So, once we’re all on the same page about the impossibility of central planning, why can’t we outline a framework for what goals our country should persue (e.g. equal cultivation of individual capacities) without assuming that bringing this about is uniquely the province of governmental institutions.

This doesn’t mean that libertarians are right when they say that government should not be involved AT ALL in helping us reach our goals. Much less does it mean that, as many comments suggest, we should refrain from even discussing our goals out of fear of what government might do if it tried to help us prsue them.

So, once we’re all on the same page about the impossibility of central planning, why can’t we outline a framework for what goals our country should persue (e.g. equal cultivation of individual capacities) without assuming that bringing this about is uniquely the province of governmental institutions.

This doesn’t mean that libertarians are right when they say that government should not be involved AT ALL in helping us reach our goals. Much less does it mean that, as many comments suggest, we should refrain from even discussing our goals out of fear of what government might do if it tried to help us prsue them.

What are some of the problems with Liam’s argument you havn’t seen mentioned here?

What are some of the problems with Liam’s argument you havn’t seen mentioned here?

I suspect that you would have to agree with me that the costs and benefits that you have discussed are extremely difficult (if not impossible) to measure accurately.

How does your theory address the inevitable errors in redistributive policies?

For example, what if (as I suspect) the marginal benefit of spending an additional billion dollars on primary public schools does not actually exceed its costs? Then you will have immorally (I think) obstructed many people’s pursuit of their potentials.

At least in Will’s world, those who misallocate resources only hurt themselves (and others who willingly cooperate with their schemes). And, they will likely improve their theories after each mistake and will do better next time. Perhaps the investment in public goods will be suboptimal, but optimal investment in public goods in unavailable to human beings with imperfect knowledge.

In your world, there will be a bureaucracy that will systematically victimize innocents and will be unlikely to even recognize its mistakes in many cases, let alone learn from them and improve its behavior.

So, I ask you: Even if a perfectly designed and executed restributive policy would be just, why should anyone think that an imperfect one executed by fallible human beings would be just?

I suspect that you would have to agree with me that the costs and benefits that you have discussed are extremely difficult (if not impossible) to measure accurately.

How does your theory address the inevitable errors in redistributive policies?

For example, what if (as I suspect) the marginal benefit of spending an additional billion dollars on primary public schools does not actually exceed its costs? Then you will have immorally (I think) obstructed many people’s pursuit of their potentials.

At least in Will’s world, those who misallocate resources only hurt themselves (and others who willingly cooperate with their schemes). And, they will likely improve their theories after each mistake and will do better next time. Perhaps the investment in public goods will be suboptimal, but optimal investment in public goods in unavailable to human beings with imperfect knowledge.

In your world, there will be a bureaucracy that will systematically victimize innocents and will be unlikely to even recognize its mistakes in many cases, let alone learn from them and improve its behavior.

So, I ask you: Even if a perfectly designed and executed restributive policy would be just, why should anyone think that an imperfect one executed by fallible human beings would be just?

You seem to suggest that this productivity argument would be mistaken, since redistribution of wealth designed as an investment in primary capacities would more than pay for itself through increased productivity. You happily assume that a government, formed out of a conglomeration of individuals with competing interests and a limited understanding of the very complicated and massive network of cooperation depending on humanity capacities, would be able to improve this system by fiat. I don’t think I need to spell out in any more detail why I might be skeptical.

The problem becomes more acute once we recognize, as you seemingly acknowledge by omission, that it’s an open question what these primary capacities actually are. It is up for dispute, as it rightfully should be in an open, liberal society, given the weightiness of the question and its close relation to personal values and identity.

It also seems like a fetishization of equality to limit our attention to the “primary capacities”, which are accessible to everyone, and necessary to everyone for the realization of one’s good. The capacity to excel in basketball, or in art, or in humor, or in philospohy, may not be open to everyone, but there is an enormous value to a society in which different people are able to excel at diverse capacities. Think of Naismith’s wondrously beneficial innovation – it is so valuable because it allowed a set of individuals who otherwise would not have had any particularly striking talents to thrive in a new niche. Instead of letting “equality” stifle us into more efficiently pursuing the same old potentialities, let’s create a society where innovation allows us to recognize potentialities that we’d never known before. We want a society in which more and more capacities become relevant, and become pathways to success, excellence, and meaning, so that larger and larger portions of society are able to flourish in multifarious ways. Devoting an enormous set of resources to allowing everyone to “adequately” develop that limited set of common capacities so that their lives may reach that minimum standard of meaningfulness will not help us create this thriving society. The society that is most effective at driving this kind of innovation and diversification of meaningful pursuits, again, looks a lot like Will’s libertarian paradise.

I hope that this comment has come across as polite, since I’m glad you’ve jumped into the fray here, Liam (and I’m a bit excited/nervous/apprehensive about jumping into the fray myself). I know that it won’t come across as a well-framed question, because it obviously is not, but I hope you’ll be able to offer a response, since I’m interested in hearing what you have to say.

You seem to suggest that this productivity argument would be mistaken, since redistribution of wealth designed as an investment in primary capacities would more than pay for itself through increased productivity. You happily assume that a government, formed out of a conglomeration of individuals with competing interests and a limited understanding of the very complicated and massive network of cooperation depending on humanity capacities, would be able to improve this system by fiat. I don’t think I need to spell out in any more detail why I might be skeptical.

The problem becomes more acute once we recognize, as you seemingly acknowledge by omission, that it’s an open question what these primary capacities actually are. It is up for dispute, as it rightfully should be in an open, liberal society, given the weightiness of the question and its close relation to personal values and identity.

It also seems like a fetishization of equality to limit our attention to the “primary capacities”, which are accessible to everyone, and necessary to everyone for the realization of one’s good. The capacity to excel in basketball, or in art, or in humor, or in philospohy, may not be open to everyone, but there is an enormous value to a society in which different people are able to excel at diverse capacities. Think of Naismith’s wondrously beneficial innovation – it is so valuable because it allowed a set of individuals who otherwise would not have had any particularly striking talents to thrive in a new niche. Instead of letting “equality” stifle us into more efficiently pursuing the same old potentialities, let’s create a society where innovation allows us to recognize potentialities that we’d never known before. We want a society in which more and more capacities become relevant, and become pathways to success, excellence, and meaning, so that larger and larger portions of society are able to flourish in multifarious ways. Devoting an enormous set of resources to allowing everyone to “adequately” develop that limited set of common capacities so that their lives may reach that minimum standard of meaningfulness will not help us create this thriving society. The society that is most effective at driving this kind of innovation and diversification of meaningful pursuits, again, looks a lot like Will’s libertarian paradise.

I hope that this comment has come across as polite, since I’m glad you’ve jumped into the fray here, Liam (and I’m a bit excited/nervous/apprehensive about jumping into the fray myself). I know that it won’t come across as a well-framed question, because it obviously is not, but I hope you’ll be able to offer a response, since I’m interested in hearing what you have to say.

If we all knew what our capacities were, we would not have any drive to find our limit, or to even wonder what our limit was. I think that your idealized world, while perhaps optimal in distribution of labor and resources, would be rather like Hell, because no one would have any hope, and only the people at the top of each capacity tree would have incentives to reach the perfection of their skills. If, across all possible paths, the best I could ever hope to do was to be the world’s 3 millionth best software programmer, then what you have told me is that despite my best intentions and effort, my impact on the world will be essentially zero. A public good? I would call your proposal a public evil.

Luckily, your proposed measurements cannot be made, so we are left to live lives of wonderful ignorance, striving to find ways to improve ourselves, hoping that we might “make it big”, despite the fact that more often than not, it will never happen.

I am struck by how similar your idealized world sounds like the world of IT in ‘A Wrinkle In Time’. IT’s world was perfectly organized by capacity as well, if I recall correctly.

I hope I was sufficiently polite in my dissent