Katrina displacement
Dover Beach
Orleans by Hurricane Katrina, to her dental appointment at the UCHSC
dental school. She has to get a job now and start over, because her
state pension is inadequate to support her. Tell me, how do the
[Ll]ibertarians think the free market will fix this?
I know that sounds throbbingly rhetorical, but if there's a decent
answer I'm interested to know what it is.
In Louisiana, she was a biotechnical lab assistant. Just FYI.
--
Dover
Dover Beach
news:Xns9CC7A3DE6EE6Bmo...@130.133.1.4:
A lab assistant in the biotechnology industry. Sheesh. Can't type.
--
Dover
Shawn Wilson
> Today for Geezer Taxi I took a 69-year-old woman, displaced from New
> Orleans by Hurricane Katrina, to her dental appointment at the UCHSC
> dental school. She has to get a job now and start over, because her
> state pension is inadequate to support her. Tell me, how do the
> [Ll]ibertarians think the free market will fix this?
So your solution is armed robbery? You want to help her, give her
your money.
Dover Beach
news:1022dd51-e757-419c...@r24g2000prf.googlegroups.com:
That's not really an answer, Shawn. Or, I don't know, maybe it is. I
did give her some of my money in a sense, since I gave my time and use
of my car. But is that all you've got? Shouldn't you be in favor of
voluntary communities to provide services? Do you really think Adam
Smith would have said "go fuck yourself" is the correct answer? Because
that's not really my reading of that early literature. But replying
with hostile rhetorical questions is the kind of thing that gets you
written off.
Seriously, if the free market is perfect, it should have a solution.
Maybe the solution is "old black women who have their homes destroyed by
natural disasters should simply lie down and die." There's so much
background, though. It seems unlikely that she had a fair chance at
attaining your level of affluence being born in the deep South in 1940.
Maybe there should be voluntary communities of bleeding heart liberals
to provide services directly out of their own pockets. Surely hearts
would stop bleeding so severely if it cost, I don't know, 10% of gross
income. Suddenly bleeding hearts would be in favor of self-sufficiency
and rugged individualism. I don't know. What's the answer?
--
Dover
Bob Ward
wrote:
>Shawn Wilson <ikono...@gmail.com> wrote in
>news:1022dd51-e757-419c...@r24g2000prf.googlegroups.com:
>
>> On Nov 18, 4:08�pm, Dover Beach <moon.blanc...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> Today for Geezer Taxi I took a 69-year-old woman, displaced from New
>>> Orleans by Hurricane Katrina, to her dental appointment at the UCHSC
>>> dental school. She has to get a job now and start over, because her
>>> state pension is inadequate to support her. �Tell me, how do the
>>> [Ll]ibertarians think the free market will fix this?
>>
>>
>>
>> So your solution is armed robbery? You want to help her, give her
>> your money.
>>
Can we reserve one of those ice floes for Shawn now, or do we have to
wait until he actually dies?
Shawn Wilson
> >> Today for Geezer Taxi I took a 69-year-old woman, displaced from New
> >> Orleans by Hurricane Katrina, to her dental appointment at the UCHSC
> >> dental school. She has to get a job now and start over, because her
> >> state pension is inadequate to support her. Tell me, how do the
> >> [Ll]ibertarians think the free market will fix this?
>
> > So your solution is armed robbery? You want to help her, give her
> > your money.
>
> That's not really an answer, Shawn. Or, I don't know, maybe it is.
It is.
> I
> did give her some of my money in a sense, since I gave my time and use
> of my car. But is that all you've got?
It's all that is necessary.
> Shouldn't you be in favor of
> voluntary communities to provide services?
Sigh...
"You want to help her, give her your money."
> Do you really think Adam
> Smith would have said "go fuck yourself" is the correct answer?
Sigh (2)...
"So your solution is armed robbery?"
Because
> that's not really my reading of that early literature. But replying
> with hostile rhetorical questions is the kind of thing that gets you
> written off.
They were neither hostile (except to the 'morality' of armed robbery)
nor rhetorical. You want to help her? do so. With YOUR resources.
Don't take resources from me by force.
> Seriously, if the free market is perfect, it should have a solution.
Yes, there is. YOU help her, with YOUR resources.
> Maybe the solution is "old black women who have their homes destroyed by
> natural disasters should simply lie down and die."
"YOU help her, with YOUR resources." Don't take them by force from
me.
> There's so much
> background, though. It seems unlikely that she had a fair chance at
> attaining your level of affluence being born in the deep South in 1940.
Yawn, sorry, my violin is broken and I know sadder stories anyway.
> Maybe there should be voluntary communities of bleeding heart liberals
> to provide services directly out of their own pockets.
Yep.
Surely hearts
> would stop bleeding so severely if it cost, I don't know, 10% of gross
> income. Suddenly bleeding hearts would be in favor of self-sufficiency
> and rugged individualism. I don't know. What's the answer?
You help her with your resources, which I said a long time ago.
Dover Beach
>
>
>
> You help her with your resources, which I said a long time ago.
>
>
Do you think that you (or anyone, or everyone) has a responsibility to
help the needy? Not a legal responsibility. Just a moral one. Never
mind all the "armed robbery" stuff. Do you have a moral duty to help
the indigent? What role does the free market play? (Maybe none.) You,
Shawn, sometimes defend religion and claim that you're a lapsed-ish
Catholic. Wouldn't the Catholic Church require charity of you? Of
everyone?
--
Dover
Mac
> Shawn Wilson <ikonoql...@gmail.com> wrote innews:053d196e-671f-4bc7...@2g2000prl.googlegroups.com:
>
>
>
> > You help her with your resources, which I said a long time ago.
>
> Do you think that you (or anyone, or everyone) has a responsibility to
> help the needy? Not a legal responsibility. Just a moral one. Never
> mind all the "armed robbery" stuff. Do you have a moral duty to help
> the indigent?
The method used matters, though. The real problem with some
government spending is that it has no owner, that the connection
between the resources consumed and their final effect is negligible.
Arguing this with Mr. Wilson is a little silly, because he has the
luxury of unelectability, and can take as extreme a position as the
logic of his argument would call for, but their a a lot of little ell
libertarians, and some of them might point ut that a huge part of the
problem was created by pretending "we're all in this together" for
situations where we clearly ain't.
Shawn Wilson
> > You help her with your resources, which I said a long time ago.
>
> Do you think that you (or anyone, or everyone) has a responsibility to
> help the needy?
I'm needy. Feel free to send me as much money as you have a
'responsibilty' to do.
Nothing?
Funny about that. "*Someone* should do something" always, Always,
ALWAYS seems to actually mean "Someone *else* should do something."
Your bleeding heart and miserly greed is not an excuse to stick a gun
in my face and rob me. You want to help? Feel free to do so.
> Not a legal responsibility. Just a moral one.
Where's MY cut of YOUR money...?
Never
> mind all the "armed robbery" stuff. Do you have a moral duty to help
> the indigent?
Do YOU?
> What role does the free market play? (Maybe none.)
Your desiring to help people and giving them *your* money IS the free
market at work.
> You,
> Shawn, sometimes defend religion and claim that you're a lapsed-ish
> Catholic. Wouldn't the Catholic Church require charity of you? Of
> everyone?
Who cares? If you think strangers can tell you what morality is, then
I would not like to see you in Nazi Germany, Stalin's Russia, Mao's
China, or prre-Civil War USA.
Shawn Wilson
> Arguing this with Mr. Wilson is a little silly, because he has the
> luxury of unelectability, and can take as extreme a position as the
> logic of his argument would call for, but their a a lot of little ell
> libertarians, and some of them might point ut that a huge part of the
> problem was created by pretending "we're all in this together" for
> situations where we clearly ain't.
Yes, it is VERY easy to greedy asshole misers to declare that it is
perfectly moral to take from OTHERS by force because they want people
given to, but are too fucking cheap to open their own damn wallet.
Other people's needs don't count of course, so it is perfectly
acceptible to steal from them. They can 'afford' it...
You want to help, open YOUR wallet. You want to steal from me? Well
there goes every hint of your 'morality'.
Dover Beach
news:71b0ca9c-665a-49f6...@w19g2000pre.googlegroups.com:
> On Nov 18, 5:16�pm, Dover Beach <moon.blanc...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> Shawn Wilson <ikonoql...@gmail.com> wrote
>> innews:053d196e-671f-4bc7-b121-
> 0ae69a...@2g2000prl.googlegroups.com:
>>
>>
>>
>> > You help her with your resources, which I said a long time ago.
>>
>> Do you think that you (or anyone, or everyone) has a responsibility
>> to help the needy? �Not a legal responsibility. �Just a moral one.
>> �Ne
> ver
>> mind all the "armed robbery" stuff. �Do you have a moral duty to help
>> the indigent?
>
> The method used matters, though. The real problem with some
> government spending is that it has no owner, that the connection
> between the resources consumed and their final effect is negligible.
That would be why I said "never mind the armed robbery stuff". I asked
about a moral responsibility. I'm not talking, yet, about the role of
government.
>
> Arguing this with Mr. Wilson is a little silly, because he has the
> luxury of unelectability, and can take as extreme a position as the
> logic of his argument would call for, but their a a lot of little ell
> libertarians, and some of them might point ut that a huge part of the
> problem was created by pretending "we're all in this together" for
> situations where we clearly ain't.
>
Yeah, well, I'd still like to know if Shawn's willing to engage with the
question. And if he isn't, okay, his prerogative, but I can't say your
comment is super-helpful either. In which particular way are we
pretending to be in this together when clearly we ain't?
--
Dover
Mac
"there's a lot...." "out", etc.
Dover Beach
> On Nov 18, 6:16�pm, Dover Beach <moon.blanc...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> > You help her with your resources, which I said a long time ago.
>>
>> Do you think that you (or anyone, or everyone) has a responsibility
>> to help the needy?
>
>
> I'm needy. Feel free to send me as much money as you have a
> 'responsibilty' to do.
>
> Nothing?
>
> Funny about that. "*Someone* should do something" always, Always,
> ALWAYS seems to actually mean "Someone *else* should do something."
>
> Your bleeding heart and miserly greed is not an excuse to stick a gun
> in my face and rob me. You want to help? Feel free to do so.
>
>
>> �Not a legal responsibility. �Just a moral one.
>
> Where's MY cut of YOUR money...?
>
Shawn, I wouldn't ordinarily do this, but now I'm going to. I *did*
email you and offer you help. I offered you a laptop so that you
wouldn't have to rely on the (publicly-funded) community college
library. You graciously answered and said that I should give the
computer to someone who needed it more than you did. So that's where
your cut of my money is.
>
>
> �Never
>> mind all the "armed robbery" stuff. �Do you have a moral duty to help
>> the indigent?
>
> Do YOU?
>
Yes.
>>�What role does the free market play? �(Maybe none.)
>
>
> Your desiring to help people and giving them *your* money IS the free
> market at work.
>
Hmm.
>
>
>>�You,
>> Shawn, sometimes defend religion and claim that you're a lapsed-ish
>> Catholic. �Wouldn't the Catholic Church require charity of you? �Of
>> everyone? �
>
>
> Who cares? If you think strangers can tell you what morality is, then
> I would not like to see you in Nazi Germany, Stalin's Russia, Mao's
> China, or prre-Civil War USA.
>
>
Yes, well, I don't think strangers can tell me that; I'm not the one
who defends the Catholic Church. You are. So, yada yada, Nazis, evil,
Stalin, blah blah, I know you are but what am I, I'm rubber you're glue,
etc.
--
Dover
Mac
> Mac <ANMCC...@ALUM.WPI.EDU> wrote innews:71b0ca9c-665a-49f6...@w19g2000pre.googlegroups.com:
>
>
>
> > On Nov 18, 5:16 pm, Dover Beach <moon.blanc...@gmail.com> wrote:
> >> Shawn Wilson <ikonoql...@gmail.com> wrote
> >> innews:053d196e-671f-4bc7-b121-
>
> >> > You help her with your resources, which I said a long time ago.
>
> >> Do you think that you (or anyone, or everyone) has a responsibility
> >> to help the needy? Not a legal responsibility. Just a moral one.
> >> Ne
> > ver
> >> mind all the "armed robbery" stuff. Do you have a moral duty to help
> >> the indigent?
>
> > The method used matters, though. The real problem with some
> > government spending is that it has no owner, that the connection
> > between the resources consumed and their final effect is negligible.
>
> That would be why I said "never mind the armed robbery stuff". I asked
> about a moral responsibility. I'm not talking, yet, about the role of
> government.
>
>
>
> > Arguing this with Mr. Wilson is a little silly, because he has the
> > luxury of unelectability, and can take as extreme a position as the
> > logic of his argument would call for, but their a a lot of little ell
> > libertarians, and some of them might point ut that a huge part of the
> > problem was created by pretending "we're all in this together" for
> > situations where we clearly ain't.
>
> Yeah, well, I'd still like to know if Shawn's willing to engage with the
> question. And if he isn't, okay, his prerogative, but I can't say your
> comment is super-helpful either. In which particular way are we
> pretending to be in this together when clearly we ain't?
Starting at the beginning, we don't all live in a place that
predictably -belongs- under water fairly regularly. A big reason for
NO's meltdown was federal policies that encouraged people to move in
large numbers to a place that could only support them, over time, in
small numbers. When's the last time you sent money to the Dutch (as
opposed to Dutch, over there) or to Oklahoma? In one case, they
admit that they are living in a place where God don't want 'em to, or
he woulda given them gills, and they act accordingly; in the other a
lot of people decided to take the hint and move. It's one thing to
identify victims of an unforeseeable catastrophe and say that it is
neither right nor efficient to throw them away; it's something again
to identify the problem, let the people who should deal with it ignore
it, and put everybody else on the hook to pay for it, again, and
again. FDR is hardly the poster child for hands-off government, but
when the Cumberland and Tennessee flooded one time to many, they aided
the victims, and saw that it could not happen again. Big difference
in mindset.
Dover Beach
news:0cb47f7b-7946-453e...@m33g2000pri.googlegroups.com:
> On Nov 18, 5:44�pm, Dover Beach <moon.blanc...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> Mac <ANMCC...@ALUM.WPI.EDU> wrote
>> innews:71b0ca9c-665a-49f6-9b6b-30cf5c14
> 2e...@w19g2000pre.googlegroups.com:
Yes, there probably were policies that encouraged people to live in
uninhabitable places. So probably my passenger wouldn't have lived
there absent those policies.
--
Dover
Xho Jingleheimerschmidt
> Today for Geezer Taxi I took a 69-year-old woman, displaced from New
> Orleans by Hurricane Katrina, to her dental appointment at the UCHSC
> dental school. She has to get a job now and start over, because her
> state pension is inadequate to support her. Tell me, how do the
> [Ll]ibertarians think the free market will fix this?
Well, I guess by her getting a job starting over.
Xho
Xho Jingleheimerschmidt
If she worked for the biotechnology industry, why was she getting a
pension from the state?
Xho
Dover Beach
news:4b04ab99$0$6708$ed36...@nr5-q3a.newsreader.com:
Don't know. Maybe it was for one of the universities? I know it used
to be that state employees didn't get SS, they got some Louisiana
equivalent.
--
Dover
Dover Beach
Yeah, I guess so.
--
Dover
Xho Jingleheimerschmidt
> Shawn Wilson <ikono...@gmail.com> wrote in
> news:1022dd51-e757-419c...@r24g2000prf.googlegroups.com:
>
>> On Nov 18, 4:08 pm, Dover Beach <moon.blanc...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> Today for Geezer Taxi I took a 69-year-old woman, displaced from New
>>> Orleans by Hurricane Katrina, to her dental appointment at the UCHSC
>>> dental school. She has to get a job now and start over, because her
>>> state pension is inadequate to support her. Tell me, how do the
>>> [Ll]ibertarians think the free market will fix this?
>>
>>
>> So your solution is armed robbery? You want to help her, give her
>> your money.
>>
>>
>
> That's not really an answer, Shawn. Or, I don't know, maybe it is.
I think it is given that an answer you disagree with will look a lot
like a non-answer.
> I
> did give her some of my money in a sense, since I gave my time and use
> of my car. But is that all you've got? Shouldn't you be in favor of
> voluntary communities to provide services?
He didn't say he was opposed to them. You giving her your money fits in
nicely with a voluntary community. Isn't that what you are currently
doing? You aren't running geezer cab all by yourself, are you?
> Do you really think Adam
> Smith would have said "go fuck yourself" is the correct answer?
I don't think libertarians worship Adam Smith anymore than (intelligent)
evolutionists worship Charles Darwin.
> Seriously, if the free market is perfect, it should have a solution.
And since you aren't a free marketeer, you won't find that solution to
your liking.
Xho
Mac
> Mac <ANMCC...@ALUM.WPI.EDU> wrote innews:0cb47f7b-7946-453e...@m33g2000pri.googlegroups.com:
>
>
>
> > On Nov 18, 5:44 pm, Dover Beach <moon.blanc...@gmail.com> wrote:
> >> Mac <ANMCC...@ALUM.WPI.EDU> wrote
> >> innews:71b0ca9c-665a-49f6-9b6b-30cf5c14
I think the next question a lot of little ell libs might have was how
much did the recovery depend on actual market forces. There's a
reason why we have terms like "seaside shack", and why vernacular
architecture varies so much from place-to-place. In previous
disasters, nobody went and brought in trailers while simultaneously
dealing with a mass of unemployed people. How much of this comes back
to inappropriate standardization of building codes, and of Davis-Bacon
gone wild?
Dover Beach
> Dover Beach wrote:
>> Shawn Wilson <ikono...@gmail.com> wrote in
>> news:1022dd51-e757-419c-9624-
87d3c6...@r24g2000prf.googlegroups.com
>> :
>>
>>> On Nov 18, 4:08 pm, Dover Beach <moon.blanc...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>> Today for Geezer Taxi I took a 69-year-old woman, displaced from
>>>> New Orleans by Hurricane Katrina, to her dental appointment at the
>>>> UCHSC dental school. She has to get a job now and start over,
>>>> because her state pension is inadequate to support her. Tell me,
>>>> how do the [Ll]ibertarians think the free market will fix this?
>>>
>>>
>>> So your solution is armed robbery? You want to help her, give her
>>> your money.
>>>
>>>
>>
>> That's not really an answer, Shawn. Or, I don't know, maybe it is.
>
> I think it is given that an answer you disagree with will look a lot
> like a non-answer.
>
>
>> I
>> did give her some of my money in a sense, since I gave my time and
>> use of my car. But is that all you've got? Shouldn't you be in
>> favor of voluntary communities to provide services?
>
> He didn't say he was opposed to them.
He didn't say anything about them. Seems like a mention would have been
a good idea.
> You giving her your money fits
> in nicely with a voluntary community. Isn't that what you are
> currently doing? You aren't running geezer cab all by yourself, are
> you?
>
No, it's a 501(c)(3), but they get lots of gummint funding, both local
and federal.
>
> > Do you really think Adam
>> Smith would have said "go fuck yourself" is the correct answer?
>
> I don't think libertarians worship Adam Smith anymore than
> (intelligent) evolutionists worship Charles Darwin.
>
>> Seriously, if the free market is perfect, it should have a solution.
>
> And since you aren't a free marketeer, you won't find that solution to
> your liking.
>
You don't know that. I read that painful article in the New York Times
the other week, you know, the one about all the throw-away teenagers,
and I thought: A lot of their suffering is due to child labor laws.
Those kids are willing to work. They DO work, at prostitution and drug
dealing. They'd work at legal jobs if they had an opportunity. Which
is worse, having six-year-olds get their hands chopped off in factories,
or having 12-year-olds living in the woods in near-starvation, subject
to rape and violence? People suck.
--
Dover
plausible prose man
> Today for Geezer Taxi I took a 69-year-old woman, displaced from New
> Orleans by Hurricane Katrina, to her dental appointment at the UCHSC
> dental school.
That was nice of you.
> She has to get a job now and start over, because her
> state pension is inadequate to support her. Tell me, how do the
> [Ll]ibertarians think the free market will fix this?
Fix what? That her state pension isn't very robust, or that she has
to find a job? The free market is the only thing that creates jobs,
you know, real jobs, without destroying more than it creates.
> I know that sounds throbbingly rhetorical, but if there's a decent
> answer I'm interested to know what it is.
You could invite her to live with you. That sounds wacky, doesn't
it?
> In Louisiana, she was a biotechnical lab assistant.
And she can never be a biotechnical lab assistant again? Or, I don't
know, a greeter at Wal-mart or something?
What do you want from me, here? A way to make her not 69 any more?
plausible prose man
> Shawn Wilson <ikonoql...@gmail.com> wrote innews:1022dd51-e757-419c...@r24g2000prf.googlegroups.com:
>
> > On Nov 18, 4:08 pm, Dover Beach <moon.blanc...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> >> Today for Geezer Taxi I took a 69-year-old woman, displaced from New
> >> Orleans by Hurricane Katrina, to her dental appointment at the UCHSC
> >> dental school. She has to get a job now and start over, because her
> >> state pension is inadequate to support her. Tell me, how do the
> >> [Ll]ibertarians think the free market will fix this?
>
> > So your solution is armed robbery? You want to help her, give her
> > your money.
>
> That's not really an answer, Shawn. Or, I don't know, maybe it is. I
> did give her some of my money in a sense, since I gave my time and use
> of my car. But is that all you've got? Shouldn't you be in favor of
> voluntary communities to provide services?
Yes, that would be the "give her your money." Hopefully without
unduly poking anyone, it's not like Shawn has any money he can give
her.
>Do you really think Adam
> Smith would have said "go fuck yourself" is the correct answer?
How is "give her your money," which, you know, is what you're doing,
the same as "go fuck yourself?"
> Because
> that's not really my reading of that early literature. But replying
> with hostile rhetorical questions is the kind of thing that gets you
> written off.
Also note the difference between voluntary community, and, you know,
the government.
> Seriously, if the free market is perfect,
perfect.
>it should have a solution.
She could, you know, get a job? Is she basically able bodied and clear
headed?
> Maybe the solution is "old black women who have their homes destroyed by
> natural disasters should simply lie down and die."
I like how the problem here is one persistent government failure
after another, and your solution is more of that sort of thing.
> There's so much
> background, though. It seems unlikely that she had a fair chance at
> attaining your level of affluence
Really?
>being born in the deep South in 1940.
You know, thanks to the government and its enforcement of the jim
crow laws and whatever that "prevailing wage" thing the unions pushed
for, since they hate black people, and so on...
> Maybe there should be voluntary communities of bleeding heart liberals
> to provide services directly out of their own pockets.
I think there are, actually.
> Surely hearts
> would stop bleeding so severely if it cost, I don't know, 10% of gross
> income.
Dave and Dana and a few other of you seem to think its just their
civic duty to fork over more like half of their income for whatever
bit of treasury looting the polity comes up with.
> Suddenly bleeding hearts would be in favor of self-sufficiency
> and rugged individualism. I don't know. What's the answer?
I'm not totally sure I understand the question.
plausible prose man
> > There's so much
> > background, though. It seems unlikely that she had a fair chance at
> > attaining your level of affluence being born in the deep South in 1940.
>
> Yawn, sorry, my violin is broken and I know sadder stories anyway.
Yeah, I tell you...this lady's doing better than Shawn as far as a
regular income, huh?
Shawn Wilson
> You don't know that. I read that painful article in the New York Times
> the other week, you know, the one about all the throw-away teenagers,
> and I thought: A lot of their suffering is due to child labor laws.
And the people who support them are exactly the same assholes who say
"I want to help, so I am a good person. Let's use YOUR money though,
since I want my money for myself. If you don't like that, you are a
bad person."
There is no end of 'well meaning' nonsense that gets done and hurts
people in that name of "we have to do *something*..."
plausible prose man
> Shawn Wilson <ikonoql...@gmail.com> wrote innews:053d196e-671f-4bc7...@2g2000prl.googlegroups.com:
>
>
>
> > You help her with your resources, which I said a long time ago.
>
> Do you think that you (or anyone, or everyone) has a responsibility to
> help the needy?
No. I'm not even sure what that means; you know, I think I could do a
reasonable enough job deconstructing it.
> Not a legal responsibility. Just a moral one.
No, and even if I did, well, this would mainly empower your neighbors
to say "that so and so, he's a bad person, not helping the needy like
he does" and in no way would any of this be some justification of the
expansion of the welfare state.
> Never
> mind all the "armed robbery" stuff. Do you have a moral duty to help
> the indigent?
Isn't Shawn actually the indigent himself? Do you have a moral duty
to help him? What about, um...Paul, Bill, Lars...what about the fifty
dollars I'm always asking for, then?
> What role does the free market play?
It's caused various charities to spring up, since there's a certain
demand for aid to provide assistance to the less fortunate in various
ways, although as Shawn doesn't quite point out, there are people in,
say, Africa who wish they only had this lady's problems.
> (Maybe none.)
Feel free to spend as much or as little time helping others as you
like.
> You,
> Shawn, sometimes defend religion and claim that you're a lapsed-ish
> Catholic. Wouldn't the Catholic Church require charity of you?
Yes. It would also expect him to think the Pope was infallible on
matters of religion, that birth control was the moral equivalent of
abortion and abortion was the moral equivalent of murder, that all non-
christians and possibly all non-catholics (maybe not the eastern
churches, but certainly the episcopalians and sons of Luther, which
means Dana, Charles, and someone else I could mention) are damned to
hell for all eternity, or at least will be spending an awfully long
time in a place that's just about as bad until they accept the
sacraments or something, which will be just about as bad in the case
of Burgess Devito, what with his Missouri Mulish streak), although
interestingly, child sexual abuse is best dealt with, by sweeping it
under the rug and blaming the victims, etc.
Shawn Wilson
> >> I
> >> did give her some of my money in a sense, since I gave my time and
> >> use of my car. But is that all you've got? Shouldn't you be in
> >> favor of voluntary communities to provide services?
>
> > He didn't say he was opposed to them.
>
> He didn't say anything about them.
Sigh (1) reiterated-
"You want to help her, give her your money."
> Seems like a mention would have been
> a good idea.
"You want to help her, give her your money."
> > You giving her your money fits
> > in nicely with a voluntary community. Isn't that what you are
> > currently doing? You aren't running geezer cab all by yourself, are
> > you?
>
> No, it's a 501(c)(3), but they get lots of gummint funding, both local
> and federal.
"gummint funding" == armed robery. Think otherwise? Try not paying
your taxes and see how long until men with guns show up to take them.
plausible prose man
> Xho Jingleheimerschmidt <xhos...@gmail.com> wrote innews:4b04b1c0$0$6703$ed36...@nr5-q3a.newsreader.com:
> You don't know that. I read that painful article in the New York Times
> the other week, you know, the one about all the throw-away teenagers,
> and I thought: A lot of their suffering is due to child labor laws.
What?
> Those kids are willing to work. They DO work, at prostitution and drug
> dealing.
Right, with you so far, DB.
> They'd work at legal jobs if they had an opportunity.
But then they'd be exploited, don't you see? Just ask Kevin, once he
and Cobblepot figure out who invented the interent.
"I'm saying if we removed all the drug laws and all the child labor
laws, sweatshops wouldn't be places you'd want to spend your youth,
and yet they would be places where some kids do spend their youth,
and
that the effects on society would be sucky. "
I especially like this part, where we all lose the house:
"Protection of minors; who will decide if a kid 'wants' to quit
school
and work eighteen hour days, the kid or the parents? Oh wait, kids
can't decide stuff for themselves, can they? So here we are
back-dooring slavery, again. It's an interesting world you want to
live in, I tell you what.
Then too, let's suppose Sleezy McBag wants to sit on the sofa and
watch soccer all day, and so he and the Mrs turn out a dozen kids in
a
dozen years, with pretty minimal effort. The kids, we are shocked to
discover, all want to work in a sweatshop, not go to school. The
McBags both die of boredom waiting for someone to score, and the
taxpayers end up supporting the little McBaglings, since they never
went to school and quit the factory once they were big enough to not
be scared of dad anymore, and, as uneducated little critters are wont
to do, took to lives of crime, and sucked at it, and are now all in
jail, to our expense. Does this seem to be a road to a stable, happy
society to you? "
Here's a great thread where you can watch Kevin being Kevin:
> Which
> is worse, having six-year-olds get their hands chopped off in factories,
> or having 12-year-olds living in the woods in near-starvation, subject
> to rape and violence?
Ah, but according to Kevin, since Al Gore took the initiative in
preventing all bad things from ever happening to anyone at anytime,
markets are broken and governments are perfect.
Slow Motion Apocalypse
I just came from Hollywood where I get hit up by the "needy" every 3
feet. I am pretty numb by now to any feelings of responsibility or
anything else toward them.
I guess maybe you can put her on a bus to Hollywood.
John Mc
On the whole I would agree Shawn and in a perfect world he would be
correct. The unfortunate thing is the world is not perfect. The problem
here is two-fold.
One, it's a matter of upbringing, far too many people have been brought
up to only look out for number one. Many of the
management/entrepreneurial types I've dealt with in my life act as
though they were raised by wolves. When did we go from 10-12% being a
good return on investment to 50% or more? There is nothing wrong with
making a living but I've got a real problem with "making a killing."
Especially, if it's backward engineering, looking for loopholes in
patents, engaging in duplicitous financial practices (read derivatives)
or just being downright unscrupulous. If you want to compete-compete,
don't look to cheat and connive no matter if it is "legal."
Two, the bleeding hearts have hemophilia. On the whole, they are SOOOOO
sure that they are right that they think that anyone who doesn't jump on
the bandwagon is an absolute ogre. They cannot see that taxation IS the
taking someone else's money/effort at the point of a gun. They do not
realize that they are supplanting someone else's ideals with their own.
Look sometime at the various "good causes" in the Stimulus Bill
congress passed and tell me these were all good and just reasons to take
someone's money. They weren't and that's the heart of the matter.
Is there a solution? I don't know. If more people would give of
themselves like Dover, it would help. It would also help if people HAD
more disposable income. Do I have a problem with Medicaid, Food Stamps
and other programs targeted at aiding the truly needy? -No, there was a
time long ago when I had to make use of them. But, yes there's always a
but, no one ever really LOOKS at the sheer size of our government and
how much of our economy it really consumes. Too many times one hears:
"It's a good cause. Ten million dollars isn't that much." (Substitute
any number you like for Ten million) With each passing year there seems
to be less "spare" money. My income has gone up and my actual living
costs haven't soared but there's not as much to go around. So this year
instead of donating food at Thanksgiving it's donating time to help
serve it.
John Mc.
--
I always heard the road to Hell was paved with good intentions
But nobody told me it was a superhighway!
Heather
wrote:
I was under the impression that children in the US were allowed to
work at many paid jobs already. Or is that only older children? But
if the existing child labour laws were repealed surely that would lead
to higher unemployment and lower wages for the unskilled adults at the
bottom of the current labour pool, which could possibly lead to higher
rates of family breakdown and put even more children on the streets.
As for the children on the streets, is there not even a minimal social
welfare system to take care of them?
--
Heather
Dover Beach
news:cqbag5tg1n5ae07qk...@4ax.com:
>
>
> I was under the impression that children in the US were allowed to
> work at many paid jobs already. Or is that only older children? But
> if the existing child labour laws were repealed surely that would lead
> to higher unemployment and lower wages for the unskilled adults at the
> bottom of the current labour pool, which could possibly lead to higher
> rates of family breakdown and put even more children on the streets.
I believe it's hard to work at most standard crummy jobs if you're
younger than 16. That's how it used to be, anyway. There are
exceptions, but they're not very common. As to the economic
consequences of easing child labor laws, I'll let the economists
speculate.
>
> As for the children on the streets, is there not even a minimal social
> welfare system to take care of them?
>
Yes, but it's definitely minimal. The first approach is to try to "keep
families together", which is sometimes not the best strategy. Foster
care is often rotten; many people are foster parents as their sole
source of income, and the money is really bad, so you get pretty bad
foster parents. There are of course some foster parents who are great,
but they're not the norm.
This is the article I was referring to:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/26/us/26runaway.html?_r=1
If you can't access it, I'll send it to you.
--
Dover
Dover Beach
news:ca76b77f-a282-4d73...@u16g2000pru.googlegroups.com:
>
> I just came from Hollywood where I get hit up by the "needy" every 3
> feet. I am pretty numb by now to any feelings of responsibility or
> anything else toward them.
>
> I guess maybe you can put her on a bus to Hollywood.
I think she's travelled enough already. At least here she's figured out
where the dental school is so she can get her teeth worked on for cheap.
--
Dover
K_S_ONeill
Yes, like the people with guns who take my money and start stupid wars
with it, or the people with guns who take the money of vegans and
people morally opposed to eating meat and pay beef ranchers subsidies
with it, or, you know, on and on. Everyone pays taxes for things they
don't like. What you don't like is providing any sort of support for
an old lady who got her house washed away. Got it.
--
Kevin
K_S_ONeill
Right, exactly! If you want to have a war take up a collection. If
no one contributes, well, I guess it wasn't that good a war idea then.
--
Kevin
Glenn Dowdy
"plausible prose man" <George...@aol.com> wrote in message
news:fb05a00d-a3c1-49e1...@j4g2000yqe.googlegroups.com...
>What do you want from me, here? A way to make her not 69 any more?
Never, ever, say that again.
Glenn D.
Veronique
> Today for Geezer Taxi I took a 69-year-old woman, displaced from New
> Orleans by Hurricane Katrina, to her dental appointment at the UCHSC
> dental school. She has to get a job now and start over, because her
> state pension is inadequate to support her. Tell me, how do the
> [Ll]ibertarians think the free market will fix this?
December's Scientific American has a column by Michael Shermer that
addressed "five innate and universally available psychological
systems" but also noted that differences between "liberal" and
"conservative" lie in how these five universals are weighted.
1. Harm/care: Evolved mammalian attachment systems mean we can feel
the pain of others, giving rise to the virtues of kindness,
gentleness, and nurturance.
2. Fairness/reciprocity: Evolved reciprocal altruism generates a sense
of justice.
3. Ingroup/loyalty: Evolved in-group tribalism leads to patriotism.
4. Authority/respect: Evolved heirarchical social structures translate
to respect for authority and tradition.
5. Purity/sanctity: Evolved emotion of disgust related to disease and
contamination underlies our sense of bodily purity.
(see http://www.moralfoundations.org for more)
Anyway, the study found that those who identified themselves as
liberal weighted the first two more highly, whereas those who
identified themselves as conservative are roughly equal in all five
dimensions, although they place slightly less emphasis on 1 & 2 than
liberals. The survey, if you want to take it, is at the URL above.
V.
--
Veronique Chez Sheep
Slow Motion Apocalypse
> On Nov 18, 3:08 pm, Dover Beach <moon.blanc...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > Today for Geezer Taxi I took a 69-year-old woman, displaced from New
> > Orleans by Hurricane Katrina, to her dental appointment at the UCHSC
> > dental school. She has to get a job now and start over, because her
> > state pension is inadequate to support her. Tell me, how do the
> > [Ll]ibertarians think the free market will fix this?
>
> December's Scientific American has a column by Michael Shermer that
> addressed "five innate and universally available psychological
> systems" but also noted that differences between "liberal" and
> "conservative" lie in how these five universals are weighted.
>
> 1. Harm/care: Evolved mammalian attachment systems mean we can feel
> the pain of others, giving rise to the virtues of kindness,
> gentleness, and nurturance.
>
> 2. Fairness/reciprocity: Evolved reciprocal altruism generates a sense
> of justice.
>
> 3. Ingroup/loyalty: Evolved in-group tribalism leads to patriotism.
>
> 4. Authority/respect: Evolved heirarchical social structures translate
> to respect for authority and tradition.
>
> 5. Purity/sanctity: Evolved emotion of disgust related to disease and
> contamination underlies our sense of bodily purity.
>
Being really horny undermines my emotion of disgust and sense of
bodily purity.
Pierre Jelenc
>
> Seriously, if the free market is perfect, it should have a solution.
Perhaps it does, but that's not relevant here. She has a state pension,
thus it is originally a state problem. Why should libertarians have to
fix the statists' errors?
Pierre
--
Pierre Jelenc
The Gigometer www.gigometer.com
The NYC Beer Guide www.nycbeer.org
Mary
> Dover Beach <moon.blanc...@gmail.com> writes:
>
>
>
> > Seriously, if the free market is perfect, it should have a solution.
>
> Perhaps it does, but that's not relevant here. She has a state pension,
> thus it is originally a state problem. Why should libertarians have to
> fix the statists' errors?
I think what Dover was suggesting is that the problem of people who
have lost homes and jobs exists, and therefore any system will have to
address it.
Calling it a state problem is sidestepping the issue - at least the
state provides a small pension. Would the free market even do that?
Mary
plausible prose man
> On 19 Nov 2009 03:04:44 GMT, Dover Beach <moon.blanc...@gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
> >Xho Jingleheimerschmidt <xhos...@gmail.com> wrote in> >>> Shawn Wilson <ikonoql...@gmail.com> wrote in
> >>> news:1022dd51-e757-419c-9624-
> >87d3c6085...@r24g2000prf.googlegroups.com
> >>> :
Sure, if there was a law that the economy could only have so many
jobs or something.
Heather is showing something called "the lump of labor" fallacy,
which is one of those counter-intuitive things about economics they
have to beat out of you when you study the subject. You can tell its
false because now that one person can do what took twenty back in 1900
or so, particulary in agriculture, the other nineteen don't all lay
around on the street corner, except in ridiculous places like France.
which could possibly lead to higher
> rates of family breakdown and put even more children on the streets.
No, that can't possibly happen, stop it.
> As for the children on the streets, is there not even a minimal social
> welfare system to take care of them?
Are there no prisons? Are there no workhouses?
plausible prose man
What, pensions? Yes, of course...what's anti-market about that?
Shawn Wilson
> > "gummint funding" == armed robery. Think otherwise? Try not paying
> > your taxes and see how long until men with guns show up to take them.
>
> Right, exactly! If you want to have a war take up a collection. If
> no one contributes, well, I guess it wasn't that good a war idea then.
And if you want to give money to the shiftless and worthless, take up
a collection. Don't pick my pocket.
And, ya know, welfare costs a LOT more than war...
Glenn Dowdy
"Shawn Wilson" <ikono...@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:3663b1e7-0051-4d8c...@x25g2000prf.googlegroups.com...
We should declare a War on Poverty.
Glenn D.
Shawn Wilson
> > Surely hearts
> >> would stop bleeding so severely if it cost, I don't know, 10% of gross
> >> income. Suddenly bleeding hearts would be in favor of self-sufficiency
> >> and rugged individualism. I don't know. What's the answer?
>
> > You help her with your resources, which I said a long time ago.
>
> On the whole I would agree Shawn and in a perfect world he would be
> correct. The unfortunate thing is the world is not perfect.
There's nothing imperfect about the world. You're just whining
because you want this woman to have more than you are willing to give,
so you attempt to justify taking from others by force to give to
her.
Either give her your money or get over yourself. Don't make up
bullshit reasons to rob me.
> The problem
> here is two-fold.
Or, you know, not...
> One, it's a matter of upbringing, far too many people have been brought
> up to only look out for number one.
Oh, yes, of course... All THOSE people were just raised wrong and are
evil. They should be willing, nay eager to do what *I* want them
to...
Many of the
> management/entrepreneurial types I've dealt with in my life act as
> though they were raised by wolves. When did we go from 10-12% being a
> good return on investment to 50% or more?
That would be never.
> There is nothing wrong with
> making a living but I've got a real problem with "making a killing."
Yes, THOSE people have too much money, are 'too' greedy, should be
forced into the mold *I* want them to assume...
I bet you think efficiency is a good thing in business though. Saving
resources can't be a bad thing, it means more for everyone else.
Well, here is a FREE economics lesson: Efficiency == cost
minimization == profit maximization.
Pick ONE: "greed is bad" OR "efficient use of resources is good".
You can't have both.
> Is there a solution?
Of course there is.
Man goes into the doctor's office, says "Doc, it hurts when I do
this. Can you help me?" Doctor says "Don't do that."
Really, it isn't rocket surgery.
I don't know. If more people would give of
> themselves like Dover, it would help. It would also help if people HAD
> more disposable income.
More than what? Compared to 1000 years ago we are fantastically rich
and advanced. Compared to 1000 years from now we are spectacularly
poor and backward.
Poverty, as existed 1000 years ago is entirely solved in the US.
There isn't any anywhere. Poverty, as will exist in 1000 years
universal now. If we were merely richer than we are now, we would
just advance the definition of poverty.
> Do I have a problem with Medicaid, Food Stamps
> and other programs targeted at aiding the truly needy? -No, there was a
> time long ago when I had to make use of them.
And if it wasn't for the government there would be more private
giving. if it weren't for taxes there would be more TO give. You
would merely have been helped by someone else.
> My income has gone up and my actual living
> costs haven't soared but there's not as much to go around. So this year
> instead of donating food at Thanksgiving it's donating time to help
> serve it.
Oh, yes, of course... Everyone wants to be 'nice' to the needy at
Thanksgiving. Funny how people don't see the need in February... I
guess the needy aren't hungry in February.
Boron Elgar
You started that one, too?
Boron
Shawn Wilson
> I was under the impression that children in the US were allowed to
> work at many paid jobs already. Or is that only older children?
Some jobs, 16+, with restrictions.
> But
> if the existing child labour laws were repealed surely that would lead
> to higher unemployment and lower wages for the unskilled adults at the
> bottom of the current labour pool, which could possibly lead to higher
> rates of family breakdown and put even more children on the streets.
No. Well, it is uncertain. It would bid wages down. But with
minimum wage laws they can't go down, so unemployment would rise
instead. Then again, the extra output and money would increase demand
for employees, reversing the effects of the previous. The ultimate
effect would probably be close to neutral. No, positive. There would
be more produced and thus more to go around.
> As for the children on the streets, is there not even a minimal social
> welfare system to take care of them?
Yes. Little better* in effect than Victorian orphanages and
workhouses, which while not luxurious were not the Dickensian
nightmare of fiction.
*The system is bad enough in its instability and its effect on
children as they are bounced around from one foster family to another
to their natural mother and back again when she loses custody (again)
for being so fucked up and abusive but we have to 'try' because
families are magical... that many people seriously support the return
of formal orphanages, which while not families, do have the virtue of
stability. But the Bleeding Hearts *know* that families = good and
orphanages = bad so it never happens.
Form someone hardly religious at all** I support religious
institutions because I trust their people infinitely more than I tust
(spit) government. While it is definitely not universal, there is a
definite positive goodness in many of the religious that government
entirely lacks.
**I am not a 'lapsed' Catholic, as was hinted in another post, because
I have never been a practicing one. I am only a technical pseudo-
Catholic as I was baptised Catholic as a function of having Italian
grandparents. It gives me a very minor claim to being Catholic that I
lack for being, say, Lutheran. Catholicism has a history and
'coolness' that other branches of Christianity lack, so I go with it.
Shawn Wilson
> >And, ya know, welfare costs a LOT more than war...
>
> We should declare a War on Poverty.
We did. Poverty won.
plausible prose man
> On Nov 18, 9:29 pm, Shawn Wilson <ikonoql...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > On Nov 18, 8:04 pm, Dover Beach <moon.blanc...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > > You don't know that. I read that painful article in the New York Times
> > > the other week, you know, the one about all the throw-away teenagers,
> > > and I thought: A lot of their suffering is due to child labor laws.
>
> > And the people who support them are exactly the same assholes who say
> > "I want to help, so I am a good person. Let's use YOUR money though,
> > since I want my money for myself. If you don't like that, you are a
> > bad person."
>
> > There is no end of 'well meaning' nonsense that gets done and hurts
> > people in that name of "we have to do *something*..."
>
> Yes, like the people with guns who take my money and start stupid wars
> with it, or the people with guns who take the money of vegans and
> people morally opposed to eating meat and pay beef ranchers subsidies
> with it, or, you know, on and on.
Right, in other words, coercion, the initiation of force, which to a
libertarian is axiomatically immoral, and something they take a pledge
not to do to each other.
> Everyone pays taxes for things they
> don't like.
That's your justification?
> What you don't like is providing any sort of support for
> an old lady who got her house washed away.
What kind of support do you think he can offer, anyway? He'll, she's
probably better off than he is.
> Got it.
Try to act like an adult, Kevin.
plausible prose man
For something everyone agrees is a terrible thing and no one admits to
liking, there sure seems to have been a lot of this "war" business,
and all in all I wonder exactly why you think the folks who brought
you, say, Shiloh and the Somme can do a better job running lemonade
stands than people who run lemonade stands, but this is usually the
point where I am told I am not acting like an adult, am disgusting,
racist, lacking in humanity, etc.
plausible prose man
Is history written by poverty?
John Mc
<snip>
No, Shawn, a portion of our salaries EVERY month goes to the local
United Way. This is in addition to donations to the local food bank over
the past year and I never pass the Salvation Army's kettles without
giving something.Do I donate so much that I injure my own well-being? In
a word No but I voluntarily make an effort. What, if any, portion of
your vast holdings is voluntarily given to anyone but yourself. Since
you're so against the taking of your wealth for another's unearned
benefit, may we then assume that you, as a matter of principle, don't
use the public roads? That your school eschewed any and all public
funds? That you won't use a local hospital if public funds were used to
build it? Because no matter how vast your wealth you don't contribute
enough to cover the entire cost of these. So you're reaping the benefits
of someone else's labor. You have the myriad advantages that come from
our society as a whole but complain when Dover asks if you feel you have
any reason at all to help the less fortunate.
<Wait a minute let me put on my Karnak The Magnificent turban>
You're going to say that because of the onerous burden placed upon you
by our confiscatory tax system and totalitarian government you have
nothing to spare, right? I have the same tax system and government to
deal with and still manage. If you were really that principled with
regard to not taking other's assets, you'd find SOME way to avoid it.
Maybe you could become a hermit.
As to your tenet that others don't have an unearned "right" to the
fruits of your labors, I agree, that is how it should be. I know you're
a firm believer in "The Virtue of Selfishness." However, I recommend
to you a monograph by David Kelley "Unrugged Individualism: The Selfish
Basis of Benevolence." It's available at Amazon and there's a review in
Reason magazine April 1997
<http://reason.com/archives/1997/04/01/nice-distinction>
You should also read -
"What's Wrong With Ayn Rand?" by Shikha Dalmia in the November issue of
this year.
<http://reason.com/archives/2009/11/06/whats-wrong-with-ayn-rand/1>
Quoting from Kelley's monograph:
"Benevolence" means good will toward others. It is a positive attitude
toward people in general, a desire for their well-being and for
peaceful, cooperative relationships with them. It is contrasted with
hostility, malice, envy, or other forms of malevolence. It includes such
traits as kindness, generosity, sympathy, charity, and tolerance as
elements. (In moral philosophy, these latter are sometimes called the
"virtues of benevolence."
You might need to look up kindness, generosity, sympathy, charity, and
tolerance.
John Mc.
--
A conservative is a man who sits and thinks. Mostly sits. - Woodrow Wilson
Glenn Dowdy
"John Mc" <Jo...@tdcogre.com> wrote in message news:he4ivl$38n$1...@aioe.org...
>
> You should also read -
>
> "What's Wrong With Ayn Rand?" by Shikha Dalmia in the November issue of
> this year.
>
> <http://reason.com/archives/2009/11/06/whats-wrong-with-ayn-rand/1>
>
Once he gets to the part about "self-actualization through productive work"
his brain is going to lock up.
Glenn D.
Slow Motion Apocalypse
I care about society as much as society cared about me.
Shawn Wilson
> > > We should declare a War on Poverty.
>
> > We did. Poverty won.
>
> Is history written by poverty?
Apparently...
Shawn Wilson
> >> My income has gone up and my actual living
> >> costs haven't soared but there's not as much to go around. So this year
> >> instead of donating food at Thanksgiving it's donating time to help
> >> serve it.
>
> > Oh, yes, of course... Everyone wants to be 'nice' to the needy at
> > Thanksgiving. Funny how people don't see the need in February... I
> > guess the needy aren't hungry in February.
>
> No, Shawn, a portion of our salaries EVERY month goes to the local
> United Way.
And yet there you are, feeding the hungry at Thanksgiving when they
don't need yet another bleeding heart, but in Februrary, where are
you?
> This is in addition to donations to the local food bank over
> the past year and I never pass the Salvation Army's kettles without
> giving something.
And therefore you have the right to steal from me? Uh, no...
> Do I donate so much that I injure my own well-being? In
> a word No but I voluntarily make an effort. What, if any, portion of
> your vast holdings is voluntarily given to anyone but yourself.
Pretty much every dollar I spend is given to someone else. That is
what trade is all about...
> Since
> you're so against the taking of your wealth for another's unearned
> benefit, may we then assume that you, as a matter of principle, don't
> use the public roads? That your school eschewed any and all public
> funds? That you won't use a local hospital if public funds were used to
> build it? Because no matter how vast your wealth you don't contribute
> enough to cover the entire cost of these. So you're reaping the benefits
> of someone else's labor. You have the myriad advantages that come from
> our society as a whole but complain when Dover asks if you feel you have
> any reason at all to help the less fortunate.
Fine. I am less fortunate than you are. How much of YOUR money do I
have a right to?
> You're going to say that because of the onerous burden placed upon you
> by our confiscatory tax system and totalitarian government you have
> nothing to spare, right? I have the same tax system and government to
> deal with and still manage.
Ah, so no one is less well off than you are, therefore no one needs
any help in the first place...
> "Benevolence" means good will toward others. It is a positive attitude
> toward people in general, a desire for their well-being and for
> peaceful, cooperative relationships with them.
People are worthless, ignorant, stupid shits who don't deserve good
will.
> You might need to look up kindness, generosity, sympathy, charity, and
> tolerance.
Spoken like someone who thinks he has a right to steal from others
because he is 'good' and they are 'bad'...
Bob Ward
>
>You might need to look up kindness, generosity, sympathy, charity, and
>tolerance.
I really didn't follow the thread, but wasn't Shawn looking for a
handout in the form of a donated laptop awhile back? How did the free
market respond to that?
Hieronymus Agricola
(in article
<ab955941-83fc-4e6f...@y28g2000prd.googlegroups.com>):
>
> Either give her your money or get over yourself. Don't make up
> bullshit reasons to rob me.
>
Oh, stop your pathetic bleating. If you don't want us taking your money, do
something about it. Meanwhile, hand it over, or the men with guns will be by
to speak with you.
--
Jerry Randal Bauer
Mary
Ironically enough, Dover offered him one.
Mary
Mark Steese
aba7-f16...@s21g2000prm.googlegroups.com:
> On Nov 18, 3:08�pm, Dover Beach <moon.blanc...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> Today for Geezer Taxi I took a 69-year-old woman, displaced from New
>> Orleans by Hurricane Katrina, to her dental appointment at the UCHSC
>> dental school. She has to get a job now and start over, because her
>> state pension is inadequate to support her. �Tell me, how do the
>> [Ll]ibertarians think the free market will fix this?
>
>
> December's Scientific American has a column by Michael Shermer that
> addressed "five innate and universally available psychological
> systems" but also noted that differences between "liberal" and
> "conservative" lie in how these five universals are weighted.
>
> 1. Harm/care: Evolved mammalian attachment systems mean we can feel
> the pain of others, giving rise to the virtues of kindness,
> gentleness, and nurturance.
That's an odd way of putting it, IMO. We can certainly imagine that we
feel other people's pain, but we're not actually feeling it. It would
make just as much sense to say "Faulty mammalian attachment systems mean
that we falsely imagine we can feel the pain of others, sometimes to the
point where we literally hug trees." I smell the unhealthy odor of
mammaliocentrism.
> 2. Fairness/reciprocity: Evolved reciprocal altruism generates a sense
> of justice.
So all the cheaters and crooks out there missed out on evolution?
It seems to me that statements like "Evolved reciprocal altruism
generates a sense of justice" demonstrate the problems inherent in using
evolutionary biology to explain human culture. Reciprocal altruism has
been observed among such diverse critters as wrasses, vampire bats, red-
winged blackbirds, and vervets, yet so far as we can tell, none of them
has "a sense of justice"; folktales notwithstanding, nonhuman animals
have never displayed any interest in jurisprudence. If they have no
sense of justice, why should we? In this context, saying "evolution did
it" is no more helpful than saying "God did it."
--
Mark Steese
=======================================================================
PS: Your second question, you thought I forgot? I didn't. I never found
the banana slug. - William Least Heat-Moon
Mac
> Veronique <veroniqueuni...@gmail.com> wrote in news:33aa31e3-4499-4ffc-
> aba7-f16723df7...@s21g2000prm.googlegroups.com:
What, you never heard of a rook's parliament?
Heather
wrote:
>Heather <redbo...@gmail.com> wrote in
>news:cqbag5tg1n5ae07qk...@4ax.com:
>
>>
>>
>> I was under the impression that children in the US were allowed to
>> work at many paid jobs already. Or is that only older children? But
>> if the existing child labour laws were repealed surely that would lead
>> to higher unemployment and lower wages for the unskilled adults at the
>> bottom of the current labour pool, which could possibly lead to higher
>> rates of family breakdown and put even more children on the streets.
>
>I believe it's hard to work at most standard crummy jobs if you're
>younger than 16. That's how it used to be, anyway. There are
>exceptions, but they're not very common. As to the economic
>consequences of easing child labor laws, I'll let the economists
>speculate.
>
>>
>> As for the children on the streets, is there not even a minimal social
>> welfare system to take care of them?
>>
>
>Yes, but it's definitely minimal. The first approach is to try to "keep
>families together", which is sometimes not the best strategy. Foster
>care is often rotten; many people are foster parents as their sole
>source of income, and the money is really bad, so you get pretty bad
>foster parents. There are of course some foster parents who are great,
>but they're not the norm.
>
>This is the article I was referring to:
>
>http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/26/us/26runaway.html?_r=1
>
>If you can't access it, I'll send it to you.
Interesting reading. It is particularly sad to read of parents
throwing their children out of the house because they could no longer
afford feed them. I still think a better social welfare system would
prevent a lot more harm than changing the child labour laws.
--
Heather
Dana Carpender
The hilarious part is that Shawn used to be part of the military, or so
I seem to recall, surely the biggest socialized outfit in the nation.
Yeah, ol' Shawn didn't mind sucking down my tax money for a few years.
What, the military isn't socialized? Really? It's government owned,
government run, supported by tax dollars. And quite a lot of the time
I'm not happy with how they're being used. But I pay my taxes anyway.
My brother suggests that Democrats start referring to the military as
"our socialized military," the roads as "our socialized roads," the
public school system as "our socialized schools," etc. Not a bad idea,
if you ask me.
Dana
Shawn Wilson
> >You might need to look up kindness, generosity, sympathy, charity, and
> >tolerance.
>
> I really didn't follow the thread, but wasn't Shawn looking for a
> handout in the form of a donated laptop awhile back? How did the free
> market respond to that?
One was offered. I declined.
Mac
> Hieronymus Agricola wrote:
> > On Thu, 19 Nov 2009 12:51:07 -0800, Shawn Wilson wrote
> > (in article
>
> >> Either give her your money or get over yourself. Don't make up
> >> bullshit reasons to rob me.
>
> > Oh, stop your pathetic bleating. If you don't want us taking your money, do
> > something about it. Meanwhile, hand it over, or the men with guns will be by
> > to speak with you.
>
> The hilarious part is that Shawn used to be part of the military, or so
> I seem to recall, surely the biggest socialized outfit in the nation.
> Yeah, ol' Shawn didn't mind sucking down my tax money for a few years.
>
> What, the military isn't socialized? Really? It's government owned,
> government run, supported by tax dollars. And quite a lot of the time
> I'm not happy with how they're being used. But I pay my taxes anyway.
>
> My brother suggests that Democrats start referring to the military as
> "our socialized military," the roads as "our socialized roads," the
> public school system as "our socialized schools," etc. Not a bad idea,
> if you ask me.
Given that schools are precisely the example that some would give as
overly-socialized, that would be a silly idea.
plausible prose man
> Hieronymus Agricola wrote:
> > On Thu, 19 Nov 2009 12:51:07 -0800, Shawn Wilson wrote
> > (in article
>
> >> Either give her your money or get over yourself. Don't make up
> >> bullshit reasons to rob me.
>
> > Oh, stop your pathetic bleating. If you don't want us taking your money, do
> > something about it. Meanwhile, hand it over, or the men with guns will be by
> > to speak with you.
>
> The hilarious part is that Shawn used to be part of the military, or so
> I seem to recall, surely the biggest socialized outfit in the nation.
> Yeah, ol' Shawn didn't mind sucking down my tax money for a few years.
Yeah, that's only hilarious if you're stupid.
> What, the military isn't socialized? Really? It's government owned,
> government run, supported by tax dollars. And quite a lot of the time
> I'm not happy with how they're being used. But I pay my taxes anyway.
National defense is a public good, Dana. Medicine (mostly) isn't.
> My brother suggests that Democrats start referring to the military as
> "our socialized military," the roads as "our socialized roads," the
> public school system as "our socialized schools," etc. Not a bad idea,
> if you ask me.
I agree. That way when someone whacks over a pothole, they can blame
the government.
David Friedman
Mark Steese <mark_...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> > 2. Fairness/reciprocity: Evolved reciprocal altruism generates a sense
> > of justice.
>
> So all the cheaters and crooks out there missed out on evolution?
>
I'm just picking up on this point, because I think it embodies an error.
Suppose someone argues, plausibly enough, the giraffes evolved long
necks in order to get at high food. The observation that some giraffes
are shorter than others would not be seen as evidence against that.
Still less would the observation that deer don't have long necks, even
though they would find them useful for the same reason.
In any of these cases, there are tradeoffs--advantages and
disadvantages. Further, the advantages depend in part on the
distribution of the characteristic. If there are lots of giraffes that
can reach leaves ten feet up but none that can make it to eleven, there
is a big payoff to having a slightly longer neck--even though it has
costs in (presumably) running slower, burning more food, and the like.
As the number of longer necked giraffes increase the payoff decreases,
so in equilibrium we would expect a range of neck sizes.
Similarly here. The more honest people there are, the lower the payoff
to watching people carefully to be sure they aren't cheating you. The
less such watching, the greater the payoff to being a cheat. So we would
again expect some equilibrium distribution of honesty.
--
http://www.daviddfriedman.com/ http://daviddfriedman.blogspot.com/
Author of
_Future Imperfect: Technology and Freedom in an Uncertain World_,
Cambridge University Press.
Xho Jingleheimerschmidt
>
> On the whole I would agree Shawn and in a perfect world he would be
> here is two-fold.
>
> up to only look out for number one.
Yes, I bet no one ever discovered that one on their own. I has to be
taught.
> Many of the
> management/entrepreneurial types I've dealt with in my life act as
> though they were raised by wolves. When did we go from 10-12% being a
> good return on investment to 50% or more?
If you have a 20% chance of losing everything, an 80% chance of making
10-12% really doesn't look so hot. Or is your imperfect world still not
imperfect enough to contain risk?
> There is nothing wrong with
> making a living but I've got a real problem with "making a killing."
> Especially, if it's backward engineering, looking for loopholes in
> patents,
Of course, many of the patents are based on loopholes in the forward
direction in the first place. Live by the loophole, die by the loophole.
Xho
Xho Jingleheimerschmidt
> Xho Jingleheimerschmidt <xho...@gmail.com> wrote in
> news:4b04b1c0$0$6703$ed36...@nr5-q3a.newsreader.com:
>>> I
>>> did give her some of my money in a sense, since I gave my time and
>>> use of my car. But is that all you've got? Shouldn't you be in
>>> favor of voluntary communities to provide services?
>> He didn't say he was opposed to them.
>
> a good idea.
Maybe, but it isn't like they are a peculiarly libertarian solution. I
mean, such things are legal now, in our non-libertarian world.
>>> Seriously, if the free market is perfect, it should have a solution.
>> And since you aren't a free marketeer, you won't find that solution to
>> your liking.
>>
>
> You don't know that. I read that painful article in the New York Times
> the other week, you know, the one about all the throw-away teenagers,
I haven't seen it. Are they run-aways, or orphans, or expelled from
their families because they aren't economically useful?
> and I thought: A lot of their suffering is due to child labor laws.
Could be. I think child labor laws may have served as a tipping
point[1] where people who wanted to send their children to school rather
than work didn't feel they could as long as they were competing with
their neighbors' children in the labor market, and with their neighbors'
child-labor-augmented income in the rent and food market. But now that
the transition has happened, it doesn't seem like removing those laws
would lead to a general reverse transition.
> Those kids are willing to work. They DO work, at prostitution and drug
> dealing. They'd work at legal jobs if they had an opportunity.
Maybe, but aren't there things more black market than McDonalds but less
black market than prostitution and drugs? Couldn't you get paid under
the table at a Korean grocery or something?
> Which
> is worse, having six-year-olds get their hands chopped off in factories,
> or having 12-year-olds living in the woods in near-starvation, subject
> to rape and violence? People suck.
Again I haven't read the article, but I don't think that having your
hand chopped off at 6 is a good protection against being raped at 12.
Can minors become emancipated as less than 16? If so, does that exempt
them from child labor laws? And how many lawyers would that take?
Xho
[1] I hate to use a phrase that Malcolm Gladwell has befouled, but
sometimes it is just the best phrase for the job, Malcolm notwithstanding.
Jon M
Because Shawn would rather rob other people and force them to fund
public libraries that let him use a computer and internet.
Jon "the internet that was also built with stolen money" M
plausible prose man
> whole I would agree Shawn and in a perfect world he would be
> correct.
Here in a less than perfect world, he's still pretty close.
>The unfortunate thing is the world is not perfect.
That's so sad.
> The problem
> here is two-fold.
>
> One, it's a matter of upbringing, far too many people have been brought
> up to only look out for number one.
Oh. See, that's not what I thought was going to follow that sentence
at all.
> Many of the
> management/entrepreneurial types I've dealt with in my life act as
> though they were raised by wolves. When did we go from 10-12% being a
> good return on investment to 50% or more?
If you're happy with 10, 12%, well, the late unpleasance aside you
can get that from the stock market at relatively little risk. Starting
a business, on the other hand, is a pretty risky situation, and
raising the capital often involves leveraging your assets and who
would do that when they can get the same reward without making it an
issue of ruining their life?
> There is nothing wrong with
> making a living but I've got a real problem with "making a killing."
yeah, well...keep it to yourself, okay? You're wrong on this one.
> Especially, if it's backward engineering, looking for loopholes in
> patents, engaging in duplicitous financial practices (read derivatives)
> or just being downright unscrupulous. If you want to compete-compete,
> don't look to cheat and connive no matter if it is "legal."
Feh. Take what you can rake, and to the devil with the hindmost.
> Two, the bleeding hearts have hemophilia. On the whole, they are SOOOOO
> sure that they are right that they think that anyone who doesn't jump on
> the bandwagon is an absolute ogre. They cannot see that taxation IS the
> taking someone else's money/effort at the point of a gun. They do not
> realize that they are supplanting someone else's ideals with their own.
> Look sometime at the various "good causes" in the Stimulus Bill
> congress passed and tell me these were all good and just reasons to take
> someone's money. They weren't and that's the heart of the matter.
>
> Is there a solution?
I'm an anarchist and I vote.
> I don't know. If more people would give of
> themselves like Dover, it would help.
I guess.
Bob Ward
wrote:
Does Shawn's dentist charge for both faces?
John Mc
> On Nov 19, 4:06 pm, John Mc <J...@tdcogre.com> wrote:
>
>>>> My income has gone up and my actual living
>>>> costs haven't soared but there's not as much to go around. So this year
>>>> instead of donating food at Thanksgiving it's donating time to help
>>>> serve it.
>>> Oh, yes, of course... Everyone wants to be 'nice' to the needy at
>>> Thanksgiving. Funny how people don't see the need in February... I
>>> guess the needy aren't hungry in February.
>> No, Shawn, a portion of our salaries EVERY month goes to the local
>> United Way.
>
>
>
> And yet there you are, feeding the hungry at Thanksgiving when they
> don't need yet another bleeding heart, but in Februrary, where are
> you?
>
>
>
Yes, VOLUNTARILY, just as the other things are voluntary. One of the
agencies the local United Way supports is Food Finders, the local Food
Bank. So through the year my donations help feed the hungry and this
November I help personally. Is your problem with what I do or what you
don't do?
In fact the monthly donation rather than from my weekly check is because
my employer does want the additional accounting costs and won't join the
local drive. Warms the cockles of your heart doesn't it? Why do you have
this fixation with February anyway? Is it because of Valentine's Day?
The Little Red-Haired Girl didn't send you a Valentine either, did she?
>
>
>> This is in addition to donations to the local food bank over
>> the past year and I never pass the Salvation Army's kettles without
>> giving something.
>
>
>
> And therefore you have the right to steal from me? Uh, no...
Where did I advocate stealing from you? I already stated that taxation
is accomplished at the point of a gun. I merely asked what IF ANYTHING
you do voluntarily? If you're tight on money I'm sure YOU could help
feed the hungry in February.
>
>
>
>
>> Do I donate so much that I injure my own well-being? In
>> a word No but I voluntarily make an effort. What, if any, portion of
>> your vast holdings is voluntarily given to anyone but yourself.
>
>
>
>
>
> Pretty much every dollar I spend is given to someone else. That is
> what trade is all about...
>
>
>
>
>
>> Since
>> you're so against the taking of your wealth for another's unearned
>> benefit, may we then assume that you, as a matter of principle, don't
>> use the public roads? That your school eschewed any and all public
>> funds? That you won't use a local hospital if public funds were used to
>> build it? Because no matter how vast your wealth you don't contribute
>> enough to cover the entire cost of these. So you're reaping the benefits
>> of someone else's labor. You have the myriad advantages that come from
>> our society as a whole but complain when Dover asks if you feel you have
>> any reason at all to help the less fortunate.
>
>
> Fine. I am less fortunate than you are. How much of YOUR money do I
> have a right to?
>
>
From the part you snipped. I wrote:
"As to your tenet that others don't have an unearned "right" to the
fruits of your labors, I agree, that is how it should be."
If you're hurting that much financially we could VOLUNTARILY start a
"Save Shawn fund." I'll throw in the first ten bucks. Of course, as a
matter of fairness we'd have to require you go through the same type of
qualification process as Food Stamp/Medicaid applicants. But I suppose
you'd voluntarily turn that down just like you turned down Dover's
laptop, right?
>
>
>
>> You're going to say that because of the onerous burden placed upon you
>> by our confiscatory tax system and totalitarian government you have
>> nothing to spare, right? I have the same tax system and government to
>> deal with and still manage.
>
>
>
> Ah, so no one is less well off than you are, therefore no one needs
> any help in the first place...
>
>
Hell no, why do you think I engage in any charity in the first place?
Does it make me feel better that I've helped someone else? Yes. Does my
doing this make me a better person than you? Maybe, maybe not. It's not
for me to say. We could take a poll.....
>
>> "Benevolence" means good will toward others. It is a positive attitude
>> toward people in general, a desire for their well-being and for
>> peaceful, cooperative relationships with them.
>
>
>
> People are worthless, ignorant, stupid shits who don't deserve good
> will.
>
>
Ya' know, that hermit option I mentioned is looking better for you all
the time.
>
>> You might need to look up kindness, generosity, sympathy, charity, and
>> tolerance.
>
>
> Spoken like someone who thinks he has a right to steal from others
> because he is 'good' and they are 'bad'...
Once again where did I say it's okay to steal from Shawn? Also, from
earlier in this thread:
"Do I have a problem with Medicaid, Food Stamps
and other programs targeted at aiding the truly needy? -No, there was a
time long ago when I had to make use of them. But, yes there's always a
but, no one ever really LOOKS at the sheer size of our government and
how much of our economy it really consumes."
Now, do I think it's absolutely correct to take anyone's money for
taxes? NO, "I" don't have a problem with programs targeted toward the
needy and happily pay taxes toward this. If you wanted to not pay taxes
and at the same time opt out of the benefits of society-roads, schools,
hospitals, etc. I, myself, would say go for it. If you want to change
the system I encourage you to vote next November. (You might find it
strange but I voted for Bob Barr last time around.) IF I KNEW that
without these taxes there would be enough voluntary contributions to
accomplish the same thing would I go that route? In a heartbeat. Only
problem is there are far too many people who think that: "People are
worthless, ignorant, stupid shits who don't deserve good will."
John Mc.
--
When the rich wage war, it's the poor who die.
John Mc
> On Nov 19, 9:31 pm, Dana Carpender <dcarp...@kivanospam.net> wrote:
>> Hieronymus Agricola wrote:
>>> On Thu, 19 Nov 2009 12:51:07 -0800, Shawn Wilson wrote
>>> (in article
>>> <ab955941-83fc-4e6f-afa2-f6e062989...@y28g2000prd.googlegroups.com>):
>>>> Either give her your money or get over yourself. Don't make up
>>>> bullshit reasons to rob me.
>>> Oh, stop your pathetic bleating. If you don't want us taking your money, do
>>> something about it. Meanwhile, hand it over, or the men with guns will be by
>>> to speak with you.
>> The hilarious part is that Shawn used to be part of the military, or so
>> I seem to recall, surely the biggest socialized outfit in the nation.
>> Yeah, ol' Shawn didn't mind sucking down my tax money for a few years.
>
> Yeah, that's only hilarious if you're stupid.
>
>
>> What, the military isn't socialized? Really? It's government owned,
>> government run, supported by tax dollars. And quite a lot of the time
>> I'm not happy with how they're being used. But I pay my taxes anyway.
>
> National defense is a public good, Dana. Medicine (mostly) isn't.
Here I agree with you. One of the main purposes of government should be
National Defense. We can argue for years on whether the purposes it's
used for really constitute National Defense.
>
>> My brother suggests that Democrats start referring to the military as
>> "our socialized military," the roads as "our socialized roads," the
>> public school system as "our socialized schools," etc. Not a bad idea,
>> if you ask me.
>
> I agree. That way when someone whacks over a pothole, they can blame
> the government.
>
>
>
They already do. Many municipalities have pothole reporting programs
that compensate you if a reported pothole causes damage to your car.
There's red tape involved but the programs exist. Or at least did before
the latest recession.
John Mc.
--
I always heard the road to Hell was paved with good intentions
But nobody told me it was a superhighway!
John Mc
could present Shawn with another moral dilemma.
Dover Beach
> Dover Beach wrote:
>
> Maybe, but aren't there things more black market than McDonalds but
> less black market than prostitution and drugs? Couldn't you get paid
> under the table at a Korean grocery or something?
>
I think you might be overestimating the number of crappy gray-market
jobs available to unwashed 14-year-olds.
>
>> Which
>> is worse, having six-year-olds get their hands chopped off in
>> factories, or having 12-year-olds living in the woods in
>> near-starvation, subject to rape and violence? People suck.
>
> Again I haven't read the article, but I don't think that having your
> hand chopped off at 6 is a good protection against being raped at 12.
Well, it is if you're still living handlessly with your family. Which
of course you wouldn't be because you've lost your economic value to
them by having your hands chopped off in the factory machinery. Damn!
>
> Can minors become emancipated as less than 16? If so, does that
> exempt
> them from child labor laws? And how many lawyers would that take?
>
The youngest I've ever heard of someone becoming emancipated was 15, but
my experience is limited to my sister's students.
--
Dover
Richard R. Hershberger
<slowmotionapocaly...@rocketmail.com> wrote:
> On Nov 18, 5:16 pm, Dover Beach <moon.blanc...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
> > Shawn Wilson <ikonoql...@gmail.com> wrote innews:053d196e-671f-4bc7...@2g2000prl.googlegroups.com:
>
> > > You help her with your resources, which I said a long time ago.
>
> > Do you think that you (or anyone, or everyone) has a responsibility to
> > help the needy? Not a legal responsibility. Just a moral one. Never
> > mind all the "armed robbery" stuff. Do you have a moral duty to help
> > the indigent? What role does the free market play? (Maybe none.) You,
> > Shawn, sometimes defend religion and claim that you're a lapsed-ish
> > Catholic. Wouldn't the Catholic Church require charity of you? Of
> > everyone?
>
> > --
> > Dover
>
> I just came from Hollywood where I get hit up by the "needy" every 3
> feet. I am pretty numb by now to any feelings of responsibility or
> anything else toward them.
>
> I guess maybe you can put her on a bus to Hollywood.
People who are serious about the idea of an obligation to help the
needy give this situation actual thought. The problem with giving
money to panhandlers is that it is an inefficient use of limited
resources. A better use would be to support (financially or
otherwise) organizations such as homeless shelters and food banks.
Richard R. Hershberger
Dana Carpender
I think the majority of Americans are happy about the idea of public
schools, yet get a little nervous about the word "socialism."
Dana
K_S_ONeill
Police and fire protection are better examples. Some people really
are mad that schools are teaching kids actual science in science
class.
Neither one is a public good, since you can be excluded from police
and fire protection and one person using up resources prevents another
from using them. Both are publicly funded. Both are very popular,
even among Republicans. Republicans are hugely fond of our socialist
police forces, they like them a lot and often want to expand them.
Everyone likes the current socialist fire protection plan better than
the pre-Civil War private fire departments, I think.
--
Kevin
S. Checker
> Veronique <veroniq...@gmail.com> wrote in news:33aa31e3-4499-4ffc-
> aba7-f16...@s21g2000prm.googlegroups.com:
>
>>
>> addressed "five innate and universally available psychological
>> systems" but also noted that differences between "liberal" and
>> "conservative" lie in how these five universals are weighted.
>> of justice.
>
> So all the cheaters and crooks out there missed out on evolution?
>
> It seems to me that statements like "Evolved reciprocal altruism
> generates a sense of justice" demonstrate the problems inherent in using
> evolutionary biology to explain human culture. Reciprocal altruism has
> been observed among such diverse critters as wrasses, vampire bats, red-
> winged blackbirds, and vervets, yet so far as we can tell, none of them
> has "a sense of justice"; folktales notwithstanding, nonhuman animals
> have never displayed any interest in jurisprudence. If they have no
> sense of justice, why should we? In this context, saying "evolution did
> it" is no more helpful than saying "God did it."
I thought I remembered something about this:
http://www.pnas.org/gca?gca=pnas%3B106%2F1%2F340&allch=
"Recent research indicates that non-human primates refuse to
participate in cooperative problem-solving tasks if they witness a
conspecific obtaining a more attractive reward for the same effort..."
The study goes on to suggest that dogs, also, will perform a task even
if you sometimes don't reward them - but will refuse to perform it if
they witness other dogs being given a "better" reward.
Now this is "justice" on a fairly basic level, some might call it greed
or envy. I don't know that Fido will go on a hunger strike because
Rover is being held without counsel in a kennel. But again and again we
see that there is no bright shining line between human behavior and
that of other animals - we almost certainly think more about things
like this than any other species, but that doesn't mean the behaviors
are absent elsewhere.
--
Now Apu, Mrs. Simpson claims she forgot she was carrying that bottle
of... delicious bourbon. Brownest of the brown liquors. What's that? You
want me to drink you? I'm in the middle of a trial...
-- Lionel Hutz, Attorney
K_S_ONeill
> And yet there you are, feeding the hungry at Thanksgiving when they
> don't need yet another bleeding heart, but in Februrary, where are
> you?
As an aside, it's his money, he can spend it how he wants. When you
give someone some money you can determine where and when it should go
to whom.
> Spoken like someone who thinks he has a right to steal from
> others because he is 'good' and they are 'bad'...
Yeah, you know, I feel bad for you, caught up in the socialist hell
that is Phoenix or wherever you are. It's awful that you'd have to
pay taxes if you had a job to support the awful socialist roads you
use, and the awful socialist fire and police protection you use, and
the terrible, terrible socialist library you use. Just dreadful.
But then it occurred to me, there are utopias in the world! Places
with little or no government at all! Why, surely such places must be
flourishing, eh? No bad socialist schools or roads or police or fire
protection or any of that. Surely even now private suppliers for all
those things are leaping into existence, spurred by the lack of bad
and unfair and inefficient government supply of these things, and are
together creating an Eden. Somalia, for example, what a place it must
be!
Anyway, you may want to read this to start:
http://wikitravel.org/en/Somalia
With no government for something like 20 years, the place just sounds
ideal, doesn't it? Of course you won't want to stay in Somaliland, I
bet there are some efforts at taxes and cops and roads and other bad
things there. You'll want to go to Puntland or somewhere nice like
that, where you won't have to worry about the evils of government at
all. Wonderful region, just the thing for you.
Have a nice trip!
--
Kevin
Mark Steese
news:ddfr-DA2606.1...@newsfarm.phx.highwinds-media.com:
> In article <Xns9CC8B6C9...@188.40.43.245>,
> Mark Steese <mark_...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>> > 2. Fairness/reciprocity: Evolved reciprocal altruism generates a
>> > sense of justice.
>>
>> So all the cheaters and crooks out there missed out on evolution?
>
> I'm just picking up on this point, because I think it embodies an
> error.
It doesn't, but carry on.
> Suppose someone argues, plausibly enough, the giraffes evolved long
> necks in order to get at high food. The observation that some giraffes
> are shorter than others would not be seen as evidence against that.
> Still less would the observation that deer don't have long necks, even
> though they would find them useful for the same reason.
Deer "would find them useful" if they lived in the same environment that
giraffes lived in, but since they live in an environment where there is
plenty of food available at the height they're already at, longer necks
wouldn't be useful at all. (Okapis, the closest living relatives of
giraffes, live in rainforests: they stand about 1.5 to 2 meters high at
the shoulder -- see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Okapi)
> In any of these cases, there are tradeoffs--advantages and
> disadvantages. Further, the advantages depend in part on the
> distribution of the characteristic. If there are lots of giraffes that
> can reach leaves ten feet up but none that can make it to eleven,
But this one goes up to eleven!
> there is a big payoff to having a slightly longer neck--even though it
> has costs in (presumably) running slower, burning more food, and the
> like. As the number of longer necked giraffes increase the payoff
> decreases, so in equilibrium we would expect a range of neck sizes.
Of course.
> Similarly here.
It does not follow.
> The more honest people there are, the lower the payoff to watching
> people carefully to be sure they aren't cheating you.
What world are we talking about here?
> The less such watching, the greater the payoff to being a cheat. So we
> would again expect some equilibrium distribution of honesty.
Nothing to do with evolution. The same man may be scrupulously honest in
some respects and dishonest in others. That's not variation, that's a
giraffe having a shorter neck and a longer neck simultaneously. And the
payoff to watching people carefully to be sure they aren't cheating you
does not depend on the number of honest people there are: it depends on
the value of what you would lose if just one dishonest person cheated
you. The whole concept of justice rests on the abstract notion of value
-- and what did *that* evolve from? Where's the adaptive benefit in
imagining that diamonds are more valuable than graphite?
Mac
Actually, as you prolly know, but Dana prolly don't, that's kinda a
vexed question since you have a a lot of positive externalities from
both. You can exclude me from a firetruck showing up, but not from my
house being safe because you put out the fire next door, and mass
firefighting (which often involves deliberate destruction of undamaged
property to create firebreaks, is about as collectivist as you can
get. As you may not know, the elimination of subscription
firefighting was a little more checkered than you might think in some
areas.
(The same is true for mandatory high school. In Boston, the
motivation that brought it through the lower chamber was openly job
creation and job stability rather than the merits of a more educated
citizenry. It was sold as jobs for teachers, and restriction of the
common labor market to grown men and women. Curley's first big
political success.)
K_S_ONeill
Even national defense is not a perfect example of a public good. In a
real shitstorm in the Pacific Hawai'i could be excluded from military
protection, for example. Alaska could be excluded. In any military
encounter outer targets are sacrificed. So we pretend that the
military protects "us", but in reality it protects what it can, and
some are not as protectable as others, much as in the fire example
where some houses cannot be saved.
Still, national defense is the canonical public good, and police and
fire protection are much more excludable and rivalrous, to use the
correct terms.
> As you may not know, the elimination of subscription
> firefighting was a little more checkered than you might think in some
> areas.
>
> (The same is true for mandatory high school. In Boston, the
> motivation that brought it through the lower chamber was openly job
> creation and job stability rather than the merits of a more educated
> citizenry. It was sold as jobs for teachers, and restriction of the
> common labor market to grown men and women. Curley's first big
> political success.)
Huh. Did not know that.
--
Kevin
K_S_ONeill
> The whole concept of justice rests on the abstract notion of value
It really doesn't. My dog had a very refined sense of unjust
punishment, for example.
> -- and what did *that* evolve from? Where's the adaptive benefit in
> imagining that diamonds are more valuable than graphite?
Every animal that can discern one thing from another places value on
some things and not on others. From there it's a short jump to
placing value on diamonds over graphite. Heck, there are birds that
use shiny things to woo mates, which is more or less exactly what we
do, and the birds clearly evolved the behavior.
--
Kevin
Slow Motion Apocalypse
>
> - Show quoted text -
I give money to street musicians and people who say things like "I am
short 40 cents for beer" or some street punks who asked "Do you have a
dollar for the weed fund?" My favorite was the dude outside of gigs in
the 1990's saying he was taking up a collection for the United Negro
Beer Fund.
Slow Motion Apocalypse
Los Angeles has a 50 year backlog on potholes and sidewalk cracks. I
guess the city council made a conscious decision to pay off injured
pedestrians and cyclists as needed rather than fix them. Los Angeles
has a pretty heavy tax burden and also been chasing off a lot of the
tax base.
plausible prose man
Of public goods, and therefore examples of market failures which the
state has some ability and even obligation to correct, you mean?
> Some people really
> are mad that schools are teaching kids actual science in science
> class.
And some other people are mad that schools are just kind of sucky, in
the main.
> Neither one is a public good,
What?
>since you can be excluded from police
> and fire protection
Huh.
> and one person using up resources prevents another
> from using them.
Eh...you want this one back, maybe? Not even saying there isn't a
kernel of truth to what you say, but that's about it.
> Both are publicly funded. Both are very popular,
> even among Republicans. Republicans are hugely fond of our socialist
> police forces, they like them a lot and often want to expand them.
Okay.
> Everyone likes the current socialist fire protection plan better than
> the pre-Civil War private fire departments, I think.
At least the ones using pre-civil war equipment.
David Friedman
<a80fff65-a38b-4a3f...@a32g2000yqm.googlegroups.com>,
plausible prose man <George...@aol.com> wrote:
(discussion on public goods)
> > > I think the majority of Americans are happy about the idea of public
> > > schools, yet get a little nervous about the word "socialism."
> >
> > Police and fire protection are better examples.
>
> Of public goods, and therefore examples of market failures which the
> state has some ability and even obligation to correct, you mean?
>
> >�Some people really
> > are mad that schools are teaching kids actual science in science
> > class.
>
> And some other people are mad that schools are just kind of sucky, in
> the main.
>
>
> > Neither one is a public good,
>
> What?
>
> >since you can be excluded from police
> > and fire protection
>
> Huh.
Correct. And both are also produced as private goods--consider a gated
community, for instance.
> > and one person using up resources prevents another
> > from using them.
>
> Eh...you want this one back, maybe? Not even saying there isn't a
> kernel of truth to what you say, but that's about it.
The two usual characteristics of a public good are non-excludability
(just covered) and zero marginal cost on the margin of how many people
consume it (non-rivalrous). Police and fire protection have some element
of that, since stopping my house from burning down also stops the fire
from spreading to yours, but not all that large an element--how large
depending in part on housing density.
National defense is a better example of a public good than any of the
other three (schooling, fire, police). But even there, one could argue
that the more people you are protecting, the greater the amount of
wealth available to be stolen by defeating your protection, hence that
there is some increased cost on the margin of number defended.
We don't, after all, observe the sort of drastic economies of scale in
national defense one might expect if it was purely
non-rivalrous--although that may be partly a distinction between area
protected and people in that area protected. Defending every other
American might be almost as costly as defending every American, given
the difficulty of determining who a missile or bomb is going to kill
before acting against it.
It may be worth thinking of some of these things in terms of positive
externalities rather than public goods--a closely related concept.
Mark Steese
aa986a...@c3g2000yqd.googlegroups.com:
> On Nov 20, 11:30�am, Mark Steese <mark_ste...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>> The whole concept of justice rests on the abstract notion of value
>
> It really doesn't.
Yes it does.
> My dog had a very refined sense of unjust punishment, for example.
That you perceived your dog as having such a sense is interesting, but
not probative. If your dog had spoken out on behalf of *another* dog
that was being punished unjustly, you might have a case.
>> -- and what did *that* evolve from? Where's the adaptive benefit in
>> imagining that diamonds are more valuable than graphite?
>
> Every animal that can discern one thing from another places value on
> some things and not on others. From there it's a short jump to
> placing value on diamonds over graphite.
You missed the point. We don't place value on diamonds over graphite: we
place value on both diamonds and graphite. The fact that diamonds are
comparatively expensive doesn't mean that stores are giving away
graphite to anyone who'll take it; a six-ounce can of graphite powder
can set you back nine or ten bucks, easy.
> Heck, there are birds that use shiny things to woo mates, which is
> more or less exactly what we do, and the birds clearly evolved the
> behavior.
"More or less exactly" is a slight exaggeration. The notion of a
diamond's value is separate from the fact that it is a shiny thing;
uncut diamonds aren't even shiny -- to the untrained eye, they look very
much like gravel. For that matter, to the untrained eye, a cut
rhinestone looks very much a cut diamond, but for some reason,
rhinestones are still comparatively cheap and diamonds are still
comparatively expensive. Do birds distinguish between diamonds and
rhinestones? Would a bird feel insulted if it found out that the diamond
another bird had given it was actually an inexpensive diamond
substitute? It seems unlikely.
Mark Steese
news:89rit6x...@fernon.pffcu.org:
> Mark Steese <mark_...@yahoo.com> wrote:
[snip]
>> It seems to me that statements like "Evolved reciprocal altruism
>> generates a sense of justice" demonstrate the problems inherent in
>> using evolutionary biology to explain human culture. Reciprocal
>> altruism has been observed among such diverse critters as wrasses,
>> vampire bats, red- winged blackbirds, and vervets, yet so far as we
>> can tell, none of them has "a sense of justice"; folktales
>> notwithstanding, nonhuman animals have never displayed any interest
>> in jurisprudence. If they have no sense of justice, why should we? In
>> this context, saying "evolution did it" is no more helpful than
>> saying "God did it."
>
> I thought I remembered something about this:
> http://www.pnas.org/gca?gca=pnas%3B106%2F1%2F340&allch=
>
> "Recent research indicates that non-human primates refuse to
> participate in cooperative problem-solving tasks if they witness a
> conspecific obtaining a more attractive reward for the same effort..."
> The study goes on to suggest that dogs, also, will perform a task even
> if you sometimes don't reward them - but will refuse to perform it if
> they witness other dogs being given a "better" reward.
>
> Now this is "justice" on a fairly basic level, some might call it
> greed or envy.
It may be "justice," but it has nothing to do with justice. It's just
squabbling over who gets more attention. If they explained to the dog
that the other dogs had done something to earn a 'better' reward, and
the dog had grudgingly conceded the fact, I'd be impressed.
> I don't know that Fido will go on a hunger strike because Rover is
> being held without counsel in a kennel. But again and again we see
> that there is no bright shining line between human behavior and that
> of other animals - we almost certainly think more about things like
> this than any other species, but that doesn't mean the behaviors are
> absent elsewhere.
Again and again we see a peculiarly human tendency to imagine that
pointing out the obvious differences between human behavior and the
behavior of other animals is in some way demeaning to the other animals.
Do you think dogs *should* have a sense of justice? Would they be any
better off if they did?
K_S_ONeill
> K_S_ONeill <uane...@gmail.com> wrote in news:c9aa7f92-d4be-4d1a-86f6-
> aa986a71e...@c3g2000yqd.googlegroups.com:
>
> > On Nov 20, 11:30 am, Mark Steese <mark_ste...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> >> The whole concept of justice rests on the abstract notion of value
>
> > It really doesn't.
>
> Yes it does.
No, it doesn't, even in your example below. Justice is an idea
related to punishment being appropriate to the crime as well as to
reward being appropriate to the act being rewarded. The second bit
rests on the value of the reward, the first does not.
> > My dog had a very refined sense of unjust punishment, for example.
>
> That you perceived your dog as having such a sense is interesting, but
> not probative. If your dog had spoken out on behalf of *another* dog
> that was being punished unjustly, you might have a case.
How on earth would that rest on an abstract notion of value? I swear,
you get lost in your own arguments, you really do. You should take
notes or something.
Anyway, speaking out about an injustice done to another animal is a
combination of empathy and a sense of justice. One could have a sense
that one was being treated badly oneself and how unjust that was even
if one had no empathy at all. Not that my dog lacked empathy. She
didn't. Very fine dog, she was.
> >> -- and what did *that* evolve from? Where's the adaptive benefit in
> >> imagining that diamonds are more valuable than graphite?
>
> > Every animal that can discern one thing from another places value on
> > some things and not on others. From there it's a short jump to
> > placing value on diamonds over graphite.
>
> You missed the point.
You didn't make a point.
> We don't place value on diamonds over graphite: we
> place value on both diamonds and graphite.
Yes, and I can pay money for cow poop at the garden section of Lowes.
You said, "From there it's a short jump to placing value on diamonds
over graphite." Now you say we don't place value on diamonds over
graphite. Which is it? Hint: it's the first one.
> The fact that diamonds are
> comparatively expensive doesn't mean that stores are giving away
> graphite to anyone who'll take it; a six-ounce can of graphite powder
> can set you back nine or ten bucks, easy.
So... that was the point?
> > Heck, there are birds that use shiny things to woo mates, which is
> > more or less exactly what we do, and the birds clearly evolved the
> > behavior.
>
> "More or less exactly" is a slight exaggeration. The notion of a
> diamond's value is separate from the fact that it is a shiny thing;
Lord you're tedious.
> uncut diamonds aren't even shiny -- to the untrained eye, they look very
> much like gravel. For that matter, to the untrained eye, a cut
> rhinestone looks very much a cut diamond, but for some reason,
> rhinestones are still comparatively cheap and diamonds are still
> comparatively expensive.
Yes, for some reason.
> Do birds distinguish between diamonds and
> rhinestones? Would a bird feel insulted if it found out that the diamond
> another bird had given it was actually an inexpensive diamond
> substitute? It seems unlikely.
Do birds distinguish between decorative things they think are valuable
and similar things they don't think are valuable? They do? Did they
evolve this behavior? They did? I see. I see.
--
Kevin
Mark Steese
news:a9a81cce-f815-4c61...@s15g2000yqs.googlegroups.com:
> On Nov 20, 7:26�pm, Mark Steese <mark_ste...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>> K_S_ONeill <uane...@gmail.com> wrote in news:c9aa7f92-d4be-4d1a-86f6-
>> aa986a71e...@c3g2000yqd.googlegroups.com:
>>
>> > On Nov 20, 11:30�am, Mark Steese <mark_ste...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>>
>> >> The whole concept of justice rests on the abstract notion of value
>>
>> > It really doesn't.
>>
>> Yes it does.
>
> No, it doesn't, even in your example below.
I see that your ability to argue has not improved. Bye-bye.
K_S_ONeill
> K_S_ONeill <uane...@gmail.com> wrote innews:a9a81cce-f815-4c61...@s15g2000yqs.googlegroups.com:
>
> > On Nov 20, 7:26 pm, Mark Steese <mark_ste...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> >> K_S_ONeill <uane...@gmail.com> wrote in news:c9aa7f92-d4be-4d1a-86f6-
> >> aa986a71e...@c3g2000yqd.googlegroups.com:
>
> >> > On Nov 20, 11:30 am, Mark Steese <mark_ste...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> >> >> The whole concept of justice rests on the abstract notion of value
>
> >> > It really doesn't.
>
> >> Yes it does.
>
> > No, it doesn't, even in your example below.
>
> I see that your ability to argue has not improved. Bye-bye.
Well, that's one way to not have to defend all the nonsense you
write. Have a nice day.
--
Kevin
Bill Turlock
You *know* what happens when you anthropomorphize the dogs,
surely?
Bill Turlock
>
..................
> >
> >
> > You help her with your resources, which I said a long time ago.
> >
>
> On the whole I would agree Shawn and in a perfect world he would be
> correct. The unfortunate thing is the world is not perfect. The problem
> here is two-fold.
>
> One, it's a matter of upbringing, far too many people have been brought
> up to only look out for number one. Many of the
> management/entrepreneurial types I've dealt with in my life act as
> though they were raised by wolves. When did we go from 10-12% being a
> good return on investment to 50% or more? There is nothing wrong with
> making a living but I've got a real problem with "making a killing."
> Especially, if it's backward engineering, looking for loopholes in
> patents, engaging in duplicitous financial practices (read derivatives)
> or just being downright unscrupulous. If you want to compete-compete,
> don't look to cheat and connive no matter if it is "legal."
>
> Two, the bleeding hearts have hemophilia. On the whole, they are SOOOOO
> sure that they are right that they think that anyone who doesn't jump on
> the bandwagon is an absolute ogre. They cannot see that taxation IS the
> taking someone else's money/effort at the point of a gun. They do not
> realize that they are supplanting someone else's ideals with their own.
> Look sometime at the various "good causes" in the Stimulus Bill
> congress passed and tell me these were all good and just reasons to take
> someone's money. They weren't and that's the heart of the matter.
>
> Is there a solution? I don't know. If more people would give of
> themselves like Dover, it would help. It would also help if people HAD
> more disposable income. Do I have a problem with Medicaid, Food Stamps
> and other programs targeted at aiding the truly needy? -No, there was a
> time long ago when I had to make use of them. But, yes there's always a
> but, no one ever really LOOKS at the sheer size of our government and
> how much of our economy it really consumes. Too many times one hears:
> "It's a good cause. Ten million dollars isn't that much." (Substitute
> any number you like for Ten million) With each passing year there seems
> to be less "spare" money. My income has gone up and my actual living
> costs haven't soared but there's not as much to go around. So this year
> instead of donating food at Thanksgiving it's donating time to help
> serve it.
I hope to take a turkey over to Cecil's Glide Memorial this year.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glide_Memorial_Church
http://cbs5.com/local/reverend.cecil.williams.2.1309667.html
plausible prose man
wrote:
> In article
> <a80fff65-a38b-4a3f-9bdc-3d831d28b...@a32g2000yqm.googlegroups.com>,
> plausible prose man <Georgefha...@aol.com> wrote:
>
> (discussion on public goods)
>
>
>
>
>
> > > > I think the majority of Americans are happy about the idea of public
> > > > schools, yet get a little nervous about the word "socialism."
>
> > > Police and fire protection are better examples.
>
> > Of public goods, and therefore examples of market failures which the
> > state has some ability and even obligation to correct, you mean?
>
> > > Some people really
> > > are mad that schools are teaching kids actual science in science
> > > class.
>
> > And some other people are mad that schools are just kind of sucky, in
> > the main.
>
> > > Neither one is a public good,
>
> > What?
>
> > >since you can be excluded from police
> > > and fire protection
>
> > Huh.
>
> Correct. And both are also produced as private goods--consider a gated
> community, for instance.
Is that a private good, or just a more local public good? Would maybe
a night watchman at your warehouse be a better example of providing
police as a private good.
> > > and one person using up resources prevents another
> > > from using them.
>
> > Eh...you want this one back, maybe? Not even saying there isn't a
> > kernel of truth to what you say, but that's about it.
>
> The two usual characteristics of a public good are non-excludability
> (just covered) and zero marginal cost on the margin of how many people
> consume it (non-rivalrous).
Please understand I have a certain horror of algebra, so is that the
same as "one person's enjoying a given instance of X would preclude
someone else from doing it?"
> Police and fire protection have some element
> of that, since stopping my house from burning down also stops the fire
> from spreading to yours, but not all that large an element--how large
> depending in part on housing density.
>
> National defense is a better example of a public good than any of the
> other three (schooling, fire, police).
Really, I think schooling is a terrible example. Schooling is
definitely excludable, since you can easily enough educate someone
without educating everyone.
> But even there, one could argue
> that the more people you are protecting, the greater the amount of
> wealth available to be stolen by defeating your protection, hence that
> there is some increased cost on the margin of number defended.
Also, it seems that when the cabbage crates were coming over the
briny, they were mainly on their way to Beachy Head or London or Hull,
and of course the Boche actually occupied the Channel Islands, you
were comparatively safe in Carlisle or Newcastle, although I suspect
your national defense bill wasn't any lower.
> We don't, after all, observe the sort of drastic economies of scale in
> national defense one might expect if it was purely
> non-rivalrous--although that may be partly a distinction between area
> protected and people in that area protected.
It would also seem there are no completely non-rivalrous and
unexcludable goods, which doesn't mean there aren't some things which
approximate them closely enough to be usefully analyzed that way,
especially since its one of Samuelson's ideas.
> Defending every other
> American might be almost as costly as defending every American, given
> the difficulty of determining who a missile or bomb is going to kill
> before acting against it.
Indeed, it might be a good deal costlier, especially if you were due
a refund or the state presued collections activities should you find
yourself on the wrong list.
> It may be worth thinking of some of these things in terms of positive
> externalities rather than public goods--a closely related concept.
I was watching your father appear on a television program, and as part
of a larger discussion about libertarianism, he and then interviewer
went through a list of cabinent departments, seeing which Dr. Friedman
would do away with if he had some veto power there. Unsurprisingly, he
was against all of them, pretty much, except the Department of
Defense. However, there was a moment when he seemingly implied some
case for a perhaps more idealized government involvement in medical
research, which could probably be extended to other forms of
scientific research and perhaps even the creative arts, if it hinges
on public goods and positive externalities.
Anyway, I was wondering if you had more to say about that.
Mac
wrote:
> Mark Steese wrote:
>
> > spam...@gmail.com (S. Checker) wrote in
> >news:89rit6x...@fernon.pffcu.org:
Sudden shortages of acrylics and black velvet,
plausible prose man
wrote:
> Mark Steese wrote:
>
> > spam...@gmail.com (S. Checker) wrote in
> >news:89rit6x...@fernon.pffcu.org:
The dog thinks you're the king of all dogs, although you will come
home and find her sleeping in your bed, under the cover, with her head
on the pillow.