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week 36 / 2026: revise and reassess

week 36 / 2026: revise and reassess

In this instalment, three things merit a second look: the impact of three- and two-wheel EVs on oil demand; Francis Fukuyama’s “The End of History?”; and—much as it pains me to admit it—Stewart Brand’s “pace layers” model.

week 35 / 2026: scholars and sandpiles

week 35 / 2026: scholars and sandpiles

In this instalment, I try to rescue the baby of Kevin Munger’s vision for a more public-facing form of academic scholarship from the bathwater of handwavey “AI” enthusiasm.

week 34 / 2026: boats and boxes

week 34 / 2026: boats and boxes

In this instalment: container shipping is starting to hit its logistical limits, at least on the land, even as it enables some seriously dirty business models. Plus: Byung-Chul Han, and E J Swift’s Clarke Award-winning novel When There Are Wolves Again!

week 33 / 2026: out and about

week 33 / 2026: out and about

Attention conservation notice: weeknotes are (sort of) on holiday.

week 32 / 2026: nature and culture

week 32 / 2026: nature and culture

In this episode: we wander into the forests of medieval Europe, return with the underlying imagery of Enlightenment and Romanticist thought, and then feel for their bones beneath the skin of the present.

week 31 / 2026: art and artifice

week 31 / 2026: art and artifice

In this episode: a long hard look at the distinction between art and artifice, and what it means to make things for their own sake. Plus: technical aspects of the new Ann Leckie novel!

week 30 / 2026: here and elsewhere

week 30 / 2026: here and elsewhere

In this episode: contemplating the end of the Western cosmopolitan urge; hanging with the New York neoLuddites; and Silicon Valley’s highly selective readings of science fiction. Plus, G K Chesterton!