Depopulation & Pulp Fiction

Featured Articles

The Age of Depopulation

Foreign Affairs • 10 Oct 2024 • ~6300 words • Archive Link

As birthrates continue to decline globally, societies are facing an impending era of depopulation that could reshape life. This piece explores the potential economic, social, and geopolitical implications of this demographic shift and raises questions about how governments, businesses, and individuals will need to adapt to this new reality.

The initial transition to depopulation will no doubt entail painful, wrenching changes. In depopulating societies, today’s “pay-as-you-go” social programs for national pension and old-age health care will fail as the working population shrinks and the number of elderly claimants balloons. If today’s age-specific labor and spending patterns continue, graying and depopulating countries will lack the savings to invest for growth or even to replace old infrastructure and equipment.

How the ‘Pulp Fiction’ Poster Became a Dorm Room Staple

The Ringer • 10 Oct 2024 • ~3200 words • Archive Link

When "Pulp Fiction" burst onto the scene 30 years ago, it not only changed the landscape of independent film but also ignited a cultural phenomenon that swept through college campuses. This article explores the journey of the film's iconic poster, which became a dorm room staple, symbolizing a unique blend of rebellion and cinematic appreciation. By delving into the creative process behind its design and its lasting impact, the piece reveals why this particular image continues to resonate with new generations of film enthusiasts.

It’s sexy, mysterious, and dangerous—a modern take on the mid-century femme fatale that could appeal to film bros and third-wave feminists alike. And perhaps most importantly, it’s a scene that never takes place in the movie itself. “It’s not like we pulled a still from the set,” says David Dinerstein, Miramax’s former head of marketing. “This was a photo shoot designed specifically to provide a feeling similar to the one you would experience after seeing the film.”

Recommended Articles

Can Ecstasy Save a Marriage?

Nautilus • 10 Oct 2024 • ~2700 words

In a quest to mend their struggling marriage, Hannah and Jacob turned to an unconventional solution: MDMA (better known as ecstasy) assisted therapy. This article explores ongoing clinical trials that are investigating MDMA's potential to enhance empathy, openness, and communication between partners and help them work through trauma and relationship issues. The article also discusses the risks and limitations of using MDMA in this context and the importance of combining it with traditional therapy.

The hype about psychedelics also makes it difficult to trust participants’ subjective responses about the effectiveness of treatment—and opens the door to enthusiastic therapists influencing the experience, Abramowitz says. He worries that psychedelics may have the same “15 minutes of fame” as other pharmaceuticals without becoming the “game-changer” many want them to be. The very internal, subjective experience of these consciousness-altering drugs also complicates the process of gathering data. “The problem with some of the things psychedelics are thought to bring about is it’s hard to verify them,” Abramowitz says.

Medicine aims to return bodies to the state they were in before illness. But there’s a better way of thinking about health

Aeon • 10 Oct 2024 • ~2900 words

The concept of health has evolved from Hippocrates' idea of a balanced body to a modern focus on localized treatments. This article invites us to reconsider health not as a return to a previous state, but as an adaptive process that embraces change and complexity. By exploring historical perspectives on regeneration, it challenges the traditional views of what it means to be healthy and encourages a broader conversation about our values in health care.

But what if health isn’t simply a return to a previous state? If we think about health as part of a larger framework of considering organisms as complex systems, there is no ‘return’. Complex systems shift in response to environmental challenges; they adapt to their conditions in order to survive – and adaptation breeds change. Framing health in terms of regeneration, and then asking what it means to regenerate, allows us to prod our assumptions about health as a singular, predetermined outcome and rethink our values in sustaining complex systems in light of damage. That raises the question: what does regeneration mean?

The Unfortunate Consequences of a Misguided Free Speech Principle

The MIT Press Reader • 10 Oct 2024 • ~6300 words

In an era where the concept of free speech is increasingly debated, Robert Charles Post challenges the notion that more speech is the solution to our political issues. He argues that the real issue lies not in the constraints on expression, but in the underlying health of our political discourse. By examining a recent New York Times editorial, Post argues how a misguided understanding of free speech may be exacerbating our societal divisions.

The norms by which any society distinguishes acceptable from unacceptable speech typically evolve in time, and, in moments of extreme polarization, can become subject to intense and unresolved social conflict. The Times editorial suggests how deeply unsettling such controversies can be. But this is not ultimately a point about freedom of speech. It is instead a point about the need for social relations to be governed by clearer or more defensible substantive principles of respect than those that now seem to be paralyzing our public discourse.

Who died and left the US $7 billion?

sherwood.news • 7 Oct 2024 • ~2400 words

This article discusses the mystery surrounding a $7 billion estate tax payment made to the U.S. government in 2022. Tim Fernholz delves into the complexities of wealth management and tax strategies, revealing how someone could leave such a staggering amount without making headlines. It explores the possibility that the payment was made by the estate of billionaire investor Fayez Sarofim, who died that year, and investigates how public estimates may have underestimated his vast wealth.

He was struck, though, by the appearance of that enormous deposit. “The degree by which this payment exceeds others in modern history — it’s not just, ‘Oh, this was the biggest one by 20%,’” Ricco said later. This was the biggest one by a factor of seven.

Picture imperfect

Science Advances • 26 Sep 2024 • ~4050 words • Archive Link

Eliezer Masliah, a prominent figure in Alzheimer’s research, now faces serious allegations regarding the integrity of his scientific work. A recent investigation reveals numerous instances of potentially falsified images across a significant number of his publications. This troubling development raises questions not just about Masliah's credibility, but also about the broader implications for research in neurodegenerative diseases.

After Science brought initial concerns about Masliah’s work to their attention, a neuroscientist and forensic analysts specializing in scientific work who had previously worked with Science produced a 300-page dossier revealing a steady stream of suspect images between 1997 and 2023 in 132 of his published research papers. (Science did not pay them for their work.) “In our opinion, this pattern of anomalous data raises a credible concern for research misconduct and calls into question a remarkably large body of scientific work,” they concluded.

Taylor Lorenz’s Plan to Dance on Legacy Media’s Grave

The New Yorker • 9 Oct 2024 • ~2150 words • Archive Link

The article discusses the career trajectory of journalist Taylor Lorenz, who has transitioned from working within legacy media institutions to launching her own independent publication, on Substack. Through her choice, this piece asks questions about the future of journalism and the rise of independent creators.

While traditional journalistic media has faltered, prompting waves of layoffs at newspapers and digital-media companies alike, the creator economy writ large has boomed; Goldman Sachs recently found that the sector, encompassing both entertainment and journalism, is worth a quarter billion dollars and has the potential to “roughly double” by 2027.

Quantifying 'The Kevin Bacon Game': A Statistical Exploration of Hollywood’s Most Connected Actors

Stat Significant • 9 Oct 2024 • ~2400 words

This entertaining piece explores the statistical underpinnings of the popular "Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon" game. While examining whether Kevin Bacon is truly the most connected actor in Hollywood, it analyzes the most connected movies and actors, and discusses the appealing nature of the game.

Usually, I try to assign greater meaning to an analysis by connecting my findings to a macro trend in the entertainment industry—I want my facts and figures to "mean something" (whatever that may be). The Kevin Bacon Game, on the other hand, is a welcome departure from this grand-scale thinking—it's just a silly little trivia game where film geeks can speak in a lexicon of movie references. There is no feasible way to tie Kevin Bacon to an all-consuming theory of cultural stagnation or the death of Hollywood, and that's the point. It's just a fun little brain teaser.

The ‘Beautiful Confusion’ of the First Billion Years Comes Into View

Quanta Magazine • 9 Oct 2024 • ~3700 words

Astronomers are buzzing with excitement over the discoveries made by the James Webb Space Telescope, which has revealed unexpected bright galaxies and peculiar cosmic formations from the universe's early years. In this piece, Rebecca Boyle explores the challenges these findings pose to existing theories about cosmic evolution, as researchers work to understand the implications of these luminous objects and their unusual shapes. The article highlights the sense of wonder and confusion among scientists as they uncover the mysteries of the universe just moments after the Big Bang.

Over star-studded slide decks and rounds of Pacifico beer, 100 or so astrophysicists exulted in the new findings about the universe’s first billion years, an epoch that JWST is revealing in exquisite detail for the first time. They shared surprising observations of “little red dots,” which abound in JWST data and whose nature remains elusive, as well as images of other early galaxies that look extremely blue. They marveled at odd galactic shapes, including bright objects that resolve into tight clusters, like bunches of grapes, and others resembling bananas. People argued over the enormous black holes spotted at those early times and the circumstances of their formation.

Can New Mexico’s Ancient Water System Survive Climate Change?

Undark Magazine • 9 Oct 2024 • ~2700 words

The article explores the challenges facing New Mexico's ancient acequia irrigation system as it grapples with the impacts of climate change, including reduced snowpack, earlier snowmelt, and increased drought and wildfires. It examines how the communal, gravity-fed acequias have sustained communities for generations, and the efforts by irrigators to adapt and preserve this unique water management system in the face of a drying climate.

. . . acequias refer both to the physical structure and the social institution that governs its use. The irrigation system relies on a network of canals that deliver water from rivers, streams, and springs. Gates open and close so the water can flow into smaller ditches that allow irrigators, also known as parciantes, to flood their land during the growing season. Each acequia functions as a democratic institution that shares water fairly during shortages. A mayordomo, or ditch boss, handles various tasks, including organizing the people, to keep the acequia running smoothly. Three commissioners, or comisionados, provide oversight.

A Head Is a Territory of Light

The Yale Review • 8 Oct 2024 • ~3200 words

Tan Tuck Ming explores the intricate relationship between migraines and the perception of light, weaving personal experience with scientific insights. The piece delves into the author's personal struggles with migraines, the challenges of identifying triggers, and the ways in which migraines can disrupt daily life. The article also contemplates broader questions about perception, consciousness, and the limits of human understanding when confronted with things that defy simple categorization.

I’ve come to understand the body as a depository of records—records of instinct, records of feeling and desire, etched in tissue and sinew, accrued over time. Each migraine is a record of its own significance, a moment when a set of circumstances triggered certain phenomena. Over a month, the records make a sequence; over a lifetime, a diagnosis; over generations, a correspondence. (View Highlight)****

On the Nature of Time

stephenwolfram.com • 8 Oct 2024 • ~6150 words

This essay explores the fundamental nature of time, examining it from a computational perspective. It delves into concepts such as computational irreducibility, the relationship between time and space, and the implications for issues like reversibility and the flow of time.

Our strong human experience is that time progresses as a single thread. But now our Physics Project suggests that at an underlying level time is actually in effect multithreaded, or, in other words, that there are many different “paths of history” that the universe follows. And it is only because of the way we as observers sample things that we experience time as a single thread.

Oregon woman’s suicide after repeated 911 calls reveals gaps in Bend’s lauded crisis response system 

InvestigateWest • 8 Oct 2024 • ~5600 words

This article discusses the tragic case of Pamela Antoni, a woman in Bend, Oregon who died by suicide after repeatedly calling 911 for help with her mental health crisis. It examines the gaps and challenges in Bend's crisis response system, which is otherwise lauded, and raises questions about the effectiveness of mental health support and the role of law enforcement in such situations. The article also discusses the issue of when it is acceptable to force someone to receive help.

In Antoni’s case, the failure to prevent her death is partially bound up in how Oregon’s laws limit crisis workers and police officers’ ability to do that. But it is also the consequence of what some called missed opportunities by first responders to dig deeper into her struggles in order to stabilize her. Antoni’s battles with paranoia and suicidal ideation were evident as she called, then hung up on 911 dispatchers, told crisis workers she didn’t trust them and kept her door closed when police officers knocked. But when she called for help on the last night of her life, no one followed up with her.

An Artists’ Squat Fought New York City for Decades. Did It Just Win?

New York Times • 8 Oct 2024 • ~2750 words • Archive Link

This article provides an overview of the history and legacy of the ABC No Rio art center in New York City. It explores the center's origins as a squatted art space and its role as a haven for radical art and politics, even as the surrounding neighborhood underwent rapid gentrification. The article also examines the complex relationship between ABC No Rio's reliance on public funding and its oppositional, anti-gentrification stance.

But what will ABC No Rio be after 10 years away, and what need will it answer? Much of its identity came from its battles with the city, its forbidding neighborhood and its decrepit building. Now the city is a partner, and the Lower East Side is a tourist destination. No Rio’s regulars, if they still exist, cannot afford to live there.