Oct 14, 2022·edited Oct 14, 2022Liked by Noah Smith
Regarding the Maitland Jones controversy at NYU… I took two semesters of Orgo with Jones at Princeton in the ‘04-‘05 school year because I was a molecular biology major (though not pre-med). Orgo with Jones was one of the most incredible academic experiences I had in college. I probably worked harder in Orgo than in every other class put together sophomore year, but it was so incredibly rewarding (full disclosure, I fortunately got A’s both semesters). I agree that there is an important philosophical question as to whether weed-out college pre-med classes are the best way to select for medical talent. But I actually don’t think Jones was ever intending to create a pre-med weed-out class. In fact, I don’t think he gave a hoot whether his students were pre-med or not (though the majority were). He probably wanted all of them to go on to do Chemistry Ph.Ds, and was designing a class that would lead people to see beauty in chemistry as he does. His class was unique in that there were no lectures… we spent the classes solving problems in groups of four, so the style really rewarded self-starters. My experience with Jones was that he really did not suffer fools and could be a bit of a diva, but if you were self-starter and came to every class ready to participate and having done the assigned background reading in advance, he would respect you and really engage with you on the problem sets that we worked on during class. I wonder if that “suffers no fools / could be a bit of a diva” style just doesn’t work so well with the current generation of college students, in which case I feel bad for them if it means they don’t have the opportunity to learn from someone like Jones who has so much to offer.
I'm not sure that the Senakw is very scalable. I suppose the federal governments of the US and Canada could give out large loans (though I expect that would be unpopular very quickly), but the reason the Squamish Nation was able to consider this project at all is because they are extremely rich. The Tulalip Tribes might be able to do something similar in Seattle (but they might not have a strong claim to the land if the Dwamish become recognized), but I think that's about as far as it goes for tribes that are in a position to do this if they were to be given city center land to do with as they wished
Welcome to Singapore. It's a bifurcated society, so while you can and should visit Marina Bay and Orchard Road, also check out the heartland! Eating at a local hawker centre, satellite town malls, HDB areas, etc. Enjoy
One of the first things I would recommend in Amsterdam to is go to the library in the city center (OBA Oosterdok). On the top floor they have a lookout cafe from which you can see most of the city. Yes, the ADAM Lookout is way taller, but since the city center doesn't have many tall buildings the extra height doesn't buy you any vantage. Plus, entrance to the library is free.
Hi Noah, I moved to the Netherlands in Aprl but to The Hague. In Amsterdam they just opened the Klimt exhibition at the Van Gogh museum, go to Hotel Conservatorium for drinks after, a former conservatoeium restructured by Piero Lissoni, my favourite hotel in Europe. Renessence a place for self care (spa, yoga). Buffet van Odette for lunch/diner. Bakkerij Loof for bread, pastry, great design. Read detective stories by Anja de Jager to get into the mood of the city
Echoing Michael Fritzell, if you have the time, the best thing you can do given your interests is spend a half day riding around the MRTs and just get off from time to time at random spots. I live in the far west (Jurong) and spend a lot of time up north (Sembawang), and rarely go to CBD/Orchard or further east. The most impressive thing here might be that careful planning and dynamism are visible across the whole island, unlike many countries where a few rich areas get all the resources at the expense of everywhere else. Not that Singapore is fully egalitarian or anything, but there is just shockingly little blight.
Welcome to Amsterdam! Amsterdam is very touristy nowadays, so if you're looking to browse the Dutch architecture while strolling around the grachten, I would advise you to go to Haarlem, which is about a 20-minute trainride from Amsterdam. And in Amsterdam I would just visit the main sights and if you have time the Rijksmuseum, which has some killer art.
As for getting around: After getting off the train rent a bike, it's really the easiest way to get around and you'll get a much better sense of the city. The bicycle paths can be very busy, which can be stressful. My advice would be to take it easy to start with. Don't try to maximize your speed, but simply stay to the right and follow the traffic laws. The city center of Amsterdam is probably not the best place to familiarize yourself with bicycle riding in the Netherlands, but it's still pretty enjoyable.
As for food: I don't know any amazing places, but there are some that I enjoy. Loetje is a famous steakhouse franchise, and if you go a little outside of the city centre, the hecticness of the city cools down a little. I enjoy Bloem36 (simple but good meals with good ingredients) and De Kas (a restaurant in a greenhouse).
Also: When I was a graduate student, I and many of my peers read your stuff fairly religiously. I could ask around among the PhDs if this is still the case and perhaps set up a small meet&greet at the Tinbergen Institute (the Amsterdam-Rotterdam graduate program situated in Amsterdam) if you are available. If you would enjoy this and have the time, let me know. Could be a lot of fun.
Amsterdam restaurant tips: Silk Road Kebab House (Uyghur food, much more than kebab only), Yemen restaurant on Javastraat and China Sichuan Restaurant on Zeedijk.
“ But America can almost certainly produce more high-quality doctors than we are producing, and health care is one of our most stubbornly overpriced services.”
This. Medical residency slots in the US have not kept up with population over time. And we are weeding out successful medical school graduates which is a drain on human capital, eg a failure of the abundance policy.
Man, you're surrounded by Asiaphiles who can't see the problems staring in the face so before you gush about Sg, I do think that a lot of your complaints re XJP can basically be transposed to Sg from an earlier era with LKY. Although he was less of a nationalist and studied in Cambridge but I can assure you he would have interfered with the economy just as much for social goals, a trait that continues to this day with the PAP especially with immigration being a hot-button issue for the populace. You guys in the States complain about GOP's gerrymandering but the PAP has absolutely mastered it. Meanwhile, you're pro-immigration but generally prioritize high-tech talent whereas Sg wants that but has a strong ethnicity-based preferentialism going on if you look at the stats over the years.
This journalist is the only one brave enough to show Singapore its dark side but she's largely been ignored and Western journalists operating in Sg don't talk about the problems or the country's problematic past owing to a litigious government. It would really be a shame for someone that believes in upholding a liberal, rules-based international order to wax lyrical about a city-state and hold it up as a model example.
Regarding the Maitland Jones controversy at NYU… I took two semesters of Orgo with Jones at Princeton in the ‘04-‘05 school year because I was a molecular biology major (though not pre-med). Orgo with Jones was one of the most incredible academic experiences I had in college. I probably worked harder in Orgo than in every other class put together sophomore year, but it was so incredibly rewarding (full disclosure, I fortunately got A’s both semesters). I agree that there is an important philosophical question as to whether weed-out college pre-med classes are the best way to select for medical talent. But I actually don’t think Jones was ever intending to create a pre-med weed-out class. In fact, I don’t think he gave a hoot whether his students were pre-med or not (though the majority were). He probably wanted all of them to go on to do Chemistry Ph.Ds, and was designing a class that would lead people to see beauty in chemistry as he does. His class was unique in that there were no lectures… we spent the classes solving problems in groups of four, so the style really rewarded self-starters. My experience with Jones was that he really did not suffer fools and could be a bit of a diva, but if you were self-starter and came to every class ready to participate and having done the assigned background reading in advance, he would respect you and really engage with you on the problem sets that we worked on during class. I wonder if that “suffers no fools / could be a bit of a diva” style just doesn’t work so well with the current generation of college students, in which case I feel bad for them if it means they don’t have the opportunity to learn from someone like Jones who has so much to offer.
I'm not sure that the Senakw is very scalable. I suppose the federal governments of the US and Canada could give out large loans (though I expect that would be unpopular very quickly), but the reason the Squamish Nation was able to consider this project at all is because they are extremely rich. The Tulalip Tribes might be able to do something similar in Seattle (but they might not have a strong claim to the land if the Dwamish become recognized), but I think that's about as far as it goes for tribes that are in a position to do this if they were to be given city center land to do with as they wished
Welcome to Singapore. It's a bifurcated society, so while you can and should visit Marina Bay and Orchard Road, also check out the heartland! Eating at a local hawker centre, satellite town malls, HDB areas, etc. Enjoy
One of the first things I would recommend in Amsterdam to is go to the library in the city center (OBA Oosterdok). On the top floor they have a lookout cafe from which you can see most of the city. Yes, the ADAM Lookout is way taller, but since the city center doesn't have many tall buildings the extra height doesn't buy you any vantage. Plus, entrance to the library is free.
Hi Noah, I moved to the Netherlands in Aprl but to The Hague. In Amsterdam they just opened the Klimt exhibition at the Van Gogh museum, go to Hotel Conservatorium for drinks after, a former conservatoeium restructured by Piero Lissoni, my favourite hotel in Europe. Renessence a place for self care (spa, yoga). Buffet van Odette for lunch/diner. Bakkerij Loof for bread, pastry, great design. Read detective stories by Anja de Jager to get into the mood of the city
Amsterdam local here. What type of dinner options are you looking for?
Singapore - Urban redevelopment authority museum - it's next to Maxwell food center. An ode to SG urban planning - it's fascinating.
Taiwan - a hidden Asia tip - go to Taiwan for Japanese food. Second the national palace museum suggestion.
Echoing Michael Fritzell, if you have the time, the best thing you can do given your interests is spend a half day riding around the MRTs and just get off from time to time at random spots. I live in the far west (Jurong) and spend a lot of time up north (Sembawang), and rarely go to CBD/Orchard or further east. The most impressive thing here might be that careful planning and dynamism are visible across the whole island, unlike many countries where a few rich areas get all the resources at the expense of everywhere else. Not that Singapore is fully egalitarian or anything, but there is just shockingly little blight.
Welcome to Amsterdam! Amsterdam is very touristy nowadays, so if you're looking to browse the Dutch architecture while strolling around the grachten, I would advise you to go to Haarlem, which is about a 20-minute trainride from Amsterdam. And in Amsterdam I would just visit the main sights and if you have time the Rijksmuseum, which has some killer art.
As for getting around: After getting off the train rent a bike, it's really the easiest way to get around and you'll get a much better sense of the city. The bicycle paths can be very busy, which can be stressful. My advice would be to take it easy to start with. Don't try to maximize your speed, but simply stay to the right and follow the traffic laws. The city center of Amsterdam is probably not the best place to familiarize yourself with bicycle riding in the Netherlands, but it's still pretty enjoyable.
As for food: I don't know any amazing places, but there are some that I enjoy. Loetje is a famous steakhouse franchise, and if you go a little outside of the city centre, the hecticness of the city cools down a little. I enjoy Bloem36 (simple but good meals with good ingredients) and De Kas (a restaurant in a greenhouse).
Also: When I was a graduate student, I and many of my peers read your stuff fairly religiously. I could ask around among the PhDs if this is still the case and perhaps set up a small meet&greet at the Tinbergen Institute (the Amsterdam-Rotterdam graduate program situated in Amsterdam) if you are available. If you would enjoy this and have the time, let me know. Could be a lot of fun.
Amsterdam restaurant tips: Silk Road Kebab House (Uyghur food, much more than kebab only), Yemen restaurant on Javastraat and China Sichuan Restaurant on Zeedijk.
In Amsterdam, get a warm stroopwafel at the Albert Cuyp market! Rudi’s original is the famous one, for good reason.
The Seafood Bar
+31 20 233 7452
https://maps.app.goo.gl/yNQEGthgtEr6hP549
in Amsterdam. Superb
Taipei restaurant list:
明福
先進海產
雞家莊
阜杭豆漿
梁記雞肉飯
永康牛肉麺
My灶
“ But America can almost certainly produce more high-quality doctors than we are producing, and health care is one of our most stubbornly overpriced services.”
This. Medical residency slots in the US have not kept up with population over time. And we are weeding out successful medical school graduates which is a drain on human capital, eg a failure of the abundance policy.
See https://khn.org/news/the-yawning-chart-med-school-students-fear/
Man, you're surrounded by Asiaphiles who can't see the problems staring in the face so before you gush about Sg, I do think that a lot of your complaints re XJP can basically be transposed to Sg from an earlier era with LKY. Although he was less of a nationalist and studied in Cambridge but I can assure you he would have interfered with the economy just as much for social goals, a trait that continues to this day with the PAP especially with immigration being a hot-button issue for the populace. You guys in the States complain about GOP's gerrymandering but the PAP has absolutely mastered it. Meanwhile, you're pro-immigration but generally prioritize high-tech talent whereas Sg wants that but has a strong ethnicity-based preferentialism going on if you look at the stats over the years.
www.wethecitizens.net
This journalist is the only one brave enough to show Singapore its dark side but she's largely been ignored and Western journalists operating in Sg don't talk about the problems or the country's problematic past owing to a litigious government. It would really be a shame for someone that believes in upholding a liberal, rules-based international order to wax lyrical about a city-state and hold it up as a model example.
So jealous.