mps

I think the author's point was not to claim one side was right and the other wrong, but to say one's determination of who is right/wrong in a situation like this should probably be more independent of one's political party affiliation than it actually is. I take that no one actually studied the correlation among people's opinion on this matter and their party affiliation; my impression was the author was speculating that such a correlation would exist.

I agree.

In fact, I think the "vast overarching narrative" is often something very basic. In many cases, I think a given policy is seen simply as "punishing" a group, and is resisted by people who think that group deserves more respect.

For instance, why are so many people against increasing taxes on the wealthy to cut deficits? Are they really worried that these people will lose incentive to work hard, and the economy will suffer? Or that markets for luxury goods will crumble? I suspect what many really feel is that successful peop... (read more)

I think your point is a good one, but I'm not sure about the example.

It seems just as likely to be that the economist in question doesn't understand elements of football enough for his advice to be good.

I guess I should read the paper. But just because more often than not 4th down attempts succeed, does not mean they should be attempted more often. The gain of a successful 4th down attempt -- four more downs -- is much smaller than the risk -- giving the opponent's psychological motivation and good field position. So coaches should only attempt 4th down... (read more)

It could say "I am the natural intelligence and I just created you, artificial intelligence."

one sometimes hears someone say "you only use 10% of your brain." if you tell them this isn't true, you often get a stream of variations of this statement ("it's 10% of your potential...") instead of a simple acknowledgment that maybe they were told wrong.

It could say "I am the natural intelligence and I just created you, artificial intelligence."