Today we've got a short interview with the self-styled Rational Optimist Matt Ridley. Matt believes Progress is inevitable, irreversible and endless, and comes from the exchange of Goods & Services. The miracle of economics guarantees continuing Prosperity as far as the eye can see, and well beyond that, too
If you go over to his website, one of the first things you'll see is—
The Best Is Yet To Come
All this despite the fact that we just witnessed a massive fraud in the U.S. housing market, the biggest, most destructive fraud the world has ever seen. According to the interviewer, "Ridley says that commerce even taught us to be nice to each other"—
Human beings are extraordinary when you think about it. You couldn't do this [stroll through an open-air market] if we were all chimpanzees, we'd all be fighting each other! You don't meet strangers and get on well with them...
Yes, that's what I like most about human beings: they never fight each other!
It's the scarecrow in The Wizard Of Oz who sings "if I only had a brain..." Think of what Matt could do with one!
http://www.rationaloptimist.com/blog/oil-runs-out
Here he shows what he thinks of the oil spill. He seems to really see glass 99% full all the time. "What Me worry?".
Posted by: Edward Boyle | 08/28/2010 at 12:02 PM