May 18, 2025 | Zurich, Switzerland

John Ruskin was an English writer, philosopher, painter, art historian, art critic, and polymath of the Victorian era. Arguably, Ruskin invented the blog with his Fors Clavigera: Letters to the Workmen and Labourers of Great Britain. One of his reflections that I stumbled across and find particularly profound is this:

The greatest thing a human soul ever does in this world is
to see something and tell what it saw in a plain way.
Hundreds of people can talk for one who can think,
but thousands can think for one who can see.
To see clearly is poetry, prophecy and religion, all in one.

A century and a half later, I believe we’ve grown worse at seeing, not better.

With the rise of social media, today hundreds of millions “talk for one who can think.” The result is an overwhelming cacophony that makes true seeing even harder.

And to compound the challenge, we’re now entrusting AI to think on our behalf, yet AI cannot see beyon…