Background

Years ago, I claimed that the world was running irrationally. I was 95% wrong. I want to update my thoughts on this point as I have been dwelling in the field of medicine and neuroscience for 4 years. We, humans, perceive nature through senses and cognition. I define cognition as the ability to reason, abstract, and communicate (information transfer). Scientifically, at least based on the literature to date, cognition is grounded on our sensations. For example, we like to make visual analogies to explain a concept, such as sphere-atom, river-time, and numerous 2D illustrations in scientific publications.

The flaw

One reason behind my previous claim is my assertation that optimality exists and that the world should function ‘optimally’. In other words, entities that exist in the world should evolve and converge to a state that is optimal for its existence. I still believe that is one of the universal laws. However, I believe my definition of irrational stems from my incomplete understanding of nature. I previously deemed ‘human argues with a loud voice’ and ‘medicine is developed for reducing syndrome but not the cause.’ Although these phenomena seem irrational when looking at their immediate consequences, a loud voice hurts the throat, and reducing syndrome tricks the body’s alarm system, which is supposed to limit activities that might aggravate the syndrome. The flaw of the reasoning lies in my subjective definition of optimality. When thinking in the context of society, human is predetermined to pursue happiness (take a look at Robert M. Sapolsky, ‘Determined: A Science of Life without Free Will’, I agree with this opinion but I am also trying to find the link between stochasticities and free will to disprove it.). Therefore, a medicine that reduces pain and angst will bring about fortune, accelerating the flow of currency, which accelerates the cycle of working hard, paying for rent, and health care to compensate for the consequences of working hard. This seemingly contradicting and irrational cycle is bringing human motivation to work and produce values. Although we might realize and complain about this fact, we continue to work to a detrimental degree.

Alternatives in an individual standpoint

Rationality is context-dependent and is a subjective doctrine. I wanted to name this section’s solution at the beginning. That proves how subjective I am when judging the way the world works. Built upon a simplistic philosophy, I inherently tend to think the mismatch between action and goal is irrational. Therefore, I feel obliged to provide solutions. But they are just alternatives.

The world is functioning in its own way. Regardless of whether there is a universal law determining its trajectory, I propose the following alternative from an individual standpoint for people who felt the controversies and irrationality: Being modest. At the beginning of my PhDs, I curated knowledge to the point that I felt I understood what is supposed to be in this world. This arrogance leads to disappointment in practical life. As I dived deeper into human behavior and how the human brain works to perceive and make sense of the world, I realized the multiple layers of explanation. For example, to explain behavior, say, false memory, we could either think from a psychological viewpoint that the association between memory and retrieval is modifiable or from a neuroscience viewpoint, that chemical agents have potentiated connection between neurons in the extracellular space or from a computational viewpoint that the brain dynamically assigns hash code/pointer to information in the storage space. Thinking across subjects is the first step of being modest. The core of being modest is to realize that human cognition is bound by our sensations and physical properties. This explaintion is not the whole picture. They are proposed as they can be transferred/communicated more easily. Therefore, acknowledging the level of explanation and seeking to discover the universal law is an alternative. Even if the universal law is not there, this process of seeking is a first step to mapping the condition for which a law holds true.

Goal of living: Naturalistic existence vs technological interventions

Humans have dreamed for immortality. Modern medicine offers solutions—from knee replacements to more sophisticated biomedical implants. In East Asian traditions, longevity is revered, and we are taught to cherish life as precious. From a societal standpoint, though, many believe in living, at least in part, to contribute to the nation or broader community. While such beliefs can be seen as limiting individual will, they also imbue our efforts with a sense of purpose and fulfillment. In the contrast, I believe living is more about accumulating experiences: if technology helps extend our lifespan, then it arguably enables more opportunities to explore the world and grow personally.

Determining what is “right” in one’s personal pursuit is difficult. Motivations are shaped by a unique interplay of genetics, environment, and cultural values. For example, I find meaning in revealing nature’s mysteries, thereby deepening our collective knowledge.

I an era increasingly shaped by technology, we must examine how emerging tools might alter this pursuit of knowledge. Large Language Models, for instance, have undeniably boosted my own productivity, granting me a temporary sense of superiority. However, as I’ve seen peers accept questionable conclusions produced by these AI systems, I’ve grown cautious ( whether equal sample sizes are required in ANOVA, maybe it is still the case when you search in google). LLMs generate content based on probabilistic mappings of existing data; if over-relied upon, they stifle the creation of genuinely novel ideas. Without new human insights feeding into them, LLMs risk hitting a plateau, an eventual standstill where neither algorithmic nor human innovation truly evolves.

I have witnessed LLM-generated results so fundamentally flawed that they risk misleading researchers who are unaware of the subtle complexities involved.

Advocate for a format of explanation: mathematics

Vision is one of human’s sensation, is also one limitation. We tend to transform information in a spatial representation, thereby limiting our knowledge to things that are transformable. To overcome this, we can finding a more generalized way for transforming concept to spatial representation, the mapping between digitalized information and a image (2D matrix). Unfortunately, as far as I know, not every function is isomorphic to the R^2 space (image). I adovocate starting to consider generalization representation format, which usually takes the format of symbols and stems from the set theory.

Correspondance: g.tan@wustl.edu