A little bit of light relief at the end of the semester…

My wife and I used to own a small grey Persian cat, called “Peen”. Peen had a number of endearing characteristics, among them a very obvious “WTF?!” expression whenever something occurred that he considered an affront to the world as it should be. His eyes would grow wide as saucers, an expression of extreme indignation would cover his face, and his head would dart from side to side as though asking everyone around him to explain the bizarre event that had just occurred—“WTF is that cat doing in my spot?” “WTF is this flavor of cat food?” “WTF is this new puppy doing here?”

I had a “Peen moment” a couple of days ago at a Public Hearing at a Planning Board meeting in Hopewell Township, New Jersey.

Art Carden often encourages students at IHS seminars to take a look at local politics, and call local politicians out if they’re making decisions that aren’t supported by evidence. So, I decided to follow his advice, and attended a Public Hearing on a proposal to create a Planned Mini City in the middle of what is now a field. (Yes, this is as crazy as it sounds.) The comments from the audience and some members of the Planning Board were music to my ears. People voiced concerns about the unintended consequences of such centrally-planned communities, advocated for organic, voluntary development rather than central planning, discussed the advantages of incentives over plans, rejected arguments from authority, and asked for data supporting the Planner’s proposals. Noticing that there were many claims made in the documents supporting the Planned Mini City that weren’t supported by any sort of evidence, I asked the Planning Board what evidence they had that the Plan would be a success.

That led to my “Peen moment”.

One member of the Planning Board informed me brusquely that “original research” (such as that done for the Planning Board supporting the Planned Mini City) “didn’t require references”, and then (in response to my eyes widening in incredulity, Peen-like), asked me if Einstein ever cited any sources. (Because, obviously, a report produced by a local town planner and, say, Einstein’s “On the theory of Brownian motion” from the 1906 Annalen der Physik are pretty much on a par.) He seemed unhappy when I informed him that Yes, Einstein did cite his sources…. And reports to the Planning Board should do so, too. Having good data is a Good Thing when making decisions that could potentially affect the lives of thousands of people.

Now, I didn’t really expect the local Planning Board to consist of Philosopher Kings selected for their wisdom, thinking deeply and impartially about pressing issues of local importance. But I did expect them to be concerned with gathering all of the relevant facts before they made a decision. To be fair, some clearly were conscientiously doing this; a couple even seemed to be changing their minds in the face of evidence presented by the public. That’s really admirable. If we’re going to have people on Planning Boards, we should have people like that. But I think it’s important for everyone to bear in mind that not all decision-makers do this. Of course, we know this in theory. “Politicians are people too”, we might say, and so have the same mix of foibles as everyone else. But my excursion into local politics really drove this home. And in that spirit I’ll echo Art’s advice: Tell students to go and see how politics is really done, and then make up their own minds as to whether more Government is preferable to less.