This is kind inside baseball–Sowell, high-powered economist insulted a Nobel Prize winning economist, Gary Becker when he was a grad student and Becker a teacher.
Read this and learn that Sowell wasn’t always a conservative guy, in fact he was a commie in his young days.
Becker probably made him uneasy. I can’t quite understand why Sowell never got around to apologizing, since they both were at the Hoover in the recent past.
http://spectator.org/print/59048
For some reason along the way I read Becker’s theories on stuff–he had a practical sociological approach to economics, that reminded me a little of the Austrians–von Mises and Hayek–not so much about esoteric formulae, more about the study of the human race and, as von Mises titled his book–Human Action.
So, for your info, just a little intro to Becker the great. The reason I liked him is he boiled down economics to the study of human activities and the effort of most rational people to maximize their position in life. Or something like that–gotta remember I am just a dumb emergency physician.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gary_Becker
Damn I like Sowell–what a class act. And He teaches from the Becker canon with his own additions. Sowell is a humanist, just like Becker, not a theoretical number cruncher like some economists. Imagine that you can’t find a math formula in von Mises. He was about what you might call sociological economics.
I have requested everything the local library system has that’s written by Mr Sowell and everything of Hayek’s. The next few weeks will be rigorous.
i talked to him once by calling the Hoover.
He is a very old man now, 80. but what a man.
I hope you have read some of his books. I don’t know where to start for recommendations, his vision of the anointed, economics, race, a trilogy on migrations. I have about 15 of his books, from basic economics to his recent books on intellectuals.
Such a fine man. He was very cordial and I think, by god, he answered his own phone at the Hoover, which is why I got to talk to him many years ago. .
Currently reading Sowell’s “On Classical Economics”
I adore the man. Meeting him is my bucket list.