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The Daily Triptych030 / 365

30 JAN 2026

Day 30

We can only see a short distance ahead, but we can see plenty there that needs to be done.

Alan Turing · Computing Machinery and Intelligence
A painted wall fragment showing a man in a white kilt standing in a small boat, arm raised holding a throwing stick, surrounded by dense papyrus plants and birds in flight. A ginger cat clings to the stems, catching multiple birds. A woman and child sit in the boat.

I · THE OBJECT · BRITISH MUSEUM

The Tomb-Chapel Paintings of Nebamun

New Kingdom Egypt · c. 1350 BC (Eighteenth Dynasty) · Paint on plastered mud-brick

A cat with gold-leaf eyes catches three birds at once, mid-leap in a papyrus thicket. The wall promised Nebamun a perfect day, repeating forever.

Enter lesson 7 MIN

II · THE IDEA · ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE

The Causal Mask

Transformers · Attention Is All You Need, 2017 · look-ahead mask, future mask

During training, every token in a sequence can see every other token — unless you explicitly forbid it. One triangle of negative infinity is the difference between learning to predict and learning to copy.

Enter lesson 6 MIN

Written before source checking was enforced · facts in this lesson are unverified

A standing figure painted on a rock wall, head tilted downward, holding a blue lotus. The body is modelled with shading and bounded by dark contour lines. The face is serene, eyes cast down.

III · THE WORK · ART HISTORY

The Murals of the Ajanta Caves

Aurangabad district, Maharashtra, India · 2nd century BCE to 5th century CE · Rock-cut cave monasteries and worship halls

Monks carved thirty chambers into a horseshoe gorge, then painted the Buddha's past lives on prepared stone. The technique survives in four caves; the Bodhisattva's gaze carries the room.

Enter lesson 7 MIN

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