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horsefacts pfp
horsefacts
@horsefacts.eth
In my last year of econ undergrad, I was lucky enough to join Jerry Gaus's graduate seminars. At the time I was disillusioned with economics, which had turned out to be about building cartoon models and torturing data with statistics. Most academic econ was more fiction writing than truth seeking. In his seminars I found a different vision: an economics grounded in moral philosophy and political economy, influenced by evolutionary theory, anthropology, and complex systems. It was just one method in an approach to understanding our complex evolved social order that was much more honest and no less rigorous. I think he is the teacher who most influenced me, though I didn't know it at the time. I started learning to program because I wanted to explore agent-based evolutionary models. And I found myself working years later on cryptoeconomic coordination games. I never made it back to tell him this: he passed away four years ago today. I often wonder what he would think about Ethereum.
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horsefacts pfp
horsefacts
@horsefacts.eth
As a teacher, he was known for being both extremely patient and generous with his students (even us undergrads) while holding them to a high standard of excellence. This was true in my brief experience. He was a great defender of Hayek and showed me that the really interesting parts of his work are not the economics. I'd need much longer casts to do justice to the ideas in "The Order of Public Reason" and "The Open Society and Its Complexities," but this is a good overview of his work: https://ppesociety.org/in-memoriam-jerry-gaus/
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Nounish Prof ⌐◧-◧🎩 pfp
Nounish Prof ⌐◧-◧🎩
@nounishprof
Thanks for this -- great to see when teachers have true impact. Appreciate you sharing this and allowing his work to reach a new audience.
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Ben - [C/x]
@benersing
Its worth checking out Sante Fe Institute’s work at the intersection of econ & chaos theory. Specifically Doyne Farmer or Brian Arthur.
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Eric P. Rhodes
@epr
how wonderful that you were able to find someone who was the signal in the noise. i returned to school this year. lot's of agenda-driven academics in the social sciences interested in story telling. but having some "experience" in the real world i find i'm able navigate those teachers who aren't interested in "truth seeking" as you say. hope that i'll find my very own Jerry Gaus one day.
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Darryl Yeo 🛠️ (at Devcon)
@darrylyeo
Man, I wish I had more passionate and prolific professors like this during my undergrad. The instructors I got left much to be desired.
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tldr (tim reilly)
@tldr
I had a very similar experience with Econ undergrad… kept thinking that “maybe it will get interesting when I get to advanced classes”. Same with Poli Sci. Then, being finished with those majors, I took a course called “Shakespeare” with a man named Larry Goldberg. My life has never been the same. He tells very good jokes in earnest, and one of them is the “Summer Reading List” he would give to students every semester. When I was working in business consulting after college, missing the intellectual activity of Professor Goldberg’s classes, I was waking up at 5am every morning to read through this list while my mind was still fresh.
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@strat.eth
It sounds like someone wonderful to converse with! I find his ideas on individuality especially intriguing. I get a sense he placed the betterment of everyone over the self. Not narrowing the focus to specifics, but instead encouraging for more cohesive benefits. There are deep truths to this, which are difficult to acknowledge on the surface. Thanks for sharing!
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Dino
@wode
What's with the porcupines tho
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tomo🌏🇯🇵🎵🐹🦀🍓 pfp
tomo🌏🇯🇵🎵🐹🦀🍓
@tomos
Your sincerity and seriousness towards things come across clearly in your writing. I feel that his will continues to live on through your activities.
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Garrett
@garrett
good teachers are life changing
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Caden
@cbxm
yo thanks for sharing, horsefacts. i don't know what he'd think of crypto but i'm sure he'd be proud of you. 🫶
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Kaido
@tamey
I am sorry for your loss bro His work lives on with you I am sure he will be proud of you
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Daniel 🎩
@danfaje
Beautiful… and may he RIP I actually find it quite impressive you were able to transition from Econ to programming smoothly
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