The defining characteristics of libertarian legal theory are its insistence that the amount of government intervention should be kept to a minimum and the primary functions of law should be enforcement of contracts...
It is a liberal trope that free markets are an uncontrolled dog-eat-dog social order in wich all forms of corporate treachery, deceit, and fraud are explicitly sanctioned by a laissez-faire philosophy embodied in law. In fact, it is the opposite; Free markets are strictly and invariably governed by the single dictum that all and only voluntary transactions are permissible. An essential implication of governance under that system is the enforcement of contracts.
Consider, for example, if you and I were to voluntarily agree to the sale of a bushell of apples to you for $10.00. I provide the apples but you fail to pay me $10.00. Your failure to pay me would result in an involuntary transaction prohibited under the laws of a free mareket. I would have voluntarily agreed to the exchange of a certain amount of apples for a certain amount of money. The actual exchange of apples for no money was involuntary on my part. Therefore, to enforce the mandate that only voluntary transactions are permissible, to enforce freedom, the government must intercede by compelling you to pay the agreed amount. In a free market, governments enforce contracts because involuntary transactions are inconsistent with freedom.
Consider cell phone contracts. If you purchase a cell phone and sign a contract agreeing not to unlock the service, but you do unlock service, then you have violated the contract. To enforce freedom the government must compel you not to unlock your phone because by unlocking your phone you are compelling the company with wich you signed a contract to engage in an involuntary transaction. It never agreed to provide you with an unlocked phone at the price which you paid for it. If you force the corporation to engage in an involuntary transaction by violating the terms of your contract then you have curtailed its freedom by compelling it to engage in a transaction to which it did not agree.
There are three ages of selfishness. The first, infantile selfishness, makes no distinction between "I want," and "I should have." The second, adolescent entitlement, is a conviction that your parents must give you anything you ask for and allow you to do anything you wish. The third, liberalism, substitues "government" for "parents." Those who violate their cell phone contracts by unlocking their service in the name of "freedom" are in fact acting selfishly and violating the freedoms of others. To some, freedom means they get whatever they want. It is infeasible to build any system of governance upon that definition for societies with population greater than one.
Based on the evidence presented in the study, the conclusion that faculty have a lower regard for female job applicants than for male job applicants is at best an unsupported assumption and at worst a misinterpretation of the evidence. Furthermore, the study results are consistent with faculty holding beliefs favorably biased toward women and against men.
To rate job applicants on the basis of jobs applications one must hypothesize a relationship between the application and the applicant. One must explicitly, or implicitly through action, supply a general answer to the question: Given an application, how well will the applicant perform on the job?.
The only definite conclusion which can be reached from this study is that faculty hypothesize different relationships between application and applicant for male than for female applicants. But here is the kicker: The "bias" exhibited in this study is consistent with a belief among hirers that women job applicatns tend to look better on paper, not worse, than male applicants. Faculty offering lower salaries to women could be operating in the belief that women are better than men at presenting themselves.
If Professor Jane Doe believes the following to be true: "Women are usually awesomely fantastic at presenting themselves, so if this female applicant looks looks like a 10/10 on paper, she is really probably an 8/10" "Men are terrible ignoramuses at presenting themselves, so if he looks like an 8/10 on paper, he's probably a 10/10".
Those statements 1) Evidently display belief favorably biased toward female and against male applicants 2) Are consistent with the study results.
So, the traditional interpretation is flawed, because it is not a conclusion, but an assumption; there is no reason whatsoever to favor it over a handicapping explanation.
Someone should study what are the assumption of the faculty about the relationship between jobs applicants and job applications. And separately, if there is a difference in those assumptions between male and female job applicants, how accurate are they?
Patents are as complex as other industrial policies like subsidies or regulatory regimes. When disputes arise, they should be put before an expert tribunal rather than a jury that is easily swayed by schoolyard "copycat" narratives.
The same case could be made that voters have no place in democracy. And is: Those seeking to concentrate political and economic strength in the hands of the few and powerful pose governance as a choice between decision making by wise and altruistic "experts" or by the ignorant and selfish common people. The myth of benevolent despotism is as old as the hills.
But that rhetoric was busted long ago. "Industrial Policy" is a euphemism for corporate welfare. "Expert tribunals" are typically comprised of those expert in only cronyism and graft if not incompetent ideologues. So the plan is that a small group of politically appointed experts will assign penalties and grant awards of billions of dollars. What could possibly go wrong?
For those who are not aware, the plan to enact all-powerful government controlled by the benevolent and wise has never really worked out . The actual course has been to grant government powers and then debate our preference for rule by the corrupt few or the incompetent many. (See TFA and surrounding comments.) Perhaps instead we should all consider before granting more power to government that it will not be wielded by wise and benevolent philosopher kings. Those with the knowledge that government power by any system is often misapplied and abused are less willing to grant power to government.
Fundamentally, the choice between administering patent law with "expert tribunals" or trial by jury is a false dichotomy, for we could remedy the problem as well by abolishing patents.
Confirmed American plagiarists U.S. Vice President Joe Biden and historian Doris Kearns Goodwin are still enjoying successful careers. So it seems that at least in the U.S. plagiarism is somewhat tolerated.
..such, "grossly inflated" casualty figures have been promulgated over the years, many based on a figure of over 200,000 deaths quoted in a forged version of the casualty report, Tagesbefehl No. 47, that originated with Hitler's Reich Minister of Propaganda Joseph Goebbels.
If this trend in falsifying credentials continues, how long before the revelations that Rich Kyanka did not really attend Turtle Mountain Community College?
A couple of interesting and related things on the subject of hiring strategies appeared this week in the Wall Street Journal.
First, a fascinating review of the book "The Rare Find" by George Anders. The review beings with this interesting anecdote and gets better after that:
When Joanne Rowling, an unemployed single mother, showed her first fanciful manuscript to a dozen British publishing houses, all quickly passed on it. Eventually a single bid emerged—for about $2,500—from Bloomsbury, then a small London publisher. Wise move: Ms. Rowling's "Harry Potter" franchise is now worth billions.
Next, James Taranto theorizes that college degrees are proxy for IQ Tests, which it is illegal to use in hiring. It raises the question of whether FaceBook's Programming Challenges will not become the target of lawsuits on the basis of "differential impact" as in Griggs V. Duke Power Co.
They of a growing movement to end democracy. See, for example, North Carolina Governor Beverly Purdue's suggestion that federal elections be suspended. James Taranto provides other examples.
V9107XA Burn due to water-skis on fire, initial encounter V9107XD Burn due to water-skis on fire, subsequent encounter V9107XS Burn due to water-skis on fire, sequela
The only animal life presented in the few photos returned from a Google image search for TSA employee "Theldala Magee" is captioned "Slug on Cabbage."
Is being a rapist a disability? Will the EEOC protect Ms. Magee's right to rape airline passengers as it protects the rights of alcoholic commercial truck drivers to drive trucks?
Is Marxism to any degree correct? Ancient mankind observed the sun as a great ball of fire in the sky and held faith in an adjunct explanatory mythology. So like Marxism; A rudimentary foundation in direct observation embellished with lustrous imaginings. It is observed that property denotes social status and quality products are valued. Marx, his signature trait of pseudo-intellectual jargonism at full power, concocts a terminology where plainspokenness will do; this is "Commodity Fetishism." And then the inevitable drivel at which the weak-minded swoon, an assertion contracting all that is known about life and history, that the desire for nice stuff is a perversity spawned and propagated by Capitalism. No. The iPod is not a vice an that desire has existed always and everywhere throughout history under all systems of government, with the rare exception of the unconventional spartan sects which renounce it. And Marxism is all like that: Mundane observation, jargonistic terminology, idiotic reasoning. Again and again and again and great steaming piles of dialectical materialism and a labor theory of value.
Yet that Communism's modern means of advance are not the bloody civil wars and inhumane labor camps of the past but mincing quibbles by its eccentric supporters in this forum is certain progress.
It is noteworthy that in less than half a century the defenders of Communism have gone from "We will bury you," to questioning whether Karl Marx was actually right about anything, whatsoever. Now, after the Soviet Union, that great empire of Communism, has collapsed in economic ruin to reveal its vaunted record of equality and prosperity to be a great lie. Now, shrunken to its last vestiges in the grotesque spectacle of North Korea, reminding perpetually of the horror intrinsic to the Communist system.
Marx is to economics what Freud is to psychology; Each an intellectual neanderthal popularizing a fraudulent science of his own invention. As with with Christian leadership which Freud and Marx partially supplanted, they seduced legions of fools with nonsense.
Communism indefensible, its sympathizers retrench to ask, at least were Marx's criticisms of Capitalism correct. Communism is greatly diminished but plentiful fools remain to answer that question in the affirmative.
Despite numerous tests, doctors can't explain how he's able to draw and paint while he's not conscious, or even what stage of sleep he's in while he works.
Perhaps he is in fact drawing while awake and we are all a dream he experiences when he is asleep.
Solyndra’s failure shows that the White House’s renewable energy policies are misguided, said two Republican congressmen.
Well, misguided yes, but not only because government has a lower success rate with business investment than does private venture capital, or because of the corruption intrinsic in the corporate welfare scam of the taxpayer bearing the risk of investment and the private business owner receiving the profits.
Beyond those reasons, the "Green Jobs" initiative was farcical propaganda because, to the degree the "green" energy replaced conventional sources, green jobs would supplant jobs in conventional energy sector; The people working in the coal-fired plant are not going to keep working there after its shut down and replaced by a solar plant. New Jobs Gained in Solar Plant - Old Jobs Lost in Coal Plan = Zero Net Employment Gain.
His green jobs promise is one instance of a pervasive class of conceptual errors committed by this President: His unceasing failure to comprehend tradeoffs. "Green Jobs" trade one type of employment for another, they do not increase net employment. High-efficiency vehicle mandates trade increased embodied energy costs for decreased fuel consumption, but do not decrease the total energy consumed over the lifetime of the vehicle. Corn ethanol mandates and subsidies trade consumption of fossil fuel by passenger vehicles for consumption of fossil fuel in the production of corn ethanol. Cash-for-clunkers trades car sales during the program for future car sales; people just move their purchase forward to take advantage of the program during the eligibility period.
Obama has made fundamental conceptual errors in devising public policy then invented preposterous explanations for the failed outcomes of those policies. As the opinion poles suggest, blaming ATMs and corporate jet owners for the failure of the green jobs fairy to rescue the economy will probably not win him elections.
As I have pointed out previously, genuine green energy investments by those with a record of success at that kind of thing is good.
A former RIAA lobbyist, Beryl Howell, is a now a federal judge ruling on these copyright extortion cases and siding with the extortionists:
Most cyber-pirates are prosecuted in the nation's capital. More than 85,000 John Does are currently caught in ongoing litigation in the district's federal court, according to the EFF. Not only is D.C. the home court of Dunlap, Grubb and Weaver, it is also the jurisdiction of Judge Beryl Howell, who worked as a lobbyist for the RIAA from 2004 to 2009, during the peak of the organization's anti-piracy campaign....
Naturally, Howell's background has prompted skepticism about her impartiality when it comes to ruling on John Doe cases. She was paid $415,000 to lobby on the RIAA's behalf as the Executive Managing Director and General Counsel at Stroz Friedberg LLC, a consulting firm, according to the Center for Responsive Politics and the implu Corporation, a company that tracks spending by lobbying firms.
Not scary? You apparently do not comprehend the implications.
Not including future increases in planned U.S government spending, solely to fund spending which government has already promised to Social Security beneficiaries, Welfare recipients, Medicare and Medicaid recipients, recipients of government pesions, U.S. debt holders and other groups, every household in the U.S. today will have to pay, on average, an additional $1,016,774.00 more in taxes than what they pay at current rates. That is, on average, an additional $370,855.00 more per citizen.
Of course, you could say that my estimate is off, because the population is growing so the average dept per person will be smaller. But even if the population doubles before the funding promises are met the numbers are still terrifying. Furthermore, historically, unfunded liabilities have increased greater than the rate of population growth.
Well since Eric Raymond, who wrote the book, is using Google+ and is blogging about it (entries here, here, here and here), maybe someone should ask him.
A dog is walking along a street. A car comes racing down the street, hits the dog, and throws it 30 feet. The dog impacts against a phone pole. It survives and learns its lesson: It never goes near that phone pole again.
Slashdot Mirror
from the Wikipedia article Libertarian Theories of Law
The defining characteristics of libertarian legal theory are its insistence that the amount of government intervention should be kept to a minimum and the primary functions of law should be enforcement of contracts...
It is a liberal trope that free markets are an uncontrolled dog-eat-dog social order in wich all forms of corporate treachery, deceit, and fraud are explicitly sanctioned by a laissez-faire philosophy embodied in law. In fact, it is the opposite; Free markets are strictly and invariably governed by the single dictum that all and only voluntary transactions are permissible. An essential implication of governance under that system is the enforcement of contracts.
Consider, for example, if you and I were to voluntarily agree to the sale of a bushell of apples to you for $10.00. I provide the apples but you fail to pay me $10.00. Your failure to pay me would result in an involuntary transaction prohibited under the laws of a free mareket. I would have voluntarily agreed to the exchange of a certain amount of apples for a certain amount of money. The actual exchange of apples for no money was involuntary on my part. Therefore, to enforce the mandate that only voluntary transactions are permissible, to enforce freedom, the government must intercede by compelling you to pay the agreed amount. In a free market, governments enforce contracts because involuntary transactions are inconsistent with freedom.
Consider cell phone contracts. If you purchase a cell phone and sign a contract agreeing not to unlock the service, but you do unlock service, then you have violated the contract. To enforce freedom the government must compel you not to unlock your phone because by unlocking your phone you are compelling the company with wich you signed a contract to engage in an involuntary transaction. It never agreed to provide you with an unlocked phone at the price which you paid for it. If you force the corporation to engage in an involuntary transaction by violating the terms of your contract then you have curtailed its freedom by compelling it to engage in a transaction to which it did not agree.
There are three ages of selfishness. The first, infantile selfishness, makes no distinction between "I want," and "I should have." The second, adolescent entitlement, is a conviction that your parents must give you anything you ask for and allow you to do anything you wish. The third, liberalism, substitues "government" for "parents." Those who violate their cell phone contracts by unlocking their service in the name of "freedom" are in fact acting selfishly and violating the freedoms of others. To some, freedom means they get whatever they want. It is infeasible to build any system of governance upon that definition for societies with population greater than one.
Based on the evidence presented in the study, the conclusion that faculty have a lower regard for female job applicants than for male job applicants is at best an unsupported assumption and at worst a misinterpretation of the evidence. Furthermore, the study results are consistent with faculty holding beliefs favorably biased toward women and against men.
To rate job applicants on the basis of jobs applications one must hypothesize a relationship between the application and the applicant. One must explicitly, or implicitly through action, supply a general answer to the question: Given an application, how well will the applicant perform on the job?.
The only definite conclusion which can be reached from this study is that faculty hypothesize different relationships between application and applicant for male than for female applicants. But here is the kicker: The "bias" exhibited in this study is consistent with a belief among hirers that women job applicatns tend to look better on paper, not worse, than male applicants. Faculty offering lower salaries to women could be operating in the belief that women are better than men at presenting themselves.
If Professor Jane Doe believes the following to be true:
"Women are usually awesomely fantastic at presenting themselves, so if this female applicant looks looks like a 10/10 on paper, she is really probably an 8/10"
"Men are terrible ignoramuses at presenting themselves, so if he looks like an 8/10 on paper, he's probably a 10/10".
Those statements 1) Evidently display belief favorably biased toward female and against male applicants 2) Are consistent with the study results.
So, the traditional interpretation is flawed, because it is not a conclusion, but an assumption; there is no reason whatsoever to favor it over a handicapping explanation.
Someone should study what are the assumption of the faculty about the relationship between jobs applicants and job applications. And separately, if there is a difference in those assumptions between male and female job applicants, how accurate are they?
Seriously, why should I care at all about this? What will make this any better than regular Ubuntu?
You can't argue with the rebound ring in da bottom. :0
That is literally true.
Patents are as complex as other industrial policies like subsidies or regulatory regimes. When disputes arise, they should be put before an expert tribunal rather than a jury that is easily swayed by schoolyard "copycat" narratives.
The same case could be made that voters have no place in democracy. And is: Those seeking to concentrate political and economic strength in the hands of the few and powerful pose governance as a choice between decision making by wise and altruistic "experts" or by the ignorant and selfish common people. The myth of benevolent despotism is as old as the hills.
But that rhetoric was busted long ago. "Industrial Policy" is a euphemism for corporate welfare. "Expert tribunals" are typically comprised of those expert in only cronyism and graft if not incompetent ideologues. So the plan is that a small group of politically appointed experts will assign penalties and grant awards of billions of dollars. What could possibly go wrong?
For those who are not aware, the plan to enact all-powerful government controlled by the benevolent and wise has never really worked out . The actual course has been to grant government powers and then debate our preference for rule by the corrupt few or the incompetent many. (See TFA and surrounding comments.) Perhaps instead we should all consider before granting more power to government that it will not be wielded by wise and benevolent philosopher kings. Those with the knowledge that government power by any system is often misapplied and abused are less willing to grant power to government.
Fundamentally, the choice between administering patent law with "expert tribunals" or trial by jury is a false dichotomy, for we could remedy the problem as well by abolishing patents.
So Romney is outsourcing Republican party functions too?
Yes, according to what I heard, they do no do it themselves, someone else makes it happen.
Confirmed American plagiarists U.S. Vice President Joe Biden and historian Doris Kearns Goodwin are still enjoying successful careers. So it seems that at least in the U.S. plagiarism is somewhat tolerated.
from the parent post
No matter how you spin it, the fire bombing of Dresden and subsequent incineration of 250K civilians was an atrocity...
from wikipedia
..such, "grossly inflated" casualty figures have been promulgated over the years, many based on a figure of over 200,000 deaths quoted in a forged version of the casualty report, Tagesbefehl No. 47, that originated with Hitler's Reich Minister of Propaganda Joseph Goebbels.
Scott Thompson does not really have a CS degree? Elizabeth Warren is not really a Native American?
If this trend in falsifying credentials continues, how long before the revelations that Rich Kyanka did not really attend Turtle Mountain Community College?
A couple of interesting and related things on the subject of hiring strategies appeared this week in the Wall Street Journal.
First, a fascinating review of the book "The Rare Find" by George Anders. The review beings with this interesting anecdote and gets better after that:
Next, James Taranto theorizes that college degrees are proxy for IQ Tests, which it is illegal to use in hiring. It raises the question of whether FaceBook's Programming Challenges will not become the target of lawsuits on the basis of "differential impact" as in Griggs V. Duke Power Co.
The culprits are:
Jeffrey Klein
Diane Savino
David Carlucci
David Valesky
They of a growing movement to end democracy. See, for example, North Carolina Governor Beverly Purdue's suggestion that federal elections be suspended. James Taranto provides other examples.
My favorites:
V9107XA Burn due to water-skis on fire, initial encounter
V9107XD Burn due to water-skis on fire, subsequent encounter
V9107XS Burn due to water-skis on fire, sequela
Generating Bitcoins
A few observations:
The only animal life presented in the few photos returned from a Google image search for TSA employee "Theldala Magee" is captioned "Slug on Cabbage."
Is being a rapist a disability? Will the EEOC protect Ms. Magee's right to rape airline passengers as it protects the rights of alcoholic commercial truck drivers to drive trucks?
You have stated in your FAQ:
What is your reasoning process here; Specifically as a charitable non-profit, what would be your motives for not making it an open design?
Is Marxism to any degree correct? Ancient mankind observed the sun as a great ball of fire in the sky and held faith in an adjunct explanatory mythology. So like Marxism; A rudimentary foundation in direct observation embellished with lustrous imaginings. It is observed that property denotes social status and quality products are valued. Marx, his signature trait of pseudo-intellectual jargonism at full power, concocts a terminology where plainspokenness will do; this is "Commodity Fetishism." And then the inevitable drivel at which the weak-minded swoon, an assertion contracting all that is known about life and history, that the desire for nice stuff is a perversity spawned and propagated by Capitalism. No. The iPod is not a vice an that desire has existed always and everywhere throughout history under all systems of government, with the rare exception of the unconventional spartan sects which renounce it. And Marxism is all like that: Mundane observation, jargonistic terminology, idiotic reasoning. Again and again and again and great steaming piles of dialectical materialism and a labor theory of value.
Yet that Communism's modern means of advance are not the bloody civil wars and inhumane labor camps of the past but mincing quibbles by its eccentric supporters in this forum is certain progress.
It is noteworthy that in less than half a century the defenders of Communism have gone from "We will bury you," to questioning whether Karl Marx was actually right about anything, whatsoever. Now, after the Soviet Union, that great empire of Communism, has collapsed in economic ruin to reveal its vaunted record of equality and prosperity to be a great lie. Now, shrunken to its last vestiges in the grotesque spectacle of North Korea, reminding perpetually of the horror intrinsic to the Communist system.
Marx is to economics what Freud is to psychology; Each an intellectual neanderthal popularizing a fraudulent science of his own invention. As with with Christian leadership which Freud and Marx partially supplanted, they seduced legions of fools with nonsense.
Communism indefensible, its sympathizers retrench to ask, at least were Marx's criticisms of Capitalism correct. Communism is greatly diminished but plentiful fools remain to answer that question in the affirmative.
"Cue" not "Queue".
(Oh I am so embarrassed.)
Perhaps he is in fact drawing while awake and we are all a dream he experiences when he is asleep.
(Queue eerie music and scary flying door.)
from TFA
Well, misguided yes, but not only because government has a lower success rate with business investment than does private venture capital, or because of the corruption intrinsic in the corporate welfare scam of the taxpayer bearing the risk of investment and the private business owner receiving the profits.
Beyond those reasons, the "Green Jobs" initiative was farcical propaganda because, to the degree the "green" energy replaced conventional sources, green jobs would supplant jobs in conventional energy sector; The people working in the coal-fired plant are not going to keep working there after its shut down and replaced by a solar plant. New Jobs Gained in Solar Plant - Old Jobs Lost in Coal Plan = Zero Net Employment Gain.
His green jobs promise is one instance of a pervasive class of conceptual errors committed by this President: His unceasing failure to comprehend tradeoffs. "Green Jobs" trade one type of employment for another, they do not increase net employment. High-efficiency vehicle mandates trade increased embodied energy costs for decreased fuel consumption, but do not decrease the total energy consumed over the lifetime of the vehicle. Corn ethanol mandates and subsidies trade consumption of fossil fuel by passenger vehicles for consumption of fossil fuel in the production of corn ethanol. Cash-for-clunkers trades car sales during the program for future car sales; people just move their purchase forward to take advantage of the program during the eligibility period.
Obama has made fundamental conceptual errors in devising public policy then invented preposterous explanations for the failed outcomes of those policies. As the opinion poles suggest, blaming ATMs and corporate jet owners for the failure of the green jobs fairy to rescue the economy will probably not win him elections.
As I have pointed out previously, genuine green energy investments by those with a record of success at that kind of thing is good.
On a related subject, don't miss the Black NASA documentary.
A former RIAA lobbyist, Beryl Howell, is a now a federal judge ruling on these copyright extortion cases and siding with the extortionists:
This appointment mischief was covered previouslyon Slashdot.
As pointed out previously, Beryl Howard is a Obama appointee, and not his first RIAA appointee.
Not scary? You apparently do not comprehend the implications.
Not including future increases in planned U.S government spending, solely to fund spending which government has already promised to Social Security beneficiaries, Welfare recipients, Medicare and Medicaid recipients, recipients of government pesions, U.S. debt holders and other groups, every household in the U.S. today will have to pay, on average, an additional $1,016,774.00 more in taxes than what they pay at current rates. That is, on average, an additional $370,855.00 more per citizen.
Of course, you could say that my estimate is off, because the population is growing so the average dept per person will be smaller. But even if the population doubles before the funding promises are met the numbers are still terrifying. Furthermore, historically, unfunded liabilities have increased greater than the rate of population growth.
Scary? You think that is scary? No, this is scary.
Well since Eric Raymond, who wrote the book, is using Google+ and is blogging about it (entries here, here, here and here), maybe someone should ask him.
A dog is walking along a street. A car comes racing down the street, hits the dog, and throws it 30 feet. The dog impacts against a phone pole. It survives and learns its lesson: It never goes near that phone pole again.