Free Speech Is a Tribal Identifier

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The phrase free speech is sort of degenerating from a crucially important political philosophical concept into a slogan. It becomes a tribal identifier right. Anything with words like woke or politically correct or whatever they become slogans by people who want to use them for political advantage and that makes it harder no matter what you might think about it. Elon Musk famously said he would not disturb the Twitter account of the guy who tracks his private plane but then got rid of all those other accounts as well.

Welcome to that beloved Mindscape annual tradition, the Holiday Message. An opportunity for a quicker and less-well-thought-out solo episode to round off another year. Ironically, this year the theme is the importance of slowing down and thinking things out really well! Illustrated by two things that have been on my mind: a couple of internet/tech kerfuffles (Elon Musk buying Twitter, Sam Bankman-Fried and the collapse of FTX), and the distinction between foundations of physics and “regular” physics. See if you can dimly perceive the thread that ties them together.

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