Harsanyi Quotes

#1. The crusade to convince us that global warming can only be dealt with by wealth destruction and higher energy prices began with an effort to 'raise awareness,' which turned into some delicate nanny-state prodding before efforts to artificially inflate prices.

David Harsanyi

#2. I haven't played a chess match for several decades. At one point I lost most of my chess games. Then I realized many of my competitors were memorizing the best moves and I was unwilling to do this.

John Harsanyi

#3. Zero-tolerance on drinking and driving - meaning no drinking at all before driving - is a collective punishment that, in essence, only affects responsible adults who follow the law.

David Harsanyi

#4. Admittedly, I possess virtually no expertise in science. That puts me in exactly the same position as most dogmatic environmentalists who want to craft public policy around global warming fears.

David Harsanyi

#5. Anyone who's had a casual conversation with his neighbors or is cognizant of reality TV should already be petrified of democracy.

David Harsanyi

#6. Democracy is just a reflection of our morals and the things that we believe.

David Harsanyi

#7. Twitter's popularity and usefulness are mysteries to me.

David Harsanyi

#8. The Founding Fathers worried that 'some common impulse of passion' might lead many to subvert the rights of the few. It's a rational fear, one that is played out endlessly.

David Harsanyi

#9. You'll notice that for many progressives, taking from the rich is not simply a necessity of budgeting but a moral imperative and a tool to institute fairness that capitalism supposedly hasn't.

David Harsanyi

#10. You will notice that the Occupy Wall Street crowds - and the progressives who support them - focus on bringing the wealthy down to earth rather than lifting the 99 percent. They have a nearly religious belief that too much wealth is fundamentally immoral and unhealthy for society.

David Harsanyi

#11. Few things trigger fear and misconception more than economic tribulation, and nothing prompts elected officials to react with more simplistic populism.

David Harsanyi

#12. My parents both defected from communist Hungary and were what most people would today call libertarian. I grew up with a general distaste for taxation and any policy that intruded on our lives.

David Harsanyi

#13. 'This is how democracy works,' Barack Obama lectured the country before giving everyone the specifics of his expansive one-man executive overreach on immigration. If you enjoy platitudinous straw men but are turned off by open debate and constitutional order, this speech was for you.

David Harsanyi

#14. Are you sick and tired of these moralizing moralizers imposing their morality on the rest of us? I know I am.

David Harsanyi

#15. It's difficult for democracy to function properly under the most favorable circumstances, but it has no chance at all when millions of voters are divorced from objective reality and incapable of understanding what is going on in Washington.

David Harsanyi

#16. Now, I do not, on any level, possess the expertise to argue about the science of anthropological global warming. Nor do you, most likely. This certainly doesn't mean an average citizen has the duty to do the lock step.

David Harsanyi

#17. You'll often hear the left lecture about the importance of dissent in a free society.

David Harsanyi

#18. In 1958, Anne and I returned to Australia, where I got a very attractive research position at the Australian National University in Canberra. But soon I felt very isolated because at that time game theory was virtually unknown in Australia.

John Harsanyi

#19. In its first 30 years of existence, up to the mid 1970s, the practical applications of game theory were very limited, probably as a result of excessive preoccupation by game theorists with cooperative solution concepts.

John Harsanyi

#20. It would probably strike the average politician as absurd to argue that the best way to fix the economy is to stop trying to 'fix it.'

David Harsanyi

#21. Health care in America, despite all you hear, still offers us citizens one of the most efficient and highest quality systems in the world. But it's expensive, and it's only getting worse.

David Harsanyi

#22. Whether you're a believer or not, a flawed biblical epic is going to be more entertaining than a remake of a Paul Verhoeven movie or some third-rate sci-fi flick.

David Harsanyi

#23. If progressives were interested in mitigating inequality, they would support the dynamism of free markets to allow the merit of ideas, products and services to win the day rather than stifle companies and pick winners in the name of imagined 'progress.'

David Harsanyi

#24. Broaden the tax base, close loopholes and flatten the tax rates - all of which would bring more revenue stability and certitude to projections as well as make filing a comparable breeze.

David Harsanyi

#25. For Philistines like me, the mysteries of Washington can be both perplexing and wondrous.

David Harsanyi

#26. Washington has a mysterious power to turn perfectly reasonable, wholesome, well-meaning human beings into equivocating crooked gasbags.

David Harsanyi

#27. Times change. Every generation has a new set of problems. Human nature is unmoved.

David Harsanyi

#28. The realization that you can't predict the future
and mold it
could only come as a shock to an academic.

David Harsanyi

#29. Faith helps many people make sense of the world around them. Faith gives them a spiritual connection to something larger.

David Harsanyi

#30. My parents owned a pharmacy in Budapest, which gave us a comfortable living. As I was their only child, they wanted me to become a pharmacist. But my own preference would have been to study philosophy and mathematics.

John Harsanyi

#31. I believe that the war on drugs is a tragically misplaced use of resources - an immoral venture that produces far more suffering than it alleviates.

David Harsanyi

#32. Political correctness is one of the engines of nannyism. Allowing and even encouraging 'offensive' ideas is vital for the intellectually health of a free society.

David Harsanyi

#33. You don't have to get things done all the time to be productive.

David Harsanyi

#34. One might argue that proper understanding of any social situation would require game-theoretic analysis.

John Harsanyi

#35. A religion without rules or God isn't sustainable.

David Harsanyi

#36. Simplification of the tax code would not only unlock dormant economic potential, but, in the process, it would blunt the preferred weapon of social engineers, who reward favored industries, punish success and distort economic incentives.

David Harsanyi

#37. In 1946, I re-enrolled at the University of Budapest in order to obtain a Ph.D. in philosophy with minors in sociology and in psychology.

John Harsanyi

#38. When I was younger, I was drawn to Ayn Rand books and other works of fiction celebrating individualism.

David Harsanyi

#39. Living most of my life in New York, I witnessed plenty of nanny state laws. Later, I lived in D.C. for a bit and saw even more. I assumed when I got to Colorado, the Wild West, there would be a rejection of such intrusive legislation. I was wrong.

David Harsanyi

#40. Throughout the Old Testament, God warns his chosen people about the perils of assimilation, shiksappeal and false gods.

David Harsanyi

#41. Obama acknowledges his overreach openly every time he argues that he intends to do the job of an obstinate Republican congress.

David Harsanyi

#42. Biblical movies need not sermonize, just be honest to the foundational story. As powerful as the message is for people of faith, it's really great storytelling.

David Harsanyi

#43. I knew that as a pharmacy student I would obtain military deferment. As I was of Jewish origin, this meant that I would not have to serve in a forced labor unit of the Hungarian army.

John Harsanyi

#44. A true fascist is anyone who wants to take away my air conditioning or force me to ride a bike.

David Harsanyi

#45. As with most people, my ideology and my attitudes about life were informed by parents and family.

David Harsanyi

#46. Aside from the occasional genocide, oppression, evil and torture, etc., it is inarguable that public policy could be implemented more rapidly in an autocracy.

David Harsanyi

#47. Let's be honest: nothing spoils 'The Walking Dead' quite like watching 'The Walking Dead.'

David Harsanyi

#48. I don't think that voters should be fixated on public policy. In a healthy republic, they wouldn't have to worry every waking hour about what their government is doing.

David Harsanyi

#49. A cultural shift is not always an ideological one - or at least not always the one you imagine. Our norms are always evolving.

David Harsanyi

#50. It is our common experience as human beings that the results of social forces seem to admit only of 'probabilistic' predictions.

John Harsanyi

#51. We need a smaller, leaner Washington. It won't happen if we raise taxes without any coinciding reform and serious slashing of spending.

David Harsanyi

#52. If had to label myself, I guess classical liberal would be best.

David Harsanyi

#53. Now, admittedly, Twitter can be entertaining on occasion, as it turns out that 140 characters offers a great chance to be misunderstood - and an even greater chance one will expose his inner troglodyte.

David Harsanyi

#54. Progressivism is the belief that we have too much freedom with which to make too many stupid choices.

David Harsanyi

#55. In summation, like your beloved pet rock, Twitter is useful only in your imagination.

David Harsanyi

#56. After preliminary work by a number of other distinguished mathematicians and economists, game theory as a systematic theory started with von Neumann and Morgenstern's book, 'Theory of Games and Economic Behavior,' published in 1944.

John Harsanyi

#57. A boatload of government money is indeed a gift. Unless, I suppose, you're one of the saps paying for the cargo.

David Harsanyi

#58. The problem is that Americans use the state as a moral compass. For libertarians, it is often frustrating to explain that advocating the decriminalization of x is not synonymous with endorsing x.

David Harsanyi

#59. The deepest mystery of Twitter is why celebrities and elected officials take part. After all, we all know they can't write their own lines.

David Harsanyi

#60. It is easy to fall into the trap of believing that democracy will improve the function of policy.

David Harsanyi

#61. In principle, every social situation involves strategic interaction among the participants.

John Harsanyi

#62. If the library's rarest frequenters are the ones we'd like to see in them the most, then libraries are failing.

David Harsanyi

#63. Until genuine political, economic, and cultural liberty are established, democracy is unlikely to offer anything more than a simulacrum of legitimacy for an oppressive regime.

David Harsanyi

#64. The Bible is filled with intriguing stories about complex and flawed human beings who ponder immense moral questions and engage in colossal clashes with evil.

David Harsanyi

#65. Democracy allows rhetoric, false empathy and emotion to pummel rational thinking - so it's no wonder so many politicians thrive in it.

David Harsanyi

#66. We have little choice but to place a certain level of trust in scientists - even when it comes to the model-driven speculative discipline of climate change. And, need it be said, most scientists take great care in being honest, principled and precise.

David Harsanyi

#67. Every decade or so, Hollywood has an epiphany. It turns out faith-based audiences enjoy going to the movies, too.

David Harsanyi

#68. Common Core, the initiative that claims to more accurately measure K-12 student knowledge in English and math, also encourages children to step up their 'critical thinking.'

David Harsanyi

#69. If the wealthy get wealthier, no one has to become one penny poorer.

David Harsanyi

#70. Ferguson argued that British involvement in World War I was unnecessary, far too costly in lives and money for any advantage gained, and a Pyrrhic victory that in many ways contributed to the end of the Empire.

David Harsanyi