If you haven’t read Leonard Read’s essay, I, Pencil, then you’re missing a vital piece of knowledge of God’s world. Understand these two incredible facts, and you will be on your way to understanding how the “invisible hand” and prices function, and how order emerges without planning from above:
1) the fact that no one knows how to make a pencil – so many different vocations and processes go into the manufacturing of something so ubiquitous and “simple”;
2) the fact that you never hear of pencil shortages, even when there is an increase in the demand for graphite when tennis becomes all the rage in some new country.
For more information, check out Russ Roberts’ article, A Marvel of Cooperation: How Order Emerges Without a Concious Planner.
Advertisements
