Category: philosophy
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politics and anti-politics
The cluster of wars in Great Britain and Ireland between 1639 and 1660 are often called “civil wars,” because they were fought by subjects of Charles I in the Kingdoms of England, Scotland, and Ireland. I prefer the more poetical title, Wars of the Three Kingdoms. But I also think of them, though no one…
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Framework for Creator’s Outputs
Creation takes many forms. Being able to see those forms accurately and arrange them in a way that makes it clear is important. Mechanization didn’t make this less important, but it did integrate better into the world because what it created it remained atoms. Computation does not integrate into the world because what it creates…
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the eight factories every city needs to build before it’s too late
When we talk about climate, collapse, or resilience, we usually end up in the same cul-de-sac: we need better leaders, better policies, better apps. But we don’t. What we urgently need is physical infrastructure that lasts. Infrastructure we can control, repair, and replicate. Not another app. Not another subsidy. Not another committee hearing on “resilience.”…
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another thought exercise
Previously, I talked about how much money a billionaire could spend and have it feel like a normal person buying a cup of coffee by setting up a thought exercise: on the day you were born, you’re handed a trust fund designed to run out the day you died, 100 years later. Every day of…
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every state should do these three things to survive the coming dystopia
The Federal government is paralyzed by ideology, bloated with corruption, and increasingly unable or unwilling to deliver basic functions. The collapse of federal coherence has forced states to become sovereign in everything but currency. That’s a longer conversation. But for states now forced to confront real-world crises dumped at their doorstep by federal abdication, it…
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Dancing at Dream’s Denouement
It is Independence Day, 2025. I don’t really have much to say that I didn’t say last year.
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Governing AI Is the Least of Our Problems
This week I attended the Seattle University Ethics & Tech Conference; a half-day affair with a focus on “the legal and political frameworks shaping AI governance”. Just the kind of boundary spanning problem that I love to sink my teeth into. Easily the best conference of the year you didn’t attend. For me, it felt…
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Why does the Japanese national land-use zoning system work?
Japan’s cities work in ways that feel almost impossible to replicate in the United States, and much of that difference begins with zoning. The country uses a nationally standardized land-use system that local governments apply without the power to modify. This top-down simplicity enables dense, walkable communities where homes, businesses, shrines, schools, and even light…
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Psychic morphine and the scourge of artificial nostalgia
The morning of January 20, 1961 was cold but clear in Washington, D.C.. The temperature began in the teens and never rose much higher. There is something telling in the fact that the United States installs its head of state not in the bloom of spring or the harvest of fall, but in the dead…
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War Never Changes
“War Never Changes” the tag-line for the Fallout videogame franchise. Within that fictional world, it means that even when countries and governments blow each other off the map, a brute with a club is still more powerful than a mayor with a plan. The player is invited to bash skulls just as much (or more)…