Culture war : empathy

From a comment thread : I was thinking about 

• (a) the feminist complaint that women are more empathetic, and that men take advantage of it and should stop taking advantage of it, and
• (b) the unwieldy rebuttal that, women should stop being more empathetic than men

I think it would be very interesting public policy to ban people from helping each other - and to make each person focus their work on themselves. ( There are numerous permutations of how you could build an entire governance culture around this - I'll save that for future imaginations. )

If nothing else, it would make a great concept for a piece of sci-fi.

--

👏 empathy 👏 is 👏 fun 👏 but 👏 shame 👏 on 👏 you 👏 if 👏 you 👏 idolise 👏 it.

Feminism vs. Patriarchy sometimes just ends up being unmasked as Humanism vs. Nihilism. It doesn't have to be that way. I think equal rights are nice, AND it's fair game for the birthing sex to choose to go full Lysistrata on reproduction (and I'm not talking about the pleasure of sex) so that the species just dies off. If the labour of birth bothers anyone, they should really just say "fuck the species, it's not on me".

Did you see my earlier post today on in vitro births being harder and more underfunded than AGI at this point in history?

Pacing of Strength and Cardio work

[ Per muscle group ]

- if no AMS or DOMS

- start day

- apply strength optimising repset ratios

- stop at failure, or moderate AMS

- end day

- if DOMS

- start day

- cardio

- end day

Daily Risk Review

Daily risk review. Bones, skin, what's in between. Easily torn, bruised, digested. Skills, friends, thoughts. Easily forgotten. Stone, steel, plastic, paper. Easily broken. Debt, equity, currency, contracts, easily lost or stolen. Such is the frailty of man.

Active, Reflective, Passive

I haven't been resting actively, enough. So recovery has been slower. See notes on increasing haptic stimuli during rest. The act of R&R at the neurological level is actually a controlled feedback loop of increasing efficiencies of operation, it is a learning process. Most people are focused on generating input data to this process during gross exercise, and the output learnings are applied in future iterations of gross exercise - so they do not think about generating inputs and outputs during rest ... rest is very passive for them.

Whereas a more active approach to resting uses the lower risk environment to study how the body reacts to motor commands and imagined states of mind, generating output learnings during the rest state. Perhaps it is appropriate to qualify this not as "active vs passive" time, but as "primary active vs secondary active vs passive time", or "active vs reflective vs passive" time.

Thus one "sleeps faster".

Pain Economics

Generally most motivation is attributable to reactions against pain. Pleasure is spoken of as useful, but biochemically it also acts to numb pain, which is its main contribution to economics. 

For example, when I look at the economics of where I spend my days, I find that the following are equally troublesome :

• (a) physical conditioning : for example, learning how to swim, or run
• (b) verbal conditioning : for example, learning how to use new languages, regardless of whether they are domain-specific languages or general-purpose languages
• (c) social conditioning : for example, ingesting the culture of individuals and groups, to understand their internal models of motivation and emotion

Most people in the working classes struggle with (c), as it puts food on the table. Some have jobs which are less political and more technical, so they are positioned more towards (b), whereas others are in manual jobs, and find themselves at (a).

In terms of pain, all are equal. However, other variables make the difference of where one ends up.

Algesic Calibration

I have recently begun the practice of placing a piece of wood with square edges beneath my work desk. It functions as a haptic antagonist. You could think of it primarily as a massage tool, but it appears to have another function : based on how much pain I feel when pressing against an edge, I can gauge how sensitive my nervous system is on any given day, in terms of hyperalgesia. 

This is very interesting. Hyperalgesia is a natural feedback mechanism in hypertrophy, being effected by various biochemical cascades. 

Two Go On a Date : A Play

Rough Draft 1 : 2024-09-19
Sufficient leeway is given in the sketch, so that the players may be of any gender, the media may be stage or screen or only sound, and the setting of the meeting may be any year between 2035 and 3035.

- - -

[ SCENE 1 ]

It was an ordinary weekend.

The one little thing on my to-do list, was to meet Chen, an ex whom I tend to avoid. But a short chat every few years, remains tolerable, and somewhat amusing.

[ ACT 1 ]

k : Hello.

c : Kay! Good to see you! What? Ah ... I see we do cheek kisses now, haha.

k : Muah. Muah. Was it easy to find the place?

c : Pretty easy. It's on the map.

k : Sweet. Good trip so far?

c : So far so good. Staying at a place not far from here actually ... I walked.

k : Oh is it in Henlow?

c : Yup. Tourist street, hopefully not a tourist trap.

k : Nice Nice. Let's order something.

c : Hi! Hot tea, please.

k : No coffee?

c : Not right now.

k : G & T please.

[ Server exits. ]

k : It's been so long.

c : It's ... been longer.

k : And you seem happier.

c : I'm not under a lot of pressure right now. Taking a bit of a break.

k : Reading a lot?

c : Not really, just ... well I was reading more at the start of the year. Now I'm just trying to feel healthier. So there's a lot of eating and working out. A bit splurgey, but what the hell ... now and then, it's okay. How about you? So you're ... in between jobs, again?

k : Just setting up the next big thing.

c : Always the next big thing.

k : Only big things for me!

c : Only little things, for me.

k : Haha, how is the nursery?

c : Sold it three years ago. Worked a bit elsewhere after that.

k : Seeing anyone interesting?

c : Always seeing someone, or two. Rarely interesting. And you?

k : Had enough of boys for a while. And girls. Just dating myself for a bit.

c : Stay safe.

k : Always safe. Not always happy. But safe, I can do.

c : Figured as much. Ah, cheers. [ clicks ]

k : [ smiles, and drinks ] Ah, so good, I haven't had a drink in ages.

c : Why not, you live here don't you?

k : In this city, but not right here, and I've just been too busy at work handing over and stuff.

[ ACT 2 ]

c : How long's it been ... five years?

k : Fiveish. Before that was ... seven, before we did dinner.

c : And dinner was six years after we met.  

k : My god, I was so young.

c : You wanted to get married. I mean you would joke about it.

k : Flights of fancy.

c : I could never tell when you were kidding, if you really wanted something, or if you really just wanted to think about things aloud.

k : It's okay.

c : Whole different world away.

k : The last time we met - AI was so trendy. NVIDIA was so hot.

c : Did you make money on NVIDIA?

k : Of course! 

c : Of course. Ambitious little thing.

k : And when I called you, you weren't sure if it was me! Asshole!

c : Er, well, that was precisely the point in time when they started to be indistinguishable, the deep fakes, right?

k : And now ...

c : HAHA ... fuckin now I wouldn't know if you were real or not.

k : Haha, no you wouldn't, would you?

c : As expected. Nothing new for me.

k : You always say things like that, you know-it-all.

c : Are you real?

k : Fuck you! 

c : Haha, I wouldn't know. Frankly I don't care. I take it for granted that anyone around me could be a bot.

k : Really. So absurd.

c : But you know they're like, indistinguishable, at this point.

k : But not everyone can afford one.

c : You could always have afforded one, haha.

k : Oh come on. [ giggles ] Do you doubt it's really me?

c : As much as anything is dubious. [ raspberry ]

k : Fifty-year-old sticking their tongue out at me. Absurd!

c : How would you know it was me?

k : Because you're such an asshole!

c : No but really, you know bots can be remote controlled. 

k : I'll do you one better - at work they already have the new fully-self-driven ones. They're programmed to ingest a personality based on journals, videos, and all that ... takes about two minutes to calibrate anyone if you have good data.

c : Nice. Maybe I'll afford myself one some day.

k : Get a real partner. Nothing like the real thing.

c : But that's the point ... nowadays bots are indistinguishable. I hired one the other day.

k : You WHAT?

c : Call-bot. Don't ask if it was a boy or girl.

k : What the fuck. How would you know it wasn't a real person?

c : I didn't think too hard about it. Completely legal. Everything by the book. Just had a good time.

k : Geez.

[ ACT 3 ]

k : Now you're making me wonder.

c : Give me your hand. Looks like you. Feels like you. Trembles like you.

k : Enough, I'll have my hand back, thanks.

c : Always a little nervous. But that's the thing - it doesn't seem like it's possible nowadays to tell a person from a bot. You said so yourself, two minutes for a basic calibration.

k : I need another drink.

c : Do you remember how I used to joke that we should do something like the Before trilogy and meet up every few years.

k : Well we're doing it. It's not ten years in between meetings, but we're doing it.

c : What else do you remember? Shaking your head again.

k : Gosh, I was so young.

c : You're still young.

k : You're still old.

c : I still love you.

k : HAha. How does a bot prove it?

c : I love a lot of people. Don't get too excited.

k : Chen! 

c : NOW you wanna touch my thigh.

k : Hahaha.

[ ACT 4 ]

c : Do you remember the first time we kissed?

k : No.

c : Traffic lights. You were shy, and gave me your cheek. And then after we parked, you kissed me properly - it was surprising.

k : By the park, was it.

c : By the park. With the flashing lights, as the cops passed.

k : I don't remember the cops.

c : I remember everything.

k : I remember you made me sad.

c : You said, it was in a good way.

k : Are you still not sure, I'm me.

c : I've never been sure, about what you are.

k : What's that supposed to mean?

c : I just knew that you wanted different things than I did, so you I had to let you go and get them. Look at you! All grown up, with your own things now.

k : Such a long time ago.

c : Do you never think about it.

k : Never. Always. I don't know.

c : You said, the last time we met, you'd outgrown me. That was a relief.

k : I did? 

c : You said, you did. Whatever.

k : Another missing bit of programming. I'll have to check with mission control when I get back to base.

c : Haha, you little fucker.

Wrong ways to exercise

The main benefits of moving the body are neurological. So the worst way to move the body, is with minimal involvement of the nervous system. Here is a tell-tale sign that you're doing it wrong : something feel repetitive. 

What? You might think, ten thousand steps, of course it's repetitive ... but that just means you weren't paying attention. And if you weren't paying attention to the MANY details of EACH step, then you wasted a lot of time, and many more opportunities to tactically optimise the boundary between yourself and your environment.

People talk about mindfulness a lot, but it's often in very abstract terms. Here it's laid out, clear as day ... these are the very details which are missing in many people's appreciation of physical activity.

"Malay tears."

"Malay tears."

Someone asked in a Malaysia Travel Group what unique souvenirs they could get in Malaysia.

I commented, as quoted, without sarcasm. There is no other region of the world which identifies so strongly as "Malay", and here our outrage based on racial identity is a day to day affair ... there is,  really, an abundance of said liqueur.

My comment was removed, and I was given a warning by the group administrators, something about kindness, so I am reposting it here.

In another group, someone asked about the best anti-aging cream. Of course, I commented, "ice cream".

Switching back to hipster cafe mode ... perhaps Malay Tears should be a flavour of ice cream.

Model Building, Model Destruction, Data Structures

The first thing that most people don't understand about "artificial" intelligence, is "organic" intelligence. Because very few people are familiar with quantifying human experiences, there is no wide-spread and commonly agreed on state of this art.

On the other hand, the venture capital marketing cycle has popularised wide-spread and commonly agreed on states of the art, for machine learning as of 2024. Unfortunately these are commercial distractions from fundamentals, which will have their time, and pass. They will have their time now because many of these currently popular concepts have had their time before, being hardly new ... their predecessors sprung up in previous summers and wilted before winter, time and time again. What has changed of late is mainly a matter of decreased costs of computing - the algorithms didn't get much better, but it got a lot cheaper to run bad algorithms. There is a place in the world for things like neural networks, but they are not the main hurdle for building machines which are indistinguishable from meaty humans.

Know thyself, it is said. Human consciousness consists of specific data structures. At the "micro" level, the atoms of experience are merely functions in fields of multi-modal sensation. At the "macro" level, the chemistry of social interaction is largely down to classifications of motivation and emotion.

Back to commercial viability. What can we look forward to? Well, most superficial art and design problems are down to the "microaesthetic" sort of data structure. Whereas, ( sales and marketing ( is talent management ( is politics ) ) ) is pretty much down to "macroaesthetic" data structures.

None of this is really new to me - since I worked on it in college a couple of decades ago. I just always when the rest of the world will figure it out. 

Meanwhile, this week I have been working on my own physical and mental conditioning, in a transitory phase between projects. I have been working on forgetting things faster, so that I can reuse my short- and mid-term memory for new things. As a heuristic, I reminded myself today, that I should think of my own short/mid-term memory management as a matter of "building models" and "destroying models". Models are simply sets of vertexes between data. The same sorts of data I referred to above.