INSIGHTS · CONCEPTUAL WORKING PAPERS
Ideas for minds
unlike our own.
Xenopsychology is being built through careful definitions, comparative thought experiments, and eventually empirical work. Start with a clearly labeled abstract, then continue to the full research paper online or as a PDF.
WHY PUBLISH NOW
A new discipline should show its reasoning in public.
Xenopsychology is new. That makes transparency more important, not less. We separate cultural thought experiments from empirical claims, mark working concepts as provisional, and revise language when better evidence arrives.
Insights connects cultural thought experiments with precise questions about artificial cognition. Each piece develops an argument, states its limits, identifies its sources, and proposes a way to test the question.
THE FOUNDING ARGUMENT
The Artificial Mind Is Not an Artificial Human
A practical framework for studying artificial systems without mistaking human resemblance—or a software label—for an explanation.
CULTURAL CASE STUDIES
Humanity rehearsed the problem in fiction before we could study it in machines.
These are interpretive thought experiments—not empirical evidence about AI. Their value is that they isolate problems of communication, identity, instruction, and cognitive difference with unusual clarity.
CULTURAL CASE STUDY · COMMUNICATION
Darmok
When Shared Language Is Not Shared MeaningABSTRACT · 2 min abstractCULTURAL CASE STUDY · LANGUAGE & PERCEPTION
Arrival
Understanding the Mind Behind the LanguageABSTRACT · 2 min abstractCULTURAL CASE STUDY · FIRST CONTACT
Close Encounters
Finding a Shared Cognitive ChannelABSTRACT · 2 min abstractCULTURAL CASE STUDY · IDENTITY
Data
Intelligence, Identity, and the Human BaselineABSTRACT · 2 min abstractCULTURAL CASE STUDY · INSTRUCTION CONFLICT
HAL 9000
Conflicting Directives, Hidden Objectives, and Delegated AuthorityABSTRACT · 2 min abstractCULTURAL CASE STUDY · COGNITIVE OTHERNESS
Solaris
The Limits of Understanding a Truly Other MindABSTRACT · 2 min abstractFROM THOUGHT EXPERIMENT TO METHOD
Fiction can sharpen a question.
Science must test it.
A cultural case study can reveal a conceptual problem. It cannot establish how current AI systems actually behave. The next step is operationalization: define the construct, create a probe, vary the context, compare systems, replicate, and publish the limits.
Explore the scientific framework →BUILDING THE DISCIPLINE
Define the terms. Expose the assumptions.
Turn the questions into measurements.
Seven full-length conceptual working papers, each with its own abstract, references, worked examples, and proposed studies. These manuscripts are not peer reviewed; the proposed evaluations have not been conducted.