First Derivative [52]
Donald Glover—existential crisis—neoliberalism—Black Panther—Jordan Peterson—Chinese “authoritarianism”—predictive policing—Pinker’s errors—demonic males
first Derivative [52]
March 2, 2018
Dear readers,
It's a year now since I started making these weekly collection of articles and sending them out. We've gone from a few friends and family (thank you Mom, Dad, Austin) to a few degrees of separation.
It's been fun to experiment and play around with what I want fD to be so I've been pretty content with letting it spread word-of-mouth. After a year, I have a better sense of what I want this to be. If you've enjoyed getting these emails, I'd really appreciate if you can help the newsletter reach new people, whether it be by sharing on Facebook, sending a Tweet, or forwarding this email.
As always, I'm very grateful for your time and attention in this crazy world. I hope that fD continues to be a valuable part of your reading and something you can look forward to seeing, once a week, in your inbox. :)
As a last note, I've started a Patreon profile. If you've been reading for a while and enjoyed the content, please consider making a small donation (1 dollar/month) to support fD here.
Cheers,
Teddy
P.S. Any feedback on content, form, etc. is always welcome (just respond to the email).
Donald Glover—existential crisis—neoliberalism—Black Panther—Jordan Peterson—Chinese “authoritarianism”—predictive policing—Pinker’s errors—demonic males
Donald Glover Can’t Save You
by Tad Friend (The New Yorker)
A great and very long profile of Donald Glover,millenial Renaissance man. Thanks to fD reader, Arthur, for the article—TK
The Poison We Pick
by Andrew Sullivan (New York Magazine)
“It may be best to think of this wave therefore not as a function of miserable people turning to drugs en masse but of people who didn’t realize how miserable they were until they found out what life without misery could be.” h/t Arthur — TK
Neoliberalism: The Movement That Dare Not Speak Its Name
by Philip Mirowski (American Affairs)
“For neoliberals, freedom and the market would be treated as identical. Their rallying cry was to remove the foundation of liberty from natural rights or tradition, and reposition it upon an entirely novel theory concerning what a market was, or should be.”
The Tragedy of Erik Killmonger
by Adam Serwer (The Atlantic)
A look at Black Panther’s “villain”. Jelani Cobb also has a nice piece in The New Yorker—TK
Jordan Peterson’s Gosepl of Masculinity
by Kelefa Sanneh (The New Yorker)
A very fair profile of Jordan Peterson—TK
The “Surprise” of Authoritarian Resilience in China
by Wenfang Tang (American Affairs)
Skip the methodology and read the interesting findings—TK
Palantir has secretly been using New Orleans to test its predictive policing technology
by Ali Winston (The Verge)
Steven Pinker is wrong about violence and war
by John Gray (The Guardian)
“Like many others today, Pinker’s response when confronted with such evidence is to define the dark side of the Enlightenment out of existence… it is also true that the power of the modern state has been used for purposes of mass killing”
The Smart Contract Network Effect Fallacy
by Kyle Samani (Brave New Coin)
“If users won’t care about underlying chains, if the tokens are instantly and seamlessly tradeable, if tokens themselves roam across chains, and if network security can be maintained, what avenues of differentiation are left between chains?”
The Behavioral Ecology of Male Violence
by William Buckner (Quillette)
For those interested in the “the problem is broken boys” view—TK
ABOUT fD
fD is a weekly newsletter focusing on signal insights and deep trends in ideas, technology, politics, economics, foreign affairs, culture, philosophy, and more. The goal is to deliver content and analyses that matter beyond the present moment.
I hope you enjoy. Questions and comments always welcome (simply reply to this email)—TK
EPHEMERA
Finally got around to watching The Big Sick (2017) and Logan Lucky (2017). Both great, and free on Amazon Video if you have Prime.