A new week! Enjoy every day, as much as you can.
The Coronavirus is the first truly global event. This observation is made in this piece, but the author says little beyond the observation—there’s no serious analysis. This is an example of what the media is good at: clever observation. It’s also an example of what people who are good at cleverness are less good at: actual insight.
If you, like me, are Jonesin’ for bookstores and libraries again, this little article will send you on a link to seven different libraries that offer virtual tours. Highly recommended.
Interesting study of political psychology as manifest in defensiveness in Sweden. Lord knows this would clearly apply to the US as well, to put it waaaaay too mildly.
A phrase I hadn’t heard before: the “deep biosphere.” As in, really deep.
A great series of small pieces on how the works of Augustine (and a few forgeries) made it through the middle ages and into early modernity.
A really interesting analysis of various populations’ contemporary opinions on which country contributed the most to winning the Second World War. Germany, France, and US say the US did; UK residents say they did. (Both are wrong, I think—clearly Russia did the most, though I think Russians’ sense that they were alone is actually a consequence of Soviet and now Putin’s propaganda, the amount of economic assistance the US provided was vast.) What this tells me is something important about the self-delusion of the UK’s citizenry is almost like the self-delusion of the French, who have never come around to recognizing their degree of collaboration with the Nazis. (Part of the problem here is the UK’s blindness to its own imperialism, before and during the war.) In fact, an interesting case can be made that the Germans were the ones who most contributed to their own defeat in World War II. Especially Hitler.
Nice piece about Frank Ramsey, one of the great “what ifs” of twentieth-century intellectual life, who still accomplished tremendous amounts before he died at age 26, making substantial contributions in mathematics, philosophy, and economics, some of which were realized only decades after his death.
Also another piece.
Either Neanderthals had children with Denisovans before they met the Homo Sapiens. This would mean that the Neanderthals with whom Homo Sapiens had children were already hybrids, who transferred both Neanderthal and Denisovan genes to the children.…Or Homo Sapiens met Denisovans long before they met Neanderthals.
A really cool story about a study of what you can learn about Neanderthals from studying Icelandic DNA. Turns out there’s a more complicated story about the Denisovians involved, too.
More archaeology, but even earlier: a genetic study of ancient human remains in Switzerland suggests the movement of the Steppe peoples into Europe about 4500 to four thousand years ago was accomplished, at least for a good long while, without much intermixing between the newcomers and the older groups of humans.
This is interesting. Middle age is hard! (I know, I know.)
"We thought that with the economic uncertainty, life might be more stressful for younger adults," Almeida said. "But we didn't see that. We saw more stress for people at mid-life. And maybe that's because they have children who are facing an uncertain job market while also responsible for their own parents. So it's this generational squeeze that's making stress more prevalent for people at mid-life."
Does this mean that life will get better in old age?
Be safe, everybody.