Rethinking Mill's harm clause under Capitalism and AI

Hey there. I hope you're having a good day!

I'm about to have some fun putting together to paper all these myriad thoughts from Thoreau's Walden, John Stuart Mill's On Liberty, Capitalism, and Nick Bostrom's Deep Utopia book on AI.

It should be pretty accessible, and I hope also interesting, but it's less packaged as an article and more like an intellectual exploration. I hope you enjoy it.

Let's dive in.

Harm and access to needs

There are many complementary and conflicting definitions of harm, in both philosophy and psychology, and I don't intend to exhaust them. Among them are physical injuries, offensive remarks, PTSD, economic harm, etc.

For today, I want to pull from Walden's Economy (his first chapter) a section where he explores life's necessities: Food, Shelter, Clothing, and Fuel.

By the words, necessary of life, I mean whatever, of all that man obtains by his own exertions, has been from the first, or from long use has become, so important to human life that few, if any, whether from savageness, or poverty, or philosophy, ever attempt to do without it. [..] The necessaries of life for man in this climate may, accurately enough, be distributed under the several heads of Food, Shelter, Clothing, and Fuel; for not till we have secured these are we prepared to entertain the true problems of life with freedom and a prospect of success.

Thoreau, Henry David. Walden, Optimized For Kindle . American Literature. Kindle Edition.

Thoreau's definition of necessities for life follows a simple criterion: "few, if any," attempt to go through life without it.

Thoreau was a transcendentalist. Among their chief values was the value of self-reliance, most exalted by Ralph Waldo Emerson's book of the same name. There are many parallels between RWE's self-reliance and John Stuart Mill's classical liberalism in On Liberty.

In Thoreau's case, going to Walden Pond wasn't as much an exercise in self-reliance as it was an example of using such values of self-reliance for, once one has fulfilled one's needs, finally facing life's most important problems. He talks about it here:

When he has obtained those things which are necessary to life, there is another alternative than to obtain the superfluities; and that is, to adventure on life now, his vacation from humbler toil having commenced.

Thoreau, Henry David. Walden, Optimized For Kindle . American Literature. Kindle Edition.

In short, Thoreau tries to model the life of fulfilling one's basic needs and then living a meaningful life instead of pursuing superfluities.

To fulfill one's needs in such a permanent fashion, Thoreau suggests building one's self-reliance.

But this self-reliance becomes harder and harder with the advent of modernity in a Capitalist society.

Capitalism's challenge to self-reliance through modernity

I'm a capitalist. I really don't mean to come across as a critic of capitalism, and I currently believe that it's a great way to organize society economically and that it is particularly superior to any proposed alternatives.

But as our technology advances, it becomes harder and harder to provide workable alternatives to capitalist goods through self-reliant means.

In a capitalist world of crude technology, you could:

• Pay a peon to farm your land, while you work on a store selling fruits
• Pay a clerk to sell your fruits while you farm your own land
• Farm your own land and sell your own fruits, and not pay anything
• Just farm and eat your own fruits and not sell anything

When technology is crude, the technological edge or gap of your own solutions compared to the market's aren't as big, and collaboration and self-reliance can reasonably compete.

But when technology advances, providing your own solutions to the world's problems becomes ever-more challenging until it becomes unworkable.

Look around. Look at your phone, your clothes, your coffee, your bed, your car, .. everything around you of value. How many of these things were created by other people, but would have been impossible for you to create on your own? Probably all of them.

Capitalism's drive to innovation, coupled with our human ability to improve technology, is increasingly making it impossible for our own work to compete with the market's work.

When this work that is now monopolized by the market involves superfluities, that's not as bad, because they are by definition not necessities.

But if this work monopolized by the modern market includes our basic necessities, such as food, shelter, clothing, and fuel, it means we have to successfully join the economy in order to get access to our needs. There's no alternative.

What's interesting about capitalism, though, is that the market is a "free market," meaning you should have the autonomy to engage, or not engage, in a transaction in the market according to your own personal willingness.

A point that's typical of classical liberalism (not to be confused with what americans mean by "being a liberal"), that's defended by John Stuart Mill on On Liberty.

In On Liberty, Mill defends people should have autonomy to act according to their will and not be compelled to act by the state.

With one exception.

Mill's On Liberty and the harm clause

Classical liberalism states people should be free to do what they want, even if others or the state believe they shouldn't do it because it's not in the acting person's best interest.

In short, "I won't let you do it, but it's for your own good." is not a justifiable reason to control others' actions under classical liberalism.

His own good, either physical or moral, is not a sufficient warrant. He cannot rightfully be compelled to do or forbear because it will be better for him to do so, because it will make him happier, because, in the opinions of others, to do so would be wise, or even right.

Mill, John Stuart. On Liberty and Other Essays (Oxford World's Classics) (p. 14). OUP Oxford. Kindle Edition.

The exception for controlling others' actions is when this action would harm others or society as a whole. In that case, it's permissible, under classical liberalism, to interfere. This is often referred to as Mill's harm clause.

That principle is, that the sole end for which mankind are warranted, individually or collectively, in interfering with the liberty of action of any of their number, is self-protection. That the only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others.

Mill, John Stuart. On Liberty and Other Essays (Oxford World's Classics) (p. 14). OUP Oxford. Kindle Edition.

In short, Mill's classical liberalism tries to encompass the colloquial "hey, you do you, as long as you're not interfering with or hurting anybody else."

This mindset is typical of capitalism and the free market when talking about state interference in individuals' private affairs, and is evident in political ideologies like american libertarianism and economic policies like neoliberalism.

What is unclear is how, if in any way, we must apply the harm clause to free market capitalism in the dealings of two private parties.

In a world where modern capitalism makes self-reliance more and more difficult, and participation in the economy to fulfill basic necessities more and more required, at what point do we trigger the harm clause and force others' or the state's intervention?

In other words, in classical liberalism, should you eventually be able to force one to buy from you, because you need to sell to not be harmed?

Isn't that a weird thought?

"Do you mean to starve us?" – says the Native American

Thoreau is, once again, way ahead of us – even back in 1854.

In Walden, he tells the story of a Native American who is selling baskets, and complains to his prospective customer when the lawyer decides not to buy them.

Not long since, a strolling Indian went to sell baskets at the house of a well-known lawyer in my neighborhood. "Do you wish to buy any baskets?" he asked. "No, we do not want any," was the reply. "What!" exclaimed the Indian as he went out the gate, "do you mean to starve us?" Having seen his industrious white neighbors so well off — that the lawyer had only to weave arguments, and, by some magic, wealth and standing followed — he had said to himself: I will go into business; I will weave baskets; it is a thing which I can do. Thinking that when he had made the baskets he would have done his part, and then it would be the white man's to buy them.

Thoreau, Henry David. Walden, Optimized For Kindle . American Literature. Kindle Edition.

The reason why this story is interesting is that, under regular market economics, the basket seller has a mistaken expectation. As Thoreau puts it:

"Thinking that when he had made the baskets he would have done his part, and then it would be the white man's to buy them."

Now, it's commonly believed that it's preposterous to expect the lawyer to buy baskets just because one wants to sell them. It's a free market, and the lawyer has the autonomy to choose.

What's great about Thoreau's analogy is that it's not about a newspaper salesperson trying to sell to a magazine salesperson, but a Native American selling to a lawyer. There's a gap in economic participation between these two characters.

The lawyer, if you've read enough Thoreau, would be presumed to have gone to law school in Harvard, an economic opportunity afforded to few, and be presumed to thrive under the new demands of lawyers with private commerce's uptick of the early XIX century.

The Native American, in turn, would have been automated out of the economy by the industrial manufacturing of baskets.

And an interesting change has happened over the past two centuries, and continues to happen:

The lawyer, now, is the one being automated out of the economy.

And so are you.

Now you weave baskets and AI weaves arguments

In the XIX century, automating the weaving baskets was easy but automating the weaving of the lawyers' arguments was hard.

Now, everything is easy.

In the book Deep Utopia, Nick Bostrom cleverly explores the best-case scenario of AI: instead of exploring the myriad ways in which AI development can go sideways, he looks at "OK, what if it works?" and helps us really think it through.

And it's not pretty.

One problem is what he calls shallow redundancy, a crisis of meaning because AI is better at everything humans can do.

Shallow redundancy

The traditional and relatively superficial version of the purpose problem — let’s call it shallow redundancy — is that human occupational labor may become obsolete due to progress in automation, which, with the right economic policies, would inaugurate an age of abundance. This would be a condition of great general prosperity and material plenty. Since it would eliminate both the need and the opportunity for paid work, it would cause one source of purpose to dry up, namely the purpose that many people currently find in their jobs.

Bostrom, Nick. Deep Utopia: Life and Meaning in a Solved World (p. 147). Ideapress Publishing. Kindle Edition.

Under the right economic policies, pervasive automation would create a condition of general prosperity. But "right economic policies," in this context, almost by definition, can't be free market collaboration because people are not the ones doing the work and creating value.

Machines are.

Like Walden's XIX century Native American competing in the economy with the lawyer, as AI advances, humans work will still have value like it does today, but its cost and total value created will be unable to compete in a free market with modern alternatives created by AI.

This transition won't happen overnight. Like other types of automation, it'll gradually improve the effectiveness of certain types of human labor, and the total value gradually comes more and more from the automation and less and less from the raw human input.

Figure 2.2: Illustration of Hans Moravec’s “landscape of human competence,” where elevation represents difficulty for computers, and the rising sea level represents what computers are able to do.

Tegmark, Max. Life 3.0 (p. 82). Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

As illustrated in Hans Moravec's landscape of human competence, the tide slowly rises – it doesn't cover everything at once. But should cover everything, or almost everything, eventually.

And as the tide rises, we must find solace in the peaks. And if we want to find this solace and fulfill basic needs, we need to find the peaks that have economic value in a free market.

And we also gotta figure out what to do with the people who can't get to the peaks to prevent them from drowning.

What to do with those drowning?

I don't know. It's hard.

Many people throw governmental solutions to the problem: Universal Basic Income (UBI), house and food programs, socialism, you name it.

But I'm interested in a different ethical question:

How should you, as an individual, change your day-to-day economic interactions with others based on the harm clause and their lack of access to basic needs?

It's the harm clause applied to modern capitalism and private market interactions. The market can make all types of ethical interactions rather interesting in current times.

I want to close this exploration with a personal story.

Around 9pm, I was driving home after Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu practice. This guy selling candy at the lights, a typical occupation of people who are really poor where I live, approached my car and offered me some candy for sale.

He also said: "Man, I need to sell some of these candy or I won't be able to buy dinner today. Will you help me out?"

This is an economic transaction, but it's also a moral one. He's selling me candy, but he's really selling me Thoreau's baskets.

I told him, "Don't worry, brother, I'll help you out." I pulled out $50 and told him, "Alright, go grab yourself some dinner."

The man was extremely grateful "thank you, thank you!" which I expected. I was happy he could buy himself some dinner today.

Now, here's something funny, which I didn't expect: He insisted I take all of his candy! I said, "no man, I don't eat candy, it's all good, you can sell it later." but he'd have none of it: he literally threw all the candy in my car's passenger seat, thanked me profusely again, and marched off.

Having all the candy was eventually a headache to solve: What to do with that much candy? I think my wife eventually took it to my in-laws.

This is a hyperbolic story, but I think it'll apply more and more to our regular day-to-day financial transactions:

Sometimes, you'll be buying regular stuff, and sometimes, you'll be buying Thoreau's baskets.

And saying "No, sorry, I don't need any baskets" may not always be the right answer.