Curt Doolittle

Theme: Property

  • are the first things one should know in political theory? 1. The first question

    https://t.co/KVOTCI8R4EWhat are the first things one should know in political theory? https://t.co/KVOTCI8R4E

    1. The first question of **ethics** is ‘Why don’t I kill you and take your stuff?’.

    2. The first question of **politics** is “Why don’t me and mine kill you and yours and take your stuff?”

    3. The first question of **group evolutionary strategy** is “How can we either kill them and take their stuff, or prevent them from killing us and taking our stuff?”

    4. The answer to all three questions is the same: “Because **cooperating in a division of labor **is productive and can continue to produce mutual returns while conflict is costly and and results only in net consumption. Over time those who cooperate have more numbers, are healthier, have better industry, technology, and warfare than those who don’t.

    5. So, how do we **organize** group evolutionary strategy, politics, ethics, production and reproduction, so that we can out-compete, or at least say at pace with, competitors, given the people, their abilities, the territory and its resources that are at our disposal?

    6. Answering this question requires facing a very **unpleasant fac****t**, that the problem we face is** human capital **(talents) and that every person at the bottom of the curve drastically reduces the effectiveness of every person at the middle and top of the curve. In other words, it matters more that you don’t have impulsive, aggressive, idiots than it does that you have calm geniuses. So by and large nations in colder climates were more successful at killing off the undesirables through winters and starvation, than those in the warmer climates.

    7. So we see many different group evolutionary strategies dependent upon human capital, territory, and resources. The most obvious are

    * the hierarchical and authoritarian irrigated flood-river valleys

    * the aggressive tribal steppe and desert regions

    * the egalitarian forest and river regions.

    * the equalitarian polar peoples

    * Each of these main groups produce different political systems in order to make use of the territory and means of production available to them. Those that do not make good use of territory and means are displaced, conquered, or exterminated by those that do.

    * All groups require:

    * A method of organizing reproduction (usually marriage)

    * A method of organizing production (an economy)

    * A method of organizing norms (usually religion/education)

    * A method of producing commons (government)

    * A method of holding territory (army)

    * There are two economic poles available and all make use of one part of the spectrum or another, and all economies resulting in some variant on the mixed economy:

    * Propertarian / Libertarian / **Capitalist** / High Trust / High Innovation – Why? No corruption in theory. Incentives work. But no competitive commons are produced, so it doesn’t work.

    * **Mixed Economy** of Consumer capitalism with some authoritarian commons production. Incentives work and commons possible.

    * Authoritarian / Totalitarian / **Socialist** / Low Trust / Low Innovation – Why? high corruption, no incentives, and it doesn’t work.

    * All governments are corrupt but if a people are successful at implementing rule of law it is possible to protect the economy using the courts from excessive interference by the government monopoly.

    * The method of deciding ( making excuses for ) which commons is produced rather than some other commons is a matter of local dispute. But it is actually a question of competition with other states, and it is only very wealthy states that choose luxuries rather than necessities.

    * That is about all there is to political theory.

    Source date (UTC): 2016-04-25 12:35:00 UTC

  • Haidt is right – because MF translates into ‘necessary’ natural law: 3/private,

    Haidt is right – because MF translates into ‘necessary’ natural law: 3/private, 3/Common property rules biased by gender strategy. @JonHaidt

    Source date (UTC): 2016-04-25 12:26:31 UTC

    Original post: https://twitter.com/i/web/status/724575314148528128

  • Haidt is right, because the MF correspond to the minimum personal and common pro

    Haidt is right, because the MF correspond to the minimum personal and common property rights required for rational cooperation. @JonHaidt

    Source date (UTC): 2016-04-25 12:24:10 UTC

    Original post: https://twitter.com/i/web/status/724574721128443904

  • After you master the four categories of property, then you master the evolution

    After you master the four categories of property, then you master the evolution of cooperation. After that, the application of the arguments

    Source date (UTC): 2016-04-25 09:12:00 UTC

  • After you master the Operational POV (grammar of existence), then you master the

    After you master the Operational POV (grammar of existence), then you master the four categories of property.

    Source date (UTC): 2016-04-25 09:11:00 UTC

  • Haidt is right – because MF translates into ‘necessary’ natural law: 3/private,

    Haidt is right – because MF translates into ‘necessary’ natural law: 3/private, 3/Common property rules biased by gender strategy. @JonHaidt

    Source date (UTC): 2016-04-25 08:26:00 UTC

  • Haidt is right, because the MF correspond to the minimum personal and common pro

    Haidt is right, because the MF correspond to the minimum personal and common property rights required for rational cooperation. @JonHaidt

    Source date (UTC): 2016-04-25 08:24:00 UTC

  • What Are The First Things One Should Know In Political Theory?

    1. The first question of ethics is ‘Why don’t I kill you and take your stuff?’.
    2. The first question of politics is “Why don’t me and mine kill you and yours and take your stuff?”
    3. The first question of group evolutionary strategy is “How can we either kill them and take their stuff, or prevent them from killing us and taking our stuff?”
    4. The answer to all three questions is the same: “Because cooperating in a division of labor is productive and can continue to produce mutual returns while conflict is costly and and results only in net consumption. Over time those who cooperate have more numbers, are healthier, have better industry, technology, and warfare than those who don’t.
    5. So, how do we organize group evolutionary strategy, politics, ethics, production and reproduction, so that we can out-compete, or at least say at pace with, competitors, given the people, their abilities, the territory and its resources that are at our disposal?
    6. Answering this question requires facing a very unpleasant fact, that the problem we face is human capital (talents) and that every person at the bottom of the curve drastically reduces the effectiveness of every person at the middle and top of the curve. In other words, it matters more that you don’t have impulsive, aggressive, idiots than it does that you have calm geniuses. So by and large nations in colder climates were more successful at killing off the undesirables through winters and starvation, than those in the warmer climates.
    7. So we see many different group evolutionary strategies dependent upon human capital, territory, and resources.  The most obvious are
    • the hierarchical and authoritarian irrigated flood-river valleys
    • the aggressive tribal steppe and desert regions
    • the egalitarian forest and river regions.
    • the equalitarian polar peoples
    • Each of these main groups produce different political systems in order to make use of the territory and means of production available to them.  Those that do not make good use of territory and means are displaced, conquered, or exterminated by those that do.
    • All groups require:
      • A method of organizing reproduction (usually marriage)
      • A method of organizing production (an economy)
      • A method of organizing norms (usually religion/education)
      • A method of producing commons (government)
      • A method of holding territory (army)
    • There are two economic poles available and all make use of one part of the spectrum or another, and all economies resulting in some variant on the mixed economy:
      • Propertarian / Libertarian / Capitalist / High Trust / High Innovation – Why? No corruption in theory.  Incentives work. But no competitive commons are produced, so it doesn’t work.
      • Mixed Economy of Consumer capitalism with some authoritarian commons production. Incentives work and commons possible.
      • Authoritarian / Totalitarian / Socialist / Low Trust / Low Innovation – Why? high corruption, no incentives, and it doesn’t work.
    • All governments are corrupt but if a people are successful at implementing rule of law it is possible to protect the economy using the courts from excessive interference by the government monopoly.
    • The method of deciding  ( making excuses for ) which commons is produced rather than some other commons is a matter of local dispute. But it is actually a question of competition with other states, and it is only very wealthy states that choose luxuries rather than necessities.
    • That is about all there is to political theory.

    https://www.quora.com/What-are-the-first-things-one-should-know-in-political-theory

  • Are Human Rights Superior Than Sovereignty?

    The question is somewhat interesting since both Human Rights (which are all property rights by the way), and Sovereignty are ambitions one can seek to produce not states of nature that must be abridged.   However, the misleading nature of the question aside:

    The ‘Postwar Consensus’ and the International Charter of Human Rights, were designed to prevent wars by requiring that all states direct policy and resources to the development of rule of law and modern economy, using largely political and economic pressure.  But also military pressure if necessary – almost always provided by the USA, as the successor to, or continuation of, the British Empire. 

    In this sense, sovereignty was limited by the western world (America-and-Anglo-conquered-Europe) to the expansion of human rights and consumer capitalism (and mistakenly, democracy) in exchange for limited aggression against them.

    This consensus held largely until Russia invaded Ukraine, set up rebel governments in the Donbas basin, seized Crimea, threatened Eastern Europe with reconquest in 2014. Since then, the combination of policies designed to weaken American political economic and military power by the Obama Administration, and the need to pivot back against the Russian threat, have exposed the Nato Alliance (the USA) as incapable of protecting member states, and the remaining member states unwilling to defend other member states – and possibly themselves.  Furthermore, China’s expansion into sea territories claimed by others, and Russian expansion into disputed the arctic, have further ended the postwar consensus.  So the postwar consensus has been de facto ended.

    Practically speaking, the only guarantee of sovereignty in the 21st century is provided by nuclear weapons, and a standing military capable of suppressing both domestic populations and at least making invasion extremely difficult or expensive.  There is no longer any even tepid guarantee of human rights imposed by a collection of foreign states. And in fact, the only incentive for states to defend human rights is to defend the financing of their militaries, by defending their economies using consumer capitalism, which requires human rights in order to function.

    South Korea being the world’s only substantial hold out.  The Arab countries quickly switching now to consumer capitalism given the change in future oil revenue predictions.  The same problem faces Russian which for all intents and purposes is an enormous gas station, where 50% of revenues depend on natural resources.

    https://www.quora.com/Are-human-rights-superior-than-sovereignty

  • What Are The First Things One Should Know In Political Theory?

    1. The first question of ethics is ‘Why don’t I kill you and take your stuff?’.
    2. The first question of politics is “Why don’t me and mine kill you and yours and take your stuff?”
    3. The first question of group evolutionary strategy is “How can we either kill them and take their stuff, or prevent them from killing us and taking our stuff?”
    4. The answer to all three questions is the same: “Because cooperating in a division of labor is productive and can continue to produce mutual returns while conflict is costly and and results only in net consumption. Over time those who cooperate have more numbers, are healthier, have better industry, technology, and warfare than those who don’t.
    5. So, how do we organize group evolutionary strategy, politics, ethics, production and reproduction, so that we can out-compete, or at least say at pace with, competitors, given the people, their abilities, the territory and its resources that are at our disposal?
    6. Answering this question requires facing a very unpleasant fact, that the problem we face is human capital (talents) and that every person at the bottom of the curve drastically reduces the effectiveness of every person at the middle and top of the curve. In other words, it matters more that you don’t have impulsive, aggressive, idiots than it does that you have calm geniuses. So by and large nations in colder climates were more successful at killing off the undesirables through winters and starvation, than those in the warmer climates.
    7. So we see many different group evolutionary strategies dependent upon human capital, territory, and resources.  The most obvious are
    • the hierarchical and authoritarian irrigated flood-river valleys
    • the aggressive tribal steppe and desert regions
    • the egalitarian forest and river regions.
    • the equalitarian polar peoples
    • Each of these main groups produce different political systems in order to make use of the territory and means of production available to them.  Those that do not make good use of territory and means are displaced, conquered, or exterminated by those that do.
    • All groups require:
      • A method of organizing reproduction (usually marriage)
      • A method of organizing production (an economy)
      • A method of organizing norms (usually religion/education)
      • A method of producing commons (government)
      • A method of holding territory (army)
    • There are two economic poles available and all make use of one part of the spectrum or another, and all economies resulting in some variant on the mixed economy:
      • Propertarian / Libertarian / Capitalist / High Trust / High Innovation – Why? No corruption in theory.  Incentives work. But no competitive commons are produced, so it doesn’t work.
      • Mixed Economy of Consumer capitalism with some authoritarian commons production. Incentives work and commons possible.
      • Authoritarian / Totalitarian / Socialist / Low Trust / Low Innovation – Why? high corruption, no incentives, and it doesn’t work.
    • All governments are corrupt but if a people are successful at implementing rule of law it is possible to protect the economy using the courts from excessive interference by the government monopoly.
    • The method of deciding  ( making excuses for ) which commons is produced rather than some other commons is a matter of local dispute. But it is actually a question of competition with other states, and it is only very wealthy states that choose luxuries rather than necessities.
    • That is about all there is to political theory.

    https://www.quora.com/What-are-the-first-things-one-should-know-in-political-theory