AI tools are making more and more work trivially easy, which is bittersweet. People love labor under the right conditions: the flow state, the sense of getting better with each rep. As AI claims competence in domain after domain, that particular human pleasure is disappearing. Are we ready to just speak things into existence, like gods? Continue reading
AI is coming for tech jobs first, and most of us are still excited about it. The tech bro doesn’t love work, he loves seeing the job done efficiently. He doesn’t want to hang on to his job, he wants to finish it. Continue reading
Sam Hyde is the Jungian shadow of contemporary comedy. I didn’t know about him for a long time, but when I found him it felt almost like deja vu. All popular comedians stand in dialogue with, not him specifically, but … Continue reading
This is money, you use it to buy thingsOk I want to use it to buy this TVah…What?Well that’s okay, it’s just that most people use a plastic card for that.How does that work?Well the plastic card represents the digital … Continue reading
After my 30 days of AI experimentation, I’m better able to use the tools available to build small-but-complete software projects. Today’s project is a simple photo booth app that uses your device’s camera to create a vintage-style photo strip you … Continue reading
When I first read In the Balance on Slate Star Codex, there was something captivating about it, like there was a big point I was supposed to get, but my mind kept getting too tired to grasp it. Anyway I think I got something now. Continue reading
I did a new thing with AI tools every day for 30 days. I recorded these clips mostly for accountability, but there’s some cool stuff in here that I’d like to share. Chapters are timestamped so you can skip around. Continue reading
The website is for my personal projects, and this is… something like that. I’ve been training at Zombie Muay Thai in Manhattan for about two years, and in February this year I fought an exhibition Muay Thai match against a … Continue reading
The math caught up to you. When you were in school you took a variety of subjects in rotating classes, covering 7 or 8 subjects in a day. You took math, and it was hard. It didn’t make you feel … Continue reading
This post is about tribalism in contemporary Western culture, and specifically it’s about the invisible assortment of people who have self-selected out of it. What the “Grey Tribe” gave up in tribal coordination, they gained in greater freedom to determine their own values and lives. The result is a fresher, more dynamic arena of human activity. I’ve spent a lot of time in some of these quiet cultures, and I want to tell you about them. Continue reading
There’s a world of difference between wanting to do something and wanting to have done something. What’s dangerous is when we conflate the two. It’s a form of deception (usually self-deception), and it sets us up for failure and frustration in our efforts. Continue reading
I want to look a category of weird mental tricks that we sometimes play on ourselves—you may be familiar with them individually, but when considered together they reveal a pattern that I think deserves more discussion. Continue reading
I made a short video course where I explain my entire process for making paintings. Because painting isn’t my most comfortable medium, I try my best to make it an easy, quick, successful project. I work in a sequence of steps that reliably move the project forward and minimize the risk of big mistakes. This is the first time I’ve made something like this, so I’m giving it away for free. Continue reading
I made a painting of one of my favorite scenes from the TV show Mad Men. Continue reading
I made a fun digital rendition of a frame from the TV show Mad Men. My original idea was to make a painting of it, but while I was thinking through how to edit my reference images in Photoshop/Blender, I got some ideas that I wanted to experiment with in depth. Continue reading
