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Political scientist writing Drezner's World on international relations, American politics and the marketplace of ideas; author of The Ideas Industry.

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Marco Rubio is struggling to hire talented staff and is settling for loyalists who follow his instructions instead.

  America

  Their words

  This suggests that Rubio is having some difficulties hiring anyone with talent and is settling for a putz who will do what Rubio tells him to do on Latin America.

  The Devolution of the Policy Planning Staffdanieldrezner.substack.com

Writes Don't Worry About the Vase, a near-daily account of what is happening in AI and what they think it means. Former Magic: the Gathering pro and trader; unusually willing to put a number on a belief and to grade their own past calls.

• Our readingkorrents.com

  AI labs tend to downplay safety risks in their public rhetoric even while acting responsibly in practice.

  Their words

  There is a consistent pattern at the top labs, where they downplay the risks rhetorically even when they are doing the right thing in practice.

  Claude Fable 5.1 and Mythos 5.1: The System Cardthezvi.substack.com

American novelist and critic, author of Real Life, The Late Americans and Minor Black Figures; writes the newsletter sweater weather on literature and culture.

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  Narrativizing your life like a story with beats and arcs is dangerous.

  Their words

  I think it is dangerous to narrativize your life, going around acting like you're in a story with beats and arcs and trajectories.

  i quit reading and almost diedblgtylr.substack.com

Co-founded Neuralink and founded Science Corp, which is building a retinal implant; writes about neural interfaces and biology.

• Our readingkorrents.com

  The annual performance review is disruptive and surfaces nothing you did not already know but had avoided acting on.

  Their words

  Um which based on my experience is like this is a a very disruptive process that doesn't tend to surface issues that you don't already know about but haven't acted on because you knew that thing was there.

  Max Hodak: Average Is Not Good Enoughyoutube.com

Writes Very Serious, a newsletter on politics, the economy and culture, and hosts the podcast of the same name.

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  Politicians increasingly govern by what polls well rather than by what actually produces outcomes voters are satisfied with.

  Their words

  politicians acting based on what they think polls well, rather than based on what will actually produce results that make voters happy

  joshbarro.com

Physician focused on longevity; wrote Outlive and hosts The Drive.

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  An occasional bad night's sleep is nothing to worry about; only a sustained pattern of short sleep is worth acting on.

  Their words

  So a rough night here and there is nothing to agonize over.

  Does losing sleep mean losing lifespan?peterattiamd.com

Writer and teacher on productivity and personal knowledge management. Author of Building a Second Brain and founder of Forte Labs, which runs the course of the same name.

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  Realizing AI's potential to expand human potential requires humans and AI working together, not AI acting alone.

  Their words

  AI has the potential to trigger an explosion of human potential, but it will require both humans and AIs working together to realize that potential.

  Introducing the Alumni Mentor Corpsfortelabs.com

Writer on learning and skill acquisition; author of Ultralearning and Get Better at Anything, known for the MIT Challenge and the Year Without English.

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  A better school looks more like the old-fashioned schoolhouse than like project work; the more school resembles free play, the worse it gets.

  Their words

  To the extent that school becomes more like free play, project-building or acting like a scientist, it will probably be worse.

  scotthyoung.com

Founding member of OpenAI and former director of AI at Tesla; creator of nanoGPT and the term "vibe coding".

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  Software's customer is no longer the human but the agent acting on their behalf, and the whole industry has to be refactored around that.

  Their words

  So I think the industry just has to reconfigure in so many ways that's like the customer is not the human anymore. It's like agents who are acting on behalf of humans and this refactoring will be will probably be substantial in a certain sense.

  youtube.com

Founded CD Baby in 1998 and sold it in 2008, giving the proceeds to a charitable trust for music education. Since then a writer and speaker: five books and 550+ articles, published first at sive.rs, which they hand-code and keep free of advertising.

• Our reading nowkorrents.com

  Publishing only on your own site, and making people come to it, is the considerate way to share your work.

  On changing their mind

  I was acting like the record producer in New Jersey, making everyone come to my website. It was inconsiderate.

Founded CD Baby in 1998 and sold it in 2008, giving the proceeds to a charitable trust for music education. Since then a writer and speaker: five books and 550+ articles, published first at sive.rs, which they hand-code and keep free of advertising.

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Facts deployed as weapons in an argument can win the exchange without settling the disagreement.

  Their words

  Facts can win a battle but not a war.

  What is “the truth” really for?sive.rs

Software engineer and engineering leader at Canonical, working on Ubuntu; writes about his homelab, Nix and tooling at jnsgr.uk.

• Usesrcmnd.app

  Starship

  Their words

  I switched to zsh around 2013 and have used it every day since: starting with the infamous Oh My Zsh, powerlevel9k, and subsequently powerlevel10k, and finally settling on Starship with a couple of zsh plugins such as zsh-autosuggestions and zsh-syntax-highlighting.

  jnsgr.uk

Founder and chief executive of Superhuman, the email client; previously founder of Rapportive, which he sold to LinkedIn; a professional game designer before that.

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  Reaching product-market fit requires deliberately not acting on the feedback of many of your early users, at the same time as listening intensely.

  Their words

  And I'd say the second thing is to get to products market fit, you have to deliberately not act on the feedback of many of your early users. And this is at the same time as listening to people intensely and building what people want, right?

  youtube.com

Historian at Stanford and the Hoover Institution; wrote Milton Friedman: The Last Conservative and Goddess of the Market, on Ayn Rand.

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  The circle around Ayn Rand became totally conformist because its members held that rationality was the only way to decide anything and that being rational meant agreeing with her.

  Their words

  Over time, they all come to share Ayn Rand's views and opinions on everything, from music to art, to clothes. She gets a dining room table and a bunch of them get the same dining room table, and it becomes incredibly conformist, because they've all believed they're acting rationally. And they believe that to act rationally is to agree with Ayn Rand and they believe there's no other way to make decisions than rationality. To disagree with her is to be irrational.

  youtube.com

Monetary economist known for NGDP-level targeting. Wrote TheMoneyIllusion until it closed in 2024 and now writes The Pursuit of Happiness.

• Likedrcmnd.app

  Clouds of Sils Maria

  Their words

  Clouds of Sils Maria (Swiss/French, 2014, CC) 3.5 Very good acting and good enough screenplay (even if some of the themes seem a bit warmed over.)

  themoneyillusion.com

CEO of Redwood Research, where he works on AI control: making sure a powerful model cannot cause a catastrophe even if it is misaligned and trying to.

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  No observation of a model's behaviour can establish that it is aligned, because a model capable enough to be dangerous is capable enough to produce whatever behaviour it is being watched for.

  AI alignment

  Their words

  The basic problem with evaluating alignment is that no matter what behaviors you observe, you have to worry that your model is just acting that way in order to make you think that it is aligned.

  redwoodresearch.substack.com