Libertarians: You fire fighter lovers sure are good at debate!

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Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

quote:

"who gave these people rights that the rest of us do not possess? Why is it appropriate that these people be permitted to take my property against my will, yet a similar action by any other member of society is considered an act of violent aggression that is punished?

The people gave those rights to the small group based on an understanding that specialization of labor is more efficient and produces better outcomes. People have, numerous times in this thread, elaborated on governments that arise from voluntary actions and asked you to explain how people voluntarily ceding the responsibility of governance is somehow immoral.

And you're begging the question by implying that taxation is theft rather than something akin to membership dues.

# ¿ Nov 14, 2014 06:37

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# ¿ May 9, 2024 19:59

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

jrodefeld posted:

How can you delegate a right you don't already have? I don't have the right to use aggression against my neighbor but somehow I can "give" this right which I never had to politicians and have them use aggression on my behalf? That is not a coherent belief.

Why do you not have this right? Because of an arbitrary starting position that you've made up? You're starting from principles, declaring them universal, then building a system from them. That works great as long as everyone agrees on your starting assumptions.

quote:

Now, what you are not understanding is that while I personally can cede authority to any person I want over my life, I cannot grant authority to such a person to have authority over another person who does NOT want to be ruled over.

Wait, so you're saying that if 10 of my friends and I all arrive on an uninhabited island and declare it ours, appoint a rotating leadership position we all voluntarily agree to be bound by, and then some random 11th jagoff shows up on our island and says that he doesn't want to be ruled over, our leader has no power or ability to remove him from our land? Well poo poo.

quote:

People WILL inevitably want to seek guidance and cede authority to wise men. This is what Hoppe was referring to when he spoke of "natural elites". I know that people wanted to turn that into some statement of racism, where the elites will all be white because they are genetically superior, but that is NOT what Hoppe was saying at all. Rather, the Natural Elites would be people who society voluntarily view as wise, intelligent and virtuous owing to their achievement and track record. People would cede "authority" only in a voluntary sense. This would be the outcome of a true division of labor.

Yeah, that worked really well for the Captains of Industry. Its like PR isn't a thing in Libertopia.

quote:

Politics rewards sociopaths, the best liars, the most duplicitous and cunning rather than the most wise.

So does business, but that doesn't stop you from creating an entire ethical framework that relies on rewarding that.

e: You're still assuming that taxation is theft.

Ravenfood fucked around with this message at 07:12 on Nov 14, 2014

# ¿ Nov 14, 2014 07:02

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

You're really just going to skate by you undermining your entire system of a contract based society while declaring my position inconsistent? That's cute.

Incidentally, I'd I had to choose between a logically consistent hellhole and an incoherent semi-okay place, I know which one I'd rather live in.

# ¿ Nov 14, 2014 07:26

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

If you're talking about what I think you are, that strategy relied on the players recognizing each other and then some of them all-defecting and others all-cooperating with each other, essentially taking dives for the teammate all-defector. Whenever a player encountered a non teammate, yeah, all-defecting to minimize their points was the strategy. This resulted in a team that took a lot of the highest scoring spots, but also the lowest.

E: tit for tat (with possibly rare forgiveness) remains the best strategy if you only have control over one player, iirc. I think, I'm really not up on it at all but find it fascinating as a layman.

Ravenfood fucked around with this message at 21:26 on Nov 21, 2014

# ¿ Nov 21, 2014 21:23

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

Nintendo Kid posted:

They are not irrelevant, it is important that people not make arguments based on falsehoods. That's how you get libertarianism.

Sorry that you prefer praexology I guess!

Jesus gently caress, dude. You've got a judge saying that bundling was an integral part of why Microsoft lost a massive federal anti-trust case, and then you've got a ridiculous internet sperg on the other side of it going "well there were other issues and Netscape was shittier anyhow." Here's the thing: Netscape could be the inferior browser to IE, but that doesn't mean that IE's behavior was in any way acceptable.

You're going to bat for IE in this bizarrely strident manner and I really don't understand why. Like, okay, you prefer period-specific IE to period-specific Netscape. Good for you. That doesn't change the fact that Microsoft was the defendant in a massive anti-trust case on which the issue of bundling the browser with the OS was integral to the outcome of the case.

# ¿ Dec 10, 2014 09:36

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

Jrod just casually admitting he thinks the EPA (or a libertarian analog thats totally not statist, guys) should be a lot stronger than it is is hilarious.

That is, unless you have another way to make corps pay for the cost of polluting?

# ¿ Dec 19, 2014 17:17

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

GulMadred posted:

The NAP applies to initiation of force. Most libertarians are willing to concede a natural-rights allowance for retaliatory force - such as defending oneself when struck (possibly including lethal force), trespassing into a thief's home to recover stolen property, or impeding the livelihood of a fradulent dealer (e.g. by filing a lien against his business holdings or by publishing defamatory material).

What about retaliation that occurs after the other person initiates force, but before I am affected by said force? eg, say I'm a ninja and someone swings a bat at me. Before the bat lands, I hit him in the face. Who initiated force? I hit him first, after all.

# ¿ Dec 24, 2014 03:16

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

Thimerosol isn't an adjuvant in any existing vaccines routinely recommended for use in children in the US, you goddamn dolt, thanks to people like you. This also, by the way, has driven up the price considerably since now we can't use multi-dose vials. The one, one exception to this is the voluntary influenza vaccine, and then only in some forms designed to be distributed to areas that don't have regular access to pediatricians (read: those parts of the country that are basically third world).

But keep wringing your hands about it anyhow.

Ravenfood fucked around with this message at 10:38 on Feb 15, 2015

# ¿ Feb 15, 2015 10:36

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

Its not a debate if you refuse to read anything people here say.

# ¿ Mar 26, 2015 10:18

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

Who What Now posted:

You're a known liar and I don't believe a single word of this. I honestly and truly believe you're lying through your teeth in order to regain some semblance of sympathy and credibility, but everything else you say contradicts your crocodile tears here.

"Living paycheck to paycheck" can be technically true and still disingenuous as all hell if their expenses grow as their income does, ie, if they chose not to save and instead spend it on a live-in nanny or whatever.

# ¿ Apr 1, 2015 15:58

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

I still don't understand how buying up all the land around someone else's property counts as initiatory aggression because reasons. Who are you to tell me what to do with my property, Jrod?

# ¿ Apr 7, 2015 16:48

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

Jesus Christ you're thick. And =/= or.

# ¿ Apr 8, 2015 22:50

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

Shayu posted:

People imo give pretty generously but people giving alone would never match the spending of the US Government, I don't really think it needs to. Also with America's obesity rates I don't think starvation is really a concern.

You can starve to death while being obese, FYI.

You're incredibly uneducated on these topics and ignoring people posting actual information in favor of your opinions. PS, the people who give most to charity as a percentage of total income are the people most likely to need charity in an economic downturn.

# ¿ Apr 22, 2015 19:26

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

Shayu posted:

Also that's good that those people give to charities.

No, its not because they won't be able to when charity is most needed!

# ¿ Apr 22, 2015 19:40

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

jrodefeld posted:

This is only an a priori truth about action if the action is being made without direct coercion. If people have choices, then the action they chose meant that they expressed their value preferences and expected to be made better off through that choice in comparison to any competing available choice.

Your second sentence has no basis on anything else. Yes, if someone made a choice, they made a choice expecting that they would be better off for making that choice for whatever reason, including a fuckton of reasons that aren't by any means "rational". That does not make them rational, that does not make that choice good, and it does not mean that there was no coercive power. "Without direct coercion" is loving asinine, since even with direct coercion, your second statement holds true. Your second statement is basically "if people have choices, they make choices". No loving poo poo, but that doesn't tell us anything. It doesn't tell is that coercion was absent or present, it doesn't tell us that this is somehow good, it doesn't tell us that anything happened besides a choice was made, possibly totally subconsciously. But "value preference" was still expressed, or whatever the gently caress, its just meaningless and we can't draw any conclusions from it, yet you not only do that, you draw an entire philosophy from it.

quote:

Leftist movements would be much more successful if they ceased relying on political action and instead relied on mass movements to remove artificial privilege provided by State enforced law. In short this means dismantling the State and allowing the market to "eat the rich" and provide for social justice and equality.

Haha, you really think the market would eat the rich. You're just so precious.

Ravenfood fucked around with this message at 18:27 on May 31, 2015

# ¿ May 31, 2015 18:14

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

So if slavery is voluntary, could you describe any particular status that isn't?

# ¿ Aug 8, 2015 18:24

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

Okay, to sum up:

"Slavery is voluntary because the slaves could choose to die. Taxation is not voluntary because there would be consequences if I didn't pay my taxes"
(With bonus!) "Contracts are by definition fair because otherwise, why would anyone have entered into one?" And "I chose to pay my taxes because I feel that taxes must be ended a certain way, but they're still theft"
"If you aren't willing to suffer consequences for your principles, you don't have Principles. Yes, of course I pay my taxes in spite of my Principles, why do you ask?"
(With bonus!) "If the human race will go extinct while holding onto my principles, so be it, for these are Principles!"
"Well, I figured out a way to make everything fair and better for everyone, but it violates my Principles so gently caress it, I'll toss it rather than examine my really shaky Principles" (You do know that classically, a reductio ad absurdam takes a set of conditions, draws them logically out to a conclusion that is patently false, and then essentially argues that the initial conditions must be incorrect, yes?)
"You all say costs would go up in the event of multiple competing FDAs, but you also say they'd be less efficient! Explain yourselves this clearly makes no sense!"
"gently caress all of recorded history, I derived what would happen from Principles so it must work out (or get us all killed, but that's okay, see above)"

Plus a whole bunch of worthless poo poo about Free Market and Hands and facts and whatnot that's, at this point, pretty blase for the thread. "Why would people sell brain cancer-causing substances" and "the polio vaccine was bad" and "the Gilded Age was p. cool yo" but mostly, I just like his complete and utter hypocrisy about his Precious loving Principles.

e: I probably missed a bunch, I'm dead tired.

Ravenfood fucked around with this message at 04:17 on Aug 12, 2015

# ¿ Aug 12, 2015 04:10

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

Who What Now posted:

Are we talking about the Sword of Truth? Because I read the entire series in high school (and even then knew it was retarded, but at the time didn't understand just how hosed up it was), and I can talk all day about those piles of poo poo. Like about how the protagonists wife gets raped multiple times throughout the series, or when the protagonist almost uncreated reality when he has sex with her and she dared to have an orgasm*.
*Overly simplified, but I assure you it's even in context

You're forgetting about the "chicken that was not a chicken but evil incarnate" and how the main character righteously hacks his way through a crowd of people "armed only with their hatred for moral clarity." Yeah. They're not even actively obstructing his passage, they just happen to be having an anti-war protest in the general vicinity of the direction he's going.

# ¿ Sep 11, 2015 03:04

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

Nolanar posted:

Hey Caros, don't listen to Captain, man. You want libertarianism, come to me, I'll hook you up. Bitcoins, voluntary debtor's prisons, you name it.

I'm disconnecting your internet.

# ¿ Sep 19, 2015 21:51

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

QuarkJets posted:

I know that a lot of people think that The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress is a pro-libertarian novel. Your post helps to illustrate that. If anything, this book is about the glorious communist revolution and the disadvantages of laissez-faire economics.

One of the moments where the main characters directly talk about their society is the trial scene with the tourist Stu, talking about their legal system, which is libertarian as gently caress.

# ¿ Oct 3, 2015 20:37

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

QuarkJets posted:

Agreed, but that's the trial system that the main characters overthrow with a glorious People's Revolution. The novel is portraying all of these libertarian systems as lovely and awful

What? No, that legal system is the one created by the Loonies in the absence of anything from the Authority. There is nothing to suggest that the post-revolution society would do anything different legally that I recall.

And it's not strictly a commune so much as a family farm, which again, kind of lets you "cheat" in a libertarian system because its a (libertarian) socially acceptable way to cooperate and coordinate with people.

# ¿ Oct 3, 2015 22:09

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

Nolanar posted:

The market will sort it out. If vital drugs are too expensive, cheaper alternatives will pop up and force competition for pricing.

And they will: right up until the old company uses the profits it made during the massive price hike to undercut the new competitor, essentially pricing them out of business after they've sunk a bunch of money into getting ready to produce the new drug. And, since the new competitor is rational and knows exactly what the original company will do in that instance, they never call the bluff, never re-work any of their production, and the old company continues doing what they're doing.

# ¿ Oct 8, 2015 09:32

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

Okay, which one of you works for Last Week Tonight?

# ¿ Nov 10, 2015 00:32

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

asdf32 posted:

Mr science, random processes have not been proven to exist so I suggest you clarify why your use of that phrase suggests you think they do.

I absolutely did not do that. God (a force unaccountable to known laws of nature) has absolutely not been disproven.

...you have zero idea how the scientific methods works, do you?

I know gently caress-all about physics, but I know enough about methodology to know that if recent studies show that current deterministic models don't adequately describe phenomena but models including randomness do, then to the best of our current understanding the universe has a degree of randomness to it. I also know enough to say that a statement like "the universe is definitely random" or "the universe is definitely deterministic" is dumb.

# ¿ Nov 24, 2015 14:58

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

Grand Theft Autobot posted:

We're talking about him like he's dead now.

Is he dead??

That is not dead which can eternal lie / and with strange aeons, even death may die. Ia! Ia! Jrodefeld ftaghn!

# ¿ Jan 14, 2016 14:48

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

Muscle Tracer posted:

Only one of these two things is the official foodstuff of the one true free currency, Bitcoin

I'm still sad the ice cream/coffee shop around the corner that took bitcoin closed down after the city started looking into money laundering claims. They were pretty decent, and I need some ice cream right now.

# ¿ Feb 5, 2016 04:26

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

Dosing herbal remedies is difficult simply because plants by their nature have wildly differing potencies, for one thing. That said, we could process them appropriately if they worked; both aspirin and digoxin are examples of extremely common medications that are derived from plants. It is also my personal opinion that aspirin was essentially grandfathered in and is much riskier than many medications we currently use, and it sure as gently caress wouldn't be approved for use as an OTC pain med. Similarly, I don't like digoxin: beta blockers and calcium channel are typically both more effective and have fewer side effects when treating congestive heart failure. Both are still frequently used and, iirc, are on the WHO's list of essential medicines, but we don't exactly suggest that patients go drink willowbark tea or chew on foxglove. Hell, atropine is a drat critical medication, but I draw it out of a carefully dosed vial instead of shoving nightshade down throats. Dosage is important. So yeah, we use herbal supplements when they work and can be dosed appropriately. And if you want to take them OTC and in wildly varying concentrations, nobody is stopping you. But I sure as gently caress won't help you get them either.

I'll look up this hawthorn crap next time I'm at work and have access to some databases.

e: Note that he does a pretty common trick re: amio. He lists a bunch of very serious complications and then says that 85% of people taking amio experience side effects. The implication is that 85% experience one of the above side effects, which is not correct. This is misleading, and I will leave it up to you to decide whether it is deliberate or not.

Ravenfood fucked around with this message at 07:51 on Feb 15, 2016

# ¿ Feb 15, 2016 07:49

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

God loving drat it

# ¿ Feb 26, 2016 14:44

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

Nolanar posted:

I found a followup to the Hoppe article. It's Stephen Kinsella providing details on the assault on Hoppe by egalitarian Bolshevik totalitarian slobbish stupid college kids. Of particular note is where he calls mediation and sensitivity training "being sent to a reeducation camp." I love how everything in libertarian thought is always cranked all the way up. Nothing is ever an inconvenience, or poorly designed, or a bad idea. Everything that happens is always fascist thugs with guns dragging you away to the gas chambers.

Being denied access to basic services such as food, housing, and healthcare based on totally reasonable biases like skin color is simply a minor inconvenience, though?

# ¿ Mar 15, 2016 22:57

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

Because being woken up at 4am to have your blood drawn is an inconvenience that wouldn't stand in a system designed to cater entirely to my whims!

Seriously though, it's because being a hospital patient leads to a massive loss of control of your personal life, up to and including the ability to breathe on your own terms, and people struggle with that, often mal-adaptively. Cancer patients seem to do especially poorly with that.

# ¿ May 2, 2016 07:01

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

Twerkteam Pizza posted:

See I think it's because he's an insufferable asshat

Asshats react by being bigger asshats when stressed, so we're both right.

# ¿ May 2, 2016 19:16

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

CommieGIR posted:

They should've prosecuted her for writing that book.

It was a prank, bro!

# ¿ Jul 28, 2016 00:58

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

Goon Danton posted:

Was Trump Right?
DNC email shines unexpected light on Cruz�s �militant� father. Article by Tyler Durden.

I'm just highlighting this for everyone.

# ¿ Jul 28, 2016 03:30

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

paragon1 posted:

Or that women just kinda like taking all the less respected jobs for less pay for some totally inexplicable reason.

Or that when they move into a field, that field just happens to drop in respect and pay.

# ¿ Jul 29, 2016 02:45

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

Twerkteam Pizza posted:

I feel like 8-bit scholar

This is a bad feeling but I learned today

Nah man, she put out a very well-written statement that makes it very, very easy for both groups to read what they want out of it. If you are reading that statement looking for confirmation that she's anti-vax (because you are too) there are enough comments and mentions that let you project your desires onto it and come away with the fact that she secretly really is on your side but can't outright say it because of the political climate. But don't worry, she'll start the ball rolling on getting to the bottom of those dastardly vaccines. And if you're looking for confirmation that she's not anti-vax (because you're not) she says enough statements about how vaccines are cool and good that you'll believe that she won't push against vaccines. Its pretty well done, imo. Don't beat yourself up about it.

# ¿ Aug 12, 2016 13:41

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

8-Bit Scholar posted:

The reason people aren't rallying behind these wonderful young people is totally because of all the racism yep

Hey, never let it be said that 8-bit can't learn.

# ¿ Aug 12, 2016 20:37

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

Nitrousoxide posted:

Look man. We're making assumptions here that the employee is accurately priced. I'm not going to go into a life story for each example to justify why each worker is earning what they are.

You just made the assumption that a Californian nurse fresh out of school is approximately 25% better than I am despite my extra experience and certification because they make more money. After all, they have a higher wage, so they must be better, right? What the poo poo, man.

Nitrousoxide posted:

What do you think is not true? That raising the minimum wage will increase unemployment?

Yeah. There probably is an edge case or two where the extra cost will be unable to be eaten and a business will be forced to close. I fully expect this to be more than compensated for by the increased spending within society, resulting in no overall increase, and possibly a decrease.

# ¿ Aug 19, 2016 04:49

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

Ohio violates the NAP.

# ¿ Aug 27, 2016 01:07

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

J Corp posted:

There are plenty of good examples in the last couple pages of government providing a service (USPS, NHS) and getting it right, why the gently caress are you defending the example that was a huge failure on a human rights level?

Given that the current criticism of government-run programs is that they're inefficient, not more moral, it seems like a pointless statement to say that the Soviets failed on a human rights level.

Ravenfood fucked around with this message at 23:18 on Sep 10, 2016

# ¿ Sep 10, 2016 23:14

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# ¿ May 9, 2024 19:59

Ravenfood: Nov 4, 2011

Stinky_Pete posted:

Ambulance services are all privatized in America afaik and the ride in the ambulance is exorbitant because some people can't pay, though now it's getting more balanced because of the individual mandate. It seems strange to me that it's privatized as it has the same basic dispatch and response model and natural monopoly as police or fire departments.

Nah, plenty of cities run ambulance services, in part because the infrastructure for dispatch already exists. The companies that work in the areas with city/county-run ambulance services often do a ton of interfacility transfers and non-emergent work, letting the city ambulances stay available for emergencies.

# ¿ Sep 11, 2016 05:06

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