For the past two weeks this company's bots been scrubbing, still scrubbing, I flatter myself some angry flunking Hilltop sophomore using AI to write a paper about the collapse of the American Empire will turn in an essay filled with diatribes about motherfucking professional Democrats. Hey, remember that whole doggie musk thing, that was wacky! Strange days, I made every putt but one yesterday within 20 feet with my red alpaca and played 72 holes over the weekend (36 Woodsboro, 36 Glen Burnie - yes, Glen Burnie) without losing one disc to ticks and nettles. I'm back on the masking tape, yo
Laugh, I will be 66 in August and I still think my disc game will get better and crest that plateau set 20 years ago and not crested yet. Is fun! the only thing I'd rather do is hike with L. Friend in the know says this summer, hooey, gonna be hot one starting with Kim Jong Trump's military parade celebrating himself, don't go (knowing I won't, wouldn't've) he said, it's a massive honeytrap. Major favorite song put in my head last night, first time I've thought of Flaming Lips in years, we parted amicably after Yoshimi, but early Flaming Lips, holyfuck
No one is more giddy with delight at the murder of two Israeli embassy employees than mthrfckng 2ionists and American oligarchs rapaciously using accusations of antisemitism to destroy free speech and impose authoritarianism in America
"The real story here is how the entire western political/media class has expressed more outrage and sympathy over the killing of two Israeli embassy staffers than tens of thousands of Palestinians in history’s first live-streamed genocide. The coverage of the story is the story, because it exposes how little regard the western empire has for the lives of non-westerners. Palestinians are not regarded as fully human, so their deaths by daily genocidal massacres are considered less worthy of attention than a double homicide in Washington DC"
"will never ever stop being angry that the people who oppose this have been treated like evil fanatics and the people who support it have been treated like respectable members of society"
"broken record here but this is a party that basically forfeited the most important election in a lifetime because they didn’t want to acknowledge critical opinions about Israel. They threw BLM and police reform under a bus and backed up over it. They’re not interested in contrary views!"
"Terminal cancer diagnosis seems like a good time to retire and get your affairs in order unless you’re a Democrat congressman doing the essential work of making sure Americans don’t have healthcare"
"This passed 215-214. We're going to lose our healthcare because 3 senior Dems have died this year. We lost Roe because Ginsburg didn't retire. We lost the election because Joe ran for reelection"
"SCOTUS allowing the President to gut agencies designed to regulate corporations and protect workers’ right to unionize—while giving a pass to the Federal Reserve, a key conduit for Wall Street power—is a brazen display of corporate favoritism and deference to oligarchic control"
"The inexorable decline of the American Empire has arrived at an Imperial Paradox. It must either fight a war and die, or not fight a war and die"
"I'm all for Joe Rogan and Bob Kennedy and Aaron Rodgers and every single one of these mouth-frothing assholes to be injected directly with all the ailments they say aren't really dangerous. Come on, tough guys, prove it to us, in your own pampered millionaire bodies
"He's going to sell them to one of his private equity buddies. Rates will go up, mortgage protection will decrease, & home loans will be more difficult to obtain without government guaranteed backing"
"The US currently spends $2,000,000 a minute on death machines, bombs, and war. Meanwhile, nearly 50 million Americans are at risk of going hungry. How does Congress respond? Their new budget increases the Pentagon budget and slashes SNAP benefits
Consciousness travels, my sweet: don’t you remember? One sends one’s thoughts to thee as on this footfall, or in this poem. But, truly, remember how we left our old meat- heads to enter the glyph and ride the crystal ark, un- bodied but worded. My mother is a starred thought— and, Don’t You Remember? the Mind from nowhere is everywhere, not just under your skin. The first mind, not evolved but absolute rainbow with me, you and me. Nothing depends on it either.
Someday I will remember this very future I am in, image in space. I will at least see her, I say to myself, she will be someone else than one ever thought and her eyes will be blue words on white.
Consciousness travels from Neptune the planet to Neptune the god of the sea.
I travel to your irony and perambulation, your decibels and vehement budget: I perceive you for you. You don’t have time. I
have time, I am the goddess of the smooth doorway. Let me in, so I can abolish your description.
1/ i am now listening to neil young's "back in the days of shock and awe" - my cd player stopped working years ago, and i installed a new one yesterday - i could have gotten one for three hundred dollars, but settled on the fifty dollar one
2/i am no longer shocked, but still in awe, of your ability to produce these blog posts reflecting the days of our lives in this world in which we live in - like you i pay attention to "current events" although i can stand it less and less
3/i have read the half-lesson at the beginning of lisa barrett feldman's "seven and a half lessons about the brain" - i my mind has been expanded by learning about the nervous system of notochords
4/speaking about systems of sensing, processing, and acting on information - grok and meta.ai have been so kind as to produce the following at my request, although they preferred to write "human" to the term i used in the inquiry - "talking apes":
Humans, large language models (LLMs), and physical robots are distinct entities with unique approaches to information processing, sensing, action, and consciousness.
Humans: Biological neural networks process information, integrating sensory inputs through the nervous system. Consciousness emerges from complex brain activity, enabling self-awareness and subjective experience. Humans act through physical bodies, manipulating the environment with muscles and tools.
LLMs: Artificial neural networks process digital inputs, generating human-like text without consciousness or sensory experience. LLMs excel in rapid data processing and pattern recognition but are limited by training data and lack real-world interaction.
Physical Robots: Sensors and algorithms enable robots to execute physical actions in real-world environments. They lack consciousness and subjective experience, with "sensing" engineered for specific tasks.
Similarities include processing information to generate outputs and relying on structured systems. Key differences lie in consciousness, emotional depth, and physical embodiment. Other potential classes of functioning beings include hybrid systems, collective intelligences, and synthetic biological entities. Each entity has its strengths and limitations, shaped by its unique characteristics.
5/over the holiday weekend i encountered the acronym TESCREAL
an acronym neologism proposed by computer scientist Timnit Gebru and philosopher Émile P. Torres that stands for Transhumanism, Extropianism, Singularitarianism, Cosmism, Rationalist ideology, Effective Altruism, and Longtermism. Gebru and Torres argue that these ideologies should be treated as an "interconnected and overlapping" group with shared origins.
recently washpost had a story "study links technology use to lower risk of cognitive decline" - my comment on that story had the most upvotes ever of any of mine at that venue - 34 - and if our host will humor me i wish to repost it here - i exaggerated my "social isolation" a bit, since i do have the honor and pleasure of living with beloved spouse missus charley - in my defense this comment was written while she was away for a week visiting family - at washpost i use the same screen name but conventionalize my orthography
I am an older adult. I read and comment on stories here at WashPost. Most of my friends are dead, so writing these remarks is as close as I come some days to having a conversation. If someone gives me a thumbs up, that is a bit like social interaction. However, I don't tailor my remarks to what I think people will agree with - I say what I think is true - although not ALL of what I think, for reasons the reader is invited to imagine. I consider myself to be participating - in a very minor way - in the quest for truth, justice, and a tolerable tomorrow.
the groundswell of agreement that was given to this comment was heartwarming, actually
1/ i am now listening to neil young's "back in the days of shock and awe" - my cd player stopped working years ago, and i installed a new one yesterday - i could have gotten one for three hundred dollars, but settled on the fifty dollar one
ReplyDelete2/i am no longer shocked, but still in awe, of your ability to produce these blog posts reflecting the days of our lives in this world in which we live in - like you i pay attention to "current events" although i can stand it less and less
3/i have read the half-lesson at the beginning of lisa barrett feldman's "seven and a half lessons about the brain" - i my mind has been expanded by learning about the nervous system of notochords
4/speaking about systems of sensing, processing, and acting on information - grok and meta.ai have been so kind as to produce the following at my request, although they preferred to write "human" to the term i used in the inquiry - "talking apes":
Humans, large language models (LLMs), and physical robots are distinct entities with unique approaches to information processing, sensing, action, and consciousness.
Humans: Biological neural networks process information, integrating sensory inputs through the nervous system. Consciousness emerges from complex brain activity, enabling self-awareness and subjective experience. Humans act through physical bodies, manipulating the environment with muscles and tools.
LLMs: Artificial neural networks process digital inputs, generating human-like text without consciousness or sensory experience. LLMs excel in rapid data processing and pattern recognition but are limited by training data and lack real-world interaction.
Physical Robots: Sensors and algorithms enable robots to execute physical actions in real-world environments. They lack consciousness and subjective experience, with "sensing" engineered for specific tasks.
Similarities include processing information to generate outputs and relying on structured systems. Key differences lie in consciousness, emotional depth, and physical embodiment. Other potential classes of functioning beings include hybrid systems, collective intelligences, and synthetic biological entities. Each entity has its strengths and limitations, shaped by its unique characteristics.
5/over the holiday weekend i encountered the acronym TESCREAL
an acronym neologism proposed by computer scientist Timnit Gebru and philosopher Émile P. Torres that stands for Transhumanism, Extropianism, Singularitarianism, Cosmism, Rationalist ideology, Effective Altruism, and Longtermism. Gebru and Torres argue that these ideologies should be treated as an "interconnected and overlapping" group with shared origins.
recently washpost had a story "study links technology use to lower risk of cognitive decline" - my comment on that story had the most upvotes ever of any of mine at that venue - 34 - and if our host will humor me i wish to repost it here - i exaggerated my "social isolation" a bit, since i do have the honor and pleasure of living with beloved spouse missus charley - in my defense this comment was written while she was away for a week visiting family - at washpost i use the same screen name but conventionalize my orthography
ReplyDeleteI am an older adult. I read and comment on stories here at WashPost. Most of my friends are dead, so writing these remarks is as close as I come some days to having a conversation. If someone gives me a thumbs up, that is a bit like social interaction. However, I don't tailor my remarks to what I think people will agree with - I say what I think is true - although not ALL of what I think, for reasons the reader is invited to imagine. I consider myself to be participating - in a very minor way - in the quest for truth, justice, and a tolerable tomorrow.
the groundswell of agreement that was given to this comment was heartwarming, actually