It does higher status in our society lend more respect and credibility to that person or that entity's model. You can, I mean, it's an entry barrier to even constructing a model that's going to be taken seriously. It is completely ridiculous. This gets to the late Herman Daly's point that a standard economist would look at food production as only 3%. So if we lose all food, we would only drop 3% of our economy, but the rest of the economy depends on people having food. What if there was a philanthropist listening to this program that would start a fund to remove prior Nobel Prizes for analysis and conclusions that were total bunk and unhelpful to society? Okay
On this episode, Dr. Erica Thompson joins Nate to unpack her recent book Escape From Model Land. Erica explores the pitfalls of conventional science models and the opportunities by which models can augment our imagination and collective understanding. What is a model, and how do our worldviews shape the way they’re made - and conversely, how do they shape our worldviews? How can we rethink and bring creativity into something as scientific as modeling to create maps of the future that are both more accurate and - most importantly - more helpful to planning responses?
About Eric Thompson:
Dr Erica Thompson is a Senior Policy Fellow at the LSE Data Science Institute, where she works on a broad programme of theoretical and practical research about mathematical models, their use, interpretation and social context. She recently authored Escape From Model Land (Basic Books, 2022) which explores the opportunities and challenges of augmenting our imagination about the future with mathematical tools.
For Show Notes and More visit https://www.thegreatsimplification.com/episode/55-erica-thompson