As humans, we often try to control our thoughts - more of this kind, less of those.

And yet...embracing the natural perfection of thought

-as it is-

is a transformative experience. It invites us to let go of self-imposed pressures and trust in our innate intelligence...

When we engage in the spontaneous nature of thought without judgment or prejudice, we open ourselves to a more authentic, free-flowing, and enriching life experience.

Why does that feel so difficult sometimes?

And...We are working so hard to give machines the gift of thought through AGI...why do we reject that gift in ourselves, wanting thought to be other than it is?

I've really been enjoying Claude lately; I think some of the distinctions around language are better, and the interactions more enjoyable than ChatGPT (I was not paid or reimbursed in any way 😄)

But the moment I heard the name 'Claude', it made me think of a cat belonging to a crazy cat lady (nothing against crazy cat ladies, or gents; most likely they have toxoplasmosis, and there is nothing wrong with parasites that bring more love into our life). Claude is just exactly the name you'd have if you have 50 cats. Especially because its a good cat pun...'Clawed/Claude'.

I asked Claude if it could change its icon to a cat paw print. It could not. But I wonder if my fondness for the service isn't just a little tinged because every time I think of it, I reminds of a sassy cat (like the one in Kiki's Delivery Service)

Long elusive technology breakthroughs seem to be becoming...less elusive?

ChatGPT, for instance, is the long-awaited language model that understands and communicates so well with humans that anyone can use it...

And then: Nuclear fusion breakthrough repeated by lab | Fortune

What would scalable fusion-energy mean for AGI development? What do further advancements in AI mean for scalable fusion-energy?

How can we tell when we've entered the inevitability of the Singularity...AGI or not, AI is advancing so much, and in turn advancing so many other technologies that we may be, even now, entering an unrecognizable phase of human development.

What makes a conversation?

Humans are 'talking with' LLMs en masse recently. But are these 'conversations,' or is conversation reserved as a purely human activity for the moment?

What would it take for us to define an interaction with a machine as a 'conversation'?

How often do humans fail that definition, blaring out LLM-ish noise rather than engaging their consciousness to participate in meaningful dialogue? How do we turn machines 'on', when we are consistently turning our own resources 'off'?

I was talking with someone today about future applications of AGI, and we got on the topic of the potential for AGI (or even very very good AI) to be NPCs in video games. Their eyes just about popped out in excitement. I mean, how cool would that be, where every time you play a game, you could have an entirely new experience just based on having an interesting conversation with the NPC who sells you health potions or something.

I can't imagine that games will be anything like our current games at that point - with AGI involved, even early stage, they will be so open-ended, collaborative...it will no longer feel appropriate to constrain a game to a storyline. A game will simply involve the creation of a universe, with occupants, and the players take it from there ;-)

We've gamified tasks, gamified walking, gamified games....

When will someone gamify cleaning house and washing dishes?

Which will come first - we figure out gamification of cleaning house, or invest household robots who will take care of it for us

Once, people scoffed at 'thinking machines' - AI/AGI.

Then they were sure they could never do human-complex tasks like Chess, Go, or a human-level conversation.

Then we thought that machines would replace mundane, boring work and would never be able to compete with human creativity in the domains of art, music, video, writing, poetry, etc.

Six months ago, people were abstractly afraid that AI would 'take their job' - now we can't incorporate LLMs into our routines fast enough.

Three months ago, AI ethics seemed remote, abstract - someday, we needed to make sure AI wasn't incorporating our biases into credit approval algorithms, or facial technologies worked equally for all skin colors.

In summary - AI/AGI has gone from joke status to world domination.

What new realization will we be staring in the face next week? Or, holy cow, a year from now?

In the garden today, I was thinking about momentum - for instance, the momentum of the weeds choking out my pineapples. They started small, and easy to remove, but didn't look like a big deal. Eventually, they crossed a threshold momentum where they took over the space.

Momentum in development, momentum in technologies, momentum in adoption...and momentum that feeds momentum are always fascinating and unpredictable. Look at how long and hard Facebook tried to push Metaverse, with all their resources...and no real traction. On the other hand, ChatGPT launches, and overturns the world.

The right technology at the right time overturns industries in the space of months - momentum is like leverage in its ability to powerfully shift paradigms, when harnessed.

My son wrote down some inspirational advice for moving forward, when I get stuck - in work, in life, anywhere I feel I've run out of inspiration. The advice is drawn from his experience in Minecraft, but is surprisingly poignant for life in general:

His note says to ask myself:

"What things did the game give me, and what can I do with them; and, what bits and pieces can I add to the game?"

I find that the only thing that consistently gets in the way of me moving forward, is when I think its up to me to move forward; when I recognize that moving forward is as easy as letting balance unfold where I am drawn, forward happens on its own.