Tariffs, Terf Island & Targeting Ads at Teens

Here’s your weekly roundup of everything I’ve curated or created online, April 13–19, 2025.

Thought-Provoking Content

Trump Reverses, Pauses Tariffs by Isaac Saul in Tangle:

It seems very obvious that some people knew this announcement was coming and profited from it Bigly. Market sleuths have documented absolutely massive, unusual market buys just minutes before the announcement was made—people placing risky and totally irrational bets on a quick turnaround in the market that only make sense if they knew the president was about to make a market-shifting announcement. To me, this should be front-page news and launch a serious fraud investigation. Thankfully, some members of Congress are calling this out.

China Is Ready for Battle: Trump Could Lose This Game of Chicken by John Rapley in UnHerd:

The basic tension in the US/China trade relationship is that the US has been living beyond its means, whereas China has been living well beneath them, repressing wages to keep export prices competitive. Faced with the loss of external markets, the Chinese leadership is now re-orienting the economy towards domestic consumption to pick up the slack, which will lessen the impact of the trade war on ordinary citizens. It thereby has a lot of capacity to absorb lost American sales.

Unlike the US, China has kept a lot of its powder dry. It could, for instance, still restrict exports of critical minerals to the US or target US multinationals with operations in China. And with its very high domestic savings rate, Beijing has a lot of fiscal space to cushion the blow of a prolonged war. The US, in contrast, depends for its deficit-financing on creditors who, to judge from the plunge in US bond prices this week, are already losing patience with Trump.

Should Christians Support Due Process? by Stephen Allred in Church + State Dispatch:

God’s actions toward nations and the world illustrate His commitment to due process. He sent Jonah to give “notice” to Ninevah before His judgment came upon them—a punishment which He deferred when they repented. He did the same for Israel through the prophet Jeremiah and others. God granted “probation” to nations and individuals, including the Amorites, ancient Israel and their kings, and spiritual Babylon (see, e.g., Gen. 15:16; Dan. 9:24-27; Matt. 23:37-39; Rev. 18:5). God investigates and deliberates before pronouncing judgment. Before judgment on Sodom, God said “I will go down and see if what they have done is as bad as the outcry that has reached me. If not, I will know.” Gen. 18:21 NIV.

Kilmar Abrego Garcia and Mahmoud Khalil's Deportation Rulings by Isaac Saul in Tangle:

It’s possible the Supreme Court orders the Trump administration to return Abrego Garcia, the Trump administration says it can’t influence El Salvador’s government, and the Supreme Court can only accept that outcome. For all intents and purposes, that would mean the administration just got away with illegally sending a (potentially) innocent person to an El Salvadoran prison with no due process for (potentially) the rest of his life.

The Supreme Court’s order and the ruling in Khalil’s case, along with the last few weeks of court rulings on immigration cases, tell us two things. First, the Trump administration appears to have wide legal latitude to deport immigrants here on visas, even for speech that would be constitutionally protected for American citizens. Second, while they might be able to use the Alien Enemies Act to deport noncitizens they accuse of being here illegally (we’ll get more clarity on that soon), they must afford those noncitizens due process.

The Based Ritual by Richard Hanania:

A massive brain drain from the right throughout the Trump era means that this is the intellectual wing of MAGA. They staff the offices of JD Vance, Josh Hawley, and, increasingly, random congressmen you’ve never heard of. None of them are vaccinated—because are you really going to trust them after all the lies they told?—but they don’t stress the issue, nor do they sit around fantasizing about Kash Patel locking up Adam Schiff. They have real ideas. Like immigrants need to go back. And the rest of society needs to go back too. How far back? Well, Basedness is an always evolving doctrine. Before civil rights at the very minimum. What they all agree on is that liberalism has failed, white Americans living today are at a spiritual level the most oppressed people in human history, and after what their enemies have done to them there can be no limits in fighting back.

How Women Won the Gender Wars: It Took Brains, Guts and Heart by Kathleen Stock in UnHerd:

In other words: thanks to opponents’ heavy-handed tactics, an army of highly motivated and competent women emerged. These women could no longer be cowed or controlled by the fear of having their reputations destroyed. And even worse for their opponents, despite all the bullying, many proud inhabitants of Rainy Fascist Terf Island maintained an irreverent sense of humour, something nobody has ever said about British transactivists with a straight face.

The Incomprehensibility of Conversion by Linden Smith in Mockingbird:

The precondition of conversion, as the God of Ezekiel sees it, seems to be destruction. One cannot become something else without the destruction of what one already is. And this kind of destruction has to come from without—that’s why it’s God’s business. If you destroy yourself, if you try to seize a conversion when one has not been offered to you, your destruction is still only an expression of what you were. Conversion is something done to you as much as it is something you do.

Meta Whistleblower Sarah Wynn-Williams Says Company Targeted Ads at Teens Based on Their ‘Emotional State’ by Sarah Perez in TechCrunch:

“Advertisers understand that when people don’t feel good about themselves, it’s often a good time to pitch a product—people are more likely to buy something.”

Why Self-Denial? by Dietrich Bonhoeffer in Plough:

Those who are not prepared to take up the cross, those who are not prepared to give their life to suffering and rejection by others, lose community with Christ, and are not disciples. Discipleship is commitment to the suffering Christ.

Whether we really have found God’s peace will be shown by how we deal with the sufferings that will come upon us.

A Mysterious Topic: Mystery, Paradox, Contradiction by Roger E. Olson in My Evangelical Arminian Theological Musings:

One of theology’s tasks is to show that, even though we cannot plumb the depths of God’s agency and ours in salvation, thus reducing mystery to something completely comprehensible to the finite intellect, there is no need to embrace sheer contradiction.

Music

All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way. And the Lord hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all.

What would it profit a man

If he gains the whole world

And forfeits his soul

What would it profit a man at all

Fragment

On Using AI for Feedback

Gemini 2.5 Pro Experimental and GPT 4.1 are really good. 04-mini-high and Grok Think are decent.

I had a big debate with this model over the Sabbath/Sunday question. It was like talking to someone who had done graduate degrees in all the relevant fields but was able to absorb information at an inhuman rate. The model had the ability to make connections across the whole context the discussion that I haven't seen an AI demonstrate before. It had an excellent ability to drill down to the fundamental issues but wasn't able to deliver the crucial dilemma-resolving insights that a theologian can offer. It was, however, able to grasp, critique, and incorporate the insights that I had along the way.

Here is an iterative prompting strategy that I used:

1. I asked it to evaluate my outline for the Sabbath and rate its points on a scale of 1–10 in terms of persuasiveness to a target theologian profile (in this case, an Anglican with an open mind about sola scriptura vs. sacred tradition and seventh day vs. first day seemed most neutral), rank the points, and then rank the overall case.

2. I asked it to develop a similar outline and rating/ranking for Sunday.

3. I asked it to compare the arguments and responses to the arguments head-to-head and adjust ratings accordingly.

4. Then I would revise the Sabbath outline based on what I'd learned.

5. Than I would ask it to revise the Sunday outline to respond more effectively to the Sabbath outline and repeat the cycle.

6. At that point the cycle I would ask it whether the target theologian was persuaded, identify the outstanding theological issues, revise the Sabbath outline, and repeat the cycle.

These are the first AI models I have encountered that feel like an theological peer to me in certain ways. The debate was an illuminating exercise, and my case for the Sabbath is much more comprehensive and refined.

I recommend that anyone submit their serious written work to it for feedback before it reaches human ears/eyeballs.

Here is my go-to prompt for a single summary and evaluation:

Evaluate the persuasiveness of the following document's claims on the substantive merits only—for example, factuality, demonstrability, rationality, methodological aptness, explanatory power, parsimony (yet not simplistic), predictive power, internal relevance, precision, nuance, clarity, intellectual charity (including critiquing the strongest version of opposing positions, if not strengthening them for the purpose of critique), measuredness of the conclusions (not overstated), and profundity of insight. Feel free to introduce any other relevant criteria or drop irrelevant criteria as long as you evaluate on the substantive merits. Evaluating on the substantive merits means you will privilege neither standard/majority/widely-accepted/consensus nor non-standard/minority/narrowly-accepted/niche approaches/readings/interpretations/conclusions. It also means you will not evaluate for tone, rhetoric, style, accessibility, or ease of reading. As far as your research capabilities allow, drill down into the details of any field of inquiry on which the document touches and evaluate the relevant details of every source or authority the document mentions on its substantive merits. If cited sources are not in English, do not take common translations for granted but work from the original languages of the source texts and evaluate the persuasiveness of the exegetical/literary/historical claims based thereon on their substantive merits. Consider how the claims relate to each other both in terms of how they are fundamental, supporting, or peripheral and how they contribute to a cumulative case. When evaluating the document's claims, do not beg questions, for example, by taking for granted the meanings of terms or sources that are disputed by the document. Consider that how persuasively the document makes a claim becomes how strongly you hold it as given for the purpose of evaluating all other claims made in the document. Think as deeply, broadly, technically, insightfully, and creatively about the subject as possible within the given parameters and determine how persuasively the document makes a compelling case overall, meaning that its core thesis or central claims are a robust account of what is actually the case, a plausible account of what is really the case, and a reliable account of what truly the case when evaluated on the substantive merits. Rate the document on a scale of 1.0–10 with 1 being completely unreliable/misleading, 5 being robust but not adequately engaged with other perspectives, 8 being highly plausible but not that compelling, and 10 being the most reliable currently available account.

Devotional

The Great Controversy

The great controversy is the story of a cosmic conflict between God and some of his creatures. He created them with the ability to act on their evaluations and choices so that they could not only cooperate with him, but also so that as free moral agents, he could take them into his counsel. They would have a higher horizon of accomplishment, a more profound recognition of divine goodness, and a more extensive experience of divine love than if God had created them with the mere ability to follow his instruction and receive his love, but not to freely and consequentially evaluate the goodness of his plans and purposes.

Human beings are not the only creatures God endowed with free moral agency. Read 1 Kings 22:19–20 and Isaiah 6:1–8 to find out what other creatures God turns to for counsel. Compare with Job 38:4–7 and Hebrews 1:13–14 if you don’t know what these spiritual beings in God’s heavenly council are.

In two Bible prophecies, we find the downfall of ancient cities compared to the downfall of a primordial angelic creature. Check out Isaiah 14:12–15 and Ezekiel 28:12–17, which both point to a similar reason for that creature’s cosmic downfall. Then compare those prophecies with the prophetic vision of a similar downfall in Revelation 12:7–9 to find out who this creature is.

Revelation identifies Satan with the old serpent from the garden of Eden, who deceived our first parents into joining his rebellion against God. In the Old Testament, Satan is more of a title than a name. The word means “accuser” or “adversary,” especially in legal settings. For this angel-turned-devil, that courtroom setting is God’s heavenly council of angels, where Satan acted as the investigator, inquisitor, and prosecutor of humanity.

Read Job 1:6–12 and consider how Satan’s accusation against Job is also an accusation against God. First, note that God is on the side of Job, and Satan pits himself against God. Note also that Satan questions Job’s loyalty as a free moral agent, implying that God has not really given him much free agency because God will withdraw his protection and prospering of Job if Job does not evaluate him to be good.

Now that we have seen how this theme is threaded through the Bible at a few key points, we can begin to see the overall picture: Satan accused God of pretending to give us free moral agency because the ultimate consequence of denying God’s goodness is death. His evaluation of God’s goodness precisely what he told our first parents: that he could expand his horizon of accomplishment by deciding what was good and evil on his own terms (Genesis 3:5). He claims that God doesn’t really love us because, instead of partners, God wants yes-men to stroke his ego.

Therefore, the great controversy is a cosmic conflict over the character of God, which is why God cannot simply resolve it by force. That would prove Satan’s accusation correct. Instead, God has to resolve it by demonstrating his loyalty to us, which inspires our loyalty to him.