Please welcome Nat Wilcox Turner and Curro Jimenez, who will be giving Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday Coffee Break features.
Saturday, June 21, 2025
Coffee Break: Working Class Life in 17th-Century Italy, Science in Decline, AI and Scientific Understanding, and Neanderthal Art
Part the First. Tales from the Crypt. Subtitled The lives of 17th century Milan’s working poor – their health, diet, and drug habits – emerge from thousands of bodies buried under a public hospital. This article appeared in Science on 1 May 2025: In 1456, the Duke of Milan established a medical institution dedicated to […]
Golden Dome Dangers: How Trump’s Scheme Threatens to Make the US Less Safe
Why Trump’s Golden Dome is set to backfire, except for the grift, which is presumably the real point.
China’s Quiet Rapprochement With Israel
“The war continues, but the war is not the theme of Israel-China bilateral relations.”
Satyajit Das: Lessons from Japan’s Massive Debt Hangover
While there are things the debt-addled West can learn from Japan, the dirty secret is they were in some key ways in better shape than we are.
Yanis Varoufakis: In the EU Nothing Succeeds Like Gross Failure: The Astonishing Case of Ursula von der Leyen
A much-deserved evisceration of both Ursuala von der Leyen and the chumps who’ve bought what she has been selling.
John Helmer: Putin Hits Pause Button on Oreshnik-Level Retaliation for Ukraine Strike on Russian Nuclear Deterrence Assets
In his latest talk with Ray McGovern on Dialogue Works, John Helmer gives far and away the best overview1 so far in the wake of Ukraine attacks on bridges and civilian trains, drone attacks targeting bombers in Russia’s nuclear deterrence forces, a failed new attack on Kerch Bridge, and phone discussions between Lavrov and Rubio […]
A Culture War is Brewing Over Moral Concern for AI
As AI systems increasingly display emotion — genuine or not — public opinion will split around calls for their rights.
Like China, a Mexico Tariffs Own Goal: US Dependence on Mexico Energy Trade Means “Those Tariffs Never Stood a Chance”?
More evidence of Trump cluelessness in his Mexico and China tariffs bobs and weaves.
Rajiv Sethi: American Leadership in Higher Education Is Being Lost for Good, to China’s Benefit
Why you can stick a fork in US higher education excellence.
Plastic Mulch Promised Better Harvests. It May Be Hurting the Soil Instead.
Plastic mulch pollution may linger for centuries
MAHA Influencers, the Future of Public Health, and Longings for Immortality
The Make America Healthy Again (MAHA) Report has dropped! The original document included phantom (hallucinated?) references, but those have been fixed apparently. Or maybe not. A graduate student who wrote a review with the same defects would get a flat “F”, but this does not seem to matter. Could AI (Algorithmic Intelligence) have had anything […]
