iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Devin Caughey @devincaughey.bsky.social · 30/05/2026

Ok then the problem is that I have forgotten all my geometry!

Devin Caughey @devincaughey.bsky.social · 30/05/2026

Forgive me for being dumb, but how do we know that the line on the left side of the triangle is perpendicular to the horizontal line across the hexagon?

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Devin Caughey @devincaughey.bsky.social · 20/05/2026

Somewhere FDR is seriously jealous.

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Devin Caughey @devincaughey.bsky.social · 30/04/2026

Moreover, Black turnout in midterm elections (as well as the turnout of Hispanics and Asian Americans in all elections) has never come anywhere close to equally White turnout, with differences ranging from 5 to 25 points.

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Devin Caughey @devincaughey.bsky.social · 30/04/2026

In 2024, the White–Black difference reached a level (11–16 percentage points, depending on the estimate) not seen since at least 1992 if not the early 1980s.

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Devin Caughey @devincaughey.bsky.social · 30/04/2026

Bernard Fraga, @chriswarshaw.bsky.social, and I have constructed time series of turnout by race (and other demographics) at the national and state levels, 1980–2024. We find that Black turnout matched White in the presidential elections of 2008 and 2012 but has fallen precipitously since then.

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Devin Caughey @devincaughey.bsky.social · 30/04/2026

The decision in Louisiana v. Callais claims, "By 2004, the racial gap in voter registration and turnout had largely disappeared.... Black voters now participate in elections at similar rates as the rest of the electorate" (26–27). This is misleading: White turnout remains much higher than non-White.

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Devin Caughey @devincaughey.bsky.social · 22/04/2026

For a moment there I thought you were talking about the Antetokounmpo family.

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Robert Griffin, Phd @rpgriffin.bsky.social · 07/10/2025

New piece from me @chriswarshaw.bsky.social , @devincaughey.bsky.social , and Bernard Fraga. Story: though we've entered a high turnout era, turnout gaps between racial groups have reemerged. Nerdy story: Using publicly available data, we've generated new, reliable turnout estimates over time.

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Devin Caughey @devincaughey.bsky.social · 14/03/2025

The logical dependence in the outcome would seem to rule out many standard methods for panel causal inference. In other contexts one would fit a survival model, but that sort of thing isn't too common in panel CI. Thoughts? Maybe PanelMatch would work because it matches on lagged Y?

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Devin Caughey @devincaughey.bsky.social · 14/03/2025

(Trying the sort of thing that used to work on Twitter): Suppose you have panel data with a binary treatment and an outcome that indicates whether something has happened yet (e.g., whether a policy has been passed). How would you estimate treatment effects? 1/2 #polisky

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Political Analysis @polanalysis.bsky.social · 26/02/2025

Currently in FirstView: “MODGIRT: Multidimensional Dynamic Scaling of Aggregate Survey Data” by Elissa Berwick and @devincaughey.bsky.social. While traditional public opinion models are restricted to unidimensional latent traits, MODGIRT allows for a multidimensional structure of preferences.

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Eric Columbus @ericcolumbus.bsky.social · 20/12/2024

100 years ago Saturday the NYT ran a story that did not hold up well at all. www.nytimes.com/1924/12/21/a...

Headline: HITLER TAMED BY PRISON.
BERLIN, Dec. 20 — Adolph Hitler, once the demi-god of the reactionary extremists, was released on parole from imprisonment at Fortress Landsberg, Bavaria, today and immediately left in an auto for Munich. He looked a much sadder and wiser man today than last Spring when he, with Ludendorff and other radical extremists, appeared before a Munich court charged with conspiracy to overthrow the Government.

His behavior during imprisonment convinced the authorities that, like his political organization, known as the Volkischer, was no longer to be feared. It is believed he will retire to private life and return to Austria, the country of his birth.

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Devin Caughey @devincaughey.bsky.social · 13/12/2024

Re methods research, Stephen Jessee and @jerzakconnor.bsky.social have a working paper on dealing with measurement error in latent variables. It too deprecates MOC and proposes an IV-based approach instead.

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Devin Caughey @devincaughey.bsky.social · 11/12/2024

Put differently: even the best scholars produce bad work, and even more often produce work that is not a good fit for a given outlet. A paper is not a person.

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Devin Caughey @devincaughey.bsky.social · 11/12/2024

Yeah I hear you on me(). MO is faster. The advantage of both over MOC is allowing other variables in the analysis model to inform estimates of the missing values rather than assuming them to be independent as MOC does (see the appendix to Treier and Jackman).

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Devin Caughey @devincaughey.bsky.social · 10/12/2024

It’s true! Though I have come to the conclusion that MOC is more assumption-dependent than is commonly realized, and it is often better to use @mattblackwell.bsky.social et al.’s “multiple overimputation” or to use Bayesian measurement-error model, which brms makes pretty easy.

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Devin Caughey @devincaughey.bsky.social · 17/11/2024

I am Gen X (barely) and have said “on accident” as long as I can remember. Didn’t realize it was nonstandard until I was made fun of for it it as an adult.

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Dean Eckles @eckles.bsky.social · 13/11/2024

Three positions at MIT between social sciences (broadly considered) and computing. For two (Sloan and Urban Studies & Planning) apply ASAP as review of applications has begun.

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Steven D. Greydanus @decentfilms.bsky.social · 28/10/2024

What makes a great comic strip work? For the week of Halloween, an appreciative breakdown of a classic monster tale from Gary Larson’s The Far Side, with more in-depth critical analysis than you probably want or would think possible!

greydanus.substack.com

Cartoon Critic #1: A Shocktober “The Far Side” commentary

(Gary Larson’s tragic tale of Edgar, a werewolf, and an obnoxious tie)

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Devin Caughey @devincaughey.bsky.social · 22/09/2024

Theoretically either is sufficient to drive the approximate bias to zero, but given that this is impossible in practice, it’s definitely better to do both. Also, doing it for the outcome has the additional advantage of reducing variance.

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Devin Caughey @devincaughey.bsky.social · 22/09/2024

For a theoretical treatment see Sarndal and Lundstrom’s 2006 textbook, which shows that the approximate bias under calibration is zero only if the outcome or inverse response probabilities are a linear function of the auxiliary vector. In raking the aux vec is the marginal dist; in PS the joint.

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Devin Caughey @devincaughey.bsky.social · 16/09/2024

On my first listen I was pretty sure that it was just an aborted mispronunciation of “migrants” with a short a (as in “immigration”), but after a second listen it sure does sound a lot like something else.

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Devin Caughey @devincaughey.bsky.social · 08/09/2024

If you’re looking for more inspiration, you can check out my “political science scope and methods” syllabus, which has a few sessions on philosophy of (social) science: devincaughey.github.io/files/syllab....

devincaughey.github.io

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Devin Caughey @devincaughey.bsky.social · 08/09/2024

For general overviews, I like Godfrey-Smith’s textbook and the Cartwright and Montuschi Philosophy of Social Science edited volume.

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Devin Caughey @devincaughey.bsky.social · 22/08/2024

Looks great! And just in time to make my syllabus for the fall.

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Devin Caughey @devincaughey.bsky.social · 22/12/2023

I’m honestly a little surprised bc my impression was that speed improvements from within-chain parallelization were nonmonotonic in the number of cores due to the fixed costs of each additional core, and 64 is way beyond the point where I thought performance declined. But maybe that’s outdated?

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Sean Gailmard @sean-gailmard.bsky.social · 20/12/2023

Coming in 2024! Cover art day is a good day. There are also blurbs and you can even order a copy: tinyurl.com/4e35mjef Intro chapter: www.ocf.berkeley.edu/~gailmard/em...

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Political Science Department at Northwestern University @polisciatnu.bsky.social · 11/11/2023

🚨Forthcoming Must Read!!! The Political Development of American Debt Relief Emily Zackin and Chloe N. Thurston (@chloethurston.bsky.social) Available now for pre-order, May 2024 UChicago Press Polisky press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/bo...

The Political Development of American Debt Relief
Emily Zackin and Chloe N. Thurston

A political history of the rise and fall of American debt relief.

Americans have a long history with debt. They also have a long history of mobilizing for debt relief. Throughout the nineteenth century, indebted citizens demanded government protection from their financial burdens, challenging readings of the Constitution that exalted property rights at the expense of the vulnerable. Their appeals shaped the country’s periodic experiments with state debt relief and federal bankruptcy law, constituting a pre-industrial safety net. Yet, the twentieth century saw the erosion of debtor politics and the eventual retrenchment of bankruptcy protections.

The Political Development of American Debt Relief traces how geographic, sectoral, and racial politics shaped debtor activism over time, enhancing our understanding of state-building, constitutionalism, and social policy.

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Devin Caughey @devincaughey.bsky.social · 18/10/2023

And either way, it’s bad for the country!

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Devin Caughey @devincaughey.bsky.social · 18/10/2023

Two important differences I think. 1) Biden may not have enough control over the party and affiliated groups to prevent a candidate from running; 2) unlike Netanyahu, Biden’s tenure in office does not depend on a congressional majority—in fact - GOP House might increase his reelection prospects!

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Devin Caughey @devincaughey.bsky.social · 30/09/2023

I like the description of Ariely as “enigmatic swami of the but-actually circuit”

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Brendan Nyhan @brendannyhan.bsky.social · 23/09/2023

How has legislative attention to race changed over time? Dramatic growth in racialized words in legislation, but concentrated in symbolic resolutions, not substantive bills drive.google.com/file/d/11WPw... - new JMP from Amber Mackey (on poli sci market from Penn, MIT predoc)

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