Articles 2023
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Concealed Carry: Review of Pockets: An Intimate History of How We Keep Things Close by Hannah Carlson
Quillette, November 17, 2023
For more than five centuries, the humble pocket has changed the way we equip ourselves to face the world. -
Elon Musk and the Value of Failure: Review of Elon Musk by Walter Isaacson
The Washington Free Beacon, November 12, 2023
The mammoth biography of Elon Musk is two-thirds epic romance, one-third tragedy. -
The Pioneering Scientist Who Explained Contagious Disease
The Wall Street Journal, September 21, 2023
After decades of experiments in the early 19th century, Agostino Bassi showed that silkworms were being killed by a microorganism, setting the stage for modern germ theory.
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Natural, Artificial, Ethical? How Synthetic Biology Is Overturning Old Categories
Coller Venture Review, 2023
For a half century we’ve been telling ourselves a story about technology as a fall from grace, about artifice as the source of human suffering and environmental ruin – even as we consumed more and more of its products. The idealistic scientists and entrepreneurs building the new biology tell a different story, a story of life and renewal. -
Gadgets and Gizmos That Inspired Adam Smith
Reason, July 2023
Adam Smith appreciated the beauty and allure of intricate systems.
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The Brilliance of Guo Pei
American Purpose, May 01, 2023
Questions of appropriation and cultural legacy are explored in Chinese couturier Guo Pei’s challenging and extravagant dresses.
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Notes on Progress: Artificial flavoring
Works in Progress, April 06, 2023
"Artificial" didn't scare Americans in the 19th century. Why does it scare us now?
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Aviators Make Biden an All-American Badass
Foreign Policy, March 24, 2023
The sunglasses are a symbol of loyalty, persistence—and the U.S. president.