Category: Link Library
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Always beware a declining superpower
Good post from Janan Ganesh at the Financial Times on how superpowers take decline (not well) and how the U.S. decline can’t really compared to Britain or France’s power decline after WW2 because that transfer was from West to West and demographically pretty similar, while this one would not be. He also says we’ve been…
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More Lawfare
“Lawfare is the hallmark of a failing state because it erodes not just political independence, but the capacity for independent judgment.” Probably not good. https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/01/chairman-powells-statement.html#comments
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U.S. interventions in the New World, with leader removal
https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/01/u-s-interventions-in-the-new-world-with-leader-removal.html The Venezuala thing is a great Bayesian opportunity: Have a prior, update as it develops. The prior would be, Yeah seems like this never works. Though, in Tyler’s recounting above, there are some counterfactuals to that common expression/belief. I couldn’t coherently speak through them, but nonetheless. I’m of two minds on this as it…
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A meme to make sense of things
Watched this and immediately understood it. That COVID “ended” is sort of a misdirection. Or, it’s not the full expression of what we mean by COVID. Not for me anyways. “everything changed” – yeah, it did
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How the Phone Ban Saved High School
It’s probably common knowledge at this point that a lot of the youth’s troubles come from The Phones. As much as Marc Andreessen and others say it can’t be, look at the charts, it’s at least got something to do with it. I read this short article – with quite a strange and abrupt ending…
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K-12 Education Spending
There is very little more essential to a free society than universal literacy and adequate public education. It is a civil rights issue. It is the foundation for absolutely everything else. To fail here is to lastingly abandon a significant fraction of our children to a lifelong struggle. Quote is from The Argument’s post in…
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On reading
Found this interesting. I don’t check as many books out from the library because they feel impermanent that way.
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World War AI
https://www.epsilontheory.com/world-war-ai
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How to Understand Things
An essay from pandemic times. Which has some uncomfortable realities in it. Mainly, good thinking requires more focus, more curiosity, less concern about what others think, and so on. https://substack.com/home/post/p-111014900 People who have not experienced the thing are unlikely to be generating truth. More likely, they’re resurfacing cached thoughts and narratives. Reading popular science books…
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Confidently Wrong
Uh oh. This spells trouble for the staunchly, and always, anti-expert crowd. Most of them are on Twitter and host podcasts (of which I listen to). Most importantly on this issue: The authors suggest leaning on social norms and respected community figures instead.