On 1/22/07, Daniel Reeves <dreeves Æ umich.edu> wrote:

I think so.  The pro-helmet argument is "society has to deal with you when
you turn yourself into a vegetable".  That's shaky ground.  You could ban
a lot of things with that rationale.

Oh, right, and think of the gene pool!  (ie, potential children!)

Relatedly, does anyone recall the economist who claims that smokers save
taxpayers money because dying of cancer is much quicker and cheaper than
dying of old age?  (The argument is meant to expose the disingenuousness
of anti-smoking activists who try to justify smoking bans on the basis of
the supposed medical costs.)

Anyone have opinions about anti-gambling laws?

--- \/   FROM Lisa Hsu AT 07.01.22 11:00 (Today)   \/ ---

> does this dislike of bans/laws extend to things like motorcycle/bicycle
> helmets, seatbelts, and the like?
>
> just curious.
>
> lisa
>
> On 1/22/07, Daniel Reeves < dreeves Æ umich.edu> wrote:
>>
>>    It took a while but Cam Wicklow's and Matt Rudary's (and possibly other
>> of my opponents in this debate who I'm forgetting) points have finally
>> fully sunk in.  (The greatest thing about improvetheworld in my opinion is
>> how often we prove Carl Sagan's otherwise apt obversation about political
>> debate wrong (see appended email signature).)
>>
>>    I no longer support smoke-free workplace laws!
>>
>>    The right strategy is a coherent policy that upholds everyone's
>> freedom:
>> freedom to smoke and freedom to not breathe smoke.  For example, mandated
>> risk-pay (i.e., the very real risk of cancer for the waitstaff of smoky
>> bars) could make it expensive enough to allow smoking that a minority of
>> establishments would choose to.  Voila, everyone's happy!  I'm really sick
>> of governments banning things.  It's a dangerous precedent.
>>    Basically, I think policy-makers should be more like mathematicians.
>> Smoking in bars and restaurants is/was a real social problem.  But there
>> are ways to fix it without adding laws.  In fact, we can fix it by
>> generalizing, clarifying, and consistently enforcing existing laws.
>> Risk-pay is one way.  Another way is to generalize liquor-license laws to
>> include smoking, i.e., directly make it more expensive for bar and
>> restaurant owners to allow smoking.
>>    It really boils down to the Golden Rule.  Banning something is A-OK
>> when you don't happen to want to do that thing anyway.  But worry about
>> the precedent you're setting for when the government decides that *your*
>> favorite risky activity is a danger to yourself and others.
>>    I should confess though that part of the reason I finally saw the light
>> on this is that, living in supposedly smoke-free New York City you can't
>> walk a block without getting three facefuls of smoke.
>>   I keep thinking how nice it would be to get the smokers into some kind
>> of
>> special smoking establishments -- "bars" if you will -- and off the damn
>> sidewalks!  Oh the irony.
>>
>>    And don't get me started on New York's transfats ban.
>>
>> Danny
>>
>> --
>> http://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/dreeves  - -  search://"Daniel Reeves"
>>
>> "In science it often happens that scientists say, 'You know that's
>> a really good argument; my position is mistaken,' and then they
>> would actually change their minds and you never hear that old view
>> from them again. They really do it. It doesn't happen as often as
>> it should, because scientists are human and change is sometimes
>> painful. But it happens every day. I cannot recall the last time
>> something like that happened in politics or religion."
>>    -- Carl Sagan, 1987 CSICOP Keynote Address
>>
>

--
http://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/dreeves  - -  search://"Daniel Reeves"

Well, you know when you're rocking back in a chair, and you go so
far that you almost fall over backwards, but at the last instant you
catch yourself?  That's how I feel all the time.    -- Steven Wright