PRESTOPUNDIT

Andrew Sullivan gets a letter on Hayek and gay marriage:

I have very mixed feelings about the push for gay marriage. Principal among my reservations is the notion proposed by Hayek and echoed by conservative thinkers such as Russell Kirk that the institutions, morals, customs and habits of society are not merely arbitrary choices. They have evolved, below the radar of abstract reason, across many generations and through many cultures. The social patterns that have survived until now are those that most guaranteed cultural fitness (in the evolutionary sense), and have thus created civilization as we know it. We must be very cautious in concluding then that we fully understand them, and more cautious about abandoning these customs simply because we can pose excellent intellectual arguments against them.

Much as some economists have recognized that no elite group of planners can ever equal the knowledge contained in the sum total of thousands of individual market decisions, no elite group of judges or legislators should feel so wise as to toss out what has taken thousands of years to develop. Why not? What harm could possibly come from such hubris? Well, that's the point, isn't it? We don't know the unintended consequences of creating massive social changes by fiat. And we will only find out by engaging in an experiment that cannot be undone ...