Thomas C. Foster is still chasing the success of How to Read Novels Like a Professor (2008), a work that frequently makes appearances in high school aThomas C. Foster is still chasing the success of How to Read Novels Like a Professor (2008), a work that frequently makes appearances in high school advanced placement courses. His practical guides vary widely in quality. This one is definitely on the lower end along with How to Read Nonfiction Like a Professor. This partially reflects the pace at which he's now turning these out (every two years since 2016).
Although my experience with film criticism is probably beyond the level of the target audience, I still think I should have been able to glean more from this book. But Reading the Silver Screen is a chaotic jumble. It doesn't make for the engaging and compelling reading experience that a hand-holding basic guide to film analysis should. Foster jumps back and forth between different modes (criticism, analysis, instruction, narration) too quickly. The films of reference are all over the places jumping between titles likely to be completely unknown to most of the target audience to contemporary films that hardly warrant attention, let alone scrutiny, at all. This work would have been better served by taking a small subset of canonical films and returning to them variously over the course of the work to make various points about the methods of film analysis and criticism. Plus, the instruction on methods is simply too basic and his efforts to show analysis-in-action try one's patience. The frame-by-frame break downs are overkill most of the time and his point could be easily illustrated in other ways. Anyone could log on YouTube and probably find better demonstrations of film analysis in seconds.
This is a book worth skipping, especially because there is already a robust set of alternatives one could reach for in this space. Just go read the critical works of major film critics. A lot of it can be found for free online too.
Merged review:
Thomas C. Foster is still chasing the success of How to Read Novels Like a Professor (2008), a work that frequently makes appearances in high school advanced placement courses. His practical guides vary widely in quality. This one is definitely on the lower end along with How to Read Nonfiction Like a Professor. This partially reflects the pace at which he's now turning these out (every two years since 2016).
Although my experience with film criticism is probably beyond the level of the target audience, I still think I should have been able to glean more from this book. But Reading the Silver Screen is a chaotic jumble. It doesn't make for the engaging and compelling reading experience that a hand-holding basic guide to film analysis should. Foster jumps back and forth between different modes (criticism, analysis, instruction, narration) too quickly. The films of reference are all over the places jumping between titles likely to be completely unknown to most of the target audience to contemporary films that hardly warrant attention, let alone scrutiny, at all. This work would have been better served by taking a small subset of canonical films and returning to them variously over the course of the work to make various points about the methods of film analysis and criticism. Plus, the instruction on methods is simply too basic and his efforts to show analysis-in-action try one's patience. The frame-by-frame break downs are overkill most of the time and his point could be easily illustrated in other ways. Anyone could log on YouTube and probably find better demonstrations of film analysis in seconds.
This is a book worth skipping, especially because there is already a robust set of alternatives one could reach for in this space. Just go read the critical works of major film critics. A lot of it can be found for free online too....more
David Garrow's gigantic biography of Barack Obama's life prior to the presidency is remarkably detailed and generally even-handed. The tome is certainDavid Garrow's gigantic biography of Barack Obama's life prior to the presidency is remarkably detailed and generally even-handed. The tome is certainly dull in some places, recording minutiae like the Obama household finances, but it is otherwise one of the closest and most honest looks at one of the most prominent figures of the 21st century available.
The true weakness I see is Garrow is uninterested in Obama's symbolic role in American culture. He acknowledges Obama's particularly important role in America's racial history and politics, but this elides a lot of how Obama actually functioned among members of the liberal elite and young aspirants and cultural producers. This of course would be something mostly in the purview of the epilogue, which I will get to in a moment, but it is still something that could have been explicitly explored. I think a work like this warrants a look at the political context of the Obama moment, including shifts in Democratic party politics and left-wing activism in the 2000s. The extent to which Obama was and remains an avatar of a somewhat new type of identity-first, elite-cultural-left way of politics is ignored. Instead, the particularities of Chicago and Illinois politics are given more attention. I think Obama the cultural figure was ignored because Garrow relies heavily on political insiders and elites to assemble his portrait of burgeoning Obama. And although the biography is honest about Obama's ties to radicals such as Bill Ayers, it seems somewhat incurious about the nature of these relationship and the extent to which they've formed Obama politically. If anything, Garrow's implicit judgement is that Obama's association with these figures was incidental and/or instrumental, and Obama was happy to dispense with these relationships whenever they became politically inconvenient.
Garrow's unvarnished perspective on his subject comes to the fore in the epilogue. He sees Obama as a talented man of admirable character who is ultimately incapable of being a significant change agent because his pre-eminent concerns are pragmatic or superficial, and his personality is standoffish and overly intellectual. Garrow casts Obama as a distant and enigmatic figure who could perform in public as a talented politician but was not particularly special behind closed doors and in smoke-filled rooms.
Obviously, some right-wingers have and will find these criticisms resonant, but I don't think Garrow's criticism comes from such a perspective. A close look at Garrow's assertions indicates most of his critiques of Obama emerge from Obama's left-flank or from a pre-political realm. In Garrow's estimation, Obama was not a transformative president (in the progressive sense of things) because he does not possess any particular character or substance. He is a member of the class of strivers that William Deresiewicz would call "excellent sheep."
Because there is something enigmatic about Obama, it is difficult to know just how accurate Garrow's portrait of Obama is. Nonetheless, I think it is the portrait that will likely end up in the history books....more
In this book, the economists Anne Case and Angus Deaton argue that non-Hispanic white Americans have endured shocking increases in mortality and losseIn this book, the economists Anne Case and Angus Deaton argue that non-Hispanic white Americans have endured shocking increases in mortality and losses in life-expectancy. These trends are especially surprising because they contrast with secular trends across other developed nations and even with other demographic groups within America. Case and Deaton identify deaths from drug overdoses, alcoholic liver disease, and suicide as a driver of this trend and label them "deaths of despair." They flounder some looking for the driver of the despair variably blaming material and sociocultural factor, while training a great deal of focus on purported "rent-seeking" in American healthcare. This is yet another look at the post-1960 low-intensity malaise afflicting Americans and American society and subsequently it makes references to these works but fails to learn many lessons from them. It is yet another tired gesture, an almost certainly useless plea for specific technocratic change that doesn't even address itself to a problem that isn't even properly diagnosed.
Since Case and Deaton's 2015 paper, the "Deaths of Despair" narrative has burrowed so thoroughly into the public consciousness, it seems to be heresy to question it. However, there are several social scientists who have evaluated their analysis and claims found reasons to be skeptical of the claims (e.g. Andrew Gelman). Even accepting that there are U.S. specific challenges related to middle-aged mortality and cohort life-expectancies, these trends are apparently almost entirely driven by the bottom centile in education. This finding complicates the Case-Deaton analysis significantly because it implicates causal factors other than social status or economic policy, specifically endogenous factors like low conscientiousness and low intelligence. This harkens back to the work of other social scientists who have argued that technological advancement and globalization has increasingly stratified society by cognitive ability and social facility. It also recommends a paternalistic policy approach as the solution rather than technocratic tweaks to corporate governance or tax policy or overhauls of the U.S. healthcare system like Case and Deaton are eager to recommend.
What I think this books implicitly helps underscore is that there is a cost of freedom in America that has been increasing since the unique and brief post-war consensus in mid-twentieth century America. This cost tends to be born by individuals in the lowest stratum whether that stratum is variably defined by wealth, social status, or educational status. The way to allay this cost is by rebuilding cultural institutions and communities that increase contact across different social strata. An organic, bottom-up solution is the only thing that will work. Social engineering and policy is rarely an instrument for connecting neighbors and providing individuals with purpose and happiness. It is unlikely America will abandon its love for liberty given its social myths, its deep cultural roots, demographic diversity, and geographic variation. We may as well embrace this openly so that we know the only durable solution to our discontent is re-connecting and re-uniting.
I also recommend Matt Yglesias review of the "Deaths of Despair" claims at Slow Boring, which takes a closer look at the claims than I have here. ...more
The Deep History of Ourselves is a foray into "Big History" by renowned neuroscientist Joseph LeDoux. The first half of the work is a low resolution rThe Deep History of Ourselves is a foray into "Big History" by renowned neuroscientist Joseph LeDoux. The first half of the work is a low resolution recapitulation of metazoan evolution through primates. This part shares a lot of similarities with Max Bennett's A Brief History of Intelligence. The second half explores the cognitive capacities of the human brain with a focus on consciousness.
LeDoux is a bit heterodox on the evolution of consciousness. He argues the capacity is unique to humans. He bases this claims on the fact we can only purportedly demonstrate self-knowledge in humans, and that unwarranted anthropomorphizing occurs when consciousness is projected on animals due to their shared affect (i.e. when a dog is clearly sad or a Dolphin is excited by its own reflection). Perhaps more convincingly, LeDoux also alleges certain circuits that are fundamental to conscious experiences are unique to human beings. I think both these claims rest on shaky ground, but the science of consciousness is quite fraught and thus cannot blame him for venturing interesting ideas. However, I think LeDoux's ideas would do well to take evolution more seriously. I think it is defensible to assume that consciousness was selected for. Our scientific efforts should be focused on confirming whether this is true and finding out exactly how and why it was selected for.
The going theory for both rapid brain evolution and consciousness is the social brain hypothesis (SBH). The model presupposes tensions between individual and group survival/fitness strategies (very game theory-ish). These tension facilitated an arms race between deception (individual) and gossip (group) that drove selection on intelligence/consciousness. This was also enabled energetically by calorie rich environments unlocked through the invention of cooking. It is likely that sexual selection played a role in this dynamic as well, though this is controversial and can still be folded into the larger SBH. I bring this up only to point out this was an omission from the work and I would have liked to see LeDoux address these ideas.
LeDoux also defends his preferred theory of consciousness, higher order theory (HOT). He does so we respect to global workspace theory and predictive processing. He folds some elements of the latter into HOT but generally argues that HOT is the best model for explaining self-awareness. To me, I can often find appealing things in any of the models of consciousness. They all seem to depart from what we can test for and prove, which is perturbing. One has to wonder if we're approaching the question improperly or if the question cannot be answered with scientific approaches (RE: Erik Hoel). Due to the recursive architecture of consciousness and the inaccessibility/murky interpretability of brain activity, I sometimes fear the worst.
Regardless, I obviously think it is worth the effort to learn about these topics and become conversant in them. This is perhaps the tenth or so work I've read on the subject. Keep them coming!...more
The Age of Grievance, which should perhaps have been retitled The Age of Unjustified Grievance, provides what is now increasingly pat social criticismThe Age of Grievance, which should perhaps have been retitled The Age of Unjustified Grievance, provides what is now increasingly pat social criticism of the obviously deranged dimensions of American politics and culture. Bruni argues Americans have becomes preoccupied by claims to victimization, and these claims have reached a totalizing and existential intensity through the usual escalatory cycle of political battles. He is loathe to entirely dispense with the utility of grievance politics wholesale as he believes such politics can drive progressive/left-liberal social change, pointing to historical examples with the rights and social position of women, minorities, and gays.
Bruni supports his critique of grievance politics with an endless procession of anecdotes cribbed from his life or the news. There is in little in the way of quantitative social analysis other than some references to research performed by economists and sociologists (much of it interesting but fragmentary). Thus, readers are mostly just receptacles for Bruni's considered opinions on the cultural moment. Subsequently, this is likely only to be a useful read for those who have entirely ignored news and news commentary for the last half decade or are especially interested in how Frank Bruni sees the world.
In many ways, The Age of Grievance is an exemplar of the usual NYT op-ed tier sophistry. Spin up silky prose with an air of detached erudition and appear to deliver an incisive and encompassing indictment of American dysfunction (in this case a culture of widespread vindictiveness and self-absorbed emotionality), while actually endorsing the existing values and goals of the current elite (i.e. those like Bruni himself - affluent urban left-liberals/progressives). This is the sort of thing that is obviously going to upset those with different values and goals. It also does nothing to remedy the identified dysfunction. The diagnosis and prescription are unfortunately shallow. Bruni fails to offer enough for those estranged from the elect. It is highly unlikely that whatever the elite of today want will solve all today's ills. It's even possible, if not likely, that today's elite are responsible in some ways for our culture of victimhood. Why would doubling down on the (partial) instigators solve the problem?
There are of course some true and important things being said by Bruni. He is far from the first one to say these things though (as he acknowledges) and some of these true and good things are cliché and seem hollows (i.e. the whole "be humble" conclusion offered in the final chapter). Nonetheless, it is good for those of his ilk and position to counter-signal their own in-group. They have to buy trust with the out-group if conciliation is possible. Although I think many readers of this ilk will not see it as an authentic peace offering in the culture war. However, it is at least working to create space for that possibility from the within the coastal bubble.
The experience of happening upon a talented writer who "gets it" but somehow still manages to be wrong is bemusing (though of course it shouldn't be). I don't how much of this is a function of failures on the part of the writer or that of the audience. I'm inclined to blame both to some extent. Our author has enjoyed a life of privilege in left-liberal, coastal enclaves and holds down two sought-after sinecures, one as a NYT op-ed columnist and another as a professor of public policy at UNC. He is able to demonstrate some ability to rise above his milieu to mildly criticize some of its excesses, but he seems to be somewhat unaware of just how dominant his way of thinking is across American institutions (even ones meant to represent those with values in conflict with his). He also seems a bit incurious about the deep origins of the dysfunction he recognizes. And some of the research he references suggests he curiosity should be piqued. However, his target audience is also the same left-liberal elite or elite-aspirants who are loathe to take kindly to the idea that their contributions to sociopolitical dysfunction may be on par with MAGA-hat-wearing deplorables.
Ultimately, this is an acceptable entry in 21st century American cultural commentary. Bruni's prose is engaging even when his thought slips in sloppiness. It is another great example of a book that should have been an essay though. ...more
Silver, of The Signal and The Noise and founder of forecasting outlet 538, has dropped his latest book as the 2024 election season approaches its climSilver, of The Signal and The Noise and founder of forecasting outlet 538, has dropped his latest book as the 2024 election season approaches its climax. The conceit at the center of the book is the increasingly salient divide between the risk-tolerant disrupters (The River) and the risk-averse establishment (The Village). In this spirit, Silver shares his personal approach to getting an edge and handling uncertainty in everyday life and professionally. The book is surprisingly more memoiristic and journalistic than one would expect. This contrasts with The Signal and The Noise, which is mostly a practical-guide to forecasting informed by Bayesian approaches and a critique of the epistemology of many modern experts. In this regard, it was quite similar to a number of Nassim Taleb's books.
Silver obviously has a gambling itch and seeks to defend the pursuit of "positive expected value" in the face of significant risk. However, he also outlines how to figure out what risks are reasonable and unreasonable and where unleashed utilitarianism breaks down. This is illustrated via his extended coverage of his experiences with SBF and among others in the EA community.
Silver expresses concern about the increasing aversion to risk in American. He worries it may eventually become a real roadblock to innovation, progress, and prosperity. However, he also understands the discomfort created by members of The River. He offers cogent critiques of the flaws of Riverian figures like SBF, Musk, Thiel, etc. He also voices concerns about enabling thoughtless and emotional risk-taking, critiquing some of the addictive gamification of activities with net costs to most participants: slots, day trading, sports betting apps, and certain social media contexts.
Ultimately, this is a substantial and engaging work that deserves a close read and communicates a lot of valuable information about Silver's personal learning experiences and his expertise in forecasting and risk. ...more
Although I'm an outsider to the field, Archaeology, like many academic disciplines, is prone to heated debates - ones that often devolve into petty sqAlthough I'm an outsider to the field, Archaeology, like many academic disciplines, is prone to heated debates - ones that often devolve into petty squabbles. It may also be a field where debates are harder to settle given that relevant primary sources are quite obviously shaped by the survivorship bias. In other words, we only have what we've found of what has persisted. Of course, multiple different lines of primary sourcing telling the same story is typically the best way to confirm our theories about the past. Unfortunately, they don't always tell the same story. Our window but an aperture. Nonetheless, we've done an impressive job of reconstructing the past even if some of it is fiction.
One of the historical moments of special interest to archaeologists and historians is the Late Bronze Age (12th century BC). It is of note because of what appears to be a catastrophic breakdown in the world order at the time. And yes indeed, there was in fact a world economy and many sophisticated civilizations to collapse at this time in the regions surrounding the Mediterranean and into the Near East.
Our author, Eric H. Cline, previously penned 1177 B.C.: The Year Civilization Collapsed to explore the factors that precipitate this mysterious collapse, bringing about a so-called 'Dark Age' according to traditional historical accounts of this time. He's returned with a sequel that tries to revise this 'Dark Age' narrative so as to explore the factors that causes some regions and peoples for weather the collapse successfully while others suffered. After 1177 B.C. is also an attempt to bring a gap between Bronze Age and Iron Age scholar, who he believes have had trouble connecting across these epochs.
To what extent Cline's project is successful is difficult to determine. This is partly a function of my ignorance. It is also a function of the organization of the text. Cline is stuffing a lot into a short book and the text gets convoluted and fragmented with litanies of archaeological artifacts. Cline jumps between incredibly specific details and very general commentary in jarring fashion even when the book is quite well organized by the regions of interest. There is simply a lot of context and meaning that Cline sees that cannot be made clear to non-specialist readers. It doesn't always help that some of the generalized commentary seems itself cribbed from pop social science books (e.g. NNT's Antifragile or Diamond's Collapse) rather than drawing from systematic original analyses comparing the differential fortunes of early Iron Age regions. I'm happy to see academics in conversation with these ideas, but they make for thin explanations when just transposed on a preferred fact pattern of the past.
Cline justifies the usefulness of studying Late Bronze Age collapse and the aftermath as an exercise in understanding what we may need to do today to prevent imminent collapse or respond to unforeseen catastrophe. I'm not sure I see a ton of lesson in the deep past other than identifying likely sources of risk, but all of these are already well-described. Alternatively, it is refreshing to see academics acknowledge that human civilization often has been pretty robust to catastrophe. For those looking for a comprehensive look at the social science of catastrophe I recommend Niall Ferguson's Doom and Peter Turchin's work on Cliodynamics. The more systematic approaches appear a more fruitful way to answer such questions.
Despite the shortcoming, Cline has undoubtedly done an impressive job of compressing four centuries of history on the collapse responses of the interconnected Late Bronze Age world and the civilizations it (re)birthed: Phoenicians, Philistines, Israelites, Neo-Hittites, Neo-Assyrians, and Neo-Babylonians. These groups adapted to their new circumstances, transforming themselves and, in some cases, laying the foundations for future empires....more
There's not much that needs to be said about this impressive work. The accolades and prestige it has accrued are well-deserved. I strongly recommend tThere's not much that needs to be said about this impressive work. The accolades and prestige it has accrued are well-deserved. I strongly recommend this extremely close examination of the life of Robert Moses, specifically his preternatural ability to wield political power and the effect this had on the city planning of New York.
Caro's portrait is decidedly less flattering than the public profile that Moses enjoyed most of his life. However, there is also a grudging admiration of the intelligence, competence, and energy of Robert Moses, especially with respect to other public leaders of the time. I think we all understand that there is something inherently double-edged about being a "great" man. The thirst for power is usually slaked at someone else's expense, and the use of power will always have costs. This is perhaps the major blind spot of The Power Broker. It never explicitly asks the counterfactual: Who would have designed midcentury New York if Robert Moses was out of the picture? Is it likely that similar choices would have been made? The implicit answer is of course no and that more well-meaning bureaucrats would have made more rational decision. However, I don't think assumption should follow given what we know about the history of municipal and state governance in America over the 20th century. Caro would like to lay the blame for the generalized failure of American city planning on Moses, but this seems to be quite a stretch. I wonder if he still thinks this today.
Regardless, I'm happy that figures like Moses are uncommon at least in the context of public service. Moses operated much more like a titan of industry, a Randian protagonist, than most lauded statesman. His tenure has also proceeded the increased regulation, bureaucratization, and deindustrialization of America, which make projects of large scales increasingly expensive, slow-moving, or nonexistent. Eventually, Moses ran into this buzzsaw himself. It's better to keep these creative and aggressive rogues in the private sphere, but we also need a government that can function effectively, especially at the local and state levels.
The Power Broker is a singular portrait of a uniquely powerful figure. The primary lesson I think we learn about power, apart from the usual lessons about reputation, conscientiousness, and strategic aggression, is that institutional expertise and technocratic creativity are modern levers that can be pulled to concentrate power....more
Not that she cares - she of course won't read this especially if we're to understand her comments on Goodreads' as sincere - I don't think I've entireNot that she cares - she of course won't read this especially if we're to understand her comments on Goodreads' as sincere - I don't think I've entirely grasped the essence of Lauren Oyler. There's is something a bit enigmatic about her, though this is perhaps by design.
What we do know is that she's a thritysomething elite aspirant and internet media addict. She came up out of flyover country (West Virginia) to the ivy league and now into the lit mag scene. She appears to have imbibed and then become somewhat disillusioned with many of the stereotypical left-liberal memes and aesthetics common to the elite yet middlebrow sphere. She's well-read in contemporary literature, has demonstrated some degree of good taste (e.g. an unironic appreciator of David Foster Wallace), and has functioned as a competent critic in a competitive and saturated landscape. She developed a distinct-enough sharp and wry literary persona and has been able to graduate beyond criticism, dabbling in literary fiction (Fake Accounts). Nonetheless, she appears pre-occupied with some inane issues and is perhaps blinkered in disappointing ways.
The theme of this collection is revenge. Oyler sees grudges as one of the primary motivating forces in literary and critical production. This is often true, especially for artists who see themselves as tastemakers or important etc. Despite her reputation as a takedown artist, Oyler is more restrained than I expected in this essay collection.
There are six essays in total: 1) Embarrassment, Panic, Opprobrium, Job Loss, Etc (concerns gossip) 2) My Perfect Opinions (concerns criticism) 3) Why Do You Live Here? (concens expat life) 4) I Am the One Who Is Sitting Here, for Hours and Hours and Hours (concerns autofiction) 5) The Power of Vulnerability (concerns gender and power) and 6) My Anxiety (concerns therapeutic culture). These essays are transparently an exercise in solipsism. Oyler is working through preoccupations of hers. This doesn't mean the writing is uninteresting. It's just that Oyler's interests and concerns are largely particular to her, and an unfamiliar reader coming to these essays is likely to be put off by them even when Oyler is being self-critical and/or clever. I appreciate the honesty even when she retreats behind various defenses but the targets of analysis often leave much to be desired or don't quite cut to the core of things. She could have pushed further and deeper. She turns an issue around a few times, raises some doubts and concerns, and then discards it without affirmatively defending a conclusion.
Perhaps, I am missing somethings. I will return to these essays. I found a lot of the actual content interesting. I share some similar interests with Oyler. I think gossip is an important social mechanism. I participate in amateur criticism (she gets paid to do it), patronize Goodreads, and obsess over cultural artifacts and internet media. I am curious about the state of the modern novel - why autofiction is so prevalent. I too am skeptical of therapeutic culture. She addresses herself to many of these topics and illuminates certain aspects of them. I was simply left wanting more....more
Interestingly, Peter Zeihan teeters on the edge between unserious and serious geopolitical analysis. In fact, sometime we veer into what's nearly geopInterestingly, Peter Zeihan teeters on the edge between unserious and serious geopolitical analysis. In fact, sometime we veer into what's nearly geopolitical fan fiction territory. He certainly doesn't shy away from bold claims - some of which will inevitably end up incorrect. Of course, this happens in the prediction business (would be cool to see what Zeihan's calibration would be if we converted his predictions into something probabilistic).
Nonetheless, Zeihan has an understandable model of national outcomes: geography, demographics, trade dependency, fiscal stability, and naval power. This model almost certainly has some predictive power but will be wrong in some important ways due to critical omissions and complex dynamics. The biggest issue I see is that his essentially linear extrapolations (a problem itself but largely unavoidable in this effort) ignore technological innovation and cultural and political institutions. I think these limitations will most dramatically effect his bearish predictions about China. I don't think China is charting a path to world hegemon, but I think it will fare better than he predicts.
Generally, Disunited Nations is yet another extension of Zeihan's usual geopolitical analysis. Instead of a focus on the U.S. like in the Accidental Superpower, the focus is on important regional players in the predicted de-globalization process - a hypothesis he details in a follow-up book called The End of the World is Just Beginning. In dramatic terms, de-globalization is the collapse of the post-WWII world order (Bretton Woods System). This prediction is not particularly outlandish as there are many analysts that see things in similar terms. Zeihan envisions them quite dramatically though. He is also very bullish about the American position, which I think is mostly true, while it has taken many analysts longer post-Iraq War and the first Trump presidency to come around to that position. And yes, there remains much doomsaying about America's fortunes too (e.g. Peter Turchin, #Resistance types, and degrowthers/green alarmists).
Zeihan sees the order coming apart for unavoidable and avoidable reasons. The unavoidable reasons appear to be a combination of demographic and fiscal constraints, while the avoidable reasons appears to be American disengagement with a system that provides them marginal direct benefit at significant cost. Zeihan sees Bretton Woods as an anomalous system that is prone to breakage and now it is finally setting in.
In the new emerging order, he sees many catastrophes. Some of these have come to pass in part with the invasion of Ukraine, instability in the Middle East, inflation, increase national populism, financial crises, etc. Some of these have already come and gone or see like somewhat temporary phenomena, e.g. populist election wins. His predictions of catastrophe extend well beyond this including gaming out a number of regional conflicts and collapses. Some of these scenarios are interesting in their counter-intuitiveness (e.g. bullishness about France as Europe's regional leader). It is also to see when morality enters into Zeihan's analysis. It seems to enter the scene at random and appear otherwise absent in other places. For instance, Zeihan is eager to tell us how bad Saudi Arabia is but less eager to tell us about how bad Iran is.
Altogether, the value of Disunited Nations is the closer look we get at the different regional players we may get in world without Pax Americana: Japan, Russia, Germany, France, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Brazil, and Argentina. The commentary on Argentina was probably the most interesting stuff to me, especially in the context of Milei's recent election. ...more
Father Time is the culmination of ten years of research and thinking by the esteemed anthropologist and veteran of the sociobiology wars, Sarah BlaffeFather Time is the culmination of ten years of research and thinking by the esteemed anthropologist and veteran of the sociobiology wars, Sarah Blaffer Hrdy. It is a comprehensive exploration of the evolutionary history of paternal care in humans. The dedication of modern fathers is often viewed as an unnatural, tenuous construction, but Hrdy argues parental care capabilities are embedded deep in our genome and can be as strong in men as women.
Inspired by witnessing the touching dedication of her son and son-in-laws as they became fathers, Hrdy began researching the biology of fatherhood, wondering if her discipline has overlooked a paternal instinct. Emerging science describing endocrinological and biopsychological changes in the fathers of infants also convinced Hrdy to dig deeper. In Father Time, she surveys paternal care across the animal kingdom and recapitulates human ethnographies of paternal care in ancestral niches to argue both that there is a latent biological substrate for paternal care and that paternal commitment in humans has been shaped by the forces of evolution. After assembling this evidence, she makes two main arguments: 1) There is almost certainly a latent capacity for the tender care that can be activated by certain conditions like proximity to infants. 2) Social selection forces rather than sexual selection alone tempered male status competition and re-direct males toward provisioning, protecting, and caring actions.
Hrdy's heterodox perspective gently rebukes both hardcore adaptionist and social constructionist theories, spooling out many interesting ideas becoming increasingly salient in the advanced world where men and women have become increasingly estranged and fertility has declined.
-According to the Standard Cross-Culture Sample of 186 human societies just 27% report the regular presence of the father at the birth of his child.
-Among the closest great ape relations (chimpanzees, gorillas, orangutans, bonobos) infant care is exclusively female.
- At most 5% of the world’s 5400 mammalian species have any direct male care of babies. (Hrdy borrows the high end of an estimate from Rogers and Bales [2019] which was based on survey of 2545 species by Lukas and Clutton-Brock [2013].
-The work of Hrdy and others has shown that infanticide of unrelated infants is a primate-wide reproductive strategy. In other words, it provides a sexually selective advantage to the males that practice it.
-The Bruce Effect - spontaneous abortion subsequent pregnant females mere detection of an unknown male in her vicinity (in mice)
-Intimate Fathers by Barry Hewlett reported that men of the Aka, a group of Central African foragers, spend 50% of a day within arms reach of infants and interact with them fondly ~10% of that time. They also hold young infants (1-4 months of age) for almost a quarter of that time. This is the highest rate of paternal involvement ever recorded in an ancestral-like hunter-gatherer setting.
-Within 6 months following birth, the baseline levels of oxytocin in new fathers approaches the average levels in mothers. What oxytocin does and how exactly it does it is still poorly understood but it is correlated with affectionate contact.
-fMRI work on mothers vs fathers shows primordial regions activation in the brainstem (hypothalamic circuits) of mothers while that father response is in cortical areas of the brain (superior temporal sulcus and medial prefrontal cortex).
Late Admissions is a singular self-portrait by one of our most notable public intellectuals.
I am quite familiar with Glenn C. Loury. I have listened tLate Admissions is a singular self-portrait by one of our most notable public intellectuals.
I am quite familiar with Glenn C. Loury. I have listened to many episodes of his podcast, especially his long-running conversations about race with other scholars, including John McWhorter, Roland Fryer, Charles Murray, and others. Loury is a thoughtful and usually generous interlocutor, who is willing to explore ideas and tender critiques that a similarly situated commentator of a different race would likely be excoriated for. This is not the only thing that makes Loury valuable in public discourse though. He is an important connector between many different discourse communities, has served as an important mentor to other rising intellectuals, and has contributed to the field of economics and the political science of race topics.
Late Admissions is a straightforward recapitulation of Loury's turbulent but illustrious life that provides a helpful tour of late 20th and early 21s century political discourse, especially on racial issues. The auto-biography moves quickly through his somewhat unstable yet precocious childhood years in the rough areas of Chicago to his failure to launch (college dropout and teenage father) to his re-launch into academic success (PhD in econ from MIT and first black tenured econ prof at Harvard) to his mid-life crisis (impostor syndrome, incessant infidelity, crack addiction, rehab, etc) to his stable emergence as a wiser public intellectual.
Late Admissions is confessional so much so that Loury has to explain believability and credibility issues that his confessions create. Some may find the divulgences gauche or that Loury is perhaps not contrite enough about them. However, I think it's helpful that Loury has provided such an unvarnished portrait of himself. There are certainly tendencies that he shares with many successful men, and these tendencies are usually hidden or obscured with great effort. Loury lifts the veil, speaking honestly about many sensitive subjects.
Loury's honesty, though many of the most serious details were already public, are important to paving the way to a better elite and public discourse for hot button sociopolitical subjects, especially race. Loury's memoir doesn't somehow solve the question of race for America, but he certainly provides a healthier and more nuanced vision.
Taming Cancer by Drew N. Kelner PhD is a comprehensive exploration of the biological intricacies of cancer and the advancements in cancer medicine. ThTaming Cancer by Drew N. Kelner PhD is a comprehensive exploration of the biological intricacies of cancer and the advancements in cancer medicine. The book covers some of the history of cancer treatments, the molecular underpinnings of the disease, and the emerging therapeutics that are reshaping the future of oncology. Kelner's work is both a tribute to the combined public and private attempt to alleviate the human tragedy of cancer.
Kelner's writing shines in its ability to distill complex scientific concepts into accessible language, making the content valuable for both laypersons and professionals. The inclusion of personal anecdotes and acknowledgements adds a human touch to the content, bridging the gap between sterile scientific ideas and deep emotions. For those without any background in molecular biology, some of the content may still be challenging. The challenge is worthwhile.
Taming Cancer has a straightforward structure with a clear progression from the basics of cell biology to the specifics of cancer's molecular mechanisms. Kelner makes effective use of figures to aid the reader's understanding. The sections on immunotherapy and the role of monoclonal antibodies in cancer treatment are particularly enlightening, showcasing the potential of precision therapeutics.
While Taming Cancer is a testament to the successes of cancer research, Kelner also notes the challenges that lie ahead. Kelner's cautious optimism is grounded in reality, providing a balanced view of the current state of the field. The book's vision of cancer as a manageable chronic condition rather than a death sentence should reassure and uplift concerned readers.
I recommend Taming Cancer to anyone interested in the science of cancer, from patients and their families to those in healthcare or research. The book offers insightful analysis, interesting history, and hope, making it a valuable addition to the stores of science communication. Kelner's book also deserves a solid recommendation for its educational value. It will be an edifying read for many, helping disentangle the complexity of the project of turning cancer into a deadly disease into a manageable one....more
I think Neil Shubin is a fairly talented science writer, but this is another excellent example of science communication that would benefit from concisI think Neil Shubin is a fairly talented science writer, but this is another excellent example of science communication that would benefit from concision. In other words, a book length treatment of this issue at the level of rigor appropriate for public consumption is not warranted. It is largely remedial earth science for those who forgot or missed primary school lessons. These are basic things everyone should know, but I think Shubin's talents are wasted on such an effort and that a book is unlikely to be the best format to deliver these points.
The central point is there is a shared and continuous history among matter in our universe. This is a very basic insight, the law of conservation of energy/mass. We also are treated to the ways this understanding has been demonstrated across various scientific disciplines. It was a fine refresher on these topics mixed with some interesting asides (e.g Camp Century - the Cold War military base in an arctic ice sheet), but I often felt my attention slipping....more
Carney, author of Alienated America and former mainstay guest of Left, Right, and Center, providea a comprehensive assessment of the inputs on family Carney, author of Alienated America and former mainstay guest of Left, Right, and Center, providea a comprehensive assessment of the inputs on family formation and operation. He pairs specialist interviews and representative profiles, including much of his own experiences, with high-level data snapshots from relevant sociology. Carney's approach isn't formalized or completely academic but still gives scientific-minded readers something to hang on to. There are also some mildly polemical aspects of the book that will ruffle some feathers, especially those with strong Progressive beliefs or even libertarian/classically liberal ones. However, Carney is pretty careful distinguishing between what his pro-family vision is versus what data say about family trends.
There are some limitations to this approach given that the nuclear family has been such a deeply entrenched institution and there are so many reciprocal determinants and effects. It's hard to evaluate family structure in a straightforward way. This is a challenge with many sociological variables though so I don't think it's reasonable to hold against the claims.
The book's animating question is one that is increasingly on the minds of sociopolitical commentators: why has parenting become increasingly challenging? There are relevant correlations too. Why has children's happiness declined compared to previous generations? Why have families gotten smaller?
In Carney's view, one that echoes memes in our increasingly online discourse, parenting appears more daunting to young prospective parents. Additionally, it seems that these Millennials and Generation Z are less equipped to handle this increased challenge . The reasons, as hinted above, are complex, involving material and cultural factors.
While financial hurdles and personal ambitions are often cited, Carney acknowledges that children have always been costly, and self-interest is likely not dramatically different across generations (though psychologists like Jean Twenge have argued just that). If we accept that these common narratives are marginal, what has actually shifted? For Carney and many other thoughtful conservatives, the answer lies in the culture. Today's societal norms are less supportive of parenting than they once were and the social enforcement mechanisms that encouraged family formation and stability have withered. Reflecting on childhood's recent past (Gen X and old Millennials), we recall a time of less surveillance and greater communal obligation and connection. Essentially, markers of local and global social trust have careened down a steep declivity.
Modern parenting is distinctly more Hobbessian, characterized by an intense focus on supervision and development. Children are expected to be constantly nurtured, amused, educated, organized, and indoctrinated into roles of mini-activists, influencers, and workers. Carney suggests a return to the essence of traditional parenting. It's essential to provide children with the freedom to experience both setbacks and triumphs, to embark on adventures, acquire serendipitous wisdom, and relish in unstructured moments.
This entails breaking free from the constraints of competitive youth sports, moving away from overprotective parenting, fortifying community bonds, transforming the workplace, and, most importantly, reaffirming our conviction in the inherent goodness of people, regardless of age.
Carney also focuses on the decline in birth rates and the apparent rise in anxiety and depression among youth. He essentially accepts Jon Haidt's narrative on this front, which is that a mixture of overbearing parenting and smartphone mediated socialization is stunting the development of mental defense against depression and anomie. However, Carney is less concerned with intervention against technology and more interested in reworking culture so that family life is pre-eminent. This reworking would includes some governmental programs to incentives family formation. The programs he favors are generally more direct cash grants and approaches that make young men more marriageable and decrease the motherhood penalty.
Through meticulous investigation, both in his journalistic capacity and as a father of six, Carney illustrates the troubled nature of current parenting paradigms. The lofty ideals prescribed for modern American parents are not only impractical but also pave the way for failure for both parents and their children....more
Combine this book with Ethan Mollick's Substack for great practical insights into the latest AI technologies.
Co-Intelligence is a pretty balanced andCombine this book with Ethan Mollick's Substack for great practical insights into the latest AI technologies.
Co-Intelligence is a pretty balanced and comprehensive approach to applying generative AI tools to daily life tasks. He explores how to leverage genAI as a creative, coworker, tutor, and coach. For those familiar with the latest LLMs like GTP4, Claude, or Gemini, then a lot of this material will be familiar. It may even been too superficial in some ways (which is why I mention going to his Substack), but it is good coverage that everyone needs to know. It is delivered in an easily digestible way too. ...more
This is a competent and comprehensive biography of Susan Sontag. The fact it won a Pulitzer is of course doing yeoman's work for sustaining awareness This is a competent and comprehensive biography of Susan Sontag. The fact it won a Pulitzer is of course doing yeoman's work for sustaining awareness of Sontag. It does somehow feel like this biography is somehow, despite its length, light on Sontag's oeuvre. We learn a lot about the kind of interesting and difficult human being she was and how this persona attracted and repelled many. But I don't feel like Moser presented a great case for why Sontag's ideas still matter or really to what extent her ideas had much to them. In many ways, the value I see in Sontag is in ideas she didn't truly test or follow through with. I think what emerges from the work is that Sontag became an intellectual celebrity persona and that Sontag could be romanticized by observers. She was a prolific and smart writer, but she was one among many. I think some of her perhaps less famous peers are proving more influential like Joan Didion and Camille Paglia.
Alternatively, Sontag is perhaps focused too much on her novels, which to my knowledge no one really reads anymore. As discussed above, we get a great deal about the distance or lack thereof between her ideas, her persona and her person. This is all interesting in a human interest sort of way, but given that she's a purported intellect and prolific writer I wanted more about that and less about Sontag's histrionic and messy personal and social life.
Now, maybe I am to blame for my reaction. I am not well read in her work apart from Against Interpretation and the other essays in that collection, such as "Notes on Camp." I thought this was an erudite collection with some decent ideas. She was clearly an original thinker in that she wasn't just swept into the fads of her time aesthetically. The converse was the story with her politics. I think much of this issue with Sontag is she was a clearly talented female intellectual who was romanticized, toasted, and celebrated because she embraced radical postures. This inspired many. It was kind of like an Obama phenomenon (using this analogy so Millennials and younger people understand). That sort of thing isn't titillating to me.
Maybe I shouldn't be put-off by the biography's partial celebration of Sontag's the great activist and intellectual celebrity. However, the books itself also goes on to be honest about the fact that Sontag's politics were mostly hollow, which undercuts a lot of what she was celebrated (and hated) for. Plus, I think this exaggerates Sontag's influence/impact with Americans. I'm quite wired into a diverse set of intellectual and mainstream discourses and Sontag's influence today seems minimal at best. I checked Google Ngram against similar writer (Susan Sontag,Gloria Steinem,Andrea Dworkin,Joan Didion,Margaret Atwood,Rachel Carson,Toni Morrison,Camille Paglia) and she is outperforming everyone but Carson and Morrison over most of the 20th and 21st century but the overall level of interest in any of these writer is marginal (for instance they're all pwned by a figure like JK Rowling). It is understandable for Moser to want to place Sontag at the center of important movements and ideas of the 20th century and in some ways she was and in other ways she seems more swept up into these changes as a smart observer.
After finishing the biography, I still don't know if Sontag is actually emblematic of the many things happening in post-war American culture or if she was just a clever gadfly? I am not sure she's left much of a mark on aesthetics or sociocultural ideas. Apart from naming and defining "camp" what will we remember Sontag for?...more
I strongly recommend this book. It is an accessible and engaging tour of Bayesian probability theory. The book balances conceptual exposition, breezy I strongly recommend this book. It is an accessible and engaging tour of Bayesian probability theory. The book balances conceptual exposition, breezy intellectual history, and practical applications. The meat of the work concerns two domains ripe for a Bayes' revolution: research science and real-world decision-making/discourse. There is also a special coda about how the brain itself may be a Bayesian agent.
This is a collection of Zadie Smith's marginalia yet because Smith is a living legend the collection is excellent. I've read my fair share of Smith (WThis is a collection of Zadie Smith's marginalia yet because Smith is a living legend the collection is excellent. I've read my fair share of Smith (White Teeth, The Autograph Man, The Fraud, and various non-fiction), and I've come to feel that I enjoy her work because of her generosity and introspective honesty sans confessional trappings. She is beset by a palpable insecurity of sorts that is somewhat mystifying given her accomplishment, but it makes sense given the trajectory of her career. She skyrocketed to literary stardom in her early 20s but some of the top critics flayed her (James Wood).
This essay is notable for foregrounding Smith's social commentary - coming during a political contentious time for her milieu. To me, she comes across to me how I think more left-liberal artist should present - high in openness whether that is to new experiences, knowledge, or inquiry; committed to a meliorist view of justice and progress regardless of the seeming urgency of any given issue; and reasonable about the constraints in place because of human nature. She is an aesthete not an activist. She is free of dogma. It demonstrates an admirable bravery on her part and true commitment to her work given the context.
I was a bit surprised by some of the content that made it into the collection including the careful profiles of Key and Peele and Jay-Z and the piece on the Justin Bieber fandom. Those pieces felt perhaps a bit too much like an attempt to be Didionesque (see Didion's essay on John Wayne) with more a PoMo angle. Nonetheless, those pieces will be dessert to most readers - I have to concede that I enjoyed them . The clear standout piece is the essay on Joy - it's an appropriate capstone on the collection....more
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