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Rothbard's Bad Scholarship on Godwin and Popper

I know some bad things about Murray Rothbard (like his view that abortion is justified by the property rights of the mother against a trespasser, his belief that children are property and that parents are not obligated to feed their children, his attack on Objectivism, and his anti-semitism). But I've seen some merit in his work on economics, and I've begun reading his book An Austrian Perspective on the History of Economic Thought. I mostly like it so far, but one must be careful not to trust everything. A particularly interesting part, to me, was the discussion of Aristotle, which I thought was good. It was a lot like what Objectivists say about Aristotle. I don't know how much this is because of Rothbard's knowledge of Objectivism, and how much it's a standard non-Objectivist view. Reading about Aristotle on the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Encyclopaedia Britannica, or Wikipedia is rather different than the Objectivist or Rothbardian interpretation. I tried to google for material on Aristotle similar to the Objectivist view, and found this page ... but I checked and the authors are Objectivists.

Here are some new Rothbard errors I've discovered (italics in quotes are added by me, unless noted):

The continual progress, onward-and-upward approach was demolished for me, and should have been for everyone, by Thomas Kuhn's famed Structure of Scientific Revolutions.[5] [italics in original]

See the replies to Kuhn by Karl Popper and by David Deutsch. (Deutsch's writing on this subject is more accessible and more general, so it's what I'd recommend first if you're interested.)

Related to Kuhn (a critic of Popper) is Rothbard's completely false hostility to Popper in The Present State of Austrian Economics:

For my purposes, I am ignoring the allegedly wide gulf between the earlier positivists with their “verifiability” criterion and the Popperites and their emphasis on “falsifiability.” For those far outside the logical empiricist camp, this dispute has more of the appearance of a family feud than of a fundamental split in epistemology. The only point of interest here is that the Popperites are more nihilistic and therefore even less satisfactory than the original positivists, who at least are allowed to “verify” rather than merely “not falsify.”

Popper is not a positivist, nor similar to one. This is totally ignorant, yet he writes about it professionally (rather than being aware of his ignorance and leaving this matter to others).

Going back to An Austrian Perspective on the History of Economic Thought, I searched it for discussion of Godwin and Burke, who are thinkers where I could readily judge the quality of Rothbard's work, offhand, from my own expertise. Burke isn't mentioned at all, which is an error in a detailed book which gives attention to many lesser known figures. (Burke is fairly well known in general, but not for his comments on economics, even though he made many of them.) Rothbard did very extensive research for this book, but somehow omitted Burke. An example of Burke's relevance, from an 1800 biography of Burke, which has been quoted in many more recent books:

[Adam] Smith, [Burke] said, told him, after they had conversed on subjects of political economy, that he was the only man, who, without communication, thought on these topics exactly as he did.

Adam Smith is a major focus of Rothbard's attention, so Burke was worth discussing at least a little.

Rothbard's treatment of Godwin was much worse. He brings up Godwin briefly in relation to Malthus and makes egregious errors:

In his Utopian belief in the perfectibility of man

The "perfectibility" of man is not a Utopian belief, it means that man can be improved without limit (without reaching an end to progress), not that man can or will reach perfection. The improvement includes both improvement of ideas and of technology. This is a major theme of Deutsch's The Beginning of Infinity, which is titled for this theme and includes Godwin in the bibliography.

William Godwin, on the other hand, was the world's first anarcho-communist, or rather, voluntary anarcho-communist. For Godwin, while a bitter critic of the coercive state, was an equally hostile critic of private property.

That's just not what Godwin says in his material on property in Political Justice.

Godwin believed, not that private property should be expropriated by force, but that individuals, fully using their reason, should voluntarily and altruistically divest themselves of all private property to any passer-by.

Rothbard doesn't provide any quote or citation for this false claim. I will, nevertheless, offer some quotes from Political Justice to refute it, from book 8 (of 8), Of Property.

Of property there are three degrees.

The first and simplest degree is that of my permanent right in those things the use of which being attributed to me, a greater sum of benefit or pleasure will result than could have arisen from their being otherwise appropriated. It is of no consequence, in this case, how I came into possession of them, the only necessary conditions being their superior usefulness to me, and that my title to them is such as is generally acquiesced in by the community in which I live. Every man is unjust who conducts himself in such a manner respecting these things as to infringe, in any degree, upon my power of using them, at the time when the using them will be of real importance to me.

It has already appeared[1] that one of the most essential of the rights of man is my right to the forbearance of others; not merely that they shall refrain from every thing that may, by direct consequence, affect my life, or the possession of my powers, but that they shall refrain from usurping upon my understanding, and shall leave me a certain equal sphere for the exercise of my private judgement. This is necessary because it is possible for them to be wrong, as well as for me to be so, because the exercise of the understanding is essential to the improvement of man, and because the pain and interruption I suffer are as real, when they infringe, in my conception only, upon what is of importance to me, as if the infringement had been, in the utmost degree, palpable. Hence it follows that no man may, in ordinary cases, make use of my apartment, furniture or garments, or of my food, in the way of barter or loan, without having first obtained my consent.

The second degree of property is the empire to which every man is entitled over the produce of his own industry, even that part of it the use of which ought not to be appropriated to himself.

Godwin didn't think people should give away their property to random people, he thought they should have property rights but sometimes, due to rational argument, give some property, as a gift, to someone who had a better use for it. I think trade should be emphasized over gifts and that Godwin wasn't a great economist, but Godwin did support private property and the free market, and was an individualist.

It is not easy to say whether misery or absurdity would be most conspicuous in a plan which should invite every man to seize upon everything he conceived himself to want.... We have already shown,[3] and shall have occasion to show more at large,[4] how pernicious the consequences would be if government were to take the whole permanently into their hands, and dispense to every man his daily bread.

Note the anti-communism.

The idea of property, or permanent empire, in those things which ought to be applied to our personal use, and still more in the produce of our industry, unavoidably suggests the idea of some species of law or practice by which it is guaranteed. Without this, property could not exist. Yet we have endeavoured to show that the maintenance of these two kinds of property is highly beneficial.

Godwin supports the protection of property.

For, let it be observed that, not only no well informed community will interfere with the quantity of any man's industry, or the disposal of its produce, but the members of every such well informed community will exert themselves to turn aside the purpose of any man who shall be inclined, to dictate to, or restrain, his neighbour in this respect.

No one should interfere with anyone's property rights, and people who try to should be stopped.

The most destructive of all excesses is that where one man shall dictate to another, or undertake to compel him to do, or refrain from doing, anything (except, as was before stated, in cases of the most indispensable urgency) otherwise than with his own consent. Hence it follows that the distribution of wealth in every community must be left to depend upon the sentiments of the individuals of that community.

What more does Rothbard want from property rights than that men use their minds in order to use their property in the way they see fit? If Godwin had his way, the result would be a capitalist dream, not a communist society.

But, if reason prove insufficient for this fundamental purpose, other means must doubtless be employed.[9] It is better that one man should suffer than that the community should be destroyed. General security is one of those indispensable preliminaries without which nothing, good or excellent can be accomplished. It is therefore right that property, with all its inequalities, such as it is sanctioned by the general sense of the members of any state, and so long as that sanction continues unvaried should be defended, if need be, by means of coercion.

Godwin, an early anarchist of sorts, who hated violence, was still willing to recommend that the government use violence in defense of property rights, even for unjust types of property that were in existence at the time (think of feudalism and serfdom kinda stuff), let alone for property rights to the product of one's industry.

The arguments however that may be offered, in favour of the protection given to inheritance and testamentary bequest, are more forcible than might at first be imagined.

Godwin defends inheritance of property, too.

The first idea of property then is a deduction from the right of private judgement; the first object of government is the preservation of this right. Without permitting to every man, to a considerable degree, the exercise of his own discretion, there can be no independence, no improvement, no virtue and no happiness. This is a privilege in the highest degree sacred; for its maintenance, no exertions and sacrifices can be too great. Thus deep is the foundation of the doctrine of property. It is, in the last resort, the palladium of all that ought to be dear to us, and must never be approached but with awe and veneration.

The view of property as being implied from the right of private judgment is the best and most correct view of the matter. Godwin is a great liberal thinker, who Rothbard doesn't appreciate. Godwin is, in this respect, more (classical) liberal than Rothbard, and closer to Objectivism which also emphasizes reason in its defense of man's rights. (Objectivism says men have one fundamental right, the right to life, and this implies "the freedom to take all the actions required by the nature of a rational being". Property rights are the implementation of this.)

And let me repeat what that last sentence says, in more modern words (palladium means source of protection, safety or preservation): Property rights should always be approached with awe and veneration, because property rights are what protect everything good. Rothbard majorly failed at scholarship.

[Godwin] was, after all, not a scholar of population theory, and he had no immediately effective reply. It took Godwin all of two decades to study the problem thoroughly and come to an effective refutation of his nemesis. In On Population (1820), Godwin came to the cogent and sensible conclusion that population growth is not a bogey, because over the decades the food supply would increase and the birth rate would fall. Science and technology, along with rational limitation of birth, would solve the problem. ["On Population" is in italics in the original]

This falsehood about Godwin needing 20 years to figure out a reply to Malthus is refuted in Godwin's book, Of Population (Rothbard got the title wrong), in the preface:

I believed, that the Essay on Population, like other erroneous and exaggerated representations of things, would soon find its own level.

In this I have been hitherto disappointed. ... Finding therefore, that whatever arguments have been produced against it by others, it still holds on its prosperous career, and has not long since appeared in the impressive array of a Fifth Edition, I cannot be contented to go out of the world, without attempting to put into a permanent form what has occurred to me on the subject. I was sometimes idle enough to suppose, that I had done my part, in producing the book that had given occasion to Mr. Malthus's Essay, and that I might safely leave the comparatively easy task, as it seemed, of demolishing the "Principle of Population," to some one of the men who have risen to maturity since I produced my most considerable performance. But I can refrain no longer. "I will also answer my part; I likewise will shew my opinion: for I am full of matter; and the spirit within me constraineth me."

Godwin didn't reply immediately because he thought he'd done enough by writing Political Justice, and that someone else could handle the much easier task of refuting Malthus' bad ideas. This had nothing to do with Godwin needing 20 years of thought or research. Godwin underestimated how influential Malthus would turn out to be, and overestimated the ability of other thinkers to address the issue.


I will keep reading Rothbard anyway. I don't think there's a superior alternative, and I do think he's better about other thinkers that he researched more, especially when their focus is more on economics (Rothbard doesn't adquately understand Godwin's thinking about reason).


Elliot Temple on October 5, 2018

Messages (286)

Rothbard in *An Austrian Perspective on the History of Economic Thought*:

> While Aristotle was critical of money-making, he still opposed any limitation – such as Plato had advocated – on an individual's accumulation of private property. Instead, education should teach people voluntarily to curb their rampant desires and thus lead them to limit their own accumulations of wealth.

> Despite his cogent defence of private property and opposition to coerced limits on wealth, the aristocrat Aristotle was fully as scornful of labour and trade as his predecessors.

Rothbard is a hypocrite. Aristotle on property is kinda similar to Godwin, but worse, and Rothbard calls that a "cogent defence of private property". Rothbard also praises some early Chinese laissez-faire and anarchist ideas, but fails to give Godwin much credit for similar ideas.


curi at 12:12 PM on October 6, 2018 | #11278 | reply | quote

1: Omitting Burke is poor choice, not an error

2: Popper HIMSELF derived, in his own words, from Lakatos (more an argument differentiating retroduction). Even of he isn't essentially abductive as was Lakatos, he is certainly "[something] similar."

3: you've clearly NOT read Godwin's FIRST edition

https://oll.libertyfund.org/titles/godwin-an-enquiry-concerning-political-justice-vol-i

He argues against transfer in fraud. Then he goes onto characterize ownership without redistribution as essentially fraudulent

He calls it the poor man's right as if the goods were already transferred to the rich man, waiting for payment


Anonymous at 3:23 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17022 | reply | quote

Oh, also Godwin did argue in fact, population is good

This is not a natalist view but symmetric, Malthus

The idea in Mises is competition from the many, not marginal production a myth or oversupply good. To argue it good, it must be real

It is outside interest of the demand, and any supposable overpopulation can be fed without extra labor. By contrast, lacking that labor does not constitute profit

Though profit is not the sole focus of property theory, neither is maximum wellbeing, that is utilitarian. It is neither classical consequential nor deontological. It is in fact more emphatic profit than property theory ever had been


Anonymous at 3:26 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17023 | reply | quote

I might add, Rothbard nowhere implies LITERAL randomness of givings. You take this too literally

That is like arguing somebody who calls socialism, "giving everything away" a refutation, the USSR as a socialist experiment simply because the clothes on their backs were still kept


Anonymous at 3:28 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17024 | reply | quote

#17022 You could give quotes of the specific passages you're referring to, analyze them, and more clearly explain what they have to do with particulars from my post.

> I might add, Rothbard nowhere implies LITERAL randomness of givings. You take this too literally

I was trying to refer to what Rothbard actually said, which I had quoted and italicized: "to any passer-by". Rothbard's claim doesn't match Godwin's position.


curi at 3:35 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17025 | reply | quote

Another thing, classical liberalism is axiom, not form

Anarchism, even minarchism is classically liberal if it is natural. Not natural as in voluntary only but interest-based

Sure, this is not a mandate but presumed in Rothbard's stateless society but Rothbard is way more a classical liberal than Godwin

Why? Because Godwin's emphasis at least in the 3RD edition is voluntarity, not axiom

He presumes the axiom of some proviso in a merely voluntary society. You might argue that is much alike an ancap society

Let's skip the part where Spooner funded Brown, Tolstoyans flipped to bolshevik, Camus against ressentiment turned to epuration

Or the fact that the only ancom society, not amish or mennonite was also only informal, barely even clear whether they could leave unless expelled once the sickle came down (https://www.econlib.org/archives/2009/11/how_the_economy.html)

Instead, that any such supposition as you make is allegedly pragmatic. It is not however classical liberal. Axioms are exact, specific even. Pragmatism is plausibility. A communist theory that is plausible is not the same as being capitalist simply because capitalism is predicated on private property. Capitalism implies profit. Property is the reduced crux. If there is property but also communal, you might argue it compatible ancap, idk but whatever. That said, classical is classical because it is neither ancom nor neoliberal. It is classical because it implies rational ego. Not simply autonomous ego


Anonymous at 3:36 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17026 | reply | quote

Oh and the difference in his citation is of Aristotle's description, dynamic human behavior

Nichomachean ethics is not widely renowned, e.g. However, Aristotle didn't argue redistribution voluntarily ooooor by force

He did argue dogma. Attitude versus actual "obligation."

It isn't even at odds Rothbard given he also EXPLICITLY condemns hedonism. That he accepts hedonia is the difference between Aristotle and Socrates, along with law

Violence, too isnt the sole coercion. Threats of violence are jawboning, a form of intended reaction

The reason this does not fall into the open socjus criteria, muh speech is violent is that peer pressure can be ignored. You cannot simply ignore being forced into jail. 1 does not lead to violence. The other acts on the intent to if uncomplied

Nowhere does Godwin straighten this out. In fact since his description of alleged fraud includes a lack of charity, it can only be interpreted his juxtaposition against property transfer by fraud as not simply a poor choice of wording or lack of clarity but an explicit exception to what he considers the interrelation, "simple justice" and liberty

Marxists oppose infringements too. So much so that they believe in infringing on property to bestow some "right" to free stuff

Antifa opposes violence. That is why its violent terrorism is to it a form of "self-defense" against that dastardly thing we call unpopular speech

If a marxist called wages theft instead of using the phrase wage-theft, would you be fooled?


Anonymous at 3:45 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17027 | reply | quote

It is also unclear how you attempt to tie objectivism into the debate on Popper

Popper has nothing to do empiricism anymore than atomism like that by Democritus is comparable not Sextus Empiricus but the scientific method

Ayn does not juxtapose the scientific method. In fact the word objectivism is closer to sociophysics, wherein it utilizes physic-analogy than it is to the scientific method

If you were actually a fan of Ayn, you would know her views on tabula rasa, to intuition contra instinct

You would also know that Darwin an anthropologist (not a biologist)'s albeit Lamarckian theory of transmutation is OUTRIGHT DENIED by her

You would also know, being your supposed moral objectivism, that moral objectivism is explicitly a matter of biological evolution

Even if Ayn shifted her views since early essays, that isn't the same thing

Alas, Locke the empiricist was more empirical and last time I checked, he was not so much empirical or idealist, he was a Gassendi-taught epicurean

Lucretius is closer to Ayn's view. Ironically, that was opposed by her in any shape or form, a place in her objectivism

I am reminded by her original love, Nietzsche inb4 declaring him "too atomistic"


Anonymous at 3:55 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17028 | reply | quote

Maybe before acting like an expert on Godwin, read ALL his editions

You might learn something. It was no mere rescribble or shuffling of page numbers, these editions

They were MASSIVE rewrites. Massive


Anonymous at 3:57 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17029 | reply | quote

> If you were actually a fan of Ayn

What are you hoping to accomplish by personalizing? And maybe my writing about *Atlas Shrugged* will convince you that I am actually a fan of Ayn Rand:

https://www.learnobjectivism.com/atlas-shrugged-chapter-1

It's mostly hard to follow what you're talking about FYI.


curi at 3:59 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17030 | reply | quote

Well so am I

My argument was against your central theses

Atlas Shrugged isn't her only work


Anonymous at 4:00 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17031 | reply | quote

The fountainhead was fiction. Atlas shrugged an expression in narrative form, objectivism

However, you attempt to tie Rothbard's reading of Atlas Shrugged into his comments on Popper

THAAAAT is what I was critiquing. Atlas Shrugged didn't cover science. Her early essays did

But then why bring it up? At most, her main late refutation of subjective thought lies in a misreading, her own of Kant on apriori

Any case, back to Popper, reread epistemologies: http://www.commens.org/encyclopedia/article/chiasson-phyllis-abduction-aspect-retroduction


Anonymous at 4:04 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17032 | reply | quote

Consider Ayn wrote on invading Cuba, wrote against drug use

You might argue the latter lifestyle unhealthy or Cuba a dictatorship, but this has nothing to do liberty, acting on restricting it nor that of self-harm even hold a premise on freedom to dogmatize. Its consequences on that of let's say family or work ethic are another debate


Anonymous at 4:06 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17033 | reply | quote

#17029 If you want to change your approach and try to make rational, textual arguments you're welcome to. If you continue with this I'm going to start ignoring you.

As it happens, I've travelled to a library to read a Godwin book on microfilm and paid hundreds of dollars to have a library scan another one for me.

You're throwing out accusations, but you don't know me and aren't using evidence or substantively arguing your case.

BTW, are you aware that Godwin wrote and believed "That commerce ought not to be regulated"? Have you read *Essay against reopening the war with france*?


curi at 4:08 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17034 | reply | quote

I will ask whether you've read Ayn's essays

If I got snarky, I apologize. I have high standards but do not know you on a personal level to pass judgments, to have been reasonable, there


Anonymous at 4:08 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17035 | reply | quote

#17035 Yes I've read Ayn Rand's essays.


curi at 4:10 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17036 | reply | quote

I am aware. But many people argued the same. Hayek did, in his theory of metaxis or catallacty

Unfortunately, his proposals were scattered. As to microfiche, that only constitutes medium of text, not the actual substance. The first edition is the same in microfiche as it is digitally. Only a change of edition would matter


Anonymous at 4:11 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17037 | reply | quote

Ok. So then I ask, how are you tying that into his remarks on Popper?

Popper wrote on several subjects, science AND politics.


Anonymous at 4:12 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17038 | reply | quote

I don't think I was snarky after the first few OPs, I am sincerely asking for elaboration, atm.

Just so it is clear


Anonymous at 4:13 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17039 | reply | quote

I do wish to add free trade is but one component of libertarianism

Henry George turned against it. Pareto always opposed it. Hansen or Haberler simply believed in subsidization as a form redistribution thru masser volume of trade

The war with France was of many premises underlying Malthus's own concerns - the other being production-reproduction (as seen in the poor laws)

This would be his Cobdenite proclamation but, not really a whole doctrine. Even certain state socialists, it is conceded by Mises beat, in his words "ansoc'ers" like Proudhon (who loathed the term but uhh, look to property disagreements, not sex in Dejacque and you'll see his meticulous assessment of rights does not hold-up well]


Anonymous at 4:29 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17040 | reply | quote

As did BTW, Hodgskin. Look, I don't hate Godwin nor do I Proudhon even

My issue is classification, practicality and intent versus wording. Wording, that is, I see as secondary to the intent. And intent means little but everything if the sentiment on which he flipflops is itself spurious


Anonymous at 4:42 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17041 | reply | quote

The reason I accept let's say Tucker despite his imho invalid reasons for valid conclusion on copyright or late stirnerite work is that he began pure as day the way Spooner did

I am not claiming Rothbard consistent everywhere. His excoriation, Plato only then to let up on Augustine or his stance, Garrison only to again excoriate Hume, way better bugs me.

I don't think I am a cultist here to defend his argument


Anonymous at 4:49 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17042 | reply | quote

You keep talking *about* books/articles/people instead of using quotes. If we both read something and then we both say our overall conclusions, we're gonna have some disagreements. If you quote a passage and talk about how you read it and why, we might be able to resolve a disagreement.

I don't know how else to make the conversation fruitful. Also you're talking about too many things at once in my opinion.


curi at 6:00 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17043 | reply | quote

I did in fact paraphrase Godwin a few times.


Anonymous at 6:06 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17044 | reply | quote

"I will suppose for example that it is right for one man to possess a greater portion of property than another, either as the fruit of his industry, or the inheritance of his ancestors. Justice obliges him to regard this property as a trust, and calls upon him maturely to consider in what manner it may best be employed for the increase of liberty, knowledge and virtue. He has no right to dispose of a shilling of it at the will of his caprice. So far from being entitled to well earned applause for having employed some scanty pittance in the service of philanthropy, he is in the eye of justice a delinquent if he withhold any portion from that service. Nothing can be more incontrovertible. Could that portion have been better or more worthily employed? That it could is implied in the very terms of the proposition. Then it was just it should have been so employed.—In the same manner as my property, I hold my person as a trust in behalf of mankind. I am bound to employ my talents, my understanding, my strength and my time for the production of the greatest quantity of general good. Such are the declarations of justice, so great is the extent of my duty.

But justice is reciprocal. If it be just that I should confer a benefit, it is just that another man should receive it, and, if I withhold from him that to which he is entitled, he may justly complain. My neighbour is in want of ten pounds that I can spare. There is no law of political institution that has been made to reach this case, and to transfer this property from me to him. But in the eye of simple justice, unless it can be shewn that the money can be more beneficently employed, his claim is as complete, as if he had my bond in his possession, or had supplied me with goods to the amount.*


Anonymous at 6:11 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17045 | reply | quote

"It is therefore impossible for me to confer upon any man a favour, I can only do him a right. Whatever deviates from the law of justice, even I will suppose in the too much done in favour of some individual or some part of the general whole, is so much subtracted from the general stock, is so much of absolute injustice."

He argued not obligation but condition in ownership


Anonymous at 6:13 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17046 | reply | quote

curi:

>> instead of using quotes.

anon:

> I did in fact paraphrase Godwin a few times.

See the problem?


curi at 6:17 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17047 | reply | quote

I am not one of those people who argue ancom isn't e.g. anarchist either

Contrast this by Hodgskin who ultimately resembled Godwin in every other way:

"I look on a right of property — on the right of individuals, to have and to own, for their own separate and selfish use and enjoyment, the produce of their own industry, with power freely to dispose of the whole of that in the manner most agreeable to themselves, as essential to the welfare and even to the continued existence of society. If, therefore, I did not suppose, with Mr. Locke, that nature establishes such a right — if I were not prepared to shew that she not merely establishes, but also protects and preserves it, so far as never to suffer it to be violated with impunity — I should at once take refuge in Mr. Bentham’s impious theory, and admit that the legislator who established and preserved a right of property, deserved little less adoration than the Divinity himself. Believing, however, that nature establishes such a right, I can neither join those who vituperate it as the source of all our social misery, nor those who claim for the legislator the high honour of being “the author of the finest triumph of humanity over itself.”

Now, we see it is not simply a different view, morality in areas like pleasure. Hodgskin in many ways deprioritized commune bonum hominis as much he did commune bonum communitatis

However, he is also explicit in making no exceptions. Godwin wasn't omissive, by oversight but per earlier revisions, hesitant to consider it a full right, irrespective any view on pleasure

It isn't the dogma but his view what constitutes rights. This is neither rational ego nor ethical ego. Albeit, Ayn would consider altruism a ticking timebomb, in organic form (bodypolitic, politikon zoon), an extension of ethical ego, no?


Anonymous at 6:20 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17048 | reply | quote

Yes. I assumed you would visit the link.

I also thought them too long, verbose to place intext. It would be difficult to capture complete context, however in any narrower excerpt.

As so you wish, I have posted these quotes


Anonymous at 6:22 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17049 | reply | quote

#17045 Please don't post unsourced quotes (source should be in the same comment as the quote). And you didn't analyze. I read Godwin as being thoroughly in favor of reason: all our decisions should be made by reason, not caprice. This is compatible with property rights controlling what happens when there is a disagreement about reason, and with the total rejection of force. I don't know what your point is.


curi at 6:26 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17050 | reply | quote

What is rational is still a choice. What is a right is reason-based.

Socialist calculation is based on reason. It just lacks rationality

What is unreasonable is still a form of human reason much as irrationality is a product, rational cognition

What is of reason in Godwin's line is that of utilitarian "ethos." That is not the naturalistic reason you normally argue

Human reason can be that of liberty or rationalism. His argument is that of rationalism, not liberty

At least, not unless a condition to ownership in redistributing portions is a methodology

Liberty is after all a methodology. It is not a substance


Anonymous at 6:31 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17051 | reply | quote

Further, it is not unsourced

The link was included a few comments back

http://curi.us/2150-rothbards-bad-scholarship-on-godwin-and-popper#17022


Anonymous at 6:32 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17052 | reply | quote

It is highly assumptuous to assume I have not analyzed Godwin, myself no?

It must be remembered language has varying meanings. Reason is like freedom. FDR used it to mean "liberation," in the Marxian sense. For us, that is not freedom

Reason is to reason. Individuals form a praxis by reason but they lack a moral exception

They might have an obligation but not an exception

That is the contemporary meaning of reason. It is moral reason, not human reason.


Anonymous at 6:36 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17053 | reply | quote

So he believed in reason being a virtue

Reason in market thought is that all men act on their own volition

His wording must be contextualized. Context matters most of all


Anonymous at 6:37 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17054 | reply | quote

If it is a right, that the other person has to my property, it is only a system based on reason so long as this is unenforced

The issue is at the top of the essay, it is clear he considers it a form, by wording of "right" -- not favor, of fraud

So he doesnt seek to lack enforcenent. He seeks to lack enforcement on just ownership

However, while enforcement even in natural law isn't unheard of, it is counter to human reason if of these alleged infractions to be indeed enforced is my right according to human reason


Anonymous at 6:41 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17055 | reply | quote

I am not reading between the lines

https://oll.libertyfund.org/titles/90#Godwin_0164-01_119

"Two of the greatest abuses relative to the interior policy ofRobbery and fraud, two great vices in society:nations, which at this time prevail in the world, will be allowed to consist in the irregular transfer of property, either first by violence, or secondly by fraud. If among the inhabitants of any country there existed no desire in one individual to possess himself of the substance of another, or no desire so vehement and restless, as to prompt him to acquire it by means inconsistent with order and justice"

That by itself is innocuous

However, when you connect the two paragraphs, it makes more sense

"Order and justice." Justice -- something he considers redistribution

That is how a positive rights theorist might characterize insurrectionary anarchism.

"Wages are theft. So i have a right, as the enforcer of said rights against this theft to take it by force"

The idea in enforcement is that a violation forfeits rights. Unfortunately this paragraph makes it clear what he is excepting to allow for enforcement


Anonymous at 6:46 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17057 | reply | quote

#17057 The other anon's comments remind me of a bad version of GPT-3. He rambles incoherently.


Anon #2 at 6:50 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17058 | reply | quote

It is injustice, he is saying to take it by force. But he does not exclude the alleged exploitation in unrestrained ownership as outside "desirability"

In fact, that is what he is attempting to articulate here

Of course socialism is greedy. But the idea in commune bonum hominis is "everybody well-off"

This is why, erroneously, fools like Deleuze argue it is an anti-oedipus

I did not claim it makes sense. Only that that is the mindset


Anonymous at 6:51 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17059 | reply | quote

> curi:

>>> instead of using quotes.

>anon:

>> I did in fact paraphrase Godwin a few times.

>See the problem?

[no direct answer addressing that a quote and a paraphrase are different things, so the correction was incorrect]

curi:

>> Please don't post unsourced quotes (source should be in the same comment as the quote).

anon:

> Further, it is not unsourced

You seem to have difficulty reading what I say.

curi

>> And you didn't analyze.

anon:

> It is highly assumptuous to assume I have not analyzed Godwin, myself no?

It means you didn't analyze *in your comment*. Your comment did not provide analysis. I asked for quotes + analysis, but didn't receive it. You seem to have a lot of trouble understanding what I say. You also IMO don't understand what Godwin was saying and haven't connected your comments to any of my claims (it's hard to tell what your point, goal or conclusions are).

I point these things out to explain one of the reasons why I've lost interest in this discussion. I regard your discussion quality and precision as poor, and these are examples of problems.


curi at 6:51 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17060 | reply | quote

#17058 It's not totally incoherent. There are lucid bits mixed in, and I think more of it would seem lucid if I'd read all the same books as him – he assumes tons of niche background knowledge. Definitely not GPT-3 IMO, let alone a bad version of it.


curi at 6:52 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17061 | reply | quote

#17059

> It is injustice, he is saying to take it by force.

Godwin doesn't believe that injustices in general should be remedied by force. He's very very anti-force.


Godwin Expert at 6:54 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17062 | reply | quote

You aren't the first to accuse me of...well, at least using the postmodern generator

Nonetheless, ordering matters less between comments than it does, to each comment's own structure

Long paragraphs annoy people. That is why I am breaking mine up.

Elliot was responding to comments i'd posted, only once I'd written several new replies, my own. So the alternating of focus between comments is an accident neither I nor Elliot planned/intended/etc

The comment section isn't ajax, so that will happen without either us realizing till after it is submitted, that a new comment has since appeared


Anonymous at 6:56 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17063 | reply | quote

"Godwin doesn't believe that injustices in general should be remedied by force. He's very very anti-force."

That would be true of his later revisions. It is inexplicit in the 1793 version (as opposed 1796 or 1798) but it is far from being "very very." All we can say is he had left it up to interpretation in the earlier revisions and explicitly condemned it in later versions


Anonymous at 6:58 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17064 | reply | quote

>> curi:

>>>> instead of using quotes.

>> anon:

>>> I did in fact paraphrase Godwin a few times.

>> See the problem?

> [no direct answer addressing that a quote and a paraphrase are different things, so the correction was incorrect]

Not an incorrect correction when I provide the actual quote. The fact I did that makes evident, I comprehend the difference. Must I actually write this? Yes, direct quotes do not paraphrase

Indirect quotes do, but I knew what you meant, so I provided a direct quote

THAT was my acknowledgment (implicit)

> curi:

>>> Please don't post unsourced quotes (source should be in the same comment as the quote).

> anon:

>> Further, it is not unsourced

> You seem to have difficulty reading what I say.

Yes ane no.

When i replied with that, I skipped the gun in only reading the first line

I had reread it after, being you explicitly request it be in the same comment

But by then, I could not delete my comment. I figured, being what is done, is done

It is why however, by the NEXT comment, I DO include the link

I did notice. I just was looking to do so there-on-out

> curi

>>> And you didn't analyze.

> anon:

>> It is highly assumptuous to assume I have not analyzed Godwin, myself no?

> It means you didn't analyze *in your comment*. Your comment did not provide analysis. I asked for quotes + analysis, but didn't receive it. You seem to have a lot of trouble understanding what I say. You also IMO don't understand what Godwin was saying and haven't connected your comments to any of my claims (it's hard to tell what your point, goal or conclusions are).

Because I did in earlier comments.

You asked for references. This is not an essay-form, I figured it would be too redundant or spammy, if I repeated myself

My conclusion was a refutation of certain interpretations you consider to be misread by Rothbard

This is an intellectual blog. I have gotten such remarks in the past, usually figuring I am posting to stir up trouble

I am simply a geek. I respect Knapp despite disagreements, then no, I am not here to like cause trouble or anything if that is what you ask?

> I point these things out to explain one of the reasons why I've lost interest in this discussion. I regard your discussion quality and precision as poor, and these are examples of problems.


Anonymous at 7:14 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17065 | reply | quote

I actually wasn't attempting to correct you. I just meant to explain why I did not recognize quotation is necessary so long as I make it accessible

Thank you for being constructive. You are a polite debater, for sure. I was trying to follow with what style or formality you prefer

I am not apt on unwritten rules and I have been told to show I will heed advice by demonstrating it, not by explaining it


Anonymous at 7:18 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17066 | reply | quote

"Misquoting is discouraged. If something isn’t an exact, literal quote, you're advised not to use quote marks." -- like that

I do lament your loss of interest. I enjoy debate. I enjoy intellectual spar


Anonymous at 7:23 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17067 | reply | quote

Do you have any quote indicating Godwin wasn't anti-force in Political Justice 1st edition?

I think he was always anti-force and I'm unclear on what useful takeaway/conclusion I should be getting from this, if any.

Godwin was so anti-force that he even thought parents shouldn't use force against their children. Few people think that. Locke, for example, suggested breaking children's spirits at especially young ages because if you wait longer then they'll fight back more.

Just as Godwin wanted parents to rely on their wisdom/arguments/reason to persuade children, he also wanted people to use voluntary reason/persuasion (not force) as a means of sometimes getting property from others. This is compatible with property rights, capitalism, etc., even though Godwin did not have a modern Austrian understanding of property or capitalism. He's not an enemy.

Rothbard:

> Godwin believed, not that private property should be expropriated by force, but that individuals, fully using their reason, should voluntarily and altruistically divest themselves of all private property to any passer-by.

Rothbard agrees that Godwin didn't want property expropriated by force, but then straw mans Godwin with the comment about giving property to any passer-by, which Godwin never said. Godwin's comments about using rational judgment to give some property to people with a better use of it doesn't mean giving it to any passer-by.


curi at 9:13 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17068 | reply | quote

I could not follow this conversation at all.


Periergo at 10:30 PM on August 9, 2020 | #17071 | reply | quote

Rothbard overlooked his first edition.

I did offer the implicit assertion of force, as well the lack of opposition to it

So, there isn't much else to quote.

Again, as to passers-by, it isn't to be taken anymore literally than hyperbole, "the clothes off my back."


Anonymous at 4:42 AM on August 10, 2020 | #17073 | reply | quote

Also I did not call Godwin an enemy. I enjoy Stirner and he was worse. I enjoy Schmitt and he was worse than Stirner

We are disagreeing as to interpretation


Anonymous at 4:44 AM on August 10, 2020 | #17074 | reply | quote

Also, there was no lack of austrian property theory by then

I would refer back to Salamanca


Anonymous at 4:46 AM on August 10, 2020 | #17075 | reply | quote

https://oll.libertyfund.org/titles/2740#Suarez_Selections1639_321

"The true meaning of the wordius. According to the latter and strict acceptation of ius, this name is properly wont to be bestowed upon a certain moral power which every man has, either over his own property or with respect to that which is due to him. For it is thus that the owner of a thing is said to have a right (ius) in that thing, and the labourer is said to have that right to his wages by reason of which he is declared worthy of his hire. Indeed, this acceptation of the term is frequent, not only in law, but also in Scripture; for the law distinguishes in this wise between a right (ius) [already established] in a thing and a right to a thing; as it also distinguishes among rights of servitude or rights of rural or urban estates, rights of use or enjoyment, and similar rights, concerning which one may consult Brisson (De Verborum Significatione, Bk. IX, word ius,at great length)"

That for instance is very austrian, no?


Anonymous at 4:51 AM on August 10, 2020 | #17076 | reply | quote

I did not choose Suarez's bizarre spelling (nor spacing) anymore than Godwin's certain bizarre sentence strutures.

Translation is a factor as are computers. I am copying quotations, per direct quotation request


Anonymous at 4:54 AM on August 10, 2020 | #17077 | reply | quote

Also I dm'd you on twitter, if you saw please? I do think I like you. I would enjoy debating with you, picking each others' brains

Plus, you seem to accept my ascerbic (at times) tone, and I don't mean it personally, though it is usually the peculiar way my intellectual "friendships" begin


Anonymous at 5:11 AM on August 10, 2020 | #17078 | reply | quote

Yes, BTW, for others who cannot follow my train of thought, I looked-up your other posts to help with context, on my end. I did not wish to misunderstand you

Here is why I do not interpret:

>Godwin did not have a modern Austrian understanding of property or capitalism.

As implying mere unawareness:

"[Godwin did not know Popperian epistemology nor modern economics], both of which had not yet been invented."

https://groups.google.com/forum/m/#!topic/beginning-of-infinity/V_Fu8UEq9Ds


Anonymous at 5:23 AM on August 10, 2020 | #17079 | reply | quote

I do know there is tension between christian and objectivist authors (although Ayn still had read her share without as total objection many her contemporary followers believe)

However, Suarez is a frequent figure cited in Austrian discourse. A niche? Sure, but not again, in Austrian discourse, is he "minor."


Anonymous at 5:28 AM on August 10, 2020 | #17080 | reply | quote

As to Popperian epistemology, I would note the paradox in treating sociology as a science AT ALL

https://www.maxwell.syr.edu/moynihan/cqrm/Volume_14_Issue_1_2/Schaffer/

Popper was an interpretivist but as we learn from the "new realist" school (William James' followers), there is a historical lineage between its extremer forms (social constructionism) and that of let's say physicalism

That lineage is not an accident either but an intellectually "consistent" pivot. Why does Lewontin argue a reduced biological "proximity" of nucleotide (nvm expression) must outweigh cultural (INTERsubjective) differences?

Abduction is not retroduction. Popper argues in his own words against sole deductive or sole inductive reasoning. He falls flat in offering ACTUAL demarcation. Ironic to his falsificationism is absent anywhere a mention, the word abduction in his book


Anonymous at 5:51 AM on August 10, 2020 | #17081 | reply | quote

https://books.google.com/books?id=O0TN1MJ0JacC&lpg=PA136&pg=PA137

Miscommunication? Popper only mentions Comte in a footnote. I have seen many claim he lambasted the law of three stages, but that isn't even an epistemology. Ontic views the universe are a main contention, besides the PARADOX of [sartean] existentialism+immaterialism noted above

As it notes in the first link, these get skewed somewhere between the two. Phenomenalism (Mill) is to immaterialism as [Sartean] existentialism is to what Rothbard yes, mischaracterizes as nihilism

I do not pretend he characterized nihilism correctly, even if newer doctrines taking its name (e.g., transcendental nihilism) are NOT EVEN CLOSE to the original meaning EITHER.

But I also know what he INTENDED, what he MEANT


Anonymous at 6:12 AM on August 10, 2020 | #17082 | reply | quote

Things get mischaracterized too. Buridan was no nominalist, nor was Scotus

The other is that of let's say Laske's view, social construction and essentialism

Both might appear to share apriori? Except they don't. They only share the distinction, the demarcation. There is a nominalism that pervades the former

It cannot be fixed with neopragmatism either. Stark contrasts emerge between Platonic realism (inductive), peripatetic realism & let's say "absolute realism." Yet, there are also very parallel aspects, however opposite they might appear

So abduction is very symmetric induction. Retroduction combines both with deduction.

Retroduction also demarcates better. It does not scientize sociology nor psychologize science

I would recommend Frankl on how ironic the origins of many reductive epistemologies are

He does not note directly the nondual axiom that ultimately guides both irrealist (or "anti-foundationalist") & neopragmatism (analytical tradition, primarily was a fork of positivism by maybe a decade before Frege gained clout -- it was in fact originated in Scottish idealism crossed the Baden school of post-kantian tradition. See "objective idealism's" total distortion of Trendelenberg, all these lie in Reid's externalism or Descarte's MBD)

But he gets pretty close


Anonymous at 6:22 AM on August 10, 2020 | #17083 | reply | quote

This is why I have said context matters.

Especially in wording, anything can be taken at face value but it must be understood in the context by which it was intended

Why do you think Davidson had such a hard time with Kant or Meinong?

Why do you think many Misesian contemporaries mistake the word polylogic (intersubjectivity) as used by Marcuse for that of supposedly empirical (deterministic at times but uhhh not quite totally true - in fact, Rothbard concedes influence as did Weber in his apriori class theory, making any metapolitical leap not too far off) polylogic, that which Mises condemns?

They are not alone. Take the metanarrarive theory which unlike the "grand" is meso. Now, that is easily explainable by the gnostic differences in much of eastern philosophy

So perhaps reading-up on Nisbet's MI fish experiment would elucidate "reading between the lines?"

Anyway in circling back:

Popper might have been classified in the same school then, Weber (though Kuhn himself has been accused of naturalism instead), but Weber was interpreting sociology. Popper simply applied this to science

He even co-wrote papers, Dennett. It is amusing since Dennett is, if no physicalist, certainly a biological materialist at minimum

Now, I do enjoy Dennett, I won't lie. I am more open-minded than you might think. I am simply noting differences and similarities boil down to method+abstract, and focus

The focus and abstracts are what Rothbard sees even if he uses the term too broadly for logical reference


Anonymous at 6:34 AM on August 10, 2020 | #17084 | reply | quote

The reason I am so hard on "reason" is for the same reasons C.S. Lewis found it important to distinguish a peripatetic view of reason (that is, taking humans as they ARE -- "is")

https://www.brainpickings.org/2016/11/29/c-s-lewis-equality-democracy/

And rationalism (taking humans as they OUGHT be -- Via Lucis, believing human reason always rational, not simply rational to let people be rational or irrational -- that is, laissez faire as a constructive destruction, demise of the weakest as Mayr might put it)

That in fact brings me to another critique. That of self-perfectibility:

https://www.marxists.org/reference/subject/philosophy/works/en/magee.htm

Limitation is a mortal fact. It is not a choice.

Perfectability is a question. It is theoretically ambiguous in that you may maximize your potential or claim to be immortal

However, being perfectly imperfect, or a better human is an agential ideal. It is highly subjective. It is pluralistically viable if perfectability is to follow our own talents, our own dreams.

Hold on. What if some people find supposed perfection in the deliberately intentionally flawed -- not simply imperfect, nor even comfort in flaw or laxness but going out of your way to be irregular, worse than mediocre?

You might ask, who in their right mind would do that? Exactly. Nobody in their right mind

But welcome to modernism. There is for instance, a thing called "anti-art," that which redefines art to be a mustache on the Mona Lisa (Duchamp) or taping 2 papers together (which bid at multi-millions)

Alternatively, Richter's "rectangles resisting routine"

Pinker might note how this ties into the idea of a blank slate. Sure enough, that wasn't only the idea behind avant-garde (hodgepodge much as Nuremberg had been to many positive+negative law systems), but architectual modernism. Ibadi cube-houses were a psychological experiment worthy of featuring in Chaosmosis. In fact, it beat Guattari to the gun. So much so, it is eerily present in the Fountainhead

Well, another example is Dweck. The idea is simply, instead of placing career in front of fun or more explicitly attempting to redefine the "good," it assumes a radical constructivist theory, self-attainment, generalistic goals, etc

Knowledge is gained. Intelligence is not. Skill is had. It is definitely teachable but it is not talent.

These are not so fluid notions of "good" when the difference lies in completing or bonking the brain surgery

It is not possible to frame this inside the selection or rather, entrepreneurial expansion any market since it lacks any expansion a niche or additional facet, role or utility. It is the redefining of skill to flatten any division of labor, with only credentials like a college degree to remain


Anonymous at 6:55 AM on August 10, 2020 | #17085 | reply | quote

As with anything, most theories predate themselves

Natural teleology for instance has more in common, despite its passive-[pro]active difference, that of evo-devo, than would Lamarck directly

We might mince words - take Belsham who applied metaphysical, not political free will, however to political ends

Much as semioccasionalism ("generale volition") would be closer that of the "omniscience" debate than Lucretius let alone James' specific premise for accepting free will *or* that of Spinoza, maybe Harris's compatiblism

But the rest is all there

E.g., https://www.econlib.org/library/Essays/LtrLbrty/bryTSO.html

Another example is Laffemas whose ideas predate Say, even closer than Condillac ever was, it is totally like the former too, distinguishable Hobson or Lauderdale (all which Hayek misunderstood)

Perhaps, too, at the root Popper's pragmatic contradiction as Apel might phrase it, is a misreading words like law or justice in Plato who over the course of his own long tract, Res Publica appears to have shifted his views (clearer in Critias as I mention earlier). Alas, his proposal befell, politically, the same issues. Piecemeal propaganda ties into a very Confucian view, just flipped on its head. Nothing like the Dao either, it is a more systematic formalization, Xuenxue's take on yinyang (ziran is docility, not necessarily mauvaise foi but the 3-mysteries cannot be equated Wuji, only uncarved wood)

He was right about historicism, I agree there. Context here is of course obvious by contrast some the other bits, what he means. There is substance theory in Hegel, the school of historicist economics (List, then later Schmollner, lotta metrics, but not the main issue per se as Menger notes), then that of critical historiography, how Nietzsche words it


Anonymous at 7:08 AM on August 10, 2020 | #17086 | reply | quote

Marx did read many these texts. His surplus theory was a corruption of, but derived too from Quesnay, for instance

Godwin might not have been aware these tracts but they certainly were neither nonexistent nor inaccessible, given even Jefferson managed to access several Spanish monarchomach texts, and Adams would travel to British battle sites, and others were already bringing oriental (or at least indological) scholarship into Europe by, not the 18th-19th century (Schlegel) but the 16th century (privatdozenten? Like Eckhart?)


Anonymous at 7:12 AM on August 10, 2020 | #17087 | reply | quote

"Better use" reminds me of the Keynesian mental gymnastics

https://bleedingheartlibertarians.com/2013/11/sufficientarian-liberalism/

These are not new attempts either. Kropotkin cited parasitic (denotative-zoological) ecosystems. Tolstoy tried to apply total pacifism (even in the case of self-defense) on Christian "existential" grounds against a [conventional] state

Wilkinson attempts somehow to apply Rawls in a Coasian manner

https://mises.org/library/rawlsitarian-paradox

Many even had misread their sources. https://mises.org/wire/selgin-contra-horwitz-and-white-mises’s-view-fiduciary-media

Words, as we learn from Saussure befall logocentrism. Some do so intentionally, others unintentionally

Some do it to attempt clearer differentiation (as might popular science on BBC)

Or for "well-intent":

https://books.google.com/books?id=OWkE2QW1g1kC&pg=PA12&q="reflected%20their%20understandable%20desire%20to%20gain"&f=false#v=snippet&q="reflected%20their%20understandable%20desire%20fo%20gain"&f=false

But words change is the point.


Anonymous at 8:25 AM on August 10, 2020 | #17088 | reply | quote

This has real consequences. Fideism underlies rationalism. Aquinas whose idea of human reason precursed Ayn

Yes, Ayn was placing reason in reaction to what would later form the basis of fideism

Another example of miscommunication EVEN AMONGST SMART PEOPLE is Tolstoy (https://mises.org/library/are-libertarians-anarchists)

Or his fanboys (https://www.lewrockwell.com/2011/12/vasko-kohlmayer/tolstoy-on-war-and-state)

But, uhh...

"Here we should note still a third variety of anarchist thought, one completely different from either the collectivists or individualists. This is the absolute pacifism of Leo Tolstoy. This preaches a society where force would not even be used to defend person and property, whether by State or private organizations. Tolstoy's program of nonviolence has influenced many alleged pacifists today, mainly through Gandhi, but the latter do not realize that there can be no genuinely complete pacifism unless the State and other defense agencies are eliminated. This type of anarchism, above all others, rests on an excessively idealistic view of human nature. It could only work in a community of saints."

Tolstoy ALSO mistakes WHY Jesus whipped pelts, this being over the holiness, passover, the distance traveled by those subject to "unjust price (like usury, these BTW predate even Socrates which acc. to biblical dating, also predates even abrahamic root at all) or where it occurred, this place of worship being his "dad's" "home," similar to modern respect in cemetaries (despite the fact, no, no literal corpses or hypothetical spirits can be perturbed)

He also does on pacifism (ignoring too, Jesus's then-cleat violation no matter the merchantile 'transgressions') which is nowhere to be found

https://coldcasechristianity.com/writings/is-jesus-a-pacifist (even if Paul contradicts himself on the application, ceremonial law too)


Anonymous at 8:36 AM on August 10, 2020 | #17089 | reply | quote

Another semantical anomaly that tripped up many the antitrinitarian thinkers,

WAY MORE THAN AN ANECDOTE, being Marxists, prior to at least Rousseau were VEEERY puritanical (the diggers, seekers, ranters, shakers, anabaptists [however much they hate Muntzer], Joachites, now so-called "Basilists" or "Tradinistas," Moses Hess, Cathar Perfects?)

...is that of "loving thy neighbor"

The true meaning was forgiveness, not altruism (why I'll tie into marxism in a few paragraphs) but let's consider the latter hypothesis shall we?

So I concede Lavey's critique of loving thy neighbor is practical not moral per se but there are scriptural roots too:

Given friendship is at the root of marriage or family first, and the idea of God's love embodied in matrimony is wide enough a net to extrapolate, it is logical to cnsider "nurtured nepotism" as adhering, like polygamy, to the notion of a "jealous god (heresy v. singular [proxy of] worship]"

But "work shall set you free?" Hmm, work ethic in capitalism is way more complex than some monastic astheticism

https://digest.bps.org.uk/2015/01/30/there-are-two-types-of-envy-only-one-is-associated-with-schadenfreude

Notice, yet the link to "new babylon," maybe homo podens isn't so far off from let's say Ludensian view of welfare "comporting" some "family model?"

After all, prefixes like post- in modernism are but mere casuistric framing:

Femen: "burqas control the female body because the man can't control himself"

Islamofeminists: "Muslim men insist women wear the hijab because he values her mind, not her body"

A comparison to the Aghoris' path to total samsara is warranted, no? In fact, Giddens notes as much about what it attempts to destroy or not actually [it is claimed anyway] destroy


Anonymous at 8:51 AM on August 10, 2020 | #17090 | reply | quote

There is also the strain of "ethical socialism (oxford) in Comte's secularism

How so, does this tie into hermetic (or utopian thought?)

Easy. Whig historiography is not only dispensational (popovsky, tymion, pepuza? Immanentize the eschaton, "successors")

It is also centered the idea of unus mundus, the gnosis, coupled Zarathustra's dichotomy of good v. evil

How does it then frame ideas like love, envy, reason (or rather fideism, different logoia unified) into its vision?

Imago dei. This is supposed an adam+eve "lineage (mitochondrial+autosomal only by nickname)," thus mean literal biological equality (which is denied not only by Doolittle, Mises too) - something Montelembert rightly excoriates (v. universality of reason)

Because the biology, morals, scripture are all conjoined.

The words of Calhoun on blacks ineligible natural rights, due to biology as opposed moral (reason) is an example of this

It is also something Godwin mistakes, though not too poorly even if his argument against bourgeousie is really better argued against neomercantilism (being aristoi or bourgeousie is a class, and in the UK, even bastard feudalism - an ACTUAL system disappeared at least 200y prior, not even counting true feudalism, be it norman as of the 13C or saxon which actually lacked a Smithian view of class to be stuck in place -- yes, Godwin criticizes this too)


Anonymous at 9:03 AM on August 10, 2020 | #17091 | reply | quote

No separation possible, it is why demarcation is a major tension

This lack of demarcation, Popper might not have intended to trigger but did

Then Godwin is similarly misinterpreted

These polymaths mainly understood. They just opined in criticism, others. They usually understood their own influences very well

I don't think Godwin misunderstood it

These are modern misinterpretations (as might be E. Pluribus unum, an opposite, "from one many," of pluralism, "from many, one")

Why not? The enlightenment sorta handicapped our view of philosophy. But the terms, the ideas in original form, through which we read enlightenment work appears to confirm a medieval bias

The autobiographical is not important to ideas, but it is if the thesis is Rothbard misread Godwin


Anonymous at 9:09 AM on August 10, 2020 | #17092 | reply | quote

Might it appear I am pontificating tangentially? Not as severely it would likely appear

I circle back to self-perfectibility as the crux of marxian thought

Via Lucis or the shining path. Hermetic knowledge is not ambigiously directed self-improvement

It by definition, has a finish point, as a form of apotheosis - nirvana, the guru as pedagogist, the trance as a vision into future exactable utopia without "actual pollutions," the real physical world serves us

It is individual because humanism has nothing to do human reason. It is the worship of reason

This is not something libertarians contend. It IIIIIS what Robespierre intended, in his "cult of reason," or "cult of the supreme being"

Even Machan, I have noted suggested openness to some civitas maximas. Does that not essentially require either some final, sempiternal arbiter (ethnofederalism) oooor assimilation (which being as disenchantment, alienation operate, incentivizes in a "necessary" democracy, rediscovery of roots) -- what Soviets did, russification to create some "new soviet man"

To have democracy+unity, one could not utilize polycentric law. It would involve making everybody "equally different."

Ideological "[n]'eu'genics" when you think about it.

Individual role here is obvious if you've read Popper on historicism

Philology, treating community disputes on a group level as individual "sides of the story"

That is the axiom behind neomarxist (analytical marxist) historiography (even if Rawls denied it)


Anonymous at 9:20 AM on August 10, 2020 | #17093 | reply | quote

The other humanistic or individual root of collectivism is stoic monism

Is not the proletarian envious the rich? Does he not compare himself and secretly desire?

https://paulocoelhoblog.com/2012/02/03/the-law-of-jante-3/

The opposites converge don't they?

If as cyrenics sought to minimalize pain how hedonists sought to maximize pleasure, the subjective wellbeing theory found in Bentham is to numb the "objective illusion," to remystify it

Keeping up with the Joneses takes debt. Crab mentality feels like you are less poor because they are less rich?

So uhh, no. Reason needs to be taken apart into these concepts


Anonymous at 9:24 AM on August 10, 2020 | #17094 | reply | quote

If the lefthand path is individualist, the righthand path is behind the spiritual premise, modern secular reason

Uppsahanids began the blur. Buddha only partly recognized this

And rationalism is ought. Aristotle is is.

That is something Ayn got. Popper by contrast sought, in his political writings, an end

That is not the means-end dichotomy of voluntary individual action

It is individual writ LARGE

Note the word LARGE. An individual ideology or notion of goodness applied commune bonum hominis

So the end is to utopia as CBA or utility is for libertarians in doing X today for Y result

His reason is not the market actions as individuals

His reason is end. Unmethodological


Anonymous at 9:28 AM on August 10, 2020 | #17095 | reply | quote

Even if I am incorrect in interpretation of Godwin's willingness or unwillingness to impose, the nature of bodypolitic is (being a paradigm), as then interpretivist recognizes, easily shifted (or transformed, connotated) over time

Why do you think Lenin broke from Plekhanov whereas Bebel did not? The gotha debate was something internal to even narodnik circles, but it wasn't this that had him contemplate likely future demands for goodies, should these wondrous idealistic promises fall flat

In fact, not only did Lenin realize this in Russia, he exploited it in the west. The early marxist movements, at least post-19C here weren't playing Alinsky's power politics

They were playing old fashioned outreach and creatively framing as they did so

The republican base wanted to hear Bush declare his plan a tax cut. As a result, there is the myth this is what a cut really is

Antifa "opposes fash." "Net neutrality" just "wants fairness." BLM simply says "black lives do matter."

How dare you support fash, an opponent his communism hears? You don't want fairness, Lessig might ask Rand? How dare you say black lives don't matter, a poor arson vic is "asked?"

Language, my friend. All in the language. It has a dangerous effect on ideas

A misreading of Cobden has wrought Richman. A misreading of Weber on force gave us Higgs. Riggenbach misassumes "individualist anarchism" is simply, as a movement, individualism PLUS anarchism

Or elitism, elite theory was nothing like classical/positive self-selection

Discrimination - do we not have discriminating tastes? Do we not discriminate against the unqualified? Do we not against malicious or untrustworthy acquaintances?


Anonymous at 9:40 AM on August 10, 2020 | #17096 | reply | quote

I wrote, perhaps too much but I hope with that, it helps to clarify where it is from which I am coming

Caprice is not force, either. Nor is it necessarily bad. Impulse is bad. Spontaneity is good


Anonymous at 9:41 AM on August 10, 2020 | #17097 | reply | quote

Just 1 more example, why it isn't absurd to suggest the word, reason isn't the same idea you think

The word anarchy. Now, the Greek were clear to differentiate verb from adjective or noun.

Hieros is priestly but a later connotation for caste

Even by the time Socrates used the word anarchy, that was not the case

Arkh means to order. The mob he described as democratic could not have been anarchic, being the archon sanctioned public demand, and thus, it was in fact ordered or archic


Anonymous at 9:45 AM on August 10, 2020 | #17098 | reply | quote

I'd really recommend if you haven't yet, read Molnar as he gets to the bottom of the universal theories that guided a modern move to fideism

Fideism is of big relevance here

Godwin was a fideist. And it shows

That is the direct opposite, not a mere minor dissimilarity, to that of human reason which guides Mises or so on


Anonymous at 9:48 AM on August 10, 2020 | #17099 | reply | quote

All theories, even that foment public choice (incl. as said, disappointment once it does not fulfill -- unless Godwin is an immortal king, well you get the idea on how hard it is to make practice from practicality) are organic (because states are not primordial, they do create themselves in a sense)

That was likely Rothbard's fear. He was, and no I can't mindread anybody let alone contact the dead, but very possibly talking practice v. practicality

It would be practical. Would it be practiced?

This is why Nietzche, despite all his rebukes, moral law as "craft[il]y christian" chose to equally rebuke that of "individualist morals"

He saw the writing on the wall not in hedonic "excess" but relativistic (not to be confused contextualist, normative, particularist) notions, the good.

Something he did not explicitate but Guenon did:

"We cannot help noticing that, like all propagandists, the apostles of tolerance, truth to tell, are very often the most intolerant of men. This is what has in fact happened, and it is strangely ironical : those who wished to overthrow all dogma have created for their own use, we will not say a new dogma, but a caricature of dogma, which they have succeeded in imposing on the western world in general; in this way there have been established, under the pretext of "freedom of thought," the most chimerical beliefs that have ever been seen at any time, under the form of these different idols, of which we have just singled out some of the more important"

https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/7291378-we-cannot-help-noticing-that-like-all-propagandists-the-apostles


Anonymous at 9:56 AM on August 10, 2020 | #17100 | reply | quote

We would be wise to understand if Godwin is even what we see him as, to still avoid conflating his intent with his ideology

Because ideology has no specific person. It is a metaphorical god with many prophets


Anonymous at 9:57 AM on August 10, 2020 | #17101 | reply | quote

And Rothbard here was criticizing Godwin's theory, his axiom

Not his means. Not his intent in the regard of ethic

Ethic is not virtue. We could live alongside Tolstoy likewise -- must it take a capitalist interpretation of his georgism to justify that?

Ofc not. He was a loon. He was a loon you would want as a neighbor. Just because you are a loon does not imply you are a danger

Much as we characterize communism as dangerous, not because any us LITERALLY believe a set of LETTERS on a screen or paper can do any harm


Anonymous at 10:00 AM on August 10, 2020 | #17102 | reply | quote

Means v. form

Form is what makes natural law. Substance backs means in respecting natural rights

You might also have common law, a law which is natural

Godwin was not a natural law theorist simply because he might've preferred law which is natural

Natural law refers to a specific Roman system. Quiritarian, Bavarian, etc

This is why you could have natural rights respected in a common law society too

But uhh, that is why Godwin is if not a minarchist, ok sure, definitely idolized anarchism at several passages

There are indeed many choices of folk law, for the anarchist, for the libertarian. However, all generally derive, historically (ideas like wuwei simply imported on rhetorical ground) from either Scotist or Peripatetic form (or Theodorus+Gratian - oikonomos)

The bastard forms that led to statutory, being decretalism, Justinian/Basilicae, Determinatio (ius commune > jurisgenetic e.g., nobles majores, formalized gentry, legal fictions, westminster declaration, vatican council & eventually, anticanon or the adequacy constitution) also being derived from albeit years of degradation, the latter

Even a possibly 3rd category, frankish law (esp. under Richard II but even as early the 7C) possibly bifurcated from mutual origins, that of saxon common law, despite the fact Scotus wasn't born yet (+the only biblical features in Salic didn't much transform it yet)

What was Godwin?

It is easy enough to articulate what NOOOOT to do. It is easy to pontificate what virtue we SHOULD (or as he imprecisely hypothesized, "ought")

But what DO you do, when disputes arise?

He has a long thesis covering civilities, but his procedure is almost promulgated in a way he believes himself conceiving it anew or at least abstractly

Take his analyses on divine right, legislature etc. Then note the absence of any exact formula

It would be easy to say he wanted to not appear determined this way or that, and let it up to us. But I don't feel it

His ideas are convincing, sure. I do not expect a particular jargon nor derivation. I in fact prefer originality. He is not really doing either.

I might derive ideas but make them my own. Where is his exactness or was it mainly common knowledge, in need no vernacular so verbose so as to cite any latin phrase or specific example accompanied logical justification outside the mere reason (argumentation ethic) for proposing what he feels might protect these rights? He cites many things, on the whole

And yet, classical liberalism is a doctrine of ethic not morals. Be it the primitive (anarchist) form OR civic humanist, let's say

He had classical liberal ideas, he was a natural rights theorist. Can he however be called a classical liberal theorist?

As a description, not that he was a theorist OF OF liberalism though.

Alas, nobody is "only." The words neutral or instead plural, or thick v. thin, cultural v. social might come into play

However, what makes these conservatives or more recent socially liberal classical thinkers liberal is they have decided on form. Not only means but form

Godwin only knows what his form isn't. It is thusly natural but for the ssme reason common law is no more per se natural law than is Daoism-proper an exact form at all per se, it does not make him a natural law theorist

Locke, though erroneously is considered the 1st (if at all) natural rights (not natural law) theorist no?

But he directly articulates in historical example a specific formula. He does not make a charactiture nor limit to property law

This is why he was not only a liberal theorist (theorist who is liberal) but a theorist who STUDIED liberalism


Anonymous at 10:25 AM on August 10, 2020 | #17103 | reply | quote

Maybe my counter-critique of you is too pedantic?

I confess I am only now LATENTLY noticing that. I CANNOT delete the mess of spam -- only stop AFTER THIS MESSAGE


Anonymous at 10:26 AM on August 10, 2020 | #17104 | reply | quote

Language i do not allude makes ideas

I go in depth here because much as language is illuminated by context, in Godwin,

The same is true by Rothbard. IDK if you know this but he was harsh on Sciabarra too.

Perhaps you would know Sciabarra? He has written on this. Which actually reminds me, I need to go, he'll be annoyed if I don't get on FB (hiding as if i'm dead to others, long story)

So enjoy an end to comment bulk


Anonymous at 10:43 AM on August 10, 2020 | #17105 | reply | quote

Just to clarify, what I mean is, if you have read Rothbard's work on EVERYBODY ELSE,

Rothbard is TOUGH TO PLEASE

I don't think he was calling Godwin the enemy

Just being himself, unaloof in distrusting the logic behind it


Anonymous at 10:44 AM on August 10, 2020 | #17106 | reply | quote

And no, I didnt dodge your question

I replied there is no "more explicit" quotation in Godwin, other than that which I have already shared

I gave my interpretation by connecting 2 paragraphs, those were as "explicit" he gets

So I did not dodge. After replying on that clarification, I did emphasize instead, context

Why? Con+text. As in not textual but CONtextual

If you are reading the same excerpts I am, those which I have shared YESTERDAY (as in NOT today), and we still disagree...

There is nothing more I can add.

That is OK ofc. Intellectual spar is socratic dialogue. It has disagreements on esp. interpretive matters

I enjoyed it. Thank you


Anonymous at 10:52 AM on August 10, 2020 | #17107 | reply | quote

*biographical. Yes i belatedly do notice that mistype of mine


Anonymous at 10:54 AM on August 10, 2020 | #17108 | reply | quote

This Isn't Spam – Posting Is Allowed!

> Maybe my counter-critique of you is too pedantic?

> I confess I am only now LATENTLY noticing that. I CANNOT delete the mess of spam -- only stop AFTER THIS MESSAGE

I woke up to 36 new comments in this topic and just skimmed a little. I'll look more later. But this discussion is **not spam**. You are free to discuss. It's really not a problem to post dozens of comments. They're all in one topic that wasn't currently being used for anything else anyway. It's not disruptive. The comments even look on topic but tangential topics are fine here too. I'm not picky about discussions drifting off topic and continuing anyway.

*I can* delete it but I wouldn't have even considered deleting it. And don't tell people to stop posting (if that's what this message means). You can stop your own posting but not theirs.

What I would suggest is you pick fake names so it's easier to tell who is who instead of both being Anonymous. You don't have to but even names like anon1 and anon2 would make it easier to read. I'm not sure yet how many people are in the discussion or who wrote the text I quoted (the guy I was talking with yesterday or someone else).


curi at 11:14 AM on August 10, 2020 | #17109 | reply | quote

#17104 This was an interesting read though I suspect I understood maybe 5% of it.

It felt akin to watching a speeding train pass by and I was trying to find a handle to jump on and it just kept speeding by with no visible handle for me to jump on.

Clearly you've read widely and I do not think this is spam nor incoherent. The failure of understanding is on my own. Might I suggest you try using a fake name so that it may be a bit easier to follow your thoughts as you post here?

I am not widely read so perhaps no matter what it would be hopeless for me to try to jump on this train, but at the least I can say that I admire your train.


Periergo at 11:25 AM on August 10, 2020 | #17110 | reply | quote

I will use my Gab alias

"Oi"


Oi at 12:12 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17112 | reply | quote

> Also I dm'd you on twitter, if you saw please? I do think I like you. I would enjoy debating with you, picking each others' brains

I don't see any DM. Did you send to @curi42?

I did get your email.

FYI: http://fallibleideas.com/discussion

I have 3 forums: here, a google group, and a Discord server. I can be DMed on Discord too. Twitter isn't a good place to discuss anyway.

Though FYI I mostly avoid talking to people privately. I want other people to be able to read stuff and participate, and I want to have archives I can refer to later.

> Plus, you seem to accept my ascerbic (at times) tone, and I don't mean it personally, though it is usually the peculiar way my intellectual "friendships" begin

I don't care that much re tone. The biggest issue is I find your claims pretty scattered and unclear. But you're welcome to keep trying.


curi at 12:44 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17115 | reply | quote

> Yes, BTW, for others who cannot follow my train of thought, I looked-up your other posts to help with context, on my end. I did not wish to misunderstand you

> Here is why I do not interpret:

>> Godwin did not have a modern Austrian understanding of property or capitalism.

> As implying mere unawareness:

> "[Godwin did not know Popperian epistemology nor modern economics], both of which had not yet been invented."

> https://groups.google.com/forum/m/#!topic/beginning-of-infinity/V_Fu8UEq9Ds

Godwin knew about e.g. Turgot and Smith, but I don't consider them to be the same as modern economics. Quite different than e.g. Mises. Reisman has criticizes Smith as a precursor to Marxism btw.

Godwin some some merit in their work (Smith, Turgot and others) but also had some doubts about it. I can't be much more specific than that. Godwin wasn't an economist and most of his writing is about other issues (many of which are economics-adjacent).

When Godwin talks about "right" he's generally talking about morality and rationality, not what we commonly call "rights" today. I think a lot of the issue comes from that terminology difference. Godwin's use of the word is still the top dictionary definition today btw, e.g. "morally good, justified, or acceptable" (adjective) or "that which is morally correct, just, or honorable" (noun) (New Oxford). The second noun definition is "a moral or legal entitlement to have or obtain something or to act in a certain way" which also fits Godwin's usage because it says "moral or legal" which is compatible with moral only but no legal entitlement.


curi at 12:54 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17117 | reply | quote

I'll rephrase:

You didn't get angry even in text, but were polite (i do not simply mean you didn't censor me) & i calmed down, to argue, myself on a more polite level

I think the main reason I got worked-up was seeing the bit on "of" or "on population" & sensed your own potential arrogance

I do stand corrected on that


Oi at 12:55 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17118 | reply | quote

#17117 yes, I am aware about Smith and labor theory. I would also say Ricardo holds either as much blame or a bit more but yes, I know and even agree

I do agree on Turgot. He is largely classified a physiocrat but I don't buy it. That is also said of Law who is, like Turgot not even close

It would however, depend on what you mean by modern. Commercial? Heterodox v. neoclassical?


Oi at 12:58 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17119 | reply | quote

> I do know there is tension between christian and objectivist authors (although Ayn still had read her share without as total objection many her contemporary followers believe)

I agree. Ayn Rand was less hostile to religious people than many of her followers are today. I don't like how the Objectivist movement has changed since Rand died. I think Peikoff got gradually worse over time without Rand there to correct him. And kicking Reisman out was a disaster.

Ostensibly over almost nothing (I assume there were other, unstated causes), Peikoff sided with the Binswanger faction. Binswanger is pretty awful:

http://curi.us/1930-harry-binswanger-refuses-to-think


curi at 12:59 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17120 | reply | quote

> So abduction is very symmetric induction. Retroduction combines both with deduction.

This is a good example of how (from my pov) you routinely start in the middle of topics and make tons of assumptions. This makes you hard to understand.

Basically you read a bunch of stuff and thought about it and have a bunch of ideas. OK so far. But then you try to talk to people using lots of your ideas which *they do not share*. You'll have to slow down and start more at the beginning to be understood. You need to use a better understanding of what is common knowledge that you can assume readers already know and what isn't.


curi at 1:01 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17121 | reply | quote

#17117 perhaps on his use the word rights

The issue I have is he uses it as a noun which doesn't fit morally right as in righteous, an adjective

I did not mean to suppose entitlement as a legal idea in theory. Only in practice.

Ancoms like ancaps base law in moral theory. But the idea of positive rights, the righteous is only what ancoms believe is possible to maximize (to do, yes...charity happens but it is never perfect -- tocqueville's paradox could be applied to expectation principle, possibility principle in prospect theory, then woven into a lens of bounded+unbounded rationality...or at least a time preference insofar as certain classes or psyches act)

So law has these 2 meanings. Law as in a fact or at least accepted theory of the "true" (apriori, inalienable rights, etc) or a code (formal law). It does not take moral law for law to be moral if that makes sense? Since you've written on reason in an interview (I read it yesterday), it seems you do get what I mean and perhaps I just should have expressed it more clearly


Oi at 1:06 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17122 | reply | quote

> That is something Ayn got. Popper by contrast sought, in his political writings, an end

I don't know what this means specifically. But I think Popper is pretty bad on politics and economics (with some good points mixed in). I mostly like Popper on epistemology and pre-socratics.


curi at 1:11 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17123 | reply | quote

> Why do you think Lenin broke from Plekhanov whereas Bebel did not?

I don't know who Plekhanov or Bebel are. You name lots of people I'm not familiar with and say stuff that's hard to understand for anyone unfamiliar. And I think everyone else here besides me has read less than I have (except maybe Alan Forrester, he reads a ton too).

My speciality is epistemology/reason, not reading all the economists and old political philosophers. I've read a lot, but a lot of it is in different areas. E.g. recently I've been reading Eliyahu Goldratt and Eliezer Yudkowsky. I read a variety partly to understand more things and partly because I dislike most works in my own preferred field.


curi at 1:17 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17124 | reply | quote

#17121

Ok. So I did circle back, mid-ramble. If I only reply to your points, your replies, i think it is easier to make habit, organized ordering

I was actually unaware except for 1 or 2 commenters early on, anybody else was reading

I figured they were ignoring me and if nobody else spokeup, they don't like see all this

Since you know epistemology and were the main conversee, I meant to share on a level of said audience, the supposition I am simply debating with you, who does know what I discuss, and it is simply out in a public forum because...well, it is how this all started

I will for others here explain what I mean:

So the scientific method consists of [i am not talking down to anybody, all know what the method is but for completeness, i will include] observation (naive realism in a modular sense -- that is, what we see is what is true), hypothesis (proposing said naive reality), testing (with ofc several variables preferrably), and concluding results (hopefully attempted by others, to be replicated)

Induction is where this conclusion lacks a clear universal. E.g., newton knew gravity rules on earth but it could not be proven it rules idk, outter space

Abduction is essentially this but in reverse. It is why I include falsification (what Elliot notes is by Popper) as a type because you ultimately disprove every other logical conclusion from the resultant data (from your experiment). This way, it is suggested you ensure the likeliest explanation visavis your thesis (the written hypothesis ofc)

Retroduction is where you apply both these to the procedure of proof. Since the method is only a procedure (integrity matters too -- p-hacking or, that is, skewing the variables for the result or P you want isn't even the worst practice. You needa show your work in this method but you can easily skew without outright manufacturing or alleging this method has been followed), these theories, these epistemologies fit into the method in that they guide your conclusion

You would abduct the conclusion but you also must, preferrably, incorporate recognition of universals or absence universal variables so that your pool of possible explanations is best equipped for any otherwise overlooked knick


Oi at 1:21 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17125 | reply | quote

> I do agree on Turgot. He is largely classified a physiocrat but I don't buy it. That is also said of Law who is, like Turgot not even close

I don't know what you mean.

I haven't read Turgot. I've read some good things about him. I've seen some quotes. He seems pretty good as fas as I know. I don't know if you're saying he's good or bad.


curi at 1:24 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17126 | reply | quote

#17124

It was rhetorical, I apologize. It is like asking my parents "did you know?" or "wanna hear something?"

Wnat I really mean is I figure they don't know & i am gonna tell them anyway

That said, I am actually surprised you've not since he might be up your alley

Systems theory. Your work appears to fit into a sociophysical or at least mathematical understanding, social dynanics

Game theory, bounded rationality, nash equilibria

Well Plekhanov developed systems theory. Very hobbesian in a certain sense, as might Doolittle emphasize

Swarm models, ant hill simulations, neural networking. The NIE economical theory behind AI as well a huge portion at least CERTAIN sects of rational choice theory

An infection model e.g., is the spread of ideas, at a measured rate. Cellular automata is useful in visualizing on a graphic, where certain unknowns and certain predictabilities converge in a larger ecosystem

It is essentially Taylor's theory of humanistic or "scientific (as opposed "romantic") bureaucracy

If you know meritocracy or psychographics (identification of variables like age or race and sex, which gone into analytics, allows for more specific "unique-spots" of any "datagroup"), you know what goes into systems theory


Oi at 1:29 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17127 | reply | quote

#17127 I actually partially dislike a lot of the attempts to model people with math. I think game theory and bounded rationality (or "rational actor") stuff is mostly wrong and doesn't understand people. I appreciate that the Austrians have criticized neoclassical mathematical economists. I'm talking with Less Wrong people but I think they're wrong about how much we can use math and statistics to guide our thinking, as well as how much we can (currently) use science to understand social and psychological issues.

We need explanations, critical thinking, arguments, debate, etc. Math, statistics, and empirical science can't replace such things.


curi at 1:34 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17128 | reply | quote

#17128 I don't mean that game theory type people get the math wrong. They often get the applications to human life wrong, IMO.


curi at 1:34 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17129 | reply | quote

#17126

A little of both. The strength in Quesnay wasn't low taxes (well THAT TOO) but apriori. The word, as coined by Quesnay (senior to Turgot like Colbert+others), laissez faire / laissez passer is a rough translation, wuwei in Lao Tzu's thought

Turgot saw Quesnay focused "too much" on agriculture, the "idea" Quesnay "overlooked" the future of industrialization

Personally, as a guy who focuses on abstracts first THEN concepts, i find this tedious. Nevertheless, Turgot set-out to ultimately "fix" this

He didn't focus too much on monetary value. Sure, unlike Colbert he was no protectionist. Even his abolition the guild system is in theory neglible, substantively ideal

But he wrought havoc on banking, which by then was already deadened by debt. Other hand, I would not go as far to claim him a georgist as I have seen some do

Though I am no fan of his, his successor was worse. I thought it was the guy after his successor a moment ago (muscle memory) but nvm, i think desmensz (or however you spell it, i keep thinking desmesne, demarest, demarol) who ultimately caved to fiat

The jacobin system of paper money (assignat), yes, AFAIK didn't even begin with them but only had been rejected till now because the French were suspicious of "foreign ideas," and Law ofc was no Frenchie

But with the desire for some "balance" gold (to stave off very common smuggling of counterfeit notes at the time) & to pay off the increasingly debilitating war debt Louis XIV left behind (in addition infrastructure or possibly worst of all, palace extravegance), this came to be implemented

To top matters off, this dude's OWN successor (now THIS name eludes me) was EVEN WORSE THAN THAT...or at least EQUALLY BAD, trying different things

His fiscal plan to spread burden of debt ultimately alienated the noble districts that paid none AND those that paid the bulk

Unlike previous plans that in this sharing of burden would have actually done so PROPORTIONALLY, this wasn't that

I cannot say the revolution would have been averted if they had but delayed? Probably

Alas, you have seen nothing so superlatively stupid yet...Phillip II was like as dumb a rock. People blame it on inherited debt but in addition to massive depreciation, he put the bulk of a yikes-high tax on his nobility, so as to avoid a peasant tax revolt? Oopsadaisies. Instead, the only debtors he had fled like all his military allies, his desire to put a cap on wars OPENED a new war in NL


Oi at 1:47 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17131 | reply | quote

#17129

I agree. That is why I noted Lenin broke from Plekhanov

Plekhanov supposed universal human nature. Lenin knew better

If you have not read Planned Chaos by Mises, I recommend it. He talks on this


Oi at 1:48 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17132 | reply | quote

#17129 i did not mean to give the impression i am hobbesian

Systems theory is useful as an analogy or dimming down to explain to laymen

But it, i do agree, is too empirical to capture the variability, nooks and crannies of human behavior

Albeit, i took you for being into that stuff. I try to shapeshift in a sense to my audience for persuasion, not even consciously either

It is NOT quite ethoipoia (yes that is a word) but ...similar intent at least


Oi at 1:51 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17133 | reply | quote

Sorry, ethopoia. Etho+poia. The spelling, i kept thinking, "it is like autopoiesis - oie before the -is or -ia")

Again, not quite exact but something similar. If I then unwittingly give off a wrong impression, what I believe...

Just know it is like autopilot for me. To the point, people hadda point it out to me.


Oi at 1:55 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17135 | reply | quote

#17128

Something for any other contribution i make, it should be useful to know is I use analogies a lot

It isn't only mathematics, it is also religion I have used in this thread too. Unlike Doolittle, I cannot wrap my head around his OBSESSIVE need to mathematize (+ridicule) subjectivist praxis (as if his conceit in taking imaginary credit weren't a turnoff ALREADY)

It is odd because I was diagnosed with Aspergers' (in the early '90s) at a pretty severe degree, so literalness has long been my struggle

I know there is tension between objectivism and subjectivism for many the same reasons, though I have only seen "neuro-hayekians" like Koppl go as far to play borderline bioeconomics, when the only rhetorical consensus hermuenetic scholars have with praxiologists is the danger (by name only, since neoclassical economics has more in common arithmetic axiom than it might realize and the positivist-interpretivist ideas mashed together by many like him tend to be in that camp) of neoclassical theories (more verbatim) like Cost of Production or aggregation, stickiness, secular stagnation (even if it "can" be+is self-fulfilled)


Oi at 2:05 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17137 | reply | quote

#17137 I dislike Hayek and Friedman. I like Mises, Reisman, Hazlitt, Rand, Bastiat, Burke, Godwin, Szasz. What do you think of Hayek?

I think Rothbard is often good on economics but also had a variety of awful ideas, including about jews, USSR, children as property, and fetuses as trespassers.


curi at 2:14 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17139 | reply | quote

And yes. So i am a radical subjectivist but as embedded in Nick Land's cultural paradigm

Why do I bring-up as relevant to LessWrong? Yarvin (moldbug) was the foundation of Land's thought

Just, Land ditched neocameralism because it is too populist, uhh, systematic or something

I know Yarvin was actually NOOOOOT well-liked there

Most follow SSC progressivism

I come from an evangelical family, I have a scientific mind but a distaste for reduction as much dogma

So I do enjoy SSC much as I do, Pinker. But my mode of thinking is closer to Harris

He isn't reductive like Dennett, whom I do enjoy, don't get me wrong but I think reduces logic too much

I never joined LW but I imagine you have certain at least shared influences me.


Oi at 2:16 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17140 | reply | quote

#17140 My influences start with my mentor, David Deutsch, a physicist with books heavy on Popperian epistemology. He also liked e.g. capitalism, Austrian econ, Rand, Godwin, Szasz. That was my introduction to libertarianism after growing up in a left wing area and not even knowing what standard Republican ideas were (tons of leftists are **VERY** ignorant of other ideas and viewpoints). Deutsch dislikes Less Wrong for their epistemology errors (he considers induction a major flaw in Objectivism too). I'm more tolerant in some ways and I talk to a lot of people, but more purist/extremist/strong-opinions in other ways.

LW and SSC do seem way to my left from what I've seen, but not as thoroughly and hatefully as some other places.


curi at 2:24 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17141 | reply | quote

#17139

I dislike Hayek too. I use the phrase spontaneous order a lot but that is about it

His social evolution was bizarre.

His UBI bits were so annoying. He contradicted himself on private law too. I could tolerate his mild sweetiepie handling, social justice or copyright given i know his views "illiberal democracy" or republicanism but worst of all, is his fanboys

His fanboys are not only useless like him. Unlike hayek who at least was sweet and openminded, they just constantly barrage mises or rothbard, latter which they have likely half the time never read

It is like a pod factory, children of the corn

I do think he had a particularly useful idea -- local knowledge

But it is not enough to induct him in any larger fashion, somebody i would deem inspiratiomal, no

Ironically, his thymology is least my reason for disliking him

His thymology BTW would even be ok if i thought mises had been wrong -- i say to disclaim i am no cultist of purity here. But it isn't why, i just agree with mises

Though no critical realist myself, i am like Hoppe fascinated by polylogic. I do accept naturalism. What I reject is hayek's theories all in all


Oi at 2:25 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17142 | reply | quote

#17139

Friedman was troubling for sure. I can get over his SSI trick if his ideas on FDI or overconfidence on bank policies didn't bug me. Then there is financialization, the theories on GDP so statically pegged population numbers

Alas, I would take him anyday over Scott Sumner. I hate THAT guy to bits

---

Though i have my own portfolio of critiques, Ayn (not counting many her contemporaries are douches as i can be too), i do enjoy her

I do. I do think Block downplayed the differences from praxiology but i also think others OOOOVERenphasize the minarchy debate as crux

I am no minarchist but axiom would be a bigger issue being I extrapolate a lot

Yes, SSC is to the left for sure. I was not endorsing his politics. Just admiring his intellect. Plus as you note, way more accepting than the larger left


Oi at 2:31 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17143 | reply | quote

#17141 and i love hazlitt, bastiat, szasz (underrated)

Accad's got valid concerns on EBM but he WAAAAAY *overdoes* it. Szasz might emphasize by contrast, neurology but he does it tastefully. Plus, although I am Jungian oriented in psychoanalysis, I love his demand for biomarkers

My criticism, hate even for the DSM thanks him

I saw about Deutsch. I haven't read him but I saw that


Oi at 2:35 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17144 | reply | quote

> I am no minarchist but axiom would be a bigger issue being I extrapolate a lot

What are you then?

I'm a minarchist who wants to move to purely voluntary institutions in the long run, with competition and consumer choice, so not a "government" anymore (government = involuntary and monopoly). But I don't want to smash the state – you have to evolve something better not just get rid of institutions. I would happily reduce the state a lot in the short term though and fairly rapidly move close to minarchy.


curi at 2:35 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17145 | reply | quote

#17145 "you have to evolve something better not just get rid of institutions."

Ideally, common law monarchy but totally private law system as might have had the Saxons

Ofc, i dont see that happening - culturally OOOOOOOOR economically so:

A medieval anarchist who predicts a road ahead of mixed minarchy, fascisms, warlord regionalism. Many purges, an irrational, unworkable majoritarian herd & absolute apex hyperindividualism making more paranoia in any revolutionary "state (state of being that is)" than the gimme populace as it currently stands, at least AFTER the executive, congressional branches -- like the constitution (as binding, not talking values, only the legitimacy) putters out under its own weight for vulturous takings.

Ok, doom and gloom. a reactionary in the sense Davila might frame it. A libertarian of the old right, but minus states, statism?

That is my theory, not my prediction. I am very clear about agreeing, it sadly won't evolve or if it does, waaaaay ahead if this even century, with blood spattered and a clean start

I just don't think that makes me a philosophical anarchist because while I hold to the NAP, I don't think Machiavelli is irrelevant in this "unholy" land as it currently stands

Minarchism is to see ideal in the state, just not trust

I would say my stance is closer, Junger's anarch or Evola's differentiated man

I see no 2nd best because I don't follow structured ideals

My ideal is indeed formulaic but centers around the real ("is") - for the real, order+liberty. I do believe in improving on baselines but only in that a barebones managerial formula is already imposed or we mean individual, firm, etc improvement

I would not say i oppose activism in the sense i play stoic, in political organization. Rather, i distrust large groups & while i settle for reform, my distrust of it is why i prefer spreading ideas to those redpillable / otherwise, "manipulate" reactions (Skinner, Schmitt, Alinsky)

Unlike the dark triad, not only do i accept i am corruptable, i am an endogeneous thinker, who sees no convenience in spotlight

I know any herd needs this but i like mentoring instead.

Though i do NOOOOT see myself as some agent of change -- i am unknown and of little importance to anybody, i have thought why i would avoid power and though i do not like corruption, i find morals a choice per se, not to explain my hesitance, an actual hardercoded fear on my part instead

Because i would avoid power, i would need czars. But i would never trust them to get it right - why i usually alienate college projects (when i didn't, i got screwed gradewise).

Why have even a visionary, a figurehead with power?

When i say the herd likes a figurehead, notice i do not mention power

So what would prevent the figurehead from siezing an expanse of power without a constitution?

Easy. The idea of polycentric law in let's say the HRE would involve not only popolani or balie systems, it would that of landed gentry

This is an organic constitution then, that gets discovered. The courts like any state have some type of legitimacy but they lack the enumetation to impose outside tort as much they do that to CREATE customs. The king, similar deal. He is absolute only in the sense he is unelected, owns no state. The tudors indulged in statelike behahior by democratising -- if not for that, bill of rights was moot. Remember, magna carta was supposed to mimick the saxon setup)

I would confess it is hard to fathom court legitimacy if unity would be optimal, cities devolved into hutterite units

Why? We are an urban, suburban, commercial society with sprawl, etc.

Same time, there are mitigative factors -- the borders would need no central power to define nor constant property line but that of privatized roads between

All other land though without proprietary titling, is that of possessionary domain. This avoids the dominium dilemma without befalling what somebody i know characterised as the mongol question (asymetric invasion, settlement from failing or oppressive foreign states)

But none of these mitigations solve the legitimation question even in a nondemocratic nonstatist nonstate paradigm. It is a catch22 that needs waiting, going with the flow

I see a 2nd best only in that I accept I do not control the larger anacyclosis (an eternal return, the rhyme of history)

An easier way to explain why i neither predict nor accept but tolerate minarchism is this:

Sobran: "we might be stuck with a state but must we worship it?"

Minarchism is not simply anarchism accepting the laws which he lacks trust in. It is, and no offense, simply a desire for law, coupled vigilantism excess or bad laws

While not all laws are bad, law is. While that part isn't per se disputed by minarchists, it is way more holistically cynical

Good government is faith in a state, a necessary evil? Or in statism? If it believes BAD government is unnecessary+evil, it is still a good government ideology

Not because it believes in statism but because it does believe in the state as a necessity. The evil is statism, state the necessity, then it is only not "good statism" belief. It *is* still a belief in good government -- not that government is good being an ideology of its own but the existence or primacy, a form of government (as opposed governance). Minarchism is not mugwompery but nonstatIST statism (eg classical v neoliberal) is STILL a form of government. If it did not constitute good government, it would be anarchism, since minarchism is government and it implies itself bad

EVERYBODY believes in good government because nobody believes in BAAAAAD government

Just, the SIZE or NATURE of that government is disputed

If minarchism does not believe in good government (that is, it is seen a logical "good" to be had, can be made to behave well -- not simply, it is good so gimme more gov more gov the more the better), it does believe in good republicanism

Unless a republic in the modern sense as opposed old classical forms is not a state,

I do agree minarchism opposes good governmentism

But that is a stretch to necessitate neologism. Government is not always statist. But states become statist. The notion alone it can be UNDONE, ROLLED BACK OR PRESERVED is what is seen as "good"


Oi at 3:21 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17147 | reply | quote

#17145

I do not only deny ancap society will occur. I think it is IRRELEVANT when the failed state is in the cards

We ultimately have no choice

All empires fall

It is unideal, that murderous void

But it isnt a preference. It is just all empires fall, a prediction

I believe in reality so if that is the descriptive criterion,

I am a fascist a monarchist a libertarian a communist an anarchist a socialist a corporatist a hedonist a familialist all at once

I just think that needs to be made as a distinction

Minarchy as 2nd best doesnt necessitate confidence. Nor does preference any less fall victim to lack of predictive power, a cataclysm that makes any state create anew, likely (understated) not in the same peaceful manner our founders did

Now i hold big respect for the founders

But it is why i think jefferson was more realist than washington, avoiding talk of some everlasting republic

"I tremble for my country as i know god's justice can't last forever"

Nobody wants a revolt but it becomes necessary insofar as getting atop the leftist curve is behind schedule, this due date

I do not mean some immantization is good. People misunderstand that as provocation

I am not a doomsday theorist. I rejected claims any fall as they got professed

What i do believe is there are observations, accumulations that in fact, i iterated last year would be coming by the shrinkage of chinese and the uprising of blacks.

I give a state presence 2y from now. But the start of a failed state to swoop forth by the end of this year


Oi at 3:30 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17148 | reply | quote

The current political climate seems very dangerous to me but I haven't read enough history to make very good comparisons. All time periods have lots of problems and figuring out which problems are more severe and dangerous is tricky.

BTW I've looked at Moldbug a little but I didn't really like it. I broadly don't like monarchy or rulers. With Popper, I'd like a system where it's realistic to switch rulers when they suck. With Godwin and others, I dream of a world of reason, peace and freedom.


curi at 3:42 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17149 | reply | quote

#17145 botie is great but it only works circumstantially or in conjunction strong charisma

Poujade had this. My ancestors the huguenots did. But it isnt so simple

Civil disobedience, same gist. We saw that in my state, PA for instance but it took desperation and ended in a loop, people recomforting themselves as if it wont come about ever again. It is only necessary to feel exactly that in your manpower but how do you make that a movement?

Scroll up please, you will see my particular disdain for democracy as an anarchist is not only rooted in any ratchet effect -- heck, not only the reformer's dilemma

It is easy on that note to distrust the masses in demaistre's words, on the same PREDICATION distrusting human power (bastiat on law)

But what about the appeal?

https://books.google.com/books?id=OWkE2QW1g1kC&pg=PA12&q="reflected%20their%20understandable%20desire%20to%20gain"&f=false#v=snippet&q="reflected%20their%20understandable%20desire%20fo%20gain"&f=false

It does not take a populist to reinterpret the immune clauses or terrorize into approval, certain judicial activist nominees

The manchester liberals sought to just vow limited welfare. The logic was that if they, in gaining larger vote portion, succeeded in getting in office, *they would be ABLE to prevent a state bloat*

They thought, well, better than just CRITICIZING and NOT OFFERING fixes

Issue here is NOOOOT they partook in the elections. It is that they HAD SO MUCH CONFIDENCE in it, they were willing to commit intellectual SUICIDE

Once they DID GAIN POWER, they only EXPANDED IT WORSE THAN the "one nation" tories

Influence does NOT TAKE institutional INCUMBENCY to exert EVEN MINARCHICALLY

But then the minarchist must understand sympathic officeholder, a cover for your extrajudicial exertions from that of activism which might appear to be like extrajudicial exertion but is only useful if you have the allies in power in the first place

You put the thinkers in the back. The shadows. Dont get him jailed nor killed, not necessarily by soft tyranny directly (1st amendment lol) but STRATEGY OF TENSION

Strategy of tension is what the police played at CVille. Antifa is violent. Whatever one thinks of a mix, varying lites, and neonazis or former hoppeans, it was in a sense manufactured. Not literally but in exploitation, in the cordoning of it all.

Now, antifa plays an easily to guess game. Leaderless only vertically, it is neither AWG nor of central command

It is presupposed, its ease of trustless collaboration, on that of simplistic m.o. it is sigint (where a foe will be) & trigger, all know what to do

This is something the right might adopt. But i have a specific layout that encourages (without relying on mass opsec), divides degrees of influence into hegemony (pareto rule of organization) for adoption, vetting. Subdivision (cf. vanguard as a selection from vetted pool) in avoiding leaked (till the last moment) not strategy only but locations esp (permits, still a bugger), but also covers the inevitable island-hopper, an attempt at 5th column (because single points of failure are of little concern to the big 20%, you embrace the lack of standard for optimum heterogeneity in all the smaller "sattelites" where overlapping membership might be encountered. If any suspect hops into the sparser bigfish groups, each event has a shared intel, a devolved resolution)

PS:

Rothbard btw criticized israel not most jews. He was not selfhating like bernie

Rather, his alliance with lets say duke isnt much different chodorov's gompers, spooner's garrison or hess's oglesby)


Oi at 3:54 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17150 | reply | quote

You sound interested in how to battle over the country/world. I'm mostly interested in how to reason well, figure out better ideas, and explain ideas to people. I want to educate and help people, not fight them.


curi at 3:59 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17151 | reply | quote

#17149 i am not talking rulers

Have you ever read Jefferson on the saxons?

The constitutional executive structure was argued after jurisdiction, by most uk propagandists during the revolution -- like daniel leonard

The ancien regime as mises noted was an early state. "I am the state"

This was after the landed gentry got formalized under henry xiv

The feudalism everybody knows is the frankish system

The allodial saxon system was similar the early althing in iceland,

Or the brehon civil system

Or the early roman natural law

Just thru a common lens

You had not judiciaries but magistrates

Not kings as rulers but private citizens

He did not own the kingdom. You all did

The posses enforced. They just didnt decide

Mark thornon at Mises has a good piece excerpting Cantillion on this.

The Bruces produced a spoils, subservience to the king

You have to go back 300 years to see total private libertarian estoppel at play

And as said, i am not a fan of his either


Oi at 4:01 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17152 | reply | quote

#17151 i do not wish to battle either

That however is why i oppose democracy

It gives incentive to invade. To start wars

To control people


Oi at 4:02 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17153 | reply | quote

> Scroll up please, you will see

I don't understand lots of the stuff you say (and I think vice versa). You can either put up with partial communication or change your style to be way more organized and connected to common background knowledge.

Comments like this one make it sound like you're overestimating how much you're communicating to me successfully or like you think the problem is my inattentiveness.


curi at 4:03 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17154 | reply | quote

#17151 you educate by prospering, allowing people this reason

In anarchist theory, all acts are voluntary under this king because it is simply you leave him to be rich

And defend your homes when attacked

And as long you act in selfinterest, he wins too

Why? If you didnt act in your selfinterest, and the town got ransacked, he loses his riches

Think of it as a tort.

A social contract is like a tort but lotta lines between the lines

There is ultimate consent because the only feu is something you were gonna do in the first place

Yes, that is reason

To keep property sacred

To make money

To find a job

And to contribute


Oi at 4:06 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17155 | reply | quote

#17153 That's pretty vague. I'm not sure why you think democracy incentivizes war.

I want a government that does way less stuff so there's much less to gain by controlling it. E.g. people won't be able to vote for more subsidies for their group if the government stops meddling in the economy or doing taxation+redistribution.

Democracy isn't perfect but I don't think it's the problem. The problem is a government that isn't constrained by a limited role for what it does. E.g. our government does education, healthcare, retirement plans, price controls like minimum wage, farm subsidies, home ownership tax incentives, and on and on. Most of this needs to stop. When the government stops doing these things, then votes won't control them anymore.


curi at 4:07 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17156 | reply | quote

#17156 the lack of classical realist policy, i refer to democracy there as a form of ideology, not a system

As a system, there is marketing to the american people. Orwell writes, wars are not meant to be won

Others just falter, i am not THAT cynical. The attrition westmoreland chose for instance lasted vietnam long

But i am referring to democracy as an ideology here

Not a system


Oi at 4:11 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17158 | reply | quote

I don't like democracy as an ideology like "the people should rule". That invites abuse like punishing unpopular minority groups. The idea that "majority makes right" is nasty. The mob is often wrong. I don't have such a high opinion of the group. Near-consensus isn't truth and democracy often doesn't get anywhere near consensus anyway.

Democracy as a system is OK at e.g. keeping the peace. It offers some fairness and some hope for improvement. Far from perfect but some fairness. And if you can persuade the majority of an idea then you can reform things. But sometimes you need like a 75% majority when the elites are against it. The majority of Americans have wanted less immigration for a long time but the ruling class don't listen.


curi at 4:15 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17160 | reply | quote

#17156 when there is a lack of control?

Ironically, though wars incentivize usurpation, it isnt how the hooks first set in

Social trust runs in paradoxical continuum

Think of the state as a forced exchange, all contenders supposing a chosen offer

They are selling you policy. And in high optimism in a market people buy more without being smart

People buy more government not because as in war they think they need it but because they are accepting its superfluity

Then the war comes. Like the recession. All the bad loans youve taken out come back to haunt you, crushing agony right?

If the recession in austrian thought is a boom's correction, the open admitting expansion of a state is the destructive counterpart

It is the recession that simply doubles down by borrowing money to fend off sharks. But a recession nonetheless

Nobody can live in constant wartime. Nor is that good

However, that optimism is good with a selfcorrecting mechanism

The war is natural balkanization comparable what is going on right now

It is all so awful, that in a sense it is good


Oi at 4:17 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17162 | reply | quote

#17160 i do agree

If it stuck to pure mechanism, that would be great

If this major transition (read polybius? Res publica? Forget plato's proposal, focus on the cycle of regimes instead) happened 300y ago,

That would be repeatable

The question is, lets suppose not what comes after the fall of america

Lets just hypothesize, america has fallen

It happened just 5m ago

Do you believe you could unite multimillions of rioters, residual officeholders (it happens, see the governors for rome in spain. They tried to get a grip back on power for at least a century after the sack), opposing nazis who wanna kill the rioters off & a thousand middlegrounders who just seek a temporary symbolic motion of solidarity?

If the system, all of it had to be reconstructed anew, do you think you could unite that?

Not only unite the sentiment, but actually get consensus on a system without the rabblerousers gone, at least?

I am not arguing you get rid of then. I UNFORTUNATELY fear mass purifications even stateless. I dont like it but that is what nietzsche called ressentiment

Anger like power consumes people. It can be calmed but only minimalized


Oi at 4:24 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17163 | reply | quote

Just a thought experiment there

I am not literally suggesting you an agent of change anymore than myself

A social contract takes consensus

That is hard to do without demagogues if you are installing it fresh from an institutional void


Oi at 4:26 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17164 | reply | quote

And demagogues scare me

Being i, like you, am a student of reason

Welcome to the unsavory interregnum. We barely have a way to survive it

It is an accumulation of poor choices haunting us

I think humankind can pull thru

But it will pull thru, after much struggle


Oi at 4:28 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17165 | reply | quote

Once that all clears, reason comes back to focus

Just focus on survival, laying low

Taking from Daoist thought, NRx calls this passivism


Oi at 4:29 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17166 | reply | quote

Reason is always eternally valid

Tragically, that gets blunted in this again, problematic period of transition


Oi at 4:30 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17167 | reply | quote

Am i doing better, articulating for you now?


Oi at 4:32 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17168 | reply | quote

You do not need to understand words like passivism.

That is why i explained it to you before bringing up the word

If you want a link too though, i can do that too

But i think it is better if i describe first, then introduce terms


Oi at 4:34 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17169 | reply | quote

Liechtenstein is a really cool example btw of monarchy

I assume you are familiar btw, the 2 types of conmon?

Liechtenstein is executive or limited king power. Not ceremonial or powerless as in the uk

In locke if you recall, his bill of rights limited the kings power by enumerating state power to rival it?

Liechtenstein is like that except the king like an absolute monarchy (in proper sense of the word is a synonym of local fiefs holding power all on their own -- unlike federalist model, SF's budget plan cannot tax me because funds arent trickling up, to be allotted by the federal gov)

Has no power EVEN over the populace in limited form. Not at all

He CANNOT make the state make laws either

He cannot gain power by depriving the state

But the people can deprive or expand the state

Since the king can however VETO the state,

He limits the state's power as might a taxee wish to throttle a higher tax rate

The people cannot override this veto. So they are in limitation minarchy by king veto

-- check on direct democracy

But also able to choose a state policy

Policy that is basically capped in size AND since the king is capping it being no diffly a private citizen, the voters,

It is always beneficial to both unless the king somehow saw good in himself being taxed extra

Agency capture, subsidu isnt however allowed in the constitution

And any amendment takes referendum

What prevents a monarchic mob?

The state. Since the state is greedy for power its own, it doesnt wanna lose that power with an amendment

You convert the bad into good

How do public services cut down on overhead?

Same way the king stays rich. He is a bizman too


Oi at 4:51 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17170 | reply | quote

Subsidy*

I think that is intelligible right?

Liechtenstein isnt exact ofc a replication to try just anywhere

But it does have lessons

And even irrespective, even any view on ideal,

It does evoke an admiration. It is a fascinating spin no?

I think anybody anywhere on the spectrum can admire the brilliance of its unique spin


Oi at 4:55 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17171 | reply | quote

The prince is a scholar too, btw

In the 60s, they hadda sell paintings just to stay afloat

Now they have bigger gdp (yes yes, sucky model. Bear with me) than germany. Despite being smaller than delaware

He wrote a book. I do recommend it.

I dont claim utopia, even if the form were replicated, in policy

They have universal healthcare. Mandatory schooling

But compared to anywhere else in the world, it is as libertarian tilted youll find ANYWHERE in the world

Ps, he is actually softer on migration than his populace. He wanted full open borders. His people rejected the referendum at like 97%

They have more companies than citizens and the towns may secede under law if they want

The king, not the state more recently tried giving individuals the right to secede, yes individually

It didnt amount to anything. But it is also highly traditional, a knit more like jeff tucker type traditional catholic community

Individualist. Belief in liberty. And realism

They are happy. Nobody secedes. But they may. Just arent


Oi at 5:02 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17172 | reply | quote

> Now they have bigger gdp (yes yes, sucky model. Bear with me) than germany.

you must mean gdp *per capita*. but then

> Despite being smaller than delaware

being small isn't a penalty for gdp per capita

and no if the US fell apart today i don't think i could unite the tribes even if i had everyone's attention.


curi at 5:36 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17173 | reply | quote

Well I thought it was NGDP, just not RGDP but I must have misremembered then, it is per capita

And no not for per capita. Again, I thought NGDP for some reason

They do have relatively simple specialized exports. Dentures, primarily. Gold/banking, second

Swiss are bigger there. It is all about dentures primarily


Oi at 5:44 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17174 | reply | quote

Switzerland* *is*

Yes, improper syntax. I mean, it isnt a collective noun so the "are" was fine but I meant swiss industry, not persons so...

I caught it


Oi at 5:45 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17175 | reply | quote

#17149 Have you written about Moldbug? People keep recommending him as often as people keep recommending me Chomsky. For this reason, I find them both suspicious.


Periergo at 5:58 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17176 | reply | quote

> Have you written about Moldbug?

Don't think so. Didn't look into him very much.

Chomsky is awful IMO.


curi at 6:06 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17177 | reply | quote

In all fairness, Chomsky's theory of cognitive linguistics is NOTHING like his politics

I agree. Chomsky sucks as a political guy. Anything economic, moral OOOR sociological

His language theory is another case but yeah


Oi at 6:10 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17178 | reply | quote

I reemphasize, I am not a Moldbug fan

Nick Land saw many the same problems you guys do in him

Moldbug is too close to marxism for my taste

Nick land takes laissez faire economics and pounds his corporate state to a bloody stump

Government is a monopoly. If i dont want monsanto running me, why would i trust the gov play monsanto?

Yarvin did not see the continuum here

He ultimately ideated a corporate fascist state, simply privatized into some like half-private law informal quasi-republic

Too technocratic for me, i am unsure how to even describe it

This is what nick land fixes

He is a bit more structured than hoppe. I have always felt i fall more into the hoppe libertarian label than i do, neoreaction, EVEN that of Land

I only brought Land or Yarvin up because, however overexaggerated his "ties" or whatever to LW, it seemed relevant


Oi at 6:16 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17179 | reply | quote

Hoppe was Rothbard's protegee. Rothbard, Mises' own (over that of Hayek)

I am way less socially conservative than Land & his influences from sorta cybernetic, transhumanist or postmodern marxian thinkers, e.g. Battaile bugged me but that is secondary to his theory

Where Anissimov says neocameralism is too similar modern commerce, Land says the opposite

It is too socialist. Time to make laissez faire work instead

It is similar in theory, MINUS ALL THAT


Oi at 6:19 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17181 | reply | quote

#17179 omg lad, Moldbug is close to Marxism? I was under the impression the fella coined the idea of "red-pilling"

Shows how little I know. I'm so klooless.


Periergo at 6:20 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17182 | reply | quote

Well, it is too similar modern commerce but not in the way Anissimov argues

Keynesianism dominates the current system. To me, that is a form of socialism simply disguised by capital exchange

Any hedonism is easily explainable stimulus. Though culture matters, i think people dont realize just HOOOOW deep gov is in the consumption impulse

I am not antimaterialist. I just get the paradox in Say has nothing to do with cutting down on luxury. No inherent good in giving up stuff either

I would be perfectly happy if you had crazed apple fanatics buy stuff they dont need

I have my gadgets. Ffs, ive spent 15000$ on forum memberships

Lol, yes i am dead serious BTW

Or 2.4k$ in 3mo on caffeine, my 1st semester of college

I get it. I do JOKE about ACTUAL cases of people claiming to need 80 pairs of shoes, but i have no MORAL qualm against it

It is different if you have the money

That is all private choice ofc. It is smart MICROrconomically, to make sure you arent like taking a 2nd friggin mortgage on your house to buy btc, which i say as a "HODLer (real slang)" myself (albeit, the real OTHER issue was people mistaking it for some stock function anymore than simply assuming us BTC oldies for thinking it a hedge)

We saw the consumer protection bullcrap in 2006 when bush passed the BRCA

By force-allowing consumers to defer by CH13 (on private loan i might add), it sorta clogged the system into infinite loop where the companies never got paid back and every consumer just kept putting off debt

If you think subprime was gawd awful, you know nothing


Oi at 6:29 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17183 | reply | quote

I think Chomsky's language theory is also bad.

And The Red Pill subreddit isn't Moldbug related. https://www.reddit.com/r/TheRedPill/ (And it's quarantined by the lying censors at Reddit.)


curi at 6:32 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17185 | reply | quote

#17182 he is a rightist thinker

Were nazis not too close to marx?

Culturally rightwing, they hated a king only as much a kaiser (also hated by the monarchists)

Like the kaiser, they liked a republic with absolute military power

Besides brothel laxness or nudy mags, they opposed inflation and urban planning

Yet they nationalized the [well voluntary] union, subsidized everything, threatened to sieze the coke plant, enacted public school services

They were rightwing. And yet, too close to Marx

If radical center had an ALTERNATIVE definition, you might call them radical bushites, no?


Oi at 6:33 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17186 | reply | quote

#17186 Nazis were national *socialists*. They were too close to Marx. Mises and Reisman wrote about them.

you could define "right wing" a lot of ways but the nazis certainly were not economically right wing.


curi at 6:36 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17187 | reply | quote

#17185 i am a follower of Meinong

I do not think that contradicts Chomsky here

Do the precepts of prosocial cognition emerge neurologically?

Are concwpts "true" in a certain sense, INDEPENDENTLY of language?

Representationalism

I actually knew some blind people back in the day (i played MUDS - similar to Zork so ofc that attracts people who need screenreaders)

I remember being confused one say when i asked how the guy knew what yellow looked like


Oi at 6:36 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17188 | reply | quote

#17187

I agree.

Hence why I say they were too close to Marx


Oi at 6:37 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17189 | reply | quote

#17187 i was trying to leverage clarification for calling Yarvin too close to marx

It was the impression, P (ok if I call you that for short?) gave, he assumed anything redpill-related implies rightwing theory

Nazis were keynesian. Goebbels was worse but both still forms of socialism, even for the tenure of Schacht

In fact it is just a more protectionist less inflationary version the weimar republic with also way more technocratic statism

The Geneva school or as Mises would call ordointerventionism


Oi at 6:40 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17191 | reply | quote

#17187 my particularly favorite analysis on the nazi economy is Gordon's

He covers in depth the background, the sects, why it didnt matter (the ratchet effect from Higgs), and so on


Oi at 6:42 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17192 | reply | quote

> my particularly favorite analysis on the nazi economy is Gordon's

Link please.


curi at 6:42 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17193 | reply | quote

#17187 along with walter block, david gordon is a fav of mine

Particularly his criticism of Peikoff

Speaking of him, you mentioned

Actually, if i were to choose a fav objectivist, cosman (though off on disease) & yaron brooks

I agree, binswanger sucks. Brooks, way better

Leonard peikoff still beats DAVID peikoff but id avoid either


Oi at 6:44 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17194 | reply | quote

so Moldbug is close to Marxism because he is close to Nazism which is close to Marxism.


Periergo at 6:50 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17196 | reply | quote

> Particularly his criticism of Peikoff

Link please.

> Brooks, way better

I dislike Yaron Brook too (and he's peikoff/binswanger/ari/etc aligned anyway).

Peikoff at least has good material (mostly old stuff). I haven't seen anything valuable from Brook.


curi at 6:50 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17197 | reply | quote

#17193

Not all aspects I had mentioned are in there

Considering how much I read, i BARELY remember to EAT. So i could note cite where I find every little thing

I do try to corroborate. That is why i like rothbard. Several ideas i have expounded for aeons myself, i find later, he himself wrote on, in texts i had, up till then, not even known existed

So i remember for instance, Ludendorff hated taxes, for a rather populist dude. The old sozis precede the Goebbels camp. What was not in the natlib parties that later transformed into the freedoms, that were however also opposed to Virchow, normally transformed alongside christian dems (who for the MOST PART anyway, ironically hated nazis as did revcons - e.g. junger or nietzsche or mann), into the 2 sects Gordon mentions of the nsdap

I also once found a booklet, a registry of the reich's union roster up for BID

Idk if it had been LEGIT. I was not gonna waste my money. In fact, being it was cheap, i imagine it was fake but it was true, the story behind its union system


Oi at 6:55 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17198 | reply | quote

#17197 on corporate structure, yeah

But compare that to worse, Kelley. What are your thoughts on Hicks?


Oi at 6:56 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17199 | reply | quote

#17197

Leonard over david always

I do confess Brooks is unoriginal. I would even say Childs had some decent work at several points his career even if i didnt like where he took it later

https://www.libertarianism.org/columns/immanuel-kant-nazism


Oi at 6:57 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17200 | reply | quote

#17197 hicks is probably an even bigger fav. I just dont get what he sees in Kelley

Yes, the libertarianism URL was the Gordon link. My bad, it was secondhand, i had read

It should be findable, an original copy though


Oi at 7:01 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17201 | reply | quote

> What are your thoughts on Hicks?

Not familiar.


curi at 7:01 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17202 | reply | quote

#17200 Oh the debate is about Peikoff's views on Kant.

My current opinion is that Kant is really awful. I've looked into him some, not a ton. I've also listened to Peikoff's history of philosophy lectures and didn't notice major flaws in the Kant stuff.


curi at 7:04 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17203 | reply | quote

Ok. Stephen Hicks you would probably like

He is Canadian, from Rockford (yes, that same 1). He is an analytical philosopher but he has even played devil's advocate on thinkspot on stuff like religion

An allround philosopher, he LOATHES political correctness


Oi at 7:04 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17204 | reply | quote

#17203 mooost stuff by kant IS awful

His critique of pure reason is the OOOOOOONLY good book by him

That said, it is SOOO good, it is a MUST

No dispute his ESPECIALLY later work was arguably more a foundation for contemporary marxism than, FFS, the famous Hobbes

It is all about WHICH book by kant


Oi at 7:06 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17206 | reply | quote

#17204 My leftists friends hate him due to his book on Post Modernism. Which makes me want to read him. Though they claim he completely misunderstands postmodern thinkers...I dunno.


Periergo at 7:06 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17207 | reply | quote

#17205

Well because that is a cherrypicking of his larger thesis. I didnt say you would agree with EVERYTHING


Oi at 7:08 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17208 | reply | quote

Searching old emails, I also see that Hicks is a Hayek fan.


curi at 7:08 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17209 | reply | quote

#17206 Can you provide a clear summary of the main good ideas you think are in critique of pure reason?


curi at 7:09 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17210 | reply | quote

Heh, every postmodernist claims others misunderstand it

Just as we dont understand venezuela wasnt truly socialist & if only lenin implemented a direct democracy

Or it isnt ethnicity doesnt exist, it is race

They do believe in free speech, you dont get conditional vs absolute

LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL


Oi at 7:10 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17211 | reply | quote

#17210 right, he isnt a good economist. Neither was Ayn. She adored copyright e.g.

Well, his critique of pure reason is centered around that of modern states being composed of ideologies

Ideologies are a form of reason. If that reason tries to change the world into some "ought," it will totally destroy everything in its path

Robespierre?

He called it banal evil. Arendt is more famous for the phrase but she was referring to more a CAREERIST spin on Milgram's experiment (which Kant didnt mean)

Take Mengele, how they found him. He got depressed, fell in love etc. How do you do that if you are a CLINICAL sociopath?

He WAS a sociopath but as anybody knows, most the world's evil is done with good intent

Well, then Hitler thought he was saving the German race

He would be that reason, to which Kant refers

An easier comparison might be made to Paterson's humanitarian guillotine.


Oi at 7:16 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17212 | reply | quote

#17210 this is why i had cautioned against a singular interpretation of reason

The definition of reason like FLIPPED 180° in meaning by the enlightenment era

Kant is defending TRUE reason against the MODERN meaning


Oi at 7:20 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17213 | reply | quote

re Hicks, if a living, active philosopher is going to impress me, i'd like to see them participate in some high quality online text discussions. i don't like the people who won't do serious debates/discussions and present no public evidence that they can discuss effectively to figure out good ideas.


curi at 7:22 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17214 | reply | quote

#17212 you're not summarizing/explaining enough for me to know what you mean.


curi at 7:22 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17215 | reply | quote

#17210 anyway whereas arendt was referring to coglike mentality (pleasing the boss, loving praise or promotion, etc is narcissism, "just following orders"),

Kant is talking the other side of the equation. Who is Eichmann's OWN boss?

WHAT was Hitler thinking? Etc

Nazis didnt have their own philosophy. It was banal because they took normal concepts, a human fear like jews or defeat and then went crazy with it

That is what he means my reason. Ideology overtaking sensibility


Oi at 7:23 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17216 | reply | quote

#17215

>WHAT was Hitler thinking? Etc

Nazis didnt have their own philosophy. It was banal because they took normal concepts, a human fear like jews or defeat and then went crazy with it

>That is what he means my reason. Ideology overtaking sensibility

"But we have got to do something" is another example of pure reason kant would take issue with, in american discourse

He was borrowing from the bible, i cant remember the exact wording

I tried googling it for you but couldnt refind it


Oi at 7:26 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17217 | reply | quote

#17215

Woops. The formatting didnt post how i intended it.

Is THAT better though?


Oi at 7:27 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17218 | reply | quote

The stuff you're saying about Kant doesn't look anything like the table of contents and introductory remarks at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critique_of_Pure_Reason

similarly doesn't seem very related to https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/kant-reason/


curi at 7:30 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17219 | reply | quote

#17215 moral panic, utopism (recreating the human race), etc are pure reason

Because they "make sense." All want a better world, yada. But they end in dystopia because they are not rational

By reason, he means ideology. Where emotions and idealisms overtake logic

His criticism is the flipside to Arendt on Eichmann

If the purveyor of pure reason commands the cog, the cog is the mob. The idealogue's appendage. His doers. His bureaucracy

And the idealogue wins because these players come together to make a system of mass murder

Not for no reason. For the greater good. The greater good that separates the genuine utopist eg robespierre from lets say stalin

It ends the same way but his view the world drives his ambition, his anger, his passion

And if there were no passion, thered be no dystopia. But man is passionate.


Oi at 7:32 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17220 | reply | quote

#17219

Perhaps because there are multiple sections

The tables of freedom are referenced. Apriori is discussed. That of banality is another


Oi at 7:33 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17221 | reply | quote

take a look at this kant stuff i wrote when a philosopher came along and lied he was interested in discussion. https://curi.us/files/ebooks/fi-kant.pdf


curi at 7:34 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17222 | reply | quote

#17222 i am not lying

Categorical imperatives, search for the specific phrase


Oi at 7:35 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17223 | reply | quote

#17222 you wanted me to dim down my conveyance

I dimmed it down. Categorical imperatives sounds so obscure as a phrase


Oi at 7:36 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17224 | reply | quote

I didn't say you were lying. Are you misreading?

i think kant on a priori, analytic/synthetic, idealism and categorical imperatives is all awful. and you seemed to be talking about other stuff closer to politics.


curi at 7:36 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17225 | reply | quote

#17224 Dim and clear are different things.


curi at 7:37 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17226 | reply | quote

#17225 that is what politics is. Philosophy

He develops his idea of categorical imperatives ties better in later on.

This is why he wrote the critique of pure reason


Oi at 7:38 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17227 | reply | quote

#17226 yes, perhaps i did not do a better job

I tried. I apologize for that


Oi at 7:39 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17228 | reply | quote

#17226 no i didn't misread but you did NOT say WHICH PART of Kant you disliked. Originally, nor it is ALL by him

https://books.google.com/books?id=iRsqAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA578#v=onepage&q&f=false

That is what I meant where I had said he developed further


Oi at 7:46 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17229 | reply | quote

#17226 it is hidden away in the section, named canon of pure reason

My bad, he doesnt REINVOKE the phrase categorical imperative

But he is developing more clearly what he means in how pure reason ties into his book on morals


Oi at 7:47 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17230 | reply | quote

#17226 the reason i dont recommend his book on morals is i think he was HAPHAZARD on assigning deontological theory. Was he a deontologist? Sorta. He seemed to wanna halfway many things

I also have a distaste for the tables of freedom

Which YES i MISREMEMBERED, is NOOOOOT in his book on pure reason

My bad

That wasnt why i recommended his critique of pure reason before

It IS ANOTHER REASON NOW


Oi at 7:50 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17231 | reply | quote

#17226 https://books.google.com/books?id=iRsqAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA578#v=onepage&q&f=false

His earlier explanation, evil was only descriptive

It is here, he makes the magic work

He makes it work by explaining HOW or WHY it does


Oi at 7:52 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17232 | reply | quote

#17226 well, "only" is a bit harsh

Not enough to my liking

Naturally, it takes BOTH books to make for clarity

But you would END with this, thats why i say


Anonymous at 7:53 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17233 | reply | quote

#17226 the canon. It is insufficient to find this by the tables of content


Oi at 7:55 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17234 | reply | quote

#17226 i read it years ago

I am bound to forget section titles

The fact i am able to absorb all of this by muscle memory, i am just lucky i am ONLY mixing stuff up and not puking brain goo

[Yes, nonliteral]

The canon was the section


Oi at 7:58 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17235 | reply | quote

#17226 i understand in retrospect you weren't accusing me

I do not have much social value except intellect. And my mind is like insomniacal, intellectually

So i need to keep that source of pride. I got defensive, insecure, feeling or figuring (maybe falsely) i had been misunderstood

I apologize


Oi at 8:03 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17236 | reply | quote

#17222 I like this so far. I think it is quite plausible that Popper is right and Kant was betrayed by his followers, like Hegel and present day Zizek being basically unreadable (to me).

Or maybe I am just biased against these 2 thinkers because I do not comprehend what they are talking about. I am open to this possibility so remain open minded. However, my intuition tells me that there is not much of a there there.


Periergo at 8:21 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17237 | reply | quote

#17237 oh gawd, I HAAAAAATE hegel

Hegel had several contrasts, kant but i think people overplay it. They were WAY closer to each other

But hegel was everything wrong with kwnt MULTIPLIED

Hegel is my bete noire

I would rather worship the devil than say something good about him


Oi at 8:28 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17238 | reply | quote

#17237 *kant

Regardless your reasons or uncertainty why you feel you are biased against hegel

[People do say he is obscure],

You are certainly IN MAJOR company, Hegel haters

Schopenhauer was the opposing kantian school to Baden (Hegel)

He loathed Hegel as did Kirkegaard

Rule of thumb -- if something is wrong with the world, I blame it on Hegel

In fact, my last cavity was Hegels fault

My receding hairline? I would blame hegel

I say all this humorously, but on a very serious underlying hate


Oi at 8:32 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17239 | reply | quote

#17237 Hegel is the Yahoo of philosophers

A 90s version of Crapple but on the web. The laughingstock everybody loves to hate

And theyre RIGHT TO HATE HIM

His ideas WERE detestable

Much as Yahoo sucks total ball

Hegel was a yahoo.

A total yahoo

In both meanings

https://themindlessphilosopher.wordpress.com/2017/07/13/how-to-destroy-hegel/


Oi at 8:36 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17240 | reply | quote

#17237

The very brief "quote (if you wanna call it that)" by schopenhauer in that link is NOT THE FUNNIEST retort by him

He had a feisty spunk in some his other takedowns

Albeit not as funny kirkegaard on journalists. He would pray for his prostitute daughter but disown a journalist son, LOL


Oi at 8:41 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17241 | reply | quote

#17237 if anything, the article is imho too soft on hegel

And its mention, liebnitz, uhh in all fairness he had some loony ideas too


Oi at 8:42 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17242 | reply | quote

#17237 albeit nowhere as bad, hegel

You cannot outhegel hegel on being a lunatic

That is scoring 100 on a scale of 1-10, how lunatic

Hegel is off the charts lunatic


Oi at 8:43 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17243 | reply | quote

#17237 the fact i wrote 5 or so replies SOLELY about how much i hate hegel should give you a clue how intense

Now imagine i am, as if possible, even MORE hateful towards gnosticism?

Albeit, i feel hegel WAS ESSENTIALLY a gnostic thinker (plotinus more or less < protagoras, stoic monism later combined zoroastrianism, among other things like biology)

But you get my point


Oi at 8:46 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17244 | reply | quote

#17237 well hegel claimed newton too empirical

So i am not claiming hegel took up biology. Heck, not even literal biology describes the modern left

But if you have ever read julian huxley, engels, you know why i hate hegel

He didnt even get whyyyyyy he disagreed with kant on autonomy

He claimed populism is an exception to the anacyclosis

As if it werent bad enough his view on history

So no he didnt use the word synthesis. But he did set forth the ideas


Oi at 8:49 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17245 | reply | quote

#17237 albeit even newton wasnt biological but you get what i mean

I know i know, i wish i had reorganized the parenthetical bit on plotinus better

That is one of the poor structuring bits, on which elliot advised me to improve

It is late at night and my brain is settling down. So the laziness is kicking in, way worse is at least partly why


Oi at 8:51 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17246 | reply | quote

#17237 *organized. Rather, i would reorganize it if i could edit


Oi at 8:52 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17247 | reply | quote

#17237 long story short, trust me, long as you hate hegel, i like you

;) ;) ;)

No shortage company, of haters there. At least from me


Oi at 8:53 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17248 | reply | quote

#17237 bete *noir

Noir, sorry. But yeah, fellow hegel-hater

We should make a club. The hegel-hate-syndicate

We would camoflague because well, health and human services

We are HHS. You gonna meet us at the HHS meeting today?


Oi at 8:55 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17249 | reply | quote

#17237 *camouflage. Sorry

I joke about the hegel-hate syndicate

Already, i am a one man hater, so...


Oi at 8:56 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17250 | reply | quote

#17237 i mentioned comte earlier

http://www1.kcn.ne.jp/~h-uchii/PhiSciJ/philsci_j4.html

But hegel was STILL worse

Haym attempted to fix him, right? I still dont buy it

John Welsh, Sciabarra's friend likes hegel. I dont

Though no fan of prussian virtue (PERHAPS ironic as only 5 generations ago, my fam led the german forces immediately under moltke, himself under bismarck), neither that nor his view on the state are the worst bit

Ffs, haller -- unlike several revisions of his work by contemporaries, was very antistatist (PER SE, and not juuuust in the historicist sense, pre-1870s) but his ideas sucked too


Oi at 9:17 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17251 | reply | quote

#17237 yes, wording:

Though i am no fan of prussian virtue anymore than i am the state, neither that nor his view on the state are the worst bit

Welsh's retort is insignificant, as is the occasional leftist's criticism, he was too prudent

Only the latter is imho a true concern but it is his dialectic i hate most of all

That imho set the argument for some social experiment, some rectification attempt which drove the state, be it class warfare (yes) OR gramsci's subaltern

Ffs, Haller was even very antistatist (PER SE, and not juuuust in the historicist sense, pre-1870s) / unlike several his contemporaries, but his ideas sucked too


Oi at 9:23 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17252 | reply | quote

#17237 comte's "law" was relevant, IDK, dafuq HOOOOW

My brain is winding down. It doesnt wind down like most other people's, in the way of fatigue. It does by just losing coherent thought

I need to sleep


Oi at 9:25 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17253 | reply | quote

so how do you like Heidegger?


curi at 11:36 PM on August 10, 2020 | #17254 | reply | quote

#17254 he basically took schopenhauer, changed around wording & infused hegel, here+there

I dont hate him but i also find zero use in him. That said, i do find myself constantly talking da+sein


Oi at 4:35 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17256 | reply | quote

#17254 what about you?

And how about husserl? I never got the love for reinach, they aren't quite the same imho, despite what hulsmann thinks

I assume despite your distaste for kant, that your love for mises would not necessarily exclude apriori thinkers?


Oi at 4:42 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17257 | reply | quote

oh my god it's turpentine at 5:16 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17260 | reply | quote

#17260 you wont find many praxiologists who DO like popper

Would Mises have?

I dont see how that is a "claim."

Minus on bureaucracy, Mises follows Weber's interpretivism

Hermueuneticists follow something closer to Popper

They are into Polanyi, and occasionally culturalism

Praxiology is opposed positivism but it is ALSO opposed culturalism


Oi at 6:11 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17261 | reply | quote

#17260 https://mises.org/wire/do-austrians-really-reject-empirical-evidence

Popper wrote on more things than epistemology. My bigger issue is many praxiologists turn down Freud

https://mises.org/wire/hegels-very-odd-definition-freedom

That isnt in disagreement, popper but it is in his interpretation

Now few mention Znaniecki. But the antitheticality is there. Much as it is to Laske or, for most anyway, Simmel (some disagree)

Verseheten is something else. Weber's interpretivism, that is Mises'


Oi at 6:23 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17262 | reply | quote

#17260 if you see in human action the book itself:

"What assigns economics its peculiar and unique position in the orbit both of pure knowledge and of the practical utilization of knowledge is the fact that its particular theorems are not open to any verification or falsification on the ground of experience."

https://mises.org/library/human-action-0/html/pp/919


Oi at 6:25 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17263 | reply | quote

#17260 mises' words, not mine

"particular theorems are not open to any verification or falsification on the ground of experience"

So hoppe is not an anomaly CLAIMING TO BE ANYTHING

He is STANDARD misesian


Oi at 6:27 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17264 | reply | quote

#17260 elliot is able to disagree with mises

I disagree with stefan, richman et al in stuff so it is bound to come up

But that doesnt change where mises stood

Lets separate disagreement with mises from rewriting his book for him to say he said what he didnt


Oi at 6:28 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17265 | reply | quote

#17260 even those who disagree over WHAAAAT he believed STIIIILL agree on what he DIDNT believe

https://mises.org/wire/sorens-raico


Oi at 6:32 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17266 | reply | quote

#17260 whether or not you find he opposed it on a misunderstanding is irrelevant

Positivism debate does not clarify weber v popper either

Weber was no popper, no matter whose interpretation of popper

And weber, mises chose


Oi at 6:33 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17267 | reply | quote

#17260 there is more than 1 epistemology opposed positivism

https://mises.org/wire/why-behavioral-economics-isnt-very-useful

There is also ayn's own distaste to psychologism, no?


Oi at 6:36 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17268 | reply | quote

#17260 though psychologism is bad, i dont agree with that article condemning behavioral economics

Yes, i disagree here i admit it

But let us be clear. Personalist economics would be apter? Schumpeter? Despite ofc his own messups


Oi at 6:37 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17269 | reply | quote

#17260 ultimately, popper's distaste of psychology is irrelevant

He DID promote psychologism

He was SIMPLY unaware his own contradiction


Oi at 6:41 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17270 | reply | quote

#17260 i think the main confusion lies between his epistemological at least writing, and his writings on politics

His open society is what i refer to

That is what was psychologistic. His epistemology however largely affirmed it

It only disagreed or SO IT IS ALLEGED, on that bit

We need to think past WORDED criticisms

Marx claimed to break from hegel but didnt really did he?

That is similar to why we fight over popper on epistemology

In the end, was marx mature+young or interrelated?

What about popper?

He began a marxist but NEITHER these books were OF THAT age. He had already given it up


Oi at 6:47 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17271 | reply | quote

#17260 words are great but what do they mean?

What they mean is whether somebodys doctrine is tainted or not

Popper has the words. But does he understand them? Does his wording match the ideas?

Perhaps if people would read up on the actual words he uses, than simply cite he argued opposition to these words, we would be able to notice mistakes

Mistakes that is in his understanding and where it is similar to his own PROPOSALS

Proposals, that is. Not critique

Nazis for instance thought themselves undemocratic. Yet to cite nazis' comments on democracy as proof they were undemocratic is lazy


Oi at 6:51 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17272 | reply | quote

#17260 proudhon "opposed socialism." Instrumentalists "opposed artels." Both say+malthus opposed overconsumption

But none of this says much as to what proudhon offered that was different. What marxs ideas couldntve avoided no matter his distaste, being already utopist aka dystopic

Nor that say was malthusian. Marx despite his labor theory favored sociology like mises

That doesnt really make marx a misesian nor mises a marxian

And sociology is an extension of psychology. Reductionism is the beef. The other is WHICH psychology

Jung? Adler? Freud? Maslow? Who?


Oi at 6:55 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17273 | reply | quote

#17260 like anything, youll find similarities sure

Like walras, menger posited subjective utility

But they disagreed on static equilibrium (as much dynamic or double, scbumpeter), moral equilibrium

And countless other things

By contrast, jevons was influenced by arithmetical economists. His energy theory is oft utilized

Prospect theory might be put alongside henry simon on bounded rationality

Several chicagoboys are famous rejecting math. But the diffs are there


Oi at 6:59 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17274 | reply | quote

#17260 this is why rothbard words it as he does

"I claim in the text that Karl Popper's view of meaning is no better than that of the positivists. For a vigorous argument to the contrary, see W.W. Bartley, III, Unfathomed Knowledge, Unmeasured Wealth (La Salle, Ill.: Open Court, 1990). His "critical rationalism" seems to me to allow one to believe whatever one chooses: the criticism to which beliefs are subjected rests on arbitrary standards"

https://mises.org/library/philosophical-origins-austrian-economics-1/html/c/189


Oi at 7:01 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17275 | reply | quote

#17260 the basis it is positivist might appear misleading,

Till you know why misesians use the word

It is seen as a parallel, no not a similarity

But dissimilarity does not make parallel an impossible description


Oi at 7:03 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17276 | reply | quote

#17260 agree or disagree with that,

My only effort here isnt to convince anybody, but clarify

Once there is clarity on WHYYYYY the bad blood,

The INTELLECTUAL DEBATE becomes WAY EASIER or straightfwd


Oi at 7:05 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17277 | reply | quote

#17260 i had to find a copy to download, the hahn book he cites

I dont like his use of putnam. He uses him elsewhere too, but even so


Oi at 7:18 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17278 | reply | quote

#17260 that warrants clarification

Putnam is a peeve of mine.

Ironically, i dont even disagree with popper on all bits, correspondence theory

I didnt put 2+2 together, davidson talked on this

Alas, i despise davidson. I dont despise popper. I just am not into him

Once upon a time. But never davidson nor putnam

Same time, i do agree with gordon. Just not for the whole case. The conclusion primarily


Oi at 7:22 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17279 | reply | quote

#17260 mind you it took me years to have the stomach to admit idk, that marx TECHNICALLY had a point on gotha for instance

I treat putnam with as weary an eye i do davidson and since this is a popper place, ill go easy there

Again as ive noted time+time again, i am hard to please

I dont look for true scotsman, but it is more that certain thinkers rub me the wrong way not by simply being at least imho wrong but the worst kinds of wrong in a pattern

When david french finally gave overdue defense to cliven+ammon, my words were something like: ok so maybe he isnt as retarded a c-nt i thought he was


Oi at 7:26 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17280 | reply | quote

#17260 popper's view of falsity or truthiness simply substitutes this with corroboration

Methodology, not whether it is true or false

His belief on falsity, truthiness is not problematic if we take it to mean facticity v. correctness

But his falsification is positing a best possible explanation that doesnt quite answer said faults in the universality, that plagued inductive logic


Oi at 7:37 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17281 | reply | quote

#17260 again i dont think i dispute he intends to avoid universal assumptions

In fact not only was falsification a methodological tweak to fix causality or replicability, but it was to in fact separate creation or usefulness from discovery or proof

The issue isnt his wording. It is his proposal

You cant just take wording. You needa think the theories

When id said language matters in context, i didnt mean language matters over ideas

The ideas are an attempt but do not match his worded effort


Oi at 7:41 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17282 | reply | quote

I disagree with many, tarski believed in correspondence. So the irony is, and it might shock some,

My hate of putnam is grounded in the same disagreement, popper

Why then he is said by rothbard to be positivist as opposed symmetric it as gordon put it is what defines experience and what popper exerted in demarcative application

Popper was applying the scientific protocol to sociology

It is further odd then he says science is not knowledge & targets more than only psychologism, sociology itself from time to time.

To later agree with sociological emphases

And it wasnt a middleground either. It was just all over the place


Oi at 7:46 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17283 | reply | quote

He seems to confuse empiricism of the bacon or associationist schools with that of biological materialism or induction

Biological materialism is not all forms as voltaire knew. Voltaire defended materialism but attacked biological materialism

Associationists denied metaphysics (as provable, not necessarily they claimed it disprovable -- only physicalists do) but that was nothing to do with its induction issue

In fact, it is no more this than it was naive realism

Naive realism rejects metaphysics in discovery+proof. Physicalism doesnt only refuse to use it or accept its validity, it claims it readily disprovable VIIIIIA naive realist suppositions+methods

Induction is a problem of universals.

Newton was an inductive thinker. Hume was not

But hume was only an externalist. Not Reideian

Reideian is where popper goes

And that is as accurate hegel calling newton basically an atheist


Oi at 7:52 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17284 | reply | quote

That essentially places it on the extreme mirror of so-called "radical empiricism"

Popper would be "radical relativist"

The problem of universals is not about relativism

The godel theorem does not either even claim this

Relativity to what?

Relativity to variables or perception?

He is attempting to apply it to variables but instead just falls to pluralizing perception

That is just truth pluralism in the modern sense. Not plurality in the sense, all people believe diff things

Nor applied to beliefs as that is

Rather, applied, he attempts to fix, or solve the correspondence DISPUTE by positing facticity as a form of truthiness, not simply clarify how facts apply to the universe, truly

But truth applies fact. Fact does not apply truth

That is not a demarcation

Induction is proving. This is just defining consensus

Like it is true ashkenazim have a higher iq on average than me,

But it does not hold, all are necessarily better at banking at physics at computers at astronomy

But you would falsify to best justify latter statement

Thats great in applying per praxiology because we dont do the human reason axiom as hayek means, the action axiom instead

But as a theory of facticity, it is false

Whether or not the fact is USEFUL to truth DOES NOT CHANGE IT FROM BEING CORRECT

It is simply then a USELESS fact

But a fact nonetheless independent usefulness

Now, induction would be an issue of measuring 1 ashkenazi jews iq and declaring ALL ASHKENAZIM are 165 iq

That would be induction

But it is still the factual average

And whether all ashkenazim are 165, induction,

Is not relevant to the usefulness now is it?

The archetype is. Some minds are objective or abstractual

There is also interest. And whether that fills a gap in skill demand or he gets the job

But since what is being tested or falsified against is not the iq question, but specialty,

It isnt really solving induction. It is solving usefulness

Usefulness might be a SOCIOLOGICAL inductive dilemma, sure

Nobody phrases it that way but ok sure great

And yet, it still doesnt explain how, by LOWERING the threshold for SCIENTIFIC PROOF, he does not OPEN the door to SOCIOLOGISM or PSYCHOLOGISM from claiming to be science

He does not demarcate. He only lowers scientific threshold

By doing that, sociology+science have a comparable, almost even burden of proof

What made sociology true is it didnt need fact

What makes science DEMARCATED is it DOES NEED fact

If science no longer needs fact,

You arent proving sociology is dually true

You are simply eliminating science

He claims to not do this

But does. And in doing so, this effort at reconciling the divide, ONLY BLURS IT FURTHER

For something to demarcate, it must be distinctly 2 things

If there is a blur, what are you demarcating?

You cant demarcate something that has no distinction

Demarcate means separate. Separate implies difference

If there is no difference there is no separation

He only distinguishes the fields

But he is denying half is valid as an INDEPENDENT study

Science isnt distinguishable by its conclusion. It is distinguishable by its method and its use

Once you blur the method, you cant distinguish the use or conclusion

He only distinguishes these 2 in that he disagrees with said distinctness

He might think he is only solving induction

But induction is still an empirical issue

To apply sociology to solve induction is to misunderstand means vs conclusion

Science needs means to prove. Sociology is a means or something idk whatever, the shared abstract of it is i mean - the unseeable yada

But he is applying sociology as a conclusion

That only ACKNOWLEDGES induction occurs

But it also ASSUMES INDUCTION occurs in ALL CASES

Newton was wrong to assume gravity then is present in space

According to popper, before we found it is zerogravity,

We could assume space is QUASI gravity

Apply that to something like genes

It is true by falsification TILL LATER NOTICE, equally that all living things are made of genes AND that NOT ALL are

We can after all, only verify (lakatos) the species weve examined have genes

But BOTH CANT BE TRUE. How do you FALSIFY that to separate it from lakatos?

You cant falsify by examining every specie. And youve verified not falsified those youve examined

We do discover species EVEN TODAY that wed no idea existed

Not only cryptospecies, but in the hadal or marianna as well bony fish we thought extinct

But if we assume because we have not examined with certainty every last specie nor can possibly know, if and once we do we did,

What is falsified about genes?

If we to solve induction must assume there is always a next contradictory specimen,

In poppers own words, you simply wait till or IF you can falsify ANYTHING

Aka it is impossible to ever

He accepts that is the case

But it doesnt answer probability

Gravity is a simple concept to prove or falsify

If the thesis is about a gazillion diff pieces and of a broad variable,

He suggests we cannot prove all species have genes

But it doesnt take idk vertibrae to prove

Though not all species have human type dna, they do have genetics of a TYPE

Even algae is able to reproduce TOO.


Oi at 8:21 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17285 | reply | quote

His critique is biology isnt truth

His proposal is biology cant be proven

Unless truth is fact, ergo the paradox in correspondence theory,

He cannot do this

If correspondence theory is fact means truth, his is that truth means fact

Circular. If fact is truth or truth is fact, you still have an "equals"

Whether it is equal to correspondence in THAT ORDER is what us coders would write as:

"=="

He is "==" to positivism in the same way nondual logic accepts either only corporeal or only spiritual

Popper distinguishes them but opposes its interdependence. He supposes rather they interprove

That is not even unlike nondual theory

Though nondual logic does only accept 1 of the 2 worlds as valid, it does acknowledge both

Nondual logic wants to SEPARATE heaven and earth. Heaven being metaphysics, ANALOGICALLY and earth being science

But by attempting to fix its alternative "opposing" realm,

It only denies reality which consists of both

Poppers goal is to bring back that duality no?

It is. But instead of bringing it back, per his critique (yes rooted in duality), he only proposes a nondual fix

That nondual fix is dualist. But not dual


Oi at 8:29 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17286 | reply | quote

Some say hume got his ideas in part from descartes

I disagree. He was an externalist but not cartesian

People might remember a similar accusation, spinoza being necessitarian

Or the assumption he favored naturata over naturans

1 is nurture, interventionist. The other is philosophical naturalism

Well similar issue with popper https://www.nyu.edu/projects/sciabarra/notablog/archives/000700.html

He is like people who claim gnosticism solves communism when in fact they confuse gnosticism with the translation of gnosis


Oi at 8:33 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17287 | reply | quote

Falsification works on psychiatry (while neither science nor falsification nor even totally, verificationism do in psychoanalysis)

But it does not solve induction

Retroduction does

Retroduction solves induction

Retroduction would cover newton's dilemma AS WELL my hypothetical Mandelian example

Itd ALSO allow for demarcation

Retroduction falsifies but it also does not conclude it this way

It solves excesses of both extremes, the variability of datasets in any experiment vs another

And leaves sociology alone

It not only better proves fact, it independently enables application aka truthiness


Oi at 8:37 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17288 | reply | quote

Retroduction inducts, deducts, abducts

It is a catch-all that can be applied loosely without scientizing sociology or sociologizing science

Without as big a margin of error as well a concludable enough certainty

It solves universals as well variables. It solves size and helps plug bias

But falsification is not retroduction


Oi at 8:40 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17289 | reply | quote

Oi at 8:46 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17290 | reply | quote

The only difference he had with simon is whether abduction proves anything

Not whether abduction is the optimal epistemology

They agreed on which epistemology

They only disagreed on what it accomplishes


Oi at 8:48 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17291 | reply | quote

Perhaos that is why popper did not mention it?

It would be easy to say he didnt because he opposed it being applied scientifically

However, he mentions induction, so either he is criticizing induction as being the only true science

Well, no either. If that is the case, for any abductive theory to not be called that but still be used to apply against science's induction,

He would have to admit abduction is not scientific

He doesnt do that

Nor is it even unknown gravity is at zero in space anymore

The abduction mightve cautioned against newtons conclusion earlier

But it is not simply probable gravity doesnt occur in space

It is proven

Is he suggesting it doesnt in other galaxies?

We know that too

In other universes? Uni+verse. I dont think anybody claims gravity doesnt, for one because NOBODY CAN PROVE OOOOR DISPROVE the multiverse

So unless somebody claims that, his wording that NOTHING can be proven is false

MANY THINGS cant be, yes

But unless we were imagining being lighter, or discerned bone shrinkage as caused by something other than pressure or floating as not gravity

WHICH IS NOT A PARTICLE so as an occurrence, it is sorta hard to attribute to something else,

Nothing is absolute

If falsificationism is indeed a valid exercise, gravity might not really be occurring

I for one accept proof of gravity.

If it were called gryvator, instead, the same thing is occurring. It could be named just "heavier weight with less pressure theorem." But alas


Oi at 8:56 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17292 | reply | quote

Newton was wrong about WHETHER it occurred in all places

But that is an easy thing to falsify AND verify

AND prove on earth, disprove in space or rather, prove space has zero

If i disprove it occurs in space (it ACTUALLY DOES OCCUR AT MINIMAL LEVELS BTW UP THERE),

I am not falsifying probability

I am invalidating aka showing newton incorrect

Unlike probability though, i am AFFIRMATIVELY PROVING zero gravity

I am not probablizing anything

If that is falsification because it indeed falsifies newtons inductive universal, falsification is empirical

Because it is empirically disproven in space aka empirically proven the opposite is true

Falsification assumes no opposites


Oi at 9:00 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17293 | reply | quote

We could quibble on the MINISCULE percentage of gravity that DOES occur up there

Much as we could that a single day is NOT ON THE DOT equal to 24h

Not only tedious, it is not undoable scientifically to prove the days ARE of WHICH EXACT number of seconds

Exactness matters in math. Thats however why we DO KNOW the EXACT percentage of gravity AND the exact secs

We also have PROVEN it fluctuates

Gravity actual percentage LIKE SECONDS fluctuate

But they do so observably and predictably

We study this in astrophysics. By observing factors which produce gravity

Same way with the way orbit does over time

You could apply falsification to CERTAIN sciences, PREDICTIONS THAT IS


Oi at 9:04 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17294 | reply | quote

Like that of pollution. It isnt the human variable nor MERELY the fact temperatures are COMPLETELY NATURALLY induced by NATURAL causes

As are even certain pollutions, etc

But this is falsifiable because we DONT KNOW the SUPPOSED effects of pollution

There are certain type carbons that exist for only a short period of time

An inductionist might see tree rings and say it doesnt matter how or blame when the same thing caused it

But this does matter. Not talking politics but like how it relates to idk, how much an idk aerosol can emits

Ofc itd also be useless because we dunno how important or useless trees are in xyz supply, where or how it affects human health

We do know it has nothing directly to do biodiversity nor the ozone

But sure certain falsifiabilities


Oi at 9:08 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17295 | reply | quote

But whereas you can never prove that, we can and did prove newton's incorrect+correct bits. We cannot conduct surgery if we mistake not knowing if all species are genetic with figuring without verifying a specific patient, that being this patient isnt even ALL humans,

Might be brainless or have 5 stomachs

If we dont claim that but suppose we dunno, you cant operate ethically on him right?

Ironically that ethical need to turn him away would violate hippocratic ethic instead

Are you verifying universals across many species, many individuals, what?

It is true you cannot rely on evidence based medicine but all who reject ebm still accept proofs like "all humans have dna"

But we have not studied a human in north korea nor hidden away in siberia for 1000y

So we must assume "nothing"

Common sense ofc knows well nobody extends falsification THAT far

True. Nobody with common sense

But popper does not clarify this

If induction is any universal, it is not simply the HIGHEST universal

He in fact ONLY OOOOOOONLY explicitly rejects the HIGHEST

Humans as a dataset is ITSELF aaaaaa universal

Popper couldve simply opposed universals

But he only opposes highest

Lowest universals cannot in fact be outside this "nothing" because provable nothing = unprovable everything. If it werent nothing, it would say some things

Why does he single out highest?

I believe groups AND individuals vary

But a deformed or preemie is already a variable

Lowest universals cannot, in individual diffs be ALL provable EVERY VARIATION POSSIBLE

But we DOOOO know for individual diffs to exist there must be genes. For deformity to occur, genes

A person might have 1 lung or be a siamese twin

Maybe im wrong a 5 stomached person could mutate

After all there are animals in chernobyl with 5 legs growing outta each single leg

But that isnt nothing provable

There is still a gene involved

Genes are not a nothing. But a something

If even a siiiiiingular something is true, it is not nothing,

If 100.00% all is unprovable, genes can only be 0.00% unprovable

If genes were at MINIMUM 0.001% provable, nothing is still only 99.999%


Oi at 9:22 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17296 | reply | quote

And in proof there is no percentage

Only in probability. Probability of proof is not however always a factor as shown above

Many things but not all

Though he does not apply this "to" science, he sorta does

By supposing science is literally 100% unknowable,

His only agreement is that what science studies is itself correct of something, independent our perception as humans

But accepting fact while denying facticity in the most absolute sense does in fact deny the varied proofs presented in any experiment

That not all studies befall induction might not be his claim, only a rule of thumb on what not to assume

However, that still in his proposal -- that is, not merely caution,

Supposes nothing is provABLE

ABLE. ABLE

ProvABILITY is not proofs

You might find proofs LATER

His claim leads to the argument that proofs are IMPOSSIBLE PERIOD

It is unprovable god exists or that he doesnt

It was YET TO BE PROVEN gravity is close to zero in space during newtons time

Unlike the 1st, the other was indeed provABLE

It just lacked the PROOF YET

Falsification is deliberately leaving that door open

Fine and all but not when it rewrites the whole facticity of definitively noninductive proofs that can only be proven otherwise, in many cases

Many might be most or few but it is not all

Gravity as an occurrence not a particle is that

Dark matter is in poppers wheelhouse

Then again, einstein never claimed that disproved atomic material NOR claimed to prove dark matter is INSTEAD what makes our MASS

Ironically, popper falls to the if else he LATER criticizes

Sorta how dawkins claims ockhams razor disproves god

I can believe in both god AND negative vacuum inflation

Maybe i can or cant KALAM + vacuum

But there is no ockhams razor


Oi at 9:32 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17297 | reply | quote

And if you can only falsify experience or evidence, it only means we might or not be able to verify OR prove dark matter

How do you falsify it though?

You would have an easier metaphysical argument claiming atomism is falsifiable

Ofc since that has NO BEARING on DARK MATTER,

It really isnt falsificationism as applies to EVERYTHING

It is VERIFICATION

But falsification implies ockhams razor

Not everything has a covariable or alternative, incompatible explanation


Oi at 9:35 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17298 | reply | quote

Hickams dictum does not explain causality because causality implies cause and effect

A specific effect

However, it does still invalidate ockhams razor if we recall not only can illnesses be comorbid (or yes, falsifiable symptoms),

But a symptom be contributed by 2 illnesses which DO HAVE THE SAME biological chemical AAAND somatic anatomatical etc pathways, pathologies, result

Psychosis for instance. Or bipolar depression as opposed unipolar even in people without bipolar

You could argue dsm is not science but a reflection of clinical summed traits

True. But there are also different mutations, even with the same proteins or nucleotides, chromosomal abnormalities or alleles. Many mental illnesses share this. Many then inside spectra, subtypes

Classical autism shares the same causes as AS. But they ALSO DIFFER in MUTATION. As well symptoms, NOT SEVERITY

Parkinsons too

But we do know this. Whether it is conclusive we know WHICH for SURE

Is a matter of conclusivity. Not lack of provability

It might be unprovable whether we can ever prove it aka also prove provability

But it is definitely provable insofar as we have the data necessary. What we lack is the replicability

But replicability is an integrity issue

In newton it was not replicability since he never tested outter space

Unless we cant test, the only inductive issue is stuff like whether any pinpointed gene is alone enough to cause this

Or whether it is the ONLY sum of mutations that cause it

Might be, AS arises from these 2 mutations

But also a totally separate 2

Other hand, it is still provable, where multiple mutations occur being we have POLYGENOMIC TOOLS

Yes yes nucleotides not genomes but bear with me

Neutral theory was falsifiable

Because it was bullsh-t

But polygenomic assessment makes it easier

Whether we know where the allele originated, is ofc open to finding older corpses or an issue of dating degrading the sample

It is also not relevant to note this, alleles, wont solve mutation

Why? Mutations dont last more than at most 2 generations and those that do without new emergence only deplete as much they accumulate

If i go back 5 generations, and average assume fecundity for birth order even irrespective a btw proven not hypergamic rate, it is still maybe i share 0.0001% of the same mutations

In addition to new 1s

Yet others which arent eeeeven mutations but actual hard inheritance, say my great great aunt who had auburn hair,

That is deleted too. We can prove that if not by the way dominant or recessives work in now multiple generations passed, by dna test


Oi at 9:50 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17299 | reply | quote

It might be falsifiable the gene that causes it is the only 1 but dating is not an issue, save for imperfectness, embalment (not that i would desecrate a grave) so if you know which 1 that caused it she had,

It is ...verifiable, no other allele would matter if i had any other too

Besides genetic incompatibility -- this is provable upon discovery

I am not suggesting this gene was incompatible with any other. Im just noting a general point here

Unless i applied my great great aunt or myself to all auburn descendants or assumed my ggm lacks it (unlike my gggm), i am pretty safe to confirm


Oi at 9:56 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17301 | reply | quote

Because i can only be incorrect in my claim if i overextend my claim

But a claim can be specific. That is not a nothing


Oi at 9:57 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17302 | reply | quote

I know this isnt quite probably useful to many here but maybe it is interesting

https://www.criticalrationalism.net/2018/12/01/critical-rationalism-and-the-critique-of-constructivist-rationalism/

It is worth noting irony, *popper mentored hayek*

Yes. I dont like hayek. But they werent like enemies. To the contrary, at least in teaching anyway as well friendlier than with rothbard hayek ever had after the years went by (which is ofc tragic, being friendship shouldnt be held hostage but being kicked from cato by koch, i guess understandable he would be envious, hayek a 2nd rate mind much as keynes also 2nd rate got popular...though the latter, he only it is said, cackled over & even mises had a fallingout, sweet guy too, with schumpeter)


Oi at 10:21 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17303 | reply | quote

The snark wasnt directed at anybody here to clarify, earlier

It was a snark at dead guys


Oi at 11:01 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17304 | reply | quote

Here is a less primary source

https://books.google.com/books?id=3VtHcYGp2pIC&lpg=PA47&pg=PA480

You seem to come from that angle too

Reason is sociopolitical but not economical to you?

The thing is, outside of scientism, the political economy is the economy & economics is a sociology

So either scientific methodology is applied to science or everything social, cultural AND economical is reason based

But reason based in that it is human reason

If it isnt the cognition nor the axiom, isnt EVERYTHING not directly empirical a reason exercise?

Regardless what 1 thinks of economics being a sociology, it is still political

If politics is reason based, i just fail to see how those are separate


Oi at 11:22 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17305 | reply | quote

Bounded rationality isnt something needed nor math

Math can do monetary or marketing can be bounded

Ayn wasnt focused on economics but there is a reason it is directly relevant to it

This is why polanyi worked on embedment or weber, industrialization

All of it is reason. Economics is simply a specialization whereas ayn generalized it in an ideal, than a description


Oi at 11:25 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17306 | reply | quote

Whatever profession popper was or wasnt, rothbard was or wasnt,

You might be surprised to learn i consider myself a political sociologist 1st, an economist 2nd

Not 1st. So perhaps it is less to do with viewpoint. Somebody can come to a different conclusion even being only secondarily an economist


Oi at 11:30 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17307 | reply | quote

Which i sensed from how Rafe words it, he is hinting at the Weiser controversy

Surely enough, i googled it

http://gordianknot.homestead.com/RC_PopperPaper.html


Oi at 11:38 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17309 | reply | quote

Mises broke from Weiser on more than only 1 thing. Menger's arguments were only part of that

Weiser actually influenced Hayek more. I mentioned Laske+Polanyi

Polanyi worked with and influenced him even MORESO than weiser EVER DID

Laske's ideas are similar to Kuhn's but applied to sociology

Culturalism i mentioned, remember? Even the neurohayekians cite Kuhn

Only certain hermueneticists actually even cover this. The road to postmodernism is 1


Oi at 11:41 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17310 | reply | quote

This is then where it boils down to Husserl v Simmel primarly in part later on


Oi at 11:42 AM on August 11, 2020 | #17311 | reply | quote

Luckman, THATS the other name, other than Laske


Oi at 12:08 PM on August 11, 2020 | #17314 | reply | quote

Thank you for all the interesting links. I have been going through a lot of them using curi's suggestion of the dream reader app. It works great and I can get through a lot more content faster without sacrificing comprehension.

However, I fear that as someone who doesn't have a basic understanding of the various topics you are presenting, that I am building a library from sheets of papers here and there. Instead of books.

Any suggestions for a beginner?


Periergo at 12:15 PM on August 11, 2020 | #17315 | reply | quote

On epistemology / logic or economics?

Ive linked popper's logic of discovery up there as have I Gordon on austrian methodology

So...

Espistemology, i have not linked?

Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding by Hume

Truths and meanings by Davidson (not an endorsement FTR)

Truth and moral sciences by Putnam (also not an endorsement)

Charles Pierce, it is best if you just get his collected papers. That is, besides, where the gold is -- personally, i hate neopragmatism but he is a MUST READ for EPISTEMOLOGY

[even BEFORE putnam or davidson, personally i hate most of all both but it gives background to the debate]

---

I assume you're familiar Human Action by Mises, but i have also already linked that too

Atlas shrugged isnt as important here imho. It is possibly unimportant atm at all


Anonymous at 12:39 PM on August 11, 2020 | #17316 | reply | quote

Sorry, 17316 is me


Oi at 12:40 PM on August 11, 2020 | #17317 | reply | quote

I also assume you have read Kant?


Oi at 12:40 PM on August 11, 2020 | #17318 | reply | quote

Understanding and Explanation is a fascinating read by Apel

At least only if you bother getting to it

And fatal conceit by hayek - AGAIN NOT AN ENDORSEMENT, i am ONLY giving background subjects


Oi at 12:43 PM on August 11, 2020 | #17319 | reply | quote

> Thank you [Oi] for all the interesting links. I have been going through a lot of them using curi's suggestion of the dream reader app. It works great and I can get through a lot more content faster without sacrificing comprehension.

> However, I fear that as someone who doesn't have a basic understanding of the various topics you are presenting, that I am building a library from sheets of papers here and there. Instead of books.

> Any suggestions for a beginner?

That stuff is broadly not beginner appropriate. I'd suggest reading stuff from https://www.elliottemple.com/essays/reading


curi at 12:45 PM on August 11, 2020 | #17320 | reply | quote

> Charles Pierce, it is best if you just get his collected papers. That is, besides, where the gold is -- personally, i hate neopragmatism but he is a MUST READ for EPISTEMOLOGY

Extensive discussion of Pierce stuff at http://curi.us/1595-rationally-resolving-conflicts-of-ideas (and also lots of links to stuff re my epistemology)


curi at 12:46 PM on August 11, 2020 | #17321 | reply | quote

Depending on how far down the rabbithole you wanna go,

And i assume you have read aristotle's many works...

Nietzche: thus spoke zarathustra, truths, gay science

Schmitt: political theology (partisan myth or war writings are unimportant)

Stirner's ego and his own

Ofc anything by tocqueville

Eumeswile by junger

Anything by Davila

Anything by spengler

Weber on bureaucracy

Managerial revolution by burnham

I wont bother with duhem

Ill leave it at ONLY THAT


Oi at 12:49 PM on August 11, 2020 | #17322 | reply | quote

I streamed commentary on the prior ~50 comments.

https://youtu.be/QDLGcVMwbS8


curi at 12:49 PM on August 11, 2020 | #17323 | reply | quote

I know it isnt beginner stuff

Thats why i left it to pierce, hume, davidson, putnam primarily

Then prefaced the next batch, "depending on how far down the rabbithole"


Oi at 12:53 PM on August 11, 2020 | #17325 | reply | quote

Ok so with pierce discussion, i guess you would be good to go, P (again hope thats ok to call you that?)

Davidson, putnam, hume might be secondary


Oi at 12:54 PM on August 11, 2020 | #17326 | reply | quote

#17323 i linked on gab, the stream


Anonymous at 12:58 PM on August 11, 2020 | #17327 | reply | quote

Thank you OI. Thank you curi.


Periergo at 1:39 PM on August 11, 2020 | #17328 | reply | quote

#17318 I've only read Morals by Kant, none of his other works. I have read most of Plato and very little Aristotle. I've read Acton, Mills and Locke. I've read some from the Stoics. That's about as much Philosophy as I have read. Very beginner.

I've wanted to read more Aristotle, Hume, Kant, Schmitt, and Arendt. I did not find Rand to be of importance until I ran into this blog, I think I am changing my mind about that. I also want to read from the anarchists more. I don't want to just read from one point of view.


Periergo at 9:27 AM on August 13, 2020 | #17386 | reply | quote

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