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HippyInASuit
Weed Farmer

Registered: 04/25/06
Posts: 49
Last seen: 15 years, 5 months
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The Last Question
#5570701 - 04/29/06 03:29 PM (17 years, 8 months ago) |
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I've been reading about something called the Singularity lately. It is fascinating to me on so many levels.
I'm in the computer field by profession and I find technology and computing interesting.
I don't follow any religious affiliation, but I consider myself somewhat spiritual and I want to increase my spiritual awareness. There are certainly philosophical and spiritual implications with this theory, and I'd like to discuss them with the community here, in an attempt to broaden my thinking on the subject.
The Singularity and the Law of Accelerating returns reminds me a great deal of some audio clips I heard, but I can't remember who gave the presentation! He referred to the concept of novelty and found a similar mathematical singularity over the course of years of research and contacting spirits using ayahuasca and 'shrooms I believe. Does anyone know who this was?
I also think of the Buddhist idea that we will all become enlightened and become a Buddha at some point. Meditation can take you there more quickly, but the course of nature is guaranteed to take you there eventually. I want to hear people's opinions on this!
Finally, I was reminded of an Isaac Asimov short story a friend recommended to me called The Last Question.
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SneezingPenis
ACHOOOOOOOOO!!!!!111!

Registered: 01/15/05
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Last seen: 6 years, 8 months
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I have made a few threads regarding this, but it never really caught on. Either people didn't care, too lazy, or it was over their head.
Get the book "The Singularity is Near" by Raymond Kurzweil. Greatest peice of non-fiction I have read.
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Darkcloud
tiwkcuFtsilihiN


Registered: 04/06/03
Posts: 1,331
Loc: USA
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Quote:
HippyInASuit said: The Singularity and the Law of Accelerating returns reminds me a great deal of some audio clips I heard, but I can't remember who gave the presentation! He referred to the concept of novelty and found a similar mathematical singularity over the course of years of research and contacting spirits using ayahuasca and 'shrooms I believe. Does anyone know who this was?
It was probably Terence McKenna:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terence_McKenna http://deoxy.org/mckenna.htm http://www.levity.com/eschaton/tm.html
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Icelander
The Minstrel in the Gallery


Registered: 03/15/05
Posts: 95,368
Loc: underbelly
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I also think of the Buddhist idea that we will all become enlightened and become a Buddha at some point. Meditation can take you there more quickly, but the course of nature is guaranteed to take you there eventually. I want to hear people's opinions on this!
This is a fun idea but there is no real evidence for it that I have seen. I adhere more to the dream state reality idea,(no hard evidence for this one either, which just goes to show you) where life and the Universe needs no other purpose then the exploration of one type of experience in an unlimited field of experience. Such as we dream of things that we cannot accomplish in our waking "real" (reel ) life. Each dream will be replaced by another and no final outcome in sight, or needed.
-------------------- "Don't believe everything you think". -Anom. " All that lives was born to die"-Anom. With much wisdom comes much sorrow, The more knowledge, the more grief. Ecclesiastes circa 350 BC
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Booby
Agent Mulder

Registered: 09/14/05
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I think the corporeal, as a unique experience, will always be attractive. So I don't think there's any danger of man giving up corporeal existence and bonding to machine (at least not permanently.)
-------------------- Let it not be remembered That mycelium eats detritus and dies But that life in all it's glory Counts mycelium to be on it's side.
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HippyInASuit
Weed Farmer

Registered: 04/25/06
Posts: 49
Last seen: 15 years, 5 months
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DarkCloud, it definitely was McKenna, thanks!
Icelander, I do believe that life is just the playing out of possibilities for the sake of experiencing what is know by God.
Psilo, I ordered The Singularity is Near and The Age of Spiritual Machines, both by Kurzweil a few days ago actually. I'm not sure which I'll start with yet.
I dug up one of your old posts and checked it out. I can see what you mean by some people not getting it. Through the links at Wikipedia I found the Friendly AI information you mentioned. The few chapters I read addressed some serious questions I had about how AI could be allowed to modify itself without abusing power and many other issues I would never have thought of. I still don't completely understand how it is proposed to build this Friendly AI, I gotta read the rest some time.
Friendly AI isn't necessarily what is going to bring on the singularity, though it seems as tough it is one possibility that would work, and is already in the works actually! Other possibilities include time travel and enhancement of human consciousness through genetic engineering and/or computer augmentation.
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dblaney
Human Being

Registered: 10/03/04
Posts: 7,894
Loc: Here & Now
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I also think of the Buddhist idea that we will all become enlightened and become a Buddha at some point. Meditation can take you there more quickly, but the course of nature is guaranteed to take you there eventually. I want to hear people's opinions on this!
"If you see a Buddha on the street, kill him!" This is a commonly uttered phrase by many masters. It's saying that if you see a Buddha elsewhere, somewhere outside of you, then it's not really the Buddha. You see, we are all already enlightened, we are all already Buddhas. It's simply a matter of realizing this. Once you've realized it, then you are liberated.
Nature is not separate from you, so you will at some point have to do something (or perhaps more accurately, not do something) in order to Awaken.
-------------------- "What is in us that turns a deaf ear to the cries of human suffering?" "Belief is a beautiful armor But makes for the heaviest sword" - John Mayer Making the noise "penicillin" is no substitute for actually taking penicillin. "This country, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inhabit it. Whenever they shall grow weary of the existing government, they can exercise their constitutional right of amending it, or their revolutionary right to dismember or overthrow it." -Abraham Lincoln
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redgreenvines
irregular verb


Registered: 04/08/04
Posts: 37,534
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Re: The Last Question [Re: dblaney]
#5573575 - 04/30/06 09:45 AM (17 years, 8 months ago) |
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some absurdities run parallel between object oriented programming and mystical assumptions. one of these is as it is above, so below. this could be taken as the salient character of fractal geometry. in any case, when working with objects, one hopes to encounter a kind of consistency for discovery, and life cycle, a reusability, and a sympathy with other objects in any package, so that they in turn operate as an object in a larger system.
in dharma, nature is the teacher, and man is a custodian who must learn from his charge.
I see a pattern in that
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exclusive58
illegal alien

Registered: 04/16/04
Posts: 2,146
Last seen: 5 years, 10 months
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Re: The Last Question [Re: dblaney]
#5573593 - 04/30/06 09:58 AM (17 years, 8 months ago) |
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HippyinaSuit:
Concerning the "Last Question" short story, it was pretty good, but from what I understand, suns are born and die all the time. The main guiding force to the creation of new stars is gravity, its called gravitational collapse of interstellar clouds. This force exists throughout the entire universe, and so do interstellar clouds. Therefore I doubt that the universe will ever see it's solar energy run out. Unless if black holes continue to behave they do right now, like cannibals eating each other out, resulting in even bigger black holes. If all black holes end up "uniting" into one huge black hole, then its very probably that all form of energy or matter will get sucked in.
And concerning the singularity theory, I've done some reading on it as well, and I tend to have more of a spiritual approach to it rather than a technological one. I see some people saying that the singularity will manifest itself by the appearance of real artifial intelligence, ie computers becoming aware, but I think awareness can only originate from biological life forms.
No, I see it as being more profound than that, i see the singularity as a turning point in human evolution as important as the appearance of language or the discovery of fire. I'm seeing patterns everywhere in our society, whether it be in politics, in physics, in technology, in ecology, in astronomy, in spiritual master's saying and writings...all the different "paths" seems like they're going to merge together, at one very particular moment in time very soon. I don't really know how to say it, and i'm not really sure of myself, but almost everyday i'm seeing signs that fit in with that picture, stuff that make me think that i may not be so crazy after all. I'm pretty excited actually.
I read a book called "Radical Evolution" throughout which the singularity theory is often mentioned. I made a bit of a personal summary of it not long ago, you can read it here
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Edited by exclusive58 (05/06/06 03:27 PM)
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HippyInASuit
Weed Farmer

Registered: 04/25/06
Posts: 49
Last seen: 15 years, 5 months
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The post you linked to seems to be okay now. I noticed a lot were messed up for a while.
I liked your post there a lot, thanks for pointing it out. I find it very interesting when there are so many different people explaining the same realization in different ways. It makes me think there is something to the idea and helps paint a slightly more detailed picture.
As for the issue in The Last Question about new stars being created, I thought about the same thing when I read the story for the second time, since I remember hearing or reading that new stars are being created in the universe.
Entropy theory still is true though, isn't it? Eventually the universe will runout of "gas," or, I believe that the other theory is the universe will implode before total entropy is reached. I'm certainly no expert in cosmology, btw.
I just say its a cool story that got me thinking.
Edited by HippyInASuit (05/06/06 11:57 AM)
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exclusive58
illegal alien

Registered: 04/16/04
Posts: 2,146
Last seen: 5 years, 10 months
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hey, thanx for pointing out that things are back to normal on that post. and i'm glad you liked it 
and i'm not knowledgeable at all concerning the entropy theory, sorry.
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explosiveoxygen
Prophet of TGMM


Registered: 07/10/09
Posts: 1,255
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Re: The Last Question [Re: Booby]
#11115374 - 09/23/09 08:43 PM (14 years, 4 months ago) |
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Quote:
Booby said: I think the corporeal, as a unique experience, will always be attractive. So I don't think there's any danger of man giving up corporeal existence and bonding to machine (at least not permanently.)
Why would it be a danger to bond with machine?
-------------------- The Great Mycelium (TGMM) is more than you and me, we are all part of One.
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