Oho! You thought I wouldn’t make it with a digest post this weekend yet again, didn’t you! Well here we are. I’m not dead yet.
This Week’s Posts
Monday, July 3rd - AI, Ozymandias
I think the current level of AI hype falls down the same rabbit hole so many human endeavors have, and for much the same reasons. Humanity, thy name is hubris.
Wednesday, July 5th - The Purpose of College, My Dear Glaucon…
A mock Socratic dialogue about college, elite admissions, and what both are for.
Saturday, July 8th - There is No Such Thing as an Identity (subscriber only)
Political trends trick us into seeing brotherhood between broad demographic groups. But the only brotherhood that exists is that which we make.
Also, the lively Beloved book club continues.
From the Archives
Song of the Week
Non-Garbage Online Reading
Kyle Chayka makes sense on Threads and other Twitter imitators - the problems with social media are endemic to forcing too many people with too many personal differences into the same room.
Book Recommendation
Birth of the Cool, Lewis MacAdams, 2001
Stuffed with incredible stories and unforgettable (and real) human characters, teeming with life and attitude, poised and relentlessly sharp, this book absolutely transported me when I was in college. This is MacAdams’s great exploration of the concept of cool and where it came from. That latter half is much, much more the author’s interest than the first; though MacAdams offers several useful glosses on what “cool” means - “a studied indifference to the vagaries of fate” is as good a gloss as I’ve seen - he’s much more interested in archaeology than etymology. MacAdams explores a variety of prominent figures who have traditionally been considered cool, such as the great jazz instrumentalist Charlie Parker or the avant-garde artist Marcel Duchamp, and pulls out historical stories to situate them in context with a cultural ideal that became overpowering by the time I was alive. You buy this book for the anecdotes (Duchamp’s first meeting with Jackson Pollock is a standout) and there’s many of them. Readers looking for a careful sociological exploration of the concept will come away disappointed. Much like the concept of cool itself, this book is something you lower yourself into and experience rather than try to understand. Beautiful black and white pictures too.
Comment of the Week
We're supposed to accept this definition of diversity as an unassailable social good, but who benefits the most and who pays the most? Among Asian Americans, those who benefit the most are those who get into these schools and have their elite statuses protected by the shield of racial progress. Furthermore, this model of diversity results in an intense intra-racial social competition to be one of the few select elite representatives of your group, to escape the Chinatown Social Ghetto, figuratively speaking. If you're an Asian American with a Harvard degree, you are among these winners, and for your continued social and professional benefit, you're demanding that even a working-class Asian American with absolutely no connections or wealth, and who only has a raggedly old SAT practice test book as a social ladder, to sacrifice themselves for you. And YOU get to be hailed as the enlightened champion of racial progress? - Chris Jesu Lee
That’s it. Domani.
Hey Freddie! Have you halted your calls for subscriber writing? I got one I’m proud of. Maybe I missed that announcement?
Hey Freddie - I know shit is off the rails for you atm. I’m just registering a want for a future time, if you’re willing… would love an article or video about your transition from Brooklynite to suburbanite (?) - are you settled? what’s your favorite thing so far? what, if anything, do you miss? Like that. Mainly I’m nosey 😁