Week thirty-four

  1. An article that generated a lot of discussions with my friends last week is this one: the birth of the new american aristocracy. We asked ourselves, do we belong to this group, economically, culturally, philosophically (believing in meritocracy for example)? Does it apply in Switzerland? If yes will it express itself the same way, or are there systems (free education, spatial mixity, direct democracy…) in place to limit the crystallization of the gaps?
  2. This coincides with my endeavor to learn the Fundamentals of Sociology. This Coursera class gives an overview from Adam Smith to Norbert Elias, covering Tocqueville, Marx, Durkheim, Weber and others. The lecturer is amazing. Join me if interested (I’m at Week 5, on Marx).
  3. Zalan asked what fun thing we’re doing in our garden. I have to say trying out the ancient Three Sisters technique from the Mayas.
How to Plant the Three Sisters (with Pictures) - wikiHow

Result: the green beans are amazing and producing tons.

But for next year, we need to see how to get the timing right: the beans outgrew the corn so much that it bent the whole structure. Also we’ve had issues of corn cross-pollination. Look at all those empty seeds! So we’ll try higher density next year.

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