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So is Michael Jackson being rash in planning a concert in Bombay? Not at all. He has struck a deal to give 85 percent of the net profit from the concert to a charity run by the son of Bal Thackeray, head of the Shiv Sena, a local political party.

Apart from masterminding all arrangements for the show and guaranteeing security, the state government has also exempted the Jackson concert from all entertainment taxes.

His heart was taken out and given to someone else when he discovered that the soul remains attached to the body by an ethereal cord for 24 hours after brain death, leaving organ donors conscious as the surgeon rips out their insides.

This cautionary parable was published in a comic strip from Happy Science, and was intended as a contribution to the debate on whether or not to recognize brain death. Unlike other nations, Japanese law does not allow a patient to be pronounced dead until his or her heart stops beating, by which time it is usually too late to donate major organs to others.

The brewery would repeatedly produce a mere third of its capacity and had 25 percent of the market, but its beer tasted nasty. In 1992, South African Breweries bought a 50 percent stake for $22.5 million and got a five year management contract. The South Africans built a new brewery, raised output, improved the taste, and won 75 percent of the market. The morning queue was forced to disperse in the face of this newly established capitalism. The private sector just doesn't give out favors the way the government does.

--Compiled by Michael Burstein from The Economist