The Nobel Prize for Tom Schelling (which is enormously exciting for everyone in Maryland’s School of Public Policy), makes me think of a few points about game theory: 1. It’s a form of political theory that harkens back to classical authors from Hobbes to Rousseau (with echoes of Plato’s Crito and other ancient works). That […]
My book entitled What Should We Do? A Theory of Civic Life will be released in April 2022. It summarizes the concepts and ideas that I believe are most useful for people who want to improve their communities and the world. It is based on many years of teaching undergraduates and advanced graduate students and […]
An election is partly a public good, in the precise economist’s sense. If representatives are selected peacefully and officials are made accountable to the majority, that is a good thing for most people. This good is indivisible. I cannot decide to forgo the benefits to me personally of democratic elections, nor sell my stake to […]
During WWII entities that seemed analogous to human brains were invented: the first computers, radar, etc. Related new ideas included artificial neurons (1943), feedback (1943), game theory (1944), stored-program computers (1946), information theory (1948), systems engineering (1940s), etc. In the 1940s, cybernetics emerged as the study of how any person, other animals, a machine, or a society attempts to direct itself while receiving feedback. This post is about the rise, decline, and renewal of cybernetics.
(Palo Alto) I recommend Healey’s 2023 history of 17th-century England as an important and enjoyable work. I grew up thinking about this topic, since my Dad was a scholar of English intellectual life in the 1600s and he regularly taught British political history. In that century, England was on a path toward global power and […]