Anarcho-capitalism VS Objectivism

[Wolf DeVoon]

Re the War of 1812, Wikipedia has a good citation to back the view that attempted annexation of Ontario "was supported by American businessmen who wanted to gain control of Great Lakes trade" (shades of Fisher, the new kid) and, in political terms, if successful would have been used as a bargaining chip to compel the British to quit supplying weapons to hostile Indian tribes in Northwest Territory (Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, and Wisconsin) which had been ceded by England to the U.S. by the Treaty of Paris in 1783. Ontario was populated by Tories who fled the U.S. during the Revolutionary War. They repulsed the attempted U.S. invasion and remained doubly loyal to England until World War II, when the continued existence of entire British Empire depended on American supplies and massive U.S. air/sea/ground combat operations in Africa, Asia, and Europe to save them.

In addition to arming Indians in the Northwest Territory, our beef with Britain that sparked the War of 1812 was impressment of American merchant sailors, all of which was settled by signing the Treaty of Ghent in 1815, ending the final chapter in a 25-year struggle for freedom from England. How awful and avatistic that we became self-sacrificial saviors of the British Crown in WWI and Soviet Russia in WWII.

American businessmen were the conniving guilty party (again) in both cases.

Between 1914 and 1917, U.S. industrial production increased 32%... The House of Morgan [took advantage of] wartime financing of Britain and France from the earliest stages of the war in 1914... Bethlehem Steel took particular advantage of the increased demand for armaments abroad... 70 million pounds of armor plate, 1.1 billion pounds of steel for shells, and 20.1 million rounds of artillery ammunition for Britain and France... [plus] 60% of the American weaponry and 40% of the artillery shells used in the War... food, horses, saddles, wagons, and uniforms were always purchased from civilian contractors. [Wikipedia]

U.S. aid to the Soviet Union during WWII exceeded $11 billion [$183 billion in 2014 dollars], including hundreds of thousands of trucks and thousands of tanks, aircraft and artillery pieces, and food shipments. With major agricultural regions of the Soviet Union under enemy occupation, and the unsatisfactory system of distribution and transportation, to say nothing of mismanagement, the entire Soviet population was in danger of sharing the fate of those trapped in Leningrad and the earlier victims of collectivization. [HistoryNet.com]

Armand Hammer returned to the United States in 1930 laden with innumerable paintings, jewelry pieces, and other art objects formerly owned by the Romanov imperial family and sold to him by the cash-hungry Soviets. In the 1930s Hammer embarked on such profitable post-Prohibition business ventures as whiskey making and the manufacture of whiskey barrels... Because of his longtime trade and personal contacts with the Soviets, Hammer and his firm Occidental Oil were among the principal participants in the broadening of U.S.-Soviet trade ties... [britannica.com]

[Gary Fisher]

@Michael

I don't think you've answered my questions, really. Again, would your people still be allowed to trade with our country if we went to war? What would happen to the property of our citizens in your country? Would your citizens be allowed to sell weapons to countries that are allied with the US, but that have remained neutral in the conflict, and that sold weapons to the US?I think these are important questions of foreign policy that need to be answered.

[Gary Fisher]

And no, I've never read Tragedy and Hope by Quigley.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Gary,

During wartime, the context changes on a fundamental level so the rules have to change. The purpose of war is not trade, it is conquest. Since they play with guns, that makes trade principles of fairness irrelevant. So of course in a war you mess in who can come into the country and all the rest. Your question is like would you believe in the property rights of someone who wanted to charge folks money for a seat in a lifeboat during a shipwreck? Fundamental context is critical.

There is no way to turn off your brain during war and just let a principle run things. You have to use your brain and survive before you can trade.

So what happens to this and that during wartime? What is the automatic answer so no one needs to think? Sorry, but it all depends on this and that during wartime.

Wartime economy, where all hell breaks loose, is not the same as peacetime economy where rational principles can instruct social organization.

Michael

[Gary Fisher]

@Francisco Ferrer

I don't buy the economic calculation argument at all. For one thing, we know from computer science that anything a multitude of computers can do, a single computer can do just as well.

Secondly, their argument depends on the idea that a rational allocation of resources amounts to a distribution of goods that maximizes consumer "well-being". There is no such thing as "well-being" in an objective sense. It is a fictitious abstraction invented by economists as a catch-all for all possible specific human motivations. There is no way to measure it at all. Thus, it is not possible to rationally conclude that the Soviet economy was objectively "inefficient". We can only measure the success of any endeavor by asking whether or not we achieved our stated goals. From the point of view of the planners in the Soviet economy, their plans were mostly successful.

It's also important to realize just how much centralized planning goes on in an advanced capitalist economy like ours. Just considering military expenditures alone is pretty staggering. First, the White House has to outline its military goals. Then the generals have to figure out how to implement those goals. Then they have to meet up with representatives from just about every industry there is in order to coordinate production and negotiate contracts to ensure that they have what they need to do what they do. The private sector does a lot of centralized planning in its own spheres as well. Along the way, a mind-boggling amount of factors have to be calculated by analysts and fancy super-computers, rather than markets. That's why both the government and private sector employ so many of them. At no point does the "well-being" of consumers come into the equation. It just can't. There's no way to measure it.

[Gary Fisher]

@Michael

Yes, I understand that things are different in war time. My question is, if you were the government of Objectivist Australia, and you were at war with the US, how would you answer the questions in my previous post? I'm not asking for quick and easy principles so that no one needs to ever think. Obviously, policies need to change with the circumstance. But I'm asking you what you think should happen. You have to make plans for all possible contingencies ahead of time. You can't hope to come with a plan for defense on the spot. Sun-Tzu said "Victorious warriors win first and then go to war, while defeated warriors go to war first and then seek to win."

[Wolf DeVoon]

From the point of view of the planners in the Soviet economy, their plans were mostly successful...

At no point does the "well-being" of consumers come into the equation... There's no way to measure it.

Golly, what a moron, wrapped in denial.

[Brant Gaede]

From the point of view of the planners in the Soviet economy, their plans were mostly successful...

At no point does the "well-being" of consumers come into the equation... There's no way to measure it.

Golly, what a moron, wrapped in denial.

Success was measured by false data feedback.

--Brant

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

@Michael

Yes, I understand that things are different in war time. My question is, if you were the government of Objectivist Australia, and you were at war with the US, how would you answer the questions in my previous post? I'm not asking for quick and easy principles so that no one needs to ever think. Obviously, policies need to change with the circumstance. But I'm asking you what you think should happen. You have to make plans for all possible contingencies ahead of time. You can't hope to come with a plan for defense on the spot. Sun-Tzu said "Victorious warriors win first and then go to war, while defeated warriors go to war first and then seek to win."

Gary,

What do I think should happen if I were a politician running a government? If my country were at war, I would do everything in my power win the war. Kind of obvious, no? I would deal with lesser issues in light of that.

If the situation were dire, I would impose harsh measures to keep the barricades high, whether the measure dealt with the economy, public speech and all the rest. If the enemy were a joke, I would be less harsh.

Like I said, there is no way to turn the brain off. You have to use it.

You are asking for emergency policies without describing the emergency and trying to justify that with Sun Tzu.

You are presupposing a shooting war between two sovereign countries that share the same basic philosophy where both are highly developed and they have strong trade ties. I don't want to sound condescending, but that's silly.

Here is where I think you and I differ. You want to rule all possible bad people so you can stay safe as your default mode of existence. I want to live among good people as my default.

Freedom doesn't work without people wanting to be good. I have often used a thought experiment to describe what I mean, but I'll say it again. If we took a group of hardened convicts, set them up with a constitutional republic, bill of rights, system of checks and balances, the whole shebang, then let them loose on an island and say make it work, what do you think would be there when we return after six months? Half the prisoners, that's what. Hell, half if that, and gang warfare would be rampant among those who survived. Freedom doesn't work for those folks. They don't want it.

So how do people want to be good? I can think of lots of ways. They go to church or engage in other periodic religious activities (the religions that promote being good). They read books about morality. They engage with moral philosophy online and off. They consume stories that carry a vision of goodness in all the different kinds of media. They form groups that meet periodically to peacefully promote causes they believe in. They chip in and help out others in emergencies. And so on.

Being good is like eating. You don't learn a moral lesson and then you're done. You have to go back and hear it again and again, preferably from different angles and through different stories, to maintain the goodness and develop good habits.

Now here's the thing. For this to work right, people have to do all that voluntarily. No one gets to control their souls. They have to want it.

And guess what? They do.

That, actually, is the foundation of American freedom. That's what made George Washington step down after two terms instead of accepting a crown. People who want to follow rules instead of owning their own will to be good and making a difference in life don't understand why he did that.

Your opinion is that confiscating property from good people, or putting them under economic constraints, or making them toady up to rulers through lobbying, is the best way society should work to best benefit them.

Sorry, I don't agree.

Free people like I described flourish under laissez-faire and create more wealth than the world has ever seen. Ever. Like they did, in fact.

Bad people who want to rule others don't do so well. They need to enslave good people to make sure they get theirs.

Michael

[Gary Fisher]

@Michael

I would do everything in my power win the war.

This is a perfectly acceptable answer, in my opinion.

I also agree with you that people have to want to be good, and that they have to learn how to do that in order for any country to work.

But I disagree with you that "I want to rule all possible bad people so I can stay safe." I do not rule anybody. I trade and deal with people on an entirely voluntary basis. Officials in government are perfectly free not to listen to me, just like anybody else.

The way I see it, I am doing everything I can to defend freedom. I'm sure you would agree that there are a lot of people out there who hate freedom and don't want to be good. Like you, I would do everything in my power to win that war. And a part of that war is simply teaching people how to be good and love freedom.

Let's get back to our roleplay.

Since your borders are completely open, the US will respond as follows:

1. Since your goods are lower priced, we will impose protective tariffs against them in US markets, and we will also induce our trading partners in Europe and Asia to do the same, so that your products can't outcompete US products in global markets.

2. We will use the additional revenue generated from those tariffs and other sources to subsidize companies that sell in your country so that they can sell the same goods at lower prices and outcompete your domestic producers.

3. We will also subsidize purchases of failing businesses in your country by our investors. Especially in the arms industry. We will however, not allow your investors to operate in the US or anywhere else in the free world.

The combined effect of these policies is that, over time, Australian businesses will fail due to competition from the US, then they will be bought out at very low prices. Eventually, all of your land, resources, and industry will be owned by American companies.

Those companies will not be allowed to fund your government, nor will they be allowed to sell arms to you.

Do you find this state of affairs acceptable?

[Brant Gaede]

War games.

Masters of the Universe.

Let the computer figure it out.

--Brant

how about a nice game of chess?

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Do you find this state of affairs acceptable?

Gary,

I don't know.

I have no idea what the scenario you are laying out would look like in reality. Certainly not the way you said. And since I find the entire premise silly, I don't know how to find any state of affairs within it acceptable.

I presume people would be shooting at each other in a war.

If they're not shooting so much, maybe what you laid out would work the way you said. Maybe it would backfire. Maybe other stuff would work. In Disneyland, the sky's the limit.

Now if they are shooting at each other a lot and employing weapons of mass destruction on each other, I don't see how any of that would be relevant.

Michael

[Brant Gaede]

The bigger the country the less need for economic protection. The bigger the country the more damaging the economic protection. Tariffs are for the small and the weak and have a lot to do with national sovereignty vrs fascistic international corporations nationally based. Corporations are legal children of the state for private commerce. The contradiction means they are de facto agents of sundry governments. A small country can protect itself from them in various ways. One might be to not have any corporations in country. Anyway, I don't think laissez-faire capitalism works with these legal economic entities.

--Brant

[Gary Fisher]

@Michael

I think we're getting closer to the true point of our disagreement. None of us can know for sure how anything would play out in reality for sure until we see it actually play out in reality. Nonetheless, we have to use our knowledge and reason and make predictions and educated guesses. Although, to be clear, the policies I mentioned are the trade policies the US would pursue in peace time not war time.

Bearing all this in mind, are there any specific reasons why you think things won't work out as I've outlined them. How do you think they would work out in your opinion?

[Gary Fisher]

@Brant Gaede

A more liberal trade policy works best when your country is already technological leader and has a huge industrial base. If it isn't, then you definitely need protectionism to develop up to that point. Contrary to popular belief, the US, Great Britain, Western Europe, and Japan industrialized only after implementing extremely steep tariffs on foreign imports. Only after their industrial base was greatly developed in the late 19th and early 20th centuries did GB and the US relax these tariffs.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Gary,

Why don't we do a thought experiment about a war between, say, a fictional O-Land Australia and, to stay in fiction, a Caliphate after ISIS takes over Iraq and elsewhere? That, to me, is a lot more plausible reality-wise than a war between a fictional superfree Australia and a relatively free USA.

Michael

[Gary Fisher]

@Michael

I think we can both agree that in that scenario the country with the superior military force (obviously, O-land Australia) would win. Not much to say there.

To make myself absolutely clear, O-Land Australia and the US are not at war in our scenario. We are simply discussing peace time trade relations. Right now, I don't see any reason why the US should declare war on O-Land Australia.

So once again, do you think that it is acceptable for the economy in O-Land Australia to be mostly run by foreign companies that do not support O-Land Australia's government financially? Or do you think that things would turn out differently, and if so why?

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

... to be clear, the policies I mentioned are the trade policies the US would pursue in peace time not war time.

And this:

To make myself absolutely clear, O-Land Australia and the US are not at war in our scenario.

Gary,

Maybe I misunderstood...

You allow free trade by default? I see. That's fine.

Are American investors allowed to freely buy property in Objectivist Australia?

Suppose our two countries were to go to war at some point. Would people in your country still be allowed to trade with us? What would happen to the property of our citizens in your country?

And here:

My question is, if you were the government of Objectivist Australia, and you were at war with the US, how would you answer the questions in my previous post?

If we are going to continue this discussion, I need a bit more consistency than this.

Michael

[Samson Corwell]

“The basic political principle of the Objectivist ethics is: no man may initiate the use of physical force against others. No man——or group or society or government—has the right to assume the role of a criminal and initiate the use of physical compulsion against any man. Men have the right to use physical force only in retaliation and only against those who initiate its use. The ethical principle involved is simple and clear-cut: it is the difference between murder and self-defense.”

Bwahaha! a black-hearted villain, advocate of physical compulsion (summons as defendant or witness, production of evidence)

http://www.stumbleupon.com/content/7KonEY Nothing to see here. Stumble on!

"The Non-Aggression Principle is a comfortable daydream without hope in hell of disarming the U.S. government, a local school district, or any of the street thugs you fear most... NAP denies the existence of any legal regime other than or prior to 'non-aggression.' It's a child's view of the law: You be nice and I'll be nice, okay? No rule for bankruptcy, property, probate, or family law... NAP deems all possessors to be unchallengeable and exempt from legal inquiry. NAP kills compulsory production of evidence, jury duty, execution of court orders by bankers in a civil case or law enforcement officers in a criminal case... In sum, NAP is the death knell of all legal due process, all inquiry, all defense of the innocent..." [COGIGG, pp. 49, 59, 63-64]

"The so-called Non-Aggression Principle (NAP) is Randian, Kantian, and Mosaic, as old as written history. For thousands of years 'Thou shall not kill, steal, covet, or trespass' was held to be universally binding on all men, either as a moral principle or the express will of God... I've never been a compromiser. As far as I'm concerned, liberty is non-negotiable and I am not susceptible to universal moral principles, utilitarian or otherwise. I view morality as a personal matter, in the context of my unique situation, inquiring What shall I do? (not what must all men and women in all circumstances do)... Liberty is your first absolute right at birth and the last thing to go when you die or become incapacitated... " [Laissez Faire Law, pp. 211-213]

"Men are incapable of confessing openly that they want to escape justice. Friend or enemy of due process, we declare with one voice that our conduct is fair and honorable, with malice toward none. The claim is usually false. In simple, 18th century language: Men are not angels. Our protestations of innocence and truth are frequently exaggerated and unwarranted. That's why we need courts of justice with compulsory production of evidence, cross-examination, and felony penalties for perjury. Men lie. We also remember wrongly, forget, etc. Evildoers should not be allowed to judge their own innocence." [op cit., p. 177]

Wolf, I'd venture to say that the problem with the NAP/NIOF isn't that they're "Kantian", but rather they're empty on their own. "Aggression" basically means "unjustified force" or something like that and no one would believe that they themselves are engaging aggression. Another problem is that "force", as it used by most chanters of the NAP/NIOF, hardly constitute force. It's truly unbelievable how often I find preferred policies being shoehorned into the NAP. Pollution as a violation of property rights they say. What amounts? What substances? It's truly ridiculous.

[Wolf DeVoon]

What is it with you and Australia? Absolutely no way Oz is ever going to be Objectivist or remotely free market.

Religion is mandatory in public schools. They protect domestic autos, coffee, toilet paper, banana growers.

Higher ed, medical care, transportation, radio, TV, theater, and music production are subsidized.

[Gary Fisher]

@Michael

The last two are questions about a hypothetical scenario within a hypothetical scenario. ;) Sorry about the confusion.

[Gary Fisher]

@Wolf DeVoon

When you were a little one, did you ever play pretend with the other children?

[Francisco Ferrer]

@Francisco Ferrer

I don't buy the economic calculation argument at all. For one thing, we know from computer science that anything a multitude of computers can do, a single computer can do just as well.

If your point is that computers can do the calculation for the socialist planners, then show that there is a computer or group of computers extant that can perform that kind of calculation even for a medium-sized economy. Name one computer program that has proven itself able to achieve this.

How many refrigerators and in what capacity, color and dimensions should the socialist planners of Country A order to be produced in Years X, Y, and Z? How will the planners gain this knowledge? Through a poll of heads of households in Country A? Will the poll include alternate consumer goods such as televisions, computers, and saunas?

Secondly, their argument depends on the idea that a rational allocation of resources amounts to a distribution of goods that maximizes consumer "well-being". There is no such thing as "well-being" in an objective sense. It is a fictitious abstraction invented by economists as a catch-all for all possible specific human motivations. There is no way to measure it at all. Thus, it is not possible to rationally conclude that the Soviet economy was objectively "inefficient". We can only measure the success of any endeavor by asking whether or not we achieved our stated goals. From the point of view of the planners in the Soviet economy, their plans were mostly successful.

Since well-being is a fictitious abstraction, what exactly will be the goal socialist planners pursue? The glorification of the supreme Leader? The economic planners' own job security?

The Soviet Union was infamous for failing to produce washing machines. But if there no such thing as "well being," the country that produces one million washing machines is objectively no better than the country that produces zero. For that matter, the U.S. would objectively be no better a place to live than Syria or Burma.

For that matter, New York in the 1930s was no better a place for a Jew's "well being" than Berlin.

If "well-being" is a hopeless objective, why did so many people in Eastern Europe reject socialism in the 1970's-1980's? What was the matter with them, putting their imaginary "well-being" above other, greater yet undefined goals?

It's also important to realize just how much centralized planning goes on in an advanced capitalist economy like ours. Just considering military expenditures alone is pretty staggering. First, the White House has to outline its military goals. Then the generals have to figure out how to implement those goals. Then they have to meet up with representatives from just about every industry there is in order to coordinate production and negotiate contracts to ensure that they have what they need to do what they do. The private sector does a lot of centralized planning in its own spheres as well. Along the way, a mind-boggling amount of factors have to be calculated by analysts and fancy super-computers, rather than markets. That's why both the government and private sector employ so many of them. At no point does the "well-being" of consumers come into the equation. It just can't. There's no way to measure it.

Yes, that is precisely why the military should be privatized.

[Wolf DeVoon]

Wolf, I'd venture to say that the problem with the NAP/NIOF isn't that they're "Kantian", but rather they're empty on their own. "Aggression" basically means "unjustified force" or something like that and no one would believe that they themselves are engaging aggression. Another problem is that "force", as it used by most chanters of the NAP/NIOF, hardly constitute force. It's truly unbelievable how often I find preferred policies being shoehorned into the NAP. Pollution as a violation of property rights they say. What amounts? What substances? It's truly ridiculous.

Thanks, but my position is unilateral lethal force (if necessary) for law enforcement and execution of court orders. How people cope with the rule of law is a matter of ethical choice. You're free to commit crimes, insult women, and pee in public. I've done all three repeatedly. Awful hard to be a teenager or an anarcho-capitalist without breaking the law and disturbing the neighbors.

see Scoundrels and Pirates

[Selene]

@Wolf DeVoon

When you were a little one, did you ever play pretend with the other children?

Yo, elitist!

New Living Translation

When I was a child, I spoke and thought and reasoned as a child. But when I grew up, I put away childish things.

English Standard Version

When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways.

New American Standard Bible

When I was a child, I used to speak like a child, think like a child, reason like a child; when I became a man, I did away with childish things.

King James Bible

When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things.

With all my love,

A...