UNR Students for Liberty » Political Philosophy

Margaret Thatcher, The New Love of My Life

Barry Belmont — Fri, 25 Mar 2011 19:49:53 +0000

I am absolutely enraptured by the beautiful, straightforward, and powerful way the former Prime Minister of England is able to defend classical liberalism. In these series of clips you can see her topple smug socialists, destroy the fallacy of self-sufficient governments, and rally for the globalization of free trade. How anyone could be opposed to free markets, free trade, and free societies after hearing such clear arguments is utterly beyond me.

Politics Through Facebook

Barry Belmont — Wed, 26 Jan 2011 07:26:44 +0000

Whenever someone shows me a political debate they’ve had on their Facebook I can’t help feeling it goes a bit like this:

Something like that at least…

Lucretius, the Libertarian?

Barry Belmont — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 02:05:06 +0000

No doubt you have come across Lucretius in your Humanities classes, perhaps even being so lucky as to have read his On the Nature of Things. Within it you will see one of the greatest expositions of Epicurian philosophy, intricate poetry, and systemic doubt in authority in all of history. A perfect example of this follows, where, as historian (poet, philosopher, renaissance woman) Jennifer Michael Hecht, “the idea that a world constantly managed by an intelligent force is much less efficient than a universe that generates itself according to regular principles” is developed.

Who can wheel all the starry spheres, and blow
Over all the land the fruitful warmth from above
Be ready in all places at all times,
Gather black clouds and shake the quiet sky
With terrible thunder, to hurl down bolts which often
Rattle his own shrines, to rage in the desert, retreating
For target drill, so that his shafts can pass
The guilty by and slay the innocent?

(Lucretius. On the Nature of Things. Translated and edited by Anthony M. Esolen.)

Basically, the idea that there is some person or god (or set of people or set of gods) who are in any way capable of managing the complexity of the world is absurd. This is the point that libertarian philosophy has been trying to hammer home ever since there was such a thing as libertarian philosophy: how could a person simply by writ control an entire population or environment or universe?

It’s a strong reminder that economics precedes according to a set of laws, and not simply because someone thinks they can tweak a few knobs on some imaginary panel label “The Economy.” Just as we have taken thunderbolts out of the hands of Jupiter, isn’t it time we did the same with the deathgrip politicians have on trade?

A Philosophy of Philosophy

Barry Belmont — Sun, 04 Apr 2010 22:41:42 +0000

Philosophy is but a useful shorthand logic for complex things. For instance, when we libertarians talk about “liberty” it’s not that we think there is an actual “thing” that exists in the real world that is “liberty.” By liberty we simply mean a collection of behaviors and actions that follow this, this, and this premise and have these 1, 2, and 3 properties. To constantly have to refer to these premises and properties over and over would become tiresome so we nail down a few key things and we bundle them up in a little package and call it liberty.

It is the role of philosophy to take these complexities and reduce them to manageable bits that can be easily manipulated, derived, modified, and understood. When we refer to a philosophy of liberty what we are saying is that liberty (with these given properties and what not) can be best gotten by X, Y, and Z means and these means are justifiable under the premises originally espoused. In essence, philosophy is a fancy form of logical bookkeeping.

But we would be remiss to actual confuse the concept of ‘liberty’or the ‘philosophy’ of liberty as anything that actually exists within the real world. To clarify, consider the concept of “happiness.” Happiness corresponds to a certain set of brain states with neurochemical realities. But, as with liberty, to constantly refer back to action potentials when discussing how happiness is best achieved or understood would cripplingly limit the conversation. So instead we refer to these physical, real brain states as “happiness” and add a useful — if ultimately fictitious — framework around them to help move the discussion along. However, this does not mean that there actually is now such a “thing” as happiness, it’s just shorthand for actual things.

To clarify even further, imagine I defined the pattern across the globe created by people eating tangerines at this moment as a Flapperdoodle. Flapperdoodle’s don’t suddenly develop a nature outside of the complex global action of eating tangerines. At base there really is no such thing as a Flapperdoodle. Just as there is no such thing as happiness or liberty or philosophy that corresponds to anything beyond a useful framework by which to interpret that complex actions of a complex world.

All of this is not to suggest that philosophy is worthless or doesn’t contribute anything to our understanding of the world, but rather to highlight the fact that all philosophies and all derivations from all philosophies must necessary be accountable to reality. We can look at the real world and test our philosophies to see if they are correct or not. Not only can we subject philosophy to the scrutiny of the real world, but we must.

So, Healthcare Reform Passed…

John Russell — Wed, 31 Mar 2010 18:58:09 +0000

Any proponent of freedom must accept that the individual owns themselves. Deviations from this premise only open itself to a belief that force over another person can somehow be justified. For those who are upset about the recent healthcare legislation that passed, one must also ask themselves if they are upset about many other social services which replace individual decision making with the collective – police, firefighters, post office workers, soldiers, and the like. This may be shocking to conservatives and libertarians who believe such services should be provided by a state because a) markets cannot do this or b) it is the state’s divine responsibility for it to do so like in the Constitution.

The problem with such an assumption is that it violates the principles of self ownership. A human being is either responsible for oneself or is not. There is no middle ground, no compromise, and no justification for anything otherwise. Period. A society cannot claim to respect the rights of individuals while simultaneously stealing money from them and supplying services which ‘provide’ them with things which they themselves should be responsible for. It should come to no surprise to anyone why the State, which was originally founded with this unworkable and compromising philosophy, has only assumed a greater role in coercing individuals into doing things ‘for them’. When such an assumption such as self-ownership is violated, like when the modest state-funded school teacher or postal worker is hired, a society has already adopted a philosophy which inevitably leads to the justification of collective action over individual action.

Individuals act. This action is not limited to the constraints of anything so long as other individuals voluntarily enter into the agreement as well. Realize that we take this concept for granted – humans enter into implicit, voluntary contracts with each other constantly. We are decision making machines which, among many other things, respect and voluntarily abide by the rights of other decision making machines. Rarely do these agreements become involuntary which is why justice must be established and why we have developed a sense of it. When a State enters into this process (the marketplace), there is no negotiation or voluntary agreements with the majority of the people – only force. This force supersedes, dictates, and will even distort the otherwise rational individual into doing things s/he may not otherwise do. Law and taxation are all products of this unnatural force bearing down upon non-consenting individuals in the marketplace. This should leave no surprise why such forces are hated by some (to some degree) and why they will never, ever, ever, ever… ever arrive at a fair and optimally efficient destination that a voluntary agreement in the marketplace could arrive at.

The next time the State passes legislation which may leave a supporter of freedom uneasy, just consider every single thing the State has done thus far to justify its current actions of violating a person’s right to self-ownership (hint: the State must violate individuals by definition). Can we find a solution which would eliminate the unnatural forces enslaving everyone to the arbitrary decision making bureaucrats of society?

I’m no hippie, but…

Barry Belmont — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 02:40:33 +0000

Oh, Hookers.

Travis Hagen — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 16:10:13 +0000

In the comments Mary’s article ‘Oh, Nevada‘ there is an epic discussion about prostitution and the morality of legalizing something that leads to drug addiction, sexual abuse, and human trafficking. While I found no hard studies on these side effects of prostitution, let’s just assume them to be true. Clearly, it is impossible to support an activity that leads to such terrible consequences, right? Wrong! Libertarians support legalized (and unregulated) prostitution not because we are horrible people who want to see people throw their lives down the shitter, but because we recognize that it is their life to throw away. Nobody has the authority to tell anybody else what they can or cannot do with his or her own body.

The case was brought up about women who voluntarily enter prostitution, but then get hooked on drugs by their pimp and are “dependent on the pimp monetarily and for illegal substances and is unable to ‘quit any time she wants to.’” (from a comment by Jacob K). Let us assume this too is also true, and still the case does not change. The prostitute is working to feed an addiction, she could leave, but she doesn’t want to, she would prefer to satisfy her need for drugs, shelter, and whatever else the pimp provides. This is a classic trade for mutual benefit, the pimp gets money for his protection and drug procuring, and the prostitute gets drugs and business for her body. They both find this trade acceptable, it happens, and they continue doing business. Neither I, nor anybody else has a right to interfere with this trade.

Of course, in the case of someone kidnapped and forced into sexual servitude, this is definitely not the case. Here, someone is forcibly taken, against his or her will, and made to perform certain acts. Yet, despite this abhorrent situation, the crime is still not prostitution. The exceptional evil here is kidnapping and slavery. Granted, prevalent prostitution leads to a greater market for sexual slaves, but trying to outlaw a legal, voluntary action to prevent a separate crime is as ridiculous as it is stupid. If it were not, there would have to be laws against trade, property, and of course, all human interaction. While these laws would drastically cut crime, they are obviously ludicrous. While more drastic than a law prohibiting prostitution, the same principle is tested. People need to be free to make mistakes, to follow their own paths, and not have bumpers on life. There is no grand social responsibility to save people’s lives from self-destruction.

In fact, the only way for prostitution to become anything but voluntary is for another, non-consensual act to take place. The prostitute must be beaten, forcibly addicted to drugs, or coerced in some other fashion, and that is the crime. Prostitution is defined as “offering sexual intercourse for pay,” and this act alone is always voluntary (see, it says ‘offering’). Getting addicted to drugs, becoming dependent on a pimp, and not making tons of money is not the responsibly of the government to stop. Even though life as a prostitute is dangerous, with exceptional risk, it should still be legal and open. It’s about freedom dammit.

Government is the Problem not the Solution

Barry Belmont — Thu, 11 Jun 2009 20:29:35 +0000

I have an inordinate respect for many scientists. I have read literally hundreds of books on science and it never ceases to amaze me the brilliant insights many scientists (or scientific journalists/writers) illuminate. One particularly interesting book I read recently was The Origin of Virtue: Human Instincts and the Evolution of Cooperation by Matt Ridley. I had read Ridley’s work before (his Genome and Nature via Nurture are two of my more favorite genetics books) and was quite interested in this one, as I have a penchant for evolutionary psychology, the evolutionary origins of morality, and the theory of evolution in general.

The book started out solidly, but I noticed Ridley dropping a hint every so often that there’s a big logical conclusion looming on the horizon. In the last four chapters or so, it broke: if virtue is precipitated evolutionarily (which all the evidence seems to suggest) then governments are, in a sense, superfluous. I couldn’t believe what I was reading, I had never guessed that I would be seeing a solid chunk of my anarcho-capitalism theory before my very eyes with oodles and oodles of science to prove it. (Then again, for the longest time, I didn’t know Thomas Sowell [another favorite author of mine] was black.) I was so happy upon reading this, that I looked for other things written by Ridley in a similar vein. What follows is from Ridley’s answer to “What’s your dangerous idea?”

Government is the Problem not the Solution

In all times and in all places there has been too much government. We now know what prosperity is: it is the gradual extension of the division of labour through the free exchange of goods and ideas, and the consequent introduction of efficiencies by the invention of new technologies. This is the process that has given us health, wealth and wisdom on a scale unimagined by our ancestors. It not only raises material standards of living, it also fuels social integration, fairness and charity. It has never failed yet. No society has grown poorer or more unequal through trade, exchange and invention. Think of pre-Ming as opposed to Ming China, seventeenth century Holland as opposed to imperial Spain, eighteenth century England as opposed to Louis XIV’s France, twentieth century America as opposed to Stalin’s Russia, or post-war Japan, Hong Kong and Korea as opposed to Ghana, Cuba and Argentina. Think of the Phoenicians as opposed to the Egyptians, Athens as opposed to Sparta, the Hanseatic League as opposed to the Roman Empire. In every case, weak or decentralised government, but strong free trade led to surges in prosperity for all, whereas strong, central government led to parasitic, tax-fed officialdom, a stifling of innovation, relative economic decline and usually war.

Take Rome. It prospered because it was a free trade zone. But it repeatedly invested the proceeds of that prosperity in too much government and so wasted it in luxury, war, gladiators and public monuments. The Roman empire’s list of innovations is derisory, even compared with that of the ‘dark ages’ that followed.

In every age and at every time there have been people who say we need more regulation, more government. Sometimes, they say we need it to protect exchange from corruption, to set the standards and police the rules, in which case they have a point, though often they exaggerate it. Self-policing standards and rules were developed by free-trading merchants in medieval Europe long before they were taken over and codified as laws (and often corrupted) by monarchs and governments.

Sometimes, they say we need it to protect the weak, the victims of technological change or trade flows. But throughout history such intervention, though well meant, has usually proved misguided — because its progenitors refuse to believe in (or find out about) David Ricardo’s Law of Comparative Advantage: even if China is better at making everything than France, there will still be a million things it pays China to buy from France rather than make itself. Why? Because rather than invent, say, luxury goods or insurance services itself, China will find it pays to make more T shirts and use the proceeds to import luxury goods and insurance.

Government is a very dangerous toy. It is used to fight wars, impose ideologies and enrich rulers. True, nowadays, our leaders do not enrich themselves (at least not on the scale of the Sun King), but they enrich their clients: they preside over vast and insatiable parasitic bureaucracies that grow by Parkinson’s Law and live off true wealth creators such as traders and inventors.

Sure, it is possible to have too little government. Only, that has not been the world’s problem for millennia. After the century of Mao, Hitler and Stalin, can anybody really say that the risk of too little government is greater than the risk of too much? The dangerous idea we all need to learn is that the more we limit the growth of government, the better off we will all be.

“One way or another, land [will be stolen]“

John Russell — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 04:51:55 +0000

Perhaps the truncation of the quote provided above is somewhat unrepresentative of the words spoken by Interior Secretary Ken Salazar, but nonetheless it represents the reality of the situation brewing over the controversial land acquisition by the federal government. According to this article by the Philadelphia Inquirer, it appears our government is issuing an ultimatum to force landowners to sell their property in order to pay tribute to the victims of Flight 93 which crashed during the terrorists attack on 9/11.

I suppose a country which does not take its ruling document seriously should not surprise her citizens when it ignores everything it was instituted to protect. Is eminent domain ever justified? If so, when does become intolerable? It is obvious that the local county is capitalizing on this circumstance to draw tourism to the otherwise nonexistent industry. How many lives were ruined again during 9/11? Better add a few more to the list to accommodate this 2,500 acre memorial celebrating “freedom”. Disgusting.

Responsibility and the Unknowable

Barry Belmont — Mon, 11 May 2009 02:33:00 +0000

I have, for the past couple of days, held before my mind a constant conundrum that I cannot adequately answer for myself. I pose it here to see if anyone can elucidate the issue more than I can.

If one is the voluntary citizen of a country (or a club or whatever) they agree to follow the rules of that country (or club or whatever). That is, they are responsible for abiding by the laws and in a sense agree to be punished should they “break the law.” But an implicit assumption is this agreement is that it is possible to know and follow all laws. If a body of law is unknowable–if one person is simply not capable of learning every law–is the citizen still responsible if he breaks that law?

The two solutions that I’ve thought of is:

1) Yes, of course he is responsible. Simply failing to learn a law cannot be held as an excuse for failing to follow it anymore than not taking driving classes excuses one from running into other cars. In this tact I believe we see law as not words written on a piece of paper but as a visceralization of “nature rights.” We already know that murder and rape and stealing are bad…they are violations of property rights that (the vast majority of) people inherently acknowledge.

2) No, get with the real world. The amount of laws on the books are entirely too much for anyone, let alone the average citizen, to come to know and comprehend. Admiralty, agricultural, aviation, banking, bankruptcy, civil rights, constitutional, consumer, corporate, criminal, education, elder law, employment, entertainment, environmental, estate, family, general practice, immigration, intellectual property, labor, liability (of all sorts), malpractice (of all sorts), media (of all sorts), military, municipal, personal injury, real estate, securities, taxation, trusts, wills…not mention all the ones I cannot think of and all the subspecialties (FDA, EPA, IEEE, etc..) that many people simply cannot think of. And these are just the laws on the books, these are the vast pieces of legislation that get passed everyday throughout the country: federal, state, county, city, district, neighborhood. There is just simply too many laws for any one person to know, thus, you cannot “fairly” be said to be responsible for every single one.

1′s Response) That’s just tough shit. Just because something’s hard doesn’t mean you get a free pass. If you don’t like it, leave.

2′s Response) Once again, get back in the real world: there’s no place for me to go. Should everything just be “tough shit” simply because a bunch of people have conspired to screw my life over?

I do not know which side I should come down on. Thus is life.

Thoughts?