This may seem obvious, but it’s important. Jane and Frank work weekdays at a restaurant. One day, their boss offers them both an extra shift… Read More »Thought experiment: Infinite inequality without injustice (1)
A pole of inaccessibility with respect to a geographical criterion of inaccessibility marks a location that is the most challenging to reach according to that… Read More »Poles of Inaccessibility; or, Point Nemo
This is a really interesting and well produced article (as are other pages on The Pudding), and I highly recommend it. There’s a version you… Read More »Recommendation: The Pudding on the Yard-Sale Model and Wealth Tax
A small stone-age tribe lives undetected in a remote forest in your country. They live sustainably off the land by hunting and foraging. The forest… Read More »Thought experiment: poverty and inequality without injustice
I recommend Tyler Cowen’s recent interview with Katherine Rundell. Here’s a highlight: It would be really important to me [when identifying a writing talent] that… Read More »Katherine Rundell on the aesthetics of language: form and substance
The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents. We live on a… Read More »At the Mountains of Madness: Edwardian* Science; Lovecraftian Cosmology
*(With apologies to readers in Britain for that horrifying z) Only when the last crocodile has been skinned will you realise that you are being… Read More »Moneyfesto; or, the Monetization* of DriverlessCrocodile
In a quiet moment I watched my youngest son playing chess on my phone. He cut a swathe through the opposition pieces with a couple… Read More »Tactics and Strategy
Read, then read again replacing “software” with “your social program” or “your business”: Software is a temporary garden whose fate is inextricably intertwined with its… Read More »Baldur Bjarnason on theory-building, living code and team churn
“Ow-eee!” cried the Crocodile. “Help! Stop! Where am I?” Roald Dahl – The Enormous Crocodile [amazon] Is this the world’s worst elevator control panel? John… Read More »Design Matters (17): Elevator Control Panel Nightmares