Agentic AI Thinks Like Boyd: The OODA Upgrade LLMs Can’t Touch
No Way Out
Interdisciplinarity, Boyd, and Academic Pushback
Ben and hosts discuss Boyd's interdisciplinary reach and why academics often misunderstand or dismiss his work.
🎖️ **Royal Marine Commando Ben Ford** (software engineer, Haskell/category theory) joins *No Way Out* to expose the **OODA loop myth** most AI devs still believe.
🔥 **Agentic AI runs John Boyd’s *real* OODA** — not the linear "observe-orient-decide-act" cartoon.
🔴 **LLMs are evolutionary dead-ends**: text-in, text-out, no destruction & creation, no real-time model updates.
🟢 **Active inference AI = fractal OODA**: destroys old models, creates new ones *every cycle* — at 1/1000th the energy.
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🧠 **KEY BREAKDOWNS**
• **Orientation = the entire loop** (neuroscience + category theory proof)
• **Unfolding circumstances = affordances in 4D space-time** (Wardley Maps + spatial web)
• **Destruction & Creation = Active Inference** (FEP, Markov blankets, low-energy dominance)
• **Why Scrum fails, exploration wins** (knowledge *of* vs. knowledge *about*)
• **2026 AI forecast**: edge-device FEP agents, Verses AI, LLMs obsolete.
💬 **QUOTE**
> “LLMs are linear OODA. Active inference is *fractal* OODA. The difference? Real-time destruction and creation.” — **Ben Ford**
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🚀 **No Way Out Podcast** – Where Marines, AI devs, and systems thinkers decode dominance.
#OODA #AgenticAI #JohnBoyd #ActiveInference #FreeEnergyPrinciple
💬 **QUOTE**
> “LLMs are linear OODA. Active inference is *fractal* OODA. The difference? Real-time dest
John R. Boyd's Conceptual Spiral was originally titled No Way Out. In his own words:
“There is no way out unless we can eliminate the features just cited. Since we don’t know how to do this, we must continue the whirl of reorientation…”
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John Boyd’s Conceptual Spiral was originally titled “No Way Out.” In his words:
“There is no way out unless we can eliminate the features just cited. Since we don’t know how to do this, we must continue the whirl of reorientation…”
Download a complete transcript of Conceptual Spiral for free by clicking here.
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- Long-form work on John Boyd, Orientation, and how to think and act inside the Guerrilla Information War.
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