#AcademicRunPlaylist - 10/20/25

The weather did not cooperate, so while hanging out inside and watching the Jays win I listened to talks for my #AcademicRunPlaylist!

First was an interesting talk by Tat-How Teh on modeling the effects of network interoperability on platform competition and consumer welfare at the Toulouse School of Economics https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xQHqd2lv49E

Next was a compelling talk by Carlos Gershenson on the limitations of network science at the Network Science Institute https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0AYs9BGqLXc

Next was an intriguing talk by Hannah Choi on biologically grounded network models with artificial cortical cell types at the Kempner Institute at Harvard University https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9gf0lCu8tVc

Next was "No Right to An Honest Living" by Jacqueline Jones. This book uses a case-focused lens to illustrate how despite Boston's role as the center of the abolitionist movement it systematically discriminated against Black workers and generally tolerated high levels of everyday racism in society. While Jones occasionally steps back and looks at larger trends, this is much more about the stories of individuals, businesses, and organizations throughout the Greater Boston area. She mostly refrains from using quantitative metrics, making it challenging to evaluate claims made about the degree to which a certain practice or trend is significant. That's fairly glaring in a history dealing with core economic issues, I'd love another edition that adds that in. If you live in the area, however, it's even more critical for you to understand this history. Highly recommend https://www.hachettebookgroup.com/titles/jacqueline-jones/no-right-to-an-honest-living-winner-of-the-pulitzer-prize/9781541619807/

Next was "The Rainbow Ain't Never Been Enuf" by Kaila Adia Story. This book is more of a memoir than a philosophical treatise, and much of more macro observations are sweeping generalizations made from personal observations. As a book capturing the experiences of a single individual and those they interact with it's interesting, but it's challenging to weigh the claims made here since they're framed more as pronouncements with little supporting evidence. When Story does bring in survey data, it's nearly always from non-peer reviewed studies with a surveying party interested in the outcome. While this is normal in philosophy and critical studies works, for me it represents a missed opportunity to drive home points with harder data. Still, as a window into the perspective of Black and Latinx LGBTQ+ people in our current moment it's an interesting read https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/770182/the-rainbow-aint-never-been-enuf-by-kaila-adia-story/

Last was "Geek Heresy" by Kentaro Toyama. The first two thirds of the book nicely mix personal experiences with research findings to detail the many flaws in the technosolutionist approach, and how even when successful effective technology acts as an amplifier of existing conditions and trends rather than a completely independent force. Toyama extends this to economic policies and the economic profession more broadly, treating simple interventions in a similar fashion to digital technologies. An important omission here is any discussion of the concept of who should design a solution and the participation and leadership of people from a target community. IMO skip after chapter 7. Highly recommend https://geekheresy.org/