Writing in public
Short, plain, unhedged essays on thinking and cognition, civilization, and identity — with poetry, story, and the small crafts of attention: coffee, calendars, kitchens, and code.
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Naturalistic reframing of agency as influence over probabilities rather than sovereign control, treating identity as ongoing construction, meaning as self-made, and life design as tuning habits, environments, and decision rules toward outcomes instead of authenticity.
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Argues that the scope of human moral concern expands with security and abundance and contracts to family and local community under threat, tracing the shift from 1990s globalization through the 2008 crisis, 2016 populism, and the 2020 pandemic.
Vision good enough to leave glasses behind causes a daily judgment call that often proves wrong, unlike wallet and keys. Merely helpful things must keep justifying themselves, while only necessities become automatic habits.
Critique of the maxim to stay silent when unsure what to say, arguing it conflates not knowing what to say, having nothing to say, and not yet knowing what one thinks, and misreads Socrates as its witness.
Intellectual bankruptcy as sophistication that produces argument without rigor, and moral bankruptcy as inflated moral language emptied of reasoning. Proposes a checkable test—whether anyone changes a public position because an argument defeated it—and warns that rigor is a transmitted skill, not an instinct.
Rhetorical analysis of a deliberately provocative secession slogan, examining how "dissolve," the hyphen in "dis-United," and "it is time" convert frustration into apparent historical mandate, then weighing real polarization against the humanitarian costs of actual dissolution.
Essays that say what the rest is trying to do.
Two Latin mottos—cogita·disce·necte·enuntia and percipe·strue·effice—read as inner and outer epistemic loops: a four-step recursive cycle of formation versus a three-step transactional cycle of action, joined by connection as the shared pivot.
Mid-century lectures by Richard Feynman and Alan Watts outperform modern talks because they predate metric-driven rhetoric, disciplinary silos, and reputational risk. Argues their appeal is uncompressed, live thinking aloud without penalty, not nostalgia.
Short story in spare Hemingway-style prose: an aging former bridge engineer and his adult son sit by a trout river, discussing a lost notebook of fish counts, forgotten memories, and the father's saying that "the wheel turns."
Fragility of the American order at its 250th anniversary, arguing continuity is achieved through renewal, not destiny. Cites Madison, Franklin, Arendt, and Jefferson, notes the Civil War and Jim Crow as breaks, and questions what "recommitment" concretely demands.
COGITA·DISCE·NECTE·FARE
