Andrew Denis 

Fellow emeritus

I seem to detect a value judgement in this article, that delayed gratification is somehow superior. Why should it be? Isn't it the case that that judgement could only be made if you had good reason to suppose that the subject's rate of discount of the future were excessive, or they were excessively risk-averse?

Don’t eat the marshmallow

The Princeton study mentioned doesn't sound cogent. It doesn't compare like with like. Be precise about the timings. When does the subject receive 'today's' reward, and when 'tomorrow's'? If we assume a 1-day and 2-day wait, then the corresponding periods should be 6 and 12 months, not 365 and 366 days. It's not unreasonable to suspect t…

Don’t eat the marshmallow

Very interesting post. Thank you. I also enjoyed the film, "The King's Speech", about George VI. Strangely, as a (now long-retired) university teacher, I don't remember ever encountering stuttering, despite putting a great emphasis on student spoken contributions - presentations and speaking in class. I did get a lot of satisfaction from…

My Friends Who Stutter

Another excellent, thoughtful article, which deserves to be widely read. Thank you.

Steroids, ‘Gender,’ and Fair Play

I am not modest about my own research, so I am going to suggest something I published about Adam Smith. Natural Law theory, particularly in the form of 18th providentialism, dictated the terms in which intellectuals thought and wrote about scientific matters of all kinds, not just economics, and Adam Smith is one of its best representati…

Can Females Rule the Hive?

I read your paper on the history of writing about bees a few days ago. An excellent paper, and particularly fascinating to me, as my research is in the history and philosophy of economics, and there are many points of contact between writing about political economy and on other subjects. So your paper was very illuminating.

Can Females Rule the Hive?