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<p>"Unique in a qualified manner"? <br>
</p>
<p>FWIW, I prompted (Indra's Net edition) and sent my DALL-E images
before I read Dave's entry into this fray... <br>
</p>
<p>I have beat GPT and Gemini around the head and shoulders a bit at
times to try to get it to expose it's own East/West (or hopefully
more subtle and gradated) distribution of knowledge/training/???
but mostly I'd say it reports (given I have the same intrinsic
myopias) on "Western" views of "Eastern" thought.</p>
<p>I do wonder if DaveW or anyone else here with more interest or
qualifications than I has explored the bi(multi?)modal
distribution in the LLMs?</p>
<p>I know EricS at the very least has some significant grounding in
linguistics (and semiotics?) and perhaps perspective on the socio
cultural implications of language constructions, etc. which might
be evidenced in LLMs as-trained by our tech-billionaire
(wannabes?) <br>
</p>
<p><br>
</p>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 3/22/24 12:07 PM, Stephen Guerin
wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote type="cite"
cite="mid:CAOmOqn+CMhQ7Ah=N1dZ1gamOnHiHTSjy_7+Sb9Nz2U0iLs-ZZw@mail.gmail.com">
<meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8">
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<div>Are you saying it's unique to a degree? ;-)</div>
<div dir="auto"><br>
</div>
<div dir="auto"><br>
</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div data-smartmail="gmail_signature">____________________________________________<br>
CEO Founder, Simtable.com<br>
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moz-do-not-send="true" class="moz-txt-link-freetext">stephen.guerin@simtable.com</a> <br>
<br>
Harvard Visualization Research and Teaching Lab<br>
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moz-do-not-send="true" class="moz-txt-link-freetext">stephenguerin@fas.harvard.edu</a><br>
<br>
mobile: (505)577-5828</div>
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<br>
<div class="gmail_quote">
<div dir="ltr" class="gmail_attr">On Fri, Mar 22, 2024, 9:31 AM
Prof David West <<a href="mailto:profwest@fastmail.fm"
moz-do-not-send="true" class="moz-txt-link-freetext">profwest@fastmail.fm</a>>
wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote"
style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex">
<div>
<div style="font-family:Arial">this is 'unique' only if you
exclude Vedic, Buddhist, Taoist, ... thought.<br>
</div>
<div style="font-family:Arial"><br>
</div>
<div style="font-family:Arial">davew<br>
</div>
<div style="font-family:Arial"><br>
</div>
<div style="font-family:Arial"><br>
</div>
<div>On Fri, Mar 22, 2024, at 9:54 AM, Stephen Guerin wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote type="cite" id="m_-1358957021482259866qt">
<div dir="auto">
<div>Prompt:<br>
</div>
<div><span
style="color:rgb(236,236,236);background-color:rgb(33,33,33)"><span
style="font-family:söhne,ui-sans-serif,"system-ui",-apple-system,"segoe ui",roboto,ubuntu,cantarell,"noto sans",sans-serif,"helvetica neue",arial,"apple color emoji","segoe ui emoji","segoe ui symbol","noto color emoji""><span
style="font-size:16px">Express a unique concept.
Make it as profound as possible</span></span></span><br>
</div>
<div dir="auto"><span
style="color:rgb(236,236,236);background-color:rgb(33,33,33)"><span
style="font-family:söhne,ui-sans-serif,"system-ui",-apple-system,"segoe ui",roboto,ubuntu,cantarell,"noto sans",sans-serif,"helvetica neue",arial,"apple color emoji","segoe ui emoji","segoe ui symbol","noto color emoji""><span
style="font-size:16px"></span></span></span><br>
</div>
<div dir="auto"><a
href="https://chat.openai.com/share/649bd4ca-f856-451e-83a2-01fc2cfe47fb"
rel="noreferrer noreferrer" target="_blank"
moz-do-not-send="true" class="moz-txt-link-freetext">https://chat.openai.com/share/649bd4ca-f856-451e-83a2-01fc2cfe47fb</a><br>
</div>
<div dir="auto"><br>
</div>
<div><br>
</div>
</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>
<div dir="ltr">On Fri, Mar 22, 2024, 6:50 AM glen <<a
href="mailto:gepropella@gmail.com"
rel="noreferrer noreferrer noreferrer"
target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true"
class="moz-txt-link-freetext">gepropella@gmail.com</a>>
wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote
style="margin-top:0px;margin-right:0px;margin-bottom:0px;margin-left:0.8ex;border-left-width:1px;border-left-style:solid;border-left-color:rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex">
<div>I guess the question returns to one's criteria
for assuming decoupling between the very
[small|fast] and the very [large|slow]. Or in this
case, the inner vs. the outer:<br>
</div>
<div> <br>
</div>
<div> Susie Alegre on how digital technology
undermines free thought<br>
</div>
<div> <a
href="https://freethinker.co.uk/2024/03/interview-susie-alegre/"
rel="noreferrer noreferrer noreferrer noreferrer noreferrer"
target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true"
class="moz-txt-link-freetext">https://freethinker.co.uk/2024/03/interview-susie-alegre/</a><br>
</div>
<div> <br>
</div>
<div> It would be reasonable for Frank to argue that
we can generate the space of possible context
definitions, inductively, from the set of token
definitions, much like an LLM might. Ideally, you
could then measure the expressiveness of those
inferred contexts/languages and choose the largest
(most complete; by induction, each context/language
*should* be self-consistent so we shouldn't have to
worry about that).<br>
</div>
<div> <br>
</div>
<div> And if that's how things work (I'm not saying it
is), then those "attractors" with the finest
granularity (very slow to emerge, very resistant to
dissolution) would be the least novel. Novelty
(uniqueness) might then be defined in terms of
fragility, short half-life, missable opportunity.
But that would also argue that novelty is either
less *real* or that the universe/context/language is
very *open* and the path from fragile to robust
obtains like some kind of Hebbian reinforcement, use
it or lose it, win the hearts and minds or dissipate
to nothing.<br>
</div>
<div> <br>
</div>
<div> I.e. there is no such thing as free thought.
Thought can't decouple from social manipulation.<br>
</div>
<div> <br>
</div>
<div> On 3/21/24 13:38, Marcus Daniels wrote:<br>
</div>
<div> > In the LLM example, completions from some
starting state or none, have specific
probabilities. An incomplete yet-unseen (unique)
utterance would be completed based on prior
probabilities of individual tokens.<br>
</div>
<div> > <br>
</div>
<div> > I agree that raw materialist uniqueness
won't necessarily or often override constraints of a
situation. For example, if an employer instructs an
employee how to put a small, lightweight product in
a box, label it, and send it to a customer by UPS,
the individual differences metabolism of the
employees aren't likely to matter much when shipping
more small, lightweight objects to other customers.
It could be the case for a professor and student
too. The attractors come from the instruction or
the curriculum. One choice constrains the next.<br>
</div>
<div> > <br>
</div>
<div> > -----Original Message-----<br>
</div>
<div> > From: Friam <<a
href="mailto:friam-bounces@redfish.com"
rel="noreferrer noreferrer noreferrer noreferrer"
target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true"
class="moz-txt-link-freetext">friam-bounces@redfish.com</a>>
On Behalf Of glen<br>
</div>
<div> > Sent: Thursday, March 21, 2024 11:50 AM<br>
</div>
<div> > To: <a href="mailto:friam@redfish.com"
rel="noreferrer noreferrer noreferrer noreferrer"
target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true"
class="moz-txt-link-freetext">friam@redfish.com</a><br>
</div>
<div> > Subject: Re: [FRIAM] the inequities of
uniquity<br>
</div>
<div> > <br>
</div>
<div> > I was arguing with that same friend
yesterday at the pub. I was trying to describe how
some of us have more cognitive power than others
(he's one of them). Part of it is "free" power,
freed up by his upper middle class white good diet
privilege. But if we allow that some of it might be
genetic, then that's a starting point for deciding
when novelty matters to the ephemerides of two
otherwise analogical individuals (or projects if
projects have an analog to genetics). Such things
are well-described in twin studies. One twin suffers
some PTSD the other doesn't and ... boom ... their
otherwise lack of uniqueness blossoms into
uniqueness.<br>
</div>
<div> > <br>
</div>
<div> > His objection was that even identical twins
are not identical. They were already unique ... like
the Pauli Exclusion Principle or somesuch nonsense.
Even though it's a bit of a ridiculous argument, I
could apply it to your sense of avoiding non-novel
attractors. No 2 attractors will be identical. And
no 1 attractor will be unique. So those are moot
issues. Distinctions without differences, maybe.
Woit's rants are legendary. But some of us find
happiness in wasteful sophistry.<br>
</div>
<div> > <br>
</div>
<div> > What matters is *how* things are the same
and how they differ. Their qualities and values
(nearly) orthogonal to novelty.<br>
</div>
<div> > <br>
</div>
<div> > <br>
</div>
<div> > On 3/21/24 11:29, Marcus Daniels wrote:<br>
</div>
<div> >> If GPT systems capture some sense of
"usual" context based on trillions of internet
tokens, and that corpus is regarded approximately
"global context", then it seems not so objectionable
to call "unusual", new training items that
contribute to fine-tuning loss.<br>
</div>
<div> >><br>
</div>
<div> >> It seems reasonable to worry that
ubiquitous GPT systems reduce social entropy by
encouraging copying instead of new thinking, but it
could also have the reverse effect: If I am
immediately aware that an idea is not novel, I may
avoid attractors that agents that wrongly believe
they are "independent" will gravitate toward.<br>
</div>
<div> >><br>
</div>
<div> >> -----Original Message-----<br>
</div>
<div> >> From: Friam <<a
href="mailto:friam-bounces@redfish.com"
rel="noreferrer noreferrer noreferrer noreferrer"
target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true"
class="moz-txt-link-freetext">friam-bounces@redfish.com</a>>
On Behalf Of glen<br>
</div>
<div> >> Sent: Thursday, March 21, 2024 7:49 AM<br>
</div>
<div> >> To: <a href="mailto:friam@redfish.com"
rel="noreferrer noreferrer noreferrer noreferrer"
target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true"
class="moz-txt-link-freetext">friam@redfish.com</a><br>
</div>
<div> >> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] the inequities of
uniquity<br>
</div>
<div> >><br>
</div>
<div> >> A friend of mine constantly reminds me
that language is dynamic, not fixed in stone from a
billion years ago. So, if you find others
consistently using a term in a way that you think is
wrong, then *you* are wrong in what you think. The
older I get, the more difficult it gets.<br>
</div>
<div> >><br>
</div>
<div> >> But specifically, the technical sense
of "unique" is vanishingly rare ... so rare as to be
merely an ideal, unverifiable, nowhere,
non-existent. So if the "unique" is imaginary,
unreal, and doesn't exist, why not co-opt it for a
more useful, banal purpose? Nothing is actually
unique. So we'll use the token "unique" to mean
(relatively) rare.<br>
</div>
<div> >><br>
</div>
<div> >> And "unusual" is even worse. Both
tokens require one to describe the context, domain,
or universe within which the discussion is
happening. If you don't define your context, then
the "definitions" you provide for the components of
that context are not even wrong; they're nonsense.
"Unusual" implies a usual. And a usual implies a
perspective ... a mechanism of action for your
sampling technique. So "unusual" presents even more
of a linguistic *burden* than "unique".<br>
</div>
<div> >><br>
</div>
<div> >> On 3/20/24 13:14, Frank Wimberly wrote:<br>
</div>
<div> >>> What's wrong with "unusual"? It
avoids the problem.<br>
</div>
<div> >>><br>
</div>
<div> >>><br>
</div>
<div> >>> On Wed, Mar 20, 2024, 1:55 PM Steve
Smith <<a href="mailto:sasmyth@swcp.com"
rel="noreferrer noreferrer noreferrer noreferrer"
target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true"
class="moz-txt-link-freetext">sasmyth@swcp.com</a>
<mailto:<a href="mailto:sasmyth@swcp.com"
rel="noreferrer noreferrer noreferrer noreferrer"
target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true"
class="moz-txt-link-freetext">sasmyth@swcp.com</a>>>
wrote:<br>
</div>
<div> >>>><br>
</div>
<div> >>>> I'm hung up on the usage
of qualified "uniqueness" as well, but in perhaps
the opposite sense.<br>
</div>
<div> >>>><br>
</div>
<div> >>>> I agree with the premise
that "unique" in it's purest, simplest form does
seem to be inherently singular. On the other hand,
this mal(icious) propensity of qualifying uniqueness
(uniqueish?) is so common, that I have to believe
there is a concept there which people who use those
terms are reaching for. They are not wrong to reach
for it, just annoying in the label they choose?<br>
</div>
<div> >>>><br>
</div>
<div> >>>> I had a round with GPT4
trying to discuss this, not because I think LLMs are
the authority on *anything* but rather because the
discussions I have with them can help me brainstorm
my way around ideas with the LLM nominally
representing "what a lot of people say" (if not
think). Careful prompting seems to be able to help
narrow down *all people* (in the training data) to
different/interesting subsets of *lots of people*
with certain characteristics.<br>
</div>
<div> >>>><br>
</div>
<div> >>>> GPT4 definitely wanted to
allow for a wide range of gradated, speciated,
spectral uses of "unique" and gave me plenty of
commonly used examples which validates my position
that "for something so obviously/technically
incorrect, it sure is used a lot!"<br>
</div>
<div> >>>><br>
</div>
<div> >>>> We discussed uniqueness
in the context of evolutionary biology and
cladistics and homology and homoplasy. We discussed
it in terms of cluster analysis. We discussed the
distinction between objective and subjective,
absolute and relative.<br>
</div>
<div> >>>><br>
</div>
<div> >>>> The closest thing to a
conclusion I have at the moment is:<br>
</div>
<div> >>>><br>
</div>
<div> >>>> 1. Most people do and
will continue to treat "uniqueness" as a
relative/spectral/subjective qualifier.<br>
</div>
<div> >>>> 2. Many people like
Frank and myself (half the time) will have an
allergic reaction to this usage.<br>
</div>
<div> >>>> 3. The common (mis)usage
might be attributable to conflating "unique" with
"distinct"?<br>
</div>
<div> > <br>
</div>
<div> <br>
</div>
<div> <br>
</div>
<div> -- <br>
</div>
<div> ꙮ Mɥǝu ǝlǝdɥɐuʇs ɟᴉƃɥʇ' ʇɥǝ ƃɹɐss snɟɟǝɹs˙ ꙮ<br>
</div>
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