10 FEB 2026

Day 41

Look well into thyself; there is a source of strength which will always spring up if thou wilt always look.

Marcus Aurelius · Meditations

A rectangular brass plaque showing figures in high relief: a central figure in elaborate ceremonial dress flanked by attendants, with detailed rendering of textile patterns, coral beads, and ceremonial regalia.

I · THE OBJECT · BRITISH MUSEUM

The Benin Bronzes

Edo / Kingdom of Benin · 14th–16th century · Copper-based alloy (brass and bronze)

Thousands of cast brass plaques lined a West African palace for centuries, recording court ceremony and conquest. In 1897 British forces took them during a punitive expedition, and they have never been returned.

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II · THE IDEA · ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE

Alternatives to Attention

Transformers · State-space models · 2023 (Mamba)

Transformers pay a quadratic price to look at every earlier token. State-space models like Mamba compress history into a fixed-size state and update it in linear time, but the trade-offs are still being measured.

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A young woman in a billowing pink dress swings high in a shadowed garden, her slipper flying off toward pale sky. A young man reclines in the lower left, looking upward. An older figure in shadow at right pulls the swing's ropes.

III · THE WORK · ART HISTORY

Fragonard's The Swing

Jean-Honoré Fragonard · 1767 · Oil on canvas

A patron told Fragonard where to place the viewer, what the young man should see, and where the woman's shoe should fly. The result is Rococo doing exactly what it was designed to do.

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