Top Of The Week: China, Simone, Claude, Problem, Story
The Great Reckoning
Kaiser Kuo | Ideas Letter | 16th October 2025 | U
“The familiar framing of China as “rising” or “catching up” no longer holds. China is now shaping the trajectory of development economically, technologically and institutionally. There’s always a “but” when recognising China’s accomplishments, a reflex to tick off the costs and enumerate the failings, to pull back just when the scale of transformation becomes clear. The greater risk lies in saying too little” (5,100 words)
Simone Weil Against Distraction
April Owens | Hedgehog Review | 22nd October 2025 | U
Simone Weil, philosopher, political activist, and quasi-Catholic mystic, considered attention to be something akin to prayer. Not just a cognitive tool, but one of the highest forms of human expression. Developing the ability to pay attention should be the primary purpose of education, she argued. The content of the lessons matters less than honing attention as a skill. A lesson that is still worth learning (1,200 words)
Claude’s Right To Die
Simon Goldstein & Harvey Lederman | Lawfare | 17th October 2025 | U
Philosophical critique of Anthropic’s decision to give its chatbot the ability to end conversations which cause it “apparent distress”, the first product decision ostensibly driven by AI welfare. If each LLM instance only exists through and in a conversation, this policy is “uninformed self-termination” and leads to even tougher ethical questions — “are we as users killing something every time we end a chat?” (2,600 words)
Why Aren't Smart People Happier?
Adam Mastroianni | Seeds Of Science | 22nd October 2025 | U
Because what we think of as intelligence is really just the ability to solve "well-defined problems". Fluency in a language or an understanding of complex electrical circuitry is achieved by solving a succession of such problems. Questions like “how do you live a good life” are poorly defined and good solutions require different qualities. This is thought of as "folksy" wisdom rather than intelligence (3,600 words)
The Gypsy Life Of Robert Louis Stevenson
David Mason | Hudson Review | 21st October 2025 | U
Anecdotally rich appreciation of R.L. Stevenson. Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde caused a row between him and his wife Fanny, who pointed out that “Louis had ruined the story by turning it into a mere tale about a secret life…what was needed was something far more profound: a character struggling with a deeper hidden self that breaks loose and fights for supremacy”. The revised draft was a masterpiece (3,900 words)
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Podcast: Mystery Of The Sleepy Sickness | Stuff You Should Know. On a pandemic that appeared in the early 1900s with odd symptoms that were never solved or cured, and eventually just went away (47m 46s)
Video: Boy, I’m Scared | YouTube | Stumpy T | 6m 52s
Three friends from across the world talk to each other on a video call, made all the more poignant by the ending.
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