outlookandinsight

You may have noticed that having a blog on the internet makes one an instant expert on everything. Today I have become an expert on outer space and share my expert predictions based on having read several articles on internet blogs written by people who know little more about the subject than I do. The […]

Current U.S. law makes foreign children born in the United States citizens at birth. Most of these children are also citizens of their parents’ home countries, so these children typically hold two or three citizenships. It is interesting to consider how this type of situation was handled in the past. The following excerpt is from

I’ve been reading a bit about Critical Theory to try to better understand the implications of its recent rise in prominence in both education and the news. (Not enough to make me any kind of expert.) The application of Critical Theory we hear about most is called Critical Race Theory, but Critical Theory can be

A multi-billionaire known for stirring up controversy (not that one—the other one) recently asserted we could reduce fentanyl deaths by simply legalizing the stuff. Apologists for the Big Drug Enforcement industry immediately responded with attempts to disprove the assertion. One of those attempts cited the experience of San Francisco “decriminalizing” some mood altering drugs and

What is value? It is whatever a particular individual decides it to be at a particular instant. Science cannot measure value. Nor can society, economics, finance, politics, technology, artificial intelligence, organizations, governments, corporations or any other collective, business, or academic pursuit determine the value of anything. Today I may value peace and quiet; tomorrow I

I first noticed something wrong a day or two after the attack on the consulate in Benghazi. Reports from reliable sources with first or second-hand knowledge of the events completely contradicted the official report from the State Department, yet most the major news organizations continued to only report the official story while ignoring information from

Humans are not the only cooperative animal. Herd animals bunch together for protection. A pack of wolves cooperates as a team to isolate and kill a herd animal. But within a pack or herd the individuals do not specialize to any significant extent. There may be “leaders” or a “pecking order, but otherwise all the

Our American racial and ethnic categories are absurd. Anyone with eyes can see that “White” people aren’t really white and “Black” people aren’t really black. An individual of Inca heritage from Peru is called “Hispanic” as is an individual from Spain. A person from Brazil is also called “Hispanic” though Brazilians generally speak Portuguese,not Spanish.

Yesterday I listened to an interview with Jerome Powell, the Chairman of the Federal Reserve Board of Governors in which he asserted that since the 2008 financial crisis the rate of inflation is no longer linked to the money supply. Mr. Powell is very smart, and knows a lot more about monetary policy than I