BC BOOK
Saved by @Alex1Powell

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. https://t.co/15doR3gxUk
W.Ross Ashby argued that negative feedback was insufficient for maintaining the stability (homeostasis) of complex system. Ashby proposed the Law of Requisite Variety. https://t.co/T4KbmZNLpL
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?
Computation in an abstract sense is the interplay of intention and mechanism. That intention may be homeostasis, perception or action. Analog systems use mechanisms of this world to implement the mechanisms required to fulfill intentions.
This is in contrast with discrete digital systems that operate in a virtual reality distinct from their underlying implementation. The only virtual analog systems we have are the kinds that are simulated using digital systems.
The other distinction of an analog system is that perception and action can be continuous. Said differently, continuity has meaning in an analog system. In fact, I would argue that the basis of meaning is dependent on continuity.
A digital system (language as an example) has meaning as a consequence of standardization. That is, agreed-upon norms of interpretation. Meaning in digital systems is an emergent feature of collective behavior.
Collectives are composed of individuals that create meaning through the observation of continuity in this world. What Peirce identifies as icons and indexes are signs that express continuity. That of a similarity relationship or a causal relationship.
Prior to the emergence of brains, organisms interacted with this world through hardwired mechanisms. This mirrors how analog systems interact with the world through the physical mechanisms of this world.
Brains however introduce an entirely new behavioral repertoire that is divorce from actual mechanics. Brains predict their analog realities through mechanisms that are yet to be understood.
Brains are able to virtualize analog realities in a manner very different from how digital computers virtualize analog reality. (Left to reader why this is obvious)
We have two options of how to brains could be implemented. Brains could be either (1) analog machines that virtualize analog realities or (2) digital machines that virtualize analog realities. The spiking behavior empirical observed appears to indicate that it is of the 2nd kind.
However, Deep Learning appears to allude to an analog machine virtualizing an analog reality. This is difficult to understand, but that is what Deep Learning appears to show.
However, there is a 3rd option. That is, the brain is both digital and analog. Biology employs the strategy of code duality across multiple scales. My expectation is that this is also the brain's strategy.
@threadreaderapp unroll

More from Carlos E. Perez

Carlos E. Perez
Carlos E. Perez
@IntuitMachine
In physics, energy is that which is causally invariant or symmetric with respect to time. Said differently, energy is never created or destroyed, it is conserved in the universe.

Now there is a question about information. Is information causally invariant? Does information remain the same with respect to time? To understand this, let's first understand what energy is, then attempt to understand what information is.

The strange thing about energy is that it is this universal currency that seems to be interchangeable between the different forces in nature (i.e. electromagnetic, strong, weak and gravity). It is that thing that makes change possible.

Now let's assume that the universe is computational in nature. That is, anything we see in nature is a consequence of computation. That is, there is computation underneath the physics that is driving the universe to change.

What does it mean then that information is conserved in this computational universe? Also, how is energy conservation related to information conservation?
SOCIETY , SCIENCE
Carlos E. Perez
Carlos E. Perez
@IntuitMachine
Those trained as physicists strive to see the world in terms of symmetries and processes that break symmetries. It's a meta-principle that guides their questioning.

This is very different from how many are taught physics (I guess in high school). We come to know of physics as consisting of laws that describe the behavior of inanimate (or is it indifferent) objects? These laws are described as expressions of equalities (i.e. equations).

But laws like Newton's f=ma or Einstein's e=mc^2 are derived from a higher meta principal. These principles are known as conservation laws. Energy, momentum, angular momentum are all conserved.

Conservation laws however are also derived from a higher principle. A conservation law implies that something remains the same as the situation of study change. Energy conservation implies that it is that something that does not change in time. In short, a symmetry.

This idea that laws are derived from conservation principles that is derived from symmetries is at the core of the study of physics. The laws of physics are only authoritative as long as they don't violate a higher principle. Ultimately, that principle is all about symmetry.
EDUCATION
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Carlos E. Perez
Carlos E. Perez
@IntuitMachine
Conscious and conscience are two words that share the same origin but mean two different things. The bias against explanations of consciousness comes from the conflation of these two words.

In addition, the question of free will is also adjacent to the notion of both consciousness and conscience. The ideas of consciousness, conscience, and free will serve as the foundation of justice in our civilization. (care to add another?)

So when we see people fail to condemn an act that is morally repugnant, we wonder if they have a conscience. But we don't wonder if they are conscious. When we incarcerate a person, we ask if they had "free will" but we inquire if they were 'conscious' during the crime.

The presence of consciousness and free will imply sentience. Which is the same as conscious and sounds just like a conscience. Our biases have muddled all the words together to likely mean the same thing.

The words that we use today continue to evolve. The same word can have a different meaning in the past. The word empathy is a recent word invented in the early 1900s. Originally it meant to place oneself from the viewpoint of a thing. Today we don't use it in this way.
LIFE
Carlos E. Perez
Carlos E. Perez
@IntuitMachine
Damasio in his book 'The Strange Order of Things' argues that the core of condition lies in homeostasis. I agree with this generalization. But let me work out in a tweet storm how consciousness relates to homeostasis.

Human consciousness is related to awareness of surprising or threatening observations. It's an error-correcting mechanism that lends attention to discrepancies of our expectations of the world.

The mind is composed of many layers of cognition. Also, its massive parallelism implies reducing the conditional checks required for error correction.

To do this, consciousness is engaged only in a time-sliced manner in a periodic manner. The majority of time spent is in unconscious activity with only periodic activation of the conscious error-correcting process.

The system 1 unconscious intuitive mechanism minimizes the effort of performing error correction. It is automated and driven by habit. It is like a river flowing without obstructions.
CULTURE
Carlos E. Perez
Carlos E. Perez
@IntuitMachine
"Three modes of evolution have thus been brought before us: evolution by fortuitous variation, evolution by mechanical necessity, and evolution by creative love." - C.S. Peirce 1893

These words were spoken prior to the discovery of quantum mechanics and computation. What if Peirce knew of these discoveries? If so, how would he have conceptualized these evolutionary modes differently?

I believe there is an extreme benefit in revisiting the writings of great minds in the past and refining them based on scientific discoveries that occurred only in their futures.

wrote the book "A New Kind of Science" that speculated how science would be different if computers existed prior to calculus.

In the same way, let me explore C.S.Peirce ideas of evolutionary philosophy from the vantage point of knowing of the discoveries of quantum physics and universal computation.
HISTORY

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Kim A. Wagner
Kim A. Wagner
@KimAtiWagner
As 2020 is coming to an end, you can either read a dozen Quilette articles or letters in The Times - or even throw in a PragerU video for good measure - insisting the British Empire was 'Overwhelmingly a force for good' and that 'wokery' is erasing history...

Or you can avail yourself of the critical and deeply researched work of actual scholars. Here are my recommendations for Christmas gifts this year - for anyone seriously interested in the history of the British Empire and its legacies:

@PriyaSatia 'Time's Monster'


-@profdanhicks 'The Brutish Museum'


-@PriyamvadaGopal 'Insurgent Empire'


-@DalrympleWill 'The Anarchy'
BOOK
Jillian Weise (Cy/She/Her)
Jillian Weise (Cy/She/...
@JillianWeise
Editor asks me: Will you review That Pandemic Antho?

I say: Maybe. There are a lot of disabled writers in it, right?

Editor: ............

I say: Like, obviously?

Editor: ............

[After a while] Editor: Wouldn't it still be interesting if there were NOT a lot disabled writers in it? Your review could be about that?

Me: No. That's not interesting at all b/c my ideal audience is disabled writers & readers, so that's just like gross.

[I really did say "that's just gross" lol]

Editor: Lemme send you the TOC.

Me: Okay.

Meanwhile, I'm impatient so I just look up the antho b/c it's Big and Famous and Everywhere.

Here's what The Pandemic Anthology published by @AAKnopf looks like. Now remember: disabled people are the most affected by the pandemic, eg we die the most.

How many total poets? Ok I stopped counting at 100.

How many disabled poets? Oh boy. Are you ready.

1 radical disabled activist. Name spelled incorrectly in the TOC

1 not radical at all disabled writer. Most acceptable disabled writer to nondisabled literary establishment b/c this writer "doesn't make a big deal about it," as I have been told
BOOK
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Dr Adam Rutherford
Dr Adam Rutherford
@AdamRutherford
I see that there is a lot of chat about ancestry and indigeneity, two complex and profoundly misunderstood concepts. Here’s a thread 1/N - I have written about these ideas extensively, in two books;

Ancestry rapidly becomes a matted web rather than a tree. Claims of ancestral purity are absurd. We are descended from multitudes, and don’t bear DNA from actual ancestors after very few generations. (fig. from @Graham_Coop


With both ancestry and indigeneity, the pertinent question is ‘when?’ If you claim ancestry from a certain group of people, then you are timestamping when you consider these ancestors to be important (to you). 3/N

Similarly, with claims of indigeneity, there is no agreed time when this kicks in.

There are a few places that have been populated by human in recent history, and so logical claims of an indigenous people make more sense, e.g. the Māori of New Zealand were the first humans to live on Aotearoa from the 12th C.
BOOK
Stephen D. Campbell, Dr. theol.
Stephen D. Campbell, D...
@the_OT_Campbell
I've gotten a few questions about this, so let me clarify and provide as much helpful information as this medium will allow.

To begin, both of my parents are MBA's and are assertive. They taught us four kids to be assertive. 1/x


Honestly, what's the worst a publisher can do, say no? If the worst that can happen is a rejection email (and believe me I've gotten ALOT), then it's pretty "safe" to at least ask.

But there were tricks that I learned about getting books from publishers. 2/x

The 1st was to request exam copies. I was a very part-time adjunct faculty for an online-only seminary in the UK. I designed two classes for them and requested books to consider as assigned reading for the classes. I still do this, since I'm full-time teaching/administrating. 3/x

The second was to become an approved/recognized reviewer for journals--it doesn't matter which ones. Thanks to a previous professor I'm a reviewer at the website for a research center. And through nothing but email, I'm a frequent reviewer for 3 journals (JESOT, JHS, RRT). 4/x

This is a helpful approach. When you know exactly where the review is going to be submitted and you know that the journal's review editor wants the review, then (in most cases) the review editor's job is to contact the publisher and make sure you get the book. That's it. 5/x
BOOK
Zig Zag Claybourne
Zig Zag Claybourne
@ZZClaybourne
A pie thread. Send the children out of the room.

Know how you're eating something so good that you hunch over it, damn the utensils, go full Altered States proto-human, baring your teeth and flailing at anybody who gets too close?

Let👏Me👏Tell👏You👏About👏The👏Sweet👏Potato👏Pie👏I👏Made Yesterday praise gawd.🙏
That pie achieved consciousness long enough to know true love.

First off, I didn't have any brown sugar. I realized that Wednesday evening. Was I about to go to the CDC testing center to get some? Hell no, Kroger was hella crowded. So Thursday morning, I take inventory. No cane sugar, no white sugar, no Alaga syrup. Started to lose hope.

Then I remembered.

I had mother-loving lemon honey. It's not super sweet, it's got a ting-tang of lemon, and--I swear to this--when I put it in my tea my 3rd eye opens in appreciation. So I do the math: brown sugar is just about the sweetness; 1/2 a jar of lemon honey should do.

And it did. You wouldn't think the combination of cinnamon, sweet potatoes, butter, eggs, and lemon honey would make you stomp a Smurf if it got too close to your pie pan, but yeah, it does.
BOOK

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Post Independence, Army wanted to select the most experienced Indian commander as Army chief. But Nehru without consulting anyone appointed Gen Rob Lockhart, a senior British Army officer as the Commander-in-Chief (C-in-C) of the Indian Army.


Most people were shocked to know that Nehru selected a British Man after fighting for independence for over 200 years! Major Gen A A ‘Jick’ Rudra of the Indian Army was completely upset with the decision.


One day Lockhart met Nehru with a strategic plan and proposed many government directive defence policies for the country. He placed it on the table and explained the point to PM Nehru. After a while Lockhart walked out of the room and met AA Jick Rudra,+

Lockhart looked shell shocked and stunned. When asked what happened he said “The PM took one look at my paper and blew his top. Rubbish! Total rubbish! We don’t need a defence plan. Our policy is ahimsa (non-violence). We foresee no military threats. Scrap the army!”

One year after the incident the Kashmir crisis had increased and Gen Lockhart used to exchange ideas with the Gen Douglas Gracey who was commander in chief of Pakistan Army.There were many infiltrations along the border which Lockhart knew and took no action. But Lt Gen Cariappa+
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SRI MOOKAMBIKA DEVI, KOLLUR (KAR)

There was an Asura, Kaumasura, who was doing penance to please Shiva and get a boon. To prevent him from asking for a boon, Devi Saraswati made him dumb (hence called Mookasur)
Later, Adi Parashakti slayed him and came to be called Mookambika.


It is said that Adi Shankaracharya had a vision in which Devi agreed to follow him provided he did not look back. He kept walking and was assured of her presence due to the sound of anklets. When he reached here in Kollur, he turned back as the sound of anklets had stopped.


So Devi stayed here and merged with the lingam. The place came to be called Mookambika Kshetram.
The linga has integrated on it’s left side MahaKali, Maha Lakshmi and Maha Saraswathi and on the right side- Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva.


A swarna rekha (gold line) divides this linga into left and right portion. Adi Shakthi in this Udhbhavlinga form appears only here.
Devi sits in padmasana and has 4 hands.
Adi Shankaracharya installed the Sri Chakra in front of Devi and also composed the Soundarya Lahiri here.
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Anu Satheesh 🇮🇳...
@AnuSatheesh5
Chennimalai Murugan Kovil
#Erode
#TamilNaduTemples 🚩

Chennimalai Murugan Temple is located  near Perunthurai in Erode District. Murugan is worshipped here as Dandayudapani. Temple is situated on the banks of Noyyal river also called Kanchima Nadhi. Temple is situated in a hill


Sthala Puranam says that, there lived a Landlord who had many cows in his farm. One among them was a Black Cow, which didn't give milk. Land lord observed that evening time, when all the cows came back after grazing, this cow used to go to a particular spot and gave all  the milk


by itself. He decided to dig the spot where the cow gave its milk

On digging a beautiful Vigraham of Murugan was found, but lower portion was very rough. So he called a great sculptor to soften it. Everyone was shocked to see that on the first chisel the vigraham bleeded.


Land lord realized that Murugan wanted the Vigraham the way it was.

Thus Prathishta was done on Chennimalai hill. It is believed that Sivalaya Chola got relieved from his Brahmahatti Dosha here. Kanda Shasti Kavacham was first offered here.

Muruganukku Haro Hara
🙏🕉🙏
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Cookie Cyboid
Cookie Cyboid
@CookieCyboid
“Why are Tumblr and Facebook cracking down on sex so much? And why is Facebook in so over zealous about it? It’s all Apples fault!” Etc etc

I can explain all. It is largely the fault of a set of US laws called SESTA and FOSTA.
TECH
Pat Walls
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And here they are...

THE WINNERS OF THE 24 HOUR STARTUP CHALLENGE

Remember, this money is just fun. If you launched a product (or even attempted a launch) - you did something worth MUCH more than $1,000.

#24hrstartup

The winners 👇

#10

Lattes For Change - Skip a latte and save a life.

https://t.co/M75RAirZzs

@frantzfries built a platform where you can see how skipping your morning latte could do for the world.

A great product for a great cause.

Congrats Chris on winning $250!


#9

Instaland - Create amazing landing pages for your followers.

https://t.co/5KkveJTAsy

A team project! @bpmct and @BaileyPumfleet built a tool for social media influencers to create simple "swipe up" landing pages for followers.

Really impressive for 24 hours. Congrats!


#8

SayHenlo - Chat without distractions

https://t.co/og0B7gmkW6

Built by @DaltonEdwards, it's a platform for combatting conversation overload. This product was also coded exclusively from an iPad 😲

Dalton is a beast. I'm so excited he placed in the top 10.


#7

CoderStory - Learn to code from developers across the globe!

https://t.co/86Ay6nF4AY

Built by @jesswallaceuk, the project is focused on highlighting the experience of developers and people learning to code.

I wish this existed when I learned to code! Congrats on $250!!
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