Essay

Super Humans and Super AI I had an issue with my buttondown newsletter. I wrote to support. Got an automated reply telling me they got my mail, they are looking into the issue but since they only have limited staff, working in a US time zone, it might take a bit for a proper reply. Within 1 hour, Steph is in my inbox, kindly explaining the issue and how they would resolve it. I said thank you for the quick answer Steph and for being a kind human Steph and Steph said no problem arjen, we don’t like talking to chatbots, and we don’t want to make you all deal with them either. <3 (<- I got that one from the emoji museum). ...

I have notes, so many. I have raw notes. I have useless notes. I have notes about notes. I have too many notes. And there is no time. But there is time! The years go fast, the hours go slow. There is time. We’ve got snackbars, AI, books, Den Helder, more AI, essays, and a stroll in the evening. Snackbar Maandag When walking my dog in the evening I regularly pass by Snackbar Maandag (Snackbar Monday). ...

Nothing is important stahlhartes Gehäuse Last time I mentioned Webers [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_cage](Iron Cage) and I do have to apologise. Sorry. I should have said stahlhartes Gehäuse of course. It’s a much more accurate and telling description. Because it’s in German. German is one of my favourite languages. Since German has poetry baked into the language. Every German is a poet. Wir haben uns lange, lange nicht geseh’n und es gibt so viel, so viel zu erzähl’n Aber wir schweigen, wir schweigen fast schon laut Das nicht gesagte beschreibt alles ganz genau ...

Today, I wrote nothing. ¯(°_o)/¯ The asymetric nature of change: Humans change slow The machine changes fast “The machine” as systems of power (politics, technology, institutions, finance). They are self-reinforcing, self-interested, and largely autonomous from the individuals inside them. A banker, a politician, a programmer; each feels like they are making choices. But the system they inhabit has its own logic, its own momentum. The machine moves, whether or not any individual wills it. ...

Short one. Gary doesn’t like Yann AI flame war, Gary Marcus puts Yann Lecun’s fame in perspective. An evening stroll I was walking my dog the other day when we ran into the sphinx “Good morning sphinx”, I said The sphinx said nothing “How was your weekend sphinx?”, I tried The sphinx stared into the distance My dog came up carrying a note in his mouth I deciphered the note: “The net serves to catch the fish; once the fish is caught, the net must be forgotten. The snare serves to catch the rabbit. Once the rabbit is caught, the snare is forgotten. Words serve to catch meaning; once the meaning has been caught, the words can be forgotten. If only I could find someone who has forgotten the words, someone I could talk to for a while.”[1] ...