Join the Think Like a Freak Book Club — and Win an Autographed Copy!
…of error” . . . Why measuring cause-and-effect is so hard . . . The folly of prediction . . . Are your predictions better than a dart-throwing chimp? ….
Just beneath the surface of the global economy, there is a hidden layer of dealmakers for whom war, chaos, and sanctions can be a great business opportunity. Javier Blas and…
Just beneath the surface of the global economy, there is a hidden layer of dealmakers for whom war, chaos, and sanctions can be a great business opportunity. Javier Blas and…
Sure, we all want to make good personal decisions, but it doesn’t always work out. That’s where “temptation bundling” comes in.
Bestselling author James Nestor believes that we can improve our lives by changing the way we breathe. He’s persuasive enough to get Steve taping his mouth shut at night. He…
…of error” . . . Why measuring cause-and-effect is so hard . . . The folly of prediction . . . Are your predictions better than a dart-throwing chimp? ….
…about. We’re currently finishing up an hour-long radio program called “The Folly of Prediction,” and I have to say that it was bracingly refreshing to read this paragraph and the…
…on public radio. The titles: “The Church of ‘Scionology,’” “An Economist’s Guide to Parenting,” “The Folly of Prediction,” “The Suicide Paradox,” and “The Upside of Quitting.” If you live within…
I had an interesting exchange recently while interviewing Tim Westergren, co-founder of the (just-public) internet radio company Pandora for our Freakonomics Radio hour called “The Folly of Prediction.” (We argue…
…9/11 was an inside job? . . . “Entrepreneurs of error” . . . Why measuring cause-and-effect is so hard . . . The folly of prediction . . ….
If you’re the kind of person who cares about “The Folly of Prediction” and The Signal and the Noise, you may want to read Amy Zegart‘s Foreign Policy piece about…
(Photo: Josh McGinn) Our “Folly of Prediction” podcast made these basic points: Fact: Human beings love to predict the future. Fact: Human beings are not very good at predicting the…
…job? . . . “Entrepreneurs of error” . . . Why measuring cause-and-effect is so hard . . . The folly of prediction . . . Are your predictions better…
Nearly everything that politicians say about taxes is at least half a lie. They are also dishonest when it comes to the national debt. Stephen Dubner finds one of the…
The practice of medicine has been subsumed by the business of medicine. This is great news for healthcare shareholders — and bad news for pretty much everyone else.
Societies where people trust one another are healthier and wealthier. In the U.S. (and the U.K. and elsewhere), social trust has been falling for decades — in part because our…
We’d love to hear from you! But first — are you here looking for a transcript? Complete transcripts for every episode of every podcast are available on this website. Choose…
Where can I find a transcript of an episode? Complete transcripts for every episode of every podcast are available here on our website. Choose the podcast from the dropdown menu…
…cutting room floor in the other time zones. So here is the transcript… Copyright 2005 National Broadcasting Co. Inc. All Rights Reserved NBC News Transcripts SHOW: Today 7:00 AM EST…
…our latest podcast, “The Church of Scionology,” tries to answer. (You can download/subscribe at iTunes, get the RSS feed, or read the transcript here.) Stanford economist Francisco Pérez-González has looked…
…doesn’t feel like work.” But Barkley’s description provides some insight about what’s really motivating his weight loss. From the transcript, I’m guessing that the group weigh-in is not a large…
Taxes on alcohol and tobacco promise to make people healthier and raise public funds. But can they backfire? Bapu Jena looks at the complicated economics of sin taxes….
Is grade inflation on the rise? How much does your G.P.A. matter in the long run? And when did M.I.T., of all places, become “the cool university”?…
Every year, there are more than a million collisions in the U.S. between drivers and deer. The result: hundreds of deaths, thousands of injuries, and billions in damages. Enter the…
When trust in doctors or the healthcare system is lost, it’s really hard to get back. Bapu Jena explores the ripple effects of a C.I.A. operation to catch Osama bin…
When it comes to end-of-life medical care, getting it right can be hard — even for doctors. Bapu Jena discusses surprising research on how we can live better — and…
Hollywood loves stories of canine heroism. But can ordinary dogs really be heroes? To find out, Alexandra Horowitz talks to a dog-cognition researcher and to Susan Orlean, author of the…
…his or her heirs. But, with a scheduled resumption of the tax in 2011, such heirs would have surrendered more than $40 million if their parent had the temerity to…
…Oklahoma. The median value was $4.66/mile. In comparison, the standard federal reimbursement rate for fixed and variable costs of operating an automobile in 2011 was $0.51/mile. From 1997 to 2011,…
In one of the earliest Freakonomics Radio episodes (No. 39!), we asked a bunch of economists with young kids how they approached child-rearing. Now the kids are old enough to…
