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I always liked Thomas Friedman's writing on foreign policy issues back in the day, but his work on globalization and technology always sounds incomplete and ama

I always liked Thomas Friedman's writing on foreign policy issues back in the day, but his work on globalization and technology always sounds incomplete and amateurish. I think Mr. Friedman would do himself a favor if he actually spent some time learning to code and hacking on an Arduino board or something so that he could start to develop more intuition on what can and cannot easily be done with technology, and where globalization fits in and where it doesn't.

gahahaha 13y ago
His writings on foreign policy and economics is also incompetent garbage. One datapoint is his support for the Iraq war. But really why he still has a column in the NYT is a mystery.
- curtis 13y ago
  I do not want to be in the business of defending Thomas Friedman, but I think his opinions on the Iraq might have been more nuanced than he is usually given credit for. For example: NEW YORK TIMES COLUMNIST THOMAS FRIEDMAN THEN: "Let's start with one simple fact: Iraq is a black box that has been sealed shut since Saddam came to dominate Iraqi politics in the late 1960s. Therefore, one needs to have a great deal of humility when it comes to predicting what sorts of bats and demons may fly out if the U. S. and its allies remove the lid. Think of it this way: If and when we take the lid off Iraq, we will find an envelope inside. It will tell us what we have won, and it will say one of two things. "It could say, 'Congratulations! You've just won the Arab Germany--a country with enormous human talent, enormous natural resources, but with an evil dictator, whom you've just removed.' "Or the envelope could say, 'You've just won the Arab Yugoslavia--an artificial country congenitally divided among Kurds, Shiites, Sunnis, Nasserites, leftists, and a host of tribes and clans that can only be held together with a Saddam-like iron fist. Congratulations, you're the new Saddam.' "In the first scenario, Iraq is the way it is today because Saddam is the way he is. In the second scenario, Saddam is the way he is because Iraq is what it is. Those are two very different problems. And we will know which we've won only when we take off the lid. The conservatives and neocons, who have been pounding the table for war, should be a lot more humble about this question, because they don't know, either." --The New York Times, January 26, 2003 (See http://www.esquire.com/features/ESQ0306IRAQQUOTES_220 http://www.esquire.com/features/ESQ0306IRAQQUOTES_220)
scep12 13y ago
How do basic coding skills or simplistic hardware projects lend themselves to an improved understanding of the global effects of technology? For a writer concerned with the big picture, I imagine understanding the effect is more important than the cause (of code). Learning how to write a bit of code may improve his appreciation for technology, but I can't imagine it changing his (broad) opinions.
- gumby 13y ago
  Because some grounding (I don't mean of the ee kind :-) would remove some of the technomystecism in his decision process. At the moment he considers the iphone indistinguishable from magic.

gahahaha 13y ago

His writings on foreign policy and economics is also incompetent garbage. One datapoint is his support for the Iraq war. But really why he still has a column in the NYT is a mystery.

curtis 13y ago
I do not want to be in the business of defending Thomas Friedman, but I think his opinions on the Iraq might have been more nuanced than he is usually given credit for. For example: NEW YORK TIMES COLUMNIST THOMAS FRIEDMAN THEN: "Let's start with one simple fact: Iraq is a black box that has been sealed shut since Saddam came to dominate Iraqi politics in the late 1960s. Therefore, one needs to have a great deal of humility when it comes to predicting what sorts of bats and demons may fly out if the U. S. and its allies remove the lid. Think of it this way: If and when we take the lid off Iraq, we will find an envelope inside. It will tell us what we have won, and it will say one of two things. "It could say, 'Congratulations! You've just won the Arab Germany--a country with enormous human talent, enormous natural resources, but with an evil dictator, whom you've just removed.' "Or the envelope could say, 'You've just won the Arab Yugoslavia--an artificial country congenitally divided among Kurds, Shiites, Sunnis, Nasserites, leftists, and a host of tribes and clans that can only be held together with a Saddam-like iron fist. Congratulations, you're the new Saddam.' "In the first scenario, Iraq is the way it is today because Saddam is the way he is. In the second scenario, Saddam is the way he is because Iraq is what it is. Those are two very different problems. And we will know which we've won only when we take off the lid. The conservatives and neocons, who have been pounding the table for war, should be a lot more humble about this question, because they don't know, either." --The New York Times, January 26, 2003 (See http://www.esquire.com/features/ESQ0306IRAQQUOTES_220 http://www.esquire.com/features/ESQ0306IRAQQUOTES_220)

scep12 13y ago

How do basic coding skills or simplistic hardware projects lend themselves to an improved understanding of the global effects of technology? For a writer concerned with the big picture, I imagine understanding the effect is more important than the cause (of code). Learning how to write a bit of code may improve his appreciation for technology, but I can't imagine it changing his (broad) opinions.

gumby 13y ago
Because some grounding (I don't mean of the ee kind :-) would remove some of the technomystecism in his decision process. At the moment he considers the iphone indistinguishable from magic.