2013-12-30

Some Links

Tyler Cowen is mostly wrong (in my opinion) on Bitcoin, and consistently so. In his most recent post on the topic, he describes a situation in which competing currencies drive down the incentive to devalue. In other words, Cowen's description of Bitcoin's "collapse" is synonymous with Bitcoin's believers' description of its success. I am optimistic for Bitcoin.

Gary Becker is good on income redistribution. There are some excellent points throughout his post, but this one caught me be surprise: "China’s inequality is now comparable to that in the US, as measured by the Gini coefficient[.]"

Puzzlingly, Jonathan Finegold Catalan defends snark. However, he clarifies in the comments that he really has in mind "being direct." I like the latter, but not the former, and yes I will admit to my own checkered history of snark.

Robert Murphy applies shared guilt to homosexuality. Here's a novel thought, though: Maybe there's nothing to feel guilty about.

And while I'm at it, Murphy's recent post on god's "omniscience" really just makes me wonder: If god can see and know everything before it ever happens, then why did any of the stuff in the Bible even occur? I mean, why punish mankind - or offer them salvation - if you can see their every move before it happens? Why not just skip that step and move straight to whatever heaven or hell he's got planned for us? Or, alternatively, why didn't he just create us to be perfect? (If he cannot, then he is not truly omnipotent; if he can then he is not truly good, etc. etc...)

Remember when people who were against the Russian government were called "rebels," not "insurgents?" I don't, either.

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