Shakespeare’s play of a magician conjuring up a storm and bringing together a group of men to his island—his mastery over a native, a compliant spirit, and a daughter who is ‘made’ to fall in love with a prince—is a meta-story of the theories propounded by Plato, Machiavelli, Hobbes, and Montaigne. The Tempest should be … Continue reading The Tempest
Today, Bill Gates is known more for his sage-like utterings on global development and the groundbreaking work of his foundation than for his technological prowess. But for someone who grew up in the ’90s, Gates was undoubtedly the towering giant of the tech world. The PC revolution that had been underway since the ’80s, the … Continue reading Gates’ Source Code
In the beginning the earth was without parking. The planner said, Let there be parking, and there was parking. And the planner saw that it was good. And the planner then said, Let there be off-street parking for each land use, according to its kind. And developers provided off-street parking for each land use according … Continue reading The Tragedy of Free Parking
In Superagency: What Could Possibly Go Right with Our AI Future, Reid Hoffman and Greg Beato celebrate the potential of AI to transform our lives. Hoffman was the co-founder of LinkedIn, was on the board of PayPal, and was an early philanthropic investor in OpenAI. While he makes a passionate case for AI, the work … Continue reading Superagency
Just as including He/She/They in your bio was recently considered an ‘in’ thing (at least until a few months ago), the term ‘Settler’ is also laden with symbolism, solidarity, and wokeness. But like many academic constructs, it does not always hold up to strong scrutiny. Settler colonialism originally referred to the process by which colonial … Continue reading On Settler Colonialism
Jean-Marc Jancovici and Christophe Blain’s 'World Without End' – a comic about Climate Change that outsold Asterix in France in the year of its launch was a sharp, engaging introduction to Energy Sources and Climate Change. The panels that caught my attention were the ones explaining the long-term impacts of Chernobyl and Fukushima. According to … Continue reading The Real Costs of Chernobyl and Fukushima
Arnold Kling’s ‘The Three Languages of Politics’ is a short, succinct and handy toolkit to categorize political communication. For Kling, the three dominant political groups – the Progressives (what we call the Left in India), the Conservatives and the Libertarians communicate along dedicated axes. Liberals view political conflict as Oppressed vs. Oppressor Conservatives view political conflict … Continue reading The Three Languages of Politics
Yesterday, I was at the Chandigarh Secretariat of the Government of Punjab. The structure, an iconic landmark of the city, is also one of the best representations of Brutalism - the minimalist architectural style emphasizing functional designs employing raw materials like exposed concrete. While much of the interior has been redesigned and repurposed, the staircase … Continue reading A ‘Brutal’ pic
The coastal districts of Odisha are often the Ground Zero of the ferocious cyclones that originate in the Bay of Bengal. But what was once a destructive phenomenon has now been tamed by the state thanks to a comprehensive, community-centric cyclone preparedness initiative that began twenty-five years ago. Last week, I spent a few days … Continue reading Balasore, Bhadrak Notes
So many of the gastronomical delights of our modern life would be impossible without modern refrigeration. Cheeseburgers, chilled beer, ice cream and of course all the imported exotic items like Norwegian salmon, Swiss cheese and Australian beef would have just remained local delicacies restricted to a few 100 kilometers from their point of origin had … Continue reading Our Refrigerated World
