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What Makes for a Healthy Society?

In a 2014 preface for his 1978 book The Ohlone Way , a description of how the indigenous peoples of California’s Bay Area lived before Europeans arrived, Malcolm Margolin shared a list of what he thought constituted a healthy society: Sustainable relationship with the

kottke.org •

Empty Nest? Or Open Door?

Last year, Gretchen Rubin wrote a widely circulated piece about trading the “empty nest” metaphor for something that “emphasizes possibility”: the open door. I somehow hadn’t read it when it came out, but being in the midst of emptying the nest/opening the door, it was

kottke.org •

In Praise of Comfort Films

In his latest video essay , Thomas Flight praises the comfort film and shares some examples (The Big Lebowski, Perfect Days, Mon Oncle, Kiki’s Delivery Service, Moonrise Kingdom) from a few different types. We want high stakes to make things interesting. But if you’re

kottke.org •

Brain man

How can you have a picture of the world when your brain is locked up in your skull? Neuroscientist Dale Purves has clues - by Asif Ghazanfar Read on Aeon

Aeon •

The grid

We talk about networks but we are rarely clear about what we mean. A specific sort of network is the grid, and even that idea is complicated by two competing meanings. There’s the benign and powerful grid of peer-to-peer connection. Culture is built on this grid. This is

Seth's Blog •