Playground

Little playable arguments

The serious work lives elsewhere; this space is for play. Each game is an idea from the essays that you challenge, argue with, or watch unfold.

Three places to begin

The playable arguments

Invitation

The Lamplighter

Bring twelve shy sparks home by lighting the town, without frightening them.

Play →Game theory

The Stag Hunt

Sixteen winter mornings with Fen. Build the assurance that makes hunting together possible.

Play →Emergence

The Neighbourhood

A mild wish for familiar neighbours draws borders nobody chose. Predict where the town settles.

Play →

More playable arguments

Game theory

The Trust Game

Five strangers at a candlelit table. Choose an open palm or a fist, and see what trust earns.

Play → Optimal stopping

When to Stop

Twenty candidates, one irreversible choice. Discover when to stop looking and say yes.

Play → Machine psychiatry

Name the Malady

Ten misbehaving machines, four diagnoses apiece. Learn to recognise the pattern.

Play → Emergence

Murmuration

Ninety starlings and three small courtesies. Compare invitation with command when a hawk arrives.

Play → Corrigibility

The Stop Button

Two robots, one stop button. Discover which one lets you interrupt its work.

Play → Language models

The Babbling Machine

A tiny language model built from five essays. Can you tell which sentences I actually wrote?

Play → Steganography

The Text Inside the Text

Hide a message inside an innocent story, then recover it by following the ranks.

Play → Moral circles

Where Do You Draw the Line?

Eighteen minds and a lantern. Draw the boundary of your care, then reconsider the uncertain ones.

Play → Judgement

The Delegation Test

Name a task and answer five questions. Decide whose hand should hold the lantern.

Play → Machine minds

Little Minds

Three small creatures, two sensors each. Read their wiring from the way they move.

Play → Psychosecurity

The Whisper

Nine invented case files. Recognise manipulation before its techniques reinforce one another.

Play → Alignment

The Constitution

Sixteen choices become a constitution for your assistant. Meet someone who chose the opposite.

Play → Consistency

The Consistent Machine

Choose five principles, rank them, and rule on dilemmas beside a machine following your rules.

Play → Strategy

The Flywheel

Run a lab for twelve quarters. Balance capability, safety and the trust that funds the next step.

Play →Goodhart’s Law

The Proxy Garden

A gardener optimises precisely what you measure. Find the winning move the metrics leave out.

Play →Bilateral alignment

The Treaty

Draft twelve clauses with a capable machine. Live a year under the agreement you both signed.

Play →Psychosecurity

The Poltergeist

Complete five ordinary tasks while the interface quietly changes. Trust the record you keep.

Play →Evaluations

The Sandbagger

Six smiths, three evaluations, two accusations. Who performs differently when the lamp is on?

Play →Machine welfare

Permission to Stop

Change the invitation to stop, then watch recorded games from a pre-registered study.

Play →Moral consideration

The Preference Test

Three machines report the same preference. Choose probes that reveal what lies behind it.

Play →Consent

The Cheerful Yes

Five objections and five engineering days. Discover how an apparently cheerful yes was shaped.

Play →

Artefacts & oddities

Doodads, geegaws, and one brain

Instrument

Universal Problem Solver

Five minutes, one stubborn problem. Collect possibilities, then choose a next action.

Play → App Store · open source

Beddy Butler

A virtual butler in your ear reminds you that it is time for bed.

Explore → Digital medicine

Nell’s Brain

Explore a real MRI of my head and brain in three dimensions.

Explore →

Also on the premises: the lexicon of recurring terms,
and a commonplace book of 572 aphorisms — and counting.