Check your Pulse #26

There are many aspects of life that pull us in opposing directions. We need to be pessimistic enough to prepare for bad outcomes but optimistic enough to undertake new projects. We need to see people both as enmeshed in systems that push them around and as free agents shaping their own lives. It’s vital to be skeptical and ask questions, but also t

Every generation thinks that its successor’s lazy habits of mind will bring on a cultural and intellectual decline.

Since the 1960s, trust in the institutions of modernity has sunk, and the second decade of the 21st century saw the rise of populist movements that blatantly repudiate the ideals of the Enlightenment.1 They are tribalist rather than cosmopolitan, authoritarian rather than democratic, contemptuous of experts rather than respectful of knowledge, and

The truth is that technology will progress against all odds. But not every country will welcome it as an opportunity for further economic development. For a long time, we’ve had good reasons to be worried about Europe. But there are now reasons to question whether the US, too, will make the most of the current transition. Now it’s the entire Wester