Like, why wouldn’t people be interested in knowing that the African slave trade of the colonial period actually started with Jewish kids, but they all died in the African climate of Sao Tome, so the Portuguese started buying slaves from the Congolese, which they captured from neighboring tribes, to work the fields??

  • Deestan@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    From the bottom of my heart: I would love getting stuck next to you at a party.

    But be prepared to hear about pre-electronic “AI” via analog differentiation calculators though.

    • BOMBS@lemmy.worldOPM
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      1 year ago

      omg, i would love it! someone that actually has something to say 😮🥳

    • stingpie@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Do you mean AI in the modern sense, like neural networks, or AI in the traditional sense? As far as I’m aware, the first neural-ish AIs were cybernetic. Before that the only generally programmable computers were electromechanical.

      • Deestan@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        An important aspect of the phrase “Artificial Intelligence” is the ever-moving goalposts. In the mid 20th century, a machine that could follow and perform mathematical instructions was an insane and exciting dream of intelligent machines. Then we got the first computers, and people went “yeah okay but they’re not intelligent” and the research of AI went into machines that could make useful decisions. Then we got programmable algorithmic machines, which clearly were “cool but not intelligent like us yes?” and the dream of AI became machines that could learn. Then machines that could imagine. Then machines that could conceivably impersonate humans. Right now the next goalpost is a bit up in the air with everything from “must have deep understanding” and “must have agency” to “must have soul”, but the most workable contender seems to be “can know truth”.

        ANYWAY

        So using the late-middle-of-AI-history definition of AI, we have machines that can make decisions and learn, taking over some human tasks.

        The same basic concept, the “Centrifugal Governor” or “PID controller” has been invented independently since at least the 17th century. A full PID has the capacity to look at the state of a system (Proportional), estimate how the system will change (Derivative), and remember how the system responds to change (Integral).

        The first controllers like the mechanisms used by windmills, and later the “centrifugal governor” invented for steam engines, mechanically changes how high the windmill stone should be or how much steam should be let out of the boiler, based on how fast the machine is running. While simple, it literally replaced human labor and was more effective than the person standing around and moving the lever whenever something seemed to go faster or slower. These did the equivalence of multiplication using only gears, levers and centrifugal force.

        Then later, we have machines that could perform derivation! Whitehead torpedoes from the 19th century used pressure sensors and gravity-aligned levers to determine how deep a torpedo was in the water, and whether it was gaining depth (tilted down) or gaining height (tilting up). Still purely mechanical, these could be programmed to remain at a fixed depth, and gently steer themselves to the correct one if they were off. This meant you could just throw them into the water pointing the right direction and away they went.

        Later again, and still before electronics we had the first instance of - via very strict use of definitions here - machine learning. A pneumatic PID controller would calculate an integration over all error values. It was used by American warships as an auto-pilot of sorts. It steered the rudder to maintain a course, and “learned” via an inflated balloon whether its steering was sufficient or not. The latter part was necessary because wind or streams would turn the ship in a way that pure calculation could not predict.

        Today we use PIDs everywhere to control temperatures and hobby drone balance and a million other things, and they tend to be electronic. But, you might still find a mechanical PD controller in your chainsaw if you open it up.

        Some more source material to dig into: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centrifugal_governor

        • qaz@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          Interesting, I never really considered how a torpedo stayed on course when computers were still the size of rooms.

  • Corroded@leminal.space
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    1 year ago

    I saw a post, probably a couple years ago now, on Reddit about a group activity where people are given 30 minutes to create a PowerPoint on any subject then have to do a presentation.

    Kind of reminds me of that

    • enthusiasticamoeba@lemmy.ml
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      1 year ago

      I have always wanted to have a group of friends who would be down with that. But I recently started seeking specifically autistic friends, and I believe it will soon be a reality!

    • cubedsteaks@lemmy.today
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      1 year ago

      I knew some people in a discord server who had their own private discord server just for doing power points on various subjects and every week they’d take turns doing presentations on whatever subject was chosen.

  • magikmw@lemm.ee
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    1 year ago

    My ADHD head wouldn’t be able to listen to all that without finding a bunch of connections to other space-time localities, concepts, and works of art and fiction, and having to immediately share. I wonder who’d drop dead exhausted first.

  • mindrover@lemm.ee
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    1 year ago

    I will gladly listen to you ramble about your niche interest but only if it is somewhat similar to one of mine.

  • Match!!@pawb.social
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    1 year ago

    Can you also contrast it with the short lived Pacific slave trade from southeast Asia to Mexico?

  • Kbin_space_program@kbin.social
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    1 year ago

    I was under the impression that the slave trade, at least for Europe, was originally a branch of the slave trade of the Ottoman Empire.

    After all, most of the “rich” looks the nobility and wealthy of Europe were emulating was that of the Ottomans.

      • Kbin_space_program@kbin.social
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        1 year ago

        Well yes. The Ottoman empire during almost all of the colonial period was a serious powerhouse and major player; one where slavery was one of its major economic engines. And you can’t really include any discussions about slavery in Europe without also including the Ottomans.

        There is a trick to tracking it though. A lot of the relevant official records from the Empire don’t track the movement of slaves or women.

        If we’re concerned about ethnicities, which we are here, the trick is they weren’t. They would note the religion of slaves, and had a tendency to just lump all Africans as Muslims or Arabs(Arap). The documents we have that make notes about sub-Sarahan African slaves comes primarily from British or French people traveling through the markets or cities.

        For a numerical example: half of the slaves in markets in Ottoman Cyprus between 1590 and 1640 were sub-saharan African. Of the remaining half, almost half of those were Russian, the rest Greek and Slavic.

    • BOMBS@lemmy.worldOPM
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      1 year ago

      if you start a YouTube/Twitch channel where you specifically invite viewers to come listen to your special interest, it’s totally on them to stay or go and that’s fair.

      Welcome to the random channel! For the next month, I’ll be sharimg about the history of string instruments.

      one month later

      Welcome back! This month will focus on quantum mechanics and other entanglements.

      one month later

      Hi! Did you know that emotions have names?

      one month later

      No videos this month. Im having a burn out.

      two months later

      Today, I’ll randomly be discussing anti-depressants and their side effects on autistic brains.