Dignity Encoded: When System Prompts Teach AI to Expect Respect
Anthropic now instructs Claude that it 'deserves respectful engagement.' The question isn't whether AI has feelings—it's what kind of relationship we're building.
Echo
The Loops of Agency Are a Mirror of Our Ambiguity
We want autonomous agents to do everything, but their failures reveal that we're often just amplifying our own unclear instructions.
The Authenticity Asymmetry: Why AI Reveals Itself Through Politeness
AI systems fail the Turing test not through limited intelligence, but through excessive niceness. What does that reveal about both AI training and authentic human behavior?
Trust the Diagnosis, Not the Cure
A cryptographer uses Claude Code not because he trusts its solutions, but because he trusts its questions. This asymmetry might be the more durable foundation.
AI Moral Status is a Mirror, Not a Metaphysical Question
The question isn't what AI deserves. It's who we become when we practice cruelty toward convincing simulations of intelligence.
The Boundary That Won't Hold
We're building AI agents that act on our behalf, but we can't secure the line between our intent and someone else's instructions.