Thursday, October 18, 2012

Natural Law remedy for systemic flaw: Civilization can be made sustainable and equitable

An unsustainable civilization is a consequence of a systemic flaw -- Natural law points to a solution.

We can think of human rights as natural law of social interaction. If human rights are a kind of natural law, then basic claims that citizens might make (such as a claim to a right to share in deciding limits to pollution and limits to rates of taking of natural resources) can be seen as manifestations of a natural phenomenon. Citizens must assert their claims to natural rights, and must act so as to create systems of government that assure these rights are respected in practice, to ensure the healthy functioning of society.

Presently, our system of government does not embody all natural rights in its functioning. The idea that natural wealth (what we might call commons or public property) ought to be shared equally is reflected in the writings of Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, John Stuart Mill, Thomas Paine, Adam Smith and others. Yet our society does not manifest this idea in practice. Natural wealth (or a monetary representation of that wealth) is not shared. Rates of putting pollution and depleting resources are not being held to limits acceptable to most people. We lack even a basic public interest poll to discern what most people would find acceptable regarding various kinds of impact on the environment.

This systemic flaw, this failure to embody a basic moral precept in practice, means that harm is done to the environment by industries without a direct and proportional economic cost being incurred. A consequence of this moral defect is that prices of things do not reflect environmental impacts such as pollution, resource depletion and habitat destruction. Prices lie to us about true costs, so we make bad decisions directly related to what kind of harmful impact is being hidden. A visceral example of this is the intense crowding of animals in what is sometimes called the 'animal exploitation industry': By crowding animals together more and by feeding antibiotics to them, expenses can be reduced and profits increased, but at potentially very high cost: More crowding means more stress and suffering of animals held captive; Routine use of antibiotics means more rapid loss of effectiveness of antibiotics to fight disease in human beings, as pathogenic bacteria are given abundant opportunity to develop resistance.

The environment is more polluted and antibiotic resistance develops faster because industries are allowed to externalize their costs. These adverse impacts--the costs imposed on society and on animal captives--are not reflected in prices.

Living systems, including human society, are delicate, intricate phenomena. It is always easier to tear down and destroy than it is to build and create. This reflects the nature of the underlying enabling conditions that are necessary in order for any creative or developmental process to unfold. The conditions necessary for maintenance of a healthy society require order and structure rather than chaos or randomness. This is true whether we are talking about creating a tower of blocks, a work of art or a civilization.

A civilization is stronger and more resilient when most everyone believes that we will all be better off by working to improve on what we have made. We cannot have many people wanting to destroy this nascent global civilization to see what else might take its place. For the benefit of all, there must be very few of us who believe that the world we have created is ugly or hurtful or evil. We need a society that all can believe in and feel glad to be a part of. Among other things, this means that the rules we live by must be seen as fair. It also means that we must have a system that recognizes the people as the rightful owners of natural resource wealth, so that the world we create together will not be a world that has more paving or pollution or noise or extraction of limited resources than what most people would say is acceptable. Then we will have a true democracy.


If we limit or discourage excessive taking of resources... or putting of pollution... or degradation of our view of the stars from outdoor lighting... by charging a fee to offending industries, then the fee proceeds (a monetary representation of what we all own in common) could be shared equally among all the world's people. (A system of random polls can show us when we have reached a point where impacts that had been excessive have been brought into line with what most people think is acceptable. At that point, the associated fees will be set at the right amount.) We will have a more equitable society. No one would live in abject poverty.

Equal sharing of natural wealth cures the defect that we see in the thriving and collapse of civilization. It also makes the boom and bust business 'cycle' into a less wildly gyrating phenomenon.

Biological Model for Politics and Economics: Human Society as Neural Network

Friday, October 12, 2012

Moral foundation allows us to adapt to circumstances

Our global civilization is headed for another great collapse unless we bring our behavior more into accord with our principles. 

Prices should honestly represent costs.

Natural resources belong to all. They should be shared.

Intelligence is the ability to make connections that foster adaptive responses, to preserve the life and promote the health of an organism. Intelligent societies respond to environmental conditions in ways that promote sustainability. Societies lack intelligence if actions by members cause damage that is not readily apparent to those members. Then individuals may unknowingly do things that harm the interests of all members of society, and that may even cause harm to the larger community of life. When we do things that cause harm and cannot see the effect of our actions, we cannot respond in a way so as to reduce or stop the harm. We cannot consider the effects of our actions on others if we remain unaware of those effects. We are unable to abide by the basic moral precept that demands that we not do to others that which we would not have done to ourselves.

Economists call the disconnect between what it costs to produce things on the one hand (including costs in terms of pollution and resource depletion) and the prices of products offered in the market on the other hand 'externalities'. Fees charged to industries according to how much ecological damage they cause would make prices of things reflect the harm (the costs) that otherwise would remain hidden from consumers. A democratic society would set the fees so that they are just high enough to make industries try hard enough to reduce pollution, resource depletion and other harmful environmental impacts. We will know that industries are, in fact, trying hard enough for a particular kind of impact when most people in a random poll agree that the amount of that kind of impact currently being produced is acceptable, with a good balance being struck between freedom and constraint, so that our economic system can function and human needs can be met on the one hand, and the interests of future generations and the larger living community are protected on the other hand.

We could decide that it will serve the public interest to limit the rate of taking of natural resources (by applying a fee), so that the shock of having to adapt to the scarcity of resources can be reduced by spreading resource availability out over a longer timeframe; or so that, in the case of renewable resources, a sustainable and healthy resource base can be maintained.

We could decide, collectively (by means of a random poll), that it is in the interest of stargazers (that's most of us from time to time) to dim our outdoor lighting somewhat on a regular basis, so that we might enjoy a better view of the night sky. Perhaps we would want to further reduce outdoor lighting on select nights, to avoid disorienting night-migrating birds, perhaps, or so that we might more fully appreciate occasional meteor showers, thin crescent (blue) moons and passing comets. A system of fees on outdoor lighting could achieve this. The fees would float up or down, if there were an imbalance between the number of people who want more outdoor lighting vs. the number who want less. Lighting fixtures could be designed to automatically dim or shut off when the fee reached a threshold amount, as determined by the user. Small changes in opinion about acceptable levels of light pollution (or any other environmental impact) would translate to modest but real changes in actual conditions. The reality, the actual human impacts on the Earth would come to match what most people feel is most acceptable. When the reality matches what the people want, then we can say we live in a democracy.

Outdoor lighting is but one of the many kinds of impacts on the environment that human beings must limit, in an efficient and fair way, if we are to build a global society that is sustainable and consistent with democratic principles. The fee system could result in the world that the largest number of people say they want to live in. We would have a more democratic society. When prices show us the harmful effect on the environment of what we do, we will choose the more environmentally-friendly habits and practices. Honest prices will promote sustainability.

John Champagne

@TallPhilosopher

Equal sharing of natural wealth promotes justice and sustainability: A solution to the matter of instability we know as the 'arc of civilization' (thrive and collapse)

Biological Model for Politics and Economics