“Sweetie! It’s time to get up for school!” We all remember that moment. We’d rustle and roll over, maybe asking for a few more minutes of sleep, or leap right into irritation that she had the…

On a podcast recently where Jonathan Goldstein was being interviewed by some lady at NPR, she asked if he believed in ghosts and that made me want to write what I think about ghosts.A lot of people…

Thoughts on progress.

“What if changing the world looked more like care than like war,” asks writer Rebecca Solnit.

A collection of studies I've found particularly interesting because they exhibit: (1) generative structure, (2) a non-trivial selection gradient, and (3) clues about some hidden universal assembly…

A real-world lesson in custody, incentives and “trustless” systems You hand over your $1,200 Canada Goose, your wallet and your keys to a bored college kid behind a folding table. In return you get a…

Musings on uncertainty and the virtues of control, transparency, and small communities.

The agents came online in 2030 and human society blossomed overnight. They managed the logistical friction of daily existence—sorting our emails, scheduling our appointments, and ordering our…

Reviewers default to grading tolerance. Recursive refinement keeps them asking what the original ask still requires, until the team has fully closed the gap.

Hope creates fear

Several Twilight Zone episodes 1 are built around one character remembering a reality the rest of the world doesn't. The second half of It's a Wonderful Life has the same basic horror: losing your…