asif.emergence.is

Legacy of power

emergence — Wed, 23 Sep 2020 01:38:19 +0000

African Undersea Cables (v.51, July 2020) map by Steve Song (cc-attrib-4.0) Off the coast of West Africa a cable travels in from the deep ocean to arrive on the beaches of Ghana and Nigeria. But this cable doesn’t connect to the rest of Africa, or to the US or Europe. Rather, it runs direct to the UK, the former colonial power. Likewise, the best connections in Côte d’Ivoire…

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Render it visible

emergence — Wed, 23 Sep 2020 01:34:13 +0000

A prerequisite for understanding the problem of disinformation is an understanding of the infrastructure over which it is disseminated. You can ask just about anyone how the postcard that you sent them arrived in their mailbox and they would be able to give you a relatively coherent description […] They would be able to describe things for instance like postcodes […] but if you ask the same…

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Artificial flowers in a synthetic garden

emergence — Wed, 23 Sep 2020 01:18:58 +0000

It might for instance be said that no machine could write good English or that it could not be influenced by sex-appeal or smoke a pipe. I cannot offer any such comfort, for I believe that no such bounds can be set. But I certainly hope and believe that no great efforts will be put into making machines with the most distinctively human, but non-intellectual characteristics such as the shape of the…

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How you can learn to live with organisms

emergence — Mon, 21 Sep 2020 11:47:50 +0000

Merlin Sheldrake’s scintillating survey of the world of fungi – particularly recommended for its description of lichen life – touches upon computation and intelligence in its references to network design by slime mold and fungal computing. Those concerned with ethical issues in AI will find much else of pertinence, including discussions of the concept of (biological) individuation…

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Smart Bench

emergence — Thu, 10 Sep 2020 13:29:59 +0000

Off-grid, emission free (in the relevant sense) and fostering communication – is this the ultimate smart bench? In a BBC radio programme Reimaging the City (2016), Colm Tóibín describes how the (relatively recently migrated) Pakistani community makes use of seats along the Rambla del Raval in Barcelona. If a person finds themselves lonely or in distress, all they have to do is to is to sit on one…

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How you can learn to live with computers

emergence — Wed, 09 Sep 2020 08:58:41 +0000

Being a computer engineer is neither illegal not immoral. It isn’t even something to be ashamed of, I guess, but there was a time in my life when I was reluctant to admit that I was one. The confession created all sorts of problems. Consider, for example, the simple, friendly ritual of meeting people at a cocktail party. A standard part of the ceremonial is to be asked, ‘And what do you do?

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