CONCEPT
The Vademecum Problem
The defining epistemological hazard of the AI discourse — <em>journal knowledge being consumed and acted upon as though it were handbook knowledge</em>, with institutional commitments compounding faster than epistemic maturation.
The vademecum problem is the pathological pattern in which provisional knowledge is treated as settled knowledge before the collective negotiation that would stabilize it has run its course. Corporate strategies, educational reforms, and regulatory frameworks are being written on the basis of understandings that are still being actively negotiated. The commitments compound: each institutional decision creates a vested interest in defending the understanding it presupposes. Over time, the institutional investment itself becomes the argument for the understanding — exactly as with the Wassermann reaction. The understanding stabilizes not through the legitimate process of testing and refinement but through the illegitimate process of institutional momentum creating the appearance of settlement.
In The You On AI Field Guide
The specific conditions of the AI moment exacerbate the problem. The technology itself evolves so rapidly that any understanding encoded in institutional structures is likely to be outgrown by the technology before the structures can be revised. Regulatory frameworks enacted today govern tools that will be substantially different by the