I think it is a problem when an individual seeks to impose his own preferences on an entire system. Let's take your example, someone who sees a moral superiority in the fact that holding is better than selling. How happy would he be if all, really all, so-called market participants saw it the same way? No one would sell. Everyone would agree exactly with their views. Everyone would be of the same opinion.

So that can't be what is meant, can it? That everyone really does behave homogeneously. What is meant instead? The individual who possibly and wrongly assumes that unity across the board would bring him something is of course mistaken. What he may mean is that he wants to imagine himself in a society that resembles him. Like-minded people. There is nothing wrong with that. Like-minded people are everywhere if you look for them. Sometimes it is more difficult to find them because they are a narrow band. In fact, a market is a "real" market when there is diversity among the participants. These differences are what make a market lively and interesting.

If one imagines that everyone in the square sells only and exclusively peaches, that would be very frustrating for anyone who wants to make an interesting morning of it.

All participants are therefore necessary for something to be called a market at all because of their diversity in presentation, size, motivation. The bored and unambitious as well as the eager and profit-seeking. The cautious as well as the easy-going. Those who are bad salesmen may be good storytellers. He who is a miserable entertainer may be good at knowing his way around the market. The moral apostles are therefore just as necessary as the egoists, because all these personalities reveal the charm of the game. Where these differences no longer exist, a market like this is dead.

The question is first of all, how do I recognise that I am dealing with a lively market that emphasises differences? If I can't see it with my own eyes? Where does this market begin and where does it end? The answer, which has been given countless times here, is the number of participants: the more, the better. One automatically and unconsciously assumes that many participants equals diversity. One is probably right about that. But maybe not. Even a huge market can be deadly boring and homogeneous. For me, it becomes particularly homogeneous and boring when the talk in the marketplace only revolves around the market, when all the sellers of goods, as if hypnotised, only talk about how to manage the thing as big and profitably as possible, but not a soul is interested in the goods on offer.

It seems to me that the hive scene is like that, where even when the stalls are being built, people are constantly talking about how they could build even more stalls, but forget about the market visitors. Those who just happen to pass by, who just want to enjoy or have a chat here and there. Strangely enough, the entrance is closed to them. Passers-by who don't have an entrance ticket. They are made to climb over hurdles, they have to go through complicated rituals before they can even address a word to the market stall owner. It's a strange market :)