Covid and Hayek
An important, disturbing concept is reinvigorated in the recent Covid event. Society is like battle in that it has starting points but no predictable evolution or outcome.
"In different ways, Hayek’s theses reiterate a single point: the diverse, complex, Open Society has evolved to the point where it has outstripped basic human inclinations and capacities. The first thesis argues that it is fundamentally at odds with our deepest moral intuitions; the second that it has outstripped our capacity to understand the function and justification of its constitutive rules; and the third that it has evolved beyond our governance. Because of the first, we are constantly tempted to morally renounce it and, on moralistic grounds, construct barriers to it. Because of the second, our attempts to reflect and reconstruct its rules lead to constant and unrelenting moral conflict; we seek to justify, and so present a series of justificatory schemes and criticisms of its basic moral structure. Yet we do not really understand how it works or what it does for us. And we seek to devise policies to improve its function, yet again we do not have the knowledge to competently do so, hence we are constantly disappointed by the last round of interventions and we blame the last government for its failures and broken promises. Perhaps, as seems to have happened today (as it has in the past), the people begin to distrust all claims to expertise and seek simpler, more intuitive solutions."--gaus
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