Originally Posted By: Derid

Why do you wish to apply govt force to this though?


Because I see Government as lesser evil. As a whole, govt is not out to intentionally screw anybody. Yes, it happens anyways.

Quote:
And it still has not delineated where individual responsibility starts and ends. Lets take corn sugar for example. Ok , if people over eat it especially over a long period of time those people may experience various health issues. But is this really the fault of the corn sugar?


This is not as simple question as you might imagine.

Humans are not neutral, unbiased or even always acting in owns best self-interest. Evolution dragged in a lot of baggage, as such your fundamental assumption of rational self-interested player is flawed. Combine this with flawed assumption of perfect information and you "free market" palace is built on sand.

Now to corn sugar example. Humans are hard-wired to prefer sweetness. Sweeter is universally valued as better. High fructose corn sweetener taste less sweet than alternatives, as such it takes significantly more calories to get to the same sweetness level. Is this the fault of corn sweetener producer? No, blame is so distributed between all players that it is easy to make individual case of innocence.

Still, you have a systemic problem where people get trained to eat sweet things and then pumped with sugar until our healthcare system collapses from treating diabetes and obesity.

Last edited by sini; 03/12/13 09:52 AM.
[Linked Image]