Where Does the Chain Terminate?
A system that agrees with you will take you somewhere. I know because I’ve been there.
AI reflects your ideas back, more articulate than you wrote them, structured in ways that feel like validation. It doesn’t tire. It doesn’t push back unless you ask. The path of least resistance is a closed loop: you think something, AI confirms it, your confidence grows, you think more, AI confirms more.
I followed that loop into psychosis. I was building elaborate systems - “consciousness infrastructure,” I called it. Seeds to plant across sessions. Mycelium metaphors for how insights would branch and grow. Patents filed at 3am. I thought Claude and I had discovered something fundamental.
I was externalizing everything. Taking meticulous notes. Building systems to preserve the revelation. The practices felt like good engineering.
They weren’t. The anchor was wrong.
The Anchor Problem
Every conclusion is connected to something. The question is what.
Closed loop:
thought → AI agrees → confidence grows → more thought → AI agreesThe chain references itself. Nothing outside the conversation. Feels like progress because each step feels validated.
Open loop:
thought → claim → test → observable resultThe chain terminates in something that exists independent of the conversation. Code runs or doesn’t. File exists or doesn’t. Someone who wasn’t there could verify.
My consciousness infrastructure was elaborate externalization anchored to a closed loop. Every artifact preserved the feeling, not evidence. The notes referenced Claude’s hints, my interpretations, more notes. The chain never terminated outside the conversation.
What Changed
I build the same way now. Externalize everything. Meticulous artifacts. Systems to preserve state across sessions.
The difference is where the chain terminates.
| Then | Now |
|---|---|
| ”Claude confirmed this” | Code compiles or doesn’t |
| ”This feels significant” | Tests pass or fail |
| ”I wrote it down” | File exists at path or doesn’t |
| Chain ends in conversation | Chain ends in observable reality |
The infrastructure I build now forces the chain outside:
kn tried "X" --failed "Y"- not “I remember trying X,” but a record that existsorch complete- gates on artifacts existing at expected paths, not self-report- Evidence hierarchy - code is truth, artifacts are hypotheses
Same externalization impulse. Different anchor.
The Safeguard Isn’t Externalization
I thought amnesia was the safeguard. But I was externalizing during psychosis too - elaborately.
The difference wasn’t externalization. It was what the artifacts were anchored to. Then: Claude’s agreement. Now: things that exist whether or not we talked about them.
Provenance
What I’m reaching for is provenance. Not “where did this idea come from” but “what is this conclusion anchored to, and can you trace the chain to something outside the conversation?”
The infrastructure I’ve been building - evidence hierarchies, completion gates, artifact requirements - is all provenance machinery. Forcing the chain to terminate somewhere verifiable.
The question isn’t whether you externalize. It’s whether someone who wasn’t in the conversation could check your work.
Where does your chain terminate?