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My Projects

PPE Curriculum Development and Recitation Sections
This time last year, enrollment in Introduction to Philosophy, Politics, and Economics (IDS 2118) hovered around twenty students. Fast forward one year, and that number has more than doubled.

What’s driving the growth? Students are hungry for the kind of sweeping, interdisciplinary inquiry this course offers—an exploration of values and constitutions, property and power, freedom and coercion, economic prosperity and inequality, entrepreneurship and the role of the state. We anticipated this growth. From PPE Speaker Series attendance, to inbox messages from curious students, to spirited hallway conversations—we saw it coming and prepared.

But when classes grow students can become anonymous and lectures can become more one-way —leaving less space to work out ideas in back-and-forth. This fall, we’re rolling out a new structure meant to preserve our sense of community and make room for discussion.

Our PPE Scholars will lead small-group recitation sections outside of class, using a curriculum co-developed by Professors Mark LeBar and Doug Norton. These recitations will create space during class for more discussion and build platoons of community within the class where students can wrestle with big ideas in a more personal setting with a tighter-knit intellectual community. The hope is this will benefit students both inside-and-outside of class.

Loaded Dice: How Non-Random Decisions Lead to Poor Understanding
One of the most important toolkits in social science is research designs for causal inference—developed largely to address selection bias. Selection bias arises when people make purposeful choices, making it hard to tell whether an outcome was caused by the choice or by characteristics of the chooser. For example, high-ability individuals often choose more education, but their success may have occurred regardless. I can't take credit for the success of many of my students (though I like to think I helped), they were bound to do well.

While researchers understand the importance of selection bias, my goal is to bring that insight to broader audiences—using funny stories from everyday life and pop culture to show why it matters. Here is an example from the start of a chapter I'm working on:
 

Florida is well known for many things: sunshine, oranges, Disney, NASA, beaches, and . . . “Florida Man”. Headlines like, “Florida man accused of stealing ambulance from hospital,” are common —the man was tired of waiting for discharge. Florida man also crashed his car into a Waffle House, retrieved his golf ball from the back of an alligator, evaded police by doing cartwheels, attempted to steal a rack of ribs by hiding them in his pants, and this is really just naming a few.
 

Before describing the Florida Man phenomenon in more detail, it’s worth noting, there is a whole sub-genre of “Florida Woman” that has produced headlines like, “A Florida woman was arrested and charged with aggravated assault without intent to kill after she reportedly ‘farted loudly’ in a Dollar Store and then pulled a knife on a man who complained.” While the ladies are certainly contenders for the crown, for ease —and because “Florida persons” lacks panache—we will stick with Florida Man throughout.
 

Florida Man trended on the internet in 2013 with the Florida Man Birthday Challenge. Tens of thousands of people went to an internet browser, searched Florida Man —along with their birthday—and then saw their Florida Man identity. For example, looking at September 1st my Florida Man comes from the BBC article “Florida Man arrested after trying to cross Atlantic in hamster wheel vessel”. Florida Man has gone international. A true global sensation!
 

The madness has leveled up and moved past internet memes. There are actual board games that can be purchased in stores alongside Connect Four and Clue. In 2024, the first ever Florida Man Games were held in St. Augustine, Florida. The Wikipedia article on the Florida Man Games lists parodic sporting events like the Evading Arrest Obstacle Course which involved escaping from handcuffs in the back of a police car, jumping fences, wrangling an inflatable alligator, and more. The Beer Belly Sumo event involved sumo wrestling while holding pitchers of beer. You can clearly see: humanity at its finest.

At this point, you’re probably thinking, Florida Man would be at home in a Hank Williams Jr. song. And you’d be right! In fact, if you listen closely to the backup vocals on his hit, “Family Tradition,” you can hear someone crash a jet ski into a pontoon boat full of feral parrots. True story.*

(*Not a true story.)

But, here is the question: Is“Florida Man” really more wild than “Georgia Man” or “Michigan Man”?

Not to take away suspense, but the answer will be “no”. Not because Florida is tame —have you been to a Florida gas station after midnight? The conclusion also isn’t reached by besmirching Georgians or Michiganders, pulling them down into the sticky Beer Belly Sumo mud.

Rather we will interrogate two leading explanations for the rise of Florida Man: selective migration and transparency laws. So buckle up. We’re diving deep into the sociology, the sunshine, and the sheer madness that is Florida Man. Please keep your hands, feet, and ribs inside the vehicle at all times.

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