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(no subject)
Jun. 27th, 2025 06:02 pm“The difference between events and their representation is the difference between story (the event or sequence of events) and narrative discourse (how the story is conveyed). The distinction is immensely important.
...when we read a narrative, we are aware of, on the one hand, the time of reading and the order in which things are read, and, on the other hand, the time the story events are supposed to take and the order in which they are supposed to occur.
...
We can squeeze a day’s worth of events into one sentence:
Perhaps even more interestingly we can tell the same story backwards and still convey both the timing and the chronological sequence of events:
We can also make many other changes in the narrative discourse and still deal with the same story. We can, for example, change the point of view (from first to third person) and expand the narrative discourse to dwell on a moment in the middle of this series of actions and still communicate with fidelity the same order of events:
“The story can take a day, a minute, a lifetime, or eons. It can be true or false, historical or fictional. But insofar as it is a story, it has its own length of time and an order of events that proceeds chronologically from the earliest to the latest. The order of events and the length of time they are understood to take in the story are often quite different from the “time and order of events in the narrative discourse.”
...we take narrative to mean all modes of conveying stories.
...
So far we have established three distinctions: narrative is the representation of events, consisting of story and narrative discourse; story is an event or sequence of events (the action); and narrative discourse is those events as represented.
...storyworld should be considered a third defining feature of narrative along with story and narrative discourse.
Abbott, H. Porter. “The Cambridge Introduction to Narrative (Cambridge Introductions to Literature).”
...when we read a narrative, we are aware of, on the one hand, the time of reading and the order in which things are read, and, on the other hand, the time the story events are supposed to take and the order in which they are supposed to occur.
...
We can squeeze a day’s worth of events into one sentence:
When I woke up, I packed two loaded guns and a ski mask, drove to the bank, robbed it, and was back in time for dinner.
Perhaps even more interestingly we can tell the same story backwards and still convey both the timing and the chronological sequence of events:
I was back in time for dinner, having robbed the bank to which I had driven with a ski mask and two loaded guns just after my nap.
We can also make many other changes in the narrative discourse and still deal with the same story. We can, for example, change the point of view (from first to third person) and expand the narrative discourse to dwell on a moment in the middle of this series of actions and still communicate with fidelity the same order of events:
He loved that old familiar, yet always strangely new, sensation of being someone else inside his ski mask, a pistol in each hand, watching the frightened teller count out a cool million. Nothing like it to wake a guy up. Nothing like it to give him a good appetite.
“The story can take a day, a minute, a lifetime, or eons. It can be true or false, historical or fictional. But insofar as it is a story, it has its own length of time and an order of events that proceeds chronologically from the earliest to the latest. The order of events and the length of time they are understood to take in the story are often quite different from the “time and order of events in the narrative discourse.”
...we take narrative to mean all modes of conveying stories.
...
So far we have established three distinctions: narrative is the representation of events, consisting of story and narrative discourse; story is an event or sequence of events (the action); and narrative discourse is those events as represented.
...storyworld should be considered a third defining feature of narrative along with story and narrative discourse.
Abbott, H. Porter. “The Cambridge Introduction to Narrative (Cambridge Introductions to Literature).”
(no subject)
Jun. 24th, 2025 01:59 pmPrediction markets don't buy the "obliteration" story
https://polymarket.com/event/fordow-nuclear-facility-destroyed-before-july
https://polymarket.com/event/fordow-nuclear-facility-destroyed-before-july
(no subject)
Jun. 22nd, 2025 10:38 amOnly yesterday I was listening to a podcast from the Hoover Institution where H.R. McMaster, who was the National Security Advisor in the first Trump administration, said that there's no way Trump was going to bomb Iran.
Few hours later, Trump ordered the bombing. So it goes
Few hours later, Trump ordered the bombing. So it goes
no TACO option available
Jun. 18th, 2025 06:22 pmBombing of Fordow cannot be undone like China tariffs; therefore, trump can't just try it, see what happens, and chicken out if things go wrong. He can't fake it either. It's his decision and whatever the outcome he'll be held responsible for it — no more Biden's faults or the if I were the president BS.
(no subject)
Jun. 18th, 2025 10:16 amThe princes of the Catholic Church listened intently as Pope Leo XIV laid out his priorities for the first time, revealing that he had chosen his papal name because of the tech revolution. As he explained, his namesake Leo XIII stood up for the rights of factory workers during the Gilded Age, when industrial robber barons presided over rapid change and extreme inequality.
“Today, the church offers its trove of social teaching to respond to another industrial revolution and to innovations in the field of artificial intelligence that pose challenges to human dignity, justice and labor,” Leo XIV told the College of Cardinals, who stood and cheered for their new pontiff and his unlikely cause.
https://www.wsj.com/tech/ai/pope-leo-ai-tech-771cca48
This is quite unexpected, although it seems quite logical in the context of Harari's Nexus
(no subject)
Jun. 16th, 2025 01:21 pmMeanwhile, the enrichment site at Fordow, which is buried deep under a mountain, has barely been touched. The enriched uranium at Fordow is believed to be enough to produce several bombs.
...
Israel lacks the deep penetrating bombs, and the heavy bombers to deliver them, that could do more damage to buried sites. The U.S. has both, and Israel would like U.S. help in taking out those nuclear sites.
https://www.wsj.com/opinion/the-fordow-imperative-for-trump-and-israel-nuclear-enrichment-site-iran-7981fbc0
Obviously, Israeli war planners had to know that before the operation; therefore, they had to count on Trump to approve the use of the bunker-busting bombs and B2 bombers. For some reason, he did not provide the approval.
(no subject)
Jun. 14th, 2025 11:11 amThe transition from the ‘red’ of awareness to the ‘red’ of thought is accompanied by a definite loss of content, namely by the transition from the factor ‘red’ to the entity ‘red.’ This loss in the transition to thought is compensated by the fact that thought is communicable whereas sense-awareness is incommunicable.
-- Whitehead, The Concept of Nature.
https://www.gutenberg.org/files/18835/18835-h/18835-h.htm
This is different for AI. Even more specifically, Jeff Dean introduced a mode of "teacher-student" transmission where both weights and elements of the model transferred between entities.
(no subject)
Jun. 12th, 2025 08:49 amOn the suggestion of my AI assistant, I'm reading Yuval Harari's "Nexus". Here's its summary of how the author defines information:
Essentially, he says that information is a graph or more precisely, it comprises edges of a graph. Therefore, we can represent it as a homset of all arrows in the graph and apply the Yoneda Lemma to understand the power structure of information.
In "Nexus," Yuval Noah Harari defines information as something that creates new realities by connecting different points into a network. Unlike the naive view, which sees information primarily as an attempt to represent reality, Harari emphasizes that information's defining feature is connection rather than representation. Information can take many forms, such as music, DNA, or stories, and its primary role is to connect and form networks, rather than merely represent preexisting realities.
Essentially, he says that information is a graph or more precisely, it comprises edges of a graph. Therefore, we can represent it as a homset of all arrows in the graph and apply the Yoneda Lemma to understand the power structure of information.
TACO du jour
Jun. 12th, 2025 08:21 amYesterday, the fucking moron paraded a trade deal with China and markets reacted - eh.. Today, the WSJ Editorial Board states the obvious in the headline: Trump Has No China Trade Strategy
President Trump on Wednesday hailed the result of the latest trade talks with China as a great victory, but the best we can say is that it’s a truce that tilts in China’s direction.
...
This gets to the larger problem with Mr. Trump’s tariff strategy—that is, he doesn’t have one. His latest walk-back shows he can’t bully China as he tried to do in his first term. China has leverage of its own.
A smarter trade strategy would be to work with allies as a united front to counter China’s predatory trade practices. Instead, Mr. Trump has used tariffs as an economic scatter-gun against friends as well as foes. This increases China’s leverage, and, like this week’s trade truce, that’s nothing to cheer about.
https://www.wsj.com/opinion/china-trade-talks-donald-trump-tariffs-f730f437
(no subject)
Jun. 10th, 2025 06:06 pmПо сравнению с воспитанием маленького ребенка, в воспитании щенка начисто отсутствует мощный метод, которые позволяет одновременно успокаивать и развивать воспитуемого. Этот метод условно называется "почитать книгу вслух". Самое близкое, наверное, будет "погрызть говяжью кость и вытащить из нее костный мозг."
(no subject)
Jun. 10th, 2025 05:27 pmI find it really productive to think about different types of AI/ML using one of Whitehead's approaches. For example, he describes three elements of any event: physical prehension (objective data), cognitive prehension (eternal possibilities), decision. Implicitly, when we talk about an agent, the fourth element is realization, i.e. action on the decision. (upd. he also has _subjective aim_, which is the target of the decision).
Each of these elements carries modes of interaction that are fundamentally different for humans and ML. First of all, physical prehension, i.e. awareness of the world, involves radically different sensory methods. Furthermore, while human awareness relies on analog biological, evolutionary fixed senses, ML can access digital non-biological signals. Further, its awareness can be retrained on new data gathering methods. Moreover, various types of ML can be trained and retrained on new senses just like we train dogs for tracking. The possibilities for creating new types of world awareness are mind boggling.
Etc, etc, etc.
Also, Whitehead's theology is highly applicable to this subject, but I'd need more time to study and think about it.
upd: transparency of prehension would be a good topic on which to "compare and contrast"
Each of these elements carries modes of interaction that are fundamentally different for humans and ML. First of all, physical prehension, i.e. awareness of the world, involves radically different sensory methods. Furthermore, while human awareness relies on analog biological, evolutionary fixed senses, ML can access digital non-biological signals. Further, its awareness can be retrained on new data gathering methods. Moreover, various types of ML can be trained and retrained on new senses just like we train dogs for tracking. The possibilities for creating new types of world awareness are mind boggling.
Etc, etc, etc.
Also, Whitehead's theology is highly applicable to this subject, but I'd need more time to study and think about it.
upd: transparency of prehension would be a good topic on which to "compare and contrast"
write about assholes drunk on power in the White House:
But the White House, led by deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller, wants to deport everyone here illegally. This means millions of people who arrived illegally but have since led law-abiding, productive lives. They have formed families and taken jobs that employers say they struggle to fill—in construction, hospitality, agriculture, healthcare, and much more.
Mr. Miller and the restrictionists want to deport everyone to send a message never to come again. But the lost contributions to the U.S. labor force will be great, especially since neither Mr. Miller nor Big Labor will tolerate more legal immigration. The labor-market impact is already showing up in the monthly Bureau of Labor Statistics report.
There is also the risk of unrest, as we’ve seen in California. It’s fanciful to think that raiding restaurants to snatch busboys, or Home Depot to grab stock clerks, won’t inspire a backlash. All the more so when ICE acts in heavy-handed fashion, as its agents sometimes do. Some on the pro-migrant left will do the same, and that’s when things get ugly. The political risks for Mr. Trump will grow if families are broken up, legal migrants are deported by mistake, or tales of hardship proliferate.
https://www.wsj.com/opinion/the-deportation-wars-begin-d3cb4f8d
(no subject)
Jun. 7th, 2025 02:58 pmThere once was an old Bedouin, who, sensing that his death was imminent,
gathered together his three sons and signified his last wishes to
them. To the eldest, he bequeathed half his inheritance, to the second one
quarter, and to the third one sixth. As he said this, he died, leaving his sons
in perplexity, for the inheritance in question consisted of eleven camels.
How were they to respect the old man's will ? Should they kill those of
the camels whose division seemed prescribed, and share the meat among
them ? Was this the required filial piety? Did their father really want them to
prove their love by accepting this loss? Or had he made a mistake, distracted
or weakened by his imminent death ? In fact, at least one error was
obvious, because one-half plus a quarter plus a sixth do not make one.
Yetto inherit on the basis of an interpretation that disqualifies a last wish, is
this not to insult to the dead? And in this case, moreover, how could one
divide ? Who would take away the remainder of the division ? All the ingredients
were there for a fratricidal war. The three brothers nevertheless
decided to try to avoid the war, that is, to wager that a solution could
exist. This means that they went to see the old sage who so often plays a
role in such stories. This old sage, on this occasion, told them that he
could not do anything for them except to offer them what might perhaps
help them: his old camel, skinny and half-blind. The inheritance now
counted twelve camels: the eldest took six of them, the second three, the
youngest two, and the old camel was returned to the old sage.
What did the twelfth camel accomplish ? By its presence, it made possible
what seemed contradictory, simultaneously obeying the father's wishes,
discovering the possi bility of respecting their terms, and not destroying
the value of the inheritance.
--- I.Stengers, Thinking with Whitehead
I'm going to steal this parable from her.
(no subject)
Jun. 7th, 2025 11:04 amК сожалению, жабогадюкинг между Т и М оказался очень коротким — М позорно слился. Еще раз убеждаемся, что каким бы гениальным ни был ученый, предприниматель или энтрепренер, против власти идти очень непросто, даже с огромными деньгами. И до Сахарова Маску, как до Юпитера.
(no subject)
Jun. 7th, 2025 10:59 amА. Воробей недавно написал, что разрешает себе писать о политике только если, как минимум, час позанимался физикой или математикой. https://avva.dreamwidth.org/3576932.html
Это хорошее правило. Для меня этот час будет включать философию — начал читать книгу Isabelle Stengers "Thinking with Whitehead: free and wild creation of concepts."
Это хорошее правило. Для меня этот час будет включать философию — начал читать книгу Isabelle Stengers "Thinking with Whitehead: free and wild creation of concepts."
Misplaced concretenes
May. 30th, 2025 05:43 pmMost discussions about AI, especially AGI, suffer from what Whitehead would call the Fallacy of Misplaced Concreteness. That is, people assume that Intelligence is something concrete existing in Nature that can be easily pointed to and described. Instead, we have a broad range of definitions covering various bundles of human and/or computer capabilities.
By contrast, discussions about industrial robots, including drones and autonomous cars, are usually much more productive because their roles are well specified in terms of tasks and accomplishments.
By contrast, discussions about industrial robots, including drones and autonomous cars, are usually much more productive because their roles are well specified in terms of tasks and accomplishments.
(no subject)
May. 23rd, 2025 08:42 pmГарвард должен пригласить хуйло на должность президента университета. Тогда наше рыжее хуйло от них отстанет.
