Atlas Shrugged

Permabear · 17-09-2014 07:19PM

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Valmont · 17-09-2014 07:39PM

oscarBravo wrote: »

Because a Gulf-scale oil spill in a wildlife refuge would have been sooo much better.

Land-based oil spills are not only much less likely to occur but they are much easier to clean up and not nearly as damaging to the environment. At sea the oil can travel for miles as a slick and poses a far greater threat to wildlife. The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is a misnomer anyway as most Alaskans can fly in to hunt or set trap lines. A small refinery and drilling operation would hardly be noticed by the grizzly bears given they would have the rest of the 78,000 sq/km to roam in.

oscarBravo wrote: »

If a business calculates that it's cheaper to pay compensation for the occasional death of a worker or chemical spill than to prevent those deaths and/or spills in the first place, then that's the rational approach for that business to take - which doesn't make it the right approach from a societal perspective.

I would like to point out that the NHS must also make these considerations in deciding how to spend their budget.

marienbad · 17-09-2014 07:42PM

Permabear wrote: »

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No not another one line dismissal , a legitimate one question in reply to your one line dismissal of an answer.

I will ask you again - if your philosophy can change nothing in such cases as Bhopal Thalidomide The gulf oil spill , then who needs you ?

What exactly do you have to offer ? Would your philosophy have prevented or mitigated such disasters ?

And on a separate issue - you seem to be very fond of France as your favourite bête noire , but try asking the right questions , for example
Are the French of 2014 better off that those of 1914 or 1814,1714,1614 etc.

Articles cherry picked from current publications are meaningless over time.

oscarBravo · 17-09-2014 07:46PM

Valmont wrote: »

I would like to point out that the NHS must also make these considerations in deciding how to spend their budget.

The NHS has to decide whether to prioritise profit motive over the lives of its employees?

magicbastarder · 17-09-2014 08:27PM

Permabear wrote: »

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i know i'm conflating two ends of your post together - but it's known that people are not ultra rational automatons.
if the laws of economics cannot take that into consideration, then economics is great as a thought experiment, not much more.

magicbastarder · 17-09-2014 08:29PM

oscarBravo wrote: »

The NHS has to decide whether to prioritise profit motive over the lives of its employees?

i assume Valmont meant that the NHS has to calculate where to spend money, knowing that it will almost certainly result in some patients not receiving optimal treatment.
e.g. in the 'we can spend £1m treating 60 patients with disease X, or £1m treating 10 patients with disease Y' - and that sort of budgetary decision is commonplace.

oscarBravo · 17-09-2014 08:35PM

magicbastarder wrote: »

i assume Valmont meant that the NHS has to calculate where to spend money, knowing that it will almost certainly result in some patients not receiving optimal treatment.
e.g. in the 'we can spend £1m treating 60 patients with disease X, or £1m treating 10 patients with disease Y' - and that sort of budgetary decision is commonplace.

I got that; I was expressing my incredulity that it was somehow being held up as the same thing.

In one case, scarce resources have to be allocated between various medical requirements. In the other, it's a choice between employees' lives and shareholders' profits.

I can't quite believe anyone would conflate the two.

Permabear · 17-09-2014 09:15PM

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Permabear · 17-09-2014 09:25PM

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marienbad · 17-09-2014 09:37PM

Permabear wrote: »

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so what do you suggest then ? And for just once can you put your case instead of finding fault with everybody else .

Permabear · 17-09-2014 09:48PM

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5uspect · 17-09-2014 09:53PM

Permabear wrote: »

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So the state attempts to regulate access to addictive and harmful substances produced by industry and the response of the addicted is rational?

Permabear · 17-09-2014 10:01PM

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5uspect · 17-09-2014 10:29PM

Permabear wrote: »

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Even if that decision leads to addiction resulting in significant health problems? Is it not more the case the the manufacturer is producing a product that removes the ability of the individual to act rationally resulting in a economic servitude?

If I sell you a product, a product I tell you will have nothing but beneficial effects, but instead it results in addiction requiring you purchase it at every increasing cost, who then is acting rationally? Shouldn't there be some sort of regulation to prevent this kind of behaviour?

robindch · 17-09-2014 10:34PM

Permabear wrote: »

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So your basic premise, as well as your ultimate conclusion, is exactly what I've said it is above - that the only thing that matters in the world are assets. And that people, aside from them as holders of assets, are simply irrelevant.

I'm truly glad that Rand's weird and autistic world is confined to her dreadful, paranoid prose.

robindch · 17-09-2014 10:37PM

5uspect wrote: »

Shouldn't there be some sort of regulation to prevent this kind of behaviour?

In a world where people don't matter, the answer is a resounding "Of course not!"

Money talks, but it doesn't listen very well.

Permabear · 17-09-2014 10:39PM

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Permabear · 17-09-2014 10:45PM

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robindch · 17-09-2014 10:57PM

Permabear wrote: »

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That was a conclusion based upon what you've written.

So that conclusion is wrong and you do -- for example -- believe that people do owe a duty of care and a duty of trust to others? If so, then that's not very Randian of you, but I do approve.

Permabear · 17-09-2014 11:03PM

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marienbad · 17-09-2014 11:03PM

Permabear wrote: »

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So what does this mean it specific terms ? Say with cigarettes as that has already been raised ?

5uspect · 18-09-2014 12:24AM

Permabear wrote: »

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So we're using different definitions of rational. Murphy and Becker refer to the maximisation of utility, a somewhat nebulous economic term, as a definition of rational behaviour, which they refer to as 'a weak concept'. They also define addiction as an increase in something resulting in future consumption of said item rather than a dependency as I postulated in my previous post. Most smokers and drinkers maintain a pretty stable consumption throughout their lives

Their model appears to be effectively a toy model with only tangental empirical data to support it. Inviscid theory and potential flow are great if you ignore viscosity and turbulence, silly things just keep getting in the way.
In all it's an interesting model but it fails to capture the reality of addiction and longer term health issues, particularly those deliberately hidden by the manufacturers.

So to go back to my initial point.

5uspect wrote: »

Even if that decision leads to addiction resulting in significant health problems? Is it not more the case the the manufacturer is producing a product that removes the ability of the individual to act rationally resulting in a economic servitude?

If I sell you a product, a product I tell you will have nothing but beneficial effects, but instead it results in addiction requiring you purchase it at every increasing cost, who then is acting rationally? Shouldn't there be some sort of regulation to prevent this kind of behaviour?

A cigarette company produces a product that they know to be bad for the health of their customers but also everyone in the same environment. The cigarette company lies about all of this. The consumer attempts to maximises their utility based on a false premise, not only becoming addicted but also terminally ill.

The consumer has been duped, they have not achieved the 'optimum benefit', in fact the outcome could not be much worse. The public is also adversely affected by secondhand smoking.

I see no reason to adopt a libertarian ideological position based on research such as this paper.

jank · 18-09-2014 03:56AM

robindch wrote: »

I see you've now added a new, additional condition to Person B's claim and person A's conclusion - naughty, naughty, you're not allowed to do that, Permabear, when constructing an analogy. Would you like to try again, this time with an analogy which is a little more honest

Well, speaking of trains and transportation. Didn't Mussolini famously make the trains run on time and didn't Hitler build Europe's first Autobahns? Pointing to a few isolated examples of transportation 'improvements' and then making the 'logical' leap, thus deducing that society works pretty well with government is pretty far fetched and frankly irrational and illogical.

To note, this is the original claim made by you.

robindch wrote: »

Since society works pretty well with government intervention, regulation and so on, I'm wondering whether you might feel that this indicates that Rand's "reasoning" was, in fact, rather faulty?

The TGV example..

robindch wrote: »

Tiny example - I was in a TGV last week - hurtling safely and in considerable comfort through the French and latterly, German, countryside at over 200mph. State, semi-state and private organizations seem to work pretty well together to me so I trust you'll understand why I reject your false allegation of a false premise.

In the USA, on the other hand - a freedum-luvin' paradise where Rand is, inexplicably, held in much higher regard than in "socialist"/whatever France - I gather that plans for a nationwide high speed rail network have been shelved.

Hmmm...

One was able to drive on a motorway in 1930's Germany, therefore government intervention works "well"..... and you are wrong to say that it doesn't (cause of my aforementioned example)! That sums it up tbh.

Turtwig · 18-09-2014 04:13AM

jank wrote: »

Well, speaking of trains and transportation. Didn't Mussolini famously make the trains run on time and didn't Hitler build Europe's first Autobahns? Pointing to a few isolated examples of transportation 'improvements' and then making the 'logical' leap, thus deducing that society works pretty well with government is pretty far fetched and frankly irrational and illogical.

As is doing the opposite: pointing to examples of bad regulation and then deducing regulation doesn't work.

Again I find myself flummoxed at having to say this. It's like you oppose state intervention that's bad, want it kept to a minimum - so does practically everyone.

Pondering over whether I should bother posting in this thread further.

jank · 18-09-2014 04:21AM

robindch wrote: »

.. I am however, glad to see that you've accepted that the TGV demonstrates that government can work effectively - and that's all I was claiming...

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Robin, what ever about your argument your constant condescending attitude like that displayed in the above quote does nobody favors here.

magicbastarder · 18-09-2014 08:52AM

Permabear wrote: »

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that is an incredibly narrow - and problematic in its own right - example to give to counter the 'people are not hyperrational economic units' issue.

5uspect · 18-09-2014 08:56AM

magicbastarder wrote: »

that is an incredibly narrow - and problematic in its own right - example to give to counter the 'people are not hyperrational economic units' issue.

The Murphy and Becker paper discusses how children who never start up a habit are less likely to form one later in life. Surely this is reason enough to increase prices?

Permabear · 18-09-2014 10:36AM

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20Cent · 18-09-2014 10:39AM

One criticism of libertarianism and Randyism is that it has never been tried in real life. It seems that this is untrue a "superman" has actually created his own Galts Gulch in Chile similar to that in Atlas Shrugged. Looks nice: http://galtsgulchchile.com/ parcels of land could be bought using bitcoins of course and other supermen could go live there free of the tyranny of regulation and taxes.
The experiment went exactly as one would expect. The superpeople are all suing each other over not getting the land they purchased and claims of scams/ponzi schemes. The "moochers" local labourers who did all the building and supplied materials are still left unpaid. Also the place doesn't have access to water. They are currently trying to get the local government to supply it to the land.

http://www.thedailybell.com/editorials/35591/Wendy-McElroy-The-Fate-of-Galts-Gulch-Chile/

http://gawker.com/ayn-rands-capitalist-paradise-is-now-a-greedy-land-grab-1627574870

Permabear · 18-09-2014 10:41AM

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Atlas Shrugged

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