Tyler Cowen: commitment

Transcript context

…Besides unpacking boxes, I have moved to New York, which is wonderful. I really miss living in a city. I’m from Istanbul, and I haven’t lived in a city for a while full-time, especially the pandemic’s last phase — that’s interesting. I am pondering to finally write a book. During the first phase of the Arab Spring in 2011, I was there the whole time; I kept going. I was in Tahrir Square. I went to Tunisia. I went all over the region. There are a lot of books that came out quickly at the time, and I just resisted writing a book just then. I’m from the Middle East. I felt like this is not over yet, and a lot of books were quite triumphant. It was only after the Gezi protests and how they played out, I felt like I’m going to write a book, and I feel like it’s a more durable and balanced book. It’s not for or against social media. It’s also not saying the movements were triumphant or not, but I had the gift — I gave myself time to let it play out. I feel the same way about the pandemic now. I feel like it was a stress test, and I think there’s going to be a first crop of books that put most of the blame on Trump’s lap, which is not unjustified. That administration has a lot to answer for, but I think the things that it has shown us are much bigger than one administration’s admittedly very real failings. I’m thinking maybe, just maybe, there is space for a book that looks at some of the things you were talking about, which is, we have to revitalize how our society works. We haven’t come to grips with this. I’m thinking I might be writing a book. It will come out after the first crop of the post-pandemic. There’ll be probably dozens of books in the next year, but mine will come after all those are over. Zeynep, thank you very much. I will take questions from the audience and from the iPad, so I’ll start with the audience. Questions? For those few people in the room who have never read Weber, what’s the right way to get started?…

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