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> "humans had a propensity to use abundance for population growth rather than for maintaining a high standard of living" Is this quote directly from Malthus? O

> "humans had a propensity to use abundance for population growth rather than for maintaining a high standard of living" Is this quote directly from Malthus? Or did you copy a second-hand source, for which I already warned about ubiquitous phenomenon of erasure-by-mass-strawmanning? > Once people are able to have a high standard of living, as they do in the developed world, they start using more abundance for that instead of for population growth. And so far, the only way people are able to have a high standard of living is by making other people far away (or not so far away, in some cases) have a low standard of living. This is the inconvenient truth of "development." After you finish Malthus, maybe check out Confessions of an Economic Hitman. In effect, our low population growth is only possibly because we're "exporting" high population growth to the poor colonial satellite nations we rely on.

pdonis 3y ago
> Is this quote directly from Malthus? It's from the Wikipedia article you referenced.
- schiffern 3y ago
  Yes I know. The question was rhetorical. Point is, don't entrust any second-hand source to paraphrase Malthus. They have pretty much universally been twisted into unrecognizably distorted strawmen. As I said, this is one of the historically verified perils of going against the intellectual grain. Even if you're right, your opponents will rewrite history (including your own thesis!) to make you "wrong" in the end. Caveat cogitatoris, friends...
pdonis 3y ago
> so far, the only way people are able to have a high standard of living is by making other people far away (or not so far away, in some cases) have a low standard of living. No, this is not correct. People in the US creating wealth does not at all prevent people in other places from creating wealth, including places from which the US imports resources. Nor does wealth creation in the US require a low standard of living in other countries. The primary cause of low standard of living is misgovernment. People who are poor are poor because the governments of their countries steal everything, so no one has an incentive to create wealth, and the world community in general allows this misgovernment to continue, and even rewards the corrupt governments (Robert Mugabe was applauded at the UN's world food summit years ago at the same time his people were starving because he and his cronies were stealing all the food for themselves or to sell abroad on the black market). This could be fixed without changing wealth creation in developed countries at all.
- PaulDavisThe1st 3y ago
  > No, this is not correct. People in the US creating wealth does not at all prevent people in other places from creating wealth, including places from which the US imports resources. Nor does wealth creation in the US require a low standard of living in other countries. Asserted without evidence. Also asserted in the face of almost utter contradiction with the historical record. It is true that someone in the US "creating wealth" by baking delicious cakes does not stop someone in a country with lithium reserves from creating wealth through mining. But it is not true that someone the US "creating wealth" by using cheap local labor, corruption and impenetrable market access to mine that same lithium is not interfering with local wealth development. > The primary cause of low standard of living is misgovernment. This is absurdly myopic. Countries with low standards of living generally have GDP levels low enough that even distributing it evenly would not move them noticeably out of the classification. People in the world who are poor are poor because (a) other people have taken resources the poor might have used to improve their own conditions (b) other people have created barriers (social, civic, physical, cultural) to poor people accumulating wealth (c) other people in the world have a vested interest in there being poor people. Some of that is tied up with governments, some of it is not. Rich, selfish greedy people exist under all forms of government, though some forms of government deal with them more effectively in terms of neutering their ability to negatively impact a lot of people.
pdonis 3y ago
> Confessions of an Economic Hitman That book is a fine illustration of misgovernment and how it prevents people in underdeveloped countries from creating wealth. (And, btw, plenty of the misgovernment is in the US and other developed countries, not just the underdeveloped countries.) What it isn't is a demonstration that any of that misgovernment is necessary in order for people in the US and other developed countries to create wealth. If all such people were thrown in jail for life tomorrow, wealth creation in the US and other developed countries would go on just fine. In fact it would probably improve, since shutting down the misgovernment would include doing it in the US, where it also impedes wealth creation.

pdonis 3y ago

> Is this quote directly from Malthus? It's from the Wikipedia article you referenced.

schiffern 3y ago
Yes I know. The question was rhetorical. Point is, don't entrust any second-hand source to paraphrase Malthus. They have pretty much universally been twisted into unrecognizably distorted strawmen. As I said, this is one of the historically verified perils of going against the intellectual grain. Even if you're right, your opponents will rewrite history (including your own thesis!) to make you "wrong" in the end. Caveat cogitatoris, friends...

pdonis 3y ago

> so far, the only way people are able to have a high standard of living is by making other people far away (or not so far away, in some cases) have a low standard of living. No, this is not correct. People in the US creating wealth does not at all prevent people in other places from creating wealth, including places from which the US imports resources. Nor does wealth creation in the US require a low standard of living in other countries. The primary cause of low standard of living is misgovernment. People who are poor are poor because the governments of their countries steal everything, so no one has an incentive to create wealth, and the world community in general allows this misgovernment to continue, and even rewards the corrupt governments (Robert Mugabe was applauded at the UN's world food summit years ago at the same time his people were starving because he and his cronies were stealing all the food for themselves or to sell abroad on the black market). This could be fixed without changing wealth creation in developed countries at all.

PaulDavisThe1st 3y ago
> No, this is not correct. People in the US creating wealth does not at all prevent people in other places from creating wealth, including places from which the US imports resources. Nor does wealth creation in the US require a low standard of living in other countries. Asserted without evidence. Also asserted in the face of almost utter contradiction with the historical record. It is true that someone in the US "creating wealth" by baking delicious cakes does not stop someone in a country with lithium reserves from creating wealth through mining. But it is not true that someone the US "creating wealth" by using cheap local labor, corruption and impenetrable market access to mine that same lithium is not interfering with local wealth development. > The primary cause of low standard of living is misgovernment. This is absurdly myopic. Countries with low standards of living generally have GDP levels low enough that even distributing it evenly would not move them noticeably out of the classification. People in the world who are poor are poor because (a) other people have taken resources the poor might have used to improve their own conditions (b) other people have created barriers (social, civic, physical, cultural) to poor people accumulating wealth (c) other people in the world have a vested interest in there being poor people. Some of that is tied up with governments, some of it is not. Rich, selfish greedy people exist under all forms of government, though some forms of government deal with them more effectively in terms of neutering their ability to negatively impact a lot of people.

pdonis 3y ago

> Confessions of an Economic Hitman That book is a fine illustration of misgovernment and how it prevents people in underdeveloped countries from creating wealth. (And, btw, plenty of the misgovernment is in the US and other developed countries, not just the underdeveloped countries.) What it isn't is a demonstration that any of that misgovernment is necessary in order for people in the US and other developed countries to create wealth. If all such people were thrown in jail for life tomorrow, wealth creation in the US and other developed countries would go on just fine. In fact it would probably improve, since shutting down the misgovernment would include doing it in the US, where it also impedes wealth creation.