Conqtra Conq (or: why plagiarism will save the human soul)

Conq writes: The only two future jobs are hipster and heroin addict. A flashy title, to be sure, but sadly lacking in substance. Cutting through the fluff, the thrust of the piece (as I understand it) is something like: “Once all human productive effort (industrial, intellectual, aesthetic, moral) is eclipsed by artificial intelligence, the only […]

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Rambling flat on my back in pain

I’m out of my mind in pain lying on my back because while I slept last night these stupid pillows were so awful that I injured my neck and shoulder or something during the night and it’s been torturing me the whole day. I have nothing interesting to say. I had many good ideas, but […]

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Truth, knowledge, artificial intelligence, and TVTropes

This is not just a throwaway blog post — it’s a genuinely refreshing take on a classic question. Why does Claude talk Like That? Justis Mills suggests this is caused by greedy decoding: an LLM completing “Wow! That’s …” may do so any number of ways: “… amazing.”“… a big step.”“… some genuinely impressive work.”“… […]

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The only two future jobs are hipster and heroin addict

People with ADHD are the master race. What we call “self-discipline” is nothing more than the slave temperament — necessary for early-stage civilizations to get off the ground, but increasingly unnecessary as knowledge work is automated. Every man in a cubicle is a Bronze Age farmer. Now that we have little genies that do our […]

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The Slush and the Sauce

I’ve been reading a lot of Inkhaven applications, enough to have gathered some thoughts and arrived on some low-resolution standards for what reliably piques my interest or chases it away. Most of it, in my opinion, is common sense. Still, keep in mind that some of these are idiosyncratic and counterbalanced by preferences among others […]

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I’ve seen Hell and it’s in Switzerland

(I’m at Inscribe, the weeklong European Inkhaven in the hills of Spain! Please forgive any roughness as I settle back into the daily posting schedule.) Look, I’m sure there are leagues of people who would love to live in a charming Swiss town. Safe, prosperous, picturesque. You’re cradled by the Alps! There are spotless streets […]

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Can we stop the slop illusion?

It’s long been clear to me that I’m the only sane person in the world. Recently a chappie on X the everything app took a real Monet painting, claimed to have AI-generated it, and asked the Greek chorus to “please describe, in as much detail as possible, what makes this inferior to a real Monet […]

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The future is spying on us

Warning: this post is possibly cognitohazardous to sensitive psychasthenics. 👁️ I don’t need to tell you that you’re being watched. We’ve known for decades we’re being surveilled by governments and corporations; our only solace as they hoard our data has been the bottleneck of analytical power. This will not last. 👁️ AI is poised to […]

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80 open letters to (nearly) everyone at Inkhaven

Team 1 It’s dizzying how much I’m indebted to you. Not only have you written one of the great works of internet fiction, but you’ve put more effort into the scene than anyone else — great things move through your hands and under your auspices. I was shy to meet you in-person but you’ve turned […]

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considerations for plzdontkillus

Short-form video content is a huge passion of mine: my 2k-word review of Instagram Reels argues it’s the greatest artform of the 21st century. Soon, plzdontkillus will bring AI safety to TikTok — and as a high-screentime (read: naturally aristocratic) zoomer myself, I have some thoughts on the subject. What follows is a dashed-off list […]

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