Journeyman Philosopher

Last month I started talking about the two different popular ways to view the world. On one side the lifeboat aphorism and on the other the spaceship aphorism. You can find the previous article here.

When I wrote I initially asked for responses to what you my readers thought. A response which was not only insightful but actually explained in more clarity than I the spaceship example follows:

I like to think of it this way: We are all on a spaceship but living in different sections and responsible for different tasks on that spaceship. The spaceship is Earth, and each section is a country/continent, some sections may be better off than others i.e. better staffed, more supplies etc. Some sections are more important than others and sections play favorites with each other, so they can pick who they help depending on what they get back from them, some sections want help, some sections want to be left alone. But the fact is if one section were to disappear the spaceship would stop functioning but at the same time each department has to ensure that they have what they need to do their job and maintain their section. Commented by Pooky

I agree with this assessment. I think the spaceship metaphor is most suitable for a fair representation of earth. My reason is that it seems accurate, whereas the lifeboat aphorism seems incompatible with the real state of affairs of earth.

What I wanted to discuss here is what I believe is a fundamental flaw with the lifeboat example that, if I remember my teachings correctly, supposedly inspired modern economists.

The lifeboat assumes that there is no such thing as renewable, thus maintainable, resources. It bases its claim on the concept that their are no self-sustaining resources, but thats just simply false.

This is clear as we think about what exactly you are doing in a lifeboat. You are only surviving, a lifeboat is not a sustainable situation. If you do not reach land, salvation, in time you will die. The fact is we aren’t just trying to protect ourselves for now, in reality we are trying to preserve our future (or at least I am). As there can be a future, just drifting and surviving for now seems non-sensical to me.

This is a very strong a misconception and I think in no way represents the real world. We do have resources that are sustainable (solar, wind, hydro), the fact that we choose to use resources that are unsustainable is of our own volition.

What I find of concern is that this justification actually influenced modern economic theories. Although when this idea came about it may have seemed more sensible, I assume perhaps because of a lack of understanding of renewable recourses, it now is non-sensical.

If it is the case that this theory that influenced our current economic theory is wrong, does this not shed doubt of the economic theory itself?

Tomorrow I will continue with an idea entitled ‘deep economics’ which touches on this issue.

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