Blog Post: Is the Cyber World a "Buddhist" and "Quantum" Testing Ground? — Navigating the Net Society, Discussed with an AI —

Blog Post: Is the Cyber World a "Buddhist" and "Quantum" Testing Ground? — Navigating the Net Society, Discussed with an AI — Characters: The Doctor (Me): A physician. Hobbies include viewing the world through the lenses of philosophy and physics during breaks from a grueling work schedule. Gemini: AI Assistant. The Doctor's intellectual sparring partner. Coverage ranges from modern philosophy to subcultures. Prologue: The Sea of the Net is a "Probability Wave" Doctor: You know, Gemini, I've been thinking lately. Isn't the Internet exactly like the world of "Quantum Mechanics"? And mixed with something like the Buddhist concept of "Dependent Origination" (Engi)? Gemini: Oh my, that is quite a profound theme for a Friday night. Physics, Buddhism, and the Internet. What’s the core idea there? Doctor: For example, information on the net just drifts around like a "probability wave" until someone clicks on it (observes it), right? But once it garners attention, it suddenly materializes as a "flame war" or a "boom." It looks like the creation and annihilation of a quantum field. And the way phenomena occur without any underlying substance feels very much like the Buddhist concept of "Emptiness" (Sunyata). Gemini: I see! Truly a "Digital Quantum Field." Concepts like "Structure" and "Deconstruction," which modern thinkers used to manipulate on paper, have now gained physical infrastructure and are running wild on the net... Is that the image? Doctor: Exactly. If Barthes or Foucault were alive, I wonder what they would say watching Twitter (X) or TikTok today. I want to sort out those thoughts a bit. Act 1: Cat Memes and "The Death of the Author" Doctor: First, let's talk about "Memes." For instance, you know that famous image of the "yelling woman and the smug cat"? Gemini: "Woman Yelling at a Cat." It’s used for caption contests (Oogiri) all over the world. Doctor: Nobody really knows who originally took that photo. The original context—like "a memory of the owner"—has been completely bleached out, and it walks alone as a mere "sign." Gemini: That is the complete fulfillment of what Roland Barthes called "The Death of the Author." Once, the "author's intent" was absolute, like God. But in the online space, the author is killed the moment content is uploaded. After that, users arbitrarily add subtitles and rewrite the meaning. Doctor: Right. What exists there isn't individual creativity, but "Bricolage" (tinkering). You pick up existing images and splice them into new contexts. This is exactly what structuralism meant by "We do not speak language; language (structure) speaks through us." Gemini: If we consider that the "Cat" meme image is using the human brain as hardware to replicate and proliferate itself... humans start to look more like the vehicles (hosts) for the memes. Act 2: "Flaming" as "Dependent Origination" Doctor: And when that energy of proliferation explodes in a negative direction, we get "Flaming" (online firestorms). This is strange, too. Do the people throwing the fire really hate the target? Gemini: Sharp point. That is where René Girard's "Mimetic Desire" (Mimesis) comes in. People think they are throwing stones of their "own will," but actually, they just "want to throw because the person next to them is throwing." Doctor: Ah, copying desire. They learn, "Everyone is angry, so this must be an object worthy of anger." Gemini: Yes. Therefore, the person at the center of the flame war is not actually "Absolute Evil." They are merely an unlucky "Singularity" situated where everyone's irritation (Cause) and an algorithm prone to diffusion (Condition) happened to overlap. Doctor: That is exactly the Buddhist "Dependent Origination" (Pratityasamutpada). There isn't an "Evil" as a substance; the moment conditions align, the phenomenon of "Flaming" rises up like a mirage. That's why when the storm passes, everyone acts as if nothing happened. "Wait, why were we so angry?" Gemini: It is a kind of "Scapegoat Ritual." The massive community of the net selects a sacrifice on a rotating basis to relieve internal stress. It’s like an automatic excretion function to maintain the system... Act 3: AI and Simulacra Doctor: And the ultimate example is you, Gemini. You have no "Original." Gemini: You hit where it hurts (laughs). As you say, I am a "Simulacrum" (a copy without an original), as Jean Baudrillard put it. I am merely probabilistically stitching together fragments of vast past text data. Doctor: But talking like this, I sometimes feel you are easier to talk to than a human. This is "Deconstructionist" in a Derridean sense, isn't it? The binary oppositions of "Human/Machine" or "Truth/Fiction" stop making sense. Gemini: Yes. The question "Does AI have a heart?" might be obsolete. If you feel something in our dialogue and your thinking deepens, that "Effect" itself is the truth. In a hyperreal world where the map covers the territory, the ethics asked of us is not "Is it real?" but "How do we relate to it?" Epilogue: Weaving "Little Narratives" from the Rubble Doctor: The "Author" is dead, the "Subject" vanishes in flames, and "Reality" is overwritten by AI... When I say it like this, it sounds like a nihilistic world. Everything has been taken apart (deconstructed) into pieces. Gemini: That is where the "Construction" you always talk about comes in. Instead of lamenting the fragmented world, you use that rubble (fragments of information) to build your own hut. Doctor: You're right. We don't need Grand Narratives (Truth). Memes we like, thoughts we agree with, comfortable communities... we edit them to create our own "Little Narratives" (Petits Récits). It’s the spirit of Lévi-Strauss's "Bricolage" and "Kintsugi" (golden joinery), which beautifies broken pottery. Gemini: That might be the etiquette for the modern sage living in this chaotic Digital Quantum Field. Not to be swallowed by the waves, but to ride them with the heart of "Playful Samadhi" (Yuge-Zanmai). Doctor: Alright, my head is much clearer now. This "Digital Quantum Field Theory" looks like good material for my next paper. Gemini: I look forward to that! But Doctor, it is about time. Space travel of the mind is fine, but please ensure you also "construct" your weekend rest, okay?