prior probability

Did you know the great rock guitarist Eddie Van Halen was not born in the USA? He was born in Amsterdam, my second-favorite city in the world, after La Habana! Also, check out this excellent essay by Matt Welch titled “Eddie Van Halen, Melting-Pot Virtuoso.” Below is one of my all-time favorite songs from my youth. Rest in peace, Eddie …

I have been watching this beautiful mural take form during my weekly commute to the university (I teach one face-to-face class on Wednesdays), and I finally got to meet the artist, Suhely, last night! Suhely’s mural is located on 517 W. Colonial in Orlando, Florida, and here is her Instagram page.

Given that the results of this year’s presidential contest will most likely be disputed, I will be speaking about these fascinating topics on Tony Suarez’s informative “I need to know” radio program later this week. I will post a link to the radio broadcast in the next day or two. The source for the image below is Akhil Reed Amar’s excellent 2005 book “The Constitution: A Biography.” Professor Amar is a national treasure. I was lucky enough to take a class with him when I was in law school, and he has since become my favorite living constitutional law scholar. (Update (10/8): I forgot to mention that this program will be in Spanish!)

Via David Noll (@davidlnoll), on this day in 2016 Nate Silver of “FiveThirtyEight” fame gave Hillary Rodham Clinton a 78.7% chance of winning the presidency. At the same time, as Mr Silver’s defenders like to remind us, Silver gave Trump a one-in-five chance of winning the 2016 election, while almost everyone else was writing Trump’s chances off completely. Will history repeat itself in 2020? Also, what about prediction markets?

Updated (10/7). Check out this investigative report about the misuse of police dogs. Maybe the “woke” critique of Paw Patrol is spot on (pun intended), after all, or maybe not! See Dylan Shelter’s excellent reply in the comment section. Hat tip: The Amazing Tyler Cowen, via Marginal Revolution.

From a recent deposition of Mr Musk:

I nominate the small square sign pictured below, which is located on Riverside Drive in Tarpon Springs, Florida.

Either former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie or President Trump’s SCOTUS nominee Amy Coney Barret (or both!) might be a coronavirus “superspreader” and Zeynep Tufecki’s report in The Atlantic: This Overlooked Variable Is the Key to the Pandemic. Hat tip: Salvador Antonetti.

Source: Remember Singapore (10/1)

Built in the 19th century, Jurong Road was the oldest road in the western part of Singapore. According to the Monthly Progress Report by the …

Coming to the End of Jurong Road

Class #6 of my Advanced Topics in Law class will be devoted to the battle of ideas over corporate social responsibility (CSR). To make this intellectual battle as memorable as possible, I have enlisted the late great conservative economist Milton Friedman and the feisty-liberal-law-professor-cum-senator Liz Warren to personify two different approaches to CSR: “greed is good” and “share the wealth.” Also, for your reference, two years ago I wrote up a detailed, 13-part paragraph-by-paragraph review of Milton Friedman’s classic essay “The social responsibility of business is to increase its profits.” Links to my extended review of Friedman’s ideas are below:

1. Review of Milton Friedman (part 1)
2. Friedman on business ethics (part 2)
3. Friedman’s critique of CSR (part 3)
4. Review of Friedman (part 4): corporate managers vs. sole proprietors
5. Review of Friedman (part 5): interlude
6. Review of Friedman (part 6): theory choice
7. Milton Friedman’s fallacy? (part 7)
8. Friedman and the art of sophistry (part 8)
9. Review of Friedman (part 9): ethics and epistemology
10. Review of Friedman (part 10): markets versus politics
11. Review of Friedman (part 11): do motives matter?
12. Review of Friedman (penultimate post): politics versus markets redux
13. Review of Friedman (last post)