Reflections on the Machine (opens in new tab)

"As our culture pivots away from Enlightenment objectivity and rationality—think post-truth, the spread of conspiracy theories—and as the world becomes ever more chaotic, the thirst for sense-making is palpable. Our chatbots stand ready 24/7 to quench it. Flowing through these individual queries is a collective desire for a techno-future that is clean, smooth, relentlessly optimizing, and most importantly, abundant: one that promises to improve individual lives and ease social and political t...