Quote from: FreeMoney on September 15, 2012, 11:21:13 PM

Seems like a group of people with 0.001% of military power will be a lot more civilized and strive to avoid conflict than a group with 10% or 60%.

This well may be the case, in at least some cases. It's hard to speculate on what an AnCap society might look like, and on what the proportion of soldiers would need to be, because no modern, developed nation has ever become AnCap. And btw, what makes you so sure that 0.001% of the population would be enough for security, assuming that's what you mean by that number (unclear post, btw)? Nazi Germany would have steamrolled a nation with such small defenses. And there have been many instances throughout history when a military has invaded a neighboring rival nation, and even though the invaders were only an infinitesimal fraction of the population being invaded, they still managed to keep them under total control. Well-trained, well-equipped soldiers just seem to have a knack for this. And sure, some AnCap citizens might have guns and stuff, but a lot of the citizens will be either unfit for or unwilling to do battle (children, olds, infirms, etc.), and besides, it's hard to take out an armored tank with a Glock pistol. In other words: It doesn't always take a lot of soldiers to take over a large population, so you'd better hope that your local defense agencies don't decide that it'd be fun to use that old-school gang tactic of enforcing a "protection tax" on every business in the area--and if you don't pay it, well, those "bad guys that we're protecting you from" (read: defense agency thugs disguised as common hooligans) are gonna bust your kneecaps with a crowbar! Also, as a side note: I just imagined Columbus, OH using its local army to invade Ann Arbor, MI, after one of the totally biased football referees blew a call in favor of the Wolverines. Implausible example, I know, but it's food for thought/extrapolation....

I should hasten to add that this is all hypothetical. I'm not saying that an AnCap society would necessarily become a police state. But it *could*, and if that happened, it'd qualify as an "actual problem." Also, another thought: Let's say that a cabal of private defense agencies took over Tallahassee, FL. Would Miami do anything to help, or would that be an unethical use of force?

And to return to the Iraq example: Sure, the insurgents did a pretty good job of defending themselves, all things considered, but the insurgents sure as hell weren't living the "good life of freedom" either (constantly hunted, hiding all the time, etc.). And the unique nature of that war--the (stupid) attempt by the US to try to "compassionately liberate" them by harming as few civilians as possible--isn't always how war goes. If the US wanted to nuke the fuck out of Iraq and take all the oil, it most certainly could. Don't get me wrong, I've been protesting the Iraq war since before it even started, but it stands as evidence that humans, while perhaps less stupid, cruel and violent than they once were (see that recent Steven Pinker book), they are still very capable of stupidity, cruelty and violence, and on epic scales. Will there be a Cold War II? Maybe, maybe not, but I wouldn't bank on it not happening, especially if you live in a society where there are lots of natural resources and other goodies to plunder, like the good ol' US of A. An AnCap society would have to find a way to prepare for this possibility (also, note that the Manhattan Project was basically a gov't program). Maybe it could, maybe it couldn't. All we can do is speculate.

Quote from: JoelKatz on September 15, 2012, 11:36:15 PM

This strikes me as somewhat bizarre. If someone advocates that women should be free to do what they wish with their bodies, are they then arguing that fat women should have more freedom than thin women since they have more body to what they wish with? The way freedom is being measured in this argument is incoherent, IMO.

Yeah, it is sorta like that, and it's also not an incoherent argument. In fact, your example aligns with it perfectly. The big difference is that your example doesn't address the broader implications. Yes, those women's bodies are their own private property with which they can do what they wish, and the ownership of one's own body is certainly integral to AnCap. But having your own private body is a given; everyone is born with that. Owning extra-bodily private property, on the other hand (e.g., land, business, belongings, etc.), is not a birthright--or rather, it is a birthright for some, but not for others, which skews the playing field from the get-go. This, I would contend, can in some cases (not all, of course) lead to an "actual problem."

Put another way: We're all born with our own bodies, but our freedom to exercise our bodies' capacities is severely limited if we don't own any extra-bodily private property that we have personal totalitarian control over; that's why Hammerton says that we are only truly free to the precise extent that we can reign supreme over our private property (the cornerstone of AnCap). Of course, part of the reason for one's lack of ownership might be laziness or ineptitude, which is within one's sphere of control (or, well, laziness certainly is). However, if we're born to parents that never acquired property and who can't afford to help out financially, we begin our adult lives stuck wandering through everyone else's property (i.e., everyone else's Micro-Totalitarian "property states"). Sure, we might be able to use our smarts/ambition to take some shit over and get our own property, but this is never a given, and even if it were, those who were born into lots of private property get a 10-mile head start in the proverbial marathon: you can run as hard as you want, but you still may not catch up with them, even if you're really fast. And unless you catch up and own some property, you are at the whims of everyone else. And yes, of course, people will let you use their property if they're generous or can make money from your usage/patronage of it, but their freedom will be far greater than yours, because they have the freedom to set the rules, and you don't. Examples: Pullman, IL in the 1800s, or a landlord who won't let you have pets or paint the walls, or a restaurant that won't serve you if you're black (and if it's a small town with only one restaurant, and you lack transportation, that'd really suck). And yes, you could always "vote with your feet" and leave Pullman Town or choose a different apartment or town, but it's not always that easy in reality (e.g., I don't consider "You can work in a sweatshop for 10 cents a day with a boss who rapes/beats you every morning, or you can starve to death in the streets" to be a real "choice"). And even if it were easy, you'd still have less freedom than the "owning class."

Research studies have been conducted that demonstrate the cause(s) of financial success in the USA (which is obviously not AnCap, but its mostly Cap, and I'd be willing to bet, for reasons I could explain if you wish, that these findings would be even more skewed in an AnCap society):

- Is willingness to work hard the best predictor of success? Answer: Nope, not really.

- Are academic success and SAT scores the best predictors? Nope, not those either.

- Well, pray tell, what is the best predictor? Answer: The wealth of the parents that you, luckily or not, happened to be a child of. That's why we have things like Pell grants, which do indeed "steal" from the affluent, but are aimed at (partially) leveling the playing field for the next generation.

And again, this is not to say that AnCap is entirely flawed. All political systems are flawed in some way. But it is to say that it doesn't always distribute freedom perfectly efficiently. Undoubtedly, there many are people out there who are smarter, more talented, and more ambitious than Tagg Romney, but they're not yet able to fully exercise their freedom through property ownership. And even if they do, few will ever attain the freedom-level of Tagg. Why? because Tagg got a lucky roll of the dice, which has nothing to to with actual merit. For every "rags to riches" story, there probably 10 (or 100, or 1000) "rags to more rags" stories, and many of these people busted their asses their whole life but were still beholden to the whims of property owners.

RurrayMothbard

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