海角大神

Very quickly, Justin Wolfers realized that his tweet had not gone according to plan. Earlier this month, the economist had meant to say that good sociologists are needed to better shape vital policy discussions. Instead, he鈥檇 basically called them all lazy.

It鈥檚 what happened next, however, that makes this a story worth sharing.

Some people responded with 鈥済leeful outrage.鈥� This had the effect of hardening his resolve and didn鈥檛 persuade him, Mr. Wolfers added in a later tweet. Some, however, pushed him to do better, asking if he understood how his words hurt causes and people he cared about. It was the latter group, he said, who convinced him he was wrong.

Not only that, . 鈥淚t鈥檒l shape how I try to win arguments,鈥� he said, adding that a friend 鈥渟ays to treat people with love, even when they鈥檙e wrong.鈥�

One of the of the 20th century is that nonviolence works far better than violence. Mr. Wolfers鈥� aborted Twitter war suggests we can marinate in that lesson even more deeply. Democratic institutions the world over are doing an admirable job of driving down levels of physical violence. But toxic discourse on social media and in politics suggests a next frontier for progress might be in finding ways to practice nonviolence not only in action, but in thought and speech.

Now, here are our five stories for today. We examine why politics struggles to deal with the gray areas of ethics, how the Texas Legislature is debating conservatism鈥檚 course ahead, and whether it鈥檚 right to save an iconic tree from extinction.