Periodic Table of Cognition

I stopped reading when I saw the table was generated by ChatGPT.

"It suggests 49 elements, arranged in a table"

The table has 56 elements.

?

We are already in a state where crackheads and also the brightest people you remember from school talk with chatgpt about their own theories on physics, nature, ... and every response they get back is like "You're absolutely right". Then they go on to publish them on the internet, and what they find are people who agree on that genius. They form together... and one day they cure cancer!

There's a smell of pseudo-science here. That weird blend of interesting + plausible with sprinkles of heavy-handed parallels.

After "Isaac Newton, who may have been the smartest person who ever lived" the level of trust fell drastically.

Sure, the periodic table was extremely useful and we were using electricity before we understood it, but we understand LLMs far better, mostly because they are our own creation.

Maybe the lines between exploration, creation and discovery are fuzzy sometimes, but this article tips over into AI propaganda.

I officially have AI fatigue syndrome...

This is much folk psychology with some correct affinities/"functions" that neuroscience has identified and studies.

For the skinny on where cognition really is at, here's Gyuri Buzsaki's short but sweet The Brain—Cognition Behavior Problem:

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC7415918/

The idea of a "periodic table" of cognition is cool. A brave attempt. I remember Douglas Copeland had one on the inside cover of "Shampoo Planet" that sorta captured the attitude of some post genXers.

https://www.abc.net.au/listen/programs/philosopherszone/are-... is an interview with Timothy Bayne, Professor in the School of Philosophical, Historical and Indigenous Studies at Monash University, Melbourne, and Co-Director of the Brain, Mind and Consciousness project.

It's got some very interesting takes on the question of when cognition starts and how Philosophers think about it, ideate it as a concept, with a side-journey into ascribing AI systems with consciousness.