How to Write an Interdisciplined Chapter

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CNN's John Sutter talks about the process of writing an interdisciplinary book. He says he starts with a big topic, then goes through Google Scholar to see if there is anything written on it. After reading papers and looking at references, he tries to reach out to living authors for clarifications. "I'm always worried about this autodidex curse" - you've read a ton of stuff but haven't actually talked to anyone who knows what's going on."

"No single paper is that good", says Bryan Caplan. To really understand a topic, you need to read the entire literature in the field. And to do the kind of scholarship Bryan's work requires, you need to cover multiple fields. Only that way can you assemble a wide variety of evidence into useful knowledge.

But few scholars ever even try to reach the enlightened interdisciplinary plane. So how does he do it?

Tyler explores Bryan's approach, including how to avoid the autodidact's curse, why his favorite philosopher happens to be a former classmate, what Tolstoy has that science fiction lacks, the idea trap, most useful wrong beliefs, effective altruism, Larry David, what most economics papers miss about the return to education, and more.

Read a full transcript enhanced with helpful links.

Recorded April 17th, 2018 Other ways to connect

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