Oh, the beauty of being wrong,
For it is a path to new light,
A journey to knowledge and insight,
Where the mind and heart are strong.

To find out you are wrong,
Is to open the door to growth,
To discover new truths,
And to shed the old cloth.

For when we think we know it all,
We close ourselves off to change,
And the world becomes small,
And our minds become strange.

But to be wrong is to be free,
To explore and to learn,
To see the world with new eyes,
And to let our spirits burn.

So let us embrace our mistakes,
And see them as gifts,
For they lead us to new paths,
And to wisdom that uplifts.

For it is better to find out you are wrong,
Than it is to be right,
For the journey of discovery,
Is the truest delight.

— A Whitman-styled poem on the beauty of embracing fallibility made by ChatGPT.

The Amazing Things & Ideas List

1. Online course I’m hooked on:

Introduction to Ancient Greek History by Donald Kagan

“Freedom was a kind of accident that came about because the usual ways of doing things were not possible.”

— Donald Kagan, Introduction to Ancient Greek History, Lecture 1

2. Contra MacAskill on sacrificing for future generations:

3. On the perils of “economic creationism”

An article by Logan Chipkin.

4. A 15th century Florentine thinker on the human condition:

“God told man that we [God] have made thee neither of Heaven nor of Earth, neither mortal nor immortal, so that with freedom of choice and with honor, as though the maker and molder of thyself, thou mayest fashion thyself in whatever shape thou shalt prefer. Oh supreme generosity of God the Father, oh highest and the most great felicity of man, to Him it is granted to have whatever He chooses to be whatever He wills.”

— Pico della Mirándola

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Onward,
Arjun

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