Rajesh Jain

Yuval Levin: “Ranked-choice voting in primaries could be particularly promising. A ranked-choice election allows voters to select multiple candidates in order of preference and then have their vote count on behalf of their second or third choice if their first or second choice is not among the top vote getters. In most forms, it is essentially an automatic runoff. From the point of view of candidates, such a system creates a strong reason to be many voters’ second choice, as well as the first choice of some. That naturally invites a coalition-building mind-set and could do a better job of attracting candidates capable of broad appeal both on the campaign trail and in office. It would compel politicians to feel accountable to a broader swath of voters, even in safe districts where only the primary matters.”

WSJ: “What’s a billionaire to do if he doesn’t want yachts or mansions, is disinclined to spend more than $15 on a watch and is satisfied with economy class even on long flights? For Charles Feeney, the answer was obvious—he gave nearly all of his money away and got that done while still alive. A co-founder of what became the international retailer Duty Free Shoppers, Feeney made billions of dollars by operating a global network of shops selling liquor, perfume, jewelry and other items at tourist hubs. Much of his success, he said, was “dumb luck,” and he didn’t need a vast fortune to support his modest tastes. So he created a group of foundations that gave away about $8 billion. He kept around $2 million to cover his retirement. “I concluded that if you hung on to a piece of the action for yourself you’d always be worrying about that piece,” Feeney told Forbes magazine in 2012. “People used to ask me how I got my jollies, and I guess I’m happy when what I’m doing is helping people and unhappy when what I’m doing isn’t helping people.””

Quantum Magazine: “Assembly theory predicts that objects like us can’t arise in isolation — that some complex objects can only occur in conjunction with others. This makes intuitive sense; the universe could never produce just a single human. To make any humans at all, it had to make a whole bunch of us. In accounting for specific, actual entities like humans in general (and you and me in particular), traditional physics is only of so much use. It provides the laws of nature, and assumes that specific outcomes are the result of specific initial conditions. In this view, we must have been somehow encoded in the first moments of the universe. But it surely requires extremely fine-tuned initial conditions to make Homo sapiens (let alone you) inevitable. Assembly theory, its advocates say, escapes from that kind of overdetermined picture. Here, the initial conditions don’t matter much. Rather, the information needed to make specific objects like us wasn’t there at the outset but accumulates in the unfolding process of cosmic evolution — it frees us from having to place all that responsibility on an impossibly fine-tuned Big Bang. The information “is in the path,” Walker said, “not the initial conditions.””

Hitesh Vaidya: “Cities embody a symphony of municipal governments, universities, companies, and community organisations working in concert. Their potential, when combined, expands and multiplies in unpredictable ways. The new age of urban agenda requires new age skills and organisational setup for implementation, improving quality of service and efficiency. A robust network for multi-level governance and strong linkages with private and non-governmental stakeholders is imperative for significant urban impact. Urban local bodies are the most “visible” among all federal government levels to the ordinary citizen, forging an unwritten social contract between them and the citizens, necessitating a more structured and inclusive citizen engagement process. Transparency, data availability, and systematic citizen engagement are crucial to building trust and designing and implementing policies that align with urban residents’ goals and aspirations. For this to happen, cities must be recognised as the first tier of governance instead of the third, as they are popularly referred to in various terminologies.”

WSJ: “Concerns about safety, connection and serendipity are prompting some people to rethink how much they use noise-canceling features. And researchers say we lose a lot when we block out everything from the sound of our co-workers’ clacking keyboards to the cooing of pigeons in our backyards. The simple act of overhearing can help people understand others’ mindsets and moods, get insight about what’s happening at their companies and learn other valuable skills. Hearing how a colleague talks on the phone could help a junior employee learn how to better conduct business calls, for example. Being open to hearing others can also lead to spontaneous encounters with people outside of someone’s usual social circle.”

Business Insider: “Given AI’s capabilities, some tech experts believe that AI-powered personal devices could be the technology that succeeds the iPhone to become the new go-to computing device in our daily lives. As Brad Stone, author of two books on Jeff Bezos and Amazon, recently put it: “More than 15 years after the introduction of the iPhone, ChatGPT and other generative AI services may soon form the foundation of a new kind of hardware device and an entirely different type of interaction between humans and computers.” Tech leaders may be betting big on AI hardware, in part, because hardware could play a “major role” in the evolution of AI, said Dan Ives, a technology analyst at Wedbush Securities. “Altman, Nadella, Zuckerberg, Cook, and Jassy all know hardware will be the gateway for AI consumer tech,” Ives told Insider. “Software is the hearts and lungs of AI while hardware represents the arms and legs.” In fact, Ives believes that it’s “now or never” for Big Tech to capitalize on the AI arms race as this “‘Game of Thrones’ battle for AI dominance” is already “catalyzing major investments, partnerships, and product launches.” 2024, he predicts, will be the “launching pad” year for AI.”

Pranjul Bhandari: “Digital infrastructure can be used to solve many of the daily problems that small manufacturers face. Start-ups could help small firms gain access to formal credit, cheaper raw materials, bigger final markets, better warehousing and logistics, and enhanced quality checks. By enabling small manufacturers to gain the advantages larger ones benefit from (that is simulate scale), they are incentivised to expand. Indeed, we are already finding evidence of the “new” domestic services sector companies, for instance in the transport services, procurement support, and ecommerce sectors, making forays into manufacturing. Why is this important? At the heart of India’s jobs problem is a sluggish low- and medium-tech manufacturing sector. Too many manufacturing firms remain too small for too long, so they never enjoy economies of scale or create enough jobs. What India needs is a slew of reforms which remove many of the impediments manufacturers face. While policy action is critical, we believe the rise in modern services can energise manufacturing.”

Noah Smith: “Pax Americana always had an expiration date. If the U.S. had avoided the Iraq War and maintained its defense-industrial base, it could have prolonged its hegemony by about a decade, but ultimately the rising power of China would have ensured the return of the multipolarity that existed before World War 2. In any case, it’s over now, and until and unless a new dominant global coalition of nation-states can be forged — either a Chinese-led global order or some kind of expanded democratic hegemony that includes India and large other developing nations — we’re going to have to re-learn how to live in the jungle. Over the past two decades it had become fashionable to lambast American hegemony, to speak derisively of “American exceptionalism”, to ridicule America’s self-arrogated function of “world police”, and to yearn for a multipolar world. Well, congratulations, now we have that world. See if you like it better.”

ThePrint: “The latest report titled State of Working India (SWI) 2023 by Azim Premji University’s Centre for Sustainable Employment points to wage stagnation in post-Covid India. It shows that its consequences are deeply worrying…The SWI report offers fresh evidence of wage stagnation in the last five years. Its findings have already been widely reported for its insights on structural changes in employment in the country. There has been a rise in the number of regular-wage or salaried workers and a decline in agricultural employment share within the various categories of youth, Scheduled Castes (SCs) and women…Policy neglect, uncertain job market, and increased contractualisation are making labourers’ economic condition worse. Inflation is negating purchasing power too.”

WSJ: “AI-driven large language models trained on massive amounts of voice, text and video conversations are now smart enough to detect and mimic emotions like empathy—at times, better than humans, some argue. Powerful new capabilities promise to improve interactions in customer service, human resources, mental health and other fields, tech experts say. They’re also raising moral and ethical questions about whether machines, which lack remorse and a sense of responsibility, should be allowed to interpret and evaluate human emotions…The benefits of the new technology could be transformative, company officials say. In customer service, bots trained to provide thoughtful suggestions could elevate consumer interactions instantly, boosting sales and customer satisfaction, proponents say. Therapist bots could help alleviate the severe shortage of mental health professionals and assist patients with no other access to care.”

NYTimes on prediction markets: “The basic idea behind Manifold Markets and similar platforms, such as Kalshi and Polymarket, goes like this: Markets aggregate information. The more information they aggregate, the more accurate they tend to be. And if enough people make enough bets, with enough information behind them, markets can tell you something useful about the future…In the Rationalists’ view, prediction markets are an essential part of a healthy civic ecosystem, and a necessary check on experts and mainstream authorities. They believe that prediction markets work because they harness the wisdom of crowds, and filter out noise and bias by reducing contentious debates to simple yes-or-no questions. Good forecasters win more bets over time, while bad ones lose money and influence. And everyone learns by watching prices move in real time, as more information is added to the market.”

Adam Mastroianni: “How do you make sense of a world where the scientific sands are always shifting and where so much remains unknown? It’s taken me a long time, but I’ve made my peace with it by learning to hold everything loosely, to remain ever humble about what we do know and ever optimistic about what we will…What sustains me now is neither certainty nor hopelessness, but a determined, humble optimism. The right answers are often simply unknown, and I might die without getting to know the truth. And yet the truth will be known one day. Just as we solved many of the mysteries that befuddled our ancestors, our descendants will solve many of the mysteries that befuddle us. Our ignorance is profound, forgivable and temporary. There are only two true errors: One is believing that we have no errors left to make, and the other is believing that those errors are permanent and irreversible.”

FT: “For Bonnie Quinn, a cash payment of £25 a week has proved to be a lifeline during the UK’s cost of living crisis. A single mother from Polbeth, south west of Edinburgh, the Scottish child payment has enabled her to afford packed lunches for her son, who rejects school meals because of his autism, and travel to her job as a catering assistant. “[It] has really helped just for me to be able to get to work and make sure that my little boy had everything when I was at work,” Quinn said of the government assistance she has received since 2021. “It has definitely been a lifesaver.” Supporters of the programme say the money is reducing deprivation among Scottish children to levels below the rest of the UK. They also say the initiative could act as a model for cash disbursements in combating poverty globally.”

Shankkar Aiyar: “Characteristically, young India views a government job via quota as the way out of the rut of doles and poverty. The aspiration is challenged by a curious Indian paradox—the coexistence of joblessness and vacant government posts—perpetuated by political apathy. It is estimated that there are over 2 million posts vacant across central and state governments. This July, the government informed Rajya Sabha that there are 9.64 lakh posts vacant across departments in the central government. Add to this over 12 lakh teacher posts—there are 117,285 single-teacher schools across India—and those of healthcare workers and police personnel left vacant across states. It is true that addressing asymmetries of opportunity and income calls for a reconfiguration of the current paradigm of reservations. It is equally true that the exercise cannot stop at merely identifying those in need. Diagnosis alone is scarcely sufficient to heal the polity. The parties chorusing the demand for enumeration must present a credible policy prescription—for modernising agriculture, for investing in human capital, for employment generation—to propel growth and harness demographic dividend. The quest for equity must be enshrined in the altar of an ambitious plan for growth without which quotas will at best represent a post-dated promise.”

Edward Luttwak: “As far as American power abroad goes, you have identified one-half of the phenomenon; the other half is Asia. The United States is now in a confrontation with China, for which it will need allies. But the United States finds itself possessed of very good allies – seriously good allies. You have India, which has all kinds of shortcomings, but practically speaking, it is the only ally we have that ties down PLA forces. There are at least 80,000 PLA troops active on the Indian border. India was trying desperately hard to stay neutral in this conflict, but the Chinese had to kick the Indians in the face until they became our allies. So China gave us India.”

WSJ: “Hardware can’t work without software. While chip companies typically don’t produce user-facing software like the apps on PCs and smartphones, they are typically responsible for providing the software tools that enable developers to write applications that can run on their chips. On that front, Nvidia put its AI stakes in the ground very early. In 2006, the company announced Compute Unified Device Architecture, or CUDA—a programming language that allows developers to write applications for GPUs. This turned out to be a key building block for the company’s AI business. It allowed engineers and scientists to program GPUs “to solve mathematically-intensive problems that were previously cost prohibitive,” the company said in its annual regulatory filing in early 2007. Over time, CUDA has grown to encompass 250 software libraries used by AI developers. That breadth effectively makes Nvidia the go-to platform for AI developers…CUDA gives Nvidia a competitive moat that competitors will find difficult to cross.”

WSJ: “In the contest to knock China off its perch as the world’s factory floor, countries such as Mexico, India and Vietnam face a formidable rival: China’s vast interior. Low-cost manufacturing is expanding away from China’s bustling coast as companies hunt for cheaper land and labor in central and western provinces. The migration has accelerated in recent years as U.S. tariffs push up costs for factories, and China’s coastal megacities focus on high-tech electronics, electric vehicles and other advanced industries. The result has been an export boom for China’s inland provinces that dwarfs the acceleration in overseas sales enjoyed by would-be rivals to China’s manufacturing crown.”

Sarah Ebner: “No real replacement [for email] has emerged. Email has not only usurped letters as the main means of communicating news — it is also a source of education and inspiration, a way to promote events and even a tool for verifying your identity. Plus, its archives live on in your inbox, remaining eminently searchable. Newsletters are just one way in which email has evolved…Email’s success lies in the seamless way it has embedded itself in every life stage: a school address is followed in quick succession by a university one, and then a professional one. In other words, email isn’t dead. It’s everywhere.”

WSJ: “The 20th century belonged to the unruly minds at 3M. From its early days, the American manufacturing giant gave its researchers a long leash to chase ideas, many to dead-ends. The hits, though, were indelible: Scotch tape. Masking tape. Videotape. Post-it Notes. N95 masks. Artificial turf. Heart medication. 3M patented adhesives and abrasives, as well as proprietary coatings and films that reflect light, repel water and insulate against cold and heat—materials at the heart of highway signs, weatherproof windows and stain-resistant clothing and carpets. Its optical film brightened the screens of millions of laptops, smartphones and flat-screen TVs. A cautious air has since settled on the 3M headquarters and research campus in Maplewood, Minn., dampening the restless ambition that built the company, according to some investors and company veterans. There are fewer new products and fewer still have been blockbusters, a dry spell that couldn’t have arrived at a worse time.”

WSJ: “As AI becomes capable of taking on more work that is now done by humans, people will need to more aggressively upgrade their skills to stay productive and employable. “Reskillers,” a new type of teacher, will help people stay one step ahead of the machines. As AI evolves, companies will put growing value on specialists who can guide such critical human development. “Teachers had it bad under the industrial revolution. Look at what they are paid,” says Stephen Messer, co-founder and chairperson of Collective[i], which has developed a foundation model that produces insights around revenue forecasting and growth. “Now, I think teachers are about to go through a revolution because of AI.” Reskillers will need to understand the talents that organizations require as technology marches ahead. “This puts an onus on employees and companies to stay relevant,” says Keith Peiris, co-founder and chief executive of Tome, a startup with a generative AI-native storytelling and presentation platform. “In the ‘old world,’ pre generative AI, maybe you needed 100 people to build a company…With AI, maybe you could build that company with 30 people.””

Ilya Somin: “The popularity of political misinformation is indeed due primarily to demand, rather than supply, which is why the problem long predates the rise of modern social media, and might well have been as bad or even worse in earlier eras dominated by what we today call the “legacy” media of newspapers and radio. The lies and disinformation that promoted fascism, communism, and other enormously harmful ideologies spread without the aid of Twitter and Facebook…This demand for misinformation is the real root of the problem. If it were lower, the supply would not be much of a danger, and at the very least would not affect many voters’ political decision-making.”

Arnold Kling: “When I finish writing a book review, I will often say to myself, “There! Now nobody has to read the book. I’ve boiled it down for them.” We would be better off if authors did that work themselves…Books and magazines evolved when printing and distribution costs were high. This meant that consumers had limited amounts of material to read, so that as a writer you could take your time getting to the point. Computers and the Internet get rid of printing and distribution costs. The most important scarce resource these days is the reader’s time. You can complain about that all you want, but I recommend adapting to it instead…Your aspiration should be to condense your thoughts into a good substack essay.”

Donald Boudreaux: “The basic rules that all good parents teach their children aren’t convoluted, dense, or esoteric. Nor are they unfamiliar. They’re unassailable and obvious, and in their simplicity provide indispensable guidance for the pursuit of success and happiness in our enormously complex world: Don’t hit other people (unless they intentionally and without provocation hit you first). Don’t take other people’s stuff. Keep your promises. Be honest. Don’t envy others’ good fortune. Don’t make excuses for your mistakes and failings.Respect other people’s peaceful habits and characteristics, even when these are unfamiliar. Work hard. Mind your own business. Might does not make right. Don’t think yourself entitled to be excused from any of these rules.”