Humanity 2.0 – It’s the Software, Stupid

A truly thought provoking video on TED is headlined: Kwabena Boahen: Making a computer that works like the brain. Boahen is a computer scientist who actually grew up Ghana, where he was fortunate enough to get a computer as a child; in the video he quotes a fellow researcher Brian Eno who said in 1995, “The problem with computers is that there is not enough Africa in them.”

Boahen takes that to mean more creative conception of computer hardware, and proposes a restructuring of the CPU along the lines of neural networks to permit more efficient processing of information.

What I find incredible is that neither Boahen, with his fresh viewpoint on computer science from his unique perspective, nor seemingly any of the speakers at TED (with the possible exception of Jill Bolte Taylor’s “My stroke of insight” – a phenomenal investigation of neuroscience of mystical proportions) make any attempt to truly grasp the significance of the analogies between advances in computing and the human brain.

More specifically, if we can use Biblical language allegorically, it seems clear that consciously, subconsciously or indeed completely unconsciously we’ve created computers in our own image.

In my humble opinion, there is deep meaning to this, and indeed the birth of the computer and with it the Internet are major potential milestones in the evolution of our species – perhaps to a Humanity 2.0 – but only if we grasp their essential meaning.

What do I mean?

To my mind the missing dimension to all comparisons between the human brain, neuroscience and the computer is the incredible avoidance of these endeavors to acknowledge the key component of all computers – namely software.

From the amazing description of an apple as an application that can be genetically reprogrammed by Juan Enriquez (again on TED) to Boahen’s concept of a chip based on neural networks no scientist seems comfortable venturing into the area that is the very key to understanding any computer system: what program is running and where did it come from?

In the scientific community this is relegated to “soft” sciences – psychology, sociology and perhaps philosophy – but it is remarkably absent, or so it seems to me, as a matter of serious inquiry, in the fields of genetics or neuroscience.

Evolution is the obvious "scientific" answer to such questions – and that’s fine – but we need to recognize that if we exist in a universe of cause and effect laws, the process that we term evolution is very unlikely to be the result of haphazard chance or accident. It is too well programmed for that.

Clearly, if the brain is the basis for our development of the computer and then the Internet -- the issue of what may be the “operating system” and what sorts of software it is running are probably the most significant issues facing us if we are to understand its true functions.

From the first personal computer I ever purchased, this was the key point: what was I going to use it for (its purpose) and then, which programs did I expect to run. In my case I would never have bought my first Eagle if I could not run a program called WordStar and write screenplays of questionable quality.

And even now I would never invest in a new computer, or load a new operating system (sorry Vista) unless I was confident that the tasks I intended to perform could be effectively completed by the software I intended to run.

The problem, of course, is that as soon as you begin to speculate on software in the brain you come across two potentially troublesome terms – either “Mind” or “Consciousness” become unavoidable factors.

Science refuses to seriously address these two concepts (except in the “soft” sciences) because they do not easily yield solely (or soul-ly) to data analysis and require deeper investigation and thought.

Indeed in the realm of quantum mechanics, the key component of the observer as a critical aspect of any phenomena that can be investigated on the subatomic level has already presented this same barrier – the presence of an embodied mind or consciousness it seems effectively determines the observable data and without an observer the result either doesn’t exist or as Heisenberg suggested, it is in reality uncertain. To our materialistically oriented mentality uncertain data doesn’t really qualify as data at all.

But I digress. When as I wrote before, Juan Enriquez describes both the computing power necessary to decode (sequence) the genome, and the ability of our geneticists to reprogram what has been discovered (and yet not create it out of nothing), this begs the question: Where did the program come from and what about the immense scale of its apparent complexity?

If you consider the brain or genetic material hardware only – as seemingly inanimate things – then certainly it could have evolved over eons from other inanimate things – perhaps stimulated by electrical energy when it is perceived as yet another inanimate thing.

But if you remain true to the computer model then there has to be an investigation of the true nature of software, both as we know it and as it has apparently come to exist in nature itself.
Taking the analogy a bit further, perhaps simplistically, but truly sincerely, we can see that for example, Microsoft Word, the evolutionary offspring of WordStar, the software for which I purchased my original Eagle, is the result of only one thing – human ingenuity and a meeting of thousands of Minds.

It could not exist otherwise.

The zeroes and ones that constitute the program that is Word or was WordStar were created by human minds with a purpose: to communicate more efficiently and connect human minds through language, sound and images.

The Internet evolved similarly, out of a human capacity for creating a system of programs that could connect us electronically – but the Internet too would never exist just to constitute a network of cables or wireless connections.

The Internet as hardware would never have evolved.

It exists only to move messages and meaning.

So again, working backwards, if the model for all of this is our own brain, and by extension, our nervous system and even our more automatic or autonomic physiology that is programmed genetically – we probably need to ask – what’s the software?

Unfortunately if we ask this question sincerely, answers do not come easily, and they are open to much debate, but at least they are the result of serious questions and not the obvious and deliberate avoidance of deeper issues.

My own suggestion would only be a self conscious pointer in two possible directions where we might look for more answers.

First inside ourselves, because deep self examination of one’s own programming is the only real access we currently have to our software. Observing others is possible at this point only in terms of their outward manifestations, verbal descriptions, and the data of brainwaves which is at present inconclusive in terms of that troublesome concept: meaning.

The second direction might be the same road some aspects of quantum physics have taken – namely East. The descriptions of meditative states and the reality of consciousness described by Eastern thought seems to dovetail nicely with the observations or “data” of quantum physicists, to their everlasting dismay.

The apparently dualistic state of light as simultaneously both wave and particle phenomena is a real paradox, just as we might argue about the “cause” or primogenitor of evolution.

It is quite possible that both neuroscience, and very likely astrophysics and astronomy, will have to be led kicking and screaming into both of these new directions – directing their investigations inside ourselves as organisms comprised of hardware (physiology) and software (essence, spirit, soul or mind) -- with a perspective broadened by the meditative practices of the East.

Only then will we perhaps be receptive to a download from somewhere or an upgrade of something that we ultimately evolve into Humanity 2.0, or failing to connect successfully and log in to something higher -- our species may degenerate into a lower life form, or become extinct, like WordStar and the Eagle computer.

Whose PC Is It Anyway?

Has this happened to you? You return to your Vista PC and find that either the screensaver is running or you have the log on screen on your monitor, and you realize that the computer has rebooted in your absence?

If all you have to do is log back in, it’s a mild inconvenience but it’s still a bit creepy…

But if after you log in, your entire desktop is GONE? That happened to me recently. Being fairly experienced, I located the actual files in my Desktop folder under my user name, so I knew the data was safe. But suddenly Vista had given me a whole new blank desktop with the default wallpaper.

And, for good measure, when I opened my browser, I found that my start page was back on MSN and my history was gone. Cool, huh?

Obviously this was the result of an update, necessitated by Microsoft’s well founded security concerns.

But it’s a lot like the manager of my building coming into my apartment and rearranging the furniture while I’m gone – or locking the doors and windows.

I don’t like it, and combined with the other inconveniences of Vista, I’m sure lots of other people don’t like it either.

What are those other inconveniences? They are too numerous to mention but how about incompatible hardware and software, new CD and DVD formats that don’t work, and interminable file transfer times?

What makes it worse is that as always, there are no solutions. I recently had a data dump, otherwise known as the blue screen of death, and when Windows returned I was told it had recovered from a serious error (it had used System Restore – the same way I got my desktop back from the other incident) and did I want to know more details…

Sure I clicked Yes, figuring I’d get the usual inscrutable information that told me nothing but this time NOTHING is exactly what I got. Nada. Zilch. No explanation whatsoever is available for a “serious error.”

How long has Windows had a blue screen problem – how about EVERY INCARNATION? Maybe it’s impossible to correct given the disparate hardware on which the platform is located, but how about providing a clear and understandable EXPLANATION of how it happens and what you can do to recover?

Here is what I mean by clear and understandable. NOT “you had a fatal error or system exception at memory base 4M60XQIC0M;’T.XOM.”
No – here is what I mean: the last program you used was _____________________________.
When you clicked ___________________________ it conflicted with ______________________.
To prevent this from happening you should uninstall ______________________________ or reconfigure ______________________________.
Alternatively you could delete _________________________ from StartUp under MSConfig.

System Restore is nice but scary. It’s like you’re waiting for the patient to come out of the ER. And there is no chance to talk to the surgeon afterwards – “Oh, we took out some malware and now the system is fine.”

I would feel a whole lot better with a clear and concise explanation of using System Recovery and Safe Mode – I know they exist but they are documented only for IT professionals. When a “normal” user crashes he may as well invoke a voodoo chant to get his system back.

It is wholly inexcusable for Vista to reboot and destroy your desktop on the one hand, requiring System Recovery, and provide no clearly understandable information on how to protect your system or bring it back from a data dump.

"Windows 7" promises a whole host of new features, including a touch screen "coffee table" interface -- I have a better idea, how about an understandable, reliable system that just works consistently?

Our New and Improved (?) Digital Washer/Dryer

Several weeks ago I left my apartment only to discover that our building had replaced our perfectly functional “analog” washer/dryers with new digital models. What sets these apart are black LCD screens with digital read-outs that show the exact length, in minutes, of the remaining wash or dry cycle.

The display also goads you into forking up an extra quarter for a “bonus” rinse cycle, but it’s optional. The only thing it doesn’t do is send a message saying, “hey– take out your clothes, another tenant needs the dryer!”, or tell you to have a nice day.

Is there a message here – besides the digital read-out? Well the old washers worked pretty well as I recall, although the lint screen on the new one is a lot nicer – but that’s because it’s new. A lint screen alone might have cost what, two bucks?

It is nice to know exactly how much time is left in a cycle, but if you’ll pardon the pun, it’s fluff.

It’s excess for its own sake. Like the SUVs and mini-vans that are now extinct, it speaks to an insatiable need, now completely programmed into our brains, to see lack where there might be satisfaction.

It also makes one think of the perfectly functional and beautiful homes that get knocked down for newer, bigger mansions, whose owners might have made do with what they had.

And it speaks to the message of the Dalai Lama, on the east coast this week and probably being largely ignored, who chastises us for always wanting more, more and more.

As you may know, his country, Tibet, is being mauled by the country that is emulating us in the more, more and more sweepstakes – China, along with also fast growing India. But both of these countries are raising extremely low standards of living a bit higher, while we are generally raising generally very high standards of living (by global comparison) higher and higher.

But the problem really isn’t us, is it? The company that built the new and improved digital washer/dryer is considered innovative, and is manned by a marketing team hell bent on convincing the world that knowing the exact length of the rinse and dry cycle is critical.

That need has flowed down the electronic synapses and dendrites of our society to the point where we need to check our email every hour, or more, and keep up with the news, while being programmed to buy more digital washer/dryers.

There may have been a lesson to be learned from the older analog washer/dryers – from that inexact interval between the end of the cycle and the time you actually remember to take out your clothes.

In that ten or fifteen extra minutes, if you aren’t checking your email or scheduling your next appointment, you might actually sit back and reflect (as the Dalai Lama might) on what the heck you’re doing anyway?

Instead of checking your email, check your reality.

In case you missed it, CNN ran a story the other day with the headline: Scientists: Humans and machines will merge in future.

No, they weren’t talking about a Yahoo-Microsoft type of merger. They were suggesting that you and I might be made new and improved with digital read-outs. Optimally, email might be downloaded directly into our brains, bypassing the laptop or iPhone entirely. According to the piece:

“Transhumanists… anticipate an era in which biotechnology, molecular nanotechnologies, artificial intelligence and other new types of cognitive tools will be used to amplify our intellectual capacity, improve our physical capabilities and even enhance our emotional well-being.”

And the proponents weren’t worried about this scenario, they seemed to welcome it as an inevitable improvement in human “efficiency” (my interpretation).

When I think about how entities like credit card companies, utilities, software manufacturers and others take advantage of new technology to pad my bill and increase my customer dissatisfaction, I have to wonder about the ultimate advantage of becoming “transhuman.”

Most of the people I see walking around shouting into their cellphones barely qualify as human.

I’d hate to reach the voicemail system of a “transcorporate customer” support center. I am sure they’d have a sensational mission statement, but the underlying reality would be far less benign.

And I’m not sure that a new and improved version of my brain or my body, complete with digital read-outs and a wireless connection to an ATM, would improve my life very much.

When I look at the other “transhuman” byproducts of a digitally improved emerging Humanity 2.0 I also have to wonder: dead birds, dying bees, beached whales and dolphins, poisoned oceans, unbreathable air at the Olympics – perhaps what we’ll be digitally replacing won’t be our brains but our lungs.

Maybe I’m making too much of the digital washer/dryer – after all, I haven’t had to wait for the dryer since they installed it. And the lint screen is impeccable. But for some reason I can’t quite fathom, I find myself checking my email more and more frequently. I think I’m becoming – transhuman.

The Meaning of Sofware?

My old Webster’s dictionary (1960) does not even list the term “software” in its entries. As recently as 50 years ago in the “development” or apparent evolution of man the concept was not widely known.

Today millions of us use software, and many humans are even well versed in the concept of “programming” – designing or directing a series of symbols to perform intended tasks using electricity and silicon.

At the same time another industry is using the most powerful computers on the planet to decode the complex set of instructions in our genetic code – the genome. It has discovered not that the genetic code is “like” software (an analogy) – but that it is in fact exactly that. Genticist Juan Enriquez has stipulated that organic life is literally an “application” – behaving according to a programmed set of instructions in its DNA.

While we still cannot create life (although scientists predict it will happen) we can reprogram it.

Here an interesting puzzle is presented.

Could software have come into existence without man – or at least intelligent life? Hardly. It is difficult to imagine software appearing in an inanimate, mechanical universe devoid of life and intelligence. Clearly in a world without humans (or intelligent life) there would be no technology.

But if Life is actually software – programmed intentionality in organic matter – is it reasonable to think that it could have “evolved” out of inanimate, mechanical stuff?

Certainly the implications are troubling – wherever the original intention behind Life’s programming – whatever its ultimate “source” – what might have created or caused that? An infinite paradox for theologians, scientists and seekers.

But the problem may not be the paradox, but the language framing it.

In posing this puzzle, we assume a level of linear causality that we have recently discovered may be entirely missing in another area of scientific inquiry – quantum physics.

Without stooping to the level of simplicity that says that all physical law is “mental” or connected to the observer or consciousness at the subatomic level (which is hard to fathom much less explain intelligently) – although it can be “felt” –

...we may nonetheless also “feel” the possibility that if our own “nature” is in fact decodable based on a set of symbols (numbers, letters, zeroes, ones), then concepts of reality pointing to the primacy of Mind over Matter – which are the basis of many ancient teachings – may be onto something very deep and true.

The decoding of the genome, for example, points quite directly to a “meaning” and “intention” in our Being – first survival – then replication – and perhaps ultimately – what? Evolution or transformation?

The development of software is a double edged sword. On the one hand it provides the potential for unparalleled control over humanity in a 1984-like scenario. What some may term degeneration of free will or involution.

On the other, it points the way toward a different level of meaning. By introducing the concept and the actual experience of an “application” – something artificial (man made) that performs intended tasks according to a [human] mental directive – an electronic being – based on human intelligence and intention – it shows how mind can shape materiality in a direct way. How a mind can exist through electrical impulses and silicon to perform intelligent, intended tasks on the human scale.

One may well ask, on what scale or in what realm of creative mental space might whatever have placed the intention or meaning within Life – our genetic code – exist?

It (God, She, He) need not exist on a material level at all. We experience the realm of thought within whatever software coexists in the operating system of our brains.

Might not a living, sentient level of thought be galvanizing the material realm, and Life on our planet, for purposes that we can barely fathom and are at a loss to explain with our feeble logic?

More Vista Stupidity

I haven't posted in a while - one reason being that maintaining my Vista "home network" is such a joy. It goes out willy nilly for no apparent reason, keeping me from moving files, accessing the web, or both.


This weekend I spent an hour resetting the network instead of watching basketball - the key point to remember is when this happens - nothing has changed - it just stops working.

I have finally learned to use the wonderful Network and Sharing Center which has the typical Microsoft circularity of diagnose and repair, which of course solves nothing.

Some of these issues are covered in the Annoyances.org website - not surprisingly the Vista Annoyances book is 664 pages long. Besides the obvious stuff I've covered here like files taking forever to move or burn to a DVD (if they even do that), and the idiocy of never having a consistent set of options in the Explorer Window (why would ever NOT want the Date Modified to appear for finding and/or sorting - yet it is NEVER there even after it's been added previously) - not being able to access the Desktop folder in Explorer in less than five clicks - the most flagrantly ridiculous aspect of Vista has to be networking.

I have been networking my PCs with Windows since 3.11.

Finally I decided to go thru the Vista web site and try to find explanations to some of my "issues" - amazingly the duplicate IP address came up as a common problem with an apparent solution - which I clicked on -- mind you this is from the Vista web site --

Forget about the inscrutable text - note the "relevant" Applies to section - it's all about Windows NT and 3.11! From the Vista web site!

Can there be any clearer testimony that this company does NOTHING to increase the stability of its product from iteration to iteration? I don't need the AERO interface - I need a networking infrastructure that WORKS CONSISTENTLY - even on Sunday morning when I want to watch basketball.

Here is a clue - if the network is working Saturday night and I DO NOTHING - it should still be working Sunday morning.

Moreover, is it too much to expect, as a home business user, that in the decades since Windows 3.11, or the five years since the initial post of this "knowledge base" article - that Microsoft might deign to actually fix the problem if IP conflicts - and perhaps make the fix transparent to the user.

...Or - failing that - at least clearly explain what the heck an DHCP server even is -- is that too much to ask?!?!

Instead they concentrate on new "features" - leaving a hole in a service that every business or even home user has a right to expect will work and perform stably.

Could a problem be the router? Of course -- since Vista needs all kinds of hardware and software upgrades to work properly.

I also saw a link for a listing of Vista supported Routers - great, another peripheral I need to upgrade for no reason. But I ran the diagnostics for my older router in Vista and it passed - so that is not the reason for my problems.

Finally, the symptom of my problem (which is nowhere covered in the Vista web pages even in the section on Win 3.11) is the sudden appearance of a duplicate network. This requires me to get rid of it by restarting my network adapter. Doubtless Windows tech support would inform me that this is a "hardware" issue -- but let's face it -- if they haven't solved the IP conflict issue since Windows 3.11 then apparently the modus operandi of making excuses instead of creating a stable working environment is not going anywhere any time soon.

Do the Math - the Meaning of Technology

Technology is often considered an indicator of the evolution of humanity, freeing it of many physical struggles and evidencing the progress of the species.

But if we grant that the essential nature of man (and woman) has not changed much in thousands of years, could the meaning implicit in technology not also be a catalyst for more profound level of evolution?

What if technology is a teaching?

Jacob Needleman, in his book “A Sense of the Cosmos”, suggests that the outer world (the physical world and the universe) is considered within many ancient religions to be the lever for the transformation of human beings from unconscious to conscious.

How might technology, as 21st century humans experience it, be instrumental in that process?

From personal experience I resisted technology early in life. As an English major I had disdain for the engineers on my college campus who had multiple pens in their breast pockets and merely tabulated, calculated and later collected sizable salaries.

Later in life I had occasion to have a number of significant experiences.

First in my reading I became fascinated by theories that the ancient Egyptians (or perhaps others who had visited Egypt) had encoded mathematical principles of the highest order in the pyramids and other ancient structures.

These structures were also speculated to have been temples (not in the modern sense) of initiation, where human consciousness might have been transformed to a higher level.

I intuitively appreciated how mathematics – the simple perfection of absolute Law (2+2=4 must be true everywhere and anywhere) might somehow be connected to such higher consciousness. On the physical plane such perfection is barely possible – exact measurement is rarely achieved – although the architects of the pyramids certainly came closer than many modern builders.
Then later in life I became fascinated by computers. My first experience was with a series of disks programmed into an IBM work processor that “taught” me how to use it.

Later I loved the process of teaching myself new “programs” – essentially active verbs or possibly even virtual life forms within the silicon that could do things and accomplish amazing feats of calculation and even graphics.

Occasionally I would hit a glitch and something “would not work.” When I was able to solve the problem it often happened that the computer had been “right” – whoever had designed the program had programmed according to a logic or math that I had not grasped – with which I was out of tune.

This alerted me to the possibility of higher impersonal intelligence. What was right was not morally right in the normal sense of the term, but rather correct in its alignment with principles of which I was yet unaware.

Becoming aware was literally enlightenment.

Now as I struggle with the meaning of my own waning physical existence I have become exposed to teachings that take a similar view of the cosmos.

They interpret the teachings of sages like Jesus, Buddha and others as not teaching insights in line with a higher personal Creator or God, but rather being in line with Nature or Life’s innate higher intelligence, as Eckart Tolle writes so eloquently in "A New Earth."

As “modern” beings we are not likely to understand the notion of physical objects as intelligent.

But what about energy?

What do we truly understand about the nature of energy?

We know that electricity is in our brains as impulses of our own thought. And we have now programmed similar electrical impulses

We know that unimaginable bursts of energy emanate through the universe and from stars like our sun.

Astronomers have speculated that remnants of the Big Bang (perhaps the first real conscious event that initiated all evolution of consciousness) still resonate throughout the universe.

If one broaches the subject of higher intelligence today the label one is given is a proponent of Intelligent Design, which is usually a front for institutional or evangelical Christianity as proof of a personal and angry or beneficent deity.

But there is a reasonable alternative – one that is being approached in science at the molecular and interstellar level.

I have written that my problems with religion began with the horrific experiences of my parents in the holocaust. My mother lost her faith while my father attributed his survival to his beliefs.

I can now take a new perspective on my father’s point of view. One winter we went to services for Yom Kippur at a congregation where we were not members. We were sent to the basement and all during the service, piped into a cramped room on speakers, we were solicited for cash.

My father left very angry, and later in life when he retired he avoided synagogues saying instead that he can commune with God just as well at sunset by the ocean.

While he never lost his belief in an anthropomorphic deity, I believe that he sensed a connection to nature and Life, based on his experiences, and of an intelligence and power of a much higher order and sought solace by connecting to it intuitively.

Technology shows us that logic and mathematics are of that higher order – they approach perfection in their certitude and also point to the inevitable fallibility of human nature.

Technology shows the potential presence of increasingly complex systems which our own ego driven and emotional natures can only dimly comprehend.

If you don’t believe this, watch the video of geneticist Juan Enriquez on the TED web site that explains how life behaves like a computer application, executing its genetic code with exquisite perfection and according to predictable mathematical principles. Of course, the ultimate complexity and level of these principles is still a mystery and withheld from our knowledge, and the subject of continued scientific inquiry.

It goes back to the experience of not understanding something about a computer but when the mystery is solved, realizing that the solution points to a system of logic that makes complete sense when understood from a perspective different, and perhaps far more advanced, than our own limited intelligence.

Ultimately technology, logic and mathematics point the way to the inevitability that life has meaning on a scale well beyond our own level of existence - where things may make sense in ways that humans cannot understand without evolving from their present state of inhumanity.

Vista Ultimate (Yeah Right)

I booted back into Vista on my desktop yesterday because it is the Ultimate version and I needed to run Virtual PC 2007, which won't run on Vista Home on my laptop. Not surprisingly after being dormant for about a month, the OS choked and on the first boot up nothing worked, including my mouse (it froze on almost every icon). I tried again and the OS came back -- I did my work (amazingly Virtual PC worked nicely) and then I figured what the heck, reward the OS with an update and its Service Pack. I got into Windows Update, saw the updates ready to download (all 398 megabytes worth) and left it alone. Several hours later I got this dialog box.

I returned to the site and tried the update again. Twelve hours later this window was still opening. How long does it take to 'prepare' to install updates. And were they ever downloaded?

The problem with Vista is it's a full time job. So I rebooted back to Windows XP. Let the sucker hibernate for another month til I need it again.