Social Democracy, Philosophy, Rat Update

[tcpip]

A few weeks ago I went to the launch of "A Little History of the Australian Labor Party" by by Nick Dyrenfurth and Frank Bongiorno, published by UNSW Press. Spent a some time chatting to some ALP colleagues many of whom I haven't talked to for some time; the former premier, Steve Bracks, the former member for Essendon, Judy Maddigan and for Federal Member for Casey, Race Mathews. It was a fairly sombre occassion give the dire state of the ALP in various opinion polls, although the point was made that the Labor Party has been in dire straits in the past and managed to recover.

Of course, this is hardly sufficient. Recovery of a social organisation does not occur as some sort of natural cycle. Rather it is something that requires conscious evaluation, reflection and consideration. I have attempted to this with a recent article on the Isocracy Network, The Sick Rose: Social Democracy In Crisis, where I outline the seriousness of the situation on an international level, the history of social democracy and the desperate need for a principled re-assertion of the core principles of liberty, democracy and socialism.

Last week wrote a short piece on developments on artificial intelligence to artificial consciousness for Lightbringers. This week I'm presenting at the Melbourne Existentialist Society on "Hannah Arendt's Existentialism" followed by "The Pursuit of Happiness" at the Unitarian Philosophy Forum.

Finally, it's been a few months since the last rat update. This is particularly important because as of last night we acquired two young new girls; a person was moving out of Willsmere and couldn't take them to their new home, so we've taken them in - welcome Tricky and Naughty, along with their rat mansion. This does mean that the possibility now exists to engage in a rat-breeding program, where I shall breed a race of super-rats to take over the world, bwahahaha!

Comments

[mr-figgy.livejournal.com]

Rats are already going to conquer the world on their own. No, what you're going to do is create a new faction that will render problematic the world-conquering efforts of the majority, thus delaying the downfall of humans for about an hour or so before that situation gets resolved. Neat!

[tcpip.livejournal.com]

Heh. I think they'll win by domesticating humans. For their own purposes they need longer limbs and a longer lifespan...

[sebastianne.livejournal.com]

Will you post the Arendt presentation somwehere? I'm working late Tuesday, but very keen to hear it!

[tcpip.livejournal.com]

I certainly will! I suspect you'll find it on my next post :)

[tcpip.livejournal.com]

Here you go, you get it two hours before the actual event :)

http://levlafayette.com/node/288

[sebastianne.livejournal.com]

Awesome- thankyou! :)

[heron61.livejournal.com]

Last week wrote a short piece on developments on artificial intelligence to artificial consciousness for Lightbringers.

Interesting and thought-provoking, my one major problem with it is that I find the concept of philosophical zombies to be utter and complete nonsense. From my PoV, something that looks and acts conscious sufficiently well is. OTOH, I think one point you mention is from my PoV crucial, which is that hardware and even programming aren't sufficient to make an actual AI, part of what is going to make an AI an actual conscious being (or perhaps far more accurately, an actual conscious being that humans can usefully interact with, since a sufficiently alien consciousness is utterly irrelevant, since it won't be able to interact coherently with humanity) is communication with humans, so the steps will ultimately be hardware, programming, and then what amounts of education, which will presumably (or at least hopefully) include moral education.

[tcpip.livejournal.com]

Well, philosophical zombies are meant only as an illustrative thought-experiment. In many ways it is an elaboration of the Chinese room experiment. The argument is against the idea that something that "looks and acts" is necessarily conscious. This said, a purely rules-based system would have problems, I think, developing new values. Which is why I come back to the Latin of consciousness related with con scientia - shared knowledge - and the capacity to make moral choices.

All said tho', it's going to be a very, very interesting next few decades.