Re114-NOTES.pdf Notes by Retraice
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- Documentary
(The below text version of the notes is for search purposes and convenience. See the PDF version for proper formatting such as bold, italics, etc., and graphics where applicable. Copyright: 2023 Retraice, Inc.)
Re114: Visions of Loss
(Technological Danger, Part 2)
retraice.com
Human loss of freedom by deference to authority, dependency on machines, and delegation of defense.
Wiener: freedom of thought and opinion, and communication, as vital; Russell: diet, injections and injunctions in the future; Horesh: technological behavior modification in the present; terrorist Kaczynski: if AI succeeds, we'll have machine control or elite control, but no freedom; Bostrom: wearable surveillance devices and power in the hands of a very few as solution.
Air date: Thursday, 12th Jan. 2023, 10:00 PM Eastern/US.
All bold emphasis added.
Mathematician Wiener
Is this what's at stake, in the struggle for freedom of thought and communication?
Wiener (1954), p. 217:^1
"I have said before that man's future on earth will not be long unless man rises to the full level of his inborn powers. For us, to be less than a man is to be less than alive. Those who are not fully alive do not live long even in their world of shadows. I have said, moreover, that for man to be alive is for him to participate in a world-wide scheme of communication. It is to have the liberty to test new opinions and to find which of them point somewhere, and which of them simply confuse us. It is to have the variability to fit into the world in more places than one, the variability which may lead us to have soldiers when we need soldiers, but which also leads us to have saints when we need saints. It is precisely this variability and this communicative integrity of man which I find to be violated and crippled by the present tendency to huddle together according to a comprehensive prearranged plan, which is handed to us from above. We must cease to kiss the whip that lashes us...."
p 226: "There is something in personal holiness which is akin to an act of choice, and the word heresy is nothing but the Greek word for choice. Thus your Bishop, however much he may respect a dead Saint, can never feel too friendly toward a living one.
"This brings up a very interesting remark which Professor John von Neumann has made to me. He has said that in modern science the era of the primitive church is passing, and that the era of the Bishop is upon us. Indeed, the heads of great laboratories are very much like Bishops, with their association with the powerful in all walks of life, and the dangers they incur of the carnal sins of pride and of lust for power. On the other hand, the independent scientist who is worth the slightest consideration as a scientist, has a consecration which comes entirely from within himself: a vocation which demands the possibility of supreme self-sacrifice...."
p. 228: "I have indicated that freedom of opinion at the present time is being crushed between the two rigidities of the Church and the Communist Party. In the United States we are in the process [1950] of developing a new rigidity which combines the methods of both while partaking of the emotional fervor of neither. Our Conservatives of all shades of opinion have somehow got together to make American capitalism and the fifth freedom [economic freedom^2 ] of the businessman supreme throughout all the world...."
p. 229: "It is this triple attack on our liberties which we must resist, if communication is to have the scope that it properly deserves as the central phenomenon of society, and if the human individual is to reach and to maintain his full stature. It is again the American worship of know-how as opposed to know-what that hampers us."
Mathematician and philosopher
Russell
Will this happen?
Russell (1952), pp. 65-66:^3
"It is to be expected that advances in physiology and psychology will give governments much more control over individual mentality than they now have even in totalita
(The below text version of the notes is for search purposes and convenience. See the PDF version for proper formatting such as bold, italics, etc., and graphics where applicable. Copyright: 2023 Retraice, Inc.)
Re114: Visions of Loss
(Technological Danger, Part 2)
retraice.com
Human loss of freedom by deference to authority, dependency on machines, and delegation of defense.
Wiener: freedom of thought and opinion, and communication, as vital; Russell: diet, injections and injunctions in the future; Horesh: technological behavior modification in the present; terrorist Kaczynski: if AI succeeds, we'll have machine control or elite control, but no freedom; Bostrom: wearable surveillance devices and power in the hands of a very few as solution.
Air date: Thursday, 12th Jan. 2023, 10:00 PM Eastern/US.
All bold emphasis added.
Mathematician Wiener
Is this what's at stake, in the struggle for freedom of thought and communication?
Wiener (1954), p. 217:^1
"I have said before that man's future on earth will not be long unless man rises to the full level of his inborn powers. For us, to be less than a man is to be less than alive. Those who are not fully alive do not live long even in their world of shadows. I have said, moreover, that for man to be alive is for him to participate in a world-wide scheme of communication. It is to have the liberty to test new opinions and to find which of them point somewhere, and which of them simply confuse us. It is to have the variability to fit into the world in more places than one, the variability which may lead us to have soldiers when we need soldiers, but which also leads us to have saints when we need saints. It is precisely this variability and this communicative integrity of man which I find to be violated and crippled by the present tendency to huddle together according to a comprehensive prearranged plan, which is handed to us from above. We must cease to kiss the whip that lashes us...."
p 226: "There is something in personal holiness which is akin to an act of choice, and the word heresy is nothing but the Greek word for choice. Thus your Bishop, however much he may respect a dead Saint, can never feel too friendly toward a living one.
"This brings up a very interesting remark which Professor John von Neumann has made to me. He has said that in modern science the era of the primitive church is passing, and that the era of the Bishop is upon us. Indeed, the heads of great laboratories are very much like Bishops, with their association with the powerful in all walks of life, and the dangers they incur of the carnal sins of pride and of lust for power. On the other hand, the independent scientist who is worth the slightest consideration as a scientist, has a consecration which comes entirely from within himself: a vocation which demands the possibility of supreme self-sacrifice...."
p. 228: "I have indicated that freedom of opinion at the present time is being crushed between the two rigidities of the Church and the Communist Party. In the United States we are in the process [1950] of developing a new rigidity which combines the methods of both while partaking of the emotional fervor of neither. Our Conservatives of all shades of opinion have somehow got together to make American capitalism and the fifth freedom [economic freedom^2 ] of the businessman supreme throughout all the world...."
p. 229: "It is this triple attack on our liberties which we must resist, if communication is to have the scope that it properly deserves as the central phenomenon of society, and if the human individual is to reach and to maintain his full stature. It is again the American worship of know-how as opposed to know-what that hampers us."
Mathematician and philosopher
Russell
Will this happen?
Russell (1952), pp. 65-66:^3
"It is to be expected that advances in physiology and psychology will give governments much more control over individual mentality than they now have even in totalita