death-of-an-economist
Original: death-of-an-economist on Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal
Transcript
Title panel: DEATH of an ECONOMIST
Panel 1: A man kneels beside a woman with reddish hair who is lying down, apparently dying.
Man: What happened?
Woman: Everything is fine, except that I'm going to die horribly.
Panel 2:
Woman: I had a sip of methanol, which made me pleasantly inebriated. I defined inebriation to be happiness, then formed a model of methanol-happiness interactions that showed a strong positive correlation.
Panel 3:
Woman: At that point I insisted that anyone in the room NOT drinking methanol was a backwards opponent of progress.
Panel 4:
Woman: Later, it turned out there were second-order effects.
Panel 5:
Woman: As I go into the darkness... please... tell my academic offspring to redefine all the model's parameters, but keep the name the same.
Panel 6:
Man: You killed 50 people, including yourself. Oh, so you oppose RANDOMIZED CONTROLLED TRIALS?
Votey:
A hand-drawn tombstone in a barren landscape reads:
"Here lies an economist. Technically she was never wrong."
Panel 1: A man kneels beside a woman with reddish hair who is lying down, apparently dying.
Man: What happened?
Woman: Everything is fine, except that I'm going to die horribly.
Panel 2:
Woman: I had a sip of methanol, which made me pleasantly inebriated. I defined inebriation to be happiness, then formed a model of methanol-happiness interactions that showed a strong positive correlation.
Panel 3:
Woman: At that point I insisted that anyone in the room NOT drinking methanol was a backwards opponent of progress.
Panel 4:
Woman: Later, it turned out there were second-order effects.
Panel 5:
Woman: As I go into the darkness... please... tell my academic offspring to redefine all the model's parameters, but keep the name the same.
Panel 6:
Man: You killed 50 people, including yourself. Oh, so you oppose RANDOMIZED CONTROLLED TRIALS?
Votey:
A hand-drawn tombstone in a barren landscape reads:
"Here lies an economist. Technically she was never wrong."
Alt text
An SMBC comic titled "DEATH of an ECONOMIST." A man kneels beside a red-haired woman lying on the ground, dying. He asks what happened; she calmly explains that everything is fine except that she is going to die horribly. She recounts that she took a sip of methanol, which made her pleasantly inebriated; she then defined inebriation as happiness and built a model showing a strong positive correlation between methanol and happiness. She insisted anyone in the room not drinking methanol was a backwards opponent of progress, but later there turned out to be second-order effects. As she fades, she begs that her academic offspring redefine the model's parameters but keep the name the same. The man replies that she killed 50 people including herself, then sarcastically asks, "Oh, so you oppose randomized controlled trials?" A satire of economists rationalizing failed models. Votey: a crude tombstone in a barren landscape reading "Here lies an economist. Technically she was never wrong."
Transcribed by Claude Opus 4.8.