Not my favorite, but amusing

Not McEwan's best. But entertaining.

As elitists go, pretty funny and somewhat astute.

FIFA and the IOC are both spectacularly corrupt, but is there consensus on the question of which of the two is more corrupt?

THE CHUTZPAH. And lol at finding a synonym for “living.”

Well, I can't say I expected a very deep run of this particular Dutch team...but not again on penalties.

As philosophy rushes to claim expertise on AI, AI companies rush to control the philosophical narrative. Unlike other disciplines, philosophy has no standards for reporting conflicts of interest. This petition endeavors to change that: docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...

Write a critical AI book, and you become everyone's confessor for their AI sins. People in my life keep telling me about their guilty AI pleasures, in search of an explanation, absolution or condemnation: us.macmillan.com/books/978037... 1/

Lol. Theft repaid by theft

The more POTUS trashes US institutions, the more US intellectual grifters trash the European lifestyle.

On Humphreys opacity, Reverse Engineering, and Social Externalities of LLMs. Shout to @drnickcowen.bsky.social open.substack.com/pub/digressi...

StS scholarship and mid twentieth century conservative political theory agree on the significance of tacit knowledge.

On Humphreys opacity, Reverse Engineering, and Social Externalities of LLMs. Shout to @drnickcowen.bsky.social open.substack.com/pub/digressi...

Real utilitarianism hasn't been tried!

I have a draft paper on Utopianism that combines a quirky interpretation of the Republic and Ursula Le Guin. With a taxonomy of different kinds of modeling I tie them together. If you are expert on any of these topics, I would love to have your comments on a draft that I am circulating.

On the Utopianism and Federalism of Le Guin, More, and Plato's Republic open.substack.com/pub/digressi...

On Istvan Hont on Smith as a follower of Locke. open.substack.com/pub/digressi...

It's funny that relativism finally got defeated by a hand-picked committee.

On Pocock and the Myth of Locke (liberalism and all that) open.substack.com/pub/digressi...

On Pocock and the Myth of Locke (liberalism and all that) open.substack.com/pub/digressi...

On The Advertisement of Hume's Treatise with a trail of rich crumbs leading to Montesquieu, and a translation of Bayle (of course). open.substack.com/pub/digressi...

Fits my priors, so: yes

Is subjective bayesianism a source of relativism in the academy?

On The Advertisement of Hume's Treatise with a trail of rich crumbs leading to Montesquieu, and a translation of Bayle (of course). open.substack.com/pub/digressi...

Had anyone ever sorted out the following: Spinoza’s ethics and the political treatise were published together. We know ethics generated nearly immediate criticisms and commentary. Do we know if anyone engaged with the PT in the first century and a quarter after publication?

We all know that senior management of the UK's universities are struggling with an impossible financial situation imposed by the government. But the way they have been handling this situation has also shown that the sector is led by some really callous & horrible people.

Which started with the publication of Spinoza’s posthumous works

Agreed. It was the reality principle overwhelming bs. It was incredibly gratifying and I am actually well to the right of the carnapian

One of the nicer arguments for socialism in its communitarian sensibilities (over induvidualist competitors) is that sports teams that win in virtue of their team spirit are really beloved in joy making ways that teams that win because they have a superstar/goat are not.* 1/2

I really like the way that insofar as there is a distinctive aesthetic associated with British democracy it is photos of people counting votes in dreary sports halls and of winning candidates flanked by idiots in fancy dress.

Spinoza, the Self-Constraints of Elites, and the Origins of State Capacity Liberalism open.substack.com/pub/digressi...

Spinoza, the Self-Constraints of Elites, and the Origins of State Capacity Liberalism open.substack.com/pub/digressi...

I gave a public lecture on Voltaire's Candide at Roosevelt earlier in the year! Followed by Chinese food with the students (not on tape). youtu.be/tI0haq7UlHw?...

That's a feature not a bug

On The Governance of LLMs, and the University open.substack.com/pub/digressi... With a shout out to @agnescallard.bsky.social and Carlo Cardasco

On The Governance of LLMs, and the University open.substack.com/pub/digressi... With a shout out to @agnescallard.bsky.social and Carlo Cardasco

"A man chooses, a slave obeys!" I scream at Microsoft word, as it once again refuses to just nudge a picture an inch to the right without changing anything else in the document.

Hume on Samuel Clarke, a reconsideration. open.substack.com/pub/digressi...

On The Pre-History of State-Capacity Liberalism (Neoliberalism is dead; Long live Neoliberalism!, pt 4.) open.substack.com/pub/digressi...

On The Pre-History of State-Capacity Liberalism (Neoliberalism is dead; Long live Neoliberalism!, pt 4.) open.substack.com/pub/digressi...

wow, just…wow This reminds me of that scene in The Big Short when Steve Eisman asks, “Why are they confessing?” and Vinny Daniel says, “They’re not. They’re bragging.”

Incitement to violence is not protected by freedom of speech, unless it is by the owner of the network.

Is there anything more awkward than being asked to comment on an erudite scholarly paper that cites a massive literature competently, even with verve, but somehow has missed the dozen (or so) papers on the same topic by the commentator? #maybespeakinginthirdperson