The Libertarian "State"

Post by **Seth** » Fri Nov 22, 2013 7:45 pm

piscator wrote:So by implication, you're saying the first practical thing America needs to do to institute a New American Libertarian State is to gather a 2/3 majority of state legislatures to repeal the 16th Amendment?

Actually the third. The first is to amend the Commerce Clause, which would eliminate 90 percent of the federal government overnight. The second is to repeal the 17th Amendment so that Senators are once again appointed by the state legislatures. The third is to repeal the 16th Amendment.

Post by **Seth** » Fri Nov 22, 2013 7:56 pm

rainbow wrote:
Seth wrote: The question is not the need for water, the question is the moral justification for seizing it from whomever owns it without their consent.
Actually, that is the question.

If you were dying of thirst and had no other option, you'd take water from someone without their consent.

...or are you saying that in a Libertarian State the right to Property overrides the right to Life?

Depends on what you mean by "no other option." If you are standing over the only well in the middle of the desert and refuse to let me drink from the well and the consequence is that I will certainly die, then yes, I would take that water. Then again in a Libertarian society you would gladly serve me water out of a mature sense of compassion, altruism and charity, just as the owner of the singular well would offer a reasonable compromise to the townspeople because contrary to what you fallaciously think, Libertarians are not antisocial psychopathically selfish people. They are simply respecters of the rights of others not to have force or fraud used against them.

But that's not the situation posed. While it might (and I emphasize the "might") be justifiable to use force to preserve life, it's not justifiable to use force for economic or social convenience, which is what the scenario given proposes. The community has many other choices it can exercise including abandoning that site and moving to one more amenable to it's needs before it becomes an issue of initiating force or dying. The mere convenience of the community of not having to walk 10 miles or dig new wells, or build water transport and purification facilities at its expense is not a justification for taking someone else's property without their consent. Once you allow that the mere whims and conveniences of the collective are sufficient justification for taking from the individual, the concepts of private property and liberty cease to exist and the society becomes a tyranny of mob rule.

Post by **Blind groper** » Fri Nov 22, 2013 9:22 pm

Seth

From time to time, you come across as very naive.

The idea that in a mature libertarian society, people would automatically behave in a charitable way..........

Perhaps you should study a bit more of human nature. Communism failed because people misbehave. So would libertartianism.

Reality is that people are greedy and selfish. This is, after all, why we use a capitalist system. Libertarianism permits too much greed and selfishness. The epitome of a true libertarian behaviour pattern was seen in the management of Enron.

Post by **Seth** » Fri Nov 22, 2013 10:38 pm

Blind groper wrote:Seth

From time to time, you come across as very naive.

From time to time you come across as very ignorant.

The idea that in a mature libertarian society, people would automatically behave in a charitable way..........

Most people already do act in charitable, altruistic and rationally self-interested ways.

Perhaps you should study a bit more of human nature. Communism failed because people misbehave. So would libertartianism.

Wrong. Communism fails because people resent being reduced to faceless cogs in the machinery who are ordered around and abused and killed when they don't obey.

Reality is that people are greedy and selfish.

Yes, some people are. But Libertarianism doesn't have a problem with people being greedy or selfish from time to time because that is their right. Libertarianism says that if you want to be greedy and selfish that your chickens will soon enough come home to roost and you will find that your refusal to act in a socially appropriate manner will leave you ostracized and rejected by the community. Since humans are social creatures, social pressure towards acceptable behavior has, and will always be a potent force in inducing cooperation and good conduct. Libertarianism does not however, unlike Marxism, insist that people conform to social mores by using physical force to induce that conformity so long as the individual is not initiating either force or fraud on others.

This is, after all, why we use a capitalist system.

Wrong. We use a capitalist system because it's the best and most effective economic system anyone has ever come up with, bar none. By the way, capitalism is an economic model, not a political one, whereas Libertarianism is a political model, not an economic one. There's that ignorance I was referring to earlier on your part.

Libertarianism permits too much greed and selfishness.

According to whom? You? The dependent class? Sorry, but what Libertarianism promotes and encourages is liberty and the right to use and enjoy that property that one has honestly acquired and the right to freely contract with others. Some people may misuse that liberty to harm others, but that is true in every society...in which case Libertarianism fully supports defensive and retributive force to defend against and recompense such harms. There's no harm to anyone else if someone is greedy and selfish so long as he does not initiate either force or fraud. Just because Bill Gates is among the richest people in the world, and might be entirely greedy and selfish about redistributing what he's earned to others, he's earned the right to be selfish and greedy with his property and nobody else has any just claim on what he's fairly and squarely earned, especially not simply because he has more than someone (or everyone) else.

Talk about greed and selfishness, that precisely describes socialism, which is based entirely on the credo that it's just to initiate force and fraud on the person next to you if he happens to possess more or better things than you do because that's not "fair" and "egalitarian" to you. That is the very definition of greed and envy made manifest and supported by the corruption that is Marxism.

The epitome of a true libertarian behaviour pattern was seen in the management of Enron.

Abysmally ignorantly red-herring wrong. Enron engaged in systematic, widespread, pervasive FRAUD, which is entirely opposite to Libertarian principles.

Post by **Blind groper** » Sat Nov 23, 2013 12:37 am

Seth

Communities do not behave well as a result of social ostracism and other such restrictions. Better than nothing of course, but far from what is desirable. If you look at the history of homicide, for example, you will find it reaches its highest level among tribal groups that rely upon those social mechanisms.

Certain Amazon tribes have been known to have such a massive murder rate that 20% of the male population, every generation, are killed by male on male violence. So much for social ostracism!

Murder rates have slowly dropped over time, and have dropped in line with the extra disincentives that come from such things as police forces.

Post by **Jason** » Sat Nov 23, 2013 1:32 am

Seth, I've written a script that should make your task of dissecting posts word for word so as to miss any point in the context easier.

I give you Seth-o-lator v0.01b:

Code: Select all

#Seth-o-lator v0.01b

import string
wtf = open('Setholated.txt', 'w')
setholator = []
seth = raw_input('Input post text (ctrl-shift-v):')
setholator.append(seth.split(" "))
for f in setholator[0]:
    wtf.write(str(f + ' <<Seth reply>>' + '\n'))

Example (BG's post):

No need to thank me. You're welcome.

Post by **Jason** » Sat Nov 23, 2013 1:50 am

Come to think of it, I may program a Seth[bot]. It will reference your post history and generate replies based on a frequency analysis of your response to text containing particular keywords.

I could have you arguing with Seth[bot]. That'd be epic.

Post by **Warren Dew** » Sat Nov 23, 2013 2:13 am

rainbow wrote:If you were dying of thirst and had no other option, you'd take water from someone without their consent.

Speak for yourself, please.

Post by **JimC** » Sat Nov 23, 2013 2:14 am

Făkünamę wrote:Come to think of it, I may program a Seth[bot]. It will reference your post history and generate replies based on a frequency analysis of your response to text containing particular keywords.

I could have you arguing with Seth[bot]. That'd be epic.

Or you could make a CES[bot} as well...

Post by **Warren Dew** » Sat Nov 23, 2013 2:22 am

Too afraid to argue with the real thing, guys?

Post by **Jason** » Sat Nov 23, 2013 2:29 am

It was just a little joke. Though making a 'persona'[bot] does sound like a fun project.

But I've been arguing with Seth for going on 5 years. Not so much lately.

Post by **Seth** » Sat Nov 23, 2013 2:30 am

Blind groper wrote:Seth

Communities do not behave well as a result of social ostracism and other such restrictions.

Of course they do. Far better in fact than through the use of force to compel desired behavior.

Better than nothing of course, but far from what is desirable. If you look at the history of homicide, for example, you will find it reaches its highest level among tribal groups that rely upon those social mechanisms.

I think I'll challenge you to substantiate that particular claim. A salient counter example is American Plains Indian culture, where no brave was required to participate in any activity he did not wish to participate in, including warfare. However, those who tried to take from the resources of the tribe (like a buffalo kill) who refused to participate in it were not permitted to benefit from it.

Certain Amazon tribes have been known to have such a massive murder rate that 20% of the male population, every generation, are killed by male on male violence. So much for social ostracism!

You have not presented an iota of evidence that "social ostracism" or the lack thereof is the causative factor in the homicide rate. It's far more likely that it's entirely cultural and has to do with warrior culture. And I also doubt that in "certain Amazon tribes" that any male member of the tribe is physically forced into laboring on behalf of the tribe.

But feel free to produce some critically robust scientific evidence for your claim and I'll be happy to factor it in to my arguments.

Until then I call bullshit on it.

Murder rates have slowly dropped over time, and have dropped in line with the extra disincentives that come from such things as police forces.

What on earth leads you to the idiotic belief that Libertarianism doesn't include law enforcement and peace keeping? Gross ignorance of Libertarianism is my guess. Murder is an initiation of force against the victim that justifies response in self defense or community defense using any necessary force up to and including lethal force.

Try again.

Post by **Seth** » Sat Nov 23, 2013 2:35 am

Warren Dew wrote:Too afraid to argue with the real thing, guys?

Evidently.

Thing is, they are all hoist on their own petard. They stuff their posts with so much idiocy in every line that I have no choice but to dismember them rhetorically. Then they get pissed because I've ripped their so-called logic and reason to bleeding shreds and instead of admitting they are wrong they resort to derails and ad hom to try to salvage some shred of dignity.

Never works, but they keep doing the same old thing over and over and expecting a different result. We all know what that behavior defines....

Post by **Blind groper** » Sat Nov 23, 2013 3:10 am

http://www.ted.com/talks/steven_pinker_ ... lence.html

Seth

The reference above details changes in the rate of violence, and documents them. If you take the time to view it, you will see that the small and primitive groups, that rely on social chastisement to control bad behaviour, have by far the highest rate of violence, including murder.

Violence has been dropping, and has reached its maximum low point in those modern nations that are western and developed, but socialist. Libertarianism shows no sign of being effective.

Post by **Seth** » Sat Nov 23, 2013 3:24 am

Blind groper wrote:http://www.ted.com/talks/steven_pinker_ ... lence.html

Seth

The reference above details changes in the rate of violence, and documents them. If you take the time to view it, you will see that the small and primitive groups, that rely on social chastisement to control bad behaviour, have by far the highest rate of violence, including murder.

Violence has been dropping, and has reached its maximum low point in those modern nations that are western and developed, but socialist. Libertarianism shows no sign of being effective.

Your reference has nothing whatever to do with Libertarianism nor does Pinker make such a link.

rationalia.com

The Libertarian "State"

Re: The Libertarian "State"

Re: The Libertarian "State"

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