Conscious acquisition of core values and adoption of first-principles changes the nature of relationship to the things. Which of your core values did you actually chose? Which ones do you carry inherited from the cult and culture of latent and ambient environment? The chosen ones are more defensible. The inherited ones are performative and signaled.

The thing about bringing back lapsed Catholics, is you will get all kinds of heretics. Careful what you wish for. The tent has to fit all kinds. Especially ones who paid attention at Mass, even if it was in English, and will tolerate Latin, but are interested in bigger things than the minuscule ecclesiastical bullshit […]

America First was a public confession by the lonely, isolated, and fearful of being forgotten. Afraid that history would not remember them. Terrified of leaving no memorable legacy. Individuals memoryholed because they were cowardly, creepy weirdos. It meant “America Alone”—the whole time. The loneliness epidemic has gone viral across wide swaths of people in various […]

Or, why doing the research and citing your work may still not be enough. Ask Claudine Gay. “Fake news” started as one thing (i.e. a factually incorrect piece of journalism) and morphed into something else (i.e. correct information which frames the subject negatively). Leveling the accusation that someone had spread “fake news” was a serious charge, which reflected sourcing […]

James Madison wrote Federalist No. 10, published November 22, 1787, to defend the U.S. Constitution by arguing that a large republic could control factions better than small democracies. Parties are Factions Factions—defined as groups united by passion or interest adverse to others’ rights—arise inevitably as a symptom of the human condition, property, and opinions. Extend […]

MYTH: if you think hard, bad things will happen to you. FACT: your soul goes marching on. The meme in this Noah Smith’s piece says it all: it’s congregationalism all the way down. John Brown looked into the moral abyss around him. The abyss looked back. It made him a little crazy. Rampant, pervasive dehumanization of adults and […]

At Luxor there is some writing carved fifteen or so feet up a stone wall at the Temple of Karnak. From the time when Alexander the Great conquered Egypt, it says: “Alexander was the child of Amen, the god of all the gods, the one who was so great that even to this day we […]