Signal A Running Record of Findings from the Internet / August 1, 2026

Artificial Intelligence: Ars Notoria and the Promise of Instant Knowledge

Anne Lawrence-Mathers traces the medieval Ars notoria, a manuscript that promised scholars supernatural shortcuts to advanced learning — a six-hundred-year-old preview of the same appeal, and the same danger, behind every promise that a shortcut can replace the discipline of actually learning something.

Read the story By Anne Lawrence-Mathers · Public Domain Review
Two figures related to the art of astronomy, from a manuscript of the Ars notoria (c. 1550–1600), via the National Library of Israel
Two figures related to the art of astronomy, from a manuscript of the Ars notoria (c. 1550–1600), via the National Library of Israel

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