Through the looking glass

I’ve recently come back up for air (so to speak).

I’ve spent the last year in pandemic world trying to enable one of the world’s largest used car sales companies to have better experiences and more efficient ways to buy and sell cars online – without leaving the comfort of your “home”.

In some ways, I might be tempted to think that I am doing something really cutting edge.. which is why I feel like I have just come up for air.

I just finished a pretty amazing book called Sapiens – https://amzn.to/3jGq2bV.

Here are my thoughts:

This book is meta!  It is a story of myths and imagined realities used to frame up the story of myths and imagined realities all centered around this thing we called human experience. 

There are places in the book that you will find the author speaking authoritatively on ideas that he feels are universal, yet they fall short of accuracy and authenticity – but that’s the brilliance of the book – like a dream within a dream,  the book did such an amazing job at stretching the imagination both into the past and towards the future to frame a shared vision on the relevance of culture and society.

I could not put it down.

Jediah Logiodice

I followed up by reading A Crack In Creation – https://amzn.to/3ArJz6b.

Here are my thoughts:

Amazing story of how humans discovered how to reprogram the code that makes up their physical bodies – and the possibilities of amazing wonders or emerging horrors are limitless. 

I can almost imagine, that some years from now, the first sentient androids are going to be referencing this book as the dawn of the intelligence explosion Bostrom refers to as “Superintelligence”.

There is no going back now – as Collins would say,, let the hunger games begin.

Jediah Logiodice

But, that’s not all… we now have flying cars: https://youtu.be/a2tDOYkFCYo, and autonomous physical in-store shopping experiences: https://youtu.be/FynpkeS7RUM, and containerized housing: https://youtu.be/qVV6CyGJgZo, and artificial intelligence running buildings as a super organism: https://youtu.be/ssZ_8cqfBlE.

I just picked up Homo Deus: https://amzn.to/2UToQaT.

It is incredible to think about how far we have come, as a species, in such a short period of time; I am really excited, but slightly reticent to see how deep this rabbit hole goes.

God and the origins of life

It’s been quite a few years since I have had the opportunity to be intellectually stimulated in the areas of religion, philosophy and science – I very much miss the days of tutelage under my friend and mentor, Bill Johnson.

One of the topics that I really took an interest in, was the intersect of religion and science. I recently added a new author to my “to read” list. His book(s) appear to settle comfortably in the company of Collins, Jastrow, Tipler, Davies, and the likes: Stephen Meyer.

Although I haven’t read his books yet (just found him this morning), I enjoyed his cursory overview of his latest book Return of the God Hypothesis from Uncommon Knowledge.

Especially appreciated his reference to Jastrow, when he wrote:

For the scientist who has lived by his faith in the power of reason, the story ends like a bad dream. He has scaled the mountain of ignorance; he is about to conquer the highest peak; as he pulls himself over the final rock, he is greeted by a band of theologians who have been sitting there for centuries.

Robert Jastrow, God and the Astronomers.

ISO: The Theory of Everything

Just finished up a thought provoking and highly-entertaining treatment of concepts and ideas swirling around related to life, the universe and everything.

Unlike some reviewers of the book, I specifically appreciate that the author tries to synthesize the scientific world view with the religious world view. 

There are too many in life that think the world is so black and white, on both sides, thus being completely unwilling to give credence to what another might say or think across the divide.

The dichotomy reminds me of a couple maxims summarized by Covey and Bragg: 1) first seek to understand, then to be understood, and 2) science and religion are opposed as the thumb and forefinger – between the two you can grasp anything.

I came to a similar simulation theory ages ago (without much science knowledge to back it up, just through general observation and cognitive experiences), I’m glad to see we have some great thinkers spending significant clock-cycles on it.

Somewhere in our future is “The Theory of Everything”.  Keep seeking!

Boys Adrift – The crises of young men

International Woman’s day has had me thinking a lot about the pandemic of the failure to launch syndrome.

My children range in age and gender, and I can look around and see this story playing out both near and far.

From Dr. Leonard Sax’s book: boys adrift:

Something scary is happening to boys today. From kindergarten to college, American boys are, on average, less resilient and less ambitious than they were a mere twenty years ago. The gender gap in college attendance and graduation rates has widened dramatically. While Emily is working hard at school and getting A’s, her brother Justin is goofing off. He’s more concerned about getting to the next level in his videogame than about finishing his homework. Now, Dr. Leonard Sax delves into the scientific literature and draws on more than twenty years of clinical experience to explain why boys and young men are failing in school and disengaged at home. He shows how social, cultural, and biological factors have created an environment that is literally toxic to boys. He also presents practical solutions, sharing strategies which educators have found effective in re-engaging these boys at school, as well as handy tips for parents about everything from homework, to videogames, to medication.

Here is another, more recent treatment on the topic:

The end of the world as we know it – or the dawning of a new age?

Artificial Intelligence might bring immortality or it might as easily bring imminent destruction of the human race.

For an accessible quick read regarding this topic, you can check out the U.S. News article We all may be dead in 2050.

If you are interested in going a bit deeper regarding the precarious position the human race is in and the challenges to be overcome as we move into this new age of enlightenment – check out the book Super Intelligence by Nick Bostrom.

 

Is there such thing as Universal Ethics?

Absolutely!  😉

Whole books and doctoral theses have been written to address this question, so it is not something that can be answered in passing.  However, I can provide some insight from those much more eloquent in the economics of universal ethics.

Rather than providing specific value statements of right and wrong to be argued over, let us look at this from the perspective of establishing whether or not there is such thing as universal statements of right and wrong.  The first question then to be answered is whether, when I make a value statement, am I intending to assert a universal, or am I just making a statement of feelings only.

C.S. Lewis, the Christian philosopher and theologian, addresses this question in detail in his book the Abolition of Man.  He states that all but the trousered ape would understand that our expression of value statements go beyond a personal bias and individual experience.  He summarizes that when I say something is beautiful, I am not merely asserting that I think it is beautiful, I am asserting that part of the nature of the object is that it is beautiful.  He goes on to pose this argument in another form, using reductio ad absurdum Lewis suggests the claim that value statements are to be interpreted as personal statements can be seen prima facie to be absurd if I were to say I do not feel well, and someone were to respond, nonsense, I feel just fine (Lewis, 2009).

Extending this argument, Lewis also poses the idea that even those that claim that rightness and wrongness is subjective would on one hand steal from someone in the first moment, but then assert as fact the unfairness of any act that allowed them to be stolen from (Lewis, 2001).  The idea being, whether or not we can agree on a set of value statements, all humans have this inborn idea, this natural law as Lewis calls it, that there is indeed a set of value statements that assert rightness and wrongness universally.

After establishing the statement that all humans have this idea of rightness and wrongness, the next challenge then is to understand how, with diverse background and cultures and experiences, we can all come to agreement on what is truly without a bias, right and wrong.  The answering of which, however,  is beyond the scope of this post.

 

References

Lewis, C. S. (2001). Mere christianity (Kindle ed.). New York: HarperSan Francisco. Retrieved from Library of Congress or OCLC Worldcat.

Lewis, C. S. (2009). The abolition of man (Kindle ed.). HarperCollins. Retrieved from www.amazon.com: http://www.amazon.com/The-Abolition-Man-C-Lewis/dp/1609421477

If Truth was Stranger than Fiction – Erasing Human Memories

Imagine a world you could take a snapshot of your brain, and then, after completing a task, you can then erase the memories of all the tasks completed. That is the concept behind the movie Paycheck.

With today’s technology and scientific advancements, this capability is not yet a reality; however, continuing advancements in the realm of neuropsychological studies, Ligand-Directed cell targeting, combined with the eccentric theories of a brilliant astrophysicist, that science fiction may someday be a reality.

I thought I would use this week’s University discussion to press our minds into the brink of reality. In doing so, please note, that while I am not claiming that we can erase memories with our current scientific knowledge, I am citing scientific studies and theoretical postulates that accrue support for my views that one day, it may be possible to erase memories.

In 2006, Mueller reviews the advancement of neurological studies for the underlying biology of memory formation, studies such as those being performed by Reissner, Shobe and Carew (Meuller, 2006). Regarding this study, Mueller states that “the demonstrated application of nodal analysis to a well investigated signaling pathway implicated in learning and memory elegantly demonstrates the potential to unravel complex molecular networks and to extract the essentials (Mueller, 2006).” Almost eight years prior, J.D.E. Gabrieli discussed the increasing capabilities of positron emission tomography (PET) and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to help identify portions of the brain that were active during learning and retrieval of specific types of memory (1998). Additionally, a purview of 40 years of neuroscience will show the significant strides we continue to make in the field of neurological studies (Kandel, 2009).

 

As scientific knowledge and technology advances, it will only become easier to identify the areas of the brain where memories are created and stored.

Frank Tipler, in his book The Physics of Christianity postulates his theories of the future of humanity. His views, based on theories around the Bekenstein Bound, baryon-annihilation and quantum computing, states that he believes humans will eventually be able to download copies of themselves into Artificial Intelligence constructs (Tipler, 2007).

Papers (which I really don’t claim to understand) around Ligand-Directed gene and cell targeting, outlines our current and growing capabilities around being able to target and address substances that meet certain biological criteria (Hajitou, et al., 2006).

Bringing all these current theories and studies into a synthesis, I propose that someday in the future, we may be able to tag and identify the current state of our memory through neurobiological methods, or make an imprint of what our current brain structure is like, right down to the atoms and molecules (Tipler, 2007). Upon taking a copy, we can then learn new concepts (such as the super-secret patented recipe for Coke or Pepsi). After the completion of our learning, we can either use future Ligand-Directed tagging to identify and target for destruction the changes in our neurology, or we might just prefer to restore ourselves to a previous state.

Sometimes, truth can be stranger than fiction.

References

Gabrieli, J. D. (1998). Cognitive Neuroscience of Human Memory. Annual Review of Psychology, 87-115.

Hajitou, A., Trepel, M., Lilley, C., Soghomonyan, S., Alauddin, M., Marini , F., . . . Arap , W. (2006). A Hybrid vector for ligand-directed tumor targeting and molecular imaging. CELL, 385 – 398.

Kandel, E. (2009). The Biology of Memory: A Forty-Year Perspective. The Journal of Neuroscience, 12748-12756.

Mueller, U. (2006). Memory: Cellular and molecular networks. Cellular and Molecular Life Sciences, 961 – 962.

Tipler, F. (2007). The Physics of Christianity. New York : Doubleday.

 

Symphony of Human Cognition

Some, like Freud, seem to imply that they adhere to no distinct worldview (Koltko-Rivera, 2004), but in my opinion that is like stating that there is no truth except that there is no truth. The denial of a worldview is the means by which one such as Freud defines his own personal worldview.

While others in attempting to define a worldview might define it in purely academic constructs, I hold with Nancy Pearcey when she states that a “worldview is not an abstract, academic concept… Instead, the term describes our search for answers to those intensely personal questions everyone must wrestle with – the cry of the human heart for purpose, meaning and a truth big enough to live by (Pearcey, 2005)”.

It does indeed seem that our worldviews are colored not only by our histories and by our experiences, but our biology and the methodology in which we examine, as through a lens, the world around us. Indeed my worldview around how individuals learn and think is driven by my own experience and expectations.

As outlined by W. Scott Terry (Terry, 2009), learning theorists often define four different approaches to learning theory: 1) Functional, 2) Behavioral, 3) Cognitive, and 4) Neuroscience. The functional approach examines how learning contributes to the survival of the organism. The behavioral approach outlines a cause-and-effect pattern. The cognitive approach discusses the semantics of how the brain codes and retrieves information, where-as the neuro-scientific approach examines how the physical biology of the brain may affect the patterns of storage and retrieval.

I must admit that my own experiential evidences and even my approach to learning suggest a strong correlation to the cognitive approach. I have strong personal evidences surrounding the capability to store and retrieve information based on external (i.e. environmental awareness) and internal (thoughts, feelings, past knowledge) influences. Couple my personal evidences with (or as a result of) past learning experiences focused on whole-brain learning and Neuro Linguistics espoused by Richard Bandler and John Grinder, and I would say that I have a strong inclination to gravitate towards the idea that there is a methodology in how we code, store and retrieve information.

However, I cannot discount the validity of the other three learning theories. Indeed, functional, behavioral and neuro-scientific theories are all grounded in a posteriori knowledge that can be supported by reproducible evidences.

Thus, I would have to contend that it is incorrect to state that any one form of learning theory can supersede any other, and that with the obvious complexity of the human organism we must synthesize all forms of learning theories to reach the maximum capacity of the human mind.

 

References

Koltko-Rivera, M. E. (2004). The Psychology of Worldviews. Review of General Psychology, 3-58.

Pearcey, N. (2005). Total Truth : Liberating Christianity From Its Cultural Captivity. Wheaton: Crossway Books.

Terry, W. S. (2009). Learning & Memory : Basic Principles, Processes, and Procedures. Boston: Pearson Education.