Accumulated knowledge
Accumulated knowledge, the wide array of shit I've learned over the years.
Much of it has felt useless, but suddenly it's clicking, coming into play.
I'm reading Freakonomics. I like it; it's well written, and it makes a strong case for its arguments, in some respects.
But it also makes a lot of underlying assumptions that don't go analyzed. And it leaves out other information that would counter their point.
I only notice these things because of accumulated knowledge and years of political growth and perhaps just getting older.
The author wrote about increased imprisonment causing reductions in crime rates. And it said that everyone benefits, but it ignored an entire sect of the population that was going to prison, people that were not benefited.
People convicted of crimes, even if they completely deserve a sentence, still aren't likely benefited (in their own eyes) by prison. Certainly not all of them.
It makes lots of assumptions that are stated as known facts. And because there are so many statements in there which do seem to be well-substantiated, the other claims are easy to just accept.
(Such as writing "people that were not benefited" above. I don't know that, I just think it. It's an argument, not a fact.)
Until something is written that I know additional information about, or that just doesn't hit right.
The extremely long chapter on baby names closes with:
What the California names data suggest is that an overwhelming number of parents use a name to signal their own expectations of how successful their children will be.
"use a name to signal"
I'm naming my baby Fred because I think Fred will be successful in life.
"use a name to signal" suggests intent, and there are no sources provided to substantiate that.
There are sources discussed for data about how many babies were named what names. None of those sources are said to include information about a parents' intent when naming their child, except one or two anecdotes, and those anecdotes don't support the conclusion!
One mother named her daughter Temptress because she misheard someone's name & miscopied it, and didn't know what a "temptress" was.
She did not name her daughter Temptress because she expected her daughter to be a temptress, per the authors' own words!
I have a better example for the accumulated knowledge thing, but I can't remember what it was. Ugh.
I still like the book. But I have to be more critical reading it than I realized when it was talking about sumo wrestlers and teachers cheating on SATs and a corporate bagel delivery business, things I know nothing about.
When it got onto abortion and crime and prison and other stuff I'm more informed on, some stuff wasn't sitting right, like oh buddy you're missing something important in your analysis.
I feel misled because I originally expected some kind of "objective economist" perspective. There's surely no such thing.
But I learned & kept reading. I'm happy to hear the arguments, and there's much on which I agree with the authors, a lot that does seem right.
Also read on respecting conservatives