Topic: Intellectual Property - In All Fairness! - page 88. (Read 105893 times)

What, exactly is your concern, again? Because it's not clear to me. Share your hardships with us.

My ideology just makes it more difficult for you to justify stealing from others to achieve some legal means to an end. It truly is sad if our civilization cares less for the ill and inferm. It's even sadder when we have to steal by covert indirect violence and deception, via unjust laws, in an attempt to try to remedy the situation. All this while trying to appear benevolent and kind. Shame.

In *your* libertarian world, yes.  Possession of a nuclear weapon means you are a maniac.  You might even be qualified, but if anyone other individual can obtain access to it, then you're still a maniac.  In present-day earth, nukes are mostly under the control of qualified people, in installations guarded by qualified people.  I can only hope that they are not maniacs.  The other nukes, if there are any, worry me.

Orderly from the standpoint of absence of violence. You could have a disorderly home, I don't care. I do care if you have lack of order and logic in your laws, especially when they commit acts of aggression against me.


Possession of a nuke equals maniac now? You own it, you're a maniac. I take it from you, now I'm an maniac. Someone takes it from me, they're a maniac...etc, etc., ad nauseum. Brilliant piece of logic. Thanks for that enlightening bit of drivel.


Accidents happen. If accidents happen, therefore we should just get rid of the human race. How was that for logic? And yes, it is possible to repurpose nuclear weapons materials for use in nuclear power plants. Look it up.

You're wrong.  Libertarianism allows me to defend myself from threats, right?  I interpret as a threat anyone carrying nuclear weapons anywhere near enough to affect me.  I am therefore entitled to defend myself.

But, hey, look at you.  You want to threaten everyone for hundreds of miles around with nukes irrespective of their wishes, whereas I would only be threatening you.   Which of us is the narrow-minded totalitarian?

But this business of nukes is tiresome and ridiculous.  Can we please stop?  For a more realistic example, please answer the questions from my previous post (from "Get the idea?" to the end):



In *your* libertarian world, yes, you should fear me, because if you do anything I don't like, anything that I consider an infringement of my rights, then I will seek redress.  In the absence of a contract between us, or a contract not addressing the conflict, yes, I will use all means necessary, including violence, to extract remuneration for losses incurred or, where remuneration is not possible, to inflict equivalent damage.  No contract = no court = no law = MightMakesRight.  I pity you.

I had b2c in mind when I wrote about the pollution.  He seems to think it's fine that anyone can do whatever they like on their own property, neighbours be damned.

I'm not sure I understand your second quoted point here - are you saying failure to pay tax is a threat, or infringing on my right to healthcare is a threat?  In any case, your ideology here would make life very hard for people with disabilities or illnesses.  I feel it would be a sad day for civilisation, the day we start charging them the full cost of their healthcare.  I expect that a majority couldn't afford it, and would succumb.  [sarcasm] But hey, it would improve efficiency, right? [/sarcasm]

But my point is that you're right when you say
Nobody is arguing that point here.  We're just arguing what constitutes a "threat".  I gave you some examples of what many people might consider a threat, some of which you agreed with, some of which you didn't.  We're not talking within the confines of libertarianism, we're defining what constitutes "correct" behaviour towards one another.  Such a discussion is not confined to libertarians, though they, certainly, do discuss it.

Oh, we can all do that:
Thomas Hobbes, 1588-1679.

Laissez faire, telle devrait être la devise de toute puissance publique, depuis que le monde est civilisé ... Détestable principe que celui de ne vouloir grandir que par l'abaissement de nos voisins! Il n'y a que la méchanceté et la malignité du coeur de satisfaites dans ce principe, et l’intérêt y est opposé. Laissez faire, morbleu! Laissez faire!!

Translation:

"Leave it be, that should be the motto of all public powers, as the world is civilized ... That we cannot grow except by lowering our neighbors is a detestable notion! Only malice and malignity of heart is satisfied with such a principle and our (national) interest is opposed to it. Leave it be, for heaven's sake! Leave it be!

Author, René de Voyer, Marquis d'Argenson (1736)

Are you suggesting that orderliness is an important component of an everyone-makes-their-own-rules libertarian society?

If he'd been my neighbour for 20 years, well, I could assume he wouldn't suddenly detonate it.  Nonetheless I would insist that it be destroyed.  It would be worth losing a 20 year friendship if I knew I wouldn't have to live beside a nuke-wielding maniac.  And don't tell me he might not be a maniac.  *Anyone* who holds a nuke is a maniac.

I think you don't know so much about the differences between the nuclear material you need for a bomb and that which you need for a power plant.  But technical problems aside, if I found out he was trying to build a nuclear power plant beside my land, you're damn right - I'd drive him away and if he resisted, well, it would be...... MMR again!!!!!!  Ask me why?  Ohhhhh, let me think now, what happened recently with a nuclear power plant....
I don't need to establish intent.  Given their inherent danger, there is only one reason to risk holding a nuclear weapon - to detonate it, or at least to threaten to do so.
And I wouldn't have to worry either - who'd prosecute me?  Who cares?  I'd have a nuclear weapon  

Indeed.

edit: fixed quotes.

You're a liar. I said if it was the best way, and it was determined that there was intent to do harm. 'And' not 'Or'. Possession and intent is necessary. Discuss intent, or I have nothing more to say to you.

You made certain services, "public services" by mere decree without considering the consequences of your actions. That style of government is stereotypical of totalitarian governments. This being progressive really starts to make sense in that context. That is the 'might makes right' type of governing I loath. You make a law just because you can, not because you should.

I would almost concede that "positive laws" could be made to protect life, liberty and property as a consequence of the physical aggressions induced by others; and that you might tax to intercede for that purpose.

I could barely stomach that, but no...oh no!..., that's not enough, you have to go way beyond that. Give an inch and you take a country mile. Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

Your "public services" are absolutely and unequivocally unreasonable and ridiculous. Never.

Ownership and intent don't matter.  If its there, its a threat and must be disarmed.  If you fail to disarm it, you are at the mercy of the person in control.  He doesn't have to leave home but he may as well have a blade at your throat.

You already know this - you agreed that society has the right to use the best way to protect itself from nukes.  I'm not sure why you want me to lead you through the same baby steps to sanity again.

You make it sound as if I pulled the trigger. I may have a laissez-faire attitude towards all types of material possessions, but I certainly am no suicidal bomber. Hardly scary talk. Many of you speak outwardly of killing first and asking questions later. That kind of attitude seems to me, at the very least, arbitrary, capricious and unpredictable. Not exactly the kind of behavior one would like for a orderly society.

Let's suppose you asked your neighbor if he had a nuke. If he said yes, from what I've read here, you'd kill him on the spot. Or alternatively, the second you found out he had a nuke, you'd kill him. Would that be an accurate assessment?

So let's just entertain this a bit further. Suppose you found out he was dismantling the nuke to use the materials in a power plant, how would you feel now? Justified? Maybe a little guilty? Should you be prosecuted? And don't say, wellll... I'd ask a few more questions, ...or... I'd do some more investigating... or... I'd check his criminal record... or... Or nothing, you would do nothing of the kind. Owning a nuke is equivalent to intent to kill. If you did any of the former "investigating" you'd be determining intent, which was the whole point I was trying to make in the first place.

OWNERSHIP DOES NOT EQUAL INTENT. Stop it with the stupidity.

You are still on this idea that you acknowledge that public services are needed but you don't want to have to pay for them.

Do you not see that is unreasonable and that it makes you appear somewhat ridiculous?

As in all things threatening, apply the following:
Act proportionally and appropriately. Try not to escalate the situation. Discern intent if possible. Try to understand.

However and considering the above, 1 is a threat, you might need to pull your gun out too.
However and considering the above, 2 is a threat, you might want to verbally respond in kind. I suggest you not use hate speech.
However and considering the above, 3 is an aggression already (it is an act in progress). Sue to enjoin. Of course, it depends also on the toxicity and concentration of sulphur. Take immediate action if necessary - your life may depend on it.
However and considering the above, 4 is not a threat or an aggression, it's competition. You're only response would be to ask nicely to refrain, contract, or compete in kind.
However and considering the above, 4 is an aggression and threat, but not to you. You have no right to the property of others (taxation), therefore you do not have a right to healthcare unless you specifically paid for it with your own monies.

Forcing others to pay their tax, because you have, is not sufficient justification.
For example, it does NOT follow that:

1) If I do X, you must do X. Likewise,
2) If X is right, you must do X. Likewise,
3) If I was forced to do X, you must be forced to do X.

Wait, you want him to sit around and wait to be killed?  And you talk about him being someone to fear?  What about people who think that we don't have a right to protect ourselves?  Surely they are far more scary?  Like you for example Fred.  You want people to accept that dying for someone else's right to a nuke is their duty to you.  That is scary talk.

Yes that's mostly correct, except to say that libertarians don't extend rights to others, that would imply duty. Duty implies contract. Contract implies consent. If you have no consent, you have no duty to others, unless by duty you mean to say not aggress. As in, "you have a duty in your actions to not aggress another". But that's a bit pedantic I would think.


Libertarians don't demand rights. That would project an outward action on another to fulfill some promise or agreement of the enforcer. Enforcement may come from without but rights don't, unless you're aggressed, in which case they might. It's contingent on the aggressor. Rights aren't conceded.


Any conflict not resolved in a non-agressive manner with arbitration will likely result in force and violence. To be explicitly and obviously clear one last time, "might makes right" ignores all actions and reactions, considerations and circumstances, and boils it down to, "I said so, I'm more powerful than you, I win, I'm right, I make the rules, therefore might makes right, no exceptions". If there are any libertarians that believe that way, they aren't libertarian. Socrates said it best, "'Might makes right' has been described as the credo of totalitarian regimes."


You describe your credo with precision. You believe in totalitarianism. No consideration for intent. You must kill. Disgustingly narrowminded you are. It's people like you we should all fear.

Nobody is arguing that assumption because it's true today.  It all depends on how you define "threat".  Just to give an example:

• If you point a gun at me, even from your own property, you are threatening me.
• If you shout abuse at me, you are threatening me (hate speech, or inciting others to hatred).
• If your widget factory emits too much sulphur, you are threatening my livestock and my livelihood.
• If you copy my music, you are threatening my music career.
• If you fail to pay your tax, you are indirectly infringing on my right to e.g. healthcare, and so threatening my health.
• etc

Get the idea?  Some people will say just owning a gun implies a threat, and so gun-owning is outlawed, or strictly licensed according to justifiable requirements.  Others will say a gun isn't a threat until it's aimed.  Others might even say that the gun was pointed but not loaded and therefore not a threat.  Everyone has their own idea of what's allowed or not, and unless you actually know *everybody* and whether any given behaviour on their part actually constitutes a threat to you, then there's no way at all you could even walk down the street without being nervous.  Damn, in some places you might even be arrested for looking crossways at a person.

Now, here's the crunch: you have defined "threat" to be "pointing a gun at someone".  Someone else might define it as "looking crossways at someone".  I, for example, could define it as "honking the horn needlessly".  Whose definition should we all follow?  Bear in mind that all three of these transcend borders between property - you can point a gun, look crossways, and honk a horn, right from one property to another.  How many definitions will you allow before there are too many to remember?

But it gets worse.  I don't like people honking the horn needlessly.  But others are ok with it.  Is it ok for me, therefore, to honk the horn needlessly?  Joe doesn't like people looking crossways at him, but can he do it, since others don't mind [i.e. since his action is not interpreted as a threat by anyone, is he permitted to do it]?

I think it's not so much that libertarianism is loaded with contradiction, but that *people* have conflicting thoughts over what rights they have themselves and what rights they should extend to others.  It seems that b2c and fred think that it's enough for one person to declare "I have the right to do such-and-such" and as long as it doesn't directly physically cause harm to anyone, then that's ok.

But they don't seem to realise that when I demand rights, I am actually demanding them from others.  That is, my "rights" are not decided by me, but are defined by what all the people around me permit me to do.  They don't come from within, but from without.  And, obviously, the rights one person demands of others will often not be what those others will concede to him.  And so, conflict arises.  It can be obvious, like 'who gets to eat the apples from this apple tree', or it can be more subtle, like 'what may I do with this computer'.  It can be balanced, like 'don't walk over my vegetable garden or I'll beat you with this stick', or it could be lopsided in favour of the stronger party like 'don't drive over my vegetable garden with your tank'.

It would be fine if everyone in the libertarian community were of a similar mind, such as a small farming community in the middle ages.  But we're not talking about small farming communities here - we're talking about the internet-enabled, jet-setting, maxi-consumer global village, with people from all walks of life, from all creeds, from all political bents, and from all racial denominations; each with their own opinion of what should, and shouldn't be allowed; hell, many probably wouldn't even know how to formulate a consistent morality.  fr & b2c claim to despise MightMakesRight, but that's what libertarianism would all boil down to in the end.


Go on... what are these other possibilities?  If all these other possibilities fail to resolve the conflict, is there an alternative to fighting it out, other than the weaker party simply running for their lives and so losing their claim?

I tell you, if libertarianism comes to pass, and anyone were to come within 100 miles of me with a nuclear weapon, I would do whatever I could to destroy them.  I would neither offer nor wait to negotiate or debate the finer points of political philosophy.  You're already infringing what I consider to be my rights and are already threatening my life, irrespective of what you consider your rights to be.

And as I said in a previous post, it really irritates me when people beep their horn for no good reason.  So, be careful, if you infringe my rights in that way, I'll legitimately go to defend my ears by giving you a sound thump on yours.  If you choose to illegitimately defend yourself, well, WhatWasItThatMakesRight again?

I'm familiar with all of the above, but fail to see how they differ significantly regarding imminent threat or threat in general, or the consequences that follow a violent act. Am I to assume these differ from possession of a nuclear weapon or related materials. Other than killing more effectively, that's about it.

And even then you can't provide a coherent argument.

People are arguing inside of your framework to show you how it WON'T work because it's loaded with contradiction.