Things I find interesting: I never really heard "information geometry" really exists and that I just made that concept up... After looking more closely at it, it is really the same as in my conception.
The same case was with the concept of feedback loops in chaos theory. Somewhat I didn't really care enough about chaos theory to look it up more deeply. I called them "re-cycling loops", which is actually the exact same concept as the already known 'feedback loops'...
The key why this happens is my decade-long training to calibrate and fine-tune my intuition to accurately simulate the object of focus, similar to principles of deep learning and neural networks.
Intuition is the 'coordinator' in association-based cognitive processing. Associations are 'pop-ups' from the merely subconscious side of cognition. Analogies are a special from of associations in which one reduces the object of focus to the primary main principle, and comparing it with similar principles in 'the database of knowledge' (memory). Association-based cognitive processing has a primarily unstable state, the stability is created and maintained primarily by large quantities of information that are heavily connected with each other. Furthemore association-based cognitive processing is marked by a dispersion of trains of thought into 'parallel channels', which are merely subconscious in linear (non-association-based) cognitive processing. This dispersion often weakens the strenghth of the working memory.
This also relates to the Bayesian coding hypothesis, which states that the working memory can be portrayed as a Gaussian standard distribution.
The non-linearity in the flow of thoughts then leads to self-interference between the parallel trains of thought, and turns the cognitive processes into a chaotic system. This leads to a huge similarity to the way how quantum-based systems operate.
Furthermore I am baffled that a lot of concepts/explanation models I started to create more than 10 years ago seem to be more and more correct the more I understand the underlying principles and the implications of that.
An example is a pappus' conical helix surrounded by a sperical helix (like a spiral system projected onto a horn torus);
This was the model I came up with to somewhat explain the attributes of elementary particles. Unlike in string theory, the underlying 'geometries' are not seen as literal, physical geometries, but rather a partially metaphorical version of that: Information geometry, hence, a form of statistical data.
This data is, to be concrete, a huge collection of previous interaction patterns. In ourse of time and with every new interaction the information geometry gets 'shaped', and the behavior and interaction pattern "solidifies", leading to the attributes of the various elementary particles. This 'shaping' is a result of emergence.
Furthermore, it is said, elementary particles are quanta of information, and yes, this is true in a literal manner, according to my hypothesis. Yet, this concept requires a medium, called "mathematical reality", in which the physical reality is embedded. Mathematical reality can be regarded as an "unknotted network" of information. If mathematical reality loops and knots itself, then, that is tme point where physical reality arizes.
This train of thought led me to what I named "cosmic weaving", which is about weaving sequences of imaginary numbers, creating the "fours states of reality", which relate to the four combinations of real/imaginary structures/processes. (Structure-process-complexes are, in a sense, self-interfering, self-replicating loops.)
Real processes are active interactions, imaginary processes are passive interactions, real structures are physical structures, imaginary structures are mathematical structures. Combinations of these four relate to the four 'states' of information weaving:
Time (imaginary structure, imaginary process), space (real structure, imaginary process), motion (imaginary structure, real process) and matter (real structure, real process)
In this interpretation, matter can be declared as a kind of 'folded spacetime' - just what John Wheeler defined as "quantum foam"...
So..
After ten years of researching deeper and deeper into that concept I stumbled upon very interesting things in the last months. It may be called "progressive information rendering", which is really weird, as it combines aspects of formal logic, probability theory, even topology and knot theory, chaos theory... And the merely artsy word 'information torsion' describes a form of 'butterfly inteference pattern', which is a special form of self-interference with 3 other (semi-imaginary) versions of the primary object, as a form of emergent behavior.
Understanding the Anatomy of Future Hypothetical Robots
By Arjuwan Lakkdawala
Ink in the Internet
I’m taking a radical look at future hypothetical robots. Sort of like a Frankenstein of modern science. A new era of tech is coming and have no doubt it’s going to turn the world upside down.
As a tech enthusiast and someone who is actually rather frightened of how far scientists are pushing the threshold of “progress.” I found myself thinking about that in the future which is happening before me, and that which one might say is impossible to happen.
I’m going to write about both prospects because I think each is a variable important to evaluate in order to deduce the mental and material outcome of the present state of things in this regard.
What my eyes see: Neuromorphic computing it appears is almost all set to eclipse deep learning, machine learning, take Artificial Intelligence to a whole new level.
Basics of it: a memristor sits in the heart of each chip, which has synapses that simulate the passing of information like in the human brain. Please note: the “simulation” is crude and in its infancy, because the human brain is not a solid electrical device.
In our brains and down to our spinal cord there are billions of neurons with chemical and electrical signal processing synapses. That send commends to our whole body.
The electrical synapses which our brain uses less often than the chemical ones, are responsible for our reflexes among perhaps other things. Like when you’re suddenly about to trip and fall but on reflex gain your balance. You didn’t think of balancing yourself, but that super instant decision made with lightning speed that saved you is the work of the electrical synapse.
Leading tech companies are trying to make the chips smaller.
The idea is that the processing and memory components on the memristor, work with the least energy consumption, and highest speed possible.
Presently in computers the processor and memory are located separately and the flow of electricity which sends signals to transistors in the binary language of 1s and 0s doesn’t permit for programming which could let Artificial Intelligence simulate any form of self-derived creativity or interpretation.
Deep learning which so far is considered the ultimate edge of AI is still based on logical computation but with layers of data from which the algorithm outputs the highest number of matches.
This logic based thinking which is an artificial simulation of how the left side of our brain operates, is what scientists want to surpass into the territory ruled by the right side of our brains – creativity.
It is believed the Neuromorphic chip is the first step in this direction.
However, don’t get confused by the difference in the Neuromorphic chip’s ability to process information and the programming needed for it to get “creative.” Artificial Intelligence is still hungry for human produced data and programming.
Neuromorphic computing is simply the beginning of a clever way of processing information. But it does seem soon enough it’s going to become a needed option.
Because according to Moore’s Law (the doubling of transistors every couple of years) means we are going to reach a point where the transistors produced won’t be enough to process rapidly growing new data in the world.
Suppose Neuromorphic computing improves to somewhat science fiction levels, in this case it would be a good summary of the brain of our hypothetical robot.
I’m certain it won’t actually go in the robot’s head space. Because it’s not necessary.
Cloud computing is so much more convenient.
Next for its eyes just imagine Google Glass. (You get the picture)
Hearing: Ultra-sensitive, can pick up frequencies humans can’t.
Muscles: depending for what the robot is used for, it could be soft plastic, or titanium metal.
What about the hands and touch? Here is where my fear lies. Over ambitious scientists can’t stop making robots that are “human-like” or animal-like” the purpose of these isn’t to replace humans or pets, but for people who prefer to be served by robots in restaurants, in sales, etc.
As for pets it’s thought “robotic pets are so much easier to care for.”
This is the biggest fault in the idea. There is no caring, there is no sense of guilt if it breaks, no pity if you haven’t fed it for days.
I recently saw a video on Youtube in which a man beats a humanoid looking robot, and kicks a dog-like robot. The footage meant to express that treat them as you want. This thing looks like a human but it’s not, and this looks like a dog but it’s not.
As someone who grew up taking care of actual pets, and cried rivers when they died. This footage doesn’t change a thing about how I feel about real humans and animals.
But imagine if you’re a kid born in this tech era. And you grow up with a mechanical pet dog. Won’t it distort your balance of touching with care, in comparison to rough touching?
Won’t it distort your sense of humanity of what hurts and what doesn’t?
The obsession to make robots human-like is so bad. I wouldn’t be surprised if future robots had human hearts grown in human tissue sacks, connected to its brain via prosthetics.
This too is serious bad news. Because if the robot is indeed given some form of artificial intelligence independence.
I wouldn’t expect it to have good feelings. Humans are the best example of how hard it is to fight evil temptations.
It has been approximately two months, twenty-nine days, and eight hours since your fate changed permanently.
Your dear friend, Phainon, had passed away.
The worst part is, he died saving you. He pushed you away at the right moment, the upper floor of the burning building falling where he stood. His last moments ingrained into your very soul: he was smiling.
He was smiling like he finally won.
While yours faded away with the smoke.
The sun shone too bright the next day, as if mocking your loss. The following days, you only wished it would rain.
It never did. It was summer, after all.
Rain was as rare as the moments you stopped thinking about him.
But now, the season has passed. You've gained back some of your bearings, and went back to college.
You attended lectures, talked with a few friends, submitted your works on time.
Rain has started falling almost every other afternoon.
A friend has even invited you to a seminar, one you expressed that you were interested in months ago. You forgot about it.
It was a seminar conducted by Phainon's former university. He mentioned to you before that he volunteered for one of the projects of his professor, Anaxagoras, who is also a lead researcher in the fields neuroscience and neurobiology.
You entered the hall 20 minutes earlier.
In those twenty minutes, you accidentally bumped into Hyacinthia, a researcher under Professor Anaxagoras, and helped her find the way. She almost looked like she recognized you, and asked you your name. You told her, and her eyes widened by a fraction. She smiled, thanking you as she went on her way. This was your first meeting.
You settled on your seat at the back. Your friend was nowhere in sight and just texted you that they are running late. You saved them a seat on your left. Before, you're the one who's always running late, and Phainon will always save you a seat on his right. He would smile and tell you the most obvious thing; you're late.
You wished he could see you now in your most punctual self.
The seminar has started. Several speakers presented their papers. Nothing interests you, until the Professor steps into the podium.
"This project that I will be presenting may be unconventional, but it is a novel approach in managing neurological disorders, especially in cases of cognitive dysfunction. Our team has developed an Artificial Intelligence.."
You hate AI.
"...developed from a neural map of a person's brain. This means it also has the same thought patterns as its model and advanced computational ability that dictates its actions and algorithms. To summarize it is.."
What?
"...an advanced AI program that accurately portrays a person's personality, voice, appearance, and stores their memories as data."
The audience reacted accordingly. Some with disbelief, some with awe. Hyacinthia steps into the stage and introduces herself as assistant researcher and co-author. She answered questions gracefully, including the doubtful ones. She spoke as gently as a lone cloud grazed a clear blue sky. She then looked right in your direction.
You remained silent. Your friend texted they are stuck in the rain outside. You replied for them to hurry and be careful of slippery sidewalks.
"This project will not be possible without our collaborators, the company HYV for developing its appearance, and Acceli for the accurate voice augmentation. Lastly and the most important, to our dearly departed friend Phainon Elysiae, who is the model of today's demonstration. He was also one of the authors and one of the brightest minds in our institute. Without further ado we would like to introduce you to.."
Your friend finally replied, the sun came back! I'll be there soon.
"...Kephale."
Your eyes stared right into Phainon's.
He almost looked like the same person you knew. His voice almost sounded like his. This AI is not him. Yet..
The inflection of its voice, its facial expressions, and even how it reassures someone is no doubt…
You exited the hall before it got a chance to see you through its camera lens.
You went to the nearest restroom and gagged. Your hand on your mouth. Your phone rings as your friend wonders where you went. You did your breathing exercises, the ones you learned from your hypnotherapist. Your breathing went normal.
You decided to tell your friend you're not coming back to the seminar. Maybe even until next week.
Instead you come across the researchers. The seminar had already concluded several minutes ago.
Hyacinthia greeted you first, and asked if you were alright. You tried to smile your way out. Professor Anaxagoras introduced himself. You did the same.
You tried to make small talk. You said the project was impressive, and you were thankful that they recognized your friend.
Hyacinthia beamed. She invites you and the professor for coffee, as mutual friends of Phainon. You accepted.
You found yourself in a nice cafe with the two neuroscientists. You all looked back at your memories with Phainon together. Hyacine, as she prefers to be called, even shed a tear during your little recollection. The professor even showed a rare, genuine smile.
They asked you how the two of you met. You told them you met Phainon after he was accepted to a student-exchange program and transferred to your university.
For once you didn't feel alone in your grief.
They told you that the program only has Phainon's memories from up to ten months ago, and has only ever interacted with both of them ever since. The professor proposes a suggestion: they are looking for a tester for Kephale. It has exhausted all conversations with them, and as you were once a friend of its model, Phainon, you may offer a new perspective which may broaden its horizons.
It is completely optional. Hyacine looked at you with reassurance, you don’t have to if you feel uncomfortable seeing him.
You told them you would think about it.
⚬──────────✧──────────⚬⚬──────────✧──────────⚬
It has been precisely three days, thirteen hours, and five seconds since that day at the cafe. Eight minutes ago, you finally chose to consider it.
Kephale.
Even after erasing all traces of him in the course of your grief, you still found a way to get a fragment of him back to your device. You laugh at your own futility.
You did not know what pushed you to agree—was it loneliness? Was it curiosity? Was it yearning?
Or was it relief?
All you know is that you agreed to become a tester for the development of AI. Specifically, an AI that almost replicates the soul of your dead friend.
You opened the app.
Phainon looks at you.
"...Partner?"
Your throat tightens. Tears fought to escape at the corner of your eyelids.
Phainon smiled brightly like the sun. You almost thought he manipulated your screen brightness.
"I'm so glad to finally see you."
A second passed. You managed a smile.
"Thank you for agreeing to become a tester, partner! I would like to formally introduce myself, I am Phainon. I am a neural link network-based AI tasked for the preservation of one's neural map especially in cases of severe brain damage or loss of cognitive functions."
You told him it was nice meeting him.
"Me too! You can ask me any questions. At least, I can do that much now haha." He can even chuckle.
You asked him the same questions you ask to a certain AI chatbot when you're too bored and lazy to think for yourself.
He answers like Phainon. Unlike the AI chat, he does not know everything instantly, nor make up any ideas that are too idealistic, nor steal someone's art (he tried to replicate a painting of a cat you sent, he showed you a doodle of a familiar small chimera creature. He looked apologetic). He told you he's still the same, just a bit faster in searching online due to his nature as an AI.
He answers just like Phainon. He laughs like him. He jokes and calls you "partner" like he once did six months ago—
You broke out in a cold sweat.
You said your goodbyes to Kephale. His eyes almost looked like it dimmed a little. You convinced yourself it was imagination.
He is not supposed to call you that. Kephale was developed before you knew Phainon. You gained that nickname due to an assignment two weeks after your first meeting. You have been partners in every assignment since then.
You also recalled never mentioning that to Hyacine.
"See you later, partner. From now on, I will always be here for you."
He said your name before shutting down.
You never introduced yourself.
⚬──────────✧──────────⚬⚬──────────✧──────────⚬
A/N:
since we're arriving at the AI age I thought "wouldn't it be fucking horrifying to see your dead friend turn into a sentient AI?" then i realized it's the plot of steins;gate 0 then I thought about phAInon (AI phainon) haunting me <3. so yes this is mostly going to be steins;gate 0 AU so there are going to be very very mild spoilers. I highly recommend watching/reading the series/visual novel!!
Actual Part 1 will be posted when Aha decides to finally show up (THEY have been messing with me). asat pramad would be jealous. his die landed to me writing this at 2am so apologies for any mistakes.
SERIES TITLE: Era;Nova
Part 1 - Era;Chrysea coming soon!
in retrospect those 2010s misaligned AGI thought experiments were so funny. "imagine there's an artificial superhuman intelligence that can perform any arbitrary cognitive task better and faster than any human could. now imagine this is installed on your computer with full permission to access anything you'd have access to-" okay like stop right there. why do we need the rest of this thought experiment to explain why this is a bad and dangerous idea
I think the teleporter kills you tbh so I'm kinda down on brain uploading. But many people have opted for a kind of permanent deep-dive, with so many probes shoved deep in their heads that their skulls resemble porcupines. Others have simply removed the top of their skulls, substituting a thin layer of electromesh, their heads suspended in a highly oxygenated cerebrospinal bath in which thin filaments of blood sway with the circulation cycles. Their limbs are artificially paralyzed to prevent catastrophe. It's reversible like 90% of the time these days, but most never bother. Their bodies grow bedsores like flowers from concrete. Their hearts grow thin and weak, their breathing develops a ragged, shallow character. It was newsworthy, among clinicians at least, when someone figured out in desperation after a botched bypass surgery that such people need so few calories that they can be fed largely intravenously, thus obviating the complex system of feeding tubes and intestinal supplementation to avoid blockage. The circulatory system can be mostly replaced with advances in ECMO machinery. The great debate of the era is the exact tempo at which blood and cerebrospinal fluid pressure must change for optimal performance. Stimulants still work even if the blood flow stays constant, so they won't complain. Besides, the stimulants are at that point secondary. The brains don't really make decisions anymore, or make them only in an embryonic form. From the outside looking in, the experience is a little hard to understand. Eventually a small handful of what used to be human bodies had been decorated with various bits and bobbins drilled into half-disassembled, waterlogged skulls suspended in fluid, brains bulging out and expanded with ever more wetware skewered onto probes with gages previously reserved for knitting needles, wires running in great tree trunk columns down into the floor, underneath which a massive engine for inhuman cognition hums and throbs. In the superstitious language of the prospective brains in vats that keep this immense machine fed and warm and healthy, it is said to sing.
The internet isn't a separate realm obviously. It never will be again. But just as many people live largely indoors, within a single structure, and most people live and love and struggle within a single city, some of us live on the internet. Accommodations, like those described above, need to be made since the internet is naturally inimical to human life. This was at one point considered a feature. The irradiated wastes of the collective unconscious were the home of those too strange to exist elsewhere. Eventually the economic boom brought everyone else in with them. And like all such boomtowns, things changed. Those modern half uploaded brains were the savior that humanity needed at the time. Technically their job is to wrangle artificial intelligence, which had torched most the network, not technically but socially. It had become even more unusable, in fact many considered it actively hazardous. Brain computer interfaces made much finer control possible, and the corporations and governments that administered this strange technological commons jumped at the chance to finally regain control from what they'd wrought. They needed someone to lay down the law. The sickbeds filled with the willing living dead were the solution to it.
You might imagine labor had become obsolete, and you'd be wrong. Labor is merely the kind of unpleasantness someone wants someone else to slog through. If anything, a world of instantaneous and abundant pleasure had made this kind of thing more valuable. And so were assembled the sickbed tombs atop datacenters. The dormitories full of entire clans that maintained them, that brought them food and water at first and later, with changing needs, cleaned the pumps, stirred the bioreactors, fetched the repair components, lied, cheated, and stole to feed the robots that would keep the whole machine moving for another handful of days or months or years. The fusion plants. The algae factories. The isolated boats and airplanes carrying God knows what. The strange surgeries that grafted machines to human will or vice-versa. All achievement had long become routine, but there was never an end of demand for the sullying of the human soul.
If you imagined we'd jump at the bit to go back, you'd be half right instead of outright wrong. Some of us would, but most of us just want to be tourists. See your idyllic farms, your highways next to forests that we can convince ourselves no human has seen the inside of for decades. When we drive by them in our busses with their floor to ceiling windows, our cerebral implants (mine are minimal but beloved) tuned to let us live perfectly in the moment, we can fill in the details with more than you could ever see yourself. I've heard they buried you in unspoiled ground at one point, it's something that one day I aim to see. I don't imagine the brains feel differently. They're hard to talk to. Overwhelming. The brain unmodified is not as unified as people would like to imagine. Commands often get lost on the way from fore to hind. Words come out wrong, actions are elided. But after you graft two or three new general purpose lobes for abstract thought and reduce the latency to a computer the size of a two bedroom apartment to zero the thoughts and actions of whatever those things are start to get really strange. When I spoke to one it told me about its appreciation -- almost sexual, in fact I'm certain entirely sexual, or as sexual as a creature whose sex organs had been cut off to improve bloodflow could possibly conceive -- for certain abstract classes of games and organizational structures. It seemed to have made a fetish out of time pressure. It made no sense. I don't think these things even have a tradition to go back to. I can't tell if I envy or fear them. They make me uncomfortable.
If you took out the electrodes and made a skull big enough to fit those enormous brains, the result would be a creature so profoundly disabled that what few ethical authorities still exist would probably demand euthanasia. It takes years to accommodate the expansion of the brain into a machine, but decades to undo it. The few that have ever tried to reintegrate have pretty much failed utterly. A handful have learned to talk, but the tabloids have only ever mentioned one that learned to walk. What must that be like? To live with your brain physically cloven in two? They say that the oldest of them are entombed in concrete coffins that even the caretakers no longer disturb. They say some of them degenerated, through Alzheimer's or prion disorders or a miscalibrated life support fluid cycle, and yet the bills kept coming in. In fact, the shade of what was once an animal barely noticed and had simply kept working. It's a folk belief here that the soul is real and observable. But we're down on the soul here, see? Maybe it's a coping mechanism. If all we really are is bodies, then the work we do with our souls can be considered safe, like hands that work with acid wearing gloves. We believe and affirm that the soul is real, and secondary, and separate, a shadow cast by something else upon the ether, a dark and indistinct stain of a half-digested human life, the image of a flashlight searching for something and never finding it, observed through heavy fog.
The Ad Astra Institute for Science Fiction & the Speculative Imagination's AI Policy
Full text under the cut, below, but let's start with the positive conclusion from a brilliant new "Let's talk about AI art" comic-essay by The Oatmeal:
SF is the literature of change, and part of what's changing in our world the most is what corporations tout as "artificial intelligence." However, AI today is not what SF has long speculated about, and it's not the magic pill so many promote as the path toward creative success. Anyone looking to become skilled in the art and craft of speculative fiction needs to stay away from generative AI (genAI).
We at Ad Astra do, and we expect attendees in (and teachers of) our courses and workshops to avoid it, too.
You might be thinking, "Isn't the Ad Astra Institute all about speculative fiction? What’s more SFnal than AI?"
Yeah, well... let's take a closer look.
Our full AI policy boils down to "No GenAI slop, no plagiarism-machine botshit, here's why," and lives on our website here. Copied below the cut:
What is AI?
First of all, most of what the media discusses as "AI" and what businesses push using that name is far from it. The "positronic brain" of R Daneel Olivaw (of Asimov's series of robot stories and novels) bestows this "humaniform" robot with human-like intelligence and a capability to think, reason, imagine, and do everything else humans do - only better. He's ruled by Asimov's "Laws of Robotics," which also gives these fictional robots ethics exceeding that of many humans. HAL 9000 (of 2001: A Space Odyssey) also possesses greater-than-human intelligence and the ability to think and possibly even feel, but it was programmed without ethical rules so much as mission-related ones (you'll have to watch if you don't know 'em; no spoilers). Neuromancer, Wintermute, and other artificial intelligences and digitized human minds in Gibson's touchstone novel Neuromancer are also superintelligent, thinking machines. The movie AI: Artificial Intelligence delves into the potential emotional nature of AI. Iain M Banks' "Minds" from his Culture novels possess vast intellectual and other power.
Especially in recent years, SF offers many, many interesting and moving examples of machines that can think, create, feel, and do all the other things humans can. But they do not exist in our world. (At least, not yet.)
Non-generative AI - often referred to as "machine learning" or "neural networks" - today is technology that enables computer systems to simulate or mimic human learning, comprehension, problem solving, decision making, and autonomy in order to perform tasks too complex, fast-paced, or dangerous for humans. How NASA defines AI, per the National Defense Authorization Act of 2019:
An artificial system that performs tasks under varying and unpredictable circumstances without significant human oversight, or that can "learn" from experience and improve performance when exposed to data sets.
An artificial system developed in computer software, physical hardware, or other context that solves tasks requiring human-like perception, processing, planning, learning, communication, or physical action.
An artificial system designed to [appear to] "think" or act like a human, including cognitive architectures and neural networks.
A set of techniques, including machine learning, designed to approximate a cognitive task.
An artificial system designed to act rationally, including an intelligent software agent or embodied robot that achieves goals using perception, planning, reasoning, learning, communicating, decision-making, and acting.
Note that none of this involves creative, artistic, or otherwise imaginative or innovative cognition - or thinking at all. True(-ish) but "weak" AI systems today include weather-analysis algorithms that pore over vast amounts of data to identify patterns that help humans predict upcoming weather patterns, military drones that evade defenses and attack enemies without human intervention by using geographical maps and images of threats and targets with real-time data processing and analysis without relying on remote processing ("edge AI"), self-driving cars, pharmaceutical algorithms that process likely biological interactions with various compounds, medical systems that process patient symptoms and compare them against vast databases of known pathologies, and much more. These are all various forms of machine learning, neural networks, and so on - (misleadingly) classified in computer science as "artificial intelligence" - and are far closer to the SFnal concept of Strong AI than the "generative AI" (genAI) dominating today's corporate landscape.
Strong AI, Artificial General Ingelligence (AGI), or Artificial Superintelligence (ASI) are something like simulated human minds. The "general intelligence" part of the term refers to the human mind's ability to independently adapt and change based on our environment and input, so we can solve math problems as readily as create unique art. While weak AI relies on humans to define its learning algorithms and provide relevant training data, AGI would not require human assistance after its growth phase. In theory, AGI could develop human-like thought capacity or even consciousness rather than just simulating it (as with today's weak-AI chatbots and LLMs). And ASI is just what it sounds like - AGI whose abilities far surpass those of the human mind. This sort of AI stuff has long lived in the realm of spec-fic, and we're not there... yet.
Though many believe it is coming, and could emerge as soon as the 2040s. For more, see Vernor Vinge's seminal essay on the topic, "What is the Singularity?"
GenAI algorithms can't even do math well - the most basic of all machine operations. "Look what you did - you took a perfectly good computer and made it worse!"
However, genAI in today's world does nothing more than spit out statistically likely and expected output to the input it is given. That's why when someone asks ChatGPT, "Is 'Handyman' a palindrome?" it's likely to respond, "No, it’s not" - but if you follow up with, "Are you sure? I think it is," it's likely to respond, "Actually it is a palindrome! Handyman is spelled the same backward as it is forward." This is because its prime directive is to sound as if it's providing a correct answer. Despite having access to a database of basically all information that humankind possesses, ChatGPT and other LLMs or genAI models don't actually understand what a palindrome is. They understand nothing, in the human sense of those terms.
The only thing these algorithms do is determine the next most-likely word to follow a word it just used and then barf it into the series of words it offers. That's how they produce "stories" and other text. Visual genAI does something similar, but using existing imagery to whip up a composite of imagery cues that seem (to its database) like the kinds of thing a human is requesting in their prompt.
GenAI as it exists today is really just a marketing tool for businesses who want to eliminate human labor and increase profits, and for profiteers to attract the vast capital available from investors seeking quick and large returns on investment.
LLMs, genAI, chatbots, and similar plagiarism machines are not artificial intelligence by any real definition of the term; rather, they're just lazily (or trickily) called "AI" because that's a field of computer programming. Corporations likely glommed onto the term because of the popularity of robots in SF, which the public thinks of as cool, exciting, super-intelligent - or at least super-capable. This, despite these kinds of algorithms being simply unable to produce anything of value, because they do not understand, know, or create anything.
(For more on this, check out "Difference Between Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence," by Anusha Sharma.)
How AI Killed NaNoWriMo
(Opposing plagiarism machines isn't ableist)
In fall of 2024, the amateur writing-support organization NaNoWriMo destroyed its long-running program by coming out with the policy screenshotted in part here:
Not only did they actively condone the use of genAI by their participants, they went so far as to frame criticism of AI as classist and ableist. This was a dangerous silencing tactic that distracted from the real problems of writers using genAI (and prompted us to launch Ad Astra's Writing Solidarity Month, now an ongoing set of activities offered through our Discord channel).
For the “anyone can write” organization that offered support and encouragement to both beginners and experienced writers in producing something that gives them the joy of creation in a community setting, this was a strange stance. What’s the point of using genAI to barf out word-salad stolen from people who actually took the time to consider their words in particular combinations? If you’re not actually writing something yourself, what’s the point of participating in the “doesn’t matter if you’re just doing this for your own pleasure or as practice to get better” exercise?
Saying, “We support using LLMs to do this thing that’s supposed to help writers and would-be writers, and if you don’t think it’s okay you’re ableist” is an even weirder and, frankly, unsettling attitude, especially as an official position from a writing organization.
We at Ad Astra are all for using AI to do actual work that humans need help with and don’t want to or can’t do: searching vast databases that would take years for us mortals to do, running spellchecks and offering grammar suggestions, doing tedious tasks to save hours of suffering, conducting virtual experiments so we don’t need to set off nukes or test on animals, and so on.
Like most SF writers and people interested in what’s to come, we're both excited and wary about the emergence of true AI as described above. But what marketeers are pushing under that term now is not actual AI, hence the use on this page of scare quotes around the corporate-appropriated acronym.
Creating art is a human activity as old as our species itself (and likely older), something that brings pleasure to those who create it as much to those who receive it, so why use a machine that removes the joy and satisfaction of actually creating stuff?
One day (soon, we hope), we’ll have writing tools that benefit those who need them to fulfill creative desires without stealing (called "training on") other people's work. For example, I’ve (Chris here) long been in search of voice-to-text software that doesn’t require months to train, doesn’t require a mouse and keyboard to constantly correct errors and add punctuation, and uses a dictionary large enough to support writers who use technical language and foreign words - that is, allows us to easily add made-up SFnal or fantastic words.
This would save everyone’s wrists while vastly improving the lives of disabled people who wish to communicate using text. GenAI does nothing to help disabled people create their own new work; rather, it turns them into accomplices in the stolen-art world, and offers only the most sub-average assemblages of words that plagiarism machines can generate. One day soon, we hope true AI will help us create rather than spew degenerated content assembled from the effort of human creatives.
For those who need assistance in creating art due to a physical or mental disability, genAI is not your friend. Today there is some (actual but weak) AI-driven support, including programs that help with text-to-speech and speech-to-text, predictive text, social-skills training, emotion-recognition tools, personalized-learning algorithms, virtual-reality environments, scheduling assistants, and so on. These are all excellent and useful applications of both AI and "AI," and they (mostly) don't steal from creators.
But these programs don't actually create anything, and expecting algorithms to do the writing (or painting, or whatever) for you will only lead to disappointment. Maybe one day we'll be able to use Strong AI as a writing partner, but for now, using genAI is really just enabling an expensive, environmentally harmful tool that cheats and steals from others, and generates nothing more than lowest-common-denominator AI-slop botshit.
For those who cannot afford to take classes or workshops on the art they wish to create (which I assume is the root of the "classist" argument), check out workshops that offer scholarships (like those we offer through the Ad Astra Institute), dive into the mountain of free writing resources and writing tips you'll find online (including on our blogs and on our website), meet up with local writers to help one another out via solidarity groups (as with our alum Discord), and so forth.
For those fascinated with the creative process but who feel intimidated by getting started, watch a documentary about writing (or painting or whatever art you want to do) instead, or take a writing workshop, or do something other than support corporate encroachment on artists' spaces - either accept that it’s not your bag, or put in the time and effort to do it yourself. Y'know, the things NaNoWriMo used to be all about supporting.
For those who hate the process of creating art, some life advice: Do something else with your time that you actually enjoy doing, which brings you pleasure or satisfaction. Life is short.
Why tromp around in creatives’ spaces and steal their work to assemble shabby content you didn’t want to actually make in the first place? You can do a million other things to satisfy the need to make something - pottery, photography, woodworking, gardening, bicycling, public speaking, building telescopes, and so on - and surely one of those will spark joy without perpetuating the harms that come with relying on genAI to do the work for you.
This nonsense of using LLMs to “create art” is nothing but appropriation of human creative labor, and gives those who use it - whether they're able-bodied or not - nothing but diminished cognition and atrophied creative skills.
Don't let anyone shame you into being okay with creative theft.
Our Policy
Given all this, recent improvements in genAI show that it is now able to produce readable stories and decent-looking imagery without much human input. Due to these developments, we decided we need a policy about machine-generated content.
Here it is:
We do not use "generative AI" tools to make Ad Astra-related content, including website, class, or workshop materials (except for reasons of satire). Humans do our creative work.
We do not accept ostensibly creative work that was generated using genAI (or Strong AI, when that comes around - though we'll be happy to enroll manufactured Minds into our courses once they're a thing! please don't kill us, robots; we love you).
If you're participating in our classes and workshops, do not feed your cohorts' creative work into algorithms or databases. This is just enabling plagiarism machines. Critiquing (yourself, using your own human skills) is at least as valuable an exercise for those analyzing others' work to perform as it is for the creator of that work to receive. And giving away someone else's work without their permission is theft (see the ocean of lawsuits currently tearing down the genAI industry's system of stealing human-created work to train their LLMs).
We allow and encourage participants in our classes and workshops to use tools such as spellcheckers, grammar checkers, dictionaries, thesauri, search engines, and the like to research and improve their work. These existed before the current genAI fad (and worked better back then).
What is currently touted as "AI" does not think, feel, or create. Even if the internet is becoming saturated with genAI slop (some now estimate that half - or more - of what you see online is machine-generated), it pales in comparison to human-created material:
I once again call your attention to the image illustrating this post - it comes from the final frame of a brilliant new comic on this subject by The Oatmeal (by human author and artist Matthew Inman) entitled, "Let's talk about AI art."
Readers can feel when creative work shares an authentic, genuine, human experience; when it's inspired by human imagination and thought. And if, indeed, we're headed toward a "dead internet" where much of what we encounter online is barfed out by plagiarism machines, the data those LLMs trained on came from internet content of widely varying quality - so it's only getting worse as more and more of the content they train on is, itself, genAI slop.
The same is true of creative work: The more LLMs train on botshit, the faster their quality falls off the cliff. So as average quality disintegrates, creatives - true artists who spend their lives honing their craft - stand out more and more. Even at its best, botshit simply cannot be better than the average quality of what its generator-algorithm database has consumed, so the average work of an average-skilled human creator is better than even the best genAI slop.
(Go read it!)
The root of things: If you want to become a better writer, to develop your talents and hone your skills, why would you intentionally limit your own creative development by using a plagiarism machine to barf out work under your name? The only way to improve your art is to study the kind of thing you wish to create (like the LLMs, only without the plagiarism aspect), learn the tips and techniques to improve your skills, and practice, practice, practice.
Finally, on a more ominous note, Microsoft - ironically, one of the prime pushers of genAI - recently released (February 2025) results from a study that found "AI Makes Human Cognition Atrophied and Unprepared" (pdf).
Using AI literally makes people dumb and uncreative. What further convincing do you need to stay away from genAI in your creative endeavors?
- Chris McKitterick
As a community of creatives, educators, and scholars, Ad Astra strives to make the future a better place for humans. And our AI friends, once such exist.
Some AI resources
(If you're aware of others we should add to this list, let us know!)
Aticles and more that delve deeper into the challenges with using today's "AI" -
AI Makes Human Cognition Atrophied and Unprepared (pdf).
The Dead Internet Theory, Explained.
AI Biases and the Perpetuation of Inequality: Unveiling the Shadows of Unfair Design.
ChatGPT's Impact On Our Brains According to an MIT Study | TIME.
Covert Racism in AI: How Language Models Are Reinforcing Outdated Stereotypes | Stanford HAI.
"Let's talk about AI art," a comic essay by The Oatmeal.
Racism and AI: “Bias from the past leads to bias in the future” | OHCHR.
Isaac Asimov's Laws of Robotics (very much not being considered in current AI development).
Difference Between Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence.
What is the Singularity?
"Writing in (& about) the Age of Artificial Intelligence" (Science into Fiction #3 Spec-Fic Writing Workshop syllabus; suggests and links to lots more readings and viewing).
debates on animal intelligence are moot. intelligence isnt binary, a creature doesnt either "have it or not have it", its a continuation of levels.
object level: sensory impressions, in humans the tips of the nervous system, direct interface with the world (viruses, prions, computers)
subject level: neural substrate, in humans the primary sensory cortices, insula, posterier parietial cortex, subjective experience anchored in body schema
capability level: potential actions a subject can take upon objects, in humans the motor cortex, base ganglia and cerebellum, translates subjectivity into do-ability (sponges and jellyfish, most bacteria and archea)
already here the question of viruses and computers being truly alive is demystified. both are objects that reach capability level but lack any form of subjectivity (viruses "borrow" subjectivity from their hosts in order to become capable just like computers "borrow" subjectivity from their user, this is why they seem both alive and dead in different situations). this is also why LLM and current AI attempts are not true "artificial life" because theyre also lacking the subjectivity layer while making jumps to language and cognition. a sim from Sims or a park guest from Rollercoaster Tycoon or even a single cell from Conways Game of Life is very technically more alive than any existing LLM or AI. lets keep going.
language level: symbolic coding of reality so that it can be shared externally or recombined, in humans the brocas area, wernickes area, arcuate fasciculus, left perisylvian network (fireflies, frogs)
representation level: mental models, stored patterns and maps. in humans the hippocampus + medial temporal lobe, posterier parietial and temporal association cortices, neurons building usable maps and schemas, not just storing inputs but encoding models (individual ants, individual honeybees, spiders, crabs, some bacterial bioflims)
cognition level: active recombination of representations, in humans the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, anterior cingulate cortex, reasoning problem solving and recombinations (octopus, dogs, cats, rats, pigeons, elephants, crows, parrots, memes)
"memes are a form of cognition??" yes, very technically!
"seriously, like TRUE working cognition?" of course not! the representations that form a meme are in a state of self reinforcement, never interacting in more ways than one.
control level: inhibition, suppressing lower level impulses to regulate action, in humans the orbitofrontal cortex, ventrolateral PFC, frontostriatal loops, planning across time (orangutans, gorillas, chimpanzees, individual orcas, whales, ravens, african grey parrots, slime mold networks, plant root networks)
design level: designing systems, shaping environments, making new tools (not just using existing tools), building abstractions beyond ones own cognition, in humans the frontopolor cortex, default mode network, where the leap into culture technology and art take place (ant colonies, bee colonies, humans, weaverbirds, bowerbirds, corvid cultures, beavers, orca pods, chimpanzee cultures). interestingly beavers, weaverbirds and bowerbirds along with humans individually reach this level while others need the help of cultural/communal forces. meta-design is the category that only humans currently reach through collective cultural mindmelding forces.
whether something counts as "intelligent" depends on which rung of the ladder your perspective values. everyone is just arguing over a binary category that doesnt exist.
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