A good paragraph from Niall Ferguson’s 2008. The Ascent of Money: A Financial History of the World (Penguin Press): “Despite our deeply rooted prejudices against ‘filthy lucre’, however, money is the root of https://www.stephenhicks.org/most progress. To adapt a phrase from Jacob Bronowski (whose marvelous television history of scientific progress I watched avidly as a schoolboy), […]
Niall Ferguson’s *The Ascent of Money* Read More »
Theist vs. Atheist — What Should You Believe? John C. Wright and I have completed our series of articles debating key issues in religion. The full seven-round series is available at EveryJoe.com’s dedicated page and here at my Theist vs. Atheist page. Translations into Portuguese are forthcoming. Here is the Table of Contents with links
The full Theist vs. Atheist debate series Read More »
In June I participated in a discussion on the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation’s “The Current” radio program, which according to its website is “Canada’s Most Listened-to Radio Program.” The topic was whether power corrupts. The journalistic context included the recent FIFA scandal, scandals in the Canadian Senate, and the ongoing scandals in politics, business, and so on around the world.
CBC discussion of corruption and power — audio Read More »
[In July 2015 I gave a talk at the Hong Kong Polytechnic University on “The Next Revolution in Art.” The text of my talk follows.] Why art matters to us Art is a perennial human desire. We need and hunger for stories, images, and sounds that are unique, beautiful, self-affirming, and/or profound. We love to
The Next Revolution in Art — my lecture in Hong Kong Read More »
In my Introduction to Philosophy course this week we are reading and discussing The Fountainhead, a great novel on the themes of independence and integrity. In Part One, Rand’s primary purpose is to contrast the characters Howard Roark and Peter Keating. Here is a table (click to enlarge) summarizing the main events in each young
The Fountainhead (Introduction to Philosophy this week) Read More »
The opening of my latest column at EveryJoe: “Many people complain about how education has become so expensive. Mostly, they are wrong. “Schooling has become more expensive, but consider the cost of the following awesome education resources: Khan Academy for learning math: Free. Louvre Online for experiencing and studying art history: Free. Google Translate for
Is Education Really Too Expensive? [new The Good Life column] Read More »
Last week I gave a talk at Fundación para la Responsabilidad Intelectual’s first North American event in Miami. FRI posted some nice photos from the conference at their Facebook page here.
Photos from talk in Miami Read More »
I gave a talk in June at a conference sponsored by Fundación para la Responsabilidad Intelectual (FRI), Junior Achievement Argentina, and the John Templeton Foundation. When I was in Buenos Aires, FRI also did three short videos of me addressing questions. Here is a 12-minute video of my response to “How Do You Explain the Great Enrichment of