Cultural Conundrums

Angela Merkel says that German experiment to create a multicultural society has "utterly failed".

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-germany-merkel-immigration-idUSTRE69F1K320101016

This is a big, yet inevitable, punch in the Europe's cosmetic pluralistic visage, it has been using to unsuccessfully mask its strongly tribalistic anatomy. Especially coming from Merkel who was the last (wo)man standing in this highly polarized debate centered on cross-cultural immigration.

A moment in the Sun

Between the shadow and the soul*

Lie stories dark and untold

Waiting for that moment to burn bright

And cast long shadows into the night.

I'm told I should improve my style
So the story isn't lost amidst yawns and rheumy eyes.
If you ask me, it's the time
In the right moment it'll all sound riveting, and with a punchline!

When the hour finally arrives, late today.

Dusky and dim, it asks me as it ebbs away

Search for it under the light of stars

But I know well the moment has slipped afar.

Hiding behind a cloud, it dissolves in the rain.

Maybe with you around, tomorrow I can try again.

-- Archana

*Inspired by Pablo Neruda's https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/49236/one-hundred-love-sonnets-xvii 

Evolution/Devolution of Artifical/Real Intelligence

I recently came across the following two articles and, rather fortuitously, ended up reading them in quick succession:

1. A fascinating account of journey of Demis Hassabis, the founder of Deep Mind (now Google's), towards the elusive and alluring goal of developing artificial general intelligence (AGI).

https://www.1843magazine.com/features/deepmind-and-google-the-battle-to-control-artificial-intelligence

2. A fascinating (albeit in an entirely different way!) about the surprisingly prevalent and growing group of people who feel vindicated in denying even elementary scientific facts such as "earth is round". For the record, I did not even know that I am a 'globetard' :(

https://www.newyorker.com/science/elements/looking-for-life-on-a-flat-earth

---

Nothing better highlights this strange conundrum of information age.  While we are on a quest to deconstruct and expand the fundamental core of intelligence at the disposal of human civilization, by actualizing it in agents presumably free of human limitations, we simultaneously grapple with our own stupidity and shun essentially everything rational. I wonder if this signals that it would be AHS (Average Human Stupidity), and not AGI, that will finally push us over the edge into The Singularity.

If an alien civilization were observing us, it would find this absolutely incredible!

Merrimack

Somewhere between the boundless blues,
The twinkles of silver
turn into streaks of gold.
Nights merge into days, days into years
Raconteurs wither away,
the story never gets old.

-- Archana

Summer memories