Might Friston’s “Free Energy” Markov Blankets = Liquid Membraning?

Karl Friston is looking to move forward describing the ‘free energy principle’, for example using the Friston/Ramstead/Babcock paper describing “all life in terms of Markov Blankets.” https://www.wired.com/story/karl-friston-free-energy-principle-artificial-intelligence/ and https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1571064517301409

Another term for Markov Blankets might be “Liquid Membraning”. I use Liquid Membraning in problem-solving; the cognitive process appears to be akin to stitching up data-points into Markov Blankets. “Cloud-Boxing” is my other term. The suggestion here is to shift away from the rigid/fixed/ossifying nature of the term “blankets” to a flow-state framework that evokes particulates and osmoticity? Could the term instead be Markov “fluidics,” “flow-states”, “nets”, “clouds”, and/or “meshes”?


“Liquid Membraning”* is the deep enveloping that evanescently correlates datasets during the gloaming phase of a sort; stitching up cloud-points out of constellations of clues; out of a search to find the deep root cause of a challenge/problem/issue/threat [ie. to go back to the deep root first principle]. This produces a key that when turned unlocks the entire problem. Computationally you could call it super-swarming. It has been suggested that creatives approach a task ‘more intuitively’, not analytically. I disagree; these skills could be characterized as hyperfast analytical tasking. Think of super-swarming as standing in a cloud. Where the cloud is a set of data points. Among these are the discrete clues that I notice. Among these are the patterns and there a route of questions to find, to follow, down to the root clue/key that unlocks everything. Another way to look at this is to say I see all the trees in the forest, and then notice the clue paths and patterns that lead me back to the one different tree.

* definition circa 25 Nov 2018


Image: “Internet map 1024” (cropped), By The Opte Project [CC BY 2.5], https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Internet_map_1024.jpg

Is Blockchain a realization of Asimov’s 3 Laws?

For Internet-era Humans:

Is Blockchain a realization of Asimov’s 3 Laws?
Blockchain’s Disruption to 2nd-Era Social Media
David Huer, Canada, January 2018

PDF Document Link [here]

This is an allusion to the idea of “Personal Presencein one of Asimov’s ‘Elijah Bailey/R. Daneel Olivaw‘ series of novels.

People in electronically-connected countries generally have 9 personas:During the Pre-internet Era (most of human culture), we had 5:

During the 2nd (Post-Chat Room) Social Media Era

Websites sold “First-4” Data to Advertisers. Inferring that First-4 Data gleans clues about Inferred-5. Using machine-learning and AI, now, to claim further inference success…

Where are you on the daily persona journey?

Who plays the instrument that manipulates your soul?

What’s worrisome for today’s social media giants?

Self-demonstrating that there is NO social contract/respect for deep privacy.
Not needing to make one, without the presence of an alternative.

Blockchain’s deep power? It is that alternative.

Blockchain systematically engineers true respect for deep privacy. A true deep social contract, a truthfully private exchange. Returning the First-4 to Asimovian Full-9 Personal Presence and Control The next iteration of the Internetosphere.

Until Blockchain gets disrupted.


Images:

(a) Fair use  via wikipedia: File:The-robots-of-dawn-doubleday-cover.jpg
(b) https://www.goodfreephotos.com/people/having-dinner-together-with-the-family.jpg.php CC0 / Public Domain License.
(c) http://maxpixel.freegreatpicture.com/Group-Businessmen-Confirming-Team-Feedback-2990424 : CC0 Public Domain, Free for commercial use. Link referral required;
(d) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Gray_vacuum_cleaner.svg CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication.
(e) https://pixabay.com/en/block-chain-personal-shaking-hands-2850276/ CC0 Creative Commons, Free for commercial use

 

“Physics advances one funeral at a time”

Here’s a fine article about astrophysics and scientific enquiry from Ethan Siegel: https://www.forbes.com/sites/startswithabang/2017/11/16/scientific-theories-never-die-not-unless-scientists-choose-to-let-them/#3ae8a4a24ccb

Mr. Siegel summarizes scientific investigation thus:

“When it comes to science, we like to think that we formulate hypotheses, test them, throw away the ones that fail to match, and continue testing the successful one until only the best ideas are left. But the truth is a lot muddier than that. The actual process of science involves tweaking your initial hypothesis over and over, trying to pull it in line with what we already know. It involves a leap-of-faith that when you formulate your theory correctly, the predictions it makes will be even more successful, across-the-board, than any other alternatives. And when things don’t work out, it doesn’t always necessitate abandoning your original hypothesis. In fact, most scientists don’t. In a very real way, scientific theories can never truly be killed. The only way they ever go away is if people stop working on them.”

Tweaking is the draw. And it truly is fun to discover when errors are in a hypothesis, as this offers the chance to discover and tweak further. This is happening with the 17th Century Atlantic Seaboard limestone smuggling hypothesis at my Cartoproblematica page. There’s an error in part of the geology. That’s neat. It means more discovery. And got me refocusing on another aspect of that same geology – narrowing the physical search area from ~1200 km2 down to 138 km2, and thence down to 4.5 km2.

  • – David Huer

Image: Churchyard – nige_hurll modified by D.Huer
https://pixabay.com/en/churchyard-gravestones-graveyard-2812800/
CC0 Creative Commons

 * Starts With A Bang “is dedicated to exploring the story of what we know about the Universe as well as how we know it, with a focus on physics, astronomy, and the scientific story that the Universe tells us about itself. Written by Ph.D. scientists and edited/created by astrophysicist Ethan Siegel, our goal is to share the joy, wonder and awe of scientific discovery.”