What Do You Want to Hear from Nassim Nicholas Taleb?
I expect to have a conversation with Nassim Nicholas Taleb, author of Fooled by Randomness and The Black Swan, in the next couple of days. He’s a very smart and talkative fellow, and I suspect he would fit into a Freakonomics Radio podcast very well. Read More »
Street Smarts
Bad news: with all due respect to Terrafugia, unless you’re a fan of Futurama it’s probably going to be awhile before you see a flying car. But cars that drive themselves are coming, probably within most of our lifetimes and possibly sooner than you might think. They will drastically cut traffic congestion, improve safety, and be a terrific boon to those like the young and the old who are deprived of mobility. The ability to take our hands off the wheel will also undoubtedly send sales of Big Macs and mascara skyrocketing. But do we have the drive to make robot cars a reality? Read More »
The Tricky Economics of Human Waste
Marketplace reports that an effort in Chicago to turn human waste into fertilizer has run into local opposition due to higher-than-expected costs. Read More »
Isn't It Funny How Governments Loosen Their Morals When Cash Is Short?
From Dan Okrent’s recent Q&A about Prohibition: “No factor played a larger role in the repeal of Prohibition than the government’s desperate need for revenue as the country fell into the grip of the Depression.” In short: governments who hate vice suddenly hate it much less when cash flow is slow. And we are seeing that again today. Read More »
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