Skip to content
The Daily Triptych063 / 365

4 MAR 2026

Day 63

Every writer creates his own precursors.

Jorge Luis Borges · Kafka and His Precursors
Stone relief panels showing a king hunting lions in an enclosed arena. Lions leap, fall, and die; some are pierced with arrows. One lioness drags her paralysed hind legs. Attendants and dogs surround the scene.

I · THE OBJECT · BRITISH MUSEUM

The Assyrian Lion Hunt Reliefs

Neo-Assyrian · c. 645–635 BC · North Palace, Nineveh

Captured lions released from cages into an arena, killed with arrows by a king who never missed. The finest animal sculpture from Assyria, made to show power, not sportsmanship.

Enter lesson 6 MIN

II · THE IDEA · ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE

The Emergent Abilities Argument

Training and alignment · Wei et al., 2022; Schaeffer et al., 2023 · Machine learning

Past a certain size, models suddenly pass tests they failed before. Some researchers see a phase transition. Others argue the discontinuity lives in the metric, not the model.

Enter lesson 7 MIN

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

Two figures embracing, their bodies almost entirely covered by robes decorated with geometric patterns in gold. The man's face is turned away; the woman's tilts back, eyes closed. They kneel on a flowered ground against a gold background.

III · THE WORK · ART HISTORY

Klimt's The Kiss

Gustav Klimt · 1907 · Oil paint and gold leaf on canvas

Klimt covered most of the canvas in flat geometric ornament worked in real gold, then painted two faces and four hands as though they belonged to a different picture entirely.

Enter lesson 6 MIN

The daily email

Four lessons in your inbox, every morning at seven.

One object, one idea, one masterpiece, one game. Deep links to that day’s pages. Unsubscribe with one click, any time.