[Borodog]

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The only way to secure equal "levels" of opportunity would be to return all of civilization to prehuman barbarism.

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Not to agree or disagree with your statement, but I wasn't suggesting that we do this.

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That was not in response to you. It was addressed to sweetjazz.

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I simply said that:

"I'd argue that all things being equal, each person on the planet "deserves" the same opportunities and considerations as everyone else."

and you said:

"I'd [subjectively assert] that all things being equal, each person on the planet "deserves" the same opportunities and considerations as everyone else . . ."

And I said, no, that is not just a subjective assertion.

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And I explained why, of course, it is.

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Differences in "levels of opportunity" are the accumulated result of voluntary decisions by individual human beings.

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Are you suggesting that it doesn't matter where your born, who your parents are, etc. etc. etc.?? To quote the "philosopher" Everlast, "You know where it ends, it usually depends on where you start."

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No. Are you being deliberately obtuse? I made it explicitly clear that it does matter, which is why the idea that everyone "deserves equal opportunity," a physical impossibility, is meaningless.

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Luckily, unlike poker, civilization is not zero sum. Human beings do not fight like animals in competition to consume finite resources. Rather, their self-interest drives them to use their reason to expand the supply of goods to others, benefitting everyone. One man's gain is positively other men's gain.

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To whatever degree this is true, I would just say that sometimes one man's gain is other men's loss as well.

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Of course. But human beings can use their reason to determine (if one's time horizon is long enough) that cooperation is in almost all cases the superior strategy. Conflict is costly (as much as Sklansky likes to postulate hyperbolic hypothetical cases of costless conflict and their obvious incentive to conflict), and social structures evolve to minimize costs.

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The rest of your post I have no desire to debate. I didn't think I was "attacking the accumulated capital that underlies the productivity of civilization". I'm not an economist, but it sounds to me like another overly simplistic sales pitch for trickle down economics.

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Typical. Can't rebutt an argument? Give it a pejorative name and dismiss it.