GLITCHET

A fascinating article on the ultimate endgame of consciousness: in silicon and steel, or in flesh? (Or in both.) We assume "that machines sit at the pinnacle of the evolution of the consciousness", but there's no guarantee whatsoever that our current technological trajectory will actually get us there. There may be an upcoming energy efficiency wall for our typical processing architectures, and we may be better off using "neuromorphic" architectures or quantum computation. And a whole lot of other really fascinating alternate futures, possible impossibilities, and strange ideas. The intelligences of the future might not even be remotely rational in the way we understand rational to be. Boy, I'd be interested to see us create the ultimate singularity-ready robots/androids/meatthoughtforms and they just vanish because they have instantly attained enlightenment or something. "Seeya, suckers!" ... maybe that's what's happening now?

Don't get too excited--it can only last half an hour. But that's a start, and they'll improve it! Anyways, I'm imagining the horrifying life of someone who is just constantly on a surgery table, having a surgery done to get a new heart implanted that only lasts 30 minutes. This is, of course, exactly what would happen because there's no more efficient way to pump a heart that's already been invented for people who need to be kept artificially alive by heart-pumping technology. NONE. NONE!

OK, TBH--I don't think Elon Musk quite gets it, either. Of course, starting any sentence with "I don't think Elon Musk quite gets it" is just asking to be proven hilariously or apocalyptically wrong in like 20 years, but I just don't fundamentally believe that we can create a robot that is like us or has our priorities unless we literally modeled the human brain, which will take a VERY long time. (Like, you know, maybe 20 years.) Granted, we can simulate a fruit fly's brain, but even that requires multiple GPUs. But I'm worried about something much more close and obviously destructive: mindless, remote-controlled robots or drones that can automatically target, shoot at, or deploy munitions against people.

We're far more likely (in my very pessimistic, future-fearing opinion) to see the sudden hostile takeover of a large city by a billionaire (or three) who pool their resources into creating an army that just murders every foe it sees. Less frightening and more "oh, the woe of systems" is that once we roll these things out into the army, if we haven't already, friend-vs.-foe identification is still quite a hard problem, especially at the on-the-ground infantry level. So... stay away from the robot police, yo. Of course, maybe it'll be better than how things are now--in a conversation with my friend, she said "I was followed by an aggressive homeless guy who seemed like he wanted to murder me but I didn't want to call the cops because I was afraid they would murder him", so, you know, there's that. And everyone knows that technology fixes social problems and the abuse of power!

Basically: no, amount of work sought didn't change (I feel like this is a duh, but then again, it probably varies from culture to culture (OR DOES IT?! (I don't know))) in Finland. GiveDirectly worked quite well (which I've linked about in a Glitchet before), and effects on the EU were quite positive registering a sharp drop in poverty. You'll have to forgive me for believing that UBI is completely feasible and possible, if only the billionaires of the world would spend less time topping the money leaderboards and more time giving everyone in extreme poverty (or even just regular poverty) money. And the pure cultural effects it would have would be enormous as well; can you imagine if you could live a minimalistic life, creating, and living, without worry? Of course, that's welfare and god knows welfare and faring well are just the worst things in the world possibly ever.

Ahhhhh-ha-ha-ha-ha. I don't even know what to say here. I mean, it pretty much describes itself, doesn't it? Click inside for some (barely) SFW gifs.

Check out this dope anthology of the Screenfull project, hosted back in 2004-2005 with a "maximalist approach to content and design", "stadium rock net.art". It seems like a really raw precursor to vaporwave, modern net art, and brutalist web design. Photos and gifs for yer eyes.

"The Apprehension Engine" - a beautifully shot, short minidoc on the creation of a device designed to create horrifying, frightening, unnerving noises. A neat little thing with some very cool construction. I'm pretty sure I've literally heard some of these sounds in my nightmare. Especially love that violin bow being rubbed on a bit of twisted metal. I miss the days of making weird feedback music on my guitar sat right next to my amp.