No War Is Illegal

Lorenzo Warby | Lorenzo From Oz | 5th March 2026

Is the attack on Iran, or any war, illegal? Laws come with remedies — consequences for breaking the law. (Public) international law only makes declarative statements, which are not enough to make it law. A war may be unconstitutional, immoral or a strategic failure, but it cannot be illegal. “A much more useful question is: does the war disrupt an existing order or does it seek to enforce it?” (2,100 words)

Puzzle: Play Nomido, the Browser’s daily word game.

Ten Thoughts On Government Data

Santi Ruiz | Statecraft | 5th March 2026

…And its idiosyncrasies. Government data systems were built for administration, not analysis. Datasets often have a small number of civil servants using them; inaccuracies can go unnoticed for a long time. Lots of data are based on representative samples, which entails assumptions that can easily invalidate findings if one forgets to include them. “There’s rarely a single person who can explain the whole thing” (2,000 words)

The Chronicler Of Decline

Ed Simon | Hedgehog Review | 4th March 2026

Lessons from Edward Gibbon and his history of Rome's collapse. "The narrative that unfolds across the six volumes of Gibbon’s history endures as a warning against the way a disease of the soul can metastasise throughout the body politic, showing how a pervasive nihilism can incapacitate a people from within." A nation's values erode slowly, until its collapse comes quickly and horribly (2,000 words)

Puzzle: Play Nomido, the Browser’s daily word game.

Yearning For The Apocalypse

Talia Lavin | The Sword And The Sandwich | 4th March 2026

Christian eschatology is an underrated factor in US government policy. "If you are a self-determined member of the elect, schooled to await the Apocalypse from your earliest days, the end of the world coincides with the destruction of your perceived enemies and your elevation to the ranks of the angels." Fragments of ancient texts are being interpreted in new ways to be causes for modern warfare (4,100 words)

Podcast: How Metrics Make Us Miserable | Plain English. Conversation with the philosopher C. Thi Nguyen about how the quantified life has become a modern religion (1h 3m)

Video: The Doodlin' Song | YouTube | Dick Van Dyke | 2m 15s

From 1963, Dick Van Dyke, Mary Tyler Moore and Sylvia Lewis perform a gently hilarious musical number, with much of the comedy residing in their dance moves

Puzzle: Play Nomido, the Browser’s daily word game.

Equality As A Consolation Prize

Ruxandra Teslo | 3rd March 2026

In a disenchanted world, equality is a consolation prize. “Without providence and fate, outcomes appear to flow almost entirely from human choice and human systems. In casting off the old metaphysical scaffolding, we have also stripped the so-called ‘losers’ of society of any sense of inherent dignity rooted in a larger cosmic story. In a secular world, equality is a last attempt to offer dignity to the weak” (2,900 words)

Puzzle: Play Nomido, the Browser’s daily word game.

The Bloody Legacy Of Ayatollah Khamenei

Reid Newton | Middle East Uncovered | 1st March 2026

Khamenei used the system he inherited to strip Iranians of all political agency. His regime met dissent and protests with unequivocal brutality. He expanded capital punishment to include charges such as “enmity against God” and “corruption on Earth”. “He will remembered by unmarked graves, economic devastation, prison cells, public executions and a generation that went unheard” (1,900 words)

Why Attack Iran?

Timothy Snyder | Thinking About... | 28th February 2026

Historian examines the US attacks on Iran. Propaganda encourages acceptance without interrogation, but it is vital to do the opposite. "A war is a time when we will be told not to ask questions. But a war is actually when questions must be asked. And they must be asked in light of what we already know." What might seem like "foreign policy" can be better understood as personal politics (800 words)

Puzzle: Play Nomido, the Browser’s daily word game.

The Case Of The Disappearing Secretary

Rowland Manthorpe | Rowland's Newsletter | 1st March 2026

Fifty years ago, it was unthinkable for a manager to type anything. Documents were dictated and then secretaries typed them. Then came a tech revolution: the personal computer. What can we learn from this for the transition into the AI era? Secretarial work didn't vanish, nor did secretaries. The job evolved: "You stop doing tasks and start overseeing systems." Change is always slower than we think (3,700 words)

We The Bacteria

Régine Debatty | We Make Money Not Art | 27th February 2026

Review of a book offering an "alternative history of architecture from the point of view of microbes". It argues that our entire built environment was created in service to microbial ecosystems. From plague hospitals to urban parks, via sewage systems and indoor bathrooms, the way we build structures has been influenced by microbes, the diseases they can bring, and our fears of infection (1,000 words)

Puzzle: Play Nomido, the Browser’s daily word game.

So You Want To Build A Tunnel...

Grady Hillhouse | Practical Engineering | 17th February 2026

"Hobby tunnelling" is increasingly popular. Amateur engineers, captivated by the idea of carving their own passageways into a subterranean wilderness, are just getting on with it. One example under a Toronto carpark sparked fears of terrorist plots until the maker came forward: "It was just a guy who liked digging." Tips for diggers: check your permits, think about spoil disposal, and watch out for fires (3,000 words)

Podcast: The Highest Exam | New Books In Economics. About the gaokao, China’s high-stakes college entrance exam and how it shapes the schooling system from the bottom up (52m 57s)

Video: Funeral For A Tree | YouTube | Steve Parker | 2m 56s

Virtual tour of an exhibition that celebrates the life of a 65-year-old oak tree. When the tree died, the artist turned slices of its trunk into wooden "records" that play the calls of birds that roosted in the tree.

Puzzle: Play Nomido, the Browser’s daily word game.

Why I'm A Quaker

Ozy Brennan | Thing Of Things | 8th January 2026

Modern Quakerism is "very possibly the most orthopraxic religion I’ve ever encountered". The primary thing that makes you a Quaker is participating in a Quaker Meeting. Quakers are focused on regular communication with what they call "Inner Light". Theology is a distraction. Being an atheist is fine. Also: "Quakers had been right about almost every major moral insight of the past 400 years" (3,600 words)

Puzzle: Play Nomido, the Browser’s daily word game.

A Frank Lloyd Wright Typographic Mystery

Paul Lukas | Inconspicuous Consumption | 25th February 2026

Wonderful piece of amateur detective work. Frank Lloyd Wright designed a Unitarian Universalist church that opened in a Chicago suburb in 1908. The letter H appears three times in the slogan he placed over the entrance. One of them is now upside down — a subtle, but noticeable, mistake. How and when did this happen, and who is responsible? The answer is surprisingly hard to track down (2,000 words)

Jimi Hendrix Was A Systems Engineer

Rohan S. Puranik | IEEE Spectrum | 25th February 2026

Hendrix might not have spoken in decibels and ohm values, but a close analysis of his work reveals a high-level technical understanding. "Reframing Hendrix as an engineer doesn’t diminish the art. It explains how one person, in under four years as a bandleader, could pull the electric guitar toward its full potential by systematically augmenting the instrument’s shortcomings for maximum expression" (1,300 words)

Puzzle: Play Nomido, the Browser’s daily word game.

My Battle With Chronic Fatigue Syndrome

Hermione Hoby | Guardian | 24th February 2026

So much of the writing on this topic force experiences into a linear narrative, ending with a triumphant recovery. This one is more interesting because it lacks resolution. Despite the writer's efforts — with everything from medical specialists to wellness coaches to fancy juices — her episodes of extreme, debilitating fatigue recur. Being sometimes-ill is difficult for the patient, and the world, to understand (4,200 words)