On September 02 2010 18:36 dvide wrote: I also want to touch on the concept that states are merely like landlords setting rules on their own property. Let's say I own a house. For the sake of argument, I inarguably own the house. Now let's say I come home from work one day and I see a hippie smoking weed on my lawn. I don't get to throw the hippie in a cage in my basement for 5 years right? I think we can all recognise that this would not be considered moral. I might have a rule that says nobody can have weed on my property, but that's irrelevant. I still cannot morally lock the guy in a cage for 5 years.
So what gives the state the moral right to do this, even if you argue that they legitimately own all of the land?
The state doesn't own the land. It governs the land. It owns some where it is deemed more useful to be a public resource rather than a private resource. (such as roads, nature reserves, public utility..)
Part of governing is the task to make sure that on the publicly available resources, individuals in a country (region of governance) don't interfere with the utility of that resource beyond the reasonable. Incarcerating someone is a tool for coercing people to follow the rules established by the governing body. How those rules are established, I guess, is your beef. Personally I think there could perhaps be improvement, but I'm not gonna argue about an anarchaic (not a word?) system being better at that. I do like to point out that the state doesn't own all the land.
How can the state even know what is reasonable to interfere with, if they are exempt of market incentives? Measuring the amount of letters they get? Measuring popularity ratings? How can that be even remotely better than price signals and profit incentives (which by the way, they still react to, but in a worse manner, through lobbyism, corruption, favoritism, etc.)?
The state doesn't have an evil agenda when it plans where to put a highway. The police doesn't have an evil agenda when it decides how many people should investigate heavy crimes. The public housing corporation doesn't plot against you in its policies. Grants aren't given on a basis of corruption.
Yes, there is some amount of corruption and the other issues you mention, at various level of politics and public services. You're exaggerating when you claim it's all that bad. The free market mechanisms you mention are just as prone to human wrongdoing. Which is, they are prone to human wrongdoing, 100% true, as is government. You can't quantify it don't try it. This point has been mentioned a lot of times, but alas you won't believe it.
The free market methodology of regulating the use of public space may be more efficient. I think that a body of governance would do better in various circumstances when regarding the interest of the overall population, whereas the free market approach would always favor the interest of the most wealthy and influential (individual or interest group).
On September 03 2010 04:31 silynxer wrote: Well it is annoying to come back after several days and having to read all those pages but as far as I see this is the last relevant post concerning my argumentation.
On August 31 2010 08:37 Yurebis wrote: By the same argument, the thug on the backalley is always a normal company as well. Please test your arguments instead of having me point obvious flaws. The thug isn't a normal company, and by normal I hope you mean voluntary, because it does not act under the NAP (non aggression principle). So a company that is not voluntary cannot be said to be voluntary.
Sorry no obvious flaw there to me. Ok so you define every entity that does not act under the NAP as "not normal company" that's fine by me, let's just call them companies altogether (normal+not-normal). Because obviously the thug is in a sense a company,
A classification is useless if includes every possible entity in it, so it must be either disregarded as inconsistent or irrelevant. I discern voluntary, cooperative beings from violent, coercive ones.
On September 03 2010 04:31 silynxer wrote: this is exactly what you are arguing: Even the thug will work in the framework of risk and benefit and he has a business model.
Not what I would call a business model for reasons above. But of course, the thug is acting on what he expects to be the best actions for his ends... (if everyone was well versed in praxeology I really would not have to write 3/4 of the things I do...)
On September 03 2010 04:31 silynxer wrote: But a company that intimidates and coerces remains a company. The reason why we don't call the mafia a company is only because in the framework of a state it is none, if you take away the state or take away it's legitimacy the mafia automatically becomes as legitimate as everything else. Or if you like you can define away it's legitimacy through your own moral code but until these morals are universally accepted this remains hollow semantics.
No, it's not semantics, it's the whole point. In the realm of private property, a company that engages in obviously private-property-invading behavior, is an outlaw. It will be seen as illegitimate, will lose business, will be retaliated upon, and will not be protected by other law-abiding entities. It puts itself in a situation of great risk, and is most commonly attributed to lowly criminals because lowly criminals have much less to subjectively lose.
It is of concern of the company, because non-aggression is popular, and all the courts would support retaliation against an initiator of violence. If a PDA (protection agency) or not even a defense agency at all, fucks somebody up, does not appear in court when called, it is automatically deemed a violent company, and won't be protected by reputable courts nor any PDA. The employees all lose their insurance, are required restitution for any breach of contracts, and can be aggressed against easily by any lawful organization or person, because he would have the backing of no one. The employee would rather steal capital from it's own aggressing company and leave, before his reputation goes down with, so the profit motive can even destroy the company from within.
The only way that an aggressing company could kill and steal, and get away with it without going to reputable courts, that I can imagine, would be for being the largest of all, and becoming a state indeed. But I doubt that would happen for several reasons that I won't elaborate until we're even past lowly criminals and 6-pool builds. Which is a shame, that after 20 pages I still haven't got past that point. Though I have only myself to blame, I guess.
This is not about theorycrafting what will most likely happen according to your view of human nature. I don't care about that, all that matters is that the state can be validly seen as company or entity acting in an AnCap world if you don't want to use this particular word.
By definition it cannot. It would not have the "An" nor the "Cap" element anymore. If you mean that ancap can revert back to less-free states, then yes it can, but I deem unlikely once it matured.
On September 03 2010 04:32 Railxp wrote: Hats off to you Yurebis, i've accepted ancap for quite a while now but i've never had the patience to argue with people online about my position for longer than a page or two. After i've made a few points I usually stop posting. Huge kudos to the work you do here, the patience, the step by step logic, the civil manner. 36 Pages and still going strong. Thanks for broadcasting the message, I dont think there is any other way to right social injustices.
Hats off to your kind sir, for being honest with yourself.
No, it's not semantics, it's the whole point. In the realm of private property, a company that engages in obviously private-property-invading behavior, is an outlaw. It will be seen as illegitimate, will lose business, will be retaliated upon, and will not be protected by other law-abiding entities. It puts itself in a situation of great risk, and is most commonly attributed to lowly criminals because lowly criminals have much less to subjectively lose.
On September 02 2010 18:36 dvide wrote: I also want to touch on the concept that states are merely like landlords setting rules on their own property. Let's say I own a house. For the sake of argument, I inarguably own the house. Now let's say I come home from work one day and I see a hippie smoking weed on my lawn. I don't get to throw the hippie in a cage in my basement for 5 years right? I think we can all recognise that this would not be considered moral. I might have a rule that says nobody can have weed on my property, but that's irrelevant. I still cannot morally lock the guy in a cage for 5 years.
So what gives the state the moral right to do this, even if you argue that they legitimately own all of the land?
The state doesn't own the land. It governs the land. It owns some where it is deemed more useful to be a public resource rather than a private resource. (such as roads, nature reserves, public utility..)
Part of governing is the task to make sure that on the publicly available resources, individuals in a country (region of governance) don't interfere with the utility of that resource beyond the reasonable. Incarcerating someone is a tool for coercing people to follow the rules established by the governing body. How those rules are established, I guess, is your beef. Personally I think there could perhaps be improvement, but I'm not gonna argue about an anarchaic (not a word?) system being better at that. I do like to point out that the state doesn't own all the land.
How can the state even know what is reasonable to interfere with, if they are exempt of market incentives? Measuring the amount of letters they get? Measuring popularity ratings? How can that be even remotely better than price signals and profit incentives (which by the way, they still react to, but in a worse manner, through lobbyism, corruption, favoritism, etc.)?
The state doesn't have an evil agenda when it plans where to put a highway. The police doesn't have an evil agenda when it decides how many people should investigate heavy crimes. The public housing corporation doesn't plot against you in its policies. Grants aren't given on a basis of corruption.
Their intents may not be evil. But that's irrelevant in the scope of intelligence that I was referring to. The state cannot do all those things even if it set up with the best intentions in the universe, and had the most energetic personnel. They can't do all that because they aren't equipped with the market mechanisms that allow an entrepreneur to do the same. An entrepreneur is heavily interested in whether his project will be profitable, and by profitable I mean it will supply an unprecedented and unsatisfied demand in society; by how much; how much will he spend out of his pocket, and how much will people willingly pay him back; how can he devise the best business model to reduce redundancy at the maximum; how can he better support specializations within that model. These are many questions that the state bureaucrat does not have to nor could answer if he wanted. He can only copy what the market is already doing or had already done. at which point his measures are outdated; or create his own arbitrary measures that will never be as accurate as the entrepreneur's, because the people using the service aren't being free to choose it. Aaand shit, I've went for too long on entrepreneurship again.
Basically, the state can't know how many people it puts on each case, it only acts on its own hunchism devoid of market demand. Tax as much as they want, spend as much as they want, as long as they've got just enough people to vote them in next election.
On September 03 2010 05:00 Badjas wrote: Yes, there is some amount of corruption and the other issues you mention, at various level of politics and public services. You're exaggerating when you claim it's all that bad. The free market mechanisms you mention are just as prone to human wrongdoing. Which is, they are prone to human wrongdoing, 100% true, as is government. You can't quantify it don't try it. This point has been mentioned a lot of times, but alas you won't believe it.
Yes, now tell me, is it easier to corrupt a few senators, or multiple courts all over the country? The answer should tell you which model is more prone to corruption.
On September 03 2010 05:00 Badjas wrote: The free market methodology of regulating the use of public space may be more efficient. I think that a body of governance would do better in various circumstances when regarding the interest of the overall population, whereas the free market approach would always favor the interest of the most wealthy and influential (individual or interest group).
How can it know what the interest of the overall population are? And why do you think it can know better than businesses trying to satisfy those demands and profit off them themselves? The central planner is just one entity, there are thousands if not tens of thousands times the number of entrepreneurs compared to bureaucrats.
No, it's not semantics, it's the whole point. In the realm of private property, a company that engages in obviously private-property-invading behavior, is an outlaw. It will be seen as illegitimate, will lose business, will be retaliated upon, and will not be protected by other law-abiding entities. It puts itself in a situation of great risk, and is most commonly attributed to lowly criminals because lowly criminals have much less to subjectively lose.
Outlaw or not is it still a company?
It is an outlaw company; it will be sued against, its employers have all their contracts void, insurances void, anyone can rob them because the courts won't hear them; anyone can kill them or arrest them if they have killed and are still killing and robbing about.
On September 03 2010 03:07 Incognito wrote: I never said that said thugs = state. But the fact that you do have thugs running around attempting to coerce people is not something I'd like to have around.
I know. That's kind of my point, because nobody says thugs = state. Now states ARE just thugs in reality, but most people think states != thugs and instead states = angels. That's the whole point. That's what makes a state work. It's merely a false meme. It's a cultural thing that states are not only inevitable, but required and are virtuous, moral entities that protect you. In the same way that slavery was once considered legitimate, we now all understand that it's not and we rationally oppose it.
And so even in a pure democracy, people aren't going to vote for slavery of the minorities just because the majority would benefit from it. It's not going to happen, because society has progressed and we have abolished slavery on moral grounds. We all 99% of us understand that there is no moral way to own another human being. Do you see what I mean? The fact that some people get political benefits from the state is true, and I don't discount it as being significant. It serves to make our job of convincing people that much harder. But in the same way that we now all rationally oppose slavery, I don't think that it's completely insurmountable.
On September 03 2010 03:07 Incognito wrote: I think you overestimate the power of legitimacy. And you ignore some other factors that can support the success of the state. There are probably more factors, but I'll list the two most obvious. One is terror. Suppose instead of pointing a gun at you, I mutilate your body and hang it up in front of my corporate office. Sure, some people will get enraged and will be provoked to fight me, but a lot of other people will be quiet and accept that I have the power to make their lives miserable. We call this a reign of terror. Usually a reign of terror isn't solely a reign of terror though. While it can be immensely useful, it also usually needs something else to back it up.
I really don't think I overestimate it. I think that 99% of people support the state's use of initiatory violence, and actively defend it in arguments. This is contrasted with 99% of people opposing state's use of initiatory violence, and actively attacking it. I think that difference is huge and creates a very large practical difference on whether the state can feasibly exist. But maybe we can agree to disagree here. I've made this point as best I can a million times already and I really don't want to try again. If I haven't yet changed anybody's mind then it's not going to make a difference.
But your point about terror. It's true that states terrorise their citizens, and it's true that this can lower opposition to them. Duly noted. But again I don't think it's insurmountable. And I doubt that if you truly did something like that, that nobody would hold you to task for it. This would not allow you to become the next state; in-fact I would argue it would only serve you to achieve the opposite of your intended effect. Do you think the mere fact that my mutilated body hangs at your corporate office means that THE REST OF SOCIETY are all going to bow down and pay you taxes? No. If anything it would only show them how bat-shit criminally insane you are and increase opposition to your "company".
On September 03 2010 03:07 Incognito wrote: Consider socialism. Of course if I will get a bunch of support if I say that I would like to destroy the top 1% on behalf of the bottom 99%.
So surely the same logic applies if I say that I would like to enslave the bottom 1% of income earners on behalf of the top 99%. Of course, I will get a bunch of support, right! No I wouldn't, because slavery is morally opposed by everybody! That's the whole point! Who would support me? And even if over 51% of the hypothetical people would support me, at least WE REAL PEOPLE can all understand that it still doesn't make it right, or moral or legitimate.
On September 03 2010 03:07 Incognito wrote: Are you going to seek to destroy the entity that protects your saftey? Or the entity that protects your business from fair competition?
It doesn't protect my safety; it hinders my safety and initiates aggression against me. It doesn't protect my business from fair competition; it restricts my business from fairly competing with those few that are politically connected.
On September 03 2010 03:07 Incognito wrote: Running around and yelling YAY FREEDOM isn't going to convince that many people who think that the benefits of government outweigh the loss of freedom it brings. The existence of government has little to do with any moral authority, but rather widespread sense of political support.
That's why I'm trying my best to address everything in detail in order to best convince people, instead of merely yelling YAY FREEDOM. Maybe you're right that widespread political support is insurmountable, but I don't think that it is so I will try. The same argument could be made for giving women the right to vote, or equal rights for blacks, or something like that. It's not insurmountable to have a major paradigm shift of political opinion in culture, and to have cultural progress in the understanding of freedom. As it has happened many times before in history. Or do you content that our current political system is somehow the pinnacle of human political progress, and no more widespread cultural political views can ever possibly be changed from this point in time? I think that's a genuine mistake.
On September 03 2010 03:07 Incognito wrote: If you're trying to make an argument, state the key points. Don't expect people to watch 30 minute videos. Note: I watched the first two minutes, noticed it has nothing to do with the quote you are supposedly trying to respond to, and then stopped watching.
I don't expect anything of you. If you don't want to watch it I honestly don't care. I link it for anybody that is interested enough.
On September 03 2010 03:07 Incognito wrote: Waiting to see how you respond, I'll go on the assumption that what you DON'T say is going to be more telling than what you do. Prove me wrong.
I'm not sure what you want me to do here.
On September 03 2010 03:07 Incognito wrote: What if the contract said "if you smoke weed I have the right to lock you up in a cage?"
Then nobody would accept the terms of that contract. And even if they did, IT'S STILL IMMORAL. Oh yes, I went and said it. I don't think contracts are binding to such ridiculous extremes. If that were true, then members of the Scientology sea org are actually bound to employment for a billion years. But thankfully we can all recognise it as being ridiculous.
I value stability, and would rather not have the instability of a state that can shape the life of millions at the stroke of a pen. And you are right on the value subjectivism. People who want to coerce will probably find the state appreciable too.
This says nothing. Just because the state has the ability to shape millions of lives with the stroke of a pen doesn't mean that necessarily makes it unstable. Plenty of people don't care about politics because they dont think it affects them that much. Does it? Well doesnt really matter because if they don't think it does, then its stable enough for them. Also rent-seeking megacorporations may not like the instability of the states ability to change rules at a whim, but then again, they have massive lobbying power. They aren't that worried. Your hand waving statement merely shows an underlying fear of the potential power of the state. Either that or it shows that you're someone who is very much affected by the state (small businessperson). There is institutionalized instability, and then there's bottom up instability. Most people are more concerned about the thugs than they are about Uncle Sam. Reason? Maybe its because they suppose Uncle Sam to be legitimate, but more likely is because they like the benefits government confers on them. Government may be a large source of evil, but it does good things to some people as I explained in another of my posts.
Is it not implied that coercion is the 'only way' when you say that voluntary action can't do what you want to do? Seems to me like an implied support. "I'd love to make peace with the middle-east but it just doesn't seem possible..."
Coercion does not equal the state. Anarcho-capitalism also does not imply the lack of coercive forces. There are non-state coercive forces. For example, social forces. Anarchism makes a breakthrough when it comes to differentiating where the coercion comes from, but doesn't do away with the problem entirely. There are also varying degrees of coercion. The reason why nobody is truly free is because everyone has priorities. The choice between death and slavery/starvation isn't really a free choice, its a weighted choice. Its a whole other problem when you decide to look at why people prioritize things in certain ways. I could even argue that we don't live in a coercive society today. You can choose not to pay your taxes if you don't want to. But that wouldn't make much of an argument. The fact that we live in a society means there will be coercion of some form, as peoples interests will come into conflict. The entire discussion of freedom is warped, because then you have questions like "what are you free from?" Also the example you mention about the middle east brings up another point: Throw religious fundamentalists into the mix and you have a group of people who seemingly act irrationally. I don't think you're really going to convince fundamentalists to do things with market incentives.
Yes. The PDAs (private defense agencies) can do such a thing, but because you know and I know that they can do such a thing, people will have prepared something to deal with it. Their contracts will be voided, they will be considered outlaws by everyone, anyone can arrest you and/or the PDAs employers, or kill you if you are pillaging. The PDA would have everything to lose, its own employers could turn get bounties+some amnesty if they manage to kill/arrest the management. Hitman businesses are pretty expensive if they're not legitimized, especially if it includes sustaining your own hierarchy, coercing big groups of people, and going against the whole society. The state can do it because it's a state, not because of the number of tanks or cops they have. If even 10% of the population today would see them for what they are, no amount of ammunition or fiat money would save them.
Assuming people are prepared is one thing Even going past that assumption, you can't say they will be considered outlaws by everyone. Obviously the company you're trying to destroy has enemies, esp if its not a monopoly (which likely wouldn't happen without the presence of a state - large accumulations of capital likewise probably wouldn't exist). They could even ignore the fact completely instead of siding with the PDA to avoid public scrutiny. Also its not like everyone cares if company X is driven into the ground and disappears from the face of the earth. Some people might, but not all. Hardly enough to justify everyone taking action to combat the PDA. Assuming everyone has FORESIGHT, then maybe yes, you could get enough individuals to combat the PDA's behavior. The question is whether you have enough resources to do so. Thats a quantitative question, not a qualitative one.
Feudalism was expensive. But it also worked, partly because of lack of transportation/geographical isolation/information asymmetry/a largely uneducated populace. So in essence anarcho-capitalism relies on the ability of people to quickly mobilize resources to respond to a threat. That has been helped by inventions such as the internet, transportation improvements, etc. Whether you have enough political willpower to execute a certain order of business is an entirely different matter. You have to get people who care. Political will still exists even without an official government. There are also non-market forces that influence people to certain actions.
Behavior economics says that people are irrational and do not always follow pure logic with regards to market decisions. It is often much cheaper to buy things in the context of social interaction/social favors etc than it is through the market. There are also things that people would do as a friendly favor that they wouldn't do for a small sum of money. Money isn't everything people care about. It also isn't the most efficient method to do things in some cases. So yes, of course its expensive to pay off people to stop them from interfering with your devious plans. But its much easier to do it with social norms.
Actually the state can do it because it comes in a big bundle. The state is all or nothing. You buy the whole package, or you don't. They can do it because people can't get rid of the things they hate about government while keeping the things they like. People like getting food stamps and other things. Bread and circuses ftw. Government essentially works by pacifying the masses. It probably contributes to the reason why public education is so bad.
* I see coercion here * - the truth is you can't escape coercion even in an anarcho-capitalist society. Its just not a formally institutionalized entity.
Uh, people individually can't know everything, yeah. But even the relations of trust and specialization is maximized in the free market. The right way to think of it is not "what wrong can happen" but how do you best prevent such wrongs. I think the most fraud that exists in the world today is by the part of a state. I don't think all private scams in history added together get to the trillions of dollars stolen and indebted by the part of governments. And that's because the bureaucrat is much more sheltered from market interaction, and the bureaucrats have to be paid by law. Hell, any scammer would love to be in the position of government - he doesn't even have to fool the people into buying, he is paid no matter what!
Explain how relations of trust and specialization is maximized in the free market?
So if the right way to think is how do you prevent such wrongs, then how would you answer that question? Pure market forces?
The biggest fraud is the fraud that is fractional reserve banking, so yes, that is a product of the state. But it doesnt really matter how BIG the scam is. All that has to happen is that it ruins one person's life. You can defraud wealthy individuals of large sums of money, or you can defraud a poor person of their meager means of living, its still fraud. Its easier to defraud uneducated people than educated people. So another reason why anarchism requires a high average level of competence/education.
Maybe the bottom line here is that anarcho-capitalism relies on a set of interlocking forces which constrain individuals to follow certain patterns of behavior. In which case if one of those forces is seen as invalid by the individual, the system breaks and said individual commits an "illogical" act. The problem is not everyone has the same goals and not everyone is in it for profit.
Are you saying the state has prevented the assassination of Bill Gates lol? Please, has the government made the grass grow too? When the government 1-steals from everyone 2- establishes a service like police and law enforcement and 3- prohibits anyone else from providing such a service, you can't say that if it weren't for it there would be no security nor law, because they are monopolizing it! It is the same thing as a proletariat waiting at bread lines in communism saying that there would be no one to give him bread in a free market! Ridiculous. A service is a service, and men are men. The men giving you security now (and doing the shittiest job at it shoud I add) would be no different than in anarchism, if not better. Because they'd be forced to compete for once, they'd be paid what the market is willing to pay, and they'd be as susceptible to the law as anyone else.
Bill Gates does not have either the funds nor the mental capacity to run a more successful state. Nor is it particularly efficient to invade property rights to protect property rights. Bill Gates would spend the necessary amount to protect his property and no more - that way he remains both popular and efficient.
First off I should probably qualify my statement and say that in anarchism theres nothing stopping the average joe from NOT killing Bill Gates. The difference is the reasons. Anyway...
The state has not physically prevented the assassination of Bill Gates, no. But there are many potential state reasons why this has not occured, namely, that poor people who would be socialists think that the government will help them get Bill Gate's wealth after he dies. Karl Marx originally said that class struggle would lead to violent revolution. The truth is that government evolved to accommodate these fears. When the welfare state came about, the class struggle theory lost its fangs because the working class is no longer "oppressed" like they supposedly would have been. Its bread and circuses again like I have mentioned. Unlike anarcho-capitalism, the poor person is not starving and in desperate need of killing Bill Gates. At least in the current system the poor person (thinks) that Bill Gates is paying for his food/clothing/shelter via the welfare state.
The rest of your paragraph is incoherrent. I dont think I said anywhere that there would be no defense/bread providing services in anarchism. So the only thing I'll say here is: would everyone be able to afford these services? Or would I have to be a wage slave to someone in order to get food/protection? On second thought, how would Police charge for services? Monthly fees? What if in a community of 10 ppl 8 people decided to pay for the service and two didn't?
Hmm well yes Bill Gates probably wouldn't need to fund a whole state, only a defense part. My bad.
You don't need everyone to be geniuses as much as today you'd need everyone to be geniuses so they can choose competent rulers. Anarchism is not about taking all responsibilities of the current economy into each individual, it's about letting each individual transfer their own responsibilities to those he chooses, instead of taking it for some collectivist cause (which btw, doesn't exist. Collectivism has no conscience, collectivism makes no decisions. Man makes decisions, and in statism, some man will have to make decisions for people, or more precisely, steal from them the ability to make decisions themselves).
The whole paragraph is confusing and seems to bypass everything I said. I don't even know if it was meant to be in response to anything I said. But then again since its so confusing I don't know if it did bypass anything. This is probably one of the paragraphs that tells me more by what ISN'T said than by what is said. However, I don't think I ever said anything about support for a collectivist cause, so my guess is that you are throwing around rhetoric in order to easily dismiss the points.
I can agree and support the idea that Anarchism allows people to transfer responsibilities to anyone he chooses, the only problem is that anarchism does much more than that. This still doesnt address many other issues including some forms of rational malevolence, irrational malevolence (terrorism), non-market forces, education levels, subjectivity of value, freedoms, information asymmetry, etc.
The main error in anarcho-capitalism is the capitalism part, not necessarily the anarchism part. But thats a whole other discussion (with tabula rasa included).
On September 02 2010 18:36 dvide wrote: I also want to touch on the concept that states are merely like landlords setting rules on their own property. Let's say I own a house. For the sake of argument, I inarguably own the house. Now let's say I come home from work one day and I see a hippie smoking weed on my lawn. I don't get to throw the hippie in a cage in my basement for 5 years right? I think we can all recognise that this would not be considered moral. I might have a rule that says nobody can have weed on my property, but that's irrelevant. I still cannot morally lock the guy in a cage for 5 years.
So what gives the state the moral right to do this, even if you argue that they legitimately own all of the land?
The state doesn't own the land. It governs the land. It owns some where it is deemed more useful to be a public resource rather than a private resource. (such as roads, nature reserves, public utility..)
Part of governing is the task to make sure that on the publicly available resources, individuals in a country (region of governance) don't interfere with the utility of that resource beyond the reasonable. Incarcerating someone is a tool for coercing people to follow the rules established by the governing body. How those rules are established, I guess, is your beef. Personally I think there could perhaps be improvement, but I'm not gonna argue about an anarchaic (not a word?) system being better at that. I do like to point out that the state doesn't own all the land.
How can the state even know what is reasonable to interfere with, if they are exempt of market incentives? Measuring the amount of letters they get? Measuring popularity ratings? How can that be even remotely better than price signals and profit incentives (which by the way, they still react to, but in a worse manner, through lobbyism, corruption, favoritism, etc.)?
The state doesn't have an evil agenda when it plans where to put a highway. The police doesn't have an evil agenda when it decides how many people should investigate heavy crimes. The public housing corporation doesn't plot against you in its policies. Grants aren't given on a basis of corruption.
Their intents may not be evil. But that's irrelevant in the scope of intelligence that I was referring to. The state cannot do all those things even if it set up with the best intentions in the universe, and had the most energetic personnel. They can't do all that because they aren't equipped with the market mechanisms that allow an entrepreneur to do the same. An entrepreneur is heavily interested in whether his project will be profitable, and by profitable I mean it will supply an unprecedented and unsatisfied demand in society; by how much; how much will he spend out of his pocket, and how much will people willingly pay him back; how can he devise the best business model to reduce redundancy at the maximum; how can he better support specializations within that model. These are many questions that the state bureaucrat does not have to nor could answer if he wanted. He can only copy what the market is already doing or had already done. at which point his measures are outdated; or create his own arbitrary measures that will never be as accurate as the entrepreneur's, because the people using the service aren't being free to choose it. Aaand shit, I've went for too long on entrepreneurship again.
Yes, you did. I don't need my government to be 100% most efficient to various measurements. I prefer it to be fair towards me. I don't have any guarantees in a free market, none. Entrepreneurs are free to ignore me. You say that I'll be a nice customer, I say that I might not be worth their efforts as I get out-competed in the demand market (will hold true for various kinds of markets, false for any other markets that you would use in an example to counter my point).
On September 03 2010 05:19 Yurebis wrote: Basically, the state can't know how many people it puts on each case, it only acts on its own hunchism devoid of market demand. Tax as much as they want, spend as much as they want, as long as they've got just enough people to vote them in next election.
Responding to market demand is also reactive, not pro-active. Hunchism doesn't exist, it is fine-tuning based on a feedback loop.
On September 03 2010 05:00 Badjas wrote: Yes, there is some amount of corruption and the other issues you mention, at various level of politics and public services. You're exaggerating when you claim it's all that bad. The free market mechanisms you mention are just as prone to human wrongdoing. Which is, they are prone to human wrongdoing, 100% true, as is government. You can't quantify it don't try it. This point has been mentioned a lot of times, but alas you won't believe it.
Yes, now tell me, is it easier to corrupt a few senators, or multiple courts all over the country? The answer should tell you which model is more prone to corruption.
I only need to corrupt one or two local courts as they affect me. Seems easier than corrupting a senator. And some other guy a 100 miles away will do the same for the court there.
On September 03 2010 05:00 Badjas wrote: The free market methodology of regulating the use of public space may be more efficient. I think that a body of governance would do better in various circumstances when regarding the interest of the overall population, whereas the free market approach would always favor the interest of the most wealthy and influential (individual or interest group).
How can it know what the interest of the overall population are? And why do you think it can know better than businesses trying to satisfy those demands and profit off them themselves? The central planner is just one entity, there are thousands if not tens of thousands times the number of entrepreneurs compared to bureaucrats.
It is the governments' job to find out what it does not know. There are companies that perform surveys and measurements at the behest of government agencies. There are statistics oriented government bodies to help make policy. The government isn't blind, and you presenting it as such makes your whole argumentation lose credibility.
@Yurebis: Then my point remains: the states right now are exactly an (in your view outlaw and criminal) company. If people act as you describe they should act so right now against the government.
As to dvide: Unlike Yurebis at least you offer a way to differntiate between government and company. But it's an incredible wonky way because it only lies in the perception of the population. It is not quantifiable (or perhaps you can convince me otherwise) and you get all sorts of associated problems. Consider an ethnic minority living in a rather remote area feeling to be not legitimately ruled by the respective government. Do they live in AnCap? The government surely has no authority over them in your sense but only power, shouldn't it be seen at least to them as an equivalent to an AnCap entity acting "unlawful"?
On September 03 2010 04:31 silynxer wrote: But a company that intimidates and coerces remains a company. The reason why we don't call the mafia a company is only because in the framework of a state it is none, if you take away the state or take away it's legitimacy the mafia automatically becomes as legitimate as everything else. Or if you like you can define away it's legitimacy through your own moral code but until these morals are universally accepted this remains hollow semantics.
Really? The Mafia becomes legitimate just because the state's legitimacy is taken away? That makes no sense. Who would actually believe that? Ok, so let's just imagine you're right about relative moral codes, universality of morality and such. Who would actually believe that the Mafia gains the moral right to extort others if the state disappears? Find anybody who accepts this and I will give you a cookie =)
[EDIT]: Btw a very interesting point you raise there: One of the reasons the mafia in Italy is so hard to come by is because in certain areas it's very deeply rooted and accepted in society.
Coercion does not equal the state. Anarcho-capitalism also does not imply the lack of coercive forces. There are non-state coercive forces. For example, social forces. Anarchism makes a breakthrough when it comes to differentiating where the coercion comes from, but doesn't do away with the problem entirely. There are also varying degrees of coercion. The reason why nobody is truly free is because everyone has priorities. The choice between death and slavery/starvation isn't really a free choice, its a weighted choice. Its a whole other problem when you decide to look at why people prioritize things in certain ways. I could even argue that we don't live in a coercive society today. You can choose not to pay your taxes if you don't want to. But that wouldn't make much of an argument. The fact that we live in a society means there will be coercion of some form, as peoples interests will come into conflict.
Yurebis, I'd like you to keep these points in mind the entire time when replying to Igognito. If you can argue that corporations would not exploit people in an anarcho-capatalist society because you have a choice over what you do with your own body, you have to use this same argument with our current system. By that logic, coercion doesn't exist in our current society because we can chose to be homeless and jobless and bypass the coercion. Again, if the only job in my region is one that exploits my well being because I'm a slave to my hunger than you have to stay consistent with "the power of choice". You can chose death and starvation in an anarco-capatalist economy just the same as we can choose homeless and jobless in a coercive government state. You cannot use such double-standards to justify exploitation.
On September 03 2010 05:52 silynxer wrote: As to dvide: Unlike Yurebis at least you offer a way to differntiate between government and company. But it's an incredible wonky way because it only lies in the perception of the population. It is not quantifiable (or perhaps you can convince me otherwise) and you get all sorts of associated problems.
But I'm not really interested in just the semantics of this argument. I'm interested in the material differences. If that difference lies in the perception of the population then so be it. The fact that there is a difference in perception is a TRUE FACT, so how can it be wonky? If it's a wonky way to define something then I don't really care, because I don't care about semantics. Words are always inter-subjectively defined; that's a fact of language.
Where as you seem to be arguing that there is no semantic difference anywhere, and so we obviously already live in anarchy. So we should just stop complaining because we're already living in our desired utopia. It's nonsense. There is a material difference that I am proposing, so I don't already live in my desired utopia. But all you're doing is attempting to redefine everything in such a way for the sake of propagandising for the state, by equating it with productive businesses.
On September 03 2010 05:52 silynxer wrote: Consider an ethnic minority living in a rather remote area feeling to be not legitimately ruled by the respective government. Do they live in AnCap? The government surely has no authority over them in your sense but only power, shouldn't it be seen at least to them as an equivalent to an AnCap entity acting "unlawful"?
I suppose, if everybody else agrees too. It's not just one opinion that matters most; it's an entire cultural paradigm shift that makes up the difference that I am proposing.
Coercion does not equal the state. Anarcho-capitalism also does not imply the lack of coercive forces. There are non-state coercive forces. For example, social forces. Anarchism makes a breakthrough when it comes to differentiating where the coercion comes from, but doesn't do away with the problem entirely. There are also varying degrees of coercion. The reason why nobody is truly free is because everyone has priorities. The choice between death and slavery/starvation isn't really a free choice, its a weighted choice. Its a whole other problem when you decide to look at why people prioritize things in certain ways. I could even argue that we don't live in a coercive society today. You can choose not to pay your taxes if you don't want to. But that wouldn't make much of an argument. The fact that we live in a society means there will be coercion of some form, as peoples interests will come into conflict.
Yurebis, I'd like you to keep these points in mind the entire time when replying to Igognito. If you can argue that corporations would not exploit people in an anarcho-capatalist society because you have a choice over what you do with your own body, you have to use this same argument with our current system. By that logic, coercion doesn't exist in our current society because we can chose to be homeless and jobless and bypass the coercion. Again, if the only job in my region is one that exploits my well being because I'm a slave to my hunger than you have to stay consistent with "the power of choice". You can chose death and starvation in an anarco-capatalist economy just the same as we can choose homeless and jobless in a coercive government state. You cannot use such double-standards to justify exploitation.
I've already written about this "wage slavery" type argument before in this thread. But I watched this good video about it today so I thought I'd share it with you since you bring it up again:
I value stability, and would rather not have the instability of a state that can shape the life of millions at the stroke of a pen. And you are right on the value subjectivism. People who want to coerce will probably find the state appreciable too.
This says nothing. Just because the state has the ability to shape millions of lives with the stroke of a pen doesn't mean that necessarily makes it unstable. Plenty of people don't care about politics because they dont think it affects them that much. Does it? Well doesnt really matter because if they don't think it does, then its stable enough for them. Also rent-seeking megacorporations may not like the instability of the states ability to change rules at a whim, but then again, they have massive lobbying power. They aren't that worried. Your hand waving statement merely shows an underlying fear of the potential power of the state. Either that or it shows that you're someone who is very much affected by the state (small businessperson). There is institutionalized instability, and then there's bottom up instability. Most people are more concerned about the thugs than they are about Uncle Sam. Reason? Maybe its because they suppose Uncle Sam to be legitimate, but more likely is because they like the benefits government confers on them. Government may be a large source of evil, but it does good things to some people as I explained in another of my posts.
Is it not implied that coercion is the 'only way' when you say that voluntary action can't do what you want to do? Seems to me like an implied support. "I'd love to make peace with the middle-east but it just doesn't seem possible..."
Coercion does not equal the state. Anarcho-capitalism also does not imply the lack of coercive forces. There are non-state coercive forces. For example, social forces. Anarchism makes a breakthrough when it comes to differentiating where the coercion comes from, but doesn't do away with the problem entirely. There are also varying degrees of coercion. The reason why nobody is truly free is because everyone has priorities. The choice between death and slavery/starvation isn't really a free choice, its a weighted choice. Its a whole other problem when you decide to look at why people prioritize things in certain ways. I could even argue that we don't live in a coercive society today. You can choose not to pay your taxes if you don't want to. But that wouldn't make much of an argument. The fact that we live in a society means there will be coercion of some form, as peoples interests will come into conflict. The entire discussion of freedom is warped, because then you have questions like "what are you free from?" Also the example you mention about the middle east brings up another point: Throw religious fundamentalists into the mix and you have a group of people who seemingly act irrationally. I don't think you're really going to convince fundamentalists to do things with market incentives.
I've had that talk with someone else trying to mud the waters. Look, it's very clear in the realm of private property. I own myself. I also own what I make, and the resources that I homestead. I can trade my products and services with other people's products and services...
Social forces aren't coercion. Taxes are coercion, for the state claims a portion of my services and products it has no part of in creating. Dying from hunger isn't coercion because there isn't a coercer who to blame. Nature isn't a rational entity that even matters in the scope of human action, nor in private property. When libertarians say they wand "freedom", of course it means freedom from something. In that case, it is from coercion, from the initiation of force, fraud, and murder. Because these are human actions that violate private property theory and NAP, non-aggression principle.
I would say the fundamentalist is the one supporting violence against non-engaging middle-easterners, perpetuating a cycle of violence that the U.S. (state) itself has started.
Yes. The PDAs (private defense agencies) can do such a thing, but because you know and I know that they can do such a thing, people will have prepared something to deal with it. Their contracts will be voided, they will be considered outlaws by everyone, anyone can arrest you and/or the PDAs employers, or kill you if you are pillaging. The PDA would have everything to lose, its own employers could turn get bounties+some amnesty if they manage to kill/arrest the management. Hitman businesses are pretty expensive if they're not legitimized, especially if it includes sustaining your own hierarchy, coercing big groups of people, and going against the whole society. The state can do it because it's a state, not because of the number of tanks or cops they have. If even 10% of the population today would see them for what they are, no amount of ammunition or fiat money would save them.
Assuming people are prepared is one thing Even going past that assumption, you can't say they will be considered outlaws by everyone. Obviously the company you're trying to destroy has enemies, esp if its not a monopoly (which likely wouldn't happen without the presence of a state - large accumulations of capital likewise probably wouldn't exist). They could even ignore the fact completely instead of siding with the PDA to avoid public scrutiny. Also its not like everyone cares if company X is driven into the ground and disappears from the face of the earth. Some people might, but not all. Hardly enough to justify everyone taking action to combat the PDA. Assuming everyone has FORESIGHT, then maybe yes, you could get enough individuals to combat the PDA's behavior. The question is whether you have enough resources to do so. Thats a quantitative question, not a qualitative one.
Really, you think that only YOU are able to have foresight, but everyone else in society will be like "dduuuur hurrr lets allow that PDA to become a state again and mass slaughter whoever they want"? Please. If you can see it, guess what, competing businesses, investors, and courts will have noticed the possibility, the means, and the opportunities, years before you did.
On September 03 2010 05:40 Incognito wrote: Feudalism was expensive. But it also worked, partly because of lack of transportation/geographical isolation/information asymmetry/a largely uneducated populace. So in essence anarcho-capitalism relies on the ability of people to quickly mobilize resources to respond to a threat. That has been helped by inventions such as the internet, transportation improvements, etc. Whether you have enough political willpower to execute a certain order of business is an entirely different matter. You have to get people who care. Political will still exists even without an official government. There are also non-market forces that influence people to certain actions.
Not an argument against ancap, not a claim I care to disagree with.
On September 03 2010 05:40 Incognito wrote: Behavior economics says that people are irrational and do not always follow pure logic with regards to market decisions. It is often much cheaper to buy things in the context of social interaction/social favors etc than it is through the market. There are also things that people would do as a friendly favor that they wouldn't do for a small sum of money. Money isn't everything people care about. It also isn't the most efficient method to do things in some cases. So yes, of course its expensive to pay off people to stop them from interfering with your devious plans. But its much easier to do it with social norms.
I'm not a neoclassicist. Read what austrian economics have to say on subjective value theory.
On September 03 2010 05:40 Incognito wrote: Actually the state can do it because it comes in a big bundle. The state is all or nothing. You buy the whole package, or you don't. They can do it because people can't get rid of the things they hate about government while keeping the things they like. People like getting food stamps and other things. Bread and circuses ftw. Government essentially works by pacifying the masses. It probably contributes to the reason why public education is so bad.
Can do what? Fuck things up? Surely. It fucks things up the moment it extorts capital. Even if it spent the capital more cohesively, it would still be subpar. People just seem to notice when it's real bad, but it's actually always bad.
On September 03 2010 05:40 Incognito wrote: * I see coercion here * - the truth is you can't escape coercion even in an anarcho-capitalist society. Its just not a formally institutionalized entity.
Uh, people individually can't know everything, yeah. But even the relations of trust and specialization is maximized in the free market. The right way to think of it is not "what wrong can happen" but how do you best prevent such wrongs. I think the most fraud that exists in the world today is by the part of a state. I don't think all private scams in history added together get to the trillions of dollars stolen and indebted by the part of governments. And that's because the bureaucrat is much more sheltered from market interaction, and the bureaucrats have to be paid by law. Hell, any scammer would love to be in the position of government - he doesn't even have to fool the people into buying, he is paid no matter what!
Explain how relations of trust and specialization is maximized in the free market?
The more trustworthy are verified over time to be trustworthy, and earn more for their work as there is less risk to account for. It is natural to put proportionally more money on a sure bet, than a risky one... The more specialized are usually more efficient, and the more efficient earn more for their work, as they satisfy customer demand proportionally at a lesser cost.
On September 03 2010 05:40 Incognito wrote: So if the right way to think is how do you prevent such wrongs, then how would you answer that question? Pure market forces?
Wrongs create a demand to right them. People look for people to right them, and I'll call them "righters". Righters progressively earn a reputation and specialize at it. Righters figure out the best models to right things out, and righters compete in the free market. That goes for anything, not just law, defense, insurance, shoemaking, starcraft progaming, etc.
On September 03 2010 05:40 Incognito wrote: The biggest fraud is the fraud that is fractional reserve banking, so yes, that is a product of the state. But it doesnt really matter how BIG the scam is. All that has to happen is that it ruins one person's life. You can defraud wealthy individuals of large sums of money, or you can defraud a poor person of their meager means of living, its still fraud. Its easier to defraud uneducated people than educated people. So another reason why anarchism requires a high average level of competence/education.
Fractional reserve banking is almost entirely a state enabled fraud. Banks who used demand deposits as time deposits would risk customers withdrawing them at the same time and discover the malpractice. Contracts will instantly put the bank at a bad position. Third parties could help keep banks on check, and any bank that denied being up for audit would instantly lose popularity.
On September 03 2010 05:40 Incognito wrote: Maybe the bottom line here is that anarcho-capitalism relies on a set of interlocking forces which constrain individuals to follow certain patterns of behavior. In which case if one of those forces is seen as invalid by the individual, the system breaks and said individual commits an "illogical" act. The problem is not everyone has the same goals and not everyone is in it for profit.
Not illogical. Criminal acts are completely logical. But they're also short term and rely on the element of surprise. When people are prepared, and able to retaliate as best as they can, is when criminality will be minimized as best as it will ever get. The way it is now, law and punishment are socialized services, inefficient and monopolized, and I claim crime is at least three times what it would be otherwise. Thats not including taxation of course.
Are you saying the state has prevented the assassination of Bill Gates lol? Please, has the government made the grass grow too? When the government 1-steals from everyone 2- establishes a service like police and law enforcement and 3- prohibits anyone else from providing such a service, you can't say that if it weren't for it there would be no security nor law, because they are monopolizing it! It is the same thing as a proletariat waiting at bread lines in communism saying that there would be no one to give him bread in a free market! Ridiculous. A service is a service, and men are men. The men giving you security now (and doing the shittiest job at it shoud I add) would be no different than in anarchism, if not better. Because they'd be forced to compete for once, they'd be paid what the market is willing to pay, and they'd be as susceptible to the law as anyone else.
Bill Gates does not have either the funds nor the mental capacity to run a more successful state. Nor is it particularly efficient to invade property rights to protect property rights. Bill Gates would spend the necessary amount to protect his property and no more - that way he remains both popular and efficient.
First off I should probably qualify my statement and say that in anarchism theres nothing stopping the average joe from NOT killing Bill Gates. The difference is the reasons. Anyway...
The state has not physically prevented the assassination of Bill Gates, no. But there are many potential state reasons why this has not occured, namely, that poor people who would be socialists think that the government will help them get Bill Gate's wealth after he dies. Karl Marx originally said that class struggle would lead to violent revolution. The truth is that government evolved to accommodate these fears. When the welfare state came about, the class struggle theory lost its fangs because the working class is no longer "oppressed" like they supposedly would have been. Its bread and circuses again like I have mentioned. Unlike anarcho-capitalism, the poor person is not starving and in desperate need of killing Bill Gates. At least in the current system the poor person (thinks) that Bill Gates is paying for his food/clothing/shelter via the welfare state.
The idea that the state is helping the poor by stealing from everyone (including the poor themselves) is laughable. But even if I were to grant that, it's even more funny that you think because the state is stealing, that the socialists are more satisfied so they want to steal less. What? As long as anyone has any wealth that they envy, they'll be up for stealing it, no matter how much or how little.
On September 03 2010 05:40 Incognito wrote: The rest of your paragraph is incoherrent. I dont think I said anywhere that there would be no defense/bread providing services in anarchism. So the only thing I'll say here is: would everyone be able to afford these services? Or would I have to be a wage slave to someone in order to get food/protection? On second thought, how would Police charge for services? Monthly fees? What if in a community of 10 ppl 8 people decided to pay for the service and two didn't?
They already pay such services. The cops aren't being paid by Bill Gates. Give me a break. They will be MORE able to pay for defense, because the market for defense won't be monopolized and socialized. It will be far cheaper. And even more ethical I argue. PDAs can charge through insurance companies, on-demand, on monthly fees, through street tolls, there is a variety of ways to pay for things one you put down the gunverment.
You don't need everyone to be geniuses as much as today you'd need everyone to be geniuses so they can choose competent rulers. Anarchism is not about taking all responsibilities of the current economy into each individual, it's about letting each individual transfer their own responsibilities to those he chooses, instead of taking it for some collectivist cause (which btw, doesn't exist. Collectivism has no conscience, collectivism makes no decisions. Man makes decisions, and in statism, some man will have to make decisions for people, or more precisely, steal from them the ability to make decisions themselves).
The whole paragraph is confusing and seems to bypass everything I said. I don't even know if it was meant to be in response to anything I said. But then again since its so confusing I don't know if it did bypass anything. This is probably one of the paragraphs that tells me more by what ISN'T said than by what is said. However, I don't think I ever said anything about support for a collectivist cause, so my guess is that you are throwing around rhetoric in order to easily dismiss the points.
Perhaps I should refresh what you said before:
On September 02 2010 13:13 Incognito wrote: On Anarchy. Anarchy is a system which depends on the existence of tabula rasa. If man is purely a product of the environment, then government can move from a physical entity to an intangible idea. Yet it still is a government. i.e. governing principle. Under the tabula rasa idea, anarchy is possible under many forms. One way is to condition everyone to act like a hive drone and make them completely constrained by feelings of not wanting to be socially ostracized by the community. That results in the non-existence of government without freedom. Another way is to have a completely educated population. Law is a substitute for rational thought. It is a shortcut that allows people who can't think rationally to come to semi-rational conclusions. Of course, law is abusable because it is arbitrary, open to interpretation, and hard to adapt to the situation at hand. Therefore, a society that has collectively achieved the highest level of education can operate without laws. Of course, the whole conflict is how you define education and rational thought. Rational for who? For individual self interest? Collective interest? A mix of all of them?
Of course if tabula rasa doesn't exist, then anarchy doesn't work. The OP bypasses this by acknowledging that anarchy doesn't work in the presence of "human nature", but then neither do states. This is a cop-out. The OP should just have denied the existence of human nature and went straight for the gut with tabula rasa. Oh well.
Bold mine.
Since you didn't understand, perhaps I should take the exact same paragraph and rephrase a little.
You don't need everyone to be geniuses in anarcho-capitalist to know which courts to pick, as much as you don't need everyone to be geniuses to vote for the right candidates. Anarchism is not about each person being experts in law and enforcers of their own laws, it's about letting each individual transfer their own moral duties precisely to those courts and PDAs he chooses, instead of socializing it into a collectivist law (which btw, doesn't exist. Collectivism has no conscience, collectivism has no moral conscience. Therefore, no law can arise from collectivism. Only man can make laws, and in statism, some man will have to make laws for people, or more precisely, steal from them the ability to make laws themselves, voluntarily).
Hope it helped a bit. I shouldn't have to though, for someone who was talking 'bout tabula rasa and shit. tee hee
On September 03 2010 05:40 Incognito wrote: I can agree and support the idea that Anarchism allows people to transfer responsibilities to anyone he chooses, the only problem is that anarchism does much more than that. This still doesnt address many other issues including some forms of rational malevolence, irrational malevolence (terrorism), non-market forces, education levels, subjectivity of value, freedoms, information asymmetry, etc.
The main error in anarcho-capitalism is the capitalism part, not necessarily the anarchism part. But thats a whole other discussion (with tabula rasa included).
Oh okay so I just wrote the above for nothing. Be clear next time thx. Apparently you are under the impression that bureaucrats somehow limit human error by being more illuminated themselves? Rational malevolence... people being mean with eachother on purpose? Like what? Terrorism, gee, I wonder if the state really stops terrorism by doing more terrorism itself. Non-market forces.. like the state and state-enabled mafias? Education... now that's funny coming from someone that
On September 03 2010 05:40 Incognito wrote: Government essentially works by pacifying the masses. It probably contributes to the reason why public education is so bad.
agreed the state was making it worse. Subjectivity of value? Hello my name is Austrian Economics, the leading expert of subjective value theory, how are you today kind sir? Freedoms,... yeah. Information asymmetry - still doesn't prove the central planner is any brighter to even begin to justify making people's decisions for them, coercively.
@dvide Discussing semantics is moot, I agree. But still, if you can't even look at an society and determine if it's AnCap or not it is kind of a problem and that's why perception is a wonky measurement. Perhaps there are areas in the world where the general state of mind and the overall situation should be called AnCap and it turns out to be really crappy. But you wouldn't even know because you call only systems where everything works out as you imagine AnCap.
The reason why we don't live in anarchy is not because of the "false meme" of government but because it's inherently human to not live in anarchy (this only as a sidenote).
Coercion does not equal the state. Anarcho-capitalism also does not imply the lack of coercive forces. There are non-state coercive forces. For example, social forces. Anarchism makes a breakthrough when it comes to differentiating where the coercion comes from, but doesn't do away with the problem entirely. There are also varying degrees of coercion. The reason why nobody is truly free is because everyone has priorities. The choice between death and slavery/starvation isn't really a free choice, its a weighted choice. Its a whole other problem when you decide to look at why people prioritize things in certain ways. I could even argue that we don't live in a coercive society today. You can choose not to pay your taxes if you don't want to. But that wouldn't make much of an argument. The fact that we live in a society means there will be coercion of some form, as peoples interests will come into conflict.
Yurebis, I'd like you to keep these points in mind the entire time when replying to Igognito. If you can argue that corporations would not exploit people in an anarcho-capatalist society because you have a choice over what you do with your own body, you have to use this same argument with our current system. By that logic, coercion doesn't exist in our current society because we can chose to be homeless and jobless and bypass the coercion. Again, if the only job in my region is one that exploits my well being because I'm a slave to my hunger than you have to stay consistent with "the power of choice". You can chose death and starvation in an anarco-capatalist economy just the same as we can choose homeless and jobless in a coercive government state. You cannot use such double-standards to justify exploitation.
I've already written about this "wage slavery" type argument before in this thread. But I watched this good video about it today so I thought I'd share it with you since you bring it up again:
This whole argument ignores utilitarianism for the sake of principle and I cannot agree with that. Is murder wrong? Yes, is murdering someone to save 10 other people still wrong? I would argue no. People are so caught up in the principle of actions that they ignore the efficiency in finding the greatest good for the greatest amount. Utilitarianism, although at times vague, is still is the ultimate measuring tool for finding the best course of action in ethics and morality.
There is point about an-cap, and the removal of 'forceful coercion'
The problem is forceful coercion is at the basis of what we are.
Compare a company that owns the land of a city and sets rules for those who want to build and operate there to a state. There is a contract that everyone living/working there is bound by established by the company. The company has an exclusive arrangement with a Particular 'PDA' and an exclusive arrangement with a particular 'Court Organization'
What is the difference with a state.
I can see you arguing the 'laws' of a state contain terms that are too binding in any contract.*
I could also see you arguing that in the company case the people chose to live there... but what about someone born there.
Our first 'decision' is 100% forcefully coerced by others (our parents) bring us into this world in a certain place. and for quite some time we can't make rational, informed decisions. (if ever)
You could also argue that the state does not 'own' the land.. however, that is the understanding. The understanding is that the ownership of the land is split up. 'sovereign' ownership belongs to the state, and other aspects of ownership belong to the 'owners'
Which means the only issue is how the state obtained 'sovreign ownership' of the land in the first place.
Which means we could transition to AnCap, call the state a large company that officially has a type of ownership of the land, and there would be no change. (*Except possibly some laws would be too restrictive as clauses in a contract)
So really An-Cap is just arguing for less restrictive laws/contract terms. (and a state that is involved as little as possible in 'other markets' besides PDA+Courts)
An-Cap could also be arguing for a cultural change (for people to have a deep respect for private property)... but honestly so are the jihadists, the communists, etc.
On September 02 2010 18:36 dvide wrote: I also want to touch on the concept that states are merely like landlords setting rules on their own property. Let's say I own a house. For the sake of argument, I inarguably own the house. Now let's say I come home from work one day and I see a hippie smoking weed on my lawn. I don't get to throw the hippie in a cage in my basement for 5 years right? I think we can all recognise that this would not be considered moral. I might have a rule that says nobody can have weed on my property, but that's irrelevant. I still cannot morally lock the guy in a cage for 5 years.
So what gives the state the moral right to do this, even if you argue that they legitimately own all of the land?
The state doesn't own the land. It governs the land. It owns some where it is deemed more useful to be a public resource rather than a private resource. (such as roads, nature reserves, public utility..)
Part of governing is the task to make sure that on the publicly available resources, individuals in a country (region of governance) don't interfere with the utility of that resource beyond the reasonable. Incarcerating someone is a tool for coercing people to follow the rules established by the governing body. How those rules are established, I guess, is your beef. Personally I think there could perhaps be improvement, but I'm not gonna argue about an anarchaic (not a word?) system being better at that. I do like to point out that the state doesn't own all the land.
How can the state even know what is reasonable to interfere with, if they are exempt of market incentives? Measuring the amount of letters they get? Measuring popularity ratings? How can that be even remotely better than price signals and profit incentives (which by the way, they still react to, but in a worse manner, through lobbyism, corruption, favoritism, etc.)?
The state doesn't have an evil agenda when it plans where to put a highway. The police doesn't have an evil agenda when it decides how many people should investigate heavy crimes. The public housing corporation doesn't plot against you in its policies. Grants aren't given on a basis of corruption.
Their intents may not be evil. But that's irrelevant in the scope of intelligence that I was referring to. The state cannot do all those things even if it set up with the best intentions in the universe, and had the most energetic personnel. They can't do all that because they aren't equipped with the market mechanisms that allow an entrepreneur to do the same. An entrepreneur is heavily interested in whether his project will be profitable, and by profitable I mean it will supply an unprecedented and unsatisfied demand in society; by how much; how much will he spend out of his pocket, and how much will people willingly pay him back; how can he devise the best business model to reduce redundancy at the maximum; how can he better support specializations within that model. These are many questions that the state bureaucrat does not have to nor could answer if he wanted. He can only copy what the market is already doing or had already done. at which point his measures are outdated; or create his own arbitrary measures that will never be as accurate as the entrepreneur's, because the people using the service aren't being free to choose it. Aaand shit, I've went for too long on entrepreneurship again.
Yes, you did. I don't need my government to be 100% most efficient to various measurements. I prefer it to be fair towards me. I don't have any guarantees in a free market, none. Entrepreneurs are free to ignore me. You say that I'll be a nice customer, I say that I might not be worth their efforts as I get out-competed in the demand market (will hold true for various kinds of markets, false for any other markets that you would use in an example to counter my point).
Can you have guarantees with the state? Perhaps it is time for you to define what a guarantee is. And compare which guarantees are more likely to be delivered. And why. The incentives of not just the state option, and the externalities of not just the free market option, but both taken together as a full cost/benefit analysis. Do it.
It is hardly your right to buy something for less than another is willing to buy it, as it is hardly your right to steal my car when you can't afford the same model. You're basically just trying to justify theft... do I really have to address the externalities of theft with you?
Quite simply, you let the state steal from others to give it to you, and you've simultaneously let it steal from you to give to others. There is a point into calling into inefficient, because it makes everyone poorer, not you richer. Unless you're at the very top, you're not really getting any benefits from what otherwise would have been a much wealthier society, with cheaper products, cheaper services, more jobs, etc. etc.
On September 03 2010 05:19 Yurebis wrote: Basically, the state can't know how many people it puts on each case, it only acts on its own hunchism devoid of market demand. Tax as much as they want, spend as much as they want, as long as they've got just enough people to vote them in next election.
Responding to market demand is also reactive, not pro-active. Hunchism doesn't exist, it is fine-tuning based on a feedback loop.
You are sooo wrong. I'm sorry but you are completely wrong. You think any entrepreneur can make profit by not being proactive? That is what profit even means in a more strictly austrian sense. Profit is the seizing of market demand that wasn't satisfied before. That is what innovation is, that is precisely what the market aka free working people are known to do best. They develop, build, plan, etc. etc. etc. better than any particular central planner does... Prices aren't used only reactively, they are used to know what can be a future profitable endeavor or not. One doesn't react to prices as much as one doesn't react to nature. Prices are just signals that one may choose to react to (I gotta buy less doritos now that the're $1 more expensive) or proactively (I'm gonna open my own chips company to undercut doritos).
On September 03 2010 05:00 Badjas wrote: Yes, there is some amount of corruption and the other issues you mention, at various level of politics and public services. You're exaggerating when you claim it's all that bad. The free market mechanisms you mention are just as prone to human wrongdoing. Which is, they are prone to human wrongdoing, 100% true, as is government. You can't quantify it don't try it. This point has been mentioned a lot of times, but alas you won't believe it.
Yes, now tell me, is it easier to corrupt a few senators, or multiple courts all over the country? The answer should tell you which model is more prone to corruption.
I only need to corrupt one or two local courts as they affect me. Seems easier than corrupting a senator. And some other guy a 100 miles away will do the same for the court there.
How much do you expect to pay by bribing two local courts enough to account for the popularity they'll lose from all other customers? And how much do you win by doing that? Can you kill a man and bribe the small courts for 1 million dollars each? And then what happens? The families will just shut up and not suspect anything? They won't ask for third parties opinions? They won't go to other courts? People that are into law won't see what's going on?
Please elaborate on the full plan of your evil scheme. And tell me how are you going to outsmart so many people in the business. And then, tell me how the well-meaning individuals inside a state responsible for checks and balances wouldn't be outsmarted in the same way, by less money.
On September 03 2010 05:00 Badjas wrote: The free market methodology of regulating the use of public space may be more efficient. I think that a body of governance would do better in various circumstances when regarding the interest of the overall population, whereas the free market approach would always favor the interest of the most wealthy and influential (individual or interest group).
How can it know what the interest of the overall population are? And why do you think it can know better than businesses trying to satisfy those demands and profit off them themselves? The central planner is just one entity, there are thousands if not tens of thousands times the number of entrepreneurs compared to bureaucrats.
It is the governments' job to find out what it does not know. There are companies that perform surveys and measurements at the behest of government agencies. There are statistics oriented government bodies to help make policy. The government isn't blind, and you presenting it as such makes your whole argumentation lose credibility.
The difference here is of course that businesses do surveys when there are no prices in a market to estimate consumer demand for, like for a new product or service - it is subpar probing than observing the buying and selling practices of voluntary customers. The government can only do surveys, and does them for rare circumstances where it didn't need them in the first place, nor do they have the incentives do keep doing them. Elections is also a type of survey that completely misrepresents demand by offering people a one dollar choice each. The state doesn't know what people want best, nor does it know by how much do they want it. And yes, the best opportunity they have at knowing it is on the basis of irregular and inefficient surveying, polls, approval ratings.
EPT
Even going past that assumption, you can't say they will be considered outlaws by everyone. Obviously the company you're trying to destroy has enemies, esp if its not a monopoly (which likely wouldn't happen without the presence of a state - large accumulations of capital likewise probably wouldn't exist). They could even ignore the fact completely instead of siding with the PDA to avoid public scrutiny. Also its not like everyone cares if company X is driven into the ground and disappears from the face of the earth. Some people might, but not all. Hardly enough to justify everyone taking action to combat the PDA. Assuming everyone has FORESIGHT, then maybe yes, you could get enough individuals to combat the PDA's behavior. The question is whether you have enough resources to do so. Thats a quantitative question, not a qualitative one.
