DIRS.INFO The most relevant business & tech news

☆ Opinion | Can Culture Be Society’s Savior?
▼ + stars: | 2024-02-17 | by ( ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

To the Editor:Re “How to Save a Sad, Lonely, Angry and Mean Society,” by David Brooks (column, Jan. 28):As a published author married to a writer/filmmaker, I deeply appreciated Mr. Brooks’s column. It pains me to witness the modern-day devaluation of the arts and humanities. When I was a child, my art history major mother dragged me to many of the world’s great museums: the National Gallery of Art, the Met, the Louvre. I may have protested after the first hour, but certain works left indelible impressions: the terrifying passion of Klimt’s “Kiss,” the seductive movement of the Calder mobile. Likewise, literature plunged me into different perspectives.

Persons: David Brooks, Ingalls, Brooks, MeiMei Fox, David Brooks’s Organizations: Gallery of Art, Met, Calder, mater, Stanford University, “ College Locations: Louvre, “, MeiMei Fox Honolulu

☆ Opinion | The Cure for What Ails Our Democracy
▼ + stars: | 2024-02-15 | by ( David Brooks | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

What do we have to do to rectify this situation? Well, a lot of things, but one of them is this: More of us have to embrace an idea, a way of thinking that is fundamental to being a citizen in a democracy. That idea is known as value pluralism. It’s most associated with the British philosopher Isaiah Berlin and is based on the premise that the world doesn’t fit neatly together. We all want to pursue a variety of goods, but unfortunately, these goods can be in tension with one another.

Persons: Isaiah Berlin, Damon Organizations: University of Pennsylvania Locations: America, British, Berlin

☆ Trump Came for the Republican Party and Took Over Their Souls - The New York Times
▼ + stars: | 2024-02-08 | by ( David Brooks | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

I thought I was beyond shockable, but this week has been profoundly shocking for me. I spent the bulk of my adult life on the right-wing side of things, generally rooting for the Republican Party, because I thought that party best served America. They have to mouth the Trumpian prejudices to survive in this era, but somewhere deep inside, the party of Reagan still lives in their souls. Donald Trump has owned this party for years. If he told them to kill the immigration compromise because he needed a campaign issue, they were going to kill that proposal.

Persons: Sarah Palin, Donald Trump, Reagan, Eisenhower, McCain, I’m, Trumpism Organizations: Republican Party, Republican, House Republicans, cynically, Trump Locations: shockable, America, Ukraine, Israel

☆ Opinion | How Art Creates Us
▼ + stars: | 2024-01-25 | by ( David Brooks | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

Recently, while browsing in the Museum of Modern Art store in New York, I came across a tote bag with the inscription, “You are no longer the same after experiencing art.” It’s a nice sentiment, I thought, but is it true? Or to be more specific: Does consuming art, music, literature and the rest of what we call culture make you a better person? Ages ago, Aristotle thought it did, but these days a lot of people seem to doubt it. Since the early 2000s, fewer and fewer people say that they visit art museums and galleries, go to see plays or attend classical music concerts, opera or ballet. Thanks to Hurston she had a new way to see, a deeper way to connect to her own heritage.

Persons: ”, Aristotle, They’ve, George Eliot, I’m, Alice Walker, Zora Neale Hurston, Hurston Organizations: Museum of Modern, tote, College, Workers Locations: New York

☆ Nikki Haley Is Tougher Than the Rest - The New York Times
▼ + stars: | 2024-01-13 | by ( David Brooks | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Donald Trump was tough, mean and self-pitying (a nifty combination). And the woman who is now Trump’s chief challenger, Nikki Haley, is one of the toughest politicians in America — by which I mean confrontational, willing to hammer her foes. When you read accounts of her days in South Carolina, her bellicosity fairly ripples off the pages. In a fantastic 2021 profile in Politico Magazine, Tim Alberta quotes a former South Carolina Republican Party chair: “Listen, man. Nikki Haley has a memory.

Persons: Abraham Lincoln, —, Reagan, Obama, Donald Trump, Biden, Nikki Haley, Tim Alberta, Haley, “, I’ve, ” Organizations: White House, Politico Magazine, South Carolina Republican Party Locations: America, South Carolina, Alberta

☆ Sam Altman Is Back at OpenAI. I Have a Question for Him. - The New York Times
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-23 | by ( David Brooks | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: 1 min

One of the nice things about OpenAI is that it was built on distrust. It began as a nonprofit research lab because its founders didn’t think artificial intelligence should be pioneered by commercial firms, which are driven overwhelmingly by the profit motive. As it evolved, OpenAI turned into what you might call a fruitful contradiction: a for-profit company overseen by a nonprofit board with a corporate culture somewhere in between. Many of the people at the company seem simultaneously motivated by the scientist’s desire to discover, the capitalist’s desire to ship product and the do-gooder’s desire to do this all safely. The events of the past week — Sam Altman’s firing, all the drama, his rehiring — revolve around one central question: Is this fruitful contradiction sustainable?

Persons: OpenAI, Sam Altman’s

And I write about politics, I write about culture, I write about social science, and from time to time, I write about world events. Because the Middle East is so contentious, a lot of the brutalism is right here in our own country. So I wanted to learn from the wise people in the past, how do you stay humane in times that are inhumane? It’s dangerous to be gentle and open-hearted in hard times, but it’s also dangerous to shut off your heart. And then I flicked down my social media feed, and I see an old video of James Baldwin being interviewed.

Persons: David Brooks, I’ve, we’ve, We’re, Homer, Agamemnon, Achilles, Max Weber, ”, James Baldwin Organizations: The New York Times Locations: Gaza, Athens, Jerusalem

☆ Opinion | Inclusion and Exclusion on Campus
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-21 | by ( ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +3 min

Literal gated communities and figurative glass ceilings exist to highlight this divisiveness in bluntly metaphorical fashion. WilliamsBurlington, N.J.To the Editor:While I commend David Brooks’s stand on inclusion, it’s a bit late. The uproar should have started on the day that universities started to cancel speeches by speakers who leaned to the right so as not to offend some vocal student groups. Rather than allow an intelligent back and forth with those they might disagree with, these people were not allowed to come to their campus. They also celebrate the virtue of humility, a virtue that is notably absent in the world of higher education.

Persons: David Brooks, David Brooks’s, Rich Corso, it’s, Andrea Economos Hartsdale, Mitchell, Fuller Organizations: New, Diversity, Equity Locations: New Jersey, Williams Burlington , N.J, N.Y, Ill

☆ Opinion | Universities Are Failing at Inclusion
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-16 | by ( David Brooks | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Over the past five weeks, Jewish students on America’s campuses have found themselves confronted with those who celebrate a terrorist operation that featured the mass murder and reportedly the rape of fellow Jews. They see images of people tearing down posters of kidnapped Jewish children. At M.I.T., Jewish students report that they were told by some faculty members to avoid the university’s main lobby — which had been the site of a pro-Palestinian protest — for their own safety. I’ve been teaching on college campuses off and on for 25 years. It’s become increasingly evident to me that American adolescence and young adulthood — especially for those who wind up at elite schools — now happen within a specific kind of ideological atmosphere.

Persons: Rabbi Nomi Manon, Hillel, ” Shabbos Kestenbaum, I’ve, It’s Organizations: Cooper Union, University, Albany, Albany Times - Union, “, Harvard Divinity School, ” Universities Locations: M.I.T, American

☆ What Democrats Can Learn From Joe Biden and Poll Numbers - The New York Times
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-09 | by ( David Brooks | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

The median voter rule still applies. The median voter rule says parties win when they stay close to the center of the electorate. The Democrats’ strong showing in elections across the country this week proves how powerful the median voter rule is, especially when it comes to the abortion issue. This year, Democrats and their supporters effectively played to median voters, with, for example, an ad in Ohio in which a father who grew up in the church castigated the G.O.P. And if you’re truly living out your faith, you’re not playing into these anger and hatred games.”

Persons: MAGA, —, Biden doesn’t, Ron DeSantis, Vivek Ramaswamy, Andy Beshear, E.J, Dionne Jr, you’re, ” Organizations: Jackson, Health Organization, Gov, Democrat, Washington Post Locations: It’s, Dobbs v, Ohio, Kentucky

☆ Love in Harsh Times and Other Coping Mechanisms - The New York Times
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-02 | by ( David Brooks | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

In response, they adopted a tragic sensibility. You can try to avoid thinking about the dark realities of life and naïvely wish that bad things won’t happen. Or you can confront these realities and develop a tragic mentality to help you thrive among them. This tragic sensibility prepares you for the rigors of life in concrete ways. Third, this tragic mentality encourages caution.

Persons: Ralph Waldo Emerson, Hal Brands, Charles Edel, Thucydides, Matt Gaetz Organizations: Hamas, Republicans

☆ Opinion | Learning to Become Openhearted
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-02 | by ( ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +3 min

Charles GoldbergNewtown Square, Pa.To the Editor:Kudos to David Brooks’s extraordinary lesson on being human. The only missing element was the power of humor, particularly when it is directed at oneself. Burdened by a debilitating stutter in my youth, I learned to laugh at it and myself. I found that self-deprecating jokes disarmed those inclined to ridicule me and invited in the compassionate. Armed with Mr. Brooks’s advice, I will try to devote my remaining years to listening, and speaking, with a human ear.

Persons: David Brooks, Brooks, “, Joe Posnanski, ”, Charles Goldberg, David Brooks’s, Tom Wilcox Boca, Robert Judkins Organizations: Concord Academy, Baltimore Community Foundation Locations: Pa, Tom Wilcox Boca Grande, Fla, Tenn

☆ In Israel and Gaza, Searching for Humanity - The New York Times
▼ + stars: | 2023-10-26 | by ( David Brooks | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

The conceptual frames that many people use to organize their understanding of the world are crashing and burning upon contact with Middle Eastern reality. The first paradigm that failed this month was critical race theory or woke-ism. A group of highly educated American progressives cheered on Hamas as anti-colonialist freedom fighters even though Hamas is a theocratic, genocidal terrorist force that oppresses L.G.B.T.Q. American universities exist to give students the conceptual tools to understand the world. It appears that at many universities students are instead being fed simplistic ideological categories that blind them to reality.

Persons: Mounk, It’s, Israel, —, Boko Haram Locations: American, Nigeria

☆ How to be Human - The New York Times
▼ + stars: | 2023-10-19 | by ( David Brooks | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

The really good confidants — the people we go to when we are troubled — are more like coaches than philosopher kings. They see who you are becoming before you do and provide you with a reputation you can then go live into. I think I’m more approachable, vulnerable. I know more about human psychology than I used to. I came across it in Kathryn Schulz’s recent memoir, “Lost & Found.” Schulz’s dad, Isaac, was apparently a cheerful, talkative man.

Persons: They’re, I’m, I’ll, Kathryn Schulz’s, ”, Isaac, Edith Wharton, “, ” Schulz, Schulz Locations: unsaid

☆ Elon Musk’s Savior Complex - The New York Times
▼ + stars: | 2023-09-21 | by ( David Brooks | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

These are what one psychologist termed “eminent orphans.”It’s easy to put Elon Musk into that category. He had no friends and lived in a world in which you either bullied or were bullied. But Isaacson’s account suggests that this is not the only or even the main impetus behind Musk’s extreme ambition. In the midst of that bleak childhood, Musk dived into science fiction, computer games and comics, and in some sense never left. In that world, Musk seems to have been gripped by a story just as fervently as a religious person is gripped by a holy book.

Persons: Alexander Hamilton, Ron Chernow, Hamilton “, I’ve, George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Bill Clinton, Barack Obama, ”, Walter Isaacson’s, Musk Organizations: Elon Locations: South Africa

☆ Opinion | Mitt Romney Has Given Us a Gift
▼ + stars: | 2023-09-14 | by ( David Brooks | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

It was the first day of the Republican convention in 2012 and I had nothing to write about, so I wrote a humor column mocking the Romney family for being perfect in every way. A few years later, before he was a senator, Romney asked me to come out to Utah to give a talk to a group he was convening. It’s a pain to write a speech and get on a plane, but I did it in penance for my sins. We all struggle to be the best version of ourselves we can be, and Romney’s struggle is now taking him into retirement and out of the Senate. On the way he gave us a gift, in the form of a series of conversations with The Atlantic’s McKay Coppins, who has written a book on him, excerpted in the magazine.

Persons: Romney, Mitt Romney’s, I’d, Atlantic’s McKay Coppins, Donald Trump contemptuously Organizations: Republican, Republican Party Locations: Utah

☆ Proud Page delighted after Wales win over Latvia eases pressure
▼ + stars: | 2023-09-12 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

Monday's win moved Wales level on seven points with third-placed Armenia in Group D but they are fourth on goal difference. Croatia, on 10 points from four games, lead the group on goal difference from Turkey, who have played a game more. "The pressure came from the outside, understandably, but we never questioned it within the group," Page told reporters. Their last win was also against Latvia in a Euro qualifier in Cardiff in March. Wales play Croatia, Armenia and Turkey in their final three Group D games.

Persons: Robert Page, Aaron Ramsey, David Brooks, Page, I've, we've, Hritika Sharma, Peter Rutherford Organizations: Latvia, Monday's, Wales, Cardiff, Thomson Locations: Wales, Riga, Armenia, Croatia, Turkey, Hyderabad

☆ Opinion | The Path to Happiness: Career or Marriage?
▼ + stars: | 2023-09-09 | by ( ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

To the Editor:Re “Marriage, Not Career, Brings Happiness,” by David Brooks (column, Aug. 20):Mr. Brooks’s advice that ambitious college graduates prioritize marriage over career could only come from a privileged male. Given the glass ceiling, if women do not prioritize a career, they may not be successful, and their self-esteem may suffer. Women who prioritize marriage may end up with far less financial security after divorce or after the death of a breadwinning husband. Further, within marriage, women generally take on a “second shift” domestically, are more likely to care for infirm husbands late in life and are more subject to domestic violence. While I agree that a strong marriage is a wonderful asset and intimacy is critical to happiness, making marriage itself a priority over financial security and self-fulfillment can backfire, especially for women.

Persons: David Brooks

☆ Opinion | The American Renaissance Is Already at Hand
▼ + stars: | 2023-09-07 | by ( David Brooks | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

A forecast from Bloomberg Economics now projects that the size of the Chinese economy will not successfully surpass the size of the American economy — despite its vastly greater population. But the core problems are endemic to the regime: Centralized authoritarian control is incompatible with a wide-open, innovative, free-flowing modern economy. Open information flow is crucial to any nation; when the state suppresses information unflattering to the regime, then everything is bound to sink into mediocrity. Since late 2021, investment in the construction of manufacturing facilities has more than doubled. Chips, electric vehicles, renewable energy sources and batteries are being manufactured in places like Michigan, Kentucky, Minnesota and Arizona.

Organizations: Bloomberg Economics, . Locations: China, America, Midwest, Michigan , Kentucky, Minnesota, Arizona

☆ King Charles: How has the British monarch done in his first year of rule?
▼ + stars: | 2023-09-06 | by ( Michael Holden | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +6 min

"I just think he's been really, really busy with everything that's happened this year, Seward said. Unnamed friends told the Sunday Times newspaper Charles had found the workload surprising but had settled into his role. Charles' son and heir Prince William was photographed driving him to church in what newspapers said was a sign of a rapprochement. Then there is the family feud with his younger son Prince Harry and his American wife Meghan. But there is a generational divide, with the young far less bothered in general about the royal family.

Persons: King Charles, Andrew Boyers, Charles, Andrew, Queen Elizabeth, Critics, Ingrid Seward, he's, Seward, Princess Diana, Prince Andrew, Jeffrey Epstein, Prince William, Prince Harry, Meghan, Harry, they're, It's, Graham Smith, David Brooks Wilson, You’ve, He's, Michael Holden, Marie, Louise Gumuchian, Angus MacSwan Organizations: Royal Ascot, Ascot Racecourse, LONDON, Majesty Magazine, Sunday Times, Media, London's Westminster, Netflix, Reuters, Thomson Locations: Ascot, Britain, Royal, Balmoral, Scotland, London's, U.S, Buckingham, London, Claire

☆ Opinion | People Are More Generous Than You May Think
▼ + stars: | 2023-08-31 | by ( David Brooks | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Are human beings fundamentally good or fundamentally bad? Are people mostly generous, or are they mostly selfish? Over the centuries, many of our leading lights have taken the view that people are basically selfish. On average, the participants spent more than $6,400 of it to benefit others, including almost $1,700 on donations to charity. Sounds pretty generous to me.

Persons: Machiavelli, Gordon Tullock, Gene, Richard Dawkins, “, Ryan J, Dwyer, William J, Brady, Elizabeth W, Dunn, Chris Anderson Organizations: TED

☆ Opinion | Does Therapy Culture Help or Hurt Us?
▼ + stars: | 2023-08-28 | by ( ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

To the Editor:Re “Hey, America, Grow Up!” by David Brooks (column, Aug. 11), about how an emphasis on trauma makes adults immature:As a psychiatrist, I feel that Mr. Brooks makes several valid points regarding trauma but fails ultimately to thread the needle. A good psychiatrist or therapist identifies the real trauma in a patient’s past — typically from events in childhood at the hands of parents or other family members — while simultaneously discouraging the kind of victim mind-set that displaces past pain onto present-day scapegoats. The goal is to illuminate the real trauma, which requires re-evaluating what is often an idealized remembrance of one’s upbringing, so that the patient can stop projecting malice onto anyone and instead regain a sense of agency. As the saying goes, those who forget the past are condemned to repeat it. If we fail as a culture to acknowledge the well-established long-term consequences, both physical and psychological, of legitimate trauma, we will wind up creating more people who identify as victims, not fewer.

Persons: David Brooks, Brooks, — Locations: America

☆ Opinion | Nikki Haley Is the Best Trump Alternative
▼ + stars: | 2023-08-24 | by ( David Brooks | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

She was the candidate brave enough to state the obvious truth that Trump took decades of G.O.P. The other candidates assumed the usual conservative postures about cutting taxes and spending, but she introduced the reality: Under Trump, the G.O.P. She seems to be one of the few candidates who understands that to run against Trump you have to run against Trump. Haley, by contrast, seems to believe that voters are intelligent enough to be treated as adults. But if any of my friends and acquaintances want to stop Trump, this is their moment to give Haley her chance.

Persons: Trump, Ron DeSantis, Haley, Saul Bellow, Ramaswamy, Mike Pence, Pence, Reagan, haven’t Organizations: Trump, Republican, hokum, Tea Party

☆ Opinion | To Be Happy, Marriage Matters More Than Career
▼ + stars: | 2023-08-17 | by ( David Brooks | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

When I’m around young adults I like to ask them how they are thinking about the big commitments in their lives: what career to go into, where to live, whom to marry. Most of them have thought a lot about their career plans. But my impression is that many have not thought a lot about how marriage will fit into their lives. In 2006, 50 percent of young adults said it was very important for a couple to marry if they intended to spend the rest of their lives together. But by 2020 only 29 percent of young adults said that.

Persons: Brad Wilcox, It’s Organizations: University of Virginia, Pew Research Center

☆ Opinion | Are the Elite Anti-Trumpers the ‘Bad Guys’?
▼ + stars: | 2023-08-12 | by ( ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

To the Editor:Re “What if We’re the Bad Guys Here?,” by David Brooks (column, Aug. 4):I am sick and tired of people like Mr. Brooks telling me that I am the problem or the “bad guy” because I am educated (and no, I was not educated at an Ivy League school, and neither of my parents finished high school) to justify the fact that 35 percent of the population are fervent supporters of Donald Trump, no matter what he says or does. Moreover, Mr. Trump is also part of the elite, but his supporters simply ignore this. This is not because he identifies with them in any way (as a golden-haired billionaire living in a mansion), but because Fox, Newsmax, and other right-wing TV and radio media outlets, right-wing militias and Trump puppet politicians in Congress essentially brainwashed them with their daily dose of propaganda about how the “left wing socialists and communists,” “elites,” the “woke,” etc., are all conspiring to take their country and only Donald Trump can stop them. In my opinion, this is the biggest problem, Mr. Brooks, not educated Americans who as you correctly state are “are earnest, kind and public spirited.”So, let’s not beat ourselves up because the other side has been completely brainwashed, does not accept facts, scientific and otherwise, is obsessed with conspiracies and lives in a right-wing echo chamber.

Persons: David Brooks, Brooks, Donald Trump, Trump, Fox, ” Organizations: Ivy League

Search resuls for: "David Brooks"

25 mentions found