Davos Newbies

Dan Gillmor on the baffling silence of US corporate executives in the battle against so-called intelligent design:

I asked Benhamou whether it was the duty of executives to speak out when the president of the US suggests that science classes be required to teach “intelligent design” as an alternative to evolution.

They absolutely should speak out, he said. It’s a fact, he observed, that today’s knowledge-based companies need people “whose minds are trained on knowledge and scientific fact, and not mixed up with this creationism bullshit.”

I then asked if he could name anyone in a prominent corporate position who’d actually spoken out in this way. He could not, he said with what sounded like regret: “It’s hard to be caught on TV saying these things, but it’s particularly important now. I feel quite worried that we’re passive about it.”

I’m particularly glad that Dan has picked up the outrageous anomaly of the Gates Foundation providing funding to the Discovery Institute. I couldn’t believe it when I read it in The New York Times but I was beginning to think no one else found that astonishing.

Some blogs by well-known academics work well (notably the Becker-Posner blog), but others are disappointments.

For me, the Freakonomics blog is decidedly in the latter category. I was lukewarm about the book, but I enjoy reading the economic investigations of Steven Levitt. Sadly, the blog is more a relentless promotional tool for the book and, now, the occasional New York Times column.

Fortunately, the pattern is broken today with Levitt’s recollections of his class with Nobel prizewinner Thomas Schelling. A charming, must-read both on Schelling and on Levitt’s views on the utility – or otherwise – of game theory.

To my mind, Schelling represents the very best of game theory. He was a pioneer in the field, a man of ideas. Unfortunately for game theory, the simple ideas that are so alluring were quickly mined. What followed was less interesting. Modern game theory has become extremely mathematical, notation heavy, and removed from everyday life. Many of my colleagues would not agree with me, but I think game theory has failed to deliver on its enormous initial promise. I’m not the only one who feels this way. I was recently speaking with a prominent game theorist. He told me that if he knew what he knew and he were just getting started in the profession today, no way would he be a game theorist.

Tom Peters: “My colleague and pal, Harry Rhoads, co-founder of the Washington Speakers Bureau, was over here for Mrs Thatcher’s 80th birthday party last week. The Queen attended, and apparently as the peons were being briefed on etiquette, they were informed that if they stuck their hand out for a (harmless) shake of the Royal Hand, it would be slapped away by a hovering attendant. After Harry’s report on this in an email, I replied in a one-line email, ‘That’s why we fought the damn war in 1776.’ Yes, I remain a steadfast Yankee Doodle Dandy.”