Picking the brains of a brilliant man...

I had made fun of economists in a previous posting -- for being more the problem than the solution -- but the authors of the bestselling books Freakonomics and Superfreakonomics deserve praise for their refreshingly radical thinking.

One of the two co-authors, Steven David Levitt, was in town for the Singapore Writers Festival last week. ST writer Akshita Nanda ably captures Levitt's incisive worldview -- and his frank assessment of Singaporean students who attended his classes at the University of Chicago -- in her interview with him.

Here are excerpts of the interview (ST Life!, "Better to think than get all As", 24 Oct, page C8):

To become a world famous academic, start by being really bad at your subject... Levitt offers his own career as proof.

"If you want to succeed in a professional field where you have no talent, the only solution is to take on a set of topics that are so degrading and embarrassing that nobody will touch them," the 44-year-old said, repeating advice given to him by his father, a renowned medical researcher in the field of intestinal gas [aka fart!].

Dr Levitt took an equally unusual career path, applying economic theory to real world problems. The result has been two books about, among other things, why suicide bombers should buy life insurance...

[When asked] about the 20-odd Singaporean students he has mentored in Chicago, [he said]: "I've never seen a smarter, better-prepared set of students. I've also never seen any group of people less willing to break rules. Great ideas are in part about breaking rules."

[During the Q&A, he said that] "it's not that (economists) are brilliant; you just have to have a framework for thinking about the world that makes you seem very smart".

To [an audience member] who said students had to work to get good grades and could not afford to take time out just to think [haha, one has to "take time out" just to think? Sheesh!] and come up with new ideas, he said, "I'd rather have my kids think than get As in school."

One of his parting statements to the crowd in the hall was, "As parents, we have an obligation to create a new generation that can think and have ideas."

[Hmmm... such smarties may well turn out to be non-conformist rule-breakers. Are our present political leaders prepared for that?]