Ipswich — Punshhh

Ugh, terrible place.

Ugh, terrible place.

I know, I'm closer to Norwich fortunately.

Fortunately I only have to go there once a year to visit my parents for Christmas. Tends to be a very boring week. The nightlife sucks.

Your overly long analysis simply ignores the fact that economies are part of the natural ecology of the Earth. The financial economy is really a function of the energy economy, regardless of how much wishful thinking goes into portraying the system as otherwise. And the idea that the economy is not complicated is absurd. — Janus

Well, it seems my overly long analysis wasn't long enough.

I'm responding to your point that "stopping the planes" would have some crazy economic consequences that would have easily outweighed the consequences of the disease, or at least it's reasonable to have such a posture in an age where opinions carry no onus to defend them critically and are just a "right" and none better than another.

I defined my use of the term economy as "that which keeps people alive" and I was quite clear I'm talking about short term measures.

If you want to bring the entire ecosystem into it, which is of course valid in the long term, but in the short term that people get food to eat and water to drink is something that is simply happening and could continue to happen even without planes flying. It's quite simple to keep people alive in a "can't fly crisis" that was created by governments to avoid a much worse crisis of "total exhaustion of the medical system, long term harm to the medical system, and hundreds of thousands to millions of unnecessary deaths ... and, oh yeah almost forgot, an economic depression level event".

Yes, the whole phenomena that is happening on earth as we speak could only be described by a very, very, very, very long vector of parameters and an equally impressive computer program to change the state of that vector. It's complicated in that sense, just like "throwing a ball" is complicated in the sense of all the calculations and nerve interaction and motor protein movement and cell metabolism that is happening for that phenomena to happen; it is simple to throw a ball in the sense that people throw balls all the time no problem.

It is simple to keep everyone alive without planes, even long term, who cares about plane travel.

It will be difficult to mange the tsunami of suffering that is upon us, it will be stressful to decide who lives and who dies, complicated to manage limited resources to face unsolvable problems, as well lives destroyed by the economic disruptions; granted, in an economy I seek to fundamentally change, but not like this, not like this.

The "not flying" would have been bad for airline and related stocks but good for the "not dying part".

However, since everything I have been talking about is about to unfold in the next couple of weeks where you live, I'm going to let your immediate short term experience speak on my behalf.

It is a rare time that this conversation here on the forum is not anonymous; my arguments I have developed here will be screaming in your face.

I will remind you in exactly 3 weeks about this topic and whether you still think the economic disruption, however you want to think of the economy, and more importantly the loss of life, that will be far, far from over, was at the same level of cost or risk as the economic disruption of stopping the planes when the window of opportunity to keep the growth rate of the pandemic -- or even stop if from being a pandemic in the first place -- was still open.

Do any human beings actually support this principle? — Metaphysician Undercover

Yes.

People who believe only in maximizing their own gain, do not want society to frustrate their efforts. Completely coherently with this worldview they will argue that their profits should be prioritized over any given definition of the public good. If they are diversified in the stock market, they will argue that whatever policy increases the value of the stock market is good.

However, although it is a perfectly coherent worldview, it does not create a coherent public position on any given topic. You'll need a public and private position so to speak.

Mostly, the counter argument to any given definition of the public good that the profits in question represent a threat to, is the framework of "rights". That there is a "right" to sell whatever it is and to do whatever actions are needed to maximize that selling that has become legal due to previous victories of this world view, such as deceptive marketing, lobbying etc. That a corporation is a person with political rights is the pinnacle of achievement in this way of counter arguing against the public good. It's such a habitual tactic that what's obviously wrong with this line of reasoning -- that all laws and rights only make sense as deriving from some public good, as if they derive from private interest there can be no coherent set of laws in ever private interests are competing with each other, which is the whole premise of the whole alchemic project of stupid we call modern economics, that also jumps in to support this world view most of the time, as it is in the interest of the economist to get paid to do so -- and therefore, rights and laws can not, in some coherent ideology of governance, be by definition against the public good. So, this sort of conversation doesn't ever go anywhere, it is just a tactic to confuse people who are unable to see it is taking the concept of individual rights out of context, and that individual rights are themselves there to mitigate the harm of an unequal society, protecting the weak from the strong and something is argumentatively wrong if they are being used to protect the strong from the weak.

Mostly, however, people supporting the neoliberal ideology, simply are not able to formulate the concept of the public good to begin with. They empathize with the investor class and it simply makes sense that profits should be protected ... even if it means massive social programs of trillions in bailouts to the banks, subsidies of all kinds paid by the public, obvious harms to the public both short and long term -- they may recognize that there is something off, but they can never quite put their finger on it.

But, today, I can use obvious examples of what I'm talking about.

When I read this headline today I was genuinely surprised Trump was "Shaken into action", and curious what measures weren't too late. Then I started to read...

Aboard Air Force One, Trump Was Shaken Into Action on Virus

We’re tracking the latest on the coronavirus outbreak and the global response. Sign up here for our daily newsletter on what you need to know.

As Air Force One sped toward Washington on Monday, the historic impact of the coronavirus outbreak became inescapable for President Donald Trump.

Televisions on his plane were tuned to Fox News, which broadcast dire graphics illustrating the single worst day for stock markets since the 2008 financial crisis. Matt Gaetz, a Florida GOP congressman who had accompanied Trump to a series of fundraising events in Orlando, had isolated himself in an empty cabin on the jet after learning he’d had contact with someone infected by the virus at a political conference. — Bloomberg news

Article is behind a paywall, but only talks about the stock market and Trump's efforts to help it.

The writer sees no problem that Trump only took real notice of the pandemic thing, which is supposed to happen to poor people that are never mentioned in this article as needing actions towards, when the stock market crashed. The writer sees zero problem with the framing that it is through the lens of the stock market to judge the priorities: first fiscal support, lower interest rates, bailout fund, tax cuts ... and never even mentioning addressing the pandemic.

Also notice the dramatization of Trump's own personal danger, taking in the "oh shit, I could get this thing" that certainly crossed the minds of the entire investor class as well; so they can empathize with Trump empathizing with them in a very visceral, stuck in a human body sort of way.

Why?

Because the neoliberal theory, that sounds good to the neoliberal investor class and propagandists, that developed and "went viral" last couple of weeks was, seeing the economic horror entailed by containment ... let's just let nature take it's course! Get back to normal as quickly as possible so the stock market can get back to climbing as usual.

Instead of addressing this catastrophic policy, neoliberals will just ignore it or defend it as "a reasonable thing", just too hard to stop those planes and shrink those airline dividends, it was too horrifying to consider, and, crucially as seen in the article, jump right to the bailouts that are now needed; not for the gig economy workers of course, not for people to be able to stay home and not spread the virus while working heaven forbid, nor for small businesses many already destroyed by their first key event now cancelled.

It sounded good,"let it run it's course", but I'll let events prove or disprove the theory that it really is good for the investor class.

There was no pushback because there was no model of the economy developed by epidemiologists for letting it "run wild", as I have mentioned. Epidemiologists assume the priority is preservation of life. Hearing this, and terrifying recommendations of stopping flights, the neoliberal ideology instinctively assumes it's another one of those cases like the "environment" or "toxic chemicals" or "health care for blacks and white trash" or "education of the poor" that can just be ignored and "nature can just run its course" in all those situations. The problem is that those things can be ignored, not because "nature runs it's course" in some neo-eugenics view of the world, but because cause and effect are separated by some distance and propaganda can always intervene between those two points in time to convince enough people that the lies were never said, if they were said it was reasonable to say, that the alternatives were also lies, and the lies are still true anyways when you think about it.

It is simply habit that anything that protects the investor class short term can be defended and no one defending that will ever face consequences. As normally changes are relatively slow and investors can just shift assets if ever the public does seem to be getting a small victory on some issue and discussion can thus shift to protecting those new assets.

This is a unique situation where the "we need to balance action for the public good against the economy" position faces immediate consequences and propaganda has a much harder time making people believe it's because of the muslims or something like that, and there was no time to shift assets and the economic and political fallout is a profound existential threat to the status quo. They'll still try, it will be interesting to see if they succeed.

I can't speak for Boethius, but if there is a collapse of civilisation, there could be some quite adverse effects in the short term, like mass fires, nuclear explosions, wreckless destruction of ecosystems. — Punshhh

Sure there could be such adverse effects, but they are not necessary concomitants of civilizational collapse. The one worry would be decommissioning of nuclear facilities.

I will remind you in exactly 3 weeks about this topic and whether you still think the economic disruption, however you want to think of the economy, and more importantly the loss of life, that will be far, far from over, was at the same level of cost or risk as the economic disruption of stopping the planes when the window of opportunity to keep the growth rate of the pandemic -- or even stop if from being a pandemic in the first place -- was still open. — boethius

I'm saying the effects of stopping all international flights would likely have incalculable short, medium and long term effects on economies, and that humanity may just not have the economic and, more importantly, energy resources to recover civilization from a catastrophic collapse. I'm not saying that would necessarily be the case, but that neither you nor I have any way of knowing whether it would be the case or even how likely such an outcome would be.

I'm also not saying that stopping the planes would not be, or have been, my preferred option, because the sooner business as usual as we know it ceases the better for the planet and humanity in the long term. I also don't think it is likely that business as usual will ever voluntarily cease in any case.

Indeed if China had completely closed its borders early enough it may have been possible to prevent the spread of the virus beyond China, I don't dispute that. But only one person would need to get through undetected...

Sure, I have no argument with that claim.

I can't speak for Boethius, but if there is a collapse of civilisation, there could be some quite adverse effects in the short term, like mass fires, nuclear explosions, wreckless destruction of ecosystems.
— Punshhh

Sure there could be such adverse effects, but they are not necessary concomitants of civilizational collapse. The one worry would be decommissioning of nuclear facilities. — Janus

I thought had adequately explained my point; unfortunately not.

When I say "there's no feasible way to lower population significantly (to 0.1 - 0.2 of current levels) without collapsing the ecosystem" I mean there's no feasible way.

How do you actually get rid of all those people? Why is suddenly the world devoid of complex second order consequence in such a plan?

Please explain how you reduce the population by 80 to 90 percent without the destruction of the environment as either the mechanism of population reduction or an immediate consequence. People are just gonna get a letter in the post and walk into the sea?

I'm saying the effects of stopping all international flights would likely have incalculable short, medium and long term effects on economies, and that humanity may just not have the economic and, more importantly energy, resources to recover civilization from a catastrophic collapse. I'm not saying that would necessarily be the case, but that neither you nor I have any way of knowing whether it would be the case or even how likely such an outcome would be. — Janus

Ok, let's see in 3 weeks if you still think stopping all the flights when it would have prevented or significantly slowed the pandemic is what would have had the "incalculable short, medium and long term effects" leading to "catastrophic collapse", whereas the "let the pandemic run free" scenario we're now living, that includes air travel bans and significantly reduced air passengers in general, has less economic consequences.

Well surely if "international travel" includes "international trade" then I think those "crazy affects" are almost certain...eventually (you are right that temporary measures may not have a huge impact, but if temporary is 1 year or more, it seems that more than 3% of the worlds population would die as a result (about 34 countries are dependent on food imports, for example). — ZhouBoTong

No where is it implied that air travel means all international trade.

But, to clarify the matter, a pandemic is not arrested by stopping all international trade, whether in the air, at sea or over the internet, but by stopping vectors of the pathogen.

Let me be as precise and erudite as you desire me to be. Effective containment on the global scale, once a pathogen is endemic in a region, simply cannot be done without extreme restrictions on air travel.

We don't know exactly how the virus is transmitted, exactly how close you need to be ... but we do know that you can't get sick from someone on another continent. For you to get it from them, in the short term, one of you, or something, needs to fly.

As for trade, we don't know if a bunch of factory workers in china coughing all day on amazon packages can't transmit the disease. WHO says cash can be a vector, seems reasonable you could put cash in a package and it would still be a vector. So it would have needed to be checked. If it did, then yes, to contain the virus international shipping needs to be paused too. However, it's an easy technical problem to solve, as most goods can be decontaminated relatively easily or just left to sit for whatever times is needed, and the decontamination process, such as just heating, can be streamlined for anything essential.

Even if stopping air travel doesn't maintain containment, the pandemic would be significantly slowed down: buying time to prepare, research, organize, optimize a strategy, as well as stagger the regions the virus hits as containment fails at different times. Yes, big hit to the airlines and disruptive to a small section of upper middle class people who happen to be flying international at or around that time.

Way less economically disruptive than what's happening now though. Flying is only one of many industries, and if containment was implemented early and effectively, flights could continue between all other regions, instead we now have global collapse in air travelers due to bans or cancels ... and the collapse of the rest of the global economy ... and hundreds of thousands to millions of people dying, in the near term future to be precise, for a preventable reason.

For sure if international flights are stopped in three weeks, rather than having been stopped early enough to prevent or at least greatly limit the spread of the virus, the outcome will likely be much worse economically (as well as fatally, of course).

The thing is once the virus gets into many countries, the only way to eradicate it, if that is at all possible, will be to cease all air travel, because otherwise closed communities where it is eradicated will be re-infected. So it never would have been a case of stopping the airlines from operating just for a short time, but at least if flights from China had been stopped early enough, flights to and from other countries may not have had to be shutdown..

"It is not the virus itself, but rather the fear and panic related to the virus and the associated altered economic behaviour that could be a damaging tipping point, forcing the global economy onto a darker path," said Katrina Ell, a senior economist at Moody's Analytics. — BBC

What's that "behavior" terrible for the economy? People not wanting themselves or their loved one's to die for a preventable reason.

If people had just "taken it", carried on as usual and not bothered about shaving a few points off the demographics, things would be merrily steaming along.

Why the neoliberal intellectuals are so shocked is that governments actually have to act in the interests of the public over the stock market in this instance. It is too quick and traumatic experience to not react once that becomes clear. Which is why Western governments, each in turn, wait until the emergency status is reached before reacting; what's happening just doesn't compute in neoliberal land. People should just rollover and die for the sake of the stock market, why aren't they just sucking it up and dying!

The thing is once the virus gets into many countries, the only way to eradicate if that is at all possible will be to cease all air travel, because otherwise closed communities where it is eradicated will be re-infected. — Janus

You haven't been following this conversation, and I no longer have time for you.

Me not following! That's a laugh. Your trying to portray this situation in terms of identity politics shows your simplistic level of thinking about this situation; so I'm not unhappy about ceasing to engage with you.

Please explain how you reduce the population by 80 to 90 percent without the destruction of the environment as either the mechanism of population reduction or an immediate consequence. People are just gonna get a letter in the post and walk into the sea? — boethius

I haven't said anything at all about radically reducing the human population deliberately, or anything about how such a thing (done in what most would think an acceptable way) would be possible or even desirable. So, it looks like it isn't I who is failing to follow the conversation.

On the other hand, if it were decided to simply euthanaze 80 or 90 percent of the population how exactly do think that would adversely affect the natural environment?

No where is it implied that air travel means all international trade. — boethius

Ok, I was being too literal again (if ALL international travel is stopped then ALL trade is stopped). I can certainly accept that was not your position.

It does seem the terrified attitude would eventually lead to a shutdown of trade (schools in the US are close to all closing...it seems business would follow soon after), and few people seem to consider just how dependent the world has become on international trade..

However, everything you said seemed reasonable and I appreciate you taking the time to lay it out for me .

If people had just "taken it", carried on as usual and not bothered about shaving a few points off the demographics, things would be merrily steaming along. [/quote]

No. If you don't delay the spread of this, your healthcare system will be completely overwhelmed. This thing killed 20 residents of one nursing home. There are over 10,000 nursing homes in America. That's A LOT of really old and/or sick people on respirators. We're about two weeks behind where Italy is at and Italy is imploding.

Governments actively pursue GDP-growth at the expense of general well being (pollution, living space). — Benkei

You do realize that general well being (pollution, living space, etc) is generally linked negatively to GDP, or do you not? I.e. the proverbial shithole countries that our celebreties love to defend but never move to are characterized by low GDP and horrible living conditions and pollution.
Maybe take a closer look at those talking points before repeating them.

Please explain how you reduce the population by 80 to 90 percent without the destruction of the environment as either the mechanism of population reduction or an immediate consequence. People are just gonna get a letter in the post and walk into the sea? — boethius

I haven't said anything at all about radically reducing the human population deliberately, or anything about how such a thing (done in what most would think an acceptable way) would be possible or even desirable. So, it looks like it isn't I who is failing to follow the conversation.

On the other hand, if it were decided to simply euthanaze 80 or 90 percent of the population how exactly do think that would adversely affect the natural environment?

What's that "behavior" terrible for the economy? People not wanting themselves or their loved one's to die for a preventable reason.

If people had just "taken it", carried on as usual and not bothered about shaving a few points off the demographics, things would be merrily steaming along.

Why the neoliberal intellectuals are so shocked is that governments actually have to act in the interests of the public over the stock market in this instance. It is too quick and traumatic experience to not react once that becomes clear. Which is why Western governments, each in turn, wait until the emergency status is reached before reacting; what's happening just doesn't compute in neoliberal land. People should just rollover and die for the sake of the stock market, why aren't they just sucking it up and dying! — boethius

Which is why the corona virus pandemic is almost as bad as an actual bio-weapon being released:sure it doesn't outright kill a higher percentage of people such as the viruses in movies or Steven King's book "The Stand", but having almost all the potential problems of any deadly highly infectious disease makes it what we in the philosophy business like to call a "non- trivial issue" when it comes to getting rid of it.

Governments by design are reactive not proactive, once a problem presents itself and they manage to resolve it they are more or less ready for whenever that problem happens again (such as if another Hitler wanted to invade France) but pretty slow on the draw when it comes to big problems that are a bit different to what they are use to. I'm not sure exactly if neoliberalism plays a part in it since it is likely more than just one narrative at play and it would be hard to imagine just one ideology or paradigm at fault here but I imagine it is likely just at fault as many of the others however that might not be saying a lot.

The stock market doesn't care if people die because just as Trump pointed out millions of people die from the flu every year and many people don't even bother to get flu shots. What it does care about is that the corona virus has put a nasty kink into various projections companies have made for the upcoming years and on top of that it presents a new potential existential threat to the global economy , the status quo,and the world as we know it. It's kind of like that old stock market saying "Buy when there is blood running in the streets", but that is assuming of course no of that blood is your own and that there is anything worth buying after the blood shed is over.

A curious thing about the black plague most people don't realize is that a lot of people got richer after it happen (since many people inherited money quicker/easier then if it didn't happen), the living standard improved for those that survived (reliable help was harder to find and more expensive after about 33% of the population was gone), and it may have saved Europe from even a worse fate. The problem was that before the black plague the population was either reaching it's max threshold for which the available farms could support or already there. If the plague didn't happen then it is likely as many people would have died from either starvation and/or war until more farm land could be developed. Of course, it is debatable whether dying from a plague is any better than people dying from war and starvation even if the latter may use more resources than the former.

I agree on the stupidity of the "war on terrorism", but likewise I would like to know what exactly the govt should have done to "prepare for a situation like this". And do you want the govt to "prepare" for any imaginable situation? You realize that that list would be unlimited, don´t you? — Nobeernolife

The unimagined existential threats may be unlimited but the imagined existential threats are not quite so unlimited. During the time of the cold war and before the term "weapons of mass destruction" was coined the military had something they liked to called NBC warfare with the NBC referring to nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons. Since biological weapons can be quite different from each other (and sometimes difficult to detect and identify when deployed) there is no one size fits all plan to deal with them if and when used. However if it was all but a given that one was used then it is highly likely that the military would setup quarantine zones to contain people if it was believed if what they were exposed to was dangerous and highly infectious.

Of course we don't live in the cold war anymore and whatever those plans for dealing with biological weapons and people exposed could be all but forgotten. However even if those plans are no longer around it is almost a given that the military still has some contingency plan if some rogue country or group did something since today it is likely much easier to develop such weapons that during the cold war. I'm sure that such measures are a bit more..draconian then what most people in Westernized countries are use to but with countries like China and Italy trying to effectively quarantine entire cities it isn't entirely much different than that. The only issue is that countries that wait too long to use such measures don't benefit if there are already too many people exposed. While I'm not saying that a unmodified military plan would be best when dealing with the corona virus, I'm also not saying that a modified military plan wouldn't be better then what countries like the US are already doing.

But this is to make corporate profit into the public good, it is not to prioritize it "over" the public good. See the difference? One says corporate profit is more important than the public good, while the other says corporate profit is the public good. But even the latter is just an illusion anyway because the profit is not shared equally by the public. — Metaphysician Undercover

I think I more or less agree. If you get a chance (ie. don't die from the corona virus in the near future), I recommend reading a book called "Economix: How and Why Our Economy Works (and Doesn't Work)" by Michael Goodwin. It explains certain thing that are not taught in economics class such as why and how companies charge as much as the can for a product and how large corporations can be as or more detrimental than large governments.

Some corporations (like people) are good, but obviously not all of them. Here in the US it is preached that corporations should be able to do whatever they like and that any government hindrance will hurt both profit and people's well being. I personally think not having corporations answerable to anyone other than their shareholders is no better than trying to run a town or city without any police and why corporations act like their in the "Wild West" when dealing with their employees and the rest of the world as a whole.

Unfortunately because of the nature of share markets a large part of the common human good, in simply economic and lifestyle (including healthcare) terms at least, has become dependent upon corporate profits. — Janus

You have it backwards: corporate profits are dependent on human beings and human good. This a given since human beings/human good have existed for hundreds of years before anyone invented the notion of corporations and corporations are dependent on the work of human beings (or at least the work of sentient beings) in order for them to exist.

Sure there could be such adverse effects, but they are not necessary concomitants of civilizational collapse. The one worry would be decommissioning of nuclear facilities.

I think the unpredictable effects would be due to the degree of chaos and the efforts of vigilante groups to survive. So a large degree of chaos might make any attempts to contain or decommission nuclear facilities impossible. Also vigilante groups could ravage our remaining ecosystems for short term gains, or survival.

I do agree with your suggestion that air travel would have to be stopped for an extended period. Indeed, if one area has endemic virus and another has managed to eradicated it. Then there can be no air travel between them for the foreseeable, and strict controls on other forms of travel. The implication being that for business to continue as usual to any degree, all countries will have to allow the virus in and manage it as best they can.

Notwithstanding the long term affects will depend on efforts to come up with an effective vaccine.

corporations are dependent on the work of human beings

They are dependent on wage slaves, a large class of subservient, pliant, people.

So now to fight the "foreign virus", Trump put a travel ban on Europe, on foreign nationals.

Except the UK.

A Trumpian response.

Perhaps it should be said that Italy was the first country to ban flights from China, which made then people to circumvent the ban and fly from other countries. And now is the one worst inflicted areas in Europe (how bad we will know only afterward).

https://climateandcapitalism.com/2020/03/11/capitalist-agriculture-and-covid-19-a-deadly-combination/

An excellent read placing the COVID outbreak within wider capitalist dynamics:

"The real danger of each new outbreak is the failure –or better put—the expedient refusal to grasp that each new Covid-19 is no isolated incident. The increased occurrence of viruses is closely linked to food production and the profitability of multinational corporations. Anyone who aims to understand why viruses are becoming more dangerous must investigate the industrial model of agriculture and, more specifically, livestock production. At present, few governments, and few scientists, are prepared to do so. Quite the contrary.

.... Capital is spearheading land grabs into the last of primary forest and smallholder-held farmland worldwide. These investments drive the deforestation and development leading to disease emergence. The functional diversity and complexity these huge tracts of land represent are being streamlined in such a way that previously boxed-in pathogens are spilling over into local livestock and human communities. In short, capital centers, places such as London, New York, and Hong Kong, should be considered our primary disease hotspots."

Yes a good read and I don't reject any of the theory. But I was listening to a virologist yesterday who said that Covid19 matches to a remarkable degree a virus found in Pangolins. He was suggesting that this virus may have combined with a similar coronavirus found in bats. This points in the direction of Chinese medicine, or bush meat trade. There have been many reports over the last few years of the very high price of Mandolin scales on the black market, most going to markets in China. This has become such a lucrative trade that Pangolins in the wild are in danger of extinction.

The only issue is that countries that wait too long to use such measures don't benefit if there are already too many people exposed. While I'm not saying that a unmodified military plan would be best when dealing with the corona virus, I'm also not saying that a modified military plan wouldn't be better then what countries like the US are already doing. — dclements

Well, that is well and good but it is a very generic statement, that you could make about any US government and in fact against any government. Hindsight is always 20-20, isnt it.