Who was saying misinformation was a moral panic?

(Plenty of people were saying fact-checking wasn't very effective, but that's a different critique)

You don't want luxury unemployment Unemployment causes a profound drop in life satisfaction and material prosperity doesn't matter

New blog post: You don't want luxury unemployment

Supporters of AI say that the harms to well-being caused by AI-driven unemployment will be offset by material prosperity.

None of the unemployment literature supports this.
chris-said.io/2026/02/13/y...

I mean ALL medical association studies.

Not to remove blame from Trump, but scientists need to pivot on these association studies.

Either the publications come with caveats in bright orange warning labels, or they should stop being funded.

Because the p-values are often wrong (e.g. errors are not clustered), or because they're not a good way to analyze funnel (it's ok if CTR goes down if impressions go up enough)?

I hate them too btw

I also think centrist pundits have been able to move beyond their own preferences.

For example, Yglesias and Shor have both said that economic left-populism could be a winner in many districts, even though it's not their personal preference.

I see. But is it not true that centrist pundits and regular voters were both pretty annoyed by wokeness?

Fair q on why the timing was delayed! Couple thoughts:

1. Many of the unpopular policies extended into 2023, e.g Covid restrictions and immigration.

2. It took time for a preference cascade to emerge (see Timur Kuran on this). Rightly or wrongly, swing voters felt liberated from wokeness in 2022.

Yes, I mean strategic error. And to answer your question, I think some on Bluesky evade the possibility of admitting error by focusing on how their opposition (MAGA) is worse.

They're right that MAGA is worse, but it's a mistake to not recognize their own strategic errors!

A boring theory of the populist right A large minority of the public wants tougher policies on crime and immigration

More here: www.slowboring.com/p/a-boring-t...

In 2016-2020, the Democrats staked out a some unpopular positions on crime, immigration, and cultural issues that repelled a lot of voters.

While many Dems now believe those were strategic errors, many people on Bluesky (the "we" here) seem to deny any error here.

If folate deficiencies really did cause autism, then you would expect to see a sharp drop in the autism-by-birth-year curve in 1997, when folic acid fortification was mandated.

Instead, the curve continued its upward trend unabated.

chris-said.io/2021/06/27/a...

But I do agree that _at some level_, all these tenets exist on the right. I just think they're not as strong.

For smalltentism, the data I remember seeing was about willingness to stop speaking to a relative if they had different political opinions.

The right is worse than the left in so many ways, but I see these particular tenets more on Bluesky.

-Credentialism. The right doesn't have this as I understand the word.
-Catastrophism. Mental health is much better on the right.
-Smalltentism. Maybe. Saw some data saying otherwise, but can't find.

FWIW many of these centrist pundits have said that economic left-populism can be viable in many districts, even though they themselves may disagree with it.

The things they say are most important to moderate on are crime, immigration, and some culture war topics.

> "Swing voters hate the things that annoy me" punditry is a cursed genre

Maybe you've discussed this elsewhere, but in what sense is it cursed?

I think it's useful to know about representation gaps between a party and the median voter, regardless of the messenger's own beliefs on the topic.

I'd also add to that list binary thinking & failure to reflect.

So many posts here are some form of "the opposition is worse, therefore we have done nothing wrong".

Nate identifies three tenets of Blueskyism: Smalltent-ism, Credentialism, and Catastrophism.

I wish he hadn't written it in such an antagonistic way, but I think he's right.

Nate unfortunately uses some of the same style he criticizes Bluesky for, but I agree with overall point.

People here don't realize how alienating this place is to normal voters.

www.natesilver.net/p/what-is-bl...

I wouldn’t look at time series in a dynamic system and making causal conclusions!

You can make better causal claims if you look at which candidates overperform relative to expectations in their district (voter party distribution) and you can see clearly that the moderates do well.

In isolation it’s hard to draw causal claims about two time series moving down at the same time, which is why I fall back to first principles about the median voter. (2/2)

I like immigration! But I’m willing to make reasonable compromises to the median voter if that helps stop authoritarians.

I did not know Starmer had moved further right in the last few months but that is likely in response to his declining popularity, not the other way around. (1/2)

A PM becoming less popular after taking office seems pretty ordinary and common, and not super informative to the debate over immigration.

More relevant to me seems voters’ own clearly stated preferences. If Starmer had stayed left on immigration he wouldn’t be in power at all!

The boring but underappreciated reality is that if you don't want authoritarians taking power, you need to come closer to median voter opinions on crime and immigration.

A boring theory of the populist right A large minority of the public wants tougher policies on crime and immigration

Large minorities of the electorate have right-wing views on immigration and crime that mainstream politicians won't embrace, as a result voters back new parties or (in the US) outsider insurgents like Trump.

www.slowboring.com/p/a-boring-t...

Got it. FWIW my prediction is that in 2 years time, Alpha School will be seen as a commercial success and, while it may have some controversies, its ability to instruct student vastly more effectively that traditional classrooms will be undeniable.

Am willing to bet on this 😀

I don’t meant to pick on you in particular because you gave thoughtful responses. I’m just trying to interrogate the broader anti-tech sentiments on here, which seem so reflexive and “armchair-hater” (again, not saying you in particular!).

Whereas tech bros often are able to enact real change, sometimes good, sometimes bad.

So when I hear that tech bros want to implement some basic but untapped education ideas (eg spaced repetition), I welcome that! Even if they don’t have as detailed knowledge as other experts. (2/3)

Thanks for the thoughtful responses. Although, if you want innovation, why is it bad that tech bros are doing it?

It seems to me that incumbent institutions + education experts have not had a successful track record of fundamentally changing education, however knowledge able they maybe. (1/3)