* Do you have the right to transact? Not in the fiat world. Here is Patrick McKenzie (patio11) explaining how banks work, among other things.

* “Los Angeles Is On a Transit-Building Tear. Will Riders Follow?” I’ve taken the L.A. subways and it was nice. Pity they’ve taken so long to construct. Relatedly, it could be that America was built on cost overruns, but, crucially, those overruns led to finished infrastructure.

* “When did humans start burying the dead?“

* “New Industries Come From Crazy People.”

* When Every Child Is a Choice. An unusual and interesting perspective.

* “All My Life, I’ve Watched Violence Fail the Palestinian Cause.”

* “The Dogs of War.” Antonio Garcia Martinez visits Israel; the last third psychoanalyzes the American response.

* “Thiel’s Unicorn Success Is Awkward for Colleges.” Surprising venue for this. Also: Peter Thiel on political errors. Figuring out you’re wrong is useful, and a lot of people can’t or won’t do it. Can you?

* “Gas Stoves Mean Dangerous Pollution in Most Homes, Study Finds.” We have a Breville Control Freak induction stovetop and it’s great, apart from the name.

* Spain lives in flats: why the country is built vertically.

* Why Vitalik Buterin (possibly a crazy person) built Zuzalu:

We already have hacker houses, and hacker houses can last for months or even years, but they usually only fit around ten or twenty people. We already have conferences, and conferences fit thousands of people, but each conference only lasts a week. That is enough time to have serendipitous meetings, but not enough to have connections with true depth. So let’s take one step in both directions: create a pop-up mini-city that houses two hundred people, and lasts for two whole months.

This hits a sweet spot: it’s ambitious enough and different enough from what has already been repeated ad nauseam that we actually learn something, but still light enough that it’s logistically manageable. And it also intentionally does not center any specific vision about how something like this should be done, whether Balaji’s or otherwise.

* “Forever is such a short, long time.”