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Nudgelords: Given their past track record, why should I trust them this time?

2 pointsby leonryabout 3 years ago

1 comment

ss108about 3 years ago
Ehh there&#x27;s probably strong criticisms to be made of Prof. Sunstein along the lines made here, but this article is at various points conclusory, glib, and shallow.<p>For example, &quot;Actually, no, their study said nothing at all about doctors, accountants, or architects. They just made that part up to make it sound more relevant.&quot;<p>Yes, they want to tell people why the research might be relevant or interesting. The quoted portion of the article says &quot;Our study . . . found that knowing about people’s political beliefs did interfere with the ability to assess those people’s expertise in other, unrelated domains.&quot; Sounds to me like the article merely seeks to show a general point. Who cares whether it deals specifically with things that were mentioned to provide some context as to why anyone should care? This guy is just cherry-picking a quote, taking it out of context, and arguably misrepresenting what the paper even wanted to show.<p>He wants to nitpick Sunstein, but then expects us to accept his sarcastic quip that Sunstein may not be one of the &quot;the most brilliant minds in American law&quot; even though he&#x27;s a stats professor and not a law professor? I guess it&#x27;s fair insofar as Sunstein is a law prof who is leveraging stats and behavioral economics in a way a lot of experts in that field apparently don&#x27;t like, but I don&#x27;t find this guy&#x27;s argument helped by this kind of sophomoric statement.