Pagination, Flying, Robert Kaplan, India
The Lowly Page Number
Marlon Ettinger | Outline | 23rd April 2018
The art and science of numbering pages in printed books. If you want the page number to be conspicuous — in a cookery book, say — put it at the top of the page on the outside edge. If you want the page number to be inconspicuous — as in a novel — put it at the bottom of the page in the centre. If you are leaving fat white margins around the text to increase the size and price of the book, as some publishers do, you should centre the page numbers so as not to draw attention to the margins (1,400 words)
On Radical Markets
Vitalik Buterin | 20th April 2018
Discussion of “Radical Markets”, by Eric Posner and Glen Weyl. “The philosophy of the book can be expressed as follows: Markets are great, price mechanisms are awesome. However, markets are socially constructed because they depend on property rights that are socially constructed, and there are many ways that markets and property rights can be constructed, some of which are unexplored and potentially far better than what we have today. Freedom is a high-dimensional design space” (5,250 words)
Where Have All The Pilots Gone?
Jon Evans | TechCrunch | 22nd April 2018
What it’s like learning to fly a light plane. “Aviate, Navigate, Communicate, they say — but at first aviation alone seems to take more brainpower than you can allocate. You have rudders, ailerons, elevators, trim, and throttle to control. Sometimes you need to tweak the propellor, the mixture, and the active fuel tank. All this while watching your airspeed, altitude, heading, and vertical speed; maintaining awareness of your engine indicators; and keeping an eye out for other airborne traffic” (2,600 words)
Searching For Scythians
Nicholas Danforth | War On The Rocks | 23rd April 2018
Energetic and entertaining review of Robert Kaplan’s latest broadside, “The Return of Marco Polo’s World”, a collection of essays arguing that Eurasia is resuming its central place in geopolitics, and that America should keep its distance. Kaplan advises “a kind of muscular minimalism or, if you prefer, robust retrenchment. America must remain strong, while also conserving its strength. If we go abroad in search of monsters to destroy, we won’t be prepared to face the real monsters that are out there” (1,520 words)
The Criminal Tribes Of The Madras Presidency
Thomas Manuel | Three Quarks Daily | 23rd April 2018
The British Raj passed the Criminal Tribes Act in 1871 so that particular Indian communities could be designated “hereditary criminals”. This was not a genetic judgment but an occupational one. “The colonial interventions of the 19th century had invalidated a lot of hereditary occupations and the British were extremely aware of the dangers of the resulting mass unemployment. In their eyes, there was no other choice for these poor nomads but to take up a life of crime. What else could they do?” (1,010 words)
Video of the day Firing Line — England And America
What to expect:
From 1990, with Christopher Hitchens, Michael Kinsley, William Buckley and John O’Sullivan
Thought for the day
The first step you take away from an extreme will generally be the most valuable
Vitalik Buterin
Podcast Principles For Life And Work | a16z
Ray Dalio talks to Alex Rampell and Sonal Chokshi about getting what you want from life
(49m 52s)