The Social AtomPeople are atoms and life is physicsMixed metaphors and messages...- September 8, 2007 An article in the NYT describes the growing concern over economic conditions, and all of the candidates' immediate desire to assign blame on you-know-who and to proclaim how they'd do better. It's obviously an irresistible way, I suppose, to score points. Much as I think the Bush administration has acted childishly and incompetently in almost every area, however, I find it awfully hard to give them any responsibility for the property market, or the irresponsible lending practices that pumped...http://thesocialatom.blogspot.com/2007/09/mixed-metaphors-and-messages.html Conservative greed, liberal...- September 6, 2007 It's pretty clear that convinced belief in the self-serving and greedy nature of humanity can induce that very behavior, not only in those who believe it, but in others as well. I've written before about the rather alarming study that looked at how graduate students in various disciplines play cooperative games, such as the Ultimatum game, in which participants do better in so far as they manage to temper narrow self-interest and cooperate. Except for graduate students in economics, students in.http://thesocialatom.blogspot.com/2007/09/conservative-greed-liberal.html Liberalism and its enemies...- September 3, 2007 Stanley Fish has written an interesting essay in today's New York Times. As he points out, alongside a spate of recent books attacking religion and its growing influence, publishing houses seem to be issuing defenses of liberal political organization, such as Paul Starr's Freedom's Power: The True Force of Liberalism. I think I could count my Social Atom as taking a similar position, arguing for government based on the maximum use of science, knowledge and open discussion based on real...http://thesocialatom.blogspot.com/2007/09/liberalism-and-its-enemies.html |