Lessons from Ballet

I grew up dancing ballet from about eight to eighteen. Here are some lessons I learned. Never stretch cold In a ballet class, stretching generally occurs after the barre – the first ~30 minute of class that is basically a methodical workout that drills all the foundational movements with the assistance of the barre (railing… Continue reading Lessons from Ballet

Haber & Bosch: Heroes or Not?

The Haber-Bosch process is perhaps one of the most widely known industrial chemical processes. I won’t describe the history in too much detail (there’s Wikipedia for that), but in a nutshell, it’s a chemical process for making ammonia (NH3) from nitrogen (N2) and hydrogen (H2) invented in 1909. N2 + 3H2 → 2NH3 This doesn’t… Continue reading Haber & Bosch: Heroes or Not?

4 Values

On one hike this summer (which there’s a funny story behind, too) my sister brought up an interesting question. I call this proxy free counseling – a question from my sister’s friend’s counselor. What are your four most important values? I immediately questioned why it has to be four—it doesn’t, of course. Could be three… Continue reading 4 Values

Review: Beyond Accumulation and Technical Progress: Negative Externalities as an Engine of Economic Growth

It’s a long title for an elegant idea. This paper asks: “why does the economy grow?” It argues that the existing reasons of 1) accumulation and 2) technical progress fail to explain why a) people work so much for money and b) why they’re still so unhappy. Bartolini argues that the missing piece of the puzzle is negative externalities, which are in fact an engine of economic growth.

Hello World

Hi, I’m Emily. If you don’t know me already, I’m not sure how you found this site. Why am I blogging? This matters more to me than you, but there’s one thing I want to say about it: you should blog too! Social media is all about being short and snappy, and blogging is an… Continue reading Hello World