Top 5: Where do ideas come from?
Plus: Brunch, the birthrate, & aliens
“Ideas that work” (Aeon Magazine)
Because — where do ideas come from? How are they formed and why do they gain traction? Knowing where ideas come from can help us understand our issues with truth and conspiracy, and knowing how ideas spread can even explain the power of social landscapes like Twitter.
Williams, for instance, continues his genealogy of accuracy and sincerity by exploring why, since Thucydides, accuracy has been extended to apply not just to descriptions of the recent past, but to the apparently less practically relevant distant past as well. He also explores why, since the 18th century, sincerity has been elaborated into an even more demanding ideal of authenticity, and he finally discusses why, in an even more socio-historically local development, accuracy and sincerity also came to serve the needs of liberal democracies, whose proper functioning is specially dependent on the cultivation of the virtues of truth in politics. Williams wrote this at the turn of the millennium, but the advent of ‘post-truth’ politics has, if anything, only confirmed his sense that the value of truth wants defending.
“The internet is flat.” (Substack — Galaxy Brain)
Because this essay is a great companion to the heady Aeon article above.
The social internet promised us deep human connections — the sort that requires nuance and patience for messiness — but instead, it’s just turned us all into brands. Brands are monolithic. They are purposefully devoid of nuance. A brand is supposed to evoke a blunt emotion (Luxurious! Dangerous! Dependable! Built to last!) and are meant to remain consistent through space and time. Once you are ‘Built Ford Tough,’ it’s expected you remain Ford Tough for quite a while. There are cars to move off the lot.
Online, especially with public facing people, the impulse to quickly categorize individuals into brand affiliations is very strong. In some cases, the impulse for the categorized individual to respond by leaning into the brand is equally strong. I see this all the time with contrarian-minded people on Twitter who, once cast as the villain, decide to devote most of their energy toward being the heel even if that behavior isn’t a particularly accurate reflection of their IRL personality.
The internet facilitates these powerful, complex parasocial relationships but, at the same time flattens everything that makes the messy, human elements of relationships possible. It flattens audiences, it flattens time and it flattens a lot of nuance.
“When the Aliens Come, Will Their Arrival Destroy Our Faith?” (The Dispatch)
Because David French dives into some of the most fundamental questions around any potential discovery of alien life: how do we reconcile this discovery with our religious beliefs?
“Not Everyone Is Worried About America’s Falling Birthrates” (NYT)
Because two demographers debate the recent data and focus on the US’s declining birthrate during the pandemic and focus on not just the numbers and economic implications, but also the desires of those wishing to have children.
“On brunch” (Substack — The Line of Beauty)
Because brunch can be a bit more profound than we think it is, especially when Dhananjay Jagannathan is writing about it.