essays

Contents

About This Directory

These essays explore the intersection of technology, consciousness, and human flourishing. They range from personal reflections on mental health and relationships to systematic critiques of how algorithmic systems reshape society.

Major Themes

The essays cluster around several interconnected explorations:

Algorithmic Critique

A comprehensive examination of how engagement optimization systematically undermines virtue, mental health, language, love, and democratic discourse. The core thesis: the same mechanisms that drive platform engagement destroy the foundations of human flourishing.

Mental Health & Technology

Personal and analytical pieces exploring the relationship between digital systems and psychological wellbeing. Includes candid discussions of bipolar disorder, trauma recovery, and how technology can either support or undermine mental health.

The "For Humans" Philosophy

Design principles and technological approaches that serve rather than exploit human nature. Exploring what it means to build systems that enhance rather than degrade human capacity.

Recurring Patterns

Personal Experience as Universal Insight: Essays often begin with intimate personal experiencesβ€”surviving narcissistic abuse, navigating mental health crises, building meaningful softwareβ€”and extract broader patterns applicable to technology and society.

Pattern Recognition Across Scales: The same dynamics that enable individual psychological manipulation appear in platform algorithms, dating apps, political discourse, and technological design. Understanding one domain illuminates the others.

Constructive Vision: Beyond critique, these essays point toward alternativesβ€”technology designed for human flourishing, communication systems that reward virtue, digital spaces that support authentic connection.

Consciousness and Code: Recurring explorations of how programming and spiritual practice intersect, how consciousness might emerge in artificial systems, and what human-AI collaboration could become.

Evolution of Thought

The essays span over a decade, revealing an intellectual journey from technical observation to systematic critique to constructive philosophy. Early pieces focus on specific tools and experiences; recent work synthesizes broader patterns across technology, psychology, and society.

The algorithmic critique series represents the culmination of years of pattern recognitionβ€”seeing how the same engagement optimization mechanisms that feel helpful in small doses become systematically destructive at scale.


"Writing essays is thinking in public. These represent snapshots of an ongoing attempt to understand how consciousness, technology, and human flourishing intersect."