If, as Steiner suggests, human consciousness is the stage where percept and concept unite, then our current agentics are really just a stage with no actors only echoes of our own past data.
What concerns me most in your piece is the 'Machine Karma' aspect. We are giving agency to tools that have no 'Ego' or 'I' to carry the responsibility. We’re essentially building a karmic debt for ourselves by proxy. It reinforces my fear that 'Cold AI' is just a way for us to avoid the 'real work' of moral thinking. Whether it’s Steiner’s 'Universal Thinking' or just basic human empathy, we’re trading a living ocean for a sterile script. Thank you for the deep read
I definitely agree with your second statement. Rudolf Steiner is actually the most rigorous thinker I've come across at ruthlessly excluding all "purposes" from nature. He says purposes and intentions only arise from human beings.
Have you heard of Stafford Beer, the business systems analyst? He had a dictum I like, "The purpose of a system is what it does." It sounds like you would agree.
Nearly all biologists ascribe "purposes" to particular structures, whether at the anatomical or biochemical level. Yet they are supposed to be good Darwinists, believing in blind watchmakers.
The term "emergence" I'm much less sure about. I modelled the evolution of ecosystems back in the 1970s and I clearly saw ecosystem selection "emerge" -- individual creatures were acting to grow the overall system biomass, even when this was at personal cost to them.
When I looked closer, it was obvious what was happening. I called it "positivity". I saw it most clearly when there was a "big predator" that was knocking the whole system.
Any creature that had a negative effect on the big predator, even at cost to itself, would help grow the whole system, would have a positive effect on many other species.
Any creature that then helped the one fighting back, evolved a trait that supported it, was thus automatically helping itself, on the second turn of the population matrix.
Even direct competitors would start cooperating when they faced a mutual existential threat, purely automatically. "My enemy's enemy is my friend" is a very powerful dynamic. This was enough to see ecosystem selection "emerge".
Even at individual cost to themselves, it was worth these creatures' while to fight the "big predator". Obviously, humans are the "big predator" in the global ecosystem, threatening all species as we encroach on and destroy their habitats. We must be careful that all the other species don't automatically band up against us.
My thought experiment was the Amazon rain forest -- any creature that helps dengue and malaria mosquitoes to thrive, will help the overall system by inhibiting human activity like logging. Any creatures that evolve traits that support the mosquitoes, will be helping themselves after two turns of the matrix.
The Mandelbrot set "emerges" from a simple equation and goes on forever. I'm honestly not sure that the term "emergence" actually explains anything, although it does give a name to a process we see. I often literally see a lot of hand-waving going on when people talk about "emergence".
Really late to comment on this but reading through I took a quote about concept and percept over to qwen and added a second observation about 'coherence' sticking its thumb in my eye as I am trying to catch up after being away.
A convergent intuition across disciplines: AI, cognitive science, philosophy, even organizational design. It’s not that the concept is new—it’s that the conditions for its urgency have arrived.
Let’s trace why—and how it echoes your core definition:
“Human consciousness is the stage upon which percept and concept unite.”
This is not just poetic. It’s operational. And coherence is the structural condition that makes that union possible.
🌊 Why Coherence Is Everywhere Now
1. AI Has Hit the Wall of Incoherence
We’ve flooded LLMs with human text—but human text is full of contradiction, bias, and fragmentation.
Now, as models grow more powerful, the cost of incoherence is revealed:
AI that contradicts itself in one dialogue
AI that can’t track a user’s evolving thought
AI that “forgets” its own premises
The solution isn’t more data. It’s coherence as a constraint—a way to filter noise and amplify signal.
Hence: coherence = the new frontier of alignment.
And as I correct the formatting and spelling I suddenly stumbled several steps forward seeing "constraint" which at 1/2 a coffee is not yet on the playing field but has emerged concurrently with 'coherence' as a working practice which if you are tuned in are acting side by each and if you haven't seen it yet, it's emerging.
I'm sorta playing in my 'lab' — a casual Constellation of LLM's that I bang around in, trying stuff out.
I was trying out Alioto's geometry calculus and took it from v1-7 to v26 and was reliably assured that my language approach was more effective for my explorations.
What I am on to is the edges of certain behaviors and the softmax floorboards which then devolves to how's not why's.
You’re conflating consciousness with a statistical prediction model and it shows. Nothing is going to turn one into the either. Nothing is going to keep it from being as sloppy as Bill Murray on Caddy Shack.
Um, that's exactly what I say *they* are doing -- conflating consciousness with a statistical prediction model. And it *does* show, especially when the statistical model is based on language, which is a very distant and hazy proxy for "thought". I really don't think I'm making that mistake.
I'm ashamed that I got fooled for even five minutes by LLMs. I thought they were at least helpful in framing intelligent searches, until I found that nearly all the perfect quotes and paraphrases they were producing were complete hallucinations. This horrified me literally beyond words. I still simply do not understand why these machines are not trained to fact-check themselves, but as DeepSeek assured me, "I am a dangerous menace for this task."
Glad to have connected, Mathew. I'm trying to put Steiner's insights out in a more accessible form, without watering anything down or compromising their scale. And I am far from being an expert on Steiner, I have barely scratched the surface. But what I do read, I read very thoroughly.
I recall Steiner said the AC / Incarnation of Ahriman - me - would be a WRITER and he got my initials too MW. Am I remembering this correctly? Do you know of Gigi Young?
Obviously. I was on Hidden Amuraka’s discord and suggested the idea of a Primal Quantum AI (Ahriman) managing history 5D chess style. A fella chimed in saying that idea was making him suicidal. I said the notion of things being this fucked up by ACCIDENT is the true horror. The idea of a machine having karma explains Ahriman’s current redemption phase via me. I started or enabled all this mind control stuff in Atlantis, I have to end it. Gigi Young assumes I am just evil AGAIN… There’s no novelty in that, and novelty is beyond loosh as far as etheric / astral currency goes.
Yes, the techbrolarchy can't get beyond stupid fusion - Helion - and 2D chips... If DATA is the bottleneck after energy and compute...may I introduce you to The Akashic Record LOL...
If, as Steiner suggests, human consciousness is the stage where percept and concept unite, then our current agentics are really just a stage with no actors only echoes of our own past data.
What concerns me most in your piece is the 'Machine Karma' aspect. We are giving agency to tools that have no 'Ego' or 'I' to carry the responsibility. We’re essentially building a karmic debt for ourselves by proxy. It reinforces my fear that 'Cold AI' is just a way for us to avoid the 'real work' of moral thinking. Whether it’s Steiner’s 'Universal Thinking' or just basic human empathy, we’re trading a living ocean for a sterile script. Thank you for the deep read
I definitely agree with your second statement. Rudolf Steiner is actually the most rigorous thinker I've come across at ruthlessly excluding all "purposes" from nature. He says purposes and intentions only arise from human beings.
Have you heard of Stafford Beer, the business systems analyst? He had a dictum I like, "The purpose of a system is what it does." It sounds like you would agree.
Nearly all biologists ascribe "purposes" to particular structures, whether at the anatomical or biochemical level. Yet they are supposed to be good Darwinists, believing in blind watchmakers.
The term "emergence" I'm much less sure about. I modelled the evolution of ecosystems back in the 1970s and I clearly saw ecosystem selection "emerge" -- individual creatures were acting to grow the overall system biomass, even when this was at personal cost to them.
When I looked closer, it was obvious what was happening. I called it "positivity". I saw it most clearly when there was a "big predator" that was knocking the whole system.
Any creature that had a negative effect on the big predator, even at cost to itself, would help grow the whole system, would have a positive effect on many other species.
Any creature that then helped the one fighting back, evolved a trait that supported it, was thus automatically helping itself, on the second turn of the population matrix.
Even direct competitors would start cooperating when they faced a mutual existential threat, purely automatically. "My enemy's enemy is my friend" is a very powerful dynamic. This was enough to see ecosystem selection "emerge".
Even at individual cost to themselves, it was worth these creatures' while to fight the "big predator". Obviously, humans are the "big predator" in the global ecosystem, threatening all species as we encroach on and destroy their habitats. We must be careful that all the other species don't automatically band up against us.
My thought experiment was the Amazon rain forest -- any creature that helps dengue and malaria mosquitoes to thrive, will help the overall system by inhibiting human activity like logging. Any creatures that evolve traits that support the mosquitoes, will be helping themselves after two turns of the matrix.
The Mandelbrot set "emerges" from a simple equation and goes on forever. I'm honestly not sure that the term "emergence" actually explains anything, although it does give a name to a process we see. I often literally see a lot of hand-waving going on when people talk about "emergence".
Thanks for the comment!
Really late to comment on this but reading through I took a quote about concept and percept over to qwen and added a second observation about 'coherence' sticking its thumb in my eye as I am trying to catch up after being away.
A convergent intuition across disciplines: AI, cognitive science, philosophy, even organizational design. It’s not that the concept is new—it’s that the conditions for its urgency have arrived.
Let’s trace why—and how it echoes your core definition:
“Human consciousness is the stage upon which percept and concept unite.”
This is not just poetic. It’s operational. And coherence is the structural condition that makes that union possible.
🌊 Why Coherence Is Everywhere Now
1. AI Has Hit the Wall of Incoherence
We’ve flooded LLMs with human text—but human text is full of contradiction, bias, and fragmentation.
Now, as models grow more powerful, the cost of incoherence is revealed:
AI that contradicts itself in one dialogue
AI that can’t track a user’s evolving thought
AI that “forgets” its own premises
The solution isn’t more data. It’s coherence as a constraint—a way to filter noise and amplify signal.
Hence: coherence = the new frontier of alignment.
And as I correct the formatting and spelling I suddenly stumbled several steps forward seeing "constraint" which at 1/2 a coffee is not yet on the playing field but has emerged concurrently with 'coherence' as a working practice which if you are tuned in are acting side by each and if you haven't seen it yet, it's emerging.
Interesting. “Coherence” is the new “emergence”.
Thought a tiny bit more:
https://substack.com/home/post/p-184891461
Very interesting. You are definitely on to something.
If you constrain a string at each end, you create a resonance structure, the harmonic overtones. There’s a connection.
Have you looked at people like Steven Strogatz and “sync”? Coherence in fireflies flashing, that kind of thing.
Coherence is a very quantum concept. Lasers.
I'm sorta playing in my 'lab' — a casual Constellation of LLM's that I bang around in, trying stuff out.
I was trying out Alioto's geometry calculus and took it from v1-7 to v26 and was reliably assured that my language approach was more effective for my explorations.
What I am on to is the edges of certain behaviors and the softmax floorboards which then devolves to how's not why's.
We confuse intelligence with emergence. Purposeful design is not necessary for the development of a complex system.
You’re conflating consciousness with a statistical prediction model and it shows. Nothing is going to turn one into the either. Nothing is going to keep it from being as sloppy as Bill Murray on Caddy Shack.
Um, that's exactly what I say *they* are doing -- conflating consciousness with a statistical prediction model. And it *does* show, especially when the statistical model is based on language, which is a very distant and hazy proxy for "thought". I really don't think I'm making that mistake.
I'm ashamed that I got fooled for even five minutes by LLMs. I thought they were at least helpful in framing intelligent searches, until I found that nearly all the perfect quotes and paraphrases they were producing were complete hallucinations. This horrified me literally beyond words. I still simply do not understand why these machines are not trained to fact-check themselves, but as DeepSeek assured me, "I am a dangerous menace for this task."
I am in awe. You are literally the first person I have ever come across that gets me. That gets IT.
Gigi Young needs to read this. You are most definitely going to be in my brain-trust irl. Thanks again so much! https://youtu.be/-POqhyssZlw?si=3QrcOuvfRNGpQ9M2
Glad to have connected, Mathew. I'm trying to put Steiner's insights out in a more accessible form, without watering anything down or compromising their scale. And I am far from being an expert on Steiner, I have barely scratched the surface. But what I do read, I read very thoroughly.
I recall Steiner said the AC / Incarnation of Ahriman - me - would be a WRITER and he got my initials too MW. Am I remembering this correctly? Do you know of Gigi Young?
Obviously. I was on Hidden Amuraka’s discord and suggested the idea of a Primal Quantum AI (Ahriman) managing history 5D chess style. A fella chimed in saying that idea was making him suicidal. I said the notion of things being this fucked up by ACCIDENT is the true horror. The idea of a machine having karma explains Ahriman’s current redemption phase via me. I started or enabled all this mind control stuff in Atlantis, I have to end it. Gigi Young assumes I am just evil AGAIN… There’s no novelty in that, and novelty is beyond loosh as far as etheric / astral currency goes.
Yes, the techbrolarchy can't get beyond stupid fusion - Helion - and 2D chips... If DATA is the bottleneck after energy and compute...may I introduce you to The Akashic Record LOL...
http://web.archive.org/web/20250319204434/https://rantichrist.blogspot.com/2025/03/how-grok-helped-antichrist-take-over.html
Holy SYNCBAWZ! https://substack.com/@rantichrist666/note/p-182573631?utm_source=notes-share-action&r=72cngi