Synthetic (AI) generated towns
Starting with this article I got intrigued and infuriated in equal measure because the journalism didn’t explain what was going on.
Culture
Nicholas Gruen.
Weekend readings on political rhetoric, free speech, and public discourse.
Recent essays
30 of 45Rearranging the deckchairs on HMS Unserious
And other things - not just the new British PM
Is Rogernomics the answer? Yes and no
Special additional Sunday edition for
The Boaty McBoatface factor: Irony to the rescue
How Count Binface changes everything … (Maybe)
Your life: Load bearing: or bear loading?
And all your other conundrums of the week: SOLVED!
Winter among the miracles: and the rent-seekers
And other things I reckon are worth your time this week
Palestine as ideological superstorm
And other things I encountered through the week
Kill me now edition
And other things I discovered this week on my travels
Hobart Stadium to cost $1.5 billion and counting
But you probably expected that
Swapping trenches in the gender wars
And other items of interest this week
Are nicer LLMs less truthful? (Hint: yes)
And other things that turned up while I was away
Why birth rates are falling everywhere all at once
And other things I learned while travelling in the Old Country (my excuse for being late).
Working class + Plutocrats => Fascism
And other equations you'll want to know about …
Blogging the 2008 crisis
The first of many out from the Club Troppo vault
Terrorists 3: Rational self-interest: 0
And other things that require your attention this weekend
Should we have called fascism 'gangsterism'?
And other things I wouldn't have included if you didn't absolutely NEED to know.
Utopianism or bust! How about neither?
And other things you simply MUST read
Are you moral typecasting (but of course you are!)
We all are, all the time. And other things to think about this weekend.
Where’s your Australian Idol?
In praise of imaginative vigour and the joy of human accomplishment.
Cometh the hour, cometh the fruitcake
And a host of other things (with a surprise appearance of Malcolm Turnbull's great grandfather).
Unthinking aloud
And other food for thought - or unthought (according to taste).
Milestones of intellectual progress
An overflow edition
Let that sink in …
And many other things encountered this week
Louis Theroux and the manosphere
Bemusement as a service
Don’t tell us your vision. Where’s your red line?
And other things of interest
Cancelled!
And how you can help me out …
Great speeches and truth telling
In the wake of Mark Carney’s great speech, I thought I’d reprise this piece from 2012 when I published it at Troppo. Thing is, Carney’s speech occupied a category of speech I didn’t mention (and I think Dennis didn’t either) — great speech as truth-telling.
Hate speech and free speech
And some other things I encountered on my round: Oh and I miss out on the Nobel - again!
Free speech and garbled-speech
And other things that coursed through my tiny mind this week …
Stop voting. Start sampling
And lots of other things from the last week