Curt Doolittle

Form: Reply

  • My Criticism Of David Miller Is A Very Limited One

    —“What, if i may ask, is your criticism of Miller? it would be interesting to see if it holds water”— Ayelam Valentine Agaliba
    (reposted for archival purposes)


    [V]al,

    I don’t disagree with Miller’s multiple “standards of justice”. I just would state it very differently, as necessities, demands, incentives, and evolutionary strategies. I mean, I say the same thing. I just say it very differently.) That said, standard of logical decidability in all matters is provided by one universal moral rule that is necessary – but we can build infinitely complex systems upon it. That one rule provides us with Decidability in law regardless of construction of social norms, and that single, necessary inescapable, universal logical test is very different from the contractual terms by which we construct social orders out of various exchanges, and inside of which we produce multiple standards of justice.

    One thought: (A Criticism)
    —“By mistakenly supposing that thinking intelligently is identical with
    thinking logically, critical thinking textbooks almost invariably regard the purpose of argument to be a combination of justification and persuasion, authoritarian goals that critical rationalists, and other supporters of the open society, must shun. “— David Miller

    (Abstract)
    Well, his criticism is correct, in that our populace is being taught very bad (justificationary ideas). But then, he doesn’t solve the problem. Popper’s argument is much narrower than Miller intuits.

    So, I think that this is not quite right. Instead:
    (a) I must justify my actions in accordance with objective morality, local norms and laws. (I must show that I met terms of the contract for cooperation – thus if I err I am blameless and free of restitution.)
    (b) I must warranty my testimony is truthful by critically prosecuting it.
    (c) I must(can) Innovate (reason / Develop Theories) by any free associative principle possible.
    I believe that is the correct hierarchy. Because it is a NECESSARY hierarchy. Just as these are necessary hierarchies:
    (a) Tautology, Deduction, Induction, Abduction, Guessing, and Free associating.
    (b) Teleological ethics, deontological ethics, virtue ethics, and intuitionistic ethics.
    (c) Murder, violence, theft, fraud, omission, indirection, socialization, free riding, privatization, rent seeking, corruption, conspiracy, conversion, invasion, conquest, and destruction.
    (d) manners, ethics, morals, laws, constitutions, property.
    (e) life, movement, memory, cost, property, cooperation, norms, property rights laws, government, state, empire.

    So, I while I understand Miller’s assumption, he is making a mistake of ‘one-ness’ or ‘monopoly’ that is a byproduct of some rather structural errors implicit in the use of logic in the discipline of philosophy. Which, if were instead, express not as manipulation of sets (which is how he works if I remember correctly) , but as a sequence of possible actions (existentially possible categories of actions), then he might not make this mistake. I mean, it seems that falsification is a hammer, and everything appears to be a nail. But at some point this is nothing but framing (using concepts one has specialization in, rather than integrating those concepts into the greater whole.

    And in this case, the greater whole, is the universal language of truth telling: science. And until insights obtained through logical analysis can be converted into truthful speech (scientific language) then it remains UNFALSIFIED. <– ***Which is my underlying argument.***

    One of the things economics teaches you is to think about equilibrating processes that negate all our actions into the realm of marginal indifference, rather than seeking binary truth of states.

    So I would argue that we should be taught the following:
    1) Manners, ethics, and Morality under the Golden Rule, Silver Rule, and the one-rule of property and voluntary exchange. The miracle of cooperation. How we insure one another in a multitude of ways.
    2) Truthfulness, Witness and Testimony (Operationalism and Existential Possibility) as well as how to spot errors in truthfulness, witness, and testimony.
    3) Logic, Grammar, Rhetoric, Debate and Oratory (as we once were), including how to spot ignorance, error, bias, deception, and Loading-Framing-Overloading (“Suggestion that overwhelms reason”).
    4) External Correspondence (empirical observation, analysis and testing) with a nod to Instrumentalism. And how to falsify external correspondence. What a pseudoscience is, and how to spot it.
    5) How to use free association (what we call ‘creativity’) “Filling the shelves of your mind, and then ‘playing’. Which is a discipline if you work at it. (It’s my preferred discipline.)
    6) arithmetic, accounting, finance, economics (in that order)
    7) Mathematics, Algebra, Geometry and Trigonometry, and at least the ‘idea’ of calculus. But taught as the history of the development of these problems that people were solving, instead of as wrote. With far more emphasis on word problems.
    8) Mind. Biology. Chemistry, Physics, (in that order)

    And honestly, I think all philosophy is discardable except as an interesting inquiry into the intellectual history of the struggle to develop science: Truth telling.

    I hope this puts my criticism of Miller in perspective.

    Curt Doolittle

  • My Criticism Of David Miller Is A Very Limited One

    —“What, if i may ask, is your criticism of Miller? it would be interesting to see if it holds water”— Ayelam Valentine Agaliba
    (reposted for archival purposes)


    [V]al,

    I don’t disagree with Miller’s multiple “standards of justice”. I just would state it very differently, as necessities, demands, incentives, and evolutionary strategies. I mean, I say the same thing. I just say it very differently.) That said, standard of logical decidability in all matters is provided by one universal moral rule that is necessary – but we can build infinitely complex systems upon it. That one rule provides us with Decidability in law regardless of construction of social norms, and that single, necessary inescapable, universal logical test is very different from the contractual terms by which we construct social orders out of various exchanges, and inside of which we produce multiple standards of justice.

    One thought: (A Criticism)
    —“By mistakenly supposing that thinking intelligently is identical with
    thinking logically, critical thinking textbooks almost invariably regard the purpose of argument to be a combination of justification and persuasion, authoritarian goals that critical rationalists, and other supporters of the open society, must shun. “— David Miller

    (Abstract)
    Well, his criticism is correct, in that our populace is being taught very bad (justificationary ideas). But then, he doesn’t solve the problem. Popper’s argument is much narrower than Miller intuits.

    So, I think that this is not quite right. Instead:
    (a) I must justify my actions in accordance with objective morality, local norms and laws. (I must show that I met terms of the contract for cooperation – thus if I err I am blameless and free of restitution.)
    (b) I must warranty my testimony is truthful by critically prosecuting it.
    (c) I must(can) Innovate (reason / Develop Theories) by any free associative principle possible.
    I believe that is the correct hierarchy. Because it is a NECESSARY hierarchy. Just as these are necessary hierarchies:
    (a) Tautology, Deduction, Induction, Abduction, Guessing, and Free associating.
    (b) Teleological ethics, deontological ethics, virtue ethics, and intuitionistic ethics.
    (c) Murder, violence, theft, fraud, omission, indirection, socialization, free riding, privatization, rent seeking, corruption, conspiracy, conversion, invasion, conquest, and destruction.
    (d) manners, ethics, morals, laws, constitutions, property.
    (e) life, movement, memory, cost, property, cooperation, norms, property rights laws, government, state, empire.

    So, I while I understand Miller’s assumption, he is making a mistake of ‘one-ness’ or ‘monopoly’ that is a byproduct of some rather structural errors implicit in the use of logic in the discipline of philosophy. Which, if were instead, express not as manipulation of sets (which is how he works if I remember correctly) , but as a sequence of possible actions (existentially possible categories of actions), then he might not make this mistake. I mean, it seems that falsification is a hammer, and everything appears to be a nail. But at some point this is nothing but framing (using concepts one has specialization in, rather than integrating those concepts into the greater whole.

    And in this case, the greater whole, is the universal language of truth telling: science. And until insights obtained through logical analysis can be converted into truthful speech (scientific language) then it remains UNFALSIFIED. <– ***Which is my underlying argument.***

    One of the things economics teaches you is to think about equilibrating processes that negate all our actions into the realm of marginal indifference, rather than seeking binary truth of states.

    So I would argue that we should be taught the following:
    1) Manners, ethics, and Morality under the Golden Rule, Silver Rule, and the one-rule of property and voluntary exchange. The miracle of cooperation. How we insure one another in a multitude of ways.
    2) Truthfulness, Witness and Testimony (Operationalism and Existential Possibility) as well as how to spot errors in truthfulness, witness, and testimony.
    3) Logic, Grammar, Rhetoric, Debate and Oratory (as we once were), including how to spot ignorance, error, bias, deception, and Loading-Framing-Overloading (“Suggestion that overwhelms reason”).
    4) External Correspondence (empirical observation, analysis and testing) with a nod to Instrumentalism. And how to falsify external correspondence. What a pseudoscience is, and how to spot it.
    5) How to use free association (what we call ‘creativity’) “Filling the shelves of your mind, and then ‘playing’. Which is a discipline if you work at it. (It’s my preferred discipline.)
    6) arithmetic, accounting, finance, economics (in that order)
    7) Mathematics, Algebra, Geometry and Trigonometry, and at least the ‘idea’ of calculus. But taught as the history of the development of these problems that people were solving, instead of as wrote. With far more emphasis on word problems.
    8) Mind. Biology. Chemistry, Physics, (in that order)

    And honestly, I think all philosophy is discardable except as an interesting inquiry into the intellectual history of the struggle to develop science: Truth telling.

    I hope this puts my criticism of Miller in perspective.

    Curt Doolittle

  • THE PUBLIC IS IGNORANT, TRUE. BUT…. (from elsewhere) One minor correction. The

    THE PUBLIC IS IGNORANT, TRUE. BUT….

    (from elsewhere)

    One minor correction.

    The budget consists roughly of 1/3 defense, 1/3 mandatory payments (Social Security and Medicaid) and 1/3 discretionary payments (everything else).

    We finance 1/3 (the military), and inflate it away. The world pays for our military through indirect taxation on the price of oil bought in dollars. This was the invention that the Nixon administration achieved with the Petro-Dollar and it was how we were able to run up the credit to defeat world communism under Regan.

    So technically speaking, 1/2 is discretionary, 1/2 is for redistribution, and the remainder – the military – is effectively free.

    Possessing this knowledge radically alters your perception of the world.

    It is why Iran wants nuclear weapons – to control oil, and to create a bourse, and to capture that ability to tax currency for itself.

    Sophisticated people in the world are not stupid, nor necessarily selfish. They merely take advantage of stupid people.

    Source date (UTC): 2015-04-03 16:48:00 UTC

  • Eric Adams Eric, Wondering if you can jog my memory of one of your specialties.

    Eric Adams

    Eric,

    Wondering if you can jog my memory of one of your specialties.

    We are writing the reports for Oversing’s forecasting system. This report should should show us (graphically if possible)

    1) how forecasts are likely to play out.

    2) what is the forecast pipeline (revenue pipleline)

    3) how accurate are each pm’s forecasts at different date ranges into the future.

    And whatever else we should know.

    I have vivid memories of a lot of graphs on your monitor showing this kind of data.

    Can you tell me what you think we should show?

    Thanks

    Curt

    Source date (UTC): 2015-03-30 07:47:00 UTC

  • REGARDING: Austin, I agree, which is why I produce the philosophical work I do.

    REGARDING: https://www.facebook.com/ProducerPetersen/posts/878432462215735

    Austin,

    I agree, which is why I produce the philosophical work I do. But then, the central issue is not technology. It is that the moral and ethical basis of the rothbardian libertine movement is antithetical to the conservative, and classical liberal tradition. And it is antithetical to western civilization.

    So if you mean ‘libertarian’ in the sense that Hayek meant it: as a classical liberal ‘aristocracy of everyone’, then it is possible. If you mean ‘libertarian’ in the sense that rothbard appropriated the term just as progressives appropriated the term ‘liberal’, and where there is no prohibition on fraud, deceit, free riding. Where blackmail is considered a voluntary exchange. And where is there no provision for the production of commons. Where, in fact, libertinism is an outright attack on the commons. Then, no such reconciliation, or pairing of interests is possible. The conservative aristocratic egalitarian ethic requires the production of commons. That is our western competitive advantage.

    THE WESTERN GROUP EVOLUTIONARY STRATEGY: TRUTH TELLING

    All groups are unaware of their first-order strategies – what we call metaphysical value judgements. And we are unaware of ours.

    The west *outpaced* the rest for very simple reasons.

    1) Being poor and small in number, self financed warriors, reliant on technology and coordinated tactics to fight.

    2) Truth Telling necessary for coordinating tactics.

    3) Heroism, and Sovereignty that resulted from the demonstration of it.

    4) Property rights that resulted from heroism and sovereignty.

    5) The production of truth-telling as a normative commons, the total prohibition of involuntary transfer of every possible kind, as a normative commons, and all defended through the jury.

    7) The jury and common law system out of property, truth telling, and the development of truth as a necessary commons.

    6) The production of material commons, as a result of the total suppression of free riding.

    The status we all sought, and the Aristocracy we all sought to join, held that every man is his own sovereign, and therefore his own legislator. Retaliation against wrongdoing is his choice. And civility arises from the use of the common law to resolve conflicts between individuals by objective means: property.

    Our rate of evolution is in no small part because the common law and jury can outlaw new forms of theft faster than any state, and therefore eliminate means of rent seeking. This reduces risk.

    Our rate of evolution is in no small part because we are the only people that tell the truth – on earth. Where truth means correspondent with reality, and absent of imaginary content. And where the central purpose of courts is to identify people who are not telling the truth, and prosecuting them for it.

    Our rate of evolution is in no small part because we invented truth, and because we invented truth, we invented the jury, the rule of law, reason, science, and all the advantages that western civilization has brought to the world both in the classical and modern eras.

    Economic velocity is determined largely by the elimination of risk. The elimination of risk is determined by the degree of suppression of free riding: meaning non-productive actions: (violence, theft, fraud, fraud by omission, involuntary transfer by externality, privatizing the commons, socializing losses, rent seeking, corruption, conspiracy, and conquest).

    Demand for the state increases whenever there is a discrepancy between the means of resolving conflicts that incite retaliation, and the means of producing conflicts. As cooperation evolves in complexity so do our means of parasitism and predation. Demand for the state decreases whenever the means of dispute resolution in lie of retaliation are provided.

    Our truth telling evolved as a necessary competitive advantage. And all our western advantage over other groups evolved from the value of truth telling – despite the fact that telling the truth is a high tax for all of us to pay. And it is a tax we are all reluctant to pay. And one many seek to avoid.

    THE SUICIDAL IMMORALITY OF ROTHBARDIAN ETHICS

    The west did not succeed on libertine (rothbardian) morality – no one can. Any group demonstrating rothbardian ethics will be defeated and punished by neighbors the same way we punish piracy and white collar crime – and recently, various forms of monetary fraud. The west succeeded in outpacing all others because of the sheer breadth of our morality, which forces all people into material production by denying them (rapidly) from all forms of non-productive sustenance (free riding).

    (This is what the socialists have sought to reverse: they wish to return us to parasitism. Because it is profitable for administrators, and desirable by the unproductive, and uncompetitive.)

    And rothbard intentionally – for reasons that are obvious in retrospect – left open deceit. Liberty is not possible under deceit. Because deceit increases demand for the state as an arbiter of differences, and destroys the use of the jury.

    UNITING CONSERVATIVES AND LIBERTARIANS

    I set out to produce the intellectual framework for doing so. Because conservatives lack a rational language for advocating their ideas. No conservative has produced either a rational or ratio-scientific framework as have the marxists and the Rothbardians.

    And with that rational framework, conservatives are able to make arguments like those I make here, and defend their aristocratic, egalitarian, high trust, highly moral society, as the only one that can possibly construct liberty. And the only one that ever has constructed liberty.

    Conservatives flee into moral allegory because they lack the rational, scientific and economic basis upon which to construct an argument for their moral biases.

    Libertarians flee into rothbardian libertinism because they lack the philosophical basis to rationally argue against the intellectual errors of the enlightenment.

    IN THE END THE WESTERN ADVANTAGE IS TRUTH TELLING

    So rather than a less moral society, we require a more moral society. We must purge the state of free riding and deceit. Re-institutionalize the requirement for truthful speech. And re-institutionalize the universal prohibition on convenient falsehoods.

    It is perhaps useful to convey that the germans since Kant have tried repeatedly to develop an honest dishonesty, culminating in Heidegger. That he jewish authors: Marx, Freud, Cantor, Mises and Rothbard created pseudosciences. And that Americans have, using the soviet-financed Frankfurt school, created postmodernism, feminism, and political correctness. All of which are systemic deceits the purpose of which is to overthrow western truth telling.

    Truth matters. Liberty will be predicated upon truth. Or there shall be no liberty. And Rothbard intentionally preserved and justified deceit in his writings.

    There is no room for cunning in a moral society. Libertinism is a cunning plan. It is also an immoral one.

    I’ll try to explain why good people can be fooled by immoral argument in another comment at another time. But libertarians are just as easily fooled as any other dimension of the political triangle.

    Curt Doolittle

    The Propertarian Institute

    Kiev, Ukraine

    Source date (UTC): 2015-03-30 03:21:00 UTC

  • Do Americans Wear Outdoor-shoes Inside Their Homes As Portrayed In Tellies/movies? Don’t They Maintain Indoor Slippers/shoes Like Asians Or Others?

    Suburban America is an incredibly CLEAN place to live.  Especially because many people drive a LOT and walk very little.  So,  for many Americans, depending upon where you live, it can be seen as ‘village’ behavior – meaning that you’re used to being dirty. Or City behavior (meaning the same). And it can be pretentious (or insulting) to ask guests to remove their shoes.   Within the past few decades its become fashionable to keep house shoes inside, and separate shoes outside.

    https://www.quora.com/Do-Americans-wear-outdoor-shoes-inside-their-homes-as-portrayed-in-tellies-movies-Don’t-they-maintain-indoor-slippers-shoes-like-Asians-or-others

  • Could Feudalism Be Recreated As A System More Beneficial To The Working Classes Than Capitalism?

    We may be wealthier in all respects, but there is little difference between mandatory labor and mandatory taxation.  Mandatory taxation is more efficient than mandatory labor.  The Feudal holding today (USA) may be larger than the feudal holding in the medieval era, but just try to leave America for another country and see what the government does to you.

    https://www.quora.com/Could-feudalism-be-recreated-as-a-system-more-beneficial-to-the-working-classes-than-capitalism

  • Do Americans Wear Outdoor-shoes Inside Their Homes As Portrayed In Tellies/movies? Don’t They Maintain Indoor Slippers/shoes Like Asians Or Others?

    Suburban America is an incredibly CLEAN place to live.  Especially because many people drive a LOT and walk very little.  So,  for many Americans, depending upon where you live, it can be seen as ‘village’ behavior – meaning that you’re used to being dirty. Or City behavior (meaning the same). And it can be pretentious (or insulting) to ask guests to remove their shoes.   Within the past few decades its become fashionable to keep house shoes inside, and separate shoes outside.

    https://www.quora.com/Do-Americans-wear-outdoor-shoes-inside-their-homes-as-portrayed-in-tellies-movies-Don’t-they-maintain-indoor-slippers-shoes-like-Asians-or-others

  • Could Feudalism Be Recreated As A System More Beneficial To The Working Classes Than Capitalism?

    We may be wealthier in all respects, but there is little difference between mandatory labor and mandatory taxation.  Mandatory taxation is more efficient than mandatory labor.  The Feudal holding today (USA) may be larger than the feudal holding in the medieval era, but just try to leave America for another country and see what the government does to you.

    https://www.quora.com/Could-feudalism-be-recreated-as-a-system-more-beneficial-to-the-working-classes-than-capitalism

  • (from elsewhere) Sean Gabb, While I laud the criticism of our abstract arguments

    (from elsewhere)

    Sean Gabb,

    While I laud the criticism of our abstract arguments, I will simply point out what the data says: that libertarians fail because the left majority rejects our economic arguments, and the right rejects our moral arguments.

    As I have written about somewhat extensively by now, libertarians are, according to the evidence, morally blind. Not as morally blind as progressives, but none the less, morally blind. And we consistently make immoral arguments.

    The reason being that the extreme libertinism that we are propagating under the term ‘libertarian’ actively seeks to undermind construction of the commons, makes no demand for truth telling, nor for the ostracization and punishment of those who prevent the commons, and engage in deceit.

    However, the west – the only people ever to produce liberty in human history – accomplished this feat through means diametrically opposed to those of the libertines: (a) participation in the violent construction of individual proprety rights in order to obtain those property rights from others in exchange. (b) the violent suppression of authority wherever it arises whenever possible, (c) the violent suppression of all deceit in all forms in all walks of life wherever it occurred, (d) the production of commons and mandatory participation in that production, (e) the ostracization, deprivation and frequent murder of those who violated commons whehter normative or physical.

    Liberty is a consequence of the militia’s martial virtues.

    There is no other possible means of constructing proerty ‘rights’ except as in such an exchange. There is no possibility – an absolute impossibility – to produce an anarchic polity in a low trust society without producing demand for an authoritarian state to suppress these behaviors. Any more than there is a possiblity of producing a communist society. Why? Becuase incentives for labor under the voluntary organization of production are necessary. Just as incentives for the voluntary construction of commons is necessary. Neither property, truth telling, nor contribution to the commons are of obvious short term interest. And that is why man has rarely except in the martial peoples been able to construct truth telling, trust, property, and commons.

    Libertinism fails because it is a mere verbalism. A beggarly appeal. You cannot ask the under classes to cease their parasitism. You cannot ask the bureaucratic classes to cease their rent seeking. You cannot ask liars to stop lying when it is their means of survival. It is irrational for them to obey. In fact, maximum parasitism and rent seeking are the most rational course of action for all peoples.

    Liberty was constructed by violence. It must be constructed by violence. It has never been constructed by persuasion. Because it is not in the interest of the many. Liberty is an aristocratic virtue. The producer of goods and services cannot ignore the demands of the producer of property rights.

    And that is what libertarians are doing: carrying on an act of verbal fraud in order to avoid a trade with the producers of property rights using organize violence. They want high trust norms in exchange for the creation of order. Libertines do not want a trade. Warriors will give us our property rights in return, but only if we give them their norms.

    To ask otherwise is to perpetuate an argumentative fraud by which we make a false moral appeal that we should get what we desire at a discount, while they should sell what we desire at a discount.

    This is merely fraud.

    And this fraud is why we fail.

    Whatever happens in your home is your own business. But talking, advertising, promoting, evangelizing it is not your own business – it takes place in the normative commons. And it is that commons that conservatives produce. We merely ride upon it.

    If we want our property rights we must exchange with conservatives their want of norms. No one gets what he wants en toto. All exchanges are a compromise.

    If we exchange with conservatives, then we can crush the kleptocracy. And be the thought leaders of all.

    Otherwise we will remain the decadent, immoral, and irrelevant in all politics.

    As libertines deserve to be.

    Curt Doolittle

    The Propertarian Institute

    Source date (UTC): 2015-03-24 06:54:00 UTC