The Valley of the Property Dolls

[BaalChatzaf]

Interesting, thank you. What constitutes 'proven superior'? What main factors are at the base of one concept supplanting another?

Bob

I a clash of arms the winner is clearly superior. Killing the enemy and busting up his sh*t is the way to prove We are superior to Them.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[sjw]

Ted:

I understand your default position. However, since they were seeking a place to settle and raise a family, they have a sense of purpose and structure.

I believe each of these families would presume that they own the land that they are using and possibly they might believe that they own as far as they can see.

Adam

Adam,

If the valley was previously unsettled, each would own the parcel of land they are actively using. They have no claim for the land "as far as they can see."

Yes.

As with all rights, it boils down to whether actual interference happened or not. Each has the liberty to take any action, including active use of property, so long as the action doesn't interfere with another. The problem happens when one megalomaniacal party imagines that he "owns" something because he imagines that he "owns" something, in spite of the fact that there is no actual use and therefore can be no actual interference. E.g., someone can claim to own the moon, and if he has the means, attack anyone who lands there. But since there was no actual interference by the moon colonizer, it is the attacker that is in the wrong.

Shayne

PS: I am going to ignore the barbarians in this thread who claim that rights don't exist unless there's a government to enforce them. These represent the most vicious and evil elements in our current society.

[kiaer.ts]

This is a very naive Hollywood movie view of Indians...

It's not worth doing a whole rebuttal to this. Here's the first thing that popped up on a Google search--with oodles of more results like it:

Native American Clashes with European Settlers

West Virginia Division of Culture and History

Here's a quote from that article:

Native American Concept of Land

A major factor in the treaty disputes was Native Americans' concept of land. Indians fought among themselves over hunting rights to the territory but the Native American idea of "right" to the land was very different from the legalistic and individual nature of European ownership. John Alexander Williams describes this in his book, West Virginia: A History for Beginners:

"The Indians had no concept of "private property," as applied to the land. Only among the Delawares was it customary for families, during certain times of the year, to be assigned specific hunting territories. Apparently this was an unusual practice, not found among other Indians. Certainly, the idea of an individual having exclusive use of a particular piece of land was completely strange to Native Americans.

The Indians practiced communal land ownership. That is, the entire community owned the land upon which it lived. . . ."

Such naivety! Such Hollywood crap!

Let's talk about horses or something and try to show off...

Michael

You said "nomads" and that is a word with a very specific meaning. It's also a very widespread notion that's a common stereotype, and a wrong one except in limited romantically portrayed cases.

Indians farmed, which certainly requires a concept of who owns the land and the crops. Your talk of nomads and comparison with the garden of eden calls forth images of Mongols on Horseback and people roaming the forest, not settled people with recorded treaties and national confederations.

Of course Indians didn't have the modern western concept of title in land expressed in deeds. I have made that point several times. Your source (a beginner's history of West Virginia) doesn't address farming - it addresses only hunting rights - which is ironic, since many settlers in North America were refugees from the enclosure policies of Britain, where land which had been long used for communal hunting and grazing was seized by nobles counter to ancient traditions.

As for your "show off" retort, it's just defensiveness. Knowing and communicating things is not showing off. I have spent years studying the cultures and languages of Siberia and the Americas. And you are a musician. If you were to educate me regarding music I would not accuse you of showing off.

[sjw]

The following is not trolling, it is an honest question on my part -

In the Canadian prairies during the nineteenth century there were roughly 30 thousand aboriginals stretched over about a tenth of the continent, hunting the buffalo, their sole resource. They had no permanent settlements in the prairie, living a completely nomadic life.

Just how much "mixing your labour" is enough? I think its a stretch to say so few could own so much but to say they had no property rights (as the ARI crowd love to harp on about) seems equally a stretch.

They couldn't claim unlimited (time or space) ownership to the land, but only to the parcel they were using and only so long as they didn't abandon it, and should have remained free to hunt so long as that was a viable means of survival. They had a right to the property they carried with them or obtained through original acquisition (the buffalo).

Shayne

[caroljane]

The following is not trolling, it is an honest question on my part -

In the Canadian prairies during the nineteenth century there were roughly 30 thousand aboriginals stretched over about a tenth of the continent, hunting the buffalo, their sole resource. They had no permanent settlements in the prairie, living a completely nomadic life.

Just how much "mixing your labour" is enough? I think its a stretch to say so few could own so much but to say they had no property rights (as the ARI crowd love to harp on about) seems equally a stretch.

"Oh come, Riel

We'll make a stand

Here at Batoche, down by the river.

O never mind their Gatling guns.

If we lose this time,

We've lost forever.

-Bill Gallaher,"The Last Battle"

Canada hanged Riel in 1885 after the defeat of the Metis Rebellion.

Edited March 27, 2011 by daunce lynam

[kiaer.ts]

down by the river.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BoA5cqDSasM

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Come on, Ted,

You're playing more show-off games.

Disagreeing with a minor point of a post is one thing. Blanking out the main point and calling the overall view naive, Hollywood, etc., is game-playing and you know it. Here's what I believe is the real point you were trying to make:

I have spent years studying the cultures and languages of Siberia and the Americas.

I have no doubt about this, but I'm not impressed enough to stop thinking. I do my own reading. I, personally, try to make my own learning a topic of interest in discussions, not a tool of "I know more than you" kind of competition.

It's a choice, I suppose. We value what we value, including the reasons we communicate.

Michael

[caroljane]

down by the river.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BoA5cqDSasM

Nice cut! But the wrong river I think. Neil Young grew up in Winnipeg, a ways from the South Saskatchewan.

[bmacwilliam]

The following is not trolling, it is an honest question on my part -

In the Canadian prairies during the nineteenth century there were roughly 30 thousand aboriginals stretched over about a tenth of the continent, hunting the buffalo, their sole resource. They had no permanent settlements in the prairie, living a completely nomadic life.

Just how much "mixing your labour" is enough? I think its a stretch to say so few could own so much but to say they had no property rights (as the ARI crowd love to harp on about) seems equally a stretch.

They couldn't claim unlimited (time or space) ownership to the land, but only to the parcel they were using and only so long as they didn't abandon it, and should have remained free to hunt so long as that was a viable means of survival. They had a right to the property they carried with them or obtained through original acquisition (the buffalo).

Shayne

So, why is it OK to have a rightful ownership claim to land we don't use in this day and age? What has changed that we can own land and not use it now, but not then?

Bob

[sjw]

So, why is it OK to have a rightful ownership claim to land we don't use in this day and age? What has changed that we can own land and not use it now, but not then?

Bob

It's not OK, it's one of the central problems of present systems. Again, see my book (I sound like a broken record, but you keep touching on key problems I've addressed there).

Shayne

[bmacwilliam]

So, why is it OK to have a rightful ownership claim to land we don't use in this day and age? What has changed that we can own land and not use it now, but not then?

Bob

It's not OK, it's one of the central problems of present systems. Again, see my book (I sound like a broken record, but you keep touching on key problems I've addressed there).

Shayne

Very interesting, and yes, I'll read the book. I assume this view of property rights must be received as heresy among those who have a stronger view on ownership?

[sjw]

Very interesting, and yes, I'll read the book. I assume this view of property rights must be received as heresy among those who have a stronger view on ownership?

Yes, it's heresy, but it's also very Lockean, and on some level fits in perfectly with existing property law for things other than land.

Shayne

[BaalChatzaf]

For people who do hunting and gathering there is no economic function for a fixed abode. For such folk, the land they pass through to hunt or gather is no more property than the rain that falls on them or the air that is blown upon them by the wind, or the light from the sun that shines on them.

Property only becomes a useful notion when one sows and harvests a fixed piece of land or keeps his flocks/herds in a relatively fixed location.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[Philip Coates]

> So, why is it OK to have a rightful ownership claim to land we don't use in this day and age? What has changed that we can own land and not use it now, but not then? [bob]

Once you take untapped land and mix your sweat with it [see my posts #8 and #15, for key aspects of this] -- make a farm or a park or a mine or build a house or whatever you choose to do with it -- it becomes yours. And your work or residency has usually given it some financial value, so you can resell it if you want, hold it for 'investment' or for a summer home or whatever you choose. The nature of the potential use - or of its monetary value - can and always does change over a long enough time period. When population rises around it, it may have value as a park or recreation area. It's resale value could go sky high.

But it became yours completely and forever when you first resided there and/or did something further with it. (In direct answer to Bob's question, you can let it lie completely fallow if you wish. In fact, often farm land needs to 'rest' or be replanted with a non-cash crop for the nitrates to replenish themselves. And forests need to be left to grow back before loggers can cut them again. And fish ponds need to regenerate.)

Just as in the case of those Indians whose lifestyle was to use land for hunting, insofar as they did not aggress against their neighbors, it should not be the case that anyone has a right to judge which use is "better" or "higher" in order to determine whether it is property at all. So much for the fallacious, vicious, immoral idea that the Indians were primitives and could be pusahed of the land in favor of the 'more civilized' -- evicted, instead of paid or leased from.

However, returning to the Indians: whether farmers or nomads, this principle of 'any use' does not mean that they could -over- claim land, claim it as far as the eye can see for hunting and "roaming" purposes and keep settlers off of an entire continent or county or state.

In U.S. history, where big conflicts between adjoining and different kinds of use of 'new' land, came into play in a major way was in the "range wars" in the Old West between the farmers and the ranchers. (Also, the related wars over water rights.) Farmers objectively needed fences so cattle and sheep and goats wouldn't eat or trample what they had labored to build. Ranch owners objectively (like the Indians) needed larger spaces than a piddling farm- sized area for huge animals to graze in, for horses to roam in, etc.

The way to ajudicate this in each case should have been: Who was there first?

He or they own it.

If farmers have heavily settled in county or township A, then other late-coming potential users, whether ranchers or miners or factory builders, would have to -buy- rights. Either that or they can try to be first in some more sparsely settled area.

Edited March 28, 2011 by Philip Coates

[bmacwilliam]

> So, why is it OK to have a rightful ownership claim to land we don't use in this day and age? What has changed that we can own land and not use it now, but not then? [bob]

Once you take untapped land and mix your sweat with it [see my posts #8 and #15, for key aspects of this] -- make a farm or a park or a mine or build a house or whatever you choose to do with it -- it becomes yours. And your work or residency has usually given it some financial value, so you can resell it if you want, hold it for 'investment' or for a summer home or whatever you choose. The nature of the potential use - or of its monetary value - can and always does change over a long enough time period. When population rises around it, it may have value as a park or recreation area. It's resale value could go sky high.

But it became yours completely and forever when you first resided there and/or did something further with it.

Just as in the case of the Indians using land for hunting, it should not be the case that anyone has a right to judge which use is "better" or "higher" in order to determine whether it is property at all. So much for the fallacious, vicious, immoral idea that the Indians were primitives and could be pusahed of the land in favor of the 'more civilized' -- evicted, instead of paid or leased from.

However, returning to the Indians: whether farmers or nomads, this principle of 'any use' does not mean that they could -over- claim land, claim it as far as the eye can see for hunting and "roaming" purposes and keep settlers off of an entire continent or county or state.

Where the conflict between adjoining and different kinds of use came into play was in the "range wars" in the Old West between the farmers and the ranchers. In the former case, they objectively needed fences so cattle and sheep and goats wouldn't eat or trample what they had labored to build. In the latter case, they objectively (like the Indians) needed larger spaces than a farm sized area for huge animals to graze in, for horses to roam in, etc.

The way to ajudicate this in each case is: Who was there first?

He or they own it. If farmers have heavily settled in county or township A, then other late-coming potential users, whether ranchers or miners or factory builders, would have to -buy- rights. Either that or they can try to be first in some more sparsely settled area.

Sorry, I don't see this as consistent. If "it should not be the case that anyone has a right to judge which use is "better" or "higher" in order to determine whether it is property at all" then we need a very specific description of which "use" qualifies as an acceptable or "higher" use, or whether we need to move on to the "Who was there first?" rule no?

Bob

[kiaer.ts]

> So, why is it OK to have a rightful ownership claim to land we don't use in this day and age? What has changed that we can own land and not use it now, but not then? [bob]

Once you take untapped land and mix your sweat with it [see my posts #8 and #15, for key aspects of this] -- make a farm or a park or a mine or build a house or whatever you choose to do with it -- it becomes yours. And your work or residency has usually given it some financial value, so you can resell it if you want, hold it for 'investment' or for a summer home or whatever you choose. The nature of the potential use - or of its monetary value - can and always does change over a long enough time period. When population rises around it, it may have value as a park or recreation area. It's resale value could go sky high.

But it became yours completely and forever when you first resided there and/or did something further with it. (In direct answer to Bob's question, you can let it lie completely fallow if you wish. In fact, often farm land needs to 'rest' or be replanted with a non-cash crop for the nitrates to replenish themselves. And forests need to be left to grow back before loggers can cut them again. And fish ponds need to regenerate.)

Just as in the case of those Indians whose lifestyle was to use land for hunting, insofar as they did not aggress against their neighbors, it should not be the case that anyone has a right to judge which use is "better" or "higher" in order to determine whether it is property at all. So much for the fallacious, vicious, immoral idea that the Indians were primitives and could be pusahed of the land in favor of the 'more civilized' -- evicted, instead of paid or leased from.

However, returning to the Indians: whether farmers or nomads, this principle of 'any use' does not mean that they could -over- claim land, claim it as far as the eye can see for hunting and "roaming" purposes and keep settlers off of an entire continent or county or state.

In U.S. history, where big conflicts between adjoining and different kinds of use of 'new' land, came into play in a major way was in the "range wars" in the Old West between the farmers and the ranchers. (Also, the related wars over water rights.) Farmers objectively needed fences so cattle and sheep and goats wouldn't eat or trample what they had labored to build. Ranch owners objectively (like the Indians) needed larger spaces than a piddling farm- sized area for huge animals to graze in, for horses to roam in, etc.

The way to ajudicate this in each case should have been: Who was there first?

He or they own it.

If farmers have heavily settled in county or township A, then other late-coming potential users, whether ranchers or miners or factory builders, would have to -buy- rights. Either that or they can try to be first in some more sparsely settled area.

Yes, Phil.

(And to add my answer for Bob, mixture is one way in which title has traditionally been established over unclaimed land. Once title is established continued mixture is not necessary - but if you want your title defended, payment of property tax is.)

[sjw]

But it became yours completely and forever when you first resided there and/or did something further with it.

No, because there is such a thing as abandonment.

Just as in the case of those Indians whose lifestyle was to use land for hunting, insofar as they did not aggress against their neighbors, it should not be the case that anyone has a right to judge which use is "better" or "higher" in order to determine whether it is property at all. So much for the fallacious, vicious, immoral idea that the Indians were primitives and could be pusahed of the land in favor of the 'more civilized' -- evicted, instead of paid or leased from.

If they're just pulling off natural resources and not "mixing their labor with the land" then there's nothing they can do about a settler who comes in and builds a farm, and then another who builds another farm, etc. Qua race, they have no right to keep members of another race off. Qua individuals, they can't rightly keep someone from building a farm on previously wild land.

Shayne

[sjw]

Sorry, I don't see this as consistent. If "it should not be the case that anyone has a right to judge which use is "better" or "higher" in order to determine whether it is property at all" then we need a very specific description of which "use" qualifies as an acceptable or "higher" use, or whether we need to move on to the "Who was there first?" rule no?

Bob

In order to properly own land, use needs to be fairly intensive, like farming, or like an ordinary suburban home. You can't just wander around shooting squirrels every so often and claim to own the land.

Shayne

[BaalChatzaf]

Watch this a laugh a bit:

Ba'al Chatzaf

[Philip Coates]

> In order to properly own land, use needs to be fairly intensive, like farming, or like an ordinary suburban home. You can't just wander around shooting squirrels every so often and claim to own the land. [shayne]

Yes: There's a distinction between (full) property rights to complete ownership, use, and disposal and partial or shared rights, such as access rights (as to a stream, a water hole, right to cross over.)

I believe this actually goes back as far as the common law, probably thousands of years earlier.