Great piece. I think so much tech determinism is a rehash of eschatology with a thermodynamics branding - which they then dispense with when it suits. The retrocausality thing is case in point.
It's shameful that the purveyors/profiteers of AI have appointed themselves to helm our ship. Where the hell are we going? And why shouldn't the rest of us get to have a say in it?
That's an intriguing footnote. The golden bird in the fourth stanza as AI? Or a mind to digital upload? I didn't see that coming, though the "brazen hawks" in the last verse of "Meditations in a time of Civil War" while clearly a broad reference to the inhumanity of the 20th century, always make me think of drones.
Great piece. I think so much tech determinism is a rehash of eschatology with a thermodynamics branding - which they then dispense with when it suits. The retrocausality thing is case in point.
Tiny correction: “Sailing TO Byzantium”.
of course it is - thanks! I have the poem memorized from my youth, but clearly not the title.
Another prediction if there aren't enough already https://0utcast.substack.com/p/the-emergence-and-the-end-of-bullshit
It's shameful that the purveyors/profiteers of AI have appointed themselves to helm our ship. Where the hell are we going? And why shouldn't the rest of us get to have a say in it?
That's an intriguing footnote. The golden bird in the fourth stanza as AI? Or a mind to digital upload? I didn't see that coming, though the "brazen hawks" in the last verse of "Meditations in a time of Civil War" while clearly a broad reference to the inhumanity of the 20th century, always make me think of drones.
a grand-uncle of mine went with the irregulars and was shot on the slopes of Ben Bulben under cloudy circumstances - https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/heritage/family-of-divided-loyalties-that-was-reunited-in-grief-1.1391641 . I'd like to imagine that he was Yeats' soldier, but he was far from Falstaffian in appearance.
though he was reportedly "cheery and outgoing."