Ashley Olsen Spotted Sporting $39,000 Backpack By The Row

[Slargos]

By the same spineless reasoning, you should cheat on your taxes, lie and steal when you can get away with it, and by all means you certainly shouldn't intervene if you see a crime being committed.

There lies the way to madness.

[Admiral Yi]

Let's say you want to save the environment by cutting out your oil consumption.  What would be the result of that?

The first result is that your quality of life would go down, or at least you're going to have to spend more on replacement goods (hopefully cleaner than oil).  The second effect is that some of the savings of oil consumption from your personal refusal to use it would be negated by other people increasing their oil consumption, since oil is cheaper now. 

Your savings won't be completely negated, unless the oil supply curve is perfectly inelastic, but it would be negated to a significant degree.

Of course your quality of life is going to decline.  I'm talking specifically about people who say they would like their quality of life to decline to further a desireable goal.

Point granted about the price feedback loop on fossil fuels.  Now see if you can construct a similar argument for why Michael Moore shouldn't buy someone health insurance and why Pat shouldn't send his income to Somalia.

[Siege]

Maybe the Climate and the Soil aren't quite exactly the same?

Sweden: 6,894,100 acres of arable land.

Norway: 2,229,000 acres of arable land.

http://www.nationsencyclopedia.com/Europe/Norway-AGRICULTURE.html

http://www.nationsencyclopedia.com/Europe/Sweden-AGRICULTURE.html

Interesting.
So, if nations starve when they surpass the pop-to=arable land ratio, will the world starve when the same happens on a global scale?
And when will this happen?

[DGuller]

Let's say you want to save the environment by cutting out your oil consumption.  What would be the result of that?

The first result is that your quality of life would go down, or at least you're going to have to spend more on replacement goods (hopefully cleaner than oil).  The second effect is that some of the savings of oil consumption from your personal refusal to use it would be negated by other people increasing their oil consumption, since oil is cheaper now. 

Your savings won't be completely negated, unless the oil supply curve is perfectly inelastic, but it would be negated to a significant degree.

Of course your quality of life is going to decline.  I'm talking specifically about people who say they would like their quality of life to decline to further a desireable goal.

Point granted about the price feedback loop on fossil fuels.  Now see if you can construct a similar argument for why Michael Moore shouldn't buy someone health insurance and why Pat shouldn't send his income to Somalia.

I don't have to construct such an argument, because I don't see any valid argument to disprove.  I don't see any logic in requiring people who advocate change to society's priorities go above and beyond in unilaterally contributing their own resources.  That seems like a fallacy of status quo to me.

[Razgovory]

Er, it doesn't work like that any more, Siege.  Modern agriculture creates massive surpluses.  In the past, not as much.  It is useful as a rule of thumb in pre-modern societies, and can explain some facts of demographics like why there are so many Chinese.

[Slargos]

Maybe the Climate and the Soil aren't quite exactly the same?

Sweden: 6,894,100 acres of arable land.

Norway: 2,229,000 acres of arable land.

http://www.nationsencyclopedia.com/Europe/Norway-AGRICULTURE.html

http://www.nationsencyclopedia.com/Europe/Sweden-AGRICULTURE.html

Interesting.
So, if nations starve when they surpass the pop-to=arable land ratio, will the world starve when the same happens on a global scale?
And when will this happen?

They don't, necessarily. The famine was a result of large scale crop failure, not overpopulation (even if in the strictest sense, if one wants to RazGuller it, the crop failures by definition lead to overpopulation if one defines overpopulation by currently available food production to population ratio).

As technology improves, so does the efficiency of production both by acerage and workload so obviously there's a roof somewhere, where the increasing demand for food simply cannot be met unless that roof is also broken by for instance a limitless source of energy and some sort of nano-assembly production.

[Admiral Yi]

I don't have to construct such an argument, because I don't see any valid argument to disprove.  I don't see any logic in requiring people who advocate change to society's priorities go above and beyond in unilaterally contributing their own resources.  That seems like a fallacy of status quo to me.

  I used the advice of that excellent poster grumbler to look up fallacy of status quo, and I have no idea what you're talking about.

[grumbler]

And I never understood the logic you employ.  Both Moore and Buffett are making arguments about how a system should be set up, not about what people should do voluntarily.  Systems require coercion.  Your argument is pretty much the same as the argument that goes like "Think taxes should be higher?  Why don't you donate to the Treasury?"

My argument is the same as saying that if you think global warming is a problem you should be making efforts to reduce carbon emissions even if there are no government regulations in place.

Of course, the better argument is that no one except a pinhead thinks taxes should be higher, a priori.  Sane people may think that higher taxes are a worthwhile price to pay for X and Y, but only the most DGuller would argue that it is better to have Z and Y and higher taxes than X and Y and lower ones. 

So, if X and Y are good for the state to do with taxes, why would they not be good things for an individual to do with private donations?

[Slargos]

And I never understood the logic you employ.  Both Moore and Buffett are making arguments about how a system should be set up, not about what people should do voluntarily.  Systems require coercion.  Your argument is pretty much the same as the argument that goes like "Think taxes should be higher?  Why don't you donate to the Treasury?"

My argument is the same as saying that if you think global warming is a problem you should be making efforts to reduce carbon emissions even if there are no government regulations in place.

Of course, the better argument is that no one except a pinhead thinks taxes should be higher, a priori.  Sane people may think that higher taxes are a worthwhile price to pay for X and Y, but only the most DGuller would argue that it is better to have Z and Y and higher taxes than X and Y and lower ones. 

So, if X and Y are good for the state to do with taxes, why would they not be goods things for an individual to do with private donations?

For the same reason that people get angry when someone passes them on the road. They're cutting in line and it's unfair.

It's a rather basic human emotional need to feel that you're being treated at least as well as everyone else.

Compare, for instance, the need to be a high earner in relative terms, rather than absolute.

[Razgovory]

Never cared for algebra.

[DGuller]

Of course, the better argument is that no one except a pinhead thinks taxes should be higher, a priori.  Sane people may think that higher taxes are a worthwhile price to pay for X and Y, but only the most DGuller would argue that it is better to have Z and Y and higher taxes than X and Y and lower ones. 

So, if X and Y are good for the state to do with taxes, why would they not be good things for an individual to do with private donations?

If that's a better way of putting it, then I'd hate to see a worse way of putting it. 

[Razgovory]

Of course, the better argument is that no one except a pinhead thinks taxes should be higher, a priori.  Sane people may think that higher taxes are a worthwhile price to pay for X and Y, but only the most DGuller would argue that it is better to have Z and Y and higher taxes than X and Y and lower ones. 

So, if X and Y are good for the state to do with taxes, why would they not be good things for an individual to do with private donations?

If that's a better way of putting it, then I'd hate to see a worse way of putting it.

I genuinely have no idea what's he's going on about.

[grumbler]

Of course, the better argument is that no one except a pinhead thinks taxes should be higher, a priori.  Sane people may think that higher taxes are a worthwhile price to pay for X and Y, but only the most DGuller would argue that it is better to have Z and Y and higher taxes than X and Y and lower ones. 

So, if X and Y are good for the state to do with taxes, why would they not be good things for an individual to do with private donations?

If that's a better way of putting it, then I'd hate to see a worse way of putting it.

Don't look:

I have never understood this logic.  Michael Moore wants sick people to have cheap health care.  Warren Buffet wants teachers to be paid more.  Why don't they write a check?  If the basic premise is correct, that these outcomes are morally superior, then why do they require the coerced participation of other people?

And I never understood the logic you employ.  Both Moore and Buffett are making arguments about how a system should be set up, not about what people should do voluntarily.  Systems require coercion.  Your argument is pretty much the same as the argument that goes like "Think taxes should be higher?  Why don't you donate to the Treasury?"

My argument is the same as saying that if you think global warming is a problem you should be making efforts to reduce carbon emissions even if there are no government regulations in place.

But that doesn't make sense either.  In a free market, voluntarily constraining yourself is self-defeating.  Others will make you suffer competetively for it, and in the process they will undo most of the savings to the environment (or society in general).

Of course your quality of life is going to decline.  I'm talking specifically about people who say they would like their quality of life to decline to further a desireable goal.

Point granted about the price feedback loop on fossil fuels.  Now see if you can construct a similar argument for why Michael Moore shouldn't buy someone health insurance and why Pat shouldn't send his income to Somalia.

I don't have to construct such an argument, because I don't see any valid argument to disprove.  I don't see any logic in requiring people who advocate change to society's priorities go above and beyond in unilaterally contributing their own resources.  That seems like a fallacy of status quo to me.

[grumbler]

I genuinely have no idea what's he's going on about.

Excellent!  If you could understand it, it wouldn't be worth saying.

[Razgovory]

Why did you post all that if you don't want him to see it.