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3 weeks ago | 
davidepstein.substack.com | David Epstein
The book Abundance, by journalists Ezra Klein (New York Times) and Derek Thompson (The Atlantic), came out last month — and during the week that followed, not a day passed without a friend or acquaintance bringing it up. Some praised it, others had critiques, but every conversation was interesting. If Helen of Troy was “the face that launched a thousand ships,” Abundance may be a book that launches a thousand policy debates.
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1 month ago | 
davidepstein.substack.com | David Epstein
Is the drive to explore new places and ideas embedded in human biology? In a rapidly changing work world, should we all be exploring a little more? Can trying new things actually be good for your health? These are the kinds of questions at the heart of a new book, The Explorer’s Gene: Why We Seek Big Challenges, New Flavors, and the Blank Spots on the Map, out today. The author, Alex Hutchinson, is one of the best science writers working today.
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1 month ago | 
davidepstein.substack.com | David Epstein
What do you think of when you hear the word “warmup”? If you’re like me, probably athletes limbering up before competition. But perhaps we should think of it more broadly. Last week, I read an intriguing study that applied the idea of a warmup in less obvious arena: pediatric anesthesia.
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2 months ago | 
davidepstein.substack.com | David Epstein
The most memorable athletic feat I’ve ever seen in person took place at the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver. While warming up for the women’s individual sprint, Slovenian cross-country skier Petra Majdič — who was projected to win several medals at those Games — slid off course and fell ten feet into a frozen creek bed. Her chest slammed into a rock and the impact snapped her ski poles like toothpicks and splintered the tip of one of her skis.
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2 months ago | 
davidepstein.substack.com | David Epstein
In 2015, I worked with the BBC on a documentary that examined illicit medical practices at the Nike Oregon Project, then the most famous and well-funded distance-running group in the world, led by marathon legend Alberto Salazar. Salazar was subsequently banned, and the Oregon Project dissolved. One of the sources for that film was a former Oregon Project assistant coach named Steve Magness.
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Jan 9, 2025 | 
davidepstein.substack.com | David Epstein
A few years ago, I wrote a New Year’s post about the “fresh start effect,” a finding in psychology research that a sense of some new beginning (like a new year) helps people make behavioral changes. After that post, economist and journalist Tim Harford, whose work I’ve long admired (he is the host of the wonderful “Cautionary Tales” podcast), wrote me a note, the essence of which was: I’m not so sure about that.
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Dec 19, 2024 | 
davidepstein.substack.com | David Epstein
Like everyone else, I’ve been talking about health insurance more than usual. One of the news stories that caught my eye was about Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield’s new policy to put a time limit on anesthesia coverage. As I assume was the case for most readers, it made me angry. Public outrage led Anthem to reverse the policy, which seemed like a straightforward win for the public.
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Dec 10, 2024 | 
davidepstein.substack.com | David Epstein
Leo Tolstoy spent more than a decade working on a single book. It’s understandable, after all that work, that he considered it his greatest contribution to humanity. The surprising part is that it isn’t War and Peace, but the comparatively obscure A Calendar of Wisdom. Each day of the Calendar features quotes from other writers and thinkers on a topic, paired with Tolstoy’s own aphoristic insights.
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Nov 19, 2024 | 
davidepstein.substack.com | David Epstein
The direct-to-consumer genetic testing company 23andMe just announced that it will close the drug-development arm of its business, roughly twenty years after the completion of the Human Genome Project (in which scientists sequenced the full human genome). This closure has symbolic importance for the promise of genetic medicine, and I want to try to explain why. I signed up for 23andMe not long after Time magazine named it “Invention of the Year” in 2008.
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Nov 4, 2024 | 
davidepstein.substack.com | David Epstein
Votebeat doesn’t do the typical horse race coverage of elections. Rather, with reporters in Arizona, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Texas, and Wisconsin, it delves deeply into how elections actually work in this country, and the threats they face. As you might imagine, Votebeat has had something of a surge in traffic of late. So I reached out to Elizabeth Green, the founder and CEO of the nonprofit journalism outfit Civic News Company, of which Votebeat is a part.