4/28 John Stossel proposes: How About Economic Progress Day? (Thanks to Eric for the link.) John Tamny wonders why, despite the clear data, some academics consistently undersell capitalism. And marketing professor Jerry Kirkpatrick, author of In Defense of Advertising, nicely debunks subliminal advertising.
4/27 Beautiful photographs of bridges around the world.
4/26 Cultural and religious control-freaks and more cultural and religious control-freaks. Closer to home: controlling yet more “inappropriate” sexual expression. And of course this is just plain control-freaky.
4/25 The entrepreneurial transformation of American business. Key quotation: “since 1980, more than 5 million jobs have disappeared from Fortune 500 companies, while 34 million new jobs were created at small businesses.” In Slate, new data on men’s and women’s work loads. And Warren Farrell has good advice to women on how to increase your income.
4/24 Cultural trends: What do people actually use the Internet for? And the always-worth-reading Grant McCracken on the decline of accidental social networks.
4/23 Fascinated by China: In Far Eastern Economic Review, Carlson Holz worries about the pressures on Western intellectuals’ integrity. Depressingly, R. J. Rummel has revised his Chinese democide numbers upwards: 73,000,000 deaths. Rich Karlgaard wonders whether Shanghai or Beijing is the future of China. And Mark Vallen comments on an exhibition of American art in China and quotes this amusing line from Colin Powell: “If you give 1.3 billion Chinamen access to home shopping on television, (communism) is over, because there is no way communism can compete with a salad shooter for $9.95.”
4/18 Philosopher Tibor Machan challenges a false alternative: Are humans by nature good or evil? Ph.D. candidate Joe Duarte reflects on life choices that make a profound difference. And here is an interesting development in artificial brain repair.
4/17 Law professor Larry Ribstein wonders if Hollywood is warming up to business. Key quotation: “rich capitalists have funded films like ‘An Inconvenient Truth.’ Why not pro-capitalist films?” (Thanks to Roger for the link.) And over at Uncle Eddie’s Theory Corner, discussion of philosophical themes in two films The Devil Wears Prada and The Pursuit of Happyness.
4/16 Excellent data, dynamic graphics, and passionate presentation: a talk by Hans Rosling on world development. (Thanks to Anja for the link.) Here is Rosling’s web log.
And Don Boudreaux has anecdotes and data pointing to the conclusion that cancer is not the killer it once was.
4/15 Business Week’s most livable cities in the world.
4/13 Today is Thomas Jefferson’s birthday. Historian David Mayer remembers Thomas Jefferson. Here are the official White House biography, the website for Jefferson’s home at Monticello, and Genevieve LaGreca’s toast to Jefferson’s achievements.
4/12 An interesting technical and business challenge: the $100 laptop and the rural poor. As my friend Eric Adkins puts it, “Some kid with a $100 laptop and loads of free time is going to invent something brilliant.”
4/11 Is Europe’s economy suffering from Eurosclerosis? Also check out Olaf Gersemann’s Cowboy Capitalism. (Thanks to Anja for the links.) And: socialism or individualism? Craig Depken quotes wise words spoken in 1907 by Nicholas Murray Butler, then president of Columbia University.
4/10 Gramscian warfare: Lazarus Long explains what Americans need to learn about ideological warfare. And Sascha Volokh has some charming word play while exploring postmodernism’s unintended consequences.
4/9 In Topoi, philosophers Kevin Mulligan, Peter Simons and Barry Smith ask: What’s Wrong With Contemporary Philosophy. Answer: Lots.
4/7 The creation of Zarathustra—the powerful and passionate sculpture by Peter Schipperheyn. (Thanks to Michael for the tip.)
4/6 An embarrassment to higher education: Florida Gulf Coast University’s speech code. And advice for graduating students: Avoid the seven deadly sins of resumé design.
4/4 Like Che and Mao: another murderous thug not to idealize: Leon Trotsky. (Thanks again to Bob H. for the link.)
4/4 He probably won’t get tenure: teaching evaluations for Professor Socrates. (Thanks to Bob H. for the link.)
4/3 Good news from the historian’s across-centuries perspective: Steven Pinker on declining rates of violence. (Thanks to Anja for the link.) And uncertain news from Caitlin Flanagan on college women’s sexual judgment and practice across the decades.
4/2 Australia round-up: A review of Donald Horne’s The Lucky Country by Keith Windschuttle. A key quotation: “second-rate has always been the wrong adjective for Australia. It tells more about the insecurities of those who use the label than anything else. It is especially untrue today when to be an Australian is to be a citizen of the world, and yet still live in the best country on Earth.” In Spiked, Guy Roth has some choice words for fashionably snobbish pooh-poohing of Australian culture. And that’s not even to mention that one of my son’s favorite television shows, The Upside Down Show, originates in Australia.
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3/31 Being a Brief Guide to Religious Denominations in America:
A Baptist is a man who got saved.
A Methodist is a Baptist who got shoes.
A Congregationalist is a Methodist who moved to town.
A Presbyterian is a Congregationalist who got rich.
An Episcopalian is a Presbyterian who ran for public office.
(Author unknown.)
3/30 In the Chronicle, Diane Ravitch has a short history of the College Boards and SAT—and a suggestion that we revive the College Boards.
3/29 An extended interview with Chinese democracy activist Wei Jingsheng, who was imprisoned by the communist Chinese for twenty years. And here’s an interesting, briefer interview with Shelby Steele, author of the new classic The Content of Our Character.
3/28 Professor David Mayer argues that political “progressives” are anything but that.
3/27 Do you recall the (now-debunked) claim that 500 scientists had signed a letter opposing evolution and supporting “Intelligent Design”? Here’s a snappy comeback: the Alliance for Science has published a letter with the signatures of 10,000 members of the clergy who support evolution. And here is a troubling item: some public school districts in Arkansas prohibit teachers from mentioning evolution.
3/25 Collectivism and human rights: Disabled newborns are killed in North Korea, says a defector. Here is a musical based on an unlikely theme: North Korean concentration camps. (Thanks to Karen for the link.) A picture that is worth one-hundred-thousand words: North Korea is dark. And R. J. Rummel has this summary overview of the horror that is living in North Korea.
3/24 In Wired, Will Wright, creator of The Sims, argues that video games build “creativity, community, self-esteem, problem-solving” skills. Not to mention that growing up on video games means you can kick tail on the real battlefield.
3/23 Political philosopher Tibor Machan takes the editors of a recent book on business ethics to task for a package-deal besmirching of libertarianism. And economist George Reisman places the blame for higher oil prices on those who help prop up the Middle Eastern cartel—including the U.S. Senate.
3/22 Is it teaching-versus-research in higher education? Professor Jonathan Zimmerman argues that it is time to give teaching more weight. Or is it athletics-versus-education at some state universities? Nobel Prize-winning physicist Carl Wieman is fed up with the University of Colorado. And here is an example of the education bureaucrat mindset in action. (Via John Enright.)
3/21 Fascinating: a study released in 2005 by Shanghai Jiao Tong University: The Top 100 Universities in the World. The global-distribution patterns are striking: Of the top 10 in the world—8 are in North America, and 2 are in Europe. Of the top 30 universities—23 are in North America, 5 are in Europe, and 2 are in Asia. Of the top 50 universities—39 are in North America, 9 are in Europe, and 2 are in Asia.
3/20 Fortune magazine has a list of 10 cool colleges for entrepreneurs. I especially like the University of Rochester’s idea of integrating entrepreneurship across the curriculum rather than having it located only in the business department. And Forbes has a great list: The Twenty Most Important Tools Ever. (Thanks to Roger for the link.)
3/19 Art insight: painter Michael Newberry explains and illustrates triangulation of light and color.
3/18 Aesthetics—from beauty to edginess: Donald Pittenger begins a chronicle on the decline and fall of the classical face.
3/17 Professor Margaret Soltan suggests that the professor-as-intellectual is obsolete and asks a dangerous question: Do sabbaticals create more value than they cost?
3/16 Fruits of the Enlightenment: Researchers have restored the vision of mice blinded by brain damage. And scientists have harvested stem cells from menstrual blood.
3/15 Bjørn Stærk requests that we translate Shakespeare into English.
3/14 With March Madness upon us, Neal McCluskey takes on the morality of taxpayer money and public university sports programs. (Via University Diaries.)
3/13 Why are there so many unhappy endings in great literature? And how can we change that? Ben Macintyre shows us how To Cuddle a Mockingbird.
3/11 Has another Michelangelo fresco been authenticated? And here is a site with some good quality images of Leonardo da Vinci sketches.
3/10 FIRE has announced its college speech code of the month.
3/9 When government schools fail, some of them turn to the private sector for help. On the other hand, as Mark Lerner reports, some failing government schools turn to yet more centralized, top-down control.
3/8 Simply excellent: Dr. Wafa Sultan on Al Jazeera television. Joshua Zader also has the link and some key quotations from the talk. And R. J. Rummel has the text of a widely-distributed letter written by Major General Vernon Chong, Command Surgeon, Headquarters U.S. European Command, Stuttgart, Germany. Update: Here is a follow-up article on Waha Sultan and her outstanding interview. (Thanks to Karen for the Sultan links.)
3/7 In the new Cato Unbound, philosopher David Schmidtz asks: When does inequality actually make a difference?
3/6 Breath-taking photographs of aurora phenomena. And is Jupiter developing a new red spot?
3/4 In the Literary Encyclopedia, Ashland University’s John Lewis states that “Ayn Rand wrote the most intellectually challenging fiction of her generation” and provides an introduction to the themes of Rand’s novels. Grant Schulyer opines about the state of the debate about Ayn Rand’s literary and philosophical significance. In a talk to SLIS, doctoral student Robert White gives an overview of Ayn Rand’s thought and significance. And if your German is up to it, check out Kapitalismus-Magazin, Freie Radikale—Das Blog der deutsch- sprachigen Objektivisten, and Objektivismus. Update: George Reisman takes Robert Mayhew to task for altering Ayn Rand’s wording in a newly-published volume of her Q & A.
3/3 For researchers and admirers of the Enlightenment: Electronic Enlightenment, a developing site with texts and correspondence of over 3,800 eighteenth-century figures. Check out also the Voltaire Foundation, the force behind Electronic Enlightenment.
3/2 In The New York Times, Dr. Brian Day on Canada’s socialized medical system: “This is a country in which dogs can get a hip replacement in under a week and in which humans can wait two to three years.” Worth reading again is Mark Steyn’s review of a Canadian film, The Barbarian Invasions. And at Division of Labour, Frank Stephenson follows up on the issue of how much high medical bills contribute to personal bankruptcies in the USA.
3/1 At San Francisco’s Exploratorium, a set of science experiments anyone can do. And Australian scientists have grown a prostate gland from stem cells.
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