One caveat. The difference between ChatGPT and human info-shufflers is still qualitative at the bottom, if only in this regard: the human versions still need to eat and sleep. Thanks to these frailties, they can still be persuaded to do better (or even to give up entirely, and spend their limited time on something better suited to their myriad gifts and flaws). The Machine can just puke nonsense forever.
Kind of seems like you are skeptical about two flying cars in every garage and a nuclear reactor in the basement? I don't know about any of that, though I am optimistic about tech, though I expect a lot of people will be returning to the land to make the earth a garden again.
Meanwhile I keep thundering my lived experience in my wee little nook of substack. Thanks for the encouragement :)
“Ah! if man would but see that hope is from within, and not from without-- that he himself must work out his own salvation! He is there, and within him is the breath of life and a knowledge of good and evil, as good and evil are to him. Thereon let him build and stand erect, and not cast himself before the image of some unknown God, modeled like his poor self, but with a larger brain to think the evil thing, and a longer arm to do it.”
SHE, by H. Haggard Rider, 1962; L.o C. ccn: 62-17415
If there is one consistent reaction I wind up dealing with, whenever I make any observation regarding Gnostic understanding, is a knee jerk dismissal. One can almost hear the cognitive door slamming shut, with the "NO SOLICITING" sign prominently displayed.
For some odd reason, perhaps political, perhaps social, the age old arrogant dismissal continues unabated. I suppose things have inproved somewhat, since organized Christianity isn't currently launching yet another genocide upon the Gnostics, yet the spiritual illiteracy of western society is so prevalent today that such dismissal smacks more of a triumph of ignorance than any statement based on principle.
But then the modern mind is bent by slogans and mindless cheerleading.
No better example of this than the constant reference to "capitalism". The very word itself encourages a vacuous flag waving for something inherently good. Yet in this unconditional celebration is an unfortunate reality, that no one understands what capitalism is, and so such accolades are showered upon sheer profiteering, and profiteering includes such accepted actions as the intentional manipulation of truth-read advertising-to achieve its ends.
The arrival of religion to the west has invented a new type of war-the religious war. It has provided a home for fanaticism, and the enshrinement of " experts", but it has payed for this all with a sneering sell off of spirituality.
However, the western world, led as it currently is by an insane tyrannical cognicentrism typified by maniacs of diminutive intelligence has never been in deeper need of spirituality.
You need to be a little more cautious about relying on intuition. It has a lot of value, a lot more than many give it, but it fails quite often as well. Good intuition comes from a grasp on how things generally work, and the mind applying that to other similar realms. But many realms are similar only in some surface features, resulting in counter intuitive behavior in others. Mental models that work in one framework fail in others for a variety of reasons, that is why transfer of learning is so elusive even among polymaths.
And there are a number of realms where human intuition is just crap, such as any complex adaptive system, and even training intuition is difficult.
You know there comes a time when terminology is not all its cooked up to be and so share ideas willfully, but there comes a time when actions speak louder than words.
I'd like to suggest that that time is upon us - and so I really appreciate when you speak to learning by living in action doing something besides sitting in ivory towers and whatnot.
Because in the forest, the moss knows, the squirrels scamper, and the forest walker wonders about what action to take next.
Today, I kid you not, I tried to capture it in a photo, but there were at least six does in my backyard, maybe more - one of them was a matriarch no doubt - she was rock solid firm and so magnificent. I haplessly tried to take a picture, but I stepped on a twig, the effing camera had a button that messed up and the picture will remain in my memory only I reckon - I will post what I got however on my site, just to prove I ain't talking shit.
Kant 1992 always cracks me up. Like is he a zombie now, is he doing the categorical imperative as a lich?
Nice post again . Lots of fresh air here. 👍🏻
On gnosticism, i currently see a kernel of truth in it that matter is evil *when* we worship it, but not inherently. What do you think?
Good stuff, brother
One caveat. The difference between ChatGPT and human info-shufflers is still qualitative at the bottom, if only in this regard: the human versions still need to eat and sleep. Thanks to these frailties, they can still be persuaded to do better (or even to give up entirely, and spend their limited time on something better suited to their myriad gifts and flaws). The Machine can just puke nonsense forever.
Kind of seems like you are skeptical about two flying cars in every garage and a nuclear reactor in the basement? I don't know about any of that, though I am optimistic about tech, though I expect a lot of people will be returning to the land to make the earth a garden again.
Meanwhile I keep thundering my lived experience in my wee little nook of substack. Thanks for the encouragement :)
“Ah! if man would but see that hope is from within, and not from without-- that he himself must work out his own salvation! He is there, and within him is the breath of life and a knowledge of good and evil, as good and evil are to him. Thereon let him build and stand erect, and not cast himself before the image of some unknown God, modeled like his poor self, but with a larger brain to think the evil thing, and a longer arm to do it.”
SHE, by H. Haggard Rider, 1962; L.o C. ccn: 62-17415
😂 These are some top-notch memes.
Churchill was certainly pro war. Douglas Newton's "The Darkest Days" is a great book on Britain's entry into WW1.
If there is one consistent reaction I wind up dealing with, whenever I make any observation regarding Gnostic understanding, is a knee jerk dismissal. One can almost hear the cognitive door slamming shut, with the "NO SOLICITING" sign prominently displayed.
For some odd reason, perhaps political, perhaps social, the age old arrogant dismissal continues unabated. I suppose things have inproved somewhat, since organized Christianity isn't currently launching yet another genocide upon the Gnostics, yet the spiritual illiteracy of western society is so prevalent today that such dismissal smacks more of a triumph of ignorance than any statement based on principle.
But then the modern mind is bent by slogans and mindless cheerleading.
No better example of this than the constant reference to "capitalism". The very word itself encourages a vacuous flag waving for something inherently good. Yet in this unconditional celebration is an unfortunate reality, that no one understands what capitalism is, and so such accolades are showered upon sheer profiteering, and profiteering includes such accepted actions as the intentional manipulation of truth-read advertising-to achieve its ends.
The arrival of religion to the west has invented a new type of war-the religious war. It has provided a home for fanaticism, and the enshrinement of " experts", but it has payed for this all with a sneering sell off of spirituality.
However, the western world, led as it currently is by an insane tyrannical cognicentrism typified by maniacs of diminutive intelligence has never been in deeper need of spirituality.
You need to be a little more cautious about relying on intuition. It has a lot of value, a lot more than many give it, but it fails quite often as well. Good intuition comes from a grasp on how things generally work, and the mind applying that to other similar realms. But many realms are similar only in some surface features, resulting in counter intuitive behavior in others. Mental models that work in one framework fail in others for a variety of reasons, that is why transfer of learning is so elusive even among polymaths.
And there are a number of realms where human intuition is just crap, such as any complex adaptive system, and even training intuition is difficult.
You know there comes a time when terminology is not all its cooked up to be and so share ideas willfully, but there comes a time when actions speak louder than words.
I'd like to suggest that that time is upon us - and so I really appreciate when you speak to learning by living in action doing something besides sitting in ivory towers and whatnot.
Because in the forest, the moss knows, the squirrels scamper, and the forest walker wonders about what action to take next.
Today, I kid you not, I tried to capture it in a photo, but there were at least six does in my backyard, maybe more - one of them was a matriarch no doubt - she was rock solid firm and so magnificent. I haplessly tried to take a picture, but I stepped on a twig, the effing camera had a button that messed up and the picture will remain in my memory only I reckon - I will post what I got however on my site, just to prove I ain't talking shit.