European History Interactive Map

The web is amazing. It is the largest smorgasbord of stuff for the brain ever imaginable. I have to admit that I spend inordinate amounts of time just learning stuff from surfing the web. It is worth reminding ourselves that the world has changed qualitatively. Used to be that information was a scarce resource. That was then. This is now. Now you have a virtually limitless supply of great information. Now the truly scarce resource is time. Anyway, go take a look at . . .
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What Holds India Back

In August in a post, Is the Indian Government the Greatest Enemy of India’s Prosperity?, I had quoted a WSJ piece which read in part, “Because India’s entrepreneurs have succeeded amid dysfunctional government and financial institutions by developing a kind of independent and experimental ingenuity, it stands to reason that the enterprising class would prosper even more were India to reduce barriers to business and clean up corruption.” I commented on that and wrote: Continue reading “What Holds India Back”

Happy Ganesh Chaturthi

It’s that time of the year again when he with the curved elephant’s trunk, of enormous body, with the brilliance of a ten million suns, the remover of obstacles, etc., visits our homes. Here are a couple of songs to welcome him.
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Must Watch Video of Daniel Everette’s Deconversion

I had read the story of Daniel Everette’s experience among the Piraha tribe years ago in an article by him. This morning, Hemley Gonzalez‘s tweet about Everette, brought that back to mind. I watched the short BBC 4 video that Hemley linked to (embedded below.) I urge you to take the 10 minutes to watch it. It is deeply moving. (On a personal note, I am off to Washington DC for a few days. Be well, do good work, and keep in touch.)
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The Pope’s Minions are Furiously Evangelising India

Catholics consider the pope to be their god’s representative on earth. In other words, anyone who declares himself or herself to be a Catholic necessarily believes that what the pope says about the nature of the universe is absolutely correct. So now consider a few of the current pope’s pronouncements.
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Of Cars and Roads

The editor in chief of India Today, Mr Aroon Purie, provides us with an excellent example of illogic that would delight anyone with a keen sense of the absurd. Here’s what he writes at the start of his editorial of Aug 27th: Continue reading “Of Cars and Roads”

Guest Post on Maoist Violence in India

Guest posts are not common on my blog but once in a long while I agree to post one. (There’s one more in the pipeline.) This one comes with the caveat that I don’t understand what’s happening in the Maoist infected areas and why; therefore don’t have any basis for endorsing the post. It’s your call.
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