Sam Harris: thinking in public

I've been binge-listening and binge-reading a bunch of Sam Harris' stuff the last several days, and I am moved to write several posts in praise of him. I've written previously about his book "Waking Up" and its impact on my life. But there's more. The is the cover post, a quick TL;DR of some of the things that I've run across and intend to write on.

So:
<TL;DR>

First: "Thinking in public." Which is what Harris does. It's inspired me to do more of that. More on this topic at the end of the section.

Second, his recent TED talk on AI. He makes the right argument, clearer than anyone else, and points out the fact that none of us--him included is reacting appropriately.

Third, his guided meditation. A companion to his book, Waking Up. There are two meditations. A short one, 9 minutes, and a longer one, 26.

Fourth, his podcasts on Trump. Actually not on Trump, but on other things, but with long sections devoted to his analysis of Trump. I've transcribed one of them. More later, linked here, once I write. Here's the first, on YouTube, and my unauthorized transcription.

Fifth, his posts on Islamic Jihadism and the intellectually vacuous response of the Left. Best arguments I have seen. In particular what Hillary should say.

</TL;DR>

Thinking In Public

I came across this phrase somewhere over the last few days, reading a bunch of Harris stuff, and the idea stuck. When I decided to write this post, and I googled for "Sam Harris thinking in public" the top links were to a podcast with Neil deGrasse Tyson. (YouTube here. Web site here. Soundcloud (downloadable) here.) I have not listened to the podcast, so I am not recommending it, though I may come back with a follow up.

For now, I'm just pimping the slogan.

Harris has been thinking in public for a while about important topics, like the ones above. I find his public thoughts to be valuable, cogent, well documented, and well argued. He's not all that funny. In fact he's kind of dry, but hey, we can't all be perfect.

So I've decided to emulate him a bit, and do a bit more thinking in public.

Who knows what will come of it.