Indeed, our particular concept of private property, which deters us from exhausting the positive resources of the earth, favors pollution.

Hardin is arguing that modern private property regimes can create a perverse incentive: owners protect their “positive resources” (the valuable, exhaustible goods on their land) but may still externalize costs by using shared sinks—air, rivers, oceans—as dumping grounds. In other words, property rights can curb overuse of what is owned while simultaneously encouraging pollution when the harms fall on the commons. The line fits Hardin’s broader critique of unmanaged commons and his insistence that environmental problems often arise from mismatched incentives and incomplete assignment of responsibility. It also implies that solving pollution requires governance structures that internalize waste costs, not merely stronger protection of private holdings.