Conscription and the media narrative on refugees
The world is watching the denouement in Aleppo, with stories emerging of massacres, particularly of young men (and probably by young men). A [story I read from Patrick Cockburn in the...
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Mama In Her Kerchief and I In My Madness: A Visitation of Sog-Nug-Hotep
“Holding with Haeckel that all life is a chemical and physical process, and that the so-called “soul” is a myth …” – H.P. Lovecraft, “Herbert West – Reanimator” Years ago I made a parody Christmas book...
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New-ish Crime Writers — the East Coast
Well, the big news is that the new Tana French (The Trespasser) and the new Peter Robinson (When the Music’s Over) are both out and both brilliant. Now to the East Coast; a study in contrasts. First we...
View ArticleMonopoly and Regulation: Excerpt from Two Lessons book
Here’s another excerpt from my book-in-progress, Economics in Two Lessons. Rather than work sequentially, I’m jumping between: Lesson 1: Market prices reflect and determine opportunity costs faced by...
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Open thread: best books of 2016
An open thread for commenters to recommend their favourite books of 2016. I’ll start with Lynsey Hanley’s *Respectable* (Allen Lane). Trying to understand my country in the light of the EU referendum...
View ArticleRacist incidents on campus
My campus — like, no doubt, a good number of others — has been afflicted over the past 18 months or so by what seems like a rise in the number of racist incidents. We made the headlines recently, when...
View ArticleThe economics of open borders
A colleague recently sent me a paper on the economics of open borders, by John Kennan, which I hadn’t known of before, though it came out in 2013. Kennan’s conclusion is striking Liberal immigration...
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Welcoming the new boy at school
When I was 13 a new boy called Matthew Arnold arrived at my secondary school. It wasn’t the beginning of the year, just some random autumn day — not even a Monday. 15 minutes before the bell went for...
View ArticlePublic Ownership: Excerpt from Two Lessons book
Here’s another excerpt from my book-in-progress, Economics in Two Lessons. As usual, praise is welcome, useful criticism even more so. You can find a draft of the opening sections here. In the section...
View ArticleAll Around My Hat
Weird memory. 1985, in some sort of lecture room in Kings College overlooking the Strand. A song starts to fade in, seeming to come from the road below. “Whatever You Want, Whatever You Need….etc”. It...
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Happy Christmas, Timberteers
Milo sends best wishes from London to all the CT gang. OK, whatever, he’s a dog. He’s only eaten three or four baubles and so far today is more or less continent. Wishing everyone who’s part of CT a...
View ArticlePublic Services: Excerpt from Economics in Two Lessons
Here’s another excerpt from my book-in-progress, Economics in Two Lessons. As usual, praise is welcome, useful criticism even more so. You can find a draft of the opening sections here. In the section...
View ArticleEducation: Excerpt from Economics in Two Lessons
Here’s another excerpt from my book-in-progress, Economics in Two Lessons. As usual, praise is welcome, useful criticism even more so. You can find a draft of the opening sections here. In the section...
View ArticleFrankenstein’s Children
This talk by Maciej Ceglowski (who y’all should be reading if you aren’t already) is really good on silly claims by philosophers about AI, and how they feed into Silicon Valley mythology. But there’s...
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