"When he goes back," Foster says, "people hang around his house. They stand around and they come by to see the great Amartya Sen."

Commencement Day

Considering today's speech, it is only natural to think of how Sen compares to another economist: Alan Greenspan, the chair of the Federal Reserve Board, who spoke last year.

The comparison may not be so telling. "For Greenspan, it is about the U.S. and the West, whereas Sen's canvas is likely to be a broader canvas," Hart says.

"It's not that they are in conflict, it's just what they concentrate on is different. Greenspan's job involves monetary policy, interest rates and he doesn't think about some poor women in India, necessarily, on a daily basis," he says. "I think Sen spends a lot of this time worrying about that sort of thing."

Looking at Sen's work, Friedman conjectured in an e-mail message that Sen's speech would focus more on philosophical than economic, challenges.

"The main point for students, I think, is that it is possible to grapple with the big problems and that being intellectually creative can enormously expand one's ability."

Foster says, "[Sen] is socially responsible in the extreme. He brings together philosophy, economics, everything."

Speaking of a recent dinner together, Foster says Sen started the conversation with a discussion of the death penalty, since Tennessee, where Foster lives, had just executed a death row inmate.

"The last time I had dinner with him at the Harvard Faculty Club, he sat across the table from me, but almost as soon as he sat down, he said, 'You must be proud of your state. They have just electrocuted a prisoner. That's really quite an embarrassment,'" Foster says. "It was quite a shock to me, but what he was saying is that... even a prisoner has rights."

"I've thought quite a lot about it since then. This prodding of my conscience," he says. "That is what he's done for the economics profession--

prodded its conscience."