Idea Rotary

A roundabout discussion of "Culture and Enterprise"

2005-08-13T09:57:00.000-07:00

In my opinion, one of the most fascinating Austrian Economists is Don Lavoie. It is a shame that he died so young and that his work is difficult to find. His work is engaging in several ways. Most notably, he lead the "interpretive turn" in Austrian Economics. This is notable simply because he takes the difficult job of defending some of post-modern philosophy--something that most people in modern economic and philosophical discourse are loathe to do. Because I am interested in ideas, I find the defense of unpopular ideas interesting. Furthermore, he has worked a good deal on economics and cultural studies, and perhaps sucessfully worked in a way that merges the two fields. Finally, he tends to write in a way that will appeal, at least somewhat, to the aspirations of the cultural left, by explaining why statist means are ultimately unsuccessful ways to obtain their goals--without spending much time denigrating their sentiments.

It is this last part, the acceptance of some "leftist" goals and sentiment, while trying to explain to that libertaian means are more efficient that interests me. I find it particularly interesting. I also find it possibly futile. The conclusion, if it can be maintained is possibly powerful. If it cannot be maintained it is a lot of waisted effort.

To explain what I am getting at, I would like to deal with the last chapter of what I believe to be his last book, Culture and Enterprise (which he wrote with Emily Chamlee-Wright). In this chapter, he argues that the shareholder model of business ethics is deficient. His argument, relying on previous chapters which discussed the cultural embeddedness of markets and the inaccuracy of the neoclassical model of business decision making is probably sound. He also, very accurately, refuses to accept the full "stakeholder" theory of business ethics as too demanding and impossible for busienss to fullfill. The conclusion that he comes to is that there is room for philanthropic activity in the business world and that there is room for "moral" as well as "economic" choices in the running of a business.

While this is all well and good, and an effort that I support, I have a fear that this will appeal to the "cultural left" (I am not saying that this is his intention, although it does seem to be his intention in some of his work). To understand why, all one has to do is to read this piece by Sheldon Richman. In that story, Richman details the charitable efforts of Wallmart, and how certain leaders of the philanthropic wold have attacked Wallmart's philanthropic efforts. Wallmart is the biggest corporate donor in the country. Even so, the National Committe for Philanthropic Responsability condemns Wallmart for its philanthropic activity. They say that it is just "corporate advertising" and that it is too locally driven (never mind that one of the main criticisms of Wallmart is that it destroys small towns).

The point that I am trying to make is that it may be impossible to appeal to large segments of the left, including the "National Committee for Philanthropic Responsbility". I have to wonder whether anything will satisfy such critics, short of pain and suffering on the part of those who can afford to give. Must philanthropic contrabutions hurt? Is it that the company is so successfull that they can make them without noticing (or that they may even be a revenue producer) the problem?

This is no way a criticism of the work of Lavoie. However, it is a part of his work that I find fascinating and somewhat unsatisfying.

Objectivism and Libertarianism, again

2005-08-07T18:05:00.000-07:00

Don Watkins likes to blog about libertarianism and objectivism.

According to Don, good political change only comes through good philosophical change. That is to say that we have a current culture that supports a "mixed economy" and that we cannot get rid of the mixed economy or its components without a philosophical change to reject said "mixed economy". This is incorrect. Political change does not come only through philosophical change. Elections do not produce the political will of the people. Perhaps Don is not read in public choice analysis, but most political outcomes are the result of economic and power games, not to mention the structure of voting process. This goes back to such incontrovertible thinkers such as Aarow, who demonstrated that the difference between various voting procedures (all of which are democratic) can turn out different results, none of which has any clear democratic priority over the others. Anyone vaguely familiar with libertarian theory understands that legislators are bought and sold, and the legislation that is produced is often determined by which interest group has the most money and/or votes, not the national well being.

The point being is that the political philosophy of the nation is not always the same as the outcome of the political process. Changing the policy and laws of this nation is not simply a philosophical endeavor. It is also the result of interest group wrangling, selling to the public, etc, etc....One can come up with short term gains. There are a number of constituencies that would support some aspects of capitalistic freedom as understood by objectivists. Why not support the changes that can be made?

Directions for Cultural Critique

2005-07-26T18:39:00.000-07:00

Listening to Allen Charles Kors second lecture on Voltaire (commerically available), I was highly impressed by his explanation of the education of Volataire. He explained that most people don't understand his philosophical education. The popular belief is that when Volataire was growing up, there was a main current of religious and aristocratic orthadoxy that had a straingelhold on France. This was the end of the reign of Louis XIV. Strong censorship laws were in place. The Bastile was the home of political prisoners. Furthermore, Voltaire was educated by Jesuits--that is to say functionaries of the Roman Catholic Church. Yet nevertheless, Voltaire became a prominant enlightenment leader, speaking out against problems with Royal as well as religious authority.

Thinking about it, this seems paradoxical. How can someone brought up in such a pro-royal and pro-Catholic atmosphere become a leader, actually a seminal thinker, for the opposition? Moreover, how can a whole crop of people in a Catholic Aristocratic dominated environment reach out and push forward the enlightenment? To answer this question, Koors pointed out the value of a Jesuit education at the time. Voltaire was studing a curiculum of logic, reason, and debate. The Jesuits taught their students exactly what was necessary in figuring out how to make good arguments pro and con. Rigour and excellence were demanded. It was not good enough to argue against strawmen. Finally, there was exposure to the classics--which included a lot of anti-religious literature, which was taught for its beauty and skill of writing.

This is all a round about way of thinking about and asking what is important in cultural critique. Do the answers matter all that much. Is a culture that appears bad (religiously intolorant, aristocratic, etc...) really all that bad if it has the seeds of change (perhaps burried, as an undercurrent)? Furthermore, what are the seeds of change? How do we move things in the right direction? Should the goal be to push the correct conclusions, or to push the way to arrive at the conclusions?

"Eternal life" as "anti-life"

2005-07-16T12:37:00.000-07:00

Over at SOLO there is an article posted by Marcus Bachler titled "Who wants to live forever".

While the article discusses various issues regarding various opinions on the eternal extension of one's life, it misses some of the most important points. To begin with, it the idea that one could live forever, or even to be 500 years old strikes me at odds with reality. People have always been hoping to find some way to achieve "eternal youth". The idea of medical and health science advances that extend life way beyond what we have today seems more wishful thinking.

It is simply not good philosophy to ignore the constraints of the real world. Everyone will die eventually. To pretend otherwise seems, well, silly. Life implies a begining and an end. It is simply the way of things. To rebell against the reality of one's death is to rebell against the nature of life. While this appears incredibly obvious, it is also something that the world of Objectivism never seems to have gotten around to.

I actually consider this to be somewhat of a defect in Objectivistic ideas of psychology and ethics. Everything seems to be about success and robustness. However, it also is true that a natural part of living on this earth is aging, weakening, and death. To ignore these facts, to pretend they aren't there, or to live a crusade agianst their reality is pointless. It is a shame that Objectivism has so little to say about this.

None of this is meant to disparage the longevity activists. I think they should follow their dreams. I don't want to stop technology or discourage it. However, I do think that to imagine that we will never die is tilting against a windmill, and I have to question a philosophical group that seems to be so focused on it.

Winning with Peace

2005-07-11T19:55:00.000-07:00

A recent article by Don Boudreaux has caused some amount of debate about the war on terror. Reading through the track backs, Don Watkins and many others have started accusing Don Boudreaux and various libertarians and peace advocates as supporting "surrender". Of course, they are wrong and Don Boudreaux is right. But I am not even interested in parsing though the arguments.

One of the reasons that objectivists and other assorted "right thinking patriots" can make hard hitting arguments is that there is no real vision of winning or even morality. The common thought is described as "we can't win". Of course that is wrong. We can and will win. However, if "we can't win" is interpreted as "there will probably be more surprise terrorist attacks that we really can't prevent", well that is true. But that is not the point.

Anti-war people need to explain what it means to win. To win means outliving the terrorists. It means not sucombing to the terrorists. To win means that we will find the terrorists and either take them into custody or kill them. It is that simple. It is to fight against terorist organizations and individuals until they are no more. This is a viable win. It may cost some casualties, but it is the best outcome possible. There is more to unpack here. This expressly includes refusing to let our way of life, our system, and our government a reflection of their own brutality.

There is a somewhat different way to determine "winning". Perhaps that would be more congenial to the pro-war people. This vision is the anhilation of vast portions of the middle east. If there is a society that we feel is promoting terror, we must destroy it. My contention is that this won't work, and we will have a never ending cycle of violence, war, and terror. Every time we kill one generation of Islamicists, we will only be creating another.

In any case, my point is that anti-war folks need to present the how and the why of victory over terrorism, as well as why brute force will never achieve that. Otherwise, we can make all of the important rational points we want regarding the inanity of the pro-war folks and why they are wrong, with little avail. We need to keep the big picture in full view.

The anti-anti-conceptual mentality

2005-07-11T19:35:00.000-07:00

Another problem that I have begun to see in some quarters of objectivism revolves around the tactic of diagnosing one's opponents errors as malfunctions of thought. I can see the appeal to invigorating epistemology by adding this technology of how to think right. Unfortunately, I also think that there are grave problems with spending much time on the issue.

I didn't think much on the issue until recently reading Don Watkin's website. In a couple of perhaps unrelated articles, he seems to have started relying on psycho-epistemological arguments to explain what is wrong with both libertarians and people who oppose massive use of force in Iraq. In each case his arguments seem to denigrate into a diagnosis of one's opponents--on a large scale--as having massive thought disorders. Libertarians, you see, hate ideas. And those who oppose the massive use of force, well, they don't like concepts. It is as if everyone who disagrees with objectivism just can't think right! I seriously began to wonder if the man ever woke up in the moarning and thought that maybe just maybe those who disagree with him might make some sense.

Perhaps I am being exagerative. And perhaps there is use for thinking of people as "anti-conceptual" or having a "hatred of ideas". But I also think that the whole business has been infected by the Objectivist mindset of being against the world, and fighting the evil doers everywhere. Scratch that. Stupid evil doers.

Proudhone: head in the stars, and other places

2005-07-10T19:39:00.000-07:00

Reading Proudhone is absorbing. It is not that all of his arguments are perfect. I actually have all kinds of markings up and down the page. However, one becomes quite sympathetic to the spirit and goal of the work. Perhaps I have just become soft and can see the wonder of living in an anarchistic world where most people are small business men or work in some sort of collective. I can see that this is a marked independance over the state of things as it is. It would be wonderful if people could easily borrow money, start up a business, and not take on the duty of paying the interest. It would be wonderful if people could work together and make profit as a group. It would be wonderful if people felt more economically empowered and had more control over their financial life. And then one gets caught up. It takes a few minutes to realized that these claims seem to be of the same status as "it would be wonderful if we all had our own spaceship".

I have more to say, but I keep erasing and re-writing. It won't be said tonight. However, I want to suggest that interest may be a usefull tool in the social distribution of loans. Furthermore, as I keep stating, money is scarce--even if we printed up lots of it its value would keep going down. I suppose that if a mutualist banking scheme could work that would be one thing. But until I can see a way for interest free banking to work (in the way it would work in a free society, not as some kind of government transfer scheme), then I don't see how mutualism can be kept up.

However, there is hope. In addition to the cooaperative story below, I have recently discovered the Grameen Bank. The idea is to provide micro loans (no more than a couple of hundred dollars) to poor people in Bangladesh. This bank has been successfull as a bank. It makes lots of loans and they get paid back. This small scale movement in a mutualist direction--providing loans to poor people who couldn't get them otherwise seems to be changing things for the better. However, it is important to note that the loans are small, and would have move things very little for the purpose of ending the monopoly of capital ownership. They even charge interest. Grameen loans appear to be a very good thing, putting money into the hands of people who need it. It is apparantly a profitable way to fight poverty. But as I stated, it is not going to be(nor does it improve the likelyhood of having) a mutualist revolution.

There is one side note. The Grameen Bank appears not only to be lending money, but promoting good decision making. It is not clear that the "16 decisions of Grameen Bank" are actually something that they require all people they loan to to follow or not. Some of the decisions seem, well, incredibly politically and morally charged--"we shall have small families" and "we shall not give or take dowry" among them. All of the decisions are prudent ones, in fact, I may call them cultural pre-conditions of economic success. However, requiring people to follow them in order to loan (if that is their practice) seems incredibly coercive. I have to wonder if it is something that mutualists or others would call "contract feudalism". But this may need more working out.

Objectivism & Moralism

2005-07-10T17:16:00.000-07:00

I have been recently tuned in to various objectivist and objectivist related internet discussions. I have come to the point of pure frustration. There are some good posts out there. And then there is a multitude of posts not worth reading. I caught myself arguing the issue of libertarianism. And then I found myself incredibly bothered by the typical thoughtless foreign policy work.

In any case, the problem in Objectivism is moralization. Everyone with a serious interest in Objectivism should read this and this.

And I am certain that the problems of justice and criminal law as adderssed by Objectivism are related to this problem.

So the question is, how to find and pull out the good stuff and ignore the bad.

Debating Intelligent Design

2005-07-08T19:47:00.000-07:00

On my way to work this morning, I heard a piece on NPR's morning news show regarding the public debates, or rather lack thereof, between supporters of intelligent design and evolution. The basic gist of the story was that scientist supporters of evolution are not really interested in debating supporters of intelligent design. This is for various reasons. To debate intelligent design people in public forums is to actually suggest that intelligent design is something whose claim to validity is good enough to bother debating. Furthermore, supporters of evolution say that public debates are more or less a game and that their ideas are not simplistic or easily sumarizable enough to be presented in a convincing enough way to convey and convince the onlooker that they are correct. Intelligent design on the other hand, is a false but perhaps dangerously convincing when argued for in small doses. Also, there was also the idea that supporters of creationism use wiley debate tricks that confuse the issues.

While I think there may be something to all of these arguments. However, I am also not totally sure that the best strategy is to give up on the debates all together. To begin with, they seem somewhat snobbish. More importantly, they abdicate the field. If this strategy leads to fewer and fewer people hearing the evolution side supported in a debate, they may come to the conclusion that the evolutionists are incorrect. I think people, at least open minded people, want to hear from supporters of evolution. They want to be able to hear both sides. They have a right to hear from both sides. Furthermore, they may draw some negative conclusions from evolution supporters non-interest in presenting their views in a popular format like the debate.

The only important question that should be asked when deciding whether to debate or not should be as to what effects would be caused by appearing and what effects would be caused by not appearing. If more people would be positively influenced by showing up than by not showing up, then you should, and the other way around. And I do understand the beauty of not showing up to make the point that ID is beneath debate. However, I fear that may only leave too many people asking: why?.

Postscript: When I originally heard the radio story, I had thought that there are many parallels with the objectivist issues of sanction and discussion with those dirty libertarians. Of course you can read all you want into my post on that. It is probably true. There are probably some factors that make the equities involved very different such as the esteem and importance that evolutionary supporters have in the scientific and academic world that supporters of objectivism do not. It would seem to make it all the more imperative for the objectivist to appear.

The cooperative Howard Roarke

2005-07-07T17:57:00.000-07:00

There is an interesting story about cooperative businesses up at alternet.

I find the article interesting for several reasons. One of them being personal: I lived in a residential co-op for a year while being a full time student at the University of Michigan. I am generally interested in mutualism and varieties of non-traditional free-market business models. Most importantly, I think the topic of cooperatives fit strongly into my interest in how laissez fair capitalist ideologies and some anti-authoritarian strains of socialism and anarchy.

What came across to me was how much working in a cooperative promotes personal responsibility. It is the flip side of not having a boss. Members have to be responsible for themselves. It is almost as if working at a cooperative requires or should induce some sort of improved responsibility at work. Or perhaps it encourages it.

"Then there is the more deeply personal issue of self-motivation. "Everybody thinks they
don't want to have a boss," says Baird of the Oakland Arizmendi. "But what they haven't
thought about is they don't want to be a boss, either. That is maybe the most revolutionary
aspect to what we do here. People have to become in charge of themselves, and not
everybody's equipped to do that."

Assuming that participation in a cooperative business enhances personal responsibility and productivity, perhaps it should be part of the cultural structures that enhance and promote free-markets, despite the fact that currently most co-op types are not free-market types. Also, one would hope that if this is a thriving business, and by many measures it has been by the cooperative pizza provider mentioned in the story, it can gain increased popularity as a successful business practice. The profits appeared high (or at least high enough that last year each employee got a bonus equivalent to a $10 increase in their wages for every hour worked in that year). The business has lasted a good while. This looks like it could be a good business.

Of course, not everything in the cooperative movement is peaches and cream. It is certainly not all Roarke and Galt. Things are decided by consensus (this is not the usual practice in cooperatives, I think). As I recall, Roarke hated committees--and there are good reasons to think that some groups and committee situations are terrible. Everyone gets paid the same amount per hour. While this mode of organization may be suited to a pizza place, I can't see how it can work with, say, designing blue prints or litigating criminal cases. Somebody has to be in charge. Furthermore, I can't imagine a law cooperative. It just makes sense to make some people lawyers and others secretaries (mostly because it doesn't make sense for lawyers to do their own secretarial work, their time is worth too much). It wouldn't even make sense to consider all attorneys at a firm equal--because they don't have equal skill, ability, and importance. It would make more sense for attorneys to work alone, each responsible for his own clients then to have a bunch of attorneys working on consensus basis where those who are the most experienced and able are treated just as those who are right out of law school.

However, it is clear that the cooperative has its function and should definitely be studied and valued by those interested in business, the free-market, worker responsibility/productivity, and culture.

Deskilling: and the problem is?

2005-07-04T19:23:00.000-07:00

Reading Kevin Carson's Free-trade Anti-Capitalist blog I have become aware of the idea of deskilling. The idea is that laborers are being dumbed down for profit. As they are being dumbed down they have less and less control over how they do their work. This is a way that they are more easily controlled.

So I decided to do some begining research on the issue. I want to see actual data on the issue. I want to see what is going on and how it works. Maybe I want to see some sign of conspiracy and determine if there is some sort of logic to this in order to verify that there is no better explanation as to what is going on. So far I have been soemwhat dissapointed.

If deskilling is supposed to be a bad thing, the Internet Encyclopedia of Technology and Culture provides pretty lame examples: the carpenter and the physician. As to the carpenter, the complaint was that the production of molding went from something that took a lot of time, effort, and skill, to something that the carpenter bought from a manufacturer that had the machinery required in order to easily and cheaply produce. This seems to be an example of making the carpenter's life easier. It now takes her/him less time to produce good woodwork. Now he can refine his other carpentry skills. Yay!

The second example that is mentioned is physician in the advent of the sphygmomanometer. According to the information provided, the sphygmomanometer (blood pressure thingy) can easily provide information to a physician that previously took a lot of work and experience to detect. When I think of professions that are being dumbed-down, I don't think of doctors. Really, if doctors can more easily measure blood pressure, well then good. Because doctor's have a lot of skilled work to do. And it seems kind of funny to act as if that weren't the case.

Maybe I am looking at this all wrong. With all my thinking on the various ideas that intersect at this rotary (libertarianism, georgism, anarcho-capitalism, mutualism, buddhism, objectivism, etc, etc....) I was hoping for something a little more recognizable. Perhaps I was looking for something that would disturb an objectivist. For all of the intellectual and eliete hard core capitalism of Objectivism, there is great appreciation for a skilled working man. Just read Atlas Shrugged. One of my main goals in understanding deskilling is to provide some sort moral questioning for the libertarian and the objectivist. Perhaps a way to show that some of the main themes of Objectivism can be interpreted in ways that may problemetize Objectivist notions of Capitalism and especially the business-government relationship. However, I have to wonder whether or not the argument for the existence of deskilling is really there and as strong as I was begining to think it may be.

Or maybe I just have to give it a better chance. I would certainly appreciate it if someone could point me out to some better information.

Reading Proudhon

2005-07-04T17:00:00.000-07:00

Recently I have taken up reading Proudhon. I have started with his work "What is Property?" Much of the work seems wrong, false, or just somehow off. I may get to that, and I may not. However, because he is really (in my opinion) adding argument after argument after argument as to why property is a bad thing (as opposed to possession, he was most certainly not a communist), it is not necessary that all--or even most-- of his arguments succeed in order for his larger point (that property should be replaced with possession) to be proven.

One of the more curious bits of thought that Proudhon advances regards the division of labor. To explain what I think he is getting at, I would have to start by saying that he thinks that labor should be divided and paid for not by time (as a modern factory 8 hour day works), but by the quantity of production or the accomplishment of a number of chores. He basically asserts that there should be some sort of equitable division of this labor, and each person should only perform his share. For that share, he should be paid. Once he has performed his work, he can do a number of things, of course. He can spend the time in leisure, raise a family, cultivate himself, etc... However, if he should decide that he wants to do more work, he would be interfering in his fellow man's ability to make a living. Of course, he could assist his slower fellow worker. However, he should not demand any kind of payment for this assistance. If I understand him correctly, to do so would violate the equal rights to provide for oneself.

This perhaps seems to be the most frustrating kind of error that Proudhon makes. That is the assumption of a fixed sum of wealth, or in this case, jobs. There seems to be a number of jobs, we all devide them among ourselves, and we split the pay equally. Of course this is wrong. There is no fixed sum total of jobs, wealth, or whatever. The number of jobs to perform, products to make, or wealth to be accumulated is not fixed. It is expanding. If I am super productive, I benefit myself. There is no limit to the number of jobs, so you can probably find something else to do. If I do this better than you, than you should do something else.

Writing this down seems awefully harsh. It feels like I am saying find another job, one that you can do better. But it is not as if there is an infinite number of jobs. And many cannot find a new job because they live in the wrong town, don't have enough experience, etc....

Nevertheless, because the supply of jobs is not fixed, there is no way to just divide them all up and share equally in the work and wages. That would limit the number of jobs. That would limit productivity. It appears to be a mistake.

The deadly silence

2005-07-03T16:41:00.000-07:00

Foreign policy and the war on terror should probably be the number one focus for political discussions today. However, they aren't. Whenever the subject of Guantanamo Bay arises, the only condemnation that appears is based toward those who call it a "gulag" or compair it to the terrors of Stalin & Hitler. Call it a debate over very bad wordage, exageration, and insensitivity. Nobody wants to mention torture.

As of this date, the Attorney General of the United States of America has advocated torture. We as Americans don't seem to care. As of this date there are serious allegations of torture at the Guantanamo Bay prison. We Americans don't really care.

I cannot describe how much this bothers me. This is beyond words. Something must be done.

Objectivist Rationalism?

2005-07-01T06:11:00.000-07:00

Thinking about the comments to this post at Anger Management (as part of the aforementioned debate) has lead me to wonder if Objectivism is too rationalistic. I had argued that a Friedmanite anarcho-capitalist world would provide a social system where rights (as conceived by objectivism) would be better respected than in a system of minimal government. Don states that the assertion could not be defended as a matter of principle and that is the problem. He elaborates by saying that "If you want to prove that a social system is proper to man, you must do so by reference to principles, particularly moral principles. If you can't do that, then you have not proved your case."

As I see it, philosophy has an important place in politics. It should describe what is good, what is bad, what rights people have, what kind of result should follow if these rights are not respected, etc... However, philosophy cannot always explain the social and political mechanisms necessary to create this. People aren't always rational, and they surely aren't always objective--at least in the sense described by objectivists. Governmental mechanisms simply don't always work the way we would think they will. It takes all kinds of extra-moral theory to explain or predict how people would react to the best prepared constitutional document and laws that philosophy can provide. You can enact the best philosophical and morally backed document that you wish, that does not mean that it will be enforced as you envision. It takes more than moral theory to plan, create, and modify political structures. It takes psychology, economics, etc, etc..... And sometimes all planning is inadequate.

Philosophy and morality should describe what kind of society we want. However, philosophy cannot always tell us how to enact this. If we are looking to enact it, we cannot limit ourselves to moral arguments. Clearly, what we do should be within the bounds of morality. However, to limit the available arguments to those with moral reasoning seems to be overly rationalistic. No philosophic blueprint can plan how society would work. While we certainly can use moral reason to get to a description of what people's rights should be and what principles society should recognize, however morality alone cannot determine the best way to structure constitutional and governmental mechanisms to get society to a place where these rights are properly recognized. For normative principles, look to morality. However, to explain how these normative principles should be enforced, I think we should be looking elsewhere.

Debate the State

2005-06-30T18:19:00.000-07:00

An interesting conversation is going on between The Agonblog and Don Watkins at Anger Management regarding minarchism and anarchism. I haven't read much of Agon as of yet, but he prooves to be a very intelligent and bold read. See also here.

However, I perhaps think that the key (or maybe just more interesting) issue is Don's post called "The Real Social Contract". The crux of the Objectivist argument seems to be captured here--libertarian anarchists think the real victim of crime is not the actual victim, but society in itself. Seems a little collectivistic for my blood.

Of course, Don is wrong in saying that criminals represent a general threat to society as a whole. People who beat their family members or kill competing black market operators generally not a threat to society as a whole. They are a threat to friends, family, and black market operaters--but not to society in general.

But to address Don's point more square on the way he was trying to argue it, it is not totally clear that he has made his point. He writes:

Why? Quoting Ayn Rand, "If men are to live together in a peaceful, productive,
rational society and deal with one another to mutual benefit, they must accept the basic
social principle without which no moral or civilized society is possible: the principle of
individual rights" (The Virtue of Selfishness, 126).

The key phrase there is "basic social principle." A criminal does not merely harm his
individual victims -- by his actions he rejects the principle that makes a moral society
possible. He therefore becomes a threat to that society as a whole. If you want to be part of
society, you must accept the principle of individual rights.

Clearly there are people who violate this "basic social principle", and a criminal does reject this principle by his very actions. As an aside, it seems strange to think that the esence of the criminal's wrong, or what makes it significant is that he rejected the wrong principle. However, just because they reject this principle does not mean that there is an automatic right for society to lock them up, beat them up, kill them, or whatever. Another response may be more appropriate, or perhaps one over the other. Actually, restitution seems most appropriate.

The possibility that we could violate this basic social principle in response to a crime is totally ignored. It is almost as if because they have committed a crime they are beyond the pale and their own rights are not worth respect. The basic principle seems to be revenge. You have violated our rights, we will violate yours. Nevermind the principle that it is bad to violate others rights. I mean that is the basic principle: Do not violate rights. It is not clear that "he did it to me first" is a really great justification.

I also can't help thinking of the Nietzsche's point that usually we call the people we fear "bad". The convergence of fear and hate and the moral outrage that usually accompanies these issues (criminal justice) seems uncomfortable, and the strong emotions of fear and hate seem strongly connected to the philosophy of criminal justice.

Anarchy & Utopia

2005-06-25T21:13:00.000-07:00

Recently, on a libertarian email list that I frequent, an old debate was brought up. The basic question revolves around how you would fund a police force without taxes, or probably more to the point: could a free-market anarchist society fund a police force. It has lead me to question the utopian nature of free-market anarchy.

The most appealing answer to this is that prisons should produce revenue. This revenue would not only be for the upkeep of prisoners (I think there are self-sustaining prisons out there, Angola prison in St. Francisvill, LA comes to mind), but also for the payment of restitution to the criminal's victim. This is actually a very pleasing resolution to the question. A prison system where prisoners were forced to pay restitution to their victims would be more just than the current system because the victims would be made whole.

Revenue producing prisons also help defend this idea by creating a mechanism where the indigent would be protected by independant profit seeking defense companies. Assuming that one could sell one's right to collect damages from criminal harm, the indigent could always sell the rights to collect the restitution to a defense company in order to insure that the offender would be appreheneded. While this appears to be a solution that would provide for the investigation of crimes against the poor and powerless as well as the apprehension, prosecution, and detention of the corresponding offender, this does not provide explicit crime prevention in poor neighborhoods. That is not to say that there wouldn't be some externalities providing some crime prevention or the fact that there would be no way around the problem. One may wonder how much security the police provide poorer urban neighborhoods anyway.

But the key problem that all of this rests upon is whether or not prisons can be modified in order that prisoners actually produce money in which to pay restitution to their victims. This seems soemwhat unlikely, although I believe some people argue that it can happen. Arguments and research (perhaps) forthcoming.

Zen politics

2005-06-25T20:35:00.000-07:00

According to Zen teaching, when two people point at the moon, they may be pointing in different directions. However, they are pointing at the same thing. That is to say that sometimes teachings may be opposed, but they aim at the same thing. What is important is the thing that is being aimed for--not the teaching. In zen, the direction, or the view, is not what is important. What is important is the moon.

Using this type of analogy, it occurrs me that there are some vast underlying commonalities between hard core advocates of laissez faire capitalism and serious socialists. The core of their teachings, or at least the goal of their teachings, may be pointing at something vastly similar. However, the corresponding viewpoint and various interpretations of fact--as well as some philosophical glosses that get in the way.

One of the most apparant ways in which this works is with attitudes towards individual initiative and responsability. On the so-called "capitalist" side, there is a whole lot of talk about the importance of individual initiative and responsability. This can be seen in the Objectivist school, which prizes individual responsability, and argues that individuals should think for themselves and take initiative in their life--including and perhaps especially at work. The individual should be in control of themselves. Economists, a few "Austrian" economists especially come to mind, talk about the benefits and importance of entrepenuership. The basic argument is that capitalism both enables, encourages, and promotes individual initiative. However, on the socialist side, there is an equal concern. Socailists, or at least the anarchists among them, face the reality of the life of a corporate employee, and the problem of de-skilling. Individual initiative, responsability, and input of the daily work tasks is deminished. Trotsky (not an anarchist, really a vicious violent totalitarian kind of guy), I believe, thought that under communism every man would be wonderfully skilled, productive, etc... Both capitalist and socialists are interested in promoting individual power, efficacy, responsability, etc... However, neither seems to see their own weaknesses in this area or recognize the truths presented by the other.

Another approach is to look at how leaders are chosen. Socialists present fears (or perhaps reality) of a government lead by economic eliets. They feel that the wealthy should not rise to the top just because they are wealthy. A more capitalistic concern is that democratically elected leaders are not necessarily the people who are altruistic or concerned with the public, but shrewd, manipulative, blood-sucking political operatives. A good example of this is a chapter of Hayek's The Road To Serfdom, which I believe is called "Why the worst rise to the top". Again, both sides seem blind to their own problems and unaware of the good points made by the other side. Each is affraid of what ammounts to greedy idiots leading the country, but neither can see that the other is affraid of the same thing.

This is clearly not enough to prove my case. It is only a brief sketch of a few of the ways that I think capitalism and socialism may be pointing at the same thing even though the viewpoint of the two is in very different directions.

Note: When I say "pointing at the same thing", I do not mean they would have the same result. Only that the same concerns may underly each ideology.

Scales falling from my eyes?

2005-06-24T06:32:00.000-07:00

I once had a teacher who taught poly sci at Macomb County Community College. He couldn't understand why marijuana is illegal. It simply no longer made sense to him. He would tell stories of asking random people on the street and at bars why marijuana is illegal. He could never get a satisfactory answer. I suppose part of the idea was some kind of gonzo discussion tactic trying to shock people out of their view, and show them it is nonsensical. However, part of it was like he crossed over into another world where he ceased understanding other people's views. It is like he took one of society's assumptions (marijuana=bad) and pointed out there is nothing to it.

I am beginign to feel the same way about non-possessory property, that is property that you own but don't personally use. I just no longer understand why we do it. Doesn't owning the land others and demanding tribute (or you could call it a "tax", but it is usually called "rent") seem like an awefully feudalistic practice? I have simply ceased to understand why society deems this practice just or usefull.

So this brings me to a question: are scales falling from my eyes, or are they growing on my eyes?

Organ Doners On Strike

2005-06-22T18:13:00.000-07:00

I have recently come accross (through Eugene Volokh) an interesting strategy for promoting leagalized organ markets. The basic idea is that other methods of promoting organ markets being aparantly futile, the author (a professor at George Mason) decided to withold his organs from donation until the time that his estate will be paid about$900.00 per vital organ.

While the idea seems interesting, I found the document lacking. It spends excessive amounts of time belaboring the arguments for organ markets. I have been on board with that for a while. What it fails to provide is any explination as to why he chose this strategy. Of all possible methods of promoting organ markets, this seems unlikely to achieve the goal. Assuming that all people seriously convinced of the goodness of organ markets (and the idea is indeed good as markets will increase the supply of available organs), I don't really see that changing the situation. Furthermore, until organ markets are indeed made legal, the witholding of organs will cause increased suffering--and thus go against the goal of increased supplies of transplantable organs. It really may do more harm than good.

However, it may not be an unethical response. It is certainly in the tradition of teachers strikes, police strikes, or nurses strikes. In fact, it may even be more "altruistic" than any of the above, because those strikes are usually for personal benefits, not the notably moral sentiment of increasing the available organs.

Buddhists teaching in ways that may

2005-06-18T19:16:00.000-07:00

Can an Objectivist benefit from some of the teachings of the Dalai Lama? Perhaps it would be best for our rational faculties to take up some of the Buddhist virtues! Take a look at this quote from The Dalai Lama's The World of Tibetan Buddhism

"One of the best human qualities is our inteligence, which enables us to judge what is wholesome and what is unwholesome, what is beneficial and what is harmful. Negative thoughts, such as anger and strong attachment, destroy this special human quality... When anger or attachment dominates the mind, a person becomes almost crazed... A person gripped by such states of mind and emotion is like a blind man who cannot see where he is going. Yet we neglect to challange these negative emotions and thoughts that lead to near insanity. On the contrary, we often nurture and reinforce them."

Basic idea: anger and attachment are bad for the mind, they make us near-crazy and prevent us from making good decisions. So we need to cultivate good mental states. Maybe, just maybe, parts of Buddhism are necessary to achieve the Objectivist goal of best use of rational facility.

On preventing surprise attacks

2005-06-18T16:53:00.000-07:00

I heard Posner talk the other day on NPR. He was discussing his new book "Preventing Surprise Attacks". While I was actually surprised that NPR played such a libertarianesque author in its main news show, I found what he had to say to be quite important.

His main point was that we can't provent surprise attacks. It is kind of basic, no? It is a surprise!
And we spend lots of time and money going to wierd lengths (think airport security confiscating nail clippers and doing lots of things that may make people feel safe, but don't really protect them) to stop the inevitable. Now we are all for preventing the next attack, but we know we can't prevent everything. Plus there was an interesting point that we go to the greatest lengths in areas where we have been hit--the air transportation system. But the lengths we go to are absurd and irrational.

He also talked about the intelligence restructuring and how that is a bad idea. He seemed concerned about the abuses of the FBI, and really liked the MI5 (although he saw some problems). One of the more interesting bits (although not totally evident) is that he compared intelligence agencies and strategies not on their logic but on the history (read: report of abuses) that the agencies had. He didn't seem to take much of a rationalistic stand, suggesting how these agencies should be run. Instead he looked at structure of the organization and evaluated it by the results--mostly allegations of abuse.

One of the more disturbing bits was that he admitted the fact that political reality in the war on terror is more connected to psychology and reason, and that people probably won't opt for lessening security even when it is rational because they want measures that make them feel secure, even if the result is not more security.

Benj. Tucker & Mutual Money

2005-06-12T19:02:00.000-07:00

Benjamin Tucker spends a good amount of effort in Instead of a Book discussing his ideas on a mutualist banking system. According to his idea of mutual banking, Tucker argues that a mutual bank can provide lots of loans at an incredibly low interest rates (note: I have my doubts on the feasability of this system, but that can be worked out later). At this point there will be a super abundance of money. This super abundance of money will lead to a super abundance of capital goods. Once capital goods are super abundant, lots of people will be able to purchase them and work for themselves. This will put pressure on employers to raise wages. In fact, labor will have the upper hand and be able to dictate its terms to owners of capital. Furthermore, since capital goods are super abundant, their possession will be of no economic benefit to anyone--they flow like water--and the price of any good will be equal to the price of labor that went into producing the good (there is also a good amount of bypassing on the argument here that labor would and should be sold and purchased in time units).

Tucker, however, does not seem to realize that even if mutual banking could put lots of money in people's hands interest free, that does not mean that capital goods would be super abundant. It seems to me that increasing the availability of money would not increase or decrease the amount of capital goods available. Capital goods would maintain the same amount of scarcity. It would just be that there would be more money out there and each unit of money would be worth less.

Furthermore, while it would be a good thing for labor to have more bargaining power, it seems unlikely that capital goods could become so abundant to be, well, worthless and command no part of the value of the consumer good produced. This does not even seem desirable.

I will have to further unpack and deal with these issues as time goes on.

A spattering of thoughts on pacifism (or non-violent resistance)

2005-06-12T14:39:00.000-07:00

1. One argument against pacifism is that it sanctions violence. If you get slapped in your right cheek and "turn the other cheek", you are supporting the violence that is being used against you. O.K. However, wouldn't a violent response to agression also sanction violence. It would affirm that violence is, after all, an appropriate way to resolve disputes. The use of violent self defense as opposed to violent agression simply implies a reluctance to solve these issues through violence.

2. Using violence--even in self defense--seems to be a concession that the dispute at hand cannot be setteled using the mind and rationality. It is giving up on thinking and manuvering one's way out of the situation. Perhaps it is an admission that the mind really isn't capable.

I'm not saying I'm necessarily a pacifist yet. It is just that these kinds of thoughts are bugging me.

Oops

2005-06-12T14:36:00.000-07:00

I forgot to link to that Bidinotto article. You can find it here: http://bidinotto.journalspace.com/?entryid=59

More thoughts on restitution and retribution

2005-06-12T14:22:00.000-07:00

Retribution, as Mr. Bidinotto puts it, reflects back the damage done by a criminal onto himself. Restituion, on the other hand, would only ask the offender to pay back the victim for damage done.

The idea of restitution is to restore the status quo ante. That is to say to pay for the damage done before the crime occurred but to force an offender to pay no further cost than requierd to in some way restore the victim to their former position. The idea is to pay back what was taken.

Retribution, on the other hand, desires to inflict the damage that the criminal has done back onto the criminal. It seems somewhat indifferent to the issue of restoring the victim. It is more insistant on creating suffering in the criminal equal to that of the victim. But why would a rational self-interested person want this? A system of restitution would not only restore the victim but also insure that crime does not pay. Anything further--namely retribution--would be an expense beyond what is necessary to remedy the situation. The money would be better spent, well, persuing one's own life as opposed to punishing other people. It seems unclear why a rationally self interested person would want to persue the issue any more than to obtain restitution. Any more seems to be a waste of money.