- https://PayPal.Me/lukeisback
"Luke Ford reports all of the 'juicy' quotes, and has been doing it for years." (Marc B. Shapiro)
"This guy knows all the gossip, the ins and outs, the lashon hara of the Orthodox world. He’s an [expert] in... all the inner workings of the Orthodox world." (Rabbi Aaron Rakeffet-Rothkoff) LATEST POSTS:
- Richard Reeves: A Life in Institutions
- Jake Adelstein: The Reporter Who Became His Story
- Jim Goad (1961-2026)
- Moira Greyland
- Robert Oscar Lopez: The Inconvenient Witness
- Two Ledgers: Decoding the Gurus and the Price of Talk
- The Pervert’s Progress: Costin Vlad Alamariu and the Making of Bronze Age Pervert
- Curtis Yarvin: A Life Against Democracy
- Mark Helprin: Against the Current
- Mark Brandt: The Man Who Asked Who Else Is Prejudiced
- John T. Jost: The Psychologist of Acquiescence
- Strange Bedfellows in the Academy: Alliance Theory and the Straussian Schism
- Tournier on Desmond Ford
- The Fence and the Blessing: How Jews Have Thought About Gentiles
- Tournier on Luke Ford
- Tournier on The Nostradamus Kid
- An Alliance Theory of Antisemitism
- Tournier on Cinema Paradiso and Desmond Ford
- The Self-Hating Jew
- The Alliance Theory in the Academy
BEST POSTS:
- * The Enlightenment Wasn’t Enlightened (6-23-26)
* Mr. Burge Draws The Line (6-23-26)
* 'Improving on Democracy' (6-17-26)
* People Leak To People Who Are Fun (6-11-26)
* Why Does Australia Produce So Many Great Journalists? (6-11-26)
* Steve Wynn and the Press: Power, Litigation, and the Contest Over Las Vegas (6-3-26)
* Sheldon Adelson and the Journalists (6-3-26)
* The Vigilant Animal: Thinkers Who Reject the Myth of Human Gullibility (6-2-26)
* The Cost of Refusing the Misunderstanding Myth (6-2-26)
* Show Me How It Travels (6-2-26)
* The Norm Explainers (6-2-26)
* Centering Marginalized Voices (6-1-26)
* What would it look like if the Washington Post put its reader first? (6-1-26)
* What would it look like if the Financial Times put its reader first? (6-1-26)
* What It Would Mean for the Los Angeles Times to Put the Reader First? (6-1-26)
* What It Would Mean for The New York Times to Put the Reader First? (6-1-26)
* Why Wembanyama Lives on the Perimeter (5-31-26)
* The Emotional Palettes Of San Diego, Los Angeles, San Francisco & Sacramento (5-27-26)
* The Administrative Capital: Sacramento Legal Culture (5-27-26)
* San Diego - The Quiet Republic (5-27-26)
* The Quiet Bar: San Diego Legal Culture (5-27-26)
* SF v LA Legal Culture (5-27-26)
* Why Talent Travels Poorly Between San Francisco and Los Angeles (5-27-26)
* San Francisco and Los Angeles as Rival Models of Urban Access (5-27-26)
* Social Cliques in New York, 2026 (5-25-26)
* Social Cliques in San Francisco, 2026 (5-25-26)
* The Rival Courts of Washington (5-25-26)
* The City of Private Rooms (5-25-26)
Category Archives: Psychology
Decoding The Fight Over Love Addiction
The NYT reports: “Is Love Addictive? Many Say Yes, and It’s Changing Our Idea of Romance. Poems and songs say love should be world-shattering. The logic of love addiction suggests that it shouldn’t.” ChatGPT says: The fight over “love addiction” … Continue reading
Posted in Addiction, Love, Psychiatry, Psychology
Comments Off on Decoding The Fight Over Love Addiction
Decoding The Stanford Prison Experiment
Gemini says: The Stanford Prison Experiment (SPE) serves as a definitive case study in how elite alliances use “expertise” to sacralize convenient narratives and how they respond when the “bullshit” underlying those narratives is exposed. 1. The Shift to the … Continue reading
Posted in Psychology, Stanford
Comments Off on Decoding The Stanford Prison Experiment
I Hallucinate, You Hallucinate, We All Hallucinate
People, who are prone to hallucinations, created AI, so why would AI not hallucinate? Psychologists distinguish between hallucinations, which involve sensory perceptions without a stimulus, and delusions, which are fixed false beliefs. Americans experience both at high rates. Research suggests … Continue reading
Posted in Addiction, Psychology
Comments Off on I Hallucinate, You Hallucinate, We All Hallucinate
Perfectionism Is Neuroticism Dressed Up
“Perfectionism” often gets framed as a noble trait. High standards. Excellence. Craft. But in practice it usually feels closer to anxiety in a tuxedo. Most so-called perfectionism isn’t about producing better work. It’s about managing discomfort. Fear of judgment. Fear … Continue reading
Posted in Psychology
Comments Off on Perfectionism Is Neuroticism Dressed Up
Hero Systems & Physiology
I flirted with Marxism from 1987 to 1989 when I then shifted towards Judaism and right-wing politics (my default state). I think my hero system of the moment shifts my physiology as well as my physiology predisposing me towards certain … Continue reading
Posted in Psychology
Comments Off on Hero Systems & Physiology
Internal Pride Mirrors External Validation – You Can’t Generate Your Own Pride
From a 2018 paper: Invariances in the architecture of pride across small-scale societies It has been proposed that one key function of pride is to guide behavior in ways that would increase others’ valuation of the individual. To incline choice, … Continue reading
Posted in Buffered, Porous, Psychology
Comments Off on Internal Pride Mirrors External Validation – You Can’t Generate Your Own Pride
The Legacy of Ernest Becker: Death, Ideologies, and Cultures
I asked ChatGPT to decode this Youtube video for talking points for my big Sunday show: Use Terror Management Theory (TMT) as the case study. Walk through the classic mortality-salience experiments, then the replication crisis: Many Labs 4 couldn’t replicate … Continue reading
Posted in Psychology
Comments Off on The Legacy of Ernest Becker: Death, Ideologies, and Cultures
The Denial of Death
Ernest Becker writes in his 1973 classic: * How can one justify his own heroism? He would have to be as God. Now we see even further how guilt is inevitable for man: even as a creator he is a … Continue reading
Posted in Psychology
Comments Off on The Denial of Death
‘No one is coming to save you: you are the one you are waiting for’
I am 59. I still waste enormous amounts of energy trying to secure approval from people who won’t give it. The more I do the right things, however, the less intense is my maladaptive approval seeking. Just under the surface … Continue reading
Posted in Psychology
Comments Off on ‘No one is coming to save you: you are the one you are waiting for’
The Trap Of Understanding
Posted in Psychology
Comments Off on The Trap Of Understanding