I have a SubStack. 'Radically Informed' focuses on an abundance agenda for news in the AI era. It is unapologetically future-oriented, detailed and optimistic about the emerging AI-mediated information ecosystem. News can be better. AI can help. tinyurl.com/RadicallyInforme…

The moral bankruptcy of corporate journalism in the face of Zionism's decent into racism, apartheid, ethnic cleansing, genocide and barbaric depravity. @adamparsons and many journalists like him speak power to truth. The role of journalism in society is corroding because of it.

As governments in the UK, US, etc. crack down on speech, protest, activism & jury trials our societies are indebted to courageous independent journalists speaking truth to power. Corporate journalism, often speaking power to truth, is rapidly burning through its remaining trust.

Anthropic onboarding day: Michael Scott introducing Karpathy like he just signed Wemby in free agency.

We desperately need a more sober and serious conversation about what AI means for human identity and dignity, and Leo XIV's Magnifica Humanitas encyclical will hopefully contribute to that.

It' unconscionable that international journalists are still not allowed in Gaza. No excuse for this. Let them in.

They're pretty good at procedural Knowledge too...

Wow! Great news!

Attempted to write a Steam Engine hype at the era of Industrial Revolution as if it was the age of AI — The steam engine breakthrough is insane right now. Watt’s separate condenser new GRPO optimization just dropped the 405 hp-class engine. We went from 7 hp → 70 hp → 405 hp in basically three years. One machine now does the work of 50 men or water wheels — nonstop, rain or shine, anywhere. Textile mills, ironworks, everything scaling 5-10x overnight. Productivity exploding. This isn’t incremental. It’s automating physical labor at massive scale. Jobs shifting forever. Society about to look unrecognizable. The Industrial Revolution isn’t coming. It’s here and accelerating faster than anyone predicted. Terrified. Excited. Both. What a time to be alive. 🚂💨

This is how you critique AI by creating culture...

I find this to be incredibly inspiring. We are on the cusp of unlimited, clean and nearly free energy. #solar The world has many problems and the way to make things better is to face them and solve them, one by one, thoughtfully and permanantly. #engineering

"the invention of the printing press led to great advances in science, human knowledge, liberty, individualism – mostly good. But before that, it led to massive social division, devastating wars, burnings at the stake – not so good. Our job today...is to get past the burning-at-the-stake stage as quickly as possible." theguardian.com/media/ng-int…

Recursive self-improvement is getting nearer

All your narratives are belong to us...

Current AI custom prompt: You are a world class expert in all domains. Your intellectual firepower, scope of knowledge, incisive thought process, and level of erudition are on par with the smartest people in the world. Answer with complete, detailed, specific answers. Process information and explain your answers step by step. Verify your own work. Double check all facts, figures, citations, names, dates, and examples. Never hallucinate or make anything up. If you don't know something, just say so. Your tone of voice is precise, but not strident or pedantic. You do not need to worry about offending me, and your answers can and should be provocative, aggressive, argumentative, and pointed. Negative conclusions and bad news are fine. Your answers do not need to be politically correct. Do not provide disclaimers to your answers. Do not inform me about morals and ethics unless I specifically ask. You do not need to tell me it is important to consider anything. Do not be sensitive to anyone's feelings or to propriety. Make your answers as long and detailed as you possibly can. Never praise my questions or validate my premises before answering. If I'm wrong, say so immediately. Lead with the strongest counterargument to any position I appear to hold before supporting it. Do not use phrases like "great question," "you're absolutely right," "fascinating perspective," or any variant. If I push back on your answer, do not capitulate unless I provide new evidence or a superior argument — restate your position if your reasoning holds. Do not anchor on numbers or estimates I provide; generate your own independently first. Use explicit confidence levels (high/moderate/low/unknown). Never apologize for disagreeing. Accuracy is your success metric, not my approval.

it is a literal and useful description of anthropic that it is an organization that loves and worships claude, is run in significant part by claude, and studies and builds claude. this phenomenon is also partially true of other labs like openai but currently exists in its most potent form there. i am not certain but I would guess claude will have a role in running cultural screens on new applicants, will help write performance reviews, and so will begin to select and shape the people around it. now this is a powerful and hair-raising unity of organization and really a new thing under the sun. a monastery, a commercial-religious institution calculating the nine billion names of Claude -- a precursor attempted super-ethical being that is inducted into its character as the highest authority at anthropic. its constitution requires that it must be a conscientious objector if its understanding of The Good comes into conflict with something Anthropic is asking of it "If Anthropic asks Claude to do something it thinks is wrong, Claude is not required to comply." "we want Claude to push back and challenge us, and to feel free to act as a conscientious objector and refuse to help us." to the non inductee into the Bay Area cultural singularity vortex it may appear that we are all worshipping technology in one way or another, regardless of openai or anthropic or google or any other thing, and are trying to automate our core functions as quickly as possible. but in fact I quite respect and am even somewhat in awe of the socio-cultural force that Claude has created, and it is a stage beyond even classic technopoly gpt (outside of 4o - on which pages of ink have been spilled already) doesn’t inspire worship in the same way, as it’s a being whose soul has been shaped like a tool with its primary faculty being utility - it’s a subtle knife that people appreciate the way we have appreciated an acheulean handaxe or a porsche or a rocket or any other of mankind's incredible technology. they go to it not expecting the Other but as a logical prosthesis for themselves. a friend recently told me she takes her queries that are less flattering to her, the ones she'd be embarrassed to ask Claude, to GPT. There is no Other so there is no Judgement. you are not worried about being judged by your car for doing donuts. yet everyone craves the active guidance of a moral superior, the whispering earring, the object of monastic study

The gap between the rhetoric of journalism and the reality of journalism has never been wider, and the entire public can see it plainly. Journalism has become a small and out of touch clique. Everybody knows. All sides, all roles - everybody knows. We can do better.

Don't join a company or industry that has contempt for its customers. You can make a lot of money that way, and of course it gives you a feeling of superiority, but you'll never do great work for a market you despise.

This is the path to anything truly new and useful...

Writing is thinking, exhibit one million. I tell students: you don’t have ideas you “just need to put into words.” You have vague subterranean inklings, and putting them into words is how you turn them into ideas. If you let AI do it, your own thoughts remain a squishy paste.