You can see the computer age everywhere but in the productivity statistics. Nobel Prize in Economics winner Robert Solow, in 1987 (quoted everywhere but it’s… Read More »Technology (5): Paul A. David’s Computer and Dynamo – on the evolution of techno-economic regimes
This is an excellent introductory series of videos giving an overview of what data is, important differences between different types of data, how it’s processed… Read More »Recommendation: Computerphile on Data Analysis
A history of augmentation Wikipedia has a nice, roughly chronological list of early technologies. It seems that weapons, cooking and languages were the trio that… Read More »Technology (3): A history of augmentation
… technology predated our humanness… The strategy of bending the environment to use as if it were part of one’s own body is a half-billion-year-old… Read More »Technology (2): Artifice-ial Beings
My working definition of technology is: anything useful made by a mind. Kevin Kelly – Technology’s Epic Story (TED talk) What technology isn’t Technology isn’t (just)… Read More »Technology (1): Second Nature
You heard it first from Thucidides. Now here’s Smith: Little else is requisite to carry a state to the highest degree of opulence from the… Read More »Adam Smith on emergent opulence: peace, easy taxes and justice
This was a great episode of People I (Mostly) Admire. The section comes at around the 15 minute mark as they finish a discussion about… Read More »Sendhil Mullainathan, Steve Levitt (and Alex Tabarrok) on sunk costs and status quo bias
This is a great (long) article about what Stripe is up to with a lot of interesting detail about how the internet works as a… Read More »Recommendation: Bryne Hobart (The Diff) on Stripe, ecosystems and the infrastucture of the internet
I’m always a big believer in, okay, start a small and scrappy project that can experiment and move nimble and move fast and can move… Read More »Sal Khan on starting small and moving without permission
I came across both of these posts in the last week, and they both highlight the problem of bad legislation. I recommend both – which… Read More »Market Economics: Slate Star Codex on Drugs Vs Chairs and The Grumpy Economist on Paying for Public Toilets