The Polymath Review

The Polymath Review

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About This Blog

Started in December, 2019, this blog is a nexus for my interests and those of people whose work I admire or enjoy. This means that I work to write intelligently about a wide-ranging set of topics. If this blog were to be a social event, I imagine it as a development of the salon for the internet age, in the French sense. You know, art and bookshelves on the walls, people chatting casually or passionately about physics or politics in the velvet armchairs,…

Importantly, this blog is participatory, in that you are welcome to leave a comment or shoot me an email requesting a post on a particular subject or drawing my attention to some intriguing human or project. This person/project could be you/yours! I would love to promote your work if I find it compelling.

A note on spelling: I strive to be consistent within individual posts in a choice of Canadian/U.S. spelling, but not between posts. This is deliberate. I write for people in both countries and so give each group its due.

Comments:

Here is a little simulation to demo how I will handle comments.

THE CAST

ME: an imp, a seeker of knowledge
COMMENTER 1: a faithful ally of effective discourse
COMMENTER 2: an otherwise reasonable person who is temporarily acting like a degenerate

COMMENTER 1: So Julia, I thought that your last post on X was a good start, but you could have taken Y idea a bit further or considered Z. Can you write a follow up filling in some of the holes? You might take a look at Omega‘s article at abc.com.

ME: Thanks for reading and for your thoughts, Commenter 1! I did my best in talking about X, but you’re definitely right that the post could be improved. This topic is important enough to revisit, and I’ll respond to Omega‘s work directly in the next post.

_____________________

COMMENTER 2: *Stream of irrelevant insults*

ME: Wow, Commenter 2, I’m sorry that you had such a negative experience reading my post about X, but you haven’t presented me with any options for helping you feel better or addressing disagreement about the subject matter. Would you like to try telling me again what you didn’t like? Let’s keep the focus on the actual topic at hand.

_____________________

(Commenter 2 now has a choice about how the play will end and what sort of character they will be. This is the sad ending.)

_____________________

COMMENTER 2: *Another stream of insults, possibly even more lurid*

ME: Hey, Commenter 2, I gave you a second chance to handle free speech responsibly, but I didn’t see any improvement in your last comment. Sadly, I’m going to remove you as a commenter in this specific discussion in order to keep it going constructively.

_____________________

(But what if it weren’t too late?! Maybe Commenter 2 could go a different way…and not just in some other universe;-). )

_____________________

COMMENTER 2: Julia, thanks for letting me know that my comment wasn’t helpful and for giving me a second chance. You’re right, it was really unpleasant reading your post on X. I guess those feelings just got the better of me in the moment, when I wasn’t thinking about how posting on the internet is an action that affects other people and situations. I’ll do my best to keep that in mind, from now on, even though I think we disagree pretty deeply on some important topics.

ME: Commenter 2, I really appreciate how you took my response to heart and have met me halfway in turning things around. I’m glad that you’ll still be part of the conversation; I think you have a lot to contribute with your different perspective, especially because we don’t agree about some key points.

Thus an inclusive and pluralistic dialogue proceeded. And there was much rejoicing.