The Map Is Not the Territory ⁠✦
If a map were to represent the territory with perfect fidelity, it would no longer be a reduction and thus would no longer be useful to us.
Everything I share — writing, short curated lists, and links. You can also find me on Threads.
If a map were to represent the territory with perfect fidelity, it would no longer be a reduction and thus would no longer be useful to us.
The sky by day is limitless, at night a feast of stars. The sun’s movement across the land makes for a parade of shadows and hues unlike in any other place on the planet. The Chisos Mountains form a majestic blue boundary off in the distance. It’s country as inhospitable as it is spectacular, for eons a place that attracted folks as irascible as the porcupines that nestle in the rocks around these parts.
Climate change is a structural problem involving politics and economics, not personal choices, and solving it will require huge political and economic changes.
So, let’s recap: there’s affordability, a slower pace of life, top-shelf food and culture, and a welcoming, friendly community. During my travels, I found myself—a near-lifelong Houston resident—increasingly bewitched by the notion of small-town life. I began dreaming, to paraphrase Guy Clark’s “L.A. Freeway,” of packing up the dishes, making note of all good wishes, saying adiós to all this concrete, and getting me some dirt-road backstreets.
Clouds, their manifesto says, are not signs of negativity and gloom, but rather “nature’s poetry” and “the most egalitarian of her displays.”
This resource being as limited as it was, should I not be doing something better with it, something more urgent or interesting or authentic? At some point in my late 30s, I recognised the paradoxical source of this anxiety: that every single thing in life took much longer than I expected it to, except for life itself, which went much faster, and would be over before I knew where I was.
It’s also weird that to us, the 2020s sounds like such a rad futuristic decade—and that’s how the 1920s seemed to people 100 years ago today. They were all used to the 19-teens, and suddenly they were like, “whoa cool we’re in the twenties!” Then they got upset thinking about how much farther along in life their 1910 self thought they’d be by 1920.
Where did he go? Did he really make it to Mars? Is he hiding out on the dark side of the Moon? Has he really accepted Chinese citizenship? Or is he just chilling in his luxury bunker in New Zealand? Nobody knows for sure, but with this new mobile game from superstar designers Mindfield you can help track down America's greatest traitor! Based on the classic children’s book, Where’s Elon? challenges you to spot the world’s greatest entrepreneur-turned-environmental-criminal across a dozen beautifully illustrated, scrolling crowd scenes. When you see him point him out quick—and be rewarded with the satisfaction of watching a beautifully rendered drone strike! Fun for the whole family.
Science is not some big immovable mass. It is not infallible. It does not pretend to be able to explain everything or to know everything. Furthermore, there is no such thing as “alternative” science. Science does involve mistakes. But we have yet to find a system of inquiry capable of achieving what it does: move us closer and closer to truths that improve our lives and understanding of the universe.
Settlers are brilliant people. They can turn the half baked thing into something useful for a larger audience. They build trust. They build understanding. They make the possible future actually happen. They turn the prototype into a product, make it manufacturable, listen to customers and turn it profitable. Their innovation is what we tend to think of as applied research and differentiation. They built the first ever computer products (e.g. IBM 650 and onwards), the first generators (Hippolyte Pixii, Siemens Generators).