CTNET by Sean Barnes
@ctnet.bsky.social
This post sits alongside two earlier ones on technology and knowledge collapse. Together they are me working out whether the innovation loop needs a human at its centre, or just needs something intelligent enough to keep it turning. www.ctnet.co.uk/ai-human-inn... #AI #PKM
https://www.ctnet.co.uk/ai-human-innovation-loop/
www.ctnet.co.uk
September 25, 2026 at 8:01 AM
This post sits alongside two earlier ones on technology and knowledge collapse. Together they are me working out whether the innovation loop needs a human at its centre, or just needs something intelligent enough to keep it turning. www.ctnet.co.uk/ai-human-inn... #AI #PKM
Research suggests domain experts get the most out of knowledge tools. So if AI does more of the discovery work, where does the next generation of domain expertise come from? I do not have a good answer to that one. www.ctnet.co.uk/ai-human-inn... #AI #PKM
https://www.ctnet.co.uk/ai-human-innovation-loop/
www.ctnet.co.uk
September 24, 2026 at 5:02 PM
Research suggests domain experts get the most out of knowledge tools. So if AI does more of the discovery work, where does the next generation of domain expertise come from? I do not have a good answer to that one. www.ctnet.co.uk/ai-human-inn... #AI #PKM
In 1843 Ada Lovelace wrote that the Analytical Engine "has no pretensions whatever to originate anything". Still true of traditional computing, where the logic sits in the program. Less clearly true of a model that learns its own.https://www.ctnet.co.uk/ai-human-innovation-loop/ #AI
https://www.ctnet.co.uk/ai-human-innovation-loop/
www.ctnet.co.uk
September 23, 2026 at 11:30 AM
In 1843 Ada Lovelace wrote that the Analytical Engine "has no pretensions whatever to originate anything". Still true of traditional computing, where the logic sits in the program. Less clearly true of a model that learns its own.https://www.ctnet.co.uk/ai-human-innovation-loop/ #AI
W. Brian Arthur argues that invention is recombination. Generative AI has been trained on close to the sum of human knowledge, so it can combine ideas across domains in a way no single person could. Possibly better than we can. www.ctnet.co.uk/ai-human-inn... #AI #Technology
https://www.ctnet.co.uk/ai-human-innovation-loop/
www.ctnet.co.uk
September 22, 2026 at 8:00 AM
W. Brian Arthur argues that invention is recombination. Generative AI has been trained on close to the sum of human knowledge, so it can combine ideas across domains in a way no single person could. Possibly better than we can. www.ctnet.co.uk/ai-human-inn... #AI #Technology
Seek knowledge. Discover. Invent. Build tools. Explore again. That loop has driven technology for thousands of years, with a human sat in the middle of it. AI is already working in three of those five stages. New post on what that does to the middle. www.ctnet.co.uk/ai-human-inn... #AI #PKM
https://www.ctnet.co.uk/ai-human-innovation-loop/
www.ctnet.co.uk
September 21, 2026 at 4:02 PM
Seek knowledge. Discover. Invent. Build tools. Explore again. That loop has driven technology for thousands of years, with a human sat in the middle of it. AI is already working in three of those five stages. New post on what that does to the middle. www.ctnet.co.uk/ai-human-inn... #AI #PKM
The finding I can't argue with: the Internet raised our confidence in what we know and lowered our scrutiny of what we consume. With AI arriving far faster than the Web did, a line from my notes feels truer: question what you consume. www.ctnet.co.uk/internet-cog... #AI
https://www.ctnet.co.uk/internet-cognitive-ability/
www.ctnet.co.uk
September 18, 2026 at 8:00 AM
The finding I can't argue with: the Internet raised our confidence in what we know and lowered our scrutiny of what we consume. With AI arriving far faster than the Web did, a line from my notes feels truer: question what you consume. www.ctnet.co.uk/internet-cog... #AI
Cognitive offloading isn't the risk on its own. Offload what you can already do without thinking. Keep hold of what you're still learning. And replace it with something just as demanding, or you start building cognitive debt. www.ctnet.co.uk/internet-cog... #CognitiveOffloading
https://www.ctnet.co.uk/internet-cognitive-ability/
www.ctnet.co.uk
September 17, 2026 at 5:03 PM
Cognitive offloading isn't the risk on its own. Offload what you can already do without thinking. Keep hold of what you're still learning. And replace it with something just as demanding, or you start building cognitive debt. www.ctnet.co.uk/internet-cog... #CognitiveOffloading
I fight doom scrolling every day, but I'm not convinced we've lost our focus. Most of us can still binge a whole series on Netflix. Where do you think the panic about the Internet got ahead of itself, and where was it right? www.ctnet.co.uk/internet-cog... #AttentionSpan
https://www.ctnet.co.uk/internet-cognitive-ability/
www.ctnet.co.uk
September 16, 2026 at 11:30 AM
I fight doom scrolling every day, but I'm not convinced we've lost our focus. Most of us can still binge a whole series on Netflix. Where do you think the panic about the Internet got ahead of itself, and where was it right? www.ctnet.co.uk/internet-cog... #AttentionSpan
A confession: before writing the doom scrolling section of my new post, I spent a while scrolling YouTube videos I didn't care about. First it was Twitter, now it's YouTube. The dopamine loop just changes app. www.ctnet.co.uk/internet-cog... #DoomScrolling
https://www.ctnet.co.uk/internet-cognitive-ability/
www.ctnet.co.uk
September 15, 2026 at 8:01 AM
A confession: before writing the doom scrolling section of my new post, I spent a while scrolling YouTube videos I didn't care about. First it was Twitter, now it's YouTube. The dopamine loop just changes app. www.ctnet.co.uk/internet-cog... #DoomScrolling
I'm 56 and I remember life before the Web. I first used it in 1996 on a college computer, searching with Yahoo. New post: what thirty years of the Internet gave me, what it cost me, and what that might tell us about AI. www.ctnet.co.uk/internet-cog... #Internet #AI
https://www.ctnet.co.uk/internet-cognitive-ability/
www.ctnet.co.uk
September 14, 2026 at 4:02 PM
I'm 56 and I remember life before the Web. I first used it in 1996 on a college computer, searching with Yahoo. New post: what thirty years of the Internet gave me, what it cost me, and what that might tell us about AI. www.ctnet.co.uk/internet-cog... #Internet #AI
Technical debt has a cognitive cousin – and AI might be quietly running up your tab. www.ctnet.co.uk/cognitive-de... #CognitiveDebt #AI
Cognitive Debt: The Real Cost of Offloading to AI - The Computer & Technology Network
Cognitive debt is the mental shortfall you build up when AI does the thinking for you. Here is how to spot it, and what you should still do yourself.
www.ctnet.co.uk
September 12, 2026 at 11:30 AM
Technical debt has a cognitive cousin – and AI might be quietly running up your tab. www.ctnet.co.uk/cognitive-de... #CognitiveDebt #AI
The Writing as a Technology series is done. Reading is invented, not natural. Writing is the invention everything else sits on. And it cost us something. Now it doubles as a shield. www.ctnet.co.uk/downsides-of... #Writing #AI
https://www.ctnet.co.uk/downsides-of-writing-ai/
www.ctnet.co.uk
September 11, 2026 at 8:01 AM
The Writing as a Technology series is done. Reading is invented, not natural. Writing is the invention everything else sits on. And it cost us something. Now it doubles as a shield. www.ctnet.co.uk/downsides-of... #Writing #AI
Reading is hard work because it is not natural to us, which is why it behaves like a muscle. The paradox: a strong one makes AI far more useful, and AI is the easiest way to stop exercising it. www.ctnet.co.uk/downsides-of... #Reading #AI
https://www.ctnet.co.uk/downsides-of-writing-ai/
www.ctnet.co.uk
September 10, 2026 at 5:02 PM
Reading is hard work because it is not natural to us, which is why it behaves like a muscle. The paradox: a strong one makes AI far more useful, and AI is the easiest way to stop exercising it. www.ctnet.co.uk/downsides-of... #Reading #AI
A note from my slip-box: my thinking shapes the AI's response, and its response alters my thinking. A cognitive feedback loop. Useful, until you notice the perspective it returns is the average one. www.ctnet.co.uk/downsides-of... #AI
https://www.ctnet.co.uk/downsides-of-writing-ai/
www.ctnet.co.uk
September 9, 2026 at 11:30 AM
A note from my slip-box: my thinking shapes the AI's response, and its response alters my thinking. A cognitive feedback loop. Useful, until you notice the perspective it returns is the average one. www.ctnet.co.uk/downsides-of... #AI
Offloading to a technology is not the problem on its own. Writing offloaded our memory and we spent the freed capacity on thinking. AI offloads the thinking. What do you spend it on now? www.ctnet.co.uk/downsides-of... #AI #PKM
https://www.ctnet.co.uk/downsides-of-writing-ai/
www.ctnet.co.uk
September 8, 2026 at 8:00 AM
Offloading to a technology is not the problem on its own. Writing offloaded our memory and we spent the freed capacity on thinking. AI offloads the thinking. What do you spend it on now? www.ctnet.co.uk/downsides-of... #AI #PKM
New post: What Writing Cost Us. Writing handed us a permanent external memory and we stopped memorising. The Internet did it again with the Google effect. Now AI offers a third trade. www.ctnet.co.uk/downsides-of... ] #Writing #AI
https://www.ctnet.co.uk/downsides-of-writing-ai/
www.ctnet.co.uk
September 7, 2026 at 4:01 PM
New post: What Writing Cost Us. Writing handed us a permanent external memory and we stopped memorising. The Internet did it again with the Google effect. Now AI offers a third trade. www.ctnet.co.uk/downsides-of... ] #Writing #AI
Post 2 of 3 in my Writing as a Technology series is up. This one celebrates what writing gave us. Next week I look at what it took away, because the oldest objection to writing was that it would make us forget.https://www.ctnet.co.uk/most-important-invention-writing/ #Writing
https://www.ctnet.co.uk/most-important-invention-writing/
www.ctnet.co.uk
September 4, 2026 at 8:01 AM
Post 2 of 3 in my Writing as a Technology series is up. This one celebrates what writing gave us. Next week I look at what it took away, because the oldest objection to writing was that it would make us forget.https://www.ctnet.co.uk/most-important-invention-writing/ #Writing
Genuine question. What would you name as the most important invention in human history? I have argued for writing, but I am aware that is the answer a person who writes would give. www.ctnet.co.uk/most-importa...
https://www.ctnet.co.uk/most-important-invention-writing/
www.ctnet.co.uk
September 3, 2026 at 5:02 PM
Genuine question. What would you name as the most important invention in human history? I have argued for writing, but I am aware that is the answer a person who writes would give. www.ctnet.co.uk/most-importa...
Our most cutting-edge technology learns by reading. Large language models are trained on human writing, which means they run on an invention that is roughly 5,500 years old. www.ctnet.co.uk/most-importa... #AI #Writing
https://www.ctnet.co.uk/most-important-invention-writing/
www.ctnet.co.uk
September 2, 2026 at 11:30 AM
Our most cutting-edge technology learns by reading. Large language models are trained on human writing, which means they run on an invention that is roughly 5,500 years old. www.ctnet.co.uk/most-importa... #AI #Writing
Einstein published general relativity in 1915, extending Newton's work from 1687. He could not have done it without reading work published 228 years earlier. That is writing doing its job. www.ctnet.co.uk/most-importa... #Writing #Science
https://www.ctnet.co.uk/most-important-invention-writing/
www.ctnet.co.uk
September 1, 2026 at 8:00 AM
Einstein published general relativity in 1915, extending Newton's work from 1687. He could not have done it without reading work published 228 years earlier. That is writing doing its job. www.ctnet.co.uk/most-importa... #Writing #Science
New post: The Invention Everything Else Is Built On. Fire and the wheel made life easier. Writing did something different. It let one human pass knowledge to another across space and time. www.ctnet.co.uk/most-importa... #Writing #PKM
https://www.ctnet.co.uk/most-important-invention-writing/
www.ctnet.co.uk
August 31, 2026 at 4:03 PM
New post: The Invention Everything Else Is Built On. Fire and the wheel made life easier. Writing did something different. It let one human pass knowledge to another across space and time. www.ctnet.co.uk/most-importa... #Writing #PKM
What happens when you let AI review your own PKM habits back to you? Here's my third update — and what finally worked. www.ctnet.co.uk/claude-obsid... #PKM #AIVaultReview #AI #Obsidian
Claude Obsidian Workflow: My PKM Update (Part 3) - The Computer & Technology Network
My latest Claude Obsidian workflow update: quicker vault reviews with Fable, automated social posts via Buffer, and a fix for my growing notes backlog.
www.ctnet.co.uk
August 29, 2026 at 11:30 AM
What happens when you let AI review your own PKM habits back to you? Here's my third update — and what finally worked. www.ctnet.co.uk/claude-obsid... #PKM #AIVaultReview #AI #Obsidian
Post 1 of 3 in my Writing as a Technology series is up. Next week: where I would rank writing against every other technology we have invented. I think it comes out top, and I will explain why. www.ctnet.co.uk/reading-is-a... #Writing
https://www.ctnet.co.uk/reading-is-a-technology/
www.ctnet.co.uk
August 28, 2026 at 8:00 AM
Post 1 of 3 in my Writing as a Technology series is up. Next week: where I would rank writing against every other technology we have invented. I think it comes out top, and I will explain why. www.ctnet.co.uk/reading-is-a... #Writing