Will Deringer
@calculatedvalues.bsky.social
Scholar of sophisters, economists, and calculators. Program in STS + HASTS PhD Program at MIT. Author of CALCULATED VALUES (Harvard UP 2018). "TILT" (2005) fan account.
Pinned
Honored and delighted by this recognition from @thenacbs.bsky.social!
Article is open access! www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/...
Article is open access! www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/...
Honored and delighted by this recognition from @thenacbs.bsky.social!
Article is open access! www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/...
Article is open access! www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/...
November 5, 2025 at 5:45 PM
Honored and delighted by this recognition from @thenacbs.bsky.social!
Article is open access! www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/...
Article is open access! www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/...
Reposted by Will Deringer
The Walter D. Love Prize is awarded to William Deringer, for “Mr. Aecroid’s Tables: Economic Calculations and Social Customs in the Early Modern Countryside,” published in the March 2024 issue of the Journal of Modern History. Congrats @calculatedvalues.bsky.social !! 👏
November 5, 2025 at 5:28 PM
The Walter D. Love Prize is awarded to William Deringer, for “Mr. Aecroid’s Tables: Economic Calculations and Social Customs in the Early Modern Countryside,” published in the March 2024 issue of the Journal of Modern History. Congrats @calculatedvalues.bsky.social !! 👏
The advance version of my article on "The 'Social Rate of Discount' and the Political Economy of the Future in Postwar America" is out in History of Political Economy!
read.dukeupress.edu/hope/article...
read.dukeupress.edu/hope/article...
The “Social Rate of Discount” and the Political Economy of the Future in Postwar America | History of Political Economy | Duke University Press
read.dukeupress.edu
August 7, 2025 at 3:05 PM
The advance version of my article on "The 'Social Rate of Discount' and the Political Economy of the Future in Postwar America" is out in History of Political Economy!
read.dukeupress.edu/hope/article...
read.dukeupress.edu/hope/article...
Reposted by Will Deringer
So happy to see KSJ in such good hands. And so happy to return to being a full-time writer, with yet another book about poison in the works.
Thrilled that Usha Lee McFarling (@usha.bsky.social) join MIT as the next Director of the Knight Science Journalism Program!
Usha will succeed the inimitable Deborah Blum (@deborahb.bsky.social), who has elevated the KSJ in countless ways over the past decade.
ksj.mit.edu/news/2025/05...
Usha will succeed the inimitable Deborah Blum (@deborahb.bsky.social), who has elevated the KSJ in countless ways over the past decade.
ksj.mit.edu/news/2025/05...
Usha Lee McFarling Named Director of the Knight Science Journalism Program - Knight Science Journalism @MIT
McFarling, Pulitzer-prize winning journalist and national science correspondent for STAT, was a 1992-93 Knight Science Journalism Fellow.
ksj.mit.edu
May 13, 2025 at 2:55 PM
So happy to see KSJ in such good hands. And so happy to return to being a full-time writer, with yet another book about poison in the works.
Reposted by Will Deringer
Some personal news. I'll be leaving STAT to take up what is a dream job for me, and a critical position in a time when science journalism is threatened on so many fronts. I look forward to supporting my colleagues, and the field itself, as much as I can. ksj.mit.edu/news/2025/05...
Usha Lee McFarling Named Director of the Knight Science Journalism Program - Knight Science Journalism @MIT
McFarling, Pulitzer-prize winning journalist and national science correspondent for STAT, was a 1992-93 Knight Science Journalism Fellow.
ksj.mit.edu
May 12, 2025 at 6:00 PM
Some personal news. I'll be leaving STAT to take up what is a dream job for me, and a critical position in a time when science journalism is threatened on so many fronts. I look forward to supporting my colleagues, and the field itself, as much as I can. ksj.mit.edu/news/2025/05...
Thrilled that Usha Lee McFarling (@usha.bsky.social) join MIT as the next Director of the Knight Science Journalism Program!
Usha will succeed the inimitable Deborah Blum (@deborahb.bsky.social), who has elevated the KSJ in countless ways over the past decade.
ksj.mit.edu/news/2025/05...
Usha will succeed the inimitable Deborah Blum (@deborahb.bsky.social), who has elevated the KSJ in countless ways over the past decade.
ksj.mit.edu/news/2025/05...
Usha Lee McFarling Named Director of the Knight Science Journalism Program - Knight Science Journalism @MIT
McFarling, Pulitzer-prize winning journalist and national science correspondent for STAT, was a 1992-93 Knight Science Journalism Fellow.
ksj.mit.edu
May 13, 2025 at 1:41 PM
Thrilled that Usha Lee McFarling (@usha.bsky.social) join MIT as the next Director of the Knight Science Journalism Program!
Usha will succeed the inimitable Deborah Blum (@deborahb.bsky.social), who has elevated the KSJ in countless ways over the past decade.
ksj.mit.edu/news/2025/05...
Usha will succeed the inimitable Deborah Blum (@deborahb.bsky.social), who has elevated the KSJ in countless ways over the past decade.
ksj.mit.edu/news/2025/05...
Pleased to announce the search for the next Director of the Knight Science Journalism Program at MIT!
Housed within MIT's STS Program, the KSJ seeks to advance science journalism in the public interest.
Job link: careers.peopleclick.com/careerscp/cl...
Full ad: www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/qwvvn...
Housed within MIT's STS Program, the KSJ seeks to advance science journalism in the public interest.
Job link: careers.peopleclick.com/careerscp/cl...
Full ad: www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/qwvvn...
Director, Knight Science Journalism Fellowship
MIT - Director, Knight Science Journalism Fellowship - Cambridge MA 02139
careers.peopleclick.com
December 16, 2024 at 5:20 PM
Pleased to announce the search for the next Director of the Knight Science Journalism Program at MIT!
Housed within MIT's STS Program, the KSJ seeks to advance science journalism in the public interest.
Job link: careers.peopleclick.com/careerscp/cl...
Full ad: www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/qwvvn...
Housed within MIT's STS Program, the KSJ seeks to advance science journalism in the public interest.
Job link: careers.peopleclick.com/careerscp/cl...
Full ad: www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/qwvvn...
Beyond excited to share this article, ten years in the making. I think it’s the best work I’ve done.
“Mr. Aecroid’s Tables: Economic Calculations and Social Customs in the Early Modern Countryside,” Jnl of Modern History
Open Access!
www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/...
“Mr. Aecroid’s Tables: Economic Calculations and Social Customs in the Early Modern Countryside,” Jnl of Modern History
Open Access!
www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/...
Mr. Aecroid’s Tables: Economic Calculations and Social Customs in the Early Modern Countryside* | The Journal of Modern History: Vol 96, No 1
Abstract In the 1610s and 1620s, a new computational technology took hold in England: printed mathematical tables for compound interest and discounting (“present value”) problems. Historians of financ...
www.journals.uchicago.edu
April 1, 2024 at 3:50 PM
Beyond excited to share this article, ten years in the making. I think it’s the best work I’ve done.
“Mr. Aecroid’s Tables: Economic Calculations and Social Customs in the Early Modern Countryside,” Jnl of Modern History
Open Access!
www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/...
“Mr. Aecroid’s Tables: Economic Calculations and Social Customs in the Early Modern Countryside,” Jnl of Modern History
Open Access!
www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/...
Reposted by Will Deringer
My excellent PhD student, Tola Ajao, was instrumental in putting this great resource together for @shothisttech.bsky.social
www.historyoftechnology.org/doing-histor...
www.historyoftechnology.org/doing-histor...
December 5, 2023 at 2:39 PM
My excellent PhD student, Tola Ajao, was instrumental in putting this great resource together for @shothisttech.bsky.social
www.historyoftechnology.org/doing-histor...
www.historyoftechnology.org/doing-histor...
Reposted by Will Deringer
Made the trip to Shelburne Falls, MA this weekend to visit the new Raven Used Books location--stunning! No better place to browse University Press titles. Especially thrilled to have found @calculatedvalues.bsky.social's book CALCULATED VALUES!
November 28, 2023 at 3:36 PM
Made the trip to Shelburne Falls, MA this weekend to visit the new Raven Used Books location--stunning! No better place to browse University Press titles. Especially thrilled to have found @calculatedvalues.bsky.social's book CALCULATED VALUES!
Reposted by Will Deringer
November 21, 2023 at 2:44 PM
Reposted by Will Deringer
Congrats & Thanks to @calculatedvalues.bsky.social MIT's William Deringer who gave an amazingly insightful lecture for our U of Minnesota HSTM Colloquium yesterday on Irving Fisher & the wide & deep history of discounting from finance & psychology to understandings of the present & future. #histsci
November 18, 2023 at 7:19 PM
Congrats & Thanks to @calculatedvalues.bsky.social MIT's William Deringer who gave an amazingly insightful lecture for our U of Minnesota HSTM Colloquium yesterday on Irving Fisher & the wide & deep history of discounting from finance & psychology to understandings of the present & future. #histsci
Excited to present Friday at Minnesota in the Hist & Phil of Sci / Tech / Med Colloquium!
I'll be talking discounting calculations, Irving Fisher, the economics of time, "New Thought," and the idealization of economics in the early 20c.
Equal parts wonky and woo-woo.
cse.umn.edu/hstm/fall-20...
I'll be talking discounting calculations, Irving Fisher, the economics of time, "New Thought," and the idealization of economics in the early 20c.
Equal parts wonky and woo-woo.
cse.umn.edu/hstm/fall-20...
Fall 2023 Colloquium
cse.umn.edu
November 13, 2023 at 4:13 PM
Excited to present Friday at Minnesota in the Hist & Phil of Sci / Tech / Med Colloquium!
I'll be talking discounting calculations, Irving Fisher, the economics of time, "New Thought," and the idealization of economics in the early 20c.
Equal parts wonky and woo-woo.
cse.umn.edu/hstm/fall-20...
I'll be talking discounting calculations, Irving Fisher, the economics of time, "New Thought," and the idealization of economics in the early 20c.
Equal parts wonky and woo-woo.
cse.umn.edu/hstm/fall-20...
Reposted by Will Deringer
Louis Gottschalk book prize for studies of the long 18th century: deadline is Dec. 1! Info here: asecs.org/resources/aw... Please share widely.
Louis Gottschalk Prize – ASECS
asecs.org
November 6, 2023 at 11:01 PM
Louis Gottschalk book prize for studies of the long 18th century: deadline is Dec. 1! Info here: asecs.org/resources/aw... Please share widely.
Reposted by Will Deringer
If you have power over a search committee (or are on it) and it still is asking for 3 letters of rec before making a long short list...c'mon. Be serious.
#BurnInHell
#BurnInHell
October 31, 2023 at 1:41 AM
If you have power over a search committee (or are on it) and it still is asking for 3 letters of rec before making a long short list...c'mon. Be serious.
#BurnInHell
#BurnInHell
When and why did the standard epithet for someone who overindulges in gambling become “degenerate”? Are others who are overcome by different vices described as degens?
October 27, 2023 at 7:26 PM
When and why did the standard epithet for someone who overindulges in gambling become “degenerate”? Are others who are overcome by different vices described as degens?
Reposted by Will Deringer
If you're a historian of technology & will be at the SHOT meeting, stop by the JHUP table and look for Asif Siddiqi, Kate mcDonald, or me. We have a book series with JHUP & are happy to discuss projects.
#Histsci #HistSTM 🗃️
(Running owl added because we all need more running owls in our lives)
#Histsci #HistSTM 🗃️
(Running owl added because we all need more running owls in our lives)
October 11, 2023 at 6:30 PM
Dutch Book arguments lose most of their power once you’ve seen how a four year old can both absolutely refuse to get into the bathtub and absolutely refuse to get out of the bathtub
October 4, 2023 at 10:07 PM
Dutch Book arguments lose most of their power once you’ve seen how a four year old can both absolutely refuse to get into the bathtub and absolutely refuse to get out of the bathtub
Reposted by Will Deringer
"Applications must include a letter of application, CV, a writing sample of ca. 25 pages, evidence of contributions to DEI, and three letters of recommendation. Finalists will also be asked for teaching evaluations"
Rice University - shame. There's no need to ask for all this up front.
Rice University - shame. There's no need to ask for all this up front.
October 4, 2023 at 1:03 AM
"Applications must include a letter of application, CV, a writing sample of ca. 25 pages, evidence of contributions to DEI, and three letters of recommendation. Finalists will also be asked for teaching evaluations"
Rice University - shame. There's no need to ask for all this up front.
Rice University - shame. There's no need to ask for all this up front.
Reposted by Will Deringer
This is the kind of post I want to see more of on bluesky
October 3, 2023 at 11:38 PM
This is the kind of post I want to see more of on bluesky
The only good part of doing the dishes is finishing the last bites of salad with the big salad fork thing and pretending to be a giant
October 3, 2023 at 11:30 PM
The only good part of doing the dishes is finishing the last bites of salad with the big salad fork thing and pretending to be a giant
Reposted by Will Deringer
September 27, 2023 at 8:29 AM
Reposted by Will Deringer
"Why is there no epistemology of the humanities that is even remotely comparable to the epistemology of the sciences?... I’m not so sure we really know how we know what we know... The first step in justifying our ways of knowing to... doubters wld be to justify them to ourselves." - Lorraine Daston
How We Know What We Know
Lorraine Daston Why is there no epistemology of the humanities that is even remotely comparable to the epistemology of the sciences? Why is it that humanists can gesture to only a handful of seminal w...
critinq.wordpress.com
September 25, 2023 at 9:56 PM
"Why is there no epistemology of the humanities that is even remotely comparable to the epistemology of the sciences?... I’m not so sure we really know how we know what we know... The first step in justifying our ways of knowing to... doubters wld be to justify them to ourselves." - Lorraine Daston
To departments and institutions that explicitly do not accept generic recommendation letters or recs from a dossier service:
Why?
(More directly: this is a terrible practice and you should stop it.)
Why?
(More directly: this is a terrible practice and you should stop it.)
September 25, 2023 at 3:41 PM
To departments and institutions that explicitly do not accept generic recommendation letters or recs from a dossier service:
Why?
(More directly: this is a terrible practice and you should stop it.)
Why?
(More directly: this is a terrible practice and you should stop it.)
Reposted by Will Deringer
How poignant: on the very same day that there’s a conference in her honor at the University of Toronto, Evelyn Fox Keller passes away ihpst.utoronto.ca/news/full-pr...
September 22, 2023 at 10:44 PM
How poignant: on the very same day that there’s a conference in her honor at the University of Toronto, Evelyn Fox Keller passes away ihpst.utoronto.ca/news/full-pr...