Newmark's Door

James replies to an e-mail that's not meant for him.

Sad but also quite beautiful.

Earth, Wind & Fire, of course. From this Washington Post reminder:

But if other groups have borrowed from EWF’s brass fanfares, bouncy rhythms and hearty mix of genres, joy remains a singular hallmark. No mainstream group or solo artist embodies that emotion as thoroughly as EWF.

See also "Boogie Wonderland".

A lot of things are just different in New York City.

This piece introduced--at least to me--the category of "Dad movies". It's a pretty good fit to my taste:

Timeless examples include James Bond films (especially the Sean Connery era); Indiana Jones; The Godfather; Rocky; Die Hard; Goodfellas; The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly; Saving Private Ryan; Unforgiven; The Martian; Predator; Air Force One; The Fugitive; High Noon; Apollo 13; Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World; Space Cowboys; and Heat. 

(Other notable examples: Red, The Right Stuff, and The Fast and Furious.)

"David Sinclair says aging is a disease that can be prevented and treated, and there is no reason life must end. The evidence he presents from scientific studies is intriguing, but far from definitive."

This is a good news/bad news history. Good news: people in the past proved to be more capable of adapting to environmental changes than you might have thought. Bad news: to so adapt, they required flexibility, flexibility that modern Big Government likely will dampen, maybe severely.

As I've written several times here, lots and lots of health problems are now being attributed to chronic inflammation, bad gut bacteria, or both.

Yes, it's still more weirdness from modern astrophysics.

Astutely observed:

In the past, people displayed their membership of the upper class with their material accoutrements. But today, luxury goods are more affordable than before. And people are less likely to receive validation for the material items they display. This is a problem for the affluent, who still want to broadcast their high social position. But they have come up with a clever solution. The affluent have decoupled social status from goods, and re-attached it to beliefs. . . .

The chief purpose of luxury beliefs is to indicate evidence of the believer’s social class and education. Only academics educated at elite institutions could have conjured up a coherent and reasonable-sounding argument for why parents should not be allowed to raise their kids, and should hold baby lotteries instead. When an affluent person advocates for drug legalization, or anti-vaccination policies, or open borders, or loose sexual norms, or uses the term “white privilege,” they are engaging in a status display. They are trying to tell you, “I am a member of the upper class.” 

Could well be another panic that was misdirected.

For my money socialism has only ugly sides.

Well, it should be microeconomics or managerial economics rather than "macroeconomics". And I doubt an instructor could safely show this to a class in about 90% of American colleges and universities.

But aside from those quibbles, it's kinda fun.

Scientific American piece by a Stanford doctor on the frontlines of CAR-T therapy.

"Citation cartels" are a fine example of Goodhart's Law. ("When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure.")

Or as Arnold Kling writes, "Systems invite gaming".

Sounds like a terrific idea. Almost every university economics dept. should do this.

Economics@Work (Econ 208) is a class offered by the Department of Economics at the University of Michigan. In this course, undergraduates are offered a regular opportunity to interact with alumni from the Department of Economics. 

Quite encouraging to read.

This is so very true:

What bothers the opponents of environmental activism is not the environmentally conscious goals or even facts presented, but the activists’ blatant hypocrisy and aura of sanctimonious religiosity. 

Read the piece for details.

A terrific piece in Harper's(!) by Lionel Shriver. It was an introduction to Ms. Shriver's work for me, so I expect to read more. (According to Wikipedia she wrote a novel that features "an economics autodidact".)

It may well be unconstitutional: "Unconstitutional Medicare-For-All".

Think of the time people will have to spend documenting they're not required to pay the tax: "You may have to fill out a wealth tax return".

I'll second this.

"CME" stands for coronal mass ejection and it's consequences sound severely ugly. Just in case you don't have enough to worry about . . .

See also "Solar Storms Can Devastate Entire Civilizations".

From last month. Another popular panic apparently debunked.

Speaking of pot, this is s thought-provoking short piece: "Big dope: how marijuana benefited from one of the slickest PR campaigns in history".

A key question is whether people with problems tend to smoke pot or whether smoking pot tends to cause problems. And while it's at least plausible causality runs in both directions, the widespread approval of modern pot should be researched a bit more than it has.

They don't have the order right, but there are an awful lot of really good games on this list.

"Luis Suarez Amazing back-heel goal Barcelona vs Mallorca 12/7/19".

"Son Heung-min scores unbelievable solo goal against Burnley".

People do go crazy for Wegmans. There were supposedly 3000 people waiting in line when the Raleigh Wegmans opened recently. But I was a bit disappointed in it and will stick to mostly to Harris Teeter, Whole Foods, and Trader Joe's.