[HN Gopher] Tomorrow people: For a century, it felt like telepat...
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Tomorrow people: For a century, it felt like telepathy was around
the corner
Author : Caiero
Score : 20 points
Date : 2024-06-10 13:18 UTC (1 days ago)
(HTM) web link (aeon.co)
(TXT) w3m dump (aeon.co)
| swayvil wrote:
| I think that we, as a society, are really attached to language
| and convention. And telepathy is incompatible with that. So any
| evidence or argument for telepathy is voided.
|
| There is a mountain of anecdote, however.
| lxgr wrote:
| All of which can be adequately be explained for with unexpected
| physical nonverbal communication channels, confirmation bias
| and various other cognitive biases, and none of which
| reproducible in a methodologically correct setting, despite
| decades of trying.
| swayvil wrote:
| "Adequate explanation" is a tool of relatively small scope,
| dependent upon the judgment of individuals, which is of
| relatively great scope. If many individuals judge it
| "telepathy" then that carries weight. Let's not put the cart
| before the horse.
| mistermann wrote:
| It sure can, but whether your explanation is correct is the
| tricky part.
|
| Luckily, most people can't realize this so the problem
| "doesn't exist", and "is" solved.
| 29athrowaway wrote:
| Telepathy is around the corner, with Neuralink it will be
| possible somehow.
| thuuuomas wrote:
| You first
| swayvil wrote:
| What will we exchange? Language? Memories? Streams of sensory
| stuff?
|
| Because language is, in the big picture, very very small.
|
| And if we were going to exchange memories etc, we might have to
| encode it.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _language is, in the big picture, very very small_
|
| You may enjoy Ted Chiang's "The Truth of Fact, the Truth of
| Feeling" [1][2].
|
| [1] https://web.archive.org/web/20140222103103/http://subterr
| ane...
|
| [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Truth_of_Fact,_the_Trut
| h_o...
| 29athrowaway wrote:
| Better than talking and being overheard. Also, with telepathy
| you could have any voice of your choice, with any sound
| effects.
| TheRoque wrote:
| Yeah, you could buy the Morgan Freeman voice pack for only
| 20$
| mistermann wrote:
| Insightful question...unless something emergent came along
| with Neuralink for free, we have a hard problem of how to
| figure out how to use the new bandwidth. And both ends need
| to be able to encode and decode, _and understand the result_
| , with multiple levels of error handling.
|
| An exception: high resolution transmission of emotions could
| be revolutionary.
| labster wrote:
| In just 20 years, we'll have fusion-powered telepathy.
| passwordoops wrote:
| <snark>
|
| In space in the metaverse on the blockchain!
|
| </snark>
| ozim wrote:
| Well I can app/sms my GF in other room without yelling already.
| The same with sending her notes on situation in a crowded room
| or on a bus/train without strangers knowing.
|
| I feel like I have it covered without implanting stuff in my
| head.
| throwanem wrote:
| If we're going to talk about telepathy and all mean the same
| thing by it, we need a rigorous definition of the term. Does
| anyone have one?
|
| If asked to invent, I'd start with "the communication of meaning
| in the absence of signification", but I am unstudied in the field
| and have no idea what prior art exists.
| Waterluvian wrote:
| Transfer of information not using the existing senses.
| loceng wrote:
| Is intuition a sense - or is that potentially some people
| excelling at reading physical cues that 99.999999% of people
| can't see or relate to what someone is then likely thinking?
| Waterluvian wrote:
| Intuition isn't a sense. There's no data being measured.
| Intuition is a processing and synthesizing of past and
| sometimes presently sensed data into some meaning.
|
| When I understand "sense" in this context I'm understanding
| "sensor." A sensor is measuring something.
|
| I think the closest I can get to telepathy without it being
| a completely wild paradigm shift in understanding is if we
| could implant technology directly into our brains, thus
| introducing new sensors.
| snowwrestler wrote:
| Growing up I read a lot of "golden age" science fiction, and I
| remember realizing how many classic "hard" sci-fi novels and
| short stories feature super mental powers like telepathy,
| precognition, teleportation, etc.
|
| - Asimov's Foundation series
|
| - Herbert's Dune series
|
| - Larry Niven's Known Space stories
|
| - Heinlein's Stranger from a Strange Land
|
| - Alfred Bester's Demolished Man and Tiger Tiger
|
| - Clarke's Childhood's End
|
| I'm sure there are more that I forgot to mention.
|
| It really did seem to be a pervasive expectation that the mind
| was the next frontier for seemingly magical scientific
| advancements. But it never panned out with actual results, and
| mental powers faded from hard sci-fi stories.
| Apocryphon wrote:
| I also noticed that Starship Troopers threw in hypnosis among
| its many military technologies, for some reason, which feels
| like a related sci-fi concept.
|
| I don't think teleportation counts. Feels like either Star
| Trek-type super-science or outright mysticism.
| BarryMilo wrote:
| I know it's not your main point, but I think most of us big
| sci-fi fans agree that "soft" vs "hard" sci-fi is a false
| dichotomy. Who knows what is and what will be possible? Just
| because the technology is wrong doesn't mean the idea is not
| interesting.
| shrimp_emoji wrote:
| Hard means it's kept within tasteful range of today's sense
| of technoplausibility.
|
| Usually it also implies that it grapples with the nitty
| gritty details to "earn" the tech. Hohmann transfers vs.
| brachistochrone trajectories omg squee
| https://projectrho.com/public_html/rocket/torchships.php
| pfdietz wrote:
| A lot of that was due to the influence of John W. Campbell.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_W._Campbell
| spacecadet wrote:
| We have telepathy, any unspoken private message is as good imo.
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