Re: finite world/resource depletion

[Hyman Blumenstock <hystock@xxxxxxxxx>]

So long as you guys keep your minds among the elves and fairies of
fantasy land, your ramblings are totally worthless.

The Real World of Real Wealth, is Land, Labor and Production -- tangible
things.  Money is totally imaginary, represented by ledger entries, or
pieces of paper or other material such as Gold, that have no intrinsic
value (Gold as something to repair teeth or make jewelry, and paper
documents, perhaps might double as toilet tissue, its value enhanced for
that purpose if made of lowest quality paper) that is supposed to
REPRESENT Real Wealth, that has to be exchanged in the Marketplace
because Food was once scarce (which it no longer is, making the
"marketplace" and "capitalism" as useful as are buggy whip sockets on
modern automobiles).

To confuse Money with
Real Wealth is a gross error that becomes starkly evident if you are
given a choice of one without the other. That is, if you were to spend
some time in the wilderness where there were no consumable resources,
would you rather take with you a barrel full of Food, or carloads of any
size full of paper Money, Securities allegedly worth millions, or even
Gold?

Replay your arguments substituting Food wherever you now say or mean
Money, and
see the utter foolishness of your ramblings.  How much more empirical
can you get?

Hyman

John B. O'Donnell wrote:
>
> Paul Henry Rosenberg wrote:
> >
> > John B. O'Donnell wrote:
> >
> > > Gregoire de Nowell (ci-devant) wrote:
> > >
> > >   ...<snip>...
> > >
> > > > It is in my view likely that as with coal the oil
> > > > question will become technologically irrelevant long
> > > > before economically exploitable resources will be
> > > > exhausted.  In my view this is unfortunate, because
> > > > I have been involved in teh professional advocacy of
> > > > alternative fuel strategies and the resource depletion
> > > > argument, so prima facie logical, is tough to let go
> > > > of.  And indeed many alternative fuel advocates
> > > > continue to hang onto it.
> > >
> > > Don't be so pessimistic. The inevitability that price
> > > allocation of whatever is or can be made available will
> > > allocate those resources to their best use is one of the
> > > most rational arguments that economists can claim as
> > > their own. When fuel alternatives become priced as an
> > > improvement over fossil fuels, the substitution will
> > > occur unless, of course, stupid political "solutions" are
> > > imposed.
> >
> > In *The Heat Is On*, published earlier this year, Ross
> > Gelbspan argues just the opposite has taken place:
> > continuing subsidies for fossile fuels have artificially
> > limited the breakout of fuel alternatives from niche
> > markets into broad competetive superiority.
>
> Any chance of identifying just what these subsidies are. Would they be
> somehow related to the fact that U.S. state and federal taxes on motor
> fuels, while exorbitant, are less than imposed in a good part of the
> rest of the world?
>
> > The stupid political solution is to continue doing this AND
> > not recognize that global warming is a cost the marketplace
> > cannot possibly price "right".
>
> Is this "Global Warming" any relation to the coming ice age of a few
> years ago? There are enough real problems to address without bringing in
> the imaginary ones of Chicken Little. Examination of even these peculiar
> theories [The coming ice age, global warming, etc.] does make sense, but
> plunging toward "solutions" to problems suspected to be by every
> headline seeking kook is just plain stupid without first determining if
> the "problem" is real.
>
> > The solution Gelbspan advocates is a complete transfer
> > of all fossil fuel subsidies to fuel aternatives.
>
> Solve a nonexistent problem by imposing a stupid political solution.
> Sounds like government by Chicken Little emotional shrieking to me.
>
> > Here's a concrete example where the finite-Earth perspective
> > makes the logic of a policy decision quite compelling and
> > obvious, while the conventional economic perspective could
> > well leave us arguing till it's way too late to do anything.
> >
> > BTW, like me, Gelbspan is a techno-optimist *PROVIDING* that
> > political problems can be solved.  Current economic paradigms
> > are part of the political problems that need solving.
>
> Not me. I'm an economics basher willing to place credit where credit is
> due. These arguments are placing blame at the doorsteps of economics
> that is not deserved. Optimism of getting political action by making
> silly noises is, to their credit, not a mode of argument regularly seen
> coming from economists speaking econoeze.
>
> Economists do, however, seem to hold as true some beliefs that any fool
> can see are tautologically impossible.
>
>
>                         -- jbod
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