Mark D. White

Writer, editor, teacher

recent posts

about

I’m a professor in the Department of Philosophy at the College of Staten Island/CUNY, where I teach courses in philosophy, economics, and law, and the author/editor/co-editor of several books.

Category: Posts by Mark D. White

  • Making Good Choices in Situations of Radical Uncertainty

    Mark D. White Barry Schwartz (author of The Paradox of Choice: Why More Is Less), Yakov Ben-Haim, and Cliff Dasco have a paper in the latest issue of Journal for the Theory of Social Behaviour (41/2, June 2011) titled "What Makes a Good Decision? Robust Satisficing as a Normative Standard of Rational Decision Making," in…

  • Same-Sex Marriage Should Be Defended on Moral Terms, Not Economic Ones

    Mark D. White Sociologist Jaye Cee Whitehead (Pacific University) has a wonderful piece in The New York Times today titled "The Wrong Reasons for Same-Sex Marriage," arguing that the recent arguments espousing the economic benefits of same-sex marriage for cash-strapped states and municipalities miss the point: Those making these economic arguments probably have the best…

  • The Royal Wedding and the Nobility of Commerce

    Mark D. White There's a very interesting article in today's Wall Street Journal about the commcerical background of the Middleton family, and how the impending royal nuptials can be seen as belated recognition of the worth of commerce and entrepreneurship: Much has been made of the fact that Kate Middleton, Prince William's bride-to-be, is a…

  • The changing purpose of faculty sabbaticals [UPDATED]

    Mark D. White Over at Prawfsblawg, Elizabeth Dale, who teaches history and law at the University of Florida, has an extremely thought-provoking post about sabbaticals for full-time professors, wondering if the original purpose–scholarly rejuvenation and renewal–has been replaced by "catching up" with work one wasn't able to complete during the normal academic terms and breaks.…

  • Steve Medema on the Coase Theorem and history of economic thought

    Mark D. White In the latest issue of Journal of the History of Economic Thought (33/1, March 2011), we find Steve Medema's History of Economic Society presidential address, titled "The Coase Theorem: Lessons for the Study of the Study of Economic Thought": The Coase theorem has occupied a prominent place in economic discourse for the last…

  • Efficiency bites

    Mark D. White From today's funny pages:  

  • Why did we evolve to reason? (in Behavioral and Brain Sciences) [UPDATED]

    Mark D. White The new issue of Behavioral and Brian Sciences (34/2, 2011) focuses on the nature of the evolutionary advantages of reasoning; the target article, by Hugo Mercier and Dan Sperber, is titled "Why Do Humans Reason? Arguments for an Argumentative Theory": Reasoning is generally seen as a means to improve knowledge and make better…

  • Much Ado about Happiness

    Mark D. White Carl Bialik at The Wall Street Journal has an article in today's edition and a blog post from last night, both very evenhanded, about the attempts by governments to measure the happiness of its citizenry, and the skepticism of some regarding the efficacy of this. For a critical look at the theory behind happiness studies,…

  • Inequality: Confusing the Issue

    Mark D. White The topic of today's "Room for Debate" feature at The New York Times is inequality, prompted by a recent paper by Mike I. Norton and Dan Ariely that shows a large number of Americans would prefer to live in a society with a more equitable distribution of wealth (like Sweden). Norton himself…

  • More eminent domain abuse (the sad legacy of Kelo)

    Mark D. White Ilya Shapiro at the CATO Institute brings yet more tragic news of eminent domain abuse in his latest CATO @ Liberty blog post – please read it, and make sure to read his earlier material on eminent domain linked in the piece. Despite what the Supreme Court decided in Kelo, this cannot…