Conversations about computing, a podcast by a16Z

  Here's the announcement of a forthcoming series of podcast interviews that looks interesting.:

Announcing First Principles: Rare conversations with the pioneers behind key computing technologies
a16z crypto editorial 

 Here's the trailer:

Financial Times quick review of four new econ books

 The FT has brief reviews of four new economics books:  Moral Economics, The Common Good Economy: A New Compass,  We Need to Tax Billionaires, and Money: The Inside Story

The price of good intentions  Four new books that examine the morals, markets and money behind modern capitalism. by Tej Parikh

Here are the remarks about the one of the four that I'm most familiar with:

      "At a time when public outrage can shape policy decisions faster than ever before, Nobel Prize-winning economist and Stanford professor Alvin Roth makes a compelling case for evidence over instinct in Moral Economics: What Controversial Transactions Reveal About How Markets Work (Basic Books £25/Basic Venture $35). Roth, whose pioneering work in market design transformed systems for kidney donation, examines some of the most contentious exchanges in modern society, including prostitution, organ sales, drugs and medical aid for the dying.

"In the process, Roth delivers some eye-opening hard-truths to those who might think moral intuition ought to underpin all regulation and law. He shows why most policy decisions involve unavoidable moral trade-offs, and how bans of activities deemed objectionable can result in transactions being pushed underground (where they become harder to regulate). He also makes the case for treating markets in distasteful services as moral tools, not failures.

“My goal is not to tell you what to think, but to help you think,” Roth writes in the introduction. He largely succeeds. This is an entertaining and mind-opening read from start to finish. Some may find the discussions about morally “repugnant” topics somewhat offensive — but that’s the point."
 

 

A rogue's gallery of transplant heroes (following ATC2026)

 After my talk yesterday at the American Transplant Congress, I had lunch with a table of transplant heroes, Joe Tector, Peter Friend, Juliana Bastos, Mike Rees and Gustavo Ferreira.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Medical aid in dying (and Moral Economics) on Freakonomics Radio

 The latest episode of Freakonomics looks at the controversies and philosophies involved in the growing legalization of medical aid in dying (MAID).  Stephen Dubner interviews people with multiple perspectives, and offers a personal insight of his own.

"DUBNER: I have a sister who died last year, it was a pretty rotten death, honestly, and she wanted to hasten it. We couldn’t physically orchestrate it. And it really made me see this issue in a new way. It just seemed, you know, I don’t want to say the scales fell from my eyes, but I’d never encountered it first-hand. And it made me think that almost anyone who did encounter it first-hand might have a reckoning, might be in favor of it. But I don’t know, maybe that’s just me. Do you have any sense of how broad the support is for it generally?

ROTH: We’re an aging population, so I think not only do more people have a reason to contemplate their own death, but more people know a peer who’s died, and certainly parents have died, and relatives, you know, siblings and friends. So I would think that anyone who’s seen an agonizing death should at least give some thought to whether we should be legalizing medical aid in dying." 

You can listen or read the transcript at this link:

Who Gets to Choose a “Good Death”?
New York is the latest state to legalize medical aid in dying. Stephen Dubner speaks with the governor who signed the law, a Nobel Prize-winning economist, a death doula — and an ethicist who thinks the very idea is wrong.

 "SOURCES:
Kathy Hochul, governor of New York.
Suzanne O'Brien, death doula, founder of Doulagivers Institute.
Al Roth, economist at Stanford University.
Daniel Sulmasy, physician, philosopher, director of the Kennedy Institute of Ethics at Georgetown University.

RESOURCES:
Moral Economics: From Prostitution to Organ Sales, What Controversial Transactions Reveal About How Markets Work, by Al Roth (2026).
"New York Moves to Allow Terminally Ill People to Die on Their Own Terms," by Grace Ashford (New York Times, 2025).
The Good Death: A Guide for Supporting Your Loved One through the End of Life, by Suzanne O'Brien (2025).
The Future of Assisted Suicide and Euthanasia, by Neil Gorsuch (2009).
EXTRAS:
"Make Me a Match (Update)," by Freakonomics Radio (2023).
 

 

Starzl Lecture: "The Economics of Kidney Exchange," Sunday at the American Transplant Congress in Boston

 I'll be speaking Sunday at the American Transplant Congress, on kidney exchange.  It will be hard to squeeze in all the recent developments in my half hour, including current controversies.

State-of-the-Art Speakers:  Transplantation’s leading luminaries and innovative thinkers will share inspiring research and insights at ATC 2026.  
 
Alvin E. Roth, PhD: 
Thomas E. Starzl State-of-the-Art Lecture: The Economics of Kidney Exchange

Sunday, June 21: 11:00 AM ET 

 

 

 

When people rely on A.I. to avoid ethical challenges

 HBS puts the spotlight on a paper by Alex Chan.

When AI Gives Advice, Employees Rarely Ask Why   Featuring Alex Chan. By Ben Rand

"People increasingly trust AI to make decisions—but research by Alex Chan finds they avoid evaluating the algorithm's rationale if it causes moral discomfort. How can organizations encourage employees to think more critically? "

 

Here's the paper:

Preference for Explanations: Case of Explainable AI
By: Alex Chan   Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 26-028, November 2025.


Abstract
Participants acted as loan officers deciding whether to approve real $10,000-loans issued by a private U.S. lender using an AI’s default-risk predictions. When explanations revealed that the AI penalized non-White or female borrowers, participants were more likely to override the AI’s profit-maximizing recommendation. When their bonuses depended on repayment, however, they sought predictions but avoided explanations, consistent with willful ignorance; this effect disappeared when explanations were framed as purely financial or demographics were hidden. A secondary experiment reveals a novel bias: participants failed to reason contingently and undervalued explanations even when these complemented private information and improved decision accuracy.
 

A chef makes the case for foie gras, and addresses the concerns regarding animal welfare

I'm no expert on the production of foie gras, but I am glad to see arguments about repugnant transactions and controversial markets that take seriously the concerns of opponents.

The Washington Post has the story.  

Why I’m proud to serve foie gras.  But first, let me take your concerns seriously.   By Bart Hutchins
Bart Hutchins is the chef and owner of Butterworth’s in Washington, D.C.

"There is now a proposed ballot initiative moving through Washington that would ban foie gras entirely. No producing it, no selling or serving it. Fines between $1,000 and $5,000 per violation. License suspension for repeat offenses

...

""I am asking you to not sign the petition. But first I want to do something the other side rarely does, which is to take their concerns seriously.

"Gavage — force-feeding through a tube inserted down a bird’s throat — looks terrible. I know because I have seen it. I understand completely why someone sees footage of it and reacts with horror. If you imagine the same thing done to human beings, it looks like violence.

"But here is what I also know, and what the activists with the megaphones do not know and do not want to know because it would complicate the argument they have decided to make.

...

' A duck’s esophagus, where the gavage tube is inserted, is desensitized, without a gag reflex, and it is capable of swallowing whole crustaceans and scaly fish in the wild. Its windpipe is separate from the esophagus, meaning the gavage process has no impact on breathing. More importantly, this overfeeding is something the bird does naturally. Before their annual migration, ducks gorge — they stuff themselves with excess food. The calories are stored as fat, not only in the liver but in the expanded esophagus. (The verb “gorge” comes from this behavior.) What foie gras farming does is amplify a natural biological process rather than invent a cruel one .

...

"The producer I buy foie gras from exemplifies the kind of care and attention good farming demands. Their ducks are raised for 15 weeks, about twice the poultry industry standard, in open barns, on a vegetarian diet. Force-feeding by hand happens three times a day for the final three weeks. Each feeding takes approximately 1½ seconds, and, from my observation, the ducks barely seem to notice it."   

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My previous posts about foie gras.