Miscellaneous Notes:
In 1964 I took the bus back from General Dynamics in San Diego to Santa Monica and started spooling out a little footage from the 16mm film that was plotted on what was the first digital plotter the SC-4020. The images were the first evidence that a computer may be provided with the capability to originate better and more detailed design decisions that act and react in far more complex ways than what we may be capable of accomplishing. The thought of making a computer into a more complicated hand tool assistant, as has been done since the early 1960’s at MIT, however that simply follows our orders one at a time, and substantially misses the point or advantages of computing altogether; in fact such an approach is much slower than a pencil. Of course nature discovered many cybernetic principles billions of years ago through the evolutionary process implied in DNA, which then proceeded to develop millions of species; all of which still infuriates many millions of people who believe that a god who looks like a man just magically made everything within a few days like a magician or perhaps like a factory; no doubt because the production line, the most advanced and efficient means of economic production that most people were aware of; which quickly became the basis of almost every national economy, by producing nearly everything we work for, would naturally be hard for most to get beyond, even in their imaginations. So the conclusion was inevitable, that god must be operating along very similar lines, which religious ministers then propound for centuries. So nearly all entrepreneurs naturally continued with the same myopic perspective and inevitably tried to make advanced machines obey the small domineering minds of their self-centered designers and users; and so the really useful discoveries right in front of our eyes were all overlooked, or not even momentarily noticed; no doubt because we weren't ready for anything more advanced than what we learned in grammar school from largely incompetent teachers who for the most part just needed a job, that ultimately amounted to anesthetizing the minds of the young, instead of opening their imagination to incredible possibilities, or just learning how to care for nature and our own life potentials.
As a result, instead of technology offering us freedom it entraps us into doing more tedious technical chores that should be performed almost completely automatically, as nature had done for eons. As a result our society became increasingly labor intensive and less efficient as we get more technology. We then began to fall behind in our work, as wasteful demands on our labor increases; because technology increases complexity, and when incompetently managed multiplies damages and labor intensive consequences; and so 10’s of millions of illegal migrants are needed accommodate our daily chores and a rapidly growing need for more and more labor. All of which developed into a need for even greater urban crowding, increased violence, a need for more housing, higher taxes, irreversible environmental destruction; marriages where everybody works, where families are ultimately defeated or eliminated, literally destroying the fabric of life forever; because we don’t have the time to understand how our world works and interrelates, and so we can’t begin to imagine or coordinate any improved solutions to support life’s needs; all of which remains incomprehensible to most because our own personal needs and desires for life are rarely if ever addressed at work, or at school, in church, in most homes nor by any government agency; all of which is now increasingly dependant on expressing life’s needs and purposes through greater understanding, not less.
Since there is little to no interest in how anything in our world works, naturally there is little real opportunity for improvement along any conventional path; and few if any views are offered that describe how our lives could benefit. Most who go to any university are just looking for jobs that pay more in order to provide for greater personal consumption. So most entrepreneurs, managers and engineers don’t especially care about technology and certainly not any beneficial purpose that it could fulfill; and since the focus is almost exclusively on economic rewards, then benefits for nature or life are practically never a consideration. Most who work in technology would just as soon be selling bricks or automobile insurance if it paid more; and so progress is of little regard. As a result business gradually became the purpose of everything. Money and consumption gradually became the only legitimate goals of work. Well a robot acting just as a responsive working tool could certainly do better than that; easily surpassing almost any human judgment or creative process; naturally being free of endless addictions, with unlimited attention to the purposes that need to be accomplished. The infinite diversity of life is based on mathematical permutations of DNA, all providing extraordinary evidence of the creative potential of the evolutionary model. The alternative is ignorance of the history of life on earth, its potential and its future; which is no doubt thought of as essential to those who manipulate life and deceive humanity for their economic power and control; while it actually has the opposite effect, because it has many times greater negative consequences, as a result of misunderstandings and destructive impacts, and so operates at perhaps less than 10% efficiency.
The factory model utilized by industry, or in any repetitive task, is just a simple tool that has been overly hyped; it’s not the basis of life. So why do politicians strictly obey the influences of extraordinarily unimaginative commerce? Why do people chase money and jobs, and then let those jobs be exported to the other side of the earth? Apparently there isn't even a rudimentary understanding or commitment to life, or nature nor anyone. Simple self-regulating working tools as feasible through cybernetics offer a far better analogy for describing our complex living environment than the psychological, economic and political models that have been used to guide humanity. We have been led to maintain technologies and institutions that don’t work very well, if at all, in order to accomplish little or no actual benefit for ourselves, while causing considerable frustrations and inflicting massive environmental and biological damages. And after enduring many centuries of tragedy, even those who suffered the most are unwilling to consider any form of personally beneficial change; whether that could amount to something as trivial as an interactive natural language to control the systems that waste so much of our time; or the more serious issue of justice based on restitution in place of vengeance; or an ecological foundation based on the protection and restoration of wilderness; and the sustainability of our own population founded on expanding our beneficial human potentials. Through a very simple process of understanding and relatively enjoyable work the world we live in can be turned into a paradise. Naturally we may need to first discover how our brains can be allowed to be more capable of understanding without loosing the significant wealth of our human and natural legacies that are being rapidly devastated and overwhelmed for no purpose whatsoever.
(js, May 2005)
1) Minor details that are conspicuously absent from existing operating systems is information about the system’s current state, for example: – is it nonfunctional? – Is it running some process? – What process? – What is the purpose of the process? – What are all the options available to the user at any point? – Provide a full and complete explanation (whether brief or voluminous, animated or a 6 hour video lecture, if one is available and requested) for each and every option, or of any software function, or of the overall system’s intent or any application’s design, as the user requests. Continuous system monitoring of all programs, hardware and data; with automatic repair of all system and application software and data, including automatic, uninterrupted linkage, of all system, application and data modules, to the latest versions and updates. The absence of such obvious yet minor features consumes many billions of frustrating user hours each year, that represents a massive loss in productivity of everyone’s most capable people, and yet such obvious deficiencies persist decade after decade without any change.
Understanding: A fundamental purpose of understanding may be to help create a healthier and fully sustainable future, with full consideration for the protection and restoration of wilderness, humanity and all threatened species; by demonstrating how all knowledge and all of nature is fully interconnected through our considerate efforts and understanding. Such an understanding is typically excluded from the educational process, which has been substantially redefined as a supplier of corporate employees, and independent firms that provide for various corporate support functions; and since these jobs are exclusively dedicated to the financial bottom line, such issues as health, avoidance of overpopulation, care of wilderness and sustainability are not only irrelevant but aggressively sabotaged when an inept manager believes it enhances short-term profits. The result is an impoverished process of learning, that becomes repulsive to most young people who may briefly realize that they are ultimately being designed to become incompetent consumers, who are then being controlled by equally ignorant authoritarian figures on the job, through government agencies, and with it all being perpetuated into the next generation. The result is a lack of understanding or an integrated overview, and an absence of imagination coupled with technical incompetence somehow seen as needed to sustain corporate growth; of course such a path will provide corporate death along with the devastation of our natural world. Perhaps home schooling or independent education is an alternative that could allow for greater freedom, imagination and technical competence, because it is far more personally tuned, less oppressive, more nurturing, encouraging imagination and offering the acquisition of essential tools to help equip anyone with useful functional capacity. Naturally, functional independence will require considerable competence and tools to be productive in botany, architecture, molecular biology, law and many other endeavors.
Richard Feynman. The central thesis of nanotechnology is that almost any chemically stable structure that is not specifically disallowed by the laws of physics can in fact be built. The possibility of building things with atomic precision was first introduced by Richard Feynman in a famous after-dinner talk in 1959 when he said: "The principles of physics, as far as I can see, do not speak against the possibility of maneuvering things atom by atom." (from: www.foresight.org/nano/whatismm.html)
When I met Richard Feynman one time in the mid 1960’s; I only knew that we were both interested in innovative ideas that might offer some functional possibilities, and we discussed various concepts related to cybernetics and physics. To deal with movies or simulations of physics or social systems as an issue in artificial intelligence or cybernetics may have been novel, however in retrospect I realize what an in depth foundation in knowledge and financial support was in fact nurturing physics and molecular biology, while I did my efforts in my free time between 11pm and 4am in a field with practically no history and virtually no form of assistance. However Richard Feynman was a pleasant and curious person who no doubt enjoyed the process of discovery much as I did. As we looked at the Cibernetik film on a 16 mm projector on a nearby wall he was observing time reversibility issues as we ran the projector backward and foreword, and I became a bit concerned about not incorporating the latest theories of particle physics into that particular system, which wasn't particularly relevant to the perception and language issues I was addressing. Nevertheless 4 dimensional physical simulation capabilities were being incorporated in the following system that I was then working on in the mid 1960's. I felt that I could of, perhaps in some way created a beneficial working tool if I could have found a way to continue with my cybernetic research and movie making; and now over 4 decades later I can see better that the thought was probably true. Although I could accomplish such tasks much faster now after having perhaps inadvertently digested these issues in greater depth; however I could also see that these concepts, no matter how helpful in terms of our general approach to computers, scientific research and the arts are still not of any real interest perhaps anywhere, and so the language and scientific implications and potentials have been substantially missed by practically everyone, which is perfectly ok; because this century really isn't ready for a more advanced or intelligent technology, no matter how helpful, and billions of people have certainly demonstrated that they can not effectively use technology or ideas on any level. More significantly there are extraordinarily disastrous consequences facing humanity and nature that are more effectively addressed through molecular biology techniques, which I am still working on regardless of anyone’s interests. But while a few people were curious about cybernetics and artificial intelligence during the 1960’s, they all had other personal economic interests and perhaps as a result too little time to explore or consider any other possibilities. Certainly no one in computer sciences or the arts at UCLA showed the slightest interest. The Whitney Museum and many others include it in their retrospective of 20th century art; and while back in the 1960's and 70's I worked for 2 full decades alone, always a 16-hour day, usually 7 days a week, with primitive tools, perhaps so I could see the potential of such discoveries; and then at jobs periodically so I could buy some computer equipment. By 1971 I was studying in a small hut I built somewhere in the Santa Monica mountains and realized I needed a job so I could care for nature that is so blatantly destroyed, so I found work on the Illiac IV super computer at NASA’s Moffett Field south of San Francisco with John Warnock who later founded Adobe. Perhaps I came at computing from a very different, largely self-taught, point of view, perhaps because the field was almost completely unexplored, however I had spent years working in engineering at UCLA on Internet design and theory among other departments; and while apparently I was hired over more than 100 others interviewed, perhaps because I had already invented, designed, tested and had timing data for the hidden-line and shading algorithm that the Evans and Sutherland Company was beginning to develop, and I described why the other approaches they were considering would be too slow or too difficult to implement in firmware; but perhaps I was considered as being atypical which is no doubt equated with incompetent by the more academically inclined, perhaps because I didn't use the same terms to describe DEC operating system internals, which are still irrelevant details, and I just speak in simple terms that anyone can follow with few to no acronyms, no matter what the topic would be; or perhaps because I have never seen any complicated concepts, unless they were unknown or misunderstood; in spite of the fact that those paid to teach make most ideas incomprehensible. Being hard working, dedicated and imaginative have always been considered negatives by any employer I have ever met; perhaps everybody knows that all the political and managerial positions are attained through political means (deception and greed), the newer hallmarks of American industry; and so there's little doubt that the lack of sincerity and consideration for each other should in fact result in the loss of entire industrial sectors to other countries. So after that job I went directly to the extraordinarily well endowed libraries at Stanford University, including a visit to Dr. Joshua Lederberg’s personal library to study various aspects of molecular cell biology. Strangely those who found massive wealth in computers stayed so close to their product engineering and marketing that there ultimately was little overview even in an engineering sense, and as a result they directed the massive wealth they acquired along an extremely narrow channel of possibilities that still significantly impedes any significant progress in the field, and may ultimately kill America’s influence in the future of software. Software firms like Microsoft, Adobe or Symantec are no doubt trying to produce a usable product, but don’t realize that they have massively inhibited any significant progress in software engineering; and it will now take perhaps over 200 years to get to any realization of the vision that was evident by 1966. These huge companies are wholly dedicated toward fulfilling a 1964 vision of what computing could be; and investments in these companies is strictly on a charitable basis to sustain the antiquated programming methods they mastered at enormous cost, perhaps into the 23rd century; if they can get away with it. If China or India want to overtake the United States in software they clearly can, the door is wide open; however the approach they take will have to be fundamentally different, and once established, the USA will loose all its software firms, because the strategy will not correspond to anything they understand here or perhaps could ever hope to overtake.
In any case I continued with my education throughout my lifetime in a multitude of fields, to understand how cities function, nano-biology, food production, wilderness and the restoration of nature, low impact architectures that are symbiotic, the loss of species and the end of humanity, the long-term preservation and analysis of DNA, and the creation of tools to recreate life after billions of extraordinarily desperate people trash the planet. What I eventually learned was ultimately vastly more useful than anything taught at any university anywhere, and so I am grateful for the potential that I can now offer, even if it is totally rejected. I only need to live long enough to do everything on my own, which is no doubt impossible; but since everything that’s needed by life is rejected as not profitable because it’s so new, what’s the choice? The alternative is the loss of life for most species and ultimately all the beneficial qualities of humanity. How could that ever be imagined as acceptable? Our species has an obligation to care for the planet and all its life forms, not to deceive or make each other ignorant for personal gain. But then how could one person salvage the extraordinary loss of life and nature? What are the elements of life that if lost will be lost forever, and if saved can recreate life better than we could have ever imagined? That’s today’s task, because if delayed it will be potentially impossible for the planet or humanity to recover. Creating brighter people might help; but a lack of knowledge or understanding or creativity or focused effort, or even a lack of tools can disable humanity’s potentials; perhaps because a few may see degradation and impoverishment as profitable for their industries; the French used the guillotine to resolve that managerial dilemma, perhaps without a great deal of consideration. Naturally I don’t know of any jobs or industries that are willing to encourage anyone to help address or solve the dilemmas of our time, unless it promotes someone’s addiction to conspicuous consumption; perhaps because humanity consists almost exclusively of intentionally ignorant, self-indulgent consumers who will only spend their money on even more neurotic consumption and destructive acts, and then condemn anyone who tries to be cooperative and save ourselves or nature from a process of self-destruction. So people with extraordinary resources typically not only accomplish nothing of long-term consequence but almost always inflict irreparable damages to nature and endangered species or redirect all the energy of human beings to focus on production and consumption, overwhelmingly as a substitute for life. All of which is made to appear benign through advertising, but perhaps couldn't be more catastrophic.
In the process of trying to understand something that cannot be grasped, we propose ideas and then test those ideas against further inquiry and research. A speculative theory is an effort to optimize research efforts that might otherwise be overwhelming or impossible. Of course flaky theories that do not account for all of the facts can result in needless research. Cybernetics as suggested here simply offers a rapid modeling tool that can help us see the results of countless theories and structural combinations that may help with our understanding of how life works or perhaps how we may develop a symbiotic relationship with nature. With the unknown, all we may have is some degree of speculation. Limiting our range of understanding through dogma or authoritarianism may acquire certainty but at the price of maintaining ignorance, waste and catastrophic results. Our society currently wastes at least 90% of its labor and resources, by taking only what is thought of as highly efficient and economically proven paths; however these overall strategies are rarely evaluated, nor the resulting damages and waste that is forced onto almost everyone’s life, as well as the threatening impact it has to the survival of life on earth, particularly our own. Being right and going against the forceful energy of billions of people would certainly be futile; particularly when all that’s being overlooked is life; our own and the life of nature. Creating a helpful solution is far easier than correcting a global disaster. However our long-term personal efforts and our research tools are simply useful in creating a better understanding that might actually work; along with helping many more participate in some effort. However among the vast number of possible paths perhaps only a few will lead to any benefit for life, while thousands of other paths that produce redundant or unnecessary products will all make money; still the choices we make in this matter are crucial to the continuity of life on earth.
James Watson and Francis Crick, 1953
I long ago learned to ignore opinions based on little to no understanding of anything. In 1998 I saw a notice on a bulletin board that James Watson was delivering a talk at UCLA, as I drove to UCLA I thought of a few questions that he might overlook, but in his talk about eugenics of the early 20th century particularly in Cold Springs Harbor New York, he had addressed all of the details I could think of. After the talk I found myself eating and standing near Dr. Watson who was not speaking with anyone, however still without any clue of a question in my mind and realizing I would certainly never see him again, then my inner voice said, tell him what you are doing; and I immediately mentioned my studies and asked his opinion about the.... [[ The text in this section is deleted (to appear in specialized biology web sites later). Since the decades of work that are typically required to create an innovative solutions to any significant human survival need have no realistic value; and since only marketing or distribution is valued; then obviously it would be more considerate not to introduce any innovative considerations, or at least delay any form of commercialization indefinitely; perhaps until someone can figure it out and market it on their own without any outside capitol investment, or not at all. The commercial misuse of often good ideas is how most global problems are created.]] (and to continue).... Later on I thought how could anyone ever need the affirmation of anyone who has little understanding or imagination, or worse has no helpful intentions.
Education: The educational system does not exist to promote the quality of human understanding. Students from kindergarten through university are with rare exceptions enduring a substantially oppressive experience to pass tests which lead to an often painfully or boring process of memorizing useless or trivial information; all at enormous costs, that is forced on the community as a mandatory burden (incidentally enforced at gun point), by a teacher's union that spends billions to finance television advertising to obtain hundreds of billions in extra funding to support what is for the most part a disaster that they push on children and also adults who themselves remain largely uneducated and addicted to any form of escape they can find in life. Most high school graduates have spent 12 years at best preparing to operate a cash register at some store with little to no knowledge of science or biology, nor nutrition, political mind control and deceptions that are all used against themselves. They could have learned vastly more by watching TV, listening to the radio, playing with the Internet and getting a few books, all at less than 1% the cost. If a retired university medical professor who did research and spent 40 years teaching advanced medical techniques wanted to help young people at a local high school with their understanding of the biological sciences, he or she would typically be seen as uncredentialed and incompetent to teach anything to young people; perhaps because they might actually offer a realistic understanding of some subject, which would be the threat to teachers and business. Eliminating the entire educational system from kindergarten through the university levels would be a realistic start at improving humanity's understanding and knowledge. Computers already provide lessons and vastly more knowledge than any school could ever hope to offer, in a vastly less oppressive and painful way. If most people never really liked school and learned practically nothing through their experience, then why would anyone perpetuate it? We could readily understand that the government is mandated by business to create mindless, obedient workers through the school systems; but how could people be duped into thinking that it's all for their benefit and then want to spend the rest of their lives paying for such senseless indoctrination that deprives their own children of a promising future, or even survival? Further how could professors who taught judges the legal principles that they used, in order to spend a lifetime bleeding people of all their money and resources in order to deny them justice, ever be in any way honored? I have spoken to a recently retired Los Angeles Superior Court judge who expressed the deepest regret for all the harm that he caused thousands of families by enforcing the laws and regulations of an extraordinarily corrupt legal system; however he was afraid to ever write about it for fear of retribution. And I am sure that at least 99% of the judges and attorneys have long ago convinced themselves that force and deceit are their birth rights; and have never regarded justice or a better life for humanity or nature as even vaguely relevant to their life's work. In every field we could name, with those rare individual exceptions, this is the inevitable result of an education system founded on deceit. If humanity is going to continue in any beneficial way, these destructive matters protected through education will have to be reconsidered. But of course this is all by design so that only 1 in 1000 can gather sufficient resources to consider the full spectrum of possibilities; and of course they never do, however such power is used to inhibit ideas creating delays that take several centuries, which affects everyone's efforts and ability to survive, and so any relevant considerations are always made available too late to be of any use.
Time: So what is the alternative to doing what we’re supposed to do, so that we could accomplish some of the tasks we would hope to see occur in our lifetime. Naturally there’s not enough time to do everything we’re expected, which is usually unbelievably time consuming, wasteful and costly; and then in our spare time accomplish all the appropriate things we care about. So many people believe that when they acquire a small fortune, or when they are very old, only then they will begin to do the right thing. The only problem is that 1) doing the right thing is then converted to marketing something useless for money, or selling art to keep attorneys and gangsters amused; and 2) the other problem is that almost everybody you know or are related to believes that you have no right to an independent thought processes, nor to quietly shift away from their addictions to personal consumption, or question the belief that all work which is not corporate slave labor is inherently worthless; and further that you will loose your marriage, family, house, car and career should you stray even a little bit too far from the consumers belief system; and of course it will all be your own fault for your own self-destruction if you do stray too far toward consciousness; not the attorneys who hunt you down with court orders, eviction notices or threats of prison for your personal efforts at trying to do the right thing. Being honest, considerate and doing helpful deeds will always make you public enemy number one; not some terrorist because in reality they stimulate new defense contracts for business leaders.
The alternative may be to initially avoid believing in any indoctrination process, which usually means having a massive amount of independent information to understand all the alternatives, and most importantly avoiding all the state regulated forms of legal entrapment like marriage or business partnerships, where one person does the work and the other does the entrapment backed-up by attorneys and police, intent on being destructive; and of course be very efficient with all expenditures of money and time; work long hours, drive an economical car and stay out of restaurants; exercise, take vitamins and study medicine for entertainment (actually the med library is much more exciting than almost any movie could ever hope to be). Obviously none of which excludes children, home, consideration for nature or relationships; it only excludes oppression and self-destructive addictions; which are apparently supposed to be the rewards for being oppressed.
(js, April 2005)
Many different kinds of mechanisms can be used to create complex emotional, logical or reasoning systems. But does an artificially aware system need to have a purpose? A simplistic electronic mechanism will have the purpose it is given and could be instantaneously replaced without any evolutionary history to be overcome or fundamental needs to be supported. However a living entity may consider sustaining its life, family, community and natural world as fundamental and consequently may focus its time, energy and resources toward being life supportive. Of course some creatures learn that self-interests alone may allow for the needless destruction of others, even family members, in order to gain all available resources, even if the resources are completely unnecessary. Laws are frequently written to protect such aggression and defend abusive behavior; as long as the conquest or violence is done in accordance with certain economic or political rules. What we have socially is a very contradictory set of reasoning principles, which allows for tremendous violence in certain circumstances even if the consequences are extremely detrimental. So we have a species that can manipulate language and reason but has contradictory purposes that are destructive at all levels of society and are regularly used against all life forms; often under the guise of economic or individual benefit, but usually having widespread disastrous economic results. However if people can’t understand their own life potential and a symbiotic reasoning process, then we live in a society that will have little chance of understanding very much or perhaps be able to design an artificial intelligence, or know what to do with intelligence if they had it. Human history is littered with the names of great teachers who had great wisdom, who were ultimately ignored or killed. We have a population that will put out vast amounts of money for computer games that teach nothing more than the fast killing of others or the total destruction of the earth. Intelligence may not be an abstract collection of clever algorithms that can play useless or destructive games. The designers of intelligent systems may themselves need some considerable understanding of life, evolution and our human potential; not just work on becoming technically clever. This may not be a task for a specialist, a functionally in-depth grasp of numerous scientific and craft disciplines may be a more appropriate preparation process. Unfortunately this educational process can easily take 80 years to just begin. We may need to live several centuries to be functionally competent human beings. Consequently the process may well begin with improving or own lives, understanding and abilities. Naturally there will be endless numbers of innovations that show promise but never develop or never integrate with our lives in some useful way, because too few people have the time, opportunity or understanding to fulfill the potentials that are available to them; and in addition tremendous energy is lost simply competing with others over comparatively trivial ideas that have gained some slight amount of market share, which tends to be the total definition of what ideas should be pursued. In order to obtain progress in the realm of intelligence or understanding many more life considerations need to come into focus than are addressed in the corporate or university setting, which may themselves be obsolete production and learning formulas; too cumbersome to allow for a broad based education that would allow for the innovation of life supportive solutions; or even provide the ability to recognize a solution when it is discovered or available. As a result tremendously helpful innovations may sit around for decades before being noticed, or perhaps be permanently ignored no matter how helpful or life supportive, because it doesn't correspond to the aggressive instincts of an investor or is offensive to an intentionally ignorant lawmaker who is being paid to make life more difficult and more costly, not better and easier; which incidentally is the social convention that has been sold to and was bought by the educated masses; who are willing to work a entire lifetime against their own interests and the interests of nature. There is little enough natural intelligence remaining, so how could such people create any kind of functional artificial intelligence? There is of course always hope for anyone who has daily exposed themselves to the intricate simplicity of the natural world, can follow the artificially convoluted processes of humanity, and can personally account for their own survival and evolutionary process. However I don’t see how anyone is going to pack a century of advanced education into four years of regurgitating confused data on exams.
It appears far too limiting to consider AI as an abstraction that will lead to some clever theory that will explain a great deal and will as a consequence be highly marketable, so that the inventors will make a vast fortune so that they can live like billionaire geniuses. AI needs much more imagination and vision to express itself through a great purpose that may only be fulfilled through such assistance. This was just as obvious in 1960 as it is now. I did not become incompetent with time; the more significant needs of life are simply extremely formidable, and after several decades of continuous research I can now integrate most of the details. Fortunately I can’t notice any difference in how my brain works over time, perhaps I've just collected more information in several areas that I felt were highly relevant. In 1989 I had a chance to briefly meet James Watson and I mentioned some biological research that I was working on. The idea really caught his attention and he thought it offered some very exciting prospects. This was perhaps the first time I mentioned any biological research ideas to anyone. Most people either have no interests in any kind of endeavor whatever, or are completely constrained by their jobs and have never allowed for any personal creativity or personal productivity in their lives; and so are actually incapable of discussing the relevance of ideas, and worse are usually completely incapable of cooperating in any kind of endeavor; so a conversation would probably lead nowhere, or may simply feed misunderstandings or worst of all lead to the misapplication of a new idea. We have huge examples of what appear to be extraordinarily inept dedications to vaguely relevant or completely counterproductive approaches to biological research by such groups as the Gates Foundation, and many others. Which only proves that somebody with a simple lab and a good idea can easily offer more long-term benefits than 20 inept billionaires and their myopic perspectives. We are living through a catastrophic moment in history where the critically needed scientific tools are available, but are rarely finding beneficial uses, because we are conditioned to hand out technical band-aides that will almost always expand the problem base, and rarely create any long-term evolutionary solutions, that free people from disease and disabilities, and create greater personal independence, abilities and creative incentives. Why would this be? But then why would someone get rich marketing poorly designed products, building cities by destroying nature, enforcing injustice, or promoting fear? Why would aggression and violence win, over consideration, understanding and personal responsibility? Because its faster than work, and pays little to no price for its destructive impacts. Which in effect defines the type of intelligence that is recognized, and so computers are usually dedicated to such competitive and limiting applications. A new reality is simply needs to created in spite of and because of all the existing obstacles. The essential question is which new vision is more relevant; the one that supports life and is completely dependant on our nurturing and understanding, or an idea about constructing a machine that can emerge at any time with few consequences worth considering. Of course leading a sufficiently productive will be a near impossibility without limiting abusive behavior, whether caused by social or commercial institutions, or by individuals; or without finding new ways of supporting considerate behavior, upon which the continuity of all beneficial biology, wilderness and endangered life forms are dependant. It is only life that is being lost in the race to commercialize the human mind and the earth. No doubt more money will be created as our dependency and human desperation is increased; which leads toward the permanent and irreversible impoverishment of life. Technology and our individual visions need not be dedicated to supporting such confining economic, political or business models, when we become more independent and efficient, and energize our more life supporting visions.
What difference could it make if you consider that it’s neurons, language, genes or complex gravitational fields that are fundamental to the creation of intelligence? My start point in the early sixties was concerned with the evolution of three-dimensional objects in time, which I found could encompass language of a multi-dimensional nature. In retrospect it’s obvious that if you start designing a system that simulates understanding too low a level, such as atoms, then you would have an insurmountable simulation task to create just one cell, then to create a brain, then perceptual capabilities, then the ability to interpret language and images, finally to be given a task which could be knowledgeably performed in a manner resembling intelligence, could take more high-speed computers than there are atoms in the universe. Starting at too low a level may give the appearance of being real fundamental scientific research, but may be a hopelessly difficult path that produces no results and does not serve a real need for intelligent systems that can assist us with the difficult tasks that are facing and life and survival on earth.
In order to make computers more readily useable and more rapidly responsive to our interests there has been a long history of developments and theories. The earliest trends moved from binary coding to assembly language to compiled languages, and continued toward two and potentially three dimensional flow-charting languages, as well as natural languages, visual and audio pattern recognition. Another approach looked at replicating neurological processes, which presented a huge jump for a system to arrive at anything resembling intelligence. However the start point to begin an artificial intelligence system is not fixed. We could start at an extremely low level by simulating atoms or molecules and hope to arrive at intelligence, but we would be creating immense computational burdens for no essential reason; or we could choose to simulate neurons, perhaps to verify some neurological theory, but we may still be accommodating a huge computational burden, that is not essential and which could defeat any progress in the field. Another alternative may be to simply write the rules for the problem to be solved in any common language, which is how virtually all computer problems have been solved. However that’s far too inflexible and labor intensive, as proven by the 100’s of thousands of specialized programmers who use this approach and spend years accomplishing very simple tasks, with resulting systems that are inefficient in terms of speed and resource requirements because of poor programming practices which are pervasive; but more significantly the systems that even millions of people have paid for and used for over a decade are still loaded with hundreds of obvious bugs that are never addressed by huge companies, significantly these systems can be readily made obsolete by relatively minor changes.
A high-level system design approach I utilized in the 1960’s implemented interconnectable process operators that functioned with and allowed the automated design of three-dimensional and acoustic objects in time with the flexibility of a natural language and three-dimensional system flow-chart visualization. This allowed complex processes to be rapidly combined to create systems in minutes or hours that may have otherwise taken years to create, and to quickly integrate rules for both human interactions as well as complex system module interactions. The intention was to describe or design systems at the level that we use to tell another person what we expect, as well as how we expect the system to interact and respond in any situation. This required that the system software would question our own human design process and clarify our inconsistencies and contradictions that it could reanalyze and present as a three-dimensional structure that we could quickly observe and reconsider, and redesign by making comments about the design. While there was never a claim that such a linguistically designed system would exceed our intelligence, however thousands or millions of well specified rules might act in a very competent way that can accomplish creative tasks that exceed our own imagination and engineering capabilities. So such machines can become very powerful assistants in any field with the ability to greatly extend our imaginations and engineering capabilities in ways that exceed our conscious understanding, since they can generate and analyze billions of complex designs, each of which exceeds our spatial and structural capabilities. When there is a way to simply and automatically assess a design objective, then genetic design systems can evolve and test vast numbers of approaches to any problem, or obtain interactive guidance to redirect its evolutionary path. As the systems we may need to design begin to exceed our understanding due to the inherit complexity of the life and events continuously occurring around us we may need more intelligent or even autonomous design systems that could be far more considerate of our own life and our evolutionary needs as well as offering protection for the natural world; something that an aggressive humanity seeking domination over others, for status, money or vengeance has proven itself to be overall self-destructive to our own interests.
Natural
Systems |
Digital
Systems |
1) Understanding and integration (4) | 1) Understanding and integration (1) |
2) Natural languages, images | 2) Artificial intelligence, natural languages (2) |
3) Thought, ideas, actions | 3) Complex processes design systems (3) |
4) Biological structure, brain and physiology | 4) Algorithms, compilers and programs |
5) Cellular biology | 5) Binary switches, hardware |
6) Molecules, lipids, proteins | 6) Molecules, metals, silica |
7) Atomic structure | 7) Atomic structure |
(js, June 2003)
So far I haven’t seen any basic computer technologies that weren't conceived and to some extent implemented by the nineteen-sixties; whether it’s global climate simulation, molecular modeling, the internet, interactive graphics, artificial intelligence, windows based operating systems, speech synthesis and recognition, and in my work cybernetic motion pictures and architectural systems. Over the decades there have been dramatic reductions in hardware costs and size, and most software tools have been enhanced with numerous features, however with far greater complexity for the user. In fact learning to use a ready-made system may take much longer, with far too many restrictions, than writing the code to accomplish a simple task. A reason for this difficulty may be the myopic vision of both the programmers and the corporate software managers; which is supported by a foundation of a very constricted vision of computer science and extremely primitive software tools that are very complex in nature with numerous syntaxes, each for very limited ranges of features and capabilities; that focus the programmers and management on hiring people who simply know how to use the esoteric features of a huge array of system languages and tools. Naturally this attracts people who thrive on complexity and escalate the complexity in their own work, with little to no documentation or program comments, in order to insure job security and ultimately to inhibit progress. The result is thousands of applications and system tools that take a great deal of time to learn, have extreme demands on computer hardware, massive numbers of hard drive access, perform unbelievably slowly, and worst of all are so full of bugs that no amount of money may remedy the problems. Programmers and users are both operating at well below 10% of their efficiency, even without redesigning the basic software tools; simply because the complexity being promoted by the managers and programmers. Such programmers might be more accurately termed tweaks; and of course tweaks will only hire, or in school give good grades to other tweaks, unless you could trick them into temporarily believing that you are a tweak based on some technical cleverness; naturally tweaks will punish or create extreme demands on anyone who is a non-tweak to quickly get rid of them, all of which is phenomenally damaging to the entire field of computer science, and keeps the field from progressing in any advanced way, in addition to being very frustrating to potentially billions of users. The result is that system designers want to be afraid of developing advanced high level system design tools, in part because system designers may have never explored such possibilities themselves, and so defend their half-century old perspective based on their ignorance, lack of vision and imagination. Perhaps bureaucracies perpetuate such mental stagnation in all fields, and institutions such as universities are already virtually obsolete; in retrospect I know that my research efforts at UCLA occurred in spite of extreme pressures and demands to thoughtlessly work for grades and money; and I am aware that other institutions may have been even more oppressive and far less helpful. Naturally I have always accepted the world just as it is; what would the alternative be? Nevertheless the need for improvement everywhere is extraordinary and needs to be brought to our consciousness to encourage change.
Highly advanced cybernetic systems have been needed during the past half century to allow designers to consider the broadest range of system possibilities, and intelligent interactions in three dimensional space and time that rival or even exceed our human capabilities in most any field or endeavor. Such systems will naturally dissolve the boundaries between all applications and eliminate the learning curve for the users, and minimize bugs through its structural association analysis. Without addressing the potential available through such a dramatic cybernetic evolution, progress in a vast number of areas will be interminably slow, costly and problematic. Of course it may take another half century to just get some of the bugs out of all the convoluted software that has been developed so far. It would be far cheaper to abandon the past and develop system design tools that would allow rewriting all software at least 100 times faster than is now feasible. Instead of waiting for some simplistic neurological theory to explain how we speak, think and work with mechanics, molecules, psychology, language, 3 dimensional images and time; we already have all the tools and understanding we need to create a unified system theory that can accommodate all our tasks, if we had the ambition, imagination and steadiness of mind to consider such purposes. After system 5 there were three additional systems developed between 1965 and 1971 to accommodate such goals, however the last system needed to be further generalized to address all algorithmic tasks with the same consistent syntax and level of system integration. What test would be adequate to demonstrate the functional capability of such a system? When we can communicate or talk to the system and ask for any class of algorithmic design from the lowest level and most concise, to the highest-level applications or purposes, or even a request that the system create other classes of system architectures, as well as simulations of those systems along with choosing its own test parameters based on inferences from previous responses. Naturally the system may enter into a dialog with the designer to resolve unspecified options, as well as to 3 dimensionally illustrate the current state of the system’s architecture with visual 3 dimensional flow chart and modular interactions. To such a high level model a learning system may be employed to help genetically evolve variations of the system’s design at a high level, without necessarily altering any of the low-level algorithms, that have been well proven and function efficiently. Such a system architecture may well exceed human design capabilities in numerous areas of any art, science, medical or engineering field, if only because these fields are very information intensive, analytic, intuitive and work intensive. What vision we have for our lives, nature, society and for our own biology is our problem or fortune, and it’s not something that will randomly resolve itself well without our care; and all the low level tasks we currently call work or creativity are barely worth anyone’s time or resources, and are fortunately entirely within the province of robots. Naturally all the arrogant technocrats interested in office politics, technical cleverness, money and personal consumption will typically have insufficient imagination, ambition and dedication to make much progress possible in designing such advanced system architectures; and of course humanity’s aggressors will steal any useful ideas from anyone and use attorneys and injustice to perpetuate their assault and financial gains. So all such advanced architectures may be best left to some future generation after this species has evolved very considerable. The creative designer may be creating a social dilemma that will probably offer no personal or social benefits by advancing any marketable technology, without first advancing the biology of our own degraded, oppressed, destructive and vengeful species. The evidence is blatant and global, and our benefits may come with considering and personally supporting the potential of humanity, and all of nature, on a very long-term and positive basis. The fullest consideration of any matter will help expand our horizons and encourage our longest-term potentials; which of course will be very much out-of-sync with a society driven by money, consumption and abuse. Only the ignorant and abusive will perpetuate the myth that conflict, competition and war are good for innovation, science and creativity; because conflict and injustice is their method confiscating the resources and labor of others. Any creative or scientific process offers sufficient obstacles to overwhelm our knowledge and insights; we do not need needless additional stress or victimization. Only abusive people need such challenges, who then inevitably and naturally waste trillions of dollars annually with their inept and destructive business decisions. They even have economic theorems that defend the unlimited destruction of investment capitol, so long as some aggressor personally wins eventually. That makes as much sense as hiring drunken school bus drivers, and hoping that one will get eventually through without a complete disaster.
Advanced solutions are not just microscopic studies of tiny details that can be readily compared to other tiny algorithmic details; which is no doubt important work on occasion; but in itself does not address the long-range potential of a system’s design. It’s wasteful to continuously demand technical solutions to complex problems that are poorly understood or inadequately developed; or to create complex simulations for solutions where the outcome is obvious or can be easily proven by personal consideration. Design strategy errors create system architectures that are extremely inefficient to evolve, and it’s usually best to completely abandon such systems, naturally salvaging all the well-proven modules. A new and well-considered architecture will allow considerable and rapid progress, until the new limits are encountered. I would typically maintain and evolve an old design well after recognizing its shortcomings, until additional discoveries suggested a considerably more advanced strategy, which generally occurred within a two-year cycle, with about 4000 to 7000 personal programming hours. Of course distributing those hours among several designers and programmers may have inflicted far greater costs, as well as greatly slowed the integration process; unless the participants have a very long-term commitment and a thorough understanding of all the issues and objectives involved. A purely technical programmer with detailed language skills may be of great help in accelerating the start-up process, but may have little knowledge of the architectural issues involved, and could greatly complicate the design process if allowed to accelerate and establish a design direction. Slower work, based on real in-depth understanding can arrive at a workable system far faster than a great deal of simply technical expertise, which can be very costly; and of course all of which has been sold to and pursued by virtually all software manufacturers. The solutions that are needed are rarely what already exists, but something which creates dramatic improvements on multiple levels, which may not be an architecturally obvious solution; and so the solutions needed may be based on a decade or more of continuous evolution in the minds of someone with a long-term and a detailed understanding, who also can provide imaginative solutions, without imposing unnecessary technical complexity, or reducing efficiency, speed or clarity of design. Technical expertise, although valuable, may have little to do with this large-scale high-level design effort or even the programming process. What is being pursued in the cybernetic design process, even the low-level algorithmic design process, in highly specialized instances, is a revelation, which is usually based on knowledge and struggle followed by a series of insights that are typically rarified and miraculous in nature. Naturally the corporate environment may depend on such insights but it usually despises the creative approach that offers the solutions needed, and always terminates the evolutionary process that creates improvement, reliability and speed. Except for a few well-documented algorithms, thousands of computer design discoveries are ignored and lost forever, particularly without a recognized web site for their documentation and preservation; which is a loss of human creativity and insight that could have enriched humanity and greatly accelerated progress. Very often the most elegant and the simplest algorithmic design is highly concise but inefficient, however it’s still very appealing to many well educated PhD programmers; but perhaps as much a 100 times slower than a peculiar design that is critically important to a project’s purpose and survival. Of course the overwhelming majority of programmers would not be able to recognize or evaluate such issues even when they claim they can and do. No doubt these are issues of spirit and deep personal consideration, extensive knowledge, experience, focus and intention; in addition to superficial technical competence, which is about the only item being watched for in universities and the software industry.
(js, May 2003)
At a university like anywhere else life is not uneventful you can find a few people willing to do damages for no apparent reason. I know of faculty members who destroyed the original materials of very costly student films, and so I avoided leaving any original materials with the film department, to the extent of making alternative prints that looked like A & B roll originals. One evening in 1964 I was invited to speak to the animation class about the computer animation techniques I was developing. I thought that sort of discussion had probably never been done before, and I was unsure how I would make the subject understandable; also being interested in Cinema Verite, I brought my portable Uher audio recorder to record my talk and a 16mm camera. However as I entered the room, without ever speaking to anyone, I was told to immediately get out of the room and never return, and that I had seriously insulted the professor; who was someone I had never met and never spoken to ever, nor did I speak to anyone else in the room or a part of the class; since I had just arrived and wasn't there more than about five seconds; when I was being grabbed and pushed out of the class room (d.m.); which I quickly mentioned was not at all necessary since I was interested in leaving such a hostile environment. And then I heard some mention of the recorder I was carrying as being the problem, which I found as a fairly surprising experience; so I tried to consider where the problem might be, since I was only interested in recording my own talk, in full view of a motion picture class, where such equipment was very common; in a department that prided itself on showing the latest documentary and Cinema Verite techniques. There's little doubt that I would do exactly the same thing today and record my talk. The following day the shit hit the fan; while completely depressed by this horrible reaction during the previous evening, someone told me that the head of the motion picture department wanted to see me. So I brought the same recorder and camera to his office. Now in a very hostile voice the department chairman (c.y.) told me how I had insulted the animation professor and greatly offended him. I guess it didn't matter that I never met, saw or ever spoke to the professor. Nevertheless I could say very little in his office as he described how he was getting ready to expel me from the university, which almost guaranteed any male student an AR-15 rifle and a trip to the Vietnam jungle, or several years in prison for refusing to murder the Vietnamese people. He then asked if that was a school camera or recorder; I said no. He then asked me to remove the film from the camera and then he unspooled the 100-foot roll in his office, and then asked for the tape from the recorder which I gave him; he then told me to get out of his office, and that he would decide my fate and expulsion. If I had thought the previous evening was depressing, this was vastly more disturbing. But I had always felt that my feelings were strictly my own responsibility, and that such intense negativity should never be allowed to guide anyone’s life; which of course didn't make anything feel any better. Later that afternoon I went to the editing rooms where Jim Morrison and a couple of others were talking and putting away their editing tools. Apparently the word had gotten around that I was in deep shit with the faculty and department chairman. Which in this context would be no dishonor in the slightest, since Jim was getting into trouble for his student film. Jim then asked what had happened, I said it was nothing, really nothing, and never mentioned anything about the extremely peculiar incident or anyone else. It was my belief that poison should not be spread. Decades later I see that such abusive incidents are repeated over and over throughout a lifetime, by people who wish to exercise authority over others by inflicting damages and maintaining their silence. I have learned that perhaps the only thing that one can do about such abuse is to avoid the abuser whenever possible, but since the incident only lasted a few seconds, decades later it's difficult to remember who caused the conflict, since it's not anything I would ever think about, and could confuse the identity of people I never met, and so attempting to avoid all such conflicts or people may be completely impossible, uncertain or harmful. So even when we try to avoid abusive personalities we can mistakenly exasperate a problem, even though the intention was intended to be benign; so perhaps a better approach would be more reserve, or the documentation of events may be helpful in reducing unintended effects. With a full class load in several sciences, doing engineering work for various professors, doing motion picture projects, trying to originate all the technical details of a cybernetic art, sleeping only four hours or less a night, and being hounded by the military, overall made the university experience unnecessarily abusive. Perhaps the university curriculum was really designed for the indifferent who are simply playing a game to get a better job on graduation. When most of the students left early in the afternoon; I left when the library closed late at night, and then went to my job’s office and continued working until 3 or 4 or 5 AM, then tried to get a few hours sleep until the morning, when the day time office workers came in at 7 or 8 AM. Dr. Mintz was very considerate and allowed me to rest in his Meteorology Department workspace. I always enjoyed work that offered some room for improvement, and I still appreciate a productive working day; now only with 7 hours sleep instead of 3 or 4. They say that at the end of one’s life no one wishes they had spent more time in the office. Apparently they haven’t had a particularly imaginative career or creative life; I of course wish I had no need for sleep and could work indefinitely in the office, or in a biology laboratory, or making motion pictures, restoring forests or caring for life in some particularly helpful way that would create change for the better. It seems that only abusers would not want to change a particularly oppressive or destructive society; and so they fit well into the conventional authoritarian scheme of things. Perhaps my doing computer animation on my own in the early 1960’s didn't fit in with some professor's view of how they would prefer to control the world or perhaps what projects should be allowed to exist. While I may not even understand such a domineering sentiment, I have noticed that such reactions to anything new occur repeatedly. Currently biologist are being threatened by president Bush if they wish to utilize stem cells to resolve major health issues; and many have had to leave the country to continue their research, as a result of such oppressive governmental controls. Unfortunately extremely few people have ever discovered any creative or useful potential for their lives, consequently they are blind to the struggles that most artists and scientists endure to create some progress, or the needless abuses that are inflicted by the authoritarian majority, who must be incredible mental failures. Given the frequency and pervasiveness of abusive personalities one might expect that nature injected abuse in our lives for some evolutionary purpose, such as the elimination of the hard working and considerate by the selfish and viscous. Well the result may be the same except that abusiveness may be simply learned in early childhood as a way of getting control of things and people with far less effort than personal responsibility or work. Of course most parents are unable to recognize or even imagine the beginnings of manipulation and abuse in a child, and consequently they may reward the behavior for many years before noticing that it's a problem that they desperately need to avoid.
During the 1960’s the Vietnam war raged on killing almost four million Vietnamese. As always the American population backed the violence, bloodshed and corporate war profits; thanks to a lifetime of media indoctrination, a school system that numbs the mind, and a war draft that threatens or forces young people into becoming killers. With a numb mind and over a decade of indoctrination, young people will kill on command; to others the draft became an issue that could result in imprisonment. So some went to college, or Canada to avoid the killing machine. Well I thought that being at a college with a full course load and passing grades that I could maintain a draft deferment. Well not after I received a draft induction letter. Of course I was determined not to kill innocent people because some abuser in authority gave a command. So I thought what could the alternative be without breaking the law and going to jail? After a short time I thought I would have to stop myself. I figured if I could control my mouth, which wasn't actually owned by the Department of War, I could reduce my energy level to something much less functional, and I could honestly attempt to be obedient but wouldn't be of much military use. When my draft physical exam was just over two weeks off, I stopped eating food all together and drank only water, without any vitamins or minerals; all of which I found easy to start, and then very easy to continue after three days without food. I also continued with all my tasks and noticed only a small decrease in energy; then a few days before the physical I noticed that I had plenty of energy; no doubt with proteins being robbed from mussels and calcium being robbed from bones. At this time, even if you were a medical student there was little to no information available regarding nutrition, fasting, vitamin or mineral depletion. A friend Danny Sabsay took me to visit a neighbor who was a biochemist, who knew something about oriental fasting and the loss of appetite, and he thought that doing this might appear to be anorexia nervosa. Well I knew I had a good appetite and would be delighted to eat at any time if the military wasn't after me. Nevertheless after almost two weeks of strict fasting my energy levels were still fairly good, so I felt I had to create a new approach to energy depletion, so I began running 10 miles a day; again with little effect; so the night before the induction examination, I literally ran all night over 50 miles, from UCLA to Santa Monica Beach, through Culver City then along Pico Boulevard to downtown Los Angeles then back to Westwood. Well I felt tired and exhausted when I got back to Meteorology at about 4 AM, but I still had energy, so I thought sleep deprivation might help, but before I could figure out how I could stay awake, I put my head on the large map table and immediately fell asleep. When I woke up 2 or 3 hours later I was extremely disappointed, since this rest caused my energy to rebound. I thought I could park 5 or more miles away from the induction center in downtown Los Angeles and run the last few miles, and did. When I finally walked into the induction center, I was given a mental exam which is taken only once and determines one’s options within the army, so I tried to do the best I could; the exam was quickly graded and the score was fairly low, much lower than I may have expected, given how easy it was compared to school exams. In any case I never did well on examinations, perhaps because I was naturally slower than most, and usually saw a number of interpretations to any question that the authors apparently missed. So it became apparent that nearly all of the hundreds of examinations that were given in school were no more than ways of measuring and rewarding conformity and a lack of understanding. The Army doctors were however surprised by the blood test results; I then discovered I couldn't fail the hearing test; and even though I could barely walk; so I passed the physical examination, later I had to explain to them that I was enrolled in school full-time, which they eventually accepted. It hadn't occurred to me until many years later that such starvation and strain could cause heart mussel and other physical damages, which may have significantly shortened the lives of those people who regularly used fasting for political protests. When the 1963 Orson Wells motion picture The Trial came out, a Franz Kafka story about a warped world without justice; only accusations, fear and punishment; I thought this is the exactly world I am required to live in. So I thought, what would the changes be that could create a more survivable community? I noticed that those on the political right or the left had almost identical personal interests, more people and more consumption; and both were only interested in promoting their own forms of aggression to win, and in making democracy some sort of a competitive sport that was nothing less than a game of mob rule; that those with media power could easily control; and so democracy became the cherished political idol that ultimately protects global abuse and violence for someone's profit, and prevents understanding or change. Trying to avoid becoming a war criminal persisted until I was 26, the draft age limit. During the past 40 years war veterans tried to show that they killed millions of Vietnamese with honor and that in turn they should be honored; even though the then head of the Department of Defense, Robert McNamara in his book "In Retrospect" and many others have admitted that the war was only a vicious mass murder that served no purpose whatsoever, something most students knew three decades earlier. Nevertheless the majority of Americans bought the “heroes fighting for freedom” story.
Looking for work in the movie industry is like trying to make money at a casino, not an effective approach to survival; there were always no openings of any kind available particularly for anyone new, and I knew that computer animation was decades away from being an accepted working tool, so I started by going to dozens of companies offering a design for a small precision desktop printer that could provide typesetting quality, utilizing the new microprocessor chip that was just developed at Fairchild Semiconductor and later available from Intel as their 4004 then 8008 chips. Even with precision graphic typography and simulations, no company was interested. Then one considerate CEO of a large computer manufacturing firm in Santa Monica, sat me down in his office and said, “your design has real potential and the technology is right, but when computer graphics becomes so low in cost as you are projecting, all such products will be made in Taiwan or somewhere in Southeast Asia, and we will be out of business and I will be retired.” Which is exactly what happened over the next two decades. I then realized that American business only wanted mindless obedient robots, certainly not new cost competitive high-tech products, and so I decided to take the first job to come along, which undoubtedly was a much easier way of life. I worked on algorithm design for the first super computer the ILLIAC 4 with John Warnock who later founded Adobe, then a laser canon wave-front analysis system, then the Grumman F-14 on the Phoenix air to air missile controls, precision high altitude bombing, heads-up and tactical information displays, then air-to-air missile targeting and detonation, and long-range cruise missile navigation; and of course saved whatever I could to buy all the computer hardware needed to build an animation system and in addition create a nature preserve. I did the best I could on each job, but discovered that really wasn't ever anything to be appreciated; in fact working an 80 hour week as requested, and getting the job done on time, with numerous improvements was never even understood; in fact it was typically resented, the survivors just talked about all the hard work they were accomplishing and left work early, and for me the jobs were soon over and I was struggling to find another. The engineering managers I usually met probably never had any functional concepts of algorithm design or efficiency ever in their entire life, and so had no clue of what I was actually doing. I offered to publish some of the algorithms for their company if they felt it was appropriate, since there were typically a number of innovations developed through my work; naturally they had no such interests and really preferred to fire me; perhaps because I didn't seem to share the same real estate value system and buy a suburban house like they did. It became obvious that any personality clues can be dangerous in the workplace, so I learned to be very discrete for survival purposes. There were just a few dedicated engineers at any company, who helped keep the designs functional; perhaps the most respect offered for hard work and careful engineering occurred when I met engineers from Japan. On one job I later learned that the engineering manager (c.s.) threw-out everything I wrote for their system, then had his favorite PhD computer scientist rewrite everything I developed, but it was noticed that their system performed many times slower with their rewritten algorithms. When I started the job I was told to look at the algorithm assembly code written by a highly respected Texas Instrument design engineer. After a couple of days, I was horrified by the highly inefficient algorithms and the large number of divides he used in TI’s custom chip, since such instructions were many times slower to execute than other operations such as a shift; and more significantly alternative algorithms that avoided the use of the divide or multiply were never considered. I obviously knew that I could write very concise code, which is expressed as a single short algorithm, which is fine if speed is not the issue; but when speed is critical and the algorithm has five distinct modes of operation and each mode can be greatly optimized through a specialized algorithm, then that’s the approach to consider. I was then advised to write assembly code for the maximum optimization. However I suggested that for code maintenance purposes the C language would be a safer choice, and that it could provide an equivalent degree of efficiency; and so I offered to take any time critical algorithm that could be written by their most experienced assembly programmer, who was a considerate and honest guy, and that I would write the C equivalent and we would openly examine the executable code from each approach. Then we counted the micro-cycles required to execute each algorithm loop in each version. To our surprise the C compiled version was actually tighter code, since it had an automatic process for the optimization of its registers. The assembly programmer mentioned that there was really no purpose in writing assembly code any longer, so we proceeded with the C environment, which gave me much more time to focus on the algorithm’s architecture instead of low level code optimization; which can greatly improve overall efficiency. Of course there are a number of specific C programming techniques that will allow for more highly optimized code generation than is typically. After everything I wrote was disposed of, replaced and then found to be very slow, their most creative engineer who actually was very capable and original, decided to compare the new version to my version on the back-up archive tapes. He later mentioned that a task which took my programs 1 second to perform, took a full minute with the new replacement programs; so he reinstalled the programs I developed. Given the general lack of engineering discipline or detailed understanding in the software field, I was no doubt never a welcome entity, and in fact never worked long enough anywhere to even obtain social security benefits; however that is the personal trade that may be required of anyone to be able to do advanced research in a variety of fields, that would never be supported by any company or government agency. In a personal, ecological or creative sense, in any case this has been the preferred path for me and I feel fortunate to have had the creative opportunities, that are in fact always available to everyone, which also offers the real potential for a beneficial personal evolutionary process. The far more constrained corporate life offers very little creative potential. It seems to put ones life on hold. Further I almost never see any beneficial life accomplishments from people with vast amounts of money, they are generally invested in corporate strategies that are perpetuating or expanding the problems that cause devastation to nature and humanity. The expensive things that people purchase rarely have any unique benefits even for the purchaser; they are usually just symbols of conspicuous consumption. Clever or capable people are usually taught to win and get ahead of others with few or no children; while the most desperate are driven to overwhelm the earth and consume all its resources; the results are a human tragedy that can leave humanity and the earth in permanently depleted and in ruins. I have been trying to find as many essential and effective solutions to our human survival and care of the earth as is possible, in spite of the aggression and abuse that is pervasive and which wastes our lives for someone else’s growth in personal wealth or destructive power. It is commonly said that there is not sufficient money to care for the earth or offer people creative jobs. Well that's never true. If there were no money whatsoever and everyone were unemployed, all those unemployed people don't need a boss to make them work, they could just start planting the seeds for the forests that have been destroyed by their cherished corporations, grow their own organic food, build small solar homes, and research biology to improve our health. Most people have far more than enough money and time to accomplish these tasks, but never do, because they wouldn't be paid for such useful work, so many 100's of millions of people remain unemployed world wide, in spite of the desperate need for their labor. Personal creativity and real efficiency is not an appealing image to the abusive personality, whether they are wealthy or desperately poor. No doubt abusers have their life to live and will never change, and they can certainly associate just with other abusers to show off their big homes, big trucks and other power symbols; unfortunately they are infected with a need to gain power over others and will design laws or abusive strategies to control or devastate their victims, then use the media to portray themselves as the benefactors of humanity. Such common strategies ultimately guide people’s minds, control the corporate work environment and create the products that are sold; while ultimately offering almost nothing worth buying and representing an obsolete approach to life, and creating human needs that can never be fulfilled in any such way. Consequently a new path for our lives based on much greater understanding is essential, and this may only come from our own personal growth, knowledge and hard work; all of which incidentally is very enjoyable and life supportive, and certainly much more encouraging than the shallow commercial rewards that big business has been promoting as the only functional economic vision.
(js, May 2003)
Jim Morrison
The Rock Legacy
During the 1960’s there was the inescapable impression that there was a social transformation in process, which was significantly affecting the lives of the young and changing our history; which greatly upset the older generation, particularly the domineering industrialists who control many aspects of society for their profits and their paid for and owned politicians. Perhaps this conflict in life perspectives resulted in a very serious conflict that ended the lives of many musical poets who had something to say, and ended the new personal vision of the artists and ultimately ended the life of a new generation; but the emptied remains of the rock, or punk or rap sound continued for decades, perhaps primarily just to enrich recording industry executives and entertain a mass audience. The overwhelming majority of the previous older generation undoubtedly saw human domination, needless warfare and economic subservience as all being undermined; but couldn't describe how the authoritarianism they clung to was beneficial or life supportive; but could only strike out at change; which had tragic consequences. But what revolutionary message was actually being conveyed in the music of the 1960’s and what was the lasting effect; because in some ways it was the beginning of another mindless transformation that continues through today with dramatic consequences; not something at all desired by the conscious artists, however most of what was occurring wasn't understood by the artists either. Any form of in depth understanding no doubt would be considered too intellectual and too out of touch with the audience. Instead of trying to guess about the consciousness of the time, I'll just recall conversations from the time, since I brought up all these issues during the 1960’s, which were then and for the most part still interpreted as psychological issues, which dramatically limited perceptions, understanding and actions.
During an anti-Vietnam War peace march about 1966, I would ask, "what about the 50,000 people who died in cars each year in the US, apparently for no good purpose?", which was about a 20 times greater than death rate of the Vietnam war. Automotive deaths were defended as irrelevant, or a necessary part of transportation, perhaps taking away from the anti-war focus, and so not worth considering. When I described how birth control pills, no matter how convenient and perhaps sexually liberating, were in fact almost completely eliminating the next generation, the responses were: that’s good, who cares, and if the new migrants do take over the country that will make it more mellow. Any transformation of life and survival in America couldn't even be imagined, even though it was blatantly occurring in front of everyone's eyes. No doubt a great deal of the sense of social consciousness and the direction was coming from the rock artists; but the social messages were not particularly complete, certainly not very conscious in spite of many people talking about their trips to gurus in India, nor was it a vision that was remotely considerate of life. The 1960’s domestic revolution was ultimately vastly more lethal than the Vietnam war, perhaps costing well over 100,000,000 lives in the US and at least as many world wide. It was myopic in its consciousness and lethal in its effect, and it became the emotional and subconscious basis of a self-imposed genocide; and in this regard promoted by the billionaire industrialist and the most advanced rock artists of the time, through today, who ultimately saw eye to eye although they consider themselves polar opposites. They each were focused on the elimination of the overly educated and anti-authoritarian Euro american population, all to be replaced by what was expected, by America's billionaires, to be a far more subservient, economically desperate and perhaps harder working migrant population (which was actually an unknown issue); and so population replacement was accomplished by simply and discretely opening the southern border; while letting a commercialized pop-culture industry act as propaganda for a new birth control industry that blatantly devastated the American population. None of this was unconscious; the immigration laws were specifically rewritten and ignored, and a genocidal pop culture was institutionalized by 1965, along with the pharmaceutical distribution of billions of birth control pills, which were quickly overtaken by mass sterilization as the primary means of eliminating pregnancy and destroying an entire population and a culture. America began and continues with the largest genocide and population extermination program in world history and as a result of media control, most people still aren't even aware of it; and the artists were no doubt oblivious of their participation and complicity or their responsibility. None of this escaped the attention of the more desperate migrant populations. They didn't need a television program to explain to them that the border was wide open and an entire continent was ready for their occupation and conquest; they marveled at America's intentional self destruction, all while the ignorant people of America just watched their TV's like sheep, while tens of millions illegal aliens mowed their lawns, worked in restaurants and replaced their children in thousands of elementary and high schools. Rock and roll presided over the death of America, it was the music that people took their drugs to and killed their babies with. About 1964 Felix Venable a friend of Jim Morrison’s at UCLA mentioned to me after class on our way to Venice, that “it was the baby killer pill that liberated women and made the sexual revolution possible”. He was the early prototype hippie, and it was obvious that he grasped the impact of what he termed "the baby killer pill"; it was just that he saw life primarily as a matter of self-gratification, and as I eventually noticed so did most young women, who were told to avoid pregnancy at all cost their entire lives, by their parents, church, school, employers, a continuous drone of vindictive black racial guilt that poured out of television and radio since 1968, and very significantly their own rock and roll music. Life, children and continuity were considered as inevitable and completely irrelevant by most young people; not necessarily involving their participation, responsibility or work. Further the adults of the older generation may have deeply resented any form of change even if it was in some cases beneficial, and overall had no clue of the implications of the life changes and genocide that was in full effect. The culture was being brainwashed, both by television and by rock and roll; with television pushing hyper-consumerism and rock music pushing personal liberation particularly from personal and family concerns or responsibilities. The musical poets and the TV commercials were essentially promoting the same self-gratification messages, and so ultimately it was completely acceptable to the billionaires who ran the world toward annihilation exclusively for their own massive world wide profits, as well as to the young people who were glad to sterilize and exterminate themselves for the sense of personal liberation it offered. Some statistics have shown that very few had ever regretted their childlessness or sterilizations, and that the experience of liberation from responsibility was an overwhelmingly positive one. However the impact on life and human evolution is a very different and tragic loss of the best and the brightest regardless of cultural background or ethnicity. However the biologic solutions that later began to emerge, that could possibly help in some small way to divert this human tragedy were labeled by the mass media as 'Frankenstein science' that should be banned world wide, and this is from the same people that are supposedly pro-life with family values. So by eliminating the development of techniques that could help women in their 30's have children; then a very significant way to save the lives of and resolve infertility for hard-working and educated women was eliminated; by the religious and politically fanatics who always seemed to pursue some of the most extreme anti-life positions possible, in the name of life. As a result we are witnessing a country’s future and potential coming to an end; and if we cared perhaps we would be considering ways to protect and restore what little remains of the life and nature. Unfortunately extremely few individuals are even remotely concerned about such matters, particularly including the quality and continuity of human life, or the survival of the natural world; perhaps because we have not been psychologically programmed to allow for such considerations, or perhaps because we wouldn't become paid employees to do any significant life protection or restoration work; while we could of course be paid to be destructive, while continuing with useless or oppressive jobs. But then without our willingness to personally acquire knowledge of biology we might not know where to begin, or perhaps even be remotely competent in any way that could be of help. If we can not ultimately resolve these essential life issues, we will no doubt exacerbate our life problems and move into a more aggressive, desperate and dangerous future, that will certainly not be resolved by wishful thinking, nor any form of subservience to some political, corporate or financial theory.
The artists of the 60's certainly recognized that our world culture is substantial founded on economic aggression, injustice and violence. When one type of aggression is prohibited, perhaps after centuries of extreme damages, it is immediately replaced by another type of abuse that few are ever aware of; and so takes another generation by surprise. Since the introduction of agriculture, aggression and violence has been a continuous process, and before that our human predecessors have undoubtedly exterminated our own and other related human species, perhaps in the same way that humanity has dominated and extinguished some of the most valuable human qualities that are increasingly rare today, in order to expand abuse, aggression and personal gain. Consciousness has never been allowed to evolve sufficiently to resolve the biological pressures behind the perpetuation of conflict. Religions, governments, universities, nor families have provided anyone with the information or the understanding needed to comprehend or resolve human conflict. Perhaps unintentionally, by the mid 1960’s the media offered enough information and video about the Vietnam war that young students could see through the deceptions of big business, government and their own indoctrination process, and as a result most decided to oppose the war, and developed a real skepticism about all the media indoctrination. The artists of course saw an opening for a music that was revolutionary in nature, perhaps only in terms of a personal psychological process of liberation, and occasionally in a political sense. However at the same time human aggression directed by business and government shifted onto two new fronts that both the artist and the audience refused to understand, perhaps because the new events conflicted with a lifetime of education and commercial media indoctrination. During the 60’s the young were thinking about and resisting the old form of battle, the Vietnam War and their own psychological liberation; while a far larger genocidal war was engulfing them and extinguishing their lives.
Birth control that was both completely effective and permanent was being sold to America’s youth on a massive scale, and consequently had a lethal impact on an entire generation, which was historically unprecedented; consequently it occurred as a surprise which had the intended impact of being genocidal in nature; since it was purposeful, lethal and specifically targeting a specific group of young Americans; because they had emerged with a personal consciousness which was interpreted as conflicting with the older industrial mass production and mass consumption purposes. Since such a massive depletion of the U.S. population could have disastrous consequences for business, housing production and retail sales, and would eventually leave America’s cities substantially unoccupied; at the same time during the mid 1960’s immigration control along the borders and inside American industries were fully relaxed so that 10’s of millions of the most desperate could flow to the U.S. as the replacement population for America’s youth. The promotion of a multi-lingual society also insured another form of social and cultural division, that could prevent any future questioning of authority or any war, as had begun in the 1960’s. During the following four decades the artists had a very limited influence on human consciousness and consequently a negligible effect on any national or life interests. Music was quickly being marketed and managed exclusively for business purposes. Even during the 1960’s the artists had a very limited understanding of the social transformations that were taking place around themselves and continuing through today. The issues of political control and the contrasting psychological alternatives were of course well understood and reflected in the music and a few movies. The newer biological transformation introduced through birth control and sterilization, as well as massive undocumented immigration, was thought of as a liberating trend, and consequently actively encouraged or supported by the artists. The artists’ understanding was completely inadequate to address the issues of genocide and population transformation, as it was actually happening. Understanding is a process that usually takes decades or generations to accomplish, and so the artists of the 1960’s were completely incapable of considering or even noticing the most dramatic transformations that had occurred in human history; even though they were themselves a very significant part of the event, and helping direct the thought processes of their mass audience. The continuous process of aggression of big business and government which originated and promoted both the most significant genocidal destruction of human beings in world history, as well as the most massive population replacement in history, had completely escaped the notice of its actual victims; although other aggressive and resentful interest groups intentionally exasperated the process; since the most aggressive were able to accelerate and take advantage of the precipitous decline in the American population. Conquest through repetitive media propaganda was driven by promoting blame and guilt for crimes that perhaps no one alive may have even consider committing, with the obvious intention of accelerating the process of condemnation and annihilation. The media owners were complicit and essential to the propaganda process, and made their television and radio time available to hammer a continent into lethargy, depression and guilt, for acts that they never committed nor even agreed with. A group of propagandists that were dozens of times more violent were publicly allowed to blame young people for crimes they never caused; literally 10’s of thousands of times over four decades, until the lies became unquestionable socially accepted truths. The basic social weapons of blame and guilt were hammered into the minds of America’s youth to justify their genocide.
The writers and musicians of the 1960’s and the decades that followed were educated in and focused on the psychology of their society, and never attended to the life and survival needs of their audience. The definition of being socially considerate, even for Mother Theresa, was helping only the poor, desperate and very often the aggressive; who usually created little or nothing of value for anyone including themselves, but have unlimited and expanding needs. All of which undermines the well-being and survival of humanity. Which is not to say that desperate people should not be helped with absolutely everything they need; certainly everyone who needs help should be helped; but far more significantly, human evolution and survival is much more dependant on the survival of the positive qualities of life that are ignored and eliminated from life, by sexual assault, murder, career burdens and taxation, to pay for the breeding of the more desperate families that demand the right to overpopulate and conquer others. The aggressive and vicious do not need to be rewarded with the conquest of the earth; and the considerate and capable do not need to be exterminated with a vengeance because they are not abusive or disabled. Governments do not have a God given right to selectively breed the most aggressive and desperate, while exterminating the most capable human beings because the capable are harder to indoctrinate and control, while the most desperate and aggressive are easier to manage through public indoctrination, mind deadening jobs and prisons. However with a population indoctrinated by thousands of hours of media; consumption becomes a much bigger issue than survival or children. Perhaps since the artists were also indoctrinated in a similar way, they were unable to even notice the survival issues involved, and naturally would greatly resent having to consider some new personal issues no matter how significant; so the artists undoubtedly found it easier to tag along with the commercial media’s vision of reality without not disturbing their audience’s preprogrammed views; even if it meant self-destruction. Which of course wouldn't even be a noticeable issue when compared to personal significance of a popular artist's income, investments, record sales, relationships, cars, travel and personal entertainment. Perhaps the one thing most industrialized people have in common is wasting or consuming life and in consequence destroying their own future. Whether anyone is on the political left or right, wealthy or poor, educated or not; and the artists were almost never an exception to this issue. So the messages evolved by the artists of the 1960’s and the decades that followed were perfect for marketing purposes. Perhaps music and the arts found their highest purpose in just offering some relief from the commercial media, without ever addressing any needs of life, humanity or nature; consequently the music rarely suggested any form of life awareness or change, or any vision which had any lasting significance. As a result, Art becomes not much more than a dated fashion statement. The artists could either not grasp the life and death issues that were affecting literally everyone, or perhaps they were never in a position to care about very much beyond their product and marketing success. Obviously it's extraordinary what artists have been able to create in their often short lives, typically with little or no support and perhaps hectic careers, surrounded by destructive legal, economic and political events, which are often directed at ending their visions and personal success. It's simply my suggestion that our vision needs to expand into greater relevance, to support and extend the positive evolution of humanity and help restore what remains of the natural world.
(js, May 2003)
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WatsonUCLA: I long ago learned to ignore opinions based on little to no understanding of anything. In 1998 I saw a notice on a bulletin board that James Watson was delivering a talk at UCLA, as I drove to UCLA I thought of a few questions that he might overlook, but in his talk about eugenics of the early 20th century particularly in Cold Springs Harbor New York, he had addressed all of the details I could think of. After the talk I found myself eating and standing near Dr. Watson who was not speaking with anyone, however still without any clue of a question in my mind and realizing I would certainly never see him again, then my inner voice said, tell him what you are doing; and I immediately mentioned my studies and asked his opinion about the long-term freeze-dry preservation of DNA to protect, sequence and catalog the biologic traits of endangered species. I'm sure the question came out misarranged; however I didn't want to mention human genes or genome preservation in case that was too sensitive a topic to be consider. But on hearing my comments he became very interested in the idea and immediately encouraged my efforts to preserve humanity’s genes including the Bushmen people of South Africa’s Kalahari desert, who carry some of the most ancient of humanity’s ancestral genes. He described how many thousand generations we and even the African people are separated from these people; and naturally I followed up with research on all the issues he mentioned, and saw how many centuries we could spend attempting to understand and care for our own human legacy; which could vanish forever even before we have even had the time to care for and study our own nature. Later on I thought how could anyone ever need the affirmation of anyone who has little understanding or imagination, or worse has no helpful intentions.