David Epstein
@DavidEpstein
author RANGE and TheSportsGene. Ex-@ProPublica, @SInow. (pic is w/Frances Hesselbein). IG @davidepstein. RANGE WIDELY newsletter 👉 http://davidepstein.substack.com
It’s real! ...so I’ll probably be tweeting on it somewhat regularly starting in a few weeks for a bit. It was ~150% as much work as the sports gene and I’m proud of the effort. I’ll aim to be mostly interesting and only a little annoying, but feel free to tell me how I’m doing!
Same reason I can't have others research for me. Researching is how I learn and I can only write well when I really understand what I'm explaining.
Yes. Writing is not a second thing that happens after thinking. The act of writing is an act of thinking. Writing *is* thinking. Students, academics, and anyone else who outsources their writing to LLMs will find their screens full of words and their minds emptied of thought.
I was explaining to my Ukrainian colleague the phrase ‘There’s no such thing as a free lunch’. She told me the equivalent in Ukrainian is ‘The only free cheese is in the mousetrap’ - which is so much better
ChatGPT (o3) made up a word ("mutuater") in simple conversation today — first time I'd had that — and then did it again ("bargai") in the same thread.
I'm sorry for them that they haven't met the Muji gel ink ballpoint nytimes.com/wirecutter/rev…
Thanks so much for sharing it, Charles!
I will never forget @DavidEpstein's incredible 2016 story on the DIY scientist, the Olympian, and the mutated gene. propublica.org/article/muscul… You won't want to miss the postcript posted today. Remembering the Incredible Life of DIY Geneticist Jill Viles propublica.org/article/rememb…
What a beautiful tribute. Remembering the Incredible Life of DIY Geneticist Jill Viles propublica.org/article/rememb… by @DavidEpstein
Vale Jill Dopf Viles - her relentless determination and DIY science is a true inspiration. I'm a huge fan of both of David's books, The Sports Gene and Range, and I followed this story when he first wrote about it in early 2016. A beautiful post and tribute to Jill.
Several moments of this lovely post from @DavidEpstein are beautiful and sad and uplifting all at once. What a fantastic bit of writing davidepstein.substack.com/p/the-most-int…
🫡 Yessir Dr. Colonel Mallon sir .... you truly have one of the world's most interesting resumes
Nice address Honorary Doctor Epstein. In the future you should address me as Colonel Mallon. After all, I am a Kentucky Colonel, even though I've stayed overnite in the state for exactly 1 night.
This is commencement gold. You've taken a universal truth the destructive power of comparison and the importance of personal growth and packaged it in2 a compelling, memorable, and deeply human narrative using iconic characters [Alice, Caesar] and personal vulnerability. .
It's graduation season, and I gave a commencement address...
Asked ChatGPT "Who am I?" Just wanted to see if it remembered my name... : "Curiosities: A magpie mind that flits from Peloton power curves to Nietzsche quotes, from German pronunciation hacks to the logistics of the Iranian Revolution—and then fact-checks every last comma."
Avg elite female gymnast shrunk from about 5'3" to about 4'9" over a few decades. Artificial selection at work...
You don’t realize how tiny she is until she’s next to him
that's pretty cool "...seatbelt laws, speed limits, stricter drink-driving enforcement, better road design and pedestrian zones, and improvements in the safety and resilience of cars themselves."
nice compilation of nuggets from writers on how they get their books done. My approach: cutting stone (it's the last one) substack.com/home/post/p-16…