Where are you on the political spectrum?

[greg]

I can actually get behind this one (picture attached). Lib unity. 

[drogulus]

I can actually get behind this one (picture attached). Lib unity. 

     I think we might have a slight disagreement on the role of predators and prey in a system of "natural" liberty. Social systems create new forms of conflict/cooperation management. In humans we have ideas about it. Ants just do it without the means or the need to explain to themselves what's going on.

[Florestan]

    The people who think they have the right to chop peoples heads off didn't get their philosophy from Cambridge.

They tried to bring it to Cambridge, though. (Kim Philby et al.) 

[drogulus]

They tried to bring it to Cambridge, though. (Kim Philby et al.) 

     The influence didn't come from or go to Cambridge philosophers. The Cambridge spies may have picked up Marxism from another discipline.

[greg]

     I think we might have a slight disagreement on the role of predators and prey in a system of "natural" liberty. Social systems create new forms of conflict/cooperation management. In humans we have ideas about it. Ants just do it without the means or the need to explain to themselves what's going on.

The idealism is that there shouldn't be predators or prey to begin with, but realizing there's no way to get around that means libertarianism is the proper solution if given a choice between that and anarchy.

[Florestan]

The idealism is that there shouldn't be predators or prey to begin with, but realizing there's no way to get around that means libertarianism is the proper solution if given a choice between that and anarchy.

Iow, libertarianism (itself a form of anarchy) is the proper solution only in an abstract context never to be obtained in real life. Some solution, indeed. 

[drogulus]

The idealism is that there shouldn't be predators or prey to begin with,

     We aren't trying to get to "to begin with", except maybe in the movie Altered States.

     I wonder where that thing in the movie would be on the political spectrum.

     I also remember another movie, The Fly, where BrundleFly talks about how insects don't have politics. I thought he made a good point.

.............proper solution only in an abstract context never to be obtained in real life. Some solution, indeed. 

     I (heh!) wholeheartedly agree.

[greg]

Well, there is a balance.

I think the most logical balance is stop making stuff be illegal that shouldn't be illegal, and only make stuff illegal that should be illegal. Which seems to be a rare thing... let people make bad decisions without adding extra unnecessary punishment, but punish others if they hurt others.

[drogulus]

Well, there is a balance.

I think the most logical balance is stop making stuff be illegal that shouldn't be illegal, and only make stuff illegal that should be illegal. Which seems to be a rare thing... let people make bad decisions without adding extra unnecessary punishment, but punish others if they hurt others.

     Who should do the shoulds is the question. Self government produces workable answers that don't break the system and inoculate against much of the crankery that plagues Absolute Certainty, Inc.

[Florestan]

     Who should do the shoulds is the question.

Precisely. For every 10 persons who think stuff X shouldn't be illegal one can find 100 who think it actually should, and for every 10 persons who think stuff Y should be illegal one cand find 100 who think it actually shouldn't. Who gets to decide and on what criteria?

Self government produces workable answers that don't break the system and inoculates against much of the crankery that plagues Absolute Certainty, Inc.

Self government is a nice but vague term which can be and is invoked by libertarians and anarchists themselves, both left and right. I prefer more technical concepts, like liberal democracy, constitutional checks and balances, bill of rights and --- oh, the horror! --- free market (which is not the same as unfettered capitalism, mind you). Otherwise, I (heh!) wholeheartedly agree.

[greg]

Precisely. For every 10 persons who think stuff X shouldn't be illegal one can find 100 who think it actually should, and for every 10 persons who think stuff Y should be illegal one cand find 100 who think it actually shouldn't. Who gets to decide and on what criteria?

Criteria should be whatever is beneficial to society. I just don't see laws that create black markets to be beneficial to society. The only argument I can see for that is removing competition for jobs by getting people in thr prison system?

Self government is a nice but vague term which can be and is invoked by libertarians and anarchists themselves, both left and right. I prefer more technical concepts, like liberal democracy, constitutional checks and balances, bill of rights and --- oh, the horror! --- free market (which is not the same as unfettered capitalism, mind you). Otherwise, I (heh!) wholeheartedly agree.

I think I would be pretty hard lib right if I weren't a creative person. I like the idea but the true boss of capitalism is popularity. If what you like to create isn't popular (regardless of actual quality/effort spent) then you don't get to make a living doing it. So you will have to work full time doing something you have little passion for for the rest of your life.

[Florestan]

Criteria should be whatever is beneficial to society. 

We're back full circle again: who gets to decide what is beneficial to society? Some people argue that black markets, having a limited extent and being under constant pressure from law enforcement agencies, are less harmful to society than the widespread availability of whatever forbidden things they sell. Other people disagree. Who is entitled to settle the matter and how?

If what you like to create isn't popular (regardless of actual quality/effort spent) then you don't get to make a living doing it.

Unless you get some rich people interested in your work. 

[drogulus]

Precisely. For every 10 persons who think stuff X shouldn't be illegal one can find 100 who think it actually should, and for every 10 persons who think stuff Y should be illegal one cand find 100 who think it actually shouldn't. Who gets to decide and on what criteria?

Self government is a nice but vague term which can be and is invoked by libertarians and anarchists themselves, both left and right. I prefer more technical concepts, like liberal democracy, constitutional checks and balances, bill of rights and --- oh, the horror! --- free market (which is not the same as unfettered capitalism, mind you). Otherwise, I (heh!) wholeheartedly agree.

    That's a perfect expression of how absolutism is inapplicable to governance of the self type, however much we are free to adopt such frameworks in our tiny little minds. The Absolutes don't scale up well. Those things you mentioned do, because they are defined by how well they do it. Whatever "originalists" think they are saying, the Constitution has no choice but to mean what we agree on.

     Holy Shit! Richard Rorty ate my brain!!

[drogulus]

 
    The vagueness of the self-government idea is a necessary feature. The project will never be completed. It's got no teleology in it or it wouldn't have any room to grow into what succeeding generations need it to become. Aristotle had this notion of final cause. We don't do that any more.

[greg]

We're back full circle again: who gets to decide what is beneficial to society? Some people argue that black markets, having a limited extent and being under constant pressure from law enforcement agencies, are less harmful to society than the widespread availability of whatever forbidden things they sell. Other people disagree. Who is entitled to settle the matter and how?

If you're asking me I don't have any opinion that is much different than the current system.

But ask an anarchist and they'll tell you that everything would be legal by default, so that would be the answer.

If there starts to be people in the group that want to crimunalize stuff then they could try the anarchomonarchist thing I described earlier to prevent laws from forming. Don't know if it would work, and it's never been tried...

Unless you get some rich people interested in your work. 

Yeah, that's basically all it comes down to.

For the art world, there's many talented people that make no money with the art they produce so they have to spend most of their time toiling away at their jobs. Meanwhile, someone tapes a banana to a wall and makes a ton of money doing it. So popularity/knowing the right people is what gives people a better life, more so than actually providing value.

Not that art is my field, but I would like to get good at it, but that's the reality I'd have to deal with regardless. Music is not in much of a better place, either.

[drogulus]

     

We're back full circle again: who gets to decide what is beneficial to society?

    The "gets" are widespread in a process designed to that end. It's the point, not a hunt for the person who is right. That way lies an infinite regression. Who decides who the right person is? And who decides who decides........enough already.

    You need a halt feature that say's "for now we've decided" and then revisit periodically by a rule for that.

[Florestan]

    You need a halt feature that say's "for now we've decided" and then revisit periodically by a rule for that.

Of course.

Wait a minute, have we been in agreement for the last few posts?

[Marc]

[...]
Wait a minute, have we been in agreement for the last few posts?

This board is getting boring. I'm outta here.

[Florestan]

If you're asking me I don't have any opinion that is much different than the current system.

But ask an anarchist and they'll tell you that everything would be legal by default, so that would be the answer.

I don't think that's exactly what a principled anarchist would tell me. More likely they'd tell me that everything would be legal upon which all members of the community voluntarily agreed to be legal and that those members of the community who disagree can secede to form a community of their own. This, of course, is pure fantasy (one with which I can sympathize, though, as I said in the other thread )

If there starts to be people in the group that want to crimunalize stuff then they could try the anarchomonarchist thing I described earlier to prevent laws from forming. Don't know if it would work, and it's never been tried...

Another pure fantasy, this time one I find absurd.

Yeah, that's basically all it comes down to.

For the art world, there's many talented people that make no money with the art they produce so they have to spend most of their time toiling away at their jobs. Meanwhile, someone tapes a banana to a wall and makes a ton of money doing it. So popularity/knowing the right people is what gives people a better life, more so than actually providing value.

Not that art is my field, but I would like to get good at it, but that's the reality I'd have to deal with regardless. Music is not in much of a better place, either.

The world has always been like that and that's how it will probably be till kingdom come.

[drogulus]

    Nothing isn't just another something. It's new under the sun.