September 29, 2007
An Exorcism Maldives Style
A disturbing video of an exorcism in the Maldives (not recommended for everyone)- I previously mentioned about it in an earlier post.
August 11, 2007
Maldives Rising
A documentary about the Maldives from Al Jazeera; Part1(above), Part 2, Part 3 & Part 4
I would highly recommed Part 2.
November 27, 2006
Podcasts- Intelligent Design, God and Style
Nature and Religion
Marine scientist Walter Stark, a pioneer of coral reef research who believes the modern view of nature is religious. It holds that nature is pure and perfect, while humans are separate and soiled. He argues that urban Australians' view of nature is problem-obsessed, because problems offer magnificent opportunities to politicians, academics, the media, and of course professional activists
A new branch of moral philosophy
Nick Drayson is a zoologist and a spinner of yarns. His outrageous book, Confessing a Murder, explains the stunning coincidence of Wallace and Darwin 'discovering' natural selection. Now he is in search of platypus memorabilia for the National Museum in Canberra.
Moral Minds: The Evolution of Human Morality
Note; A lot of these podcasts are available for limited time, so download now.
Capitalism, not democracy leads to peace?
Don Boudreaux links to an interesting working paper by Columbia University political scientist Erik Gartzke; The Capitalist Peace.
The following is the conclusion of the paprer.
“This study offers evidence suggesting that capitalism, and not democracy, leads to peace. Additional research is needed to corroborate, extend, and even refute the findings reported here. One must be circumspect in questioning a body of evidence as large and as carefully constructed as that on the democratic peace. Still, economic liberals have long seen in free markets and prosperity the potential to discourage war. A century ago, the “conventional wisdom” looked more like this study and less like that of democratic peace researchers. While past arguments were clearly simplistic and overblown, there does now seem to be grounds for reconsidering liberal economic peace theory.Critics can differ with my revision of classical arguments, or can plausibly challenge the assumptions on which my version of the capitalist peace is built. The statistical models I develop, and the findings that I present, can be altered, possibly in ways that again show that democracy matters. For now, I hope my claims are coherent, empirically plausible, and at the very least intellectually provocative. What is the “larger” relationship between development, capitalism, and democracy? It might be that democracy actually lies behind the apparent impact of capitalism on peace. Still, the world was not always made up of 50% democracies. Little attempt has been made to rule out the possibility that democracy and peace have common causes. A logical extension of this study is the exploration of determinants of political and economic liberalism, though resolving these more complex causal arrows would seem to require a far more profound set of conclusions about the world, ones that are still under construction in comparative politics, economics, and other fields.
The collapse of the Soviet Union in the early 1990’s gave new impetus to the exploration of domestic determinants of international relations. Today, political revolution from without is being attempted in the Middle East, in no small part because policy makers believe that peace can be had through regime change. If the imposition of liberal politics offers a domestic paradox, at the international level coercing democracy is an extreme, though arguably logical, extension of democratic peace theory. At the same time, allowing people freedom to choose implies that they will sometimes choose to disagree. A growing number of popularly elected leaders oppose the interests of established democracies. If democracy reflects the popular will, and many people in the world are unhappy, we should perhaps not expect that all new democracies will like the old ones.”
Related;
The Democracy Advantage: How Democracies Promote Prosperity and Peace (chapter 1 of the book)
R.J. Rummel's blogs; Freedom's Principles and Democratic Peace
The Declining Advantages of Democracy: A Combined Model of War Outcomes and Duration D. Scott Bennett, Allan C. Stam III
Economic Freedom of the World 2005 Annual Report; Chapter 2 - Economic Freedom and Peace
Book review of Alexis de Tocqueville: Prophet of Democracy in the Age of Revolution—A Biography By Hugh Brogan -Alexis de Tocqueville's strong views on demagoguery and citizenship are worth remembering, as is clear from a splendid new biography
Democracy pays off in the long run...
Economic and Political Freedom: Does One Lead to the Other?
Podcasts;
Niall Ferguson: The War of the World
Private Equity- the purest capitalism
November 26, 2006
Guide to Flirting
An interesting article from the latest edition of The Economist; Flirting-Don't misunderestimate yourself;
“Dr Hill showed heterosexual men and women photographs of people. She asked them to rate both how attractive those of their own sex would be to the opposite sex, and how attractive the members of the opposite sex were. She then compared the scores for the former with the scores for the latter, seen from the other side. Men thought that the men they were shown were more attractive to women than they really were, and women thought the same of the women.Dr Hill had predicted this outcome, thanks to error-management theory—the idea that when people (or, indeed, other animals) make errors of judgment, they tend to make the error that is least costly. The notion was first proposed by Martie Haselton and David Buss, two of Dr Hill's colleagues, to explain a puzzling quirk in male psychology.
As studies show, and many women will attest, men tend to misinterpret innocent friendliness as a sign that women are sexually interested in them. Dr Haselton and Dr Buss reasoned that men who are trying to decide if a woman is interested sexually can err in one of two ways. They can mistakenly believe that she is not interested, in which case they will not bother trying to have sex with her; or they can mistakenly believe she is interested, try, and be rejected. From an evolutionary standpoint, trying and being rejected comes at little cost, except for hurt feelings. Not trying at all, by contrast, may mean the loss of an opportunity to, among other things, spread one's DNA.”
Related;
Interview with Martie Haselton (podcast)
Study links women's fashion sense to ovulation
Looking Good-Our obsession with physical appearance may not be so shallow, after all;
“A Polish researcher named Grazyna Jasienska recently designed an experiment to determine whether symmetrical women have higher levels of the key reproductive hormone estradiol. In the journal Evolution and Human Behavior, her team reports the results. They compared the left and right ring fingers of 183 Polish women between the ages of 24 and 36. Women whose fingers differed in length by more than two millimeters formed the asymmetrical group. Their average estradiol levels were 13 percent lower than the symmetrical group average.When the scientists screened out rural women, whose economic status and harder lives could skew their hormone levels, the difference in average hormone levels between symmetrical and asymmetrical urban women rose to 28 percent.
Marquardt's work has an artistic spin to it. Like Euclid, Leonardo da Vinci and Le Corbusier before him, the doctor became fascinated with the possibility that beauty itself could be quantified. His instincts told him that beauty is not in the eye of the beholder. "I didn't find that to be true," he explains in an interview. "Guys seem to agree. They may argue over whether they prefer Michelle Pfeiffer or Kim Basinger, but you never hear anyone say Roseanne Barr." He had always been mathematically inclined, so, beginning in the early 1970s, Marquardt set out to compile the measurements of beautiful faces. He focused on people who were paid for being attractive -- movie stars and face models. His colleagues scoffed: "Every doctor I talked to told me I was nuts," he recalls.”
Our minds are not what we think
From FT a case of patient with Cotard syndrome;
"She was completely preoccupied with the thought that she was dead," he recalls. "She kept saying that she'd died two weeks before and was worried about whether my office was heaven or not."The young scientist realised that Liz was suffering from a rare and strange condition known as Cotard syndrome, which for the sake of brevity I'll define as the delusion that one is dead. The condition was named after the French psychiatrist Jules Cotard who wrote about some classic cases in the late 1800s. He called it delire des negations and described a host of other symptoms including feelings of guilt, denial of body parts and even, paradoxically for someone who thinks they are dead, thoughts about suicide….
Roughly 100 cases of Cotard delusion have been reported in the medical literature, which certainly makes it rare, although not as rare as some other strange delusions, such as the single case of a man with "perceptual delusional bicephaly". He believed he had two heads and was admitted to hospital suffering gunshot wounds from where he'd tried to shoot one off….
Eventually he did get through, and posed a series of questions to assess an aspect of her personality known as her attributional style. Broadly speaking, this measures a person's tendency to attribute events in their lives to themselves (internal attribution) or to other people or luck (external).
He asked Liz a standard set of questions, presenting her with a range of scenarios - for example, a friend sending her a postcard - and asking her to think about the most likely cause of that event, whether it be herself, other people or chance.The results showed that Liz had a significantly higher number of internal attributions than usual. This was interesting because it relates to one of the prevailing theories about what happens to patients with Cotard delusion. Scientists think that patients with Cotard syndrome have suffered some kind of disruption to the brain wiring for recognising faces. "The idea is that there are two elements to the visual recognition system," McKay explained to me over the phone last week from his new office at Australia's Charles Sturt University. The first element does the pattern-matching business of recognising a face, the second provides the more emotional buzz of familiarity…”
Via Mind Hacks
Related;
Looking Good-Our obsession with physical appearance may not be so shallow, after all
On Consciousness Evolved by VS Ramachandran
Moral Sense Test
Podcasts
Moral Minds: The Evolution of Human Morality
Incest, infanticide, honour killings - different cultures have different rules of justice. But are we all born with a moral instinct - an innate ability to judge what is right and wrong? Could morality be like language - a universal, unconscious grammar common to all human cultures? Eminent evolutionary biologist Marc Hauser and philosopher Richard Joyce take on these controversial questions in impressive new tomes, and to critical acclaim. But could their evolutionary arguments undermine the social authority of morality? Is biology the new 'religion'? Guests include Marc Hauser and Richard Joyce
Mindfulness
The 'holy grail' of meditation techniques is mindfulness. But what is it, exactly? And why has the medical profession suddenly appropriated this age-old technique devised by yogis and Buddhist monks? Professor Emeritus at the University of Massachusetts Medical School, Dr Jon Kabat-Zinn, is the world leader in this field. We also hear from 'the guru of calm', Paul Wilson. Having published scores of books on Calm (Little Book of Calm, Instant Calm etc) Wilson is convinced it's a technique he learned in the Queensland outback
A new branch of moral philosophy
Neuroethics is a new field. It concerns the ethics of the science of the mind and the ethical questions that arise out of our growing knowledge of the way in which the mind works. Before the year 2000 there was little need for the term but rapid advances in the sciences of mind, and the rise of pressing ethical issues surrounding them, mean that we cannot any longer remain without the term or the field to which it refers.
The elimination of iodine deficiency as a cause of brain damage
A Child's Spirit
Encounter ponders the subject of spiritual development in children, and also considers how forces at play in the wider world can shape, and often thwart, children's spiritual lives
Note; Podcasts above are from Radio National and are available for limited time...so download now.
Podcast of the Day- Lecture 3 Reform and Deregulation
The Boyer lectures by Ian Macfarlene, former governor of Reserve Bank of Australia, continuos;
By the 1970s the world's developed economies were stuck in the worst position they had been in since the Great Depression of the 1930s. Australia shared this experience but, propelled by a program of reform and deregulation, it slowly became competitive again and began to register strong rates of growth. In this environment the corporate sector embarked on an era of heightened activity, driven by massive borrowings, takeovers and mergers. It is now apparent that the implications of sudden financial deregulation were not fully understood, and the dawn of the 1990s would bring with it new challenges for those charged with navigating the twin hazards of boom and bust.
Listen to the podcast. Some excerpts below;
“Let me digress for a moment to discuss another epithet routinely applied by those opposed to economic reasoning, which is to refer to economics as the dismal science. Whenever I hear this term, I wonder how many people who use it know its origin. It was coined by Thomas Carlyle, in 1849, in an essay called, Occasional Discourse on the Negro Question, in which he argued for the reintroduction of slavery into the West Indies. He viewed the former slaves as 'indolent, two-legged cattle, who should be subject to the beneficent whip'. It is extraordinary that the author of these views which were reactionary and racist even by the standards of 1849, should have had the temerity to refer to his opponents, the most prominent of whom was John Stuart Mill, as representing the dismal science, when all they were doing was arguing that freed slaves should have the same rights as other free people. Mill wrote a reply to Carlyle expressing views that would be widely held today, but unfortunately it is Carlyle's throwaway line that has endured, not Mills' sensible reply….
While there had been a long series of steps in the process of financial deregulation, the decisive one that shook up the system was the entry of 15 foreign banks in 1985. They were eager to gain a foothold in Australia, and this meant lending where it was easiest to do so, which was lending to businesses. Foreign banks everywhere have always found it difficult to break into the household lending market.The existing banks also increased their lending to maintain their market share, even though they had little experience of the credit assessment required in the new deregulated world. One prominent bank chief said that he had 'thirty years experience as a lending banker, but the first 29 were all the same.' As the competition to lend intensified, many borrowers, who had formerly not been able to obtain credit, did so, and in large amounts.
The journalist and financial historian, Trevor Sykes, sums up the period this way: 'Never before in Australian history had so much money been channelled by so many people incompetent to lend it, into the hands of so many incompetent to manage it.'..
November 23, 2006
Podcasts
Altruism
The term altruism was coined by the 19th century sociologist Auguste Comte and is derived from the Latin “alteri” or "the others”. It describes an unselfish attention to the needs of others. Comte declared that man had a moral duty to “serve humanity, whose we are entirely.” The idea of altruism is central to the main religions: Jesus declared “you shall love your neighbour as yourself” and Mohammed said “none of you truly believes until he wishes for his brother what he wishes for himself”. Buddhism too advocates “seeking for others the happiness one desires for oneself.”…
If both mankind and the natural world are selfishly seeking to promote their own survival and advancement, how can we explain being kind to others, sometimes at our own expense? How have philosophical ideas about altruism responded to evolutionary theory? And paradoxically, is it possible that altruism can, in fact, be selfish? Contributors include Miranda Fricker, Senior Lecturer in the School of Philosophy at Birkbeck, University of London, Richard Dawkins, evolutionary biologist and the Charles Simonyi Professor of the Public Understanding of Science at Oxford University and John Dupré, Professor of Philosophy of Science at Exeter University and director of Egenis, the ESRC Centre for Genomics in Society (from BBC’s In Our Time).
Niall Ferguson: The War of the World
The 20th century was a period of unprecedented economic growth and scientific discovery, but equally a century of unparalleled bloodshed and warfare - estimates suggest that 1 in every 22 deaths in the 20th century were the result of violence. Niall Ferguson argues that the intensity of the 'hundred years war' can be explained by the factors of ethnic disintegration, economic volatility, and empires in decline - forces which are to be found behind sites of contemporary conflict, notably the Middle East.
Can chocolate cure hypochondria?
Associate Professor in Latin Humanism Yasmin Haskell from the University of Western Australia talks about the history of hypochondria and benefits of chocolate.
Des Moore on Milton Friedman
“Why was Friedman so influential? It was not due to esoteric analyses of economic theory accepted in academia. He did very little of this and many academics resented his rebuttals of the merits of government intervention. His influence came importantly from his ability to explain and defend his beliefs in terms that were comprehensible and persuasive to the layman. His constant theme that adoption of free market policies were in the interests of the common man helped enormously.”
Utility of Force- General Sir Rupert Smith (ret., British Army)
The Long War General John Philip Abizaid, Commander of U.S. CENTCOM
A Conversation with Akbar Ganji and Martha Nussbaum
Democracy Amercian and British style
Does raising the miminum wage help the poor?
Private equity - the purest capitalism
Related blog- Going Private
Podcast of the Day- Islamic Finance for US
Marc Chandler, global head of currency strategy at Brown Brothers Harriman & Co., talks about opportunities in Islamic finance and the outlook for the U.S. dollar and euro (Bloomberg podcast).
Related;
Britain can be gateway to Islamic finance- Gordon Brown (earlier post)
The State of Islamic Finance in Australia
Short Selling and the Travesty of Islamic Finance
Cayman Islands Emerge As Leading Islamic Finance Domicile
Islamic Finance podcast
Fund for Shariah Scholars in Islamic Finance
Islamic Finance isn’t Islamic
Islamic Finance (World Bank portal on the topic)
Popularity Of Islamic Finance Market On The Rise
“Not surprisingly, the jump in popularity of sukuks has drawn the interest of institutions outside the Middle East.Two years ago, the German state of Saxony Anhalt sold the first sukuk from the West. IFC is the first supranational to issue Islamic securities in the Malaysian market, and the first supranational to issue domestic Islamic bonds in any market”
Islamic Banking (transcript of a program at Radio National)
Two stories on Islamic Finance
Blogs related to Islamic Economics and Finance; Islamic Finance Blog, Islam and Economics
Bibliography on Islamic Banking
Working Papers
Corporate governance in institutions offering Islamic financial services : issues and options
Corporate governance and stakeholders' financial interests in institutions offering Islamic financial services
Regulating Islamic financial institutions : The nature of the regulated
Mapping the possibilities for Islamic microfinance
November 22, 2006
Book recommendations from Tom Palmer
“People who wish to understand the Islamic tradition would do well to try to start with an examination of the role that Islam played in the development of law, rather than with the various Muslim-bashing books that have appeared recently”, says Tom Palmer.
Book recommendations;
Wael B. Hallaq’s The Origins and Evolution of Islamic Law
Harold Berman’s Law and Revolution: The Formation of the Western Legal Tradition.
Law and Revolution, II: The Impact of the Protestant Reformations on the Western Legal Tradition
Mohammad Hashim Kamali’s books-Principles of Islamic Jurisprudence, Freedom of Expression in Islam , Freedom, Equality and Justice in Islam
This Law of Ours and other essays, by Muhammad Asad
Related;
Muslim Basher Robert Spencer Upset at my Dismissal of his Book (Tom Palmer post)
Islam and Economics- blog of Professor at Rice University
Podcasts;
Islam Then and Now
Daniel Peterson believes the key to understanding present Islamic attitudes lies in understanding the religious and philosophical texts of its past.
Interpreting culture
The distinguished American anthropologist Clifford Geertz died last month
Podcast of the Day- First genocide of the 20th Century?
One million people were killed in the Armenian genocide in 1915. It was the first genocide of the twentieth century, and in many ways set horrific template for all the genocides that came after it - including the Holocaust. The Armenian genocide has been in the news a bit lately because the French National Assembly and Senate have passed a bill that makes denying the Armenian genocide a crime.
Taner Akcam argues that issue of the genocide is inextricably linked to the idea of modern Turkey, and says that if Turkey is going to make it as a democracy it must start facing up to its past. Akcam is part of a small group or Turkish scholars who are starting to challenge the Turkish governments' account of the genocide - and he is the first specialist to actually use the politically and morally charged word "genocide' to describe the killings. The release of his book in Turkey earlier this month was met with irate criticism in the mainstream Turkish press. Listen to the podcast (from Radio National).
Related; Genocide?
November 19, 2006
Podcast of Day- Boyer Lectures
Lecture 2: From Golden Age to Stagflation
For the world's developed economies, the end of the second world war was the trigger for almost 30 years of sustained growth. Ian Macfarlane says the Keynesian system of economic management had served policy-makers well, but asks had Keynesian policies been pushed too far, beyond their natural limits? Inflation began to rise in all countries in the late 1960s and early 1970s. When the first OPEC oil shock occurred it would bring the post-war boom to a sudden close, and give rise to a new condition—stagflation. Some excerpts below;
“These economic developments and macroeconomic debates occurred in virtually all the developed countries. Nowhere were they more prominent than in the United Kingdom, where inflation had two peaks in excess of 20% per annum, during the 1970s and where the UK government finally had to go, cap in hand, to borrow from the IMF in 1976. Perhaps therefore it is fitting that former British Prime Minister, Jim Callaghan, be given the last word to sum up what he had learned from the economic turbulence of the 1970s. Callaghan said, and I will quote:
What is the cause of high employment? Quite simply, and unequivocally, it is caused by paying ourselves more than the value of what we produce. There are no scapegoats. That is as true in a mixed economy under a Labour government as it is under capitalism or communism. It is an absolute fact of life, which no government, be it left or right, can alter. We used to think that you could spend your way out of a recession, and increase employment by cutting taxes and boosting government spending. I tell you in all candour, that that option no longer exists, and that insofar as it ever did exist, it only worked on each occasion since the war, by injecting a bigger dose of inflation into the economy, followed by a higher level of unemployment as the next step. Higher inflation, followed by higher unemployment; we have just escaped from the highest rate of inflation this century has known; we have not yet escaped from the consequences, high unemployment. That is the history of the last 20 years.
To an economist, Callaghan's eloquent lament sounds very much like a lay-man's version of the dynamic instability engendered by attempts to exploit the Phillips Curve.”
Milton Friedman on Iraq War
“Mr. Friedman here shifted focus. "What's really killed the Republican Party isn't spending, it's Iraq. As it happens, I was opposed to going into Iraq from the beginning. I think it was a mistake, for the simple reason that I do not believe the United States of America ought to be involved in aggression." Mrs. Friedman--listening to her husband with an ear cocked--was now muttering darkly.
Milton: "Huh? What?" Rose: "This was not aggression!" Milton (exasperatedly): "It was aggression. Of course it was!" Rose: "You count it as aggression if it's against the people, not against the monster who's ruling them. We don't agree. This is the first thing to come along in our lives, of the deep things, that we don't agree on. We have disagreed on little things, obviously--such as, I don't want to go out to dinner, he wants to go out--but big issues, this is the first one!" Milton: "But, having said that, once we went in to Iraq, it seems to me very important that we make a success of it." Rose: "And we will!"
-In an interview on WSG; The Romance of Economics Milton and Rose Friedman: Dinner with Keynes? Yes. War with Iraq? They disagree
Related;
The Great Friedman
Milton Friedman - Economist Who Showed The Way For Thatcher
Milton Friedman On Prohibition
Shalom Milton Friedman
Is Monetarism Dead?
Milton Friedman and the Pencil
All the obituaries of Milton Friedman relate this little anecdote
An Appreciation of Milton Friedman
Milton Friedman: How to Cure Health Care
Friedman deserves the thanks of everyone opposed to conscription
Milton Friedman Died. Did We Lose a Scientist?
Milton Friedman, A Modern Galileo
Friedman's theories leave a mixed legacy (something from England)
The Legacy of Milton Friedman
What Bush Could Learn From Milton Friedman
Milton Friedman on Hong Kong (1998)
Origin of the Methodology of Positive Economics?
On the Origins of "A Monetary History" (via Tyler Cowen)
"This paper explores some of the scholarship that influenced Milton Friedman and Anna J. Schwartz's "A Monetary History". It shows that the ideas of several Chicago economists -- Henry Schultz, Henry Simons, Lloyd Mints, and Jacob Viner -- left clear marks. It argues, however, that the most important influence may have been Wesley Clair Mitchell and his classic book "Business Cycles" (1913). Mitchell, and the NBER, provided the methodology for "A Monetary History", in particular the emphasis on compiling long time series of monthly data and analyzing the effects of specific variables on the business cycle. A common methodology and the stability of monetary relationships produced similar conclusions about money. Friedman and Schwartz deemphasized Mitchell's "bank-centric" view of the monetary transmission process, but they reinforced Mitchell's conclusion that money had an independent, predictable, and important influence on the business cycle."
November 18, 2006
Some Podcasts
Andrew Leigh interview about Milton Friedman (second item on the podcast)
Interpreting culture
The distinguished American anthropologist Clifford Geertz died last month. This week, we take a respectful but sceptical look at his work, its origins in philosophy and its consequences for philosophy. Savage Minds have more Clifford Geerz.
"Shifting aims, moving targets: on the anthropology of religion"- a lecture by Clifford Geertz
Imps of the Mind Gone Awry: Obsessive Compulsive Disorder
Rituals, checking the stove, repetitive thoughts. Everyday patterns for all of us, but when they go awry, the impact of these imps of the mind is devastating and life-consuming. This week, a provocative theory with new, convincing science - could Obsessive Compulsive Disorder in some children be triggered by a common bout of strep throat? And, nipping the obsessions and compulsions in the bud - one parent's story, and a pilot project already changing the lives of young people plagued by OCD. More links here.
The State of Russia
Professor Christopher Read examines the current state of Russia and its changing political and economic position
Libertarian Paternalism Is Not an Oxymoron
Cass Sunstein, professor of Jurisprudence at the University of Chicago Law School
Anecdotes about Milton Friedman
"Everybody loves to argue with Milton, particularly when he isn't there."
- George Shultz
"Everything reminds Milton Friedman of the money supply. Everything reminds me of sex, but I try to keep it out of my papers."
- Robert Solow
Brad DeLong writes;
“General William Westmoreland, testifying before President Nixon's Commission on an All-Volunteer [Military] Force, denounced the idea, saying that he did not want to command an army of mercenaries. Milton Friedman interrupted him: "General, would you rather command an army of slaves?" Westmoreland got angry: "I don't like to hear our patriotic draftees referred to as slaves." And Friedman got rolling: "I don't like to hear our patriotic volunteers referred to as mercenaries. If they are mercenaries, then I, sir, am a mercenary professor, and you, sir, are a mercenary general." And he did not stop: "We are served by mercenary physicians, we use a mercenary lawyer, and we get our meat from a mercenary butcher"
On responding to criticisms about giving advise to Pinochet regime (Mankiw article on Friedman);
“Friedman was--and is--unrepentant. Of course, he did not endorse the dictatorship. But, he wrote, "I do not regard it evil for an economist to render technical economic advice to the Chilean government to help end the plague of inflation, any more than I would regard it as evil for a physician to give technical medical advice to the Chilean government to end a medical plague." He also notes that years later, when he offered similar economic advice to China, there were no similar protests, even though the left-wing Chinese dictators were no less oppressive than Pinochet.”
Art Diamond recalls;
“One characteristic that came through in class, as well as in his public debates and interviews, was that he was focused on the ideas and not the personalities expressing them. I remember seeing Friedman debating some union official on television. He talked at one point about how he and the official had had to work hard in their youth. Friedman seemed to like the union official; he just disagreed with some of his ideas, and wanted the union official and everyone else, to understand why. By the end of the "debate", the union official had a warm, amused, expression on his face.I remember once Friedman saying that more of us should speak out more often on more topics; that the bad consequences to us weren't as bad as we supposed. Probably he was right; though he had a lot working in his favor---his quick-wittedness, his good will, his sense of humor, and probably his being so short in physical stature---it was probably hard for anyone to feel threatened by him, so they were more apt to let down their guard and listen to what he had to say.”
John Quiggin has similar views of Friedman;
“Friedman was effective in part because he was obviously a person of goodwill. I never had the feeling with him, as with many writers in the free-market line, that he was promoting cynical selfishness, or pushing the interests of business. He genuinely believed that economics was about making people’s lives better and that disagreements among economists were about means rather than ends and could ultimately be resolved by careful attention to the evidence.”
Thomas Sowell recalls;
“The other side of Friedman was his generosity with his time to help students, and even former students. In later years, long after I had left the University of Chicago, he helped me with his criticisms and advice on my work--only when asked. When I was offered an appointment to the Federal Trade Commission in 1976, he was asked by the White House to urge me to accept but he declined to do so. It was the best non-advice I ever got. I would have been miserable at the FTC.”
Walter Block recollects;
“Another personal recollection. Once, at a Mont Pelerin Meeting, there was a panel discussion entitled “How to win a Nobel Prize in economics. The panelists were James Buchanan, George Stigler and, of course, Milton Friedman. This was pretty fast company. I don’t remember any of the specifics but I remember coming away from that event with the thought that “Milton Friedman is an intellectual tiger,” so overwhelming was he in that discussion.”
Related;
More links at PrestoPundit, Tim Worstall, Aplia blog, Southern Appeal and still more Google Blog search.
Podcasts;
Lucas, of University of Chicago, Discusses Friedman's Economics
Friedman on Capitalism and Freedom
Miscellaneous;
How Milton Friedman Changed Economics, Policy and Markets
Milton Friedman- An enduring legacy
The Legacy of Milton and Rose Friedman’s Free to Choose-Economic Liberalism at the Turn of the 21st Century; A Conference Hosted by the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas
On Milton Friedman's Ninetieth Birthday -Remarks by Governor Ben S. Bernanke
Milton Friedman- Money and Economic Freedom
Milton Friedman interview (The Region)
Milton Friedman, a father of financial futures
The Methodology of Positive Economics
My Tribute to Milton Friedman: The Little Giant of Free Market Economics
Milton Friedman, RIP, and inflation targeting
Applying Some of Friedman's Wisdom
John Maynard Keynes By Milton Friedman
Roofs or Ceilings? The Current Housing Problem
November 17, 2006
Carnival of Podcasts
The Peasants' Revolt
But who were the rebels and how close did they really come to upending the status quo? And just how exaggerated are claims that the Peasants’ Revolt laid the foundations of the long-standing English tradition of radical egalitarianism?
A bit more of British history podcasts via Brad DeLong. See also British History blog.
Heritage
In this four-part Heritage series Malcolm Billings explores the archaeology of patriotism in the USA; Part One, Part Two.
Air Taxi!
Recently the market for air taxis has really taken off but can this expensive form of personal transport really fly?
Crusading
What exactly were Crusades and how useful are they as a metaphor in the twenty first century?
Interview with John Emsley
If you are really keen to murder a spouse, which chemical element would you choose? Arsenic is SO last year. Mercury is so - well, mercurial. Cambridge chemist John Emsley offers informed advice for anyone contemplating homicide who would like to show a little flair and impress the team from CSI.
Flat Tax Reform in Slovakia: Lessons for the United States
The Liberal Roots of the American Empire
Michael Desch, Professor and Robert M. Gates Chair in Intelligence and National Security Decision-Making, George Bush School of Government and Public Service, Texas A&M University
Talking to terrorists
A discussion about an ongoing dialogue with several groups officially deemed terroist organisations. 'We don't talk to terrorists, full stop' - that is one end of the spectrum of approaches to dialogue. The other end might be: 'We'll talk to anyone, anywhere, anytime, if we think its going to lead to a resolution'. Related - Conflicts Forum
More upheaval in the US newspaper industry
How is technology changing our world?
Today we take stock of these and other questions, have a look at what has and what hasn't changed with respected authors Joel Kotkin and Bill Eggers.
The mystery of Linear B, the script that pre-dated alphabetic writing in Greece. Listen to the podcast.
Interview with Mark Thompson
Dr. Moira Gunn speaks with career entrepreneur and author Mark Thompson, who is currently a visiting scholar at Stanford Business School. Thompson talks about some 200 people he spoke to who have either built organizations or launched crusades – personal success built for a lifetime.
S.H.A.M.
The Self Help and Actualisation Movement is worth more than $8.5 billion U.S. in America alone. From Anthony Robbins getting his clients to run over hot coals to Marianne Williamson teaching that money is energy, and energy is infinite in the universe, it's getting hard to tell the difference between spruikers and sages. But according to investigative author, Steve Salerno, the happiness industry is banking on keeping us unhappy.
The Omidyar Network
In conversation with John Battelle, legendary technologist Pierre Omidyar explains the philosophy and business plan underlying his new network for investment in for-profit ventures which foster economic, social, and political self-empowerment. Applying lessons learned from his founding of eBay, this new investment strategy is based on the belief that people are basically good, and that connecting them with the right tools can build trust and opportunity.
The Economist of the Century
“Sloppy writing reflets sloppy thinking”- Milton Friedman
Milton Friedman has died.
Condolences to his family- his son David Friedman comments about some of the less well-known contributions of the great economist.
“My first post to this blog, at:http://daviddfriedman.blogspot.com/2005/12/my-first-post.html
described the superiority of the Chicago style workshop, where the participants are expected to read the paper in advance and the presenter to talk about it for not very long, rather than presenting it, over the more conventional approach. As best I can tell the Chicago style workshop was an invention of my father's.
Long ago I happened to be doing some statistical work, and discovered that my father had a statistical test named after him, a way of doing statistics on ordinal rather than cardinal values—just what, in that project, I needed.
I gather that he was in part responsible for a much more important statistical breakthrough, the idea of using the results of the first N tests to decide whether to do test N+1, instead of selecting the number of tests in advance.”
A comment at Freakonomics blog put it nicely one of the things that I liked about him most;
“What I enjoyed most about him was his ability to frame his arguments objectively as opposed to slinging mud and attacking the character of his opponents in the name of ‘debate.’ To paraphrase Thomas Sowell, it was enough for Friedman to state that his opponents were mistaken and their policies harmful—and why.His genius was that he was capable of thinking far beyond anyone else yet he was equally capable of explaining economic concepts and ideas in a manner than most any layman could understand. “Free to Choose” lit a fire of interest in economics for me, and had I not read it I doubt I would have returned to college to pursue an econ degree.”
Related;
Obituaries; CATO, NYT, Financial Times, Chicago Tribune, WSG, More at Google News.
Across the blogs; Danish blog, Mahalanobis, Catallaxy, Businomics, The Club for Growth, Jane Galt, Instapundit, Reason blog, Economist’s View, Greg Mankiw, RGE, Robert Lawson, William Polley, Arnold Kling
Podcast- Honoring Milton Friedman
Some of our earlier posts on Friedman;
Learning Economics with Milton Friedman
The Secret of Gary Becker
An Email from the Michael Jordan of Economics
Miscellaneous;
A Charismatic Economist Who Loved to Argue
It's easy to forget how revolutionary they were
Milton Friedman: a study in failure (this person needs a little more enlightening)
When I think of Milton Friedman- Tyler Cowen
Milton Friedman: Entrepreneurial Economist
Iconoclastic economist who put freedom first
Favorite Milton Friedman Quotes
Milton Friedman: An Open Book
Friedman's "last contribution to academia."
From The Economist blog;
"MILTON FRIEDMAN has died. An economics giant, he not only revolutionised monetary theory, but singlehandedly did more than almost any economist in history to advance the cause of free markets. He was not merely an accomplished economist, but an accomplished popular writer; his Newsweek columns remain gems of clarity and brilliance decades later. We will not soon see his like again."
The unwritten rules of proxemics
A fascinating article in NYT talks about role of personal space and its implications;
“Communications scholars began studying personal space and people’s perception of it decades ago, in a field known as proxemics. But with the population in the United States climbing above 300 million, urban corridors becoming denser and people with wealth searching for new ways to separate themselves from the masses, interest in the issue of personal space — that invisible force field around your body — is intensifying….But whether people have become more protective of their personal space is difficult to say. Studies show people tend to adapt, even in cities, which are likely to grow ever more crowded based on population projections.
Yet studies involving airlines show the desire to have some space to oneself is among the top passenger requests. In a survey in April from TripAdvisor, a travel Web site, travelers said that if they had to pay for certain amenities, they would rather have larger seats and more legroom than massages and premium food. And a current advertisement for Eos Airlines, which flies between New York and London, is promoting the fact that it offers passengers “21 square feet of personal space.”
While people may crave space, they rarely realize how entrenched proxemics are. Scholars can predict which areas of an elevator are likely to fill up first and which urinal a man will choose. They know people will stare at the lighted floor numbers in elevators, not one another...
They know commuters will hold newspapers in front of them to read, yes, but also to shield themselves from strangers. And they know college students will unconsciously choose to sit in the same row, if not the same seat, each class.
“If you videotape people at a library table, it’s very clear what seat somebody will take,” Dr. Archer said, adding that one of the corner seats will go first, followed by the chair diagonally opposite because that is farthest away. “If you break those rules, it’s fascinating,” he said. “People will pile up books as if to make a wall — glare.”
Edward T. Hall, an anthropologist and the father of proxemics, even put numbers to the unspoken rules. He defined the invisible zones around us and attributed a range of distance to each one: intimate distance (6 to 18 inches); personal distance (18 inches to 4 feet); social distance (4 to 12 feet); and public distance (about 12 feet or more). …“In the U.S., it’s very closely linked to ideals of individuals,” said Kathryn Sorrells, an associate professor of communication studies at California State University, Northridge, who is writing a book, “Globalizing Intercultural Communications.” “There’s an idea that you have the right to this space,” she said, noting that it was born of a culture that prizes independence, privacy and capitalism. …
Paco Underhill, the author of “Why We Buy: The Science of Shopping” and the chief executive of Envirosell, a research and consulting company whose client list includes Bloomingdale’s, Saks Fifth Avenue, Starbucks and McDonald’s, discovered that most consumers will walk away from whatever they are looking at in a store if a customer inadvertently brushes against their backside, disturbing his or her personal space.
And so, what may seem like a minor behavioral tic can help department stores determine how far apart to place racks of clothes, bistro owners figure out how to configure the bar area and college campuses to design residence halls."
Related;
Some of researchers cited in the article; Robert Krauss, David B. Givens, Kathryn Sorrells, Nick Yee, Paco Underhill
Marketing New Zealand- From fantasy worlds to food
Swarming the shelves-
"Another recent study on the power of social influence indicates that sales could, indeed, be boosted in this way. Matthew Salganik of Columbia University in New York and his colleagues have described creating an artificial music market in which some 14,000 people downloaded previously unknown songs. The researchers found that when people could see the songs ranked by how many times they had been downloaded, they followed the crowd. When the songs were not ordered by rank, but the number of times they had been downloaded was displayed, the effect of social influence was still there but was less pronounced. People thus follow the herd when it is easy for them to do so."
Podcasts;
Trends and Products: Alternate Reality
This week a look into how and why places like You Tube and My Space could suddenly - seemingly out of the blue - be billion dollar sensations. There is a new cultural phenomenon called Alternate Reality, according to University of Sydney's Christy Dena. She explains all
The smell of architecture
Architecture has traditionally favoured sight above all over senses.
So what place is there for the sense of smell in our relationship with the built environment?
Trends and Products: the impact of pdf files
Kevin Kelly writes about the way technology is changing our lives. Today he talks to By Design about the impact of the pdf file, and the way in which information is being digitised. What effect is this having on our day-to-day lives?
Creative prison: design can change behaviour
Do you think that architecture can change behaviour and can influence character? Who knows for sure, but British architect Will Alsop believes good design can change lives for the better.
Trends and Products: ethical fashion
November 15, 2006
Madness in Bollywood Movies
Seems like an interesting study;
“OBJECTIVE: To study the portrayal of mental illness (especially psychosis) in Hindi films since 1950 and to study the influence of prevalent social, political and economic factors on each portrayal. METHOD: Using two encyclopedias and one source book, films that had mental illness affecting one of the protagonists were identified. The social, economic and political factors were identified using history texts. RESULTS: In the 1960s after India became a Republic, the political climate was one of idealism and as a result the portrayal of mental illness was gentle, more international in its outlook, and used psychoanalytic techniques. In the 1970s and 1980s, as a result of increased political and bureaucratic corruption and an unstable political climate, the portrayals became harder and psychopaths were portrayed more often. In the 1980s, the trend continued with female psychopaths, and avenging women emerged as a major force because the political and judicial systems were seen as impotent in delivering justice. In the 1990s, following economic liberalization, the women were seen and used as possessions in society and the cinema, and portrayals of stalking and morbid jealousy increased. CONCLUSION: Hindi films since the 1950s appear to have been influenced by changing cultural norms which in turn affected the way mental illness is portrayed.”
Via Mind Hacks; Lights, camera, madness - Bollywood style
Related;
A pat on the back for `Lage Raho Munnabhai'
Insanity in films
Indian author and film-maker Ruchir Joshi interview
Podcast of the Day- May the Force Be With You
“The New Rules of the Game is a three part in depth look at globalisation what it means and how it has developed. BBC diplomatic correspondent Jonathan Marcus will take us to Europe, the United States, the Balkans, and China, where he investigates globalisation as a force for both good and evil.
In program one, May the Force Be With You, Jonathan Marcus travels to China and the United States to explore the sinews that bind the new globalised world together. He examines what is meant by globalisation; where did it come from and how has it evolved? What is the relationship between technological change and globalisation? Is it really, as its advocates suggest, a force for good? We hear from one of globalisation's greatest advocates Tom Friedman and from one of its fiercest early critics Robert Kaplan.”
Listen to the podcast.
Iraq reconstruction fact of the day
“Meanwhile, multiple audits conducted by U.S. and other agencies point to waste and malfeasance involving funds slated for reconstruction. The most recent, conducted by a UN oversight agency, found that the Halliburton subsidiary KBR had charged the Iraqi government $25,000 per truck per month for 1,800 fuel trucks that, it turns out, sat largely unused (PDF) along the Iraqi border…
All told, U.S. taxpayers have spent some $38 billion to rebuild Iraq—though much of the country’s infrastructure remains at prewar levels and many Iraqis still lack adequate water, electricity, and heating oil.”
- Tracking U.S. Dollars to Iraq
Related;
SPIEGEL INTERVIEW WITH IRAQ'S HEALTH MINISTER
The Least Accountable Regime in the Middle East
Doubling Down in Iraq -Warfare isn't like business.
The Baghdad Billions (podcasts)
November 14, 2006
Podcast of the Day- Political Economy of Bad Regulation
Russ Roberts talks with Sam Peltzman at Econ Talk.
Listen to the podcast.
Also have a look at a selection of articles by Tim Harford and Jamie Whyte, a freelance writer published in The Times (London), this year’s Bastiat Prize winners and other finalists.
November 12, 2006
Podcast of the Day-The Search for Stability
Ian Macfarlane, former governor of the Reserve Bank of Australia is giving the Boyer Lectures for this year. The focus is macroeconomics titled The Search for Stability.
Listen to the first lecture- The Golden Age
The end of the second world war ushered in an era of incomparable economic growth. In the era of post-war reconstruction the world's developed countries would enjoy a 'golden age' of low inflation and full employment. Guided by the theories of John Maynard Keynes, governments became increasingly confident in how to apply macroeconomic policy. Ian Macfarlane examines why this prolonged stability led some to proclaim that business cycles and recessions were things of the past. By the early 1970s it was clear such optimism was misplaced.
Here is the transcript.
November 11, 2006
Economists and Integrity
Two economists who recently lost part of their titles;
Andrei Shleifer ’82 isn’t the only Harvard economics professor to have been stripped of his endowed title after allegedly getting his hands dirty.Martin L. Weitzman, the Harvard faculty member accused of stealing horse manure from a Rockport, Mass., farm in April 2005, has also recently lost his title as the Ernest E. Monrad Professor of Economics.
David Warsh has an interesting column on the issue. He concludes;
“There is, indeed, a common thread running through both incidents: a rather startling arrogance; in each case a Harvard professor acted as though he were entitled to take whatever he wanted, regardless of the law. Granted, there is not much moral equivalence between a $900 quarrel in a small town, on the one hand, and, on the other, an unrepentant betrayal of an adoptive country, an alma mater, hundreds of employees and a raft of friends (which also cost Harvard well over $30 million and much reputational capital). Applying the same penalty to the perpetrator of a misdemeanor as to a man who smuggled Soviet-style values into the highest levels of government and education in the United States might seem to send no more weighty a message to the Harvard faculty than, Don't get our name in the newspapers by breaking the law. But perhaps it is too early to say.Small gestures, cunningly contrived, can have big effects. The price of not doing the right thing is going up as well.”
What is Harvard teaching its students? Mankiw, please explain?
Related;
On the Subject of Hypocrisy: The Shleifer Affair
Truth and Truthfulness (podcast)
Philosophers and theologians explore ideas about truth and truthfulness.
Podcasts
“Some people will never learn anything because they understand everything too soon”
- Alexander Pope
Alexander Pope
So how did Pope manage to transform himself from a crippled outsider into a major cultural and moral authority? How did he shape our ideas about what a “modern author” is? Does his work still have resonances today or is it too firmly embedded in the politics, cultural life and rivalries of the period?
The Baghdad Billions- Part 1 (The first year of reconstruction) and Part 2 (Failure of the US aid programme)
Gun control - a new study has found the 1996 gun buy-back had no effect on firearm deaths.
The Science Show versus God
This week Richard Dawkins' remarkable book The God Delusion is released in Australia. Dawkins, Professor of the Public Understanding of Science at Oxford says he hopes that reading his book will make believers doubt their faith. He explains why he is so convinced, through the weight of scientific evidence, that atheism is the more valid viewpoint. Two winners of the Templeton Prize, given for building bridges between spiritual values and science, Professors John Barrow from Cambridge and Paul Davies now in Arizona give alternative views
Stem Cell Research
The history of the science of stem cell research - what are stem cells and when and how were they discovered.
The curse of the Western world: a history of obesity
North Korea
On Rear Vision this week a look at the history of North Korea and in particular the history of the relationship between North Korea and the United States of America
Harry Messel
One of Australia's most famous physicists tells of a childhood in Canada where he excelled at school, did two degrees simultaneously at university, and came to live in Australia. His pioneering work here has to be heard to be believed.
High blood pressure medication
A recent Australian study looked at medication for high blood pressure and the implications of patients' adherence or non-adherence to their doctor's prescription of these types of drugs
Jane Goodall
Jane Goodall talks about her 40 years of work with chimpanzees in Tanzania, and the relationship between chimpanzee behaviour and human behaviour.
Home Fronts: Indonesia
Terry Lane examines the political influence of Islamist values, the impact of radical organisations on Indonesian society and the democratisation of Indonesian institutions, in the fifth program of this six part series
Tobacco and Culture: First Nation Peoples face the Challenge
Sucking on cigarettes. It's a public health nightmare for the world's indigenous peoples. Maori women have the word's highest rates of lung cancer. Smoking rates haven't dropped in 15 years amongst Aboriginal Australians. But, for Native Americans native tobacco still has sacred, ceremonial value.
Paracelsus
He became known as the Luther of Medicine for his reformist medical practices, but Paracelsus, who was born in Switzerland in 1493, was also a religious man. His belief that the body was actually empowered by God had implications for his theories of healing.
November 10, 2006
Politicians do what they do to stay in office
Lessons from the recent elections in the US;
“About $2.6 billion was spent on the 468 House and Senate race