You are what you read, even if you don't always remember it • Hacker News Board

Re: You are what you read, even if you don't always remember it

#91

Post by somenameforme » Thu, Apr 25, 2024, 5:20 AM UTC

nlitened wrote: post #88

somenameforme wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd challenge this with a thought experiment. Imagine we put a group of toddlers on an island and somehow give them knowledge of language (and enough sustenance to survive), but absolutely 0 external input otherwise. These people, as they grow, would gradually develop their own views, values, and perspectives. Do the exact same thing on another island and you'd get entirely different results! One can see this very th…

Giving a knowledge of a language is a _huge_ external input, intertwined with culture and life experience of the language teacher. And the smaller the external input we give to this group of toddler, the more they will resemble a violent pack of chimps in the end. Unlikely to develop their own values and perspectives.

Well, again - I think the isolated tribes are a good example. Two different examples are the Sentinelese and the Nukak. The former are actively hostile and violent to any outsiders, with very few exceptions, while the Nukak were completely peaceful and receptive since their first contact. These isolated tribes are largely a mirror into the past that give us a view of what humanity, in all of its diverse forms, might have looked like long ago.

In any case you also have an ancestor issue. The views, values, and so on that we take for granted simply did not exist at some point. Yet, here we are.

Re: You are what you read, even if you don't always remember it

#92

Post by samlhuillier » Thu, Apr 25, 2024, 5:20 AM UTC

I like to think of this like fine-tuning LLMs. When you fine-tune an LLM it doesn't pick up and memorise all of the training data. Rather it adjusts its weights/perspectives based on the content trained on/read.

Re: You are what you read, even if you don't always remember it

#93

Post by d0mine » Thu, Apr 25, 2024, 5:21 AM UTC

nlitened wrote: post #88

somenameforme wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd challenge this with a thought experiment. Imagine we put a group of toddlers on an island and somehow give them knowledge of language (and enough sustenance to survive), but absolutely 0 external input otherwise. These people, as they grow, would gradually develop their own views, values, and perspectives. Do the exact same thing on another island and you'd get entirely different results! One can see this very th…

Giving a knowledge of a language is a _huge_ external input, intertwined with culture and life experience of the language teacher. And the smaller the external input we give to this group of toddler, the more they will resemble a violent pack of chimps in the end. Unlikely to develop their own values and perspectives.

why "violent pack of chimps" instead of free-loving bonobos?

Re: You are what you read, even if you don't always remember it

#94

Post by porushpuri » Thu, Apr 25, 2024, 5:24 AM UTC

Guess that makes me part mysterious novel and part forgotten grocery list.

Re: You are what you read, even if you don't always remember it

#95

Post by jbverschoor » Thu, Apr 25, 2024, 5:28 AM UTC

Your body is what you eat and how you use it. Your mind is what you read, hear, and how you apply it.

Re: You are what you read, even if you don't always remember it

#96

Post by persnickety » Thu, Apr 25, 2024, 5:28 AM UTC

somenameforme wrote: post #74

y04nn wrote: post #25

Don't forget that you are the result of all the past sensory interactions that you experienced in your whole life, people you interacted with, books you read, advertisements, songs, news headlines, etc. Even if you think you don't remember them, at one point in your life it was processed by your brain and may have changed some posterior decisions you made, thus making you what you are now. Since I realized this, I am…

I'd challenge this with a thought experiment. Imagine we put a group of toddlers on an island and somehow give them knowledge of language (and enough sustenance to survive), but absolutely 0 external input otherwise. These people, as they grow, would gradually develop their own views, values, and perspectives. Do the exact same thing on another island and you'd get entirely different results! One can see this very th…

Small changes accumulate and lead to divergence.

Even if you could make the toddlers physically identical, you can't place them all in the same point in space and always see, hear, touch the same things.

Add randomness inherent in the current understanding of (quantum) physics and you'd need a strong convergence mechanism for your experiment to prove what you're saying.

Re: You are what you read, even if you don't always remember it

#97

Post by threatofrain » Thu, Apr 25, 2024, 5:33 AM UTC

piloto_ciego wrote: post #84

NERD_ALERT wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Free will hasn’t been proven. It’s up in the air how much is predetermined, and how to even define “free” in the context of free will. Even if we do have free will it’s still influenced to some degree by our biology.

My Diogenes answer would be to walk across the room and slap you: “if I didn’t chose to do it you cannot be angry at me.” That’s tongue and cheek sure, but the point I feel stands. Free will is certainly constrained, and our material and biological conditions do matter - there’s no amount I can will to make myself fly, but they are not necessarily as rigid of constraints as many would have you believe. We can overcom…

Not really. We don't need an answer to the question of free will to react to anything.

Re: You are what you read, even if you don't always remember it

#98

Post by huygens6363 » Thu, Apr 25, 2024, 5:35 AM UTC

piloto_ciego wrote: post #84

NERD_ALERT wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Free will hasn’t been proven. It’s up in the air how much is predetermined, and how to even define “free” in the context of free will. Even if we do have free will it’s still influenced to some degree by our biology.

My Diogenes answer would be to walk across the room and slap you: “if I didn’t chose to do it you cannot be angry at me.” That’s tongue and cheek sure, but the point I feel stands. Free will is certainly constrained, and our material and biological conditions do matter - there’s no amount I can will to make myself fly, but they are not necessarily as rigid of constraints as many would have you believe. We can overcom…

I’m not sure what the point is?

Why can’t I be angry? Surely you must see anger is and never will be rational (and also not free).

My anger at your slapping is as much determined as your slapping. I see no problem.

Free will arguments usually refer to these “justice requires freedom”-like arguments and I feel that’s not the case at all.

You can punish, you can feel anger. It’s all included. You cannot separate reactions, this one is free, this one is not. It’s a package deal.

Re: You are what you read, even if you don't always remember it

#99

Post by huygens6363 » Thu, Apr 25, 2024, 5:39 AM UTC

piloto_ciego wrote: post #85

ixsploit wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How are you experiencing free will? You have no idea what your next thought will be, nor can you control it. You have the opinion that you have free will, but that doesn't mean it's true.

You can’t choose what you will think about? How do you get through the day? Are you just frequently blindsided by random non-sequiturs that derail you for hours? I routinely chose things to think about or things to concentrate on. It’s not like all thoughts leap into my mind fully formed either. Hell, I edited this message before hitting reply.

And what process do you propose decided to think “I chose my thoughts and what to concentrate on”?

Surely you must see this is problems all the way down.

Re: You are what you read, even if you don't always remember it

#100

Post by skilled » Thu, Apr 25, 2024, 5:40 AM UTC

Zambyte wrote: post #20

al_borland wrote: post #12

>I cannot remember the books I've read any more than the meals I have eaten; even so, they have made me. I heard those quote for the first time about 4 years ago. I had often been a bit disappointed with myself for not taking more notes while reading, or reviewing what I read in a way where I could be one of those people to bring up quotes and concepts, citing back to the original source, with freakish accuracy. This…

I still encourage you to write though. Writing has seriously transformed the way that I think. I refer to my notes very often too.

Writing is a powerful learning tool also. I am often surprised that programming books and other learning materials don’t encourage writing and note taking, outside of an academic environment.

Just the act of writing an idea or a concept down helps to instil it in your mind, helping you either remember it or continue conceptualise the material you are learning about.

Reading, learning, doing and writing it all down is a powerful combination to accelerate learning, at least in my experience.