Fascinating article about the mayoral terms of Antanas Mockus in Bogota Colombia. Urban Design, Civil Society, Engagement. One time, he asked citizens to put their power to use with 350,000 "thumbs-up" and "thumbs-down" cards that his office distributed to the populace. The cards were meant to approve or disapprove of other citizens' behavior; it was a device that many people actively - and peacefully - used in the streets. (more)

Kyle Eschenroeder on Depression, Loneliness, and Invisible Asymptotes. (more)

probably the key to Customer Retention (more)

Double Decision. Double Decision is the current version of the speed training cognitive intervention used in the ACTIVE study (more)

“The traditional approach to learning is to define the objectives (the gap between the knowledge a person has and the knowledge the person needs to perform the task), establish the regimen for practice, and provide feedback. Learning procedures and factual data is seen as adding more information and skills to the person’s storehouse of knowledge. However, this storehouse metaphor is poorly suited for cognitive skill, and does not address the differing learning needs of novices and experts. Teaching cognitive skills requires the diagnosis of the problem in terms of flaws in existing mental models, not gaps in knowledge. It requires learning objectives that are linked to the person’s current mental models. It requires practice regimens that may have to result in “unlearning” that enables the person to abandon the current, flawed mental models. It requires feedback that promotes sensemaking. We propose a Cognitive Transformation Theory to guide the development of cognitive skills. Finally, we present several strategies that might be useful in overcoming barriers to understanding and to revising mental models. https://thecynefin.co/library/cognitive-transformation-theory/

Steve Yegge: "I was chatting with my buddy at Google, who's been a tech director there for about 20 years, about their AI adoption. Craziest convo I've had all year. The TL;DR is that Google engineering appears to have the same AI adoption footprint as John Deere, the tractor company. Most of the industry has the same internal adoption curve: 20% agentic power users, 20% outright refusers, 60% still using Cursor or equivalent chat tool. It turns out Google has this curve too.* (more)

Gary Bencivenga's Marketing Maxims. Based on decades of scientific testing, here are my favorite maxims (short, easy-to-remember guiding principles) on how to… (more)

A truffle is the fruiting body of a subterranean ascomycete fungus, one of the species of the genus Tuber. More than one hundred other genera of fungi are classified as truffles including Geopora, Peziza, Choiromyces, and Leucangium.[1] These genera belong to the class Pezizomycetes and the Pezizales order. Several truffle-like basidiomycetes are excluded from Pezizales, including Rhizopogon and Glomus. Truffles are ectomycorrhizal fungi, so they are found in close association with tree roots. Spore dispersal is accomplished through fungivores, animals that eat fungi.[2] These fungi have ecological roles in nutrient cycling and drought tolerance.[3] Some truffle species are prized as food.[4] Edible truffles are used in Italian, French[5] and other national hautes cuisines. Truffles are cultivated and harvested from natural environments. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Truffle (more)

One of the Things I Love, esp Dark Chocolate (more)

a healthier source of caffeine? (also an "interesting" ice cream flavor)

like green tea, but even more like dirt/dust

Default Friend: I LIKE Labubus and Dubai Chocolate and Matcha and Lana and Brandy Melville and TikTok Aesthetics and and and. Today, in his newsletter, W. David Marx (who, as an aside, is a must-read) wrote about an Amanda Mull piece on the disorienting nature of contemporary trends: Labubus and Dubai chocolates and matcha and chamoy and Swedish candy, all things that seem to emerge from nowhere, mean nothing, and disappear just as quickly. (2025-08-14-MarxOnlyFadsACultureandEconomyOfLabubu) (more)

The problem "above" the Problem you started with. (meta, meta-game)

Daniel Bendisi Kokotajlo[1] is an artificial intelligence (AI) researcher. He was a researcher in the governance division of OpenAI from 2022 to 2024,[2] and currently leads the AI Futures Project. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_Kokotajlo (more)

complex problem problem-solving approach embracing uncertainty, from Saras Sarasvathy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saras_Sarasvathy (more)

aka effectual reasoning

Robert Kegan (born August 24, 1946) is an American developmental psychologist, author, and consultant. He was the William and Miriam Meehan Professor in Adult Learning and Professional Development at Harvard Graduate School of Education, where he taught for forty years until his retirement in 2016.[1] Additionally he was the Educational Chair for the Institute for Management and Leadership in Education and the Co-director for the Change Leadership Group.[2] He is a licensed psychologist and practicing therapist, has lectured widely to professional and lay audiences, and consults in the area of professional development and organization development. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Kegan Books: Evolving Self, In Over Our Heads, How the Way We Talk Can Change the Way We Work, An Everyone Culture. (more)

The One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA), or the Big Beautiful Bill (P.L. 119-21), is a U.S. federal statute passed by the 119th United States Congress containing tax and spending policies that form the core of President Donald Trump's second-term agenda. The bill was signed into law by Trump on July 4, 2025.[1][2] Although the Act is popularly referred to as the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, this official short title was removed from the bill during the Senate amendment process. Therefore, the law has no official short title. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One_Big_Beautiful_Bill_Act (more)

one flavor of Welfare Reform, where people are required to work, or given work to do, in return for their Public Assistance. Often end up really being Bullshit Jobs. (more)

Thomas Harold Massie (born January 13, 1971) is an American politician. A member of the Republican Party, Massie has been the United States representative for Kentucky's 4th congressional district since 2012. Raised in Vanceburg, Kentucky, Massie earned two degrees from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he worked on computer simulation.[2][3][4] He later founded a startup based on that work, returning to Kentucky after selling the company. In 2010, Massie was elected judge-executive of Lewis County. A libertarian Republican, Massie was first elected to Congress in a 2012 special election with the backing of the Tea Party movement.[5] His staunch opposition to increases in federal spending, reauthorization of warrantless surveillance programs, and interventionism have earned him the nickname "Mr. No". During President Donald Trump's second administration, Massie drew national attention for his disputes with Republican leadership over the One Big Beautiful Bill Act and the Jeffrey Epstein Files Transparency Act. He ran for re-election in 2026 in what was the most expensive U.S. House primary in history, losing renomination to Ed Gallrein, the Trump-endorsed candidate. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Massie