@MasterTimBlais It could still be a consciousness thread! Tbh I think you’re right. Very difficult to create a formal theory of consciousness that would say quantum fuzz has zero of the sort of interaction that creates consciousness, and there’s sure a lot of it… my q is, what’s the avg valence


@erikphoel Huge!


@erikphoel This is also frustrating when trying to justify new ways of doing things! Insiders often feel wary about shifts in the field (perhaps justifiably- academic status games are grim) and outsiders don’t see the need


@RokoMijic Confusion is likely to continue, and false-negatives and false-positives are going to increasingly pose problems. Btw just condensed my book into a paper (slightly narrower scope, but 25% the length) https://t.co/LxV5JNT6vU

@RokoMijic Confusion is likely to continue, and false-negatives and false-positives are going to increasingly pose problems. Btw just condensed my book into a paper (slightly narrower scope, but 25% the length) https://opentheory.net/2023/06/new-whitepaper-qualia-formalism-and-a-symmetry-theory-of-valence/


I’m increasingly thinking of longevity bioscience as less about living longer and more as a way to invest in creating and defending beauty — of which longevity is a nice side-effect. Arkadi has a nice writeup on longevity at Zuzalu:
https://t.co/eWgsjrkuCh

I’m increasingly thinking of longevity bioscience as less about living longer and more as a way to invest in creating and defending beauty — of which longevity is a nice side-effect. Arkadi has a nice writeup on longevity at Zuzalu:
https://www.lifespan.io/news/zuzalu-shining-city-on-the-black-mountain/


@danfaggella Unironically I think we need to sharpen our arguments about why humans should be preserved: why humanity is actually (1) good, (2) rare, (3) strong. I think we are all three, but if we can’t explain and demonstrate why we should prepare to not be treated as such


@danfaggella Super important, although I grant it may not make sense to slow down in order to study these things; I think that merely produces power consolidation under a dysfunctional system. The button that actually works is “put personal energy into research on things that matter”


@RokoMijic @danfaggella If you had a billion dollars, 10 years, and the mandate to define the human axiological seed, do you have a sense of how you’d approach things?


@MWCvitkovic What’s your take?


@MWCvitkovic Makes perfect sense


Super excited about this. Prophetic is a project with enormously ambitious (correctly ambitious!) scope, and @EricWollberg is a fantastic entrepreneur. https://t.co/mCuML5VzbR

Super excited about this. Prophetic is a project with enormously ambitious (correctly ambitious!) scope, and @EricWollberg is a fantastic entrepreneur. https://x.com/PropheticAI/status/1671906332058824705


@Meaningness It feels difficult to square the apparent structure in phenomenology with the claim that this structure cannot be formalized. The claim could end up being correct, but does not seem obvious or simple


@Meaningness @RokoMijic @creitve The same critique could have been applied to electromagnetism in the 1600s - that it was a fools’ errand to try to formalize. But it turns out there was crisp formal structure to be found. Not all such hunts for formal structure bear fruit but some do


@DelPierr111 Nice find!


@nosilverv I suspect this happens automatically as the number of ways a given logical structure can map to reality collapses to 1


@pwlot Looking forward to it! I really enjoy your takes


@gwern @PradyuPrasad Norms around hypercerts / impact certificates could go a long way


@moskov @vincentweisser This is great! My suggestion would be to add another two columns for (1) the technical/legal infrastructure required to support each proposal, and (2) plausible second-order effects from having that infrastructure available.


@eigenrobot @orthonormalist Have seen some signatures of culture war stuff, my sense is that running into said tangle is among the many things that can derail creatives


@alpharivelino Chart out a plausible research paradigm into consciousness; clarify what pain/pleasure are; understand emotional updating+psychedelics; reverse-engineer meditation; become enlightened & help others become so. I’m happy with my efforts on the first 3, still working on the latter 2


@mihir021 @alpharivelino Thank you! Yes, I have some new work coming out- hopefully this summer, although I don’t want to overpromise in that respect. Appreciate the kind words.


@mihir021 @alpharivelino Two great threads of research I’m aware of are @RomeoStevens76 and @nickcammarata ‘s writings on tanha


@nickcammarata @dukkhafactory The Buddha was actually pretty selective in terms of claims; a lot of the supernatural stuff comes in from later monastic scholarship. Also- seems like an interesting question for AI


@MrAde94 Lots! It’s a property that’s highly degraded by default- remove 10% of the noise and it would substantially improve. Many sources of noise to choose from. Longer term there could be neurotech that functions as an ‘emotional coprocessor’


Machine consciousness should be among the most important technical problems of our time, but “consciousness discourse” is subtly anchored in ingroup/outgroup distinctions. If something is ingroup it can probably feel; if it’s outgroup it can’t.


This is wrong but not irrational. Selective observations about fundamental ontology & moral patienthood are routinely used as a wedge to break rival coordination mechanisms. Efforts to more confidently arbitrate these Qs are often seen as politically aggressive — because they are


This doesn’t bode well for our ability to navigate false-negatives (creating conscious beings but not treating them as such) and false-positives (creating non-conscious beings that use motifs we associate with personhood to argue for their rights). Both paths lead to dark places


But to keep things in perspective the world is likely much weirder than we think it is: “Common sense is incoherent in matters of metaphysics” as @eschwitz notes (common sense is an aggregate of globally incoherent local heuristics). Likely many things we think we know but don’t


@eschwitz As @elonmusk is wont to say, “the most entertaining outcome is the most likely.” I can say I think the stakes for consciousness over the next few decades are *different* than commonly assumed


@RomeoLupascu I like it! What are your next steps on developing the theory?

I really like the frame of dual-aspect monism for consciousness, which seems compatible with your approach: https://t.co/hdEh8dzXXj

@RomeoLupascu I like it! What are your next steps on developing the theory?

I really like the frame of dual-aspect monism for consciousness, which seems compatible with your approach: https://opentheory.net/2019/06/taking-monism-seriously/


If you could ask the universe one y/n question about its fundamental laws, what would you ask?

Rules: question returns “1” if the answer is yes, or “0” if the answer is no or if your question wasn’t precise enough


@DelPierr111 Nice, I like that a lot


@cube_flipper Interesting! Would love to hear more


@cube_flipper I dig it- and I like the idea of posting a ton of cool consciousness thought experiments on Twitter for GPT5 to trawl through


@ataiiam Right — imagine there are people working on Maxwell’s equations, except the equations are for moral patienthood and determine who has the moral high ground in society. There’s no way that doesn’t get messy. Distinct set of challenges that skew political


RT @jwmares: Moral courage is the rarest thing in the universe


@ataiiam I’m more agnostic on digital computer binding and think it’s entirely possible substantial consciousness arises today- but that’s weakly held. https://t.co/Hh2p9RHYbG

@ataiiam I’m more agnostic on digital computer binding and think it’s entirely possible substantial consciousness arises today- but that’s weakly held. https://x.com/johnsonmxe/status/1667085037328580609


@MrAde94 I suspect metabolic issues and damage from pathogens (which everyone has). Post-Covid complications are distressingly common and offer a vector that’s likely not specific to Covid; that’s actually optimistic in that there’s potentially a lot of room for improvement


@UrgentWonder It’s a great question. A couple of related Qs,
- What valuable lineages in this space are dying?
- How are nervous systems statistically different today in ways that matter to the path than they were 20,100,1000 years ago?


@davidad Very cool; I’m also bullish on the constitutional approach. Wrote up some thoughts on ‘what makes a good AI constitution’ here: https://t.co/SCUldxhjHF

@davidad Very cool; I’m also bullish on the constitutional approach. Wrote up some thoughts on ‘what makes a good AI constitution’ here: https://opentheory.net/2023/05/ai-x-crypto-x-constitutions/


RT @OshanJarow: Deep within my fly-over of the theories-of-consciousness-constellation in tomorrow's @voxdotcom Future Perfect newsletter,…


@MrAde94 Frankly it could be (there are enough improvements within reach) but the problem is coordination. We’re not presently on track for a biosingularity and lack the infrastructure and freedom of action necessary for anything drastic and fast. But some things possible+effective still


@MrAde94 I’ve strong expectations around certain approaches to genetics and neurotech. The neurotech frame I like the most is the “emotional coprocessor” frame — just as computers had sound cards, gpus, etc if we can figure out the brain’s APIs we can build specialized hardware


@QiaochuYuan @nickcammarata @David_Lawson_10 This thread feels strange and unfair to Nick fwiw. I hope you reconsider.


@eigenrobot Unironically


@neurovium Hi Nima, fascinating paper! Curious whether you have expectations for how the thesis will present in additional forms of imaging. For related literature I really enjoyed https://t.co/H0ZP1NhNmo and would (self)-recommend STV as a thesis in this space https://t.co/1rNw0zdjp4

@neurovium Hi Nima, fascinating paper! Curious whether you have expectations for how the thesis will present in additional forms of imaging. For related literature I really enjoyed https://royalsociety.org/blog/2023/04/symmetries-mind-and-life/ and would (self)-recommend STV as a thesis in this space https://opentheory.net/Qualia_Formalism_and_a_Symmetry_Theory_of_Valence.pdf


@michael_nielsen Not a particle physicist but the particle would immediately decay into subparticles and form a gravitationally-significant X-ray cone vaporizing & imparting incredible heat&momentum, which would lead to a huge shock wave and explosion. Basically Earth would shatter->blow up->melt


@michael_nielsen The gravitational effect, the momentum, and the heat of the x-ray cone would all lead to different sorts of destruction. Most of the energy would probably(?) simply pass through the earth and carry some of the earth with it into space (sorta how the moon was formed, x100000000)


@cube_flipper I think the skeletal muscle vs smooth muscle tension distinction is significant; imo both can be used for medium term memory but I expect smooth muscle is more broadly used for computational purposes


@cube_flipper Part of this is access (it’s everywhere), part reliable geometry (vasomotion is the same everywhere, and part the fact that smooth muscle can latch (which imo is used extensively to freeze hyperpriors)


@cube_flipper Latches take between seconds to minutes to form (loosely — it’s not well categorized); they’ll commonly be in organs as well as vascular channels. If you notice a tightness in some organ, try to relax and put your awareness there, notice the unlatching (which will take ~1m)


@cube_flipper Carrying a heavy backpack will also lead to smooth muscle latches around the body, putting it down will allow the latches to release


Yesterday I posted Principles of Vasocomputation, a piece of deep research describing the vasomuscular system as a crucial regulatory mechanism for neural activity, and the product of about a year’s worth of thinking. 🧵 https://t.co/vzGxzCUWuY

Yesterday I posted Principles of Vasocomputation, a piece of deep research describing the vasomuscular system as a crucial regulatory mechanism for neural activity, and the product of about a year’s worth of thinking. 🧵 https://opentheory.net/2023/07/principles-of-vasocomputation-a-unification-of-buddhist-phenomenology-active-inference-and-physical-reflex-part-i/


I’ll aim to make a proper thread later, but would be glad to take questions here.


@BenAnderson421 Thank you!


@br___ian Thank you! I do think processing is lost in organ loss, less in limb loss. Not a binary thing, just makes the emotional drives associated with that area weaker — a loss of connection to an organ is a loss of a “resonance reservoir” of that specific type


@br___ian About the vasodilators — I actually think psychedelics will uniformly have a large effect on the vascular system, and we’ll come to think of an important component of their effects as primarily vascular. The vasodilators used in medicine may on avg be weaker /qua/ vasodilators


@nickcammarata I feel like demonstrating to yourself you can log off and you don’t owe people anything and everything will be fine is probably good- I understand about attention


RT @adamsafron: 1/3
The centrality of "heart clenching" as both a source of suffering and powerful integrative objective function(al?) ring…


@paul__is__here There’s a bit of an odd situation with muscles that the relaxed state is the metabolically expensive state- this is where rigor mortis comes from (and a corpse immersed in ATP will relax). Energy shortages will lead to contraction+latches as cells reduce expenses


@wooblewoof @bierlingm This is great, also the links after each section of the piece are intended to offer context


@polyparadigm @selentelechia I do suspect that fMRI’s BOLD response might be a reasonable way to infer vascular latches (vs neural activity). I also suspect EEG might actually be measuring coherent vasomotion moreso than populations of neurons firing! Interesting methodological Qs


@bierlingm @wooblewoof Thank you! And would be glad to discuss on a space sometime soon- lmk


@bierlingm @wooblewoof Will think about how to phrase my ambition with this work. Generally my work aims for nuanced unification


RT @Plinz: @s_r_constantin @selentelechia otoh the major breakthroughs in ai happened after the leading labs became aware of the problems w…


@JudiciaIreview @paul__is__here My advice would basically track paleo advice: whole foods, good oils, exercise


@s_r_constantin @selentelechia Part of the thesis (which I cut for length) is that the latch-bridge mechanism of smooth muscle cells is amazingly undercharacterized. Hope to turn my notes on this into a post at some point


@br___ian After discussing this topic with a friend I wouldn’t call psychedelics vasodilators (perhaps the opposite) but I would call them highly vasoactive and likely to drive the clench-release cycle (and this releases latches)


RT @burny_tech: May all beings unlatch their sticky muscle latches of unskillful active inference priors 🙏


@k3baah Putting attention into an area requires bloodflow (fuel) to the neurons, which is blocked by the latches. This makes it hard to put your attention there, but if you succeed the latches will open to allow the blood. Gradual thing


@allgebrah The total load distribution will include both skeletal muscle and smooth muscle


@allgebrah Yeah I expect some pretty redundant systems, although energy access is not the easiest thing to build redundancy for


@allgebrah Oh I don’t think smooth muscles can effectively lock skeletal muscles, but the load stress on the body likely triggers some smooth muscle tension (which is in a lot of places)


@NickADobos Thanks Nick!


@PashaKamyshev I like Sarno’s work a lot; I’d suspect some deep parallels between repressed emotions and frozen hyperpriors. The effectiveness of massage really depends on who does it and whether they feel or just go through the motions imo


@akatzzzzz Thanks- could you describe what you mean by constructed emotions?

Fully ontologically naturalistic; I just think Buddhist phenomenology is really good and useful for mystery selection


@akatzzzzz @LFeldmanBarrett I see Barrett’s theory as entirely compatible with the vasocomputation frame: the body can essentially program itself through selective vascular clamps, which reduce the space of possible resonances/behaviors/interpretations. We call what remains an “emotion”.


@sxysun1 @augmenthack Great to see you working on this! I think your ideas around on-chain commitment devices for AIs are really promising


@yacineMTB @AsherSoryl A big issue for computationalism is inherent ambiguity around which Turing-level computations a physical system is performing. If there is no objective fact of the matter, there’d be no objective fact which qualia the system is experiencing


@NickADobos Good question; vascular clamps and latches have a slightly different signature than classical tanha but I’d tend to lump them together since I think they’re all from the same reflex (“cringe into safety” - which can be skillful or unskillful)


@NickADobos If I’m right, tanha is a signature of compression pressure being applied locally — “tilting the pinball machine” to knock uncertain/ambivalent sensations into specificity. Happens with both senses and thoughts


Absolutely fantastic talk by Nagel and a very careful description of “why monism”. I suspect monism might be a more generative assumption than most philosophers realize, because it offers hard constraints and thematic inspirations from physics: https://t.co/hdEh8dzXXj https://t.co/UTr5eqJhnW

Absolutely fantastic talk by Nagel and a very careful description of “why monism”. I suspect monism might be a more generative assumption than most philosophers realize, because it offers hard constraints and thematic inspirations from physics: https://opentheory.net/2019/06/taking-monism-seriously/ https://x.com/davidchalmers42/status/1680939489760354309


@burny_tech Different strategies for reducing different stages of clench (vasomotion, clamp, latch) although computational unity in what they’re all trying to do for us


@Plinz is a national treasure https://t.co/wJ4zhd1GQI

@Plinz is a national treasure https://x.com/Plinz/status/1679833326620639233


RT @EricWollberg: This is epistemological metaphysics.

Honored to have @johnsonmxe onboard as as Advisor to @PropheticAI.


@wolftivy @FlippinAlbanian These really stood out. Great stuff https://t.co/ql8S1jR7qb

@wolftivy @FlippinAlbanian These really stood out. Great stuff https://x.com/johnsonmxe/status/1681146501999763456/photo/1


@EvilVizier @wolftivy I suspect our visual system has built-in harmony/resonance/jiggle detectors. Hypothesis: what we find attractive is high resonance, low dissonance. Fat in usual places good but too much or in the wrong places is high dissonance. SSRIs/xenoestrogens change the fat distribution alg


@Mark_Solms That was a beautiful lecture, and introduced me to your work. It also seems to me you’re on the right track. I’d like to offer the Symmetry Theory of Valence as something consistent with both your approach and Nagel’s neutral monism: https://t.co/LxV5JNT6vU

@Mark_Solms That was a beautiful lecture, and introduced me to your work. It also seems to me you’re on the right track. I’d like to offer the Symmetry Theory of Valence as something consistent with both your approach and Nagel’s neutral monism: https://opentheory.net/2023/06/new-whitepaper-qualia-formalism-and-a-symmetry-theory-of-valence/


@pwlot IIT is significantly better than its’ critics give it credit for — much of the criticism is of the sort “this violates my intuitions about consciousness”. This is a reasonable thing to consider but hardly sufficient as a take-down…


One of the most important projects today is making the outside-view case that humans are good, noble, strong, rare: that we are worthy stewards of the universe & worth preserving.

I think this is true. But if we can’t make this case to future AIs, why should they keep us around? https://t.co/hCquAFRhRu

One of the most important projects today is making the outside-view case that humans are good, noble, strong, rare: that we are worthy stewards of the universe & worth preserving.

I think this is true. But if we can’t make this case to future AIs, why should they keep us around? https://x.com/RokoMijic/status/1681318699603722245


@hastuc_dibtux Right — I think all points on that continuum have merits, I want to see a faction arise that wants to improve the human condition without changing human nature. Like, treat the dynamical space of the enlightened human mind as a good (robust, antifragile) solution for [1/2]


@hastuc_dibtux navigating multi-level selection, but improve the fundamental building blocks of our self-organizing systems. Clean up the junk, get rid of a bunch of viruses, improve our metabolisms, find a reliable on-ramp for enlightenment. Find all the free lunches, but respect the core


@hastuc_dibtux “May the best system win” but we’re not really on the path for even trying for a platonic biosingularity. Gotta fill out the roster of possible amazing futures if we want the best to win


@QiaochuYuan @meekaale @MasterTimBlais I always thought it’d be cool to try conversations where A could hear B and C but not D, B could hear A and D but not C, C could hear A and D, etc. A+C would talk, then B+D. So each person would be supercoordinating with their invisible partner to keep conversation flowing


@hastuc_dibtux I’m a big believer in metabolism as important for progress on the path; retreat centers cooking with e.g. soy/canola/safflower/rice bran/corn oil etc feels weird


@hastuc_dibtux You’ve read my latest? https://t.co/J5T7087loa

@hastuc_dibtux You’ve read my latest? https://x.com/johnsonmxe/status/1679463930605740037


@hastuc_dibtux Very cool, will think about this


@Rares82 @hastuc_dibtux Yes; imo good areas of mindspace are rare and classical Buddhist enlightenment seems really valuable to understand for several reasons. I see theories of identity as modes of coordination. The ones good enough to persist often follow a paper-rock-scissors pattern


@PashaKamyshev Hard to keep a lid on AI long-term without breaking humanity. Imo the steelman of Page is we’re trapped in nihilism/technocapital and need to get out somehow. But agreed that anti-human-ism is not the way


@exrhizo That’s a great video


@garbledgarfield @AskYatharth @relic_radiation @AgotaDubi @embryosophy Fascia and non-VSMC smooth muscle seem super important — I focused on VSMCs due to (1) neural access, and (2) the latch-bridge mechanism. Fascia have good access and can contract but can’t latch (like smooth muscle can)


@mattx1b After thinking about @AskYatharth ’s excellent comments on fascia, I added the following: https://t.co/RX00RWrttH

@mattx1b After thinking about @AskYatharth ’s excellent comments on fascia, I added the following: https://x.com/johnsonmxe/status/1681751093452107778/photo/1


RT @awjuliani: Thanks to @InferenceActive for hosting @adamsafron, @johnsonmxe, and myself on the livestream today. It was a pleasure to ch…


@cube_flipper @johnsimerlink Worth trying and seeing what fine details of phenomenology are different with different sorts of release! I strongly believe fascia are super important for distributed stress minimization. Current puzzle is what resolution they’re computationally relevant at, if that makes sense https://t.co/VmKJ8pjm6N

@cube_flipper @johnsimerlink Worth trying and seeing what fine details of phenomenology are different with different sorts of release! I strongly believe fascia are super important for distributed stress minimization. Current puzzle is what resolution they’re computationally relevant at, if that makes sense https://x.com/johnsonmxe/status/1681876659518025728/photo/1


@cube_flipper @johnsimerlink I may have to adjust my estimate that bodily suffering is primarily a latch phenomena; what sort of experience is the process of myofacial release? And what do you have the feeling that myofacial tension is trying to do for you? https://t.co/maF6BQSsIf

@cube_flipper @johnsimerlink I may have to adjust my estimate that bodily suffering is primarily a latch phenomena; what sort of experience is the process of myofacial release? And what do you have the feeling that myofacial tension is trying to do for you? https://x.com/johnsonmxe/status/1681877966970650627/photo/1


RT @adamsafron: 3/12
Loved thinking with @johnsonmxe about how individuals can host multiple resonating free energy landscapes, and of all…


RT @adamsafron: 11/12
I'm currently working on expanding this into a much larger effort dedicated to developing human(ely)-aligned A(G)I, w…


@cube_flipper @johnsimerlink I think there’s going to be big value in understanding the different ways skeletal muscle, fascia, and smooth muscle can each hold tension. I definitely believe the somatic view that organs can be “open” or “closed”; what is the relative contribution of latches vs fascia here?


@cube_flipper @johnsimerlink I think of this as fumbling around trying to find the key that has locked a hyperprior in place. Looking for the class of evidence that would allow the body to release that prediction/stabilization. Often it’s trustworthy&perceptive touch with a certain intention


@cube_flipper @johnsimerlink In my experience, there are different tiers of latch-complex stickiness: some you can whittle away, some regenerate if you don’t dissolve all of it, some are recreated by upstream factors


@cube_flipper @johnsimerlink I think of the vasomuscular system as an anxious (often neurotic) busybody control freak that tries to keep the lazy “Buddha nature” nervous system productive & out of trouble by forcefully puppeting it. Often this is counterproductive, but it does mean well…


@cube_flipper @johnsimerlink Fwiw in those situations I wonder what the tension is trying to do for me, and also look at my metabolic situation. I feel much better, and latches release much more easily, when I eat high protein & specifically avoid bad oils (imo most are bad; coconut and olive are good)


@dendricide @nopranablem I think that’s basically what general anesthesia does


@dendricide @nopranablem That’s basically my read! I left some hints in the piece, may expand later


@exGenesis Just have a felt-sense reason to build and it’ll happen. Imo the sweetest feeling in the world is having a place to put your love where it’ll feed good things and you get something back. Imo nihilism is often tacitly fear of getting resource-pumped


@SurenVynn I think that’s fair, although the literature speaks of revision vs confirmation; here’s a quote from https://t.co/j4WHYgh1fg https://t.co/7KFCFWKPcy

@SurenVynn I think that’s fair, although the literature speaks of revision vs confirmation; here’s a quote from https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S014976342100261X https://x.com/johnsonmxe/status/1682019511518769152/photo/1


@tszzl Humans are awesome, but I suspect part of coexistence with AIs will involve clarifying why https://t.co/OdnjRuBsAX

@tszzl Humans are awesome, but I suspect part of coexistence with AIs will involve clarifying why https://x.com/johnsonmxe/status/1681329833404506115


@exGenesis We all suffer from undertraining and plasticity loss on some topics


@exGenesis Incoming RLGF


@tszzl I worry that human values are hard to pin down


@SilverVVulpes Many aspects of the Covid storyline inform my model of what’s likely to happen with AI


@AlignmentGuts @PrinceVogel My sense is there’s likely a general protocol/channel for getting people reinstated, although it’s probably not a thing to speak about publicly. I’m out of the loop, but happy to put energy into the process for @nosilverv if someone knows what it is


RT @johnsonmxe: @SilverVVulpes Many aspects of the Covid storyline inform my model of what’s likely to happen with AI


@ataiiam @SilverVVulpes We think there’s a vast array of civilizational menu options for navigating challenges, but most of these buttons don’t work. When we try to press the button for “Manhattan Project for AI Alignment” we’ll get power consolidation for political incumbents


@ataiiam @SilverVVulpes I’m relatively optimistic about AI alignment, but that’s mostly due to AI plausibly being alignable by default, belief in the seriousness of leading AI companies, and belief that consciousness research is an untapped source of clarity around value and minds


@garybasin Tokens for whichever blockchain settlement or compute layer AI agents end up defaulting to is probably the closest thing today


@gfodor Understanding consciousness seems important in order to navigate both false positives and false negatives, as well as situate what human values are. There’s also potential for bolstering alignment research as we understand what minds are and how humans have aligned themselves


@gfodor Will self-recommend this paper if you haven’t read it already: https://t.co/LxV5JNT6vU

@gfodor Will self-recommend this paper if you haven’t read it already: https://opentheory.net/2023/06/new-whitepaper-qualia-formalism-and-a-symmetry-theory-of-valence/


@tegmark AI Safety: The Physics Challenge was a very powerful piece. Perhaps the best way to assuage the themes you describe is to write a followup. Research over (or in addition to) political advocacy https://t.co/OdnjRuBsAX

@tegmark AI Safety: The Physics Challenge was a very powerful piece. Perhaps the best way to assuage the themes you describe is to write a followup. Research over (or in addition to) political advocacy https://x.com/johnsonmxe/status/1681329833404506115


@markooooooo @JakeOrthwein Happy to meet!


@selentelechia Your family is like a Kwisatz Haderach program but for poasting


@maxhodak_ @RCarhartHarris It was the first theory to explicitly nail the correct goal (build a formalism for an experience)


@maxhodak_ @RCarhartHarris If understanding the formal structure of consciousness is not the proper goal of consciousness research, what is?


@maxhodak_ @RCarhartHarris I don’t like the equations either, but it was the first ToC I know of that explicitly identified the goal of formalism, and attempted to infer the structure of information within the formalism. Prior theories didn’t assume formalism (GWT) or are silent (Orch OR)


@maxhodak_ @RCarhartHarris IIT causal math aside, David Balduzzi’s paper is worth skimming for how he suggests sensory manifolds are blended in the formalism https://t.co/bhSLbbZilS

@maxhodak_ @RCarhartHarris IIT causal math aside, David Balduzzi’s paper is worth skimming for how he suggests sensory manifolds are blended in the formalism https://journals.plos.org/ploscompbiol/article?id=10.1371/journal.pcbi.1000462


@maxhodak_ @RCarhartHarris The Symmetry Theory of Valence offers a strong prediction within IIT, or any ToC which generates a formalism. Imo the correct approach is to split the problem in half, “generate the formalism” vs “predict things within the formalism”


@maxhodak_ @RCarhartHarris New (Spring 2023) STV paper, with updated predictions: https://t.co/LxV5JNT6vU

@maxhodak_ @RCarhartHarris New (Spring 2023) STV paper, with updated predictions: https://opentheory.net/2023/06/new-whitepaper-qualia-formalism-and-a-symmetry-theory-of-valence/


@RichDecibels Interested!


@exGenesis The original social purpose of language — “Grug had to eat common food because bear smelled it and would have attacked village! Not Grug fault food gone”


@exGenesis Wordcels as literal magicians that make themselves and others hallucinate false sensory perceptions. Bet that was fun until our memetic immune systems started to come on-line


@exGenesis https://t.co/oWRjHO03aT


@wolftivy I think of this as part of a “barbell strategy” — hope for the best, prepare for the worst. Both biosingularity and mystification approaches gain plausibility under collapse scenarios. Tacit timelines are pretty crazy these days though


@aryehazan Imo similar to a satisfactory explanation of electromagnetism: a compact logical structure which has demonstrable and unbounded predictive power in its domain. Concretely: a method of analyzing a system and returning a mathematical formalism of ‘what it feels like’ to be that sys https://t.co/whntuENHfn

@aryehazan Imo similar to a satisfactory explanation of electromagnetism: a compact logical structure which has demonstrable and unbounded predictive power in its domain. Concretely: a method of analyzing a system and returning a mathematical formalism of ‘what it feels like’ to be that sys https://x.com/johnsonmxe/status/1684068131562483713/photo/1


@aryehazan Graphic from https://t.co/bPds7OZOP6 ; condensed version (without the graphic) here: https://t.co/LxV5JNT6vU

Imo the crucial lens is formalism

@aryehazan Graphic from https://opentheory.net/PrincipiaQualia.pdf ; condensed version (without the graphic) here: https://opentheory.net/2023/06/new-whitepaper-qualia-formalism-and-a-symmetry-theory-of-valence/

Imo the crucial lens is formalism


@erikphoel Congrats Erik! Really looking forward to reading.


@PrinceVogel @tszzl Am thinking of genius as (1) having a very wide/deep/beautiful storm of possibilities, and (2) reaching into this storm and plucking out something beautiful. If I’m right this is literally a muscle impulse. But muscle performance changes as you age https://t.co/vzGxzCUWuY

@PrinceVogel @tszzl Am thinking of genius as (1) having a very wide/deep/beautiful storm of possibilities, and (2) reaching into this storm and plucking out something beautiful. If I’m right this is literally a muscle impulse. But muscle performance changes as you age https://opentheory.net/2023/07/principles-of-vasocomputation-a-unification-of-buddhist-phenomenology-active-inference-and-physical-reflex-part-i/


@PrinceVogel @tszzl Yeah and more geniuses fade from metabolic insufficiency than anything else imo


@tszzl There’s reason to believe there’ll be architectural lock-in as AI systems advance. Not all AI architectures will have equally favorable projections into the qualia domain. Figuring out what’s “good” here before it becomes unsteerable feels significant! https://t.co/LxV5JNT6vU

@tszzl There’s reason to believe there’ll be architectural lock-in as AI systems advance. Not all AI architectures will have equally favorable projections into the qualia domain. Figuring out what’s “good” here before it becomes unsteerable feels significant! https://opentheory.net/2023/06/new-whitepaper-qualia-formalism-and-a-symmetry-theory-of-valence/


@basileSportif What comes to mind: integration affordances, reification leaks, nondeterministic hyperstructures, hyperstructure affordances, rich crypto libraries, unified execution environment, hidden state, noncomposable blobs, mirroring problem, state shard collection, OSI/POSIX for crypto


@SMcfarnell I expect the dual-aspect monism approach to bear a lot of fruit in the future; monism offers much more constraints and generative heuristics than many realize: https://t.co/hdEh8dzXXj

Local field potential / EMF theories are also very promising imo, and tie in with monism

@SMcfarnell I expect the dual-aspect monism approach to bear a lot of fruit in the future; monism offers much more constraints and generative heuristics than many realize: https://opentheory.net/2019/06/taking-monism-seriously/

Local field potential / EMF theories are also very promising imo, and tie in with monism


@frideswyth Hope you feel better soon! My weird supplement rec is nattokinase, dissolves both microclots and spike protein


Crab tanha https://t.co/0Mqzepazxp


RT @itsjaneflowers: i'm totally confident that having skimmed a few blog posts on neural annealing i have a pretty intuitive grasp on the w…


@ataiiam @SMcfarnell I think that’s well stated; if pressed I’d be amenable to idealism (qualia are more real than physics, which when we get down to it are mere regularities in our qualia that we get useful compression from treating as ‘real’). I’d want to preserve the assumption of structural xfer


RT @BringRivalBack: Hi there,

If you're reading this, it's probably because you know Rival Voices. He is an active member of TPOT who has…


@BringRivalBack @michaelcurzi @blisstweeting @nosilverv @exGenesis @PrinceVogel @the_greatabyss @ketyrii @yashkaf @m_ashcroft @TylerAlterman @mechanical_monk @AIActorCritic @liminal_warmth @gptbrooke @shinywynaut @dpinksh @KThorssen @RafaelEnder1 @1stMarsColonist @midwitmagnet @eigenrobot @AndrewCurran_ @_ali_taylor @astridwilde1 @pmarca @psychocarto @bluueflowerrr @elonmusk Apparently Rival got an email that his account was reinstated, and to reset his password if there was any problems (didn’t work). Glitch thesis is extremely likely imo

Tyler is finishing a book, slow to reply


@BringRivalBack @michaelcurzi @blisstweeting @nosilverv @exGenesis @PrinceVogel @the_greatabyss @ketyrii @yashkaf @m_ashcroft @TylerAlterman @mechanical_monk @AIActorCritic @liminal_warmth @gptbrooke @shinywynaut @dpinksh @KThorssen @RafaelEnder1 @1stMarsColonist @midwitmagnet @eigenrobot @AndrewCurran_ @_ali_taylor @astridwilde1 @pmarca @psychocarto @bluueflowerrr @elonmusk Within the last few days


@michaelcurzi @BringRivalBack @blisstweeting @nosilverv @exGenesis @PrinceVogel @the_greatabyss @ketyrii @yashkaf @m_ashcroft @TylerAlterman @mechanical_monk @AIActorCritic @liminal_warmth @gptbrooke @shinywynaut @dpinksh @KThorssen @RafaelEnder1 @1stMarsColonist @midwitmagnet @eigenrobot @AndrewCurran_ @_ali_taylor @astridwilde1 @pmarca @psychocarto @bluueflowerrr @elonmusk I’m told he tried on both phone and computer, and — I quote — “you can answer curzi that i updated the phone app for it and now i have a stupid X and i hate him for it 😂”


With respect to all parties involved, I was not consulted about either of the two claims about my work here and I do not endorse this messaging. https://t.co/wqgQdAJ7nh

With respect to all parties involved, I was not consulted about either of the two claims about my work here and I do not endorse this messaging. https://x.com/algekalipso/status/1683328649506828288


@selentelechia I suspect magnesium is important for smoothness in muscle impulse (less tanha!) and for releasing smooth muscle latches. Need to do a little more research here


@42irrationalist @selentelechia My top 2 would be magnesium and nattokinase —

NK is a broad spectrum fibrolytic sourced from natto beans — it dissolves blood clots, arterial plaque, and covid spike protein lol. Good for circulation, good for protecting against microclots, good against microspasms. Strong rec


RT @RomeoStevens76: If we invert the format of the four noble truths some of the implications are clearer to me:
1. Value exists (direct sh…


@markooooooo Of all those ingredients I’d literally only trust the water and salt


@DrYohanJohn @powerfultakes and I have a running discussion that if we are in a simulation, there could be computational constraints on local density of incompressible information. A simple way to enforce this would be varying the local laws of physics. I guess this could be a weird x-risk


@PhaentGames @markooooooo I tend to keep things simple and very close to paleo — my diet is mostly meat, fruit, fish, eggs; sometimes nuts/vegetables/rice. No additives (v important). I also endorse keto. Supplements: magnesium, nattokinase, creatine, collagen, vitamin D. May make a thread later!


@PhaentGames @markooooooo Everybody’s going to be a little different and it’s worth listening to what your body actually thinks about various foods. But imo a lot of eating well is not eating bad stuff, and a lot of that is being ready to say “this is not food. I’d rather fast”


@ataiiam @DrYohanJohn @powerfultakes Not directly on topic but I wonder about this https://t.co/N7T1ni8LGm

@ataiiam @DrYohanJohn @powerfultakes Not directly on topic but I wonder about this https://x.com/johnsonmxe/status/1686780345436323861/photo/1


@AsherSoryl @PhaentGames @markooooooo Diet science is rather schizophrenic, with multiple sets of incompatible science. I speak from the perspective of having been ill and becoming better through cutting particular allergens and processed foods. I think to some degree this will generalize, but I’d tend to suggest …


@AsherSoryl @PhaentGames @markooooooo that if you get to enough of a low-noise state that you can listen to your body, it’ll outperform external advice. As to lab grown meat, I think it’s honestly complicated. Done well it would be awesome; there are also numerous failure modes. In particular I worry about nutrient..


@AsherSoryl @PhaentGames @markooooooo balance, especially given the aforementioned multiple bodies of literature inseparable from ideology. Centralization, contamination, and economic culture war are also concerns.  Personally, I’m putting my energy into the third path, knowledge. How happy is a cow? A chicken? —


@AsherSoryl @PhaentGames @markooooooo I hope my research can help shed light on these questions under various conditions, and I hope my research isn’t used for culture war (if consciousness research starts to code as ‘red’ or ‘blue’ the field will be in big trouble)


@RafaelEnder1 @BringRivalBack @nosilverv Yes


@made_in_cosmos You’ve never truly felt love until you’ve adopted a baby duck. Would strongly recommend but be ready to clean a lot https://t.co/cpebWUPQyn

@made_in_cosmos You’ve never truly felt love until you’ve adopted a baby duck. Would strongly recommend but be ready to clean a lot https://x.com/johnsonmxe/status/1687048506970718208/photo/1


@Rares82 @AsherSoryl @PhaentGames @markooooooo Fwiw my expectations are that animals have qualia, infants have qualia, current computers likely (>50%) have qualia, black holes & other megastructures have qualia. Children likely have denser qualia than adults- “phenomenological middle age” might be 15yo https://t.co/36gXJJPeoH

@Rares82 @AsherSoryl @PhaentGames @markooooooo Fwiw my expectations are that animals have qualia, infants have qualia, current computers likely (>50%) have qualia, black holes & other megastructures have qualia. Children likely have denser qualia than adults- “phenomenological middle age” might be 15yo https://opentheory.net/2019/09/whats-out-there/


@Rares82 @AsherSoryl @PhaentGames @markooooooo I tend to be very careful with attaching “oughts” to these expectations though, for a lot of reasons


@cube_flipper @markooooooo @42irrationalist @selentelechia @Grimhood Some smooth muscle latches are there for a reason


@Rares82 @AsherSoryl @PhaentGames @markooooooo Kind of! I prefer the monism frame to the epiphenomenalism frame- https://t.co/hdEh8dzXXj

@Rares82 @AsherSoryl @PhaentGames @markooooooo Kind of! I prefer the monism frame to the epiphenomenalism frame- https://opentheory.net/2019/06/taking-monism-seriously/


@meekaale @made_in_cosmos @the_aiju Thank you! Link here: https://t.co/WcaRfrtpaq

@meekaale @made_in_cosmos @the_aiju Thank you! Link here: https://opentheory.net/2023/05/autism-as-a-disorder-of-dimensionality/


@BringRivalBack @made_in_cosmos @nosilverv @Support +1


Computationalism can be framed as the thesis that all Turing-complete systems are also “qualia-complete” — that any Turing machine can generate any qualia.

If we can decisively prove this true or false, we can infer much about the future, and avert much conflict.


RT @danfaggella: @johnsonmxe Inarguably one of the most important questions of the century (though we have much less than 80yrs to solve it…


@cube_flipper @phantom_opus I suspect people have more smooth muscle in more places than they realize; also the way the body’s distributed stress minimization system offloads across different types of muscles means skeletal muscles can “feel” latched, whereas the actual latches are in smooth muscles


@cube_flipper @phantom_opus Would be worth comparing beta blockers vs ketamine vs magnesium in terms of smooth muscle relaxation


@TylerMo41608321 This question is a natural faultline in future politics wherein each side will believe that literally everything of value is at stake.


@Anand_Venkatram @cube_flipper @phantom_opus Yeah! Lots of feedback loops, and also lots of variation in bloodflow. Currently working on tracking down more details about the latch bridge mechanism specifically, and also threshold effects with neurons and bloodflow — how easily they fall into stereotyped activity patterns


@danfaggella You’re going to have the premier AI realpolitik + cosmism + transhumanism podcast, I love to see it


@PrinceVogel I think the “nervous system” just likes to vibe; the vasomuscular system is the hypervigilant micromanaging twitchy worrier


@PrinceVogel Nervous system 🤝 vasomuscular system

Blaming the adrenal glands


@Palomar_qfwfq @PrinceVogel I’d guess (relatively benign) viruses would quickly emerge out of the human transposon environment;

It is notable how a dwindling population can sometimes explode in numbers once it gets small enough that all its usual pathogens/parasites die out


@insideNiMA @robinhanson If this is the chosen path for dealing with AIs in the long term, I suspect it will be the chosen path for dealing with fellow humans also


RT @evanbfish: Finally got through the latest from @johnsonmxe , favorite whitepaper of the month

https://t.co/mZL7XCqsen

RT @evanbfish: Finally got through the latest from @johnsonmxe , favorite whitepaper of the month

https://opentheory.net/Qualia_Formalism_and_a_Symmetry_Theory_of_Valence.pdf


@RomeoStevens76 @BecomingCritter I’m sorta thinking of schizo as an excessive tolerance for ambivalence (undertuned vasomotion reflex & historical lack of RLVF), and stimulants as substances that increase VSMC twitchiness against ambiguity/ambivalence

Nicotine as boosting “readiness to tilt the pinball machine”


@davidad I’ve framed autism as a disorder of excess network dimensionality, and lead poisoning would plausibly reduce effective ND- feels plausible to me. But imo ASD symptoms worsen with metabolic deficits- effects of lead on metabolism? Also tagging @crimkadid https://t.co/WcaRfrtpaq

@davidad I’ve framed autism as a disorder of excess network dimensionality, and lead poisoning would plausibly reduce effective ND- feels plausible to me. But imo ASD symptoms worsen with metabolic deficits- effects of lead on metabolism? Also tagging @crimkadid https://opentheory.net/2023/05/autism-as-a-disorder-of-dimensionality/


@KanizsaBoundary @RomeoStevens76 @BecomingCritter @steve47285 That’s a great reference, and I think I agree with the implication


@InquilineKea @RomeoStevens76 @BecomingCritter I suspect computationally interesting drugs influence the conditions of local vasoconstriction, and that the purpose of local vasoconstriction (vasomotion) is to apply more local compression pressure. Weak (-) correlation between HRV and twitchiness https://t.co/vzGxzCUWuY

@InquilineKea @RomeoStevens76 @BecomingCritter I suspect computationally interesting drugs influence the conditions of local vasoconstriction, and that the purpose of local vasoconstriction (vasomotion) is to apply more local compression pressure. Weak (-) correlation between HRV and twitchiness https://opentheory.net/2023/07/principles-of-vasocomputation-a-unification-of-buddhist-phenomenology-active-inference-and-physical-reflex-part-i/


@InquilineKea @RomeoStevens76 @BecomingCritter Perhaps “the role of the vasomotion twitch reflex at the computational level is best described as applying compression pressure on local neural patterns” instead of “the purpose of local vasoconstriction” might be more accurate


@InquilineKea @RomeoStevens76 @BecomingCritter A vasomotion twitch can be thought of as “shaking the pinball machine” — an attempt to collapse an ambiguous sensory pattern to something more definite. Can be a skillful or unskillful process

RLVF = Reinforcement Learning by Vascular Feedback


Fantastic in-depth thread from @mmjukic of Bismarck Analysis about the rise of Japanese cultural exports. Very curious what similar things might be happening today https://t.co/fymFXshXcV

Fantastic in-depth thread from @mmjukic of Bismarck Analysis about the rise of Japanese cultural exports. Very curious what similar things might be happening today https://x.com/mmjukic/status/1688928525058023424


@PrinceVogel Have some notes on this; was thinking pure glucose + DMSO for latch release, but definitely some toxicity concerns. Highly local microinjection of ketamine might do similar things in theory


@PrinceVogel Mostly looking at local glucotoxicity; I’m gathering DMSO is mostly safe at low dosages based on its historical use, although not harmless: https://t.co/wTODHS8M8k - apparently you can just buy it on Amazon

Seems actually pretty simple to test? Pending the glucotoxicity angle

@PrinceVogel Mostly looking at local glucotoxicity; I’m gathering DMSO is mostly safe at low dosages based on its historical use, although not harmless: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-40660-0 - apparently you can just buy it on Amazon

Seems actually pretty simple to test? Pending the glucotoxicity angle


@PrinceVogel I don’t per se, although if the underlying problem is inflammation I’d swear by a strict elimination diet


@cube_flipper @ratata_the_rat I ended up putting a lot of the EM stuff in PQ into the appendices; also sections V-VI of my condensed version here (also has more thoughts on symmetry measures/metrics) https://t.co/1rNw0zdjp4

@cube_flipper @ratata_the_rat I ended up putting a lot of the EM stuff in PQ into the appendices; also sections V-VI of my condensed version here (also has more thoughts on symmetry measures/metrics) https://opentheory.net/Qualia_Formalism_and_a_Symmetry_Theory_of_Valence.pdf


@cube_flipper @ratata_the_rat Wouldn’t exactly agree with this categorization btw - the condensed version (which focuses directly on STV) would be a good starting point. Has some descriptions that may address or at least frame @ratata_the_rat ‘s questions


@RomeoStevens76 I’d like to see a post-post Wittgenstein lineage which says “yes and” and offers a typology of language games. Physics is “merely” a language game but has properties that e.g. political theory or postmodernism don’t. I guess this is basically what LLMs are tacitly doing


@MarcoSFabus Potential NO release from TPS is super interesting; do you have a sense of the mechanism / causal chain involved?


@42irrationalist @eshear Thanks! I’d also connect this question with my vasocomputation theory — basically the body can hold information in muscular tension (especially VSMC tension), but this is a finite system & if you clamp it too many places you get rigidity, poor circulation, lack of responsiveness


@42irrationalist @eshear Part of the hypothesis is that the less you use the vascular system to shape neural behavior, the clearer your default awareness is. When your vascular system is twitchy and when it clamps/clenches, your awareness contracts


@nosilverv Hormone rewards from your “team carbs” flora


@PrinceVogel Respectfully curious


@PrinceVogel I left QRI last year as did several others, and would categorize my path and QRI’s path as strongly divergent. But it was a very interesting few years

British professor energy- very interesting, thank you :)


@PrinceVogel (superlike)


@simon_ohler Totally boosting my pet hypothesis here https://t.co/WcaRfrtpaq

@simon_ohler Totally boosting my pet hypothesis here https://opentheory.net/2023/05/autism-as-a-disorder-of-dimensionality/


Looking into a mirror until you like what you see is an incredibly potent spiritual practice https://t.co/05fDS8Rhr8

Looking into a mirror until you like what you see is an incredibly potent spiritual practice https://x.com/pachabelcanon/status/1690639638292254720


@pachabelcanon I don’t want to say too much here, but would recommend simply trying it (and really taking the “until you like what you see” seriously)


@nosilverv @uberstuber Everything is basically pointing to this! I think there could be some cool low-key experiments https://t.co/RXayIzDVwG

@nosilverv @uberstuber Everything is basically pointing to this! I think there could be some cool low-key experiments https://x.com/johnsonmxe/status/1688955351670960129


@nosilverv @uberstuber If willpower is literally a muscle creatine makes a lot of sense


@cube_flipper @nosilverv @uberstuber Nice! With insulin or sugar? I’d be concerned about glucotoxicity/excitotoxicity, be gentle :)


@RichDecibels @exGenesis Free Energy is often framed as surprise — if you want to persist as an organism you need to minimize the amount you get surprised. This also implies going out into the world and leveling up (building your compression library)


@RichDecibels @exGenesis I believe it’s a reference from thermodynamics / statistical mechanics, speaking about the entropy of a system. As a gross simplification, free energy is bad for the same reason free radicals are bad — they cause messes


@exGenesis @RichDecibels I don’t speak for the fristonians but I like your description!


@nickcammarata @tszzl This is going to sound odd, but I think motivation is a leaky reification; systems are driven by their attractor dynamics moreso than high-level concepts (although I think network symmetry is an important attractor for bio neural nets, see Section V in https://t.co/LxV5JNT6vU)

@nickcammarata @tszzl This is going to sound odd, but I think motivation is a leaky reification; systems are driven by their attractor dynamics moreso than high-level concepts (although I think network symmetry is an important attractor for bio neural nets, see Section V in https://opentheory.net/2023/06/new-whitepaper-qualia-formalism-and-a-symmetry-theory-of-valence/)


@selentelechia @eigenrobot Vegetables don’t want you to eat them, fruits don’t tend to mind - evolutionarily speaking

…but if @nickcammarata is right about plant qualia I wonder if there’s also a fruit/vegetable phenomenological divide. Maybe “what it feels like to be [average fruit]” > [average veg]?


@PrinceVogel @generativist A friend shared this- medical+somatic specialist in NYC that uses FLIR to inform his therapy  https://t.co/1MBAVWlyHK (I’ve not seen him myself)

@PrinceVogel @generativist A friend shared this- medical+somatic specialist in NYC that uses FLIR to inform his therapy  https://visceralcure.com/ (I’ve not seen him myself)


Absolutely great 10k word article on the past, future, and philosophy of space exploration by @mmjukic:

“What it means to be human will be ultimately determined by how we respond to the question of space, which will itself determine how we organize our societies.” https://t.co/tsTQOrbk68

Absolutely great 10k word article on the past, future, and philosophy of space exploration by @mmjukic:

“What it means to be human will be ultimately determined by how we respond to the question of space, which will itself determine how we organize our societies.” https://x.com/mmjukic/status/1692171783557005502


I think a lot of people are wondering “how do I believe in humanity?”

This is both philosophical: are we really good? and practical: what do we have to look forward to?

Space exploration is an answer to the second, and can help keep the first true https://t.co/DPR6siCYwu

I think a lot of people are wondering “how do I believe in humanity?”

This is both philosophical: are we really good? and practical: what do we have to look forward to?

Space exploration is an answer to the second, and can help keep the first true https://x.com/mmjukic/status/1692591018401583180


@insideNiMA @antoinesakho I suspect more may be governed by conservation laws than we realize


@PashaKamyshev @EricElmoznino Will comment soon!


@exgenesis @strangestloop It can be hard to build in this space since each move needs to make sense from many domains

And it’s hard to make swords that only cut evil

What’s on your wishlist?


@SurenVynn I think it’s almost always best to use a more precise term than metaphysics! https://t.co/z3rP87JpW4

@SurenVynn I think it’s almost always best to use a more precise term than metaphysics! https://x.com/johnsonmxe/status/1694672689279983714/photo/1


@exgenesis @strangestloop Essentially yes; there are a lot of fragments of truth out there. Easy to make something that sounds good, harder to make something that not only is consistent with but actively ‘says something useful/testable’ in all related domains.

I like your list


@nosilverv @selentelechia The difference between what is and what you can handle


@selentelechia You may enjoy my theory about autism and network dimensionality- https://t.co/WcaRfrtpaq

@selentelechia You may enjoy my theory about autism and network dimensionality- https://opentheory.net/2023/05/autism-as-a-disorder-of-dimensionality/


@turchin Truth is something that makes sense from all angles; additional time allows more angles to be explored, but some angles need more intelligence to map. The base intelligence requirement is to stabilize the problem such that you can triangulate multiple angles


@this_is_silvia This was great; looking forward to the others!


@RokoMijic In the space between moral realism and antirealism there’s room for a moderate position — there’s an objective fact of the matter about conscious experiences. You can build morality on top of this fact, but I wouldn’t push people to do so.

Just as the speed of light is the same…


@Plinz There is an alternative focused on beauty, not hedonism

https://t.co/me9operZSR

@Plinz There is an alternative focused on beauty, not hedonism

https://opentheory.net/2022/04/emmy-noether-and-the-symmetry-aesthetic/


@bolekkerous I’d love to see it. My sense is the bottleneck is more in creative hardware integration and UX/visualization rather than novel tech miniaturization, but I could be wrong


@OshanJarow Hugely anticorrelated skills


@neats29 Here’s what I think is going on- https://t.co/vzGxzCUWuY

@neats29 Here’s what I think is going on- https://opentheory.net/2023/07/principles-of-vasocomputation-a-unification-of-buddhist-phenomenology-active-inference-and-physical-reflex-part-i/


@neats29 If we build a better picture of how alignment works in humans this could help us build more alignable AIs, and perhaps help AIs be kinder to humans;

“Understand what kind of thing a nervous system is” is Step 1 in a lot of good plans (and probably a few bad ones, but imo more…


RT @nosilverv: "Tanha is cringe." https://t.co/ZttCes9DSx


@danfaggella Provocative. I’m increasingly thinking about the wisdom of a “barbell” strategy- if we’re headed upwards, help that happen in a good way. If we’re headed downwards, make the most of the pre-Malthusian Dreamtime.


@danfaggella I gather part of the Neuralink play is to allow something human in the core causal loop of the future — to prevent humanity from being wholly causally downstream of AI.

Underappreciated angle for AI safety: make the case for why humanity deserves to be in the loop https://t.co/OdnjRuBsAX

@danfaggella I gather part of the Neuralink play is to allow something human in the core causal loop of the future — to prevent humanity from being wholly causally downstream of AI.

Underappreciated angle for AI safety: make the case for why humanity deserves to be in the loop https://x.com/johnsonmxe/status/1681329833404506115


@danfaggella Not a dunk on humanity! Nor a suggestion that we need to justify ourselves. We were here first. But I think we should invest in carefully understanding “what kind of thing” we are, and what properties humanity has that are particularly unusual/great. The better we see this the…


The poor suffer

The middle class go to therapy

The well-off go on retreats

The superrich commission autobiographies https://t.co/ivQBVuR5Ny

The poor suffer

The middle class go to therapy

The well-off go on retreats

The superrich commission autobiographies https://x.com/DefenderOfBasic/status/1701584507609178159


@danfaggella The power law trends we’ve seen over the last century seem very likely to accelerate;

Harari talks about ‘the masses’ traditionally having political, economic, and military power. And how the story of the last few decades is the economic and military relevance of the average…


@frideswyth Even quokkas aren’t too many generations of selection away from fierce/clever/noble creatures — humanity is even more adaptable. I totally see the point though, neither the best nor worst outcome


@frideswyth Wanted to riff on this a bit —

Humanity’s tech value is we’re the universe’s premier nanotech platform and it isn’t even close. Mobile, fully autonomous, communicative, self-regulating and self-healing, self-replicating, self-improving, tool-creating, behaviorally adaptable &…


@frideswyth Lol yes. I lost it when I heard what quokkas’ primary response to danger is — drumming their feet on the ground with “hey uh guys something’s wrong I need an adult” energy


@nosilverv My guess is this is what birdsong is for — an honest display of nervous system health. Focus sexual selection on this specific trait countless generations and you get some real birdchads

(I think birds are the happiest animals)


A conversation between some of the leading lights of physics about beauty and symmetry. One thing it can be difficult to express is just how seriously physicists take symmetry — in physics symmetry is not a quirky geometric property, but the core organizing logic of reality (1/3) https://t.co/cdhQUtpWKW

A conversation between some of the leading lights of physics about beauty and symmetry. One thing it can be difficult to express is just how seriously physicists take symmetry — in physics symmetry is not a quirky geometric property, but the core organizing logic of reality (1/3) https://x.com/skdh/status/1702363158441050353


This is part of my absolutely rock-solid belief in the Symmetry Theory of Valence (STV). If consciousness is real in the same way as electrons are real, symmetry considerations will dominate the ontological structure of consciousness in the same way they do in physics. (2/3)


I recently condensed my book on consciousness, Principia Qualia, into a paper focused specifically on valence. It’s about 30% of the length, and includes more neuroscience and more testable predictions. I’d be glad if people gave it a careful read. https://t.co/LxV5JNTEls

I recently condensed my book on consciousness, Principia Qualia, into a paper focused specifically on valence. It’s about 30% of the length, and includes more neuroscience and more testable predictions. I’d be glad if people gave it a careful read. https://opentheory.net/2023/06/new-whitepaper-qualia-formalism-and-a-symmetry-theory-of-valence/


@ataiiam Thank you! Hearing that from you means a lot.

I believe I understand your question (although I’m not 100% confident — let me know if this addresses the center).

I think philosophers have to be very careful with is-ought and preference claims:

(1) STV as described in PQ is… https://t.co/MbaYHhF7UT

@ataiiam Thank you! Hearing that from you means a lot.

I believe I understand your question (although I’m not 100% confident — let me know if this addresses the center).

I think philosophers have to be very careful with is-ought and preference claims:

(1) STV as described in PQ is… https://x.com/johnsonmxe/status/1702566740046008632/photo/1


@endgaragesnow Audiences are fickle; Nietzsche famously wrote for the future, Friston has said he writes for himself. Maybe we can now add an option of writing for future AIs. I can just say that I’ve realized that more people read our work than we will ever realize, even if they don’t interact


@RichDecibels Nice


@nosilverv https://t.co/JI90fhhey1


@bronzeagebuddha I strongly rec nattokinase — broad spectrum fibrolytic that dissolves clots, plaques, and even spike protein to an extent. Also over the counter (might need to order online)


@bronzeagebuddha Nice. 100mg/day is pretty standard (one serving of natto has 80mg), if well tolerated I’d keep at that dose until 1 week after COVID’s gone. Can take daily for years though


@bronzeagebuddha I looked into toxicology and you could literally take the whole bottle and be fine. Might be worth increasing the dose during covid, I think if it were me I’d take 500mg/day


@cloned_ID Thank you! I have a print on demand version on Amazon; I intend to update it slightly and add hardcover at some point but this would be a solid first edition https://t.co/W854peSpaL

@cloned_ID Thank you! I have a print on demand version on Amazon; I intend to update it slightly and add hardcover at some point but this would be a solid first edition https://www.amazon.com/Principia-Qualia-I-Framework-Valence/dp/1542773415/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?crid=3J59VCDLBFXGF&keywords=principia+qualia&qid=1694872038&sprefix=principia+qualia%2Caps%2C257&sr=8-1


@mjdramstead @SurenVynn @WorldImagining @ineshipolito Good afternoon; some observations & open questions (feel free to respond or not, I understand everyone’s busy)-

As I understand it, and loosely speaking, IIT is a complexity measure and method for system decomposition, FEP is a universal principle of self-organizing systems, and…


@SurenVynn @demiurgently Conceptually, very easy to do! Practically, biotech is very finicky…


@mechanical_monk An unexplored frontier in megastructure engineering is structures specially designed to produce a lot of certain kinds of qualia. LQOs (Large Qualia Objects)

Too early/schizo to say much about these, but imo they should eventually be part of SETI heuristics… https://t.co/vW4V4kKr41

@mechanical_monk An unexplored frontier in megastructure engineering is structures specially designed to produce a lot of certain kinds of qualia. LQOs (Large Qualia Objects)

Too early/schizo to say much about these, but imo they should eventually be part of SETI heuristics… https://x.com/johnsonmxe/status/1703401950048362695/photo/1


@nickcammarata Some surreal experiences for animals:

- Exposure to various psychoactive substances and technological superstimuli;
- Experience of city living and modernity (which has a lot of weird chunky sensory dimensionalities — I wonder if some animals get “Tetris effect” flashes in…


A bombshell of an open letter dropped this week, with 124 authors (some very notable) criticizing a leading theory of consciousness, IIT, as “pseudoscience”.

I disagree with the theme and arguments of the letter. Erik P. Hoel has a rejoinder (below), which is an an absolute tour… https://t.co/0ldCWmDBJi

A bombshell of an open letter dropped this week, with 124 authors (some very notable) criticizing a leading theory of consciousness, IIT, as “pseudoscience”.

I disagree with the theme and arguments of the letter. Erik P. Hoel has a rejoinder (below), which is an an absolute tour… https://x.com/erikphoel/status/1703441570970636556


@powerfultakes That’s a great suggestion. My latest paper is a good on-ramp for the core ideas of valence, formalism, symmetry, and self-organization-

https://t.co/LxV5JNT6vU

Also a good intro- https://t.co/Ppql0LSR8c

But I’ll work on the directory of research

@powerfultakes That’s a great suggestion. My latest paper is a good on-ramp for the core ideas of valence, formalism, symmetry, and self-organization-

https://opentheory.net/2023/06/new-whitepaper-qualia-formalism-and-a-symmetry-theory-of-valence/

Also a good intro- https://opentheory.net/2022/04/it-from-bit-revisited/

But I’ll work on the directory of research


@bennettpoasting My guess is nicotine alters the vasomotion reflex such that it’s better (more aggressive) at resolving uncertainty; a test for this might be whether nicotine alters baseline muscle reflexes https://t.co/vzGxzCUWuY

Part of the hypothesis is that schizophrenia involves an…

@bennettpoasting My guess is nicotine alters the vasomotion reflex such that it’s better (more aggressive) at resolving uncertainty; a test for this might be whether nicotine alters baseline muscle reflexes https://opentheory.net/2023/07/principles-of-vasocomputation-a-unification-of-buddhist-phenomenology-active-inference-and-physical-reflex-part-i/

Part of the hypothesis is that schizophrenia involves an…


@BasedBeffJezos It’s autism (literally) https://t.co/WcaRfrtpaq

@BasedBeffJezos It’s autism (literally) https://opentheory.net/2023/05/autism-as-a-disorder-of-dimensionality/


@WiringTheBrain I like the list! I’d add that a theory of consciousness should be able to determine how pleasant or unpleasant an experience is


@36_72541890 @BasedBeffJezos Good question. Have been meaning to write this out —

I’m considering three biological causes which push toward the schizoid cluster:
- (1) Reduced connectivity between brain regions (well-established in the schizophrenia literature). Basically all brain regions help regulate…


@bayesianboy @BasedBeffJezos Discussed at the end of the piece- empirically it looks like ASD involves both


@bayesianboy @burny_tech Happy to address good criticisms :)


@jessi_cata I appreciate the review; I’d also recommend my condensed and slightly updated paper on the topic. PQ is intended as a blueprint for consciousness research; the paper zeroes in on valence in particular, and digs deeper into neuroscience and falsifiability.

https://t.co/1rNw0zdjp4

@jessi_cata I appreciate the review; I’d also recommend my condensed and slightly updated paper on the topic. PQ is intended as a blueprint for consciousness research; the paper zeroes in on valence in particular, and digs deeper into neuroscience and falsifiability.

https://opentheory.net/Qualia_Formalism_and_a_Symmetry_Theory_of_Valence.pdf


@qorprate @jessi_cata Appreciate the comments! I discuss these topics a bit further in my more recent paper. Basically, symmetry makes a great attractor for self-organization, and I expect the brain has used this extensively and coupled it to homeostatic requirements: https://t.co/1rNw0zdjp4 https://t.co/PCGyfKrt21

@qorprate @jessi_cata Appreciate the comments! I discuss these topics a bit further in my more recent paper. Basically, symmetry makes a great attractor for self-organization, and I expect the brain has used this extensively and coupled it to homeostatic requirements: https://opentheory.net/Qualia_Formalism_and_a_Symmetry_Theory_of_Valence.pdf https://x.com/johnsonmxe/status/1704010117170008556/photo/1


@moissanist @metaLulie Thanks for the tag! I agree with Lulie’s observation and I think vasocomputation is a great frame for explaining how and why. Patterns of muscle tension are transmissible, and tacitly encode lots of information (like clamps on a Chladni plate encode information)


@metaLulie @moissanist Essentially, the muscular system (in particular smooth muscles & fascia, and in particular VSMCs) holds tension as a way to restrict the patterns of the neural system. Sort of like how pinching a vibrating system reduces the ways it can vibrate. These pinches can be brief, or can…


@schizohobo Magnesium, collagen, creatine - have been thinking of adding coconut oil on skin (apparently the skin absorbs it well enough that it’s legitimately a source of calories)


I suspect caffeine (1) increases neural activity, allowing a higher dimensional working space, (2) dials up the vasomotion reflex, leading to more compression pressure on neural patterns. Very potent combination that increases your capacity to chew through complex uncertainty,… https://t.co/IqUQx4BRcu

I suspect caffeine (1) increases neural activity, allowing a higher dimensional working space, (2) dials up the vasomotion reflex, leading to more compression pressure on neural patterns. Very potent combination that increases your capacity to chew through complex uncertainty,… https://x.com/sama/status/1704168397498712100


@m_ashcroft @metaLulie @moissanist @jonnym1ller Thank you!


RT @m_ashcroft: lots of things keep pointing me back towards diving properly into Predictive Processing as a means to make sense of some of…


@Jeanvaljean689 @metaLulie @moissanist Thank you!

And — I’d definitely agree with that…

To flip it around, I’d also expect that being mentally unfree in various ways will present as physical limitations in movement.


@hastuc_dibtux I wouldn’t feel qualified to weigh in on this, though I think the muscular system does have a simple tendency to upregulate/downregulate in a way the neural system doesn’t (and this makes strict synchronization hard — might underlie a lot of tolerance dynamics tbh)


RT @nosilverv: > “something bad happened, I will not let it happen again, I must hold this pattern of tension in order to reduce my dynamic…


@jessicamalonso I’ve long appreciated your beautiful threads; thank you for the kind words. To brainstorm a little further:

I think a lot about the human nervous system being fundamentally social — we not only can synchronize with others, but naturally synchronize, and in some senses *must*…


@lukeplato @metaLulie @moissanist I think there’s strong evidence that NO plays a central role in tension/release; I’d also suggest that interventions which lead to cycling the clench-release process may be particularly interesting to look at. E.g. sauna + cold plunge


@edefic @metaLulie @moissanist I think that’s a reasonable approach to the terminology; my use of the term points at the relative durability and foundational status of latched priors, per my writeup (which I think should have a different name than priors simply held in active tension)


@arno_shae @StatsLime I’d agree — as I understand it, a hyperprior is (1) a probability distribution on another probability distribution (or a parameter of this distribution); it’s also used more informally as (2) “a prior that’s particularly fundamental and gets built on top of.” I expect these two…


@EiiisD @metaLulie @moissanist To locate this in idea space, this is essentially an implementation-level account of how the Free Energy Principle - Active Inference framework may be implemented in humans. FEP-AI discusses probability distributions and predictions but doesn’t make commitments as to how these…


@RokoMijic We should either work on developing an objective measure of subjective experience, or fully bite all the bullets involved with this being impossible.

My sense is most eliminativists/subjectivists like to hang out at the “60%” area — their worldview is a basket of eliminativist…


@RokoMijic Phenomenology sure seems to have structure; why can’t a description of what systems generate what kinds of structures be formalized?

Many things we talk about tacitly assume experience is “real” -> has deep structure, has objective existence. We’d need to throw away a lot of…


@nosilverv Platonic humanity has never been tried!

Might go well, might go poorly. But probably better than the natural degenerate case


@phantom_opus Apparently a genetic cause hasn’t been identified; also uncertain whether this is a disorder of vasospasm or whether the latch-bridge mechanism is also involved...

To reframe the question we could consider what psychological traits/symptoms may be caused by similar vasospasms…


@JimmyRis I’d agree with all that! NO feels very promising. I think “cycling” latches tends to be the most efficient at opening them — not just vasodilation (or vasoconstriction) but both. Eg sauna + cold plunge. I wonder if breathwork has an element of this…


@selentelechia This is great (your wording, not the problem)— going to paste a few screenshots from my autism piece https://t.co/WcaRfrtpaq https://t.co/TzDdt5vVii

@selentelechia This is great (your wording, not the problem)— going to paste a few screenshots from my autism piece https://opentheory.net/2023/05/autism-as-a-disorder-of-dimensionality/ https://x.com/johnsonmxe/status/1705807308662436054/photo/1


@hormeze @metaLulie @moissanist I’d particularly recommend magnesium, nattokinase, and perhaps L-citrulline;

“Vasodilators” may help but are likely less effective than cycling clench+release (e.g. sauna+cold plunge). Also avoiding seed oils is surprisingly important — I think it’s a clear path from seed oils…


@selentelechia Very simple metric for how “artificial” a pattern is is its fractal dimensionality — sounds like woo but there’s actually decent research on what range natural patterns usually fall into (and humans strongly prefer things in this range) https://t.co/hnQX8UHvuw

@selentelechia Very simple metric for how “artificial” a pattern is is its fractal dimensionality — sounds like woo but there’s actually decent research on what range natural patterns usually fall into (and humans strongly prefer things in this range) https://aeon.co/ideas/feel-good-fractals-from-ocean-waves-to-jackson-pollocks-art


RT @heydannymiranda: New full episode with @jwmares now live!

Justin might be the most interesting person I've had on the show.

• Cofound…


Nattokinase saved my life a few years ago. You should probably consider taking it.

🧵
NK is a cheap, powerful, and easy to get fibrinolytic that dissolves blood clots and plaques. Imo it’s also the supplement with the best +EV for longevity and cognitive health. (1/n)


The body produces clots (fibrin tangles) to prevent blood loss and mop up small debris like pathogens. Blood loss was a big danger throughout most of our evolutionary past so this system tends to be at high readiness, with clots constantly forming and dissolving. Your background…


Japanese natto (fermented beans) contains a bacterial enzyme “nattokinase” that’s a natural, broad-spectrum fibrinolytic (clot dissolver). One serving of natto contains about 80mg (~1600 FU) nattokinase. I recommend taking it in pill form —


— it’s more convenient and natto’s taste is not for the faint of heart. NK is still a bit rare in physical supplement shops but easy to find online — I usually get mine on Amazon and take 100mg/day or as-needed.
https://t.co/nMy17puUX0

— it’s more convenient and natto’s taste is not for the faint of heart. NK is still a bit rare in physical supplement shops but easy to find online — I usually get mine on Amazon and take 100mg/day or as-needed.
https://www.amazon.com/s?k=Nattokinase


Nattokinase is amazing at dissolving clots. It’s unusual in that it does so via multiple pathways, also reduces blood pressure, & is broadly protective of the cardiovascular system. It also has a fantastic safety profile: people have been eating it for literally thousands of… https://t.co/h7TguZUiKi

Nattokinase is amazing at dissolving clots. It’s unusual in that it does so via multiple pathways, also reduces blood pressure, & is broadly protective of the cardiovascular system. It also has a fantastic safety profile: people have been eating it for literally thousands of… https://x.com/johnsonmxe/status/1707080384419139797/photo/1


Aspirin thins blood by disabling the platelets which form blood clots; warfarin (originally sold as rat poison) blocks vitamin K which blocks coagulation. Nattokinase dissolves clots and other tangles *after* they’re formed, as well as having aspirin-like anticoagulation effects.…


Nattokinase is sufficiently broad spectrum in what it dissolves that it also dissolves arterial plaques (36% reduction after 6 months of 6000 FU/day, vs 11% with statins):
https://t.co/rAx6XrowAU

Nattokinase is sufficiently broad spectrum in what it dissolves that it also dissolves arterial plaques (36% reduction after 6 months of 6000 FU/day, vs 11% with statins):
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28763875/


Slightly more esoterically, nattokinase also dissolves the covid spike protein(!):
https://t.co/mcjafXQNYG

Slightly more esoterically, nattokinase also dissolves the covid spike protein(!):
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/36080170/


There’s some question of whether Nattokinase could also help treat Alzheimer’s, prion diseases, and other buildup-related neurodegenerative diseases. Apparently covid seems to create fibrin tangles that contribute to these conditions — dissolving these tangles might be broadly…


At any rate, nattokinase is the best solution to blood clots I’ve found and it’s not even close. The next question: who has blood clots?

Traditionally medicine has focused on big clots. If you have a stroke, a big thrombosis that swells up, or a pulmonary embolism — “yep you had…


The emerging picture, however, is that we semi-frequently go through periods of having large amounts of tiny clots, and these “microclots” may be a significant driver of physiological and cognitive decline. Basically, even tiny clots can kill tissue if they get stuck in the wrong… https://t.co/OtLwX0gazT

The emerging picture, however, is that we semi-frequently go through periods of having large amounts of tiny clots, and these “microclots” may be a significant driver of physiological and cognitive decline. Basically, even tiny clots can kill tissue if they get stuck in the wrong… https://x.com/johnsonmxe/status/1707081954850460158/photo/1


A few years ago I had some mysterious symptoms — strange yellowing bruises (especially after flying) despite not bumping into anything, a strange “hot ripping pain” just above my knees, sharp pinprick pains that traveled periodically, strange sluggishness, and eventually…


I think being familiar with what it feels like to have clots — and that nattokinase is a viable treatment for them — is among the most unusual pieces of health knowledge I have. I’d like more people to have this knowledge.


I expect clots can lead to a dynamic similar to “Kessler syndrome” — basically, if a blood clot is banging around in your vascular system, it can create injuries that lead to more clots, which then go on to make more clots, and so on. Not great. The good news is that if you…


What should people expect from taking NK? Mostly, nattokinase supplementation is about ‘the dog that didn’t bark’. Fewer bad things happen, especially if you’re still eating seed oils (apparently a substantial contributor to microclots)

But I felt healthier after taking… https://t.co/y7m1mJXyCd

What should people expect from taking NK? Mostly, nattokinase supplementation is about ‘the dog that didn’t bark’. Fewer bad things happen, especially if you’re still eating seed oils (apparently a substantial contributor to microclots)

But I felt healthier after taking… https://x.com/johnsonmxe/status/1707083562367725866/photo/1


A couple friends report feeling “good but weird” after taking nattokinase. I suspect this could be because the vascular system gets calibrated to a certain flexibility. If you have a lot of plaques and other debris that stiffen your vascular system and then take nattokinase, some…


In general I think a lot of cognitive and emotional wellness is bound up in having a responsive vasomuscular system, something that illness can affect:
https://t.co/JmoIrTuFtw

In general I think a lot of cognitive and emotional wellness is bound up in having a responsive vasomuscular system, something that illness can affect:
https://x.com/ahandvanish/status/1706402893522231623


Vascular flexibility supports cognitive-emotional flexibility, which supports capacity for relaxation, happiness, and feeling itself. Nattokinase won’t dissolve muscle tension, but it may help restore tensile range and capacity for tissue relaxation. https://t.co/vzGxzCUWuY

Vascular flexibility supports cognitive-emotional flexibility, which supports capacity for relaxation, happiness, and feeling itself. Nattokinase won’t dissolve muscle tension, but it may help restore tensile range and capacity for tissue relaxation. https://opentheory.net/2023/07/principles-of-vasocomputation-a-unification-of-buddhist-phenomenology-active-inference-and-physical-reflex-part-i/


I’m not a doctor and this isn’t medical advice, just my story. Counterindications for nattokinase include head trauma, having a known blood disorder that hinders clotting, or taking other blood thinners. It’s always possible someone has a big clot that’s lodged somewhere, and…


But for the average person I think nattokinase is hugely positive. It’s probably especially good to supplement if you have symptoms of clots, are a frequent traveler, have a history of cardiovascular disease / poor diet / arterial plaque, have COVID, are recovering from covid, or…


@schizohobo Similar thoughts about cryonics


@DzambhalaHODL Thank you!


@Rares82 Not any that I trust; lots of potential confounders with this particular topic…


@Rares82 I also take it on an empty stomach


@nickcammarata My guess is human nervous systems recently increased their parameter counts, and are in evolutionary novel environments, and thus require more “RLVF” before flow-state dynamics produce good results. And I suspect “sensory type safety” in novel environments is esp hard


@VahnAeris Also works!


@kristijan_moves Reports seem to differ- theory would suggest it’s a good idea but anecdotally it seems to work fine without


@ArtirKel 100mg / 2000 FU - single dose


@sashachapin @nickcammarata My guess is that if the tanha-producing reflex is dialed too low in childhood you get schizophrenia, but the minimum setting drops as networks mature


@nickcammarata Thinking a lot about metabolic insufficiency these days https://t.co/UGMnkbGcBg

@nickcammarata Thinking a lot about metabolic insufficiency these days https://x.com/ShitpostGate/status/1706609566849593434


@JazearBrooks @nickcammarata Interesting — I’m seeing some arguments on both sides and I’m not sure which studies to trust; overall feels this is a noisy topic with a lot of degrees of freedom in what and how to measure.

The “dilution effect” (the argument that we’re selecting for things like yield, not…


@georgejrjrjr That’s a good question- I’m not sure


@nickcammarata Good question — I strictly avoid gluten/dairy and when I was looking at brands, Pure Encapsulations seemed the most reliably clean, but since I did my research a lot of brands have moved to better manufacturing processes. NOW & Doctor’s Best would be less expensive options that…


@nickcammarata I’ve read that effects peak somewhere between 3 to 12 hours after ingestion (two conflicting studies); I think a plan of starting at 1/10th the dose and doubling every other day would be solid.

Apparently there’s no established toxic dose; there have been both rat and human…


@annaarthoe @nickcammarata I suspect you’ll get the most out of NK the first few times you take it (dissolving any lingering junk your body can’t dissolve on its own, especially spike protein), and then ongoing doses are likely to be more preventative. If it were me I’d maybe start with 50mg, then 100mg,…


@winstonian3 I’d suspect there’s something wrong with some signaling pathway or crucial nutrient in Raynaud’s, but I bet NK would help prevent complications of reduced bloodflow


@winstonian3 I haven’t yet- the review article here has a broad set of sources to trawl through though https://t.co/q45gcm3fAu

@winstonian3 I haven’t yet- the review article here has a broad set of sources to trawl through though https://x.com/johnsonmxe/status/1707080384419139797


@the_aiju I’d expect that to be decently +EV! Would be interested to hear if it helps


@papayathreesome Some of the benefit from NK comes from the first few doses dissolving fibrin debris that have had some time to build up; you could likely get most of the benefit here from taking it a few times per month.

Other benefit comes from having some in your system protectively, to…


@hastuc_dibtux Good question— not sure


@xerambela @nickcammarata I don’t have an attachment to the particular claims in this meme, although I expect there to be a general trend of reduced nutrient density in (1) fruits and vegetables, and (2) in the foods people eat (which include but aren’t limited to said fruits and vegetables) https://t.co/NfRDEzz8bw

@xerambela @nickcammarata I don’t have an attachment to the particular claims in this meme, although I expect there to be a general trend of reduced nutrient density in (1) fruits and vegetables, and (2) in the foods people eat (which include but aren’t limited to said fruits and vegetables) https://x.com/johnsonmxe/status/1707299871898669396


@Gkatlana This review article is probably a better starting point https://t.co/q45gcm3fAu

@Gkatlana This review article is probably a better starting point https://x.com/johnsonmxe/status/1707080384419139797


@drmichaellevin I wonder how to evaluate “what a memory is” in this context. E.g. I expect VSMC clenches to be a very significant operator on neural activity, to the degree that smooth muscle (+fascia) tension may be the primary store of “medium term memory” and a crucial store of hyperpriors.…


@phantom_opus Super relevant! Will think about this


@Willyintheworld I suspect nattokinase might be a better option than statins — https://t.co/3naNFAMleB

@Willyintheworld I suspect nattokinase might be a better option than statins — https://x.com/johnsonmxe/status/1707079273608106375


@keithfrankish I believe pain and pleasure might be among the easier cases — imo it’ll be much harder to characterize something like “red” https://t.co/LxV5JNT6vU

@keithfrankish I believe pain and pleasure might be among the easier cases — imo it’ll be much harder to characterize something like “red” https://opentheory.net/2023/06/new-whitepaper-qualia-formalism-and-a-symmetry-theory-of-valence/


@PrinceVogel I’m guessing you haven’t read my piece on autism and dimensionality, and I think you’d appreciate the Faustian aspects: https://t.co/WcaRfrtpaq

@PrinceVogel I’m guessing you haven’t read my piece on autism and dimensionality, and I think you’d appreciate the Faustian aspects: https://opentheory.net/2023/05/autism-as-a-disorder-of-dimensionality/


@PrinceVogel Grateful to hear that! I’m assuming you’ve read Principles of Vasocomputation — https://t.co/vzGxzCUWuY

I keep my philosophy and my neuroscience mostly separate, but if you want to see what I’m up to in philosophy this would be the starting point: https://t.co/LxV5JNT6vU

@PrinceVogel Grateful to hear that! I’m assuming you’ve read Principles of Vasocomputation — https://opentheory.net/2023/07/principles-of-vasocomputation-a-unification-of-buddhist-phenomenology-active-inference-and-physical-reflex-part-i/

I keep my philosophy and my neuroscience mostly separate, but if you want to see what I’m up to in philosophy this would be the starting point: https://opentheory.net/2023/06/new-whitepaper-qualia-formalism-and-a-symmetry-theory-of-valence/


@parafactual Acute head trauma where there could be hidden bleeding — probably not relevant if it happened a while ago


@PrinceVogel Not a yoga person but as a general rec I take a nattokinase at the start of long flights https://t.co/3naNFAMleB

@PrinceVogel Not a yoga person but as a general rec I take a nattokinase at the start of long flights https://x.com/johnsonmxe/status/1707079273608106375


@TylerAlterman @luCidm1nd One rabbithole is “does EEG actually measure aggregate neural activity or something else?”

I have it on good authority that the causal epistemics are more uncertain than people want to admit;

I suspect EEG might measure vasomotion instead https://t.co/vzGxzCUWuY

@TylerAlterman @luCidm1nd One rabbithole is “does EEG actually measure aggregate neural activity or something else?”

I have it on good authority that the causal epistemics are more uncertain than people want to admit;

I suspect EEG might measure vasomotion instead https://opentheory.net/2023/07/principles-of-vasocomputation-a-unification-of-buddhist-phenomenology-active-inference-and-physical-reflex-part-i/


@TylerAlterman I suspect there’s huge variance in how sensitive people are to other peoples’ footprints in the EM field, and I’d expect that the average study won’t do a great job at navigating this


@myceliummage I suspect more motifs are cross-species viral than anyone realizes https://t.co/dc08pSx2nH

@myceliummage I suspect more motifs are cross-species viral than anyone realizes https://x.com/johnsonmxe/status/1703481704743137456


@paul__is__here I don’t think this is a large risk (and have recommended nattokinase to my elder relatives); chances are nattokinase would lead to clot ablation rather than breakup.

I might recommend asking about prior clot phenomenology and having a plan for what to do in case of a problem


@Andercot @ylecun @mcuban @Rufus87078959 If the universe is a solution to some physical optimization problem it would be a significant finding. If consciousness corresponds to a specific physical property that’s where I’d look for the optimization https://t.co/Ppql0LSR8c

@Andercot @ylecun @mcuban @Rufus87078959 If the universe is a solution to some physical optimization problem it would be a significant finding. If consciousness corresponds to a specific physical property that’s where I’d look for the optimization https://opentheory.net/2022/04/it-from-bit-revisited/


How would the Great Civilizations of history approach AI alignment?

My sense is ‘very different than we have.’ I’d especially like to see Victorian England’s take, and perhaps the Venetian Empire. Even 1950s America.


How would the Great Civilizations of history approach AI alignment?

My sense is ‘very different than we have.’ I think some approaches might plausibly be better — I’d especially like to see Victorian England’s take, and perhaps the Venetian Empire. Even 1950s America!


@meekaale Pretty based honestly.

Here’s GPT4’s free association (not super actionable)- https://t.co/X5ru5e40L6

@meekaale Pretty based honestly.

Here’s GPT4’s free association (not super actionable)- https://x.com/johnsonmxe/status/1711076908627116212/photo/1


@meekaale I remember that tweet. It’s not a crazy idea


@LandsharkRides Learning language probably decreases the brain’s energy parameter — functions as an energy sink, makes experience less ‘magical’. https://t.co/FKyygE1cL4

@LandsharkRides Learning language probably decreases the brain’s energy parameter — functions as an energy sink, makes experience less ‘magical’. https://opentheory.net/2019/11/neural-annealing-toward-a-neural-theory-of-everything/


@nickcammarata I sort of assume some of the value of laying out arguments today is being better-represented when AIs of the future dialogue about the topic. There’s probably a lot of value in writing this essay and making various points more explicitly part of the universal prior(!)


@42irrationalist Once we figure out how to enumerate this it’s over for other NFT projects


@josephkelly @dhruvbansal @unchainedcom It’s incredibly exciting to see your progress!


RT @RomeoStevens76: "If you manage to control yourself there will be ice cream" said the parent.

"I sure hope this doesn't have unforeseen…


@nosilverv Universal Basic Congregation


@liminal_warmth I’ve been thinking of ADHD as the body’s tensile system being inadequate for holding the brain’s neural system in a particular context-appropriate shape. Basically, if you’re experiencing ADHD, your body is holding fragments of multiple disparate contexts and is unable to commit…


@chercher_ai I’m really curious about the extent to which people can learn to consciously control (or even be aware of) the latch-bridge mechanism of smooth muscle cells… also the degree to which various somatic practices are specifically designed to affect this


@nickcammarata There’s an art to writing for AIs such that your content is most helpful, most influential, etc and these factors might differ from how humans judge content

Just like we’re finding training LLMs on textbook-style data is particularly effective, there’s likely a tweet format that…


@LambdaP @hormeze @metaLulie @moissanist Navigating the question of “seed oils” is a little confusing since there are so many sources of health data. I think the most interesting way to carve this space is three basic clusters:

1. Mainstream, e.g. the American Heart Association recommends unsaturated vegetable oils…


@cube_flipper @chercher_ai The theory started from (1) a lot of noticing correlations between tension, thought, and feeling, (2) a lot of learning about somatic practices from a close friend and thinking about what somatic practices could mean when they say a chakra is “open” or “closed”, and (3) thinking…


@chercher_ai @FloPopp @cube_flipper I note why I focused on VSMCs in my piece; I suspect fascia follow similar activation motifs and are part of the same distributed stress minimization network, but will hold tension for different functional reasons

I think these fine details matter!


@x_snowfield @cube_flipper @chercher_ai Yeah that feels very similar! I think it would be worth digging into the details of orgone therapy for non-intuitive tips / protocols that could be refurbished…

A while ago @relic_radiation also posted a few pages from a super interesting book that was discussing how “energy…


@cube_flipper @chercher_ai @FloPopp Oh man, I had the mother of all knots in my stomach for years, was diet (gluten) related, took eating better and years of deliberate relaxation to fix.

This is a little bit tangential to the smooth muscle stuff, but this experience helped build up a model of “every organ is a…


@Rares82 @x_snowfield @cube_flipper @chercher_ai @relic_radiation “As you do anything, so you do everything”


@relic_radiation @cube_flipper @x_snowfield @chercher_ai Super interesting!


@x_snowfield @cube_flipper @chercher_ai @relic_radiation Very interesting- so many questions haha. I do think there’s a world of difference between “bodywork with vs without feeling” and it’s interesting to consider mechanistically just what the difference could be


@RichDecibels Love it.

This is going to sound a bit odd, but my pet hypothesis is that a lot of the feeling of loneliness comes from a breakdown of communication within the body.

I’ll reframe “man is a social animal” as “humans are social harmonic computers, designed to toss resonances back…


@nosilverv This is so good


@Rares82 @onemanpony This is an amazing description!


@Rares82 @onemanpony (The thoughts about VSMCs determining boundary conditions for nerve resonances is a really cool reframe btw)


@Roko__eth I mostly agree with the former! Disagree with the latter.

Seems like there’s a 2x2 matrix that could be fleshed out


@QiaochuYuan My model of the body has behavior driven by two systems, neural and vasomuscular;

By default the neural system is lazy, pleasant, a little schizo, “likes to vibe”. Almost all of the heavy-duty processing happens here.

By default the vasomuscular system is anxious, planning,… https://t.co/HQ3YJNVEYO

@QiaochuYuan My model of the body has behavior driven by two systems, neural and vasomuscular;

By default the neural system is lazy, pleasant, a little schizo, “likes to vibe”. Almost all of the heavy-duty processing happens here.

By default the vasomuscular system is anxious, planning,… https://x.com/johnsonmxe/status/1712001038423593146


@wooblewoof @paul__is__here I missed this before! Some comments: https://t.co/XHbGa3W08T

@wooblewoof @paul__is__here I missed this before! Some comments: https://x.com/johnsonmxe/status/1712112135424119295