The SMH’s list of 100 public intellectuals came out on Saturday. I was one of the 100 random people asked to vote. The people who I chose are those whose views aren’t predictable, and who I enjoy reading. There are lots of people who satisfy the latter condition but not the former. I tend to think that the best public intellectuals are those who pick interesting issues, and have a new perspective on them. For too many of those on the list, I feel like I invariably know what they’re going to say on issue X when I start reading their articles.
More discussion on the list at Catallaxy and John Quiggin’s blog.
I don’t mind people whose conclusions I can guess in advance, so long as their arguments and/or evidence are less predictable. Quiggin often falls into this category.