Variations on a theorem of Tate

Let $F$ be a number field. These notes explore Galois-theoretic, automorphic, and motivic analogues and refinements of Tate's basic result that continuous projective representations $Gal(\bar{F}/F) \to PGL_n(C)$ lift to $GL_n(C)$. We take special interest in the interaction of this result with algebraicity (on the automorphic side) and geometricity (in the sense of Fontaine-Mazur). On the motivic side, we study refinements and generalizations of the classical Kuga-Satake construction. Some auxiliary results touch on: possible infinity-types of algebraic automorphic representations; comparison of the automorphic and Galois "Tannakian formalisms"; monodromy (independence-of-$\ell$) questions for abstract Galois representations.