2011年9月8日 星期四

Passion never dies

I spent the greater part of an hour yesterday talking to young men and women--students on summer vacation from the University of Warwick.  The location is Lei Yue Mun Holiday Park on the HK side.  The students invited me to talk about urban renewal, and I went over the meaning of the public interest and the difficulties of public choice: you can never avoid benefiting someone while hurting someone else.  We talked about the mandatory auction ordinance, the new rule that allows the mandatory auction of the rest of the properties once 80% of owners have agreed to sell or have sold their flats to the developer.  Then I introduced them to the concept of the representative individual as discussed in my book Public Policy and the Public Interest and in the entry in Wikipedia. I watched the enthusiasm and the passion for knowledge among the young souls.  It was a great day.

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  1. A conversation

    DK Matai (Announcement) Criticism

    Why criticise? Great minds discuss ideas. Average minds discuss events. Small minds discuss people! - Eleanor Roosevelt.

    What are your thoughts, observations and views? Please join the Socratic dialogue on ATCA 5000 at https://www.yammer.com/atca. We look forward to hearing from you!

    Don Swenson in reply to Lok Ho: My sense is that all religions miss the mark of the prophets of God (their general message). Prophets reveal the reality of a Higher Intelligence by their words and prophecies. For example: Muhammad received his revelation from the 'spiritual' realm and then others followed after discerning the message and its meaning. Yeshua (also called Jesus by English speaking persons) demonstrated the reality of the 'spiritual' realm by his behavior and actions. Others sensed his message and the actions as directly from a Higher Intelligence (his message was the Kingdom of God for this planet). Thomas Jefferson displayed his inner revelations when he wrote the Declaration of Independence during a critical period of American history. He recognized that our liberties and sovereign rights derived from a Creator God (not from human Government...as a non-spiritual person might desire ). Americans discerned this message an created a new destiny for themselves and the World (1776 - 2012). All these prophets and teachings imply that human beings are 'at effect' and under the control of this 'spiritual' realm (my assumption). Many of us sense that this 'dualism' is our core reality going forward.

    Lok Ho in reply to Don Swenson: Human institutions are always flawed. But some human institutions are better than others, and none of us can escape from the constraints of human institutions. That is why spiritual people understand that we need to improve our human institutions so that people can have a better chance to live in peace. One of the keys to improving human institutions is to build in mechanisms to prevent the abuse of power: political power, policy making power, discretionary powers of bureaucrats, the power of speech, the power of physical force, the power of science and technology, etc. etc. The spiritual realm lies within the mind. The institutional realm lies within the domain of worldly governments and community groups. We must not forget the importance of the institutional realm, even though it sounds mundane.

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