Ten Rules for Thinking Differently About Numbers
Tim is an economist, journalist and broadcaster. He is author of “The Next Fifty Things That Made the Modern Economy”, “Messy”, and the million-selling “The Undercover Economist”. Tim is a senior columnist at the Financial Times, and the presenter of Radio 4’s “More or Less”, the iTunes-topping series “Fifty Things That Made the Modern Economy”, and the new podcast “Cautionary Tales”. Tim has spoken at TED, PopTech and the Sydney Opera House. He is an associate member of Nuffield College, Oxford and an honorary fellow of the Royal Statistical Society. Tim was made an OBE for services to improving economic understanding in the New Year honours of 2019.
“Tim Harford is peerless at making sense of a complicated world and our place within it. This is a book that all children should read”
Matthew Syed
“Tim Harford is our most likeable champion of reason and rigour… clear, clever and always highly readable.”
The Times, Books of the Year
“Endlessly insightful and full of surprises – exactly what you would expect from Tim Harford.”
Bill Bryson
“Packed with fascinating detail… Harford has an engagingly wry style and his book is a superb introduction to some of the most vital products of human ingenuity.”
The Sunday Times
“It’s a very very good book, full of wise counterintuitions and clever insights.”
Brian Eno
“Every Tim Harford book is cause for celebration. He makes the ‘dismal science’ seem like an awful lot of fun.”
Malcolm Gladwell
“In a world that craves certainty, Harford makes a compelling case for why we can’t have it. A brilliant and oddly empowering book.”
Dave Gorman
“The very best letters from the ‘Dear Economist’ columns from 2003-2008 in one handy book-sized package.”
“As lively as it is smart, charming, penetrating, and wise. If you are at all interested in knowing much more than you do about how the world works, you couldn’t ask for a better guide than Harford.”
Stephen J. Dubner
“This book should be required reading for every elected official, business leader, and university student.”
Steven D. Levitt
https://omny.fm/shows/cautionary-tales-with-tim-harford/playlists/podcast https://omny.fm/shows/cautionary-tales-with-tim-harford/the-dunning-canoe-ger-effect When John Darwin walks into a shop in London, it causes an instant stir. After all, John Darwin has been dead...
What is the value of high-quality, trustworthy official statistics? Given the number of things that statistical agencies measure, we might expect that they have attempted to put a number on this too. In fact, they have often been rather coy. A UN report, “Promoting,...
In the 1950s, polio spread at an unprecedented rate, killing or paralysing thousands of Americans. Two renowned scientists raced to develop a vaccine, taking radically different approaches and becoming bitter rivals in the process. Decades later, when a new virus...
https://omny.fm/shows/cautionary-tales-with-tim-harford/how-civilisations-die-with-paul-cooper As Governor of Britannia, Magnus Maximus has a huge army at his disposal, which is just what he needs to secure the Roman imperial throne. But perhaps the impressive general...
Marathon day. An early train into London, then an unfamiliar journey across a race-disrupted city from Paddington to Blackheath, all in good time for the start of the race. I was nervous, of course, but was cheered by the sight of another bib-wearing runner — more...
I'm speaking at 5x15 at 7pm on Monday 29 June - and at the FT Weekend Festival on Saturday 5 September. In both cases there are some brilliant speakers on stage - come along!
https://omny.fm/shows/cautionary-tales-with-tim-harford/can-you-make-a-sherman-tank-float? It’s D-Day and the Allies are about to invade Nazi-occupied France. For the landings to succeed, American soldiers on Omaha Beach will have to break through some formidable...
There is a gap between the calm, rational decision-makers we often aspire to be and the overwrought, sentiment-tossed creatures we often are. Rarely is that gap wider than in the political arena. Policy seems like it should be a matter for cool, evidence-based...
https://omny.fm/shows/cautionary-tales-with-tim-harford/the-inventor-who-almost-ended-the-world-classic Thomas Midgley’s inventions caused his own death, hastened the deaths of millions of people around the world, and very nearly extinguished all life on land. ...