[FRIAM] emergent mind - ai news by ai

[Steve Smith]

DaveW-rote:
>
>     Steve Smith's use of the phrase "arms race" reminded me of John
>     Brunner's /Shockwave Rider /and its underlying premise of the
>     dangers of constant change, 'first the legs race, then the arms
>     race, then the brain race'. (Brunner was inspired by Tofler's
>     book, /Future Shock/.)
>

My biggest takeaway from /Shockwave Rider/ was the *collectivizing* of 
Intell (igence?) via /Hearing Aid/10-9//s /as well as the power of 
"witness" it offered to the "witnessed".   The ideation of a small set 
of people collectively listening to the pulse of the bulk populace as a 
social/mental-health service  yielding the residue of a sort of 
collective wisdom/awareness in the subset is reminiscent of both the NSA 
and of the LLMs.

I have read it thrice, I think it is time for a revisit.  It was written 
in the shadow of Nixon/Allende as we are (still) in the shadow of 
Trump/Zelenskyy?  I think my second read was in 1984 in "honor of" 
Orwells 1948 novel of that name (1984) coming of age.

I think my last read was circa 2010 near the beginning of the 
smart-phone era and the death of the landline.

>     The book also poses a problem: if you have two bodies in orbit,
>     how does one catch up or surpass the other. /"See you later
>     accelerator,"/ illustrates the perceived fallacy of these kinds of
>     "races."
>
>     The current AI mania is akin to the brain race in Brunner, except,
>     in the book, the race was to increase/augment human intelligence
>     not artificial.
>
>     I wonder where the world might be if the same effort and money
>     that has been spent on artificial intelligence had instead been
>     invested in Englebart's effort to augment human intelligence.

I am not AS interested in /Intelligence/ as I am perhaps in 
/Consciousness /which of course, the discussion of, is an entirely 
different kettle of eels.

- SteveS
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