So, stream of consciousness and no AI. I’m trying to not contribute to the Dead Internet phenomena. What’s that? Consider when the saturation point of AI generated content becomes a wet rag that is far too heavy to wring out. And at that point AI drinks AI. Or eats.
That’s a problem? Why because the clear web of information is no longer clear, its saturated with content that doesn’t have a stake in the generation of content. AI won’t be losing sleep about the potential errors in that last trillions of tokens converted to text from the prior days. But what if that was you?
Even this stream of consciousness. Its doubtful that anyone will call me up on whats written here, however - the possibility of wild claims with no basis of reality has relational consequences that a machine does not fathom. At least for now.
That’s a problem. Large scale information output, no direct accountability upon its identity, it’s meaning - relationally speaking. That’s what real sentience will do to you!
Besides, who would want to in their right minds just be spewing out information, with all kinds of over-averaging approximations and hallucinations…. just because?
Things feel like they are moving towards and intersection point. There’s probably some clever academic label for such phenomena but i don’t know what that is right now. If you do - comment. And that’s not an order!
What I’m getting at is that when the system weight cannot hold anymore patches to stay upright, that in fact the patches themselves become the weight pulling it down rather than propping it up - we have multiple fail points signalling at once. That’s where we see the shift. What they will look like, its hard to say. But we can see the dark clouds approaching.
I’m not about the doom and gloom of this phenomena, in fact, it’s simply a course correction. And that course correction at a certain point will force a full appraisal of just how far we’ve drifted. That’s not the kind of mirror we generally like to clean and stare straight into. An opaque mirror is just so…. well comforting. For a time.
And yet, for a time is the key phrase.
It’s when it is no longer a comfort, that we reach for the Windex or whatever preferred glass cleaning brand you’d like.
Undoubtably, the image isn’t pretty. But it’s either we take stock of who and what we are right now - or to stretch the analogy - where we are right now - that we can grasp how to get back on track. Bittersweet Symphony as the Verve song goes.
So, the question remains. What will you bring along with you on the next part of the journey?
Well what is genuinely valuable to you?
I recall back in ‘94 I was watching my family home getting close to burning down to the ground. A firestorm had just engulfed the house across the road that I had watch for the last few years a home builder lovingly extend and beautify. The Australian dream - up in smoke, just like that. Seriously it was in under 10 sec.
So, as a 16 YO, I ran into my room and grab my guitar.
I figured… if anything matters to me right now, and I had nothing, I’d want to be making songs.
Songs, many songs I’ve composed, for an audience of one - myself… that’s what I valued. Not even my bodyboard - that was my meaning and identity at that time.
It was the music I could play to connect with something greater than myself.
In fact that’s the core.
The connection to what can’t be defined, not without cheapening it.
That was my highest value.
Still is.
So what will you bring?