[lbo-talk] Maximise or satisfice?

[ravi]

Doug Henwood wrote:
> 
> Of course they don't perfectly reflect technical output. Companies 
> game the system all the time - but not just American ones. Still, 
> there's little doubt that U.S. science and technology are extremely 
> sophisticated. We also make some very fine cultural products, popular 
> and high - and much of the rest of the world agrees. People come from 
> around the world to our universities. We're not a bunch of 
> knuckle-dragging dolts, fer chrissake. A lot of this is misanthropy 
> disguised as politics.
> 

i do not disagree with your larger point (except perhaps to wonder if
we, the majority of the entire world population, are indeed a bunch of
knuckle-dragging dolts) . your choice of "no., of patents" as a measure,
is however [to me] still dubious. if other nations *also* "game" the
system, that doesn't make our patent system or volume any better a measure.

	--ravi