Legal Person:
An individual or group that is allowed by law to take legal action, as plaintiff or defendant. It may include natural persons as well as fictitious persons (such as corporations)
So, the derivation is personality defining person and person being eligible to be a legal person, subject to a body of law, expected to behave to those laws, and participatory in the process of the law. The body of law itself is rooted theoretically in a social contract, a negotiated quid pro quo of what I can do and can't do and what you can and can't do. The social contract, a baseline reference for rational social behavior, is only a useful fiction. The law is a living thing having many contributing factors including the possible.
Artificial intelligence, having a functional coherent volition regimen (CVR), and the machines it drives have no personality and therefore cannot be any person and definitely not a legal person. Like a dog, which also has a CVR but not a personality, it is subject to the regulation of law, especially in terms of liability, but not participatory in that process. It must be in the 'keeping' of a legal person, or owned as commonly construed, in order to rationalize liability and dangerous behavior and bring smart machines into social and legal accountability, very much as the law treats working animals.
It becomes essential on the force of this argument that we, as persons, agree on the logic that machines, as much as is economically possible, adapt to humans and not vice versa in order to empower humane social existence. We need to negotiate, as a social contract, the role of owner as that of empowered keeper, a steward of a specified domain, usually an object or enterprise, but including smart machines and real property.
On that basis, smart machines must then, logically and legally, be in the keeping of a legal person, licensed to such a bonded person, in order to effect the redress of liabilities for wrongful action. They may be subject to licensing fees for redress of the social cost of their employment, which is to say, just as a runaway horse's keeper is liable for consequent damage, so a robot's keeper is liable for consequent socioeconomic damage. A smart machine is not a simple drill press. It is closer to a mechanical draft horse.
Next blog: Personality, Player, and the Coherent Volition Regimen
Do Well and Be Well
Friday, October 19, 2018
Friday, October 12, 2018
Personality, Moral Agency, and the Coherent Volition Regimen
I am here involved in the search for differences and equivalents in human, animal, and machine psychology, to use the word loosely, in an effort to adequately place smart machines in a large context socioeconomic system. Being oriented in one's context is an essential starting point for the building of a sane mind and we cannot be sane in our employment of such machines until we can adequately place them in our context.
The topic of the first blog was personality as a special case of coherent volition regimen (CVR). Today's subject is moral agency as essentially human. What is moral agency? It is the deployment of personality into the world as directed by a codified value system, rational and irrational. A value system is the rules of the rules of a game of existence, material and social existence. However, not even humans can abstract the rules of the rules of a game from experience. According to Ludwig Wittgenstein, the logician, we can only estimate them. It appears that 'game', the rules of the rules, is a Kantian a priori.
Animals notoriously play games. They can figure out the rules of some games. They apparently have 'game' a priori also. However, they cannot estimate the rules of the rules of a game, much less approximately codify them into a somewhat rational value system. That is what makes moral agency an essentially human role.
Artificial intelligence can also figure out the rules of a game. It can, to certain and increasing extent, explain itself. We will have to wait and see whether it can codify the rules of the rules without an a priori construct. I am betting that it can't. I am betting on human exceptionalism. However, with estimates of 1000 IQ for neural networks currently in development, the odds are close to even.
Moral agency, like language, like the opposable thumb, like the large complex brain, like the penchant for technology, is an important component of the argument for human exceptionalism. Dogs have a CVR but they cannot codify a value system. An AI robot has a CVR but it probably cannot codify a value system. We are very likely alone in that.
Next blog: Personality, Legal Persons, and the Coherent Volition Regimen
Do Well and Be Well
The topic of the first blog was personality as a special case of coherent volition regimen (CVR). Today's subject is moral agency as essentially human. What is moral agency? It is the deployment of personality into the world as directed by a codified value system, rational and irrational. A value system is the rules of the rules of a game of existence, material and social existence. However, not even humans can abstract the rules of the rules of a game from experience. According to Ludwig Wittgenstein, the logician, we can only estimate them. It appears that 'game', the rules of the rules, is a Kantian a priori.
Animals notoriously play games. They can figure out the rules of some games. They apparently have 'game' a priori also. However, they cannot estimate the rules of the rules of a game, much less approximately codify them into a somewhat rational value system. That is what makes moral agency an essentially human role.
Artificial intelligence can also figure out the rules of a game. It can, to certain and increasing extent, explain itself. We will have to wait and see whether it can codify the rules of the rules without an a priori construct. I am betting that it can't. I am betting on human exceptionalism. However, with estimates of 1000 IQ for neural networks currently in development, the odds are close to even.
Moral agency, like language, like the opposable thumb, like the large complex brain, like the penchant for technology, is an important component of the argument for human exceptionalism. Dogs have a CVR but they cannot codify a value system. An AI robot has a CVR but it probably cannot codify a value system. We are very likely alone in that.
Next blog: Personality, Legal Persons, and the Coherent Volition Regimen
Do Well and Be Well
Sunday, October 7, 2018
A General Concept of Personality; the Coherent Volition Regimen
First, and make no mistake about my intent, personality is an essentially human phenomenon. Using the word properly, dogs do not have a personality. Chimps do not have a personality and, above all, machines do not have a personality. However, the consistent anthropomorphic mistakes made in reference to other creatures and even machines indicate that something like a personality is present. In this blog I am searching for that something.
What is a personality? Personality is what makes a human being a person, a special being capable of moral and legal behavior, capable of somewhat rational social existence. A personality is the specific attributes of a specific human being. In the Aristotelian construct we know as 'qua', a thing in the role of other, it is the defining characteristics of the human thing who assumes social roles in the larger construct of social existence. In a simple example, Rex, in the role of lawyer, makes his case to the jury. In the Aristotelian sense, water qua ice, Rex qua lawyer is essentially the same bundle of attributes differently configured. He has the same personality. The problem, then, is to rephrase an essentially human phenomenon so as to account for anthropomorphic errors. Let me try.
A personality is a type of 'coherent volition regimen' (CVR) composed of idiosyncratic manners of perception, cognition, volition, and action in concert with a feedback loop so that a consistent pattern of relatively unique cultivated behavior, reasonably adaptive over time, is reliably exhibited. That does describe a personality and a coherent volition regimen.
So, dogs do have a CVR but not a personality, although much more of it is wired into their brains than humans have a priori. A robot driven by machine learning also has a CVR but not a personality. They are not persons in the grand scheme of social existence which I examine in the next three blogs.
Next: Personality, Moral Agency, and Coherent Volition Regimens
Do Well and Be Well
What is a personality? Personality is what makes a human being a person, a special being capable of moral and legal behavior, capable of somewhat rational social existence. A personality is the specific attributes of a specific human being. In the Aristotelian construct we know as 'qua', a thing in the role of other, it is the defining characteristics of the human thing who assumes social roles in the larger construct of social existence. In a simple example, Rex, in the role of lawyer, makes his case to the jury. In the Aristotelian sense, water qua ice, Rex qua lawyer is essentially the same bundle of attributes differently configured. He has the same personality. The problem, then, is to rephrase an essentially human phenomenon so as to account for anthropomorphic errors. Let me try.
A personality is a type of 'coherent volition regimen' (CVR) composed of idiosyncratic manners of perception, cognition, volition, and action in concert with a feedback loop so that a consistent pattern of relatively unique cultivated behavior, reasonably adaptive over time, is reliably exhibited. That does describe a personality and a coherent volition regimen.
So, dogs do have a CVR but not a personality, although much more of it is wired into their brains than humans have a priori. A robot driven by machine learning also has a CVR but not a personality. They are not persons in the grand scheme of social existence which I examine in the next three blogs.
Next: Personality, Moral Agency, and Coherent Volition Regimens
Do Well and Be Well
Saturday, September 29, 2018
Notes on Volition and Property
I am a behaviorist when it comes to volition. The act and the will are undifferentiated. I do not know what you intend except by what you do.
When we lack a significant commonality with another human being and, in consequence, treat them in a cavalier fashion we are said to be alienated in the vulgar if not the clinical sense of the word. I would offer a closer descriptive term. I would say that without the relational threads that compose social existence, we 'objectify' other human beings. Which is to say, we treat them as though they lack significant volition, as a stone, as a tree, as an object. And we do so as a more capable being, as a human to a dog. The dynamic resembles a behavioral hypothesis to be proved or disproved.
While I am willing to leave the why of humans doing this to psychology, I am concerned about the philosophical consequences. 'Object', as it comes into the English language from the Greek, means to present to the mind. Apparently, by so doing, it also means to include in one's social sphere with all the categories of social hierarchy. We seem to have a prejudice wired into our brains, perhaps related to fight or flight, that anything not immediately identifiable with ourselves in reliable relationships, my dog, my neighbor, your wall, is an object lacking volition until it proves otherwise, a sort of analytical xenophobia.
Thus the human need to 'know' their universe resolves as a need to establish reliable relationships with everything in that universe and that ordering inclination resolves in terms of greater and lesser volition, both cognitive horsepower and physical capability. Property then resolves as a reliable relationship, not 'possession ' as the concept has evolved, but 'keeping' as the Ancient Greeks had it.
If one removes possession from the lexicon of property, robots present an interesting problem. Soon to have the cognitive horsepower of a smart dog and the capability of significant physical action, they resolve in a complex 'keeping' relationship such as one has with a dog. In such a relationship they are eligible for licensing as a means of establishing legal liabilities and responsibilities. And if subject to licensing, they are subject to licensing fees, a new rational and valuable revenue stream.
Do Well and Be Well
When we lack a significant commonality with another human being and, in consequence, treat them in a cavalier fashion we are said to be alienated in the vulgar if not the clinical sense of the word. I would offer a closer descriptive term. I would say that without the relational threads that compose social existence, we 'objectify' other human beings. Which is to say, we treat them as though they lack significant volition, as a stone, as a tree, as an object. And we do so as a more capable being, as a human to a dog. The dynamic resembles a behavioral hypothesis to be proved or disproved.
While I am willing to leave the why of humans doing this to psychology, I am concerned about the philosophical consequences. 'Object', as it comes into the English language from the Greek, means to present to the mind. Apparently, by so doing, it also means to include in one's social sphere with all the categories of social hierarchy. We seem to have a prejudice wired into our brains, perhaps related to fight or flight, that anything not immediately identifiable with ourselves in reliable relationships, my dog, my neighbor, your wall, is an object lacking volition until it proves otherwise, a sort of analytical xenophobia.
Thus the human need to 'know' their universe resolves as a need to establish reliable relationships with everything in that universe and that ordering inclination resolves in terms of greater and lesser volition, both cognitive horsepower and physical capability. Property then resolves as a reliable relationship, not 'possession ' as the concept has evolved, but 'keeping' as the Ancient Greeks had it.
If one removes possession from the lexicon of property, robots present an interesting problem. Soon to have the cognitive horsepower of a smart dog and the capability of significant physical action, they resolve in a complex 'keeping' relationship such as one has with a dog. In such a relationship they are eligible for licensing as a means of establishing legal liabilities and responsibilities. And if subject to licensing, they are subject to licensing fees, a new rational and valuable revenue stream.
Do Well and Be Well
Sunday, September 2, 2018
Property, Economic Goods, and Capital Goods: A Reflection
The taxonomy is classic, property, economic good, Capital Good. The importance of that categorical derivation is essential to economics. So, noticing a certain vague confusion concerning the nature of property, I decided, presumptuous I know, to reason into the subject a decent definition of it.
In what manner do we own anything in the philosophical sense, excluding custom or psychology and convention or law? To own something in the philosophical sense is, first, to possess more volition than it does and, second, to direct it in a reasonable fashion. I mean by volition, rational will composed of logical reflection and a consequent action. This is not the current sense of the word which is more tuned to the pragmatic, small 't', truth and consequent action, but it is the sense of the concept of property as it has come into being.
Philosophically, then, volition or the lack of it defines the category of property or what may be considered property. Law and psychology have placed serious constraints on that definition to the end of humane social existence. A stone has no volition. It must be directed if it is to 'do' anything. If I am directing the stone, say placing it into a wall, it is in my 'keeping' in the Ancient Greek sense of ownership by legitimate use. Past that 'keeping' as a philosophically sound position, property is all custom and convention. It is a dynamic concept changing from society to society and time to time.
Given this flux of meaning, how do we ascertain property in the economic sense? It is, in short, a matter of picking nits through specific custom and convention to variable conclusions. This is intolerable philosophically. So, let me continue to be cheeky and rethink the very idea of economic good.
First, significantly diverging from Marshall, the proper subject of economics is material existence, the art of being in time and space and all the objects and services that that entails but not the ideas and beliefs motivating the keeping of objects and the contracting of services, which I term custom or psychology. Psychology is psychology. Law is law. Economics is economics. Whatever valuable constructs psychology brings to the table of economic discussion, it is not germane to the subject of property, beings with volition 'keeping' 'objects' with less volition. Law is only a constraint upon the possible in economic analysis.
The concept of property as stated above is cut and dried and clear. Even as custom and convention muddy those waters so does technology. If I deploy a robot possessed of machine learning, reason, and significant mechanical movement, action, do I, in fact, own that robot or an I contracting with it for labor services? The AI currently in development creates a serious exception to robots as Capital Goods in the philosophical sense.
The question on the table of economics is not easy to answer. It is to define the point at which robots move from object to contractor, from Capital Good to Labor Good. Society waits for the answer.
Do Well and Be Well.
In what manner do we own anything in the philosophical sense, excluding custom or psychology and convention or law? To own something in the philosophical sense is, first, to possess more volition than it does and, second, to direct it in a reasonable fashion. I mean by volition, rational will composed of logical reflection and a consequent action. This is not the current sense of the word which is more tuned to the pragmatic, small 't', truth and consequent action, but it is the sense of the concept of property as it has come into being.
Philosophically, then, volition or the lack of it defines the category of property or what may be considered property. Law and psychology have placed serious constraints on that definition to the end of humane social existence. A stone has no volition. It must be directed if it is to 'do' anything. If I am directing the stone, say placing it into a wall, it is in my 'keeping' in the Ancient Greek sense of ownership by legitimate use. Past that 'keeping' as a philosophically sound position, property is all custom and convention. It is a dynamic concept changing from society to society and time to time.
Given this flux of meaning, how do we ascertain property in the economic sense? It is, in short, a matter of picking nits through specific custom and convention to variable conclusions. This is intolerable philosophically. So, let me continue to be cheeky and rethink the very idea of economic good.
First, significantly diverging from Marshall, the proper subject of economics is material existence, the art of being in time and space and all the objects and services that that entails but not the ideas and beliefs motivating the keeping of objects and the contracting of services, which I term custom or psychology. Psychology is psychology. Law is law. Economics is economics. Whatever valuable constructs psychology brings to the table of economic discussion, it is not germane to the subject of property, beings with volition 'keeping' 'objects' with less volition. Law is only a constraint upon the possible in economic analysis.
The concept of property as stated above is cut and dried and clear. Even as custom and convention muddy those waters so does technology. If I deploy a robot possessed of machine learning, reason, and significant mechanical movement, action, do I, in fact, own that robot or an I contracting with it for labor services? The AI currently in development creates a serious exception to robots as Capital Goods in the philosophical sense.
The question on the table of economics is not easy to answer. It is to define the point at which robots move from object to contractor, from Capital Good to Labor Good. Society waits for the answer.
Do Well and Be Well.
Sunday, May 20, 2018
The Necessity of Basic Income and Free Education
Our concept of the social responsibility for the economic well-being of individuals in our political economy is being disrupted. With the advent of globalism the very idea of separate political economies is under pressure. It is becoming clear that we must be both more generous in our societal amendments to income and education and more strict in our fiscal accountability, a neat trick I must admit.
The health of a political economy, production, distribution, and administration, is now and will be forever measured by the comparative value of its currency in relation to world currencies in a free market. There is no absolute measure of a healthy econom, only relative health. Basically, it works or it doesn't. This series of blogs is an attempt to systematically address the black box of the allocation of wealth for socioeconomic good in the hope of rationalizing that process to achieve economic and social accountability in the political economy.
By creating an equation that measures the effect of social spending on the 'goodness' of its currency, I have created a theoretical metric measuring the abstract health of a political economy in terms of its currency without comparative valuation. It is an index useful in judging the wisdom of expenditures beyond current economics so that the politically possible will be realized efficiently and responsibly.
What of the politically possible? It is becoming conventional wisdom that our consumerist capitalist political economy cannot maintain both growth and capital concentration without priming the pump of consumer spending. The idea of a basic income is not just to replace social welfare programs but to cut to the chase of putting more money in the hands of consumers to maintain growth and the concentration of capital. As I argued earlier, a licensing fee for automation would accomplish that in a fair bargain.
While the bar to education is coming down, online schools and access to texts and explanatory materials for the autodidact, the bar in the workplace for necessary paradigms and skill sets is going up. This happy coincidence also requires monetary support in order to work. We must provide it. There has never been a period of creative destruction quite like the one we face.
And that brings me to the subject of venture capital. It is not in the nature of venture capital, a mass industrial institution, to provide funds on a substantial risk/ moderate reward basis and the only mechanism we have in place to manage this intense creative destruction is venture capital. We need to create a public venture capital corporation to fund the small bespoke factories of the future and their economic infrastructure on a breakeven basis. Faced with the social default of meaningless existence, we must assert our better nature, our life force, and move ahead into a world of possibility and meaning.
Thank You Kind Readers,
Do Well and Be Well
The health of a political economy, production, distribution, and administration, is now and will be forever measured by the comparative value of its currency in relation to world currencies in a free market. There is no absolute measure of a healthy econom, only relative health. Basically, it works or it doesn't. This series of blogs is an attempt to systematically address the black box of the allocation of wealth for socioeconomic good in the hope of rationalizing that process to achieve economic and social accountability in the political economy.
By creating an equation that measures the effect of social spending on the 'goodness' of its currency, I have created a theoretical metric measuring the abstract health of a political economy in terms of its currency without comparative valuation. It is an index useful in judging the wisdom of expenditures beyond current economics so that the politically possible will be realized efficiently and responsibly.
What of the politically possible? It is becoming conventional wisdom that our consumerist capitalist political economy cannot maintain both growth and capital concentration without priming the pump of consumer spending. The idea of a basic income is not just to replace social welfare programs but to cut to the chase of putting more money in the hands of consumers to maintain growth and the concentration of capital. As I argued earlier, a licensing fee for automation would accomplish that in a fair bargain.
While the bar to education is coming down, online schools and access to texts and explanatory materials for the autodidact, the bar in the workplace for necessary paradigms and skill sets is going up. This happy coincidence also requires monetary support in order to work. We must provide it. There has never been a period of creative destruction quite like the one we face.
And that brings me to the subject of venture capital. It is not in the nature of venture capital, a mass industrial institution, to provide funds on a substantial risk/ moderate reward basis and the only mechanism we have in place to manage this intense creative destruction is venture capital. We need to create a public venture capital corporation to fund the small bespoke factories of the future and their economic infrastructure on a breakeven basis. Faced with the social default of meaningless existence, we must assert our better nature, our life force, and move ahead into a world of possibility and meaning.
Thank You Kind Readers,
Do Well and Be Well
Saturday, May 19, 2018
Bespoke Production: The Humane Resolution of Mass Industrialism
Blog 3
What I am calling Value Dilution Economics is based upon the observation that when one leverages their economy, whether with Keynesian mechanics or supply side mechanics, one either overcooks their economy or overcooks their society and dilutes either the value of money or the quality of their social existence. It is a very reliable and historically evident relationship. We are now moving into the Age of Productivity, a smart-machine enhanced manufacturing process and a smart-machine enhanced distribution system. What will that entail? First, some attempt must be made to envision what this economy will look like and, second, how can it be managed to a humane end? Certainly, unless one defines civilization as a death cult where machines do all the work and we lay around taking drugs and watching bad television, it must be managed. We must direct the machine and not the other way around. Certainly, it must be to a humane end. We must enhance social existence, nothing less makes any sense whatsoever.
While there are a number of areas of intense research and development, three stand out as pointing the way to a humane society.
Artificial intelligence has the capacity to enhance human existence, both economic and social, by handling the mundane, tedious, details and protocols that harass us and devour our time.
Derivative of artificial intelligence are robots, even autonomous, thinking robots, those fearsome, delightful inventions.
Third, there are 3D printers, now even capable of placing metal in computer defined patterns, that can build intricate objects. Using these three elements I envision a humane factory as follows:
The human factor- a clever resourceful person of some mechanical insight.
The AI factor- a production manager, a business manager, a marketing manager, all under the direction of the human factor.
The robot factor- assembly robots, AI driven, able to learn new tasks reasonably quickly, capable and flexible.
The 3D printer- industrial 3D machines that can make intricate parts to exacting specifications for robot assembly.
The criteria for a Bespoke factory is- can it make an assembly robot with minimal outside components? Can it make a 3D printer with minimal outside components? That autonomous capability is beyond mass industrialism. It is the mark of the Age of Productivity.
The scheme for the Age of Productivity is simple:
There are factories. There are virtual markets matching production and sales. There are brokers directing AI assistants staffing those markets. There are AI enhanced points of sale. There are human consumers whose income is enhanced by a basic income, whose free education is AI enhanced.
If POM + POS generate z amount of dollars minus reasonable net profit then expenditures on education, basic income, and government equal z amount of dollars minus net profit. Of course, that's theoretical. Deviations would be normal.
This gives an x=5 equation for Value Dilution Economics. That is:
(POM+POS)/(education+basic income+ government+2)= .4 as value dilution factor
The value dilution is high because the Age of Productivity reduces human access to value addition, to the simple creation of wealth, in POM and POS. It necessarily is weighted to social utility as:
(money in circulation)(.4)= 'goodness` of currency
Do Well and Be Well
Next Blog:
The Necessity of Basic Income and Free Education in the Age of Productivity
What I am calling Value Dilution Economics is based upon the observation that when one leverages their economy, whether with Keynesian mechanics or supply side mechanics, one either overcooks their economy or overcooks their society and dilutes either the value of money or the quality of their social existence. It is a very reliable and historically evident relationship. We are now moving into the Age of Productivity, a smart-machine enhanced manufacturing process and a smart-machine enhanced distribution system. What will that entail? First, some attempt must be made to envision what this economy will look like and, second, how can it be managed to a humane end? Certainly, unless one defines civilization as a death cult where machines do all the work and we lay around taking drugs and watching bad television, it must be managed. We must direct the machine and not the other way around. Certainly, it must be to a humane end. We must enhance social existence, nothing less makes any sense whatsoever.
While there are a number of areas of intense research and development, three stand out as pointing the way to a humane society.
Artificial intelligence has the capacity to enhance human existence, both economic and social, by handling the mundane, tedious, details and protocols that harass us and devour our time.
Derivative of artificial intelligence are robots, even autonomous, thinking robots, those fearsome, delightful inventions.
Third, there are 3D printers, now even capable of placing metal in computer defined patterns, that can build intricate objects. Using these three elements I envision a humane factory as follows:
The human factor- a clever resourceful person of some mechanical insight.
The AI factor- a production manager, a business manager, a marketing manager, all under the direction of the human factor.
The robot factor- assembly robots, AI driven, able to learn new tasks reasonably quickly, capable and flexible.
The 3D printer- industrial 3D machines that can make intricate parts to exacting specifications for robot assembly.
The criteria for a Bespoke factory is- can it make an assembly robot with minimal outside components? Can it make a 3D printer with minimal outside components? That autonomous capability is beyond mass industrialism. It is the mark of the Age of Productivity.
The scheme for the Age of Productivity is simple:
There are factories. There are virtual markets matching production and sales. There are brokers directing AI assistants staffing those markets. There are AI enhanced points of sale. There are human consumers whose income is enhanced by a basic income, whose free education is AI enhanced.
If POM + POS generate z amount of dollars minus reasonable net profit then expenditures on education, basic income, and government equal z amount of dollars minus net profit. Of course, that's theoretical. Deviations would be normal.
This gives an x=5 equation for Value Dilution Economics. That is:
(POM+POS)/(education+basic income+ government+2)= .4 as value dilution factor
The value dilution is high because the Age of Productivity reduces human access to value addition, to the simple creation of wealth, in POM and POS. It necessarily is weighted to social utility as:
(money in circulation)(.4)= 'goodness` of currency
Do Well and Be Well
Next Blog:
The Necessity of Basic Income and Free Education in the Age of Productivity
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