Nathan Taylor

Predictions about self-driving cars

Predictions are hard, especially when they’re about the future. With that said, self driving cars are almost certain. Why? Because going to the hospital is bad. Very bad. Quote: “More than 30,000 Americans are killed each year in road accidents, and another 240,000 or so have injuries severe enough to require hospitalization.” Let’s take a… Continue reading Predictions about self-driving cars

Demonizing along your preferred axis

Arnold Kling has an essay out called The Three Languages of Politics. It’s an easy read, a 25 page ebook selling for $1.99. The thesis is Progressives, Conservatives and Libertarians each have distinct axes for good and evil, expressed in different languages. Progressives default to oppressors/oppressed, Conservatives to civilization/barbarism, Libertarians to freedom/coercion. This seems rather… Continue reading Demonizing along your preferred axis

Living with a deep faith in science

Last week’s post on Atheism as a sacred belief showed how atheists can be as dogmatic as anyone. The central insight is anything we care passionately about can become sacralized, and immune to reason. Even atheism. Since I’m a ra-ra science fan, science works that way for me. For example I love this “it works… Continue reading Living with a deep faith in science

Atheism as a sacred belief

The image above is taken from this nice 15 minute video interview of Jonathan Haidt (on left) by David Sloan Wilson (on right). I’m a big fan of Haidt and Wilson, and did a previous post on Haidt’s views on Republican science denialism. A key Haidt insight is a) all groups have sacred beliefs, and b)… Continue reading Atheism as a sacred belief

Race and IQ. Can’t we all just get along?

Jason Richwine resigned from the conservative Heritage Foundation a few weeks ago because his PhD thesis titled IQ and Immigration Policy came to light with this choice media quote: “No one knows whether Hispanics will ever reach IQ parity with whites, but the prediction that new Hispanic immigrants will have low-IQ children and grandchildren is… Continue reading Race and IQ. Can’t we all just get along?

Snail mail to the stars

“The Post Office Is Dying Because We Don’t Need It Anymore” says a recent headline. And yes, mail volume decreased 22% in the past five years. Yet mail is still being used for that most modern of tasks, moving extremely large computer files. In computer jargon, moving data by carrying a computer hard drive around… Continue reading Snail mail to the stars

Politics are driven by urbanization as much as race

One exaggerated explanation for the 2012 presidential election was “Only white people voted for Mitt Romney….Or not quite only.” That’s because 88% of Romney voters were white versus 56% for Obama. And given the ongoing relative demographic decline in whites, there’s a narrative predicting a parallel decline in Republican electability. But this narrative is a partial… Continue reading Politics are driven by urbanization as much as race

Sometimes bad policy isn’t caused by red state/blue state, but by biased human cognition.

Start with deeply opposed ideological beliefs, toss in some heated red state/blue state tribal conflict, and things can quickly devolve into bad public policy. We see it on the news every day. But sometimes bad public policy stems from another cause, the hidden flaws and biases in human cognition. This is more interesting since less… Continue reading Sometimes bad policy isn’t caused by red state/blue state, but by biased human cognition.

Coupons will never, ever, ever go away

You can arbitrarily divide the world into people who love shopping and people who hate it, although I suppose most are indifferent. Anyway, I’m in the shopping is evil camp. As such I used to get my hopes up when I heard coupons and discounts might go away, for example via the magic of internet… Continue reading Coupons will never, ever, ever go away

A future where it’s normal for all public spaces to be captured on video

I like science fiction well enough to occasionally indulge in the bad kind. By bad I mean stories where the science is so-so and the ideas are recycled. I recently finished a moderately bad book using a commonly recycled trope: a future where all public spaces are routinely captured on video. The plot turns on a… Continue reading A future where it’s normal for all public spaces to be captured on video