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The Gospel of Nature
John Burroughs published Time and Change in 1912. Hewas a well known naturalist, corresponding with Teddy Roosevelt, John Muir and others. He has been largely…
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Nature’s Infinite Book of Secrecy
In nature’s infinite book of secrecyA little I can read.William Shakespeare
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Did You Do Your Best?
Responsibility is a unique concept… You may share it with others, but your portion is not diminished. You may delegate it, but it is still…
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The Battle of the Bulge
To hell with you, ignoble paunch, abhorrent in my sight! I gaze at your rotundity, and savage is my frown. I’ll rub you and I’ll…
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Builds Character
If a person who has not had enough exercise attempts to backpack, then he will find the going difficult. He might think, “I sweat, I…
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No Man Is An Island
No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main John Donne
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The Righteous Mind
I know I’m late to the party, but Jonathan Haidt’s The Righteous Mind, published in 2012, contains some important ideas. Haidt’s assertion that “anyone who values…
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No Brief Candle
I want to be thoroughly used up when I die, for the harder I work the more I live. I rejoice in life for its…
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The Man Who Almost Discovered America
Scientists go out there and discover things about how the world works. I’m a scientist and sometimes I discover stuff before breakfast. I’m like Christopher…
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The Line Separating Good and Evil
The line separating good and evil passes not through states, nor between classes, nor between political parties either – but right through every human heart.…
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Three Cheers for Ignorance
Knowledge is power! Knowledge is what our civilization is built on. All those medieval monks dedicating their lives to understanding how the universe works? You…
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Paul Auster Has Died
Paul Auster is dead. I keep returning to two of his novels, Mr. Vertigo and Moon Palace. Their protagonists, even though they are fictional, are…
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When One is Most Alive
There is an ecstasy that marks the summit of life, and beyond which life cannot rise. And such is the paradox of living, this ecstasy…
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The Stamp of our Parents
Whose history can ever reveal very much? In my view Americans put too much emphasis on their pasts as a way of defining themselves, which…
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London Calling
Don’t you just hate those market researchers calling you? They’re annoying. They’re persistent. If you make the mistake of answering your phone, they’ll steal your…
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Daniel Dennett Has Died
Philosopher and scientist Daniel Dennett is dead. His book on Intuition Pumps, or thought experiments, is one I hope to return to here.
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Reversion to the Mean
Things tend to even out over time. If something is extraordinarily high or low on first measurement, it will often be closer to the mean…
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The Encyclopedia of Concepts
Expertise isn’t easily transferable. Chess grandmasters excel at chess, not International Relations, and surgeons are good at surgery, not juggling. True expertise can only arise…
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Ash Jogalekar’s 100 Desert Island Books
This is a good list. Plenty of inspiration. I’ll have to make a list like this eventually. Stay tuned.
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How Not to Eat Well
People worry a lot about food. Is it authentic? Is it healthy? Is it local? Is it organic? Is it sustainable? Is it The Best?…
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Revenge is Sour
The whole idea of revenge and punishment is a childish daydream. Properly speaking, there is no such thing as revenge. Revenge is an act which…
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Map of California Fossil Sites
I made an interactive map of California fossil sites based on data by Don Kenney.
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The Thing With Feathers
“Hope” is the thing with feathersThat perches in the soulAnd sings the tune without the wordsAnd never stops – at allAnd sweetest – in the…
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How I’ll Know if Things are Going Well
I feel like most people are too pessimistic about the long-term development of the United States, but it’s also possible that I’m too optimistic. While…
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Ken Ilgunas’ Podcast Journey
Ken Ilgunas’ experience of how podcasts have influenced him is similar to my own but he’s more articulate in describing it. He has also recently…
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The Maniac
Biographies are a waste of time. There’s little to be gleaned from the lives of those we admire. The details of someone’s childhood or their…
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The First Snowfall
The snow had begun in the gloaming,And busily all the nightHad been heaping field and highwayWith a silence deep and white.Every pine and fir and…
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Utopia for Realists
The idea of a universal basic income (UBI) has been around for some time. It’s a bold idea that has the potential to fundamentally change…
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Liberalism and Authority
The liberal attitude does not say you should oppose authority. It says only that you should be free to oppose authority. Bertrand Russell You’re talking…
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The Tickle Trunk
Our canoe was made by the Grumman Aircraft Engineering Corporation from heavy-duty aluminum and weighted 75 pounds. On account of it being late summer, some…
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The Man in the Arena
It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could…
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Nabokov’s Favorite Word is Mauve
This is an unusual book. I’m not aware of any other attempt to analyze literature using big data and statistics. For example: Ernest Hemingway, together…
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Three Nights Song
He waits to happen with the clearreality of what he thinks about-to be a child who wakes beautifully,a man always in the state of wakingto…
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The Anthropic Principle, But Even More So
It didn’t have to be this way. The laws of nature could’ve been different so that life wouldn’t have emerged, humans wouldn’t have evolved, and…
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Tree House
A tree house, a free house,A secret you and me house,A high up in the leafy branchesCozy as can be house.A street house, a neat…
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God Hates Singletons
Wolf Tivy on Palladium explores the risk of a single artificial intelligence, through recursive self-improvement, taking over the world. This hypothetical event has been termed…
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Specialization is for Insects
A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet,…
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The Alphabet of American Animals
The armadillo, the armadillo has armor above but not belowThe bear, the bear has a lot of hair everywhereThe coyote, the coyote can never let…
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Acquainted With the Night
I have been one acquainted with the night.I have walked out in rain – and back in rain.I have outwalked the furthest city light.I have…
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Trust, But Verify
“I want to double-click on that,” says the head of my division. We’re all sitting around a conference table and for once, there’s no laptop…
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Improbable Destinies
Is there such a thing as destiny? How resilient are outcomes to changed starting conditions? This was the question that Stephen Jay Gould asked in…
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Yonder Blue Ridge
May your trails be dim, lonesome, stony, narrow, winding and only slightly uphill. May the wind bring rain for the slickrock potholes fourteen miles on…
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Jim Harrison
I’ve been reading a lot of Jim Harrison lately. It’s an infatuation with his work that began a few years ago but has now reached…
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Can AI Solve Science?
To this ultimate question we’re going to see that the answer is inevitably and firmly no (Stephen Wolfram).
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Desert Tales
The number of weird things that happen to a person in the wild is directly proportional to how much time that person spends in the…
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Vernor Vinge Has Died
This week, science fiction writer Vernor Vinge died. Rainbows End (2006) is one of the best science fiction novels of all time.
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The Second Kind of Impossible
Short version: Paul J. Steinhardt’s The Second Kind of Impossible is the best science book I’ve read in a long time. Long version: Crystals are…
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