Sublime
An inspiration engine for ideas
I believe that much of today's crime is also a function of space. We cannot pack a dozen young rats in a concrete shoebox without their attacking and killing each other. We cannot pack millions of our young into the concrete boxes of our cities without expecting them to lash out in pain and anger and violence.
GERRY SPENCE • HOW TO ARGUE AND WIN EVERY TIME
The door to jungle hut number 27, where Sam worked, was unlocked, and the receptionist’s desk was vacant. I’d soon be asking Nishad Singh for the same premortem I’d ask of others at the top of their psychiatrist’s org chart: “Imagine we’re in the future and your company has collapsed: tell me how it happened.” “Someone kidnaps Sam,” Nishad would
... See moreMichael Lewis • Going Infinite: The Rise and Fall of a New Tycoon
Weekly Update–Pub Night this Friday!
Editor John Staudenmaier once advised me to devote the most time to trying to understand my villains, who almost by definition were the people whom I least understood. His advice resembled journalists’ practice of trying to give everyone mentioned in a story the chance to comment, even if they cannot shape the story overall.
Zachary Schrag • The Princeton Guide to Historical Research (Skills for Scholars)
in order to enjoy the inestimable benefits which the liberty of the press ensures, it is necessary to submit to the inevitable evils which it engenders.
Alexis de Tocqueville • Democracy in America, Volume I and II (Optimized for Kindle)
One measure of the career of Robert Moses is longevity. His power was measured in decades. On April 18, 1924, ten years after he had entered government, it was formally handed to him. For forty-four years thereafter—until the day in 1968 when he realized that he had either misunderstood Nelson Rockefeller or had been cheated by him and, in either
... See moreRobert A. Caro • The Power Broker
the theories of jurisprudence, of absolute and relative justice, of intimidation, utility, and the
Enrico Ferri • Criminal Sociology
Mill held that truth emerges from an unfettered competition of ideas and that individual character is most improved when allowed to find its own way uncoerced. That vision was insufficient for 20th-century American liberalism.
Charles Krauthammer • Things That Matter: Three Decades of Passions, Pastimes and Politics
when you see a movie where the good guy is “off book”, “gone rogue”, you should understand this not as a lack of permission but as the highest sanction for action: you still have all of the physical risk but now are above all laws, you don't work for the government, you work for the very idea of government, do what you have to, go crazy.