AC axiom question

[hmkpoker]

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where people are marooned on islands and starving to death doesn't in any way "break" anarchocapitalist theory

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What if the situation does not involve dying but person A offered just a tiny cramp section of the island with one banana tree, while he has access to myriad of tropical foods and resources that allows utility growth which he denies to you?

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Note how this contrasts with the same situation in civilized society. A poor man in a shack is not going to steal from a rich man, mainly because the rich man has acquired security forces that will stop him.

Does the initial island dweller have any security? No? Then it looks like there's nothing preventing the newcomer from exercising partial ownership on the island.

[hmkpoker]

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FWIW I think you raise a good question, the correct answer to which is 2). This assumes of course (as stated in your original question) that person B wants to be an ACer at all costs and that person A refuses every offer that B makes, like working until he dies for A's benefit in exchange for the bare essentials for survival.

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The non-aggression principle is subordinate to the axiom of human action. When non-aggression conflicts with one's ability to acquire a better state of affairs, violence will ensue. Period. Property rights/non aggression are cited so frequently by ACists because they typically assume a civilized society where the acquisition of an optimal state of affairs coincides with non-aggression. In these types of cases where it does not, property rights cease to have any meaning, because no one's going to follow them anyway. There's no reason to.

[madnak]

AC isn't a code of ethics, or organizational relationships, or anything of the kind. AC isn't even a "code" in the first place. It's a way of structuring society (I would say it's actually the process that such a structure would result in). It's not even meaningful to talk about "society" on a deserted island.

Especially as its argued here, AC doesn't have rules. It's more the concept that a certain structure of society will be stable and productive. To argue against the propositions, you must explain why an AC society wouldn't be stable or productive - you can't argue against the morality of AC, because there is no such thing. Or at least, it's heavily disputed and rejected by many ACists.

We can talk about "market economies" developing on islands as an illustrative technique, but the situations will never be realistic. And we don't even believe AC is always best - only that under certain conditions it's the most stable, productive setup. It escapes the modernist approach of "better" forms of government - it's more like evolution. Different governments are adapted to different societies. And now, just as we lost our gills millions of years ago, we're going to lose government. Now that we've "crawled onto land," now that we have sufficient resources that basic survival can be assured for virtually everyone, elements of our old "physiology" are ceasing to be useful.

Evolution is a good way to describe what happens within a society as well. It's "survival of the fittest," essentially. Businesses that aren't fit won't survive. Over a long period of time in a stable environment, businesses will conform to the needs of the populations they serve very closely - they'll be adapted to their environments. So, apply that to your island. How would the social situation evolve? Well, it won't in the first place. No reproduction, no evolution. But it will unfold, depending on the social environment (the personalities of the two inhabitants) and on sheer dumb luck. Maybe one will kill the other, maybe they'll get along, maybe one will hide in the bushes and the other will never even know about him, maybe they'll live on different sides of the island without interacting... AC absolutely does not "prescribe" anything in this situation.

[SLP]

Awful lot of tapdancing in this thread.

[Ayn Rand]

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where people are marooned on islands and starving to death doesn't in any way "break" anarchocapitalist theory

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What if the situation does not involve dying but person A offered just a tiny cramp section of the island with one banana tree, while he has access to myriad of tropical foods and resources that allows utility growth which he denies to you?

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So person A has no desires or demands that could be fufilled by B? He doesn't need a butler or someone to even help him? Seems to me if A has something B wants, as long as B has something A wants (labor or property), we won't have much of a problem here.

[DougShrapnel]

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Suppose person A somehow got marooned on an island. Over the years, the person mixes his labor with all the island so it satisfies the generally accepted threshold for most ACer's to determine ownership. One particular characteristic of person A is that this particular recluse lifestyle maximizes his utility moreso than any other type.

Now suppose a 2nd person B, washes up on shore. Now if person A refuses any portion of the island to person B, what would person B do if he was devout follower of AC?

[/ QUOTE ]Can I instead say that A is the wealthist 20% and B is the rest? A will attemp to exploit B, B will conitue to be exploited until B fights for his share of the island. What is his share? I can't say that I have the best answer. But B will attempt to get it none the less. Within time A and B decide to end the fighting and figure out a peaceful coexistance. This exchange is marked down in a social debt and justice recorded keeping agency with the ability to enforce it on the entire island. At this point many things can happen, it's almost limitless. Sometimes A, or even B will attemp to get rid of the record keeping agency. Sometimes B or even A might attemp to get rid of both the record keeping agency, and wealth. Other times, the island can change so much that the record keeping agency is a detriment to both A and B, if the record keeping agency is designed well it will adjsut. If not a new record keeping agency, possibly agencies will emerge.

[Metric]

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And we don't even believe AC is always best - only that under certain conditions it's the most stable, productive setup. It escapes the modernist approach of "better" forms of government - it's more like evolution... ...Over a long period of time in a stable environment, businesses will conform to the needs of the populations they serve very closely - they'll be adapted to their environments. So, apply that to your island. How would the social situation evolve? Well, it won't in the first place. No reproduction, no evolution... ...AC absolutely does not "prescribe" anything in this situation.

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Interesting and useful analogy with evolution there. Another analogy might be with thermodynamics. Although thermodynamic principles (maximum entropy, etc.) are extremely accurate and useful for the analysis of large systems, the thermodynamic quantities of entropy, pressure, temperature, equilibrium etc. may not even be defined at all in the regime where just a few particles are concerned -- small systems can be manipulated in such a way that thermodynamics is basically irrelevant and certainly not prescriptive.

Something similar is probably happening here -- AC principles may make beautiful predictions in the limit of a large modern society, but abstracting it to two isolated individuals on an island is probably an exercise in manipulating undefined quantities that are designed to be useful in a completely different regime. The outcome of the situation will be overwhelmingly dominated by other factors.

If this is a completely unnecessary post, please forgive me -- I'm a geek and I figured "ah, what the hell."

[Borodog]

Metric,

I often find myself thinking in exactly these kinds of terms.