Automation

There have been phases of automation. An earlier phase (mid 20th c.) saw the elimination of many metal-bashing "male" jobs. AI is set to do the same to "women's work". Receptionists, PAs, Librarians, Admin Staff and HR. These roles were core to the domestic work portfolio of "traditional families" or households with two earning adults … Continue reading Automation

Me me me and me-these-days

Why was doing drugs in semi-public toilets ever liberating? "Me, me, me..." is not what interests, well, me-these-days: reading Max Wallis and Alex Dimitrov.

Or will it…?

Everything turn out all right? Well strip the knickers off my naked emperor... Sometimes I feel we "Boomers" just might have dropped the ball.

Poetry demands utility

I think this will turn out all right if I just come quietly.

With my tin foil hat on

I am suggesting that there are sets of affinities that encourage people and their friends, firms, institutions, communities, governments and enterprises to act in certain ways. Blackboard provided a means towards control of the curriculum should someone want to. The patent application was, possibly, late dot-com chutzpah. Its subsequent deployment strikes me as strategic and in line with neoconservative affinities. Evidently, today in the deep winter of 2025.

I make models, ships in bottles…

These phrases, from a poem of mine (here) begin to articulate my understanding of what art, and poetry as a kind of art-in-words, does. Among other things, art mediates the distance between the moment and the eternal. Art represents the macrocosm in the microcosm, bursting like Michelangelo's Awakening Slave: a moment out of the stone … Continue reading I make models, ships in bottles…

Slaughter of the scapegoats

After "they" drown or otherwise kill, or deport (to where?) all the scapegoats, I mean refugees - do you fucking seriously think people do what migrants do because it is an easier and pleasanter option? - then, "they" will have to turn on themselves. But how can "we" be around with popcorn to watch the … Continue reading Slaughter of the scapegoats

Connections to the great unknown

I walked out humming the chorus to House Carpenter: "Save your love for loneliness, save my love for sorrow..." and said hello to neighbour, Peggy Seeger. In Oxford 2025 it is still just possible to be one degree of separation from Ramblin' Jack Elliott.

Time, perception and the infinite

Life is energy, movement, change, time. An implication of infinite space and time is that only the here and now exists forever. Thermodynamics. Energy moves: hot to cold. Movement is time. Movement is relative: this moves towards/away-from that; faster/slower, more/less. Movement is change: here to there. Change is time. Change is relative. Time is relative. … Continue reading Time, perception and the infinite

Zombie Apocalypse

It occurs to me that a zombie apocalypse may be the outcome of AI development. You could say that AI IS the zombie apocalypse. Since Dawn of the Dead, zombies have eaten brains. This seems an apt metaphor for what generative AI using large language models is doing. Machine reading as much of the world's … Continue reading Zombie Apocalypse