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from Res Obscura [alt+shift+b] in history

Using GPT-6 and Opus 5.5 to trace alchemical knowledge and decode 17th century letters

a week ago

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Using Opus 5.5 to discover a new eyewitness record of the dodo

Frontier models can now produce novel historical knowledge, but in a really weird way

4 days ago • 1 votes

The "mechanical miracle" that ruined Mark Twain's life

Learning from the automation dreams of the first Machine Age

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Quality non-fiction books are the antithesis of AI slop

...so I vibe-coded a tool for finding more of them

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Why they stopped building wooden stupas

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More in history

Vintage Color Photos Capture New York City Streets and Daily Life in 1980

New York City in 1980 had a look that can be surprisingly difficult to picture today. The buildings are familiar, the streets are recognizable, and the crowds move with the same hurried energy, yet the details belong unmistakably to another time. Cars from another generation line the curbs, shop signs have different names, and people […]

3 hours ago • 1 votes

What Did Africans Know About The Outside World?

On British “Spies” and News from India

yesterday • 1 votes

But I don’t *want* to save liberal democracy

UK News Report extra

yesterday • 2 votes

Sudan, 1898

From the archives

yesterday • 1 votes

Five Slogans Re Cultural Drift

I’m wondering how well I might organize my cultural drift messages around a few key slogans.

yesterday • 1 votes

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