The Seen and the Unseen - hosted by Amit Varma

He went the IIT-IIM route, became a self-taught data genius, but then got off the treadmill to live a portfolio life. Karthik Shashidhar joins Amit Varma in episode 456 of the Seen and the Unseen to share his insights from a lifetime of looking.

(FOR FULL LINKED SHOW NOTES, GO TO SEENUNSEEN.IN.)

Also check out:
1. Karthik Shashidhar on LinkedIn, Twitter, Mint, GitHub, Pensieve and his own website.
2. Pertinent Observations — Karthik Shashidhar's Substack.
3. Art of Data Science — Karthik Shashidhar's data Substack.
4. ADHD and Company — Karthik Shashidhar's other substack.
5. Between the Buyer and the Seller — Karthik Shashidhar.
6. Old episodes of The Seen and the Unseen with Karthik Shashidhar: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6.
7. Gopi Gupta, Vegetarian — Karthik Shashidhar.
8. Anxiety and the Path of Least Resistance — Aella.
9. Coming Back To Me — Marcus Trescothick.
10. My learnings (for myself) from Babbage Insight — Karthik Shashidhar.
11. What Our Genes and Phones Tell Us — Episode 117 of Everything is Everything.
12. Marginal Revolution and EconLog.
13. Statistical Modeling, Causal Inference, and Social Science — Andrew Gelman's blog.
14. Junk Charts — Kaiser Fung's blog.
15. Thirty to twenty nine — Karthik Shashidhar's 2011 post after quitting his job.
16. Varun Grover Is in the House — Episode 292 of The Seen and the Unseen.
17. Studs and Fighters — Karthik Shashidhar.
18. AlphaZero defeats Stockfish: Quick thoughts — Karthik Shashidhar.
19. From Strength to Strength — Arthur Brooks.
20. Roam Research.
21. London taxi drivers and bus drivers: a structural MRI and neuropsychological analysis — Eleanor Maguire, Katherine Woollett and Hugo Spiers.
22. Writing by Hand is Good for your Brain – Here's how to do it — Neal Stephenson.
23. Project Thirty, Hippies and Capitalism — Karthik Shashidhar.
24. Liquidity — Karthik Shashidhar.
25. Correlations: In Traffic, Mortgages and Everything Else — Karthik Shashidhar.
26. Social Desirability Bias: How Psych Can Salvage Econo-Cynicism — Bryan Caplan.
27. Binders full of women — Karthik Shashidhar.
28. The Three Languages of Politics — Arnold Kling.
29. Arnold Kling and the Four Languages of Politics — Episode 394 of The Seen and the Unseen.
30. What Maharashtra wants: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 — Karthik Shashidhar's five-part series.
31. Wanting — Luke Burgis.
32. Luke Burgis Sees the Deer at His Window — Episode 337 of The Seen and the Unseen.
33. Rafa and the Ranatunga Principle — Karthik Shashidhar.
34. 2024 Commencement Address by Roger Federer at Dartmouth.
35. Amit's Pomodoro clock.
36. The Misbehavior of Markets — Benoit Mandlebrot.
37. Nassim Nicholas Taleb on Amazon.
38. The Selfish Gene — Richard Dawkins.
39. The Baroque Cycle — Neal Stephenson.
40. Deep Work — Cal Newport.
41. Number of the Beast, Painkiller, Ride the Lightning.
42. Rust Covers Diamonds — Karthik Shashidhar's playlist.

This episode is sponsored by CTQ Compounds. Check out The Daily Reader and FutureStack. Use the code UNSEEN for Rs 2500 off.

Amit Varma, Shruti Rajagopalan and Pranay Kotasthane have just started a new YouTube Show called Watching the Wheels. You must watch it. You must! You simply must!! It's mast!!!

Amit Varma runs a course called Life Lessons, which aims to be a launchpad towards learning essential life skills all of you need. For more details, and to sign up, click here.

And have you read Amit's newsletter? It's madly active right now! Subscribe right away to The India Uncut Newsletter! It's free!

Also check out Amit's online course, The Art of Clear Writing.

Episode art: 'Life, Understood' by Simahina.

It is difficult to talk about economics and policy and philosophy in our languages -- but it is important, and the discourse needs it. Pranay Kotasthane, Saurabh Chandra and Khyati Pathak join Amit Varma in episode 455 of The Seen and the Unseen to discuss the sense of purpose behind their iconic Hindi podcast Puliyabaazi, and the lessons they learnt from it.

(FOR FULL LINKED SHOW NOTES, GO TO SEENUNSEEN.IN.)

Also check out:
1. Khyati Pathak on Twitter, Instagram, Substack and her own website of comics.
2. Pranay Kotasthane on Twitter, LinkedIn, Amazon and the Takshashila Institution.
3. Saurabh Chandra on LinkedIn and Twitter.
4. Puliyabaazi.
5. Episodes of The Seen and the Unseen w Pranay Kotasthane: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18.
6. Making Policy Fun with Khyati Pathak and Friends — Episode 374 of The Seen and the Unseen.
7. The State of Our Farmers — Episode 86 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Gunvant Patil).
8. Varun Grover Is in the House — Episode 292 of The Seen and the Unseen.
9. The Ideas of Gandhi -- Episode 545 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Ram Guha).
10. Indians Dads Going to School.
11. The Nurture Assumption — Judith Rich Harris.
12. The Blank Slate — Steven Pinker.
13. Very Bad Wizards.
14. Understanding India Through Its Languages — Episode 232 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Peggy Mohan).
15. भारतीय भाषाओँ में हमारे अतीत के सुराग़. Clues to our past in Indian languages ft. Peggy Mohan -- Puliyabaazi.
16. यह लिबरल आख़िर है कौन? Foundational Ideas of Liberalism -- Amit Varma on Puliyabaazi.
17. Yamini Aiyar on Puliyabaazi: 1, 2.
18. Special Episode: संविधान का मुखड़ा -- Puliyabaazi.
19. Premchand Ki Amar Sahitya Collection (Hindi) -- Munshi Premchand.
20. Sanskriti Ke Char Adhyay (Hindi) -- Ramdhari Singh 'Dinkar'.
21. Puliyabaazi courses on YouTube.
22. Why Is India's Liquor Policy So Weird? -- Puliyabaazi.
23. स्टार्ट-अप करें तो कैसे? How to Start-Up ft. Saurabh Chandra -- Puliyabaazi.
24. Divya Prakash Dubey: Ek Jeevani — Episode 399 of The Seen and the Unseen.
25. Harishankar Parsai on Amazon and Wikipedia.
26. Raag Darbari (Hindi) (English) — Shrilal Shukla.
27. नई वाली हिंदी कहानियाँ। The Art of Storytelling ft. Divya Prakash Dubey -- Puliyabaazi.
28. Story Jam -- Arti Jain.
29. गांधी टैगोर की पुलियाबाज़ी. The Gandhi Tagore Debates -- Puliyabaazi.
30. Pranay Kotasthane's Mindmap about the Gandhi-Tagore debates.
31. The Mahatma and the Poet — Edited & Compiled by Sabyasachi Bhattacharya.
32. विज्ञान का विज्ञान। The Scientific Method ft. Nihar Shah -- Puliyabaazi.
33. रेत का दिमाग़: मस्तिष्क से प्रेरित इंजीनियरिंग. Neuromorphic Computing ft. Chetan Thakur -- Puliyabaazi.
34. 1857 की लड़ाई का आँखों देखा हाल. An Eyewitness Account of the 1857 War -- Puliyabaazi.
35. अश्वशास्त्र. The Story of the Horse in India -- Puliyabaazi.
36. The Dominance of War-Elephants in India. हाथियों का युद्ध में इस्तेमाल। -- Puliyabaazi.
37. Puliyabaazi episodes on BR Ambedkar.
38. Thoughts on Linguistic States -- BR Ambedkar.
39. The Grammar of Anarchy — BR Ambedkar.
40. Parchaiyan (Wikipedia, YouTube), Tanhaiyaan (Wikipedia, YouTube), Dhoop Kinare (Wikipedia, YouTube) and Doctor Bahu (YouTube).
41. पाकिस्तान का आर्थिक सफ़र। Understanding Pakistan's Economic Challenges ft. Uzair Younus -- Puliyabaazi.
42. मिलिट्री-जिहादी कॉम्प्लेक्स:पाकिस्तान का दूसरा चेहरा. The Pakistani Military-Jihadi Complex -- Puliyabaazi.
43. Puliyabaazi episodes on the constitution.
44. सिर्फ राजनेताओं ने नहीं, भारतीय जनमानस ने हमारा संविधान पिरोया है। How Public Movements Shaped Indian Constitutionalism? ft. Rohit De and Ornit Shani -- Puliyabaazi.
45. क्या खून बेचना वैध होना चाहिए? Should Paid Blood Donations be Legal? -- Puliyabaazi.
46. एक देश, एक परीक्षा और अंतहीन दबाव: क्या वाकई कोई और रास्ता नहीं है? One Nation, One Exam, One Deep Crisis -- Puliyabaazi.
47. Anand Unni's podcast.
48. Thale-Harate Kannada Podcast.
49. John Mayer and Ed Sheeran discuss watches.
50. The Devil's Dictionary — Ambrose Bierce.
51. Kafan (Hindi) -- Mushi Premchand.
52. हिंदी साहित्य का स्वाद: कविता, कहानियाँ और किस्से। A Brief History of Hindi Literature ft. Arun Jee -- Puliyabaazi.
53. पुलियाबाज़ी वाली हिंदी का मतलब क्या? How Do We Discuss New Ideas in Hindi? -- Puliyabaazi.
54. पंडित नेहरू का 15 अगस्त 1947 का 'किस्मत से एक बाज़ी' वाला ऐतिहासिक भाषण -- Jawaharlal Nehru's 'Kismat se Baazi' speech.
55. Rewriting History: The Life and Times of Pandita Ramabai -- Uma Chakravarti.
56. The Pakistan Experience -- Shehzad Ghias Shaikh.
57. The Complete Robot -- Isaac Asimov.

This episode is sponsored by CTQ Compounds. Check out The Daily Reader and FutureStack. Use the code UNSEEN for Rs 2500 off.

Amit Varma, Shruti Rajagopalan and Pranay Kotasthane have just started a new YouTube Show called Watching the Wheels. You must watch it. You must! You simply must!! It's mast!!!

Amit Varma runs a course called Life Lessons, which aims to be a launchpad towards learning essential life skills all of you need. For more details, and to sign up, click here.

And have you read Amit's newsletter? It's madly active right now! Subscribe right away to The India Uncut Newsletter! It's free!

Also check out Amit's online course, The Art of Clear Writing.

Episode art: 'Puliyabaazi' by Simahina.

Mahatma Gandhi's ideas shaped modern India, and were as fiercely contested in his time as they are today. Ramachandra Guha joins Amit Varma in episode 454 of The Seen and the Unseen to discuss Gandhi and his arguments.

(FOR FULL LINKED SHOW NOTES, GO TO SEENUNSEEN.IN.)

Also check out:
1. Ramachandra Guha on Amazon, Twitter and his own website.
2. Arguments With Gandhi -- Ramachandra Guha.
3. Ram and Friends -- Episode 440 of The Seen and the Unseen.
4. Ram Guha Writes a Letter to a Friend — Episode 371 of The Seen and the Unseen.
5. Ram Guha Reflects on His Life — Episode 266 of The Seen and the Unseen.
6. A Cricket Tragic Celebrates the Game — Episode 201 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Ram Guha).
7. Taking Stock of Our Republic — Episode 157 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Ram Guha).
8. Understanding Gandhi. Part 1: Mohandas — Episode 104 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Ram Guha).
9. Understanding Gandhi. Part 2: Mahatma — Episode 105 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Ram Guha).
10. Gandhi Before India -- Ramachandra Guha.
11. Gandhi: The Years that Changed the World -- Ramachandra Guha.
12. The Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi.
13. Hind Swaraj -- MK Gandhi.
14. An Autobiography — MK Gandhi.
15. The Good Boatman -- Rajmohan Gandhi.
16. The Multitudes of Mahatma Gandhi -- Episode 10 of Watching the Wheels.
17. Small Doors Into the Large Rooms of India -- Episode 450 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Pranay Kotasthane and RSJ).
18. Annihilation of Caste -- BR Ambedkar.
19. The Mahatma and the Poet -- Edited by Sabyasachi Bhattacharya.
20. The Grammar of Anarchy — BR Ambedkar.
21. Stride Toward Freedom -- Martin Luther King Jr.
22. Vinayak Damodar Savarkar: Fountainhead of fundamentalism in India -- B Jeyamohan.
23. The Flaming Feet -- DR Nagaraj.
24. BR Ambedkar interviewed by the BBC in 1955.
25. Gita Press and the Making of Hindu India — Akshaya Mukul.
26. The Gita Press and Hindu Nationalism — Episode 139 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Akshaya Mukul).
27. For Love of the Automobile -- Wolfgang Sachs.
28. The Simon-Ehrlich Bet.
29. Forgotten Ally: China's World War II, 1937-1945 -- Rana Mitter.
30. China's Good War: How World War II Is Shaping a New Nationalism -- Rana Mitter.
31. Cecil John Rhodes in Love and War -- Jonny Steinberg.
32. Victorian Miniature -- Owen Chadwick.
33. The Mantle of the Prophet -- Roy Mottahedeh.

Amit Varma, Shruti Rajagopalan and Pranay Kotasthane have just started a new YouTube Show called Watching the Wheels. You must watch it. You must! You simply must!! It's mast!!!

Amit Varma runs a course called Life Lessons, which aims to be a launchpad towards learning essential life skills all of you need. For more details, and to sign up, click here.

And have you read Amit's newsletter? Subscribe right away to The India Uncut Newsletter! It's free!

Also check out Amit's online course, The Art of Clear Writing.

Episode art: 'Motion' by Simahina.

Indian politics is deeply complicated, and existing frames don't do it justice. Srikrishna Ayyangar joins Amit Varma in episode 453 of The Seen and the Unseen to discuss the deep dives he has made in the field, including with innovative methods like set theory.

(FOR FULL LINKED SHOW NOTES, GO TO SEENUNSEEN.IN.)

Also check out:
1. Srikrishna Ayyangar on LinkedIn, Amazon and NLSIU.
2. A Logic of Populism: India and Its States -- Srikrishna Ayyangar.
3. Administrative Analysis -- Christopher Hood.
4. The Burden of Democracy -- Pratap Bhanu Mehta.
5. The Republic of Apathy (2007) -- Amit Varma.
6. Manish Sabharwal is a Good Ancestor -- Episode 451 of The Seen and the Unseen.
7. 300 Ramayanas — AK Ramanujan.
8. Can Economics Become More Reflexive? — Vijayendra Rao.
9. Biju Rao Won't Bow to Conventional Wisdom — Episode 392 of The Seen and the Unseen.
10. Shaping the Political Arena -- Ruth Berins Collier and David Collier.
11. A Certain Idea of Europe -- Craig Parsons.
12. Building State Capability: Evidence, Analysis, Action -- Matt Andrews, Lant Pritchett and Michael Woolcock.
13. From Strength to Strength — Arthur Brooks.
14. The Age of the Partial Outsider — Janan Ganesh.
15. State Building: Governance and World Order in the 21st Century — Francis Fukuyama.
16. John Collison's tweet on the world being a museum of passion projects.
17. The Structures of Everyday Life -- Fernand Braudel.
18. The Design of Everyday Things -- Don Norman.
19. What is Populism? — Jan-Werner Müller.
20. Why Both Modi and Trump are Textbook Populists (2017) -- Amit Varma.
21. The Populist Playbook — Episode 42 of Everything is Everything.
22. The Populist Zeitgeist -- Cas Mudde.
23. Populism: Its Meaning and National Characteristics -- Ghita Ionescu and Ernest Gellner.
24. The Macroeconomics of Populism in Latin America -- Rudiger Dornbusch and Sebastian Edwards.
25. Populism: Concepts in the Social Sciences -- Paul Taggart.
26. A Tale of Two Cities -- Charles Dickens.
27. Neoliberalism and the Transformation of Populism in Latin America: The Peruvian Case -- Kenneth Roberts.
28. Populism: What's in a Name? -- Ronaldo Munck.
29. Kiran Ahluwalia Finds Our Aam Zameen -- Episode 328 of The Seen and the Unseen.
30. Facts Don't Matter. Stories do (2016) -- Amit Varma.
31. Barack Obama roasting Donald Trump.
32. A Life in Indian Politics — Episode 149 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Jayaprakash Narayan).
33. Radically Networked Societies — Episode 158 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Pranay Kotasthane).
34. Populism and Hindu Nationalism in India -- Ashutosh Varshney, Srikrishna Ayyangar and Siddharth Swaminathan.
35. The Logic of Social Science -- James Mahoney.
36. Ethnicity and Populist Mobilization -- Narendra Subramanian.
37. A Sixth Of Humanity: Independent India's Development Odyssey -- Devesh Kapur and Arvind Subramanian.
38. Raja Yoga -- Swami Vivekananda.
39. Evolution of Pragmatism in India, The: An Intellectual Biography of BR Ambedkar -- Scott Stroud.

This episode is sponsored by CTQ Compounds. Check out The Daily Reader and FutureStack. Use the code UNSEEN for Rs 2500 off.

Amit Varma, Shruti Rajagopalan and Pranay Kotasthane have just started a new YouTube Show called Watching the Wheels. You must watch it. You must! You simply must!! It's mast!!!

Amit Varma runs a course called Life Lessons, which aims to be a launchpad towards learning essential life skills all of you need. For more details, and to sign up, click here.

And have you read Amit's newsletter? It's madly active right now! Subscribe right away to The India Uncut Newsletter! It's free!

Also check out Amit's online course, The Art of Clear Writing.

Episode art: 'Rally' by Simahina.

The city and nature do not need to be at odds with each other; and dreamers can be doers. Harini Nagendra joins Amit Varma in episode 452 of The Seen and the Unseen to discuss her work in ecology, urban sustainability, detective fiction and the art of managing multitudes.

(FOR FULL LINKED SHOW NOTES, GO TO SEENUNSEEN.IN.)

Also check out:
1. Harini Nagendra at LinkedIn, Instagram, Twitter, Google Scholar, Amazon, Substack, Azim Premji University and her own website.
2. Cities and Canopies: Trees in Indian Cities -- Harini Nagendra & Seema Mundoli.
3. Shades of Blue: Connecting the Drops in India's Cities -- Harini Nagendra & Seema Mundoli.
4. Nature in the City -- Harini Nagendra.
5. The Bangalore Detectives Club -- Harini Nagendra.
6. Insights on linking forests, trees, and people from the air, on the ground, and in the laboratory -- Elinor Ostrom & Harini Nagendra.
7. Polycentric governance of multifunctional forested landscapes -- Harini Nagendra & Elinor Ostrom.
8. Tree diversity, distribution, history and change in urban parks: studies in Bangalore, India -- Harini Nagendra & Divya Gopal.
9. From Bangalore's Lakes to Detective Mysteries -- Harini Nagendra interviewed on the Expressions Podcast.
10. If a city forgets itself, what lies ahead? -- Harini Nagendra interviewed on From the Marginlands.
11. Thinking ecologically about our urban future -- A talk by Harini Nagendra.
12. Our Cities are Designed For Men, By Men -- Harini Nagendra & Amrita Sen.
13. Where Have All the Women Gone? -- Episode 1 of Watching the Wheels.
14. Safety First: Perceived Risk of Street Harassment and Educational Choices of Women — Girija Borker.
15. The Life and Music of Shubha Mudgal — Episode 426 of The Seen and the Unseen.
16. The Incredible Curiosities of Mukulika Banerjee — Episode 276 of The Seen and the Unseen.
17. The Life and Times of Mrinal Pande — Episode 263 of The Seen and the Unseen.
18. Elinor Ostrom at Wikipedia, Google Scholar and Econlib.
19. The Overcoat -- Nikolai Gogol.
20. The Age of the Partial Outsider — Janan Ganesh.
21. Earwitness to Place — Bernie Krause interviewed by Erin Robinsong.
22. What Our Genes and Phones Tell Us -- Episode 117 of Everything is Everything (on alternative data).
23. Silent Spring -- Rachel Carson.
24. Tragedy of the Commons -- Garrett Hardin.
25. The Logic of Collective Action -- Mancur Olson.
26. India Awakes -- The documentary presented by Johan Norberg about, among other things, the Forest Rights Act.
27. Barun Mitra, Philosopher and Practitioner — Episode 264 of The Seen and the Unseen.
28. The Hidden Life of Trees — Peter Wohlleben.
29. Ideas of India -- Shruti Rajagopalan's podcast.
30. Robin Hobb on Amazon.
31. Folktales From India -- Selected and edited by AK Ramanujan.
32. A Flowering Tree --And Other Oral Tales from India -- AK Ramanujan.
33. Mookajjiya Kanasugalu -- K Shivaram Karanth.

Amit Varma, Shruti Rajagopalan and Pranay Kotasthane have just started a new YouTube Show called Watching the Wheels. You must watch it. You must! You simply must!! It's mast!!!

Amit Varma runs a course called Life Lessons, which aims to be a launchpad towards learning essential life skills all of you need. For more details, and to sign up, click here.

And have you read Amit's newsletter? It's madly active right now! Subscribe right away to The India Uncut Newsletter! It's free!

Also check out Amit's online course, The Art of Clear Writing.

Episode art: 'My City' by Simahina.