shirgall

The essence of discussion is listening to what others are saying and then building upon it.

You are not using the definition of theft. Theft is the taking of another's property without consent. Your second premise is not valid. Instead, for tax to be theft it has to be the taking of another's property without consent. It is if anyone does not consent to the tax.

3. Did you know how much they charge to renounce US citizenship? https://www.cnbc.com/2016/05/17/exposing-the-hidden-tax-costs-of-renouncing-us-citizenship.html 4. If everyone in Luxembourg expressly and universally agrees to the antics of the Grand Duke then I guess they consent. You have to ask those poor souls. If they tolerate it that doesn't count as consent. Just because there exists a complicated avenue of redress of grievances does not imply consent if people don't avail themselves of the process. Open rebellion is not required to indicate lack of consent, either. Heck, there is personal risk in just expressing your disavowal in public, even in countries that claim to support free speech. The problem is that government systems are not an algorithm that produces a provably correct result, they are a heuristic intended to produce a good enough answer in good enough time. Heuristics are easily tuned to subjective desires but not to universal moral principles. Command economy advocates are the most notorious for getting this wrong. There have to be checks, balances, limitations of power, and alternatives to produce the widest tolerance of what is going on. Since nations do a bad job of increasing these limitations because of the iron law of bureaucracy, specific government systems are never going to last forever. They must be constantly remade and reinvented over the centuries.

Yes.

1. Just because it worked doesn't make it right. It might be better that nobles arranged things in such a way in the past, but that's not a moral principle. 2. I just said that going to 3 is okay unless specifically disallowed in advance, and then you just said going to 3 entails breaking the contract. These situations are different. In the lease I wrote for a rental property, I said everyone of age to consent to a lease had to sign to it, and that all residents had to abide by it. If they have a baby nothing changes. If a child gets old enough to sign a lease, they have to sign it and abide to it by consent. No conflict, as the choice to join the lease or move out is based on the ability to consent, not existence. 3. Consent given by a guardian ceases when one comes of age. Even so, a guardian cannot consent to your rape, or your understanding of morality is wrong. This is why I think guardians consenting to sex change operations for minors is abuse. Such life-changing decisions (especially since some operations lead to sterility) should not be done to those who cannot consent. 4. The very fact that I have to pay property tax indicates to me that the powers that be think they own the land and can charge me rent for my deed of ownership, and therefore my deed is only worth just how much effort the government goes to to prevent open revolt. I'm under no delusions that they'd take as much control as possible just short of widespread civil disturbance.

In the case of a Monarchy an asshole with an army claims the land is theirs, often as ordained by God. False premises do not yield valid conclusions. I can imagine trying to avoid getting put to death by such a delusional megalomaniac, but not consenting to their rule without such duress. The baby gets to stay unless you specifically disallowed it in the agreement, which is why boilerplate leases have all sorts of forbidden activities and blocks of text related to otherwise common or natural activities. I have never seen one where a lessor is forbidden from procreating, but I suppose it is possible. Everyone in human history is born into conditions they have to deal with. That's does not imply consent. When they start making decisions on their own, that's the first time consent can alleged. There's a reason there is an age of consent in most of the world.

A well-written contract has procedures for when they are broken and dissolved, agreed in advance with knowledge and consent. Sounds better than family court to me.

What benefit do I derive from taxation that justifies taking my resources from me without my consent?

I still think the solution is to keep government out of the marriage business. Failing that, I'm fine with making it easier for anyone of any inclination to marry, but to require a reason to divorce.

Theft provisions benefit for the recipients of ill-gotten gains, just like taxation. I have benefited very little from taxation all my life, and certainly unlikely to have directly benefited. I never consented to any of those taxes. I call taxation theft because those resources are taken from me without my consent. Just because I didn't resist doesn't mean I consented. There is no positive utility claim in violation of consent, only in the gathering of the resources. The utilitarian argument is that consent is irrelevant. Utilitarians don't believe in, or understand consent, only in that some machination must be erected to give the illusion of consent, like representative democracies, republics, or courts. None of these mechanisms actually garner unanimous consent. The only mechanism that respects consent applies taxes only to those that consent to them.

If a cake contains a little poison, is it poisoned? Stick to the facts and avoid the analogies. The bottom line is if taxation obtains resources without consent, it is theft. It's not even a tyranny of a majority that decides these things, but a plurality of representatives selected by pluralities. If I were to engage if excessive analogy, the consent is diluted so much homeopathic cure-all peddlers are envious.

I think you have it backwards. Unless taxation is consented to by everyone affected for the entire time it is in effect, is it theft, because taking things from people without consent is theft. That is the bad apple that taints the barrel. That is the universal at play.

Only 3% of the population of the colonies took up arms against the greatest Army and Navy in the world... and won their freedom for a brief while.

Only if you always make the same decision in every case, and even then that only makes duress not exist for your decisions. If duress doesn't exist, why did our ancestors coin a word for "threats, violence, constraints, or other action brought to bear on someone to do something against their will or better judgment." Sure, there are studies that show that people go along with taxes if they think someone is going to get shafted worse, and there are others who want to loot or mooch their way for life, and there are yet others who feel that if you play the game of voting you automatically consent to the decision of the plurality, but none of those things overrules the existence of a lack of consent for some of those who are taxed. Instead we should recognize that borders, standing armies, legislation but plurality, and the like the necessarily evils that must always be overseen, constricted, limited, and questioned. If I believes that this was still being done I might grudgingly consent to being taxed, but I still would not expect to tax those who do not consent.

Consent cannot be given under duress. Consent is active, not passive. Consent requires an individual who is conscious of giving consent and its consequences. Consent can be withdrawn. These elements are far stronger than a communicated preference.

Theft is not based on preference but consent. For taxation not to be theft, only those who vote for a tax should be obligated to pay for it. That people prefer to pay a tax rather than be shot resisting arrest doesn't make it consensual.

Yeah, it's weird, when I go to my orders and click the print edition link I get redirected to the Kindle edition. We just have to be patient and let the publisher and distributor work it out.

I don't know. My experience with print on demand is that inventory running out triggers another print run so there will be a delay until the next run can go... but that delay is usually not long unless unexpected demand is present. In the past Amazon used to claim items were in stock when they came from a print on demand supplier, but with predictability from Prime being a selling point, they don't do that anymore.

In the announcement video Stefan indicated an audiobook was in progress.

It's print on demand, so keep an eye out. http://artoftheargument.com/ will redirect you to it.

My copy has a printing date of "August 28, 2017" and I received it August 30. That's pretty "print on demand" to me. Publisher "CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform" which does print-on-demand for Amazon in the US, Canada, and UK...

To date I have only seen availability in Canada, the United States, and the United Kingdom... but it's early in the launch.

You might think so, but part of teaching the proper argumentation also teaches the value of proper argumentation. "Imagine a world where the truth-shredding viciousness of verbal abuse no longer decided the day." and "By loving the world enough to staunchly defend The Argument we can actually create a world we can love."

Well, you can always read the Kindle version.

So... it's out. Can we have a new subforum for The Art of the Argument? https://www.amazon.com/Art-Argument-Western-Civilizations-Stand-ebook/dp/B0756QYZ26/