Topic: How long would it take for Anarchy to start working? - page 19. (Read 16391 times)

If I have to pick from just these options, I'll pick the first one.

I am a Discordian. I am forbidden to hold absolute dogmas. I only deal in relative catmas

Which is just a complicated way of saying that of course I don't know the truth. But I have strong suspicions

Ok, I have just one last simple question to ask...

If you think that government (any government for that matter) is corrupt and all that, it would mean that it makes people lives worse. So, is it all in all a relative evil (i.e. without government our lives might have changed from bad to worse) or an absolute one (i.e. without government our lives would have changed beyond any doubt only for the better)? Take your pick!

Of course government has also produced some new and useful technologies, too. It doesn't surprise me, since it routinely uses up 30 - 50% of the resources of the whole economy (as measured in GDP), it is bound to do SOMETHING useful, probability theory dictates that   Actually, who knows how many more inventions there would have been, if these resources would have not been tied up in government and thus things like financing a bureaucracy, social spending, and war. Hey, war! Wasn't that the reason why the government invented what we now call the internet in the first place? I hear that they didn't want to have a single point of failure in their organizational structure, which could be taken out with a nuclear attack by the Soviets (or whoever else). Also the government didn't turn the internet into what it is today. I am willing to argue that it was precisely the relative freedom from government censorship and regulation which brought forth many wonderful things, which we now use via the web.

To be honest, right now I don't feel like the discussion is going anywhere, we're just bringing up circumstantial evidence supporting one claim or the other.

I'm at a loss about what to say. I just want you guys to entertain the notion, that anarchy might not be an impossible utopia, after all

But of course, you're free to do what you want

Ironically, the development of what you call today Internet was financed by the government you're now blaming for being crooky and selfish... How come?

Yes, it surely was technology and scientific progress that directly changed our lives for the better today, but nothing could be further from the truth than to say that it was in spite of there being government, especially that which finances science and all...

Actually not at all. I'll just say that we're better off in spite of there being government, not because of it. The improvement of life conditions has been arguably due to technology, not politics.

I'm willing to concede, that maybe government has been necessary throughout history, because there was an absence of other forms of organization. But now that it has gotten us to the point, where we have the INTERNET, its usefulness has expired. We can now manage our affairs much more efficiently on a p2p basis. Bitcoin is in the process of proving this right now

But you can't deny the fact that on the whole we're living better today than a hundred years ago and still better than a thousand (or even ten thousand)! 
From your position (corrupted power with people crooked and selfish here and there) it would be hard to explain...

I don't think it works this way...

I feel like hawker summarized the overarching theme of criticism:


I think we're not that far apart in what we want. But we have different views on how such things are to be achieved and probably also different definitions of a "decent society", as well.

I view it like this: NOBODY can guarantee you a decent society. Anarchy just gives you the option to try and go ahead and help create such a society. Government doesn't guarantee a decent society - I feel like it just stands in the way of such an endeavor by its very nature. And I suppose it's hard to deny that if government indeed does start destroying society instead of helping it, it is much harder to stop or change its course than to stop any other individuals or groups.

The only thing harder to change would be the underlying culture, which is the source of both - the genital mutilation and government. IMHO the two of them are not that far apart. One cuts off parts of your genitals, the other rapes your butthole  

Well I'm glad this discussion is polite and fun. This topic is hard to debate, because neither the side claiming anarchy can work, nor the one claiming it can't work have any sort of evidence to support their claims and thus must rely on highly subjective stuff like "what is human nature" and "what do I like in society".

You ignored my question about those poor ones who either refused to choose your "law provider" or chose the wrong "benefactor". Should they give in to the majority or what? Should your "laws" then be applicable to them or they shoud be in reservations and concentration camps as soon as possible? 

Actually, what you suggest boils down to having several states in the borders of one...
I don't think this is ever possible, but if it were, one of these "states" would eventually crush all the others and usurp the power. What would stop it from trying?

In any case this is not anarchy...

So your view is that quaint customs like female genital mutilation, bride burning and honour killings are A-OK in your anarchist utopia because we have "delegated" the right to stop them.  Of course I am sure you accept it will be unpleasant for the victims but at least you feel that we will be "free."

Having the right to live a decent society is important to me.  It seems to me that anarchism is simply taking that right away.

You can't take responsibility for other people's lives. Indeed you can help them, but ultimately it is their choice what to do with their lives

The present system embodies the moral standard that we all share and it is effectively preventing female genital mutilation in the West and reducing it in the Middle Eastern states what actually function as states.  Of course in places like Sudan and Somalia where there is anarchy, almost all girls get their bits cut.

That's how anarchy is worse.  It removes the legal mechanisms for controlling aberrant behaviour.

You overlook a simple logical inference here. If some living creature is not a predator then it is preyed upon, i.e. the rest of nature is prey to your predators (by definition), so it inevitably falls victim for the second time, now to that survival of the fittest strategy...

There is a very simple explanation to this. These people may be selfish and crooked, they may even be inveterate villains (like Hitler and the crew), but they have the same trait in common, i.e. lust for power which can be satisfied only through organising people around them. If they are clever at that, they understand that their own ambitions can be fulfilled to the full only through making lives of the people around them better (be it a family, a city, a state, whatever). Even if you are as greedy as Midas, your greed can only be fed up to the limit if you are constantly giving back

This comes right back round to where we started.

Think of the governments as companies that produce and enforce the law.  Law providers as such.

If you look at the world as a whole you can see, right now, there is no universal consensus.   We live in an anarchic world populated by what amounts to protection rackets.  

How about instead of these rackets you have several companies that offer security and you can choose which to go with?  One of these stipulations of these companies will be, for example, we will provide you protection from being murdered but if you murder someone then by the terms of the contract you must go to arbitration and accept the judgement.  It's through this process that the laws that you live under are formed.  The company has incentive overall to provide laws that are to the best benefit of the majority of their customers.

Imagine that if these companies that produce law and protect people are 1) No longer confined to any particular territory and 2) They have to attract customers rather than forcibly extracting money from them.   Then you have the same anarchic world where these companies have to interact with each other but customers are free to choose who they want to go with and what level of service they want.   The companies have great incentive to co-operate with each other.  In fact much more so than governments of today, because governments of today can steal vast amounts of money and force people through threat of jail to obey them and kill for them if necessary.   Those dangers don't exist in a voluntary society.

In this case the laws you mentioned earlier (what is it you?) are not laws but nothing more than rules of decorum at best. Law by definition is a system of rules which are enforced by some institution with the purpose of penalising disobedience

That is one possible interpretation. This loops back to what I was saying about "human nature" and the different ways of perceiving it.

If you think, that people are selfish and crooked,  it makes sense to believe in this interpretation. But at the same time you need to explain how handing the reins of government to these selfish and crooked people helps improve the situation.

The other way of looking at it is to perceive the other evolutionary strategy, the one who is so often overlooked in face of "darwinism" and social darwinism: symbiosis/cooperation.

Today most people believe in evolution. And evolution is being described as a process of random mutation and natural selection.

There is a meme in our culture, which equates the "natural selection" part of the equation with "survival of the fittest". But this misses the whole picture. Survival of the fittest is a survival strategy employed mainly by predators. Much of the rest of nature employs the "survival of the most useful" strategy with a great degree of success. In fact, the more evolved and complex a biosphere is, the more of this second type of strategy you can find in there.

So to answer your question: no, not each for himself and devil take the hindmost. I don't like that idea.

What I like instead: everyone together with anyone, taking personal responsibility. Have a problem that people are starving? Go take your friends and feed them. Worried that they're uneducated - go educate them! That sort of deal But it's easy for me to have faith in such a scenario, because I am what can be described in terms of (sorry for bringing this up again, but it's such a useful model) the 8 circuit model of consciousness as a "neophile". One who has received an imprint from his environment saying that the world is an OK place, new things are amazing and people can generally be trusted unless they've been corrupted somehow.

My approach is about closing the experiential gap between decision and consequence. The further away we are from the consequences of our actions, the worse decisions we do - from pragmatic AND moral standpoints. Look at people, who eat meat every day, yet have great trouble even watching a video from one of the chicken factories.

It needs to feel like YOUR responsibility. Not some unelected panel of "experts". Alternatively you can elect to just don't give a fuck, but you don't need government for that, do you?

So each for himself and devil take the hindmost?
That's what I like most about anarchy and above everything else...

So now you are looking for the best method of subdueing those who don't share your ideas about anything? 
As I remember, we were talking about anarchy, not oppression, right?