Bad Feelings
We spend so much of our life trying to deny, judge, or banish negative feelings. What would happen if we just tried to listen to them?
Culture
Plain English.
A newsletter about abundance and building a better world.
Recent essays
30 of 53Why Harvard's Dean 'Encourages' Students to Use AI
The end of summer brings a fresh throng of Americans to college campuses.
AI Safety Is Having a Moment
Why are the AI labs building a technology that they say might destroy the world?
We Can't Let AI Writing Take Over the Internet
An interview with Pangram founder and CEO Max Spero on how AI writing has flooded the internet, why it matters, and why it’s worth cleaning up
How to Survive the AI Cyberpocalypse
Or: A comprehensive explanation for why it’s time for everybody to clean up their password game, immediately
The American Sports Plutocracy Is Bullshit
American sports laws amount to a kind of out-in-the-open conspiracy to help a lucky few billionaires get much, much richer
The Great American AI Rebellion
Americans hate data centers. But most of AI's builders are clueless about why.
The 9 Questions I’m Obsessed With Right Now: AI, Politics, Movies, Drugs, and Western Civilization
Why are socialism, marijuana, and original blockbusters ascendant? Where do "Western values" come from? Why do modern people torture ourselves with comparison and guilt?
The Four Horsemen of the AI Bubble Apocalypse
The smartest reasons to worry about the state of AI in an age of intense volatility—and my best attempt to explain why each of those worries might be wrong.
The Next Miracle Drug Might Already Be in Your Medicine Cabinet
If we want AI to solve every disease in our lifetime, super-intelligence is not enough. We need an equally ingenious policy to guide the discovery of new drugs.
What Is Lost When We Make 'The Odyssey' Modern
Christopher Nolan's 'Odyssey' is an extraordinary, modern epic. Homer's Odyssey is an even more extraordinarily strange one.
A Philosopher’s One-Word Theory to Explain Why the World Feels So Weird
Once you learn what the "uni-context" is, you won't stop seeing it everywhere
Is This the End of Booze?
The turn against moderate drinking has been sudden and sharp. But it's not often based in science.
America, 1926: What a Forgotten 100-Year-Old Report Says About Who We Are
America in 1926 was obsessed with technology, immigration, women, work, and money. Sound familiar?
It’s the Best Time Ever to Become a Millionaire by Working Alone
There are more—and richer—tiny companies. AI could be playing a big role.
The U.S. Went to War to Take Away Iran's Superweapon. It Gave Iran a New One.
Trump lost the country. The U.S. lost a half-hearted war. Israel lost an ally. The Middle East lost the illusion of security. Asia lost growth. Global trade lost a dependable artery.
The Derek Thompson Substack Turns 1! Here's How the Newsletter Is Doing
Thank you for being a paid subscriber! And please use this birthday to tell me what you want this newsletter to grow into
The Cult of the Enhanced Self
Americans have never been healthier, or more alone. These things might be related.
Why Do the Best Leaders Fail at the Most Important Job?
What do Marcus Aurelius, Bob Iger, Bill Belichick, and William Shawn have in common? Succession failure.
Why Are Men So Bad at Making—and Keeping—Friends?
There are two problems with the famous “male loneliness crisis”—the loneliness part and the male thing.
The AI Boom Has Entered Its 'Wait, Is This Worth It?' Era
The great AI cost panic of 2026 is upon us
Can America Escape the Cycle of Vicemaxxing?
Donald Trump did not invent political corruption. But he may be accelerating something more dangerous: the collapse of universal moral standards into a culture of endless special exceptions.
The Global Fertility Crisis Is Worse Than You Probably Think
Everybody knows about the decline in birthrates. Fewer people understand why—or just how significantly it could transform society in the next few decades.
The Six Megatrends That Define 2026
Every week, I save dozens of screenshots of charts, essay passages, science and economics papers, and tweets.
How AI Could Help Cure Pancreatic Cancer
The most lethal cancer is invisible to the human eye until it's too late to treat. In today's Q&A, a Mayo Clinic doctor says AI can see what the best radiologists cannot.
The Big Question Lurking Beneath the AI Debate
Is artificial intelligence normal?
Why Your Best Ideas Aren’t Original
What the mysterious history of "multiple discovery" in science tells us about the nature of creativity
How American Dads Became the Parents Their Fathers Never Were
Compared to their parents, Millennial fathers have roughly tripled the amount of time they spend with kids. The new American dad is more present and more exhausted—but also, more satisfied with life.
If America's So Rich, How'd It Get So Sad?
Or: How the 2020s broke our brains
The AI Vibe Shift Has Officially Arrived
We seem to be moving from a period of demand scarcity (not enough customers) to supply scarcity (not enough compute)