Nate Silver On Gambling And Politics

The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan

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Nate is a statistician and writer focused on American politics and sports, and a longtime friend from the blog days. He was the founder and editor-in-chief of FiveThirtyEight, and now he writes his own substack, Silver Bulletin. He’s the author of The Signal and the Noise, and his forthcoming book is On the Edge: How Successful Gamblers and Risk-Takers Think (pre-order here).

For two clips of our convo — on the pluralism of gay social networks, why poker is so male — pop over to our YouTube page. Other topics: Nate growing up in the Midwest obsessed with sports and the debate team; the Best Little Boy in the World syndrome; coming out while living abroad; how the LGBT Society in 1999 was apolitical; gays as heterodox thinkers in media; the joys of code-switching; the diversity of sports fans and poker players; the sexism in poker; Maria Konnikova and Maria Ho; how a poker player can benefit from discrimination by defying stereotypes; Erving Goffman and risk-taking; testosterone; Nate grossing $750,000 in poker; the flow state of gambling under extreme pressure; how Gen Z is more risk-averse than older generations; immigrants as risk-takers; the morality of gambling; addiction; people peeing at slot machines; Fauci’s noble lie for masks; the Swedish model during Covid; effective altruism; Obama the poker player being cool under pressure vs. Trump’s impulsivity; Truman’s gambling mindset and Hiroshima; the online poker boom; how Nate doesn’t want to be known as the political forecast guy; the misconception of him as a partisan Dem; Will Stancil; how the economic perceptions of the public are usually accurate; Biden’s age; his people blaming the media for his problems; the convention option for switching nominees; the White House not boosting Kamala Harris; her flaming out before Iowa in 2020; Claudine Gay’s plagiarism; Twitter under Musk; and, yes, Angry Birds!

Browse the Dishcast archive for an episode you might enjoy (the first 102 are free in their entirety — subscribe to get everything else). Coming up: Jeffrey Rosen on the Stoics and happiness, Rob Henderson on class and “luxury beliefs,” Christian Wiman on resisting despair as a Christian, George Will on Trump and conservatism, and Abigail Shrier on why the cult of therapy harms children. Please send any guest recs, dissents, and other pod comments to [e-mail].