iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

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ashley bardhan @ashleybardhan.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

is there a better word than devastated? (shattered? fly-swatted?) anyway i've been laid off. i joined gamesradar+ as a freelancer in 2023, and the site had my lifelong admiration by the time i became a senior writer in 2024. i'll miss it lmk if u need a creepy🧟‍♀️ gurl: ashleybardhan(at)gmail(dot)com

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Chris Bratt @chrisbratt.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

In recent years, the media has quietly begun to change the way in which it writes about Bobby Kotick, the former CEO of Activision Blizzard. PMG investigates how Kotick used the threat of defamation to reshape his legacy in the games business, one article at a time. www.youtube.com/watch?v=kKwp...

youtube.com

Inside Bobby Kotick's Campaign Against the Press

YouTube video by People Make Games

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Edwin Evans-Thirlwell @edwinet.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

Great piece of reporting, though we should be wary of relying on blackbox AI detectors (the article employs a good mixture of investigative methods, besides Pangram).

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jessica harvey @jessiscah23.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

Roman Sands RE:Build is out. After so many years, you can finally play our labour of love. It's deranged, it goes SO MANY PLACES, it probably shouldn't exist, and I've no idea if you're going to like it or not but that ain't the point. Roman Sands RE:Build. store.steampowered.com/app/2231460/...

store.steampowered.com

Save 10% on Roman Sands RE:Build on Steam

A service industry adventure with an apocalyptic flavor. A manic genre mashup told across two broken realities. Step through the cracks: find your Exit.

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Ａ．Ｄｅｇｅｎ　Ａｒｔ @adegenart.bsky.social · 26/08/2026

More specifically I made the character portraits And dioramas you may find about the psycho-sexual terror in a museum of the fascist heart Jump into the future NOW

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Edwin Evans-Thirlwell @edwinet.bsky.social · 05/09/2026

Continue to think that one upside of the attempted normalisation of AI-generated art is the opportunity for a countervailing push to understand and appreciate the artworks and aesthetics that are being co-opted, including their conditions of labour. www.rockpapershotgun.com/hopefully-a-...

rockpapershotgun.com

"Hopefully a meteor will strike the earth soon": Game devs talk genAI witchhunts and the importance of honing your visual literacy

Failbetter, New Blood and other game developers on the importance of honing your visual (and technical) literacy if you want to effectively fight against genAI.

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Dr. Emily Price @emilyprice.bsky.social · 02/09/2026

My planned columns about women and the games industry return; this time I’d like to talk to women who review video games about their experiences landing and writing reviews, especially recently. If this is you, reach out via DM or eaprice.work@gmail.com

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renegade cut @renegadecut.com · 30/08/2026

found something great on reddit, which is such a rare happenstance that i felt i should post it

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Edwin Evans-Thirlwell @edwinet.bsky.social · 26/08/2026

This is the engineer Jones, the blueprint man, / loving the place he designed, visiting it alone. from The Book of the Dead, Muriel Rukeyser (1938) wvupressonline.com/node/717

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gita “the formalist” jackson @xoxogossipgita.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

if you are a person of color and want to pitch to aftermath, i encourage you to do so. if you haven't pitched before or want to talk through an idea before you send it to the pitch email, give me a shout via email gita @ aftermath.site

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Jank @jank.cool · 20/08/2026

Here are Jank's subscriber goals. It's simple - the more people join, the more writers we let out of their cages. www.jank.cool/behold-our-f...

jank.cool

Behold, our first subscriber goals

Here’s what we will do if more of you all support us

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Edwin Evans-Thirlwell @edwinet.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

I'm working on a feature about videogame art that has been falsely accused of using genAI. If it's happened to you and you'd like to share thoughts about why your work attracted suspicion, feel free to give me a bell: edwin.evansthirlwell@rockpapershotgun.com

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Bullet Points @bpmonthly.bsky.social · 19/08/2026

Bullet Points Monthly started 10 years ago. To mark a decade of the site, our editors--Yussef Cole, Reid McCarter, Astrid Anne Rose, and Ed Smith--looked at the state of the shooter. We also got nine contributors to do the same. bulletpointsmonthly.com/2026/08/19/s...

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Avery Edison @averyedison.com · 27/04/2026

Something to bear in mind as things get harder, from a 2009 Metafilter post from someone who lives through Sarajevo.

Metafilter post from Dee Extrovert part 1: Well, unlike the majority of you (l assume), 1 actually lived several years in a period of savagery and killing, during which nothing - food, water, electricity, phone, clothing, sense of safety, school, the ability to go out in public, etc - was available, except during totally unpredictable, brief and sporadic occasions.
Of those who couldn't leave my city, Sarajevo:
Some people (very few) were prepared for what they thought would be the "long haul" - this tended to be a couple of months. These people were widely seen as lunatics and dangerously pessimistic ones at that.
Most people were not at all prepared. This included my family. Many of those - like my family - considered the idea of "preparation" to be an affront to the decency we felt most people possessed. Were we wrong? Well, I don't know. We suffered greatly; my parents were killed. But speaking only for myself, I never felt I cheapened my soul by betting on calamity.
Today, that still feels like it's worth something.

Metafilter post from Dee Extrovert part 2: But here's the main point: "Preparing" for the disaster really didn't do anyone much good. Those who
"prepared" ate a little better for a while. They stayed warmer for a few extra days. They enjoyed the radio for a while longer (via batteries.) But in the end, they ended up hungry, cold and bored too, just like the rest of us. Guns and weapons helped no one directly and were even of little to no use in the defense of Sarajevo, since they were toys compared to the shells, bombs and high-powered armaments of the attacking forces.
The worst parts of war were psychological - the fear, anxiety, boredom, loneliness, paranoia, bad dreams.
Respite from those things came with sharing food with a neighbor, finding a piece of clothing that would fit someone you knew, commiserating with others in your position, figuring out how to make make-up from brick or french fries from wheat paste and spreading this newly-acquired war knowledge around the mahala.
We knew who had extra food and supplies. For the most part, they weren't attacked or hassled or bothered. Contrary to what these survivalists say, those in dire times generally hold on to their personal sense of pride even more than they do in normal times. I'd take a bite of a friend's salad without bothering to ask in normal times. I'd never have done that in wartime, no matter how hungry I was.

Metafilter post from Dee Xtrovert: Well, unlike the majority of you (l assume), 1 actually lived several years in a period of savagery and killing, during which nothing - food, water, electricity, phone, clothing, sense of safety, school, the ability to go out in public, etc - was available, except during totally unpredictable, brief and sporadic occasions.
Of those who couldn't leave my city, Sarajevo:
Some people (very few) were prepared for what they thought would be the "long haul" - this tended to be a couple of months. These people were widely seen as lunatics and dangerously pessimistic ones at that.
Most people were not at all prepared. This included my family. Many of those - like my family - considered the idea of "preparation" to be an affront to the decency we felt most people possessed. Were we wrong? Well, I don't know. We suffered greatly; my parents were killed. But speaking only for myself, I never felt I cheapened my soul by betting on calamity.
Today, that still feels like it's worth something.

Posted on Jan. 28th 2009. 1696 favorites

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Vajra Chandrasekera @vajra.me · 11/08/2026

I've talked about the Sameer Project before—an excellent life-saving on-the-ground initiative in Gaza. Since April 2024, they've distributed nearly a quarter of a million meals alone (plus water, medical care, and shelter). But funding has dropped so much that they'll have to shut down without help.

chuffed.org

Food & Water x The Sameer Project

Translating Falasteen (Palestine), in collaboration with The Sameer Project, launched a fundraising campaign to support families in Gaza facing severe hardships. Our mission is to provide food & water...

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Jade King ✍️ OPEN FOR WORK @konayma6.bsky.social · 10/08/2026

No time like the present - if you're PR, editors, or even just a little curious go ahead and add jadekingfreelance@gmail.com to your lists ❤️ getting chinese later it feels justified.

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Edwin Evans-Thirlwell @edwinet.bsky.social · 06/08/2026

A more specific call for article input: I'm very keen to talk to a Mongolian historian who can talk about the cultural significance of the Yam networks - what it means to portray and celebrate those institutions today.

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Unwinnable @unwinnable.com · 23/07/2026

ICYMI: "Assassin’s Creed was unusual: a game produced in the West in which we inhabit an (albeit Occidentalized) West Asian freedom fighter resisting a European invasion." @mlupetti.upandpunch.red on playing Assassin's Creed during the Gaza genocide and 25 years after 9/11:

buff.ly

Replaying the first Assassin's Creed Videogame During the Gaza Genocide - Unwinnable

Few Western games would have allowed us to play “the terrorist.”

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Emanuel Maiberg @emanuelmaiberg.bsky.social · 21/07/2026

companies are sourcing millions of printed books for AI labs that scan them for training data, then destroy them. printed books are more valuable because they're free of AI slop, and AI labs know destroying them is an "optics problem." www.404media.co/ai-companies...

404media.co

AI Companies Are Buying Tons of Old Books Because They're Free of AI Slop

ISBNdb, a company that sources printed books for AI companies to turn into training data, tells clients “the optics problem is real.”

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Caelyn @caelyn.bsky.social · 21/07/2026

I'm sad to say that I'm no longer working with the team at Rascal. It's been a great couple of years, but circumstances have dictated that it's time for me to move on. That does mean that I'm now (quite desperately) looking for freelance work, so if you need words for/about games, my DMs are open.

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videogame history @vghistory.bsky.social · 16/07/2026

crazy cars, game over screen, macintosh (1988) www.mobygames.com/game/781/cra...

monochrome chunky pixelated graphics with four cars, standing hoods first in the dirt (boots in the air). a forest surrounds them. big text up top: game over

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Edwin Evans-Thirlwell @edwinet.bsky.social · 14/07/2026

Managed to catch Covid again during a press trip, despite masking up for travel - I may be hard to reach for the next week or so.

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Edwin Evans-Thirlwell @edwinet.bsky.social · 12/07/2026

"Decay can extract softness from despotism, political persistence from the abolition of utilizable power... Decay mars power on virtual surfaces of zero, there to be rotten and reeked up; but above all, decay leeches death from the living without falling into the black transparency of death."

icamiami-org.storage.googleapis.com

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Unwinnable @unwinnable.com · 11/07/2026

"The frog in the boiling pot of water looks around and finds all that’s left is hot metal." @jaymcastello.bsky.social reflects on 10 years of writing in the games space:

unwinnable.com

10 Years in the Game Space - Unwinnable

2016 games media was clumsy. 2026 games media is a fucking disaster.

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Roger Hare @hareontherun.bsky.social · 29/06/2026

Nine Pens Poetry Press currently open for pamphlet submissions 😊 Pamphlets | Nine Pens share.google/xj0WxWOqOp2v...

share.google

Pamphlets | Nine Pens

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Brendy_C @brendyc.bsky.social · 05/07/2026

Valnet is a journalist's idea of hell. Support indie games media where you can and help to kill this bullshit. pressgazette.co.uk/news/confusi...

pressgazette.co.uk

Confusion and anger as publisher moves journalists to pay-per-click contracts

Journalists on The Gamer paid $8 per thousand clicks.

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Edwin Evans-Thirlwell @edwinet.bsky.social · 02/07/2026

If you have ever had to belatedly turn an online-required game into an offline-capable game, and would like to come sob bitterly into my shoulder while I transform your anguish into an article of some kind, please, hit me up: www.rockpapershotgun.com/authors/edwi...

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autumn wright 🍂 @autumn-wright.com · 30/06/2026

just sent the email ending the lease at my apartment of 4 years to move next month AND got word I'm losing my part-time editing job that's covered my cost of living for 3 years so uh hey who needs a copy editor?

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Chancellor! @cdsart.bsky.social · 14/04/2025

Counting Petals

A room decorated in various flower themed decorations of every kind and colorm. including a wall paper, various abstract paintings of flowers on the wall, a side table painted with flowers. On top of the side table is a flower vase, a flower lamp, a rabbit holding a flower ceramic statue, a bird sitting on a flower ceramic statue, a tulip ceramic statue and then another painting of flowers. There is a single window in the room and outside looms a group of barely visible police officers in swat gear staring inside. There is a door to the right almost out of frame. A single dandelion taped across it like a lock.

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Jank @jank.cool · 24/06/2026

Unreal killed Blueprints last week and also all my cats. www.jank.cool/blueprints-i...

jank.cool

Blueprints is dead, and so is my unfinished game about cats

Goodbye to the only way I know to code

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Clever Mia @readvesna.com · 23/06/2026

if you haven't yet, please buy poppy and my latest game, HUNGERWINTER. its a game about starving to death which we are both currently doing. support us here: das-kunstkollektiv.itch.io/hungerwinter

das-kunstkollektiv.itch.io

HUNGERWINTER by Das Kunstkollektiv, Mia Cain, Digital Poppy

The hunger. The hunger...

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Chris Tapsell @christapsell.bsky.social · 19/06/2026

Here's a rare one: we're hiring a News Editor at Eurogamer! The role is hybrid in London, though there can be some wiggle room on this for a worldie of a candidate. We're after someone who can not only proof, but understand how to push a story forwards originally. www.eurogamer.net/eurogamer-is...

eurogamer.net

Eurogamer is hiring a News Editor

We're after a top-class newshound to take us into a new era here at Eurogamer.

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Edwin Evans-Thirlwell @edwinet.bsky.social · 16/06/2026

If you're affected by any Xbox cuts and feel it would be useful to talk to RPS about it, my email is in my bio: www.rockpapershotgun.com/authors/edwi... Some older reporting I've done of the anon sourcey variety: www.rockpapershotgun.com/former-devel... www.rockpapershotgun.com/how-embracer...

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metal flesh express @oma-metal-flesh.bsky.social · 12/06/2026

for manifesto jam. lessons from the one teacher i respect. meal-ticket-games.itch.io/mcguirkifesto

meal-ticket-games.itch.io

McGuirkifesto by Meal Ticket Games

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inkle @inkle.co · 10/06/2026

Okay, so this is massive and we're terrified. Partnering with @play.breakthrought1d.org in the fight against diabetes, the ENTIRE inkle catalogue is on Humble Bundle right now for $20 -- including TR-49, all four novels, both Overboard! games, 80 Days, all four parts of Sorcery! ... everything.

humblebundle.com

The Complete Inkle Library

Adventure awaits in these beloved classics and new favorite games from Inkle! Get them at the price of your choice and support Breakthrough T1D!

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cécile @haraiva.bsky.social · 02/06/2026

MANIFESTO JAM 2026 An invitation/provocation for YOU to write a manifesto. Running for a full week from June 8th to June 15th (AEST). Participate and submit at: itch.io/jam/manifest...

itch.io

Manifesto Jam 2026

A game jam from 2026-06-07 to 2026-06-14 hosted by haraiva. MANIFESTO JAM 2026 A Manifesto for Manifesto Jam, 2026: SEND ME YOUR ADDRESS SO I CAN VISIT YOU AND EXPLAIN MY PASSIONS I'm sick of talks. I...

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IGN Creators Guild @ignunion.bsky.social · 06/06/2026

IGN Entertainment is refusing to pay its workers the wages we deserve, even as we make #IGNLive the event that it is this weekend. So we left a message that can’t be ignored. And you should too. Let our upper management know that you support us by sending them an email here: bit.ly/4e2uUCP

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melos han-tani (Danchi Days out Oct 29!!) @hantani.bsky.social · 03/06/2026

Today, kick off SGF with some old games, in the 2nd edition of the Unearthed Treasure Room, a showcase of recent overlooked games we want you to play!! Starting shortly here: youtu.be/mxIrzO7R0EU?...

youtu.be

The Unearthed Treasure Room 2: An Alternative Showcase of Overlooked Games

YouTube video by ANALGESIC PRODUCTIONS

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CrimethInc. Ex-Workers' Collective @crimethinc.com · 04/06/2026

To our dismay, the artist and author Marjane Satrapi has passed away. As she wrote, ordinary Americans and Iranians have more in common with each other than we do with either of our governments, which have far too much in common with each other. We honor her memory and oppose the war.

NO WAR WITH IRAN!
The world is not divided into countries. The world is not divided between East and West.
You are American, I am Iranian, we don’t know each other, but we talk together
& we understand each other perfectly. The difference between you
& your government is much bigger than the difference
between you & me.
And the difference between me
& my government is much bigger
than the difference
between me & you.
And our governments are very much the same...
—Marjane Satrapi

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Dragon Wasabi Potato ドラゴンワサビポテト @dragonwasabipotato.bsky.social · 30/05/2026

I don't talk about this quite often, but let me shout out we're accepting donation support for our curations. as you see, we've been dedicating a lot to illuminate and archive so many meaningful works by solo devs and small teams all over the world. a tiny tip would be welcomed! warpdoor.com/about/

screenshot from Warp Door website with links for the donations

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Edwin Evans-Thirlwell @edwinet.bsky.social · 30/05/2026

"Everywhere, all the time, the gamer confronts the rival impulses of chance and competition, intoxication and spectacle, as homeopathic antidotes to a boredom that challenges being from within." - McKenzie Wark, 2007 www.hup.harvard.edu/books/978067...

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Edwin Evans-Thirlwell @edwinet.bsky.social · 18/05/2026

Still playing through, but I enjoy how Zero Parades thinks about 'bad art' and inauthenticity. I haven't read them - I'd rather not have anybody else's thoughts in my head just yet - but Alexis and Nic's reviews for EG and Jank should be worth a gander www.rockpapershotgun.com/zero-parades...

rockpapershotgun.com

Zero Parades: For Dead Spies is both bootleg Disco Elysium and a spirited interrogation of fake culture in all its guises

ZA/UM's first post-Disco RPG Zero Parades is obsessed with forgeries and bootlegs and the ways they can be wielded for erasure and displacement.

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Olivia Guest · Ολίβια Γκεστ @olivia.science · 08/05/2026

Preprinted! Been working on this for ~1 year w wonderful coauthors Nancy & Mark: > Understanding Artificial Neural Networks: Mysterianism about Known Mechanism is Mysticism doi.org/10.5281/zeno... Have you noticed many experts say they don't understand AI? What's going on? 🤯 Let us tell you... 1/

Understanding Artificial Neural Networks:
Mysterianism about Known Mechanism is Mysticism
Olivia Guest1,2, Nancy Abigail Nuñez Hernández3, and Mark Blokpoel1,2
1Department of Cognitive Science and Artificial Intelligence, Radboud University, The Netherlands
2Donders Institute for Brain, Cognition, and Behaviour, Radboud University, Nijmegen, The Netherlands
3Facultad de Estudios Superiores Acatlán-Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Mexico
Mysterianism is the idea that human cognition, mind, cannot be understood. Taking this
concept and applying it to known mechanism — such that claims are made that we do not
know how engineered systems, such as artificial neural networks (ANNs), work, or that they
constitute black boxes that we can only open with difficulty — is inappropriate at best and
malicious at worst. We do know the mechanistic structure of such models because we designed
and built them. We also do know their functional role (what they are for) as well as the
mathematical function they are asked to approximate (map inputs to target outputs). Because
mysterianist beliefs about known systems, such as ANNs, are often expressed, scientists need
to sit up and take notice. We provide an error theory as to what is going on to help unpick
this metatheoretical blunder. Ultimately, the problem is that ‘understanding’ is not a technical
term in these cases: the word is co-opted for a specific narrative to sell ‘artificial intelligence’
through mystification. All computational systems, from pendulums to databases, will behave
in ways we cannot predict or control — this is not a unique property of ANNs — and experts
do indeed grasp the computational properties of these systems nonetheless.
Keywords: artificial neural networks; mechanism; black box; epistemology; artificial
intelligence; understanding

4 GUEST, NUÑEZ HERNÁNDEZ, & BLOKPOEL≈
ANNs are equiva-
lent to or inspired
by humans.
α
≡
ANNs are a black
box or unknowable,
even if opened.
β
≡
Humans are a black
box or unknowable.
γ
Figure 1
Three co-occurring (latent) assertions in the context of con-
temporary reasoning on AI and cognition. While they may
appear to hang together in “reflective equilibrium” (Elgin 2017),
their metatheoretical examination brings their contradictions to
light. Starting from the top, and moving clockwise: 𝛼) represents
the typical assertion of so-called cognitive, neural, or otherwise
biological plausibility or inspiration presented for ANNs; 𝛽) is
the claim we tackle head on here — both in terms of analysing
the constituent terms and in how it relates to the other two
assumptions; and 𝛾) exemplifies a type of mysterianism, which
while not always explicitly expressed, plays a background role
and importantly comes into conflict with the other two claims
in important ways

MYSTERIANISM ABOUT KNOWN MECHANISM IS MYSTICISM 11World
?Di
Data?Si
ANN
Figure 3
Not all systems, 𝑆𝑖 relate to their relevant data, 𝐷𝑖 and world
phenomena this way, but ANN models (as many inferential
statistical models) do when used without scientific understand-
ing of the data-generating process or without verbal or formal
theory to match (Guest and Martin 2025b, 2021, 2023). As we
move from left to right above, we move from full understanding
of engineered systems, 𝑆𝑖 to less or even possibly none of the
data, 𝐷𝑖 to the world which can be thought of as the set of
phenomena to be understood.

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Edwin Evans-Thirlwell @edwinet.bsky.social · 06/05/2026

I'm attending Digital Dragons this month - if you're also there and would like to chat, my email is in my bio. (I apologise in advance if I get too busy and ghost you.) www.rockpapershotgun.com/authors/edwi...

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Aftermath @aftermath.site · 27/04/2026

Aftermath is teaming up with our pals at Rascal, Rogue, and Never Post to bring you an indie media bundle--get a month of all our sites for 50% off! aftermath.site/indie-media-bu...

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