Posted on 09/30/2006 11:52:28 AM PDT by ChinaGotTheGoodsOnClinton
FREEPER HELP NEEDED
Due to the to tearing down the legacy of Adam Smith in liberal economics departments in favor of such economists as Karl Marx which has been going on for the better part of the last century I am doing everything I can to save what I can of it.
I based the following letter to students on stories told to me by my late economics professor. In the last 20 years I’ve ran across bits and pieces of them, but now I am having trouble coming up with the slightest hint of them!
I am sending out dozens of letters to anyone I can think of and this is not a request for a heroic effort from any of you. But if something pops into any your minds when reviewing the stories about Adam Smith below…I’d appreciate you jotting down a response to me about where you’ve seen them before.
Thanks!
Dear Students:
Final Grades are now posted. Let me know if you have any questions.
In a recent email from student I got the question:
“What does the father of economics have to do with information security?”
One of the first things that pops into my mind that I hope you take away from this class is that all books and current infosec classes I know of are wrong, dead wrong on the “Know Thy Enemy” portion.
But you know the terms; ‘extortion, British banking system DoS, gambling sites extortion, click through fraud, botnets, ad click fraud, wholesale ID theft, organized crime identity theft’ and can instantly prove your case about who your organizations real enemies are!
At the heart of the real threat: economics.
What to do about the threat? Again the answer lies in economics. The values of your assets determine the resources you have at your disposal to mitigate, transfer, or accept the risks.
And certainly there is another element to Adam Smith that I really like. Instead of being the miserly penny pinching personality most would expect from “The Father of Economics” he was quite the opposite!
During his day the professors were paid directly by the students. Many accounts’ survive to this day of the lengths he would go to to avoid having students pay him. Stories abound of trap doors and secret passage ways he would use to leave the lectern. He would practically fly off the handle when awarded cash prizes, awards and recognition for his contributions to industry and commerce (ah… the burden of having to leave his present project whatever that might have been at the time to accept the awards and the prize money!)
Indeed he was someone of whom I’d like to say: “He spent his whole life trying NOT TO GET RICH….but ultimately he failed”.
And since you are the students that I’ve had the pleasure of hopefully teaching how to find out things, I’ll leave the documentation of that statement up to you.
All the best….
Your Professor
Your Freeper name is great. Can't help but best of luck Bump ..
As someone with a masters in economics, a fan of Adam Smith, and a devotee of the Austrian School of Economics, I have to admit I do not understand what it is you are asking for.
I would suggest walking down to the English department and speaking with a fellow professor regarding grammar.
Beat me to it - my thoughts exactly, altho these days the English professor may be just as incoherent.
Adam Smith an altruist. Who'da thunkit?
Marx? Is he really being taught today? I would think Marx had been relegated to the history department by now.
Keynes has long been the replacement for Adam Smith in liberal econ departments. Just look at the government to see why Keynes is the bible and Adam Smith is considered a theoretical philosopher like Copernicus.
I admit the intro was a little rough.
It was unproofed.
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