The singularity framing is really tough here, right? It comes from black hole physics. Essentially, at the event horizon, the way we know how to do physics stops working, and we rightly conclude that we can't currently say anything about the other side of the event horizon. It is not saying that nothing is occurring there. Matter, time, space, energy, whatever, that still is there (maaaaybe?) and is still undergoing something. It's just that we don't know what that is.
The same is true with using these tech singularity arguments. Like, in the age of superintelligence (if that happens), there will still be thing happening, the dawn will still come every day and the dusk will still too. It's just that we say our current ideas about that new day aren't that applicable to that new age (God, this sounds like a hippie).
However, unlike with black hole physics where we aren't even sure time can exist like we know, we are likely all going to be there in that new superintelligence age. We're still going to be making coffee and remembering bad cartoons from our youth. Like, the analogy to black hole physics breaks down here and maybe does a disservice to us. It's not a stark boundary at the Schwartzchild radius, it is a continuous thing, a messy thing, a volatile thing, and very importantly for the HN userbase, a thing that we control and have the choice to participate in.
We are not passively falling into the AGI world like the gnawing grinding gravity of a black hole.
I don't know, are we actually going to be making coffee in the case of the AGI singularity?
If you listen to the hardcore doomers, the misaligned superintelligence will curl a finger on its monkey paw and turn the planet into paperclips or something. If you listen to the most depraved boosters, AGI will remove the need for 99.999% of human workers and so we all get turned into biofuel to churn out more tokens.
Yes those are really extremely scenarios but that's how I think of the singularity. It's so alien that we cannot rule out anything.
The event horizon = singularity metaphor is a little off. There is no breakdown in the laws of physics at the event horizon. It's just that there is no light or matter that escapes from the event horizon. But the laws of physics don't break down until you reach the center of the black hole (which will happen in finite time after you cross the event horizon).
So there are a couple interesting and meaningful changes at the event horizon, but it's not a mathematical singularity.
This is a timeless entry. It's aimed at humanities, but every STEMy person I have shown it to agrees with it.
TLDR: Only get a PhD under 2 conditions:
1 - You are rich and otherwise very bored.
2 - If by Christmas in your first year in grad school, you are absolutely certain that you and your PI get along so well that nothing could hold you back from carrying that coffin at their funeral.
If either condition is not met stringently, you're wasting yours and everyone else's time.
2 is key. omg the number of students who are like "I want to be a professor" and can barely name a program they're targeting much less the people in it
When I first moved to LA, I remember thinking that it was so strange for all these people to have these really high end cars with like 700 HP in them, all to sit in traffic all day long. Like, why bother?
Then I sat in LA traffic all day long in early September in 100+ heat, and I looked over and saw some old bitty in a very nice Bentley. Not a drop of sweat on her, couldn't hear a horn honking if she tried, music was probably perfect quality, seat was probably massaging her the whole ride home.
That's when I finally got it. It's not the engine that mattered to her.
People into ultra-luxury car brands have a saying something like "The person who pulls up to a five star hotel in a Rolls Royce has a huge suite but the person who pulls up in a Bentley owns the hotel." :-)
Hey , just want to say thanks for doing such a hard job. I know I couldn't do that kind of work day in and day out. So thank you for doing the real hard work and making it all a better place for all of us.
I mean I get that the student broke the rules, at least per this anecdote. And what was done is dishonorable and the student deserves what is coming to the student.
But, I think it gets to a deeper issue with education.
Like, the cynic in me will say that the student learned a new tactic, one that got rewarded, and they are likely to repeat it over and over.
But the teacher, the hopeful part of me, the one that wants growth and striving, that part of me says that the student learned a lesson and is unlikely to repeat that hack. That they got dragged about, told a lot of very tough stories, saw the consequences, and then saw the light, and they will never do it again. And that experience taught them more than the class ever could about life - a much more valuable lesson in the end.
I hope that is what occurred. I think that's probably what the many admins told themself what would happen. I have worked with Princeton grads though, and it is much more likely that nothing of the sort occurred.
Most 'elite' grads think they pulled it over on the school, like they always have, that they were cleverer, somehow. That they 'won', when they really lost and learned worse than nothing, they learned the wrong thing. And then they get out into the real world and they get a successful bigjob and a nice little manageable coke habit and a not as manageable addiction or two. Then a spouse when that time comes and that other line says something no-one really wants, but not with a person they respect or that respects them. And by the time the second kid is done teething, the divorce is done and they think they are 'free' again. So they dive off a cliff in some azure water as the grandkids aren't well taken care of by expensive as hell help.
The ayahuasca vomit dries on the corner of their mouth as they check their actually-personal account for the half dozen 39th birthday wishes, they wonder where it all went wrong. They decide that it was others, not themselves, surely, that can't be true, because Dad was an asshole and Mom really wasn't ever 'there'-there when you think about it.
Because they are still trying to pull one over, to be cleverer, to be the 'good' one at whatever life is in their mind: A long fucking ladder covered in degrees and accolades and tears and jackasses. They live in the derivative.
So, look, don't be butthurt about a jackass undergrad that is too blind and treadmilled to ruin their own life.
But do be butthurt that the system is too fucking tired and old to really deeply care anymore about the young and not just hurting their 'future' - as if that could ever be measured by only a GPA.
> Because they are still trying to pull one over, to be cleverer, to be the 'good' one at whatever life is in their mind: A long fucking ladder covered in degrees and accolades and tears and jackasses. They live in the derivative.
OP here. I think you're attributing relatively sophisticated motivations to cheating. I've seen it at elite institutions and those that were far less prestigious.
I don't think the motivations for cheating are different in the Ivy League compared to any other institution.
If I can speculate on most motivations (no particular order), they would be:
- Failing would be an embarrassment (to me, my family, etc.) and I probably won't get caught.
- The work for this course is completely irrelevant to my career path. They're just making me jump through hoops. I'll work honestly after I cheat my way through this course.
- I'm pressed for time or other there are other external issues fucking up my life, so I don't have time to study. I could definitely understand the course material if <horrible issue in my life> weren't happening right now, so cheating isn't that big of a deal.
I think most of this is excuse-making, but the human mind is capable of magnificent self-deceptions.
A couple more points (not really addressed to you).
I agree with many other commenters who say that the school admins do not want you to drop problems like this at their doorstep. The prof. usually has to navigate these waters on his/her own.
I've told this story many times over the years and the most common response (also given here) is something like "I'm sure she's put her talents to great use on Wall Street". Gives you a sense of public perception of Wall Street--which I believe is largely accurate.
Ricks kinda beats a dead horse as he goes over and over again that non-violence is not unaggressive. It is typically quite militant when done well.
Non violence is a tactic, one that is typically better at achieving results than violence, as it tends to change the other side that is violent to adjust down to non violence as well. Like getting a drunk to be quieter by whispering to them (Note: that is a poor analogy).
Rick's book is just so very good and my poor internet comment can't possibly do it justice. He convinced me that the Civil Rights movement is so big because it gave the US a brand new tool in conflicts. It's not just violence or submission anymore.
First, it's hard to read, it needs a white background with black text and larger font.
Second, I know this is aimed at English speaking south Asian/Indian readers, so it's like stepping into a strange new world for me. I do a lot of story structure work and it's really fun to learn about this totally new universe of story structure. I wonder what the cross over will be like when you do 'western' film and media.
Third, have you tried translating these monosyllable words (ga, ma, pa, etc) into English? I know that it may not be really possible, as I think you're borrowing from Indian musical traditions that evolved totally separately. But it would be nice to a westerner (eventually!) to have something to work from to try to understand it all.
Fourth, it's really dense reading here too. You might want to have a way to tie this to something that the user has already seen as an intro. Just loading us up with data and reading is hard. Maybe try to dissect a film or show or book first? Like maybe have a little button there that we can use to click into something and see what is going on in like a really popular Bollywood film (I have no idea about south Asian media, sorry!)? Then walk the user through how you're dissecting that film. Maybe have some diagrams too.
Fifth, why do this? I'm interested in why you all wanted to do this project at all. Is there an 'About' page or something?
"Have you tried translating these monosyllable words (ga, ma, pa, etc) into English?"
There is a toggle on the top that goes from Swaras to Solfrege - which is the western notation for music.
There is a floating window now that shows what the mapping is between each register and the note, so that it becomes easier for folks to understand the correlation.
"I wonder what the cross over will be like when you do 'western' film and media."
All of the 405 films that you see there is Hollywood films. The list of the movies that constitute this data is listed here : http://arc.quanten.co/browse
"You might want to have a way to tie this to something that the user has already seen as an intro."
If you want to see how this breaks down, We've put out two sample content - one is Anora (which won the Oscar for Best picture last year) and in terms of TV Shows we have also mapped the Pilot episode of The Pitt (though the data used for the analysis was only films)
you can access the complete breakdown for the film and series here:
"I'm interested in why you all wanted to do this project at all."
I used to host a filmmakers club in my open floor office for a few years and used to listen to filmmakers talking about how they make films. While I come from the software world where everything can be A/B tested and there is a beta, test, feedback, iterate, release cycle, it felt odd that films lack any of it - and it is pretty much a hit or miss. And unlike software, you don't get a chance to re-release a film. And the lack of any meaningful audience data and structure data, felt like a huge gap - one that artistic sectors like music and culinary arts have quite well bridged, but the visual story telling world hasnt. That's where the wheels started to churn - that was almost 11 years ago.
Weiland is of the mode that how a character changes over a story is the plot.
She generally separates out the internal state of the protagonist from their external state.
She has 3 arc types: positive, flat, and negative.
Positive arcs are the typical Hero's journey (along with the other 5 archetypes of the title). The protagonist comes back changed in a good way and the story world is better in gestalt. Her concepts of the Truth, the Lie, the Ghost, the Need, and the Want are all intertwined here and are developed in other books and on her website. Positive change arc are 'comedies' in the classical Greek sense.
Flat arcs have the protagonist already in possession of the Truth and mostly have them affecting the story world with that Truth. Sounds boring, but they tend to be the most memorable characters for audiences.
Negative arcs come in 3 varieties that I won't bore you with. Generally, the protagonist rejects the Truth and embraces the Lie. These are 'tragedies' in the classical Greek sense.
Her overall structure is on a 11 beat framework that fits nicely with 3, 4, or 5 act structure (she has a lot to say about that).
I would highly recommend her work for deep dives into narrative and story structure.
I'm totally at a loss as to any of the content itself, or the method, or the results. And I've never really heard of any of the films either. But I'm just looking at it and I can 'smell' that there is something here. Man, I really hope this is not a hallucination or some AI slop.
I've been thinking about this for a few years now (used to host a filmmakers club in my office and listen to them talk about storytelling and the challenges) and have been working on this for more than 2 years now. There is a lot of work that has gone into this.
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