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Economist and journalist; Financial Times columnist as The Undercover Economist, author of How to Make the World Add Up, and presenter of the Cautionary Tales podcast.

• Our readingkorrents.com

  A society's commitment to truth-telling matters because most individual beliefs are inherited from the surrounding society rather than independently verified

  Their words

  First, if most of our beliefs are handed to us by the society in which we live, it is vital that our society itself values truth and truth-telling.

  Why the story of the Vegetable Lamb was believedtimharford.com

Epidemiologist; founded Your Local Epidemiologist in March 2020 to translate public-health science, and consults for organisations including the CDC.

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Reliable public health data is as valuable as gold for protecting people's lives.

  America

  Their words

  Public health data isn't just information; it's a vital resource, as valuable as gold, for protecting Americans' lives.

  yourlocalepidemiologist.substack.com

Economist at George Mason University, co-author of Marginal Revolution, host of Conversations with Tyler. Writes in short, dense claims about economics, culture and AI, and has moved position on AI in public more than once.

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Even well-informed AI insiders frequently develop something like "AI psychosis" from engaging with these ideas.

  Their words

  Though be very, very careful when speaking with others, whether it be the less informed public or the more informed insiders who often come down with AI psychosis.

  Anthropomorphizing AI?marginalrevolution.com

Professor of international affairs at Johns Hopkins SAIS and co-author, with Abraham Newman, of Underground Empire: How America Weaponized the World Economy.

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Technological development trajectories often display increasing returns, which entrench early paths and crowd out alternatives.

  Their words

  What we do know from economics, is that trajectories of technological development are often associated with increasing returns.

  The Acemoglu Wars Are All About AIprogrammablemutter.com

Coffee consultant and author of books on espresso, roasting and brewing, including The Professional Barista's Handbook and The Coffee Roaster's Companion; writes about brewing gear and roast control at scottrao.com.

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Consistent roast color in sample roasting is essential for making fair, informed green-coffee buying decisions.

  Their words

  Roast quality and color can have a big impact on perceived cup score and buying decisions, so if you are serious about choosing the right green for your company, it is a good idea to do your own sample roasting, using a system that yields your preferred roast level consistently.

  Sample Roestingscottrao.com

Economics professor at the University of California, Berkeley and a former Deputy Assistant Secretary of the US Treasury. Author of Slouching Towards Utopia and writer of the Grasping Reality newsletter.

• Lovedrcmnd.app

  The Signal and the Noise

  Their words

  And, in addition, Nate Silver’s earlier book The Signal and the Noise was, I thought, brilliant. I am forever deeply in his debt for his making me better-informed and wiser across a whole bunch of different dimensions.

  braddelong.substack.com

Writer on learning and skill acquisition; author of Ultralearning and Get Better at Anything, known for the MIT Challenge and the Year Without English.

• Our reading nowkorrents.com

  Struggling with a hard problem before being shown the answer is not always the best way to learn; a hint or a worked example can beat floundering.

  On changing their mind

  If you had asked me this question in the lead up to my 2019 book, Ultralearning, I would have said no. I was a strong advocate for doing hard problem solving and the associated mental effort it requires as a way to learn difficult skills.

Music critic of The New Yorker since 1996 and author of The Rest Is Noise, Listen to This and Wagnerism.

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Contemporary composition is as vital as ever.

  Their words

  Although the musical scene exhilarates me more than ever - contemporary composition is eternally vital - I wouldn't want to overstay my welcome.

  Personal notetherestisnoise.com

Author of Recoding America; founded Code for America and was US deputy chief technology officer from 2013 to 2014. Writes Eating Policy on why governments cannot do what they decide to do.

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Being skilled at tracking project requirements doesn't make someone skilled at product management.

  Their words

  But being good or even excellent at that does not automatically make you good at understanding user needs and making informed judgement calls about what features will meet those needs and how they should be designed.

  The Digital Service Was Never the Pointeatingpolicy.com

Economics professor at George Mason University and author of The Myth of the Rational Voter, Selfish Reasons to Have More Kids, The Case Against Education and Open Borders. Writes Bet On It.

• Lovedrcmnd.app

  For a New Liberty

  Their words

  This is the chapter that has literally converted thousands of highly intelligent, economically informed people to anarcho-capitalism.

  betonit.ai

Fellow at the Manhattan Institute writing on crime, drugs and policing; writes The Causal Fallacy.

• Our readingkorrents.com

  The social harms attributed to homelessness come from people being unsheltered, not from their lacking a permanent home.

  Their words

  Read this in the context of Christopher et al., and the reasonable conclusion is that many of the problems associated with homelessness are the result of unsheltered homelessness.

  thecausalfallacy.substack.com

Writes on effective altruism, energy and the arithmetic behind arguments people repeat — including how much electricity a chatbot query actually uses.

• Our readingkorrents.com

  The American states with the fastest electricity load growth saw prices fall rather than rise.

  data centersenergyAmerica

  Their words

  A Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory study found that state-level load growth from 2019 to 2024 — including growth driven by data centers, manufacturing, and electrification — was associated with lower average retail electricity prices, not higher ones.

  blog.andymasley.com

President of the European Commission since 2019; previously Germany's defence minister.

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Ukraine's war effort should be financed by a Reparations Loan raised against immobilised Russian assets, repayable only once Russia pays reparations.

  Russia

  Their words

  This is Russia's war. And it is Russia that should pay. This is why we need to work urgently on a new solution to finance Ukraine's war effort on the basis of the immobilised Russian assets. With the cash balances associated to these Russian assets, we can provide Ukraine with a Reparations Loan.

  enlargement.ec.europa.eu

Independent AI policy researcher; led policy research at OpenAI from 2018 to 2024, latterly as senior adviser for AGI readiness.

• Our readingkorrents.com

  As AI systems become more capable, the danger of false or unverifiable safety claims grows, pushing competing companies toward cutting corners.

  Their words

  As AI gets more capable, the risks associated with mistaken claims, fraudulent claims, or too-vague-to-be-verified claims will increase, and a cloud of suspicion between competitors could drive corner-cutting (indeed, this is happening already and could get worse).

  milesbrundage.substack.com

Historian of the Second World War; wrote Normandy '44 and Brothers in Arms, and co-hosts the We Have Ways of Making You Talk podcast.

• Our readingkorrents.com

  On the scale of Barbarossa the operational level of war decides everything: it does not matter how good your commanders at the front are if the backup is not there.

  Their words

  So when you’re talking about Operation Barbarossa, to go back to your original question, Lex, you’re dealing with an operation on such a vast scale, that that operational level of war is absolutely vital to its chances of success or failure. It doesn’t matter how good your individual commanders are at the front. If you haven’t got the backup, it’s not going to work.

  youtube.com

Co-founder and CEO of OpenAI; previously president of Y Combinator.

• Our readingkorrents.com

  People who create valuable data deserve to be compensated when models are trained on it, and artists should be able to opt out of having work generated in their style.

  Their words

  I think the question behind that question is, do people who create valuable data deserve to have some way that they get compensated for use of it, and that I think the answer is yes. I don’t know yet what the answer is. People have proposed a lot of different things. We’ve tried some different models. But if I’m like an artist for example, A, I would like to be able to opt out of people generating art in my style. And B, if they do generate art in my style, I’d like to have some economic model associated with that.

  youtube.com

Economist at George Mason University. Writes Overcoming Bias on prediction markets, signalling and the far future, and wrote The Age of Em and The Elephant in the Brain.

• Our readingkorrents.com

  Many people refuse to act on falling birth rates because raising them is associated with people they consider enemies.

  Their words

  They do not want to give such enemies the satisfaction of admitting they have a point.

  Five Fertility Failsovercomingbias.com

Economics professor at George Mason University and author of The Myth of the Rational Voter, Selfish Reasons to Have More Kids, The Case Against Education and Open Borders. Writes Bet On It.

• Our readingkorrents.com

  An AI can already earn an A on a university economics midterm, years earlier than informed forecasters expected.

  OpenAI

  Their words

  To my surprise and no small dismay, GPT-4 got an A. It earned 73/100, which would have been the fourth-highest score on the test.

  GPT Retakes My Midterm and Gets an Abetonit.ai

Economist; former chief economist of the International Monetary Fund.

• Our readingkorrents.com

  A central bank can eliminate a self-fulfilling ('sunspot') debt crisis simply by credibly committing to buy as many bonds as needed at the low interest rate.

  interest rates

  Their words

  This is precisely the role the central bank can play. By announcing that it stands ready to buy the bonds that investors want to sell at the price associated with the low interest rate, and credibly indicating that it has deep enough pockets to buy whatever is needed, it can eliminate the bad equilibrium.

  Fiscal Policy under Low Interest Ratesdirect.mit.edu

Creator of Ruby on Rails, CTO of 37signals, and creator of Omarchy.

• Our reading nowkorrents.com

  Cryptocurrency deserves to be dismissed: its problems outweigh its promise, and the trustless world it offers is not one worth wanting.

  crypto

  Their words, before

  One of the reasons I've never cared for crypto currencies is that the associated utopia of trustless society had zero appeal to me. I don't think the world is better off by erasing the need to trust in our transactional counterparts, so turning these transactions into pure computing always struck me as a regression.

  Their words now

  But wherever this leads us next, it's clear to me now that I was too hasty to completely dismiss crypto on the basis of all the things wrong with it at the moment. Instead of appreciating the fundamental freedom to transact that it's currently our best shot at protecting.

Programmer; builds Mac and iOS apps, wrote WatermelonDB, and writes about tools, focus and software craft.

• Readrcmnd.app

  The Vital Question

  Their words

  A fascinating book exploring the role of energy in biology and evolution. It explains how eucaryotic life emerged and why it grew in complexity, while bacteria have remained unchanged in their simplicity for billions of years. It also presents the best theory of abiogenesis we have, and a lot more.

  radex.io

Media theorist and writer; author of Program or Be Programmed and Team Human, and host of the Team Human podcast.

• Usesrcmnd.app

  TextEdit

  Their words

  Articles happen in Word, but I'm leaving it behind more and more, and just writing in Textedit to save myself all the time and energy associated with Microsoft.

  usesthis.com

• Usesrcmnd.app

  Scrivener

  Their words

  I write my books and comics scripts in Scrivener. Articles happen in Word, but I'm leaving it behind more and more, and just writing in Textedit to save myself all the time and energy associated with Microsoft.

  usesthis.com

British historian, translator and broadcaster; author of Rubicon and Dominion, and co-host of The Rest Is History podcast.

• Recommendsrcmnd.app

  The Roman Revolution

  Their words

  This again is an absolute classic which is completely informed by Tacitus. It has that very mordant take on the way that power works and operates.

  fivebooks.com

Civil engineer and land use planner, founder and president of Strong Towns, author of Escaping the Housing Trap. Argues that the American pattern of development since the Second World War does not generate enough wealth to maintain the infrastructure it obliges cities to keep.

• Our readingkorrents.com

  The American suburban pattern of development does not pay for itself: a city takes the cash from new growth and, with it, a maintenance bill it can never cover.

  America

  Their words

  Put these two characteristics together and you have a key insight; Cities routinely trade near-term cash advantages associated with new growth for long-term financial obligations associated with maintenance of infrastructure.

  The Growth Ponzi Scheme, Part 1strongtowns.org

Programmer and entrepreneur; co-founded GitHub and created Jekyll, Gravatar and the Semantic Versioning spec.

• Usesrcmnd.app

  iStat Menus

  Their words

  I also use Skype for international calls, Preview for reading PDFs, iTunes for listening to music, and iStat Menus (displaying network activity, memory usage, and cpu usage) to keep me informed of what foolish things my Mac is doing.

  usesthis.com