update some descriptions

content/blog/2023-04-17_vegan/index.md

@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 +++
 title = "Thoughts on Veganism: A Reply"
-description = "Why I eat meat and dairy"
+description = "While browsing [geminispace](https://gemini.circumlunar.space/), I came across [this article](https://gemini.envs.net/~negatethis/thoughts-on-veganism.gmi) by `negatethis`. Below is the text of the email I sent in reply, lightly edited. This is by no means a complete explanation of my thoughts on the subject; for example, I spend little to no time on the ethics of animal domestication."
 
 [taxonomies]
 categories = ["blog"]
@@ -10,7 +10,7 @@ tags = ["farming","politics","philosophy","veganism"]
 zenn_applause = true
 +++
 
-While browsing [geminispace](https://gemini.circumlunar.space/), I came across [this article](https://gemini.envs.net/~negatethis/thoughts-on-veganism.gmi) by `negatethis`. Below is the text of the email I sent in reply, lightly edited. This is by no means a complete explanation of my thoughts on the subject; for example, I spend little to no time on the ethics of animal domestication. 
+While browsing [geminispace](https://gemini.circumlunar.space/), I came across [this article](https://gemini.envs.net/~negatethis/thoughts-on-veganism.gmi) by `negatethis`. Below is the text of the email I sent in reply, lightly edited. This is by no means a complete explanation of my thoughts on the subject; for example, I spend little to no time on the ethics of animal domestication.
 
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@@ -25,7 +25,7 @@ You say "we eat animals purely for pleasure". I personally don't see things this
 
 This is just one example of a way in which I find eating animals to be necessary. I believe there are many more, as we have evolved to hunt and eat meat, but I'm not a nutritionist and I won't be any good in a debate over this. I assume you disagree.
 
-The central point which I wish to hear your thoughts on is a broader idea about the acceptance of death as an inevitable part of life. Let's lay aside the oppression involved in domestication for the time being, and consider hunting instead. Death is inevitable and the natural end to temporary life. As life is good, and with the existence of life comes death, I believe that there is a sense in which death is good as well. The moral argument against taking life seems to me to rest on the assumption that to die in another way, "naturally", would be a better death. However, when a person takes an animal's life with wisdom and compassion, they will make decisions which take the wellbeing of other beings into account. 
+The central point which I wish to hear your thoughts on is a broader idea about the acceptance of death as an inevitable part of life. Let's lay aside the oppression involved in domestication for the time being, and consider hunting instead. Death is inevitable and the natural end to temporary life. As life is good, and with the existence of life comes death, I believe that there is a sense in which death is good as well. The moral argument against taking life seems to me to rest on the assumption that to die in another way, "naturally", would be a better death. However, when a person takes an animal's life with wisdom and compassion, they will make decisions which take the wellbeing of other beings into account.
 
 This means, for example, that a hunter of deer will choose to shoot a mature buck who is socially dominant and has many mates, thereby allowing the gene pool to remain diverse and the deer population to be resilient against disease. Moreover, the animal's body will contribute very significantly to the well being of those who eat it. In contrast, if the hunter refrained from killing, the animal would still die, and its body would be eaten by other nonhuman animals or would simply decompose, a fate which is not better or worse in any sense I understand. The duration of life would be at least somewhat longer, but to me this is not clearly a morally important point.
 

content/blog/2023-05-02_physicalism/index.md

@@ -1,12 +1,13 @@
 +++
 title = "Descartes Was Wrong About Minds"
-description = "Consciousness Is an Emergent Property of Matter"
+description = "Way back in 1641, René Descartes dropped *Meditations on First Philosophy*, in which he famously claimed he was certain that he existed. But towards the end of his little book, he also made some pretty influential claims about the nature of the mind, saying it was totally separate from material substance. I think his arguments for this are bullshit, and I want to try to explain why."
 
 [taxonomies]
 categories = ["blog"]
 tags = ["philosophy"]
 
 +++
+## Consciousness Is an Emergent Property of Matter
 
 Way back in 1641, René Descartes dropped *Meditations on First Philosophy*, in which he famously claimed he was certain that he existed. But towards the end of his little book, he also made some pretty influential claims about the nature of the mind, saying it was totally separate from material substance. I think his arguments for this are bullshit, and I want to try to explain why.
 

content/blog/2023-05-06_misfin/index.md

@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 +++
 title = "Thoughts on Misfin"
-description = "Some notes on the new minimalist messaging protocol"
+description = "Over the past few days, `lem` has been over at [misfin.org](gemini://misfin.org) on [gemini](https://geminiprotocol.net/) making the new internet mail protocol a reality. Yesterday, I sent the first misfin message as `mail@satch.xyz`. I want to jot down a few notes for reference as things move forward."
 
 [taxonomies]
 categories = ["blog"]

content/blog/2023-11-01_williams-record-speech/index.md

@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 +++
 title = "Opinion: We Must Disregard Attacks on Free Speech"
-description = "An argument in the Williams Record against censorship"
+description = "In an op-ed, Satya Benson ’26 critiques responses to recently published opinion pieces in the Record."
 
 [taxonomies]
 categories = ["blog"]
@@ -19,7 +19,7 @@ In last week’s issue of the Record, there was yet another set of articles writ
 
 As someone who believes that Israel is grossly violating the human rights of Palestinians and has been for many decades, who opposes the United States’s funding of the Israeli military, and who supports pro-Palestine movements like Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions, I am very concerned by the intolerant arguments which I have seen from the anonymous group Students Against Genocide (SAG) in its recent letter to the Record.
 
-On the national scale, the censorship which pro-Palestine groups are facing in the press and on social media is very unsettling. The Biden administration is asking the Qatari government to censor Al Jazeera’s coverage of the war in Gaza, just a week after Israel approved emergency regulations giving itself the power to block Al Jazeera broadcasts in Israel. Groups like Canary Mission try to intimidate pro-Palestine voices on college campuses by publishing the names and faces of those who criticize Israel. The Record — and the nation as a whole — must remember that freedom of expression is something which intrinsically benefits victims of oppression, those who do not stand with the powerful majority on a given issue. No one should legitimize censorship and intolerance by engaging in it against those who defend Israel. 
+On the national scale, the censorship which pro-Palestine groups are facing in the press and on social media is very unsettling. The Biden administration is asking the Qatari government to censor Al Jazeera’s coverage of the war in Gaza, just a week after Israel approved emergency regulations giving itself the power to block Al Jazeera broadcasts in Israel. Groups like Canary Mission try to intimidate pro-Palestine voices on college campuses by publishing the names and faces of those who criticize Israel. The Record — and the nation as a whole — must remember that freedom of expression is something which intrinsically benefits victims of oppression, those who do not stand with the powerful majority on a given issue. No one should legitimize censorship and intolerance by engaging in it against those who defend Israel.
 
 SAG wants the Record to do exactly that. The group tries to justify its call for censorship by alleging that Garnick’s opinion caused harm to Palestinians and to vulnerable communities on campus. An anonymous student responsible for the newspaper postings told the Record, “the Record has blood on their hands — the blood of Palestinians — in printing that article.” But I find it ludicrous to think that more Palestinians will suffer as a result of the opinion Garnick wrote. In my opinion, the arguments in that article were so poorly reasoned that they exposed the hypocrisy and shortsightedness of some of those who defend Israel. For example, Garnick claimed that Israel is seen as evil simply because it is stronger and did not address the nation’s continual violations of international law, and he seemed to imply that the immoral actions of other countries make Israel’s human rights abuses acceptable. For this reason, publishing the article could just as well be said to help the Palestinian cause as to hurt it.