First, what I am advocating is nothing like communism.
I am not sure if your capitalization is intentional, but while you advocate nothing like Communism, you most certainly do advocate communism.
But if a system exists that guarantees the basic minimums necessary for survival
It doesn't. It's one of those dillusions that's created by the plantitude of the surplaces of the modern society driven by self-interest. Because that system demands and creates constant increases in efficiency of production that "minimum" to which people are accustomed is constantly growing.
There are only the rights we agree to uphold for each other.
I disagree. Right exist as long as we agree not to take them away from each other. I don't need you (or anyone else) to breeth. But you can take (or attempt to take) that right from me. Anything for which I need you is a priviledge that I earn by being useful to you. I don't need you to talk to my neighbor and try to exchange my goods for his or my services for the services of your neighbor. So as far as you are concerned, this is my right. As far as your neighbor is concerned, it is my priviledge. If you try to tax my interraction with your neighbor, you take away my right.
Rights derive from agreements between individuals, and need not be justified though the naturalistic fallacy, nor through appeal to divine authority.
Again, rights do naturally exist until taken away. Apeal to an abstract divine as a tool for guaranteeing non-revokability of rights was used as a poetic license in the understanding that everyone would take it allegorically. Unfortunately, the poetic value can get chipped away with time, so I would agree that it is best not to open that door to superstitions.
collectively agree
A number of people cannot share one mind. They can simultaneously agree. But it is physically impossible for them to collectively agree. What you propose is collusion and they often (although not always) break because an opportunity comes along which makes backstabing a very advantageous proposition. Again, it's just a matter of assigning the proper weights in the Prisoner's Dilemma.
you place responsibility unfairly on the shoulders of that individual, and absolve any other factors of responsibility.
Yep. We are not victims of our circumstances. At least most of the time -- in all but the most dire of situations.
We have the faculty for trying to change our circumstances. It is this faculty that allowed us to create the civilization (ie, an environment modified to suit our wants, some of which, of course, arouse from our needs). The extent to which we are victims of our circumstances rather than masters of them is the extent to which we have advanced.
Is it fair that they be held responsible for their actions, while the adults who enslaved and brainwashed them are not?
I don't see how you can suggest that anyone deems the adults who enslaved them and brainwashed them are not guilty of anything. It is fair to hold these children accountable for the murders they commit. But you are taking examples of extreme circumstances in which people have been turned into automatons to try to demonstrate the point that all people are automatons. Why not go for the kill and compare ourselves to people who have been lobotomized? Or even had their entire prefrontal cortex removed? Why only go for those who have been specifically conditioned not to consider choices that life offers? To prove that we can be driven to madness? Ok. Granted. But why should I be judged by those standards? I am talking about free-thinking individuals. How they got to that point is irrelevant. What matters is that they are there. The thing is what it is -- not what it used to be and not what it might become.
I say there is no clear demarcation between self and non self, and I challenge you to present on
Contracts are created through free association. I enforce the contract by refusing to deal with those who break it.
Again, that's not a contract. It's a pact. In case of a contract, there is way to punish the cheater. In case of a pact, it is the cheated that gets to carry the burden of most of the damages. Severing of association is not a punishment -- the cheater expects as much. He just waits for the moment when it becomes advantageous to break the pact and backstab. Let's just agree that we both understand the ramifications of the Prisoner's Dilemma before we debate this ad nauseam.
It sounds as if you wish to limit people's ability to redress wrongs, where only the powerful have the ability to choose their course, and lesser men would not have the power to band together into groups to protect their interests. In short, a sort of neo-feudalism, which is what most Objectivists seem to desire, and why I have such a problem with the idea.
You have yet to show how it follows from anything I say, but Ok. If we set the bar for conclusion making lower than a logical chain of reasoning, then I'll can just say, "I want nothing of the kind nor does Objectivism". And then not explain... perhaps stipulating that I am not an Objectivist.
You haven't thought through the consequences of your philosophy.
Oh? I have. Quite extensively. Both on eithical and logical grounds, through examination of previous historical examples, through considering behavioral and cognitive psychology and through dabbling in game theory. But ok, I'll keep thinking.
First, what if one person owned all the resources in the world?
I told you I didn't want to consider monopolies other than to say that I was against them. And, yet, that's where you chose to take it. It's a slightly different topic because it is a singularity condition in an otherwise mostly smooth progression. I already stipulated that I think that they must be treated differently. Now I'll state that it is precisely because they are singularity conditions that they deserve a different treatment.
Unfortunately for your philosophy, people see themselves as members of a community first, and traders second. It's in our nature. We can only really conceptualize around 150 individuals. Everyone outside of this circle of 'real people' is an abstraction, less than human.
I agree with the premise, but disagree with the conclusion. The fact that we can't imagine a group large (approximately 150) to be our community is precisely why communism and Communism fail.
All I propose is that anyone who wants to trade with me sign a contract saying they will a.) support a basic minimum guarantee of access to resources necessary for survival to all people, b.) only trade with people who make the same agreement.
And I've demonstrated that people who make such demands are more likely to be crooks than people who do not. I certainly would never sign such a contract and would definately demand higher price for my services (probably much higher) from any member of such a community... That's my line in the sand. No further.
I am not proposing any type of 'commune,' and I think that you reading things into what I am writing that I did not intend is getting in the way of any real communication.
Yet another property of the communists -- never taking responsibility. "you misunderstood", "you need to be educated", "we think otherwise" are all the signs. Whatever happened to "I mis-spoke", "I wasn't clear enough", "let me see how what you and I think differs". All the signs of cooperation (that come out of necessity) are absent in the men who wants to dictate.
I really don't see how you can stay logically consistent with your beliefs and disapprove of what I'm suggesting.
By realizing that what you suggest is rooted in treating life as a guarantee rather than a gift (from nature) and that y
Look around the world a bit. Look at Europe, or South America. May I suggest that you look at all of Europe? And that you take a very careful look at South America?
You very conveniently interchange "I" and "we". Talking about choice (which is undestandable in the context of "I") and community (which can only exist in the context of "we") as if they were one.
What I am proposing is all built on free association and contract.
Contract is not a free association. It is a voluntary suspension of ability to associate freely (expressed as an agreement to assume responsibility for performing certain actions) in exchange for the other signatories doing the same (although, of course, the actions for which the other signatories assume respoinsibilities might be different). As with all contracts, they are only as valid as the ability to enforce them. Generally these types of contracts are kept together by the fear of retribution (ex communication, etc.) So, whether you realize it or not, you are very much looking to make heretics. How do you propose enforcing yours? A contract which has not enforcement mechanism is not a contract -- it's a pact. And pacts break up as soon as one member withdraws on a caprice. What you don't seem to realize is that the action you propose does not require a contract. It is just as easily accomplished with an individual choice (as in "he is selfish, so I am not going to go to his store").
Is it coercion to tell a man who has no food, no land, and no means of support, "You do what I say or you starve to death?"
You can't make such a statement. The only statement you can make is "I will help you not to starve to death if you do what I say." You posed your question in such a way that the premise that the starving person must accept a contract or starve. But that's not the case. He must accept the contract to prevent starvation in this particular way. He may find other means to support himself as far as the provider is concerned. It is not the provider's fault that he is able to provide. Whatever he has was created (hopefully he is an honest man and created it through his own talents or through exchange of the work of his talents for someone else's property). But the fact that someone has created something does not mean that he must share it. It means that he is free to name the price for it. If he weren't, it is likely (although definately not guaranteed) that he wouldn't bother creating it in the first place. I am sure we both can come up with examples of things people create without expecting to profit from them. But the key is that if they weren't able to profit from them, many people who do end up creating would not bother (again, not all, but many... if history is any indication, most). And what if the the man with all that bread was not free to charge for it? Well, the destitute person in your scenario would starve. Noone would offer him the employment because that's immoral. But that "cat" wouldn't bother creating a situation of ownership of bread either (what the hell for?).
Whites will be forming compacts not to deal with blacks. The rich will be forming free associations with each other to economically limit the choices open to the poor. All without coercion, merely with economic and social pressure.
"When I disagree with a man of reason, I let reality be the final arbiter." The reality is that in Brooklyn, NY, Palestinians do business with Israelis, R&B artists are welcome in all restaurants and car dealerships despite their backgrounds (sometimes not only poor, but criminal) and I live in an ethinicly-centric neighborhood the language of which I do not speak. All of this is possible because people are willing to think of themselves as traders before they are willing to think of themselves as members of a community. Trade (fueled by greed) is what makes this cooperation smooth and generally mostly flawless. Politics are put aside. People work for the same businesses despite vast political differences and religious background simply because it is the best way to profit from their talents -- not because it would benefit their communities.
If someone decides to break their contract with us, we are under no obligation to continue to deal with them. So your idea of cooperation means creating a schism at the slightest of disagreements? In that case, we both agree. Since your community will disintegrate to the point where it's just you... and perhaps the "United Front of Judea" pretty darn soon. Your signature tells me you'll get the reference. So are advocating a virtual uncompromising individuality with the exception for some few individuals who agree with you 100%.
You receive the majority of the extra value created in the trade, while I am only a little better off. Only if you forget the fact that you received quite a bit more than you claim. Since you have no transportation, the food was delivered to you. That's work which has value. But even if you assume that both people are trying to take advantage of each other, then the price they agree on in the end is fair. I won't get into monopolies. I'll just say that in order to keep the market free, monopolies must discouraged and possibly split by the government. But that's a whole other topic.
Most people value fairness and reciprocity far more than personal gain Don't you see what you are saying? You are saying that people wish to be selfish for their personal satisfaction. That is that a fair life is a selfish goal -- it is thought after out personal benefit.
Choice and inevitability are the same. :) I guess this one of the more fundamental disagreements. Calvin was burnt at the stake for taking your position. Luther sparked the Reformation by insisting on mine. Rand identifies a human being's key difference from other animals as the fact that a man is a volitional being. I should take back my previous reply. You are free to disagree. There's been enough burning of heretics. I'd ask that you stop trying to form a community that will make heretics out of more people, but your mind seems pretty set. Let's just hope, then, that noone takes our words seriously enough to march to them.
Choice and inevitability are the same. And yet if you make your choice as if it were, you have chosen to be no different than a rock laying motionless -- dead. To act as if you had a choice, to make an attempt to make that choice is to chose life. Are you so certain that as the cursor hover over "submit" and I decide whether or not I want to bother to end the nihilism which you have chosen that I will not go and get lunch instead? Is the cat dead or alive?:)
We should strive not to create conditions that make people feel as if they are not in control. The "we" is only an occassional occurance. Most of the time it is just you -- alone with your thouhgts. We should be aware of how other people feel when we pick our methods -- not when we pick our goals. Our goals must be own own guided by our own priorities... Strike that. They always are our own -- guided by our own priorities.
As much as will and self are illusions, they are necessary illusions. They are not at all.
But you should not force me, or anyone else, to have to deal with them in any fashion. Noone does.
As I mentioned, helping others is in everyone's rational self interest. Tried it. And strongly disagree.
it is our right The question becomes what happens when one of the collective you decides to change his mind and to interract with those you don't think he shouldn't interract with. Is that his choice? Or still yours? Because if anyone makes that choice for him, that's coercion.
Selfish non-cooperators can deal with other selfish non-cooperators and try to take advantage of each other all they like.
You are confusing selfish and dishonest. It is a common meme of today to say that one implies the other. But it is severely incorrect. Selfish people who are honest approach each other as traders -- negotiating exchange of value for value as they see it. A selfish person is not a crook -- he is just not willing to exchange what he values more for what he values less. In exchange, fairness is his goal -- not taking advantage.
Happy, secure people are a positive externality, and scared, angry desperate people are a negative externality.
Show me a happy-go-lucky guy and I'll show a used car salesman. Living life as an exploration requires constant scepticism. Scepticism requires doubt. Doubt breeds unease. I don't trust the happy, secure people -- they tend to be dogmatic, full of prejudices and stubborn if you look just a little bit under the surface. And they are the ones who'll get angry and destructive when the reality fails to match their expectations.
People who are capable of making intuitive leaps don't always make the right ones and even when they do solve problems, they may not be solving the problems you asked them to. The "leaps" are recognition of previously unrecognized patterns. They might be detectable mathematically. More often than not, this is a result of making conclusions from incomplete data. Recognizing that fact (ie skepticism) is the process of identifying unknown parameters. This is automatable. If the "problem" they solved is not the one you asked to solve, then you either didn't state your objective concretely enough or your didn't narrow the parameters of a desired solution enough. People who "get you" simply have become accustomed to a set of parameters that you are likely to take for granted (because we, humans, are probability-guessing-driven machines). Such narrowing of parameters based on previously recognized pattern of preferences can be done by an artificial system as well. Any more questions?
I just realized something that I should add to this:
By doing so you declare that you have a right to be a tyrant over your neighbor as long as enough of your other neighbors agree to share the benefits of your tyranny. This coalescence of power (and eventual rise of a hierarchy of the powerful) is how all tyrannies were established. The only way out of it is to leave your neighbor alone to do as he pleases with his own property. If you wish to serve, do so. Find a way to be useful to those who you believe need your service. But respect your neighbor's right to stare at the sky or pretty girls while you do that. Do not demand that he serves as well. The key requirement for preserving freedom is that of making no intrusion on the freedoms of others. Again, if you wish to alleviate suffering, don't expect to do it by forcing others into helping you. You may wish to do it on your own and hope that you'll end up leading by example, but if you allow yourself to exercise coercion of any kind for however great a cause, you'll permit yourself to enter the road to tyranny.
What is inside, once was not. Perhaps, the key distinction, then, is whether what goes in and out is a choice or an inevitability. She insists that it is a choice. Often, of course, it is an inevitability. But I would think that fighting to make it a choice is the fight for life and surrendering to it being an inevitability is accepting the life of a farm animal.
And I posit that it this sense of community that is forced (rather than occurs naturally) that creates red tape and regulations that try to precisely define that which we entrust the government to make us feel. We pick who we love, who we become friends with and towards whom we wish to be charitable. When this choice is made for us and forced on us at the threat of violence (the only tool available to a government), we lose our humanity and lose sight of the value of that which we hoped to force on ourself -- love, friendship and family. Who one choses to do business with is an individual choice. And need not be given up to an entity established for the purposes of common protection. Therefore, such an entity may not demand it. If you want to start boycotting stores which happen to not contribute as much to charity as your community leader thinks they should, you can feel free. But when you do that, you allow your community leader to usurp your individuality and, by doing so, abandon part of your ability (or at least willingness) to reason. If you give your community the power to shut down a store owner who does not contribute what you think they should to charity, you give your government the right you yourself do not have -- the right to intrude on the property of others. By doing so you declare that you have a right to be a tyrant over your neighbor as long as enough of your other neighbors agree to share the benefits of your tyranny. This coalescence of power (and eventual rise of a hierarchy of the powerful) is how all tyrannies were established.
On a personal note, I went through 3 stages in life. I started as an overachiever. As a teenage rebellion, I turned to religion and embraced the values of living for the sake of others. And as the third stage, I decide to live for the sake of self-improvement despite the objections from others. I probably don't have to explain which of the stages was least productive and most destructive. The life for the sake of others at the sacrifice of myself was nihilistic. It made my talents irrelevant. It was an exercise in self-destruction. Such a life is a life of a tool -- not of a free-thinking individual.
As for your comment that Ayn Rand started with contempt for the weak... She was person of great intellect. She worked tirelessly and cared more to be recognized as correct by the brightest of the minds. She wrote because she wanted to improve the world. She has characters in her books who are not of great personal accomplishment who still wish to live life to the best of their potential. She admires them (a drifter who wants to continues to try to find work after his factory is out of business). She pities them when they fall prey to the talented exploiters (James Taggard's wife). Her attitude towards them is very human. She just doesn't wish to be told that all men must accept the fate of the untalented as their own. That's not contempt for the weak. It is love for virtue.
An honest egoist? Any day. I'll know that he personally invested in his honesty (because of his ego he is personally invested in everything he does). His personal investment in his honesty would not let him cheat me.
Wow, your take on Buddhism is completely wrong. One does not embrace the harshness of anything. In fact, he specifically rejected austerity and self-denial. Buddha taught that everyone had to think for themselves, that no one should believe anything anyone else (including him) said, if it did not agree with that person's common sense. People use Buddhist techniques to gain, not lose effectiveness in the real world. Buddha taught that reason was vital, crucial even. A gift not to be wasted. He taught that everything was a product of an understandable chain of cause and effect, it's only like the core of the whole philosophy. I just remembered how much this resonates in this (it is from John Galt's speech in Atlas Shrugged):
"...The most depraved sentence you can now utter is to ask: Whose reason? The answer is: Yours. No matter how vast your knowledge or how modest, it is your own mind that has to acquire it. It is only with your own knowledge that you can deal. It is only your own knowledge that you can claim to possess or ask others to consider. Your mind is your only judge of truth--and if others dissent from your verdict, reality is the court of final appeal. Nothing but a man's mind can perform that complex, delicate, crucial process of identification which is thinking. Nothing can direct the process but his own judgment. Nothing can direct his judgment but his moral integrity..."
Integrity, btw is not uprightness (as it is used today), but rather consistency (the traditional English meaning)... derived from integral or indivisible. Other than that one word (and again only because of its modern usage), it sounds like your are embracing Buddha for the reasons John Galt would applaud.
He taught that everything was a product of an understandable chain of cause and effect, it's only like the core of the whole philosophy. Sounds fascinating. I should look into it beyond the pop culture references. I was inferring what I said from the portrayed notions about lifestyles of Buddhist monks.
So this would thwart reverse engineering, but not thwart piracy. Pirates are quite advanced. They were capable of slicing the chips thinly enough to examine them layer-by-layers years ago. Of course, once reverse engineering is thwarted, the piracy will become more profitable and proliferate. Well, good luck with that patent, guys.
Afraid you'll have to do just that -- give him your wallet. That's a requirement for becoming a monk, is it not? A philosophy that insists on embracing the harshness of mother nature and not attempting to think one's way out it (but rather to think one's way into accepting it)... ok. You can have it. Not for me though. Thankfully, they don't insist on being the only one true way, so they are willing to let me be. But the effect of that philosophy on its followers seems to mellow them down and make them lose their edge. Again, not for me. As far as I am concerned it asks people to deny their humanity -- to lose their capacity (or at least willingness) to go through the synthesis/analysis/ramification chain of reasoning. But again, I doubt it's for you, either. I was angry when reading Ayn Rand at first, too. I had to figure out for myself that she had to be taken with a grain of salt because she couldn't get what love was. But now that you know that, ask yourself if you can really disagree with her reasoning (even if you dislike her conclusions). She doesn't really have a recepie for how to treat those you love (or befriend) -- just how to treat those you neither love nor hate.
To be more accurate, when their political philosophy fails, they blame their circumstances. If the philosophy worked, it would be a good guide to action under any but the most extreme and the most dire of circumstances. Otherwise, it's plainly dillusional. Would you care to try another altruist?
Sorry, I think your analogy is seriously flawed It's not flawed. It's imperfect. I'll admit it. But it is accurate as far as the point at hand is concerned -- those who fail never run out of excuses.
Are you seriously suggesting that if I asked Carter to hold onto my wallet that I wouldn't get it back, through incompetence or malice? If he found some "worthy" cause (shouldn't be hard for a man with his connections), I doubt you'd see your money again.
They never are... It's also not North Korea's fault that they had a famine. That's why 2 million died. Guess what? We had a famine just now. How many people died as its direct result?
Second to GWB, Carter's presidency is known for the worst handling of the economy in the known US history. I am not sure why you would pick him to handle your wallet.
But on a less personal note, I'll agree that her writting skills never rose up to a great level. It might have something to do with the fact that she was writting in her second language. We'll never know. As for your assertion that she "denied" certain things, well she presented proofs based on assumptions. Her logic is rarely faulty (although there were certain rare occasions where I caught her being farfetched). Her assumptions might be questionable since she didn't understand love at all. But, having said that, her description of a society in which most people don't love each other (it doesn't mean they hate each other -- just honestly treat each other as strangers) is fairly accurate. I challenge you to show that she "denies" something that is unrelated to love and does so in an emotionally charged rather than rational manner.
Mises and Rothbard It is hard to define the "greatest" economists. Society is composed of too many contributing factors to (so far) accurately say which ones are necessarily prevelant. Certainly there come momemnts when different contributing factors contribute much more than others. At those times it seems like a certain economic theory is more accurate than another one. But it would seem silly to dismiss Mises and Rothbard. Certainly, we can agree that more people have been killed in the name of altruism than in the name of all religions taken together. So I think I'll take the people that knee-jerk away from forced altruism (and forced fraternity) to the men of free-association (ie, trade). Kindly, count to 10 if you feel any need to spew an insult since this topic does tend to be pretty emotionally charged.
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First, what I am advocating is nothing like communism.
I am not sure if your capitalization is intentional, but while you advocate nothing like Communism, you most certainly do advocate communism.
But if a system exists that guarantees the basic minimums necessary for survival
It doesn't. It's one of those dillusions that's created by the plantitude of the surplaces of the modern society driven by self-interest. Because that system demands and creates constant increases in efficiency of production that "minimum" to which people are accustomed is constantly growing.
There are only the rights we agree to uphold for each other.
I disagree. Right exist as long as we agree not to take them away from each other. I don't need you (or anyone else) to breeth. But you can take (or attempt to take) that right from me. Anything for which I need you is a priviledge that I earn by being useful to you. I don't need you to talk to my neighbor and try to exchange my goods for his or my services for the services of your neighbor. So as far as you are concerned, this is my right. As far as your neighbor is concerned, it is my priviledge. If you try to tax my interraction with your neighbor, you take away my right.
Rights derive from agreements between individuals, and need not be justified though the naturalistic fallacy, nor through appeal to divine authority.
Again, rights do naturally exist until taken away. Apeal to an abstract divine as a tool for guaranteeing non-revokability of rights was used as a poetic license in the understanding that everyone would take it allegorically. Unfortunately, the poetic value can get chipped away with time, so I would agree that it is best not to open that door to superstitions.
collectively agree
A number of people cannot share one mind. They can simultaneously agree. But it is physically impossible for them to collectively agree. What you propose is collusion and they often (although not always) break because an opportunity comes along which makes backstabing a very advantageous proposition. Again, it's just a matter of assigning the proper weights in the Prisoner's Dilemma.
you place responsibility unfairly on the shoulders of that individual, and absolve any other factors of responsibility.
Yep. We are not victims of our circumstances. At least most of the time -- in all but the most dire of situations. We have the faculty for trying to change our circumstances. It is this faculty that allowed us to create the civilization (ie, an environment modified to suit our wants, some of which, of course, arouse from our needs). The extent to which we are victims of our circumstances rather than masters of them is the extent to which we have advanced.
Is it fair that they be held responsible for their actions, while the adults who enslaved and brainwashed them are not?
I don't see how you can suggest that anyone deems the adults who enslaved them and brainwashed them are not guilty of anything. It is fair to hold these children accountable for the murders they commit. But you are taking examples of extreme circumstances in which people have been turned into automatons to try to demonstrate the point that all people are automatons. Why not go for the kill and compare ourselves to people who have been lobotomized? Or even had their entire prefrontal cortex removed? Why only go for those who have been specifically conditioned not to consider choices that life offers? To prove that we can be driven to madness? Ok. Granted. But why should I be judged by those standards? I am talking about free-thinking individuals. How they got to that point is irrelevant. What matters is that they are there. The thing is what it is -- not what it used to be and not what it might become.
I say there is no clear demarcation between self and non self, and I challenge you to present on
Contracts are created through free association. I enforce the contract by refusing to deal with those who break it.
Again, that's not a contract. It's a pact. In case of a contract, there is way to punish the cheater. In case of a pact, it is the cheated that gets to carry the burden of most of the damages. Severing of association is not a punishment -- the cheater expects as much. He just waits for the moment when it becomes advantageous to break the pact and backstab. Let's just agree that we both understand the ramifications of the Prisoner's Dilemma before we debate this ad nauseam.
It sounds as if you wish to limit people's ability to redress wrongs, where only the powerful have the ability to choose their course, and lesser men would not have the power to band together into groups to protect their interests. In short, a sort of neo-feudalism, which is what most Objectivists seem to desire, and why I have such a problem with the idea.
You have yet to show how it follows from anything I say, but Ok. If we set the bar for conclusion making lower than a logical chain of reasoning, then I'll can just say, "I want nothing of the kind nor does Objectivism". And then not explain... perhaps stipulating that I am not an Objectivist.
You haven't thought through the consequences of your philosophy.
Oh? I have. Quite extensively. Both on eithical and logical grounds, through examination of previous historical examples, through considering behavioral and cognitive psychology and through dabbling in game theory. But ok, I'll keep thinking.
First, what if one person owned all the resources in the world?
I told you I didn't want to consider monopolies other than to say that I was against them. And, yet, that's where you chose to take it. It's a slightly different topic because it is a singularity condition in an otherwise mostly smooth progression. I already stipulated that I think that they must be treated differently. Now I'll state that it is precisely because they are singularity conditions that they deserve a different treatment.
Unfortunately for your philosophy, people see themselves as members of a community first, and traders second. It's in our nature. We can only really conceptualize around 150 individuals. Everyone outside of this circle of 'real people' is an abstraction, less than human.
I agree with the premise, but disagree with the conclusion. The fact that we can't imagine a group large (approximately 150) to be our community is precisely why communism and Communism fail.
All I propose is that anyone who wants to trade with me sign a contract saying they will a.) support a basic minimum guarantee of access to resources necessary for survival to all people, b.) only trade with people who make the same agreement.
And I've demonstrated that people who make such demands are more likely to be crooks than people who do not. I certainly would never sign such a contract and would definately demand higher price for my services (probably much higher) from any member of such a community... That's my line in the sand. No further.
I am not proposing any type of 'commune,' and I think that you reading things into what I am writing that I did not intend is getting in the way of any real communication.
Yet another property of the communists -- never taking responsibility. "you misunderstood", "you need to be educated", "we think otherwise" are all the signs. Whatever happened to "I mis-spoke", "I wasn't clear enough", "let me see how what you and I think differs". All the signs of cooperation (that come out of necessity) are absent in the men who wants to dictate.
I really don't see how you can stay logically consistent with your beliefs and disapprove of what I'm suggesting.
By realizing that what you suggest is rooted in treating life as a guarantee rather than a gift (from nature) and that y
What I am proposing is all built on free association and contract.
Contract is not a free association. It is a voluntary suspension of ability to associate freely (expressed as an agreement to assume responsibility for performing certain actions) in exchange for the other signatories doing the same (although, of course, the actions for which the other signatories assume respoinsibilities might be different). As with all contracts, they are only as valid as the ability to enforce them. Generally these types of contracts are kept together by the fear of retribution (ex communication, etc.) So, whether you realize it or not, you are very much looking to make heretics. How do you propose enforcing yours? A contract which has not enforcement mechanism is not a contract -- it's a pact. And pacts break up as soon as one member withdraws on a caprice. What you don't seem to realize is that the action you propose does not require a contract. It is just as easily accomplished with an individual choice (as in "he is selfish, so I am not going to go to his store").
Is it coercion to tell a man who has no food, no land, and no means of support, "You do what I say or you starve to death?"
You can't make such a statement. The only statement you can make is "I will help you not to starve to death if you do what I say." You posed your question in such a way that the premise that the starving person must accept a contract or starve. But that's not the case. He must accept the contract to prevent starvation in this particular way. He may find other means to support himself as far as the provider is concerned. It is not the provider's fault that he is able to provide. Whatever he has was created (hopefully he is an honest man and created it through his own talents or through exchange of the work of his talents for someone else's property). But the fact that someone has created something does not mean that he must share it. It means that he is free to name the price for it. If he weren't, it is likely (although definately not guaranteed) that he wouldn't bother creating it in the first place. I am sure we both can come up with examples of things people create without expecting to profit from them. But the key is that if they weren't able to profit from them, many people who do end up creating would not bother (again, not all, but many... if history is any indication, most). And what if the the man with all that bread was not free to charge for it? Well, the destitute person in your scenario would starve. Noone would offer him the employment because that's immoral. But that "cat" wouldn't bother creating a situation of ownership of bread either (what the hell for?).
Whites will be forming compacts not to deal with blacks. The rich will be forming free associations with each other to economically limit the choices open to the poor. All without coercion, merely with economic and social pressure.
"When I disagree with a man of reason, I let reality be the final arbiter." The reality is that in Brooklyn, NY, Palestinians do business with Israelis, R&B artists are welcome in all restaurants and car dealerships despite their backgrounds (sometimes not only poor, but criminal) and I live in an ethinicly-centric neighborhood the language of which I do not speak. All of this is possible because people are willing to think of themselves as traders before they are willing to think of themselves as members of a community. Trade (fueled by greed) is what makes this cooperation smooth and generally mostly flawless. Politics are put aside. People work for the same businesses despite vast political differences and religious background simply because it is the best way to profit from their talents -- not because it would benefit their communities.
You are confusing selfish and dishonest. It is a common meme of today to say that one implies the other. But it is severely incorrect. Selfish people who are honest approach each other as traders -- negotiating exchange of value for value as they see it. A selfish person is not a crook -- he is just not willing to exchange what he values more for what he values less. In exchange, fairness is his goal -- not taking advantage.
Happy, secure people are a positive externality, and scared, angry desperate people are a negative externality.
Show me a happy-go-lucky guy and I'll show a used car salesman. Living life as an exploration requires constant scepticism. Scepticism requires doubt. Doubt breeds unease. I don't trust the happy, secure people -- they tend to be dogmatic, full of prejudices and stubborn if you look just a little bit under the surface. And they are the ones who'll get angry and destructive when the reality fails to match their expectations.No, you are just trying to assign the quality of being hypocritical to someone invested in himself. The dictionary (and real life) disagree.
OS? You assume that they'll have an OS? Why? Your nervous system (despite being somewhat modular)seems to be pretty monolithic.
And I posit that it this sense of community that is forced (rather than occurs naturally) that creates red tape and regulations that try to precisely define that which we entrust the government to make us feel. We pick who we love, who we become friends with and towards whom we wish to be charitable. When this choice is made for us and forced on us at the threat of violence (the only tool available to a government), we lose our humanity and lose sight of the value of that which we hoped to force on ourself -- love, friendship and family. Who one choses to do business with is an individual choice. And need not be given up to an entity established for the purposes of common protection. Therefore, such an entity may not demand it. If you want to start boycotting stores which happen to not contribute as much to charity as your community leader thinks they should, you can feel free. But when you do that, you allow your community leader to usurp your individuality and, by doing so, abandon part of your ability (or at least willingness) to reason. If you give your community the power to shut down a store owner who does not contribute what you think they should to charity, you give your government the right you yourself do not have -- the right to intrude on the property of others. By doing so you declare that you have a right to be a tyrant over your neighbor as long as enough of your other neighbors agree to share the benefits of your tyranny. This coalescence of power (and eventual rise of a hierarchy of the powerful) is how all tyrannies were established.
On a personal note, I went through 3 stages in life. I started as an overachiever. As a teenage rebellion, I turned to religion and embraced the values of living for the sake of others. And as the third stage, I decide to live for the sake of self-improvement despite the objections from others. I probably don't have to explain which of the stages was least productive and most destructive. The life for the sake of others at the sacrifice of myself was nihilistic. It made my talents irrelevant. It was an exercise in self-destruction. Such a life is a life of a tool -- not of a free-thinking individual.
As for your comment that Ayn Rand started with contempt for the weak... She was person of great intellect. She worked tirelessly and cared more to be recognized as correct by the brightest of the minds. She wrote because she wanted to improve the world. She has characters in her books who are not of great personal accomplishment who still wish to live life to the best of their potential. She admires them (a drifter who wants to continues to try to find work after his factory is out of business). She pities them when they fall prey to the talented exploiters (James Taggard's wife). Her attitude towards them is very human. She just doesn't wish to be told that all men must accept the fate of the untalented as their own. That's not contempt for the weak. It is love for virtue.
An honest egoist? Any day. I'll know that he personally invested in his honesty (because of his ego he is personally invested in everything he does). His personal investment in his honesty would not let him cheat me.
"...The most depraved sentence you can now utter is to ask: Whose reason? The answer is: Yours. No matter how vast your knowledge or how modest, it is your own mind that has to acquire it. It is only with your own knowledge that you can deal. It is only your own knowledge that you can claim to possess or ask others to consider. Your mind is your only judge of truth--and if others dissent from your verdict, reality is the court of final appeal. Nothing but a man's mind can perform that complex, delicate, crucial process of identification which is thinking. Nothing can direct the process but his own judgment. Nothing can direct his judgment but his moral integrity..."
Integrity, btw is not uprightness (as it is used today), but rather consistency (the traditional English meaning)... derived from integral or indivisible. Other than that one word (and again only because of its modern usage), it sounds like your are embracing Buddha for the reasons John Galt would applaud.
So this would thwart reverse engineering, but not thwart piracy. Pirates are quite advanced. They were capable of slicing the chips thinly enough to examine them layer-by-layers years ago. Of course, once reverse engineering is thwarted, the piracy will become more profitable and proliferate. Well, good luck with that patent, guys.
Afraid you'll have to do just that -- give him your wallet. That's a requirement for becoming a monk, is it not? A philosophy that insists on embracing the harshness of mother nature and not attempting to think one's way out it (but rather to think one's way into accepting it)... ok. You can have it. Not for me though. Thankfully, they don't insist on being the only one true way, so they are willing to let me be. But the effect of that philosophy on its followers seems to mellow them down and make them lose their edge. Again, not for me. As far as I am concerned it asks people to deny their humanity -- to lose their capacity (or at least willingness) to go through the synthesis/analysis/ramification chain of reasoning. But again, I doubt it's for you, either. I was angry when reading Ayn Rand at first, too. I had to figure out for myself that she had to be taken with a grain of salt because she couldn't get what love was. But now that you know that, ask yourself if you can really disagree with her reasoning (even if you dislike her conclusions). She doesn't really have a recepie for how to treat those you love (or befriend) -- just how to treat those you neither love nor hate.
To be more accurate, when their political philosophy fails, they blame their circumstances. If the philosophy worked, it would be a good guide to action under any but the most extreme and the most dire of circumstances. Otherwise, it's plainly dillusional. Would you care to try another altruist?
They never are... It's also not North Korea's fault that they had a famine. That's why 2 million died. Guess what? We had a famine just now. How many people died as its direct result?
Second to GWB, Carter's presidency is known for the worst handling of the economy in the known US history. I am not sure why you would pick him to handle your wallet.