https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n15xS4Ylod5

Introduction

• Andrea Hiott introduces the conversation, framing it within her work on a navigational framework for cognition. She highlights similarities and differences between her work and Levin’s, particularly regarding “navigation” vs. “waymaking”.
• She situates Levin’s research in a broader paradigm shift toward understanding cognition ecologically, overcoming traditional dichotomies (like machine/life).

Early Influences and Conceptual Framework

• Levin describes his early childhood interest in the relationship between technology and biological life, viewing both as complex systems without a sharp distinction.
• Childhood experience of taking back of TV, playing with catepilllars/bettles, thinking how someone must have but the tv things togethor and saying okay so also those catepillats also had to be made somehow too, so whats similar whats differne.t
• He recounts pondering the similarities/differences between a TV and a caterpillar, leading to an interest in artificial intelligence and developmental biology.
• Continuity vs. distinctness of the TV to catepillar, it’s very clear tv needed some sort of engineer, but the catepillar needed a bit of help, it’s parent, but there are differences between those. the butterfly probably does not have a plan.
• How much help you needed outside, plus How much do you, on your own? After turning on the juice with the computer hardware, now the intersting things/software begins. This part is not determined by the engineers, but laws of mathetmaics, physcis. so of coruse ther eare degree of differences of agency but i didn’t think ther ewas barrier between them.
• Inspired by reading science, he states Sci-Fi influence. It opened up that it seemed natural there weren’t huge divisions. He intuited it can’t be so narrow/binary when it comes to defining, intelligence and so, that our current/classical interpretations are limited. It made it seem more connected/continuous between different forms of life (ie tech, insects)  
• Levin studied computer science (AI focus) but realized that a fundamental understanding of biological intelligence (embryogenesis) was lacking. There was no magical “here it is” line and then got a phd to explore such.
• He emphasizes the importance of studying diverse embodiments of mind and overcoming traditional disciplinary barriers to see the full picture and not be “terrible” which only holds things back and misses key info that allow progress.

Perspective, Agency, and Terminology

• Levin saw beyond dichotomies. It seems very odd how folks categorize a tv vs catipellar when really it makes things complicated/unhelpful.  
• Discussion of observer-relative understanding. Our perception of agency is constrained by our scale and sensory limitations. What do observes see? It’s constrained by their limited perspectives, what they are tuned into for.
• A common error is thinking humans represent *the only* way agency could come to be, that one would believe this shows a profound narrowness/mistake in logic. Evolution does not get the monopoly.
• Science needs practical questions, where the real-world makes progess on it all, not philoshy.
• Attributing agency, whether up or down, both can go very wrong. Job of scients to find where agence is for that given case/point/perspective, not at the lowest possible but rather optimaility.
• There is a connection creativity and thinking beyond, the “observer,” seeing other persectives helps break free of unhelpful thinking, including binaries and lines/dichotomies.
• philosophy matter, and is indeed, critically important because others only want “to focus on science” when those very “philsosphical assumptions/outlooks” would prevent scientists from new lines of experimenst no one had done before. it guides a lot.      
• Levin discusses the strategic choice of using existing terms (like “learning” or “intelligence”) versus creating new ones, to challenge conventional (and often limiting) usage.
• They explore how these debates about terminology are part of expanding cognitive possibilities and challenging ingrained assumptions. This causes confusion.
• If a science calls himself Newton, “then don’t rename gravity and rename that other part Shmavity when it is clear they are simply parts of gravity. That loses the main unifying factor!”

Motivations and Challenges

• Levin describes alternating between two motivating perspectives: (1) a drive for practical medical applications to address suffering, and (2) a need to resolve fundamental conceptual issues to empower wider scientific progress.
• The issue isn’t really *philosophical,* it’s deeply practical (which bag to bring if asked to help remove *the heap*– bulldozer, showel? that matters deeply! ie to match what type of intelligence.). So science, so can better erase these barriers!
• For example, once a neuro science was looking at cells with ion channels, another guy say his post-doc guy got out of line because he wanted to look at cells that were non-neural!  He called to comaplain to get his post-doc guy “in line” to not get “crazy”! but Levin points out, all their instruments would measure non-neuronal cells. And their “frameworks”! so then why, for the sake of the lab/science/human, do we need these distinctions and seperation?
• He discusses difficulties to help, facing the limitations of current medicine (“stuck in the hardware phase”).
• They touch on the tension between specialized disciplines and the need for interdisciplinary thinking to grasp complexity, scale.
• Discussion about continuity/continuum: Many creatures: all came from the egg: continuum, can feel scary and unsettling; even buddhists can freak out over non-self/constancy and regularity, however there are *advantages* with going away with pseudo-hard problems/conundrums. The inconsistencies sort of dissapear and it can feel good for others! It opens up new, very practical way to move forward with “what can give us joy” (even if parts die and fall-off or you replace liver). It gives space.   

Scaling, Measurement, and “Cognitive Light Cones”

• The “observer-based perspective”: recognizing that what we perceive is influenced by our own scale, tools, and prior assumptions.
• Measurement *resonance*, a need for “high-agency” tools. This may connect how phyiscist see things, which leads them to make “low agency tool”, hence, *resonance* of the two makes it find it. High agency? Our mind is a pretty good high-agency instrument. If using lower, you will not notice what we call “agency”. 
• Science fiction explores unconventional scales and perspectives, broadening our understanding of potential forms of agency.  
• the problem: it can become a *huge* problem  to apply too little, and assume simple machines are everwhere, and, of course, we know, when too low-view, ethical considerations go down also.
    
• “Cognitive light cone”: defined as the scale of goals a system can pursue (spatio-temporal scale of goals).  “What it is illumintated?” The scales that get our interest.
• Human cognative light-cones want the scale (ie weeks/months, etc), this also includes concerns/wellbeing (maybe beings who care/compansion even bigger!). Levin talks with Bhudist too to gain diff perspectives on scale, compassoin etc.
• Humans are biased towards 3D space because of our outward-facing senses, but other spaces (physiological, transcriptional) are equally relevant for cognition. 
• Levin recounts pushing back against the definition of “neuron”, as these attributes don’t only work with neuro science  It extends beyond; everything applies outside of those too, if using the very same tools, to measure it!! (So Levin and a new paper talks about Morphogenesis being a type of behavioral space– they also connect mathematically!).
• Analogy: When you come in contact with me, what bags, should I have? and to what extent.
• Navigation versus Way making: *navigation* tends to implies that the actor themselves also know *where* they go (a human would, like a tree, perhaps not); that all life makes-way (the actor itself *needs* not “to know”/to plan what-where-why), only that it may need “to go”: even tree is physcially/transcriptally move, it moves too.

Xenobots, Agency, and Future Directions (Brief Mention)

• Xenobots are introduced as examples of “never before existed” organisms that show emergent agency, challenging traditional views of where agency originates. The study group would *commit* to extending their cognititve/spheres.
• People see Xmachina guy cutting his skin/freakout, some interpet, “Well then I am just a robot. All bad”; rather what you may should interpret is how awesome that *you* may very well can do the thing; this is Descartian point , the fact that i exsit can move, do, think. This would not imply losing out of your exsitence (instead, a wonderful fact that one does!) . This all means being in practice can change perspective/be better!.
•   It brings up the big Q’s to define words, when and if “conventional defintion” is a limit or barrier. The dance, that it brings,  the good (or maybe bad), is what Levin goes on in the real world when they can only take you seriously when you talk withing their “definition”/box but, they’ve closed of all these interesting ways forward.
• There is suggestion of future discussions about regeneration in the context of previously nonexistent forms.
•  People have told him to stop talking philophicaly/abstract. If Levin’s groups did not apply abstract thinking to those areas in real life, science will lose/halt (or get it completely *wrong*,  which Levin implies goes more unnoticed than when others go *over*–this will create big, huge, big, BIG, and bigger issues )
  
• Metacognitive “loop” can go wrong too (poisonous sugar bacteria– what matters? It goes deeper).    

引言 (Yǐnyán)

• 安德烈·希奥特 (Āndéliè Xī’àotè) 介绍了对话，将其置于她关于认知的导航框架的工作中。她强调了她的工作和莱文的工作之间的相似之处和不同之处，特别是在“导航”(dǎoháng) 与“寻路” (xúnlù) 方面。
• 她将莱文的研究置于一个更广泛的范式转变中，即生态学地理解认知，克服传统的二分法（如机器/生命）。

早期影响和概念框架 (Zǎoqí Yǐngxiǎng hé Gàiniàn Kuàngjià)

• 莱文描述了他童年时期对技术和生物之间关系的兴趣，将两者都视为复杂的系统，没有明显的区别。
• 童年经历：拆开电视机后盖，玩毛毛虫/甲虫，思考一定有人把电视机的零件组装起来，然后说，那些毛毛虫也一定是以某种方式制造出来的，所以什么是相似的，什么是不同的。
• 他回忆起思考电视机和毛毛虫之间的异同，从而对人工智能和发育生物学产生了兴趣。
• 电视机和毛毛虫之间的连续性与独特性：很明显，电视机需要某种工程师，但毛毛虫也需要一点帮助，它的父母，但它们之间存在差异。蝴蝶可能没有计划。
• 你在外面需要多少帮助，以及你自己能做多少？在打开计算机硬件的电源后，现在有趣的事情/软件开始了。这部分不是由工程师决定的，而是由数学、物理定律决定的。所以当然，自主性存在程度差异，但我认为它们之间没有障碍。
• 受到阅读科学的启发，他说科幻小说影响了他。这开启了一个似乎很自然的观点，即在定义智能等方面，不存在巨大的鸿沟。他凭直觉认为，在定义智能等问题上，它不可能如此狭隘/二元，我们目前/经典的解释是有限的。这使得它看起来在不同生命形式（即技术、昆虫）之间更加连接/连续。
• 莱文学习了计算机科学（专注于人工智能），但意识到缺乏对生物智能（胚胎发生）的基本理解。没有神奇的“这就是”线，然后获得了博士学位来探索这些。
• 他强调研究各种各样的思维体现的重要性，以及克服传统的学科障碍以看清全局的重要性，而不是“糟糕的”，这只会阻碍进步，并错过允许进步的关键信息。

视角、自主性和术语 (Shìjiǎo, Zhǔdòngxìng hé Shùyǔ)

• 莱文看到了超越二分法的东西。当人们对电视机和毛毛虫进行分类时，这似乎非常奇怪，而实际上这会让事情变得复杂/无益。
• 讨论观察者相关的理解。我们对自主性的感知受到我们的规模和感官限制的约束。观察者看到了什么？它受到他们有限的视角、他们所关注的事物的限制。
• 一个常见的错误是认为人类代表了自主性产生的*唯一*方式，认为这一点表明了逻辑上的深刻狭隘性/错误。进化并没有垄断。
• 科学需要实际问题，让现实世界取得进展，而不是哲学。
• 归因自主性，无论是向上还是向下，都可能出错。科学家的工作是找到特定情况/点/视角的自主性所在，而不是在尽可能低的水平上，而是优化。
• 创造力与超越“观察者”的思考之间存在联系，看到其他视角有助于摆脱无益的思维，包括二元和界限/二分法。
• 哲学很重要，而且实际上至关重要，因为其他人只想“专注于科学”，而这些“哲学假设/观点”会阻止科学家进行以前没有人做过的新实验。它指导了很多。
• 莱文讨论了使用现有术语（如“学习”或“智能”）与创造新术语的战略选择，以挑战传统（通常是限制性的）用法。
• 他们探讨了这些关于术语的争论如何成为扩展认知可能性和挑战根深蒂固的假设的一部分。这会导致混乱。
• 如果一位科学家称自己为牛顿，“那就不要将重力重命名，当很明显它们只是重力的一部分时，将另一部分重命名为‘Shmavity’。这失去了主要的统一因素！”

动机与挑战 (Dòngjī yǔ Tiǎozhàn)

• 莱文描述了在两种激励性观点之间的交替：(1) 寻求解决痛苦的实际医疗应用的驱动力，以及 (2) 解决基本概念问题以推动更广泛的科学进步的需求。
• 问题并不在于*哲学*，而是非常实际的（如果被要求帮助移除*堆*，应该带哪个袋子——推土机、铲子？这非常重要！即匹配哪种类型的智能。）。所以科学，这样可以更好地消除这些障碍！
• 例如，有一次，一位神经科学家正在观察带有离子通道的细胞，另一个人说他的博士后家伙越界了，因为他想观察非神经细胞！他打电话抱怨，让他的博士后家伙“守规矩”，不要“发疯”！但莱文指出，他们所有的仪器都会测量非神经元细胞。以及他们的“框架”！那么，为了实验室/科学/人类的利益，为什么我们需要这些区别和分离呢？
• 他讨论了帮助、面对当前医学局限性（“陷入硬件阶段”）的困难。
• 他们触及了专业学科与理解复杂性、规模所需的跨学科思维之间的紧张关系。
• 关于连续性/连续体的讨论：许多生物：都来自卵：连续体，可能会感到可怕和不安；即使是佛教徒也会对无我/恒常性和规律性感到恐慌，然而，消除伪难题/难题有*好处*。不一致性会消失，其他人会感觉良好！它开辟了一种新的、非常实际的方式来推进“什么能给我们带来快乐”（即使部分死亡和脱落，或者你更换了肝脏）。它提供了空间。

尺度、测量和“认知光锥” (Chǐdù, Cèliáng hé “Rènzhī Guāngzhuī”)

• “基于观察者的视角”：认识到我们感知到的事物受到我们自身的尺度、工具和先验假设的影响。
• 测量*共振*，需要“高自主性”工具。这可能会连接物理学家如何看待事物，这导致他们制造“低自主性工具”，因此，两者的*共振*使其找到它。高自主性？我们的思维是一个非常好的高自主性工具。如果使用较低的工具，您将不会注意到我们所说的“自主性”。
• 科幻小说探索非常规的尺度和视角，拓宽了我们对潜在自主性形式的理解。
• 问题：应用太少，并假设简单的机器无处不在，这可能会成为一个*巨大*的问题，而且，当然，我们知道，当视角过低时，道德考虑也会下降。
• “认知光锥”：定义为系统可以追求的目标的尺度（目标的时空尺度）。“它照亮了什么？”引起我们兴趣的尺度。
• 人类的认知光锥需要尺度（即周/月等），这也包括关注/福祉（也许关心/同情更大的存在！）。莱文也与佛教徒交谈，以获得关于尺度、同情等不同的视角。
• 人类对 3D 空间有偏见，因为我们的感官向外，但其他空间（生理、转录）对认知同样重要。
• 莱文回忆起对“神经元”定义的抵制，因为这些属性不仅仅适用于神经科学。它延伸到更远的地方；如果使用完全相同的工具来测量它，一切也适用于那些之外！ （所以莱文和一篇新论文谈到形态发生是一种行为空间——它们也在数学上连接！）。
• 类比：当你与我接触时，我应该有什么包，以及到什么程度。
• 导航与寻路：*导航*往往意味着行动者本身也知道他们要去*哪里*（人类会，像一棵树，也许不会）；所有生命都在寻路（行动者本身*不需要*“知道”/计划什么-在哪里-为什么），只需要它可能需要“走”：即使树在物理/转录上移动，它也会移动。

异种机器人、自主性和未来方向（简要提及） (Yìzhǒng Jīqìrén, Zhǔdòngxìng hé Wèilái Fāngxiàng (Jiǎnyào Tíjí))

• 异种机器人被介绍为“以前从未存在过”的生物体的例子，这些生物体显示出涌现的自主性，挑战了关于自主性起源的传统观点。研究小组将*致力于*扩展他们的认知/领域。
• 人们看到《机械姬》中的人割伤他的皮肤/惊慌失措，一些人解释说，“那我就只是一个机器人。一切都很糟糕”；相反，你应该解释的是*你*很可能可以做这件事是多么棒；这是笛卡尔的观点，我存在的事实可以移动、行动、思考。这并不意味着失去你的存在（相反，这是一个美好的事实！）。所有这些都意味着在实践中可以改变视角/变得更好！。
• 它提出了定义单词的重大问题，当“传统定义”是限制或障碍时。这种舞蹈，它带来的，好的（或者可能是坏的），是莱文在现实世界中所追求的，当他们只有在你用他们的“定义”/框框说话时才会认真对待你，但他们已经关闭了所有这些有趣的前进方式。
• 有人告诉他不要进行哲学/抽象的谈话。如果莱文的小组没有将抽象思维应用到现实生活中的那些领域，科学将失去/停止（或完全*错误*，莱文暗示这比其他人走得*过头*更不被注意到——这将产生巨大、巨大、巨大和更大的问题）。
• 元认知“循环”也可能出错（有毒的糖细菌——什么重要？它更深入）。