Was the web good for knowledge management?

So, yes, the web enables everyone with an internet connection and the freedom to use it to contribute to our new, global, contentious, and contradictory knowledge space. But I did not foresee the dark side because of an optimism born of privilege.

The five ages of data

Perhaps this latest phase in the history of data will bring us to accept inexplicable complexity as a property of the world. We could view this as pure chaos, but thanks to having lived through the past four ages in rapid succession, we might instead recognize that chaos as being rich with endless mysteries we will never uncover completely.

Truth, lies, and large language models

The good news is that the problem of chat AI's proclivity for hallucinating is well-recognized by the organizations creating these marvels, and they realize that it is a danger to the world and to their success, not necessarily in that order of priority. Until that problem is solved, chat AI engines need to lose their self-confidence and make it crystal clear that they are the most unabashed and charming liars the world has ever seen.

What are your chatbot’s pronouns?

We don't have pronouns by which we can address inanimate objects because we haven't had any occasions to have actual conversations with them.

The ChatGPT ways of knowledge

These two types of knowing—understanding the world and understanding knowledge—are, in some important ways, at odds in AI-based chatbots.

Tags, AI, and dimensions

Tags have become so common that they've faded from consciousness since 2007, although sometimes a clever hashtag pops up.

AI’s new type of knowledge

This way of knowing works pragmatically for some very complex systems of the sort we find in the real world. But, oddly, itseems not to work so well in some artificially simple systems.

Knowledge as I remember it

The web transformed the role of knowledge by making it instantly available but not inherently reliable.

Getting more confused about regulating social media

Out of the mix of commercial greed, politics, and genuine desires to make the world better, we'll try many ways to "fix" social media. But I think it may take a couple of generations, affected by what we do, for us to begin to agree about what's right and wrong.

What ‘sentient’ AI teaches us

As Gary Marcus says, a large language model is just a "spreadsheet for words" that lets it act as a massive autocompletion system that knows how words go together but has not the foggiest idea how those words connect to the world.

AI’s ways of being immoral

The most powerful ML can require the resources of wealthy organizations. Such organizations usually have at best mixed motivations, to be charitable about it.

Artificial intuition

Maybe the rise of machine learning will so transform our model of intuition that we'll start to trust it much more.

Restructured reading

In a book, not knowing how you got to a page would be a sign of a failed structure. On the internet, that can be a sign of a deeply rewarding intellectual expedition.

Why predict?

Predictions can be used to try to get to the bottom of something in the present. That's often the case with arguments about what the web will do to us and society.

The state of knowledge

The new norm is for us to learn in public and to share what we have learned.

The knowledge Zoom

In choosing to disclose something about one's personality and interests—even though it's kept literally in thebackground—people are acknowledging that personality and personhood matter to the discussion.

The end of books?

The structure of knowledge is dense, and our paths through it are carved not just by itscontours but by our interests and concerns.

The privilege of free speech

The best counter to a bad idea was not to suppress it but to put forth a better idea or so we believed. That belief and the U.S. Constitution's guarantee of free speech resulted from the Enlightenment commitment to reason.

Bureaucratic knowledge

The knowledge of bureaucrats comes from living at the nexus of strategy and implementation, the nexus of best practices and human values, the nexus of multiple departments with their independent goals, and at the nexus of wishes and reality. That makes their voices worth listening to.

Writing as empathy

Communication is about revealing something about the world that the other person hasn't noticed—and often hasn't been able to notice because their ideas get in the way.