I’ve done book and film reviews before, but here’s my first stab at reviewing podcasts. New medium. New approaches
Stephen Dubner and the folks at Freakonomics Radio have assembled a masterful three part biography of theoretical physicist Richard Feynman (The Curious Mr. Feynman, The Brilliant Mr. Feynman, and The Vanishing Mr. Feynman plus an extra-Mr. Feynman Takes a Trip-- But Doesn’t Fall). Feynman’s life and legacy, recounted in the biography Genius: The Life and Science of Richard Feynman, is colorized by this outstanding audio biographical sketch. Drawing from archives and interviews with his daughter, students and colleagues, this series paints an excellent portrayal of one of the great minds of the 20th century. Feynman, you may recall was a key player in the Manhattan Project, and later in the investigation into the cause of the Challenger explosion. This series captured his lively mind, his passion for pure science, and his devotion to finding things out. Like a good biography, I felt that I really understood Feynman, and what made him tick at a depth Joanathan Eig failed to do in his recent biography of Martin Luther King. As is the case with all brilliant and talented people, Feynman had his eccentricities and contradictions. He seemed ambivalent about receiving his Nobel Prize, claiming that he had already won the prize through the sheer pleasure of his discoveries. Yet, he also seemed seem to revel in the attention. And while interviews with the women that were platonic friends of his later in life, he had a long track record for being a womanizer and was criticized in many quarters for exploiting women. His work on the Manhattan Project was instrumental in defeating Japan, but he clearly had misgivings and was troubled by his s role in the development of this terrible weapon.
In addition to the three part series, Freakonomics added another episode, entitled Extra: Mr. Feynman Takes a Trip—But Doesn’t Fall. In it, Freakonomics interviewed three women that befriended him at the Esalen Institute where Feynman spent the later years of his life (mostly ill with cancer) and where he experimented with psychedelic drugs. Through these interviews, we gained insight into Feynman, the man and his intellectual humility. One of the women stated flatly, “He had no self-aggrandizement.” I could not help but contrast Feynman with the narcissistic Anthony Fauci, who proclaimed, “I am The Science,” and kept bobbleheads and portraits of himself in the background of his office. Dismissing competing hypotheses about the origin of Covid and waiving off others that showed up with other evidence in hand, Fauci showed himself to be the quintessential anti-Feynman.
The Feynman series was beautifully done, down to the background music score. Yet, the series also left me a bit sad and disillusioned. Hearing about Feynman’s intellectual pursuits and deep desire for discovery immediately brought to mind the how politicized science has become. From the mishandling, distortion, and overt lies around the data used to guide us through the Covid pandemic, to the false and overbroad claims around climate change, to the DEI statements that are required to get tenure at major universities, to the science curricula at major universities (see, e.g. Afro-chemistry at Rice University) politics is now dictating science rather than allowing science to guide policy. The notorious Dr. Fauci, Rochelle Walensky and Mandy Cohen now embody this shift and it’s not hard to imagine what Feynman would have to say about them.
The series also conjured up thoughts of another intellectual giant—Harvard’s Roland Fryer. Maybe not so coincidentally, Bari Weiss recently conducted a lengthy interview with Fryer on her podcast Honestly. Fryer has also been interviewed on Glenn Loury’s podcast The Glenn Show, EconTalk with Russ Roberts, among others. Fryer is widely believed to be one of the country’s finest economic minds, and has a compelling personal story. Growing up without a mother, a father that did time, and cousins that were drug dealers, Fryer somehow overcame all this to become a top tier economist at Harvard with the help of a doting grandmother.
Fryer, like Feynman has an insatiable and relentless intellect. And, like Feynman, he is singularly devoted to ferreting out truth, backed by hard and confirming data-wherever it may take him. You know, the kind of truth that used to be Harvard’s raison d’etre. Veritas and all that. It makes Fryer a rare bird in an academic community that now starts with a conclusion and seeks out and cherry picks data to support that conclusion. Listening to his interviews, one gets an immediate sense of his charm, his resilience, and his sincerity. Aside from seeking out what is provable, he is also devoted to finding the “diamonds in the rough,” talented individuals that are overlooked in blighted communities, and solving problems of wasted human capital. It is the driving force behind the man.
The drama of Fryer’s story begins with his rigorous study of racial disparity in police enforcement. He found that, while blacks were treated somewhat more roughly in sub fatal incidents, unarmed blacks were not being shot at greater rates than whites—a conclusion that flew directly in the face of the accepted public narrative, and efforts to defund the police and otherwise change law enforcement approaches across the nation. So astonished was he at finding this contrary conclusion, he enlisted a second team to look at his data—and they confirmed it. Against the counsel of several colleagues, he published his findings anyway.
In another era, Fryer would have graced the cover of every Harvard publication, and would have become to Harvard what Milton Friedman was to Chicago and the Hoover Institute. But alas, we are in the post-Floyd era, and we have woken up to the fact that Harvard got out of the truth-seeking business some time ago without any formal announcement. With Roland Fryer, Harvard played the role of the Roman Catholic Church with Galileo in its attempt to excommunicate him for his apostasy. Dragging out an old, settled matter involving an inappropriate relationship with a student. The pitchforks and torches mob was led by serial plagiarist, Claudine Gay, and Harvard pilloried him, suspended him and took away his laboratory. Outside the ivy walls, Fryer also received physical threats for publishing his findings.
Now Gay has had somewhat of a comeuppance. Her abysmal showing at the congressional hearings on antisemitism on campus opened a Pandora’s Box into her fraudulent background and the contrast couldn’t be more evident. Fryer has more than 50 publications to his name while we learned that Gay’s paltry few are riven with plagiarism. Based on her actual “scholarship” Gay should never have been given tenure in the first place and should have been summarily dismissed when all this was uncovered. While forced to step down as president, she will stay on as a faculty member and retain her $900,000 a year salary.
I could not help but contrast the two men. Fryer is now rising from the ashes. The back to back podcasts left me with a number of questions. Is Roland Fryer the intellectual heir to Feynman? What would Feynman think of Fryer? Should Fryer actually to be held in higher esteem than Feynman? Feynman did not face the institutional headwinds that Fryer faces. And Fryer had a much tougher journey to achieve what he has achieved. Both had smudges in their reputations arising out of inappropriate conduct with women. Should that matter in assessing their lives?
I think sometimes the right people are placed in history at exactly the right time. Winston Churchill and Chesley Sullenberger to name a couple. Feynman’s genius helped end the Second World War. Perhaps Fryer’s genius will help to end the scourge of Wokeness, a danger that may be presenting a bigger threat to our society than Imperial Japan did.
I strongly encourage any of my readers to listen to the Feynman series on Freakonomics Radio as well as Bari Weiss’s interview with Fryer on Honestly (February 13 program). You won’t be disappointed.
Amidst all of the turmoil that is going on right now, having courageous intellectual giants like Roland Fryer in our midst gives me hope, and why I remain….Darkly Optimistic.