Many aspects of Western civilization are far less functional than they used to be. What went wrong, and how should we respond? My new curriculum (drawn up in collaboration with Samo Burja) aims to answer those questions. Read it and enroll in discussion groups below.

New article on my blog ! How can we solve democracy's limitations without falling into autocracy

I should remind y'all that I view Marxists/Communists as roughly analogous to Neo-Nazis and theocrats. If there's an expectation that I'm supposed to converse with any or all of these people in good faith, w/e ig, but they get a pretty short leash all the same. Surely.

These calculations look like one hell of a ride... #MondayReads

Trying to find where my crux with Rationalists lies. I suspect it's different views of rationality: instrumental truth-tracking within human bounds versus normative coherence under uncertainty.

Well, ain't this a nice perk! #WednesdayReads

I find it disappointing that neither Greeks nor Romans found it in them to depict divinized Truth in their coins, but thankfully we have Emperor Huvishka of the Kushan Empire who has the Zoroastrian Asha Vahishta in this one

Thirty-fifth book of the year finished: Bruce Schumm's Deep Down Things. You can watch a video review of it here: youtu.be/75HZCximmH0

In the new 'things I learned today' series, reading wikipedia's page on the Sursock bronze, I've just become acquainted with the syncretic cult of Jupiter Optimus Maximus Heliopolitanus and its iconography.

Is it just me or is ChatGPT getting better? I've been able to get it to act non-sycophantically and to make good objections to arguments, and to have it instruct me on new stuff in a way that seems... quite effective?

This month's purchases: Lives of the Eminent Philosophers - Diogenes Laertius Proof: The Uncertain Science of Certainty - Adam Kucharski The Blank Slate - Steven Pinker A History of Greece - N. G. L. Hammond The Glass Bead Game - Hermann Hesse