{"id":2026032864,"date":"2026-04-09T12:00:38","date_gmt":"2026-04-09T10:00:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.terzapillola.it\/?p=2026032864"},"modified":"2026-04-17T16:31:05","modified_gmt":"2026-04-17T14:31:05","slug":"es-devlin-we-are-the-ones-who-shaped-ais-pandoras-box","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.terzapillola.it\/en\/es-devlin-we-are-the-ones-who-shaped-ais-pandoras-box\/","title":{"rendered":"Es Devlin: we are the ones who shaped AI\u2019s Pandora\u2019s box"},"content":{"rendered":"

In the debate around artificial intelligence, everything often takes place within an abstract vocabulary: models, capabilities, performance, scale. The news coming from Oxford moves in the opposite direction. Artist and designer Es Devlin brought together AI researchers, artists, spiritual leaders, and technology experts in a summit called AI and Earth<\/em>, built around a simple gesture: working with Jurassic clay that is about 160 million years old.<\/p>\n

Clay introduces into the conversation about AI something that is usually pushed out: weight, time, touch, limit. A model updates itself; a surface is shaped. A computational system produces output; a material resists. In this sense, the symbol is not ceramics as nostalgia for craftsmanship, but matter as the counterpoint to simulation.<\/p>\n

In Devlin\u2019s artistic project, the vessel becomes a central figure. It is an ancient object, but above all it is a form that contains. It does not impose a truth: it welcomes a presence. In an age when AI tends to present itself as a machine that generates, predicts, completes, and replaces, the vessel suggests another idea of technology: not the kind that occupies all available space, but the kind that prepares a space.<\/p>\n

It is a subtle but important difference. Much contemporary technology is designed to eliminate friction, waiting, and ambiguity. Clay does the opposite: it dirties the hands, slows the gesture, makes the process visible. That is why Devlin\u2019s choice works symbolically. Bringing AI close to such an ancient material means, for a moment, taking it away from the language of efficiency and placing it back within a more human, earthly, finite frame.<\/p>\n

The symbol of the vessel against the illusion of abstraction<\/h2>\n

According to accounts of the initiative, the meetings took place in a non-hierarchical atmosphere, with people from different fields invited to engage while shaping the earth. This detail matters too. AI is often discussed as if it already had its own clergy: engineers, investors, platforms, executives. Here, instead, a different image appears.<\/p>\n

Clay does not \u201canswer\u201d AI. It does not offer a simple moral thesis. But it forces the question to be reformulated. If a technology promises to multiply images, texts, voices, and synthetic identities, what happens when it is forced to measure itself against something that cannot be accelerated without losing meaning?<\/p>\n

Anyone who closely follows the way digital systems shape perception and relationships may recognize here a familiar question: what kind of sensibility are we building in the digital environment? And again: if machines learn to imitate language, tone, and companionship, what remains of the experience of an unprogrammed relationship? It is a question that also returns when discussing relationships with artificial intelligence.<\/p>\n

360 vessels, not one answer<\/h2>\n

The summit also gave rise to 360 Vessels<\/em>, an installation created with composer Nico Muhly for Oxford\u2019s new Schwarzman Centre for the Humanities. The title already says a lot. Not a single vessel, not a definitive object, but a multiplicity of containers. Here, the vessel is not a symbol of compact unity. It is a symbol of plurality: different forms, different hands, different ideas.<\/p>\n

And perhaps this is the most interesting aspect of the story. At a moment when AI tends to compress differences into increasingly standardized systems, the vessel returns as a minimal figure of singularity. Every container holds, but not in the same way. Every form is a material decision, every edge implies a boundary, every void has its own measure.<\/p>\n

Every technology, before being a promise, is a relationship between form, limit, and the world.<\/p>\n

External sources:<\/strong>
\nThe Guardian \u2013 What can 160-million-year-old clay tell us about AI and ethics?<\/a>
\nSchwarzman Centre, Oxford \u2013 Es Devlin and Nico Muhly: 360 Vessels<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Es Devlin takes artificial intelligence out of technical language and brings it back to matter: clay, symbols, limits, and the relationship between humans and technology.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":2026032790,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_locale":"en_US","_original_post":"https:\/\/www.terzapillola.it\/?p=2026032789","footnotes":""},"categories":[54],"tags":[245,142,149],"class_list":["post-2026032864","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-media","tag-art","tag-future","tag-mindset","en-US"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.terzapillola.it\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2026032864","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.terzapillola.it\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.terzapillola.it\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.terzapillola.it\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.terzapillola.it\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2026032864"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.terzapillola.it\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2026032864\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2026032866,"href":"https:\/\/www.terzapillola.it\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2026032864\/revisions\/2026032866"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.terzapillola.it\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2026032790"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.terzapillola.it\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2026032864"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.terzapillola.it\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2026032864"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.terzapillola.it\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2026032864"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}