From: hallam@Etna.ai.mit.edu
Date: Sun, 9 Jun 1996 05:57:57 +0800
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Subject: Re: [NOISE] Buying whales with digicash Re: Anonymous stock trades.
In-Reply-To: <199606081754.NAA21353@jekyll.piermont.com>
Message-ID: <9606081830.AA05221@Etna.ai.mit.edu>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain



>Sure, but Dr. Phill Hallam-Baker, D.Phil., was contending that
>Friedman said the free market solution was for people to voluntarily
>stop buying whale meat -- he wasn't even contending that Friedman said
>the whales should be owned. Dr. Phill Hallam-Baker, D.Phil., presented
>a portrait of Friedman that is so totally out of line with even the
>most fuzzy headed free market types that it is almost impossible to
>believe that he said anything of the sort.


Perry, 

	Apart from hero worship why do you believe that Friedman is not able to say 
anything ridiculous? I found the letter to be ridiculous which is why I remember it. 

	Since you were so certain that Hess was not a staff member of the Cato institute 
despite being listed as such on their home page is it not just a little possible that 
you might be wrong in this case?

	Plus, to say that such an analysis would be out of line with "even the most 
fuzzy headed free market types" is somewhat rich. I have heard plans to eliminate all 
government apart from the army, privatising roads and the police. I have heard numerous 
claims that monopolies cannot ever exist under any circumstances unless they are created 
by government. I have even heard it stated that had gun ownership been more widespread 
in the UK the Dunblane massacre would not have occurred. Whether  the teacher was 
expected to gun down Hamilton with the Kalashnikov she carried to school each day or 
whether the tots were expected to come to her aid with Smith and Westons I'm not sure. 
In short I don't think that there is any type of piffle that the "most fuzzy headed free 
market types" cannot offer.

	How to save the whales is a logical outcome of Friedman's thesis that markets 
are everything. It is unfortunately very common for great men to get megalomania and 
believe they have the solution to the worlds problems in one theory.

	The flaw in Perry's "stakeholder" theory is the same one in many academic 
theories. It assumes that most people are smart enough to realise their true interests. 
It assumes that people take a longer term look than they do. 

	
		Phill