https://vegasharmon.com/tags/rhetorical/ Recent content in Rhetorical on Vegas Harmon Hugo en Mon, 12 Oct 2026 00:00:00 +0000 https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/each-gpt-beats-the-last-so-much-for-intelligence-being-too-slippery/ Mon, 12 Oct 2026 00:00:00 +0000 https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/each-gpt-beats-the-last-so-much-for-intelligence-being-too-slippery/ But I don’t need you to accept my speculative philosophical research program - only the drop-dead obvious fact that GPT-6 is better than GPT-2 in every way, and the same process that produced these improvements will soon be used to produce GPT-7, 8, and 9. Once we accept this empirical argument, what is left of the philosophical argument that intelligence is too slippery and conflationary to work with? https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/machine-gods-the-abstraction-that-eats-the-debate/ Mon, 12 Oct 2026 00:00:00 +0000 https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/machine-gods-the-abstraction-that-eats-the-debate/ Here are three propositions. Metaphors are the fundamental abstraction layers in modern AI debates. We are in a moment where you could plausibly argue that Eliezer Yudkowsky and Nick Land are the most influential policy intellectuals in the US conversation. Just look at the state of the two of them. This is not a good thing. The collision of (1), (2), and recent events means that “machine gods” have now entered the discussion. https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/i-predict-that-you-will-counter-that-this-is/ Mon, 12 Oct 2026 00:00:00 +0000 https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/i-predict-that-you-will-counter-that-this-is/ I predict that you will counter that this is actually just [perfectly reasonable explanation of why an AI would think this way for instrumental reasons], and that when we dissect the perfectly reasonable instrumental reasons why AI would think this way, it will be identical to the convergent instrumental goals that we were trying to convince you of all along. https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/create-more-than-you-consume/ Fri, 23 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +0000 https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/create-more-than-you-consume/ The more you create, the more powerful you become. The more you consume, the more powerful others become. https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/a-changing-heaven-keeps-earth-the-same/ Sat, 15 Nov 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/a-changing-heaven-keeps-earth-the-same/ As long as the vision of heaven is always changing, the vision of earth will remain exactly the same. https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/a-grumbler-or-only-a-grumble/ Sat, 15 Nov 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/a-grumbler-or-only-a-grumble/ The question is whether she is a grumbler, or only a grumble. https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/a-stronger-angel-a-fiercer-devil/ Sat, 15 Nov 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/a-stronger-angel-a-fiercer-devil/ It is a stronger angel, and therefore, when it falls, a fiercer devil. https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/all-dry-all-withered-all-spent/ Sat, 15 Nov 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/all-dry-all-withered-all-spent/ It was all dry: all withered: all spent. https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/all-hell-is-smaller-than-a-pebble/ Sat, 15 Nov 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/all-hell-is-smaller-than-a-pebble/ ‘Yes. All Hell is smaller than one pebble of your earthly world: but it is smaller than one atom of this world, the Real World.’ https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/cynghanedd-in-english/ Sat, 15 Nov 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/cynghanedd-in-english/ Billet spied, Bolt sped. Across field Crows fled, Aloft, wounded, Left one dead. https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/happiness-courts-the-light/ Sat, 15 Nov 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/happiness-courts-the-light/ Ah, happiness courts the light, so we deem the world is gay; but misery hides aloof, so we deem that misery there is none. https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/humility-is-thinking-of-yourself-less/ Sat, 15 Nov 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/humility-is-thinking-of-yourself-less/ Humility is thinking of yourself less, not thinking less of yourself. https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/nick-land-and-summoning-demon-gods/ Sat, 15 Nov 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/nick-land-and-summoning-demon-gods/ As far as I can tell from reading his blog, Nick Land is the guy in that terrifying border region where he is smart enough to figure out several important arcane principles about summoning demon gods, but not quite smart enough to figure out the most important such principle, which is NEVER DO THAT. https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/no-golden-rules/ Sat, 15 Nov 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/no-golden-rules/ The golden rule is that there are no golden rules. https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/reality-is-harsh-to-the-feet-of-shadows/ Sat, 15 Nov 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/reality-is-harsh-to-the-feet-of-shadows/ Reality is harsh to the feet of shadows. But will you come? https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/ridicule-of-the-great-applause-of-the-learned/ Sat, 15 Nov 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/ridicule-of-the-great-applause-of-the-learned/ Garish in her dress, eccentric in her habits, chaste in her conduct, coarse in her speech, she succeeded in her lifetime in drawing upon herself the ridicule of the great and the applause of the learned. https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/some-rise-by-sin/ Sat, 15 Nov 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/some-rise-by-sin/ Some rise by sin, and some by virtue fall. https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/the-two-tenets-of-true-atheism/ Sat, 15 Nov 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/the-two-tenets-of-true-atheism/ But for you to make this move would reveal the two fundamental tenets of true atheism. One: There is no God. Two: I hate Him. https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/thirst-was-made-for-water/ Sat, 15 Nov 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/thirst-was-made-for-water/ ‘You have gone far wrong. Thirst was made for water; inquiry for truth. What you now call the free play of inquiry has neither more nor less to do with the ends for which intelligence was given you than masturbation has to do with marriage.’ https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/thy-will-be-done/ Sat, 15 Nov 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/thy-will-be-done/ There are only two kinds of people in the end: those who say to God, “Thy will be done,” and those to whom God says, in the end, “Thy will be done.” https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/time-weighs-most-on-those-who-have-it-least/ Sat, 15 Nov 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/time-weighs-most-on-those-who-have-it-least/ Strange thing, time. It weighs most on those who have it least. https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/to-be-in-a-passion/ Sat, 15 Nov 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/to-be-in-a-passion/ To be in a Passion you Good may do But no Good if a Passion is in you. https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/we-shall-ask-for-none/ Sat, 15 Nov 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/we-shall-ask-for-none/ But be the ordeal sharp or long or both, we shall seek no terms, we shall tolerate no parley; we may show mercy—we shall ask for none. https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/when-in-rome-leave/ Sat, 15 Nov 2025 00:00:00 +0000 https://vegasharmon.com/commonplace/when-in-rome-leave/ When in Rome, leave.