| Sunday, 30 June 2024 |
A community-powered Sunday newsletter on mental models, self-reflection, learning, growth, photos, books, and more Subscribe here
Good morning [%first_name |Dear Reader%],
Hello again, dear reader! Today’s edition is special!
Wait, I walked into that one.
“Isn’t every edition special, Rohin?” I hear you asking.
“You’re right. It absolutely is.”
“Perhaps you mean today’s edition is different?”
Yes. It is. Because today’s edition doesn’t have a lead theme. Instead, we have for you a range of super interesting articles we’ve been collecting for many weeks now. They cover diverse topics such as mental health, AI, debt, non-profits, algorithm aversion, running, and whale language.
So grab a mug or cup of coffee, switch on some music, and find your favourite reading spot.
But before that, we’re launching our second community Quest!
First Principles Quest—Parenting
What does parenting mean to us?
For me it is both a fortune and a privilege. The fortune to be able to bring new life into this world. And the privilege to also nurture, love, and guide it till it’s ready for the world. And perhaps, in the process leave the world better off for when I am no longer there.
And here’s everything else we have for you this week.
1. “Smorgasbord”
2. Invisible Women, and other great reads 📚
3. An American photoscape 📸
[Pro tip: This email is a highly abbreviated version, since many email clients impose restrictions on the amount of material we can publish in a single email before intervention. In fact, it’s likely some email clients may even clip this truncated email.
The best way to experience this edition is to read it on our website, where all sections are featured in full and unabridged form.
Also, if your default setting is to not show images within emails, please consider turning it off for this newsletter. Or else, you’ll miss many of the interesting images and photos we carry each Sunday.]
“Smorgasbord”
If the focus of healthcare is moving from merely treatment to wellness, shouldn’t it too for mental healthcare?
“Psychiatry must dream a better society”
There must be a change of focus from ‘disease’ to ‘healthy lifestyle’. To a large extent, rather than chemical imbalance in isolation, it is the physiological, hormonal, and psychological imbalance caused by poor sleep, inadequate nutrition, and scant exercise that snowballs into severe individual and social suffering. Psychiatry and other health-related specialties must engage in a consistent effort to rescue the basic tenets of health.
[…]
Mental health conditions are often caused by physiological imbalance that is socially constructed. Deficits in sleep, nutrition, exercise, introspection, and other pillars of good mental health do not occur in the vacuum, they are produced by how we live. Precarious working and housing conditions, unemployment, racism, misogyny, homophobia, transphobia, physical and symbolic violence, the war on people that use certain drugs, and other forms of social bias all contribute to mental suffering and need to be considered systemically. The individual’s environmental and social setting must be understood and improved through integrative practices. It is time to strive towards a more naturalistic and benign approach to promoting mental well-being, by strengthening the connections to one’s own body, nature, and community.
Ted Chiang is not just a great sci-fi writer, he’s also one of the few writers able and willing to hold the giant tech companies deciding our fate to account.
I enjoy reading The Ken because it is informative, the articles are well researched, well written, without the spin and bias. I admire The Ken team for their dedication to getting closer to the true picture.
Hari Buggana
Chairman and MD, InvAscent
Transparent, Honest, Detailed. To me, The Ken has been this since the day I subscribed to them. The research that they put into each story and the way it is presented is thoroughly interesting. Personally, I’ve always had a great time interacting with the publication and reading the stories.
Harshil Mathur
CEO and Co-Founder, Razorpay
The Ken has proven naysayers wrong by successfully running a digital news publication on a pure-subscription business model in India. They have shown that discerning readers are willing to pay for well-researched, well-written, in-dept news articles.
Kiran Mazumdar Shaw
Executive Chairperson, Biocon Limited
As a designer, it’s easy to get lost in the craft of building products. As a business owner however, keeping up with a rapidly changing landscape is key to saying relevant. The Ken doesn’t just help me stay on top of what’s happening in India(and beyond), but makes it fun to do so.
Rahul Gonsalves
Co-founder and CEO, Obvious Ventures