"Fra Mauro’s map organized state-of-the-art knowledge about the world beyond Murano, but it was also art for the state. Venice was a mercantile superpower. World maps were not made for sailors, but for “intellectuals, aristocrats and members of government.” In the Venetian oligarchy, the three were much the same." - The Wall Street Journal
A problem becomes a crisis when it challenges our ability to cope and thus threatens our identity. In the polycrisis the shocks are disparate, but they interact so that the whole is even more overwhelming than the sum of the parts. - Aeon
The European tendency to mistake Europe for the world – what might be called “the Eurocentric fallacy” – has obscured our understanding of the EU and its role in the world. It has led to an idealisation of European integration as a kind of cosmopolitan project: what I call the myth of cosmopolitan Europe. - The Guardian
Rather than the rightness of going after Harry, I was questioning the heat with which I’d done so. I scolded myself: It’s not your comeback. It’s not your mother. For the thousandth time in my ghostwriting career, I reminded myself: It’s not your effing book. - The New Yorker
"Most confusingly, we once had distinct writerly lanes (hers being women’s bodies, sexuality, and leadership; mine being corporate assaults on democracy and climate change). But by the time Occupy happened, the once-sharp yellow line that divided those lanes had begun to go wobbly." - Vanity Fair
Damage to Ukraine's cultural sites has been extensive, according to Unesco (the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation). Its Red List of Cultural Objects at Risk records verifiable damage to more than 259 cultural sites since the war began. - BBC
Over the last decade or so, with the vast expansion of social media networks, a new, seemingly sophisticated language sits on modern society’s tongue. Some call it therapy-speak. Or psychobabble. But despite its prevalence, the language is divisive. - The Guardian
Digital culture functions today as the Enlightenment cosmopolis once did: as a fantasy in which society reshapes itself along the lines of affinity. “If settled norms, practices, laws, and places are our roots, digital culture is uprooted and uprooting." - The New Atlantis
"Our frayed relationship with the very idea of the future has worried me for some time. It’s healthy for a society not to be unquestioningly, complacently Pollyanna-ish about what’s to come, but it’s also deeply unhealthy, and feels somehow un-American, for a society to recoil from even engaging with its future." - Slate
Politicians and state officials, often with the help of management consultants, are making liberal arts education scarce in some of the poorest states in the Union. This trend, typically led by Republican-controlled legislatures and often masquerading as budgetary necessity, threatens to have dire long-term effects. - The New York Times
In theory, nothing about the brain’s squishy wetware prevents its internal states from being observed. “If you could measure every single neuron in the brain in real time, you could potentially decode everything that was percolating around in there.” - The Atlantic
All of these power-adult former theater kids exist in a moment when the very things that used to make drama-loving teenagers an easy punchline have become strengths. Today, performing an outsize version of oneself is often rewarded. - The New York Times
As was the case with the professor, photos uploaded to Christie’s oftentimes include GPS coordinates for where they were taken; those coordinates are so precise that they reveal not just a street address but can even indicate within a few feet exactly where inside a building a photo was taken. - Washington Post
"The stunning success testifies to potency of confrontational works that cater to an audience that believes it is underserved, but also: the increasing savvy of promoters and fans — including conservatives — who have mastered digital platforms and guerrilla marketing tactics to dominate culture industries they say have marginalized them." - The New York Times
"The truth is I'm not necessarily concerned about not upsetting traditionalists. I think people who love our art form are still gonna love it because we're still gonna play some Puccini and Verdi. To me it's — it's never about not upsetting. And if some people are upset, well, too bad." - CBS
