Res Obscura

I have been writing a niche history blog for 15 years

A special appeal to support Res Obscura on its Crystal Anniversary

Using generative AI as part of historical research: three case studies

... in specific domains. Three case studies with GPT-4o, o1, and Claude Sonnet 3.5, and what they mean

2k-year-old wine and the uncanny immediacy of the past

Why artifacts like the Carmona Wine Urn, the Pazyryk Rug, and the Sword of Goujian are so important

Using Opus 5.5 to discover a new eyewitness record of the dodo

Frontier models can now produce novel historical knowledge, but in a really weird way

The “mechanical miracle” that ruined Mark Twain’s life

Learning from the automation dreams of the first Machine Age

Why early modern books are so beautiful

Three theories

Simulating History with ChatGPT

The Case for LLMs as Hallucination Engines

Using LLMs to trace alchemical knowledge and decode 17th century letters

Using GPT-6 and Opus 5.5 to trace alchemical knowledge and decode 17th century letters

Translating Latin demonology manuals with GPT-4 and Claude

At long last, a real-world use case for AI!

When Jorge Luis Borges met one of the founders of AI

One reason I became a historian is the joy of encountering moments in the past that are foreign, yet also oddly familiar.

On 17th century "cocaine"

A new analysis of mummified brains pushes back the timeline for the globalization of coca

Margaret Mead, technocracy, and the origins of AI's ideological divide

The anthropologist helped popularize both techno-optimism and the concept of existential risk

Historical maps probably helped cause World War I

On cartography as historical argument

Margaret Mead, John von Neumann, and the Prehistory of AI

A deep history of Halloween

Or, how far back can historical analysis take us?

Why etymologies matter: How tracing words can illuminate history (2024)

How tracing words can illuminate history

Do painters subconsciously paint themselves into their work?

The Renaissance history of automimesis, and a proposal for research

Why did clothing become boring?

An investigation into when, how, and why everyone started dressing the same — and what it was like when they didn't

There should be more cash prizes for solving historical mysteries

On the Herculaneum scroll and the underrated value of historical knowledge