Say what? What’s up with the title of this post, right? OK, bear with me here, this will make sense, I promise! Though we will be meandering a bit through Indian and Chinese philosophy, growing up Chinese-American, AI superpowers, and finding out what love’s got to do with it.
So I recently attended a philosophy conference, Mind, Attention & World: Themes in Indian & Buddhist Philosophical Theory, at New York University. It was a two day event with many speakers presenting, and while I was only able to attend the first day, it was quite a learning experience, one which has proved staying power. Since then, I’ve spent some time thinking about what I heard, in particular, Evan Thompson’s and Curie Virag’s presentations.
Thompson’s talk was “Affect Biased Attention and Concept Formation.” My understanding of it and takeaway was, according to a Buddhist theory of concepts, all concepts and conceptual cognition have a subject-object structure that is biased by one’s motivations and affects. Discussions on attention in cognitive science and neuroscientific studies on meditation ought to account for this. If these aspects are brought into dialogue with these fields of contemporary science, it can offer a positive and beneficial way to understand the mind.
Here’s a cool diagram, which shows the difference between conceptual and non-conceptual cognition in ascertaining the color blue. It’s based on ca. 7th century Indian Buddhist philosopher Dharmakirti’s exclusion theory, which says conceptual cognition is predicated on exclusion, i.e., blue is blue because it is not red, not yellow, not a piece of paper, nor lunch, and so forth.
Non-conceptual cognition is here represented as pure perception of the image or object vs. conceptual cognition (“This is blue”) represented as exclusion. Exclusion is affected by motivations and affect, memories, thoughts, feelings, etc. from past experience.
Makes sense, if you ask me. Our minds have to make judgments built upon experience in order to be efficient, to streamline the massive stimulation we receive in the phenomenal world.
Thompson presented the view that one can have moments of awareness that give insight on how conceptual cognition is habituated and biased. These moments allow one to glimpse and experience non-conceptual cognition, when one can see things as they are, without biases, when one can weaken “the subject-object (grasper-grasped) structure of experience.” In other words, when one can more clearly understand the nature of mind, which goes beyond its perceptual, dualistic limitations.
In Buddhist practice, this is what meditation can help bring about.
I like that he continues to share a principle idea that was presented in The Embodied Mind: Cognitive Science and Human Experience, namely, cognitive science and Buddhist philosophy with its mindfulness/awareness practices can and should inform each other.
On the contrary, philosopher Curie Virag gave a talk entitled, “Attention as Cognitive Resonance.” It was not what I expected. It turned out to be more of a talk about Neo-Confucianism and its conclusion that the Buddhist theory of mind is an absurd contradiction.
The focus was on ideas put forth by preeminent Neo-Confucian philosopher Zhu Xi of the Southern Song (1126–1271) dynasty. This below slide quotes his assertion that mind is self-evident subject, and it is mind which controls the external world. That is to say, subject controls object. Therefore, the Buddhist view of mind which does not conform to subject-object formulation is summarily dismissed. Zhu asks, “is what we call the mind a unity or duality? Is it subject or object? Does it control the external world or is it controlled by the external world? We do not need to be taught to see the fallacy of the Buddhist doctrine.”
It seems to me, mind is here reified as subject without any need for a deeper investigation into the subject-object paradigm. Disappointing, in this philosophical regard. Though as a reformer of his time, I can see how Zhu brought “cognitive resonance,” as Virag’s presentation suggests, into Chinese culture by his emphasis on harnessing one’s attention towards being self-aware, authentically emulating the ethical behavior of sages, rather than merely ritualistically going through the motions without any genuine connection. Laudable, in this social regard.
Virag’s talk, though, has kept me pondering since I heard it, for a different reason. As a first generation child of Chinese immigrant parents who grew up bi-cultural with one foot in Chinese tradition and the other foot in American, it was a fascinating academic view into my own ancestral culture’s philosophy. It was also humorous for me to realize how Western my thinking is, having been educated and raised in the U.S. according to Enlightenment, humanist ideals.
Take this slide, for example, in which Virag summarized some Neo-Confucian terms.
While I venture to say that I understand these terms, “heart/mind” is one that a Westerner would easily trip over and not be able to make sense of, since we separate heart and mind, associating the former materially with the physical, pumping organ, and the latter with the brain. We also linguistically do not conflate the two. But in Chinese language, it is common to say, for example, “My heart thinks…” Because I grew up bilingual, I naturally understand the meaning of this, and perhaps importantly, I understand the experience of it–what it feels like when your heart thinks. My English-speaking self, however, feels a cognitive dissonance. Why, the heart feels; it’s the mind that thinks! If the heart is “thinking,” then it is not rational. It is instinct, seen often as lesser than the higher, more evolved mind.
I was also struck by what I saw as the rigidity and absolutism of Confucian ideas, built on very defined hierarchical social structures. Seeing Virag’s slides brought me back to childhood, when I had to traverse the different behavioral landscapes of Chinese and American cultures, plus figure out my identity and assimilate.
While Western culture, of course, has hierarchical social rules and forms of deference, having grown up in a Chinese culture, too, I can say that there is a very strong difference, and that is, Chinese culture looks down upon, suppresses, and disavows individuality. One is raised to see oneself as part of the group–especially the familial group. Actions taken solely based on one’s own individual desires and dreams are viewed and criticized as selfish. What you do as a person reflects deeply on your entire family. If you have done something shameful, your whole family bears the shame. Your whole family suffers. The sense of responsibility is that much greater in terms of being careful not to make mistakes.
Americans champion individuality. We don’t worry so much about making mistakes. We say, go for it! Take a chance, and if you fail, no big deal. Learn from your mistakes, and try, try again. We accept rebellion, when one rises up in opposition to family or social convention. In fact, we find challenging the status quo and inventing a new one rather heroic. That’s how innovation occurs. That’s what thinking outside-of-the-box and being original means.
Definitely not so in Chinese culture! At least not during my childhood and early adulthood.
So, I wonder, what attitudes and expectations are at work today in contemporary Chinese culture? And this leads me to the book I’m currently reading, AI Superpowers: China, Silicon Valley, and the New World Order by Kai-Fu Lee.
Lee believes we have entered the age of deep learning implementation, as opposed to discovery, and that China is poised to engage powerfully and efficiently in this next phase of the human digital revolution, given its already vibrant internet economy based on a single app, its stunning amount of big data, aggressive entrepreneurship, and top-down government support. As in Thomas Edison’s discovery of harnessing the power of electricity in his light bulb invention, it was really the implementation of electricity across industries that changed the world. Similarly, Lee says harnessing the power of AI is yet to be seen across industries, and surely it will change the world.
The book tackles so much, but in the context of this post, I’m bemused by Lee’s descriptions of U.S. Silicon Valley culture compared to Zhongguancun culture, China’s version. Silicon Valley’s entrepreneurship is demographically elite, professional, utopian, mission-statement driven to do good in society, where copying is frowned upon as unethical and authenticity praised; whereas Zhongguancun’s entrepreneurship is scrappy, cut-throat and combative, likened to gladiators fighting to their deaths in the coliseum, such that all rules apply, be it copying, creating knockoffs, or foul play. Lee says the goal is winning profit.
I’m wondering, where is the legacy of Neo-Confucianism in all this? The traditional respect for hierarchy? The modeling of sage-like behavior? Where is one’s jing, and authenticating one’s virtue? How is the heart/mind oriented in contemporary China? Lee would have you believe that it’s gone by the wayside–that is, at least in entrepreneurship.
I found it poignant that Lee, after battling cancer recently, had an epiphany about what really matters in this human life. In one word, it’s Love. Love is what he has reprioritized his life to include more of, and experience more of, and share more of, in his post-chemo remission and health.
I hope as we all move forward into the new world order of digital technology, including artificial intelligence, virtual reality, augmented reality, bioengineering, cyborgs, robots, and so forth, that we bear this human message of love deeply in our minds, or our heart/minds, as it were.
Maybe this brings us back to Silicon Valley. After all, the hippie movement did give rise to its culture, and as the prescient Beatles sang, All You Need is Love.