Statistics in the Progressive Era were more than mere signs of a managerial government’s early efforts to sort and categorize its citizens. The emergence of statistical selves was not simply a rationalization of everyday life, a search for order (as Robert Wiebe taught a half century of historians to say).2 The reliance on statistical governance coincided with and complemented a pervasive revaluation of primal spontaneity and vitality, an effort to unleash hidden strength from an elusive inner self. The collectivization epitomized in the quantitative turn was historically compatible with radically individualist agendas for personal regeneration—what later generations would learn to call positive thinking. – Hedgehog Review
Category: ideas
The Wellness Trap
Once we realize that we cannot find lasting happiness through relying on outer things, we might turn to meditation, but now a new problem can arise. Many people today are drawn to meditation practice for enhancing their own well-being: we would all like to achieve “inner happiness,” but again we are back to the search. The very attempt to seek a happy mind becomes endless, with chasing the happiness leading to more chasing. At the same time, our efforts to get rid of stress can seem to create even more stress. Meditation itself now becomes a new kind of hamster wheel upon which we endlessly run—running but not moving. – Lithub
Those Ubiquitous Ads For MasterClass? Here’s What You Actually Get
MasterClass launched in 2015 with just three classes: Dustin Hoffman on acting, Serena Williams on tennis, and Patterson on writing. Since then the company has grown exponentially, raising $135 million in venture capital from 2012 to 2018. It now has more than 85 classes across nine categories. (Last year it added 25 new classes, and this year it intends to add even more.) After the pandemic hit, as people started spending more time at home, its subscriptions surged, some weeks increasing tenfold over the average in 2019. – The Atlantic
How The Aztecs Recorded History
The Aztec historians, creators of a genre called the xiuhpohualli (SHOO-po-WA-lee), developed a highly effective way of keeping satisfying memories alive. The pictographic texts that Itzcoatl burned were only a part of the Aztec way of keeping history. The glyphs served as mnemonic devices designed to elicit volumes of speech. – Psyche
Our Collective Dreams Of Rome
So many legends, so much art, and yet … “Rubbish collects in gutters, litter spills from over-stuffed communal bins, pigeons scavenge among fallen, leaking garbage bags. People walk casually past the trash, a symptom of ineffectual politicians and waste plants straining for space. La grande bellezza is looking like shit.” Then the virus came. – The Guardian (UK)
Some Creative Ways To Reopen Theme Parks Safely
Nothing will be the same, or at least for a long while, so why not try something new? “It’s easy to imagine many areas of a theme park resort being refashioned into a special-event space. I’ve been holding out hope that the outdoor grounds of the Disneyland Hotel would be utilized for a food and drink event featuring the talents of the staff at its tiki bar Trader Sam’s. But this is also a chance to re-imagine the theme park space, to view the entire grounds as something akin to a game board.” – Los Angeles Times
Can German (Can Any) City Centers Be Saved During The Coronavirus?
Many things have battered the city center over the past two decades. “German mayors have tended to turn to marketing in an effort to attract more people to the city center. With retail moving online, entertainment, cultural events and good food became the primary selling points. And it worked for quite a while.” Then Covid-19 shut it all down. – Der Spiegel
Of Experts And The Willingness To Be Wrong
When experts and pundits can’t or won’t say ‘I don’t know’, the consequences can be dire. In the short term, bad advice leads to bad decisions. In the context of admitting uncertainty about challenging questions, there are two ways this can happen. These are particularly clear and salient in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. – Aeon
When Fans Of A Show Become Its Owners
Fans come to see themselves not just as the audience for, or patrons of, a given “intellectual property” but (to paraphrase the old WestJet slogan) as owners too. This feeling of ownership is often vindicated by the franchises themselves, which deliberately pander to the hopes and expectations of their core audiences. – The Walrus
Frustrating: Quality Information Costs While Lies Are Free
A white supremacist on YouTube will tell you all about race and IQ but if you want to read a careful scholarly refutation, obtaining a legal PDF from the journal publisher would cost you $14.95, a price nobody in their right mind would pay for one article if they can’t get institutional access. Academic publishing is a nightmarish patchwork, with lots of articles advertised at exorbitant fees on one site, and then for free on another, or accessible only through certain databases, which your university or public library may or may not have access to. – Current Affairs