There is a comfortable assumption floating around modern culture that bad art is harmless. A terrible painting hangs on a wall and does nothing. A poorly written novel sits on a shelf and gathers dust. A sentimental film plays to an indifferent audience and vanishes from memory. No damage done. Everyone moves on. Bertrand Russell […]
Why Bad Art Is Dangerous: Russell on Taste and Reason Read More »
Here is something that should bother you more than it does. Your company probably hired smart people. It might have even fought to recruit them, offered competitive salaries, and bragged about its talent pipeline. Then it placed those smart people inside a system that makes it nearly impossible for them to act smartly. This is
Smart People, Dumb Systems: Why Your Organization is Designed to Fail Read More »
There is a particular kind of confidence that emerges when a crowd believes it has located the moral truth. Not a truth. The truth. The one that settles all debate, justifies all punishment, and requires no further discussion. If you have spent any time online in the last decade, you have watched this confidence in
Why “Cancel Culture” Is a Failed Attempt at Centralized Morality Read More »
Once, Gary Becker was running late to a student’s oral exam. He needed to park. The legal lot was far away. The illegal spot was right there. So he did what any rational person might do. He weighed the fine, the probability of getting caught, and the time he would save. Then he parked illegally.
In 1977, Richard Nelson asked a question so simple it was almost embarrassing. If we can put a man on the moon, why can we not fix the ghetto? The question was not rhetorical. Nelson, an economist at Columbia, genuinely wanted to understand why a society capable of extraordinary technical feats seemed incapable of solving
The Moon and the Ghetto Paradox: Why Tech Advances While Society Stagnates Read More »
Somewhere right now, in a conference room with bad lighting and worse coffee, someone is saying the phrase “let us leverage our synergies to move the needle on our core competencies.” And somewhere in that same room, someone else is nodding along while having absolutely no idea what was just said. This is not a
Beyond the Buzzwords: How Wittgenstein Can Save Your Office from “Meaningless” Jargon Read More »
There is a strange moment in every finance textbook where the author quietly asks you to believe in something you cannot see, touch, or verify. It usually arrives around chapter three. You are told that markets are efficient, that prices reflect all available information, and that rational agents make optimal decisions under uncertainty. No evidence
Is Modern Finance a Branch of Metaphysics? Alfred North Whitehead Makes the Case Read More »
There is a phrase so deeply embedded in political language that most people never stop to examine it. “Public servant.” Say it slowly. Let it sit. Now ask yourself a simple question: when was the last time you felt served by the Department of Motor Vehicles? Murray Rothbard, the American economist and libertarian thinker who
The Myth of the “Public Servant”: Why Bureaucrats Only Serve Their Own Expansion Read More »
There is a peculiar trick that language plays on us. Add an adjective to a noun and you can destroy the noun entirely. “Social justice” does to justice what “people’s republic” does to republic. It negates it while wearing its clothes. Ayn Rand understood this better than most. She called the concept of social justice
Why “Social Justice” Is the Enemy of Actual Justice Read More »
You have never held an opinion in your hand. You have never locked one in a safe, insured it against theft, or watched it appreciate in value on a shelf. And yet, if someone tries to take one from you, something inside your chest tightens in exactly the same way it would if they reached