Followup on taxes = theft

[a500lbgorilla]

There's a reason why taxation has to be theft.

Individualism - the individual is the basic unit of analysis
Individual Rights - people have natural rights not given by the gov't
Spontaneous Order - people have a natural drive for order without the gov't
Spontaneous Rule of Law - people have a natural drive for generally applicable and spontaenously developed laws without the gov't
Limited Gov't - the gov't protects rights, but must be limited as much as possible
Free Markets - free markets are the economic system of free individuals
The Virtue of Production - people keep the fruits of their labor
Natural Harmony of Interests - through market participation, disagreements are resolved in a mutually beneficial manner
Nonaggression Principle - war is bad.

If not, many of the first principles of libertarians are at risk of folding.

edit to add a quick clarifying blurb for each

[MadMojoMonkey]

I don't think I've called anybody names.

Let me show you what I mean.

It's like you think agents have no agency. I mean, nobody in their right minds would claim that people weren't capable of feeling wrongly taken from until the law came along and told them so. Oh wait...

Here, I was called "not in my right mind" for believing what I was taught from a textbook on anthropology.

I.e. the concept of ownership is not ubiquitous among human societies. When the concept first arises, it is not personal ownership, but tribal ownership. Humanity existed for millennia as mostly isolated bands of ~150 people or fewer. Each band may only come into contact with another once a year or so. When small groups rely on each other for survival, the idea of individual ownership does not necessarily even come up. Still these bands had highly structured and ordered societies.

What level of insane would somebody have to be to say that, due to the technicalities imposed by Superman, I wasn't murdered? Everybody would say these technicalities are only distracting from the normative meaning of murder and the implementation of something doesn't change the concept of that thing.

Here, anyone who believes that there is a difference between killing and murder, and that conceptually speaking, killing is more broad, is called insane.

You arbitrarily choose the word murder to be the normative, while killing seems the more appropriate choice. Killing is clearly defined w/o any subjectivity. Murder is defined as a subset of killing. Often a definition of murder explicitly calls it a legal term. When legality is left out, it is still a subset of killing involving a lack of justification or excuse.

I feel Superman has cleanly eliminated the legal definitions in your example, so not murder on that count. I'm left wondering if Superman had any justification or excuse. I'm no Superman expert, but I was under the impression that having justification is one of his core principles. "Truth, Justice, and the American Way," is his motto, right?

So, if you had said, "No one would say I wasn't killed." Then I agree.
When you specifically set up that hypothetical to rule out the definition of murder and I disagree with you still using the word murder, then I am called insane.

Murder has ethical connotations whereas killing doesn't. You say you aren't interested right and wrong, but you choose words which inject this morality into the conversation. I object to using the word murder over killing in your example on that ground alone.

[wufwugy]

How else can you settle disputes?

I'm not talking about settling disputes. I'm talking about the existence of dispute, the type of logic we use to accuse somebody of theft in the first place. I'm not prescribing what we do after that point. I'm suggesting we apply the logic we used to get to that point and put it onto other things to see how it fits.

[wufwugy]

You'll be unable to get me there, because I dont see any significance to that special status.

I don't understand. Having special status is the significance.

I think maybe you're saying that the law has to exist and it has to be by a monopoly. I agree in that law has to exist but not that it requires monopoly. Still, I'm not sure how this illuminates anything when evaluating taxation in terms of theft. All it does is just make a special kind of theft legal.

[wufwugy]

Here, anyone who believes that there is a difference between killing and murder, and that conceptually speaking, killing is more broad, is called insane.

You arbitrarily choose the word murder to be the normative, while killing seems the more appropriate choice.

I chose "murder" because I was talking about murder. The example I chose was not of just a killing. It was murder by any reasonable assessment of the concept. The one possible way it could be not considered murder was a technicality, but clearly that technicality is meaningless. If the law is what turns "a killing" into "a wrongful killing", we're already lost, because we've said that the arbiter of meaning is an authority with the might to determine what it desires.

[JKDS]

I don't understand. Having special status is the significance.

I think maybe you're saying that the law has to exist and it has to be by a monopoly. I agree in that law has to exist but not that it requires monopoly. Still, I'm not sure how this illuminates anything when evaluating taxation in terms of theft. All it does is just make a special kind of theft legal.

Perhaps a better way of saying it was "I dont see the same significance that you do". I acknowledge that only the government can tax, but I dont see this as being wrong, unfair, or even the slightest bit unnerving.

[JKDS]

I chose "murder" because I was talking about murder. The example I chose was not of just a killing. It was murder by any reasonable assessment of the concept. The one possible way it could be not considered murder was a technicality, but clearly that technicality is meaningless. If the law is what turns "a killing" into "a wrongful killing", we're already lost, because we've said that the arbiter of meaning is an authority with the might to determine what it desires.

Why not just say wrongful killing? Murder is another term that only exists within the context of law. A great many countries have laws resembling murder, but murder still means different things depending on whose law youre under.

[MadMojoMonkey]

I chose "murder" because I was talking about murder. The example I chose was not of just a killing. It was murder by any reasonable assessment of the concept. The one possible way it could be not considered murder was a technicality, but clearly that technicality is meaningless. If the law is what turns "a killing" into "a wrongful killing", we're already lost, because we've said that the arbiter of meaning is an authority with the might to determine what it desires.

All of which is beside the point. You said you haven't name-called. I provided evidence that you have.


Now you're injecting right and wrong into it again, whereas I'm trying to strip that unneeded baggage away.

The difference is either ethical or legal. If you rule out legal, then you're left with ethical.

There is no absolute in human ethics. There is strong evidence (what with all the killing in the world) that plenty of people do not feel that killing is ethically wrong. At least, if they think it's wrong, they think it's less wrong than not killing.

Even if I agree with you on the point that Superman murdered you in that hypothetical scenario, that doesn't mean that all people agree. There is no moral or ethical answer which all people agree is true. The assertion that "I just know it's right" is a claim made by people with opposing views.

Am I insane for thinking this?


The fact is that not all killing is murder. Look up the definitions of murder and you'll see what I mean. Murder is definitely killing, but not all killing is murder. Murder is "unethical killing," if you like. If you're asking about right and wrong, then the answer is simply: it depends.

Is your claim that "if you don't know that it's wrong, then you're insane" not an ad hominem?

[a500lbgorilla]

I'm not talking about settling disputes. I'm talking about the existence of dispute, the type of logic we use to accuse somebody of theft in the first place. I'm not prescribing what we do after that point. I'm suggesting we apply the logic we used to get to that point and put it onto other things to see how it fits.

And this is the problem with all this moralizing. It's too abstract. It's too disconnected with reality. When transitioning from this impossible to form but widely suspected to exist notion of theft and ownership you're going to have to deal with re-integrating all the stuff you peeled away in the first place.

You can't do this. So instead you have to wave your hands around and hope everyone takes for granted the idea of ownership and the idea of theft exists in some pure platonic form and very clearly that's not the case upon examination.

[a500lbgorilla]

Taxes aren't theft because in reality they're not. The only way you can appear to make it so is by deleting a lot of complex interactions between human instinct and civilized human interaction, hope they accept an undefined notion of theft independent of a legal framework, hope they don't question the concept of ownership itself, and hope that all of this gives them the insight to dispel the illusion of gov't and recognize the cruel damage it has wrought on our otherwise harmonious nature.

Human reasoning and human abstraction weren't meant for discovering deeper truths. It was a lucky trick we discovered that if you're careful not to abstract too far from reality and you check your abstractions against reality, you can create ones that are robust and meaningful. A lot of macroeconomics fails this mark and all of Libertarianism does.

[a500lbgorilla]

And if you can't define abstract theft, and ownership, and disputes, you can't claim to know anything about them for some aspect of them that you're fully unaware of could overturn your beliefs about them.

[wufwugy]

I acknowledge that only the government can tax, but I dont see this as being wrong, unfair, or even the slightest bit unnerving.

Do you find it unnerving that when the government does something, if law is considered a moral authority, if that thing the government does is thought to be wrong, it is instead "right"? We can apply CoccoBill's logic to this, where he said that a majority is what decides morality. So, this means that we could have a majority that has decided on the morality of a thing, yet the tax regime disagrees, so we end up the tax regime determining outcomes regardless of morals.

Why not just say wrongful killing? Murder is another term that only exists within the context of law. A great many countries have laws resembling murder, but murder still means different things depending on whose law youre under.

Murder has been embedded into the social and individual psyche. It has meaning beyond a technicality. This type of viewpoint is valid in law too.

But sure, I can say "wrongful killing". Which means I would say theft is wrongful taking. But that's kinda exactly the same thing as theft except for technicalities that most think to be meaningless. If I say to my friend "somebody wrongfully took this thing", he would probably say "oh so he stole it?".

You said you haven't name-called. I provided evidence that you have.

Where?

There is no absolute in human ethics. There is strong evidence (what with all the killing in the world) that plenty of people do not feel that killing is ethically wrong. At least, if they think it's wrong, they think it's less wrong than not killing.

Even if I agree with you on the point that Superman murdered you in that hypothetical scenario, that doesn't mean that all people agree. There is no moral or ethical answer which all people agree is true. The assertion that "I just know it's right" is a claim made by people with opposing views.

Am I insane for thinking this?

No you're not insane for thinking this, because it's true. I'm just not talking about this. I'm not talking about how we decide as a society what is moral. I'm getting at a thought experiment where we apply what we already have established about theft and see how that fits onto taxation.

Is your claim that "if you don't know that it's wrong, then you're insane" not an ad hominem?

I didn't say that and it would be ad hominem if I said that was evidence for a position.

And this is the problem with all this moralizing. It's too abstract. It's too disconnected with reality.

That's what this is. It's not a prescription for how to deal with reality. It's a way to better understand the abstraction, which is usually a good initial step to making better applications for reality.

Taxes aren't theft because in reality they're not. The only way you can appear to make it so is by deleting a lot of complex interactions between human instinct and civilized human interaction, hope they accept an undefined notion of theft independent of a legal framework, hope they don't question the concept of ownership itself, and hope that all of this gives them the insight to dispel the illusion of gov't and recognize the cruel damage it has wrought on our otherwise harmonious nature.

I don't advocate any of this. I have presented a very defined idea of theft.

Let's examine this line

Taxes aren't theft because in reality they're not.

The "in reality" is a claim by an entity with the biggest guns. This is irrelevant to the examination of what theft is on a conceptual level. Consider this: a law passes that says every newborn child is the property of the state. Would this make it true that children truly are state property, or would it just be a practice where children are state property? The answer is the latter. There is no real true property. It exists in minds and in practices. If this new law passed, we'd find most of the population revolt because they believe it to be wrong. My purpose ITT is to take that logic and apply it to other things to see if people are being consistent and rational about those things.

And if you can't define abstract theft, and ownership, and disputes, you can't claim to know anything about them for some aspect of them that you're fully unaware of could overturn your beliefs about them.

I haven't shied away from defining anything. If I did I would stop talking since it would mean I have no leg to stand on.



It seems you guys have said you mostly agree that taxation has most elements of theft. So let me ask this: what makes taxation not theft?

[a500lbgorilla]

That's what this is. It's not a prescription for how to deal with reality. It's a way to better understand the abstraction, which is usually a good initial step to making better applications for reality.

Don't move from this spot. Don't try to win the argument. Just recognize what you mean right here.

[a500lbgorilla]

Because, as best as I know, you're wrong.

[wufwugy]

You'll have to explain.

[a500lbgorilla]

How? I already made the point that you abstract too far. You came back and said, "nah, it's alright." and I reasserted that it's way too far for the reasons I already asserted.

[wufwugy]

How? I already made the point that you abstract too far. You came back and said, "nah, it's alright." and I reasserted that it's way too far for the reasons I already asserted.

The thing is that it isn't too far because we're talking about two different things. You're talking about a practice and saying that because the practice is a certain way, reality is a certain way. I'm not talking about a practice.

If you want to say that taxation is not theft because the government says so, then, well, we're both right. Because I'm talking about what makes taxation theft on an abstract level, and it would mean you're saying that even though that's the case, you're not interested in stopping there. Which is fine, because I never intended this thought experiment to go beyond there.

[wufwugy]

Rilla, do you think that taxation isn't theft because the tax regime gets away with it?

[a500lbgorilla]

I cheated a bit when I started to smell blood in the water.

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/property/

This was one of David Hume's conclusions. There is nothing natural about private property, wrote Hume. The ‘contrariety’ of our passions and the ‘looseness and easy transition [of material objects] from one person to another’ mean that any situation in which I hold or use a resource is always vulnerable to disruption (Hume 1978 [1739], p. 488). Until possession is stabilized by social rules, there is no secure relation between person and thing. We may think that there ought to be: we may think, for example, that a person has a moral right to something that he has made and that society has an obligation to give legal backing to this moral right. But according to Hume, we have to ask what it is in general for society to set up and enforce rules of this kind, before we can reach any conclusions about the normative significance of the relation between any particular person and any particular thing.

Our property is nothing but those goods, whose constant possession is establish'd by the laws of society; that is, by the laws of justice. Those, therefore, who make use of the words property, or right, or obligation, before they have explain'd the origin of justice, or even make use of them in that explication, are guilty of a very gross fallacy, and can never reason upon any solid foundation. A man's property is some object related to him. This relation is not natural, but moral, and founded on justice. Tis very preposterous, therefore, to imagine, that we can have any idea of property, without fully comprehending the nature of justice, and shewing its origin in the artifice and contrivance of man. The origin of justice explains that of property. The same artifice gives rise to both. (ibid., p. 491)
The view that the issue of property begs questions about the general basis of social organization had already been foreshadowed by Thomas Hobbes. Indeed Hobbes regarded property as the key to political philosophy: ‘[M]y first enquiry was to be from whence it proceeded, that any man should call any thing rather his Owne, th[a]n another mans’ (Hobbes 1983 [1647], pp. 26–7). For Hobbes, property rules were the product of authority—the acknowledged authority of a sovereign, whose commands could guarantee the peace and make it safe for men to embark on social and economic activities that outstripped their ability to protect themselves using their own individual strength. Hume, by contrast, was interested in the possibility that the relevant settlement might emerge as conventions from ordinary human interactions rather than as impositions by an acknowledged figure in authority (Hume 1978 [1739], p. 490).[3]

My searching helped me understand where the arguments were coming from. And I, personally, see the entire practice as a mechanism of social argument, agreement, and persuasion. As a, whatever I am, I just don't give a shit about all of the argumentation behind getting people to agree, I only care about the argumentation behind predicting the future... and in that, all of this is bumkum.

[JKDS]

Do you find it unnerving that when the government does something, if law is considered a moral authority...

Philosophers have been struggling with the question of right and wrong for millennia, and I dont believe that there is an actual source that can define what those concepts are. However, one source of authority that philosophers go to for defining right and wrong is the law. There are issues with that, of course, but there are issues with all sources of such moral authority...even purely subjective and individual ones. I dont take issue with law being a source for this reason, especially since it is created by a group of people who all subscribe to other sources of moral authority...and I have the power to effect change.

if that thing the government does is thought to be wrong, it is instead "right"? We can apply CoccoBill's logic to this, where he said that a majority is what decides morality. So, this means that we could have a majority that has decided on the morality of a thing, yet the tax regime disagrees, so we end up the tax regime determining outcomes regardless of morals.

The government does not create "right" actions. At most, it proscribes a small set of "wrong" actions. This isnt an all inclusive set of wrong actions either, just a small subset of actions that the majority agreed were wrong.

It is frequently the case, however, that laws exist which no longer fit that view. Either because the majority changed, or the viewpoint itself changed. In such a case, the law changes as well. This doesnt bother me.

Murder has been embedded into the social and individual psyche. It has meaning beyond a technicality. This type of viewpoint is valid in law too.

You're taking law for granted here. You and everyone else has grown up in a world of laws and governments, where terms like murder and theft not only exist, but are common knowledge. Yet these terms are still purely legal ones. They are especially well known legal terms, but are legal terms nontheless.

But sure, I can say "wrongful killing". Which means I would say taxation is wrongful taking. But that's kinda exactly the same thing as theft except for technicalities that most think to be meaningless. If I say to my friend "somebody wrongfully took this thing of mine", he would probably say "oh so he stole it?".

This is still taking property rights for granted. You cannot steal, nor commit theft, if there is no recognized ownership right. Your friend saying this is recognizing that property rights exist by law, and that when someone takes your property he is committing the crime of theft.

Wrongful takings are a different story though. I'd call it a wrongful taking if you ate the last slice of pizza b4 I had a chance to get any, but that doesnt make it theft or stealing (at least in the US). All that is required for a wrongful taking is a subjective view that something is yours, and someone else took it wrongfully. It doesnt require property rights, ownership, or theft to exist. It doesnt even require recognition that it was wrongful.

However, it doesnt have that "umpf" anymore. The force of law is no longer behind the words, and so 'wrongful taking" or "wrongful killing" arent as sexy. Its also obviously subjective now, and so more likely to be ignored.

[wufwugy]

I cheated a bit when I started to smell blood in the water.

CHEATER

[a500lbgorilla]

CHEATER

In my defense, I had some trouble understanding why 'ownership' was difficult to define. That shit ain't right.

[wufwugy]

I dont take issue with law being a source for this reason, especially since it is created by a group of people who all subscribe to other sources of moral authority...and I have the power to effect change.

So a necessary factor is that you can effect change. Do you feel like you have a reasonable amount of ability to effect change under a tax monopoly?

You're taking law for granted here. You and everyone else has grown up in a world of laws and governments, where terms like murder and theft not only exist, but are common knowledge. Yet these terms are still purely legal ones. They are especially well known legal terms, but are legal terms nontheless.

I think the point I was getting at is that they're not exclusively legal ideas. You say they're exclusively "legal terms", which I get why that can be said.

Wrongful takings are a different story though. I'd call it a wrongful taking if you ate the last slice of pizza b4 I had a chance to get any, but that doesnt make it theft or stealing (at least in the US). All that is required for a wrongful taking is a subjective view that something is yours, and someone else took it wrongfully. It doesnt require property rights, ownership, or theft to exist. It doesnt even require recognition that it was wrongful.

That's what I'm saying. This is the idea that people have in their heads about legal terms like theft or murder. When somebody feels wronged, he doesn't think "Well let's see what the law says so I can know how to feel". He thinks "this was a wrongful thing because such n such". The reason I'm making this distinction is so we can evaluate other things by this rationale to see their similarities.

Maybe I should have entitled the thread "taxation is like theft except in that the government can do it so in that way it isn't like theft". I probably didn't think to do that because I wanted to get to that point because I thought doing so would be enough to say "taxation is theft" because I didn't anticipate the notion that the morality of a thing is changed by the might or technicalities of an authority.

[JKDS]

So a necessary factor is that you can effect change. Do you feel like you have a reasonable amount of ability to effect change under a tax monopoly?

I dont know what a tax monopoly is. I do feel I have a reasonable amount of ability to effect change in the United States though. If a 13yr old on twitter can effect change for police brutality, I think I can too. Its not easy, no. But nor should it be.

I think the point I was getting at is that they're not exclusively legal ideas. You say they're exclusively "legal terms", which I get why that can be said.

The idea that some killings or takings can be wrongful isnt purely legal. Thats true. But Murder and Theft are specific kinds of killings and takings, and these only exist in the legal realm.

The reason I'm making this distinction is so we can evaluate other things by this rationale to see their similarities.

Everything is similar under this framework though, so I dont much see the point.

[wufwugy]

I dont know what a tax monopoly is. I do feel I have a reasonable amount of ability to effect change in the United States though. If a 13yr old on twitter can effect change for police brutality, I think I can too. Its not easy, no. But nor should it be.

One day we'll have to discuss this, because I don't think people have a reasonable ability to effect change through the democratic process of a tax monopoly. I think we have the evidence of such in how much more positive change happens in free markets.

[wufwugy]

If you want to say that taxation is not theft because the government says so, then, well, we're both right. Because I'm talking about what makes taxation theft on an abstract level, and it would mean you're saying that even though that's the case, you're not interested in stopping there. Which is fine, because I never intended this thought experiment to go beyond there.

I want to add to this.

I don't think it's relevant what an authority says. Saying it does matter strikes me as Logical Fallacy 101. While a tax regime may have legitimacy among its supporters, among its dissenters, how is the tax regime anything other than illegitimate?

[a500lbgorilla]

But there's no such thing as ownership without the authority. This is what you take for granted. You own something under the framework of law. Under that same framework taxes aren't theft. Theft and ownership are meaningless independent of the central authority.

[a500lbgorilla]

The really interesting thing to come from all of this is that 'ownership' is an essentially contested concept like 'art' and 'social justice'. It's rather unintuitive due to the ubiquity and long history of the practice.

[wufwugy]

But there's no such thing as ownership without the authority. This is what you take for granted. You own something under the framework of law. Under that same framework taxes aren't theft.

Even if it were established that taxes aren't theft, the reasoning you use to get there cannot be true since it means that truth is dependent upon authority.

This is like saying the sky isn't blue because an authority says it's balzork instead. You're saying "Aha! Since an authority defines taxation and defines theft and they are not defined as the same thing they are not the same thing." But that only changes the practice of the thing, not the idea of the thing.

It would be pointless to evaluate taxation in terms of theft if it is believed that the practice that taxation is defined as not-theft is the only relevant information. We can call things whatever we want, but that only changes what we call them, not the idea of them.

[a500lbgorilla]

This is like saying the sky isn't blue because an authority says it's balzork instead.

Alright, if you don't want to deal with the question of 'What is ownership?' then maybe you'd like to deal with the question 'What is blue?'

Did you know that the Illiad didn't describe the sky as blue? It found every other way to describe it but by calling it blue

I see what you're after. The gov't doesn't dictate reality. But it sure as fuck affects it. And its effects in things that exist purely in the human-on-human realm are, as best as I can register, complete.

So yes, if the gov't said otherwise, the truth would be otherwise. But the gov't doesn't say otherwise, because it has to actually exist, and in that the idea of taxes and the idea of theft aren't the same.

[wufwugy]

But the gov't doesn't say otherwise, because it has to actually exist, and in that the idea of taxes and the idea of theft aren't the same.

The reason I claim taxation is theft is because I don't think the "in that" is relevant. I get how taxation is technically not theft because, well, technicalities. A controversial claim equating two things has merit if it shows reason to believe that the technicality is the only useful distinction.

[JKDS]

Saying it's a technicality is to say that masturbation isn't murder because of a technicality.

[wufwugy]

Saying it's a technicality is to say that masturbation isn't murder because of a technicality.

Those things are different in many more ways than just technicalities. Regardless, playing the game of technicalities is hairy since it can easily go too far. The spirit of an idea can keep it in check.

The spirit of murder is far different than the spirit of masturbation. However the spirit of taxation is mostly different from the spirit of theft in the context of a supposed agreement about taxation. Which raises the question: what if there isn't an agreement?

I mean, some people would like to opt out of Social Security. They would like to not pay SS taxes and in turn not receive benefits at a later date. This is illegal, which is effectively the government saying their property must be confiscated for this thing they do not want. I'm not sure how this is different than the spirit of theft.

[a500lbgorilla]

The reason I claim taxation is theft is because I don't think the "in that" is relevant. I get how taxation is technically not theft because, well, technicalities. A controversial claim equating two things has merit if it shows reason to believe that the technicality is the only useful distinction.

But theft doesn't exist "out that". The idea of taking doesn't even exist without some globally agreed framework for the idea of ownership. To own something is a technicality.

[a500lbgorilla]

The spirit of an idea can keep it in check.

If you would actually explore the spirit of the idea, you'd see you're taking it for granted based on the long history of the convention.

[CoccoBill]

I should add that I thought more about this and I think I see why you mentioned it.

His argument is compelling, but only as an organizing principle. Which I mostly agree with. I forget the specific names, but the types of logical fallacies that would be used if what he said was about a fundamental truth of morality includes appeals to large numbers.

Well yeah. I meant that there are no fundamental truths about morals, no universal beliefs common to all people, we all have our own. So to reach a consensus and agree on them on a societal level, we need the authority the define it, be it based on religion, democratic majority or something similar. Re: your question on if I agree if it would be ok to shove christian fundamentalism down people's throats, no, my personal morals say it wouldn't be. If the majority of Americans did think it's ok, it would make it the de facto moral standard there. The only way to see who's right is by applying the notions in the TED talk I linked, imo. It should be fairly easy to device an algorithm for morals, something like 1. minimize suffering, 2. maximize happiness etc.

Even if it were established that taxes aren't theft, the reasoning you use to get there cannot be true since it means that truth is dependent upon authority.

This is like saying the sky isn't blue because an authority says it's balzork instead. You're saying "Aha! Since an authority defines taxation and defines theft and they are not defined as the same thing they are not the same thing." But that only changes the practice of the thing, not the idea of the thing.

It would be pointless to evaluate taxation in terms of theft if it is believed that the practice that taxation is defined as not-theft is the only relevant information. We can call things whatever we want, but that only changes what we call them, not the idea of them.

There is no "idea" that everyone agrees on, see Palestine vs Israel, settlers vs native indians, Crimea and so on. Calling dibs, doing an exchange, having an agreement, all meaningless unless all parties agree on the terms. I don't believe absolute morality is in any objective sense encoded into us, it's just a personal notion based on beliefs, culture, childhood trauma and whatever. We need a moral authority, as in, both yearn for one on an individual level and need it as a society, to function efficiently, we need to agree on the rules to play. Phase 1 of common morals was religions, phase 2 laws and regulations. I hope phase 3 is science based on outcomes.

Theft, taxes, morals, laws, government etc are not part of our physical reality, without humans agreeing on what they are, they don't exist. Theft is the breaching of a moral code, a concept. If you remove the other concepts that are used to define it and just leave theft, it becomes whatever anyone happens to think it is, not something solid and measurable. We have a definition of theft and a definition of taxes, and they're not the same.

[wufwugy]

The idea of taking doesn't even exist without some globally agreed framework for the idea of ownership.

The practice doesn't exist without framework, but the idea needs no consensus.

Theft, taxes, morals, laws, government etc are not part of our physical reality, without humans agreeing on what they are, they don't exist. Theft is the breaching of a moral code, a concept. If you remove the other concepts that are used to define it and just leave theft, it becomes whatever anyone happens to think it is, not something solid and measurable. We have a definition of theft and a definition of taxes, and they're not the same.

This is an evaluation for how norms are established. The thought experiment of this thread is not about that.

[MadMojoMonkey]

I honestly don't know what your point is anymore.

If you abstract the notion of theft to the point that you leave it weakly defined using equally weakly defined terms, then what do you expect from your conclusions?

If I strip away all the differences between taxation and theft, and then compare them, then obv. they are the same.
I just don't see the point. Now we need a new word for taxation which matches the original definition so that we can still talk about the mechanism by which we fund our public servants and services.

[wufwugy]

If you abstract the notion of theft to the point that you leave it weakly defined using equally weakly defined terms, then what do you expect from your conclusions?

Nothing I've said has been weakly defined. Irrelevant issues have been brought up and I've been trying to show why they're irrelevant. I've been doing this partly by saying how the thought experiment does not depend on how things are defined, but then I just get told that I'm not defining things. This line is wholly irrelevant. If instead we were talking about how a society organizes, I'd be right on board with you.

If I strip away all the differences between taxation and theft, and then compare them, then obv. they are the same.

It's not about stripping away the differences so much as evaluating what the differences actually are. We've made great progress on this actually, as it has become clear that the main difference between theft and taxation is an appeal to authority.

I just don't see the point. Now we need a new word for taxation which matches the original definition so that we can still talk about the mechanism by which we fund our public servants and services.

An evaluation of the concept of something has zilch to do with an evaluation of the practice of that thing. Regarding the OP claim, it doesn't matter one single bit how taxation or theft is defined. What matters is that they are defined. Then, after whichever definition anybody chooses to use, that person can evaluate the logical consistency that they use to achieve those definitions.

This thread started out on the right path when everybody jumped to discussing the social contract. The social contract exists because of the idea that taxation is wrong in the first place. This law determinism came out of nowhere and is just a super weird justification which nullifies why anybody would think a social contract is a good idea in the first place.

[wufwugy]

So far the reasons given for why taxation isn't theft:

1) There's a social contract and we all consent to it by not hiding in a cave or living on a steel platform off the coast. Nevermind that nobody uses this idea of consent for anything else.

2) Might is right. Okay, so that still means taxation is theft, just that it's accepted theft.

3) A moral majority decides. It's a way to organize a society, but individual morality is just as relevant as collective morality, so that argument doesn't apply to dissenters. Besides, it's a rather scary way to organize a society.

4) The definition is what matters. Taxation is defined as not-theft; therefore it's not theft. That one's a doozy.

[wufwugy]

I'm mostly done with this thread for now. You guys should give closing arguments if you want. It's been fun

TBH, I learn a ton from internet debates, but it's always some way down the road. What I mean is that when somebody gives me an idea about something, even though I may disagree with it, it's still an influence and I can use it to better evaluate the later instances I come across similar stuff. Debate isn't so much about changing minds as it is about planting seeds.

[boost]

I'm mostly done with this thread for now. You guys should give closing arguments if you want. It's been fun

TBH, I learn a ton from internet debates, but it's always some way down the road. What I mean is that when somebody gives me an idea about something, even though I may disagree with it, it's still an influence and I can use it to better evaluate the later instances I come across similar stuff. Debate isn't so much about changing minds as it is about planting seeds.

tl;dr: a500lbgorilla planted his seed in wufwugy.

[CoccoBill]

So far the reasons given for why taxation isn't theft:

1) There's a social contract and we all consent to it by not hiding in a cave or living on a steel platform off the coast. Nevermind that nobody uses this idea of consent for anything else.

On the contrary, the same idea is used for all laws, everywhere, both written and unwritten. This is the big one, IMO. Everyone (at least in western countries) is free to pick whichever social contract they want. I don't think anyone is "owed" an ideally pleasing model to be handed to them for no effort, even if no one else supports it.

2) Might is right. Okay, so that still means taxation is theft, just that it's accepted theft.

I don't think anyone argued this.

3) A moral majority decides. It's a way to organize a society, but individual morality is just as relevant as collective morality, so that argument doesn't apply to dissenters. Besides, it's a rather scary way to organize a society.

I'm guessing you're not suggesting that tyranny by few would be better than tyranny by many. So everyone should be able to define their own laws, act according to their own morals. Who settles disputes if 2 people have opposing morals? Yes, this is a trick question.

4) The definition is what matters. Taxation is defined as not-theft; therefore it's not theft. That one's a doozy.

This together with 1) is where it's at. 3) is irrelevant except to demonstrate the definition of theft is meaningless without a moral authority or common agreement. The concept of theft is based on morals, not some underlying physical constant of reality.

[MadMojoMonkey]

So far the reasons given for why taxation isn't theft:

1) There's a social contract and we all consent to it by not hiding in a cave or living on a steel platform off the coast. Nevermind that nobody uses this idea of consent for anything else.

2) Might is right. Okay, so that still means taxation is theft, just that it's accepted theft.

3) A moral majority decides. It's a way to organize a society, but individual morality is just as relevant as collective morality, so that argument doesn't apply to dissenters. Besides, it's a rather scary way to organize a society.

4) The definition is what matters. Taxation is defined as not-theft; therefore it's not theft. That one's a doozy.

1) You have yet to understand the contract as inherent with the fact that everyone is born into a culture chosen by their parents. You balk at the amount of choice the parents have, but unless they are being coerced or threatened with coercion or violence then any hardship is merely a part of life.
The child finds himself a de facto signer of the social contract by no choice of his own. His parents signed for him in his stead. Eventually that child is a grown-up and now must choose for himself. Life is hard; no one owes him (or you or me) easy choices.

You assert this is an injustice, but many assert that it is justice. Should laws not protect babies, because the babies have not willfully entered the social contract? In America, the choices of the baby are made by the baby's guardians until the baby is old enough to make their own choices. If you are upset with the social contract of the society in which you were born, then blame your parents and move away. This is not a burden; it is the market of life in action.

***
It is a fallacy to say "nobody uses this idea of consent for anything else." The broad generality imposed by using the word "nobody" is where the fallacy lies. Suggesting that what "everybody" or "nobody" thinks should compel a change in my opinion is merely an appeal to emotion. If what 1 person (e.g. me) thinks is contrary to that statement, then it is false.

Why do you assume that this reasoning is unique to taxes?
Fun fact: You can type the question in as much time as it takes to assert the answer.

I could describe to you dozens of examples of how the social contract interacts with our daily lives on every level. Many of those interactions involve consent. I'd be accused of changing the subject to illustrate this point, but that doesn't mean the point isn't there to be made. It strikes me as unimaginative of you to even propose such a statement.

2) No one has said might is right. Might is right means that morality is dictated by the most coercive presence. No one has said that taxation is right because the gov't says so. People have said that taxation and theft are defined terms, those definitions stem from gov'ts use of them. Those definitions provide clear distinctions between taxation and theft in a deep, conceptual way.

No one is attaching morality to whether the definitions "should" come from there. We're just saying that they DO come from there.

It is not an appeal to authority unless morality is attached.

3) America is designed to bolster the moral majority, with checks and balances to protect a tyranny of the majority. Other countries are designed in different ways. There are countries with a tyranny of the minority, if that's your thing. CoccoBill's point is relevant.

You seem to be proposing some utopian society in which everyone gets along and agrees on all the things. Insofar as you are stipulating the society in ignorance of human frailties and propensity for selfish mistakes, you are not describing a realistic vision.

4) lolwat!? You propose to have a deep discussion about something and leave the principle terms undefined!?
SMH

What college teaches this? It should be assaulted by all other reputable institutions to protect the name of intelligent discourse.

Taxation hasn't been defined as "not-theft" by anyone ITT. Are you being intentionally dense? Honest question. You seem to have stubbornly attached yourself to this notion and no matter how many logical and rational responses you get to your questions, you still draw the conclusion that anyone who doesn't agree with you suffers from cognitive dissonance.

Srsly, this thread is only a few pages long. Give it a re-read and actually digest your opponent's responses. I feel you're simply looking for generic arguments to respond to rather than listening to individuals who have complex and intelligent opinions.

The definition of taxation is complicated. It involves history and social order and social construction. You propose to strip away all the nuance of what the concept actually is, then you arbitrarily choose an emotionally charged word like "theft" to compare it to. You can do this with any concept ever.
Being jailed is theft. Bullying is theft. That guy cutting me off in traffic stole my lane!
Taxation is generosity. Taxation is selfish. Taxation is a market force. Taxation is socialism.
The conceptualization of taxation as theft isn't unique to either taxation or theft.

When you break anything down to a conceptual level, then all sorts of things can come out of it. The problem is that everyone's concept is personal, subjective and ultimately unique.

[a500lbgorilla]

You need to be careful even with the idea of consent. It's another one of these slippery imaginables that emerges when a group of people turn to each other and start discussing what behaviors are tolerable when and how. Think on it, in some ways the idea of consent requires the real notion of free will.

Why drive so far afield when you can start with some more solid foundation?

Might doesn't make right. Might doesn't care about right. Might makes nations and in doing so it takes possession of lands, resources, and even peoples. There's no need to intellectualize it, nor is there any reason to justify it. It's how it works.

In the long history of making and inheriting nations, these ideas like Justice, Freedom, Consent, Property have been crafted to build a better relationship between the gov't and the governed, to make the reality of the set up easier to swallow and easier to manage. Through political unrest, civil unrest, revolution, conquests, discoveries, fortune, and all the rest, these ideas exist to help us live in the world history has made for us. The key is, though, that these ideas follow as rationalizations for the practices that had been so successful.

[wufwugy]

MUST

CONTAIN

URGE

[boost]

Wuf, I know you said you're done, but knowing as how Libertarians love hypotheticals...

Whatever your end goal for government may be, could you imagine that, to achieve this goal, a tax regime would present fewer and/or less severe draw backs than a free market system? Or is this inherently impossible, and if so, why and what is your the ultimate goal your government is looking to fulfill?

[wufwugy]

Wuf, I know you said you're done, but knowing as how Libertarians love hypotheticals...

Whatever your end goal for government may be, could you imagine that, to achieve this goal, a tax regime would present fewer and/or less severe draw backs than a free market system?

The only type of reason I've found is if there is an existential threat that is too hard to assess that the only reasonable defense of that threat is an assumption of this existential threat. What I'm getting at is something like a government that assumes it's at great risk of invasion, thereby it engages in behavior that thwarts obscure threats of invasion that it couldn't have found otherwise. I don't really believe this is a reasonable argument, but it was something I brought up when debating Rilla because he argues from the position that there is always an existential threat from invasion.

Outside of that type of thing, I don't see reason to think that government would work better than a free market at expanding societal goals of peace and prosperity. Governments create more violence and destruction than any other entity (by a lot), so the belief that government is a healer of violence and destruction is a little nose-scrunchy. Additionally, the problem solving process is a market one, not a regulation one. The idea that mandates are a problem solving mechanism is an acceptance of the idea that the answers are already known but merely not implemented. Well, that's just simply not the case. We don't know the answer to virtually any societal problem that can be raised. We can't find the answers by assuming we already have the answers and developing mandates around the ideas. When we evaluate areas where we use this practice, we see results of the problems just getting worse and worse. But when we evaluate areas where we don't use this practice, we see incredible flourishing of answers.

We were all once online poker players. A market would never have made it illegal, but a government did. Imagine this type of thing on a scale of millions, and you have the purpose of the state. Markets turned Mario Bros into WoW in no time. Catastrophe insurance is profitable. Markets can do the same for anything that can be valued and priced. This includes security and law. On the flip side, education and healthcare are just two of the biggest areas where the government increases its involvement, and they just keep getting worse.

If we go the route of choice as a concept, democracy is said to work because voters have a choice. Wouldn't this mean that if a different system were to provide greater choice it would work even better than democracy? It does. Markets provide much greater choice, and that choice is why we see the divergence of results between markets and states. To the extent that we say society needs a group of people to run things is ironically the extent that we say the democratic principle of people running their own lives is wrong.

I'm not sure if I answered your question. Let me know.

It should also be noted that if libertarians didn't believe their ideas increase the freedom of the people, they wouldn't believe them. The popular narrative that revolves around libertarians like the Kochs is that they're trying to crush freedom, but the irony is the collectivist, top-down, state tax-and-regulate philosophy is what stymies freedom.

[!Luck]

after giving it much thought i realized that wufwugy is a fucking retard.

[boost]

My question was a round about way of asking, "do you believe it is possible that you are wrong." I was curious if you were participating in a discussion or using discussion as a pretense to expound an ideology. From your response it seems like the latter is true. With that being said, I probably shouldn't pick at any of the details, but...

Governments create more violence and destruction than any other entity (by a lot)

This is like the fat free diet craze of the 80's/90's. Over consumption of fat, and it is very easy to over consume certain fats, can lead to health problems. But it does not follow that a fat free diet is healthy. We now know that a diet rich in certain types of fats is the only way to have a healthy diet. My point is, there are many things in life which have some inherently bad qualities, but overall they are a net positive. The bigger the scope the bigger the drawbacks can be while overall we've got a net positive-- yet this makes perfectly good systems/entities/whatever easy to take pot shots at since it's hard to see the forest for the trees.

We were all once online poker players. A market would never have made it illegal, but a government did.

A free market couldn't make it illegal, because once an entity did, it would de facto be a government... But putting semantics aside, I think your faith in the ideology blinds you to potential undesirable outcomes. You don't think it's possible that a powerful enough free market entity could disrupt or even halt online poker? You don't think that we could have been happily playing online poker in Libertopia one day and then have the cord yanked the next? What happened in real life was that a group which wielded more actualized power exerted their force in a way our group did not like. You mean to say that's exclusive to our current system and impossible in Libertopia?

If we go the route of choice as a concept, democracy is said to work because voters have a choice. Wouldn't this mean that if a different system were to provide greater choice it would work even better than democracy? It does.

Who says that? In what context are they saying it? But more to the point: It is said that caloric intake is the way to rid yourself of hunger. Hunger is bad. You should never stop eating.

[wufwugy]

after giving it much thought i realized that wufwugy is a fucking retard.

I'm sorry things haven't been going well for you. It gets better.

[wufwugy]

A free market couldn't make it illegal, because once an entity did, it would de facto be a government... But putting semantics aside, I think your faith in the ideology blinds you to potential undesirable outcomes. You don't think it's possible that a powerful enough free market entity could disrupt or even halt online poker? You don't think that we could have been happily playing online poker in Libertopia one day and then have the cord yanked the next? What happened in real life was that a group which wielded more actualized power exerted their force in a way our group did not like. You mean to say that's exclusive to our current system and impossible in Libertopia?

A free market wouldn't ban online poker because the demand isn't there. I mean "demand" both colloquially and economically, but mostly economically. There's a price to be paid to ban online poker, and the demand (the paying of that price) wouldn't be there in a free market. There is irony in that what many say they don't like about markets, that they encourage the pursuit of money, is also why markets wouldn't ban things like online poker. The demand for illegal online poker is a product of mandatory revenue streams that government receives i.e. taxes. The reason this is necessary to create demand for something like banning online poker is that the government doesn't have to make money on the issue. Its responsibility is to the vote, so we end up getting a bunch of what would otherwise be horribly cost-ineffective policies.

Probably the best example of this is what has been recently called the prison industrial complex. It's a misnomer, but I'll use it. The popular sentiment is that greed from private companies is responsible for more imprisonment than otherwise. But when we dig into what's really going on, we find the private companies aren't responsible. The reason is because they are only supplying the prisons. The government creates the demand for more imprisonment, and it is only able to do so because its revenue stream is uninterrupted and uninhibited by dissent. Of course, the private companies develop a symbiotic relationship with the government, where they try to get more demand for prisons and they increase their own supply, but the lifeblood of the dynamic is the tax regime creating a demand that couldn't exist without a tax regime since then the demand would not be cost-effective.

Who says that? In what context are they saying it?

Pretty much every time I've seen the issue of markets and government discussed, it's said that the vote is all the choice people need. We discussed this extensively ITT even. Several others think that the vote is a reasonable tool for change. Meanwhile very little positive change comes from the vote, so I'm left wondering. I like the idea of "voting with the dollar". It's democracy on steroids and it's what brings us the robust markets that we already have.

[wufwugy]

My question was a round about way of asking, "do you believe it is possible that you are wrong."

Of course the position I hold could be wrong. But I don't think it is because I have yet to see a formidable rationale for why. What I'm getting at is things like this: people who disagree will often say "but we need government to provide necessities for people otherwise they wouldn't be provided". But that claim is factually inaccurate. There is a wealth of information on how necessities are handled by governments and by markets, and the markets have blown the governments out of the water.

I say this because I want to address your statement about whether I'm participating in a discussion or dispersing an ideology. It's both. I'm a junkie for this stuff, so I put a lot of thought into it. I declare things but I'm also open to any compelling arguments. I have a ton of experience in believing the wrong thing, so I think it's extra important to always reassess.

[a500lbgorilla]

Governments create more violence and destruction than any other entity (by a lot)

Why is that, do you think? Maybe because, if you're really good at violence, you get to make a gov't, and it tends to be violence is one of the main pillars to keep it up. You don't destroy this dynamic by trying to wave away the institution of gov't. People made the damn things in the first place and nothing has changed about them.

If we go the route of choice as a concept, democracy is said to work because voters have a choice. Wouldn't this mean that if a different system were to provide greater choice it would work even better than democracy?

No. It wouldn't mean that. Life can throw a U-shaped response at you where, past a certain point, more of the good things makes things worse.

It does.

And this style of thinking, with its obvious faults, pervades libertarianism.

[a500lbgorilla]

Of course the position I hold could be wrong. But I don't think it is because I have yet to see a formidable rationale for why.

Wuf, you are wrong. Being right is damn near impossible.

[a500lbgorilla]

A good example: There's a puzzle called the 2/3rds puzzle. It says that for any group of people guessing a number between 1-100, the winner is the one who chooses closest to 2/3rds the average.

This cat named Nash pipes up and says, "any guess 67 or up is wrong, for these numbers are greater than any possible solution. Therefor, any guess above 45 is wrong as there is no reason to choose numbers higher than 66. Therefore, any guess above... this goes on until you reach 0 as the answer. The only answer where no one else makes a mistake and where no one else can force themselves into an advantage."

A fantastic rationale and clearly the right answer.

Then some group of people called Behavioral Game Theorists wondered, "well, ok, but what actually happens?" Well, it turns out the thinking people actually use goes something like this: The average guess is 50, so I should shoot for 2/3rds of that or 33. Of course, some other people will be on that game as well, so I may want to go to 22, maybe weighted a little bit higher to account for the numbskulls, maybe a little lower for those guys who are just too damn clever for themselves and guess 0.

And it turns out that in practice, the answer falls between 15-25.

So who gives a shit about the most clever attractive rationale? It's the rationale for whatever actually happens that's best.

You don't tell Nature what it'll do, you find a way to let Nature tell you what it'll do.

[CoccoBill]

Can't speak for others, but personally I don't think voting is a reasonable tool for change in most current implementations. Voting however _is_ the de facto method for it in a democracy, and the reasons you see little positive change through it is not a problem with the method itself. Voting works spectacularly well in many contexts, and is in my opinion a very good starting point for a fair system. I think its main weaknesses are 1) voters' lack of expertize when it comes to complex subjects, 2) the fact that it's probably not optimal if a decision is heavily damaging to a minority but neutral or mildly positive to the majority, the minority gets trampled on, and 3) voting with the dollar.

1) This is genuinely bad. People vote against their own interests all the time, and more importantly against common interests. The whole idea that in a representative democracy you're actually supposed to vote selfish and ignore all aspects of common good is utter insanity. For this we need education, free public media, studies, evidence, fact-checking etc. much more than we have now. I wouldn't mind a basic test required to be eligible to vote, just to check you're reasonably sane and understand some basic concepts. Same goes for making babies but that's a whole different discussion.

2) Only being able to vote yes/no, for/against or for a single candidate is unnecessarily limiting. Some statistician is needed to explain exactly how, but being able to cast more nuanced votes would greatly benefit the situation. If you're on the fence on a subject or feel mildly about it, vote +1. If you're vehemently against it, vote -3. Or something.

3) To say we don't already vote with the dollar is absurd. Money is what decides things, for many reasons. Why should a person with more money have more say on how things are run?

[wufwugy]

Why is that, do you think? Maybe because, if you're really good at violence, you get to make a gov't, and it tends to be violence is one of the main pillars to keep it up.

A lack of a violence monopoly doesn't necessarily mean a violence monopoly will arise. It is likely that your view was most relevant for pre-modern eras, where there was little means to assess or defend against violence by entities that didn't focus almost entirely on violence. But it's completely different today, to the point that I think a security market would actually create even more effective defenses against violence than we currently have.

States aren't just good at violence, it often helps them. To a state, acquisition of nuclear technology is an advantage, but in a market it's just a colossal liability. The incentive for peace for people like Bill Gates and the trillions of dollars in commerce and industry are even greater than the incentives for peace of a state. Without peace, businesses lose everything, but states and state officials often thrive without peace.

You tell me that I'm ignoring the threat of violence and just hoping for a fantasy world. What I'm actually doing is rationalizing how a market would be expected to counter the threat of violence even better than the state. I believe things like the US military selling itself on a market would end up creating a nuclear free world within 50 years. Every state with nukes has virtually zero reason to get rid of them, but if enough of security was handled through markets, we would likely see an overwhelming push to once and for all get rid of nukes.

No. It wouldn't mean that. Life can throw a U-shaped response at you where, past a certain point, more of the good things makes things worse.

Then make a case for why the peak positive amount of choice is the current rendition of the vote.

And this style of thinking, with its obvious faults, pervades libertarianism.

This, and the previous thing I said, were meant for brevity. I saw the logical problems that you see as I was typing it. I didn't want to write paragraphs full of qualifiers.

Wuf, you are wrong. Being right is damn near impossible.

Well, okay then. It's not like we didn't already know that. But since this is your response, what are we even doing here in the first place? What you're saying here is like if I point at a tree and say "that's a tree" and you say "actually nobody knows because all claims are based on assumptions at the foundation".

This is debate, where both sides argue why they're right and the other is wrong. Boost was wondering if I knew to entertain the idea that my position isn't right.

[wufwugy]

3) To say we don't already vote with the dollar is absurd. Money is what decides things, for many reasons. Why should a person with more money have more say on how things are run?

Voting with the dollar is different than lobbying.

People with more money shouldn't have more power to run things, but that is a problem of the system of law monopoly than of voting with the dollar. Lobbying is where people use power (be it wealth or otherwise) to create mandates. Voting with the dollar is where prices and choices create norms. It's like if you're in a marketplace where people sell anything they can think people will wanna buy and you buy what you want. Lobbying is where the marketplace is corrupted behind the scenes. Lobby type behavior does happen in markets (it's called negotiation), but it doesn't work to the detriment then since it still doesn't create mandates (because no monopoly) and instead creates deals.

I'm not sure if I explained this well at all. The point is that I mean something entirely different than lobbying when I say voting with the dollar.

[!Luck]

I'm sorry things haven't been going well for you. It gets better.

hahaha, it sure does.

[CoccoBill]

States aren't just good at violence, it often helps them. To a state, acquisition of nuclear technology is an advantage, but in a market it's just a colossal liability. The incentive for peace for people like Bill Gates and the trillions of dollars in commerce and industry are even greater than the incentives for peace of a state. Without peace, businesses lose everything, but states and state officials often thrive without peace.

You tell me that I'm ignoring the threat of violence and just hoping for a fantasy world. What I'm actually doing is rationalizing how a market would be expected to counter the threat of violence even better than the state. I believe things like the US military selling itself on a market would end up creating a nuclear free world within 50 years. Every state with nukes has virtually zero reason to get rid of them, but if enough of security was handled through markets, we would likely see an overwhelming push to once and for all get rid of nukes.

Why do you think the market wouldn't come up with nuclear technology to create energy? Why do you think the market wouldn't try to monetize it, also by weaponizing it since that would be enormously profitable if you're the only one to have it? What possible motivation would the market have to get rid of nukes once they exist? When a psychopath or an extremist group gets nukes and wants to kill everyone, What Would Market Do? I don't believe a word you're saying.

[CoccoBill]

Voting with the dollar is different than lobbying.

People with more money shouldn't have more power to run things, but that is a problem of the system of law monopoly than of voting with the dollar. Lobbying is where people use power (be it wealth or otherwise) to create mandates. Voting with the dollar is where prices and choices create norms. It's like if you're in a marketplace where people sell anything they can think people will wanna buy and you buy what you want. Lobbying is where the marketplace is corrupted behind the scenes. Lobby type behavior does happen in markets (it's called negotiation), but it doesn't work to the detriment then since it still doesn't create mandates (because no monopoly) and instead creates deals.

I'm not sure if I explained this well at all. The point is that I mean something entirely different than lobbying when I say voting with the dollar.

I know what you meant, I'm just trying to show you they're not as different as you seem to think. They're different yes, roughly by the same degree that taxation is different than theft. If voting with the dollar in libertopia is the only way to vote, obviously people with the most dollars would have the most effect. Directly purchasing goods for personal consumption is just a small subset of the things money can buy, with or without a government. I don't see why a free market society would have smaller income gaps than what we have today. This means that the majority of the people could only "vote" for things that are basic necessities for them. The rich on the other hand could invest, loan, create and change anything they want. I'm pretty sure not all rich people would only do nice things. Lobbying is using money to have societal effects, it would of course exist just the same. It would be more limited by it's reach, yes, but there also wouldn't be regulations limiting it.

[wufwugy]

Why do you think the market wouldn't come up with nuclear technology to create energy?

It probably would because of how profitable it is.

Why do you think the market wouldn't try to monetize it, also by weaponizing it since that would be enormously profitable if you're the only one to have it?

Whoever said war is profitable doesn't know what is profitable. War used to be profitable back when there was no industry, just a bunch of farmers with nothing and aristocrats with blacksmiths. Then, the best way to achieve better living standards was by killing. Now, it's not even close to like that. There's way more profit to be made by selling a good that people want to buy than by using force. Give Microsoft and Koch Industries and any group of huge companies the option to try to force people to do things, and they'll close the door on it since the cost-benefit analysis would show it to be a disastrous endeavor. And even if they were foolhardy enough to try, they'd go bankrupt lickety-split.

What possible motivation would the market have to get rid of nukes once they exist?

They're a colossal risk. Violence and threat of violence kills profits.

When a psychopath or an extremist group gets nukes and wants to kill everyone, What Would Market Do?

That too is a colossal risk. Why assume that only government can assess threats and violence? Individuals and companies assess risk constantly. Nobody would just bend over if there wasn't some tax regime to tell them that violent thugs need to be dealt with. Given how efficient and effective markets are, if we let them handle jihadists, I suspect we'd find that they actually handle them, instead of this quagmire bullshit we have today and will have forever.

[MadMojoMonkey]

I'm convinced that wuf is proselytizing. It's as if he wants to redefine what humanity is in order to make a point.

Violence exists on just about every scale imaginable in this world. Plenty of it is done by non-governmental agencies.

Russia is invading Ukraine, right? The national borders we take for granted are not so stable as they seem. Many genocides have happened within my lifetime and about 50/50 were perpetuated by a gov't.

I guess the Swiss stand out as a state which has maintained its borders w/o open war. People find exceptions wherever they can, I guess.
If nothing else, it illustrates that there's a variety in the choice of governments in the world.

***
For the record, if I thought for a second that wuf's view of humanity held up to reality, I'd def. agree with him.

If taxation were not a thing we have chosen, then sure, it would be theft.
If it was being done by some outside agency, then sure, it would be theft.
If you were prevented from leaving the jurisdiction of taxation by violence or threat thereof, then it would be theft.

But then, I don't think any of that is a description of reality. I can agree that some taxation is theft, but not that taxation is theft at it's core, as a concept.

***
I think there's a flaw in wuf's notion that the gov't is an outside agency which is imposed on people. Gov't is a broad term to define an overriding social structure. This structure can have many forms and may be imposed by a mighty ruling family or composed of the citizens over which it governs... and everything in between and other stuff, too.

[wufwugy]

If you were prevented from leaving the jurisdiction of taxation by violence or threat thereof, then it would be theft.

It's reasonable to ask somebody to leave his family, his friends, his job, and everything he knows so he can be free from being told that other people taking stuff he created is good for him. Gotcha.

[CoccoBill]

Whoever said war is profitable doesn't know what is profitable. War used to be profitable back when there was no industry, just a bunch of farmers with nothing and aristocrats with blacksmiths. Then, the best way to achieve better living standards was by killing. Now, it's not even close to like that. There's way more profit to be made by selling a good that people want to buy than by using force. Give Microsoft and Koch Industries and any group of huge companies the option to try to force people to do things, and they'll close the door on it since the cost-benefit analysis would show it to be a disastrous endeavor. And even if they were foolhardy enough to try, they'd go bankrupt lickety-split.

Ask Haliburton, Lockheed Martin, Boeing & co whether war is profitable. Why do you think wars would end in a free market? Wouldn't it be a lot more efficient to blow your competitor up rather than invest in r&d to create a superior product?

Violence and threat of violence kills profits.

Except when they don't.

That too is a colossal risk. Why assume that only government can assess threats and violence? Individuals and companies assess risk constantly.

I don't think anyone assumes this.

Nobody would just bend over if there wasn't some tax regime to tell them that violent thugs need to be dealt with. Given how efficient and effective markets are, if we let them handle jihadists, I suspect we'd find that they actually handle them, instead of this quagmire bullshit we have today and will have forever.

I would argue that governments came about, because they were needed to fund and organize a military to protect the citizens. What are the regulations currently in place that stop the market from handling the jihadists?

[a500lbgorilla]

A lack of a violence monopoly doesn't necessarily mean a violence monopoly will arise. It is likely that your view was most relevant for pre-modern eras, where there was little means to assess or defend against violence by entities that didn't focus almost entirely on violence.

Yes, history has a lot to do with it. That's very perceptive. Every today had a yesterday. And if you look at the history, gov'ts are everywhere. If you look at the present, they're everywhere. But when you 'look' at the future, by closing your eyes and playing with imaginary people living imagined lives in futures never to be, it's just markets and shit.

But it's completely different today

Completely different. New rules. New Earth. New Man. New everything! Forget history and drink this kool-aid. Glory in the market place! For Man has given to us possession of the Earth and only Profit is his Prophet.

You tell me that I'm ignoring the threat of violence and just hoping for a fantasy world. What I'm actually doing is rationalizing how a market would be expected to counter the threat of violence even better than the state.

And what I'm doing is pointing out the mistakes you make in rationalizing.

Well, okay then. It's not like we didn't already know that. But since this is your response, what are we even doing here in the first place? What you're saying here is like if I point at a tree and say "that's a tree" and you say "actually nobody knows because all claims are based on assumptions at the foundation".

"That's love," wufwugy says. "Is it?" I wonder.

This is debate, where both sides argue why they're right and the other is wrong.

And yet, it's become so much more.

[a500lbgorilla]

Then make a case for why the peak positive amount of choice is the current rendition of the vote.

Why? Your and my intellect will not be the deciders in this. You could have everyone on Earth agree that more democracy will create a better world and that still won't make it so. It would make it more likely that someone tries it somewhere, and that is what I'm interested in - what would actually happen.

[a500lbgorilla]

It's like someone that lives their entire life fighting with swords, and he has in him this deep understanding of sword-fighting, and he tries to communicate these ideas to other people and it comes out like The Book of the Five Rings. Or a man spends his life dogfighting in fighter planes and he tries to pull his deep understanding together and creates the OODA loop.

These things clearly contain a lot of knowledge, but it's knowledge that only existed through those guys experiences. If you come along and try to pick them up, you'll need some experience along side them to really decode them. And you'll never fully decode them, as your experiences will never be theirs.

But we're not talking here about a single person in a battle, we're talking about the management of communities, economies, and nations. You aren't really going to grasp the beast by picking up Ludwig von Mises Book of the Five Rings and taking it for gospel. You're going to have to spend some time actually interacting with the marketplace. Moving the pieces around. Seeing how it can change. You'd need to be a president, a banker, a Steve Jobs, a farmer, an art dealer, a conman, you'd need to be a bit of everyone to really understand what profit is.

It's rather a bit of super human knowledge. This is why you need to be able to test your thoughts to see if they really bare out, but it's so damn hard to test on things like societies. It's so hard to have real experience with an actual market or economy. They're even difficult to see and measure. And without good testing, it's so easy to miss something, and for every time you miss, you drift further and further from a working understanding.

[a500lbgorilla]

Think about the software you're running on the hardware that's running it. That shit is a black box of pure black magic. You can spend years getting into it and never have a complete understanding of it all. But it works, because at every step of the way people were able to test to see that the next thing would work.

This kind of stuff happens in a marketplace, ideas for businesses have a way where they can be tested to see if they work by the standard of profitability. Two identical ideas might even diverge in results and then you can go looking for the reasons why. Well, there has been a marketplace for nations through out history, and it's benchmark isn't profit, it's been violence and governance.

[MadMojoMonkey]

It's reasonable to ask somebody to leave his family, his friends, his job, and everything he knows so he can be free from being told that other people taking stuff he created is good for him. Gotcha.

A) No one is asking him to leave. He's choosing to flee from economic oppression.

B) His family, friends and knowledge are free to travel with him.

C) Wherever he goes will have a society with rules. If/when he has children, they may not hold the same economic philosophies as he does. They may choose to live somewhere else.

D) It's reasonable to ask anyone anything. Questions are the foundation of reason.

***
My parents moved hundreds of miles to start a family. My lady has moved thousands to spend time with me. In both cases, family were "left behind" to lead a new life. In both cases, they didn't know anyone where they were moving. They had to find financial stability when they got there. They only had faith in their own skills to succeed, given life's travails.

These are ridiculously common stories. There is no burden in the freedom to choose where to live and to whom you choose to ally.

The burden is only in a restriction from movement.

[a500lbgorilla]

I love the twisted logic that the companies that make things work are kept running through cash, therefore cash makes things work, therefore cash should make everything work. Oh cash doesn't seem to make something work? Well, that's the gov't for yah. Why does the gov't exist? Give it time... it's just the decaying artifice of our savage past.

Wait, so why hasn't cash overthrown gov't yet?

And why would cash need corporations, but not gov'ts? Clearly some hierarchical structures would exist in a market place - businesses are hierarchies of branching responsibilities to achieve some end, would cash simply create a new profitable gov't?

Of course it would! First (and don't ask me how, cash'll figure all this out for us) there would be competing cash-gov't with some aspects of some markets under one and some aspects of others under another. How will the markets deal with this kind of competition? How will intra-gov't disputes be settled. Certainly not with guns. Those haven't been very decisive in the past.

No, they'll of course be a profit-driven and uncorruptable judicial authority which everyone invests their faith in and follows without contention. Until, of course, the marketplace sees an opening and delivers the Judge Dredd algorithm which then acts as perfectly attuned judicial AI. Once it sweeps the market, everyone will follow it until a new, better Judicial AI hits the scene. You can know it's better because it judges itself so, while the older model disagrees - get outta here with that trash!

Of course, no one really minds because AIs have already swept every other industry and people have basically no needs left unsatisfied. With this lack of human desire, and therefore lack of market demand, the world begins imploding. Once the recession begins to take from people, they panic as they have long since attempted to develop their marketable skills because prices were so low, they cost nothing but a few drops of blood per day to realize everything anyone would ever need.

There is famine and strife and society separates along class lines - The have-halves who maintained ownership rights of estates and industries, and those bums who simply owned themselves. Soon the profit motive grips the world as these near worthless entities, with no resources to improve, volunteer themselves to each other and form a massive corporation. These marauders struggle endlessly to squeeze cash from the stones of the wastelands no one cared assert ownership of. Eventually, they peacefully accept their fate - the only thing they can do to profit is accept that their existence is debt and peacefully pass on without being coerced.

And the world is just a little bit better, thanks to the Free Market.

[wufwugy]

Ask Haliburton, Lockheed Martin, Boeing & co whether war is profitable.

It's easy to think I'm wrong when what I said goes unconsidered. These companies make profits on war because the demand is created by government. War is NOT profitable, but that doesn't mean instances of companies making a profit by acquiring some of the wealth destruction for themselves doesn't happen.

I don't think anyone assumes this.

Then what is it about government that it can do so better?

I would argue that governments came about, because they were needed to fund and organize a military to protect the citizens. What are the regulations currently in place that stop the market from handling the jihadists?

Taxes pay for it already and the government has a legal monopoly on it.

Yes, history has a lot to do with it. That's very perceptive. Every today had a yesterday. And if you look at the history, gov'ts are everywhere. If you look at the present, they're everywhere. But when you 'look' at the future, by closing your eyes and playing with imaginary people living imagined lives in futures never to be, it's just markets and shit.

I get it, you're not interested in projections. The world needs people like you. It also needs people like me.

...

The demands you ask for are incredibly unreasonable compared to analogous situations. I can walk down the street to buy food but I have to move to Thailand to play poker. The ultimate solution to this problem, as it exists a million different ways, is a law market.

Wait, so why hasn't cash overthrown gov't yet?

Do you see how this claim contradicts the basis of your entire argument against my position? Cash doesn't overthrow the government for the same reason that cash wouldn't overthrow market security norms. Cash goes bankrupt long before getting anywhere on its overthrowing agenda.

[CoccoBill]

It's easy to think I'm wrong when what I said goes unconsidered. These companies make profits on war because the demand is created by government. War is NOT profitable, but that doesn't mean instances of companies making a profit by acquiring some of the wealth destruction for themselves doesn't happen.

Again, why do you think wars wouldn't exist without governments? War is profitable to those who profit from wars. You can replace "wars" in that statement with x. In a free market there's no reason not to build a business around x, as long as it's profitable.

Then what is it about government that it can do so better?

You claimed that the market would do an instant nuclear proliferation if governments only allowed it to. I said they wouldn't, since nukes are profitable. You said that yeah it's a risk but businesses evaluate risks just like governments do. So what is it that you're saying now exactly?

Taxes pay for it already and the government has a legal monopoly on it.

Please explain how markets would "solve terrorism"?

[MadMojoMonkey]

The demands you ask for are incredibly unreasonable compared to analogous situations. I can walk down the street to buy food but I have to move to Thailand to play poker. The ultimate solution to this problem is a law market.

Frankly, I don't see the difference here. Certain practices are legal in some places and not legal in other places.
Also, your argument amounts to whining. If Thailand were also down the street, would you be whining?
How close is close enough to stop the whining, but beyond that is whine inducing? Just throw me out a number and I'll hop on board to be your secretary of transportation in this new gov't free utopia.

This "law market" of which you speak is in practice as the various nations of the world and your ability to go live in them.

Unreasonable is living where you are oppressed, not in the freedom to leave.
Unreasonable would be tangible restraint from leaving, not in your affections or sentimental attachment to your home, or your arbitrary notion of how far from that place is "too far."


The only thing limiting your freedom to change your life so that you do not live in an oppressive state is your own dedication to glorifying laziness. You have a right to be lazy, and all the inherent responsibilities that come with that are yours. Among them is being responsible for (oppressed by) things about which you disapprove, yet are choosing to be too lazy to affect. Your choice to sit there rather than move is what is oppressing you, not the state of where you chose to sit.

***
You keep ignoring the fact that your parents chose to raise you in whatever place they did. They accepted the legal ramifications of that choice when they made it. They could have moved to Florida, Missouri, Canada, Thailand... maybe they chose the "easy" path of not moving too far. That's their choice.

Now you had no choice in being born or choosing the nation in which you were raised, but now you're a big boy, with all the rights and responsibilities that come along with it.