Re: [FRIAM] lurking

[Marcus Daniels]

Glen writes:

< I vacillate between thinking digital computers could [not] be conscious 
because of this argument; the feedback loops may have to be very close to the 
metal, like fpga close. Maybe consciousness has to be analog in order to 
realize meta-programming at all scales? >

Even if that were so, viruses have been pulled from history or tweaked and 
created in the lab.   So we have a design specification, and the means to make 
it.One could imagine a robot fabricating the close-to-the-metal machine 
too.   There is a story one can write down how it is done.   If there is no 
story, it is not science we are talking about, it is something else.  

And referencing your hilarious "let them eat space" remark, one can distinguish 
between saving the design or prototype for human life from the current 
instances of life.   Democratic government is concerned with governing, 
supposedly on behalf of the instances, and Musk can whatever values he has.  

-Original Message-
From: Friam  On Behalf Of u?l? ?>$
Sent: Tuesday, November 2, 2021 8:03 AM
To: friam@redfish.com
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] lurking

Well, I could be wrong. But both Nick and EricC seem to argue there's no 
privilege "in the limit" ... i.e. with infeasibly extensible resources, perfect 
observability, etc. It's just a reactionary position against those who believe 
in souls or a cartesian cut. Ignore it. >8^D

But I don't think there can be *complete* privilege. Every time we think we 
come up with a way to keep the black hats out, they either find a way in ... or 
find a way to infer what's happening like with power or audio profiles.

I don't think anyone's arguing that peeks are expensive. The argument centers 
around the impact of that peek, how it's used. Your idea of compiling in 
diagnostics would submit to Nick's allegation of a *model*. I would argue we 
need even lower level self-organization. I vacillate between thinking digital 
computers could [not] be conscious because of this argument; the feedback loops 
may have to be very close to the metal, like fpga close. Maybe consciousness 
has to be analog in order to realize meta-programming at all scales?

On 11/2/21 7:36 AM, Marcus Daniels wrote:
> My point was that the cost to probe some memory address is low.   And all 
> there is, is I/O and memory.  
> 
>  It does become difficult to track thousands of addresses at once:  Think of 
> a debugger that has millions of watchpoints.   However, one could have 
> diagnostics compiled in to the code to check invariants from time to time.   
> I don't know why Nick says there is no privilege.   There can be complete 
> privilege.   Extracting meaning from that access is rarely easy, of course.  
> Just as debugging any given problem can be hard.
> 
> -Original Message-
> From: Friam  On Behalf Of u?l? ?>$
> Sent: Monday, November 1, 2021 3:20 PM
> To: friam@redfish.com
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] lurking
> 
> Literal self-awareness is possible. The flaw in your argument is that "self" 
> is ambiguous in the way you're using it. It's not ambiguous in the way me or 
> Marcus intend it. You can see this nicely if you elide "know" from your 
> argument.  We know nothing. The machine knows nothing. Just don't use the 
> word "know" or the concept it references.  There need not be a model 
> involved, either, only sensors and things to be sensed. 
> 
> Self-sensing means there is a feedback loop between the sensor and the thing 
> it senses. So, the sensor measures the sensed and the sensed measures the 
> sensor. That is self-awareness. There's no need for any of the psychological 
> hooha you often object to. There's no need for privileged information 
> *except* that there has to be a loop. If anything is privileged, it's the 
> causal loop.
> 
> The real trick is composing multiple self-self loops into something 
> resembling what we call a conscious agent. We can get to the uncanny valley 
> with regular old self-sensing control theory and robotics. Getting beyond the 
> valley is difficult: https://youtu.be/D8_VmWWRJgE A similar demonstration is 
> here: https://youtu.be/7ncDPoa_n-8
> 
> 
> 
> On 11/1/21 2:08 PM, thompnicks...@gmail.com wrote:
>> In fact, strictly speaking, I think literal self-awareness is impossible.  
>> Because, whatever a machine knows about itself, it is a MODEL of itself 
>> based on well situated sensors of its own activities, just like you are and 
>> I am.  There is no privileged access, just bettah or wussah access.
> 

-- 
"Better to be slapped with the truth than kissed with a lie."
☤>$ uǝlƃ


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[FRIAM] effective altruism at work!

[uǝlƃ ☤ $]

Let them eat space! Elon Musk and the race to end world hunger
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/nov/02/elon-musk-race-hunger-world-food-programme-global-disaster

> Musk’s excuse for not handing over a tiny portion of his wealth to the WFP is 
> hardly original. Billionaires love to sorrowfully declare that they are dying 
> to pay more tax, but they can’t bear to see their money used inefficiently, 
> so, for everyone’s sake, they had better hoard it instead. Last week, in 
> response to a (very short-lived) plan by the Democrats to tax billionaires, 
> BlackRock CEO Larry Fink said he would happily part with more of his dosh if 
> there were assurances it would be spent well. “If we could find solutions 
> where the money could be directed in a proper way, I have more to give.” 
> Fellow billionaire Ray Dalio also said he would willingly pay more tax if it 
> accomplished “greater productivity” but sadly, he wasn’t sure that it did. 
> Musk, meanwhile, insinuated that he was doing us all a favour by not paying 
> more tax. “My plan is to use the money to get humanity to Mars and preserve 
> the light of consciousness,” he tweeted last Thursday. A couple of days later 
> he darkly warned that a billionaire tax would trickle down. “Eventually they 
> run out of other people’s money, and then they come for you.”



-- 
"Better to be slapped with the truth than kissed with a lie."
☤>$ uǝlƃ

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[FRIAM] Forwarded from Carnegie Mellon

[Frank Wimberly]

Speaking of sensors:


When it comes to the senses, touch remains a challenge for artificial
intelligence and robotics researchers.

Teaming up with Meta AI, we hope to change that through a new tactile
sensing skin they believe will increase the sense of touch in robotics,
wearables, smart clothing and AI.

Called ReSkin, the technology is affordable, durable and easy-to-use. It
harnesses advances in machine learning, soft robotics and magnetic sensing
to create a skin that is versatile and as easy to apply as a bandage.

More about ReSkin 👉 https://cmu.is/reskin.


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

505 670-9918
Santa Fe, NM

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Re: [FRIAM] lurking

[uǝlƃ ☤ $]

Your "larding" is irritating. So, I'll respond in bullets, forming what 
kindasorta looks like a coherent response. But it's just a busyness trick, 
promulgated by busyness people. I encourage you to formulate your posts as 
coherent wholes and deny your your hedonic "larding" impulse.

• I have no antipathy for behaviorism. I *am* a behaviorist, at least in 
principle. You may think I have antipathy for it because I've done a good job 
steelmanning my opposition. Sorry about that. It happens all the time. It's me, 
not you.

• My usage of "self" relies on scoping. If we can't talk about scope, then we 
can't talk about self.

• sense vs know - No, the word "know" is hopelessly useless. Just stop using it.

• the hand that turns itself off - No, that's not a loop because there's only 1 
iterate. This is one of the reasons finite state machines are incomplete models 
without a controller or a clock. I've been trying to find a way to ask such a 
question about hypergraphs. But my ignorance prevents me.

• causal vs regulatory loop - "Causal" is more primitive than "regulatory". If 
you want to start with "regulatory", then you'll have to define "causal" in 
terms of "regulation". In my experience, regulation cuts a thing into 2 parts: 
the system and the regulator. So cause is a prerequisite to regulation. But I'm 
happy to play some other game if you set up the rules.

• uncanniness - Yes, it does tell us something about the circuitry. Uncanniness 
is a phenomenon, generated by a generator. We can study gen-phen maps both 
forward and inverse. By comparing the behavior (phenomenal repertoire) of a 
single machine, under different conditions, we can infer some properties of its 
gen-phen map, which constrains the properties of the generator.


On 11/2/21 8:39 AM, thompnicks...@gmail.com wrote:
> You may accuse me of trolling in what follows, or being manipulatively 
> stupid, but honestly I do not understand what you are saying and would LIKE 
> to understand it.   Please see larding, below.  Of course I may not 
> understand my own motives. 
> 
>  
> 
> Nick Thompson
> 
> thompnicks...@gmail.com
> 
> https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/
> 
>  
> 
> -Original Message-
> From: Friam  On Behalf Of u?l? ?>$
> Sent: Monday, November 1, 2021 4:20 PM
> To: friam@redfish.com
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] lurking
> 
>  
> 
> Literal self-awareness is possible. The flaw in your argument is that "self" 
> is ambiguous in the way you're using it. It's not ambiguous
> 
> */[NST===>I guess I need to understand your usage.  <===nst] /*
> 
> in the way me or Marcus intend it.
> 
> You can see this nicely if you elide
> 
> */[NST===>i.e., “remove”?<===nst] /*
> 
>  "know" from your argument.  We know nothing. */[NST===> I can agree, for 
> some values of the word, that we know nothing, but isn’t that  the same world 
> in which we sense nothing?  <===nst] /*
> 
> The machine knows nothing. Just don't use the word "know" or the concept it 
> references.  There need not be a model involved, either, only sensors and 
> things to be sensed.
> 
> */[NST===>So, your antipathy for behaviorism not withstanding,  this feels 
> like a hyper behaviorist position you are adopting.  Way beyond mine.  Let’s 
> talk about that toy which involves a hand that comes out and turns off the 
> switch that governs it.  This is a loop, right?  Is there sensing going on 
> here?  <===nst] /*
> 
>  
> 
> Self-sensing means there is a feedback loop between the sensor and the thing 
> it senses. So, the sensor measures the sensed and the sensed measures the 
> sensor. That is self-awareness. There's no need for any of the psychological 
> hooha you often object to. There's no need for privileged information 
> *except* that there has to be a loop. If anything is privileged, it's the 
> causal loop.*/[NST===>Well, I would start with the regulatory loop.  <===nst] 
> /* 
> 
>  
> 
> The real trick is composing multiple self-self loops into something 
> resembling what we call a conscious agent. We can get to the uncanny valley 
> with regular old self-sensing control theory and robotics. Getting beyond the 
> valley is difficult:
> 
> */[NST===>Oh, getting into the uncanny territory is no problem.  Practically 
> anything that stands up on its hind legs (or wheels) and looks us in the eye 
> is uncanny.  But uncanniness doesn’t tell us anything about the circuitry we 
> are looking at, does it?  It might tell us something about our circuitry. 
> <===nst] /*
> 
> https://youtu.be/D8_VmWWRJgE  A similar 
> demonstration is here: https://youtu.be/7ncDPoa_n-8 
> 
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> On 11/1/21 2:08 PM, thompnicks...@gmail.com  
> wrote:
> 
>> In fact, strictly speaking, I think literal self-awareness is impossible.  
>> Because, whatever a machine knows about itself, it is a MODEL of itself 
>> based on well situated sensors of its own activities, just lik

Re: [FRIAM] lurking

[thompnickson2]

Hi, Glen, 

 

You may accuse me of trolling in what follows, or being manipulatively stupid, 
but honestly I do not understand what you are saying and would LIKE to 
understand it.   Please see larding, below.  Of course I may not understand my 
own motives.  

 

Nick Thompson

thompnicks...@gmail.com

https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/

 

-Original Message-
From: Friam  On Behalf Of u?l? ?>$
Sent: Monday, November 1, 2021 4:20 PM
To: friam@redfish.com
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] lurking

 

Literal self-awareness is possible. The flaw in your argument is that "self" is 
ambiguous in the way you're using it. It's not ambiguous 

[NST===>I guess I need to understand your usage.  <===nst] 

in the way me or Marcus intend it.

You can see this nicely if you elide

[NST===>i.e., “remove”?<===nst] 

 "know" from your argument.  We know nothing. [NST===> I can agree, for some 
values of the word, that we know nothing, but isn’t that  the same world in 
which we sense nothing?  <===nst] 

The machine knows nothing. Just don't use the word "know" or the concept it 
references.  There need not be a model involved, either, only sensors and 
things to be sensed. 

[NST===>So, your antipathy for behaviorism not withstanding,  this feels like a 
hyper behaviorist position you are adopting.  Way beyond mine.  Let’s talk 
about that toy which involves a hand that comes out and turns off the switch 
that governs it.  This is a loop, right?  Is there sensing going on here?  
<===nst] 

 

Self-sensing means there is a feedback loop between the sensor and the thing it 
senses. So, the sensor measures the sensed and the sensed measures the sensor. 
That is self-awareness. There's no need for any of the psychological hooha you 
often object to. There's no need for privileged information *except* that there 
has to be a loop. If anything is privileged, it's the causal loop.[NST===>Well, 
I would start with the regulatory loop.  <===nst]  

 

The real trick is composing multiple self-self loops into something resembling 
what we call a conscious agent. We can get to the uncanny valley with regular 
old self-sensing control theory and robotics. Getting beyond the valley is 
difficult: 

[NST===>Oh, getting into the uncanny territory is no problem.  Practically 
anything that stands up on its hind legs (or wheels) and looks us in the eye is 
uncanny.  But uncanniness doesn’t tell us anything about the circuitry we are 
looking at, does it?  It might tell us something about our circuitry. <===nst] 

https://youtu.be/D8_VmWWRJgE A similar demonstration is here:  
 https://youtu.be/7ncDPoa_n-8

 

 

 

On 11/1/21 2:08 PM,   thompnicks...@gmail.com 
wrote:

> In fact, strictly speaking, I think literal self-awareness is impossible.  
> Because, whatever a machine knows about itself, it is a MODEL of itself based 
> on well situated sensors of its own activities, just like you are and I am.  
> There is no privileged access, just bettah or wussah access.

 

-- 

"Better to be slapped with the truth than kissed with a lie."

☤>$ uǝlƃ

 

 

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Re: [FRIAM] lurking

[Marcus Daniels]

I really don’t get it.  I appreciate the achievement of modern games with the 
professional artists, the physics engines, etc. but I just can’t imagine 
spending a minute of time on it.   I know people that do, and it is bewildering 
to me what could possibly be wrong with them!  Work for no reason.

> On Nov 2, 2021, at 8:10 AM, Prof David West  wrote:
> 
> Before the thread leaves games for consciousness ...
> 
> A couple of years back, World of Warcraft passed the 1 billion player hour 
> mark. That is just one game. A survey somewhere  around that time claimed 
> that self identified gamers averaged 30+ hours a week engaged in games. The 
> low end of the curve was 20 hours a week (if you did not play that much, I 
> guess you did not consider yourself a gamer) and the high end was well over 
> 100 hours a week.
> 
> The question of the day (then): why do people spend enjoy games so much more 
> than real life and especially work life? There was a 'movement', under the 
> umbrella label of "gamification" to apply ideas/principles supposedly gleamed 
> from analysis of why games were so compelling and apply those ideas to 
> education and work in specific, but also life in general. 
> 
> I have half-dozen or so books on this subject and will look them up if anyone 
> is interested.
> 
> davew
> 
> 
>> On Tue, Nov 2, 2021, at 8:36 AM, Marcus Daniels wrote:
>> My point was that the cost to probe some memory address is low.   And 
>> all there is, is I/O and memory.  
>> 
>> It does become difficult to track thousands of addresses at once:  
>> Think of a debugger that has millions of watchpoints.   However, one 
>> could have diagnostics compiled in to the code to check invariants from 
>> time to time.   I don't know why Nick says there is no privilege.   
>> There can be complete privilege.   Extracting meaning from that access 
>> is rarely easy, of course.  Just as debugging any given problem can be 
>> hard.
>> 
>> -Original Message-
>> From: Friam  On Behalf Of u?l? ?>$
>> Sent: Monday, November 1, 2021 3:20 PM
>> To: friam@redfish.com
>> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] lurking
>> 
>> Literal self-awareness is possible. The flaw in your argument is that 
>> "self" is ambiguous in the way you're using it. It's not ambiguous in 
>> the way me or Marcus intend it. You can see this nicely if you elide 
>> "know" from your argument.  We know nothing. The machine knows nothing. 
>> Just don't use the word "know" or the concept it references.  There 
>> need not be a model involved, either, only sensors and things to be 
>> sensed. 
>> 
>> Self-sensing means there is a feedback loop between the sensor and the 
>> thing it senses. So, the sensor measures the sensed and the sensed 
>> measures the sensor. That is self-awareness. There's no need for any of 
>> the psychological hooha you often object to. There's no need for 
>> privileged information *except* that there has to be a loop. If 
>> anything is privileged, it's the causal loop.
>> 
>> The real trick is composing multiple self-self loops into something 
>> resembling what we call a conscious agent. We can get to the uncanny 
>> valley with regular old self-sensing control theory and robotics. 
>> Getting beyond the valley is difficult: https://youtu.be/D8_VmWWRJgE A 
>> similar demonstration is here: https://youtu.be/7ncDPoa_n-8
>> 
>> 
>> 
>>> On 11/1/21 2:08 PM, thompnicks...@gmail.com wrote:
>>> In fact, strictly speaking, I think literal self-awareness is impossible.  
>>> Because, whatever a machine knows about itself, it is a MODEL of itself 
>>> based on well situated sensors of its own activities, just like you are and 
>>> I am.  There is no privileged access, just bettah or wussah access.
>> 
>> -- 
>> "Better to be slapped with the truth than kissed with a lie."
>> ☤>$ uǝlƃ
>> 
>> 
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Re: [FRIAM] Unrecognized Thinkers

[Prof David West]

Required reading for Nick (it's metaphors all the way down, you fuckers) 
*Metaphor, A Practical Introduction,*  2nd Edition, by Zoltan Kovecses. 

TOC
1-What is Metaphor
2-Common Source and Target Domains
3-Kinds of Metaphor
4-Metaphor in Literature
5-Nonlinguistic Realizations of Conceptual Metaphors
6-The Basis of Metaphor
7-The Partial Nature of Metaphorical Mappings
8 Cognitive Models, Metaphors, and Embodiment
9- Metaphorical Entailments
10-The Scope of Metaphor
11-Metaphor Systems
12:Another Figure: Metonymy
13-Ther Universality of Conceptual Metaphors
14-Cultural Variation in Metaphor and Metonymy
15-Metaphor, Metonymy, and and Idioms
16-Metaphor and Metonymy in the Study of Langauage
17-Metaphor and Blends
18-Metaphor in Discourse
19-How Dopes All This Hang Together?

davew



On Mon, Nov 1, 2021, at 10:55 AM, thompnicks...@gmail.com wrote:
> Ahem.  Speaking as the “Dean” (oldest surviving member) of this distinguished 
> mostly geriatric community, I think respect goes both ways, or it goes 
> nowhere.  So, those of us who seek to command respect must be prepared to 
> give it, particularly to such memes as OK Boomer, which I think expresses 
> quite aptly an impatience with anybody who asserts old knowledge just because 
> it is old.  I, of course, am Pre-boomer, a Silent.  If a meme were started, 
> “Be silent, Silent!” I would resist it (obviously) but I sure as hell would 
> respect it, and try to mine it for its implicit content. 
>  
> I quite like my status as Dean, by the way.  When FRIAM is given a collective 
> Nobel, I expect to lead you all into the celebratory dinner, bearing our 
> staff in my crooked hand, shuffling along in my bedroom slippers, my shirt 
> untucked from my honorific belt,  muttering over and over again, “Metaphor 
> all the way down, you fuckers!”
>  
> By the way, Jon, it’s funny to see you take so stridently a “youthist” 
> position, you, who have perhaps more than any other, sought to support and 
> harvest value from the fading *eminences grises* amongst us.  Still.  Point 
> taken.
>  
> Oh, and, Glen: thanks for collecting the products of the firehose into 
> puddles.  Otherwise I would surely have drowned.
>  
> Nick
>  
> Nick Thompson
> thompnicks...@gmail.com
> https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/
>  
> *From:* Friam  *On Behalf Of *Jon Zingale
> *Sent:* Sunday, October 31, 2021 2:23 PM
> *To:* friam@redfish.com
> *Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] Unrecognized Thinkers
> 
>  
> "Memes can spread as if they are amplified, for instance the stupid 'Let's 
> Go, Brandon' meme or the dull 'OK Boomer' reply."
>  
> Well, it certainly is your thread to bend. My feeling is that corrosion and 
> destruction can often arise as part of a creative process. Age demographics 
> in politics in the United States, to my view, are pretty off balance. My 
> personal plan is to help cultivate a different one. Nothing against old 
> people, of course, but in the next elections I plan to rank choice not by 
> party but simply by age.
> 
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Re: [FRIAM] lurking

[uǝlƃ ☤ $]

The reason people are playing games so much is the same reason so many people 
spend so much time on facebook or tiktok. And I'd go further and argue that 
it's the same reason for the rise of so much fake news. SteveS posted that 
article awhile back about QAnon and the gamification of real life. That sounds 
very similar to the gamification of work and education, to me. It's all about 
the dopamine.

Augmented Reality (AR) seems like a reasonable route forward ... a simple 
enlarging of things like geocaching or Pokemon Go. Waze used to have an AR game 
where, while driving around, they'd ding your phone and if you drove by a place 
with a glyph on your map, you'd get some prize (dopamine!) ... like 
thanksgiving, there'd be turkey dinners strewn about the city.

But this conversation belongs, I think, on the Quantified Self thread. I see TV 
commercials saying things like "Level Up Your Fitness Routine" or whatnot ... 
where "level up" is a gamer term. And I posted awhile back about my friend's 
battle with his ex-wife about the gamification of their kids' lives. Soccer, 
karate, ballet, math, student body president, early standardized testing, 
"magnet" summer camps, networking with high profile business people, will all 
get you into a good school, to get a good job, to make lots of money, to retire 
wealthy. 

Ugh. Disgusting. That's what gamification of education and work feel like to 
me. I'd rather cyborg my body and measure the metabolites in my feces than 
maximize my Life Productivity. But neither sound that appealing.


On 11/2/21 8:09 AM, Prof David West wrote:
> Before the thread leaves games for consciousness ...
> 
> A couple of years back, World of Warcraft passed the 1 billion player hour 
> mark. That is just one game. A survey somewhere  around that time claimed 
> that self identified gamers averaged 30+ hours a week engaged in games. The 
> low end of the curve was 20 hours a week (if you did not play that much, I 
> guess you did not consider yourself a gamer) and the high end was well over 
> 100 hours a week.
> 
> The question of the day (then): why do people spend enjoy games so much more 
> than real life and especially work life? There was a 'movement', under the 
> umbrella label of "gamification" to apply ideas/principles supposedly gleamed 
> from analysis of why games were so compelling and apply those ideas to 
> education and work in specific, but also life in general. 
> 
> I have half-dozen or so books on this subject and will look them up if anyone 
> is interested.
> 
> davew
> 
> 
> On Tue, Nov 2, 2021, at 8:36 AM, Marcus Daniels wrote:
>> My point was that the cost to probe some memory address is low.   And 
>> all there is, is I/O and memory.  
>>
>>  It does become difficult to track thousands of addresses at once:  
>> Think of a debugger that has millions of watchpoints.   However, one 
>> could have diagnostics compiled in to the code to check invariants from 
>> time to time.   I don't know why Nick says there is no privilege.   
>> There can be complete privilege.   Extracting meaning from that access 
>> is rarely easy, of course.  Just as debugging any given problem can be 
>> hard.
>>
>> -Original Message-
>> From: Friam  On Behalf Of u?l? ?>$
>> Sent: Monday, November 1, 2021 3:20 PM
>> To: friam@redfish.com
>> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] lurking
>>
>> Literal self-awareness is possible. The flaw in your argument is that 
>> "self" is ambiguous in the way you're using it. It's not ambiguous in 
>> the way me or Marcus intend it. You can see this nicely if you elide 
>> "know" from your argument.  We know nothing. The machine knows nothing. 
>> Just don't use the word "know" or the concept it references.  There 
>> need not be a model involved, either, only sensors and things to be 
>> sensed. 
>>
>> Self-sensing means there is a feedback loop between the sensor and the 
>> thing it senses. So, the sensor measures the sensed and the sensed 
>> measures the sensor. That is self-awareness. There's no need for any of 
>> the psychological hooha you often object to. There's no need for 
>> privileged information *except* that there has to be a loop. If 
>> anything is privileged, it's the causal loop.
>>
>> The real trick is composing multiple self-self loops into something 
>> resembling what we call a conscious agent. We can get to the uncanny 
>> valley with regular old self-sensing control theory and robotics. 
>> Getting beyond the valley is difficult: https://youtu.be/D8_VmWWRJgE A 
>> similar demonstration is here: https://youtu.be/7ncDPoa_n-8
>>
>>
>>
>> On 11/1/21 2:08 PM, thompnicks...@gmail.com wrote:
>>> In fact, strictly speaking, I think literal self-awareness is impossible.  
>>> Because, whatever a machine knows about itself, it is a MODEL of itself 
>>> based on well situated sensors of its own activities, just like you are and 
>>> I am.  There is no privileged access, just bettah or wussah access.


-- 
"Better to be slapped with the truth 

Re: [FRIAM] lurking

[Prof David West]

Before the thread leaves games for consciousness ...

A couple of years back, World of Warcraft passed the 1 billion player hour 
mark. That is just one game. A survey somewhere  around that time claimed that 
self identified gamers averaged 30+ hours a week engaged in games. The low end 
of the curve was 20 hours a week (if you did not play that much, I guess you 
did not consider yourself a gamer) and the high end was well over 100 hours a 
week.

The question of the day (then): why do people spend enjoy games so much more 
than real life and especially work life? There was a 'movement', under the 
umbrella label of "gamification" to apply ideas/principles supposedly gleamed 
from analysis of why games were so compelling and apply those ideas to 
education and work in specific, but also life in general. 

I have half-dozen or so books on this subject and will look them up if anyone 
is interested.

davew


On Tue, Nov 2, 2021, at 8:36 AM, Marcus Daniels wrote:
> My point was that the cost to probe some memory address is low.   And 
> all there is, is I/O and memory.  
>
>  It does become difficult to track thousands of addresses at once:  
> Think of a debugger that has millions of watchpoints.   However, one 
> could have diagnostics compiled in to the code to check invariants from 
> time to time.   I don't know why Nick says there is no privilege.   
> There can be complete privilege.   Extracting meaning from that access 
> is rarely easy, of course.  Just as debugging any given problem can be 
> hard.
>
> -Original Message-
> From: Friam  On Behalf Of u?l? ?>$
> Sent: Monday, November 1, 2021 3:20 PM
> To: friam@redfish.com
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] lurking
>
> Literal self-awareness is possible. The flaw in your argument is that 
> "self" is ambiguous in the way you're using it. It's not ambiguous in 
> the way me or Marcus intend it. You can see this nicely if you elide 
> "know" from your argument.  We know nothing. The machine knows nothing. 
> Just don't use the word "know" or the concept it references.  There 
> need not be a model involved, either, only sensors and things to be 
> sensed. 
>
> Self-sensing means there is a feedback loop between the sensor and the 
> thing it senses. So, the sensor measures the sensed and the sensed 
> measures the sensor. That is self-awareness. There's no need for any of 
> the psychological hooha you often object to. There's no need for 
> privileged information *except* that there has to be a loop. If 
> anything is privileged, it's the causal loop.
>
> The real trick is composing multiple self-self loops into something 
> resembling what we call a conscious agent. We can get to the uncanny 
> valley with regular old self-sensing control theory and robotics. 
> Getting beyond the valley is difficult: https://youtu.be/D8_VmWWRJgE A 
> similar demonstration is here: https://youtu.be/7ncDPoa_n-8
>
>
>
> On 11/1/21 2:08 PM, thompnicks...@gmail.com wrote:
>> In fact, strictly speaking, I think literal self-awareness is impossible.  
>> Because, whatever a machine knows about itself, it is a MODEL of itself 
>> based on well situated sensors of its own activities, just like you are and 
>> I am.  There is no privileged access, just bettah or wussah access.
>
> -- 
> "Better to be slapped with the truth than kissed with a lie."
> ☤>$ uǝlƃ
>
>
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[FRIAM] it is the games!

[Marcus Daniels]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2021/11/02/josh-hawley-pornography-video-games/?itid=hp_politics


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Re: [FRIAM] lurking

[uǝlƃ ☤ $]

Well, I could be wrong. But both Nick and EricC seem to argue there's no 
privilege "in the limit" ... i.e. with infeasibly extensible resources, perfect 
observability, etc. It's just a reactionary position against those who believe 
in souls or a cartesian cut. Ignore it. >8^D

But I don't think there can be *complete* privilege. Every time we think we 
come up with a way to keep the black hats out, they either find a way in ... or 
find a way to infer what's happening like with power or audio profiles.

I don't think anyone's arguing that peeks are expensive. The argument centers 
around the impact of that peek, how it's used. Your idea of compiling in 
diagnostics would submit to Nick's allegation of a *model*. I would argue we 
need even lower level self-organization. I vacillate between thinking digital 
computers could [not] be conscious because of this argument; the feedback loops 
may have to be very close to the metal, like fpga close. Maybe consciousness 
has to be analog in order to realize meta-programming at all scales?

On 11/2/21 7:36 AM, Marcus Daniels wrote:
> My point was that the cost to probe some memory address is low.   And all 
> there is, is I/O and memory.  
> 
>  It does become difficult to track thousands of addresses at once:  Think of 
> a debugger that has millions of watchpoints.   However, one could have 
> diagnostics compiled in to the code to check invariants from time to time.   
> I don't know why Nick says there is no privilege.   There can be complete 
> privilege.   Extracting meaning from that access is rarely easy, of course.  
> Just as debugging any given problem can be hard.
> 
> -Original Message-
> From: Friam  On Behalf Of u?l? ?>$
> Sent: Monday, November 1, 2021 3:20 PM
> To: friam@redfish.com
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] lurking
> 
> Literal self-awareness is possible. The flaw in your argument is that "self" 
> is ambiguous in the way you're using it. It's not ambiguous in the way me or 
> Marcus intend it. You can see this nicely if you elide "know" from your 
> argument.  We know nothing. The machine knows nothing. Just don't use the 
> word "know" or the concept it references.  There need not be a model 
> involved, either, only sensors and things to be sensed. 
> 
> Self-sensing means there is a feedback loop between the sensor and the thing 
> it senses. So, the sensor measures the sensed and the sensed measures the 
> sensor. That is self-awareness. There's no need for any of the psychological 
> hooha you often object to. There's no need for privileged information 
> *except* that there has to be a loop. If anything is privileged, it's the 
> causal loop.
> 
> The real trick is composing multiple self-self loops into something 
> resembling what we call a conscious agent. We can get to the uncanny valley 
> with regular old self-sensing control theory and robotics. Getting beyond the 
> valley is difficult: https://youtu.be/D8_VmWWRJgE A similar demonstration is 
> here: https://youtu.be/7ncDPoa_n-8
> 
> 
> 
> On 11/1/21 2:08 PM, thompnicks...@gmail.com wrote:
>> In fact, strictly speaking, I think literal self-awareness is impossible.  
>> Because, whatever a machine knows about itself, it is a MODEL of itself 
>> based on well situated sensors of its own activities, just like you are and 
>> I am.  There is no privileged access, just bettah or wussah access.
> 

-- 
"Better to be slapped with the truth than kissed with a lie."
☤>$ uǝlƃ


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Re: [FRIAM] lurking

[Marcus Daniels]

My point was that the cost to probe some memory address is low.   And all there 
is, is I/O and memory.  

 It does become difficult to track thousands of addresses at once:  Think of a 
debugger that has millions of watchpoints.   However, one could have 
diagnostics compiled in to the code to check invariants from time to time.   I 
don't know why Nick says there is no privilege.   There can be complete 
privilege.   Extracting meaning from that access is rarely easy, of course.  
Just as debugging any given problem can be hard.

-Original Message-
From: Friam  On Behalf Of u?l? ?>$
Sent: Monday, November 1, 2021 3:20 PM
To: friam@redfish.com
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] lurking

Literal self-awareness is possible. The flaw in your argument is that "self" is 
ambiguous in the way you're using it. It's not ambiguous in the way me or 
Marcus intend it. You can see this nicely if you elide "know" from your 
argument.  We know nothing. The machine knows nothing. Just don't use the word 
"know" or the concept it references.  There need not be a model involved, 
either, only sensors and things to be sensed. 

Self-sensing means there is a feedback loop between the sensor and the thing it 
senses. So, the sensor measures the sensed and the sensed measures the sensor. 
That is self-awareness. There's no need for any of the psychological hooha you 
often object to. There's no need for privileged information *except* that there 
has to be a loop. If anything is privileged, it's the causal loop.

The real trick is composing multiple self-self loops into something resembling 
what we call a conscious agent. We can get to the uncanny valley with regular 
old self-sensing control theory and robotics. Getting beyond the valley is 
difficult: https://youtu.be/D8_VmWWRJgE A similar demonstration is here: 
https://youtu.be/7ncDPoa_n-8



On 11/1/21 2:08 PM, thompnicks...@gmail.com wrote:
> In fact, strictly speaking, I think literal self-awareness is impossible.  
> Because, whatever a machine knows about itself, it is a MODEL of itself based 
> on well situated sensors of its own activities, just like you are and I am.  
> There is no privileged access, just bettah or wussah access.

-- 
"Better to be slapped with the truth than kissed with a lie."
☤>$ uǝlƃ


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