The Podcast Browser

Interview with Robert Liddiard & Oliver Creighton about their book Medieval Warhorse. Discusses the medieval warhorse as a battle-winning technology, the evolution of breeds, & their centrality to chivalric identity & romance literature. @HistoryExtra thepodcastbrowser.com/robert-liddiar…

We didn’t have “HR” when building Palantir, for similar reasons - I avoided Ryan’s mistake. And when we needed some PeopleOps, we hired technical leaders. Going into the vast majority of companies and firing most of their HR and Marketing departments would tend to create value!

Podcast with Martin Parkinson discussing Australia’s “permanently temporary” guest-worker system, skilled migrant underutilization, subsidisation of research by international students, the importance of productivity growth, & more. @joewalkerpod thepodcastbrowser.com/martin-parkins…

Podcast with Siri Hustvedt about her memoir Ghost Stories. Describes her 43-year marriage to the late author Paul Auster, their writing, family tragedies, Auster’s cancer treatment, and the psychology of grief. @ninetonoon thepodcastbrowser.com/siri-hustvedt-…

Podcast with Alex Imas discussing why automation fears persist despite contradictory evidence, the history of technological disruption, and why AI may not be destroying work but redirecting us toward new industries and opportunities. @DKThomp @alexolegimas thepodcastbrowser.com/the-case-again…

Interview with Debin Ma discussing the making of the modern world from an eastern perspective: why China fell behind, why Japan modernised early, China’s recent transformation, and why East Asia has experienced so many economic miracles. @on_humans_pod thepodcastbrowser.com/debin-ma-china…

Podcast with Alvin Roth about his book Moral Economics. Discusses how we should reason about morally contested markets such as sex work, drugs, selling organs, and adopting children. @seanmcarroll thepodcastbrowser.com/alvin-roth-mor…

Podcast with David Epstein about his book Inside the Box: How Constraints Make Us Better. Explores the counterintuitive idea that boundaries, and not unlimited freedom, often make us more creative, productive, and fulfilled. @EconTalker @DavidEpstein thepodcastbrowser.com/david-epstein-…

Podcast with Kimberlé Williams Crenshaw about her memoir Backtalker. Discusses the origins of intersectionality and critical race theory and explores how structural failures specifically impact Black women. @Slate thepodcastbrowser.com/kimberle-willi…

Podcast with David Reich about his article Ancient DNA Reveals Pervasive Directional Selection Across West Eurasia. Explains that natural selection has been rampant in the last 10,000 years, contrary to previous beliefs that it was quiescent. @dwarkesh_sp thepodcastbrowser.com/david-reich-wh…

Podcast with Richard Munson about his book Ingenious: A Biography of Benjamin Franklin, Scientist. Highlights Franklin's often overlooked scientific achievements. @amseonline thepodcastbrowser.com/richard-munson…

@henrycooke See also Russ Greene on Total Boomer Luxury Communism. americanmind.org/salvo/what-is-…

@henrycooke This is a political economy problem with people voting for Total Boomer Luxury Communism. We need to talk more about the improved equity effect of indexing super to just the CPI versus raising the age of entitlement, as argued by Heuser Whittington.heuserwhittington.com/insights/the-v…

Column today on the superannuation fix few are talking about - or ruling out thepost.co.nz/politics/36100…

Podcast with Russ Greene about his essay What Is Total Boomer Luxury Communism? Discusses the fiscal problem of massive pension systems and the political economy that drives transfers from younger generations to older ones. @razibkhan @GreenPlusAnE thepodcastbrowser.com/russ-greene-to…

Podcast with Antony Beevor about his book Rasputin: The Downfall of the Romanovs. Discusses Grigori Rasputin, the Siberian peasant healer who influenced the family of Russia's last tsar, until assassinated by the imperial couple's relatives. @HistoryExtra thepodcastbrowser.com/antony-beevor-…

Last night I listened to David Reich’s interview with @dwarkesh_sp on his new Nature paper, “Ancient DNA reveals pervasive directional selection across West Eurasia.” dwarkesh.com/p/david-reich-2 Reich and his team present a method for detecting directional selection in ancient DNA time series, testing for consistent trends in allele frequency over time. They find that hundreds of alleles have been under strong directional selection, including alleles correlated with measures of cognitive performance. I have followed David Reich’s work for over a decade now and cite him in my economic history courses all the time. Nothing has changed my view of ancient history as much as his research, and the research his methods have triggered. His findings also bear directly on another line of work, “Natural Selection and the Origin of Economic Growth” by @GalorOded and @Omer_Moav at the Quarterly Journal of Economics, which proposes a similar mechanism. Reich’s results give a serious empirical boost to Galor and Moav's research agenda. Reich returns several times in the interview to behavior related to what economists call the discount rate (without using such a term). The evidence suggests that humans began discounting the future less with the advent of agriculture, because directional selection favored patience. I’ve long thought modern schooling serves this same function, training people to defer immediate rewards for long-term gains, and that such training is the most valuable trait one can have in daily life. Contrary to the Foucaults and Freires of the world, that schools are boring is a feature, not a bug. I don’t expect anyone at the schools of education to get this.

Interview with Matt Longo about his book The Invisible Hand. Distinguishes the physical visible hand from its neural invisible hand representation. Explores how cortical magnification and tool co-evolution drive human dexterity. @ManyMindsPod thepodcastbrowser.com/matt-longo-the…

Podcast with Robert Allen about his 2009 book The British Industrial Revolution in Global Perspective. Attributes the Industrial Revolution to Britain’s high wages and cheap coal. @on_humans_pod thepodcastbrowser.com/robert-allen-t…

Podcast with Stephen B. Young about his book Adam Smith and Modern Economics. Reframes Adam Smith as a moral philosopher, balancing the "invisible hand" with the "impartial spectator" (conscience). @NewBooksEcon thepodcastbrowser.com/stephen-b-youn…

Podcast with Robert Caro about his books The Power Broker and The Years of Lyndon Johnson. Discusses his research and writing process on the LBJ series, and the impact of his bestselling 1974 biography of NYC Parks Commissioner Robert Moses. @cspan thepodcastbrowser.com/robert-caro-th…