How To Become A Centaur (by @ncasenmare)

 AIs are best at choosing answers. Humans are best at choosing questions.
via @mit_jods How To Become A Centaur by Nicky Case

…we’ve told ourselves that our relationship between ourselves and our AI is like a chess game: 

Zero-sum — one player’s win is another player’s loss.

…
They invited all kinds of contestants — supercomputers, human grandmasters, mixed teams of humans and AIs — to compete for a grand prize.²

Not surprisingly, a Human+AI Centaur beats the solo human. But — amazingly — a Human+AI Centaur also beats the solo computer.

This is because, contrary to unscientific internet IQ tests on clickbait websites, intelligence is not a single dimension. (The “g factor”, also known as “general intelligence”, only accounts for 30-50% of an individual’s performance on different cognitive tasks.³ So while it is an important dimension, it’s not the only dimension.) For example, human grandmasters are good at long-term chess strategy, but poor at seeing ahead for millions of possible moves — while the reverse is true for chess-playing AIs. And because humans & AIs are strong on different dimensions, together, as a centaur, they can beat out solo humans and computers alike.

…
Now, not only does pairing humans with AIs solve a technical problem — how to overcome the weaknesses of humans/AI with the strengths of AI/humans — it also solves that moral problem: how do we make sure AIs share our human goals and values?

And it’s simple: if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em!

The rest of this essay will be about AI’s forgotten cousin, IA: Intelligence Augmentation. The old story of AI is about human brains working against silicon brains. The new story of IA will be about human brains working with silicon brains. As it turns out, most of the world is the opposite of a chess game:

Non-zero-sum — both players can win.

…I’ll show how humans are already working with AIs in various fields, from art to engineering. And finally, I’ll give some rough ideas on how you can design a good partnership with an AI — how to become a centaur. 

Together, humans and AI can go from “checkmate”, to “teammate”.

Over the next few decades, the wonders in The Mother of All Demos slowly reached the public. The personal computer gave ordinary people the power of computing, something only governments and big corporations could afford previously. A particle physics lab in Switzerland released a little thing called the “World Wide Web”, which let people share knowledge using things called “web pages”, and people could even create connections between pieces of knowledge using something called a “hyperlink”.

Steve Jobs once called the computer a bicycle for the mind. Note the metaphor of a bicycle, instead of a something like a car —a bicycle lets you go faster than the human body ever can, and yet, unlike the car, the bicycle is human-powered. (Also, the bicycle is healthier for you.) The strength of metal, with a human at its heart. A collaboration — a centaur.

Doug Engelbart envisioned that the computer would be a tool for intellectual and artistic creativity; now, our devices are designed less around creation, and more around consumption. Forget AI not sharing our values — even non-AI technology stopped supporting our values, and in some cases, actively subverts them.⁷

We hoped for a bicycle for the mind; we got a Lazy Boy recliner for the mind.

…

When you create a Human+AI team, the hard part isn’t the “AI”. It isn’t even the “Human”. 

It’s the “+”.

…

Human nature, for better or worse, doesn’t change much from millennia to millennia. If you want to see the strengths that are unique and universal to all humans, don’t look at the world-famous award-winners — look at children. Children, even at a young age, are already proficient at: intuition, analogy, creativity, empathy, social skills. Some may scoff at these for being “soft skills”, but the fact that we can make an AI that plays chess but not hold a normal five-minute conversation, is proof that these skills only seem “soft” to us because evolution’s already put in the 3.5 billion years of hard work for us.

And if you want to see the weaknesses of humans, go to school. This is the stuff that’s hard for human intelligences, and requires years of training to gain even a basic competency: arithmetic, computation, memory, logic, numeracy. Note that these are all things your phone can do better and faster than the smartest human alive. (And we wonder why kids feel school is meaningless…)

AIs choose answers. Humans choose questions. And given all the possibilities, the promises and pitfalls of technology in the coming decades, the next question for us humans to choose is:

What’s next?

Meanwhile, the story of IA has been one of a tragic fall. Starting out strong with Doug Engelbart’s Mother of All Demos, the idea of IA has slowly been forgotten, as technology shifted from tools for creation and more towards tools for consumption. Someone stole the wheels off the bicycle for our mind.

But now, these two story threads may be starting to wrap together, forming a new braid in history: AIA — Artificial Intelligence Augmentation.⁸ IA can give AI the human partnership it needs in order to remain aligned with our deepest goals and values. And in return, AI can give IA some new replacement wheels for the bicycle of our mind.

I’d like to tell you what the future holds. But if you tell someone something good is inevitable, it can cause self-defeating complacency — and if you tell someone something bad is inevitable, it can cause self-fulfilling despair.

Besides, answers are for AIs. As a human, you deserve questions.

Symbiosis shows us you can have fruitful collaborations even if you have different skills, or different goals, or are even different species.  Symbiosis shows us that the world often isn’t zero-sum — it doesn’t have to be humans versus AI, or humans versus centaurs, or humans versus other humans. Symbiosis is two individuals succeeding together not despite, but because of, their differences. Symbiosis is the “+”. 

A new chapter in humanity’s story is beginning, and we — living together — get to write what happens next.

is the world coming to an end?

I quote one of the last Peter Diamandis' newsletters… as it sets up the right mindset (in my opinion) to "front facing" the future.

We’re living in a period of rapid change, and over the next 5 years, we’re going to see significant disruptive advancements that will reshape the world as we know it. 

So many people fear change, and because they don’t understand where technology is leading us, they have very gloomy views of what the future holds. 

If you listened to many media pundits, they’d have you believe that the world is coming to an end. 

The data shows others. 

The facts, however show that the world is getting better at an extraordinary rate. 

I truly believe that this is the most exciting time ever to be alive. 

As an entrepreneur, you have access to the world's information on Google. You can go onto Amazon Web Services and have access to more computational power at your fingertips than the Joint Chiefs of Staff had just 20 years ago. And on top of all that, there’s more capital available to entrepreneurs than ever before. 

Then there’s the major advancements in longevity. 

The cost of things like genome sequencing and stem cell treatments are dropping every year. 

These treatments have massive potential to extend the healthy human lifespan and cure disease...  And it won’t be long until these treatments become affordable to the average person. 

That’s just scratching the surface of some of the major advances that will shape our future. 

And yes. I won’t deny it. Some of the coming disruptive advances in technology are going to create problems in the short term. 

For example, there is no doubt in my mind that artificial intelligence will displace millions of jobs over the coming years, with the potential to create mass technological unemployment. That will be a big problem. 

However, it’s also true that the world’s biggest problems are the world’s biggest business opportunities. 

And as an entrepreneur, you can use these emerging technologies to help solve these problems — and create wealth for yourself — while also making a positive impact on the world. 

But to put yourself in a position to solve these coming problems, you must be able to see them before they happen. 

Leaders anticipate. Followers react. 

Fortunately, you don’t need a crystal ball to see these problems coming. 

There’s a science to accurately predicting what’s coming over the horizon. 

My goal is to show people where the future is going. To show people what technologies are going from deceptive to disruptive. 

And perhaps most importantly of all… To show you how you can take advantage of these coming changes, and massively impact the world, so you are excited about the future, rather than fearful of it. 

Having the right mindset is essential in preparing yourself for these new opportunities. And something I call a “Massively Transformative Purpose,” or MTP. 

I’ve put together free training to teach you exactly what an MTP is, how you can discover your own, and how this knowledge affects everything else you will do for the rest of your life. 

Watch the training video here:
http://getabundance.digital/mtp   

 

If you can anticipate what’s coming, you have a tremendous advantage in life. You don’t want to miss this. 

Best, 

Peter 

Cuando la carrera cobra más importancia que el destino

~Antoine de Saint-Exupéry; Tierra de los hombres, 1939

"El uso de una herramienta inteligente no te ha convertido en un aburrido técnico. Me parece que esos que tanto se espantan de nuestros progresos confunden el fin con los medios. En efecto, quien siembra con la única esperanza de lograr bienes materiales no logra nada por lo que valga la pena vivir.

La máquina no es un fin.

El avión no es un fin: es una herramienta. Una herramienta como el arado.

Si creemos que la máquina echa a perder al hombre es, tal vez, porque

nos falta un poco de perspectiva para poder emitir un juicio sobre las consecuencias de cambios tan rápidos como los que nos ha tocado vivir.

¿Qué son cien años de historia de la máquina frente a los doscientos mil años de historia del hombre? Acabamos de instalarnos en este paisaje de minas y centrales nucleares. Acabamos de mudarnos a esta nueva casa, que todavía no hemos ni siquiera terminado de edificar. A nuestro alrededor todo ha cambiado muy deprisa: relaciones humanas, condiciones de trabajo, costumbres. Hasta los fundamentos de nuestra psicología se han visto sacudidos. Las palabras separación, ausencia, distancia, regreso, aunque son las mismas, ya no remiten a las mismas realidades. Para aprehender el mundo de hoy usamos un lenguaje creado para el mundo de ayer, y nos parece que la vida del pasado se adecúa mejor a nuestra naturaleza porque responde mejor a nuestro lenguaje.

Cada progreso nos ha alejado un poco mas de unas costumbres que todavía no habíamos tenido tiempo de adquirir,

por lo que somos auténticos emigrantes que aun no han podido fundar su patria.

Todos somos como jóvenes ingenuos que se siguen asombrando frente a juguetes nuevos. Por eso competimos con los aviones: éste sube más alto, ése vuela más rápido. Olvidamos el motivo por el que los hacemos volar. 

La carrera cobra más importancia que el destino,

y siempre ocurre lo mismo. Para el infante del ejército colonizador que funda un imperio, el sentido de la vida es conquistar. El soldado desprecia al colono, pero ¿acaso esa conquista no se lleva a cabo para que el colono pueda afincarse? Del mismo modo, al exaltar nuestros progresos, nos servimos de los hombres para trazar vías férreas, para erigir fábricas, para perforar pozos de petróleo. Casi habíamos olvidado que hacíamos esas obras para que sirvieran a los hombres. Durante la conquista nuestra moral fue una moral de soldados, pero ahora tenemos que colonizar, tenemos que llenar de vida esta casa nueva, que todavía no tiene rostro. La verdad fue, para uno, edificar; la verdad es, para otro, habitar.

Así, poco a poco, nuestra casa se hará más humana. Incluso la máquina, cuanto más se perfecciona, más se difumina detrás de su función. Parece que todo el esfuerzo industrial del hombre, todos sus cálculos, todas las noches en vela encima de los planos, sólo conduzcan de modo visible a la sencillez. Parece que se necesite toda la experiencia de varias generaciones para perfilar lentamente la curva de una columna, de un casco de barco, de un fuselaje de avión, para lograr la pureza primigenia de un seno o de un hombro. Parece que el trabajo de los ingenieros, de los delineantes, de los analistas del centro de estudios, consiste, aparentemente, en borrar y pulir, en aligerar aquel empalme, equilibrar esta ala hasta que ya no se la note, hasta que ya no sea un ala incrustada en un fuselaje, sino una sola forma que, perfectamente lograda, se ha desprendido de su ganga; una forma que sea como un conjunto misteriosamente ensamblado, espontáneo como un poema.

Parece que la perfección se alcanza no ya cuando no queda nada por añadir, sino cuando no queda nada por suprimir. Al término de su evolución, la máquina se disimula.

De esta forma, la perfección del invento reside en la ausencia de invención. Y así como en el instrumento se ha ido borrando cualquier mecánica visible, por lo que disponemos de un objeto tan natural como un guijarro pulido por el mar, el manejo de la máquina, admirablemente, consigue que nos olvidemos de ella.

En otro tiempo teníamos que trabajar con un artefacto complicado. Actualmente nos olvidamos de que un motor gira. A fin de cuentas cumple con su función, la de girar, así como un corazón palpita y no por ello nos fijamos en el nuestro. 

La herramienta ya no absorbe nuestra atención, más allá de sí misma, y gracias a ella encontramos nuestra auténtica naturaleza,

la del jardinero, la del navegante o la del poeta."

Co-workers and makers: New public policies and corporate strategies for the city

LSE Business Review – Co-workers and makers: New public policies and corporate strategies for the city

Our seven propositions to make communities more open, sustainable and inclusive:

1. More emphasis should be put on ‘infra-organisations’, i.e. transparent platforms designed for independent entities to share identity and governance.‘Infra-organisations’ provide infrastructural services without searching for the increasing returns likely to lead to a monopoly (Google). They benefit both citizens and entrepreneurs. The growth of each sub-unit is limited to the governance can remain highly collaborative. Framasoft in France best illustrates this new trend;
2. An ‘inclusive label’ could be organised by collaborative communities and collaborative movements themselves: the label would work like a brand to signal a product’s social and ethical quality (respect for the rights of workers and the environment) and be operated by a combination of public and private structures;
3. Mega-spaces could be opened in all cities to let expressions of creativity flourish: collaborative spaces can coordinate broader movements. The whole city could periodically be turned into an urban-planning ‘hackathon’ to mobilise a diverse set of individuals from a given area. Such involvement can strengthen the social fabric of a territory.
4. Academic presence in the city should be reinvented towards more urban and rural mobility. Academics could be made to serve and spread knowledge geographically and socially. Collaborative spaces can serve their mobility;
5. Ephemeral labs could be multiplied and supported by public authorities and private companies. Mobile labs or maker spaces can help revive rural areas and connect isolated communities together;
6. Open innovation should be made more open. Innovation involves numerous external and internal stakeholders. Why not push open innovation initiatives in the space of the city itself (e.g. with fablab trucks)?;
7. Finally, better global digital infrastructures should be developed for coworkers, remote workers, and nomads, which requires the support of public policies, at the national and EU levels.

Electronic Frontier Foundation – Digital Privacy at the U.S. Border: Protecting the Data On Your Devices and In the Cloud

Digital Privacy at the U.S. Border: Protecting the Data On Your Devices and In the Cloud | Electronic Frontier Foundation

Contents

• Download

• Executive Summary

• Part 1: Digital Privacy Guide for Travelers

• What is the Border?

• Risk Assessment Factors

• Factors About You

• Factors About Your Data and Devices

• Before You Arrive at the Border

• Talk to Your Employer

• Minimize the Data That You Carry Across the Border

• Protect What You Carry Over The Border

• Social Media and Online Accounts

• When You Are at the Border

• What to Expect

• Basic Rules for Everyone

• Try to Avoid Implicit "Consent"

• What Could Happen When You Comply With An Order?

• If You Comply With an Order, Should You State That It Is Under Protest?

• What Could Happen if You Refuse To Comply With an Order?

• Should You Attempt to Persuade the Agents to Withdraw Their Order?

• After You Leave the Border

• Make a Record of What Happened

• Change Your Passwords and Login Credentials

• Government Offices That May Help You

• Part 2: Constitutional Rights, Government Policies, and Privacy at the Border

• The Law of Border Searches and Seizures

• The Fourth Amendment at the Border: Digital Privacy

• The Default Constitutional Privacy Rule

• The Border Search Exception

• The Exception to the Exception: "Non-Routine" Searches

• Border Searches of Digital Devices

• Interior Checkpoints

• The First Amendment at the Border: Freedom to Privately Speak, Associate, Acquire Information, and Gather News

• The Fifth Amendment at the Border: Freedom From Self-Incrimination

• Passwords

• Fingerprints

• The First, Fifth, and Fourteenth Amendment Intersection at the Border: Freedom From Discrimination

• Consent: Waiving Constitutional Rights at the Border

• What If You Are Not a U.S. Citizen?

• Federal Policies and Practices on Digital Searches

• Federal Agencies that Oversee the Border

• Device Search Policies

• Search

• Seizure

• Searching Social Media and Other Cloud Content Without Using Travelers' Devices

• Part 3: The Technology of Privacy Protection

• Encryption

• Understanding Weaker Screen-Lock or User Account Passwords

• Strong Full-Disk Storage Encryption

• Activating Encryption

• Choosing a Strong Password

• Do Not Forget Your Password

• Turn Off Your Device

• Secure Deletion and Forensics

• Some "Deleted" Information is Not Really Deleted

• Overview of Secure Deletion

• Built-In Factory Reset Features

• Wiping Hard Drives and Removable Media

• Individual File Secure Deletion

• Clearing Free Space

• Flash Media

• Encryption and Secure Deletion

• Cloud Storage

• The Role of Cloud Storage in a Border Data Protection Strategy

• Forensics

• Risks Associated with Cloud Storage

• Personal Cloud Storage

• More Elaborate Data Minimization Ideas

• Conclusion

Facebook, Instagram y Twitter están matando "internet"

 "Para mí los blogs encarnaban los ideales del world wide web"

Por qué Hossein Derakhshan, el "padre de los blogueros" de Irán, cree que las redes sociales como Facebook están acabando con lo bueno de internet - BBC Mundo:

"Lo llamé modestamente El editor: yo mismo porque mi filosofía era que cualquiera podía ser editor, sin tener que estar sujeto a una extraña práctica editorial que en Irán incluía mucha autocensura", relata.
"Ser el editor de uno mismo y no tener que considerar los intereses de una institución editorial era liberador, teniendo en cuenta la larga historia de lucha de los escritores y los periodistas iraníes"…

Irónicamente, enlacé alguna entrada sobre esto en facebook y posiblemente hasta lo twiteé… en lugar de bloggearlo (como ahora, rectificar es de sabios). 

PSED: Todo el problema… cortoplacismo

Me ha dicho que se pide aval de socio porque el dinero se le anticipa a la empresa, no al cliente de la empresa: "entonces, yo he visto que el cliente es solvente y lo acepto (el factoring) pero el anticipo requiere aval del socio en cualquier caso por la razón indicada.

Normativa del Banco de España, que si ve que no se ha hecho así les obliga a llevarlo a pérdidas, sin más (aunque vayan a cobrarlo seguro –que supongo que entonces lo sacan de pérdidas y pasa a "recuperados"–). 

Con aval no se lo hacen llevar a pérdidas.

Ese es todo el problema… cortoplacismo en los resultados (de los bancos).

Interpelado el dtor. de la oficina sobre si hacer lo que diga el banco de España, no conduciría a considerar entonces a toda la banca de carácter público en lugar de privado… me ha indicado que es la normativa, endurecida tras los años locos que causaron (se descubrieron) la crisis. 

Ahora las normas impiden esos desmanes y puede que sean demasiado rígidas.

Le he dicho que una entidad privada debería hacer lo que quisiera, prestar o no con o sin aval según su entender… pero, claro, si salía mal no debía venir nadie a rescatarlo (no una entidad púbica, al menos).

Me he quedado a gusto, pero no servirá de nada.

(conversación con un director de oficina… no concienzudo estudio con detalle de las normas y reglamentos)

Pensamiento

Sin

Elaborar

Demasiado

PSED: La investigación debe estar abierta #science20

En algunas conversaciones sobre "innovar"  he dicho abiertamente que si se investiga con dinero público el resultado debe ser público y que así las empresas pueden innovar alrededor de esa investigación.

Esto supondría que las universidades (como "investigador público") deberían de dejar de limitar la innovación con patentes y de rentabilizar la investigación con licencias. Evidentemente si hay que pagar, es más fácil para las grandes compañías hacerlo y que así puedan innovar alrededor de esos objetos de propiedad industrial, reforzando aún más su posición en el mercado, dificultando la competencia.

Por supuesto es un cambio de paradigma muy grande que supone dar la vuelta a "todo lo establecido". Y esa ambición es justamente el primer limitante para que nadie se sume a la idea cuando ésta la comento en algunos foros…

Lo explica muy bien Fernanda Peset en la presentación de maredata (desde el min. 1:04 a 1:15 ó a 2:00). Maredata es un proyecto, que junto a otros como Eexcess, favorece los datos abiertos (#opendata), la ciencia 2.0 y desde una perspectiva más amplia, la web 3.0 (la web semántica), el cloud-computing y el big-data a través de la interoperabilidad.

Lo que no acabo de entender es cómo va a encajar esta apertura del conocimiento de las universidades con la política actual de sus OTRIs, enfocada al 100% a retorno de la "inversión" mediante el licenciamiento de las patentes…


Pensamientos
Sin
Elaborar
Demasiado

Company culture

En esta esta entrada sobre Netflix. ya hace un tiempo reflexionaba sobre la importancia de una fuerte (y, mucho mejor, escrita) cultura de empresa.

Viene esto al caso al llamar Alvaro González nuestra atención al respecto del "handbook" de GitLab.

Eso me ha recordado la presentación, sobre esto mismo –la cultura–, de Google.

Me recuerda también esto a una entrada sobre la ideal manera de ser, que empezó pensando en emprendedores y acabó concluyendo en una serie de valores y prácticas que creo serían sanas en general ;-)
Confianza, resiliencia, empatía/psicología, paciencia, esfuerzo y mindfulness

Creo que voy a abrir una página en el blog para ir enlazando estos documentos…

La nación perfecta…

How to Be an Anticapitalist Today

How to Be an Anticapitalist Today | Jacobin

1. Smashing Capitalism
The argument goes something like this: the system is rotten. All efforts to make life tolerable within it will eventually fail. From time to time small reforms that improve the lives of people may be possible when popular forces are strong, but such improvements will always be fragile, vulnerable to attack and reversible.

The idea that capitalism can be rendered a benign social order in which ordinary people can live flourishing, meaningful lives is ultimately an illusion because, at its core, capitalism is unreformable. The only hope is to destroy it, sweep away the rubble, and then build an alternative. As the closing words of the labor tune “Solidarity Forever” proclaim, “We can bring to birth a new world from the ashes of the old.”
…

It is one thing to burn down old institutions; it is quite another to build emancipatory new institutions from the ashes.

Why the revolutions of the twentieth century never resulted in robust, sustainable human emancipation is, of course, a hotly debated matter.
…

To actually transform capitalism, visions that resonate with anger are not enough; instead, a strategic logic that has some chance of actually accomplishing its goals is needed.



2. Taming Capitalism
Here is the basic argument. Capitalism, when left to its own devices, creates great harms. It generates levels of inequality that are destructive to social cohesion; it destroys traditional jobs and leaves people to fend for themselves; it creates uncertainty and risk for individuals and whole communities; it harms the environment. These are all consequences of the inherent dynamics of a capitalist economy.
…

The idea of taming capitalism does not eliminate the underlying tendency for capitalism to generate harms; it simply counteracts their effects. This is like a medicine which effectively deals with symptoms rather than with the underlying causes of a health problem.
…

Globalization has made it much easier for capitalist firms to move investments to places in the world with less regulation and cheaper labor, while the threat of capital flight, along with a variety of technological changes, has fragmented and weakened the labor movement, making it less capable of resistance and political mobilization. Combined with globalization, the increasing financialization of capital has led to massive increases in wealth and income inequality, which in turn has increased the political leverage of opponents of the social-democratic state.
…



3. Escaping Capitalism
Escaping capitalism typically involves avoiding political engagement and certainly of collectively organized efforts at changing the world. Especially in the world today, escape is mostly an individualistic lifestyle strategy.…

Intentional communities may be motivated by the desire to escape the pressures of capitalism, but sometimes they can also serve as models for more collective, egalitarian, and democratic ways of living.…

The Do It Yourself movement and the “sharing economy” may be motivated by stagnant individual incomes during a period of economic austerity, but they can also point to ways of organizing economic activity that are less dependent on market exchange
…



4. Eroding Capitalism
It is grounded in the following idea: all socioeconomic systems are complex mixes of many different kinds of economic structures, relations, and activities.

Existing economic systems combine capitalism with a whole host of other ways of organizing the production and distribution of goods and services: directly by states; within the intimate relations of families to meet the needs of its members; through community-based networks and organizations; by cooperatives owned and governed democratically by their members; though nonprofit market-oriented organizations; through peer-to-peer networks engaged in collaborative production processes; and many other possibilities.
…

The idea of eroding capitalism imagines that these alternatives have the potential, in the long run, of expanding to the point where capitalism is displaced from this dominant role.
…



Real utopias
… turns eu, which means good, and ou, which means no — into “u” and placing this before the Greek word for place, topos.
U-topia is thus the good place that exists in no place. It is a fantasy of perfection.

How then can it be “real”? It may be realistic to seek improvements in the world, but not perfection. Indeed, the search for perfection can undermine the practical task of making the world a better place. As the saying goes, “the best is the enemy of the good.”

There is thus an inherent tension between the real and the utopian. It is precisely this tension which the idea of a “real utopia” is meant to capture. The point is to sustain our deepest aspirations for a just and humane world that does not exist while also engaging in the practical task of building real-world alternatives that can be constructed in the world as it is that also prefigure the world as it could be and which help move us in that direction.



Conclusions
If you are concerned about the lives of others, in one way or another you have to deal with capitalist structures and institutions. Taming and eroding capitalism are the only viable options. You need to participate both in political movements for taming capitalism through public policies and in socioeconomic projects of eroding capitalism through the expansion of emancipatory forms of economic activity.