An essay is a rehearsal of an idea, an exploration.

Assertiveness and correctness are not the same thing. Precision requires work, experimentation, diligence, and persistence.

Meditating on the multidimensional emergency of our historical moment requires honesty, beyond prejudgments or conventions, and that means reviewing interactions between ideas before they begin to operate in the high stakes landscape of human experience.

We need critical thinking. To know the difference between interesting and liberating.

We need readers, philosophers, poets, and architects.

We need learning to be part of everyday life, and for it to work in a human way, beyond the reach of digitized systems and artificial intelligence.

Grab a pen or pencil, and some paper. Sit and write, before you know what you will write.

Convert unpolished mental occurrence into phrasing and argument, and then test them: Do they hold up when you add evidence? Do they hold up if you ask who will be harmed?

Rehearse your ideas, so they might be helpful in building a better world for all of us.