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Prose

Find Silvano D'Agostino's online prose.

Birthdays and Greatness

Silvano D'Agostino

Some number of years ago—three according to the date of the note under which I filed the piece away, at least six in my mind (feels like I must have still been in college when I first read it), though really three and a half at most, considering the publication date of August 2020—I read this delightful New Yorker piece and it spoke to me. I Thought I Would Have Accomplished a Lot More Today and Also by the Time I Was Thirty-Five. Me being me, I decided to make it my annual birthday read.

I don’t really remember how I felt when I first read the piece. Clearly, I barely even remember what stage of my life I was in. But I think it set free a certain energy within me. An I’m unlikely to and really desperately don’t want to end up that way energy. Which gives you some indication of the fear I must have felt about potentially ending up that way after all.

A little over a year ago, I had a conversation with a trusted elder. We were talking about what I was looking to learn, and I had been thinking a lot about hard skills. He pointed me instead in the direction of Ego Development. I haven’t gone out of my way to dive particularly deep; judging by what little I do know about integral theory and related ideas such as Ego Development, the scientific foundation seems fuzzy at best. But I have a whole take about how sometimes frameworks have value even when they’re not scientifically sound.

Tragedy and parenthood have very little in common, other than prompting deep introspection. As my eventful twenty-eighth revolution around the sun nears its end and I re-read the New Yorker piece, the fear is gone. I still find the article quite amusing, and I still feel tremendously hungry for accomplishment. But the energy around it has changed.

One of the most important thought technologies of my twenties: Capital G Greatness requires remarkable tradeoffs. In college, this thought technology presented itself as a path, planting the seed of that fear I felt when first reading the article. Three years ago, I recognized this thought technology and began putting it into words. Today, I am embracing it because the tradeoffs weren't worth it to me.

I suppose I have another seven years to go.

5 Year College Reunion

Silvano D'Agostino

It’s been a week since I returned to campus for my 5 year college reunion. It took that week, a week of vacation no less, to fully reflect on the reunion, putting it into perspective with the five years since graduation and the four years at Harvard that preceded it.

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New Problems?

Silvano D'Agostino

Some time early last semester, it must’ve been September or October, but it feels like forever ago, a few other students and I had the opportunity to have lunch with the very interesting Jill Lepore. At some point in the conversation, Lepore said the following:

“Very few problems are actually new.”
~Jill Lepore

I haven’t quite been able to let Lepore’s statement go — it’s been on my mind a lot; I agree with it in a way, yet I want to scream bloody in another.

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How We Still Misunderstand  Watch

Silvano D'Agostino

Articles inevitably keep popping up regarding  Watch’s pricing and purpose, particularly since the March 9 event has been announced and we are rapidly approaching the April launch. However, regardless of its technical purpose, especially IRL but on the interwebs as well, the Watch still appears to be misunderstood deeply on the most basic level of attraction.

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On Sharing Fragile Ideas — Or How I Am Arrogantly Humble

Silvano D'Agostino

A number of ideas pop through my head every day; small things, mostly, mixed with the occasional bigger concept. I write them down. I decide they're not worth pursuing (just yet). I deem them only OK, not good enough to be shared, to be thought about further, not iterated upon enough yet. This goes to answer why I tend to be careful with sharing fragile ideas.

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Whither Twitter?

Silvano D'Agostino

I, like so many of us, love Twitter to death – I use it literally all throughout my waking hours, I have been a true complesionist for a few months, but even before, Twitter had transformed the way I work, and drastically changed the way I interact with the Internet. There was a time, when we all truly loved Twitter, the company, just as much as Twitter, the service. Today, while we still love the service, we fear (for) the company. So… whither Twitter?

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ELMUN Speeches

Silvano D'Agostino

Recently, I opened and closed my last English-speaking MUN conference as Secretary General, the conference my school hosts, the Elephant Model United Nations (ELMUN). It was awesome but also sad in some ways, since it felt like the first of many goodbye's that are to come for me. I delivered two speeches as part of my duty, both of which apparently achieved their goals. I have been asked several times whether they would be published somewhere – so without further ado, here they are:

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