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On Culture — On the things we create, and how they create us

• [audio] Values Don't Matter — 24 Jan 2026
  Values are virtue ethics in disguise—traits we’re expected to cultivate. But virtues are context-dependent (courage for a soldier isn’t courage for a teacher) and the situation overwhelmingly drives behaviour. The real task is designing the context, not listing the virtues.
• [article] Hydraulic Despotism — 1 Dec 2025
  Control the water, control the people. Today’s water is energy, social media, infrastructure. We’re coerced through convenience, not malice. There are many vectors for control—we don’t need to hand them over.
• [audio] Mundane Cults — 29 Nov 2025
  We’ve been taught that cults are dark and scary things. But we have been fooled. The cult is a prominent building block of modern community. If you’re not in one, you’re probably doing something wrong. The question is, is the cult you’re in a cult you chose?
• [audio] Men Aren't From Mars — 15 Nov 2025
  Men and women engage in identical behaviours—complaining, offering solutions, needing validation, resisting criticism. The difference isn’t biological, it’s interpretive. We cast the same behaviour as reasonable for one gender and unreasonable for the other. Gray’s book is a perfect case study: emotionally troubled men are normalised while women’s ordinary needs are pathologised.
• [marginalium] Digital Personhood — 1 Jul 2025
• [marginalium] Is culture socially costly — 30 Jun 2025
• [marginalium] The Personal and Private Nature of Smartphones — 25 Jun 2025
• [marginalium] Love is about betterment — 24 Jun 2025
• [marginalium] Caligula as an anti-ideology — 19 Jun 2025
• [marginalium] Nature is Nurture — 18 Jun 2025
• [marginalium] Why Individuals Avoid Information — 17 Jun 2025
• [marginalium] AI spiritual bliss attractor state (pdf) — 6 Jun 2025
• [marginalium] What Is Centrism? — 6 Jun 2025
• [marginalium] Does Testosterone Effect Economic Preferences? — 30 May 2025
• [marginalium] Pitfalls of AI for information gathering — 28 May 2025