Claude gave me this unobfuscated C code for `long z,x,G;main(){for(puts("P1\n80 80"),scanf("%10lx",&G);3-z/2160;x=++z%81/8-5)putchar(5>x?!(16>>(x^-(x<1))+1&G<<5>>z/6485)^49:10);}`:
#include <stdio.h>
/
* PPM Pattern Generator
*
* This program generates a 80x80 black and white PPM image based on a
* hexadecimal input pattern. The pattern is rendered as ASCII art using
* bit manipulation to determine which pixels are on or off.
/
int main() {
long pixel_index = 0; // Current pixel being processed (0-6399 for 80x80)
long horizontal_offset; // Horizontal position relative to center
long hex_pattern; // Input hexadecimal pattern
// Output PPM header for 80x80 black and white image
// P1 = ASCII black and white format
// 80 80 = width and height
puts("P1\n80 80");
// Read hexadecimal pattern from user (up to 10 hex digits)
scanf("%10lx", &hex_pattern);
// Process each pixel in the 80x80 image
// Continue until we've processed all pixels
// The condition (3 - pixel_index/2160) continues while pixel_index < 6480
// This accounts for 80x80 = 6400 pixels plus some margin
for (; 3 - pixel_index/2160; ) {
// Move to next pixel and calculate horizontal offset from center
pixel_index++;
horizontal_offset = (pixel_index % 81) / 8 - 5;
// Determine what to output for this pixel
if (horizontal_offset < 5) {
// We're in the main pattern area (central region)
// Complex bit manipulation to determine pixel state:
// 1. Calculate bit position based on horizontal offset
int bit_pos = (horizontal_offset ^ -(horizontal_offset < 1)) + 1;
// 2. Extract relevant bits from the pattern
// hex_pattern << 5 shifts the pattern
// >> (pixel_index/648*5) selects which part of pattern to use based on vertical position
long pattern_bits = (hex_pattern << 5) >> (pixel_index/648 * 5);
// 3. Check if the specific bit is set
int bit_is_set = (16 >> bit_pos) & pattern_bits;
// 4. Invert the bit and XOR with '1' (ASCII 49) to get '0' or '1'
char pixel_char = (!bit_is_set) ^ 49;
putchar(pixel_char);
} else {
// We're outside the pattern area - output newline
putchar(10); // ASCII 10 = newline character
}
}
return 0;
}
/
* USAGE:
* Compile: gcc -o pattern_gen pattern_gen.c
* Run: ./pattern_gen
* Input: Enter a hexadecimal number (e.g., 1234ABCD)
* Output: PPM format image data that can be saved to a .pbm file
*
* EXAMPLE:
* ./pattern_gen > output.pbm
* Then input: DEADBEEF
*
* The resulting .pbm file can be viewed with image viewers that support PPM format
* or converted to other formats using tools like ImageMagick.
*/
It is not the just queue that is the bottleneck. If the new power plants designed specifically for powering these new AI data centers are connected to the existing electric grid, the energy prices for regular customers will also get affected - most likely in an upwardly fashion. That means, the cost of the transmission upgrades required by these new datacenters will be socialized which is a big problem. There does not seem to be a solution in sight for this challenge.
Exactly. We could have had a discussion about whether a executive order can override house of representatives had such order be issued by Trump post inauguration yet overriding it prior to that should be the bigger deal here.
It's unfortunately not news that a Trump presidency doesn't respect the mores of the office.
The president can pardon people for breaking federal law and can stop the enforcement of federal law[1] so as president elect it makes sense that he can effectively neuter any federal law short of congress deciding he has gone to far and impeaching and removing him.
[1]i.e. federal agencies no longer prosecute personal marijuana use by executive order
Defending against AI-capable adversaries without employing AI is an invitation to disaster. AI will compress decision time frames from minutes to seconds, expand the scale of attacks, and demand responses that will tax the limits of human cognition. Human operators will not be able to defend against AI-enabled cyber or disinformation attacks, drone swarms, or missile attacks without the assistance of AI-enabled machines. The best human operator cannot defend against multiple machines making thousands of maneuvers per second potentially moving at hypersonic speeds and orchestrated by AI across domains. Humans cannot be everywhere at once, but software can.
Every time I see these kinds of video, whether that is of protein translation, kinesin walking on microtubule, or birth and death of a galaxy, I get this feeling that Panpsychism is closer to truth that it gets credit for. Any constraints we put in the defining consciousness and life seems to be just some arbitrary constraint put there for our own convenience.
Isn't panpsychism a kind of reverse materialism? Both seem to correctly recognize that terms we create are just lines we draw on our map through the terrain of reality, which we rank by their usefulness, by how close they seem to be "carving nature at its joints". Based on my brief skimming, panpsychism seems to say the terrain is all mysterious and wonderful, whereas materialism says it's all just mundane.
Or am I completely mis-skimming the Wikipedia entry on panpsychism?
I think you'd enjoy the work of Bernardo Kastrup, who is a proponent of idealism, while also arguing against panpsychism, for basically the reasons you just stated - ie, there is a reality made of parts, and those parts are x, where x is 'matter', 'mind', 'consciousness', 'electromagnetism' and so on. But the trouble then is that you can only describe the constituent parts in terms of those parts. For example, subatomic particles have properties like spin and charge, but that's the only way you can describe them - in relation to one another - without having to go a level 'deeper' if it were possible to describe them in further parts (which would only be describable in terms of those parts, and so on).
> Do you consider yourself to be mysterious or just mundane?
Mundane, that is even more amazing.
> What is your experience of your own Being-ness?
My electrons and nuclei are arranged in a weird pattern. If you ask them if I'm conscious, they can move another electrons and nuclei to type "yes". If you ask them if I'm lying, they can move another electrons and nuclei to type "no". It's just a strange pattern that simulates a delusion, don't trust them.
A good question, something I'll have to think about.
The immediate if indirect answer I can give you: I stopped feeling this sense of wonder, mystery, greater purpose of reality, somewhen during my university years. I only ever experience these feelings when consuming works of fiction.
> Any constraints we put in the defining consciousness and life seems to be just some arbitrary constraint put there for our own convenience.
The definition of consciousness is very much tied to how humans (or some scientists) perceive consciousness. I'm pretty sure my dog is conscious of itself and its surrounding. It just happens to have a less sophisticated consciousness than the one I have. Some animals might have a pretty high consciousness but they fail to communicate it to the humans.
I love Alan Watts too. In any case, I need to insert the necessary reference to recently passed John Conway's Free Will Theorem. I recommend every one to watch his 6-lecture long presentation on this, available on YouTube and underappreciated given the number of views, where he captivatingly describes his proof that, if we have free will, so do elementary particles. This is a purely mathematics- and physics-based proof which I understand is fully accepted by the scientific community, and while it, of course, does not provide an explanation of the underlying cause, it provides the best possible description obtained by scientific methodology so far.
I like to think that, somehow, Alan Watts and John Conway were digging the same tunnel, just starting from the two endpoints, and bound to meet at some point in the future. We just need a few more diggers of that stature (tall order, I know).
He would definitely dig that. Curiously, I was drawn to this thread because I was just listening to him today, talking about crystals and the nature of reality. He would go thru so many topics in such detail and clarity, it's incredible.
Same. I often notice the precision with which he used language. Such a joy to listen to.
I especially like the chill-step YouTube videos some people assemble and publish. I download them with youtube-dl and listen to them on my phone at night while drifting off to sleep.
At 61 years of age, the philosophy he describes (Advaita Vedanta / Zen Buddhism / Taoism) brings me great comfort.
> I often notice the precision with which he used language.
Indeed. Hard to find an inaccuracy, even when he's talking about some details of technical subjects. He had an exceptional ability to translate between the spiritual and the technical in a way which seems to make complete sense.
> Such a joy to listen to.
A true spiritual entertainer. Never boring. I imagine he could be a stand-up comedian today.
> I especially like the chill-step YouTube videos some people assemble and publish. I download them with youtube-dl and listen to them on my phone at night while drifting off to sleep.
Similar, I went thru a lot of the material on youtube. High-quality material with transcripts can also be found here: https://www.organism.earth/library/author/alan-watts
A lot of it I listened to many times over and I keep getting new insights out of it, it's so densely packed.
> At 61 years of age, the philosophy he describes (Advaita Vedanta / Zen Buddhism / Taoism) brings me great comfort.
Definitely helps to know these philosophical perspectives, especially if one gets tangled up in some harmful model of reality.
Somehow the basic (non-religious, just philosophical) Taoism seems to most align with me at the moment. I credit the Dao for solving a very tough naming problem for me. ;)
I can't see this connection at all. Could someone who thinks or feels this way elaborate?
Does this feeling arise because those atoms move? Or is it the self-assembling behavior? Is this the same feeling some people have when they see a door suddenly close due to the wind, as if some spirit is responsible? I remember feeling like this as a kid. But getting older, I realized that this feeling of agency behind everything is unfounded. And the feeling faded away.
Panpsychism, pantheism, etc, are enticing because humans are predisposed to see patterns, structure, reason, and intelligence; to anthropomorphize nature. Characterizing as "arbitrary" our admittedly feeble and flawed attempts at distinguishing the human mind is an easy way to placate that underlying, intrinsic desire.
Of course, maybe it is true! (That felt good to say :)
> Every time I see these kinds of video, whether that is of protein translation, kinesin walking on microtubule, [...] I get this feeling that Panpsychism is closer to truth
Those two are... sadly quite different than the TFA video. Those are cartoons, steeped in artistic license, accommodation of animation software limitations, and artists regrettably but intentionally prioritizing "pretty" over a misconception-spawning lack of resemblance to reality. Think of a video of Saint Trump's day, with frames selected to show him floating along, limbs unmoving, through a deserted White House. Problematic when learning biology. Not a good source of ground truth.
Cloud platforms like AWS, Azure and GCP, are now the de-facto operating systems for web apps and services. Section 230 also provides them immunity from the content that gets hosted in those platforms. I find it unfortunate that we are in this situation where the platform providers are also playing the police. They should stick to being a platform and policing side of this should be left to the law enforcement.
What will we feel if Microsoft and Apple start deciding what kind of contents can be generated and saved in their operating systems? It feels like time is ripe for a cloud provider that simply provides a platform.
If Amazon turns out to be similar to Dutch East India Company, we are looking at Amazon growing 200 years old with dozens of settlements and colonies all over the world.
I have been wondering about whether there is a limit to how much Amazon can grow in terms of number of industries they can expand into and also how big can they grow in each of those industries. At some point, there will obviously be attempts to create legislations to stop them from growing. Such legislative maneuvers will probably be rendered ineffective by intense lobbying.
I think there has be change in consumer behavior and expectation to stop Amazon at this point. But will there be significant enough change in consumer behavior so that it is longer feasible for Amazon to grow so much?
I don’t think this sort of regulation would happen unless they meet the criteria for a monopoly and I’m not a lawyer but I don’t think Amazon meets these criteria. It has competitors in every market it is currently in. Walmart, Target, and Etsy are all competing retailers online and physically. Azure competes with AWS. The process here on out to beat profitable and large competitors to wield monopoly power is incredibly difficult. I don’t see a problem if they enter new industries to find more opportunities for growth, companies do this all the time.
> consumer behavior and expectation to stop Amazon at this point
why? if amazon is providing a service that people want (and pay for) at a very competitive price (either by making economies of scale that only they have, nor by leveraging existing business assets they own like AWS), then theres' nothing wrong.
#include <stdio.h>
/ * PPM Pattern Generator * * This program generates a 80x80 black and white PPM image based on a * hexadecimal input pattern. The pattern is rendered as ASCII art using * bit manipulation to determine which pixels are on or off. /
int main() { long pixel_index = 0; // Current pixel being processed (0-6399 for 80x80) long horizontal_offset; // Horizontal position relative to center long hex_pattern; // Input hexadecimal pattern
}/ * USAGE: * Compile: gcc -o pattern_gen pattern_gen.c * Run: ./pattern_gen * Input: Enter a hexadecimal number (e.g., 1234ABCD) * Output: PPM format image data that can be saved to a .pbm file * * EXAMPLE: * ./pattern_gen > output.pbm * Then input: DEADBEEF * * The resulting .pbm file can be viewed with image viewers that support PPM format * or converted to other formats using tools like ImageMagick. */