Tomáš Sedláček

   The best part about kicking off the local philosophy festival by going to a talk by a Czech economist at the history museum is that you get to be the sort of person who kicks off the local philosophy festival by going to a talk by a Czech economist at the history museum.  Since the talk was a groovy sort of event, in English, and free, I definitely said, “I’m in” when my Polish friend Kaska suggested we attend.  As Polish is very similar, linguistically, to Czech and since she has spent almost her entire adult life living in Germany, Kaska understood all the Czech and the German.  I struggled to understand every third German word and just ended up clapping when the German people clapped and waiting patiently for Tomas Sedlacek to start giving his lecture in English.
    The best thing about Sedlacek is that while he is an absolutely brilliant international economist, a professor in Prague, and a bestselling author, he also has a ginger madman vibe somewhere between Carrot Top and that weird guy your friend met on the internet.  The best part was when he told us that his book was published by some random poet he met at a bar.  Nevertheless, he gave a fascinating lecture explaining his, not exactly new, but vitally important and impeccably argued thesis:  We should not ask, “Does the market work?”  We should instead ask, “Does the market work the way we want it to?”  He went on to say that there are things, clean air, peace, love, etc., that cannot possibly be assigned monetary values, and that economics should be put in its very important, but ultimately constrained, place in political decision making.  Brilliant, brilliant man.  He should be on the Daily Show talking to Jon Stewart and hawking his poet-published book.
    Now, the trouble with going to a fascinating lecture is that lots of other smart people in the room want to talk about how smart they are as well.  I admit; I am one of those people.  I wanted to shoot my hand up in the air and ask Dr. Sedlacek how he felt about the somewhat obscure but still influential early 20th century American economist Thorsten Veblen, who just coincidentally, attended the same college I did.  But, I didn’t, because I make it a rule not to act like a complete douche bag and waste 150 people’s time.  Nevertheless, many of my fellow lecture goers decided to embrace their innate douchbaggedness wholeheartedly. 
    First came the woman who asked how economics was impacted by the gender imbalance among scientists.  Now, I’m as happy as the next gal to call out the patriarchy, but this question had nothing to do with anything in the man’s talk.  Sedlacek completely dodged the question and went on to talk about the economics of buying a friend a glass of wine.  Next came along the elderly German woman who told him that she was part Czech too.  Great!  Lady, thanks!  Now we just need an obnoxious American to tell everybody that he’s somehow related to the English royal family and we will be well on our way to complete asshattery!  At this point I think somebody actually asked a valid reasonable question, but it wasn’t nearly as memorable.  The last question was asked by a middle aged German man who actually sported leather patches on his corduroy jacket and horn rimmed glasses worn non-ironically.  He rambled on for about five minutes discussing capitalism and communism until somebody shouted from the back, “What is the Question?!”  It was amazing.
    After the talk ended, Sedlacek was swamped with more eager question askers.  As Kaska wittily observed, he answered their questions while he checked his pockets for a pack and longingly looked out the front door, where other economics enthusiasts were already enjoying their post lecture cigarettes.