"The point this article is trying to make is that the notion of "spontaneous order" is fundamental to both the theory of evolution and the free market. One would be hard pressed to design from scratch a working flamingo, and one would similarly be hard pressed to design from scratch a working economy."
But what good is a flamingo? If you're trying to solve human problems, spontaneous order from some sort of survival-of-the-fittest system is not good enough. Things that are useful to humans require conscious design. Spontaneous order gave us wood, but it took a human engineer to design the wheel. Evolution by natural selection never could have designed such a tool spontaneously.
Sure, the economy is a lot more complicated than that, and the precautionary principle is sound advice. All the same, there's every reason to believe that humans are capable of designing something better, as long we're not reckless about it.
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"The point this article is trying to make is that the notion of "spontaneous order" is fundamental to both the theory of evolution and the free market. One would be hard pressed to design from scratch a working flamingo, and one would similarly be hard pressed to design from scratch a working economy."
But what good is a flamingo? If you're trying to solve human problems, spontaneous order from some sort of survival-of-the-fittest system is not good enough. Things that are useful to humans require conscious design. Spontaneous order gave us wood, but it took a human engineer to design the wheel. Evolution by natural selection never could have designed such a tool spontaneously.
Sure, the economy is a lot more complicated than that, and the precautionary principle is sound advice. All the same, there's every reason to believe that humans are capable of designing something better, as long we're not reckless about it.