Skip to content

Concepts

Each term in the words of the essay that introduced it, with every other piece that uses it.

  • 10 terms
  • 19 pieces use them

01 · The terms

A to Z

  1. Absorption rate

    “The second is your absorption rate: how reliably you turn a new capability into a number your CFO or customer would recognise.”

    Introduced 28 Jun 2026

    How Long Until Your AI Edge Stops Paying?

    1 other piece uses it

  2. Amnesia with API keys

    “Most agents fail, get patched, and return with the same action surface.”

    Introduced 9 May 2026

    Your AI Agent Stack Is Solving The Wrong Problem

    1 other piece uses it

  3. Canopy

    “The output is the canopy, and the canopy gets replaced.”

    Introduced 23 Apr 2026

    The Forest Floor Is The Product

    5 other pieces use it

  4. The capacity stack

    “It decides one thing: how much raw compute can physically exist.”

    Introduced 3 Jun 2026

    The Other Half of Compute

    No other piece uses it yet

  5. The comforting false fix

    “It is the same move every time: spend on the part you can see so you do not have to diagnose the part you cannot.”

    Introduced 17 Jun 2026

    The Seven-Layer Agent Audit

    No other piece uses it yet

  6. Displacement rate

    “Growth-rate is one variable. Displacement-rate is the other.”

    Introduced 23 Apr 2026

    The Forest Floor Is The Product

    3 other pieces use it

  7. Proof design

    “Call it proof design: building the signals that still mean something when the surface costs almost nothing to produce.”

    Introduced 2 May 2026

    What Proves You Can Think?

    No other piece uses it yet

  8. Residual failure correlation

    “Once you have driven down how often each system fails, the risk that is left lives in how much their failures move together.”

    Introduced 28 Aug 2026

    Everyone Got Safer. That's the Problem.

    No other piece uses it yet

  9. The stable liar

    “This is the stable liar: a number that goes on looking right long after it stopped being right.”

    Introduced 2 Jun 2026

    The Stable Liar

    2 other pieces use it

  10. Substrate

    “The substrate underneath is what does not get replaced.”

    Introduced 23 Apr 2026

    The Forest Floor Is The Product

    9 other pieces use it

Each strip runs from the first essay (5 Apr 2026) to the latest (7 Nov 2026). A mark is a piece that uses the term; gold is the essay that introduced it.

02 · The laws

7 pages

The five laws and the two principles built from them each have a page of their own: the plain claim, the question to ask, and what would prove it wrong.

The newsletter · Free

Subscribe to get each new piece in your inbox, with something to use in every one.

Several essays a week, plus Notes through the week.

Signup completes on Substack. Unsubscribe from any email.