Knowing Everything There Is To Know

Giovanni Pico della Mirandola, a 15th-century Italian scholar, wanted to know everything there was to know. Nobody in the 21st century could entertain such a hope, except if he really knew nothing about the world. Are we lucky enough to have an American exception under our eyes? (On Pico, see Henri de Lubac, Pic de la Mirandole, Paris, 1974.)

In a social media post supporting the demand of a trade union (the International Longshoremen Association or ILA) to block automation at East Coast and Gulf Coast ports...