I want a morality that allows us to say with certainty, and with no caveats, “that is evil.”
Tuning the Universe
Are we a mere accident, the chance result of comingling molecules in a primordial soup, brought into consciousness by a fluke of probability inevitable in an infinite universe? Are we a necessary extension of ever-increasing entropy, biological machines evolved to accelerate and further entropy’s conquest of order? Are we, rather, divinely created, the protagonists for which this setting was formed?
Testing AI, Students, 3
The proposed Weizenbaum test is so lacking in structure, objectivity, rigor, and specificity as to not even define what the grading scale or reference answers would be.
Definition, Abstraction, and Language’s Limitation
Where I asserted that abstractions result in language’s limitations, my brother argued that language’s limitations cause its abstractions.
Predicting the Future of Science Fiction
If we don’t have a vision for the future, the future might never arrive.
Generosity of Perspective
Generosity, and its application to our interactions and the way we view the world, is not a revolutionary concept, nor is it a complex one, but that does not make it less potentially powerful.
Pondering Utopia: A Fool’s Errand?
Utopias litter the mythological landscape. They crater the philosophical expanse, and they mar the psychological maps. Fiction’s forest is dotted with utopias like delicate, diseased orchids that never quite work.
How We Know
The study of how we know is known as epistemology, and its extensive philosophical tradition offers three main schools of thought that each have innumerable permutations presented by every philosopher who has ever philosophized: skepticism, rationalism, and empiricism.
Normative and descriptive Judgements
This is not a referendum on whether normative decision-making is superior or inferior to descriptive decision-making.
“Advanced” Civilization
How do we define “advancement” of a civilization? Their technical ability? Their scientific understanding? Their cultural complexity? Their living standards? Their economic vitality? Their individual rights and freedoms? Their average capacity for individual fulfillment? Their life expectancies?
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