I begin today expanding upon my previous analysis of Nate Silver’s distinction between “Riverians” and “Village People.” Silver says that River People possess the following two “clusters of attributes”[1]: COGNITIVE CLUSTER PERSONALITY CLUSTER Analytical Competitive Abstract Critical Decoupling Independent-minded (contrarian) Risk-tolerant “Analytical” – Nate says this is “to resolve something complex…
Category: Popular Culture
Popular Culture
Summa Contra Argentum: Pars Prima
My first objection to Nate Silver’s book is the title, or to be perfectly accurate, the subtitle: The Art of Risking Everything. I can only assume that some publisher or agent demanded this subtitle, because it seems to go against a fair amount of what is actually in the book. Risking everything is…
Algorithms
Games Beyond Edges?
September 15, 2023 Bruce Schoenfeld’s Game of Edges: The Analytics Revolution and the Future of Professional Sports traces the impact of numerical analysis on sports, from the Moneyball days of the 1990s Oakland Athletics; through the 2000s curse-breaking Boston Red Sox; to Liverpool Football Club’s use of predictive analysis; to the NBA Golden…
Intersubjective Realities
Red vs. Blue vs…. Green?
September 11, 2023 It’s football season again, and many of us (not me) are participating in fantasy football betting groups. In its own little way, this is a symptom of what I like to call “the Cult of Prediction.” It used to be that only “nerds” participated in “rotisserie leagues”…
Popular Culture
“Barbenheimer” and the Need for Rigorous Imagination
August 15, 2023 “Barbie was everything we didn’t want to be . . . everything the feminist movement was trying to escape.” – Gloria Steinem on Barbie (the doll) I’ve had a week or two to digest the two giant moviegoing experiences of the summer, and it occurs to me…
Popular Culture
“Oppenheimer” and the Real Miracle of the Nuclear Age
July 31, 2023 The Christopher Nolan film “Oppenheimer” is all over the headlines this summer (along with the film “Barbie,” directed by Greta Gerwig). Having just watched it, as a professional scenario planner and “futurist” (whatever that might mean), I have thoughts. The main thought is my amazement that we…