Param Vaswani

fig. 1 · what coexists
𝒰 · both / and MIND / BODY TECHNOLOGY PHILOSOPHY SOCIETY CREATION cognitive architecture M ∩ T structural difference M ∩ S phenomenology M ∩ P ai alignment T ∩ P building your way out T ∩ C power & consent S ∩ P making as thinking P ∩ C me cursor ∉ 𝒰

I’m Param. I read philosophy, build systems, and file reports on what the machines are doing to the rest of us — beginning, unavoidably, with me. Small instruments, one subject, error bars left in.

Raised by the algorithm, realigning by hand.

A diet of Aeon and LessWrong, in unequal measure. Studying philosophy of mind after a year spent building with the machines — subject and journalist at once, which is a conflict of interest I would rather declare than resolve. Vegan. Lived all over the world; only ever really lived online. Bangalore, briefly — then westward.

the beat: machine mediation → human judgment. the method: build the instrument, then stand in front of it.

fig. 2 · the distribution of taste
taste is distance from the mean, chosen on purpose. the curve is everyone; the thumb is the feed; the machine underneath is the proof that the curve is not a metaphor.
distribution.sim — the curve, and the machine that proves it
μ, fair — the default settings −1σ +1σ overcorrection autumn ’25 — every decision through the machine spring ’26 — cold turkey now — chosen, revised monthly
n = 0 · me: 0
real randomness, real binomial, real sample mean — no thumbs except the one you place.
the four rooms · one house
create/

Making is thinking. Output forces a precision that reading, talking, and planning never quite demand — even when the thing made is imperfect. Especially then.

enter →
consume/

Reading widely isn’t the goal; models that predict are. Otherwise it’s a larger pile of interesting things you once encountered.

enter →
curate/

Attention is the scarce resource. The diet sets the prior you bring to everything else. What you refuse to attend to matters as much as what you keep.

enter →
cohere/

The views should fit together — or the contradictions should be named. Invisible incoherence is rot. A named contradiction is sometimes just honesty.

enter →

create

create = { essays } ∪ { systems }
essays
six written, none published. that is the standing debt, and it is the only number on this site i am not proud of.
systems
forty-six of them, built mostly at night, mostly alone, mostly with a machine at the other end of the keyboard. some for use, some for the joy of the rabbit hole. the register is the evidence in the argument below — this is what a year of building with them actually looks like.
kind state
S = { systems } · |S| = 46 of 46
shipped ≠ up. several of these are unreachable on purpose, and a few are down because a domain lapsed — the register is a record of work, not a status page.
the full archive runs to 185 rows across 1,022 sessions; this is the half worth naming.

consume

what goes in decides what comes out

reading

  • Clark & Chalmers, The Extended Mind
  • Aeon & Psyche, most mornings
  • LessWrong, with a raised eyebrow
  • 80,000 Hours, selectively

watching

  • Slow cinema on MUBI
  • Anything Joachim Trier
  • no shorts. deleted the apps.

listening

  • Fleet Foxes · Wilco
  • Vampire Weekend · Bon Iver
  • Phoebe Bridgers
  • and the old ghosts — Peep, Lean — for the record.
fig. 3 · the influence graph
nothing arrives alone. most of these run one way — two run both, and that difference is the whole story.
influences.map — bidirectional
fig. 1 shows what overlaps; this shows what flows. hover a node — the two-way edges are the ones that changed me.

curate

kept, cut, passed on

cohere

making it hang together
fig. 4 · precedence
which value gets the last word, by situation.
a call to make. does it touch a person? can it be undone? is everyone already doing it? always no no yes yes no KINDNESS UNCERTAINTY INDIVIDUALITY TASTE PRIVACY end of route.
— pick a situation —
deterministic here. messier in production.
standing contradictions
held open on purpose.
builds with AI ∧ suspicious of AI
loves systems ∧ distrusts platforms
fleet foxes ∧ yung lean
craves order ∧ trains for uncertainty
online since forever ∧ keeps the exit
the ledger
numbers are commitments to update, not positions to defend. hover for the working.
proposition p Δ
I move westward by spring ’27 .85 ▲
…to Brooklyn, given that I move .65 —
Heavy LLM use atrophies unaided judgment (in me, by 2031) .70 ▲
Gen Z anxiety is signal, not disorder .75 ▲
I’ll still be vegan at 40 .93 —
This design survives twelve months .35 ▼
— hover a proposition —
last audit: august 2026.
principles
  1. Dissect the package. What is said, how it’s sold, what actually arrives — three different things.
  2. Keep the exit. Any system you cannot leave owns you.
  3. Judgment is the last thing to outsource. Automate the work; never the choice of which work is worth doing.
  4. Question the frameworks you question with. Every instrument has assumptions baked in — especially the ones that feel like plain glass.
  5. Impact over intent — in both directions, including when I’m the one who meant well.
  6. Credences, not vibes. Numbers keep me honest about what I actually believe. See the ledger.
currently
fig. 5 · directionally correct
the think-for-yourself layer — a toy for truth seekers. every brick is an input; the paddle is judgment; the score is an angle.
truthseeker.sim — every brick bends the path
green bends you toward truth violet bends you away error —° · updates 0
keep the belief in play. the score is an angle, not a number.
you don’t arrive. you stay pointed.
fig. 6 · the arbitration
where the line falls, task by task. one rule sets it: delegate what is cheap to check. move the line and watch the set change.
arbitration.sim — the boundary is one number
cost of checking it → can’t be checked cost of being wrong → unverifiable · expensive · mine my line
D = { x : check + cost ≤ 0.84 } · |D| = 8/17
your line sits where mine does.
hover a task for the ruling. drag the gold line, or use the slider.
the coordinates are the claim, not the line. argue with a task’s position — where the line goes after that is taste.
fig. 4 decides which value gets the last word. this one decides who does the work.
running commentary
thoughts.log — tail -f
aug 2026both / and
I overcorrected with the machine — every hour planned, every note processed, every decision routed through it. Then cold turkey. Both were positions the pendulum picked, not me. The right relationship keeps shifting; that’s probably the honest answer.
aug 2026wiring
The vocabulary preceded the clarity. Getting language for how my nervous system actually runs wasn’t pathologising — it was finally being able to describe myself to myself. A neurodivergent mind in a neurotypical world is a translation job, and I finally have the dictionary.
aug 2026power / tech
The algorithm gave me language, community, intellectual access. It also flattened things, extracted attention, made ambient dissociation feel normal. Genetics plus environment — and the environment was built by a business model nobody consented to.
jul 2026epistemics
Life isn’t optimisation toward a maximum; it’s variance around a mean. Calibrate for the tails — expect them. Individuality is distance from the mean, chosen on purpose. See fig. 2.
WESTWARD ’27 .85 ▲··· BROOKLYN | MOVE .65 —··· JUDGMENT ATROPHY ’31 .70 ▲··· GEN Z = SIGNAL .75 ▲··· VEGAN @ 40 .93 —··· THIS DESIGN, 12 MO .35 ▼··· 𝒰 REMAINS OPEN···