Research | Antikythera

Agentworld

A world co-populated with many billions of AGI-level agents is the basis of a very different kind of society than any we have known. There is considerable intellectual, economic and scientific interest in Agentic AI, defined broadly as discrete AIs tasked to perform intricate actions that go beyond what we might expect from a tool, or even from a technology, instead increasingly closer to the complex goal-directed motivations of humans. Agentic AI will enable not only the individual coordination of fleets of interacting actions on one’s behalf, but also produce new forms of synthetic social relations. Most “conversations” will be between agents and other agents, nested within larger temporary aggregates. As we watch agentic doubles of ourselves do things on our behalf, we enter into psychological relationships with the double in the mirror, a shadow who now speaks back to us. How might we clarify this mechanistic organic agency that seems to frustrate easy terminological categorization? What even is “agency” in this context and how may human agency -past, present, future– be re-examined in light of it? Agentworld explores the phases of agent design, proliferation, alignment, and ultimately the realization of a new society of minds.

Agentworld

A world co-populated with many billions of AGI-level agents is the basis of a very different kind of society than any we have known. There is considerable intellectual, economic and scientific interest in Agentic AI, defined broadly as discrete AIs tasked to perform intricate actions that go beyond what we might expect from a tool, or even from a technology, instead increasingly closer to the complex goal-directed motivations of humans. Agentic AI will enable not only the individual coordination of fleets of interacting actions on one’s behalf, but also produce new forms of synthetic social relations. Most “conversations” will be between agents and other agents, nested within larger temporary aggregates. As we watch agentic doubles of ourselves do things on our behalf, we enter into psychological relationships with the double in the mirror, a shadow who now speaks back to us. How might we clarify this mechanistic organic agency that seems to frustrate easy terminological categorization? What even is “agency” in this context and how may human agency -past, present, future– be re-examined in light of it? Agentworld explores the phases of agent design, proliferation, alignment, and ultimately the realization of a new society of minds.

Diffusionism

A far greater challenge than the engineering of AGI-level models will be the intricate integration of their new possibilities across diverse human cultures. Presuming that alignment must always be bi-directional between society and new technologies, Diffusionism explores the phases and strategies by which the diffusion revolution will unfold. “Diffusionism” holds that the long term impact of making functional general intelligence widespread, inexpensive, accessible and useful will be, on net, extremely positive. The augmentation and amplification of collective and individual intelligence will upend every institution predicated on a scarcity of access of agency. How can traditions and discourses contribute to transformation (rather than regulation)? Cen we shift from the obsession on hard alignment with societal norms to the reimagination of planetary society in the age of heterogeneous machine intelligences?

Diffusionism

A far greater challenge than the engineering of AGI-level models will be the intricate integration of their new possibilities across diverse human cultures. Presuming that alignment must always be bi-directional between society and new technologies, Diffusionism explores the phases and strategies by which the diffusion revolution will unfold. “Diffusionism” holds that the long term impact of making functional general intelligence widespread, inexpensive, accessible and useful will be, on net, extremely positive. The augmentation and amplification of collective and individual intelligence will upend every institution predicated on a scarcity of access of agency. How can traditions and discourses contribute to transformation (rather than regulation)? Cen we shift from the obsession on hard alignment with societal norms to the reimagination of planetary society in the age of heterogeneous machine intelligences?

Hemispherical Stacks

Many geopolitical dynamics today revolve around computation: hardware, software, networks, and cultural interpretations of digital forms. Data, and more importantly the right to model it, is now a sovereign substance, something over which and from which sovereignty itself is claimed. This marks a shift toward a more multipolar geopolitics, filled by hemispheres of influence, and the multipolarization of planetary scale computation into Hemispherical Stacks. These stacks extend from energy sourcing, intercontinental transmission, and cloud platforms to addressing systems, interface cultures and different guises of the “user.” As cloud platforms take on roles traditionally performed by modern states, albeit crossing national borders and oceans, conversely states are evolving into cloud platforms. The geopolitical tensions that arise in the friction between these two reframe the prospects of planetary governance. Hemispherical Stacks develops scenarios that consider the multipolarization of planetary computation.

Hemispherical Stacks

Many geopolitical dynamics today revolve around computation: hardware, software, networks, and cultural interpretations of digital forms. Data, and more importantly the right to model it, is now a sovereign substance, something over which and from which sovereignty itself is claimed. This marks a shift toward a more multipolar geopolitics, filled by hemispheres of influence, and the multipolarization of planetary scale computation into Hemispherical Stacks. These stacks extend from energy sourcing, intercontinental transmission, and cloud platforms to addressing systems, interface cultures and different guises of the “user.” As cloud platforms take on roles traditionally performed by modern states, albeit crossing national borders and oceans, conversely states are evolving into cloud platforms. The geopolitical tensions that arise in the friction between these two reframe the prospects of planetary governance. Hemispherical Stacks develops scenarios that consider the multipolarization of planetary computation.

Synthetic Intelligence

AI and the philosophy of AI have evolved in a tight coupling, informing and delimiting one another. Our vocabulary’s ability to describe what artificial language is and is not marks a threshold where philosophy of AI must invent a new framework.

Synthetic Intelligence traces the implications of artificial intelligence, exploring the path cleared by the externalization of thought in technical systems. What is reflected back is not necessarily human-like. The view is beyond anthropomorphic notions of AI and toward fundamental concern with machine intelligence as (in the words of Stanisław Lem) an existential technology. Areas of interest include large foundational models, natural and artificial language, models of mind, animal cognition, urban automation, machine sensing, anthropic bias, and the global history of machine intelligence beyond standard Western narratives. The questions posed must be drawn from diverse cultures and contexts but also invented in concert with the ongoing evolution of intelligence in all its guises. Synthetic Intelligence investigates the long-term implications of machine intelligence for philosophy, science, and design.

Synthetic Intelligence

AI and the philosophy of AI have evolved in a tight coupling, informing and delimiting one another. Our vocabulary’s ability to describe what artificial language is and is not marks a threshold where philosophy of AI must invent a new framework.

Synthetic Intelligence traces the implications of artificial intelligence, exploring the path cleared by the externalization of thought in technical systems. What is reflected back is not necessarily human-like. The view is beyond anthropomorphic notions of AI and toward fundamental concern with machine intelligence as (in the words of Stanisław Lem) an existential technology. Areas of interest include large foundational models, natural and artificial language, models of mind, animal cognition, urban automation, machine sensing, anthropic bias, and the global history of machine intelligence beyond standard Western narratives. The questions posed must be drawn from diverse cultures and contexts but also invented in concert with the ongoing evolution of intelligence in all its guises. Synthetic Intelligence investigates the long-term implications of machine intelligence for philosophy, science, and design.

Recursive Simulations

Recursive Simulations are simulations that not only represent the world but which act back upon what they simulate, completing a cycle of sensing and governing. This includes machine sensing technologies (vision, sound, touch, etc.), synthetic experiences and environments (including VR/AR), strategic scenario modeling (gaming, agent based systems), active simulations of complex architectures (digital twins), and computational simulations of natural systems that enable scientific inquiry & foresight (climate models and cellular/genomic simulations). All of these simultations pose fundamental questions about sensing and sensibility, world-knowing and worldmaking. They also have different relations to the real. While scientific simulations pose meaningful correspondence with the natural world and provide access to ground truths that would be otherwise inconceivable, virtual and augmented reality produce embodied experiences of simulated environments that purposefully take leave of ground truth. These two forms of simulation have inverse epistemological implications: one makes an otherwise inaccessible reality perceivable, while the other bends reality to suit what one wants to see. In between is where we live.

Recursive Simulations

Recursive Simulations are simulations that not only represent the world but which act back upon what they simulate, completing a cycle of sensing and governing. This includes machine sensing technologies (vision, sound, touch, etc.), synthetic experiences and environments (including VR/AR), strategic scenario modeling (gaming, agent based systems), active simulations of complex architectures (digital twins), and computational simulations of natural systems that enable scientific inquiry & foresight (climate models and cellular/genomic simulations). All of these simultations pose fundamental questions about sensing and sensibility, world-knowing and worldmaking. They also have different relations to the real. While scientific simulations pose meaningful correspondence with the natural world and provide access to ground truths that would be otherwise inconceivable, virtual and augmented reality produce embodied experiences of simulated environments that purposefully take leave of ground truth. These two forms of simulation have inverse epistemological implications: one makes an otherwise inaccessible reality perceivable, while the other bends reality to suit what one wants to see. In between is where we live.

Planetary Sapience

The evolutionary emergence of natural and artificial intelligence is moving towards the intentional conception and artificial composition of viable planetary systems. This conjoins two connotations of the term planetary: one scientific/astronomical and another normative/philosophical. The first sense of planetary is the geophysical entity from which all terrestrial thought emerges. The second sense includes the deliberate and deliberative composition that is inspired by thought comprehending itself in such terms and grasping the implications. The present historical moment is defined by this paradoxical challenge: How can the ongoing emergence of planetary intelligence comprehend its own evolution and the astronomical preciousness of sapience, while simultaneously recognising itself in the reflection of the violence from which it emerged and against which it struggles to survive? As the evolution of planetary intelligence was grounded in cascading centuries of pilotless destruction, its future is now existentially entwined with a radically different career for composition, foresight, and order. Taking this seriously demands a different sort of speculative and practical philosophy, and a corresponding sort of computation. Put directly, what future would make this past worth it?

Planetary Sapience

The evolutionary emergence of natural and artificial intelligence is moving towards the intentional conception and artificial composition of viable planetary systems. This conjoins two connotations of the term planetary: one scientific/astronomical and another normative/philosophical. The first sense of planetary is the geophysical entity from which all terrestrial thought emerges. The second sense includes the deliberate and deliberative composition that is inspired by thought comprehending itself in such terms and grasping the implications. The present historical moment is defined by this paradoxical challenge: How can the ongoing emergence of planetary intelligence comprehend its own evolution and the astronomical preciousness of sapience, while simultaneously recognising itself in the reflection of the violence from which it emerged and against which it struggles to survive? As the evolution of planetary intelligence was grounded in cascading centuries of pilotless destruction, its future is now existentially entwined with a radically different career for composition, foresight, and order. Taking this seriously demands a different sort of speculative and practical philosophy, and a corresponding sort of computation. Put directly, what future would make this past worth it?