|
Use an LLM to build a personal wiki for areas of research
At the beginning of April, the prominent AI researcher Andrej Karpathy tweeted (https://x.com/karpathy/status/2039805659525644595) out an idea that was, for a certain kind of productivity nerd, an infohazard. He described the idea this way: ‘Something I’m finding very useful recently: using LLMs to build personal knowledge bases for various topics of research interest.’ He proceeded to describe his process: adding source documents to a local folder and using an LLM to extract and organize their contents into a Markdown wiki that gets updated as he adds new material.”
I don’t know whether I will do this but it sure is intriguing.
2026-08-20
The Sand Letters
“On his deathbed, President Chester Arthur ordered that all of his personal and professional papers be burned. Three barrels of documents went up in flames. But 23 letters survived, initialed only ‘J.I.S.’”
Arthur was a prince of the spoils system of government — institutionalized corruption and bribery — that was standard through most of the 19th Century. But as President he led dismantling that system and replacing it with professional civil service that drove many of the great advances of the U.S. in the 20th Century.
Arthur was turned around, to a large extent, by those 23 letters, from Julia Isabella Sand, a woman who lived an obscure life in New York. Though she exerted great influence on Arthur, she and the President never met.
Comedian and amateur historian Elliot Kalan and 99% Invisible host Roman Mars tell the story.
2026-08-20
| 