Libertarians: Stop Using Logic

[Copernicus]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
No, but I might invest $900 and spend the other $100 of my available capital on an insurance policy against that $1m judgment coming in. Policies for investment in dangerous (in this sense of potential liability) businesses would cost more so I would be less inclined to invest in those companies.

[/ QUOTE ]

How do you even have a clue about what's dangerous? Obviously, we're never ever having a > 1 man shop that makes explosives in Libertopia, because for liability purposes, that's suicidal. But how about food (always prone to that pesky e-coli), or drugs? Is there a pharmaceutical company in this brave new world? Anybody wanna imagine the type of venture capitalist that puts 10 million dollars into research knowing that, if the drug turns out to have unforeseen side effects in a decade, it'll cost him a hundred?

What's with this whole "I'm Superman, but when I'm not, I'm perfectly willing to have 4 different layers of insurance companies riding herd over every action I take" mindset?

[/ QUOTE ]

You actually pinpointed "whats with it" in your prior post. Its a lack of understanding of (or unwillingness to admit to) transaction costs. Could a Rube Goldberg system of insurances and private protections be devised that would ultimately accomplish the same things as the corporate form does? Certainly (although society would still ultimately be on the hook from the "bad/evil doers", because even insurers would ultimately run out of money). Would that system be as or more cost and time efficient as the current one? People love to put down lawyers now. Imagine their power in this "utopian" world. LMAO.

[DING-DONG YO]

After reading the ACist FAQ and the posts by some of the "big L" libertarians, I find this whole business to be very LOL indeed.

I never read the politics forum before the culling and bruhaha, but I can imagine it was a sight to behold.

[pvn]

[ QUOTE ]
They did for a while even though they weren't doing anything illegal, didn't they? But in Libertopia, blah blah the rational consumer should instantly know that and change blah blah.

[/ QUOTE ]

Who is claiming this? You've got a whole army of strawmen, don't you? Oh, but they are all clones of the same old tired "yootopian wacko" strawman.

[ QUOTE ]
I live in Libertopia and I want to stop supporting a bunch of people doing things I don't like with my wallet. How do I go about doing this?

[/ QUOTE ]

Don't trade with people you don't trust. Wow, that was hard.

[pvn]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
It happens to be that the alternative to government forcing my costs on others that I envision has a lot of insurance companies being willing to trade these risks in manageable chunks. It might work out this way in practice or it might not.

[/ QUOTE ]

Could you please go ahead and figure that out before you tell the rest of us to live in Ancapland, Paulmerica, or Libertopia?

[/ QUOTE ]

Nobody is trying to force you to live in any utopia. Stop with the strawman. If you want to subject yourself to a regulatory body that will test your bathwater to make sure it's not hot enough, go right ahead. Nobody seeks to deny you that choice.

[adanthar]

[ QUOTE ]
Maybe someone would develop a way to generate electric power in a distributed fashion so that you wouldn't need all the wires. Then all the copper and steel that would have gone into the distribution network could be put to better use.

[/ QUOTE ]

And maybe we can develop the means to harvest boundless energy from methane. By the way, I hope that "someone" comes up with that process before millions of people starve. You've got a month.

I mean, at least you're being honest/consistent/whatever, but at which point am I supposed to want to live there?

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
So why the hell are you arguing that Ancapland is awesome?

[/ QUOTE ]
Because I'd rather be left to my own devices (and leave everyone else to theirs) than try to figure out exactly what are the right amounts of every type of investment and production.

[/ QUOTE ]

Do you understand that, to me, your political philosophy appears to be determined by an antisocial personality disorder?

[adanthar]

[ QUOTE ]
Nobody is trying to force you to live in any utopia. Stop with the strawman. If you want to subject yourself to a regulatory body that will test your bathwater to make sure it's not hot enough, go right ahead. Nobody seeks to deny you that choice.

[/ QUOTE ]

You're voting for Ron Paul and attempting to get others to do so. I am voting against Ron Paul (well, not really because he's too marginal to count, but more against this entire philosophy) and trying to persuade others to do so. 2+2 has a politics forum, where we can discuss our differences on the free marketplace of ideas. In fact, I think I'm up 1-0 at the moment. Isn't it wonderful?

edit: missed this:

[ QUOTE ]
Don't trade with people you don't trust. Wow, that was hard.

[/ QUOTE ]

Whom do you and don't you trust? What corporation produced the food you're eating, each one of the three dozen different electrical appliances in your house, and the several hundred different articles of clothing in your wardrobe? Who made each subcomponent of your car? What other subsidiaries does the corporation you work for own?

Wanna list them all out for me, then figure out which one makes choices you don't agree with, and then stop trading with them all? Daily?

[tomdemaine]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Nobody is trying to force you to live in any utopia. Stop with the strawman. If you want to subject yourself to a regulatory body that will test your bathwater to make sure it's not hot enough, go right ahead. Nobody seeks to deny you that choice.

[/ QUOTE ]

You're voting for Ron Paul and attempting to get others to do so. I am voting against Ron Paul (well, not really because he's too marginal to count, but more against this entire philosophy) and trying to persuade others to do so. 2+2 has a politics forum, where we can discuss our differences on the free marketplace of ideas. In fact, I think I'm up 1-0 at the moment. Isn't it wonderful?

edit: missed this:

[ QUOTE ]
Don't trade with people you don't trust. Wow, that was hard.

[/ QUOTE ]

Whom do you and don't you trust? What corporation produced the food you're eating, each one of the three dozen different electrical appliances in your house, and the several hundred different articles of clothing in your wardrobe? Who made each subcomponent of your car? What other subsidiaries does the corporation you work for own?

Wanna list them all out for me, then figure out which one makes choices you don't agree with, and then stop trading with them all? Daily?

[/ QUOTE ]

Who do you trust? The guy who can't be fired who checks your water supply? The people with the incredibly powerful union waving guns around to get money to teach your kids? The guys who aren't liable for the full costs of your car exploding? The people who build and run your planes trains and buses who openly bribe government officials to get their way? Please figure out the ones who make choices you don't agree with and then vote against them. Oh wait you can't.

[tomdemaine]

Adanthar,

What right does anyone have to take my money at gunpoint and use it for things I don't agree with? For example why should I be forced to pay for a war I 100% disagree with that kills 100,000's of civilians that I've never met.

[adanthar]

[ QUOTE ]
Who do you trust? The guy who can't be fired who checks your water supply? The people with the incredibly powerful union waving guns around to get money to teach your kids? The guys who aren't liable for the full costs of your car exploding? The people who build and run your planes trains and buses who openly bribe government officials to get their way? Please figure out the ones who make choices you don't agree with and then vote against them. Oh wait you can't.

[/ QUOTE ]

Water supply:
So, how many people in the US have died from bad water lately? I hear they don't have much if any government oversight of the water supply in China these days - how's that working out for them? But okay, China might be an unacceptable example. How about this country, where, two generations earlier, rivers caught fire?

Union and teachers:
The US school system sucks. The alternative models are the Europeans and the Asians. Both have flaws, but both produce students that are way ahead of us on every test score you can think of. I'm in complete agreement with you that NCLB sucks and vouchers might be a nice stopgap somewhere, except that, in practice, the majority of voucher kids right now end up going to schools that teach them evolution is spelled with two i's. But none of that has anything to do with Libertopia, because the federal government doesn't even set the curriculum - the local ones do. What's the over/under on how many scientists Kansas is turning out right now?

Planes, trains, and buses:
You seriously wanna compare the accident statistics on the railroads today, per 1000 people riding them, to the JP Morgan era? Please do. Planes? Okay - would you like to fly on an American/European/Asian airline or a Russian one? How about African? What about "some guy in Libertopia who's had ten hours of flight training but doesn't have a pilot's license (or need one, because there aren't any)?"

You really, really wanna compare the safety of anything we've got right now to any historically unregulated era? Please. Go ahead. And then tell me the human meat content of your sausage.

[tomdemaine]

Technological improvements? Also the problems you reference were the fault of common (ie governemnt "owned") land. How is a Russian airline more free than a US one? At least we agree on privatizing education lets get that sorted out first and then we can see where we go from there.