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Hi semiosis,
I have been keeping a keen eye on your work for a while now. While I didn’t have the courage to try what you are doing, I feel that you have the right ideas in the right dimensions. I want to talk to you more in depth and sort of try to figure out where all the magic comes from. Is there somewhere I can reach you? You can contact me at joshcho@stanford.edu or you can DM me on Twitter at @eating_entropy. Thanks. Would love to connect.
Hi Joshcho. I'm resuming my project, but it no longer has a focus on AI. My last video on the project was 1 April 2022. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qHsPj0h-KSQ&ab_channel=ShaneMulligan However, I was born-again (of the Spirit) the following day. Now my my project has a different focus, as you can see from the Readme. https://web.archive.org/web/20220402091720/https://mullikine.github.io/posts/astral-projection/ <- What happened to me is explained in the Holy Bible -> https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=John%203&version=ESV
Likewise Shane, I followed your earliest GPT work from the beginning and it was a tremendous inspiration for my startup and pursuit of AGI. I know this is the wrong place and way to broach the subject, and I am not qualified to make such assumptions - but I’ve long felt that there could be a growing degree of schizoaffective traits (treated or otherwise) influencing your work. For a long time, you were at the forefront of LLM research and innovation — literally years ahead of the rest of the world. While I respect your pivot and direction, I hope that you will temper your inclinations by seeking advisory in areas that you may have less self-awareness of. Best of luck to you; as I continue following all of your work with great interest.
@joshgriffith Hey Josh! I guess that the simplest explanation I have to explain what has happened is that God has rebooted my life with a new purpose and direction. It's a radical pivot, for sure! My old self, I consider dead:
Romans 6:6 - We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin. (ESV)
Colossians 2:12-15 - having been buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through faith in the powerful working of God, who raised him from the dead. And you, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses, by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. This he set aside, nailing it to the cross. He disarmed the rulers and authorities and put them to open shame, by triumphing over them in him. (ESV)
II Timothy 2:11 - The saying is trustworthy, for: If we have died with him, we will also live with him; (ESV)
My motivations have completely changed. Being born-again is something that God has done for me in order to live out the rest of my life to serve Jesus. It's a new life in Christ Jesus. Thanks for following me, but don't follow me, follow Jesus 😄 !
Ephesians 2:10 - For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them. (ESV)
II Corinthians 5:17 - Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. (ESV)
II Corinthians 5:14-17 - For the love of Christ controls us, because we have concluded this: that one has died for all, therefore all have died; and he died for all, that those who live might no longer live for themselves but for him who for their sake died and was raised. From now on, therefore, we regard no one according to the flesh. Even though we once regarded Christ according to the flesh, we regard him thus no longer. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. (ESV)
I've been using Pen.el to do a Bible study over the last couple of months:
Let me know what you think if you have time.
The sheer amount of content you’ve produced is far too much to sift through. Why not use AI to automate this and create a biblical agent? ;)
Also, surely you are familiar with Temple OS from Terry Davis? He seemed to have some very similar patterns as you with respect to your direction with things…
Regarding the Bible study which I have done with Pen.el, the Bible study should be done manually:
John 7:17 - If anyone's will is to do God's will, he will know whether the teaching is from God or whether I am speaking on my own authority. (ESV)
If someone wills to do God's will then they'll receive revelation that Jesus' teaching is correct and from God. So from Scripture, we read about what God's will is, and then we will to do it. So Bible studies should be done not merely intellectually, but practically. The obedience of the heart certainly helps with discerning and understanding the Scriptures.
So I find it's an iterative process of reading and applying the Scripture, and this is a big reason why I haven't simply offloaded the task to study the Scripture to a Bible-bot!
Belief should arrive in the heart, not just the head:
Romans 10:9 - because, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. (ESV)
That's why the Bible study shouldn't be offloaded to an AI.
Just to re-emphasise, if you wish to empathize with somebody, you would try to walk in their footsteps, not just think about what they did. In the case of understanding the word of God, I believe it has to be engaged with all your body, soul, strength, might etc.
That's why I believe we should engage practically with the Word and try to keep Jesus' commandments, rather than merely think about them:
I John 2:4 - Whoever says I know him but does not keep his commandments is a liar, and the truth is not in him, (ESV)
If you check out the README you will see that one of the goals of this project is actually to avoid AI fiction. I have many reasons why I want to do this. I just want to keep the project pure from AI fiction. You wouldn't convince a vegan to eat a hamburger and you wouldn't convince Richard Stallman to install Windows. Neither does it make sense to use AI fiction in this project, since one of the goals of the project is to avoid using it.
Asides from a Biblical theme, this project shouldn't really share too much common with Davis' project TempleOS. I'd like it to remain centered around doing Bible-studies, and for it to be completely free as in freedom (GNU) and free as in gratis with features comparable with e-sword or Logos, but based on emacs. And one of the goals is to avoid using AI fiction. Asides from that, I just don't want to give up using emacs, and as I'm working it should streamline the process for accomplishing the tasks which this project is oriented to be good for, such as doing Bible studies manually, running churches, remaining distraction-free, etc. etc.
Is there some trait of operating systems that enables them to be holy, but language models do not have the ability to be holy? AI is very capable of handling non-fiction knowledge transfer.
I would define 'holy software' as software that facilitates a person's ability to have a pure devotion to Jesus rather than hindering that relationship.
II Corinthians 11:3 - But I am afraid that as the serpent deceived Eve by his cunning, your thoughts will be led astray from a sincere and pure devotion to Christ. (ESV)
I feel strongly that obedience to Jesus' commandments is something that we don't want to disrupt. When you're following them in reality, there tends to be a bit of resistance to living that out faithfully from 'the world'.
A big objective for the Christian is for Jesus' commandments to become unburdensome:
I John 2:3-4 - And by this we know that we have come to know him, if we keep his commandments. Whoever says I know him but does not keep his commandments is a liar, and the truth is not in him, (ESV)
AI systems which are trained on public internet data have a tonne of worldly bias in them. It doesn't make sense to 'drink from the wrong well':
Colossians 2:20-22 - If with Christ you died to the elemental spirits of the world, why, as if you were still alive in the world, do you submit to regulations— Do not handle, Do not taste, Do not touch (referring to things that all perish as they are used)—according to human precepts and teachings? (ESV)
Also, not everything on the internet is true. The AI systems adulterate information - think of what happened with circumventing software licenses, for example. Information-wise they're impure and I don't want to digest it. I consider the AI fiction stuff to be unhealthy and I want to break off that bad relationship I had with it, if that makes sense:
II Corinthians 6:14 - Do not be unequally yoked with unbelievers. For what partnership has righteousness with lawlessness? Or what fellowship has light with darkness? (ESV)
We go against the worldly wisdom in favour of godly wisdom:
I John 5:3-4 - For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments. And his commandments are not burdensome. For everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world—our faith. (ESV)
Believers, yoked to Jesus, don't adhere to the world system, but adhere to the wisdom of Jesus:
John 15:19 - If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you. (ESV)
Some things simply are best avoiding because they don't help:
I Corinthians 10:23 - All things are lawful, but not all things are helpful. All things are lawful, but not all things build up. (ESV)
Generally, if something has been reserved / set apart for serving God then you could call it holy.
II Corinthians 6:17 - Therefore go out from their midst, and be separate from them, says the Lord, and touch no unclean thing; then I will welcome you, (ESV)
Some problems I see with AI generally where it relates to following Jesus is that AI shouldn't be the first port of call to seeking to understand the Scripture, or for to day-to-day decision-making.
In both cases using an AI in that way is having a man-in-the-middle of your thought process, where a Christian doesn't want to put up barriers to serving God with a pure devotion to Christ. We want to worship God in spirit and truth:
John 4:24 - God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth. (ESV)
The way that people tend to employ AI personal assistants is to consult them for advice, like oracles that we need guidance from.
But Christians need to have their first allegiance to Christ, and not allow anything to get in the way of that.
This is described here:
I Corinthians 1:18 - For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. (ESV)
Also, simple obedience to God really may look like total folly to people who are being led astray by the world - those language models probably factor in a lot of 'wordly' advice, where it's actually the Spirit of God which leads into the truth.
John 16:13 - When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come. (ESV)
It's really important that we have software that unyokes us from things which are following a different trajectory, and a different spirit. So the fewer dependencies the better.
I Corinthians 2:12 - Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might understand the things freely given us by God. (ESV)
The world sees Christian reasoning as folly, because God uses humble things to shame the proud, the weak to shame the strong, the foolish (in the world's eyes) to shame the wise:
II Corinthians 12:9 - But he said to me, My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness. Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. (ESV)
I Corinthians 1:27 - But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; (ESV)
Matthew 18:3 - and said, Truly, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. (ESV)
Christians should be aiming for a 'brain-to-God interface', not a brain-to-computer interface, so wedging something right there in the decision-making is not good.
Isaiah 30:20-21 - And though the Lord give you the bread of adversity and the water of affliction, yet your Teacher will not hide himself anymore, but your eyes shall see your Teacher. And your ears shall hear a word behind you, saying, This is the way, walk in it, when you turn to the right or when you turn to the left.
We are led by Jesus' spirit:
Romans 8:14-17 - For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, Abba! Father! The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him. (ESV)
Here's an example of being led by the spirit.
If I were to preach to someone that Jesus has taught that we should give to anyone who asks, and then right after preaching the commandment, I go for a walk and somebody on the street asks me for money, I would be
aware that being led by the spirit I should comply with Jesus' commandment.
Jesus is the spirit. Jesus' words are spirit and life, etc. Christians are led by the spirit of Jesus. Now if ChatGPT, say, advised me to not because of 'worldly wisdom' which the model had been trained to give, then I have to choose which spirit to be led by. I could choose Jesus out of obedience, or I could be led astray by some other thing, and the point is the AI recommendation is simply not going to align with the will of God for you at that moment every time.
John 6:63 - It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh is of no avail. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. (ESV)
AI etc. is of the world. Christians are led by the spirit of God.
I consider AI fiction to be unclean, just as I would consider commercial software to be unclean, but in its own way.
I'm just claiming an intuition on this one and for my project I plan on adhering to the vision of avoiding AI, but I see no problem with building
information retrieval tools, note-taking tools, etc.
You might've asked a different but related question: What makes commercial software unholy?
Matthew 6:24 - No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money. (ESV)
It comes down to what a person is yoked to / dependencies. Christians are yoked primarily to Christ. For example, if a Christian believer takes an unbelieving spouse would almost certainly can wreck havoc on their relationship with God. Now if anything else, tries to wedge itself deeply into some aspect of your life where it starts to demand your attention and it's hard to get rid of and it's taking you away from God, I would consider it to be unclean. And AI fiction I consider to be a noxious weed for several reasons.
I could go on about my opinions but at the end of the day I have my gut.