Democracy and our very capacity to communicate are under threat from a new generation of bots. A perspective from which population decline is a good thing. Political uncertainty risks costing France its status as a core EU asset. Three tips to win an argument. What makes a memory real?
QUOTE OF THE WEEK
ARTICLE OF THE WEEK
Yuval Noah Harari, What Happens When the Bots Compete for Your Love?
(The New York Times, 4 September 2024)
The starting assumption: “Democracy is a conversation”, and “the fact that modern democracy has been built on top of modern information technologies means that any major change in the underlying technology is likely to result in a political upheaval.” This explains in part the current crisis of democracy (all over the world, but primarily in the US where opponents can’t even agree on the most basic facts, such as who won the 2020 presidential election). The reason: tech enthusiasts promised that tech and social media would spread truth, but so far, they’ve had the opposite effect. This won’t improve with a new generation of bots that can masquerade as humans and mass-produce intimacy. Democracies should protect themselves by banning them (gifted article, reads in 10 min or so).
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Chandran Nair, The world’s population is poised to decline—and that’s great news
(Fortune, 29 August 2024)
A great majority of analysts see plunging fertlity rates as a calamity. Chandran Nair doesn’t, affirming: “we should see population contraction as a good thing. After all, it is not resulting from our wars, pandemics, or famines. It is driven mainly by human progress: education, awareness, women’s rights, shifting societal values, and the economics of the cost of living.” He argues that, as populations decline and age simultaneously, economies must transition from a quantity-driven growth paradigm to one that values quality of life and rights to basic needs as the most critical indicator of economic success.” Read on to understand his perspective (metered paywall, reads in 5-7 min).
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Marcus Ashworth, The Vanishing Bull Case for Investing in France
(Bloomberg, 4 September 2024)
The proof that politics matters for the financial markets more than most investors think. Since Macron called a surprise election in June, France’s CAC 40 equity index has had a terrible year relative to its European peers, and the country’s bond yield premium over Germany has remained abnormally high. When there is so much political uncertainty, when the government budget deficits keep growing, and the economy is sputtering, it’s hard to imagine better times ahead for France. Put bluntly: “France is at risk of losing its status as a core-EU asset” (gifted article, reads in 4-6 min).
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Megan Sauer, Highly persuasive people are great at arguing—they use these 3 tactics, says Ivy League psychologist
(CNBC, 30 August 2024)
Wharton Professor Adam Grant is a legend in the world of organizational psychology. He offers three tips on how to enter an argument in which you effectively disagree, without simply saying ‘no’. (1) Keep conflicts task-oriented, i.e.: focused on a specific issue, not on a relationship problem; (2) Frame disagreements as debates instead of arguments – don’t make it personal; (3) Be someone you’d like to debate with – treat the other person as equal (free access, 3-4 min).
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Jim Davies, What Makes a Memory Real?
(Nautilus, 2 September 2024)
We rely on our memory to understand the reality we live in, so it’s important to know how memory works. And how can we make sure we can tell the difference between memories of things that happened from memories of things we simply imagined? A cognitive scientists responds, explaining in the process why changing the narrative on false memories is surprisingly simple. Scientific evidence suggests that true memories tend to have more sensory detail like smells and sounds, and tend to have more emotion. “The more vividly you imagine the memory, the more like real life it seems” (metered paywall, 5 min).
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