Nov 5
Holly explores how tools mediate our relationship with the world and shape us through use. What happens when AI becomes a cognitive tool that risks doing not just what we do, but the very things that give us meaning?
Oct 9
Maria Popova explores how success can ossify our personal narrative, using Rockwell Kent's encounter with a statue from his past as a metaphor for resisting the trap of becoming our own myth.
Jan 2
Religion doesn't vanish overnight. It fades in sequence: Participation drops first, then Importance, finally Belonging. A study of 111 countries reveals this pattern holds across cultures.
Dec 20
Harris Kupperman runs the numbers on AI capital expenditure and finds a terrifying gap: the industry needs $480 billion in revenue just to cover 2025 investments, but there simply aren't enough paying customers to make it work.
Dec 19
As AI makes writing effortless, we face an uncomfortable question: if we stop wrestling with words ourselves, do we lose the ability to think deeply? Michael Dean argues that writing isn't just communication—it's how we earn back our cognitive agency.
Dec 18
Colin Lewis argues that AI overspending isn't a bug but a feature—bubbles are civilization's way of coordinating massive resources around transformative technologies, turning irrational exuberance into innovation breakthroughs.
Dec 17
Three brilliant writers circle the same truth from different angles: Henrik Karlsson on sacrifice, Sherry Ning on values as a filter for spending, and Ian Leslie on buying happiness. Together, they reveal why what we think we want rarely matches what we actually need.
Dec 16
David Deming, Harvard's new Dean, pushes back against AI job apocalypse fears, arguing that CEOs use AI as a convenient scapegoat and that technological disruption historically creates opportunities for the educated elite.
Dec 15
Alex connects David Graeber's bullshit jobs theory with AI disruption, arguing that while meaningless corporate work persists, it's increasingly becoming just a paycheck to fund real entrepreneurial work—and AI is removing the entry-level rungs that once led to corporate careers.
Dec 15
James O'Sullivan argues that social media has transformed from a discovery tool into a distraction machine, where billions of users scroll through AI-generated slop not for information but for 'ambient dissociation.'
Dec 10
Branko Milanović's sobering reflection from a Columbia panel on democracy asks the uncomfortable question: what if people are using democracy to elect undemocratic leaders, and what if that's not a bug but a feature?
Nov 20
Joseph Heath explains how the brightest Marxist philosophers of the 1980s quietly became liberals—not because capitalism won, but because they stripped away Marx's theoretical baggage and found John Rawls had already built better tools for critiquing inequality.
Nov 15
Neal Stephenson challenges the sacred writing rule 'show don't tell,' arguing that skilled exposition can move plot faster and engage broader audiences than pure dramatization.
