Daniel Unplugged

Since free trade is beneficial (I will not attempt to argue it here), you can be near certain that if people are becoming poorer, there is very little free trade going on. Did somebody say price controls in Venezuela?

The only fair amount of tax is zero. It is unfair, not to mention immoral, to have any of your property stolen, even 1% of it.

Nor does the donator get to feel or be appreciated for his kindness. Of course, with regards to welfare, their actually is no donator, the money was extracted from a taxpayer under threat of being abducted and locked in a cage for years on end.Kindness and charity has been replaced with hopeless dependence, resentment and coercion. It's so tragic.

Economics 101, free trade benefits both countries. Look up comparative advantage for a full explanation. To answer your question more directly, selling products to tourists/exporting to foreign countries, which in a way is the same thing, benefits the local economy. It give the locals more purchasing power than they would otherwise have. This is why: The whole purpose of selling a local products to a foreigner is to get money to purchase something back from the foreigner. If a local does not value what he can buy with the money more than what he has to sell to get it, he does not trade. This is why trade must benefit him. It is true that tourists pay almost no heed to what is best for the local economy, nor does almost everybody else engaged in trade, but they don't need to. Thats the beauty of free markets, all people need to do is to act in their own best interests. The act of engaging in trade is enough to know that you are benefiting your trading partner. The benefit to the locals is found in what they can buy with the money they get from selling to the tourists. I don't get what you mean when you link tourism to the environment, could you please clarify your point.

Isn't morality by definition subjective, since it is concerned with human emotions, notably empathy for the victim of immortality? The purpose of the thought experiment above is not to make a moral cause look bad, it is to push moral principes to their extreme to see if they still hold.

The guy pulling the lever was not coerced, so morality applies to him. While this dilemma ultimately has few practical applications in of itself, except in the rarest of circumstances, I thing it is important to nut it out. In any case, it is at minimum an interesting thought experiment.

While I believe that most parents do a woeful job raising their children, I think that if they take state parenting classes, matters would only become worse. Not to mention that forcing people to take parenting classes violated the NAP.

Future historians will decide this. I suspect they will have a hard time picking one. So many of them are great, and worthy of historical recognition.

Stefan was speaking of Islam several hundred years ago. Muslims today do not endorse slavery the way they did back then. To be fair, he was not targeting Islam, he very intentionally pointed out that slavery was endorsed by (almost) all cultures, religions and races at that time. Islam was, correct me if I am wrong on this, the dominant moral authority at the time, and, could have, at any time, stated that slavery was a moral abomination before god, and ended it in the Islamic world. It did not.

I used to suspect that too. I'll reference something Stefan made to demonstrate why I believe what I do: when a program continues for a long period of time, producing consistent results, you know that it is achieving it's desired goals, otherwise it would be changed. If the goal was to produce well educated, enlightened, individuals, the course of public education would have been changed when it began producing the opposite. It has not, and I don't suspect it will anytime soon. Public education is working exactly the way it is supposed to.

First a classic moral dilemma: A train is out of control and is about to plough into and kill a group of 5 people who are tied to the track. You are standing next to a lever that can divert the train onto another track that has one person tied to it. Should you pull the lever? The NAP would seem to require you not to pull the lever, since it agresses against the person on the other track. Of course, we would like to minimise the deaths of innocent people, but without violating our principles. Here is my idea: NAP is not violated where the agression is consensual, like in a boxing match. Therefore, if the person on the other track consents to sacrificing himself to save 5 lives, it is ok to pull the lever. In this case, consent cannot be given by the guy on the other track, since he is too far away for his voice to be audible. I think it is OK to pull the lever if there is necessary, reasonably assumed, consent (NRAC). That is, if it is reasonable to believe, and it is impossible to know for sure, that given the choice, the person on the other track would consent to their life being sacrificed to save the lives of 5 others, then it is OK to pull the lever. This eliminates the violation of the NAP, minimises the death count, and, does not open the door to taxation, since taxation is obviously not consensual (if you pull the lever because of a utilitarianist arguement, you legitimize taxation, since in regards to taxation, exactly the same principle applies, that the needs of the many, outweigh the needs of the few). Any thoughts on this?

I agree that "deflationary spiral" is not the correct term to describe what is happening in Japan. I was hoping that one would slip through. I think it is quite possible that the same thing could happen in the US in the next decade. That is, a prolonged period of bugger all inflation and almost no GDP growth. Once US consumers refuse to keep taking on more debt, demand will be insufficient for sustained inflation, even if there is lots of money printing. Basicly, if the dollars/yen getting printed dont chase goods and services in the economy, they don't feed inflation, they just create asset bubbles. GDP will remain weak for oh so many reasons. Of course, the dollar could collapse in a big wave of inflation causing a debt reset in the US and likely around the world. At some point, the ever growing amount of phantom wealth, that exists as fiat currency, will be realised for what it is, and there will be a panic as people try to convert their phantom wealth into real wealth. That will be the death of the dollar, perhaps. We live in interesting times.

Alex, I accept your agruement, the woman does not aquire an obligation to the child when she does not choose to abort. The obligation only arises if the woman willingly accepts it. I still consider that, seeing to it that the child is cared for, is the right thing to do, even though it is not an obligation. In the same way, the right thing to do is to give a glass of water to a person dyeing of thirst, but it is not an obligation unless you have previously accepted it as one. Thanks, Daniel

Gold is viewed by investors as a hedge against inflation, and a safe store of value in times of economic turbulence. So when bad economic news comes out it tends to go up and vice versa. During hyperinflation, by definition, overall prices in the economy will be going up at a very fast rate. It is very important to note that price inflation is only a manifestation of a decrease in the value of a currency. It is more accurate to say that the value of money is declining than to say that the value of goods and services is increasing. In a hyperinflationary environment it is likely that the price of gold and silver (and probably bitcoin too) will rise far faster than the price of groceries. This is because people will flock to gold and silver to preserve their purchasing power. A huge increase in demand = a huge price increase. Remember, fiat currency is ultimately worthless, it is just paper afterall. Once confidence in it ends, it returns to its intrinsic value of nothing. The value of the us dollar when measured against goods and services drops by ~the inflation rate of ~4% per year and has actually been pretty stable in the last 10 years or so, albeit with a constant decrease in value. Gold on the other hand, fluctuates wildly in comparison with movements of value either up or down more than 15% in most years. Of course, the last 10 years have seen far more up years than down. 9 to 1 I think. The US dollar drops in value every year without fail, although this may change in the near furure if a deflationary spiral sets in, such as what has been happening in Japan in the last 10 or so years, but thats another story. Since the dollar always drops in value but gold can go up or down, the relationship is neither linear nor inversely proportional, even though it may seem so at times. FYI, I own gold, silver, bitcoin and litecoin. I'm out of fiat as much as I can be. I think it is going to end badly for owners of dollars, this bull@!#$ can't go on forever.

I run a successful small business. Here is some advice. Profit is critical. Know your costings. Try hard to think all costs you might incur even the little ones like stationary, and especially the time you will need to put in. Always try to minimise your costs, but be careful not to sacrifice quality too much. You need to find the right balance. Test the market before you jump all in. Talk to potential customers to determine if they would be likely to buy your product. Minimise your overheads where you can. Working from home saves renting a shop, in the early stages this might help. Running a low profit margin to ensure a low price in the early stages may help, since you need to increase your market share. Make certain that there is a reason why people should purchase your product instead of buying from the other guy, and make sure they know that reason, but don't be pushy. Your customers must walk away happy with their purchase. They give you free advertising that way, and are likely to come back. Word of mouth advertising from your customers is more effective than any paid ad. Be aware that it takes time to build a customer base, so don't expect off the charts revenue straight away. Customers love freebies, even if it is something as worthless as a cold can of drink after the lesson. Know what your customers really want, not just what they say they want. For example a guy might say he wants to improve his music skills to play more pitch perfect, but in reality his actual motivation to to be more appealing to women, so try to incorporate that into the lesson. Be in it for the long haul. Expect setbacks. Have a plan for dealing with setbacks before they come up. Remember, you are probably on your own. Most people will not back you, and will come up every reason under the sun why you will fail. You have to back yourself. Good luck

I entirly agree with your premise weenie, and, perish the thought, think that Stefan is completely wrong on this one. ps. I love bitcoin

That is of course, the whole point of state education. That don't want to create students with critical thinking skills, who will question the authority of their masters. They want people to accept what they are told, and obey without question. They want people to be dependant on the state because that way they will be unlikely to question it's legitimacy, and will make far better slaves. Great point on regurgitation being pretty much the least useful skill in the modern era.

If I may answer the above question to alex; if a woman realises that she has become pregnant from a rape, I think an abortion is morally acceptable. If she chooses not to abort, is she, implicitly at least, accepting the responsibility of a parent? I think she is, and that it is acceptable to pass this responsibility onto a willing adopter if she sees fit. If she gives birth, then allows the baby to go without care, she has failed in her responsibility as a parent, and is morally accountable. This is however, unlikely, and a bit of a mute point, since she would likely make her decision with certainty, in the early stages of pregnancy. Rarely would a woman choose not to abort, and also choose not to ensure the child is taken cared of, one way or the other.

We take it for granted that we exist in a rational universe, where everything can be explained using the principle of cause and effect. We assume that cause and effect always applies, and that it is a true and valid explanation of how the universe works. All of science is based on this belief. Without it, we would be unable to understand anything. So what caused condition Z? Condition Y of course. What caused condition Y? Condition X. Condition X? Condition W and so on and so on. This can end in one of three ways: 1. An infinite regression, which seems impossible. 2. We will reach a condition that has no cause. 3. At some point we will reach a condition, say condition A, whose cause was condition Z, or some other condition that was in fact caused by A, which is a circular arguement. My point is that the whole principle of cause and effect must, at some point, break down and/or cease to apply, in which case true understanding/knowlege is impossible. Does anyone have a way around this?

Yes and yes.

Well said dsayers

Kalmia, you might be interested in reading up on 'projection'. I think that will provide you some background information for what you observe.

Just for the fun of it, here is one of my favorite anti communist arguments. Imagine an absolutist capitalist society. A single corporation has taken over all other corporations. It is the only employer that exists and holds a monopoly in all industries. All people are forced to work for the corporation. The board of the corporation lives in luxury and all the workers live in poverty. The corporation controls the police and uses them to severly punish any who speak out against the corporation or disobey its commands. The corporation owns all media, and all media unequivocally presents pro corporation propaganda. Nobody may enter or leave the society. Nobody may attempt to compete with the corporation to provide any good or service. Nobody may attempt to produce goods for themself. All items of value are owned by the corporation. The most minor indiscretion against the corporation is met with extreme punishment. It is a brutal slave society with all workers being the slaves of the corporation. Then inform them that you have just described communism in practice. Just replace corporation with government.

I try to avoid "debating" with statists and marxists. At every opportunity I make the point that taxation is theft and requires the extortion and kidnapping of innocent people. If this point is ignored or rejected, there is no point in continuing the conversation. The conversation will not be a meaningful debate and I know that they will not be swayed. Once a person rejects basic morality and reason, demonstrates the inability to distinguish between fantasy and reality, and rejects an offer of help, I accept the 'fact' that it is too late for them. Their brain is damaged beyond repair. I wish I could help them, but I need to be realistic. A lifetime of propaganda, fear and violence, and the lack of any good influences takes its toll. Some people are damaged but fixable, but most are the shattered and unrepairable remnants of what used to be a human being. I think we should focus our efforts elsewhere.

Curious, how did girl a know the identity of girl b in order to ostracise her? I think this particular story was made up, or at least omits some critical information. Your point though, is entirely valid. Ostracism seems to work quite well. If only it was used more often aganist lying politicians and violent parents etc.