161 Comments

I'm only partway through but I can't get over the fact that Mises Caucus sounds like dirty talk from Jar Jar Binks.

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There were two von Mises brothers. One was an economist and one a structural engineer. So I keep thinking people are also really excited about the von Mises stress tensor. Just me?

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Thanks for answering this, now I don't have to look it up! Had the same thought when they were talking about von mises economics. Reminds me of Scott Alexander's piece exploring why genius runs in families.

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I just assumed Mrs von Mises was a tough mom. :)

Do you have a link? That sounds interesting

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It's been almost 24 hours now and I still can't stop laughing at this!

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I feel like I need to apologize to anyone else who spent all weekend with "Mises Caucus" as their intrusive thought.

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Hahaha!! We had fun with it all weekend!

I love the people here.

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I was a little disappointed in the aside that (paraphrasing) "well have the kids complained about opposite sex trans youth with them" implying it's only overly concerned conservative parents are concerned. Can we just assume if adults are too nervous to stand up and say what they think that's against the trans orthodoxy why would we think children are brave enough to do so and would? Didn't we just have an awesome episode about high schoolers getting cancelled? Male genitalia in the girls locker room is a hill I'm willing to die on for my kid.

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I’m willing to die on that hill for your kid. I’ve done some work (just volunteer stuff) with girls who’ve suffered abuse and it’s appalling to me that we aren’t by default keeping male genitals as far away from young girls’ spaces as possible. This is the most insane thing I’ve ever heard. There is a reason even in battered women’s shelters that boys of a certain age are “monitored” and “encouraged” toward a friend’s house etc instead of staying in the shelter.

Of course no kids will stand up and say they’re uncomfortable. They shouldn’t have to, that’s what ADULTS are for. I don’t have kids but I was one and I knew nothing! Thank goodness adults protected me from my own stupidity.

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I’m glad you’re speaking up, too.

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“Can we just assume if adults are too nervous to stand up and say what they think that's against the trans orthodoxy why would we think children are brave enough to do so and would?”

Exactly!

Also, hearing people that aren’t parents dismiss parents AGAIN (hearing this a lot on Twitter, etc.) is getting old. We heard it from the swimmers from UPenn who spoke out anonymously - they were warned not to talk, and were gaslighted that any discomfort they felt was grounds for them to seek counseling. Why would it be any different for high schoolers? And even if there WERE okay with it, parents have a right to say “no.” By Jesse’s reasoning we should do away with permission slips.

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The swimmers were exactly who I was thinking of

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Jimmy Concepts sounds like a mob hitman who got really into existentialism and/or postmodernism.

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I can see him sitting at a table eating sausage and fried peppers with Joe Pesci and Ray Liotta. (With a corpse in the trunk of Pesci's car).

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*A conceptual corpse.

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"Conceptual Corpse" is my band that performs Peter Gabriel-era Genesis songs in the musical style of Rob Zombie.

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There's a short story by Woody Allen from his collection Getting Even that had a mobster named Albert the logical positivist Corillo.

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I hate being this guy, but it's the second ep you guys have talked about Keynes. His name is pronounced KAYNZ. not keynz. KAAAAAYNZ.

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You say Rolling and I say Rawling. Let’s call the whole thing off.

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You guys totally have an Episode 15. It's titled "Blocked and Reported: Everyone Is Getting Fired All At Once, Except For Us", and there are copies of it floating around on the internet, for example at https://www.bababam.com/katie-herzog-and-jesse-singal-blocked-and-reported/202006111000-everyone-getting-fired-all-once-except-us

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Good job! Now go find some 60's Doctor Who!!

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That’s so weird. It’s quite a key episode, introducing Bon Appetit/Reply All, Fuck Hertzo/CHOP/CHAZ, Jew Zee, Yasher Ali... I can remember the episode title and vaguely think I’ve heard it before. But it’s definitely not in my feed. And that makes me anxious.

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It's even on youtube already: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ

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If you guys are looking for material I’d be interested to hear Jesse talk about the recent findings on the non-chemical nature of depression and what that means. Maybe it’s more a topic for a callin as it’s not culture war-y enough though tbh I think the use of SSRIs is a big culture war issue at this point. Link to the Story https://t.co/mqXuKvbveD . Just a thought anyway

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Scott Alexander had a post about this issue a while back that I found persuasive.

https://slatestarcodex.com/2015/04/05/chemical-imbalance/

TLDR “The idea that depression is a drop-dead simple serotonin deficiency was never taken seriously by mainstream psychiatry. The idea that depression was a complicated pattern of derangement in several different brain chemicals that may well be interacting with or downstream from other causes has always been taken seriously, and continues to be pretty plausible”

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I would love to look into this!

SSRIs are like a magic pill for me. I’ve had depression since I was a teenager- and didn’t get medication for it until my late thirties. I haven’t had any depressive episodes since.

Is it a placebo? Whatever it is, it works and lets me have a happy life.

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Karlyn Borysenko is the reason I'm against psychologists with a PhD referring to themselves as "Doctor."

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Jill Biden is another good example of someone with a PHD passing themselves off as a doctor when it suits (in her case, when it suits her husbands career). They used this to bad-faith effect multiple times during the pandemic.

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Anyone with a PhD is rightly referred to as "Dr." in academia. It makes perfect sense to use the title more generally, as well, and doesn't seem bad faith at all to me.

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You are 100% correct- but hear me out:

The reason the title "Dr." commands respect in our society is because of medical doctors, and maybe also people in the hard sciences with PhDs. People who have gone to school forever and studied theories about education are not revered. It's borrowed glory.

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Here's another reason it bothers me for Jill Biden. Her main position is first lady and wife of Joe. Supporting the president, That's pretty important. If I'm supporting my spouse it's not about me and I'd be an ass to bring up the PhD. If she's lecturing on her research topic that's fine

Titles are useful when relevant and needless bragging otherwise.

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Thank you for helping me understand why I always thought my microbiology prof father deserved to be called "Dr." but my political scientist husband did not.

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Anecdote alert: in my four years of college I never heard a single professor ask to be addressed as Doctor.

I work in Pharma R&D, which has a lot of Ph.D folks floating around. I have not heard anyone ask to be addressed as Doctor. Even some of the MDs don't use it because they are in research instead of practice.

Where I have heard it is in Jill Biden's field - education. I laughed when the controversy exploded because the use of Doctor seemed so prevalent among the Ed.D community. Must be a status thing.

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Isn’t that because they simply assume everyone knows their credentials, though? People don’t insist on titles among peer groups - it’s there to demonstrate your credentials to the outside world, not the in-group.

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If you are referring to the MD's working in research, point well taken. They've got nothing to prove to the in-group. I would be curious how they present themselves to outsiders.

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> I never heard a single professor ask to be addressed as Doctor.

Because "professor" is higher status.

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It actually depends where you are. In the US ‘professor’ is often just a lecturer.

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I'm also with Captain Holt on this https://youtu.be/_5QoYZuMILo

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Funny, I’ve never seen him in a comedic role.

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Oh you are in for a treat. Captain Raymond Holt is one of the great comic creations: https://youtu.be/0zJLltYWtNA

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I’m going to watch this show! I’ve loved him since the movie Glory a million years ago and then in Homicide but I didn’t even know he’d done a comedy. Nobody irl suggests these things to me because I’m told I have the sense of humor of a dead halibut. Fair enough. I rarely like comedy sitcoms but I don’t see how I could go wrong with this one - the compilation was funny because he’s such a good “straight” man. See, I know funny ;)

Thanks!

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When you are giving out physical health advice (that serves your husbands political agenda) and prefacing it with "I'm a doctor" and what you are is a PHD is early education child care, then that seems extremely bad faith to me. She's not a medical doctor. She's a trophy wife with a PHD in an unrelated field. She should not be passing herself off as a medical doctor (implicitly or explicitly) when it suits her. It's a lie.

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Jill Biden may be a lot of things, but she is not s trophy wife. I can do a little inner eye roll when Ed PhD's are too into their credentials, but I am not here to denigrate teachers.

Hands down the best professor I ever had was a Educational methods professor ( yes, a PhD). She was stellar. She is, by all accounts, a wonderful hardworking person. She is not in the same universe as a trophy wife.

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I prefer professor. Dr feels off unless I'm annoyed by companies losing my luggage

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I love this! For anyone who likes to hate Karlyn, there's a parody account on twitter called @karlynsbrainstem I highly recommend it!

I'm a knitter and a former supporter of the Mises Cauc so I've known about this clown bitch for quite awhile! I was creeped out when the notification for this episode dropped in my inbox because her name has been flooding my mentions lately

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Twitter says @karlynsbrainstem doesn't exist.

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Sorry, I misspelled. It's karlynbrainstem

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My dad’s fourth wife’s father once sent me a book about how heaven was organized as a corporation. Very specific details about various departments. This is all to say every person has a weird theology in their head that they reverse engineered to justify their view of the world. But you’re supposed to wait until you’re senile before you write a three hundred page explanation of it that no one wants to read. Although bonus points for making all of our world a deliberate choice. Ultra libertarian cosmology.

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I’m a free-stater who moved to Manchester last year. Having lived in a couple big cities in the last decade I can say southern New Hampshire is not super liberal, however, the sea coast region is. A typical bar in Manchester is full of pool-shooting sluts, guys with ‘Fuck Joe Biden’ shirts spelled in a gun font, and normal gay couples who don’t follow the news at all. The music is from the 90s and so is the fashion. Trump nearly won here (within city limits) in 2020. It certainly has its charms.

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“A typical bar in Manchester is full of pool-shooting sluts, guys with ‘Fuck Joe Biden’ shirts spelled in a gun font, and normal gay couples who don’t follow the news at all. The music is from the 90s and so is the fashion.”

Don’t threaten me with a good time!

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I live in nh

Shocking number of progressives up north. A lot of Bernie bros.

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Sounds like a lot of Vermont osmosis going on up there. In the ski towns you also do get a lot of progressive signaling. Whether it’s genuine or meant to flatter the Boston-clientele sensibilities, I can’t say.

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Yeah, I think you're right. More to do with it's proximity to Vermont than anything.

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I believe Jeremy Kauffman lives in Manch. That’s where all the crypto-bro $$$ is.

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Yes LBRY and Odysee are headquartered in Manchester and you can find Jeremy at the local free-state club house on any given week. Very funny guy. I’m surprised his campaign videos haven’t gotten more traction in the twittersphere: https://youtu.be/kdfym6LKpQ0

The crypto-wealth is pretty well dispersed too. A lot seems to be on the (fancier) seacoast. For instance Bruce Fenton, who is our free-state candidate for US senate, has quite the waterfront farm/estate.

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Holy shit I used to play frisbee with this guy before he lived in NH. I'm FLOORED right now

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Wow, yeah lol that’s how his wife said she met him (ultimate frisbee) during her speech at the campaign launch, as their little kids just wandered around the stage the whole time. Free spirits the lot of them.

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Have any Twitter users checked on Katie? Has she become Our Lady Of The Fucked Up Mentions?

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Don't know what a beachhead head is... Some of you haven't spent 8 hours just *setting up* a 40K battle and it shows.

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I only know bc my father is a WWII history aficionado.

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Doesn’t that sum it up. I was stunned, how could you not know what a beachhead is? But then I thought about the number of times I’ve had to pause the podcast and do some googling to figure wtf they’re talking about because sometimes it’s like we’re on two different planets… and never the twain shall meet.

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Why do I feel like 30 years ago Karlyn would've been screaming at people on the subway and that would be the extent of her influence? Modern media is like a mental illness/personality disorder transmission vector.

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I used to live in the Lincoln Park neighborhood in Chicago. There was a regular rider on a couple of the bus routes that went up and down Clark Street. Don't know her name but she'd give her...uh, dissertations on a daily basis. She made some good points at times! And then....yikes. But every dissertation was topped off with a nasal-labial mining and harvesting expedition. Ahhh...those were the days. Your comment reminded me of some good memories.

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The explanation of Austrian economics seemed half-baked to me, and I don't think Katie transmitted how ill-considered these guys are by most everyone else in economics -- even hardcore libertarians such as Bryan Caplan are not that much into them (https://econfaculty.gmu.edu/bcaplan/whyaust.htm). "People respond to incentives" is accepted by pretty much every serious economist I know of -- and, far from necessarily resulting in radical libertarianism, can be the basis for suggesting that government should align incentives in certain ways to improve both private and social outcomes (the whole "nudge" vibe of behavioral economists such as Richard Thaler).

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If you are looking for a succinct description of the entire field of economics it is "individuals respond to incentives."

I was disappointed in J/Ks lack of prep in discussing the topic.

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Katie totally called this one: Karlyn is going NUTS on twitter.

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I knew KB would have diarrhea of the tweets over this. She is very, very preoccupied with how she is perceived.

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Jesus, I wish I hadn't looked.

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Yes, and it is delicious!

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I am a Mainer currently in Illinois with Masshole Roots in Palmer and Lowell, as well as southern NH. NH is nice but sweet little towns like Hudson and Palmer are CRAZY expensive now from the Incomers taking over.

Now, I highly recommend A Libertarian Walks Into a Bear by Matthew Hongoltz-Hetling. It’s about a libertarian takeover of a small NH town (Grafton I believe- free state project related I think) and all that goes wrong, including bear attacks. Enjoy.

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Yes, that book was great. Truth is stranger than fiction.

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Sounds great. I'll look for it.

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