Singularity and the legacy of the world.

I'm cross posting this from my other blog.

I’ve been reading up on quite a bit of transhumanist literature recently, both arguments for and against it. I must say, I’m beginning to think that the biggest hurdle to any kind of transhumanist and historical/technological singularity ideas is the shallow naivety of the transhumanism/singularity proponents themselves.

Technology will not magically fix the ailing of the world, and the nature of intelligence and consciousness will take much longer to understand fully; it is only that we will be capable of simulating such characteristics using artificial medium. Electric networks certainly catalyzed some great changes for the system of the world, but in the end it was merely catalyzing of the potential already there. The human network and corresponding complex system of human-nodes and social-economic-cultural links were already put in place long time ago, to the extent that we classify such trait as a fundamental part of humanity as organisms. This also means that simple increase in technological capacity will not be enough to surpass the nature of the human network itself, only speed the process already in place.

Mind you, I am very enthusiastic about the future potential of humanity. And I do certainly believe that some sort of chapter-opening change of human civilization will take place sometime soon, not necessarily while I’m alive (I’m 21 by the way) but definitely soon when viewed from the scales of world history. I am simply becoming increasingly skeptical of the kind of change expected to take place by the transhumanist community at large (if there can be such a thing). Massive information processing and storage ability does not translate into intellectual capacity without human input. There simply aren’t enough scientific evidence to support such a claim. The very idea that some sort of external intelligence engine would be able to fix the world’s problems is a vague notion that makes me want to question the degree of understanding possessed by some of the more radical supporters of transhumanism regarding matters of intelligence, brain physiology, and complex system dynamics. Certain degree of performance boost in brain capacities will definitely change the face of human civilization. Artificial intelligence in its ideal form will transform everyone’s lives. There is no doubt about that. I am just very irked about the underlying notion that such advances would be the singular answer to the singular problem of the world. Does anyone remember the concept of legacy anymore? I suggest you to find and read Jaron Lanier’s essay on irreducible complexity (I’ve read it in a book) if you don’t know what I am talking about.

I believe in singularity-esque future, and all the good things it will bring. I also believe in reasonable ideas and sound scientific basis for reality, something some people seem to be forgetting in their rush to live forever.

Ideas, ideas

I have the problem of being burdened with overwhelming number of ideas to think and write about. So far, I have drafts of Jasper Johns, the significance of form, Sherlock Holmes, Introduction to artificial life, the concert I attended last friday, mathematical construct of complex dissipative systems, playing violin, and so on and so forth... And none of the ideas are complete to my satisfaction... All the increasing workload with the gradschool preparation doesn't really help matters either.

Sigh. They'll be done sooner or later.

Two interesting free events at the Met this week.

Wednesday
Medicine at the Metropolitan Museum—Ancient Near East and Byzantium
Discusses medical practices in ancient Mesopotamia, Iran, Cyprus, and Byzantium, as illustrated by objects in the Museum's galleries. Intended for the general public; no medical knowledge is presumed.
David T. Mininberg.
Free with Museum admission.
11:00 a.m., Gallery Talk Stanchion, Great Hall 

Friday
The Ambivalence of Interpretation: The Case of Poussin Landscapes
This lecture is made possible by the Audrey Love Charitable Foundation.
Willibald Sauerländer, director emeritus, Zentralinstitut für Kunstgeschichte, Munich.
Free with Museum admission.
3:00 p.m., Bonnie J. Sacerdote Lecture Hall, Uris Center for Education

I'm defintely going to these.

Damn my body.

Some very interesting experiences and thoughts today, which will have to wait until tomorrow since I'm too tired to think right now.



I really hate how my body can never measure upto the expectations of my body. My mind must stop at every turn and wait for this body to catch up. Darn it.

The world science festival!

The world science festival 2008 is in NYC from late May to June.

I am so excited! I just can’t wait to attend the events. They have bunch of big-name Nobel-laureates giving talks in conjunction with performance/conversation with artists, on wealth of interesting topics like the human identity, the ever-staple nature of quantum universe, future cityscape and physical basis of life.

I'm already jotting down notes and marking down stuff on my calender (so I can ask for time off at my job). I'm definitely attending on all of the artscience events/performances, as well as everything related to robotics, human identity, and origin/nature of life-like systems. I may be attending one or two quantum-string physics symposium/panel/lecture, though given how all I hear about science in popular forums all revolve around the quantum universe I might as well skip them. I am definitely taking any and all Nobel-laureate panel/conversation events I can take, as well as any event in art museums. I believe a few events are taking place right inside the Met!

Some of these events will be rare opportunities. I suggest anyone even remotely interested to plan to attend at least one of the events they might be interested in, even just to show support for art and sciences (and artsciences).

Hmm. I wonder how much the tickets will cost. Will I have to live on instant noodles from now on?

 

Just a few notes (since I can't sleep)

http://community.livejournal.com/imaginarybeasts/

It's a creative writing/arts community on the livejournal. I've been reading some of them, and I must say I'm quite impressed. Their new theme for the coming issue is steampunk. Maybe I can write something up.


Oh, and Vernor Vinge posted the full copy of his book, the Rainbow's End on the net. It's an old news, but if you weren't aware of it, I suggest reading it. It's a sci-fi based in coming-of singularity age.


I've read an interesting essay using the concept of irreducible complexity to argue against current version of singularity espoused by the majority of the so-called transhumanists. I found them quite compelling, but maybe it's because I don't really agree with the unreasonably exaggerated vision of what 'singularity' of a human civilization would be like to begin with. Maybe I'll post something on that end later on.

Ugh, my head hurts.

Twilight

Thinking of Olin Levi Warner's Twilight.

The sky outside my room-size balcony is in the thoughtful shade of blue. The field of trees extending into the horizons are shimmering in the last rays of the sun, already sinking into the other end of the land. I can see thin lining of clouds turning violet just above the tree line.

I love the twilight. This is my favorite time of the day, neither light nor dark, everything feels so calm, and everything feels as if they are thinking. At this time everything seem to regain their true shape, lost and twisted during all the happenings of the day, and will be lost in the opaque obscurity of the night. In this hour, something seem to reach out to my being beyond the veil of the world, scattering strange, indescribable feelings. It's a feeling that reminds me of all the beautiful things I've ever seen in my life.

In this hour, I feel like I'm truly alive, and the mysteries of the universe brushes silently against my windowsill.

The city of dreaming books

I read this one a long time ago. I can still remember it vividly, filled with fantastic beings and locales. This book is a sort of crossover between creative fantasy and fairytale, though when I think about it practically every single creative writing can be said as a variation of the two categories. The style of the book is very reminiscent of the free-form fantasy /anything-goes style that seem to be all the rage these days, and the general scenery is sketched down in very imaginative and carefree manner tied together by meticulous storytelling ability.

Majority of the book really does revolve around the city of dreaming books, Bookholme, which is said to be inspired from the used books stores from the East Coast USA. Bookholme is an ancient city built upon giant network of caves and dungeons originally dug up to store precious and/or dangerous books away from prying eyes. As the time passed and the city got larger, people began dumping more and more books into the underground, which led to the formation of people called book hunters. Somewhat different from the book hunters we are familiar with from works like the Club Dumas, the book hunters of Bookholme are hunters first and book readers second (if they even know how to read), capable of dealing with giant monsters and blood sucking insects nesting in the subterranean book dungeon, as well as the ‘dangerous books’ created by book alchemists of the old.

As you can probably realize, this book is a real treat for the little bibliophile in all of us. Illustrated and light on tone, there is no mistaking that this is a children’s storybook, although I must say that the book is never childish like some of the forced children’s literary content out there. I’d rather classify this as a family content rather than a book aimed straight at children. Nothing beats a sunny afternoon, a good cup of tea, cute pastry, and a chapter or two of the city of dreaming books for relaxation.

The humanity’s obsession with information containing medium had been around since the beginning of history, and it might even stretch further than that, into the primordial side of us as life-like constructs. I’ve always been curious about that. Why would there be such mysterious appeal to information containing medium in nature? Books, monoliths, codex,and drawings, the signs are a plenty. Will it be too much to understand them as an attempt to create some sort of artificial life through the means at hand? A layer of translation between the world and humanity perhaps?