“Food Is Not Magic.” Garth Brown probes the oddities that ensue when people conscript food into an ideological project: “Contradictions and superficiality do not discredit the claim that the modern food system is dysfunctional. Given the ever-increasing burden of chronic disease on the health care system and on the quality of the citizen’s lives, the only surprise should be that it has taken so long for food to become this much of a political issue. Because the resulting politics so often rest on ignorance about the realities of food production, complacency born of food security, and magical thinking about what makes foods good or bad, they make agriculture and diet subordinate to bespoke, largely online projects. But food, an irreducibly material necessity knit from seeds and soil and sunlight, cannot grant immortality, restore masculinity, or own the Libs, and attempts to enroll it in digital crusades diminish the real value it can provide.”
“The End of Publishing as We Know It.” Alex Reisner continues his reporting on how AI is eroding the economy for human writing on which it depends: “Chatbots have proved adept at keeping users locked into conversations. They do so by answering every question, often through summarizing articles from news publishers. Suddenly, fewer people are traveling outside the generative-AI sites—a development that poses an existential threat to the media, and to the livelihood of journalists everywhere.”
“The Death of the Public Library.” Zac Bissonnette looks at why library visits are drastically down and describes the tensions inherent in their effort to be welcoming to all, even if that means becoming de facto homeless shelters: “as libraries look to be ‘everything to everybody,’ as one librarian put it, they are becoming less and less to fewer and fewer people. Current practices aren’t solving homelessness, but seem well on their way to destroying the public library. As one anonymous librarian said in response to a survey about mentally ill library guests, ‘This problem, not the invention of the internet, could prove to be the final demise of the public library as we know it.’”
“In Defense of Pint and Pipe.” Malcolm Guite explains why he indulges in drinking and smoking despite the warnings of health experts: “It is assumed that the body is essentially a machine, a linked series of mechanical processes whose performance can be optimized by ensuring the best input, in terms of foods and supplements, and the best output in terms of exercise. There is analytic attention to food and drink in terms of nutrients, fiber, and alcohol content, but no consideration of the ambience, culture, atmosphere, nuance, gregarious and social aspects of eating and drinking, no consideration of their meaning or the part they play in the richness, depth, and happiness of human life considered as a whole integrated experience. Most of the advice we are given on how to live a healthy life ignores or even undermines the great intangibles, the unmeasurable qualities, as opposed to the measured quantities, which make that life worth living.”
“Saving Our Kids from Scrolling to Death.” Emily Harrison argues that churches should help offer an alternative to the social internet: “We shouldn’t blame or ridicule parents, but we do need to call them to a higher standard. The church must be willing to say that parental controls are a red herring and that the social internet is simply incapable of replacing the goodness of in-person community.”
“Another Reason I Collect Books.” Brian Miller offers an anecdote to explain why printed books still matter: “The book is in excellent condition and the dust jacket intact. I flip the book open, stopping at the title page. On that page is an inscription from its author to another historian. I stand there for a long moment. Serendipity seems an insufficient word to capture the cascade of coincidences I’m experiencing, there on the gravel driveway this summer afternoon.”
“The Business of Raising Children.” Sarah Reardon wonders how much stuff parents actually need to raise children: “While most of the baby gear I received has been helpful in welcoming my daughter into the world, much of it was unnecessary, even though I presumed otherwise beforehand. My incorrect assumptions have caused me to wonder: do we overestimate or misrepresent the necessities for childrearing? How does our materialist culture influence the way we go about raising a child? And how might we straighten out any twisted notions we have as a result?”
“There is No Such Thing as Artificial Intelligence.” Treating AI chatbots as people, Nathan Beacom argues, “is a disaster. In uncritically letting these machines shape our lives, we become prey to all kinds of manipulation, we lose sight of reality, and we are induced, in an important way, to take a reductive view of actual people. Chatbots offer us a form of relationship without friction, without burden and responsibility. This illusory kind of relationship hampers our ability to engage in the difficult challenge of real bonds, which are the only things that can give value to human life. The more we personify AI, the more we slouch toward lives of isolation and deception.”
“The Uncommon Power of Common Things.” Kinley Bowers reflects on the Wendell Berry conference at Grove City College this spring: “In all his writing, Wendell Berry understands that size is no determinant of value. He never underestimates the importance of small farms, small communities, small opinions, small plants, and small animals.”
“A Place to Stand: On Reading Poetry.” Rachel Welcher considers the value of poetry and reviews my recent book of poems: “But if we are talking about introducing grounding rhythms, in addition to touching grass and learning to identify local birds, I would also suggest we read a bit more poetry. Not just any poetry, but the kind that gives us a place to stand as we process an experience, emotion, or philosophy of life.”
