It’s been a week folks. I keep thinking we’ll get a break, and then Monday happens.
This week? Well SAB 121 was rescinded and banks can custody crypto assets. OpenAI released Operators. There’s going to be a US Digital Assets Stockpile. We’re getting declassified JFK, RFK, and MLK documents. There’s a new Model Y design. And that’s just in the last 24 hours.
There was also an inauguration. It was inside, in case you missed that, so the crowds weren’t YUUUUUGE, but there were still plenty of billionaires. They were in suits, their fiancés were sometimes in lingerie, and the senators were in a hoodie and shorts— at least, Fetterman was. Then we got over 200 Executive Orders, J6 people were pardoned, the whole Biden family was pardoned, Fauci was pardoned, Ross Ulbricht was pardoned — basically everyone was pardoned, so clean slate. Then Elon was awkward, DEI died, and $TRUMP went down in value (whaddya know?). A 33-story rocket was caught by chopsticks for a second time, and OpenAI announced a $500 billion dollar new project from the Oval Office called Stargate that sends everyone rushing to buy more $NVDA. Not everyone is sure they have all that money though, but Satya from Microsoft is reassuring: “All I know is I'm good for my $80 billion.”
This is exhausting! Oh, and the whole country is really cold!
On to the reading!
Timely
Epiphany and the Modern World - We’re a couple weeks past the Feast of the Epiphany, but this meditation on the role of the magi today is still potent.
Last Boys At The Beginning Of History - An anecdotal look into the young people attracted to national political movements - both the conservative and the liberal - what they’re thinking and how they think about our place in history.
Why are tech people suddenly so into homeschooling? - ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Timeless
The Dial of Progress - A delightful mental model for thinking about how to get more progress. Initially applied to Covid, it applies to plenty more. Crank it up.
25 Useful Ideas For 2025 - We’re still just starting this year off guys, strap in and try on some new mental models.
Beware of metacognitive laziness - From the department of we-really-didn’t-need-a-paper-to-tell-us-but-still comes the conclusion that having tools like ChatGPT might make our brains lazier and overly dependent on these tools as crutches. Maybe you, but not me.
wtfhappenedin1971? - In case you’ve never seen this, it makes for an interesting set of charts and graphs. How could so many different measures start changing or diverging at exactly the same time? If you want, here’s a hint.
Books
The Ancient City by Numa Denis Fustel de Coulanges - What a mouthful of a name! De Coulanges was a 19th-century french historian and one of the most well-read academics in original Greek and Latin texts of the time. The Ancient City is an exposition of the nature of the ancient Greek and Roman world, in particular the role that religion played on culture and social structures, all built on insanely deep primary text references. He suggests that most ancient societies were effectively a series of interlocking cults and that all of the form and rules of the larger societies were generated from these beliefs. So how the heck did I find out about this obscure 19th century book? I’ll tell you. Marc Andreesen. The critical edge today is less around STEM skills (table stakes) and more around the ability to understand humanity and societies: how they move, what principles underpin them, and how they’re developed, which is, in essence, the classical view of the humanities. Andreesen knows this. During an interview he gave a 15 minute explanation about how it has informed his thoughts on cults and societal groups since World War II. So yeah, give it a whirl.
Tweets
Some good ones, so you don’t need to scroll!
The world is amazing. Cheers!