[ExI] Limits of human modification

[Prometheus Awards]

[Attributions stripped, since they were confusing me.]
>>> Choose any 2 economists ?and they will give you 2 mutually exclusive
>>> ways that they insist is the one and only way to increase the GDP.
>>> And that is even without CRISPER.
>>
>> This is incorrect. There is a near-unanimous agreement among
>> economists on many fundamental findings of economics,
>
>In the USA the Federal Reserve is thinking about raising interest
>rates in December, half the world's economists think that would be a
>wonderful idea, the other half thinks it would be a terrible idea,

This is roughly true, but it doesn't refute the statement that "There
is a near-unanimous agreement among economists on many fundamental
findings of economics". Most of macro-economics is outside the
fundamental findings that there is near-universal agreement on. Which,
of course, means that the statement above starting "This is incorrect"
isn't a reasonable rejoinder to the preceding statement on
disagreements about how to increase the GDP.

Economists agree on many things. One is that trade is pareto
improving, so each of the hypothetical economists would be willing to
agree that reducing barriers to trade would increase GDP (on both
sides of the trade barrier). So even the first statement above isn't
right. You may be able to choose two random economists and expect them
to have inconsistent favorite prescriptions for improving GDP, but
it's unlikely either would claim that her proposal is the only way.

> There is a reason economics is called the dismal science.

This one is easier. The reason it's called the "dismal science" is
that economics can't be relied on to produce a consensus that your
favorite social intervention will have the consequences you want. A
nineteenth century historian coined it because economists of the time
didn't agree with his prescription that slavery would improve the
conditions of blacks in the West Indies.

Chris
----
Every machine that's put into a factory displaces labour. [...] The
man who's put to work [on] the machine isn't any better off than he
was before; the three men that are thrown out of a job are very much
worse off. But the cure isn't Socialism, [it's] for somebody to buckle
to and make a job for the three men. Nevil Shute, _Ruined City_

Chris Hibbert
hibbert at mydruthers.com
http://mydruthers.com
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