This is something that's been stewing in me for a while, and I hope I can present it fairly ( Read more... )

Veil after veil have we lifted, and ever the face is more lovely.
--Apuleius

I've noticed a while back that there are some interesting taste overlaps among "people like me."

Bach is a big one.  Math people, with eerie consistency, really like Bach.  Even the ones who've never heard of the math/Bach connection.  When I was about eleven, the Bach bug ( Read more... )

 The extremes on this debate are absurd.  College is not useless; it has many benefits to students. On the other hand, it would be surprising if the most efficient way to provide those benefits was exactly the social institution of college in America as it exists today.

The signaling function of college works pretty damn well.  Yale/Princeton/MIT ( Read more... )

"A pianist has to believe in telekinesis.  You have to believe you have the power to move your fingers with your mind."

I learned that from Phil Cohn, my piano teacher's piano teacher.  Once in a while, when I was in high school, she'd arrange for me to have a master class with him.  He was a diminutive man who looked exactly like Dr. Strangelove, ( Read more... )

Ezra Klein just made an argument I've been making since sophomore year of college.

Finance and consulting jobs are popular among elite college students because they give a predictable path to professional life for liberal arts students who have no idea what to do with their educations.  Top banks and consulting firms come to colleges and offer a ( Read more... )