8 ms·
Why shouldn't we have ethical opinions about the economy?
by 7sidedmarble 4y ago
Why shouldn't we have ethical opinions about the economy?
- tbrownaw 4y agoSo, things like "functioning markets are good" and "price-fixing is bad"?
- User23 4y agoAnd usury is awful.
- ClumsyPilot 4y agoSlave markets were functional. Feudalism was functional. The market for drugs and organs are functional. Lets try tougher ones - are markets captured by cartels functional? Does OPEC inhibit free market or are they free market in action? When tech companies create anti-poaching agreement to supress wages, is that functional?
- nec4b 4y agoDo you have ethical opinions for example about Newton's laws in physics? Or do you accept them for what they are?
- BHSPitMonkey 4y agoHumans design the system in which the market operates. Obviously one cannot make an appeal to change physics.
- nec4b 4y agoWe design car and planes just as well with physics.
- BHSPitMonkey 4y agoThis is not analogous. You likened criticizing our economy (inclusive of the state of various laws that determine how it impacts people) to criticizing physics itself (to suggest that doing so is unreasonable). The economy is like a singular, gigantic vehicle we all occupy. It abides certain natural laws (such as human nature, and the scarcity of certain resources), but the vehicle itself is designed by some of our fellow passengers (and its design does not optimize for the things many of us feel it should).
- nec4b 4y agoSure it is. You and other passengers are trying to design the vehicle by ignoring human nature, scarcity, etc. (the physics). Because you are asking yourself why does the piston deserve all the fuel and not the headlights.
- UncleMeat 4y agoAnd if somebody makes a shitty car that contains an extra bomb that randomly explodes and kills people we tell them that's a shitty car. We don't blame physics.
- parthianshotgun 4y agoThis is sarcasm I'm assuming?
- nec4b 4y agoI thought implying there was some sort of cosmic injustice when a software developers"deserves" more than a nurse, was some sort of sarcasm. We would never understand anything about the world if we talked like that about for example why does this rock deserves a higher potential energy than that acorn.
- parthianshotgun 4y agoI'm not following you. Rocks and acorns are not outcomes of human political will, but our economy, society, and systems, among others, are. Maybe I'm missing something, I'm eager to understand your perspective further.
- nec4b 4y agoI hope you agree that human political will is bounded by some natural laws, the same way rocks and acorns are bound by physics. And if you want to do something useful with that political will, you better understand those laws.
- parthianshotgun 4y agoYes I agree with that, but having understood those laws (hypothetically), of which I guess you might be referring to human behaviour, evolutionary principles etc. How can we be sure that those naturalistic foundations could possibly inform the problem of 'what to do now'? Wouldn't be a bit like a mirror trying to reflect itself, or possibly, a fish trying to understand that it's in water?
- nec4b 4y agoUnderstanding the laws doesn't guarantee we'll be able to solve the problem. But not knowing them almost guarantees we will not do a good job.
- berniedurfee 4y agoI’d go further to ask why ethics shouldn’t play a more active and significant role in the governing of an economy?