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  • “Our Dollar, Your Problem” by Kenneth Rogoff

    • The dollars reach is a unique oddity in history
    • Inflation is inherently a minor default
    • Seahawk movie
    • Currency exchange rates were based on USD
    • Other currencies are too thin to support large exchanges
    • Size matters but is not everything
    • The US attracts foreign investment seeking safer investments
    • We then invest in foreign markets for better returns
    • Europe’s low spend in defense allows it to spend much on social programs
    • Japan’s debt is really high
      • A weak Japan is not in the US interests
    • “This time is different”
    • If not on the Euro, Greece and Spain could have printed its own money to cover debt and might not have been trusted with so much debt
    • Central Banks speak to markets like owners speak to dogs, sentiment is more important than content
    • Asia is half of the USD block
    • Trade deficit is not as important as the saving/spending rate
    • China orchestrated worked migration to prevent over pressure
    • The IMF is judged on how well they match official numbers, not actual numbers

  • “The Sweet Spot” by Paul Bloom

    • Humans pursue pain to bring meaning to their joy
    • Persons kidnafpped by indigenous people in the “Wild West” would often go back to their kidnappers, but never the other way around
    • Pleasure and pain are not opposites
    • Horror junkies like feeling scared
    • The English word “happy” is broader than comparative words in other languages
    • More money brings more satisfaction but happiness plateaus
    • Thinking about the past and the present brings meaning but not happiness
    • We tend to try to balance hedonic experiences with pain
    • Thinking something is painful makes the actual pain less intense and we experience pleasure
      • It has to be brief
      • Not cause permanent damage
      • (Surprises are painful)
    • “Expensive signaling” is a way to show you are serious and willing to “pay” the price
      • Engagement rings are a good example, expensive and pointless
    • Boredom is pain signals for the mind
    • We get the same pleasure at watching people get justice as we do getting justice ourselves
    • Thinking hard does not burn any more glucose than thinking relaxing
    • The most taxing brain exercise is opening one’s eyes
    • Mental exhaustion is a way to help compel one to look for other things to do with one’s life
    • Most engaged people are clergy, military, librarians
    • Don’t focus on being happy to be happy

  • “Cross Purposes” by Jonathan Rauch

    • Christianity is on a quick, steep decline
    • Parishioners are bringing their politics to church with them
    • For liberals, the answer to “Who is in charge here?” should be “No one”
      • The system is not perfect but tends to get better over time
      • They are seen as godless
    • Making money is the only value on the rise while most other values are in decline, especially faith
    • The US Founders thought being virtuous would help make people more governable
    • Four foundations
      • Mortality
      • Morality
      • Murder
      • Miracles
    • “People have a perfect right to believe that we exist for a reason even if that reason is not scientifically provable. We are, of course, not entitled to believe whatever we want.”
    • Being ubiquitous does not make it inherently right
    • “Any unlikely natural explanation is inherently more plausible than a miracle.”
    • Democracy depends on religion that desires to support democratic society; Religion depends on a democracy that supports moral values
    • Liberalism is inherently anarchy-adjacent
    • Conservatives characterize liberality as too much freedom
    • Locke and others knew that there needed to be limited freedom for both persons and government
    • “Religion does best when it adapts to the needs of actual people”
    • We should move zeal out of politics and back to religion
    • “Evangelic” became synonymous with “conservative”
    • (true) Christianity can be summed as
      • Fear not
      • Imitate Christ
      • Forgive each other
    • “Christian nationalism” is not religious but political
    • “We are to be governed by laws, not individual people”
    • ‘What we gain by accepting what is already de facto law is insignificant compared to what we gain by working together’
    • We should be navigating to increasing moral agency
    • Mormon theology drives its approach to politics, most churches are the other way around
    • “You can’t beat something with nothing”
    • Many churches are missing “adults” to help keep the church in the spiritual realm and out of politics
    • Christians should avoid the “Church of fear”; “fear not” is the most common admonition in the New Testament
    • We should not pass laws “because Jesus said so” but we also shouldn’t be “allergic to religion”
    • De-escalation is a benefit in itself
    • Christians practices would be benefited if they realized they not in the promised land but are exiles

  • “Dr. Calhoun’s Mousery” by Lee Alan Dugatkin

    • Too many mice kills the society
    • With eel grass, starfish live lone lives, without it, they clump together
    •  Rats in human cities tended to self-regulate their populations
    • Fighting takes place on the way to the feeder, but not at the feeder itself
    • Hypothesis that small mammals have frequent aggressive interactions; as the interactions drop, the mammals move in the direction that is most likely to increase such interactions, thus spreading out
    • Generations of leisure impairs the ability to care for young
    • Morning songs may be how birds take a census
    • Dominant rats did not mind pan-sexual and homosexual rat advances on themselves
    • Culture helps manage the abundance of social interactions we have today
    • An “invisible college” allows for important topics to be discussed and foment so answers are ready when they are needed
      • (This is something the internet can help with but does not necessarily)
    • Rats with low social velocity have more randomized patterns that might be better adapted for changing environments
    • Connectivity decreases entropy but adds stress

  • “The Spinach King” by John Seabrook

    • “Truck” comes from “bartering or produce growing”
    • Marel is a prehistoric chemical that made the northeast growing really productive
    • East Coast farms were slow to adopt irrigation, hampering their productivity
    • Road building is naturally connected to farming because they need to get their farm goods to where the people are
    • National road building was originally under the Department of Agriculture
    • During WWII, people were encouraged to pick frozen foods to let canned goods support the war
    • There is a difference between having money and being rich
    • Farming + Contractor work = Year-round work
    • Internal Family Systems (IFS) is a therapy system that is an internal analysis
      • (Damaged people exude power to distract from the weakness inside)