Our brains evolved to tell stories before they evolved to speak.
This has fundamental implications for our susceptibility to communication in the networked age.
Recent major media stories that feel to us like they’re part of a larger narrative campaign.
Recent major media stories that feel to us like they’re part of a larger narrative campaign.
Recent major media stories that feel to us like they’re part of a larger narrative campaign.
The outcomes of NFL games are inordinately influenced by officials relative to other sports. This is not new. The Narrative environment faced by the NFL in 2021, however, IS new.
I’m not sure they’re ready for it.
When a famous person shakes his or her finger at you, they’re not telling you a fact.
They’re telling you how to think about a fact.
Called It - Election Edition
Men of God in the City of Man is a nine part series about a narrative virus that infected the charismatic and Pentecostal churches in the United States. It isn't a story about Christian Nationalism. It isn't a story about January 6th. It isn't a story about why people voted for Trump. It is a story about a story. It is a story about the language that created a self-sustaining movement defined by its unwavering belief in a fundamentally corrupt electoral system.
Recent Notes
Now There’s Something You Don’t See Every Day, Chauncey
Narrator: Well, today we find our heroes flying along smoothly… Rocket J. Squirrel: Flying along smoothly? Bullwinkle J. Moose: You’re just looking at the picture…
Narrative Uber Alles
Yesterday the Wall Street Journal ran a front page story titled “OPEC Sees Less Demand for Its Oil in 2015”, as well as another article…
We Now Return to Our Regularly Scheduled Programming
Hilsenrath Analysis: Friday’s Jobs Report Assures Global Central Banks Going in Two Directions ― Wall Street Journal, December 5th, 9:59a ET Earlier today I tweeted that “I…
Signs and Portents
Young nanny: Look at me, Damien! It’s all for you. [she jumps off a roof, hanging herself] – “The Omen” (1976) When one has…
The Unbearable Over-Determination of Oil
Market outcomes are always overdetermined, which is a $10 word that means if you added up all of the likely causes and their likely percentage contribution to the outcome you would get a number way above 100%.
Nowhere is this more true than the price of oil.
Mike Tyson: Master Game Theorist
Everyone has a plan until they get hit in the mouth. – Mike Tyson My long-term strategy turned into a 12-hour strategy. – “Survivor” contestant…
Wherefore Art Thou, Marcus Welby?
Seek not the favor of the multitude; it is seldom got by honest and lawful means. But seek the testimony of few; and number not…
Calvin the Super Genius
People think it must be fun to be a super genius, but they don’t realize how hard it is to put up with all the…
Hey Spike
The strong do what they can, while the weak suffer what they must. — Thucydides, “The History of the Peloponnesian War” (395 BC) Global growth…
Going Gray
Everything under the sun is in chaos. The situation is excellent. – Mao Zedong (1893 – 1976) Forget it, Jake. It’s Chinatown. – Chinatown (1974)…
Best of List
I’ll have a new full-length Epsilon Theory note out early next week (“Going Gray”), but wanted to pass along two background points. First, a replay…
Finest Worksong
Take your instinct by the reinsYou’d better best to rearrangeWhat we want and what we needHas been confused, been confused– REM, “Finest Worksong” (1987) The…
The Game of Thrones and the Game of Markets
Two items for the mid-week. First, an invitation to attend a Salient Webinar I’ll be presenting next Thursday, September 18th at 2pm ET, titled: “The Game…
The Ministry of Markets
– Actual conversation as I left a client meeting with a Salient colleague last Friday and we checked our phones… Colleague: Wow, looks like the…
The Name of the Rose
If names be not correct, language is not in accordance with the truth of things. ― Confucius, “The Analects of Confucius” (551 – 479 BC)…
An Ice Bucket Dilemma
Something on the lighter side from Epsilon Theory today, as summer winds downs here in the last week of August. Most of us have seen videos galore…
One Little Old Russian Convoy
You know what I’ve noticed? Nobody panics when things go “according to plan”. Even if the plan is horrifying. If, tomorrow, I tell the press…
Here We Go Again
From an Epsilon Theory perspective, the scariest, most market risk-creating event of the past 48 hours had nothing to do with Iraq, nothing to do…
Fear and Loathing on the Marketing Trail, 2014
I shared a dark suspicion that the life we were leading was a lost cause, that we were all actors, kidding ourselves along on a…
Watching the Narratives
You think you’re alone until you realize you’re in it. Now fear is here to stay. Love is here for a visit. – Elvis Costello,…