Cross-Check, A Free Journal - John Horgan (The Science Writer)

This scene, right outside my apartment building, is sort of limits-of-knowledge-ish.

Mass Moonie wedding, Madison Square Garden, New York, 1982.

If you look carefully you can see, from left, the (partially hidden) air purifier, faux fireplace, dumbbells, bicycle and, beyond the window and balcony railing, Pier A.

Even robotic food carts need love.

How does the neural net in our skull grok something as complicated as “Rocky”?

“Supervision” implies benign intent, but it can be cruel and coercive.

Recent view from my living room.

My idea of action is sitting on the Hoboken waterfront, drawing a picture and hanging it on my refrigerator door.

Matt Damon, I mean Odysseus, is haunted by the ghost of a woman his trickery killed.

This diagram of a perceptron, an early machine-learning method, might appear cryptic, but Anil Ananthaswamy explains it clearly in Why Machines Learn.

Science journalism has never been more important, or imperiled.

I watched Shakespeare’s brutal play in this lovely new theater of Hudson Valley Shakespeare.

This comic strip by Crumb, published in 1987, serves as a grim complement to “Death of a Salesman.”

I’m hoping this book will help me learn how machines learn.

This 1931 edition of Resurrection doesn’t really capture the novel’s dark, unsexy vibe.

This phony photo illustrates an advertorial by schoolai on how “teachers can use AI to boost engagement in STEM classes.”

HOBOKEN, JUNE 8, 2026.

This famous photo of the Loch Ness monster turned out to be a hoax.

My brother Matt Horgan with his son Jack and daughter Molly in Cork, Ireland, 1999.

James Joyce Center, Dublin, Ireland.