View source for Philosophy:No such thing as a free lunch

{{short description|Popular adage communicating the idea that it is impossible to get something for nothing}}
"'''No such thing as a free lunch'''" (alternatively, "'''There ain't no such thing as a free lunch'''", "'''There is no such thing as a free lunch'''" or other variants) is a popular [[Philosophy:Adage|adage]] communicating the idea that it is impossible to get something for nothing.  The acronyms '''TANSTAAFL''', '''TINSTAAFL''', and '''TNSTAAFL''' are also used.  The phrase was in use by the 1930s, but its first appearance is unknown.<ref name="safire" /> The "free lunch" in the saying refers to the formerly common practice in American bars of offering a "[[Finance:Free lunch|free lunch]]" in order to entice drinking customers.

The phrase and the acronym are central to [[Biography:Robert A. Heinlein|Robert A. Heinlein]]'s 1966 science-fiction novel ''The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress'', which helped popularize it.<ref name="verifier">{{cite book|last=Keyes|first=Ralph|title=The Quote Verifier|publisher=St. Martin's Press|location=New York|year=2006|page=[https://archive.org/details/quoteverifierwho00keye/page/70 70]|isbn=978-0-312-34004-9|url=https://archive.org/details/quoteverifierwho00keye/page/70}}</ref><ref name="Smith 2006 131">{{cite book|last=Smith|first=Chrysti M.|title=Verbivore's Feast: Second Course|publisher=Farcountry Press|location=Helena, MT|year=2006|page=131|isbn=978-1-56037-404-6}}</ref> The free-market economist [[Biography:Milton Friedman|Milton Friedman]] also increased its exposure and use<ref name="safire">Safire, William, ''The New York Times'', 2-14-1993 [https://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9F0CE7DF1138F937A25751C0A965958260 "On Language; Words Left Out in the Cold" ]</ref> by paraphrasing it as the title of a 1975 book,<ref name="Friedman, Milton 1975">Friedman, Milton, ''There's No Such Thing as a Free Lunch'', Open Court Publishing Company, 1975. {{ISBN|087548297X}}.</ref> and it is used in [[Finance:Economics|economics]] literature to describe [[Finance:Opportunity cost|opportunity cost]].<ref name="Gwartney 2005 8–9">{{cite book|last=Gwartney|first=James D.|author2=Richard Stroup|author3=Dwight R. Lee|title=Common Sense Economics|publisher=St. Martin's Press|location=New York|year=2005|pages=[https://archive.org/details/commonsenseecono00gwar_0/page/8 8–9]|isbn=0-312-33818-X|url=https://archive.org/details/commonsenseecono00gwar_0/page/8}}</ref> Campbell McConnell writes that the idea is "at the core of economics".<ref name="McConnell 2005 3">{{cite book |title=Economics: principles, problems, and policies |last=McConnell |first=Campbell R. |author2=Stanley L. Brue  |year=2005  |publisher=McGraw-Hill Irwin |location=Boston |isbn=978-0-07-281935-9 |oclc=314959936|page=3 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=XzCE3CjiANwC&q=%22free+lunch%22+economics&pg=PA3 |access-date=2009-12-10}}</ref>

==History and usage==
==="Free lunch"===
The "free lunch" refers to the once-common tradition of saloons in the {{wipe|United States}} providing a [[Finance:Free lunch|"free" lunch]] to patrons who had purchased at least one drink. Many foods on offer were high in salt (e.g., ham, cheese, and salted crackers), so those who ate them ended up buying a lot of beer. Rudyard Kipling, writing in 1891, noted how he

<blockquote>...came upon a bar-room full of bad Salon pictures, in which men with hats on the backs of their heads were wolfing food from a counter. It was the institution of the "free lunch" I had struck. You paid for a drink and got as much as you wanted to eat. For something less than a rupee a day a man can feed himself sumptuously in San Francisco, even though he be a bankrupt. Remember this if ever you are stranded in these parts.<ref>{{cite book |first=Rudyard |last=Kipling |title=American Notes |publisher=Brown and Company |location=Boston |year=1899 |page=[https://archive.org/details/americannotesrud00kiplrich/page/18 18] |oclc=1063540 |url=https://archive.org/details/americannotesrud00kiplrich |access-date=31 May 2014}}<br/>{{Gutenberg|no=977|name=American Notes by Rudyard Kipling}}</ref></blockquote>

TANSTAAFL, on the other hand, indicates an acknowledgement that in reality a person or a society cannot get "something for nothing". Even if something appears to be free, there is always a cost to the person or to society as a whole, although that may be a hidden cost or an [[Finance:Externality|externality]]. For example, as Heinlein has one of his characters point out, a bar offering a free lunch will likely charge more for its drinks.<ref>{{cite book |last=Heinlein |first=Robert A. |title=The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress |publisher=Tom Doherty Associates |location=New York |year=1997 |orig-year=1966 |pages=8–9 |isbn=0-312-86355-1}}</ref>

===Early uses===
[[File:Tanstaafl - dos utt - 1949.jpg|thumb|right|TANSTAAFL: a plan for a new economic world order. (Pierre Dos Utt, 1949)]]
The earliest known occurrence of the full phrase (except for the "a"), in the form "There ain't no such thing as free lunch", appears as the punchline of a joke related in an article in the ''El Paso Herald-Post'' of June 27, 1938 (and other Scripps-Howard newspapers about the same time), entitled "Economics in Eight Words".<ref>{{cite web |first=Fred |last=Shapiro |title=Quotes Uncovered: The Punchline, Please |url=http://freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/07/16/quotes-uncovered-the-punchline-please/ |work={{wipe|The New York Times}} – Freakonomics blog |date=16 July 2009 |access-date=16 July 2009}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|title=Economics in Eight Words|url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1144&dat=19580313&id=jPoeAAAAIBAJ&pg=7426,4042997|access-date=1 April 2014|newspaper=The Pittsburgh Press|date=March 13, 1958 | quote = "...first published in Scripps-Howard newspapers 20 years ago."}}</ref>

In 1945, "There ain't no such thing as a free lunch" appeared in the ''Columbia Law Review'', and "there is no free lunch" appeared in a 1942 article in the ''Oelwein Daily Register'' (in a quote attributed to economist Harley L. Lutz) and in a 1947 column by economist Merryle S. Rukeyser.<ref name="verifier" /><ref name="yale">{{cite book|title=The Yale Book of Quotations|editor=Fred R. Shapiro|publisher=Yale Univ. Press|location=New Haven, CT|year=2006|page=[https://archive.org/details/isbn_9780300107982/page/478 478]|isbn=978-0-300-10798-2|url=https://archive.org/details/isbn_9780300107982/page/478}}</ref>

In 1949, the phrase appeared in an article by Walter Morrow in the ''San Francisco News'' (published on 1 June) and in Pierre Dos Utt's [[Monograph|monograph]] ''TANSTAAFL: A Plan for a New Economic World Order'',<ref>{{cite book |last= Dos Utt|first= Pierre|title= TANSTAAFL: A Plan for a New Economic World Order|year= 1949|publisher= Cairo Publications, Canton, OH }}</ref> which describes an oligarchic political system based on his conclusions from "no free lunch" principles.

The 1938 and 1949 sources use the phrase in relating a fable about a king (Nebuchadnezzar in Dos Utt's retelling) seeking advice from his economic advisors. Morrow's retelling, which claims to derive from an earlier editorial reported to be non-existent,<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.barrypopik.com/index.php/new_york_city/entry/no_more_free_lunch_fiorello_la_guardia/ |title=The Big Apple: "No more free lunch!" (Fiorello La Guardia) |publisher=Barrypopik.com |date=2007-03-08 |access-date=2016-05-14}}</ref> but closely follows the story as related in the earlier article in the ''El Paso Herald-Post'', differs from Dos Utt's in that the ruler asks for ever-simplified advice following their original "eighty-seven volumes of six hundred pages" as opposed to a simple failure to agree on "any major remedy". The last surviving economist advises that "There ain't no such thing as free lunch."

In 1950, a ''{{wipe|New York Times}}'' columnist ascribed the phrase to economist (and army general) [[Biography:Leonard Porter Ayres|Leonard P. Ayres]] of the Cleveland Trust Company: "It seems that shortly before the General's death [in 1946]... a group of reporters approached the general with the request that perhaps he might give them one of several immutable economic truisms that he had gathered from his long years of economic study... 'It is an immutable economic fact,' said the general, 'that there is no such thing as a free lunch.'"<ref>Fetridge, Robert H, "Along the Highways and Byways of Finance", ''The New York Times'', Nov 12, 1950, p. 135</ref>

The September 8, 1961, issue of ''LIFE magazine'' has an editorial on page 4, {{"'}}TANSTAFL', It's the Truth", that closes with an anecdotal farmer explaining this slight variant of TANSTAAFL.

===Popularization===
In 1966, author [[Biography:Robert A. Heinlein|Robert A. Heinlein]] published his novel ''The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress'', in which TANSTAAFL was a central, libertarian theme, mentioned by name and explained. This increased its use in the mainstream.<ref name="verifier"/><ref name="Smith 2006 131"/>

Edwin G. Dolan used the phrase as the title of his 1971 book ''TANSTAAFL (There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch) – A Libertarian Perspective on Environmental Policy''.<ref>{{cite book |last= Dolan|first= Edwin G.|title= TANSTAAFL (There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch) – A Libertarian Perspective on Environmental Policy|year= 1971}} updated and reissued in 2011</ref>

===Meanings===
;Science
In the sciences, no free lunch means that the universe as a whole is ultimately a [[Closed system|closed system]]. There is no source of matter, energy, or light that draws resources from something else which will not eventually be exhausted. Therefore, the no free lunch argument may also be applied to natural physical processes in a closed system (either the universe as a whole, or any system that does not receive energy or matter from outside). (See [[Physics:Second law of thermodynamics|Second law of thermodynamics]].) The bio-ecologist Barry Commoner used this concept as the last of his famous "Four Laws of Ecology".

According to American theoretical physicist and cosmologist [[Biography:Alan Guth|Alan Guth]] "the universe is the ultimate free lunch", given that in the early stage of its expansion the total amount of energy available to make particles was very large.<ref>{{cite book | last = Hawking| first = Stephen| title = A brief history of time| url = https://archive.org/details/briefhistoryofti00step_1| url-access = registration| publisher = Bantam books| year = 1988| page = [https://archive.org/details/briefhistoryofti00step_1/page/144 144]| isbn = 0553175211}}</ref>

==== Economics ====
In economics, no free lunch demonstrates [[Finance:Opportunity cost|opportunity cost]]. Greg Mankiw described the concept as follows: "To get one thing that we like, we usually have to give up another thing that we like. Making decisions requires trading off one goal against another."<ref>''Principles of Economics'' (4th edition), p. 4.</ref> The idea that there is no free lunch at the societal level applies only when all resources are being used completely and appropriately – i.e., when [[Finance:Economic efficiency|economic efficiency]] prevails. If not, a 'free lunch' can be had through a more efficient utilization of resources. Or, as [[Biography:Fred Brooks|Fred Brooks]] put it, "You can only get something for nothing if you have previously gotten nothing for something."  If one individual or group gets something at no cost, somebody else ends up paying for it. If there appears to be no direct cost to any single individual, there is a [[Finance:Social cost|social cost]].  Similarly, someone can benefit for "free" from an [[Finance:Externality|externality]] or from a [[Finance:Public good (economics)|public good]], but someone has to pay the cost of producing these benefits. (See Free rider problem and [[Tragedy of the commons]].)

==== Finance ====
In [[Finance:Mathematical finance|mathematical finance]], the term is also used as an informal synonym for the principle of no-[[Arbitrage|arbitrage]]. This principle states that a combination of securities that has the same cash-flows as another security must have the same net price in equilibrium.

==== Statistics ====
In [[Statistics|statistics]], the term has been used to describe the tradeoffs of statistical learners (e.g., in [[Machine learning|machine learning]]) which are unavoidable according to the [[No free lunch theorem|"No free lunch" theorem]]. That is, any model that claims to offer superior flexibility in analyzing data patterns usually does so at the cost of introducing extra assumptions, or by sacrificing generalizability in important situations.<ref>{{cite arXiv | last1 = Simon | first1 = N. | last2 = Tibshirani | first2 = R. |eprint=1401.7645 |title=Comment on "Detecting Novel Associations In Large Data Sets" by Reshef Et Al, Science Dec 16, 2011 |date=2014 | class = stat.ME }}</ref>

==== Technology ====
No free lunch is sometimes used as a response to claims of the virtues of [[Free software|free software]]. Supporters of free software often counter that the use of the term "free" in this context is primarily a reference to a lack of constraint ("libre") rather than a lack of cost ("[[Gratis versus libre|gratis]]"). [[Biography:Richard Stallman|Richard Stallman]] has described it as {{Double+space}}[[Gratis versus libre|'free' as in 'free speech', not as in 'free beer']]{{Space+double}}.

The prefix "TANSTAA-" (or "TINSTAA-") is used in numerous other contexts as well to denote some immutable property of the system being discussed. For example, "TANSTAANFS" is used by [[Electrical engineering|electrical engineering]] professors to stand for "There Ain't No Such Thing As A Noise-Free System".{{Citation needed|date=June 2016}}

==== Sports ====
Baseball Prospectus coined the abbreviation "TINSTAAPP", for "There Is No Such Thing As A Pitching Prospect",<ref>{{cite news | url=http://mlb.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20130411&content_id=44526640&vkey=news_mlb&c_id=mlb | title=Even top pitching prospects are no sure thing | work=MLB.com | date=12 April 2013 | access-date=6 May 2013 | author=Leach, Matthew}}</ref> as many young pitchers hurt their arms before they can be effective at a major league level.

==== Social policy ====
Hungarian prime minister Ferenc Gyurcsány used this adage to justify his social reforms in the mid-2000s. As a post-socialist country, Hungary struggled with the illusion of the state as a caring and giving, independent entity, rather than being the embodiment of the community. The saying "there is no free lunch" represented that even if the state provides welfare or something else for the people in need, it is in fact bought or provided by other people of the same community through taxes. Therefore, the state cannot provide everything for everyone, and increased provisions given by the state can only be financed by economic growth, increased taxes or public debt.

==== Exceptions ====
Some exceptions from the "no free lunch" tenet have been put forward, such as the [[Astronomy:Sun|Sun]] and [[Chemistry:Carbon dioxide|carbon dioxide]].<ref name="Friend">{{cite book| last = Friend| first = Tim| title = The Third Domain: The Untold Story of Archaea and the Future of Biotechnology| publisher = National Academies Press| year = 2007| page = [https://archive.org/details/thirddomainun00frie/page/21 21]| isbn = 978-0309102377| url = https://archive.org/details/thirddomainun00frie/page/21}}</ref> It was argued in particular that [[Biology:Metabolism|metabolism]] evolved to take advantage of the free lunch provided by the Sun, which also triggers production of vital oxygen in plants.<ref name="Friend"/>  However, these too fall short in that the viewpoint is an [[Open system (systems theory)|open system]], Earth, with "free" inputs from the Sun.  When viewed from the larger system context, the Sun/Earth or Solar System, there is no net energy exchange, and still "no free lunch".<ref>{{cite news | title = Is the earth a 'closed system' with the Sun providing the sole input?| url=https://www.quora.com/Is-the-earth-a-closed-system-with-the-Sun-providing-the-sole-input| date=11 December 2013 | access-date=26 November 2016| author = Wilson, Richard}}</ref>

==See also==
{{div col|colwidth=22em}}
* Demonstrated preference
* Have one's cake and eat it too
* He who does not work, neither shall he eat
* [[Biography:Milton Friedman|Milton Friedman]]
* [[No free lunch in search and optimization]]
* [[Organization:No Free Lunch|No Free Lunch]]
* [[Finance:No-arbitrage bounds|No-arbitrage bounds]]
* [[Philosophy:Parable of the broken window|Parable of the broken window]]
* Revealed preferences
* [[Finance:Scarcity|Scarcity]]
* [[Social:Tax choice|Tax choice]]
* [[Trade-off]]
* Zero-sum game
{{div col end}}

==Notes==
{{Reflist|30em}}

==References==
*Tucker, Bob, (Wilson Tucker) ''The Neo-Fan's Guide to Science Fiction Fandom'' (3rd–8th Editions), 8th edition: 1996, Kansas City Science Fiction & Fantasy Society, KaCSFFS Press, No ISSN or ISBN listed.

[[Category:Adages]]
[[Category:Economics catchphrases]]

fr:Gratuité (économie)#TANSTAAFL

{{Sourceattribution|No such thing as a free lunch}}