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Cap and Trade vs. the Carbon Tax
Friday, June 13, 2008 5:09 PM

[Cross-posted on the parent blog ] So I've been addressing the issue of anthropogenic climate change for some time now, and I haven't said much in the way of addressing specific policy proposals. But I was just given a delightful present by one of my fellow FEE associates: a copy of the American Institute for Economic Research's latest Economic Education... Read More...

by Donny with an A | with no comments

Filed under: Justice, Climate Change, Appropriation and Environmentalism, Economics, Emergent Problems, Compensation

Generational Rights
Monday, May 05, 2008 5:40 PM

[Cross-posted on the parent blog ] The conclusion that we cannot infringe upon future people’s right by causing climate change may not appeal to individuals who see injustice in the fact that by causing climate change, the world we leave behind for future people could be substantially less hospitable than it would have been if presently existing people... Read More...

by Donny with an A | with no comments

Filed under: Justice, Climate Change, The Non-Identity Problem, Opportunity

Rights for Future People in Light of the Non-Identity Problem
Sunday, May 04, 2008 5:08 PM

[Cross-posted on the parent blog ] To this point, we have identified rights-infringements as occurring where climate change causes the climate system to become more dangerous. It might seem, then, that wherever the impacts of a more dangerous climate system are felt, rights will be infringed, into perpetuity. After all, the mere passage of time between a cause... Read More...

by Donny with an A | 2 comment(s)

Filed under: Justice, Climate Change, The Non-Identity Problem

Climate Change and the Right to Culture
Tuesday, April 29, 2008 3:30 PM

[Cross-posted on the parent blog ] The Right to an Opportunity for Cultural Integration Focusing only on property damage caused by climate change, it may be noted, seems to leave out a large part of the picture of why people are concerned about climate change. In addition to the impacts discussed so far, many would find objection the fact that climate change... Read More...

by Donny with an A | with no comments

Filed under: Justice, Climate Change, Opportunity, Lifestyles

A First Glance at What Rights Could Be Infringed by Climate Change
Monday, April 28, 2008 3:18 PM

[Cross-posted on the parent blog ] Climatic Shifts and the Right to Environmental Conditions The most obvious kind of rights infringement which could be caused by climate change involves damage done directly to individuals and property by environmental phenomena. Easiest to think about are the shifts in “normal” environmental conditions which are... Read More...

by Donny with an A | with no comments

Filed under: Justice, Property Rights, Climate Change

What Does It Mean to Advocate a Market Solution to Climate Change?
Tuesday, April 15, 2008 1:22 AM

[Cross-posted on the parent blog ] The purpose of this post will be to tie together some ideas I've been toying around with in other posts, in order to start working towards a coherent introduction to my thesis on the libertarian approach to thinking about climate change. Here goes nothing. Moving Past the Science As a group, libertarians have not dealt well... Read More...

by Donny with an A | 3 comment(s)

Filed under: Justice, Climate Change

Is There a Right to Culture?
Thursday, April 03, 2008 3:52 PM

[Cross-posted on the parent blog ] Last week I had a conversation with my thesis advisor, Dr. Harry Brighouse, in which we discussed an interesting idea which I think might prove important in one way or another, and which I think is worthy of elaboration here. The idea was that a big part of what people are concerned about in discussing climate change is that... Read More...

by Donny with an A | 2 comment(s)

Filed under: Justice, Property Rights, Climate Change, Appropriation and Environmentalism, Opportunity, Lifestyles

Climate Change, Vanishing Lifestyles, and Children
Tuesday, March 25, 2008 7:56 PM

[Cross-posted on the parent blog ] So in a previous post , I discussed a case in which rising sea levels, resulting from a warming of the Earth, caused the salinization of a Bangladeshi farmer's land, so that he could no longer grow rice on it in the way to which he was accustomed. I concluded that as the owner of the land, with full property rights, he should... Read More...

by Donny with an A | with no comments

Filed under: Justice, Property Rights, Climate Change, Appropriation and Environmentalism, Opportunity, Lifestyles

Climate Change and Market Definition of Property Rights
Tuesday, March 25, 2008 1:35 AM

[Cross-posted on the parent blog ] A fellow named Gregory responded to my post, " Can the Free Market Solve the Problems Posed by Climate Change? " with an argument which I think deserves to be discussed in some depth. Gregory wrote: If the market has not arrived at an efficient means regulating itself (compensating those damaged) then a government... Read More...

by Donny with an A | 2 comment(s)

Filed under: Justice, Property Rights, Climate Change, Appropriation and Environmentalism, Emergent Problems

Climate Change and Getting Out of the Way
Friday, March 21, 2008 7:06 PM

[Cross-posted on the parent blog ] Imagine for a moment that you are Abdul, a Bangladeshi rice farmer. You have farmed rice your entire adult life, and you plan to continue into the foreseeable future. Unfortunately, Bangladesh is an extremely low-lying nation; almost all of the country's land lies below 10m above sea level, and your farm is no exception... Read More...

by Donny with an A | 9 comment(s)

Filed under: Justice, Property Rights, Climate Change

Can the Free Market Solve the Problems Posed by Climate Change?
Thursday, March 20, 2008 5:22 PM

[Cross-posted on the parent blog ] When confronted by the possibility of climate change, many libertarians default to the position that the free market, with its ability to mobilize the ingenuity of the economy for the satisfaction of the desires of the people, will provide the solutions we desire. I want to discuss this view, because I think it is the result... Read More...

by Donny with an A | 4 comment(s)

Filed under: Justice, Property Rights, Climate Change, Appropriation and Environmentalism, Economics

Cost-Benefit Analysis in Light of the Non-Identity Problem
Tuesday, February 19, 2008 11:48 AM

[Cross-posted on the parent blog ] So earlier I wrote about the role played by discounting in doing cost-benefit analyses on the impacts of climate change. I concluded that discounting of future damage is unethical because it treats future people as if their interests matter less than present people's. But recently, I've also been discussing the implications... Read More...

by Donny with an A | 5 comment(s)

Filed under: Justice, Discounting, Climate Change, The Non-Identity Problem, Economics

Does the Fact that Individuals Discount Entail the Existence of a Social Discount Rate?
Friday, February 15, 2008 4:09 PM

[Cross-posted on the parent blog ] In my last post , I discussed the idea of discounting as it relates to cost-benefit analysis. I reached the conclusion that discounting treats future people's interests as if they were less significant than our own, and that if cost-benefit analysis aims to make people the best off, then this seems like a bad practice. I... Read More...

by Donny with an A | 5 comment(s)

Filed under: Justice, Equality, Discounting, Climate Change, Economics

Cost-Benefit Analysis, Discounting, and Climate Change
Thursday, February 14, 2008 10:29 PM

[Cross-posted on the parent blog ] I wrote a paper last semester on the notion of discounting future damage (I'll explain what this means below), and I wanted to revisit the issue now that I've done a little more research, to see if I still agree with what I wrote then. Basically, my paper examined how our views of the proper role of discounting are dependent... Read More...

by Donny with an A | 1 comment(s)

Filed under: Justice, Equality, Discounting, Climate Change, Economics