2026-07-13 19:11:23

Every so often I will write things down with a pen on paper and feel an incredible sense of joy and gratitude. Somehow there is this system whereby I can encode my thoughts into symbols, and then transfer those symbols onto a surface, and then both I and other people can later imbibe those symbols and transfer them back into thoughts. What the hell! This is incredible.

Numbers are also incredible. I tried to write some sentences about this but I couldn't figure out how. But iyknyk: numbers are rad.

I do not believe that in a million years I would have come up with either of these myself. Some previous human(s) had this incredible breakthrough that abstract concepts can be embodied in manipulable symbols, and then that system can be taught to other humans, and those humans' abilities in all kinds of spheres can be 100+x'ed as a result. Genuinely brilliant. I don't even know what to call them – cognitive technologies? They have changed my life forever, obviously, and I'm so deeply grateful for it. YOU ARE READING MY WORDS RIGHT NOW, WE ARE DOING THE THING.

Of course this leads me to wonder... are there any other things like this out there? Are there yet-uninvented or just not-yet-popularized symbolic/cognitive technologies that we might still benefit from? If you have ideas – specific or just "I think it might be this-shaped" – please let me know in the comments.

The first thing that comes to mind for me is something spacial/directional: maybe there's some better way to symbolically map space and direction that would make it easier for all of us to rotate the proverbial shapes? But I don't know what it would be, or even what shaped hole it fills.

2026-07-10 19:11:40

Every so often, someone will tell me I simply MUST read such-and-such, or HAVE TO visit someplace, or WILL LOVE a certain movie.

I hate this so much.

I can't tell how much it's just a cultural thing; I can't tell how much they think they're speaking hyperbolically, rather than literally commanding me to do something; I don't know how much any other people are bothered by this, or if this is unique to me.

But I hate it! Please stop.

2026-07-09 19:11:46

Perhaps if you grew up in Canada they taught you about this in history class, but it's brand new to me!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/King%27s_Daughters

Apparently in the 1600s, France had a severe gender imbalance in their efforts to colonize North America. 

In English speaking colonies, whole communities and families moved together– men, women and children--usually to escape religious persecution and create utopian communities without government oversight (the North) or to reinvent feudal farming communities (the South). 

In contrast, the French government was way more hands-on with their colonies, and New France was more of an economic effort than a social/utopian experiment. Most of the French colonists were young working men without wives or families.

So, for ten years (1663-1673), King Louis XIV sent about 800 penniless young women to New France, all expenses paid, with a completely new wardrobe, household linens, and dowry thrown in. This initial financial boost meant that the girls weren't prostitutes or servants, but rather free agents with the economic power to choose their own husbands. Because the King was providing their dowry, they were known as "The King's Daughters" which is a pretty cheeky nickname--a bit of a flex, a bit of a roast. 

The best part of reading this Wikipedia entry is scrolling the Famous Descendants section. In addition to some male ice hockey players and at least one canonized Catholic saint, these women passed their genetics on to:

Hillary Rodham Clinton

Angelina Jolie

MADONNA (!!!) 

Chloe Sevegne

Now I'm re-imagining the conversation:

ADVISOR: Your Majesty, we don't have enough women in the New World. 

KING: Easy fix, Paris is chock full of baddies. Go there and get me 800 of the hottest, smartest, hungriest girls you can find.

KING: Oh, and make sure they can absolutely kick someone's ass!" 

Yes, I knowwwww that the Notable Descendants section has a massive selection bias, but it's delightful to imagine a boatfull of healthy, strong 18-25 year-old Madonnas, Angelinas, Chloës and Hilarys. It's such drama! 

What kind of social instability and absolute havoc was going on in those ten years when 800 of them showed up? What were they thinking? What were they feeling? How much did they interact with First Nations women? Did they have any moral or intuitive scruples about colonization? What was it like to live in a world with very few older women? I'm sure there is some historical record answering these questions, but since I don't speak or read French, I will probably just enjoy wondering and not knowing. 

Thanks for Wikiing with me! :-) 

2026-07-08 21:44:47

Ever wondered how your namesake stock has been performing these last few years? Are you outperforming or, um, experiencing headwinds? Well, now you can find out.

[Cannot stress enough that this is a toy, I make no guarantees on the accuracy of this data, and this is not investment advice.]

2026-07-07 19:11:00

I once met a guy who had previously gotten to the top of two different highly competitive professions. I asked him for the secret of his success, which is probably a bad question in general, and he replied:

Most people don't want to succeed, they just want to say that they tried their best and there was nothing they could do.

My first reaction was genuine outrage: I thought the guy was a privileged prick, that he had no idea how truly insurmountable many people's circumstances are, and how lucky he was to have got to where he'd been.

My second reaction was to think about my own life and go:

oh.

I guess I do often give up at the first obstacle.

And:

oh.

I do secretly enjoy the relief of thinking well, I tried– I guess there was nothing I could do.

I still believe there are people who really can't do anything about their circumstances. And that it's fraught to apply this philosophy to anyone but yourself.

There is also a sense in which The Things You Can Do are strongly constrained by the range of things you're willing to do, and that e.g. sometimes you can become a famous artist or philosopher if you're willing to abandon your children, but many of us think that this does not actually justify the results.

But with all those caveats, I do suspect that many people would benefit from trying on for size the thought:

"I'm not truly trying to succeed at X right now, I'm content to say I tried and there was nothing I could do."

And then: "What would I do if I really wanted and needed to succeed at X?"

And then: trying that, and a couple other additional things too.

2026-07-02 19:11:50

1. The easiest people to make friends with are the friends of your existing friends — both because your friends are unusually likely to share your taste in people, and because a pre-existing mutual is an extremely helpful shortcut to establishing trust.

2. As such, if you’re moving to a new place, you should just ask everyone you know whether they know anyone there you should meet. (Sometimes you won’t become friends with those people directly, but you will become friends with their friends, etc).

3. Also, when you’ve just moved to a new city, you have to say “yes” to everything. Even when you've just arrived and are not settled in yet, and even activities that aren’t exactly your jam — be a little overly-easy up front, and then later you can co-ordinate on doing the things you enjoy more.

4. The main dropped ball I personally see in terms of budding friendships is followup after the first meeting. You go to a party and you meet a friend-of-friend and you both vibe. Most people in my circles seem to make vague noises like “well I hope I see you around!”, or at best they ask for a number but never make a concrete bid to hang out. My guess is that the tipping point for Becoming Friends is probably seeing someone 3 times, so if you’re at 1 you gotta work hard to make the next 2 happen; after that it'll either happen naturally or no.
5. It's genuinely hard to differentiate sometimes between “person who does want to be friends but is somewhat disorganized and/or has a busy life” from “person who doesn’t want to be friends, really, but is awkward saying no.” I think you just have to swallow this risk somewhat: reach out 2 or 3 times (tops) over a few weeks or months, and if they can’t coordinate let it slide. Unfortunately there is no way to know for sure either way — I've had very good friends who I really thought were trying to politely reject me at first, but who were actually just extremely disorganized and/or flaky.
6. One helpful trick sometimes is to invite people to something last-minute that you’re pretty sure they can’t come to, so they hopefully won’t feel social pressure about saying “no” to it. Text them something like “hey I know it’s super last-minute but me and some friends are doing XYZ tonight, want to come?” If they actually can come: great. If they text back quickly and enthusiastically saying they can’t tonight but would love to [do whatever] in future, also great – they do want to be friends and genuinely can't make it. If they don’t reply till after the event, or if they just reply with a “sorry I have plans”, they probably aren’t looking to be friends, though again you can never really be certain.

7. This one is up to you but I really think if possible you should travel to the other person the first couple of times (unless they very enthusiastically decide to travel to you). Just make it as easy as possible for the other person to say “yes” — go to where they live, or to the activity they like, as a catalyst for the friendship, then later you can get things on an even footing. (The second part is important too, nobody likes a doormat, truly).

8. From what I remember of high school chemistry, a lot of reactions require a certain amount of "activation energy" for the two components to combine, but once they've melded you need much less energy to keep them together. A lot of my previous tips could be re-written as: don't get into a relationship that requires unreasonable amounts of your energy to maintain, but do be willing to provide most-or-all of the activation energy for a friendship to start. My sense is that many friendships don't get going because neither party (nor lucky outside circumstances) successfully provide the needed activation energy, even though both parties would have enjoyed the friendship once it started.
9. As with throwing parties: when making friends, really try to be at ease around the other person, even at the cost of other priorities. I know it might sound like I’m screaming RELAX! COME ON, RELAX ALREADY! at you, but I truly think “being at ease and putting others at ease” is an important and surprisingly actionable skill. E.g. if you’re anxious about someone else’s experience you might be tempted to keep asking “are you having a good time? Are you cold? Are you hot? Am I being annoying? I’m being annoying, I know it, tell me.” But this does not put people at ease, so instead you gotta just breathe in and out (or whatever your personal method is of deescalating your feelings) and prioritize being at ease over fixing the (possible) problem. Similarly if you’re thinking “oh wow I’m so boring I have nothing to say”, remember that being at ease is more important than being interesting, so don’t stress the interesting-ness if it puts you ill-at-ease. Etc etc etc for other doubts and worries.
10. The Propinquity Effect – "the tendency for people to form friendships or romantic relationships with those whom they encounter often" – is one of the last social psychology results I actually believe in. In the old days people became friends by running into each other in the neighbourhood a few times, but we don’t live in that world any more so you have to do the same thing digitally. Send people some texts occasionally, even if it’s a dumb meme or an unnecessary question or a thing that made you think of them. (I am not great at doing this, if I'm honest, but I think it’s a great thing to do). Again, don’t overdo it and if they never text you first/back then you gotta let it go, etc, but first you gotta try a bit. (Or, you know, join a club or activity where you'll see the same people multiple times, that works too).
11. I still think small groupchats are an underrated social technology, and that if e.g. you hang out with 3 people, it’s nice to make a little groupchat of those 3 people and send them a photo of the evening (or whatever) so that in future if you go to something you can send a text to that group and have those people feel like they’re part of a (mildly) cohesive unit. I get endlessly made fun of for making too many groupchats, and I know some people do truly find it annoying, but frankly the benefits outweigh the costs so I keep doing it anyway.

I made a game, it's a great way to make friends. If you like Charades, Taboo or Monikers you might enjoy it.