Living Within Limits - Chapter 5

Default Status

In law, the default position is expressed in the well-known statement: "Innocent until proven guilty."  Innocence is the default position as a matter of method, not fact.  The burden of proof rests upon the investigator and the evidence to prove otherwise.  Failure to do so would suggest the justification of the default position (innocence) as distillation from facts.

Perpetual Motion Machines

In science, as in law, there are default positions, for example the 1st and 2nd laws of Thermodynamics, stating that energy must be conserved, and that work releases heat (in a closed system).  This has not kept man, being an inquisitive & indominable creature, from pursuing the perpetual motion machine - a device which would convert heat from the surrounding into work (reducing entropy).  Such a device would refute the fundamental basis of thermodynamics.  Unfortunately for us (but fortunate for the fabric of creation), our ingenuity has yet to match our imagination on this subject. 

In science, the perpetual motion machine is considered an 'original sin', because it violates the Postulate of Impotence defined by the default position.  In other words, default positions define the limits that govern modern science.

Soft sciences are not bound by hard rules...

However, modern day economics currently has a default position that more closely resembles the perpetual motion machine, rather than real limits (such as the conservation of energy).  Impotence is not a term well-liked by economists.  Neoclassical econ can be well summarized by George Gilder, who in his book Wealth and Poverty said that

'The US must overcome the materialistic fallacy: the illusion that resources and capital are essentially things which can run out, rather than products of the human will and imagination which in freedom are inexhaustible.'

Translation: Capital can solve any problem; wealth can be created from the imagination; therefore poverty and limits can be overcome if we will it (God-like) - (Scientific Translation: Perpetual Motion Machine)

I'm hungry...

What is ironic is that there is one rule of economics that is so basic, it may not even be taught in Econ 101, yet is known by all: "There is no free lunch".  This is the oft-disregarded default position of economics.  By the time students graduate Econ 101, however, this truth will have been drowned out by far more useless knowledge.

But doesn't history tell us otherwise...

As my friends are keen to point out, since the 1700's we have made significant strides in progress.  Standard of living has been going up exponentially for the past 300 odd years.  Why should we expect the future to be any different?  This is a valid question, and I hope to address it in a future post.