Discussed at the time (of the article):<p><i>Frank Ramsey: A Genius by All Tests for Genius</i> - <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22321970">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22321970</a> - Feb 2020 (23 comments)<p>Also:<p><i>Frank Ramsey: A more human philosophy</i> - <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24320717">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24320717</a> - Aug 2020 (2 comments)<p><i>Frank Ramsey – The Man Who Thought Too Fast</i> - <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23011233">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23011233</a> - April 2020 (122 comments)
Can anyone identify and enumerate the "tests for genius" that Ramsey passed?<p>Edit: Found them. They are Samuelson's own criteria:<p>1. Test of Time: Samuelson suggested that the work of a genius economist should stand the test of time, remaining relevant and influential long after its initial publication.<p>2. Transcendence of Paradigms: Genius economists should be able to transcend prevailing paradigms and make significant contributions that reshape the field of economics.<p>3. Originality and Creativity: Samuelson emphasized the importance of originality and creativity in the work of genius economists, highlighting their ability to generate novel ideas and insights.<p>4. Broad Influence: Genius economists should have a broad influence beyond their own specialized areas of research, impacting the broader discipline of economics.<p>5. Impact on Policy: Samuelson suggested that the work of genius economists should have practical implications and influence policy-making decisions.<p>6. Pedagogical Impact: Genius economists should also have a significant impact on economic education, shaping the way economics is taught and understood by future generations of students.
> In 1999, Donald Davidson, a leading philosopher of the twentieth century, coined the term ‘the Ramsey Effect’: the phenomenon of discovering that an exciting and apparently original philosophical discovery already has been presented, and presented more elegantly, by Frank Ramsey.<p>Kind of a nice legacy I guess, considering the short career.
The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy has a nice biography and overview of his Philosophical and Mathematical contributions[0] as well as a nice summary of his Economic contributions[1], if anyone is looking for some additional context/information wrt Ramsey.<p>[0] <a href="https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/ramsey/" rel="nofollow">https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/ramsey/</a>
[1] <a href="https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/ramsey-economics/" rel="nofollow">https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/ramsey-economics/</a>
<i>He also would have loathed those who used his results to argue that the best economy is one generated by the decisions of individuals, with minimal government intrusion. He was a socialist who favored government intervention to help the disadvantaged in society.</i><p>The genius of this viewpoint brings to mind:<p><pre><code> “The curious task of economics is to demonstrate to men how little they really know about what they imagine the can design.”
― F. A. Hayek, The Fatal Conceit: The Errors of Socialism (Volume 1)</code></pre>
<i>> Although Ramsey was employed by Cambridge as a mathematician, he only published eight pages of pure mathematics. But those eight pages yielded impressive results.</i><p>Be that as it may, but with just eight papers to your name, you'd be gone out of any position in today's academia faster than you can say "key performance indicator".