Anarcho-Capitalism: A Branden ‘Blast from the Past’

[George H. Smith]

A person has the right to jump off a cliff, if he likes, or kill himself in some other way. Suicide is a fundamental right of individuals.

This is where we disagree, and it is due precisely to the thing you don't understand. I do agree that suicide is a right--for people who have a reasonable grip on reality. But a deranged person runs a serious risk of making an undoable decision (like kill himself) that he would not make if he had a better grip on reality. I find it more than reasonable to block him (if at all possible) until he can make that choice, i.e., exercise that right, with a minimum of rationality. But my fundamental standard is reason. A deranged person does not have his reason operating. I think it is an oxymoron to talk about volitional rights in his case. Thus I believe it is perfectly proper for a government to interfere with him by initiating force to restrain him until it is clear that he has gotten possession of his reasoning mind. Then if he wants to kill himself, at least it is by reasoned choice and not by a mental imbalance that he would otherwise regret. If you want conceptual referents for this, there are oodles of stories of failed suicides where the person came back to living, deeply regretted attempting it and full of gratitude for those who kept him from succeeding. In almost all cases, he will say he lost his reason when he went off the deep end. Your standard is force, irrespective of reason. So using that standard (NIOF) as the fundament, we can stand by and let a deranged person kill himself and say he is perfectly within his rights. Obviously, there are no more rights for this person, and no possibility of discovering if he actually wanted to exercise them, after he kills himself. Volition ends when his life ends. Agree or disagree, that is an example of how the different fundamental standards lead to different conclusions. Michael

So who decides whether or not a person is not capable of reaching rational decisions? Government? Suppose this government decides that only deranged people could possibly wish to carry a gun? Does "reason" then justify the incarceration of such people until they come to their senses?

You are in fact defending a "for this own good" standard that is the slipperiest of all slippery slides. (Augustine famously used this approach to defend religious persecution. What rational person, after all, would truly want to suffer an eternity of torment in hell?) If you wish to initiate force against a person to keep him from killing himself, because you don't view his decision as rational, then you may take this risk. The person may later thank you, or he may sue the shit out of you -- but if you want to take this risk, that is your business. It is not the business of a government, however, to decide which of our decisions are rational and which are not. (e.g., in the matter of using drugs or drinking too much).

Ghs

[Bosco]

Michael,

Here is a key passage from Rand's essay "Collectivized 'Rights'":

Any group or "collective," large or small, is only a number of individuals. A group can have no rights other than the rights of its individual members. In a free society, the "rights" of any group are derived from the rights of its members through their voluntary, individual choice and contractual agreement, and are merely the application of these individual rights to a specific undertaking. Every legitimate group undertaking is based on the participants' right of free association and free trade. (By "legitimate," I mean: noncriminal and freely formed, that is, a group which no one was forced to join.)

...A group, as such, has no rights. A man can neither acquire new rights by joining a group nor lose the rights which he does possess. The principle of individual rights is the only moral base of all groups or associations.

Any group that does not recognize this principle is not an association, but a gang or a mob.

Given these and similar statements by Rand, is it any wonder that Randian anarchists have been led to ask: So how can a monopolistic government that one is "forced to join," an association of men that is not based on "voluntary, individual choice and contractual agreement," be regarded as anything other than "a gang or mob"?

O'ists have twisted themselves into philosophical pretzels in their efforts to deal with this problem. If Rand had not dismissed anarchism so bluntly and vehemently -- this probably had a lot to do with her personal dislike of Rothbard -- I doubt if this would have been such a hot-button controversy.

Ghs

How is one "forced to join" a Randian government?

--Brant

By being compelled to pay a "membership fee" (tax)?

Tim Hopkins

[Bosco]

George, in an anarchist society, what is to stop the protection agencies from colluding like what people suspect proponents of a NWO are doing within different governments around the world?

It seems like a weed... You can rip the top off, break the stem or pull it out from the roots... it's still not really gone. Is information and education what will keep a society free once the miracle of a revolution has happened?

Aren't cartels and monopoliies pretty unstable economic arrangements when the state is not around to enforce them?

[Dennis Hardin]

It is highly rewarding to gain the benefit of intellects being driven to max revolutions.

(Can't help picturing a naval scenario of battleships launching broadsides

with 20" guns.)

#341 from MSK is a thoughtfully original one, from my pov.

Full speed ahead, and damn the torpedoes!

Tony (Awaiting the salvo from USS George H Smith.)

Tony,

I like your comparison to naval battleships. However, I keep thinking of another kind of war. . .

"I want Balboa! I want Balboa!"

P.S. What round is this? I lost count.

[George H. Smith]

George, in an anarchist society, what is to stop the protection agencies from colluding like what people suspect proponents of a NWO are doing within different governments around the world? It seems like a weed... You can rip the top off, break the stem or pull it out from the roots... it's still not really gone. Is information and education what will keep a society free once the miracle of a revolution has happened?

The institutionalization of power is always dangerous. This is why most individualists throughout history have favored a decentralized system of power. For early conservatives, such as Edmund Burke, the preservation of freedom requires intermediate institutions, such as a church or nobility, that function as buffers between individuals and the power of Leviathan. For radical republicans, such as Thomas Jefferson, sovereign states serve this function vis-a-vis the federal government. For libertarian anarchists, this is the function of alternative justice agencies.

The particulars differ, but the basic solution has remained the same. If you concentrate all power in one centralized institution, then you are asking for trouble. In a decentralized system, if one institution abuses its power, then you have other places to go, i.e., other institutions that might be able to protect you from Leviathan.

In Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Edward Gibbon gave an astute explanation of a major reason why the later Roman Empire was able to become so despotic. The territorial area ruled by the Roman Empire was so vast that there was no realistic way for the vast majority of people to escape from its jurisdiction.

A similar reason has been given (e.g., by Tocqueville) for the failure of the French Revolution, in contrast to the American Revolution. The French government deprived the provinces of their traditional "liberties" and concentrated all power in the central government. A mosaic of different legal systems was standardized and rendered uniform (via the Napoleonic Code). Thus when Napoleon took over the reins of power, that was that -- there were no other legal authorities to whom one could appeal.

The American Revolution had a different result. For the most part, the highly decentralized system of power of the colonial era -- from townships and counties to states and the central government -- were retained, at least for a while. Writing during the 1830's, Tocqueville (in Democracy in America) explored the crucial role that this highly decentralized system played in maintaining individual freedom in America.

But never mind any of this, so far as O'ist minarchists are concerned. Unmindful of history, unless written by Rand or Peikoff, they enthusiastically endorse a highly centralized government that maintains a coercive monopoly on all law. They have read Ayn Rand, so what else do they need to know?

Ghs

[Brant Gaede]

Michael,

Here is a key passage from Rand's essay "Collectivized 'Rights'":

Any group or "collective," large or small, is only a number of individuals. A group can have no rights other than the rights of its individual members. In a free society, the "rights" of any group are derived from the rights of its members through their voluntary, individual choice and contractual agreement, and are merely the application of these individual rights to a specific undertaking. Every legitimate group undertaking is based on the participants' right of free association and free trade. (By "legitimate," I mean: noncriminal and freely formed, that is, a group which no one was forced to join.)

...A group, as such, has no rights. A man can neither acquire new rights by joining a group nor lose the rights which he does possess. The principle of individual rights is the only moral base of all groups or associations.

Any group that does not recognize this principle is not an association, but a gang or a mob.

Given these and similar statements by Rand, is it any wonder that Randian anarchists have been led to ask: So how can a monopolistic government that one is "forced to join," an association of men that is not based on "voluntary, individual choice and contractual agreement," be regarded as anything other than "a gang or mob"?

O'ists have twisted themselves into philosophical pretzels in their efforts to deal with this problem. If Rand had not dismissed anarchism so bluntly and vehemently -- this probably had a lot to do with her personal dislike of Rothbard -- I doubt if this would have been such a hot-button controversy.

Ghs

How is one "forced to join" a Randian government?

--Brant

Do you honestly not understand what I meant? Must I explain once again, for the umpteenth time on this thread, what the anarchist/minarcist dispute is about?

If it will make you feel better, I will concede your point. One is not literally forced to "join" a Randian government; i.e., one is not forced to become a member of that institution per se, such as by becoming a bureaucrat or a policeman. The word I should have used is "state," not "government." The former normally has a broader meaning than the latter, since it includes not only the institution of government but also the territory over which a government claims coercive jurisdiction. The O'st government does not give you a choice as to whether you will be a member of its state. If it did, you could secede or do business with a justice agency of your own choosing -- and this would lead to that terrible thing, that horror of horrors, that social condition in which humans could not survive from more than a nanosecond, called "anarchism."

Ghs

Coercive jurisdiction means 1) retaliatory force against initiators within and 2) initiators from without who want to come in and continue the initiation of force as conquerors. In any case the justice agency you would repair to will also be dealing with and using force and if you have a beef with me your agency will have a beef with me and my justice agency.

--Brant

[George H. Smith]

In case people are curious about why I have spent so much time on the anarchism controversy, after having discussed it so many times in the past, the explanation is this:

I am currently writing a lengthy introduction for a collection of articles on anarchism that Roy Childs wrote during the late 1960s and early 1970s. This will be published by Cato as an e-book, and possibly later as a printed book. My intro is due on May 1.

I will be exploring this controversy in considerable detail and from various angles, and I typically like to immerse myself in a topic before writing an extensive treatment of it. I find it interesting that orthodox O'ists still are unwilling to confront the key argument that Roy presented in his 1969 article, "An Open Letter to Ayn Rand." This of course was the article that converted me, Randy Barnett, and many other O'ist types from minarchism to anarchism.

Meanwhile, I have not yet finished my next Cato essay, so I will leave Dennis to flounder about on his own for a while, while I spend the rest of tonight and most of tomorrow on that project. He is temporarily free to explain how Rand did not really mean what she said about the NIOF and a proper government. It is perfectly okay, you see, for a government to initiate force, so long as Dennis gets to decide when this is okay. This is permissible because Dennis speaks not for himself but for reason.

Ghs

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

So who decides whether or not a person is not capable of reaching rational decisions? Government?

George,

Of course not--at least not in the sense you are implying.

The institution of government is a default condition of human behavior. A guy (or gal if she's a badass) bashes other people over the head and says he (or she) is in charge. Some people agree and then you have a gang.

That is the root of government.

And that will always be with human beings until some kind of evolution gets it out of us.

It so happens that some rational people stood up to the bashers, bashed right back, and once they got some breathing room they introduced reason to this form of coexisting. They codified what reason they could in charter documents and sliced power up so no basher could gain total power. They knew people die off and the new ones who come along have to learn everything from scratch. As Reagan said, freedom is not passed on in the bloodstream. So the founders made it hard to change the fundamental slicing of power.

It's the rational people who determine if a deranged person is rational and they codify standards for it in government. And change it when it gets off balance.

But let's take your premise as a default. NIOF it is.

So... do you consider NIOF to be a rational fundamental premise? If it is an irrational one, why should anyone accept it? Because someone says so? That's not a very good argument unless you are a basher. And if it is a rational premise, by your very question, who decides it is rational?

I know who decides. To speak simply (but complicated works, too), there are some widespread standards of rationality. Even ones Rand agreed with. I presume you are familiar with a few yourself.

If not, we can nitpick it to death.

But unless a standard of rationality can be agreed upon, you won't even answer your own question applied to NIOF, i.e, why anyone should accept NIOF as a fundamental principle. Because who determines what is rational?

That's your question, not mine.

Michael

[George H. Smith]

Michael,

Here is a key passage from Rand's essay "Collectivized 'Rights'":

Any group or "collective," large or small, is only a number of individuals. A group can have no rights other than the rights of its individual members. In a free society, the "rights" of any group are derived from the rights of its members through their voluntary, individual choice and contractual agreement, and are merely the application of these individual rights to a specific undertaking. Every legitimate group undertaking is based on the participants' right of free association and free trade. (By "legitimate," I mean: noncriminal and freely formed, that is, a group which no one was forced to join.)

...A group, as such, has no rights. A man can neither acquire new rights by joining a group nor lose the rights which he does possess. The principle of individual rights is the only moral base of all groups or associations.

Any group that does not recognize this principle is not an association, but a gang or a mob.

Given these and similar statements by Rand, is it any wonder that Randian anarchists have been led to ask: So how can a monopolistic government that one is "forced to join," an association of men that is not based on "voluntary, individual choice and contractual agreement," be regarded as anything other than "a gang or mob"?

O'ists have twisted themselves into philosophical pretzels in their efforts to deal with this problem. If Rand had not dismissed anarchism so bluntly and vehemently -- this probably had a lot to do with her personal dislike of Rothbard -- I doubt if this would have been such a hot-button controversy.

Ghs

How is one "forced to join" a Randian government?

--Brant

Do you honestly not understand what I meant? Must I explain once again, for the umpteenth time on this thread, what the anarchist/minarcist dispute is about?

If it will make you feel better, I will concede your point. One is not literally forced to "join" a Randian government; i.e., one is not forced to become a member of that institution per se, such as by becoming a bureaucrat or a policeman. The word I should have used is "state," not "government." The former normally has a broader meaning than the latter, since it includes not only the institution of government but also the territory over which a government claims coercive jurisdiction. The O'st government does not give you a choice as to whether you will be a member of its state. If it did, you could secede or do business with a justice agency of your own choosing -- and this would lead to that terrible thing, that horror of horrors, that social condition in which humans could not survive from more than a nanosecond, called "anarchism."

Ghs

Coercive jurisdiction means 1) retaliatory force against initiators within and 2) initiators from without who want to come in and continue the initiation of force as conquerors. In any case the justice agency you would repair to will also be dealing with and using force and if you have a beef with me your agency will have a beef with me and my justice agency.

--Brant

Possibly. And as we all know, when people have beefs with other people, the rational thing to do is to go to war and kill the people with whom we disagree. Too bad rational people have never figured out methods of resolving beefs in any other way -- just as they have never figured out ways to feed the hungry without government welfare programs, or to care for the sick without government medical services.

Why, in a free society, not only would we have fighting in the streets -- we would also need to step over the sick and starving, and possibly shove the mentally deranged aside, in order to reach the people we want to kill!. What would we do -- oh, how could we manage to live from day to day -- without the wise and paternalistic guidance of a beneficient government?

Ghs

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

btw - As an addition, I agree with decentralizing power, but I really like the way the founders did it, making the more fundamental parts (like right to life, free speech, etc.) centralized and decentralizing from there all the way down to local governments.

Michael

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Please do lead me through the "conceptual hierarchy." Even quoting a single passage by Rand in which she says or suggests that "reason" per se is a standard by which we should judge the legitimacy of governmental actions would be nice.

George,

Sure. But do I really need to quote to you where Rand called reason man's tool of survival? If you insist on a quote, I will get you one. May I suggest Atlas Shrugged for starters?

The chain goes like this:

Human life (without life, there can be no reason, no force, no nothing).

So that is the starting point.

To have human life, you gotta survive.

To survive, you need reason. To use reason, you need freedom. Reason doesn't work when enslaved. You can't force it to work.

Do I really need to go on?

Now if a context meets the criteria for reason, but violates NIOF, which concept is more fundamental in the chain?

In your world, apparently it is NIOF. And you have dismissed reason from the conceptual chain, extracted it from the concept, and relegated it to a process for forming the concept.

Rand claimed to have derived and justified the NIOF principle via a process of reason, but this is a different issue.

Your words:

Does military conscription violate your standard of "reason"? Many people consider conscription to be perfectly reasonable. So how would your standard of reason reach a different conclusion, without first being used to justify a theory of rights and the NIOF principle?

Is this a serious question?

Of course I don't agree with conscription.

But if the USA were under serious invasion, I can see a case for emergency conscription. Reason would demand that. There is just not time for niceties. The only alternative would be to accept the conditions of what being conquered would entail. Usually, from what I understand from history, sack and plunder are not very good prospects.

Michael

[George H. Smith]

So who decides whether or not a person is not capable of reaching rational decisions? Government?

George,

Of course not--at least not in the sense you are implying.

The institution of government is a default condition of human behavior. A guy (or gal if she's a badass) bashes other people over the head and says he (or she) is in charge. Some people agree and then you have a gang.

That is the root of government.

And that will always be with human beings until some kind of evolution gets it out of us.

It so happens that some rational people stood up to the bashers, bashed right back, and once they got some breathing room they introduced reason to this form of coexisting. They codified what reason they could in charter documents and sliced power up so no basher could gain total power. They knew people die off and the new ones who come along have to learn everything from scratch. As Reagan said, freedom is not passed on in the bloodstream. So the founders made it hard to change the fundamental slicing of power.

It's the rational people who determine if a deranged person is rational and they codify standards for it in government. And change it when it gets off balance.

But let's take your premise as a default. NIOF it is.

So... do you consider NIOF to be a rational fundamental premise? If it is an irrational one, why should anyone accept it? Because someone says so? That's not a very good argument unless you are a basher. And if it is a rational premise, by your very question, who decides it is rational?

I know who decides. To speak simply (but complicated works, too), there are some widespread standards of rationality. Even ones Rand agreed with. I presume you are familiar with a few yourself.

If not, we can nitpick it to death.

But unless a standard of rationality can be agreed upon, you won't even answer your own question applied to NIOF, i.e, why anyone should accept NIOF as a fundamental principle. Because who determines what is rational?

That's your question, not mine.

Michael

I have discussed the status of the NIOF principle extensively on this thread, including in posts from earlier today. I am not going to repeat myself yet again.

As for agreement about reason, Rand discusses this in "What is Capitalism"? Humans are fallible, so even well-intentioned people will inevitably disagree over what is rational and what is not. This is why freedom, as formulated in the NIOF principle, is essential to human welfare. So long as we don't initiate force against one another, it doesn't matter whether we agree or not.

Ah, but how do we get people to agree on the NIOF principle? Some valuable precedents here can be found in the centuries-long struggle to establish religious freedom. The victory for "freedom of conscience" took a long time. It was partly the result of argument and persuasion, but practical experience probably played a greater role. People simply got sick of the perpetual bloodshed and conflict caused by the efforts of some religious groups to impose their beliefs on other groups, until they finally realized that individual freedom is the best solution -- even if this meant tolerating atheists, Jews, Catholics, and other repulsive types.

It took a long time for many people to learn this lesson, but it would never have been learned unless there has been Isaiahs crying in the wildnerness for centures before religious freedom became a practical reality -- unless, that is, there had been people around to say This is wrong, period. If the standard-bearers had equivocated, if they had said There are exceptions to religious freedom, so let's not be dogmatic; or if they had said Religious persecution is part of human nature, so it is not practical to call for its abolition -- then it is doubtful that religious freedom would ever have been achieved.

The abolitionists in ante-bellum American, a small and depised minority, are another valuable example of how a small group of principled individuals can exercise influence far beyond their numbers.

Ghs

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

As for agreement about reason, Rand discusses this in "What is Capitalism"? Humans are fallible, so even well-intentioned people will inevitably disagree over what is rational and what is not. This is why freedom, as formulated in the NIOF principle, is essential to human welfare. So long as we don't initiate force against one another, it doesn't matter whether we agree or not.

George,

Man, is that a sidestep.

Do your "well-intentioned people [who] will inevitably disagree over what is rational" include those who disagree with the rationality of NIOF?

If not, then I still ask, why should anyone accept an irrational principle as law?

Is NIOF a rational or irrational principle?

Or do you think that is a stupid question that needs no answer and just is just because?

Michael

EDIT: I just saw something in your comments and it made me chuckle. You said Rand said humans are fallible (and she did), but you imply that this is why she thought reason should be excluded from her concept of government. I submit, that is an extremely hard sell. I would be interested to see where Rand stated that the principles that underpin the institution of government should not be based on reason, or that reason was not essential in their fomulation.

Here's another conceptual chain for you.

Rand's ethics are based on reason. (Do you need a quote? I will provide several if you like.) Ethics is expressed by moral principles. For Rand, rights are moral principles taken to the social level. (I won't provide a quote for this since you have several times.)

So look at the chain.

If reason underlies ethics and ethics underlies individual rights (which includes NIOF), it follows that reason underlies individual rights. And if individual rights underlies government, by the same logic, reason underlies government. (Of course, I mean legitimate government according to Rand here.)

Remove reason and the chain falls apart.

To me, this is simple Objectivist concept formation. Linear, I admit, but still valid according to Rand's approach..

[George H. Smith]

As for agreement about reason, Rand discusses this in "What is Capitalism"? Humans are fallible, so even well-intentioned people will inevitably disagree over what is rational and what is not. This is why freedom, as formulated in the NIOF principle, is essential to human welfare. So long as we don't initiate force against one another, it doesn't matter whether we agree or not.

George, Man, is that a sidestep. Do your "well-intentioned people [who] will inevitably disagree over what is rational" include those who disagree with the rationality of NIOF? If not, then I still ask, why should anyone accept an irrational principle as law? Is NIOF a rational or irrational principle? Or do you think that is a stupid question that needs no answer and just is just because? Michael

I didn't sidestep anything. As I explained before, it has never been my intention on this thread to personally justify the NIOF principle. Rather, I have explained how Rand justified and applied this principle, because this is what is relevant to the anarchism/minarchism controversy.

Is it not already obvious to you that many, indeed most, people do not accept the rationality of the NIOF principle? You don't accept it, for example, and neither does Dennis -- and there is no doubt that a world-wide poll would reveal that the vast majority of people do not agree with Rand on this issue. So what?

Your last question is not so much stupid as it is badly muddled. You have failed to distinguish two different questions: 1) Is it possible to determine what is rational? The answer to this question is yes. 2) Is it possible to get everyone to agree about what is rational? In many cases, the answer to this question is no.

So what if people disagree about the rationality of the NIOF principle? I don't know about you, but when people disagree with me, I either (a) ignore them or (b) attempt to persuade them. In the case of the NIOF principle, I often recommend that they read Rand on this subject, and this has sometimes yielded positive results.

So what do you do when people disagree with you? Tell them that this is part of human nature and leave the matter there?

Ghs

[Brant Gaede]

Please do lead me through the "conceptual hierarchy." Even quoting a single passage by Rand in which she says or suggests that "reason" per se is a standard by which we should judge the legitimacy of governmental actions would be nice.

George,

Sure. But do I really need to quote to you where Rand called reason man's tool of survival? If you insist on a quote, I will get you one. May I suggest Atlas Shrugged for starters?

The chain goes like this:

Human life (without life, there can be no reason, no force, no nothing).

So that is the starting point.

To have human life, you gotta survive.

To survive, you need reason. To use reason, you need freedom. Reason doesn't work when enslaved. You can't force it to work.

Do I really need to go on?

Now if a context meets the criteria for reason, but violates NIOF, which concept is more fundamental in the chain?

In your world, apparently it is NIOF. And you have dismissed reason from the conceptual chain, extracted it from the concept, and relegated it to a process for forming the concept.

Rand claimed to have derived and justified the NIOF principle via a process of reason, but this is a different issue.

Your words:

Does military conscription violate your standard of "reason"? Many people consider conscription to be perfectly reasonable. So how would your standard of reason reach a different conclusion, without first being used to justify a theory of rights and the NIOF principle?

Is this a serious question?

Of course I don't agree with conscription.

But if the USA were under serious invasion, I can see a case for emergency conscription. Reason would demand that. There is just not time for niceties. The only alternative would be to accept the conditions of what being conquered would entail. Usually, from what I understand from history, sack and plunder are not very good prospects.

Michael

R U Kidding Me?

Millions of civilians with guns would mow the bastards down. Except in the pussified NE U.S.

There is no longer any utilitarian need for conscription. It's no longer the number of bodies but people with brains.

Draft boards? If anybody would serve they'd be tarred and feathered. Their offices burned down.

--Brant

I guess we need to be invaded to be pissed off enough to do something about the violation of our rights!!

(Michael, you came a cropper with this one.)

[George H. Smith]

Does military conscription violate your standard of "reason"? Many people consider conscription to be perfectly reasonable. So how would your standard of reason reach a different conclusion, without first being used to justify a theory of rights and the NIOF principle?

Is this a serious question? Of course I don't agree with conscription. But if the USA were under serious invasion, I can see a case for emergency conscription. Reason would demand that. There is just not time for niceties.

You have reinforced my point about crucial importance of the NIOF principle. You "can see a case for emergency conscription," because you are not dogmatic about the NIOF principle. Of course, this is not merely you speaking. Rather, you are telling us what "reason" dictates, so you get to decide when is it necessary to compel people to behave as you think they should.

In fact, reason demands no such thing. Having rejected the NIOF principle, you seek cover under the mantle of "reason" when you wish to control the lives of other people.

Thus have the chickens come home to roost.

Ghs

[Brant Gaede]

As for agreement about reason, Rand discusses this in "What is Capitalism"? Humans are fallible, so even well-intentioned people will inevitably disagree over what is rational and what is not. This is why freedom, as formulated in the NIOF principle, is essential to human welfare. So long as we don't initiate force against one another, it doesn't matter whether we agree or not.

George, Man, is that a sidestep. Do your "well-intentioned people [who] will inevitably disagree over what is rational" include those who disagree with the rationality of NIOF? If not, then I still ask, why should anyone accept an irrational principle as law? Is NIOF a rational or irrational principle? Or do you think that is a stupid question that needs no answer and just is just because? Michael

I didn't sidestep anything. As I explained before, it has never been my intention on this thread to personally justify the NIOF principle. Rather, I have explained how Rand justified and applied this principle, because this is what is relevant to the anarchism/minarchism controversy.

Is it not already obvious to you that many, indeed most, people do not accept the rationality of the NIOF principle? You don't accept it, for example, and neither does Dennis -- and there is no doubt that a world-wide poll would reveal that the vast majority of people do not agree with Rand on this issue. So what?

Your last question is not so much stupid as it is badly muddled. You have failed to distinguish two different questions: 1) Is it possible to determine what is rational? The answer to this question is yes. 2) Is it possible to get everyone to agree about what is rational? In many cases, the answer to this question is no.

So what if people disagree about the rationality of the NIOF principle? I don't know about you, but when people disagree with me, I either (a) ignore them or (b) attempt to persuade them. In the case of the NIOF principle, I often recommend that they read Rand on this subject, and this has sometimes yielded positive results.

So what do you do when people disagree with you? Tell them that this is part of human nature and leave the matter there?

Ghs

What they will agree with you about is competing defense agencies. They'll get their own and put it against yours and you better be one of the five families.

--Brant

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Is it not already obvious to you that many, indeed most, people do not accept the rationality of the NIOF principle? You don't accept it, for example,...

George,

This is bull-crap.

Of course I accept NIOF as rational.

I think I've even said that explicitly.

I don't accept NIOF as more fundamental than rationality itself. Or a replacement for it. And rationality covers a hell of a lot more than NIOF.

Michael

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

You have reinforced my point about crucial importance of the NIOF principle. You "can see a case for emergency conscription," because you are not dogmatic about the NIOF principle. Of course, this is not merely you speaking. Rather, you are telling us what "reason" dictates, so you get to decide when is it necessary to compel people to behave as you think they should.

In fact, reason demands no such thing. Having rejected the NIOF principle, you seek cover under the mantle of "reason" when you wish to control the lives of other people.

Thus have the chickens come home to roost.

Goerge,

What on earh are you talking about?

I'm stupid, so please talk slowly when you get like that.

Michael

[Brant Gaede]

Is it not already obvious to you that many, indeed most, people do not accept the rationality of the NIOF principle? You don't accept it, for example,...

George,

This is bull-crap.

Of course I accept NIOF as rational.

I think I've even said that explicitly.

I don't accept NIOF as more fundamental than rationality itself. Or a replacement for it. And rationality covers a hell of a lot more than NIOF.

Michael

That's true. If rationality didn't get you there you are somewhere else.

--Brant

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

R U Kidding Me?

Brant,

Nope. It would probably fall under marshall law.

Millions of civilians with guns would mow the bastards down.

I have no doubt about that. But if a big army was needed quick due to invasion, I can see it happening. And justified.

Michael

[Brant Gaede]

Blood On the Risers.That's OL tonight. And soon Dennis will wake up!

--Brant

[George H. Smith]

You have reinforced my point about crucial importance of the NIOF principle. You "can see a case for emergency conscription," because you are not dogmatic about the NIOF principle. Of course, this is not merely you speaking. Rather, you are telling us what "reason" dictates, so you get to decide when is it necessary to compel people to behave as you think they should. In fact, reason demands no such thing. Having rejected the NIOF principle, you seek cover under the mantle of "reason" when you wish to control the lives of other people. Thus have the chickens come home to roost.

Goerge, What on earh are you talking about? I'm stupid, so please talk slowly when you get like that. Michael

Okay.

If...you...don't...accept...the NIOF principle....as a binding...limitation...on government...then...all bets...are off...because...governments....will be free...to do...anything...that they....deem..."rational." For example...they .. and not you... will get...to decide...what qualifies...as an... "emergency."

Ghs

[George H. Smith]

Is it not already obvious to you that many, indeed most, people do not accept the rationality of the NIOF principle? You don't accept it, for example,...

George,

This is bull-crap.

Of course I accept NIOF as rational.

I think I've even said that explicitly.

I don't accept NIOF as more fundamental than rationality itself. Or a replacement for it. And rationality covers a hell of a lot more than NIOF.

Michael

You accept the NIOF principle as an occasional principle, to be applied only when "reason" dictates that it should. This is not how Rand uses the NIOF principle, and this was what I was referring to.

Almost everyone accepts the rationality of the NIOF principle in their daily lives. And many accept it, if only implicitly, in certain political areas, such as religious freedom and freedom of the press. But this doesn't mean that they accept NIOF as a fundamental and essential restraint on government. Rand believed exactly this, and so do I. You and Dennis, in contrast, do not accept this.

Ghs

[Brant Gaede]

R U Kidding Me?

Brant,

Nope. It would probably fall under marshall law.

Millions of civilians with guns would mow the bastards down.

I have no doubt about that. But if a big army was needed quick due to invasion, I can see it happening. And justified.

Michael

So was justified the Civil War, WWI, WWII, and all wars since through Vietnam. All were crap. That the crap continued is another matter.

--Brant

what would Rand say?--I thought she confined her ethics of emergencies to individual people, not governments