When you assume...

There is a spelling rhyme that goes : when you assume, you make an 'ass' out of 'u' and 'me'. Or as my brother Simon says, "When you make an assumption, you make an 'ass' out of 'umption'." In either case asses are involved. Studying economics exposes a person to a lot of assumptions. However, most people's understanding of economics is limited to the fair price mechanism where price is determined by the interplay between supply and demand. "Supply and demand" doesn't mean anything without understanding the assumptions behind it. And once you know what the assumptions are you can begin to learn about where these assumptions fall short. But these little assumptions don't compare to the big one. We can also say that an assumption is a belief that is taken for granted. The big ass is the one that the majority of people in the world take for granted. That big assumption is that the world belongs to humans. If the world belongs to humans, than it is ours to do with however we please. And how do we prove it belongs to us? Well, who knows how, but it is at least worth considering this basic assumption when we make our decisions about what we do with it. And really, if we extrapolate out from historical events where Europeans claimed countries that were already populated, we could find our selves in a situation where aliens have already claimed Earth for their own, and we don't know that we are destroying somebody else's property.