Brains working towards machine consciousness

 The Telegraph ran a story in April 2009 about some research by Immordino-Yanga et al.  I have to say I am not sure about the criteria for inclusion/exclusion of exemplars provided in the paper (under Behavioural Data Analysis), and the sample size of 13 before excluding various results from the analysis would appear to leave something to be desired (i.e. numbers).  However, let us assume that the basic result is at least indicative of how the brain works when presented with the types of stimuli.

The Telegraph, of course, wades in with references to Twitter and only covers the equivalent concerns about TV later in the piece.  One of the strengths, to my mind, of social media is that it does provide the potential for the reflection that is required for 'moral sense', unlike, for instance, the news on a TV channel.  It provides the opportunity to have your say, to bounce your ideas and feelings off others; whereas the TV only does that if you watch in a social setting.  Furthermore, the social media has the advantage of reinforcing the idea that the information presented is only opinions - the gist of traditional print and broadcast media is that they are authoritative.

But this work does suggest that the mode of working which I see prevalent amongst learning professionals on social media is a good one.  People experience their news feeds, via traditional media and social media, and then reflect on what they see using either the social media itself, or by taking some time to blog about the subject.  This would seem to be good practice.

Whether the absence of this good practice can harm morals, of course, is an entirely moot point.  Perhaps in an environment where people were only exposed to the 'fast paced digital media' we might see different morals developing.  Morals are innately personal; society has ethics as a collective correlate of the individuals' sets of morals.  What one 'morally crusading' newspaper might see as damaging morals, others might see as the freeing up and liberalisation of morals.  More to the point, and where I think the Telegraph would have been better to focus, is that it does seem possible that people engaged with fast paced information streams might not develop or maintain such a high level of compassion that those who engage more with people do.  Whether the disconnect would be the same if one "buried one's head in books", I am not sure.