Market Incentives Behind Barrel Math

Eric kicks off 2026 with an audio essay rant targeted at the ham-fisted "percentage" math that people use to answer the question:

"How much of a whiskey's flavor comes from the barrel?"

In the censored words of George Carlin: "It's all BS, and it's bad for ya." To demonstrate this, we sift through GC-MS whiskey sample results, human neurobiology, and behavioral economics.

In the end, it's a poorly posed question invented to solve a problem that doesn't exist, and it colors our expectations about flavor in harmful ways.