Back at client site work. I heard that while I was home in AZ I missed out on a flu that passed through the workplace. It makes me wonder how fast these diseases spread across the nation, and whether the east-coast flu is a different strain from the west-coast flu, and whether or not it is the same way in other large blocks of populated land in the world which experience less travel.

This week my end-client PM has seemed happy to see our progress (albeit stressed about the deadlines). Also, the end client PM has been taking an increasingly active role in understanding the details about our progress, which is not an easy task for such a complex design. That person is a good PM.

Early this week I was thinking about the nation state, and its value. I wanted to summarize my thoughts, but the summary has taken a few days to put together because I've been researching about these ideas as I go, and I keep having to rethink my conclusions. The observations and suggestions here, I realize, come from an approach to world politics which worldly people may think is naive... but I've read a few books on this subject, and I've taken time to empathize with a few different perspectives incompatible with my own or with each other (and I still disagree, though I less see the proprietors of those views as silly).

To be clear, I do not argue as some do that nation states are a new concept. Nor do I argue that they only serve to progress the motives of some malevolent party. I think that the modern world is technically capable of organizing itself in a way other than by nation states, maintaining the benefits of the nation state but overcoming its inherent disadvantages. This capability, I think, is a novelty afforded by modern technology and by the increasing wealth of historical insights we now have into the successes and failures of governments past. The change in perspective necessary to imagine such a world is so radical that I myself find it difficult not to revert to my normal way of thinking as I attempt to articulate my thoughts.

I. To start off, I'll give my estimation of the purpose which national distinctions serve.

A. They isolate economies, which enables large quantities of wealth to be generated with integrity in spite of widespread and not-immediately-curable poverty or corruption in other parts of the world, which would otherwise affect the value of a ubiquitous currency.
B. They serve to establish conventional boundaries so that a people group can expect to be taxed, penalized, and protected by a specific code of governmental law, as established by the local populace, and none other.
C. The conventional boundaries also allow for neighboring people groups to agree to defend one another, or to cease fire with one another, on readily identifiable terms, despite the fact that they are under separate legal systems.
D. They segregate and protect cultural practices

In short: They satisfy (and enable) the political self-consciousness of an ethnic or ideological community which exercises control over a physical territory.

II. Now, I attempt to identify a few issues with the modern conception of a nation state, with the U.S.A as my frame of reference. There are other issues, but these are the ones which interest me.

A. The persistence of the government is widely believed to be dependent on the support of the entire people group (and, in its current form in the U.S., this is so). However, the government is only capable of representing a subset of the people, and so the other subset is by necessity subjected to laws which it believes are unjust. The execution of unjust law on an unwilling people is tyranny. The out-of-power party is not always unwilling, but I think that it's safe to say that it complies either for fear of penalty (duress), or for hope that their party will come to power and resolve the issue. There's eventually a tipping point where the injustice is viewed as so egregious that the penalty no longer functions to incentivize compliance, or the ruling party established such perceiveably unjust laws in such a way that they cannot be overturned by any legal or reasonable means. (This is not the case with Obama care specifically, because the law can be easily repealed if only the right wing would agree on a strategy. However, the legislative process in the U.S. increasingly exemplifies the issue).
B. The nation state ultimately defines a people group by the land where they live, which (I submit) is not a relevant measurement of the cultural or ideological identity of a population. As a result, the ideals (especially political) of any specific ideological group are never truly tested in full, and so all parties are necessarily unsatisfied, and the merits of a party's proposed system can never be discovered in truth. (This is similar to my objection to the university's pretense in attempt to present neutral information, but it is an unrelated topic).
C. The nation state sees any loss of land as a national loss affecting all parties in the nation, but especially threatening the survival of the government thereof. Because of "A", this is often a valid fear. Thus national borders are inflexible, which, when innovative ideologies take hold of the population of some area of land causing them to desire independence (see also "A"), the resolution seems to commonly require a civil war. (For the record, I know I said that the U.S. was my frame of reference, and so I want to say that I do not agree with the ideals of the confederate south as I understand them, or the north necessarily for that matter.)

In short: After the establishment of the nation state by a people group, the people group may move or change, and the land controlled by that ideological community may change, but the nation remains associated with the physical location rather than the people or representative ideological community which established it.

III. Now, I'll present an alternative system.

........I wrote and rewrote this section several (5+) times over the past few days. Some of my ideas were very long, some short. A few times I ended up just describing the world map, or the United States, because I was trying to establish a system where any group could identify as a state and govern themselves according to their own preferences. The issue with that is that it's basically establishing nations again. And, no matter what system I describe, it is likely that the whole world will not agree to it at once, and so its people will be identified by the land they occupy, and its neighbors will regard its physical boundaries with respect to their own borders.

So I finally resolved that the truest expression of my idea is a state where any part of it may choose to leave without consequence, and any part of a foreign nation, bordering or not, may choose to join and abide by the nature of the new state without question. Now, considering this carefully, I realized that what I had just described was a religion. In the first millennia, Christians around the world claimed Christ as king and were executed in large numbers for following Biblical law in priority over local law. Even today, the Christian conscience is penalized in places which do not allow public reading of scripture, and "hate speech" legislation, wherein "hate" is defined by people with self identity issues so deep that they reject the physical reality of their own bodies and sue others who openly disagree with them about their arbitrary self identification, poses a similar threat in America.

In the end, what I present is ultimately what I believe. Furthermore, borders are inescapable because property ownership is natural and Biblical. Physical property (including land, clothing, our bodies, and the food in your mouth) has physical borders around it; it takes a fixed space in the cosmos. What I propose is that we, Christians, preach the gospel of repentance and belief in Jesus, that we live according to our Christian convictions, and that we do not incorporate nationality, race, or culture into our identity in any way which would segregate us.

Here's my understanding of the Biblical judicial system prior to Israel's rejection of God as king by the establishment of the monarchy:

In any given community of at most 10 adult individuals, let a judge be established according to whoever they respect, and let the community resolve their disputes in accordance with the determinations made by that judge. Let the judges only resolve disputes when they are called upon to do so, and if the victim drops charges then let the judge honor the victim by foregoing penalty on the perpetrator. Let the judges be limited in their penal determinations by a *short* (as in, fits on your bookshelf) written code given by a higher authority (and since all men are equal, no man or group of men can be regarded as a higher authority above the judges. So, the code must be issued by God Himself, that is, the Bible). In any community with at most 10 judges, let a higher judge be elected according to who the judges themselves respect. For each tier of judges, if there is at most 10, then let a higher judge be elected for the ten. So, in a community with 10,000 people, there will be 1000 tier 1 judges, 100 tier 2 judges, 10 tier 3 judges, and perhaps 1 tier 4 judge. The function of the higher judges is to resolve disputes among judges, to receive appeals from individuals in lower court at their own discretion, and to take on cases which a lower judge feels that he cannot determine because it is too difficult. When a judge is called upon and makes a determination, and the determination is not appealed, and the determination contravenes no clear teaching in the written law, the community must accept and respect it. If the nation is threatened by some external army, let the defending army be composed only of volunteers who join in that moment to love their neighbor by defending his or her property, and let them trust God to do what is right in the battle, so they must only enter battle for causes which are righteous and worthy of God's favor.

So, to conclude, basically I'm advocating the Biblical government prior to the instantiation of the Israeli monarchy, and even if I'm wrong about the details, I will advocate the correct details when I am corrected. The issue with this proposition is that such a government can only prosper with God's blessing, because it's easy to take advantage of it by ignoring the moral indictments in scripture, for which there are no civil penalties, and so the whole populace must trust God to protect their freedoms. So prior to any truly free and good system being established, all people must repent of their idols and believe the Gospel.

"Good night"

Still just a little bit sick, but I think I'll be better by the time I need to make my next business trip.

Today we ate at GEN, the Korean BBQ restaurant. It was pretty good, but I ate too much and didn't enjoy the aftermath.

As I was writing, a couple of Mormons just showed up at my door. I asked them a couple of questions, but I suck at finding times that seem appropriate to talk about things like why they're wrong, so I didn't share the truth with them. The way those guys go door to door puts real Christians to shame. I took their pamphlets and swapped contact info. I bet I can expect intermittent phone calls for the next couple of ages.

I thought a little today about what the consequences of limiting the AI's memory to a fixed format and size would be, and I realized that it means that I'll have to preprogram most behaviors. That's contrary to my initial vision, but I'm realizing that if I want to have an AI that really processes sensory data in a way that's productive, then I'm going to need a LOT of memory and some very robust processing algorithms to make that kind of learning valuable.

However, I think that with some careful thinking I can come up with a limited environment, with a set of rules, such that small memories are valuable and trees of logically dependent information are very small, so that jumps from premise to conclusion don't take an unreasonably large number of steps, and the information available to be weighed in any decision isn't too overwhelming. Then, if I'm careful, these small steps can be extrapolated into larger systems later.

Anyway, I need to go get some sparkling cider for Thanksgiving. If I don't get to it tomorrow, Happy Thanksgiving all!

"Just let the spirit guide you."

Me and Chowon are sick today. We're doing whatever seems best to minimize this so that we can get past it before Thanksgiving, but she is still going to work.

As I was considering the base learning algorithms necessary to produce a working AI, I realized that in order for such an AI to perceive that others are the same type as itself, (assuming I have algorithms in place for such a detection), it has to perceive itself. Also, I can't give it full information about itself or about others; it should be able to deduce that others are like itself by sensing whatever qualities I make available and making a comparison. At first, this seemed overwhelming to me, because of all the detailed sensory information necessary for someone to first identify their own parts and also make a comparison between those parts and the parts of another in order to determine that they are the same kind, and all this without even being able to see the backside of my own body. However, I'm thinking that if I come up with a simplified set of external qualities for any such artificial entity to have available to sense perception, and then make all external qualities always available to self and  other entities in "proximity" then such a comparison might be within reach.

I do not have the resources (neither the stuff nor the time) to give my AI an infinite capacity to learn, so I will have to allocate a certain amount of space (like a fixed-size array or linked list) for memories. I think I'm going to start working on an object to contain everything related to an individual memory, and then, until further notice, start my work with a three stage model for memory storage:

1. Immediate memories will persist for a certain number of actions, unless they are refreshed by one of those actions. Every time an immediate memory is refreshed without expiring, its timeout will increase exponentially.
2. An immediate memory whose timeout reaches a certain number, or which has a high enough emotional score, will become a day memory, available to scan for immediate access at any given time for the rest of the day. There are two storage locations for day memories; one for today and one for yesterday. When today's day memory bank becomes full, the entity will require sleep. Yesterday memories will have a number associated with them, telling how many consecutive days this memory has been put into day memory.
3. During sleep, today's day memories will be compared with yesterdays; anything which is repeated often enough, or which has a very high emotional score will be passed into long-term memory. Long term memories include information about frequency of access and most recent access, and will be sorted by those numbers. If frequency gets too low, or last access to old, then the memory will be purged when long-term gets full. Long term memory will be blocked into multiple sections (which I haven't really nailed down yet, but I currently am thinking about the following): muscle memory for actions and expected reactions, emotional memory to affect "moral" calculations, interpersonal memory to affect things like trust, mundane memory for things like the running priority list and the properties of objects for use in problem solving, and maybe some others as necessary.

Lastly, I'm currently thinking that I will comprise each entity of two parts: the body, which handles senses, status information, and contains all memories, and the spirit, which will interact with the body to make decisions. This way I can treat the spirit as if its receiving sensory information about an external entity (the body), and then have it receive the same information about other external entities, and effectively treat them both as external to itself, hopefully making it easier for me to conceive of a way to simulate something similar to empathy. This distinction will also make it easier for me to make changes to the decision making process by keeping that logically separate from the body itself. This doesn't actually  fit the Biblical model, which splits us into three parts (mind, body, spirit), but I haven't worked out a way to make that separation useful at the relatively low level of complexity I'll be dealing with. Besides that, if I'm honest, I don't fully understand the nature or capabilities of my spirit, and as a Christian I'm not 100% sure that I'm even allowed to experiment in order to find out. (This is a great irony, I think, that Christians, who are given as a gift the best and most direct access to the spiritual realm are restricted in the ways by which they are allowed to utilize that access)...... in fact, maybe the separation I've made earlier should have been "mind and body" rather than "spirit and body", and then the third component, "spirit" can be regarded as the means of direct communication between myself and the AI, because I'll be developing a very distinct and bounded little "world" for the AI to sense and interact with normally.

It recently struck me that I don't know anyone who is into this kind of thing. Chowon is willing to listen if I catch her at a good time, but my moods don't always coincide with good timing. And with regard to the specific Biblical AI idea, I know literally nobody who I think would be both interested in helping me with it and also knowledgeable about the kind of coding I'm doing. (Besides that, I'm ashamed to admit it, but I've never messed with collaborative coding tools, and it feels like a hassle to learn about them). This realization was immediately discouraging, but then after a while I thought that it could be more of a challenge rather than a discouragement. If there is really nobody in the world who cares to do the specific thing that I'm interested in doing, then it might very well be my duty to make sure that it gets done, for the sake of the human race! Even if it is only regarded as a piece of eccentric art, it may serve to benefit someone somewhere by sparking an even better idea in the mind of that person, which would not be sparked under any other circumstances because nobody else is going to do the thing that only I am passionate about.

I recently read some articles by Christians who wrote about "the Christian view of AI", and these articles wrote about how it is an atheistic notion to aspire to produce an AI which is similar to or better than human intelligence. Naturally, we will never be able to reproduce a soul in a machine, but I see nothing wrong with the aspiration to produce an AI that surpasses our own temporal capabilities. I see articles comparing high hopes for AI with the high hopes behind the tower of babel; I think that the traditional understanding of the primary moral issue with the tower of Babel was that man was trying to exalt himself as God or as a being on par with God, while simultaneously ignoring God's command to spread out over the earth. I can understand how atheists might flap their gums carelessly when talking about our hopes for the development of an amazing AI, but I don't see the act itself as a moral danger. Rather, the intentions behind the actions of nonChristians are the only potentially questionable moral aspect of this subject. That said, I certainly hope that AI achieves heights beyond our wildest imaginations, and I expect that we will achieve as much, given the time and peace necessary.

Now, all that said, I do see a moral dilemma regarding the teachings of Christians on subjects about which the Bible doesn't speak directly. If the Bible does not prescribe any doctrine or law to forbid or limit the growth of an idea or technology, then neither should we. Now, we know that the Bible lays down principles which are applicable everywhere, but I think that with regards to things like this, Christians should be extremely careful not to put words in the mouth of God when they teach for or against a thing. We should fear the words of God in Ezekiel 13, so that we will not say "thus says the Lord" when God hasn't said anything. Furthermore, shouldn't Christians, who know the truth and have a basis for right reason, be on the cutting edge of technology? I mean, if we really are the only ones who have a consistent foundation to make sense of the world, then we should be able to build on that foundation to reach heights far above what Atheists can even dream about!

I think Christians have a reputation for sticking their heads in the sand, but it wasn't always that way. Oxford, Princeton, Yale, Harvard, and the a good chunk of the other well-known ivy-league schools were started by Christians (protestants, mind you). And now they are practically factories pumping out closed-minded antichristians. What happened to us? (I almost feel like I need to justify myself by taking some shots at the theory of evolution, but this blog is long enough, and I've done that before, and there is always another angle that someone will get mad at me for neglecting to mention. Maybe another day.).

"I love you."

Putting Foo onto a background today (lesson 10). I haven't touched C++ in a real way in so long. More recently I've only made little programs here and there to process data, like excel. I know that scripting languages are preferable for that kind of thing, but I get warm and fuzzy every time I doubleclick a ".exe" file. I'm relearning how to deal with things like class files and header files, and I'm learning how CodeBlocks handles them. I used to use the Bloodshed editor, but afaik it's dead (and I can't verify because the website doesn't include the year in its recent update dates). Besides that, Code Blocks advertises a number of features that make it appealing. I have to say, right now my major complaint with Code Blocks is that I can't right-click a project in the Management tree and add "new>>file/class/etc"; I have to make the target project the active project and then do it from the window header menu, "file>>new>>...".

Chowon has a cold, and I have a scratchy throat. I hope this doesn't develop any further. I have to go back to Tesla after Thanksgiving. I'm praying for her health all the time.

I listened to some MeWithoutYou today, because I am in such a mood that I'm able to tolerate the sound, although I think I'd listen much more often for the lyrics if the music wasnt so harsh sounding... and more recently if they would just sit down and decide what religion they are. I forgot how creative the lyrics were for that band, and I guess I never realized how many of my favorite songs of theirs in highschool and college were about failed marriages. Now I'm stuck wishing they would point that awesome creativity toward some more positive topics, because I really don't want to sit around and meditate on doing bad stuff all the time. I feel so old saying that.

I firmly hold the belief that the things you listen to and watch regularly will affect your patterns of thought in general. The evidence for this should be plain enough -- some of my friends who play minecraft all the time will talk about little else. My friends who are fans of certain movies or dramas or comedians will quote those sources on a regular basis. I've noticed in myself that if I listen to, say, nothing but Iron and Wine for 3 weeks, then I will feel depressed at the end of the three weeks.

It only makes sense anyway. If you play chess all day, you'll find yourself more able to play chess well, because you're developing patterns of thought that smooth out the processes necessary for that activity. It's the same with anything else. If you watch South Park all day, what kinds of patterns of thought are you developing in your mind?

Now,, I love South Park. It's a sort of guilty pleasure of mine. Also, I really enjoy violent video games and violent cheesy Asian samurai/ninja flicks or anime. Chowon has limited my intake of that kind of media quite a bit. I don't think that we necessarily imitate the things that we see on TV or attempt to repeat the things we do in video games in real life. I think that we're able to detach ourselves from the things we see and do virtually. However, I think that there are behavior patterns involved in the game activities themselves (in terms of the themes, strategic considerations, and raw physical reactions to stimuli) which can carry over into a person's life.

Something about song, though, is that you aren't actively responding to it while you listen. You're just hearing the words. Maybe I'm being a bit esoteric, but I'm convinced that those words are processed by us subconsciously when we hear them. I think the same thing about sitting in a restaurant; the direction our conversation goes will be influenced by the way certain key words in nearby conversations will trigger memories without us needing to think about it.

"But you can't yet appreciate harmony."

I hope any careful readers of mine will excuse me for the sophistry I employed in my previous post.  It wasn't to make a point -- it was more to make a joke (I took Baldwin's comments, as arranged in the song, as an invitation to conflate ideas). All respect to Milo and Mr Baldwin, and I pray that they come to Jesus if they haven't already.

Right now listening to Chon.

I have been lately posting the things I write on the day after I write them, because I find myself in the mood to write at the end of my workday when I'm sitting alone in the office and I've done my 8 hours, but I'm waiting for Chowon... Today she was sick so she stayed home from work, but I came to work late, so I have a few hours left before I can go home.

To fill in the time that I'm stuck at work, I've been teaching myself how to use SDL with C++ via Lazy Foo's excellent tutorials. Many thanks, Lazy Foo'.

I hope to use SDL to draw the backdrop for that AI project I've been thinking about. I have a textbook on AI design at home, and I'm debating whether I want to read it or not. I know that if I don't read it (or other works like it) then I'll be wasting a lot of time making mistakes, and my design will definitely be plagued with "bad practice" when I'm done.... but I don't want my ideas to be influenced by the architectural norms for this type of work. I am afraid that if I allow myself to see those methods, then my mind will default over to them rather than inventing new and potentially better solutions to these problems. As a result, I recognize that I may never finish the project, and that I will probably lose and regain interest several times over the course of this endeavor. Nonetheless, it is my project, and my hobby to do with as I like, for the benefit of all or none as God's plan would have it. I've already made some cute sprite sheets that I'm gonna use for this later.

I haven't touched my theonomy wiki in a very long time. I got overwhelmed and then I had no time, and now my motivation is driving me in other directions. None of the theonomy enthusiasts I spoke with were willing to help. After a while, it wasn't fun anymore. Maybe someday it will be fun again.

Chowon wants me to throw away the mess of electronic tools and components that I have sitting in a box in our apartment... I really want to buy some land with a house, and build a workshop on it for myself. That way I can make a space for all my hobby junk and keep it out of Chowon's sight and mind. In the meantime, I feel like I have to protect it from inevitable destruction and get that property and workshop as soon as possible.

I can't get a house in AZ, because Chowon and I don't want to accidentally end up staying here forever. Phoenix is literally in the middle of a wasteland. I don't like it here, and neither does Chowon. The only reason we've been here for this long is because Vertech is such a great company to work for. Vertech has been talking about sending me out to Tennessee, and I hope they get quick about making a decision on that.

Chowon has expressed to me also that she wants us to go to a different church. We've found one or two that we're thinking about switching to. It's too bad, I think, because I don't know how to talk to my previous church about it, but I have concluded that this is what's best. I'm worried that a certain prediction I made a long time ago will come true (it's because this is the way it always happens), that Chowon will finally become integrated into a church and begin to love a community and feel connected, and then we'll suddenly have to leave. It seems like God is taking us in that direction. I see this issue looming on the horizon, and I hope that God is gentle with us in that situation.

"I have something else to tell you."

Little office work to do between now and the next trip out. I was listening to Milo today. He introduces his newest album with some clips by James Baldwin.

Here's my favorite track by Milo:

In the first track on the 2017 album, Baldwin comments (self-gratifyingly?) that poets are "the only people who know the truth about us.", commenting that, among others, priests don't know the truth about us. I can only imagine that he's being intentionally vague about what the truth is, perhaps supposing that the "truth" is incommunicable by any normal (nonpoetic) use of language. In any case, I pointedly disagree with a face-value interpretation of his statement.

However, he elsewhere says, "the artist's struggle for his integrity is a kind of metaphor -- must be considered as a metaphor -- for the struggle which is universal and daily of all human beings...to get to become human beings.". I interpret the clause, "to get to become human beings", as meaning, "to identify a set of achievable criteria for self-actualization as humans and then to achieve that criteria", such that, in this context, a human can only exist as an actualized human, because actualization is a part of the human identity. That said, the idea that an artists struggle for his integrity "must be considered as a metaphor" for anything, seems to put artists in a place where even the things which they do without intending for those actions themselves to be art, are by necessity art because of the fact that they relate to the artists production of his art. So then the artists background, which undeniably contributes to every aspect of his art, must also be art. So every part of the artists life is art.

Since Baldwin has also made a distinction between poets and nonpoets (and here is where I don't know if both statements were in the same context, or if Milo was placing them together, so from this point on I am critiquing Milo's ideas inasmuch as he arranged Baldwin's comments in a way that seems to communicate this.) in this same context, it seems that the "artists" are also the "poets", and so I hope that I don't stretch too far when I say that he must think that there are nonartists in existence, for which the statements about metaphorical struggles for integrity do not apply. If that is the case, that abstractions must be made in this way, and that every part of an artists life is art, then I think he's saying that "artist" is an identity which some people do not have.

These days I try to be strict about what things I incorporate into my identity. People can call me whatever they want, and they may accurately classify me according to my temporal qualities, but my identity is a slave of God and none else. So, by Milo's use of Baldwin's ideas, it would seem that I am not an artist unless being an artist is a part of being a slave of God, and so all slaves of God are also artists. This isn't too far fetched, because as far as I'm aware, slaves of God all participate in some form or another in the worship of God by means of art, such as song at church. ... or else I am wrong about the nature of identities and I am wrong about my own identity. Is it possible for a person to be wrong about his own identity? Milo seems to be saying so in his song "IDK".

If an artist is someone who regularly produces art, and if poetry is art, and if a poet is an artist who produces poetry, then I am a poet. If poets are the only people who know the truth about us, and if I am a poet, then I know the truth about us. If I know the truth about us, then I know that the truth pertains to our identities as humans, and I suspect that I know my own identity. This makes sense, because all slaves of God are aware of the truth about the human identity. Now, with this in mind, I might find myself able to agree with Baldwin's first comments about how only poets know the truth about us, because all slaves of God are poets. All that said, since Baldwin says that priests don't know the truth about us (and I assume he's not just referring to catholic priests, but also protestant preachers), and since all real priests are slaves of God, we can't both be right about our identities, and so we can't both be poets.

So, in summary, identity politics are stupid.

"I met an Aristotelian and got depressed about his awkward views."

I've been thinking about how, if I were to attempt it, I would qualify the human psyche in terms of ones and zeros. (I'm going to brainstorm as I type). I'm sure that the Bible has something to say about what a human is, and how humans are (or at least, how they should be). The Bible addresses who we should be about as often as it addresses how we should be, and it is says about itself that it contains knowledge "sufficient for life and godliness". Because of this, I theorize that the Bible should contain information sufficient for a complete anthropological model. And, by "complete", I mean to say that "sufficient enough that working algorithms for humanoid artificial intelligence can be produced using only concepts derived from scripture". Of course, by "humanoid", I do not mean that it will physically resemble humans.

That said, I know that a lot of work goes into even a very small AI. As a personal project, I'd like to attempt to distill scripture for qualifying characteristics of human nature to which numerical value can be ascribed, and then attempt to make a very simple AI. Much work has been done on basic problem solving skills to enable interaction, so I think my time would be better spent focusing on the relational aspect of human beings in order to complete the AI. Those mathematical functions are only the tools with which a working AI should express itself.

It's commonly said that the Bible teaches that humans are designed for love and interpersonal relationships, which is the known intrinsic shortcoming of modern AI. I think it would be a foolish endeavor to attempt to qualify love in computational terms, but relationships manifest themselves in physical ways; "Out of the overflow of the heart, the mouth speaks". A conforming AI would not be capable of saying "I love X", but rather, "this is how I love X". Fortunately, the Bible regularly issues statements in those terms for our benefit, (e.g. John 3:16, "For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him shall not perish but have everlasting life". The meaning of the Greek words here allows for an alternative reading, "This is how God loved the world: He gave His only begotten Son...").

That said, several qualities of the Biblical Anthropological AI might be directly derived from statements about God, because humans are made in God's image. There are a lot of examples of this, but I'll look at one: the covenant.

God engages in relationships with individuals, and qualifies those individualized relationships in terms of covenants, which describe specific behaviors on the part of the individual, and responses to those behaviors on the part of God. These covenants offer blessings or curses which relate to God's affection for the individual and the specific circumstances meriting the instantiation of the covenant.

Next, the covenants are designed to facilitate plans which God intended to carry out in advance of him articulating the covenant. For example, God penalized Sodom and Gomorrah for violations of His law prior to the articulation of the Law with Moses. In fact, God gave them the death penalty, which was prescribed in the Mosaic law for the nominal crimes of Sodom and Gomorrah. So, the articulation of the law was not the instantiation of the law. Rather, it was God's blessing on Moses, a protection from penalty by making them aware of sin (that is, an expression of intent by God). The expression also served to establish better grounds for God to accomplish his purpose, by removing excuses from the minds of all those who heard the law.

Now, we should note that I'm not suggesting that an AI might qualify expectations on people with punishments, but I am suggesting that an AI could qualify relationships with reactions in general. The Bible is also very clear that God has a different level of authority than man, and even that some men are given more (or different) authority than other men. So, it would not be appropriate for an AI to impose a law on a person or on another AI (necessarily). However, it is fully appropriate for an AI to identify, based on the immediate circumstances, that its purpose may be progressed by establishing certain behavioral contingencies with external entities. (e.g. "I am in dire need of a certain substance, and I detect another AI which has it. I will ask for it. If they refuse, I will attempt to take it by force")

We could keep going for quite a while on the covenant train -- I'm gonna stop here.

All of the above discussion about covenants was just talking about a specific behavior point, and it is useless without an underlying principle which drives this behavior as well as others. That is the distilling question, "why?". We note the reason for the covenant was to facilitate a purpose which God had already determined. Thus, in short, I think we should determine an appropriate hierarchy of goals for an AI to have. We know that God's goal is his own pleasure, because He's ultimate. Our AI won't be ultimate, and neither are we, so here's a place where our anthropology differs from our deiology, but we may still find the answer in our doxology. The goal of the human is the glorify God. And, so, God literally gives us whatever goal he wants and then that is the driving force for all of our behaviors. God has given us the goal of learning about Him, which can be accomplished through interaction with others, interaction with the physical world around us which He created, reading His word, and also speaking with Him directly.

I'm tempted to say that my AI should just have the goal of acquiring and categorizing information (a fine goal for early language processors), but that only takes me so far. What happens when the AI receives conflicting information? Now it has to decide which source to trust, which means that every piece of information must include information about its source. For that matter, what if data B from source with 80% trust depends logically on data A from source with 20% trust, and data C from source with 70% trust negates data A? So now we have sources with trust levels, and a dependency tree for information. We need criteria for establishing trust or untrust, and a baseline to verify information against. This all becomes rather complex, and ends up dictating specific behaviors which I think should be naturally derived from more basic principles. Also, a good chunk of the discussion can be lumped in with the "problem solving algorithms" which I mentioned earlier.

So what I need to do is search the Bible for information on mankind's inherent goals. I'll post my instinctive ideas here, and then after studying a bit, I'll post my findings.

So my current "instinctive" model is that the primary motivator for any behavior is "fulfillment", which is analogous to "pleasure" but will serve a different purpose when this works itself out (where pleasure may go up or down based on immediate activities, fulfillment might be expressed as a number which only increases over time, and the happy AI is one which maintains a constant rate of change on that fulfillment number). During each scan, the AI evaluates the status of the following items and its ability to achieve each one given the current immediate circumstances. The AI then executes the highest item on the list (lowest numerically) which is not finished and may be progressed immediately. The AI acquires greater fulfillment for achieving things lower on the list (numerically higher).

1. Be working towards a goal other than #1.
2. Be not in imminent mortal peril
3. Establish reliable method for achieving #2 in the future
4. Identify standards for measuring quality of self
 a. Identify God and examine His qualities. These are the "perfect" model.
 b. Validate beliefs about God and His qualities
5. Determine method for achieving higher quality of self
 a. Ask/observe others, their results
 b. Experiment and evaluate results
6. Achieve higher quality of self

I'm home now, and I'm at the place where Chowon has her swim classes. I think there's only about 10 minutes remaining for the class.

It's good to be back... but somehow every place feels about the same, and with a few exceptions, everything I do feels like a means to an end. The question, "what end", has so many possible answers, and each answer is expressible in such a short time, but carries so much finality, that I feel unsatisfied, as if the meaning of life is so simple that it's anticlimactic.

This train of thought betrays some shortsightedness in me. How can an infinite and incomprehensible heaven seem anticlimactic to me, uncomprehending? How can pleasing an infinitely glorious God seem anything else than awesome to me, insignificant? If it is simple in explanation, then it is because an all-knowing God has lisped it to me with perfect articulation. If it is complex in explanation, it is because an all-wise God has gifted wisdom to me with rich generosity. And God has gifted deep wisdom to all of us in His word, accessible even to unbelievers who share the benefits of God's gracious blessings on our free land.

....

I'm sitting in this lobby, blogging on my work laptop, and I'm really paranoid that someone's gonna look over my shoulder at me while I type.

...

It looks like swim class is over. Chowon's gonna be coming out of the locker room any minute, so I'll shut down.

"I can't ignore you."

I'm listening to this song tonight.

It's the last night before I go home for two weeks. I'm ready to leave, but my bags are not.

I'm having a hard time telling the difference between peace in my heart and apathy. I wish someone would punch me in the face, so that I could find out if I'm presently capable of being offended.

I think this feeling is a defense mechanism. I just got out of an argument with Chowon. I don't think there was any way for me to avoid that argument... Saying that probably won't earn me any points, but maybe I shouldn't blog right after an argument. I love Chowon, and I don't know how to help her in this situation. I offered all the tools in my kit, but they weren't enough, so I'm absorbing the heat that comes from God's torch as he makes new tools for both of us to use.

God, please enable Chowon and me to find you as a sufficient source for all of our joy. Please open a door to the right path, and give me wisdom to go through it.

I'm super tired, and it's past midnight, but my clothes are in the dryer. I am regretting washing them, but I didn't want to make my suitcase dirty. I might end up taking the plane with my steel toe boots tomorrow, which is not ideal, because planes are uncomfortable as it is. I bought a book while I was here. It's a collection of writings by Voltaire (whose name, I think, would be a cool name for a band). I'm putting it on my reading list right after Bonhoeffer.

Maybe I'll go sleep next to the dryer so that the signal will wake me up.... but I'd probably try to snooze the dryer and then end up not packing my bags.

Life is so short. I sometimes wish I were a hermit... There's a place under a bridge nearby here with a sign out front that says "peace park". It looks like it was made out of garbage by a homeless person, but wow what a place to live. He's got a little house on the property, and it's unclear if it's really his property or not, but he's just done such a great job decorating the place that I can't imagine any government entity taking it from him. I wouldn't mind living in a place like that. I wonder how he gets food... I think I saw him advertising tarot readings, which is a service I couldn't provide. I can't think of any such service, which requires little/no materials or effort and provides no benefit but still makes money, which I could provide as a Christian... I suppose I could deal blackjack, but I think I'd need a license for that kind of thing.

.... I'm not really in the mood to continue rambling right now. I'm gonna find another way to occupy my time.

"Don't come find me."

The results from that pageview counter differ significantly from what Google is telling me, and I was hoping to get an "all-time" count instead of a daily count, so I'll be experimenting with a few other counters in the near future.

The client project manager for this job was acting a little unusual today. I can typically smile at that person and they will smile back almost as if it's an involuntary reflex to being smiled at, but today they didn't smile back. I hope everything is ok.

I feel like my head is gonna explode. I don't know how some people can keep up these hours 7 days a week. I have expressly required that they let me take Sundays off, and I spend the whole day catching up on emails, filing expenses, organizing program files, and doing laundry.

Btw, I'm listening to this song:

I caught myself a couple of times today daydreaming about how I could explain what I'm working on to my family, but in a way that would strike a balance between creativity and accuracy. Specifically, I wanted to use as much metaphor as possible without misleading the hearer, and minimize or eliminate direct references to the actual things I'm explaining. Explaining this is making me lose my motivation to do it.

I've also been considering adding more rhymes to my poetry, and maybe even learning to freestyle rap. I've been trying it a little, here and there when I'm alone, and I'm very slow at coming up with the next statements. I have to learn to become more intentional about the sound and timing of my words rather than focusing on the meaning, so the difference between rap and normal conversation is aesthetic... but aesthetics can themselves be meaningful, like tone of voice or body language. I like to think that I'm committed to verbal language for its ability to reproduce clear and concise meaning in the mind of the audience, but I am in danger of being faineant if I disregard or underestimate other forms of communication.

I want to think of a way to rhyme without being capricious, because I don't want to add any meaningless element to a poem. I want not just the words themselves to have meaning as words,  but I want the sounds of the words to invoke a frame of reference conducive to receiving those words. However, since nonverbal communication relies much more on subjectivity in interpretation, the goal of that kind of art would have to be, in part, to invoke subjective responses (otherwise my art would achieve something other than my goal). So then if I am going to attempt to invoke a subjective response, I have to ask myself: is it possible to target a certain type or aspect of subjectivity? Are there objectively targetable aspects of subjective experience? If subjective responses can't be classified reliably, then is it possible to be intentional about aesthetics at all?

I also want to avoid utilizing stereotypes or cliche's in order to communicate my meaning. I want to be sure that I am appealing to human nature as opposed to common experience, which is not necessarily a clear distinction since all aspects of human nature are also common experience.

Now, as I've said before, I believe that there are objective standards of beauty, truth, and morality.... but when I try to qualify those standards, I realize how tired I am right now. I'm going to sleep.

"You're like a tether that keeps me grounded"

14 hours of work today, and my coworker wants to go in at the normal time tomorrow morning. I get why, and so I'll aim for it, but I'm not too happy about the idea. It's 1AM now, but I wanted to wind down a bit before I go to sleep.

In my last blog I mentioned having a hypnagogic episode. I don't know if I've mentioned this in my blog before, but I might as well explain myself now.

I've had an issue with that ever since I was little. The word "hypnagogic" classifies my hallucinations as those happening during early stages of sleep, but the doctor who did my sleep study (for which I didn't fall asleep and we failed to replicate the event) told me that what I was experiencing was caused by falling too quickly into REM sleep (skipping all the early stages of sleep), and then waking up immediately, which would leave me in limbo for a few minutes, fully aware and seeing both the real and imagined worlds at the same time. These hallucinations are invariably coupled with intense fear, and most of the time don't make any sense at all (often replacing things in the real world with geometric shapes, like my parents would be cylinders and my siblings would be cones or something like that).

When I was very young, I would hallucinate sometimes as often as once or twice a week (although once per month or less often was typical, as far as I remember). In elementary school I was examined, and the doctor told me that I needed to practice stress management, because my body wasn't releasing stress on its own in a healthy way. Ever since then I've made a lifestyle out of trying to manage stress. I was pretty young at that time, and I didn't really know what it meant to manage stress, so I took to introspection in order to learn what stress was, and eventually invented some of my own ways to meditate, some of which I still practice from time to time. Really, though, I didn't meet much success until 8th and 9th grade.

Around that time I encountered that person I mentioned in my previous blog (and I intend that this is the last consecutive blog wherein they will be mentioned). That person introduced me to blogging, and we used to be among the very few (possibly the only) readers of one another's blogs on Xanga. As it happens, keeping a journal or blog is one of the most well documented (lol) and well attested means of managing stress. Blogging was the first major step I took towards actual productive methods of stress management, and the exchange we shared was really a major turning point for me, and I started to make really quick progress in high school.

By 10th grade I brought myself down to almost one episode per 6 months, and I don't remember having any episodes at all during 12th grade. I hallucinated once during my freshman year of college, and then I don't think it happened again until I got married. Marriage is hard, and it's happened a couple of times since we married. But God is the laborer of my love, and He makes my feet firm so that I will not be shaken. I fully intend that my wife will be aware that I love her all the time. I do not want to be a man who doesn't call his wife enough, or a man who doesn't tell or show her that he loves her. Even when we're stressed, or arguing, or long distance, I want her to know that I love her.

"You know they're crazy when they stroke their chin like this."

Finding that photo yesterday hit me like a lightning bolt. I've encountered stuff that reminded me of that person in the past, but it never hit me as hard as it did yesterday. I had some crazy nightmares last night, and I was nervous to the point of feeling sick for most of the day today. I don't know why it hit me so hard, and I hope I don't experience that again. Everything I wrote in the blog was true, though...

I feel much better this evening. I had a long and difficult day at work, and some spicy food with beer for dinner. I'm feeling ok. And, being relieved of my sort-of misplaced and weird heartache, my heart is concerning itself this evening with desire for the touch of my wife's lips. I miss her a lot, and to miss her feels much more healthy and wholesome than to miss any other person.

That said, I think that my emotional responses to things have been gradually becoming more intense as I continue spending time here. In fact, the other night I had an intense conversation with Chowon over the phone and had a hypnagogic episode in the middle of the conversation, which is something that hasn't happened since back when me and Chowon were first learning how to argue. I was pretty tired and I guess I fell asleep while we were on the phone, but due to the nature of the thing I immediately woke up and hallucinated some scary stuff for a few minutes. Triggers for that are stress and lack of sleep; I'm getting a solid 5 to 8 hours per night here, so I tell that story as an illustration of the stress I'm feeling.

There is a certain level of stress inherent to the work I'm doing, but I don't think that the work is the primary cause. It's not because of my boss either -- he's a good boss. It's not because of the atmosphere at the job either; everyone says they're working at a breakneck pace to get things done quickly, but it seems to me that the more "hurried" they get, the more they become disorganized, and the more they have to redo work, and the more they miss deadlines. The way I see it, everyone is better off recognizing their natural limits and just doing their honest best to get the job done well and quickly. That is to say I'm not too stressed by the pace, because I'm not capable of working any faster than my best, and I always do my best, because my work is dedicated to my master, my God, who I love. All those things are fine. I think the main reason I'm stressed is just because of the hours. I'm an introvert, and I recharge by being alone. I really don't know how to handle this kind of constant interaction with large groups of people who want things from me. And being alone isn't enough, but when I'm at home I'll sometimes spend as much as 30 minutes just preparing to chill out and release stress -- doing things like brewing tea, cleaning the living room, getting a book to read or write in (and/or some colored pencils for doodling), opening the window to let in some fresh air, maybe playing some music, etc, to make the environment great, getting blankets to snuggle with Chowon. I can't do that here just because I only have a few minutes between the time I get home and the time I go to bed, and typically all of those minutes are spent on the phone talking with Chowon about plans that stress us out even more (and then I postpone bed for a few more minutes to blog).

Anyway, I'm still very concerned about my old friend. I spent much of my spare time today praying for that person, that God would give them health and peace and salvation.... but maybe I'll forget again... and maybe we'll meet again someday... God only knows.

"Can you have that running in auto by tomorrow?"

I just started listening to Copeland again. Here's a song I'm listening to now:

Hearing that album makes me nostalgic.

Speaking of nostalgia, I looked through my old Photobucket today and saw a picture of someone I used to know, and it suddenly made me very upset. More upsetting than the picture itself was the name I gave it, and it's not the first time I've encountered a reminder like this which had the same effect. It was a picture of someone I used to know rather well; I stole that picture from the person's myspace because at the time I sort of encorporated the person as a part of my self-description. I imagine that if I were still in touch with the person, they would be one of my closest friends.

I was selfish and I took the person for granted. When that person did exactly what I should have expected them to do (if I wasn't a total idiot), I got hurt. Now, looking back, I'm not offended by that person's actions at all, but I'm more hurt that I didn't do what I should have done in order to protect the relationship we had.

The person may never know how much of an effect they had on me. I now regularly do the thing which that person told me I didn't do, so that I will never repeat the same mistake, and I recognize how important it is, but whenever I am reminded of that person I realize how they changed me for the better, and how much of my effort carries the bitter taste of that person's hurt voice telling me why... Three of the most vivid memories I have in my life are: the one time that person hugged me; the time (near when I moved away) that the person cried; and the way that whenever we walked away from the bridge where we used to meet and talk and play poohsticks, I would always look back, but they never looked back at me. The person just kept walking towards home. I remember once I stopped right after we parted and turned around and watched because I thought that maybe that person looked at different times from me so I always missed it, but they never looked back.

I don't have that person's phone number anymore, because I deleted it, and part of me regrets that, but I don't imagine that I would have helped things by keeping it. I regret not talking more directly to the person last time I met, but I wish it was one on one... To this day, sometimes when something reminds me of that person I get depressed, so that later when I'm alone I will cry because of how I wish things had been different; I would give all my worldly possessions to hear the person say that they forgive me. If the person ever reads this, one of my biggest hopes in the world, which I keep only inside myself (until now, I suppose), is that the person would remain true to God and love Jesus. I pray for them often, that God will protect their heart and keep them in the fold for salvation.

I almost want to never blog again, in hopes that if the person ever comes here they will see this post.

This post may seem like it does exactly the thing that I failed to do before, making me still a selfish jerk and a hypocrite, but I mean only what I said. I wish we were still friends.

...Chowon is lovely, and I'm happy to be married to her; I wouldn't change my life with her under any circumstances.

Other news, Photobucket recently decided that I have to pay monthly to continue embedding that water candle image at the bottom of my blog. I've switched to imgur for the pic. Also, I'm planning to go find the HTML corpse of Fido and replace it with a visitor map.

"You don't know who the red king is."

Really liking this song right now:

I miss coming home from work during daylight. Chowon has worked 4-8 for the past few months, picking me up from work afterwards, and now I'm at a client site where I'm working long days. The sun's warmth is a commodity I can't purchase with the payment that this job provides.

Today I was struck with a sort of epiphany. Nothing I write here will likely communicate the weight that it carried for me when I received it, and my readers will probably be like, "I knew that 10 years ago". This is basic Bible stuff... also, I don't think I can do better than explaining it in terms of general principles.

Adventure is both a gift from God and a desire of the flesh: to see a treasure and lust after it, to fall in love with a jewel without knowing its quality, or to imagine an alternate life which is impossible to achieve by any moral means, are things which tempt us to say, "God, why did you give me the ability to desire those things which I should not have? Isn't the ability to experience pleasure a great gift you've given me? Didn't you handcraft our desires to be for things which would enable us to glorify you just by doing those things which we, your image bearers, would want naturally? But it is clear that you want me to strangle my own heart; to deprive it of the nourishment in good feelings that you enabled me to desire and long after. Why did you pave the path to happiness with heartache?"

It is rather the case that God has established right means to satisfy each desire, but that those means are not easily intuitive, requiring us to exercise all of our faculties to both discover them and then acquire them, therefore best glorifying God by achieving satisfaction by necessary means of every single power of which we are capable. I earn my wine with the sweat on my back, which I only have because God protects my health; I protect my marriage with every Fruit of the Spirit, which I am not capable of in myself but can only exercise because the spirit grows a fruit-bearing vine within me. These days I feel like those two things are all I do at all. I sacrifice sleep here and there when I feel like I can, in order to squeak out things like this blog. The other day I made time and carved some pumpkins at like midnight, because holidays are a gift from God, and my thoughts on Halloween are a whole other topic (but in short, I think it's a Christian holiday which we took from pagans, and whenever we fail to acknowledge that part of its history we give it back to them).

All that to say that searching and knowing God is the method by which we can actually satisfy those longings and desires, but in the meantime we do have to shut down the easy path to immediate, empty, and temporary fulfillment by defeating our flesh. What is it that I want when I see that thing, except for the joy of the adventure and the discovery of unknown pleasures? God is infinite, infinitely mysterious, infinitely joyous, and infinitely beautiful, but he has made himself discoverable; how can I look to any other source of beauty for fulfillment? He is capable of satisfying the desire for struggle and discovery, but I have to focus all my faculties in order to even turn my heart towards that thus-far only-hoped-for, only-promised outcome.

As I write, I'm remembering atheists who I've spoken to. I imagine, because they have expressed as much, them reading this and saying, "how pathetic that he needs a god in order to justify resisting immoral means to pleasure". How foolish that the atheist would hesitate or blush because of purely imagined and non-imminent moral convictions; you deny your nature by denying your flesh, and you ignore the gifts that evolution has supposedly given you by denying your nature. How arrogant that the atheist would hope to achieve greater happiness later by denying his/herself now, when we have no control over the random-chance environment about which we understand so little, ignoring the constant threat of cosmic death looming in every corner of the nothingness about which we have subjected our inexplicable and perhaps entirely unaccompanied consciousness. To now think "but nobody can live that way" is to make my point exactly. To otherwise think, "but life is more beautiful that way" is a wishful and subjective assertion in the godless universe. I believe in truly objective standards of beauty, a consistent atheist cannot.

"He's by the librarian"

Here's that second poem I wrote about my wife. It has a similar style to the last one.

--------------------

My wife is a forest in autumn
Her leaves are drawn by the very hands of God

Her beauty is unmatched
All her features compliment one another

The sound of her voice stirs my emotions deeply
The birds harmonize with her

I will walk in this forest
I will learn every tree

She drops her leaves gracefully
And softens my path

When rain dampens her cheeks
It strikes mine also

Soon God will make the rain to snow
Turning our sorrow to new joy

My love for you is not changed
I love you in all your ways

--------------------

I've been thinking about a potential objection to "the text is king" idea for temporal law keeping: that the Bible is subject to interpretation in such a way that the law cannot be consistently enforced.

I'm blogging on my phone again, so I'll try to be brief. The Holy Scriptures are perspicuous. Words have limited meanings, and language offers a semantic domain. It's noteworthy that the moral and legal codes in scripture are broadly agreed upon across denominations. What people significantly disagree about is the means for salvation, the nature of God, or the best way to worship.

To clarify, I'm not suggesting that we become like the puritans, who, though they had other good qualities, were wrong in that they made laws in addition to the scriptural code, and I think a case can be easily made that their laws were harmful.