Sign in Subscribe

Art Carden

Blessed Assurance: LEGO and Its Imitators Don't Make "The Same Thing"

The holidays are behind us, and no doubt many parents uttered many curses after stepping on many LEGO bricks over the last few weeks. Compared to their competitors and imitators, LEGO bricks command a handsome premium. Why? Is it because people are easily manipulated by slick advertising and legacy brand

Quote of the Day: Helmut Schoeck, "Envy"

The envious man thinks that if his neighbour breaks a leg, he will be able to walk better himself.

Applied Mere Economics: More Time With Your Kids Costs Less Than You Think

Here's a harsh reality: your marginal project- the "last in, first out" project on your to-do list or CV- probably isn't very good. I look back at my CV and see some papers the world wouldn't notice if they disappeared. Bad papers

I Read Things: Thomas Sowell's "Knowledge and Decisions"

I've been thinking about asking my social media network to recommend a single book, article, poem, or story that they didn't write that will help me understand them better. I'm a total Thomas Sowell fanboy, so if I had to pick a single book,

New Year's Day Reading Suggestion: Michael Novak's City on a Hill

Here's Michael Novak's 2014 essay Caritapolis: A New Global Vision for Christian Social Thought. Novak explains that it would be a shame for people to progress in economic and political liberty but use that liberty to "live like pigs, enslaved to our desires, without reflection

Politics is the Mind-Killer: Beware of Simple Stories Backed By Graphs

About eighteen years ago, Eliezer Yudkowsky explained how "Politics is the Mind-Killer." This was before social media really took off. Since he first wrote, social media sites have been firehose of evidence supporting Yudkowsky's claim. One of my favorite recurring themes on X (formerly Twitter) are

Make More. Take Less.

That's my simple, four-word message to anyone who wants to improve the world. Overwhelmed by an endless list of problems and feeling powerless to do anything about them? What can you possibly do about it all? How do you walk by faith and not by sight? As it