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Retorts

And Again

Young Rodney [Viewpoint, April], no longer an environmentalist, is less than kind to old John, his professor, in the amusing Viewpoint. I admired the sustained imagery -- John is said in every case to "overshoot", to "ram", to "attack", and young Rodney is in every case "unaware and unscathed".

Their politics are their own affair. It is the free-market "science" that deserves a second look. I was not aware until young Rodney raised my consciousness that, to quote young Rodney,

"All things are worth simply what others will pay for them."

Let us test this hypothesis. I want Rodney's mag wheels. Here is fifty dollars in used Treasury notes. Who will...

Hang about! Rodney will yelp. Private property, duty of the State to preserve ownership of.

This, I take it, is quite different -- in a scientific sense -- from a "government fetish" which "does not like the idea of people freely transacting."

Nor was I aware of the following scientific facts, assuming I have disentangled young Rodney's syntax:

There will always be exactly enough rain forests and whales unless the socialists interfere.

There are no famines. The battle to feed all of humanity has been won.

I see now, thanks to Viewpoint, just "what science is all about." Sustained imagery and snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. Who will tell young Rodney?

Ken McAllister, Christchurch