Astral Codex Ten Podcast

Latest Episodes:

Your Book Review: The Mind Of A Bee Aug 24, 2023

Show notes

[This is one of the finalists in the 2023 book review contest, written by an ACX reader who will remain anonymous until after voting is done. I'll be posting about one of these a week for several months. When you've read them all, I'll ask you to vote for a favorite, so remember which ones you liked]

Are bees smart?

To answer that question, here's a crab spider:

Sadly, this is not a review of a book called The Mind of a Crab Spider. But as you crab spider lovers know, crab spiders and bumble bees are natural rivals.

Both bees and crab spiders are well-matched for strength and speed, and in the Rumble with the Bumble, the crab spider doesn't necessarily win. Bees can often evade the spider, and live to pollinate another day. Lars Chittka, who wrote The Mind of a Bee, and who can safely be blamed for this book review, got thinking. He and his lab decided to build fake robotic crab spiders, and had them really robotically attack bumble bees when they visited flowers.

https://astralcodexten.substack.com/p/your-book-review-the-mind-of-a-bee

Bride Of Bay Area House Party Aug 20, 2023

Show notes

[previously in series: 1, 2, 3]

You spent the evening agonizing over which Bay Area House Party to attend. The YIMBY parties are always too crowded. VC parties were a low-interest-rate phenomenon. You've heard too many rumors of consent violations at the e/acc parties - they don't know when to stop. And last time you went to a crypto bro party, you didn't even have anything to drink, and somehow you still woke up the next morning lying in a gutter, minus your wallet and clothes. You finally decide on a Progress Studies party - the last one was kind of dull, but you hear they're getting better.

https://astralcodexten.substack.com/p/bride-of-bay-area-house-party

In Defense Of Describable Dating Preferences Aug 20, 2023

Show notes

The New York Times has an article on "dating docs". These are a local phenomenon - I think an ex of mine might have been Patient Zero. I don't begrudge the Times for writing about them. I'm just surprised they're considered an interesting phenomenon. What could be more obvious than making sure potential dates know what you're like?

https://astralcodexten.substack.com/p/in-defense-of-describable-dating

Your Book Review: The Weirdest People in the World Aug 20, 2023

Show notes

Finalist #13 in the Book Review Contest

Down from the gardens of Asia descending radiating, Adam and Eve appear…

— Walt Whitman

When I grew up I was still part of a primitive culture, in the following sense: my elders told me the story of how our people came to be. It started with the Greeks: Pericles the statesman, Plato the first philosopher, Herodotus the first historian, the first playwrights, and before them all Homer, the blind first poet. Before Greece, something called prehistory stretched back. There were Iron and Bronze Ages, and before that the Stone Age. These were shadowy, mysterious realms. Then history went on to Europe. I learnt as little outside Europe as I did before Greece. There was one class on 20th century China, but that too was about China becoming modern, which meant European.

A big silent intellectual change of the past quarter century is the broadening of our self-concept.

https://astralcodexten.substack.com/p/your-book-review-the-weirdest-people

Highlights From The Comments On Putin Aug 18, 2023

Show notes

[original post: Dictator Book Club: Putin]

Table of Contents:

1. Comments Further Illuminating Putin's Rise To Power 2. Comments Questioning Masha Gessen's Objectivity 3. Comments Claiming Putin Is Very Slightly Less Bad Than The Book Suggests 4. Comments On Putin As Culture Warrior 5. Comments Expressing Concern That The FBI/CIA Are Capable Of Undermining Democracy In The US

https://astralcodexten.substack.com/p/highlights-from-the-comments-on-putin

Links for August 2023 Aug 18, 2023

Show notes

[Remember, I haven't independently verified each link. On average, commenters will end up spotting evidence that around two or three of the links in each links post are wrong or misleading. I correct these as I see them, and will highlight important corrections later, but I can't guarantee I will have caught them all by the time you read this.]

https://astralcodexten.substack.com/p/links-for-august-2023

Your Book Review: The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich Aug 12, 2023

Show notes

What does it take to be literally Hitler?

https://astralcodexten.substack.com/p/your-book-review-the-rise-and-fall

More Memorable Passages From "The Man Without A Face" Aug 12, 2023

Show notes

Actual serious review here, Amazon link to the book here. These were just some extra parts that stuck out to me.

https://astralcodexten.substack.com/p/more-memorable-passages-from-the

Dictator Book Club: Putin Aug 09, 2023

Show notes

Review of Masha Gessen's "The Man Without A Face"

[previously in series: Erdogan, Modi, Orban, Xi]

I. Vladimir Putin's Childhood As Metaphor For Life

Vladimir Putin appeared on Earth fully-formed at the age of nine.

At least this is the opinion of Natalia Gevorkyan, his first authorized biographer. There were plenty of witnesses and records to every post-nine-year-old stage of Putin's life. Before that, nothing. Gevorkyan thinks he might have been adopted. Putin's official mother, Maria Putina, was 42 and sickly when he was born. In 1999, a Georgian peasant woman, Vera Putina, claimed to be his real mother, who had given him up for adoption when he was ten. Journalists dutifully investigated and found that a "Vladimir Putin" had been registered at her village's school, and that a local teacher remembered him as a bright pupil who loved Russian folk tales. What happened to him? Unclear; Artyom Borovik, the investigative journalist pursuing the story, died in a plane crash just before he could publish. Another investigative journalist, Antonio Russo, took up the story, but "his body was found on the edge of a country road . . . bruised and showed signs of torture, with techniques related to special military services."

https://astralcodexten.substack.com/p/dictator-book-club-putin

Meetups Everywhere Fall 2023 - Call For Organizers Aug 09, 2023

Show notes

You can find the meetup organizer volunteer form here. If you want to know if anyone has signed up to run a meetup for your city, you can view that here. Everyone else, just wait until 8/25 and I'll give you more information on where to go then.

https://astralcodexten.substack.com/p/meetups-everywhere-fall-2023-call