Julian Simon Quotes

• Adding more people causes problems. But people are also the means to solve these problems. The main fuel to speed the world’s progress is our stock of knowledge; the brakes are our lack of imagination and unsound social regulations of these activities. The ultimate resource is people—especially skilled, spirited, and hopeful young people endowed with liberty—who will exert their wills and imaginations for their own benefits, and so inevitably they will benefit the rest of us as well.

  Julián Simón

  Media, Gente, Imaginación

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• It is your mind that matters economically, as much or more than your mouth or hands. In the long run, the most important economic effect of population size and growth is the contribution of additional people to our stock of useful knowledge. And this contribution is large enough in the long run to overcome all the costs of population growth.

  Julián Simón

  Running, Knowledge, Hands

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• Our supplies of natural resources are not finite in any economic sense. Nor does past experience give reason to expect natural resources to become more scarce. Rather, if history is any guide, natural resources will progressively become less costly, hence less scarce, and will constitute a smaller proportion of our expenses in future years.

  Julián Simón

  Pasado, Años, Dar

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• The main fuel to speed the world's progress is our stock of knowledge, and the brake is our lack of imagination.

  Julián Simón

  Past, Imagination, Progress

  Julian Lincoln Simon (1998). “The Ultimate Resource 2”, p.38, Princeton University Press

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• The world's problem is not too many people, but lack of political and economic freedom.

  Julián Simón

  People, Political, World

  Julian Lincoln Simon (1998). “The Ultimate Resource 2”, p.495, Princeton University Press

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• Esta es, en resumen, mi previsión a largo plazo: Las condiciones materiales de vida seguirán mejorando para la mayoría de la gente, en la mayoría de los países, la mayor parte del tiempo, indefinidamente. Dentro de uno o dos siglos, todas las naciones y la mayor parte de la humanidad alcanzarán o superarán el nivel de vida occidental actual. Sin embargo, también especulo con que mucha gente seguirá pensando y diciendo que las condiciones de vida están empeorando.

  Julián Simón

  Correr, País, Pensar

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• The most important benefit of population size and growth is the increase it brings to the stock of useful knowledge. Minds matter economically as much as, or more than, hands or mouths.

  Julián Simón

  Hands, Mind, Growth

  Julian Lincoln Simon (1998). “The Ultimate Resource 2”, p.12, Princeton University Press

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• We now have in our hands—really, in our libraries—the technology to feed, clothe, and supply energy to an ever-growing population for the next seven billion years.

  Julián Simón

  Technology, Hands, Years

  "The State of Humanity: Steadily Improving". Cato Institute Policy Report, www.cato.org, September/October 1995.

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• Human beings create more than they destroy.

  Julián Simón

  Humanos, Seres Humanos

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• Dado que podemos esperar que las generaciones futuras sean más ricas que nosotros, independientemente de lo que hagamos con los recursos, pedirnos que nos abstengamos de utilizar recursos ahora para que las generaciones futuras puedan disponer de ellos más adelante es como pedir a los pobres que hagan regalos a los ricos.

  Julián Simón

  Using Resources, Generations, Asking

  Julian Lincoln Simon (1998). “The Ultimate Resource 2”, p.295, Princeton University Press

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• Greater consumption due to increase in population and growth of income heightens scarcity and induces price run-ups. A higher price represents an opportunity that leads inventors and businesspeople to seek new ways to satisfy the shortages. Some fail, at cost to themselves. A few succeed, and the final result is that we end up better off than if the original shortage problems had never arisen. That is, we need our problems, though this does not imply that we should purposely create additional problems for ourselves.

  Julián Simón

  Correr, oportunidad, crecimiento

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• There is only one important resource which has shown a trend of increasing scarcity rather than increasing abundance. That resource is the most important of all—human beings. . . . [An] increase in the price of peoples’ services is a clear indication that people are becoming more scarce even though there are more of us.

  Julián Simón

  People, Important, Scarcity

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• The standard of living has risen along with the size of the world's population since the beginning of recorded time. There is no convincing economic reason why these trends toward a better life should not continue indefinitely.

  Julián Simón

  Size, Reason Why, Population

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• La esencia de la riqueza es la capacidad de controlar las fuerzas de la naturaleza, y el alcance de la riqueza depende del nivel tecnológico y de la capacidad de crear nuevos conocimientos.

  Julián Simón

  Technology, Essence, Levels

  Julian Lincoln Simon (1998). “The Ultimate Resource 2”, p.13, Princeton University Press

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• Not understanding the process of a spontaneously-ordered economy goes hand-in-hand with not understanding the creation of resources and wealth. And when a person does not understand the creation of resources and wealth, the only intellectual alternative is to believe that increasing wealth must be at the cost of someone else. This belief that our good fortune must be an exploitation of others may be the taproot of false prophecy about doom that our evil ways must bring upon us.

  Julián Simón

  Believe, Hands, Evil

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• Energy is the master resource, because energy enables us to convert one material into another. As natural scientists continue to learn more about the transformation of materials from one form to another with the aid of energy, energy will be even more important.

  Julián Simón

  Important, Energy, Transformation

  Julian Lincoln Simon (1998). “The Ultimate Resource 2”, p.162, Princeton University Press

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• The increase in the world's population represents our victory over death.

  Julián Simón

  Victory, Population, World

  "Hoodwinking the Nation".

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• Our whole evolution up to this point shows that human groups spontaneously evolve patterns of behavior, as well as patterns of training people for that behavior, which tend on balance to lead people to create rather than destroy. Humans are, on net balance, builders rather than destroyers.

  Julián Simón

  People, Training, Balance

  Julian Lincoln Simon (1998). “The Ultimate Resource 2”, p.75, Princeton University Press

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• Based on first-hand evidence of your own senses - the improved health and later ages at which acquaintances die nowadays as compared with the past; the material goods that we now possess; the speed at which information, entertainment, and we ourselves move freely throughout the world - it seems to me that a person must be literally deaf and blind not to perceive that humanity is in a much better state than ever before.

  Julián Simón

  Moving, Past, Hands

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• Progress toward a more abundant material life does not come like manna from heaven. . . . My message certainly is not one of complacency. In this I agree with the doomsayers: our world needs the best efforts of all humanity to improve our lot.

  Julián Simón

  Our World, Best Effort, Heaven

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• All of us necessarily hold many casual opinions that are ludicrously wrong simply because life is far too short for us to think through even a small fraction of the topics that we come across.

  Julián Simón

  Thinking, Topics, Opinion

  Julian Lincoln Simon (1998). “The Ultimate Resource 2”, p.55, Princeton University Press

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• Not understanding the process of a spontaneously-ordered economy goes hand-in-hand with not understanding the creation of resources and wealth.

  Julián Simón

  Hands, Understanding, Wealth

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• Letting the religious right teach ID in schools is like letting the Marines teach poetry in advanced combat training. As a scientist, I see these the relevancy between the two sets to be equal. If Kansas is going to mess up like this, the least it can do is not be hypocritical and allow equal time for other alternative "theories" like FSMism, which is by far the tastier choice.

  Julián Simón

  Religious, School, Marine

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• Friedrich Hayek, who died on March 23, 1992 at age 92, was arguably the greatest social scientist of the twentieth century. By the time of his death, his fundamental way of thought had supplanted the system of John Maynard Keynes - his chief intellectual rival of the century - in the battle since the 1930s for the minds of economists and the policies of governments.

  Julián Simón

  Government, Mind, Intellectual

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• People call me an optimist, but I'm really an appreciator ... years ago, I was cured of a badly infected finger with antibiotics when once my doctor could have recommended only a hot water soak or, eventually, surgery.... When I was six years old and had scarlet fever, the first of the miracle drugs, sulfanilamide, saved my life. I'm grateful for computers and photocopiers ... I appreciate where we've come from.

  Julián Simón

  Grateful, Doctors, Years

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