RealityApologist posted:

I'm not interested in simple myths. This is the story of our first steps into the digital age as a global species. It is among the biggest stories we've every told, and it outstrips every one of us in our attempts to tell it. It is a song we all know a few words to, but we're struggling to find the melody to harmonize around. I know a verse or two, and if you hum a few bars I can fake some more, and I'm happy to perform them at open mic night for a general audience until the rest of us can catch the tune and sing along. By the time that happens it might be a different song entirely, and that's okay. It's a beautiful song.

RealityApologist posted:

It's worse than that, because many of the books required for such a library haven't been written, and some of the basic scientific research for writing it hasn't yet taken place.

It was claimed in an earlier post that one of the characteristics of cranks is that they compare themselves to Copernicus or whatever, and since I've been talking about paradigm shifts it seems that I fit the mold. But in my analogy to alchemy, I didn't posture as Boyle, as a scientist making cutting edge discoveries that is changing the field. Instead I compared myself to a disgruntled alchemist who was waiting for the paradigm shift to come.

I have a very hand-maiden view of philosophy: we're not the ones making the discoveries, we're the ones trying to interpret the results of science and their implications to the issues that matter to us. My model is of Kant commenting on the debates of Newton and Leibniz; although Kant's grasp of the physics was only just passable, the conclusions he draws from these debates represents a turning point in intellectual history. The virtue of Kant's system was how his big picture, comprehensive view spiraled out of these fundamental debates at the core of natural, science. Almost nothing about Kant's system works, and he's wrong about a lot of the science, and the whole framework has been superseded numerous times, and yet his tremendous intellectual labor continues to bear fruit.

So I know the devil is in the details, and filling out that library will take generations of dedicated work from serious scientists. And I know that to generate an understanding of those details I have to put in that work. I have done some of that, again primarily in network theory and in agent-based modeling, and these biases are very clear on my work, and I have a long way to go.

But I also think that enough of the library has been filled in, and there are enough parts on the table, that we can start thinking about the big picture view again: that genuinely comprehensive framework that unifies not just scientific practice but our knowledge and power itself. I think this trend towards unification, and the importance of networks as a fundamental explanatory device in this unification, is both suggested by the science I've cited but also plain as day in the social and cultural trends over the last decade. The rise of the internet and social networks has made us all a little more competent at thinking in terms of networks and their dynamics, and it is finding application in just about every domain of human life.

When you say "keep it simple, stick to what you know, and don't get ahead of yourself"-- and don't get me wrong, that's good advice-- it also has the effect of saying "don't look at the big picture, keep your head down and cloistered with your provincial concerns, and stay in your place." And look, I'm all in favor of serious science and an intellectual division of labor but gently caress that. Everyone in this thread is right that I'm not capable of speaking on behalf of this library of developing knowledge, but no one else is either. And yet there it is, this massive global network that we're all suddenly attached to as if it has always been there. We all know it is there and that it is new and special, and we are all terribly uncertain about what it means or what to do about it. Most of us don't even know where to start to describe our condition; they are confused and bewildered and scared, and that makes them easy pickings for the Singularity theory and other simple myths that make the world seem like a simple place.

I'm not interested in simple myths. This is the story of our first steps into the digital age as a global species. It is among the biggest stories we've every told, and it outstrips every one of us in our attempts to tell it. It is a song we all know a few words to, but we're struggling to find the melody to harmonize around. I know a verse or two, and if you hum a few bars I can fake some more, and I'm happy to perform them at open mic night for a general audience until the rest of us can catch the tune and sing along. By the time that happens it might be a different song entirely, and that's okay. It's a beautiful song.

quote:

What we have been describing are some of the clues that could have allowed
believers in DP to hypothesize that the basic, most microscopic representation of
information, that governs heredity and growth, must be a digital representation.
Years ago there were no practitioners or followers of DP, and the digital basis of
genetic information remained outside of the conscious thoughts of most biologists,
even as a possibility, until the discovery of the structure and nature of DNA.
Today, a follower of DP could still predict that we will discover that digital
processes govern the growth and development of living things. Perhaps life is based
on digital-informational processes involving the digital information encoded in
DNA. It is obvious to a few (including the author and Stephen Wolfram) that such
digital processes as seen in cellular automata are possible explanations and models
for many of the informational processes in biology.

quote:

DP takes a definite view of quantum mechanics (QM) that is not aligned with
the Copenhagen Interpretation or even with any other contemporary view of QM.
We reject the idea that there is such a thing as the irreversible act of observation or
that there is the classical world and the quantum world. DP assumes that some DM
system is all there is, while imposing informational laws that include conservation
of information.

quote:

I'm not interested in simple myths. This is the story of our first steps into the digital age as a global species. It is among the biggest stories we've every told, and it outstrips every one of us in our attempts to tell it. It is a song we all know a few words to, but we're struggling to find the melody to harmonize around. I know a verse or two, and if you hum a few bars I can fake some more, and I'm happy to perform them at open mic night for a general audience until the rest of us can catch the tune and sing along. By the time that happens it might be a different song entirely, and that's okay. It's a beautiful song.

RealityApologist posted:

http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2011/06/united-nations-declares-internet-access-a-basic-human-right/239911/

SedanChair posted:

Hey Eripsa you want to see some actual loving cyborg discrimination you sheltered lunkhead? How about the employment rate of war vet amputees with prosthetic limbs? You think maybe that's a little more real than me thinking you're an rear end in a top hat because you point Glass at me?

ryde posted:

Uh, wow.

Guys, I don't think that Eripsa is saying that tools is literally as important as gender for identity. He's also not saying that "cyborg discrimination" or discrimination based on tool usage is literally as important an issue as discrimination based on sexual orientation, race, class, etc. He's simply trying to point out that they have some similarities. At least, thats what I'm getting from all this. I'm not sure where people are reading the "People being hostile because I use google glass is one of the most important issues facing us today," thing.

jre posted:

Or answer my question about what type of chemistry and what the relevance to chemistry was from that paper.

RealityApologist posted:

I'm not going to talk about gender identity and cyborgs any more because you are all obviously too immature to handle the discussion.

Dusseldorf posted:

The paper he linked by Baez showed that there were similar mathematical structures used for cell growth modeling, chemical kinetics and particle theory where the greater system could be modeled mathematical tools developed for network theory.

RealityApologist posted:

I'm not going to talk about gender identity and cyborgs any more because you are all obviously too immature to handle the discussion.

quote:

Thank you for this. There's a wild disconnect between the claims I'm making and the claims being attributed to me, and it is the result of deliberate and hostile interpretation designed only to make me look foolish regardless of the content of my claims. These hostile interpretations result in people demanding that I answer to claims or respond to objections that are completely distorted versions of what I have said. This is one of the primary reasons people claim that I can't deal with criticism, that I change my positions arbitrarily, or that my views are incoherent.

If you or anyone else sees the gap between what I've said and how I'm being interpreted on this issue, I hope you consider the possibility that this has been a problem with other claims I've made in this and other threads. Which is not to say that I'm always right and don't make mistakes, which I've done several times and will undoubtedly do again. I'm just saying that it's hard to communicate with a virulently hostile audience.

RealityApologist posted:

paying my dues on the dirty streets on the internet.

Pesmerga posted:

To suggest that someone who is told they can't wear Google glass in a nightclub is suffering the same sort of violation of personal integrity as someone who has a limb blown off, and is treated badly by both systems and individuals afterwards demeans their suffering.

RealityApologist posted:

It's worse than that, because many of the books required for such a library haven't been written, and some of the basic scientific research for writing it hasn't yet taken place.

It was claimed in an earlier post that one of the characteristics of cranks is that they compare themselves to Copernicus or whatever, and since I've been talking about paradigm shifts it seems that I fit the mold. But in my analogy to alchemy, I didn't posture as Boyle, as a scientist making cutting edge discoveries that is changing the field. Instead I compared myself to a disgruntled alchemist who was waiting for the paradigm shift to come.

I have a very hand-maiden view of philosophy: we're not the ones making the discoveries, we're the ones trying to interpret the results of science and their implications to the issues that matter to us. My model is of Kant commenting on the debates of Newton and Leibniz; although Kant's grasp of the physics was only just passable, the conclusions he draws from these debates represents a turning point in intellectual history. The virtue of Kant's system was how his big picture, comprehensive view spiraled out of these fundamental debates at the core of natural, science. Almost nothing about Kant's system works, and he's wrong about a lot of the science, and the whole framework has been superseded numerous times, and yet his tremendous intellectual labor continues to bear fruit.

So I know the devil is in the details, and filling out that library will take generations of dedicated work from serious scientists. And I know that to generate an understanding of those details I have to put in that work. I have done some of that, again primarily in network theory and in agent-based modeling, and these biases are very clear on my work, and I have a long way to go.

But I also think that enough of the library has been filled in, and there are enough parts on the table, that we can start thinking about the big picture view again: that genuinely comprehensive framework that unifies not just scientific practice but our knowledge and power itself. I think this trend towards unification, and the importance of networks as a fundamental explanatory device in this unification, is both suggested by the science I've cited but also plain as day in the social and cultural trends over the last decade. The rise of the internet and social networks has made us all a little more competent at thinking in terms of networks and their dynamics, and it is finding application in just about every domain of human life.

When you say "keep it simple, stick to what you know, and don't get ahead of yourself"-- and don't get me wrong, that's good advice-- it also has the effect of saying "don't look at the big picture, keep your head down and cloistered with your provincial concerns, and stay in your place." And look, I'm all in favor of serious science and an intellectual division of labor but gently caress that. Everyone in this thread is right that I'm not capable of speaking on behalf of this library of developing knowledge, but no one else is either. And yet there it is, this massive global network that we're all suddenly attached to as if it has always been there. We all know it is there and that it is new and special, and we are all terribly uncertain about what it means or what to do about it. Most of us don't even know where to start to describe our condition; they are confused and bewildered and scared, and that makes them easy pickings for the Singularity theory and other simple myths that make the world seem like a simple place.

I'm not interested in simple myths. This is the story of our first steps into the digital age as a global species. It is among the biggest stories we've every told, and it outstrips every one of us in our attempts to tell it. It is a song we all know a few words to, but we're struggling to find the melody to harmonize around. I know a verse or two, and if you hum a few bars I can fake some more, and I'm happy to perform them at open mic night for a general audience until the rest of us can catch the tune and sing along. By the time that happens it might be a different song entirely, and that's okay. It's a beautiful song.

RealityApologist posted:

I didn't do this. If this is your area of research then I'd expect you to be very sympathetic with the importance of tools for one's identity and well-being. Accessibility is a huge factor in mental health. Our tools matter.

I've said explicitly that Glass is basically an irrelevant novelty that doesn't add much to a person's identity, but that other tools can be so important for one's health and well-being that to take them away would be a violation of their personhood. These are clearly compatible claims that are deeply sympathetic to the sort of work you do.

If you're angry at me it's only because of the bandwagon hatred of this thread. I wouldn't dream of demeaning people who are suffering due to discrimination. Saying that our tools constitute our identity is not a demeaning claim, and doesn't at all imply that Glass is as important as a prosthetic limb. Seriously, we're on the same side here, but we're being pulled apart by people who are insisting that our tools don't matter. They are wrong, not us.

Zodium posted:

Ambition must be tempered by integrity. There is an ocean of difference between stick to what you know and start with what you know.

RealityApologist posted:

I'm not going to talk about gender identity and cyborgs any more because you are all obviously too immature to handle the discussion.

SedanChair posted:

Hey Eripsa you want to see some actual loving cyborg discrimination you sheltered lunkhead? How about the employment rate of war vet amputees with prosthetic limbs? You think maybe that's a little more real than me thinking you're an rear end in a top hat because you point Glass at me?

Pesmerga posted:

To suggest that someone who is told they can't wear Google glass in a nightclub is suffering the same sort of violation of personal integrity as someone who has a limb blown off, and is treated badly by both systems and individuals afterwards demeans their suffering.

RealityApologist posted:

I'm not going to talk about gender identity and cyborgs any more because you are all obviously too immature to handle the discussion.

RealityApologist posted:

I didn't do this. If this is your area of research then I'd expect you to be very sympathetic with the importance of tools for one's identity and well-being. Accessibility is a huge factor in mental health. Our tools matter.

I've said explicitly that Glass is basically an irrelevant novelty that doesn't add much to a person's identity, but that other tools can be so important for one's health and well-being that to take them away would be a violation of their personhood. These are clearly compatible claims that are deeply sympathetic to the sort of work you do.

If you're angry at me it's only because of the bandwagon hatred of this thread. I wouldn't dream of demeaning people who are suffering due to discrimination. Saying that our tools constitute our identity is not a demeaning claim, and doesn't at all imply that Glass is as important as a prosthetic limb. Seriously, we're on the same side here, but we're being pulled apart by people who are insisting that our tools don't matter. They are wrong, not us.

SedanChair posted:

Hey Eripsa you want to see some actual loving cyborg discrimination you sheltered lunkhead? How about the employment rate of war vet amputees with prosthetic limbs? You think maybe that's a little more real than me thinking you're an rear end in a top hat because you point Glass at me?

Gerund posted:

What are the 'tools' then, and is the reason that it is necessarily to split "Cyborg identity" from disabled/handicapable identity that you necessarily require said 'tools' to also be the means of the upper social class to reinforce their own privilege?

JawnV6 posted:

Wanamingo posted:

Genuine question here, would it really be cyborg discrimination if the prosthetic limbs actually make the veteran more employable compared to wounded vets without them?

RealityApologist posted:

Which is not to say that it's always wrong to discriminate against shoes, but just that the category is different. So a question like: should steroids be allowed in major league gaming? is a question about whether it's okay to discriminate against shoes.

RealityApologist posted:

But shoes aren't like this. Nothing about my feet have malfunctioned when I wear shoes (in fact, the wearing of shoes is actually a major cause of foot malfunction). I don't use shoes to overcome a disability, I use shoes to expand my capacities. Shoes allow me to walk on hot, dirty asphalt and other surfaces that would ruin my feet, giving me new possibilities for exploring my world. And it will never happen that I'll be done wearing shoes, the way I might no longer need crutches. Shoes are an extension of my tool kit that I'll use regularly all my life.

Which is not to say that it's always wrong to discriminate against shoes, but just that the category is different. So a question like: should steroids be allowed in major league gaming? is a question about whether it's okay to discriminate against shoes.

Dogstoyevsky posted:

I feel like that means we don't have to worry about cyborg discrimination so much since if Google Glass ends up being as mind-bogglingly useful as shoes, pretty much everyone will be down. Also, at the risk of sounding super glib, shoes aren't a part of my identity (and I think most other peoples') so this is perhaps not the best metaphor you could have chosen.

RealityApologist posted:

Your liver is a tool.

Pesmerga posted:

In that case, you need to be much more specific about the interrelation between tools and identity, and what by making a distinction between different types of tools. Because I agree, tools can form part of identity construction, but that is because pretty much anything can be used to construct identity. But such an argument requires a hierarchy of identity construction, ranging from the essential or internal (such as sexuality, gender, race), the mutable (nationality, tribal, professional) and the 'surface level' for want of a better word (identification with certain types of hobby, social activity, choice of consumer electronics). Prosthetics could fit either into the essential if we are talking about the mental association with the body, once a prosthetic has become 'internalised' and is identified with that person's body. In the case of a detachable limb, it is possible it could be identified more with the mutable, if that personal connection is not as strong (for example, upgrading a prosthetic). This also means while all might be part of identity construction, the real impact of discrimination, hate and denial of personhood/worth appears in the first two categories, such as ill treatment of homosexuals or national discrimination. In that 'surface level' social cues and etiquette should, and are likely to override, the sense of identity. Turn off your mobile phone in a cinema. Don't smoke inside. Don't wear recording devices in social settings. Yes, it is part of identity construction, but no, to argue for the restriction of the use of a 'surface level' device is unlikely to constitute discrimination.

SedanChair posted:

Physically more employable or more likely to actually be hired?

CommieGIR posted:

Performance enhancers and prosthetic to restore function to someone who is disabled are not the same things.

RealityApologist posted:

Good. I think we're mostly on the same page re: identity and tools, but we differ over our metaphysics. This is why network theory is important for my view, and probably represents a good example of where network theory is actually preferrable to the alternative.

Because you're also appealing to a kind of network when you're talking about a "hierarchy of construction", but you bring a lot of metaphsyical baggage with that picture that I'd want to sort through carefully. For starters, the relationships here aren't necessarily hierarchical, one entirely contained within the scope of the next, in a top-down fashion with the bottom being the "most essential". This is, instead, a densely interconnected web of relations with no clear "top" or "bottom". What you are calling "essential" is not a matter of essences in the Aristotlean sense, of what it truly is in itself in some mysterious metaphysical sense. The virtue of network theory is that it allows for a precise way of saying exactly how essential something is to the network, in terms of its centrality and connectivity across the network.

Because look, maybe my gender is a huge part of who I am and how I understand myself, but for you gender is an entirely uninteresting part of your life that bears almost no weight on your activity; lots of people identify as asexual or without gender identity at all. Same with nationalism, or ethnicity, or my cell phone, or the rest of it. These things don't necessarily play some essential role in our lives; the role they play just is the product of how they interacts with the rest of the tools constituting my identity. And it's an open question what those tools are and what role they play.

So I agree with you that there is a difference between tools that are more or less central to our lives, but I don't have any deep commitments to what those tools are and what their precedence is. And I think this is a virtue of the network paradigm over the traditional sorts of hierarchical or essentialist views you're elaborating here.

RealityApologist posted:

Comparing two things does not mean I think they are the same thing. Comparing two things is meant to highlight their similarities.

Seriously, guys. You're compromising your ability to make me look dumb by posting this poo poo.

CommieGIR posted:

You are comparing a choice to gain an edge in a competitive sport versus a choice to regain a normal, functional life.

Similarities? Yes, but their function is not one in the same, nor are they comparable beyond advantages.

Pesmerga posted:

My major issue is that I think the metaphysical baggage, as you put it, cannot be disassociated from the rest of it. One of the problems with a network theory approach to all aspects of life is it assumes that everything can be quantified, based on an indeterminate number of variables, in which all human behaviour, psychology and emotion can be modelled and analysed. Our unconscious biases impact the model, meaning that any model that seeks to understand or quantify human emotion and response is flawed. I'm much more of the belief that some things are more useful to be analysed from a qualitative perspective. In this respect, the rough classifications while lacking somewhat in nuance are nevertheless necessary for regulation and lawmaking.

quote:

With regard to the shifting and inconstant nature of identity that you mention, that's specifically why I believe that modelling based on network theory is not likely to tell us much, particularly when dealing with issues where there is a strong element of human psychology, belief or emotion involved. The realisation that relationships are networked rather than purely hierarchical is important - but equating this as all needs and desires functioning in networks goes too far. The need for water is more important than the need for a particular brand of water. A prosthetic hand for an injured worker is more important than a pair of sunglasses that can tell the time. And particularly when it comes to designing laws and systems of social governance, there is a need to form hierarchies and prioritise.

LGD posted:

No, the whole point of his original post was drawing a distinction between the two. I mean 95% of what he's written in the thread is (AFAIK) unintelligible garbage but his last few posts have been clear and on point in describing his worldview. He's just eliding a number of serious issues like the fact that shoe/cyborg discrimination isn't actually an issue for society, and that discriminating against some types of personal enhancement is perfectly appropriate and socially necessary/desirable- i.e. a Hanzo steel sword from glorious Nippon offers substantial enhancements to my personal capabilities in the abstract, but people would react poorly to me carrying one around for very good reasons.

quote:

Which is not to say that it's always wrong to discriminate against shoes, but just that the category is different. So a question like: should steroids be allowed in major league gaming? is a question about whether it's okay to discriminate against shoes.