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Why are we here? What is our purpose? Mustn’t there be a point to this vast, remarkably complex drama being played out on this relatively tiny little speck in the cosmos? In short, what is the meaning of life?
By definition, there cannot be a more important question. Surprising, then, how little attention it receives. Most academics will scoff at attempts to approach the issue in a scholarly context. […]
→ No CommentsTags: Philosophy · Emotivism
Three primates died today while traveling in a motorized vehicle in an arid region between the Tigris and the Euphrates rivers. Although we can state nothing with absolute certainty, the three “humans” — basically hairless, cognitively advanced monkeys with a striking genetic similarity to the common chimpanzee — were most likely killed by some sort of explosive device as it incinerated the vehicle beneath them. Over six thousand miles away, another primate of the same species claimed that those killed were members of a group he called “The United States Army.” Upon further investigation, membership in this “army” is marked chiefly by clothing, as well as by certain behavioral traits. The exact purpose of the army’s presence in the region, called “Iraq” by some, is under fierce debate.
→ No CommentsTags: Nonfiction · Philosophy · Truth · War
“I am nothing,” she says, her eyes avoiding mine. In her face I see contradictory tinges of apathy and embarrassment, further complicating the interpretation of her already polysemous declaration. I am nothing. Maybe she thinks her life is a failure. Maybe she feels ineffectual in some specific regard. Or maybe she has accepted her relative unimportance in the vast cosmos. […]
→ 6 CommentsTags: Nonfiction · Philosophy · Atheism · Discrimination
“Artificial Intelligence,” quipped one Stanford engineer,” is the science of how to get machines to do the things they do in movies.”
Let us hope that is not the case. Given the inherent unpredictability of the forthcoming emergence of AI, perhaps it was fitting creative artists-rather than technological gurus-were the first to offer an opinion on what the arrival of artificial intelligence might mean to the world. But instead of being treated to imaginative predictions, audiences were subjected to twenty years of adulterated AI, bastardized to justify hours of senseless violence.
→ No CommentsTags: Philosophy · AI · Science