Euthanizing Pavlov's Dog

It's ironic that Ivan Pavlov, a Russian psychologist, proved the virtues of capitalism. He performed his famous experiments with regular dogs who learned through repetition that rewards would be delivered directly after ringing a bell. Pavlov didn't always use a bell to trigger the reactions, he experimented with both positive and negative reinforcement using other stimuli including whistles, metronomes, and electric shock on his dogs. Eventually the dogs learned to “ring the bell” themselves in order to be rewarded. Man's best friend gave us a spectacle for a simplistic interpretation of capitalism.

Rewarding good behavior elicits more good behavior. That was the conclusion drawn from his experiments. Similarly, punishing bad behavior helps to eliminate unwanted behaviors. Intelligent life learns to associate cause and effect. Touch a hot stove and you get burned. The result: you won't touch the hot stove anymore. The storage of a desired memory can be easily reinforced with pleasure or pain, whether it's with cash, food, sex, or with an electric shock.

Capitalism Is Instinctual

There is no society more noble than one that promotes unbridled self-interest without corruption, because it provides the driving force behind free thinking. Untarnished capitalism is the manifestation of instinctual behavior, and therefore good, natural, and right. It is the right way.

Capitalism always held consistent with the basic instinctual principles of survival. Americans always lived by the moral code that if they worked hard in school, became educated, got a good job, worked hard some more, didn't lie, cheat, or steal, and planted the seeds of a meritorious life, that they would subsequently be self-rewarded handsomely with a generous portion of spoils.

“The world runs on individuals pursuing their separate interests.” --Milton Friedman

It stands to reason that the more educated you become the higher your social value should be. The harder you work the more money you can make, and so on. It is still mostly that way in America because the country was founded on merit based principles, but that is eroding quickly.

Socialist America

All forms of welfare are socialist: “Collective ownership and distributed goods.” Any government programs like HEW (Health, Education, and Welfare) are socialist. Any programs to level the playing field, help the disadvantaged, open doors for specific ethnicities, minorities, ages, races, or genders, all amount to socialism. Favoritism of any kind is socialism. Money packages to keep companies from becoming insolvent is socialism. Social security and Medicare are socialist. Our “national debt” is rooted in socialism. The Federal Reserve central bank promotes socialist behavior and is at the heart of the problem.

Ayn Rand, a peasant who immigrated to the USA from the USSR, who wrote her magnum opus “Atlas Shrugged”, understood that the looters of free enterprise are the destroyers of our imaginations. The looters are the corrupt lawmakers who create socialist programs and packages to help the incompetent compete with the competent. She illustrates how government programs create friction like sand in the gears, making life more difficult and complicated for the truly capable and talented until they can no longer perform.

Government has nothing to give, it creates no wealth, and therefore only has the lowly task of merely staying out of the way and ensuring that the gears of free enterprise are untrammeled and free of corruption. Government programs are the bane of civilization.

“Thanksgiving is a typically American holiday. The lavish meal is a symbol of the fact that abundant consumption is the result and reward of production.” --Ayn Rand

Atlas Shrugged was published in 1957 and was a warning to America about what can and will happen if it stayed on a course aimed toward socialism. Here we are over 50 years later and America did not heed the omen. Eventually the gears are becoming more and more fouled with vile corruption at all levels and backward programs that lift the weak onto the shoulders of the drowning strong. In the book, all production, everything, eventually just stopped. Unfortunately I worry that it's going to be a much bigger disaster in real life when we finally lose our best friend.

The grim reaper is coming for Pavlov's dog now. People have lost trust that they will be rewarded proportionally for their hard work anymore. Instead good behaviors are often punished and bad behaviors are rewarded. Could it be that you work hard all your life and the government can still take all your wealth anytime and hand it to whom they choose? Is that the lesson now? Were the government's promises to properly manage our money empty and our hard work in vain?

R.I.P. Pavlov's dog.

Victor Del Prete