Hemlock #32: Machines of Loving Grace - Palantir, Alex Karp, Alchemy and Science, Brute Force Mimetic Objects, Atomic Poetry, the Automation of Violence, and the Endless Empire of Perpetual Advantage

Everything becomes its opposite.

cw: animal harm, general doom.

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"All Watched Over By Machines of Loving Grace" (1967) by Richard Brautigan

I like to think (andthe sooner the better!)of a cybernetic meadowwhere mammals and computerslive together in mutuallyprogramming harmonylike pure watertouching clear sky. I like to think(right now, please!)of a cybernetic forestfilled with pines and electronicswhere deer stroll peacefullypast computersas if they were flowerswith spinning blossoms. I like to think(it has to be!)of a cybernetic ecologywhere we are free of our laborsand joined back to nature,returned to our mammalbrothers and sisters,and all watched overby machines of loving grace.

Poem: Batter my heart, three-person'd God by John Donne

Credits:

Richard Brautigan Reading "All Watched Over By Machines of Loving Grace"

Palantir CEO Alex Karp Speaking in February 2025 in New York (End of Episode)

Rachmaninoff, Prelude Op. 3 No. 2 in C-sharp Minor performed by Mr. Forte (Creative Commons)

George Kennan, Memo PPS23, February 24th 1948. Declassified in June 1974.

Books:

The Assassination Complex by Jeremy Scahill and the Staff of The Intercept

The Power Elite by C. Wright Mills