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Comment by andrewclunn | Hacker News Reader

So if I own stock in a company that purchases materials that use a mining process that pollutes... I am therefore responsible for that pollution? I mean what about the people who buy my product then? I wonder what percentage of academics are responsible for tenuous studies meant to push a political agenda?

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You mean if I buy a stolen TV I actively participate in motivating the TVs to be stolen? If that's the case, they should make it illegal to buy stolen TV in the first place (hint: it is illegal)

I think the more common scenario is something like "I bought R410 refrigerant so my elderly parents would not die during the next heat spell, knowing that these A/C appliances typically end in a leak or release event, meaning some kid in India gets the downstream effect of greenhouse emissions instead of me."

I don't think this is at all comparable, and I think GP is being unfairly dismissed.

Yes, but this is the kind of thing Kaczynski wrote about in his manifesto. If you don't produce the product using the externality heavy process that reduces the cost, someone else will, and put you out of business. The whole economic system demands it, it is unavoidable. USA mostly solves this by just offloading the problem onto China.

That is why some people argue for a more capitalist system where the referee of industry job is to make sure businesses pay for externalities, enabling free trade rather than just shitting on the next guy.

On one hand, it feels pointless for someone like me to be environmentally conscious - no matter how hard I try, I won't be able to pollute even one millionth of pollution that people like Zuck are going to cause. But I am living on this planet too, so it is my responsibility too, to be environmentally conscious (no matter how little practical effect it has).

In the end though, the only thing we can control (to some extent) is our own consumption...

Unfortunately there doesn't seem to be much political support in pricing externalities into the cost of products, even though that would be the most efficient "free market" way to solve the problem.

I'm not sure you would even need political support. The courts would just have to uphold the property rights of the polluted, and your right to exercise derivatives on your property i.e. sell a a pollution easement on your property.

I agree that it should be that way.

Neutralizing externalities is an essential part of the capitalist system. Markets with heavy externalities are not free markets.

Is that not true to some extent? I've always accepted that when I buy a pair of trousers that's a tacit support for child labor in Bangladesh, since I know it takes place.

I know this sounds extreme. For sure my part in it is way smaller than the CEO of H&M, but I do take part in the system.

> For sure my part in it is way smaller than the CEO of H&M, but I do take part in the system.

I think it's completely the responsibility of the child's employer (or whatever other term you deem appropriate), and I've never understood why others feel differently.

Interesting. Is this only the case for responsibility, or do you feel the same for any sort of downstream effect?

As an example of the same more general question, do you believe in consumer demand driving production?

I would find it very odd if you believe in downstream effects but not downstream responsibility.

I believe in agency. If I pollute the air, I cause a negative externality for others. But if I buy a product from someone who produces it unethically, I don't cause that unethical production. If the producer can't offer me the same good produced ethically at the same price, that isn't my fault.

That's mostly the same point again. I was asking in the opposite direction. Do "good things" flow upstream?

In your example it would be: would the producer still be producing the unethically produced good without a seller?

Another way to form that question is the more general: does demand drive production, or does production drive demand? Will we buy whatever is produced or will we produce whatever we demand?

>would the producer still be producing the unethically produced good without a [buyer]?

I don't think there's a clear yes or no to this, and I also don't consider this question relevant to my analysis.

Thank you for both correcting it and answering anyway, that's not a given on the internet :)

I suppose I understand. It's a denial of philosophical realism (he wouldn't do that bad thing if it wasn't for me and therefore I'm part of that bad thing) in favor of idealism (no matter if I want the bad thing to happen, he shouldn't do it). I suppose I hold that same opinion when I advocate for intervening in the market to limit the supply of "bad stuff".

I can respect that.

So because you're not the only one to blame you shouldn't be blamed at all??? lmfao

My bet, without looking: The journalist made that up and its not in the paper itself.

The paper says private consumption and investments

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41558-025-02325-x

> My bet, without looking

confirmation bias

On a bet that is, by nature, open ended? I mean. Its a bet.

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