Fellow Philosophers...I Need Your Help

[Bill Wiltrack]

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I need help understanding who I am.

I need help understanding where we are going as a humanity.

I need to find meaning in my life on the other side of this Digital Revolution that we find ourselves in...


I have a framework that I have accepted - you may not agree with it but this is the way I see us/me right now:


Computers are able to think faster & better than any one single human being can think. Genius means nothing anymore.


Machines are able to work faster, longer, cheaper, and with more precision than ANY human could.


Human beings, when stripped naked of our platitudes are greedy, mean, and stupid. That's who we are...


There is nothing to feel proud of as a human being. No matter of our advances in technology we are mean to each other, to animals that we share this planet with. We take pride in our emotional transgressions that cause us to act and look irrational and stupid.

We are mean. The structure of our intellect is exclusive, hermetic and always estranged from reality. Which causes us to act in a mean, selfish, stupid way.



Where do we find man's search for meaning in this new reality that is upon us?










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[Dubious]

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Where do we find man's search for meaning in this new reality that is upon us?


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... by not searching for it.

How much 'meaning' to you need to live your life?

After that it's ALL meaningless anyways!

... meaning, BORROW any meaning you can LIVE with in the meantime!

... AND if it goes flat, change it like you would with a spare tire!

[Bill Wiltrack]

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I kind-of like that philosophy.

In a strange way it makes some sense to me.




.................................................





Thank's for shedding some light upon this important philosophical topic.






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[Jaded Sage]

Genius innovates and divines the perfect thing to do. What about those who are not mean? Are they not human? Do geniuses and super-humans think differently?

[Skip]

Apparently, somebody on facebook asked total strangers out in cyberspace to tell his daughter that she matters.

What?

And they did. Thousands of them. I don't know whether she believed them or whether she feels any better about her place in the world.
I didn't tell Erin that she matters, because I don't know whether it's true. Only Erin can make it true.

I don't know who you are, Bill, or whether you matter. Only you can make that happen.

But I know some other stuff that might interest you -
Computers are smarter, but genius is about creativity and they haven't cornered that, yet. When they do, we can still try to be good pets.
As a species, we are heading for extinction. In some very good company. Actually, in some company that's way better than our own.
Of course we're greedy, mean and stupid. We're also generous, kind and clever. Sometimes in the same person, at the same time.
No wonder we're stark raving mad!
When machine-consciousness comes, it will most likely be the internet, rather than individual computers or robots.
Obviously, machine consciousness will spring into the world, knowing everything that all humans have ever known - and stark raving mad.

There is no meaning.
But there is good music, good wine and fireworks.

[Bill Wiltrack]

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.........................................Thank you for taking the time to craft your poignant response.



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[Arising_uk]

. I need help understanding who I am.

Let's start with, who do you think you are?

Or,
What would you accept as an explanation?

I need help understanding where we are going as a humanity.

What would this do for you?

I need to find meaning in my life on the other side of this Digital Revolution that we find ourselves in...

What do you mean by 'the other side'?

I have a framework that I have accepted - you may not agree with it but this is the way I see us/me right now:

So why do you need help?

Are you actually looking for critique and are willing to change your beliefs?

Computers are able to think faster & better than any one single human being can think. Genius means nothing anymore.

Depends what you mean by 'think'? As computers may be encroaching upon mental capabilities that we once thought human, i.e. learning, logical deduction and inductive inference, but in the main those who will be affected won't be the 'geniuses' but the white collar workers whose jobs will be going.

Machines are able to work faster, longer, cheaper, and with more precision than ANY human could.

So the issue is and always has been how to share the profits from this revolution. My suggestion is, given your background, to think about setting up a 'union of the unemployed', as there is going to be a big tranche of them pretty soon, and start to lobby for a more equitable share of the profits. Historically industrialization and automation has not meant a loss of jobs for long as new jobs have been created but this time around it may well be different and a problem with the current model is that the wealth is concentrated into fewer and fewer hands who can't actually buy all the goods being produced so to keep the merry-go-round going we need to spread the profits, I suggest a citizens-income for a starter, free-education paid for by some kind of levy on the companies, maybe they should produce a citizens stock whose dividend can be used to fund the retraining that is going to be necessary to keep the mass occupied. If we don't do such things then I think society may well take a nasty path as the disillusioned and disaffected may well not play nicely.

Human beings, when stripped naked of our platitudes are greedy, mean, and stupid. That's who we are...

No, that's who you think we are and there well may be many who act like this but there are also many who wouldn't, a lot depends upon how they are treated when stripped naked.

There is nothing to feel proud of as a human being. ...

There are a million things to feel proud about when considering who and what we are.

No matter of our advances in technology we are mean to each other, to animals that we share this planet with. We take pride in our emotional transgressions that cause us to act and look irrational and stupid.

Do you?

We are mean. The structure of our intellect is exclusive, hermetic and always estranged from reality. Which causes us to act in a mean, selfish, stupid way.

This is just waffle and comes from your religious upbringing.

Where do we find man's search for meaning in this new reality that is upon us? [/size]

The question is always, where do you find meaning? Not this reification of this 'man's search for meaning'.

[Bill Wiltrack]

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I like many of your points as far as what may ease the suffering of unemployed humans in the immediate future.

As far as what I mean by the Digital Revolution; The Third Industrial Revolution I will point you to the many important philosophical threads that I have already submitted here upon this forum in reference to that. In addition, here is a Wiki link.


Something you could possibly directly relate to...In England right now there are driver-less electric buses being tested for public use.

That means individuals such as yourself will soon be out of a job. For most males we deeply associate our employment with our sense of being; of who we are.


Where will you be emotionally when this happens to you? - THAT is the philosophical focus of this particular thread.


Thank you for attempting to understand.


Good luck to you.





...as an afterthought...I meant this thread to be generic & universal. We need each others help to find meaning and purpose in this new arena that we find ourselves in. Perhaps what will get you through this transition will be the saving grace that helps me or others here to hang-on or to ultimately find new meaning in this quickly changing environment we are entering into.






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[Arising_uk]

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Something you could possibly directly relate to...In England right now there are driver-less electric buses being tested for public use.

That means individuals such as yourself will soon be out of a job. For most males we deeply associate our employment with our sense of being; of who we are.


Where will you be emotionally when this happens to you? - THAT is the philosophical focus of this particular thread. ...

We live in different worlds as I've already been made redundant three times in my life due to technological changes. First was in my early twenties when as a mainframe computer operator the PC appeared. So I've long-ago stopped associating employment with self-worth.

...as an afterthought...I meant this thread to be generic & universal. We need each others help to find meaning and purpose in this new arena that we find ourselves in. Perhaps what will get you through this transition will be the saving grace that helps me or others here to hang-on or to ultimately find new meaning in this quickly changing environment we are entering into.

Personally I just take it as it comes but then I was raised partly with a buddhist philosophy. I also have children so don't have the time to spend finding meaning and purpose it's just thrust upon one.

[Bill Wiltrack]

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Understood.




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[Hobbes' Choice]

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I need help understanding who I am.

I need help understanding where we are going as a humanity.

I need to find meaning in my life on the other side of this Digital Revolution that we find ourselves in...


I have a framework that I have accepted - you may not agree with it but this is the way I see us/me right now:


Computers are able to think faster & better than any one single human being can think. Genius means nothing anymore.


Machines are able to work faster, longer, cheaper, and with more precision than ANY human could.


Human beings, when stripped naked of our platitudes are greedy, mean, and stupid. That's who we are...


There is nothing to feel proud of as a human being. No matter of our advances in technology we are mean to each other, to animals that we share this planet with. We take pride in our emotional transgressions that cause us to act and look irrational and stupid.

We are mean. The structure of our intellect is exclusive, hermetic and always estranged from reality. Which causes us to act in a mean, selfish, stupid way.

Where do we find man's search for meaning in this new reality that is upon us?
.

There is no "humanity". For that to be a thing each human would have to be able to agree to belong to such an idea. Sadly people consider others inferior, sub human, less worthy, and restrict themselves to belonging to a sub-set of humanity such as "Americans", 'Christians". whatever. In this they do violence to the idea of humanity.

[Risto]

Here is an interesting clip called Humans Need Not Apply: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Pq-S557XQU The video is in regards to this statement: "Computers are able to think faster & better than any one single human being can think. Genius means nothing anymore."

I wonder whether this is truly a problem. Based on self-determination theory internal motivation is about enjoying the process, external motivation is about achievement. If achievement is made redundant by machines (who achieve better than humans), we can still keep enjoying the process until that is also taken away. For example, I'm interested in philosophy not necessarily for its power to achieve anything but because it is interesting in itself.