Kickoff For November 14, 2022
Welcome to this week’s edition of the Monday Kickoff, a collection of what I’ve found interesting, informative, and insightful on the web over the last seven days.
Let’s get this Monday started with these links:
Art Is for Seeing Evil. wherein Agnes Callard explains why she assigns a collection of classic novels to her philosophy students: to highlight what’s crucial to understanding death, or self-creation, or courage, or self-consciousness.
Why overthinkers struggle with remote work, wherein we learn that it’s all wrapped up in their tendency to obsessively worry about things that could go wrong.
Our Friend the Atom, wherein Becky Alexis-Martin explores how Atomic Age symbolism worked its way into all aspects of life after World War Two, all the while masking the dangers of our use of the atom.
Sumo Is Getting Big in Texas, wherein we learn why and how the Japanese sport is gaining a following in the Lone Star state — not just among people who watch bouts, but also people taking up the practice of sumo.
The Crypto Geniuses Who Vaporized a Trillion Dollars, wherein we learn about the origins of Three Arrows Capital and about its two founders, who thought they’d take the financial world by storm but instead helped trigger a crypto crash.
How to tackle ‘wasted-time worry’ - and why we need to, wherein Madeleine Dore looks at why people stress about not using time efficiently, and why even with all of the productivity techniques and advice and apps at our disposal we end up wasting our time worrying.
Another Path to Intelligence, wherein we learn more about the decentralized brain of the octopus, and how those sea creatures might rival that of creatures with single brains, like humans.
Daydreaming and Concentration: What the Science Says, wherein cognitive psychologist Stefan Van der Stigchel examines the good and the bad of letting your mind wander, both for our mental health and our performance and productivity.
The language that doesn’t use ‘no’, wherein we learn about a language from Nepal called Kusunda which has a number of quirks but which also is on the cusp of dying.
And that’s it for this Monday. Come back in seven days for another set of links to start off your week.