ᛕᎥᕼᗷᗴᖇᑎᗴ丅Ꭵᑕᔕ @Kihbernetics@qoto.org

Most theories of #consciousness start with #information while a proper way to address any neural theory of consciousness should be as a #control science because the primary function of the nervous system is not to process information but to control the body.

Most control is internal to the system, a distributed, analog, homeostatic ***unconscious*** #regulation 1️⃣ of essential internal variables that are keeping the body alive and well. None of the mechanisms on this level "cares" about what is happening outside of the body.

Only on the next level do we find the kind of information necessary for the rate-dependent negative #feedback_control mechanisms 2️⃣ keeping some *external* controlled variables within limits engaging (through the use of regulators) in performing whole-body actions (behavior) in the immediate environment. Those actions can be conducted either ***consciously or unconsciously***.

Finally, on the highest level, we have the rate-independent, open loop always ***conscious*** #governance 3️⃣ maintaining the long-term goals and providing stability and direction to the lower level of control that will plan, implement, and track the fulfillment of those goals.

Even if you are gullible enough to believe LLMs are like brains, with their own 'minds', you must surely realize that they are 'brains in a vat'.
There are three ways one can take from here:
1️⃣ Use them as intelligence amplification tools;
2️⃣ Equip them with bodies;
3️⃣ Join them inside the vat.😏

For David Chalmers, virtual reality is genuine reality, at least until lunchtime 😀

https://youtu.be/7s0SzcUnzZo?feature=shared&t=637

A #representation is not something that can be found in an observer's mind. Representations are physical copies or models of the object they represent and they are all residing in the same domain external to the observer's mind.

According to #CS_Peirce, a #sign (the ***representation***) is something that brings its #interpretant (the #observer), into *the same sort of correspondence* (#state of mind) as the #object it stands for. Therefore, #information and #knowledge exist in a different domain internal to the system

#Representation = #Reproduction.

The representation can be a #copy, or the re-#production of the object using the same #substance the object is made of (e.g. a *carbon copy* of a page or a copy of a living cell). In contrast, a #model (a map) is the reproduction of the object's form in a different substance.

Unlike real (artisanal) art, the reproduction (copy) of "digital art" is indistinguishable from the original. In addition, what is usually referred to as the "digital copy" of a physical work of art, is, in fact, a digital *model* of the real object it represents.

>Although the history of science and ideas is not my field, I could not imagine adopting Alfred North Whitehead's opinion that every science, in order to avoid stagnation, must forget its founders. To the contrary, it seems to me that the ignorance display ed by most scientists with regard to the history of their discipline, far from being a source of dynamism, acts as a brake on their creativity.

***On the Origins of Cognitive Science*** - *The Mechanization of the Mind*

by J-P Dupuy and translated by M. B. DeBevoise

*An examination of the fundamental role cybernetics played in the birth of cognitive science and the light this sheds on current controversies.*

https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262512398/on-the-origins-of-cognitive-science/

A Springer Open access book from @decidim

**Decidim, a Technopolitical Network for Participatory Democracy**

*Philosophy, Practice and Autonomy of a Collective Platform in the Age of Digital Intelligence*

https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-031-50784-7

The difference between a #Transformer and a #Transducer is that a *transformer* can re**form**ulate (modify the form) of the same substance, while a *transducer* can re**produce** the form observed in one kind of substance into the *same* form but in *another* type of substance. This kind of *reproduction* is usually called the #model.

@tg9541

What is a better approach in your opinion?
I don't think you can evade talking about work and energy in general if you want to understand how life and the "self" came to be.

*Terrence W. Deacon* writes beautifully about this conundrum:

https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rsta.2022.0282#d7508913e1

I have a somewhat different position on his second statement, however.

I think there **is** a self that determines **how** the system responds to an external perturbation.

Found it! 😎. It is called the
***Maximum Entropy Production Principle (#MEPP)***:

>The so-called maximum entropy production principle (MEPP) is known much less (even among specialists in physics of nonequilibrium processes). This antipode, as its name seemingly means, of Prigogine's principle has been overshadowed by its more famous twin. MEPP was independently proposed and used by several scientists throughout the 20th century when they dealt with general theoretical issues of thermodynamics and statistical physics or solved specific problems. By this principle, a nonequilibrium system develops so as to maximize its entropy production under present constraints.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0370157305004813

A system doesn't ***feed*** on #order (or #negentropy) from the environment it has to ***create*** it.

You can't get your desk organized by just acquiring some order from the environment. You have to do some #work and use some of your #free_energy. Schrödinger admits as much:

#Life as the ultimate form of #self_organization is usually thought of as ***resisting*** the *Second Law* of thermodynamics that says all #order eventually dissipates over time into a state of thermal equilibrium and enduring uniformity (disorder).

An alternative explanation says that organization (order) spontaneously emerges in dissipative structures ***because*** of the Second Law of Thermodynamics because ordered structures are much better at dissipating energy (thus more rapidly increasing the #entropy) than disordered ones.

The explanation (for which I now can't find the proper reference😟) exemplified this with whirlpools and how they spontaneously emerge because the water molecules in them don't bump into each other as much so the flow through the drain (transition to an equilibrium state) is faster when they are streamlined (organized) into a vortex.

@psybertron @tg9541

Cybernetics has a peculiar relationship with the topic of self-organization. I don't recall Wiener having ever taken this matter seriously, von Foerster thought a system is "feeding" on the order from the environment, and this is Ashby talking about "self" organization requiring the presence of another machine.
That's why I had to "invent" Kihbernetics and return to the basics.😀

@tg9541 @psybertron

That's precisely the point I'm trying to make. Any mindset that is based on the distinction between the #controlled and the #control system, must be very attractive to would-be dictators.

@tg9541 @psybertron

Yes. I think the emergence of modern computing in the same period didn't help cybernetics at all because everything was (and still is) considered as "computation", although the ever-increasing power of computation, as Ashby noted, allowed the analysis and simulation of "medium complexity" systems along with traditional deterministic and stochastic methods for dealing with the extreme cases.

@psybertron @tg9541

Agree. I think Ashby's "noble" objective should be the real purpose:

>Cybernetics offers one set of concepts that, by having exact
correspondences with each branch of science can thereby bring them into exact relation with one other.

But then many, including Wiener, had a narrow misguided view when worrying about the "wrong use" of cybernetic automation in "enslaving" humanity.

@psybertron @tg9541

I would be very interested in any reference to examples of how to use of cybernetic thinking "to understand how to guard against totalitarian/amoral/ideological (control) purposes".

#Trust is #Experience over #Time.

@tg9541

#AI, like all other machines we invented, produced, and use in our daily lives is an #amplifier of our ability to #reason, in the same way that cybernetic #automation was (is) an amplifier of our ability to better (with more power) #control our environment, and radios, computers, the #internet, and social media in particular, are all amplifiers of our #communication capabilities.

Amplifiers do not care what they "amplify", so if you have "garbage in" you can be assured that you'll get much more "garbage out", and because amplifiers are very sensitive to ***positive*** (reinforcing) #feedback, you need some reliable ***negative*** (regulation) feedback to keep them in check.

#AI and #Trust

>I trusted a lot today. I trusted my phone to wake me on time. I trusted Uber to arrange a taxi for me, and the driver to get me to the airport safely. I trusted thousands of other drivers on the road not to ram my car on the way. At the airport, I trusted ticket agents and maintenance engineers and everyone else who keeps airlines operating. And the pilot of the plane I flew in. And thousands of other people at the airport and on the plane, any of which could have attacked me. And all the people that prepared and served my breakfast, and the entire food supply chain—any of them could have poisoned me. When I landed here, I trusted thousands more people: at the airport, on the road, in this building, in this room. And that was all before 10:30 this morning.

https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2023/12/ai-and-trust.html