Bbenzon

Humankind got its start on the African savannas some hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of years ago. At various times in our cultural history we’ve moved to distinctly new cultural ground, as it were. And so we are moving now, and have been for the past half century. This blog is how I see that move. Intellectually, I'm broadly interested in culture and the brain. Within that compass, anything could show up here. Literature and films (including animation), certainly, music as well, and graffiti. But, other things may show up as well. It's a blog, don't you know, it moves.
MY BLOGS
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New Savanna
http://new-savanna.blogspot.com/
Humankind got its start on the African savannas some hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of years ago. At various times in our cultural history we’ve moved to distinctly new cultural ground, as it were. And so we are moving now, and have been for the past half century. This blog is how I see that move. I'm broadly interested in culture and the brain. Within that compass, anything could show up here. Literature and films (including animation), certainly, music as well, and graffiti. But, other things may show up as well. It's a blog, don't you know, it moves.
LATEST ARTICLES ( 7243 )
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ChatGPT Renders a Scene on Mars in Three Styles
I did this painting when I was, say, eight or nine year old. I wanted to see what ChatGPT would do with it, so I uploaded it and asked it to do three different... Read more
Posted on 30 April 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Dialog with Claude 3.5 on the Intellectual Potential of Man-Machine Interaction
I've posted a new working paper. Title above, links, abstract, contents, and introduction below. Academia: https://www.academia. Read more
Posted on 30 April 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
A Bunch of Tulips
Posted on 29 April 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY
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The Concept of Superintelligence Just Isn't That Useful
Dwarkesh Patel interviews Ege Erdil and Tamay Besiroglu, co-founders of Mechanize, a startup dedicated to fully automating work. Before founding Mechanize, Ege... Read more
Posted on 29 April 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Claude 3.7 Describes a Country Scene Along with Three Variations Created by...
Sometime in the last two or three years I began thinking about the fact that the same transformer architecture that is used to create large language models... Read more
Posted on 29 April 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
In Defense of an Online Life
That's the title of a new post by Tyler Cowen over at Marginal Revolution. It's derived from a piece Cowen published at The Free Press, Why I (Often) Choose My... Read more
Posted on 29 April 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
When AI Became Decoupled from Any Understanding of the Human Mind
I’ve been thinking a bit about the history of AI and how it led to the current situation where it has become effectively decoupled from any attempt to understan... Read more
Posted on 28 April 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
A New Green Day in the Park
Posted on 28 April 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY
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Ignorant White House Techbros Are Destroying Our Seed Corn
David Singer, White House Tech Bros Are Killing What Made Them (and America) Wealthy, NYTimes, April 28, 2025. What’s seed corn? It’s corn the farmer preserves... Read more
Posted on 28 April 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Academia Shrugged
Well, not quite. But who knows how this will develop. Stephanie Saul and Alan Blinder for the NYTimes (April 17, 2025): Emerging From a Collective Silence,... Read more
Posted on 27 April 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Tulips Gone Wild!
Posted on 27 April 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY
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Hollis Robbins Worries About the Moral Emptiness of the AI Business
She's reviewing a current book: In 2018, I was in the audience at a Pitch Day event in San Francisco as two computer science majors pitched to potential... Read more
Posted on 27 April 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Today's Visit to Mickey D's
Posted on 26 April 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY
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The Rise of the Woke Right | Glenn Loury & Daniel Bessner
0:00 Intro 1:10 Glenn meets the young Marx 2:32 The new wokeness of the political right 8:30 What is the democratic counterpart of foreign policy and national... Read more
Posted on 26 April 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
On the Streets of Mumbai [Desi Beats]
YouTube page: We put together a DJ set, shot in a moving auto rickshaw, winding through the lively streets of Mumbai! Auto rickshaws in our city are like... Read more
Posted on 26 April 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Friday Fotos: ChatGPT Changes Manhattan's West Side
In the last two years I spent a lot of time having ChatGPT create new stories from old. I’d give it a story and ask it to create a new story on based on, but... Read more
Posted on 25 April 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Claude 3.7 on the Impossibility of Direct Brain-to-brain Communication
Elon musk has expressed a desire to create technology that will allow direct brain-to-brain communication. That is, a pair of people who are linked through... Read more
Posted on 25 April 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Neuromorphic Computing
From YouTube: Explore a brand new paradigm in computing, and how it might offer faster solutions that can support scientific breakthroughs. [... Read more
Posted on 25 April 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Ezra Klein and Ross Douthat on the Mystic Destiny of Donald John Trump, and Othe...
I kid you freakin’ not. And the use of “mystic” in this context creeps me out a bit given that I just wrote a piece for 3QD where I recount how I offered... Read more
Posted on 25 April 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
West Meets East Heavy Metal Meets Konnakol
From YouTube page: If Meshuggah were from India. V Shivapriya and BR Somashekar Jois perform rhythmic phrases set to Mishrachaapu Tala. Remixed by Andre... Read more
Posted on 25 April 2025 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY