Unscientific Reports

9 questions for a conversational AI trained to respond as a secular Buddhist teacher BuddhAI is an AI-powered tool built on top of an LLM (likely Claude or ChatGPT) created by the EthicalMindfulness, a secular Buddhist organization based in Germany. While LLMs aren’t able to explain how they were

James Fearon’s 1995 paper remains one of the most assigned texts in international relations In his 1995 article, Fearon seeks to answer why wars happen if they are so costly. He begins by outlining three possible explanations: 1. Irrational - people, including leaders, do not act in their best

Engaging, thoroughly researched book that offers a strong foundation, if at times incomplete, for domestic peace I appreciated this book by economist Dominic Rohner. It’s a thoroughly researched presentation, from a rationalist IR perspective, about necessary ingredients for peace, supporting conditions, how those things need to come together, and

Stanley Milgram’s lesser known experiments on conditions for dissent I recently read Thomas Blass’s intellectual biography of Stanley Milgram, The Man Who Shocked the World. In addition to being a rich behind the scenes look into Milgram’s life and work, the book described multiple variations of his

They’re performed for some military and civilian roles - why not for political leaders with power to do mass violence? This is going to be an exercise in using publicly available tools to develop mental fitness assessments of political leaders. The motivation is that these assessments can potentially say