You are the upgrade

Augmented Natural Intelligence as the Only Way Forward

Data, acceleration, and the future of intelligence: Lessons from 25 books about AI, technology abstraction, and consciousness.

Making Soup

A preface for the curious, the confused, and the computationally overwhelmed

“Ik kan er geen soep van koken.” (Dutch idiom: “I can’t make soup from this” — in other words, “This makes no sense to me.”)

If you came here looking for definitive answers about AI, I have bad news: this is not the book for you.

But if you’re here to wander through wild ideas, unexpected metaphors, and more questions than conclusions — welcome. You’ve just found a book that tries to make soup from hundreds of others. Not a tidy recipe. More like a strange, spicy, idea-stirring stew.

The Truth Is: I Read All the Books, and I’m Still Confused.

I’ve read dozens of books about AI — and I’m none the wiser in the binary, black-and-white sense. If anything, I’m moreoverwhelmed, more amazed, more cautious, and more optimistic all at once. AI isn’t just changing technology — it’s shifting how we think about ourselves, each other, and the systems we’ve built.

But here’s what I do know:

• We are all programmers now. Not in Python, necessarily. But in English, in prompts, in choices. In how we talk to machines and how they talk back.

• Technology abstraction is accelerating. AI is eating code, design, strategy, language — everything. It’s not just part of the tech stack anymore. It is the stack.

• Organisational DNA is changing. AI means DAOs, digital twins, smart agents, and synthetic employees. It’s more than disruption — it’s mutation.

• Data is the real problem. Not collecting it — interpreting it. Most AIs are basically eating junk food. Context, nuance, ethics? Rare ingredients.

• Culture will be the battleground. When everything else is leveled by tech, what’s left? Story. Values. Meaning. Relationships.