Recent Posts

Think for Yourself?

Thinking, like learning, is a distributed human activity. Don't try to do it all by yourself. It’s fascinating how vehemently people cling to the words of some clowns and charlatans — clowns and charlatans who also preach, “Don’t follow blindly! Don’t be sheep! Question people…

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On being plagiarized

What do you do when someone repeatedly passes off your work as their own? Being the victim of a serial plagiarist has got me worried about the opportunities for theft that are created by paywalled environments.

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How do pandemics end?

History, I think, begs us to second guess our assumptions about conquering COVID-19 and invites us to reimagine our lives and priorities in an evolving, adaptive world.

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Some High Mountain

A timeless thought experiment, handed down through centuries and cultures, invites us to keep the human experience (and our personal ambitions) in sharp perspective.

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How much I do not understand

I do not understand what it would be like to explain to my son why he is more likely to die at the hands of the police than other people. I do not understand what it would feel like to be watched like a hawk…

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Uncertainty, as mantra

We know as much about the future today as we did in November 2019, at which time every human on the planet had absolutely no idea what was about to happen. Now we are in the middle of a profound opportunity to recalibrate our relationship with uncertainty.

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We are not all in this together

We love to say that we are all in this together. But who exactly is included in this declaration of togetherness? We are living in a period that is anything but a common, universalizing, and unifying moment. Should we change the way we speak of solidarity?

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