Recommended viewing. It's only thirteen minutes. If you don't have the time, put it on the shelf till you do. If you don't have the desire, get the desire.
07-24-2015 11:00 PM
#1
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Why libertarianism is so dangerous.Recommended viewing. It's only thirteen minutes. If you don't have the time, put it on the shelf till you do. If you don't have the desire, get the desire. |
07-25-2015 06:46 AM
#2
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I liked it but | |
07-25-2015 12:16 PM
#3
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I guess. Hyperbole would be a weird way of looking at it. It gives the claims of statists every benefit of the doubt and uses that to show the logic of their claims. |
07-25-2015 01:02 PM
#4
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It could also be seen as an admission that anarchy is self-defeating, the power vacuum argument. | |
07-25-2015 01:30 PM
#5
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It could but I think that's a step in the right direction because it means the premise that the government monopoly is the same as the feared violent gangs of an anarchistic society has been accepted. The government monopoly is just a far more sophisticated form of the violent gang. |
Last edited by wufwugy; 07-25-2015 at 03:27 PM. | |
07-26-2015 05:36 AM
#6
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The NA principle is pretty stupid. | |
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07-26-2015 05:43 AM
#7
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It's like trying to solve the prisoner's dilemma by restricting players from being uncooperative. | |
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07-26-2015 05:45 AM
#8
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At the bold, it's one he'll of a bet to make. Because if you're wrong, a bunch of us may get murdered /raped /pillaged. | |
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07-26-2015 05:54 AM
#9
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As an aside, climate change has been a pretty consistent feature of human history. It won't destroy the world, though it may end humanity, and it very much could destroy entire civilizations. | |
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07-26-2015 06:17 AM
#10
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Last edited by Renton; 07-26-2015 at 06:21 AM. | |
07-26-2015 06:20 AM
#11
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07-26-2015 06:32 AM
#12
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07-26-2015 07:11 AM
#13
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But that isn't what you said. How is adhering to the non-aggression principle equal to disregarding the existence of violent thugs who would do you harm? | |
07-26-2015 07:14 AM
#14
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In that you disregard the possibility that you could become violent. | |
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07-26-2015 07:20 AM
#15
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How? | |
07-26-2015 07:21 AM
#16
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In the Roman Republic, they had a principle of never bringing armed troops into Rome. Until someone brought armed troops into Rome. Then people started bringing armed troops into Rome. | |
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07-26-2015 07:29 AM
#17
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The non-aggression principle is like a pledge of celibacy. Someone's going to break it. | |
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07-26-2015 07:30 AM
#18
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Violence is quite rare among civilized people who aren't empowered by a state, and there's nothing in the NAP that says one can't use violence in self-defense. I fail to see how it is naive to hold civilization up to this standard, since it seems to form the basis of law and order in all cases of non-state-sanctioned violence. All the NAP is saying is that initiating force is wrong. If you think this is a naive stance, it must be because you believe it is not wrong to initiate force for certain non-defensive reasons. Your argument isn't addressing these specifics, but merely stating that violence is an inevitable consequence of interpersonal interaction and therefore it is naive to take a moral stance against it. | |
07-26-2015 07:33 AM
#19
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07-26-2015 07:34 AM
#20
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The whole point of the state is to be the violent authority. They won the aggression game, and they continue to win it by stripping that power from others and beefing up their own. They are a testament to the overwhelming incentive to be the baddest man around. They dictate laws. | |
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07-26-2015 07:42 AM
#21
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If you really believe people would have such a propensity toward being violent were it not for the watchful eye of the state, I suggest you go to a 3rd world country where the law enforcement is practically negligible. You might be very surprised how peaceful the people are. | |
07-26-2015 07:44 AM
#22
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07-26-2015 07:44 AM
#23
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07-26-2015 07:59 AM
#24
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No libertarian is against laws or policing. We're only against monopolies on the provision of laws and policing. | |
07-26-2015 08:12 AM
#25
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Laws are messy. They're informed by all sorts of trends and forces. Some laws aren't even formed from a violent authority, like Judean/Christian/Muslim laws. They don't need threats of violence in this world to sway behavior, merely rewards/punishments for the infinity here-after. And you want a new law more closely aligned with Judean law than State law that says initiating aggression is a no-no. If you were masterful, you could get a lot of people to follow it, but you won't get them all. And everyone who tries to break that law and fails, will teach the next guy what mistakes to avoid. | |
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07-26-2015 08:27 AM
#26
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Rank | |
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07-26-2015 09:04 AM
#27
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I'm not saying the 3rd world countries are doing it right, I'm saying there's not much to correlate the existence of strict law enforcement with the reduction of violent crime. The U.S. has one of the most strict justice systems in the world and ranks 108th in intentional homicide rate. Aside from warlord-wracked African nations and cartel-wracked Latin American ones, it's one of the most dangerous countries in the world. | |
07-26-2015 09:30 AM
#28
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It's not about how the US uses its violent authority, it's about why and how the US has a violent authority. You approach this problem by brushing it aside. | |
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07-26-2015 09:36 AM
#29
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Look at these apes violating the non-aggression principle through unnatural incentives. | |
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07-26-2015 09:49 AM
#30
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That video gets great. He hits on the idea of the golden-rule as a solution to the prisoner's dilemma and how you can show that evolution baked it into us with examples of bats and fish. Of course, the trick is that we're more subtle with it. What happens when you teach someone that they've already been tit'd against? They'll be driven to Tat even if that isn't the strictly correct response to the truth of the situation. Makes me think about Israel-Palestine how they talk about how awful the other has been to them. | |
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07-26-2015 09:53 AM
#31
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Unnatural was a weak word to use. What I mean are incentives that are only possible due to an exterior influence to the system. I.e. a larger gang or a state. | |
07-26-2015 09:58 AM
#32
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Makes me think of the Industrial revolution and the confluence of forces that converged to create it. | |
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07-26-2015 09:58 AM
#33
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PS a Sapolsky video hosted on a Libertarian website | |
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07-26-2015 10:05 AM
#34
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^Dominant males live a better life in terms of stress hormones alone. A pure natural incentive to be at the top. | |
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07-26-2015 10:28 AM
#35
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1) So let's say you want to accomplish the NA principle. The baboons did it by have all the problem actors die off, leaving only those who suffered to form a new social system. How does it happen with humans? | |
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07-26-2015 11:29 AM
#36
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YWZAL64E0DI#t=1h1m45s | |
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07-26-2015 01:55 PM
#37
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Rilla, you have misinterpreted the NAP. In your frame, your points would have accuracy. But that isn't NAP. However you're not alone, many libertarians misinterpret NAP too. Even the guys who made the OP video misinterpret it on the margins. Whenever they have Thaddeus Russell on, they tend to get into heated debate that nudges towards what their misinterpretation is. |
Last edited by wufwugy; 07-26-2015 at 02:03 PM. | |
07-26-2015 02:03 PM
#38
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That's why I propose doing it gradually. I would much rather devise a hundred year plan to go stateless than to go overnight. Even then, the only real important thing is to have a culture of liberty so that wherever issues arise, the response from the people is "the people can solve this problem, the government only makes it worse". |
07-26-2015 02:27 PM
#39
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There is a paradigm shift that makes what was once true no longer true. Back when people were poor, unproductive, and technology was shit, the incentive to initiate violence to secure resources was higher than the incentive to defend resources (unless you were yourself a different force initiator). But today it's not like that. No violent gang on the planet is going to take over Silicon Valley or NYC. In the stateless hypothetical, the incentive for the vastly productive people to protect themselves would be far, far, far greater than the incentive to initiate violence against them to such a degree that they work for you. This is because the status of the productive people no longer has anything to do with initiation of violence and everything to do with protection of their property and environment. |
07-26-2015 02:40 PM
#40
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Yeah, I got that. All my points still stand. | |
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07-26-2015 02:42 PM
#41
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It should also be noted that the Articles of Confederation states were mostly stateless. They weren't entirely stateless, but compared to today they were mostly. And they worked out just fine. No violent gangs or outside invaders were taking shit over. The operative reason the Articles were scrapped for a new more powerful federal constitution was because the states were mistreating the people to the point that the people were uprising and actually winning. |
07-26-2015 02:43 PM
#42
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07-26-2015 02:47 PM
#43
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The points don't stand, though. They're addressing a strawman. |
07-26-2015 02:58 PM
#44
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Welcome to argument. I'm not writing a book here. I'm just hitting you with the twitter-feed of my contentions. There's depth to them that I'd be glad to explore if you'd engage them. But you don't. You just brush them aside. | |
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07-26-2015 03:01 PM
#45
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On the contrary, I'm interpreting reality as it is. You're clinging to an ideology. You're the one saying "these two entirely different realities are the same". You're extrapolating from a world irrelevant today. Just because it was virtually impossible to protect yourself from violent gangs back when everybody were farmers with no technology doesn't mean that the entirely different world today is just as susceptible to violent gangs. |
07-26-2015 03:04 PM
#46
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Wow. I gotta step away. You're... off. | |
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07-26-2015 03:08 PM
#47
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How can I brush off points that I don't even disagree with? In your version of the NAP, you are RIGHT. But that isn't NAP. |
07-26-2015 03:12 PM
#48
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What is my version of NAP? Hint: it includes the word initiate. | |
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07-26-2015 03:16 PM
#49
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The NA principle is rules-making. But why would anyone follow the rule? The answer had better be because it's their natural habit to do it (which Sapolsky had an interesting video exploring) or that there exists something to coerce people to follow it - refs, police, presidents, Gods, something. | |
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07-26-2015 03:23 PM
#50
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07-26-2015 03:28 PM
#51
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"What about hypocrisy?" | |
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07-26-2015 03:40 PM
#52
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I think our main disagreement is as follows: you're saying human nature is a certain way therefore such n such. I say the description of human nature is but one aspect and is not the only arbiter of results. |
07-26-2015 03:47 PM
#53
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Of course they are, but that's irrelevant. The NAP is a personal ideology that frankly I don't think is that useful. |
07-26-2015 03:49 PM
#54
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I would put it this way: any understanding of the human world is going to have to sample from a lot of sources. You're relying heavily on one source. I'm chipping away at it to show that it isn't the be all end all. | |
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07-26-2015 03:52 PM
#55
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07-26-2015 03:57 PM
#56
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Spoon made a great post about the 48 laws of Power in his AMA than got me reading it. It's an incredible book that samples from an unreal range of historical sources about Kings and courtiers and art dealers and conmen. I think it'll show you that libertarianism doesn't exactly explain the lay of the land. | |
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07-26-2015 04:05 PM
#57
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It definitely doesn't in most of the world. Most of the world is a dirt poor technological backwater with little commerce. You can go pretty much anywhere in Africa with guns and take over, but if you did that in Silicon Valley, even if the US military didn't exist, you'd find contracted security forces with bigger guns sent to kill you and keep the flow of commerce intact. |
07-26-2015 04:12 PM
#58
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07-26-2015 04:36 PM
#59
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Why do you think this? We're well aware of what a big problem violence is. There's nothing about the NAP that brushes off the constant existence of violence or the threat thereof. It just is critical of ALL initiation of violence, not just of that of the unauthorized sort. Again and again, libertarians are in favor of law and order, we just have a different view of what societal problems are so large that we need laws to solve them. Also, in case it needed to be said, most libertarians are statists and fully believe in a role for government, just a much more limited role. | |
07-26-2015 04:39 PM
#60
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07-26-2015 04:40 PM
#61
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Maybe then, we should leave this abstract subject and discuss some ways in which you believe initiating violence is warranted. | |
07-26-2015 04:41 PM
#62
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Pick a top 10 nation and I'll show you how initiating violence helped them out. | |
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07-26-2015 04:44 PM
#63
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We're not talking about how a state can gain by initiating violence, we're talking about morality. The NAP wasn't devised with optimal nation-building in mind. | |
07-26-2015 04:46 PM
#64
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07-26-2015 04:46 PM
#65
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Are you implying that it's naive to be critical of things like Manifest Destiny? | |
07-26-2015 04:48 PM
#66
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Come again? | |
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07-26-2015 04:56 PM
#67
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There are plenty of ways outside of the state to provide incentives against aggressive behavior. In a free society it would be on property owners to defend their property, either on their own or more likely by proxy. Literally every square meter of land would be someone's property and you would be subject to the owner's rules. A big problem with crime in today's world is that most of it occurs on public property and there is much less urgency to deal with that crime since no one is directly responsible for combating it [edit: AND has a vested interest in combating it]. | |
Last edited by Renton; 07-26-2015 at 05:00 PM. | |
07-26-2015 04:59 PM
#68
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07-26-2015 05:02 PM
#69
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What exactly about my post elicited that response? I'm defending a point of view. Because I didn't go through all of the other possible systems of government in the limited scope of that post, I'm drinking the gatorade? | |
07-26-2015 05:06 PM
#70
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"untethered from reality" was a point I made at wuf, that you found I made at you and so I made it at you. | |
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07-26-2015 05:09 PM
#71
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And I'm not talking about be all end all as in governing people but rather as in a lens to see the world. There are entire lenses that aren't political at all; aren't economical at all. | |
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07-26-2015 05:31 PM
#72
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You directed the "untethered" bit at wuf but you've constantly been making the argument in this thread and others that libertarian (nay, economic) views are utopian and not informed by reality/history/whatever. It's insulting. It's fine to appeal to established norms, but calling your debate opponent delusional cheapens the conversation. It's the kind of thing I would expect from 2p2 politics, not from here. | |
07-26-2015 05:37 PM
#73
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My points about Economics were their own. I almost made the point earlier that your contention that 3rd world countries seem fine while following the NA principle was akin to my point about NJ/PA w.r.t the minimum wage - sniffing around the edges but missing the central push. But when I argue against Economics and argue against the understanding of the consequences of raising the minimum wage, I know how, where, and why I'm full of shit. Economic theory gets the main thrust, but it misses the details. But you don't have this same appreciation. The world won't follow first principles and the NA principle is a first principle. | |
Last edited by a500lbgorilla; 07-26-2015 at 05:42 PM. | |
07-26-2015 05:50 PM
#74
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07-26-2015 05:55 PM
#75
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I think my point about 3rd world countries can seem cherrypicky but I wasn't intending to definitively state that those countries were better off. Only that the crime has a lot more to do with the incentives for committing crime than for the justice system that punishes the crime. For example, the third world countries that make all the heroin (afghanistan, burma, etc) are pretty fucked up. The fact that Afghanistan and Burma are not developed countries has less to do with this than the fact that they are vital to black markets. | |
Last edited by Renton; 07-26-2015 at 05:58 PM. | |