(Freedom vs Liberty) Is it just my own selection bias in action, or has the term FREEDOM been sufficiently appropriated as to mean “Positive Freedom and liberty” and LIBERTY such that it currently means “Negative Freedom and liberty”? It’s too bad we LIBERTARIANS don’t have such energetic literary activists who can put together a campaign to ‘reconstruct’ the meanings of liberty and freedom the way the marxists have, and by doing so appropriated our terminology: via editing, shaming and critique. LIBERTY IS DETERMINED BY 1) The available means of production. 2) The impact of the means of production on reproduction (family) 3) The allocation of property rights between individual, family and commons to suit production and reproduction. 4) The Freedoms and Duties we grant each other according to those rights, and the flexibility of altering those relations in response to changes in the means of production. 5) The degree of rent-seeking (corruption) by leaders of the hierarchy or network of organizations that resolve conflicts and facilitate investments (ownership or government). 6) The degree of contribution by individuals willingly paid to the extended family (commons) in exchange for status which increases their opportunities for mating, experience, and opportunity. THE STATUS ECONOMY – THE OTHER INVOLUNTARY APPROPRIATION (Government members obtain status as well as compensation and earners do not obtain status OR compensation. The need is to create status signals such that the earners are willing to contribute to the commons of their extended family. If instead, high tax payers were publicly identified and given political voice, if not political vote, then the world would be a very different place. But politicians fear this fact. And to some degree, the corrupt on both sizes are protected by their anonymity. Imagine a state of the union meeting where the top 500 taxpayers instead of 500 elected politicians, were required to give their opinions on the state of the union. )
Source: Original Site Post
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1) On The Purpose Of Scriptural Versus Rational And Ratio-scientific Ideologies. 2) On The Source Of Property Rights And Liberty.
(good read) (Quotable) “I don’t like package deals. That’s mainly the reason I don’t identify with a particular political position. If I end up looking like a libertarian, it’s only because they happen to be where I’m going anyway. I reserve the right to do my own thinking.” – Kenneth Allen Hopf COMMENT Ideologies can be as rigid as scripture to which you must adhere (totalitarianism), or mere boundary conditions that describe similar sentiments (freedom). They are both means of obtaining political power. The first is a means of coercion into dogma by threat of ostracization. The second a means of affiliation by promise of opportunity. However, both scriptural threat and sentimental promise, are predicated on the absence of ratio-scientific knowledge. In the face of evidence of what man REALLY DOES with democracy, what he does with his economy, with his social order, with his freedom, with his laws, then we no longer are faced with an era of IDEOLOGY. We are faced with the outcome of the era of ideology. And the outcome of that era is that the SUCCESS of rich democratic countries had nothing to do with their democracy. Democracy is a luxury good that was ALSO made possible wealth. THE SOURCE OF THE WEST’S WEALTH AND PROSPERITY But that wealth had nothing to do with democracy. It had to do with: 1) The aristocratic egalitarian ethics of cattle raiding, land holders, bronze, the horse, the wheel, and chariot, who used inferior numbers, and voluntary, organized, cavalry tactics that required high personal and familial investment, as well as voluntary cooperation in tactics for shared risk and gain. The tendency to adopt disruption in the form of new technology, new members, and new leaders – because enfranchisement meant rights to private property and elected leaders rather than community property and static leaders. 2) Small homogenous countries – first Pagan, but the more protestant and german the better, operating as extended families, with the high trust of extended families. 3) The prohibition on cousin-marriage out to six or ten generations, and the Absolute Nuclear Family (ANF) as the organizational unit of production AND reproduction. 4) Common law, individual property rights, and rule of law. money, accounting, interest, credit and banking. 5) The manorial system that suppressed the fertility of the underclasses, and created the ‘protestant ethic’ in all of society, by requiring conformity to good practice in order to obtain access to rented land, and reproduction. 6) The evolution of credit backed by ‘the extended family’ represented by the state. 7) Plagues that suppressed and reversed the fertility of the underclasses, and which forced the upper classes to spread into the work force. An ’empirical bias’: a preferential bias toward, and continuous development of, technical, scientific, practical solutions. We cannot tell if this bias genetic or not yet but in part, it is beginning to look like a) minority status, b) competitive value of technology to compensate for small numbers, c) balance between verbal and spatial intelligence d) habituation. 9) The discovery and conquest of the New World and the subsequent trade, at a time when a plague had wiped out vast portions of north american indians. 10) The weakness of the Ottoman empire, Indian continent and the Chinese empire, from institutional decay. (In China, the failure to develop institutions of ‘calculation’ at scale and reliance on moral rather than empirical arguments. In Arabia, the persistent problem of ignorance, tribalism, low IQ, and inbreeding.) The weakness of the colonies, and the relative disparity in technological, calculative, and social development of the rest of the world meant the easy imposition of trade. And the re-adoption of ratio-scientism as a competitive advantage in the west while the other states had either fought it off intentionally (Islamic Civilization, Chinese Civilization), or who could not for a variety of reasons make use of it (Hindu civilization). ON CALCULATION The importance of calculation was I think, discovered or at least elucidated by Weber. But calculation is important, because it is NECESSARY. Without means of calculation, as the society becomes increasingly complex, SCALE AND DYNAMISM – ADAPTATION – EVOLUTION The state is often credited with the origin of calculative technologies. But this is to overstate the ‘state’ in its primitive origins in the fertile crescent. However, these small city states had all the properties of western city states, but earlier. THey created their innovation when they were small. They LOST their innovation when they became states and empires. THE STATE CALCIFIES – EVERYTHING. PRIVATE PROPERTY DOES THE OPPOSITE. IT MAKES EVERYTHING DYNAMIC, ITERATIVE, ADAPTIVE.
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1) On The Purpose Of Scriptural Versus Rational And Ratio-scientific Ideologies. 2) On The Source Of Property Rights And Liberty.
(good read) (Quotable) “I don’t like package deals. That’s mainly the reason I don’t identify with a particular political position. If I end up looking like a libertarian, it’s only because they happen to be where I’m going anyway. I reserve the right to do my own thinking.” – Kenneth Allen Hopf COMMENT Ideologies can be as rigid as scripture to which you must adhere (totalitarianism), or mere boundary conditions that describe similar sentiments (freedom). They are both means of obtaining political power. The first is a means of coercion into dogma by threat of ostracization. The second a means of affiliation by promise of opportunity. However, both scriptural threat and sentimental promise, are predicated on the absence of ratio-scientific knowledge. In the face of evidence of what man REALLY DOES with democracy, what he does with his economy, with his social order, with his freedom, with his laws, then we no longer are faced with an era of IDEOLOGY. We are faced with the outcome of the era of ideology. And the outcome of that era is that the SUCCESS of rich democratic countries had nothing to do with their democracy. Democracy is a luxury good that was ALSO made possible wealth. THE SOURCE OF THE WEST’S WEALTH AND PROSPERITY But that wealth had nothing to do with democracy. It had to do with: 1) The aristocratic egalitarian ethics of cattle raiding, land holders, bronze, the horse, the wheel, and chariot, who used inferior numbers, and voluntary, organized, cavalry tactics that required high personal and familial investment, as well as voluntary cooperation in tactics for shared risk and gain. The tendency to adopt disruption in the form of new technology, new members, and new leaders – because enfranchisement meant rights to private property and elected leaders rather than community property and static leaders. 2) Small homogenous countries – first Pagan, but the more protestant and german the better, operating as extended families, with the high trust of extended families. 3) The prohibition on cousin-marriage out to six or ten generations, and the Absolute Nuclear Family (ANF) as the organizational unit of production AND reproduction. 4) Common law, individual property rights, and rule of law. money, accounting, interest, credit and banking. 5) The manorial system that suppressed the fertility of the underclasses, and created the ‘protestant ethic’ in all of society, by requiring conformity to good practice in order to obtain access to rented land, and reproduction. 6) The evolution of credit backed by ‘the extended family’ represented by the state. 7) Plagues that suppressed and reversed the fertility of the underclasses, and which forced the upper classes to spread into the work force. An ’empirical bias’: a preferential bias toward, and continuous development of, technical, scientific, practical solutions. We cannot tell if this bias genetic or not yet but in part, it is beginning to look like a) minority status, b) competitive value of technology to compensate for small numbers, c) balance between verbal and spatial intelligence d) habituation. 9) The discovery and conquest of the New World and the subsequent trade, at a time when a plague had wiped out vast portions of north american indians. 10) The weakness of the Ottoman empire, Indian continent and the Chinese empire, from institutional decay. (In China, the failure to develop institutions of ‘calculation’ at scale and reliance on moral rather than empirical arguments. In Arabia, the persistent problem of ignorance, tribalism, low IQ, and inbreeding.) The weakness of the colonies, and the relative disparity in technological, calculative, and social development of the rest of the world meant the easy imposition of trade. And the re-adoption of ratio-scientism as a competitive advantage in the west while the other states had either fought it off intentionally (Islamic Civilization, Chinese Civilization), or who could not for a variety of reasons make use of it (Hindu civilization). ON CALCULATION The importance of calculation was I think, discovered or at least elucidated by Weber. But calculation is important, because it is NECESSARY. Without means of calculation, as the society becomes increasingly complex, SCALE AND DYNAMISM – ADAPTATION – EVOLUTION The state is often credited with the origin of calculative technologies. But this is to overstate the ‘state’ in its primitive origins in the fertile crescent. However, these small city states had all the properties of western city states, but earlier. THey created their innovation when they were small. They LOST their innovation when they became states and empires. THE STATE CALCIFIES – EVERYTHING. PRIVATE PROPERTY DOES THE OPPOSITE. IT MAKES EVERYTHING DYNAMIC, ITERATIVE, ADAPTIVE.
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(CORE) We Cannot Think Without Metaphysical Biases
Given that Don Finnegan has just hit a nerve by reminding me about Friedman’s perspective on Irish Law, I’m going to throw something out here that may not be as obvious and important as it seems. As usual it might take me a bit to get there. But I think it’s worth the journey. 1) MAN MUST SENSE 2) MAN MUST PERCEIVE 3) MAN MUST REMEMBER 4) MAN MUST CALCULATE (PLAN) 5) MAN MUST CHOOSE. 6) MAN MUST ACT ON HIS CHOICE, AND HAS NOT EMPIRICALLY DEMONSTRATED HIS CHOICE UNTIL HE HAS ACTED. 7) MAN MUST CHOOSE WITH INSUFFICIENT INFORMATION, BECAUSE OUTWITTING NATURE IS HIS ONLY CHANCE FOR PROFIT. It is impossible to make guesses without some basis for decision. And every civilization constructs a set of narratives that contain those metaphysical means of decision making. Those rules or guidelines, or recommendations not only make decisions possible, and rational, in the presence of insufficient informaiton, but the biases contained in those metaphysical assumptions allow us to FUND by micropayments, of all kinds, our norms. We create a reality with them. And we cooperate at the metaphysical level. (We have to.) We couldn’t think otherwise. The truth is that in almost no circumstance can humans make decisions as a group without shared metaphysical assumptions. Sure, without property man cannot form a division of knowledge and labor. But without metaphysical value judgements groups cannot cooperate at all. We have a healthy literature of cultural differences in cognition. Cultural differences in verbal and spatial intelligence, and cultural and genetic differences in the distribution of intelligence. The east and west differ between emphasis on verb and noun, on connectivity versus particularism. On constitution versus Shape. Most importantly, they differ ON BALANCE VERSUS TRANSFORMATION: “The purpose of man is to bend nature to his will, and to leave the world better for having lived in it”. That is the western metaphysics. Almost everything can be reduced to that statement of individual action. “Truth and debate mean the rapid resolution of differences by conflict” (See Donald Kagan); versus deception and delay until matters resolve themselves in the eastern sense (See Kissinger and Huntington.) And for example Jewish civilization and western civilization vary between the rebellious ethics of the bazaar and ghetto (Rothbardian ethics) and the land owning ethics and morality of the aristocratic egalitarians in the high trust society. These are metaphysical group assumptions that constitute the primary means of decision making for each group given it’s evolutionary strategy. LIBERTARIAN ERRORS For example, in the we often talk about Bouridans’ ass. The problem when you must choose between two orange vendors both offering equal oranges at equal prices. How do you choose? The only thing interesting about any exchange is this very question. Why? Because in large, any commodity is chosen not on price, or on consumption value, but on signal value, and the signal we most often pay for is contribution to our commons. ie: price is meaningless, since it is rarely what is purchased. We largely pay for signals and norms, and we pay for our factions and our preferences. And therefore all the Misesian and Rothbardian ordinal arguments to price are meaningless outside of commodities trading, and nothing at all to do with social order AT ALL PERIOD. In, fact, it is quite easy to case Rothbard and Mises as continuing the cultural tradition of intentionally ignoring the normative economy of land holders as a means of rebelling against it. When I first heard this argument from Dr Herbner, I was kind of stupefied that Misesians thought clearing preferences was ordinal predicated on price rather than a network (technically a graph) predicated largely on signals on norms, where price was merely the first marginal criteria. IN fact, the only way to argue for the ordinal versus the graph, was to argue AGAINST payment for norms, which puts Mises, Rothbard and Hayek into perspective. (And is why I criticize Mises and Rothbard. It’s why they failed.) IN OTHER WORDS WE DID NOT KONW OUR METAPHYSICS NOR WRITE IT DOWN. As such we have been largely defenseless against jewish rhetoric, and franco-germanic counter-englightenment figures, desperate to restore the church under the authority of the educational institution. Desperate to wrest control of society back into obscurant language and moral mysticism, and away from the hands of the engineers, scientists, lawyers, accountants, entrepreneurs and consumers who create and maintain the society we live in. Conservatives are largely right. But WE HAVE FAILED TO ARTICULATE FREEDOM AND LIBERTY in rational terms with MORAL DEPTH sufficient for they and their numbers to adopt in favor of the west. We can be free amongst a majority of conservatives. But we cannot be free amongst a majority of statists. The state and democracy are just communism and are antithetical to liberty, private property, common law, personal sovereignty. PROGRESSIVE LIBERTARIANISM IS TO LIBERTY WHAT THE FRANKFURT SCHOOL WAS TO CLASSICAL LIBERALISM.
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(CORE) We Cannot Think Without Metaphysical Biases
Given that Don Finnegan has just hit a nerve by reminding me about Friedman’s perspective on Irish Law, I’m going to throw something out here that may not be as obvious and important as it seems. As usual it might take me a bit to get there. But I think it’s worth the journey. 1) MAN MUST SENSE 2) MAN MUST PERCEIVE 3) MAN MUST REMEMBER 4) MAN MUST CALCULATE (PLAN) 5) MAN MUST CHOOSE. 6) MAN MUST ACT ON HIS CHOICE, AND HAS NOT EMPIRICALLY DEMONSTRATED HIS CHOICE UNTIL HE HAS ACTED. 7) MAN MUST CHOOSE WITH INSUFFICIENT INFORMATION, BECAUSE OUTWITTING NATURE IS HIS ONLY CHANCE FOR PROFIT. It is impossible to make guesses without some basis for decision. And every civilization constructs a set of narratives that contain those metaphysical means of decision making. Those rules or guidelines, or recommendations not only make decisions possible, and rational, in the presence of insufficient informaiton, but the biases contained in those metaphysical assumptions allow us to FUND by micropayments, of all kinds, our norms. We create a reality with them. And we cooperate at the metaphysical level. (We have to.) We couldn’t think otherwise. The truth is that in almost no circumstance can humans make decisions as a group without shared metaphysical assumptions. Sure, without property man cannot form a division of knowledge and labor. But without metaphysical value judgements groups cannot cooperate at all. We have a healthy literature of cultural differences in cognition. Cultural differences in verbal and spatial intelligence, and cultural and genetic differences in the distribution of intelligence. The east and west differ between emphasis on verb and noun, on connectivity versus particularism. On constitution versus Shape. Most importantly, they differ ON BALANCE VERSUS TRANSFORMATION: “The purpose of man is to bend nature to his will, and to leave the world better for having lived in it”. That is the western metaphysics. Almost everything can be reduced to that statement of individual action. “Truth and debate mean the rapid resolution of differences by conflict” (See Donald Kagan); versus deception and delay until matters resolve themselves in the eastern sense (See Kissinger and Huntington.) And for example Jewish civilization and western civilization vary between the rebellious ethics of the bazaar and ghetto (Rothbardian ethics) and the land owning ethics and morality of the aristocratic egalitarians in the high trust society. These are metaphysical group assumptions that constitute the primary means of decision making for each group given it’s evolutionary strategy. LIBERTARIAN ERRORS For example, in the we often talk about Bouridans’ ass. The problem when you must choose between two orange vendors both offering equal oranges at equal prices. How do you choose? The only thing interesting about any exchange is this very question. Why? Because in large, any commodity is chosen not on price, or on consumption value, but on signal value, and the signal we most often pay for is contribution to our commons. ie: price is meaningless, since it is rarely what is purchased. We largely pay for signals and norms, and we pay for our factions and our preferences. And therefore all the Misesian and Rothbardian ordinal arguments to price are meaningless outside of commodities trading, and nothing at all to do with social order AT ALL PERIOD. In, fact, it is quite easy to case Rothbard and Mises as continuing the cultural tradition of intentionally ignoring the normative economy of land holders as a means of rebelling against it. When I first heard this argument from Dr Herbner, I was kind of stupefied that Misesians thought clearing preferences was ordinal predicated on price rather than a network (technically a graph) predicated largely on signals on norms, where price was merely the first marginal criteria. IN fact, the only way to argue for the ordinal versus the graph, was to argue AGAINST payment for norms, which puts Mises, Rothbard and Hayek into perspective. (And is why I criticize Mises and Rothbard. It’s why they failed.) IN OTHER WORDS WE DID NOT KONW OUR METAPHYSICS NOR WRITE IT DOWN. As such we have been largely defenseless against jewish rhetoric, and franco-germanic counter-englightenment figures, desperate to restore the church under the authority of the educational institution. Desperate to wrest control of society back into obscurant language and moral mysticism, and away from the hands of the engineers, scientists, lawyers, accountants, entrepreneurs and consumers who create and maintain the society we live in. Conservatives are largely right. But WE HAVE FAILED TO ARTICULATE FREEDOM AND LIBERTY in rational terms with MORAL DEPTH sufficient for they and their numbers to adopt in favor of the west. We can be free amongst a majority of conservatives. But we cannot be free amongst a majority of statists. The state and democracy are just communism and are antithetical to liberty, private property, common law, personal sovereignty. PROGRESSIVE LIBERTARIANISM IS TO LIBERTY WHAT THE FRANKFURT SCHOOL WAS TO CLASSICAL LIBERALISM.
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BUT IS IT GENETIC?
Yes, conservatives are INNATELY more critical of free-riders: “North Eurasian and Circumpolar hunter-gatherers (Hutterites and Amish, Puritans) will be more prone to altruistic punishment than those from Middle Old World culture area (Jews, Gypsies, Chinese)” “…. *** Puritan groups seem particularly prone to bouts of moralistic outrage directed at those of their own people seen as free riders and morally blameworthy.***” -Kevin MacDonald AND SO: Whether it is cultural or genetic or both doesn’t matter so much, although I’m in the 60/40 camp in favor of genetic on this topic. And the pareto rule would suggest that as long as you’re in a 90/10 proposition or less, diversity isn’t a problem. But two things are certain: a) people don’t actually assimilate outside of their gene pool, and b) our tribal differences – our tribal DIVERSITY is something very precious for everyone. Probably the ‘cuircumpolar’ in particular. Because that individualism is economically superior to group-ishness.
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BUT IS IT GENETIC?
Yes, conservatives are INNATELY more critical of free-riders: “North Eurasian and Circumpolar hunter-gatherers (Hutterites and Amish, Puritans) will be more prone to altruistic punishment than those from Middle Old World culture area (Jews, Gypsies, Chinese)” “…. *** Puritan groups seem particularly prone to bouts of moralistic outrage directed at those of their own people seen as free riders and morally blameworthy.***” -Kevin MacDonald AND SO: Whether it is cultural or genetic or both doesn’t matter so much, although I’m in the 60/40 camp in favor of genetic on this topic. And the pareto rule would suggest that as long as you’re in a 90/10 proposition or less, diversity isn’t a problem. But two things are certain: a) people don’t actually assimilate outside of their gene pool, and b) our tribal differences – our tribal DIVERSITY is something very precious for everyone. Probably the ‘cuircumpolar’ in particular. Because that individualism is economically superior to group-ishness.
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The Melting Pot That Isn't
Data is data. Turns out that what we melt is purely scientific, legal, and commercial; and what doesn’t melt is family, morality, metaphysics, and therefore politics. Or, what I would describe in Propertarian terms, as “explicitly calculable” implicit knowledge vs “inexplicitly calculable” tacit knowledge. We can structure formal institutions only for a subset of knowledge. Myth, tradition, ritual, family, morals, ethics, and manners are something that can also be institutionalized. And that us the conservative vision: formal institutions are not enough.
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The Melting Pot That Isn’t
Data is data. Turns out that what we melt is purely scientific, legal, and commercial; and what doesn’t melt is family, morality, metaphysics, and therefore politics. Or, what I would describe in Propertarian terms, as “explicitly calculable” implicit knowledge vs “inexplicitly calculable” tacit knowledge. We can structure formal institutions only for a subset of knowledge. Myth, tradition, ritual, family, morals, ethics, and manners are something that can also be institutionalized. And that us the conservative vision: formal institutions are not enough.
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The Melting Pot That Isn't
Data is data. Turns out that what we melt is purely scientific, legal, and commercial; and what doesn’t melt is family, morality, metaphysics, and therefore politics. Or, what I would describe in Propertarian terms, as “explicitly calculable” implicit knowledge vs “inexplicitly calculable” tacit knowledge. We can structure formal institutions only for a subset of knowledge. Myth, tradition, ritual, family, morals, ethics, and manners are something that can also be institutionalized. And that us the conservative vision: formal institutions are not enough.