From: allens@yang.earlham.edu (Allen Smith)
Newsgroups: comp.society.futures
Subject: Re: Suppressing innovations (was Mander and Telev
Date: 6 Apr 92 03:59:56 GMT
Organization: Earlham College, Richmond, Indiana

In article <1992Apr2.054515.20041@leland.Stanford.EDU>, whynot@leland.Stanford.EDU (William Shepherd) writes:
> In article <1992Mar31.061917.10381@norton.com> brian@norton.com (Brian Yoder) writes:
>>> In article <1992Mar17.071839.27651@midway.uchicago.edu> mss2@midway.uchicago.edu writes:
>>> Mander trying to suppress television is no different in principle than an
>>> administrator at the National Institutes of Health saying, "This year we're
>>> taking some money from the cancer budget and giving it to the AIDS 
>>> researchers."
>>
>>Of course it's the same.  The NIH is not spending it's own money either.  
>>BOTH of them are wrong because both are trying to use force to control the lives of other people.
> 
> Actually, they're fundamentally different.  We (taxpayers) give money to the
> NIH.  Then they (appointees of our elected representatives) decide how to 
> spend that money.  They, as much as we, are free agents in a market, deciding
> what to consume.  On the other hand, government regulation of television would
> amount to interference in a transaction between two other agents in the 
> economy.   

	Agreed.
> 
>>> Taking the attitude, "innocent until proven
>>> guilty" towards technology has proven too costly in the past. 
>>
>>"Too costly"?  How about showing me some dead bodies?  I can show you a pile
>> of them resulting from FDA regulations on new drugs which keep them out of
>> the hands of people who could benefit from them for years, just as an
>> example.
> 
> Dead bodies?  I've got two words for you:  DDT and thalidomide.  Don't forget,
> FDA regulations are there for a damn good reason.  Given, bureaucracy often
> goes too far, but there are many circumstances where caution is more than
> justified.  

	I would say that regulations forbidding DDT use are justifiable by 
that its use can harm those who haven't consented to its use. Thalidiomide 
was a simple case of something being found out later that wasn't known at 
first. Shall we stop usage of any drug until everything is known about it? 
If so, we wouldn't be using any drugs- and medicine would be, in many 
ways, back to the stone age.
> 
> Advocating either rigid government control or complete laissez faire is
> foolish.  The government has it's role to play in the technological market,
> just like the rest of us.  It's big and ugly, chews up money and makes
> mistakes by the bushel basket, but it's there because it needs to be.
> 
	The government's proper role can be divided into two areas:
	1. Making sure products that hurt those who haven't consented to 
their use aren't used (for instance, the prescription status of 
antibiotics- thus delaying the development of antibiotic resistance).
	2. Making sure the public is informed of the risks of various 
drugs. An instance is the warning label on tobacco products.
	Other ways in which the government intervenes in technology, aside 
from funding research & development, are generally not justified.
	-Allen
Newsgroups: comp.society.futures