Reality is always more complicated than you think.
Profile
Jake Young is a MD/PhD student at Mount Sinai School of Medicine focusing in Neuroscience. He is due to graduate in 2032. He received a BS and a MS in Biological Sciences from Stanford University -- where he spent most of his time drinking heavily and building vegetable catapults instead of learning information that would now be eminently useful. When he is not failing terrifically to perform his sworn duties, he enjoys watching bad movies, ethnic food, and running.
Pure Pedantry is a blog about science -- social sciences and otherwise -- as well as academic and scientific culture. No one can live on science alone, so I also like to dwell on pop culture, periodically explore the humanities, and indulge in other types of geeky goodness.
Jake is joined periodically by two wonderful guest bloggers: Kara Contreary and Kate Seip. See the About Page.
DISCLAIMERS: 1) Jake Young is not a licensed physician (yet). He is merely a medical student. The information published on this site is not intended for use in medical decision making. Please seek advice from a licensed, medical professional before making any health decisions. 2) The opinions expressed are my own or those of my co-bloggers. They do not represent the views of SEED magazine or the educational establishments we currently attend.
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Economics:
One of the difficult things about economics is that you can't really see an economy develop from scratch. There is no visible State of Nature. All you see is the continuous process. In that light, here is a very interesting...
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Posted on July 9, 2008 1:33 PM • 3 Comments •
At least someone is benefiting from the economic stimulus package: An unforeseen and surprising beneficiary of the Economic Stimulus Plan, a plan that George Bush contends will "boost our economy and encourage job creation," has surfaced this week. An independent...
Posted on July 8, 2008 12:21 PM • 2 Comments •
Haha! The Law of Demand works. Price goes up. Driving goes down. Figure: NYTimes I repeat: if you want to lower demand for and hence consumption of gasoline, this is the best thing that has ever happened for you. Prices...
Posted on June 3, 2008 11:36 AM • 4 Comments •
An team of economics all-stars -- including a couple Nobel laureates -- advocates in Science for the removal of legal barriers to establishing low stakes predictions markets in the US: Several researchers emphasize the potential of prediction markets to improve...
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Posted on May 19, 2008 11:49 AM • 4 Comments •
Zimbabwe is in the midst of skyrocketing inflation (check out this chart in the Economist), so this story -- while amusing -- is not entirely unexpected: I had lunch in Mutare yesterday, a town in Zimbabwe on the Mozambique border....
Posted on May 17, 2008 12:32 PM • 6 Comments •
The WSJ has a fascinating article on the economics of bubbles and why it might be rational to support a bubble until it bursts: Bubbles often keep inflating despite cautions such as Mr. Greenspan's famous warning of "irrational exuberance." Tech...
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Posted on May 16, 2008 2:11 PM • 2 Comments •
Paging Kara (or some other economist). I have an economics question. We were discussing monopolistic competition in micro today. So I get how because the quantity produced under monopolistic competition is less than the efficient scale there is some dead...
Posted on April 29, 2008 10:49 PM • 5 Comments •
The occasional 7-dwarf orgy notwithstanding (and you cannot convince me it never happened--I just know there was a night with a full moon and an opportunistic bottle of peach schnapps...), when most Western fairy tales end with "and they all...
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Posted on April 20, 2008 5:30 AM • 12 Comments •
Tyler Cowen breaks down the thinking that a carbon cap with dividends is better than a carbon tax: A broader question is whether the carbon dividends in fact make the citizenry better off. First there is the question of the...
Posted on April 19, 2008 3:33 PM • 1 Comments •
Tyler Cowen of the blog Marginal Revolution writes in the NYTimes about how prices carry important information and how you need trading to establish the value of securities: To understand the depths of the current crisis, let's go back to...
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Posted on March 25, 2008 12:19 PM • 0 Comments •
(This is sort of a round-up of comment on the economics news. I don't have much to say about it yet.) It would appear that the economy has just gone from bad to really bad, although if you wanted to...
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Posted on March 17, 2008 1:02 PM • 3 Comments •
This is just for Kara. A really common textbook for introductory economics classes is Greg Mankiw's. In the first chapter, he lists 10 principles of economics. This guy has translated them into terms lay people can understand. Heads up: people...
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Posted on February 28, 2008 9:47 AM • 0 Comments •
I don't know if I mentioned this but I am taking a course in introductory economics in my spare time. (Just because I love econ so much!) Anyway, this is probably a bore for the economists out there (since it...
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Posted on February 13, 2008 3:20 PM • 3 Comments •
Economics: is there anything it can't do? Here are some economists speculating about why long distance relationships fail. Their answer: too much money. Instead, says Mr. Cowen, people in long-distance relationships may spend more money than local lovebirds. How is...
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Posted on February 11, 2008 2:04 PM • 6 Comments •
I mentioned in an earlier post on Ron Paul that one of the policies he advocates that I do support is a return gold standard. I used to think this for two reasons -- both moral rather than economic principles,...
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Posted on December 22, 2007 1:20 PM • 15 Comments •
An investigative report in the Cleveland Plain Dealer looks at the FDA Fast Track. For those who don't know, the FDA Fast Track was created to accelerate the drug approval process for drugs targeted at under-treated diseases. Yet there is...
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Posted on December 14, 2007 12:12 PM • 2 Comments •
Alan Greenspan argues in the Wall Street Journal that the housing bubble was the direct result of geopolitical changes and their effects on long-term interest rates. Therefore, some correction was inevitable: The root of the current crisis, as I see...
Posted on December 14, 2007 11:30 AM • 1 Comments •
Improving the general caliber of economics understanding is a critical goal.
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Posted on October 22, 2007 9:44 AM • 3 Comments •
Sigh, the weak dollar is killing me over here in London. But if Marty Feldstein says it's a good thing, I guess I'm in no position to contradict him....
Posted on October 15, 2007 5:35 PM • 1 Comments •
I am not smart or qualified enough to explain the work of the winners of the Nobel in economics, but they have a great explanation at Marginal Revolution....
Posted on October 15, 2007 12:35 PM • 0 Comments •
Socrates gave us the foundation of modern philosophy when he claimed that his only wisdom was in knowing his own ignorance. By implication, of course, everyone else was even stupider than he and just didn't know it, believing they were...
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Posted on September 28, 2007 1:20 PM • 3 Comments •
The Fraser Institute has put out its annual report on Economic Freedom of the World -- a score and rank measuring "the degree to which the policies and institutions of countries support economic freedom". It's basically a rundown of countries...
Posted on September 12, 2007 10:29 AM • 5 Comments •
Milton Friedman and Anna Schwartz, in their seminal work A Monetary History of the United States, 1867-1960 (1963), argued that the policies of the Federal Reserve led to the Great Depression. These policies included cheap money during the 20s followed...
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Posted on August 17, 2007 10:42 AM • 1 Comments •
As Winston Churchill once said: "Democracy is the worst form of government, except all those other forms that have been tried from time to time." While still humorous in its construction, this statement is hardly controversial in this day and...
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Posted on August 15, 2007 6:53 PM • 20 Comments •
Nicholas Wade reports in the NYTimes about a UCD professor, Gregory Clark, and his theory of the Industrial Revolution. His answer is that high fertility rates in the upper classes caused them to steadily supplant lower classes. They brought productive...
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Posted on August 10, 2007 10:18 AM • 9 Comments •
Anyone who has traveled in Europe before and after the introduction of the euro can appreciate how easy tourism is made by the common currency (haggling with the guys in money change booths was never my idea of vacation). But...
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Posted on July 14, 2007 6:30 PM • 7 Comments •
I live in Manhattan, and it has always been a source of fascination how prices got so exorbidant. While I am somewhat protected from market forces -- I live in school-subsidized housing -- even with the help I have a...
Posted on May 1, 2007 10:29 AM • 1 Comments •
Over at The Frontal Cortex, Jonah has a blog referring to a WSJ article impugning economic jurisdiction in questions outside the traditional bounds of economics. Specifically, the article cites a paper recently publicized by Cornell University claiming to establish a...
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Posted on February 28, 2007 3:28 PM • 3 Comments •
I wrote before about how I think the NY trans-fat ban is scientifically supportable but not particularly the government's business. Here is interesting speculation in Free Exchange: Banning trans fats in restaurants, but not in grocery stores, doesn't make sense....
Posted on December 19, 2006 10:45 AM • 3 Comments •
The Stern Report -- a report by Sir Nicholas Stern, head of Britain's economic advisory panel -- that came out last month urged action on climate change in terms of future economic loss. I reported on people like Richard Tol...
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Posted on December 5, 2006 10:27 AM • 1 Comments •
I have a bunch of articles on politics here that I have been perusing. Free Exchange has a post on the moral benefits of growth. One of them is that it is prerequisite to the creation of jobs that allow...
Posted on November 27, 2006 11:41 PM • 0 Comments •
Many people took issue with my post about Milton Friedman's death. Actually I don't think they were taking issue with my post; most of them were taking issue with Milton Friedman's existence. Whatever. Everyone has their own heroes. While I...
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Posted on November 20, 2006 11:52 PM • 17 Comments •
Milton Friedman has passed: Milton Friedman, the grandmaster of conservative economic theory in the postwar era and a prime force in the movement of nations toward lesser government and greater reliance on free markets and individual responsibility, died today. He...
Posted on November 16, 2006 2:08 PM • 15 Comments •
I have tried to show that the gender gap in the sciences is not the result of cognitive differences, but that begs the question about what else to which it can be attributed. It could be that it is the...
Posted on November 16, 2006 10:49 AM • 0 Comments •
Edmund Phelps -- recent winner of the Nobel Prize in economics -- defends the moral rightness and the economic wisdom of the capitalist system in this essay in the WSJ: There are two economic systems in the West. Several nations--including...
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Posted on October 24, 2006 9:43 AM • 4 Comments •
The Economist has an article about an economist using evolutionary ideas. To wit: ...Eric Beinhocker, of the McKinsey Global Institute, has undertaken his own 500-page haj, entitled "The Origin of Wealth: Evolution, Complexity, and the Radical Remaking of Economics". In...
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Posted on July 24, 2006 10:07 AM • 3 Comments •
This study from the University of Michigan used eBay to determine whether a seller's reputation helped them get higher prices:...
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Posted on July 10, 2006 12:52 AM • 1 Comments •
I think this paper sounds fascinating but we don't have access to NBER papers here. Anyway, check out this abstract:...
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Posted on July 10, 2006 12:17 AM • 1 Comments •
