Wednesday, November 20, 2024

#325 / How Would You Like To Date A Fake?



Eli Tan, I believe, is a real person. His picture is below. Above, you will see some people who are not real. I guess they might be friends of Tan.


Tan writes for The New York Times, and he has suggested that it may well make sense to "date" A.I. Clones, like those shown at the top of this blog posting. Tan's article, which advances this proposition, was published on November 15, 2024. It was titled, "Are A.I. Clones the Future of Dating? I Tried Them for Myself." To be clear, at least as I understand it, it was actually Tan's Clone who entered into relationships with other A.I. Clones.

It has been a long time since I was part of the dating scene (in fact, to be honest, I never really was). At the time I was Tan's age, I was forced to deal with "real" people, and I wasn't that good at it - at least not in the "dating" context. I don't give myself a high rating based on my personal "dating" experiences (which were, as I have just revealed, pretty much non-existent). 

At any rate, my experience, apparently - now long left behind - must be a fairly common phenomenon, and I guess that's the problem with trying to date real people in the real world. Let's make it easier! Let's use artificial intelligence to generate "artificial people," so we can deal with those artificial people and "practice up," before jumping into the deep end and having to deal with other human beings. 

After all, we don't let pilots fly planes until they have spent a lot of time with a flight simulator. Same principle! Let's learn to "fly" with dates who aren't actually "real." We'll get better as we sort through the artificial personages and then it's just one short step to "real flight," with the A.I. Clones left behind and an enduring human connection the net result of our simulated relationships. 

Does all that sound good to you?

Well, stodgy and old-fashioned as I am, I don't think "simulated" human relationships are the answer to ending up with good "real" human relationships.

Artificial sweeteners can make you sick. In fact, as I discussed in an earlier blog posting, they can lead you to suicide. My best advice is to accept the truth. As challenging as "real life" can be, there ain't no shortcut!

 
Image Credits:

Tuesday, November 19, 2024

#324 / Is "Digital Citizenship" Our Political Future?

 


Tracy Dennis Tiwary, who calls herself an "anxiety researcher," is a professor of psychology and neuroscience at Hunter College, The City University of New York. Tiwary is also the co-founder of Arcade Therapeutics, which "uses breakthrough neuroscientific research to improve mental health through casual, accessible mobile games."

Jonathan Haidt does not (as far as I can tell) utilize mobile games in his own work. Haidt is an American social psychologist who is the Thomas Cooley Professor of Ethical Leadership at the New York University Stern School of Business. According to Wikipedia, Haidt's main areas of study are the psychology of morality and moral emotions. He has recently published a new book, The Anxious Generation: How The Great Rewiring of Childhood is Causing an Epidemic of Mental Illness

"Anxiety" is the topic that has brought Tiwary and Haidt together in the April 21, 2024, edition of The New York Times Book Review. A "Q&A" with Haidt, commenting on his book, appeared in the Book Review on that date. On a facing page, Tiwary's review of Haidt's book, "The Rise of the Machines," evaluated Haidt's concerns. Incidentally, the title I just provided is the hardcopy version of the title of Tiwary's review. Online, her title is this: "Coddling Plus Devices? Unequivocal Disaster for Our Kids." Tiwary's review, online, has the following subhead: "In The Anxious Generation, Jonathan Haidt says we’re failing children — and takes a firm stand against tech."

As might be expected from someone who uses "mobile games" in her medical practice, Tiwary is not persuaded that "tech" is causing us to fail children. As between "coddling" and "devices," it looks to me like Tiwary is thinking that "coddling" is doing the most damage. Here are the last words in what Tiwary has to say about Haidt in her review: 

Haidt writes, “what is happening to us? How is technology changing us?” His answer: “The phone-based life produces spiritual degradation, not just in adolescents, but in all of us.” In other words: Choose human purity and sanctity over the repugnant forces of technology. This dialectic is compelling, but the moral matrix of the problem — and the scientific foundations — are more complex.

Yes, digital absolutism might convince policymakers to change laws and increase regulation. It might be a wake-up call for some parents. But it also might backfire, plunging us into defense mode and blocking our path of discovery toward healthy and empowered digital citizenship (emphasis added).

Can a "healthy" and "empowered" citizenship be "digital"? If you think it can, give a point or two to Tiwary. But maybe citizenship, in the end, can't be "digital," and particularly not if you want citizenship to be "healthy" and "empowered." If you believe that there is, actually, a "real world," and that when we enter the "digital world" (completely controlled by massive corporations by the way) we are actually "somewhere else," then I'd say let's start paying some attention to Haidt's concerns. I think he is right that "tech" (like "artificial" intelligence) is not, in the end, our actual friend.

Since I was reading the April 15, 2024, edition of The New Yorker magazine just before dealing with Haidt and Tiwary, I am appending the following cartoon, which comes from that issue. I mentioned "artificial intelligence," and not in a positive way, in my remarks above. This cartoon is consistent with my own thoughts about how "tech" relates to "intelligence." 

Think about it! Maybe you might start agreeing with me that Haidt has the better argument, and that if we want a "healthy" and "empowered" citizenship, we need to get together with our friends, in the "real world," and start exercising our collective power. 



Monday, November 18, 2024

#323 / There's No Freedom Without Government



My title, today, comes directly from The Wall Street Journal. The statement that "There's No Freedom Without Government" serves as the headline on an August 28, 2024, column by William Galston. Galston's sentiment is not one that is normally associated with The Wall Street Journal, and I could not resist highlighting it - probably mainly for that reason. 

Very few of those who might read this blog posting of mine are likely to maintain subscriptions to The Wall Street Journal, and they thus might well find themselves shut out by a paywall if they try to read Galston's column by clicking the link I have provided in my first paragraph. Therefore, mainly to prove that I am not misquoting, I guess, I have reproduced Galston's column below. 

As you will note, if you read the column, which I certainly encourage, Galston's major argument is that the way that our government supports freedom is mainly by protecting those individuals who exercise their rights. This role of government is "defensive."

Now, I definitely agree that this "defensive" effort is an important role of government, but I would like to go a bit further - something referenced by Galston, but not truly highlighted. In fact, "government" is not only needed as way to "defend" individual freedom. "Government" is an important way for us to utilize our freedom in a "positive" direction. 

We are not just a bunch of individuals, who need a government as a referee/protector, to "defend" our individual freedoms. We are "together in this life," and we need to debate and discuss what we should do, collectively. "Politics" provides the process by which these discussions, ending in decisions, takes place, and "government" is  the mechanism by which we can take "affirmative action," collectively, to achieve our agreed-upon goals. 

"Self-government," which is the kind of government we have, means that "government" is not something separate from us. Government is, in the end, "just us." Government is the mechanism that we have established (and can change if we want to) that allows us, we ourselves, to take action together, to attempt to carry out projects which we have determined are appropriate and beneficial. Government is "affirmative," not just "defensive." Let's not forget that. 

Let's not forget that we, together, exercising our governmental powers, and utilizing the "government" that we create, have the ability to change the world! Our ability to act, together, to create the best world that we can dream of, is "freedom to." "Freedom" is not just "freedom from." 

Government gives us both kinds of freedom, and I think that our "freedom to" is, probably, the most important kind.

oooOOOooo

There’s No Freedom Without Government
Natural rights don’t mean much without a mechanism for protecting them

By William A. Galston

Since Ronald Reagan’s presidency, Republicans have called themselves the party of freedom, while Democrats have focused more on equality, justice and diversity. Now, Democrats are racing to reclaim the mantle of freedom. Their response to the Dobbs decision overturning Roe v. Wade was the opening gun in the bigger race.

To traditional conservatives wedded to the idea that freedom and smaller government are joined at the hip, this development might seem incomprehensible. Despite the populist takeover of the Republican Party, 8 in 10 Trump supporters say they prefer a smaller government providing fewer services, according to recent Pew Research Center polling. By contrast, only 2 in 10 Harris supporters want smaller government. More government means less freedom, conservatives say, so how can Democrats masquerade as the party of freedom? 

To find the answer, we must look back to the ideas on which the American political tradition was built. According to the Declaration of Independence, individuals are endowed with natural rights. But it’s one thing to have inherent rights and quite another for those rights to be respected and protected. Individuals can get away with violating others’ rights if there isn’t an enforcement power to stop them. That’s why government is needed—to “secure” our ability to exercise our rights—and it must be strong enough to do so. Government can go too far, and citizens must resist it—with their voices and votes, and through the courts—when it overreaches. Conversely, a government too weak to secure our rights is not more but less compatible with freedom.

What rights does the government exist to protect? Most Americans can recite the triad: life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. But preceding this passage in the Declaration are the words “among these are.” This language implies—and the Constitution’s Ninth Amendment underscores—that people have other unalienable rights as well, some of which are unenumerated, meaning not explicitly stated in the law. When government expands to protect these rights, it doesn’t exceed its rightful authority. 

The Sixth Amendment, for instance, states that in all criminal prosecutions, the defendant has the right to have the “assistance of counsel for his defense.” If a defendant can’t afford a lawyer, this right is an empty promise—unless the government provides one at public expense. In Gideon v. Wainwright (1963), the Supreme Court rightly required government to do just that. There it is: an expansion of government, but for a critical purpose.

Another example: The 15th Amendment says that neither the federal government nor a state may deny or limit the right of American citizens to vote. But for nearly a century after this amendment’s passage, many states flagrantly disregarded it and the federal government failed to enforce it—until the civil-rights movement forced the issue. Enforcement proved costly, complex and controversial. Once again, a larger and stronger government was needed to secure a fundamental right.

In his 1941 State of the Union address, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt outlined “four freedoms” he believed the government was obligated to protect: freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom from want and freedom from fear. The Atlantic Charter, signed by Roosevelt and Winston Churchill, expanded on these four freedoms and formed the core of the Allies’ fight against Nazism. These ideas about freedom eventually made their way into the founding documents of the United Nations. Far from being radical or un-American, they became the subject of some of Norman Rockwell’s most famous paintings. 

Freedom from want and fear affect individual liberty and prospects for collective self-government. “Necessitous men are not free men,” Roosevelt said in 1944. “People who are hungry, people who are out of a job are the stuff of which dictatorships are made.” He was right: Desperate times allow demagogues to appeal to people’s needs and emotions, and then no one’s liberties are safe.

When a government collects taxes, it restricts my freedom to use these resources for my own purposes. But without revenue, the government won’t have what it needs to carry out its responsibilities. The government’s existence necessarily imposes limits on us. Our rights, however, can’t be secured without such limitations. A definition of freedom that ignores this truth undermines itself.

In every society, some individuals and groups are stronger than others, and they’ll perennially be tempted to use their strength to the disadvantage of others. As philosopher Isaiah Berlin once wrote, “Total liberty for wolves is death to the lambs.” Government is needed to protect the rights to vote, speak freely, assemble peaceably, organize to improve workplaces and society, and compete as entrepreneurs on a level playing field. A government too weak to protect vulnerable members of society is too weak to fulfill its constitutional promise of equal freedom under the law.


Sunday, November 17, 2024

#322 / OMG. Really?

 

Robert Reich is pictured above, but I'm betting that you didn't need me to tell you that. I think it's fair to say that Reich is one of our better known "public intellectuals." Most of the people I hang out with, anyway, would immediately recognize Reich if they saw him on the street. Click this link if you would like to learn more about Reich. That link will also furnish you with a picture of a much younger Robert Reich. 

My blog posting today comes as a reaction to one of Reich's own blog postings, as published on Substack. Reich's posting on November 14, 2024, had this title: "Trump wants Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to be Health Secretary. OMG. Really?

Reich doesn't have much good to say about other recent nominations, either: 

Friends, 
Trump is giving his middle finger to America. 
Nominating the alleged sexual trafficker Matt Gaetz to be Attorney General, Fox News host Pete Hegseth to be Secretary of Defense, and bizarro Tulsi Gabbard to be Director of National Intelligence are acts of nihilistic disruption. 
Now, nominating conspiracist and fabulist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to the nation’s leading health job — overseeing the Food and Drug Administration, the Centers for Disease Control, and the National Institutes of Health, among other sensitive positions — is an act of utter hubris. 
At a time when the truth is a precious common good, and the public’s health is already precarious, RFK Junior has made a name for himself spreading dangerous health lies.... I knew Robert F. Kennedy, and Robert F. Kennedy Junior is no Robert F. Kennedy. If not for his lustrous name, RFK Junior would be just another crackpot in the ever-growing pool of bottom-feeding fringe characters encircling Trump like ravenous slugs.

In my immediate reaction to the election of Donald J. Trump to the presidency, I said that "we are now likely going to be presented with an incredible opportunity to renew the vigor and effectiveness of democratic self-government in the United States." This rather optimistic statement was based on my prediction that Trump, as president, would do things that would, ultimately, discredit him, and discredit his Administration, and would thus let concerned citizens make some very much-needed changes to our federal government.

So far, these early nominations (aptly characterized by Reich) provide some evidence that I may have been correct in my prediction. We may well find ourselves, sooner rather than later, with an opportunity to make real, substantive changes.

But to take advantage of the opportunities that will come, however and whenever they do, we will need to be actively engaged, ourselves.

"Self-government" does require that we be engaged, ourselves

Let's not forget that. Let's not drop the ball!

 
Image Credit:

Saturday, November 16, 2024

#321 / Philosopher President - That Crazy Old Man


I am betting that very few who are reading this blog posting, and who are, therefore, seeing the picture above, will be able to identify the person pictured. 

If I told you that the person pictured was formerly the president of a country you have heard of, and a country you may even know something about, I am betting that many people who are reading this blog posting would be quite surprised. This person doesn't really look like a former president, does he? Given the person's name (José Mujica), I am betting that only a very few would know anything about him, or have any idea of who Mujica is (or was). 

Until I read an article in the August 24, 2024, edition of The New York Times, I would have had no idea about who the person depicted was, and if given his name, I don't think I could have told you a thing about him. I don't think I would have even recognized his name.

That's my loss! This blog posting is my attempt to make sure you aren't as much in the dark as I was about former president Mujica.

You can click the following link for a Wikipedia write up on Mujica

If you do click that link, you will learn that Mujica, born on May 20, 1935, is "a Uruguayan politician, former revolutionary and farmer who served as the 40th president of Uruguay from 2010 to 2015." A former guerrilla with the Tupamaros, Mujica was tortured and imprisoned for fourteen years during the military dictatorship in the 1970s and 1980s. A member of the Broad Front coalition of left-wing parties, Mujica was Minister of Livestock, Agriculture, and Fisheries from 2005 to 2008, and he was a Senator afterwards. As the candidate of the Broad Front, he won the 2009 presidential election and took office as president on 1 March 1, 2010. He was the Second Gentleman of Uruguay from September 13, 2017 to March 1, 2020, when his wife Lucia Topolansky was vice president.

Better than reading Wikipedia, I recommend that you read the Times' article I have already mentioned. Online, the Times' article is titled, "How to Be Truly Free: Lessons From a Philosopher President."

Mujica is 89 years old, and is battling cancer. Jack Nicas, the Brazil bureau chief for The Times, based in Rio de Janeiro, visited with Mujica in August. Nicas reports that Mujica describes himself as "fighting death." Nicas also says, though, that "Mr. Mujica’s legacy will be more than his colorful history.... He became one of Latin America’s most influential and important figures in large part for his plain-spoken philosophy on the path to a better society and happier life."

If you can do it, you should read Nicas' report in its entirety. It may well be the case, however, for nonsubscribers, that The Times' paywall will shut you out. If that's the case, I suggest that you think about the few excerpts I am posting below. 

Nicas doesen't call Mujica a "philosopher president" for nothing!

How is your health?
They did radiation treatment on me. My doctors said it went well, but I’m broken. (Unprompted.) I think that humanity, as it’s going, is doomed.
Why do you say that?
We waste a lot of time uselessly. We can live more peacefully. Take Uruguay. Uruguay has 3.5 million people. It imports 27 million pairs of shoes. We make garbage and work in pain. For what? You’re free when you escape the law of necessity — when you spend the time of your life on what you desire. If your needs multiply, you spend your life covering those needs. Humans can create infinite needs. The market dominates us, and it robs us of our lives.

Do you believe that humanity can change?
It could change. But the market is very strong. It has generated a subliminal culture that dominates our instinct. It’s subjective. It’s unconscious. It has made us voracious buyers. We live to buy. We work to buy. And we live to pay. Credit is a religion. So we’re kind of screwed up.

Yet your speeches often have a positive message.
Because life is beautiful. With all its ups and downs, I love life. And I’m losing it because it’s my time to leave. What meaning can we give to life? Man, compared to other animals, has the ability to find a purpose. Or not. If you don’t find it, the market will have you paying bills the rest of your life. If you find it, you will have something to live for. Those who investigate, those who play music, those who love sports, anything. Something that fills your life.

How would you like to be remembered?
Ah, like what I am: a crazy old man.

That’s all? You did a lot.
I have one thing. The magic of the word. The book is the greatest invention of man. It’s a shame that people read so little. They don’t have time. Nowadays people do much of their reading on phones. Four years ago, I threw mine away. It made me crazy. All day talking nonsense. We must learn to speak with the person inside us. It was him who saved my life. Since I was alone for many years, that has stayed with me.

Yet the digital world is where ... life is now lived.
Nothing replaces this. (He gestures at the two of us talking.) This is nontransferable. We’re not only speaking through words. We communicate with gestures, with our skin. Direct communication is irreplaceable.

Biology is an important part of your worldview.
We are interdependent. We couldn’t live without the prokaryotes we have in our intestine. We depend on a number of bugs that we don’t even see. Life is a chain and it is still full of mysteries. I hope human life will be prolonged, but I’m worried. There are many crazy people with atomic weapons. A lot of fanaticism. We should be building windmills. Yet we spend on weapons. What a complicated animal man is. He’s both smart and stupid.
 
Image Credit:

Friday, November 15, 2024

#320 / Cheating With Chatbots

  

Dr. Jacob Riyeff, pictured, is the Academic Integrity Director at Marquette University. Riyeff has little patience for anyone who would justify the use of Artificial Intelligence technology (A.I.) as a way to "learn." 

Recently, a brief and abbrievated statement of Riyeff's views appeared in one of the little "Daily Digs" sent out by Plough Magazine. Click that "Daily Digs" link if you'd like to subscribe. It's free. 

I agree with Riyeff. See if you agree, too. You can click the link at the bottom of the indented excerpt for a much more extensive presentation of Riyeff's essential point: 

Cheating with Chatbots
JACOB RIYEFF

I’ll admit it: I’m getting tired. Tired of pushing against the current of “AI” hype. Tired of explaining that having a chatbot produce answers for you is not education. Tired of explaining that, indeed, taking ideas and words you didn’t make and submitting them as your own work (without attribution) is plagiarism. Tired of arguing that thinking for ourselves and not pursuing cognitive offloading to massive for-profit companies are genuine human goods.

Whatever, I sometimes say. If students want to stifle their own social, intellectual, and, dare I say, spiritual growth and have chatbots do their work, just let them. Like I said, I’m tired. I’m tired of flailing to explain how what I find precious in life is in fact precious. Maybe I’m just being a stick-in-the-techno-progress-myth mud. But then I see what some students submitted as their own work this term, academic work that dedicated instructors would have to read and evaluate, and I once again feel like I cannot give up on saying all this.


Again, click that link at the bottom of the indented material to get a more extensive argument in support of Riyeff's position. I'll just add this, as a former college instructor. Each one of us is unique, and we need to celebrate, and elevate, and appreciate our own and unique selves. We are each worth it!

But to demonstrate that we're "worth it," that "each of us has his own special gift," as Bob Dylan says, we need to do the work, ourselves, to discover who we are. We need to do the work, ourselves, to find out what we know. Once we have discovered these things, once this has been revealed to us, we will then know, each one of us, what we think, what we believe, what we are uncertain about, what we know is true, and what we think might be true.... 

We need to reveal ourselves, to ourselves, and then to each other, in all our glory and our shame. No high-tech computer program can accomplish this on our behalf.

That work, discovering our own special gifts, and no "Chatbot," is the path to wisdom and the hope of the world!*

 
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Image Credit:

*No chatbots are ever consulted as these daily blog postings are prepared. In fact, as I noted several blog postings back, the reason I have been writing these daily blog postings for fourteen years is to make myself think about the "Two Worlds" that we call home. I am really very sorry for anyone who believes that "truth," and "reality" exists independently of those living, breathing (and acting) human beings now alive, and that "intelligence" is somehow available without an individual doing the work to discover it, and (even more importantly) to create it!

Thursday, November 14, 2024

#319 / The End of US Democracy?



 
That blurry picture, above, portrays Jason Stanley, who is the Jacob Urowsky Professor of Philosophy at Yale University. On November 7th, Project Syndicate published his article claiming that "The End of US Democracy Was All Too Predictable." Click the link to read the article. I don't think any paywall will prevent you from doing so.

In case you haven't guessed, Stanley is working with the following equation: 

Election of Donald J. Trump = End of US Democracy

It may well be that the election of Donald J. Trump was predidctable, as Stanley argues. You have, undobutedly, read lots of articles endorsing this proposition (usually accompanied with analyses of various kinds, demonstrating that "the Democrats," or "liberal elites," or Kamala Harris (to get personal about it) were so far out of touch with reality that they actually believed that there was a chance that Harris could be elected. Fond foolishness, according to these "day after" pundits. 

Those articles are worth reading, I think (I have been reading them), since they point out things that many might have overlooked. 

However (if I may be so bold as to say so), equating the election of Donald J. Trump with the "End of US Democracy" is absolutely uncalled for. Furthermore, it is dangerous to make a statement like that, since someone might actually believe that this statement is true, and act accordingly (i.e., give up doing what "democracy" demands). The equation that Stanley mobilizes (Election of Donald J. Trump = End of US Democracy) suggests that the only thing that counts in determining whether or not "democracy" exists is who the president is. In fact, Stanley goes back to Plato to argue just that. 

Just in case someone reading this blog posting might have missed it, the government of the United States was specifically designed to make it very difficult for a potential tyrant actually to acquire and utilize tyrannical power. That is what our famous "checks and balances" are all about. That is why our state governments are independent of federal power, and why our country is the United States of America, not just "America," plain and simple.

Does the election of Donald J. Trump put "democracy" at risk? I, personally, like to call it "self-government," but whether you say "self-government," or "democracy," the answer is YES! 

Has "democracy" "ended"? The answer is NO!!

"Democracy" (again, I like to call it "self-government") isn't going to "end" unless and until you, and I, and we all give up on the idea that we're in charge of our elected representatives (including the president), not the other way around. 

If I were teaching in the Political Science Department at Yale University (I did teach in the Politics Department and Legal Studies Program at UCSC for eleven years), and if Stanley were a student in my class on "Democracy," I would give Stanley's paper a failing grade. 

Don't let the "professors," or the "pundits," or any "politician" tell you that our system of self-government has "ended." 

It hasn't ended! Not yet, and it won't either - unless and until we all give up.

I guess Stanley may have given up. 

Not me! And I hope not you!


Image Credit:
 

Wednesday, November 13, 2024

#318 / John Donne And A Reader's Response



My blog posting from yesterday, featuring some words of wisdom from The Lorax, a wonderful children's book by Dr. Seuss, evoked a response from one of my readers. 

Let me say, I don't get many responses to my blog postings, which leads me to appreciate and treasure them when such responses are sent my way. My blog is not, actually, intended to educate or indoctrinate (or to provoke response and dialogue); it is, basically, the way that I have chosen to compel myself to "think" about the "Two Worlds" in which we live, and to document my thoughts. Still, when my thoughts are read and taken seriously by someone, I am truly delighted!

In this case, the response I received on my ruminations about the quote from The Lorax, the quote that I featured yesterday, struck me as important, and I have been stimulated to respond to the response! 

In connection with my "response to the response," I have called upon the assistance of John Donne, whose poem, "No Man Is An Island," is probably known to most who are reading this. Please feel free to substitute "Person" for "Man," to update the language utilized by Mr. Donne, who is pictured above. He was writing in the 14th Century, which accounts for his word choice. Most readers will not fail to note that the recent presidential election seems to provide some evidence that there are a substantial number of people who have not yet caught up with realities and language appropriate to the 21st Century, in which we now "live and move and have our being."

Please click here to review my blog posting from yesterday. Following is the response I received from a reader: 

I have that quote on my refrigerator. The quote ... is, of course, attributed to Dr. Seuss. And it shows a big dog lying down looking very glum, with those words above him. Yes, I care an awful lot. And among my friends and acquaintances, I seem to be out in left field. No one is an "activist" in any way. Most of my older friends don't even support environmental or humanitarian causes. 
All I can do is to write letters. And this week I will be writing President Biden, to tell him that his handling of the withdrawal from Afghanistan and the unbridled chaos at the southern border is what made people I know leave the Democratic persuasion. And of course, his decision to run for another stint in the White House lost ME, that's for sure! I wrote and called many times last year to suggest that he start looking for a male senator to take his place in the next election. Kamala made mistakes--bashing DJT instead of proposing much needed changes! That is exactly what PBS did in 2016. All we heard every night were the insane things that DJT said, and not one word about Hillary Clinton! 
We can't even call the White House! They never pick up the phone. And the V/M gives us only two minutes. And is only available Mon-Thurs from 10 to 4 eastern time, except even then, no live person ever responds. 
I'm done with politics, Gary. I have my own problems to deal with and I've been remiss in getting things done. No more. I'm dedicating my life to me now, since no one is taking care of this old lady BUT me! 
Thanks for listening.

My bet is that this response to my blog posting will have captured the thoughts and feelings of many who might read my blog. So... here is my response to the response: 

I completely endorse the idea that you need to “take care of yourself!” 
I guess my only observation is this. Who we “are” (even as individuals) is sometimes not “self-evident.” “We” are not only individuals. We are individuals, but that is only part of who we are. I often put it this way, in my blog: “We are in this together,” with “this” meaning “life.” To care for "ourselves," we need to care for others, too.
John Donne said it more eloquently:
No Man Is an Island
No man is an island, 
Entire of itself;
Every man is a piece of the continent,
A part of the main.
If a clod be washed away by the sea,
Europe is the less,
As well as if a promontory were:
As well as if a manor of thy friend's
Or of thine own were.
Any man's death diminishes me,
Because I am involved in mankind.
And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls;
It tolls for thee.

Tuesday, November 12, 2024

#317 / Someone Like You

   

 
A while back, I published the image above (and the poem) on my Facebook page. Lots of people "liked" it, and I thought it would be appropriate to republish it here. There are probably quite a few people who are not "Facebook Friends," but who, at least once in a while, do see the postings that I make available on this blog. 

Those who regularly read my blog postings know that I am constantly urging us to get involved, ourselves, in "self-government," and in "politics," arguing that we can't actually have "self-government" unless we do just that, and get involved ourselves

As Dr. Seuss tells us in his wonderful book, The Lorax, there will definitely be consequences (bad consequences) if we don't care "a whole awful lot." That observation absolutely applies to getting involved in "politics," and in "self-government." If we don't care a "whole awful lot," then "nothing is going to get better. It's not!" In case this hasn't occurred to you, let me suggest that the result of our November 5th election makes it more urgent than ever that we start caring "a whole awful lot" (and getting involved, ourselves, in that "Political World" in which we most immediately live).

Monday, November 11, 2024

#316 / Remembering The Club Of Rome




Earlier this year, The New Yorker reminded its readers about The Club of Rome. I am referring to an article by Idrees Kahloon, Washington Bureau Chief for The Economist. His article was titled, "The World Keeps Getting Richer. Some People Are Worried." It was published in the June 3, 2024, edition of the magazine. In the article, Kahloon reminds us that The Club of Rome, founded in 1968, has its origins in a rebellion against what the founders called our "suicidal ignorance of the human condition.”

The "ignorance" against which The Club of Rome was attempting to fight was, actually, ignorance of the following fact, a fact well known to anyone who has been reading my blog postings: "Our World," the world in which we most immediately live, is not a world that exists - or that can exist - on its own. Human civilization (another name for the world that we have created) is utterly, and absolutely, dependent upon the "World of Nature," and this "World of Nature," the world on which we ultimately depend for everything, is a world of limits. 

LIMITS! What a challenging concept! Our human tendency is to think that whatever limits appear to constrain us can be, and must be, and should be overcome by human ingenuity and enterprise. "Enterprise" is particularly valued by the billionaire class, and by the business oligarchs who largely determine what happens in our human world. 

The Club of Rome was talking about limits, way back in 1968, and placed itself in direct opposition to the idea that all apparent "limits" are simply temporary impediments to the realization that we can do anything we want to do. 

As I have said, often enough, in the daily blog postings that appear here, we can, in fact, do "anything," but only in the "Human World" that we create. My "Two Worlds Hypothesis" is insistent that we live in and have obligations to TWO worlds - two different worlds, both of which we inhabit simultaneously. 

Most immediately, we live in a world of our own creation. Ultimately, however, we and the human world that we immediately inhabit - and that we create - are absolutely limited and constrained by the "World of Nature," most typically called Planet Earth: 


I invite your attention to Kahloon's article. He is impatient with those, from Malthus on, who emphasize "limits." Kahloon is an advocate of "economic expansion," and he claims that efforts to promote economic expansion are far from being "part of the problem," as many declare. According to Kahloon, those who think that endless efforts to expand our economy is a problem are simply paying undue attention to a "myth we'll have to outgrow." 

Looking at that picture of Earth from space, it seems to me that while our planet is definitely commodious, it is ultimately limited. It appears that Kahloon has not yet come to grips with the fact that while we do have no limits to our human ingenuity, as our ingenuity operates within the world that we create, the ultimate reality we inhabit, revealed by that picture above, makes very clear that the "limits" imposed by the World of Nature are no myth at all.


Sunday, November 10, 2024

#315 / Forgive Us....




The photo above accompanied an article in Plough, a magazine that describes itself as "an award-winning international magazine of stories, ideas, and culture that appears weekly online and quarterly in print." Founded in 1920, "Plough asks the big questions: How can we live well together, and what gives life meaning and purpose in a complex world?"

I am supposing that the rising sun, in the photo, is intended as a talisman of what always comes with a new day: a new chance, a new moment, a time during which we can do things never thought about or contemplated before. The snowflakes, about to be warmed by the rising sun, are symbols of what has been in the past - so often beautiful - but which will pass away, as a new day comes, and as new opportunities and new possibilities appear. 

That's my own reading of the image that Plough chose to accompany its story, "The Faculty of Forgiving." The magazine also included the following, from political thinker Hannah Arendt

The Faculty of Forgiving
HANNAH ARENDT

Without being forgiven, released from the consequences of what we have done, our capacity to act would, as it were, be confined to one single deed from which we could never recover; we would remain the victims of its consequences forever, not unlike the sorcerer’s apprentice who lacked the magic formula to break the spell. Without being bound to the fulfillment of promises, we would never be able to keep our identities; we would be condemned to wander helplessly and without direction in the darkness of each man’s lonely heart, caught in its contradictions and equivocalities – a darkness which only the light shed over the public realm through the presence of others, who confirm the identity between the one who promises and the one who fulfills, can dispel. Both faculties, therefore, depend on plurality, on the presence and acting of others, for no one can forgive himself and no one can feel bound by a promise made only to himself; forgiving and promising enacted in solitude or isolation remain without reality and can signify no more than a role played before one’s self.

The key to the “predicament of irreversibility” is forgiveness.

Our recent election has provided us, now, with a new opportunity to act, and to act together, in a "new moment." Things never thought about or believed possible, before, are now able to step forth onto the stage that is, in fact, the "real world." (Shakespeare did, after all, have a pretty good handle on the profundity of human existence). As Arendt so rightly said, there is a solution to the "predicament of irreversibility," and forgiveness is that secret key. 

An article by Adam Kirsch, published in The Wall Street Journal, on Saturday/Sunday, August 17-18, made me think about what Plough (and Arendt) say about forgiveness. The article I am thinking of was titled, "The Ideology Behind Campus Protests Is About More Than Israel." The article spoke to the profound complicity of Americans in what is sometimes called "Settler Colonialism." Kirsch is not only a journalist. He is a poet and literary critic, too, and he well understands that "Settler Colonialism" is not confined to events in Israel and Palestine. The conquest of the North American continent, by the predecessors of people we now call "Americans," has, perhaps, been the model for what came later, all around the world. 

However horrible the sins we have committed, time has come (and gone) upon all our past, and we are alive right now. Let us, please, remember forgiveness. Let us, please, find within ourselves the ability to forgive not only those who have wronged us, but to forgive ourselves, for all the wrongs that we have done. As Arendt notes, we need others in order to be able to forgive ourselves. 

Let's give it a shot!

Amen.


Saturday, November 9, 2024

#314 / Hype Train

 


An article in The Wall Street Journal noted that "The AI Revolution Is Already Losing Steam." That link I have just provided is to the title of the article I am referencing. Here is the subhead: "The pace of innovation in AI is slowing, its usefulness is limited, and the cost of running it remains exorbitant." 

Let me give you the first few paragraphs, which ably sums up the story: 

Nvidia reported eye-popping revenue last week. Elon Musk just said human-level artificial intelligence is coming next year. Big tech can’t seem to buy enough AI-powering chips. It sure seems like the AI hype train is just leaving the station, and we should all hop aboard. 
But significant disappointment may be on the horizon, both in terms of what AI can do, and the returns it will generate for investors.
The rate of improvement for AIs is slowing, and there appear to be fewer applications than originally imagined for even the most capable of them. It is wildly expensive to build and run AI. New, competing AI models are popping up constantly, but it takes a long time for them to have a meaningful impact on how most people actually work.

I have been, from the beginning, and I continue to be, an Artificial Intelligence (AI) skeptic. Thus, The Wall Street Journal isn't telling me anything that I don't already think. Maybe you haven't been so skeptical. I have a friend like that, for instance, who has emoted with great gusto on how AI has been helping him in his work. As part of his job, he needs to provide memos about complicated governmental issues. Now, he boasts, he doesn't have to do any extensive individual research or writing himself. He just writes out the prompt, asks AI to provide what he asks for, and then he gets his memo in about thirty seconds. Only minor tinkering is required. It's a great time-saver, he says.

My friend has been working in government for over fifty years. Were AI to give him one of those Artificial Intelligence "hallucinations" we have heard about, he probably wouldn't be fooled. Why wouldn't he be fooled? Well, for fifty years my friend has been doing his own research and writing, and by doing so he has taught himself about the subjects that he has studied. Typing in a prompt doesn't require you actually to do any thinking yourself. So, for a new college graduate, using AI is a surefire way to stunt your own education and abilities.

Surely that's not good? Not the way I think about it, anyway! As I say, I am an AI skeptic. 

Just in case you are wondering, this blog posting was not produced by AI. I could have put in a prompt that said, "review the following article published in The Wall Street Journal [providing the link], and then give me a blog posting expressing skepticism about the use of Artificial Intelligence as a way to engage in public discussion about our society, economy, and political life."

I didn't do that. Therefore, what you're getting is what I, actually, think.

Took me more than thirty seconds to write this, too! 



Friday, November 8, 2024

#313 / Are We Doomed?

 

 
The New Yorker published an article, back in early June, that posed the following question: "Are We Doomed?"

I have looked through the "back issues" of my daily blog, and I can safely say, having done that, that I am definitely not a "doomer." I have written about "doom," right from the beginning, and while I am often pessimistic about what is happening, I always end up saying that we are NOT doomed. 

My refusal to stipulate to "doom," as bad as things are (and, of course, they can get a lot worse, too) is based completely on the fact that we can "act." 

I like to think that I can "observe" with the best of them, and what I see out there is profoundly upsetting - and "discouraging" would also fit. The New Yorker's illustration, above, outlines just a few of the existential threats that are all too real: (1) Nuclear War; (2) Biohazards and Biological Warfare; (3) Artificial Intelligence; and (4) Climate Change. This is definitely only a "partial list." Even (5), listing "all of the above," leaves out a lot of horrible  possibilities. 

As doomworthy as all of these threats are, we do have an antidote. It is often called "human freedom." What human freedom essentially means is that all extrapolations based on past and current practices do not amount to "inevitability," since we have the power to change what we are doing, and to do something completely new, something never even thought about or tried before.

The article in The New Yorker, the one I mentioned at the beginning, reported on a class at the University of Chicago called, "Are We Doomed?" Perhaps the magazine will let you get access to the article, if you click this link. I think it's a fun read, and I recommend it. The "subheading" to the article, following the title, is this: "Here's How To Think About It."

Are we doomed? Think about it the way I just explained. That's my advice. 

But thinking about it isn't enough, of course. 

We actually need to do some of those "new things," those things never ever thought about or tried before. We need to "act." That means, of course, if we're serious, that we have to change our own lives, on the way to changing the world.

Frankly, I wish I had been teaching that class!