Steven Johnson
Non-fiction writer, podcaster and occasional TV host. Author of thirteen books including The Ghost Map, Where Good Ideas Come From and Extra Life, host of the PBS series How We Got To Now, and author of the Adjacent Possible newsletter on innovation.
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What they believe
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A true pirate is defined by rejecting the authority of nations and empires altogether, not merely by breaking their laws.
To be a true pirate implies a broader disavowal. The pirate renounces the long-distance authorities of nations and empires.
adjacentpossible.substack.comSaid 9 Aug 2026This on korrents
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The external tools people use to reason, remember and calculate — including chatting with an LLM — are genuine extensions of the human mind, not just aids to it.
the external tools that we use to help us reason, remember, associate, calculate-from counting on our fingers to chatting with an advanced LLM-should be properly understood as extensions of our own cognitive process.
adjacentpossible.substack.comSaid 16 Jul 2026This on korrents
The bold line is korrents’ wording; the quote is theirs. These 2: what they wrote before what they said aloud, one per source, newest first.
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From one piece The Uses Of Terror 2 beliefs · adjacentpossible.substack.com
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Their words
The Sea Peoples did not invade lands to claim them as their own, or extract treasure or slaves to bring back to their homeland. They seemingly torched the great capitals of the Bronze Age just to watch them burn.
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Their words
To be a true pirate implies a broader disavowal. The pirate renounces the long-distance authorities of nations and empires.
16 July
From one piece Notebooks And The Extended Mind 2 beliefs · adjacentpossible.substack.com
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Their words
the most pressing question is not whether the machines are on the verge of sentience, since the likelihood of that seems low.
Notebooks And The Extended Mindadjacentpossible.substack.com
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Their words
the external tools that we use to help us reason, remember, associate, calculate-from counting on our fingers to chatting with an advanced LLM-should be properly understood as extensions of our own cognitive process.
Notebooks And The Extended Mindadjacentpossible.substack.com
2 June
From one piece Cognitive Uploading 3 beliefs · adjacentpossible.substack.com
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Their words
So often with new software paradigms, what looks like inevitability turns out to be just design failure that can be solved with the right guardrails or affordances or system instructions.
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Their words
To a certain extent, the concerns about cognitive offloading are an example of technological lag, where the mainstream discussion of AI and its impact is still framed in terms of the first-generation chatbots.
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Their words
I truly believe that following this kind of approach to AI in the classroom would, in the aggregate, produce better learning outcomes than the research and writing workflows available to students pre-AI.
3 April
From one piece The Legible Society 2 beliefs · adjacentpossible.substack.com
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korrents.com
Writing originated from flattening physical accounting tokens into two-dimensional signs pressed into clay.Their words
By transforming a physical, three-dimensional counter into a two-dimensional sign, these early accountants made a momentous step towards history's inaugural information technology: writing.
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korrents.com
Root crops resist state taxation better than grain because they can be harvested piecemeal and stored underground.Their words
Even other domesticated foods like root crops and tubers proved remarkably resistant to the tax collector, because they grow underground and can safely be left in the soil for months, even years.
2 March
From one piece Back To The Garden 3 beliefs · adjacentpossible.substack.com
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That now ubiquitous timeline names eras after the inorganic materials that happened to survive in the dirt.
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And what makes a society illegible to the tax collector also makes it illegible to the traditional archaeologist.
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archeologists naturally build their interpretations of human history out of artifacts that survive the passage of deep time.
3 February
From one piece The Architecture Of Ideas 2 beliefs · adjacentpossible.substack.com
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korrents.com
The purpose of a creative work environment is to produce ideas that would not otherwise have occurred to you.Their words
At the most elemental level, that is the goal of a creative work environment: it should help you have ideas that would have never occurred to you.
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Their words
standard word processors are actually comically unsuited for complex, long-form thinking
26 January
13 January
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But the "Fall" into agriculture turns out to be a much more nuanced-and jagged-story than the standard account would have it.
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Beliefs
Korrents What they believe 16 beliefs — each backed by an exact quote.
Each is a — compiled by korrents.com, not by them: the one-line wordings are korrents', the quotes are theirs.
Recent
A true pirate is defined by rejecting the authority of nations and empires altogether, not merely by breaking their laws.
To be a true pirate implies a broader disavowal. The pirate renounces the long-distance authorities of nations and empires.
The Uses Of Terror Said 9 Aug 2026
Some historical raiders destroyed conquered cities for destruction's own sake, not to seize land, treasure, or slaves.
The Sea Peoples did not invade lands to claim them as their own, or extract treasure or slaves to bring back to their homeland. They seemingly torched the great capitals of the Bronze Age just to watch them burn.
The Uses Of Terror Said 9 Aug 2026
The external tools people use to reason, remember and calculate — including chatting with an LLM — are genuine extensions of the human mind, not just aids to it.
the external tools that we use to help us reason, remember, associate, calculate-from counting on our fingers to chatting with an advanced LLM-should be properly understood as extensions of our own cognitive process.
Notebooks And The Extended Mind Said 16 Jul 2026
Show 13 more
Current AI systems are very unlikely to be close to achieving genuine sentience.
the most pressing question is not whether the machines are on the verge of sentience, since the likelihood of that seems low.
Notebooks And The Extended Mind Said 16 Jul 2026
A well-designed AI-integrated approach to schoolwork can produce better learning outcomes than pre-AI research and writing methods.
I truly believe that following this kind of approach to AI in the classroom would, in the aggregate, produce better learning outcomes than the research and writing workflows available to students pre-AI.
Cognitive Uploading Said 2 Jun 2026
Current fears about AI causing harmful cognitive offloading are largely based on outdated impressions of early chatbots rather than today's AI tools.
To a certain extent, the concerns about cognitive offloading are an example of technological lag, where the mainstream discussion of AI and its impact is still framed in terms of the first-generation chatbots.
Cognitive Uploading Said 2 Jun 2026
Apparent inevitabilities in new software paradigms are often just design failures that can be fixed with better guardrails.
So often with new software paradigms, what looks like inevitability turns out to be just design failure that can be solved with the right guardrails or affordances or system instructions.
Cognitive Uploading Said 2 Jun 2026
Root crops resist state taxation better than grain because they can be harvested piecemeal and stored underground.
Even other domesticated foods like root crops and tubers proved remarkably resistant to the tax collector, because they grow underground and can safely be left in the soil for months, even years.
The Legible Society Said 3 Apr 2026
Writing originated from flattening physical accounting tokens into two-dimensional signs pressed into clay.
By transforming a physical, three-dimensional counter into a two-dimensional sign, these early accountants made a momentous step towards history's inaugural information technology: writing.
The Legible Society Said 3 Apr 2026
Archaeological interpretations of human history are biased toward artifacts made of durable materials that survived, not what mattered most to the people who made them.
archeologists naturally build their interpretations of human history out of artifacts that survive the passage of deep time.
Back To The Garden Said 2 Mar 2026
A society structured to resist being catalogued and taxed by a central authority is for the same reason resistant to being reconstructed by archaeologists.
And what makes a society illegible to the tax collector also makes it illegible to the traditional archaeologist.
Back To The Garden Said 2 Mar 2026
The Stone Age, Bronze Age and Iron Age framework names historical eras after the inorganic materials that happened to survive, not what those societies actually valued.
That now ubiquitous timeline names eras after the inorganic materials that happened to survive in the dirt.
Back To The Garden Said 2 Mar 2026
Standard word processors are poorly suited for complex, long-form writing.
standard word processors are actually comically unsuited for complex, long-form thinking
The Architecture Of Ideas Said 3 Feb 2026
The purpose of a creative work environment is to produce ideas that would not otherwise have occurred to you.
At the most elemental level, that is the goal of a creative work environment: it should help you have ideas that would have never occurred to you.
The Architecture Of Ideas Said 3 Feb 2026
The standard narrative of agriculture as a sudden civilizational fall oversimplifies a far more gradual, complicated history.
But the "Fall" into agriculture turns out to be a much more nuanced-and jagged-story than the standard account would have it.
The Agrarian Fall Said 13 Jan 2026
There was a long, unexplained gap between the first domestication of crops and the emergence of the first agrarian states.
Over the past three decades, scholars have identified a massive, unexplained gap in the timeline between the first domestication of crops and the emergence of the first agrarian states, complicating the narrative popularized by authors like Harari and Diamond.
The Agrarian Fall Said 13 Jan 2026
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A korrent is a belief a person has stated in their own words: one sentence stating the claim, backed by a quote and a source, kept at korrents.com.
Under a name here, the quoted block is what they actually said. The korrent beneath it is the claim those words support, in korrents' wording — tap it to see the record, its source, and who else holds it.
Nobody here wrote their own korrents. They are compiled from public statements, and a person can change their mind, which is recorded too.
Recommends rcmnd
rcmnd What they recommend 8 things — each backed by an exact quote.
Compiled by rcmnd.app, not by them: the quotes are theirs, and each links to the post it was copied from.
Recent
Loved Trust Exercise
But what really makes it brilliant is a kind of meta-fictional twist that happens in the middle of the book
adjacentpossible.substack.com 23 Nov 2021
Mixed on The Precipice: Existential Risk and the Future of Humanity
I wouldn’t say that this is the most compelling book I’ve ever read in terms of the prose style or storytelling, but it does provide a very helpful, almost quantitative overview of all the potential threats looming out there
adjacentpossible.substack.com 23 Nov 2021
What others say about The Precipice: Existential Risk and the Future of Humanity →
Liked The Bomber Mafia
It’s one of the first truly audio-first books that I’ve encountered, both in the prose style which has clearly been written from the ground up to be heard, not read
adjacentpossible.substack.com 23 Nov 2021
Show 5 more
Loved The Alignment Problem: Machine Learning and Human Values
I just finished this book a few weeks ago and it is still reverberating in my mind
adjacentpossible.substack.com 23 Nov 2021
What others say about The Alignment Problem: Machine Learning and Human Values →
Liked Life's Edge: The Search for What It Means to Be Alive
That led me to pick up this new book from one of the great science writers of our time, Carl Zimmer, and it did not disappoint.
adjacentpossible.substack.com 23 Nov 2021
What others say about Life's Edge: The Search for What It Means to Be Alive →
Loved Against the Grain: A Deep History of the Earliest States
reading some of the early reviews suggested to me that it has a lot of overlap with this astonishing book by James Scott
adjacentpossible.substack.com 23 Nov 2021
What others say about Against the Grain: A Deep History of the Earliest States →
Recommends Enemy Of All Mankind
The other book of mine that makes a thoughtful gift for the history buff in your extended clan is my 2020 book, Enemy of All Mankind
adjacentpossible.substack.com 23 Nov 2021
their own
Recommends Extra Life: A Short History of Living Longer
If you’re looking for gifts to buy your history-minded friend or family member, I’d recommend my last two books. First, there’s Extra Life , which tells the heroic story of how we doubled life expectancy over the past hundred years.
adjacentpossible.substack.com 23 Nov 2021
their own
What others say about Extra Life: A Short History of Living Longer →
Where they publish
Newsletter Adjacent Possible His newsletter on innovation: where good ideas come from and how to keep them from turning against us.
Open adjacentpossible.substack.com
Recent
- Introducing Expert Intelligence 21 Sept 2026 Your favorite books, now your personal brain trust.
- The Uses Of Terror 9 Aug 2026 Piracy, civilizational collapse, and Christopher Nolan's The Odyssey
- Notebooks And The Extended Mind 16 Jul 2026 Philosophy is the new jam; NotebookLM gets a new name.
Show 17 more
- Cognitive Uploading 2 Jun 2026 What if AI can give us more to think about, not less?
- The Legible Society 3 Apr 2026 In part four of Planet of the Barbarians: how early city-states used the world’s first information technology to finally close the agrarian trap.
- Back To The Garden 2 Mar 2026 In part three of Planet of the Barbarians, a four-thousand-year paradise vanishes from the archaeological record. But did a memory of it persist in the Book of Genesis?
- The Architecture Of Ideas 3 Feb 2026 A field guide to the rituals, routines, and workflows of creative thinkers.
- The Wetlands Interregnum 26 Jan 2026 In part two of Planet of the Barbarians: how Cold War espionage gave us new insight into the origins of the agricultural revolution.
- The Agrarian Fall 13 Jan 2026 In part one of Planet Of The Barbarians: reconsidering humanity’s greatest mistake.
- Introducing Planet Of The Barbarians 5 Jan 2026 In a new five-part series, a declassified history of the first civilizations.
- What Is The Right Atomic Unit For Knowledge? 26 Nov 2025 Two centuries ago, the invention of peer-reviewed articles changed the course of scientific history. What will be its equivalent in the age of AI?
- The Blank Page Revolution 20 Sept 2025 How paper changed the way we think.
- Magic Cards and Knowledge Bottles 24 Jul 2025 Can AI give us an enhanced version of the "digital librarians" first envisioned almost a half century ago?
- Machine Readable 25 Jun 2025 Language models are opening new avenues for inquiry in historical research and writing. But will they undermine the reading of primary sources?
- City Of Bombs 9 May 2025 My first true NYC book—now out in paperback—wins an Edgar Award.
- Condensing The Iceberg 19 Feb 2025 Attention, addiction, and the crucial art of withholding information in an era of data abundance.
- How To Read A Novel 31 Dec 2024 Why fiction gives us an antidote to narrowband thinking.
- In The Context Of Long Context 21 Nov 2024 What happens when you can instantly transform an entire book into a playable simulation? That—and much more—is now possible thanks to the long context revolution.
- Ways Of Flourishing 25 Oct 2024 Thoughts on progress and the "compressed 21st century" from my speech accepting the Pioneer Award from the University of Pennsylvania.
- Listening To The Algorithm 13 Sept 2024 Thoughts on a new feature at NotebookLM that turns your sources into an extended audio conversation.
Link verified 4 Sept 2026. Recent items update automatically from the channel.
x.com @stevenbjohnson His X account.
Recent
- Brooklyn. 9 Oct 2026
- I’ll admit that I read thus quickly as announcing an even newer book called The BREAKUP WITH GRAYDON CARTER, which no lies I would read in a heartbeat. But a discussion of the brilliant Breakup in conversation with Grayson would also entertain. @kbandersen have you told the story of the notebook test we did with that early draft? That was meaningful, I think. 8 Oct 2026
- The Running Ground contains such an extraordinary personal narrative that it should be read start-to-finish in addition to exploring all the amazing new AI uses that @nxthompson describes here. But that's the beauty of Expert Intelligence in @Gemini_Notebook: you can do both! 8 Oct 2026
Show 17 more
- One driver behind @Gemini_Notebook’s growth—now #9 in overall users among all AI web apps—is the team’s investment in making Notebook the most advanced tool for managing the knowledge you need to do your best work with AI. Just in the last five months we’ve launched… Auto-Label Sources. Automatically group large source collections by topics, which you can then manually modify. (Or sort by date, kind, or name.) Effectively a version of Mind Maps that helps you keep your sources organized, and makes it easy to focus on the model on a subset of sources when you need to. Student Notebooks In Clas… 7 Oct 2026
- So cool to see @Gemini_Notebook land at #9 in the new @a16z rankings of most popular consumer AI web apps. The team has been cranking! (And note that @Google is the only company with two AI products in top ten — and four in the top twenty.) 6 Oct 2026
- Tokyo. 3 Oct 2026
- The camera feature in the @Gemini_Notebook mobile app is so transformative for on-the-go research. I was up in the Sierras working on a new project, and I just took photos of everything, like this museum display. Then I asked for a detailed report of all the info in the image. The text below is what I got back. (I fact-checked it myself and it was 99% accurate -- and some of the text it transcribed is so blurry in the image that it was hard for me to read it.) Next step is to generate documents like this for all the photos I took, and then ask Notebook to highlight all the information that ad… 17 Sept 2026
- Eagle Lake, above Tahoe, earlier today. 15 Sept 2026
- Someone should write a book about how video games are making us smarter. 😉 15 Sept 2026
- Yosemite this morning. Absolutely sublime. 13 Sept 2026
- I've added @sapinker's Sense of Style to all my notebooks with writing projects, asking for a Pinker edit with each draft. I don't always agree with every suggestion but it's invariably productive and stimulating advice. Plus if you're in the US, you can get a free copy of the book, which you can both read and use as an on-demand editor in @Gemini_Notebook. There are twenty other great titles in the promotion as well, though it's a limited time offer, and you can only choose one book. (And yes, Google is paying for the books so authors/publishers will be compensated!) Full list and details he… 4 Sept 2026 play.google.com
- Every Expert Intelligence notebook we feature includes a note from the author and extra sources curated by them. Here's @AnnieDuke explaining how exploring her fascinating book Thinking In Bets in @Gemini_Notebook can help you make smarter decisions. 4 Sept 2026
- This week at @Gemini_Notebook, we're featuring two notebooks built around a pair of recent popular advice books, starting with @ericries' instant classic, The Lean Startup. Add Eric's book to any notebook, and it's like having him as your personal coach. 4 Sept 2026
- The power of Expert Intelligence in @Gemini_Notebook: Add The Sense of Style by @sapinker to a notebook with a draft you're writing. Ask for feedback based on Pinker's ideas. It's the opposite of AI slop: personalized advice based on human expertise, facilitated by AI. And what I love about this is that I'm getting actionable suggestions here AND Notebook is serving as a guide to Pinker's underlying philosophy of writing. So I'm learning deeper principles as I improve my draft. And of course everything in the Notebook response points directly back to specific passages in Pinker (and my own dr… 31 Aug 2026 notebook.google.com
- Kind of thrilling as an author to see that "Use with @Gemini_Notebook" option on the @GooglePlay bookstore page for one of my books. (Most of mine are now available as part of Expert Intelligence.) This is going to open up entirely new ways for readers to experience my work. 29 Aug 2026
- We are so encouraged by the response to Expert Intelligence from authors and publishers. Books (and other published knowledge) should thrive in the age of language models. And we're eager to bring EI to other Google surfaces soon beyond @Gemini_Notebook. So much more to do! 28 Aug 2026
- Here's the official blog post announcing the new Expert Intelligence framework bringing published books and more to @Gemini_Notebook (and soon other surfaces across @Google.) It includes info about the free book giveaway we are doing for US users as well. 28 Aug 2026 blog.google
- After working closely with publishers (including @penguindrandom & @BloomsburyPub) and a dream team of leading authors, we're launching a Google-wide program bringing trusted sources (starting with books) to @Gemini_Notebook and more: Expert Intelligence. 27 Aug 2026
- I thoroughly enjoyed going deep with @nxthompson on AI and the future of writing and creativity for The Most Interesting Thing in AI podcast. A few highlights: • How Nick and I have used @Gemini_Notebook to write our books • Why AI can lead to more serendipitous discovery in the research process (at least using Notebook’s citation-based approach) • The brilliance of the “explain” button in Notebook’s quiz feature • AI as the anti-social-media, with its gravitational pull towards mainstream consensus (citing @danwilliamsphil) • Why our attachment to the human voice of the writer is not going a… 14 Aug 2026
- I have some news. But first a little backstory. Almost exactly four years ago, I drove down to Mountain View for my first day as a Google employee. I was fifty-four years old, and somehow had managed to avoid ever having a proper job over that entire period, other than a few startups that I had founded in my twenties and thirties. At that point Google Labs, which had just been formed a few months earlier, was headquartered in a fairly anonymous looking suburban office park off 101, closer to Office Space than Silicon Valley on the Mike Judge spectrum. And as it happened, my first day at Googl… 16 Jul 2026
Link verified 4 Sept 2026. Recent items update automatically from the channel.
Podcast American Innovations Hosts the American Innovations podcast.
Link verified 25 Sept 2026.
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