Johanna

Is the Controlled Substances Act really responsible for the general decline since 1970? We’re not sure, but what is clear is that drugs are foundational technologies, like the motor, combustion engine, semiconductor, or the concept of an experiment. New drugs lead to scientific revolutions. Some of those drugs, like coffee, continue to fuel fields... See more

If you don't hire originals, you run the risk of people disagreeing but not voicing their dissent. You want people who choose to follow because they genuinely believe in ideas, not because they’re afraid to be punished if they don’t. For startups, there's so much pivoting that’s required that if you have a bunch of sheep, you’re in bad shape.

There’s often an initial apprehension that comes from welcoming a lot of new hires into the fold. But there’s also something deeper. What these comments get at is the sense that there’s a certain “unscalable” spirit from a team’s earlier, scrappier days — and that each new addition represents a slow chipping away at the je ne sais quoi that forged... See more

A model is a simplification which fosters understanding.

If you criticize X to Y, Y wonders whether you criticize him to others as well. This problem can increase to the extent your criticism is biting and on the mark.

By forcing everyone to “earn” a living through a job, not only do we waste people’s time and other resources, but we also damage the environment. Jobs are bad for the environment.

“I think the idea of air taxis is kind of bullshit,” Carlo Ratti, an architect and urban theorist who serves as director of the Senseable City Lab at MIT, told me. “Technology can change many things, but it cannot change physics. Helicopters are loud and expensive and, for most forms of transportation, inconvenient.” As near-silent electric and... See more

A strong UBI would corrupt the division of labor. Making participation in gainful employment functionally optional threatens to unravel the entire system of collective production that sustains society as we know it.