This Substack is big and unusually varied. I make no claims to be a good thinker or writer, but it is undeniable that I write a lot on a lot of different subjects. Perhaps you might think the food is terrible but at least the portions aren’t small. I am very mindful though that this month I have only managed to write five articles, with perhaps the possibility of one more before the end of the month, making only 6 at best. The usual goal is 8 a month, 2 per week, minimum. I fear I may be running out of ideas, something that happens periodically.
But I have had so many ideas, and regardless of whether they are good ideas or bad ideas, I do not shepherd them responsibly. The general pattern is that I have an idea and I write about it, fling it into the universe alone, and then often don’t think about it again. I’ve decided to take this dry spell as an opportunity to do better, go back through my previous writing, and try to ‘draw out’ elements of ideas that weren’t adequately spelled out.
The posts I am considering revisiting are listed below. Some- maybe even most- might not ultimately be included. The large majority of my lovely readers have never read the large majority of items on my list, since the blog has been growing quite quickly. If you would like anything else included, let me know. I am planning on approximately reverse chronological order as per the list below.
I would like your suggestions of topics, matters, aspects etc. to cover.
Existential tragedies, a partial list
Should you care about that issue?
Deadwater (poem) maybe with some other selected poems
For communism and against foreclosure on the future
Recent advances in Natural Language Processing- Some Woolly speculations
GDP undervalues government services
Informal musings on the self-organisation of authoritarianism
The paradox of high expectations: The more you demand, the less you get
Technological unemployment isn’t the point
Yvne
Carving up the philosophical terrain around personal identity a little differently
The effects of Kaldor-Hicks improvements in an oligarchical society
The paradox of the crowd
Movements are always a distorted lens on the ideas they embody
300 Arguments, a commentary
Brief Reflections, 1
A brief argument for materialism about power
What are relative income effects
The origins of religion & OCD
Meeting Nietzsche at the limits of rationality and the limits of Analytic Philosophy
Autopsy on a dream
A Katana, an iron bar and prison
The nasty side of my leftism
The eighth day of Klaug
Utilitarianism is an egalitarianism
A change in how we've thought about the afterlife, and what it might mean
The Mystery of Love
I’m not particularly worried about confirmation bias PLUS Four parts of belief PLUS Rationalism and social rationalism
An agnostic philosopher considers God, the limits of reason, and universalism
Granting textual authority to overcome textual tyranny
Does anyone really respect democracy?
Just three dumb guy thoughts I had
Why don't people often try to earnestly persuade others of their political views on the internet?
Hypotheticals
Confessions: A psychological and intellectual autobiography
The AI Control Problem in a wider intellectual context
The greatest potential for censorship is in the algorithm, not in the bans
The Problem of Simulator Evil
Government Watch: An idea for an NGO
Miscellaneous thoughts on the right wing of politics
A theory
Just read the Damn Book of All Hours- my (losing) entry for Scott Alexander's book review contest
Regarding Blake Lemoine's claim that LaMDA is 'sentient', he might be right (sorta), but perhaps not for the reasons he thinks
A brief reply to Scott Aaronson's- "We Are the God of the Gaps"
A thought experiment on retributive punishment and why it's bad
Compensatory concealment: or why good things are generally better than they appear to be and bad things are generally worse than they appear to be.
Two Pieces: A 'Commentary' on the Oldest Systematic Program of German idealism & A Discussion on the Meaning of Life
The unknown face and flow of wanting: Theses on the philosophy of desire
Only God can judge Kanye West: refusing the spectacle of judgement and judgement of the spectacle AND The spectacle of judgment
We are the parasite- a decelerationist creed
The ethical work pay gap
Total forgiveness
A list of the problems we face on the left AND A list of the reasons for the Anglophone left to be optimistic
SBF, FTX, EA & LT: my reflections and asking some tough questions about effective alturism and power
The tragedy of the artistic intellect and artificial intellect
The king and his wicked advisors
Social media outrage is driven by something like a base rates fallacy
Perhaps I'm crazy, but I'm not wrong: all 18 year old's should have six votes
Aesthetics, morality, the past and the future: reflections
Big hopes, humble hearts: How should the philosopher see themself?
Time compression
Miscellaneous thoughts about the future
Under heaven's eyes: For the dignity of consequentialism
Brief reflections on quantum theology: The Many Worlds Interpretation and Abrahamic religions
You are not entitled to feel proud of your ancestors
On the right to steal for dignity and the preservation of life
The tragic quality of wonder in a competitive attention economy
How to cleave the right in two
Many worlds and the solution to the Sleeping beauty problem
Pathological fear is, in a real sense, cancer
Metaethics moulds morality in the real world: some cases
A simple reason to think traditional decision theory has an optimism bias
Mitigation, not free will
Concentric circles of morality
A general argument for the left
The Green Eyed Monster: Philosophical and political notes on envy
Has Bayesianism made traditional epistemology obsolete?
The cupboards of perfection
The view from utopia
The Room & Matt Christman
Statistics, Shakespeare and Sam Bankman-Fried
Gaza
Behold the dreamer
I have a question for those supporting Israel's actions
Against the Rowling Roll
Inadmissable knowledge: Introducing a concept
Waking up on the 14/11/2023 with OCD
A particular type of man
Agency, structure, love and moralism
A brief comment on the political pathologies of timidity
But what makes the barnacles stick to the whale?
Moral Breadth
Organic & compositus belief
Introducing cogiatics
Most general advice is bad: A conjecture
You are a blind idiot God
The Food Pile Guard who could not know: a tragedy
We should protect privacy because it lets people get away with crime and other wrongdoings
The "privacy paradox" and what privacy discourse misses plus other notes on privacy
Limerence and the divine
Laws are silent in unjust war: Student protests for Palestine and the original fantasy of liberalism
Advice to a frustrated leftist intellectual
Reflections on discovering someone I know did something awful
A king, two vizziers and a courtier: Abstract reflections on the debate AND a defense of voting in hell
Create worlds unto others as you would have created unto you: A speculative ethics and metacosmology
Queen Trump
Parelthonology and the victory of love over history
Affirmative action must be comprehensive because otherwise it disproportionately comes at the expense of those with hidden disadvantages
Holly Lawford-Smith visits the University of Sydney: Anatomy of a controversial talk on feminism and the right
Notes on punishment
Longtermism versus the poor and vulnerable? Or, how we can rise to the height of our halo.
An accounting of agonies PLUS An inequality metric for comparing societies on suffering input-output
PLUS: THE MANY NOTES OF MANY THINGS to take a format to be decided
In addition to putting out revised editions, I have another project I’m working on. It combines 1. A theory of what the left could look like rooted in its very first appearances. 2. A study of Gregory of Nyssa. 3. An investigation of the desire for heroism. 4. An argument that certain aspects of common legal systems represent slavery [but not in a sovereign citizen kind of way]. 5. An argument that the left in its broadest sense is, was and always will be a movement against slavery. It’s big and disorganized. we’ll see what happens.
When I read this I thought of you and wanted to read your take on it, just sayin': https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/your-book-review-progress-and-poverty