Japan, Nihilarians and The Biggest Bastiat Broken Window in History

One of the weaknesses in the modern cultural infrastructure is the notion that action is inherently valuable. Perhaps it is an unfortunate hangover from the choice-obsessed existential period but it permeates everything, chilling common sense and often building mountains out of molehills. So crazy Gaddafi gets a military response from the entire Western World, water pistols are outlawed in kindergartens, building codes have more prohibitions than the Torah. Now editorials are proclaiming the advantages of the destruction of Japan: It will allow for building and growth.

Could any statement be more unreasonable? Should the Japanese provide the GDP coup de grace and finish off what is still standing? On a broader level, is this the subtle reason countries go to war, to be defeated and destroyed so the can beat their enemy by their subsequent great postwar growth? Should each country have a Bureau of Growth that selectively destroys areas of high productivity in the country so it can eventually be reclaimed? One wonders if the muted charitable response to the unfortunate Japanese does not spring from this weird belief that they are an able people and, in rebuilding, will be better off.

Symbolic work is Sisyphus; economic work is productive, creative, and meaningful to more than the individual. Economic work is of benefit to all. Symbolic work might keep you off the street, might distract you from your ailments, make you a better person. But symbolic work will not benefit the economic community. Building a house, tearing it down, rebuilding the house, tearing it down for generation upon generation is meaningless, worthless and distracting. Trying to make it valuable is insane.

There are illnesses where the afflicted repeat physical acts that have meaning to only them, pulling out invisible drawers, hanging invisible pictures. A wonderful scene in the movie Blow Up had the lead character, in his final surrender to fantasy, join a tennis game played without a ball. It's doubtful that this nihiliarian movement is pathological, it's probably just easier than hard analysis and difficult choices.

It's easier than honest thought.