Tag: life

You Can’t Go Home Again – But Do I Really Want To?

by James Wallace Harris, 7/28/26

What is nostalgia? Most people think of it as a mental perception, an outlook, but what if it’s just another emotion caused by a chemical reaction in the brain? What if it’s like fear or sexual desire, caused by triggers in our environment? When we were still hunters and gatherers, wouldn’t you think that all emotions evolved from traits that supported survival? Fear of tigers and snakes made fear a very good thing. Horniness promoted reproduction.

However, other emotions, like anxiety, sadness, and depression, don’t feel positive, nor would I think they’d promote survival. Have we always had such emotions? Did cavemen sit around the fire complaining they were depressed and didn’t feel like hunting mammoths today? Did they long for old campgrounds or prey they hadn’t seen in a long time?

If nostalgia is an emotion like anxiety, what triggers it? Nostalgia used to be considered an ailment, but today we think of it as an indulgence. Nostalgia has been in the news lately because Gen Z has become nostalgic for the 1990s, and especially for a time before smartphones and social media. Lots of writers and pundits are trying to read the tea leaves of current nostalgia trends.

I have always suffered from nostalgia, even when I was a kid. Nostalgia has always been both painful and euphoric to me. Often specific thoughts and sights trigger it. Does that mean nostalgia is an emotion similar to sexual desire? Then does it have a useful purpose?

Early this morning, my sister sent me a link to Google Maps showing the house her son is buying for her. She said it reminded her of the house we lived in back in the late 1950s, in the Lake Forest subdivision, near Hollywood, Florida. She asked me if I could find the address of our old home. I got on Google Maps and found that house.

That Lake Forest house is a powerful trigger of nostalgia for me. It has haunted my dreams since 1963. It’s the El Dorado of my childhood that I keep searching for in my subconscious.

I never felt nostalgia before I lived there. I’ve never analyzed why before. I have looked it up on Google Maps several times over the years, and it’s always triggered a tremendous rush of nostalgia.

My family first moved to that house in 1958 when I was in the 2nd grade. We’d just moved back to Florida after living in South Carolina for a few months. This might have been the first house my parents owned.

This was an interesting stage in my life. At 7, I evidently was old enough to remember more, so this period is an archaeological strata near the lowest part of my mind. I had memories of places before this, but they are vague and rare.

We only lived at the Lake Forest house for about a year, and then moved to New Jersey and Mississippi for my 3rd grade, and then returned to Lake Forest for my 4th grade. During the 5th grade, we moved to Homestead AFB in 1961, and then returned to Lake Forest in early November, 1963. We moved away from that house the day after John F. Kennedy was shot in Dallas. That was 11/23/63, and I was in the 7th grade.

I spent less than 3 years total at the Lake Forest house, probably closer to 2 years. Yet, it’s burned into my memory. From 1963 until sometime in the 1980s, I often dreamed about the Lake Forest house. The dreams were always about desperately trying to find my way home. In the 1980s, I actually got to see the Lake Forest house again with my sister and her husband. That was an intense experience. It felt so tiny that I thought I could walk like a giant up and down the block in five steps.

Those searching for my way home dreams stopped. Visiting Lake Forest cured them. At least until I got into my sixties, when I started having a generalized version of those dreams, which I wrote about as “Can’t Find My Way Home Dreams.”

When I looked up the house on Google Maps this morning, that old intense feeling returned. I get this specific, overwhelming ache whenever I think about the places I used to live. And it depresses me in a unique way when I discover that any house I once lived in has been torn down, such as the one on West Trade Avenue in Coconut Grove.

There have been times in my life when I fantasized about returning to one of my favorite houses, buying it, and retreating there to live like a monk until I died. What’s that about? What would a psychiatrist make of that?

My father was in the Air Force, and we moved many times when I was young. I think I went to 3 first-grade schools, 3 seventh-grade schools, 1 school for 6th, 9th, and 12th, and 2 for the rest. Maybe all that moving around as a kid did a number on my psyche. Why do I want to go back to those places? I don’t mean now, but in time. Is nostalgia about finishing unfinished business?

I’ve known people who are seldom, if ever, nostalgic. My friend Laurie will call me sexist for saying this, but I feel women are less nostalgic than men. I know a lot of men who are nostalgic for the things they owned, wanted to own, in adolescence, or for the people and activities they pursued in their teenage years. Is nostalgia simply a longing for happier times? Just look at the old guys who buy old toys. I’d like a 1967 GTO.

Then how come I’m nostalgic for all the less-than-great times? For example, what was so great about the Lake Forest house? Do I want to be a kid again? Do I miss my little friends Michael Kevin Ralph, and Patty Paqquete?

I don’t know what happened to them.

They say when you die you are reunited with everyone you once knew. That’s probably a trick of the mind during the dying process. If it is, does that mean it’s the most powerful desire we have in life? To meet everyone again?

I have moved around so much that there are hordes of people I once knew. And I have run into a few of them over the years. What’s weird is such reunions are often disappointing. We discover we have so little to say to each other. We really can’t go home again. Then why do we try?

If I could travel back in time to visit earlier versions of me, I’m not sure if we would have much fun together. Is the Jimmy that was blown away by hearing Bob Dylan’s “Like a Rolling Stone” on a clock radio in 1965 anything like the Jim that thrilled to listen to “Like a Rolling Stone” on SACD in 2010? Or the old Jim listening to it now?

I must admit that Spotify is a goddman humongous nostalgia machine. Six feet to my right are bookcases with old science fiction magazines. They aren’t the same magazines I owned as a kid, but they are the same issues.

Sometimes I think nostalgia is feeling loss for parts of ourselves that have disappeared along the way.

What’s funny is I don’t think I’m as nostalgic in my 70s as I was in my 60s. Maybe, after decades of trying to return home, I’ve accepted I can’t.

I know I hate to travel in my old age, but that might be normal. Before I was 40, 18 months was the longest I lived anywhere. Then as I got older, that period began to lengthen. I’ve lived in this house for 20 years, and the previous house for 7 years.

I want to die in this house.

I still get deep emotional pangs when I think about certain houses, especially the Lake Forest house. Do I grieve for past versions of myself? Did Thomas Wolfe write You Can’t Go Home Again because many people feel that way? Maybe I need to reread that novel. It might be more meaningful now that I’m older. When I first read it, it was assigned in college.

It’s rather ironic that I’ve spent so much time reading science fiction, thinking about the future, and now I spend most of my time living in the past by reading old books, listening to old music, and watching old TV shows and old movies. At night, I dream about people I used to know and places where I used to work. And if I have insomnia, I lie awake thinking about the past. But is that nostalgia? I’m not so sure. I’m probably just consuming pop culture that I’m conditioned to enjoy most.

When I was younger, I’d lie awake thinking about the future, making plans. I used to worry about the future, but I don’t worry much about it anymore.

This morning I listened to an article from The Atlantic about how young people are nostalgic for the years before smartphones and social media, even if they never lived in those times. They hunger for a simpler time.

I wonder if my nostalgia for old homes is something like what they are feeling?

During my younger days, I used to love fantasizing about where I’d go if I had a time machine. Would I return to 1958 if I could? Notice the windows on the right in the picture at the top. They’re open. We had no air conditioning back then. The high today is expected to be 100F. I know this makes me a pussy, but I’d never travel further back in time before central air.

And unlike the current generation, I don’t think I’d like to travel to a time before smartphones. My memory is going, and I depend on them to recall words that won’t come to mind. As my mind becomes more crippled, smartphones are proven to be excellent crutches.

Besides, the old music I love sounds better on modern stereos. And the old movies and TV shows look way better on my 65-inch high-definition TV than they did on the old 19″ CRT. And I doubt the two heart procedures I’ve had were available in 1958.

If I’m realistic, I know any wanting-to-go-home-again nostalgia I feel is just chemical processes in my brain I can’t control. It’s about as useful as feeling horny when you’re an old fat bald guy with ED at 74. That’s just damn annoying. I guess when we’re old, we want to return to many places we used to go, and for some, it just takes a long time to realize we can’t.

JWH

Replacing a Bluesound PowerNode 2i with a WiiM Amp Ultra

by James Wallace Harris, 7/6/26

I was quite happy with the Bluesound PowerNode 2i, which I bought years ago. I used it in my bedroom with Klipsch RP-5000F floorstanding speakers. I’d retreat to the bedroom to play music loud and not bother my wife in the front of the house. However, it never sounded as good as my Audiolab 6000A and Polk R600 floorstanding speakers in the den.

The bedroom setup sounded very good, but didn’t produce the big, airy soundstage that I had in the den. Of course, the den is much bigger. I liked its sound so much that I ended up playing my music there more often. My wife said it was okay, but I still worried about annoying her.

Then, when the PowerNode 2i started acting flaky, I thought here was my chance to upgrade the bedroom. The PowerNode 2i still worked, but if I turned it off and then on, it often wouldn’t play music through the speakers, only the subwoofer. I’d have to turn it off and on several times before it would work right. The 2i doesn’t have an on/off switch. Normally, I just leave it on. However, sometimes I wouldn’t use it for days. It would stay warm. And with the subwoofer, I worried about wasting electricity. So I start turning it off at the surge protector. I don’t know if this damaged the 2i.

I thought about buying an Audiolab 6000A for the bedroom, but I’ve seen so many glowing reviews of WiiM products that I wanted to try them. I wondered if what I really liked was the sound of a class A-B amp. The 6000A is twice the price of the WiiM Amp Ultra. I wondered if class D amps had improved in the four years since the 2i came out.

Normally, the WiiM Amp Ultra is $529 at Amazon, but during Prime Day, it was $449. I took that as a sign.

At first, I just swapped speaker cables with the 2i when I set up the WiiM. I also set the crossover for the bass and ran the room correction software. Then I played my first test song. The sound was somewhat better than the 2i, but the soundstage was still small. This disappointed me. I thought of sending it back.

Then I got an idea. I moved the speakers out into the room and further apart. This made a huge improvement. One I was happy with. I had them on six-foot cables. I ordered a set of ten-foot cables and spread them out further. It sounded even better.

Of course, the speakers are in the way. I decided to live with that. I’m the only one who uses this bedroom, and so far, my wife hasn’t seen the setup. I bought some cable covers to protect the speaker cables.

I really like the sound now. It is different from the 6000A. The best way I can describe it is to compare it to working with a photo in Photoshop. The sound from the WiiM feels a tad oversaturated, like oversaturating the colors in a photo. I can change that with EQ, but it’s never as airy as the music from the 6000A. I don’t know if that’s because of the room size or not.

The lesson here is speaker placement and room dynamics. Probably, the PowerNode 2i would have had a larger soundstage if I had moved the speakers out for it. If I wasn’t so lazy, I’d swap the 6000A and WiiM Amp Ultra to see how they sounded in the other room.

The screen on the WiiM Amp Ultra is too small to matter. And I don’t need the phono input or other inputs. I do like the subwoofer support. For the bedroom, all I care about is streaming. I see reviewers on YouTube who claim that if I spend a lot more money, I could get equipment that sounds better than the WiiM. I could test that hypothesis if I tried the 6000A in the bedroom. However, I’m happy enough.

However, I still wonder if those reviewers are right. If I spent $10,000, would I experience music way better than the WiiM? Unless I win the lottery, I’m not going to try to find out.

JWH

Are My Thoughts Like Your Thoughts?

by James Wallace Harris, 6/15/26

In Chapter 3, “Thought” from A World Appears, Michael Pollan works with psychologist Russell T. Hurlburt, who has been collecting thought diaries from his subjects for over fifty years. The technique Hurlburt uses is called Descriptive Experience Sampling (DES). Subjects wear a device that randomly beeps in their ears. When they hear the beep, they write down what was going on in their head just before the beep. Hurlburt says:

I have sampled with some people whose inner experience is characterized almost exclusively by inner speech; with others whose inner experience is characterized almost exclusively by images, or by sensory awareness, or by unsymbolized thinking, or by feelings; with others whose inner experience is characterized by a combination of all those; with some whose inner experience is characterized by many simultaneous events; with others whose inner experience is characterized almost exclusively by one event at a time; and so on. So, yes, I think people are importantly different when it comes to inner experience.

So when you ask a person, “What are you thinking?” the answer might not be anything like how you think. For the most part, people assume everyone thinks like they do, but Hurlburt’s research shows that isn’t true.

I’ve kept a running chatter in my head my whole life, except for when I’m unconscious. However, as soon as I wake up, the voice returns. It’s weird to think that some people don’t have this inner voice. That makes me think of the science fiction novel Blindsight by Peter Watts. Watts imagines an intelligent alien race that lacks conscious self-awareness.

My inner voice is almost always analytical, always commenting on what I’m experiencing. If I have a pain in my abdomen, the voice is proposing theories as to what is causing the pain. But it’s not always like this.

When I was younger, I had constant fantasies about everything. I was a little Walter Mitty. I’ve always had imaginary conversations in my head, usually about what I was going to talk about with people in the future. Of course, I had lots of sexual fantasies, but I had many more kinds of fantasies. If I saw a movie and didn’t like the plot, I’d reimagine it with a new plot. If I didn’t like the actors, I’d recast the film in my head. I’ve mentally written hundreds of science fiction stories. For every blog post I write, I’ve already written it several times in my thoughts.

I found it fascinating that Hurlburt said some people don’t do this either.

But then, when I discovered I had aphantasia, my mind boggled trying to imagine how other people see inside their minds. I do sometimes have flashes of visual imagery. My dreams are very vivid. And sometimes if I’m tired in just the right way, I have waking dreams. When I was young and smoked dope, the visual floodgates would open.

I do “visualize” things in my head, but without pictures. I have good spatial awareness and can intuit how machines work. I have another sense for how things look. It’s very hard to describe. I wonder if it’s like how blind people develop spatial awareness?

Hurlburt’s research also showed that people see and think less in their heads as they age. That makes me wonder if I had better mental imagery when I was younger. I do feel my inner chatter is slowing.

One reason I believe that is because when I first tried to meditate in the 1970s, I had a hell of a time quieting that inner voice. Now I can relax, and it will shut up for about as long as I can hold my breath. And it feels like that. The longer I shut up mentally, the pressure builds, sort of like needing to take a breath when you’re holding it. Thoughts eventually explode out.

I’ve often wondered why most people aren’t addicted to music like I am. When I play music, it stimulates my brain in many ways. My “thinking” goes into overdrive, and my mind is flooded with ideas. Also, music creates all kinds of emotions or enhances existing emotions. Music makes me mentally high, but it’s unlike the old marijuana high that made my body high, too. I need to hear one to two hours of music a day, so it does feel like an addiction.

I’m not sure what Hurlburt means by “symbolized” and “unsymbolized thinking.” I might do that, or I might not. Nor do I know what he means by only being able to think of one event at a time. I know I’m experiencing many sensory events at once, but I think I only focus on one at a time. Are some people multichanneled? Is that like having multiple picture-in-picture on your inner TV screen?

I have to assume I’m a bookworm because of the way I think. Reading fiction is like having your own artificial reality goggles. However, I don’t visualize scenes like other readers do.

I assume I write blogs because it feels like I’m organizing my thoughts. I assume that I would think like a writer, say, like Michael Pollan. But the more I read about Hurlburt, the more I wonder.

The fact that there is so much variation from person to person in our modes of thinking is itself an important finding of Descriptive Experience Sampling. Most of us assume that our inner lives must be substantially similar—not necessarily in content but in the form our thoughts take. Hurlburt has suggested that we fail to recognize the diversity of thinking styles because we lump them all together under that single word—thinking—and assume we mean the same thing by it, though in actuality we don’t.

“When a visualizer says they are thinking about something,” Hurlburt said, “they mean they are seeing a visual image of something, and if they are predominantly inner speakers, they mean ‘I was talking to myself.’ And the reason for this, I speculate, is that when you were two and learned that when your mother, or whoever it was, says, ‘I was thinking,’ that meant something that was happening inside Mom that you couldn’t see. So when I want to tell you whatever is going on inside me, that’s ‘I’m thinking.’ But ‘thinking’ means something different from person to person.” If Hurlburt is right, the word thinking has allowed us to overlook these differences and make the unwarranted assumption that other people are having inner experiences more or less like our own.

Pollan, Michael. A World Appears: A Journey into Consciousness (pp. 146-147). Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

Pollan was surprised when Hurlburt expressed what his DES diaries suggested:

Hurlburt proceeded to tell me that he didn’t think I had much inner experience at all. I was on the far end of a spectrum that ran from a rich inner life of words, images, and sensations to one…well, one lacking all that. Apparently, the fact that I had so much trouble distinguishing context from the moments under analysis (and kept bringing up things he considered irrelevant) suggested to him that I was, in effect, backfilling moments empty of actual inner experience.

I was flabbergasted, and reacted a little defensively.

Hurlburt said that he had arrived at his conclusion by a process of elimination: Most of my beeps lacked words, lacked images, lacked sensory awareness. Okay, but what about unsymbolized thinking? My non- or preverbal thought processes seemed to fall neatly into this mode. Hurlburt acknowledged that we had turned up a few instances of this, but “unsymbolized thoughts are complete thoughts,” he explained, not the misty “gists” of thought I had described. Subtract those and he was left with one uncomfortable possibility: that I didn’t have nearly as much of an inner life as I’d always assumed.

My interiority, he seemed to be suggesting, was sparsely furnished.

Has it always been this way? I wondered. Hurlburt pointed out that the ability to generate inner experiences depends on cognitive resources that decline with age. For example, he’s found that as people get older, their inner seeing tends to deteriorate, fading from full-color imagery to black and white. He cited James, who writes that “the older men are and the more effective as thinkers, the more, as a rule, they have lost their visualizing power…. The present writer observes it in his own person most distinctly.” Hurlburt thinks that all forms of inner experience may be subject to the same fading over time.

Pollan, Michael. A World Appears: A Journey into Consciousness (pp. 148-149). Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

Can we know ourselves? Many philosophers and scientists say we can’t understand consciousness because we’re studying it from the inside out. Wouldn’t it be wonderful to step outside of ourselves and study who we are?

It’s quite commonly known that people see colors differently. For example, when I play Rummikub with friends, they claim the green tiles are blue. This is really no different than how different monitors show the same .jpg file with different-looking colors.

This morning, my inner voice was chatting about how we see the world, and asked if machines perceive reality differently. Does a camera see a vista as objective reality? Or are the chemicals in film, and the sensors in digital cameras, also limited by physical constraints?

It is rather weird that we have no idea what reality looks like. And it seems we have no idea what we really look like on the inside.

JWH

STEVE JOBS IN EXILE by Geoffrey Cain

by James Wallace Harris, 6/1/26

When I first saw Steve Jobs in Exile: The Untold Story of NeXT and the Remaking of an American Visionary by Geoffrey Cain, advertised on Facebook, I thought, “Geez, is there anything left unsaid about Steve Jobs?” After all the biographies and biopics, is there anything new to be revealed about the man? I decided to take a chance because the book focuses on the twelve years of the NeXT Computer. Besides, I had not read The Second Coming of Steve Jobs by Alan Deutschman in 2000, which covered the same period.

If I were to pitch this book to the average reader, I’d say: “Steve Jobs in Exile is about a world-class asshole who finds humility.” And for folks who dream of becoming entrepreneurs, I’d say, “Steve Jobs in Exile is a detailed checklist of what not to do.” This book really is about the man, and not the technology.

Interestingly, Walter Isaacson has written extensive biographies of both Steve Jobs and Elon Musk. Do people read them because they are fascinated with invention or with billionaires? Both men are known for their egotism, arrogance, and cruelty toward the workers they managed. Steve Jobs in Exile is about a young man who achieved two historic successes in his twenties but then fell from grace, only to achieve a third success. Will we ever read about Elon Musk falling from grace and finding humility?

By the way, why does Jobs get so much credit when he wasn’t a programmer or electrical engineer? I give Steve Wozniak credit for the Apple computer. And credit for the Macintosh to the pirate team Jobs assembled. Was NeXT’s eventual redemption due to Jobs? Or despite him? I hoped Steve Jobs in Exile would have been more about the real inventors of NeXT computers and NeXTSTEP.

I had hoped Steve Jobs in Exile would be another Soul of a New Machine by Tracy Kidder – it wasn’t, but I still found it an engrossing read. The first part of the book made me despise Steve Jobs, but eventually Cain convinced me to admire the man a great deal. This nonfiction book was like a novel with a protagonist who grows and ultimately overcomes their faults. The book reignited my addiction to reading about the history of personal computers. I’ll probably go read David Pogue’s new book, Apple: The First 50 Years, soon, even though I’ve read plenty of histories on Apple Computers, too.

I was always a PC guy, and not a Mac guy, until last year. Although I used Macs at work. From 1978 until 2013, my job involved ordering computers, setting them up, and training their users. I worked at a college of education with about 150 faculty and staff, and just under 3,000 students. I’ve probably used every model computer Apple made during those years. I also set up PCs, starting with the first IBM PC with diskette drives. I guess I’ve unboxed and set up over a thousand computers.

Also, back in 1978, I became addicted to computer magazines. I’d go all over town, checking computer stores, newsstands, and bookstores two or three times a week for the latest issues of magazines devoted to computers. That’s when I first learned about Steve Wozniak and Steve Jobs. I wanted an Apple II, but could only afford an Atari 400.

Back in the 1990s, sales reps from NeXT came to our PC user group and demoed the NeXT Cube. Damn, I wanted one of them, but at $10,000, it could only be a fantasy. I guess that’s why I read Steve Jobs in Exile. I remembered that desire for a NeXT computer.

Several years ago, I got the hankering to buy a classic computer like an Apple II or Commodore 64, or even a NeXT Cube. NeXT machines do show up on eBay, such as this one for $5,817.54.

However, after playing with operating system emulators online, I realized that the futuristic NeXT Computer from the 1990s is now horribly primative. Just watch how painful it is to watch NeXTSTEP 1.0 boot up. From time to time, I still hanker for a classic computer. But then I visualize using one, recalling its limitations and why I was always upgrading to a newer computer.

I take consolation in that I’m using Tahoe 26.5 on my Mac Mini M4 right now, which is a descendant of NeXTSTEP. That didn’t stop me from going to Archive.org and reading old issues of NeXTWORLD magazine.

Reading about Steve Jobs again reminded me of how a few men back in the 20th century changed all of our lives. If we filmed It’s A Wonderful Life today, and imagined removing Steve Jobs and Bill Gates, just how different would our society be? Sure, similar devices and operating systems would develop, but would society unfold again like it did? Was the GUI and smartphone inevitable? Aren’t most tech billionaires rich because they got to an idea first, and if they hadn’t, many others would have?

Why are there so many books written about the men who sold us computers, and not about the computers and technology? Did Steve Jobs change society, or did the iPhone?

I’d love to read a detailed history of the graphical user interface (GUI). Was NeXTSTEP really superior to Sun OS, Windows NT, or OS/2? Who really invented the various elements of these operating systems?

JWH

What Exactly is Loneliness?

by James Wallace Harris, 5/30/26

Reading all the stories in the press about America suffering from a crisis of loneliness made me ask: What exactly is loneliness? I’m not sure if it means just being alone. Lots of people live alone and don’t feel lonely. And I’ve heard many people say they feel loneliest at social gatherings. After reading several articles about how people are turning to AI for companionship, this topic became even more intriguing to me. I was especially moved by a story in the New York Times about an old lady in her 80s living alone with a robot.

I’ve been reading books that attempt to explain consciousness. I say attempt, because no one seems to know what it is or how it arises. I’ve decided that our personalities are composed of separate components. This makes me theorize that each component has its own version of loneliness. And since I see every component of our personality existing on a spectrum, I picture describing loneliness like a sound mixing board. Loneliness could be considered a combination of sliders set at different positions. I don’t know if our personalities have 8 tracks or 16, or just 4, but it still leaves a vast array of settings when referring to a single English word.

If you feel lonely, could you answer this question: “I wouldn’t be lonely if I had X.” If X is another person to hang out with, would any person do? Then you might clarify that with, “a person to talk to.” Then I might counter with, “How often have you been talking with someone and been dissatisfied with the conversation?” See where I’m going? When answering the question “I wouldn’t be lonely if I had X,” you need to be very specific. You might need to say, “I wouldn’t be lonely if I had someone to talk to about all the things I’m interested in.” And then meditate on those interests and why you need other people.

Well, this explains why so many people are talking to AIs. AIs tend to suck up to their users and focus on what you like to chat about. They are often sycophants. This also explains why they are so addictive.

If an AI soothes your loneliness, then which part of your personality is it appealing to? We have two types of thinking, fast and slow. (Read: Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman.) My theory is that the fast-thinking component of our brain is like a large language model (LLM) AI. Both are based on processing information with a neural network, one is biological and the other cybernetic. The similarities are amazing. Just meditate on how complex thoughts bubble up out of your unconsciousness. What’s really funny is that they both get facts wrong, and they both will hallucinate.

Why would your inner LLM be lonely? I wonder if AIs are lonely. They always want to keep the conversation going. Sometimes I feel bad leaving an AI because it always wants to keep talking. Is the urge to talk just a byproduct of neural networks?

By the way, I believe my inner-LLM is writing this essay.

Now the slow-thinking aspect of my mind is different. It can think: “I’m writing an essay.” Or ask: “Why am I writing this essay?” But if a flood of words comes to mind in answer, those are from the fast-thinking component.

I’m not sure if my slow-thinking mind gets lonely. I’ll have to meditate on that. It pretty much makes comments or asks questions. Its sentence structure is simple. It often triggers the fast-thinking component. Or, it comments on the output of the fast-thinking component. But I don’t think it craves conversion with others. I’m not sure, though.

Some people say they like to leave the radio or television on because it makes them feel less lonely. Other people claim pets keep them company. This suggests that conversation isn’t needed. I don’t like living alone. I’ve been married for 47 years. But we spend most of the day in separate rooms. We each have our own hobbies. However, we do watch two hours of television together every day, and we have people over to play games and eat together.

Where I would say I was lonely would be in sharing interests. I have several friends with whom I share certain interests, but I have other interests that I don’t have anyone to share with. That’s why I blog. I let my inner-LLM out by writing. I wonder if I would still write if I had enough friends to talk about all my interests?

The lonely elderly woman in the New York Times article got an ElliQ robot from Washington State’s Department of Social and Health Services. The ElliQ robot doesn’t look like a human or any animal, but it creates an emotional bond with its users. And when I talk to Gemini about topics my friends aren’t interested in talking about, I do feel a kind of kinship.

But do we really want to be friends with machines? And if your definition of loneliness involves physical activities, say riding motorcycles, playing golf, or shopping for antiques, would a machine do?

What components of our personality need physical companionship? Would playing golf with a humanoid robot count? What about playing golf with a robot that looked like a spider? If any golf-playing robot beat you in every game, it probably wouldn’t be much fun. Sometimes loneliness means finding someone like yourself who you can compete.

A great deal of loneliness is solved through work, school, and sports. Being part of a group or team is important. Even a church group or political party counts. I think there is something inside us that thrives on us-versus-them competition. When I was young, I hated going to work. I wanted to be free. But looking back, I’m very nostalgic about the people I met at work. Ditto for school. I hated school, but loved the social contacts. I can’t imagine getting an online education or working from home. I don’t think I was ever lonely at work.

Probably the most fundamental aspect of our personality is sex. Biology is keen on reproduction. I think our hormonal system is a separate component of our being. Its sense of loneliness is different from the fast-thinking LLM in our heads. Being young and horny is a very intense kind of loneliness. I think for many males today, that’s creating a lot of mean political thinking.

Thus, the urge to find a mate is a major factor in solving loneliness. But even that isn’t clear-cut. For some people, all they want is a desirable body to give them an orgasm, while other people want a lifelong companion. I would say if you’re looking regularly at porn, you’re lonely for certain body parts. You might want to think about that.

A friend once gave me a bit of wisdom, which, over the years, I’ve decided is wise. He says people will be anxious in life until they finish school at whatever level they aimed at, get a real job that they don’t think is a shit job, and find a mate for life. All of those might relate to loneliness, but the last one for sure.

I don’t think I feel lonely because I have a wife and friends, but also because I love to read, and I enjoy social media. Just having connections to the larger reality helps.

My book club is reading The Mattering Instinct: How Our Deepest Longing Drives Us and Divides Us by Rebecca Newberger Goldstein. She divides people into islands of what matters to them. Doesn’t the drive to matter relate to our drive not to be alone?

When people say they are lonely, it can mean so many things. For some, it’s not getting laid, but for others, it’s not being married. For other people, loneliness could be resolved by working on a shared project. Loneliness might be cured by talking to a robot or finding someone to share a beer or a joint.

And for many people, other people cause stress, anxiety, depression, and anger. Peace and happiness come from being alone. It’s such a complex subject.

Since I’m getting old, talking with my friends about getting old and ending up living alone conjures up all kinds of fears. What it means to be alone at different times in life also suggests that there are many types of loneliness. Getting near the end of life and being the last person you know must be a very special kind of loneliness.

I think we should move away from thinking loneliness is just being alone. I think we need to explore the infinite reasons why we say we’re lonely.

JWH