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On the attacks in Paris.
Military drone strikes may have increased the risk that innocent civilians die elsewhere.
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On chess as a window to the soul.
I loved chess growing up, enough that I always felt a shiver of pleasure when games appeared in novels.
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On punishment as criminal deterrent.
Kedia et al. showed that financial crimes flourish when they go unpunished.
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On stuttering.
During his first year of graduate school at Harvard, a friend of mine was trying to pick a research advisor. This is a pretty big deal — barring disaster, whoever you choose will have a great deal of control over your life for the next five to eight years. My friend found someone who seemed…
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On Marlon James’s “A Brief History of Seven Killings.”
James created a striking depiction of some of the brutal homophobic lives eddying near Bob Marley.
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On reading Playboy from the 1970s.
Take away the rampant chauvinism and Playboys from the sixties and seventies are actually pretty good magazines.
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On computing and word magic.
Both computers and golems are given life by the generative power of words.
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On the naming of rabbits.
Our house was chaotic … and then we inherited Uncle Max and Kichirou.
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On Eka Kurniawan’s ‘Beauty Is a Wound,’ mythology, and misogyny.
Kurniawan’s interests mirror my own — why wouldn’t I love his book?
Annie Tucker, Beauty is a Wound, David Foster Wallace, Eka Kurniawan, feminism, feminist, Flo the Progressive Insurance girl, Franzen, geek, geek culture, girl, Heartbreak, Kurniawan, Mahabharata, Mark Leyner, misogyny, mythology, neg, Neil Strauss, Purity, repetition, Scott Aaronson, sexual assault, The Game, The Pale King, The Sugar Frosted Nutsack, Translation
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On play (and playgrounds).
N’s best friend’s father often goes by the name “Kingkong” for his film work — he’s helped make many movies in Bangkok. I assume he was half kidding when he told me, “Nobody on the crew could pronounce an exotic name like ‘Greg.’ ” I think “Kingkong” is a charming name for an American filmmaker to use in…
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Frank Brown Cloud 