My pick this week is not about chess, although it’s by a chess player. Scottish grandmaster Jonathan Rowson wrote a long essay on Tasting the Pickle. Pickle as in predicament, as in what we’re in. Tasting as in experiencing, because the predicament seems to be so big that it is not possible to think through all the way.
Venkatesh Rao’s Into the Weirding series makes for an interesting to companion to Rowson. What Rowson calls the meta-crisis, Rao calls the Great Weirding, but both agree that we are in the middle of a profound transformation. In some ways Rowson and Rao are opposites. Whereas Rowson is thoughtful, at times meditative, Rao is sharp and snappy. Both have the saving grace of not taking themselves too seriously.
Finally, when it comes to tasting something - experiencing it - maybe fiction is the best tool we have. The Ministry for the Future, by Kim Stanley Robinson, is a science fiction novel about humanity trying to deal with climate change in the near future.
What are you reading this week?