Tyler Cowen on writing & thinking
Cowen thinks good thinking comes from weighing many points of view and resisting tidy narratives or simple first principles, and he sees internet writing as a powerful new discipline. Since 2024 AI has reshaped his writing advice: write at high frequency rather than predictive books, be more interesting than the AI 'question box', and write for the AIs as an audience, while keeping his own voice and using AI only as a critic.
11 points · 5 appearances · 2019–2026
How the view evolved
Writers' real challenge: readers preferring to play with AI → You're an idiot if you're not writing for the AIs
In 2024 he saw AI mainly as a competitor for writers, with readers possibly preferring to play with AI output; by 2025 he treats the AIs as a key audience in their own right, arguing you're an idiot if you're not writing for them.
Up next
2019–2026
“I didn't agree with that post. If you look at labor market data, the returns to IQ as it translates into wages, they're amazingly low. They're pretty insignificant. People who are very successful, they're very smart, but they're people who have say eight or nine areas where they're like, on a scale of 1 to 10, there are nine. Like they have one area where they're just like an 11 and a half on a scale of 1 to 10. And then on everything else, they're an eight to a nine and have a lot of determination. And that's what leads to incredible success. And IQ is one of those things, but it's not actually that important. It's the bundle, and the bundles are scarce. And then the bundles interacting with the rest of the world. Like just try going to a mid-tier state university and sit down with the committee designed to develop a plan for using artificial intelligence in the curriculum. And then come back to me and tell me how that went, and then we'll talk about bottlenecks.”
2024–2026 · changed view
“Yeah, that's what I think it will be like again. Great stagnation is over. We'll go back to those earlier rates of change, transform a lot of the world, mostly a big positive. A lot of chaos disrupted institutions along the way. That's my prediction.”
2019–2026 · changed view
“Absolutely. Yeah, and here that is either acceptable or even admired, or to be a loner. And since so many people are outsiders and that we're all immigrants, is selecting for people who left something behind, we're willing to leave behind their families, we're willing to undergo a certain brutality of switch in their lives, makes us a nation of weirdos. And weirdos are creative. Yeah, and Denmark is not a nation of weirdos. It's a wonderful place, you know, great for them. Ideally you want part of the world to be fully weirdos and innovating, and the other part of the world to be a little kind of chicken, risk-averse, and enjoy the benefits of the innovation, and to give people these smooth lives and six weeks off and free ride. And everyone's like, oh, American way versus European way, but basically they're complements.”
2019–2026 · changed view
“I don't think economics will ever be very predictive. It's most useful for helping you ask better questions. You look at something like game theory: well, game theory never predicted USA and USSR would have a war, would not have a war, but trying to think through the logic of strategic conflict, if you know game theory, it's just a much more interesting discussion.”