Tim DeRoche

"Could there be an evolutionary explanation for this common human act of worship? Is it grounded in an animal instinct? I’ve come to believe that it is." My latest for @unherd unherd.com/2025/11/can-ev…

@ToddSeavey Thanks, Todd. Wonderful tribute to Brian. I didn't know him well, but our lives had intersected at both Reason events and Burning Man events out here in LA. Wishing I had got to know him better...

I write a few suitably strange, random thoughts on the very sad occasion of my friend and fellow libertarian writer Brian Doherty passing away: splicetoday.com/politics-and-m…

Many thanks to @moveincircles for her very kind words about my book Scholastic Metaphysics, about which she says “I don’t think Professor Feser intended it as a page turner, but I tore through it like it was an airport novel.” As she explains in this lucid and important lecture, she finds in Aristotelian-Thomistic metaphysics the vocabulary needed properly to understand today’s deepest moral and political controversies. Especially important, as she says, are the distinctions between (a) act and potency, (b) substance, accident, and substantial form, and (c) the four causes. She notes that it was the moderns’ attack on and burial of Aristotle, Aquinas, and Scholasticism that would pave the way for developments such as feminism, contraception, and the trans phenomenon. And she says that these are held in place by a “Thomophobia” (great coinage!) that dismisses traditional metaphysics a priori as a tool of oppression. Give her lecture a listen.

On March 16, 2006, I released the first episode of EconTalk, The Economics of Parenting. The guest was the very funny always insightful Don Cox: econtalk.org/the-economics-… It was just under 35 minutes long. At some point not long after, I realized I had to release an episode every week and settled on the length of 60 minutes. At some point after that, I realized I could go longer than an hour, though only a handful approach the two hour mark. Twenty years later, and 1040 episodes later, here is the 20th anniversary episode with the great @mungowitz who has effortlessly graced the program a record-setting 51 times. Audio here: econtalk.org/the-economics-… Video on the @HooverInst YouTube channel (a new distribution channel for us!): youtu.be/BDTHOrB6KvQ?si… Enjoy and thanks to all of you who listen.

@Available2All Here's the story in @The74: the74million.org/article/report…

van Ruisdael has been one of my favorite painters since I saw The Jewish Cemetary at the Gemaeldegalerie in Dresden.

The detail about him making ready meals for her and the kids to eat while he’s gone — that broke me completely.

An obituary I never wanted to write.

@MattWelch Great tribute, Matt.❤️

@MattWelch Oh no.

Very very sad news indeed.

@nickgillespie @brianmdoherty @reason Oh no. So sorry to hear this, Nick.

Heartbroken to share this tragic and unexpected news about my longtime colleague and friend @brianmdoherty, who died from a hiking accident. So happy to have spent most of my career working shoulder to shoulder with him, both at @reason and the late, lamented Suck. Unlike Camus with Sisyphus, I don't have to imagine Brian happy as he chronicled the great, innovative weirdos who created things like Burning Man, underground comix, cryptocurrency, and the modern libertarian movement. He and his work will be missed--and more important, remembered. RIP, Brian, RIP. His Reason archive is online at reason.com/people/brian-d…

A very well-written, very justifiably angry parental reflection on edtech:

Umm...worth a read.

This was @NYCSchools response to our new report, And Stay Out! Here’s the thing: it’s hard to guarantee every student “access to a high-quality education” with a system built on exclusionary attendance zones. So what reforms could state leaders take up to expand opportunity for all students? Here are a few options for the legislature and @GovKathyHochul ⤵️

Let's keep this in mind @Available2All

Our work over at @Available2All was featured in the @nypost this week. We worked hard on this.

We need to normalize PhDs teaching high school. That solves at least two problems: absorbs some of the elite overproduction and put subject-matter experts (rather than ed school grads) in hs classrooms. (I know there are other problems.)

“There are students stuck in schools that do not provide a high-quality education. Students should have other options, including access to schools outside their neighborhood.” @dany_egorov @timderoche @Available2All nypost.com/2026/03/09/us-…

Ezra Klein: "Having AI summarize a book or paper for me is a disaster. It has no idea what I really wanted to know and wouldn't have made the connections I would've made. I'm interested in the thing I will see that other people wouldn't have seen, and I think AI typically sees what everybody else would see. I'm not saying that AI can't be useful, but I'm pretty against shortcuts. And obviously, you have to limit the amount of work you're doing. You can't read literally everything. But in some ways, I think it's more dangerous to think you've read something that you haven't than to not read it at all. I think the time you spend with things is pretty important." @ezraklein

I didn’t really get the problem with gender ideology at first. I’m liberal-minded about most things. 'Live and let' live has generally been my motto. I believed inclusion mattered. I believed in being kind. In not using language that might upset people unnecessarily. I knew people who identified as transgender. I knew some adults chose medical treatments or surgery to resemble the opposite sex. That seemed to me a matter of personal autonomy. Adults can do what they wish with their own bodies. What I hadn’t realised - and I feel slightly embarrassed admitting this - was that I’d misunderstood what was being claimed. I thought “transgender” meant a form of self-expression. A man who liked wearing women’s clothes. Someone changing their name. Gender non-conformity. What I hadn’t grasped was that some activists weren’t just asking for tolerance. They were asserting that declaring yourself the opposite sex made you the opposite sex. Not metaphorically. Literally. And that this wasn’t just cultural. It had legal consequences. - It meant men who said they were women were demanding access to women’s sports, prisons, domestic violence shelters and hospital wards - It meant the rewriting of healthcare language - “pregnant people”, “bodies with cervixes” - to avoid saying “women” - It meant children struggling with identity being affirmed onto medical pathways with lifelong implications And also redefining same-sex attraction. Lesbians called 'bigoted' for not wanting relationships with men who identify as women. Gay men accused of prejudice for saying they're not attracted to female bodies. None of which made any sense. But I'd also overlooked how far this had travelled - into HR policies, professional bodies, schools, political parties and public institutions. And how easily disagreement was framed as cruelty. Speaking up felt risky - because others were being publicly humiliated for doing so. None of this is abstract. Because sex is the basis on which safeguarding works. On which data is collected. On which cancer screening programmes run. On which fair sport and single-sex spaces depend. It’s written into law - including the Equality Act - because material differences matter. If sex becomes a 'feeling' rather than a biological category, those protections become unstable. And once reality becomes negotiable, everything does. Once I saw it, I couldn’t unsee it. But I needed to be sure. So I read. Books, research papers, policy documents. When I finally spoke publicly, there was backlash from all directions. Many women thanked me - both quietly and publicly. But some feminists criticised me for speaking too late. Others were angry about a past interview I’d done with the parent of a transgender person, accusing me of promoting harm. It takes courage to change your mind publicly. It takes courage to speak when you know your reputation, friendships or livelihood may be on the line - when you know raising your voice could strain, or even end, relationships you value. Once I understood what was at stake, staying silent was no longer an option. I lost my livelihood simply for saying I didn’t like the phrase “pregnant people”. That alone tells you something is deeply wrong. It shouldn’t be this way. I will never judge any woman for when she finds her voice. Because every voice adds value - whenever it is raised. And I know how persuasive this ideology can be. I know how easily it bypassed me. And I know how much courage it takes to admit, publicly, that you got something wrong.

@NedStanley @Available2All Thanks, Ned! Worked hard on this one. Troubling stuff.

As a former Bronx teacher, this one hurt to read, because I've seen the faces on both sides of the Westchester County Line and the deep inequities of redlining firsthand. Bravo to @timderoche and @Available2All for this major report. Strongly recommend reading and engaging.