JSDev

I'm having trouble understanding what the definition of a tautology is. I commented on a post on facebook that seems tautological to me. Given this definition: Somebody posted this as part of their argument that praxeology doesn't have any value. I responded that since, by definition, praxeology is a deductive study, it is not empirical, therefore to use it as an argument against it, is a tautaology. a couple people on the thread said I needed to go back to logic school. I need help, thanks!

Which is why I said omniscience is impossible. The only argument against this claim that I'm hearing can be summed up as "Omniscience is possible if an omniscient being exists". This doesn't answer the question. If I say, it's impossible to know if you've reached the limits of all knowledge, you can't simply say "well, not for an omniscient being"!

What kind of IT work do you do? I'm your age and I've been in web dev for about 15 years and it can be really frustrating at times with office politics etc, but as I get older, and since I've been getting into self-knowledge I have way more confidence to not be complacent to bullshit. I'm also a father but I started really young so my kids are all teenagers. However, a friend of mine who is older than me had a son a couple years ago, and I'm starting to see that more often, older people having kids. And of course Stefen had a daughter late in life. It's not unusual. Age combined with self knowledge is a powerful tool for seeking out quality relationships. Don't let age get you down.

I almost died laughing... "cooperation" "empathy" "reciprocity" are key elements of free markets, not government. What an idiot.

The love it or leave it argument is actually not an argument that requires any time wasted refuting... It requires no understanding of property rights / who owns what, etc to invalidate. This is because the moment someone says that to you, they don't realize that it implies that they agree with everything the state is doing and that it automatically disqualifies all forms of dissent and protest, which is completely counter to leftist sensibilities. You can tell them that from this day forward they're not allowed to speak out against *anything* they perceive to be wrong like the war because they too can just love it or leave it.

Just listened to this "debate"... I had great respect for Kinsella until hearing this. I can't wrap my head around why he felt it was necessary to act like a child (no disrespect to children). As wrong and annoying as helfeld was, he didn't deserve to be called a mother fucker. His lifeboat questions were pretty easy to answer too. Fine to steal water in an individual life or death situation but do not codify and institutionalize this theft in the form of a gang and call it a moral limited government. Also, why don't you have friends who will give you water voluntarily, I mean you're dying and nobody wants to give you water? The question is completely absurd.

Sorry, "ancap" rules aren't just something we pulled out of our ass. Question #1 and #2 have been answered over 100s of years of common law. The burden of proof is on you to come up with a set of alternative rules, that are better at resolving conflicts than what we've been doing for centuries. Just to be clear, what we have now is the usurpation of these common law rules by gangs, asserting, through brute force alone, their own rules for applying ownership. No coincidence, they always rule in their own favor. This is not reason, it is not philosophy, and it DOES NOT resolve conflicts, it creates conflict.

So you admit then that you have no theory. Sorry, but everyone who wants to live in a civilized peaceful society NEEDS a theory, explicitly stated or not. Even socialists have a theory, they believe in collective ownership of property. A civilized society, be it libertarian or non-libertarian, REQUIRES some form of property rights to resolve conflicts over scarce resources. You need rules to determine how to assign ownership - when that ownership is in dispute. How do you propose to resolve these conflicts? (I made some changes to my entry above since you have posted. Please re-read for added clarity)

Labmath, I'd suggest that rather than you trying to dissuade us of our theory of property, a theory that has been tested and in practice within 100s of years of common law, where most law comes from, how about you describe your theory of property and how it is better than ours at resolving property disputes. You can start by describing your theory as it relates to our most fundamental property, our bodies. **Your theory of property rights has to be consistent, predictable, and universal, that is it cannot be arbitrary and it must appeal to reason** You have the burden of proof, that your theory is better than one that has been finely tuned over 100s of years and laid down on well worn cowpaths. Let's do this very methodically so that the curious among us have an opportunity to really think about the new ideas you'll be teaching us.

I'd argue it was I who stopped the conversation. You never answered my question as to why you make a distinction between shirts and land. You are only interested in defending a position rather than having any real curiosity for anarchism. You think you can come to a forum devoted to libertarianism and all that it entails, and blow our minds with your nonsensical ideas on property rights like we haven't heard this shit before? You have a tremendous lack of respect and empathy for people who have thought about these things for a very long time. Why are you here? What do you expect to get out of this conversation? Do you own your body or do others have to agree that it belongs to you? And if they disagree?

Seriously? It's the same reason I can't assert a right to your shirt. This is ridiculous already.

Why do you make a distinction between land and clothing? Because your clothes are made of cotton grown on land, I can just take the shirt off your back, right?

Not sure. It's like asking how would you deal with someone who doesn't believe in gravity lol. Anyway, I'm not sure how your island metaphor relates to statism/democracy. Are you suggesting that social rules and environmental issues are only possible with a state? This just seems like a reformulation of "muh roads!". There's decades worth of reading material on how things could work in a voluntary society, if you're truly curious. No offense, but I'm not spending my time going over that for you.

I'd tell them their 7th grade social studies understanding of government is deeply flawed. The dead giveaway is in this statement: "If anyone disagrees with the way we choose to govern ourselves, they have two options..." There is NO "we" and there is NO choice. Those are euphemisms for gangs with guns.

I don't know what to say but thanks. Unexpected but right on.