A longstanding plan in my circle at Columbia was to take a large number of existing game-theoretic models, apply an infinite discount rate (rendering the value of future gains and losses effectively zero), and submit our findings to Rationality and Society as an...
Nothing fails like success. Consider vaccines. It's rather easy to worry about pesudo-scientific links between vaccines an autism, or even the small percentage of real adverse consequences of...
On Monday, neorealist IR scholar and Foreign Policy blogger Stephen M. Walt posted his top ten list of "movies that tells (sic) us something about international relations." He was looking for broad...
Though I've previously blogged about the potential serious human security threat of bird flu, I'd like to counter the current media hoopla with a little context (from a CNN report): There had been...
Cases in Israel and New Zealand.Back to clearing the writing and reviewing assignments on my desk....
Amongst the headlines on the economic crisis, torture memos and the Obamas’ new dog was an almost-missed article that may prove more interesting. As the Washington Post reported on Thursday, “Turkey and Armenia announced yesterday that they had agreed in principle to normalize relations.” This is significant in light of 20th century relations between Turkey and the Armenians, beginning with the expulsion of Armenians from Turkey during World War I and continued debates over whether or not this counted as genocide, and extending to after the Cold War, when Armenia emerged as an independent...
To continue a thread I started some weeks ago: If you're thinking about getting a Ph.D., think again. Its a dysfunctional industry. From today's NY Times op-ed pages, Mark Taylor writes:GRADUATE education is the Detroit of higher learning. Most graduate programs in American universities produce a product for which there is no market (candidates for teaching positions that do not exist) and develop skills for which there is diminishing demand (research in subfields within subfields and publication in journals read by no one other than a few like-minded colleagues), all at a rapidly rising...
Watch the entire proceedings of the Battlestar Galactica cast's visit to the United Nations here.
Interesting post this morning over at The Argument on the similarities between the Taliban and organized crime. This idea echoes earlier (and interesting) work by Charles Tilly on the origins of the state. While I think Peters' analysis is interesting and thought provoking, I don't think it means we should ignore the religious aspect of the movement. Understanding the criminal aspects of their enterprise is useful for gaining perspective on their material capabilities and the methods through which they maintain and grow those capabilities. It also allows us to think thoroughly as to how we...
My first semester in graduate school I had the pleasure of attending a talk by General Wesley Clark (Ret.). He gave the talk not soon after the attacks of September 11th and the US offensive in Afghanistan. At the time, Clark was just begining a PR offensive that would eventually position him as a contender for the Democratic nomination in 2004. During the Q&A I asked him a question about the regional dynamics going forward as a result of the Afghanistan offensive. While not criticizing the move (I was for it), I questioned what the potential fallout could be in terms of domestic politics...
I just turned down a request that I review for a journal because, in part, they failed to send me an anonymized copy of the decision letter the last time I reviewed for them. And this despite the journal using an electronic review system that automates the process.I can think of a number of reasons why all peer-reviewed journals should be required to supply reviewers with copies of their decision letters. In no particular order:(1) It provides closure to the reviewer.If I invested--at minimum--a few days in carefully reading an article and writing a review of anywhere from two to six pages,...
I've been hearing rumors to the effect that US negotiators have cut a deal with the Kyrgyz government to allow continued use of Manas. But media sources remain silent, except to note that the Russians are sending additional warplanes to their own base in Kyrgyzstan. Instead, they report on a new US-Tajik agreement to allow transit rights for non-military supplies to Afghanistan. This adds to existing deals with Uzbekistan and Russia.But, interestingly enough, U.S. Assistant Secretary Of State Richard Boucher made it very clear that Washington does not consider Tajik, Uzbek, and Russian deals...