in which brute says things about libertarianism

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BRUTE
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in which brute says things about libertarianism

Post by BRUTE »

Mister Imperceptible wrote:I sometimes wonder if libertarianism is an excellent personal philosophy, and not really viable as a political philosophy. (Isn’t “libertarian” incompatible with “-ism” by definition?)
this is likely true. politics is the game of taking shit from other humans (paraphrasing), and a philosophy that tries to minimize taking from other humans is probably not very viable. if politics is more broadly defined as "strategy for humans living together peacefully and prosperously", then brute would say libertarianism is way better than anything else, but most humans aren't ready for it. libertarianism is all about making the pie bigger and turning zero-sum games into positive-sum games. that's a long-term strategy that requires cultural and physical capital, education, and a majority of players of the game to defer short-term gains for long-term gains.

in a similar vein, liberal democracy was probably not a viable political philosophy for most of human history, until it was. but once it was adopted, it was quickly the only "viable" one, mostly by drastically increasing the level of what could be achieved.
Hobbes wrote:One thing I've never fully grokked about libertarianism is its' equating (?) of freedom with a market economy; or, said differently, that a market economy maximizes personal freedom. Yet, when I look at the economy, I see that people are essentially forced into the job market (or at least requiring socially acceptable paper\digital credits\money) by virtue of needing to feed\clothe\provide requirements of life for themselves. This reality doesn't strike me as maximizing individual freedom at all really (it more reminds me of debt bondage). Rather, it would seem to me that, unless people had an independent source of the requirements of life (food, water, medicine, housing), free from external seizure\prices, people couldn't really be said to be free.
the accusation leveled here is almost funny. of course libertarianism doesn't create free food, shelter, and housing for all humans. it is not a genie.

but the need for food, shelter, and clothing does not arise from libertarianism, but from human existence in nature. humans had to labor and were "unfree", in that sense, way before humans invented the word libertarianism.

as Hobbes says himself, libertarianism merely claims to maximize personal freedom, i.e. free humans from their "nasty, brutish, and short" existence better than any other system.

roughly said, if there is a percentage of their lives that humans have to spend to labor for food, clothes, and shelter, vs. sitting around drinking beer and watching Seinfeld re-runs, then libertarianism claims to decrease that percentage faster (on average and in the long run) than any other system.

the key insight of libertarianism is that shit costs money (=economics). making a policy to guarantee free food, shelter, and clothing to all humans does not magically create food, shelter, and clothing for all humans. libertarianism says that what creates food, shelter, and clothing much better than government policy is a well-oiled free-market system that will naturally drive down the cost of food, shelter, and clothing over time, so that most humans can easily afford it working just a few hours per week. or, if FIRE is reached, without working at all.

ThisDinosaur
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Re: in which brute says things about libertarianism

Post by ThisDinosaur »

BRUTE wrote:
Mon Jun 25, 2018 1:52 am
libertarianism is all about making the pie bigger and turning zero-sum games into positive-sum games.
This is more like an assumption about capitalism. How does a libertarian government address the issue of externalities? I don't see how the problems of air and water pollution are addressed without a strong government regulating the private sector. What about police and military? Privatization of these seems very likely in the setting of a weak government, and I don't see how that doesn't lead to asymmetric concentration of power.

I agree with the libertarian preference for more freedom/fewer laws when evaluating all new policy. But I also kind of see the self organization of people into a democratic government (mob) as another expression of freedom. The evidence for this is the fact that there aren't really any libertarian governments because it would be fertile ground for authoritarians to take control. I agree with libertarians that the use of force should be as rare as possible. But I frequently see libertarians saying all regulation is wrong/bad/unnecessary. Whether any given law is wise or not is extremely context specific and its not so simple as saying we are all better off with less regulation.

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Jean
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Re: in which brute says things about libertarianism

Post by Jean »

Air and water pollution is an agression that can be stoped by any mean available.

batbatmanne
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Re: in which brute says things about libertarianism

Post by batbatmanne »

BRUTE wrote:
Mon Jun 25, 2018 1:52 am
the need for food, shelter, and clothing does not arise from libertarianism, but from human existence in nature. humans had to labor and were "unfree", in that sense, way before humans invented the word libertarianism.
The biggest problem, imo, is that natural opportunities have been denied to those who are not born as a member of the property-owning class. You should look into the Georgist critique of contemporary capitalism/neoclassical economics. The view is roughly that there are three factors of production: land, labor and capital. Capital and land are not the same thing, because supply of land is fixed and it therefore does not respond to the price mechanism. Furthermore, the philosophical justifications used for property do not apply to natural objects that have not been produced by anyone (see Locke's proviso). To exclude others from natural opportunities without compensation is therefore deemed unjust.

The Georgist view is perfectly compatible with libertarianism and has notable advantages. There is a straightforward and principled way to generate taxes to support a minarchist government: tax natural opportunities at their full value. This includes taxes on the unimproved value of land, resource extraction and severance, extraterrestrial domain use and the EM spectrum, legal privileges with fixed supply, pollution, right-of-way, seignorage, patents and other IP (to the extent that these remain), etc. This would generate a significant amount of taxable revenue, more than is ordinarily supposed by measuring the distorted markets in land that exist now. These taxes are economically efficient because supply of these things are fixed. There are ingenious auction-based solutions to the distribution of some of these privileges. In addition, there is no need for an over-complicated tax code and bureaucracy, all other forms of taxation can be abolished and replaced. These taxes would also allow for a lot of flexibility in managing environmental externalities.

For the most part, Georgism is neutral concerning how the money gets spent. The libertarian solution is simple: on the basis of the equality of persons, every citizen gets an equal portion of whatever remains after paying for necessary government services. This is commonly referred to as a citizen's dividend, and it functions like a basic income. Everybody is essentially getting a share of the price that the best user of natural opportunities in the economy is willing to pay in order to exclude others. I think that this kind of system would alleviate many of the worries that leftists have about wealth distribution while still appealing to the principles of libertarian self-ownership and freedom.

Riggerjack
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Re: in which brute says things about libertarianism

Post by Riggerjack »

. How does a libertarian government address the issue of externalities? I don't see how the problems of air and water pollution are addressed without a strong government regulating the private sector.
Oh. Well, we have a overlapping net of strong government regulations currently, so I assume you are happy with our current solutions? Or were you simply hoping to say "externalities", and expect the conversation ended there?

The term externalities is an economic term to describe effects of a transaction that fall outside the terms of the transaction. It has nothing to do with libertarians, statists, environmental groups, or the price of coffee at Starbucks. It is simply the areas that are not addressed in our current system.

Pollution is the current classical example. And for good reason. Our current situation has at it's roots a court decision in late 18th century New England. The courts ruled that the community was better served by having a local factory, and the local increase in opportunities, than they were without it, even though they had a decrease in quality of life due to pollution. Very similar to the kelo v new London case of a few years ago. This is your current system. The state looks after it's interests, and tells you a nice story so you can go back to sleep.

Now if you think externalities would be worse under a libertarian system, that is worth talking about. But if your point is there are minor weaknesses to libertarian ideas, I think we can just agree. If your bar for improvement is perfection, well, I am working on it, but perfection is not very tolerant, so I endorse other options for the imperfect. :evil:

ThisDinosaur
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Re: in which brute says things about libertarianism

Post by ThisDinosaur »

Riggerjack wrote:
Mon Jun 25, 2018 12:18 pm
Oh. Well, we have a overlapping net of strong government regulations currently, so I assume you are happy with our current solutions?
No.
Riggerjack wrote:
Mon Jun 25, 2018 12:18 pm
Or were you simply hoping to say "externalities", and expect the conversation ended there?
Sure.
Riggerjack wrote:
Mon Jun 25, 2018 12:18 pm
It has nothing to do with libertarians, statists,
Disagree. Libertarianism specifically advocates the free market as the solution for most if not all human problems. Pollution is a particularly strong example of how this ideology breaks down. A factory makes a product and makes a profit. The customer buys the product at an 'acceptable' market price. All are enriched. Except for the people down river from the factory who *may* lose more in dollar-denominated healthcare costs, work years, and life-quality years (if they could be so denominated) than the other two parties gain.
Riggerjack wrote:
Mon Jun 25, 2018 12:18 pm
The courts ruled that the community was better served by having a local factory, and the local increase in opportunities, than they were without it, even though they had a decrease in quality of life due to pollution.
This is an evaluation that would be better done on a case by case basis. And do you, Riggerjack, of all people, think a single court with an "impartial judge" is best to decide in favor of consumers and industry against the common man?

BRUTE
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Re: in which brute says things about libertarianism

Post by BRUTE »

ThisDinosaur wrote:
Mon Jun 25, 2018 6:07 am
How does a libertarian government address the issue of externalities? I don't see how the problems of air and water pollution are addressed without a strong government regulating the private sector.
how does a non-libertarian government address the issue of externalities? would ThisDinosaur say that it's working?

there are of course tons of private ways to address externalities. courts, private contracts, a sort of voluntary certification or trade organization that only accepts companies that agree not to pollute.

if the argument is that "this might not work perfectly", ditto for every other system including government. it would just work better.
ThisDinosaur wrote:
Mon Jun 25, 2018 6:07 am
What about police and military? Privatization of these seems very likely in the setting of a weak government, and I don't see how that doesn't lead to asymmetric concentration of power.
how does a strong central government not lead to asymmetric concentration of power? that is almost the definition of government (monopoly on violence).

brute would argue that if separation of government power into 3 branches is good, then separation into more branches, keeping each other in check, is better.
ThisDinosaur wrote:
Mon Jun 25, 2018 6:07 am
But I also kind of see the self organization of people into a democratic government (mob) as another expression of freedom. The evidence for this is the fact that there aren't really any libertarian governments because it would be fertile ground for authoritarians to take control.
this is not evidence of it being correct, good, or moral, merely that it happened. societies are generally better off to the degree that they are more libertarian. admittedly it is very difficult to control for other confounding factors.
Last edited by BRUTE on Mon Jun 25, 2018 1:41 pm, edited 1 time in total.

BRUTE
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Re: in which brute says things about libertarianism

Post by BRUTE »

batbatmanne wrote:
Mon Jun 25, 2018 11:06 am
The biggest problem, imo, is that natural opportunities have been denied to those who are not born as a member of the property-owning class. You should look into the Georgist critique of contemporary capitalism/neoclassical economics.
brute is not a student of neoclassical economics.

brute has given up on answering "where do property rights come from" (including to land). at this point, his best answer is "property rights are a social custom that has evolved to minimize violent conflict". some libertarians believe in natural rights, mixing land with labor, or whatever George believed. in that regard, what batbatmanne suggests does not sound too incompatible with a somewhat minarchist libertarian government.

however, brute would suspect that those "not born as a member of the property-owning class" will still be better off in the long run under a system that is freer economically. such a system will increase economic progress x% faster per year due to its freer economy. regulation/redistribution R will improve the lot of population A by y%, but worsen the lot of population B by z%. thus, A is better off under R until economic progress in the freer economy would've increased A's benefits to a higher level than they gain from R, i.e. until cumulative x > y. B will, of course, immediately benefit from not having to suffer R. if enough "economic drag" by regulations R1..Rn is imposed on the economy by thousands of special interest groups, then eventually all humans are suffering at the hands of all other humans, slowing down the entire system dramatically.

as Bastiat said: Government is the great fiction through which everybody endeavors to live at the expense of everybody else.

now the suggested Georgist minarchy sounds more libertarian than anything that exists today, maybe with the exception of Singapore or Hong Kong. so brute would actually be strongly in favor of such a minarchist system.

brute also thinks there is no "just" way to redistribute property (or anything else) or grant property rights (or lack thereof), because there is no objective way to determine justice. justice is in the eye of the beholder, or more realistically, the humans holding power who can enforce their view of justice. for example, brute finds it unjust that humans have to pay taxes without being asked on a line-item basis if they consent to paying.

the libertarian (or is it the classical liberal?) idea of justice, or double-negative golden rule seems the most compatible and objective one to brute: do not unto brute what you would not want brute do unto you. it does not legislate any morals (banning gay marriage or drug use or paying for social security). the only conflicts under it arise at the boundaries of what constitutes an externality. clearly murder, theft, and spilling chemicals in rivers are externalities. but what about listening to loud music at 10am? burning wood in a stove? driving a car? these boundary cases are where the court system comes in, and they change all the time due to technology and cultural shifts. for example, smoking is now considered a huge externality and basically banned from public places, at least in the US, in contrast to just 10-20 years ago. the problem with automobile externalities is about to be alleviated completely by electric cars, or at least shifted to the battery manufacturing site, as far as brute understands.

ThisDinosaur
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Re: in which brute says things about libertarianism

Post by ThisDinosaur »

BRUTE wrote:
Mon Jun 25, 2018 1:15 pm
there are of course tons of private ways to address externalities. courts, private contracts, a sort of voluntary certification or trade organization that only accepts companies that agree not to pollute.
Who enforces the courts and contracts? I suggest a government by the people. I agree that no system works perfectly, but I disagree that libertarian anti-regulation works Better than the current system. But its hard to cite all of the environmental disasters that Didn't happen in the existing system. Since Scott Pruitt has been ousted, we lost the opportunity to run a useful experiment here.
BRUTE wrote:
Mon Jun 25, 2018 1:15 pm
how does a strong central government not lead to asymmetric concentration of power? that is almost the definition of government (monopoly on violence).
A too strong central government is an asymmetrical concentration of power. A too-weak government leads to an asymmetrical concentration of power. I'm not trying to be the anti-libertarian guy here. I'm just weirded out by BRUTE's cult-like devotion to this particular ideology, given the careful way you seem to consider other issues.
BRUTE wrote:
Mon Jun 25, 2018 1:40 pm
brute has given up on answering "where do property rights come from"
...
as Bastiat said: Government is the great fiction through which everybody endeavors to live at the expense of everybody else.
Property rights are also a fiction. We have adapted our instinct to hold territory as a bedrock to our civilization. The story behind wealth is property and the story behind property is that I peed on this before you did.

Riggerjack
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Re: in which brute says things about libertarianism

Post by Riggerjack »

No, I am pointing out that externalities apply to all systems.

Pollution is a thorny one in that violation costs are low, and enforcement costs are high. This favors a system that can apply blanket rules, and ignore costs, like regulation. It is the go to criticism of libertarian ideas, mainly because it compares the strength of our existing system to the weakness of another. It's not even an apples to oranges comparison, it's peeled apples slices vs orange rind.

Resolving externalities is a separate issue from market vs regulation. It is addressing the source of the externalities. All of our current externalities are regulations based. If you find any are not to your liking, perhaps this is a good place to talk about alternative approaches.

But while I am critical of libertarian ideas for the same weaknesses you point out, I am far from ready to concede that libertarians couldn't do it better than our current regulated "solutions".

Riggerjack
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Re: in which brute says things about libertarianism

Post by Riggerjack »

Must type.... Faster. Or at least read the posts that beat me to the punch... :oops:

BRUTE
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Re: in which brute says things about libertarianism

Post by BRUTE »

ThisDinosaur wrote:
Mon Jun 25, 2018 1:56 pm
Who enforces the courts and contracts? I suggest a government by the people. I agree that no system works perfectly, but I disagree that libertarian anti-regulation works Better than the current system. But its hard to cite all of the environmental disasters that Didn't happen in the existing system. Since Scott Pruitt has been ousted, we lost the opportunity to run a useful experiment here.
there are plenty of methods for enforcing contracts besides a government. ostracism, voluntary group memberships/certifications like in Snow Crash, HOA-style territory-based ones (these would effectively be micro-governments).. brute isn't saying he knows exactly what the perfect solution would look like, only that there are plenty of alternatives. how likely is it that the best system ever was devised 200 years ago and it can never be improved?

and yes, it's a shame about Pruitt. brute is pretty anti-EPA and was pretty hyped about Pruitt's image as an anti-regulator, but then it also seems that Pruitt is a dipshit, at least if the media is to be believed (brute has never met Pruitt).

and experiments in economics are almost impossible. this is why economics is harder than other sciences, where one can simply drop a rock and see if it lands on the ground every time.
ThisDinosaur wrote:
Mon Jun 25, 2018 1:56 pm
A too strong central government is an asymmetrical concentration of power. A too-weak government leads to an asymmetrical concentration of power.
this is a pretty common critique of libertarianism, and it might even be true. it seems like a special case of the 4th turning cycle. brute is not sure if this cyclical nature of everything is just inherent in all (social) systems, or if there is a way to reach a stable equilibrium - or where that equilibrium would lie. in the 90s it seemed like one had been reached with "The End of History". right now, it seems pretty obvious that no equilibrium has been reached as of yet.

brute has 2 mental models here:
1)if the cyclical nature is unavoidable, brute thinks the more time spent in the more free/libertarian parts of the cycle, the better. at least then, so goes brute's thinking, it will be an upwards spiral instead of a downwards spiral.
2)if equilibria are possible, brute's suspicion is that they can still shift over time. the stable equilibrium for a medieval society likely looks way different than that for current society. brute suspects that the equilibrium will tend to move over time from zero-sum focused to more positive-sum. so it is possible that right now, libertarianism would lead to an instability and a collapse or power grab, resulting in a power asymmetry. but maybe in 50 or 100 years, that same equilibrium would be way more libertarian. simply because of the progress in technology, wealth, and education.
ThisDinosaur wrote:
Mon Jun 25, 2018 1:56 pm
I'm not trying to be the anti-libertarian guy here. I'm just weirded out by BRUTE's cult-like devotion to this particular ideology, given the careful way you seem to consider other issues.
what can brute say. ThisDinosaur can be assured that brute has given at least as much careful consideration to libertarianism as he has given to anything else. in fact, there's probably nothing else brute has thought and read about as much, maybe except computers.

brute is long over the phase where he's actively trying to convert humans to libertarianism. but if discussions flare up or humans are interested and ask questions, he is happy to talk about it. he has yet to hear a good argument against libertarianism except "that would never work" or "hard to imagine".

in the grand scheme of things, maybe this is a helpful way to think about it: there are myriads of ways to organize a society. there are tons of problems that arise from humans interacting with each other, yet also tons of benefits. the context constantly changes as well (technology, culture, geography, weather, ..). among infinite solutions to an ever changing problem, brute is certain of only one thing: the pinnacle of organizing society has not been reached yet, and even if it was found, it would likely change within days. thus, brute is open to new ideas about how to organize societies. brute thinks the best way to find new, better solutions to a complex set of problems is constant iteration, trial and error.

the reason brute tends towards the direction of libertarianism in where he would like to iterate is informed by his work with complex systems. it is almost impossible to order a pizza for 10 humans and make them all happy. why would humans even attempt to order a single pizza for 330 million humans? therefore decentralized, local solutions appeal to brute.
ThisDinosaur wrote:
Mon Jun 25, 2018 1:56 pm
Property rights are also a fiction. We have adapted our instinct to hold territory as a bedrock to our civilization. The story behind wealth is property and the story behind property is that I peed on this before you did.
brute agrees. fiction == social construct here. but the fiction of property rights can lead to very good outcomes if applied correctly, i.e. to scarce things humans would otherwise fight over. when applied to non-scarce things (intellectual property), it is a terrible idea.

brute regards property rights like he regards table manners. mostly better off with the fiction. open to changing it where it's not working.

ThisDinosaur
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Re: in which brute says things about libertarianism

Post by ThisDinosaur »

I think the cyclical thing is partly driven by people trying to overcorrect for the problem they are most familiar with. The most recent one. They inadvertently find themselves trying solutions that have been rejected 2+ generations before, or even romanticizing the people who tried them.

Because I am aware of this phenomena, and because I know intelligent people often disagree, I'm extra careful not to get too attached to any one system of thinking. This has the tendency to make me a contrarian prick. Its also made me suspicious of all forms of tribalism. Libertarianism appears to be growing in importance as a tribe. Its certainly the most important of the "third" parties available in the US, and rattling the Two Party System was one of my motives when I was considering voting for Gary Johson (I didn't).

I guess I'm of the opinion that there is some benefit to the unincorporated individual if the powerful groups are all distracted by squabbling, accomplishing nothing.

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Re: in which brute says things about libertarianism

Post by 7Wannabe5 »

Libertarian in the sheets. Communitarian in the streets. That's the way 7WB5 rolls.

daylen
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Re: in which brute says things about libertarianism

Post by daylen »

@ThisDinosaur I share your view on decentralizing attachment to systems. I can also see your point on the rising importance of libertarianism. Due to the growing polorization of right and left, both parties have spawned populations that continue to venture into authoritarian territory (neo-marxism in particular). At the same time, the group near the (center, libertarian) part of (right-left, authoritarian-libertarian) space is expanding. What this means is that the political dimension of authoritarian-libertarian is starting to become more important.

One advantage that the center-libertarian group has is collaboration. Generally, people in this group can argue their sides without much threat of complementary schismogenesis occurring. This is partly because libertarians can genreally agree that liberty is the most important value (however it is defined) and negotiate from there. On the authoritarian end (or at least not libertarian), the alt-left and the alt-right do not collaborate at all even though a left and right government both converge onto the same system when navigating to authoritarian land.

Interesting related video.. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rpb-COhbMIM

chenda
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Re: in which brute says things about libertarianism

Post by chenda »

Libertarianism may have some value as a useful counter-weight to government or social overreach; I can't see libertarian becoming, say, a white supremacist, because it would be an absurd contradiction.

But the question remains - why hasn't an economically successful, developed society ever practiced it ? (I am bit bemused by the reference to Singapore, a very authoritarian nation) Not been rhetorical, though this interesting article might provide answers https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/07/maga ... -myth.html

That is not to say smaller government models are necessarily unviable. There is though a obvious split between market/individualist anarchism vs. collectivist/socialist anarchism, and the sort of sui generis ideas like the previously mentioned Georgist, or Mutualism. These I think are much more realistic models to consider.

ThisDinosaur
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Re: in which brute says things about libertarianism

Post by ThisDinosaur »

@daylen Re: Your Weinstein video.

Weinstein said: "If you push any value to an extreme, it becomes a dystopian nightmare."

Exactly.

When he's talking about how left and right are arguing about shit that doesn't matter, it reminded me of a SlateStarCodex article about why it is that political parties do that. Essentially, most ideas are widely agreed to be either obviously good or obviously repugnant. So an inordinate amount of time in politics is spent quibbling about nonsense. Add in some tribalism and people start straight up hating their own family members for wearing red hats.

Riggerjack
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Re: in which brute says things about libertarianism

Post by Riggerjack »

As well they should. Redhat was just... Oh, you were talking about actual hats. Nevermind. :oops:

BRUTE
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Re: in which brute says things about libertarianism

Post by BRUTE »

chenda wrote:
Mon Jun 25, 2018 4:57 pm
But the question remains - why hasn't an economically successful, developed society ever practiced it ?
brute answers this in his original post. in short: the same can be said of any idea before it's been successfully done the first time, for example liberal democracy. because the viability of ideas is contextual, and the context is not right (yet?) for libertarianism.

at the same time, most individual parts of libertarianism and even anarcho-capitalism have been done, and even very successfully for hundreds or thousands of years. there are multiple examples of essentially stateless, but not lawless, societies, e.g. medieval iceland. David D. Friedman talks about these in his book "Legal systems very different from our own".

i.e. all the individual pieces of libertarianism have been shown to work, at least at times, on their own. brute thinks maybe once the world population of humans tapers out around ~10-12 billion, and the average standard of living approaches that of today's Europe, maybe humans will get their shit together and stop thinking in the short term, zero-sum ways of today. then libertarianism on a bigger scale could happen.
chenda wrote:
Mon Jun 25, 2018 4:57 pm
(I am bit bemused by the reference to Singapore, a very authoritarian nation)
in certain ways, yes. Singapore has no capital gains tax, a 22% flat income tax. those alone are incredibly non-authoritarian if one considers the economic aspects of life important. some aspects of life there are certainly less free than in the west, e.g. chewing bubble gum. on the other hand, brute is allowed to drink beer on the sidewalk in Singapore, whereas that's illegal in the US.

it is hard to average the authoritarian-ness of Singapore vs. e.g. the US, because unlike taxes, almost all domains of the state are hard to quantify. what percentage of free speech does Singapore forbid vs. the US? what percentage of surveillance on their own human people do they undertake?

it also depends on the individual asked. brute knows plenty of humans, many from India, that moved to Singapore and love it. they couldn't care less about chewing gum rules or free speech, they're just happy they get to be rich. now this can be mocked or looked down upon, but only by someone who hasn't been denied the ability to become rich. one Indian friend actually told brute the story about how well he is treated at Changi International Airport as a brown person vs. trying to enter western countries. so even in that comparison, the perceived authoritarianism is not completely one-sided.

Hobbes
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Re: in which brute says things about libertarianism

Post by Hobbes »

BRUTE wrote:
Mon Jun 25, 2018 1:40 pm
batbatmanne wrote:
Mon Jun 25, 2018 11:06 am
The biggest problem, imo, is that natural opportunities have been denied to those who are not born as a member of the property-owning class. You should look into the Georgist critique of contemporary capitalism/neoclassical economics.
brute has given up on answering "where do property rights come from" (including to land). at this point, his best answer is "property rights are a social custom that has evolved to minimize violent conflict". some libertarians believe in natural rights, mixing land with labor, or whatever George believed. in that regard, what batbatmanne suggests does not sound too incompatible with a somewhat minarchist libertarian government.
I had been driving at the lack of natural opportunities, as batmanmanne said so much better than I. I'm only vaguely familiar with George's critique, and I wasn't aware of 'minarchist libertarian' at all. When I get a chance, I have some studying ahead of me :geek:
Thanks!

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