I’ve been playing around with AI in academia for a while, and there are bunch of things that I think it can do and bunch of things it sucks.

• It spits good terminologies. Sometimes we don’t know how to dive into a topic because we don’t know there are vocabularies that describe the phenomenon or pattern, with which we can easily search and learn, and AI is handy in collating all those fancy terms that you wouldn’t easily know. Taking from here, one can find peer-reviewed resources to dig deeper.
• Caveat: not reliable for direct answers. I used it to answer my questions every now and then, and its answers even contradict themselves. Silver lining is that when reading them carefully, the incorrectness is obvious, but it can be time-consuming so not worth it.
• It can collate college course schedules for one to know in what sequence to learn a subject. Self-study sometimes get tricky when one follows a flexible schedule and at some point they cannot go forward because there are something they don’t know which is not a google-click away. Thus using college schedules is an easy method. Most colleges have their course schedules open for public so AI can rarely make huge mistakes. Even it make mistakes it’s not a big deal.
• Caveat: from here it’s better to seek for other resources (e.g. MIT OpenCourseWare etc).
• It gives good sentence parsing. For philosophical, mathematical texts, or generally any texts that are peer-reviewed and is meant to be understood (which excludes anything poetic), I use AI to help me parse them whenever I don’t understand. For a language model I guess that’s what it was meant to do at the first place.
• Caveat: It mansplains. But good thing is one can shut it up anytime they feel like.

I read a piece of news this morning, and it struck me as a bit surprising and confusing at first glance, so I tried to see it in topology to see whether there’s any ways to interprete it better.

The news went like this: some school teachers shared grievances over irrelevant responsibilities attached to their performance evaluation, which concerns new governmental incentives that applies to general citizens. In order to propogate the nudges, school teachers were ordered to encourage the students to ask their parents to adapt to them, and if it failed, the teachers would get public reprimand in school. Both the teachers and the parents complaint about it, and it triggered much criticism from the public as well. 

I draw a simple graph to represent this structure: 

In the graph we can see that there are several players in the interaction: government, school, teachers, students and parents, the edges represents some kind of connection, least of all, they know each other, but most possibly much more complicated.

For civil responsibilities, we can transform the graph into a digraph with arrows representing responsibility-taking direction. Each player in the field takes their own responsibilities, i.e., are reflexive, and at the same time there is a partial order existing among government, school, teacher and students.

These arrows can also be interpreted as “who directly imposes influences on the other’s decision-making.” Here, I am only taking consideration of obligations, not implicit influences like propoganda and rhetoric. And these decision-makings are all under the condition that their behaviors are legal, i.e., not breaching any rules that are forbidden by law.

We can see that in this power hierarchy, there isn’t a path from govenment to parents. The nudges can only influence the parents through softer methods to persuade them to make their own decisions, either by stimuli or rhetoric.

But at the same time, there are other layers of these same modes, as a multiplex network.

This layer represents a subtler relation among the multiple members. This is the human psyche that strive to get into someone else’s good books, for the benefit of future gain, either of political benefits, career growth, educational resouces, emotional bonding, etc. One could also say there are arrows too from teachers to students and teachers to parents, making them reciprocal relations, but the desires this way are not as strong as the other way around, so I omitted them for simplification purpose.

We can see that in this representation, there are two paths from parents to the government. The one who wants favor is in a less powerful position and the ones pointed to more powerful ones. Thus there emerges an established power system with the inversion of the arrows.

Here the hierarchy is established. And now the decision-making is no longer based upon a responsibility system but an inversive struture of favor-seeking. In other words, this favor-seeking human psyche is taken advantage of for executive purpose.

There are also two components that worth ponder about in this graph, namingly the one bounded by bureaucratical obligation (gov, school, teachers) and the one by moral, legal and emotional obligation (teachers, students, parents). The former one is an executive path and the latter one is not much so, and there could also be interesting findings. But I ran out of time, so I guess that’s it for now.

诗歌是一种语言的杂技，但多于杂技的一点是，其中有追寻真理的意图。语言与其他艺术媒介不同的是，语言就是意义的直接载体，每一个字都有既定的约定俗成的、达成共识的含义，文字的组成方式也有约定俗成的、听起来顺耳的组成形式。诗歌试图通过破坏字和词原本的含义范围，以及破坏词与词本土化的连接方式，来探索语意是不是能有更多的可能性。

但我想，很少有人对诗歌本能的吸引是来自于这样逻辑性的思考，我们喜欢诗歌首先是因为它们很美。为什么会感觉诗歌很美？因为它们没有像普罗大众一样使用语言。这是我们追求新颖的天性。我们喜欢看违反规定的东西，违背规律的东西，我们会感到本能的好奇。就好像街上一旦有人发生争执，我们就会想凑过头去看看他们在吵什么，因为这样的事情可不是天天都有。

诗歌给人的本能吸引就在于此：新颖。新颖的东西总有一种活力，因为它并不稳定，还没有被纳入到已有的公序良俗之内，它刚刚露出枝桠，会收到各种各样的评价。它还没有被刻上纪念碑，也没有被钉上耻辱柱，它很有意思，让人忍不住感到很触动。偶尔，这样新颖的书写方式却能表达出我们平时用规范语言所说不出的情感，那这时我们就会忍不住要热泪盈眶了。

如果诗歌只有对语言的玩弄，那它也就是一个手工艺品罢了，但手工艺品也有把玩的乐趣，是一种雅兴。此外，如果手工艺者以手工艺的目的，却让观赏的人体味到了艺术的快感，那手工艺及艺术的边界就变得模糊了，这就是两者之间的灰色地带。

我无法接受的是将病人文学捧上神坛，对疯子诗人的崇拜，以及浪漫话诗人和作家的奇闻，比如顾城，或小说家威廉巴勒斯。这二位都有一个共性，就是杀妻。顾城比巴勒斯稍有点人性，在杀妻之后自杀，巴勒斯则是杀害完妻子之后逍遥法外。顾城的诗歌自然有美感，巴勒斯的裸体午餐也有它的幽默之处，但这样的文学都是病人在生病之后写出的症状，它一定有美感，但不值得被认为是神圣的作品。应当想的是，他们为何会生这样的病？社会出了什么样的问题，会让人他们出这样的作品？

所有的疯子都是诗人，但不是所有的诗人都是疯子。

语言学中，很多讨论常会用声望来解释一种语言的流行度的变化，这点我不太认同。会超过一种语言（包括方言）的人都会意识到，运用非母语语言的目的是在目标语言的语境当中获取某些东西，或是信息，或是美感，或是幽默，或是与运用该语言的人的交际，或是哲学，或是思想，或是娱乐，或是机会。不管是哪一样，绝非是在自己母语环境当中运用第二语言来彰显自己的威望，稍微想想就会发现，这有什么意义呢？花了这么久的时间来学习一门语言，只是为了自己看上去更厉害吗？

即使是对英文的讨论，声望也总在议题之上，这让我感觉很困惑。当一门语言已然被广泛使用，那么国际上运用这门语言的人就会越来越多，这是基本的人的心理。一旦想走出母语的世界，就势必希望首先学习最多人使用的语言，这是一个非常本能的理由。拉丁语难道不比英文更有声望吗，如果按照这样的原因，为什么大家不去学习拉丁语呢？不过我想，以声望的思路，又会有英文取代拉丁文成为最有声望的语言一说。

语言的发展及其复杂，但如果对语言的讨论圈限在将语言看作装点使用者门面的饰品，未免舍本求末。

這幾天看了很多許倬雲先生的談話節目，深有感觸。實際上，自出國以來，逐漸有的想法是意識到了中國文化的重要，其美感，其精神，其魄力，在世界思想史內是極其重要的一環。許先生談到，在上世紀庚子賠款資助留學的學生中，後學成歸來的，多少會認為自己所留學過的地方相比較於中國更好，成為了他國的宣傳使者。這點讓我感到意外，因為與我自己留學的感受全然不同。

瑞士在客觀來講，有很多獨特且值得學習的地方，這是共識，我按下不講。但中國的魅力在於，那裏有一種獨樹一幟的精神，一種「氣」，這在西方是尋覓不到的。西歐在這個世紀的發達體現在物質文明，桌子更漂亮，手錶更精準，但這些東西再怎樣也只是工具，匠人精神當然是好事，但他既然有一個匠字，那就是在製作「器」，匠也是器，這個社會就成了器具的堆積。而對器具的過度重視，人就會被放在後面的位置，最後會變成人人願意製作更好的器，成為更好的器。中國講究的「氣」則是另一碼事，那是一種以人為本的討論，人應當對於自己的精神有一個交代，對自己的族人、這世界上全部的人都有個交代，這是中國道德的底色。當然，西方的道德也自成一派，但它是理性推理出來的，從上帝推理出人應如何行事，是一種精準的道理條文；中國的道德是人心的衝動，是一種激情，人要為氣節負責，是要於周圍世界產生連結的一種狂熱。

出國前不懂為何中國人在國外也喜歡抱團，喜歡小圈子講中文，喜歡用自己的系統辦事，我想，除了人們詬病的走關係辦事之外，這裡面有一種於人產生連結的動力。我在國內學習語言刻苦至極，以至於出國沒經歷語言障礙。我的原本動力就是希望於人交流，產生連結。但出國後意識到，人與人的連結並不是靠語言相通，靠的是人與人內心往對方靠攏的衝動。西方社會的獨立性強，人要獨立，要距離。獨立是中國人要學的東西，距離是西方人要改的東西。

當然，瑞士教了我很多東西，教會我如何更好地照顧到別人感受，如何更好地使用工具，如何製造規則系統並運行這個系統，但總而言之，瑞士的系統都是期待在人和人更少發生牽絆的前提下運行一個社會。但這樣的社會有孤立的問題，人與人不再產生衝突的同時，也不再產生碰撞和交談。火車上面沒有人聊天，陌生人的行李旁人一般不會扶一把，這是瑞士社會提倡的個人尊嚴和獨立，但同時，人與人沒有打開話匣的開口，門窗緊閉，空間沒有聯通，最親密的人也不知彼此心中所想，人AI化，AI人化，我想，這是我對西方社會所並不認可的一個部分。

中國還有一種氣節，是狹義的精神，這是我最看重，也是最思念的地方。在國內社會工作多年，遇到過不少敬重的人，從他們身上學到了很多我敬佩的品質，狹義就是最大的特點。它是匿名化的道德，是只為做事而做事的忘我，它甚至不為神明，不是西方的書罪券，也不是為博取自己的快活，它就是為做而做，為人而博，為心中道而爭取，以薄薄的肉身而衝擊建構的大廈。沒人會用一本書的推理來教導別人為何要這樣做，它憑藉的是一種人本能的道德判斷和尊嚴。

許倬雲先生講，中國的神話是以人為核心的，西方的創世理論是神的產物，這與我一直以來的思考有很大的共同之處。即使在人本主義盛行的歐洲，其時代精神也只是向人賣了一步，向神走遠了一步。而中國精神的核心，向來是圍繞於人的。

對歐洲的觀察和遊歷，讓我對自己文化產生了深刻的理解和感動，這是我意想不到的體會。