Author Archives: Luke Ford

About Luke Ford

I teach Alexander Technique in Beverly Hills (Alexander90210.com).

Sam Harris and the Secular Mind

Samuel Benjamin Harris (b. 1967) hosts a popular podcast and meditation app. With a PhD in neuroscience from UCLA, he’s best known as a critic of religion. Harris was born in Los Angeles. His father, Berkeley Harris (1935 to 1984), … Continue reading

Posted in Guru, Sam Harris | Comments Off on Sam Harris and the Secular Mind

‘Toward a Theory of Cultural Trauma’

Yale sociologist Jeffrey C. Alexander published this valuable decoding essay in the 2004 book Cultural Trauma and Collective Identity. He shows that group trauma claims are not automatic. They do not simply follow from the severity of a trauma. Instead, … Continue reading

Posted in Trauma | Comments Off on ‘Toward a Theory of Cultural Trauma’

The Buffered Economist and the Porous Citizen: How Market Liberalism Mistakes What Human Beings Are

The modern defense of free trade rests on a tacit anthropology that economists rarely acknowledge because it appears to them as common sense. Beneath the language of efficiency, comparative advantage, consumer welfare, and aggregate growth sits a particular image of … Continue reading

Posted in Buffered, Economics, Porous, Trade | Comments Off on The Buffered Economist and the Porous Citizen: How Market Liberalism Mistakes What Human Beings Are

NYT: ‘Book on Truth in the Age of A.I. Contains Quotes Made Up by A.I.’

Benjamin Mullins reports: “Steven Rosenbaum, author of “The Future of Truth,” said he had started his own investigation after The New York Times asked about the fake quotes.” The verification pipeline is the story. Rosenbaum wrote the book. BenBella edited … Continue reading

Posted in AI, Journalism | Comments Off on NYT: ‘Book on Truth in the Age of A.I. Contains Quotes Made Up by A.I.’

The Buffered Twenties

Smart educated young men in their twenties live at the peak of buffered self-confidence. The buffered self believes it stands outside its history. It treats inheritance as background, family as embarrassment, body as instrument, name as preference, career as canvas. … Continue reading

Posted in Buffered, Charles Taylor, Porous | Comments Off on The Buffered Twenties

The Buffered, The Porous & The Iran War

When Trump-aligned voices call Democratic critics of the Iran war traitors, the charge does not function as legal description or strategic argument. It functions as boundary defense. Charles Taylor (b. 1931) developed the distinction between the buffered self and the … Continue reading

Posted in Buffered, Iran, Porous | Comments Off on The Buffered, The Porous & The Iran War

Philosophy After the Seminar Room: Michael Millerman and the Post-Academic Intellectual

Michael Millerman (b. 1984) occupies a hybrid position in contemporary intellectual life. Trained in political philosophy yet operating outside the research university, he combines scholarship, teaching, translation, and digital entrepreneurship into a single career. His project traces philosophical questions about … Continue reading

Posted in Philosophy | Comments Off on Philosophy After the Seminar Room: Michael Millerman and the Post-Academic Intellectual

Famous Writers Stuck In The Trap Of Audience Expectations

Most famous writers know more than they say but they keep turning out blinkered work anyway. A few have refused. Stuck in the trap: Ta-Nehisi Coates (b. 1975) writes for college-educated liberal Whites who buy his books and grant him … Continue reading

Posted in Intellectuals | Comments Off on Famous Writers Stuck In The Trap Of Audience Expectations

The Neglected Intellectual

The sociology of intellectuals has a thin but useful shelf on this. Lewis Coser (1913-2003), Edward Shils (1910-1995), Pierre Bourdieu (1930-2002), Russell Jacoby (b. 1945), and Randall Collins (b. 1941) all treat the complaint of neglect as a structural feature … Continue reading

Posted in Guru, Intellectuals | Comments Off on The Neglected Intellectual

Franzen at the Closing Door

Jonathan Franzen won the National Book Award for The Corrections in November 2001. The book sold three million copies. He appeared on the cover of Time. Oprah Winfrey picked his novel for her book club. He became, for a moment, … Continue reading

Posted in Climate, Freedom, Jonathan Franzen | Comments Off on Franzen at the Closing Door