2005–2026
162 entries· 64 essays· the site as data →

AI

42 entries
2026 4 entries
  • Apr 10
    EssayWorld Machines The Cosmos and the Model

    Humboldt, the Romantics, and What AI Loses by Averaging

    19 min
  • Mar 27
    EssayWorld Machines The Octotypic Mind

    Carcinization, Cognitive Prosthetics, and the Shape of Intelligence After AI

    11 min
  • Mar 8
    EssayWorld Machines The End of Identity: AI, Plasticity, and the Divergence Machine

    Over the past year, the Contraptions club has been reading through history—from Giordano Bruno and Montaigne to Spinoza, Adam Smith, and Hume. We are now using using Venkatesh Rao’s Divergence Machine …

    4 min
  • Jan 11
    EssayWorld Machines The Kernel and the Ark

    I. The Wall and the Infinite # It is possible that the history of the modern West hinges on a single, melancholic misreading of Voltaire. When Candide, exhausted by the Lisbon earthquake and the …

    12 min
2025 1 entry
  • Dec 26
    Essay The Deep Dark Terroir of the Soul

    This is the third and final part of the Thicket Series: Part 1: Logic of the Thicket and the Unsearchable Web Part 2: The Architecture of Resistance The history of the working subject might be best …

    14 min