This reminds me of how Bhutan is (mis)managed.

maybe these cats are cousins of the Hedonic Price Deflator crew (?)

Their happiness metric probably isn’t so philsophically different from GDP anyway. Both try to create an objective measure of subjective values.

In both cases, what you’re really trying to measure is how much value was produced. But as Mises pointed out, interpersonal value comparisons simply aren’t possible. So GDP is a broken concept.

“..there is always soma, delicious soma, half a gramme for a half-holiday, a gramme for a week-end, two grammes for a trip to the gorgeous East, three for a dark eternity on the moon…”

“By this time the soma had begun to work. Eyes shone, cheeks were flushed, the inner light of universal benevolence broke out on every face in happy, friendly smiles. Even Bernard felt himself a little melted.”

Now, now, Nick. You’re just going to give yourself a bad case of apoplexy. I want you to take out your nice, unbleached, organic meditation pillow, assume the Lotus position, inhale deeply, and on the exhale repeat after me:

It’s not easy being green. :-]

I’m going to take a cue from Maddox, circa 2001, whose anti-vegetarian campaign still makes me giggle

Here’s my plan to irritate the Friends of the Earth: For every natural resource you don’t consume, I’m going to consume three. So, I’m not just canceling out your lifestyle; it’s actually making things worse by consuming MORE than would have been consumed in the first place.

IMHO, I ate my meditation pillow, and you’re wrong- it would be very easy to be Green. I’d just have to say ‘Stop That’ all the time!
What’s it like having a last name that ends in ‘ho’?

I had no idea who “Friends of the Earth” was until I read this blog. So I looked them up, saw that they work with legislation to use tax dollars for “environmental” purposes and immediately closed the website in disgust.

What disgusts me is what is commonly referred to as environmentalism these days, and the responses it provokes. I would consider myself an environmentalist if it didn’t put me in league with these sorts of people as I do it from my own accord based on the logic and reason I have used. No one needs to tell me to not buy a plasma tv for me to buy an lcd. No one needs to tell me how bad global warming is for me to reduce using gasoline, as it is one of the most heavily subsidized products in our country’s history. I would rather ride a bicycle than continue to pay into the subsidies, especially since the ethanol hoax is being pushed upon us at the pump.

But, what also bothers me is that someone would actually base their actions and views on those of these hypocrites, instead of using logic. Is it logical to use 3 natural resources for every 1 someone doesn’t use? I say no.

First off, what does that really mean. Let’s say there is x amount of unused natural resources in the world. The most that can be used is x, so to say you’re going to use 3x is impossible. Obviously the math would vary depending on how many people are not using the 1x and how many people are using the 3x, but I think you can see my point. People actually get worked up into following these half-jokes, but it’s just not reasonable. For instance, let’s tie this in with vegetarianism/veganism since it was brought up. By common conservative estimates it takes 10 calories of grain to produce 1 calorie of beef for human consumption. Over 90% of the corn grown in this country is used to feed animals. Who is one of the biggest recipients of corporate welfare in this country and makes huge amounts of profit from corn-based products for animal (and human) consumption? Archer Daniels Midland. So, in theory you could reduce ADM’s revenue by 90% by switching to a vegan lifestyle (or at least knowing where your meat came from and knowing that it wasn’t fed from these crops). Of course, you would also have to avoid their prevalence in the vegetarian/vegan community with soybeans (mock meats and such). My main point is, though, if you are trying to not be a slave to companies such as ADM wouldn’t it be prudent to not consume 3x as much of something that consumes 10x as much of their product?

That being said, few things are as annoying as vegetarians/vegans and environmentalists constantly preaching, so hopefully I’ve just entered some new ideas into the argument. I have no desire to change the way people act (as long as they don’t infringe upon my property rights, and animals are property as Rothbard so eloquently pointed out), but would love to see people change the way they act themselves. I may be the only “vegan,” “environmentalist,” “anarcho-capitalist” out there, although I despise the first two labels. True environmentalism would actually be achieved through an anarcho-capitalist society as, by definition, you can’t pollute your own land and you would be fined heavily for damaging the property of another.

At this point it is late and I’m probably starting to ramble. This is my first post on my favorite website, and I welcome any comments on anything I brought up.

Hey George, I realize it was a joke. It just reminds me of things my old uber-neoconservative “republican” roommate would spit out from his Fox News reports and take seriously, though. He would actually do something like this to his own detriment. I apologize for not giving you more credit! I have no problem bashing vegetarians and environmentalists, or at least what is passed off as them these days, as they are some of the weirdest, hypocritical people I have ever had the “privilege” of associating with.