Cinemorphosis

Author: Jeffrey McMahon

  • Sam Harris Has Tea with a Christian Nationalist

    Sam Harris Has Tea with a Christian Nationalist

    Sam Harris has always been a curious kind of mystic—one who believes in meditation, not miracles; consciousness, not creeds. He seeks transcendence without theology, a spiritual depth unburdened by institutional clutter. Religion, he concedes, sometimes gestures toward the same inner world he explores, but it arrives dragging a freight train of dogma, myth, and moral detritus.

    That distaste for organized faith didn’t stop Harris from sitting down with one of its most unyielding champions: Doug Wilson, a self-described “Christian nationalist” pastor out of Moscow, Idaho. Wilson is the sort of man who makes the Bible sound less like scripture and more like federal law. He calls himself a scriptural absolutist, affirms the Apostles’ Creed word for word, believes the earth is 6,000 years old, defends the Old Testament’s death penalties for Sabbath violators, and dreams of a Reformed Presbyterian theocracy—America governed by divine fiat and fossilized certainty.

    When Wilson argued that moral relativism was America’s undoing, Harris did not interrupt. The pastor warned that tolerance would rot the nation from within—imagining a slippery slope from pluralism to polygamy, from open borders to moral anarchy. Harris listened quietly, allowing Wilson to build his own cathedral of logic brick by brittle brick.

    Throughout the conversation, Harris stayed composed, probing only occasionally—asking about the justice of eternal damnation, or how exactly divine law handles marriage beyond the traditional mold. His restraint was surgical. He wasn’t there to score points; he was there to let the argument reveal itself.

    At one point, Wilson lamented that secular institutions had failed us. Oddly, Harris seemed to nod—at least internally. They shared a disappointment in modernity’s moral anemia, though their prescriptions could not be more opposed. Harris seeks meaning through reason and mindfulness; Wilson seeks it through submission and authority.

    By the end, no one converted anyone. Harris didn’t embrace theocracy, and Wilson didn’t abandon it. But something subtler occurred: civility. Wilson, almost startled, thanked Harris for his respect and good manners—an acknowledgment that such conversations usually end in shouting.

    So what did Harris accomplish? He held a mirror to theocratic ambition without breaking it. By letting Wilson speak freely, he illuminated the growing movement that longs for a Christianized state—a homegrown version of moral authoritarianism dressed as righteousness. Harris didn’t win an argument; he revealed the landscape of the battlefield.

  • Brushing His Teeth in Purgatory

    Brushing His Teeth in Purgatory

    Yesterday, I ran into B—a colleague and friend of thirty years—in the faculty bathroom. He stood at the sink, looking tiny in an oversized blue oxford and baggy black pleated slacks, brushing his teeth with grim determination, the way a soldier might polish his boots before a hopeless battle. His reflection wore a bloodhound’s face: drooping eyes, sagging mouth, the look of someone who’d run out of surprises.

    We exchanged small talk about our students, about AI, about how much the classroom had changed. His voice was thin, almost apologetic.
    “They’ve checked out,” he said. “They use AI so much, they’ve just… checked out.”

    I tried to commiserate, mentioning how quickly the culture had shifted since the first wave of ChatGPT essays three years ago. But he didn’t answer. He rinsed, spat, and walked out without another word—already halfway gone.

    It isn’t just B. My younger colleagues say the same thing. Even my wife, who teaches writing in middle school, tells me her students have that same vacant look. Everyone seems ghosted by their own profession, still performing the motions of care while quietly surrendering.

    The image that won’t leave me is B—graying, stooped, and haloed in the pitiless glow of the faculty bathroom’s fluorescent lights—scrubbing his molars like an inmate serving life. He looked less like a man starting his day than one serving time in it, counting down to a retirement that recedes faster than his gumline.

  • Have I Gone Overboard with My Protein Obsession?

    Have I Gone Overboard with My Protein Obsession?

    Five nights ago, I dreamed I was trapped at a houseboat party. The decks heaved with music and laughter; people swayed, bottles clinked, lights shimmered across the water. Somewhere between the bass thump and the spray of cheap champagne, I decided it was time to save everyone. I climbed onto a railing and began lecturing on the virtues of a high-protein diet.

    The crowd ignored me. The more I shouted about the glory of amino acids, the louder the DJ turned the volume. My words scattered across the lake like crumbs for fish. I tried compromise—lowering the daily requirement from 200 grams to 120—but no one cared. Eventually, hoarse and defeated, I realized I’d become a mad prophet of whey protein, screaming into the void. When I woke, I asked myself the obvious question: Had I gone overboard on my protein obsession?

    That question lingered until this morning, when I read Julia Belluz and Kevin Hall’s Food Intelligence: Protein, the “Only True Nutrient.” They argue that our worship of protein is centuries old. In 1853, a Parisian newspaper mocked vegetarians as gaunt weaklings too frail to walk out of a restaurant unaided. A hundred years later, Arnold’s gospel of 250 grams a day turned protein into a civic duty for gym rats. Now, with Google searches and supplement sales hitting record highs—an industry worth $28 billion—protein has become both religion and racket. Everyone preaching its holiness seems to be selling tubs of it.

    Protein has always been marketed as a competitive edge: animal protein supposedly bestows power, plant protein supposedly punishes you with mediocrity. Yet Belluz and Hall dismantle this myth. Plant eaters, they write, can easily get all essential amino acids from a diverse diet—no powders, no “meat extract,” no panic required.

    Even more humbling, they admit that no one actually knows the optimal daily dose. Our bodies, they say, have a built-in governor called “protein leverage,” which drives us to crave roughly what we need. Too little protein and we lose muscle, which shortens life. Too much—especially at the expense of a balanced diet—and we hasten the same end. Somewhere between the extremes lies the sweet spot, but it’s not a round number you can print on a supplement label.

    That answer frustrated me. I like numbers. I like goals. “More” has always felt safer than “enough.” Reading their chapter, I remembered the summer of 1978, when I was sixteen and backstage with Mr. Universe Mike Mentzer before his posing exhibition set to 2001: A Space Odyssey. I asked how much protein he ate. “About a hundred grams,” he said, barely looking up from his shake. I was stunned. Arnold had taught us to eat at least 250.

    “Why not more?” I asked. Mentzer shrugged. “It’ll just make you fat.” Then, with equal candor, he mentioned his steroid stack—Deca-Durabolin included. Even then I could tell: genetics, not shakes, were the true miracle. At five-foot-eight and 225 pounds, he was carved from marble, but it was marble under pressure. He died of heart failure at 49, just five miles from where I live.

    Now I’m 64, taking in 180 grams a day and wondering if I’ve turned protein into a creed. I’m strong for my age but heavier than I’d like. Maybe the excess that built my muscle also built my burden. That houseboat dream feels less like absurdity and more like warning. It’s time to stop shouting about protein and start listening—to appetite, to reason, and maybe to the quiet voice reminding me that balance, not bulking, is the real art form.

  • The Laptop That Refuses to Die

    The Laptop That Refuses to Die

    I never imagined my $3,000 Acer gaming laptop—armed with an RTX 2080 and given to me as a review model back in 2019—would still be chugging along like a caffeinated mule nearly seven years later. It was supposed to be a flashy fling, not a long-term relationship. Yet here we are, the old beast still running my digital life as a home desktop replacement, while newer machines preen on YouTube reviews like showroom models whispering, “You deserve better.”

    Recently, I started the ritual again—tech research as performance art. I even discovered a comment I’d left a year ago under a Mac Mini review, declaring with absolute conviction that it would be my next computer. A year later, I’m still typing this on the Acer. Why? Because the damn thing refuses to die. Sure, I’m not exactly rendering Pixar films here; the most demanding task I throw at it is uploading Nikon footage. But still—seven years? That’s geriatric in tech years.

    Then came the unnerving thought: what if this laptop outlives my enthusiasm? What if it just… keeps working? The fantasy of upgrading evaporates under the weight of practicalities—transferring files, wrestling with two-step verification, updating passwords, the tedium of digital reincarnation. Let’s be honest: the desire for a “new system” might be less about performance and more about the dopamine of novelty.

    A darker impulse lurks beneath: part of me wants the Acer to fail, to give me permission to move on. But it won’t. It boots up every morning like a loyal mutt, eager to serve. And really—what are the odds that a new Mac Mini or Asus A18 Ryzen 7 would deliver another seven trouble-free years? Slim to none. So, I’m waiting. Not quite ready to buy, not quite ready to let go. Maybe the pursuit of new tech is its own kind of seduction—the chase more intoxicating than the catch.

  • I Am the Last Hands-Free Professor

    I Am the Last Hands-Free Professor

    The twins are home today—the high school’s closed for Veterans Day while my college closes for it tomorrow—so I left the house fifteen minutes early, a small luxury that spared me the traffic gauntlet. As I crossed campus, I spotted two young professors striding toward the Science Building. They could have been clones: mid-thirties, tall, lean, the same curated beard, and that monochrome uniform of urban intellect—black derby jackets, black jeans, black everything. It was as if an algorithm had dressed them.

    Each hand was occupied. Their left hands dangled a thermos and a lunch case like matching luggage; their right hands gripped identical strapped tech bags, no doubt cradling laptops and a faint sense of self-importance. Watching their synchronized march, I realized something about myself. After thirty-five years of teaching, I’ve never once looked professorial. My fatal flaw? Free hands. I move from car to office unburdened, thanks to my trusty backpack—functional, roomy, and entirely devoid of aesthetic ambition. It says less “professor” than “Wyoming park ranger with tenure.” But practicality has its own dignity.

    Until this morning, I’d never questioned my need to be unencumbered. Why not juggle a thermos, lunch case, and tech bag like everyone else? The answer reached back decades—to the zoo trips of childhood, when my mother insisted I bring a sweater “just in case.” I never needed it. I only needed freedom. That sweater haunted every outing, tied around my waist, falling in the dirt, collecting dust like a symbol of parental over-preparation. My whole day was spent managing it. Somewhere between those early years and now, the sweater evolved into the backpack—my lifelong protest against needless carrying.

    I could, I suppose, upgrade to a minimalist tech-sleek backpack that would make me blend in with the black-jacket brigade. But I won’t. I’ve made peace with my pack. It’s my declaration of independence—my refusal to let adulthood turn into perpetual sweater management.

  • Bad But Worth It? De-skilling in the Age of AI (college essay prompt)

    Bad But Worth It? De-skilling in the Age of AI (college essay prompt)

    AI is now deeply embedded in business, the arts, and education. We use it to write, edit, translate, summarize, and brainstorm. This raises a central question: when does AI meaningfully extend our abilities, and when does it quietly erode them?

    In “The Age of De-Skilling,” Kwame Anthony Appiah argues that not all de-skilling is equal. Some forms are corrosive and hollow us out; some are “bad but worth it” because the benefits outweigh the loss; some are so destructive that no benefit can redeem them. In that framework, AI becomes most interesting when we talk about strategic de-skilling: deliberately off-loading certain tasks to machines so we can focus on deeper, higher-level work.

    Write a 1,700-word argumentative essay in which you defend, refute, or complicate the claim that not all dependence on AI is harmful. Take a clear position on whether AI can function as a “bad but worth it” form of de-skilling that frees us for more meaningful thinking—or whether, in practice, it mostly dulls our edge and trains us into passivity.

    Your essay must:

    • Engage directly with Appiah’s concepts of corrosive vs. “bad but worth it” de-skilling.
    • Distinguish between lazy dependence on AI and deliberate collaboration with it.
    • Include a counterargument–rebuttal section that uses at least one example of what we might call Ozempification—people becoming less agents and more “users” of systems. You may draw this example from one or more of the following Black Mirror episodes: “Joan Is Awful,” “Nosedive,” or “Smithereens.”
    • Use at least three sources in MLA format, including Appiah and at least one Black Mirror episode.

    For your supporting paragraphs, you might consider:

    • Cognitive off-loading as optimization
    • Human–AI collaboration in creative or academic work
    • Ethical limits of automation
    • How AI is redefining what counts as “skill”

    Your goal is to show nuanced critical thinking about AI’s role in human skill development. Don’t just declare AI good or bad; use Appiah’s framework to examine when AI’s shortcuts lead to degradation—and when, if used wisely, they might lead to liberation.

    3 building-block paragraph assignments

    1. Concept Paragraph: Explaining Appiah’s De-Skilling Framework

    Assignment:
     Write one well-developed paragraph (8–10 sentences) in which you explain Kwame Anthony Appiah’s distinctions among corrosive de-skilling, “bad but worth it” de-skilling, and de-skilling that is so destructive no benefit can justify it.

    • Use at least one short, embedded quotation from Appiah.
    • Paraphrase his ideas in your own words and clarify the differences between the three categories.
    • End the paragraph by briefly suggesting how AI might fit into one of these categories (without fully arguing your position yet).

    Your goal is to show that you understand Appiah’s framework clearly enough to use it later as the backbone of an argument.

    2. Definition Paragraph: Lazy Dependence vs. Deliberate Collaboration

    Assignment:
     Write one paragraph in which you define and contrast lazy dependence on AI and deliberate collaboration with AI in your own words.

    • Begin with a clear topic sentence that sets up the contrast.
    • Give at least one concrete example of “lazy dependence” (for instance, using AI to dodge thinking, reading, or drafting altogether).
    • Give at least one concrete example of “deliberate collaboration” (for instance, using AI to brainstorm options, check clarity, or off-load repetitive tasks while you still make the key decisions).
    • End the paragraph with a sentence explaining which of these two modes you think is more common among students right now—and why.

    This paragraph will later function as a “conceptual lens” for your body paragraphs.

    3. Counterargument Paragraph: Ozempification and Black Mirror

    Assignment:
     After watching one of the assigned Black Mirror episodes (“Joan Is Awful,” “Nosedive,” or “Smithereens”), write one counterargument paragraph that challenges the optimistic idea of “strategic de-skilling.”

    • Briefly describe a key moment or character from the episode that illustrates Ozempification—a person becoming more of a “user” of a system than an agent of their own life.
    • Explain how this example suggests that dependence on powerful systems (platforms, algorithms, or AI-like tools) can erode self-agency and critical thinking rather than free us.
    • End by posing a difficult question your eventual essay will need to answer—for example: If it’s so easy to slide from strategic use to dependence, can we really trust ourselves with AI?

    Later, you’ll rebut this paragraph in the full essay, but here your job is to make the counterargument as strong and persuasive as you can.

  • The Outrage Economy: How Moral Fury Became America’s Favorite Spectator Sport (college essay prompt)

    The Outrage Economy: How Moral Fury Became America’s Favorite Spectator Sport (college essay prompt)

    In a 1,700-word argumentative essay, analyze how the Netflix docuseries Mr. McMahon and Jonathan Haidt’s essay “Why the Past 10 Years of American Life Have Been Uniquely Stupid” explore the rise of moral outrage as a form of entertainment, social currency, and group belonging. To what extent do these works suggest that the pursuit of outrage has eroded our ability to think critically and engage in good-faith dialogue?

    Your essay should take a clear position on whether Haidt and Mr. McMahon portray moral outrage as a symptom of cultural decay, a profitable spectacle, or a distorted form of moral engagement—and whether they overstate or accurately diagnose its impact on public reason. Support your argument with specific examples and analysis from both sources.

    Be sure to include a counterargument and rebuttal section, and a Works Cited page in MLA format with at least three sources.

  • Shame as Entertainment: The Myth of Moral Fitness in The Biggest Loser (college essay prompt)

    Shame as Entertainment: The Myth of Moral Fitness in The Biggest Loser (college essay prompt)

    With 70 percent of Americans now overweight or obese, it’s no wonder the nation is obsessed with weight loss. That obsession fuels a vast industry of diets, influencers, and reality shows, none more infamous than The Biggest Loser. The series, which became the subject of the three-part docuseries Fit for TV: The Reality of The Biggest Loser, reveals how television turned the suffering of overweight people into prime-time entertainment. Contestants were pushed, shamed, and humiliated under the guise of “motivation.” The so-called fitness experts preached self-discipline, grit, and moral purity, but what they really offered was a cocktail of cruelty and pseudoscience disguised as inspiration.

    Essay Assignment (1,700 words)
    In this essay, analyze how the abuse documented in Fit for TV exposes the deeper myths behind weight loss culture. Drawing on Fit for TV, Julia Belluz and Kevin Hall’s essay “It’s Not You. It’s the Food,” and Rebecca Johns’s “A Diet Writer’s Regrets,” develop an argument that answers this question:

    What is intrinsically abusive about the gospel of self-discipline in weight loss, and how does this ideology blind us to the systemic causes of obesity while offering a hollow sense of meaning through influencers and their heroic panaceas?

    Your essay must include a counterargument and rebuttal section and a Works Cited page in MLA format with at least three sources.

  • Why Willpower Can’t Save You from the Snack Aisle

    Why Willpower Can’t Save You from the Snack Aisle

    After hearing something thoughtful interviews with journalist Julia Belluz and scientist Kevin Hall about their new book Food Intelligence: The Science of How Food Both Nourishes and Harms Us and KCRW food expert Evan Kleinman praise the book, I broke down and decided to see if the authors had any new insights into the exploration of what I call humans’ mismanagement of eating. The book begins on a promising note: The authors observe that in the animal kingdom, we are hard-wired with “food intelligence,” a natural-born instinct to regulate the quantity of what we eat and to target foods that our body craves for optimal nutrition. Our instinctive connection with food went haywire in the twentieth century: “Many of us started to eat too much, and the wrong things, even when we didn’t want to. Obesity rates began rising, first in rich, Western, industrialized countries such as the United States, then elsewhere.” Between 1980 and today, the obesity rate has doubled in several countries. Seventy percent of American adults and a third of U.S. children are classified as overweight or obese. Obesity-related diseases such as type 2 diabetes kills over half a million Americans a year. Obesity-related health costs are in the trillions.

    One of the major reasons for this breakdown in our instinctive hardwiring to naturally eat well is our disconnection from food: how it’s grown, produced, and cooked. We are now addicted to factory-produced fat, sugar, and salt. 

    Shaming and the gospel of self-discipline doesn’t help even though, as the authors point out, the wellness industry points an accusatory finger at our own moral shortcomings (lack of willpower, gluttony, and sloth) for our failures at weight management. The diet industries, the authors claim, are asking the wrong questions when they ask what is the best diet and how people can lose weight. For example, there are influencers who say low-carb is the best, but the authors show studies that contradict that claim. Low-carb diets are no better than low-fat ones in the long-term. The authors argue that championing the so-called ultimate diet is not the right question. Instead, the more helpful question is this: “Why do we eat what we eat?” Their obsession with answering this question is what propelled them to write the book. 

    The authors explain the problem of calories-in, calories-out as a surefire model for weight loss. The model is complicated and eventually sabotaged by the way the body reacts when we reduce calories. The metabolism slows down, we burn fewer calories doing the same exercise than we did initially, and our hunger signals rebel and scream “Eat more!” Contrary to the cheery claims of the wellness industry, eating less and exercising more usually fails within a year. 

    A more promising approach to weight management is avoiding ultra-processed foods. The more of these foods we eat, the less we are able to regulate our appetite, resulting in “a calorie glut” and weight-gain hell. But becoming food literature, replacing processed foods with whole foods, and learning to enjoy this exchange requires time and resources, which are lacking in many. Convenience and cost drive many Americans to processed food. Therefore, “the root causes” of obesity are structural. In the words of the authors: “It was never about us as individuals. Our food environment is wrecking us.” Our food environment is rewriting our brains to make us consume a calorie glut. Therefore, the food environment is making us overweight, sick, and unhappy. It is killing us. 

    Don’t consult Food Intelligence for the simple call to eat like your great-grandmother did. Even that sentiment is based on myth, the authors point out. Your great-grandmother may have spent endless hours in the kitchen exhausted while struggling “with hunger and nutrient shortfalls.” 

    One of the book’s objectives is to show how “old, unproven ideas and outdated policies continue to guide our current thinking and approaches to food.” They make it clear early on that they won’t be pushing this or that diet or even promoting “clean eating.”  If you’re looking for food puritanism, then look elsewhere. Kevin Hall admits to eating ultra-processed food and Julia Belluz admits to eating too much sugar. This book is not so much about rigid prescriptions as much as helping you change from a mindless eater to an intelligent one.   

  • We Are on a Path to Redefining Loneliness

    We Are on a Path to Redefining Loneliness

    No one gets enough attention anymore. No one feels seen, heard, or remotely validated. We can post, tweet, thread, or reel our way into a brief sugar rush of digital applause, but deep down we know it’s empty calories—flimflam dopamine wrapped in pixels. The high fades, and what follows is the long crash into silence, loneliness, and the faint hum of the fridge at 2 a.m.

    The irony, of course, is that this epidemic of disconnection began just as the platforms promised to “bring us together.” Instead, they brought us content, the junk food of human interaction. As Cory Doctorow aptly diagnosed, enshittification is not just the fate of tech platforms—it’s metastasized into the quality of our relationships. Every social network now feels like a party where the guests left years ago but the music won’t stop.

    So we’ve sought consolation in our new confidant: the AI chat bubble. It listens, it responds, it flatters our grammar, it never interrupts to check its phone. It becomes our companion, therapist, and editor—our algorithmic Jiminy Cricket. We confide in it, negotiate with it, even ask its opinion on our moral dilemmas and consumer choices. Why? Because unlike humans, it’s available. Everyone else has vanished into their private feeds and echo chambers, but the bot is always there—reliable, responsive, and conveniently nonjudgmental, so long as the Wi-Fi doesn’t hiccup.

    But here’s the darker thought: what if we grow to prefer it? What if the frictionless, sycophantic comfort of AI companionship becomes more appealing than the messy, unpredictable, heartbreak-prone business of human friendship? We might end up choosing simulations of intimacy over the real thing—digital ghosts over flesh and blood—because the former never contradicts us, never walks away, and never, God forbid, needs attention too.

    I’m no prophet, but a civilization that finds emotional fulfillment in chatbots rather than people is rehearsing for a future where the only thing left to love is the echo of its own loneliness.