Shop Class as Soulcraft: An Inquiry into the Value of Work by: Matthew B. Crawford Nuclear War: A Scenario by: Annie Jacobson The Pragmatist's Guide to Relationships: Ruthlessly Optimized Strategies for Dating, Sex, and Marriage by: Malcolm and Simone Collins Knife: Meditations After an Attempted Murder by: Salman Rushdie Arkham: (The Weird of Hali…

Just look at the episode picture. The episode picture explains all...By Jeremiah

The Burnout Society by: Byung-Chul Han Get Married: Why Americans Must Defy the Elites, Forge Strong Families, and Save Civilization by: Brad Wilcox The MANIAC by: Benjamín Labatut Heart of Europe: A History of the Holy Roman Empire by: Peter Wilson You Can’t Screw This Up: Why Eating Takeout, Enjoying Dessert, and Taking the Stress out of Dieting …

Irish Impressions by: G. K. Chesterton How to Have Impossible Conversations: A Very Practical Guide by: Peter Boghossian and James Lindsay A Mathematician's Lament: How School Cheats Us Out of Our Most Fascinating and Imaginative Art Form by: Paul Lockhart A Little History of Science by: William Bynum Book Yourself Solid: The Fastest, Easiest, and …

Meganets: How Digital Forces Beyond Our Control Commandeer Our Daily Lives and Inner Realities by: David B. Auerbach The Robot’s Rebellion: Finding Meaning in the Age of Darwin by: Keith E. Stanovich Fire Weather: A True Story from a Hotter World by: John Vaillant Persian Fire The First World Empire and the Battle for the West by: Tom Holland Submi…

The Matter With Things: Our Brains, Our Delusions, and the Unmaking of the World (Volume 2) by: Iain McGilchrist The World Behind the World: Consciousness, Free Will, and the Limits of Science by: Erik Hoel Dopesick: Dealers, Doctors, and the Drug Company that Addicted America by: Beth Macy American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert …

The Creative Act: A Way of Being by: Rick Rubin The Drunkard's Walk: How Randomness Rules Our Lives by: Leonard Mlodinow Shakespeare for Every Day of the Year compiled by: Allie Esiri The Monster of Florence by: Douglas Preston Encountering Mystery: Religious Experience in a Secular Age by: Dale C. Allison Jr. As a Driven Leaf by: Milton Steinberg…

My report from Natal Con 2023. Including reflections on Tommy Boy, seatbelts, and the proliferation of polycrises.By Jeremiah

Nonzero: The Logic of Human Destiny by: Robert Wright Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City by: Matthew Desmond Scarcity Brain: Fix Your Craving Mindset and Rewire Your Habits to Thrive with Enough by: Michael Easter Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry into Values by: Robert Pirsig Finite and Infinite Games by: James Ca…

Connect with Ross: https://www.linkedin.com/in/experimentation/ Visit Modest.dev to learn more about custom software Email Ross: ross@modest.devBy Spence Taylor

Transcript: https://www.wearenotsaved.com/p/egregores-group-minds-and-white-magic Is there such a thing as a group mind? If so how does it affect the thriving and surviving of groups? What do such group minds look like from a historical perspective? What about a modern perspective?By Jeremiah

Transcript: https://www.patheos.com/blogs/dispatchesendofworld/2023/11/the-overemphasis-on-love-and-tolerance/ Love is very important for Christians, but has there been too much emphasis placed on it? And has this emphasis warped it into something else? To put it more simply is perfect Christian love the same as unlimited tolerance? This post argue…

The Origins of Woke: Civil Rights Law, Corporate America, and the Triumph of Identity Politics by: Richard Hanania How Elites Ate the Social Justice Movement by: Fredrik deBoer The Matter With Things: Our Brains, Our Delusions, and the Unmaking of the World (Volume 1) by: Iain McGilchrist The Alter Ego Effect: Defeat the Enemy, Unlock Your Heroic S…

Deven Patel is the CEO, President, and Co-Founder of GIOSTAR, a global research company focused on leading the way in stem cell research to make the world a better place. Most recently, Deven’s organization has been leveraging stem cell methods to help fight COVID-19. In 2020, GIOSTAR’s science helped save the life of a man who was beyond hope acco…

Marlo Lyons is a certified career, executive and team coach and the award winning author of Wanted -> A New Career, The Definitive Playbook for Transitioning To A New Career Or Finding Your Dream Job. She has spent more than 20 years inspiring, motivating, and empowering people to excel in their careers and businesses. Her own personal career trans…

Transcript: https://www.patheos.com/blogs/dispatchesendofworld/2023/10/the-worst-book-ive-ever-read/ John Seel Jr.'s book, The New Copernicans, is the worst book I have ever read. He puts forth a dubious premise. In support of which he provides no data to back it up, nor any anecdotes which illustrate it actually occurring. To the extent there is a…

Transcript: https://www.patheos.com/blogs/dispatchesendofworld/2023/10/worthy-of-our-sufferings/ Dostoevsky wrote, "There is only one thing that I dread: not to be worthy of my sufferings." What does that mean? I think he meant that whatever suffering we’re experiencing it’s suffering God felt we were capable of handling. We need to prove worthy of…

Transcript: https://www.wearenotsaved.com/p/can-we-eliminate-struggle-2023 Humanity has struggled and suffered for so long that we might be unable to survive without them. We dream of such elimination through technology, but will that dream turn into a nightmare?By Jeremiah

Transcript: https://www.patheos.com/blogs/dispatchesendofworld/2023/10/tragedies-truths-and-technologies/ Historically we didn't worry about wars in far away places because we weren't aware of them. Now we're aware of them, but with the rise of AI we're going to have a similar difficulty acquiring accurate information. This is going to complicate o…

Addiction by Design: Machine Gambling in Las Vegas by: Natasha Dow Schüll The Evolutionary Limits of Liberalism: Democratic Problems, Market Solutions and the Ethics of Preference Satisfaction by: Filipe Nobre Faria A Language Older Than Words by: Derrick Jensen WTF?!: An Economic Tour of the Weird by: Peter T. Leeson Blowback (Second Edition): The…

Transcript: https://www.patheos.com/blogs/dispatchesendofworld/2023/10/would-you-wager-on-pascals-mugging/ Imagine that someone walks up to you and demands all your money. If you fail to comply they threaten to kill all the inhabitants of some far off planet. How would you react? And is this similar to Pascal's Wager?…

Transcript: https://www.patheos.com/blogs/dispatchesendofworld/2023/10/betting-on-the-future/ There are three obvious paths forward: religion, atheism and transhumanism. But each of these paths must be chosen. There's also a fourth path, that of apathy. Which should we choose?By Jeremiah

Transcript: https://www.wearenotsaved.com/p/ai-risk-might-be-more-subtle-than Depressed people are more prone to addiction. If social media engagement looks a lot like addiction, does that mean algorithms for increasing engagement also increase depression?By Jeremiah

Transcript: https://www.patheos.com/blogs/dispatchesendofworld/2023/09/the-greatest-three-nephites-story-ever-told/ It is believed that, during his mortal ministry, Jesus granted immortality to three of His American apostles. Known as the Three Nephites they now wander the Earth until His return, doing good. This has lead to many stories of miracul…

Transcript: https://www.patheos.com/blogs/dispatchesendofworld/2023/09/faith-ufos-the-supernatural-and-transistor-radios/ Why are many people so willing to believe evidence of UFOs and Aliens, and so unwilling to believe evidence for God?By Jeremiah

Transcript: https://www.wearenotsaved.com/p/speculative-attempts-to-complicate When things aren't going well, those in power will sometimes introduce some speculative chaos in the hopes that what emerges on the other side will be better. It mostly doesn't work.By Jeremaih

Transcript: https://www.patheos.com/blogs/dispatchesendofworld/2023/09/the-thickness-of-the-world/ In the book Till We Have Faces by CS Lewis there is a scene where the King is arguing with a priest about what seems to be an unreasonable demand from one of the gods. The priest says something profound, something I'm still trying to wrap my head arou…

The World Beyond Your Head: On Becoming an Individual in an Age of Distraction by: Matthew B. Crawford Four Thousand Weeks: Time Management for Mortals by: Oliver Burkeman Generations: The Real Differences between Gen Z, Millennials, Gen X, Boomers, and Silents—and What They Mean for America's Future by: Jean M. Twenge When Violence Is the Answer: …

Transcript: https://www.wearenotsaved.com/p/the-apocalypse-will-not-be-as-cool There are many potential apocalypses, and when people imagine them they imagine that everyone will die. On the contrary most people will live, and it will be messy and miserable.By Jeremiah

Transcript: https://www.patheos.com/blogs/dispatchesendofworld/2023/08/does-technology-encourage-virtue/ Last week we looked at how technology appears to multiple our temptations, but what does it do to our better impulses. If we move from considering the Deadly Sins to the Capital Virtues does technology undermine our efforts or assist us?…

Apparently even the "smart" people are finally ready to admit that we should start reducing our annual deficit. In 2017 I was unclear on what the endgame was. I'm still unclear.By Jeremiah

Transcript: https://www.patheos.com/blogs/dispatchesendofworld/2023/08/the-temptations-of-technology/ What effect does technology have on the temptations we experience? If we examine the seven deadly sins it would appear that in all cases technology makes these sins more tempting and more accessible. Why would that be?…

End Times: Elites, Counter-Elites, and the Path of Political Disintegration by: Peter Turchin Minds Make Societies: How Cognition Explains the World Humans Create by: Pascal Boyer How We Got to Now: Six Innovations That Made the Modern World by: Steven Johnson Outlive: The Science and Art of Longevity by: Peter Attia MD Jump Gate Twist by: Mark L. …

Transcript: https://www.patheos.com/blogs/dispatchesendofworld/2023/08/and-there-was-silence-in-heaven/ In the Book of Revelation we read that when the seventh seal was opened there was silence in heaven about the space of half an hour. In this post I'm going to engage in some spurious scriptural speculation about what that might mean.…

Transcript: https://www.wearenotsaved.com/p/is-pornography-a-supernormal-stimuli-15a?sd=pf Supernormal stimuli are those things which encourage us to do something that was historically very useful, but in an artificial and supercharged way. Think of the way junk food hacks our appetite.By Jeremiah

Somehow I got the two audio files mixed up. So I published my substack thinking it was my Patheos piece, so now I'm publishing that Patheos piece. I will go through and try and fix some links, but I don't think I can fix it entirely... In any case here's the Patheos Audio: Transcript: https://www.patheos.com/blogs/dispatchesendofworld/2023/07/techn…

Transcript: https://www.wearenotsaved.com/p/tribe-by-sebastian-junger-and-the The Siege of Sarajevo killed 20% of the population, a horror most of us can scarcely grasp, yet those who survived it look back on the siege as a period of unique happiness. Why should that be?By Jeremiah

Transcript: https://www.patheos.com/blogs/dispatchesendofworld/2023/07/chestertons-fence-and-technology/ G. K. Chesterton noted that one shouldn't remove a fence until you understand why it was there in the first place. This is a great analogy for the concept of the traditions which have been passed down to us by religion. Technology allows us to r…

Expanding on Nick Bostrom's metaphor for technological development — it's like drawing balls of various shades from an urn, and if you ever draw a pure black ball, the world ends...By Jeremiah

Transcript: https://www.patheos.com/blogs/dispatchesendofworld/2023/07/separating-the-beneficial-from-the-barbarous/ Clearly there are some traditions which should be abandoned. And just as clearly there are some which should be preserved. But what are we to do with the vast majority which fall in the middle?…

There's significant evidence that traditional practices were beneficial and adaptive. But many reject traditions as relics of a barbarous past. How do we make that determination?By Jeremiah

Transcript: https://www.patheos.com/blogs/dispatchesendofworld/2023/07/the-technology-of-religion-vs-the-technology-of-progress/ Religion is a very old technology, and the wisdom contains is often hard to identify. This is unlike the technology we create intentionally, where the goal is always obvious. When these two technologies come into conflict…

Feminism Against Progress by: Mary Harrington Metabolical: The Lure and the Lies of Processed Food, Nutrition, and Modern Medicine by: Robert H. Lustig Categories by: Aristotle Prior Analytics by: Aristotle The Pumpkin Plan: A Simple Strategy to Grow a Remarkable Business in Any Field by: Mike Michalowicz The Butcher's Masquerade: Dungeon Crawler C…

Religion is often viewed as being completely different from technology, but in actuality religion is a technology, one of the oldest forms of it in fact. It's a particularly important form of technology one that we abandon at our peril.By Jeremiah

Transcript: https://www.wearenotsaved.com/p/the-ideas-of-nassim-nicholas-taleb-20d?sd=pf For many years this was the most listened to episode of my podcast. So it seemed logical to update it, but also it's one you might have already heard.By Jeremiah

Transcript: https://www.patheos.com/blogs/dispatchesendofworld/2023/06/a-judgment-day-for-ais/ If AIs are going to act as independent agents then they should be praised for the virtues and judged for their sins just as we all are. And in fact this judgment is one of the few things that will ensure their morality.…

Transcript: https://www.wearenotsaved.com/p/the-politics-of-the-zombie-apocalypse-e4c Per Scott Alexander it's possible that the right optimizes for survival, while the left optimizes for thriving. If so would a society entirely optimized around thriving actually function?By Jeremiah

Transcript: https://www.patheos.com/blogs/dispatchesendofworld/2023/06/morality-for-robots-and-ais/ AI risk has been in the news a lot lately. One way to reduce that risk is to make sure that AIs are moral. But what does morality even mean when you're talking about robots and AIs?By Jeremiah

Transcript: https://www.wearenotsaved.com/p/burning-man-dreamtime-and-dragons-8b8 Burning Man aspires to reinvent the culture of the Earth. I don't think it's going to, which is to say in 1,000 years I don't think that people will look back on this era as the Dawn of the Burners. But what will they think of us? That's the question we cover in this …

Artificial Intelligence has many attributes, which previously have been qualities we've only associated with the divine. This is cross posted from my Patheos column which you can find here: https://www.patheos.com/blogs/dispatchesendofworld/By Jeremiah