The Theory of Communicative Action, his 1980s magnum opus, was not (to put it mildly) as accessible as some of his newspaper opinion pieces. But its central idea—that our nature as linguistic beings puts reason and the search for consensus at the core of who we are—remains an antidote both to intellectual relativism and Trumpian realism, which elevates national or individual self-interest above all other sources of human motivation.
In antiquity, many opined about "the elements" in combination. Around 2500 years ago, Leucippus and Democritus founded the idea of atoms. Perhaps everything, they opined, was composed of indivisible building blocks. In the late 1700s, hydrogen and oxygen were discovered. Circa 1804, John Dalton revived atomism to explain chemical behavior. Then in 1869, Mendeleev developed the periodic table: organizing the atoms.
Books rise to the level of enduring art, I believe, when their writers take something ordinary and reintroduce it in a way that radically transforms it. The right work can make a subject that's never crossed my mind, or that strikes me as aggressively boring, into something incantatory, pulsing with meaning.
All of us live in an age where we're bombarded by social media and artificial intelligence - when striving to be your authentic self becomes an increasingly difficult task. Yet, even if it has somehow become a common goal, it is unclear how many of us can truly define the "authenticity" that we say we are pursuing.
Peter Drucker saw this symbiosis first. He realized that the new industrial order would depend on a worker who produced ideas instead of widgets. The knowledge worker became the engine of prosperity, and management became the social technology that synchronized millions of minds. The modern firm was as much an invention as the transistor it depended on. Three decades later, Tom Peters caught the next wave.
Again. It was happening again. Not even three weeks ago, federal agents murdered a mother of three named Renee Good. A few days before that, another federal immigration officer shot and killed Keith Porter, Jr. in Los Angeles. Daily, our city network of concerned citizens is documenting the injustices happening against our neighbors. Pittsburgh - like America itself - would not exist without immigrants, yet we watch them be dehumanized and terrorized hourly in what has long been known as Mister Rogers' Neighborhood.
So long as I manage to avoid lightbulbs or stay out of wine glasses, the buzzing will inevitably give way to silence. My wings will abruptly stop flapping and I'll careen towards the ground like an asteroid. I'll become a speck on a rug, a bit of debris absent-mindedly vacuumed up by someone who has no idea what adventures I've been on in the past minute.
In case you didn't get the memo, everyone is feeling very Chinese these days. Across social media, people are proclaiming that "You met me at a very Chinese time of my life," while performing stereotypically Chinese-coded activities like eating dim sum or wearing the viral Adidas Chinese jacket. The trend blew up so much in recent weeks that celebrities like comedian Jimmy O Yang and influencer Hasan Piker even got in on it. It has now evolved into variations like " Chinamaxxing" (acting increasingly more Chinese) and " u will turn Chinese tomorrow " (a kind of affirmation or blessing).
February 2026 issue.When I was a child I was terrifiedof the space between One and Zero vast as the ages before my birthstrait as my death-late at night I heard my parents arguinglovingly in their locked room, the angora cat coming homewith a sparrow in her mouth, and the raindrops on the shinglescounting themselves-how to sleep, how to cross the empty placebetween the name "sparrow" and that limp thing crying,adamant, creating me with its cry
I was suspicious, even cynical, about what the world insisted was vital to the life of my unborn child. I was partly sceptical because so much of the advice I was getting was contradictory. But I was also suspicious because I'd spent most of my 20s reading Nietzsche. Nietzsche is not, perhaps, a natural choice for a young mother. But he helps to fuel certain questions about values, and purpose, that are central to questions of care.
This APA Blog series has broadly explored philosophy and technology with a throughline on the influence of technology and AI on well-being. This month's post brings those themes into focus recounting a vital Washington Post Opinion piece by friend of the APA Blog, Samuel Kimbriel. Samuel is the founding director of the Aspen Institute's Philosophy and Society Initiative and Editor at Large for Wisdom of Crowds. We collaborated on a Substack Newsletter about intellectual ambition, building on his essay, Thinking is Risky.
Many philosophers strike me as like Polish apparatchiks in 1983-they turn up to work and do what they did yesterday just because they don't know what else to do, not because they seriously believe in the system they are maintaining. I think it's not been fully appreciated how much of a blow it is to the confidence of the field's youth that scientific ambitions are increasingly abandoned as untenable.
Often, people make financial decisions based on what they need for themselves in the future. However, those who think about their families beyond their own lifetimes have a better chance not only of leaving wealth behind but also of ensuring it grows. It's never too late, either. A good way to give loved ones a head start, whether they are taking on a business or just needing to pay for a funeral, is with a good life insurance policy.
