AGI Significance Paradox: As progress accelerates towards AGI, the number of people who realize the significance of each new breakthrough decreases.

All Biological life on earth is possible because of a discrete digital mechanism of preservation and replication.

The mechanism of signaling between the superorganism we know of as bacteria and its ongoing war against viruses is through a digital mechanism.

The source of innovation in biology is in this milieu of microbiome and viromes that are ubiquitous in every complex multicellular organism on earth. Humans are walking ecologies and cannot survive stripped of these ecologies.

We can picture this as a cloud of digital interaction that surrounds all of us.

The cells of multicellular creatures however do not communicate in the same way as bacteria. The DNA of mammals are sequestered from daily activity so as to prevent wear and tear.

A children's book written in 1954 inspired by Wiener's Cybernetics that explains some common day analog systems:

Analog computation originally meant the construction of a simulation of another system by means of a mechanical or electrical system that represented the same dynamics as the physical system. That is an analog of what's being simulated.

Nobert Wiener generalized this idea in Cybernetics to describe control systems that through negative feedback promoted stability.

W.Ross Ashby argued that negative feedback was insufficient for maintaining the stability (homeostasis) of complex system. Ashby proposed the Law of Requisite Variety.

These machines that 'seem to think' are examples of what was known as analog computation. Cybernetics, control theory, biology are examples of analog computation. But what does this mean other than being the opposite of discrete/digital computation?

Interesting to realize that the living things that lay the foundation of the biosphere are extremely robust as compared to the humans that are destroying the biosphere.

Seed can remain dry and dormant for ages only to reborn when provided the proper nutrients. In contrast, most animals require a continual living vessel to reconstruct itself from its DNA.

Evolution appears to constantly perform tradeoffs between robust organisms and organisms that are adaptable. Co-evolution makes possible the development of complex species as a consequence of robust organisms.

We exist as a consequence of the multitude of less complex individuals that make up our biosphere. We are in fact symbionts that are in constant cooperation with our microbiome. Absent our individual ecologies leads to death.

We are inseparable from our microbiome, we are inseparable from our societies, and we are inseparable from our biosphere. The biggest lie we are told is that as individuals, we are independent of our world.

Chess may be a good analogy for explaining the difference between a descriptive model of reality and a generative model of reality.

A descriptive model of chess will describe the rules (i.e. initial setup, allowed moves, points per piece, objectives). This tells you how a chessboard might evolve and also narrows the combinations of realistic chess positions.

In contrast, a generative model involves the actual gameplay between competing players that follow the rules. It generates new styles and patterns. It establishes new strategies and tactics. It generates new openings, middle gameplay, and end game tactics.

A generative model is an evolutionary model that leads to emergent behavior. As a consequence, a master of chess is able to recall the layout of chess positions in a real game in an instant, yet is unable to remember pieces placed in random positions.

That is because causality is present in the movements of pieces in a chessboard. An intuitive system like the human mind is able to capture that causality as a means to understanding and recall.

1/Just had an interview scheduled with @goddeketal, Dr Simon Goddek, the post-doctoral researcher at the Faculty of Mathematics and Statistics in the field of biotechnology, at an unnamed Dutch university. This researcher has been publicly pointing out that the paper that...

2/ the PCR test as the gold standard underlying global "lockdowns" was passed after maximum ONE day of peer review, as opposed to the average at that same journal of 172 days in 2019. Also that several authors have conflicts of interest. Unfortunately we were forced to cancel..

3/ because he was strongly advised by his university to maintain silence and not speak publicly -- to step back from this issue. I learned from a source that his university was heavily assailed by many complaints. Other scientists who have signed the review criticizing the PRC..

4/test, the "Retraction Request Letter", a critique that got worldwide attention, have also been bombarded with attacks, their relatives are being called at night, and their universities assailed. Some are at risk of losing jobs. Even former employers are being harassed. I..

5/ Note : scientists around the world are being silenced and harassed if they speak up in normal criticism of the scientific methods or conclusions used to advance the lockdown agenda and COVID testing. This is not post-enlightenment scientific discourse, this is how scientists

https://t.co/xvP6tVlIaE
Quite a surprise. Ferguson isn’t qualified to comment on such things. He lacks understanding of basic biological concepts, partly explaining why his predictions are often so extreme.

That said, I’ll take him as an ally. It’s clear we’re already at herd immunity. How can I be sure? London had a huge peak of excess deaths in spring. The timing of peak deaths showed clearly that the pandemic was self-limiting. Recall much debate about whether the interval...

...between lockdown & peak deaths was long enough for lockdown to have been the cause of reducing deaths? The answer was “no”. But it was close & I can understand people thinking “well, it’s close, so perhaps it was lockdown that did it?”, thereby establishing a foundational...

...myth favoured by those who genuinely believe lockdown saves lives (it clearly doesn’t).
I’ll get to London & here immunity. But those wavering about the evidence about lockdown in spring really will benefit from cogitating on this graph.

In blue are the 30 trusts with the earliest date of peak deaths in spring. In red, the 30 with the latest peak deaths. For me, this is proof that national lockdown, which began Mar 23, played no role whatsoever in turning the pandemic. You’ll see some areas had peak daily...

Here is another very enjoyable conversation, with @Pandata19’s scientific advisory board member, Dr Jay Bhattacharya. Key ideas in this thread.

We are making world-changing decisions on the basis of evidence that is not very good. Vast scientific evidence tells us that infection fatality rates are much lower than originally expected. A small fraction of people get severe illness. 2/10

The scientific community has been resistant to evidence not supporting the majoritarian view, preferring instead to gin up panic, focusing on the worst case for everything the virus does & the best case for everything lockdowns do, and ignoring the range of uncertainty. 3/10

Academe is a strange place now, with debate stifled. But there's a sense some are opening up to considering opposing views. This is key, since suppression of views stops knowledge from progressing—the end of science. Public health norms of unified messaging complicate this. 4/10

Why did we, from the start, assume we knew nothing about this virus, instead of assuming a reasonable prior? Low susceptibility was evident early on. Assuming any virus is new is hard to square with our deep-time co-evolution with viruses, & their slow evolution. 5/10

1/This is a rant I had with someone while texting, and I thought it would make an interesting thread:

2/ Jim, If you come across any information, I still desire to hear any information on the state of our beleaguered union.