Recycling Eyeglasses Is a Waste of Money

Whew, that essay is its very own brand of crazy. It seems both freightened and mean spirited through and through. I feel really bad for you if recycling and environmentalism scares you as much as it appears to scare Steven Landsburg.

I know why are you are an environmentalist: because you breathe air and drink water, just like I do. I'd guess you are just as interested in those things being non-toxic as I am. I'd guess you're just as interested in your grandchildren and humanity finding abundant clean air and water in the future as I am. I could be wrong about these things since I don't know you, but I'd still be willing to bet money that you enjoy being outdoors sometimes.

> Yeah, that's why electricity is free, right? Also by this logic

What a nice straw man you have there. You're trying to change the subject, just like Tierney and Munger did. I was talking about energy, not about cost. I claim energy is abundant, not free. Tierney argued against recycling by claiming that recycling uses more energy than new production. Tierney is pretending to miss the point of recycling completely. He's fully aware that debating the relative energy consumption of recycling vs new products has nothing to do with why people recycle, and he's fully aware that even if recycling uses lots of energy, even if recycling wastes tons of energy, there are still compelling reasons to recycle.

Petroleum is limited, while neither energy nor money are limited. Arguing over the percentages of waste of energy & cost is arguing over margins of the two things that won't run out. The earth and it's oil, on the other hand, are finite, and we're starting to see their limits. You can choose to ignore that, if you want, and continue to argue over the margins of the unlimited resources.

Just curious, but why are you using the weak political opines and outright rants of non-expert journalists who have agendas to argue economic and scientific issues, when there are actual economists and scientists who are writing about these things? I'm sure there are real scientists who have good arguments against recycling, if what you really want is to oppose recycling.

> You don't seem to have any rebuttal to the actual content of the essay.

What would you like to argue about? There's nothing for me to rebut. Steven's experience is his own, he's free to interpret the world however he wants. If he's scared of environmentalism and wants to rant about it, that's his choice. He forfeits any reasonable discussion automatically by comparing a general desire to have clean air and water with religious fundamentalism. It's an ad hominem that doesn't deserve any response.

> This doesn't make me a kind of naive environmentalists as described in Landsburg's essay.

Sounds like we're getting somewhere now. Let's talk about the good environmentalists like you, not the naive ones. What makes you a better environmentalist than the kind Landsburg talks about? What is your improved plan for keeping the air and water clean and available forever, without needing to recycle? Will your plan be cost and energy effective?

I didn't see Landsburg drawing a line between naive environmentalists and other kinds, did I miss something? He seemed to draw a blanket conclusion that all environmentalism is nothing more than faith. I know you don't agree with that.

> I understand that you personally prefer recycling though (for religious/aesthetic reasons). I respect your choice.

I haven't stated a preference for recycling, nor given any religious or aesthetic reasons for said preference, so I'm not convinced you understand. Calling it religious is pretty disrespectful, which you already know. But you don't know me, nor my preferences on recycling, so all I can do is return the favor and say I respect your choices too.

Normally, the reduction in landfill fees is counted as a saving in favor of recycling, interesting that in your case it's the opposite and seen as an income stream for the people deciding whether to recycle or not. Sounds like a political problem, though I accept that in theory there could be places where it makes neither economic, nor ecological sense to try to recycle. I'd only really trust a proper expert analysis on that though, as it's quite complex (e.g. if you profit from recycling A, but it costs you to recycle B, does it still make sense to recycle both if some of the cost are shared by both materials)

> I don't consider myself an environmentalist, but I think there are some things that can be done to improve the environment.

Then you are an environmentalist. It's hard not to be one, if you're a human and want to live.

> not buying clutter in the first place would be a good thing to do

Yes!!

> I'm interested in progressive consumption tax

Me too!

> poor people in poor countries have is indoor air pollution, and the use of cheap and plentiful fossil fuels is one solution there. [...] Fossil fuels are essential to fight poverty too

I can agree that fossil fuels may be good solutions to the immediate problems of today like poverty and indoor pollution. But I see from your wording you already understand, as I do, that fossil fuels are only one option, and may not be the ideal solution in the future. G7 countries are now setting goals to reduce dependance on fossil fuels. Why? Is their belief in cleaner energy a religious cause with only faith and no evidence? No, there are both environmental and economic reasons for the US to start avoiding fossil fuels.

> This doesn't seem like a fair characterisation of his position. Which part of his essay did he compare people who desire clean air/water with religious fundamentalists? He didn't, right?

Wrong. And it's not just me, The American Enterprise Institute characterized this article of Landsburg's explicitly as "Why naive environmentalism is like religious fundamentalism", which is accurate since that's exactly what Landsburg said.

http://www.aei.org/publication/why-naive-environmentalism-is...

Just a few direct quotes from Landsburg:

"We consider environmentalism a form of mass hysteria akin to Islamic fundamentalism or the War on Drugs."

"The naive environmentalism of my daughter's preschool is a force-fed potpourri of myth, superstition, and ritual that has much in common with the least reputable varieties of religious Fundamentalism."

"The underlying need to sacrifice, and to compel others to sacrifice, is a fundamentally religious impulse."

That point was stated explicitly multiple times, and is more or less the entire thrust of this divisive, mean spirited, and self-righteous rant from beginning to end. Are you reading the same thing I'm reading? You yourself adopted and used the term "religious" to describe recycling already in this thread, by what leaps of logic are you suddenly claiming to be not aware of this?

Forget the fundamentalist angle, just calling it "religious" is an attempt to discredit the environmental position as lacking any evidence or logical thought. Calling someone's reasons religious, without understanding them and when they wouldn't describe them that way is not just disrespectful, it's intentionally ignorant, it's trying to not understand and trying to disagree, self-righteously so. It's too bad Landsburg doesn't recognize the deep hypocrisy of his own self-righteousness, nor the fact that like you and I, he does actually believe that clean air and clean water being available now and to future generations is a mission worth fighting for. He, like you, is an environmentalist.

You might think Landsburg's writing sounds great, and that it makes a good reference in a discussion like this, but he said a lot of disrespectful things about a vague unspecified group of people without a single piece of evidence. He only states that their position is unreasonable and zealous, but hasn't shown that even once, nor clarified who he's even talking about. This paper is really weak, you are doing a much better job explaining your views on recycling than Landsburg did explaining his. You'd certainly make your points quicker and more agreeably if you left his writing out and spoke for yourself instead.

> Landsburg says it's naive environmentalists that are similar to religious fundamentalists (which I fully agree).

Well, I suppose good luck to you both in your quest to sway any reasonable people, if you want to carry on with your ad hominem attacks. The comparison is flat-out inaccurate, and you know it. But worse, it's attempting to escalate the disagreement rather than find common ground.

As far as I can tell, you and Landsburg are both reacting to people acting self-righteously. Yeah, it happens. It happens everywhere in all subject matters and all corners of the earth. Smart people do it, and dumb people do it. Religious people do it, and secular people do it. It's fairly human for someone who is certain they are right to act self-righteously and attempt to demean the opposition with less than pure logic and evidence. I can point out examples of where both you and I have said self-righteous things in this thread. I will refrain from comparing you or me to Islamic fundamentalists, you're welcome, but I'm happy to identify the double-standard you've established for yourself.

Wouldn't it be better to identify as the kind of environmentalist you want to see other people being, and give it a better name, than to exaggerate your way to negativity and hate?

Steven didn't make a clear distinction between naive environmentalists and other kinds, didn't define what "naive" means, and did not qualify every intentionally inflammatory reference to religious environmentalism with the word "naive". Both the title and the very first quote I cited above fail to qualify with "naive", they are talking fairly unambiguously about all environmentalists. The implication was made absolutely and repeatedly clear that he's saying environmentalism is naive, not that there's a slice of environmentalism that is rational and right. It sounds to me like you don't fully agree with what he's saying.

> But you are right that economists are usually the best kind of environmentalists. We need people who can do calm and cold cost-benefit analysis of given policies (environmental or otherwise)

I appreciate the attempt to bridge our gap. I do agree that considering the larger benefits of environmental policy is a good idea. I disagree that economists are the "best" environmentalists - I'm not convinced economics is the best framework for evaluating the benefits of environmental policy.

http://scholarship.law.georgetown.edu/facpub/323/

> which most people who identify as "environmentalists" can't seem to do.

Do you want to provide some evidence for this claim? One of the problems with your argument, fueled by Landsburg, is you're providing only random amateurs as evidence against, and limiting to only the ones acting badly. You're happy to provide a line of professionals to support you, but you don't seem to be seeking out the professional contrary position. How about debating the people who've established some of the current recycling policy, rather than worrying about what people in a parade think when they're provoked?