turn-on, tune-in, drop-out

A sort of national Sabbath, with no allowable fictions or preparations needed, is observed tomorrow with the national Day of Un- plugging—such a movement has taken on universal proportions, I think that all of us have an embarrassment of choices available to us when it comes to being off-line, dozens of analogue and manual things to make whole and appreciate. It’s not downtime, like a power-outage, that usually inspire thoughts like “I could do the vacuuming, except—“ but really a disconnection that pulls one’s attention elsewhere. I am really not one to speak to this sort of Lenten forfeiture, but it does seem like a very good idea that bears regular repeating. How do you plan to observe this date and spirit it represents?

oracle or time and temperture

A really engrossing article from Aeon magazine profiles some more big-thinkers regarding the fracturing future possibilities for mankind. Building from an earlier clever interview that leaned towards the apocalyptic, our impulsive and unhelpful tendencies are explored but also our positive capacities and how they might be synthetically extended.
Like some hard-hitting thought-experiment, which does not seem so far-fetched like the classic Cartesian teasers of Brain-in-a-Vat or Teleportation that involves re-assembly of a subject on-site with simultaneous destruction at the origin, the dialogue summons up a hypothetical, benevolent and omnipresent Artificial Intelligence, having gradually won acceptance, that’s like the Ancient Greek household gods, cults, patrons, oracles and wishing-wells, only closely monitored, mimicking current trends in social networks and driven traffic, also known as popularity. The intelligence’s only manifestation in the real world would be as a question-and-answer service—a very sophisticated one, which would learn by aggregation of all queries and solutions offered, evaluating and project their outcomes. Such a universal internet, pervasive and accessible, could learn as well by positive-reinforcement, and here I think is where the dialogue veers towards doom and gloom, sort of like a lab rat (by who are the overlords and who is the subject?) who avoids an electro-shock or earns a treat from historical successes and failures. It all sound eerily familiar, and the landscape, world-view of inquiring minds. But how accommodating is the landscaper? Certainly most problems are not without precedence and our predicaments and quandaries are not as unique as we’d like to think in some form, but a lot of examples from the past do not necessarily yield a right, correct answer

conclave

Although not without historical precedence, the more reflection dedicated to the Pope’s resolve to resign his post enlivens some interesting repercussions. It seems that one cannot simply retire from the office, and his intentions to repair to a Roman monastery make me wonder if Benedikt will be a mentor, a shadow pope, inviting a second succession of schisms for the Church Universal.
And does his decision open up an expectation, the option for all predecessors to gracefully bow out, whether a divine directive or public perception of being outmoded, like some old and tired politician. With some providence, we will not be overcome by such intrigues.

autodidactic or natural interface

A team from the University of Karlsruhe has been awarded an honourarium from an internet giant for having developed an “air-writing” system to make using touch-screens easier and more intuitive.

The input device is a glove—with hopes of reducing the apparel, the tether to a wrist-band later, and seems quite promising. The idea that we could reify our gestures makes pashas of us all, clapping to summon a servant to feed us grapes. I don’t know about integrating the ability to shout demands into everything, since words are a form of communication and not just a one way street and characters are made of a lot of errant gesture, not all of which are appropriate to realize right away or with the help of an over-zealous assistant. I do like the idea, however, that one could write on a make-believe tablet or make a telephone call by pantomime.