Whoa, Vol. 2: Conversations on AI × Creativity

Bonus: The Age of The Sublime with Robert Greene

26 snips
Mar 12, 2026
Robert Greene, bestselling author of The 48 Laws of Power who wrote a new book on the sublime after a near-fatal stroke. He explores why phones and modern life shrink our sense of awe. He discusses pain and near-death aliveness, how mastery and long-term focus enable transcendence, and how AI can both inspire and erode our capacity for wonder.
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INSIGHT

Science Makes The World Sublime While Phones Shrink Our Minds

  • Modern science reveals a vast, exploding sublime (Big Bang, black holes, origins of life) that contrasts with minds shrinking to the size of phones.
  • Robert Greene argues culture's superficiality and phone-driven attention blinds us to cosmic discoveries happening now.
ANECDOTE

Stroke Catalyzed The Book On The Sublime

  • Greene's 2018 stroke brought him close to death and triggered the urgency to finally write his book on the sublime.
  • Lying in an ambulance after the hospital, he decided the experience signaled it was time to pursue the subject seriously.
ADVICE

Look Without Labels To Reclaim Childhood Wonder

  • Change perception by divorcing words from objects: look at a tree or clouds as the raw phenomenon rather than the label.
  • Greene's exercises train you to see ordinary things freshly to reclaim the childhood sense of wonder.
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