The Openwater Project

"...sea of Thought alone" wrote Wordsworth in a poem about Isaac Newton. Now it may become possible to peer into the thought of people who think deeply about most things, thought included. This would further revolutionise the progress people make in advancing the productivity leverage in STEM domains and software engineering. The 100X productivity is appearing now, will it be possible to go to 1000X within the next 10 years? ...and replicate that as part of a system of thinking from person to person. Could it be something that is learned and assumed by students?
There is certainly an element of breaking out of the pragmatics of a System in highly effective and transformative thinking just like in zen tuition.
Openwater is the brainchild of a former Facebook executive Mary Lou : they plan to create a wearable to enable us to see the inner workings of the body and brain at high resolution. And do that at 1000 dollars I would guess. It would fit into a hat or a headband.
You could type at the speed of thought! Or even just think up structures of code in mere seconds. It will likely go much further as it could be combined with Machine Learning, which itself will have moved by leaps and bounds in 8 years time. It will be noninvasive. It will have much potential in improving our cognitive capabilities at the speed of thought itself!

Unwilling Masochism

... a state in which one is harmed, rejected or "trained" without actually asking for it. The result must be distinct and separated from the actual deeds and behaviours. another one of those philosophical laxatives with a sleeping pill and an unpleasant epiphany in the morning.

My Personal Cassandra Effects

1.  More rains as part of the global warming and changing weather patterns, less actual sunshine
2. WTC would be attacked. Some of the original bombers told that it would be attacked in 10 years time.
3. There maybe duons in the DNA among the codons
4. Blockchain will fundamentally alter the principles of regulation of economy by state actors in their present forms. The separation of state from economy happens.
5. China would converge in their military and economic interests with the Islamic world, Pakistan, maybe Iran
6. Computers will be guiding the development of better programs in machine learning around 2015 - it happened in 2017
7. Computers will have the same complexity as a human brain in the 30s not the 20s as Kurzweil predicted. 
8. Consciousness is not likely to emerge for another 10 years to the general public, so maybe in the early 40s. Comatose 'brains' and mentally ill cyberbrains may be the first iterations...! 
9. Moore's Law will go (almost) unbroken until the new paradigm of nanoengineered carbon computers take over, likely working on optronic systems instead of electronics

The Energetic Limit of a Bot Swarm in Sandboxes

Sandboxes are software fences for programs that could harm the System. By itself a malevolent or error prone code could stall, or crash the system. Inside a sandbox the sandbox would be closed instead, and the system would persist.
So one could create an ethical principle that if you use artilects or bots to improve your life in some way, they could not interact with other bots to harm other people as a result of their activities. Success should not be based on malicious intents against others.
However in this way one is limited in their growth only by the number and functionalities of the bots which in turn are limited by the computing power that could be brought to bear which in turn ultimately needs energy.
It might be an interesting mathematical limit to explore for an information economist - does the energy requirement increase at a faster rate than the growth rate of computing power, the Moore's Law?
- does the increase for energy reduce with time?
- do effective algorithms prove to give an advantage for bots to reduce the need for ever more computing power?
And what would the trends confluence on, if at all... 

An Optimistic Fatalist

An interesting combination: like a laxative with a sleeping pill!
An optimist believes in a positive and successful and progressive future, while fatalist thinks that there is no way to alter the present to change the future.
I suppose that some reading of communism would present exactly that kind of a view on reality. Emancipation and the revolution are imminent but there is nothing that one could do now because of historical materialism is formed by the masses.
It also provides an angst of existence, by letting you know that there is something better, but even if you want to be part of it your effort avails you a Nothing - no difference.

The Fourth Escape from Nihilism

To play a game and regard the existence in terms of rules you can apply to it.

Absence as a Source

Absence of judgement is LOVE
Absence of pain is HAPPINESS
Absence of evaluation is PEACE
Absence of distraction is SERENITY
Absence of feelings is SOBRIETY
Absence of completion is OPENNESS
Absence of secrecy is TRANSPARENCY
Absence of perfection is DIVERSITY
Absence of contaminant is PURITY
Absence of pomposity is BREVITY


Absolute absence is the UNKNOWN NOTHING a source of the unnumbered, an empty unit, that can always be added to itself without growth or compoundment. No whole results from this either. No divisibility into parts of differing qualities.

'is' refers to a assignment or signifies the source of the succeeding object.

On Justice

Hegel writes on the right of the society to bestow the right to a sentence when a criminal is judged.  The criminal has a right to a sentence.
There are two options to where that right becomes unnecessary, first, if the person is rehabilitated fully before the sentence and the behaviour has altered radically, there is a complete shift in the identity, secondly if a pardon has been signed and the truth of the conviction behind the sentence has been overturned.
In the first case we can experiment with the possibility only now with the changes availed by information technologies and advances in psychological and emotological evaluations. We should be aware however that the psychopathic mind will always seek to game the experiments and alter outcomes.
In the second case we have to seek rehabilitation for the society itself.

Impact Theory, Upgraded

About a year ago I started watching and bingeing on self help and development through interviews with millionaires and influencers by the very successful Tom Bilyeu who started the Inside Quest and pivoted for the second time the whole thing into the Impact Theory a while ago.
So I read the Impact Theory Belief System, comprising of 25 points. As I was reading I realised that they could be improved on a lot. Many of the phrases contain ambiguous or negative terms that cannot be measured or even defined easily. So it may be necessary to put in more detail and upgrade the belief system for it to work as something more than a vague guide for inspiration and a drive for the grind.

So here is my version 2.0beta with all the kudos for the great original:

1. Original: Human potential is nearly limitless.
   How nearly, and how limitless?
   Upgrade: Human potential can be set new, more advanced targets on every iteration. You define your iterations and targets and reviews.
2. Original: Personal growth is the highest priority of Impactivists
   Do people actually walk the talk, behave according to their priorities?
   Upgrade: Impactivists are made when they set personal growth as the first priority and take massive action to pursue it.
3. Original: You can acquire new skills in any area at any time.
   How does this connect with the personal growth? Could this potential be ignored? What limits are there to the skill areas?
   Upgrade: To make progress in personal growth you acquire new skills in the areas in need and among your interests by working on them in a constant flow-based drive between boredom and frustration.
4. Original: It requires focus and disciplined practice to acquire new skills
   How about insights that come in a flash with little prior warning and propel your understanding of the skill to a whole new level? Training routines can only be a start for the flow, one needs to escape the routine to see the skill from the outside looking in, to have insights.  Focus is a killer of insights.
   Upgrade: One needs meditation and practice and self-conscious retrospectives to acquire new skills
5. Original: You can do anything you set your mind to, without limitation.
   If there is one lie then why not have more, other points are connected to this one after all. Again the limitation problem...
   Upgrade: You can do anything in your mind dojo, transcend your previous limits regularly.
   Mind Dojo is a training room for your mind, perhaps it also includes a Mind Castle, an imaginary visual streaming 'greenroom' and other tools...
6. Original: #5 is a lie. But it is an empowering lie. Impactivists do and believe that which empowers us.
   Why lie?
   Upgrade: Number 5 is an illusion that empowers Impactivists. Impactivists do and believe that which empowers us and they weed out everything that disempowers. 
7. Original: It does not matter who you are today. It only matters who you want to become and how hard you are willing to work to become that person.
   First point is negative.
   Upgrade: Define the target self of your personal growth and set how hard you work to get into that skin.
8. Original: See beyond your current self to the opportunity of becoming the best version of yourself.
   Overlaps too much with the previous point now, however:
   Upgrade: Visualize the best future you that you imagine now.
9. Original: The Impact Theory Community is a safe place to make mistakes.
10. Original: Mistakes are a great teacher to those who are willing to admit they have made one.
    Can be shortened to:
    Upgrade: Admit your mistakes and learn from them.
11. Original: Share the lessons learned from your mistakes with your fellow Impactivists.
12. Original: Failure is temporary. Move quickly beyond it. 
    May I rest on the laurels?
    Upgrade:Success is temporary. Move quickly beyond it. 
13. Original: Everyone has something to teach you. Learn from whoever you can.
    Upgrade: Everyone has something to teach you. Learn from everyone you have time for.
14. Original: Impactivsts do not make excuses. Ever.
    Impactivists fulfill or decline an opportunity without justification.
15. Original: Any obstacle can be overcome
    Negative
    Upgrade: Any opportunity can be resolved.
16. Original: Building your self-esteem around being right all the time will lead to poor decision making.
    Are there other ways of building your self esteem?
    Upgrade: Build your self-esteem properly. Improve decision-making by admitting when you are mistaken.
17. Original: Building your self-esteem  around identifying the right answer and pursuing it faster than anyone else.
    So fast that you burn out before you get there? Who needs to identify the right answer and does that include robbing the glory surrounding the right answer from someone else?
    Upgrade: Build your self-esteem properly. Identify the right answer and accept it, respecting the person who originated it. Pursue the path speedily, effectively and consistently.
18. Original: Have very clear goals
    Upgrade: Have SMART goals, a vision with WHY and a mission for the world.
19. Original: Do that which moves you toward your goals.
    Upgrade:  Emotivate yourself you towards your goals.
20. Original: Do not do what moves you away from your goals
    Upgrade: Remove and obviate distractions persistently. 
21. Original: Only work in an environment that is moving you towards goals
    Upgrade: Change the environment that moves you towards your goals faster.
22.  Original: Impactivists are linchpins who work hard, smart and long hours
    Upgrade: Use as many hours as you can possibly sustain, working hard and smartening your work.
23.  Original: Passion will help you keep fighting to reach your goals when things get difficult. Center your life on passion. 
    Upgrade: Center your life on passion to overcome passion.
24. Original: Impactivists motivate and inspire those around them.
    Upgrade: Motivate, inspire and uplift those around you.
25.  Original: Take the RED pill
    Upgrade:  Take the RED pill

Personal Manhattan Projects are Limited in Number

I called them Personal Manhattan projects, Peter Diamandis calls them Personal Moonshot Projects - a considerably more palatable as well as more peace-loving sign.
The curious thing is that there are a limited number of them so that if everyone worked for one of the projects we would have tens if not hundreds of millions of people working on the same goal. A lot of human resources! Also we might little by little enrich our world with ever newer aims that would impact the whole of humanity, or its vast majority. 

Whose words were these anyway...

Whether a king of socialism plants words into a newspeak mode of language used to re-engineer the society or does the capitalist use language to social engineer its workers. That seems to be the gist of Roger Scruton.
  Where is the harm if the capitalist or entrepreneur re-purposes words in a new context? Take 'revolutions' itself. Socialists like Zizek cry of foul play when their treasured symbol the Revolution is used to mean a sudden change in economics created by shifts in technology.  The fact remains that technology does alter societies with no turning back, no bottling the invented and throwing it away; whereas social revolutions led by communist ideals often do default back to capitalist societies by the sheer pressure exacted by private interests ie the profit motive.
According to the canon of communism revolutions must, by historical necessity, be achieved through violent means. Knowing is not enough, it seems a communist must fight.  People have fought to the sad deaths of the many.
Technological revolutions do bring their own casualties, and maybe even a looming disaster or two that could end the human race's progress on the face of the earth. One hopes that such cost of progress is lower but at over, an estimated 100000000 road traffic deaths just from cars throughout their 100 odd years of accidents the numbers measure up to each other too well. This does not even figure in machine accidents at work, nuclear disasters and attacks, climate change or air pollution, all of which are major killers on their own!
However when you combine the two - social revolutions and industrial revolutions you have an even more potent adversary to humankind's pursuit of peace, love and happiness. The environment is then such that progress becomes more important than an individual and when this ideology is scaled to the whole state - no one stands to benefit from this very promise of progress and everyone tends towards the miseries of anxieties, hazards and accidents. The environment is ruined all the faster the less the people who use it have control over how they are exploited in service of yet more progress.

While the entrepreneurs are busy calling their profit seeking ideas with a new name - the impact motive as it is called now, the worker all but left to seek low paying person-to-person gigs with no pension guarantees will scrape a living for this new economy of impact. The impact is hard! We are all on the line to be impacted. A wish that a could muster a counter thesis of sufficient impact tears into this expose. What an impact it would be if we could instead run an enterprise on democratic principles!

So the reengineering of society and mesmerisation by talking, with these short examples that have been explicated, could be seen as something that happens below the general concepts ruling language by viral means, hence there is cross pollination between both sides of the divide - each others' semiospheres are polluted as well as enhanced by ideas from the other.  So are we any the wiser?

The Lost Class

One could keep on wondering of the potential accuracy of the lost class narrative. Its a story that there are no more workers... yes the industrial revolution is almost over and the information age has taken afoot but workers' conditions have not improved much for a lifetime. They have been transferred to the service sectors and perhaps to mail and logistics for a short-while. But a worker is still a person of no means of production, a have not. Work itself has also not disappeared, that might have been another route to the verity of such a sarcastic statement: "there are not many workers left." Instead the worker is alive, in drudgery and legwork and very much in misery. The misery is in actuality deepened by the fountains of melancholy-making social media behemoths, keeping the workers locked in to their small screens of colorful pictures by regular swipes that give a measured release of dopamine - the soma of the masses, of our current times.  So the deeper the sleep continues the longer the people will be sucked dry of resources and happiness by a small number of successful and smooth operators of the mystery engines of capitalism. 
  To see into this is not a matter of gnosis or an epiphany or a sudden awakening as if from a dream state. It is a matter of historical importance made possible when you contribute to a society that is egalitarian as a priority. Yet it is easy to preach and yet for me a difficult step to take to shed the dream that I could one day become a smooth operator myself. A sweet carrot on a stick remains... and so I am not a Prophet of Awakening from Dreams, I am also a dreamer.  Shackled fast to the work.
 

cannot be displayed because it violates content regulations

A Chinese man by the name of Zhang Guochen has made a bold attempt that has garnered the approval of the common citizen of the Peoples' Republic of China.  He mentions a 'fake life' created by a state sponsored industrialised urbanisation of Beijing is staged for every citizen. More for those who still hope to become a member of the capital's economy.
A light has been shun on this image of a dream, albeit faint in the smog of the city.
  Is it the capitals of the world that make for such an ugly transformation of the Asian virtue of hospitable to its very opposite - inhospitable?
What a cost on human existence is the western capitalism exacting on Chinese industry? Is it not with the willing cooperation of the communist top nomenklatura, that such a mechanism to counterfeit existence executes a deathly, ghostly tax on every minute lived?
A time to ask questions from our side of the wall too. Sometimes there is a wonder in societies where information is closed to free press by censorship -  it forms a dissident vanguard, another class of the oppressed in the very heart of the bosom of the republic of the free from the oppression of the capital. Yet it also hides a stark reality where every flower of creativity is cut before it blooms and every plant is not let to live its full cycle of life. Finally it is just weedkiller left on the field. On Chinese internet only the criticism of the piece remains forming an echochamber more easily tuned for the state mastered news.

"There are over 20 million people left in this city, pretending to live. In reality, there simply is no life in this city. Here, there are only some people’s dreams and everybody’s jobs." ...an excerpt from the piece Under the Dome

Third Escape from Nihilism

We should not extend our conception of reason and meaning of life to look for it at the end. It should be sought here or at least from within life itself. Because when it is gone, nihilism reaches for its own throat, suffocating itself. So it fails to explain anything and hence even its proposition is worthless.
So stay conscious and look at the wealth of meaning implicit in our existence.

The Second Escape from Nihilistic Absurd

If I see myself from outside the box. Look at myself as a figure in history, even admitting that it will all end in the absurd, no meaning or purpose that remains I still get to look at the whole thing in this imaginary way as a Grand Tragedy. As the birth of tragedy, from music and poetry, tragedy can be enjoyed in the same way rain is comforting when we experience it from the cosy and dry  habitat of a home. Tragedy is also a reason to live life joyously, passionately as its meaning.

Paradox of Freedom of Information and Right to Privacy

On one hand we have Assange who is liberating a lot of private information to the public to behold. On the other hand we have Snowden who recommends cryptography to hide your personal data as best as you can.
NOT a paradox!
Both principles stress that the individual should be leveraged with more right than the might of the state has.
If all use encryption and keep their personal doings and goings secret then the state will have difficulty in coercing the individual.
If information is free then the world is more transparent and there would be less room for corrupt practices conspired against the individual by those in power.

Theatrical Assembly

I have personally heard from a secretary for a MP to the British Parliament that all the talks are preplanned, that all the agendas and acts are prearranged in the cabinets and back-rooms and every vote is rigged so that the results lodge into a preplanned range of votes.
A theatre of democracy indeed is played out to the public at large. This indeed comes from a country who often signifies itself as the staunchest defender of democracy in Europe as well as the world.
Alas the assembly of egotists and greedy entrepreneurs crafts and whispers every one of its messages into laws, by its powerful measure of coercion.
The play usually has three scenes and three sad endings.
Beginning: The hidden agenda is constructed, the conspiracy starts up.
Middle: The MP makes a speech, a debate is played out perfectly.
End: The invisible hands in the cabinets make money from the pockets of the people.
People are sent to war, determined to fight for democratic values.
The invisible hand stops money flowing from them to the peoples.

(Dream(Dream))

Hidden under the ocean lies a grain of golden sand.
There maybe a grain of truth to the similarity of irreality of a dream state of mind and the process of losing the existing and valuable handful of sand to the homogeneity of other particles of sand that is then covered and mixed in a method of shuffling by the waves.
The poem works on two levels - missing and grieving reality, and having nothing to base one's sense of reality on so what is there to miss and well  - even that is going to go - 'to the deep'.

The ethereal and ephemeral  dreamstate forms the cause of the worry as everything from it disappears and soon vanishes from the mind...
I am reminded yet again of the various levels of consciousnesses of which Gurdjieff spoke of. Leary also had a multilevel system of consciousness.