Jag Bhalla writes: Economics is in our nature. But it is not, as most economists promote, the narrowly self-interested kind. Our paleo-economics required inalienable other-interestedness. The logic of our “natural economics” can help tame modern market errors.
There are three evolutionary ideas that economics can benefit from —evolution and economics are both in the “productivity selection” business.
First, anthropologist Christopher Boehm’s work on our evolved moral-rule processors.
Second, economist Robert Frank’s “Darwin’s Wedge” patterns that show how competition can create inefficiency.
Third, studying “objective moralities” can fix the “Naturalistic fallacy,” and describe an as yet unnamed natural principle that “survival of the fittest” must yield to.
- There are many factors of competition that can create inefficiency.
- There is a higher (yet unnamed) natural principle that “survival of the fittest” must yield to.
