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Zman Kietilipooskie

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Government is/or soon will be outdated

Basically Government or soon will become more of an evil then it is a good. It is or soon will be become un-necessary due to the abilities of business. A governmental system can be removed with the only the judiciary system remaining. Government played a role in our lives when ethics and morality were still undefined as well a technology was still in its infancy. Now that communication has moved to the public and morality is common we have entered a new age.

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    Steven Meglitsch

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    Dec 5 2012: Hi Zman.
    I couldn't dissagree with you more. The fiscal debacles of the last decade must be proof enough of that. I know it often seems as though the representatives we elect and the governance they provide us are flawed, but in a democracy that is mostly because we allow them to be.
    Your utopian idea that our lives would be better served by unfettered business than elected governent ... no way. I can't imagine any sillier principle for governance than profit. In fact, the worst aspect of the American system of government is that our elected representatives allow the interests of the rich to supercede the interests of people.
    The Ayn Rand theory (yours, Zman) is that no government is the best government. Business, economy, health and welfare will regulate themselves by some magical principle I have never been able to grasp.
    Now, let's look around the world and find a country that has virtually no government and see what it's like ... well, ... hmm ... In fact, I can't think of a single one in recent times. The last ungoverned societies must've been back in the paeleolithic era, before agriculture, before permanent settlement, when there were about a million people on Earth. That situation lasted for almost 100,000 years, and nothing much happened in terms of human development.
    Ever since agriculture and permanent settlements took over as the human way of living, about 10,000 years ago, there has been government, some good, some bad. As the human population increased, local communities merged into larger and more compex societies and governance, too, gradually became larger and more complex. All of our modern day technologies, knowledge, wealth etc. have grown out of this progression.
    From the million or so human beings that lived on Earth during the Paeleolithic we have now become seven billion. The thought that government will become obsolete as our societies and our lives get more and more complex is silly.
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      Krisztián Pintér 200+

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      TED Translator
      Dec 5 2012: that "ayn rand theory" is in fact much older. rothbard is a better bet
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        Steven Meglitsch

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        Dec 5 2012: I used Rand because she was a pure fiction author. Rand was, by the way, twenty years older than Rothbard.

        But right from J:B:Turbot and Adam Smith in the 18th century there has been an economic fiction that capitalism in an unregulated free market will lead to a better world. Well it didn't during the Quin dynasty in China, it didn't in 18th century USA or Europe, and it won't today. A capitalist system is inherently geared at only one thing, maximizing profits by controlling the market, and that means sidestepping competition by any means.
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          Krisztián Pintér 200+

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          Dec 5 2012: i was sloppy in my post, wanted to write mises, menger and back to bastiat. but then realized that they were minarchists, so settled with rothbard instead, the first true anarchist of this line.

          meanwhile i recalled that rand was not even an anarchist, she was also a minarchist. anyway, if you want to attribute a world view to someone, attribute it to thinkers, and not novelists / sorta-philosophers. if one wants to understand how can people operate without a state, one needs to read no rand, but rather the thinkers i have mentioned.

        • John Smith 30+

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          Dec 5 2012: Actually Adam Smith did not favor unregulated capitalism, ihe advocated for a government that keeps income inequality in check and takes care fo those who fall through the cracks of capitalism.

          Unregulated capitalism as the answer to all problems is an idea from the 20th century. Ludwig Von Mises must have been a particularly heartless man since in 1900 there were still slums with abject poverty in them within walking distance from his prestigious Vienna University, a direct result of 19th century robber baron style unregulated capitalism. It's like someone who grew up in India defending the caste system.
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        Steven Meglitsch

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        Dec 5 2012: Read them in depth, they are absolutely as much fiction writers as Rand. Anarchism, too, is a utopian fiction, just like communism ... look like tempting ideas on paper, but put them into pratice and they simply nurture the growth of despotism.
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        Steven Meglitsch

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        Dec 5 2012: I wrote a paper years and years ago comparing (If I recall correctly) anarchist thinking of Proudhon, Bakunin, and Maréchal with Anarcho-capitalist thinking of Rothbard, Friedman (Milton, not David) and Hayek. Not a very good paper, I think, but I read them all - Menger too, I think ... don't recall Mises.
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          Krisztián Pintér 200+

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          Dec 5 2012: you did not answer the question. what constitutes as "in depth" reading of, say, rothbard? i suspect your knowledge on the issue is not that deep, if you list friedman as anarcho-capitalist. he was not even a minarchist, really. he wanted the government to manipulate money, which is the absolute core of a capitalist economy. also, mises is the beethoven of austrian ecnomics, so no recalling him is ... well, serves as a hint. i claim that your knowledge about anarcho-capitalism is not too deep.

        • John Smith 30+

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          Dec 5 2012: "I wrote a paper years and years ago [...]"

          But that won't be good enough for anarcho capitalists, they'll always say you haven't read enough if you don't agree with it, because they believe their theory is so perfect (make no mistake: they don't see it as the least worst system invented so far, as Adam Smith saw capitalism, but really as the flawless answer to every problem present and future, pretty much religious worship) that anyone who read it thoroughly must become hooked. It's also a debating tactic meant to make you give up, it's a bit like claiming that 1+1=5 and then saying that no one is qualified to comment on that until they've read your 863-page dissertation on why 1+1=5.
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        Steven Meglitsch

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        Dec 5 2012: Sorry I'm not going to bicker about who read how much of what. Read a lot of that stuff in the 1960's along with Marx, Engels and Lenin and Mao ... eventually I dismissed them all as paper tigers of human development, sorry. Keep reading, but for my money they all became obsolete two generations ago, even though we are still living with the consequences of attempt to implement their ideas. The development of third world poverty in the 20th century is the proof they were dead wrong.
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          Krisztián Pintér 200+

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          Dec 5 2012: and which one of marx, engels, lenin or mao was anarchist? let alone anarcho-capitalist? communism was born obsolete, it did not even have to become.

          and now we observe the downfall of democracies. look at greece, spain, the US. but in fact you can look around in the entire EU.

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