[Following up on my “Do conservatives really value economic liberty?”, on the conservatisms of Newt Gingrich, Robert Bork, and Irving Kristol.] In The New York Times, moderate conservative David Brooks reflects upon Charles Murray’s Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960-2010. Brooks agrees with Murray that Americans have divided into two polarized “tribes.” “The […]
Another anti-freedom conservative: David Brooks Read More »
The humor of my youth, worth revisiting regularly.
Classic philosophical Monty Python Read More »
In my Philosophy of Art course, we are discussing Plato’s philosophy of art, by means of selections from Statesman and Books 3 and 10 of The Republic, along with snippets from Ion, Phaedrus, and Symposium. In The Republic, Plato makes a systematic case for censoring all arts. The task of the Platonic philosopher is to
Plato on censoring artists — a summary Read More »
In this extended interview, philosopher Douglas B. Rasmussen responds to a series of questions (listed below) about his life and work. Dr. Rasmussen is a professor of philosophy at St. John’s University in New York. In addition to the books discussed in the interview, he is the author of articles in American Philosophical Quarterly, The
Profiles in Liberty: Douglas B. Rasmussen Read More »
Rights in Mises, Hayek, and Rand I am chairing a session and presenting a paper on the theme of “Rights in Mises, Hayek, and Rand” for the annual conference of the Association for Private Enterprise Education, to be held April 1-3, 2012 in Las Vegas, Nevada. The rationale for the session: Three giants of twentieth-century
Rights in Mises, Hayek, and Rand — APEE panelists Read More »
Share of US labor force working in agriculture: 1840: 64% 1880: 43% 1920: 27% 1960: 10% 2000: 1.5% What an amazing transformation over 160 years. Interesting to compare the USA’s numbers with these statistics from the CIA’s World Factbook on percentages of people employed in agriculture around the world, e.g., Afghanistan 78%, Kyrgyzstan 48%, Malaysia
Employment in agriculture: statistics Read More »
Check out Rocket Singh, Salesman of the Year, an engaging movie with a healthy business ethics kick. The main character is a young college graduate with mediocre grades who lands a job at a computer sales company. He is soon confronted with corrupt-but-usual practices in the company, and his naïveté puts him on the fast
Rocket Singh, Salesman of the Year Read More »
Links to my posts over the last three years on the causes of the crisis. This is an ongoing project, and I’ll add new items to the Financial Crisis page as they are posted. Ten posts: 1. What is the US economy? Introduction. Before blaming the economic crisis on either government regulation or free enterprise,
Collected posts on the financial crisis Read More »