Welcome to the forum. This is a good OP (original post).

What are your takes on usefulness and uselessness? — Oppida

I consider myself a pragmatist. Usefulness is the primary standard by which I judge knowledge, truth, beliefs, and actions. I see the primary question that philosophy has to answer as not what is true, but what do I do next? What do I do now?

i can give you a choice to make the world as efficient in any and/or every area, wether it is artificial (man-made) or natural doesnt matter, — Oppida

I think it does matter. Usefulness and efficiency are fundamentally human values. To talk about the efficiency of natural processes is meaningless except, maybe, in the context of human actions. The goal is to make human action in the face of organic nature more effective.

What the hell would we be doing? there has to bea certain limit for our current brains to break trough, otherwise we'd get bored — Oppida

I think that’s exactly right. Some religious traditions specify that God or the gods created humanity specifically because they got bored.

humans have been working thowards an "easier" life for the past [insert year in which we began to fiddle with tools] years, when should we stop? should we stop? — Oppida

I don’t think the proper question is should we stop, or when should we stop. I think it’s can we stop. I’m not certain that we can intentionally do so. Somewhere along the line, somethings going to make us stop—either nature or our own foolishness.

What are your takes on usefulness and uselessness? — Oppida

Here’s something else. It’s from. Ziporyn’s translation of the Chuang Tzu:

Carpenter Stoney was traveling in Qi when he came upon the tree of the shrine at the Qu Yuan bend. It was over a hundred arm spans around, so large that thousands of oxen could shade themselves beneath it. It overstretched the surrounding hills, its lowest branches hundreds of feet from the ground, at least a dozen of {41} which could have been hollowed out to make into ships. It was surrounded by marveling sightseers, but the carpenter walked past it without a second look.

When his apprentice finally got tired of admiring it, he caught up with Carpenter Stoney and said, “Since taking up my axe to follow you, Master, I have never seen a tree of such fine material18 as this! And yet you don’t even deign to look twice at it or pause beneath it. Why?” Carpenter Stoney said, “Stop! Say no more! This is worthless lumber! As a ship it would soon sink, as a coffin it would soon rot, as a tool it would soon break, as a door it would leak sap, as a pillar it would bring infestation. This is a talentless, worthless tree. It is precisely because it is so useless that it has lived so long.”

Back home that night, the tree appeared to Carpenter Stoney in a dream. It said to him, “What do you want to compare me to, one of those cultivated trees? The hawthorn, the pear, the orange, the rest of those fructiferous trees and shrubs—when their fruit is ripe they get plucked, and that is an insult. Their large branches are bent, their small branches are pruned. Thus do their abilities embitter their lives. That is why they die young, failing to fully live out their Heaven-given lifespans. They batter themselves with the vulgar conventions of the world, as do all the other things of the world. As for me, I’ve been working on being useless for a long time. It almost killed me, but I’ve finally managed it—and it is of great use to me! If I were useful, do you think I could have grown to be so great?

I can't remember exactly what was said or who, but a Taoist descendant of Lao Tzu name Chuang Tzu commented on the value of worthlessness. The example he gave was a large tree not suitable to be cut down; if such tree was useful, it would be cut down and processed for whatever purpose the ancient chinese had for it. Just for context, the earliest taoists who i mentioned existed over 2,000 years ago.

There's also this neat random quote that I saw recently by an american president, of course spoken much later:

Wherever you have an efficient government you have a dictatorship. — Harry Truman

So in this light, the question then becomes why would efficiency be desirable at all? The cost of what corporations refer to as "efficiency" makes it seem in-efficient at times. For example, let's use A.I. like you mentioned in the OP: how much time does it take dealing with the false claims it generates and errors it makes?

Doesn't efficient industry produce a lot of waste, in the form of garbage etc.? Clearly people do not like to do more work than necessary, or expend more effort than necessary, but how can we keep efficiency from creating different external costs?

Hello! And thanks. I feel sort of obligated to share more of myself for the purpose of the chat now, so:

Firstly, i think that to consider usefulness is to establish a pre-existing frame of work, so yeah, i do agree that it doesnt really make any sense to speak of "natural usefulness". However, i can also see the frame changing to nature in some other contexts, specially in those that -unlike i do- dont discriminate between the artificial and natural. One could consider them both the same thing but, obviusly, it depends on the ontology that whoever considers any of this may have.

Some religious traditions specify that God or the gods created humanity specifically because they got bored. — T Clark

Funny you should mention this. I partially believe in what i said before about the artificial/natural being more or less two faces of the same coin (a sort of reality coin). I've wonder if we'd really be bored with an infinite cosmos of ifinite possibilities, but with no humans. As i see it, we add a lot of complexity to a deterministic universe, although i can also see the idea that it is not all that deterministic. What im trying to say is that, looking at us humans from a god's POV would be a lot of fun, because we are not only part of an already incredibly complex natural system, but we've created an ever-more-so complex artificial system.

Now onto the stopping part, maybe i should share some context.

Im currently living in a country in which a lot of people love happiness. Now, of course that i am aware of the "dangers" of hedonistic practices and i dont subscribe to the idea that humans should feel happy all the time, or that happiness is the ultimate goal of human doing, so seeing this situation has made me think a lot about wall-e (the movie) and A Brave New World (keep in mind im not only the most cultured human on earth but also the most humble humblemost humbleton) which has led me to a couple of conclusions:

1. Im rather silly
2. Supose that people obtain meaning trough actions like doing something they like, where/when does this action become bothersome rather than meaningful?

I have the present example of switchboard operators. Did they like it? Did any of them consider that meaningful and, thus, "useful" to their existance? Say i loved being a switchboard operator. Would i find it annoying that we have done technology that renders my doings meaningless? Again, this idea comes from the situation we are facing with AI. AI is extremely efficient at making anything you ask it so, if we keep developing it, will the switchboard operator problem happen again? Of course, this is assuming anybody liked being a switchboard operator but, what if? people can be weird, theres always people who only find meaning trough niche or specific tasks. I mean, AI is certainly extremely good at predicting the weather, but i like meteorology and i dont want to be surrounded by Ai that can do it a trillion times better than i do not because i'd lose my job, but because i'd lose something im passionate about, even if i fail, even if im inefficient at it.

Im sorry if any of this is hard to follow but, condensed into a few words: i appreciate inefficacy; i like analogic things like discs and old pianos even if technology can do it better, and i certainly wouldnt change that for a perfect machine that can stimulate my pleasure centers in my brain to make me feel happy all the time, or feel purposeful, or feel anything, or feel that i am listening to a record-player.

And to be clear, im not against AI!!! im mainly worried about its use because, when we can do anything, will we do anything? we already have near all the knowledge in our pockets and yet, again, people around me are all addicted to feeling good; hell, im addicted to a great degree too.

I dont want this to become another AI thread tho, its just an example of how much attention ive seen people give to pleasure over any other activity in my surroundings.

This is very interesting. I feel i should also ask, what are your takes on art? is it useful? i mean, it obviusly is to a certain frame but, in what frames exactly? and to which ones would it be worthless?

Also, you can see that the tree is, in fact, useful to the people who are sitting under it, and also to those who admire it, but not to those who want to tear it down. Toughts?

Indeed, why should it?

Or where should it? I've a friend that loves maths and engineering. He told me once something like "Of course i love efficiency! why would you possibly want to be inefficient?" As a context, we were talking about making a spaceship for some videogame, and i suggested he made some decorations for its interior (he literally just made a huge box with wires and called it a day), and he said that it was unnecessary.

Well of course it was unnecessary! At least for it to fly. But for it to be remembered was a whole other thing. Should he have done that? It made me think just how much our conception of "useful" is kind of messed up, and so does the example of the tree. Again, both Huxley and Orwell made utopias that worked almost flwalessly, but that were completly devoid of -oh the subjectivity- of humanity.

Again, both Huxley and Orwell made utopias that worked almost flwalessly, but that were completly devoid of -oh the subjectivity- of humanity. — Oppida

their "utopias" were criticisms of utopian (huxley, in brave new world) and authoritarian (orwell, in 1984) governments. Neither one was described as being flawless, but reflections of where they thought society was heading through their observations. Orwell thought socialism would give rise to the thought police: people who you could not escape no matter how hard you tried to hide your dissidence, within a world that made it hard to conceive of anything beyond this fictional socialist dictatorship called. One of the strong, organizing principals of the society is a reverse cult-of-personality figure named Emmanual Goldstein, who the citizens are directed to hate and show rage towards periodically as the enemy of the society (similar to "the terrorists" in the west, and how russians describe "imperialist america" in the east). This world is split into two geo-political factions, and i don't remember what they are called or much about the ideological underpinnings.

Huxley conceived of a scientifically crafted test-tube baby society, with a great utopian drug called Soma, and open, genderless sexual relations that were devoid of any sort of passion or romance. The rebel in this latter world is someone who learns to return to the ways of nature, but they are ridiculed by the utopians near the end of the book.

You've reminded me that i have forgotten much of the content of "brave new world", but my description of 1984 is pretty accurate since i read that again fairly recently.

Yes! My bad, i meant that the way they produced was flawless; both envisioned societies were extremely "useful" in the frame of society because in both of them, people emphasized a greater good. Brave New World case being the society itself and -as i understand- the party being 1984 case.

Now, i'd also like to push yet another division of usefulness for the sake of argumenting. Toughts on "material" usefulness and "humane usefulness" for current-day living? By this i mean whats strictly necessary and whats useful but not necessary, respectively.

Hola! Welcome to TPF. Enjoy your time here. :smile:

Say that, for instance, we humans are suddenly, magically implented with infinite knowledge; we are now omnipotent and omnisapient. What the hell would we be doing? there has to be a certain limit for our current brains to break trough, otherwise we'd get bored and simply go insane or at least thats what i -in a VERY summed up way- think of practicality, that it has to be present in some level. — Oppida

We already have 'infinite' knowledge, but we don't know how to manage it. Furthermore, our knowledge has been used in the most selfish and violent way ever imagined. We will not become bored. Particularly, one of the pursuits of humankind is to achieve wisdom and knowledge, and its importance was already pointed out by Aristotle and Ancient Greek thinkers. I could be wrong, but I feel like you only give credit to artificial things – either the AI or God. Perhaps (at least this is what I always thought), AI is just our alter ego. But the machine will never surpass our determination. As you pointed out, it will be hard to see if it is capable of discerning inside ethical dilemmas, for instance; while we can. Therefore, our knowledge is infinite.

Ah, Hispano! qué bien! Habrá que hablar en inglés para entretener a otras audiencias.

Im a little confused. What do you exactly mean by "infinite knowledge"? Do you mean infinite capabilities to understand? Maybe you think all knowledge is simply dormant within us? What about examples of the selfish and violent uses and also, explain what you mean by "only giving credit to artifcial things. Muy interesante si si.

Ah, Hispano! qué bien! Habrá que hablar en inglés para entretener a otras audiencias. — Oppida

Sí. No se permite publicar en español. A excepción de una categoría reservada para ello que puedes consultar aquí: https://thephilosophyforum.com/categories/52/spanish-discussion

Im a little confused. What do you exactly mean by "infinite knowledge"? Do you mean infinite capabilities to understand? Maybe you think all knowledge is simply dormant within us? What about examples of the selfish and violent uses and also, explain what you mean by "only giving credit to artifcial things. — Oppida

Perhaps "infinite" was not a suitable adjective, and I should have said limitless. My point is, anyway, that our knowledge is intended to keep expanding all the time, and most of us seek wisdom and abilities to put them into practice. If something like AI exists, it is thanks to our vast knowledge. I can't imagine a fish typing on the screen of Gemini Google Assistant, for instance. The problem of our vast level of knowledge is that we sometimes do not know how to control/manage it.

This is why I think that instead of using our knowledge to do sublime things (oil painting or writing a poem), it is mostly used in violent goals: war, abuse, weapons, nuclear bombs, etc. It is obvious that the dropping of nuclear bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki was one of the evilest and most unethical acts that humankind has ever recorded. However, the brains who created that weapon were actually pretty genius, with a limitless knowledge of science.

Imagine if we decide to spend all of our knowledge and energy on better common things. Do you think that water scarcity or food shortages would be an issue? Absolutely not!

Well, since usefulness (and therefore uselessness) is a subjective term, everyone's answer will only really be meaningful to themselves. Thus advice on process can be germane to many, but advice on the particulars will not be.

What are your takes on usefulness and uselessness? should one be pursued more than the other? I mean, lets consider for a moment that i am a god and i tell you that i can give you a choice to make the world as efficient in any and/or every area, wether it is artificial (man-made) or natural doesnt matter, you can make it work as efficiently as you want. What areas would you make more efficient? less? — Oppida

One issue for me is: what constitutes useful and useless, and how do we determine which is which? So isn’t our initial problem how we determine our values?

I consider myself a pragmatist. Usefulness is the primary standard by which I judge knowledge, truth, beliefs, and actions. I see the primary question that philosophy has to answer as not what is true, but what do I do next? What do I do now? — T Clark

I think I am in full agreement - in as much as I understand usefulness.

AI has had an obvious impact on efficiency in a lot of areas on life, and there are clearly ethical questions involved, but my main concern was (i think) and existentialist one. Say that, for instance, we humans are suddenly, magically implented with infinite knowledge; we are now omnipotent and omnisapient. What the hell would we be doing? there has to be a certain limit for our current brains to break trough, otherwise we'd get bored and simply go insane or at least thats what i -in a VERY summed up way- think of practicality, that it has to be present in some level. — Oppida

This seems a bit muddled to me. What would we do if we were omnipotent and omniscient? How would we know if we were not either? This strikes me as one of those inherently unanswerable questions.

AI is one thing; is the possibility that humans might have infinite knowledge, another? What exactly is infinite knowledge, and what would it look like for humans to have it? Do you mean having direct access to it through something like AI? There are likely inherent limits to human cognition—not so much in terms of acquiring knowledge or information, but in the conceptual frameworks we can grasp and the structures of epistemology we can operate within. Certain ways of understanding reality may appear profoundly alien at first, potentially requiring a generation or more to fully assimilate and integrate into our collective thinking.

Yes, answers to this particular questions are supossed to be useful to yourself, so feel free to share them! Im eager to know more ways in which to consider usefulness and efficancy.


So, you believe that humans have an infinite capacity for learning? because if we do, should we pursue our full potential? or, more specifically, in what areas should we pursue our full potential, ideally? because, if we know too much too fast, if we become extremely efficient, if we dont have a goal that takes time, what would we do? Technology is accelerating at an extremely fast pace and i personally fear another meaning crisis born not from the lack of purpose, but from a new, artificially-created lack of purpose created by being too efficient in our tasks. Again, the example of the switchboard operator ladies; did they lose purpose? they got liberated from a task , only for them to be given another thanks to automation, but do they feel any more fulfilled after losing their jobs? probably, the answer is yes, but this has a wider implication for technology.

Say you're a carpenter and that a new machine has come out in the world that can do carpentry 10x as faster as you can. How would you feel? does the answer lie in the fact that you like or do not like your job?


Of course! to talk of usefulness you need a frame of reference. Heres one you can use for the fun of discussing: When should we stop a technology from being "too useful" or "too useless"? Look at the example above, too.

Yes, indeed, it is not a directly answerable question i supose and yes, you nailed the part of us getting this infinite knowledge trough AI in that example. So again, retaking the AI example; If we had an AGI, what then? what would we possibly do? wouldnt human action be rendered completly "useless" in the frame of doing anything? Again, this question of efficancy was born from the fact that us human could become completely sedentary once we obtain AGI. Like mentioned before, mostly born from my personal fear of humans going trough another "meaning crisis". Toughts?

So, you believe that humans have an infinite capacity for learning? — Oppida

Absolutely.

because if we do, should we pursue our full potential? or, more specifically, in what areas should we pursue our full potential, ideally? — Oppida

It depends on what you consider as a "potential". Each of us can show our potential in many different ways. However, this is not a limit to our ability to learn. For example, I have always been more interested in languages, law, literature, philosophy, etc. than physics or maths. For this reason, I always used all my potential to learn the first disciplines I mentioned, not the latter. But this is not a limitation to learning maths for me. It is just that numbers are not my cup of tea.

Say you're a carpenter and that a new machine has come out in the world that can do carpentry 10x as faster as you can. How would you feel? does the answer lie in the fact that you like or do not like your job? — Oppida

I understand your wondering and concerns. I also felt the same way you do right now, but I came to the following conclusion:

It's not the carpenter's problem if a machine comes out in the world that can do carpentry 10x faster. The problem is the world we live in. Most of the folks want efficiency and things done as soon as possible. But this is not new. The First Industrial Revolution swept a large number of farmers from the orchards, which was a terrible mistake. The goal was to teach the farmer how to use the tractor, not to replace him. A farmer has always been very proud of his job, so they carpenter too. These jobs are based on knowledge and experience, and a machine would hardly substitute them. Yes, a machine can do it 10x faster but with less quality. Ferrari and Lamborghini cars are handmade. :smile:

did they lose purpose? — Oppida

No, they just lost their jobs and it sucks when the unemployment rate increases.

Very true. I live in a city and, let me tell you, the vibe is very VERY different from that of a small town. Everything here is to be done "now" and to be done with efficiency. This pressure i see people put on themselves and on others is very clearly wearing them down.

Anyways, farmers are a good oportunity to represent my idea too:

Say im a farmer who loves farming; now, since i like the process of planting and harvesting, my crop yield will be less than of those who industrially farm, however, it might also be of higher quality. This might not be forever the case though, maybe some day a technology that does just what i, a farmer, do (be it a robot or a system or whatever) and then some, with the benefit of being cheap. Wouldnt be that unfair for me? I mean, i can always keep farming but, nobody would buy it! The problem gets worse once you realize that people actually prefer the machine over your work, so the tools with wich you used to farm go up in price or to simply dissapear.

This possibility is why i consider the question something ethical: should we keep advancing in technology to make it as efficient as it can get when theres a risk of losing something people like doing? Doing for the sake of doing is a very powerful tool to have meaning in life.

Now, i can see the argument that the cure for this would be art: if you do art whilst you let the machines do hard, laborious work, then youd be avoiding this all together. But i think that the moder human cares more about pleasue rather than doing.

This is what i mean: why would you do something you dont have to do? why do something that is explicitly useless? And if the answer is "because it gives us meaning", then why?

Sí. No se permite publicar en español. A excepción de una categoría reservada para ello que puedes consultar aquí — javi2541997

But this is not a particular forum section, verdad? It's only limited to those threads?

I sympathize with the rule that we've gotta speak english here as it helps with simplicity and clarity, and doesn't give too much hope to people who prefer no to speak english. I like speaking foreign languages though, siento como otra persona...jajaja...

Wow, another Hispanic fella? That's crazy.

If you post a thread in Spanish, it goes under that category, but it is not hidden. It appears on the main page. @fdrake allowed us to start threads in other languages; however it is not frequently used because the point is to have a common language for sharing our ideas, and the site rules clearly state that this site is English-speaking, by the way. :lol:

I sympathize with the rule that we've gotta speak english here as it helps with simplicity and clarity — ProtagoranSocratist

Exactly. It makes everything easier in terms of communication. :up:

Oh i'm not hispanic, I'm from the U.S. and am a white person, but i have learned to speak spanish fairly well from traveling and personal study. I also want to learn more languages, but finding the time and place to practice them is difficult.

One could consider them both the same thing but, obviusly, it depends on the ontology that whoever considers any of this may have. — Oppida

I don’t think this is right. As I understand it, nature is what happens all by itself, without goal, purpose, meaning, or use. All of these characteristics are nailed on later by humans.

I partially believe in what i said before about the artificial/natural being more or less two faces of the same coin (a sort of reality coin). — Oppida

Maybe this will seem like I’m contradicting what I just said, but I agree with this, although I’m not sure I mean it the same way you do. I’m an engineer. I came from an interest in science and started out as a materialist. In past decades, I have become interested in Taoism. I think that comes from a recognition on my part that the universe is half human. As Lao Tzu wrote—The Tao that can be named is not the eternal Tao. It is naming, something humans do, that brings reality into existence—something that can be expressed in words and handled as an object.

What im trying to say is that, looking at us humans from a god's POV would be a lot of fun, because we are not only part of an already incredibly complex natural system, but we've created an ever-more-so complex artificial system. — Oppida

I think maybe that from a God‘s point of view, the world is incredibly simple—probably just one thing—whether or not there are people in it. That one thing is what Taoists call the Tao.

I have the present example of switchboard operators. Did they like it? Did any of them consider that meaningful and, thus, "useful" to their existance? — Oppida

Don’t discount the value of work, whether intrinsically fulfilling or not, as a source of livelihood. Being able to take care of yourself and those you care about is a fundamental need.

if we keep developing it, will the switchboard operator problem happen again? — Oppida

It has happened many times in the past and will happen many times in the future unless, I guess, we finally establish our permanent uselessness.

people around me are all addicted to feeling good; hell, im addicted to a great degree too. — Oppida

As an alternative to feeling good, there is feeling at peace

Good! I am glad you took the time to learn my language. :smile:

An alternative to feeling good, there is feeling at peace — T Clark

:100:

Also, you can see that the tree is, in fact, useful to the people who are sitting under it, and also to those who — Oppida

True, but it would still be there whether or not those people found it useful. It’s current usefulness is irrelevant to it’s existence.

what are your takes on art? is it useful? — Oppida

I don’t think art is useful. But then I never said that only useful things have value.

I think I am in full agreement — Tom Storm

If I were to make a list of the people here on the forum I consider pragmatists, you would be near the top of the list, whether or not you think of yourself that way.

lmfao, i was referring to a chuang tzu passage in my first comment in this thread, only to discover you literally just posted the while story i was referring to....

i was referring to a chuang tzu passage in my first comment in this thread, only to discover you literally just posted the while story i was referring to.... — ProtagoranSocratist

As they say—great minds. I just happened to have an electronic copy of the Chuang Tzu on Kindle.