Voluntarism, Minarchism & What if True Utilitarianism Requires Libertarian Non Aggression Self Ownership?

in philosophy •  7 years ago  (edited)

“The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.”

I think a voluntary society is possible and preferable. What I worry is the conflicts that must be overcome, perhaps by one generation that shuts down a prison war society premised on institutionalized state violence may devolve eventually by generations of people that do not understand the importance of structures in place. Perhaps some level of minimum guaranteed financing for sufficient incentives for specific deterrence creating and enforcing a private voluntary culture of non aggression would be preferable to some devolution. Now financing such collective good as specific deterrence against aggression does not have to be financed by taxation, perhaps taxation is an effective means toward overcoming free rider problems, but whether it is necessary I do not think has been proven. And if we want to competitively price it, if we had all the mass surveillance apparatuses deployed toward deterring actual crimes that have victims, then we might be able to significantly cut back existing structures that manage the criminal “justice” system.

For me the best two arguments for state intervention are 1. overcoming free rider problems for some “minarchic” level of state regulation, 2. internalization of externalities. Until we can quantify pollution on a micro level and make it so those who pollute directly must pay sufficient prices to neighbors to consent to pollution, or only do such industry in an area where they own all the land in which the pollution would reside, I think there is some merit to intervention, until we have an ideal system where people can only do stuff where they either own all the property altered by the conduct or they pay voluntary pries to all property that’s value is modified by their conduct.

Recently, I have been engaging more with some of my friends who are socialists many who like Dennis Kucinich running for Democratic nomination for governor of Ohio. I perceive many of these people’s main objection to Libertarian minimum/to none level of government is that they believe such a system would quickly resolve into a facist system of with a corporate ruling class—which somehow is not what we currently have. I think a big misunderstanding that libertarianism does not adequately address in the marketplace of ideas currently with statists is that just because we do not want wealth redistribution, or want private roads, or we do not want public schools does not mean we are for poverty, leaving in a primitive society with little decent infrastructure, or want large groups of uneducated people. Instead, a counter that doesn’t seem to penetrate the market place of ideas is that we just do not want institutionalized state violence exacting tribute from people for any reason instead we want a society in which people choose where their dollar goes to. Many may think that education that the parent, but more importantly the child values, is what is important, not supporting armies of bueaurcracy. In the internet age do we really need people getting paid high salaries managing our kids for 8 hours a day? If people can really learn so much how are American high schools not printing out lawyers and doctors after 18 years of 8 hour days 30 some weeks a year? How possibly can people get GED’s without devoting years of their lives to studying this stuff? I’m not saying it’s not worth it to have kids get daily lectures from intellectuals about important stuff, but can they really absorb such a high pay rate of input for 8 hours, or could costs be shrunk and have it be 30min or a little longer of an important lecture, then the rest of the time doing online courses they are interested in or getting excersize or doing art or music when they choose?

It is not that we do not want roads, but we want to have choices. We do not want to be forced to subsidize roads with our taxes we want full control of the infrastructure we use and its quality, we believe the market will provide better options that the market craves.

Now a little background about my philosophical bent. Now not every libertarian necessarily wants to end poverty. But none of them want a system where those who do want to end poverty are not permitted to. Myself I would ideally like a global guaranteed minimum income for all humans worldwide. Ideally such system would be financed voluntarily. But until we have a voluntary society, I think replacing the entire federal government, or perhaps all parts not part of a “night watchmen” role such as perhaps, fbi, courts, military, maybe even a little epa—but no fda nonsense with a $10k guaranteed annual income. The 2014 US budget seemed like it was around $3.2 trillion with another hundred billion or so in deficit spending as well as the budgets of state and local governments not inclusive. For 330 million residents my vision would cost $3.3 trillion. Now I don’t know about you, but I’d prefer another $10k in my pocket and ever other US resident and no drug war and no war on drugs.

For me, Robert Nozick’s “Anarchy, State and Utopia” brought me toward minarchism and anarchy. I think it is an exceptional read about how Libertarinism is Utilitarianism but Utilitarianism is not Libertarianism. Another book that really changed my perspective when I was a big statist, was Jeremy Rifkin’s end of work. Previously I used to be concerned about money in politics, inequality, climate change and unemployment. Now I am concerned about poverty, institutionalized state violence, mass surveillance and biodiversity.

We live with the most humans living at the highest standard of living of all time in recorded history to my knowledge. If population had not continue to explode over the twentieth century, I wonder if there would still be poverty. Previously I was convinced the best solution to our society run amok was that we needed to organize on the production end of the market process and force companies and others to fund the structures and goods I thought should exist. And to some extent in the pre internet age, this system may very well be the only efficient system, especially if the interests that desire intervention lack the organizational costs to organize on the consumptive end of the market process. Now thanks to the mass diffusion of internetworkred computers, the costs of social organization particularly for 1.computation, 2. coordination, 3. communication as observed in “Here Comes Everybody” by Clay Shirky. Even without internet we already were witnessing such interventions of people doing businesses that constructed the realities they wanted to live in such as the successes of Mondragon Corporation in the Basque region of spain that is a very large worker owned cooperative that has tens of thousands of employees and multi billion in revenue.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mondragon_Corporation

I am convinced now that we need not deploy government for all things or perhaps anything. I think the blockchain provides the framework that could create a guaranteed minimum income to help end poverty and facilitate free trade and peace among the people’s of the world. I think blockchain can provide the incentives necessary for major projects to protect biodiversity perhaps we should start building lochs to save the Maldives if it will be destroyed by rising sea levels. Perhaps we can change and improve our whole society tomorrow and no longer need government if we can just convince everyone that action underlined by violence, which all state action is predicated on violence is not necessary. Maybe we cannot convince them for their own lives, but perhaps we can convince those we disagree with to let us live free on our own land.

I have no problem and support letting people create their own private cities with or without guns, with or without abortion, with or without drugs, so long as people are free to leave anytime and as long as they do not initiate violence against anyone not voluntarily choosing to be subject to their jurisprudence. I have a vision of a world that embraces Duncan Timms “urban mosaic” where all the subcultures of the world can be free to live non violently how they wish. Now if we want to go in depth, perhaps there can be some overriding laws, perhaps there could be a universal enforcement against slavery and/or pedophilia or other concerns people may raise. Hopefully we will be free someday.

I conclude these words with the question for the utilitarian readers who might assert they are for maximizing aggregate utility but are convinced institutionalized state violence, and massive interventions into wage rates and regulations and state licensing are the tools toward a better world. What if libertarian minimum/non intervention actually maximizes utility? What if not having the ability to force people at the barrel of a gun to engage in decades long wars for ambiguous goals, to not have to fund incarcerating nearly 1% of US citizens behind bars, many for nonviolent crimes? What if instead of having open corruption that is embraced where municipalities bend over backwards to compete to give large firms like amazon incentives for location in their jurisdiction, where politicks embrace paying higher than market rates because arbitrarily the workers live in their area or their nation state instead of following their duty of cost minimization to the taxpayer, the one law of the market takes over that you make the best quality good at the lowest cost? What if instead of having 6,000 classified patents under the National Invention Secrecy Act of 52’ that directly inhibits technological advance, and instead of having most of human information hidden behind university and corporate paywalls via patents and copyrights—even the goddamned law in merica is mostly hidden behind Bloomberg, Weslaw and Lexis paywall, despite the clearly false pretense of the law being for and by the people. That instead of talking about condemning people to pointless jobs a machine can do so the bureaucrats can manage the poor we utilize automation to liberate all human labor and enable everyone who wants to learn anything to do so, we would probably have a start trek enterprise by now and most diseases cured if we quit letting central planners design inefficiencies and instead prevent current interventions designed to create a breakaway civilization of those at the top and those without the licensing.

I think it very well may be the case protecting the right to self ownership and the non aggression principle provide an important framework that if finally respected combined with the inherently neutral/positive sum game of the enlightened self interest of voluntary exchange would realize actual aggregate utility maximization. And sure one might cite Barrington Moore for some reason that “No bourgouis, No Democracy,” but why must we force people into collectives and force them to share their fates with people who will only subtract from an individual’s utility? I have not been convined that inequality is inherently bad, if the lowest lot lived as Kings and the highest lot lived as gods is that so bad, or is even that level of inequality bad? If the alternate is poverty and endless pointless war, than I am even less convinced.


Author unlicenses any copyright interest in this article, but also does not give any warranties


Any copyrightable material created by the article’s author is released into the public domain. Images and video used are from Pixabay and other sources and may also be unlicensed. If you have questions about what this means and what you can do perhaps hire an attorney since your law is so complex.

Federalist No 62

“The internal effects of a mutable policy are still more calamitous. It poisons the blessing of liberty itself. It will be of little avail to the people, that the laws are made by men of their own choice, if the laws be so voluminous that they cannot be read, or so incoherent that they cannot be understood; if they be repealed or revised before they are promulgated, or undergo such incessant changes that no man, who knows what the law is to-day, can guess what it will be to-morrow. Law is defined to be a rule of action; but how can that be a rule, which is little known, and less fixed? Another effect of public instability is the unreasonable advantage it gives to the sagacious, the enterprising, and the moneyed few over the industrious and uniformed mass of the people. Every new regulation concerning commerce or revenue, or in any way affecting the value of the different species of property, presents a new harvest to those who watch the change, and can trace its consequences; a harvest, reared not by themselves, but by the toils and cares of the great body of their fellow-citizens. This is a state of things in which it may be said with some truth that laws are made for the FEW, not for the MANY.”
Authors get paid when people like you upvote their post.
If you enjoyed what you read here, create your account today and start earning FREE STEEM!
Sort Order:  

very interesting post

your comment could be on any post, recommend at least making it more meaningful especially if your gonna upvote yourself bc people downvote your kind of comment.

sorry i edited my post, wanted to say thank you

I will look into this thanks for advice. I am trying to improve, hope will passage of time I will improve

Great stuff, we are thinking alike, I made a post a while back how blockchain technology could create a voluntary based tax system. Each can choose what sector they contribute towards. Another point you mentioned was the education system, A good read that follows your spark idea is Open by David Price. he discusses alternative future education models based on choice and technology learning. a Very interesting read for an inquiring mind like yours. Thanks for the post.. Peace.

will have to check that out, yea i think the current educational system and its costs are truly despicable.

your right, I like what you said about paying for the pollution we put out as individuals or as corporations. Most of all, I agree more on having FREEDOM over ourselves what we choose to do as long as harms no other. I have and have known people who have been incarcerated for absurd amounts of time or for petty crimes, or locked away on hearsay just because of someones social status. Sorry I didn't go into earlier I was very tired. Anyway I hope we can learn from eachother

cool yea big book from the Chicago school of sociology i beleive

i hope i cleared it up a bit for ya friend, again i wanted to say something was just really tired :-)

"Peace" should be the word of the millenium, as it is one of the hardest attributes to achieve.

yea, hopefully we will realize a peaceful and free world someday

You think that the people we have in this period of time would keep this ideology? I found insight on your words, and people should think out of the box with this matters. Up vote for you

thanks, I think people are becoming less and less pleased with arbitrary centralized power, at least in US as we see with increased libertarian attitudes on weed and gay equality witnessed in trends in General Social Survey.

10 out of 10 for this great and enlightening

thanks, glad you liked it, I enjoy discussing philosop0hy

Good work,nic post.

thank you, your comment tho could be on any post, recommend making more meaningful bc people downvote spammy comments.

if the conflicts are overcome or somewhat minimised ...i think this socitety can grow hugely as a whole

yea, i think the best way to overcome them is through nonviolence and respect for human dignity.

Upvoted, resteemed, shared on twitter, and followed. Don’t stop sharing your thoughts!

thanks a lot, hope steemin has been going well for you!!

So Good I re-read this post Great Content very well thought out and Im hoping others really appreciate this Post! Awesome!

thanks, glad you enjoyed it, hope the week has been going well for you!!

very interesting your post friend greeting from venezuela.

thanks, seems like steem is getting big down there? Hope the days have been going well for you!!

This post has received a 2.08 % upvote from @boomerang thanks to: @fatkat

Sorry to comment here. I have sent 1.5 sbd but didnt get upvoted, plz follow up on this thnx @boomerang

Barrington Moore is the man: “No bourgouis, No Democracy,”
He would most def be a whale in Steemit

yea he seems like was an intelligent elite.

Thank you fatkat for making a transfer to me for an upvote of 1.41% on this post!

Half of your bid goes to @budgets which funds growth projects for Steem like our top 25 posts on Steem!

The other half helps holders of Steem power earn about 60% APR on a delegation to me!

For help, will you please visit https://jerrybanfield.com/contact/ because I check my discord server daily?

To learn more about Steem, will you please use http://steem.guide/ because this URL forwards to my most recently updated complete Steem tutorial?

Nice story

what was nice about it? people downvote comments that can be on any post and are not meaningful

You got a 13.90% upvote from @postpromoter courtesy of @fatkat!

Want to promote your posts too? Check out the Steem Bot Tracker website for more info. If you would like to support the development of @postpromoter and the bot tracker please vote for @yabapmatt for witness!

We live in a society which is so dominated by positional classification which refers to ones position in the society. We don't prefer rank classification which is actually defined by ones technical or non technical abilities. Positional ones always dominate the rank ones. Higher salaries are meant for the people who have political favours or organisational favours. We neglect the labour class who put all their blood and sweat in making the organisation to achieve its goal. We just need to do a good human supervision and plus added monetary benefits on this class just to balance out the behavioural approach in general

Possibly, I think Robert Nozick makes a convincing case for inequality in "Anarchy, State and Utopia"

I will have to go through it .

it's pretty good, has some great ideas

You got a 5.59% upvote from @buildawhale courtesy of @fatkat!
If you believe this post is spam or abuse, please report it to our Discord #abuse channel.

If you want to support our Curation Digest or our Spam & Abuse prevention efforts, please vote @themarkymark as witness.

Release the Kraken! You got a 16.18% upvote from @seakraken courtesy of @fatkat!

This post has received a 19.14% UpGoat from @shares. Send at least 0.1 SBD to @shares with a post link in the memo field.

Invest your Steem Power and help minnow at the same time to support our daily curation initiative. Delegate Steem Power (SP) to @shares by clicking one of the following links: 1000 SP, 5000 SP or more. Join us at https://steemchat.com/ discord chat.

Support my owner. Please vote @Yehey as Witness - simply click and vote.

very good..

what was very good, your comment could be on any post, beware people downvote this kind of comment

Congratulations @fatkat, this post is the most rewarded post (based on pending payouts) in the last 12 hours written by a Superuser account holder (accounts that hold between 1 and 10 Mega Vests). The total number of posts by Superuser account holders during this period was 1359 and the total pending payments to posts in this category was $13403.02. To see the full list of highest paid posts across all accounts categories, click here.

If you do not wish to receive these messages in future, please reply stop to this comment.

I agree with you when you say that Blockchain has the potential to change governments. Its really a strange thought, something we wouldn't have thought about a few years ago.
I can't really say anything except lets see how it goes! First currency, then the world!

yep i imagine the power dynamics will be significantly different in 10 years, unless the power elite can recapture internet and blockchain by then

Personally, this appealed to me. Your school of thought is apt. I do hope I will get to see more of you, Cheers.

thanks, yea love posting on steem, thanks again!!

good information, follow @virusteem

kinda spammy comment, people downvote short comments that beg for upvotes and follows

awesome post :D

thanks, but your comment can be on any post, recommend making more meaningful comments about the content, you risk downvotes with your style of comment

Excellent post! And thanks for giving me two more books for my reading list.
I am gravitating towards voluntaryism, but also with some reservations similar to yours. I do think there are some things that the State has improved (although maybe a good argument could convince me otherwise - I'm still finding my way in this).
I'm from the UK, and many people here are still haunted by memories of life before the NHS. For many of us, the urban poverty that Dickens wrote about is etched in our DNA. If we didn't have child labour laws for example, would that nightmare return?
Having said that, going into the city centre yesterday in freezing cold weather and seeing homeless people everywhere, still in their sleeping bags, makes me wonder what our "civilisation" has really achieved.

Yea i think it is despicable poverty still exists in the age of technological abundance. Not saying government coercive intervention is the solution, but it can overcome free rider problems.

Hi I am following your articles they are nice.

thanks, your comment is ambiguous and could be on any post, recommend making more meaningful if you dont want to risk downvotes from others

Thank you for your advice and appreciation plz support upvote me

Upvote and Follow me. From Aceh, Indonesia to the world :) @aceh.wonderful

No, recommend not begging for things, people downvote that on steem

Your post is very nice and useful. I like it and I need support from someone like you

no, you risk downvotes begging for support and making comments that are meaningless and can be on any post

i m new on steemit

Generic comments could be mistaken for spam.

Tips to avoid being flagged

Thank You! ⚜

why would you post this here, you risk downvotes making meaningless comments that do not deal with the content

içerik çok güzel

sorry im ignant merican

nice post

nope, and you risk downvotes begging and making worthless comments

Good read. I hope you'll have some works like these in the future.

hope to enjoy discussing making a free society!!

This post has received a 13.88% upvote from thanks to: @fatkat.
For more information, click here!!!!
Send minimum 0.050 SBD|STEEM to bid for votes.


Do you know, you can also earn daily passive income simply by delegating your Steem Power to @minnowhelper by clicking following links: 10SP, 100SP, 500SP, 1000SP or Another amount

  ·  7 years ago Reveal Comment

I agree with you, which is obvious, because I am a libertarian / minarchist, but in what I do not agree, it is in the proposal of a universal basic income, because I think it would not solve the problem, I think the only way eradicating poverty is producing more wealth in a competitive free market, so that costs go down and goods become accessible to the poorest people, who obviously have to work to earn their share.

yea i just think that the "Luddite Fallacy" that the net amount of jobs does not decrease with technological advance will expire soon if it has not, so do not understand how you envision people making any income even if goods are cheaper when robots destroy many jobs?

I Agree With You SIr

thanks, glad you liked it, you commen tho could be on any post so you risk downvotes keeping it ambiguous

You got a 9.10% upvote from @mercurybot courtesy of @fatkat!

  ·  7 years ago Reveal Comment

You got a 24.57% upvote from @bid4joy courtesy of @fatkat!

  ·  7 years ago Reveal Comment

This post has received gratitude of 9.60 % from @appreciator thanks to: @fatkat.

This is a long read and I am just to tired to get through it but will return.

c'est la vie, hope you have been doing well bud!!

==What if True Utilitarianism Requires Libertarian Non Aggression Self Ownership?===

That is the implication of one of the principles of the Libertarian Party Radical Caucus. Very few understand it - there is no essential conflict between natural rights and utilitarianism. Trolley be damned.

Yea, i think the truly interesting thing for statists "utilitarians" that literally they will never maximize utility if their approach is distortionary economic interventions one after another.

You got a 10.23% upvote from @ipromote courtesy of @fatkat!
If you believe this post is spam or abuse, please report it to our Discord #abuse channel.

If you want to support our Curation Digest or our Spam & Abuse prevention efforts, please vote @themarkymark as witness.

Interesting read.

From a quick scan you think you seem support libertarians but much of what you discuss seems to lean towards to the socialist side of things. Universal minimum income and education but somehow don't want anybody to organize it but that it should just happen happenstance.

now if you are an anarchist i can understand a complaint, but BIG/GMI is not inconsistent with minarchy necessarily. perhaps dont make a quick scan and assume what people think?

Interesting, and comprehensive too.
Have you read Anarchy, State and Utopia, by Robert Nozick? If not, you really should as he was developing a lot of similar ideas - it's a pity he never lived to see the advent of blockchain technology.

yea, i mention the book in the post? yea i imagine he would be very intrigued by blockchain

Wow, how did I miss that? I must have been tired when I read this last night.

c'est la vie, great book though, if your at anarchapulco hit me up, hope things are going well, thanks for your ideas!!

Thank you for sharing friend. The bit about pollution really spoke to me. I never thought of it as a system inwhich my pollution could adversly affect my neighbor and there for it is unjust. That's truly fanstic though <3

Keep on spreading the good word friend!

Iexcuse me sher ya @fatkat