“There’s a saying in quiz shows,” Wisse says, “that a good question has to get one of three reactions: ‘I knew that,’ or ‘darn I should have known that,’ or ‘I didn’t know that, but now I’m glad I do.’ That’s basically what we’re looking for.”
He oversees a staff of eight writers. Another eight researchers to double-check the facts. Researchers ensure that the facts are independently verified, and that spellings and other details are correct. This usually requires two or more independent sources per question. Both the researchers and writers work on what is called “pinning” in the jargon of Jeopardy! Pinning means sorting out that there is for sure only one possible answer. Of course, sometimes as we’ve seen in the show, the judges will accept one of two answers, but that’s the upper ceiling of multiple choices.
The cuisine’s long history here might be part of the reason, too. It’s “Grandma’s food,” Hauck said. At a time when American eaters seem interested in sampling new-to-them cuisines from around the globe — Native American food is the new poke is the new Uighur is the new Filipino — German food seems stodgy. Not to mention that in the age of Instagram, it suffers from an acute case of brown.
It’s also hearty, heavy and boasts enough starches to make ketogenic, gluten-free Whole 30 adherents lose their minds — which makes it seem out of place in our current food culture.
Silicon Valley has long celebrated failure as a way station to success. And yet it has failed women repeatedly, with little recognition or progress made — or even an attempt to learn from past mistakes. In Chang’s words, “it’s time for the industry to own it.”
[T]he focus of the book is really in the subtitle: “A Quest to Make Doctors Believe in Women’s Pain.” She builds a convincing case that women describing discomfort are more likely than men to be dismissed by physicians, but along the way tells a story that will resonate with anyone (man or woman) who has ever experienced pain.