The serpent is back

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And the LORD God planted a garden in Eden, in the east; and there he put the man whom he had formed. [9] And out of the ground the LORD God made to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food, the tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. The LORD God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to till it and keep it.

Now the serpent was more subtle than any other wild creature that the LORD God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God say, `You shall not eat of any tree of the garden’?” [2] And the woman said to the serpent, “We may eat of the fruit of the trees of the garden; [3] but God said, `You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, neither shall you touch it, lest you die.'”
[4] But the serpent said to the woman, “You will not die.
[5] For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”

But the LORD God called to the man, and said to him, “Where are you?”
[10] And he said, “I heard the sound of thee in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked; and I hid myself.” He said, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten of the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?”

The name of today’s serpent is “Artificial Intelligence”. The enjoyable gifts of offloading human accountability and laborious tasks to a new world of comfort and opportunity is a fine tasting apple. It will be a wonderful world. Or, perhaps similar to the burden of sin brought upon Adam and Eve, there is good and too much bad ahead.

Bill Gates himself said that if we bite into AI’s apple, we as a species are vulnerable to extinction. The first Garden of Eden was designed around a different ethic of mutual survival and caring for the Garden.

16,000 extinctions and counting, disappearing water, millions of starving people, abusive plutocracy, chemically poisoned atmosphere and inadequate food don’t seem to be signs of caring for the first Garden. Is Artificial Intelligence the new stimulus package that will magically fix everything?

Ancient Mariner

Current governments are jitterbugging

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The commotion in the United States today is not just one political rainstorm. The 20th century was very much like clouds building on the horizon. Internationally, it was a century of thunderstorms, aka wars; it was a century of floods and earthquakes, aka large industrial changes – automobiles, airplanes, farm equipment and massive manufacturing ability. It was the introduction to television, computers and the Internet. Change in human lifestyle was mandated.

From 1900 to 2025, world population grew by 4 1/2 Billion; given that world population had grown only by less than 200 Million since the time of Jesus, the storms of the 20th century were hurricanes.

It is no wonder that, at the beginning of the 21st century the world was about to pop, needing only a pointed needle-head and a world pandemic to pop it.  There were other signs that the past was rotting: The “Western Alliance’ established by the western victory in World War II is no longer in line politically or economically as the Internet rapidly dismantled old boundary liaisons and began replacing them with corporate-driven trade agreements strong enough to resist government intentions. Asia and the Middle East were able to step into affairs of the world with virtually no meaningful counteraction from the Western Alliance.

Turning to more abstract issues, there are two unbreakable rules for which Mother Nature requires allegiance: “Survival of the Fittest” and “Democracy  works only when there is enough to go around for everybody”. Democracy is a political idea only recently brought into the world of politics. The United States was born into a spanking brand new continent with an abundance of natural resources, so it formed a ‘democratic republic’, meaning that the ground-level public had some authority in running things – which means that there had to be enough to go around.

Since then, US population has increased 130 times from  2 1/2 Million in 1776 to 347 Million in 2025. Slowly, the abundance of the continent disappeared until some serious events in the 20th century: the Great Depression in the 1930’s and the beginning of obvious plutocracy which began in the Reagan administration (1984) and continues to worsen as the 21st century comes into being.

The result today is a society rife with populist arguments. It’s the MAGA versus the WOKE; it’s the nonwhites versus the whites; it’s the plutocrats versus the support of the needy.

The populist era must be resolved with some speed. Mother Nature is losing patience with the oligarchic behavior of the Human species. Further, if it runs too long, the results may be corporatism or anarchy or simply, survival of the fittest.

Ancient Mariner

Choice – 2

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In the last post, the point was made that the subconscious chemistry of the human body has much more direct influence on our conscious decision-making than we may think. In fact even turtles and young humans are driven to act in a certain way because of the  production of sex hormones. Our tendency toward any form of behavior, e.g., morality, allegiance, competitiveness, artistic sensitivity and even one’s sense of self, all are the product of subconscious evaluation of life experiences derived from memory, physiological chemistry and predetermined genetics.

Which leads mariner to ponder why typewriters are making a comeback; why handwritten letters are on the rise and why cryptocurrency seems unusually alien. He used Google search to provide a commentary on cryptocurrency. The search engine produced the following script:

“A cashless society significantly impacts privacy by replacing anonymous cash transactions with traceable digital footprints, allowing corporations and governments to monitor, profile, and even control spending habits, increasing risks of data breaches, identity theft, and potential misuse for targeted advertising or social scoring, while eliminating the privacy afforded by physical cash. Every digital purchase creates a record of what you buy, where, and when, making true financial anonymity virtually impossible and increasing surveillance potential.”

 

Every invention since iron tools has taken a piece of human individuality away – an individuality manufactured by each person’s subconscious. In other words, the subconscious mind has had a continuous diminution of its job to make humans individuals – it’s evolutionary heritage – by standardizing behavior, belief and self identity. It will not take many generations to invent a bot made of skin, muscle and bone.

It is a lot more bother to use but mariner is considering getting out his old typewriter. It may not only save his individuality but the lives of 640,000 U.S. Postal Service employees as well.

[Did you notice that Google knew which side of the bitcoin mariner wanted to hear?]

Ancient Mariner

Choice

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There were times in mariner’s life when he marveled at the ability of fish and birds, and even American Bison, to swarm. Swarming is that phenomenon where a large group (he is talking only about living creatures) is able to move in unison without a leader and without reason.

Where did this last one come from?

Regular readers will know that he enjoys challenging the idea that the conscious mind is in charge and it is what decides how we engage reality. Virtually all creatures from bees to humans swarm – even turtles and they swarm coming from a distance far apart from one another. Do turtles look at a calendar or check the stars and say it’s time to head back to Costa Rica?

Turtles are sensitive to Earth’s magnetic waves. Not that turtles took a class in conscious understanding of magnetic waves, they have a subconscious awareness so their conscious brain doesn’t have to track magnetic waves, its just, well, it feels like that’s the direction where the turtle should go – no maps or coordinates needed.

This desire to return at a certain age in turtles is the exact same feeling human boys have around age 12-14:  it seems the right thing to do is to talk to girls. The same pure subconscious hormones in action both for turtles and humans. Perhaps the human swarm in the picture is derived from the same subconscious hormones – going to see Ariana Grande live! It seems the right place to go . . . .

Ancient Mariner

 

I don’t want to talk about it but

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There is no doubt in mariner’s mind that in the near future there will be a bot to help you when you are finished taking a dump. Be pleased – it will run ads about toiletry products while it wipes you and will flush the toilet for you. Will it pull up your underwear? It may well prompt you to change from the brand you are wearing.

Already on the market is Claude Code and it is likely this will be a required enhancement the next time you buy a new computer. Claude is an administrative assistant who will take over management of your bills, banking, investments, your office filing system (No more will you have to struggle opening that heavy file drawer), the content of your daily meals and order the appropriate groceries for home delivery.

Service bots are popping up everywhere; there may be a utility bot that controls your thermostat according to budget and weather – an added fee to your utility bill. For gardeners there will be a rabbit-sized bot to do the weeding along with a SIRI-driven planting and harvesting calendar sensitive to local weather and keeps track of every plant.

Think about it; how long before there are bots that replace humans with bot-to-bot relationships? They will be needed because the only human behavior left is recliner-chair management. Welcome to Matrix. The next specie variation will be Homo bot.

Hold on a minute, my spouse is trying to tell me something. . . . hmmm…

Mariner suspects you already know that he has visited alter ego Amos.

Ancient Mariner

Let’s talk about strings

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In recent months mariner has passed time reading around in the sciences. There is a much debated concept in quantum physics called the ‘string theory’. It never seems to get settled primarily because it is a theory. The theory is about how things come together in the Universe, supposedly one batch of atoms meets up with another kind of string and something happens. His metaphor is a three-year-old child (the energy string) and a floor spread with small, different shaped beads the child uses to make endless bracelets.

Several years ago, mariner’s wife wrote a poem about string theory. He knows her fans are eager to read it. Forthwith:

String Theory

I do not know how the world works,
Even in the smallest detail–
Not sure how the sun and moon revolve
among the galaxies
Not sure what an atom is.
But like the physicists,
I have my own string theory:

Given any two strings of anything–
Christmas tree lights, extension cords, necklaces–
Any two strings of anything will entangle themselves
in more intricate knots than any you could ever tie
if you tried.

There seems to be a force at work that seeks entanglement
and is not content to let two strings lie quietly side by side.
Maybe that is the way the world works–
Even among the galaxies, even among the atoms–
Everything,  always,  seeking connection.

MKM

8-17-2016

Indicators

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There is no doubt that the public suffers from a cacophony of disturbing, destructive, socially dismembering headlines. The political vitriol is deafening.The razing of government ethics is profound. The crescendo grows endlessly. There is armed aggression in the towns of America. Why?

There are virtually silent headlines that go unnoticed and underappreciated. Cultural values are changing. Following are some charts that show silent headlines which we absorb into the inner, perhaps subconscious workings of our minds – particularly that section that cares about survival. Do citizens subconsciously want a new form of government?

Moral and spiritual values which guide our general lifestyle are changing.

Economics is showing contradictory statistics about career safety and adequate opportunity to sustain financial security.

A point of clarification about the next chart. As corporations collected more income for productivity, this increase was not shared with the workers.

Many more silent charts are available citing shortages in every area of the biosphere. What will our government look like in 2050?

Ancient Mariner

How will it turn out?

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[[[   Before mariner starts his post, Scientific American magazine reprinted an expert accounting of the current influenza infections. Almost one in 10 people who visited a doctor in the U.S. in the week ending on December 27 were there for flu-like symptoms according to new data. This is a new record. Keep apprised of the news in this area of medicine, Be aware of flu-like symptoms you may have. The current flu shot is not tailored to this new flu but it will help. GET YOUR FLU SHOT!   ]]]

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In recent years, mariner has, in a passive way, been curious about how future economies and social mores will function when national boundaries are little more than map identities; economies will be tied to global strategies rather than nations; when small power skirmishes will be forced to cease by global authorities; when intelligent computers tell humans what to do in business and health without personal influence from professionals, politicians or private equity interests.

To get a perspective on this topic, mariner climbed the tall mountain where alter ego Guru lives to have a conversation about this topic. Guru lives in a pleasant but simple home designed to be fire resistant and sturdy. Guru has an unusual water supply drawn from a dozen atmospheric distillers; his house is heated by a pipe system that runs up to 30 feet underground; His electricity is solar; his food supply comes from farmers on the mountain. Guru is very much a theorist unrestrained by today’s reality and uses conjecture as if he were solving a jigsaw puzzle.

Mariner started by asking who Guru’s favorite was to master the strife and transformation that was occurring around the world today. He proffered democrats or republicans, perhaps global authoritarianism, start over with wars as in every other social shift, a food war?

“My favorite, Guru said “is Mother Earth”.

“Wow”, mariner said. “Why is the planet the winner? He understood biomass issues and population issues that have to be solved but how is the planet a winner?”

“What humans have never accepted, even back to the hunters and gatherers, is that the planet doesn’t belong to them. Trees don’t belong to them, rocks don’t belong to them, water doesn’t belong to them, not all the minerals and chemicals, not all the energy, not even every living creature living on this planet belongs to them. Even so, humans have ravaged the balance of planetary chemistry; humans have destroyed tens of thousands of species by destroying their habitat. The Earth is in a position where it must fight back.”

“What about artificial intelligence?” mariner asked. “Isn’t the miracle of high speed rationalizing supposed to help restore the situation?”

“No. Electronic processing, being nothing more than magnetized electrons, is incapable of human rationality. Every transaction is nothing more than another transaction. Electrons don’t carry morality; once executed it is gone. Further, the Earth has no memory. Once things begin to shift for whatever reason, the Earth doesn’t look back, it simply adjusts to the changing environment.”

“Where all the other players, that is, life including humans and plants, the biosphere and the very stable weather of the past 100,000 years will suffer, is that a global change is beginning that will trash many nations because all humans have to fight back is money. It is hard to imagine but nations will avoid war because they don’t have the money to keep up with the earth. This shortage of cash already is a news item as Earth begins to toss about weather patterns, melting glacial ice, rising sea levels and global shifting causing earthquakes, volcanoes and more as Earth continues on its orbit.”

Guru continued on but mariner could not keep up with Guru’s theories because mariner’s mind was already swimming with the concepts Guru laid out. He graciously thanked Guru and headed down the mountain.

The only metaphor mariner can come up with is that for many centuries, humans have been using an Earth credit card and now humans have reached their card limit and Mother Earth is calling in the debt.

Ancient Mariner

It’s all about results

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As seasoned readers know, mariner has been spending a lot of time living with alter ego Nosey Mole. His labyrinth of tunnels and small rooms provide privacy and isolation from the noise of the outside world. Nosey is a classic every day, common-guy  conservative wooed by things that he feels are important within the scope of his daily life. It’s not about political fantasies, “it’s about getting things done, damn it!” In the swampy gunk that passes for Constitutional government, it is no wonder that Nosey has become skeptical and prefers watching TV shows broadcast in the 1990s.

Nosey and mariner were visiting the other day. I asked him what little pieces of his life does he fear will disappear. He thought for a full minute or so then replied,

“Little pieces? I suppose you mean cheap stuff that ain’t cheap no more? You know, it ain’t around anymore and it ain’t little but I miss malls with all different kinds of stores and restaurants and movies and bowling alleys.”

Mariner encouraged Nosey to continue.

“One of my favorite times of the morning is gone. I really liked my first cup of coffee along with my local newspaper. It was about what was happening near me – I knew a lot of those people and the problems were local and could affect my home directly. It had the local high school sports, a crossword puzzle and my favorite part, the funnies. Is Pogo still in the comics?

Nosey was beginning to roll.

“Hey, I’ll tell you something little that ain’t around no more: keeping your house warm!! My mother told me when I was 10 years old that it cost her 33¢ a gallon to pay the oil bill for our house. My bill this month was $2.18 a gallon!!”

“I’ll tell you something else that ain’t around anymore: The US Government! If this government had been around in the 40’s, we’d be German citizens today. You want more? Want to talk about less taxes? Talk to the BIG money guys.”

Nosy was getting hyped. Mariner thought it best to end the conversation in a friendly way and moved down the tunnel to his room.

Nosey could have gone on through the night. There are so many things disappearing or taking on a new shape. For example, local newspapers being replaced by smartphones who couldn’t care less about the fact that Aunt Millie died, four homes are being razed, malls and Pogo. For mariner this is a poignant disappearance for him but culturally dangerous for the nation’s society.

Smartphones and computer shopping took away the malls. Remember when we could walk down the mall and bowl a few frames then stopped at a pub for some billiards?

Ancient Mariner

Inherent rank versus government

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Over the years, especially since retirement, mariner has watched dozens of TV programs, read science journals, roamed about in Wikipedia – all of which had in common the subject of behavioral zoology. Evolution provides each creature with a set of behaviors that help them to survive in the wilderness of Planet Earth.

What brought the idea of a post on the subject is that Junk University recently ran a series of programs on some of our fellow creatures: Hyena, elephant, three varieties of monkeys, and cougars.

To make a long documentary about peculiarities short, he will leap to insights that seem to reflect common similarities – including humans.

Just to give merit to matriarchs, numerous female insects and birds decide who the father will be. Most predators do the same.

About half the monkey species have matriarchies. Elephants have matriarchies. Gorillas have a shared matriarchy-patriarchy where  female rank in the herd carries over to her offspring while patriarchal domination of the herd is a competitive rank that dictates herd-wide activity. In hyenas, ranking mothers give birth to larger, stronger females who have a firm authority sufficient to ward off predators. Most of the feline class have dominant mothers probably because the male comes along only when its time to have sex.

A further delineation is mammals versus species who abandon their young, mostly small animals and birds. Social behavior is much more prominent in mammals.

The pattern that mariner perceived is that all mammals are born with a genetic capability to maintain some degree of family order. While there are different patterns, the objective is universal: maintain order in the clan.

Is this true about humans, that there must be a sustained social behavior in order to function as humans? Yes, of course. What is fascinating is to study how earlier versions of Homo handled that control. Our hunter gatherers had a matriarchy-patriarchy like the gorillas. This hardly changed as a principal behavior until about 10,000 years ago when the economics of power switched from surviving to survival of the fittest. Centuries of King patriarchs  became the dominant social rule as a defense against an era of continuous warfare.

The Western Culture was planted in Europe during the first peaceful period after Roman domination. Early agricultural economics led to patriarchs who owned land. Lords and barons and such became the controllers of behavior both for men and women. Society in general still had not ranged far from total dependency on natural resources.

But something was changing. Patriarchal politics remained too primitive to deal with the new economics of local jurisdictions. To keep this post brief, the singular benchmark in history that flopped society from the rule of inbred animal behavior to something called ‘government’ was the signing of the Magna Carta on June 15, 1215.

That was the moment inherited animal behavior became subservient to standardized individual rights published in a constitution. Are 21st century humans about to revisit what controls human behavior?

Ancient Mariner