ZAP!!!

Do you have any ZAP methods of prevention aside from threat of lawsuit?

I do have a means of prevention of a broad attack against a city:

1) don't frack with other people's affairs.   The whole reason America, Britain, etc. have terrorist problems is due to their interventionist foreign policy.   If you notice, nations that have virtually no military have virtually no terrorist problems.   The majority of Latin American countries come to mind.   The Drug War in general causes all of the fighting over drugs, thus ending drug prohibition would end the violence over drugs; this is different than foreign policy, but it works on a similar mechanism.

2) Gieger counters are a particularly effective way for someone to know whether you are bringing a nuke into a city, I am pretty sure.   Suitcase nukes give off radiation, as far as I know, and modern radiation detectors should be able to detect that.   Suitcase nukes, from what I know, are as big as two 55 gallon drums stacked vertically, and weigh far too much to carry alone.   You can't hide a modern suitcase nuke in a hotel, much less get it into a hotel.

Plus, who would want to nuke a peaceful city.   Oh right, an American president did that twice; governments nuke people, just after governments invented nukes.

Biological warfare, invasions, etc. only occur because of either because of interventionist foreign policy or because of government greed.   The current arc in EFT is a good example of how government merely wants to gain from aggression (I guess increased tax revenue).

It is true that ZAP will not stop lunatics, but lunatics tend to be politically driven(e.g. Tuscon, Arizona shooting, like all the assassination attempts on all politicians), so if you get rid of politics, namely government, then you nobody will have any reason to go psycho over politics.   The only thing left to go nuts over might be religion and sex, but I don't hear about religion being a problem  as much as sex-related aggression is a problem, namely rape and spouses attacking each other over cheating.

In between these extremes is a continuum with no clear delineations. At the end of the day, what happens may be second guessed by an arbiter, who will have to apply the ZAP as he sees it based on forensic evidence and the testimony of the participants and witnesses. Hey, it is entirely possible that the arbiter will get it wrong. Welcome to the human race. We do the best we can with what we have. There is nothing wrong with the ZAP as a principle. After that, though, how it is applied is a judgment call. You never get perfection under any system of dispute resolution, but you do get a guiding principle and a forum in which to decide how it should be applied. Works for me.

Thank you! I have been trying to make this simple obvious point for some time, and it seemed to me that it had not been acknowledged until now.

ZAP is a clear, simple, obvious moral code. And in practice it does not always have a clear, simple, obvious application.

And that's OK.

Nothing is ever perfectly safe.  Do the best you can and deal with the consequences.

As to invasion, see our earlier threads.  Things got rather interesting.

MAD is not limited to interactions between governments.  Individuals are applying the same principles to their daily interactions.  Think of some of your neighbors or acquaintances.  Or family for that mater.

At the end of the day, what happens may be second guessed by an arbiter, who will have to apply the ZAP as he sees it based on forensic evidence and the testimony of the participants and witnesses. Hey, it is entirely possible that the arbiter will get it wrong. Welcome to the human race. We do the best we can with what we have. There is nothing wrong with the ZAP as a principle. After that, though, how it is applied is a judgment call. You never get perfection under any system of dispute resolution, but you do get a guiding principle and a forum in which to decide how it should be applied. Works for me.

You are right that it isn't fair to demand perfection of AnCap if we don't get perfection from the present governmental system.

However, I think I should clarify what I think the point is that is being harped upon by detractors of AnCap in this discussion.

Despite some really big exceptions, like taxation and conscription, our current system of democratic government, at least originally, had the same basic idea as its goal as is behind the ZAP. What defines our current system as distinct from the AnCap ideal, therefore, is not their shared idea that individuals have rights and are not creatures of the state - but rather, the exceptions to the ZAP that our system allows.

Thus, the point is that an AnCap system, in practice, is going to be defined, not by the ZAP, but by how arbitration works within it, since that's where the "exceptions" - that may not be the right word - to the ZAP are going to come from. Under AnCap, you can't just ignore the existence of other people either, and so the form that arbitration will take will make a very big difference to the kind of society you will be living in - so if arbitration is handwaved away as "something we'll figure out later", the objection that AnCap is a pig in a poke is a legitimate one.

if arbitration is handwaved away as "something we'll figure out later", the objection that AnCap is a pig in a poke is a legitimate one.

Yes, well, welcome to life.  So is government a pig in a poke.  American law says X, but what it means doesn't get determined until you -- you, specifically -- are in court about it.  Then a precedent is set, but how that precedent applies next time will only be determined next time.  Governmental court is an arbitration process, just as unknowable as an anarchic one.  And it's one that comes with a lot of extra baggage, like 8-10 years in prison for murder and 25 years in prison for a little toke of weed despite public opinion.

The advance security that is sought by setting up "government" does not exist.  In AnCap, I know things are fluid and uncertain; under a government, I run the risk of believing I know what the hard and fast rules are, only to find, when it comes time, that I was terribly wrong, so that I pay for my advance security with the shock of disillusionment.

"Eternal vigilance" isn't limited to "always be ready for violence".  It means "always be ready for anything".  Life's like that.  No government can spare you that.  AnCap's just a way of acknowledging that security is an illusion.

If you'd like to discuss arbitration schemes, we could start a new thread. . . . :-)

Low profiles are insufficient unfortunately, look at Chile for example. Resources are also sufficient for targeting, look at Argentina. There is also the question of political expediency, like Clinton vs the pharma company in Africa when the Starr report was released. Under banner of 'unification against a common threat' of their own invention, existing is sufficient cause for all sorts of issues. Low profile and good karma are reasons I don't want to displace a native population in order to form a country.

I agree regarding enhanced targeting for MAD. With appropriate intel, efficiency increases drastically as both deterrent and penalty.

It appears the main methods advocated so far are simply risk hedging which I fully endorse. I don't want to be classified as a "detractor" but rather someone who wanted to brainstorm the efficiency of ZAP at the international level.  A superior culture will subsume an inferior one, look at how many times China was invaded but survived due to cultural power.  Another example would be Chapterhouse Dune by Frank Herbert.

Arbitration is inherently more fair than courts, the main imbalance of power with courts is the entire premise of police -> prosecution -> government. The aggression against Dmitri Skalarov is a prime example. Adobe dropped the case, the FBI took it up and detained him for a year without 'victim' participation or consent. E.g. the wheels keep turning even when nobody is driving the car. My situation was similar.

I wanted to simplify civil torts by creating a list of "standard" contracts. They would be fill in the blank, fill in the penalty for violation. Negotiation and settlement should be lawyer free. On the other hand, if the contract is contested later it would simply be a matter of going down the checklist, looking for violations, excising the stated penalty, charging extra for being stupid enough to go to court after breach of contract. People could sign any contract they want, but the courts would only hear "standard" contract cases. The difference I created for this sort of design was courts would ask militia to enforce the decisions, unlike arbitration which inherently has no teeth. All 3rd party contracts would be arbitrated outside the courts.

For any sort of criminal proceedings, my main concern regarding justice is a reliance on evidence. Evidence is not currently collected in any sort of fair way in the US, so any attempt at fairness is an improvement. UK's rules of evidence are unknown to me.

I think ZAP is the ideal system for homesteads. Regarding security of space stations made cheaply, welding together a bunch of derelict craft would permit redundant air supply. The main issue would be integration of the computer systems or docks if the space industry doesn't standardize quickly after it goes commercial.

Despite some really big exceptions, like taxation and conscription, our current system of democratic government, at least originally, had the same basic idea as its goal as is behind the ZAP.

Quite true. The seed of destruction was the faulty idea that an agency of coercion (i.e., government) could safeguard those ZAP ideals. Thus the US democratic government was doomed ab initio, by its internal contradiction.

What defines our current system as distinct from the AnCap ideal, therefore, is not their shared idea that individuals have rights and are not creatures of the state - but rather, the exceptions to the ZAP that our system allows.

Bingo.

Thus, the point is that an AnCap system, in practice, is going to be defined, not by the ZAP, but by how arbitration works within it, since that's where the "exceptions" - that may not be the right word - to the ZAP are going to come from.

This does not follow. Assuming arguendo, that Belters mostly adhere to the ZAP as a first principle, then arbiters will do so as well. Why? Because they will not be hired by litigants if they do not.

Also, everyone keeps assuming that "arbiter" is some sort of professional caste. It is not. Anyone can sit it arbitration. ANYONE. In EFT, Pablo Rosenberg is probably the closest thing to a professional arbiter. With Reggie, on the other hand, arbitration is a sideline to his church activities--much as rabbis play the role of arbiter in the resolution of disputes between Jews.

Let's create a simple example. Robyn borrows a blouse from Libby to wear to a party. A clumsy boy spills wine on the blouse, creating a permanent stain. Libby wants Robyn to buy her a new blouse (the "you break it, you buy it" theory); Robyn thinks that Libby assumed the risk by lending it to go to a party. (Also she advances the theory that she is not responsible for the stain (the "I didn't stain the blouse, the oaf did" theory).

Rather than fight about it, they decide to ask Emily to resolve the issue and agree to abide by her decision. Emily agrees to act as arbiter (for free or for .2 grams of gold). She decides that Robyn should pay half the cost of replacing the blouse. Neither Robyn nor  Libby are crazy about the solution, but a deal is a deal. Problem solved. Now is Emily secretly aspiring to be a member of the putative oligarchy that does/will rule Ceres? Probably not.

Under AnCap, you can't just ignore the existence of other people either, and so the form that arbitration will take will make a very big difference to the kind of society you will be living in - so if arbitration is handwaved away as "something we'll figure out later", the objection that AnCap is a pig in a poke is a legitimate one.

If the ZAP is the Belters' First Principle, then mutually agreed upon arbitration to resolve disputes, is the Second Principle. Why? Because it is pretty much the only form of dispute resolution that does not, explicitly or implicitly, involve the initiation of force. (I say "pretty much the only form" because, there are even more primitive alternatives, such as paper-scissors-stone or running a foot race.)

BTW, trial by combat, trial by ordeal or throwing the I Ching are all permitted by the ZAP. For a resolution based on the merits, though, some sort of voluntary third-party resolution is the only ZAP-compliant option.

And just to tie this up, voluntary means voluntary. If someone does not agree to arbitration, his life will suddenly become a lot more complicated.

And just to tie this up, voluntary means voluntary. If someone does not agree to arbitration, his life will suddenly become a lot more complicated.

But that's the detail in which the devil may lie.

It is being assumed that shunning is inadequate for dealing with "real criminals", and not all "real criminals" will make mistakes in victim selection, and that "real criminals" - that is, people who commit serious aggressions, like murder and rape, against other citizens, will exist, however infrequently. It seems to me that any system adequate to deal with them... will also have the power to impose community whims on people as well... unless there's something going on here that no one has spelled out.

This could well be a "theoretical" problem - especially if citizens of an expanse where AnCap is practiced can vote with their feet (no mutual extradition treaties that override the judgment of the arbiters in the next village over, for example - so you can run from the imposition of a local whim, but not from the penalty for a serious aggression, because all the villages will agree about those). People with statist habits of thought may imagine appellate arbiters and Supreme Planetary Arbiters, but if a putative AnCap society doesn't have things like that, then it makes it more plausible that it isn't a state in disguise after all.

EDIT: Oh, and by the way, I've thought of an even sillier objection to AnCap.

Local: Welcome to our happily functioning anarchist society.

Visitor: Oh, that's nice. When will you be having your next election, so that the people here can decide if they want to retain anarchy as their form of government?

Local: We don't have government, so we can hardly have elections.

Visitor: But that's tyranny!

So one must make allowances for the fact that much about AnCap is unintelligible to the traditional mind-set.

When will you be having your next election, so that the people here can decide

Elections decide nothing.  Before the election -- long before -- there has been some level of social conversation about the issues.  This may be by the water cooler, it may be movies made with a particular bent, it may be ads on a bus.  The election is only a means to tally up how successful the various sides of the conversation have been.

If you wait until voting time to flex your civic muscles, it's too late:  you've long since been manipulated -- instead of being one of the manipulators.

It is being assumed that shunning is inadequate for dealing with "real criminals", and not all "real criminals" will make mistakes in victim selection, and that "real criminals" - that is, people who commit serious aggressions, like murder and rape, against other citizens, will exist, however infrequently. It seems to me that any system adequate to deal with them... will also have the power to impose community whims on people as well... unless there's something going on here that no one has spelled out.

Perhaps I missed something, but this seems confused.

Sure, there will be mechanisms for dealing with "real criminals".  If such mechanisms aren't standard, they will be created as necessary.  And, certainly, such mechanisms in a community of people where aggression is accepted would lead to the aggressive imposition of community whims.  But what does that have to do with an AnCap community?

And, certainly, such mechanisms in a community of people where aggression is accepted would lead to the aggressive imposition of community whims.  But what does that have to do with an AnCap community?

Now, that's an effective response... from an angle I didn't even think of.

Finding people you can trust as neighbors, though, solves a lot of problems under any political system - and, again, people with statist habits of thought might imagine that a requirement of the right kind of political system is to somehow dispense with that requirement. I can't refute the counterargument that this would be wishing for the impossible.

1) don't frack with other people's affairs.   The whole reason America, Britain, etc. have terrorist problems is due to their interventionist foreign policy.

And the reason Sweden, Switzerland, Thailand, Nigeria, etc have terrorist problems is?

Take a look at the bloody borders of Islam map.

It is being assumed that shunning is inadequate for dealing with "real criminals", and not all "real criminals" will make mistakes in victim selection, and that "real criminals" - that is, people who commit serious aggressions, like murder and rape, against other citizens, will exist, however infrequently. It seems to me that any system adequate to deal with them... will also have the power to impose community whims on people as well.

Any monopoly system to deal with them will have the power to impose community whims.

But assume that the authority of the arbiters comes in large part not from some professional caste of enforces that are obligated to follow the dictates of the arbiters, but from the fact that people would otherwise fight it out, and for real crimes, shoot it out - that burglars submit to arbitration because the likely alternative is that the homeowner puts the burglar's head on a post outside his home to discourage subsequent burglars, and that homeowners don't actually need to go to arbitration - if the burglar already has a bad reputation and no one who wants to stick up for him, the homeowner can probably just stick the burglar's head on a post without bothering with arbitration - and if the burglar skipped out after a previous arbitration, and burgles again, that is quite possibly what will happen.

Such authority is not capable of enforcing "community whims".

Or, indeed, community anything.  It cannot enforce public good laws, only private good laws.  There has to be a particular aggrieved party who is particularly aggrieved at a particular offender.  The offender can get away with doing things that are bad for society.  He cannot get away with doing things that are bad for some particular person.

Such authority is not capable of enforcing "community whims".

Or, indeed, community anything.  It cannot enforce public good laws, only private good laws.  There has to be a particular aggrieved party who is particularly aggrieved at a particular offender.  The offender can get away with doing things that are bad for society.  He cannot get away with doing things that are bad for some particular person.

I will give a silly example. Imagine that on Ceres people realize that human dandruff is a bad thing. It blows around everywhere. It gets into people's food. It gets into air filters. I's just basicly unsanitary and bad. And everybody but you has gotten convinced about this, to the point they all shave their heads daily and vacuum them to minimise dandruff.

So, somebody calls for arbitration on you because you are walking around in public with hair on your head. You believe that you have a right to grow hair and you sure don't want to be on record as someone who refused arbitration.

So this bald woman tells the bald arbitrator that when she saw your hair it made her sick to her stomach and she started to get an asthma attack. Because of you.

And the arbitrator agrees that your dust-mop is an assault on the senses for everybody who sees it, and open aggression on the air filters. But it isn't like you're killing anybody. People breathe each others' skin flakes all the time, you're just doing it hundreds of times worse. So he rules that you can keep your hair if you want to, and the only requirement is that if you go into a corridor that uses the public corridor company's filters you must pay them 0.1 gold per day, and if anybody who sees you in public complains to you then you must pay them 0.01 gold per complaint on the spot.

This might seem like a badly debased ZAP arbitration. But I think that if you find yourself doing something in public that most people disapprove of, they will find a way to go after you.

All existing forms of states have failed to eliminate real criminals - people who rape, murder, and steal. Even Singapore, which has quite extensive lists of crimes and punishments thereof, has a problem with real criminals.

Why then all the bitching and moaning about the possibility that real criminals might be able to survive in a society which takes ZAP seriously? If we apply the same standard to both, then we should conclude that both statism and ZAP are failures.

Is Holt honest enough to do that?

A better criterion would be, which sort of organization reduces real crime? Since real crime is by definition aggression, it seems that ZAP would have a definitive lead in any such race.

As for people like Holt, they'd have trouble buying a meal without paying up front - and their coins would be tested. Who would trust such perverse people?