iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

But my main point is this: In thinking about #AI stop fantasizing just because you are doing sloppy thinking. There are more pressing things to bother about AI than its purported "intelligence": its impact on societies, environments, economies, and how to guardrail these.

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So to call #AI "statistical machines", or "intelligent", or "intelligent + self-aware", or whatever is primarily and simply a question of taste. (Humans are, with respect to language skills, "statistical machines" too, and nobody seems to bother and see that as a problem.)

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Which means that the decision whether the counterpart is intelligent (etc. or not is a mere act of fiat because the problem cannot be decided introspectively or by any other evidence that is not already question-begging. (Turing Test, Solipsism, Other-Minds-Problem meet Skepticism.)

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In this situation, any decision whether the machine is intelligent or not, sentient or not, conscious or not, is a function of and presupposes your being the instance doing the act of understanding.

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That is: You cannot but project intelligence onto anything that reacts to you with sufficiently complex response behaviour, i.e., you cannot be sure that your human counterpart is a sentient and intelligent being either, and with that, that you are. (Solipsism meets Other-Minds-Problem.)

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simsa0 @simsa0.bsky.social · 11h

Again, put simple: It is your capability to understand that makes it impossible for you to decide whether (apparent) complex response behaviour of the machine is tantamount to sentience or not (Turing test turned upside-down).

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To put it simple: Every knowing system needs a body and a temporal-spatial environment to act in, experience, create meaning in order to attain understanding and knowledge. With #AI, you as prompter are the body part. Without you, there's no knowing, esp. no all-knowing AI. And no apocalypse either.

SpookJ 👻 @snoopj.hachyderm.io.ap.brid.gy · 01/10/2026

Reposted by simsa0

Happy "Charles Darwin is poorly today" Day to those who celebrate 165 years ago today, Charles Darwin was having a rough one

Photo of Charles Darwin's hand-written journal entry from 1 Oct 1861 and digitized text of same

"But I am very poorly today and very stupid and hate everybody and everything."

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simsa0 @simsa0.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Spencer Kornhaber, "What #AI Will Do to Art" www.theatlantic.com/magazine/202... Nice. Not too bold in order not to scare you, but nice

theatlantic.com

What AI Will Do to Art

Holly Herndon and Mat Dryhurst believe the future doesn’t have to belong to slop.

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simsa0 @simsa0.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

#AI is not a tool—it is a feedback loop, and it is changing you while you change it —Lil Internet

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simsa0 @simsa0.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

G. Jikeli & Ph. Karpe, "Three Accusations against Israel: Apartheid, Settler Colonialism, and Genocide under Legal and Historical Scrutiny" papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.... "[A]partheid and genocide are not established and [...] settler colonialism is an inadequate classification" What a surprise.

papers.ssrn.com

Three Accusations against Israel: Apartheid, Settler Colonialism, and Genocide under Legal and Historical Scrutiny

This article examines three recurrent classifications of Israel and its conduct: apartheid, settler colonialism, and genocide. It treats apartheid and genocide

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simsa0 @simsa0.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

As I'm off the next days, here's one in advance—not in a particular form and awkward too. ;-) Best wishes for your coming birthday and your new year ahead. May it be happy and blessed. Gray hair not always that of deep despair but rather what we earned from care.

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simsa0 @simsa0.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

What remains of the revolution, of the noble radiance—one or two new words, a language, slightly altered.

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simsa0 @simsa0.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

Was übrig bleibt von der Revolution, vom hehren Leuchten — ein, zwei neue Wörter, eine Sprache, leicht verändert.

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simsa0 @simsa0.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

i24news, "Is Turkey a threat to Israel?" | On the Record with Hay Eytan www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qgam... An informative conversation between Ariel Oseran and Hay Eytan on how Turkey's attitude towards Israel changed — from co-existence to rivalry to enmity, from pro-Palestinian to pro-Hamas.

youtube.com

Is Turkey a threat to Israel? | On the Record with Hay Eytan Cohen Yanarocak

YouTube video by i24NEWS English

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Reposted by simsa0

Marika Mikiashvili 🇬🇪🇺🇦🇪🇺 @marikamikiashvili.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

"What are the protests achieving?" A constant sense that this isn't over, and the Georgian Dream cannot achieve a full control. #GeorgiaProtests Day 668 📷 MOSE

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Reposted by simsa0

Marika Mikiashvili 🇬🇪🇺🇦🇪🇺 @marikamikiashvili.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

I am searching for ideas for how to monetize so that I can continue Georgia diplomacy & democracy advocacy long-term — and to not always depend on your very kind donations. And to be honest, other than monetization, I also feel like I should take up on a new challenge and expand myself anyway. 1/3

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simsa0 @simsa0.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

@johnmiedema.bsky.social Thank you a lot! I want to reply in more detail. For now just this:. When you say, "[writing essays] was greatly facilitated by AI. I finally could write almost as fast as I think", I couldn't but grin *and* marvel that you didn't continue "slow reading" with "slow writing".

(And that is also why even in the most absurd caricature of "society", the mafia organization, rules and protocols and rituals are so important and to be observed by all: It is this sense of normality that makes syndicate members capable of monstrosities they no longer sense as such.)

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Again: There is no "banality of evil". There is not even a "desire" for normality but the importance of normality for there to be monstrosity. Without it, monstrosity becomes a choice. With a sense and frame of normality, monstrosity becomes a version of "hard times but we'll get through this".

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(And that is why resistance against Erdoğan, the Ayatollahs, the Islamists is or has been abound: they all failed to create a sense of normality, and came down on every resistance that arose from a different sense of normality than what was in the leaders' mind, by brute force.)

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That's why people rebel and fight back. Why there is a possibility to fight back. Because this capriciousness, his capriciousness, is the opposite of what people know and embrace as normality. It is his capriciousness that prevents people from sliding into monstrosity.

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He has no discipline; he doesn't provide a sense that he himself obeys the laws, rules, protocols that are there to be observed by all for there to be a society. He is incapable of holding up and instilling a (new) sense of normality.

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And that is why there is resistance against Trump and his regime. Because he doesn't follow the book. He appears capricious and self-serving. He doesn't create a sense of normality, he doesn't create a new frame of normality under and in which people could slide into monstrosity.

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The strict obedience of rules, laws, protocols even and especially (!) by the instigators of the regime themselves creates the frame of normality in which every slip into monstrosity can appear at the same time awful and reasonable. To turn into a monster you need a sense of normality.

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Thus everyone can have a sense of normality while society and the state turn into barbarity and bestiality. Normality is the key. Not some mysterious "banality of evil" or some miraculous brainwashing or some (libidinous) desire for submission (Wilhelm Reich and others).

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The same happened under Stalin and under Hitler (at least before the war). The strict observance of the rules, laws, protocols lends normality to the monstrosity. The monstrosity is possible because it is introduced and increased under the rules and procedures of normality.

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The reason why Putin's regime is stable and Trump's regime is not, is that Putin meticulously observes political procedure and protocol: He holds elections even though it's clear he'll win; he follows the law by the book (even if he has to rewrite the book to obtain the laws convenient to him).

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And why there has been, at least in the beginning before people were slaughtered in multitudes, resistance against Erdoğan in Turkey, against the ayatollahs and the Revolutionary Guards in Iran, against the Islamists in various other parts of the world.

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One wonders why there has not been (much) resistance against Hitler and his regime, against Stalin and his regime, or against Putin and his regime. (Or against Xi and his regime, for that matter.) And why there is resistance against Trump and his regime.

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Auch beschloss der Parteitag, sich "bedingungslos schützend" vor Juden wie vor Palästinenser zu stellen. www.die-linke.de/partei/parte... Frage ist halt, wo denn im Vergleich zu Juden Palästinenser in Deutschland gefährdet sind. Die Schutzerklärung für letztere relativert gerade die für erstere.

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Zur Erinnerung: Die Partei Die Linke beschloss an ihrem Bundesparteitag am 19. Juni 2026 in Potsdam, Israels Krieg mit der Hamas im Gaza-Streifen Völkermord zu nennen. Wer jetzt noch behauptet, die Gesamtpartei sei nicht antisemitisch, will nicht hinsehen oder weiss genau, was er tut.

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Do a blog post on that, please.

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But perhaps you're less a text and more a an image person. BTW: How is your art, your painting doing? Do you use AI in your art at all? And if so, In what way? What do you cherish, where do you put a break? 2-2

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All agree. But I already noticed how AI tools foster my laziness and carelessness. And I hope you don't mind me saying this, stylistically your blog posts (like the recent one I cherished on your blog) show their AI influence. Its tone is less personal, somewhat sallow. 1-2

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That alley I refuse to walk. It would make me lazy. Style and writing I have to learn by doing, not by copying and pasting.

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Perhaps it's a good thing that BlueSky restricts its post character limits to 299. If they raised it, I'd probably write even more profusely.

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I really wished BlueSky would raise that limit. I sent a feature request several months back but I guess it's not their priority.

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I don't like this style in other modern writers as well, as it purports a sense of clarity I find — again ;) — trite. Anyway, you're mostly right with regard to Tolkien writing. Thanks for the correction. (Predilection of topics and ideology is obviously a personal matter.) 3-3

The interspersed poetry is generally rated inferior to his prose though. Anyway, re: his crafting (not topics or ideological leanings) I guess I got caught up in his archaisms and deliberate paratactic style which to my taste is stylistically inferior to subordinate clauses. 2-3

I stand corrected. A quick AI search showed re: Tolkien's craft (not topics or conservative ideology) a large lexicon, varied voices in his characters, measured and constructed paratactic style, register-shifting in style at important moments. More or less as you said. 1-3

Again, thank you for that article. It gave me exiting perspectives I hadn't thought about (primarily because they are way beyond my usual purview and expertise). 4-4

2) helps me understand neurotech and related devices not as rigid on-off-devices but as fluid assistance, stepping in by overload. Like a prosthetic that comes to the fore and vanishes into the back depending on occasion — contrary to the walker or rollator model of tech-based assistance. 3-4

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1) points to a framework of evaluation that is also interesting in historical perspective: Not only that, e.g., information search and retrieval can be evaluated by reduction of effort, but that its development over time went along those lines with regard to hardware and infrastructure as well. 2-4

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Thank you for this exciting overview. Two lines stood out to me: 1) "The potential saving is the number of calls avoided multiplied by their actual cost, provided ... [equal accuracy" 2) "Aricò ... used an EEG-based workload estimate to trigger assistance and observed reduced workload." 1-4

John Miedema @johnmiedema.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

Reposted by simsa0

AI Makes Machines Smarter. Neurotech Makes Humans Smarter. A Cost Case for Neurotechnology in Operations johnmiedema.substack.com/p/ai-makes-m... #neurotech #ai #operations #infrastructure #it

johnmiedema.substack.com

AI Makes Machines Smarter. Neurotech Makes Humans Smarter.

A Cost Case for Neurotechnology in Operations

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Reposted by simsa0

The Kimono Gallery @roger1952.bsky.social · 23/09/2026

Hoshi-wajo standing wooden statue. 11th century, Japan. The wooden flesh of his forehead and nose splits open like a parting curtain, unveiling the calm, serene face of a Bodhisattva emerging from within the mortal shell. In his right hand, raised in a gentle gesture of instruction

Carved from a single block of timber, a monk standing in solemn monastic robes reveals a miraculous inner metamorphosis through a deep vertical cleft down the center of his head and face. The wooden flesh of his forehead and nose splits open like a parting curtain, unveiling the calm, serene face of a Bodhisattva emerging from within the mortal shell. In his right hand, raised in a gentle gesture of instruction, and his left hand, holding a slender ritual water vase (suibin), the figure exudes a quiet, poised presence. The aged surface of the sculpture is etched with deep vertical wood grain, tool marks, and age-worn fissures that catch dramatic, directional light, capturing the physical tension between the outer human countenance and the divine radiance hidden within.
Dating to 11th-century Heian-period Japan, this extraordinary wooden sculpture depicts Hōshō Wajō (the Chinese monk Baozhi, 418–514 CE), a renowned Buddhist master of the Southern Liang Dynasty celebrated for his eccentric wisdom and miraculous deeds. According to Japanese Buddhist folklore recorded in collections such as the Konjaku Monogatarishū, when Emperor Wu of Liang sent court painters to capture the monk's portrait, Baozhi used his fingers to rend open the skin of his face, revealing the Eleven-Headed Guanyin (Jūichimen Kannon) beneath to demonstrate that true Buddhahood cannot be captured by superficial physical likeness. Sculpted in the ichiboku-zukuri (single-block wood carving) technique, this work represents a pinnacle of Japanese religious monozukuri (artisanal mastery), translating a literary legend of spiritual transfiguration into a startling, physical masterpiece of sacred art.

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