dirty data and the database problem

Who isn't underwhelmed by the claims made for 'big data'.

The two problems which will never go away are 1) proliferating databases

and 2) unclean data.

Unclean data is the biggest problem with any plan to compare and utilise data. It is a purely human problem. Bad inputting, bad collection, multiple sources- these are the reasons for unclean data.

Data has to be inputted to fit the database in question. Transfering it to a new database you find it needs a different format, a different setting. But you input it as best you can- and so dirty data gets into the system.

Next- the number of databases is always rising. This violates the first rule of databases which is: only one database for one set of data. Why? because one of the databases will be neglected and the data will soon 'not match'. The classic case of this is when you have two address lists and forget to update both with every change of address. PRETTY SOON you won't know which database is correct.

The number of databases is always rising. So data is always at risk. We will always have this problem...

space and time luxury

First space was the luxury, now it is time.

In Tokyo you knew the restaurant's price not from the menu (hidden) but from how crowded the place was. An empty restaurant with lots of space between tables would be very expensive.

Now time is the ultimate luxury. you can only get it by divesting yourself of things and information. The addiction to new information is just another kind of shopping. The person on a shopping spree has no time.

Travel distorts our sense of time; the pandemic has changed things but only by deforming, denting; the basic geometry and topgraphy of time mean it remains the ultimate luxury.

Notice the often unlined and bizarrely young looking faces of reformed heroin addicts (those who get out before it's too late); they have spent so long wasting time it has forgotten their appearance, passed them by looking for more obvious victims to age.

static and dynamic images of perfection

An ancient Greek statue is made with a static image of perfection in mind. Other more improvised artforms have a dynamic image of perfection.

why things remain as they are

Why things are as they are.

Imagine something boring and pointless like the opening of parliament.

But you are the big cheese.

You get a load of attention.

You get vip treatment.

You get the red carpet.

Suddenly it all makes sense.

When you’re a candidate voting makes total sense as it is about GETTING IN and not about doing stuff- which ordinary people realise you can't so they stay away.

Being part of a simulation is fun when you are a big cheese, or kinda fun, especially if you are starved of attention, or bad at getting it in everyday life as many politicans are, or you have some dents from childhood in your personality.

Being in a SIMULATION when you are well regarded is like being at a party- social fun and games. SO the games run on as they cater for people’s attention needs. But they have little real function. 

tipping point for games

In all games there are limiting rules and enabling rules.

The same exists for any human activity that mimics or substantially shares characteristics with a game.

The enabling rules are what make the game attractive- it is what you CAN do. In monopoly you can gain wealth, you can own properties and enjoy building hotels on those properties. The limiting rules make the game possible, but some may seem arbitrary- paying income tax, going directly to jail, not allowing more than one hotel per property.

The limiting rules mirror the enabling rules, almost like a negative mimics a positive print. But since a game must be fun to play the limiting rules are always kept to an absolute minimum.

There are two tipping points worth thinking about- when the limiting rules overwhelm or dominate the enabling rules to such an extent that the game becomes distorted. Or the obverse- when the enabling rules have no real limit and run away with themselves. In this case the game ceases to be a game and resembles a natural disaster, a growth, an explosion. The situation whereby the ever increasing nature of limiting rules begins to distort the enabling rules to create a new game also presents problems.  The game can only continue for so long, after that it will fracture and widespread cheating will tend to occur. The simulation of the game - played with widespread cheating - can continue for a long time, but the rewards are increasingly viewed with disdain (at first they can be compared with the real rewards but over time this is forgotten (though the cheaters will try to remind people of 'the past' more and more, this will backfire because the real differences (rather than merely the similarities which the cheaters want to display) will eventually become obvious). An alternative path is one in which cheating is ever more harshly punished, but that again results in terminal decline.

Another scenario is when the enabling laws become way more powerful than the limiting laws. A catastrophe is predicted but the limiting laws/rules lag too far behind. Or are applied to the wrong things because people are having so much fun with the extravagant enabling rules. Eventually the game loses interest since the key thing is the symbiosis of the enabling and limiting rules. Unless you start a new game it may prove very hard if not impossible to reset this symbiosis.

the way of love

Sufism is often known as the way of love. Christianity is known as the religion in which love is paramount. St Paul goes so far as to say that all virtues are nullified without love. So naturally love became a high value commodity. And high value things attract clippers and fakers just as much as coinage does. People 'clip' by telling themselves they are using love when they aren't. They fake when they use the word to get credit for themselves. So the word goes out of use with sincere people. But the problem then is that a whole generation(s) grow up not really knowing what that thing that was once called 'love' is.

It certainly isn't what is called love now- slushy romance/attachment/obsession.

In fact in pre-romance, pre-Christian times loves was a technical term about as emotive as the word attention is now. What you give attention to, grows. What you deprive of attention, withers. This is why Idries Shah refined and promoted the use of the word attention and didn't emphasise 'love' in his writing. If you use attention like a fertiliser, a technical tool for good in your life you will see the benefit.

weaponising technology

Every development in technology produces a new weapon. And history shows that if man gets a weapon he WILL use it.

Cars are wonderful but cars beget armoured vehicles.

Aeroplanes are like magic but planes drop bombs.

Nuclear power is marvellous but nuclear missiles are not.

Travel to the moon using a rocket that will threaten a country in another continent.

Even GM foods are used to threaten countries to get in line over their seed buying policies.

As Paul Virilio pointed out: invent a ship and you invent a shipwreck. Technology is not neutral; it not only leverages our ability to do harm it changes our behaviour. People in cars behave differently to people walking. But then people who run behave differently too. Perhaps it is just the speeding up that changes our behaviour; we weren't designed to go so fast.

Try and think of a technology that only benefits? Only basic ones surely; tables, cheese, making fire...but fire causes more destruction than almost anything. You can't get away from the double edges sword of technology.

Since this is very obvious we should be careful about technologies that are slow to reverse. 

Since we invent new technologies to fix errant old ones we should be aware that some damage is irreversable. Surely it makes sense to pursue only that tech which produces zero waste, or zero non-recyclable waste. At some point this should become a new convention of human activity.