.....I think Thomas Sowell is a genius. Loved his book Is Reality Optional? (How could you NOT love a book with that title?) Took Forbes magazine for years, simply because it published his columns.
Anyway, every once in a while, he publishes a column that contains his "Random Thoughts." Some of them are priceless:
Adolescence is a relatively recent thing in human history — a period of years between the constraints of childhood and the responsibilities of adulthood. This irresponsible period of adolescence is artificially extended by long years of education, much of it wasted on frivolities. Tenure extends adolescence even further for teachers and professors.
Many disastrous mistakes, in both public and private life, are not due to people thinking stupidly but to their not bothering to think at all. If you don't stop and think, then it doesn't matter whether you are a genius or a moron.
He is one person I would really love to meet in real life.
Wow! I'm in complete agreement with him about adolescence! I've argued with several friends of mine in anthropology/sociology classes that adolescence is something we've created. I've also argued that the longer I stay in school, the longer I feel I'm in some weird extended state of adolescence and that it's time for it to be over!
this explains sooo much about academia.
That remeinds me of the part in Gulliver's Travels where the Grand Academy of Projectors of Lagado in their great intellectual experiement --attempted to turn their "doo doo" back into food.
Like that Styx song..."I got too much time on my hands...tick, tick, tick, tick."