Now Reading

  On 6/29/2016 at 3:40 PM, LimpyLoo said:

 

  On 6/29/2016 at 9:27 AM, tec said:

Haha I've read that too, quite fun but even simple speak can't help me with quantum physics.

What aspects of QM did you have problems understanding?

(Just curious)

 

 

Basically all of it. I typed some stuff that was going to go here but I'm not even sure that was right. Observable particles acting differently when they are unobserved, all that, the book does a good job of explaining Schrodinger's Cat but science was never my strong point despite a love of space and the universe. It is a frustrating combination.

QM is probably the weirdest thing we've ever learned about the universe

There's really no way to have a perfectly intuitive grasp of it

 

I spent a lot of time reading about the Delayed-Choice Quantum Eraser experiment

It's like a QM 'greatest hits' compilation

If you can wrap your head around that, then you're stylin'

But yeah... I literally thought it was a joke at first

The punchline is that even if you wait until AFTER shooting particles through the slits (lol)

To (indirectly) observe what happened...whether you look or not will determine how the particles acted....in the fucking past

 

Now, apparently there's not an actual causal relationship between the later observation and the earlier action...but the actual (proposed) explanation is almost as weird as retrocausality: so you don't need observers to get QM weirdness...it could happen without anyone looking....what causes the weirdness is whether 'which path' (i.e. which slit) information exists or not...like, this doesn't make any sense based on how we think the universe works...like so the analogy with Shrodinger's Cat...it's not that the cat is just both alive and dead until someone looks at it...it's that IF (and only if) there exists information in the universe regarding the cat's status (looking inside the box is just one example)...then the cat will have always been either alive or dead, never having been in some hypothetical superposition of both

 

IMO this detail of QM is the strangest thing humanity has ever discovered

Edited July 1, 2016 by LimpyLoo

P.S. Oh and also, if there exists 'which path' information, but it is destroyed, then the cat will always have been in a superposition of alive/dead

(According to the analogy)

Now reading a non-fiction book about A.I. called Superintelligence: Paths, Dangers, Strategies By Nick Bostrom

 

No one really talks about this but human level artificial intelligence is a very real possibility and it's not really a question of if but rather a question of when. Anyways, there are a lot of factors to consider and different types of intelligences that can be achieved. Some think this will be humanity's last problem because it would either destroy us or this "god in the machine" would solve all of our problems.

 

Getting a lot of "ah-ha" moments when reading this book and I highly recommend it, especially to people on this forum who, I'm sure, already think about crazy shit like A.I. taking over the human race.

  On 7/2/2016 at 5:19 AM, Danny O Flannagin said:

Getting a lot of please God now moments when reading this book and I highly recommend it, especially to people on this forum who, I'm sure, already pray for crazy shit like A.I. taking over the human race.

 

fixt 4 u

 

But really I've seen this discussed relatively regularly for at least the past decade, and on occasion well before then (Terminator 2: Judgement Day was one interesting documentary-style film on the subject, look it up! ). It rarely comes across as very serious discussions because I don't think we're seriously close to it, nor close to even understanding what it really entail for not only humans and our meager understanding of self-awareness and consciousness in general, but also for the AI. I am always curious to see some serious discussion of the topic though so I'm gonna go look up some info on the book :)

  On 7/1/2016 at 7:03 AM, LimpyLoo said:

QM is probably the weirdest thing we've ever learned about the universe

There's really no way to have a perfectly intuitive grasp of it

 

I spent a lot of time reading about the Delayed-Choice Quantum Eraser experiment

It's like a QM 'greatest hits' compilation

If you can wrap your head around that, then you're stylin'

But yeah... I literally thought it was a joke at first

The punchline is that even if you wait until AFTER shooting particles through the slits (lol)

To (indirectly) observe what happened...whether you look or not will determine how the particles acted....in the fucking past

 

Now, apparently there's not an actual causal relationship between the later observation and the earlier action...but the actual (proposed) explanation is almost as weird as retrocausality: so you don't need observers to get QM weirdness...it could happen without anyone looking....what causes the weirdness is whether 'which path' (i.e. which slit) information exists or not...like, this doesn't make any sense based on how we think the universe works...like so the analogy with Shrodinger's Cat...it's not that the cat is just both alive and dead until someone looks at it...it's that IF (and only if) there exists information in the universe regarding the cat's status (looking inside the box is just one example)...then the cat will have always been either alive or dead, never having been in some hypothetical superposition of both

 

IMO this detail of QM is the strangest thing humanity has ever discovered

 

 

Totally, it's nuts. Sadly even some of what you posted gets a bit lost on me, almost like my brain just freezes and says "you fucking what mate?". There's a book called How to Teach Quantum Physics To Your Dog which I'm going to pick up soon.

  On 7/2/2016 at 5:37 AM, auxien said:

 

  On 7/2/2016 at 5:19 AM, Danny O Flannagin said:

Getting a lot of please God now moments when reading this book and I highly recommend it, especially to people on this forum who, I'm sure, already pray for crazy shit like A.I. taking over the human race.

fixt 4 u

 

But really I've seen this discussed relatively regularly for at least the past decade, and on occasion well before then (Terminator 2: Judgement Day was one interesting documentary-style film on the subject, look it up! ). It rarely comes across as very serious discussions because I don't think we're seriously close to it, nor close to even understanding what it really entail for not only humans and our meager understanding of self-awareness and consciousness in general, but also for the AI. I am always curious to see some serious discussion of the topic though so I'm gonna go look up some info on the book :)

Superintelligence is an amazing book...

 

And perhaps an AI thread is in order, because it's such a rich topic that has implications for economics, global politics, labor, democracy, Utopia and Distopia, actual immortality, nuclear game theory, art and music, right-libertarianism vs socialism, psychology, morality, etc etc...I mean, if word got out that someone was currently developing super-intelligent AI, it might set off a chain reaction that destroys the world before the thing is even built. The perception would be that whoever develops it will rule world for the rest of time, I mean just imagine if it's the Chinese gov't or Solicon Valley Right-libertarians who get there first...neither strike me as the type eager to donate the fruits to humanity and create a work-free utopia for all...and that's assuming that whoever makes it would have any measure of control over it, which...the 'control problem' is an open problem that I would bet good money that it's unsolvable...like, you would have to design an elaborate system of incentives and failsafes that was immune to exploits, human error or corruption...a super-intelligent AI is gonna find elaborate, domino-like exploits that humans could never imagine....

 

P.s. sorry for the unsightly wall of text

Edited July 2, 2016 by LimpyLoo

  On 7/2/2016 at 5:11 PM, LimpyLoo said:

 

  On 7/2/2016 at 5:37 AM, auxien said:

 

  On 7/2/2016 at 5:19 AM, Danny O Flannagin said:

Getting a lot of please God now moments when reading this book and I highly recommend it, especially to people on this forum who, I'm sure, already pray for crazy shit like A.I. taking over the human race.

fixt 4 u

 

But really I've seen this discussed relatively regularly for at least the past decade, and on occasion well before then (Terminator 2: Judgement Day was one interesting documentary-style film on the subject, look it up! ). It rarely comes across as very serious discussions because I don't think we're seriously close to it, nor close to even understanding what it really entail for not only humans and our meager understanding of self-awareness and consciousness in general, but also for the AI. I am always curious to see some serious discussion of the topic though so I'm gonna go look up some info on the book :)

Superintelligence is an amazing book...

 

And perhaps an AI thread is in order, because it's such a rich topic that has implications for economics, global politics, labor, democracy, Utopia and Distopia, actual immortality, nuclear game theory, art and music, right-libertarianism vs socialism, psychology, morality, etc etc...I mean, if word got out that someone was currently developing super-intelligent AI, it might set off a chain reaction that destroys the world before the thing is even built. The perception would be that whoever develops it will rule world for the rest of time, I mean just imagine if it's the Chinese gov't or Solicon Valley Right-libertarians who get there first...neither strike me as the type eager to donate the fruits to humanity and create a work-free utopia for all...and that's assuming that whoever makes it would have any measure of control over it, which...the 'control problem' is an open problem that I would bet good money that it's unsolvable...like, you would have to design an elaborate system of incentives and failsafes that was immune to exploits, human error or corruption...a super-intelligent AI is gonna find elaborate, domino-like exploits that humans could never imagine....

 

P.s. sorry for the unsightly wall of text

 

 

Well i doubt one nation would be able to tame such an intelligence. The scariest thing is I have no idea what it would do or what its MOTIVATION would be ( I guess he'll go more into that later in the book). But it just seems like we as a species are constantly writing ourselves out of the equation with technology. To reiterate, we don't really have a place in the future because we'd become obsolete.

And i know it sounds like science fiction but everywhere you look, our world is becoming some fucked up sci-fi novel (NSA, drones, worldstar hip hop) and scientists really have no idea when this will be created, there are estimates from 5 years to 100 years

Finished Purity by Franzen. Not as good as Corrections / Freedom (no surprise, they were excellent) but it was definitely enjoyable.

Started on South of the Border by Haruki Murakami and is looking to be as melancholic as his other work. And short too, which is a plus! Too many eight hundred pages books to read atm.

  On 7/2/2016 at 5:11 PM, LimpyLoo said:

and perhaps an AI thread is in order, because it's such a rich topic that has implications for economics, global politics, labor, democracy, Utopia and Distopia, actual immortality, nuclear game theory, art and music, right-libertarianism vs socialism, psychology, morality, etc etc...I mean, if word got out that someone was currently developing super-intelligent AI, it might set off a chain reaction that destroys the world before the thing is even built. The perception would be that whoever develops it will rule world for the rest of time, I mean just imagine if it's the Chinese gov't or Solicon Valley Right-libertarians who get there first...neither strike me as the type eager to donate the fruits to humanity and create a work-free utopia for all...and that's assuming that whoever makes it would have any measure of control over it, which...the 'control problem' is an open problem that I would bet good money that it's unsolvable...like, you would have to design an elaborate system of incentives and failsafes that was immune to exploits, human error or corruption...a super-intelligent AI is gonna find elaborate, domino-like exploits that humans could never imagine...

That's a lot of what if's. And my current thinking is an uncontrollable superintelligence has GOT to be better than the UK Conservatives. Even if they implement a system of blocking out the sun for their power source: the weather's shit enough as it is.

 

edit: the quantum mechanics confusion reminds me of when I listened to the Dalai Lama's autobiography, read by Richard Gere. When the book gets to the section about quantum physics--which the Dalai is well versed in--Richard Gere can be heard audibly struggling to process what he is reading aloud. Quite amusing, worth a listen (and not just because the book is good).

Edited July 2, 2016 by Bechuga

  On 7/2/2016 at 7:20 PM, Bechuga said:

Finished Purity by Franzen. Not as good as Corrections / Freedom (no surprise, they were excellent) but it was definitely enjoyable.

Started on South of the Border by Haruki Murakami and is looking to be as melancholic as his other work. And short too, which is a plus! Too many eight hundred pages books to read atm.

 

i recently brought 2 more of his (Colorless Tazaki and What I Talk About When I Talk About Running). something about his stuff keeps pulling me back in despite me never being sure if i like him or not. i enjoyed South of the Border right up until the end - it ends just when it gets going and it doesn't answer anything (typical Murakami).

 

i'm reading The Naked and the Dead (Norman Mailer) at the moment (a 700+ page novel). good stuff so far. some very purple prose keeps cropping up but he did write this in his early/mid 20s so it is mighty impressive considering.

1) The AI 'motivation' question is really interesting...of course the big concern isn't really creating an evil AI...it's creating an AI that regards humans the way humans regard ants...what's strange is that in the last 5-10 years, we have more and more come to realize just how crucial emotion is in motivation...I think the current thinking is that perfect stoics like Spock or Data are impossible...that without emotion there can't be preference or motivation...it makes sense if you think of emotion as a sort-of gauge of how much the world is aligning to your will (and to the extent that it's not, we feel negative emotions which we seek to minimize though acting on the world, etc etc)....anyway, that's something I've not heard talked about anywhere

 

2) The 'what-ifs' in my post are just a few possibilities, but the fact is SOMEONE is gonna design it, and there are gonna be massive economic and political shifts, and wars have been started over much less. I think the only way to avoid that sorta stuff is to assemble a global committee to design it, with the goal of sharing its fruits equally among all people.

If it's designed by some right-libertarians who aren't big on charity or sharing or general pro-social behavior, then just think how that might play out. They will potentially have the power to destroy any government on earth (esp. if an AI can improve itself, or create better versions of itself...eventually the outcome will be a sort of all-powerful machine God)...so anyway, if word got out that such a person/group was on track to create a super-intelligent AI, the choices would be to either stop them or let them rule the world.

Just read PKD's Confessions of a Crap Artist which was slightly disappointing, especially with such a great but pretty misleading title.

 

Now reading A Confederacy of Dunces, and unlike the last 2 or 3 times I tried to read it, I'm finding pretty easy and actually quite funny, antiquated racism aside. I think I just read a little slower and more carelessly than the intended audience.

 

I think it's time to read some smarter mathy/sciencey/philosophyey books. I ordered a few Alan Kay mentioned in his recent AMA on Hacker News - Thinking: Fast and Slow, Amusing Ourselves to Death and a couple others. That'll be a good little handicapped ramp up from the fiction.

  On 7/2/2016 at 7:44 PM, QQQ said:

 

  On 7/2/2016 at 7:20 PM, Bechuga said:

Finished Purity by Franzen. Not as good as Corrections / Freedom (no surprise, they were excellent) but it was definitely enjoyable.

Started on South of the Border by Haruki Murakami and is looking to be as melancholic as his other work. And short too, which is a plus! Too many eight hundred pages books to read atm.

i recently brought 2 more of his (Colorless Tazaki and What I Talk About When I Talk About Running). something about his stuff keeps pulling me back in despite me never being sure if i like him or not. i enjoyed South of the Border right up until the end - it ends just when it gets going and it doesn't answer anything (typical Murakami).

 

 

No-one quite does melancholy that isn't teenage angst type pretentiousness like Murakami. Tsuru Tazaki I loved, even read 75% of it in one night until it was finished and felt ruined, but in a good way. Should really get onto reading Wind-Up Bird Chronicle / Norwegian Wood.

 

Murakami doesn't resolve certain stuff, but I feel that is the point, especially with something like After Dark or (my favourite heartbreaking book) Sputnik Sweetheart. It does make me scared to read him, because he inflicts such perfect psychic damage on me, but I keep coming back too.

 

Spoiler: Tazaki does not feature many, if any cats. Does feature a vinyl record. And salad.

 

 

  On 7/3/2016 at 2:32 AM, Bechuga said:

 

  On 7/2/2016 at 7:44 PM, QQQ said:

 

  On 7/2/2016 at 7:20 PM, Bechuga said:

Finished Purity by Franzen. Not as good as Corrections / Freedom (no surprise, they were excellent) but it was definitely enjoyable.

Started on South of the Border by Haruki Murakami and is looking to be as melancholic as his other work. And short too, which is a plus! Too many eight hundred pages books to read atm.

i recently brought 2 more of his (Colorless Tazaki and What I Talk About When I Talk About Running). something about his stuff keeps pulling me back in despite me never being sure if i like him or not. i enjoyed South of the Border right up until the end - it ends just when it gets going and it doesn't answer anything (typical Murakami).

 

No-one quite does melancholy that isn't teenage angst type pretentiousness like Murakami. Tsuru Tazaki I loved, even read 75% of it in one night until it was finished and felt ruined, but in a good way. Should really get onto reading Wind-Up Bird Chronicle / Norwegian Wood.

 

Murakami doesn't resolve certain stuff, but I feel that is the point, especially with something like After Dark or (my favourite heartbreaking book) Sputnik Sweetheart. It does make me scared to read him, because he inflicts such perfect psychic damage on me, but I keep coming back too.

 

Spoiler: Tazaki does not feature many, if any cats. Does feature a vinyl record. And salad.

I love the dreamlike quality of Murakami's stuff, including how much he leaves hanging. I've only read Windup Bird Chronicles and Kafka on the Shore so far. I enjoyed the latter more but both had lots of beautiful haunting images and thoughts, which sometimes got a bit heavy for me.

maybe it's cause i had spent all day in the sun in southern spanish summer (was feeling dizzy while reading) but the Eschaton game off Infinite Jest had me laughing out loud this evening

  On 7/4/2016 at 11:09 PM, ThatSpanishGuy said:

maybe it's cause i had spent all day in the sun in southern spanish summer (was feeling dizzy while reading) but the Eschaton game off Infinite Jest had me laughing out loud this evening

It wasn't the sun; that part is an absolute highlight of the book. Keep going, it's an unbelievable read, and surprisingly touching

Edited July 7, 2016 by lawrenke

After Brave New World (which was A++, much better than I expected) I'm now halfway through Jeffrey Eugenides Middlesex. Very satisfying and engrossing read, reminds me of stuff like The World According to Garp and The Deptford Trilogy.

oh I grabbed that Garp book from one of those free "travelling book" thingies, is it good?

Very good

 

This was wicked crazy fun. I would keep a tab open with dictionary.com and elseq on in the background. If it got too dense, I would read it as if its sci-fi poetry.

nearly finished Oliver Sacks' autobiography, great read, fascinating character, smart bloke, all round good egg.

  On 7/12/2016 at 10:37 PM, gnarlybog said:

Nice! I find Baudrillard most compelling when (as here) he's on about language/linguistic representation in particular (rather than broad "simulation ≥ reality" musings).

Alan Moore's Providence #1 arrived, long overdue getting some new weirdy beardy occult/magic musings

 

and its actually warm out (again)

 

garden, Providence and the recliner - saaaaaaaaaaaaafe

picked this up 4 a gold coin donation @ recent election's local polling station fete's 2nd hand book stall , & halfway thru:

 

 

havn't read it since was a schoolkid so now v much ejnoying the eerie tropical surrealism / alt reality. gr8 story, characters a bit wooden imo but its only a short book, & wld make 4 a gr8 film if some dir. cld do smthng similar 2wat coppola did w. conrad's 'heart of darkness'.

 

theres this vid w same name, which looks good, but seems 2b inspired by another book ?

 

  On 7/19/2016 at 9:21 PM, cwmbrancity said:

Alan Moore's Providence #1 arrived, long overdue getting some new weirdy beardy occult/magic musings

 

and its actually warm out (again)

 

garden, Providence and the recliner - saaaaaaaaaaaaafe

 

Sweet, gonna order me this thing.