>So precisely who is going to pay for all this, and the reduction in growth it’s going to entail?
Who is going to pay for the billions of corpses of men, women, and children? (And the "reduction in growth" that that entails)
>It’s very rational for business firms to lobby against externalities being priced in. It’s rational for ranchers to cut forests for economic gains. And it’s rational for the many many people who are being propelled up out of poverty to want better food, clothing and power.
This confuses "profitable" with "rational".
Motives (e.g. the profit motive, or altruism, or thinking about the commons) are not "rational" or "irrational", they are personal and sentimental.
One can think rationally about what their actions will bring on. The decision depends on their intentions and feelings, which themselves have little to do with rationality.
Picking the most profitable of two courses of action, externalities be damned, doesn't require reasoned thinking (only as much as to figure out which is the most profitable).
But while calculation "this will bring me profit" involves rational thinking, so does the calculation "this will also eventually destroy this place, or hurt society".
People are perfectly able to reason about the general (e.g. societal) and future impact of their actions, and avoid doing stuff that will have negative consequences.
It doesn't take irrationality to do that -- just not being a selfish greedy prick, which is orthogonal to rational thinking.
Who is going to pay for the billions of corpses of men, women, and children? (And the "reduction in growth" that that entails)
>It’s very rational for business firms to lobby against externalities being priced in. It’s rational for ranchers to cut forests for economic gains. And it’s rational for the many many people who are being propelled up out of poverty to want better food, clothing and power.
This confuses "profitable" with "rational".
Motives (e.g. the profit motive, or altruism, or thinking about the commons) are not "rational" or "irrational", they are personal and sentimental.
One can think rationally about what their actions will bring on. The decision depends on their intentions and feelings, which themselves have little to do with rationality.
Picking the most profitable of two courses of action, externalities be damned, doesn't require reasoned thinking (only as much as to figure out which is the most profitable).
But while calculation "this will bring me profit" involves rational thinking, so does the calculation "this will also eventually destroy this place, or hurt society".
People are perfectly able to reason about the general (e.g. societal) and future impact of their actions, and avoid doing stuff that will have negative consequences.
It doesn't take irrationality to do that -- just not being a selfish greedy prick, which is orthogonal to rational thinking.