Res Obscura

Res Obscura

Home
Notes
My books
AI in education
Archive
Leaderboard
About

AI

All Souls exam questions and the limits of machine reasoning
The world's most eccentric exam is newly relevant in the age of AI
 • 
Benjamin Breen
5
OpenAI's "Study Mode" and the risks of flattery
Serious learning requires friction, frustration... and other humans
 • 
Benjamin Breen
AI makes the humanities more important, but also a lot weirder
Historians are finally having their AI debate
 • 
Benjamin Breen
14
When Jorge Luis Borges met one of the founders of AI
One reason I became a historian is the joy of encountering moments in the past that are foreign, yet also oddly familiar.
 • 
Benjamin Breen
AI legibility, physical archives, and the future of research
A followup to "The leading AI models are now good historians"
 • 
Benjamin Breen
12
The familiar loneliness of the Kinetoscope
One other way that the 2020s resemble the 1890s
 • 
Benjamin Breen
1
The leading AI models are now good historians
... in specific domains. Three case studies with GPT-4o, o1, and Claude Sonnet 3.5, and what they mean
 • 
Benjamin Breen
33
Post-postal
What did we lose when we stopped writing letters?
 • 
Benjamin Breen
3
LLM-based educational games will be a big deal
For the first time, digital games can make qualitative assessments of learning. Here's what that might look like.
 • 
Benjamin Breen
2
"He spoke of computers with some awe"
Margaret Mead, John von Neumann, and the prehistory of AI
 • 
Benjamin Breen
6
Role-playing with AI will be a powerful tool for writers and educators
Or, how well can GPT-4 simulate an acid trip in 1963?
 • 
Benjamin Breen
3
Simulating an LSD trip in 1963 with GPT-4
The question: how well can GPT-4 simulate a trip on LSD, specifically one in early 1960s Los Angeles? The answer… pretty damn well. Read on for the…
 • 
Benjamin Breen
© 2025 Benjamin Breen
Privacy ∙ Terms ∙ Collection notice
Start writingGet the app
Substack is the home for great culture