No Such Thing as a Free House

Rockamellon: I think I have found a crack in the facade of your argument, Socrato.

Socrato: Do not wait then, friend. Tell me what is broken and we will see if it can be fixed or if it is a mistake of a fatal nature.

Rockamellon: You say that if a thing has no impact on the world then it is of no value, yes?

Socrato: I said that, yes.

Rockamellon: So if our discussion does not turn into a marketable book, written by whoever, then it is of no impact.

Socrato: No. I did not say that. I said that it would still have value if it had impact on someone and caused them to make a measurable economic decision.

Rockamellon: Could you give me an example of this measurable economic decision, friend Socrato?

Socrato: Of course. Suppose, for instance, that you and I were having a discussion about value and money. Furthermore, suppose we were trying to figure out if there can be value in something without it having a dollar value.

Rockamellon: We are having that discussion, Socrato.

Socrato: All the better to use it as an example, then. Suppose further that some poor sod happened to overhear our discussion and being of a particular personality type, decided he wanted to prove that value can exist outside of money.

Rockamellon: I see.

Socrato: Suppose then that he sells his house and all his belongings, deserts his family and goes to live in the woods as a hermit. If he did this, our discussion would then have value.

Rockamellon: Because why?

Socrato: Because it put a house and a house full of belongings on the market.

Rockamellon: And what if instead he gave these things away for free?

Socrato: Then we would return to the argument we had earlier about child care and how despite not offering a price, he is still engaging in an exchange that is an economic one - he's giving someone a free house that they would normally have paid for and that they will then turn around and spend that money they didn't spend on a house on something else.

Rockamellon: And the value of his hermit-hood?

Socrato: Nothing unless someone writes a book about it.