Can a Jolt Be Good for You? (When Reductios Crash and Burn)

Bob Murphy tries to do a reductio of the case that disasters sometimes contain a silver lining by positing the absurdity of the analogous microeconomic case:

The "macro" case of an economy with idle resources, suddenly being jolted out of its rut by a hurricane, is analogous to a "micro" case of a man who was laid off, agonizing over what to do with himself. Should he go back to school, apply to work at fast food restaurants, start his own lawn-cutting business…? Then, in the midst of his indecision, he realizes his house is on fire! The man suddenly knows exactly what he needs to do with himself—he has to run to the kitchen and grab the fire extinguisher. Yet would anybody dare argue that the fire, notwithstanding the property damage to the house, at least solved the man’s problem of idle labor?

Well, Bob, the answer, unfortunately for your argument, is that perhaps not in such an extreme case (but who knows without more details), but in closely similar cases, yes, people would so dare argue, and do so dare argue, all the time. (And I think they are quite correct to do so.) In fact, as an Evangelical Christian, Bob must be familiar with the absolutely vast number of "it seemed awful at first, but it turned out to be a blessing in disguise" stories that arise in that setting. (I linked to just four of hundreds and hundreds of pages that come up with that theme in a Google search.)

Then, there is the well known adage in AA circles that one has to "hit bottom" before one can get better: "Hitting rock bottom in addiction or alcoholism is actually a good thing in most cases." And the same idea occurs in Buddhism, in Judaism, in Hinduism, in Islam, in Taoism, in New Age spirituality, in Wicca, in sports, in business, in handling post-traumatic stress, and more areas that you can surely identify for yourself. When I broke my leg a year-and-a-half ago, I had to conclude that, in the end, the stress and trauma had been good for me: I had grown too lethargic, and the injury forced me to take a good look at whether I really wanted to keep living that way. (And these examples show the utter stupidity of the response to "There is a silver lining to this disaster" that I sometimes see posted on blogs: "Yeah? Then why don't we nuke our own cities?" Well, if I had gone and deliberately broken my own leg, that would just have been sinking into self-destructive despair rather than rising above circumstances!)

Now, certainly none of the above proves that the same thing can happen on a macro level. That is a matter for empirical investigation. But it does show that Murphy's reductio fails spectacularly: Yes, at the micro level we dare to say good can come out of bad all the time, and across all cultures and all eras, as far as I can see.