Weekly Reading List: 31/08/2025

Things I Read This Week That Made me Think

Every week, I gather the media that made me pause, highlight, or argue with myself in the margins. Pieces that cut across venture, history, culture, science, and the odd rabbit hole I didn’t expect to fall into. I don’t think of this list as “recommended reading.” It’s more like a set of doorways: some open into hard analysis, others into lyric reflection, some into outright weirdness.

This week’s selection moves from the practice of documenting what we know to the uncomfortable realities of AI bubbles, from vultures collapsing ecosystems to the question of why Indian nightlife feels hollow, and from transparent mouse skulls in neuroscience labs to the jingles of ice-cream trucks.

1. 50 Things I Know
A Substack entry that’s less “listicle” and more distilled philosophy. Each point is short enough to fit on a post-it, but together they create a mosaic of lived experience and earned perspective. Some are pragmatic (“It’s easier to change your environment than your willpower”), others are closer to koans. What struck me is how many of these insights are less about accumulating knowledge and more about pruning: learning what not to do, what not to care about, what not to hold on to.

2. I’m an AI enthusiast. The bubble scares me.
Alberto Romero, who’s been writing carefully about AI for years, lays out why the hype cycle unnerves even those who love the technology. He points to the hallmarks of bubbles, overpromising, distorted incentives, capital chasing heat instead of fundamentals, and asks: What happens when this one pops? The essay is interesting because it doesn’t dismiss AI’s potential. Instead, it warns that bubbles, while dangerous, also accelerate infrastructure and adoption in ways that remain after the crash. Think of railroads, or the dot-com boom. Romero situates AI in that lineage: the long-term impact will be real, but the path there will be brutal.

3. Inside Intel’s tricky dance with Trump
The Wall Street Journal digs into how semiconductor politics have become entangled with American politics. Intel finds itself in a precarious position: needing government support for chip manufacturing expansion, while also being whiplashed by Trump’s demands and threats. The piece is valuable because it shows how “industrial policy” isn’t an abstract; it’s executives and politicians in rooms, trading favors, threatening consequences, and making bets that ripple across supply chains. It’s a reminder that geopolitics often plays out through the boardrooms of a handful of firms.

4. What Should Remain Hidden?
A reflective, almost spiritual piece on the value of secrecy. In a cultural moment obsessed with transparency, confession, and algorithmic exposure, the essay argues for the power of the hidden. Not everything must be shared, not every truth must be aired, not every story is owed to the public. There’s something countercultural about defending mystery, defending silence. I found myself thinking about how much of modern identity is built by showing, and how freeing it might be to let some things remain unseen.

5. Why Have a Blog?
Alexey Guzey’s classic post is both manifesto and encouragement: write a blog because it sharpens your thinking, because it leaves a trail of your curiosity, because it creates unlikely collisions with strangers who find it years later. He argues that writing in public is less about audience and more about dialogue with yourself, with time, with anyone who stumbles across your words. In a world shifting toward closed platforms and ephemeral posts, this essay feels almost radical.

6. Inventing the Renaissance: The World at First Light
The New Yorker reviews Ada Palmer’s exploration of the Renaissance as less a historical inevitability and more a conscious act of storytelling. The “rebirth” we imagine was partly constructed by people who wanted to frame their time as exceptional, and who built the myth of the Renaissance as much as they lived it. This review reminds us that history isn’t just what happened, it’s what people insisted on believing about what happened. A timely point when we’re all busy trying to name and narrate our own eras.

7. The Premium-Mediocre Life of Maya Millennial
Venkatesh Rao’s classic essay from Ribbonfarm coined a term that still stings: “premium mediocre.” Think fast-casual restaurants with Edison bulbs, Airbnbs with fake Eames chairs, life curated to feel just aspirational enough while remaining hollow. The essay is less a rant than a diagnosis of a generation caught between real luxury and mass-market sameness, with social media amplifying the performance. Rereading it years later, I was struck by how relevant it still feels. If anything, the premium mediocre has only intensified.

8. What is the "Greedy Algorithm" and Why is it So Dangerous?
A YouTube breakdown of how greedy algorithms—by optimizing for immediacy—can blind you to better long-term outcomes. They’re fast and intuitive, but flawed when the “locally right” doesn’t mean “globally best.” Pair this with a deeper read on the math to unpack why greed isn’t always gold.

9. Vulture Extinction & Collapse
A sobering ecological essay on how vulture populations collapsing across South Asia triggered cascading crises: carcasses rotting in fields, feral dog populations exploding, human disease spreading. It’s a stark reminder of how fragile ecosystems are, and how a single keystone species can invisibly hold a system together until it disappears. If you care about climate, this is an unsettling but necessary read.

10. Why has clubbing in India become so awful?
Vogue India’s cultural criticism that will resonate with anyone who’s stepped into a nightclub lately and felt underwhelmed. The essay dissects how India’s nightlife has become formulaic, over-priced, and more about status signaling than genuine community or joy. It raises questions about what clubbing once offered (release, rebellion, belonging) and why those energies are now dissipating. A reminder that cultural infrastructure matters as much as physical infrastructure.

11. The Sovereign Individual and the Paradox of the Digital Age
An Aeon essay that revisits the 1990s libertarian text The Sovereign Individual in light of today’s internet. The paradox: the same tools that give us radical autonomy (crypto, remote work, personal publishing) also bind us to new dependencies (platforms, surveillance, algorithmic governance). It’s a smart, nuanced piece about freedom that doesn’t descend into cliché.

12. Mouse Scalp Transparency and Brain Development
Stanford researchers have engineered a way to make mouse scalps transparent, letting them observe brain development in real time. It sounds grotesque, but the science is staggering: a window into how neural structures form, evolve, and malfunction. Beyond the technical breakthrough, the piece invites reflection on how much of our future medical insight will come from interventions that feel both awe-inspiring and unsettling.

13. The Ice-Cream Truck: History and Hysteria
A deep dive into the cultural history of ice-cream trucks. From Depression-era beginnings to their postwar boom, to today’s mixture of nostalgia and regulation battles, the piece traces how a jingle can both delight children and drive adults insane. It’s a reminder that even the most whimsical parts of urban life carry layers of economics, design, and psychology.

That’s this week’s list. If something here tugged at you, share it with a friend who’d linger over it too. And if you’ve read something recently that belongs on next week’s stack, hit reply, I love trading links.

Prefer a shorter, more visual version? I post this weekly on Instagram as well: @harnidhk.

See you next week with another set of ideas worth your time.

Love,

Harnidh.