Are anarchists overgrown teenagers?

[sjw]

But if I am sitting in my office right now at my computer, which I possess as a tenant only because of a contractual lease wherein my lease payments have been properly made, am I a government, or am I simply a leaseholder with a contractual right to possession? The situation does not change, in principle, simply because I am the landlord rather than tenant, does it? Or does ownership of a thing (such as land) create "government," in your view?

Feel free to ignore if this is too elemental, but most people not steeped in the minarch/arch debate would find it rather counterintuitive that "government" can be created by ownership, in microcosm or otherwise, but especially in microcosm. Most, even those with a Lockean conception of natural rights, I think, would say that something far less than "government" is created by mere ownership, i.e., contract rights, the right to alienate the property, etc.

"As in other departments of science, so in politics, the compound should always be resolved into the simple elements or least parts of the whole." --Aristotle

It's not "too elemental", it's the crux. Observe any human being taking rights-respecting action. If you can't build government from there, from the ground up, then you can't build it at all. It must emerge from individual actors taking specific action.

What kinds of actions can human beings rightly take? There are many different ways to express our right to act. This is our right to life, our natural right to act in any way whatsoever so long as it does not interfere with the equal rights of others. Formally, I divide rights into: self, property, medium, land, consent, and justice. It is through exercise of these, and only these, that government can be created.

A reasonable specification of what a government does: Create rules, enforce the rules, adjudicate disputes concerning the rules. To govern is to do these things.

The question here is not whether a single individual can do these things, but where he may rightly do them. And my answer is that so long as what he is implementing is natural law, he may do them anywhere, and so long as he stays in the bounds of natural law, then he may implement additional rules concerning the use of his own property.

I presume none of this is in dispute here. I presume everyone agrees with my definition and use of governing. The problem is only defining at what point we call some implementation of governing a government. Now I think this is a rather silly thing. I don't think it matters in the slightest, because as we slide from the very small kinds of governing, to the very large institutional kinds, there is no reason to draw firm lines. The only really important matter is that natural law must be respected regardless of scale.

What is a government? It is what we call a system of laws, a history of precedent, knowledge, and people that have become large and formal enough to earn such a lofty title. But, at every step along the way, nothing new or magical has really happened other than what the single individual was doing all by himself, happened to have grown very large and formal. Nothing new has been added to the kinds of rightful actions of individuals that wasn't already there in a single individual.

Shayne

Edited February 16, 2011 by sjw

[sjw]

I have been involved in many debates on this issue, both in person and in print, and in most of those I have been quite civil. What I cannot stand about Shayne are his slip and slide tactics.

No, what you don't like is someone talking over your head, or actually knowing more than you do. You could mentor me on a great many things because you are far better than me at a great many things, but you don't want to, because on the fundamentals, I clean your clock.

You seem to regard intellectual exchanges as a type of competition. How very sad.

Ghs

No, I don't, but I do tend to speculate on the reasons why a person such as yourself engages in dishonest ad hominem attacks. You owe me an apology.

Shayne

[Brant Gaede]

I have been involved in many debates on this issue, both in person and in print, and in most of those I have been quite civil. What I cannot stand about Shayne are his slip and slide tactics.

No, what you don't like is someone talking over your head, or actually knowing more than you do. You could mentor me on a great many things because you are far better than me at a great many things, but you don't want to, because on the fundamentals, I clean your clock.

You seem to regard intellectual exchanges as a type of competition. How very sad.

Ghs

No, I don't, but I do tend to speculate on the reasons why a person such as yourself engages in dishonest ad hominem attacks. You owe me an apology.

Shayne

Well, that spikes this thread.

--Brant

[George H. Smith]

You owe me an apology.

Here is my apology: I'm sorry I ever took you seriously enough to get involved in this exchange. Your posts -- such as your vicious smears of Rothbard, which came out of the blue and had nothing to do with anything -- have gotten increasingly bizarre. Dealing with a part-time psychopath is not high on my list of priorities right now, so you will need to find someone else to annoy.

My apologies to OL members for my participation in this extraordinarily ugly thread. A number of you warned me offlist about Shayne, but I didn't listen. Live and learn.

Good luck to you, Shayne. When you are an old man, surrounded by boxes of privately printed books that no one bought and wondering why no one ever took your ideas seriously, remember me and this moment. I won't be around to say "I told you so," so I will say it now. I told you so.

Ghs

[Selene]

[sjw]

Here is my apology: I'm sorry I ever took you seriously enough to get involved in this exchange. Your posts -- such as your vicious smears of Rothbard, which came out of the blue and had nothing to do with anything -- have gotten increasingly bizarre. Dealing with a part-time psychopath is not high on my list of priorities right now, so you will need to find someone else to annoy.

I "smear" a dead person by posting your own writing about the vicious attacks he waged on you, but all your vicious dishonest smears of me, a living person, mean zilch to you. You're a true man of justice George. You're the author of ATCAG? Then why do you worship the dead? Surrounded by them with all your books. You're no better than the Ayn Rand acolytes, you just substitute Rothbard for Rand.

My apologies to OL members for my participation in this extraordinarily ugly thread. A number of you warned me offlist about Shayne, but I didn't listen. Live and learn.

Good luck to you, Shayne. When you are an old man, surrounded by boxes of privately printed books that no one bought and wondering why no one ever took your ideas seriously, remember me and this moment. I won't be around to say "I told you so," so I will say it now. I told you so.

Ghs

Well that's a bold prediction to make, given how so many authors in our genre achieve some kind of success.

Speaking of notability, have you visited your Wikipedia page lately? It looks in danger of being deleted. You may want to do something about that. Honestly, and I really mean this, I think it's completely asinine that anyone would contest your notability. Other, lesser libertarian figures have a Wikipedia page that's not contested. But the culture isn't always fair now is it? Go ahead and gloat at your fantasy of my failure.

I'm proud of what I did, if I'm ignored while no one does any better with these ideas, that's not an indictment of me. As far as I'm concerned my book project has been a resounding success. I had hoped you would show me otherwise, that I had been wrong and that you guys are on the right track (because it would be so much easier if I could trust you people to do your jobs), but alas, you were not up to the task.

So this is what it's come to. First George claiming he would trounce me, then reduced to repeating over and over again like a little child "define government," and now this pathetic, cowardly flounce of his.

Shayne

[Brant Gaede]

Adam, you've no horse in this race.

--Brant

[caroljane]

Adam, you've no horse in this race.

--Brant

Brant, having been ringside for some of this I'd say "no dog in this fight" would be more entirely pc here.

Edited February 16, 2011 by daunce lynam

[Brant Gaede]

Brant, having been ringside for some of this I'd say "no dog in this fight" would be more entirely pc here.

"Fight" is between George and Shayne, what's left of it. "Race" refers to substantive discussion.

--Brant

I don't care about the fight that much

Edited February 16, 2011 by Brant Gaede

[sjw]

Brant, having been ringside for some of this I'd say "no dog in this fight" would be more entirely pc here.

"Fight" is between George and Shayne, what's left of it. "Race" refers to substantive discussion.

--Brant

I don't care about the fight that much

I prefer the Wild Wild West discussion forum to the heavily moderated/sedated/censored type, but the ideal would be some kind of moderation based on a rational system of adjudication, explicit rules and procedures, methods of appeal, the overriding purpose being truth about the issues and method being reason and logic, not about the people. The Internet is a great playground for libertarians in creating civilized systems of "government" for discourse, they should set an example of how they'd run things if they were in charge. Instead we set the example that has been set here, or on other forums, we set an example of dictatorship and censorship. Statistically speaking, have libertarians really earned the right to tell the rest of the culture how to do things? I think not. Not yet.

Shayne

[Brant Gaede]

Brant, having been ringside for some of this I'd say "no dog in this fight" would be more entirely pc here.

"Fight" is between George and Shayne, what's left of it. "Race" refers to substantive discussion.

--Brant

I don't care about the fight that much

I prefer the Wild Wild West discussion forum to the heavily moderated/sedated/censored type, but the ideal would be some kind of moderation based on a rational system of adjudication, explicit rules and procedures, methods of appeal, the overriding purpose being truth about the issues and method being reason and logic, not about the people. The Internet is a great playground for libertarians in creating civilized systems of "government" for discourse, they should set an example of how they'd run things if they were in charge. Instead we set the example that has been set here, or on other forums, we set an example of dictatorship and censorship. Statistically speaking, have libertarians really earned the right to tell the rest of the culture how to do things? I think not. Not yet.

Shayne

If you think George would stand for that you don't know George. It's still an open question whether Jimmy Wales destroyed the old Atlantis with his "civility" requirement or George did by leaving. That's because George didn't stick around except to say he was out of there and most left too going to the new AtlantisII in Yahoo Groups. But neither George nor I have any doubt about this "open question." It was Wales and Wales all the way down.

--Brant

[sjw]

If you think George would stand for that you don't know George. It's still an open question whether Jimmy Wales destroyed the old Atlantis with his "civility" requirement or George did by leaving. That's because George didn't stick around except to say he was out of there and most left too going to the new AtlantisII in Yahoo Groups. But neither George nor I have any doubt about this "open question." It was Wales and Wales all the way down.

--Brant

Oh, is that why his Wikipedia page is contested?

Of course George wouldn't stand for it, it would remove his primary weapons.

I'm not saying this kind of rule should necessarily apply to the whole forum, but I think it'd be nice to have a "rational debate" area, where if you enter it, you are subject to agreed-upon and amendable rational rules of discourse. Not civility per se, but reason. For example, if George asks me to do something, and I say why I shouldn't, or if I simply ask him why, the burden of proof shifts to him. To keep restating that I need to do something while insulting me would be considered non-responsive to the point at issue and a violation of the "no ad hominem" rule. That's just simple, basic logic.

Having just one little area where people take Aristotle seriously would be nice. That's all I ask, just a tiny area reserved for reason. You still have the whole wide world to be obnoxious and rude and unreasonable everywhere else. People could go into this area if they want, and leave it and have a brawl if they want, but while in it they've got to follow reason or have their submission moved into the Wild Wild West area.

Shayne

[Brant Gaede]

dup deleted

Edited February 16, 2011 by Brant Gaede

[Brant Gaede]

Who's going to pay the moderator, Shayne?

--Brant

[sjw]

Who's going to pay the moderator, Shayne?

--Brant

Good question. Taxes?

Shayne

[sjw]

Who's going to pay the moderator, Shayne?

--Brant

One might simply try using written rules, consent, and self-moderation. I mean, if you agree to the rules, and someone points out that you broke them, or if the rule was that a point of order meant that you had to specify why that wasn't a breech of the rules, that just might enough among reasonably honorable people. If someone blatantly violates the rules, and I mean blatantly, then perhaps a moderator could move their stuff to the Wild Wild West (without this some real rat might come in and screw everything up).

That could even be done here at OL by creating another topic area with a set of revisable rules for that area, numbered for convenient reference. Or, when someone creates a topic, one might permit them to "own" the set of rules for that topic, since they created the thread. There are a lot of things that could be tried to improve the productiveness of the conversations, without constraining people who don't like it except on specific threads.

Shayne

[PDS]

Who's going to pay the moderator, Shayne?

--Brant

Good question. Taxes?

Shayne

Maybe a Nozick-like "voluntary protection association" could police matters. The only problem is, according to Nozick, we would end up with a government as a result.

[sjw]

Who's going to pay the moderator, Shayne?

--Brant

One might simply try using written rules, consent, and self-moderation. I mean, if you agree to the rules, and someone points out that you broke them, or if the rule was that a point of order meant that you had to specify why that wasn't a breech of the rules, that just might enough among reasonably honorable people. If someone blatantly violates the rules, and I mean blatantly, then perhaps a moderator could move their stuff to the Wild Wild West (without this some real rat might come in and screw everything up).

That could even be done here at OL by creating another topic area with a set of revisable rules for that area, numbered for convenient reference. Or, when someone creates a topic, one might permit them to "own" the set of rules for that topic, since they created the thread. There are a lot of things that could be tried to improve the productiveness of the conversations, without constraining people who don't like it except on specific threads.

Shayne

This is actually analogous to my theory of government: natural law in the wilderness, with the liberty to create areas where man-made law applies. If someone doesn't like a given area and its man-made rules, they can go to the wilderness, or they can found their own system of rules.

Shayne

[Selene]

Shayne:

A lot like Coventry:

"Coventry" is a science fiction short story by Robert A. Heinlein and part of his Future History series. It was collected into the book Revolt in 2100.

[edit] Plot summary

The protagonist, David MacKinnon, is a romantic idealist up for trial for assault. Since the government fears that he will repeat his action, he is given a choice: either allow trained psychologists to fix him, or leave to an area known as Coventry. MacKinnon chooses to emigrate so he can escape the boredom of a too-civilized future. He is sent to the rugged outland beyond the Barrier, where people who refuse to abide by social norms are exiled, rather than submit to radical psychotherapy. He finds out that the peaceful anarchy he envisioned is but a corrupt democracy and he is immediately jailed, losing all his goods. Outside of the democracy is a military dictatorship and a group of expatriate of the former theocracy. Befriended by a man he knows only as "the Fader," he breaks jail. He then finds out that the dictatorship is planning an attack on civilization. He breaks out of Coventry with Fader to warn everyone. He then learns that the Fader is actually an agent of the United States Army, and that he has redeemed himself by risking his life to warn the rest of the country.

[basimpson22]

Idealism is about effortful change for the better. It is a central fact of human nature that we have the ability to mentally project an ideal, and then, if our ideal is properly grounded in truth, if we put in the effort, and if we are not too unlucky, finally attain it. For the weak, striving for an ideal may demand too much effort, and because of their weakness, they may learn to resent that which is unattainable by them. They may even learn to pretend that ideals are impossible folly. Idealists should be patient with such infirmities, but they should not sacrifice a better tomorrow for the sake of the emotional problems of the weak, for not only is our failure to achieve an ideal our own loss, in the end it is their loss too. So for our good and theirs, we should ignore their cynicism as we reach for the ideal.

Shayne

I was told you specialized in the use of ad hominems. I don't see that though. I see well formed, well grounded opinions and ideals. You condemn cynicism and uphold idealism. How could anyone argue against that? Cynicism is a cancerous concept. What progress has ever been made in the name of cynicism. Mere sustenance is the most a cynic could hope for and impotence a close second. Whereas the idealist has in him boundless potential.

[sjw]

Idealism is about effortful change for the better. It is a central fact of human nature that we have the ability to mentally project an ideal, and then, if our ideal is properly grounded in truth, if we put in the effort, and if we are not too unlucky, finally attain it. For the weak, striving for an ideal may demand too much effort, and because of their weakness, they may learn to resent that which is unattainable by them. They may even learn to pretend that ideals are impossible folly. Idealists should be patient with such infirmities, but they should not sacrifice a better tomorrow for the sake of the emotional problems of the weak, for not only is our failure to achieve an ideal our own loss, in the end it is their loss too. So for our good and theirs, we should ignore their cynicism as we reach for the ideal.

Shayne

I was told you specialized in the use of ad hominems. I don't see that though. I see well formed, well grounded opinions and ideals. You condemn cynicism and uphold idealism. How could anyone argue against that? Cynicism is a cancerous concept. What progress has ever been made in the name of cynicism. Mere sustenance is the most a cynic could hope for and impotence a close second. Whereas the idealist has in him boundless potential.

Thank you.

Shayne