February 2012
3 posts
anarchei asked: I'm curious. Do you run the Redshift Media account on Vimeo, and if so, will you be uploading the "George Ought To Help" video there at all?
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On the non-existence of Human Needs
Everyone I know exposes themselves to an increased risk of death in order to satisfy other preferences they hold: Travelling by car, smoking, drinking alcohol, crossing the street, biking, going swimming, giving birth, eating food that hasn’t been pre-liquified to minimise the chance of choking, the list goes on.
Apparently most people do not place infinite value on extending their own...
January 2012
3 posts
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The weak case for laissez-faire
Markets are complex systems. Threats of force against peaceful people, to get them to do X or to refrain from doing X, have an ambiguous net effect on overall well-being (these interventions will have unintended consequences). But the threats themselves have a negative effect on well-being. Insofar as our goal is to maximise well-being, we are not justified in making threats of force against...
December 2011
9 posts
logicallypositive:
I think lefties have a legitimate point when they talk about consumerism… It’s annoying and devoid of any sort of genuine meaning
Agreed. Closely linked is the problem of firms ‘manufacturing desire’. Bullets to bite though. The alternatives are much worse.
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I use the word voluntary a lot. This is what i mean: If a given purposeful behaviour would _not_ have obtained if a threat of force being maintained by another person or persons, against the agent, were removed, then the purposeful behaviour was not voluntary. All other purposeful behaviour is voluntary.
A person may decide to run indoors in bad weather to avoid getting wet. This is a voluntary...
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Capitalism Is the Enemy of Democracy?
http://www.truth-out.org/capitalism-enemy-democracy/1323789051
The title of the article is almost right. Democracy is the enemy of capitalism, and capitalism is the friend of the poor.
The most significant accomplishment for Occupy Wall Street (OWS) to date is that the Occupiers have managed to poke a hole in the legitimacy of neoliberal capitalism and its central claim that unregulated...
State interventions in markets, however minor, cause unintended consequences. The interventionists see the consequences and conclude that more intervention is needed to fix them. The unintended consequences ripple outwards, becoming increasingly severe, politicians scramble to implement new interventions to fix them. That’s how continuing belief in the appropriateness of violent intervention...
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Diaspora invites
There’s some decent ancap-ansoc dialogue/arguing going on on the diaspora alpha (it’s like google+, but open source). But I’d like some more knowledgeable propertarians on there. Who would like an invite?
Oh: Diaspora posts can be synced to auto-publish on tumblr and facebook, which is handy.
Drop your email address in my ask box if you’d like to join.
Define power
logicallypositive:
everyone uses this term, but what do you mean by it?
Capacity to effect absolute influence in the world. How this absolute influence is to be measured is a tricky one.
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Monster roars: what's all that about?
A gigantic monster appears. It strikes a pose and roars at the film’s hero. Why would a large predator behave that way towards small prey? This skyrim ad is as good an example as any : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w1AenlOEXao
Getting the hang of https://joindiaspora.com (the open source, less evil, facebook/google+ alternative). Looks uncannily similar to google+, seems to work fine so far. (testing: this diaspora post should show up on facebook and tumblr automatically)
November 2011
7 posts
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Vigilance against creeping 'Human needs' →
Caitlyn - I watch the episodes of My Super Sweet 16 where they show how much is spent on each facet of these parties. With every price that pops up on some lavish, useless thing, I say to myself what basic, practical life necessity that money could pay for (my bachelor’s degree, a wedding, a down payment on a house, etc.). Then my heart just breaks. Right into a million pieces.
There are no...
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The shaky foundation of exploitation theory
One-sheet printable PDF here: http://ge.tt/9zPHW4A
Suggestion: Print a bunch of copies and head towards your local Occupy protest, politely hand copies to the people listening to the Marxists.
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Collective brain: improvements? suggestions?
I’ve been seeing a displeasing amount of Marxism on youtube footage of the US occupy protests. I wanted to put together a one-sheet handout which would function as both an introduction to the foundational problems of Marxist exploitation theory, and a taste of Austrian economics.
Here’s the text of my attempt below. Any suggestions for improvements welcome (I will link a PDF version...
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Interview with LibertariaNation.org
Here’s the English version of an interview I did for LibertariaNation.org
.
Tell me a little bit about you: where were you born, where do you live, what is your occupation etc.
I was born in Huddersfield, that’s a town in the north of England, in the late 70s. I currently live in Rotterdam, in the Netherlands. I do freelance digital media work. Currently most of my income comes...
October 2011
9 posts
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Libertarianism: Replies to Jon Stewart
My responses to the questions that Jon Stewart asks judge Napolitano here.
1 Is government the antithesis of liberty?
I prefer not to talk about liberty if possible since it means lots of different things to different people. But to the extent that liberty means freedom from coercion, yes the state is inherently hostile to liberty.
2 One of the things that enhances freedoms are roads....
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The state: Necessarily willing and able to kill...
Just watched the footage of Scott Olsen seemingly shot in the head at close-range with a tear gas canister, by police in Oakland. It’s enraging, but shouldn’t be surprising.
The continued existence of the state in any form (monarchy, dictatorship, representative democracy) depends entirely on the willingness and ability of its agents to attack and ultimately to kill peaceful people....
Smash the Evil 1%! →
The “occupy” protest movement is thriving off the claim that the 99 percent are being exploited by the 1 percent, and there is truth in what they say. But they have the identities of the groups wrong. They imagine that it is the 1 percent of highest wealth holders who are the problem. …
But there is another 1 percent out there, those who do live parasitically off the population and exploit the...
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Occupy Amsterdam. A 'new form of democracy'?
Earlier today I visited the ‘Occupy Amsterdam’ camp at Beursplein Amsterdam.
I wanted to get a sense of what kinds of ideas were prevailing in the Dutch branches of the occupy movement, and if appropriate, suggest resources for research for any open-minded protesters who weren’t yet familiar with austro-libertarian analyses of the current situation.
I joined a conversation...
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'Markets not Capitalism'
This looks like an interesting book, looking forward to reading it. Like the cover too. Deliberately disowning the word capitalism though, I don’t think that’s smart. Perhaps the content will change my mind about that. From the comments section at mises.org someone said:
Language is dynamic (as you all may know from reading Shakespeare), just like the market. “Capitalism” is a lost...
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“Thank goodness Jobs didn’t believe ideas could really be owned when he visited...”
– Sheldon Richman
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Steve Jobs compared to the banksters
Jobs, and his firm Apple, relied in large part on state coercion—the initiation of force via IP law—for its success. He presided over a company that makes amazing products, but his actions—filing patents—have prevented and continue to prevent other products from coming into existence.
For me Jobs and the banksters that OWS protesters decry have very similar moral...
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Exchange with a 'resource based economy' advocate
A response to a Resource based economy/venus project advocate responding to my RBE vid on youtube. I’ll note in passing that I think capitalism is the ‘resource based economy’ par excellence, but these folks have a moneyless, centrally managed system in mind.
If a resource becomes more scarce, its price goes up, and more money is made by those who control that resource.
...
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September 2011
3 posts
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Why would Bitcoin enthusiasts spend Bitcoin... →
In response to stuff quoted from this article.
Bitcoin’s limited money supply is one of the things that people like about it: the currency cannot be debased, as money can when central bankers print more of it. But the flip side is that if the demand for bitcoins rises, for whatever reason, then the value of bitcoins will necessarily rise as well. So if you think that bitcoins are going to...
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George responses: Disgusting, Disgraceful filth!
Critics of George Ought to Help have called it:
Fluff, Childish, Brainwashing, Extreme right wing ideology, Wrongheaded, Misleading, Dishonest, Disgusting, Disgraceful filth.
Unfortunately the same critics tend not to explain exactly what it is about the video they find so disagreeable. On the face of it their invective is puzzling because all George does is invite the viewer to reflect on...
August 2011
12 posts
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“Anarchism is not a romantic fable but the hardheaded realization, based on five...”
– Edward Abbey (via libertariancontrarian)
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Sam Harris taxation facepalm
Awful article by Sam Harris. I’m just going to respond to a couple of passages.
I agree that everyone should be entitled to the fruits of his or her labors and that taxation, in the State of Nature, is a form of theft.
The qualifier ‘in the State of Nature’ allows Harris to deny that taxation currently is theft, but escapes having to explain why. I’d be interested to...
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“Libertarianism is not and does not pretend to be a complete moral, or aesthetic...”
– Myth and Truth About Libertarianism, by Murray N. Rothbard (via conza)
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Does an anti-propertarian need permission to use...
The anti-propertarian, responding to the action axiom attempt to establish the existence of property, might say:
Only according to a framework that views a body as property have I used property to deny its existence. I don’t share this view—I don’t view this body as property.
I have not depended on the assumption that property exists in order to deny the existence of property. There is no...
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The action axiom doesn't establish the existence... →
twoplustwoequalsfour:
Disclaimer: I recognise property rights.
The action axiom easily establishes property as a fact: One who acts necessarily uses himself, his property, to act. This cannot be refuted since refutation requires action.
The action axiom does not establish property as a fact.
Property is a thing a person has the exclusive right to dictate the terms of use of. Property is...
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Property rights challenge: Can you defend it using... →
twoplustwoequalsfour:
Freedomain Radio: A Proof of Property Rights
It is impossible to argue against property without using property.
It’s not impossible to argue against the legitimacy of property rights without assuming their legitimacy. That’s what Molyneux claims is true, as I understand his argument.
I think most people do tacitly assume the legitimacy of property rights in...
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Those Boring Politics: On Economies of Scale and... →
thoseboringpolitics:
[…] I’m making a post explaining that economies of scale would still exist in a free-market. They would just exist to a smaller degree.
Businesses will obviously still finance and evaluate their assets, output, and expenses frequently in a free-market. In fact, they’ll have to scrutinize more into it since they’ll be completely on their own and without...
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Desert island statism again →
iproteus rehearsing standard statist apologies for the coercion of the state, and me rehearsing standard responses to them ;)
In response, the government as us goes back to Social Contract theory, wherein individuals give up some portion of their natural rights in exchange for civil rights.
You ignored Rothbard’s response to your claim that ‘we are government’, which is...
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Highs! Epiphanies! Despairs!: Government is the... →
A reply to fortunateson’s reply to my post.
I’m highly suspicious of ideologies that seem to stem from one principle — “taxation is theft,” in this case.
Regarding taxation as theft isn’t the starting point, it follows from more foundational insights.
For instance the assumption that property rights apply universally—that the same rules apply to the state, as do to an...
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The People and the State are not seperate... →
In response to my post, iproteus writes:
This demonstrates acutely the major flaw of libertarian thinking. In a democracy, the People and the State are not seperate entities. Therefore taxes are not “the expropriation of resources from peaceful people under the threat of force”, but rather an agreed upon pooling of resources to better the common good.
Rothbard knew how to deal with this...
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Government is the only solution
The crucial thing that differentiates a state from a private organisation is that a state has the power to tax people.
So everything that a state does, qua state, is funded by taxation.
Taxation is the expropriation of resources from peaceful people under the threat of force.
So if one says “Problem X cannot be solved without government”, this also means “Problem X cannot...
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'Market thinking' and talking during concerts
In the Dutch language Gonzo Circus site, a 2010 article by Peter Bruyn rails against ‘market thinking’ (marktdenken).
Bruyn links the rise of this tendency to the trend towards audiences talking through music concerts. By marktdenken I think he means a tendency towards commodification, and towards viewing economic success or viability as the ultimate measure of worth.
The market is...
July 2011
6 posts
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On the presupposition of racial equality and... →
Fringeelements made a post lately. The topic was the presupposition of aggregate equality or difference in aspects of cognition, when considering the groups of humans that get called races. He quite reasonably asked:
“Why would the default assumption be innate equality? How incredibly unlikely would this be?”
I learned that a responder on facebook—who I’ll call...
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Prejudice
Let’s go one step further: we find that purple males are involved in the vast majority of incidents. So now we can go one step further and give so much more attention to purple males, somewhat more attention to purple females, and some benefi ts to pink females and pink males – to in some way compensate for the trouble that the purple people have caused.
I can hear the cries of racism and...
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Proportional retaliation necessarily part of NAP?
Conza replied to my previous post:
The principles of proportionality of punishment and of strict liability, are part of the libertarian conception of the NAP. Shooting someone for stealing gum - no, no as punishment. That’d be murder.
I disagree that proportionality in retaliation is necessarily part of the NAP. In order to insist on it there needs to be an extra rule formulated. The...