TT's Lost in Tokyo — by TokyoTom

[Update: Bob Murphy sends in an email comment, copied (in relevant part) at the bottom of this post.]

I`ve addressed here on five different threads the question of whether there is an “objective moral order”, which Gene Callahan broached in a May blog post. I`ve commented here mainly because I find the subject interesting, but the subsequent discussions at Gene Callahan`s blog and at Bob Murphy`s blog to be rather unproductive, if not frustrating and disappointing.  However, I note that Bob Murphy, bless his soul, has kindly emailed me a comment for me to post on one of my recent threads, in which Bob refers to a recent relevant comment elsewhere by Gene.

Allow me to repost here Bob Murphy`s comment, and my response, but first here`s some context from the post that Bob Murphy is responding to:

1. Me:

While I certainly agree that man has an exquisite moral sense, my
own view is that that sense and capacity are something that we acquired
via the process of evolution, as an aid to intra-group cooperation,

– as Bruce Yandle has suggested,

– as argued by Roy Rappaport (former head of the American
Anthropology Assn.) in his book “Ritual and Religion in the Making of Humanity” (which I have discussed here) and – as I have recently discovered –

– as David Sloan Wilson has argued in his book “Darwin`s Cathedral: Evolution, Religion, and the Nature of Society“.

I note that the NYT has recently run a series of posts on related topics. 

In my view, our moral sense, rituals and “sacred postulates” (later, religions) have played a central role in the evolution of man as a
social animal, by
providing a fundamental way of ordering the world, the group`s role in
it, and the individual`s role in the group – thereby abating commons
problems both within and created by the group. The religious
lies at the root of our human nature, even as its inviolable, sacred
truths continue to fall by the wayside during the long march of
culture and science out of the Garden of Eden. While we certainly have
made progress (partly with the aid of “universal” religions) in
expanding the boundaries of our groups, we very much remain group,
tribal animals, fiercely attentive to rival groups and who is within or
outside our group, and this tribal nature is clearly at work in our
cognition (our penchant for finding enemies, including those who have
different religious beliefs that ours).

But I didn`t really kick off this discussion – why are Callahan and
Murphy so reticent to describe what it is they think they mean when
they assert that there are “objective moral truths” and an “objective
moral order”?  (I can understand why I seem to have earned the clear
hostility of one them; after all I have proven by my persistence and/or
thickheadedness to be, if not an “enemy”, then in any case not one of
the august clear-sighted.)

Here are a few questions I left with them at Bob`s most recent post:

–
Are those who believe that there is an objective “moral” order
asserting that, for every being – regardless of species – that there is
a uniform, objective moral order in the universe? Or is the argument
that there is an object moral order only for conscious and self-aware
beings, and none for organisms that are not conscious, or are conscious
but not self-aware?

– Or is the argument that the “objective”
moral order exists only for humans, and perhaps someday can be
identified and located in universally shared mental processes, based on
brain activity and arising from shared genes?  Will such objective moral order still exist if all mankind ceases to exist?

– Or is the
objective moral order one that exists for some humans, but not all –
depending on physical development of the brain as we mature (with the
development of some being impaired via genetic or other defect)?

– Is the human “objective” moral order universal, for all individuals – of whatever, gender or age – across all history?

– Is an objective moral order something real that can be tested for
despite the inability of a particular observer to perceive directly –
like beings that can`t directly perceive light (or like us who can`t
personally physically observe much of what technology allows us to)?

– And
if the objective moral order is a part of the universe, can we apply
the scientific method to confirm its existence of and explore its
parameters, and to explain (and test) it with “laws”?

– What are some of the parameters and laws governing the moral order?

2.  Bob Murphy`s comments: (emphasis added)

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

[Here is Gene`s relevant comment:

“Something that is correct only ‘to’ someone is subjectively, not
objectively, correct. What ‘objective’ means is precisely ‘to any and
all possible perceivers.’ And, of course, it is simply a further muddle
to introduce beings incapable of perceiving the objective item in
question, as if that raised doubts about its objective status. ‘Would
this be objectively correct for ants?’ makes no more sense than ‘Is it
objectively true for ants that Mars has two moons?’ It is objectively
true, not ‘for’ anyone, that Mars has two moons, and it is also
objectively true that ants are a kind of being that cannot peer through
telescopes or count to two. It is objectively true that murder is
wrong, and if ants were the sort of being capable of murder, which they are not (as far as we know!), it would be wrong for them to commit murders.”]

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.

3.  My response: (emphasis added)

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 [in item 1 here], 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?

#

re: Evolution, religion and our insistence on a still undefined “objective” moral order

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

If anyone is still reading, let me note that I posted a week or so ago further thoughts on the evolution of moral codes and why we fight over them (rarely applying to those outside our group the same moral standards that we apply to those within our groups).

[Update:] Further email comment from Bob Murphy (posted with approval):

I’m going to have to punt on this debate for now. If you agree that
“Bob should not kill an infant” has a truth value more significant
than “Bob should not wear a dress to work” than I’m happy. I think
maybe when I say “morality is objective” you are interpreting it to
mean something more than what I do mean. After all, you are saying
moral rules apply to all humans, so I don’t know what our difference
is at this point. I thought originally you were saying you were a
moral relativist.

Further to my preceding post, on “Confirmation bias, rent-seeking and the rush to print the latest science “scoop (Linzen-Choi)“, I note that Bob Murphy has kindly  put up a new blog post that notes and responds to my comments to him.

Since it`s late here, interested readers might want to check out Bob`s post, including and the comments that I and others have left.

On a meta-level, yes, I`m aware that on this and similar public policy issues involving science, each group of protagonists seems eager to rush into battle with the latest science that they view as favorable to their cause. My point is NOT that the latest news may not be important, but that we should be careful that we are actually seeking to understand it, instead of blindly looking for confirmation of our pre-existing notions. We should also be careful of the motivations (rent-seeking; self-justification, etc.) of those who are quick to bandy news about. 

Yes, this cuts more than one way; we are all human, after all.

Since I`m in Tokyo and deprived of Bob Murphy`s enviable access, via talk radio, to cutting-edge climate science, I thank him using his blog to bring it to the attention of his audience (which occasionally includes me). Says Bob (emphasis added):

Chip Knappenberger explains
the significance (and remaining holes to be plugged) in the recent
Lindzen-Choi paper that’s got talk radio in such a tizzy. The opening
sentence: “MIT climate scientists Richard Lindzen and collaborator
Yong-Sang Choi soon-to-be published paper (Geophysical Research
Letters, American Geophysical Union) pegs the earth’s “climate
sensitivity”—the degree the earth’s temperature responds to various
forces of change—at a value that is about six times less than the “best
estimate” put forth by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
(IPCC).”

Well, well, if talk radio is covering a new article that purportedly downplays climate risks, then others who have invested time in casting doubt

I`ve blogged previously about my various conversations with Chip Knappenberger, who is employed by the self-described “advocacy” group of Pat Michaels, New Hope Environmental Services.

I went to pay a visit to his post at Rob Bradley`s pro-coal, “free market” MasterResource blog, which I have discussed on any number of occasions here – especially after Mr. Bradley unceremoniously withdrew the welcome mat for libertarian critics (yours truly) while in mid-conversation with (and without notice to) several of his guest bloggers.

I reviewed Chip`s precis of the Lindzen-Choi paper and attempted to leave comments at MasterResource, but they were “disappeared” as soon as they were posted, so I forwarded a copy of my comments by email directly to Chip, which I copy below (with minor edits):

Chip, I couldn`t resist trying to comment on your post at MR, and
checking to see if Rob still has his blog set up to automatically
exclude all of my comments. Unfortunately, he still seems to be
convinced that a principled and libertarian approach (or his clients`
needs) requires maintaining his echo chamber by excluding me.

To check the sophistication of his method, I have for the first time
just tried commenting anonymously (I have until stayed away and simply
hoped Rob would change his mind), and to my surprise the comment went
through – though it is “awaiting moderation”. [update: this post has now received immoderate , “echo chamber” moderation]

I thought I would give you a head`s up on my pending comment, which I
do not expect to see published – but who knows?  Strange things
sometimes happen, such as Rob quoting with approval a link to a
comment that I have made:
http://mises.org/Community/blogs/tokyotom/archive/2009/08/26/fun-with-partisanship-and-self-deception-the-climate-follies-and-rob-bradley.aspx.

My comment is below; I will wait until tomorrow before cross-posting
at my own blog.

Sincerely,

Tom

[comment left at MasterResource]
“It is too early to tell whether Lindzen and Choi’s findings will
prove to be the end-all be-all in this debate.”

But it`s not too early for you, for others who act as paid mouthpieces
for fossil fuel and others who wish to avoid policy action, to trumpet
this as yet unpublished paper all over the intertubes, is it Chip?

By the way, continuing studies on the “sensitivity” of temperatures to
GHG increases should not lead us to ignore either the problem of ocean
acidification from our accelerating CO2 build-up or the very exquisite
sensitivity of the Earth`s climate and ecosystems to the 0.6 C average
temp increase that we have experience over the past 50 years
(remaining stuck at a peak for the past 10).  The Arctic and temperate
zone glaciers continue to rapidly thaw, and other changes affecting
ecosystems and human livelihoods are still underway.

I note I have seen very preliminary remarks by James
Annan here, and by

I note that Bob Murphy is no climate expert, but simply posting blindly about something that he thinks cuts in the direct he wants; in a similar vein, Knappenberger also evidently is puffing the importance of a scientific article that is hot off the presses, but can`t be troubled to link to any articles providing additional context. (A recent blog post and comments by Steve McIntyre at Climate Audit also point out the difficulties in reaching conclusions from the new research.)

I also note, as I have previously, that not only Chip but Bob as well – when he has on his “economist for IER” (which is a coal and public utility front group that was de-funded last year by Exxon) hat – are, at least in part, being compensated to undercut climate change policy.

In this context, we all are prone to note evidence that fits into our existing world view, while discounting contrary information, such “confirmation bias” is readily apparent in the internet and radio coverage of this piece.  While climate change and climate policy are certainly hot topics, it doesn`t seem to me that the so-called “skeptics” are at all taking this new study skeptically, but are instead eagerly lapping it up, assume it is good news, are are loudly trumpeting it. Now who`s fooling whom?  Many “skeptics” look just like the “alarmist” “global warming cult” “believers” whom they abhor.

Unfortunately, while it`s impossible to know what Rob and Chip are actually thinking and why, it`s clear that a dangerous mix of self-deception, confirmation bias and rent-seeking permeates the tribal conflicts that we are seeing in current over the use of government, not the least in the case of climate change, which is a difficult scientific and policy issue.

In April, under a regulatory process that the Bush EPA was compelled to commence by a Supreme Court decision (pursuant to the April 2, 2007 decison in Massachusetts v. EPA, 549 U.S. 497 (2007), in which the Supreme Court determined that greenhouse gases are air pollutants covered under Section 202
of the Clean Air Act, which applies to motor vehicles), the EPA issued
a proposed finding that (i) current and projected
atmospheric concentrations of CO₂ and five other greenhouse gases (methane (CH₄), nitrous oxide (N₂O), hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs),
perfluorocarbons (PFCs), and sulfur hexafluoride (SF₆) threaten the public health and welfare of current and
future generations (due to their
contribution to climate change), and that (ii) emissions
of such gases from motor vehicles contribute to atmospheric concentrations of
key greenhouse gases and thus to the threat of climate change.

The EPA commenced a 60-day public comment period that ended on June 23, but which it has subsequently determined to keep open while it develops its final findings. If the findings are issued, they will compel the EPA to
develop regulatory standards for new motor vehicles under Section 202
of the CAA, and probably as well to develop regulatory standards for utilities, industry and other parts of the economy under other parts of the CAA, which have essentially identical endangerment finding triggers (but which were not the subject of the Supreme Court decision).

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce has now stirred up a bit of a kerfluffle about the EPA`s looming final  “endangerment” decision, by requesting the EPA to adopt an unusual, time-consuming trial-like procedure in reaching its decision. What`s really going here?

While no doubt the Bush Administration would have been delighted to consider such a device of postponing any endangerment decision, the Obama Administration`s lack of interest in further delay (having already extended the hearing process by several months) has earned for them from some conservative corners (Chris Horner of the NRO`s “Planet Gore”) the judgment that it is the Obama administration that is being “cowardly“.  Surely there are excellent arguments to be made that the Clean Air Act should not be used to regulate U.S. industry on climate matters, but it is Congress that passes laws and the President who signs them  into law, not the administrative agencies. The Bush administration and Republican Congress could have forestalled the present situation by amending the CAA to exclude CO2; their lack of interest in doing so has forced this matter into the hands of the Obama EPA.

On the other hand, the Obama administration`s hands have been tied by the Bush administration`s inaction, though it is not doubt happy to use the dangling endangerment finding as a Damoclean sword to get Congress moving on climate change legislation (and perhaps as a backup in case Congress cannot be persuaded). However, as the EPA has considerable discretion in determining when to issue its final determination, it can withhold the endangerment finding until it decides: it is really serious about passing climate change legislation, is ready to put significant pressure on Congress to get it, thinks it can live with Congress comes up with, and is willing to live with the consequences of “failure”, in which case it will have to move forward on promulagating GHG emissions regulations for new motor vehicles.

It`s useful in looking at this situation to ponder just how much wriggle room the EPA actually has on substantive issue.  The answer?  Very little.  On this, allow me to quote from respected libertarian resource law professor Jonathan Adler (Case Western, and commenter at The Volokh Conspiracy legal blog and at NRO):

1.  In an April 22 post at the NRO`s Corner, Adler answers the question “D[oes] the EPA Have a Choice?” (emphasis added)

“Many folks on the right, including Jonah,
have criticized the EPA’s decision to issue an endangerment finding as
some sort of power grab.  Implicit in this argument is the idea that
the EPA had a meaningful choice whether to conclude that the emission
of greenhouse gases causes or contributes to air pollution that can be
reasonably anticipated to endanger the public health and welfare (the
relevant legal standard under Section 202).  I reject this premise, and
I don’t believe one has to accept apocalyptic climate change scenarios
to reach this conclusion.  For one thing, the standard is somewhat
precautionary — the language empowers the EPA to regulate despite the
existence of uncertainty.  For another, it would be very difficult for
the EPA to justify a contrary conclusion under current law.

“The Supreme Court’s decision in Massachsuetts v. EPA held
that greenhouse gases were air pollutants under the Clean Air Act
subject to EPA regulation.  This means that the only question for the
EPA is whether such GHG emissions meet the standard above.  Whether or
not one believes greenhouse gases pose a serious threat, the EPA does
not get to make this decision on clean slate.  For years the EPA has
been stating that climate change is a serious problem.  Indeed, the
Bush Adminsitration, at the very same time it declined to regulate greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act,
asserted the Agency’s belief that climate change is a serious problem. 
Therefore, for the EPA to not make an endangerment finding, not only
would it have to argue that the relevant evidence does not support the
conclusion that greenhouse gases could be “reasonably anticipated” to
threaten public health and welfare, but also that the EPA’s many prior
pronouncements about the threat of climate change over multiple
adminsitrations [sic] were wrong.  Even though courts are quite deferential
to agency interpretations of scientific evidence, this would be a
difficult case to make.  Courts are more demanding when an agency
reverses course, and the EPA would have an awful lot of contrary claims
to explain away.  Thus, even if the Obama EPA had been disinclined to
make an endangerment finding, I think such a finding could have been
compelled in court.

2.  Adler also commented earlier at The Volokh Conspiracy on the likelihood of the EPA prevailing in the case of any industry legal challenge to an endangerment finding, and the next regulatory steps after the endangerment finding (emphasis added):

The proposed findings will now go through a 60-day public comment
period. Shortly thereafter, the findings will be finalized. Industry
and anti-regulatory groups will almost certainly challenge the findings
in court, and their legal challenges will almost certainly fail. Even
if one doubts the accumulated scientific evidence that anthropogenic
emissions of greenhouse gases contribute to climate change and that
climate change is a serious environmental concern, the standard of
review is such that the EPA will have no difficulty defending its rule.
Federal courts are extremely deferential to agency assessments of the
relevant scientific evidence when reviewing such determinations.
Moreover, under the Clean Air Act, the EPA Administrator need only
“reasonably . . . anticipate” in her own “judgment” that GHG emissions
threaten public health and welfare in order to make the findings, and
there is ample evidence upon which the EPA Administrator could conclude
that climate change is a serious threat. This is a long way of saying
that even if climate skeptics are correct, the EPA has ample legal
authority to make the endangerment findings.

Once the findings are finalized, the EPA will then be required to
develop regulatory standards for new motor vehicles under Section 202
of the Act. As a practical matter, the EPA will also have to prepare to
regulate greenhouse gas emissions under other portions of the act, as
the relevant endangerment findings necessary to trigger such regulation
are effectively identical to that which triggers motor vehicle emission
regulation under Section 202. Even if the EPA sought to resist such
regulation, it would be relatively easy to force the EPA’s hand through
additional citizen suits, much like the suits that set the EPA on this
course in the first place.…

Regulating greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act will not be a
particularly cost-effective way to reduce the nation’s greenhouse gas
emissions. The EPA and White House understand this, but they also
recognize that, under Massachusetts v. EPA, the agency does not
have much choice. Moreover, the threat of Clean Air Act regulations on
greenhouse gases will create significant pressure upon Congress to
replace such regulation with some alternative, such as the
cap-and-trade program.

This is my fourth follow-up post to “Grist and the tragedy of the panicked enviro“, where I try to clarify the institutional frameworks for understanding and addressing resource problems, in response to confusion in comments by others.

Here is my most recent comment:

Cyberfarer, thank you for your response [here], which is well-intentioned, but both perceptive and blind.

First, I see you’ve adopted a page from the climate “skeptics” playbook, by
applying the self-deceptive ad hominem device of labelling those you
disagree with as “true believers” in something.  This is a partisan
tactic that lets you treat others as enemies, and spares you from the
trouble of listening to them, trying to figure out what they’re saying
and responding the them, as opposed to a black and white strawman that you’ve conjured
up.  Congratulations on mirroring those whom you dislike most.

Second, with all of your clear thinking, like Mr. Sacks, you offer us no
practical advice, just reasons for despair.  Lezlie, who follows you,
at least provides an agenda.

Third, of course, you’ve got me all wrong; I’m not an ideologue, a “true believer” or even an apologist of
any kind the status quo; I’m a concerned human being, a fellow
traveller on Planet Earth and a pragmatist. You’ve been misreading me,
and certainly have not troubled yourself to consider the very pragmatic
analytical tools that I’ve offered to help you figure how to diagnose
and attack the problems that you perceive.

And what have I offered? Nothing more or less than the rather obvious observations that
resources that are not owned and managed – whether privately or by
groups (including, obviously, by communities and native peoples) tend
to be trashed, and that similar problems are experienced where
resources are formally “owned” by governments but essentially used by
elites for their own benefit. I have NOT argued that private property
is the cure-all, nor have I condoned theft nor the manipulation of
governments by elites. In fact, I have rather clearly pointed out that
both theft and misuse of government have been and remain very much a
part of the problem.

Fourth, you continue to misunderstand the nature of our problems, and want to lay everything at the foot of
“capitalism” and “markets”, when the real problem is either the lack of
ownership of resources or government fiat/theft.  Western capitalism is
not responsible for extinctions and environmental devastation that
preceded capitalism and markets, or that has taken place under
state-directed economies. This gets old, but look at the prior
extinctions, messes of the former USSR (and at the Aral Sea today),
Hanford and Rocky Flats, Haiti, and China.

Sure, the consumer and industrial supply demands of markets (not merely in the West) continue
to pull chains of destruction elsewhere in the world, but destruction
only occurs with respect to resources that are not owned and protected
(or where theft by those more powerful occurs). Tofu and meat eaters
alike are indirectly responsible for rainforest destruction, mainly
because governments “own” most the rain forests and don’t prefer to
protect native title where it is recognized, so the conversion of such
land into soybeans (or palm oil to feed government-mandated demands for
biofuels) continues.

In any case, is it more effective to wail about the evilness of corporations that compete to provide us ever more
cheaply things that we choose to buy, or to demand better property
rights protection abroad, pay closer attention to where our food comes
from and end domestic mandates that drive destruction? You’re welcome
to your rants against true believers like me, but I’m personally more
disposed towards trying to be practically effective.

Fifth, you are very right to criticize corporations; Mr. Sacks has had a history
of doing that. Not only do I agree with much of his analysis (which he has not provided here), but I’ve devoted a fair amount of time to examining the entanglement of corporations and government:
http://mises.org/Community/blogs/tokyotom/search.aspx?q=limited

Our state governments were wrong to get into competition with each other to
grant corporate status to investor-owned enterprises, in exchange for
fees and later taxes. Corporate status freed investors from down-side
risk, by limiting liability to the amount of capital contributed. This
incentivized: investors to encourage corporations to embark on risky
activities that shifted costs to innocent third parties; the
concentration of wealth in corporations; the corruption of the court
system that once protected third parties from damages caused by others
(by replacing strict liability with balancing tests); and the ensuing
battle – that you noted – over legislatures to regulate corporations
(and courts to enforce regulations). Is there a takeaway on this. other
than continuing to fight political battles to block legislative sweet
deals and theft, including working to revise our corporate order?

Anyway, I wish you well in your tirades.

A recent post on the Mises Daily pages on the “Religious Roots of Liberty” by the late Congregationalist minister Rev. Edmund Optiz (1914-2006) (originally published in The Freeman, February 1955) provides an opportunity to restate and discuss some of the thoughts I’ve been working though on evolution, group dynamics, religion and on the assertions of some that there is an “objective moral order”.

It seems like quite a bit to chew, I know, but I dared (with the modesty and boldness of the inexpert, of course) to venture a few thoughts.

[And since I’m having problems with formatting here, I am linking to the archived version of this post.]

Such authority would purportedly trump all laws to the contrary. Private operators of “critical” computer networks would also have to periodical nform the government of their network infrastructure and make sure their network managers have a new federal license.

More on this obvious nonsense here:

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-10320096-38.html

http://www.opencongress.org/bill/111-s773/show

http://bytestyle.tv/content/cybersecurity-act-2009-s-773-grants-obama-power-shut-down-internet-ignore-laws (with links from April, when this idead first reared its ugly head)

The draft of S.773 is here:

http://www.politechbot.com/docs/rockefeller.revised.cybersecurity.draft.082709.pdf

According to a summary at http://www.obamabeenlying.com/?p=127, the legislation would (I have not confirmed):

• allow the president to “declare a cybersecurity emergency” in
  regards to “non-governmental” networks and do whatever he feels is
  necessary;
• establish a federal certification program for “cybersecurity professionals”
• require that some computer systems and
  networks in the private sector be managed by people who have been
  awarded a federal cybersecurity professional license; and
  
• authorize the government to engage in
  “periodic mapping” of private networks deemed to be “critical”, and those
  companies “shall share” requested information with the federal
  government. “Cyber” is defined as anything having to do with the
  Internet, telecommunications, computers, or computer networks.
  

Say hello to Big Brother.

I`m disposed to wonder (1) How would a Patriot act (thanks, Republicans for helping to pave the way for this!), in the face of such legislation and (2) how it is that anyone would think that the government could do a better job of defending private networks (and information) from cyber attacks than those who build and maintain such networks for their own business purposes, and who have legal obligations to protect their customer`s information?

This is my third follow-up post to “Grist and the tragedy of the panicked enviro“,
where I try to clarify the institutional frameworks for understanding
and addressing resource problems, in response to confusion in comments
by others.

cyberfarer
Posted 9:26 pm
27 Aug 2009

… [addressed to T Worstall]

In fact I do
understand what Hardin was saying. Hardin sets up a hypothetcial
situation and then sets about knocking it down. We call that a strawman
argument.

But you didn’t address my salient point. We live in an
era of the ascendency of private property and yet we have witnessed an
acceleration of the destruction of our natural heritage. Under the
management and control of private interests, we can witness the
remaining rain forests of south east Asia being raised for palm oil
plantations. Under the control and and management of private interests
we can witness boreal forests being decimated. In fact, over the past
fifty years as control and managenment of resources to pass to private
interests, we witness the acceleration of the their destruction.

The reality puts the lie to Hardin’s strawman argument.

The
issue of sustainability is not one of private or public ownership as
The Church and its followers would prefer to frame it. The issue is the
central role of profit above all else in our culture.

The free
market economy generates wealth by converting a living planet to a dead
planet; that is, by converting living ecosystems into commodities for
trade and profit. To the free market and its economists, a forest which
provides erosion control, flood control, climate and water
conditioning, habitat, sustenance, and any number of other services not
only to humans but all other species is only valuable in our free
market system when it has been converted to lumber or pulverized for
paper or some other use. That is the true tragedy of the commons. Not
ownership, but the short-sighted stupidity of people and especially of
those worship wealth without understanding its source.

TokyoTom
Posted 2:29 am
29 Aug 2009

cyberfarer, I`m sorry, but this couldn`t be more wrong in its
understanding of WHY messes happen (and they undeniably do); the result
is that you (and Sacks) have no clue where to start in trying to solve
problems:

The free market economy generates wealth by converting a living planet
to a dead planet; that is, by converting living ecosystems into
commodities for trade and profit.

The
free market system is really simply people trading what they have to
others for what they want, and it works quite well where resources are
owned (either privately or by communities).  It can, however, be a
powerful engine of destruction for resources that are not owned – such
as for resources sourced where property rights are not protected or the
government (elites) “own” too much.  Thus our continued political
struggles over giveaways of public resources, the destruction of the
Amazon/Indonesian forests (and Philippine under Marcos), and the
collapse of fisheries that fishermen – often just guys trying to make a
living – have no rights to actually protect the resource.

To the free market and its
economists, a forest which provides erosion control, flood control,
climate and water conditioning, habitat, sustenance, and any number of
other services not only to humans but all other species is only
valuable in our free market system when it has been converted to lumber
or pulverized for paper or some other use. That is the true tragedy of
the commons.

You
are only right in part, as all of these things have obvious value, and
people protect them privately or band together as groups to manage them
wherever they desire and can (and are not prevented by the government).
There is an awful lot of private and community conservation going on
around the world.  The absolute worst cases are where the resources are
owned by governments, with rights to exploit being leased to companies
that have no property rights and thus no longer-term rights or obligations. 

Not ownership, but the short-sighted stupidity of people
and especially of those worship wealth without understanding its source.

No,
absolutely ownership; people and groups compete for resources, and can
preserve valuable ones only when they can PROTECT them by excluding
others (i.e., owning) them

You, like Sacks, think that the only
way to solve problems is to radically change either capitalism (while
ignoring worse destruction takes place outside of free market regimes)
or human nature.  Sorry, but this is blind and stupid, and ignores the
fact that local traction is available for most problems.

See the case of the Amazon, for example:

http://mises.org/Community/blogs/tokyotom/archive/2009/05/24/capitalism-the-destructive-exploitation-of-the-amazon-and-the-tragedy-of-the-government-owned-commons.aspx

I
highly recommend you start studying (not simply free thinking), which
will make your very legitimate concerns much more effective.  I mean,
even the environmental groups are calling for better property
rights/protection for fisheries, species, forests and water.  Are they
stupid and evil too?

This is the second follow-up to my post “Grist and the tragedy of the panicked enviro“,
where I try to clarify the institutional frameworks for understanding
and addressing resource problems, in response to confusion in comments
by others.

T Worstall
Posted 5:27 pm
27 Aug 2009

TokyoTom makes most of the points I would wish to make. Except for this
one: you clearly do not understand what Hardin was saying about the
tragedy of the commons. For example, he made very clear that there are
two possible solutions to the degradation of an open access resource.
We can have social (socialist) regulations and limitations or we can
have private (capitalist) property solutions. Those are his
descriptions BTW. Which works best depends upon the society and the
resource. He emphatically did NOT say that pricvate property sultions
were the only ones possible. And nor does any economist say that
private property solutions are the only ones either possible or
desirable. Try reading some Ronald Coase on transaction costs to see
why.

TokyoTom
Posted 10:03 pm
27 Aug 2009

Let me add some further nuance to Mr. Worstall`s comment by saying
that Hardin`s fertile observations have fuelled extensive further
research on common property problems, with Elinor Ostrom being recognized as a leading light.

Here is one general bibliography on commons research: http://www.indiana.edu/~workshop/wsl/tragedy.htm

Ostrom
has refined Hardin`s work in the following way (quoting from a review
of Ostrom`s 1990 ground-breaking and extensively researched book, GOVERNING THE COMMONS, The Evolution of Institutions for Collective Action):

Ostrom uses the term “common pool resources” to denote natural
resources used by many individuals in common, such as fisheries,
groundwater basins, and irrigation systems. Such resources have long
been subject to overexploitation and misuse by individuals acting in
their own best interests. Conventional solutions typically involve
either centralized governmental regulation or privatization of the
resource. But, according to Ostrom, there is a third approach to
resolving the problem of the commons: the design of durable cooperative
institutions that are organized and governed by the resource users
themselves.

“The central question in this
study,” she writes, “is how a group of principals who are in an
interdependent situation can organize and govern themselves to obtain
continuing joint benefits when all face temptations to free-ride,
shirk, or otherwise act opportunistically.”

The
heart of this study is an in-depth analysis of several long-standing
and viable common property regimes, including Swiss grazing pastures,
Japanese forests, and irrigation systems in Spain and the Philippines.
Although Ostrom insists that each of these situations must be evaluated
on its own terms, she delineates a set of eight “design principles”
common to each of the cases. These include clearly defined boundaries,
monitors who are either resource users or accountable to them,
graduated sanctions, and mechanisms dominated by the users themselves
to resolve conflicts and to alter the rules. The challenge, she
observes, is to foster contingent self-commitment among the members ….

Throughout the book, she stresses the dangers of overly
generalized theories of collective action, particularly when used
“metaphorically” as the foundation for public policy. The three
dominant models — the tragedy of the commons, the prisoners’s dilemma,
and the logic of collective action — are all inadequate, she says, for
they are based on the free-rider problem where individual, rational,
resource users act against the best interest of the users collectively.
These models are not necessarily wrong, Ostrom states, rather the
conditions under which they hold are very particular. They apply only
when the many, independently acting individuals involved have high
discount rates and little mutual trust, no capacity to communicate or
to enter into binding agreements, and when they do not arrange for
monitoring and enforcing mechanisms to avoid overinvestment and overuse.

Ostrom
concludes that “if this study does nothing more than shatter the
convictions of many policy analysts that the only way to solve common
pool resource problems is for external authorities to impose full
private property rights or centralized regulation, it will have
accomplished one major purpose.”

A
profile of Ostrom, who is a member of the National Academies of Science
and and Editor of its Proceedings, is here:
http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?artid=1748208

Her work can be found here: http://scholar.google.co.jp/scholar?q=Ostrom,+Elinor&hl=en&btnG=Search and

here: http://de.scientificcommons.org/elinor_ostrom

One
thing worth noting is that the historical and ongoing records are rife
with examples – such as our crashing local fisheries – where government
intervention has done more harm than good.  In these cases and in
others, Ostrom introduces an analytical approach that is acceptable
widely across the political spectrum, even if differences in opinion
will remain.  See, for example, this discussion at libertarian-leaning
George Mason U:  http://www.theihs.org/bunnygame/

This is the first of several follow-up posts to my post “Grist and the tragedy of the panicked enviro“, where I try to clarify the institutional frameworks for understanding and addressing resource problems, in response to confusion in comments by others.

cyberfarer
Posted 2:58 am
27 Aug 2009

I’m sorry, but the “tragedy of the commons” is utter B.S. The Western
world has pursued a course of private property and has managed to leave
ecological catastrophe in its wake. The “tragedy of the commons” and
other simplistic market morality fail to understand the essence of that
which it seeks to moderate, the capitalist consumer market premised on
profit and only profit.

The rate of exploitation and the decline
of resources, water, energy, fisheries, soil, minerals, etc., all
occured under a free market, private property paradigm. That is the
facts and the reality. Pretending it isn’t true and wishing for a
morality that doesn’t exist within the free market is juvenile and
counter-productive.

The “tragedy of the commons” represents a
hypothetical situation that does not occur in real life. In real life,
corporations own, or vie to own, resources or access to them for the
purpose of extraction and profit and they seek to maximize profits
through economies of scale, that is industrial extraction methods,
drift netting, blowing up mountains, tossing mining waste into clear,
pristine lakes. The money is in the resource and when the resource is
exhausted they will move on to the next one.

TokyoTom
Posted 1:38 pm
27 Aug 2009

Cyberfarer,

Thanks for your comments on the “tragedy of the
commons”. Though you are way off base, you provide an opportunity for
deeper discussion.

The tragedy of the unmanaged commons paradigm
is BS?  My flip response?  Go tell it to Gavin Schmidt at Real Climate,
who posted a perceptive essay in May on the tragedy of the commons
dynamics that are affecting climate and global climate policy
coordination. 
Did you miss this and the relatively productive discussion thread?

Sure,
the Western
world has managed to create many environmental problems, but we`ve
largely cleaned up our own messes, haven`t we?  While it by no means
excuses our own faults, far worse environmental problems have been
created and are still stewing in Russia and other state-directed
economies, and it`s no coincidence that the vast pollution being
created in China and India are tied to governement-owned enterprise and
an inability of injured people to sue for damages or to stop harmful
activities.  And the great waves of extinctions created as man spread
around the globe tens of thousands of years ago can hardly be laid at
the foot of either the Western world or of private property rights (nor
can the collapse of earlier civilizations).

The
“tragedy of the commons” is NOT a “simplistic market morality”, but a
description of cooperation problems and incentives relating to shared.
open-access resources.  The tragedy of the commons and problems of
cooperation – and theft – are not even limited to mankind, but permeate
nature.  This perceptive article by Bruce Yandle touches on competition
in nature, and links the ascendance of man to our evolution of
relatively enhanced cooperation:
http://www.thefreemanonline.org/featured/the-commons-tragedy-or-triumph/

The
“tragedy of the commons” paradigm is useful to analyze, but the
paradigm doesn`t “seek to moderate” anything, and is just as useful in
looking at the ways Western nations still contribute to environmental
problems around the world (as I point out here:
http://mises.org/Community/blogs/tokyotom/archive/2007/09/28/too-many-or-too-few-people-does-the-market-provide-an-answer.aspx) as it is in examining:

– environmental devastation in Haiti (which has little or no property rights, and vast free-for-all “government” holdings),

–
deforestation in Indonesia and the Amazon:
http://mises.org/Community/blogs/tokyotom/archive/2009/05/24/capitalism-the-destructive-exploitation-of-the-amazon-and-the-tragedy-of-the-government-owned-commons.aspx,

– pollution in China: http://mises.org/Community/blogs/tokyotom/search.aspx?q=china, and

–
crashing fisheries around the world as a result of government of marine
resources (producing free-for-alls and fleet subsidies) and a
free-for-all for other unowned or unprotected resources:
http://mises.org/Community/blogs/tokyotom/search.aspx?q=fish.

On fish, you might note what the organization Defying Ocean’s End (cofounded by Conservation International, The Nature Conservancy,
Natural Resources Defense Council, The Ocean Conservancy, Wildlife
Conservation Society, The World Conservation Union, and World Wildlife
Fund) recently said:

http://www.defyingoceansend.org…

“Overfishing,
high bycatch rates, the use of gear types that damage habitat (like
trawls and dredges), and the large subsidies supporting fisheries
(totally over $15 billion per year) are all symptoms of an underlying
problem. In most fisheries that are exhibiting declines in
landings and revenues, overfishing, bycatch, and habitat damage,
actions that result in the symptoms are actually rational given the way
the fisheries are managed. In these fisheries, secure privileges to
catch certain amounts of fish are not specified, so naturally
individual fishermen compete to maximize their individual shares of the
catch. No incentives for conservation exist in this situation, because
every fish conserved can be caught by another fisherman. The
competition to maximize catch often results in a fishery “arms race”,
resulting in the purchase of multiple vessels, the use of powerful
engines and large vessels, and the use of highly efficient gear like
trawls.

“Most of the solutions that have been implemented or proposed to fix the world’s fisheries center on command-and-control
measures: regulators or courts telling fishermen how to fish through
the imposition of controls on effort (e.g., fishing vessel length,
engine horsepower, gear restrictions, etc.). Prescriptions like these
work against strong economic incentives for maximizing catch, which are
not addressed by such measures, and are of course usually resisted by
fishermen. Often, prescriptions create incentives for “work-arounds”
and set up a cat-and-mouse game between fishermen and regulators – for example, if regulators impose a restriction on vessel size,
fishermen may purchase two vessels to maintain high catch levels.

“As
in most natural resource problems, more effective solutions will
address the fundamental drivers of unsustainable fisheries. In this
case, the key necessary reform will be to designate secure catch
privileges.”

You
say: “The rate of exploitation and the decline
of resources, water, energy, fisheries, soil, minerals, etc., all
occured under a free market, private property paradigm.”  This is
clearly demonstrably wrong, and draws entirely the wrong lessons. While
private property is certainly no panacea, neither are they what is
wrong.  Very often, is is governments that have been and are wrong,
though there is certainly some learning going on.

While
Garrett Hardin`s “The Tragedy of the Commons” certainly represents a
hypothetical situation, it is actually a very powerful analytical tool
for understanding and fashioning solutions to countless “real life”
problems. See Elinor Ostrom et al., Revisiting the Commons: Local Lessons, Global Challenges, Science, 04/09/99 http://conservationcommons.org/media/document/docu-wyycyz.pdf

“In real life,
corporations own, or vie to own, resources or access to them for the
purpose of extraction and profit and they seek to maximize profits
through economies of scale, that is industrial extraction methods,
drift netting, blowing up mountains, tossing mining waste into clear,
pristine lakes.“

What
you describe here is a conflict between preferences over how resources
are used.  Do you prefer a free-for-all, or a situation where those who
use a resource can protect it, negotiate with others who wish to see
other values preserved, and who are responsible for negative
consequences caused to others (not always a part of some property
rights systems), or perhaps a situation where governments make all
resource exploitation decisions?”

“The money is in the resource and when the resource is
exhausted they will move on to the next one.”

The
money is never in the “resource”, but in the ways that people can use
it or otherwise value it (and of course people also value pristine
environments).