Marvin’s Best Weekly Reads March 30th, 2025
“The harder the battle, the sweeter the victory.” – Les Brown
"What I do know is that his description of the Artificial Man is an apt metaphor for many “leaders” and figures in the public eye today. Such figures also flourish on social media, where being an anonymous provocateur and an attention-seeker has become a substitute for demonstrable accomplishment.
We may contrast the Artificial Man to the Man of Substance. The man of substance elevates not only himself and those around him with real achievements, he dignifies every job he undertakes.
The chasing of empty acclaim means nothing. Yet for the Artificial Man, appearance is everything; he surrounds himself with empty statements, elusive and shape-shifting accomplishments, and platitudinous mists."
https://qcurtius.com/2023/02/11/the-artificial-man-and-the-man-of-substance/
2. "The paper finds that, in areas where working-class men are doing better, marriage rates go up, cutting the marital class gap in half. Making men more “economically viable,” to use one of Scott’s favorite terms, turns out to be key to improving marital prospects.
There’s a corrosive downward spiral at work right now. As the economic prospects of men without a college degree decline, marriage rates fall. That leaves millions more men and women without a partner to share the responsibilities and benefits of family life. In other work by AIBM, we show that half of men without a college degree aged 30 to 50 now live in a household without children.
Without the positive pressures that come from being a father and husband, men are even less likely to really go for it on the work front. They are more likely to be unemployed. They become more vulnerable to addiction, more socially isolated. All of which makes them less attractive as potential spouses. Boys raised in single-mother households then struggle in school and in life, and they have difficulty finding a mate and forming a family, too. And so the cycle turns. The economic struggles of boys and men become entrenched across generations."
https://www.profgalloway.com/marrying-up-and-marrying-down/
3. "You can probably guess why it reminds me of consulting—the game of Civilization and the one that firms like McKinsey play in real life aren’t all that different. They, too, are tasked with efficient resource allocation. They, too, will sometimes have to sacrifice many people to achieve victory. The gaming software of choice was Excel, but there isn’t all that much difference between optimizing financial models and optimizing a civilization. I had one friend who, as a 24-year-old strategy consultant, built a spreadsheet that led to 3,000 people losing their jobs. Victory! (It still haunts him to this day.)
Perhaps the appeal comes from the fact that building startups can feel like a video game. A tweak of a button color here or an adjusted sales email headline there, and suddenly you win money in your bank account. The labor is still on a screen, still optimizing pixels, but rather than imaginary points, you get real dollars.
So video games, when viewed correctly, have transferable skills and attitudes that can help technologists win. However, I worry that in our embrace of these games, we have accidentally let something darker, meaner, and greedier into our tech culture’s subconsciousness.
Said simply: I worry that big tech CEOs view everyone other than themselves as NPCs (non-playable characters). I worry about this because they’ve, like, said it.
The perspective this term ultimately represents is that in their world, their perspectives—and most importantly, the victory in the games they play—are the only things that matter. Those who disagree or get in the way of that outcome are just NPCs, sacrificial cavalry units, factory workers fired in the name of efficiency. Each of us regular people are just units on the digital board."
https://every.to/napkin-math/playing-civilization-7-is-like-being-a-ruthless-corporate-consultant
4. "While tariffs and trade relations may change over time, an expanding global production network creates more robust channels of market access for Chinese companies, particularly as local jobs become attached to Chinese factories. One might see this as the third phase of China’s development of global supply chains more generally. The first phase was about securing access to resources.
The second phase—the Belt and Road Initiative—was about building the infrastructure for global production and shipping. And now the third phase is about securing access to markets.
While tariffs and market access are motivating Chinese firms to build new plants abroad, how they’re going about this is not driven by economic interests alone. Beijing is trying to shape the global expansion of Chinese manufacturers, including which countries they invest in and how. Beijing is encouraging Chinese companies to build plants in “friendly” countries while discouraging them from investing in others in a kind of “industrial diplomacy.”
Countries across the developed world and the Global South alike are eager for Chinese companies to build factories in their markets, with the promise of new jobs and new technology. Given its attractiveness, Chinese manufacturing investment can be used by Beijing as a geopolitical tool to reward certain countries and punish others."
https://www.high-capacity.com/p/china-is-trying-to-reshape-global
5. This was a fun podcast interview with my friend Alastair.
6. 2025 SaaS Vibe check. All spot on.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4CjJnhmPy3o
7. Title says it all: Financial Nihilism & Political Instability. Well worth watching.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G6HESVcM4Ic&t=191s
8. "The old adage “your fund size is your strategy” has never been more true. Many funds who have grown tremendously in size find themselves forced to shift strategies — and their brands have not always caught up to their new reality. But a corollary adage also applies for founders: “their fund size is your fundraising strategy.”
In other words, founders should think very carefully about which investors they are targeting and why. Raise from a fund that is too small, and you may find they are unable to help you when the chips are down. Raise from a fund that is too large, and you may find they are not the true company-building partners you were hoping to work with."
https://medium.com/angularventures/five-emerging-vc-swimlanes-a6f39d9ae0e9
9. "The next time you hear an entrepreneur lament how hard it is to fill a role, remind him that 10 to 20% of his time should be spent on recruiting—both for roles open today and roles that will be open tomorrow."
https://davidcummings.org/2025/03/01/recruiting-on-non-recruiting-work-trips/
10. "Power might work if there were no consequences—if karma didn’t exist. But history tells us otherwise: No empire holds power forever.
Yes, the U.S. has power now, but it won’t always. I don’t know exactly how that shift will happen, but I know it will. How do I know? Because every other empire has arisen and has passed.
And when that time comes, the best insurance policy is having helped others when we had the chance."
https://wisdom2events.substack.com/p/power
11. A Cold ruthless look at present geopolitics. The Neo-Liberal world order is dead.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-knLXnai3Mk
12. Trying to understand the ever changing geopolitical world. Interregnum.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xZQu9wwJ3vo
13. This is the right take in my view. Does Europe step up? I hope so but doubt it. Either way America is not reliable anymore.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NXoreH_5coA
14. "So what was supposed to be another operation Danube turned into a long, bloody and a very destructive war.
And, as the war progressed, the definition of what counts for the victory in this war was changing.
Long, arduous, WWI style battles for the mining villages and towns of Donbass were all counted as the great wins. And they indeed were, under the new measuring scale (of what counts for success).
But the fact that the scale did change, was a massive, enormous defeat that hardly anyone could predict in January 2022.
Back then, consensus was that in case of Russian invasion, Ukraine could hold for weeks, or days. Or may be hours.
Hardly anyone predicted it would actually hold for years.
At this point, I don’t see any sign of victory for Russia."
https://kamilkazani.substack.com/p/three-years-of-war
15. Listening to the tinfoil hat perspective of geopolitics. Just trying to understand the nuttiness in the world right now.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tO7bhSRGhoI
16. "But some founders are opting out of this nonsense and I do think we will see more of them do so.
It is easier than ever to bootstrap a company to sustainable operations. Some founders will do it. Others will notice. Maybe it will even become fashionable to do so.
At least one can hope."
https://avc.xyz/drinking-from-a-firehose
17. "The question, then, is how to ensure the longevity and continuity of a regime based on vibes and a cult of personality rather than shadowy men in grey suits. No matter how one looks at it, whether the policy is one of returning to the traditional NATO, Western alliance configuration, or the America Alone policy of MAGA, democracy stands in the way of achieving either.
America’s rivals do not know whether they’re going to get a sweet pipeline deal, tariff slap, a barrage of ATACMS, or a gay pride parade from the increasingly schizophrenic hegemon."
https://morgoth.substack.com/p/the-deep-state-a-necessary-evil
18. "Therefore, Europe faces a choice: either increase troop numbers significantly by more than 300,000 to make up for the fragmented nature of national militaries, or find ways to rapidly enhance military coordination. Failure to coordinate means much higher costs and individual efforts will likely be insufficient to deter the Russian military. Yet collective insurance means moral hazard and coordination problems need to be credibly solved."
https://www.bruegel.org/analysis/defending-europe-without-us-first-estimates-what-needed
19. "While fostering next-generation primes like Anduril and Palantir is an important step toward modernizing defense capabilities, it may not fully address the Pentagon's need for speed and adaptability in today's rapidly evolving threat landscape. A "Moneyball" strategy, focused on buying wins through smaller, specialized players—would complement this effort by delivering high-impact solutions without the overhead of creating new mega-contractors.
Findings from the NNCTA reinforce the need for tools to evaluate readiness systematically, align investments with mission-critical needs, and ensure scalability across sectors. By adopting smarter metrics and leveraging structured assessment platforms, defense agencies can redefine how they maintain technological superiority while fostering a diverse ecosystem of innovators.
Ultimately, achieving this vision will require overcoming entrenched bureaucratic challenges and adopting flexible acquisition models, something that the Department of Government Efficiency might address, but the payoff could be truly transformative: faster innovation cycles, reduced risks, and sustained global leadership in critical technologies."
https://advancehumanity.substack.com/p/the-new-defensetech-game-lessons
20. Best show on Silicon Valley right now.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UGmOYNWiV1A&t=139s
21. "A lot of software today is built on relatively little proprietary knowledge and personal experience. It is built by people with passing exposures to the problems they’re solving.8 It is built by founders who arrive at their ideas via an incubator and a pivot. It is built by Geoff.
That used to be ok, because our unique talent for technology more than made up for our naiveté elsewhere. Founders could build huge businesses by plowing technology into analog problems, and investors like YC could build huge funds by selecting for whiz kids over world-weary experts. And they could both succeed because technical leverage mattered more than domain-specific taste.
But I’m not sure that will work for much longer. Just as it’s becoming harder to out-write an LLM, it’s becoming harder to out-develop one too. And if experts can prompt their way to a product just as easily as those of us in Silicon Valley can, what winning talent are we left with?"
https://benn.substack.com/p/the-end-of-yc
22. "The fourth explanation is that President Trump and his Administration believe that the United States is one of three great powers caught up in a multilateral order characterized by increasingly hostile rivalries. Over the past few years, the other two “Great Powers” have formed an alliance against the United States. While critics want the Trump Administration to rely on Allies, Trump believes these allies are weak and politically unstable.
Under this interpretation, the Administration understands that the United States cannot withdraw from this rivalry or ignore the world, but it is also limited on what it can achieve, and limited by the resources available. They believe that while the United States has some important strengths, America is also burdened with significant millstones around her neck.
Unlike prior Administrations, it seems clear to me that President Trump views many of our allies as millstones that sap American power and encumber the United States with responsibilities that aren’t her own. I’ve written this before, but I will write it again, President Trump and his team believe that the United States can no longer afford the luxury of providing two “common goods” to the world:
#1 – Security
#2 – A Market of Last Resort
The United States started providing these “common goods” (and I use that term with its definition from political economy) following the Second World War and as the Soviet-American Cold War started. At the time, the United States represented nearly 50% of global GDP and we were the only major power not devastated by WWII. We had massive industrial capacity that we could direct towards helping our friends. Between 1947 and 1991, leaders in Washington sought to provide the security and economic stability to allow Western Europe and the East Asia periphery to rebuild themselves, while resisting Soviet domination. As Western Europe and East Asia recovered, we encouraged those countries to share the burden, but that was only modestly successful. The United States did this for its own self-interest, but Americans also paid significant costs for building and maintaining this system."
https://chinaarticles.substack.com/p/bizarre-great-power-triangle
23. "Building borders and defensive walls is taking the place of protecting other nations and spending trillions on endless overseas engagements. The Vances, Gabbards and Hegseths make the claim that many of these adventures are deadly, costly and pointless, the Ukrainian meatgrinder being a case in point. A more isolationist America, a multi-polar world with Beijing and Moscow as distant partners is the emerging foreign policy doctrine for which Trump is only the messenger. That is what is driving the change and that is what informed the clash in the Oval Office last Friday.
This is not to say that the world should be throwing Ukraine under the bus. On the contrary. The free world should be committed to see this through and ensure that Putin’s aggression is stopped in its tracks and Ukraine somehow ekes a win out of this bloody stalemate. But under the current circumstances it cannot and those that could help deliver such a result - the US and Europe together - are unable to deliver that right now. Avoiding a Third World War is, and here Trump did make a valid point, one of them.
So in the end, it will come down to a negotiated settlement and provide that what Zelenskyy has asked for: security guarantees. Once the dust settles over this meeting and the Europeans have put their heads together it may well be that an arrangement can be made to work that will solidify some sort of deal with Putin. It will shift more of the burden to London, Paris, Berlin and a number of other European capitals. That is what Trump wants and it is unfortunate for one of the bravest men of our time that he is one of the first world leaders to bear the brunt of the Trump foreign policy doctrine and a newly emerging geopolitical dynamic. He and the people of Ukraine deserve better."
https://pieterdorsman.substack.com/p/security-guarantees
24. Helpful list.
"When I say evil, I mean EVIL. I don’t mean people who are merely sharks (highly selfish and only care about themselves). Evil is much more than sharks – they are people who enjoy watching the world burn.
With these types, you want to identify them and stay away i.e. don’t have sex with them, don’t make them your business partner, don’t become their “close friend” or associated with them, etc. because anyone who comes close to them takes damage (today or tomorrow).
This is unlike sharks because with sharks you merely need to be extra careful in your dealings but otherwise it’s a non-issue. Sharks might even make good business partners and you want to have some of them on your side.
On the hand, you never want evil on your side because evil wants to destroy you the moment you don’t look eye to eye with them."
https://lifemathmoney.com/11-signs-of-evil/
25. "Given the scale of the existential threat Europe faces, this production capacity is far below what is necessary. For comparison, the Lockheed Martin currently produces around 700 JASSM-ER cruise missiles annually, with plans to expand output to over 1,000 per year. Meanwhile, Russia missile manufacturers are producing approximately 1,200 cruise missiles and 600 short- and medium-range ballistic missiles annually.
The likely Swedish acquisition of the Taurus KEPD 350 represents an important step for European security, potentially opening the door for additional Taurus orders by other states. It is unfortunate that Taurus production had to wait until 2025 to hopefully be restarted, but better late than never.
This being said, Europe still faces a major gap in production capacity, and unless large-scale procurement contracts or public investments materialize soon, European missile output will continue to lag behind operational requirements."
https://missilematters.substack.com/p/taurus-news-and-the-future-of-the
26. "But Trump’s treatment of Zelensky, and his tolerance of Putin’s invasion, also illustrate a deeper and more important shift. America’s foreign policy is now fundamentally extractive, focused on forcing weaker countries into making economic concessions. Trump’s insistence that Ukraine surrender mineral rights to the U.S. in exchange for aid was the traditional action of a Great Power extracting value from a client state — the same type of thing the USSR did to the Warsaw Pact nations during the Cold War.
For eight decades after World War 2, the U.S. defended the postwar geopolitical and economic order based on norms. That’s gone now. Under Trump, America acts like a gangster demanding protection money.
In any case, America’s abrupt turn from moral beacon and defender of the free world is unsurprising, given the fundamental immorality of the Trump administration. If you have the morality of a gangster, you will behave like a gangster."
https://www.noahpinion.blog/p/america-is-ruled-by-gangsters-now
27. Southern Italy for the win.
"Southern Italy now has the best value proposition in Europe from a cost of living and lifestyle point of view. Real estate is incredibly cheap, to the point that the real cost is the cost of the renovations rather than the cost of the house itself.
The cost of living is extremely low. It is now much more affordable than Eastern Europe and even the Balkans, but without the economic dynamism. Yet the quality of food and produce is vastly superior. I even paid €1 for a beer one evening in a bar in Palermo during happy hour (happy hour lasted until 11pm)."
https://mailchi.mp/41edf0278ee8/probably-the-most-affordable-part-of-europe?e=123a1c25c4
28. "Then from a portfolio perspective, I like to align my investing across the capability spectrum. Think about an allocation like 60/30/10 - 60% AI that seems to have a proven match to a task and is going somewhere, 30% to stuff that shows promise but isn’t there yet, and 10% to speculative AI that could be game changing but, could also blow up entirely and never make it. The 10% is often the most overhyped stuff, and you need exposure to it but, it’s very unlikely it’s as close as the pundits would have us believe.
AI has some characteristics that make it uniquely difficult to predict its future. I expect we are still several major disruptive moments away from really settling in to a more stable AI future. I think following the self driving car market is a good gauge of progress, partly due to the technical learnings but also due to the fact that cars require a lot of safety and security and will lead the framework development for how we think about AI and safety in other domains."
https://investinginai.substack.com/p/conflicting-ai-opinions-and-fsd-as
29. This guy hates America but his view that the tech containment of China by the US has failed seems correct. Unfortunately.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6L3wUW_ckic
30. This is Gold. Listen to this. "War Mode"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n0AB6pZpotg
31. A good case for Europe in the world. Also important to understand the landscape of sovereignty for the future.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bxDmHvGZtPQ
32. The New American Industrial Association. #Reindustrialize America.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UJHoSzM5UXw
33. How to thrive in the age of AI. Great conversation here.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZE1AjTnsubI
34. Educational discussion on the future of war. USVs & Drones.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RuxTUtITvMA
35. "A new multilateral defence bank aimed at tackling growing security threats will offer private sector lenders risk guarantees and help standardise procurement rules in Europe, which its founder describes as a “disaster”.
Announced on Sunday, the new Defence, Security and Resilience Bank — the first multilateral development bank for defence, which seeks to secure £100bn in capital — aims to solve the defence financing gap in western countries.
It plans to issue AAA-rated bonds backed by shareholder nations to get “cheap capital” for defence procurement quickly into Nato countries, across the EU and into Indo-Pacific allied nations without increasing government debt."
https://www.thebanker.com/content/9e120840-4cbf-45cf-a10c-39d0090ae8f5
36. "There are many other forces one can cite, and we could further explore the broad network of global interests that have aligned to attack America's leadership position in the world. A long list of countries, from China to Israel to Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Qatar, and Iran, all have active roles in what's been unfolding, and everybody has their own preferred angle. Political division, extremism, organized crime, lack of education, and relentless information warfare have been constants, as well.
Also implicit across every angle explored here is the primacy of oil, gas, and other extractive industries. The end result is a laissez-faire approach to energy, mining, cryptocurrency, and the privatization of governance. With no effective government left to regulate industry, we can expect unbounded effects on climate and the environment, with Putin's Russia as a primary beneficiary.
One more caveat: it is a grave error to view Trump, Putin, Musk, or the others merely as grifters — or greedy, or motivated by profits, or only wanting to benefit from government contracts. Theirs is a bid to remake the world; they want power and the chance to impose their worldview onto everyone else.
Second, they don't think money (in the form of fiat currency) is real. Their goal is to replace fiat currency with an entirely new global financial order, and a supranational monarchy to match. For example, Musk wants to use Starlink at the FAA to capture the global aviation system, not score some measly government contract. It's time to think bigger. "