Ahh, I give ol' Ayn a hard time. I think she is boring, highly overrated, too verbose, not very clear headed and a slight bit sociopathic (she may not actually come out and mock altruism, but she doesn't seem to understand it from a personal perspective. She also has a disturbing love of power and her little rape fantasies are amusing.)
It's her followers I have a really hard time with. Not, of course, you kind sir. The other followers. You know which ones I mean. She probably wouldn't like them either. Comes with the territory. In fact I like to think that most great religeous leaders and philosophers would secretely hate and despise their followers. But that's just me being an elitist twit.
Christ, do you people not even READ what I post? I'm saying everything we do is self interested. I'm saying that recognizing this is a good thing (well, I'm saying it now, but it was implied.)
And I'm also saying that lazy good for nothing short sighted selfish assholes love to use Ayn Rand's "philosophy" as an excuse to be lazy good for nothing short sighted selfish assholes. Look, be whatever kind of person you want to be. I respect your right to do that. But I don't have to repsect you (not you, PepeGSay, you the hypothetical shortsighted selfish asshole).
You get it. Acknowledge the selfishness in every action, but still find reasons to help others. It makes you feel good. And in general natural things that make us feel good do so for evolutionary reasons, because they are smarter from a survival standpoint. So the reason that people feel good about helping other people is that in the long run it helps us survive.
So just let me make fun of the stupid people who don't like helping others, and therefore are less likely to survive, mate, and pass on their genes. Dumbasses!
I SAID that all motivation boils down to selfish motivations. My point was that some types of selfish motivations, like the kind that people traditionally call selfish, are plain STUPIDER than other types of selfish motivations (like the ones people traditionally call altruistic.)
So to put it in words a dumbass like you can understand: altruism is selfish but smart, while pure selfishness is selfish and dumb. Of course altruistic people are selfish, it's the only thing anyone can be, but we aren't stupid.
Like I said, I'll defend your right to be purely selfish, but I'm going to call stupidity when I see it.
Hehe, my ideal world would be run open source style. You don't have to contribute, but everyone knows if you do or you don't, and your social standing in the community is based entirely on the quality of what you give. Think of all the effort people put into gaining social standing, now think about a society where the only way to gain it is to actually do good for the community. Yeah, yeah, I know the free market is SUPPOSED to work this way what with the invisible hand and all, but I think absolute freedom of information, with all that entails (no privacy, for one thing) would be required to actually make it work. Of course, absolute freedom of information would be required to make my plan work, too, otherwise people would find some way to game the system like they game the free market. So I guess what I'm saying is DOWN WITH PRIVACY! EVERYONE IN EVERYONE ELSE'S BUSINESS, ALL THE TIME! It's the only path to Utopia, comrades.
People who use the crazy straw man arguments of Ayn Rand tend to be the type of people who want an excuse to feel good about doing nothing. Her philiosophy is the ultimate sop for the supremely egotistical. It's a short sighted kind of selfishness, though, the same kind of selfishness that leads to things like procrastination. "If it feels good now, do it! " is not a great philosophy.
Sure, in the end everything we do, we do for selfish reasons, but I like helping people. Not because I like them to bow or scrape, not because I feel better than them, but because I feel like I am building a world where people help each other, a world where, if the situation were reversed I would be helped. I also feel good about not having desperate miserable people around me.
The irony is that Ayn Rand's philosophy is, " To hell with everybody, as long as you're feeling virtuous about it. And I'll tell you how to feel virtuous about ANY damn thing you want to feel virtuous about, as long as it isn't helping someone else! Remember: Helping is Hurting, Charity is Theft, a Hand Up is a Slap in the Face, Sharing is Selfish, Only Egotism is True Loving Compassion."
Ayn Rand and people like her who consider any kind of charity or compassion as selfish egotism are the laziest type of self involved, egotistical, idiots. I will defend their right to spout their crazy nonsense, but that doesn't mean I have to like it or that I have to say it isn't B.S.
You don't want to help others? Fine. Don't, see if I care, but if you are going to mock me for caring and for acting out of compassion and assign to me the basest of motives, I am for sure going to point out how selfish, egotistical, and short sighted you are. There are plenty of good reasons for wanting to help others that don't revolve around being a self important prick.
Listen, lad. I've built this education system up from nothing. When I started here, all there was was swamp. The king said I was daft to build a school in a swamp, but I built it all the same, just to show 'em. It sank into the swamp. So, I built a second one. That sank into the swamp. So I built a third one. That burned down, fell over, then sank into the swamp. But the fourth one stayed up. An' that's what your gonna get, lad -- the strongest school in these islands.
Please, you have done nothing but engage in ad-hominem attacks for this entire thread. You have called anyone who disagrees with you childish, an idiot, or worse. You play the game of excusing the behavior of one party by comparing it to the behavior of the other, as if two wrongs somehow make a right.
The only people you are going to impress with those kind of arguments are small minded, bigoted idiots who have already made up their minds anyway. Preaching to the choir may be fun, and yes I'll admit I do it to, even up to and including the things I have accused you of, but not for EVERY SINGLE POST IN A THREAD, for crying out loud! Here's an idea: try making at least one rational, well reasoned post per thread.
Well, I definitely think there are few truly indigenous peoples. By indegenous I mean didn't have to kick anyone else out. Maybe some rainforest tribes? Native Australians?
Aslo, the early history of the Pacific Islanders is not well known. There is still some debate about where they came from and how they migrated. The Micronesian, Melanesian and Polynesian (Small Island, Black Island, and Many Island) cultures are distinct but related. What amazes me the most about them is that they could reliably navigate over thousands of miles of open ocean without a compass.
Right about the Basques, anyway. I stand by what I said about the Polynesians. They most definitely conquered the original inhabitants. From this page on Hawaiian history I quote:
The Marquesans first settled in 100 AD and the Marquesans reaching Hawaii, the most geographically remote archipelago in the world, around 400 AD. The Maori landing in New Zealand in 700 AD and the Tahitians beginning to arrive in Hawaii between 1100-1200 AD. The conquering war chief, Pa'ao from Tahiti around 1300 AD.
Sorry, I lived there with a native Hawaiian and studied polynesian culture, and you are flat out wrong. My room mate was heavily into the Hawaiian Sovereignty movement, so I probably know a lot more about the subject than you.
There are two types of native Hawaiian people, the peaceful shorter, darker skinned folks who lived there prior to 800 AD, and the taller, lighter skinned Polynesians who conquered the islands around that time. The legends of "menehuna" or little people refer to these original inhabitants or more likely their gods, much like the Tu'atha de Danann of the Celts became fairies and elves to later conquerors.
The Polynesian descended Hawaiians were certainly a sovereign nation, but let's not put them on a pedestal. They were a feudalistic hereditary aristocracy where the serfs had very few rights. They were very warlike, with local warlords from the various islands launching frequent raids on their neighbors until the outright conquest of all the islands by King Kamehameha with the help of his white allies and their cannons.
As a footnote, there are basically three pacific cultures, the warlike feudal Polynesians, the clan based Micronesians, and the merit based Melanesians. Polynesians were the Vikings of the Pacific, when youger sons of landed nobles didn't inherit land, the would frequently pack up a bunch of plants, animals and warriors in a double hulled sailing ship of up to 100 feet in length and go of to find some uninhabited or easily conquered island to settle. The Micronesians are matrilineal , clan based and peaceful. The Melanesians are merit based as I said, meaning the leaders are whoever is the best at a particular thing. Likely the original Hawaiians were Micronesian, or possibly Melanesian though the Melansian Islands are much further away than either the Polynesian or Micronesian Islands.
That, my friend, is a damn fine idea. Would it work though? I've been in quite a few marches and protests and many people who go to these things think of them as a big holiday, a fun kind of festival where they can hang out and meet members of the opposite sex while doing something that makes them feel like they are changing the world. This is not to denigrate all the really great activists out there who really do work hard to carry out their ideals, nor the people who put their lives on the line to protest. I've known plenty of them as well.
Canvassing is more like actual work, less social, and much less fun. I've done a lot of that too. Could we convince people to do it? Maybe we could garauntee they would be paired up according to their sexual preference. Kind of a combined flash mob/canvassing/dating service. Now that would really motivate the troops!
Basques are Islamic peoples who emigrated to Europe. Hawaiians are descended from Polynesian conquerors. Neither are original inhabitants at all. Don't know about the Nicobar Islanders.
My '05 Subaru Imprezza does a damn good job here in Albuquerque. It takes about 5 minutes to completely cool the car when it has been sitting in the sun all day, and it's been over 100 during the day here recently. The air coming out gets cold in about 30 seconds. And I have never seen the engine temperature vary at all after it hits operating temperature, no matter what the conditions.
Yet, according to your interpretation all other property is public. It follows that the constituent elements from which I am made were once public property. Thus either I am public property, or through possession of the elements of which I am made they become mine and thus not all property is theft.
False dichotomy. You don't own you. No one owns you. You aren't the materials you are made up of. On average, in seven years time you won't have a single same atom in your body that you have today.
To whom do I owe recompense for claiming unheld property? Why?
To everyone in the world. For reducing the choices we have.
How did the "public" gain claim to public property? By what right did they do so?
Because before someone owned the resource, everyone shared it. Anyone could use it. After someone took it, the rest of us couldn't use it. Why should we let someone exclude us from doing what we could before?
I disagree. Natural rights are everything it is within my power to do to assure my survival. Society is an attempt to voluntarily abridge some natural rights to better secure others. I.E. I give up the right to try and kill you, under the understanding that you will not kill me.
We use the term rights when perhaps ability would be a better description. Natural rights would then be the unabriged natural abilities which do not conflict between individuals.between individuals." Note the plural. Between individuals, i.e. society.
Besides that, the right of property does conflict between individuals. You take it, I can't use it, why should I agree to that?
This was exactly the point I was making, by signing such a contract I am clearly taking property from the downstream owner, which was not mine to sign away.
But everything you do in this interconnected world impacts someone negatively. If you don't have the right to pollute your stream because of someone downstream, what right do you have to eat your food, breath your air? All right, a bit over the top, but you see my point? Taking property is like polluting the stream.
Look, I'm not saying the concept of property is bad, I just want to hear some good reasons for it. As it is, I think of property as a contract. The rest of us agree that you can exclude us from it in exchange for you upholding the same right in us, and contributing to the common good.
If you do not believe that the individual is capable of making intelligent choices on his own, how then can another individual with authority be any better? Inevitably this authority will act in the same greedy and selfish manner. He/She would take payoffs to ignore the pollution etc. How then does this improve the situation?
Ah, the old conundrum. Let me be clear on my position. I used to be a hard core anarchist. Not the bomb throwing kind (a media myth to discredit the movement) but the Trotsky kind. Very much like a Libertarian, if you care to look into it. I still believe fundamentally in the idea of self government. I have looked into communism and rejected it. Do you know that communism was originally supposed to be a stepping stone to anarchy? The communists just didn't think the people could get there on their own, and there is some merit to the idea (think of the chaos if we just did away with all government tomorrow.) But ultimately I believe in the individual.
However, I think for self governance to work, things need to be far more equitable and fair than they are now. There are huge imbalances in the distribution of wealth that do not arise from merit. Some inequality is perfectly fair. The excellent and hard working should receive more than the lazy and stupid. But no one is worth hundreds or thousands of times more than another. Why should I agree to a valuation system that creates such imbalance?
Property rights are important for a healthy society. but it is important to realize where they really come from. They don't come from our ability to
You might not get the results you were thinking of. You need to refine your search. Try "President Bush," "hot wet bush" or perhaps "shaved bush" depending on what you were actually trying to find.
]]What could you possibly labor on or with that wasn't public to begin with?
The ultimate conclusion to this line of reasoning is that I myself am public property. Which leads to a whole set of justifications for power over what I do with my finite time here on earth.
No, you can do what you will with your time. No one owns you. You just can't take from the publicly held resource, or even unheld resources without some recompense. Even taking an unused resource is limiting my choice to use it in the future, why should I agree to that? Will you use force to uphold your decision to take it? Without society, you have only the 'right' to take what you can hold by force. With society, we can come up with rules that govern such things. You may get the rights to do certain things that limit the choices of others, but those rights may come with strings attached. Those strings may include the agreement to uphold said rights for others, even those you don't care about. They may also include the responsibility to contribute something back to the society that granted them. Don't like it? You still have the right to try to take what you can hold by force. But society might not approve of that, and would be justified in responding with force. Or you can move on to someplace where no one will contest what you have taken. No one is saying they own you, but no one is saying that you should be given any resource without some responsibility to the ones who agreed to uphold your right to take it. That would be you stealing from others.
This IMO is a fallacy. Look to the animal kingdom. Territory, and its defense is a natural and ingrained instinct. Accordingly by my natural rights I have the right to "take" property owned by no one and improve it so I may survive.
There are two fallacies here. First, this is a common form of the naturalistic fallacy. You are attempting to argue what should be from what is. Second, there are no such things as natural rights. Rights only exist in relation to society. Without society, there would be no need for the concept of rights. The only rights anyone has are those that everyone agrees to uphold. And why should I or anyone else agree to uphold your right to take for yourself what was previously shared by all? There may very well be some good reasons, but you haven't given them here.
If I do not agree to the terms of your society, how then do you reconcile my rights to public land? Surely there can be no moral basis for claiming that the majority has a greater right to sightseeing than the outcast has in attempting to farm for survival.
Society has a greater moral claim to the land than you do only insomuch as the land might benefit a greater number if used by all than exclusively by you. However, you only have two options in getting everbody else to agree to your concept of property. The use of force, which we both agree is wrong, or accepting that property is not a natural right, but a contract between you and society that comes with some some reciprocal responsibilities.
]]People have intrinsic motivations besides greed. In fact, modern economic research shows that fairness end reciprocity are two concepts with more motivational power than pure self interest
I would disagree. Fairness and reciprocity are there because of self interest. It is an aquired survival skill, thus very strongly tied to self interest.
I am not saying that it doesn't boil down to self interest. In fact, everything does. However, it is a genetic form of enlightened self interest. Cooperation is a survival strategy that is more effective than competition.
]]And it still does not answer the question of externalities, those things beneficial or detrimental to parties other than those involved in a transaction
(your response snipped here, as it simply doesn't address my question)
I don't want to take your or anyone else's labor. That at least is one thing we can agree on. Coercion is wrong, stealing is wrong, the use of force is wrong. However, you can't labor without taking from the public domain. What could you possibly labor on or with that wasn't public to begin with? That land you irrigated? By moving in and working it, you have stolen choice from me. Before, I could go there to hunt, to gather, or just to meditate on the natural beauty. Now I cannot. Who gave you the right to take what had been freely shared by all and make it your own? With any resource it is the same, though it may have the labor of individuals in it now, and those individuals are entitled to the fruits of their labor, originally, it belonged to all.
I do not wish to sheild anyone from ALL the consequences of their actions, yet it occurs to me that having a shield from consequences is precisely the reason we humans form groups. If I am sick, or made a mistake in hunting and have no food I do not need to die for my mistakes. That should be the bottom line. No one should have to die or suffer unbearably for their mistakes. Those who do not want to be a party to the bargain that no human being lets any other human being starve to death or die of exposure should be outcast, to live or die on their own, not a part of human society, as they so obviously wish. Beyond making ure that everyone is provided with the basics, sure, every one should be free to do as they wish. People who have a lot tend to think they can do without that kind of insurance, but being part of society, gaining the benefits of society, they should help pay, or be outcast. Think of it as a membership fee.
You have engaged in a kind of slippery slope argument that is untennable in the light of research and common sense. People have intrinsic motivations besides greed. In fact, modern economic research shows that fairness end reciprocity are two concepts with more motivational power than pure self interest in a large majority of the population. Your sort of cynical view of humanity is in fact the thing that is really creating the problem. Google for "fairness reciprocity economic research" and you will see what I mean.
You have also given short shrift to the problem of externalities, public goods and the free rider problem. Look, anyone can claim that something doesn't benefit them, that they shouldn't have to help pay for it, but if that were allowed in the case of public goods (like clean air) that all can benefit from, then no one would pay to help maintiain those goods.
Free market evangelists use this as an argument that EVERYTHING should be privately owned, but since everything was orginally public, who gets paid when things go private? All of us? Besides, a group of people acting democratically can manage a resource at least as well as a single private owner can. And it still does not answer the question of externalities, those things beneficial or detrimental to parties other than those involved in a transaction. The free market doesn't deal with those things well at all. What is your solution?
I honestly want to know, as this is something I have been thinking about for some time. Let's try dropping the antagonisytic tone and try to learn from one another. I suspect we have more in common than you might think. Maybe you could stop calling my philosophy evil and I could stop implying that all libertarians are selfish bastards?
I never said my set of morals was better than yours, I never claimed I wanted to TAKE your labor, and I never said I advocated violence, so quite with the hysterics.
When Herve died, he left a lot of money to a charity he set up. Their goal is to make travel easier and more acommodating to little people. They have set up small condos all around the world, where everything is scaled for people his size. They have a trust fund set up so that any adult under four foot six can stay there free of charge. Do you know what they call them? Herve Villachez's Stay Free Mini Pads.
Badump cha. Thank you, I'll be here all night. Try the veal, it's to die for.
They are owned by a big media conglomerate that serves the interest of its wealthy shareholders, and that is to brainwash ignorant chimps like you into spouting their lies for them. Which you have done admirably. Your corporate masters will be proud of you.
Contract of all involved parties is a hard concept, since in an inherently interconnected world, anything person A and B do together also effects the rest of us. How do you propose solving the problem of externalities through contract alone? How will you keep your neighbor from polluting your air and water? Who will own the public infrastructure such as roads or power lines that are natural monopolies and thus subject to abuse? (or do you think we should let the free marklet sort it out and all be free to choose from any of 20 roads and seventy powerlines all coming to our house?)
Ownership is a social concept, nothing to do with the individual. If you were the only person on earth, ownership would mean as much to you as water does to a fish.
All ownership at the social level originates from theft. What was once a public good, owned by no one, is through the power of some authority declared private, and all others are kept by force from using that previously public good.
Helping others is a public good. Poor, sick and hungry humans are desperate humans, who will kill cheat and steal. Killing or jailing them all is not as economical as making sure all humans have a basic level of food and housing that will keep them from turning into dangerous animals. If I pay to get rid of a pack of wolves stalking the town, you benefit from it as much as I. Why shouldn't you be forced to help pay for it?
The way most libertarians yammer on about contracts makes me think you are all the type who would go to dinner and dash out tithout paying because you didn't sign a contract. Most libertarians want all the benefits of society without paying for them. They think that magically the free market will provide for all the things that taxes do now without costing a dime more, and that all the sick, poor and hungry will just conveniently die or suddenly become rich, fat and happy instead of rising up and kicking their sorry libertarian asses when all the services are cut off. Libertarians are the kind of idealists who sound noble to many on first hearing, but the noble smoke screen of personal responsibility hides a selfish streak a mile wide in most of them.
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Ahh, I give ol' Ayn a hard time. I think she is boring, highly overrated, too verbose, not very clear headed and a slight bit sociopathic (she may not actually come out and mock altruism, but she doesn't seem to understand it from a personal perspective. She also has a disturbing love of power and her little rape fantasies are amusing.)
It's her followers I have a really hard time with. Not, of course, you kind sir. The other followers. You know which ones I mean. She probably wouldn't like them either. Comes with the territory. In fact I like to think that most great religeous leaders and philosophers would secretely hate and despise their followers. But that's just me being an elitist twit.
Christ, do you people not even READ what I post? I'm saying everything we do is self interested. I'm saying that recognizing this is a good thing (well, I'm saying it now, but it was implied.)
And I'm also saying that lazy good for nothing short sighted selfish assholes love to use Ayn Rand's "philosophy" as an excuse to be lazy good for nothing short sighted selfish assholes. Look, be whatever kind of person you want to be. I respect your right to do that. But I don't have to repsect you (not you, PepeGSay, you the hypothetical shortsighted selfish asshole).
You get it. Acknowledge the selfishness in every action, but still find reasons to help others. It makes you feel good. And in general natural things that make us feel good do so for evolutionary reasons, because they are smarter from a survival standpoint. So the reason that people feel good about helping other people is that in the long run it helps us survive.
So just let me make fun of the stupid people who don't like helping others, and therefore are less likely to survive, mate, and pass on their genes. Dumbasses!
I SAID that all motivation boils down to selfish motivations. My point was that some types of selfish motivations, like the kind that people traditionally call selfish, are plain STUPIDER than other types of selfish motivations (like the ones people traditionally call altruistic.)
So to put it in words a dumbass like you can understand: altruism is selfish but smart, while pure selfishness is selfish and dumb. Of course altruistic people are selfish, it's the only thing anyone can be, but we aren't stupid.
Like I said, I'll defend your right to be purely selfish, but I'm going to call stupidity when I see it.
Hehe, my ideal world would be run open source style. You don't have to contribute, but everyone knows if you do or you don't, and your social standing in the community is based entirely on the quality of what you give. Think of all the effort people put into gaining social standing, now think about a society where the only way to gain it is to actually do good for the community. Yeah, yeah, I know the free market is SUPPOSED to work this way what with the invisible hand and all, but I think absolute freedom of information, with all that entails (no privacy, for one thing) would be required to actually make it work. Of course, absolute freedom of information would be required to make my plan work, too, otherwise people would find some way to game the system like they game the free market. So I guess what I'm saying is DOWN WITH PRIVACY! EVERYONE IN EVERYONE ELSE'S BUSINESS, ALL THE TIME! It's the only path to Utopia, comrades.
People who use the crazy straw man arguments of Ayn Rand tend to be the type of people who want an excuse to feel good about doing nothing. Her philiosophy is the ultimate sop for the supremely egotistical. It's a short sighted kind of selfishness, though, the same kind of selfishness that leads to things like procrastination. "If it feels good now, do it! " is not a great philosophy.
Sure, in the end everything we do, we do for selfish reasons, but I like helping people. Not because I like them to bow or scrape, not because I feel better than them, but because I feel like I am building a world where people help each other, a world where, if the situation were reversed I would be helped. I also feel good about not having desperate miserable people around me.
The irony is that Ayn Rand's philosophy is, " To hell with everybody, as long as you're feeling virtuous about it. And I'll tell you how to feel virtuous about ANY damn thing you want to feel virtuous about, as long as it isn't helping someone else! Remember: Helping is Hurting, Charity is Theft, a Hand Up is a Slap in the Face, Sharing is Selfish, Only Egotism is True Loving Compassion."
Ayn Rand and people like her who consider any kind of charity or compassion as selfish egotism are the laziest type of self involved, egotistical, idiots. I will defend their right to spout their crazy nonsense, but that doesn't mean I have to like it or that I have to say it isn't B.S.
You don't want to help others? Fine. Don't, see if I care, but if you are going to mock me for caring and for acting out of compassion and assign to me the basest of motives, I am for sure going to point out how selfish, egotistical, and short sighted you are. There are plenty of good reasons for wanting to help others that don't revolve around being a self important prick.
Listen, lad. I've built this education system up from nothing. When I started here, all there was was swamp. The king said I was daft to build a school in a swamp, but I built it all the same, just to show 'em. It sank into the swamp. So, I built a second one. That sank into the swamp. So I built a third one. That burned down, fell over, then sank into the swamp. But the fourth one stayed up. An' that's what your gonna get, lad -- the strongest school in these islands.
No, no. I can't remember the whole thing, but the punchline is, "so the hooker says, 'hey, that's not a banana!'"
Please, you have done nothing but engage in ad-hominem attacks for this entire thread. You have called anyone who disagrees with you childish, an idiot, or worse. You play the game of excusing the behavior of one party by comparing it to the behavior of the other, as if two wrongs somehow make a right.
The only people you are going to impress with those kind of arguments are small minded, bigoted idiots who have already made up their minds anyway. Preaching to the choir may be fun, and yes I'll admit I do it to, even up to and including the things I have accused you of, but not for EVERY SINGLE POST IN A THREAD, for crying out loud! Here's an idea: try making at least one rational, well reasoned post per thread.
Well, I definitely think there are few truly indigenous peoples. By indegenous I mean didn't have to kick anyone else out. Maybe some rainforest tribes? Native Australians?
Aslo, the early history of the Pacific Islanders is not well known. There is still some debate about where they came from and how they migrated. The Micronesian, Melanesian and Polynesian (Small Island, Black Island, and Many Island) cultures are distinct but related. What amazes me the most about them is that they could reliably navigate over thousands of miles of open ocean without a compass.
A quick google on the subject shows you are completely right. My bad.
Sorry, I lived there with a native Hawaiian and studied polynesian culture, and you are flat out wrong. My room mate was heavily into the Hawaiian Sovereignty movement, so I probably know a lot more about the subject than you.
There are two types of native Hawaiian people, the peaceful shorter, darker skinned folks who lived there prior to 800 AD, and the taller, lighter skinned Polynesians who conquered the islands around that time. The legends of "menehuna" or little people refer to these original inhabitants or more likely their gods, much like the Tu'atha de Danann of the Celts became fairies and elves to later conquerors.
The Polynesian descended Hawaiians were certainly a sovereign nation, but let's not put them on a pedestal. They were a feudalistic hereditary aristocracy where the serfs had very few rights. They were very warlike, with local warlords from the various islands launching frequent raids on their neighbors until the outright conquest of all the islands by King Kamehameha with the help of his white allies and their cannons.
As a footnote, there are basically three pacific cultures, the warlike feudal Polynesians, the clan based Micronesians, and the merit based Melanesians. Polynesians were the Vikings of the Pacific, when youger sons of landed nobles didn't inherit land, the would frequently pack up a bunch of plants, animals and warriors in a double hulled sailing ship of up to 100 feet in length and go of to find some uninhabited or easily conquered island to settle. The Micronesians are matrilineal , clan based and peaceful. The Melanesians are merit based as I said, meaning the leaders are whoever is the best at a particular thing. Likely the original Hawaiians were Micronesian, or possibly Melanesian though the Melansian Islands are much further away than either the Polynesian or Micronesian Islands.
That, my friend, is a damn fine idea. Would it work though? I've been in quite a few marches and protests and many people who go to these things think of them as a big holiday, a fun kind of festival where they can hang out and meet members of the opposite sex while doing something that makes them feel like they are changing the world. This is not to denigrate all the really great activists out there who really do work hard to carry out their ideals, nor the people who put their lives on the line to protest. I've known plenty of them as well.
Canvassing is more like actual work, less social, and much less fun. I've done a lot of that too. Could we convince people to do it? Maybe we could garauntee they would be paired up according to their sexual preference. Kind of a combined flash mob/canvassing/dating service. Now that would really motivate the troops!
Basques are Islamic peoples who emigrated to Europe. Hawaiians are descended from Polynesian conquerors. Neither are original inhabitants at all. Don't know about the Nicobar Islanders.
Just to nit-pick a little.
My '05 Subaru Imprezza does a damn good job here in Albuquerque. It takes about 5 minutes to completely cool the car when it has been sitting in the sun all day, and it's been over 100 during the day here recently. The air coming out gets cold in about 30 seconds. And I have never seen the engine temperature vary at all after it hits operating temperature, no matter what the conditions.
[srightmer@dfelker ~]$ tar -xvzf democracy-1.0.tar.gz ./configure --bythepeople --branches=3 --style=republic --enable-executive --enable-legislative=bicameral --enable-judicial --add-module=billOfRights 1>&2 /dev/null /dev/null
[srightmer@dfelker ~]$ ln -s democracy-1.0 democracy
[srightmer@dfelker ~]$ cd democracy
[srightmer@dfelker ~]$
[srightmer@dfelker ~]$ make 1>&2
[srightmer@dfelker ~]$ su
[srightmer@dfelker ~]# make install
Simple!
Yet, according to your interpretation all other property is public. It follows that the constituent elements from which I am made were once public property. Thus either I am public property, or through possession of the elements of which I am made they become mine and thus not all property is theft.
False dichotomy. You don't own you. No one owns you. You aren't the materials you are made up of. On average, in seven years time you won't have a single same atom in your body that you have today.
To whom do I owe recompense for claiming unheld property? Why?
To everyone in the world. For reducing the choices we have.
How did the "public" gain claim to public property? By what right did they do so?
Because before someone owned the resource, everyone shared it. Anyone could use it. After someone took it, the rest of us couldn't use it. Why should we let someone exclude us from doing what we could before?
I disagree. Natural rights are everything it is within my power to do to assure my survival. Society is an attempt to voluntarily abridge some natural rights to better secure others. I.E. I give up the right to try and kill you, under the understanding that you will not kill me.
We use the term rights when perhaps ability would be a better description. Natural rights would then be the unabriged natural abilities which do not conflict between individuals.between individuals." Note the plural. Between individuals, i.e. society.
Besides that, the right of property does conflict between individuals. You take it, I can't use it, why should I agree to that?
This was exactly the point I was making, by signing such a contract I am clearly taking property from the downstream owner, which was not mine to sign away.
But everything you do in this interconnected world impacts someone negatively. If you don't have the right to pollute your stream because of someone downstream, what right do you have to eat your food, breath your air? All right, a bit over the top, but you see my point? Taking property is like polluting the stream.
Look, I'm not saying the concept of property is bad, I just want to hear some good reasons for it. As it is, I think of property as a contract. The rest of us agree that you can exclude us from it in exchange for you upholding the same right in us, and contributing to the common good.
If you do not believe that the individual is capable of making intelligent choices on his own, how then can another individual with authority be any better? Inevitably this authority will act in the same greedy and selfish manner. He/She would take payoffs to ignore the pollution etc. How then does this improve the situation?
Ah, the old conundrum. Let me be clear on my position. I used to be a hard core anarchist. Not the bomb throwing kind (a media myth to discredit the movement) but the Trotsky kind. Very much like a Libertarian, if you care to look into it. I still believe fundamentally in the idea of self government. I have looked into communism and rejected it. Do you know that communism was originally supposed to be a stepping stone to anarchy? The communists just didn't think the people could get there on their own, and there is some merit to the idea (think of the chaos if we just did away with all government tomorrow.) But ultimately I believe in the individual.
However, I think for self governance to work, things need to be far more equitable and fair than they are now. There are huge imbalances in the distribution of wealth that do not arise from merit. Some inequality is perfectly fair. The excellent and hard working should receive more than the lazy and stupid. But no one is worth hundreds or thousands of times more than another. Why should I agree to a valuation system that creates such imbalance?
Property rights are important for a healthy society. but it is important to realize where they really come from. They don't come from our ability to
You might not get the results you were thinking of. You need to refine your search. Try "President Bush," "hot wet bush" or perhaps "shaved bush" depending on what you were actually trying to find.
post David Lazarus address, phone number and google map coords? I'm interested in, uh, how accessible his house is by large van...
]]What could you possibly labor on or with that wasn't public to begin with?
The ultimate conclusion to this line of reasoning is that I myself am public property.
Which leads to a whole set of justifications for power over what I do with my finite time here on earth.
No, you can do what you will with your time. No one owns you. You just can't take from the publicly held resource, or even unheld resources without some recompense. Even taking an unused resource is limiting my choice to use it in the future, why should I agree to that? Will you use force to uphold your decision to take it? Without society, you have only the 'right' to take what you can hold by force. With society, we can come up with rules that govern such things. You may get the rights to do certain things that limit the choices of others, but those rights may come with strings attached. Those strings may include the agreement to uphold said rights for others, even those you don't care about. They may also include the responsibility to contribute something back to the society that granted them. Don't like it? You still have the right to try to take what you can hold by force. But society might not approve of that, and would be justified in responding with force. Or you can move on to someplace where no one will contest what you have taken. No one is saying they own you, but no one is saying that you should be given any resource without some responsibility to the ones who agreed to uphold your right to take it. That would be you stealing from others.
This IMO is a fallacy. Look to the animal kingdom. Territory, and its defense is a natural and ingrained instinct. Accordingly by my natural rights I have the right to "take" property owned by no one and improve it so I may survive.
There are two fallacies here. First, this is a common form of the naturalistic fallacy. You are attempting to argue what should be from what is. Second, there are no such things as natural rights. Rights only exist in relation to society. Without society, there would be no need for the concept of rights. The only rights anyone has are those that everyone agrees to uphold. And why should I or anyone else agree to uphold your right to take for yourself what was previously shared by all? There may very well be some good reasons, but you haven't given them here.
If I do not agree to the terms of your society, how then do you reconcile my rights to public land? Surely there can be no moral basis for claiming that the majority has a greater right to sightseeing than the outcast has in attempting to farm for survival.
Society has a greater moral claim to the land than you do only insomuch as the land might benefit a greater number if used by all than exclusively by you. However, you only have two options in getting everbody else to agree to your concept of property. The use of force, which we both agree is wrong, or accepting that property is not a natural right, but a contract between you and society that comes with some some reciprocal responsibilities.
]]People have intrinsic motivations besides greed. In fact, modern economic research shows that fairness end reciprocity are two concepts with more motivational power than pure self interest
I would disagree. Fairness and reciprocity are there because of self interest. It is an aquired survival skill, thus very strongly tied to self interest.
I am not saying that it doesn't boil down to self interest. In fact, everything does. However, it is a genetic form of enlightened self interest. Cooperation is a survival strategy that is more effective than competition.
]]And it still does not answer the question of externalities, those things beneficial or detrimental to parties other than those involved in a transaction
(your response snipped here, as it simply doesn't address my question)
By your response, I don't think
I don't want to take your or anyone else's labor. That at least is one thing we can agree on. Coercion is wrong, stealing is wrong, the use of force is wrong. However, you can't labor without taking from the public domain. What could you possibly labor on or with that wasn't public to begin with? That land you irrigated? By moving in and working it, you have stolen choice from me. Before, I could go there to hunt, to gather, or just to meditate on the natural beauty. Now I cannot. Who gave you the right to take what had been freely shared by all and make it your own? With any resource it is the same, though it may have the labor of individuals in it now, and those individuals are entitled to the fruits of their labor, originally, it belonged to all.
I do not wish to sheild anyone from ALL the consequences of their actions, yet it occurs to me that having a shield from consequences is precisely the reason we humans form groups. If I am sick, or made a mistake in hunting and have no food I do not need to die for my mistakes. That should be the bottom line. No one should have to die or suffer unbearably for their mistakes. Those who do not want to be a party to the bargain that no human being lets any other human being starve to death or die of exposure should be outcast, to live or die on their own, not a part of human society, as they so obviously wish. Beyond making ure that everyone is provided with the basics, sure, every one should be free to do as they wish. People who have a lot tend to think they can do without that kind of insurance, but being part of society, gaining the benefits of society, they should help pay, or be outcast. Think of it as a membership fee.
You have engaged in a kind of slippery slope argument that is untennable in the light of research and common sense. People have intrinsic motivations besides greed. In fact, modern economic research shows that fairness end reciprocity are two concepts with more motivational power than pure self interest in a large majority of the population. Your sort of cynical view of humanity is in fact the thing that is really creating the problem. Google for "fairness reciprocity economic research" and you will see what I mean.
You have also given short shrift to the problem of externalities, public goods and the free rider problem. Look, anyone can claim that something doesn't benefit them, that they shouldn't have to help pay for it, but if that were allowed in the case of public goods (like clean air) that all can benefit from, then no one would pay to help maintiain those goods.
Free market evangelists use this as an argument that EVERYTHING should be privately owned, but since everything was orginally public, who gets paid when things go private? All of us? Besides, a group of people acting democratically can manage a resource at least as well as a single private owner can. And it still does not answer the question of externalities, those things beneficial or detrimental to parties other than those involved in a transaction. The free market doesn't deal with those things well at all. What is your solution?
I honestly want to know, as this is something I have been thinking about for some time. Let's try dropping the antagonisytic tone and try to learn from one another. I suspect we have more in common than you might think. Maybe you could stop calling my philosophy evil and I could stop implying that all libertarians are selfish bastards?
I never said my set of morals was better than yours, I never claimed I wanted to TAKE your labor, and I never said I advocated violence, so quite with the hysterics.
But Bill Gates gets half.
Just FYI, this was originally published in The Onion, but is no longer available in their archives.
When Herve died, he left a lot of money to a charity he set up. Their goal is to make travel easier and more acommodating to little people. They have set up small condos all around the world, where everything is scaled for people his size. They have a trust fund set up so that any adult under four foot six can stay there free of charge. Do you know what they call them? Herve Villachez's Stay Free Mini Pads.
Badump cha. Thank you, I'll be here all night. Try the veal, it's to die for.
They are owned by a big media conglomerate that serves the interest of its wealthy shareholders, and that is to brainwash ignorant chimps like you into spouting their lies for them. Which you have done admirably. Your corporate masters will be proud of you.
Contract of all involved parties is a hard concept, since in an inherently interconnected world, anything person A and B do together also effects the rest of us. How do you propose solving the problem of externalities through contract alone? How will you keep your neighbor from polluting your air and water? Who will own the public infrastructure such as roads or power lines that are natural monopolies and thus subject to abuse? (or do you think we should let the free marklet sort it out and all be free to choose from any of 20 roads and seventy powerlines all coming to our house?)
Ownership is a social concept, nothing to do with the individual. If you were the only person on earth, ownership would mean as much to you as water does to a fish.
All ownership at the social level originates from theft. What was once a public good, owned by no one, is through the power of some authority declared private, and all others are kept by force from using that previously public good.
Helping others is a public good. Poor, sick and hungry humans are desperate humans, who will kill cheat and steal. Killing or jailing them all is not as economical as making sure all humans have a basic level of food and housing that will keep them from turning into dangerous animals. If I pay to get rid of a pack of wolves stalking the town, you benefit from it as much as I. Why shouldn't you be forced to help pay for it?
The way most libertarians yammer on about contracts makes me think you are all the type who would go to dinner and dash out tithout paying because you didn't sign a contract. Most libertarians want all the benefits of society without paying for them. They think that magically the free market will provide for all the things that taxes do now without costing a dime more, and that all the sick, poor and hungry will just conveniently die or suddenly become rich, fat and happy instead of rising up and kicking their sorry libertarian asses when all the services are cut off. Libertarians are the kind of idealists who sound noble to many on first hearing, but the noble smoke screen of personal responsibility hides a selfish streak a mile wide in most of them.