Jezebel 
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New York, 2:22 AM
Mon Nov 9
19 posts in the last 24 hours
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11/05/09
11/05/09
I haven't read the new book yet, but the original one just seemed like a compendium of propositions supported by individual (smallish, but interesting) data studies. It didn't purport to "pin" or "blame" or even draw final conclusions about anything -- thus it was necessarily incomplete. The original book just presented the outcomes of certain (again, smallish) studies and proposed that final answers to the questions posed would have to take those outcomes into consideration -- even if the outcomes and book wound up being thoroughly debunked, which is part of the progress of science anyway.
Is the new book as different from the original as this post strongly suggests? If true, that fact seems like it would be worth an explicit mention or two.
11/04/09
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11/04/09
Clearly, Monsieurs Levitt and Dubner are not familiar with the expression "end of pipe solution". #superfreakonomics
11/04/09
agh agh aghggghhhhhh blargle this is the worst idea ever. #superfreakonomics
11/04/09
11/04/09
This is crazy shit. How could you even begin to think it was a good idea, after you had thought about it for more than about 5 or 6 seconds? #superfreakonomics
11/04/09
11/05/09
This sort of unwavering faith in endless progress and an endless upward curve in the economy drives me nuts. "Oh, we don't need to do anything! The white-haired team of einsteins in their privately funded lab will come up with something that'll save us all from near-certain doom! Let's go drive around the block in the Hummer while we wait for the giant acid rain pipeline to the sky!"
*stab stab stab* #superfreakonomics
11/05/09
@Catabolic: Yeah, that's what gets me, too. There's a belief that someone will just come save you. You don't need to change your habits - just buy the new product and don't worry about a thing! I mean, we're all in this together, and I think we're all going to have to change what we do, a little bit. Yeah, the few things I do myself won't make a difference, but if a thousand people do them, there will be change. So jump on the train, people, because it's better for all of us! #superfreakonomics
11/04/09
And what is so wrong with trying to conserve some fossil fuels? They're going to run out sooner or later anyway, so we might as well start figuring out our next step. #superfreakonomics
11/04/09
He went on to say that geo-engineering solutions are attractive because they would work faster, thereby giving conservation more time to work. He admits that running a tube into the sky is just a short-term fix, but that it would give longer term solutions time to be implemented and have an effect. #superfreakonomics
11/04/09
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11/04/09
Perhaps part of the problem is the declining quality of NYC public school chancellors. Unlike the chancellor, I'm sure many of the aforementioned sub-standard teachers still know the difference between "is" and "has". #superfreakonomics
11/04/09
11/04/09
I was only offended because I thought it was his typo, and as such made his criticism of sub-standard teachers kind of irrelevant. #superfreakonomics
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11/04/09
Additionally, women are disincentivized from seeking out better paying opportunities or returning to work after kids and so often discrimination is masked as women making a personal choice--it can be masked in the data, in Superfreakonomics, everywhere. #superfreakonomics
11/04/09
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11/04/09
Levitt now says that the chapter wasn’t meant to lend credibility to global warming denial — but when you open your chapter by giving major play to the false claim that scientists used to predict global cooling, you have in effect taken the denier side. The only way I can reconcile what Levitt says now with that reality is that he and Dubner didn’t do their homework — not only that they didn’t check out the global cooling stuff, the stuff about solar panels, and all the other errors people have been pointing out, but that they didn’t even look into the debate sufficiently to realize what company they were placing themselves in.
And that’s not acceptable. This is a serious issue. We’re not talking about the ethics of sumo wrestling here; we’re talking, quite possibly, about the fate of civilization. It’s not a place to play snarky, contrarian games. #superfreakonomics
11/04/09
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11/04/09
@MissyMcCLung: Clever women? Anyhow, it's a very small piece of the puzzle, so focusing on women fleeing the teaching world for better-paying jobs is pretty bogus.
The bigger issue is that the pay is so shitty. #superfreakonomics
11/04/09
My guess is that a big part of the problem is the attrition rate, too--I know some very smart people who went into teaching and burned out in the first few years, which I understand is not uncommon. A few of those people probably just weren't cut out for the job, but a lot of the stress was administrative, standardized-test-related, bureaucratic headaches--which, when combined with the reality that they could make more money in fewer hours working a less demanding job AND be nagged less by parents/friends/strangers, made it a pretty easy choice to leave. #superfreakonomics
11/04/09
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11/04/09
I'll probably read this one too though. If its like the first, its a quick easy read. #superfreakonomics