Yesterday a colleague received a very enthusiastic and courteous invitation to Yale's "Access to Knowledge" Conference, hiply billed A2K. Meaning no disrespect to those at Yale involved in organizing this event . . . I can't help but wonder whether the panels will be made up of people frantically agreeeing with one another... "Knowledge is good" "Yes Yes very good" "When people don't have knowledge, it is bad!" "Yes Yes very bad," and "sometimes people can't get the knowledge that they need!" "Indeed, very true, very true" "Terrible, terrible," and finally that all this should be rectified by someone else paying for the wider distribution of knowledge, "free" if possible.

I grow cynical in my old age. It might well be a wonderful conference, with the importance of the rule of law, freedom of contract, property rights, and relief from corruption and oppressive taxation and regulation at least given a fair hearing.

posted by Solveig Singleton @ 9:01 AM | Academia

Link to this Entry | Printer-Friendly | Email a Comment | Post a Comment(0)