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The Intrepid

TiGGR: Seveneves - New Earth Rising

The latter third of Neal Stephenson's Seveneves takes place five millennia after the world-ending events of Hard Rain and the survivors' arduous trek to The Cleft. The descendants of the titular Eves have evolved into distinct races while reconstructing humanity's presence, first in orbit, then

PaRappa the Rapper Epistemology

Or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Viral Nature of Thought Introduction: The Driving Test Picture this: You're sitting in front of a wall of text from a historian on Facebook. It looks like news analysis, smells like civic engagement, but something feels... off. You&

The Thermostat and the Fire: Systems Performing as Designed

At 3 AM on July 4th, while America slept off its birthday barbecues, the Guadalupe River rose 26 feet in 45 minutes. One hundred and nine people died, including dozens at a summer camp that had been built in a federally designated floodway. The camp had no warning system. The

The Unplayable Game: A Manifesto for Impossible Media

On unreadable novels, unnavigable walks, unlivable possessions, and why breaking your medium is the point The Complaint as Confirmation "It's unplayable!" This is not criticism. This is diagnosis. When someone declares your game unplayable, your novel unreadable, your art piece unnavigable, they're confirming that

July 18th: Parking Lots and Bookstores

A man died in the Safeway parking lot while I was getting groceries. That evening, our friends talked about The Raincoats at Powell's. My wife played me Kleenex/Liliput when we got home. I worked on a Lasers & Feelings hack about 80's Vegas with four

Out of the Loop

"Once, you chased shadows on the edge of science. Now you debug error messages from machines you once thought were gods." You remember when the impossible was Tuesday. When robots walked through your backyard and you followed them home. When the power plant hummed lullabies that bent reality.

The Nuoc Mam Theory of Modern Politics

It’s quite fishy indeed. On reductions, myths, and the tyranny of concentrated narrative We are drowning in narrative concentrates. Every side, every faction, every ideologue is in the business of distillation — turning messy, bleeding reality into aromatic ideology. History becomes not just a lesson, but an ingredient. You don&

When Consensus Meets the Range

There's a moment when you're holding a loaded rifle and someone next to you starts getting careless with their muzzle direction. Time slows. Your peripheral vision sharpens. Every instructor on the line turns toward the problem like iron filings toward a sudden magnetic field. What happens

Fragments of Drift: Games That Pretend to Be Philosophy (and Sometimes Are)

A critical introduction to experimental storytelling games that blur the line between play and meditation What You're Getting Into Fragments of Drift is a collection of three storytelling games that occupy an unusual space: they are simultaneously role-playing games, collaborative writing exercises, philosophical thought experiments, and ritual performances.

When 'OK Boomer' Rightly Rings Hollow: The Joneses

The phrase "OK Boomer" cuts through generational discourse like a rusty safety pin through polyester—sharp, dismissive, and often misdirected. When Gen Z hurls it at anyone over 40, they're usually aiming at the right cultural sensibility but hitting the wrong generational target. The architects of