Abstract

RICHARD POSNER IS WIDELY described as a libertarian, 1 but as many of this journal’s readers likely know, this is not true. 2 And the latest of his many books, Catastrophe: Risk and Response, may be his most statist work yet, for it wants nothing more than to scare you into accepting bigger, ever-more-powerful government. It is part of a stream of recent work from University of Chicago court intellectuals advocating bigger government and explicitly attacking those who warn against trading liberty for security. 3 The book looks at several interesting-but-unlikely catastrophic scenarios in which millions of humans could be killed. And its proposal for avoiding each one is more power for the state. All the while, however, Posner overlooks the critical fact that the state poses the greatest danger of all to human life—and is responsible for many of the catastrophic risks he analyzes. CATASTROPHE! In his first chapter, Judge Posner describes a number of scenarios under which a catastrophe could kill many, most, or all of us. This is the best part of the book, because some of these disasters are so outrageously unlikely and unfathomable, and Posner so clearly enjoys describing them in graphic detail. Indeed, not since The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy has an author appeared to have so much fun wiping out humanity. Four catastrophes in particular get extensive attention: asteroid collisions, scientific accidents, global warming, and bioterrorism. The first disaster discussed is an asteroid collision, described as follows: 1He has even called himself one (Kurtz 2001).

Citations

19	Catastrophe: Risk and Response - Posner - 2004
19	Death By Government - Rummel - 1994
2	ÒO.J.Õs Defense: A Reductio Ad Absurdum of the Economics of Coase and Posner.Ó - Block - 1996
1	The Health Hazards of NOT Going Nuclear - Beckmann - 1976
1	Other Legal Matters: An Interview with Richard A - “Sex
1	The Changing of the Guard. http://www.lessig.org/blog/ archives/002110.shtml - 2004b