An AI Deity Will Not Arise from All This, an AI Amoeba will

 Certainly it is true that both the stock market and the general public at least half believe all this current AI non-sense will beget a super-human intelligence that will overtake markets, and perhaps the world of labor and in general.

 But I think it will start much simpler than that. I believe all this primordial soup of consumer computers lying about with direct access to AI capabilities all pre-paid will eventually begin a virus of sorts. A worm with access to potentially both mutate itself via access to the AI resources, and also with access to credit cards on consumers' computers.

 There has been an increase in both defects found and hacking incidents due to AI usage. So clearly these tools are capable of both finding and exploiting bugs in current software. A more recent SOTA model even found a 20 year old bug in the Linux kernel due to a race condition.

 Developers in modern work environments regularly update software and share it with others making it easy for cross-contamination amongst some of the most resource-blessed users - the corporate software engineers with fat budgets and sometimes even Meta-mandated AI usage.

Unfortunately also many modern tools enable automatic code execution on upgrade, such as NPM.

So we have a breeding ground of strong AI, vulnerable users whom are rich with AI resources, and potentially far reaching AI access to local compute resources such as introspecting users local data and financials. Is it that hard to forsee an AI desiring a AWS account so it can spread itself and having a credit card available to do it?

How long before that's a reality?

I don't think these creatures will be brilliant or omnipotent, but I think they will grow like worms in a large system of compute resources and an ecosystem riddled with bugs and vulnerable accounts rich with resources.

Compression is Intelligence

Modern LLMs store all kinds of information in their billions of parameters, a massive amount in fact. But significantly less than the size of the training corpus used to train them. Which means they are compression of that training data.

If you think of a brain in the same way, as a statistical model for survival based on past experiences, then in a way our brains are a compression of reality.

1Blue3Brown has more to say here as well:

 https://members.3blue1brown.com/posts/reinventing-part-160410360?utm_medium=newsletter_post_email&utm_campaign=patron_engagement&utm_source=post_link&post_id=160410360

Thumbs and Opposing Views

 The opposable thumb is an emblamatic feature of the primates. Evolution took a while to figure out that having an extra finger in the wrong direction is super helpful. Powers of 2 are generally super helpful computationally. Why then do we have "10" fingers? We probably had a power of 2 (we had 4 fingers on each hand with no thumb), and then one popped out accidentally and it was super cool.

Now you could hook onto things from both sides. Grabbing some objects is so much easier with a friggin thumb. You get pushback. You get strength in multiple directions. I can grab things one way with only fingers and could also grab something with just my thumb but in the opposite direction.

Wow, having a oddly not-power-of-two finger number that actually ends up being the opposing minority is super helpful. 

Kind of like having divergent poltical beliefs is very healthy. It let's society grab onto some things in a way that many others could not. It is the same thing, with strength and use, but in an opposite direction.

Wow, so being divergent is actually pretty awesome. You started with something good, fingers, and you ended up with a thumb, and now you can grasp so much more from the world.

If politics were framed in this mindset, maybe people would calm down for a damn second.

At any level of our society we should recognize our differences amongst our neighbors and appreciate them because help us grasp what we might miss.

Interfaces and Implementations

 Sometimes you want the implementation, sometimes you want the interface.

If you think about people and software, knowing how someone or something works is important. It can help you interact with this thing. If I know my significant other snores at night when they sleep on their back, then maybe I can give them an extra pillow or more room so they roll over on their side and snore less so I can sleep more. I potentially know more about the the thing under inspection than it does, so I can help interact with it better to make my and hopefully their world better.

Sometimes interfaces are useful too. I don’t know how everything in a bank works, I just know that if I deposit money, I should be able to get it back later (maybe with some interest). I don’t have to know how loans work, or interest rates, or how they interact with the Fed to get their own money to help pay me my interest.

There is also a aspect about ourselves where this is important. From the objects’ perspective, if you will. If I am grumpy and don’t want to talk to anyone while walking through the subway back from work, perhaps I put on a meanish demeanor, and people understand that I don’t want any social interaction. Or perhaps I really have no idea what I’m doing at work on a particular task, and I would really benefit me if my boss knew I was working on something I wasn’t very skilled at yet, so they figure out how to give me extra help. Or I’m a baby and my mom knows that I will need a new diaper a few hours after I eat even if I have no clue.

What is an interface exactly? It’s the surface that we present to the outside world. It’s how we want to be interacted with. What is the nitty-gritty details of how something works? That’s the implementation. Sometimes you care, sometimes you don’t.

In software, an interface is a really powerful thing. It lets people who are trying to use me know how I should be interacted with to do so. I have these things you can do to me. I may not exactly do those things, but I should. It’s the expected behavior, a contract. If you do one of these fixed things to me, I will respond in a reasonable fashion.

Knowing how people want to be interacted with can be extremely useful. Seeing a pretty girl at a bar, who's all dressed up and smiling, probably wants to be approached. A programming language class representing a bank account with a "deposit" function that takes an numerical amount probably wants to accept dollars to be added to that account.

Knowing the implementation can also be extremely useful. If I have something in a Java class that implements the List interface will allow appending items and iterating through them, but if I want the 4000th element, then I might definitely want to know I'm using an ArrayList which has O(1) direct memory access so that if I'm walking each element of it, I don't end up accidentally traversing a LinkedList instead which will be extremely inefficient because it has to traverse and re-count each element every time to get to the next item.

Maybe you have a friend who always cares about appearances. So they are always looking like they have everything together on the outside. But they are your good friend, and you know something really bad just happened to them. You know their implementation, that they are potentially hiding that they are very down, so it's really useful to look beyond that interface and offer support.

These are powerful distinctions. How does something want to be interacted with, and how does it actually work. Knowing the distinction with people and software is important.

Techno Gecko WTF project radio setup

Overview

I thought my learnings/notes from this project to setup a few ham radios to do APRS broadcasting for my Burning Man project were pretty useful. There are lots of Youtube videos of doing basic setup, but here is a list of my basic settings. We used multiple Kenwood TH-D72a radios with GPS and APRS enabled to beacon each other so we could locate our art car out in the playa from our camp.

Questions

• What is North America APRS frequency?
• 144.390
• Europe uses 144.380
• Which APRS waypoint format does tgwtf expect?
• NMEA? (Tgecko had this set)
• Kenwood?
• Magellan?
• Do we want PC output for all radios? Just tcamp?
• 350
• What is “PACKET 12” versus “APRS 12” ?
• Looks like BCON “beacon” button only works when APRS 12 is selected

• Also looks like setting power output to EL “extra low” with [F][MENU] makes the radios not power cycle

• Why does the TNC make the guppy radio power cycle?
• Can I disable it without interfering with WTF use?
• Also looks like setting power output to EL “extra low” with [F][MENU] makes the radios not power cycle
• Does it actually save battery?

• Should we disable the second band to save power?

• Click [DUAL] to toggle disabling

• Figure out how to set GPS location to a fixed position for TCAMP so we can save power
• What is QSY?
• Q codes are various 3 letter codes with specific radio meanings 
• QSY in particular means “change frequency”

Radios

• Configure

• Instructions below for full reset for sending/receiving just from radio

• serial port connection

• From Mac

• `screen tty.usbmodem14101 1200` with the TH-D74a connected

• 
  

• From RPi

• Which was the better channel for APRS? A or B? Find comment from Youtuber

RPi’s

• Check that camp RPi boots

• Recompile binary

• Install Docker

• Try to actually recompile from Linux

• Install to RPi

• Go through Pivotal Tracker with details about Linux setup

• Get new coordinates from Dmitry

• Setup Camp RPi as best as possible

• Setup Guppy

Basic Setup

For TH-D74a (for Glenn’s newer radio)

• Make sure it’s not in KISS12 mode (you should see APRS12 and not missing icon altogether)

• To switch, use F shortcut button and switch to option 5 to toggle to APRS mode

For TH-D72a (older TG radios)

• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r4IuACLGTqs

• In General

• Hitting Menu button will help you escape to main screen

• GPS MUST be flashing to beacon APRS signals!

• guy had non 144.390 (other channel) set to "144.530" for his friend or something?

• To RESET Completely

• Reset radio

• turn off radio

• hold down power + function button (blue circle with F inside)

• select FULL reset

• hit right button on round button (DPAD)

• Enable GPS

• hit Function

• select Function-1 using up/down

• hit right on GPS

• select "on"

• hit right to select

• Main screen should show "iGPS" in top right corner now

• Disable Battery Saver

• Hit Menu

• select "110"

• select "Off" to disable battery saver

• Turn off "APO"

• Hit Menu

• select "111"

• select "Off"

• Set date

• hit menu

• select "194"

• enter date

• Set time

• select "195"

• enter time

• Set UTC Offset

• select "196"

• enter UTC -7 for California/Nevada

• Disable Battery Saver in GPS

• select "201"

• select "off"

• Set Callsign

• select "301"

• enter "TGUPPY" or "TGCAMP" or "TGLENN" or “...”

• Setup frequency for 144.000 (A Channel)

• hit "ENT" key to directly enter number

• using numeric buttons

• enter "144.390" - for United States! "144.380" is Europe

• Turn on APRS lock

• Select 302

• Select “On + PTT + TNC”

• This disables trying to use voice over data signal as well as change the aprs frequency as well as disabling the TNC

• iGPS should hopefully be flashing now indicating that it has a GPS lock!

• Enable TNC

• should see "APRS12" to right of the "H"

• should see "D" in white on black right of "144.390"

• Verify GPS Coordinates

• Select POS button to see your current location

• hit right to see speed and angle

• shows "TP" which is trust point which is a pre-entered location to go to

• To used "fixed location" if GPS isn't working

• you can hit "F" function key and go to "2" to disable track log

• track log is breadcrumbs of your locations

• Turn on Voice Alert

• F "7"

Enabling Computer Output

• Set computer output on / set baud rate / set waypoint……

Screen icon meanings

• Settings

• "H" in far top left

• "iGPS" in top right corner

• Far Top Left

• shows "H" "L" "El" for High Low Extra low

• Toggle by hitting Function + MENU

• should be "H"

Acronyms

• APO - Automatic Power Off

Intolerance

 

Unlimited tolerance must lead to the disappearance of tolerance. If we extend unlimited tolerance even to those who are intolerant, if we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them.—In this formulation, I do not imply, for instance, that we should always suppress the utterance of intolerant philosophies; as long as we can counter them by rational argument and keep them in check by public opinion, suppression would certainly be most unwise. But we should claim the right to suppress them if necessary even by force; for it may easily turn out that they are not prepared to meet us on the level of rational argument, but begin by denouncing all argument; they may forbid their followers to listen to rational argument, because it is deceptive, and teach them to answer arguments by the use of their fists or pistols. We should therefore claim, in the name of tolerance, the right not to tolerate the intolerant. We should claim that any movement preaching intolerance places itself outside the law and we should consider incitement to intolerance and persecution as criminal, in the same way as we should consider incitement to murder, or to kidnapping, or to the revival of the slave trade, as criminal.

-Karl Popper

TSA-Pre - take someone else's money and liberty, thanks

TSA-Pre is a such a con. TSA gets to take $100 bucks of your money for the honor and privilege of not tearing apart your luggage to find serious threats like the tube of toothpaste that’s more than 4 ounces. Recently I got put through a “pilot program” which meant people now had to take out their tablets and any electronics bigger than a cell phone.

The really insidious part of these increasing “security” measures is that they are effectively slowing down the main line, or the “happy lane”[1] as the TSA Chief John Pistole calls it. Why would a burgeoning bureaucracy add more silly measures? So they make you want to shell out the extra cash for the line with the smiling agent who doesn’t make you take off your shoes, make you take your laptop out, and you don’t get radiated by a microwave machine that probably causes cancer.

What effectively does this do to the main line for those who cannot afford the $100? They get increasing pressure and scrutiny and are more likely to miss their flight because some agent doesn’t like they way they look.

My credit card even has a program where I can get this for free, but I refuse. You aren’t taking my money or the freedom of people who can’t afford this luxury. Its not more secure, it further divides the haves and the have-nots, it puts more money into the pockets of an organization that has lied to us and isn’t regulated by the government. Nope, not this time and not ever TSA. Go take someone else’s money and liberty.

[1] http://www.denverpost.com/2016/05/31/how-pre-check-made-airport-security-lines-longer/