Categories: "Culture"
new weight loss scheme
June 14th, 2012It might have been at work where I first saw mention of this story in Gizmag, describing how Evgeny Katz and fellow researchers at Clarkson University have implanted a snail with an enzyme-based biofuel reactor, allowing said snail to generate electrica… more »
ra ra ra
June 11th, 2012Fascinating to see the 2012 venus transit in the different wavelengths (The sound track is a bit overdone). Local conditions in Seattle were not ideal for a direct experience. This reminds me of a few science fiction stories about engineering around… more »
optimism on econtalk
June 5th, 2012Current events have me prone to pessimism, but this podcast encourages a longer view that observes large improvement in the human condition, with dramatic gains in worldwide standard of living, lifespan, infant mortality, and other measures, tracking co… more »
regulation on econtalk
May 30th, 2012This discussion of regulation made a point I did not previously appreciate, in the context of the Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX) regulations that were enacted a few years ago in response to some blatant cases of fraud on the part of some corporate executives. … more »
knowledge and power on econtalk
May 29th, 2012This episode wraps around the context of our modern economy, focusing on features of increased specialization and dispersion of knowledge, and what checks are there to institutional size and scope. Addresses whether we must have concentration o… more »
socialist killers on econtalk
May 28th, 2012These two fascinating pieces surround people who were in the center of the Bolshevik revolution in Russia; the guests each authored biographies. The one about Trotsky has a chilling conclusion from Robert Service: "This is one of the terrifying things… more »
intellectual property on econtalk
May 24th, 2012The discussion from the first of these is from a very different business perspective; I had previously seen Johanna Blakeley give a TED talk. See also my fb posts from 4/18/2010 at 9:03 am for more on this.
Fashion and Intellectual Property (6/14/20… more »
scarcity and markets in lungs and livers
May 24th, 2012Not every scarce thing is valuable to lots of people, or even to a few people. Setting aside lifeboat situations and the like, our individual time in this life is unique in being both extremely scarce and generally non-transferable. This note aims to r… more »
more on institutional corruption
May 15th, 2012I had written here on the topic of how social justice is not served by institutional corruption. more »
Justice on econtalk
May 13th, 2012One of the things I appreciated about this episode was the explicit accounting of three perspectives with respect to social justice: that from the standpoint of natural rights, the question of effectiveness towards ends, and that of how the institution… more »
