[alancalverd]

If a car loses one wheel because someone has stolen it, does it stop being a car?

See reply 1510 above

[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

If a car loses one wheel because someone has stolen it, does it stop being a car?

See reply 1510 above

So you haven't found a useful definition for consciousness?

[alancalverd]

Nor, it seems, has anyone else.

Consciousness has intrigued and baffled philosophers. To begin, we must define and describe consciousness. What to include in a complete definition and description of consciousness?

[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

Nor, it seems, has anyone else.

Do you think that it's still possible to be defined in a useful way, at least in principle? Why or why not?

[alancalverd]

Unless you can find a use for the term, there is little point in defining it.

We define mass, energy, momentum, etc., as "that which is conserved when..." or "that which determines the outcome of..." but the problem with consciousness is that it seems to be "that which we would like to believe is conserved/motivates/determines...." with no evidence of observation or desirability.

The concept is as flexible and useless as "god", though historically less poisonous. 

[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

Unless you can find a use for the term, there is little point in defining it.

What do you think about my definition of consciousness?
It's the capacity to pursue goals.

[alancalverd]

As ably demonstrated by a guided missile.

[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

Similar situation to the case in the short video may had happened in the forming of social structures of multicellular organisms, including humans.

How Did Multicellularity Evolve?
5:33 Cytokinesis
6:30 Organismal polarity
7:24 Somatic cells
7:43 Gonidia

Multicellular organisms evolved from colonies of unicellular organisms. Likewise, social structures of organisms evolved from individual organisms. Extrapolating further, we are in the process of building a multiplanetary society. If we succeed, the next step would be building a multi-stellar society.

[alancalverd]

The first two sentences merely state the obvious. But can a distribution of organisms over distances such that two distant elements cannot communicate within their own lifetimes be called a society rather than random pollution of the universe?

[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

#RethinkingEnergy #TheGreatStranding ? A New Energy Report by RethinkX

Rethinking Energy ? The Great Stranding: How Inaccurate Mainstream LCOE Estimates are Creating a Trillion-Dollar Bubble in Conventional Energy Assets

Wrong decisions lead to unintended consequences.
Unexpected results come from false assumptions.

[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

As ably demonstrated by a guided missile.

A guided missile is more conscious than an unguided missile.
A baby is more conscious than a fetus.
Generally, an adult is more conscious than a child, and they are more conscious than a baby.
A conscious man is more conscious than an unconscious man.

[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

The first two sentences merely state the obvious. But can a distribution of organisms over distances such that two distant elements cannot communicate within their own lifetimes be called a society rather than random pollution of the universe?

Whose lifetimes are you referring to? The societies or their individual members? Why not their individual cells making up those members? Or atoms making up those cells?

[alancalverd]

The essence of all the assemblies you have described, from multicellular organisms to human societies, is collaborative benefit to their members. If you are a thousand light years apart, you can't benefit from collaboration unless your life expectancy exceeds 2000 years.

[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

The essence of all the assemblies you have described, from multicellular organisms to human societies, is collaborative benefit to their members. If you are a thousand light years apart, you can't benefit from collaboration unless your life expectancy exceeds 2000 years.

Why can't they?

[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

If AI Takes All Of Our Jobs... Who's Going To Buy Everything?

Companies have been trying to cut down on workers for as long as those workers have demanded pay and benefits.

Whether it?s downsizing, outsourcing, streamlining, understaffing, or automating, if there is something a business can do to get rid of workers and their salaries, you better believe they are going to do it.

But this time does feel a little bit different. Recent AI advances have been mocked for not quiet living up to the bold claims of their tech bro founders.

But even in their current, imperfect form, LLM?s, general use robots and generative models are ALREADY replacing jobs and they are getting better every day.

So that?s bad for workers, but if you are a senior corporate executive or company owner, maybe you should be asking yourself?

If we automate everybody?s job? who is going to buy all of your stuff?

I have some good news and some bad news for your theoretical company.

The good news is that labor reduction systems of all varieties have ALREADY cut out millions of manhours in America alone and made the workers who are left more efficient at their jobs.

Artificial intelligence is just another tool that your company can use to get more work out of fewer staff or replace teams entirely.

Even here at little old works media group we used to have someone working part time whose job it was just to cut out images on Photoshop to use in our goofy little animations.

Now Adobe Suite has inbuilt AI features which can automatically remove backgrounds from any image with absolutely no human time or skill involved.

Now if you still think that sounds a bit depressing, well welcome to this channel, but also, I should tell you that market trends say this is already happening? AI isn?t going to change YOUR world, it?s just going to continue a trend that?s been happening for years now.

So it?s time to learn How Money Works to find out if how companies are adapting to a world where nobody can afford anything anymore.

[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

The REAL Cause of EVERY Financial Crisis

We?re at it again. These are tough times.

It?s gotten so bad that it has even taken a toll on this and it?s a big deal.   
In NYC, for decades, there was the pizza principle: where a slice of pizza was the same price as a subway ticket.
But not anymore. The decade-long balance is now gone.
The bad thing is that it?s much more than just pizza.
Global chaos, rampant inflation, and a looming financial crisis.
Crypto rose promised millions and then collapsed, taking people?s fortunes with it.

Startups are closing down, and thousands are losing their jobs.
Expensive pizza is the least of our problems.
The problem is that having something to eat, like a slice of pizza a miracle for some.

 And a bigger question lingers: how do we end up in this sh*t in the first place? And, most importantly, who?s responsible?

Let?s talk about financial crises in this episode of Company Forensics.

0:00 Financial Crises - Intro
1:27 Financial Crises- 1700
6:04 Financial Crises - 1929
16:52 Financial Crises - 2008

A reminder that unexpected results come from false assumptions.

[alancalverd]

from: alancalverd on 27/07/2024 10:33:04
The essence of all the assemblies you have described, from multicellular organisms to human societies, is collaborative benefit to their members. If you are a thousand light years apart, you can't benefit from collaboration unless your life expectancy exceeds 2000 years.

Why can't they?

Because by the time you have an answer to your question or request, you will be dead or the response will be irrelevant.

We do have books of "answers" to 2000-year-old questions, and they are responsible for pretty much every large-scale antisocial act of the last 4000 years.

[alancalverd]

If AI Takes All Of Our Jobs... Who's Going To Buy Everything?

The underlying problem here is the hypothetical Right to Work.
Every time you grant someone a Right, you are imposing a Duty on someone else. 
But there is no statutory duty on anybody to employ anyone, so the "right to be employed" is meaningless.

If I set up a business to make or do something, it is entirely up to me whether to do it myself, employ someone else to do it, or use a machine.  It's literally "my business". 

If I want to expand, the business, no problem. If the market won't sustain the business, I contract and folk lose their jobs - sad, but inevitable. So what's the moral dilemma about contracting the workforce voluntarily? I'm still responding to or anticipating market forces.

If the pursuit of profit is immoral, I shouldn't have set up the business in the first place, and nobody should invest in it or even lend me money to start up. But then nobody would have been employed!

Startups are closing down, and thousands are losing their jobs.

Every entrepreneur knows (or should know) that a 90% failure rate is normal. Nothing new here, unless we have bred a generation who have no respect for the facts of business. 

Simple fact: the tractor displaced 95% of agricultural workers in the UK. We have never been better fed, nor, until very recently, more able to afford good food. Nor do we have troops of starving agricultural laborers roaming the streets in winter.

[alancalverd]

The REAL Cause of EVERY Financial Crisis

Greed, gambling with other people's money, and stupidity.

[hamdani yusuf (OP)]

from: alancalverd on 27/07/2024 10:33:04
The essence of all the assemblies you have described, from multicellular organisms to human societies, is collaborative benefit to their members. If you are a thousand light years apart, you can't benefit from collaboration unless your life expectancy exceeds 2000 years.

Why can't they?

Because by the time you have an answer to your question or request, you will be dead or the response will be irrelevant.

We do have books of "answers" to 2000-year-old questions, and they are responsible for pretty much every large-scale antisocial act of the last 4000 years.

Futurists have predicted about Longevity Escape Velocity. Aubrey de Grey predicted that persons who will live into a thousand years have been living with us.
The information can be exchanged across generations. Especially if it's important enough.