On Mon, Aug 18, 2003 at 05:28:34PM -0400, Bryan Caplan wrote:
One idea he did not explore: Maybe there is no inter-stellar travel
because the benefits almost never exceed the costs. It takes years to
get anywhere, and at best you find some unused natural resources. If
Julian Simon's
James Surowiecki has an article in the New Yorker (available at
http://www.newyorker.com/talk/content/?030818ta_talk_surowiecki) arguing
in favor of child tax credits, on the grounds that raising children
produces positive externalities. My question is, has anyone done a study
that quantifies how
On 8/21/2003, Steffen Hentrich wrote:
I believe opportunity costs of ten humans pulling a plow are higher. So it
is useful to employ horses. Which horse is able to teach a children,
except to eat a piece of sugar?
This may be true now, but the question is about subsistence farming, under
which by
At 01:34 PM 8/22/2003 +0200, Steffen Hentrich wrote:
This may be true now, but the question is about subsistence farming, under
which by assumption the opportunity cost of humans is roughly the cost to
feed them.
But what is the difference between human intelligence or higher
productivity in other
On Thu, 21 Aug 2003, Bryan Caplan wrote:
That seems to water down the Principle to complete irrelevance, doesn't
it?
Well, the notion that life is very unlikely, but happened on earth
through sheer chance, does not require that earth is special in
any fundamental physical sense.
What's
The issue is marginal productivity, not average productivity. The
subsistence scenario is one where the supply curve of laborers is low and
fat. The demand curve may rise to great heights, but eventually if falls
down to meet such a low supply curve.
Robin Hanson [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Right. It's another reason why I think there isn't any basis for it.
Selection comes to mind. On uninhabited planets, sentient beings don't ponder
this question.
Quoting Robert A. Book [EMAIL PROTECTED]:
On Thu, 21 Aug 2003, Bryan Caplan wrote:
That seems to water down the
On Fri, Aug 22, 2003 at 10:50:35AM -0700, Fred Foldvary wrote:
However, the earth is not a closed system, as we continually get energy
from the sun, so even if we use up some resources, solar radiation will
supply energy, and technologicalp progress will make ever more efficient
use of it.
Robert Book wrote:
Maybe horses eat cheaper food than humans? That is, maybe you are
right that horses eat 10x as much food by weight, but that doesn't
mean it's 10x as much weight by dollar value.
That's possible.
Maybe having a horse pull a plow with one person holding it is
more productive
Robert Book wrote:
The usual argument is that once life reaches a level not that much further
than our own, it should expand out to colonize the universe at a relatively
rapid pace. Either this is wrong, or the nearest life at anything like
our level must be very very far away.
Well, we have
Robert A. Book wrote:
Everyone seems to assume that if there is life elsewhere, it must
be so much more advanced and more perfect than we are -- but there
is absolutely no evidence to support that belief. I think it's
just romantic wishful thinking . . . .
If life is *common* Elsewhere, it's
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