2024-05-02
or well
Misha Valdman (April 24) on Derek Parfit, via Marginal Revolution.
New Yorker article making the rounds on ECMO.
Scott Alexander reviews Richard Hanania’s book. Will be interesting to read the response (80% likely to occur). Interesting comment, suggesting that Katherine Dee at Default Friend has a better explanation for the origins of the 2010s era vitriol being tumblr blogs.
SPAR Summer 2024 projects. Wonder if I should apply for something, because I think generally stuff like this gets oversubscribed.
Similarly, Roots of Progress blog building cohort. This one is even more tempting, although I also don’t rate my chances highly assuming I do apply. Actually, my stated preference for what I wanted to be when I grew up was a public intellectual, in the mold of Christopher Hitchens. I wonder how many other people became jaded on the idea of writing in public in the 2010s. If I’m being honest, for the most part it was because there are easier and more certain ways to make money, but I really did get the feeling that people would go after you for any flaw. When I reread him, even on something like Iraq where we can now definitively say he was wrong, what I primarily feel is admiration at just how sharp he writes. Why do people bother getting mad?
Noah Smith on American TSMC.
Robin Hanson on cultural drift. Sometimes I wonder how much of what he writes is Straussian. Direct accounts of his persona indicate it shouldn’t be possible since he finds it difficult to model normies, but maybe he’s modeling his audience?
