Interview about EconTalk

EconTalk also helps pass the time while cutting and splitting firewood. However, you do need the right type of headphones to keep the roar of the chainsaw from overpowering Russ and the guests. (I prefer Etymotic's in-the-ear noise isolating earphones.)

Russ, I stumbled on Cafe Hayek and since then I have never missed a post and frequently I read the comments to. I have learnt a lot from it. But I also appreciate you commitment to work with different media.

At 53 my vision is not what it used to be and I spend already too much time for my own good reading on the computer or on paper books and most recently on the Kindle. I used to read while working out on the stationary bicycle and similar devices I cannot do it anymore, and here is where podcast like EconTalk has been a godsend. I bet that people with long commutes by car can also appreciate the format.


Thank you.

Another nice comment to the interview. I'll quote it here:

Vijay on June 18th, 2009 at 4:43 pm

I am from India. I come from a family where I cannot afford to leave my job. Going to schools like GMU is beyond my means. So, websites like econtalk and cafehayek (though they are more relevant to the U.S) are my only means to get a glimpse of economic wisdom which would otherwise be confined to the corridors of elite American & European universities.

Thank you, Russ. Keep up the good work. You have quite a number of followers in Indian metros. If your google analytics isn't showing up enough downloads from India, it can only because of our low bandwidth connections and our consequent response to rely on CDs and thump drives. Thanks again.

When economists like Hayek point to entrepreneurial learning in the context of changing relative prices to explain the empirical pattern of order in the global economy they are providing a powerful causal explanation — a scientific explanation of undesigned order, no less that Darwin did with his mechanism of natural selection to explain adaptation and the origin of species.

Let me suggest again Russ that you are just wrong about the nature of science and the nature of empirical explanation.

A causal explanation with rival alternatives gained through difficult theoretical work isn't a "philosophical language", it's empirical science — it's empirical science in the case of Darwin and it's empirical science in the case of Hayek.

What you are objecting to Russ is the sort of fake pseudo-science Hayek long ago dubbed "scientism" -- a bogus and confused attempt to imitated the most simple explanations found in a restricted parts of the natural sciences.

When you point out that a mistaken approach to economics is pseudo-science you haven't established that economics is not science, you've established that many economists don't do economics, they do pseudo-science. That is all.

In the interview Russ says:

"I've become much more skeptical of certain kinds of empirical work and much less confident of economics as an empirical science generally. I see it more as a way of thinking, a language, a philosophy for approaching the world."

EconTalk is so good, it never ages. Each episode is worth listening, some more than once. The interviews with Munger are funny and thought-provoking, the ones with Friedman are historic, while the ones with Leamer and Romer are just great. I like it when Russ talks to intellectuals like Marglin of completely different orientation. I hope that more Nobelists and Bates medalist may be interviewed in the future, as well as more economic actors (e.g., car dealers, Wal-Mart employees, even pimps and Wall Street traders).

@K Ackermann (and other Michael Lewis fans) -

Lewis was interviewed on On Point recently about his book on fatherhood. It was very amusing.

I disagree with one of your answers. The podcasts where guests disagree with you are in the second tier. The first tier belongs to Michael Lewis, Nassim Taleb, and Mike Munger,

Speaking of Michael Lewis, any chance you could get him back to discuss Liars Poker and Next? They have both proved prophetic and timeless. For example, if the SEC didn't understand a 15-year old day trader circa 1998, does anyone think they have any institutional clue about derivatives today?

You're getting some good publicity.

I bump into your name and Don's name quite a bit now that they mean something to me.

Congrats, a nice read.

Russ,

You're getting fan mail in the comments to the interview post. (Well, one so far...)