Mind Matters Natural and Artificial Intelligence News and Analysis

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social-but-not-social-stockpack-adobe-stock
Social but not social
Type
post
Author
Andrew McDiarmid
Date
January 18, 2022
Categorized
Relationships, Social Media
Tagged
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Relationship Advice: Think Before You App

If the people we are having dinner with matter to us, why are we always checking our phones?
Andrew McDiarmid
January 18, 2022
Relationships, Social Media

This story originally appeared at Newsmax as “You Can Actually Find Joy Outside Your Smartphone.” Recently, I took my family into town to get dinner. We live in a small community, in the country, so it’s a bit of an event to go out to dine in the city. Once there, I called around to see what establishments were open. Before I reached any humans, I was told to visit websites, download apps, and consider ordering online for pickup. One message even hung up on me without transferring me to a person. Finally, I found a place that would take us in and actually feed us. As we moved through the ordering line, one of the workers wore a shirt that made…

miniature people
miniature people walking on streets,people are moving across the pedestrian crosswalk in the city road
Type
post
Author
News
Date
January 4, 2022
Categorized
Relationships, Social Media
Tagged

The Strange Story of Google’s “Selfish Ledger”

If you need Google to run your life, this is definitely for you
News
January 4, 2022
Relationships, Social Media

At one time, not too many years ago, Google top hats developed the idea to push the rest of us to change society, as follows: The video was obtained and published on Thursday by The Verge. It describes a so-called “Selfish Ledger” that would collect all of your data, including actions you make on your phone, preference settings, and decisions you make, and not just keep it there for future evaluation. Instead, the ledger, which would be designed and managed by Google, would interpret that information and guide you down a path towards reaching a goal, or on a broader scale, doing your part to help solve poverty or other societal problems. In one example, the video describes how the…

crowd of same person
Top view of grey crowd of identical people and special one woman, difference and diversity concept. Unique among the faceless, not like everyone else. Shocked, wondered, going mad. Collage.
Type
post
Author
Stephen Berger
Date
December 31, 2021
Categorized
Relationships, Social Media
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How Do I Know If I Am Living in a Digital Ghetto?

AI-enabled tools can help to achieve the objectives of those motivated to create anger, fear, isolationism, or bigotry by manipulating our attention
Stephen Berger
December 31, 2021
Relationships, Social Media

I have recently been enjoying the PBS documentary on the history of New York City, part of the “An American Experience” series. With that in the back of my mind, I read design theorist William Dembski’s thought-provoking article, “How Does Worldview Differ from Cultural Environment?” I found myself contemplating various aspects of his argument and in this article, I would like to present some thoughts, using this statement as a launching point: When I taught apologetics at seminary, I would stress to my students that in doing apologetics, they needed to get out of the ghetto. Some seem to think that there is a Christian community in which one can isolate oneself. Beyond this Christian community there is a secular…

fetus hands
embryo silhouette in woman hand
Type
post
Author
Michael Egnor
Date
December 28, 2021
Categorized
Ethics, Medicine and Health, Neuroscience, Relationships, Social Media
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Political Website’s Christmas Gift to Readers: Promoting Abortion

FiveThirtyEight asked readers to share their abortion stories and got something it hadn’t bargained on: Many were glad it didn’t happen
Michael Egnor
December 28, 2021
Ethics, Medicine and Health, Neuroscience, Relationships, Social Media
If you want to understand the mindset of the abortion lobby, note that this plea for accounts of killing of children in the womb appeared on Twitter on Christmas Day. Read More ›
red-pill-blue-pill-concept-the-right-choice-the-concept-of-the-movie-matrix-the-choice-of-tablets-stockpack-adobe-stock
Red Pill Blue Pill concept. The right choice the concept of the movie matrix. The choice of tablets
Type
post
Author
Gary Varner
Date
December 18, 2021
Categorized
Artificial Intelligence, Arts & Culture, Philosophy of Mind, Relationships
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The Matrix Trilogy: Some Final Thoughts

I enjoyed the films and am looking forward to the Matrix Resurrections but there are some things I need to say as a reviewer
Gary Varner
December 18, 2021
Artificial Intelligence, Arts & Culture, Philosophy of Mind, Relationships

While waiting for The Matrix: Resurrections, December 22: I admit, I’ve given this trilogy a hard time. But I do actually enjoy the films… when I’m not thinking about them. There are some good elements, and I want to point those out before going further. First of all, the relationship between Neo and Trinity is solid. It develops with the trilogy and we don’t have to suffer through a bunch of “will they?/won’t they?” tropes. A viewer can get invested in their relationship, so it hurts when Trinity dies. I appreciate any film where this risk is taken, instead of breaking up the characters and then getting them back together just so the writers don’t have to show the relationship’s…

merry-christmas-and-happy-new-year-greeting-card-with-copy-spacemany-snowmen-standing-in-winter-christmas-landscapewinter-background-stockpack-adobe-stock
Merry Christmas and happy New Year greeting card with copy-space.Many snowmen standing in winter Christmas landscape.Winter background
Type
post
Author
Andrew McDiarmid
Date
December 16, 2021
Categorized
Relationships
Tagged

Reuniting Humanity, One Hello at a Time

The Smartphone has done much more than just reinvent the phone. It reinvented how we interact
Andrew McDiarmid
December 16, 2021
Relationships

This story originally appeared at Newsmax. (December 13, 2021) Lately, I’ve been noticing something in recent years that maybe you’ve noticed as well. We don’t hello to each other in the streets as we once did. Perhaps it’s a small thing; easily dismissed in an age of distraction and (often) manufactured problems. It is nonetheless disturbingly telling. For the better part of a decade, I’ve been taking a couple of walks during my workday. I work in downtown Redmond, in Washington State, which is home to Microsoft and a host of other tech companies. During my 20-minute walks, I see quite a few folks who exercise, walk dogs, bike, wait for the bus, walk for pleasure, or are just  trying to…

time-travel-machine-surreal-steampunk-technology-stockpack-adobe-stock
Time travel machine. Surreal steampunk technology
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post
Author
News
Date
December 4, 2021
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Are We Tethered To Our Time Despite Time Travel?— Sci-fi Saturday

A very short film about a girl on a mission to save her mother raises a profound philosophical question
News
December 4, 2021

“Tethers” (2021) at DUST by Matthew Steele Finley (uploaded at DUST November 24, 2021, 5:22 min) A woman travels in time to save another woman’s life but the risk could be far reaching for her own reality. Review: “Don’t kill your mother or anything,” the time travel technician (Larry Herring) warns Anna (Abigail Williams), as she prepares to travel back to prevent a tragedy set maybe thirty years ago in an upper middle class home. Not too many spoilers but Anna must attempt to persuade her future mother Rachel (Alicia Kelley) not to marry her father — a man whom she knows (the way the future knows the past) is not good for her mother. Sshe shows her mom the…

couple-in-bed-on-mobile-phones-ignoring-each-other-in-relationship-problems-and-technology-addiction-stockpack-adobe-stock
Couple in bed on mobile phones ignoring each other in relationship problems and technology addiction
Type
post
Author
Andrew McDiarmid
Date
November 18, 2021
Categorized
Relationships, Social Media
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5 Ways to Keep the Digital Marketplace Out of Your Home

Today, people who share living quarters interact much less, due to the constant presence of social media and other digital alternatives
Andrew McDiarmid
November 18, 2021
Relationships, Social Media

After a busy day in the public sphere, it’s a beautiful thing to come home. Our house is a sanctuary, a safe place to relax and regroup. And it’s where we cultivate some of our most intimate relationships. Up until the early decades of the 20th century, the family home was viewed as a private domain that should not be intruded upon by the marketplace. But the development of new technologies like the telephone, radio, and television blurred the line between our public and private spheres. Today, we give a host of companies and organizations intimate access to our family through our screens, subscriptions, digital assistants, and smart appliances. This erosion of our private time and our place of refuge…

man-and-woman-playing-game-using-virtual-reality-headset-and-gamepads-in-the-dark-room-of-the-playing-club-stockpack-adobe-stock
Man and woman playing game using virtual reality headset and gamepads in the dark room of the playing club
Type
post
Author
News
Date
November 6, 2021
Categorized
Arts & Culture, Philosophy of Mind, Relationships
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In a Futurist Game, Inmost Thoughts Are Real — Sci-fi Saturday

When a family plays the game, long-simmering hostilities surface as acts
News
November 6, 2021
Arts & Culture, Philosophy of Mind, Relationships

“My House” (2020) at DUST by Alexander Edep (Oct 25, 2021, 9:53 min) A family game night turns ugly when a protective mother, desperate to keep her turn in the game a secret, is forced to commit a heinous act that holds a troubling, family-shattering secret. Review: Don’t watch this one to relax. It features a futurist game played by members of a family (a couple with a teenage boy and girl). In it, just about any family circumstance can be simulated — and is. The telling touch is that the event that is simulated is just what one could see happening, apart from law, religion, civilization, and, inevitably — what the neighbors would think? The game feels like unconscious…

sci-fi-scene-of-the-creature-machine-invading-city-digital-art-style-illustration-painting-stockpack-adobe-stock
sci-fi scene of the creature machine invading city, digital art style, illustration painting
Type
post
Author
News
Date
October 30, 2021
Categorized
Artificial Intelligence, Arts & Culture, Relationships
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Worst Case: AI Robots Invade to “Help” Us — Sci-fi Saturday

A well-meaning AI attempts to “rescue” an impressionable child from the coming wipeout of humanity
News
October 30, 2021
Artificial Intelligence, Arts & Culture, Relationships

“Cera” (2021 ) at DUST by John Robinson Irwin (October 20, 2021, 7:33 min) An 11-year old girl’s loyalty to her parents is tested after an attack by her caregiver hints to a greater violent upheaval beyond their rural surroundings. Review: The story opens with Hailey (Cali DiCapo)and her father John (Jason Isaacs) finding her mother Maria (Maria-Elena Laas) stabbed, though not dead. Minimal dialogue does a good job at filling us in on an, at first, nameless horror without breaking the suspense. Thus, we sense that “Cera” is an intelligent caregiver but not a human being and that the child’s devotion to her could be fatal or… It gets creepier from there. Minimal spoilers but it’s not clear, in…

shocked-woman-holding-laptop-being-picked-blamed-by-many-people-in-the-internet-stockpack-adobe-stock
shocked woman holding laptop being picked blamed by many people in the Internet
Type
post
Author
Denyse O'Leary
Date
October 26, 2021
Categorized
Relationships, Social Media
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Silicon Valley: From Laid Back Hippies to Top Cops…What Happened?

A political science prof traces the steps by which the naive assumptions of the early Valley morphed into shadow banning, outright banning, and so forth
Denyse O'Leary
October 26, 2021
Relationships, Social Media

Political scientist Jon Askonas offers a grim but somehow strengthening look at how Silicon Valley morphed from Apple’s revolt against 1984 to an increasingly comfortable relationship with totalitarian China. We must, he says, go back to the beginning. First, this is how Apple saw itself in 1984: Most of Silicon Valley saw itself that way — liberating people from authoritarianism. So what happened? In an incisive essay at The New Atlantis, Askonas offers some thoughts on what’s changed: ➤ First, he says, the Valley was very much influenced by 1970s California hippie beliefs about human nature that did not long survive realities like this: Faced with deadly riots in unstable societies caused by Facebook posts, Facebook tweaked its algorithms in…

Group of people holding hands praying worship believe
Type
post
Author
Denyse O'Leary
Date
October 24, 2021
Categorized
Ethics, Philosophy of Mind, Relationships
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Compassion and Religion: Darwin’s Unscratchable Itches

If one’s research is in a hole as deep as evolutionary psychology is when accounting for compassion, why not stop digging?
Denyse O'Leary
October 24, 2021
Ethics, Philosophy of Mind, Relationships

Last Sunday, I pointed to a chapter I wrote in The Comprehensive Guide to Science and Faith: Exploring the Ultimate Questions About Life and the Cosmos (2021) on evolutionary psychology, best understood as the psychology we have derived from our not-quite-human ancestors. “Not-quite-human ancestors”? Well, if you believe in conventional evolution theory at all, you must suppose that we have not-quite-human ancestors. Thus, to understand the origin of traits like giving to the Heart & Stroke Fund or subscribing to popular science magazines, we must get back to a point before any such institutions could have existed but there was some sort of dim potential. But we can’t really do that because, as noted last Sunday, there is no such…

cute-white-english-bulldog-puppy-in-a-graduation-cap-stockpack-adobe-stock
Cute white English Bulldog puppy in a graduation cap
Type
post
Author
News
Date
October 21, 2021
Categorized
Mathematics, Relationships, Social Media
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Tested!: Are the Least Expert People the Most Confident? No.

The claimed Dunning–Kruger effect in psychology is a very shakeable truth frequently exploited by online social bullies
News
October 21, 2021
Mathematics, Relationships, Social Media

Have you ever been in an online discussion where a vocal proponent confidently claimed that his opponent was the victim of the dreaded “Dunning–Kruger” effect? At Vox, Brian Resnick explains, “That’s where people of low ability — let’s say, those who fail to answer logic puzzles correctly — tend to unduly overestimate their abilities”: An obvious example people have been using lately to describe the Dunning-Kruger effect is President Donald Trump, whose confidence and bluster never wavers, despite his weak interest in and understanding of policy matters. But you don’t need to look to Trump to find an example of the Dunning-Kruger effect. You don’t even need to look at cable news. Brian Resnick, “An expert on human blind spots…

cute-handmade-reborn-baby-doll-stockpack-adobe-stock
Cute handmade reborn baby doll
Type
post
Author
Eric Holloway
Date
October 12, 2021
Categorized
Artificial Intelligence, Relationships
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Is GPT-3 the “Reborn Doll” of Artificial Intelligence?

Unlike the reality doll collectors, GPT-3 engineers truly believe that scaling up the model size will suddenly cause GPT-3 to think and talk like a real human
Eric Holloway
October 12, 2021
Artificial Intelligence, Relationships

There is a worldwide community that collects “reborn dolls.” These dolls look almost like real babies. Look again, closely, at the featured photo above… They help some collectors cope with the loss of a child. For others, it fulfills their sense of self image. And yet others just see them as a quirky hobby. Regardless of how much the baby dolls mimic the appearance of real dolls, the dolls will forever remain copies because the external appearances are not generated by biological processes. For the collectors, this is a feature, not a bug. They enjoy the appearance of a baby without the real life difficulties of raising a real person. As one collector comments, her doll “doesn’t turn into a…