Choosing Better

Is freedom doing whatever you want, or becoming what you were made to be? Enoch and Tim trace the shift from classical to modern freedom, from Adam Smith to John Stuart Mill's harm principle, and ask what we lost along the way. Why can we only argue about usury, cheating, or assisted suicide in terms of harm and victims, when what many of us really believe is "it's just wrong"? Recording Date: March 26, 2026Credits: Drew Elliot (music)

Enoch and Tim discuss privacy in an age of data, AI, and mass surveillance. Using Flock cameras as a central example, they explore the benefits and drawbacks of the new technology that has drawn such backlash. They compare Flock tocorporate data systems like Ring, consider how privacy laws might have such a hard time catching up with technology, and challenge the idea that “nothing to hide” means nothing to fear.  Correction: In the episode Enoch incorrectly stated that each vehicle in the US gets scanned an average of over 800 times per day that should have been per year.Recording Date: September 1, 2026 Credits: Drew Elliot (music)

America is coming apart. The most likely place for a college educated adult to meet their spouse is at university. This is not just true for some college and universities; it is true for just about every university. But what happens when intelligent people leave their hometowns for university study, meet “the one”, and then settle down? We begin to sort our very neighborhoods and towns my education and merit. Fewer than half of Americans have a college degree, yet most people with a college degree live in towns where most of their neighbors also have college degrees. Join Enoch and Tim as they explain this social problem and throw out some ideas on how to fix it.Note: We accidentally posted these in reverse order, so last week was part two on this topic and this week is part I. Hope you enjoy!Reference: Coming Apart by Charles Murray (2012).Recording Date: May 7, 2026Credits: Drew Elliot (music)

Update: I (Enoch) accidentally had my recordings mis-labeled and posted the wrong episode this week (Which means the old show-notes didn't match). We're keeping the episode posted, but this was the second part in a two parter. Stay tuned for the first part ... next! Correct show notes for this episode below.What if America’s political divide is no longer just playing out at the ballot box, but at the wedding altar and in the nursery? Enoch and Tim discuss how ideology is increasingly shaping who people marry, why nearly 80% of spouses now share the same political outlook, and what this reveals about the deep social sorting underway in the United States. The conversation then turns to the growingfertility gap between conservatives and liberals, with Tim sharing insights from recent research by the Verity Research Lab that highlights stark differences in how each group views children, parenting, and family life. Together, these patterns point to more than political disagreement, they suggest two diverging visions of marriage, family, and the future of America.Reference: Coming Apart by Charles Murray (2012).Recording Date: May 14, 2026Credits: Drew Elliot (music)

When does prenatal screening determine whether a child will be born at all? In this episode of Choosing Better, Enoch and Tim explore Down syndrome, abortion, eugenics, and the quiet social pressures that shape “choice.” From viral controversy and global termination rates to Tim’s research on Down syndrome birthrates, they ask what we are missing when children with disabilities are screened out and disappear from our communities. The conversation ends with a call to choose better by building communities where families facing a pregnancy with Down syndrome are met with courage, support, and love.Commercial referenced in the episode can be found here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ju-q4OnBtNU. Tim’s full public lecture can be found here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ULqFaSh3nG0.