[Curtis Rutland]

Well, to avoid more insults directed at myself, I'm going to agree to disagree and stop talking, because apparently I'm just a moron.

[supersloth]

i'd mine for pervin'.

[AVReidy]

jon.kiparsky, on 22 March 2013 - 12:04 AM, said:

It'll be brilliant! Thinking will be a thing of the past! We'll just... umm... sit around and watch tv and stuff!


Yeah, thanks but no thanks.

I was talking about mental calculation. You would have to be out of your mind (or paranoid about brainwave surveillance or mind-control/suggestion of some sort) to reject a technology like that. Until we have real AI to think for us, such technology would only augment our brains. It would help us think by taking care of the stuff we use computers and calculators for. Maybe someday wearable computers will recognize patterns and suggest plans of action for us, but I'm just thinking of the benefits in the near future.

I hope someday everyone will be able to solve problems with their wearable computers by using an extremely-high-level, personalized brainwave interpreter.

[modi123_1]

... and the always on surveillance of your activities and anyone with eye visual or audio pickup range.

[AVReidy]

You can stick to your 15-inch laptops. Nobody can see what you're doing on those, I hear.

[modi123_1]

Though.. if this evolves fast enough I can totally stop reenacting 'Strange Days' and their SQUIDs(Superconducting Quantum Interference Device), and just live it... and then duplicate it so someone else can live it.

[AVReidy]

I agree that it's totally impractical until they figure out how to create a non-verbal input system. I think it would be more practical if you could control your headset with a conventional smartphone until they think of something better. I don't want to be in public talking to myself.

"Ok Glass, take a picture of the hot chick over there, and keep the flash off so nobody notices."

[jon.kiparsky]

AVReidy, on 22 March 2013 - 04:27 PM, said:

jon.kiparsky, on 22 March 2013 - 12:04 AM, said:

It'll be brilliant! Thinking will be a thing of the past! We'll just... umm... sit around and watch tv and stuff!


Yeah, thanks but no thanks.

I was talking about mental calculation. You would have to be out of your mind (or paranoid about brainwave surveillance or mind-control/suggestion of some sort) to reject a technology like that.

Yep. 'Cause brains do so much better if you don't use them. People get infinitely smarter when they don't know where they are, they just go where their prosthetic points them, and they know so much more when they don't have to remember anything.

This is absolutely pathetic... it's like some fat slob sitting around talking about how he's just saving up his energy for some time when he'll really need it. "All of you people doing all that thinking and stuff, you're wasting all your thoughts. You're gonna need them some day!"

I really don't understand how anyone could find thought so hateful that they'd want to offload it onto a machine, or hate the world so much they wouldn't even want to know where they are in it. This seems very strange to me.

[AVReidy]

You know there's a difference between calculation and problem solving, no? Anything with a brain can count. Reasoning and creative problem solving is what separates us from animals. A cockroach can count and do arithmetic, but it can't appreciate or utilize "numbers" (consciously, at least). It's so obnoxious when people walk around like, "Hey, I'm obviously the intellectual badass around here because I'm a pro at multiplication, so don't even try to mess with me." And why did I even compare people to cockroaches? We're so pathetic at calculation relative to computers, but computers are all but incapable of reasoning, learning, and creativity even with the most complex AI software.

I'm not arguing that we should abandon our brains and rely on computers; I think they have potential to make things even easier on us. We could be far more productive.

This post has been edited by AVReidy: 22 March 2013 - 03:15 PM

[baavgai]

Greg ( the guy I linked to previously ) uses a bluetooth version of SpiffChorder to talk to Glass. ( Greg is the hairier guy on the top of that link. )

So, clandestine interaction with the device is already in beta...

[Atli]

jon.kiparsky, on 22 March 2013 - 10:01 PM, said:

I really don't understand how anyone could find thought so hateful that they'd want to offload it onto a machine, or hate the world so much they wouldn't even want to know where they are in it. This seems very strange to me.

It's not about "hating" thought or the world around you. It's about efficiency. I'm sure as hell not going to be spending half my day doing complex calculations by hand, or figuring out optimal travel routes on an old-fashioned map, when a few keystrokes can give me that info in a matter of milliseconds. I've got better things to do; things I'd rather spend my day doing.

jon.kiparsky, on 22 March 2013 - 10:01 PM, said:

This is absolutely pathetic... it's like some fat slob sitting around talking about how he's just saving up his energy for some time when he'll really need it. "All of you people doing all that thinking and stuff, you're wasting all your thoughts. You're gonna need them some day!"

Why do you assume people aren't thinking at all? I may not be spending my day thinking those specific thoughts, but I'm certainly not laying around blankly drooling into my pillow either. There are things I want to be thinking about that I'm happy to sacrifice some mundane and more or less pointless skills for, now that computers can do those things for us with ease.

If things like these Glasses can help us avoid having to repeatedly thinking the same things over and over, we might actually get a few new thoughts in ever now and then...

[jon.kiparsky]

I think your claims of efficiency are not very well grounded. Have you ever actually looked at a map? It's hardly an all-day affair to figure out how to get from point A to point B - particularly since your brain will memoize that information if you use it at all frequently, and then there's no more looking it up. So you're not actually saving any time, there's no efficiency there. All you're doing is using a tool to ignore the world.

And to further damage your argument, time that you spend not thinking doesn't sort of "save up". It's not like you're able to bank the two minutes you didn't spend looking at a map, and somehow learn more later. All you're doing is not doing. You're avoiding using your brain to do something it's pretty good at, and you're avoiding learning something about the world you're in. No savings, no "learning more later", no "thinking higher and better thoughts" - just using a tool to dodge a chance to think about the world you live in.

Whether or not that occasion of thought would be helpful to you is not yet established. We can go into that or not, as you like, but it's obvious that you don't somehow think a new deep thought because you didn't have to look for directions. All that happened there was you avoided thinking.

Another sort of "efficiency" that often comes up, horrifyingly enough, is the "efficiency" of not having to know stuff - in your case, the supposedly efficient use of your brain to not construct a mental map of your surroundings and locate yourself in it. This of course is an elective ignorance which again comes with no return benefits. You don't get to know extra facts about, say, number theory because you studiously maintain your ignorance of your local geography. There's not some sort of "space" in your brain that you're saving - your memory isn't a hard disk that gets filled up. In fact, it's quite the other way around, by all accounts. The more you know, including about seemingly trivial and unimportant details like where you are and what it's like here, the more you can know. This, at least, is one of the consistent messages I've drawn from a lot of reading in cognitive science over the last two decades. Nothing ever comes up to contradict this. So this sort of "efficient" use of your brain's resources is also fallacious.

Quote

If things like these Glasses can help us avoid having to repeatedly thinking the same things over and over, we might actually get a few new thoughts in ever now and then...

And a final fallacy. Name me one cognitive task that you perform regularly that the moronocle can perform for you, and show me how that adds up to you "thinking new thoughts".

(Interestingly, this is a completely different way in which the google goggles suck: not only are they an embodiment of discourtesy and a positive menace when used by motorists, but they also contribute to your advancing ignorance and mental decreptitude - this is a really brilliant stroke on google's part!)

[Atli]

jon.kiparsky, on 23 March 2013 - 02:15 AM, said:

Have you ever actually looked at a map?

jon.kiparsky, on 23 March 2013 - 02:15 AM, said:

It's hardly an all-day affair to figure out how to get from point A to point B - particularly since your brain will memoize that information if you use it at all frequently, and then there's no more looking it up. So you're not actually saving any time, there's no efficiency there. All you're doing is using a tool to ignore the world.

Probably not, no, but does take longer and it is more effort. You also seem to think that people don't learn the directions given by their routing software. We do. I've never had to ask Google to direct me to the same place twice. It's the exact same information I'd have gotten from the map, just easier to fetch and use. They also tend to take into account things you can't really get from an ordinary map, like traffic patterns and speed limits. They don't just give you a path between A and B, they give you the most optimal path between A and B.

jon.kiparsky, on 23 March 2013 - 02:15 AM, said:

And to further damage your argument, time that you spend not thinking doesn't sort of "save up". It's not like you're able to bank the two minutes you didn't spend looking at a map, and somehow learn more later...

No, I'm not saving it up. I don't just sit there for those two minutes and stare blankly into space either. Believe it or not, I am actually capable of thinking while driving, or sitting on a train, or walking, or whatever. It's not wasted time just because I avoided spending it reading a map.

jon.kiparsky, on 23 March 2013 - 02:15 AM, said:

Another sort of "efficiency" that often comes up, horrifyingly enough, is the "efficiency" of not having to know stuff - in your case, the supposedly efficient use of your brain to not construct a mental map of your surroundings and locate yourself in it. This of course is an elective ignorance which again comes with no return benefits. You don't get to know extra facts about, say, number theory because you studiously maintain your ignorance of your local geography....

O, I know my local geography very well. I don't use Google Maps to show me around my own home town, nor would I ever have to consult a map for that area.

Where GPS directions come most in handy is when you are traveling through areas you rarely visit. For instance, I recently visited London. I used Google Maps extensively to get around, and it worked beautifully. In no way whatsoever would my live have been made easier nor would I have benefited at all from knowing more details about the areas I traveled through. The rarity of my travels though those areas make learning the geography pretty much pointless. - Of course I learned the area I stayed in... from Google Maps mostly. (It is an actual map, you know.)

Additionally, wherever I visited, all I had to do was open my Google Maps screen and it would immediately show me a map of the surrounding area and all the noteworthy places around me. Pretty much exactly like a normal map would have, except it's far easier to use and gives you a LOT more detail. - Try asking a normal map to show you just the Italian restaurants within a mile of your location, and how well it's been rated in the past, and the opening times, and the menu, etc... Just imagine how these goggles could extend that ability.

jon.kiparsky, on 23 March 2013 - 02:15 AM, said:

And a final fallacy. Name me one cognitive task that you perform regularly that the moronocle can perform for you, and show me how that adds up to you "thinking new thoughts".

How about the thing we've just been talking about: Driving directions. With the Goggles taking care of the navigating, I'd be free to maul over whatever else may be on my mind. Usually that would be my work. In my case programming, but who knows, some uber scientist just may be considering some revolutionary ways to treat cancer while driving to work.

[stackoverflow]

What a silly thing to argue about.

The argument against the glasses because they are "cameras" and it's an invasion of privacy is totally crap. I work in a surveillance (software) company and let me tell you, if you're afraid of cameras the Google Glasses should be the least of your worries. The software I write during the day should terrify you, and I guarantee no matter where you live in the world the software I help write has seen you and god knows what else.

[creativecoding]

Quote

Have you ever actually looked at a map?

I think a better parallel here would be "Have you ever actually looked at a map while walking in a place you don't know?". There's a difference between memorizing locations and being directed towards a location. I couldn't care less about what street is where in a far away city. Heck, I'll forget it after a day. What I care about is getting from point A to point B and using a map will only slow me down.

I mean yeah you shouldn't rely on Google Maps for getting you to work and back, but you shouldn't have to memorize a map for everywhere you go.

just a thought.