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Eternal Equipoise: millennia at Eurasia’s heart
"the Uyghurs' current geopolitical predicament is only a bit more than 250 years in the making. The modern name of their homeland, Xinjiang, comes from the Chinese word for “New Territories.” A vast land more than twice the size of Texas, it was only annexed in the 1750’s by the ethnic Manchu emperors of China, during the Qing Dynasty, when ravenous imperial powers divvied up Eurasia’s heart between them."
Action Bias Among Elite Soccer Goalkeepers: The Case of Penalty Kicks
"analysis of 286 penalty kicks in top leagues and championships worldwide shows that given the probability distribution of kick direction, the optimal strategy for goalkeepers is to stay in the goal's center. Goalkeepers, however, almost always jump right or left. We propose the following explanation for this behavior: because the norm is to jump, norm theory (Kahneman and Miller, 1986) implies that a goal scored yields worse feelings for the goalkeeper following inaction (staying in the center) than following action (jumping), leading to a bias for action."
Are Women Overinvesting in Education? Evidence from the Medical Profession
"The median female (but not male) primary-care physician would have been financially better off becoming a physician assistant. While there is a wage gap, our result occurs primarily because most female physicians do not work enough hours to rationalize medical school whereas most men do." The cost is more socialized in other countries, but the cost to society as a whole would seem to have some similarities.