Zero-sum thinking tends to also be prone to zero-product thinking. In other words, it also underestimates what interactions bring to the table beyond its parts. Our intellectual intuitions have not adjusted to multiplicative dynamics and still underestimate their ubiquitousness.

When working on any creative project, oscillating between hubristic overestimation of its value and pessimistic self-derision is an inevitability. Arguably, it is this tension that keeps one going

Within bounds, the need to present one’s intellect makes for a more interesting conversation. Some of the most interesting conversations I have had were deeply personal and full of vulnerability, yet not entirely rid of intellectual posing.

„Die Liebe herrscht nicht, aber sie bildet, und das ist mehr.“ - Goethe

„And I say that life is indeed darkness save when there is urge, And all urge is blind save when there is knowledge. And all knowledge is vain save when there is work, And all work is empty save when there is love“ - Khalil Gibran, The Prophet

Baumol‘s cost disease and comparative advantage seem to be the only two insights from Economics (with a capital E) that are both counterintuitive and true.

The truth is the ultimate Schelling point.

„We do not live to do the things that we please, but to do with love the things that we must.“ - Alexandra Fedorovna

We develop superstitions by persistently overestimating the mutual information between salient events due to experiential undersampling. Missing an important real link, though, has on aggregate always been more detrimental than hallucinating a connection where there is none.

„Sometimes the point isn’t to make people believe a lie; it’s to make people fear the liar.“ - @anneapplebaum

When you are selfish, you become misanthropic.

It is most often only when you let go of your attachment in a pursuit you have been pushing hard on that good things happen - neither the pushing nor the non-attachment alone are enough

„If you are immune to boredom, there is literally nothing you cannot accomplish.“ - David Foster Wallace

The center of any culture is sterile.

“They who know the truth are not equal to those who love it, and they who love it are not equal to those who delight in it” - Lao Zi

"Spend time on beautiful things, and then meet a better self."