Intellectual Property - In All Fairness!

[FredericBastiat]

So, in the libertarian world you are advocating, the rule is "if someone establishes that another intends to do him harm, he is entitled to immediately defend himself; through violence if necessary".  You then stated that observation is necessary to determine a person's intent, but you admit that this is not always possible, and also that it is subjective.  Let me repeat myself:

Let me try to reduce this to the minimum:

• Do I, or do I not, have the right to immediately defend myself, with mortal violence if necessary, as soon as I perceive a threat to my life?
• Do you, or do you not, have the right to carry a gun into a room where you and I are discussing the solution to a mutual conflict?

Question 1: Yes. Question 2: It depends. Who owns the room?

edit: the sun example was not necessary.  It was pathetic.  FirstAscent asked you a legitimate question, you replied with an absurdity.

Here's the original quote:

Tell me how you measure intent of some individual that you have never met, nor even know exists?

The answer is there is nothing to measure. It's nearly equivalent to asking what to do when you don't have anything to act upon.

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[fergalish]

There is no lie.  Your own text shows you to be happy to have innocents killed.

By all means ignore me.  You acknowledge that regulating materials works.  You don't actually care about the consequence of not regulating them.  I do.  We won't agree.

What you are describing is a society in which people are being killed. A society where they know how they can save their own lives. Regulating materials will save them.  But your strange ideology means they "shouldn't" do it.  They should die.

Not nice.

Liar again. I pointed out your lies. Redact them, or admit you have nothing more to add other than ad hominem.

Fred, you've lost.  You've said you'd prefer a nuclear wasteland to infringing a single person's rights.  You've said people can't act until they establish intent.  You've said it's not possible to establish intent with an unknown assailant.  You've said people can't prohibit dangerous goods even when they know there are such people as would use them violently.  For you, the right to hold any arbitrarily dangerous item supersedes the right to life.

Am I entitled to hold a nuclear weapon in a city, that is detonated should a drop of liquid fall anywhere on its surface?  Assume I legitimately acquired all the raw materials to manufacture such a device, and my intent is merely to show how much faith I have in the umbrellas manufactured by my factory.
EDIT: AND the city does not prohibit possession of nuclear weapons.

[fergalish]

Let me try to reduce this to the minimum:

• Do I, or do I not, have the right to immediately defend myself, with mortal violence if necessary, as soon as I perceive a threat to my life?
• Do you, or do you not, have the right to carry a gun into a room where you and I are discussing the solution to a mutual conflict?

Question 1: Yes. Question 2: It depends. Who owns the room?

The owner died with no heirs.  We have both laid claim to the room.  This is the conflict we must resolve.  Alternatively the owner is libertarian and his terms and conditions specify "Section 1: No person entering here may threaten another." and nothing more.

I'm blue in the face trying to explain to you that SOMETIMES there would be interactions between people and/or businesses that would not be governed by the clauses of a contract.

[FirstAscent]

Just so you know, you lost this argument a long time ago. You know it. We know it. You can continue to put up a show if you want, be we all know that when you go to bed at night, you're well aware that your arguments have failed.

Was this the argument where you shoot first and ask questions later, in contradistinction to where I preferred to determine intent first? Why are you so against measuring motive or intent as necessary precursors to violent retaliation?

Why would I be against measuring motive or intent? I'm simply saying it's not a comprehensive solution.

[FirstAscent]

Please Please answer this question.

If anti violence vaccine would be discovered would you want a law to force everybody to take it?

Please .

Nope.

[FredericBastiat]

Fred, you've lost.  You've said you'd prefer a nuclear wasteland to infringing a single person's rights.  You've said people can't act until they establish intent.  You've said it's not possible to establish intent with an unknown assailant.  You've said people can't prohibit dangerous goods even when they know there are such people as would use them violently.  For you, the right to hold any arbitrarily dangerous item supersedes the right to life.

Am I entitled to hold a nuclear weapon in a city, that is detonated should a drop of liquid fall anywhere on its surface?  Assume I legitimately acquired all the raw materials to manufacture such a device, and my intent is merely to show how much faith I have in the umbrellas manufactured by my factory.

Now you're just being freakishly absurd. Should we have nuclear weapons if they can be detonated when anybody accidentally sneezes too? If I rolled my eyes any harder, they'd get lost in the back of my head.

The problem with this line of argumentation, is that the second I concede (I won't), you can immediately justify regulating any object or compound as long as it can be proven to be potentially dangerous in at least one case, hypothetical or otherwise.

One more nail in the coffin of Liberty, six more feet under the thumb of Totalitarianism. I ain't buying, so stop trying to sell me.

[FirstAscent]

The problem with this line of argumentation, is that the second I concede (I won't), you can immediately justify regulating any object or compound as long as it can be proven to be potentially dangerous in at least one case, hypothetical or otherwise.

Why would you think such an idiotic thought? The goal is (and has always been) to regulate and/or prevent the ownership of the key components that allow the construction of said offending WMDs, and additionally, regulate the construction or manufacturing of said WMDs.

Why would we want to regulate the possession of stainless steel, which is almost certainly a component, but not the defining component?

[fergalish]

Now you're just being freakishly absurd. Should we have nuclear weapons if they can be detonated when anybody accidentally sneezes too? If I rolled my eyes any harder, they'd get lost in the back of my head.

The problem with this line of argumentation, is that the second I concede (I won't), you can immediately justify regulating any object or compound as long as it can be proven to be potentially dangerous in at least one case, hypothetical or otherwise.

One more nail in the coffin of Liberty, six more feet under the thumb of Totalitarianism. I ain't buying, so stop trying to sell me.

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh, AT LAST, Fred reaches his limit.  But, just for pride, he won't concede the point.

You know, you're absolutely right, I am being freakishly absurd.  In *my* opinion, *you* started being freakishly absurd a long long time ago (imagine! any Joe Public being allowed to handle nukes!).  And that's the crux of the problem.  Everybody draws their own absurd line.

How's about this:

If I am obliged to allow you to bring your normal nuclear weapon into a crowded city, even though I consider it to be extremely risky and hazardous, are you then obliged to allow some crackpot umbrella-maker to bring his raindrop-triggered nuclear weapon into the city, even though *you* consider *that* to be extremely risky and hazardous?

If I can't legitimately stop you, then you can't legitimately stop him.  Correct or incorrect?  Actually, let me rephrase that: logically consistent, or logically inconsistent?

edit: To put it another way: is "freakishly absurd" just how *you* define it, or should we come up with a common definition that we all can understand and agree with?

[AyeYo]

If everyone was willing to accept that everytime you get in your car, you have to bring along a chain of drivers licences, one for each road you drive along, and everytime you enter in a shop, you have to read it's full terms and conditions, and so on, then "protecting business" might actually work as a method of avoiding conflict - in other words, there would have to be a contract governing every single interaction between people and businesses, specifying all possible outcomes of that interaction, and all compensations to be paid for each of those outcomes (so you'd have to put a monetary value on the life of your child, should a heavy box fall on him).

So, if we're willing to accept such an absurdity, then yes, "business prevails" logically follows as a violence inhibitor.  

Even then it doesn't work because there's no governing body forcing anything to abide by those agreements.  There's no point it given him the benefit of a doubt that all interactions are covered by contracts and therefore will go smoothly, because contracts without a centralized governing body to enforce them mean absolutely jack shit.


I sign a contract with you that says if your kid gets hurt in my store, I'll pay all the medical bills.
Sure enough, your kid gets hurt in my store.
You come and ask for money for the medical bills.
I laugh in your face and tell you pound sand - "make me pay out".
Your only option is to resort to violence to hold me to the contract.


There's just no way around it.  It's the nature of our world.  Violence will always be the ultimate decider of whose ideas prevail.  This is why we have a centralized, democratic government that holds the biggest gun, and we all contribute to it to make mutually benefitial rules that we all agree to live by.  Without that centralized power, the man with the biggest gun will make ALL the rules, all by himself.

[NghtRppr]

Is gasoline a weapon?  No.

O rly?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Molotov_cocktail

[FredericBastiat]

Ahhhhhhhhhhh, AT LAST, we realize that it was Fergalish's, and Hawker's sole intent to annoy Freddy. They weren't interested in logic or reason, law or justice, just annoy and chide... Haaaaa Haaaa. It was just a joke. You really are Libertarians in Socialist clothes. Ahhh, funny, *busting a gut* now.

How "Feraglishisly Absurd" and "Hawkishly Annoying"

[Hawker]

There is no lie.  Your own text shows you to be happy to have innocents killed.

By all means ignore me.  You acknowledge that regulating materials works.  You don't actually care about the consequence of not regulating them.  I do.  We won't agree.

What you are describing is a society in which people are being killed. A society where they know how they can save their own lives. Regulating materials will save them.  But your strange ideology means they "shouldn't" do it.  They should die.

Not nice.

Liar again. I pointed out your lies. Redact them, or admit you have nothing more to add other than ad hominem.

Point to the lie and I will happily redact it.  All I see is that thousands of people are alive today as a result of regulating fertiliser sales, you say we should not regulate them so its logical to say that you prefer unregulated fertiliser sales to human lives.

Please correct me...tell me its good those people are alive and that the regulation is good because it saves lives.

[Hawker]

Is gasoline a weapon?  No.

O rly?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Molotov_cocktail

By your logic a sharpened pencil is a weapon 

Stop avoiding the main issue; if I do prove that a nuke is a threat to me regardless of whether the owner intends violence, are you happy to recognise that we have a right to ban possession of nukes?

[fergalish]

Ahhhhhhhhhhh, AT LAST, we realize that it was Fergalish's, and Hawker's sole intent to annoy Freddy. They weren't interested in logic or reason, law or justice, just annoy and chide... Haaaaa Haaaa. It was just a joke. You really are Libertarians in Socialist clothes. Ahhh, funny, *busting a gut* now.

How "Feraglishisly Absurd" and "Hawkishly Annoying"

Not so.  My intent was merely to expose the flaws in your philosophy; I can't speak for Hawker but his posts have been reasonable, coherent and pertinent.  Unfortunately, the only way to expose those flaws was to escalate the discussion to hitherto unknown levels of absurdity (unregulated nuclear weapons, raindrop-triggered nuclear weapons etc).

Here is your philosophy in a nutshell if I may permit myself, and, by your own admission, it must be logical and coherent:

1. Do no violence except to defend from imminent perceived threats to life, health or property.
2. Do not threaten or damage the life, health or property of another.
3. Honour all your contractual obligations.

Is that more or less correct?  If not, please correct it.

Items (1) and (2) are in direct contradiction with one another where two conflicting parties do not identically interpret the words "violence", "defend", "threat", "life", "health", "property", "damage" AND where the parties are not governed by a comprehensive contract covering ALL possible scenarios.

So I'm not interested in annoying you - that's not the point of a good debate, in fact it would ruin a good debate.  But your reaction here very clearly *suggests to me* that you are unable to resolve the contradiction.  Therefore: your philosophy is flawed.  Defend it or I will *conclude* that you cannot resolve the contradiction, and I will feel entitled to follow your every pro-libertarian comment on this board with a link to this thread stating that your philosophy is flawed and and you are unable to defend the accusation that your libertarianism is inherently contradictory.

So, if we're willing to accept such an absurdity, then yes, "business prevails" logically follows as a violence inhibitor.  

Even then it doesn't work because there's no governing body forcing anything to abide by those agreements.

I sign a contract with you that says if your kid gets hurt in my store, I'll pay all the medical bills.
Sure enough, your kid gets hurt in my store.
You come and ask for money for the medical bills.
I laugh in your face and tell you pound sand - "make me pay out".
Your only option is to resort to violence to hold me to the contract.

There's just no way around it.  It's the nature of our world.  Violence will always be the ultimate decider of whose ideas prevail.  This is why we have a centralized, democratic government that holds the biggest gun, and we all contribute to it to make mutually benefitial rules that we all agree to live by.  Without that centralized power, the man with the biggest gun will make ALL the rules, all by himself.

I agree with you, it is the nature of people and of the world; but try stretching your credulity to the point where, should my kid get hurt, and the owner doesn't pay, then the contractually specified court would convict the store owner and either the court-specified enforcement agency enforces the contract or, irrespective of the prices he offers, everybody stops shopping there because they don't trust the owner to safely operate a store and/or abide by his contractual obligations.

I mean, like that, it could work - I mean IF EVERY SINGLE PERSON THE WHOLE WORLD WIDE suddenly changed their nature and started behaving honestly, it might work.  Except in situations where an honest conflict arises because both parties honestly consider themselves in the right AND no mediator is specified, Fred & b2c have still not proposed an alternative to violence and therefore "MightMakesWinnerMakesRight".

[fergalish]

If I am obliged to allow you to bring your normal nuclear weapon into a crowded city, even though I consider it to be extremely risky and hazardous, are you then obliged to allow some crackpot umbrella-maker to bring his raindrop-triggered nuclear weapon into the city, even though *you* consider *that* to be extremely risky and hazardous?

To put it another way: is "freakishly absurd" just how *you* define it, or should we come up with a common definition that we all can understand and agree with?

Fred, b2c and any other libertarian: do you dare to answer these questions?


edit:

• Do I, or do I not, have the right to immediately defend myself, with mortal violence if necessary, as soon as I perceive a threat to my life?
• Do you, or do you not, have the right to carry a gun into a room where you and I are discussing the solution to a mutual conflict?

Question 1: Yes. Question 2: It depends. Who owns the room?

And you have still to answer question 2 in the circumstances where possession of a gun is not addressed in the t&c, if any, of the room where we stand.

[AyeYo]

then the contractually specified court would convict the store owner and either the court-specified enforcement agency enforces the contract

Exactly, so we're back to violence again.  There's no way around it.


You're right though.  If everyone in the world magically turned into perfect, god-like beings with ZERO variance in opinion, it would work.  And if everyone in the world grew wings we could fly.  But what do those idiotic fantasies have to do with discussing real-world issues?  They can't seem to see the irrelevance.

[NghtRppr]

By your logic a sharpened pencil is a weapon 

There is no hard and fast rule of what counts as a weapon. That's the point.

Stop avoiding the main issue; if I do prove that a nuke is a threat to me regardless of whether the owner intends violence, are you happy to recognise that we have a right to ban possession of nukes?

I've already addressed this. I guess you weren't paying attention. (See: this post) I'll go over it again though. It depends on what you mean by threat. If you simply mean that it's dangerous then no. If you mean that it's mere existence shows intent to cause you harm then you have the right to defend yourself. However, that's complete nonsense. The mere existence of a gun doesn't show intent to cause you harm. Pointing it at you does. Since you don't need to aim a nuclear bomb (for the most part) then it takes something else to show intent, some overt gesture.

o·vert /ōˈvərt/
Adjective: Done or shown openly; plainly or readily apparent, not secret or hidden.

That's the key word.

[FredericBastiat]

You're right though.  If everyone in the world magically turned into perfect, god-like beings with ZERO variance in opinion, it would work.  And if everyone in the world grew wings we could fly.  But what do those idiotic fantasies have to do with discussing real-world issues?  They can't seem to see the irrelevance.

Nobody said nothing bad would happen in a Libertarian world. It's just the only ideology that has the fewest 'is-ought' constructs and logical incompatibilities. Your Socialist/Communist/Oligarchy/Fascist/Name-you-flavor-of-might-makes-right world isn't perfect either, in fact, far from it. I can point out more logical inconsistencies in your ideology than you can in mine. Libertarianism starts with the NAP and builds on that, yours is just majority rules, personal liberties be damned.

But of course you will say that libertarian ideas are too "simplistic" and we must "complicate" them because of the "real world", and due to these supposed "real world" problems, it's just easier to threaten violence upon your neighbor to achieve your goal, than envision some other way. There's more than one way to "skin a cat", and thus, not all means to an end should be justified. I know of one too many politicians, dictators, kings, princes, and thugs that espouse that sort of poppycock.

[Hawker]

By your logic a sharpened pencil is a weapon 

There is no hard and fast rule of what counts as a weapon. That's the point.

Stop avoiding the main issue; if I do prove that a nuke is a threat to me regardless of whether the owner intends violence, are you happy to recognise that we have a right to ban possession of nukes?

I've already addressed this. I guess you weren't paying attention. (See: this post) I'll go over it again though. It depends on what you mean by threat. If you simply mean that it's dangerous then no. If you mean that it's mere existence shows intent to cause you harm then you have the right to defend yourself. However, that's complete nonsense. The mere existence of a gun doesn't show intent to cause you harm. Pointing it at you does. Since you don't need to aim a nuclear bomb (for the most part) then it takes something else to show intent, some overt gesture.

o·vert /ōˈvərt/
Adjective: Done or shown openly; plainly or readily apparent, not secret or hidden.

That's the key word.

Lets move from theoretical to something we both know works.

In Ireland and the UK, we regulate fertiliser sales to avoid the making of huge truck bombs.   I'm guessing the US does something similar after Oklahoma.  It has saved thousands of lives.  Empirically we know this works.

Do you feel that regulation is legitimate?

[NghtRppr]

By your logic a sharpened pencil is a weapon 

There is no hard and fast rule of what counts as a weapon. That's the point.

Stop avoiding the main issue; if I do prove that a nuke is a threat to me regardless of whether the owner intends violence, are you happy to recognise that we have a right to ban possession of nukes?

I've already addressed this. I guess you weren't paying attention. (See: this post) I'll go over it again though. It depends on what you mean by threat. If you simply mean that it's dangerous then no. If you mean that it's mere existence shows intent to cause you harm then you have the right to defend yourself. However, that's complete nonsense. The mere existence of a gun doesn't show intent to cause you harm. Pointing it at you does. Since you don't need to aim a nuclear bomb (for the most part) then it takes something else to show intent, some overt gesture.

o·vert /ōˈvərt/
Adjective: Done or shown openly; plainly or readily apparent, not secret or hidden.

That's the key word.

Lets move from theoretical to something we both know works.

In Ireland and the UK, we regulate fertiliser sales to avoid the making of huge truck bombs.   I'm guessing the US does something similar after Oklahoma.  It has saved thousands of lives.  Empirically we know this works.

Do you feel that regulation is legitimate?

No regulations are legitimate. Only self-defense is legitimate. This is getting tedious.