I’ve run across the phrase cloud computing several times recently. I Googled the phrase, read the various entries, but still didn’t understand what it actually was – until our trip a couple of weeks ago to the Florida Keys.
In addition to the lovely location, our agent’s house is a book lover’s dream. So one afternoon when I realized I was nearly finished with the book I’d brought with me, I started roaming through the books around the house, starting with the stack on the table pictured above.I picked up one called You Are Not a Gadget, by Jaron Lanier, known as the father of virtual reality. I’d never heard of the book, but the first page I turned to discussed cloud computing. Synchro, I thought, and read on.
“Cloud is a term for a vast computing service available over the internet. You never know where a cloud resides physically,” writes Lanier. “Google, Microsoft, IBM, and various government agencies are some of the proprietors of computing clouds.”
So it might be said that one possible cloud is composed of the millions of individuals who contribute to the internet through blogs, websites, forums, a kind of global brain, as Lanier calls it. “According to a new creed, we technologists are turning ourselves, the planet, our species, everything, into computer peripherals attached to great computing clouds. The news is no longer about us but about the big new computational object that is greater than us.”
As I was reading this, it suddenly dawned on me that one of the best examples of a computing cloud is a web bot that claims to use the internet as a giant oracle that can predict future events. The two men who own the technology, Clif High and George Ure, call themselves Time Monks. The technology and algorithms, which are kept secret, supposedly tap into the collective unconscious through spiders that search the Internet for 300,000 words. The predictions can allegedly predict catastrophes 60-90 days in advance.
I’ve been following George Ure’s site for a couple of years now. Occasionally, he posts free predictions from the web bots, but mostly he’s an economist who rarely sees anything good about the economy and is a diehard urban survivalist. Just before the financial meltdown in 2008, he and Clif were on Coast to Coast, I think it was, and were talking about the web bot predictions for a dire downturn in the economy. It was definitely a hit. They claim to have other hits, but I can’t vouch for them.
So the web bot project uses millions of blogs and websites to make predictions. Quantity, in other words. In his book, Lenair talks about quality versus quantity. “The fragments of human effort that have flooded the internet are perceived by some to form a hive mind or noosphere.” Some of his tech friends – like Larry Page, one of Google’s founders – expects “the internet to come alive at some point.” Other people – like science historian George Dyson – believes it has happened already.
Lenair has some interesting stuff to say about blogs and blogging and how the internet is changing the book and music industries. That alone is worth the read. But his particular take on the “hive mentality” of the web and what it may mean for individual creativity is what really captured me. And thanks to this book, I finally have a clearer understanding of computer clouds and was able to identify the web bot project as one such cloud. I also realized that the government routinely uses their computing clouds to scan blogs and websites. We wrote about our experience with that here. There have been other such incidents, but that’s a post for another day!
Don't anyone think for a moment that spiders aren't in some manner "intelligent". We had an enormous, and I mean size of the human adult palm enormous, female banana spider who chose to weave her beautiful web just outside the FL room door where I spend 90% of my time, The back door is solid glass, so when I look out, I viewed out tropical garden plants, and "Charlotte" in her very large web. I thought she had babies, but when I researched banana spiders, I learned that the very small spiders around her were actually males. They aren't toxic, but being the serious arachnophic I am, I asked hubby to please re-locate her and put her, with her mates, over the back fence. This he accomplished, with some difficulty. I breathed a sigh of relief. Then lo and behold, next morning, Charlotte was back outside the door, sans mates, however, spinning a new web home! She managed to somehow creep and crawl her way all the way from the back of our neighbor's yard, across our privacy fence, and return to her original space. Weird. I just leave her alone now and V E R Y carefully open the back door! WV:
"chies" (appropriately, she looks as if she's laughing at me, saying 'cheese' for a camera!) cj
3 spiders in 3 days, yuck.
Synchro for sure, Connie.
trish and Rob, take a look at the WV in my comment posted on this space at 9:55. The WV was "ingeram". I didn't notice that until I went bacj and re-read the comments. This is creepy as all get-uot. Drop the "e" from that WV and we get the EXACT spelling of the last name of JI. Exact. And what are we discussing here? Man, talk about synchronicity! Wow and double wow! And speaking of spiders, my middle son who doesn't read this blog, came by yesterday, knows how aracnophobic I am, and told me that yesterday morning a huge FL spider somehow landed on his shoulder while he was in the shower! He said he literally went berserk. (He's also arachnophobic!) cj
Very thought provoking post.
Had 3 spiders in 3 days here. One was nearly big enough to saddle up and go for a ride. EEEK!
wv +unuclo
Would have been approriate for the previous post. Un nuclo
Spiders are not allowed in my home. Every time I see one, I remind them they belong outside where I can admire their web.
Actually, the respect for all life including insects is something I promote, but not in my house. If I'm supposed to respect them, they need to respect me. So I have no problem chasing bugs out of my home, especially my kitchen. And if they are not faster than me, they meet an early demise.
But this post was about the WEB BOT technology with is NOT about predicting the future but about techno-spiders that stream through cyberspace and the WEB built from words and energies of the moment.
Any sites that post predictions for the future from the spiders they send out are creating a web of energy according the filter of their water vapor molecules – that are combining with others in the cloud. The most basic physics will show water vapor created in a toxic environment will contain levels of toxicity. Acid rain results.
Though I know nothing about George Ure and his predictions, you've stated he's an urban survivalist who rarely sees anything good in the economy. Which is fine for him, but I'm not urban or a survivalist and I find global economic predictions rather misleading for individuals.
So that's the beauty of my spider tonight. Big, black and fast. I chased him with a napkin, with intent to kill, and stating spiders are not welcome in my home.
I didn't get him (her?) because she disappeared into the gap of molding by the floorboards.
WV: endieste (the spider didn't meet its end!)
Odd,that spider. All day, I've been finding tiny spiders on my dark wooden desk – hard to spot unless a light is on or the sun is shining thru the window in a perfect way. Some mama has given birth here somewhere around my desk.
To me, spiders are about creativity. But honestly, I don't like them right in right in nmy face like this!
Yep. Proof. Big black spider suddenly appeared on the wall crawling toward my desk. LOL!
wv: forewoo (could be personal to me about "before my woo-woo" days.) 🙂
Thanks, Terri. This confirms what I've felt about "clouds of information."
Oh, funny, this wv: profe – I looked at this and saw PROOF.
SYNCHRO POST for me! 🙂
Unfortunately it would take too long to explain the many layers. I'll just state one.
Cloud Computing is something my hubby is directly connected to on the technology side and I've done my best not to pay too much attention because that's not my thing anymore. But it was professionally until only four years ago, so there's a lot I do understand and am often amused to see how the "science" integrates strongly with "ancient philosophy". This is where the SYNCHRO comes in.
I've had many synchro messages and my personal messages are related to TIME. Which is good because it's going to take time for me to figure out anything worth repeating.
I see the cloud as a mist. What were single water vapor molecules are now being joined into a cloud of energy which extends through the stratosphere and is the birthplace for some powerful energy.
Rain, hail, lightning, tornadoes, thunder, etc. are birthed within clouds. The syncrho for me relates the cloud to both philosophy and technology, with added energy and maybe more storms on the horizon. I love a good storm. Clears the air, adds nitrogen to the soil.
How fun.
Thanks!
WV: onsedgi – on the edge – is what I saw this to mean.
Over a period of several yearsI've become very familiar with the web bots of Clig High and George Ure, as a consequence of a peculiar
relationship with a fellow who was my client, and who is a friend of Clif's. My interest in the web bots arises from my immersion in languages and syntax, and the Time Monks seem to have created a new "language", for lack of a more apt description, as a means of translating the material they receive through their zillions of crawling spiders. Whether their predictions are correct or not, for me, is a moot point. The introduction of a language for computer purposes is what is fascinating. I expect to see more such languages and "clouds" evolving as time passes. cj
There are more authors like Peter Russell (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Russell_(author)), Francis Heylighen and Valentin Turchin (also with biographies in Wikipedia). Peter Russell uses now and then the word "synchronicity" (with its meaning defined by Jung). For that phase when the internet (or networked information) becomes alive and thinking (or for e.g. the transition from monocellular to multicellular) Turchin has coined the term "metasystem transition".
Chardin was way ahead of his time! And yes, with blogging, I thinbk we're there.
I have been fascinated with this idea ever since I read Teilhard de Chardin's idea of the noosphere. He postulated that the next step of human evolution after the biosphere is the one that we create with our minds and the collective consciousness that emerges. We are definitely there with the blogosphere, don't you think? Great post, lots of good information here!
Feeding into the clouds: interesting phrase there, Mike. I like it!
Energy is energy, like Nancy said, and in that sense, I think the internet IS already alive.
wv: pyriest – priest?!
An interesting post, not something I've thought about before. I guess, as with all things, it can be good or bad – it depends what we are all feeding into the 'clouds.'
Just as an aside…..the word "internet" resonates to the frequency of 15/6, which is the frequency of anything relative to ETs and UFOs, both poles of 15/6, positive and negative, light and dark. For me, this speaks volumes in myriad ways, and I sense it to be very positive although obviously it can be abused and used for negative purposes as well as positive purposes, as we all know. cj
Mind boggling indeed – thanks again for something potent to contemplate. The comment about the internet being "alive" intrigues me. I can't see how the internet can limit human creativity – if anything, it expands the parameters of what is possible all the time.
Energy is energy. Thoughts are energy. If it is concentrated, it makes sense that it could create.
It all goes back to being responsible for thoughts, and thoughts that go out into clouds of other thoughts.
On the other hand, what an opportunity to circumvent governments that want to control what its populace thinks and believes about the rest of the world. Maybe the people will be able to influence each other in very powerful ways. Maybe even in good ways…
I agree with Gypsy. Mind-boggling, yet with such a ring of truth to it that it's….frightening? Enlightening? Both?
cj WV: ingeram
oh, gee, mind-boggling and totally intriguing the whole concept – and a bit disconcerting –
wv here = preenmy – pre enemy? need i say more? 😉