Friday, March 29, 2002

Value and the Environment. The environmentalists constantly bemoan the "crises" of depleted resources: trees being cut down, oil reserves being drained, and animal species becoming endangered. They make statements that seem sensible--such as, that it is obvious that these resources all have value to us and that they therefore must be conserved.ÊHowever, what is ignored is that what is valuable can only be determined through the market process. If value is not determined by the voluntary interactions of humans all pursuing their own ends, then it can only be determined by one individual forcing his own judgment on others. That would not be true value assignment though; it would be slavery. Trees, oil, and animals only have value with regard to how they satisfy human wants, so the market process is the only means by which their true value can be utilized by individuals. If these are truly valued, then as their stock decreases, their prices will climb until they only satisfy the most urgent wants. [Ludwig von Mises Institute] This article was written by a college student, and serves as a nice counterexample to the image of college students as a bunch of brainless pseudo-socialist twits. comment () trackback ()  11:43:31 AM     Arabs Denounce West Bank Attack. Palestinian refugees burned tires and clashed with police in several cities Friday, protesting Israel's assault on Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, which Arab leaders denounced as a rejection of their new collective call for peace. [AP World News] The ironic thing here is that burning tires and clashing with police is unusually civilized behavior for Palestinians. Who know, maybe if Arafat is killed they'll be driven to Ghandi-style peaceful resistance? comment () trackback ()  11:40:18 AM     PDA Handwriting System Released. Connects sheet of paper to device [allNetDevices Wireless News] The device is for Palm and PocketPC, and will cost $99. Of course, it would be simpler to just by Newton MessagePad 2100 for about $150, thus saving lots of money overall and winding up with the best PDA on the market. comment () trackback ()  9:37:53 AM     Symantec ships SystemWorks 2.0 early [MacNN] Someone has a very strange idea of what constitutes "early." comment () trackback ()  9:22:06 AM     Virtual kingdom richer than Bulgaria. The virtual setting for the online game Everquest has been found to be the 77th richest country in the world. [BBC News: sci/tech] The article doesn't mention it, but this "virtual country" doesn't have any taxes or regulations, and there aren't any real-world taxes or regulations that affect it's economy. This allows it to have a gross national product per capita much higher than it would have if crippled by government theft. comment () trackback ()  9:20:38 AM

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