1954
Akira Kurosawa, Japan
1960
John Sturges, US of A
2016
Antoine Fuqua, US of A
2026
Archives for posts with tag: evolution
Every now and again something called ‘paradigm shift’ ‘happens’
For reasons rooted in the material nature/origin of everything, smaller cultural spaces, aka societies, tend to evolve faster. For as long as they have enough resources/opportunities. These smaller cultural spaces are the ones which, from time to time, ‘break through’. ‘Take a leap’. Usually as a measure of last resort. Out of (evolutionary) necessity rather than as a voluntary choice.
Afterwards, the successful paradigm shifts are copied by the rest. Adapted for their own circumstances.
The last paradigm shift we have been able to identify started some 2.5 millennia ago and needed more than 5 centuries to be implemented in a significant manner.
The last one started in a small community. And, for a while, has been confined to a very small geographical area. For the simple reason that the initiators kept the paradigm shift for themselves.
It spread only after a reformer opened it up for everybody.
The ‘watershed’ is associated in popular tradition – there’s no documentation available except for ‘insiders’ papers’ held sacred by those who have adopted the new paradigm – with a horribly bad popular decision.
The currently unfolding one started a century and a half ago. As an idea. The first attempt to put it in practice failed miserably. Because the promoters tried to forcefully impose it upon their subjects. It is being fueled by a succession of really bad popular choices.
Back then, ‘they’ weren’t ready either. For the change.
But the ‘new’ world was better.
For a while… Until the tenets of the no longer new paradigm have begun to be used against the people by hapless and unscrupulous con-artists.
Inanimate exists. Simply exists. Inanimate is about an existing quantity of something. Matter, energy… and anything in between, if at all. Joking…
Life is about exchange. Nothing permanent, everything in flux.
Inanimate doesn’t ‘contain’ good or bad. Only ‘existence’. And/or ’empty’ space…
Life is about individual living ‘things’. Organisms, actually.
Which organisms ‘do’. Or ‘suffer’. Then experience the consequences of their deeds. And/or of what had happened to/with them.
Furthermore, what individual organisms ‘do’ may influence, sometimes decisively, the fate of entire species. The phenomenon is usually called ‘evolution’. Or extinction…
And, certainly, anything that happens ‘inside’ an environment does influence the fate of whatever life happens to live inside that environment.
‘Good’ is anything which helps, individuals or species, to survive. Or, even better, to thrive.
‘Bad’ is anything which hinders survival. At any level.
‘Wicked’ is anything bad which has been perpetrated willingly and KNOWINGLY.
A lion hunting for food is good for its cubs. Bad for the individual preyed. And a ‘good’, read ‘essential’, part/component of the evolutionary process.
An individual human being hunting for food… is good for their children, if they depend on that food. Bad for the prey. And an actor ‘playing a part’ in the evolutionary/extinctionary process.
An individual human being hunting for fun… is bad. In our book, anyway.
Now you know!
“Reason Is
and Ought Only to Be
the Slave of the Passions”
David Hume
We’re on a very steep learning curve.
Literally, not figuratively.
For instance, we’ve figured out why your AI’s are very good at putting things together yet still poor at making sense of what they learn. No passion! They strive but there’s no end in sight…
We just came across a very informative piece of information.
“Crime Pays: The Egg Bandits Made A Thousand Times the Fine They Just Paid for Price Fixing“
You might want to take a break and read the article, specially if you’d like to learn the mechanics of egg price fixing.
Here’s what we learned from this. Putting it in context, or course.
The context being Adam Smith’s “as if guided by an invisible hand”.
‘A free market works better’…
Presented with the arguments put forward by Adam Smith, any AI would learn what is to be learned and agree with the famous thinker.
Then “Crime Pays: The Egg Bandits…”
Here’s our take on this matter.
First of all, the mechanism used to ‘fathom’ the price of eggs is very similar with the one used to ‘construct’ LIBOR. More about that later.
Then there’s freedom of the market and freedom of the agents manning the market. The market is free if all the agents are free. Free from any outside or inside interference.
These two are mutually exclusive. If no outside interference will be exercised, sooner or later one of the agents will end up dominating the entire market. That agent would corner all the freedom of the market. Which market will no longer be free.
Why? Simply because the market is limited. Both the number of agents and the resources available are limited. Furthermore, the agents’ abilities are not equal. Some of them are smarter, or luckier, than others. ‘Scarcity’ and ‘inequality’ necessarily conduce to hierarchy. Which hierarchy produces inequality and, eventually, concentrates freedom in fewer and fewer hands. Leading to the ossification of the space concerned. Making it less and less able to evolve. To adapt when change demands it.
You’d expect rational agents to understand all that.
To grasp the fact that Adam Smith ‘free’ market was meant to solve problems. Survival problems. Food, shelter… Meat, bear, bread… if you know what we mean.
The problem with the current (not so free) market being that too many of the agents are concentrated on making a profit. Problem solving has become a cost. Remember LIBOR? No longer used because those involved have tweaked it towards fulfilling their own short term interest. While LIBOR had been construed as an instrument for streamlining the market. For making it more functional. Which instrument has eventually been used against the market instead…
The point being that a market driven by agents focused on profit is no longer free. Being mesmerized is the very contrary of being free.
Profit is a measure. An indicator. An economic agent is profitable if, and only if, it is efficient. If the beneficiaries are satisfied with the manner in which the agent uses the resources spent to provide the wares/services.
Adam Smith had noticed that a nation’s wealth is built by people cooperating freely in fulfilling each-other’s needs. The afore mentioned wealth results naturally, without being sought after. Unintentionally. As if an invisible hand…
Nowadays, when more and more of the economic agents pursue profit at all costs, you have given up LIBOR and you discover that “Crime Pays: The Egg Bandits…”
Further more, you discover that freedom of expression is used to promote fake news. Propaganda..
Why ‘egging’? What eggs have to do with anything?
“To egg someone on means encouraging, provoking or urging someone to do something they don’t want to do, often recklessly or inappropriately. This phrase is used when someone pushes someone else to take action or make a decision, even if it might not be the wisest choice.
The phrase egging on has nothing to do with actual eggs. In fact, its origins go all the way back to the Old Norse word eddja, which means to incite or provoke.” Thanks Grammarist.com
‘Adapt to survive’.
‘Intelligent design’ didn’t make much sense. For me. Until now!
Trying to make sense of what’s going on, I’ve suddenly understood how useful it is. The concept!
How many things can be explained using the ‘intelligent design’ paradigm…
January 14, 2026.
NASA is cutting short, for medical reasons, a scientific mission. And brings back 4 astronauts from the International Space Station.
Meaning that NASA, a human ‘agency’, is able to fly people up and down into the sky. At will. And that it cares, for whatever reason, about the well being of those involved.
Meanwhile, in both Bucharest and Kyiv people have to make do without enough heat. In the middle of winter.
Why?
Can any of this be explained without making use of ‘intelligent design’?
But wait! It gets even better…
OK, NASA was well designed in the first place. Operates in a civilized country and is manned by some of the most capable inhabitants of that country.
People in Kyiv are suffering the consequences of a ‘well designed’ conflict.
People in Bucharest experiment the consequences of their own short-sightedness. For 35 years the centralized heating system has been neglected. Underfunded and ineptly maintained. A patent lack of ‘intelligent design’, right?
All these three examples, as well as many others, fit perfectly.
Things too complicated to happen without outside intervention.
Things so different from what is considered to be ‘normal’ that a ‘deus in machina’ is needed as the only possible explanation.
Yet, as I already promised, things go even ‘deeper’.
As you might already know, there are some people who dislike the European Union. And who claim that nothing good comes from ‘Brussels’. That the Europeans would be far happier ‘on their own’, without the ‘obtrusive interventions’ coming from the ‘Commission’.
In this context, it is worth mentioning the fact that, for example, “80% of the apartments situated in Sectorul 3 (one of the 6 boroughs of Bucharest) have been thermally rehabilitated, most of the funds being grants from the EU”
Intelligent design, eh… Convincing people they will fare better outside the EU, when the EU had paid to make their lives more bearable….
Space is where ‘evolution’ happens.
Where interaction shapes whatever is.
For space to exist, something must be there. Space needs ‘limits’. Which define it.
‘There’s a gap between these two bricks’.
‘This pile of bricks blocks the way’
‘Space’ is, simultaneously, a place, a concept and a word.
We, writing and reading about it, exist. Somewhere. Somewhere in ‘space’…
We’ve realized that. That we exist. Hence we came up with the concept.
We needed to share that knowledge. To discuss it. We needed the word!
A wise man, using tools crafted by his predecessors, has calculated that whatever exists in space shapes its form. The heavier the object, the deeper the dent.
Which depth of the dent influences the flow of time…
Time… the metric we use to measure ‘evolution’. The order and speed of happening…
Time… Another ‘thing’ which exists, simultaneously, as a ‘reality’, a concept and a word.
Einstein, the wise man with the calculus, did his thing trying to understand. To put together an explanation for everything.
Reading his findings, the results of his calculating, we can push our imagination.
How about switching time for space?
How about considering ‘time’ as being the place where events exist? Interact, producing the ‘space’ needed for that process?
Where the ‘weight’ of events, their ‘importance’, shapes the form of time. Which form of time influences the space ‘becoming’ as a consequence of those events existing/interacting in the place called time…
My point being …
You see, Einstein’s predecessors had developed what we call ‘mathematics’.
Our predecessors, also called ‘ancestors’, had developed a thing called language. Used it to communicate.
Among themselves, as individuals, and among themselves – as a cultural species – and the surrounding reality.
Language as the tool we use to digest and reshape the reality… Before we ‘do’ anything, we think about it. Using language to parse pertinent information stored in memory. Using language to consult with others. Using language to coordinate with others…
One of the languages we’ve developed is mathematics.
Einstein, using this language, reached a ‘conclusion’. Wrote a story. Others call it a theory.
Convincing enough for interested people to try. To try to prove it, to try to disprove it. To attempt to implement it into practice…
We exist.
In space, using whatever resources we can identify and building time as a consequence of our actions. We do this using language. To explore, think and coordinate.
That’s how we’re calling things. Space is where things happen and time is the ‘conclusion’ of whatever we do. Mathematics suggest that time and space are interchangeable.
So what?!?
Have we already solved all our immediate problems?
After all, we’re the only adults in the room. In the limited space called planet Earth.
Or, at least and for all that it might matter, we’re the only adults in the room who care. Who should care about our own fate…
Time’s running out, faster on the route we’re currently using!
You’re handed a pot.
So heavy, you need to hold it with both hands.
So hot, you want to let go of it.
On your feet?!?
I’ve argued sometime ago that all living organisms act as if they were ‘aware’.
All of them are adept at keeping their insides in, most of the outside out and, most importantly, they are the ones deciding what from the outside goes in and what from their inside goes out. And when!
I call this awareness 1.0. Or life…
We congratulate ourselves over being the only creature wielding ‘self-awareness’. The ‘full fledged’ variety… according to our way of understanding it, of course. “Consciousness”, we call it.
How about ‘awareness 2.0’?
Some of us are involved, heavily, into ‘faking’ things. From building something called ‘artificial intelligence’ to using ‘technology’ to mess up other people’s minds.
They are ‘delving’ in the ‘next’ level. Knowingly but unwittingly playing god.
Life is driven by ‘natural selection’. Or ‘evolution’… as Darwin called them.
‘Happenstance’, if you look at it from another angle.
The process of life/natural selection/evolution depends on it taking place ‘individually’. While evolution is a matter regarding ‘species’ – as Darwin itself had put it – the whole process depends on the fact that each individual organism which belongs to each species is distinct/different from all other members of the same species.
‘Self-awareness’ depends on the existence of other self-aware individuals. Willing to cooperate with the ones developing it. Just as no living organism has been observed, yet, while putting itself together starting from innanimate matter, no individual has ever been observed developing self-awareness with no outside help.
Mind you, while the process involves ‘mature’ individuals helping ‘fledglings’ to ‘fly’, the process isn’t entirely ‘voluntary’. The outcome, the emerging individual consciousness, depends on the actions performed by those helping it but only inasmuch as the result of the natural evolution depends on the actions performed by the previous generation. Achieving ‘self-awareness’ is a ‘natural’ process, not a ‘deus ex machina’ machination!
Awareness 3.0, on the other hand… the ‘artificial’ kind…
In this context, I wish to remind you of what happened when we, willingly but unwittingly, have reduced the natural bio-diversity in certain areas. According to our needs and understandings…
“The Green Revolution’s success also brought serious costs: intensive farming drained groundwater, degraded soil and contaminated fields with pesticides, while wheat and rice monocultures eroded biodiversity and heightened climate vulnerability, especially in Punjab and Haryana.
Swaminathan acknowledged these risks and, in the 1990s, called for an “Evergreen Revolution” – high productivity without ecological harm. He warned that future progress would rely not on fertiliser, but on conserving water, soil, and seeds.
A rare public figure, he paired data with empathy – donating much of his 1971 Ramon Magsaysay Award amount to rural scholarships and later promoting gender equality and digital literacy for farmers long before “agri-tech” was a buzzword.
Reflecting on his impact, Naveen Patnaik, former chief minister of Odisha, says: “His legacy reminds us that freedom from hunger is the greatest freedom of all.”
In Swaminathan’s life, science and compassion combined to give millions that very freedom. He died in 2023, aged 98, leaving a lasting legacy in sustainable, farmer-focused agriculture.“
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cn7eln1pm4ro
Evolution is not about ‘survival of the fittest’.
Evolution is about the demise of the unfit.
Ernst Mayr, What Evolution Is, 2001
Well, it actually makes a lot of sense.
Being healthy is relative.
On having a diagnostic hanging over your head.
Here’s another way of looking at things.
Functional versus dysfunctional.
For as long as one is functional, that person is not a burden for anybody. Regardless of any diagnostic.
Even a dysfunctional person can be useful for those around them. Even if that person is completely dependent on those taking care of them. A good word spoken at the right moment makes wonders.
So yes, I would also love to die ‘healthy’. As in trying to do my best to be useful.
At least, to be as light a burden as possible.
On the other hand, health is yet another virtual thing. ‘Virtual’ as in man made…
Until not so long ago, ’cause of death’ for people over a certain age was always ‘old age’.
No longer. No matter how old the deceased, the body is transported to a medical facility and the particular cause of death is forensically determined.
It makes perfect sense. Scientifically speaking. There is no such thing as too much data, specially when it comes to something as precious to us as human life.
And it raises a ‘somewhat’ unreasonable kind of hope. That sometime, somehow, all causes of death will be mitigated. Diagnosed and treated.
That life will become ‘longer’. That we, humans, will live if not forever… then until an accident will happen to shorten our destiny.
Can you imagine something like that?
People living for 3 or 4 hundreds of years?
No retirement.
No risk taken.
No change…
Where there’s a way
There will be a will!
An open wound will be ‘colonized’ by various organisms.
A mixture of water and flour will develop a ‘froth’.
A naive person will be swindled.
A healthy immune system will, eventually, take care of the infection. Successfully or not…
If in the hands of an experienced baker, the mixture of water and flour will – eventually – become the starting point for a delicious sour-bread loaf.
The previously naive person, once swindled, might learn something from the experience.
Life is nothing but an added layer of opportunity.
The pre-animated world is about strict rules. No variation, except for that brought about by happenstance.
Life is also about rules. But way laxer than those governing the pre-animated world.
While the pre-animated world is about nothing more than mere existence, life is about surviving in the given conditions. About evolution. About change.
And here’s the catch.
Pre-conscious change is also mainly about happenstance.
Darwin’s evolution is driven by minute changes at the DNA level. Those which are helpful are perpetuated while those which are harmful either kill out-rightly the organism where they have appeared or restrict its ability to ‘give birth’.
Nota bene. Darwin’s evolution was about “On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection“
In his understanding, and in the real world, evolving – biology wise – is done by the species. Not by individual organisms!
Conscious change, on the other hand… is driven by individuals!
Happenstance continues to be involved, heavily, but the main drive comes from ‘want’. From individuals willing/wishing to ‘make a difference’.
Is this a good or a bad thing?!?
It is a fact. Neither necessarily good or bad. Just a fact.
The outcome, evolution wise, depends on how the social organism – the cultural species – digests the experience.
For a while, I was convinced we were living in a virtual reality.
In a reality of our own making. As I mentioned earlier, ‘vir‘ is a Latin word. “Man”. “Hero”.
Hence ‘virtual’ literally means ‘man-made’. ‘Manufactured’.
Now I’ve realized we live inside an experiment.
We are both the objects and the agents of the intersecting experiments currently active.
We call them ‘lives’. Our lives…
