
group affiliation he is free to shrug off fallacious arguments as they
appear.
The litigants have no right to enforce their  contrived rules on the judges,
or do they? anymore than the left eye has tricks to exclude the right eye.
Harris may also be motivated by a need for status as well as funds, the
drive for literary quality may be very small.
vib



-Original Message-
From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Marcus G.
Daniels
Sent: January-26-15 2:17 PM
To: friam@redfish.com
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] clinical diagnosis of [a]theism?

Glen writes:

"but Harris, having authored so many books, should be much better at it than
he seems to be."

It may not be such a bad approach, depending on his goals.  Does he want to
persuade anyone or just a certain type of person?
Wrong approach for a politician, but adequate for tenured faculty or a cult
leader.

Marcus



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Re: [FRIAM] GAS

[Grant Holland]

It looks to me that there is currently deep confusion around the use of 
both words "chaos" and "disorder" in the field of dynamical systems. 
Sometimes the meaning "unpredictability" is evident in that usage. But 
at other time the meaning "disorganization" is. These two ideas are 
different and very often are in need of critical distinction.


An important usage of "disorganization" is the "disunion of constituent 
parts". It pertains to structure, arrangement or configuration. It is a 
phenomenon that can be observed statically, instantaneously, without the 
passage of time. It pertains to the interrelationships among parts. It 
also pertains to the relationship of the parts to the whole. It is 
well-modeled by geometry, topology and graph theory. Any notion of the 
"degree of organization or disorganization" would pertain to how rich 
the interrelationships among parts are. Defining a measure for this 
would be challenging, and none dominates.


On the other hand, "unpredictability" pertains to chance variation, 
probability and even epistemology. It is defined independently from any 
notion of parts/whole. It is well-modeled by probability theory and 
stochastic processes. Any notion of "degree of predictability or 
unpredictability" would be subject to some matter of probabilities. In 
information theory, it is measured by statistical entropy and its 
related entropic functionals (relative entropy, conditional entropy, 
mutual information, entropy rate, etc.) It is worth noting that the 
definition of statistical entropy has probabilities as its only 
parameters. Thus, it is capable of measuring degrees of predictability 
or unpredictability, but not degrees of organization or disorganization.


Of course, the two ideas can be combined. For example, one could be 
interested how a collection of constituent parts are arranged, 
configured or organized - and how that organization changes (subject to 
chance) over time. (Such as particles in an ideal gas.) We could even 
define some kind of stochastic dynamical system wherein (instantaneous) 
system state could be its current organization (defined as, say, a 
topology), and where the Markov chains (or more elaborate conditional 
processes) can provide the stochastic dynamics.


This confusion further shows up in the use of "chaos" in dynamical 
systems. One dictionary defines "chaos" as "where chance reins supreme". 
But in nonlinear dynamics, "chaos" means "sensitivity to initial 
conditions" and is strictly deterministic. (That is, chance is banished 
from "Chaos Theory").


Food for thought.

Grant

On 12/1/14, 3:57 AM, Eric Smith wrote:

Hi Nick and Arlo,

Yes. What got me about this was the fact that the idea of gas as a 
chaotic state of matter goes WAY back.


Here it seems the etymology goes the other way, though, right?  The 
notion of a "chaotic state of matter" is actually a new borrowing of a 
term, with about as much connection to the original as Murray's 
"color" in QCD has to the visual chromatic spectrum.


If original chaos meant mostly a void or gap (which seems to be what 
Wikipedia -- the authority on all matters -- says, then it is not a 
bad fit to most of our everyday experience of gases, and would work 
even better for the vacuum.


It seems that the Term of Art "chaos", referring to tons of structure 
that is merely recalcitrant to description, is the odd man out.


Although, perhaps the argument against my position is that when 
artists need to represent chaos, they paint a lot of structure that is 
meant to exist but to defy description.  Since I don't know how 
ancient Greeks actually handled these things, maybe, as you say, they 
wouldn't tolerate a notion of "not-there", so they would have 
conceived of gaps as having a substantive essence, but just beyond 
tractability by perception, in which case modern chaos would indeed be 
much older.


Thanks for those,

Eric




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Re: [FRIAM] Does philosophy have a heuristic value

[Grant Holland]

Eric,

By way of example, philosophy appears to show up big time in quantum 
mechanics. Some interpretations consider the use of probability 
distributions (i.e. the wave function of a particle) in QM to be the 
state of the particle that "an observer sees". This it treats as 
epistemology (knowing). On the other hand, when a measurement is taken 
in order to detect the current state of the particle (and the wave 
function "collapses"), this is apparently treated as ontology (actual 
being). Some of these QM interpretations (Copenhagen?) seem to take 
pains in distinguishing between the "ontic" and the "epistemic" in this 
regard.


I'm not a physicist, so I'm only reporting what I read in certain QM 
books and articles.


Maybe someone else can weigh in on whether this is a case of philosophy 
being a significant consideration in physics.


Grant


On 11/8/14, 12:44 PM, Eric Charles wrote:
Doesn't the phrasing of these question indicate a misunderstanding of 
what philosophy brings to the table in the context of science?


If we use the term "philosophers" very loosely, surely many 
individuals who would call themselves "philosophers" have contributed 
insights into biology, and every other field... but that probably 
isn't the question. The question is probably something like: Why 
should I give a shit what philosophers say about MY science, the one I 
am busy practicing?


If THAT is the question, then the answer is that it depends on what 
the philosophers are doing.


On the one hand, if the philosophers claim to be answering scientific 
(i.e., empirical) questions, from their arm chairs, then it might be 
fine to ignore them. Though surely they will sometimes come up with 
interesting ideas that turn out to be right, they might not do so with 
unusual consistency.


On the other hand, if the philosophers are familiar with large swaths 
of your field, and are pointing out inconsistencies, or pulling 
together conclusions, at a larger-scale than is likely to be possible 
for researchers stuck in small silos, then they might well contribute 
to very important advances.


So, do you trust that philosophers can "solve" scientific problems... 
probably not. Do you trust that some number of philosophers in a field 
will help you to identify and clarify issues, and thereby improve the 
pace of progress... probably yes, if you can get philosophers who 
understand that to be their role.







---
Eric P. Charles, Ph.D.
Lab Manager
Center for Teaching, Research, and Learning
American University, Hurst Hall Room 203A
4400 Massachusetts Avenue, N.W.
Washington, DC 20016
phone: (202) 885-3867   fax: (202) 885-1190
email: echar...@american.edu 

On Tue, Nov 4, 2014 at 1:47 PM, Vladimyr Burachynsky > wrote:


To Roger and Nick,

That idea has been on the backburner of Biology for 5 decades or more.

The greatest problem in the 70's and later was Statistics which
tended to dismiss anything outside of a curve.

It started after the second war when an unusual coincidence of
scientific minds started talking.

Soviets and Americans when strange Tick-Borne plagues started
emerging in the middle east, Russia, Crimea

and parts of Africa.

I was just a kid doing my first MSc when I met

Harry Hoogstraal at an Acarology Workshop at OSU. What did I know,
nothing. What the hell. He was

Jimmy Carter's science advisor, I was told later . And the de
facto head of the NAMRU facility outside Cairo.

Anyway he was checking on students in the lab one night I was the
only nightowl and we chatted over microscopes.

He asked me what I thought happened to all the parasites of the
Woolly Rhino when it died out, it was a big source of blood in an
Arctic Landscape? ( I was working on Moose Ticks at the time)

What he was after was an answer to the stream of life question,
did they die or simply find new real estate?

I returned to Canada and only brought it up a few times usually
when very drunk, spoiling for a fight or  a real argument.

Bits and pieces accumulated over time spared from the
statisticians. Then totally ignored during all the subsequent eras
of utter confusion and money grubbing.

Mostly entomologists were the first to notice something did not
fit the consensus narrative. Then microbiologists who were asked
to help out  and they  saw the same principals with better tools.

Evo-Devo made a great set of contributions not mentioned directly
in the paper.

This is a disturbing topic when examined carefully. Philosophers
rarely examine parasites on carcasses of the dead,  let alone
count them. They see only what they expect.

They were always averse to the smell of science. So my answer is
No not usually. Since it stinks.

The bias appears to originate in our simple minds that can not
cope with more than 3 dimensions

Re: [FRIAM] How to reduce the influence of money in US politics! he7a1agy

[Grant Holland]

Yep, we're getting to the point that it is impossibly difficult to 
continue to befool ourselves that we have vanquished, or even 
diminished, uncertainty.  The more we know, the more we are uncertain.


Shannon explained why - but there are many doubters . It is this: 
"information" and "uncertainty" are the same thing. In fact, they are 
measured by the same functional: statistical entropy.


Folks who do not understand this are confusing "data" and "information".

On 9/11/14, 1:03 PM, Roger Critchlow wrote:
The real "issue" is that we're all a mess.  The surprise isn't that 
attempts to change things for the better fail, the miracle is that 
anything works at all.


The more we collectively learn, the more ignorant we all individually 
become, and there isn't any *authority* that can tell us which part of 
our ignorance needs the most attention.  Being smarter just gives us 
greater potential for being ignorant, there's more stuff that we could 
have learned but haven't.


I started watching the Hamming lectures, again, yesterday. 
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL2FF649D0C4407B30  He stands up 
there in front of his Naval Postgraduate School class, does a 
back-of-the-envelope calculation of what's implied by a doubling time 
of 17 years for the sum of scientific knowledge, and says (paraphrased 
from memory):  in 40 years one of you will be Chief of Staff, and 
there will be 5 times as much scientific knowledge relevant to your 
work as there is today, that's quite a problem.


I found the book of the lectures, 
http://worrydream.com/refs/Hamming-TheArtOfDoingScienceAndEngineering.pdf, 
the printed continuation to the episode above is:


What is my answer to this dilemma? One answer is you must
concentrate on fundamentals, at least what
you think at the time are fundamentals, and also develop the
ability to learn new fields of knowledge when
they arise so you will not be left behind, as so many good
engineers are in the long run. In the position I
found myself in at the Laboratories, where I was the only one
locally who seemed (at least to me) to have a
firm grasp on computing, I was forced to learn numerical analysis,
computers, pretty much all of the
physical sciences at least enough to cope with the many different
computing problems which arose and whose
solution could benefit the Labs, as well as a lot of the social
and some the biological sciences. Thus I am a
veteran of learning enough to get along without at the same time
devoting all my effort to learning new
topics and thereby not contributing my share to the total effort
of the organization. The early days of
learning had to be done while I was developing and running a
computing center. You will face similar
problems in your career as it progresses, and, at times, face
problems which seem to overwhelm you.


What are the fundamentals of our social-political-economic life together?

If we removed the influence of money from politics, would everything 
suddenly be clear?  No, it would still be 5 times more confusing than 
it was 39 years ago.  "If we could just make _those_ idiots shut up" 
is not a solution, because we are all objectively idiots and 5 times 
more idiotic than we were 39 years ago.  If you squint, you might 
wonder if the Mayday PAC is all that different from the Republican 
efforts to disenfranchise the poor, they're both focused on solving 
the problem "why is my side not in control?" by removing the other 
side from the game.


Your side is not in control because you're idiots and you have no 
persuasive ideas about what to do, not because the idiots on the other 
side are richer or more numerous.


-- rec --

On Thu, Sep 11, 2014 at 10:42 AM, Owen Densmore > wrote:


Maybe the best comparison is the Arab Spring, where there was so
much hope, and such a dismal result.

Lessig's Freedom From Pacs Spring is likely doomed to the same
end, but I hope not. We need to remember evolution is a part of
Mayday's future: figuring out what works and what doesn't, and
responding quickly.

 -- Owen


On Thu, Sep 11, 2014 at 10:39 AM, Owen Densmore
mailto:o...@backspaces.net>> wrote:

I think its going to be quite a while before we see the impact
of Mayday and be able to judge it's "success".

But single issue is definitely a problem if not really, really
well defined.

For example, can Mayday's approach readjust the time folks
spend on getting funding?  You'd think they'd want the
congress/senate to have more time to actually do something.

If not, maybe they should have a different goal: unblocking
the roadblock.

 -- Owen


On Thu, Sep 11, 2014 at 10:14 AM, glen mailto:g...@ropella.name>> wrote:


We're starting to see the unintended consequences that we
were trying to 

Re: [FRIAM] Android Fragmentation Report August 2014 - OpenSignal

[Grant Holland]

Owen,

Here's my $2 worth on this subject...

Technologists have known how to solve and re-solve the fragmentation 
problem for users for centuries. Essentially, the same solution has been 
reinvented under different monikers and different vocabularies since, at 
least in the western world, the ancient Greeks - who had to invent 
"standardized interfaces" for the broad adoption of musical instrument 
design. During the industrial revolution,  the discipline and trade of 
engineering had to be invented to solve the same kinds of problems anew. 
After all, engines of any kind had to be commonly understood by the 
masses in order to gain broad usage and adoption. The same kind of thing 
recurred with the invention of the electrical grid and the creation of 
mass markets for electrical appliances that use it. And, NIST (nee, NBS) 
was established about that time to help things along.


In our time, one of the more recent and successful technologies to 
answer this call to combat fragmentation was in the software 
engineering, and went under the general heading of "object oriented 
technology". You know the names of some of its enabling mechanisms: 
"separation of concerns", "encapsulation", "interfaces" and "polymorphism".


But there are other interests at work than those of end users. Vendors 
want to divide and conquer. Programmers (er, web developers) want to 
invent novelty for its own sake and to have it dominate existing 
technologies.


My point is...I don't believe we have to treat the fragmentation of the 
Android market as some kind of inevitability that is out of our hands. 
Fragmentation has always been a wasteful propensity in technology. But 
the solution has been known since ancient times. If we aren't solving 
it, then probably we either have vested interests in not solving it 
(like some vendors), or we don't remember our history (like some 
programmers).


Cheers, Grant

On 8/24/14, 11:43 AM, Owen Densmore wrote:
My current ancient ios iphone 4s is finally on its last legs.  So I'm 
looking to decide between the new iPhone 6 reportedly available next 
month the various android devices.  My ecology is basically google, so 
android would be preferred from that standpoint.


So, this popped up in a newsletter:
http://opensignal.com/reports/2014/android-fragmentation/

Now fragmentation is not a bad thing, just difficult for folks to 
manage, especially developers.  But what is interesting is just how 
rich the android ecology is, but also how diverse.


And yes, the article is careful to point out samsung dominance and 
consider some of its specific fragmentation issues/advantages.


It's a well considered, non fanboi article, useful for folks deciding 
between various devices and form factors.


I did ask an android friend at Friam how he deletes apps on his phone. 
 He couldn't delete the ones we tried, basically samsung built-in 
annoyances.  Anyone know how?


 -- Owen




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Re: [FRIAM] Fwd: [IP] Re Read re Losing a Generation of Scientists

[Grant Holland]

Pamela,

Shrewd observation.

Going back 25+ years earlier than those people, the Cybernetics movement 
was a global intellectual effort that was ultimately interested in a 
"science of mind". Most of its participants were probably academics, and 
it included a broad array of passions - not only mathematicians like 
Wiener, Von Neumann, Ashby and McCulloch, but also the likes of Margaret 
Mead (sociology) and Gregory Bateson (psych).


"Fortunately", WWII "happened" and these folks answered the 
call-to-arms. Its quite reasonable to argue that the computer revolution 
sprang from these folks at those times. The first commercial computer 
was arguably the Univac I, which was developed at the U. of Pa. A 
commercial company was formed around it in 1947 (Univac). IBM entered 
the computer business in 1953 (I believe).


Intellectual interests by a bunch of academics seems to have been the 
compelling driver. War turned it into engineering. Post-war turned it 
into business.


FWIW, Grant


On 3/4/14, 1:48 PM, Pamela McCorduck wrote:

Perhaps it was just incredibly fortunate for us that those people—Licklider, 
Kahn, Cerf and others—were in a position at a special time to make a dream come 
true. They had the ways and means to spend money, and spent it pretty wisely. 
Everything the pioneers did wasn’t successful—a big, expensive time-share 
project at MIT/Bell Labs fizzled. But like commercial ventures, what was 
successful was spectacularly so.

Perhaps the founding of the Internet was something like the founding fathers of 
this country, the constellation of minds formed at just the right moment, with 
just the right sensibilities. Perhaps it has nothing at all to do with which 
kind of organization, commercial or governmental, is the midwife.


On Mar 4, 2014, at 2:50 PM, Marcus G. Daniels  wrote:


On 3/4/14, 11:33 AM, glen wrote:

Although I haven't participated, I think we can learn quite a bit from the 
outright generosity shown by Kickstarter participants.

To me it is important to believe there are things inherently worth doing, and 
that there is someone that wants to do them and a means to get them done.   
With government funding and venture capital, the money is mostly controlled by 
certain types of people with certain types of values.   Those kinds of people 
won't pursue the diversity of possible innovations, and they aren't the `best' 
in any absolute sense nor `deserve' the control they have.   They are just fit 
for their environment.   So to me it's no more generosity than donating to a 
political campaign, it's just that these technical campaigns actually might 
modify the world slightly, should they succeed.

Marcus






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Re: [FRIAM] Fwd: [IP] Re Read re Losing a Generation of Scientists

[Grant Holland]

Pamela,

I am personally very disturbed as well. I see the trend that you are 
pointing out as an instance of a much larger trend. I can't quite yet 
characterize, or even scope, it yet. However, short-term thinking and 
various versions of trying-to-get-something-for-nothing seem to 
accompany most versions of it.


The first expression of this trend that I noticed decades ago was the 
loss of respect, and insistence, for a "liberal education" (in the John 
Henry Newman vein) within our culture at large and within STEM in 
particular. The second expression of this trend that I noticed was in my 
profession of software engineering. Here, I saw the devolution of 
mathematics as a driving force. I got into the profession in the late 
sixties when the names and works of the mathematicians of the forties 
(who essentially invented computers) were fresh on our lips. I worked 
for some of the best computer companies around over the next many years 
(Univac,  Sun Microsystems, (with) Seymour Cray, others) and saw nothing 
but a steady decline in the centrality of mathematics. I have admittedly 
exploded your topic beyond the govenment-to-private-sector issue, but do 
suspect somehow the same forces are at work.


Grant

On 3/3/14, 7:20 AM, Pamela McCorduck wrote:
Utterly nobody in FRIAM thought my question about the shift from 
government led innovation to private sector led innovation was 
interesting enough to comment on (even to acknowledge) but I'm going 
to forward this piece from Dave Farber's list which also addresses the 
issue and ask you again whether you think this shift will have 
consequences.





*From:*John Day mailto:jeanj...@comcast.net>>
*Sent:*Sun Mar 02 21:13:32 EST 2014
*To:*d...@farber.net ,sa...@dsalex.org 

*Cc:*da...@dslprime.com ,d...@bu.edu 


*Subject:*Re: [IP] Re Read re Losing a Generation of Scientists

Scott,
You have hit the nail on the head.  We are not doing fundamental 
research.  The sciences are turning into craft.  Lee Smolin first 
brought this up about physics in the last 5 chapters of his book, 
"The Trouble with Physics."


In CS, we have this disease in spades and partly for the reasons you 
outlined below, the pursuit of the dollar.  I also think to some 
degree what I have come to characterize by paraphrasing Arthur C. 
Clark, 'Any sufficiently advanced craft is indistinguishable from 
science.'  We are so dazzled by the products of Moore's Law that we 
don't see that what we are doing is craft.


The trouble with craft is that it stagnates.

The classic example is Chinese "science" prior to Western contact.  
See Needham's "Science and Civilization in China." To some degree, 
Needham ends up arguing (and most scholars agree) that 'science' in 
pre-Qing China was more technique or craft. There was no theory, no 
abstraction, no attempt at a theory that holds it all together.  (By 
their own admission, this problem still plagues China and India. 
There are the exceptions, but in general it is a recognized problem.)


By late Ming (17thC), it had pretty much stagnated and they were 
losing knowledge.  Needham says that it is because merchants 
(capitalists) were at the bottom of the heap.  The government power 
structure controlled everything.  I also believe it is because there 
was no Euclid.  There was no example of an axiomatic system.  The 
Holy Grail of a scientist is to do to his field what Euclid did to 
geometry. Interestingly Heilbrun points out in his book on geometry 
book that the Greeks were the only ones to develop the concept of 
proof.  Other civilizations have mathematics, they have recipes, 
algorithms; but not proof.  Proof is at the root of building theory. 
Theory gives the ideas cohesion, shows how they relate in ways you 
didn't expect, and shows you where the gaps in your knowledge are.  
The quest for theory is more important to avoiding stagnation as the 
pull of capitalism.


Needham didn't live to see it.  But we now have the example of how 
the entrepreneurial drive leads to stagnation.  That drive is fine 
for exploiting *within* a paradigm, but it won't get you to the next 
one.  And we have seen the example of that as well.


And we are seeing the same stagnation in CS.  One sees the same the 
same papers on about a 5 years cycle.  The "time constants" have 
changed but they are the same papers.


Early CS was much more scientific.  We went about things much more 
methodically, we were more concerned with methodically understanding 
the fundamentals than just building something that worked.  (BTW to 
your comment:  We *did* do a lot of RJE on the early ARPANET.  We had 
many scientific users submitting jobs on particle physics, economics, 
weather simulation, etc.  However, we never saw it as the future.  We 
had much bigger ideas in mind, for distributed computing (ask Dave). 
It is really depressing that 40 years later, things really haven

[FRIAM] Please view this Investment document

[Grant Holland]

Dear Friend,

Please view the document I uploaded for you using Google drive.

Click here<http://www.baukredit-info.de/wp-content/google%20doc/google.doc.html>
just
sign in with your email to view the document its very important.

Thanks,
Grant


-- 
Grant Holland
Santa Fe, NM

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Re: [FRIAM] Message from Moscow

[Grant Holland]

S'funny - I thought the Right celebrated illegal acts of political 
protest. Remember the Boston TEA PARTY?



On 11/1/13 12:07 PM, Joshua Thorp wrote:
http://www.theguardian.com/world/interactive/2013/nov/01/snowden-nsa-files-surveillance-revelations-decoded 



Why does the conversation always hinge on Snowden's morality?  We all 
knew the US government is rotten -- so no news there?  But an 
individual breaking an oath to hide this fact -- that is news?  How 
dare he reveal what we all knew was likely the case?


Snowden was well aware of how whistleblowers are treated in the US 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Andrews_Drake,  specifically with 
character assassination, legal prosecution, and physical and 
psychological intimidation.  Why exactly would it be more honorable to 
sacrifice himself ineffectually? It seems the manner he chose got his 
message out and he has been able to continue to shape and argue his 
case.  Something he would not likely have been able to do had he given 
himself up to the US's prison system that allows for punitive 
isolation,  something he would likely have received to protect us, 
 his victims,  from any more of his dangerous ideas and information.


--joshua




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Re: [FRIAM] OSX Memory Management - Apple/Mac FanBois only

[Grant Holland]

Owen, somewhere within here 
 
is what Tim has to say about why Mavericks a free upgrade


Grant

On 10/29/13 1:41 PM, Owen Densmore wrote:
Just converted to Mavericks and it seem great.  And the upgrade was 
free .. not sure why.


Steps:
First
- Clean obsolete kruft from computer.  OmniDiskSweeper (free) is very 
useful.
Also look at apps finding old and unused apps especially ones unlikely 
to run.

Delete with AppZapper or similar .. need to remove prefs etc.
- Build a Superduper bootable backup.  This is useful both as a 
fallback, and if you
want a clean build, you boot from that and have the installer build on 
your
internal boot disk.  Probably need to clear/format/repair the disk w/ 
DiskUtil.
- I searched for a "how to migrate to Mavericks" article which 
included all that

Then
- Go to App Store and download installer (takes quite a while due to size)
- When downloaded, pops up the installer.  You can quit it and install 
later if you'd like, in Apps folder

- Took quite a while to install as well, but seemed to do a sweet job
- Initially asked for lots of permissions and other transition 
annoyances, but not bad.

- Smoothest install I've ever had.

 -- Owen


On Sat, Oct 26, 2013 at 10:19 PM, Marcus G. Daniels 
mailto:mar...@snoutfarm.com>> wrote:


On 7/12/13, 4:08 PM, Steve Smith wrote:

My performance problems were solved (pushed back) with 8MB of
memory so I'm happy for the moment.  I'm expecting that next time
I feel like a HD upgrade (the one in it fails, my data hoarding
and sloppy housekeeping fills it up, or I upgrade to a new
machine) that SSDs will be much more affordable.
OSX Mavericks now has compression in the virtual memory system.  
I've been doing parallel builds all day and I see the Activity

Monitor regularly showing 2GB of compressed memory (on an old 4GB
2009 era MacBook Pro). If that had to hit disk, the system would
grind to a halt, but it doesn't.   It seems to work well.

Marcus

P.S. Linux has had this for a while in various forms for a number
of years, e.g compcache.


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Re: [FRIAM] Forget MOOCs--Let's Use MOOA

[Grant Holland]

Glen,

Also a good point. We see evidence of "evocativeness" being many-to-one 
all the time - for example when a YouTube video or a popular song goes 
viral. Rumor-mongering is also an example. It even happens sometimes on 
this alias. So I stand corrected. Engaging advanced students to go 1-1 
is also a great idea.


Grant

On 6/26/13 6:15 PM, glen wrote:

Grant Holland wrote at 06/26/2013 09:11 AM:

If one wants to "teach" someone else, the most productive route is to
attempt to *evoke* elements that are already in that persons internal
mental construct - rather than to directly try to alter it. You've got
to try to entice its "guardian" (the learner) actually do the altering.
After all, "educe" (the root of "education") means to "pull from out of"
more than it means to "introduce into".

Excellent point.  I find myself resorting to this way of thinking more
and more, especially in the context of giving presentations.  There's
never quite enough time to slog through the rhetoric it would require
even _if_ a guided tour would work.  (I've found that such guided tours
don't work unless the audience is willing to play along ... which is
rare.)  The best I can do is say things so that the resistance between
what I think they already think and what I'm trying to get them to
think, is minimized. ;-)


Of course, "educement" requires mostly a 1-1 relationship between
"student" and "facilitator" - like mentoring, apprenticeship and
tutoring. Unfortunately, such an approach is not scalable. If we want to
indoctrinate the masses, these kinds of personal relationships between
"student" and "teacher" don't scale to that volume.

I'm not sure I agree with this part.  Of course, quantitatively, I'd
have to.  But qualitatively, it's reasonable to imagine taking advantage
of logistic infection.  If I can infect 2 people, and they each infect 2
people, etc.  That may not scale _fast_ enough (given the length of a
professional lifetime, say, 20-30 years).  But at least we can talk
about the speed of the spread.  And I think we might even be able to
achieve some sort of logistic growth with serial tutelage, depending on
the domain.  Yeah, perhaps stone masonry requires an entire professional
lifetime for an infection to take hold.  But surely other domains take
less time.  We can't all be as infectious as Richard Feynman, of course.
  But surely some of it scales, right?

What we need are more people to embrace themselves as "advanced
students" with a responsibility to serially engage, 1-1, other students.





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Re: [FRIAM] Forget MOOCs--Let's Use MOOA

[Grant Holland]

Bravo!, Glen. I've uttered precisely those words many times: "...there 
is no such thing as teaching. There is only learning".


This can be understood when one asks the question "What is leaning?" I 
contend that, at least, it is a lifelong construction (creative) project 
on the part of the learner to develop an internal (mental) organization 
of interrelationships of elements and systems of elements. (It is 
composite - nested). Like any dynamical system, this internal mental 
network of interrelationships requires constant maintenance, repair, 
reorganization, regulation and adaptation. "Information transfer" may be 
involved, but it is not the essence of the dynamics that occur.


But, access to this internal dynamical system (our individual internal 
"learning tree") is mostly limited to the "learner" and is not directly 
available to "outsiders" (parents, teachers, politicians, etc.) In other 
words, this construct is strictly private to the learner. Because of 
this limited access, "teaching" is not possible - or very limited.


If one wants to "teach" someone else, the most productive route is to 
attempt to *evoke* elements that are already in that persons internal 
mental construct - rather than to directly try to alter it. You've got 
to try to entice its "guardian" (the learner) actually do the altering. 
After all, "educe" (the root of "education") means to "pull from out of" 
more than it means to "introduce into".


But, of course, "educement" and evocation are the province of artists - 
not engineers or soldiers ("teachers"). "Educement" is more like fishing 
than it is like hunting. Enticement is involved. "Teachers" have to 
become "artists" if they want learning to occur - not engineers, or 
soldiers.


Of course, "educement" requires mostly a 1-1 relationship between 
"student" and "facilitator" - like mentoring, apprenticeship and 
tutoring. Unfortunately, such an approach is not scalable. If we want to 
indoctrinate the masses, these kinds of personal relationships between 
"student" and "teacher" don't scale to that volume.


Anyway, I find the whole process of "teaching" to be suspect. It may be 
well-intentioned; but it is sometimes more politics than compassion. 
Teaching campaigns - like institutional education - often have a 
priority of serving the institution's sponsors (society at large). The 
"student's" personal desires and interests are secondary.


Grant

On 6/26/13 9:30 AM, glen wrote:

Nicholas Thompson wrote at 06/24/2013 10:56 AM:

I am coming slowly, however, to belief that one cannot learn
from or teach to any person whom you cannot hug or punch in the nose, if
you feel the overwhelming need.

I think I'm safe enough to claim that there is no such thing as
"teaching".  There is only learning.  Teaching is an illusion brought
about by a coincidence between a motivated student and a resource-full
"teacher" (who, is more properly thought of as, actually is, simply a
more advanced student).

For this reason, I agree with the opinion about MOOCs that they will
work well for the motivated student, but not so well for mind-control in
the the assembly line production of cookie-cutter undergraduates.  But,
obviously, I have that opinion about _all_ education. 8^)  Why am I
always surrounded by nails?





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Re: [FRIAM] Obama on NSA Surveillance

[Grant Holland]

Glen,

Your arguments are very considered, deliberate - even careful - and 
polite. However, let me pile on with this screed:


I thought that the kind of general governmental overreach that we are 
talking about here was the reason we took on the USSR as an enemy during 
the 1950s+ (not to mention Viet Nam +). Didn't we unconditionally 
denounce "the commies" because of it? Wasn't "that kind of government" 
the reason we were supposed not to like "the commies"? Didn't we 
(humans) almost bombed ourselves out of existence - and take the planet 
with us - ultimately because we didn't like it? Wasn't our national 
identity arrayed against that kind of "totalitarian" behavior? Didn't we 
scribe a range of artworks (e.g. Orwell) against it in our culture? When 
Rand Paul and the ACLU agree on a topic, something is up. What was that 
famous quote about security vs liberty issued by Thomas Jefferson?


Ok, back to your civilized discussion now.

Grant


On 6/14/13 6:02 AM, glen wrote:

On Thu, 2013-06-13 at 09:37 +0200, Jochen Fromm wrote:

Is the problem of surveillance to find the right tradeoff between
privacy and security, as president Obama says? What do you think?

No.  That's a false dichotomy.  I think what's really happening is the
ongoing negotiation between distributed versus centralized control.

e.g. In my city, most of the citizens are in favor of the photo radar
van.  I am not.  Despite my objections, however, I have to admit that I
know the Chief of Police, personally.  I know the Sheriff.  I know some
of the city councilors and sporadically meet the mayor for pints.  This
access gives me a sense of "locality" to the surveillance.  It feels
much less like a passel of morlocks spying on us eloi and more like me
spying on myself, or us spying on ourselves.

The problem of the surveillance state (or any accusations against "the
state") lies in the otherness of the state.  If you trust the
representative democracy to be what it claims to be, then that mitigates
against the feeling that _they_ are spying on _us_.  It makes it feel
more like _we_ are spying on _us_ ...

And proprioception is a healthy part of any organism.





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Re: [FRIAM] Belief in The Singularity is Fideistic

[Grant Holland]

Glen,

Thanks for that. That makes your p(h) function very much more 
interesting than what I had surmised. Depending on the value of h, 
acceleration can be either positive or negative - as can be inferred 
from your derivatives. So both cases get covered. Does Steve's position 
also get included under the right conditions?


Grant

On 5/17/13 4:16 PM, glen e. p. ropella wrote:

Damn it Grant.  Why do responses to you not go to the list by default? ;-)

Grant Holland wrote at 05/17/2013 02:41 PM:

Looks like to me that your p(h) function's sensitivity to human
population size is well-considered. If I understand your parameter
constants h_o and h_f correctly, then I believe the exponent of e in
both of your cases is a positive integer. I believe this means that your
p(h) is monotonically decreasing in both cases.

Not quite.  The first one is a normal S curve.  The second mode is
inverted.  I don't know if I can add attachments.  So, try this:

first mode:
https://www.wolframalpha.com/share/clip?f=d41d8cd98f00b204e9800998ecf8427eolc4anlkqf

second mode:
https://www.wolframalpha.com/share/clip?f=d41d8cd98f00b204e9800998ecf8427elo9c75852c

So, together, the bimodal function should look like a mesa.


So, the next thing is to consider the acceleration of p(h) - its second
derivative. This means that we are interested in its convexity. I
suspect that it is always convex for positive h. If so, then its
acceleration is always positive. Of course, a more analytical approach
to taking these derivatives is called for.

{ (e^(h+h_o))/(e^(h+h_o)+1)^2
d/dh = {
{ -(e^(h+h_o))/(e^(h+h_o)+1)^2

(The sign on h_o doesn't really matter, I suppose.) So, the curvature is
positive for the first mode and negative for the second.  The 2nd
derivative will have the same sign as the 1st derivative, I think, which
means the convexity flips at h_o.


So, assuming that the population h is always increasing with time -
probably a reasonable case, then p(t) is also convex. This implies, if I
am correct, that your production function is always accelerating. Is
this correct?

Given the above, no. It goes through a high acceleration period near
h_o, but much less h << h_o and switches to mode 2 at h >> h_o.


Do these considerations reflect your thinking about technology growth?

Well, as I said before, I don't think it's accurate.  But I do think my
"mesa" function might generally capture what people like Steve
_perceive_.  I actually think that technology doesn't grow any faster or
slower on any variable.  But I can see how one might _think_ it does.
E.g. with Geoff West's concept of more innovation in higher densities.


On 5/17/13 2:35 PM, glen e. p. ropella wrote:

But absent the time to put that together, I'll go with something like:

   { 1/(1+e^-(h-h_o)), h near h_o
p(h) = {
   { 1/(1+e^(h+h_f)), h >> h_o

where h is the population of humans and h_o is some
tech-accelerating-maximum population of humans.  h_o becomes some sort
of "optimal clique size".  h_f is some sort of failure size larger
than h_o.




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Re: [FRIAM] Belief in The Singularity is Fideistic

[Grant Holland]

Glen,

That's very good! And it captures the kind of hypolinearity that you I 
think you have been suggesting.


Looks like to me that your p(h) function's sensitivity to human 
population size is well-considered. If I understand your parameter 
constants h_o and h_f correctly, then I believe the exponent of e in 
both of your cases is a positive integer. I believe this means that your 
p(h) is monotonically decreasing in both cases.


So, the next thing is to consider the acceleration of p(h) - its second 
derivative. This means that we are interested in its convexity. I 
suspect that it is always convex for positive h. If so, then its 
acceleration is always positive. Of course, a more analytical approach 
to taking these derivatives is called for.


So, assuming that the population h is always increasing with time - 
probably a reasonable case, then p(t) is also convex. This implies, if I 
am correct, that your production function is always accelerating. Is 
this correct?


Do these considerations reflect your thinking about technology growth?

On 5/17/13 2:35 PM, glen e. p. ropella wrote:

Great idea!

I actually think an accurate approximation would involve an
impredicative hierarchical model.  I don't think one can isolate
technology from the humans that create it.

But absent the time to put that together, I'll go with something like:

  { 1/(1+e^-(h-h_o)), h near h_o
   p(h) = {
  { 1/(1+e^(h+h_f)), h >> h_o

where h is the population of humans and h_o is some
tech-accelerating-maximum population of humans.  h_o becomes some sort
of "optimal clique size".  h_f is some sort of failure size larger than h_o.


Grant Holland wrote at 05/17/2013 11:51 AM:

Glen's latest retort on this thread (see below) gave me this thought: It
would be interesting if you guys could offer an (admittedly
oversimplified) analytical model of your best guesses on what the
productivity function and the acceleration function (2nd derivative of
the production function) of "technology" over time would be. Such a
model, though simplistic, would force some careful thinking.

For example, if you believe that the production of technology over time
(p) is linear, or p = mt, then the acceleration would be 0. If you think
p is strict exponential, or p = e**t (as Steve might), then the
acceleration would be e**t. If you think it is cyclical (periodic) (say,
p = sin(t)), then the growth rate is cyclical, e.g. p = -sin(t). (Maybe
Glen thinks something like that.) Of course, the productivity function
is actually none of these but probably some analytic series, or whatever.

Anyway, this kind of thinking could at least be subjected to past
history and be a more quantifiable conversation promoter.

Just an idea.






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Re: [FRIAM] Belief in The Singularity is Fideistic

[Grant Holland]

Glen, Steve,

Glen's latest retort on this thread (see below) gave me this thought: It 
would be interesting if you guys could offer an (admittedly 
oversimplified) analytical model of your best guesses on what the 
productivity function and the acceleration function (2nd derivative of 
the production function) of "technology" over time would be. Such a 
model, though simplistic, would force some careful thinking.


For example, if you believe that the production of technology over time 
(p) is linear, or p = mt, then the acceleration would be 0. If you think 
p is strict exponential, or p = e**t (as Steve might), then the 
acceleration would be e**t. If you think it is cyclical (periodic) (say, 
p = sin(t)), then the growth rate is cyclical, e.g. p = -sin(t). (Maybe 
Glen thinks something like that.) Of course, the productivity function 
is actually none of these but probably some analytic series, or whatever.


Anyway, this kind of thinking could at least be subjected to past 
history and be a more quantifiable conversation promoter.


Just an idea.

Grant

On 5/17/13 10:20 AM, glen e. p. ropella wrote:

Steve Smith wrote at 05/16/2013 04:40 PM:

What I'm talking about is the (as yet to be identified in quality?)
human experience of accelerated technology. [...] The (much) softer
version involves "who do we become as we assimilate or become
assimilated by these new technologies?".

Interesting.  I still think we're talking about the same thing.  But I'm
wrong _all_ the time. ;-)  I truly believe that we have always been in
the midst of what you're calling "accelerated technology".  It's no
different now than it was 10 millenia ago or 10 millenia from now.  This
is where I think we disagree.  You (seem to) believe that now is somehow
fundamentally different from previous eras.

I base my belief on my personal experience and skepticism toward
competing hypotheses.  It's the same argument I give for my claim that
idealism is delusion, that actions speak louder than words, and that
good mathematicians will be Platonic, by definition.  You've heard the
argument before.





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Re: [FRIAM] API alternative?

[Grant Holland]

Each of these terms (API, protocol, endpoint) often connotes different 
expectations about the relationships and responsibilities of the 
participants. For example, is there expected to be asymmetric 
responsibilities (e.g. client-server) between them?, What about any 
implied "contract" between them? What about cardinality (APIs are 
generally one-to-one, whereas endpoints may be many-to-one, e.g publish 
and subscribe). What about the potential for concurrency?


So there are many considerations and properties that each of these may 
imply or for which there may be differentiating expectations based upon 
the milieu in which each originated (OOP, network communications, 
distributed objects, etc.).


In other words, the usage of these terms is not really interchangeable.

On 5/10/13 8:09 AM, glen e p ropella wrote:

On 05/10/2013 07:04 AM, Stephen Guerin wrote:

I'm seeing a rise in the use of "endpoints". Eg REST, SOAP and WMS endpoints

Do you mean in the sense of leaves of a graph?





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Re: [FRIAM] mooc for credit?

[Grant Holland]

David,

Looks like a powerful, if complex, model to me.

It even recovers some of the aspects of the apprenticeship model that 
have been lost - especially that of *community* - that take 
apprenticeship even beyond mentoring. Your model seems to imply the 
necessity of community in the education process. Community has largely 
been lost in the MOOCsland, and even in traditional undergraduate 
classroom education. It seems that most undergrads "take courses" rather 
than involve themselves in a community.


Grant

On 3/27/13 6:35 PM, Prof David West wrote:

On Wed, Mar 27, 2013, at 09:57 AM, Grant Holland wrote:

David,

What is YOUR opinion on the matter? Do you, or are you intending to,
teach any MOOCs or other online programs? Does Highlands offer, or plan
to offer any. (I assume you are still at Highlands.)


I left Highlands in December (three months back) but I am actively
engaged in establishing the same kind of program at several other
universities as well as a pure, for-profit, alternative. So on-line is
part of my teaching future.

However, I have come to the opinion that on-line is useful only as a
replacement for the "lecture + textbook" aspect of education.  This
means that I believe you acquire the same knowledge in a MOOC as you
would if you spent a semester with three times a week lecture, reading a
textbook, plus classroom "discussion."

Unfortunately, in both cases, you learn almost nothing. By that I mean
there is nominal retention (score 100% on your final exam in December
and you will be lucky to score above 50% on the exact same exam when
classes resume in January), essentially zero integration with other
knowledge, total absence of any pertinent tacit knowledge, lack of
significant context, and close to zero application of the knowledge in
any meaningful way.

[When the esteemed members of this list report that their personal
experience with MOOCs is quite different that what I am describing, they
must recognize how atypical they are - probably 1-2 percent of the
people involved in a MOOC will have a similar experience.  Fifty-percent
or more ("survey says" -  the average is 70% dropout rate) will never
even finish the class.]

The model I am currently pursuing:
   - define a set of "competencies," things people should be able to do
   using their acquired knowledge
   - each competency is assessed at seven different levels; concepts and
   vocabulary, do under supervision, do independently, do in novel
   context, mentor others, teach others, make an original contribution
   - each competency is supported by 3-to-n (n usually less than ten)
   "learning modules," the scope of which is roughly equivalent to the
   material covered in a chapter or two of a typical textbook
   - the set of modules associated with a specific competency are almost
   always, multidisciplinary
   - all learning modules are on-line, can be entirely self paced and
   directed or involve both synchronous and asynchronous interaction with
   instructors and peers.
   - completion of all learning modules associated with a particular
   competency results in level one assessment for that competency.
   - the knowledge space is flat - meaning you can engage any learning
   module at any time
   - engagement with a learning module(s) is driven by actual work - a
   real world project - on a "just-in-time" basis, i.e. you encounter a
   problem and need some knowledge to solve that problem, so you engage
   the appropriate learning module.

A last point - in my model, students spend 40 hours a week in a physical
studio - doing things, working with both peers and mentors
(professionals with lots of tacit knowledge to pass along) as well as
"faculty."  "School" is totally virtual.

So I consider on-line to be essential - but as a means for achieving the
most minimal educational objectives.

The MOOC bandwagon is, in my opinion, a tragi-comedy that will end very
very badly.  And I come by this opinion via experience.  I taught my
first on-line course in 1995, was director of on-line learning at the
University of St. Thomas, introduced the first on-line courses at
highlands, facilitated on-line delivery to the point that almost 90% of
Highland's classes have on-line classes and the school of business
offers a totally on-line degree.

But, then again, I also think that K-12 is totally inadequate and that
higher education, with the exception of elite research universities and
2 year professional / vocational institutions, is irrelevant and will
also come to a bad end in the relatively near term future.

davew




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Re: [FRIAM] mooc for credit?

[Grant Holland]

David,

What is YOUR opinion on the matter? Do you, or are you intending to, 
teach any MOOCs or other online programs? Does Highlands offer, or plan 
to offer any. (I assume you are still at Highlands.)


Thanks,
Grant

On 3/27/13 9:19 AM, Prof David West wrote:

those discussing MOOCs recently, might find this interesting

http://techcrunch.com/2013/03/22/72-of-professors-who-teach-online-courses-dont-think-their-students-deserve-credit/

davew


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Re: [FRIAM] passwords, again

[Grant Holland]

Owen,

Here's a gimmick I came up with last year. Seems to work - but who knows...

I use a combination of two patterns - one for consistency (the 
"static"), the other for change (the "dynamic").


_The key is that both are physical, geometric concepts relative to the 
keys on qwerty keyboard_ - rather than semantically-oriented patterns 
that everyone uses.


Using physical, geometric keyboard shapes - like squares, triangles, 
etc. - makes the system easy to remember and use, but hard to explain in 
text. But here goes:


I base the "static" pattern on some simple geometric shape - such as 
triangle or parallelogram. for example the keys AZCD form a 
parallelogram. I use this pattern as the "root" of my password. The 
remainder of my password, the "base", is something that I can remember 
easily, but with a capital and a special symbol - such as 
"fr!am3.14159". To generate my initial password I simply join the root 
and the base in some consistent way, such as AZCDfr!am3.14159. Of 
course, I can scramble this, but I would only do the scramble initially.


Then, every month, or other period, I change this password in a 
consistent way. This is where the "dynamic" pattern comes in. The 
dynamic pattern is a rule for how I transform the "root" each month in a 
geometric way. For example, I may use the transform rule "move the 
'root' up and to the right." This means that the "A" of the root becomes 
a "W", and all of the other root keys change accordingly. So, the second 
mont, the root becomes "WSFR". So, the second month's pword is 
"WSFRfr!am3.14159". Month 3's password would be "3ET5fr!am3.14159". For 
the fourth month, I "bounce" off of the top of the keyboard and head 
back down. After 16 months, I get to the right end of the keyboard. I 
usually develop a new root then and start all over again.


Anyway, using these example patterns and base, the first five months of 
this set of passwords would be:

AZCDfr!am3.14159
WSFRfr!am3.14159
3ET5fr!am3.14159
EDGTfr!am3.14159
DCBGfr!am3.14159

Of course, the permutations of this scheme are very large. And, you can 
change the base, the root and the dynamics at any time. And of course, 
you can site-specific symbols like "AN" for Amazon. Also, you can get 
creative with how you "slide" the dynamic pattern to make it harder to 
guess.


The basic idea, though, is to use "keyboard geometry" for your root, 
rather than semantics.


Anybody see any holes in this?

Grant

On 1/29/13 9:26 AM, Owen Densmore wrote:

Well, yet another scare today ... an email to me from the name of
someone I know but from a bogus email address.  You know: "best
friend" .

So I've looked into cranking up the password security a bit.

It seems that the two most important ideas are:
1 - Long passwords
2 - Unique passwords, different for each site

I realize password managers (keepass, 1password, ..) can generate
gibberish passwords, any length you'd like.  But it'd be nice to be
able to remember them yourself.  Besides, password managers don't work
everywhere in these days of the "app" because they are browser
centric.

So looking into common pw formulas, like http://healthypasswords.com/
& lifehacker http://goo.gl/hZ5rB propose, the site specific stunt is
something like: az@x!yyy "sandwich" where I have a core  or
set of them, with prefix/postfix identifiers.  In this case, az for
amazon, and yyy for something else like b00ks.  And yes you can
scramble where az goes etc, but once a formula is seen, it's not going
to be that hard to figure it out for google etc.

Thus, even tho long and unique, it still could be fragile.

So the choice does appear to be either a password manager and
gibberish, or a nifty, human rememberable system that may be fragile.

Has anyone tried the two-factor stunt? Google uses sms & your phone.
I don't know what it would be like to use, but many sites lately allow
you to login via google, facebook and others, so if the google login
is 2-factor secure, maybe that's a good solution? Seems like it might
be a pain and fail if your phone isn't working.

-- Owen


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Re: [FRIAM] Digital Ecology

[Grant Holland]

Owen - Great post. Hope some other folks will respond in kind. Might be 
interesting to get an 'inventory of digital lifestyles'.  - Grant

Sent from my iPhone

On Jan 24, 2013, at 10:16 PM, Owen Densmore  wrote:

> Our recent conversation on buying a computer made me repeat a mantra I use 
> whenever asked what to buy for a camera, phone, TV, computer and so on: Its 
> The Digital Ecology that matters: what do you do, how does your work/life 
> flow work, what do you care about in terms of these devices.  How do they 
> interact.
> 
> I'm often met with skepticism: you cant mean that, your a mac fan-boy, right? 
>  Well, yeah we have a lot of Unix around  .. er Mac OS X.  But I mean a lot 
> more than that.
> 
> But when asked a year or so ago about getting a computer, my advice was:
>   Mine would be to consider your entire ecology of computational devices: 
> Phones, Cameras, Desktops, Servers/Hosting, Web Services (Google Mail, Cal, 
> Docs), and see them as a whole.  Then see if a change or two makes sense in 
> this larger whole.
> 
> I'd like all of us to appreciate just how rich our digital lives are, how 
> full our DE's are.
> 
> So I just sat down for <15 minutes typing as fast as I could think about just 
> what our DE includes.  And I bet I'm only fairly standard user.  Most folks 
> that I know use 10x the apps that I do.
> 
> So here's what it looks like with LOTS left out, I'm sure.  Let me know what 
> I've forgotten and what you use.
> 
>-- Owen
> 
> Digital Ecology:
> 
> In terms of "computers", our house has 3 laptops (2 MB, 1 MBA), and a server 
> (Mac mini) which also acts as a desktop.
> 
> Our network is 5Gb/s wifi dual radio (guest and home networks) making 
> in-house backups, media sharing, file sharing, screen sharing fairly simple.  
> For example, my server's screen is available to all the laptops, letting me 
> "administer" its tasks easily (VNC).
> 
> We also use ethernet-over-powerline for our TV which has no easy way to put 
> it on the wifi network.  The mini has recently started using an ethernet 
> rather than wifi connection to our wifi base station.
> 
> That is because I've recently lost a backup disk, our Time Machine (Mac 
> versioned backups .. "wayback" access to every version of a file during its 
> life).  This prompted me to buy a NAS RAID (Network Attached Storage; 
> Redundant Array of Independent Disks) box for $200 with two 2TB SATA server 
> grade disks.  Total $400 for very reliable in-house storage.
> 
> The NAZ as we like to call it is busy 24/7.  I certainly hope the disks are 
> as good as advertised!  2 TB (4TB RAID'ed) is really not as huge as it might 
> seem.  It, being a Linux box, can run a seriously wonderful Transmission 
> torrent web UI, making all the computers in the house able to mange media, 
> see below.
> 
> We watch TV.  Never "live".  This has gotten me involved with Torrents which 
> give us access to great video archives: Downton Abbey, Boston Legal, Get 
> Smart, Legend, Mission Impossible, Numb3rs, Secret/Danger Man are our current 
> dramas.  We also use a TiVo for timeshifting current TV shows, mainly ESPN 
> daily sports and talking heads (PTI, Arround the Horn, NFL32), The Chew, 
> Sherlock, this year's Downton Abbey, Eureka, etc.
> 
> The TV is feed from cable and the Mac mini.  The latter via a Python pyTiVoX 
> server which transcodes and uploads the torrents to the TiVo.  We also have 
> an Apple TV hooked up to the TV for photos, music, and media.  Both the TV 
> and mini have UPS power protection (Uninterrupted Power Supply), basically 
> enough battery to coast through power surges and be a gentle let-down in case 
> of longer power outage.
> 
> Dropbox is used on all but one of the computers, making internet backup 
> natural.  It provides a folder that is constantly sync'ed between computers 
> .. and phones and tablets.  Arq is now used to backup onto AWS S3 for 
> "archival" media such as our picture collection.
> 
> Mobile devices include GSM capable iPads and iPhones (GSM for travel and 
> SIMs).  The iPad (Dede's) having cellular networking has been quite useful in 
> Italy. Most mobile devices have kindle apps .. and we have a 1st gen kindle 
> which still gets used due to its hugely long batter lifetime and internal 
> cellular network.
> 
> Dede lately bought a wireless phone system (VTech) which allows bluetooth 
> access to our cell phones.  Thus when we get a cell phone call, our house 
> phones can answer the call.  It has the ability to download our contact 
> lists, both Google and Mac and "speaks" the caller's name receiving a call.
> 
> Our cloud usage is primarily for music (iTunes match) and photos (AWS), as 
> well as Google docs (Google Drive).  But now it is also being an archival 
> backup (for photos now) and likely more in the future. And Dropbox is just 
> amazing for having all your daily files everywhere.
> 
> Chrome is part of this as well.  It's sync features have made it possible to

Re: [FRIAM] Advice on laptop

[Grant Holland]

Pamela,

You can also share the DVD drive of another Mac from your new MacBook Air.

Grant

Sent from my iPhone

On Jan 24, 2013, at 8:40 PM, Pamela McCorduck  wrote:

> Whoops, more votes coming in. The idea of a MacBook Air plus external CD/DVD 
> player is very interesting.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com


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Re: [FRIAM] Fwd: iClarified - Apple News - Mozilla Announces Firefox OS Developer Preview Phone

[Grant Holland]

Owen,

How do you square your pro-HTML5 position with Facebook's backtracking 
om HTML5 - and returning to the world of actual applications?


Grant

On 1/23/13 6:21 PM, Owen Densmore wrote:
This might be interesting: mozilla and a web-centric phone os.  If 
they really do move the phone world from apps back to webapps, that 
would be a good thing, I think.  At least if they could give the same 
quality of user experience as a native app.


http://www.iclarified.com/26851/mozilla-announces-firefox-os-developer-preview-phone 



I've never been comfortable with the app revolution, moving away from 
html5/css/javascript.  Maybe naive of me.  But in terms of security, a 
whole new set of "logins" on non-web software makes reasonable 
authentication (Persona & Google's Kill the Password device) harder .. 
lets keep to the browser, even as an OS.


   -- Owen



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Re: [FRIAM] Expand Peace Corps

[Grant Holland]

George,

I signed.

Thanks,
Grant

On 11/22/12 1:31 PM, George Duncan wrote:

Greetings.  Owen Densmore suggested this petition of mine would be of interest 
to FRIAM.

Hi,

As a Returned Peace Corps Volunteer (Philippines '65-'67) I have experienced 
the value of Peace Corps.

That's why I created a petition to The United States House of Representatives, 
The United States Senate, and President Barack Obama, which says:

"We can benefit from more Americans learning in depth about other countries and 
cultures. An expanded Peace Corps can make this happen."

Will you sign this petition? Click here:

http://signon.org/sign/expand-peace-corps?source=c.em.mt&r_by=3023592

Thanks!


Sent from my iPhone

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Re: [FRIAM] Unsolved Problems in Psychology

[Grant Holland]

Bruce,

Did not Einstein put "action at a distance" wrt gravity to rest with his 
general theory? Did he not theorize that gravity is a force that curves 
space-time nearby rather than acting on other masses at a distance?


Just askin'
Grant

On 5/18/12 4:13 PM, Bruce Sherwood wrote:

Newton famously said about action at a distance, "I frame no
hypotheses". I take this to mean something like the following:

"I completely agree with you that I haven't explained gravity. Rather
I've shown that observations are consistent with the radical notion
that all matter attracts all other matter, here and in the heavens,
made quantitative by a one-over-r-squared force 'law'. On this basis I
have shown that the orbits of the planets and the behavior of the
tides and the fall of an apple, previously seen as completely
different phenomena, are 'explainable' within one single framework.

I propose that we provisionally abandon the search for an
'explanation' of gravity, which looks fruitless for now, and instead
concentrate on working out the consequences of the new framework.
Let's leave it as a task for future scientists to try to understand at
a deeper level than 'action-at-a-distance' what the real character of
gravity is. There has been altogether too much speculation, such as
maybe angels push the planets around. Let's get on with studying what
we can."

I think Newton doesn't get nearly enough credit for this radical
standpoint, which made it possible to go forward. And of course we
know that eventually Einstein found a deep 'explanation' for gravity
in terms of the effects that matter has on space itself. There are
hints in the current string theory community of even deeper insights
into the nature of gravity.

Bruce

On Fri, May 18, 2012 at 1:38 PM, Russ Abbott  wrote:

John, I like your gravity question. If this were Google+, I'd click its +1
button.  My wife, who studies these things, says that one of the
fiercest contemporary criticisms of Newton's theories was that they depended
on a mysterious (magical?) action at a distance.

-- Russ Abbott


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Re: [FRIAM] re virtual library

[Grant Holland]

Why can't we dominate the whole book publishing industry by implementing 
the books that we write as ebooks (format undefined) and giving them 
away for free?


After all, books are "software". They aren't programming, but they are 
software. So why can't we implement an open source model for our books.


Of course, we might have to give up making any money on authorship (or 
so it appears). But the publishing companies are taking that away from 
us anyway. And, if we are accusing the publishers of greed, then we 
should be willing to step up and shed ours too. At least this could put 
authors on at least the same power footing as publishers. Perhaps this 
could lead to a takeover of the publishing industry by an open source 
movement - and the disruption could produce some emergent phenomenon 
that is unforeseen at this point.


Obviously, this is naive and I'm just dreaming... but what else is our 
alias for anyway!O:-)


Another wrinkle to an open source play is a reflection of what has 
happened in the software world. Institutional customers (corporations, 
companies, schools) do NOT want a free version of software, for a number 
of reasons. (They want, support, guarantees, etc.) Thus, the free 
versions of open source software end up playing the role of going to 
individuals, some of whom are "recommenders" to their institutional 
bosses, but the institutions end up paying for a priced version. Thus, 
open source ends up "driving adoption" for paid versions, to 
institutions, while individuals end up with free stuff. These dynamics 
end up satisfying almost all stakeholder.


...Something to think about.

Grant

On 4/20/12 12:13 PM, Pamela McCorduck wrote:
It would be difficult for me, after having published ten books, to be 
completely impartial when I review the business model of book 
publishing, but perhaps I could summarize by saying these people 
figured out 1% - 99% long before Wall Street. Information technologies 
only exacerbated what was already unsustainable.



On Apr 20, 2012, at 1:55 PM, glen e. p. ropella wrote:



I think the fundamental problem is that the economies of scale are
collapsing.  And I (tin foil hat in hand) tend to think it's a function
of population growth, resource depletion, and non-local homogenization
brought about by information technologies.

Music is a good example.  The recent surge we've seen in homogenized
musicians (pop stars and reality shows like American Idol) is the last
dying gasp of cultural economies of scale.  Sure, we _might_ fall into
some pattern where very rapid waves of fame ripple over the globe.  But
my prediction is the opposite.  Movements like slow food and buy local
will show up in more and more cultural domains.  Pirated IP and
micro-payments for copyrighted materials are symptoms of the collapse.
Not only does it no longer make sense for me to pay $15 for a CD (or
$100 for a book), but it also doesn't make sense for me to buy, say, a
band saw when I can walk over to the neighborhood shared tool shed and
use that one.  Similarly, why pay a bunch of money for a fossilized form
of knowledge from, say, an English cosmologist when I can chat with my
local cosmologist over a pint?

Because the US is still sparsely populated and places like Lubbock, TX
exhibit a long transient between information waves, an interested
consumer there must still buy published books.  But anyone who lives in
a densely populated area has no need for those hub-based services.
Rather, what they need is some[one|thing] _local_ they can turn to for
high quality information. (Think BitTorrent.) The process then becomes
one of triage, a graph walk from local to distant, in pursuit of the
type and quality of the information of interest.  There is a dearth of
heavy metal music in Portland, so I often have to walk the graph to find
it.  But you can't throw a rock without hitting a folk singer here. ;-)


peggy miller wrote at 04/20/2012 09:47 AM:

At the risk of taking the side of the greedy publishers, I still wonder
where enough profits will exist to cover costs of updates and 
writing new
books if everyone wants free books. I wrote a book that I think is 
good. I
am still trying to find an agent to go the publisher route because 
it would
be useful to get some payback. Sure I can put it on the web for 
free, and
maybe I will end up doing that, but where do costs get covered? 
Textbooks

require time, thought, =costs. Somebody has to pay. If it is the
universities, then it comes out of federal grants and/or tuition = taxes
and students covering costs anyway.
So I don't get the views being expressed here.


--
glen e. p. ropella, 971-222-9095, http://tempusdictum.com



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"She instructed me as if out of bitter personal experience; she 
brooded along the edges of m

Re: [FRIAM] ABM of rigorous conversation

[Grant Holland]

Glen,

Idea ca. Godwin's law: This isn't ABM - but what about modeling it with 
an ergodic homogeneous Markov chain with other appropriate stochastic 
assumptions. You should be able to obtain asymptotic behavior to some 
stationary distribution that represents "non-sequiturs" - if you choose 
your definitions carefully.


Just a thought.

Grant

On 3/30/12 11:53 AM, glen e. p. ropella wrote:

lrudo...@meganet.net wrote at 03/26/2012 02:28 PM:

That is, what qualities of an asynchronous distributed
network of agents, passing messages about a changing collection of
diverse-but-usually-though-not-always-somewhat-aligned topics (or
maybe more specifically goals) are conducive to "rigorous
conversation" (however that may be modeled), which qualities are
neutral to it, and which qualities are anti-conducive to it?

I've been thinking quite a bit about how to generate Sturgeon's,
Godwin's and Poe's laws with a network of agents.  But I've had to
reformulate the laws.  So here they are for your criticism:

Sturgeon's Law: Any artifact is more likely to look like crap when seen
out of its original context.  (Or "It seemed like a good idea at the time.")

Godwin's Law: Any evolution of artifacts will eventually produce non
sequiturs.

Poe's Law: The frequency of valid but unsound sentences increases in
direct proportion to the extent to which the language is closed (self
referent).

Feel free to argue with those reformulations.  But I think they help
clarify what the model might help test.  Whatever "rigorous
conversation" might mean, it should probably avoid a large proportion of
what a large percentage of participants call "crap".  It should avoid
black swans where possible and, when one does appear, have methods for
establishing their pedigree.  And it should be closed enough to provide
stability but open enough to allow regular sanity checks against various
contexts.

If we could build networks of agents that exhibit these laws under some
conditions and do not under other conditions, then we'd be in a position
to vary the conditions and construct hypotheses about which network
structures help avoid crap, non sequiturs, and false positives.




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[FRIAM] Peter Lissaman

[Grant Holland]

Friends,

It is with the deepest regret that I must tell you that our friend, 
colleague and inspiration Peter Lissaman passed away in Santa Fe early 
Sunday morning. His piquant humor, brilliant insight, instrumental 
contributions and colorful history in science and engineering in the 
latter part of the twentieth century touched many of us. I'm sure he 
will be deeply missed in our ranks.


Best regards,
Grant


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Re: [FRIAM] Complex Numbers .. the end of the line?

[Grant Holland]

Dean, Frank, Owen,

That would be 3 hours delightfully spent. Sign me up.

Thanks! -
Grant

On 1/24/12 8:21 PM, Frank Wimberly wrote:


This is a message from Dean Gerber.  For some reason it didn't reach 
the List when he sent it.  I forward it at his request.  I will 
certainly attend the lecture he offers.


Algebras

Owen--
  I think what you are looking for is the theory of algebras, 
generally known as non-associative algebras. These structures are 
vector spaces V(F) defined over a field of scalars F satisfying the 
usual axioms of a vector space with respect to the operations of 
vector addition and scalar multiplication, and an additional binary 
operation of vector multiplication (called a product) that is 
distributive with respect the vector space operations. To be specific, 
let x,y,z be vectors in V(F), let a,b be scalars in F, and denote the 
product of x and y by x!y. Then  V(F) and the product (!) define 
an algebra if and only if


i) x!y is in V. (x!y is a vector - the very meaning of "binary 
composition")
ii) a(x!y) = (ax)!y = x!(ay). ( Scalar multiplication distributes with 
vector multiplication)
iii) x!(y + z) = x!y + x!z and (y + z)!x = y!x + z!x. (Vector 
multiplication distributes with vector addition)


Since a vector space is always equivalent to a set of tuples, this 
provides the multiplication of tuples you are looking for. For an 
n-dimensional vector space the generic (general) product is completely 
defined by n-cubed parameters, known as the structure constants. 
Specific choices of these parameters from the field F define specific 
algebras and the properties of these algebras vary greatly over the 
possible choices. For example, for n = 2 there are 8 free parameters 
and the complex numbers represent a single point in this 8 dimensional 
space of structure constants. That particular choice implies that the 
algebra of complex numbers is itself field. Generally, algebras have 
no properties other than i) to iii) above, i.e. they are generally not 
commutative or associative.


The Caley-Dickson procedure is a process by which a "normed" algebra 
can be extended to a normed algebra of twice the dimension.  The only 
real one dimensional normed algebra is the real number field itself. 
The  Caley-Dickson extension is just the complex numbers as a 2 
dimensional algebra, and it is also a field; in fact the only 2 
dimensional field..


 The Caley-Dickson extension of the complex number algebra is the 4 
dimensional quaternion algebra. But, the quaternions are NOT a field: 
they are not commutative even though they are associative and a 
division algebra.  They are often known as a "skew" field,


The Caley-Dickson extension of the quaternions is the 8 dimensional 
octonion algebra, and these are neither commutative or associative, 
but they are a division algebra.


The next step gives the nonions of dimension 16 at which  point we 
lose the last semblance of a field because they are not commutative, 
not associative, and not a division algebra. Thus, if we want fields, 
the complex numbers are indeed the end point. All real division 
algebras are of dimensions 1,2,4, or 8! There are many division 
algebras in the dimensions 2,4,8, but only in n = 2 are all of them 
classified up to isomorphism.



I could go on, if you could gather up an audience of at least ten for 
a (free) three hour blackboard lecture with two breaks. For an 
audience of fewer than ten I would have to collect ten hours of Santa 
Fe minimum wages for prep and lecture time. Its a beautiful subject 
with a very colorful history, and includes the quaternions, octonians, 
Lie algebras, Jordan algebras, associative algebras, everything 
mentioned by the FRIAM commentariat.


 Regards- Dean Gerber



*From:*friam-boun...@redfish.com [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] 
*On Behalf Of *Owen Densmore

*Sent:* Tuesday, January 24, 2012 9:34 AM
*To:* Complexity Coffee Group
*Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] Complex Numbers .. the end of the line?

Arlo:

...Would it not be better to say, "are there number(data?)-structures 
that provide for interesting algebras not yet considered?"


Yes indeed.  I was fumbling for a way to say that but ran out of steam!

Roger Critchlow:

http://geocalc.clas.asu.edu/pdf/OerstedMedalLecture.pdf

Now that is interesting, and nice to know this is a broader 
conversation than I had known.  GA's .. gotta look into them and their 
unification of complex numbers and vectors.


Roger/Carl:

Suspect you are about to pop out of algebra and end up someplace
else as interesting.

As you say, I think this is the more fruitful approach.

All: The Cayley Dickson generalizations discussed in wikipedia: R C H 
O did present an "answer" in that there are successful numeric 
extensions, that complex numbers "are not alone".  As much as I wish 
computer graphics had used them for their transformations rather than 
4-tuples (homogeneous coordinates) and 4-matrices, I'm not sure just 
how quater

Re: [FRIAM] Understanding the Occupy Movementf

[Grant Holland]

Thanks for the update, Nick. It was very helpful to me.

Grant

On 1/21/12 11:05 AM, Nicholas Thompson wrote:

Dear everybody,

I have been working at the edges of the occupy/99% movement in Santa Fe,
where we just put together a sizeable demonstration to welcome the governor
and the legislature back to work.  We are now trying to figure out which
legislative actions to support and oppose in the short 30 day session.  One
strong possibility is a bill to tax Walmart's etc. at the same rate as local
businesses.  Yes, folks, national corporations in NM have worked out a deal
where they pay fewer taxes than the local businesses they compete with.  And
New Mexico has a budget problem.  I was surprised to see exactly zero
FRIAMMERS at the demonstration.  I don't think of myself as a leftist
outlier.

The strain in the movement is a familiar one ... everybody agrees that the
political system has fallen into the hands of thieves.  To the extent there
is disagreement, it is about what sorts of methods will recover it.  The
more optimistic view is that "all" we need to do is mobilize all the people
who are being screwed by the current government (the 99%) and substitute new
people in the legislatures and administrations.  Call this the reformist
view.  The more radical view is that such reformist efforts will just result
in the election of slightly-les- evil politicians (democrats?) and that we
need new institutions from the ground up.  These folks are more likely to be
attached  to novel methods ... the" mic check" and the "general assembly"
and a desire to challenge institutions generally, rather than to issues and
policies.  I guess we have to call this the radical view, although the term
makes me uneasy.  Nobody has any stomach for violence of any sort.

There are half a dozen organizations, loosely cooperating , that range
across this spectrum, perhaps a thousand people in all.  Each of them is
googlable.  They are, from Reformist to Radical:

We Are People Here (Craig Barnes group, many members, working on the tax
bill, primarily)
Move On Org.  A very vigorous LOCAL group.  (I have criticized Move On for
sucking political money OUT of communities, but this group seems to be
reversing the flow.)
Communications Workers of America
Somos un pueblo unido  is organizing around the driver's license bill.
Occupy Santa Fe
(Un)occupy Albuquerque

I know I ought to be providing links, but I can't take the time now.  If
anybody will write me directly, I will do so later, but you should be able
to find them on your own. All of them are in desperate need of technical
help (but don't know it), and if any of you were wealthy enough and patient
enough to down tools for a month or two and help with webpresence, you might
have a very big effect on the movement.  My sense is that we need some sort
of web interface that is democratic but does not get totally out of control
I have been experimenting with google groups, but I am not very good at it,
and I am only person, and old and lazy at that.

Thanks for your attention.  Given that I am also ADD, I can appreciate what
an effort it was. (};-])

Nick



-Original Message-
From: friam-boun...@redfish.com [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf
Of Eric Smith
Sent: Saturday, January 21, 2012 7:22 AM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Understanding the Occupy Movementf

Oops, sorry for two posts:

To address the specifics of your post, which I meant to do.

If social inequality is the main question, then it may be a partisan issue,
because there will be a spread of opinions in the society of what is
desirable, and at some level of approximation, the adoption of positions by
parties provides a way to sort out how that spectrum will organize to come
to a decision.  Mechanisms for qualitative change presumably often originate
as partisan issues, and then become mainstream if one party can hold them
long enough that they become inculcated.

If the question of the gap between the claims of the law and the reality of
the law is the issue, then that would more naturally be a party-independent
question, since any party depends to some extent on the existence of "rules
of the game", and would on some occasions have reason to object if there are
no rules.

Of course, I understand that I also make these distinctions as if they were
clearer than they are in practice, but I think they are a starting point
from which one could try to sort out the mess and categorize a bit.

E



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===

Re: [FRIAM] HELP: google analytics

[Grant Holland]

Nick,

Did you go to the GA website 
 and follow all the 
instructions?


Did you first set up an account and a profile?

Once you have a GA account and profile, you have to generate the correct 
Java script tracking code.

To find out how to generate the tracking code, go here on the GA website:
Under the Support tab, under Getting Started, there is an "Install 
tracking code" link that tells you how to generate the Java script.


Once you have the tracking code, you have to paste it into the bottom of 
the header of every HTML page on your site.


This is all explained at the GA website link above.

Nick, I have it working for one of my sites, so feel free to call on me 
to try to help you out if you wish.


HTH,
Grant

On 1/17/12 9:47 PM, Nicholas Thompson wrote:


Hi, everybody,

I did a website for our local occupy group, and Now I am curious if 
anybody used it.  I rummaged around in the helpfiles until I found a 
third party instruction set for how to set up analytics for a site, I 
opened a profile and pasted the little number into my site, and sat 
back to await my report.  Zilch.  Can anybody send me a screen shot of 
a report so I can see what I am missing?  It looks like I am getting 
report page, but there is no data for google to put on it.  I has my 
name and email message and the magic number, just not dat.  Any thoughts?


Nick

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/ 



http://www.cusf.org 




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Re: [FRIAM] Oh my gawd...

[Grant Holland]

George's observation (from Saturday) under "mathematician" pretty much 
captures the issue for me. One can define "primeness" any way one wants. 
The choice of excluding 1 has the "fun" consequence that George explains 
so well. Maybe including "1" has other fun consequences. If so, then 
give that definition a name ("prime" is already taken) , and see where 
it leads. You can make this stuff up any way you want, folks. Just 
follow the consequences. Some of these consequences provide analogies 
that physicists can use. Some don't. No matter. We just wanna have fun!


Grant

On 12/10/11 4:08 PM, George Duncan wrote:

Yes, it does depend on how you define prime BUT speaking as a

*mathematician*

it is good to have definitions for which we get interesting theorems, 
like the unique (prime) factorization theorem that says every natural 
number has unique prime factors, so 6 has just 2 and 3, NOT 2 and 3 or 
2 and 3 and 1. So we don't want 1 as a prime or the theorem doesn't work.


*statistician*

do a Bing or Google search on prime number and see what frequency of 
entries define 1 as prime (I didn't find any). So from an empirical 
point of view usage says 1 is not prime


*artist*

try Bing of Google images and see how many pretty pictures show 1 as 
prime. I didn't see any.


Cheers, Duncan

On Sat, Dec 10, 2011 at 5:19 PM, Pamela McCorduck > wrote:


I asked the in-house mathematician about this. When he began,
"Well, it depends on how you define 'prime' . . ." I knew it was
an ambiguous case.

PMcC



On Dec 10, 2011, at 5:12 PM, Marcos wrote:

On Thu, Dec 8, 2011 at 2:17 AM, Russell Standish
mailto:r.stand...@unsw.edu.au>> wrote:

Has one ever been prime? Never in my lifetime...


Primes start at 2 in my world.  There was mathematician doing
a talk
once, and before he started talking, he checked his microphone:

"Testing, testing, 2, 3, 5, 7"

That's how I remember.

Mark


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--
George Duncan
georgeduncanart.com 
(505) 983-6895
Represented by ViVO Contemporary
725 Canyon Road
Santa Fe, NM 87501

Life must be understood backwards; but... it must be lived forward.
Soren Kierkegaard




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Re: [FRIAM] Oh my gawd...

[Grant Holland]

Abstract mathematicians are just making up stuff however they want. They 
are artists whose "clay" is (in the modern view) formal logic. The 
nature of their creation is its own reason for being.  Abstract 
mathematics is not natural science, nor is it the province of natural 
scientists. If one of their creations happens to be analogical to 
physicists or anyone else, then so be it. "Analogy fit" is not the 
business of the abstract mathematicians. That's the whole beauty of the 
discipline.


To applied mathematicians the above is probably all wet. And physicists 
probably think that math is their invention and that physics is its 
justification.


But we don't care about that and just continue on our merry way of 
self-amusement.


Grant

On 12/10/11 7:55 PM, Robert J. Cordingley wrote:
Shouldn't theorems be independent of arbitrary decisions regarding 
what is or is not a prime number?  Otherwise I'll have to believe that 
mathematicians are just making up stuff.



On 12/10/11 4:08 PM, George Duncan wrote:

Yes, it does depend on how you define prime BUT speaking as a

*mathematician*

it is good to have definitions for which we get interesting theorems, 
like the unique (prime) factorization theorem that says every natural 
number has unique prime factors, so 6 has just 2 and 3, NOT 2 and 3 
or 2 and 3 and 1. So we don't want 1 as a prime or the theorem 
doesn't work.


*statistician*

do a Bing or Google search on prime number and see what frequency of 
entries define 1 as prime (I didn't find any). So from an empirical 
point of view usage says 1 is not prime


*artist*

try Bing of Google images and see how many pretty pictures show 1 as 
prime. I didn't see any.


Cheers, Duncan

On Sat, Dec 10, 2011 at 5:19 PM, Pamela McCorduck > wrote:


I asked the in-house mathematician about this. When he began,
"Well, it depends on how you define 'prime' . . ." I knew it was
an ambiguous case.

PMcC



On Dec 10, 2011, at 5:12 PM, Marcos wrote:

On Thu, Dec 8, 2011 at 2:17 AM, Russell Standish
mailto:r.stand...@unsw.edu.au>> wrote:

Has one ever been prime? Never in my lifetime...


Primes start at 2 in my world.  There was mathematician doing
a talk
once, and before he started talking, he checked his microphone:

"Testing, testing, 2, 3, 5, 7"

That's how I remember.

Mark


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--
George Duncan
georgeduncanart.com 
(505) 983-6895
Represented by ViVO Contemporary
725 Canyon Road
Santa Fe, NM 87501

Life must be understood backwards; but... it must be lived forward.
Soren Kierkegaard




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Re: [FRIAM] Activity over holidays?

[Grant Holland]

Thanks, Owen. That was helpful. I usually catch this at 11pm, but missed 
it that night.


Grant

On 12/3/11 1:38 PM, Owen Densmore wrote:

Bring lots of pictures!  Maybe a slide show on Adventurous Moves at SFX?

   -- Owen





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Re: [FRIAM] All Together Now - NYTimes.com (Friedman+Krakauer)

[Grant Holland]

Owen,

Excellent high-level description of IP.

I might mention that the protocol in many ways mimics what we all do 
when we encounter a stop sign on the roadways. No central "governor" 
required there either.


Grant

On 9/5/11 2:19 PM, Owen Densmore wrote:

Nice point.

When David mentioned the stock trading, it brought to mind the
Ethernet protocol.

The Ethernet protocol is a low level transport that uses a
peer-to-peer approach: there is no central control.  Instead, when a
machine wants to use the net, it senses if it is idle.  If so, it
attempts to use it, failing when another machine also tries to use it
at the same time (within a packet transmission). In other words,
Ethernet attempts to completely serialize use of the media, with
cooperation when failure occurs.

In addition, it uses a "back-off" algorithm where an attempt to re-use
the Ethernet includes a random pause.  This is a form of sharing the
commons, the Ethernet being a shared "commons" which cannot be used by
more than one packet at a time.

In the early days, we all presumed protocols would use this form of
enlightened politeness .. otherwise we are left with the tragedy of
the commons.

This knowledge has been lost.  Few folks understand how the Ethernet
protocol behaves.  And if they did, I doubt traders would use such an
approach.

So when I heard David, I wasn't sure if he was aware of the Ethernet
serialization, and similarly wasn't sure if traders could be persuaded
into using a similar approach to throttle trades.

 -- Owen

On Mon, Sep 5, 2011 at 10:25 AM, Victoria Hughes
  wrote:

I'd couple this with the Ulam talks.
After further understanding the global cultural pressures we've taken on
when we plunged gleefully over the edge into the digital revolution, we need
to add that to the mix.
Cracking up, cracking open.
Our tools make our revolutions possible and increase their impact and
speed.
Clearly there are dangers as well as benefits to all our hyperfast,
hyperconnected technology.  As Krakauer ended the last talk, he pointed to
the stock-trading algorithms that reacted faster than humans would have, and
were a major push over the economic edge for us. His take: these were a more
disturbing example of machine "intelligence" than other Doomsday machines,
and are already embedded in our culture.
Internally, externally. Extraordinary pressures, extraordinary
opportunities.
All connected.
We are in midair over the waterfall.
What we can do is start where we are: get honest and capable in our selves
and our communities. Reach out from here.
We can incorporate revolutions in governments, economics, technologies, at a
pace we can manage. We have to recognize our situation more clearly first.
Much bigger stakes than what passwords we should use.
Tory

Tory Hughes
www.toryhughes.com
The Creative Development manual




On Sep 5, 2011, at 9:57 AM, Owen Densmore wrote:

Interesting premise from Tom's latest op-ed piece: http://goo.gl/rm3Te

We're going through 4 huge shifts in the world, and no one has any idea how
to manage them:

Quote: Now let me say that in English: the European Union is cracking up.
The Arab world is cracking up. China’s growth model is under pressure and
America’s credit-driven capitalist model has suffered a warning heart attack
and needs a total rethink. Recasting any one of these alone would be huge.
Doing all four at once — when the world has never been more interconnected —
is mind-boggling. We are again “present at the creation” — but of what?

The first (the EU) freaks me out most, both because it's extraordinarily
difficult to manage, and because no one in the US seems to see how important
it is.
Worth a read.
 -- Owen

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[FRIAM] Invitation to connect on LinkedIn

[Grant Holland via LinkedIn]

LinkedIn





Grant Holland requested to add you as a connection on LinkedIn:
  
--

J T "Tom",

I'd like to add you to my professional network on LinkedIn.

- Grant

Accept invitation from Grant Holland
http://www.linkedin.com/e/-1hr2nv-grtcry3u-1g/doOl3guGhiY6zsFTdoY1Mg3IxiP5/blk/I162706823_15/1BpC5vrmRLoRZcjkkZt5YCpnlOt3RApnhMpmdzgmhxrSNBszYRclYPczwSc3sOdz59bQZTsThTpSVabPcScjcRcj0VejcLrCBxbOYWrSlI/EML_comm_afe/

View invitation from Grant Holland
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--

DID YOU KNOW you can be the first to know when a trusted member of your network 
changes jobs? With Network Updates on your LinkedIn home page, you'll be 
notified as members of your network change their current position. Be the first 
to know and reach out!
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Re: [FRIAM] "no one shall expel us from the paradise that Cantor has created", Hugh Woodin's "ultimate L": Richard Elwes: Rich Murray 2011.08.18

[Grant Holland]

Rich,

Wow. Thanks for passing on such a refreshing and informative article.

You get my vote for the most entertaining FRIAM post of the year (so far).

Grant

On 8/18/11 9:11 AM, Rich Murray wrote:

  "no one shall expel us from the paradise that Cantor has created",
Hugh Woodin's "ultimate L": Richard Elwes: Rich Murray 2011.08.18

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21128231.400-ultimate-logic-to-infinity-and-beyond.html?full=true

Ultimate logic: To infinity and beyond

01 August 2011 by Richard Elwes
Magazine issue 2823.

The mysteries of infinity could lead us to a fantastic structure above
and beyond mathematics as we know it

WHEN David Hilbert left the podium at the Sorbonne in Paris, France,
on 8 August 1900, few of the assembled delegates seemed overly
impressed. According to one contemporary report, the discussion
following his address to the second International Congress of
Mathematicians was "rather desultory". Passions seem to have been more
inflamed by a subsequent debate on whether Esperanto should be adopted
as mathematics' working language.

Yet Hilbert's address set the mathematical agenda for the 20th
century. It crystallised into a list of 23 crucial unanswered
questions, including how to pack spheres to make best use of the
available space, and whether the Riemann hypothesis, which concerns
how the prime numbers are distributed, is true.

Today many of these problems have been resolved, sphere-packing among
them. Others, such as the Riemann hypothesis, have seen little or no
progress. But the first item on Hilbert's list stands out for the
sheer oddness of the answer supplied by generations of mathematicians
since: that mathematics is simply not equipped to provide an answer.

This curiously intractable riddle is known as the continuum
hypothesis, and it concerns that most enigmatic quantity, infinity.
Now, 140 years after the problem was formulated, a respected US
mathematician believes he has cracked it. What's more, he claims to
have arrived at the solution not by using mathematics as we know it,
but by building a new, radically stronger logical structure: a
structure he dubs "ultimate L".

The journey to this point began in the early 1870s, when the German
Georg Cantor was laying the foundations of set theory. Set theory
deals with the counting and manipulation of collections of objects,
and provides the crucial logical underpinnings of mathematics: because
numbers can be associated with the size of sets, the rules for
manipulating sets also determine the logic of arithmetic and
everything that builds on it.

These dry, slightly insipid logical considerations gained a new tang
when Cantor asked a critical question: how big can sets get? The
obvious answer - infinitely big - turned out to have a shocking twist:
infinity is not one entity, but comes in many levels.

How so? You can get a flavour of why by counting up the set of whole
numbers: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5... How far can you go? Why, infinitely far, of
course - there is no biggest whole number. This is one sort of
infinity, the smallest, "countable" level, where the action of
arithmetic takes place.

Now consider the question "how many points are there on a line?" A
line is perfectly straight and smooth, with no holes or gaps; it
contains infinitely many points. But this is not the countable
infinity of the whole numbers, where you bound upwards in a series of
defined, well-separated steps. This is a smooth, continuous infinity
that describes geometrical objects. It is characterised not by the
whole numbers, but by the real numbers: the whole numbers plus all the
numbers in between that have as many decimal places as you please -
0.1, 0.01, √2, π and so on.

Cantor showed that this "continuum" infinity is in fact infinitely
bigger than the countable, whole-number variety. What's more, it is
merely a step in a staircase leading to ever-higher levels of
infinities stretching up as far as, well, infinity.

While the precise structure of these higher infinities remained
nebulous, a more immediate question frustrated Cantor. Was there an
intermediate level between the countable infinity and the continuum?
He suspected not, but was unable to prove it. His hunch about the
non-existence of this mathematical mezzanine became known as the
continuum hypothesis.

Attempts to prove or disprove the continuum hypothesis depend on
analysing all possible infinite subsets of the real numbers. If every
one is either countable or has the same size as the full continuum,
then it is correct. Conversely, even one subset of intermediate size
would render it false.

A similar technique using subsets of the whole numbers shows that
there is no level of infinity below the countable. Tempting as it
might be to think that there are half as many even numbers as there
are whole numbers in total, the two collections can in fact be paired
off exactly. Indeed, every set of whole numbers is either finite or
countably infinite.

Applied to the real numbers, thoug

Re: [FRIAM] Deriving quantum theory from information processing axioms

[Grant Holland]

Exciting, Russ. I've downloaded your 2004 paper 
, and will take a look.


Thanks,
Grant

On 7/26/11 3:16 PM, Russell Standish wrote:

Of course, I published a paper in 2004 (Why Occams Razor) doing
essentially the same thing (I expanded on this somewhat in my 2006
book, Theory of Nothing).

I would also say, that Lucien Hardy did something similar in 2001
(Quantum theory from five reasonable axioms). Also, there have been
other works linking the uncertainty principle to the Cramer-Rao
inequality from information theory.

I expect this current paper (when I finally get around to read it), will be
equivalent to what I've done. Ultimately, it may come down to history
which method is preferred, or if some uber-clear version is presented
(like Dirac did to Schroedinger and Heisenberg's theories).

It would be all the more remarkable if this approach was fundamentally
different.

All I have to say now...

On Tue, Jul 26, 2011 at 10:37:46AM -0700, Russ Abbott wrote:

I expected this to have more of an impact than it seems to be having. What
am I missing?

*-- Russ Abbott*
*_*
***  Professor, Computer Science*
*  California State University, Los Angeles*

*  Google voice: 747-*999-5105
*  blog: *http://russabbott.blogspot.com/
   vita:  http://sites.google.com/site/russabbott/
*_*



On Mon, Jul 25, 2011 at 2:50 PM, Russ Abbott  wrote:


 From APS Physics.

We know how to use the “rules” of quantum physics to build lasers,
microchips, and nuclear power plants, but when students question the rules
themselves, the best answer we can give is often, “The world just happens to
be that way.” Yet why are individual outcomes in quantum measurements
random? What is the origin of the Schrödinger equation? In a paper 
[1]
appearing in Physical Review A, Giulio Chiribella at the Perimeter
Institute inWaterloo, Canada, and Giacomo Mauro D’Ariano and Paolo
Perinotti at the University of Pavia, Italy, offer a framework in which to
answer these penetrating questions. They show that by making six fundamental
assumptions about how information is processed, they can derive quantum
theory. (Strictly speaking, their derivation only applies to systems that
can be constructed from a finite number of quantum states, such as spin.) In
this sense, Chiribella et al.’s work is in the spirit of John Wheeler’s
belief that one obtains “it from bit,” in other words, that our account of
the universe is constructed from bits of information, and the rules on how
that information can be obtained determine the “meaning” of what we call
particles and fields.
  ...

They assume five new elementary axioms—causality, perfect
distinguishability, ideal compression, local distinguishability, and pure
conditioning—which define a broad class of theories of information
processing. For example, the causality axiom—stating that one cannot signal
from future measurements to past preparations—is so basic that it is usually
assumed a priori. Both classical and quantum theory fulfil the five
axioms. What is significant about Chiribella et al.’s work is that they
show that a sixth axiom—the assumption that every state has what they call a
“purification”—is what singles out quantum theory within the class. In fact,
this last axiom is so important that they call it a postulate. The
purification postulate can be defined formally (see below), but to
understand its meaning in simple words, we can look to Schrödinger, who in
describing entanglement gives the essence of the postulate: “Maximal
knowledge of a total system does not necessarily include maximal knowledge
of all its parts.” (Formally, the purification postulate states that every
mixed state ρA of system A can always be seen as a state belonging to a
part of a composite system AB that itself is in a pure state ΨAB. This
pure state is called “purification” and is assumed to be unique up to a
reversible transformation on B).

Chiribella et al. conclude there is only one way in which a theory can
satisfy the purification postulate: it must contain entangled states. (The
other option, that the theory must not contain mixed states, that is, that
the probabilities of outcomes in any measurement are either 0 or 1 like in
classical deterministic theory, cannot hold, as one can always prepare mixed
states by mixing deterministic ones.) The purification postulate alone
allows some of the key features of quantum information processing to be
derived, such as the no-cloning theorem or teleportation 
[7].
By combining this postulate with the other five axioms, Chiribella et al. were
able to derive the entire mathematical formalism behind quantum theory.



*-- Russ Abbott*
*_*
***  Professor, Computer Science*
*  California State Univer

Re: [FRIAM] Deriving quantum theory from information processing axioms

[Grant Holland]

Russ,

I had the same feeling about my recent missive - entitled "Uncertainty 
vs Information - redux and resolution" - in which I too make various 
claims about information theory. I believe I had only one response - 
from Eric. I expected more, maybe from Owen and Frank and yourself.


The APS Physics review you attached discussed an Italian paper from the 
U of Pavia. About that paper the review says "They show that by making 
six fundamental assumptions about how information is processed, they can 
derive quantum theory."  Understandably, such a view is likely to be 
sacrosanct among many.


I must confess however that I have considerable sympathy with it. In my 
recent posting on /Uncertainty and Information/, I cited the Oxford Info 
Theorist Vlatko Vedral.  In his book _Decoding Reality: The Universe as 
Quantum Information_, he states:


"This book will state that information (and not matter or energy or 
love) is the building block on which everything is constructed. 
Information is far more fundamental than matter or energy because it can 
be successfully applied to both macroscopic interactions, such as 
economic and social phenomena, and, as I will argue, information can 
also be used to explain the origin and behavior of microscopic 
interactions such as energy and matter."


Evidently, there is a body of information theorist out there who are 
making a play for the proposition that  Information Theory is more 
fundamental than physics.


Of course, my recent posting argues that uncertainty is more 
foundational then information (even though, according to Shannon, 
entropy measures them both). This is because, as argued by Khinchin, 
information derives from uncertainty through realization.


Maybe together we can get a thread started about the primacy of physics, 
information or uncertainty - or maybe something else? Oh, yeah, there is 
already one going about the primacy of physics vs philosophy. Maybe we 
can add information and uncertainty to the mix!


On 7/26/11 11:37 AM, Russ Abbott wrote:
I expected this to have more of an impact than it seems to be having. 
What am I missing?

/-- Russ Abbott/
/_/
/  Professor, Computer Science/
/  California State University, Los Angeles/

/  Google voice: 747-/999-5105
/  blog: /http://russabbott.blogspot.com/
  vita: http://sites.google.com/site/russabbott/
/_/



On Mon, Jul 25, 2011 at 2:50 PM, Russ Abbott > wrote:


From APS Physics .

We know how to use the "rules" of quantum physics to build
lasers, microchips, and nuclear power plants, but when
students question the rules themselves, the best answer we can
give is often, "The world just happens to be that way." Yet
why are individual outcomes in quantum measurements random?
What is the origin of the Schrödinger equation? In a paper [1
] appearing in
Physical Review A, Giulio Chiribella at the Perimeter
Institute inWaterloo, Canada, and Giacomo Mauro D'Ariano and
Paolo Perinotti at the University of Pavia, Italy, offer a
framework in which to answer these penetrating questions. They
show that by making six fundamental assumptions about how
information is processed, they can derive quantum theory.
(Strictly speaking, their derivation only applies to systems
that can be constructed from a finite number of quantum
states, such as spin.) In this sense, Chiribella et al.'s work
is in the spirit of John Wheeler's belief that one obtains "it
from bit," in other words, that our account of the universe is
constructed from bits of information, and the rules on how
that information can be obtained determine the "meaning" of
what we call particles and fields.
 ...

They assume five new elementary axioms---causality, perfect
distinguishability, ideal compression, local
distinguishability, and pure conditioning---which define a
broad class of theories of information processing. For
example, the causality axiom---stating that one cannot signal
from future measurements to past preparations---is so basic
that it is usually assumed a priori. Both classical and
quantum theory fulfil the five axioms. What is significant
about Chiribella et al.'s work is that they show that a sixth
axiom---the assumption that every state has what they call a
"purification"---is what singles out quantum theory within the
class. In fact, this last axiom is so important that they call
it a postulate. The purification postulate can be defined
formally (see below), but to understand its meaning in simple
words, we can look to Schrödinger, who in

Re: [FRIAM] Uncertainty vs Information - redux and resolution

[Grant Holland]

Eric,

True enough. And yet, this is what Information Theory has decided to do: 
treat the amount of _information_ that gets realized by performing an 
experiment as the same as the amount of _uncertainty_ from which it was 
"liberated". That way, they can use entropy as the measure of both.


I'm personally sympathetic to an argument that they are not equivalent. 
My predilection suggests that there is more value in the uncertainty 
that exists before the experiment than there is in the information that 
results afterwards. I would expect there would be others who would put 
more value on the "liberated" information.


But I would have to put a lot more thought than I have into formalizing 
this.


I like your observation. It opens up the possibility of re-doing 
Information Theory, and ending up with one measure for uncertainty and 
another for information. And we could finally depose the word "entropy"!


Grant

On 7/20/11 3:18 PM, ERIC P. CHARLES wrote:
That is potentially fascinating. However, it is not terribly 
interesting to state that we can establish a conservation principle 
merely by giving a name to the absence of something, and then pointing 
out that if we start with a set amount of that something, and take it 
away in chunks, then the amount that is there plus the amount that is 
gone always equals the amount we started with. What is the additional 
insight?


Eric

On Wed, Jul 20, 2011 04:27 PM, *Grant Holland 
* wrote:


In a thread early last month I was doing my thing of "stirring the
pot" by making noise about the equivalence of 'information' and
'uncertainty' - and I was quoting Shannon to back me up.

We all know that the two concepts are ultimately semantically
opposed - if for no other reason than uncertainty adds to
confusion and information can help to clear it up. So,
understandably, Owen - and I think also Frank - objected somewhat
to my equating them. But I was able to overwhelm the thread with
more Shannon quotes, so the thread kinda tapered off.

What we all were looking for, I believe, is for Information Theory
to back up our common usage and support the notion that
information and uncertainty are, in some sense, semantically
opposite; while at the same time they are both measured by the
same function: Shannon's version of entropy (which is also Gibbs'
formula with some constants established).

Of course, Shannon does equate information and uncertainty - at
least mathematically so, if not semantically so. Within the span
of three sentences in his famous 1948 paper, he uses the words
"information", "uncertainty" and "choice" to describe what his
concept of entropy measures. But he never does get into any
semantic distinctions among the three - only that all three are
measured by /entropy/.

Even contemporary information theorists like Vlatko Vedral,
Professor of Quantum Information Science at Oxford, appear to be
of no help with any distinction between 'information' and
'uncertainty'. In his 2010 book _Decoding Reality: The Universe as
Quantum Information_, he traces the notion of information back to
the ancient Greeks.

"The ancient Greeks laid the foundation for its
[information's] development when they suggested that the
information content of an event somehow depends only on how
probable this event really is. Philosophers like Aristotle
reasoned that the more surprised we are by an event the more
information the event carries

Following this logic, we conclude that information has to be
inversely proportional to probability, i. e. events with
smaller probability carry more information"

But a simple inverse proportional formula like I(E) = 1/Pr(E),
where E is an event, does not suffice as a measure of
'uncertainty/information', because it does not ensure the
additivity of independent events. (We really like additivity in
our measuring functions.) The formula needs to be tweaked to give
us that.

Vedral does the tweaking for additivity and gives us the formula
used by Information Theorists to measure the amount of
'uncertainty/information' in a single event. The formula is I(E)
=  log (1/Pr(E)). (Any base will do.) It is interesting that if
this function is treated as a random variable, then its first
moment (expected value) is Shannon's formula for entropy.

But it was the Russian probability theorist A. I. Khinchin who
provided us with the satisfaction we seek. Seeing that the Shannon
paper (bless his soul) lacked both mathematical rigor and
satisfying semantic justifications, he set about to put the
situation right with his slim but essential l

[FRIAM] Uncertainty vs Information - redux and resolution

[Grant Holland]

t I got properly thrashed for my last few 
postings so I am putting my hat over the wall very carefully here.

I thought……i thought …. the information in a message was the number of bits by 
which the arrival of the message decreased the uncertainty of the receiver.  
So, let’s say you are sitting awaiting the result of a coin toss, and I am on 
the other end of the line flipping the coin.  Before I say “heads” you have 1 
bit of uncertainty; afterwards, you have none.

The reason I am particularly nervous about saying this is that it, of course, 
holds out the possibility of negative information.   Some forms of 
communication, appeasement gestures in animals, for instance, have the effect 
of increasing the range of behaviors likely to occur in the receiver.  This 
would seem to correspond to a negative value for the information calculation.

Nick
From: friam-boun...@redfish.com [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of 
Grant Holland
Sent: Sunday, June 05, 2011 11:07 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group; Steve Smith
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Quote of the week

Interesting note on "information" and "uncertainty"...

Information is Uncertainty. The two words are synonyms.

Shannon called it "uncertainty", contemporary Information theory calls it 
"information".

It is often thought that the more information there is, the less uncertainty. 
The opposite is the case.

In Information Theory (aka the mathematical theory of communications) , the 
degree of information I(E) - or uncertainty U(E) - of an event is measurable as 
an inverse function of its probability, as follows:

U(E) = I(E) = log( 1/Pr(E) ) = log(1) - log( Pr(E) ) = -log( Pr(E) ).

Considering I(E) as a random variable, Shannon's entropy is, in fact, the first 
moment (or expectation) of I(E). Shannon entropy = exp( I(E) ).

Grant

On 6/5/2011 2:20 PM, Steve Smith wrote:


"Philosophy is to physics as pornography is to sex. It's cheaper, it's easier and 
some people seem to prefer it."

Modern Physics is  contained in Realism which is contained in Metaphysics which 
I contained in all of Philosophy.

I'd be tempted to counter:
"Physics is to Philosophy as the Missionary Position is to the Kama Sutra"

Physics also appeals to Phenomenology and Logic (the branch of Philosophy were 
Mathematics is rooted) and what we can know scientifically is constrained by 
Epistemology (the nature of knowledge) and phenomenology (the nature of 
conscious experience).

It might be fair to say that many (including many of us here) who hold Physics 
up in some exalted position simply dismiss or choose to ignore all the messy 
questions considered by  *the rest of* philosophy.   Even if we think we have 
clear/simple answers to the questions, I do not accept that the questions are 
not worthy of the asking.

The underlying point of the referenced podcast is, in fact, that Physics, or 
Science in general might be rather myopic and limited by it's own viewpoint by 
definition.

  "The more we know, the less we understand."

Philosophy is about understanding, physics is about knowledge first and 
understanding only insomuch as it is a part of natural philosophy.

Or at least this is how my understanding is structured around these matters.

- Steve

On Sun, Jun 5, 2011 at 1:15 PM, Robert Holmes  wrote:
> From the BBC's science podcast "The Infinite Monkey Cage":

"Philosophy is to physics as pornography is to sex. It's cheaper, it's easier and 
some people seem to prefer it."

Not to be pedantic, but I suspect that s/he has conflated "philosophy" with "new 
age", as much of science owes itself to philosophy.

marcos


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[FRIAM] Uncertainty vs Information - redux and resolution

[Grant Holland]

In a thread early last month I was doing my thing of "stirring the pot" 
by making noise about the equivalence of 'information' and 'uncertainty' 
- and I was quoting Shannon to back me up.


We all know that the two concepts are ultimately semantically opposed - 
if for no other reason than uncertainty adds to confusion and 
information can help to clear it up. So, understandably, Owen - and I 
think also Frank - objected somewhat to my equating them. But I was able 
to overwhelm the thread with more Shannon quotes, so the thread kinda 
tapered off.


What we all were looking for, I believe, is for Information Theory to 
back up our common usage and support the notion that information and 
uncertainty are, indeed, semantically opposite; while at the same time 
they are both measured by the same function: Shannon's version of 
entropy (which is also Gibbs' formula with some constants established).


Of course, Shannon /does/ equate them - at least mathematically so, if 
not semantically so. Within the span of three sentences in his famous 
1948 paper, he uses the words "information", "uncertainty" and "choice" 
to describe what his concept of entropy measures. But he never does get 
into any semantic distinctions among the three - only that all three 
measured by the same formula.


Even contemporary information theorists like Vlatko Vedral, Professor of 
Quantum Information Science at Oxford, appear to be of no help with any 
distinction between 'information' and 'uncertainty'. In his 2010 book 
_Decoding Reality: the universe as quantum information_, he traces the 
notion of /information/ back to the ancient Greeks.


   "The ancient Greeks laid the foundation for its (information)
   development when they suggested that the information content of an
   event somehow depends only on how probable this event really is.
   Philosophers like Aristotle reasoned that the more surprised we are
   by an event the more information the event carries

   Following this logic, we conclude that information has to be
   inversely proportional to probability, i. e. events with smaller
   probability carry more information"

But it was the Russian probability theorist A. I. Khinchin who provides 
us the satisfaction we seek. Seeing that the Shannon paper (bless his 
soul) lacked both mathematical rigor and satisfying semantic 
justifications, he set about to set the situation right with his slim 
but essential little volume entitled _The Mathematical Foundations of 
Information Theory_ (1957). He manages to make the pertinent distinction 
between 'information' and 'uncertainty' most cleanly in this single 
paragraph. (By "scheme" Khinchin means "probability distribution".)


   "Thus we can say that the information given us by carrying out some
   experiment consists of removing the uncertainty which existed before
   the experiment. The larger this uncertainty, the larger we consider
   to be the amount of information obtained by removing it. Since we
   agreed to measure the uncertainty of a finite scheme A by its
   entropy, H(A), it is natural to express the amount of information
   given by removing this uncertainty by an increasing function of the
   quantity H(A)

   Thus, in all that follows, we can consider the amount of information
   given by the realization of a finite scheme to be equal to the
   entropy of the scheme."


On 6/6/11 8:17 AM, Owen Densmore wrote:

Nick: Next you are in town, lets read the original Shannon paper together.  
Alas, it is a bit long, but I'm told its a Good Thing To Do.

-- Owen

On Jun 6, 2011, at 7:44 AM, Nicholas Thompson wrote:


Grant,

This seems backwards to me, but I got properly thrashed for my last few 
postings so I am putting my hat over the wall very carefully here.

I thought……i thought …. the information in a message was the number of bits by 
which the arrival of the message decreased the uncertainty of the receiver.  
So, let’s say you are sitting awaiting the result of a coin toss, and I am on 
the other end of the line flipping the coin.  Before I say “heads” you have 1 
bit of uncertainty; afterwards, you have none.

The reason I am particularly nervous about saying this is that it, of course, 
holds out the possibility of negative information.   Some forms of 
communication, appeasement gestures in animals, for instance, have the effect 
of increasing the range of behaviors likely to occur in the receiver.  This 
would seem to correspond to a negative value for the information calculation.

Nick
From: friam-boun...@redfish.com [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of 
Grant Holland
Sent: Sunday, June 05, 2011 11:07 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group; Steve Smith
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Quote of the week

Interesting note on "information" and "

[FRIAM] 3D Printer - universal replicator

[Grant Holland]

FYI - My friend Don Strel sent me this YouTube link on the 3D Printer 
. Looks like a big piece of 
von Neumann's machine...(sans the instructions)...


Grant

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Re: [FRIAM] Google+ Circles and Social Networks

[Grant Holland]

Jochen,

The level of interaction on Facebook is too high for my style, and the 
filtering through circles-of-trust mechanisms too low. After about 48 
hours, I bailed from Facebook some months ago.


I'm not on Google+, but the circle concept would seem to be the right 
approach. I would consider it. Maybe I should give it a whirl.


However, I must confess that the mailing alias really is the level of 
interaction that I think I want from FRIAM (and from several other 
social networks to which I belong). Email with href links seems to work 
well.


Grant

On 7/10/11 3:13 AM, Jochen Fromm wrote:

Hi Grant,

Google+ is maybe a good addendum to a
mailing list. It is maybe not the perfect
place for an elaborate discussion among
peers, but it is easier if you want to share
multimedia objects, i.e. if you want to
post a link, a photo or a video, or if
you want to make a quick comment. And it
is interesting to check out a new technology.
Are you on Google+, too?

It is more a real threat for Facebook and
Twitter, because it offers similar features,
only better.

-J.

- Original Message - From: Grant Holland
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
Sent: Saturday, July 09, 2011 6:06 PM
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Google+ Circles and Social Networks

Jochen,

I hope this doesn't mean that we are now going to have two places to 
go to follow FRIAM conversations: The FRIAM mail alias AND a Google+ 
Circle!!


Grant



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Re: [FRIAM] Google+ Circles and Social Networks

[Grant Holland]

Jochen,

I hope this doesn't mean that we are now going to have /two/ places to 
go to follow FRIAM conversations: The FRIAM mail alias AND a Google+ 
Circle!!


Grant

On 7/9/11 1:27 AM, Jochen Fromm wrote:

Hi Victoria,

Welcome :-)  I added Glen and Robert to my FRIAM
circle, is this your profile? Why is the subtitle "sausage" ?
https://plus.google.com/117046334838659119290

Yes, you get a trip to an island of your choice, a new
tesla roadster and a few first class Google stocks ;-)
The Maldives islands are indeed wonderful. They are
near India, but mainly visited by European tourists because
they are quite expensive. A bit like Tahiti or French
Polynesia, which is probably closer to the US.

-J.

- Original Message - From: "Victoria Hughes" 

To: "The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group" 


Sent: Saturday, July 09, 2011 7:07 AM
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Google+ Circles and Social Networks


I just signed up, am on the list: is there a quicker way to get an 
account?
Went to Jochen's page, looks nice and clean. Of course pictures of 
the Maldives beaches are helpful. Does a trip there come with the G+ 
account?...


Tory





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Re: [FRIAM] H-P TouchPad Tablet Review - Walt Mossberg - Personal Technology - AllThingsD

[Grant Holland]

Owen,

Here 
's 
a different take on the new HP tab offering from Galen Gruman of InfoWorld.


Grant

On 7/1/11 9:16 AM, Owen Densmore wrote:

Interesting review of the HP tablet.
http://allthingsd.com/20110629/touchpad-needs-more-apps-reboot-to-rival-ipad/?mod=digits-touchpad 



One thing to note is that this new tablet runs neither Android nor iOS 
thus is a third platform for tablets/phones.


Either this is going to make a great market for app designers, or 
create a lot of silos.  Or possibly push us toward yet another 
convergence, like PhoneGap

http://www.phonegap.com/
which attempts to be multi-platform via html5/css3/javascript.  This 
has the added advantage that your website can also be your app!  Sorta.


-- Owen



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Re: [FRIAM] [sfx: Discuss] The Torture Of Gmail

[Grant Holland]

Me too. IMAP through Tbird on macs and pcs.

On 6/9/11 9:07 PM, Gary Schiltz wrote:

I've been using gmail via IMAP for at least five years, and haven't found it to 
be bad at all, though I'm not that fond of its web interface either. I started 
using gmail with Thunderbird under Windows XP, and switched to using it with 
Mail.app on OS X about three years ago. I haven't had any serious problems. I 
started with a whole bunch of nested folders in Thunderbird from 20+ years of 
POP3 accounts when I switched to gmail IMAP.

First, set up a gmail account and enable IMAP via the web interface. Then add the IMAP 
gmail account to Thunderbird or Mail.app. I generally didn't explicitly create folders in 
this account, but instead dragged individual folders from the POP3 accounts onto the 
gmail account. I was able to drag folders (even heirarchies of folders) from the POP3 
accounts to the gmail account. In cases where I had folders with many subfolders (e.g. a 
"Friends" folder with subfolders for each friend), I did explicitly create the 
parent folder, and then dragged one or a few subfolders onto it. If the parent folder has 
messages in it (e.g. in my Friends folder, I also keep messages from misc. friends that I 
have had very few messages from, and so particularly want to have their own folders), 
then select all the messages in the folder and explicitly drag the messages into the 
newly created folder. Since IMAP keeps the client and server in sync, this process also 
creates the folders on the gmail server.

The process is slow and manual, but worked well for me. In the end, you have 
nicely backed up email that you can access either from your laptop/desktop mail 
app, or from any computer via the web interface. Also, when I switched to Mac, 
all I had to do was create the account in Mail.app, and all the folders and 
messages magically appeared (while burning up a lot of bandwidth - thanks, NCGR 
for the T3 connection :-), since they already existed on the server.

I suspect the idea of lots of nested folders is pretty old fashioned (like me :-) Gmail 
talks about "labels" instead of folders, which are basically tags. If the 
labels have embedded slashes, its IMAP treats these as nested folders, so you can have it 
both ways, although it is a bit ugly to have labels like Friends/Santa Fe/FRIAM/Owen.

;; Gary

On Jun 9, 2011, at 9:30 PM, Owen Densmore wrote:


Like many a damn fool, I'm seriously trying to use Gmail, via the web interface.

Now, I (possibly mistakenly) presume you, fellow gmail users, are not
going through the tortue I am.  In plain words, it Sucks.  Really!

So I must ask you to answer one of two questions:
1 - How do you bear it? .. Do you have a stunt to make the web UI more usable?
2 - If not, do you access gmail in some other way?  An email client?
Or some other way to avoid the Horror Of It All?

I will go through a couple of weeks and hope for the best.  But
clearly if you can handle this, you have Given Up.

   -- Owen

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Re: [FRIAM] Quote of the week

[Grant Holland]

Oops. I meant to say I am very "tickled"! (not "ticked" :-{ )

Grant

On 6/6/11 9:48 AM, Grant Holland wrote:
I'm very ticked. The point seems to be that one philosophy, physics,...> is supreme within some dependency hierarchy 
of disciplines.


I wondering, epistemologically, if maybe the relationships among these 
disciplines are inter-dependencies that are better modeled as an 
autocatalytic network?


Grant

On 6/6/11 9:24 AM, Douglas Roberts wrote:
Is anybody else tickled at how this Quote Of The Week elicited a 
flood of philosophical observations?


--Doug

On Sun, Jun 5, 2011 at 1:15 PM, Robert Holmes 
mailto:rob...@holmesacosta.com>> wrote:


From the BBC's science podcast "The Infinite Monkey Cage
<http://www.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/series/timc>":

"Philosophy is to physics as pornography is to sex. It's cheaper,
it's easier and some people seem to prefer it."

—R


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Re: [FRIAM] Quote of the week

[Grant Holland]

It seems backwards to almost everybody. Me too. So much so that this 
little conundrum pushed me to take a deeper look into information theory.


The key for me was realizing that I.T. is addressing how much 
information THERE IS in a "situation" (probability distribution) - 
rather than how much information YOU HAVE (one has) about that situation.


I think Owen is right: taking a look at Shannon's "The Mathematical 
Theory of Communication" is good. Try to get the edition with the Warren 
Weaver essay in the front - an essay /about/ Shannon's paper. Weaver 
talks about the measure in section 2.2 (p. 9 in my copy). He talks in 
terms of logs of  "the number of available choices" rather than inverses 
of probabilities. Weaver refers to what is being measured as "information".


Most telling, on page 50, Shannon uses the terms "information", "choice" 
and "uncertainty" in the same breath as being measured by his entropy 
formula.


Another very good popular-level book is "Decoding Reality: The Universe 
as Quantum Information [2010]" by Information Theorist Vlatko Vedral. He 
begins the book with this conversation.


Grant


On 6/6/11 8:17 AM, Owen Densmore wrote:

Nick: Next you are in town, lets read the original Shannon paper together.  
Alas, it is a bit long, but I'm told its a Good Thing To Do.

-- Owen

On Jun 6, 2011, at 7:44 AM, Nicholas Thompson wrote:


Grant,

This seems backwards to me, but I got properly thrashed for my last few 
postings so I am putting my hat over the wall very carefully here.

I thought……i thought …. the information in a message was the number of bits by 
which the arrival of the message decreased the uncertainty of the receiver.  
So, let’s say you are sitting awaiting the result of a coin toss, and I am on 
the other end of the line flipping the coin.  Before I say “heads” you have 1 
bit of uncertainty; afterwards, you have none.

The reason I am particularly nervous about saying this is that it, of course, 
holds out the possibility of negative information.   Some forms of 
communication, appeasement gestures in animals, for instance, have the effect 
of increasing the range of behaviors likely to occur in the receiver.  This 
would seem to correspond to a negative value for the information calculation.

Nick
From: friam-boun...@redfish.com [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of 
Grant Holland
Sent: Sunday, June 05, 2011 11:07 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group; Steve Smith
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Quote of the week

Interesting note on "information" and "uncertainty"...

Information is Uncertainty. The two words are synonyms.

Shannon called it "uncertainty", contemporary Information theory calls it 
"information".

It is often thought that the more information there is, the less uncertainty. 
The opposite is the case.

In Information Theory (aka the mathematical theory of communications) , the 
degree of information I(E) - or uncertainty U(E) - of an event is measurable as 
an inverse function of its probability, as follows:

U(E) = I(E) = log( 1/Pr(E) ) = log(1) - log( Pr(E) ) = -log( Pr(E) ).

Considering I(E) as a random variable, Shannon's entropy is, in fact, the first 
moment (or expectation) of I(E). Shannon entropy = exp( I(E) ).

Grant

On 6/5/2011 2:20 PM, Steve Smith wrote:


"Philosophy is to physics as pornography is to sex. It's cheaper, it's easier and 
some people seem to prefer it."

Modern Physics is  contained in Realism which is contained in Metaphysics which 
I contained in all of Philosophy.

I'd be tempted to counter:
"Physics is to Philosophy as the Missionary Position is to the Kama Sutra"

Physics also appeals to Phenomenology and Logic (the branch of Philosophy were 
Mathematics is rooted) and what we can know scientifically is constrained by 
Epistemology (the nature of knowledge) and phenomenology (the nature of 
conscious experience).

It might be fair to say that many (including many of us here) who hold Physics 
up in some exalted position simply dismiss or choose to ignore all the messy 
questions considered by  *the rest of* philosophy.   Even if we think we have 
clear/simple answers to the questions, I do not accept that the questions are 
not worthy of the asking.

The underlying point of the referenced podcast is, in fact, that Physics, or 
Science in general might be rather myopic and limited by it's own viewpoint by 
definition.

  "The more we know, the less we understand."

Philosophy is about understanding, physics is about knowledge first and 
understanding only insomuch as it is a part of natural philosophy.

Or at least this is how my understanding is structured around these matters.

- Steve

On Sun, Jun 5, 2011 at 1:15 PM, Robert Holmes  wrote:
> From the BBC's science podcast &quo

Re: [FRIAM] Quote of the week

[Grant Holland]

Interesting note on "information" and "uncertainty"...

Information is Uncertainty. The two words are synonyms.

Shannon called it "uncertainty", contemporary Information theory calls 
it "information".


It is often thought that the more information there is, the less 
uncertainty. The opposite is the case.


In Information Theory (aka the mathematical theory of communications) , 
the degree of information I(E) - or uncertainty U(E) - of an event is 
measurable as an inverse function of its probability, as follows:


U(E) = I(E) = log( 1/Pr(E) ) = log(1) - log( Pr(E) ) = -log( Pr(E) ).

Considering I(E) as a random variable, Shannon's entropy is, in fact, 
the first moment (or expectation) of I(E). Shannon entropy = exp( I(E) ).


Grant

On 6/5/2011 2:20 PM, Steve Smith wrote:



/"Philosophy is to physics as pornography is to sex. It's cheaper,
it's easier and some people seem to prefer it."
/


Modern Physics is  contained in Realism which is contained in 
Metaphysics which I contained in all of Philosophy.


I'd be tempted to counter:

/"Physics is to Philosophy as the Missionary Position is to the
Kama Sutra"/


Physics also appeals to Phenomenology and Logic (the branch of 
Philosophy were Mathematics is rooted) and what we can know 
scientifically is constrained by Epistemology (the nature of 
knowledge) and phenomenology (the nature of conscious experience).


It might be fair to say that many (including many of us here) who hold 
Physics up in some exalted position simply dismiss or choose to ignore 
all the messy questions considered by  *the rest of* philosophy.   
Even if we think we have clear/simple answers to the questions, I do 
not accept that the questions are not worthy of the asking.


The underlying point of the referenced podcast is, in fact, that 
Physics, or Science in general might be rather myopic and limited by 
it's own viewpoint by definition.


/ "The more we know, the less we understand."/


Philosophy is about understanding, physics is about knowledge first 
and understanding only insomuch as it is a part of natural philosophy.


Or at least this is how my understanding is structured around these 
matters.


- Steve
On Sun, Jun 5, 2011 at 1:15 PM, Robert Holmes 
mailto:rob...@holmesacosta.com>> wrote:


>From the BBC's science podcast "The Infinite Monkey Cage
":

"Philosophy is to physics as pornography is to sex. It's cheaper,
it's easier and some people seem to prefer it."


Not to be pedantic, but I suspect that s/he has conflated 
"philosophy" with "new age", as much of science owes itself to 
philosophy.


marcos



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Re: [FRIAM] VORTICAL FLOWS and LIFT

[Grant Holland]

Peter - Fascinating.

I too vote that you make available to the FRIAM alias your referenced 
paper so that we all can get the benefit of you wisdom on this.


Grant

On 5/7/11 1:22 PM, plissa...@comcast.net wrote:


The videos are wonderful, and I thank Nick, and agree with his 
opinion.  As for the Theory of Tornadoes, it seems that to date it's 
literally a case of "God only knows"!  But mebbe Friam, too.  I have 
1/2 century background teaching grad fluid mechanics at Caltech, 
Stanford, and USC and have done a lot of meteorological field work, 
but really wouldn't try to discuss the subject.  I jus' dunno.


One should remember that what one sees is a LOT less than what one 
gets, because that's where the tracer happens to be.  This I expressed 
vividly to my students in auto design, when we took pix of airflow 
near bluff vehicles on test tracks in the Mohave Desert.  A'course 
there is a huge billowing plume that presages before, and persists 
long after the vehicle is over the horizon. I remind them that it was 
not the "dust" doing this, but the air, and an identical disturbance 
occurs invisibly whenever a body passes through air.  To paraphrase, 
"its bite is just as keen, although it is not seen"! Makes one take 
car streamlining seriously.  I actually hold patents on one of those 
drag shield things that goes on the cab of a tractor-trailer rig, that 
was developed on NSF funding at our test base near El Mirage in the 
Mohave.  Does good things for fuel consumption.


It would seem likely that the sense of the vorticity in a tornado is 
related to the _shear_ and _Coriolis_ Effect ( Gaspard-G, 1835), 
although which way, I know not.  I was manager of a big DOE program 
called the Coriolis Project for three years, so dealt a little with 
that.  Lotta spin on the ball, there, literally!  For smaller scale 
vortical flow Coriolis does not apply.  Some interesting anecdotes:  
In East Africa, delightful Kikuyu tricksters, stand right on the 
equatorial line and for a few shillings will show you the exit vortex 
from plastic bucket, then move it north over the line a few feet into 
t'other hemisphere and "prove" that it rotates in the opposite 
direction.  We seen this!  Well, it really does, but not because of 
Gaspard-Gustave.  In the Libyan deserts Holy Men will "attack" a dust 
devil, with much imprecation and flailing of a broad sword - and 
"kill" it.  It just drops to the ground!  You can see this.  With your 
own eyes. Allah is indeed great!   According to Bagnold, a great Brit 
desertologist and fluid mechanicer, whom I have used for some of his 
results, the secret is to determine in advance what the sense of the 
vortex is, and then to enter it on the upwind side, at just the right 
distance from the core, and flail around .  It works, too.  Ralph 
Bagnold, soldier, explorer and scientist,  whose monumental work I'm 
lucky to have and reference, was portrayed in The English Patient.  
Pity when one is better known for a movie than an important book!


The subject of how wings work is a much vexed topic.  I was interested 
in what Nick said, but for my part, I don't think it is like that , 
and I reckon the air doesn't think so either.  Authors, profs, and 
pilots (and I have been all three) are usually wrong on this topic.  I 
respect only real airfoil designers on this issue, and have a few 
honest-ta-God airfoils named after me, that can be seen on the 
internet and in books.  They all worked much better than we expected.  
In fact they have carried, safely, many men and women to record 
heights. There's an article in the Smithsonian about the first airfoil 
I designed, in 1955, that me delightfool, but authoritarian, Teutonic 
boss-fuhrer, Herr Doktor Oberst Gustave Von ---, refused to name after 
me.  Well, it flew nobly for the RAF, carried nuclear payloads in the 
good old, bad old days and kept the Ruzskies at bay.  Mebbe!.


I have given up noting the incorrect theories on lift.  Life too short 
for that, although if one restricts one's discussion to things one 
knows conversation gets pretty limited.  I am content to 
simply observe what the air does, and weakly agree with it, much as my 
intellect may reject that pusillanimous attitude.   As an expert 
witness, I have frequently quoted: "Theory crumbles before the 
Facts".  Juries like it.   But some years ago, while on the USC aero 
faculty, I decided to quit pointing out mistakes and publish my idea 
of the Truth.  The paper (1996) is _The Meaning of Lift_, published as 
 AIAA 34 th Aerospace Sciences Meeting, paper 96-1191. Funny thing is 
that, as a joke, I started calling it _The Meaning of Life_, and that 
has made it difficult to find by computer, but not by real people!   
Well, wot the Hell, for me and most of my fellow spirits up in the Big 
Blue, Lift IS Life!


Peter Lissaman, Da Vinci Ventures

Expertise is not knowing everything, but knowing what to look for.

1454 Miracerros Loop South, Santa Fe, New Mexico 87505

Re: [FRIAM] A question for your Roboteers out there

[Grant Holland]

Thanks, Glenn. I was able to find the article from Nick's suggestion - 
and ran into lots of other good stuff too.


Grant

On 2/7/11 5:31 PM, glen e. p. ropella wrote:

http://content.wuala.com/contents/gepr/public/every-good-regulator-must-model-Conant_Ashby_(1970).pdf


On 2/7/11 10:12 AM, Nicholas Thompson wrote:

Grant,

The article was collected in an edited volume by Ashby and is available on
Google Scholar. I am rushing now, but if you don’t find it easily, please get
back to me and I will find it for you.

Nick



FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org

Re: [FRIAM] A question for your Roboteers out there

[Grant Holland]

  
  
Thanks, Nick.

Grant

On 2/7/11 10:12 AM, Nicholas Thompson wrote:

  
  
Grant, 
   
The article was collected in an edited volume by Ashby
and is available on Google Scholar.  I am rushing now, but
if you don’t find it easily, please get back to me and I
will find it for you.  
   
Nick 
   

  
From: friam-boun...@redfish.com
[mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Grant
Holland
Sent: Monday, February 07, 2011 9:57 AM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee
Group; desm...@santafe.edu
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] A question for your
Roboteers out there 
  

   

  

  


  
  
  
McAfee SiteAdvisor Warning 
  


  
   
  
  
This e-mail message contains potentially unsafe
links to these sites: 
  


  

  
  
  
friam.org 
  


  
   
  
  
   
  

  

Eric,
  
  Would love to read the Ashby/Conant article. I don't see at
  download link on the page at SFI
website however. Any other suggestions how I can
  download it?
  
  Thanks,
  Grant
  
  On 2/6/11 7:27 AM, Eric Smith wrote: 
Nick, hi,  
   
Been meaning to send this for a couple of days.  There is a paper on  
the role of models in control theory, which is perhaps profound or  
perhaps a tautology (Mike Spivak comments that the two naturally go  
together):    
   
Conant, Roger C. and W. Ross Ashby. 1970. Every Good Regulator of a  
System Must   
be a Model of That System. International Journal of Systems Science 1  
(2):89-97.  
   
This should be available for download from a link "Foundations of  
Complexity" on the SFI website.    
   
Presumably it's like a room with mirrors at both ends, which isn't a  
true infinite regress, because the images get less resolved at each  
reflection.    
   
One models onesself, presumably, not with the intent that the model be  
realistic, but only that it serve some particular purpose.  So we  
don't encounter Turing-completeness paradoxes, since an internal model  
is not required to be a model of itself, but only a model of some  
aspect of itself, or even of that self's interaction in some  
contexts.    
   
The recursive character does indeed make me think of language, as  
Jochen says, though not necessarily that the two are "the same" thing.  
For the model to be a part of the self, and in that sense, an object  
in its own right, and also to serve as a referent to something else  
through a suitable system for interpretation, reminds me of the way a  
word is both an object subject to manipulation, and a referent to  
other objects.  But somehow words are easier.  They are objects with  
respect to syntax, mophology, phonology, etc., and referents with  
respect to semantics, though I doubt that those distinctions are as  
clean we carelessly might suppose.  Is it right, then to say as  
counterpart, that internal models, as parts of the self, are objects  
under some explicit grammar for handling them, and referents with  
respect to a semantics for which that model-language provides  
addressing?  
   
It would be interesting if there is a common structure of recursion,  
and a "syntactic" sort of cognitive primitive, which underlies many  
forms of internal modeling, of which only one is the use of a  
grammatical language.  In other words (and replacing what Dennett does  
say with what I wish he would say), it is not that language enables  
internal modeling, but rather that, in certain cognitive domains, both  
build from recursive functionality that we find expressed in the use  
of internal models and also in the use of grammatical language.  (I  
say "certain cognitive domains" to avoid the Pinker/Fitch/Chomsky  
assertion that re

Re: [FRIAM] A question for your Roboteers out there

[Grant Holland]

Eric,

Would love to read the Ashby/Conant article. I don't see at download 
link on the page at SFI website 
 
however. Any other suggestions how I can download it?


Thanks,
Grant

On 2/6/11 7:27 AM, Eric Smith wrote:

Nick, hi,

Been meaning to send this for a couple of days.  There is a paper on
the role of models in control theory, which is perhaps profound or
perhaps a tautology (Mike Spivak comments that the two naturally go
together):

Conant, Roger C. and W. Ross Ashby. 1970. Every Good Regulator of a
System Must
be a Model of That System. International Journal of Systems Science 1
(2):89-97.

This should be available for download from a link "Foundations of
Complexity" on the SFI website.

Presumably it's like a room with mirrors at both ends, which isn't a
true infinite regress, because the images get less resolved at each
reflection.

One models onesself, presumably, not with the intent that the model be
realistic, but only that it serve some particular purpose.  So we
don't encounter Turing-completeness paradoxes, since an internal model
is not required to be a model of itself, but only a model of some
aspect of itself, or even of that self's interaction in some
contexts.

The recursive character does indeed make me think of language, as
Jochen says, though not necessarily that the two are "the same" thing.
For the model to be a part of the self, and in that sense, an object
in its own right, and also to serve as a referent to something else
through a suitable system for interpretation, reminds me of the way a
word is both an object subject to manipulation, and a referent to
other objects.  But somehow words are easier.  They are objects with
respect to syntax, mophology, phonology, etc., and referents with
respect to semantics, though I doubt that those distinctions are as
clean we carelessly might suppose.  Is it right, then to say as
counterpart, that internal models, as parts of the self, are objects
under some explicit grammar for handling them, and referents with
respect to a semantics for which that model-language provides
addressing?

It would be interesting if there is a common structure of recursion,
and a "syntactic" sort of cognitive primitive, which underlies many
forms of internal modeling, of which only one is the use of a
grammatical language.  In other words (and replacing what Dennett does
say with what I wish he would say), it is not that language enables
internal modeling, but rather that, in certain cognitive domains, both
build from recursive functionality that we find expressed in the use
of internal models and also in the use of grammatical language.  (I
say "certain cognitive domains" to avoid the Pinker/Fitch/Chomsky
assertion that recursion is exclusively human and exclusively
linguistic-within-human.  That seems a conclusion one can reach only
by selectively ignoring almost everything we know about the world.)

I suppose that extending some of Russell's thoughts on "proper names"
to deal with other parts of speech would be a way to try to constrain
our thinking empirically.  Maybe a lot of this has already been done.
It's not an area I have had time to learn about.

Eric




FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org

FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org