🧠 Curiosity
Maybe you have followed the public discussion about a change of etiquette at the web software company Basecamp. If not, in short what you need to know to interpret what’s following, is that they have committed to “no more societal and political discussions” on their company accounts (for more details, read the public announcement, the follow up blogpost and a detailed report about the whole story). Following this I have been wondering, what a world would look like where all companies have such a ‘no politics’ policy (drawing some inspiration from Kant’s categorical imperative):
I have come to the conclusion that I think I won’t like it. Let me tell you why:
Everyone would live in offline filter bubbles
Much criticism has been voiced about algorithms creating filter bubbles in our Social Media news feeds. Banning any kind of political discussion from workplaces would do much the same to our offline world. It’s inherently human that we tend to surround ourselves with people that we like and people who hold similar views to ours. When it comes to coworkers, however, we usually don’t have much of a choice (for better or worse). Undeniably, people self-select in companies based on vision/mission, nevertheless, I believe that coworkers are still more likely to have different opinions than most of our friends. Banning political topics from coffee break chats, thus means reducing the number of viewpoints we get exposed to which in turn makes us more likely to hold more radical opinions.We’d forget that it’s ok to disagree
I don’t think everyone always has to have the same opinion, showing respect to others also means acknowledging different viewpoints and not believing that you know it all. I would even go as far and call it a tragedy, that we have come to a point where the prevailing debating culture is so offending, that companies fear it could hurt their earnings. But this is nothing that can be fixed by banning political discussion (on the contrary, having less space to practice constructive discussion will make things worse), rather it needs a turn away from the all-or-nothing mindset towards a culture where people don’t feel the need to impose their personal opinion on everyone around them.Problems don’t solve themselves by not talking about them
One of the triggers of the Basecamp policy shift, was a list containing ‘funny names’, some of which of African and Asian origin. It apparently caused an internal discussion among employees on inclusion, racism and diversity, which has ultimately been shut down by the founders. I don’t know enough of the background story and the culture of Basecamp to judge what was really going on here, but in any case, muting those critical voices definitely didn’t solve the issue at hand. If people were being racist, they are still acting discriminatory. If people incorrectly believed that someone was being racist, they are still not feeling save.
So from my point of view, that’s a no to ‘No Politics’. If you have any different arguments, I’d love to hear them during a virtual coffee break.
Note: I am not saying that companies themselves necessarily need to be political (that’s a whole different story), it’s just about having political discussions in the workspace.
🤖 Curses & Cures
Some beaches in Hawaii consist of sand containing the mineral olivine which dissolves in seawater and thereby pulls out H ions from the water. This reaction binds CO2 from the ocean in bicarbonate which marine animals such as corals use to build their skeletons and shells.
Why it matters: If you mine 1 ton of olivine and put it on a beach, it will remove 1.25 tonnes of free CO2 from the environment. If you do that about one trillion times you could offset one year of human carbon emissions. This seems like a lot, but according to estimates by the researchers of Project Vesta, this would only mean turning 2% of the world’s shelf seas green. Yes, this is more complex than planting trees and it would cost a bit of money (although actually not that much if the current estimates of $10/ton CO2 removed hold true). But trees also have some problems when it comes to carbon capture - they take up a lot of space, they require care over multiple decades and if they happen to burn in the course of a wild fire, all carbon is released again and all the effort is for the birds. Given that the UN estimates that we will need to start removing tens of millions of carbon each year by the 2030’s, to me, this looks like one promising puzzle piece that could help us ‘solving’ climate change.
📚 Curation
Experience: I’ve had the same supper for 10 years
Sometimes we tend to forget that not everyone in this world is longing for fame and infinite passive income - read this short article for a reminder to enjoy the simple things.
”I have lived in the Teifi valley, in west Wales, all my life: 72 years. I’m a farmer and look after 71 sheep. My boyhood was spent helping my family on the farm. I have never wanted to run away from it, even as a young lad. This valley is cut in the shape of my heart. I once visited a farm in England, about 30 years ago; that was the only time I left Wales.”Why Is It Hard to Acknowledge Preferences?
Yet another Scott Alexander article, but it just illustrates perfectly, why we should become more accepting towards different opinions
“I recently stayed at a B&B owned by a nice elderly couple. Very, very nice. The moment I stepped in the door, they asked how my flight was, where I was from, what I did, how I'd enjoyed my three minutes of visiting their city so far, what kind of food I liked, what my favorite color was, et cetera. I played along - no point in offending people - but I warned that my friend, who would be arriving a little later, was much more introverted, and would appreciate being efficiently directed to her room without the welcome committee.
A little later, my friend arrived. From my room, I could hear them start welcoming her, ask her how her flight had been, start trying to get to know her - until I ran out and rescued her, for which she reports gratitude.”
Life May Be Rare [Podcast]
An entertaining interview with Oxford Professor Dr. Anders Sandberg that explores the probabilities around life in space
“It’s really hard to apply statistics to life on earth, because we just have one example. So the fact that life seemed to have shown up on earth about 4 billion years ago, (…) that was rather early in earth’s history, you could say ‘Oh life must be easy to do’, it only took a few million years and a lot of that was probably just earth cooling down so that oceans could form. But of course it could be that well, there is a lot of hard steps between life showing up and podcasting and that means that planets where podcasting is invented also had to have very early life because its super improbable that they developed life after let’s say a few billion years and then only have a billion years later the aliens are podcasting to each other.”
✨ Curios
If you are looking for business ideas - here is a list of paid apps with very bad reviews
A robot that looks a bit like a dust mob wants to be your next pet - meet flatcat
A pizzeria owner in Detroit was upset that a many people parking across his restaurant got a hefty fine because of poor signage - he bought a bucket of paint and took matters in hand himself.
The Notion API is finally here (this is one for the books!) - super excited for all the cool things that will surely be built with it.