rights

I am not saying Free Will is a bad thing, All I am stating is a society based on Absolute Freedom is unworkable, where one based on AnCap will function.

I see. I think we were arguing at cross-purposes. My bad. Still, what I was saying was that everyone already has absolute freedom, but they don't typically exercise it.

I hate to be pedantic here, but the word is "inalienable". The "un" came from Fox News when it felt the need to be different.
Please use the correct word in the future, unless you really are an uneducated twit.
Thank you.

Huh. There was a fairly famous debate between Jefferson and Adams about "un" or "in"-alienable. Jefferson liked "in", Adams liked "un". "Un" might be a New-Englandism.

dictionary.com has both. "Inalienable" gets defined with a bunch of stuff, "unalienable" with a link to "inalienable", with not calling it incorrect.

You're not being "pedantic", dude. Just opinionated.

Sam makes a good point about violence: It's costly, and ruins your rep. This would cause most sane people to avoid it, and well... shall we say... weeds out the less sane?

But again, ignoring the guns, if someone refuses to abide by (or even show up at) an arbitration, all the injured party need do is make that fact public. Smart, sane people would then avoid dealings with them, for the simple reason that if the guy screwed one person over, they're likely to do it again. So, someone who repeatedly refused or failed to make good on arbitration would rapidly find themselves out in the cold, with no friends, and no business contacts.

Sunny: We're just not seeing it. It all sounds like...sorry, but a bunch of handwaving. By which we mean ad hoc contingency schemes rather than a coherent organized system.

Even with ZAP in place, we don't see how violence is prevented, except that everyone is armed (so everyone is too scared to cause violence). It still sounds like everyone hopes that everyone else will obey the rules. True, in every society the people tacitly agree to cooperate for the good of the whole, but anarchy seems to suggest a certain naivete that ZAP and a free market and unrestricted gun ownership will prevent violence. Other societies however accept that violence will occur and make contingencies for it, whether or not that means forming a government. Granted, characters in EFT acknowledge that Belt society is not perfect, but the comic itself presents the Belt as utopic, with the (rare) internal problem being "magically" solved by a market solution. It all has an unreal feel that we found jarring; we just couldn't suspend our disbelief.

Anywho, the scenario we presented of the gorilloids was meant to allow us try to understand how anarchy would prevent violence but also deal with it if it came up, but the explanations don't sound realistic. It's easy to accept that people willing to cooperate would accept the results of arbitration and be kept in line by the consequences of a breach of contract, but what about a bad person seeking power? Such people don't care about reputation; they aren't intimidated by the shunning techniques you've described. A BPSP could get around attempts to cut him off financially; he could deal with an armed population by securing more powerful arms (unrestricted ownership after all) and a gang to back him up. Once he has a power base he can begin intimidating the weaker members of the community. It becomes worse if he receives support from merchants or manufacturers hoping to cash in on his rise to power, or a significant percentage of the population, either out of fear or greed. Eventually one of two things is going to happen: either the remaining members of the community will violently confront the BPSP before he becomes too powerful, or he will take over the community.

An armed society obviously helps, but ultimately it requires the people in the society in general to do their part to maintain a civil society.  You think shunning wouldn't work?  It won't if people don't want to support a civil society, but it will if people don't want to have a paranoid, evil, corrupt society.  

So you have some guy who either won't submit to arbitration or doesn't agree with the results of arbitration, and he wants to go around and do bad things.  First of all is the "armed society" bit.  He's refused civil society, and is branded an outlaw.  Anybody can kill him without legal consequence, and if there is a reward for doing so, then he'll have bounty hunters after him.  More importantly, anyone willingly associating with him will run the risk of ruining their reputation.  So he runs into trouble because he can't find a restaurant that will serve him, a hotel that will let him stay there, a grocery store that will sell him food, or even a retail store that will sell him clothes, medicine, batteries, or other supplies.    In any fairly modern technological society, he's going to be denied most of the benefits of living in such a society, unless he gives up and submits to the legal system and the decision of the arbitration.

Yes, I suppose he might be able to live out in the wilds somewhere, assuming he actually can manage to live off the land, and assuming there are some wilds to live in, but he's still a branded outlaw and at risk of capture or being killed.

You think he'll just spend a lot of money and bribe his way?  Only if his criminal activity has managed to net a lot of money, and that money isn't traceable.  With free banking, there would be multiple currencies, and depending upon his crime, and which currency he had stolen, it might very well be traceable, and merchants could be on the lookout for the specific money he stole.  

Otherwise, he's not likely to have a lot of money, and couldn't afford to bribe his way very far.  If his crime was murder instead of robbery, for example, why would he have a lot of money?

And don't get started on eccentric millionaires--without government subsidies, contracts, and other government intervention, you'll find that the wealthy in a free society primarily get wealthy by serving their customers and clients better than their competition.  A lifetime of building wealth that way instills habits in a human being that are not easily changed or broken, short of outright insanity or dementia developing.   And even if our eccentric millionaire did suddenly change after decades of serving people, he would find it hard to continue making more money, and would start losing money, instead, thus providing limits on how far he can keep going with his diminishing supply of money.  

In short, human nature would not change, but in an anarchic society, the incentives that people have would be different than they are now.  And that would make all the difference in the kind of society we would have.

"what about a bad person seeking power? Such people don't care about reputation; they aren't intimidated by the shunning techniques you've described. A BPSP could get around attempts to cut him off financially; he could deal with an armed population by securing more powerful arms (unrestricted ownership after all) and a gang to back him up. Once he has a power base he can begin intimidating the weaker members of the community. It becomes worse if he receives support from merchants or manufacturers hoping to cash in on his rise to power, or a significant percentage of the population, either out of fear or greed. Eventually one of two things is going to happen: either the remaining members of the community will violently confront the BPSP before he becomes too powerful, or he will take over the community."

Congratulations, you've just described the origin of the State. It is what happens when a community allows a BPSP to succeed. States get *larger* by conquest of other peoples and *multiply* in number by schism, but you hit the nail on the head for an organic original State. Thanks for joining our side!

"So how would it prevent a BPSP from trying to take over, or how it would deal nonviolently with one actively working to take over?"

Who said anything about being 'nonviolent'? A BPSP is already initiating aggression, violating the ZAP, so to correct it will likely require defensive violence. This is moral. This is not pacifist. Eliminating him is justified by the Silver Rule: "Do not do unto others what you do not want them to do unto you." Since he is violating the property and lives of others, he is demonstrating that he expects others to do the same to him, so the solution is to do so. He either wakes up to the morality of respecting other's property before it escalates too far, or he is killed, or he succeeds in creating a State.

While more peaceful methods are tried first, eventually some dogs just have to be put down after demonstrating that they are too dangerous to those near him (and he refuses to stay far from them). In the not-so-wild West, stealing horses was a hanging offense. No wonder that every cowboy movie has horses just lazily tied up with single strap of leather casually wrapped around a hitching post. They'll only be stolen if it's worth your life to take one, say if you're already a capital criminal and need to get out of Dodge in a hurry. That armed society was a polite society and each respected his neighbor's property, largely.

An anarchy allows its members to learn whatever they wish to learn on their own (negative liberty); it creates libraries and offers incentives… it provides seeds and loans of tools… it offers incentives to volunteer…

No, there is no 'it' as an actor. You were trying to refer to 'an anarchy' (from your previous sentence) as acting. 'It' does not. It is a system. The first half of your paragraphs above talk about an anarchy 'allowing'. It doesn't 'allow' in the sense of me giving you permission to walk across my lawn, but it does 'allow' in the sense that the system doesn't prevent peaceful actions. It is a lack of rulers (not a lack of rules). In an anarchy, there are no masters (of others) and therefore no slaves (hire your services out all you want, though, even for life). Even where there is group action, only individuals are actually acting (self-identifying as group members), and analyzing things this way really helps clear up confusion. A person may create libraries and offer incentives if he so wishes. Feel free to do so yourself, knock yourself out. I loan books from my personal library, as many do. But the assumption of a State keeps creeping into your thought process. Just thought I'd help set you straight before you go too wrong.

rfaramir and macsnafu make good points. I can't really improve on them. I will pull out some good quotes, though:

A BPSP is already initiating aggression, violating the ZAP, so to correct it will likely require defensive violence.

And here's the point I was trying to make before, but in more detail:

More importantly, anyone willingly associating with him will run the risk of ruining their reputation. So he runs into trouble because he can't find a restaurant that will serve him, a hotel that will let him stay there, a grocery store that will sell him food, or even a retail store that will sell him clothes, medicine, batteries, or other supplies. In any fairly modern technological society, he's going to be denied most of the benefits of living in such a society, unless he gives up and submits to the legal system and the decision of the arbitration.

Sunny: The Golden Rule states, "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you." In other words, it doesn't just advocate passive restraint from harming someone else, but also commands the active pursuit to aid someone else.

You would have to be Christian in order to believe the Golden Rule applies to you.  ZAP has no provision for religious-based compassion.

The "Golden Rule" not being Christian doctrine, some would say it applies no matter who you are.  I (thank God) am an atheist and find no conflict between the Golden Rule and the Zero Aggression Principle.  I generally do unto others as I would like done unto me:  I leave them the f u c k alone.  Representatives of government and other initiators of force do not return the favor.  In the present political climate (and especially here in the lovely region known as New Jersey), self-defense against these individuals is not safe.

Eile: So the right ta life is not just the right not ta be murdered but also the right ta be protected. The right ta liberty is not just the right not ta be locked up (or ta be denied the protection of the law) but also the right ta be granted freedom (or granted the protection of the law). And the right ta property is not just the right not ta have yer stuff stolen, but also the right ta be given stuff you need. In other words, if natural rights mesh with the Golden Rule, they not only prevent the government from doing harmful things, they also obligate the government ta do beneficial things. Like protect people from gun violence, pollution, hazardous work places, shoddy merchandise, and bad food and drugs; grant people the ability to live and work where they want without discrimination; and give people the basic necessities of life.

ZAP and Anarcho-capitalism as espoused here means exactly that.  The right to Life is the right to live, but not be protected (AnCap is social darwinism at its worst: kill or be killed; there is no government to do the protecting of the weak or minority), etc.
And, being  in the majority, AnCappers likke it that way.

Sunny: But even if natural rights do not mesh with the Golden Rule, it still obligates Christians to actively help other people, not just refrain from hurting them.

You would have to be Christian for this to apply.

I see nothing in the words "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you" to mandate a christian, atheist or anyone else to do a damned thing.  To me, the interpretation is that if you do unto others, it had better be something you would like done unto you.  If you would like being killed in self-defense, initiate force against an adherent of the Zero Aggression Principle and see where it gets you.

There is no requirement under the Golden Rule (or the Zero Aggression Principle) to perform charitable acts, for instance.  That's entirely your choice.  A choice which is easier to make if government isn't claiming to do them for you and stealing most of your money do so.

Sunny: The Golden Rule states, "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you." In other words, it doesn't just advocate passive restraint from harming someone else, but also commands the active pursuit to aid someone else.

You would have to be Christian in order to believe the Golden Rule applies to you.  ZAP has no provision for religious-based compassion.

The "Golden Rule" not being Christian doctrine, some would say it applies no matter who you are.  I (thank God) am an atheist and find no conflict between the Golden Rule and the Zero Aggression Principle.  I generally do unto others as I would like done unto me:  I leave them the f u c k alone.  Representatives of government and other initiators of force do not return the favor.  In the present political climate (and especially here in the lovely region known as New Jersey), self-defense against these individuals is not safe.

There is no requirement under the Golden Rule (or the Zero Aggression Principle) to perform charitable acts, for instance.  That's entirely your choice.  A choice which is easier to make if government isn't claiming to do them for you and stealing most of your money do so.

Before Jesus, Rabbi Hillel said, "What is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow: this is the whole Torah; the rest is the explanation; go and learn" (Shab. 31a). Hillel recognized brotherly love as the fundamental principle of Jewish moral law. (Lev. xix. 18).  (And as Jesus studied the rabbis, it is likely his version was inspired by Hillel.)  Perhaps if you searched, you could find similar statements in other cultures.

Perhaps if you searched, you could find similar statements in other cultures.

Wouldn't have to search far, or hard:

"An ye harm none, do as ye will" - Wiccan rede.

"Hurt not others in ways that you yourself would find hurtful." - Udana-Varga 5,1 (Buddhism)

"This is the sum of duty; do naught onto others what you would not have them do unto you." - Mahabharata 5,1517 (Hinduism)

"No one of you is a believer until he desires for his brother that which he desires for himself." - Sunnah (Islam)

If you see someone drowning, "Do not do unto others..." (ZAP) means not throwing them an anchor, while "Do unto others..." (Golden Rule) means throwing them a rope and hauling them to shore.

The former is "I shouldn't hurt him"; the latter is "I should save him!"

A fair assessment. Most people would still attempt to save them, but there is no obligation to.

You think shunning wouldn't work?

I don't think shunning as such would work, because the guy who operates a hamburger stand has no profit in shunning bad guys.

However, rentacops, mutual defense associations, militias, and so on and so forth do have an interest in shunning bad guys, since trouble is expensive, so the known bad guy has no one who will defend him.  That kind of shunning would work just fine.

If you decline arbitration, you get a bad name.  If you get a bad name people might shun you - or they might get away with just killing you.

If people are not resolving their disputes, they are "out of law" with each other.  If there are two large groups that are not resolving their disputes, then they are out of law with each other, which is the anarcho capitalist equivalent of being at war with each other.  If there is one guy who is not resolving his disputes with anyone, he is out of law with everyone, which is to say, an outlaw.

I see. I think we were arguing at cross-purposes. My bad. Still, what I was saying was that everyone already has absolute freedom, but they don't typically exercise it.

True enough since you choose to internalize it, even those ruled by oppressive totalitarianism have it...

Yet In that case, any attempt to exercise it is typically their own very brief display of Absolute Freedom.. 

Quote from: myrkul999 on May 11, 2012, 01:20:40 AM

I see. I think we were arguing at cross-purposes. My bad. Still, what I was saying was that everyone already has absolute freedom, but they don't typically exercise it.

True enough since you choose to internalize it, even those ruled by oppressive totalitarianism have it...

Yet In that case, any attempt to exercise it is typically their own very brief display of Absolute Freedom.. 

Something like.  I generally find that taking the argument to the point of "absolute" freedom is seldom helpful.  I do not have the "freedom" to fly like Superman; Tero Sand, a quadriplegic, did not even have the "freedom" to sit up, much less walk where he would -- both of these involving lack of physical power to do so.  In the case of randomly punching someone in the face, I do have the physical power to do that, but I do not have the, heh, social power.  The specific responses of other humans to our actions are only slightly less predictable than the responses of, say, gravity or ionic bonding; they are every bit as inherent to the situation.

"Absolute" freedom is a red herring.  Even if we limit our "absolute" to "that which is materially possible", it can only matter to Robinson Crusoe (before Friday).

So, what can "freedom" mean in the context of a community of other humans, i.e., humans in their natural habitat?

So, what can "freedom" mean in the context of a community of other humans, i.e., humans in their natural habitat?

Well, as I said, your freedom to swing your fist without consequence ends at my face. You have the freedom to do anything you like, so long as you don't step over the line and violate someone's rights.

.........

"Absolute" freedom is a red herring.  Even if we limit our "absolute" to "that which is materially possible", it can only matter to Robinson Crusoe (before Friday).

So, what can "freedom" mean in the context of a community of other humans, i.e., humans in their natural habitat?

Truth be I was looking for myrkul999's reply and was content at it being the last word.
We had discussed this down to the logical conclusion.

I have no interest in arguing "red herring's" with you and your reflection..

OK, guys, I confess.  I am "sam" (heh, sam I am).  "sam" is my sock puppet, my evil feminist scheme to make these views as ridiculous as possible in order to draw scorn upon anyone who voices them.

But I'm only going to announce it this once.  In all future "sam" posts, I'll either ignore it or deny it, depending on my mood.

Now I fully expect YOU WILL troll spam this mellyrrn/sam so here is your topic to chew at...  

In a perfect government, if one ever exists,,,
Personal Freedom is the motivation in government and Defined Rights only limit personal freedoms by making them fair for everyone.

Only one truly talking to there own reflection in the same thread would argue that.

An armed society obviously helps, but ultimately it requires the people in the society in general to do their part to maintain a civil society.  You think shunning wouldn't work?

People do what is good for themselves, then what they have contracted to do, then what is good for kin, then what is good for friends and associates.  Society comes up way in the rear.

Government is rationalized as a solution to this problem, but of course government winds up doing what is good for government.  Any vision of anarchy that requires people to "do their part" has to explain why they are going to do their part.

Assume people form associations for the purpose of defense, based on contract rather than birth or geography.  If most people contract in advance of trouble, with an insurance type contract where the association charges them by the year rather the incident, whether the charge be in money or defensive services, then everyone has the correct incentives, since the association does not want people who bring trouble.