James is doing a wonderful job explicating J.S. Mill's defense of free speech in On Liberty. He's now turned to what I think is one of the best of Mill's arguments - that free speech is required because, as a student just said,"no one has a monopoly on the truth." Given human fallibility, we need free speech to discover the truth. Competition among various views of the world will generate a better approximation to truth than would happen if any limits were imposed upon speech. Thus our ignorance becomes the justification for freedom, as freedom allows us to generate knowledge that would otherwise go undiscovered. Mill is very clear on this point.
Of course this argument is precisely parallel to the Hayekian/Austrian argument about the way in which the market works as a discovery process. (See Hayek's essay"Competition as a Discovery Procedure.") What I find especially interesting about this is that the Hayek essay was written in the late 1960s (although embryonic versions of the ideas were around earlier), after Hayek had been engaged in his fairly deep study of Mill. Hayek long admired Mill and edited a collection of Mill's letters with Harriet Taylor. In the early 50s, he and his second wife took a European vacation that retraced some steps that Mill had taken.
Given Hayek's admiration for Mill, I wonder how much of what emerged in the 1960s in Hayek's thinking about competition came from his study of Mill and Mill's argument for free speech in On Liberty? Furthermore, some contemporary Austrians, myself included, have argued that markets are extra-linguistic communication processes, so one way of seeing the parallels in Mill and Hayek is to argue that all forms of communication should be free because all forms of communication, whether speech or markets in this case, are ultimately discovery processes that are socially necessary to overcome our structural ignorance.
I think this same argument can be extended to Darwinian evolution as well. Evolution via natural selection is a very similar sort of discovery process as markets and free speech. The implied vision of human natural and social life as being an interconnected set of evolutionary discovery processes is, for me, quite inspiring. We are all connected in our biological, social, economic, and intellectual evolution by similar sorts of discovery processes.
Of course this argument is precisely parallel to the Hayekian/Austrian argument about the way in which the market works as a discovery process. (See Hayek's essay"Competition as a Discovery Procedure.") What I find especially interesting about this is that the Hayek essay was written in the late 1960s (although embryonic versions of the ideas were around earlier), after Hayek had been engaged in his fairly deep study of Mill. Hayek long admired Mill and edited a collection of Mill's letters with Harriet Taylor. In the early 50s, he and his second wife took a European vacation that retraced some steps that Mill had taken.
Given Hayek's admiration for Mill, I wonder how much of what emerged in the 1960s in Hayek's thinking about competition came from his study of Mill and Mill's argument for free speech in On Liberty? Furthermore, some contemporary Austrians, myself included, have argued that markets are extra-linguistic communication processes, so one way of seeing the parallels in Mill and Hayek is to argue that all forms of communication should be free because all forms of communication, whether speech or markets in this case, are ultimately discovery processes that are socially necessary to overcome our structural ignorance.
I think this same argument can be extended to Darwinian evolution as well. Evolution via natural selection is a very similar sort of discovery process as markets and free speech. The implied vision of human natural and social life as being an interconnected set of evolutionary discovery processes is, for me, quite inspiring. We are all connected in our biological, social, economic, and intellectual evolution by similar sorts of discovery processes.
Tuesday, July 12, 2005 - 12:57
Comments
James Taylor is working his way through J. S. Mill's "Harm Principle." There was a brief exchange with a student about how Mill defined an "adult" for the purposes of the "rational adult" in his theory. James' response was that, in fact, "rationality" defines adulthood. We know an adult because he or she is rational. Ignoring the complexities of determining rationality, I'm more interested what this means in a society where adolescence has been extended in the ways that it has been in our own. Would Mill's rationality test have likely included more children of younger ages than would be the case today? Would a 13 year-old chosen at random been more likely to meet the rationality test in the mid-19th century than today?
Monday, July 11, 2005 - 15:01
Well, James Taylor has just broken new ground in IHS seminars by asking the students how far they are willing to extend Mill's harm principle. He started by going over various state laws on sexual practices. Then he moved to say "well, one reason I'm interested in this topic is that I'm a member of a persecuted sexual minority, where my 'love' is illegal in every state. To show you, I've brought my partner with me today." He then proceeded to pull out, from behind the podium, a large toy stuffed sheep. His beloved "Flossie." Much hilarity has ensued, but it's also a great way to push Mill's argument about rationality and consent.
The students are resisting that bestiality should be legal by arguing that animals can't consent. James's response is to ask them if they are vegetarians. "You are willing to kill animals brutally to eat them - all I want to do is make sweet love to one beautiful sheep." That's a brilliant response in my book. It's really pushing them to get at what our objection to bestiality really is. Is it just that it's "icky?" Of course the real danger is that rather than get them to rethink bestiality laws, he might turn them all into vegetarians!
Now we've gone to adult, consensual incest and then to necrophilia. We should have some interesting lunch conversation.
I also need to mention the he told us that the state of Idaho has a law against anal sex, the punishment for which is life in prison. James noted the irony of using life in prison as a way to deter men from engaging in anal sex.
The students are resisting that bestiality should be legal by arguing that animals can't consent. James's response is to ask them if they are vegetarians. "You are willing to kill animals brutally to eat them - all I want to do is make sweet love to one beautiful sheep." That's a brilliant response in my book. It's really pushing them to get at what our objection to bestiality really is. Is it just that it's "icky?" Of course the real danger is that rather than get them to rethink bestiality laws, he might turn them all into vegetarians!
Now we've gone to adult, consensual incest and then to necrophilia. We should have some interesting lunch conversation.
I also need to mention the he told us that the state of Idaho has a law against anal sex, the punishment for which is life in prison. James noted the irony of using life in prison as a way to deter men from engaging in anal sex.
Monday, July 11, 2005 - 14:48
Glen has now shifted over to talking about"The Two Things". For economics, Glen argues that the two things are"Incentives matter" and"There's no such thing as a free lunch." I've thought a lot about this one and I'm not sure those are the two I would pick. I'd probably keep TANSTAAFL, but I might swap out the incentives one for something about the dispersed and tacit nature of knowledge and the role of economic/social institutions in making that knowledge socially usable.
He also has two really good examples about how incentives matter. The first is the, presumably apochryphal, story about the American elementary school class who raised money to buy African children out of slavery as a way to reduce the total amount of slavery. His point was that this raised the price of slaves and encouraged more people to"reallocate" children into slavery to capture the now higher returns. (For the econ-geeks, the demand curve shifted up and to the right, raising the price of slaves, leading to an increase in the quantity supplied.) Incentives matter and they often create unintended and undesirable consequences. The other example was increased security at airports leading people, on the margin, to drive instead of fly, which is, of course much more dangerous. Thus the attempt to increase airline safety backfires and causes more problems. I've made this same point about proposed legislation to require all small children on planes to be in carseats. Kids who currently fly free on a parent's lap would now have to be charged as the carseat takes up a paying seat. That additional expense will lead some folks on the margin to drive, dramatically increasing the danger to the child.
He's now talking about his Wal-Mart and Mexican labor regulations example he mentioned here.
He also has two really good examples about how incentives matter. The first is the, presumably apochryphal, story about the American elementary school class who raised money to buy African children out of slavery as a way to reduce the total amount of slavery. His point was that this raised the price of slaves and encouraged more people to"reallocate" children into slavery to capture the now higher returns. (For the econ-geeks, the demand curve shifted up and to the right, raising the price of slaves, leading to an increase in the quantity supplied.) Incentives matter and they often create unintended and undesirable consequences. The other example was increased security at airports leading people, on the margin, to drive instead of fly, which is, of course much more dangerous. Thus the attempt to increase airline safety backfires and causes more problems. I've made this same point about proposed legislation to require all small children on planes to be in carseats. Kids who currently fly free on a parent's lap would now have to be charged as the carseat takes up a paying seat. That additional expense will lead some folks on the margin to drive, dramatically increasing the danger to the child.
He's now talking about his Wal-Mart and Mexican labor regulations example he mentioned here.
Sunday, July 10, 2005 - 12:48
Glen's characterization of the economic way of thinking as Goals filtered through Constraints leading to Choices makes for a nice set-up for extending economic analysis to "non-economic" choices. Right now, after walking them through how that framework applies to consumers and producers, he's having them think through how you can understand political action using it as well. His bottom line, as it is with economic choices, is that we cannot make the world submit to our wishes. We always face constraints and we always must make choices, and those choices have costs.
Making these sorts of public choice arguments to libertarian students is like shooting fish in a barrel, at least in the sense that they are strongly predisposed to being cynical about political actors. What public choice can do is to give them a theoretical framework for understanding and explaining the perverse outcomes of the political process without assuming that politicians are irredeemably evil.
Making these sorts of public choice arguments to libertarian students is like shooting fish in a barrel, at least in the sense that they are strongly predisposed to being cynical about political actors. What public choice can do is to give them a theoretical framework for understanding and explaining the perverse outcomes of the political process without assuming that politicians are irredeemably evil.
Sunday, July 10, 2005 - 12:46
Glen has just mentioned one of my favorite"economic ways of thinking" - every good and service is really a bundle of qualities, or has"multiple margins of choice." When regulations make it hard to adjust one margin of choice, sellers or buyers will move to other margins. Glen used rent control as an example, where the restrictions on the official price lead to landlords compensating by reducing quality or by finding other"fees" (e.g., a key fee). I've made the same argument about minimum wage laws - employers may respond to a minimum wage by reducing the amount of labor they hire, or they might respond by reducing various non-monetary benefits, or making working conditions marginally less comfortable. Glen's point here is that regulators cannot imagine all of the possible margins of choice, thus any attempt at regulating the conditions of sale are likely to create all kinds of unintended consequences that frustrate the intended goals of the regulation.
Sunday, July 10, 2005 - 13:02
Tom is beginning his talk on the orgins and nature of the law by reminding us that the"law" is not encompassed by the actions taken by the state. Rather the law includes all the sorts of contractual agreements and rules that govern our lives. He just used the word"enterprise" to describe the process of generating these rules. The law is"not a set of commands given by a supreme ruler," rather it's a service industry. Not surprisingly, he's now using Lon Fuller's wonderful definition of law: the enterprise of subjecting human conduct to the governance of rules.
Much like the way public choice gives students a framework for systematically understanding political activity, so does the Fuller insight give students a framework for thinking about the way in which rules, not just state-made law, serve to coordinate human choices. Tom is starting to use this insight to talk about"polycentric" law, or the idea that multiple forms of law can overlap within the same geographic area. Law need not be, and in fact is not, a monopoly within a specific geographic region.
Much like the way public choice gives students a framework for systematically understanding political activity, so does the Fuller insight give students a framework for thinking about the way in which rules, not just state-made law, serve to coordinate human choices. Tom is starting to use this insight to talk about"polycentric" law, or the idea that multiple forms of law can overlap within the same geographic area. Law need not be, and in fact is not, a monopoly within a specific geographic region.
Sunday, July 10, 2005 - 14:39
Steve Davies is our after dinner lecturer tonight, giving a wonderful talk on what he calls"The Age of Funk." This talk explores the way in which human life has never been better than it is right now and then compares that to the various chicken littles on both sides of the political spectrum who are constantly telling us how bad things are. It's really an extended riff on Easterbrook's The Progress Paradox.
He just made the huge point that many children prior to the 20th century were not raised by both parents - women frequently died in childbirth and men at work, leaving children to be raised by stepparents, especially stepmothers. The modern obsession with the problems of single parenthood or stepfamilies is hardly new. The mom-dad"traditional" family that we've invented in our nostalgia frequently didn't exist back then either. Yes, now it's due to divorce more often than death, but the breaking up of the marital dyad and the consquent adjustments to new parenting arrangements are hardly only post-war phenomena. It's always been the case that children have had to deal with changes in family form/structure.
It's worth asking whether it's worse for children of divorce today to have, potentially, 4 parents, ideally, interested in their welfare, two of whom are their biological parents, or worse historically, when there would be two parents, at most, only one of whom was biologically related. Is divorce worse than the death of a parent? Are two remarriages better than one? Interesting questions.
He just made the huge point that many children prior to the 20th century were not raised by both parents - women frequently died in childbirth and men at work, leaving children to be raised by stepparents, especially stepmothers. The modern obsession with the problems of single parenthood or stepfamilies is hardly new. The mom-dad"traditional" family that we've invented in our nostalgia frequently didn't exist back then either. Yes, now it's due to divorce more often than death, but the breaking up of the marital dyad and the consquent adjustments to new parenting arrangements are hardly only post-war phenomena. It's always been the case that children have had to deal with changes in family form/structure.
It's worth asking whether it's worse for children of divorce today to have, potentially, 4 parents, ideally, interested in their welfare, two of whom are their biological parents, or worse historically, when there would be two parents, at most, only one of whom was biologically related. Is divorce worse than the death of a parent? Are two remarriages better than one? Interesting questions.
Sunday, July 10, 2005 - 22:59
James just said "Utilitarians don't believe in rights." Glen and I just grunted in unison. It may be that utilitarians don't believe in natural rights, but one can be a utilitarian, in the broadest sense, and still argue that a particular set/bundle of rights will lead to the greatest good, or put better, will have consequences that (virtually) all will think are good. Or put somewhat differently, it may be that a system in which individuals have very strong rights is a system that generates the best consequences (i.e., is best from a utilitarian point of view). The rights, and their strength, are derived from the consequences they generate, which requires significant dollops of empirical/historical evidence about what "works" and what doesn't.
James just got pretty close by saying that utilitarians might believe that people should act "as if" they have natural rights if such rights, empirically, lead to the maximization of happiness. Why not just say people have "rights" (strong rights) rather than pretend "as if" they are natural?
James just got pretty close by saying that utilitarians might believe that people should act "as if" they have natural rights if such rights, empirically, lead to the maximization of happiness. Why not just say people have "rights" (strong rights) rather than pretend "as if" they are natural?
Saturday, July 9, 2005 - 23:29
This is fun. Glen and I can carry on a conversation sitting next to each other without talking! Interesting that he pointed out that natural law is compatible with consequentialism. I just read a paper at the History of Economics Society meetings that argued that one effective way of understanding Hayek is that he was strongly influenced by the natural law tradition. In particular, the paper argued that spontaneous order theory can be seen as a version of natural law.
I have to admit that I used to love the sorts of deductivist natural rights arguments James is putting forward, until they got beat out of me as an undergraduate. My latter-day consequentialism doesn’t find these as interesting or persuasive as my earlier-day quasi-Randianism.
And I swear, if James makes one more haggis joke... and now he's decided to pick on me as the example for his "heavily-armed" economist mugger. Oops, now he's had me shoot Glen! The good news for me is that Glen's will left me his spot on Agoraphilia.
Cross-posted at Agoraphilia, along with Glen's original post.
I have to admit that I used to love the sorts of deductivist natural rights arguments James is putting forward, until they got beat out of me as an undergraduate. My latter-day consequentialism doesn’t find these as interesting or persuasive as my earlier-day quasi-Randianism.
And I swear, if James makes one more haggis joke... and now he's decided to pick on me as the example for his "heavily-armed" economist mugger. Oops, now he's had me shoot Glen! The good news for me is that Glen's will left me his spot on Agoraphilia.
Cross-posted at Agoraphilia, along with Glen's original post.
Saturday, July 9, 2005 - 23:01
I’m at Pitzer College in Claremont, CA this week at an Institute for Humane Studies Liberty & Society seminar for college students. With me here are the pair of fun fellows behind the Agoraphilia blog, Glen Whitman and Tom Bell. Joining the three of us are Steve Davies, a historian, and James Stacey Taylor, a philosopher. We’ve decided to live-blog the week at Agoraphilia, so do check in over there to see what we’re up to, what we’re thinking about, what students are curious about, and the general fun and frolic that ensues when you confine 5 faculty to cell-block style dorm rooms and awful institutional food.
I'll try to cross-post my entries here.
I'll try to cross-post my entries here.
Saturday, July 9, 2005 - 20:02
My friend Will Wilkinson has an excellent piece about charges of"Social Darwinism" against policies designed to increase ownership at The American Spectator. One highlight, referring to a recent talk by Barack Obama:
Modern market societies -- ownership societies -- are the paradigm of interdependent, mutually advantageous cooperation, and are as far as can be imagined from the society of atomistic predators Obama invokes to stir the disdain of the fresh-faced graduates of Knox. Market societies -- ownership societies -- are wealthy because they rely on and reinforce a high level of social trust and norms of cooperation.Along the lines of using Kelo as a way to talk to the left about the importance of property rights, emphasizing the cooperative nature of markets is another possible strategy.
Wednesday, June 29, 2005 - 12:37
Since Darwin just missed making the now infamous Human Events 10 Most Harmful Books list, I suppose it's on topic with recent shouting matches around here to note that the attempt to teach"intelligent design" in public school science classes continues apace. The latest story comes from Michigan.
What struck me in this piece was the wisdom of a local pastor:
What struck me in this piece was the wisdom of a local pastor:
"It wasn't until creationism was ousted from public schools that intelligent design was brought in," said Mark Jennings, a Gull Lake Community Schools parent and pastor of the First Presbyterian Church in Richland."I've always thought the school should leave teaching about God to the church and we'll leave science to the schools."Indeed. At the risk of invoking a libertarian cliche, it remains worth noting that controversies like this are the near-inevitable result of taxpayer-funded school systems. Often times the separation of Church and State can be accomplished quite effectively by the separation of School and State.
Monday, June 6, 2005 - 08:45
Charles, Charles, the boxers-briefs debate is as false a dichotomy as left-right, so I'm surprised libertarian types are buying into it. Aren't we all about challenging the status quo? Aren't both choices really fundamentally flawed? And don't those flaws come together in the extreme? (Castro probably wears briefs, and how different is he really from Saddam?)
Libertarians should be challenging the old categories. For the underwear anarchists, there's always" commando" ("The only thing between him and us is a thin layer of gabardine"), but for those who wish not to commit to anarchism, yet still wish to blow up the old binaries, there's this university administrator's underwear of choice: boxer-briefs.
Like libertarianism is to"left" and"right", boxer-briefs take the best of both worlds and use them to form a consistent underwear worldview. The comfort of the boxer, the support of the brief. Libertarian underwear nirvana, and the choice of binary busters everywhere.
Libertarians should be challenging the old categories. For the underwear anarchists, there's always" commando" ("The only thing between him and us is a thin layer of gabardine"), but for those who wish not to commit to anarchism, yet still wish to blow up the old binaries, there's this university administrator's underwear of choice: boxer-briefs.
Like libertarianism is to"left" and"right", boxer-briefs take the best of both worlds and use them to form a consistent underwear worldview. The comfort of the boxer, the support of the brief. Libertarian underwear nirvana, and the choice of binary busters everywhere.
Saturday, May 21, 2005 - 13:47
My employer (and Gus's I should add) is back in the news as the challenge of new media and freedom of speech collides with the desire to"protect" students. Here's the link to the Inside Higher Ed article . For the record, even though I was a target, multiple times, I opposed the blocking of the blog and I'm equally uncomfortable with the lawsuit. For the further record, I find these students (and a couple are now alums) to be reprehensible intellectual cowards, but the best remedy for that is sunshine. I'd be interested in what others think.
Friday, May 13, 2005 - 20:27
Just a follow up to David's post from the other day: There is now an online petition to oppose the boycott, which can be found here.
Hat tip to David Velleman at Left2Right.
Hat tip to David Velleman at Left2Right.
Monday, May 9, 2005 - 11:27
With a large hat tip to the excellent Cafe Hayek, this Coyote Blog piece on the
effects
of minimum wage hikes is fascinating and informative.
Friday, April 1, 2005 - 17:03
So one part of my administrative job is working with my colleagues in Student Affairs to do programming, particularly for first-year students. Through a process I don't yet understand, we had the great good fortune to have 3 DEA agents visit campus to converse with us about how they could do educational programming for our students on a recent rise in cocaine use on campus. What's interesting about this is that the Student Gov't was all thrilled with this idea. Suffice it to say, I was not. Drug education is one thing, but bringing the DEA to do it? Nah. It's like getting tax advice from an IRS agent.
But what really pissed me off was something more subtle. In describing what sort of program they might do, they wanted to include a former/recovering drug user of college age to talk about his/her experience. Okay fine. But they kept referring to this person as"the victim!" Not"the addict," which has problems of its own, nor even the"former user" or"former abuser" but the"victim." It was all I could do not to leap out of my seat and yell at these people:
"They're only victims because of YOU bastards!!"
The rhetorical power of calling a former user a"victim" is just fascinating. Then, of course, the DEA is just saving victims all over the place. It would have been rude of me to ask"if they are victims, who has victimized them? Please point to the person or people who harmed them." Of course the answer will be those evil drug peddlers... as if"victims" are helpless robots in the face of illegal drugs.
Not a good day. Not a good day at all.
But what really pissed me off was something more subtle. In describing what sort of program they might do, they wanted to include a former/recovering drug user of college age to talk about his/her experience. Okay fine. But they kept referring to this person as"the victim!" Not"the addict," which has problems of its own, nor even the"former user" or"former abuser" but the"victim." It was all I could do not to leap out of my seat and yell at these people:
"They're only victims because of YOU bastards!!"
The rhetorical power of calling a former user a"victim" is just fascinating. Then, of course, the DEA is just saving victims all over the place. It would have been rude of me to ask"if they are victims, who has victimized them? Please point to the person or people who harmed them." Of course the answer will be those evil drug peddlers... as if"victims" are helpless robots in the face of illegal drugs.
Not a good day. Not a good day at all.
Thursday, March 31, 2005 - 20:57
Our HNN neighbor Judith Klinghoffer writes, in a post titled THE TERRY SCHIAVO CASE MAKES ME LOVE DEMOCRACY:
"And yet, I find the specter of the most powerful people in the only superpower drop[sic] everything to focus on the destiny of a single badly disabled woman edifying."
I could not disagree more. Whatever one thinks of the merits of the husband's case, the idea that our esteemed legislators are concocting a bill to save the life of one woman, and calculating the electoral benefits thereof in the process, is precisely what I dislike about democracy. This is just the kind of abuse of Congressional power that gives democracy a bad name. It is antithetical to any reasonable understanding of the rule of law, not to mention the tax dollars being spent as lawmakers rush back to DC to vote on this bill while procedure allows them to.
And the notion of using the subpoena power to resolve a case of this sort is hardly what one thinks of when one thinks of the merits of democracy - at least not the type framed by a meaningful constitution.
Rant over.
"And yet, I find the specter of the most powerful people in the only superpower drop[sic] everything to focus on the destiny of a single badly disabled woman edifying."
I could not disagree more. Whatever one thinks of the merits of the husband's case, the idea that our esteemed legislators are concocting a bill to save the life of one woman, and calculating the electoral benefits thereof in the process, is precisely what I dislike about democracy. This is just the kind of abuse of Congressional power that gives democracy a bad name. It is antithetical to any reasonable understanding of the rule of law, not to mention the tax dollars being spent as lawmakers rush back to DC to vote on this bill while procedure allows them to.
And the notion of using the subpoena power to resolve a case of this sort is hardly what one thinks of when one thinks of the merits of democracy - at least not the type framed by a meaningful constitution.
Rant over.
Sunday, March 20, 2005 - 18:00
A quick question for any wiser constitutional scholars than I: The Constitution expressly prohibits "Bills of Attainder," which are laws targeted at a specific person. Historically, of course, they were targetted in a negative way (e.g., declaring person X a traitor or such), so the Schiavo case may be different. Still, if Congress passes a law designed to save the life of a specific, named, person, isn't that an unconstitutional Bill of Attainder?
My quick bit of "legal research" suggests that the definition normally includes "punishment without trial," so that it's not just about naming a specific person, but about doing so for a nefarious purpose.
Even so, the notion of the whole Congress being called in to adjudicate a family tragedy like this really does step way over any line of the legitimate powers of the state, whatever the real meaning of a Bill of Attainder is.
My quick bit of "legal research" suggests that the definition normally includes "punishment without trial," so that it's not just about naming a specific person, but about doing so for a nefarious purpose.
Even so, the notion of the whole Congress being called in to adjudicate a family tragedy like this really does step way over any line of the legitimate powers of the state, whatever the real meaning of a Bill of Attainder is.
Saturday, March 19, 2005 - 23:19
