#conscientious

[civanticism]

CIVANTICISM Softhearted Compassion | Hardnosed Coherence https://www.civanticism.com/

[howifeltabouthim]

I don't want him to think that just because I've appeared on the scene, he's disappeared from it.

L.P. Hartley, from The Harness Room

[1introvertedsage]

[dwuerch-blog]

Paris - the City of Lights

How fitting that Paris hosts the 2024 Summer Olympics. John 1:5 says, “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.” As I watched the athletes, I saw that light shining brightly. The opening ceremony was a spectacle of monumental proportions, even as rain poured on athletes navigating the Seine River in boats. This unique approach, unlike any previous ceremonies,…

[the-midnight-in-me]

I remember in grade school (1st or 2nd grade iirc?) one of our teachers handed out "superlative" awards at the end of the year. Most of my classmates had classic, fun ones. When it came to mine, the teacher said something to the effect of "this one is a bit more serious and this is what the word means [....] you're the most conscientious"

I think back on that a lot. Like...what normal 7/8 year old is conscientious? How does that not set off alarm bells? But it was praised and awarded as a good thing so surely the reason why isn't important, right? /s

[artg210sustain]

Manifesto #6

For this manifesto, I used the randomizer constraint. I used a headstone to show inaccessible design is dead or outdated and that we should focus on designing accessibly. The cracks and overgrown grass also help to show the idea of being outdated and hasn't been in style for a while now.

Tweaked Manifesto

For my revisions, I added a stone texture to the headstone. I also made the crack a bit smaller and made the text look a bit more like it is carved into the stone and changed it to all caps to be more authentic to an actual headstone.

[themandalalady]

23-12 Fairthful

Download to Color Section 12 of the 2023 Mandala of the Year Continuing with honoring the Chinese Year of the Rabbit which started on January 22, Section 12 of the 2023 Mandala of the Year is now available. This month’s characteristic associated with Rabbit energy is “faithful”. From WhatIsMySpiritAnimal.com about Rabbits they shares: “Rabbit Meanings in Hindu tradition are lovely. They are…

[persephone-s-eyes]

Había ignorado por completo el tiempo que llevaba existiendo

Cuantas veces he sido yo y he dejado de ser

Ayer, mañana y HOY

Hoy que siempre parece ser el mismo día y de un salto a otro eres alguien diferente

Alguien que ya no existe

[vincentblackbearmediallc]

The environmental impact of balloons, even biodegradable ones, are severe and little known by the general public. If people understood the environmental impact of balloons, they would think twice about buying them.People ask, “where can I buy biodegradable balloons?” because they want to be environmentally conscientious, but these balloons are bad for the environment too.

[zooeytang]

Do not fear the rain, it's only here to help you grow

[counselorssoapbox]

Industrious.

Industrious.Photo courtesy of Pixabay.com Industrious. Sunday Inspiration.     Post by David Joel Miller. “It is not enough to be industrious; so are the ants. What are you industrious about?” ― Henry David Thoreau, Letters to Various Persons “Society will develop a new kind of servitude which covers the surface of society with a network of complicated rules, through which the most original minds…

[celiottjohnston]

Opinion: (Repost) “With Great Data Comes Great Responsibility: AI, Conscientiousness, Creativity, and Exploration”

I recently wrote and published the following article for Triptych, the interactive design firm where I am a partner and the acting CSO. 

In the face of a tidal wave of consumer enthusiasm, a new crop of artificial narrow intelligence (ANI), tools have set off a sort of technological arms race. Refined, foundational generative adversarial networks (GAN), and generative pre-trained transformers (GPT) now offer users the necessary processing bandwidth to follow their visual and intellectual whims, with incredible results achieved at previously unimaginable speeds.

In response to this need, a cohort of innovators are scurrying to capitalize on the AI frenzy, each striving to seize the attention of a voracious audience propelled by both anticipation and apprehension. However, if we pause for a moment to reexamine the past, and consider the fallout of emotionally-charged adoptions of pioneering technologies — such as asbestos, DDT, the dotcom bubble, subprime loans, or social media — what do we discover? Have we genuinely comprehended the full trajectory of this technology, or are we pressing ahead with progress for progress’ sake? More significantly, what concessions are we making by permitting our FOMO to override our executive function?

In light of the recent advancements in these exponentially more sophisticated ANI systems, the Strategy Team foresees several adverse effects on the horizon, resulting in fundamental shifts in the perspectives of both producers and consumers of information. Our view is that these advancements will first impact the overall conscientiousness of AI users, and then, like a river flowing toward its tributaries, shift both the creative drive of producers and consumer urge for exploration.

Conscientiousness

In the pantheon of empirically-backed personality traits, conscientiousness has remained a stalwart example of responsibility, discipline, and order. It speaks to the ability to work hard, strive towards goals, and follow established norms and rules. Individuals with a high level of conscientiousness tend to take obligations seriously, deliberate over choices, and behave with caution rather than impulsiveness. It is viewed as an essential ingredient for success, both personally and professionally, and a reliable predictor of health and well-being. Such individuals believe that true knowledge requires deep understanding of both the process and result of their labor, and is earned in proportion to the time and effort invested in doing so.

However, conscientious individuals who object on moral grounds to using generative AI as a means of completing iterative tasks at a scaled speed, may increasingly be viewed as burdensome rather than prized for their autonomy and insightful contributions. Thus our team is reluctantly forecasting an emerging, AI-driven trend that places a premium on the volume of productive output in lieu of careful consideration.

Prediction: The indiscriminate use of AI will ultimately lead to a devaluation of conscientiousness as a desirable trait for collaborators. Practically speaking, managers and teachers may find it increasingly difficult to distinguish between desirable, higher-performing employees or students and their augmented, but otherwise lower-performing counterparts.

Creativity

For the producer, the act of creativity is a dialog between the contrarian impulse to challenge the conventional and an intuition born from experience and knowledge. It is the fuel that drives innovation, not mere iteration. Creativity is a crucial ingredient in the alchemical pursuit of shifting paradigms, but it is never a safe or predictable outcome. It is the lens that allowed us to see the value in the accidental discovery of penicillin.

In recent times, the concept of creativity has become a cultural afterthought, a softer target for AI. We see this in the constant upgrades of smartphones, video games, television shows, and movies that lack definitive conclusions. The desire to drive culture forward through creativity has been replaced by a desire for returns on investment. Unfortunately, few producers have the courage, patience, or budget needed to create something truly original, especially when GPT-4.0 could produce a script for $20/month. However, if producers turn to AI for inspiration, they risk being led further into the murky waters of sameness and mediocrity.

Prediction: An unrestrained embrace of AI will force producers to make a Faustian bargain. They will have to choose between producing at the pace set by AI and stifling their creativity or ignoring AI and risking having their creative expression ignored or worse, replicated by the production juggernaut that is AI. For creative producers, this is a dilemma that requires courage and a willingness to embrace risk, for we feel that it is only through such bravery that creativity can thrive.

Exploration

The concept of exploration, as opposed to stagnation, is akin to the trait of openness found in the Big Five personality traits. Openness to experience correlates with intellectual curiosity and imaginative thinking, traits associated with creativity, curiosity, and a thirst for knowledge. Those high in openness are divergent and abstract thinkers, able to generate multiple novel solutions to complex problems.

Our team in turn predicts that AI systems, whether narrow or general, will eventually trend towards the mean value when trained on large datasets. Sadly, we believe that this mean value will become the guiding locus of consumer exploration, and our culture of sameness will grow further entrenched as the dominant force. For individuals naturally inclined towards exploration, AI’s remixes of tailored content will not nourish, but instead, placate them with fast-food-esque content. For those less exploratory, any cultural momentum driven by creative or innovative thinking will come to a halt, replaced by an algorithmically-predictable culture of dystopian mediocrity.

Our prediction is that, if left unchecked, the human desire for exploration will become subservient to the culture’s need for efficiency and predictability — with the result being a society that values conformity to the popular norms over creativity, innovation, and individuality. AI will be able to lower the barriers to both production and consumption, but our prediction is that this future may look more “variations on a theme” than “paradigm shifting.”

AI Adoption

In light of the potential shifts away from conscientiousness, creativity, and exploration, and our frenzied hunger to adopt, our team is encouraging clients to adopt a healthy collaborative posture toward generative ANI. The exponential growth of its capabilities makes it difficult to generate hard and fast rules, but we suggest the following, somewhat philosophical, approaches to developing governing policies on the use of AI:

AI is a tool that has the power to hyper-augment your capacity for production. Use it as such, and not the reverse. By using AI wisely, you’ll be able to comprehend and assimilate complex ideas at a deeper level, and iterate through exploratory drafts of creative inspiration at rates never before possible.

Data is valuable, but it’s incomprehensible without human intuition, experience, and the will to shape and interpret it. Though more data will make responses more comprehensive, it won’t necessarily correlate with more knowledge. Recognize that AI is not a replacement for human judgment and expertise.

Though AI can help locate a destination, it shouldn’t be the destination. Embracing a “good enough” mentality and relying solely on AI to generate content risks sacrificing organic creativity, which will never be within ANI’s purview.

By adopting these approaches, we believe that clients can use AI to enhance their creativity and innovation, rather than stifle it.

[whisperintrees]

Be conscientious, get conned.

[artg210sustain]

Summary #6

Accessible design is so important in a world where people are living longer and longer. While this is great the world itself isn't necessarily elderly friendly. There is poor design everywhere in terms of accessibility and this needs to be addressed. Especially when you consider that one day the elderly person needing a more accessible world will be you. A balance needs to be found between practicality and accessibility while still making nice clean designs clients will love. That's our job as designers, after all, to find creative solutions to problems clients are facing.

An example I found was this tiny type on the warning label of Clorox wipes. The warning is very important, especially in the case of an emergency and yet it is one of the smallest typefaces on the package. The part that was the most ridiculous to me was the fact that there is more room right below it to make the type a couple sizes bigger and still have some negative space.

The most important thing to keep in mind going forward as designers is that the designs we make today could be the ones that either benefit us or affect us in a negative way in the future. It is up to us now to design a more accessible world for people now and each other later.

Takeaway statements:

accessibility today can help us all tomorrow

design for your future

accesible design is athstetic design

accessibility is for everyone

design with purpose

design with functionality