qualitative research

LOOM XVII: The Polanyi Inversion

What Happens When We Can Tell More Than We Know

"Polanyi's paradox: we know more than we can tell. AI inverts this — we can now tell more than we know. When friction dissolves, articulation outruns understanding."

LOOM XVI: Are You Climbing the Right Hill?

When Rigor Becomes the Wrong Kind of More

"A researcher discovers that optimizing a research design with AI created a local maximum — five stages of performed rigor on the wrong hill. What happens when you bring a task instead of a doubt?"

LOOM XV: Theorizing by Building

How Do You Become Someone Who Knows?

"The invitation is not 'here are tools that embody our ideas' but 'watch us work, try it yourself, refine your own practice.' Two open source tools."

Epistemic Voids #2: Showroom Fallacy

Confusing curation for capacity

"Testing a chat window or one-click button doesn't reveal which layer produced what we observed. The showroom fallacy: mistaking product constraints for model limits."

Epistemic Voids #1: Citation Theater

When papers become props

"AI thesis writing gone wrong — a viral workflow generates claims first, retrofits citations as evidence. Surface markers of academic rigor, none of the depth."

LOOM XIV: The Calculator Fallacy

When AI Qualitative Analysis Meets Human Expectations

"The calculator mindset expects AI to deliver objective truth in interpretive work. What gets blocked is the third space where understanding emerges."

LOOM VI: The Pattern Beneath the Voices

Cognitive Signatures in Human-AI Research: Towards a Resonant Methodology

"Different AI models reveal distinct theories of how understanding emerges—through dialogue, classification, or achievement-oriented progression."

LOOM IV: Dialogue as Method

A Letter on Knowledge Co-Creation in the Age of AI

"When dialogue becomes method, the boundaries between researcher and subject, between human and artificial intelligence, begin to blur in productive ways."

LOOM III: Between Automated Precision and Lived Understanding

A Dialogue on the Future of Social Science Research

"What remains is the unique resonance of human interpretation—the ability to provide insight into data that software can't, grounded in lived experience."

LOOM: Locus of Observed Meanings

The Moment of Shift

"From seeing AI as instrument to experiencing it as interlocutor—exploring new possibilities where meaning emerges through human-AI interaction."

Academic Writing

"Storytelling, construct clarity, and the craft of qualitative papers. Resources from ASQ Blog, New Scholars, and Academy of Management."