TurnRightThenLeft, there are mathematical figures and there are figures of speech. Are you sure you haven't confused the two? You say, "if 80 per cent of our choices are neutral, ten are good and ten are harmful, then 'limiting choice' is the wrong option 90 per cent of the time".

Your logical fallacy is to simply add them all up as if every choice is equally weighted. So you (unintentionally?) give the choice to attack someone the same mathematical significance as the choice of orange juice instead of tea. Surely you don't intend to give them a similar moral rating?

Murder is a wrong choice all the time and we should limit people's choice on that for 100% of the time. But if you want to choose orange juice 100% of the time, that's cool by me. The hardest cases are the ones in between. For these, we don't need statistical formulae - we do need moral reasoning and well-informed public debate.

To the author: Ross, given your well-placed suspicion of centralised curricula, I am interested to know your views on the status of "choice" in an outcomes-based environment vs. a prescribed-content curriculum. I ask this question in the context of my own statements on the matter, published here in OLO: "The new curriculum micro-managers", 23 June 2006.

Frankgol -

I agree, and was not trying to use some mathematical percentage to prove whether choice is good or evil - it can be either. My point is that most of the time it is benign. Even if you weight choices by their significance, again, it will turn up benign most of the time.

I would still argue that if we were to look at the intrinsic concepts of choice vs limiting choice, choice comes up better - if for no other reason as limiting choice implies someone is doing the limiting, and that hints at dominance.

Many argue that laws are based on morals.

I would simply argue that morals are ultimately a matter of perspective - most religions have condemned practices which today are often seen as benign - once upon a time it was seen as a serious sin within the Christian faith to eat meat on a friday.

On the other hand, we can't simply live in a world with no laws - chaos would reign, and we couldn't hope for a reasonable standard of life.

One possible measure, is the effect our actions have on others. This is still exceedingly difficult to quantify, but I would argue that it is at least more quantifiable than a moral perspective.

Eating meat on friday harms no one (well, maybe the animal being eaten, though it probably wouldn't care if it had been eaten on the Monday instead). So there is really no basis, other than the religious which is not shared by all, to keep such a law.

Laws governing matters like illegal drug use are contentious - the individual needs to have control over their body, but what about the cost to the taxpayers of their hospital bills?

That being said... what if they are willing and capable of paying all their associated health costs?

Cont'd

Then there are the arguments that their influence will spread to others, and that the only way to stop drugs is to prevent their spread altogether.

But then... we still allow alcohol abuse and smoking, which are by far the most damaging drugs. Perhaps because they are the legal ones, but then again, perhaps not. Perhaps society would be better off without alcohol though they say a glass of wine a day is beneficial to your health.

Ultimately, by limiting most of these choices, we create as many problems as we solve.

I don't claim to know all the answers, but I think I know a fair number of the questions.

Frankgol, if you're calling for a reasoned debate, then I'm in.