We are social animals of a hierarchical nature. We crave communication, and we are given it. We are made to watch television, occasionally receiving a tidbit of useful information or an interesting show. But if you watch TV with a stopwatch, you’ll find that the benefits it offers are not Continue Reading
Politics
articles on social and political topics
What to do with public goods?
Public goods are a type of good that has the following characteristics: The characteristic of non-excludability means that it is practically impossible to exclude a person from the group of consumers of this good. A characteristic of non-rivalrous consumption is that the consumption of a good by one person does Continue Reading
And who are the judges?
—Hello, is this the League of Superheroes?— So, what’s your superpower?“I don’t tell someone that they’re living incorrectly if their values don’t align with mine.”— Your power is too great. When some people judge others, it becomes unclear upon reflection why they are doing so. They condemn something because it Continue Reading
Avoid the news.
Here and below is the translation by Danila Egorov of the article “Avoid News” by Rolf Dobelli. If you are proficient in English, you can stop reading here. Just move on to… link Текст для перевода: .. This article is an antidote to the news. It’s long, so you might Continue Reading
A bit of singularity
It sneaks up on us quietly, gradually. At first, we don’t see it. Then we see it rushing towards us and think we’ll have time to react, but then suddenly, what was that? To notice something, you need to stop and look around. For example, look at the change in Continue Reading
On Justice, Reputation, and Disposable Forks
What is justice? We often hear that justice must prevail, that something is just while something else is not. We want to live in a just society, with a fair court and equitable authority. The question of what justice is was posed by Plato in his book “The Republic,” but Continue Reading
Quarantine 2020 and the Foreboding of Civil War
What is a “revolution”? Oh! What an inexhaustible source of inspiration for a humanitarian! And what kinds of revolutions are there? Is a counter-revolution a revolution? What does Marx say, and what does Rabinovich say? Let’s categorize revolutions. Velvet, orange, top-down, bottom-up, spontaneous, organized. And let’s spread the categories across Continue Reading
Be careful not to mix them up!
The prince from Kiev was baptized in Crimea when Moscow was not even a consideration, which is why Crimea holds sacred significance for Russians. Ukraine is part of Russia, which is why we are waging a trade war and facing exorbitant gas prices specifically with Ukraine. We and the Ukrainians Continue Reading
The system is going haywire.
The mechanism embedded in our brains that is responsible for rationalization, searching for reasons, and attempting to predict consequences, as well as the urge to find patterns in random events and the obsessive desire to explain everything to ourselves and others, is regulated by dopamine. This neurotransmitter has been responsible Continue Reading
Is it correct?
Even if we manage to organize a guaranteed impartial vote count, which can be achieved by granting complete independence to the Central Election Commission—essentially creating a separate “electoral” branch of government with its own funding system and implementing various electronic systems with cryptography—we will still not be able to answer Continue Reading