The conventional defense of the patent system is that it is essential in order to stimulate creativity. For example, in “ Don’t Believe the Hype “ (Feb. 2005, IP Law & Business ), patent attorneys John Benassi & Noel Gillespie conclude that our patent laws continue to “foster innovation.” This is so even though many observers believe our patent
The Free Market 26, no. 4 (April 2005) Has academia become so politicized that teaching good economics, and using politically sensitive illustrations, can lead to threats, fines, penalties, demotion and worse? It certainly seemed so in early February when Hans-Hermann Hoppe, a leading student of Murray Rothbard and senior fellow of the Mises
Tin Whiskers: The Next Y2K Problem? My company (we make semiconductor lasers) is scrambling along with other high-tech electronics and laser manufacturers to meet the growing wave of regulations—from Europe, Japan, and probably others—requiring lead to be phased out of various types of electronic products. As this article points out, this is
Dear Dr. Alden and Dr. Robins: Hans-Hermann Hoppe’s exceptional erudition, scholarship, and intelligence are a matter of public record, and have been for years. He is one of the very few academics of whom it can be said that his thinking has changed lives (including the lives of readers whom he has never even met) for the good. Those of us around
Professor, ACLU may sue UNLV , from The Rebel Yell. This is a particularly instructive--and scary--article. Finally, the name of the student who accused Hoppe, Michael Knight, is revealed. Some of his comments are really a sad statement on the egalitarian, entitlement mentality of today’s brainwashed crop of sniveling, totalitarian-minded
Excellent letter by Tom Woods (sent a bit late but with a good excuse )-- February 14, 2005 Carol C. Harter, President University of Nevada, Las Vegas Dear President Harter: I am a Columbia University Ph.D. and the author of a recent New York Times bestseller on American history. I join the rest of the academic community in calling upon you to
apropos nothing: from here : “There is a myth that all Austrians are generalists. General instincts are fine, but they are not enough to sustain a school. A body of thought stands or falls on its practitioners ability to master the technical issues in particular fields. It’s what distinguishes dilettantes, hobbyists, and amateur philosophers from
One of my many favorite Hoppe quotes, from his Banking, Nation States and International Politics: A Sociological Reconstruction of the Present Economic Order , Review of Austrian Economics , (Vol. 4 Num. 1), 1990, which explains why the relatively rich, Western countries, which have relatively liberal internal economic policies, would tend to be
Now this is kind of interesting. In the Winter 2004-2005 issue of Cato’s Regulation , Thomas M. Lenard of the Progress & Freedom Foundation responded to a previous article in the same publication by Lawrence Lessig, Coase’s First Question , which apparently suggests, using purportedly Coasean reasoning (see below for more on this), that we should
What is the Mises Institute?
The Mises Institute is a non-profit organization that exists to promote teaching and research in the Austrian School of economics, individual freedom, honest history, and international peace, in the tradition of Ludwig von Mises and Murray N. Rothbard.
Non-political, non-partisan, and non-PC, we advocate a radical shift in the intellectual climate, away from statism and toward a private property order. We believe that our foundational ideas are of permanent value, and oppose all efforts at compromise, sellout, and amalgamation of these ideas with fashionable political, cultural, and social doctrines inimical to their spirit.