I guess we're all minarchists now

[sjaar...@gmail.com]

Back in 2016-ish someone (I think it was Martin) recommended the book "Better angels of our nature" by Stephen Pinker and his evidence for the leviathan theory, which suggest big, impersonal government makes the world a more peaceful and less violent place. I have a FIFO system for book recommendations, so I did not read the book at the time, but responded with skepticism and critique anyway.

I have now worked through the backlog of book recommendations ahead of that one in the queue and got to reading Pinkers "Better angels of our nature"... and would like to retract all of what I said back in 2016-ish and apologize for my negative response at the time. I would also like to apologize to Frances for my skeptical responses to her posts on Daniel Kahneman's "Thinking Fast and Slow" which I got to reading last year.

Pinker and Kahneman have convinced me that I was wrong about human nature and that there is strong evidence for a purpose and need for government and rule of law and that this is what makes the world the peaceful place we live in today. I do still support government staying out of everything else though, which I guess now makes me a minarchist. I can highly recommend both books.

P.S. I tried to reply to the original threads on the LibSA group, but I couldn't find it and I don't seem to be able to post to that group anymore... so I hope Frances, Martin and others who were in those discussions are in this group and see this. I'm always grateful for being proven wrong and having my mind changed. That's the only way to improve.

S.

[viv...@iafrica.com]

I haven't read tje Pinker book. Can you explain what you mean by: "There is strong evidence for a purpose'? Does it mean the concept of having purpose is important to humans? This is an important tenet of my DisMotivational speaking, and I recall us talking about this at Golden Gate, so if you are retracting, i have to double-check my thinking on this, pleae?

viv

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From: "sjaar...@gmail.com" <sjaar...@gmail.com>
To: "Individualist Movement" <indivi...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Friday, September 26, 2025 6:50:30 PM
Subject: IM: I guess we're all minarchists now

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[Stephen vJ]

Hmm... that is one of the deepest questions I've seen in a while so I want to be sure to think it through and answer with substance. I'm also frantically trying to paint the house before winter arrives, so I'm going to say no, I don't think people need purpose any more than evolution has intent... but let me think it through a bit more and answer properly tomorrow.

Stephen.

On Sep 28, 2025, at 09:22, viv...@iafrica.com wrote:



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[Trevor Watkins]

Stephen Libsa googlegroups is still there (https://groups.google.com/g/libsa/search?q=pinker)and is a treasure trove of articles from our thoughtful past. There are several articles referencing Pinker, but most seem to be in the 2017/2018 period.
Dang, we were smart when we were young....

Trevor Watkins .. cSASI
bas...@gmail.com - 083 44 11 721 - www.individualist.one

[Trevor Watkins]

Can you be more specific about what you mean by "purpose"? Does the universe have a purpose? Do I have a purpose? Who defines what is a purpose, and what is just random mucking around? I suspect free will and determinism may be involved. 

Most religions think that our purpose is to be re-united with our all-loving and all-powerful heavenly father, but no one ever seems to address how he lost us at the mall in the first place, and why he can't just whisk us back up if he is so all-powerful. 

Personally I change my purpose in life frequently, depending on age, level of intoxication, and likelihood of success. Millions of people who seem to have no conceivable purpose, apart from conception perhaps, seem to stagger along just fine. I think the answer to the purpose of life might be 41, but am not sure.

Trevor Watkins .. cSASI
bas...@gmail.com - 083 44 11 721 - www.individualist.one

To view this discussion, visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/individualist/28C2ACBE-9AB0-4891-B1FD-295B87A2C6F9%40gmail.com.

[Stephen vJ]

Indeed, we have generated a wealth of excellent material over the years. I can no longer post to LibSA so I assume it is now a static archive and future conversations will happen here... or is it just me ? ;-)

Stephen.

On Sep 29, 2025, at 07:31, Trevor Watkins <bas...@gmail.com> wrote:



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[Stephen vJ]

Right, so the word "purpose" has more than one meaning or use. The way Trevor and Viv use it below is in the personified sense, usually suggesting that the universe or god or evolution has some human-like thinking process, which they both point out is non-sensical and I agree.

That's not the sense I used the word though - I meant it in reference to an inanimate object, in this case government and specifically an impersonal leviathan government, not the local HOA. In that sense, most man-made objects do have a purpose, assuming the creator is man and the individuals involved had some goal or purpose in mind when creating the object.

A rock in a field somewhere has no purpose and a human life in the context of the universe has no purpose greater than a bacteria on the back of a moist rocky moth circling the big candle in the sky... but a fork has a purpose - to move the peas from your plate to your mouth in a more civilized way that scooping them up with your fingers.

As Trevor points out, purpose is not inherent in the object, but depends on goals, desires, need, etc. at a specific point in time, so that the fork could also have the purpose of opening a can of paint or occupying a place of honour in a wall decoration or for stabbing the shoulder of your friend who just wouldn't shut up while you're trying to take a nap.

Government is a man-made object which requires and demands substantial upkeep and does not conveniently confine itself to the cutlery drawer until needed. It imposes itself on our lives daily and in countless significant ways. So it is interesting to know why - for what purpose and to what end ?

I have been searching for that answer for about 4 decades now and the only reasonable answer I have gotten in all this time is from Pinker i.e. government as an omni-present and omnipotent substitute for god makes us refrain from stabbing our buddies with forks. It makes people think twice about hurting each other, which has lead to the world being a more peaceful place than it has ever been.

The rest of what it does still seems evil, nefarious, bogus, wasteful and unnecessary, so in an ideal world I guess we would want to have a foundation of peace and leave everything else to individuals. I'm still new to this conclusion, so I don't know exactly what that would look like or how one would contain it to that single purpose, but now I'm starting to get how Leon and others could support the rule of law, which did not make sense to me until now.

Stephen.

On Sep 29, 2025, at 08:06, Trevor Watkins <bas...@gmail.com> wrote:



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[Stephen vJ]

Also, I don't think government should get involved in all cases, but I haven't figured out where to draw that line. Consent seems a decent guideline, but that does not prevent the Canadian government from considering the use of preferred pronouns a crime.

Stephen.

On Sep 29, 2025, at 10:26, Stephen vJ <sjaar...@gmail.com> wrote:

Right, so the word "purpose" has more than one meaning or use. The way Trevor and Viv use it below is in the personified sense, usually suggesting that the universe or god or evolution has some human-like thinking process, which they both point out is non-sensical and I agree.

[Trevor Watkins]

The good news is that you can now post to libsa again. The bad news is that I have no idea how your posting permission got changed to "not allowed". I do, however, prefer to use indivi...@googlegroups.com and retain libsa as an archive.

The primary purpose of government, according to the Declaration of Independence, is to secure the unalienable rights of its citizens, specifically the rights to Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness. A bit like the purpose of a knife is to cut your food. The reality is way different. 

From my perspective, purposes,like intentions, are meaningless. Consequences are what counts, and on which you will be judged, by some higher power like me.

Trevor Watkins .. cSASI
bas...@gmail.com - 083 44 11 721 - www.individualist.one

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[Sid Nothard]

We are not born with innate purpose, and the majority of humankind live their lives with little or no purpose other than to reproduce.

 

So each individual has to figure out to what purpose he wants to put himself to, and how much conviction he is going to give to it.

 

And when the one with purpose becomes wealthy, those without are overcome with envy and hatred.

I suppose that is human nature at work.

 

Sid Nothard cSASI

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[Stephen van Jaarsveldt]

Good points. We could of course take Harry Browne's advice and consider government a force of nature... but that only works in a developed country with stable government, which currently covers only portions of two continents. The rest of the world is still subject to corrupt, self-serving, failing and power-hungry despots... and even the developed nations have no guarantee of avoiding regression to that in the medium to long term. I guess you could still consider government a force of nature without purpose or agency even in those failed cases, similar to resigning yourself to living in a rainy, stormy climate prone to floods or in the shadow of an active volcano. That may well be a more practical approach, since the average bad government is about as easy to do something about as the weather... but that feels rather defeatist and I find it hard to believe that the writers of the declaration of independence were no different than the authors of a religious text i.e. that their writings had no actual meaning and that the consequences of it could have been attributed to nature, luck and inevitability of evolution just as well without them. Are we deluding ourselves and over-estimating our ability to influence the world ? Are we over-estimating the sphere of influence of man on humanity and it's institutions ? Looking at all the other ways in which we grossly over-estimate our spheres of influence, that may well be the case.

S.

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