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I'm not sure if I understood well, but if I did the problem can be solved by alowing homesteading of parts of, let's say, the ocean. The problem rises only because it is illegal, thus there is no incentive for obtaining more natural resources, thus making them part of the market system.
Besides, the market never sais what is to be done. It only tells you when you are wrong.
MK, thanks for the comment.
Allowing homesteading is a classic libertarian response. It's flaw is that it expects the government to do something that it rarely does - to get out of the way.
Perhaps a more realistic approach would be for the government to actively focus on "tragedy of the commons"-type situations, and to promote dialogue and private property solutions.
ITQs (individual transferable quotas) have already proved themselves to be a viable solution for most fisheries. In the case of seas within the 200 mile limit, the US can aggressively seek to realize ITQ regimes. Internationally, things are less settled as the applicable legal regime is not clear in which event we can try to establish a useful legal regime and can actively promote dialogue and discuss technology that would make it easier to establish property rights regimes for fisheries that are outside various nations' exclusive zones.
Really interesting list, thanks for sharing it. The "theory of market failure" is one of the most exciting topics of economics for me.
By the way, you've got to be careful with capital letters in links. If you copy and paste some of the links, it doesn't work. Some work, but others don't. You should change these ones:
Pollution Trading Permits as a form of Market Socialism and the Search for a Real Market Solution to Environmental Pollution
Robert W. McGee and Walter E. Block
www.walterblock.com/.../pollution_trading_permits.pdf
Resolving the Tragedy of the Commons by Creating Private Property Rights in Wildlife
Robert J. Smith
www.cato.org/.../cj1n2-1.html
And the latest one in Acton doesn't work.
Thanks for the head's up, Martin. The links all work now.
good post, i read that too. can you blog about POLAR CITIES re my blog here? thanks. pro or con okay.
Tom,
I'm curious to know what you feel should be done about environmental crises, within a Libertarian framework? We both agree that employing government force in a command-and-control paradigm is ineffective and actually destructive, so what would you propose that individuals do within their own sphere of voluntary influence to address these issues?
Also, since talking about individual actions speaks primarily to actions taken on the consumer side of the equation, what would you propose that businesses do to address these issues? Environmentally-friendly production methods are all well and good, but how would you resolve the fact that many of these methods simply aren't profitable in today's market? Some people are indeed willing to pay extra for environmentally-friendly products, as evidenced by the proliferation of organic food markets, but I suspect that they are in the minority. In any case, how do you prevent pricing the poor out of some market by advocating a switch to more expensive, yet more environmentally conscious methods of production, without forced "charity" to make up the difference?
~ Ron
Danny, as the climate warms, economic activity will naturally gradually shift to the north as opportunities arise.
The last thing that would help us to efficiently allocate capital and resources if we experience a pinch due to rapid climate change would be direct governmental investments and subsidies.
We do, however, need government involvement in clarifying and enforcing property rights to any Arctic assets that are now "public".
Ron, good questions. Appropriate responses of course depend on the precise problem that you're talking about.
Individual responses on what we call "environmental" problems typically have limited effectiveness because harms are usally spread out, it is often difficult to identify a precise person/firm responsible and one's legal rights to take action both limited and burdened by the balance between personal costs and benefits that are shared with others.
Individuals can multiply their influence by banding together with those who agree with them and making their voice heard through purchasing campaigns, protests and other forms of market pressure (boycotts, speech, disclosure/dissemination of information about the undesired behavior, supporting "green" firms and products, etc.).
Changes in market demand gradually move businesses and as supply gradually changes more "expensive" green products become less expensive. And of course pollution isn't "free" - but merely the shifting of real costs to others - and often represents real welfare losses that would be avoided by more efficient arrangements that had the effect of internalizing external costs. Cleaning up the environment in the Western nations did not impoverish anyone.
There are of course profitable businesses to be made in finding and marketing ways that reduce the inefficiencies that result in environmental damage. Cleaner and greener businesses should be marketing themselves, not only to consumers but to other businesses. Information is a key driver of expanding opportunities to reduce pollution, etc.
Clean businesses should be campaigning to get the government out of the way as much as possible, except for trying to clarify and enforce property rights, or otherwise coordinating group action.
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"Man is clever but not wise ("homo sapiens" is a misnomer)"
True. But humanity is wise. Men create cultures, economies and law.
Man's flaw is that he is over confident of his own intelligence. He tries to control things he doesn't understand, like culture, economies, and law.
You have just made an excellent case for why government involvement will not improve the environment. Because governments, like man, are not wise.
Jon, thanks for the comments. A response is here: mises.com/.../sophmoric-optimism.aspx
"This is too simple, as well as self-contradictory. Humanity is wise because he collectively (but non-deliberately?) creates "cultures, economies and law" (let's not forget governments), but individuals are foolish when they seek to use institutions to achieve particular purposes?"
Yes, humans do create these collectively and non-deliberately. Economies are many individuals pursuing their own interests. By acting upon only local knowledge, many simple beings can create complex systems.
Most importantly economies are not beings of themselves, they are only a network of many simple actions.
Government does not belong among culture, economies, and law. Government is the opposite of the spontaneous order found in the other three. It is not the result of simple actions forming a complex whole, it is centrally planned.
Individuals are foolish to believe they can create institutions able to centrally plan decentralized spontaneous systems.
As Mises proved, human institutions do not have the knowledge to centrally plan markets. Societies only function because of antonymous units acting on local knowledge.
Sound Law is developed through the course of human (inter)action, not introspection. Because, as you said, humans are clever, not wise.
Sorry, but not only have governments also evolved, continue to evolve and can be consciously shaped, but it behooves us to understand them and try to consciously shape them, if only to minimize the damage that they do.
all the coins have two sides, man is not perfict.
So I am agree men is clever but not wise.
Men always do something wrong.
"Sorry, but not only have governments also evolved, continue to evolve and can be consciously shaped, but it behooves us to understand them and try to consciously shape them, if only to minimize the damage that they do."
Governments do evolve. They evolve as a matter of self defense, they change their organization and role in order to maintain a justification for existence.
Of course governments can be consciously shaped, they are institutions, not societies. Governments can be controlled, but they do not control.
Jon, I afraid I don't follow your last comments.
No, citizens are not wrong to seek to counterbalance corporations, but the govt is a poor counterbalance to corporations.
Lets not forget that the 800 lb. gorilla in the room grew to be that big mainly because of the welfare it keeps getting from the Govt. It is the nature of corporations (and individuals) to be rent seeking. But rent seeking is useful only when the govt is powerful enough do any favours. If you weaken the govt, or better still eliminate it, you make rent-seeking unprofitable. That IMHO is a better counter-balance.
Cheers!
MCLA
Governments do not achieve their ends. They are not able to control economies as they desire.
When they seek to control people, they end up destroying human productivity.
Governments operate with negative sanctions. But violence is not a productive force.
There is no animating spirit controlling societies that governments can manipulate. That is a pagan myth.
Governments can impede, but they can not control.
MCLA, I agree completely that the best way to lessen rent-seeking is to reduce the rents that are available through government.
This implies smaller government, but also suggests that we can make progress by focussing on breathing more life into the federalist structure of power-sharing with the states, the checks and balances between the branches of government, by limiting the ability of either political party to get a local lock on power by gerrymandering.
I appreciate the agreement that citizens are not wrong to seek to counterbalance corporations, but you've missed a point. Corporations are the 800 lb. gorilla not because of ongoing corporate welfare - that's simply the effect. Their powerful advantages over citizens comes from their size and financial power, which derives from legislative grants of unlimited life, unlimited purposes and limited liability for their investors. To reduce government, some effort must be made to moderate these advantages.
<i>I also realize that for certain cases our shared tool of government may serve productive or even essential purposes. </i>
So, you believe that government is needed to 'fix' the enviromental 'problems' ???
I always thought that to be a libertarian, one needed to understand that the only legitimate function of government is to protect individual rights.
Also, libertarians usually realize that monopolic government can't really protect individual rights because it is...a monopoly.
You on the other hand, don't realize this, and also believe that government is essential to deal with polution ?
Juan, thanks for your visit.
I am certainly in favor of radical envrionmental deregulation domestically, but believe a more nuanced position is required for problems that are outside or extend beyond our borders. In any case, I don't expect our government will voluntarily disappear, so I am in favor of incremental changes that shift towards a greater reliance on property rights, markets and voluntary cooperation.
I hope you will browse through my other posts to get a better picture of what I think. In addition, you might try this comment thread on the main Mises blog:
blog.mises.org/.../007152.asp
I'm more or less familiar with your position, I think ?
You believe that 'science' has declared that GW is a fact - is real - is objective - etc ?
You say that property rights are needed to address the problem ?
I believe that government is not needed for domestic pollution problems, but for climate change and the oceans, which involve resources nobody owns, there is an imprtant role for government.
I don't really understand what you mean by your last paragraph. Corporations are groups of willing participants. I don't see what is inherently bad about that. When they lobby government to give them special privilages, they are no worse than the poor family begging the government for welfare. Corporations just illuminate the corruption of our system better than anything else. In the end, being an 800 lb gorilla isn't a bad thing in itself; you can't blame things for being what they are. It's when they have a tool that allows them to silently hurt people that they become dangerous.
That tool is a corrupt, powerful government. Take away that tool, take away the threat.
So, you're not advocating the privatization of the sea, but rather that world-government control it ? Same thing for the atmosphere ?
Contumacy, those who get the greatest gains from government are not particularly interested in loosening their grip.
Yes, corporations are "voluntary" asociations but think back a bit. Aren`t they creatures of the state? Are their state-given advantages to corporations that partnerships and other busiesses created under common law don`t have? Have those advantages grown? And - apart from competition from upstarts - don`t they have more powerful levers over government than individuals?
Juan, your presumptive strawman is offensive, so you hardly invite me to bother with you further.
No, I don`t advocate world government.
I`ve already given you a thread that spells out more of what I think. You can take a look, or wait until I post more here. Your choice.
In what ways Ron "has underestimated the seriousness of the climate change problem" in your opinion?
Do you think climate change problem is serious and real?
I've seen you're quite interested in environmental issues, I guess you'll have some scientific knowledge about this...
It's allright Tokyo. Your claim that 'libertarians' deny I don't know what , sounds offensive to me. And the claim that man is clever, but not wise, sounds also offensive.
And let me ask, If man is not wise, we should we listen to your 'arguments' ?
we should we listen to your 'arguments' ?
I meant :
Why should we listen to your 'arguments' ?
Martin, man's activities - GHGs, soot, tropical deforestation, albedo changes) - are very clearly forcing the climate (even if we do not know with certainty what other facors are at work) and oceans is a geologically rapid way and with effects that are already evident in advances of the seasons/climate zones/growing days in the US and in the much higher temps and thawing of the Arctic. This is having a big impact on natural systems, as well as human systems. Moreover, there is a huge amount of inertia in the system, so we will see increasing impacts for some time, even if we were to do the impossible by stopping at GHG emissions tomorrow.
Here is a decent summary: www.carbonequity.info/.../Arctic.pdf. The IPCC summaries are also useful, but are already out of date due to rapid changes.
If one country controlled the world's thermometer and was cranking it up, you can bet many people would be upset, and those adversely affected demanding compensation. But the fact fo the matter is that as nobody owns the atmpsphere, we simply have no control mechanism, so we face a tragedy of the commons situation and complex, difficult negotiations about what to do. Opposition comes various sources: those who benefit most from the status quo (free GHG emissions and freedom to pass costs on to others), thos who oppose ANY government meddling in the economy or, worse, the creeping creation of a world government (even though internationally there simply is no government fiat, but voluntary multiparty negotiations), and those who enjoy the partisanship (hating socialists, enviros etc.) and as a result have a hard time seeing the real facts.
Juan, who's saying you should listen to me? I've made arguments above about what I see are problems - feel free to argue them directly.
You can think and engage in discussion, or you can prove my point for me. The reflexive prickliness is an inherited tribal cognitive mechanism that gets in the way of thinking clearly. Have you noticed this? There are still an awful lot of Bush supporters who think the the Iraq invasion and subsequent war conduct were all the morally right thing to do - and they typically think those who disagree with them are insane or liberals or both.
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Actually, the Ropers were banned because they behave in juvenile internet spamming.
Brett, tell me more. My own experience has been that Republicans when criticized tend to view the critics as enemies and thus, ipso facto, liberals.
This statement by Leon is par for the course: "a bunch of liberals pretending to be Republicans"
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Clearing the Air About Genesis
No one else, presently walking on this Earth, is an expert on Genesis. Do not even listen to anyone else trying to expound what Genesis is saying, or what "creationism" is, for they do not understand the text, and are speaking from ignorance. There is no "creation account" in Genesis. There is no such thing as a "creation/evolution" contest. It is "evolution" verses the "Observations of Moses ", given to Moses by God in 1598 BC, in biblical order, as revealed by the Living Word in the Gospels.
The world of theology (and creationism) has never understood Genesis, so of course they would not have told us the truth, since they never did their "homework". Each day in Genesis, from Gen. 1:2 thru 2:3 was a 24-hr day , shown to Moses, taken from seven different weeks (1 day from Creation Week, 6 days from 6 restoration weeks), and each week was from a different geologic age. The seven days conveyed to Moses were not linear.
Genesis chapter two covers about a 200 yr period, starting in about 7200 BC, and has nothing to do with chapter one. There was no "evolution". There was Creation, followed by extinction, then six periods of restorations, with five more extinction events in between, ending each era of mankind. With the third era of mankind (the second restoration), God "redesigned" mankind to be in His image, after His likeness, in about 64 Million BC.
If you have comments, issues, or questions, direct them to me ([email protected]), or read the book "Moses Didn't Write About Creation!". Have I made myself clear?
Herman Cummings
PO Box 1745
Fortson GA, 31808
[email protected]
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Herman, thanks for your comment. Please feel free to comment directly to "Fundamentalist" on the relevant thread(s).
TT
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New paper!
Is this the science that proves climate change wrong?
geoclimaticstudies.info/benthic_bacteria.htm
Carbon dioxide production by benthic bacteria: the death of manmade global warming theory?
Daniel A Klein*, Mandeep J Gupta*, Philip Cooper**, Arne FR Jansson**.
*Department of Climatology, University of Arizona; **Department of Atmospheric Physics, Göteborgs Universitet (University of Gothenburg, Sweden.)
Received: 18 February 2007 / Accepted: 9th August 2007 / Published online: 3rd November 2007
©Inst Geoclimatic Studies 2007
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While this is tangential to his central theme, Hossein-zadeh is far too generous in that first paragraph you have quoted. Does he offer any evidence to support those claims (of the economic benefits of imperialism in the past)?
You can't just say they were experiencing rapid economic growth at the same time they were pursuing imperial policies. Correlation does not imply causation.
The question is: was the economic growth greater than, the same as, or less than would have occurred in the absence of the imperial policies (all else being equal)?
Todd, of course I'm not offering him to discuss the point that concerns, nor have I don't the legwork to give you and answer.
However, if you think about it, I think that you'd agree that he is probably right - that in the past imperialism and aggression were substantially motivated by gains to elites from theft from other countries (and such wars/empires were sustained by resources and spoils from the countries invaded) but now, at least in the case of the US empire, the motivations are much less about spoils abroad than about gains elites get by milking the US state.
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Is there no room between global warming is a farce and global warming will be catastrophic?
Sun Microsystems' opinion carries no weight with me. These are the goons that wrote Orin Hatch's anti-trust suit against Microsoft for him, claiming that Microsoft was harming consumers by giving away a free web browser which was eventually taken down by open-source competitors of all things (and has any company actually committed the second stage of predatory pricing?).
Some of the largest energy companies welcome the regulation as increased (imposed) operating costs will bar new competitors from entering the market.
There is a lot of hysteria that comes from the environmentalist crowd's desire to have all bow to their larger wishes--the founder of Greenpeace quit the organization saying that it had been hijacked by political interests using the evironment as a tool for other aims.
Al Gore won a nobel prize for a making a film claiming ocean levels would rise 20 feet in the next hundred years, while the IPCC's report gives a 95% chance of a one foot rise over that time span with a worst-case scenario of two feet. With many in the international community, and especially the NGOs that represent no constituency in particular and their enormous influence in the U.N., celebrating such hype as a step in the right direction, instead of properly treating it as a step backwards that complicates a rational solution to the problem, I don't think distrust of the U.N. is unwarranted.
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Wow I almost wrote a post on the exact same article. The difference is that I was going to point out what rent-seeking bastards the business leaders are.
Local governments won't stop people from competing with you? No problem! At least not when you have a socialist world state that (you hope) can stop new competition everywhere!
I also appriciated their use of the broken window fallacy. Sure action would create business opportunities...but along comes at least 10x as much cost. Just think of all the good could be done with the money fed to the global warming gods.
I put these men on the same level as military industries pushing for war so they get more business.
but what these collectivists are really saying is that they want a global tax on individuals so that their costs in reducing GHG. They make themselves look good for "caring" about the environment and yet we pay for their ability to carry out and take credit for saving the planet.
Kyle, I agree that we should have our eyes open on the points you mention. But we should certainly not close our eyes either, and pretend that this all a perfect storm of idiots, collectivists, misanthropes and the misuinformed.
The people who signed this statement are obviously well-informed and while some may have rent-seeking purposes tha`s a hard sale to say of all of them.
Contumacy and Stephen:
Thanks for your comments. I am sorry if I have misled you with my snark. I actually think the issue is quite complex. You might try taking a look at my comments on Sean Corrigan`s recent post, "Carbophobic Socialism",
blog.mises.org/.../007482.asp, and then some of my earlier posts on my blog.
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Fascinating! Good eye.
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Tom, the first time I read this post, I had a hard time seeing your point through the heavy fog of sarcasm. Writers of think that sarcasm makes their writing more biting in some way, but it really doesn't work. I don't know if it is the venue of the web or if it is a general principle. In case case, it is bad form if your goal is to be understood.
Many thanks, Jeff. I have responded to you directly by email.
Funny post, it had me laughing out loud. I do hope you realize I was kidding though.
Apologies for the lack of clear organization. Maybe later, as time allows. http://jolt.law.harvard.edu
Like a magician Connaughton is forcing a card. To see how, just look up how many power plants are under construction today.
Eli, Connaughton is talking about the anticipated need for energy/CO2 capture globally. How far off is this gross estimate?
Only a moving universe of opportunity plus choice enables
the present reality.
Each individual human being possesses a unique, highly
developed, and sensitive perception of variety. Thus
aware, man is endowed with a natural capability for enact-
ing internal mental and external physical selectivity.
Quantitative and qualitative choice-making thus lends
itself as the superior basis of an active intelligence.
Human is earth's Choicemaker. His title describes
his definitive and typifying characteristic. Recall
that his other features are but vehicles of experi-
ence intent on the development of perceptive
awareness and the following acts of decision and
choice. Note that the products of man cannot define
him for they are the fruit of the discerning choice-
making process and include the cognition of self,
the utility of experience, the development of value-
measuring systems and language, and the accultur-
ation of civilization.
The arts and the sciences of man, as with his habits,
customs, and traditions, are the creative harvest of
his perceptive and selective powers. Creativity, the
creative process, is a choice-making process. His
articles, constructs, and commodities, however
marvelous to behold, deserve neither awe nor idol-
atry, for man, not his contrivance, is earth's own
highest expression of the creative process.
Human is earth's Choicemaker. The sublime and
significant act of choosing is, itself, the Archimedean
fulcrum upon which man levers and redirects the
forces of cause and effect to an elected level of qual-
ity and diversity. Further, it orients him toward a
natural environmental opportunity, freedom, and
bestows earth's title, The Choicemaker, on his
singular and plural brow.
- from The Season of Generation-Choicemaker
"Man is a being capable of subduing his emotions and
impulses; he can rationalize his behavior. He arranges
his wishes into a scale, he chooses; in short, he acts.
What distinguishes man from beasts is precisely that he
adjusts his behavior deliberately." Ludwig von Mises
Do not read more into the post than is there. I did not and do not endorse this or any other tax. What the tax proposal does do is call the alarmists' bluff.
As a follow-up, I recently withheld my willingness to sign a statement on global warming policy until it eliminated some sentences that implied support for the tax. The language was subsequently changed.
On the main blog, Sean Corrigan posts the latest missive of what he considers the brave dissenting voices
[snark meter - medium] John Baden, a former logger and oilman, has long been a pillar of the "free
Dr. Cordato:
Thanks for your comments. Sorry, but I couldn't help finding interesting the fact that you found McKitrick's tax proposal interesting.
I hope people will take a further look at it.
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Thanks for posting this. His quote about one-third oligarchy, one-third plutocracy, one-third theocracy is a good measure of the current Republican presidential candidates as well.
... is what poor countries need. So argues Keith Lockitch of the Ayn Rand Institute , in a new article
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Spot on comments. We need to find a nice plot in Iberia.
TokyoTom, Harold Bloom, the literature professor and literary critic, and Allan Bloom, author of The Closing of the American Mind among other books, are not the same person. And death has supervened in the latter's case btw.
[Many thanks for the correction! Where have I been? TT]
I don’t believe that the best initial reaction to environmental issues is to curse “enviros” as being “misanthropes” who hate mankind and are itching for most of us to die.
I agree. I want a clean environment as much as anyone. However, you have only to look at the DDT ban in Africa to prove that there are a great many enviro's who, if not wishing for mankind to die, don't care if a great many do die even when the science as with DDT, is now known to be seriously flawed (actually, it was known to be flawed then. The ban was purely political.).
You may have missed the interview on tv with the President of Greenpeace who fought against mining in Rumania, even though Rumania is one of the poorest countries on Earth and desperately needs economic development. He actually said that the people are poor, but they smile a lot. So, they are happy in their poverty, I guess. This movement is where white Republicans were 60 years ago with their "Let them eat cake" attitude. (yes, I know she didn't really mean it.)
Remember, the co-founder of Greenpeace broke away from the organization is disgust as Greenpeace was no longer science based, but purely political.
Anything that will give all governments vast powers over every aspect of our lives, needs to be viewed with extreme skepticism. This makes anything Bush has done, which I have never noticed in my life nor heard anyone else with any specific example of a loss of privacy, pale in comparison. There is no comparison.
Mac, thanks for the comments - which it seems run to your general views of enviros instead of to this particular post.
I think the key for Austrians in approaching environmental issues has to be an understanding that these issues are ones of an inability of people with different preferences to express those preferences in the marketplace through economic transactions, due to a lack of clear or enforceable private or community property rights in resources. As a result, the disputes become politicized.
Austrians should fundamentally be sympathetic to all sides here, and focus on how, practically, can property rights (or joint management systems) be established.
Sure, some enviros might be socialists, but many rent-seekers on the corporate side are essentially socialist as well. But ideology has little to do with whether or not there is actually a problem that deserves consideration.
More specifically, have you really researched the DDT issue? I think that you are wrong on the facts and that your summary is sloppy and muddled. Do you have any idea who banned DDT, when, where and for what applications?
I'm not sure about the Romanian mining issue. Who were enviros pressuring - the foreign mining co? I'd say they have every right to exert market pressure on such firms, even if they may be wrong from a policy perspective. I don't object to such projects, as long as the local community actually has the ability to collect damages in the event of pollution by the mining firm.
As for Bush, perhaps you might want to read the article on the main blog about Glen Greenwald's book, "How would a Patriot Act?" The Administration's push to spy on us, control us and to hide it's actions from us, all free of Congressional oversight or any submission to rule of law, has been real and appalling.
Of course we should be skeptical about whether government can actually help do soemthing about climate change. That said, people overstate what is likely to happen. First, there is no global government, but many independent ones that are all trying to agree how to deal with a shared atmosphere while still cutting a good deal for themselves. The situation is analogous to ranchers negotiating to close of a range to newcomers and set management rules to keep the range in good shape.
Second, the US is unlikely to adopt any system that is more burdensome than other industrialized nations. Adding a tax on carbon is hardly intrusive, and such a tax could be used to offset payroll or income taxes. If cap and trade is adopted, such a system would have the effect of creating market prices for GHG emisssions. Either system would essentially send signals to the market, and leave everyone free to act in ways that suit their own preferences, and would be preferable to mandates or the use of taxpayer funds to subsidize investments in new technologies.
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Thank you for you informed and reasoned response. I will get back to you, as time allows, with the DDT data and quotes as well as Greenpeace. I like to be accurate in my statements, which I am sure that I am, but I hardly expect you or anyone else to take my word for it.
However, the WHO is trying to get the DDT ban lifted in Africa and the African nations are begging for it, but it is the enviro's who are fighting it tooth and nail. But, that said, I will get the hard data for you.
I agree with you and Adler that this has been an embarrassing subject for libertarians, who have in large part refused to talk about it. But I would be hesitant to make an analogy to ranchers deciding what to do with their territory; governments are not forming agreements about their own contributions to climate change, but rather are agreeing to coerce their citizens into certain things, regardless of what those individuals think about it. If we portray climate change as a justice issue, then that isn't necessarily a problem; we wouldn't have a major problem with coercing a burglar. But it's important to realize that climate change policy must reflect some underlying view of what's ethically permissable. To be honest, it's unclear what kind of ethical paradigm is consistent with the kinds of policy we've been hearing about.
Donny: "I would be hesitant to make an analogy to ranchers deciding what to do with their territory; governments are not forming agreements about their own contributions to climate change, but rather are agreeing to coerce their citizens into certain things, regardless of what those individuals think about it."
I understand your objections, but please understand my point, which is that in the case of climate change there is no single government that is seeking to coerce us, for its own benefit and that of insiders. Rather, at the international level this is very much an open, multi-party negotiation. None of the different governments (or packs of thieves, as some may have it) perfectly represents the interests of its citizens, but de facto they perform such a role, and such negotiations on the level of states are unavoidable. The situation is very much like one of resource users negotiatiating how to manage a commons.
I just read it. Glaring omission in his argument: he provides no analysis of the the failure of the competence of the state to manage this problem if it is a problem. He also mixes up real and fake markets: private roads vs tolls on public roads, e.g.
This may be less harmful solution to non-existant problem. Not much more though. There's no problem in 0,7 degree Celsius bump in decades... even if it would actually be due to our 0,28% contribution to global warming.
This would create fake market of fake goods. Hopefully effectively averting fake problems.
BTW If Mars was considered it's obvious that it's atmosphere will be owned by one to terraform it. But how do you slice ownership of air we all got for free?
Jeff, the competence of the state is indeed a serious issue. So is rent-seeking. Discussions of policy should ignore neither.
But I'm not sure what you're suggesting as to the difference between real and fake markets in the context of climate change policy. Do you mean to advocate, instead of taxes or emissions permits, that the best way to address climate change would be to first privatize all roads globally and then for parties affected by climate change to band together to sue the roadway companies? And for the same parties to sue utility firms worldwide?
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TT, don't you worry that these "voluntary" measures are merely a prelude to mandates, and mandates themselves will be used as a cartelizing device for big business to impose costs on smaller competitors? That's the history of regulation in a nutshell.
Jeff, how would your concern actually play out in this case? I see an effort by large utilities, banks and enviros to lead the market in a way that disadvantages coal, not competitors - and creates opportunities for new technologies. Smaller utilities or banks are not subject to the principles and remain free to contruct or finance whatever facilities they want.
The only way that the utilities would get a leg up on competitors would be, in the event legislators act, if they were allocated free emission rights or tax exemptions or subsidies that were not available to others. That of course is something to keep an eye out for.
I see this more as large users of the commons agreeing that the commons is being abused and deciding to act together to restrain their own engrossment.
False assumption--if fossil 'externalities' are included via Pigouvian tax, it must include such externalities for renewables as well (although the price of endangered bald eagles killed by wind likely a tough calculation)---but be aware that will in all likelihood NOT change the energy resource mix much. It cannot be just 'carbon tax' but include every impact--and that cannot be accurately done.
Tom, thanks for the comment. There are plenty of externalities and since we need to balance the ability of the government ot effectively do anything (direct/indirect costs of government and rent-seeking) I certainly am not of the view that we should try to be looking for externalities in order to justify Pigouvian taxes.
I agree with you about the externalities to wind and biofuels. We need to do a beter job protecting property rights in tropical forests and maybe create them in raptors. And we should remove subsidies for ethanol.
Great example of how fake libertarians can destroy freedom in the name of 'freedom'.
Hi Tom,
Thanks for letting me know about your post via my blog.
I totally agree with your final statement about whaling distracting us all from much more important issues.
I have been and remain skeptical that (self-declared) environmentalists would be happy with ITQs being applied to whales. They want to control what other people do, not just look after their own property.
The frustrating thing with whaling is that the environmentalists could get over it today, if only they had the will to do so. A recent article on the Pew's Tokyo Whale Symposium noted that the chair of the meeting thought it was important that the whaling issue be brought to a conclusion, apparently (according to what I read in the paper) because the environmentalists need to free their resources up to focus on other important issues.
I say: So, swallow your pride and do it. Blaming whaling people and their sympathizers for dragging it out is ridiculous as sustainable whaling is quite acceptable from a conservation point of view. Which makes me think - if it's not for conservation that they aren't spending these resources on other "issues", perhaps it's actually a good thing that whaling alone is a scapegoat.
So unfortunately I think the IWC has too many political problems as it is without it being complicated further by ITQ discussions. Once it's solved it's fundamental problem - the disagreement about whether taking whales is OK or not - then ITQs could indeed by a good talking point.
My prediction is that the IWC will become entirely irrelevant before that happens however. Maybe a replacement organization (of whalers) will consider ITQs though.
David, many thanks for your comments.
I hope you'll give me a holler the next time there is whaling event in Tokyo. I can be reached at my email address noted here: mises.com/.../TokyoTom.aspx.
I hope that a path ahead can be found within the IWC and relatively soon, but in any case I don't expect Japan to walk away from the IWC, unless they are first prepared for real heat in their relationship with the US.
I think all parties in this mess deserve blame, including the US, for failure to exercise leadership. However, the fact that it is thoroughly politicized is not a surprise, and is of course what is the principal stumbling block to progress.
Politicization is a natural consequence when resources do not have clear private (or long-established community) owners. In these cases, governments become proxy battlegrounds for expressing one's preferences, as the lack of any ownership makes it impossible for parties with differing interests to express those interests via private or market transactions. This often deteriorates into partisan, zero-sum battles. For some of the enviros, this deadlock allows a simplified, black-white grandstanding that helps to keep the flow of donations coming; likewise, in Japan and other whaling nations I suspect that there is no small political hay that is made by standing firm against those radical enviros who would try to dictate how Japan and others should use the oceans's resources.
While a particular possible solution such as ITQs can be discussed later, I think that both sides need to better understand the institutional factors that underlies the present rather sick dynamics.
Regards,
Tom
Juan, thanks for your visit. One doubts that this group can have much of an impact itself, though it would be very interesting to hear their thinking behind their decision to advocate carbon taxess, no?
In their more considerate writings, Austrians have counseled a cool, rational approach to environmental
If you're going to talk about Reisman, you should probably start from the beginning. He actually represents one of the more fascinating viewpoints in the climate change debate, because he holds positions that you wouldn't think anyone would hold. You might check out:
www.mises.org/.../qjae5_2_1.pdf
www.lewrockwell.com/.../reisman34.html
You might also be interested in my reaction to the first piece:
libertarian-left.blogspot.com/.../emergent-problems.html
With regard to Corrigan, I think he has made some legitimate points. Not every post an Austro-libertarian makes need be one that ignores the extremists and the mistaken arguments among the environmentalists. That said, this shouldn't be the sole focus of every Austro-libertarian. A division of labor in dealing with environmental issues is acceptable.
As you know, I agree that Reisman's posts are particularly unconstructive. You might like my comments on his more recent post: "<a href="A' target=_new rel=nofollow mce_href='http://blog.mises.org/archives/007800.asp">A'>blog.mises.org/.../007800.asp">A Word to Environmentalists</a>."
I would also add, as I've noted before, that Reisman is self-professedly not a strict Austrian. He is as much a classical economist as he is an Austrian, if not more so. And on some issues, like environmentalism, he can channel Rand in her worst moments.
We should also be careful not to conflate Austrian economics with libertarianism just because most people here happen to adhere to both.
war is peace . . . carbon taxes are property rights.
Donny, thanks for your comments. Actually, Dr. Reisman has vigourously posted on environmental topics on LvMI over the past two years. I encourage you to look for these prior posts and at some of the discussion. The two pieces you link to were posted and commented on here: blog.mises.org/.../006691.asp
blog.mises.org/.../006700.asp.
The authors' archive for Dr. Reisman now looks like it only goes to last April, but he has many earlier pieces - which apparently you need to run a search on the blog to find.
Geoffrey, I appreciate your comments. Not sure what Corrigan has right, though.
Peterus: "BTW If Mars was considered it's obvious that it's atmosphere will be owned by one to terraform it. But how do you slice ownership of air we all got for free?"
I agree with your point that it's pretty clear that mankind owns the atmopshere. We'd certainly take that position if aliens came and tried to alter it. But how to manage the commons? That's the tough question - as it is for most commons. But there's no principled position that insists that the commons be carved up, instead of being managed as a commons under agreed rules.
Juan, obviously carbon taxes do not represent property rights, because they are imposed by the state and the proceeds not given to those who own the air or to those who experience costs from climate change. But what if a national trust was declared over the atmosphere, and any "users fees" charged directly returned per capita to citizens? Would that represent a property right?
You've saved me from having to make any more comments on the latest Reisman article. Thanks very much.
There appear to be two listings for posts by Sean Corrigan. You only link to one. Here's the other:
blog.mises.org/.../Corrigan2
This, for example, from his latest blogpost is a good point:
"The article ends with this: "It is estimated by the year 2050, another seven million persons are expected to take refuge in Mumbai after global warming leads to either a drought or deluge in their village or city elsewhere in the country," D'Silva said.
I especially like this last "prediction" - sometime in the next four decades, somewhere in India, it will either rain too much or too little! A clarion example of rational scientific falsifiability!"
blog.mises.org/.../007775.asp
Predictions like that from climate scientists are meaningless as prediction and amount to mere fearmongering.
I'm glad to find you have a blog, Tokyo Tom--I've enjoyed seeing you repeatedly mop the floor with Reisman in comment threads at Mises Blog over the last couple of years. In all that time, I don't think I've once seen him directly address any of your counter-arguments. The only time I'm aware of that he even acknowledged their existence was in a purely facetious post with absolutely no substantive argument in it.
That seems to be a common pattern with him, though. He devoted a string of posts to denouncing me, and never even acknowledged my counter-arguments (with the exception of an oblique "some argue that..." reference that probably indicated his having read one of my counter-posts).
Geoffrey, thanks for the comment. Thanks for pointing out that Sean Corrigan has two threads, but they were already both up - maybe I'll add an "and" to make it clearer.
As for Corrigan's points, I hardly believe that they are in good faith. India is large, and like in the US, climate change is expected to increase the likelihood both of regional droughts and extreme weather events like heavy downfalls and flooding. (In fact, it seems we are already seeing this in the US.) It is neither meaningless nor fearmongering to note this - though of course politicians and others can be expected to fearmonger.
In my recent post, " Escape from Reason: are Austrians conservatives, or neocons, on the environment
Climate change is a non-problem on one hand and the perfect excuse for totalitarianism on the other. Responsible libertarians should avoid providing arguments for their enemies. Also, I think it was pretty obvious for libertarians that the price of gov't solutions is always higher than the benefits supposedly earned through these 'solutions'.
Walter Block of Loyola University has graced the main LvMI blog with a rare post, this time a clipping
Juan: "Responsible libertarians should avoid providing arguments for their enemies." What is this supposed to mean? That libertarians should never change their minds for the most convenient position on matters of science? People like that are what Hayek said he disapproved of in his essay "Why I am not a Conservative".
TT, I'm so sorry your comment was snagged by the software as spam. Because of your blog here, I looked through the spam comments and found yours. Probably the number of URLs caused this. I'm approved it. Thank you also for not jumping to the conclusion, as some people do, that you are somehow being censored.
Actually, TT, you could more readily assure that your comments will be published right away, and not be tagged as spam, if you would put fewer URLs in them, remember that people do have Google, and that it is always better to make a concise and compelling argument than to refer people to twenty things that they should read.
Well, doesn't confirmation bias work the other way round too? The global warming activists who are so thoroughly convinced disaster is looming on the horizon and CO2, and only CO2, is the primary cause, are just as apt to fall prey to this.
Here's one more proof...
Buenos Aires has first snow since 1918
www.guardian.co.uk/.../argentina.weather
Only fanaticals can't admit that more snow proves GW. And so does less snow.
Actually, I thought Gunter's article was reasonably fair, as long as it was intended as satire the way he implied at the end. He specifically said that evidence he presented didn't entail anything about the long-term state of the comment, and his purpose seemed to be to call attention to the sort of reporting which can legitimately be considered alarmist is nature; screaming about droughts, heat waves, and floods really is unfair and unrepresentative of the current state of the science.
However, it's worth noting that none of the events he cites are particular problematic for the mainstream view. Just as individual warm years don't prove anything, neither do individual cold years. A quick glance at a temperature record spanning over the past century does seem to reveal a trend, with considerable year-to-year variability. Last year was a departure from the trend which doesn't seem outside of the range of the normal variability we've seen over the past century. It isn't that these things fall short of being conclusive evidence against the mainstream view; they aren't convincing evidence against it at all.
In short, if Block were citing the article to try to dispute the mainstream view, his argument would miss its mark. Gunter's article doesn't really make any trouble for anyone. But if he's just taking a shot at the mainstream media, then I personally don't think he's being unfair.
Donny, I appreciate the comment here, but good observations like these would engage more people if you'd also make them over on the main comment thread.
However, I wish that you wouldn't try to twist yourself intoa pretzel by trying to be even-handed with those whose own attempts to appear even-handed are easily dtermined to be disingenuous.
Gunter has consistently tried to cast doubt on the main conclusions coming from science and on the motives of others, rather than being frank about the science and focussing on policy. He has an agenda of persuading Canadians to do nothing (and perhaps to assist those similarly inclined here), and this consistent with it.
Likewise, Block's intentions can be judged from his complete lack of commentary on structural problems/policy from a Misesean viewpoint and from the reactions he elicited on the main thread.
It's extremly disappointing.
Here's some more:
World Climate Report: www.worldclimatereport.com/.../antarctica-ain’t-cooperating/
This blogpost isn't very constructive, Tom. The tone is miscalculated. And continually accusing Austro-libertarians of being hypocrites on private property rights, contrary to all evidence, is insulting and counterproductive. For one thing, you can't expect all of us to know about a particular local case before it is brought to our attention, but you appear to blame us here for not knowing. For another, you can't expect all of us to drop our other projects and leap to the aid of the local inhabitants, as you appear to in this post. What are YOU doing for them? Aside from badgering us with insulting and either disingenuous or ill-informed posts this? You know very well that we defend private property rights and that we are against anyone, including companies, receiving government permission and protection to do violate them. Why would local private property owners merely wanting to defend their private property be viewed by us as sniveling, evil enviros? That's just insulting, Tom, and you should know better.
Geoffrey, did you note that your link describes none of the underlying dynamics discussed above?
We don't have uniform world, so why should climate change be uniform, anyway?
The point of the article wasn't to claim that climate change is or should be uniform, so I fail to see the relevance of your question. The article is pretty clear; what they are criticizing is the alarmist hype coming from some scientists, some politicians and others (like Gore), and particularly the media.
Geoffrey:
The fact that the "World Climate Report" page that you link to takes pains to cite the latest IPCC reports as an authority on Antarctica but then concludes that "Antarctica Ain't Cooperating" ought to give you a clue that their report is disingenuous and deliberately incomplete.
That you can't see that - or trouble youself to dig a little deeper - is a sign that your own confirmation biases are getting in the way.
To help you and others, I will update my post with more information.
In comments on my preceding post, Antarctic cooling? Or WHY "The Antarctic Ain't Cooperating"
Oh geez. You're going to play the "source of funding" card? I'm disappointed.
You realize that you've descended into ad hominem, right? That's what attempting to discredit someone's substantive views by resource to their alleged or actual, partial or total source of funding amounts to.
veritasnoctis.blogspot.com/.../global-warming-funding-non-issues.html
veritasnoctis.blogspot.com/.../more-ad-hominem-and-suppression-of.html
Way to go lumping yourself in with the hypocritical leftist-statist alarmists.
You want to talk about money? All right, let's play that game.
veritasnoctis.blogspot.com/.../al-gores-environmental-hypocrisy.html
veritasnoctis.blogspot.com/.../more-hypocrisy-realclimate-and-funding.html
veritasnoctis.blogspot.com/.../yet-more-environmental-hypocrisy-follow.html
veritasnoctis.blogspot.com/.../not-all-energy-ceos-are-selling-out-and.html
So much for the credibility of Al Gore, RealClimate and GreenPeace, if we take your ad hominem tactic as a serious method of criticizing their substantive views.
I think it`s clear that I`m talking about Pat Michaels` work on the World Climate Report, not Pat Michaels generally. This particular piece is so one-sided that it`s really hard not to wonder - and see - why.
Did you miss my update to my first post, where I went to some trouble also to point out the science that Michaels` conveniently omitted?
Ｉ`ll take a look later at your references. But cui bono is a necessity when we`re discussion rent-seeking, not an ad hominem. And yes, it`s perfectly appropriate to look in all directions.
Great ecoterrorist resource. Thanks!
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Juan, thanks for your comment. When I orginally posted a more sarcastic take on the property and human rights violations that are occuring in the Appalachians, Geoffrey Plauche upbraided me for being unfair. But was I really? As you illustrate so well, this site is full of the small-minded, who actually DO view "local private property owners merely wanting to defend their private property ... as sniveling, evil enviros".
Thanks for proving me right, and Geoffrey wrong.
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In an earlier blog post - "Why Pat Michaels says "The Antarctic Ain't Cooperating"
Update: I have separately posted for the interest of readers my exchange of emails with Chip Knappenberger
There is a new climate change lawsuit in US courts, this time by the Inuit inhabitants of an Alaskan
It's no big deal but Skeptical Science is by John Cook, not John Cross (although John Cross is a regular commenter).
[TT: Thanks for your comment, John (and thanks for the patient, even-handed work on your site)! Not sure how I got that wrong, but I've made the correction.]
As I noted in my April 15 post, mises.org/.../bush-hoist
Here's a very interesting piece by Kristof at the New York Times about the reactions of Obama and
I ran across some interesting and topical Frank Zappa lyrics the other day, so I`m putting them up here
" You have been warned: green fascism could soon be on the march. " So does libertarian Ron
I think you're jumping on Ron unfairly. Recently, several environmental leaders have, in fact, been talking about "going beyond capitalism" whatever that means. And, the environmentalists are going to to claim that the food crisis validates their anti-capitalist views, when in fact, they were causal in the starvation: preventing the development of oil and natural gas wherever possible (raising the transport element of food prices); preventing the use and development of GMO crops where-ever they can; and most recently (as we discussed) by greasing the skids for the corn lobby to make more money selling so-called "green fuel" instead of selling their crops for use as food.
Ken, thanks for your comment, but what`s unfair? I daresay that not only does Ron actually care alot about development and environmental issues, but he also has deep insights into the dynamics of the "tragedy of the commons" and of bureaucratic mismanagement and use of the state by elites as an instrument of theft that do lead to destructive development.
But what does Ron do? Instead of seeing an opportunity to describe what might be useful steps forward in addressing what actually are shared concerns, Ron gives us blaring trumpets and ad homs about those evil greenies.
Of course I agree with you that many environmentalists advocate counterproductive policies that greatly please insiders like ADM. But instead of trying to work through why some environmentalist policies are actually counterproductive, Ron has taken to easy - and counterproductive - path of slipping into a tribal and adversarial pattern. That he does so is not particularly surprising, but it is nonetheless disappointing.
After all, hating enviros will not make the problems that concern them go away.
You know, his analysis here does indeed seem superficial. In fact, the impersonal state as we know is even younger: about 500 years ago, at least according to the neglected masterpiece Rise and Decline of the State by Martin van Creveld.
Also I once asked J.G. Hulsman about the problem of societies that don't seem to be prepared for what we think of as liberty, societies where violence rules, rights are not respected, and tribalism is the only pattern. His answer I found very compelling. He said that no matter how bad a society is, there is nothing that state can do to make it better. A state in a bad society is going to become the center of the evil, monopolizing it and spreading it.
Challenging! What do you think?
Jeff, thanks for your visit. Diamond touches on a number of interesting subjects, but he doesn`t make it very clear where he`s going. He tangentially makes that point that our tribal predispositions haven`t changed (which is why we love stories about blood brothers, loyalty, and vengeance), but it seems peculiar for his main emphasis to be on what we lost - vengeance and related closure - when we gained more peaceful societies where violence was constrained by the state.
I`ll have to take a look at van Creveld, but I imagine that being impersonal is one of the chief characteristics of a state - codes are enacted or decreed, institutions are established, etc. - but this has a very ancient history that precedes writing.
I`m not sure I understand the cases that concern you and Hulsman. History tells us that pre-state societies were very much like the one Diamond describes - with intertribal violence no doubt having the effect of keeping human populations within the bounds of food resources then available given existing technology and organization. But these societies were still subject to very complex social rules. It seems that our apparently relatively greater freedom to choose lifestyle, career etc. and relaxation of restrictive traditional rules reflect growing wealth and social needs for greater flexibility. But we have given up very tight bonds of brotherhood and community for atomization and alienation - while still longing to immerse ourselves in close communities.
I am not sure that I would agree that a state cannot make a "bad" society better, but I`m also not clear I understand what you think a bad society is or how a state arises. However, I do think the world faces very difficult problems of development due to ineffective or misgoverned states - and that these may require "developed" states to make concerted efforts to introduce better governance, protect property rights and establish capital formation institutions.
You frame the question "should" as if it were a purely utilitarian matter. The bigger question is whether the stolen funds (taxes) used by government can legitimately be used for anything at all, or if the whole thing is immoral and unethical.
Fred, thanks for your comment.
I have expressly raised the suggestion that it may be preferable for Western governments to spend less taxpayer money on crop research and to leave this matter as one for private markets to respond to. Western aid in this area has perhaps created a moral hazard that has led to greater levels of subsidies (and lower levels of private investment) in the developing nations.
However, I do think it is worth paying attention to the ongoing problems of development/misgovernance and hunger in the third world.
Analysts at Cato have suggested that such problems merit investment by the West in resolving: See Indur Goklany, "What to do about climate change", www.cato.org/pub_display.php.
It's not a direct question about this post, but, are you worried about the oil situation where Iran, Russia and Venezuela can use the oil for political reasons and screw us up?
Thanks
Martin, sure there are political risks such as you point to. But oil and refined products are quintessential commodities, for which there are sophisticated markets able to take supply risk into account. Further, it seems rather clear to me that actions by our government have been at best neutral with respect to (if not INCREASED) such political risk. If we weren't meddling in the ME and elsewhere - at high costs taken directly from taxpayers (and borrowed from future generations) - oil would still come to market, and with LESS political friction. Iraq is shut down now, Bush seems to have done his best to alienate Venzuela, and is apparently itching to disrupt supplies from Iran as well, and the trail of stupidity/cupidity goes all the way way to the US/British overthrow of Mossadegh and the installation of the Shah, which then brought us the Ayatollah.
With this kind of help, worrying about "enemies" seems to be a complete distraction from the real source of our problems.
I am in agreement insofar as the claim that government does not have the right to enforce a particular theological claim purely on the basis of its religious pedigree. There are many theological claims, however, that are worth consensus support, such as the principle of autonomy (which may be rephrased as "freedom of conscience"). Nevertheless, there are also natural, and theological, restrictions. The right of autonomy is limited by its impact on the lives of third parties. Thus, it makes sense to violate the right to autonomy when it comes to regulating smoking in a public place, or when it comes to banning abortion and euthanasia -- though the details may be different in each case.
And, although the principle of autonomy applied to taxpayers does not appear to be involved, at least not directly, in government funded programs for immoral biomedical research, one ought to be careful about using "the public good", however well intentioned and seemingly coherent the position may seem to be, to advance positions that are completely at odds with the consciences of many individual taxpayers.
Fr. Gearhart, thanks for your comments.
I agree with your last paragraph, except I would note that government funding of what you see as "immoral" biomedical research certainly does involve the principle of autonomy at a very fundamental level - in the form of government taking tax dollars by force from unconsenting taxpayers, which is something that Pinker also seems to completely overlook.
Would you agree that the best moral position here would simply be to end federal funding of medical research, particularly research that many strongly object to as a matter of conscience?
And what about that which apparently motivates Pinker? That is, not whether "dignity" is a useful concept, but whether it is fair for him to be concerned that the President's Council is exploring this idea in order to forge a justification to further regulate purely PRIVATE research?
Finally, you assert that "it makes sense to violate the right to autonomy" in certain cases, without addressing the costs of such violations on those on whom they are imposed, or on society as a whole when the power of the state is expanded. The past century and the present ought to provide plenty of food for thought as to the damage that large states often do, both to individual autonomy and the public weal.
I am inclined to accept personal autonomy, as I suggested, wherever it does not violate the life or property of another person, or of the people of a community or nation. There can be significant costs involved in curtailing autonomy, and each case must be evaluated according to its merits. The Just War doctrine of the Catholic Church considers just such questions of evaluation.
Fr. Larry, thanks for your further comment. It seems to me that if you agree that "There can be significant costs involved in curtailing autonomy, and each case must be evaluated according to its merits," then you actually share alot of common ground with Pinker, as this is his real concern. One cannot simply map private rights and obligations regarding personal autonomy onto a broader community or nation, as the elements of coercion, abuse of power and manipulation for private gain all come into play.
In this light, it seems to me that there is actually substantial common ground, with further agreement possible were people to focus more on the role of government. Pinker ought to be able to agree that others can legitimately oppose government funding of certain research projects, while others like Levin might be able to concede that even while certain private, non-government supported activities are cause for concern, they may not rise to a level that they think calls for government prohibition or oversight.
Thanks for your post - I don't have time to read it all right now, I'll have to come back to it. Keep writing!
Also, I think it's obvious that the first researcher/lab that cures aging is going to set off such a gold rush that any inane bioethics council is just going to get run over. Like the gatekeeper in 2 Kings 7. That's what's great about the market - the coin of the realm *is* the coin of the realm.
I copy below a post that, by virtue of too many links (and likely spam), has apparently been held up
Yeah, I was surprised you didn't join in at the time, I said a lot of what I think you would have (though because it was my opinion, not yours), modulo a little frustration at the complete stupidity of his remarks.
I copy below comments on Bob Murphy 's June 4 blog post, Cap and Trade Is Not a "Market Solution"
[snark meter - medium] John Baden, a former logger and oilman, has long been a pillar of the "free
Bob Murphy , an economist at Rob Bradley 's Institute for Energy Research , has posted on the main
Hi, thanks for bringing this to our attention. While you are right that Murphey is stacking the deck by cherry picking values for various parameters that support his argument, I cannot help but smile at the biter bit. Nordhaus <a href="rabett.blogspot.com/.../sins-of-fathers-hallmark-of-modern.html"> was the first to use the tactic wrt climate science</a> and placed major procrastination penalties on all of us in the early 80s with the Nierenberg report. Wm N has a lot to answer for
here: aguanomics.com/.../counterpoint-on-carbon-taxes.html
I find the Lockean Proviso problematic. What is its justification. What specifically gives anyone "common-property" rights? And who holds them?
Stephen, thanks for your question.
Locke's premise is that all of the world was given to man in common by God. A more secular approach would be simply to recognize that man is, by virtue of intellect, ability to cooperate and by resulting technology, top dog and gets to decide how to carve up the world.
But actually man has gone through a process of gradually controlling resources (and excluding others) on a group basis (and many such "common property" regimes remain in place) and then towards private property. During Locke's time, there were many English commons, in which community residents had various customary (and legally recognized) rights to use. I believe that by his proviso he was making a shorthand reference to such rights, which limited the ability of any single member of the community to use the commons in way that damaged the rights of others.
Commons are also called "common pool resources". Some commons are very clearly defined, but then there are a mass of other resources that are open-access with no defined owners (the oceans and atmosphere), as well as resources that are socialized and bureaucratically mismanaged - and for such situations, where homesteading just hasn't occurred, I think Locke's proviso is worth considering.
Besides Dolan's discussion of Locke, here are a couple of other Misesean discussions on property rights:
mises.org/.../6_3_6.pdf
mises.org/.../19_2_1.pdf
With respect to remaining commons, it is clear we need to find property rights regimes, which might, particularly in the case of socialized property, involve the use of government to set rules:
www.cato.org/.../reg20n3f.html
Elinor Ostrom et al., Revisiting the Commons: Local Lessons, Global Challenges, Science 9 April 1999: conservationcommons.org/.../docu-wyycyz.pdf
www.cooperationcommons.com/.../361
Thank goodness! Another libertarian/conservative (see my previous posts on Bruce Yandle and Gene Callahan
See Ron Bailey's recent summary of developments about whether it may be possible to buy time on climate
TokyoTom,
The above is an interesting piece in itself, but do you know what happened to that cap-and-trade discussion on www.gene-callahan.org? Because I haven't been able to reach the website for several days now.
In my recent post, " Escape from Reason: are Austrians conservatives, or neocons, on the environment
This time it`s David Veksler , with a post on the main LvMI blog , with the title I`ve quoted above.
I copy below comments I made on June 11 (Tokyo time) on Bob Murphy 's June 4 blog post, Cap and Trade
Prominent climatologist Dr. James Hansen , Director of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies and
<i>However, I do think that Hansen's rhetoric on this is unfortunate, as it is likely to detract from his scientific message, which he elucidates very well in articles, presentations and scientific publications available at his Columbia U</i>
The rhetoric detracts very much from the message he wishes to get out. Nearly every discussion I have read at blogs or newspaper articles has been either a) a reaction to his call for criminal charges or b)discussions justifying his frustration (without accompanying discussion of the evidence for climate change!)
Yours is probably the first post to actually provide links to the tax plan, or discuss it.
I'll probably blog later. :)
The folly practically speaks for itself . Why does Bjorn Lomborg think that governments can better determine
"(In this context, there are, of course, private action suits now under way against the major fossil fuel firms for climate change damage; .... )"
Let's see, those who consume the products and services of 'major fossil fuel firms' actually cause, as in are responsible for, 'climate change damage', so let's go get those who provide the products and services. Very sensible and rational in these days of victimhood. I can't take responsibility for what I do, so let me blame everyone else.
And its very ironic that those who have started these private action suits could not have taken the very first step in the process without the products and services of the very firms they are suing.
Energy consumption is truly omnipresent in every thing we do.
"CEOs of fossil energy companies know what they are doing and are aware of long-term consequences of continued business as usual. In my opinion, these CEOs should be tried for high crimes against humanity and nature."
Apparently Hansen himself is unaware of his dependence on, and consumption of, the products and services of major fossil fuel firms.
Where does this lead us? Automobiles kill thousands every year. Let's sue the auto makers. Oh, wait a minute, that's been tried wrt guns.
Dan, thanks for the comments.
1. It sounds like you really don't have any clue about the nature of the private damage suits I'm referring to. But your approach is very much like the upstream industrial manufacturer saying to those downstream air or water suffer (adversely affecting their health, property and economic planning) to just lump it, because they may also get some benefit from cheaper products which do not reflect the externalizes costs of pollution.
Adopting the "grin and bear it" approach to the costs that economic activities impose on others is a great way to concentrate gains in those who own the economic enterprise, while shifting costs to others. As far as I know, such a "beggar your neighbor" principle isn't very well grounded in libertarian or free-market ideals, though it's a common enough occurence when the powerful control the formal and informal institutional infrastructure.
The fact that there is a legacy aspect to the problem (given the long-term nature of the influences exerted by GHGs and soot) coupled with the ubiquity of activities that generate them make it virtually impossible for anyone to obtain a private remedy. But these don't change the conceptual analysis.
2. "I can't take responsibility for what I do, so let me blame everyone else." Isn't that what you're arguing, implicitly?
3. "Apparently Hansen himself is unaware". It sounds to me like he is fully aware; in fact, probably more aware than virtually anyone. I suppose that is why he is speaking out. If you have a conscience, with knowledge comes responsibility.
4. "Where does this lead us?" The atmosphere and oceans are vast unowned and unmanaged commons. Like it or not, we must - at some time or another - develop some institutions to manage them. The only real question is how much damage we will do to those resources, to ourselves and to other unowned resources that depend on them before we actually undertake and implement effective management. (Important but ancillary questions relate to the nature of the managment systems and their efficacy and costs.)
We can start now, or we can start later. How much damage do you vote for?
5. "CEOs of fossil energy companies know what they are doing".
You seem to have missed that what Hansen is really addressing is not so much the public positions taken by these firms as their hidden use of think tank proxies to discredit science that they publicly support, and their behind the doors dealings with politicians. I think that these are legitimate points of concern (and are endemic to rent-seeking from government).
Owl, please note that I've posted a few more thoughts back on Bob Murphy's thread: www.gene-callahan.org/.../murphy-answers-silas-on-cap-and-trade.html
In response to Jim Hansen's recent expressed desire for "public trials" for fossil fuel
Good eye, TT!
Thank you. I have also responded. Any idea what happened to the site when it went offline for several days?
I have previously blogged on libertarian, non-state, approaches to climate change; allow me to use this
Well...those aren't all demagogues. Interesting read.
Senora Lucia, thank you. My reference to demagogues in the heading is an acknowledgement that a fair percentage of the clear thinkers at the libertarian Ludwig von Mises Institute (which kindly hosts my subversive blog) consider virtually anyone who supports a state action to be a demagogue.
I don't entirely disagree with them, but am sufficiently "unclean", independent and pragmatic that I consider it my contribution to LVMI to try to keep those who object to the growth of the state aware of (and, if possible, engaged with) those others who are pushing for such action.
I have previously blogged on libertarian, non-state, approaches to climate change ; allow me to use this
That idea sounds pretty stupid. I'm surprised it comes from Lomberg, who is apparently a skeptic on AGW AND believer in government efficiency.
There are precedents for trying CEOs when they sought to evade the law OR, knowing the penalty to be weak, broke the law because the profits would be larger than the penalties. OTOH, note how BIG cigarette companies managed to expand their market power under the tobacco settlement while passing the cost to smokers. Tread with caution.
Pingback from Peabody Coal is VERY concerned about how Jim Hansen is "cheapening the dialogue" - TT`s Lost in Tokyo
Thanks for the comment, David. As a liberal, Lomborg does not object in principle to the state spending money - he just wants it spent according to HIS priorities.
It's funny that even with all of the obvious problems created by ethanol and biofuels subsidies Lomborg doesn't see any problems with the state choosing the best next-generation energy technologies. I understand that Ted Nordhaus is another one who wants government to lead the way green energy investments.
Penn's making it harder than it really is. Just extend the traditional libertarian desire for well-defined property rights, to the atmosphere. No libertarian should be surprised by an unowned, scarce resource being abused.
(Btw, note my new bloggy...)
In response to my comments last month to Bob Murphy 's June 4 blog post, Cap and Trade Is Not a "Market
as this article in the July 7 NY Times shows. This is not at all surprising, as owners all have incentives
On July 1, The Wall Street Journal ran a jaw-droppingly astonishing, juvenile and profoundly self-deluded
My last piece, on Bret Stephen 's straight-faced but ridiculous dismissal in the WSJ of all concerns
My last piece (on Bret Stephen 's straight-faced but ridiculous dismissal in the WSJ of all concerns
In the context of the latest fuel strikes by European fishermen, George Monbiot has an excellent piece
It looks like Lubos woke up on the wrong side of bed. BELOW is the type of "rational", "dispassionate"
I already made my <a href="aguanomics.com/.../tsa-rant.html on David Zetland's blog</a> about what Bob's QJAE/JLS article will look like:
-You'll list all the wasteful uses of oil that government leads to, which is non-responsive, because as I repeatedly emphasized on the other aguanomics thread, those very same wastes are holding back economic growth that would lead to the same oil being used, most likely sooner.
-You'll talk about how people can use social pressure to encourage boycotts of carbon-intensive companies, not seeing how your'e basically conceding the calculation debate, since the possibility of a public boycott getting producers to accurately account for consumption of resource (as opposed to pure private property + supply/demand) implies the possibility of non-price accounting of the cost of scarce resources.
-(Optimistic scenario output of crystal ball) You'll (finally!) give a well-informed account of how property rights could arise in the atmosphere and other environmental resources, which completely reconstitutes cap-and-trade or a carbon tax via private courts, thus proving the very same policies you railed against to really be no more objectionable than government bans on murder.
Pingback from james hansen cooling
"In my opinion, people like you should be put in jail or executed before it's too late."
Heh, will Motl dare to express such sentiments in public? Hansen just suggested that oil CEOs and think-tanks should be "tried" -- only tried -- for high crimes against humanity, and look at the crapstorm he faced.
-- bi, <a href="frankbi.wordpress.com/"><i>International Journal of Inactivism</i></a>
[Update below] My last piece (on Bret Stephen 's straight-faced but ridiculous dismissal in the WSJ
Oh, wait:
www.webcitation.org/5ZE0GSy7h
-- bi, http://frankbi.wordpress.com/
Observation 1) LM (and many other skeptics) seems possessed by genuine fear or paranoia. Hitlers loom, the UN Kyoto Hypercommunists are coming...etc, etc.
Observation 2) LM (and many other skeptics) seems to have apathy or active dislike for the environment or the natural world. Restated: from a normal person's viewpoint, the skeptics are blind to the many interrelated issues like species diversity, extinctions, environmental support systems.
Question: are the two observations above related? Are we looking at an actual inability to connect with a larger world, followed by them becoming fearful of the people (who do) that they cannot understand?
--Lepus
Lepus: Beats me. I think the whole anti-environmentalist movement started with 1) causing 2), but in Motl's case I don't know what got him off the deep end.
TokyoTom: Looks like your totally ecocommiechickenlittlefascistic comment over at Motl's blog just got censored, I mean freedomed:
before -- www.webcitation.org/5ZE4C94rU
after -- www.webcitation.org/5ZEK18b9X
Frank, thanks for pointing out Motl`s blog post. Isn`t it ironic that such a lover of reason should so fail to notice his own glaring deficiencies in it?
He made be smart, but he`s so blinded by his own preconceptions that he is able to engage only in a monologue, and he`s got the emtional maturity of a gnat.
Was I unreasonable or obtuse? It seems that he flew off the handle because of frustration over my failure to play his part he had ascribed for me.
Lepus, thanks for your comment.
1) is certainly correct with some anti-enviros, and it may have some slight foundation (in the degree of socialism present in the enviro movement and in the objectives of many environmentalists to regulate perceived environmental harms by the state). But it`s fair to notice that environmentalists also have their bogeymen and little notice the frequently unhelpful role that states play in aggravating resource problems. So there are perception issues all around, which provides ammo for facile sophists like Bret Stephens to write piece that Motl and others who are predisposed to hate the left lap up.
I think that 2) is also fair for some skeptics, but certainly not all. Many see a potential problems but are more preoccupied with their visions of the train wrecks we get when government is asked to step in to "help" us.
Your last question is a good one, but it is also ubiqitous and not limited to alienated enviro-haters. We all have a difficult time wrapping our heads around the world and are prone to tribal reactions. As a result, fear is not uncommon whenever we feel threatened by those whom we do not identifiy with and do not understand.
The suspicion also extends to people whom you perceive are different but are making strange overtures, possibly like me to Lubos.
Frank, thanks very much for archiving my comment to Lubos and his deletion! I wasn`t aware of Webcitation; thanks for showing it to me.
I`ll make a note elsewhere on the blog of what he deleted.
Person, my guess is that Penn is reluctant to really be fair on the science mainly because he finds the proposed solution to be so unpalatable. Even I don`t welcome the growth of the state, but I prefer reality over eyes-wide-shut.
I`m disappointed that my attemptsat discoursewith Lubos Motl - a Czech physicist *** climate science
I`m disappointed that my attempts at discourse with Lubos Motl have blown up. Lubos, a Czech physicist
Pingback from [Update] Mind Games: Bret Stephens of The Wall Street Journal panders to "skeptics" by abjuring science and declaring himself an expert on "mass neurosis" - TT`s Lost in Tokyo
LM writes: "The right to exhale or otherwise emit carbon dioxide - basic processes inevitably associated both with life and modern civilization"
Would LM listen if one pointed out to him that there is a no conection between exhaling small amounts of CO2 waste (derived from above ground carbon stocks), and the "right" to dump large amounts pollution into the commons? Is he rational here?
This is such a simple thing to understand. LM rejects reason and conjures the argument that the "right to breathe" is under assault by the enviros.
He is not alone: poneke.wordpress.com/.../co2
This again looks like paranoia. Is LM bent enough to have come up with this distortion on his own? Or was this placed where he could find it?
I am remind of how, when recently a presidential candidate was talking about SUVs, excessive energy use, and leadership, the issue was broadcast as the "democrats will ask the UN to tell us where to set our thermostats". This is very creative misinformation. Just as claiming that envirofascists will take away your right to breath.
Lepus, the two memes here - enviros want to stop respiration and modern society will end if we price carbon - are very common.
The first of course is completely dishonest, but there are many who buy it because environmentalists are similarly charged with wanting to stop population growth in order to protect wildlife. I suspect that LM understands and is linking this with use of fossil fuels only to make a more pwoerful rhetorical statement (and maybe persuade himself).
The second is tied into the very real difficulties in actually cutting back on GHG emissions and atmospheric stocks, especially given existing linkages between CO2 and energy use and the rapid growth of China, India, Brazil etc. If we don`t quickly develop and install new technology, there is now way we will make a dent in GHG atmospheric growth unless we drive ourselves into a very serious depression. That`s what the skeptics are hyping as the AIM of environmentalists - all while denying that there`s any serious problem that merits action.
The paranoia comes in LM thinking that everybody but a few skeptics are irrational and that enviros are enemies of mankind that should be "euthanized" or quarantined.
I agree on the negotiating problem. 18 months to Kyoto III, and we already know that the G8 are unwilling to commit to anything before 2050 (as of now) and that the G(everyone else) are unwilling to move first...
Also see this post, on winners and losers from cap and trade: aguanomics.com/.../speaking-of-carbon.html
It's long been obvious that: (1) government policy concerning the use of public lands is highly bureaucratized
Tom -- I like the idea, esp. the twist with giving ANWR to the Sierra Club. Life is about tradeoffs, and many interest groups want to eat their cake and have someone else pay for it.
You are also (accidentally?) invoking the tragedy of the anti-commons. See this post:
aguanomics.com/.../water-and-public-trust.html
"we have deadlock, with valuable resources sitting in the ground, and possibilities for mutually beneficial deals lost."
Eh, not so fast. Oil companies haven't even used up all their existing offshore drilling leases at the Gulf of Mexico, so why on earth is ANWR and OCS suddenly so "valuable"?
And I'm not sure how opening them up will be "mutually beneficial". I mean, Sierra Club drills oil and causes more global warming, so that Sierra Club can later use the proceeds from selling oil to, um, protect against global warming? I don't know... this sounds like a win-win situation, where the winners don't include the public.
(Could it be that the proposal to open up ANWR and OCS is just an election gimmick by McCain that only benefits vote count? That can't be, right?...)
Anyway, if you ask me, I'd probably suggest the government cede the land to wind power companies. Or Al Gore.
I'll limit the scope of my response to oil and natural gas resources.
As a matter of pure, present, economic efficiency, your proposal may make sense. But when future economics and environmental concerns are factored in, I'm not sure it does.
The underlying assumption -- that all lands with "high commercial value" should be developed -- seems to me misguided. The implication is that we should design our land management policies to insure the extraction of all "valuable" oil and gas. The problem is that it makes no sense to extract it unless we're going to burn it. And if we pump out and burn everything that's economically feasible to pump out and burn, we're going to cook ourselves. The politically incovenient truth is that we're ultimately going to have to decide to leave some of the ancient sunlight in the ground if we want to survive, no matter how "valuable" that sunlight may appear to be in the short term.
On another note, if we're going to distribute the proceeds of any extraction tax, those proceeds should go primarily towards the development of alternative energy sources, as the carbon tax in England does. This would offset the costs, in the form of global warming, that are presently being externalized onto posterity. Distributing the proceeds in the present on a per capita basis would constitute generational exploitation.
I saw on the mainstream nightly news (nbc?) that insurance companies were helping too!@!omg
Good point, that others mentioned on threads last year. The insurers help to fight fires, because that's cheaper than paying out on their contracts, and they set their premiums based on the degree of fireproofing of the construction and lanbdscaping.
In my view, we out to just let fires burn - except where private individuals, communities and public forests/parks - on their own budgets - make decisions to prevent and or extinguish. The $1 billion open checkbook that Congress now gives for wildfire fighting is great for agency budgets, but pays almost zero dividends (and maybe worse - by kicking the problem down the road).
David, this is not so much an anti-commons tragedy as a classic battle for control over a socialized commons. Up until now, those who prefer environmental, recreatational and other values over development value have been winning.
The political consensus that supported the status quo is unsteady, and environmentalists and others ought to be able to recognize the advantages gained from improved managment.
Environmentalists could perhaps also, by agreeing to the steps mentioned here, help to persuade Congress to approve a carbon tax/rebate program.
Frank, I see my proposal as a way to defuse debate, improve resource management and to even win a better climate deal. If the land were given away to Sierra Club, TNC or Audubon, would they develop it? You'd be darned sure! They could use the funds to protect the Amazon, Kalimantan, and do a bunch of other things - even bring climate law suits and push for carbon taxes. Locking up resources in public lands means these groups have no interest in balancing even their own priorities, as the best they can do under the current situation is to simply to stall.
As the Arctic warms, other resources up there will be developed. In fact, OCS development, which is much riskier that land development, is already being considered.
Another factor is that Inupiaks have development rights in ANWR that Congress locked up after the Inupiaks bartered away other land to the US. We should uphold our end of that deal, and allow exploration and development of at least their portion.
John, thanks for your comments.
The right way to manage the primary environmental risk is through a carbon tax. Even with such a tax, ANWR is valuable, primariliy because natural gas and coal are much preferable in many ways to coal.
BTW, I do not assume that all lands with "high commercial value" should be developed. Rather, all values should be considered and balanced. That doesn't happen when resources are socialized, either because one party wins the political battle or gets favorable treatment for bureaucrats, and because bureaucrats have few incentives to really balance all interests fairly.
Such a balancing would also happen if we turned our public lands into public trusts that had to live on their own budgets.
The upper hand that the environmentalists have had up until now on ANWR and OCS is obviously unsteady, and they could improve their overall position by trading for a general rebated carbon tax and royalty pass through, that would probably be loved by taxpayers worried about the costs of climate change policies.
I disagree with you on how royalties should be used. Without a deal such as I propose, they will continue to go into our general pork barrel slush fund, from which we can expect nothing but more Congressional giveaways. The administrators could use incentives like a slice of the royalties in order to be a little more concerned about actually collecting them. I also think that cutting a roylaty check to citizens, like Alaska does, would help boost support for better oversight, and end the favoritism and uneconomical giveaways we see in BLM and USFS.
I am NOT in favor of using extraction royalties to give poliicians more money to spread around to well-connected friends and on boondoggles, or expand the range of bureaucratized activities (which is why I see a carbon tax as much preferrable to cap and trade). We already do enough environmental damage with our sugar and ethanol subsidies, and as we saw with synfuels, the government is just not the right actor to be determining what we should invest in. For this, simple carbon pricing without further meddling (other than continuing general climate research, emissions monitoring and dissemination of information) is the best way.
I don't see any reason why environmentalists would (for example) pump oil out of the ANWR. Resource extraction is intrinsically an environmentally damaging activity, no matter how well managed, and the point of refuges is usually to preserve ecosystems in a pristine state, not an only-moderately-degraded state. Any financial benefit would be more than offset by their massive loss of credibility with the public if they pursued such a strategy. That said, I could see such groups getting involved in e.g. the ecotourism business.
James, thanks for the comments.
The environmentalists and others supporting them have until now prevailed over those advocating development in ANWR using the argument you mention (and others). But I think they should be interested in shifting, for a number of reasons; primarily because if public/legislative opinion shifts, then a portion of ANWR will be developed, but with little control by environmnetalists. I think that environmentalists ought to be more proactive, and look at a wider big picture that improves federal resource management greatly, rather than playing these continuous rear-guard battles that are inevitable when a resource is owned by the government.
"the point of refuges is usually to preserve ecosystems in a pristine state". I appreciate your idealism, but in the real world "reserves" are set up only in very remote places that are difficult to develop, and for which a primitive state (open for recreation) is probably the best economic use. Even where the demand for recreation/environmental use is high, much of our vast BLM and USFS lands are used for tree and mineral resource extraction. Our politicians love to cave to whomever makes the greatest campaign contributions.
And, as noted, there are important concerns to balance. If TNC, Audubon or Sierra Club owned ANWR, they would certainly proceed with careful, limited development. Besides protecting ANWR, they could use the revenues to protect the Amazon, Western rivers (and salmon), etc.
Ok, so long as you are on the hotseat, another angle here: why bias the ownership in favor of environmental groups? Why not just privatize the thing by selling it to the highest bidder? Aren't you merely "picking winners and losers" in the marketplace, same as a central planner?
In general, you have real insight here, but I'm not for limiting the privatizing possibilities to only those that conform to my values.
Jeff, clearly privatization of most of the federal lands is desirable. Federal "management" has often been inept (information problems and incentive mismatches) and/or corrupt (good ol' rent-seeking). But outright privatization simply isn't going to happen, as politicians like to have royalty and other payments coming into the Treasury for them to play with. If privatization were to occur, I would agree that the feds should simply auction off the land to the highest bidder.
My point in referring to environemental groups was not they they should be favored, but simply that, if they owned these lands, they WOULD develop them too - the point being that the current deadlock is simply a result of federal ownership preventing parties from agreeing to compromises, while incentivizing grandstanding and rigidity.
What I have suggested here is simply a way to break the current deadlock over ANWR and the OCS, while paving a way for improved federal resource management generally.
My chief grounds for skepticism here is not that environmentalists or oil and gas firms are not interested in compromising, but that the federal government/Congresscritters will be reluctant to let Americans directly capture the benefit of resources that, after all, WE are supposed to own. Instead, politicians like to sport about in fields of cash, with administration relatively unfettered by citizen oversight(other than by those evil enviros).
But I do see a great opportunity here that is worth exploring. Congresscritters would be very popular if they found ways to give royalty checks to citizens - and this would set the path for further quasi-privatization as well as for a recycled carbon tax.
[Update: For an ongoing case study of the startling irrationality and "sick souls" of some
TT. Thank you for your both your responses; it has taken me a few days to understand them--and also maybe what I was thinking.
We are faced with a whole ecosystem in the denier movement. I've done some research--I read Lomborg (ik), and visit the Beck and Limbaugh sites (groan). Then I read their references. And so on.
There are the enablers like Soon and their funders. The millions of voters that have been coopted by the anti enviro propaganda, often through the skillful use of memes (existing or planted?, I wonder)(and if existing, how many generations have they survived?).
Many curious species are less easily spotted-- Spencer, Pielke, et al, who are entitled to an opinion in this issue, but have strong motives from other issues (ear tip to the big bunny).
All of it seemingly cohering into a do nothing or do little course which is basically suicidal for the planet.
My (previously unrecognized) instinct is to categorize the different species in this ecosystem. Track the flow of energy. Develop a taxonomy. Ask a zillion questions.
Enter LM. He is like every puzzle in the denier ecology rolled up into one person. An engine of contradiction, juxtaposing concepts like euthanasia and freedom in some fractured logic. Using reason to unseat reason.
I applaud your efforts to talk with Lubos. (now, i am heading over to his blog for a little observation...)
Lepus
So, my instinct here is to try to understand this
Lepus: Thanks for your comments.
May I suggest that one of the best ways to engage skeptics on the right is on their own terms? Namely, that it is largely voluntary cooperation among millions/billions through markets, based on private property that is responsible for the creation of our wealthy societies. However, it is well-recognized that this mechanism doesn't work for resources that are UNOWNED (or are "public" but used for private gain by corrupt elites) - like the ocean (and its fisheries, which no one has any incentives to protect and are being destroyed), tropical forests/wildlife and the atmosphere.
Even die-hard rightists ought to be able to recognize that the absence of effective property rights (individiual or group) is the road to ruin, so that we need to find a way to manage such resources, rather than to continue to subsidize their destruction.
Such people ought also to be sensitive to what church leaders say about abusing nature.
Pingback from Lubo?? Motl 2: The cool-headed overheat; to this "rational" scientist, I'm a freedom-hating hypercommunist Nazi who should be "jailed or executed" - TT`s Lost in Tokyo
I briefly commented previously on the perilous state of the West Coast salmon fishery , which is crashing
As any PERC fellow will tell you, the Indians had a combination of private and community management of salmon runs. Although the feds destroyed them by making salmon an open-access resource (destroying those institutions), technology also played a role. Modern fishing gear made it easier to catch salmon at sea. I am sure that the Indians would have solved that problem as well, but those were simpler days.
The sad thing is that local institutions could probably "fix" the salmon commons today, but they are prevented by the exercise of federal power. Give us back the Tenth Amendment!
And maybe Bob will pay us a visit and just tell us to use technology (paid for by Indians of course) to "adapt" to wild salmon extinction. Preach it, Bob!
They've been "spending the past five years mocking climate change concerns"? As far as I know, they did one single episode addressing global warming, and the most vivid thing I remember from that episode is Penn Jillette looking at the camera and saying (basically) that we don't have enough evidence, we just don't know yet.
whatthehellman, perhaps you have a point; P&T did their environment BS show sometime ago, and I'm not sure how many times they've actually revisted the issue. But certainly the rest of the "skeptical" world has found great comfort in the mockery that P&T served up ever since.
David, were you a PERC fellow too? You might have noticed that my two main links were to PERC papers.
"technology also played a role": Technology ALWAYS plays a role in accelerating tragedy of the commons situations - mainly by giving outsiders the ability to steal resources that had been traditionally managed under a common property regime. This is why history is a wave of extinctions or near-extinctions.
I agree that the federalization of problems has tended to exacerbate them, via bureaucratization and resulting rent-seeking. That federalization has occurred under expansive Commerce Clause assertions of authority. What we need is the Supreme Court is to start hacking back the CC jurisprudence.
As noted on the prior thread , in a recent blog post, scientist Lubos Motl concluded that there "
On the main Mises blog, Bob Murphy has just advocated opening ANWR and the OCS to oil and natural gas
Jerry Taylor , a senior fellow at the Cato Institute , published a pithy criticism in last week's
Keeping in mind that most environmentalists have major left-wing or selfish goals alongside them, it's no suprise that they're going to reject a solution that doesn't satisfy those goals, even if it is the most efficient.
I don't see any reason why a libertarian shouldn't favor Pigouvian taxes over taxes on labor and investment, if it's a simple replacement of one for the other, but then there's always that nebulous fear that a "replacement" will be an "addition".
Silas, I'm not as sure as you about the motives of "most" enviros. I think plenty just want to see effective action and, aware of the lack of stomach by Congresscritters for anything that says "tax", favor cap and trade and legal mandates/technology forcing as a result. I think that most are aware that corporate interests are more adept than they at manipulating government, but since that is exactly the battle, it doesn't occur to them NOT to try to use the government to micromanage.
I understand the libertarian concern that resource taxes will end up being additional, but that's why I favor creating popular support for the rebate side of the equation.
As you've mentioned, in Canada, the British Columbia Liberal party government (which is centre-right) has a carbon tax (at least a partial one). The leader of federal opposition Liberal party has also proposed a national carbon tax.
One issue in a market with a carbon tax is how to deal fairly with imported goods that may have had no costs, or unequivalent costs, applied in their country of origin for the carbon dioxide emitted in their manufacture.
The idea that nuclear is carbon free is complete and utter garbage. There are huge volumes of ore that must be processed to create tiny amounts and this requires lots of energy.... i.e. fossil fuels. Think monster trucks and machinery and massive milling operations. For the Olympic Dam in Austrialia - uranium grades are lower than 1 gramme per ton!
Andeeh, thanks for you (strong) opinions. Perhaps Ron Bailey was overstating his case by saying "essentially", but if we replaced all of our fossil-fuel power generation with nuclear, on a net basis would out emissions rise, stay steady or drop dramatically? Would we have to rip up as much ground? Would we put as many heavy metals, other pollutants and particulates in the air, ground or water?
Here's a couple of many articles on Sanders Research (site is now closed but you can still see them) there are answers to your question here:
www.sandersresearch.com/index.php
A side issue is that there isn't enough Uranium available anyway and so the costs of Uranium itself will go to the moon if so much demand is brought to bear. The truth is that there is no solution that allows for business as usual for electrical utility. The next decade will see a lot of shutdowns and brownouts. The best prospect I have seen is perhaps a solar project for the sahara desert. So maybe Gore is right in that respect but generally I think the whole CO2 trading issue is a "grab on the commons" or in Austrian School paralance you might say it's changing a condition of human welfare i.e. the ability to emit Co2 freely to being a factor of production. Either way its a scam.
I believe nuclear was always a spectacle of big government, it's never been a cost effective endeavour and would never have survived if it were not for the atomic bomb. The only way nuclear looks cost effective is to completely disregard decommisioning and waste disposal. In UK this is done by socializing those risks - the dirty business of decomissioning and the nightmare of digging a huge tunnel underneath a mountain to dispose of the waste.
Paul Krugman reaches the above conclusion in his August 1 New York Time op-ed , which asks "Can
andeeh, I believe that most of the opposition to nuclear power comes from the fact of its inital connection with government, but actually nuclear power is extremely safe, is much more reliable than "alternative" power, and by far poses the least environmental costs. Every thing else requires ripping up much more ground, leaving more messes, putting more stuff into the air or otherwise taking up space. Waste can easily be reduced (and power supplies multiplied by orders of 100s) by using breeder reactors. It is the other energy options that by far socialize much more risk.
andeeh: There are "little" reserves of uranium because people aren't looking for it because people aren't building nuclear plants because the government isn't issuing permits. Reverse the last, and you'll see uranium start being found. Estimates about reserves in the Rockies are pretty high.
And yes, it doesn't require "a lot" of fresh, clean oil to be able to extract uranium, but here's a secret: the EROEI is still much, much higher, meaning the total CO2 per unit of nuclear power energy is ridiculously low. That's why they call it carbon free -- it very nearly is.
And by the way, even the oil used to get that uranium can become carbon-free through the miracle of <a href="dotearth.blogs.nytimes.com/.../">nuclear octane</a>: use the cheap nuclear energy to suck CO2 out of the air and store it as fuel.
Now, since <b>of course</b> you want to make a fair comparison, do you know how much oil -- and other environmentally damaging materials -- it takes to put up those beloved solar panels? There are many case of people being "environmentally friendly" by setting up solar panels built in China who are actually shipping their pollution and CO2 overseas while barely making up the energy used in making them!
First, TT, your Gene Callahan link goes to your blog's main page rather than <a href="www.fee.org/.../article.asp essay</a>.
But about Callahan's piece: I don't think the comparison you made in that context is accurate. Krugman want's moral suasion aimed at getting the political system right. Callahan, on the other hand, was advocating wishy-washy boycotts of "wasteful" companies. He doesn't even realize that far from being a good argument, far from being a bad argument, that's a damning admission of the weakness of his own arguments!
Why? Because if charitable "public awareness campaigns" can get producers to (for the most part) accurately price in the value of a very vital resource they're using up, then ... wait for it ... <b><i>Socialism works!</i></b>
See, we don't need the price system! Just as we can replace money-driven workers with common-good-driven workers, we can replace profit-driven resource valuation with common-good-driven buyers! "Economic calculation argument? What's that?"
Third, if we should be framing climate policy opponents as immoral, why shouldn't we also be framing climate policy *exploiters* as immoral? Those are the people whose favored course of action involves an unnecessarily wasteful policy designed to achieve non-environmental goals, or very narrowly important environmental goals.
Finally, I wouldn't worry about automakers -- they can <a href="silasx.blogspot.com/.../why-i-cant-stop-laughing-at-gm.html">barely afford regular operations</a>, let alone lobbying.
Heh, too bad I put my comment about this in the more recent post of yours, TT.
I'll elaborate more here: public boycott/suasion campaigns will only give a very noisy signal to corporations of how damaging their activities are to the environment, and it will be skewed toward more visible ones.
You've seen environmentalists (like the "Green Lantern" on Slate) try to calculate which activitiy is "truly" more damaging to the environment. It manifests in, for example, the debates over whether shipping organic food a long distance is worse than shipping factory farm food over a short distance.
The fact is, even for very basic calculations, it gets complicated, and environemtnalists will almost certainly have biased calculations and use them for non-climate purposes when wielding their power -- that's what they already do.
So, I think it's clear that if you think that this suasion is an acceptable alternative to internalization of environmental damages, you might as well go the way and advocate that all products be free, with only protests to impede those who are "wasteful" (i.e. socialism).
On a Mises blog thread last year , I noted: controlled burns might of course be useful in some places
Andeeh, I agree with Person: besides hydro dams, "renewable" resources have a simply enormous environmental footprint. Moreover, wind and solar are intermittent and can't provide baseload power.
Nuclear power is far more environmentally benign. Further, we can get even more safety, greatly expand recoverable energy and nearly eliminate the "waste" problem by moving to fast breeder reactors: www.nuc.berkeley.edu/.../anlw.html
www.nuc.berkeley.edu/.../anlw.html
Silas, thanks for your comments.
I've fixed the link.
Second, I agree that Krugman and Callahan can be distingushed: Callahan is arguing for direct and indirect (via the media) pressure on firms/executives - viz., on private actors to change their economic behavior - while Krugman is arguing for moral pressures to change LAWS. My observation would be that communities and nations quite commonly codify social pressure in the form of laws, and moral opprobium is not something easily contained.
However, I think you're stretching beyond any useful bounds when you say that Callahan's argument could also produce the resoult that we don't need a pricing system/socialism works. I think he's rather acknowledging that social pressure, especially if organized, can influence corporate actors in effective ways. Plus he's impliedly arguing that direct regulation is extremely blunt and prone to all manner of mischief, so that non-state actions are, in balance, better. He has a point, but it's a generalized one that isn't clearly correct in the case of climate change.
Third, I agree that it is perfectly fair to frame climate policy *exploiters* as immoral. Sometimes straightforward engagement works better, and moral stands can be self-defeating if, as is common on the Mises blog, the moral stad is a tribal one that enables self-deception and essentially leaves the public stage to the others.
Finally, as for automakers, it still seems to me that a concern for their welfare is a substantial obstacle to better climate policy. But probably at this point it's the coal interests that are the more serious problem.
Person, I agree that "public boycott/suasion campaigns will only give a very noisy signal to corporations of how damaging their activities are to the environment, and it will be skewed toward more visible ones."
In short, suasion campaigns directed only at private behavior have only limited efficacy, and are really not of the scale needed to deal with real structural issues like climate change.
It is not clear to me that such suasion campaigns are of much use at the legislative/regulatory level, as the fossil fuel interests and their backers are very sophisticated and effective at twisting such efforts - so that it is people like Jim Hansen who look like the bullies, while all attention is drawn away from those who are creating risks and costs for others.
But I do think Gene has put a finger on a phenomenon that is natural and may be efficicious, but in any case is worth understanding.
I received the following email today from Cathy Zoi , who is the CEO of Al Gore's "Alliance
Also 100%, but then it is one of those silly quizz's where the correct answer is whichever trashes the present administration's policies the most.
Agree entirely with your reply. The correct answer to your question, if I can answer on Cathy's behalf, is that it takes a decisive leader who has balls to undertake measures that aren't the easiest political option, democracy (decision making by committee) just isn't great as a system in changing the direction of the ship of state, so it requires a leader, or leaders, who are not only decisive, but also brave and charismatic to carry the electorate along with them. Alternatively the present direction has to get so shitty for the populace that they're prepared to support anyone who promises something new, be he a Hitler, or a Jefferson.
That's what bothers me about Austrians (and I have in mind Bob Murphy):
They blame the problem on lack of property rights, but then oppose ANY plan to establish property rights in them, just because some plans would permit too much bloat, and then say they don't think a free market would even assign rights in the atmosphere. And then one of them has the audacity to point and laugh at someone who says the government should define the rights and then step out of the way!
If it's not deliberate deception, it's a good imitation.
John P. Holdren , an MIT and Stanford -trained nuclear physicist who is the director of the renowned
>> First, they have not come up with any plausible
>> alternative culprit for the disruption of global
>> climate that is being observed, for example, a culprit
>> other than the greenhouse-gas buildups in the
>> atmosphere that have been measured and tied beyond
>> doubt to human activities.
This is just like the argument "if not God, then who made the world?".
The burden of proof is on the believer, not on the skeptic.
>> (The argument that variations in the sun's output
>> might be responsible fails a number of elementary
>> scientific tests.)
Such as?
>> how it can be that everything modern science tells us
>> about the interactions of greenhouse gases with energy
>> flow in the atmosphere is wrong.
The science is not wrong, just take a look on arXiv. The myth of the "scientific consensus" is just a myth.
[Update: David Zetland at his Aquanomics blog has linked to my piece , astutely noting that if one applies
>> The burden of proof is on the believer, not on the skeptic.
>>
The "skeptics" now rarely bother to address the arguments of the "believers". The above commenter is a perfect example. He says there is no consensus, because there are papers in arXiv. That's a non-sequitur. Science doesn't work by consensus, but decision making often does. Everyone knows that virtually every climate science organisation, and many other general scientific organisations, which have advanced a position on climate change have emphasized its reality, its seriousness, and the need to act.
He is also dismissing the very convincing counterarguments to the theory that the sun has been responsible for current global warming, and failing to even appreciate, let alone falsify, a real theory for how carbon dioxide acts in the atmosphere, which can be shown to account to current warming. The components in that theory has been carefully constructed over time using science. Both real and fake skeptics continously question those components: but real skepticism has led to their strengthening. Fake skeptics squack about the laws of thermodynamics, or, often amateurishly, invent (or promote) models of the atmosphere (that often just so happen to be improbably insensitive to C02 increases), without bothering to show why they are better than current models, or why those current models should be dismissed. There is nothing wrong with all of this -- it is good to question established theory, and you often have to start somewhere. But you cannot seriously dismiss established theory when alternatives are uncredible, especially when established theory would indicate that responsible people ought to take action.
The post by Toyko Tom illustrates how real skeptics operate, and have been operating for years. It has been skepticism that has led to a fairly advanced understanding of earth's atmosphere: enough to make very convincing predictions and observations about climate change.
xSFx, thanks for your comments.
1. The point that "skeptics" have not offered any other plausible explanations for observable warming is NOT the same as the argument "if not God, then who made the world?" It`s the other way around. Scientists offer an explanation and the skeptic response is "it`s natural" without an explanation of any mechanism.
Here is a place to start for reasons that the argument that "variations in the sun's output might be responsible fails a number of elementary scientific tests": www.skepticalscience.com/solar-activity-sunspots-global-warming.htm
You might also like this look by Pat Michaels and Chip Knappenberger as to what they think is in store: www.worldclimatereport.com/.../what-the-future-holds-in-store. Money quote?
" But the targets won’t come close to being met as a bits-and-pieces solution will not achieve the goal of halving current global CO2 emissions by the year 2100—much less any year before then. In fact, more than likely, these legislative efforts will not, to any noticeable degree, even begin to separate the blue and the red curves for a long time to come—far too long to avoid elevating global temperature 2 degrees above “natural” levels.
That’s what the future holds in store. Get used to it."
Thomas Friedman has an op-ed at the New York Times that describes some of Denmark's energy taxation
TokyoTom, please don't buy into the propaganda that oil use *causes* foreign wars, since the wars are clearly not a necessary result of oil use, but rather, really stupid or evil politicians. Singapore, Switzerland, and France seem to get fresh, clean oil from the Middle East without putting a military there.
About the economic losses from carbon taxes: couldn't they be canceled with a rebate to citizens or a corresponding reduction in labor and capital taxes? Or am I just wishing for a free lunch here?
Silas, thanks for the comments. Perhaps I wasn't making myself clear enough; I haven't bought into the oil causes foreign wars nonsense. My point was that US policies to keep energy cheap are often used by politicians to justify that nonsense (which are giveaways to friends that are combined with politically advantageous chest-thumping). There are many sources of oil, so we certainly don't need any military interventions.
My remark about Denmark was intended to note that a focus on energy independence - although it's not something I really worry about - can be advantageous because it makes it harder for politicians to embark on energy-related wars. But Denmark is much smaller than the US and whatever pork it has simply doesn't scale up to the massive US defense/intelligence pork.
I think there is a free lunch on carbon taxes, as economists have long agreed that shifting from taxes on labor, capital or income to consumption would improve investment. Accordingly, I don't think there is an immediate disadvantage from being an initial mover - if other taxes are actually cut - though eventually nations must coordinate if they think aggressive mitigation and adaptation measures are needed. But trade policy is available as enforcement leverage, so I don't think that the international coordination issue is the real hang-up.
The tough issues are figuring ways to buy off our coal extraction and transport industries (and the states that are hooked on the revenues) and to make sure that we avoid cap and trade/alternative energy pork by going for rebated carbon taxes.
If I had to rank the energy options from best to worst I would say:
1- no government interference
2- government interference where the government makes a good choice (like taxing a destructive action to offset the externalized costs and compensate the rest of the impacted society, the pollution from burning oil)
3- government interference where the government makes a bad choice (like spending huge sums on maintaining a military empire to dominate oil supplies rather than taxing much less and letting the people pay a bit more at the pump instead)
So Denmark's choice is not the most bad, but also not the best it could be. In my opinion at least.
Also, global warming, its causes and potential problems have been wildly distorted for political reasons. The actions that governments take as a result of this misperceived danger are also wildly off base. Carbon in the atmosphere is a good thing, warmth is a good thing. Weather people can't even predict a hurricane more than a few days out, what makes anyone think they can predict droughts floods or other changing weather patterns?
Kevin, you left out of your list of energy options:
- getting the government out of the business of owning and leasing land;
- getting the government out of the business of running and regulating utilities;
- eliminating corporate income taxes (allowing immediate depreciation); and
- replacing taxes on income and capital with taxes on energy,
among others.
Your first two statements about climate change are off base. As it relates to a shared global resource, no single nation is going to adopt ruinous policies. Rather we face a situation more like ranchers deciding to close the range, or fishermen deciding to impose catch limits. The only industry to benefit from federal action/inaction so far is coal, which is by far our dirtiest energy source.
As for what we can or can`t predict, doesn`t the house win in the long run when betting on odds? When we load dice, can we make predictions on outcomes? As for warm being good, when did that give those making things warmer the right to do so, regardless of the wishes of, or costs to, others?
Cato Unbound's new climate issue features a lead essay by Jim Manzi , who is an MIT- and Wharton
Does he advocate forcing emitters to raise contingency funds so that they can pay for any damages that they cause?
If the risks are as small as he suggests, then it should be easy for the emitting companies to adsorb the extra costs.
LL, thanks for your visit. Well, of course Manzi hasn`t done that, as he`s just not a libertarian and doesn`t care about protecting people and property from damages caused by others. Rather, he`s a conservative; I imagine he wants to keep government small and doesn`t particularly care that the status quo protects the polluters, who are happy to pay modestly for the protection.
Pingback from William M. Briggs, Statistician » Wrong -> Immoral -> Illegal?
Hey TT I finally took the plunge and did the quiz. I found one of the questions really deceptive. On the question about clean coal, it asks how much of the harmful emissions is captured and stored safely, and claims the answer is zero. Now check out their explanation:
"There is not a single commercial coal-fired power plant in operation or under construction that captures its carbon pollution and safely prevents it from entering the atmosphere. So-called “clean coal” doesn’t address the climate crisis. Coal is dirty. Unless we capture and store the carbon, there is no other way to describe it."
So, it calls clean coal "dirty" on the grounds that it doesn't remove the CO2, when in reality, the CO2 is the cleanest byproduct emitted!
Yes, coal is a horrible energy source, but its Co2 is not "dirty".
A few days ago I concluded that Jim Manz i’s lead essay in Cato Unbound's new climate issue
[UPDATE: See my follow-up post .] Cato Unbound's new climate issue features a lead essay by Jim Manzi
TT, have you seen this?
www.aps.org/.../monckton.cfm
Yes, of course, lm.
Have you seen this?
climateprogress.org/.../irony-gate-viscount-monckton-a-british-peer-says-his-paper-was-peer-reviewed-by-a-scientist-how-droll.
Monckton is engaged in deliberate deception.
It was Plato who said, "A tyrant…is always stirring up some war or other, in order that the people may require a leader...." T seems to fit the tyrant model...
Thanks for the comment. Pickens is more cynical and ambitious than that. He's not trying to be a leader, but seeking to manipulate political power for his benefit.
Tokyo Tom wrote:
Manzi thinks investments of the following types are merited: “improved global climate prediction capability, visionary biotechnology to capture and recycle carbon dioxide emissions, or geo-engineering projects to change the albedo of the earth’s surface or atmosphere”. Does Manzi not see that carbon pricing would encourage private investments in all of these areas?
-|-|-
Or you might say that carbon taxes, or the equivalent, would allow the market to fund what it decides are the better ideas for reducing emissions. With a tax, there is much less need for the government, within reason, to pick which technologies to fund, or allow to operate. I say "within reason", because some technologies, like some carbon sequestration plans, can reduce carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, but we may not know whether they will still work after hundreds of years have passed. Other technologies, such as clean energy or energy efficiency, presently have better understood or lower risks of failure or avoid producing carbon dioxide in the first place: a carbon tax would make these technologies more valuable.
A topic of great economic consequence is the state's withholding of advanced energy technologies in favor of corporate monopolies and state monopolies of tactical power.
Producing the engines to make all water into fuels would allow every IMF borrower country to immediately escape the bonds of 1st world domination. This is an acceptable condition for most of the world's populace, but controllers desperately want that monopoly to stand.
YOU Bret Stephens !!!! DIE !!!!
from Russia in love baby))))))))))
crf, thanks for your comments. The point of carbon pricing is to incentivize reductions in GHG emissions while leaving to the market decisions about how to achieve reductions and what technologies to invest in.
There ar fewer incentives for narkets to invest in prediction, sequestration and geo-engineering, but they still exist.
Considerable public funds have been invested in climate models; if the government ceased funding model research and scenario generation, it would be likely that private investors would acquire one or more such models - which would help to deflate the politicization of the models.
Further, if tax policy allows offsets for direct carbon capture or sequestration that are demonstrated to be effective (for at least a period of 50 years or so), then markets will also have incentives to invest in such technologies.
Perhaps the strongest case for government funds is in investigating geo-engineering options, since it is difficult to see how private investors could capture any returns from such investments.
William, I'm with your first paragraph, but you have me on the second, as the only way to turn water into a "fuel" is either to store it behind a dam and capture potential energy by releasing it, or by putting energy INTO the water (heat or electricity) to generate eith steam to drive turbines or H2 that releases energy when burned.
Jim Manzi has just posted the close-out essay in the online forum (at Cato Unbound ) that the Cato Institute
Ron Bailey , Science Correspondent of Reason Online , reported recently "how some environmental
More from the National Review 's "Planet Gore" corner . My reaction? While we do need investments
John P. Holdren , an MIT and Stanford -trained nuclear physicist who is professor at Harvard's Kennedy
The bleeding-heart liberal do-gooders! Puzzlingly, this Heritage Foundation essay completely fails to
I copy below comments I made on a related thread at Roger Pielke, Jr.'s Prometheus science policy
You really should check out this posting by the esteemed statistician Dr. Briggs:
wmbriggs.com/.../do-not-smooth-times-series-you-hockey-puck
You learn quite a bit from the experts on how to 'smooth' data to fit your outcome.
Jacob, thanks for the cross-reference to Briggs.
What's the volume of water in the Actic Ocean?
How much energy did or are these did or are they releasing?
How much energy is required to raise the temperature of a litre of water by one degree?
Let me decide whether or not the volcanoes are effecting water temperatures in the area
Thom, by all means feel free. I've just posted some relevant opinion, that's all. Andy Revkin at the NYT Dot Earth blog did more detailed reporting.
See this surprising decision in the UK , letting climate-change protesters/trespassers off the hook for
Another example might be when you push a woman from the street and she breaks her arm. If you saved her from beeing hit by a Truck, I don't think she can sucessfully sue her.
I think the decision of the jury is wrong, even under the assumption that anthropological global warming is real. There is just a too big gap of causation there between spraying and preventing global warming.
T/T: I'm with you on your general point, but ... how the hell does spray-painting a smokestack stop net CO2 emissions?
Also of note: <i>"Professor James Hansen of Nasa, who had flown from American to give evidence,"</i>
ROFL! Who wants to bet that his (statistical) contribution to CO2 emissions by taking this extra trip more than wiped out whatever the activists prevented?
Also, hansen <i>appealed to the Prime Minister personally to "take a leadership role" in cancelling the plan and scrapping the idea of a coal-fired future for Britain.</i>
One thing I'll never "get" is how so many people believe:
a) AGW is a SEVERE threat to humanity ...
b) but not as severe as using nuclear power plants.
Finally, as usual, this just highlight's how Gene Callahan's "just shun polluters" doesn't work, since you have to solve the entire economic calculation problem *without prices* to even figure out who needs to be shunned. Oops!
I know, you don't like me crticizing Gene's shunning idea, apparently even if I do it politely, but it needs to be said. AGW debates make libertarians use arguments they would never endorse in any other context.
Silas, it is certainly true that "AGW debates make libertarians use arguments they would never endorse in any other context," but Austrians allow for - and the real world certainly contains - effective informal mechanisms. Not everything works by price; moral suasion can be very powerful, and is obviously indispensible for getting legislators to agree to the quasi-market measures that you and many others think are necessary.
I find it a little irksome that some conservatives and libertarians ascribe a seeming lack of nuclear power to environmentalists. When did they take POWER and DECIDE for everyone that nuclear power was a greater threat than global warming? Honestly, I doubt many environmentalists believe that nuclear power is worse than global warming. A lot of environmentalists do not like nuclear at all, but they come by their opinions honestly, and would suggest that technologies and policies other than nuclear would be better. One might criticise those ideas, but they are not stupid.
The idea that it's environmentalists at fault for whatever direction the US takes its energy policy is even more laughable when you look at the construction of coal plants over the last decades: environmentalists hate coal even more. They apparently stopped nuclear, but can't stop coal? Are environmentalists the reason we have such awful fuel economy in our cars? Did they suggest Detroit build trucks, rather than efficient cars (did environmentalists draft the "Chicken law")?
Is it possible that there is a lack of new nuclear power stations because it is expensive to build them, staff them with highly educated workers and managers, regulate them, dispose of their waste safely and attempt to restrictively control knowledge and materials to prevent nuclear proliferation?
Even if one thinks, as I do, that nuclear could in the future become ever more important in the power mix, do you not think there are arguments related to timing and scale that suggest a large short term increase in nuclear power could be unwise and inefficient?
At any rate, a carbon tax, and perhaps some limited subsidies and oversight to get the nuclear industry's act together (read Joe Romm's take on the currently inefficient and misrun nuclear industry), could make nuclear power more competitive vis-a-vis coal, and especially coal with (the fanciful) carbon capture and storage solutions (read Vaclav Smil about how ccs is not likely to be a large solution). The investor may then like to fund the nuclear industry, and with funding you'll see plants built.
TT: Yes, moral suasion is necessary to get legislatures to start the quasi-market measures, but that doesn't save Gene's position, since he opposes that!
crf: "A lot of environmentalists do not like nuclear at all, but they come by their opinions honestly, and would suggest that technologies and policies other than nuclear would be better."
If you really think AGW will be catastrophic, you must believe nuclear poses a similar threat in order to so strongly oppose it, OR have a truly bizarre preference ordering which justifies the title "stupid".
"environmentalists hate coal even more. They apparently stopped nuclear, but can't stop coal? Are environmentalists the reason we have such awful fuel economy in our cars?"
What do you think would have happened if environmentalists had (sensibly) promoted the idea of:
"Increase the energy supply by adding wind/solar power BEFORE resorting to nuclear power BEFORE resorting to any expansion of coal usage"
instead of:
"Increase the energy supply by adding solar/wing power BEFORE resorting to coal BEFORE resorting to nuclear"
Do you see what happens? If legislators do what environmentalists say, but don't want to approve big enough subsidies to wind/solar, what happens? You get a much worse energy source.
Now am I justified blaming the larger environmentalist movement for its painfully poor ability to prioritize?
Drat, it seems the EcoFreako website has, er, melted away.
Roger, thanks for the news. When I get back home I'll check to see if I downloaded those songs.
Let me rephrase my main points. The market explains much of the relative lack of nuclear power today, and the rest of our energy use. And even in a fairer market (with carbon taxes), I don't believe a short term ramp-up of nuclear would be cost-effective, and that a freer market would not support it to a great degree, as opposed to other forms of energy. (Wouldn't it be great to test this, in a market with proper carbon taxes!) In the free market side of things, this is because it is hugely capital intensive, doesn't scale particularly well, and is a mis-run industry in terms of the number of companies involved and designs, and requires highly skilled and educated workers who are short supply. In the regulatory side of things nuclear also has special issues not present in other energy choices, which greatly hinder its freedom in the marketplace: there is no free market is nuclear knowledge or workers or regulators, nor can its waste be dealt with in anything but a highly regulated and expensive manner, and the market for the supply of uranium is also very constrained and regulated. And many of those constrainsts to the free market cannot be alleviated, due to safety and national security concerns.
"If you really think AGW will be catastrophic, you must believe nuclear poses a similar threat in order to so strongly oppose it, OR have a truly bizarre preference ordering which justifies the title "stupid""
So if you argue against nuclear, you're in favour of unchecked global warming. Hmm.
You've not even addressed the point of what I earlier wrote. Perhaps some people (environmentalists, economists, capitalists, citizens, politicians, whatever ...) do not think nuclear can help alleviate fossil fuel use in a certain short time frame, as you do. You simply assume nuclear will work, and is the most cost efficient to do it quickly. But why?
You continue to pretend that it is anti-nuclear environmental activists who were standing in the way of what would be (could be) a near term nuclear renaissance. I pointed out in my post many reasons, most market based, and some regulatory and security based, which you don't address, for why nuclear may be believed to be costly short term. And I pointed out that anti-nuclear activists and environmentalists have never, ever been the drivers of energy policy.
This is your argument, with extra sarcasm:
You don't like what some environmentalists and anti-nuclear activists say about nuclear.
You just know nuclear is The Answer. And, because it is The Answer you say people who might argue differently have to now explain why they think it is better to have unchecked global warming. People who argue fairly do not resort to trickery like this.
You seem to believe that markets have had no large role play in why nuclear has a lower proportion of power than you might like. And it is due mostly to anti-nuclear environmentalists who took power and decided that few plants would be built.
Which politicians are listening to enviromentalists when crafting policy? And when was there a unified message from enviros which suggested "first wind/solar/renewables, then coal, then nuclear"? And, supposing this were the case, why do you think that if they said "first wind/solar/renewables, then nuclear, then coal" it would make a difference? Are you suggesting that, absent carbon taxes, and absent credits for wind/solar/renewables, that money would then flow from congress for nuclear plants if only enviros had prioritised them above coal? Do you really think coal plants would not be built (to a degree outstripping nuclear), absent carbon taxes, if only the enviros had prioritized their message properly?
I don't see how opposing the theory of (macro-)evolution is necessary "being wrong on science". Just because those scientists not in favour of evolution are a minority doesn't mean that they are wrong or unscientific.
Torsten,
Some who argue against creationists may make the logical mistake of suggesting that being in a minority is what makes the anti-evolution activists wrong. What really makes them wrong, however, is that they are wrong on the facts and in the conclusions they draw from those facts.
I've been reading the arguments of anti-evolution activists for several years. Gaps in the fossil record, irreducible complexity, mutations occur too infrequently, 2nd Law of Thermodynamics, polonium halos, etc. None of these arguments have survived even my inexpert scrutiny. (My M.S. is in physics. The last biology course I took was in high school.) I have never seen a truly scientific argument against evolution. Lot of arguments are dressed in the language of science and/or use actual data. But they are all missing essential scientific reasoning. This next quote from physicist Richard Feynman's 1974 commencement address at CalTech shows up so often in online discussions about science because it is such a clear and obvious explanation of how to be 'scientific'. (Feynman was considered a great teacher of science, not just a great scientist, for his ability to explain things so well.)
"The first principle is that you must not fool yourself—and you are the easiest person to fool. So you have to be very careful about that. After you've not fooled yourself, it's easy not to fool other scientists. You just have to be honest in a conventional way after that."
He notes that being scientific requires a level of utter honesty that is not normally found in other areas of life. When making a scientific argument, you must be willing to question and doubt your own argument and imagine all of the ways in which it might be wrong.
"We've learned from experience that the truth will come out. Other experimenters will repeat your experiment and find out whether you were wrong or right. Nature's phenomena will agree or they'll disagree with your theory."
This is what is missing from those that I have seen argue against evolution. I do not see them being honest in that kind of complete way. Their arguments are constructed solely on the basis of what information and ideas support their desired conclusion. Evidence that contradicts that conclusion is either misinterpreted badly enough so that it seems to support it or ignored entirely.
I'm still waiting for a scientist to make that kind of utterly honest scientific case against evolution.
Thanks for the reply JasonTD,
I am aware of the basic arguments from both sides (evolutionists / creationists). I don't know why you deem the mentioned arguments to be flawed and I think discussing them in detail here would explode this blog post. What you are pointing to can however be called bias on the creationist/anti-evolutionist side. But let's don't forget that this applies to evolutionists/Darwinists as well. Pointing to the others side biases and motives is btw. an ad hominem line of argument and hence a very unscientific way to argue.
In my own point of view organisms are complex functional systems that require a high degree of perfection for their continued existence and reproduction. It can be reasonably assumed that this won't come into existence by chance. This places the burden of proof on the evolutionist shoulders, who now would have to demonstrate via experiment that my kind of reasoning is wrong.
That most people in academia do share evolutionist beliefs seems to be the result of the hegemony of this point of view.
If there is interest into discussing the matter on the forum, we can do so, since this may attract an even broader audience to the forum via the search engines.
I made no reference to the motives or biases of the anti-evolutionists. My points were directed only at the rhetorical tactics they use and how they are unscientific, in my opinion. I don't see any ad hominem in what I said.
Your second paragraph shows a misunderstanding of how scientific knowledge is constructed and advanced. During informal discussions over scientific issues, people, including scientists, will often revert to the normal way of debating ideas: each taking a side and arguing in support of theirs and/or against the other side. This seems natural to people since it is how arguments and ideas are discussed in the vast majority of situations. But what makes science unique as a system of knowledge is that there is, in fact, only one side: nature itself. There is an objective truth to strive to reach. Our ability to reach that truth and describe it correctly is, of course, limited. Even successful theories are only accepted as correct provisionally. Further testing and observation will always be needed to modify those theories, expand them to cover new phenomena, or even replace them if necessary.
This is what Feynman was getting at. In science, you don't stake out a position to defend against challengers, because what is going to provide the toughest challenge to your ideas is not other people, but reality. So, not fooling yourself, as he put it, is your top priority. You need to be at least as skeptical of your own ideas as you are of the ideas of others.
When you put forth your own view of life and its history, you have made a claim about how life behaves in nature. That claim must stand or fall on its own merits. Whether or not some competing claim is 'better' doesn't actually make your claim a successful scientific idea. However, the Theory of Evolution also needs to stand on its own merits in the same way. So, I do agree that there is a 'burden of proof' for supporters of Evolution, just not that it is any higher than the burden of proof on you to support your view.
I don't particularly wish to discuss evolution vs. creationism in detail here, for two reasons. One is that it is off the original topic of how the issue relates to parental choice in education. Second is that I am far from an expert in that area. As I said, my field is physics. I am a science educator (I teach chemistry and physics at a public high school in Florida), not an evolutionary biologist. As such, I have read a fair amount about how the issue is debated in public forums, but there are those much better qualified to discuss the science in full detail. I would be happy to continue discussing how this issue relates to the nature of science and how education in science relates to the original topic of TokyoTom's post. I actually have more to say on that topic than I have so far, but I am running out of time for tonight.
Thank you for the interesting discussion so far, Torsten. I hope we can continue it. And thanks to Tom for providing a good place for thoughtful discussion.
FOX offers soapbox for Pickens mouthpiece Warren Mitchell (former chairman of Southern California Gas
This is a good idea. I hope it works.
The cynical me says that this is likely part of a far-sighted effort on the part of corporations to deal with the future pressure upon governments to act to require mandatory licencing on many environmental technologies. Corporations would likely (and quite properly) push back hard against such legislation, and it would help to be armed with a well thought-out alternative. So they need to collectively build an in-house procedure, and to build a reserve of good will with the public.
They are learning their lesson from watching the situation with drugs for Aids and other tropical diseases. There is, in many countries, a problematic effort in getting mandatory patent licencing for generic manufacturers to sell product to African countries. The positions of the pharma industry here has garnered much public ill-will. They may be a victim of their own too successful lobbying efforts. A more careful and thought-out approach would have done the pharma industry better, instead they fought too hard at every step, didn't prepare a good alternative, and got a system that isn't working as well as it should.
CRF, while some degree of cynicism is probably appropriate, the example of the pharma companies just isn't applicable to these inductrial firms.
No doubt there're looking for PR benefits, but why can't they also be interested in a cleaner environment and saw a way to get both, by opening up for free use patents that they found useful but didn't see a goldmine in?
Like any government program, when it fails the statists always say that not enough money was spent on it.
Paid scientists say what hey are paid to say.....they wish to keep their jobs. How can modelers and data miners,, not a single actual atmospheric scientist among them. Amazing hey made their computers agree with their computers, all without having to deal with the messy real world.
"Paid scientists say what hey are paid to say"
Your freely offered comments are less than worthless.
R W, thanks for commenting. Does Exxon pay its scientists (two of whom sit on IPCC panels) to agree with the IPCC summaries? Why? And do China, India and Brazil also pay its scientists to agree with the IPCC? Why? What about all of the other corporations that agree with the IPCC? Is it all a conspiracy by scientists, corporations and governments around the world to fall unfer the thumb of anonymous super-regulators at the UN?
crf, thanks for your comments, too. Perhaps you can add a little meat next time, rather than a simple dismissal of another commenter?
In June, I made a number of comments to Bob Murphy in response to his blog post entitled, Cap and Trade
Bob is still being extremely deceptive:
1) He refuses to say that anywhere that a reader of his original op-ed would read it.
2) It's not that his statements "could easily be construed" that way; there simply is no other way to interpret them. As I mentioned on my blog, (can't access now for some reason), he structured his essay like this: "Genuine, *market* prices are good at reflecting scarcity. Like if a pipeline blew up, and oil got more expensive, that's a price reflecting a genuine new scarcity. But if the price exploded because of emission caps, that doesn't reflect scarcity."
No human being, *including* those who know Bob and have every existing piece of disambiguating context, could possible read that contrast and say, "Oh, but at, um, non-explosive levels, that could of course reflect scarcity."
To claim that he was simply "could be misinterpreted" is a lie.
Btw TT, what do you think of my blog post specifically about scarcity? I'll link it when I can access my blog again.
Silas, it puzzles me that Bob, despite his relative openness (he did after note in comments on his LVMI blog post that we had good comments, and has a number of discussions with you and me in various places), has been so begrudging to acknowledge his obvious overstatement here.
Is this your blog post on scarcity that you`re referring to? I don`t think I saw it previously,but I think Bob linked to it somewhere. I would say that you are a bulldog and somewhat more prolix than you need to be to make the point - but it might well be what Bob`s stubbornness has earned.
Oops; this post, right? silasx.blogspot.com/.../setting-scarcity-straight-once-and-for.html
Yes, that's the one! Okay, it could have been toned down, but what about my attempt to define what it means to "reflect scarcity" such as in the case of carbon caps? Does the chain of reasoning make sense to you?
They hold shares, not run it. If I wanted interest I would be a manager.
Good point about corporations. Watch out, though; Stephan Kinsella might pop up here and comment! :-)
scinerams, who committed this tort? How many heads will roll? What individuals stand for TVA?
I`m not saying that shareholders (here, the American people generally) run the TVA; my principal point is that limited liability of shareholders enables and encourages torts like this. Without a state grant of limited liability in the case of usual corporations, large shareholders would take greater interest in how well the firm manages risk, and smaller shareholders might purchase insurance to make sure they have no large contingent exposure. The result would be better thought-out operations, based on pressure from shareholders and insurers.
What`s different in this case is that TVA is a government-owned corporation, so not only does it generate risks for others to bear, but the taxpayer is stuck holding the bag for clean up operations and liability costs.
Who runs the TVA? Bureaucrats.
Individuals have to take full responsibility for their actions, and others in their community can hold them responsible. Not so for corporations generally, particularly not government ones.
William Anderson has a thoughtful New Year's Day post , pointing out how Paul Krugman fails to understand
Great post TokyoTom! And thanks for researching it and posting those links. I hope this brings more reasoned debate to the issue.
I also hope that certain libertarians (and you know who I have in mind) don't respond to this by suggesting that Somalis pay Westerners to stop exploiting them, as their "market solution" for AGW seems to be...
The right-wing Business & Media Institute has published a rather confused piece by Chris Horner
"the potential consequences of releasing all of the fossil carbon stored up since the Age of Dinosaurs."
Well then, can't one also say the biosphere has a massive carbon deficit waiting to be restored? What is your ideal level? temperature? This fretting sounds like the intellectually lazy Precautionary Principle, which places the burden of proof upon the accused, often expecting them to disprove a negative. Greens: "This release of _____ CAN'T be good." Bush: "Iraq CAN'T be innocent of terrorism." Is the release of plant food (CO2) to just be assumed as a bad thing? Is carbon dioxide as a nuisance to be just taken as a primary absolute? I'll stick with you as long as you use reason, but let's not pretend to have a genuine trail of reasoning if the primaries are not yet proven as good/bad.
I'm intrigued when I read demands for Carbon "Markets" on a Mises site. Fine, but shouldn't one prove there's a scarcity? and also, as a torte situation, prove harm against a specific party (not "society"). If not, then it's not a "market." I hate when statists steal that term. It's just coercion.
In an earth-shaking ;) essay in today's Human Events, CEI 's Chris Horner comes clean and acknowledges
In a recent post, Andy Revkin , a New York Times reporter who blogs on energy and environmental issues
ADC, thanks for your comment.
First, who's demanding that the government create carbon markets? Not me. I'm simply referring to the rather basic Austrian insight that where markets don't exist, people with differing preferences lack the means to enter into mutually welfare-enhancing transactions. As Roy Cordato states:
"The focus of the Austrian approach to environmental economics is conflict resolution. The purpose of focusing on issues related to property rights is to describe the source of the conflict and to identify possible ways of resolving it."
"If a pollution problem exists then its solution must be found in either a clearer definition of property rights to the relevant resources or in the stricter enforcement of rights that already exist. ... This shifts the perspective on pollution from one of "market failure" where the free market is seen as failing to generate an efficient outcome, to legal failure where the market process is prevented from proceeding efficiently because the necessary institutional framework, clearly defined and enforced property rights, is not in place."
"[T]he Austrian approach to solving pollution problems may face implementation problems at the margin, i.e., with certain "tough cases," defining and enforcing property rights already stands as the fundamental way in which interpersonal conflicts of all kinds are avoided or dealt with. …This is not to suggest that the clear definition of property rights is an easily achievable goal in all situations. It is not. But, while the Austrian approach to solving pollution problems may face implementation problems at the margin, i.e., with certain "tough cases," defining and enforcing property rights already stands as the fundamental way in which interpersonal conflicts of all kinds are avoided or dealt with."
mises.org/.../cordato-humans-cannot-harm-the-environment.aspx
Second, in this connection, perhaps you've failed to note that the "necessary institutional structure" - clearly defined and enforced property rights - is NOT in place? Walter Block notes that the "tort system" you refer to is broken, being largley supplanted by a command and control scheme heavily subjected to rent-seeking:
"in the 1840s and 1850s a new legal philosophy took hold. No longer were private property rights upheld. Now, there was an even more important consideration: the public good. And of what did the public good consist in this new dispensation? The growth and progress of the U.S. economy. Toward this end it was decided that the jurisprudence of the 1820s and 1830s was a needless indulgence. Accordingly, when an environmental plaintiff came to court under this new system, he was given short shrift. He was told, in effect, that of course his private property rights were being violated; but that this was entirely proper, since there is something even more important that selfish, individualistic property rights. And this was the “public good” of encouraging manufacturing."
"From roughly 1850 to 1970, firms were able to pollute without penalty. This is why “there is no way to force private polluters to bear the social cost of their operations” a la Pigou; this is why there was a Samuelsonian “divergence of social and private costs.” This was no failure of the market. It was a failure of the government to uphold free enterprise with a legal system protective of private property rights.
"In the 1970s a “discovery” was made: the air quality was dangerous to human beings and other living creatures. Having caused the problem itself, the government now set out to cure it, with a whole host of regulations which only made things worse."
mises.org/.../limited-liability-produces-both-pollution-and-political-meddling-block-on-environmentalism.aspx
Third, you confuse your own wishful thinking about climate science with the structure of Austrian analysis, which is mainly concerned about preferences and whether there are institutional means for expressing them. I certainly don't think that CO@ as a nuisnace should be "just taken as a primary absolute." But I also don't think that the views expressing concern can simply be dismissed as "lazy".
I've spent plenty of time on the main blog discussing the science, if you care to let your own diligent fingers do a little walking.
Fourth, I also do not favor the precautionary principle, but view it as a response by citizens and consumers to abuses by government and by investors who use the limited liaiblity corporate form to avoid responsibility for the risks that their business investments generate. If investor liability was not limited by the state, pressure groups would see much less need to try to use government to check corporations.
mises.org/.../the-gift-that-keeps-on-giving-the-state-grant-to-shareholders-of-limited-liablity-for-torts-committed-by-corporations-dialogue-with-stephan-kinsella.aspx
> Corporations ... you can't blame things for
> being what they are. It's when they have a
> tool that allows them to silently hurt people
> that they become dangerous.
I don't blame corporations for being what they are -- the creation of a misread footnote in a court case subsequently turned into immortal limited liability "people" larger than life.
But -- as they are a creation of government -- the suggestion that their behavior will be improved by removing their creator is a clear case of mistaking Dr. Frankenstein for his Monster. It's the monster that's the problem.
Dr. F. just needs serious reeducation.
We made them, we need to restrain our creation.
arent you being a bit rough on Block ,you cite some good works - Sheldon Richman, - Gene Callahan,- Edwin Dolan,
who you seem to appreciate. where you aware that block is fenitely a supporter of free market environmentalism, and has written a book on the subject and many papers. of course he is opposed to stasist environmentalism and what passes as the Environmentalist mainstream movement... but with good reason.....
Nir, thanks for your comments. Yes, I'm familiar with Prof. Block's works, having cited him a number of times: mises.org/.../search.aspx.
Am I being a little rough on Block? Little ol' me? Don't think so. It's perfectly fair to observe that he has posted on a topic while declining completely to discuss it from an Austrian viewpoint, and to speculate on the reasons why.
Jerry Taylor of Cato is o ne careful observer of the carbon follies who sees the handwriting on the wall
Robert L. Bradley, Jr. is an energy expert (author, former speechwriter for Key Lay and director of public
Austrian-leaning economist Bob Murphy , whose efforts last year to discount the work of Yale's William
well, did the books and the journal articles discuss environmentalism from an austrian viewpoint?. if so, you are just criticising his choice of topic on the particular day block wrote the article; in which he didnt cover the same ground that he had covered elsewhere. no offence but i think that might be a little rough.
I have repeatedly made roughly the same criticism since last June, and sadly, Bob_Murphy will respond to anything but that point. The way I've put it is, would you justify this kind of harm, in any other context, with a CBA? Is it somehow okay to give someone's kids asthma (or flood their land, etc.) as long as, hey, don't worry, this'll help the economy!
The silence is deafening.
Nir, thanks for commenting, but I actually love Prof. Block's choice of topic; it's been calling out for productive engagement from Austrians for years, but what we usually get is ad homs and poo flinging.
BTW, did you actually look at Block's post? It has no substance, but is simply a straight post of someone else commenting on the weather.
Silas, can you stick a link or two into your comments? There may be an inquiring mind or two out there.
Rob Bradley has a new post up at MasterResource , cheering on big (and now "clean") coal, which
Well there's also the question of what policy-making paradigm would justify the use of cost-benefit analysis in this way...I mean, is Murphy really the kind of guy who's going to say that the role of policy is to allocate resources and coordinate behavior in order to maximize the net present value of overall social outcomes?
I noted in a previous post that Rob Bradley , CEO of the Institute for Energy Research and lead blogger
I believe that a key problem - and thus a key opportunity - that our country faces is over-regulation
Further to my previous posts , excerpted below are the recommendations that Paul Joskow (energy expert
We need to utilize everything in out power to reduce our dependence on foreign oil including using our own natural resources.OPEC will continue to cut production until they achieve their desired 80-100. per barrel. The high cost of fuel this past year seriously damaged our economy and society. Oil is finite. We are using oil globally at the rate of 2X faster than new oil is being discovered. We need to take some of these billions in bail out bucks and bail ourselves out of our dependence on foreign oil. Jeff Wilson has an eye opening new book out called The Manhattan Project of 2009 Energy Independence Now. He explores our uses of oil besides gasoline, our depletion, out reserves and stores as well as viable options to replace oil and the pros and cons of each. Oil is finite, it will run out in the not too distant future. WE need to take some of these billions in bail out bucks and bail America out of it's dependence on foreign oil. The historic high price of gas this past year did serious damage to our economy and society. WE should never allow others to have that much power over our economy again. I wish every member of congress would read this book too. www.themanhattanprojectof2009.com There could be no better investment in America than to invest in America becoming energy independent. Create cheap clean energy, millions of badly needed new green collar jobs, and reduce our dependence on foreign oil all in one fell swoop! America needs to wake up and smell the coffee.
Brian, sorry, but I'm only interested in opening up power markets to competition, so consumers have access to various providers. This would expand renewables, investments in smart grid and other technologies, and lower the relative use of coal (and make that use cleaner).
The only problem with our use of foreign oil is that politicians and ourdefense industry like to use that as reasons for them to pick taxpayers' pockets for counterproductive trillion-dollar wars.
Energy independence? Sorry, but just another name for protectionism.
[Note: Although the giant snakes I mentioned in my preceding post may have fat tails, I didn't want
"If you cannot measure it; You cannot improve it." -- Lord Kelvin Consistent with its mission
George Will has gifted us with a thoroughly confused op-ed in the Sunday WaPo . Will predictibly trots
Henry Payne 's (cartoonist at the Detroit News and commentator at NRO) has a interesting post up
After decades of loathing nuclear power as the ugly, monstrous child of a big government Dr. Frankenstein
Tokyo Tom,
What makes you think carbon taxes are better than corporate income taxes or CAFE restrictions? Why should auto companies be faced to pay a different tax in order to get rid of an anticompetetive CAFE standard? Carbon taxes distort the market just like CAFE standards. I don't see any difference. I don't disagree with your points on poor corporate governance and stubborn labor, but your view that a carbon tax is some kind of creative new idea doesn't follow. It just changes where the tax is paid, but doens't change anything fundamental.
William Anderson (an adjunct scholar of the Mises Institute and economics prof. at Frostburg State University
The February 25 Wall Street Journal carries an insightful piece of commentary by James K. Glassman (president
EH, thanks for your comment. Sorry for not seeing/posting it sooner, but I get so much spam that I sometimes fall behind.
Some taxes are not as distorting as others; economists have long noted that taxes on income (particularly on capital) have the effect of dampening investment relative to cosnsumption. As corporate income is taxed at the dividend level, corporate income taxes further depress capital investment. To the extent firms can avoid income tax altogether, the use of armies of accountants and tax lawyers is a deaweight loss to the economy.
If we taxed carbon, automakers would only see it in the energy that they use (and indirectly in the steel, etc that they purchase) and in a shift in demand by consumers for vehicles. Automakers would respond to such changes, which would be much less intrusive (and provide more direct benefits in terms of carbon policy) than are CAFE standards.
In a series of posts at the self-declared "free market" blog of the fossil-fuel energy industry
Anti-enviro Steven Milloy ,adjunct scholar at CEI, author and co-founder of a gadfly free-enterprise
" - is he trying to sabotage a government-lite carbon policy, so that government-heavy policy is more likely to prevail "
Probably not. Maybe the status quo -- no policy at all, is the outcome he wishes. The clues should be his dreamy musing about the whole of climate science "falling apart" and use of the pejorative word "alarmist" to describe Hansen: he who so many self-described libertarians blame, along with the evil-fat Gore, for breaking their decades-long waking-dream that carbon dioxide emissions really are cost-free; he who thinks that due to feedbacks, atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide need to be shortly stabilized, then reduced to 350 ppm, beyond the 550 ppm many advocate as a stabilization point; he who often skillfully uses libertarian arguments to advocate policy to fight an economic problem that pseudo-libertarians blissfully ignored -- leaving them feeling rather impotent. Marlo Lewis may think that if he calls Hansen alarmist, he can go back to beddy-bye and dream happy-thoughts where carbon dioxide is only a life-giving gas for the happy plants. RINGGGG-RINNNGG: that's the alarm clock going off! Rise and Shine my little munchkin-libertarian.
Whatever path people take that doesn't involve willful 900 ppm suicide, it's going to result in <b>starting</b> emissions reductions. Starting emissions reductions, under <i>any</i> ulimate realistic scenario of where you wish carbon dioxide levels to be stablized (eg, no matter 350 ppm or 550 ppm), means some cost needs to be put on emissions, and <i>initially</i> those tax levels, or cap & trade equivalent, are likely to be similar, no matter the ultimate policy scenario chosen, and will be paid mainly by consumers (and taxpayers), like our poor gas-consuming Alabaman truckers (and the taxpayers who'll support the inevitable tax breaks they'll cut to lessen the burden of their higher cost fuel). Whether you get your cap and trade, or you get your carbon tax, or you get your regulations, all will involve broadly comparable costs, initially. Hansen's moved on to try and advocate an initial policy he, and many economists, see as involving the lowest costs with the greatest chance of success: that, despite inevitable tax breaks, carbon taxes are the most economically efficient.
Tom Woods , in his recent "Another "Free Market" Intellectual Has Second Thoughts"
oo ha, thanks for visting - but why bother if you're not going to actually argue?
crf, thanks again for another perceptive comment.
Those who want no policy at all will bear some responsibility for facilitating the adoption of the least-preferable policy option.
But it's not clear to me what Lewis is really trying to achieve. Perhaps coal feels there more to be gained from opaque cap & trade and side deals on funding "future coal"/CCS than from a straight carbon tax.
I do think that there is a fair amount of self-deception on the conservative-libertarian right, but that's true about the left as well; we're all human, after all.
My own view is that in order to see "startling" reductions we need greater competition (and unblended, time-sensitive rates) in the power sector (so consumers see the greater cost of coal and can choose not to buy) and a truly global deal, as otherwise the GHG-heavy industry will simply migrate to developing nations.
I don't agree that cap & trade, carbon tax, or regulations all involve broadly comparable costs. A carbon tax policy is much cheaper and will generate much less economically depressing burdensome regulation and opportunity for back room deals that reduce effectiveness.
But we certainly DO need to get started, as the world is way behind the curve. We will probably need some heavy geoengineering which, to be fair, ought to be financed by the GHG emitters.
As far as I can see various governments & think-tanks pushed programs for the poor. Most (or all) of the financial instruments for these ideas are NOT traded via established market systems, e.g. CBOT, NYMEX &c...
Sooo, IMHO there is NO flaw in the market system, the market is doing its job right now, albeit pretty rigorous, punishing companies worldwide, particulary the guilty.
Sadly, so-called "free-marketers" are often so busy smacking down bad arguments from greens
TokyoTom--you miss some important follow up points/comments at Master Resource. You mis-interpreted my comments and thus reached a faulty conclusion. “the damage my pollution does to you is fine because people want to but my products” –only I NEVER said that. What I said was that the [damage function] calculated negative externalities were smaller than the price/cost premiums demanded by most renewables. I never said anything about where the various costs are placed.
wrt to “by being allowed to shift real and significant costs to others, and that we`d all be better off if those socialized costs were internalized. ” yes, but only provided the social benefits are similarly internalized, and that the social costs of e.g. wind also be internalized--right now they are seldom acknowledged, even less frequently quantified, but never once placed where they belong.
Tom, thanks for your comments here, and pointing to your comment at MasterResource; I posted this in part because it wasn`t clear when I would get a response there.
However, your additional remarks simply further illustrate your muddled thinking.
1. My chief point was that energy/power producers of whatever type should be bearing their own costs instead of externalizing them, and that it is clear that coal producers and coal-fired utilities are NOT bearing all of the costs of their activities, but shift them to others. As a result, broad swaths of the population (the American Lung Assn says that even now there are more deaths annually from coal than there are homicides) are left with the damages, while investors in coal get the profits.
2. Your initial response? That the "extensively studied" “human costs of coal” or “externalities” "are mostly, if not completely, offset by the economic benefits". As I noted this IS very much a utilitarian - and profoundly non-libertarian - calculation that elevates considerations of general social costs and benefits over the rights of people not to be physically harmed by others, and over the duty of people not to harm others.
3. You then compounded your socialistic, non-libertarian analysis by further stressing indicating that general social costs and benefits are also to be compared between various energy technologies ("the negative externalities [of coal] are NOT enough to offset the higher cost premiums of technologies like wind"). This is a market planner`s calculation, not one that a libertarian (much less a power producer) engages in.
4. You now say that you haven`t said where the various costs should be placed, but you both suggest that a general social cost-benefit analysis is appropriate and refuse to acknowledge that a libertarian view both rejects a general social cost-benefit analysis while clearly making actors liable for the harms they cause others.
5. You further illustrate your misunderstanding of libertarian principles - and basic economics - by rather astonishingly arguing that social costs should be internalized "only provided the social benefits are similarly internalized". The whole reason why people engage in market transactions (and wealth is generated as a result) is that all parties believe that the value of benefits that they receive exceed the cost of the trade; your formulation would end the market system! If you are trying to suggest that there are vast positive externalities to coal, please note, again, that it is not a libertarian or market principle that simply because an economic activity generates positive benefits that that means the people engaged in such activities do not have liability for the damages that their activities cause to others.
6. You make a further mistake by suggesting that coal producers/power generators should only have to bear the costs that they impose on others only if the social costs of wind are also internalized. What, is it okay if I throw my trash in your yard, simply because nobody sues the factory down the street because the government has given it a license to pollute? For shame; one social cost does not justify another.
7. Again (how many times do I have to say it?), I am not arguing FOR wind. I understand perfectly well that not only is it a less efficient and generally less valuable technology, but that there are also social costs (particularly bird and bat kill). But these points have nothing to do with whether or not coal should carry its own weight.
8. Finally, allow me to note that on top of all the health and property costs directly associated with coal mining and power generation, that there are significant climate risks as well - enough so that even Exxon supports the IPCC, is leading investments in GHG-lite technology and supports carbon taxes.
I guess you miss the distinction between quantification and allocation. It would also be nice if you revealed your real self, rather than hiding behind a nom de guerre.
It may still seem novel to some, but Exxon Mobil Corporation began throwing its weight behind carbon
The March 6 Financial Times has a great piece by Willem Vuiter , professor at the LSE and former chief
Tom, I certainly didn`t miss the distinction; I made the point upfront that coal producers and users should - as a matter of principle - be allocated the considerable costs that they generate (though libertarian point out that aggregating damages across people of different preferences is inherently flawed). I also made the further point that in determining external costs. one does not also measure external benefits; one is liable for the damages he cause even if others like his products. Thus steel mill should still liable for damages it causes to neighbors, even though others like the steel (especially cheap) and the neighbors buy cars etc buod with the steel.
I have a hard time believing you are actually puzzled over this.
Perhaps sometime I`ll abandon my pseudonym, but it`s of little relevance to the points I`ve made. This website and the internet puts many things I`ve written at your fingertips, and even in the blogsphere, and cetaintly here, reputation matters quite a bit.
It seems you mention identity only to sidestep the work of thinking about markets and principles. But since you`re working for "free market" groups, that seems to present some problems.
Coal producers and users should carry their own costs, but if and ONLY if ALL other producers and consumers do. My original and continuing point is that those who assert that coal has externalities that exceed those of other technologies or that externalities only have negative signs are the muddle headed ones or are intentionally deceptive. Goodbye.
Tom, you`re a difficult one to have a conversation with, because you are not willing to examine libertarian or market principles, and seem to be confusing observations about costs shifted to others as conclusions about how we ought to change policies. Logically they are distinct.
One can recognize that there are considerable external costs associated with coal, and have a separate discussions as to why things are they way they are (I refer to Murray Rothbard on the subversion of common law principles, to be replaced by regulation and rent-seeking), and on the merits of possible policy options.
And one can have a similar discussion about wind, renewables and nuclear power, on their own merits, without referring to coal at all.
But you seem to advance a principle that is entirely unlibertarian, as well as a massive policy coordination effort that is in fact impossible and an evenhandedness that is never in fact observed in practice.
This betrays you as a believer in social planning, instead of in free markets.
"those who assert that coal has externalities that exceed those of other technologies or that externalities only have negative signs are the muddle headed ones or are intentionally deceptive" - Hmmm; this is actually a new one. I challenge you to take a look back through my comments and find ANY place where I said that the externalities of coal exceed those of other technologies; I wasn`t trying to make such a point but to argue that each technology should be considered on its own merits by the market. But since you bring it up, can you find a single energy expert who thinks that coal imposes fewer externalities than, say, natural gas?
And as for externalities, again you fail to comprehend. I have certainly indicated that the some goods may have postitive externalities (though I can`t say I`ve really heard anyone make an argument that there are strong "public good" aspects to fossil fuels or other energy, all of which can easily exclude free-riders.
So look in the mirror if you`re looking for someone who`s confused. Deliberate deception? It`s a shame that you let your dumb hostility lead you to further debase yourself by throwing out completely unsupportable charges like that, rather than working to understand libertarian and market principles that you are still clueless about.
A darn shame, in fact, especially for someone working and blogging at "free market" institutions.
But maybe hostility and ignorance is exactly what MasterResource and Pacific Research Institute want; they come in handy if one`s purpose is not to protect market principles, but to defend particular special interests.
Please feel free to comment again, as freedom is too important to turn one`s back on. You say goodbye; I say hello.
Limited liability is a pretty minor problem compared to all the other regulatory moral hazard incentives that encourage irresponsible behaviour.
[Update: I have separately posted for the interest of readers my exchange of emails with Chip Knappenberger
Finally, someone in the Fed is arguing that the Fed should stop printing money like crazy to bail out
Your link is broken. As for Mr. Volker not knowing what is going on -- I doubt that. He stands to profit for interest made by the Fed, does he not? And as for the "moral hazard problem" -- any company that can turn to the tax payers for financial support when their merger fails might as well try it.
[Update: Links fixed] Bloomberg reported on March 6 that Former Fed Chairman Paul Volker, in proposals
Brannon, many thanks for commenting and pointing out the link problem, which I have fixed.
Volker"s no longer a member of the Fed of course, so is unlikely to see the Fed as part of the problem (though he might think that Greenspan and Bernanke have led it astray). But it's certainly a good thing that he is helping to raise attention to a general problem of misaligned incentives.
While you are right that goverment attracts rent-seekers, there's little new in that. My point is that rent-seeking has acccerlated along with the rise of large corporations, which have at their core the state grant of limited liability, which both incentivizes managers to undertake activities that may be socially hazardous (but for which shareholders have no residual liability; leading to increasing regulation), which has lessened shareholder interests in controlling managers, which has increased management's freedom and moral hazard.
At least in the financial sector, the rot is pervasive and the system falling apart.
A few items of interest have come to my attention regarding the TVA's massive spill last December
How? By shutting down polite and reasoned debate, from a perspective that is certainly more free market
Roger Pielke, Jr. , who is a fairly constant critic of climate scientists, posted last week at his Prometheus
I just ran across an interesting speech and related commentary provided last month at TED by behavioral
You're reaching. But then, the whole enviro-fanaticism is based on reaching, imagining, fabricating, obsessing...
As far as Lew, be thankful he panders to people like me. Whatever he is doing, it seems to be working, because there are even enough surplus resources to allow for you to criticize him with a Mises blog.
Is there a reason my previous comment did not appear?
The chief reason why posts don`t show up immediately are that the spam is so bad I need to hold all comments for review (the LVMI system doesn`t include a test for spambots)l; on top of that, I live in Tokyo (and work!), so I`m not always in a position to be poring over my poring for gems like yours among the dreck.
I appreciate your effort, but you`ve obviously failed to understand my own tongue-in-cheek post. I`m praising Lew - who troubles to actually engage people on what is wrong with the sytem as it isn - and criticizing George, who prefers to ignore entrenched statism in favor of jousting against strawmen. One is productive, while the other is simply amusing himself and pandering to those who prefer partisan and reflexive combat to thinking and honest engagement. People like you, it seems.
Who`s a "reaching, imagining, fabricating, obsessing" enviro-fanatic, as you would have it, by the way? Under Reisman`s terms, isn`t Lew Rockwell - who dares to point out that it is the sick system of "public utility" regulation that lies at the core of the dissatifaction of those calling for "green" energy - an enviro-fanatic? I agree wholeheartedly with Lew - does that make me, or you, an enviro-fanatic?
Just how productive are all these labels, anyway? Do you prefer to follow Reisaman in fighting Frumious Bandersnatches, or Rockwell`s actual application of libertarian principles? Think free, or adopt the Reisman Rule (TM) - your choice.
"there are even enough surplus resources to allow for you to criticize him with a Mises blog."
Yes, indeed; and even for befuddled students like you!
My little blog gets about 20% of the personal aggregate traffic; why do you suppose LVMI tolerates such an obvious disruptive, fanatical participant such as me? Inquiring minds want to know!
TT I absolutely love how condescending and arrogant your replies are. I couldn't cast the stereotype better than your performance.
The left yabbers about nuclear winter caused by nuclear bombs. This implies nukes can be used to cool things down. The left yabbers about global warming. Why is it unreasonable to investigate whether nuclear bombs could not be used to cool things down and offset global warming? Which one of these two contentions are you watermelons not serious about?
Dear student of liberty, please feel free to demonstrate how it is arrogant of me to waste my time on my own blog pointing out your obvious errors.
I`m sorry I let your own deliberate offensiveness, layered on top of your lack of understanding, trigger a snide reaction. For that you have my apologies, even though you clearly don`t deserve them. Oh, I`m just so lousy at winning friends and gaining influence!
Stephan, I was just talking about the frumious bandersnatch and in walks the yabberwocky! Such coincidences are to be celebrated!
But surely you`re not serious about open air nuke tests to combat climate change, but Reisman was, and on the LVMI main pages. His discussion was not the type of facetious one you throw out to dodge addressing it. You disappoint me.
What the left yabbers about is worth mocking, but anyone worth his salt as a libertarian would do like Lew and spend a little time acknowledging that preferences for green power, etc. are perfectly fine, explaining that the reason for their frustration is public utility regulation that stifles competition and protects utilities, and suggesting approaches that would foster consumer goals while advancing liberty.
But it`s so much funner to be like George, right?
What would Ludwig von Mises have said? mises.org/.../draft.aspx (quoting Reisman`s translation)
Here`s Bradley`s post, A Texas-Sized Energy Problem: Republicans, Democrats, and ‘Baptists &
Tom, it's time to drop your sarcasm and just be direct and clear. I am serious--why not investigate nuclear winter as a way to offset alleged global warming?
As for all the fulminating against global warming... are you aware that we are in an interglacial period, probably somewhere near the middle? The earth is bound to start cooling and heading towards another ice age before long. If global warming is real, it will only delay this--which is good. In any event, suppose we impoverish ourselves to slightly decrease the warming for a few decades, until natural cooling starts anyway. Why do this.
The nuclear test ban treaty makes the discussion, if you could call it that, moot.
Thank goodness. It is ridiculous: Finland, Sweden, Canada, Russia and the United States would not support it. They wouldn't want their northern reaches to become thermonuclear dead zones.
-.-.-
" They hate the American way of life because of its comfort and luxury, which they contemptuously dismiss as “conspicuous consumption.” And to frighten people into abandoning it, they are threatening them with a global-warming version of hell. " - - Reisman
This is not yet so open and explicit as to be obvious to everyone."
The article's caricature of the "environmentalist", as a religious nut with a hidden conspiracy, which Dr Reisman has keenly seen through, to destroy western civilisation, is repulsive. He doesn't mention by name any of these horrible people who he claims wish to enslave the minds of humanity. I doubt they exist, in any meaningful number, or, if they do, have any political or social influence.
nope arm the ships with 20mm cannons and shoot em, the british didnt cut us any slack. maybe the Somalians like them but im not Somalian. dont try to justify the acts of violent criminals
Stephan, thanks for your comment, but I`ve been preoccupied. However, it`s hard to believe that you want Dr. Reisman`s suggested testing of atom bombs in the Arctic to be taken seriously from ANY perspective, much less a libertarian one. There are obvious issues about the role of government, consent and compensation of those facing fallout risks, the problem of interfering with Arctic ecosystems and access to resources that are coming available as a result of thawing, potential releases of methane by the explosions themselves, plus small things like international treaties as crf notes.
Are you suggesting that I`m "fulminating" about "global warming"? I`ve just been trying to steer the discussion from fulminations by Reisman (and fawning worshippers) towards actual libertarian principles and productive engagement.
"are you aware that we are in an interglacial period ... Why do this"?
I don`t agree with your suppositions, but at least they provide a start for conversation.
My reading indicates that climatologists agree that the Milankovich cycles are in a unique period of overlap and, given the forcings that we have already made (starting millenia ago with albedo changes/methane releases resulting from agriculture), this interglacial is expected to last for another 50,000 years, and that man`s activity is by far the largest climate forcing variable - and we`re only heading north. This involves heavy pollution and will be accompanied by other large costs to private and shared assets, including drastic changes in ocean chemistry and ecosystems.
Mises, Yandle and others recognize that societies invested in establishing informal and formal private and communal property rights systems in order to tame tragedy of the commons problems and lead to more efficient plan formation; IMHO it`s time for us to start managing our atmosphere and oceans, instead of allowing those who profit from exploiting these resources (a wealthy class of investors and executives) to continue to do so while playing a rent-seekers` and spoilers`s game that allows them to continue to shift costs to the rest of us.
A focus on this will also help to shift down the environmental Kuznets curve and improve the protection of private health and property in China and elsewhere.
I`m all for having the victims protect themselves, Ryan, but ---
it`s extremely puzzling that you and others can`t be bothered to ask why they are not doing so already, and why our navies are supposed "needed" to protect private shipping from those big, bad, ferociously whimpy Somalis.
Also, who says EXPLAINING the genesis of Somali privacy is in any way a "justification" for their thefts?
But since we`re on the topic, why is it that you dodge any consideration of the much larger theft of Somali fisheries that is still underway?
It`s a simple reality that "undefended" resources are treated as common or "found" property by those in a position to take the resource.
Kurt, take up your argument that "there is NO flaw in the market system" with Tom Woods, who rather clearly implies that "the financial markets as they exist today might in fact be fatally deformed by the presence of the Fed and other government factors".
I`m just offering my own humble opinion as to the root of the government intervention that has led to this very obvious problem of moral hazard and risk-shifting.
Sukrit, thank you very much for your visit. I think we can agree that there many "regulatory moral hazard incentives that encourage irresponsible behaviour." However, it`s my own humble opinion that the grant of limited liability lies at the core, and that James Glassman and William Nolan are on to something important - the need for owners, executives and traders to "have more skin in the game".
Limited liability has meant limited responsibility for the downside, fewer incentives and lessened ability to monitor risks, greater shifting of costs to society and thus to greater social demand for regulation.
Limited liability is where the cycle of regulation takes wing.
Bob Murphy has recently noted that he is busy at work, doing yeoman`s work in fighting the good battle
[and here as well]
TT, I agree that polluters with good political connections tend to get a free ride. My question, however, is whether a carbon tax is the right approach to this? After all, the carbon tax will not be used to pay those who suffer from pollution.
Wouldn't tort law be a better approach? So, instead of putting up a tax that may turn out to benefit current rent seekers indirectly again, wouldn't it more sense to give standing to those who feel they have been negatively affected by the industry?
And, wouldn't it make more sense to stop subsidizing economic structures that encourage fossil fuel use, such as suburbs (created largely by the subsidization of highways)?
Car ownership continues to be heavily subsidized by the government in countless ways, just as the construction of stand-alone single-family houses, and rural settlement.
The frustrating issue for me is that what appears to be the most effective solution - more market, less government, more tort - is the politically least possible. So we have a bunch of government policies promoting all kinds of pollution, and then we need more government policies to deal with that. If I weren't so angry, I would cry.
Ok, maybe there is one solution: trying to educate the greens on economics. I doubt that they are being socialist out of malice, I just don't feel they understand economics.
But - how does one do that?
Where did your own comment go???? Did you delete it? why?
James, sadly, yes, it looks liike I managed to delete my own comments.
This is mainly a function of the volume of comment spam that I get - pages and pages daily. As a result, I find it most convenient simply to check a box at the top of page and scroll through briefly to unclick real comments before deleting. This time I am my own victim, but unfortunately I have also inadvertently deleted the occasional guest comment. Obviously I need to be more careful.
James, let me respond to you again, slightly differently this time.
How to explain economics to enviros? My view is that a good start is to try, and with a sympathetic ear.
Austrians should understand that we mainly face a rent-seekers` game; that it was failure to protect property rights that have led to the worst problems, and that when government acts as owner or regulator (as opposed to info provider or coordinator) then insiders win favorable deals while the general public weal is ignored.
This might be more successful than taking the approach of Reisman and others, who ignore rent-seeking and the fact that "enviros" are typically a relatively wealthy class, in favor of ad homs about "envirofascists", and green Nazi-commies.
There is an active thread at RealClimate regarding the tragedy of the commons; maybe that`s a good place to find a few enviros who might be willing to listen:
mises.org/.../strange-but-true-in-the-context-of-climate-amp-fisheries-enviros-discuss-property-rights-and-cooperation.aspx
Further, as I noted in my now deleted comment, I agree with you that libertarians that want to be productive area could be champions of promoting greater consumer choice (especially deregulation in the power sector), ending subsidies and encouraging the dissemination of greater information.
Apparently Rob Bradley `s self-proclaimed "free-market" energy blog, "MasterResource"
Roger Pielke, Jr. , a political scientist who fairly persistently blames climate scientists for the very
In addressing in a recent post Rob Bradley `s claim to have a "high" level of readers, I was
I recently posted a copy of a comment to Bob Murphy , trying to explain Roe Romm`s attack on Bob`s effort
The Ludwig von Mises Institute (which kindly hosts these pages!) continues to outdo itself on providing
in re:
2) you are also missing calculation problems arising from inaccurate prices, namely that those most damaged by harm to the environment would seek appropriate damages. But then the burden of proof is on them. it is not simply a question of malice. if you actually had prices and contracts such that those who pollution encroaches upon voluntarily agree to some tolerable degree of it, there is a sensible market solution before the need for legal action. And there is a motive to develop technology that's cleaner or can actually clean the air. And it's competitive...unless we try to centrally plan it. The problem is largely city planning over property rights, in regards to ownership of the environment - surely you should own some pattern of property you homestead - this is reinforced by noise laws - why not soot?
as far as the rest) if IER is really attempting to engage in rent-seeking activity, they have done themselves a folly, as Dr. Murphy doesn't encourage anything of the sort.
bob, thanks for your comments.
You refer to "seek[ing] appropriate damages" for pollution generally, as if we have clear property rights, court systems that enforce them, and no massive governmental regulatory interference. Unfortunately, none of these is true, going back centuries, as Block and von Mises both recognize:
mises.org/.../draft.aspx
The non-climate environmental costs of coals remain massive, as the American Lung Association points out, and of costs are much higher in China/India, which provide even less protection to health and property rights
Generally, I favor a shift from our present regulatory structure to stricter enforcement of property rights, but see a legitimate role for government to play as a coordinator, particular with respect to regional and global commons.
As for the rest, why withhold judgment? The evidence is clear that IER is playing a rent-seeker`s game. If Bob Murphy doesn`t want to encourage rent seeking then he ought to consider the terms of his relationship with IER, and whether his criticisms are one-sided.
[some snark in the title] Further to my prior posts , here is the full list of my comments over at the
Rob should change his mind. Since a cooperation has supported the carbon tax, he should know that the company has done its research. Exxon would not just come out an sport something blindly.
Rugrat
Isn't this "hired guns" nonsense just a witchhunt?
If Bob has said something dishonest, fine. If he hasn't, and he's representing the perspective of his employer with honesty, then who cares who is tainted by who?
This isn't high school for crissakes (although it might seem that way to the James Hansen fanclub).
Further to my prior posts , here are my more recent comments over at the remarkable RealClimate thread
e’re not going to get rid of limited liability any time soon. I mean, most of modern history is intimately linked to limited liability. I think that one morally consistent position is to restore unlimited liability for torts or their jurisdictional equivalents. But I can see problems with this in the real world.
Jun, thanks for your comment.
I agree that we won`t get rid of limited liability for torts anytime soon. But if the awareness of an important source of moral hazard problems increases, we may eventually see attempts to attack the problem.
Sure, much of "modern history is intimately linked to limited liability" - in many BAD ways, such as encouraging the generation of environmental, health and safety externalities, and consumer blow-back and the growth of bureaucracy, as I have noted elsewhere.
But just pointing to the pervasiveness of corporations doesn`t mean either that the problem was unavoidable then or that it is difficult to focus on the problem now.
"one morally consistent position is to restore unlimited liability for torts" We agree! This is the chief part of the corporation that investors could not have arranged by private contract with counterparties and other voluntary creditors (though the grants of unlimited purposes and liability, and the judicial extension of Constitutional rights to these legal fictions are also significant and contribute to the ability of corporations to manipulate government).
It`s precisely because I see problems "in the real world" that result from the grant of limited liability that I keep bringing attention to it.
Reason science correspondent Ron Bailey , whom I criticized last year around this time for his dark warnings
It's been about 2 or 3 days since I commented. The comment has not been posted yet.
[LS, as I noted, the amount of spam and the absence of a captcha means I have to moderate, which means delay as well as the possibility of a mistaken deletion by me. I have yet to deliberately decline to post a comment.
I have found your earlier comment and will post it in a second, but you might note that you actually commented on a different thread: http://mises.org/Community/blogs/tokyotom/archive/2009/05/18/147976.aspx. TT]
Well said, Tom
Some more links to ponder:
World grain reserves:
home.comcast.net/.../grainreservves.jpg
Biofuel growth rates:
home.comcast.net/.../img29.gif
National Geo, "End of Plenty?":
ngm.nationalgeographic.com/.../bourne-text
LS, unfortunately, you might have missed it, but a key Austrian insight is that the business of government, which is what we`re discussing, is ABOUT rent-seeking (by business and others).
Pointing out what is obvious is sometimes distasteful, but not dishonest.
"Who cares who is tainted by who"? Maybe those who don`t want to get fleeced, in addition to those whose preferences differ and are battling over the wheel. Presumably you, too, which is why you bother to comment here.
But if you don`t like it, maybe you should tell Republicans to stop questioning the motives of the big business interests that are supporting the Waxman bill: www.politico.com/.../22734.html. I agree with fully with their criticism, but I just think that - rather obviously - there`s more than one side here. Only those who prefer to support one side of the rent-seeking game refer only to the bad motivations of others, while ignoring their own (or portraying their own as pure).
"This isn't high school for crissakes"
It sure ain`t, which is why I find it hard to tolerate your own brand of uninformed, ad hom-laced (James Hansen fanclub") and in-your-face (viz., "nonsense", "withchunt", "crissakes") behavior. How long will you continue to belie your own purported interest in adult conversation? Inquiring minds want to know!
Judging by your second paragraph, I`m sure you are capable of meeting higher standards.
I post below, with permission, a comment I received by email from Kevin Carson:
Thanks, Tom. You certainly have Bailey's number. He consistently fails to address counterarguments. I don't know how many times I've brought up John Jeavons in comment threads at Reason, and raised the question of whether his "organic is less productive" assertions conflated the organic-conventional distinction with the small-large distinction (smaller farms--both organic and conventional--are more efficient, but most "organic" farms are just conventional large factory farms minus synthetic fertilizers).
And I think he still occasionally repeats the Rachel Carson --> malaria lie.
Best,
Kevin
I attach the followiong comment received from Kevin Carson by email:
"> Also, a reader pointed out this new article )the feature in the latest > NatGeo:
> ngm.nationalgeographic.com/.../bourne-text
He certainly seems to be bending over backwards to be fair to Borlaug & Co. It would be nice if he acknowledged the possibility of a "Green Revolution" based on giving the land back to the people it was stolen from, teaching them about nitrogen-fixing crops and rainwater conservation, etc.
Kevin"
Too shallow? Blog some depth. This constant critique of Bob for not satisfying your particular viewpoint with HIS blog posts is rather tiresome.
Umm, perhaps, just perhaps the depth is in the comment thread I reference?
"Blog some depth." Yes, Sir! Right away, sir!
"This constant critique of Bob for not satisfying your particular viewpoint with HIS blog posts is rather tiresome."
Are you threatening to stop reading my posts, or to cease your pattern of high school locker room-type of uninformed, ad hom and shallow comments?
But if you`re so worried about Bob, why don`t you run over to HIS blog and persuade HIM to stop responding to me? I`m sure he`ll be grateful for your solicitude.
I consider my exchanges with Bob to be a conversation, an effort to persuade that I think useful to share here. If you disagree, please make some substantive comments; if not feel free to save your time by refraining from substance-less comments like these.
The incessant calls for - and criticism of - government-funded/mandated "green/clean power"
Tom, I don't understand this post. It seems like you are saying, "Why aren't the so-called free market energy analysts explaining the positive virtues of free markets in energy, the way, say, the free market energy analysts have done so several times in the past, which I now quote?"
In my Politically Incorrect Guide to Capitalism I do this, and in the speech I just gave to the North Dakota Policy Council last week (I'll be posting video when it's online) I do this.
It seems you are accusing some of "us" of hypocrisy or sins of omission because we don't explain how to privatize utilities in op eds blasting "green jobs."
Seriously, how can you conclude your article asking if "Austrians and others have their problem-solving caps on" when you just quoted a bunch of Austrians and others who have their problem-solving caps on?
And why not be Gandhi? If you think free marketeers should focus on constructive solutions instead of criticizing the economic absurdities in the policies being pushed in DC right now, then <i>you go ahead and write them up.</i>
Don't you see that you are doing the very same thing that you constantly criticize others for doing, namely seeing perfidy when it might just be an intellectual (or strategic) mistake?
Seriously, how much time do you spend blogging about the shortcomings of the people who "ought to know better"? Why not write the articles you keep telling us to write?
Tom, I think there's a lot of common ground here. I've been talking for some time about the merits of smart metering, and the fact that the perceived demand for reliable 24/7 power is really an artifact of pricing schemes designed to elicit that demand (low at night, so coal-fired power stations can keep running, fixed during the day, so the price mechanism doesn't work to respond to fluctuating demand and supply). And environmentalists have long bemoaned the incapacity of the system to reward energy conservation measures.
Wow, for once in the history of the universe, TokyoTom is *less* diplomatic than I would have been ;-)
Yes, I'm the same silas barta that linked the cool graphic in that discussion...
"Umm, perhaps, just perhaps the depth is in the comment thread I reference?"
Then why mention his post is shallow here, if it was developed in the comments where he gave you as much attention as two heterosexual men on different continents could expect from one another?
""Blog some depth." Yes, Sir! Right away, sir!"
It simply seems hypocritical to me that an advocate of the market with the capacity to provide depth where shallowness (opportunity exists) would deliberately choose to lobby his competitor to perform the role that he claims to fulfill in the marketplace.
I thought your goal was to add to the discussion, not to browbeat people to represent your POV for you.
In a free market, protests are a waste of time. With a low cost of entry, any legitimate operator can and should fill the void.
"Are you threatening to stop reading my posts, or to cease your pattern of >>high school locker room-type of uninformed, ad hom and shallow comments<<?"
Ad hom.
"But if you`re so worried about Bob, why don`t you run over to HIS blog and persuade HIM to stop responding to me? I`m sure he`ll be grateful for your solicitude."
You're the squeaky wheel. Everyone knows that. Bob is just fighting you over there so that people don't have to fight you over here.
"If you disagree, please make some substantive comments; if not feel free to save your time by refraining from substance-less comments like these."
And the inevitable threat.
It's like watching a rerun. A resort to the same tactics when things don't go a certain way.
Bob, thanks for the Qs and comments.
Please understand that you were not the sole target audience for this post, which I pulled together from quite a few prior posts, specifically in order to post at the "Real Climate" comment thread on tragedies of the commons, in order to make them consider whether heavy government mandates for green energy were in fact needed: www.realclimate.org/.../the-tragedy-of-climate-commons
In this, am I not your ally?
To the extent I was addressing guys like you, your first and third sentences completely miss my point, as you have consistently also done at your blog. My point to you is that you are failing to engage those who are calling for or supporting green jobs. To the extent you`re not ridiculing them (for the benefit of the do-nothing echo chamber), you simply say this or that policy is wrong, and never engage by acknowledging the frustration of their preferences by the status quo or by identifying possible win-win polices.
As a result, how can you expect to be productive, as opposed to being written off and ignored as just another defender of the status quo?
"Seriously, how can you conclude your article asking if "Austrians and others have their problem-solving caps on" when you just quoted a bunch of Austrians and others who have their problem-solving caps on?"
Easy - while there is very good, balanced commentary out there, it is relatively hard to find. It seems to me that the mode of most Austrians is to attack the motives and intelligence of those who support green jobs, while ignoring common ground and the rent-seeking built into the current status quo.
I think that the best hope for economic and personal freedom is for Austrians and libertarians to more careful not to come off as defending the status quo and by aggressively seeking to address the legitimate frustratons of those unhappy with the status quo.
"If you think free marketeers should focus on constructive solutions instead of criticizing the economic absurdities in the policies being pushed in DC right now, then you go ahead and write them up."
It`s not either - or Bob, one can offer constructive solutions as well as being critical. And this post IS and attempt to do both, as well as to encourage others to do so.
"Don't you see that you are doing the very same thing that you constantly criticize others for doing, namely seeing perfidy when it might just be an intellectual (or strategic) mistake?"
No, I don`t see it. You must be referencing other conversations, Bob, since I`m made no implications of any perfidy here. But I DO think that the continued bashing of "enviro-fascists" that we fairly consistently see from Austrians and their friends is an "intellectual (or strategic) mistake" that reflects our penchant to see those we disagree with as perfidious. I`m pretty sure that so far I haven`t fallen into that trap myself, even with those I`ve been most critical of (or most critical of me).
"how much time do you spend blogging about the shortcomings of the people who "ought to know better""??
More than I`d like, though I prefer to think of it as trying to point the way to solutions. Are you telling me that my criticisms are all for naught? In any case, a fair reading of my work here and comments elsewhere shows that I strive to blog directly on analysis and solutions as well.
John, thanks for visiting. I`m happy to hear you share an interest in increasing consumer choice and the competitiveness of power markets.
Do you have any links you care to share?
liberty student, thanks for going to the effort to provide more substantive criticism than your usual fare.
"shallow"?: You implicitly concede that Bob`s initial post WAS shallow. In any case, I put this up before Bob responded; he doesn`t always, and I hoped that perhaps someone here might jump in. What`s holding you back, BTW; afraid of the water?
"It simply seems hypocritical to me that an advocate of the market with the capacity to provide depth where shallowness (opportunity exists) would deliberately choose to lobby his competitor to perform the role that he claims to fulfill in the marketplace."
This and following sentences are thought-provoking, but fly like a lame duck. By your own suggestion, you should not be commenting here, but blogging separately. But that makes it kinda difficult to have conversations, doesn`t it?
But actually, have you not noted that I both contribute to traffic at Bob`s while generating some traffic and head-scratching of my own? A conversation need not be a zero-sum game, as you seem to prefer.
Besides, if I am aiming to influence the debate, do you really think that commenting at the blog of a smart guy like Bob is a waste of time?
"In a free market, protests are a waste of time."
This is simply wrong. First, division of labor implies that we can`t efficiently produce everything ourselves. Second, in a free market, consumer protests are in fact highly effective, as sellers don`t want to lose customers.
"Ad hom." - Glad you noticed. Now will you stop posting them, so I can put down the mirror I`ve been holding up to you?
"Bob is just fighting you over there so that people don't have to fight you over here."
Bob ignores me half the time. But he`s also commenting here. I`m pretty sure he hasn`t appointed you as his guard dog (which, to be frank, is the role you`ve taken on) in what is a conversation, not a war. But if you feel strongly, you should really take it up with Bob, not not me, and tell him to stop encouraging me.
Unfortunately, the rest of your comments spoil a good comment by resorting to form:
"the inevitable threat." - there`s nothing to this but your own dark fantasies. Seriously; you have no support for this. I post all comments, after I have chance to go through the spam filter. My point was simply to get you to be more substantive, as your other posts to date have simply been a fairly empty bother. You can keep posting empty stuff all you want; I won`t block you.
"It's like watching a rerun. A resort to the same tactics when things don't go a certain way." You are talking to yourself about yourself. Sure you`ve irked me, but every point I`ve made in response has been fair.
It's impossible to know the true cost of power at the time it is generated because power is balanced on a moment-by-moment basis.
There is also significant evidence that deregulation is making the grid less stable because the regulatory services that keep the grid running aren't as profitable as running a generator at 100% of capacity (or thereabouts) as much as possible.
"Free the markets!" is easy to tout when free markets work. The evidence from FERC (Federal Energy Regulatory Committee -- or something like that, they are just "FERC" to me) is that the energy market isn't one of the ones that needs more deregulation at this point.
I read the referenced article and it is fairly ignorant of WHY the electric grid works like it does. Comparing electricity to almost any other utility is a really bad analogy. The grid is balanced =instantaneously= in ways that no other public utility is and the price of producing that power isn't known until the amount of effort needed to balance the system is known.
That said, time-of-day billing should be made more widely available. Demand responsive billing would be helpful as well, for those customers who are willing to curtail demand on request.
The second comment by John Quiggin is very much spot-on -- I used 122KWh last month and the effective cost of electricity for my house was $0.20 / KWh. If the objective of the utilities truly is to work on demand reduction (and that's the law here in Texas), my KWh rate should have been much lower, and the folks using more should have paid more.
FCH, thanks for commenting. I`m not sure which references article you didn`t like, but Kielsling, Taylor, Joskow and Google are all quite familar with how the grid functions, and all see great potential for savings, profit and greater consumner satisfaction if competition is increased and consumer choice enhanced.
Simply pushing for green mandates will continue to leave underlying rigidities and inefficiencies unaddressed.
Searching for solutions to problems is admirable, but the effectivenss of such efforts will be limited
Good work TT
It strikes me that there are two sides here, for example the splitting apart of British Rail, which has had both good and bad results. Better rolling stock, much higher prices if you don't fit one of the specials.
However, that being said, just as there is one net, there has to be one electrical distribution system, in other words, the system can have multiple sources and sinks but only one operator.
Glad you liked it. Welcome to the "dark" side!
Eli, don`t you want to lower the barriers to entry, increase competition and remove all of the rigidities that have so long frustrated consumers and discouraged conservation, efficiency and green power technologies?
Why leave all of this in place?
Sure, by its special nature the power marketplace requires careful and constant supply/demand balancing. But that type of "regulation" can be achieved by the voluntary cooperation of the players themselves, in a market that is completely open to entry.
We should stop protecting public utilities, increase competition, and let investors and firms fight over who can do the best job of responding to our desires. Sure, those who want can ask government to subsidize and set mandates for green power, but the roots of the frustration, and this avenue of reducing it, should not go unexplored.
I wouldn't go that far. I'm still using incandescent lightbulbs.
[Update: I`ve added more background on Exxon, "Malthusians" and productive engagement.] How
I`ve done a bit of blogging over the past few weeks regarding the " The tragedy of climate commons
I think most of the legislative proposals are beside the point. The real reduction in carbon emissions will come about almost entirely as a result of Peak Oil. And since mid-range estimates of the production falloff are pretty much isomorphic with the mid-range targets for consumption cuts, the effect of Peak Oil on energy consumption will probably be more significant than any politically conceivable legislation. What's more, all the fossil fuel substitutes for dwindling oil output have the same problem: steeply escalating cost of extraction and rapidly declining EROEI. Which means the price of fossil fuels will be governed by the same law Henry George described for real estate: it will take more and more capital inputs to get the same amount of usable energy, the further we move toward the margin.
Indeed, there most certainly is "objective moral reality!" Yet, I'm intrigued that this 'existentialist's dilemma' appears, of all places, on this most-illustrious site. I submit the appearance of this question here represents a loud warning to each freedom-loving reader that the busy enemy has bored exceedingly deep during our lazy stupor. I am all too happy here, to encourage any with the mysticism-vanishing, stunning simplicity of human “objective moral reality.”
Each conscious individual is thus "sublimely equipped with the ultimate survival tool to competently deal with reality successfully," ... a phrase first coined by Dr. Nathaniel Branden (the father of 'self-esteem.') To the degree one is in sync with his empirical, natural, day-to-day physical environment (an Aristotelian logic concept, deeply & gradually undermined starting some 2600 years ago) he alone is to a similarly comparable degree, uniquely invulnerable to loss from the vacuous, immoral, Platonic 'sleight-of hand nothingness disease' of existentialism & the meaninglessness of 'species' to his individual 'fight or flight' survival & prosperity. Power of intention over choice, (unlike the merely instinctual, therefore perpetually-innocent beasts,) causes us conscious human beings to appropriate the unavoidable imperative of morality.
Each conscious individual is endowed with the practical facility & responsibility to judge in the best interests of only s/his & only s/his own abiding happiness (this is the purpose of the conscious human being's one-&-only life s/he'll ever have): i.e., "Good for me = Moral.” This is not at all a cultural nor species-conundrum; morality is distinctly an individual pursuit in which collectives are only a resultant, secondary, incidental, conceptual, aggregate. One cannot ascribe objective moral imperative to a non-sentient concept. A culture, a group, a species ~ no matter how enlivened by its highest indivisible entities within ~ has no moral capital nor value except that of its least sentient, indivisible member.
Antithetically, an individual may choose actions “Bad for me = Immoral," if he defaults on factors that are extant & influential to his uniquely self-discernible reality. Of course, something cannot be 'good for me' if it brings undeserved harm to innocent others. Nor will my good self-esteem survive my overly-recurrent violations against others when I lay my self-directed, introspective head down at night, no matter how self-beneficial a thing may appear or feel to me or any others, in the short term.
To explain, in any scenario where I net more than I've earned through some unfair value exchange, my 'usurpment' triggers my conscience, which is my baseline in sanity, & my only inescapable authority & judge (not fundamentally cultural or subjective, nor residing anywhere outside of me.) Reflexively finding myself honestly guilty of undermining the abiding happiness (purpose) of my own sentient life, my objective conscience is thus hardwired to plunder my good self-esteem when I cause destruction. This is perhaps my most dependable life-lifting mechanism as a social being, existing to cause me internal pause long enough to repair this 'Bad for me = Immoral' destructive orientation, which (potentially) is then caught & stopped from any longer running adverse to my creative, cognitive, real human purpose. So, to wrangle with a quote from Gene, I iterate that "Likewise, any objective moral order [better 'imperative'] would be true only relative to the physical and mental endowments of the” ... individual, ... as each individual has “buck stops here authority” over his own, but only his own, 'Good for me = morality' or 'Bad for me = Immorality.' Culture simply smalls to zero, when one is faced with his own personal decision “whether or not to do good work during Sunday's cultural rest.” Hence, there can be no empirical "objective moral order" that exists independent of the individual's own objective 'Good for me = Moral." I say, for example, even cannibalism is moral should I need live off another's cadaver, as long as that individual's life is not in the least involuntarily destroyed for my gain.
'Bad for me = Immoral.' This includes the likewise unnatural actions committed through the anti-civilized initiation of force, threat, or dishonest coercion by others (government, chief, don, king, president, club, family, included) against me, (or vice versa.) In a similar modus operandi to myself, another individual's default on their own survival tool (consciousness) lies diametrically opposed to their own 'Good for them = Moral' conscious, human hardwiring. For to trade fairly & voluntarily of oneself with others in order to achieve success in dealing with life (discernible reality) competently, is the underpinning of all earned abiding happiness, & simply not available to mere-conceptual, inanimate, individual-derivitive groups.
Indeed, this discussion significantly touches upon the crux of the peaceful prosperity & freedom R3volution this Dr. Ron Paul generation now battles. Armageddon (a personal spiritual war, not a collective or species schism) can only be won by the self-honestly integrated, net-productive individual ~ for himself & himself alone. This battle will not end, to the last human, except through that highest, indivisible conscious entity known as the conscious human individual deciding, & finally trumping the mystically divisible collective (a beast of ultimate disunity) with his own self-directed self-leadership ~ in his own best interests, & judging from his own life's self-standards. 'Group' is a permanently subjective concept; non-empirical, ... divisible, easily disjunctive, manipulable, vulnerable to waxing, waning, & disintegration, as if built on blowing sand. Dr. G. Edward Griffin (freedom-force.org) has much very worthwhile to say about this; he has been particularly focused & poignant on this very matter over some decades now.
To further pursue this pedantically, the writings of Ayn Rand, Hayek, & early Dr. Nate Branden, are advisedly handy to have around the house; & while logician Aristotle was mystic-ridden Plato's superior as regards objectivity, yet Dr. Julian Jaynes (Princeton) stands as the premier scholarly authority of all.
Kevin, many thanks for your comments.
Unfortunately Peak Oil will provide incentives for shifting to other fuels like coal, which is abundant in North America, AUstrali, China and India.
When will Peak Coal occur?
There are moral rules that are the same for everyone and independent of "opinion". But to say they are "objective" is more difficult. What is "right" is what increases one's sense of fulfillment, and so it is impossible to separate "rightness" from subjectivity. And yet I think that the general path to maximum fulfillment is the same for all humans in general, whether it be the product of God or of eons of time, physics, and chance.
Thus, though morality cannot be objective in the sense that it is truly "outside" the individual, yet it is objective in the sense that it is invariant across humanity. It is also independent of individual opinion inasmuch as people who diverge are simply ignorant of the truth of their own nature.
Those behaviors which are moral are those which lead to the maximum long-range hapiness (fulfillment) of the individual. These behaviors generally include such things as freedom, responsibility, integrity, honesty, honor, love, compassion, etc.
Bill
Mountjoye, thanks for your visit. It was brave of you to comment, knowing that you might inadvertently aid a "busy enemy [who] has bored exceedingly deep during [the] lazy stupor" of freedom-lovers.
However, you seem to entirely misunderstand the thrust of my comments, which are not focussed primarily on whether there is a human nature but to whether there is an objective moral reality that exists on its own, apart from human beings altogether.
Bill, many thanks for your level comments.
I think we are on the same page, at least in concluding that there is no "objective" moral order existing outside of mankind (or of life altogether).
As for what objective moral order exists for man, I think that it is readily apparent that we frequently feel conflict between narrow self-interest and conformity with group norms (and the norms of overlapping groups).
It seems to me that the existence of group norms (and their varying rigidity) reflects both genetic and cultural evolution. Yandle has some interesting insights into this in the last article that I link to on this page: mises.org/.../starve-a-cold-feed-a-fever-links-to-austrians-on-environmental-issues.aspx
Further, I would note that we do not uniformly apply group norms to all humans, but treat people differently, depending on mental capacity, familiarity with the rules, membership in the group, status, age, etc. This leads me to question whether there is even a fixed human nature, shared at all times by all humans (from conception theough death).
Danny Shahar (whom Gene Callahan predicts "will be a philosophical star very soon") sent me the following comments by email, which post with his permission:
"I think the concerns you voice are pretty much on the money. I agree with the idea that understanding morality is a matter of understanding human psychology. In the comments section of one of the posts on my blog, I laid out the groundwork for my position in a set of ordered propositions; I think it sounds a lot like what you were saying. The proposition to which Gene took exception was the very first: "1) Value is a mental phenomenon which proceeds from evaluation (conscious or unconscious); without evaluating minds it would be incoherent to speak of value." Gene wrote, "#1 is certainly wrong, just as it is true that, without mathematicians, 2 + 2 would still equal 4." But I have no idea what Gene thinks he's saying here; 2+2=4 is simply true by the definition of the terms used. This seems to clearly not be true of the claim, "Capriciously killing is wrong" or "You ought not to kill capriciously."
Do you know what's going on?"
FWIW, Danny`s blog is here: libertarian-left.blogspot.com
Robert Wenzel has a couple of posts up on his blog that rightly ring alarm bells about the plans of the
I just stumbled into Bob Murphy `s June 8 post at the LvMI Daily site, and submitted a few comments.
Ron Bailey , science correspondent at ReasonOnline, has a very useful post up that outlines how markets
Ron Bailey , science correspondent for ReasonOnline , on July 1 noted in a Hit & Run post that "
Joe Romm `s defense of Waxman-Markey against climate scientist James Hansen (who prefers rebated carbon
For the benefit of the curious and/or idle reader, I`m cross-posting from my little-used personal blog
Political scientist and climate commenter Roger Pielke, Jr. and scientist and Climate Progress blogger
Robert Murphy , Austrian school economist and blogger , is in my book a remarkably thoughtful and insightful
I copy below (with minor changes for clarity) a further comment I made on the piece by Bob Murphy ( "I'm
[Note to first-time readers: the title is tongue-in-cheek.] I have previously blogged on libertarian
Margo Thorning, Chief Economist and SVP at the influential American Council for Capital Formation (and
Joe Romm has a post up at Climate Progress that is highly critical of the U.S. oil industry, his ire
I refer to my previous posts on the interesting subject of whether there is an "objective moral
This is the first of several follow-up posts to my post " Grist and the tragedy of the panicked
This is my fourth follow-up post to " Grist and the tragedy of the panicked enviro ", where
A recent post on the Mises Daily pages on the " Religious Roots of Liberty " by the late Congregationalist
Since I`m in Tokyo and deprived of Bob Murphy `s enviable access, via talk radio , to cutting-edge climate
Further to my preceding post, on " Confirmation bias, rent-seeking and the rush to print the latest
... is what poor countries need. So corrrectly argues Keith Lockitch of the Ayn Rand Institute , in a
I agree. And even if a predicted effect is observed, that is only one half of the equation. From a thermodynamics view, yes, it's pretty much inescapable that increasing the opacity of the atmosphere in the IR band will nessesarily raise the equalibrium temperature because it is in the IR band that a great deal of the re-radiated energy escapes.
However, this does not mean there are no mechanisms that can shunt the energy back into higher wavelengths, and it does not mean that some mechanism might not kick in that sinks CO2 more effectively.
Stronger, and more frequent storms would produce more lightning, and besides visible light, lightning also releases large amounts of energy in radio wavelengths, which, I believe, are easily passed out of the atmosphere.
We can handle a rise in the oceans. We can handle any of the first-order effects of a warmer earth. What is important to find out is if we can handle any feedback loops that are hypothesized. If the answer is yes, but with great hardship, then mankind can ride out earth's hysteretic regulation, and there will be a future and a clean slate.
Government simply will not address the problem if it involves plunging the world into economic ruin, no matter what. It would just begin carrying out a more orderly transition to the eventual state. If the stable state is 500 million people, then 9 of 10 people are going to go one way or the other. The government is not going to shut everything down so 9 of 10 people first have to suffer, do ugly things, and then die anyway.
The bottom line is, if there is a problem, then that problem is measured in PPM, and the earth will get that number one way or another. If it was linear, it would not be a problem. The only real danger is from a discontinuous, runaway process, no matter how short lived. If all the methane and CO2 is brought up from the bottom of the oceans and permafrost, then there will be one of those outstanding layers in some future ice core sample that showed 50 years, just a blip, of rapidly increasing temps that may have been responsible for a massive die off.
There are a heck of a lot of species that we know used to exist, and now they don't. It certainly wasn't man hunting them.
Note: I received the following comment by email from Bob Murphy:
==
On the general issue of "are morals objective for everyone?" I refer to this excellent discussion by Gene Callahan:
www.gene-callahan.org/.../freedoms-just-another-word-for.html
When I say that I think morality is objective, what I mean is that a statement such as "it is better to kiss an infant than to drown it" is a different type of thing from the statement "chocolate ice cream is better than vanilla." The latter is clearly stating a subjective preference, whereas the former is (I claim) reflecting an objective truth about reality.
Note that to say morality is objective doesn't necessarily mean that 'the same rules' apply to everybody, at least not in the sense that I think you mean. It might not be immoral for Eskimos to euthanize old people, whereas it could be considered murder in Manhattan. But this doesn't actually prove morality is subjective. By the same token, it's OK for me to eat the food in my fridge. But if somebody else wandered into my house and did the 'same thing,' it would be theft.
I'm a Christian so if you ask me for a list of these rules, a good start is the Ten Commandments. And then if you want to know how to apply these rules, I'd tell you to read the gospels and study the life of Jesus.
As far as your specific questions, I don't want to bother trying to answer them. I admit I can't give you great answers on some. But to me, that doesn't show that morality is subjective after all. There are plenty of non-material things (like mathematics etc.) that are rock-solid objectively true. So I think our difference here is much deeper than an issue of mere morality. I think you are a materialist and I'm not, which is influencing our discussion on morality.
Bob, thanks for troubling to visit and read, but your comments are obviously a disappointment - as you`ve simply done none of the heavy lifting that you have implied by insisting on various occasions that there is an "objective" moral order.
All that you`ve done here is to make a very weak argument that MAN has a moral sense regarding how we treat others. But this is not only obvious, it is also something that I have asserted all along. While it tells us something I agree is objectively true generally about man - something that I have made various attempts to explore here and to sketch out on your blog and Gene`s - it tells us essentially nothing about an objective moral order to the universe, that is applicable to other life forms, and that will survive mankind if we were all ever to perish.
I`m afraid I have to disagree with you about Gene`s post, which in fact illustrates the weakness of his position regarding "objective truth". While he suggests that by "objectively correct" we mean something that is correct for `any and all possible perceivers' (so far, so good), he then presents the example of ants, for whom he asserts it would be wrong for them to commit murder IF THEY WERE CAPABLE of committing murder. But he`s failed to notice that he`s not only begged the question about what we mean by saying that "it is objectively true that murder is wrong", but he`s suggested that because ants lack a capacity to perceive moral strictures against murder, they are unable to commit it. By doing so, he`s just invited in all of the questions that I`ve outlined above, plus questions of culture and exigency that you have pointed out by your reference to Eskimos. Can any animals or life forms other than man commit murder? Do moral restrictions against murder require some threshold level of self-reflection, intellectual capacity, typical social structure, physical and social maturity, or upbringing?
So there IS an objective moral order, but it only applies to those able to perceive it? This is both a very modest position, as well as one that oddly smacks of belief in Leprechauns.
Rather than arguing that still undefined but "objective" moral rules are embedded in the structure of the universe but have only limited application, isn`t it easier to acknowledge that man has a moral sense, observe that it enhances our ability to cooperate, observe that other animals also exhibit patterns of reciprocal behavior and posit that our moral sense is something that we have evolved, as it enhanced our ability to survive and procreate?
By the way, I note that fellow Community blogger lilburne and I agree generally about morality*
"There is a burgeoning school of thought in evolutionary biology and the cognitive sciences (led by Marc Hauser and Steven Pinker) which contends that morality is not just cultural artifice, but that it is an intrinsic feature of the human mind which evolved over the countless millennia of humans living together."
mises.org/.../245211.aspx
I`ve addressed here on five different threads the question of whether there is an "objective moral
"2+2=4 is simply true by the definition of the terms used."
Yes, it seems that objective ethicists have the desire to impart their own personal ethics with the definitive authority of a logical proof. Witness Rothbard: "Where there is no property there is no justice; a proposition as certain as any demonstration in Euclid." They so WANT it to be so.
This post was quoted here:
davidbrin.blogspot.com/.../jokes-predictions-and-serious-prospects.html
Note: this post was referenced here: www.dailyfinance.com/.../the-dirtiest-bus-tour-in-america-attacks-cap-and-trade-bill
I left the following comment at a recent Mises Blog post by Stephan Kinsella, but the number of links
<i>it tells us essentially nothing about an objective moral order to the universe, that is applicable to other life forms, and that will survive mankind if we were all ever to perish.</i>
We are all subservient to the biosphere. The prime objective is to flourish. A secondary objective to aid the first is to survive. The we sacrifice ourselves so that our children may live is an example of that (along with many other species exhibiting the same thing).
We are induced to thrive by through hormones that induce a sensation of love or lust, and we are rewarded with great pleasure from the act of sex. We are induced to act against our own self interest by the chemicals that produce a sensation of love. This protects our offspring by making us always cognizant of loved one's needs. Part of our 'self' is transferred.
Animals possibly hold a higher moral station in how they serve the biosphere. We waste, they don't. A cheetah does not run around at top speed all the time, but we are always seeking gain, even at some other's loss.
If you were to chart the increase of entropy by each species, there is one, and only one, that stands out many orders of magnitude more than the rest. Not sure of the natural morality of that.
Another thing that is unique to the species of man, is that we wipe our asses. I'm not sure if that is a design flaw, or if there is some higher meaning.
[Well, the Mises server just swallowed my first attempt at this post, so the reader will just have to
Keith, welcome.
You lost me on the question of waste and seeking gain. All animals waste, to the extent they have the luxury. Waste, in the sense of consuming more than needed, is limited simply because extra killing, eating etc. can be costly. But that`s the very reason why various animals have "wasteful" reproductive displays, to show they they are more than fit.
Some predators kill just for fun, if the prey can get away.
Granted, technology has enabled man to catch and kill more tan he needs, so we do waste alot.
"we are always seeking gain, even at some other's loss."
Well, we do raise crops, husband animals, preserve bits of nature, in order to satisfy our own desires. But what animal cooperates, if not for its own advantage?
(As for the arses, because we stand upright, we`re one of the few species where what`s left can get in the way of walking. Standing upright also makes man the only species to get hemmorhoids).
I hear arguments like Gene Callahan's quite often from objective ethicists addressing their opponents: "You're in no position to call X behavior wrong."
If pressed, they will clarify that by "wrong" they mean "objectively wrong." The funny thing is, no one seems to be able to define what that means.
Bob Murphy hints that "objective" does not imply "universal." If not universal, then what?
Recently I have also heard the term "agent-relative." Is this a roundabout admission that "objectively wrong" is an incoherent concept? Well, let's be charitable and help the other side make their case. This view seems to indicate that something can be "objectively wrong" for a given agent, even if not universally wrong for all agents.
Yet we are still left wondering what precisely is meant by "objective." If the Rothbardian view of "objective ethics" is based on property rights, property rights must surely be deemed objectively valid (if not, how could ethics based on property rights be objective?).
Therefore, my approach has been to analyze the concept of property rights in search of something objective. If objective property rights are to be based on Lockean homesteading, then the standard of "mixing one's labor with an unused object makes it one's property" must be objectively valid (if not, again, the putative objectivity of the ethical system vanishes). However, it seems superficially that this standard was adopted for utilitarian and/or evolutionary reasons - particularly the fact that we humans tend to naturally feel that an unused thing belongs to us once we take it up and begin to use it.
If there is an argument for the objectivity of the Lockean homesteading ("mixing one's labor") standard for property rights, I would like to hear it.
A bit late, but I just saw this post. I have first-hand experience with private forestation, and I completely agree. My family and I actually own various plots of pine trees in Spain, and we sell them to loggers in a sustainable fashion only because that guarantees long-term maximization of profit for us: www.economicthought.net/.../forestation-through-the-free-market
AJ, thanks for your comment. My own view is an evolutionary/historical one:
- like other animals, we fight over resources and put some effort into protecting/warning others against taking what we possess (e.g., a dog and its bone, or parental care);
- we develop use/possession rules within our in-groups, but feel little compunction against taking resources of others (particularly if out-group) that are poorly protected; and
- we use religions and other ethical systems to try to put moral teeth into our property rules, even as much of the moral support for property institutions is rather instinctive.
I can understand the desire of some to say that there are universal, "objective" moral rules, but our morality is quite flexible and any other intelligent life might have quite different moral rules. Sociobiologists like E.O. Wilson are probably closest in observing cooperative behavior in various species is closely tied to degree of kinship - but that hardly gets us to any useful "universal" rules that exist outside of man, does it?
A recent post by the prolifically productive Bob Murphy , " A Quick Note from Baltimore ",
Jonathan, thanks for your comment. My point is not that private forestry is not without its problems, but that government "ownership" is often at the root of the problems that concern us the most.
A reader of Bob Murphy` s recent post on climate science - " TokyoTom Moving the Goalposts? "
I tend to agree with your evolutionary/historical analysis. The rhetoric of some objective ethicists reminds me of Eric Hoffer's words in The True Believer: "It is obvious, therefore, that in order to be effective a doctrine must not be understood, but has rather to be believed in. We can only be absolutely certain of things that we do not understand."
I think this has something to do with why no objective ethicist can clearly define exactly what they mean by "objective." It's as is if "objective" is a synonym for "don't ask."
It has come to my attention that Gene Callahan has responded to my remarks regarding "objective
Nice quote by Hoffer, AJ; thanks.
I`m not sure what Callahan is really thinking, though.
I found this a little off: "To say there are objective standards of science doesn't mean that we judge all scientific discoveries without regard to the circumstances of time and place. If someone submitted to a journal today the fact that Jupiter has moons, he wold be laughed at. That doesn't mean that objectively we cannot judge that Galileo made a great discovery."
In fact there ARE scientific findings deemed true for all space and time, such as Newton's laws of motion (on a macroscopic scale).
But really, this whole grasping at their intended meaning seems a bit indulgent because, as far as I can tell, Bob and Gene still haven't defined what exactly they mean by "objective." How many hints and clarifications before they come right out with a coherent definition?
It sounds like they're describing the eternal Tao or something, not a precise, well-defined theory. This is what prompted the Hoffer quote; if they are secure in their position, they should welcome the light of clarity so that we may all understand their truths better.
AJ, I found Gene`s comment off, too, but for a different reason: it seems completely irrelevant to the point that Bob was asserting, which was that there are objective moral rules, but they aren‘t universally applicable.
I agree that they really don`t seem at all eager to really make their own case; Bob is the more willing, but abandons his efforts for any difficult questions (he seems satisfied that he has made his case for objective moral rules if I agree that man sees a moral element to his actions), while Gene keeps asserting that he has spelled everything out (that actually his first point, but as it was nonsubstantive I responded at Bob`s thread and not here) and then resorts to sarcasm.
They seem to hardly know what their position IS, much less being interested in defending it. Your Hoffer quote is perfectly apropos here.
I have encountered a similar pattern of responses from the objective ethics crowd on the Forums.
Challenge his facts and ideas. Challenging his paycheck is cowardly and dishonest.
I agree with Liberty Student. Only because Bob Murphy gets a part of his income due to "Big Coal" doesn't discredit his ideas.
liberty student, if Bob forthrightly informed everyone that he gets paid to talk about climate change by the group of investors who has benefitted the greatest from the non-free market status quo, I wouldn`t feel a need to mention it.
It is absurd to suggest that libertarians - whose biggest peeves center on the entanglement between the state and business - either shouldn`t notice, or shouldn`t comment on, the way some of their erstwhile members make one-sided comments that happen to suit the agenda of statist corporations that are funding them.
Krazy kaju:
I agree that Bob`s funding doesn`t discredit his ideas per se. It`s just that "Bob`s ideas" conspicuously deflect light from the whole picture.
TT,
Why would Bob admitting he gets paid by so and so change anything? Do you believe Bob's opinion is compromised?
If yes, could you substantiate such a claim?
liberty student, I believe that the answer to your question is patently obvious:
If Bob were to forthrightly acknowledge what interests are funding his opinion, readers would be more likely to notice what the real PURPOSES of his remarks might be.
It is precisely to mask such purposes that rent-seeking corporations like to channel their efforts through "think tanks", pundits and the like.
Both Bob Murphy and Scott Horton are well aware of this, which is why
- when Bob identified himself the economist for IER, Horton immediately said, "Ah now, wait a minute. Does that mean that you`re a front man for Exxon or something?", and
- Bob chuckled, hemmed and hawed and replied, "Uhh, well, no, but, you can take it with a grain of salt if you want."
But sadly, Bob did NOT take the opportunity of Horton`s specific question to explain who funds IER - not Exxon or oil, but coal - even though most of his later substantive comments were ABOUT how Waxman-Markey is a fight between interest groups for government favors.
As to whether who funds Bob affects what he says, it think that`s also fairly evident: if it didn`t, his funders wouldn`t bother to pay for his services. Of course this doesn`t at all need to imply that Bob doesn`t mean what he says (he probably does, and I agree with him on many points), but simply that he omits to say other relevant things.
The coal- and utility-funded "free-market think tank" Institute of Energy Research has a just
I hope Tokyo Tom will tell us who the most noble and self-funded commentator is on the topic, so that we might all swallow his ideas and arguments wholesale.
Wouldn't such a carbon tax benefit Exxon? If it taxes businesses that emit carbon while providing rebates to everyone (consumers), wouldn't consumers have more money to spend on gasoline?
TT, that is an evasive way of further undermining Bob's credibility while trying to cover your own ass for taking potshots at him.
"This doesn't need to imply..."
But that is exactly what you are doing. You have inferred numerous times in this post and comments, that Bob is compromised by his employer.
Can you answer, clearly, yes or no that he is compromised?
And if not, don't you find your inferences somewhat irresponsible within the context of sincere and productive debate?
Nir, I don't think TT will be so forthcoming.
TT is fallaciously claiming a sin [sic] of omission, is proof of a sin of commission. It is a non-sequitur.
The fact is, anyone can make any claim that Bob has not provided enough background, about LvMI, about Chaos Theory, about his personal religious beliefs, about what sort of car he drives.
By making an ad hominem (challenging Bob's person and not his ideas) now TT can duck and weave the "we shouldn't draw anything from this thing I have decided to make a big deal about" while avoiding discussing any issues Bob may be incorrect on.
kk, carbon taxes would affect anyone buying fossil fuels or power generated from it, not simply businesses. Rebating the taxes would eliminate the regressive impact on lower and middle classes, but as prices would change to reflect the tax, Exxon would still be adversely affected.
Cap-and-trade would have a similar impact on prices, but is more transparent, involves less pork and would engender less price volatility. It seems to me that Exxon is absolutely right on the merits and is arguing for the far preferable policy.
Nir, it`s good that apparently you`re NOT interested in swallowing anyone`s ideas and arguments wholesale.
But if so, why does it bother you that I provide you with additional information about Bob and the interests that are funding him? Are you uninterested in Austrian insights about rent-seeking?
Maybe you should take your complaint to Bob, who himself suggested that listeners might want to take his views with a grain of salt.
ls, you`re having a tough time reading me.
1. I think I`ve fairly clearly stated that I think that Bob`s expressed opinions on climate change are influenced by the fact that they are supported by a rent-seeking interest. When I said "This doesn't need to imply..." I was referring to whether or not he believes what he SAYS - as opposed to what he omits to say - and expressed the view that he probably does mean what he says (as well as that I agree with much of what he says).
2. I don`t think I`m being evasive at all, but rather straightforward. And I don't consider my fairly open challenges to Bob on this matter to be "somewhat irresponsible" within the "context of sincere and productive debate". Instead, I reluctantly find them to be necessary, given the ubiquity of rent-seeking and the ways that it perverts both legislation and the debate over it.
3. I like Bob and don`t really enjoy making this criticism, but I think he would probably be the last to say that questioning his entanglement with rent-seeking interests is off-limits, particularly when rent-seeking is PRECISELY one of his chief substantive criticisms of cap-and-trade. Bob`s personal familiarity with Austrian criticisms of the influence of business and other interest groups on government policy does not create immunity from criticism on the same grounds.
4. "I don't think TT will be so forthcoming". Care to take back your words? In the future, perhaps you`d be good enough to leave me time to reply before you speculate on whether I will?
5. "a sin [sic] of omission, is proof of a sin of commission. It is a non-sequitur." You`re using a lot of big words, but I`m not sure I follow you. I`ve said Bob failed to disclose something that was relevant to the discussion. Period. (Bob may have some thoughts on if it was a sin and what kind, but if it was deliberate I`m not sure I see a distinction between omission and commission.)
6. "anyone can make any claim that Bob has not provided enough background".
Sure, but there are only certain times when "full disclosure" is relevant; on most things Bob comments on whether someone funds him is irrelevant. But when he is talking about legislation that will have a significant impact on someone who is paying him to speak, that fact that he is acting as a spokesman is VERY relevant. That`s why Scott Horton asked the question, and why Bob dodged it.
7. "by making an ad hominem"
Sorry, but if you want to split hairs, a "cui bono" argument is not ad hominem argument. In any event, Austrian economics tells us that we need to worry about the perversion of government via rent-seeking. If the wheels of our worrying about rent-seeking are ever to hit the road, it means that we have to keep asking "who benefits".
This of course complicates debate and cuts many ways; sorry that I can`t make life simpler for you.
8. "while avoiding discussing any issues Bob may be incorrect on."
Are you serious? I`ve had several years of substantive discussions on climate on the LvMI blog, and argue routinely with Bob on substantive matters, both on my blog and over at his. All you`re showing here is an unadmirable ignorance or shortness of attention.
In any case, your attention is welcome, but we can have a more intelligent and productive discussion if you`d check your inclination to reflexive negativity.
Joe Romm of Climate Progress has a new post up that lambasts a recent WaPo op-ed by "environmental
Exxon CEO Rex Tillerson has done it again*, by proposing in a speech on October 1 in Washington, D.C
Last year around this time I criticized Reason science correspondent Ron Bailey , for a rather empty
People can compete with their competition to provide the best products and service at the best price or people can compete for government influence to give them an unfair advantage over their competition.
There's really no other option.
The larger government gets the more the latter is beneficial, and eventually required. We're almost there now.
Well said. It seems to me that the best way to influence this is to start forming a consumer-supported coalition of principled, non-rent-seeking firms.
On the heels of my post about Apple leaving the U.S. Chamber of Commerce , here are a few more links
My recent post, " Bob Murphy on climate change at Antiwar Radio; a puppet for the "King Coal"
"If you cannot measure it; You cannot improve it." -- Lord Kelvin I noted in February ("
Last week the Wall Street Journal ran an op-ed by James P. Lucier, Jr ., a managing director of Capital
I excerpt below portions of my prior posts here that refer to Elinor Ostrom and are indebted to her thinking
Bob Murphy has a new post up at his blog, " CBO Testimony Misleads on Cost of Cap-and-Trade "
Tom, what exactly are you jabbering about?
Cheers, Stephan
In my preceding post I commented on Austrian (dis)engagement on climate issues, as exemplified by Stephan
I didn't moderate or block anything. This is the first I've heard of it.
"You: (i) post without significant comment a one-page letter from a scientist - as if the letter itself is vindication, victory or a roadmap for how we should seek to engage the views and preferences of others,"
How, how DARE I publish something someone else has written! The nerve!
"(ii) refuse to answer my straightforward questions (both above and at my cross-linked post, which you visited) on how we engage others in the very active ongoing political debate, in a manner that actually defends and advances our policy agenda, (putting aside the insulting and disingenuous "Tokyo asked me to respond" and "it's so rambling I am not sure what to respond to");"
I have no obligation to respond to your rambling comments. I don't know what you are jabbering about.
"(iii) then proceed to present your own view of the science,"
How, How... DARE I present my own opinion! The nerve!
"If you are not actually interested in discussing policy on a serious issue, then consider refraining from posting on it."
"discussing policy" is how socialists describe it when the foregone conclusion is that the state is going to intervene, and we need to just have a nice cozy chat about what knobs to twiddle to satisfy or balance this or that "interest" against others. Real libertarians don't "discuss policy"--they talk about property rights.
Well... this has to be the worst blog I've ever read.
In my preceding two posts, on how Austrians strive for a self-comforting irrelevancy on climate change
Stephan, I`m sorry; you have my full apology, as I`ve noted above.
Since you`ve provided some substantive comments, let me respond briefly:
- my point is not at all that you`ve had the nerve to publish something someone else has written, but the fact that you`ve done so with a piece that just a little scratch reveals is mainly twaddle and that you don`t at all address how Mises blog readers ought to engage others on this issue, including particularly whether we ought to consider engaging the various people fighting over the wheel of government in ways that might to help improve on the status quo and to advance the cause of freedom.
- as to your views of the science, of course I have no problem at all you stating whatever those views might be. My point is that you were not at all responsive to my question about whether it would be more productive than calling enviros evil to engage them (and the big boys who use them as puppets) in discussing changes that Austrians would like to see that might advance the enviros` (and others`) agendas.
- "discussing policy" is how socialists describe it when the foregone conclusion is that the state is going to intervene, and we need to just have a nice cozy chat about what knobs to twiddle to satisfy or balance this or that "interest" against others. Real libertarians don't "discuss policy"--they talk about property rights.
The only way that Austrians can achieve their purposes is by seeking to influence others AND government. My point is not at all "socialistic".
Real libertarians DO discuss policy, AND property rights, AND, like Ostrom points out, the way communities can, without government interference, devise their own rules to manage commons.
I stand by my point, that we ought to be vigorously discussing all of these things, including, in the context of climate change concerns:
- ending counterproductive public utility monopolies;
- allowing immediate write-off of capital investments;
- ending favoritism under the CAA for the dirtiest coal-fired power plants;
- ending licensing of nuclear power (and federal insurance caps); etc.
"The only way that Austrians can achieve their purposes is by seeking to influence others AND government."
It is against the self interest of the politicians to reduce their power, wealth and influence. No state / political in the history of the world has ever done so voluntarily.
To contend as such is naive and ignorant of history, as well as strategy. How has this strategy worked for CATO? How has it worked for every single free market think tank the world over, in their respective countries?
It never has.
You post a lot of really long material, and it doesn't seem like there is a lot of commenting.
Maybe you should break it up into more smaller posts, and engage your audience more than trying to promote a particular position. You will probably get more attention to the topic and your ideas that way.
Just some food for thought. I completely skimmed this, after skimming your long comments on the Mises blog. If you can't capture my attention in 3 or 400 words, I have to move on. There is simply too much content online to read blog comments and posts that are essay length.
[Folks, I hope you do a better job than I do at saving draft posts before they`re finalized; I just lost
J ohn Quiggin , a left-leaning Australian economist and professor at the University of Queensland, has
Hayden's letter was outrageous.
Nothing chaps my hide worse than someone thinking they spoon-fed me garbage and I was too stupid to know it.
It's one thing to lay out some facts and then spin it in full daylight for all to see, but it's something else to to actually get paid by big oil and only scratch up a few feeble-minded and wrong subjective sentences.
Exxon/Mobil should drop him and at least try to find a better adversary. Someone not so terribly lazy.
John Quiggin , a left-leaning Australian economist and professor at the University of Queensland, has
I note first that I am reminded by a pithy comment from someone else that, despite the length of my previous
Conza88, you misunderstand me. If libertarians have the slightest interest in persuading anyone, they kinda have to actually, you know, TRY.
Keith, thanks for your comment; I`m glad somebody agrees! But not simply Hayden`s letter; it`s the penchant of Mises Bloggers and readers to post and swallow this nonsense that is so amazing and appalling.
FWIW, you might note that Exxon appears to have changed its tune (if not its stripes) and is expressly advocating carbon taxes:
mises.org/.../search.aspx
First, George Reisman , and now, Stephan Kinsella . I have asked two of our leading lights whether they
ls, I appreciate your interest and considered suggestions, which sound good. There was an earlier point when I had more comments, but they seem to have tailed off when spam grew.
Are you suggesting my posts are too long generally, or just this one?
However, you might note that some of these longer posts serve the additional purpose of broadcasting, backing up and keeping available comments I`ve made elsewhere.
Do other blogs get more comments? I suppose that even w/o comments I feel that at least people are listening, as I get between 20-40% of user blog traffic at any time.
Thanks again. I must be doing something right, too, if I`ve got you biting your tongue on negative comments!
I copy below a comment I just left at Stephan Kinsella `s post on the main LvMI Blog, " Physicist
Give it a rest for crying out loud.
Whether global warming is occurring or not is actually completely irrelevant. Property rights are the solution.
"Property rights are the solution."
Sure; somebody tell China quick!
The Israeli-Palestinian conflict isn’t primarily about religion, race or any other distinguishing ethnic feature. It is a conflict that revolves first and foremost around subjugation and oppression of a people by a stronger, colonialist power. Were the Canadians to invade the United States and establish a protectorate, Americans would be pretty mad and would rise up in arms. It’s the same thing when Israel does it to Palestinians.
Sukrit, thanks for commenting.
Sure, but my point is that the West has been empowering the hardliners on all sides for decades.
Time for us to make them (including Egypt, which aids the shameful blockage of Gaza) carry the full costs of their own pigheadedness.
Do you disagree?
I'm somewhat of a Malthusian (in the real sense of Thomas Malthuse), but I would be the first to acknowledge that the popular take on it (such as relating to the environment) basically stems from an ignorance of technology and economics.
Edmund, thanks for your visit.
I`d say there`s plenty of ignorance all around: there are large-scale, very real threats to natural ecosystems and wild resources that we rely on, but very little understanding of the roles that governments and consumer markets play in overwhelming whatever indigenous resource management regimes may exist and in creating "tragedy of the commons" problems through socialization of resources/management.
See here, for example:
mises.org/.../too-many-or-too-few-people-does-the-market-provide-an-answer.aspx
mises.org/.../tragedy-of-the-panicked-enviro-iv-not-capitalism-but-intensive-use-of-unowned-resources-is-the-problem.aspx
Agreed, altough in an ultimate sense I care absolutely nothing for the 'natural' environment; I'd like to see it entirely exploited to the maximum for the purposes of civilization and turned into something resembling Coruscant.
Edmund, I would never expect a Coruscant, because people both need and value nature. Problems now on the nature front all stem from meddling governments and insufficient property rights.
Aaah, the Great Climate Hack ("GCH")! I`m flattered by a back-handed request to weigh in -
Apologies, but I can`t resist: I saw a news item earlier today - "Copenhagen climate summit borrows
Tom--heroic! Keep on "evolving"! I suggest you watch the NGC The Earth channel.nationalgeographic.com/.../earth-the-biography special. Shows big trends. makes them look silly.
Stephan: Heroic? Surely you jest; I`ve said little here that I haven`t said previously.
Readers might also want to take note of this December 4 recent WaPo op-ed by James Murdoch , chairman
TT, I was really hoping that this would be your much-awaited response to "climategate" - a clear and cogent analysis of what matters here and the degree to which it might have changed your outlook. You are a real expert and I really want to know what you think. Did I miss your analysis?
Jeff, thanks for the kind words; my response was here:
My Climate Confession; or the war with deceivers and with self-deception: mises.org/.../my-climate-confession-quot-climate-change-emails-stop-glaciers-from-melting-quot.aspx
Ever since "climategate" broke, I've wondered how our own climate gadfly, Tokyo Tom, would
This seems to be a case of, if you want to believe it badly enough, and point the finger at others, you might be able to avoid genuine introspection.
This post was mostly empty rhetoric (not unique on this blog), appeals to populism and authority. I want to know, does TT trust the work of Jones and Mann prior to these emails, and does he still trust this work after? If not, then can we toss out all of the derivative work?
TT, you didn't address anything substantive in the emails, simply glossing over them, and assuming they are an outlier.
But if Mann, Jones and the other climategate emailers are outliers, who is the IPCC leaning on?
And if these men have been blocking genuine scientific inquiry, and fighting against transparency and open debate, then how can you trust any of the other data provided to the IPCC, which is not wholly and completely in the public domain, including complete raw data sets?
It seems to me, that every time raw data is released (which is what Jones was deliberately obstructing), the science is not settled, as the genuine debate can start, and the error checking becomes sincere.
The difference between an alarmist and a skeptic, is that science is inherently based on skepticism and inquiry. That is very hard to do, when the alarmists are monopolizing the data, funding and reporting, then destroying or altering data that does not agree with their preconceptions.
Sorta like what you have done in this blog post. Deride and ignore anything which could challenge your position, instead of thoughtfully and honestly checking both your premises, and the premises of your critics.
A courageous position, pro-environment, pro-liberty, pro-science, would be for you to demand absolute transparency from each and every climate researcher, and every iota of data. When it is all on the table, for everyone to scrutinize, then we can start forming meaningful conclusions, not before.
FYI, the appeals to big oil and who is getting paid is nonsense, particularly from a so-called Austrian. You know full well, as a matter of methodological individualism, that the economic incentive is there for everyone. It is blatantly dishonest to point it out only in the skeptic camp as I and others have noted in your ad hominem attacks on Bob Murphy. Your attack on other Austrians, and then this wrist slap post for the proven liars and scoundrels only continues to undermine any seriousness people might have for your writing.
Climategate is a big deal. Now, everyone sees these little emperors have no clothes, and thoughtful citizens want to know if their science is bad, then where is the good science that the climate agenda is based on, and how soon can we check and scrutinize that work?
If you're sincere about science and facts, you will be asking this question as well.
I have commented on your response TT. I can't speak for Jeffrey, but what you offered was anything but clear and cogent. Just more empty rhetoric and a complete dodge of substantive examination.
ls, thanks for the engagement. No time to respond now, other than to note that you ignore the opportunities presented by the behavior and preferences of others.
limited liability is not a privilege nor is incorporation. hessen has shown how contracts can and should be formed by private agreement. And shareholders would not be liable anyway for actions of employees under standard principles of causation and responsibility.
Stephan, what are you jabbering about?
You know very well that:
(1) I am talking not about what owners could contract with each other, their employees and voluntary creditors, but about the state grant of limited liability to investors/shareholders, which limited liability is something that non-consenting parties injured by corporate acts (acts of employees, managers and owners) certainly could not contract to give to owners in advance, and
(2) this limited liability is not simply and incidental and irrelevant aspect of a corporate structure that could otherwise be cobbled together by contracts, but a key attribute that even today is one of the chief reasons for incorporating (including multiple subsidiaries), has fuelled investments in risky activities that may pay off but leave the injured holding the bag for losses that exceed assets, and led to a spiral of corporate growth, externalization of risk, the growth of the corporation, the subversion of the common law (that Block documents as the reason for the growth of environmental problems), the distrust of corporations and continuing pressures by citizens on government to "do something".
You`ve probably also noted the absurd string of judicial decisions by which corporations, rather than the individuals working in and owning them, have Constitutional rights, and "due process" rights under the 14th Ad (which was drafted with slaves and former slaves in mind, but who are hard to find in the jurisprudence).
You`ve probably also noted that the state grants of unlimited life and purpose, coupled with limited liaiblity, have served to make corporations singularly potent rent-seekers, serving as huge pools of assets by which to corrupt government (as well as sheep to be shorn by government), and engendering both the modern distrust of corporations and of "capitalism".
What climate concerns?
Yeah, you know, the ones that prompt Bob to write.
Tom, why do you use the wrong apostrophe in your writing?
I just type it in here with my Japanese-based Windows PC. I don`t particularly like it, but not sure I can easily change, other than drafting in Word and then pasting in.
Along these lines, I've found an excellent article by law professor John Hasnas on the origin of rights in a state of nature. Basically he argues that rights in a society are born out solutions to social problems that worked for that society. Plus the fact that people feel entitled to what they have enjoyed for a period of time. For instance, if they have enjoyed a certain (de facto) right for a period of time, they will come to feel entitled to that (normative) right. They will come to feel that they SHOULD have that right.
I have seen several people in the objective ethics camp fall in love with this article, which actually totally destroys their position. In other words, it sets them straight by showing how ethics being subjective doesn't imply the bad things they think it does.
I cannot recommend it enough, and I think it could hold the key to a resolution of your debate with Murphy and Callahan.
journals.cambridge.org/.../displayFulltext
Or mises.org/.../12969.aspx
AJ, many thanks for your visit and comment.
The Hasnas article is, essentially, my position. I imagine it may be useful for many people, maybe even Gene, Bob and Stephan. I`ll try to bring it to their attention, but I`m not holding my breath.
David R. Henderson has a nice post up at Antiwar.com , titled "In Defense of Avatar" , in which
the first link doesn't work.
perhaps you could write up a complete revisionist report on this topic for Mises.org? It looks extremely fascinating.
Tom, why do you use the backwards apostrophe (`) instead of a normal one? It's very distracting and annoying.
I noted in my previous post - Avatar resonates in China - where standing up for property rights (and
I received the following comment by email from a non-registered reader:
One need not travel to China to find indigenous cultures lacking human rights. America leads the world in percentile behind bars, thanks to ongoing persecution of hippies, communists, and non-whites under prosecution of the war on drugs. If we’re all about spreading liberty abroad, then why mix the message at home? Peace on the home front would enhance global credibility.
The drug czar’s Rx for prison fodder costs dearly, as lives are flushed down expensive tubes. My shaman’s second opinion is that psychoactive plants are God’s gift. Behold, it’s all good. When Eve ate the apple, she knew a good apple, and an evil prohibition. Canadian Marc Emery is being extradited to prison for selling seeds that American farmers use to reduce U. S. demand for Mexican pot.
The CSA (Controlled Substances Act of 1970) reincarnates Al Capone, endangers homeland security, and throws good money after bad. Fiscal policy burns tax dollars to root out the number-one cash crop in the land, instead of taxing sales. Society rejected the plague of prohibition, but it mutated. Apparently, SWAT teams don’t need no stinking amendment.
Nixon passed the CSA on the false assurance that the Schafer Commission would later justify criminalizing his enemies, but he underestimated Schafer’s integrity. No amendments can assure due process under an anti-science law without due process itself. Psychology hailed the breakthrough potential of LSD, until the CSA shut down research, and pronounced that marijuana has no medical use. Former U.K. chief drugs advisor Prof. Nutt was sacked for revealing that non-smoked cannabis intake is scientifically healthy.
The RFRA (Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993) allows Native American Church members to eat peyote, which functions like LSD. Americans shouldn’t need a specific church membership or an act of Congress to obtain their birthright freedom of religion. God’s children’s free exercise of religious liberty may include entheogen sacraments to mediate communion with their maker.
Freedom of speech presupposes freedom of thought. The Constitution doesn’t enumerate any governmental power to embargo diverse states of mind. How and when did government usurp this power to coerce conformity? The Mayflower sailed to escape coerced conformity. Legislators who would limit cognitive liberty lack jurisdiction.
Common-law holds that adults are the legal owners of their own bodies. The Founding Fathers undersigned that the right to the pursuit of happiness is inalienable. Socrates said to know your self. Mortal lawmakers should not presume to thwart the intelligent design that molecular keys unlock spiritual doors. Persons who appreciate their own free choice of path in life should tolerate seekers’ self-exploration. Liberty is prerequisite for tracking drug-use intentions and outcomes.
----------------------------------
This email was sent by Bill Harris (wrh512 _yahoo.com)
antinomian-peacenik.blogspot.com
Further to my prior post , here are some additional resources on Haiti: Walter Williams , Only Haiti
This post was mentioned on Friendfeed by TokyoTom: A libertarian immodestly summarizes a few modest climate policy proposals - TT`s Lost in Tokyo - http://mises.org/Communi...
Further to my preceding post on speech and corporations , I highly recommend Lawrence Lessig `s insightful
Further to my preceding posts on corporations and free speech , I invite others to read a semi-serious
[Note: Hope the obvious snark isn`t too confusing.] An obviously deluded Bill Gates apparently: become
This post was mentioned on Twitter by Tokyo_Tom: It`s "Too Late"?! See &enjoy this GREAT new Anthem of the Revolution. Let`s stand for rts agnst big govt & #CorpSpeak http://bit.ly/9RBnD5
This post was mentioned on Twitter by Tokyo_Tom: New post on #CorpSpeak:"Jefferson Was Right" about dangers of corporations and of Supreme Court http://bit.ly/cfxheO #tcot #tpp #tlot #p2
Lessig doesn' expressly say it, but we also need to rein in the "self-evident", "unalienable
I won't reprise the essay referred to in my receding post , by which Lawrence Lessig presents his
This post was mentioned on Twitter by Tokyo_Tom: @oleuanna Not circular; see http://bit.ly/1K9U0p. See also http://bit.ly/bfPEX. BTW, are you fighting breaches, breeches or both?
[This is a work in progress and largely taken from previous posts, but readers might find some value
"Whhhaaat the heck is TT up NOW?" I can hear some of you asking yourselves. Bill Gates , Roger
This post was mentioned on Twitter by Tokyo_Tom: Speech& Sociopaths:Does it make sense 2collapse,for Const purposes,distinction btwn humans &corporate "persons"? http://bit.ly/dzxO5K #tcot
These "tribal truths" seem to fairly summarize modern political discourse - whether in the
I reported two weeks ago that a PR firm - Murray Hill, Inc. - had embraced the Supreme Court's resounding
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As I noted earlier , Bill Gates has recently posted his thoughts on how to address climate issues . Since
[Note: Snark inside.] As I mentioned earlier , Bill Gates has recently posted his thoughts on how to
Case in point is Kate Sheppard , reporter on energy and environmental politics in Mother Jones '
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canng.com/.../cscent.pdf
Thomas Jefferson Free Ebook
[It looks like I'm having formatting problems; sorry, readers!] I left the following comment on Kevin
My goodness! Another Frumming at NRO! So Jim Manzi, a conservative/libertarian and a reasoned critic
I pulled out my peashooter the other day and levelled a few criticisms (" Risk-shifting, BP and
Teedog: my reply was not a "reflexive defense of corporations" at all. It was a criticism of some of your points.
There is no "stubborn unwillingness to closely examine the role that the special grants to corporate investors that lie at the core of the problem of snowballing corporate statism, spiralling politicized rent-seeking battles, incompetent government and concupiscent and grand-standing politicians". We are completely opposed to all this and really don't need left-libertarians or others to inform us of stuff we have long known without the "aid" of hoary leftist "tools."
"1. Stephan chooses to set the stage with a bunch of labels - "enviro-global-warming anti-corporation libertarian"."
Is this not accurate? You are an environmentalist, global warming opponent, and anti-corporate. I was merely letting readers know who you are. Why you think this is improper is beyond me--unless it's inaccurate, in which case you are free to set the record straight (which I note you didn't do; you merely pointed to my description as if it is somehow criticizable, without specifying why or how).
"Whatever makes you happy, Stephan. I know you and others have a hard time resisting the urge, which is why I often playfully sign off as the resident friendly enviro fascist! Nah, couldn't possibly be a "real" libertarian."
I didn't say you aren't a real libertarian, and I dind't call you an enviro-fascist.
"On corporations, the "environment", and climate - as on central banking, fiat currency and the whole mess of banking and capital markets regulation - I'm simply anti-un-contracted-for-risk-shifting-and-government-enabled-moral-hazard and arguments against rent-seeking that ignore existing special deals."
So am I. I suppose we only differ on whether passive "shareholders" of a totally private, contract-based "corporation" would under libertarian private law be considered vicariously responsible for torts committed by employees of the corporation that they own shares in. I think they would not. If you think they should be, you have to explain why. But if you can provide a good reason, I do not opose it. I think we simply should not extend to person 2 liability for person 1's acts, without a good reason anchored in libertarian principles of causation and responsibility.
"But if it's easier, just keep calling me"anti-corporation" and continue to lump me in with "enviro-fascists"."
I did not say the latter, and as for the former, it's simply shorthand for your opposition to corporate limited liability.
"'The point is it’s a bad thing that’s happened to it.Why not feel sorry for them?'
"Really, Stephan? BP deliberately ,measures and takes risks as part of its business; no one else who has been or maybe injured had a clear concept of such risks or either assumed them or had any ability to control them. Clearly, BP is the one that has interfered with others' use and enjoyment of their own property, of common property and of government-owned property; in law, we call them "tort-feasors"."
And they'll have to pay; and they are going to be damaged by this. This is a firm that is engaged in a peaceful, productive business of providing oil to consumers. They are doing a good thing. And they suffered a huge blow b/c of this accident. They will pay. It's not good. That's why we should not attack them but mourn for them. The non-misanthropes among us, anyway.
"It's hard to believe you want to further support Lew's absurd claim that BP is the leading victim now - we simply have assume that in the future, BP or someone else will throw some compensation at all of those other unworthy, insignificant passive victims. Nice."
Let's say there is $200B of damage that BP will have to reimburse. Presumably they will suffer far more damage than anyone else. Leading victim--get it?
"Sounds like you're agreeing that this incident is unlikely to "wreck"BP, given insurance, self-insurance and the $1.6 billion Oil Spill Fund. But its sounds like you also are suggesting that BP has every right to negotiate with government ofr liability caps. Interesting."
I think the liability will be greater than $1.6B. Far more. I think BP will pay it. I think it will hurt BP and its shareholders. And/or its insurers. I think that this is one reason why the original tax-for-trust-fund idea was unfair: because they are taxed yet are still going to as a practical matter be liable. I doubt we'll hear enviros or you saying that they should be reimbursed for the taxes they were forced to pay.
"Let me repeat: some might feel vindicated and be eager to use this incident to bash BP, etc. - people/firms certainly are fighting over government - but that doesn't make them "happy" that disaster has occurred."
we'll have to disagree on our assessments of the mentality of modern enviros. I am sure there are plenty who are cheering because this will help put a halt to future oil drilling expansions.
"You apparently missed it, but there were plenty of "misanthropic sickos" on Lew's comment thread who expressed thoughts similar to “I don’t get the calls for pity. Boohoo another oil giant might have bankrupted itself.”"
Lew doesn'thave comment threads.
"Stephan: No libertarian is in favor of liability caps. What is he talking about?
Simple, Stephan. Lew explicitly recognizes that government has screwed up the ability of enviros and others who have conflicting preferences about the use of resources to engage in voluntary transactions that would advance mutual welfare - yet he chooses to bash those whose preferences are frustrated by government, while feeling sorry for those whose preferences are favored."
You mean BP who has to negotiate w /the feds for the right to drill in the OCS, you mean BP who is taxed and regulated by states, is favored? Some favoritism.
" What is remotely even-handed - or Austrian - about this imbalance? Is it simply that it's okay for those who make omelets to take eggs from others, since the omelet "makers" are being "productive"?"
I don't know what you are talking about. We Austro-libertarians are opposed to the state-corporate intermixture. We praise BP for its wealth-genrating activities, despite its imperfections, not because of them.
"I suspect this is the key reason why Stephan troubled himself to respond, but surely he can see it is not only counterfactual, but dodges any consideration of the consequences of limited liability in terms of fuelling industrialization and fights over using government to check corporate excesses. Investors then and now deliberately choose to conduct business activities through corporations precisely because government absolves owners from any liability in excess of enterprise assets."
So?
"While it is possible for voluntary counterparties (employees, lenders and others doing business with the firm) to agree in advance to limit their resources solely to enterprise assets, those who are injured by acts of companies or their employees and agents do not in advance choose the nature of the those who are responsible for harming them."
The qustion is, is the shareholder the one responsible for harming them? you need a reason to argue this. The arguments I've seen are problematic for a few reasons. First, they are based on a nebulous, not articulated idea of causation. Second, it depends on accepting the artificial state legal classifications such as "ownership". Third, the implicit theory of causation you urge would be so broad as to ensnare any number of people who also have relationships with the firm: lenders, debtors, vendors and suppliers, consultants, contractors, employees, stakeholders even. If you arbitrarily draw the line around shareholders but not around the others, you need a good reason why--that does not just point to the state's legal classifications "he's an owner and he's not".
" Accordingly, the broad blanket grant of limited liability to corporations is clearly anti-libertarian."
No. Not according to Hessen and Pilon. Also Rothbard. www.stephankinsella.com/.../rothbard-on-corporations-and-limited-liability-for-tort
"Accordingly, dividends received by shareholders from risky activities are not clawed back if risks are realized and claims exceed corporate assets."
So? Are vendors payments clawed back? What about customers who received a refund? What about employee paychecks?
" Further, shareholders are given disincentives from too closely directing manage mt (for fear of claims that they have direct responsibility for torts)."
So. If you ride on a plane you also are arranging things so that you are not responsible for the airline's policies.
" When combined with other corporate attributes (unlimited life & purposes, relative anonymity of ownership, remoteness of owners from communities in which the firms operate, and ability of powerful firms and wealthy investors to influence judges, legislators, bureaucrats and other officials), we have seen a steady erosion of common law and growth in the regulatory state - as citizens fight to limit the risks and costs that corporations impose on individuals and communities. Is Stephan unaware of the central role of corporations in rent-seeking battles? In the perversion of the 14th Amendment - designed to protect emancipated slaves and Chineses coolies - into a weapon to elevate corporations over the states, and to permanently shift power to the Federal government?"
Wow. Some thesis there. Write it up counsellor, with a careful argument and citations.
"Just as most commentators overlook the massive moral hazard and risk-shifting that is part and parcel of thye federal opversight of banking (ncessitated by deposit insurance and fractional banking), so do Stephan and Lew insist on keeping their eyes closed to the legacy of risk-shifting, statism and escalating fights over increasingly incompetent and corrupt government. Why?"
Because we are already opposed to any unlibertarian policy or law, and of necessity, any negative consequences that flow therefrom. But as long as libertarian principles are followed, any "moral hazards" etc. are not unlibertarian.
My pal Stephan Kinsella has pestered me about the recent letter in Science by a bunch of the world's
While the Associated Press blames the disaster in the Gulf on the lack of regulatory oversight, the White
As a follow-up to Lew Rockwell 's Feel Sorry for BP? and my two sets of comments on it ( Risk-shifting
I have already criticized Lew Rockwell's May 5, 2010 piece, "Feel Sorry for BP?" ; and
Daniel McCarthy , senior editor of The American Conservative , posted a thoughtful essay the June 1 issue
Well, one may well argue that, if BP were a person it would be a career criminal , but surely not all
I continue to scratch my head on the knee-jerk reactions by Austrian-libertarians on problems regarding
Another BP post ! Warning: salty language from salt-of-the-Earth people kittens: [View:http://www.youtube
I have just stumbled across by Jeffrey Tucker's May 27, 2010 post on the Mises Economics Blog regarding
Ed Dolan (Professor at Stockholm School of Economics in Riga, Latvia and editor of the Austrian classic
Another BP post ! 1. Over on his The Money Illusion blog, Chicago-school economist Scott Sumner has a
Another BP post ! I copy below some comments I left on the above-entitled post by Kevin Carson (slightly
"I would observe that Austrians at LvMI routinely discount - if are not actively hostile to - the preferences that non-industrial users (and destested "enviros") have regarding common or publicly-owned resources. This is clearly inconsistent with Austrian principles. ... "
I didn't quite understand your point(s) in this paragraph.
Austrians would say that rights derive from individuals. Therefore if individuals in a group prefer to own something "in common", they can, through a contract. That's like a home owners bylaws or a marrital contract.
As far as I can tell, Austrians are not against voluntary common ownership.
Where is the inconsistency?
Dumky, welcome to LvMI, and thanks for the Q.
My point is not that common/community property is inconsistent with Austrian economics; it isn't at all (though far too many have simplistic, fetishized view that "private" property is the pinnacle of Austrian understanding).
Rather, my point is that there a plenty of commons and plenty of government-owned resources, and that too many Austrians reflexively support statist industrial users while hostilely dissing others who would like to use or protect the resource -- and this tendency finds no basis in Austrian economics per se.
I have a number of posts up discussing this further; search for my posts on "watermelons" or see this, for example:
mises.org/.../with-a-convenient-inconsistency-on-quot-abstractions-quot-like-quot-the-environment-quot-and-quot-bp-quot-are-austrians-unaware-of-the-heavy-thumb-they-have-on-the-scale-of-quot-preferences-quot.aspx
Another BP post ! As I noted yesterday , liberal blogger Matt Yglesias has a useful blog post up - "
Makes sense. I haven't encountered that attitude too much, but Lew's article which you were criticizing definitely deserved it.
It seems to me that environmental protection is just another application of private property, just like leisure time. It may not be considered "productive" by any objective measure, but that's simply because its value is subjective (and value always is).
The inconsistency you point out may be the result of a knee-jerk reaction by some Austrians when they hear "common ownership". That term is overloaded to mean voluntary ownership (like marriage, or owning a company with other shareholders) and collectivism...
1. I noted in November 2007 Gene Callahan's interesting post , entitled " How a Free Society
Tom: Are you suggesting that more government is the answer? Are you denying the power of persuasion?
I think you would say that the problem in the Gulf is corporatism and government policies that prevent proper assignment of liability and individual rights. Is that right?
If so, I would agree. I think everyone affected (directly or indirectly) by the spill, who can convince a judge and jury they have been harmed should be able to sue BP. I think that current laws probably limit that sort of thing.
But I also think that persuasion can be tremendously powerful. In the end, it is persuasion that really changes behavior.
I suppose if by government you mean the rule of law, rather than the state, then I would agree with you that more "government" is needed. It seems to me there is little recognition of the rights of individuals in the air they breathe and the water they drink and use.
William, thanks for your comments. I agree with you that the chief problem in the Gulf is "corporatism and government policies that prevent proper assignment of liability and individual rights." A different angle is the Avatar one: we have a commons in Gulf fisheries, but inept and kleptocratic government steals from local users and gives rights to risk-shifting corporations.
I agree with Callahan and Richman that moral suasion are essential and can be powerful. But certainly its efficacy is limited by existing statism, and this should not be ignored or made light of - particularly for a punchy,global problem like climate.
Further, I was trying to stir things up a bit among our rabid enviro-haters here at LvMI, by pointing out to them not only that the moral pressure LvMI posters detest is a legitimate (and perhaps the chief) non-statist approach to commons issues, but also that most Austrians seem intent on deliberately squandering whatever limited political capital they may have with "enviros".
I noted in a post yesterday that Sheldon Richman has recently suggested that the best, nonstatist way
It's a bit puzzling - and disturbing - that, in the midst of an ongoing and epochal pollution event
The Guardian ran a story last weeks that illustrated some of the human costs of BP's oil debacle
For a preceding post, I put together an index to my posts to date, and thought it might be useful to
Yes, another BP post ! I was a bit critical in my last post of Ron Bailey's suggestion that a gross
arrogate, not abrogate. duh.
what do you expect us to say? this is just a tort. Torts happen.
Thanks; fixed.
But it's not "just" a tort, but a complex problem of commons mismanagement, corruption, moral hazard and an Avatar-like deprivation by government of rights to local fishermen, etc. Uninterested in trying to analyze or suggest fixes to the obviously failed institutional structure? You know, the kind we offer for the financial crisis set off by deposit insurance, etc.?
Oh, and BTW, if it's "just a tort", care to take a stab at who the tortfeasors are? No easy out by saying "BP", as we know they're just a fiction, and real people commit torts 'and crimes).
1. As prologue, I refer to my earlier posts on (1) corporate "free speech", campaqign contributions
Is it too much to ask to have a little more light of Austrian analysis thrown on BP? I've asked Lew
I kinda liked this, so I've cribbed it from an earlier post , where it served as prologue and summary
I've addressed the poor health of the world's oceans quite recently , in response to a flip comment
A recent post on the Mises Economics Blog by contributor S.M. Oliva , " LeBron and the Collectivist
The following comment on Stephan Kinsella's July 14 post, The L. Neil Smith – FreeTalkLive
How about finding a way to lessen or remove the Pacific Garbage Patch and then actually doing it yourself? What a bunch of miserable schmucks. I think Sea Stalker would be a better name. Not exactly Gandhi style nonviolence here. Not sure who gets inspired by their tactics. Instead of trying to win in the battlefield of ideas, their corrosive new breed of altruism seeks to tell others what behavior is acceptable. There's no negotiating, no compromise with them, every whale must live, even if humans must die? Of course if they ever win the whale war there are the seal and dolphin and so many other wars. Vegan Zombies all of them.
Dear PO:
Who owns the oceans? The Japanese government, which itself steals from its taxpayers to conduct these whaling operations at a loss?
I understand the urge to hate those disgusting, nasty enviros, but where are the property rights that allow enviros to express their preferences through market transactions? Can't these disgusting groupos be seen as a project to homestead the oceans? Is that wholly a bad thing?
Battlefield of ideas? Haven't the enviros run rings around the Japanese in that arena?
But what the heck is this "ideas" nonsense about, anyway? Why would that even be an issue, except for the utter lack of property rights, and the active interference of governments?
Enviros certainly can't go head to head against governments in a showdown of force, but they can certainly try to grandsytand and to embarrass the Japanese, aqnd they've been very succcessful at it. I think they've actually distracted/detracted from bigger issues of overfishing, but libertarians expressly recognize the validity of moral suasion and marshalling public opinion.
I profoundly disagree with the Japanese government, which is ripping off its own taxpayers, giving itself a black eye, AND distracting/detracting frommore important issues of how to manage crashing ocean fisheries.
Similarly, I think Sea Shepherd's activities are counterproductive, even though they are very popular in Australia, NZ and elsewhere.
I commented previously on Stephan Kinsella's Mises Blog post: “ The L. Neil Smith – FreeTalkLive
This seems to me to be fallacy of two wrongs make a right.
I am fully for embarrassing and thwarting all Govts, but not by initiating force. Enviro-altruists have no ability to care for animals or ecosystems and are vile second handers. Using force to bring morality is wrong for Govts and for pressure groups. A better avenue is to put a high price on whales and GreenPeace can monitor harvest and payment due.
I am with you wanting men of ability who can homestead the planet. They would have skills to increase/decrease fertility. They would enforce a barrier between wild and civilization to protect each from the other. Any man would be free to enter this enforced wilderness but could bring no technology, only a rescue beacon. All men need not surrender their ability to live in the ancient ways.
I think you touched on an area libertarians don't consider. There's no reason to demand corporate immunity and the corporate veil. Any entrepreneur should have equal and full economic freedom, and also accountability to others. It seems that limiting the liability of business is tied to the state's desire to fascistly control business. It leads to prosecutors and agencies respecting/piercing corporate veils as fits their power centralizing agenda. In short its more about tyranny than allowing business to flourish.
Who is to "put a high price of whales" if no one owns them?
But isn't that EXACTLY what Sea Shepherd is trying to do, by harrassing and publicizing the Japanese fleet?
And how does one go about homesteading the wild, except by staking a claim and using force or the threat of it to defend it?
Nice to have a positive word of agreement from someone, PO; thanks.
I like your style!
ShroomyD, golly jee willickers. Thanks for the kind words.
You are an articulate writer. Thanks for taking the time to respond. I'm willing to limit the rights of groups here but to me, it's a tragedy if an individual Japanese man does not have the right to get in his boat and catch a whale. If to legitimately protect fisheries it needs to cost 5000 yen per harvested whale, ok.
PO, you're misunderstanding markets, pricing and protection.
It seems you're saying governments should be setting prices for whales - how, unless it auctions off catch rights?
Prices motivate sellers/suppliers to take valuable resources; but the problem with many resources is that the resources aren't owned or can't be protected - or are owned by governments and prices set don't reflect preferences of competing users or costs to others (like Sea Shepherd, or fishermen in the Gulf of Mexico).
To solve whaling and fisheries problems, we need a shared management system/property rights system that has the right to exclude others.
Eventually the Japanese man is going to return to Japan with his harvested whale where he can be regulated, taxed, etc.
You're making this way too complicated, whales in your possession can be treated as really big fish, subject to a really big tax, as big as needs be to protect fisheries.
PO, thanks for further comment. Your suggestion obviously can work only when all governments reach a shared conclusion to protect "really big fish" and implement taxing policies, since otherwise, what's to require Japan or any other nation to do anything?
Rather than internationally coordinated tax policies, might it not be easier for the countries concerned to set up some type of property rights regime, like we see for certain other fisheries?
"That emulation improves products and welfare is surely correct, and technological progress certainly makes emulation even cheaper. But individuals and groups are less likely to invest in developing information if competitors can freely and easily copy it. "
IP advocates seem to have no imagination. They don't see any role for entreprenuerial creativity when dealing with a mixed world of non-scarce AND scarce things. You are basically the same as the mainstreamers who believe in "market failure" and that we need state intervention to fix these market failures.
How do you know there will be "less" incentive to innovate, or less innovation? And so what, anyway? Are we all consequentialist-utilitarians now? Is libertarianism about individual liberty and freedom and the sanctity of property rights--or is it about setting a monopoly force government to impose coercive rules designed to "make it more likely for people to invest in developing information"?? The "libertarian" IP advocates seem to have no principles, no mooring. It's all just ad hoc policy wonkism.
Stephan, thanks for your quick comments.
Hoever, are you suggesting I'm an "IP advocate"? On what basis? I've taken no such advocacy position in my comments. Stop creating bogey-men and focus on my comments.
I see plenty of role for entreprenuerial creativity in dealing with a non-IP world; there's already plenty of it (as stealing/spying is unrelenting).
WHo's to say how much less innovation we'll see if it is easily swiped and duplicated? Dunno, but it seems axiomatic that there'd be less than if such info and related returns could be inexpensively protected.
Who's arguing for state intervention? I'm just suggesting that your blanket dismissal glosses over some important issues you might want to fill in to be more persuasive.
Tom, eithery ou are or are not an IP advocate. If not, we have no beef. If you are, then my comments apply. As for focusing on your comments--I've focused on what I think worth replying to.
Stephan, I am NOT an IP advocate (technological advance and abuse fatally undermine any case), but it seems we still have a beef: your arguments misunderstand property and are shallow (show me principles, and I'll show you a dog growing over a bone), misunderstand scarcity and the role of scarce information in competitive advantage and progress and (along with IP advocates) misunderstand the factors (especially avoidance of private cost of protection) that drove the development of IP.
Further, your case is not at all geared towards non-libertarians: the business/investor community globally is pushing ahead to strengthen IP, and domestic industry is unlikely to agree to abandon any defenses they may have against industrial spying, particularly by China.
Last month the conservative Canadian National Post ran a surprising editorial. It certainly caught me
Thanks for the thoughtful points.
Regarding the first one (that IP is not property because of principle but rather technological advancement), I'd have to disagree.
Whether it takes a little or much effort (and my own private resources) to duplicate a pattern does not change that duplicating it does not take it away from the other person. That was true before technological advancements.
That said, technological advancement is relevant in that it makes the matter more obvious to the crowds, to intuitively grasp the problem.
Also, it is worth considering that still today some ideas and patterns can still be protected by their inventors by making it more expensive to copy, by using non-IP means (technical obfuscation, NDAs, ...).
"Formal IP has at least some of its roots in a group decision..."
Are you saying that the IP laws are legitimate because of the democratic process, or maybe the constitution? What "group decision" are you referring to?
Regarding your final point and "SCARCE knowledge", given the non-rivalrous nature of knowledge (my "taking" it does not literally "take" it from you), I'm not sure it qualifies as scarce.
To be honest, I'm a bit confused on the terminology issue, as the dictionary defines scarce as "being in insufficient supply", but Kinsella seems to use it as "being in insufficient supply AND rivalrous". I prefer to use "rivalrous" directly for more clarity.
To me, the lack of rivalry means that ideas and patterns are not conflict-generating in the sense that deserves monopoly control (ie. private ownership). An intuitive indication of this fact is that any IP laws are arbitrary (duration, fair use exceptions, ...), unlike real property.
Dumky, thanks for your comments.
My basis position is that "property" is a fluid social construct; the "principles" we use to reinforce it is a process of conscious and subconscious rationalization.
In an age of cheap replication of information, duplicating may take away little from the other person, but even today as in days of yore it may disadvantage them by eliminating a competitive advantage.
The Greeks understood this instinctively when they had Zeus chain Prometheus for stealing fire and giving it to man.
That people still want to guard information undercuts the anti-IP arguments, but I agree that it does not justify state protection.
On "group decision" I suggest you look further at my older posts that I link at top, but I am suggesting that for parts of IP there was an explicit quid pro quo: we'll protect your position if you disclose your knowledge, so that society may benefit. This is an explanation, NOT a defense for IT.
Squabbles about "rivalrous" ignore that it is human beings and groups themselves that are rivarlous, and that knowledge can provide real and important advantage. This is why individuals and groups - and then governments - have strove to protect knowledge.
Human societies protect all resources where the benefits of doing so out outweigh the costs. There is a very wide and continually shifting spectrum here. My view is simply that the costs of govt IP now greatly outweigh the benefits.
Oops; as for "scarce", this is a comparative term. Even easily reproduced information, requires an investment of valuable time to acquire. In any case, people and groups protect information only because they perceive that it's not already out of the bag; i.e., because THEY regard it as scarce.
"My basis position is that "property" is a fluid social construct; the "principles" we use to reinforce it is a process of conscious and subconscious rationalization."
I lean that way too. I'm still trying to understand the "natural rights" approach.
I kinda like the argumentation ethics argument (it's elegant). There may be an analogous line of reasoning, where my arguing with you implies that I accept that you replicate patterns that I share with you or that I do not explicitly protect from you.
"That people still want to guard information undercuts the anti-IP arguments, but I agree that it does not justify state protection."
That seems wrong to me. People want to guard their business, and they would prevent competition if they could. That does not seem a valid pro-IP argument. Also, it is not compatible with the quest for universal ethics.
It is true that knowledge is valuable. But my shoe store is valuable too. The fact that you open a competing shoe store "harms" me, but not in a way that I could justify aggression against you.
It seems that you are willing to accept government intervention based on utilitarian arguments (cost/benefit). The whole problem with that is it requires interpersonal utility comparison, doesn't it?
Dumky, it seems that you, like Stephan, want to turn me into a pro-IP advocate. I'm not an advocate for government intervention here; I'm just trying to understand in part how we ended up with IP in the first place, and criticizing some of the anti-IP positions.
My point about guarding is that people tend to treat valuable information in the same way that they treat tangible property: they pay to protect it, and they pay to acquire it. I don't see a sharp principled distinction between information and tangible property, and I think this undermines the anti-IP case presented by Stephan. I still agree with his net position, but on same basis that libertarians try to persuade others about the state generally - that its costs far exceed its benefits, and that defense of property generally should be left to individuals and associations.
I know you're anti-IP, I'm just trying to understand why and why your argument different from Kinsella, and which arguments are stronger. I'm trying to get to the bottom of it, in a friendly way.
Regarding government in general, I would say that economists can assert that government (due to its involuntary nature) yields a net loss compared to the alternative. Libertarians, it seems to me, don't make that case as much as saying unprovoked coercion is illegitimate.
So I'm not sure that arguments for or against IP and government really compare to each other.
Like you, I wonder how we ended up in the situation we're in today, both for IP and for government. Are government and IP a result of beliefs and biases? Maybe the problem is simply the lack of clear theory about government, although I think philosophers and classical economists had figured it out rather well a few centuries ago ;-)
Maybe this calls for a historian's work, to look back at the first IP laws, and their subsequent escalation. My concern is that the history of the laws won't tell us much, because laws seem rather de-coupled from what people really want (call me jaded ;-). It's easy to say yes to a law, when the costs are very indirect and you don't have to make any direct trade-off yourself.
Dumky, sorry; I'm short for time.
My main approach to Stephan is that in a purely libertarian society, IP protection of some agreed sort remains conceivable.
Dumky:
I'm aware that libertarians try to make principled, ethical arguments against government and IP; I support those efforts. However, given that most people are NOT libertarians, utilitarian/cost-benefit arguments are also needed.
Governments and IP are not simply the result of beliefs and biases; we obviously have them today simply because we had them yesterday, and we had them yesterday because people worked to created them (and to change and make use of them).
I think that a history of IP could tell us something useful, but without the history we know that much IP today is quite abusive.
As now, in the past some knowledge was quite valuable, so pre-IP we saw many informal and formal methods used to limit the scope of people who knew or could acquire or disclose such knowledge.
I refer to David Korten , a Stanford-trained economist, former professor at Harvard Business School,
Such is the tone of a deep, searching piece on the Mises Economic Blog by budding philosopher Geoffrey
The comments regarding on limited liability at Geoffrey Allan Plauche 's post, " Ecofascism
More follow-up regarding on limited liability excerpted from Geoffrey Allan Plauche 's post, "
More follow-up comments regarding on limited liability, excerpted from the comment thread to Geoffrey
"One offers money in exchange for goods or services, the other offers money for the profits he expects to gain from the company's business model."
Actually, shareholders need not have ever given money to the company--they often acquire the shares from a previous shareholder. Now whatchoogonna say?
In fact, while a customer does give money to the company--thus aiding and abetting it, in some sense--a shareholder does NOT. The reason is you can become a shareholder by buying a share from a previous shareholder, without ever giving a dime to the company.
As I have previously noted , renowed Harvard Law professor Lawrence Lessig is also seriously concerned
I just stumbled across a Mises Daily post by Sterling T. Terrell (an "economist and writer living
I wish to make note of a brief comment thread in the blog comments to Stephan Kinsella 's October
Law professor Lawrence Lessig (once Stanford, now Harvard), the internet's most famous lawyer and
So I wondered when I saw William Grigg' s "When Goliath Is the ‘Victim’" post
Lessig does sound libertarian at times. He definitely recognizes deep problems with the government and legal system. But I often find myself disappointed with his conclusions.
He attempts to fix big government, as opposed to shrinking it to avoid the unavoidable corruption.
I'm still hoping he'll see the light, as he otherwise is a great speaker.
Thanks for the comment, Dumky. I share your partial disappointment with Lessig, even as I think he's doing us all a valuable service in exploring aspects of what is wrong with US government.
I think he should be focussing more on federalism and or corporation limited liability status as a way to rein in the statists and increase responsibility.
I left the following comments recently at Thomas L. Lorenzo 's December 15, 2010 Mises Daily post
Lew Rockwell has a curiously perceptive yet blind post out yesterday ( The Unthinking Right , Friday
I just left the following closing comment on Jim Fedako's December 30 Mises Economics Blog post,
Jacques Rueff's "Monetary Sins of the West", found at www.mises.org
All too true.
In the not-unsympathetic hour-long presentation that BBC broadcast on January 31 (after surviving a legal
Jeffrey Tucker 's February 9 Mises Daily post, Obama on Auto-Defrosting Refrigerators , is perfectly
Wow -- The American Conservative is now running a sympathetic overview by Sheldon Richman on the "
Here's another post of the quoted title by Joel Hirschhorn that I thought worthy of your attenton
LOL! This reminds me of some guy telling me that there's a Libertarian-Socialism. I was laughing so hard that I couldn't explain the inherent difficulties of having such a thing.
"The law creates and protects that bundle of rights called property or the corporation, and this same law can rearrange that bundle of rights if it is in the public interest." - Ralph Nader
I think I'd just as likely ally with Adolf Hitler, thank you very much.
Stephan Kinsella has another post up at the Mises Daily on " Rethinking IP "; while I share
I can understand the desire to protect one's business from new government carbon mandates and from
Further to my previous post ( Rethinking "Rethinking IP", or, if we step away from statism
Readers may recall my ongoing criticisms of Lew Rockwell , Stephan Kinsella and many others over their
The TSA Poses no threat, hahaha. And by the way, never mind the man behind the curtain.
I really liked Charles Koch 's March 1 editorial in the Wall Street Journal . But why won't he
Hey Tom, If you get a chance, please check out this blog post I wrote about Jonathan Adler's paper on climate change.
www.skepticalscience.com/Libertarian-Climate-Conundrum.html
Thanks.
Thanks so much for your visit to LvMI - just to give me a comment?? - and your cross-link to your interesting post at Skeptical Science.
I've taken a quick look; my chief comment would be that you and the 'libertarians' you discuss have all missed that the status quo favors massive corporations whose very status is suspect from a libertarian standpoint: they are creatures of government that could not exist without govt in their present form, and that embody moral hazard via the govt grant of limited liability to shareholders.
Cato and other vocal 'libertarian' organizations are in fact corporate fronts and won't bite the hand that feeds them, and thus avoid delving too deeply when they defend a 'free market' that is predominated by organizations that are not controlled by shareholders or communities and that are dedicated to extracting gains irregardless of costs that others may be forced to bear.
I also think a significant problem is groupthink - all around - as I've discussed w John Quiggin.
Here are a few places you can look to get a better handle on my thinking
mises.org/.../the-cliff-notes-version-of-my-stilted-enviro-fascist-view-of-corporations-and-government.aspx
mises.org/.../judith-curry-climate-scientist-who-is-controversial-because-she-talks-with-39-skeptics-39-wonders-about-quot-libeterianism-and-the-environment-quot.aspx (look for my comments)
mises.org/.../search.aspx (Rob Bradley's 'Master Resource'))
Yes, I'm Worried in Tokyo, as I keep running across tweets like this: Should Residents Of Tokyo Be
I alerted readers in January to a blog post on libertarianism and the environment by Dr. Judith Curry
Bob Murphy linked to this earlier, but for those of you who missed it or want to flip it to others: From
Why the Hell should I care about 'genetic fitness'? The human species is not an end in itself. The only end in itself is me, what I want. Everything else is entirely subsidiary to that.
Thanks for indulging the rambling title, dear readers. My thoughts wander even as try to gather them
Of course, the lack of managerial liability here has nothing whatsoever to do with "limited liability" in corporate law--which insulates shareholders, not managers, from liability for torts of employees of the corporation.
Stephan, I'm pleased you visit.
Happy NOT to hear you say that you think TEPCO and its shareholders are the biggest victims!
I understand the distinction and think I've got it pretty clear already. However, you can betcha that if shareholders bore some downside risk - say if shares were not fully paid up, or if the firms were partnerships - you could be damned sure that shareholders would make sure that managers had some liability for their mistakes (such as a salary or bonus escrow/clawback).
The multiple layers of shielding from risk make it easier for practically everyone to avoid incurring costs relating to downside risks that others will bear, it difficult to determine responsibility and making poor decisions even more likely.
(Note; tongue firmly in cheek: see my straight post earlier .) Well, maybe they weren't WISE to build
"I understand the distinction and think I've got it pretty clear already."
But are you sure? Opponents of limited liability routinely conflate limited liability with managerial liability issues.
"However, you can betcha that if shareholders bore some downside risk - say if shares were not fully paid up, or if the firms were partnerships - you could be damned sure that shareholders would make sure that managers had some liability for their mistakes (such as a salary or bonus escrow/clawback)."
I can betcha? I can be damned sure? Dunno seems a little armchair to me.
BTW what if, absent modern corporate law, TEPCO had been organized as a limited liability partnership? Would the limited partners be "fully liable" so as to give them an incentive to make sure managers are "liable for their mistakes"? I.e., would you abrogate limited liability partnerships too?
"their founding shareholders took advantage of Japanese limited liaiblity incorporation laws that free shareholders from any concern about personal liaiblity (and, as TEPCO's shares are "fully paid-up", from any future cash calls by management) that would otherwise exist for private enterprises;"
The problem, as ever, is the state; if I recall you do not oppose the state. If you are right about these limited liability laws' effects (there is no proof you are), it is the state's fault.
Why do we have these type of reactors instead of say thorium? for nuclear weapons purposes, perhaps?
"the Japanese government allowed them to qualify as a 'public company' and thus widely raise capital from the public, under regulations that isolate managers from shareholders and create barriers to entry);"
"allowed"? Wow, if you have the right not to allow, you might as well as well set conditions that are "reasonable," right?
"the Japanese government licensed TEPCO as a public utility, effectively granting it a monopoly in the greater Tokyo area,"
More state fault.
"the Japanese government ensured that TEPCO could raise the long-term capital necessary to fund the nuclear power plants,"
More restuls of statism. Do you yet oppose the state? If not, this is what you get.
"by authorizing to set rates guaranteeing TEPCO's returns on its investments by government,
by licensing the power plants themselves and approving their location, suppliers and safety, and
by giving TEPCO express liability caps for damages that radiation releases may cause others if an "act of nature" occurs?"
Do you oppose the state or support it?
"And surely none of the concatenation of these acts of government, the construction of the plants and the earthquake or tsunami is the PERSONAL responsibility of any of TEPCO's emploees, managers or executives, right? "
No libertarain argues this; in fact limited liability has do do with shareholders NOT employees, managers, executives (or directors).
"Boy, aren't Austrian insights wonderful?"
Austrians do not argue this. Your understanding of Austrianism seems to be as good as your understanding of the state. IF the state gives us such terrible rules and results, why not oppose the state--as we good Austro-anarchists do? Join us.
Wait, but aren't you opposed to principle opposition to IP law?
Stephan, don't be a meat-head. I'm fully in favor of both 'principled' and non-principled opposition to STATE IP.
It's just that I can't resist standing up to your continued suggestions that your 'principles' would rule out PRIVATE IP. Without a state, people would still value, invest in and protect information, and would apply our traditional apnoply of moral suasion and sanction in doing so.
Yours,
PS: It's late and I'm preoccupied. I'll circle 'round later to your unwillingness to join me in trying to put a halt to excesses of those government-licensed machines that are destroying Hayek's "market morals" - and using IP to rip us off.
Stephan, it was just a comment on a blog, not a treatise by me. Feel free to go run over there and provide even more clarity it you wish.
The second quote is based on my understanding of the science of human action. But maybe you've never noticed that people pay alot more attention to risk when they feel there's a good chance that some of it may be pinned on them?
Seems to me that is is PRECISELY to avoid risk that investors use laws to form limited-liability entities, one reason why firms incorporate subs, and why most US nuclear power plants have separate ownership vehicles.
Stephan, do you really not understand that I have no problem with partners reaching different agreements among themselves as to who bears liability for what? Such agreements are not binding on third parties. My problem is with persons - especially persons initiating activities that pose risks to others - USING THE STATE to achieve what they could not by contract.
"it is the state's fault."
Unenlightening. PEOPLE act and choose to act, not "the state" and not legal fictions like "corporations". While the state holds guns to peoples heads, in the case of corporations it merely skews incentives, which is PRECISELY my point.
"No libertarain argues this"
"Austrians do not argue this."
Stephan, I'm not quite sure how you missed my sarcasm. Certainly the positions I criticize are NOT based on Autsrian principles, but then again there is the little problem of human inconsistency, embodied by your good self and by Lew, who have skated very close to what I have exaggerated for the very purpose of having you recognize your own sympathy for the Devil.
BTW, I'm a card-carrying member! Really.
And while I really, realy DO appreciate your engagement and invitation to join you, I hope you will also consider my invitation for you to join me in figuring out ways to deal with the host of problems that spring from state-corporatism (not simply the corporate abuse of IP).
I wanted to post a few additional and somewhat scattered thoughts I have had relating to the 1986 essay
A buddy forwarded to me a link to a flash movie he'd received via a chain of forwarded emails headed
Last night I was Sleepless in Tokyo because Matt Ridley and one of his commenters rewarded with nice
I post here some of my further dialogue on the comment thread to Matt Ridley 's " Nuclear crony
Here is another piece of my dialogue on the comment thread to Matt Ridley 's " Nuclear crony
I'm a fan of Jerry Taylor, an even-handed, level-headed guy working out of the Cato Institute who
A little birdy Tweet by the Ayn Rand Center for Corporate Individual Rights told me that the ARCs Voices
I ran across an interesting WSJ piece today that I Tweeted as follows : #Nuclear =EXPERIMENT: Tepco Let
No doubt a locally cold winter helped many readers put behind them thoughts about last year's worldwide
I discussed Callahan and Richman at some length previously . Since I hope they are right, I bring you
Hello Tom-
I stop by your blog on occasion and I really enjoy it. We share similar concerns, and in context of being new to the Mises community I find it refreshing to see a free-market approach to problems that are largely ignored or disregarded by many at Mises. This latter tendency is understandable (though not necessarily well reasoned IMO) given the statism of the major strain of environmentalists out there. Again, your approach is interesting.
Anyway, regarding this post:
While I don't agree with what I know the Koch's to be up to politically, I also don't care for the crying game the media and "educational" institutions are playing. When we look at actual numbers in all time donations to political parties Koch's are at #87, that is, after making one's way through stampedes of blue donkeys, a few other elephant families, and encountering some fences, we finally arrive at the Koch's.
www.opensecrets.org/.../list.php
What irritates me is that the top donors on this list are using coercively confiscated money to fund party alliances making them the largest cases of conflicting interests in regard to political donations, and there is not a peep about this fact in our "free press."
Thank you for your time.
-Allen
My reading on the kerfluffle about the Koch brothers' funding of free market economics programs at
Ran across a fun little 2-minute YouTube clip that is apparently going to run shortly on the ABC's
I am prompted by recent events to follow up on thoughts I emailed to Sheldon Richman a few months back
Very well put. Yes moral hazard was institutional introduces by government. You can see it especially well in the area of nuclear power. But that's not all, there are "caps" on every liability and after that?
Friedrich, thanks for the comments.
Yes, I have a number of posts on the moral hazard problems created in the nuclear power sector - and also banking, oil and gas, etc.
I tried to leave a few thoughts with Jefrey Tucker in response to his June 2 post, Scrupulosity and the
"Those state-created entities that institutionalize moral hazard via an absentee shareholder class that was ab initio absolved of residual responsibility for the acts of the the legal fiction they own, and whose CEOs and executives operate without responsibility to any owners?"
Tom you and I at least know the evil comes from "government" and their "help". Grant at the expense of anyone else. Yes that's big coprorations and "big" government. They are the tombstones of honesty. They are the defrauders and in fact the get legitmated by vote. And so we have them the deledefs.
Friedrich, thanks for your comments.
Have you seen my suggestions here on reforms?
Immodest thoughts: To fix capitalism, we must get govt out of corp risk-mgt+get SHrs to start paying attn to risks http://bit.ly/kNAWFT
In addition to the comment that I blogged the other day regarding Jeffrey Tucker's June 2 post, Scrupulosity
I copy below some more of my dialogue with Stephan Kinsella and others, regarding on Jeffrey Tucker 's
The problem is management and bureaucrats try everything to not beeing held responsible. And the are quite successfull to eliminate any kind of supervision of the owners. The people supposed to supervise are managers themselves elsewhere. So how could one expect supervision, and share holders have not chance of it because many of them to not supervise but ask there bank to "vote" for them.
So IMHO it's unfair to get to the share holders first. At first one had to get managers having to see the results of their doing in their own purse.
This has not happened anywhere in the failout- period of the last 2 - 3 years.....
FD, thanks for your comment, but my point is more subtle.
Just like deposit insurance means depositors don't pay attention to whether or not bankers engage in risky activities, so too does limited liability mean that shareholders are not investing in managing risk.
Shareholders should be overseeing companies or banks, not governments, but that's precisely the situation we find ourselves in.
Could government's efforts to "protect" us have anything to do with poor management and decisions that benefit executives and traders, but harm shareholders, depositors and third parties?
Daniel P. Aldrich is an up-and-coming political scientist who got interested in disaster recovery when
Well there is but one problem with limited liability. The stock holders have nearly no way of "influencing" the managers. And the managers do everything they can to be among themselves, with as less liability than possible. And so it goes. The stock holder does not have influence the managers gets grossly overpaid and if things turn bad they are a off an away for another round of stealing.
Because property rights are restricted more and more, people just "put" their money somewhere hoping to find the "less" worse company.
But otherwise I just think you're right.
FD, the "agent - principal" problem you describe is very real, but not a primary consequence of limited liability. It is a rather attenuated result, to be sure, but one more clearly seen as a consequence of the "public company" regulations that in effect free management from shareholder supervision.
While in public cos shareholders typically have no real voice, that is certainly not the case for private (non-listed, closely-held) companies.
Of course the rise of public, government-regulated capital markets is itself a product of the creation of limited liability corporations.
Simply not true. But well this days lies are truths and truths are lies.
I'm absolutely with here as posted here. Yes it's the worst of anything we can currently see in politics. And it's due to using government for granting advantages to those "liked"
This is a nice one.
[This is an edited re-post .] Libertarians have not quite focussed on how the state grant of limited
Allow me to shill for Gonzalo Lira , a Chilean-American novelist, filmmaker, founder of the Strategic
Robert A.G. Monks is another well-known Republican now railing at runaway crony capitalism and its related
This is a precis of my preceding post . As I noted, veteran shareholder activist Robert A.G. Monks has
I ran across the following post by Jason Brennan a few weeks ago; no doubt quite a few of you will like
Man great piece
I find the contrast between those who profess to love freeom and reason and their own distemper while they call everyone else an irrational man-hater is both startling and dismaying. <a title="Yaneto" href="www.yaneto.com/.../a>
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