Tyler Cowen: belief

Transcript context

…Do you actually have a conscious theory of what's going on when you get on a call with somebody, and three minutes later you're like, "You're not getting the grant"? What happens? Well, often there's one question the person can't answer. If it's someone applying with a nonprofit idea, plenty of people have good ideas for nonprofits, and I see these all the time. But when you ask them the question, "How do you think about building out your donor base?" it's remarkable to me how many people have no idea how to answer that. Without that, you don't have anything. So it depends on the area. But that would be an example of an area where I ask that question pretty quickly, and a significant percentage can't answer it. I'm still willing to say, "Well, come back to me when you have a good case. " Oddly, none of those people have ever come back to me that I can think of, but I think over time some will. That's a very concrete thing. But there are other intangibles. Just when you see what the person thinks and talks about too much. So if someone wants to get an award only for their immigration status, that to me is a dangerous sign. Even though at the same time, usually you're looking for people who want to come to the US, whether they can do it or not. There are just a lot of different signals you pick up, like people somehow have the wrong priorities, or they're referring to the wrong status markers. It comes through more than you would think. If you had the transcript of the call, but you couldn't see the video, you would say no. But in the case where you could see the video, you might say yes if you see the transcript. What happens in those cases?…

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