The term greed actually does have linguistically negative connotations, and therefore is not a technically fit word to describe the motivations behind abstraction of trade.
A better word? Mutual Aid? Idunno...
Trade is entered not because you will help the other person, but because the other person will help you. (this is true for both participants) Mutual benefit might be a good term, or Rational self-interest. |
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Yes - used at the right time, heroin is fine. Heroin was made as a therapeutic drug and when its needed, its fine to use it. And the same is true of inflation. If its needed, as it is in Japan, then use it. When the need passes, stop.
I can't see why you find that hard to accept.
Except that the governments keep doctor shopping until they find one that will prescribe them infinite amounts of heroin, and the minute one starts to talk about lowering the dose, they fire him and get another. And God forbid a doctor comes along and suggests that Heroin isn't needed at all, that pain is natural, and it tells us when we're doing damage to our body, and we shouldn't just keep using drugs to mask the symptoms. That doctor gets laughed right out of the office. Hmmm. I have no idea what point you are trying to make. |
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Odd that today, so many people would volunteer to be employees, and so few to be employers... Too much inbreeding?
I'm going back to ignoring you until go to fucking rehab and start talking sense. Just because the point went over your head doesn't mean that I'm not talking sense. Maybe you can have someone explain it to you. In the meantime: Still waiting on this: Markets still require foundations on which they can be built. So they do. We've established communication is one, and that a State is not needed for communication. What other foundations are required for Markets, and how do they require a State? |
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If you pay money to a government that mass murders like the US or UK - you're no better than the murderers.
If you're ok with paying for genocide because you're worried that some government thugs may knock on your door, then you're a weak coward and deserve to be a slave.
And if you sit around trolling on the Internet when confronted by mass murder, what does that make you? A recruiter? |
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Eventually running the circles of efficiency improvements (something evolution is all about) may indeed lead to world state. I strongly doubt that. Economies of scale only go so far. |
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To answer your question, I don't really feel much. I honestly don't mind doing so, I believe in having an obligation to paying your country in return for the high living standards we receive. At the end of the day, they can spend it on what they want.
Easy enough for you to say, Australia's #13 in military expenditures. Most of your money actually goes to your country's upkeep. Most of ours goes to blowing up bridges (and then rebuilding them) on the other side of the planet, while our bridges rot out from underneath us. To say nothing of the human cost. I don't pay taxes... I'm net receiver... Also known as a dependent slave. No wonder you're so pro-State. |
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Yes - used at the right time, heroin is fine. Heroin was made as a therapeutic drug and when its needed, its fine to use it. And the same is true of inflation. If its needed, as it is in Japan, then use it. When the need passes, stop.
I can't see why you find that hard to accept.
Except that the governments keep doctor shopping until they find one that will prescribe them infinite amounts of heroin, and the minute one starts to talk about lowering the dose, they fire him and get another. And God forbid a doctor comes along and suggests that Heroin isn't needed at all, that pain is natural, and it tells us when we're doing damage to our body, and we shouldn't just keep using drugs to mask the symptoms. That doctor gets laughed right out of the office. |
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Meanwhile the good news from Japan keeps rolling in
Yep, Japan is entering it's Golden Era... Weimar Republic Golden Era (1924–1929)
Gustav Stresemann was Reichskanzler for 100 days in 1923, and served as foreign minister from 1923–1929, a period of relative stability for the Weimar Republic, known in Germany as Goldene Zwanziger ("Golden Twenties"). Prominent features of this period were a growing economy and a consequent decrease in civil unrest.
The 1920s saw a remarkable cultural renaissance in Germany. During the worst phase of hyperinflation in 1923, the clubs and bars were full of speculators who spent their daily profits so they would not lose the value the following day. When did the German economy go wrong? In the 1930s under Brunning when they introduced austerity. Yeah, Detox from the inflation high is a bitch. Don't ya think it might be wise not to start chasing the dragon in the first place? The Germans were unique in that they went for higher inflation than anyone else and then went for stricter austerity than anyone else. The Versailles Treaty is the big factor in both. So, a little heroin is OK, as long as you don't overdo it? And if rather than going cold-turkey, you gently bring yourself off of it? If only it weren't other people's lives that they're messing with.... |
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Freeganism prohibits me from ever touching or spending federal reserve notes, especially on the uselesa consumer goods you can get for free if you try.
By that, I assume you mean the smartphone you're using right now? You didn't get that for free, you bought it with a pretty pebble. |
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Meanwhile the good news from Japan keeps rolling in
Yep, Japan is entering it's Golden Era... Weimar Republic Golden Era (1924–1929)
Gustav Stresemann was Reichskanzler for 100 days in 1923, and served as foreign minister from 1923–1929, a period of relative stability for the Weimar Republic, known in Germany as Goldene Zwanziger ("Golden Twenties"). Prominent features of this period were a growing economy and a consequent decrease in civil unrest.
The 1920s saw a remarkable cultural renaissance in Germany. During the worst phase of hyperinflation in 1923, the clubs and bars were full of speculators who spent their daily profits so they would not lose the value the following day. When did the German economy go wrong? In the 1930s under Brunning when they introduced austerity. Yeah, Detox from the inflation high is a bitch. Don't ya think it might be wise not to start chasing the dragon in the first place? |
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How about defining land as public property, as opposed to not defining land as no property at all? 'Cause the latter seems rather unfeasable; we might all want to live in the heart of London or Paris or whatever.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commonsSorry, I think I'm missing your point? How are we gonna decide who gets to live on the Champs-Élysées? What has the Tragedy of the Commons got to do with this? My point: If all land is held "in common," the people who use that land have less care for it. Think about it: Would you throw a Styrofoam cup onto your front lawn? Yet, many people litter while driving down the road. As to your other two questions: Yes, we can't all live on the Champs-Élysées (even if all land is held in "common"). That's why, to prevent conflict, we recognize two ways of acquiring land: Original appropriation, and voluntary sale. That way, land goes to those who value it most. |
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Let's not get lost in the details. The two goals are:
(1) Endure
(2) Expand
In other words, a punctual rephrasing of "be fruitful and multiply."
Everything else (keeping peace, waging war, making and enforcing laws, providing social services etc., etc.) is an inevitable, but strictly incidental set of consequences. Like defecating for living things: inevitable, but hardly raison d'etre.
More like means to those ends. Charles Tilly distinguishes four activities performed by the State, as those "biological functions": war making (“eliminating or neutralizing their own rivals outside the territories in which they have clear and continuous priority as wielders of force”), state making (“eliminating or neutralizing their rivals inside those territories”), protection (“eliminating or neutralizing the enemies of their clients”), and extraction (“acquiring the means of carrying out the first three activities—war making, state making, and protection”). In a just world, only the third and fourth activities would be acceptable, and the fourth only voluntarily. |
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To answer your question, I don't really feel much. I honestly don't mind doing so, I believe in having an obligation to paying your country in return for the high living standards we receive. At the end of the day, they can spend it on what they want.
Easy enough for you to say, Australia's #13 in military expenditures. Most of your money actually goes to your country's upkeep. Most of ours goes to blowing up bridges (and then rebuilding them) on the other side of the planet, while our bridges rot out from underneath us. To say nothing of the human cost. |
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Something similar was used in Eric Frank Russel's story, " And Then There Were None" Of course, what you suggest would require a world state to pull off successfully, as you admit. A system like this requires a level of trust to work smoothly, and in large societies (above the Dunbar number), trust is hard to come by. That's why we use money. It allows transactions without trust - in fact, explicitly with people you don't trust - " Cash on the barrelhead." |
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I'm not sure why, but I find this really fascinating to watch  Will it turn into all out war, or will eventually a stable kind of peace be settled ... *eats popcorn* Well, game theory states that it will eventually settle down. |
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For the third time:
Markets existed in Ireland when it had no state, and in Iceland, when it had free-market law. So your premise that "some non-voluntary monopoly (e.g.: a government) might be necessary in order to create suitable conditions for markets." has already been dis-proven by history.
And then they invented alcohol.  Don't their tribal mini-kingdoms count as governments? Seems like you're arguing semantics. tribal mini-kingdoms. ie, not a non-voluntary monopoly.  Gee, what a strange society it must have been... So many people 'volunteered' to be peasants, and hardly anyone 'volunteered' to be king.... Too much inbreeding? Odd that today, so many people would volunteer to be employees, and so few to be employers... Too much inbreeding? And still waiting on this: Markets still require foundations on which they can be built. So they do. We've established communication is one, and that a State is not needed for communication. What other foundations are required for Markets, and how do they require a State? |
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Not only targeted, but charged with... Resisting Arrest.
And nothing else? Bullshit charge. |
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Rocky Horror Picture Show if I'm really stuck on one Java line and I can't invoke class.
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An obvious attack because of his planned armed protest in DC planned for July 4th.
Maybe, maybe not. Once the arrests start at these rallies, they cast the net pretty wide. How many other arrests were there? They went straight to Kokesh. Arrested him and one other guy. A few others were detained then let go after the rally. Well, I amend my previous statement to "maybe, maybe yes." Definitely sounds targeted. |
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I have been unable to change my personalized forum pic to another one I found on the web. But there is no problem changing it to one of the stock photos. Why is this?
What are you trying to change it to? |
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