Weaving Myth

Pentium As A Navajo Weaving

Ken Shirriff | 1st September 2024

There is a striking visual similarity between integrated circuit designs and Navajo weaving. This is historically resonant. In the 1960s, the Fairchild company set up plants to make integrated circuits on Navajo land with Navajo workers. History now comes full circle, as Navajo artists recreate the complex designs of Pentium chips — with over three million tiny transistors — on woven rugs (6,700 words)

Challenging The Myths Of Generative AI

Eryk Salvaggio | Tech Policy Press | 29th August 2024

Read between the slick marketing lines about generative AI’s capabilities. The prompt myth creates the illusion that LLMs are “retrieving information rather than constructing word associations”. The intelligence myth conflates “AI systems inspired by models of human thought” with a capacity to think. The scaling myth claims that all problems can be fixed with more data or better training (3,600 words)