Quote from Alex on August 4, 2022, 12:06 pm

For A New Liberty Is A Game Changer To Understand Systemic Power Dynamics

I've read Lucio's summary of For A New Liberty, and I’m very excited that he is familiar with this kind of ideas, as this is a very "niche" book. This is probably one of the few books I would recommend to anyone interested by politics, as this has the potential to greatly increase your clarity and rationality about many things.

Off topic

By the way Lucio, do you have any technique or system to be able to read that many books quickly and to choose them? I am impressed by your ability to absorb new relevant information that quickly.

Off topic

Anyways, I strongly recommend anyone interested by power dynamics to read this book. This has been a game changer for me, and allowed me to understand collective power dynamics to a much deeper level (I would say a systemic level), not just at an interpersonal level.

The most important thing to understand from this book for me is objective law (natural law, iusnaturalism) as opposed to subjective law (positive law). Indeed, we currently live under a legal system based on positive law (which is subjective), that is to say people in power decide what is legal or not in an arbitrary way. Which means that this kind of law can never be impartial, and in consequence fair. And this leads to the problem of legislative inflation, with laws that keep contradicting the previous ones being created every year, as soon as new people get to power.

And so here are the criteria to create an objective law:

• 1st, it cannot be invalid logically, it must adhere to the law of noncontradiction in logic https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_of_noncontradiction
  • Here is a simple example: if we take the right to property, it is negated because of a forced tax system. Thus, logically speaking, there is a contradiction.
• 2nd, it must apply to everyone (isonomy).
  • So if you take money by force from a group of people to give it to other people, there is no isonomy as some individuals have rights that others don’t have, and at the expense of others.
• 3rd, law can only concern the individual, as there is no such thing as a completely homogeneous group.

Thus, we can determine what are at the 3 rights that derive from these criteria:

• Right to property.
• Right to exchange freely.
• Right to defend yourself.

Of course, a group of individuals can decide to create a positive law on top of the natural law for their specific society. But to be legitimate, the laws should be voted unanimously, not by a majority vote. And also, there should be a right of secession for people who don't want to live under that kind of law anymore.

In fact, libertarianism is very different from other political ideas and completely unique. Because it doesn’t prevent you from living with the morality and values that you want as an individual. It just prevents you from imposing it to other people who don’t have the same values/morals. And nothing prevents you from living in a society where consenting individuals share similar values and morals.

Anyways, what needs to be understood from all of this is that as long as you don't recognize that law should be objective (the only way for it to be impartial), you will be manipulated by people in position of power that just impose their subjective will upon you under the pretense of common good. This is the ultimate form of frame control, I would even dare to say systemic frame control. Justice and fairness are illusions in such a system, and you're being alienated without even knowing it. The consequence is that we’re all living under some degrees of agentic state (see Milgram experiment for more information).

It seems hard to develop a true enlightened individualism under these conditions, as we are constantly crushed by collectivism. I believe that this creates a lot of learned helpessness in the general population, and prevent most people from developing an internal locus of control.

This is similar to religious dogmas that used morality to control individuals in previous historical times. They had the monopoly to decide what was "good" or "wrong", even though these concepts are completely contextual, subjective and thus arbitrary.

Note: This is my personal interpretation, description and justification of natural law. I go a bit further than what Rothbard wrote in his book. But I believe that this distinction between objective and subjective law is really the best argument in favor of liberalism and even libertarianism, as the state is ontologically negating natural law.

 

Reply to posts on this thread

I would start by saying that politics, economics, law, and any related topics are very complex things. Everything I am saying now is reflecting my current level of thinking, which is probably likely to evolve in the future. That being said, I have researched and thought about all of this quite thoroughly, and I believe that I have strong arguments. However, this doesn’t mean that I am necessarily right, so I am open to any strong counterargument.

Lucio wrote:

the government must be supported and voted in by non-rigged, massive suffrage vote, and repeatedly voted in and out. In simple words, this would most often correspond to a "correctly functioning democracy".

This is what I believed for a long time, but the problem I see now with this approach is that most voters aren’t rational, thus easily manipulated by politicians that promise extraordinary (and often stupid) things, especially populists. That’s why I believe as long as we’re living under this kind of system, there would be a progressive decline into political extremism, and more and more restrictions imposed to individuals (such as what happened with terrorism, covid forced lockdowns and vaccination, and let’s see what else the future holds).

And the worst part is that we as humans have a tendency under stress to fight to avoid learned helplessness. And that’s why we tend to have a bias towards political interventionism under any stressful circumstances, and to look for scapegoats for our problems.

I would recommend to anyone interested by this topic to read a book called Democracy For Realists. Since reading it, I became really disillusioned with democracy, probably to a point of no return.

Lucio wrote:

A total lack of government would mean anarchy. But anarchy is almost non-existent in the state of nature -something anarchists don't always grasp-. Most groups of people naturally move out of anarchy because an organized form of self-government to punish value-taking (stealing, rape, fraud, murder, etc.) and defend the value-adding and collaborative nature of society from hostile forces and marauders (armies) usually does allow for an expansion of collaborative and win-win exchanges that ultimately benefit most people.

I agree that the leftist idea of anarchism doesn’t really exist in nature. However, I believe that capitalism and private property are very natural things. Animals (and humans) have a very strong natural sense of territoriality and property.

And a common misconception that I see with anarcapism is that people believe that there would be no laws, justice or order under such system. But since we have natural law as I explained, and that societies could even have a positive law on top of it, we could also have private tribunals (this already exists with arbitral tribunals), private polices, etc. In fact, there could be hundreds of different models of anarcapist societies. That is what I like about this model, and what I find very natural, because this favors mixed strategies as opposed to fixed strategies in terms of game theory.

Regarding win-win exchanges, I would say that liberalism and free markets are probably what has favored win-win exchanges the most in the history of humanity. Because it allowed for the first time for the emergence of a completely new paradigm: transcendence of zero-sum games. Indeed, people/groups/countries could become richer by doing win-win transactions with strangers (bringing value to each others) instead of predating on each others. The pie did not have a limited number of parts anymore, but kept growing thanks to cooperation.

If the state stopped limiting that much what individuals can do, I have little doubt that this dynamic would become even stronger, that there would be more growth, and that we would eventually see even more value-creating societies emerge. Because this is already what we're seeing in the most free societies.

 

Lucio wrote:

In exchange for your taxes, you get plenty of goods:

That being said, the robbery analogy doesn't hold in my opinion. Taxes are an exchange. You have little say in what you get back because you're part of millions, but being part of a huge society also comes with its advantages. You can for example spend your whole life without caring about politics, laws, and law enforcement and someone else will still do it for you.

This is a way of seeing things. But I could compare it to a store owner being extorted by a gangster in exchange for his “protection”. Sure, his protection could be useful so this is not an entirely zero-sum game, but this is still forced. I believe there would be more fair and efficient ways for this store owner to get protection, for example paying a private security company (assuming he even wants and need to outsource protection for his business).

Personally, I don’t have any problem if people decide to live under such a system, as long as I am free to live under the one I choose. Which is not really the case at the moment, states are strongly opposed to the creation of anarcap societies https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2015/05/11/liberlands-leader-detained-while-trying-to-enter-the-country-he-just-invented/

 

Lucio wrote:

Yeah, definitely some services might be better handled by private corporations.

But private corporations are in it only for the profit.

Private corporations also do not care to shut off people who cannot afford a certain service. And they will never do anything that does not provide a return for the investor in the short-term.

A democratic government's job is to do the good of the people and to negotiate conflicting interests for the overall good. Well, to be precise, most elected officials' goal is to be re-elected, but in a universal suffrage system, the best way to be re-elected is to provide public goods and good policies.

Eventually, consumers have the power to boycott these corporations if the service they offer isn't that good (which isn’t the case with governments that have monopolies), and competition would favor the emergence of better services. This is what's more “Darwinian”, in the sense that there is a “survival of the fittest”, which is currently prevented by crony capitalism. The organizations that would win the competition are the ones that offer the best services.

In the kind of governments based on the state, politicians keep promising empty things, or unrealistic things they never do. They get elected by promising that they will increase taxes for rich people to give it to poor voters, raising the minimum income, etc. But "poor voters" aren't even aware of all of the negative effects this would have (reducing growth which is the strongest force to reduce poverty, increasing unemployment, etc).

The last problem I have with this system is that (to speak in Nassim Taleb’s terms), the politicians don’t have any skin in the game. Whereas entrepreneurs and private businesses do.

 

Kellvo wrote:

I'm intrigued because I both agree and disagree with several of the points made here. Government is a tool used by those who inevitably have self-interest at heart; while it can benefit the masses, it can easily be turned against them as well. It can be used for robbery as Anon said, as well as provide a structure for win-win solutions as Lucio shows. Ultimately, however, it is kept in place by the (implied) threat of violence - not just by cops, soldiers and judges, but by the degree of willingness that a citizen population is willing to trade security for freedom (and vice versa) and the capability to act in regard to that.

It's for this reason that, while I support a healthy government, I even more support a strong Second Amendment, an informed citizen population, and the ability of said citizenry to support themselves - growing food/living 'off the grid', learning useful and tradable skills, and knowing how to survive and fight being just a few. Likewise, I support a strong awareness of power dynamics, self-development and releasing of unnecessary attachments across the board to ensure maximum self-agency for each person, while also including healthy traditions and win-win exchange systems to ensure societal cohesion.

I agree with everything you said and this is very well put. However, I believe that what you call a healthy government cannot be in the form of a state, for the reasons stated at the beginning of my message.

I believe that the most efficient forms of governance are usually decentralized ones, because centralized governments don’t have access to much information (which is why communism with all its centralized planning kept failing). But I admit that this depends of what qualifies as "efficient" or not which can vary from person to person.

 

Lucio wrote:

A supra-partes government helps to expand the rewards for collaboration -friends-, and discourage the opportunities for defecting -enemies-.

By supra-partes, do you mean “impartial”?

 

Lucio wrote:

Another "plus" for governments (or any body that can enforce rules and regulations).

When people have access to finite resources, as it's the case for many of the world's resources, everyone has an incentive to take as much as possible -see the Easter island history-.

That's where a government can step in and do what's good for everyone, rather than allowing everyone to rush towards future poverty and dejection.

The environment, and environment-related regulations, are an example of helpful government intervention. Preserving wildlife is another. And so is global warming. People complain that we're not doing enough, I don't know about that. But for sure we wouldn't have done anything without governments and international agencies to coordinate governments' efforts.

I can understand this argument, but I’m skeptical with the premise that a government can know “what’s good for everyone”. A group of people, no matter how smart they are eventually don't have access to as much information as millions of citizens. This is why fixation of prices doesn't work, as well as most political planning. I actually came to believe that people in a position of power suffer from a big Dunning-Kruger bias to even believe that they are able to know what is good for all people. Anyways, Hayek wrote great things about this with his idea of spontaneous order.

Otherwise, to take this example of environment-related regulations, to me this is a very good illustration of the hubris of politicians. Indeed, the measures taken by the european commission with its Green Deal or the German EnergieWende are little short of a catastrophy. Politicians keep encouraging or even forcing the wide adoption of electric cars (that will run mostly on coal which is one of the most polluting and CO2 emitting source of energy), the adoption of solar and wind power (that are very expensive and also inefficient so that needs to be complemented with coal) that will reduce growth, or even the reduction of nuclear power. All I can see from their decisions is reduced productivity and growth in the near future, and then a sharp increase of societal entropy and tension.

As Thatcher said: "climate change provides a marvellous excuse for worldwide, supra-national socialism".

 

Lucio wrote:

Would you, we, the world, or most pepole be better off without governments and/or international organizations?

I think that it depends of the type of government.

 

Lucio wrote:

By the way, guys, are you familiar with "flag theory"?

It's a movement to avoid taxation and governments' restrictions. To be a global citizen who is free of any jurisdiction.

Excited to read about this here! I live with the flag theory principles since several years and this has been life-changing for me. Even though regulations are becoming a lot stricter lately, so I'm not sure how much longer it will be possible to live this way (harder to open a bank account in several countries, capital controls coming back to europe, etc).

 

Lucio wrote:

And that's why I think that anarchy is probably the biggest risk factor for violence worldwide

Would you include anarcapism in your definition of anarchy?

 

Lucio wrote:

The government is not necessarily oppressive and does not have that much power.

I agree that a government is not necessarily oppressive, however I believe that the state is based on the arguments posted in my first message. What do you think about it?

Comment of Lucio's critics to For A New Liberty

Unluckily, I see no evidence that anarcho-capitalism -or total laissez-faire- works better

That’s a fair point, as we never had any living example of an anarcap society.

That being said, I think there is still evidence that the least government we have, the higher most human development indicators are, including for economy and buying power, education, general happiness of population, healthcare, poverty, inequality, etc: https://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2016/10/27/spain-has-no-government-for-10-months-economy-grows-unemployment-falls-to-18-9/

Moreover, countries with the least government spending usually have the most growth, and countries with the most government spending have slowed growth.

 

And for the little data I am aware of in terms of unfettered free-market capitalism, it’s not all so positive.

For example, after financial regulations were cut by free-market enthusiast Alan Greenspan & co., we had the huge 2008 financial bubble

For example, I don’t believe that during financial crises the government should just “do nothing’.

Many economists, for example, believe that letting Lehman Brothers collapse was a mistake because the fear that ensued paralyzed the markets, and then engulfed “main street” as well.

Crises are also psychological, and simply by providing reassurance and financial backstop, the government can do a lot to help restore confidence in the markets.

That is a very interesting argument, and one topic that I have to admit I am not very knowledgeable about.

That being said, it seems that the main causes of the bubble were:

1. Government interventionism with the fed offering banks very low interest rates.
2. Laws such as the Community Reinvestment Act which forced banks to lend mortgages to poor and insolvent people (so again, government interventionism).
3. Moral hazard which allowed banks to take risks without any skin in the game (so still the fault of governments).
4. Other reasons such as securitization.

I don't see how this would have happened in truly free markets. Like Stef said, more often than not crisis are due to government interventionism.

 

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To conclude, I would say that if I am realistic, even though theoretically and practically speaking I believe libertarianism (and maybe anarcapism) would be the most logical, efficient and fair political/legal/economical system, I’m also completely aware of the difficulties to implement such systems due to the limits of humankind.

As a matter of fact, libertarianism is the political idea whose members have the highest average IQ, or the political idea that is the most shared between people whose IQ is in the 99th percentile (over 150) http://milesresearch.com/tns/press.htm

In my opinion this isn’t a coincidence, because you need to have higher conceptual abilities and logic to be able to understand libertarianism, which already excludes a large part of the population. And that’s also why I am not surprised to see libertarian ideas discussed here by many of you ;).

Anyways, I will not wait for the general population to become able to understand this, I will continue to live my own life as free as possible thanks to flag theory, TPM and other things that empower me individually.

Quote from Lucio Buffalmano on August 4, 2022, 4:02 pm

Awesome post, Alex, and good to hearing from you -and cool profile picture, too :)-.

I agree with you, to book -and the few of this kind- go beyond political personal preferences, and enlighten on general power dynamics / how the world works -indeed it's also part of the red pill section of the "best books list"-.

Quote from Alex on August 4, 2022, 12:06 pm

It seems hard to develop a true enlightened individualism under these conditions, as we are constantly crushed by collectivism. I believe that this creates a lot of learned helpessness in the general population, and prevent most people from developing an internal locus of control.

This is similar to religious dogmas that used morality to control individuals in previous historical times. They had the monopoly to decide what was "good" or "wrong", even though these concepts are completely contextual, subjective and thus arbitrary.

Note: This is my personal interpretation, description and justification of natural law. I go a bit further than what Rothbard wrote in his book. But I believe that this distinction between objective and subjective law is really the best argument in favor of liberalism and even libertarianism, as the state is ontologically negating natural law.

Yeah, an attitude I see in some people I'd define "(at least in part) gullible" is the belief that there is always some state or government entity that has your back or best interest.

Even people who as a first thing seek a hotline or a government program often have little internal locus of control, and sometimes low self-esteem and low personal empowerment.

I think it might not be by accident that some people are trusted into self-empowerment and taking more responsibility -including a larger internal locus of control- when they reach rock bottom and realize that all they had was themselves.

Quote from Alex on August 4, 2022, 12:06 pm

Comment of Lucio's critics to For A New Liberty

Unluckily, I see no evidence that anarcho-capitalism -or total laissez-faire- works better

That’s a fair point, as we never had any living example of an anarcap society.

That being said, I think there is still evidence that the least government we have, the higher most human development indicators are, including for economy and buying power, education, general happiness of population, healthcare, poverty, inequality, etc: https://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2016/10/27/spain-has-no-government-for-10-months-economy-grows-unemployment-falls-to-18-9/

Moreover, countries with the least government spending usually have the most growth, and countries with the most government spending have slowed growth.

Yeah, I think both are most certainly possible.

Yet, especially for the first one, I'd be careful to draw much from it, since:

1. No government for 10 months, doesn't equate to "no government", since all laws were still there, still being enforced, taxes still the same, still being collected, etc.
   To make a comparison, it would be like equating "no engine thrust" to "no speed" in a car/motorbike, when in truth if you stop accelerating for 10 seconds you're still moving pretty much at the same speed as before (inertia/momentum)
2. One country for 10 months is circumstantial evidence, since one should take into account what other countries have done and, most damning... How do we know Spain wouldn't have grown even more with an active government?

And for the second one, if we take for valid that less government equals more growth, then we should ask ourselves: does growth also equate to equally important measures such as well-being, quality of life, and some other indicators that people may care about (say, the environment being "protected enough" to avoid tragedies of commons; safe-enough cities where you can walk at night in most parts, etc.).

Again, this is not to deny that smaller governments aren't potentially better, it's just to put things in perspective.

---

By the way, Alex, if you know of any resource that was enlightening / helpful to you and want to publish a review on it, just let me know (I myself manage to read relatively a lot because I use audiobooks and fill many "transition time gaps" with listening/reading).

Quote from Alex on August 4, 2022, 5:18 pm

Thanks Lucio, I know we both share great love for The Godfather :) - They don't make masterpieces like this anymore...

Quote from Lucio Buffalmano on August 4, 2022, 4:02 pm

I think it might not be by accident that some people are trusted into self-empowerment and taking more responsibility -including a larger internal locus of control- when they reach rock bottom and realize that all they had was themselves.

Yes, I can really see that. At least that's what I see in most of my entrepreneur friends and myself. I think that in a time like ours where men don't have rites of passages anymore, this can help us to find resources inside to grow and change. However, this is very dangerous as this can also break people forever.

Quote from Lucio Buffalmano on August 4, 2022, 4:02 pm

Yet, especially for the first one, I'd be careful to draw much from it, since:

1. No government for 10 months, doesn't equate to "no government", since all laws were still there, still being enforced, taxes still the same, still being collected, etc.
   To make a comparison, it would be like equating "no engine thrust" to "no speed" in a car/motorbike, when in truth if you stop accelerating for 10 seconds you're still moving pretty much at the same speed as before (inertia/momentum)
2. One country for 10 months is circumstantial evidence, since one should take into account what other countries have done and, most damning... How do we know Spain wouldn't have grown even more with an active government?

Indeed, that's a solid nuance and I completely agree with you.

Quote from Lucio Buffalmano on August 4, 2022, 4:02 pm

And for the second one, if we take for valid that less government equals more growth, then we should ask ourselves: does growth also equate to equally important measures such as well-being, quality of life, and some other indicators that people may care about (say, the environment being "protected enough" to avoid tragedies of commons; safe-enough cities where you can walk at night in most parts, etc.).

Again, this is not to deny that smaller governments aren't potentially better, it's just to put things in perspective.

I agree that there was a need for nuance and perspective (as it is so easy to become bigots with politics).

Regarding your questions, it would be nearly impossible to answer them in a definitive way while staying honest. There seems to be a correlation between GDP per capita and quality of life according to some studies I've just skimmed, but that's definitely not my expertise and I would need to do more research as I'm not well informed.

I also remember from past reads that the richer countries pollute less according to Environmental Kuznets' Curve.

Regarding the tragedy of common goods, there are 2 solutions to this problem that are nationalization and privatization. But nationalization doesn't seem to be a perfect solution, even though privatization might not be any different. According to a a book called "Governing the commons : The evolution of institutions for collective action", nationalization of forests has had disastrous effects in many developing countries plagued by deforestation. There are also other alternatives proposed by some economists, but that's definitely not my expertise.

These are complex topics, and I don't think that libertarianism needs to be the answer to all problems. This is just a strong legal foundation that allows for more fairness, freedom, efficiency and opportunity. The rest is up to individuals and groups.

Quote from Lucio Buffalmano on August 4, 2022, 4:02 pm

By the way, Alex, if you know of any resource that was enlightening / helpful to you and want to publish a review on it, just let me know (I myself manage to read relatively a lot because I use audiobooks and fill many "transition time gaps" with listening/reading).

Thanks for reminding me of the existence of audiobooks! I stopped using audiobooks few years ago because I found that the books I really liked required a more engaged approach with active listening and notetaking that did not really suit Audiobooks. How do you manage to take notes and make such complete yet summarized reviews while you're reading? And are you only using Audible or other services? Anyways I will try to switch back to Audiobooks for a while to see if this increases my reading productivity.

Regarding your question, are you looking for books on economics, politics, or any other topics?

I am currently reading a book called Moral Calculations by László Mérő and the author is really interesting, I believe I will read others of his books once I finish it. I also have books of a very interesting author called Bruno Latour on my list. Another phenomenal author is Iain McGilchrist. I believe I will be quite busy with these 3 authors for this year :).

Quote from Lucio Buffalmano on August 4, 2022, 7:28 pm

Yeah, I pretty much agree with your points and I think we're quite close in terms of how we see it.

Maybe I'm a bit more skeptical about how "certain" the upsides are, and a bit more careful about the downsides -plus that governments may form out of sheer pressure from neighboring places that form them-.
Otherwise, we share most of the same beliefs and preferences.

OFF-TOPIC

As for audiobooks and reviews, I'm wary of going off-topic here.

Check out this post reviewing Audible for audiobooks (CTR+f for "audipo", the app I use) and consider that I'm strategic about it: good books with complex topics I also prefer the ebook version (or otherwise listen multiple times to them).
But for good and "simple" ones audio format is perfect -for example, "Unplugged Alpha" or books by Rogert Currie were better than I expected, but simple to grasp so didn't need any highly focused cognitive attention.

And for writing reviews, check out this thread (and feel free to write there or open new threads for these topics).

OFF-TOPIC

Quote from Alex on August 5, 2022, 9:08 am

Quote from Lucio Buffalmano on August 4, 2022, 7:28 pm

OFF-TOPIC

As for audiobooks and reviews, I'm wary of going off-topic here.

Check out this post reviewing Audible for audiobooks (CTR+f for "audipo", the app I use) and consider that I'm strategic about it: good books with complex topics I also prefer the ebook version (or otherwise listen multiple times to them).
But for good and "simple" ones audio format is perfect -for example, "Unplugged Alpha" or books by Rogert Currie were better than I expected, but simple to grasp so didn't need any highly focused cognitive attention.

And for writing reviews, check out this thread (and feel free to write there or open new threads for these topics).

OFF-TOPIC

OFF-TOPIC

Thank you very much for this post reviewing Audible, I learned many valuable things and already started to use Audipo while being able to take precise notes. This app is amazing and I'm pretty sure it will boost my productivity!

Another good app that I could also recommend is called Tayl, I will try it to turn some of my ebooks into mp3 and try reading them with Audipo in the next few days and see how this works. Combined with libgen this can potentially give you access to unlimited knowledge.

Regarding writing reviews, I will keep it in mind and probably try it in the next few months.

OFF-TOPIC