Desipio Message Board

Quote from: SKO on May 17, 2010, 07:33:12 AM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1eTAzYjbKm4 He has soared on the wings of a demon.

I feel like Morph should be chiming in with a photoshop right now.

But back to the original quote...

The overall effect of these twin strategies is to erode statutory regulation on the one hand and neuter negative market effects on the other.

(Again, both pursuant to a company's rational self-interest and both incentivized by the market.)

Say a company succeeds at gutting both of the above. Seems to me that all that would be left to ensure that the now-insulated market actor doesn't "get theirs" while burning everything else to the ground (whether by malicious intent (rare) or by negligence or merely cutting corners to cut costs) is... their personal responsibility.

Or at least their "enlightened self-interest." Which is to say: recognition that preserving the system serves their own rational self-interest.

Which was kind of the point of that quote from Digby's blog post (though perhaps poorly worded and over-simplifed):

QuoteThe funny thing is that the same people who believe we should rely on tort law also push "tort reform" which essentially guts it.

This exposes one of the great problems with libertarian thought. First, it assumes that people are rational in the first place. And then it assumes that people who are rational care about preserving the system as much as they care about getting theirs.

This fundamental misunderstanding of human nature is what led Oracle Greenspan to find himself gobsmacked at the age of 80 by the Wall Street melt down. It just never occurred to him that rational people would kill the golden goose—even though they had already hoarded enough goose eggs to keep them and their heirs sitting pretty for centuries.

For all its cynicism when it comes to the power of government, American right-libertarianism is actually downright idealistic when it comes to corporate power and the working of the market.

The million dollar question for the libertarian is: How does one, in a world of competing parties with competing interests, have a functioning libertarian polity in which self-interest is not pursued to un-libertarian ends?

Quote from: Brownie on May 15, 2010, 07:53:42 PM

Quote from: R-V on May 14, 2010, 11:13:02 PM
Yes.

QuoteThis exposes one of the great problems with libertarian thought. First, it assumes that people are rational in the first place. And then it assumes that people who are rational care about preserving the system as much as they care about getting theirs.

It's precisely the role of government in this matter that indicts Krugman as a simplistic boob.

Libertarian thought assumes that self-interest trumps all. (Interestingly, no political system eradicates self-interest; some pretend no one should care about it. Of course BP, Halliburton and Transocean should be most concerned about their interests.)

Yes, BP, Halliburton and Transocean should be expected to pursue their self-interests, just as anyone would.

Indeed, rational self-interest leads the oil industry to actively work to limit statutory regulation on the front end.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/05/05/AR2010050504837.html
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704423504575212031417936798.html
http://www.nola.com/news/gulf-oil-spill/index.ssf/2010/05/kenner_hearing_coast_guard_ins.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/14/us/14agency.html
http://www.pogo.org/pogo-files/reports/natural-resources/drilling-the-taxpayer/nr-rik-20080918.html#Industry_Influence_Whos_in_Charge_Here

So far, so good from a libertarian perspective, I guess: a self-regulating market mechanism is better than the blunt instrument of centralized regulation.

But how else to ensure adequate safeguards?

When it comes to the regulation of drug safety, Friedman (in the interview Krugman quotes) suggests tort law as an alternative to the FDA.

Set aside for the moment that he's more circumspect in that same interview when it comes to the tragedy of the environmental commons (allowing that "there are cases like the power plant that emits smoke that dirties my shirt in which the company is imposing a cost on me for which I'm not being compensated" that would be a good argument for government coercion).

Let's stipulate that all of the negative externalities can be mitigated and discouraged through market forces and tort law alone: that the risk of liabilities (and, if they survive, the subsequent beating a company would take from wary investors and insurers) should be enough to incentivize due diligence.

Accountability with less government coercion through a self-regulating market. Fine.

Let's suppose, however, that the same group's rational self-interest also leads them to actively work to use the strong arm of the government to limit their own liability exposure on the back end.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-oil-spill-new-20100514,0,6291548.story

Of course, in limiting their own liability at the legislative level, they're also effectively limiting the freedom of others (in this case, say, out of work Gulf fishermen) to pursue their rational self interests in the courts.

They're, in effect, using the coercive power of the state to shift some of their risks onto others. (In fact, it seems to me that a market that efficiently prices in risk encourages the offloading of risk and the avoidance of responsibility, by whatever means necessary. That the market incentivizes increased regulation in this case.)

Not exactly a triumph of libertarianism. And, yet, it's certainly consistent with their pursuit of that great libertarian ideal: self-interest.

The big point, then, is that in practice a libertarian privileging of self-interest above all will very often lead to un-libertarlan outcomes. (See also: bank bailouts.)

"Meanwhile, in the real world"... we have irony.

Here's the thing, though... Often enough we find such un-libertarian encouragement of government regulation dressed up in libertarian-like market-friendly language. From the story above:

QuoteThe American Petroleum Institute, the industry's trade group, said Thursday that raising the cap could also increase the costs of exploration and production in the Gulf of Mexico by 25%, "which would threaten our nation's energy security, reduce government revenues and cost thousands of American jobs."

More than that, "tort reform" has long been a battle cry of many (though not all) self-described "libertarians" on the American Right:

http://reason.com/archives/2002/08/01/knave-of-torts/

For them, torts are just another form of stifling "regulation." And, so, increased regulation of torts thus becomes effectively another form of "deregulation."

And that goes beyond irony into just plain daft.

Quote from: MAD on May 16, 2010, 11:25:33 PM

Quote from: Slaky on May 16, 2010, 10:55:17 PM

Quote from: MAD on May 16, 2010, 09:51:15 PM

Quote from: Slaky on May 16, 2010, 06:27:37 PM
Holy Die-ver?

You just gave me a great idea for if I ever get to to start the Stevie Winwood thread, Slak.

Did he ever go by Stevie?

I thought so; could be wrong.

I know that he was only sixteen when he recorded "Gimme' Some Lovin'" with the Spencer Davis Group.  I suspect he was getting laid when he was 14, so for what it's worth, I could see him going by it.  Tonks?

Are you suggesting that getting laid at 14 would make him more likely to go by "Stevie"?

Hmpf. I guess the past really is a different country. Especially in a different country.

Now, how did a Dio thread turn into a discussion of Stevie Winwood?

Where's Jon?

Quote from: Wheezer on May 16, 2010, 09:08:13 PM

Quote from: Fork on May 16, 2010, 08:09:26 PM

Miller Lite now has a "vortex bottle".

JO?

It's too bad the slogan isn't "grooved for your pleasure."

"Rifled, just like the human penis!"

Heaven or Hell?

(Put me on the board.)

I quite enjoyed reading through this...

http://www.pensionplanpuppets.com/2010/5/12/1468507/fun-with-rivals-part-one

Quote from: JD on May 15, 2010, 10:37:47 AM

Quote from: Dr. Nguyen Van Falk on May 15, 2010, 09:31:20 AM

Quote from: JD on May 15, 2010, 08:48:43 AM

Quote from: Eli on May 14, 2010, 11:06:42 AM
Mike Schur wrote this episode, so I got a kick out of that guy who ran for mayor in Partridge, Minnesota.  You know, instead of Partridge, Kansas, which is Ken Tremendous' fictional hometown.  Anyone else?  No?  OK then.

"What's a not-gay way I can ask him to go camping?"

What's Ken Tremendous? 

Cousin Mose.

How does EG know where Ken Tremendous is from?

He's an internet fanboy with FJM cock hanging out of his mouth.

http://www.firejoemorgan.com/2007/11/missed-connections.html
http://www.firejoemorgan.com/2006/12/very-special-holiday-message.html
http://www.firejoemorgan.com/2005/04/glossary-of-terms.html

Quote from: JD on May 15, 2010, 08:48:43 AM

Quote from: Eli on May 14, 2010, 11:06:42 AM
Mike Schur wrote this episode, so I got a kick out of that guy who ran for mayor in Partridge, Minnesota.  You know, instead of Partridge, Kansas, which is Ken Tremendous' fictional hometown.  Anyone else?  No?  OK then.

"What's a not-gay way I can ask him to go camping?"

What's Ken Tremendous? 

Cousin Mose.

Quote from: Wheezer on May 14, 2010, 08:05:39 PM
If they'd a-done that for President Harding, he'd be alive yet.

QuoteWhile Clifford used his break time Monday to bang out a few pointed e-mails to GOP leaders asking for help in getting his poster back, King Middle School Principal Mike McCarthy started getting phone calls from rank-and-file Republicans who were upset by what they said they had seen in Clifford's classroom.... They also objected to the contents of a closed cardboard box they found near Clifford's desk. Upon opening it for a look-see, they found copies of the U.S. Constitution printed and donated to the school by (gasp) the American Civil Liberties Union.

A 'small government' movement railing against tyranny while acting like brownshirts? Go figure.

Quote from: Yeti on May 14, 2010, 06:49:09 PM
wtf

Don't try to pretend you didn't expect this.

Would it be hijacking this thread to note here that I'd like the opportunity to punch Dan Carcillo in his dirtbag drama queen face?

Going back to Eden, then...

We've talked about Smokey as Satan or Satan-like alot.

The flipside of Satan as the paragon of evil (tempting Adam and Eve to sin against God) is Satan as a rebellious "culture hero" (in the mold of Prometheus), who grants man the gift of a god-like knowledge that God is trying to deny them. The "fall" of man was occasioned by the birth of human consciousness and free-will (both man's blessing and his curse), and saw the dawn of human civilization.

Perhaps it is "in [man's] very nature to sin" (as Jacob claims Smokey believes). But, by the same token, it's human nature to strive towards god-like knowledge. To fly too close to the sun on those wings of pastrami.

QuoteMAN IN BLACK: There are very smart men among us. Men who are curious about how things work.

In both the stories of Prometheus and Eden, this striving and the sin of disobedience to God are directly intertwined.

Now, if the writers of Lost indeed looked to Satan as a model for the Man in Black (and I still think that's a big part of his character), a major source for them would have likely been Lucifer (the "light-bearer") in Milton's "Paradise Lost." As it turns out, the connection between Lucifer and Prometheus is particularly pronounced in Milton's poem. Pronounced enough to inspire an entire vein of literary criticism on the topic...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucifer_and_Prometheus
http://books.google.com/books?id=MsR909HjyGkC&printsec=frontcover

QuoteIt thus happens that Prometheus, the sinner and culture-hero, can be detected in the Satan of Paradise Lost. Milton's Satan has absorbed so many Promethean qualities that we are in danger of admiring him and sympathizing with him. Satan is in trespass and thus sinful; but at the same time he represents our (Greek and unregenerate) aspiration towards new and higher levels of existence, our human battle against heavy and indifferent odds.

What pushes against this tack a bit for me is the fact that Smokey doesn't seem to give a shit about the people he lives and works with. Yeah, he's helping them find this amazingly awesome Light that Not-Mother and Jacob won't trust them with. (And later on, he presents himself as a liberating figure to Sawyer and his other recruits, freeing them from the island and from Jacob's manipulations.)

But, while Prometheus was a hero to men for siding with them against a tyranical God who wanted to kill them all, Smokey's not really doing it for them as much as he's using their curiosity and industry to get himself off of the island.

In fact, he has nothing but contempt for the people he's lived with for over two thirds of his life.

That seems far from "heroic."

All that said, he's now a kind of tragic (and increasingly sympathetic) figure...

Quote from: Dr. Nguyen Van Falk on February 23, 2010, 11:39:31 AM
http://lostpedia.wikia.com/wiki/The_Substitute_transcript

QuoteLOCKE: What I am is trapped. And I've been trapped for so long that I don't even remember what it feels like to be free. Maybe you can understand that. But before I was trapped, I was a man, James. Just like you.

SAWYER: I'm havin' a hard time believin' that...

LOCKE: You can believe whatever you want, that's the truth. I know what it's like to feel joy... to feel pain, anger, fear... to experience betrayal. I know what it's like to lose someone you love.

Not to mention "special."

So I'm kind of starting to pull for him. A bit.

Second, the fire of the gods...

I've been more or less convinced to stay on Jacob's side of things for a while now. But in the back of my mind there's always been a sense that everything could still flip-flop along these lines...

Quote from: Dr. Nguyen Van Falk on February 24, 2010, 12:41:54 AM

Quote from: R-V on February 23, 2010, 09:33:33 PM
So is anyone else squarely on the side of the Man in Black in this upcoming rumble? The recurring theme throughout all these flashsideways is that all these people would be just fine if not for Jacob and his sneaky meddling.

I'm not so sure.

On the one hand, I've been prepared for a "the evil guy is good" twist for a while now.

Even if EvilLocke is a Satan type, there's plenty of room to look at him the other way around as a hero to man. Like Prometheus, who stole the fire from the Gods for man, Satan in the Garden of Eden can be viewed as a liberating figure, opening men's eyes to their free will through the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

...

And, in this episode, Smokey felt like he had a serious Prometheus-stealing-fire-from-the-gods thing going on. (Which, again, isn't necessarily inconsistent with him being a Satan type. More on that in a moment.)

http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.01.0132:card=42

QuoteFor the gods keep hidden from men the means of life. Else you would easily do work enough in a day to supply you for a full year even without working; soon would you put away your rudder over the smoke, and the fields worked by ox and sturdy mule would run to waste. But Zeus in the anger of his heart hid it, because Prometheus the crafty deceived him; therefore he planned sorrow and mischief against men. He hid fire; but that the noble son of Iapetus stole again for men from Zeus the counsellor in a hollow fennel-stalk, so that Zeus who delights in thunder did not see it. But afterwards Zeus who gathers the clouds said to him in anger: "Son of Iapetus, surpassing all in cunning, you are glad that you have outwitted me and stolen fire—a great plague to you yourself and to men that shall be. But I will give men as the price for fire an evil thing in which they may all be glad of heart while they embrace their own destruction."

(Incidentally, that "evil thing" created to bring men to destruction? Woman. [ high-fives Yeti ])

Prometheus is a prototypical "culture hero."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Culture_hero

QuoteA culture hero is a mythological hero specific to some group (cultural, ethnic, racial, religious, etc.) who changes the world through invention or discovery. A typical culture hero might be credited as the discoverer of fire, or agriculture, songs, tradition and religion, and is usually the most important legendary figure of a people, sometimes as the founder of its ruling dynasty.

In fact, he secures mankind much more than fire. Not least of all, he created man in the first place. And, in "Prometheus Bound," he's proclaimed "universal succour of mankind"...

http://classics.mit.edu/Aeschylus/prometheus.html

QuoteBut hear the sequel and the more admire
What arts, what aids I cleverly evolved.
The chiefest that, if any man fell sick,
There was no help for him, comestible,
Lotion or potion; but for lack of drugs
They dwindled quite away; until I taught them
To compound draughts and mixtures sanative,
Wherewith they now are armed against disease.
I staked the winding path of divination
And was the first distinguisher of dreams,
The true from false; and voices ominous
Of meaning dark interpreted; and tokens
Seen when men take the road; and augury
By flight of all the greater crook-clawed birds
With nice discrimination I defined;
These by their nature fair and favourable,
Those, flattered with fair name. And of each sort
The habits I described; their mutual feuds
And friendships and the assemblages they hold.
And of the plumpness of the inward parts
What colour is acceptable to the Gods,
The well-streaked liver-lobe and gall-bladder.
Also by roasting limbs well wrapped in fat
And the long chine, I led men on the road
Of dark and riddling knowledge; and I purged
The glancing eye of fire, dim before,
And made its meaning plain. These are my works.
Then, things beneath the earth, aids hid from man,
Brass, iron, silver, gold, who dares to say
He was before me in discovering?
None, I wot well, unless he loves to babble.
And in a single word to sum the whole-
All manner of arts men from Prometheus learned.

And for this he is punished by Zeus: chained to a rock (trapped) until he was set free by another great hero to man, Heracles (incidentally, Zeus' favorite son).

Okay. Now for the really obnoxious posts.

About that Light...

Quote from: R-V on May 12, 2010, 10:18:16 AM
Jacob's first goal is to protect The Light/Pandora's Box/Ark of the Covenant/whatever you want to call it, because it is the source of all the good stuff in life. It can't be destroyed because then none of us would be able to take naps or eat bacon. It can't be found or exploited by Man, because then we'd become corrupt jagoffs obsessed with naps and bacon, and would eventually melt like the Nazis at the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark.

All great. I like the Ark of the Covenant comparison.

Maybe it's even something bigger: something as amorphous and all-encompassing as "God him/itself"—again, kind of like the Force. Is there a God down that hole?

(Actually, the Ark of the Covenant is said to be God's "footstool" on Earth. Wherever the Ark is, that's where God resides.)

http://lostpedia.wikia.com/wiki/Across_the_Sea_transcript

Quote
MOTHER: Don't go in there.

BOY IN BLACK: What's down there?

MOTHER: Light. The warmest, brightest light you've ever seen or felt. And we must make sure that no one ever finds it.

BOY IN BLACK: It's beautiful...

MOTHER: Yes it is. And that's why they want it. Because a little bit of this very same light is inside of every man. But they always want more.

JACOB: Can they take it?

MOTHER: No. But they would try. And if they tried they could put it out. And if the light goes out here... it goes out everywhere. And so I've protected this place. But I can't protect it forever.

BOY IN BLACK: Then who will?

MOTHER: It will have to be one of you.

Quote
JACOB: What's down there?

MOTHER: Life, death, rebirth. It's the source, the heart of the island.

The comparisons I kept going to while watching were:

a) The Tree of Life and The Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil planted in the middle of the garden of Eden, watered by a river.

b) The fire of the gods.


First, the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, from which Adam and Eve were forbidden to eat...

http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Genesis+2&version=NIV

QuoteNow the LORD God had planted a garden in the east, in Eden; and there he put the man he had formed. And the LORD God made all kinds of trees grow out of the ground—trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food. In the middle of the garden were the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

...

And the LORD God commanded the man, "You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die."

http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Genesis+3&version=NIV

QuoteNow the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the LORD God had made. He said to the woman, "Did God really say, 'You must not eat from any tree in the garden'?"

The woman said to the serpent, "We may eat fruit from the trees in the garden, but God did say, 'You must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will die.' "

"You will not surely die," the serpent said to the woman. "For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil."

After Adam and Eve disobeyed God by eating the fruit of that tree and got kicked out of Eden, God denied them access to the fruit of the other tree...

QuoteAnd the LORD God said, "The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever." So the LORD God banished him from the Garden of Eden to work the ground from which he had been taken. After he drove the man out, he placed on the east side of the Garden of Eden cherubim and a flaming sword flashing back and forth to guard the way to the tree of life.

The fruit of the first tree gave man god-like knowledge. Effectively, it's what gave humans their consciousness, separate from the godhead, and free-will. Getting booted from Eden also marks the birth of agriculture.

The fruit of the second tree grants eternal life, but good luck getting past the guard.