Terry Nguyen recently wrote in his Vague Blue post: “I’m less interested in the question of plagiarism or whether the reading public can tell the difference between what’s written by a human or a machine. I’m interested in what happens to our minds when people are systematically discouraged from thinking, from putting pen to paper.”
He asserts that language is fundamental to the human condition, “a conduit to our innermost desires, beliefs and sense of self(s). Human perception of the world is uniquely dependent on language.”
The use of language in our understanding of the world, and ourselves, is addressed very sharply in Owen Barfield’s astonishing book, History In English Words. He examines the adoption of certain words, and the oft changed meaning of words, over the past 5,000 years.
In brief, Sanskrit is the oldest ‘formal’ language, which developed in the Indus Valley Civilisation during the Bronze Age and included ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia, and areas we now call Pakistan, northwest India and northeast Pakistan, lasting from 3300 BCE to 1300 BCE. The social structures were “organised in systems of matriarchies” (Barfield) unlike the later patriarchal Aryan cultures.
Nguyen mentions a conversation between the poet Bianca Stone and the critic Ryan Ruby, where Ruby talks about poetry as the original media technology. Echoing the thesis he put forth in Context Collapse, Ruby argues that poetry is foremostly a social relation, not just a set of forms that produces an object on the page. According to Ruby, AI poses a threat to the project of poetry because language models (LLMs) “can operate in a world in which there is no audience.”
The Mahābhārata (compiled 300 BCE–300 CE) is the longest epic poem known and has been described as “the longest poem ever written”. Its longest version consists of over 100,000 shlokas (verses) or over 200,000 individual lines (each shloka is a couplet), and long prose passages. At about 1.8 million words in total, the Mahābhārata is roughly ten times the length of the Iliad and the Odyssey combined. Much is described as a concise guide to Hindu Philosophy and a practical, self-contained guide to life.
Nguyen also contends it has become alarmingly easy to neglect language’s role in shaping one’s inner and outer worlds when “ideas can simply be prompted into existence” by non-human AI/LLMs. It’s possible to extrapolate from this view that AI/LLMs can be ‘forced’ to adhere to whichever social, political or religious belief is held by the programmers, or, indeed, by the ‘owners’ of the programmers.
Returning to Barfield, the role of women as leaders and warriors – in Mesopotamia (6000 BCE), Troy (3000 BCE), (Atlantis (550 BCE perhaps), and as recent as pre-Celtic Gaul (300 BCE) – was almost written from history by the Christian church. The early ‘Fathers’ simplified language, to better control people and also to disparage and persecute those with other beliefs. Barfield states that Christianity “deprived people of that dearest of possessions, freedom of thought”.
He continues that the grim meaning gradually acquired by the Latin word for ‘inquiry’ became inquisition – “for the first time in the world’s history to pry into and endeavour to control private thinking” – which lasted 300 years! (12th–15th centuries). In the 15th century witch ‘trials’, tens of thousands of people, mostly women, were executed, while thousands more were imprisoned, tortured, banished and/or had lands and possessions confiscated.
Nguyen continues: “LLMs don’t ‘write’ with a reader in mind, which is one of the defining characteristics of poetry as a response to the world. Instead, a simulacra/semantic average of a poem can be generated, based on pre-existing forms. The result is something that looks like a poem and sounds like a poem. The popular saying would have us believe that the thing in question is a poem.
Stone mentions that she recently heard someone describe poetry as “radical intimacy” although adds, “I sense distance [is also] important.” Nguyen finds in favorite poems this paradox of distance and intimacy. He continues: “Maybe distance cultivates intimacy between speaker and listener, between sublingual meaning and literal interpretation. Or maybe we treasure poetic expression because distance can never truly be overcome.”
The interface between context and content – which appears to be central to the human capability of critical thinking – may soon be lost to the vast majority of humans as the sociopolitical bias of both technology oligarchs and world leaders become the only language allowed!
His energy, immediacy and open spaces in his earlier compositions were appealing, no matter whenever heard in another context or in later life.
And yet, and now, at the Isle of Wight Festival 2025, as part of the Sting 3.0 tour, the 3-piece sounded tired, including guitarist Dominic Miller. The song selection was nostaligic, including Message in a Bottle, Englishman in New York, Every Breath You Take and Roxanne. Obviously the band have played these many times but Miller was often back-to-audience, his guitar lacking the bite that was needed.
Sting was not in good voice, often straining even in song keys that were lower. Great chunks of energy were lost, with the change of pitch very noticeable on all the parts we used to love about Sting’s tone. Note sustain was frequently absent and the lacklustre performance overall was little better than a pub covers band.
You can watch Sting on the YouTube clip, front and centre for most of the set, often attempting to interact with the audience. To be fair, it definitely looks like he loves playing his music – and his bass.
The audience response, mostly in the front rows, is positive, but I doubt the softer and almost muted strength of Sting’s voice would have been heard in the middle or back with any clarity. The call-and-response attempts with the audience also appeared lacklustre, with many passive faces. A great pity to see yet another ‘rock god’ attempting to reclaim former glories.
– Brian Thurogood, June 28 2025
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