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Post by zendancer on May 19, 2024 10:27:37 GMT -5
I'm currently in Portugal, so a bit out of touch, but the basic approach is to take away name and form from people attached to name and form, and to take away emptiness from people who are attached to emptiness. If all boundaries are cognitive illusions, what can we say about that which has no boundaries? All we can do is point and say, "Take a look for yourself." In Portugal ND is "não-dualidade." FWIW, Lisbon (Lisboa) is an amazing city. Today we head to Cascais for five days. Lots of fun! Foi divertido. I spent three weeks studying Portuguese only to find out that European Portuguese is vastly different than Brazilian Portuguese, which is what all of the language courses teach. Haha. I had to start all over. Portugues e' uma lingua dificil (because it is accented and many syllables are simply skipped over or omitted altogether.) Yup, I hear you. I've been reading "I Am That" again recently and I marvel at the seeming contradictions of NM when talking to various questioners' but really there is no contradiction at all. He simply meets everyone where they are at. One of the sweetest exchanges I read recently was with a questioner whose mind was simple, clear and child-like. O meu lado paterno da família era dos Açores. Cresci a comer muita sopa de couve e linguica :-) Um dia destes vou falar-vos do meu bisavô, que foi raptado por piratas aos 14 anos, mas que depois escapou. Portugal parece-me lindo. Estou a usar um tradutor que traduz para português europeu que se encontra aqui. www.deepl.com/translatorWow! You'll have to share that story with us when you can. I never realized that the Azores are part of Portugal, nor did I realize how many countries speak Portuguese--usually the Brazilian variety. Makes sense. 200 million Brazilians and only 10 million E. Portuguese. We had an incredible personal guide in Lisbon who took us off the beaten path and told us so many interesting things that the average tourist would probably never hear. I love the rhinoceros story that explains why all of the sidewalks are tiled. Too funny. I'm also in love with the pasteis de nata custard cakes! Amazing. He took us to a bakery that makes 20,000/day, and they were extraordinary, especially with cinammon and still hot out of the oven. When I read your post, I could understand about half of it, but there were several words beyond my ken. Eu so sei algumas palavaras em Portugues!  |
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Post by justlikeyou on May 19, 2024 19:30:07 GMT -5
Yup, I hear you. I've been reading "I Am That" again recently and I marvel at the seeming contradictions of NM when talking to various questioners' but really there is no contradiction at all. He simply meets everyone where they are at. One of the sweetest exchanges I read recently was with a questioner whose mind was simple, clear and child-like. O meu lado paterno da família era dos Açores. Cresci a comer muita sopa de couve e linguica :-) Um dia destes vou falar-vos do meu bisavô, que foi raptado por piratas aos 14 anos, mas que depois escapou. Portugal parece-me lindo. Estou a usar um tradutor que traduz para português europeu que se encontra aqui. www.deepl.com/translatorWow! You'll have to share that story with us when you can. I never realized that the Azores are part of Portugal, nor did I realize how many countries speak Portuguese--usually the Brazilian variety. Makes sense. 200 million Brazilians and only 10 million E. Portuguese. We had an incredible personal guide in Lisbon who took us off the beaten path and told us so many interesting things that the average tourist would probably never hear. I love the rhinoceros story that explains why all of the sidewalks are tiled. Too funny. I'm also in love with the pasteis de nata custard cakes! Amazing. He took us to a bakery that makes 20,000/day, and they were extraordinary, especially with cinammon and still hot out of the oven. When I read your post, I could understand about half of it, but there were several words beyond my ken. Eu so sei algumas palavaras em Portugues! |
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Post by justlikeyou on May 19, 2024 20:05:43 GMT -5
Yup, I hear you. I've been reading "I Am That" again recently and I marvel at the seeming contradictions of NM when talking to various questioners' but really there is no contradiction at all. He simply meets everyone where they are at. One of the sweetest exchanges I read recently was with a questioner whose mind was simple, clear and child-like. O meu lado paterno da família era dos Açores. Cresci a comer muita sopa de couve e linguica :-) Um dia destes vou falar-vos do meu bisavô, que foi raptado por piratas aos 14 anos, mas que depois escapou. Portugal parece-me lindo. Estou a usar um tradutor que traduz para português europeu que se encontra aqui. www.deepl.com/translatorWow! You'll have to share that story with us when you can. I never realized that the Azores are part of Portugal, nor did I realize how many countries speak Portuguese--usually the Brazilian variety. Makes sense. 200 million Brazilians and only 10 million E. Portuguese. We had an incredible personal guide in Lisbon who took us off the beaten path and told us so many interesting things that the average tourist would probably never hear. I love the rhinoceros story that explains why all of the sidewalks are tiled. Too funny. I'm also in love with the pasteis de nata custard cakes! Amazing. He took us to a bakery that makes 20,000/day, and they were extraordinary, especially with cinammon and still hot out of the oven. When I read your post, I could understand about half of it, but there were several words beyond my ken. Eu so sei algumas palavaras em Portugues! It was in the early 1890s when my great-grandfather, Joseph Lopes, 14, was shanghaied (kidnapped) by the nasty crew of a whaling ship. It was almost two years later when he and his friend found a watch guard asleep and opportunity to slip off the ship and swim to shore in Virginia. That's as much of it that I know. He didn't speak much and when he did it was mostly in Portuguese. Other than playing checkers with him, and him beating me every single time, there wasn't much more real interaction. He died when I was 12. Those pastries sound wonderful. I grew up in a Portuguese/Italian American culture. Gloucester, MA is the oldest fishing port in the US. Some of my favorites treats were at Easter - Portuguese Sweet Bread, some with hard boiled eggs inside. Lightly toasted with butter this was a delicious treat growing up. Christmas time it was Portuguese Vina Dosh, wine/garlic marinated pork chops. I still recall the first time I tasted one of these. It was amazing. The earlier translation read "cabbage soup" but really it was meant to say Portuguese Kale Soup with Linguica which I still enjoy to this day. :-) Ah, you got a very good guide indeed. I bet the joy was mutual. From the time I was a kid up until today as an Uber driver, I love playing tour guide like that when called upon. Did you know that Brazil houses the largest Japanese population outside Japan? I wonder what Brazilian Portuguese with a Japanese accent sounds like. What is the rhinoceros story? PS: I checked with my mother earlier today who told me it was a whaling ship and not a proper pirate ship as I remembered the story. |
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Post by andrew on May 19, 2024 20:54:31 GMT -5
Yup, I hear you. I've been reading "I Am That" again recently and I marvel at the seeming contradictions of NM when talking to various questioners' but really there is no contradiction at all. He simply meets everyone where they are at. One of the sweetest exchanges I read recently was with a questioner whose mind was simple, clear and child-like. O meu lado paterno da família era dos Açores. Cresci a comer muita sopa de couve e linguica :-) Um dia destes vou falar-vos do meu bisavô, que foi raptado por piratas aos 14 anos, mas que depois escapou. Portugal parece-me lindo. Estou a usar um tradutor que traduz para português europeu que se encontra aqui. www.deepl.com/translatorWow! You'll have to share that story with us when you can. I never realized that the Azores are part of Portugal, nor did I realize how many countries speak Portuguese--usually the Brazilian variety. Makes sense. 200 million Brazilians and only 10 million E. Portuguese. We had an incredible personal guide in Lisbon who took us off the beaten path and told us so many interesting things that the average tourist would probably never hear. I love the rhinoceros story that explains why all of the sidewalks are tiled. Too funny. I'm also in love with the pasteis de nata custard cakes! Amazing. He took us to a bakery that makes 20,000/day, and they were extraordinary, especially with cinammon and still hot out of the oven. When I read your post, I could understand about half of it, but there were several words beyond my ken. Eu so sei algumas palavaras em Portugues! Big fan of them too. I haven't seen them in America, but they sell them in grocery stories in the UK. They are that perfect problematic size of having to ask oneself....'is one really enough?' |
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on May 31, 2024 14:39:26 GMT -5
Not a fan of AI potentially putting graphic artists out of work, and producing ripoff material. But we'll see.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Jun 4, 2024 15:40:51 GMT -5
A particular realization makes this obvious. It happened to Federico Fa grin as he contemplated how to design a sentient computer, but it can happen as a result of contemplating ymany other existential questions. People look at two trees, but never realize that the space between the two trees is also what the trees ARE and is also what is looking at the trees. As Pope wrote, "A little knowledge is a dangerous thing. Drink deep or taste not the Pierian Spring." The intelligence of THIS is incomprehensible to the intellect, but the intellect can be informed of that incomprehensibility by a realization of what lies beyond the capacity of the intellect. I read Federico's book, and he doesn't say that humans can't create a truly intelligent system. He said he thinks that our current computer systems won't do it, because they operate by the rules of classical mechanics [*] and a classical system (according to him) can't be truly intelligent or creative like a human. But he doesn't preclude the possibility of constructing an artificial system that taps into the quantum realm, in the same way that he thinks true human intelligence also does. [*] by classical, he means that while the circuits have quantum properties and effects, they don't effect the outputs -- the overall behavior of the circuit follows completely deterministic rules, of the macroscopic world, without quantum "weirdness". Shawn interviewed Federico. Nice! If you're interested ... www.youtube.com/watch?v=OvaboTOYpIo |
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Post by stardustpilgrim on Aug 14, 2024 11:15:10 GMT -5
I don't quite understand this fascination with AI or ChatGPT. There is zero understanding on the end of AI, none whatsoever. AI is like Searle's Chinese box. AI is just manipulating bits, multiple 1s and 0s.
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Post by inavalan on Aug 14, 2024 17:55:57 GMT -5
As I see it ...
The inner-reality is materialized into objects on the space-dimension, and into events on the time-dimension.
Human intelligence isn't the only kind of intelligence. Intelligence is one level of response to perceptions. It can be used reactively or creatively.
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Post by andrew on Aug 14, 2024 20:21:34 GMT -5
I don't quite understand this fascination with AI or ChatGPT. There is zero understanding on the end of AI, none whatsoever. AI is like Searle's Chinese box. AI is just manipulating bits, multiple 1s and 0s. I like the AI machine in 'Interstellar'. If that's the future of AI, I could go with that. But I am also left uninterested with what we have today. Seems like a lot of folks want to explore Ai consciousness before they take the time to explore their own consciousness. Cart before the horse. |
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Post by stardustpilgrim on Aug 14, 2024 22:50:51 GMT -5
I don't quite understand this fascination with AI or ChatGPT. There is zero understanding on the end of AI, none whatsoever. AI is like Searle's Chinese box. AI is just manipulating bits, multiple 1s and 0s. I like the AI machine in 'Interstellar'. If that's the future of AI, I could go with that. But I am also left uninterested with what we have today. Seems like a lot of folks want to explore Ai consciousness before they take the time to explore their own consciousness. Cart before the horse. Yes, pretty cool. Data, ST Next Generation is cool too. I got Federico F-a-g-g-i-n's new book. It came out about 2 months ago. I pre-ordered it on Amazon, but it took them about an extra 3 weeks to get it, and get it to me (very unusual). The guy is a genius. He covers a lot of physics, quickly and succinctly, in new expressions. I agree with him, AI is never going to be conscious, self-aware. I think it will get so sophisticated you will think it's conscious, however. Then, it will essentially be a philosophical zombie. I'm going through it slowly, about 85 pages in. Irreducible; Consciousness, Life, Computers, Human Nature. |
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Post by laughter on Aug 16, 2024 11:16:06 GMT -5
I don't quite understand this fascination with AI or ChatGPT. There is zero understanding on the end of AI, none whatsoever. AI is like Searle's Chinese box. AI is just manipulating bits, multiple 1s and 0s. In terms of the large language models, it's a more sophisticated version of the search engine, which opens up new vistas of practical applications. The obvious ones are over-hyped, but still transformative - customer service bots, real-time autonomous decisions based on data, to name a few. But it can also amplify and supplement the intellect and breadth of knowledge of the user. The revolutionary aspect of it is overblown, but it is a significant incremental step in our technology base, generally. |
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Post by stardustpilgrim on Aug 16, 2024 11:33:06 GMT -5
I don't quite understand this fascination with AI or ChatGPT. There is zero understanding on the end of AI, none whatsoever. AI is like Searle's Chinese box. AI is just manipulating bits, multiple 1s and 0s. In terms of the large language models, it's a more sophisticated version of the search engine, which opens up new vistas of practical applications. The obvious ones are over-hyped, but still transformative - customer service bots, real-time autonomous decisions based on data, to name a few. But it can also amplify and supplement the intellect and breadth of knowledge of the user. The revolutionary aspect of it is overblown, but it is a significant incremental step in our technology base, generally. Yes, but it's still merely the manipulation of data.
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Post by laughter on Aug 16, 2024 12:16:30 GMT -5
In terms of the large language models, it's a more sophisticated version of the search engine, which opens up new vistas of practical applications. The obvious ones are over-hyped, but still transformative - customer service bots, real-time autonomous decisions based on data, to name a few. But it can also amplify and supplement the intellect and breadth of knowledge of the user. The revolutionary aspect of it is overblown, but it is a significant incremental step in our technology base, generally. Yes, but it's still merely the manipulation of data. Right, the idea of the machine becoming conscious is based on a misconception. From the personal perspective, the machine will always only ever be a simulated extension of the consciousness of the creators of the machine. What fascinates people is the underlying existential question: "is it conscious?". This brings us to a netherworld, that isn't really the personal perspective, but if the questioning is occurring, then the questioner hasn't penetrated the illusion of personhood.The people asking if the AI can become conscious are speculating about a melody they've never heard, a color they've never seen, a flavor they've never tasted. In one sense, the AI is an expression similar to the changing of the seasons and the process of evolution. Just because people had a hand in creating it doesn't make it other than that. To anyone who has answered the question, the answer is clear, not directly transmissible, and the process of the questioning by others may or may not be of any particular interest. Although I really can't imagine it not being interesting. |
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Post by stardustpilgrim on Sept 1, 2024 10:28:13 GMT -5
A modified vacation. Found this, it's lengthy. Read in full. Is meat necessary for consciousness? This is a balanced article, most of the top consciousness guys mentioned. From the article: Will AI ever become conscious? It depends on how you think about biology. If consciousness requires meat, no matter how advanced technology becomes, then the whole debate over AI consciousness would be rendered moot. No biology means no mind, which means no risk of suffering. That doesn’t mean advanced AI will be safe; serious, even existential, risks do not require AI to be conscious, merely powerful. But we could proceed in both creating and regulating artificial intelligence systems free from the concern that we might be creating a new kind of slave, born into the soul-crushing tedium of having one’s entire existence confined within a customer service chat window. Rather than asking if each new AI system is finally the one that has conscious experience, focusing on the more fundamental question of whether any type of non-biological feeling mind is possible could provide much broader insights. It could at least bring some clarity to what we know — and don’t know — about the moral conundrum of building billions of machines that may not only be able to think and even love, but suffer, too. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ snip/ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The great substrate debate: Biochauvinism versus artificial consciousness So far, to the best of human knowledge, everything in the known universe that has ever been conscious has also been made of biological material. That’s a major point for the “biochauvinist” perspective, supported by philosophers like Ned Block, who co-directs the NYU Center for Mind, Brain, and Consciousness. They argue that the physical stuff that a conscious being is made of, or the “substrate” of a mind, matters. If biological substrates are so far the only grounds for thinking, feeling minds we’ve discovered, it’s reasonable to think that’s because biology is necessary for consciousness. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ snip/ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ For the time being, Metzinger feels that we’re stuck. We have no way of knowing whether an artificial system might be conscious because competing and largely speculative theories haven’t settled on any shared understanding of what consciousness is. Neuroscience is good at dealing with objective qualities that can be directly observed, like whether or not neurons are shooting off an electrical charge. But even our best neuroimaging technologies can’t see into subjective experiences. We can only scientifically observe the real stuff of consciousness — feelings of joy, anxiety, or the rich delight of biting into a fresh cheesecake — secondhand, through imprecise channels like language. Like biology before the theory of evolution, neuroscience is “pre-paradigmatic,” as the neuroscientist-turned-writer Erik Hoel puts it. You can’t say where consciousness can and can’t arise if you can’t say what consciousness is. Our premature ideas around consciousness and suffering are what drive Metzinger to call for a global moratorium on research that flies too close to the unwitting creation of new consciousnesses. Note that he’s concerned about a second explosion of suffering. The first, of course, was our own. The deep wells of heartbreak, joy, and everything in between that humans, animals, and maybe even plants and insects to some degree, all experience trace back to the dawn of biological evolution on Earth. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ snip/ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ A theory of consciousness isn’t the only important thing we’re missing to make actual progress on the substrate debate. We also don’t have a theory of life. That is, biologists still don’t agree on what life is. It’s easy enough to say a garbage truck isn’t alive while your snoozing cat is. But edge cases, like viruses or red blood cells, show that we still don’t understand exactly what makes up the difference between things that are living and not. This matters for biochauvinists, who are hard-pressed to say what exactly about biology is necessary for consciousness that can’t be replicated in a machine. Certain cells? Fleshy bodies that interact with their environments? Metabolisms? A meat-bound soul? Well, maybe these twin mysteries, life and mind, are actually one and the same. Instead of any known parts of biology we can point to, maybe the thing you need for consciousness is life. As it happens, a school of cognitive scientists, “enactivists,” have been developing this argument since Chilean biologists Francisco Varela and Humberto Maturana first posed it in the 1970s. Today, it’s often referred to as the life-mind continuity hypothesis. It argues that life and mind are differently weighted expressions of the same underlying properties. “From the perspective of life-mind continuity,” writes Evan Thompson, a leading philosopher of enactivism today, “the brain or nervous system does not create mind, but rather expands the range of mind already present in life.” |
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roscod
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Post by roscod on Sept 13, 2024 1:29:11 GMT -5
This is one of the most advanced theories of consciousness in the current scientific debate. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integrated_information_theoryIt is championed by a fellow called Christof Koch, who worked extensively with Francis Crick to try and identify the "neural correlates of consciousness". he has a very good book on the subject of consciousness titled "The Feeling Of Life Itself". he discusses consciousness and AI in quite a bit of depth. |
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