🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <SLAGLE.92Jun3001118@sgi417.msd.lmsc.lockheed.com> slagle@lmsc.lockheed.com writes:
>
>All of which would seem to argue for a small-scale, flexible
>commuter transportation system.  Maybe we should try individual
>commuter units.  Maybe we could call them auto-mobiles, to
>mean self-transport units.  You suppose anybody'd buy one?
>--
>----
>Mark E. Slagle                                 PO Box 61059
>slagle@lmsc.lockheed.com                       Sunnyvale, CA   94088
>408-756-0895                                   USA

Millions of people are leading desperate, poverty-stricken lives with little
hope.  All of which would seem to argue for a cheap, readily-available,
euphoria-inducing substance.  Maybe we could call it crack.  Think anyone
would buy it?

Mark's logic rests on that tired old neoclassical assumption that unrestrained
individual self-interest leads to the greatest good.  Of course, all human
beings are rational actors and capable of careful, critical analysis.  Maybe
more neoclassicists should study some basic social psychology.  Maybe they 
could explain the phenomenon of making runs on banks, the tragedy of the 
commons, and similar situations in which the decisions made separately by many
individuals lead to outcomes which none of them desire.  I wonder if Mark
enjoys driving in the Bay Area during rush hour.  I know I sure get a kick out
of it.  

Scott
(murt@leland.stanford.edu)
Of course I don't speak for Stanford.