A.I. II

 

A.I.

Artificial intelligence
Way, you love me
Love the way you love me
It's so clear
You make everything inside me feel
Just automatic hurt
Bring me back tonight'
Cause you're intelligent, so real
So real

Artificial Intelligence? Are you kidding?

While Artificial Intelligence, AI, is getting a lot of press these days, it is not really anything new. Only the terms are new. It used to be called Machine Learning. Before machines, it used to be called the Wisdom of the Crowd. When lower animals do it, it is called Neural Networks or Instinct. “Artificial” is because it is done quickly by computer, the artificial part that does not mind processing many, many observations. The “Intelligence” part should more properly be called “Inference”, because there is nothing intelligent about it. If it were intelligent, it would know what caused those inferences. What results are correlations given a multitude of observations  However, the correlations can themselves have problems.

1.      Spurious Correlations            

      Just because there is a strong correlation between an event and something else that is observed at the same time, it does not mean that this correlation has any meaning. There is a book about spurious correlations.  (Virgen, Tyler; Spurious Correlations; Hachette Books; New York; 2015)  My favorite is that there is a strong correlation between drowning deaths in pools and the number of Nicholas Cage film appearances in a given year. No mater how bad people think Nicholas Cage is, I don’t think that is the reason people drown in pools. 

2.     Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.          

      A correlation can only be made of observations that were made. If the sample excludes certain observations, any correlations would be suspect. Famously, the Literary Digest predicted that FDR would lose the 1936 election to Alf Landon because its readers said in a poll that they were overwhelming voting for Mr. Landon. However the  public included many, many voters who were NOT subscribers to Literary Digest. In November, Roosevelt won the election in an unprecedented landslide, winning every state except Maine and Vermont while also winning the popular vote by 24%. If you don’t make an observation, then the correlation to that observation will of course be zero. And therefore your sample will be biased.

    3.      Correlation is not causation        

      Just because there is a correlation it does not mean that the observation was caused by the event. It takes intelligence to make sense of how and why a correlation exists. There were thousands of years of observations of the planets. The popular wisdom was that the planets revolved about the Earth, and that observations of planets were explained by retrograde motion of some planets. In fact it took Copernicus to intelligently propose that all of the solar system planets, including the earth, really revolved about the sun. 

If someone tells you that AI told them so,  remember this. Then you won’t have to be like Galileo when the inference was that all objects in space move around the Earth, and be forced to recant, as he did, of his observations of the moons of Jupiter. But still they move.

Luicifer

 

It Ain't Necessarily So

Things that you're liable
To read in that Bible
It ain't necessarily so

Did Lucifer get cast out of heaven?

The Old Testament of the Bible does not include any tale of Lucifer being cast out of heaven by God. Revelations 12 in the New Testament includes a mention of the story of the War in Heaven, but I would like to suggest that Lucifer cast himself out of heaven because he came to close to an absolute, i.e. God. There appears to be two portions of our universe: an orderly portion, e.g. heaven, and a chaotic portion, e.g. h- e- double hockey sticks. 

Our portion, which is NOT heaven, is governed by Entropy. The Second Law of Thermodynamics says that the Entropy of the Universe is increasing and that any action which reduces energy will be accompanied by an equal increase in entropy. The ultimate fate of our universe is when all energy is in its lowest state and every amount above that minimum has been converted to entropy. A trickle of water begins as orderly. If it exceeds the capacity of the stream bed, then it may become white water rapids, but eventually that stream flows into a large body of water (i.e. a lake) where it becomes still.

The size, variance of the chaotic portion of the universe appears to be 0.5²π²/3. It is suggested that this is not an accident. 0.5 is the odds of a binary choice. π is Pi, the mathematical symbol related to a circle, perfection, an absolute. 3 is the minimum size of a stable group,  ( E.g., a trinity). It is also suggested that the size of the chaotic portion of the universe is equal to the size of the orderly portion of the universe.

Order can arise from Chaos, but only as a means of increasing Entropy. That is, two atoms can undergo fusion to become a single atom with lower energy, increasing Entropy, and while this appears to be more orderly, but this is only a temporary waypoint until its eventual further decay, release of energy, and an further increase in entropy.

I would suggest that in casting himself out of heaven, Lucifer, Satan, was trying to become a single member who approached the absolute, exhibited parabolic behavior, not hyperbolic behavior. If there is an example of hyperbolic behavior it is orderly, favors a group, is a System Optimal solution. If there is an example of parabolic behavior, it selfishly favors only the individual, is a User Optimal solution. Observations of hyperbolic behavior in a chaotic domain are examples of orderly behavior. Observations of parabolic behavior in a chaotic domain are exmples of chaotic behavior.

Whether it is “I am the Lord thy God. Thou shall have no God before me” or Einstein’s Theory of General Relativity where objects can not exceed the speed of light, an absolute, you can try to reduce error, but to err is human, to forgive is divine. Don’t try to be something that you are not.  By definition humans will always have error because they are not Divine. Have humility, not hubris, and accept that, or risk also casting  yourself into chaos..

Time Travel

  If I Could Turn Back Time

If I could turn back time
If I could find a way
I'd take back those words that have hurt you
And you'd stay

Unfortunately you can’t turn back time.  What has happened, has happened.

If I could turn back time,  then I would revisit those moments in my life that haunt me even today.   In kindergarten agreeing that I won’t be friends with Robbie Carter any more; berating my son before a Madison Muskies’ game; my behavior at my brother Kevin’s wedding; my attempted suicide, etc. But I have to live with the consequence of these actions.  Or do I?

U.S. District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk has turned back time and invalidated the FDA decision in 2000 to tentatively approve  mifepristone; its decision in 2016 when it relaxed restrictions on the medication, citing its safety, efficacy and minuscule rate of adverse incidents; its decision in  2019 to approve a generic version of mifepristone, and its later decisions after easing some requirements during the pandemic, by permanently lifting the in-person dispensing requirement, allowing the medication to be prescribed through telehealth appointments, dispensed at retail pharmacies and sent through the mail.

I did not know you could turn back time.  Excuse me while I go see Judge Kacsmaryk. Then I intend to borrow his Way Back machine and do something about that Hitler fellow.

Ethics

 

You’re A Mean One Mr. Grinch

Just face the music, you're a monster, Mr. Grinch, yes, you are
Your heart's an empty hole
Your brain is full of spiders
You've got garlic in your soul, Mr. Grinch
I wouldn't touch you with a thirty-nine-and-a-half foot pole

How mean is he, Johnny?

Boy, “ Strip Search Sammy” Alito must be PO. Here he goes and leaks a draft opinion of the Supreme Court. ( I know that the “investigation” did not prove this, but “com’n man”), and that is still not enough to make him the worst member of the Supreme Court. Justice “Long Dong Silver” Thomas has permanently earned that distinction.

ProPublica, proving that government FOR THE PEOPLE has not perished from this earth, has disclosed that Justice Thomas has:

·        Accepted lavish vacations from billionaire, with what is obviously a super villain name, Harlan Crow, collector of Hitler memorabilia, where he associated with Leonard Leo, at that time head of the Federalist society advocating for "conservative" federal judges. But that was not a violation of law because “someone” told Justice Thomas that accepting the hospitality of “friends” was ethical. J;

·        Crow also bought the home that Justice Thomas owned with his mother, a transaction that he did not disclose. Crow then let Justice Thomas’s mother live in that home rent free, and made improvements to that property and surrounding properties, but no ethical violation here. J;

·        Crow donated to the organization founded by Virginia "Ginny" Thomas, Justice Thomas’ wife, she of the January 6^th problems, which enabled her to take a large salary, but no ethical violation here. J;

·        Justice Thomas declared income from a defunct real estate trust, but “Nothing to see here, Move on.” J.

In overturning Roe v. Wade, Justice Thomas opined that it was time to revisit Griswold, contraception, and Obergefell, same sex marriage, but he left out Loving, miscegenation, which would have barred his marriage to Ginny.

Sorry “Strip Search Sammy.”  Justice Thomas has set the bar so high I don’t think you can ever clear it. Time to declare Justice Thomas the worst, apologize to Anita Hill, and move on.

Choices II

 

Waist Deep in the Big Muddy 

Well, I'm not going to point any moral,
I'll leave that for yourself
Maybe you're still walking, you're still talking
You'd like to keep your health
But every time I read the papers
That old feeling comes on;
We're, waist deep in the Big Muddy
And the big fool says to push on. 

It sure is Muddy, but how Big  is the universe? 

Our universe allows choices. Thus it has to be big enough to accommodate all of those choices. Choices are inherently random. (Well, maybe her hairdresser knows! In a previous blog post I said that the absolute, God, was like Rick Blaine from Casablanca. I guess that I am now suggesting that God is like Clairol. Oh, well, I guess when it comes to blasphemy, "In for a penny, In for a pound".😉 )

An individual  may not like the choices made by others, but that is not the point. “Stuff happens!” A random normal (unbiased)  distribution is the logistics distribution, also known as the
sech-squared distribution. If the median choice is 50% then s, the range parameter of that distribution, must be 0.5.  The odds of a choice ( e.g. a coin flip of heads and tails) is 50%, regardless, if the result,  choice, can only be heads (e.g. 100%) or tails (e.g. 0%). If s is 0.5 then the variance, size, to accommodate all of the choices is  0.5²π²/3. 

The fact that it involves squares is important. While any number can be expressed as the sum of two numbers regardless of the surface, a square can also be expressed as the sum of two squares but with different results depending on the surface. (I.e., if the surface is flat, then the answer must satisfy Pythagoras’ theorem). If we are in a flat surface (universe) then also taking Einstein’s Theory of General Relativity into account, the choices should also satisfy E=mc².  Then a flat, Euclidean, relativistic mass equation, m, would be m₀/√(1-(v/c)²), where m₀ is the rest mass at a velocity, v, of zero compared to the speed of light, c. However if the universe is hyperbolic, then Pythagoras’ theorem does not apply, and the relativistic mass equation is instead m=ln(cosh(v/c)cosh(m₀)±sinh(v/c)sinh(m₀)). This does not have the problem of becoming imaginary when the velocity exceeds the speed of light. It becomes undefined, is an acknowledgement that the velocity can NOT exceed the speed of light. However this equation suggests that the mass becomes infinite, an absolute, when v=c. To prevent that, it is suggested that as velocity approaches the speed of light, its relativistic mass transitions from the existing chaotic portion of the universe and enters a non-chaotic, orderly, portion of the universe. ( The division between these two portions is what is called the Big Bang).  The variance, size, of the chaotic portion of universe is equal to the size of the orderly portion of the universe. At the transition,  the relativistic mass equation is rotated by 90 degrees counterclockwise, and becomes a maximum when the speed in the orderly portion decreases to zero. 

Thus the equation of relativistic mass, m, in the orderly universe must satisfy 
XXXX, where the transition occurs when the relativistic mass is m_t and the ratio of the velocity to the speed of light is 1. This is a rotation of the chaotic equation by 90° and a translation of the origin from a ratio of velocity to the speed of light of 0 and a mass equal to the rest mass to an origin of (1,m_t). Because it was already said the maximum relativistic mass, m_m, in the orderly domain occurs when the velocity is zero then 0=XXXX . The variance of the orderly universe must also be equal to the variance of the chaotic universe. This means that m_t occurs at m_m*.5*π/√3. 

I would propose that the maximum relativistic mass be called the Warp Factor, which means that in the original  Star Trek, Mr. Scott should have said, “Aye sir. I can give you Warp Factor  ½*π/√3, and maybe a wee bit more!”.

Children

 

The Greatest Love

I believe the children are our future
Teach them well and let them lead the way
Show them all the beauty they possess inside
Give them a sense of pride to make it easier
Let the children's laughter remind us how we used to be

But do you believe that children are wards, not property?

In a group, e.g. a state,  there are full members and there are wards of the group. A ward is not yet a full member of the group but is in the care of the group until they become a full member. A group also needs a sovereign, a leader. The United States of America was an experiment in that every member of the group has a say in choosing that leader and making sure that the sovereign’s power to make laws, administer laws, and rule on laws, were by separate groups of individuals. This distinguishes it from a hereditary monarchy where the sovereign passes though a hereditary line to a single individual. It is also is distinguished from an electoral monarchy ( e.g. the early Holy Roman Empire) where rather than inheritance,  the sovereign is an elected individual. The sovereign can also be chosen by dominance (i.e. authoritarianism). While the sovereign is typically an individual, the sovereign can be a group, (e.g. the Communist Party of China). A sovereign serves two roles: 1) the ruler of the group; and 2) the personification of the group. It is possible to separate these roles, for example a constitutional monarchy where the group rules, but the personification is inherited.

It possible for both the ruling sovereign and the personification sovereign to be elected as separate individuals (e.g. France). If the ruler is a subgroup of the larger group, the leader of the subgroup typically also serves the personification role  ( e.g. Xi of China). While it is theoretically possible for both the personification and ruling sovereign to be chosen by dominance, practically an authoritarian, dictator, will try to exercise dominance and become the personification sovereign, either directly, or by the personification being a puppet of the ruler.

In the United States of America, according to our constitution, representation is based on members AND wards of the state (which at one point included women, children, and slaves). Children can become full members based on their age ( e.g. age to work, age of marriage, age of voting, age to buy alcohol, etc.). Slaves, who would otherwise have met the age test, became members of the group when slavery was abolished. Women achieved the right to vote, and arguably became full members, but there was still the matter of whether a wife surrendered her group rights, became a ward of her husband upon marriage. (This confusion was attempted to be corrected by the Equal Rights Amendment). Individuals, who are not physically, or mentally, capable of membership in the group, may be long‑term wards of the group.

However a ward is NEVER property. Being a ward means that it is a status which can change. Property can not change its status. Property belongs to an individual. Property can be sold, gifted, transferred, or after the owner has died, can be disposed of according to a will. Upon death, debts are discharged and only the assets, positive property, can be “inherited.”  The heirs are NOT responsible for, do not, can not, inherit, the debts of the deceased. Children and wives can not be sold when the husband is alive, nor can they be disposed of as property in a will. Once upon a time, slaves could be disposed of as property, but as mentioned before, slavery in the USA  was abolished by the 14^th Amendment. Thus legally children and women, including wives, can not be property.

Children are wards of their parents. Parents are wardens of their children. The group has conceded that its interest as a warden of the children is inferior to the parent’s role as a warden. However the group has not, can not, acknowledge a position that children are property of their parents. If the parents refuse certain actions to their children, who are only the parent's wards until they reach adulthood, then the parents have abandoned their role as warden of their children and the group can, and should, exercise its role as warden. Children can be proud, or ashamed, of their ancestors, but they are not ever responsible for the actions, positive or negative, of their ancestors. Parents can be wardens of their own children. However they are not the wardens of the children of other parents.

This does not mean that adults can not have a special relationship with those who were once their wardens. However legally they are not, and never were, property of their wardens. The group lives on because those children have become adults, are the future. An individual adult has a finite life span, but a group does not have a definite life span.

Absolutes?

 

Where Have All The Flowers Gone

Where have all the flowers gone?
Long time passing.
Where have all the flowers gone?
Long time ago.
Where have all the flowers gone?
The girls have picked them every one.
Oh, When will you ever learn?
Oh, When will you ever learn?

When will we ever learn?

Albert Einstein’s Theory of Relativity can, and arguably should, be viewed as an allegory.  Nothing can exceed an absolute ( i.e. the speed of light) .  And we can approach but never equal that absolute ( i.e. the speed of light).  There are different frames of reference for viewing the absolute and each of these frames of refences is correct, but only for that frame of reference.  Other frames of reference are equally valid.  Thus saying that you are absolutely right is an impossibility.  If you were absolutely right you would violate Einstein’s Theory.  (and let’s get the BS that Einstein’s is only a theory out of the way.  EVERYTHING can only be a theory.  It can not be absolute, 100% certain.  There is no such thing as a scientist who is 100% certain about anything).

If you look at any position, it can not be absolutely correct, whether that position is on abortion, same sex marriage, prohibition, religion, immigration, etc. You are  making a choice for yourself, but it is just that, a choice.  It is not, can not, be absolutely correct. 

Quantum Mechanics tell us that reality is random.  Albert Einstein was, paradoxically, a Determinist who despite his theory thought that you could find an absolute.  He famously said that “God does not play dice with the universe”.  He said this because there appears to be a paradox between an absolute who knows everything, including the results of random events, and the fact that there are random events.   How can things be random if God, an absolute, knows the outcome of a random event.

I have proposed an answer that allows an absolute to know the outcome, “God (and only God) plays with Loaded Dice.”   https://dbeagan.blogspot.com/2023/02/loaded-dice.html

The people who oppose the choices made by others, whether it is abortion, prohibition, same sex marriage, LGBTQIA+ rights, immigration, religion, etc. are saying that only their choice is right and should be imposed on others.  They are correct that they are absolute, they are absolutely WRONG. You should make laws that protect the group, but you should make no laws that impose your morality on the group.  You are not, can not, be an absolute.

It is a lesson that unfortunately the ruling classes in Texas, Idaho, Florida, Mississippi, Missouri and far too many places, have yet to learn.