A quick poetry read that doesn't even require a You Tube Face thumbnail to make you click and snap back to a simpler, more sophisticated time of culture and beauty. -B
Brian (not the Brian that helps me write this newsletter, another Brian, Brians everywhere!) and I used to work together and I still keep up with his writing and attempt to keep up with where he's currently living. I am also 33 but I did not reflect at all upon that fact as of yet. -C
We've all taken a wrapping paper cardboard tube and bonked someone else on the head with it. Which probably led to them picking up a cardboard tube and attempting to bonk you back. Follow this to the logical conclusion and we have the fantastic web comic Penny Arcade's "Cardboard Tube Samurai" series. He wanders the land dispensing justice, one cardboard bonk at a time. -B
Grey Lady Steel Man - Model Citizen
In the last issue we shared a Link that passionately proscribed the removal of the New York Times from your life. We also have shared a couple of links over the last few months to Scott Alexander's Slate Star Codex (now renamed as Astral Ten Codex). Scott got embroiled in a bruhaha with the NYT and his community has a feud simmering with the author of the so-called "hit piece" on Scott, a writer named Cade Metz.
Here's a smart, humble and fair take laying out what this all must have looked like from Cade's perspective. Nothing is ever simple. People are complicated and we should all strive to see the world through the eyes of others. -B
Y'all may have picked up on this already, but the little issue previews we add to these issues are always pulled from one of the articles we share. This issue's preview was "rigorously consistent Bayesian updating", which I yanked from this article. I liked how absurd that phrase sounded to me, but it also sent me down a rabbit hole that landed me at this YouTube explainer of the Bayesian Belief Update. -C
The original title when I sent this link in was "CALVIN YOU NEED TO READ THIS". It is one of the most passionate, well-written essays I've read in a long time. I think the NYT in this article is really a metonym. But what a moving look at the digital divide that deepens every day. -B
Is Substack the Media Future We Want
H/T Joe D. Great question. I like the counterweight to corporate media. I hate the paying $5 a month to a ton of different writers who I used to get for free. But I'm willing to do it to ensure independent thinking survives. -B
This is a fantastic exploration of email newsletters and their obvious beginnings as real newsletters (that you received, you know, in the mail). It made me think about why we like to write, which is also what the Rob Rhinehart essay above made me think about. -C
Still Alive - Astral Codex Ten
Slate Star Codex is back as, unshockingly, a Substack. Just what I needed in my life.... another Substack.
"We've lost a lot of that old Internet, sold our birthright to social media companies and content providers for a few spurts of dopamine"
-B
Jordan Peterson Plays in the Left’s Cultural Sandbox
I'm low-key fascinated by Jordan Peterson. I bought and skimmed his book 12 Rules for Life and found it to contain interesting if standard self-help fare ("Make Your Bed"). I listened to a few of his podcasts / speeches and found him an independent thinker who clings tenaciously to what he thinks is correct no matter the social consequences. When so much of human interaction is lubricated by bending to each other what do you make of someone who does not bend?
Probably as a result of this stiffness and the insatiable desire of our tribes for in group contrarians (IGC) to cast out and denounce, Peterson has become an absolute lightning rod for the St. Elmo's fire of tribal conflict. The link above contains David French's comments on JP from 2018 when 12 Rules first came out. David French has recently become an IGC on the right as his Christian faith and conscience led him to publicly support Biden. So there are some interesting ouroboros IGC layers here. -B
Cornwall Sinkholes in 2020 caused by bronze age mining activities
Thousands of years of tin mining in the UK now lead to abandoned mine maws opening with frightening frequency. Read more about the trade routes that existed from the UK to the middle east as rare metals found only in the UK made their way eastward. -B
This launched me down a pretty deep sinkhole of YouTube videos of drones exploring sinkholes, like this one. -C
Wikipedia has a ton of money. So why is it begging you to donate yours?
The ideological capture of so many of things of the 2002 era internet (i.e. Wikipedia is now controlled by an editorial cabal with an ideological agenda) makes me sad but that's probably just because I'm a middle-aged Gen-X'er experiencing for the first time all the BIG FEELINGS every generation always feels as they progress through middle-age. Irregardlessly, don't give Wikipedia any of your money...they really don't need it. -B
I'm having some pretty big feelings about you trying to sneak the use of "irregardlessly" by me...I'll leave it this time but you've been warned. - C