The wonder of the world around us

That's great, that's all we need, comparing human beings to ants. The communists would love that.

We're going to have to do better than that.

How about the price system of allocating resources?

I compare Darwin's "bottom up" science with Hayek's "bottom up" science, here:

http://www.hayekcenter.org/friedrichhayek/hayekmyth.htm

Quotable:

"To account for this directly observed teleological phenomena, which now raises a pressing question in the new context of the conjecture of modification by descent, Darwin provides a new bottom-up causal process as a rival to the top-down Providential Creation explanation. This bottom-up process shows how the manifestly observable apt structure and behavior of biological features could be generated to look as if they where invented or constructed by the design of a 'blind goods-maker' or the intent of an 'invisible hand'. Significantly, the bottom-up explanatory elements provided in Darwin's bottom-up causal account are open-ended in the sense that they involve an open-ended disjunction of causes, the physical constitution of which is undisclosable in advance of the unique unfolding of evolutionary history. The reward of reproductive opportunity can be given not only to structurally identical biological expressions, but also to very nearly similar structural constitutions. Ultimately the only common property which a structure must have to be identified as belonging to a functional or teleological category is the shared effect these structures have in producing the replication and persistence of entities sharing the same historical origins and which constitute parts of an evolving historical species, without it ever being possible to make any principled distinction between chance event and selective event in any particular instance. What we have at bottom in this situation is the primacy of our direct perception of the teleological characters of organisms. The physical constitution of particular exemplifications of the adaptive functional features and teleological doings Darwinian theory is designed to explain cannot be provided in advance of the historical unfolding of an historically unique population, which is to say that our direct teleological and functional observation of the features requiring explanation in evolutionary biology cannot be given a replacement in the time and place independent categories of physics and chemistry."

More:

"One of the roles of the economist's equilibrium construction, in which costs and prices or values are made to exactly equal each other, is to help us to observe the design-like order in the economy, by pointing to the deep order within change within the extended domain of resource use coordination implied by the repeated pattern in which prices approach costs of production. The observation of a systematic design-like order within the larger extended economy becomes problematic when we realize that the individual understandings which go into this wider social coordination are limited, imperfect, and divided, making our cognitive relation to this order very different from our relation to the posited facts which go into a resource using intentional plan given to the understanding of a single mind. Within the logic of an unflawed resource using plan worked out by a single intelligence, the elements which go into the plan are part of a single understanding, given as a commensurable totality within the scope of the plan. As parts of a well-considered logic, they are perfect and unlimited `given's within the domain of the plan, without room for the sort of incommensurable differences in thought which distinguish different minds, or the open-ended changes in our knowledge which takes place when we begin to see the world in a new way. If the individual understandings that go into making the social order of resource use coordination are necessarily limited, imperfect, divided, and always changing in an open-ended fashion in the way that individual human understandings are limited, divided, imperfect and always changing, then the pattern observed in the market cannot be the product of a (single) human mind and producer. A problem then arises: if we observe a plan-like systematicity in the extended social order of resource use coordination which no individual planner and producer could create, then how does this extended systematic social order arise? And if this systematic order in the social coordination of resource uses shares only some but not all of the logical characteristics of a plan given to the understanding of a single individual, then which of these does it share, and what are its structural features? And if the social order of resource use coordination is not the result of the coherent deliberative plan of a single human being, then what is the cause and underlying process behind this order?"

More:

"The order in the market might be explained by several alternative rivals:

1. Postulate a top-down omnipotent super-mind production master in the image of the individual human planner.

2. Conjecture that learning or changes in understanding in the context of changing relative money prices and stable negative rules of just conduct (such as honesty and property rights) is responsible for the undesigned order of resource use coordination in an extended society, suggested by the repeated pattern in which prices approach costs of production and the extended division of labor.

3. Postulate that we are ant-like creatures or crude robot-like machines who produce a plan-like social order as the result of simple and physically predictable regularities in our behavior.

4. Take for granted unimaginable luck in the completely random `casino' economy (Keynes), or postulate unimaginable luck in the relational valuation structure through time of production (Kaldor)."

The ant metaphor is reasonably apt.
Each ant is an independent actor responding to information it perceives in accordance with its nature.

The "queen" as the head of the colony is a flawed construction. It is more accurate to view the queen as the reproductive organ of the colony and likewise responds to the information it receives in accordance with its nature.

It is a limited metaphor, however, as ants are neither self observant nor able to imagine possibilities.

If you think of the two groupings (people and ants) as a society than the wonder of a lack of centralized control plays out for both. At least for now there is no one authority that dictates the choices that each individual makes on a daily basis. We plan out our daily action consistent with the goal of maximizing our overall well being. At a micro scale we may have the illusions of top down control (the larger the grouping the less real control over each individual actually exist). However the reason for this "direction" is that we are using someone else's property and resources to attain our individual self interest.

I have often thought that what unnerves the central planners and Keynesians is that they greatly dislike the idea that these uncontrolled masses are making decisions that they personally disapprove of. As a result they desire to control those decisions to produce their desired result. In the end however the ants will prevail.

"A functioning organization with no one in charge is so unlike the way humans operate as to be virtually inconceivable. There is no central control. "

Anyone who has worked in a large corporation recognize it looks much more like an ant farm than a planned economy.

In part, to solve the "socialist calculation problem of the private firm" is why we have activity based accounting, which is a kind of free market within the organization.

Even in places without ABC, political deals on many levels (not usually the central one) serve as the basis of exchange.

I often discus with my wife whether corporations are more likely to "solve their problems" or simply "the worst ones die, the (lucky) better ones live". Usually the latter is more true than the former.

Consider examples such as the "Good to Greats" that then crater shortly after the book publication…

Oooh, cool!

After the EconTalk podcast with the Keynesian prof from St. Louis, I think that dedicated leftists would only see the "collective" in the ants' efforts, and totally miss or block out the lack of central planning.

Observer stated:

"I have often thought that what unnerves the central planners and Keynesians is that they greatly dislike the idea that these uncontrolled masses are making decisions that they personally disapprove of. As a result they desire to control those decisions to produce their desired result. In the end however the ants will prevail."

Can you say "The Borg" in insect form? Resistance is futile! Too funny.

Actually, an interesting posting and comments.

Enough with the ants already.

What are you trying to do, turn yourselves into laughingstocks?

Sam,

I remembered this video and information from your prior posting and I was sure it was you that had.

And, yep, muirduck reacted just as you said.

I read a book called "Bumblebee Economics". In the preface, it said that insect colonies are sometimes used to justify free market economics. I got a real kick out of that.