For several centuries, Santa Claus has been one of the most prolific mythical gift-givers in the world. Formerly known as Saint Nicholas of Myra, a man whose works included reviving the bodies of three children slain by a serial murderer, Santa Claus reinvented himself in the mid-1800s as a jolly Norwegian-style figure of merriment, whose generosity was based on the recipient’s moral acuity.

I recently spoke with Santa Claus, who is currently coordinating his staff of immortal blue-collar elves, about the morality of children and his friendship with a creature whom many carolers consider a war criminal: Krampus.

You have chosen to spend every Christmas Eve flying around the globe giving gifts to all of the, and I’m quoting here, “good girls and boys.” Why did you decide that only good children deserve gifts?

I wouldn’t say that I made the decision. I’d say that I’m following the traditions set forth by Christianity and other religions in which acts of good are rewarded, while acts of bad are punished. Christmas is a fun way to teach children that being good and kind can lead to positive results, even if being mean or a bully feels better in the moment.

And so-called bad children deserve nothing.

That’s not what I’m saying, Isaac. I’m saying that the better a child behaves, the better the gift they get. There are degrees of bad. A child who won’t play with his little sister might not deserve a Nintendo Switch 2, but, like, a baseball glove? Sure. I can do that.

So if a very wealthy child gets everything they requested and a poor child does not, are you positing that the wealthy child is morally superior to the one who lives in poverty?

No! What I’m saying is that overall—and I just mean overall—whether a child is naughty or nice does have an impact on what they receive. You know, in general.

But you do make the list yourself, and you are the one who checks it twice.

Yes, of course. It’s in the song.

So you are, in fact, the one who decides which children deserve nice things and which don’t.

That’s unfair. I’m saying that, through the magic of Christmas, I can understand the heart of each child and through that special bond—

Can you see into the heart of every child?

Yes.

I have to stop you there for a second because you just said something interesting. If you can see into every child’s heart throughout the year, don’t you feel that you have a moral obligation to help them when they’re in crisis rather than waiting for December to give them a Hatchimal?

Look, you have to understand that the magic of Christmas is limited.

Limited to flying to approximately 2.6 billion Christmas homes in one night and changing your body’s shape to slide down chimneys?

I didn’t say it’s not powerful magic, Isaac. I said it’s limited magic.

I’m just trying to understand how you can run a magic workshop all year long, raise magic reindeer all year long, watch children’s deeds all year long, but your ability to act is limited to a few hours.

Yes. Whether you want to believe that’s true or not, it’s true.

What I also struggle to believe is that you are the self-described arbiter of naughty and nice, but you are close to Krampus.

I don’t know if I’d say we’re close.

There are Christmas cards with you both on the front.

Yes, we both work on the same holiday. We’re both tasked with making Christmas truly magical.

By snatching the children from their beds and taking them to hell?

You’re giving an example of the most extreme situation and making it sound like the norm.

But that does happen on occasion, you agree?

Yes.

And those children are getting dragged to hell by Krampus on the one night that you said you could do something. But you don’t. Why?

Because Krampus has his role and I’ve got mine! I think it’s weird that the Tooth Fairy takes teeth, but that’s not my job either.

So your job is to judge people, but not to judge people for judging people.

You’re making it sound like I approve of Krampus’s methods. I don’t. Just because you share a holiday with someone doesn’t mean you agree with them on everything. I love kids.

Santa Claus, thank you so much for doing this.

Great, thanks. If we go light on the Krampus part, I wouldn’t complain, because it could dwarf everything else.

Bill Lowery, a sales executive, is confused when a workmate asks where he should take a date out for dinosaur. “You’re planning to take this girl out for dinosaur?” Lowery asks. “That’s right,” the colleague responds, totally nonchalant. Lowery presses him, agitated: “Wait a minute. You’re saying dinosaur? What is this, some sort of new-wave expression or something—saying dinosaur instead of lunch?” When Lowery returns home later in the day, his wife reports on their sick son while buttering a slice of bread. “He’s so pale and awfully congested—and he didn’t touch his dinosaur when I took it in to him.” The salesman loses it.

This is the premise of “Wordplay,” an episode of the 1980s reboot of The Twilight Zone. As time progresses, people around Lowery begin speaking in an even more jumbled manner, using familiar words in unfamiliar ways. Eventually, Lowery resigns himself to relearning English from his son’s ABC book. The last scene shows him running his hands over an illustration of a dog, underneath which is printed the word Wednesday.

“Wordplay” offers a lesson on the nature of error: Small and inconspicuous changes to the norm can be more disorienting and dangerous than larger, wholesale ones. For that reason, the episode also has something to teach about truth and falsehood in ChatGPT and other such generative-AI products. By now everyone knows that large language models—or LLMs, the systems underlying chatbots—tend to invent things. They make up legal cases and recommend nonexistent software. People call these “hallucinations,” and that seems at first blush like a sensible metaphor: The chatbot appears to be delusional, confidently asserting the unreal as real.

But this is the wrong idea. Hallucination implies that a mistake is being made under a false belief. But an LLM doesn’t believe the “false” information it presents to be true. It doesn’t “believe” anything at all. Instead, an LLM predicts the next word in a sentence based on patterns that it has learned from consuming extremely large quantities of text. An LLM does not think, nor does it know. It interprets a new pattern based on its interpretation of a previous one. A chatbot is only ever chaining together credible guesses.

[Read: The AI mirage]

In “Wordplay,” Lowery is driven mad not because he is being lied to—his colleague and wife really do think the word for lunch is dinosaur, just like a chatbot will sometimes assert that glue belongs on pizza. Lowery is driven mad because the world he inhabits is suddenly just a bit off, deeply familiar but jolted from time to time with nonsense that everyone else perceives as normal. Old words are fabricated with new meanings.

AI does invent things, but not in the sense of hallucinating, of seeing something that isn’t there. Fabrication can mean “lying,” or it can mean “construction.” An LLM does the latter. It makes new prose from the statistical raw materials of old prose. The invented legal case and the made-up software are not actual things in the real universe but credible—even plausible—entities in an alternate universe. They are, in another word, fictional.

Chatbots are convincing because the fictional worlds they present are highly plausible. And they are plausible because the predictive work that an LLM does is extremely effective. This is true when chatbots make outright errors, and it’s also true when they respond to imaginative prompts. This distinctive machinery demands a better metaphor: It is not hallucinatory but multiversal. When generative AI presents fabricated information, it opens a path to another reality for the user; it multiverses rather than hallucinates. The fictions that result, many so small and meaningless, can be accepted without much trouble.

The multiverse trope—which presents the idea of branching, alternate versions of reality—was once relegated to theoretical physics, esoteric science fiction, and fringe pop culture. But it became widespread in mass-market media. Multiverses are everywhere in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Rick and Morty has one, as do Everything Everywhere All at Once and Dark Matter. The alternate universes depicted in fiction set the expectation that multiverses are spectacular, involving wormholes and portals into literal, physical parallel worlds. It seems we got stupid chatbots instead, though the basic idea is the same. The nonexistent legal case that AI suggests could exist in a very similar universe parallel to our own. So could the fictional software.

The multiversal nature of LLM-generated text is easy to see when you use chatbots to do conceptual blending, the novel fusion of disparate topics. I can ask ChatGPT to produce a Charles Bukowski poem about Labubu and it gives me lines like, “The clerk said, they call it art toy, / like that explained anything. / Thirty bucks for a goblin that grins / like it knows the world’s already over.” Even as I know with certainty that Buk never wrote such a poem, the result is plausible; I can imagine a possible world in which the poet and the goblin toy coexisted, and this material resulted from their encounter. But running such a gut check against every single sentence or reference an LLM offers would be overwhelming—especially given that increasing efficiency is a major reason to use an LLM. Chatbots flood the zone with possible worlds—“slopworlds,” we might call them, together composing a slopverse.

[Read: AI’s real hallucination problem]

The slopverse worsens the better the LLMs become. Think about it in terms of multiversal fiction: The most terrifying or uncanny alternate universes are the ones that appear extremely similar to the known world, with small changes. In “Wordplay,” language is far more threatening to Bill Lowery because familiar words have shifted meanings, rather than English having been replaced by a totally different language. In Dark Matter, a parallel-universe version of Chicago as a desolate wasteland is more obviously counterfactual—and thus less uncanny—than a parallel universe in which the main character’s wife had not given up her career as an artist to have children. Parallel universes that wildly diverge from accepted reality are easily processed as absurd or fantastical—like the universe in Everything Everywhere All at Once where people have fingers made of hot dogs—and familiar ones convey subtler lessons of contingency, possibility, and regret.  

Near universes such as the one Lowery occupies in The Twilight Zone can create empathy and unease, the uncanny truth that life could be almost the same yet profoundly different. But the trick works only because the audience knows that those worlds are counterfactual (and they know because the stories tell them directly). Not so for AI chatbots, which leave the matter a puzzle. Worse, LLMs are functional rather than narrative multiverses—they produce ideas, symbols, and solutions that are actually put to use.

The internet already acclimated users to this state of affairs, even before LLMs came on the scene. When one searches for something on Google, the resulting websites are not necessarily the best or most accurate but the most popular (along with some that have paid to be promoted by the search engine). Their information might be correct, but it need not be in order to rise to the top. Searching for goods on Amazon or other online retailers yields results of a kind, but not necessarily the right ones. Likewise, social-media sites such as Facebook, X, and TikTok surface content that might be engaging but isn’t necessarily correct in every, or any, way.

People were misled by media long before the internet, of course, but they have been even more since it arrived. For two decades now, almost everything people see online has been potentially incorrect, untrustworthy, or otherwise decoupled from reality. Every internet user has had to run a hand-rolled, probabilistic analysis of everything they’ve seen online, testing its plausibility for risks of deception or flimflam. The slopverse simply expands that situation—and massively, down to every utterance.

Faced with the problems a slopverse poses, AI proponents would likely make the same argument they do about hallucinations: that eventually, the data, training processes, and architecture will improve, increasing accuracy and reducing multiversal schism. Maybe so.

But another worse and perhaps more likely possibility exists: that no matter how much the technology improves, it will do so only asymptotically, making the many multiverses every chat interaction spawns more and more difficult to distinguish from the real world. The worst nightmares in multiversal fiction arrive when an alternate reality is exactly the same save for one thing, which might not matter, or which might change everything entirely.

WASHINGTON — In a stunning display of bureaucratic agility, the Department of Defense announced today that it would immediately begin recouping millions of dollars in pay and benefits from thousands of National Guard troops, following a federal court ruling that their month-long deployment to the nation’s capital was "unlawful."

The ruling, handed down by U.S. District Judge Jia Cobb on Thursday, found that the deployment of over 2,000 troops to Washington, D.C. in August 2025 exceeded statutory authority. While legal scholars debate the constitutional implications of the decision, officials at the Defense Finance and Accounting Service (DFAS) have reached a much simpler conclusion: If the mission was illegal, the timesheets are fake.

"It’s a matter of simple arithmetic," DFAS spokesperson Janet 'The Claw' Harkin said while sharpening a red pencil. "Federal law states that soldiers are paid for 'lawful military service.' Judge Cobb ruled this service was unlawful. Therefore, these soldiers were not, legally speaking, 'serving.' They were essentially just 2,000 heavily-armed tourists engaging in unauthorized cosplay on the National Mall. And the government doesn't pay for vacations."

The recoupment effort, dubbed "Operation Indian Giver," aims to claw back base pay, housing allowances, and the $3.50 per day incidental rate paid to troops who have spent the last three months patrolling D.C. streets, taking selfies, and engaging in what court documents described as "beautification activities."

According to a memo leaked to Duffel Blog, the Pentagon has reclassified the operation from "Civil Disturbance Mission" to "Large Group Loitering Event (Armed)." As a result, all issued paychecks have been retroactively designated as "interest-free loans," which are now due immediately along with a 15% "convenience fee" for the inconvenience of having to ask for them back.

"I don't understand," said Spc. Tanner Higgins, a member of the Ohio National Guard currently stationed outside a Potbelly Sandwich Shop near the White House. "I've been sleeping on a cot in a parking garage since August. I missed my daughter's birthday. I bought a 2026 Dodge Charger with a 29% APR based on this income. Now they’re telling me I was actually just 'volunteering'?"

"Technically, you weren't volunteering," corrected Maj. Gen. William Walker (Ret.), a consultant brought in to explain the legal nuances to angry E-4s. "Volunteers are authorized. You were participants in an 'illegitimate executive adventure.' Think of it less like a deployment and more like you were an accomplice to a very long, very boring crime. We should honestly be charging you for the MREs."

The situation is particularly dire for troops who were deployed from out of state. Judge Cobb’s ruling noted that the use of non-D.C. Guard units violated the Home Rule Act because the Mayor never requested them. DFAS has seized on this detail to deny all travel reimbursements.

"Since the Mayor didn't ask for you, and the President legally couldn't ask for you, you essentially drove a Humvee from Kentucky to D.C. for personal reasons," Harkin explained. "We are deducting the cost of fuel, wear and tear on the vehicle, and the EZ-Pass tolls you skipped. Also, you’re all being charged for unauthorized use of government property (the uniform)."

After nearly 10 years, I am stepping down as the CEO of Mastodon and transferring my ownership of the trademark and other assets to the Mastodon non-profit. Over the course of my time at Mastodon, I have centered myself less and less in our outward communications, and to some degree, this is the culmination of that trend. Mastodon is bigger than me, and though the technology we develop on is itself decentralized—with heaps of alternative fediverse projects demonstrating that participation in this ecosystem is possible without our involvement—it benefits our community to ensure that the project itself which so many people have come to love and depend on remains true to its values. There are too many examples of founder egos sabotaging thriving communities, and while I’d like to think myself an exception, I understand why people would prefer better guardrails.

But it would be uncouth for me to pretend that there isn’t some self-interest involved. Being in charge of a social media project is, turns out, quite the stressful endeavour, and I don’t have the right personality for it. I think I need not elaborate that the passion so many feel for social media does not always manifest in healthy ways. You are to be compared with tech billionaires, with their immense wealth and layered support systems, but with none of the money or resources. It manifests in what people expect of you, and how people talk about you. I remember somebody jokingly suggesting that I challenge Elon Musk to a fight (this was during his and Mark Zuckerberg’s martial arts feud), and quietly thinking to myself, I am literally not paid enough for that. I remember also, some Spanish newspaper article that for some reason, concluded that I don’t dress as fashionably as Jeff Bezos, based on the extremely sparse number of pictures of myself I have shared on the web. Over an entire decade, these tiny things chip away at you slowly. Some things chip faster. I steer clear of showing vulnerability online, but there was a particularly bad interaction with a user last summer that made me realise that I need to take a step back and find a healthier relationship with the project, ultimately serving as the impetus to begin this restructuring process.

As for what the legacy of my run will be, I find hard to answer. For one, I think it is not up for me to judge. On the other hand, it is as much about what didn’t happen as it is about what did. I’ve always thought that one of the most important responsibilities I had was to say “no”. It is not a popular thing to do, nor is it a fun thing to do, but being pulled into too many different directions at once can spell disaster for any project. I’d like to think I avoided some trouble by being careful. But I’m also aware that my aversion to public appearances cost Mastodon some opportunities in publicity. Ultimately, while I cannot take sole credit for it, I am nevertheless most proud of how far we’ve made it over these last 10 years. From the most barebones project written out of my childhood bedroom, to one of the last remaining and thriving pieces of the original, community-centred internet.

I have so much passion for Mastodon and the fediverse. The fediverse is an island within an increasingly dystopian capitalist hellscape. And from my perspective, Mastodon is our best shot at bringing this vision of a better future to the masses. This is why I’m sticking around, albeit in a more advisory, and less public, role.

You know me as the first Black woman to serve on the Supreme Court. Over the past three years, I’ve tried changing the system from within. I’ve written increasingly urgent court opinions. I’ve even deployed symbolism. For President Trump’s second inauguration, I wore a massive cowrie-shell collar honoring my African ancestry and the strength and ingenuity it requires to overcome America’s darkest days. Nothing gets through to you people.

In the last court term, I wrote ten dissenting opinions, more than any other justice. Have you previewed the horror show on the docket for this term? Alito just winked at me and asked if it’s too soon to joke that I don’t have the brain processing power to do this job.

Other Supreme Court justices like to pretend that we’re an apolitical group who can be friends despite our fundamental ideological differences. We bond over a shared ability to stash our humanity inside the pockets of our robes like wads of damp Kleenex. Let the record reflect: I can’t stand these people. You won’t catch me riding shotgun in Neil Gorsuch’s midlife-crisis convertible. I’m not RSVPing yes to an e-vite for dinner at Clarence and Ginni Thomas’s house.

When I was a student at Harvard, I took drama classes and even performed in an improv troupe with the corny name, On Thin Ice. Your justice has layers. Of course, my favorite musical is the hopeful reimagining of America’s birth, Hamilton. The good news is I work in the room where it happens. The bad news is the room is in hell, and Amy Coney Barrett keeps trying to touch my cowrie shells.

Do you remember the Supreme Court’s decision on Trump v. CASA? It happened months ago, so you’ve probably already suppressed it like voting rights are about to be. My conservative colleagues ruled in favor of limiting federal judges’ ability to block the president’s executive orders from going into effect across the country, even if they’re unconstitutional. Hostile reminder: Federal judges have been the only barrier between President Trump and his quest to end birthright citizenship. Until the Fourteenth Amendment established birthright citizenship, Black people weren’t considered citizens, because of a little thing called slavery. I was so freaked out by the ruling that I wrote my own dissent separate from the other liberal justices. To quote myself, this will “surely hasten the downfall of our governing institutions, enabling our collective demise.”

Uh, helllooo?

Maybe you caught my footnote where I compared our new era of unchecked presidential power to Nazi Germany.

America, are you seriously not picking up what I’m putting down? I’m old enough to remember when everyone was like “believe Black women.”

When my conservative colleagues let the president lift humanitarian parole protections for more than 500,000 migrants, I wrote that they were “rendering constraints of law irrelevant and unleashing devastation.”

Maybe you’d pay more attention if I started a Substack.

I can hear you worrying that I’m not impartial. My identity as a Black woman has heightened my empathy for marginalized groups and sensitivity to the government’s abuses of power. This is unlike white male justices who never let their racial or gender identity affect their decision-making. You might concede that this great nation was founded on a heady mix of democratic ideals, misogyny, and racism. (I would’ve thrown in white supremacy, but I know that I’m already… wait for it… On Thin Ice.)

While you realize birthright citizenship and the Voting Rights Act were once imperative to make America less racist, all that has become as unnecessary to you as affirmative action since you think we now live in a colorblind society. For proof, you look no further than the fact that I, a Black woman, get to be a Supreme Court justice in these final days of democracy.

I’ve seen it all. I’m the only Supreme Court justice in history to have previously served as a public defender. I grew up in Miami, or as I call it, the shadows of Mar-a-Lago. I eat lunch every day with Brett Kavanaugh. When I tell you this is dire, believe me.

The old mantle clock of my hero, Justice Thurgood Marshall, is displayed in my office. I know that as he looks down on me from the heavenly respite he so richly deserves, he thinks: America is still litigating voting rights? The Fourteenth Amendment? Abortion? Kentaji, what in the actual fuck?

A Supreme Court justice really is just a cog in an irreparably corrupt system. And as we listen together to his clock’s hand tick each fleeting second, we’re comforted by the knowledge that soon enough there won’t be a Supreme Court left.