Michael Eddy

We all need stronger BS filters. As signal gets harder to distinguish from noise, real rigor becomes rarer—and more valuable.
3/3

In the conferences I'm attending & across social media, I'm seeing more claims that sound good, but collapse under basic scrutiny. The framing is slick; the rigor is missing.

Bad ideas have always existed. What’s new is how effortlessly they can now masquerade as insight.
2/3

In the age of AI, sounding right is easier than being right.

It’s never been simpler to spin ideas that 𝘧𝘦𝘦𝘭 true—confident tone, polished narrative. AI can turn half-baked thoughts into viral TED-talk soundbites.

But rhetorical sparkle isn’t substance.
1/3

Dunning-Kruger effect in practice:

In 53k forecasts across 100 projects, people who are more confident are actually much less accurate.

New 📄 by @evavivalt.bsky.social & @sdellavi.bsky.social

Export Boom Atlas by Growth Teams Explore the playbooks behind 82 export booms in emerging economies since 1995

Check out the new Export Boom Atlas from @GrowthTeams–an interactive map of 80+ export booms from developing economies, showing how countries from Vietnam to Morocco to Costa Rica achieved rapid sector-level growth that created jobs and prosperity. 🌍 https://exportbooms.org”

I love it when papers have accompanying websites!

also, neat when i found out @stanfordimpactlabs.bsky.social had a small role in supporting this work!

📄 & 💻by @marshallburke.bsky.social & a impressive team!

adaptationatlas.org/...
www.nber.org/papers/...

@ukri.org has announced a £11.5m investment in AI-driven evidence synthesis (METIUS).

Backed by a $126m global alliance including @wellcometrust.bsky.social, the project aims to make research more accessible for policymakers on climate, education, justice and development.

Fascinating paper on a timely question... kudos!!

New research by Pierre Azoulay, Danielle Li, Bhaven Sampat and me.

Earlier this year, the President’s budget proposed a 40% cut to the budget of the NIH. This motivated us to ask: what if the NIH had been 40% smaller?

With a few notable exceptions, I’m struck by how few funders are openly sharing what they’re learning from AI in decision-making.

What am I missing?

We’ve embedded this directly in our latest RFP. (screenshot 👇)

This is about experimentation, transparency, and learning—together with the research & funding community.

Here’s what “responsible” means to us:
➡️ AI augments—not replaces—human decision-making
➡️ New workflows that weren’t previously possible
➡️ Robust safeguards
➡️ A learning agenda to test key claims

That’s why @StanfordImpact is piloting responsible AI use in our funding processes.

Our goal: accelerate impact-focused science R&D.
✅ Faster decisions
✅ Lower costs
✅ Reduced burden on applicants

Right now:
⚠️ Many funders ban AI outright.
🙈 Others ignore it.
🤖 And slick AI vendors make bold, untested claims.

None of this felt right to me

Ever applied for funding… and then had to wait months for a response? ⏳

What if funders could move faster and make better decisions—so applicants can secure funding & get straight to work?

AI could help. But the current landscape is messy. 🧵

GAO gets schooled by the Department of Education The FAFSA team snaps back, then punches back

After a disastrous launch, the Dept. of Education's new team fixed the FAFSA system, helping 14M+ students. But the GAO criticized their modern methods with an outdated playbook.

It's high time we focus on outcomes not broken processes, argues @pahlkadot

I wonder why more academics don't publish their papers with companion websites? I find it so much more enjoyable reading an interactive site!

"AI Agents for Economic Research" by @antonkorinek www.genaiforecon.org

I remember meeting Karthik & @singhabhi.bsky.social w/ the Mindspark/EI team when I was working at Global Innovation Fund back in 2017—and being blown away by how they were designing for impact @ scale from day 1.

A stellar example of academics + do-ers partnering for scale 🚀📈👇

Kudos @benjaminsmanning.bsky.social & @johnjhorton.bsky.social for this important contribution!

Not to mention, aiming to put your paper to use at scale with @expectedparrot.bsky.social 🦜 www.expectedparrot.com

my main concern is that these lab-style games don't mirror interventions at scale....

But they do provide a controlled testbed to explore whether underlying mechanisms generalize, and if mechanisms don't generalize, unlikely you're intervention will generalize either.

Impact-focused funders often ask: if it worked here, will it work there?

This paper is a small, but impt step toward a generalized approach (grounded in theory + human data) to generalize research across settings—core to putting social science to use at scale.💪

The Replication Engine | IFP How to build automated replication infrastructure for better, faster science

Science faces a replication crisis: billions wasted, progress slowed, policy misled

A new idea from @i4replication.bsky.social Brodeur & Barbarioli in @ifp.bsky.social's #LaunchEngine imagines how to build automated replication infrastructure for *better* & *faster* science ifp.org/the-replicat...

College Application Mistakes and the Design of Information Policies at Scale Founded in 1920, the NBER is a private, non-profit, non-partisan organization dedicated to conducting economic research and to disseminating research findings among academics, public policy makers, an...

Now, go read the @nber.org paper! www.nber.org/papers/w34164
christopherneilson.github.io/work/Applica...

Authors: @anaisfabre.bsky.social at IFS; Chris Nielson @yaleeconomics.bsky.social; Ignacio Rios @utdallas.bsky.social; & Tomas Larroucau @arizonastateuni.bsky.social with collaborators at Chile’s Min of Education @mineducchile.bsky.social

Kudos to everyone involved!! 🎉

This wasn’t a one-off: the policy scaled nationwide with persistent enrollment gains—evidence that “designed-for-scale” information can work in real systems.

Results: previously unmatched students were 44% more likely to get an offer; placements into higher-ranked programs rose 20%

The intervention: show applicants tailored admission probabilities + program info + smart nudges (e.g., "don’t forget a safety school"). Delivered inside the application portal.

Few things I love more than when I see a paper report on how research was put to use at scale!!👇

New study on fixing college admissions. In Chile’s centralized system, personalized, in-platform info helped students avoid common app mistakes & improved outcomes🧵⬇️

A New Way to Reduce Children’s Deaths: Cash

Link to @apoorvanyt.bsky.social NYT coverage: archive.ph/ct2o0

Link to study: nber.org/papers/w34152

Link to @give-directly.bsky.social summary: givedirectly.org/mortality2025/

www.nytimes.com/2025/08/18/h...

Policy takeaway: Pair income support with access to obstetric care.

Cost-effective, scalable complement to maternal/child health programs—and a great example of research that fuels real-world impact