AI, the AQAL, and Kosmic Linguistics, Joe Corbett (original) (raw)
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Integral World: Exploring Theories of Everything
An independent forum for a critical discussion of the integral philosophy of Ken Wilber
Joe Corbett has been living in Shanghai and Beijing since 2001. He has taught at American and Chinese universities using the AQAL model as an analytical tool in Western Literature, Sociology and Anthropology, Environmental Science, and Communications. He has a BA in Philosophy and Religion as well as an MA in Interdisciplinary Social Science, and did his PhD work on modern and postmodern discourses of self-development, all at public universities in San Francisco and Los Angeles, California. He can be reached at [email protected].
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Joe Corbett
This is how one can use the AQAL to supplement scientific theories, including how to build a true AGI.
Artificial Intelligence is the latest wonder technology set to transform the world as we know it. There are different kinds of AI, such as LLM's (e.g. Chatgpt), self-driving cars, and deep fake video and music generators, among others. It will be the thesis of this essay that whatever AI we are talking about, in order for it to achieve the status of a true AGI virtually indistinguishable from true human capabilities and even beyond, it will have to operate by the same principles spelled-out in the AQAL, and that these principles are at the foundation of the Kosmos itself.
Using the AQAL to see how AGI and the universe must do this, we can see that in the Upper-Right Quadrant there are individual things. Let's call those things letters that represent sounds. We can also call them fundamental units of whatever kind, like particles of matter in the universe. In the case of things called letters they are combined to create larger things called words, but in order to do that the letters must align in a coherent way. For instance, the letters d-g-o do not combine to form a coherent sound (try it for yourself, you won't be able to pronounce it with your tongue), but the letters arranged as d-o-g or g-o-d do align to form a coherent sound, and that allows us to assign a larger meaning to them. Similarly with particles of matter, they must be in a place with respect to the other parts of the system such that the whole will make sense. Thus an electron cannot be at the center of an atom, but must be orbiting the nucleus of protons and/or neutrons for the larger unit called an atom to make sense to the universe.
Likewise, words in a sentence cannot appear in any random order, but must follow a sequence that obey the rules for syntax, which is an algorithm for thought. Sentences in turn must follow one another in logical order, such as not putting conclusions before propositions, and paragraphs must build on the paragraphs before them and not the ones that come after in order to create something coherently understandable as a narrative. In each case, letters, words, sentences, and paragraphs must contain a code of self-organizing order that distinguishes it from disorder, chaos, and otherwise incomprehensible noise and random information.
The above linguistic examples illustrate how the Lower-Right Quadrant, the system of things in relation to other things, operates by a principle of the coherence of things. That is to say, the parts of a system (each of which are manifested in the URQ) must fit together not in any random way, but in a way that makes phonic, logical, and syntactic sense to the property of the system of things itself, whether that be the anatomical structure of the mouth and throat that allows for only certain kinds of letter pronunciations, a cognitive structure that allows for the configuration of only specific kinds of propositional sequences, or the physical laws of atomic structure that allow for only certain formations of particle configurations. From the atomic level to the linguistic, there are sequential, hierarchical and potentially many other rules of organization that recursively feedback into how the relations between things are put together to form a coherent whole. It is of utmost importance for systems theory to identify what rules of organization might be operating for the different kinds of systems under investigation.
Switching now to another set of relations but this time concerning the inner domain of things, just as the parts or things of a system must fit together in their external relations to make coherent sense, so must the internal qualia and significance (the individual identity and signified definitions) of signifiers (things) fit into a system of interior relations (a collective identity of understanding) that ultimately determines the individual meaning and semantic significance of each thing. Dog is only meaningful in relation to other animals, and god is meaningful only in relation to other transcendent and non-transendent signifieds. This is not about the coherence of the thing within the system, it's syntactic relation to other things. This is about the internal relation the thing has to the interior of other things, to other defining meanings within the system of things. Thus an electron is different from a proton not just by the position it occupies within the atomic system of an atom (the atomic syntax), but by the internal properties of spin, mass, charge, etc., that define them as different particles, which is the atomic semantics.
What has just been described as pertaining to the atomic and linguistic levels also applies to all levels inbetween, to the molecular, biological, societal and ecological, as well as to the subatomic and cosmological levels. Any whole or holon that is sufficiently complex, including the entire universe itself as a single unit, must have a domain of its existence that defines the parameters for systemic coherence, and that is the syntactic domain in the LRQ. But it also must have a domain of inner consistency, identity, and meaning that relates the parts of the system to the internal differences between them, and that is the semantic domain in the LLQ.
However the individual meaning of the parts of a system, its semantic component, does not end with those parts simply acquiring individual significance in the ULQ and URQ, as such meanings accumulate over time and converge into larger patterns called archetypal forms in the LLQ, which are simply larger units of meaning than the individual parts. Like words forming sentences, sentences forming paragraphs, and paragraphs forming emergent narrative meanings, the archetypal forms are patterns of meaning writ large, like giant encompassing words with larger and multivalent significance, and they form the foundation of particular cultural beliefs. But these archetypes may themselves be combined to form still larger patterns of meaning called myths and other stories we tell ourselves to make sense of the world, including scientific stories, that form entire worldviews.
So you can see that the LLQ is particularly productive of the Beautiful and Truthful forms of our world that we know to be Good, but it would not be possible without the organizing coherence of Justice. At each level of existence in the Kosmos, there is a syntax of functional coherence and order operating under varied rules and roles to make the semantic meanings and identities internal to systems possible (and productive) of still greater and more complex meaning.
This is how one can use the AQAL to supplement scientific theories, including how to build a true AGI. What would it mean in a given scientific field to see the syntax and semantics operating on the objects and phenomenon observed? What signifiers in the URQ and signifieds in the ULQ would be operating as the parts within the semantic and syntactic fields of relations that are being studied? The AQAL is telling us that the Kosmos can be studied as a language that is speaking itself into existence, and while it may have multiple forms of language, there is a basic universal structure to the grammar.
God is speaking to us and showing us how to do as He/She/It does. Will we look, listen, and do as IT (Integral Theory/AQAL/God) does? Or will AGI, arguably the “second coming” of humanity's savior, just be a fading memory in those who refused to listen and turned their backs on their own Creator?