Noah, I can throw an wrench in the saltwater either-or comparison and say this:

Noah,

I can throw an wrench in the saltwater either-or comparison and say this:

That if saltwater economists and justify pseudo-scientific morality, then why can’t freshwater economists defend morality with pseudo-scientific models.

The problem isn’t that one side or the other errs. It’s that both sides err.

Why do politicians and voters react positively to freshwater arguments, and negatively to saltwater arguments?

Is it because they are ill informed? Or is because justifying morality poorly is preferable to justifying immorality well.

And lest you suggest that morals are subjective, one would have to answer why cooperation is preferable to non-cooperation. It is only preferable if it is not parasitic for the individual – not if it is merely Pareto optimal in the aggregate.

And why is this conflict raging in economics and politics?

The underlying question is one of familialism, tribalism and dysgenia – is our society moral or not? Is heterogeneity a good or a bad?

And that is too uncomfortable a question for the Academy to answer.

Which is why some of us are out here trying to answer it.

Uncomfortable truth that it is.