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Humans began to rapidly accumulate technological knowledge 600k years ago

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Re: Humans began to rapidly accumulate technological knowledge 600k years ago

#201

Post by bloak »

sydbarrett74 wrote: post #68
cpncrunch wrote: post #60

News article says humans, but earliest human (homo sapiens) was around 300kya. The actual paper uses the word hominids rather than humans.

Can we all agree that 'human' should be defined as all members of the genus Homo ?

A single-word common name usually refers to a genus: "oak" is anything in Quercus, "wagtail" is anything in Motacilla and so on. That's not conclusive because there are plenty of exceptions, and "human" could easily qualify as a special case, but I don't see why "human" shouldn't be any member of Homo.

Re: Humans began to rapidly accumulate technological knowledge 600k years ago

#202

Post by feedforward »

Anotheroneagain wrote: post #112
alun wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You might find the essay "I, Pencil" by Leonard Read interesting. It's told from the point of view of a pencil who talks about the complexity of his own creation and all of the components involved in the process

It's just ideological drivel. People never had any difficulty to cooperate on such level.

One part of the drivel - he says don't let the government inhibit the invisible hand of the market that Adam Smith discusses in The Wealth of Nations. But in The Wealth of Nations, the invisible hand is the hand of the government inhibiting free trade between nations.

Re: Humans began to rapidly accumulate technological knowledge 600k years ago

#203

Post by Y_Y »

goatlover wrote: post #193
Y_Y wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> “Early humans” are still humans. I respectfully disagree, as started in my earlier post. It would be nice if human language worked like that, but it does not always. A "stone frigate" isn't a boat, an "iron lung" isn't a respiratory organ.

Those things aren't closely related biologically, so not a good analogy. "Human" isn't a precise biological category, it's just based on how the word is used, unlike homo sapiens. And some people, including scientists, use it to mean closely related species of hominids. Or hominids generally.

I agree? I didn't know close biological relation was a prerequisite for a good analogy, but I'll gladly oblige: vampire squid, velvet ant, slipper lobster, naked ape.

Re: Humans began to rapidly accumulate technological knowledge 600k years ago

#204

Post by mistermann »

MeImCounting wrote: post #93
mistermann wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where does "clearly" originate, and what does it refer to? Is "just" a synonym for "exactly" in this context?

"Clearly" refers to the obviousness or self-evidence of the statement. In this context, "just" means "similarly" or "in the same way," or ig "exactly" if you like. "Clearly" because exterior stimuli clearly influence both thinking and feeling, a concept supported by common experience and scientific understanding of human cognition and emotions.

How are all of these measured?

Re: Humans began to rapidly accumulate technological knowledge 600k years ago

#205

Post by BenFranklin100 »

davidmnoll wrote: post #48
BenFranklin100 wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We think in something Steven Pinker termed “mentalese”. It is distinct from human language. There are many examples of people who are cognitively normal, but either lack or have severely impaired language for various reasons. The distinction between reason and language is not widely appreciated, and is a main if not the primary reason people overestimate the abilities of LLMs.

Stating the mentalese hypothesis as fact is a bit tenuous

Sure, like most areas involving intelligence, much work is yet to be done. However, mentalese or the Language of Thought Hypothesis, occupies a much stronger position than the hypothesis that human language itself is our fundamental engine of reason, which is almost assuredly not true. This last fact has serious implications for the valuations of the majority of AI companies.

Re: Humans began to rapidly accumulate technological knowledge 600k years ago

#206

Post by Anotheroneagain »

feedforward wrote: post #202
Anotheroneagain wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's just ideological drivel. People never had any difficulty to cooperate on such level.

One part of the drivel - he says don't let the government inhibit the invisible hand of the market that Adam Smith discusses in The Wealth of Nations. But in The Wealth of Nations, the invisible hand is the hand of the government inhibiting free trade between nations.

It gets inhibited by the banking system anyway, you would at least have to adopt the Chicago plan (full reserve banking) to avoid it. As it is now, it's about who gets given the money, rather than anything similar to free market.

Re: Humans began to rapidly accumulate technological knowledge 600k years ago

#207

Post by 7thaccount »

vidarh wrote: post #134
7thaccount wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I find it hard to believe that they can't at all imagine what a tree looks like or imagine a face of a friend. I can understand some difficulty in a perfect image, but nothing?

I see nothing at all. I spent 45 years or so thinking people were talking metaphorically when talking about picturing things, because surely they couldn't actually see things while awake? I see things when I dream , so I know what it is like, and some years ago I had a single experience during meditation I've never managed to replicate, but otherwise nothing while awake.

So if I told you to close your eyes and think about your best friend's face....you cannot see ANYTHING?

Re: Humans began to rapidly accumulate technological knowledge 600k years ago

#208

Post by alickz »

alun wrote: post #72
johnnylambada wrote: post #27

It’s fascinating to think about the number of PUs (procedural units) it takes to make a modern tool. Something as simple as a modern hammer must number in the thousands and a mobile phone in the millions or billions.

You might find the essay "I, Pencil" by Leonard Read interesting. It's told from the point of view of a pencil who talks about the complexity of his own creation and all of the components involved in the process

Paraphrased here in 2 minutes by Milton Friedman: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=67tHtpac5ws

Re: Humans began to rapidly accumulate technological knowledge 600k years ago

#209

Post by BurningFrog »

MattPalmer1086 wrote: post #104
AlotOfReading wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The word human is commonly used for both modern humans and members of the entire genus Homo. Hominids is a more general superset that isn't strictly correct here. The term hominin is more appropriate in this context and what they actually use in the abstract. In my opinion though, "human" is the better word here for conveying the right mix of informality without implying the specific semantics of "Hominini sans Pan".

Is it? This is literally the first time Ive seen the word human applied to other hominids. I see many discussions about neanderthals and denisovians and so on. I have never seen them referred to as human.

Being 2.3% neanderthal, I'm... not sure what to think about it.

I think it's a case of the classic issue of trying to make sharp boundaries in a continuum. There just are no fully satisfying answers.

Re: Humans began to rapidly accumulate technological knowledge 600k years ago

#210

Post by BurningFrog »

acchow wrote: post #135
graemep wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is also reasonable to argue that they and we are subspecies of the same species not rather than separate species.

Of course we are not separate species since successful interbreeding did happen (when the populations interacted).

If you look closely at it, the concept of "species" is impossible to define exactly.

That's fine in general. Many words are like that. But it makes it flawed as a scientific concept.

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