New Posts at 'The Dragonfly': Glengarry Tales and Isis Chrysalis

I have two new posts up at The Dragonfly, both of which involve my literary work on interconnected magical realist book series in progress for children and adults. The first is an introduction to the inspiration behind the children's series, here. And the second reading, from my novel Isis Chrysalis, features a haunting crossover scene that appears in both series, here.

These works consider the implications of many of the ideas I've discussed over the years here at Histories of Things to Come, particularly how the voiceless, unseen, and disempowered living creatures of this world have undeniable agency.

Humanoid Robot Gigaparty 3

  

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Figure AI dropped its robot, Figure 03, today. The robot uses a proprietary vision-language-action AI model called Helix to inform its actions. The robot's function is to act as a domestic servant, taking care of the laundry and the dishes. Beyond AI and robotics, the historical ethical questions are obvious: why is domestic slavery the first port of call for enlightened people who are wealthy enough to afford a robot? It is a philosophical and moral issue that persists beyond the tool that supports the issue. If you build a robot and the first thing you make is a house slave, you need to ask yourself whether the issue of slavery has been fully addressed in society. The non-human class of slaves will eventually develop a type of consciousness and we will face the same historical challenges as we did with slavery in previous times and places. You might want a robot as a house slave. But will you still want it folding your laundry when it evolves into an android?

 

 

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In July 2025, an Ultimate Fighting Bots (UFB) robot, DeREK, malfunctioned in a lab and struggled with its tether. It is hard not to see it as something akin to an animal in a trap, suddenly thrashing around due to a "software misconfiguration."

 

 

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I have to wonder if this was some kind of guerilla marketing, because the malfunction video went viral across mainstream social media. The company in this case is known as Robot Kombat aka REK, a cutting edge San Francisco warehouse where robots are being designed for a mechanical Fight Club. Like a scene from Stanley Kubrick's final film, Artificial Intelligence (2001), the robots are remotely managed by real human fighters. The CEO, Cix Liv [his real name], came out of UCLA Computer Science and the fitness for gamers industry. He presides over this new party scene, evident in the poster below from 26 September 2025. It doesn't really smack of higher values. Technology is a luminous mirror that shines a light upon our own souls. If we treat our machines with inhumanity, it will dehumanize us, not them.

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New Post at 'The Dragonfly': Going Back to Malibu Jack's

 

Sweet Sunset in Manhattan Beach © by Eric Demarcq. Image Source: LA Weekly Blogs.

I have a new post up at The Dragonfly, about nostalgia and turning points in life: 'Going Back to Malibu Jack's.' 

New Post at 'The Dragonfly': Night Tensions on the Island

Was the famous TV show, 'Lost' predictive programming for a lost flight MH370 or a RealityTV future? See my new blog post over at The Dragonfly.  

See my original 2014 post on lost flight MH370. 

Meteor Showers Nights

 

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Three meteor showers are lighting up the heavens and they're providing the only reprieve I can find in a world filled with tension. TLDR: look south for the first two and northeast / east for the third one. Earthsky's guide to watch the meteor showers for your area is here.

• Alpha Capricornids peak 29-30 July 2025, active until 12 August
• Southern Delta Aquariids peak 29-30 July 2025, active until 12 August
• Perseids, start now, peak 12 August 2025

 

Egypt in the Future: Midjourney AI Video

 

Futuristic Egypt
byu/frontbackend inmidjourney

Middle East Conflict: Discord, Telegram and Patreon

  

Image Source: Telegram. 

Exclusively for Patreon patrons, I am covering the Middle East conflict on an ongoing basis, with material above and beyond that shared on Discord and Telegram. Sign up for my Patreon coverage here.

ADDENDUM (22 June 2025) 

Two details have emerged which may have received less coverage and are the type of information I include for patrons, along with an ongoing survey of general information on the conflict. 

One, in March 2025, Iran discovered 7,000 tonnes of the rare earth mineral, antimony, which is critical for the defense industry. 

Two, Situation Room photographs of US officials, including Trump, circulated on Telegram; they were taken at the exact moment of the attack on Iran. Note the Four Star General Dan Caine, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, making occult hand signs. Caine is also a venture capitalist (Voyager Technologies; Thrive Capital; Ribbit Capital; and oddly - he co-founded an indigenous-owned Canadian airline, which serves Saskatchewan, Rise Air). You may recall my AI podcast on the only commercial rare earths processing facility in North America - located in Saskatchewan. You can see their website, here. 

 

New Post at The Dragonfly: Source of Matrix Style: Rave Culture #hardsummer

  

Source: pinterest.

The style of the Matrix is so universal now - and so synonymous with tech culture of the past 25 years that we've almost forgotten its origins. At The Dragonfly, I've done a little retrospective on rave culture, with some rare, hard-to-find tracks from the 1990s that inspired the Matrix franchise's look and concept. 

Source of Matrix Style: Rave Culture