The Ledger
Every statement that passed quotation and attribution checks. Mix any filter with any other: certainty 1/5, debate potential 5/5, or both at once.
why aren't all 14 resolved? a statement only gets an assessment when the public record can support or contradict it. opinions and what-ifs never can, and 0 checkable ones are still open, waiting for their date. predictions held up or didn't; assertions are supported or contradicted. on every card: ▮▮▮▮▮ certainty · ▮▮▮▮▮ debate potential. speakers are clickable
Caplan: Schooling signals worker capability rather than teaching practical skills
“Well, if you go and do well in your Aristotle class, your foreign language class, this, though useless in terms of what you will do, it is impressive. It is convincing. It's a way of selling people on your value as a worker.”
Caplan: Education's signaling function removes pressure to improve genuine student learning
“The signaling function of education is on an emotional level, at least very deeply grasped, and so there's almost no pressure from anyone in the system to actually improve genuine learning.”
Caplan: Broad educational attainment simply inflates employer hiring requirements
“There is this treadmill or rat race effect where for any one individual that would give them more opportunities, and that's true, but if you go and give a whole generation more opportunities, the result is just that employers jack up the educational expectatio…”
Caplan: Educational signaling explains why students cheat to impersonate high achievers
“Signaling explains why students cheat. And I'm like, yeah, of course, but it never occurred to me until you told me, yeah, the whole point, you know, you cheat in order to impersonate a good student, so you want to be treated like an A student even though you'…”
Caplan: Voters avoid direct mistake costs, unlike consumers who shop
“There's a fundamental difference between shopping and voting. When shopping, if you make a mistake, you pay the price. Where in voting, if you make a mistake, you were just tipping the scales a little bit towards all of society having a worse outcome.”
Caplan: Democracy is a shared water pool used simultaneously as trash disposal
“Rather than thinking about democracy as a supermarket, think of it more about as like a common pool of water that is also our trash disposal system. And so people simultaneously are throwing in all of our intellectual garbage, but it's also where we drink.”
Caplan: Education advances individuals but creates no net value for society
“Looking better than other people is a great way to advance yourself, but it is not a way for society to advance.”
Caplan: Parents prioritize college admissions and emotional fit over standardized test scores
“Parents aren't that concerned about getting their kids test scores up. So they may want them to have high SAT scores, but in terms of state standardized tests, most parents don't care about that stuff very much. And instead, they're mainly concerned about gett…”
Caplan: Rising general education levels intensify social stigma against non-degree holders
“In terms of competitiveness, there's much better in 1950 to be a high school dropout because in those days there were so many high school dropouts that there just wasn't that much of a stigma against it. And the reason is precisely that the higher the educatio…”
Caplan: Vocational education builds practical skills rather than signaling social status
“If you take signaling seriously, the really good thing about vocational education is it seems like it's much less about impressing others. In fact, there may even be a little bit of a stigma against it, and more about acquiring actual concrete practical skills…”
Caplan: Job competence requires domain-specific practice, not general critical reasoning
“The answer seems to be practicing that specific job. You know, the way that you get to be a good pilot Is not by taking a critical reasoning class. It's by, you know, getting in the simulator, getting in the cockpit, and learning to deal with a thousand differ…”
Caplan: Weight empirical results heavier when they contradict researchers' own preferences
“This is one of my heuristics, by the way, is you're putting more weight on results people don't want to find.”
Caplan: Job applicants can easily fake conscientiousness on personality tests
“Fake being smart, that's hard. But on the other hand, fake being conscientious on a test, that's something where anyone can do it.”
Caplan: Financial stakes force people to reason more objectively
“When there's no money on the table, people form their beliefs in a very emotional way. But this is not a fixed trait of human nature. It's not like they have to be emotional. Rather, they're selectively emotional and in ones where there's some real stakes, som…”