nrh@inmet.UUCP (02/08/85)
>***** inmet:net.politics / whuxl!orb / 2:24 am Feb 6, 1985 >I don't see why Libertarians can't just cancel their membership in the >Human Race. Hmmm.... Rant on, Tim. If you *really* can't see why, you're pretty much out of it Human-Race-Wise... >I mean, despite the fact that they were the beneficiaries >of such things as their mother's milk, the food and clothing their parents >or society provided, an education, the learning of past generations, >the capital goods and technology of many generations past labor, I don't >see why they owe anyone anything. Gosh, Tim. You're reading this article right now. Do you now "owe" me some "benefit"? You're sitting (I assume) on a chair right now. Who do you "owe"? If it isn't obvious, I'm pointing out that in some cases where you receive benefit (my netnews submissions) you don't owe me anything despite the fact that I do some work for you -- I *choose* to do it. This is, for example, the case with most mothers and their children, the food and clothing given by parents. They feel obligated to give this stuff to you because they love you and wish you to have a good life, not because they expect to accrue favors from you in the future. As for education, I went to private schools from junior high school onward, and gladly would have gone to private school before that (there wasn't room in the local one). My family *paid* for that schooling. They were forced to pay the taxes for the public schooling, and they chose to pay the extra money for the private schooling. I don't owe either school system a DIME -- those bills are marked "PAID IN FULL". As for the "capital goods and technology of many generations past labor", why, bless you son, either that was given to me, or I paid for it also! Now that I'm an adult, I expect to benefit society somewhat, but that is largely a side effect of my private concerns: I wish to have children, and I wish to raise them well. I wish to write good programs and make life easier for people -- but that is what I get paid to do, and I *demand* *nothing* *more* than that payment (although naturally, I'll get the best deal I can). Of course, the Socialists would like everyone to think that they owed "society" something, and they'd love to blur the distinction between "society" and "government" to bolster the underpinnings of their unworkable system, but what a cheap trick! The people you accuse me of "owing" would be the first to deny that I "owed" them anything. I can just see it: Q. Mr. Spielberg, Tim Sevener here for netnews: what does Nat Howard owe you? A. Who the hell is he? Who the hell are you? Q. Mrs Howard, What does Nat Howard, your son, owe you? What do you want from him? A. I want him to be happy. Q. Mr. Howard, What does Nat Howard, your son, owe you? What do you want from him? A. I want you to get out of here and mind your own business, you objectionable, nosey, pinhead. (Dad is actually nicer than that, but if he heard some of the things you've said.....) Q. Mr Don Knuth, What does Nat Howard owe you, a major contributor to his professional knowledge? What do you want from him? A. Did he buy my books? Q. Yes. A. Well.... maybe that he should buy the new editions. Get it? I didn't coerce any of these people into giving me things. I was given things (as were you) and I paid for things (as did you). That I love my parents is not something that need be codified into law -- and great harm has come from attempting to do this sort of thing in the past. >Egads! To be coerced to feed starving >children! I hope that you, a socialist, are not going to tell us about the starving children in Ethiopia, a place where "hoarders" are (we are told elsewhere in this forum) shot by the government? >What a terrible imposition! Or worse yet, coerced to even educate >the brawling brats! Yes indeed. Coerced to educate them by funneling money through a massively inefficient government, which then will teach them things I object to (the US government is a good institution, special creation must be considered coequal with evolution) in ways I object to (biased history books, censored libraries). If it were *necessary* to have public schools, it might be worth it, but it is not -- parents and do-gooders (in the place of parents) exhibit a tremendous concern for children's education, just as they do for the same children's nutrition. Or do you think that the State must supply this nutrition or there'll be massive starvation? I remind you that this seems to happen often in the countries where it is thought the State must supply the food. >Why, whatever for? Can't they just fend for themselves? Now *THERE*'s an idea. Perhaps they can! Perhaps all we need to do is get out of their way! It's worked before.... >Why can't humans just kill their young as the males of some other species >are prone to do? An odd question. Perhaps you should ask Stalin. >At least some humans still possess the admirable trait >of killing others of their species to protect their territory and property. >Now THERE'S a noble quality of humanity! It's my understanding that no libertarian has ever advocated this as the regular way to do business, except with people who you have a valid reason to think might use force against you. >Are there any ethical obligations (aye, even "coercions" to help others?) >involved in being a member of the human race? Well? Are there? Ennumerate them, please. I'd be very interested to see what you think are biological imperatives ingrained in humanity itself, and how these lead to your own beliefs. My personal belief is that the obligations owed by humanity need not all be codified as laws. >Other than that of take what you can get and the devil with anybody else? >Where would humanity be with such an attitude? Indeed. Of course, no libertarian that I know of has seriously advocated such a course (if you think I'm wrong, quotes please). That you wish to put your moral sensibilities into law binding on those with different moral sensibilities annoys me. >Forgive me but I believe that being a member of the human race along with >its inherited disadvantages and manifold advantages, also entails obligations >to the rest of the human race. And these are not just "voluntary". >If children are not clothed and fed and educated there will soon be no >human race. Excuse me, but some children are not clothed and fed now, and some children have ALWAYS been starving, and yet there is NOW a human race. If you wish to blur distinctions (in this case between "all children" and "some children", please do not do it with such an easy lens to shatter -- it only makes you look silly. >Beyond the children necessary to our future, I think that >the poor should be helped out of their predicament. The best means for doing >this can be debated. But our obligation to do so cannot. Indeed. How about "letting people help each other as they choose to do so?" To argue that libertarians have no feeling for the poor is to reveal that you do not understand our ideas. Of course, the authoritiarian notion that "anything not required is forbidden" is consistent with your (apparent) feeling that everything "good" must be required by law, and everything "bad" must be forbidden by it. > from an unrequited anthrophile, > tim sevener whuxl!orb Ah, Tim. I've a certain fondness for humanity myself -- one reason why I'm a VOCAL libertarian, as opposed to remaining silent in the face of such silly and dangerously unworkable ideas as socialism.
nrh@inmet.UUCP (02/24/85)
The reason why the FDA will prohibit drugs whose ABSENCE will kill more people than their AVAILABILITY has been succinctly pointed out by Milton and Rose Friedman in "Free to Choose": If you're an FDA member, you have two possible risks when you make a decision about a drug in the face of real-world imperfect knowledge: A) You can approve the drug, knowing that you'll look like a dangerous fool if the drug turns out to be another thalidomide (a drug which turned out to cause severe birth defects). B) You can prohibit the drug, knowing that it may be safe, and thus you may have killed people who needed it, but this is a relatively safe thing for you to do -- the people who die will probably never know. It seems to me that the FDA should content itself with stamping things "approved" and "not approved", and then letting people buy them or not. As for the contention that the FDA is a net good: .... [M]ay these costs not be justified by the advantage of keeping dangerous drugs off the market, of preventing a series of thalidomide disasters? The most careful empirical study of this question that has been made, by Sam Peltzman, concludes that the evidence is unambiguous: that the harm has greatly outweighed the good. He explains his conclusion partly by noting that "the penalties imposed by the marketplace on sellers of ineffective drugs before 1962 seems to have been sufficient to have left little room for improvement by a regulatory agency." Friedman credits this quote as being from Peltzman's "Regulation of Pharmaceutical Innovation".