- I suggest listening to these podcasts on Russia’s mafia capitalism, Silicon Valley’s undermining of social values, the need for non-manipulated social and news media and privacy in the Age of Surveillance.
- “Doing well in school is nothing to be proud of” and how the meaning of meritocracy was inverted from “undeserving” to “deserving”
- Menstruation apps are sharing your physical, sexual and emotional data with advertisers (mostly via Facebook’s sales machine). Meanwhile, colleges are forcing students to install tracking apps
- “America once had a balanced transportation landscape, one with choice and some semblance of freedom… until the federal government put nearly all its weight behind the automobile.”
- Experiences are replacing shopping malls (and they are pretty cringy)
- Andrew Yang is a really cool presidential candidate: smart, honest and (realistically) devoted to the middle classes in a way that few others are
- A farewell essay to a dear, brilliant, compelling friend.
- Smart phones and students: “awkward interactions, calculated risks, time alone, and connecting with others without being in control of the interaction are all important parts of being human. Navigating those experiences is part of a healthy engagement with a world that we can never fully master, and the illusions of safety and control provided by our technology also produce isolation, distraction, and anxiety as we retreat from that uncontrollable world.” Related: Insights from students who lived 10 days without their phones. (I will try this with mine).
- How economists used “virtual currency” to overcame Brazil’s perennial hyperinflation in the early 1990s.
- A sharp but insightful rant against research on the history of philosophy