Friday

A very tedious week all told, much time spent dealing with problematic colleagues and little writing.

The Scholarly Connections meeting went well although not many came. We heard about a variety of projects and it was good to know that one was sparked off by a previous meeting.

Having suggested to the author of the very long paper that he should send the abstract off to a journal editor, was pleased to discover that this advice had been followed and the editor had made some very perceptive comments, although I had to interpret them for the author. If he follows them up, he could produce a very good paper but it needs a lot of work because the ideas need to be knitted in to the existing literature properly and it's a literature that is new to him.

Reluctantly attended the RKTC meeting with the 24 item agenda. Made some observations but left early. There is a battle to be fought about conference budgets but I don't have the energy at the moment. Our incoming acting head is very much on the ball and it will be good to work with her - I don't think we'll always agree but we have a similar outlook on what's important. The post will be advertised again in the new year but I can't imagine that we'll see a flood of applications. Looks as if I'll be spending quite a bit of time on interview panels this month, with an SL/PL post to fill and post docs, as well as a potential PhD student.

Have read more of Derman's "Models Behaving Badly". Struggled through the physics to his discussion of financial models. Must ask Yuval if he has read it - I think Donald Mackenzie's sociological approach is much more readable because he provides so much more context. I'm quite prepared to be convinced that financial models and theories are not like those in physics but Derman's argument isn't very clear, in my view. But I haven't finished the book yet, perhaps all will become clear at the end. Then I can get back to Kahneman.

Busy weekend ahead, getting organised to go to Cambridge next week. Hope we really can make good progress on the book, much depends on whatever my co-author has managed to write. Second dose of Simon Russell Beale this week last night - watched "Collaborators" at the cinema, live from the NT. Amazing play and very thought-provoking.