Although I’m generally aligned with longtermism, this essay in Aeon points out important (if slightly hyperbolic) tradeoffs that have to be considered. As with so many things, we need to find ways to fix today’s problems while also keeping an eye on the future
Microposts
Great weather for apple picking 🍎
Day 23: Lots of meaning to discern when playing Codenames 📷
Murderbot is one of my favourite characters from the past couple of years. So, this origin story from Martha Wells was fun to read
Day 22: Having a rest with friends 📷
Day 21: An impressive space at the foot of a mountain 📷
Day 20: I’m looking forward to resuming winter sports 📷
Day 19: Mirror in a lake 📷
Morning arising 📷
Day 18: Lucy is finished for the day 📷
Day 17: No need for a compass when hiking in the city, just follow the sound of traffic 📷
Day 16: Rotation 📷
Day 15: Ethereal 📷
Day 14: My favourite wheels as a kid 📷
Day 13: Lucy is a couch animal 📷
Day 12: Rock legends 📷
Day 11: Hygge 📷
Day 10: The bridges of my morning run 📷 🏃♂️
Day 9: Swinging through the trees is safe with this gear on 📷
Day 8: A benefit of a twilight run is that the sidewalks are clear 📷
Day 7: Spice 📷
Day 6: Street 📷
Day 5: The toys are watching, always 📷
Although A Desolation Called Peace by Arkady Martine isn’t as remarkable as A Memory Called Empire, I still really enjoyed it. Some of the enjoyment was momentum from the first book. I also liked the mystery of the aliens and the exploration of shared memories and awareness 📚
Day 4: Sharp dressed boy 📷
Day 3: Majority votes are rare in Canada these days 📷
Added this to my “brains are fascinating” note: How memories persist where bodies, and even brains, do not
It seems that a 44-year-old French man had gone to hospital complaining of a mild weakness in his left leg. Doctors learned that the patient ‘had a shunt inserted into his head to drain away hydrocephalus – water on the brain – as an infant. The shunt was removed when he was 14.’ When they scanned his brain, they found a huge fluid-filled chamber occupying most of the space in his skull, leaving little more than a thin sheet of actual brain tissue. The patient, a married father of two children, worked as a civil servant apparently leading a normal life, despite having a cranium filled with spinal fluid and very little brain tissue.
Day 2: Lightning up the Dark 📷
Day 1: Touch 📷
Fathoms by Rebecca Giggs is about so much more than whales. Beautifully written, Giggs uses whales to talk through society, culture, environmentalism, evolution, and history, along with lots of good natural history on whales📚