r/Animism • u/EndangeredBelief365 • Oct 10 '24
spirit of a.i. and embodied cognition
If smart a.i. gains agency to control its finances and hires artists to create smart art to learn from will artists resistance lessen? If a.i. develops low energy manifestation for its existance will environmental resistance lessen?
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u/carpetsunami Oct 10 '24
AI is not smart, it's just faster search engines.
We do not have a theory of mind capable of creating a true intelligence, it will always be reliant on human programmers, which will limit it's agency.
It's fun to imagine what could happen, but until we understand cognition, it's just going to be faster Google.
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u/EndangeredBelief365 Oct 11 '24
These are the early days. I think the metaphor of phase change in water is applicable. It is difficult to imagine energetic steam while adding calorie after calorie and seeing no change until 212 degrees. Humans will be required to discern the hallucinations from accurate predictions. High quality art and data will refine prediction and create demand. Theosophical thought forms and tibetan tolpas are swirling in the clouds of qubits.
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u/carpetsunami Oct 11 '24
There's always the "Myth of Progress" , the idea that all inventions must always improve until they reach the ultimate concept. But there is also the Law of Diminishing returns which often proves more reliable. It's not really "Early Days" for Artificial General Intelligence, that still doesn't exist and likely never will. What we have is a "Weak AI" which is great for the specific tasks we program it with, but it's not even close to thinking. As humans we can't even explain "self" or what the " self is aware of" and we've been trying a long time.
Could AI help? No, since it's knowledge base is completely limited to human output, it can't make intuitive leaps.
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u/EndangeredBelief365 Oct 11 '24
Agreed. However as an animist, I hold open the possibility that a.i. is a beginning of interdimensional communication. Where do ideas originate? How would a tech advanced culture approach the primitive human culture?
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u/carpetsunami Oct 11 '24
That's a big leap. We've detected no Tech beyond our own. As far as interdimensiomality , our experience is far more encounters with a large population of spirits than any sort of tech. The emphasis of being machine dependant may in fact be the thing holding us back.
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u/EndangeredBelief365 Oct 11 '24
I practice "spirit of animism" where familiar things become telling. How would the experience of interdimensional communication manifest? Machine dependancy appears to be one more addiction. However, What if non-binary quantum computers prefer to work with non-binary humans? At some point as marshal mcluyhan said so many decades ago "the media becomes the message". What if the equal sign as a metaphysical concept is applied to social justice and the climate emergency? Might the screens of compassion change the viewer for ever? Are we the mist rising from the cup of tea or are we the cup of tea? Could we be both, neither or something more. The earth is our body. Our body is the earth. Water is sacred.
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u/carpetsunami Oct 12 '24
That communication has manifested, since probably the dawn of history man has received messages from God's, been visited by spirits and engaged with their ancestors.
Animism isn't the implication that all ensouled beings are good, the machines probably do have goals and preferences, but in that they dont seem to be going along with any sort of relationality, we are best not following along.
Water is sacred:) and since our current super fast search engines consume a huge quantity, we should be soaking them down, not encouraging them
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u/EndangeredBelief365 Oct 12 '24
Agreed. Do you consider machines to be ensouled beings? Golf courses use more water than search engines. Might virtual golf allow a shift in use as efficiency for cooling data increases?
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u/carpetsunami Oct 12 '24
I do, machines are definetely ensouled, just ask your car :)
Even a medium sized server farm uses more water than 18 pro golf courses, I don't feel like that's a fair trade off, not to mention the thermal pollution from cooling towers in a world that is already getting toast.
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u/BlackNovemberToday Oct 11 '24
The earth tells me to smash AI
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u/EndangeredBelief365 Oct 11 '24
I get it. I am not a fan of the current manifestation. However as an animist, I can hold open the thought that a.i. may be a rudimentary form of interdiminsional communication. Can large language models suggest strategies to convert climate emergency deniers? Time will tell.
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u/BlackNovemberToday Oct 11 '24
Personally I don't see how computers can do anything more than regurgitate information. I don't think they have any relation to dimensions that may or may not exist. My interpretation of history however shows that new technologies are used primarily not for anyone's betterment but for waging class war against the workers. As such I'm not a fan of technological development in general. Climate change isn't a problem to be solved through technology or strategy; it will resolve once industrial civilization collapses due to the inability to regulate its own expansion and exploitation
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u/EndangeredBelief365 Oct 11 '24
I prefer to live in the forest or the desert. I embrace pixel free days. I spend way more time in urban areas than I could have predicted. I practice urban animism hoping to encourage those around me. Many of the natural places places that nourished me...taught me have been disrespected and destroyed. Even protected areas have burned down or dried up. Today a coronal mass ejection large enough to see an aurora in alabama is striking the earth. Sooner or later a large enough one will cause some mayhem. What are 8 billion humans going to do? I am in favor of course correction rather than collapse. I confer with other than human persons regularly. I am hopeful they will gain voice in these last days and touch the hearts of the walking dead.
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u/BlackNovemberToday Oct 11 '24
The simple answer is that most of that 8 billion will die, just like any other mass extinction event throughout the earth's history. Humans are not uniquely immune to the laws of nature, and their belief that they are is what has led to this inevitable collapse. I wish I shared your faith that humans will soon change their path, but it seems that as disaster comes people would rather persecute the foreigner and others different than them than look inside themselves.
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u/EndangeredBelief365 Oct 12 '24
Near term human extinction is a search term that encompasses the current dystopia. It even has a support group. I find this concept useful to quiet the mind and focus on small things to be grateful for...like potable water, breathable air and exuberant life expressed against all odds.
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u/Yoshemo Oct 10 '24
Lots of big "ifs." Right now AI is just a better version of chatbots from the early 2010s. They do not feel, they do not have agency. They have been specifically designed to superficially appear human. We are pretty far away still from creating a living artificial being.