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Details: Written by: Richard_McKie; Parent Category: Economy; Category: Markets; Published: 14 December 2010; Hits: 23911

Thomas Carlyle coined this epithet in 1839 while criticising Malthus, who warned of what subsequently happened, exploding population.

According to Carlyle his economic theories: "are indeed sufficiently mournful. Dreary, stolid, dismal, without hope for this world or the next" and in 1894 he described economics as: 'quite abject and distressing... dismal science... led by the sacred cause of Black Emancipation.' The label has stuck ever since.

This 'dismal' reputation has not been helped by repeated economic recessions and a Great Depression, together with continuously erroneous forecasts and contradictory solutions fuelled by opposing theories.

This article reviews some of those competing paradigms and their effect on the economic progress of Australia.

Travel

Cuba

What can I say about Cuba?

In the late ‘70s I lived on the boundary of Paddington in Sydney and walked to and from work in the city. Between my home and work there was an area of terrace housing in Darlinghurst that had been resumed by the State for the construction of a road tunnel and traffic interchanges. Squatters had moved into some of the ‘DMR affected’ houses. Most of these were young people, students, rock bands and radically unemployed alternative culture advocates; hippies.

Those houses in this socially vibrant area that were not condemned by the road building were rented to people who were happy with these neighbours: artists; writers; musicians; even some younger professionals; and a number were brothels.

Fiction, Recollections & News

The Cloud

Chapter 1 - The Party

This morning Miranda had an inspiration - real candles! We'll have real candles - made from real beeswax and scented with real bergamot for my final party as a celebration of my life and my death. This brief candle indeed!

In other circumstances she would be turning 60 next birthday. With her classic figure, clear skin and dark lustrous hair, by the standards of last century she looks half her age, barely thirty, the result of a good education; modern scientific and medical knowledge; a healthy diet and lifestyle and the elimination of inherited diseases before the ban on such medical interventions.

It's ironical that except as a result of accidents, skiing, rock climbing, paragliding and so on, Miranda's seldom had need of a doctor. She's a beneficiary of (once legal) genetic selection and unlike some people she's never had to resort to an illegal back-yard operation to extend her life.

Opinions and Philosophy

Copyright - Greg Ham

I've just been reading the news (click here or on the picture below) that Greg Ham of Men at Work has died; possibly by suicide.

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