Episode #16: Alex Merose on Convenience Store Woman

Alex Merose extols the virtues of lazy action and calls on us to embrace Duchamp into our hearts through discussion of Sayaka Murata's Convenience Store Woman and Maurizio Lazzarato's essay "Marcel Duchamp and the Refusal of Work." We explore themes of conformity, work, resistance, lazy action, and whether or not Duchamp was right that "language was a mistake."Shout out to Maxime Lenormand for production assistance.Many show notes!Alex Merose's websiteConvenience Store Woman by Sayaka MurataMarcel Duchamp and the Refusal of Work by Maurizio LazzaratoCoffee Mill - Marcel Duchamp's 1911 painting at the TateBaudrillard's Simulacra and SimulationVaporwaveHeraclitus the obscureDavid Reich on the Dwarkesh Podcast - discussing genetics and human history, including some theories about the emergence of languageIf on a winter's night a travelerOpening keynote from CNG Conference 2025Many thanks to Alex for sending these references:How Food Played a Role in the Rise of PatriarchyNagarjuna (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)Alex's photos of Art by and inspired by Marcel Duchamp from the National Museum for Modern and Contemporary Art in SeoulAlex's photos of Duchamp's works mentioned in the Lazzarato paper from the Museum of Modern Art in NYC - Work: A Deep History by James SuzmanWork podcast on Spotify If you enjoyed this, please share it.Produced by Jed Sundwall. Write to jed at techsontexts.net with feedback and suggestions for books or guests.Intro music by Secret School.Outro music is "3/10th of the Population" by WE™.Please donate to Radiant Earth.