Tuesday, March 3, 2026
Questions not asked..............
An interesting study on the Labor Force in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts was published last month. It was noted that, in the past five years, there was an out-migration, with 182,000 "net domestic residents" leaving the Commonwealth. Judging from the study, this is a problem.
As far as I can tell, they never asked the question: why did they leave? It's a puzzle.
From your lips...................
Our national debt is just shy of 100% of GDP ($31 trillion), but we are not on the brink of a fiscal abyss. On the contrary, it is not unreasonable to think that Congress can manage some degree of spending control, and it is not the case that the economy faces a crushing burden of debt in any event, as Chart #13 shows. The true burden of debt is not the size of our national debt, but the cost of servicing that debt as a percent of our national income. Today that burden is significantly less than it was during the 1980s, mainly because interest rates are far lower than they were back then. If Congress exercises even modest restraint and the Fed doesn't have to raise interest rates (which they won't have to if inflation remains under control), then we can gradually reduce our deficits and the burden of our debt
All things considered, things don't look so bad at all!
-Calafia Beach Pundit, from this chart-filled post
What the World needs now................
The algorithms are designed to keep us as “users,” but the world needs us to be creators. When we move from being passive consumers to active curators, we learn better and build a body of work that matters.
A Great Reset.......................?
If there is a common theme running though the actions of the US in the past year, it is fighting back against the institutions, governments, and entities which want to undermine capitalism. That would be a really Great Reset.
-Brian S. Wesbury, from this post
Fun with science..................
APOD offers the difference between mid-infrared (Webb) and ultraviolet (Hubble). If you go to the site, you will be offered both a better description and the ability to toggle between the two views. Much fun.
Foggy...................
Forecasting the length and severity of war always seems easier with the benefit of hindsight, just like it is with markets.
-Ben Carlson, from this post
Applies to grandparenting as well......
Being a parent, Johnson insisted, isn’t about nobility or beauty, pride or pleasure. Rather, it is “the simple, nerve-wracking, mindless, battering-ram process of trying to teach a savage to use a fork.”
-Daniel Smith, from here
Monday, March 2, 2026
A whole lot of projecting going on........
We have no historically successful roadmap to go by, and in a sense this may be a situation like Hayek's critique of government planning -- that a perfect roadmap cannot exist because we don't understand the mass of individuals we are "liberating", or even how they define "liberated', or even if they really want to be "liberated." As all of us humans do, we project our own preferences and outlooks and assumptions on people where they may well not fit at all.
-Warren Meyer, thinking a bit about Iran
Simple......................
Simple and shallow sound the same until you ask the second question. The person who earned their simplicity can go ten levels deep when challenged. The person who skipped the work falls apart at level two.
-Shane Parrish, from this episode
A nonzero chance...........
I don’t want to get sidetracked here, but I think there’s a nonzero chance that AI never gets much better than humans at most of the things that humans were better than computers at in 2021.
-Noah Smith, contemplating world domination
On intentional scheduling...............
Here’s the standard interpretation of this result: Social media is distracting, and if you’re distracted, it becomes harder to maintain control over your schedule. So, the more you use social media, the worse you become at time management.
But I’ve become interested in the reverse form of this argument: the better your planning system, the less time you’ll spend on engagement-based applications like social media.
-Cal Newport, as posted here
On big, shiny ideas..............
If you find yourself wondering how no one has thought of this before, that’s a warning sign. Chances are, there’s a quiet graveyard of leaders who learned something expensive that you haven’t yet uncovered. Go talk to them.
I’m pro-innovation. I believe in big ideas. But I’m skeptical of shiny ones—too clean, too theoretical, too detached from human realities. The best strategies are forged in constraint, humility, and patience. They’re honest about how many variables they’re trying to solve at once.
-Mike Sharrow, from here
Sunday, March 1, 2026
Truth....................
...............war is a runaway train and we just don't know where it will take us.
Life its ownself...................
....................with a friend called Fish.
I know intelligence when I see it. I’d recognize a Bigfoot, too, on sight, because it’s about as rare.
Thursday, February 26, 2026
prolong and multiply.............
To be happy at home is the end of all human endeavor. The sun looks down on nothing half so good as a household laughing together over a meal, or two friends talking over a pint of beer, or a person alone reading a book that interests them; and all economics, politics, laws, armies, and institutions, are only valuable in so far as they prolong and multiply such scenes.
-C. S. Lewis, as culled from here
downstream......................
And that’s the funny thing: so many of our problems aren't even the actual problem. They are the downstream effect of some deeper, unseen problem. And the work to actually fix the problem usually has way less to do with fixing and way more with simply learning how to see it clearly in the first place.
-Mark Manson, from this episode
Wednesday, February 25, 2026
cognitive patience.......................
...............apparently, we are losing it:
. . . which is defined as the “ability to [maintain] focused and sustained attention and delay gratification, while refraining from multitasking.”
On deciding...............
When you can’t decide, ask yourself: Which option minimizes future regrets?
Then do that.
-Mark Manson, from here
Two humilities...........
Western civilization, it seems to me, stands by two great heritages. One is the scientific spirit of adventure—the adventure into the unknown, an unknown which must be recognized as being unknown in order to be explored; the demand that the unanswerable mysteries of the universe remain unanswered; the attitude that all is uncertain; to summarize it—the humility of the intellect. The other great heritage is Christian ethics—the basis of action on love, the brotherhood of all men, the value of the individual—the humility of the spirit.
These two heritages are logically, thoroughly consistent. But logic is not all; one needs one's heart to follow an idea. If people are going back to religion, what are they going back to? Is the modern church a place to give comfort to a man who doubts God‑more, one who disbelieves in God? Is the modern church a place to give comfort and encouragement to the value of such doubts? So far, have we not drawn strength and comfort to maintain the one or the other of these consistent heritages in a way which attacks the values of the other? Is this unavoidable? How can we draw inspiration to support these two pillars of western civilization so that they may stand together in full vigor, mutually unafraid? Is this not the central problem of our time?
-Richard Feynman, from this talk
Sounds about right...........
Die Welt des Glücklichen ist eine andere als die des Unglücklichen.
translated as "The world of the happy is quite different from the world of the unhappy."
Or a shared drink................
The important thing is to sit down at the table and talk. Some things are just easier to say across the remains of a shared meal.
Tuesday, February 24, 2026
Sippican Cottage.....................
.................notes the times they are a changing';
. . . there are bound to be lots of casualties from the integration of leviathan computational machines into everyday life. It might not be you directly, but there’s bound to be a lot of collateral damage.
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