Day: May 8, 2007

Hitchens, the American

So what do you know — Christopher Hitchens has become a naturalized American citizen. That’s simply great. I can prove syllogistically that Hitchens doesn’t think he is god. Here’s how:

1. Hitchens thinks he is great. (I agree.)
2. God is not great. (According to Hitchens as the title of his latest book is God is not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything.”)
3. Therefore, Hitchens doesn’t think he is god. Q.E.D.

(Proving Hitchens is allah is left as an exercise for the interested reader. )

Here’s Hitchens speaking with Lou Dobbs on CNN.

The Indian Education System — Part 7

Markets Work

Imagine for a bit what it would be like if education were provided by private sector firms. Can it be done? Would a socially optimal amount, variety, and quality of education be provided? Would there be market failures? If so, how can those market failures be corrected? Can one devise mechanisms to correct those failures?

The answer to whether the private sector can provide education is clearly ‘yes’ because around the world for a very long time private firms have provided education very successfully. Both private sector for-profit and not-for-profit business models exist. Education, at some level of description, is a service like any of a very large variety of goods and services provided very efficiently by the market. The generalization that markets work holds quite meaningfully in the specific case of education broadly.
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Stupidity Revisited

It’s been a while since this blog has visited Bush, the POTUS. Here’s Bill Maher psychologically analysing Bush at Crooksandliers.com. It is hard to comprehend the mentality of a population which voted for a stupid person like Bush not once but twice. Words defy me. Oh that reminds me, here’s a google video titled Words Defy Me by the incomparable Jon Stewart.

And talking of stupid people and their stupidity, read the Story of Stupidity at whereelse but stupidity.com. To get a quick feel for the book, I would recommend you read the last chapter, the Age of Arrogance. For the record, I quote the epilogue of the book here.
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