I'm Back

At least for a little while. Sorry about the long hiatus (if anyone's still reading this); the school semester got really busy, and I didn't have time to keep this thing updated. I'll try to do better this coming semester, but I can't make any prmoises; if I get overwhelmed with my work, there's not much I can do. But there'll be a few articles I'll post before break ends, if nothing else.

Death of Reductio, Free Trade Edition

The idea of reductio creep has been pretty well established in libertarian circles. The idea is that a stupid policy will be suggested to demonstrate the absurdity of some seriously advanced plan; everyone will explain to the arguer that there's no way anything that absurd will happen. A few years later, the idea originally presented as a reductio ad absurdum will be honestly suggested as a good idea. It happened with the anti-fat lawsuits and taxes; it happened with smoking bans.

Now consider a common pro-free-trade argument: "If it would be a good idea for Americans to stop importing goods from Mexico, why shouldn't New York stop importing good from New Jersey?" The usual answer is to try to explain why the two suggestions are totally different, or duck the question altogether. But reductio is dead, and while walking through the mall last week I saw this sign outside a video game store:



I want to cry.

Laughter is the Best Antiauthoritarianism

Julian Sanchez posts on Shake Hands with the Devil: The Failure of Humanity in Rwanda, a book on the Rwandan genocide. He then asks if postmodernism and ironism might provide an important check on tyrrany:

Laughter is, after all, a powerful antiauthoritarian check: Egalitarian bands of foragers and hunters frequently used ridicule as a means of keeping (temporary) leaders within their proper bounds. And as Jonathan Glover notes in his fantastic book Humanity: A Moral History of the Twentieth Century, authoritarianism seems to take hold more easily in places that lack a strong tradition of political satire. You sometimes run into this odd frame that classes pomos and jihadis and Nazis together under the rubric of "nihilism." But with apologies to Walter Sobchak: Say what you will about the tenets of nihilism, at least it's not an ethos—which Salafism and fascism certainly are.

This passage reminds me of two separate ideas—and since this is my blog, I'm not going to worry about the fact that they're almost totally unrelated and I'll put them in the same post. First is P.J. O'Rourke's point that seriousness can be a weapon:

Self-loathing is oneo f those odd, illogical leaps of human intuition that is almost always correct. "Serious" people are dense and know it. But, they think, if they can be grave enough about Yugoslavia their gravity will make up for the factthat—like most people—they don't know what's going on there and—like all people—they don't know what ot do about it. Seriousness is stupidity sent to college...

Seriousness lends force to bad arguments. If a person is earnest enough about what he says, he must have some point. There's a movement in some of our school systems to give creationists equal time in science class. Man was plopped down on earth the week before last, is one rib short on the left, and becuase silly people are serious about this so are we.

If people are being intensely serious, we can feel bad about not taking them seriously, making fun of them, joking about them. "It's easy to mock him, but what have you done about the poor, disenfranchised baby seals in the Amazon Rain Forest being burned by Global Warming?" Nothing, because that's stupid. But it can be hard to say that in public.

And yet mockery can be the most useful and effective way to deal with all sorts of stupidity. Lots of people do and say stupid things, and either don't realize it or don't want to realize it. If you can force them to admit just how silly they're being, 90% of the time you've already won.

The second disjointed thought is on Objectivism. Objectivists are notorious for not having much in the way of a sense of humor; I suspect they feel it undermines both the typical objectivist's sense of superiority over the faith-having altruistic parasite, and the leadership's control over the movement. I wrote in the comments of a post below that Objectivism is like a religion that dumped the idea of God, but kept all of the potentially harmful institutional stupidities. As such you have this cultish sense of superiority to outsiders, and reverence for the cult leadership; this is exactly what Julian said laughter is dangerous to (I should interject here that this isn't per se a critique of the underlying philosophy, some of which is quite good and some of which is complete crap. It's just a complaint that the cultishness of the movement has sabotaged its ability to do good by making it stupid. As far as I can tell, the objectivists who have a sense of humor are also the ones who aren't likely to buy into the whole cult-thing).

Essay on Innocence

by Robin Hanson (thanks to Tyler Cowen at Marginal Revolution).

Plus ca Change...

There are the several bad Effects of Whoring; and it is an unhappy Thing, that a practice so univeral as this is, and always will be, should be attended with such mischievous Consequences: But since few or none of them are the necessary Effects of Whoring, considered in itself, but only proceed from the Abuse and ill Management of it; our Business is certainly to regulate this Affair in such sort as may best prevent these Mischeifs. And I must here beg pardon of those worthy Gentlemen of the Society, if I can't conceive how the Discouragement they have given, or rather attempted to give, to public Whoring, could possibly have the desired Effect. If this was a Vice acquired by Habit or Custom, or depended upon Education, as most other Vices, there might be some Hopes of supressing it; and then it would no doubt, be commendable to attack it, without Distinction, in whatever Form or Disguise it should appear: But alas! this violent Love for Women is born and bred with us; nay, it is absolutely necessary to our being born at all: And however some People may pretend, that unlawful Enjoyment is contrary to the Law of Nature; this is certain, that Nature never fails to furnish us largely with this Passion, though she is often sparing to bestow upon us such a Portion of Reason and Reflection as is necessary to curb it.

This from "A Modest Defence of Public Stews: or, an Essay upon Whoring as it is now practiced in these Kingdoms . . . Written by a Layman," an essay by Bernard Mandeville. Mandeville argues that we can't get rid of fornication, or prostitution, so we should try to control them and their negative effects; legalize and license some prostitutes so guys go there, rather than having streetwalkers and pimps.

This essay was written in 1724. It could have been written today. plus c’est la meme chose.

Nozick, As Usual, Was Right

Brad DeLong argues in favor of redistribution to assuage envy: Bill Gates's wealth makes everyone else unhappy because it makes them feel poor, so we can make most people much happier by taking wealth away from the rich. Greg Mankiw articulates the argument in more formal economic terms, and expresses distaste. Tyler Cowen responds, as does Jane Galt.

The core of DeLong's argument is that we can equalize status, so low-status people don't feel unhappy. I see three problems with this. First, unless everyone has the exact same income, there will still be status, and richer and poorer people. The people at the bottom of the income distribution will still be at the bottom, even if the distribution itself narrows. If the source of envy is relative positions, merely narrowing the ramge of wealth isn't helpful.

The second problem is that equality of income doesn't translate to equality of compensation or of position. P.J. O'Rourke once commented that even in hyper-egalitarian Sweden, "someone alwasy turns out on top":

All salaries in Sweden may come out, after taxes, somewhat the same. But who gets the room with the view? Who flies off to European Union cheese-food milk-fat-content subcommittee negotiating sessions on the sunny isles of Greece? And opera tickets are heavily underwritten by the Sweedish government. What a relief to the working stiff. "Bundle up the kids, Helga, we're all going to see Claude Debussy's Pelleas et Melisande! [Your author here would like to interject that regulations on performances of Debussy surely appear in the Geneva conventions somewhere.]

I had dinner that night in another expensive restaurant, and in the men's room, there was a rack of reading material, all of it annual reports. I don't think anyone had evr been in there who wasn't—like me—on an expense account, except, of course, for the fellow, probably an immigrant, who cleans the toilet.

If companies can't compensate their executives and top workers with cash, they'll find some other way to compensate them. It's possible that DeLong would find this preferable, if it causes the average person to notice and therefore envy less. But the deadweight loss and lack of transparency concern me.

But the third and best problem with the politics of envy comes from Robert Nozick's Anarchy, State and Utopia. Sadly, I don't know where my copy is at the moment so I can't give a direct quote. But Nozick points out that there's an infinity of ways I can compare myself to other people. "I'm not as athletic or rich as Michael Jordan," I can say, "but I'm smarter, so he should envy me." Because we can compare ourselves in so many ways, no one has to come out on the bottom of the status distribution; people decide which dimensions they value how much, and tend to value what they're good at more (or perhaps tend to be better at what they value). These different weightings allow two people to look at each other and each say, "I'm better off than he is."

If we follow DeLong's policies, we start eliminating ways for people to compare themselves. The end result is that people are more likely to feel inferior and worthless, because it's less likely that there's a weighting that advantages them relative to everyone else (since there are fewer dimensions of comparison, there are fewer degrees of freedom in constructing a weighting system). So paradoxically, making people more equal, even if successful, actually exacerbates perceived inferiority and increases welfare loss from status comparisons.


Update: Jane Galt is really smart. I think she hit everything I said here, and writes better to boot. Someone should make her stop blogging so we inferior bloggers don't feel so bad.

Feral Genii

And while I'm linking to blogs that I strongly advocate reading, let me plug Jennifer's Ravings of a Feral Genius. A very interesting and entertaining writer, with a lot of good things to say.

Why I Am Not an Environmentalist

D.A. Ridgely at Inactivist posted on his town's recycling regulations, and points to an excellent piece on the problems with environmentalism as a religious movement (as opposed to the environmental movement as an attempt to promote greater recognition of certain externalities generated by certain activities, a movement that now is largely triumphant).

Read the piece. And read Ridgely and the others at Inactivist, which is a wonderful blog with many other interesting writers.

Yes, Religion Does Have a Purpose

Amy Alkon, a militant atheist, writes of a woman who complained about college Christian groups that threw pizza socials. "Of course they threw pizza socials," I want to say. "College students like pizza socials. That's half the point of a group like that. It's an excuse to have pizza socials."

I'm not a religious person. But I'm often frustrated by atheism's most public figures; religion has done a great deal of good, and they don't like to admit it. Amy Alkon is usually such a person, and even though I typically agree with her I find her a bit shrill whenever the subject comes up. But today she gets it right. Religion is as common as it is not because the Pope is a nefarious hypnotist with a supernatural ability to compel us to submit to his beliefs, but because religion serves a number of real purposes in most people's lives.

The most obvious benefit is psychological; belief in god gives an order to the universe that makes a lot of people feel more secure about their lives. I don't need religion to balance me; I trust that everything will turn out well, and try to make it so, but don't need god to keep me from freaking out. But if your church helps you get through the day, put in that extra bit of effort, or just generally makes your life happier and better, more power to you.

But a lot of atheists miss the wholly practical advantages of belonging to a church: a social network. Church socials give you a place to hang out and meet people in your area (and things to do with them)—something that lots of twentysomethings, especially in the cities, say is becoming harder and harder to find. Without her church my grandmother would spend her days sitting at home watching the shopping network on TV; instead she has a circle of friends, places to go, and things to do so she doesn't get terminally bored. Church is an opportunity for business networking as well, putting parishioners in contact with all sorts of people from the community whom they might want to talk to. It's a convenient structure to organize large-scale charitable activities. And it can be a place to turn if you have a run of bad luck and need some help to tide you over.

Churches these days aren't doing as good a job at a lot of these as they used to, largely because we don't let them. The important part of a social network is the 'social' part; as fewer people participate, whether from secularization or other reasons, the networks become less valuable and people have less reason to join in. But we don't yet have a good replacement. In the long run I suspect the internet will provide; as the social networking sites figure out how to create interfaces that actually allow their users to network socially, they will replicate many of the benefits that churches used to provide in abundance.

But many atheist spokespeople remind me of G K Chesterton's comment on overambitious reformers:

In the matter of reforming things, as distinct from deforming them, there is one plain and simple principle; a principle which will probably be called a paradox. There exists in such a case a certain institution or law; let us say, for the sake of simplicity, a fence or gate erected across a road. The more modern type of reformer goes gaily up to it and says, "I don't see the use of this; let us clear it away." To which the more intelligent type of reformer will do well to answer: "If you don't see the use of it, I certainly won't let you clear it away. Go away and think. Then, when you can come back and tell me that you do see the use of it, I may allow you to destroy it."

This paradox rests on the most elementary common sense. The gate or fence did not grow there. It was not set up by somnambulists who built it in their sleep. It is highly improbable that it was put there by escaped lunatics who were for some reason loose in the street. Some person had some reason for thinking it would be a good thing for somebody. And until we know what the reason was, we really cannot judge whether the reason was reasonable. It is extremely probable that we have overlooked some whole aspect of the question, if something set up by human beings like ourselves seems to be entirely meaningless and mysterious. There are reformers who get over this difficulty by assuming that all their fathers were fools; but if that be so, we can only say that folly appears to be a hereditary disease. But the truth is that nobody has any business to destroy a social institution until he has really seen it as an historical institution. If he knows how it arose, and what purposes it was supposed to serve, he may really be able to say that they were bad purposes, that they have since become bad purposes, or that they are purposes which are no longer served. But if he simply stares at the thing as a senseless monstrosity that has somehow sprung up in his path, it is he and not the traditionalist who is suffering from an illusion.

When someone like Richard Dawkins (a very bright man whom I much admire) calls religion a virus and explains that it serves no purpose and is actively harmful, he alienates the majority of Americans who know that their religion benefits them. The secularist spokemen won't be taken seriously until they can admit that religious organizations benefit their members, and find some other way to provide those benefits.

And that's why I think Amy is basically right when she says we should have Atheist organizations. Not because atheism needs to be a religion, but because people like to have groups that can throw the pizza parties. Form a club for atheists to hang out, chat, meet members of the opposite sex, and go on camping trips, and a lot of them will love to join. It's really all about the pizza.

Interesting pro-National Health Care Argument

Don Boudreaux at Cafe Hayek posts a critique of Malcolm Gladwell's New Yorker article on universal health insurance. A good post, but nothing shockingly new. But Tom West in the comments has a nuanced and interesting defense of a Canadian-style system that I'd not heard before:

I think you misunderstand the advantages of a national health-care scheme. If the Canadian model is any indication, you can get about 90% of the health outcomes for close to 50% of the costs.

Two things, however. National health-care works because it *is* rationing. Anybody who thinks they can get the advantages of national health-care (much lower costs) without the downside (somewhat lower health outcomes) is completely fooling themselves.

Frankly, unless Americans are willing to accept this trade-off, (and I don't think they are) it isn't possible to gain the primary benefits from a national health care system...It's easy to be told "there's nothing we can do for Grandpa any more". That doesn't work when next door somebody
is doing something (mostly fruitlessly spending dollars, but there will be *some* successes) for their Grandpa.)

...(A better analogy instead of steel is cars. People are currently buying BMWs, but if the government centralized it, we'd all be riding Toyota Corolla's. A *lot* cheaper, but not quite the same thing.)

I believe I've run across parts of this before, but Tom is the first person who's laid it out this clearly. National health care saves money because it forbids expensive, low-benefit treatments. It gives you a way to feel you've done everything possible without actually spending money on all the things that are possible. If no one can get these treatments—say, because private healthcare is outlawed—you can't feel bad about not spending barrels of money to extend Grandma's life another six months. Thus the scheme is dependant on outright forbidding many treatments, and insuring that there's no superior private option availalble. (Tom notes that the US provides a last-resort outlet, which lets off some pressure but isn't terribly visible and so doesn't bother most Canadians.)

Tom is right that this will save a lot of money (though moving to a Canadian system in America removes Canada's outlet, and ensures that we don't have one either). But this plan also means that you aren't allowed to get healthcare that could save your life. I find this thoroughly repugnant. That's a moral argument, not an economic one, and I can't prove its objective truth. But I can't buy into Tom's scheme; and I doubt that most Americans, were the plan presented to them clearly, would either.