Sharon, Author at Joshua Spodek

RIP Edith Eger, Survivor of Auschwitz, Author of The Choice

I rated Eger's book The Choice as one of My favorite books and movies of 2025 as well as my life, comparable to Victor Frankl's Man's Search for Meaning. I listened to The Choice and I don't remember another book that led me to tears so much. I was outright bawling. I can't recommend it enough. I found her through Philip Zimbardo's work. They were friends and colleagues. She knew Frankl too. She died on April 27. I recommend starting with The Choice, then watching videos of her, of which there are plenty. Her book became an international bestseller. Oprah featured her. She was covered globally. Here are some articles, followed by some quotes from them. Forced to dance for Mengele at Auschwitz, she was…

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May 9, 2026

Models

More Julian Simon confusion, considering homelessness

It's been a while since I wrote about how economist Julian Simon's theories don't work. I last wrote about him in Some thoughts and responses to Julian Simon about six months ago. I heard him mentioned in a video, which prompted me to share a thought I had on my list of blog post ideas. Consider homelessness, a perpetual problem, as far as I know, in every society. One of Simon's big ideas is Adding more people causes problems. But people are also the means to solve these problems. The main fuel to speed the world’s progress is our stock of knowledge; the brakes are our lack of imagination and unsound social regulations of these activities. The ultimate resource is people—especially skilled, spirited, and hopeful…

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May 8, 2026

Artificial Intelligence / Models

Do people talking about AI understand exponential growth?

Most speculation I see about what might happen with artificial intelligence anticipates some stable situation where humans and AI reach an equilibrium. Do people not understand exponential growth? Do they not understand that AI drives the development of AI? Even if you don't know differential equations or calculus, which predicts exponential growth, you have to see that that situation means that the faster AI develops, the faster AI develops more AI. In other words, any equilibrium will last less time than the one before. By the time AI creates a robot with human intelligence and physical ability, ten minutes later it will be able to create one with double each. If not exactly ten minutes later, well short of any time for us to adjust.…

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May 7, 2026

Addiction / Artificial Intelligence / Relationships

Artificial Intelligence isn’t improving people’s lives. It’s helping them fulfill their roles, which rarely improves their lives.

[Note: I wrote the post below before last week's post Artificial Intelligence and atrophy of mental ability like intelligence, self-awareness, emotional regulation, and expression, which it overlaps. I held back on posting it because of the question in the last paragraph. I'm finishing the third volume of The Gulag Archipelago and studying the effects of dominance hierarchy, which artificial intelligence is forming. People who criticized Stalin didn't fare well. Should we worry about criticizing the people and machines who may be at the top of a steepening dominance hierarchy?] There may be some people who can't talk to other humans, maybe because of a birth defect, that artificial intelligence can help directly. Then again, it may not actually help in the long run, but even…

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May 6, 2026

Freedom

John Adams nailed the US today

Learning about the US founders leads to finding great insight. I came across words from John Adams as President of the United States. I copy the whole letter below (it's out of copyright), but call attention to a few notes. The words some people know: "Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious People. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other." He's saying we have to know our values and act on them, not take things for granted. What also caught my attention is a sentence in the wordiness of the time, but seemed to me to nail the US today, maybe not completely, but well enough to show how predictable our situation: "should the People of America, once become…

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May 5, 2026

Pollution and Depletion

So corrupt, integrity looks extreme

People call my attempt to pollute and deplete less "extreme." Let's consider the view behind this defense that to me feels like an attack. It comes from people living in a culture that induces us to act against our values. Most of us can't eat breakfast without hurting others, for example by funding production that funds fossil fuel extraction for the plastic and transport if you eat packaged food. I feel it too, though less for having acted I felt the personal responsibility that first week over a decade ago when I avoided packaged food and saw the shelf where I normally started shopping at the local market. I couldn't see actual food, only boxes, bags, jars, and cans. For all my advanced degrees and…

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May 4, 2026

Art / Creativity / Education / Exercises / Hands on Practical Experience / Models / Nature / Tips

This week’s selected media, May 3, 2026: Changing views of extinction in history

This week I finished: A Man at Arms, by podcast guest Steven Pressfield: I hear Steven has two groups of fans -- those of his The War of Art-type books and those of his historical fiction -- and they don't overlap much. I was in the first group. His latest book, The Acadian, comes out soon. We're scheduled to record our second podcast episode on it this week. It stands on its own, but follows A Man at Arms, so I started with it. I'm also watching his Warrior Archetype series. It's also my first novel in a while. The basics are great, but it works as a complete whole where each part builds to a conclusion that feels greater than the sum of its…

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May 3, 2026

Nonjudgment / Pollution and Depletion / Visualization

May Day / No Kings Garbage.

The other day I posted pictures of the needless garbage Democratic candidates send to my mailbox. They talk sustainability, but look at their action. You can see the pictures in Democrat Garbage: When Democrats Say They Value Sustainability, They Mean When It's Convenient For Themselves (Republicans Probably No Different). Am I unfairly judging them? On the contrary, the conflict is between their values and their actions. I didn't ask for them to send me garbage. I work to stop junk mail being sent to me. I hardly receive any now, but Democrats do it. Holding people accountable to their values helps them. It doesn't hurt them. Their garbage continued to arrive after the election. I put an image of more recent garbage of theirs at…

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May 2, 2026

Addiction / Artificial Intelligence / Creativity / Doof / Fitness / Nature / Relationships

Artificial Intelligence and atrophy of mental ability like intelligence, self-awareness, emotional regulation, and expression

I see more and more ads for artificial intelligence. This evening on the subway one ad promoted how AI could turn the workplace task of creating a slide deck from two weeks of many sub-tasks like compiling data and designing slides into one prompt followed by a complete slide deck. The task would take minutes now. I've heard a lot of uses for artificial intelligence. I haven't heard of one that improves people's lives. I'm sure they exist, but I haven't seen them. Most are like the one above. It's tempting to point out that it saves time and likely improves the quality of output, that it enables the person to focus on what they want to, not low-level mundane work like making sure the…

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May 1, 2026

Freedom / Visualization

More Americans died in the Civil War than all other wars combined

From the Civil War Museum in Harrisburg, PA: "The number of war-related deaths in 1861-1865 is greater than the total number of American deaths in all other American wars." I've been stating that finding lately and wanted to cite my source for future reference. Estimates on deaths from wars are hard, as pages like How Many Died in the American Civil War? at History.com describe. Wikipedia's United States military casualties of war links many sources. You can define war deaths to include only people in the military or not, you can pick high estimates or low, and so on. I consider the Civil War Museum a credible source. Its gift shop had signed books from podcast guest David Blight (so far I've only finished the…

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April 30, 2026

Volunteering

Volunteering as meditation

The other day my volunteer shift to deliver food gave me a double challenge. The amount of food that would have been thrown away required two trips and it was raining and cold. Then last night, the volunteer organizer said there was a big load of milk close to the expiration date and asked if anyone could do an extra shift. No one else could do it and I could, so this morning I did another double load. Liquids are the most dense, so the load was particularly heavy. (This picture is from another shift. I don't take pictures every time I deliver so reuse pictures from old posts stored in Wordpress.) Saturday's cold and rain would have made me feel miserable if I were…

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April 29, 2026

Blog

More of what you gain from stopping polluting and depleting

I just wrote a post Clarifying what people get when they pollute and deplete less since everyone views polluting and depleting less the way a heroin addict views using heroin less. They think it means deprivation and sacrifice. On the contrary, it bring liberation and freedom. Also health, safety, and security. You get more. Another person who couldn't see his way to stopping depriving others of life, liberty, and property without due process of law was Thomas Jefferson. We know he valued life, liberty, property, and the pursuit of happiness, but he only worked to attain them for himself and his peers. He didn't extend those values to his slaves. Like us today, he saw freeing his slaves as deprivation, sacrifice, and risk, despite his…

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April 28, 2026

Clarifying what people get when they pollute and deplete less

A6FY1C Brent Delta North Sea

Addiction / Awareness / Doof / Freedom / Hands on Practical Experience / Pollution and Depletion

Clarifying what people get when they pollute and deplete less

What people get from polluting and depleting less: I used to tell people that they'd save money and time because they will. Nobody believes me. Nobody. They see buying coffee at Starbucks to go and ordering takeout as saving time, missing that those who do those things have the least time. Knowing your values so you can prioritize them and dismiss less valuable things (like takeout coffee and takeout) restores time and money. I first thought stopping things that cause pollution and depletion---particularly those that fund extraction of fossil fuels, uranium, and other nonrenewable resources---would bring deprivation and sacrifice. Now I see that many things I once thought necessary or unavoidable are unnecessary. In time and with hands-on practical experience they become repugnant and disgusting,…

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April 27, 2026

Tips

This week’s selected media, April 26, 2026: The Great Divorce and How to Know Your Self

This week I finished: How To Know Your Self: The Art and Science of Discovering Who You Really Are, by soon-to-be podcast guest J. Eric Oliver: I'm scheduled to record an episode with Oliver. He is a professor at the University of Chicago. He teaches in the political science department, but has also taught a course for undergraduates that is apparently popular on knowing yourself. As I understand, this book is based on that course. People had asked him for years if he could recommend a book on knowing yourself. He could recommend hundreds, but not a single one, so he wrote it. The book overlaps with my leadership classes and my book Leadership Step by Step, though mine is more experiential. His covers a…

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April 26, 2026

Fitness

Donated blood for the first time in a while, courtesy Sebastian Junger’s post

Regular readers know I've read a lot about psychology, anthropology, economics, and why people do things. According to most theories, donating blood shouldn't make much sense. It doesn't cost that much in time, nothing in money, and has a low risk of loss, but you won't get much direct benefit. The odds of you receiving your own blood are zero. Materially speaking, donating is a dead weight loss, but if enough people do it, we all benefit. I think everyone views the act with high value. I won't deny that I'm posting about it partly because I expect people will consider the act valuable, even after I state so, since everyone knows that sharing about it is part of the process. The other part is…

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April 25, 2026