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1. In Rogue One, bureaucratic infighting plagues the Empire and the rebellion

   The main plot device of the original 1977 film Star Wars is that the rebels have stolen the blueprints for the Empire’s new secret weapon, and have to find a way to capitalize on it before the Empire’s agents catch them. The newest film ...

2. Cuba, Castro, the arts and freedom

   Fidel Castro's death last week was marked by nine days of enforced mourning. Sales of alcohol and live music were forbidden over this period. It seems like a fitting coda to Castro's legacy—one which censored and imprisoned ...

3. Harry Potter prequel features disturbing draconian laws

   Spoiler alert: This post contains details of the film Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them In the original books and movies about Harry Potter, we see that the wizards of Great Britain have a government that parallels the muggle (non ...

4. Algorithmic observation—we eagerly buy books about other people doing their jobs

   An article in Popular Science this week details the success of a computer algorithm designed to predict which novels are—and are not—bestsellers. Given a pile of 5,000 hits and misses to sort, the algorithm was able to tell bestsellers ...

5. Netflix superhero show spotlights issues of race and policing

   "A black man in a hoodie with bullet-proof skin”—this is the description given by amazed bystanders of Luke Cage, the latest Marvel superhero to get a show on Netflix. The subject of illicit prison experimentation, Cage (played by ...

6. Lawn Boy makes business and economics fun

   I just finished reading a pair of books with chapter titles like, “The Principles of Economic Expansion,” and “The Law of Increasing Product Demand Versus Flat Production Capacity” and “The Methodology of Team Development.” They’re for ...

7. Trump’s appeal relies on performance, branding and a world of mindless entertainment

   Like many, I find myself observing the American election unfold with a mix of fascination and horror, as though witness to a slow-motion political train wreck that will have dire consequences not only for those on the train, but for ...

8. Star Trek, Plato and the misreading of things

   Imagine I wrote a book in which I advanced a philosophical argument showing that state authority is not well-justified, but that nevertheless, it’s a bad idea to go around killing and bombing. Now imagine that someone blew up a ...

9. ’80s movie taps timeless entrepreneurial spirit

   Last night I watched Coppola’s 1988 movie Tucker: The Man and His Dream for the first time since high school. I remembered the film as the story of one of the great American entrepreneurial dreams and its demise at the hands of the ...

10. Architecture and urban planning may have helped lay foundation for Syrian civil war

    While you may be annoyed that your tax dollars fund government cultural programs and are spent purchasing works of abstract expressionism you consider ridiculous, you probably wouldn't accuse government subsidized art of changing ...