Google Axon. Advertising Dopamine.
OK. Bear with me. This will take awhile to get where I’m going.
Giant, long introduction to the point I’ll get around to making eventually…
Alan Turing — who invented the idea of the modern computer (sometimes called a "Turing Machine"), and whose first real stab at which is shown here — basically said that given a recording medium big enough, and enough time, you could record and solve any problem that could be stated clearly. That’s a gross oversimplification, but it’ll do for my modest blog.
Last October, we hit the 60th anniversary of John von Neumann’s initial proposal for the "universal computing machine" — i.e., the computer. Von Neumann took Turing’s ideas and turned them into a reality — a machine that could process different equations, rather than solving only one. A programmable computer, that is. The first use for which was to work on the equations for the atomic bomb.
60 years ain’t a very long time, and look what we’ve got today?
George Dyson has written two really interesting articles, one called Turing’s Cathedral and one called The Universal Library that deal with how far we’ve come since Turing’s initial thoughts on the subject, and where we’re headed; specifically with regards to what Google, and Internet search in general, is doing with our "thoughts" on the Web.
Dyson does a good — and admirably brief — job of describing the history of how Turing and von Neumann’s ideas have gotten us to modern computing, the Web and Google. But I want to pull out a couple passages in order to make a point.
OK. So Google is mapping the Web. Big deal. We knew that. I’ve heard the metaphor before, and ain’t really surprised to hear it again. I’m not sure I buy it, as a map is fixed, and search results change, not just based on criteria, but daily, based on changes to the data landscape. But Dyson goes on to talk about the three types of computing calculations that can be done, and how most computers are built to deal with "computable problems;" those with questions that can be easily asked and solved (if not easily solved, at least being predictably solveable). The second type, "non-computable problems" have questions that can be asked, but where we know we have no way to solve them.
The third type are most interesting, most fecund, and most appropriate for creative types like us:
The example he gives is the question, "What makes something look like a cat?" A child can draw a circle, six lines and a couple dots, and almost anyone will say, "That’s a nice cat." But to get a finite answer that would distinguish that solution from, say, "What makes something look like a mouse," would be very hard. In this case, as Dyson puts it:
And at this point, while reading his essay, my brain had a "Rubix Cube" moment. Which is what I call it when various things all start twisting around and reassembling in a different array than they were a few moments ago. I’m not saying all the colors line up (in my brain, sometimes the yellow side and green side do, but rarely any more than that), but something certainly changes.
I studied some child psychology and development in school. Not much. Just a few courses. But I do remember that the human brain starts out with lots more open neual pathways than it ends up with. Babies have (if I remember correctly) something like 10-times as many neural connections as adults. As they grow and learn and try to do things, certain pathways become strengthened — i.e., "putting spoon in mouth to get food" beats out "putting spoon in ear to get food" and the latter set of neural paths eventually dies out.
[Aside: we also learned that the part of the brain responsible for processing the "don't do that!" response to painful activities is the same part that processes the response to trying do do things in a new way after all those initial, baby-to-youngster, extra neural pathways have died out. That is, our response to change is physiologically very similar to our response to pain. We don't want to do things that might hurt us, and we don't want to do things in a new way, because it might hurt us. My prof explained that this is a survival mechanism; if you do things in the way you've done them before, it probably won't kill you, because it hasn't already. Problem is, from a creativity standpoing, doing the same thing might as well be death.]
Dyson goes on to talk about machine intelligence, the possibility that Google may be the basis for the first worldwide artificial intelligence, dogs and cats living together… mass hysteria. OK. Not those last two. But, while I think it’s interesting and, as a sci-fi fan, not boring or laughable, AI is not something innately predictable or that I want to focus on.
I do, however, want to focus on the idea that Google is providing a worldwide brain already. Not an intelligence, per se. But a digital analog (I love saying that) to the physical, juicy meat and chemicals that make up our own grey matter and allow us to process our own biological questions, searches, answers and thoughts.
For the love of Pete, Havens… Get to the point.
OK. OK. Calm down. Here’s the point.
I have a friend at work whom I respect very much. She’s one of our web team managers. Loves wikis (as do I), but hates blogs. Because, to her, they are, basically, unrestrained "thoughts," posted to the Web. I’m paraphrasing her, but she finds most of what she reads on blogs to be drivel.
As do I. But I love blogs. Why?
Because they let everyone post their drivel, and some of that drivel ain’t drivel to me. I don’t care about the 9,000,000 teens who are blogging on what they wore to the blah blah blah. Or about many entertainment blogs. Or about hundreds of millions of other blogs out there. But I care what John Battelle says abourt search. And I care what Bill Ives says about KM. And I care what my friend Jenn writes in her poetry.
Again, I hear you say, "Get on with it. What’s the point here? That everybody likes different stuff on the Web? We knew that."
Yes, but…
If Google, by searching the Web in finer and finer increments — and, more recently, printed materials and other media — provides a methodology for me to determine which thoughts (for words, which are mostly what we’re searching for and through, are thoughts) out there are going to help me be more productive, creative, happy, healthy, etc… then isn’t Google acting as a kind of meta brain, by which everyone will be connected to those thoughts?
I’m not positing artificial intelligence here. I’m not imagining some great, Ozymandian force, rising up under the Google campus and causing us to buy more porn, redo our mortgages and connect with classmates. I’m theorizing that this "new brain" is making the aggregate cognitive abilities of everyone connected to it more… something.
Faster? Happier? Productive? Worried? Distracted? Creative?
I’m not sure yet. Some people I know are very distracted by the Web. I know I can be. Some are very empowered in their jobs and personal life and hobbies. There’s so much more that we can know in a few seconds or minutes than we could even a few years ago at all, or in a time span that was prohibitive. And it keeps getting better. Or at least faster, more, funkier, distractiver, etc.
Was that the big point?
Almost. Sort of. Yeah. In brief:
- Google (and search in general) is a way to connect our thoughts across time and distance
- Tools like blogs and wikis allow more people to put thoughts out there.
- As Dyson says, providing a robust manner to search a "von Neumann matrix" (the Web) in a random fashion is a good way to solve the "third kind" of logic problem; i.e., rather than try to program a computer to answer the asked question, "What does a cat look like?" you search the Web for decriptions or pictures of cats until you have an idea in your head that satisfies your personal contextual need.
- By searching others’ thoughts, we find ways to use them to solve our own problems
- By posting our thoughts, we incrementally improve the matrix (i.e., we help the Web "learn")
But here’s an ancillary point.
How appropriate is it that advertising is Google’s "dopamine" in this "big brain" metaphor?
I know, I know. The big search window isn’t "advertising supported." The "natural" search results are based on some insanely complex calculations that are based on key words, inbound links, how often your page changes, etc. etc. That being said, Google pays for all that with advertising. That and that being said, many of the best "natural" links are buoyed by SEO strategy that is, essentially, advertising (or at least marketing) supported.
In our metaphor, then: advertising/marketing = positive neural reinforcement.
Which is true in reality when we examine how the Web works. Those sites that are visited more often are more likely to survive. More traffic equates to either more revenue — for commercial sites, that’s the definition of life — or more interest. If you have readers, sponsors, friends, authors, contributors… whatever… your site will be much more likely to flourish than if you have fewer.
I’m not saying that the model is bad. I use Google a couple dozen times a day at least. It’s a great tool. Once you learn about how to narrow and expand your searches, you can get around a lot of the crap that’s force-fed by SEO "strategies." But I am saying that if we’re going to have a global brain that’s going to help us connect to each other’s thoughts, maybe we need to be thinking about what the chemical is that stimulates that brain.
Because, if we work the metaphor backwards, an advertising model might be akin to a lima bean advertiser telling your kid, "I’ll give you a dollar to stick your fork full of peas in your ear," every time he’s trying to eat peas.
December 3rd, 2005 at 8:29 pm
Spot on with the meta-brain theory, I believe. I’ve been in tune to the debate on Google print, and could care less about the copyright issues (so long as they get resolved in such a way that the concept continues in a suitably regulated fashion). My interest lies not only in the obvious power such a service could bring to me (i.e. quickly tracking pertinent info on a specific topic), but it would also bring all published information within the reach of every literate person. Everywhere. This, on top of certain local efforts to bring wifi to major metropolitan areas (Philadelphia, Google’s supposedly dewiring SF), has potential to bring staggering change upon society.
That being said, it is, as you seemed to be hinting at, a good time to consider who the arbiter of this potential massive change really is. It’s comforting to know that Google’s mantra is “Do No Evil”, but is that mere propaganda in a greater campaign for something going on behind closed doors? They’ve seen my e-mails, and I don’t really care. But now I want to see theirs. How do we know that their definition of “Evil” does not include marketing Scientology books to someone who searches for “religion”? They’ve made some documented decisions to disclude certain content before — it’s certainly just as easy to include hand-picked advertising. Not saying I have ANY reason to think this is the case — I’d just like to be sure this power is in the right hands.
Thanks for the Dyson articles — off to read that now.
December 4th, 2005 at 3:25 am
Oh, so much to read, so many, many potential comments. For now I have a question pertinent to one of your asides —
You bring up the “pain sector of brain lights up when situations requiring new information are encountered” phenomenon. I like your prof’s theory, that we react to learning in the same way that we react to discomfort because it’s a survival trait — known behaviours are usually safer than new and untested ones. Ergo, the brain itself discourages learning.
However, I have a bit of a problem with the last portion of this theory. Learning does not actually feel painful, and that may be a crucial point, here. Having the neural center of the brain associated with discomfort light up and having the brain process/transmit pain signals are not necessarily the same thing.
Intense anxiety does feel like having a thumb slammed in a drawer, only minus the pain, itself. The two are primarily similair in that you get the same sort of physiological background noise with both — increased heart-rate, pulse, adrenaline levels, restlessness, a certain proneness to reactivity, etc.
Now I’ve read that 90% of the activities an average individual engages in are actually learned or automated — 90% because that list includes some really basic stuff like breathing, reaching up to scratch an itch, crossing the living room to reach the kitchen, flicking on a light in a familiar room, driving to work, etc. From what I understand, the really interesting thing about the human brain is that it is designed to be adaptable — rather than beginning as a stable map of constant responses or instincts (swim upstream, spawn and die)the human brain has the ability to develop instincts, alter them when they no longer work, or even drop them altogether. Even more intersting is the brain’s ability to shove so much activity off the psychic main stage and into the subconscious.
Now, in re-considering the brain’s tendency to access the neural cluster associated with pain, it may very well be that the brain is not so much actively discouraging learning, but intensifying the same sense of vigilance that normally accomponies pain — in other words, triggering a stress response could be the brain’s way of shouting “Hey you! Wake up! We have a series of “does not compute” signals! This could be important! Snap out of auto-pilot!” Couldn’t it? (see, I told you this was leading to a question).
December 4th, 2005 at 3:54 am
From what my prof (and later some other folks I’ve met in the child dev and mental health industries) have told me, there are two different kinds of neural responses when something painful happens to us. First, is the pain itself, which hurts. Duh. Pain is natural, not learned, and can’t be turned on or off except through extreme measures (i.e., drugs, meditation, training, etc.) Second, is the *learned* response to a painful stimulus. IE, “When I touched the stove last time, it was hot and it hurt me, so I shouldn’t do it again.”
That second response — the brain’s wish for us to generally avoid pain — is the one that is also triggered when we try to do a familiar thing in an unfamiliar way.
For example, one of the tests that was quoted in my class involved forcing people to write with their “off” hands while their brainwaves were being monitored. Their feelings registered very similarly to how you’d feel if someone made you stand near a dangerous animal or told you they were going to hit you; worried, anxious, frustrated, etc.
The same readings held true for cognitive issues as well. Students in one study were shown fake news stories of a familiar, pleasant or benign public figure in which it was reported that they had done something very bad. Now, you’d expect that to register as “yuck” on the old brain scan. But the same thing happened when they did the reverse and showed articles that claimed bad people had been proved innocent or done good things.
The basic point my prof was trying to make is that the first way we learn to do something ends up being strengthened over time. It’s like the roads around Boston. They follow paths that were originally designed by cows. The cows wore narrow paths in the dirt, which became country roads, which became larger roads, which eventually became Route 128. You use something, it gets stronger. You don’t, it’s a pain to make it work another way.
Mostly we try to avoid pain. And for many people, that translates into a marked desire to avoid change; and learning is a kind of change. Lots of people really, really don’t like school or having to learn new job skills. It’s hard. Why? Because it forces you to do different stuff with your brain.
A concept I’ve brought up before is “The Beginner’s Mind.” This Buddhist idea is one that suggests we should examine the feelings of frustration, fear, anxiety (whatever) that grip us when we’re challenged with a new situation, and learn not only how to deal with them… but how to actively seek them out and cherish them.
Creativity thrives on change. Not always huge change; sometimes very incremental, subtle change. But if you are afraid of change — if you associate it with pain, loss or confusion — you won’t be able to create anything new.
That’s one of the reasons I worry a bit about advertising supported search on the Web. And about our current search tech. They tend to “bubble up” the same stuff again and again. The easy stuff. The stuff we found last time. There are ways to go deeper, search more granularly or boisterously… but if the emphasis shifts even further to commercial models, we may find non-commercial Web activities becoming ever more “painful.”
December 6th, 2005 at 11:00 pm
I think you might dismiss the “artificial intelligence” model too quickly. If you think about how the brain stores, organizes, and retrieves information, you are not too far from Google. Once the search engine mavens find a way to go from “related links” to “unrelated but maybe relevant links” we will be that much closer to AI. As for advertising, John Battelle’s book makes clear that the Google founders really had two brilliant breakthrough ideas. The first involved improved searches through ranking the importance of sites. The second was figuring out a business model that would make a search engine something more than an amusing add-on to the all-important “portal.” No advertising, no search engines. No search engines, and the Internet is a system for posting online brochures and sending email. Capitalism is the engine that drives individual initiative as much as the other way around. Google was just a really neat toy until someone figured out the pay-per-click business model. Gimme some of that dopamine, baby. It makes the world go ’round.