Books

1/ Reading and reflecting on HP Lovecraft while on a plane. I’ve kept going back to him every now and then since my teenage years. I usually can’t read more than one short tale at a time, but I can’t go for too long without reading one either.

One of the themes that I enjoy most in his writings is this idea —foundational to the cosmic horror genre— that the universe is incomprehensible to us puny humans.

Not that I believe it to be true (I am confident in science’s explanatory power) but I find it a compelling literary device.

It creates tension in the unknown unknowns, which are infinitely many, lurking beyond our limited experiential horizon. By contrast, classic horror (e.g., Stephen King’s) circumscribes evil to a mundane object or monster (a car, a clown, a dog, etc.).

PhD in aviation ∩ climate science | Aviator, diver, ETH maxi, nexialist | Host of /diving /ethfinance /eth-staker /geopolitics /science /singapore /thomas

i’m perpetually surprised and impressed that despite the profound unknowableness of a universe so fundamentally unlike the mental models our evolved cognition tend toward, humans do manage to exert will and achieve results (albeit temporary results) and some individuals do manage to (albeit very temporarily) assert their mental models upon the world and see practical results. i am envious.