LATEST BLOG POSTS

This week I finished: Seven Brief Lessons on Physics, by Carlo Rovelli: I didn’t know when I borrowed this book that it was an international bestseller with over 13,000 online reviews. I only knew it was short and on a topic I loved. I was indulging in an old passion I haven’t indulged in for decades. The early stuff about relativity and quantum I had studied. Some later theoretical stuff[…] Keep reading →

I ate lunch at a restaurant with a friend yesterday. Lunch was great because of the company. The salad that came with it was covered in oil. I used to dislike vegetables. I covered them in dressing. I was partial to Italian, but ranch or French would do. I didn’t know any better. The dressings came pre-made in bottles, full of flavor. By contrast, the vegetables tasted bland. I’m talking[…] Keep reading →

About twenty-four hours after giving blood, while chopping collard greens, I chopped a bit off my finger. Sorry if it’s gross for you, but it reminds me of something I learned when I dated a woman who was a chef: if you cook enough, you cut and burn yourself. I don’t know if this picture captures it. I took it today, about twenty-four hours after cutting it. I should have[…] Keep reading →

I like the idea that if I create something, you and I agree on a price, and we exchange your cash for my product then we mutually benefit. The more I sell to people voluntarily choosing to buy what I made, the more mutual benefit I create. What if to make my product, I harm someone? For example, if in my manufacturing process, I save money by dumping mercury in[…] Keep reading →

I gave blood today. The medical system never ceases to shock me with its needless waste, senseless rules ostensibly based in safety but clearly not, and mindlessly following those rules without question. For context, I met an NYU researcher, Cassandra Thiel, who researched and published on comparing an operation performed in two hospitals, one in the UK, the other in India. The Indian hospital impacted the environment five percent—that is,[…] Keep reading →

People jump to treating our environmental problems as rooted in science, therefore they look for solutions from scientists. I’m seeing the problem more as social than scientific in the following way. First, I want to clarify that understanding the mechanisms by which Earth’s ecosystems are changed depend on science. I’m not challenging that we understand the mechanisms through observation, experiment, debate, and the other tools of science. When I pollute[…] Keep reading →

Our culture increasingly isolates and addicts us: doof, binge-TV, social media, online gambling, and so on. We associate the most serious addiction with hard drugs, but they are just a prominent case of our culture overall. I’m not writing this post about people addicted to hard drugs. I’m writing it about modern culture. I found this fentanyl testing and overdose treatment kit while picking up litter in Washington Square Park.[…] Keep reading →