Dakryn's Batshit Theory of the Week

[Einherjar86]

It doesn't explain anything that I can see. All it does is evaluate whether a subject engages in activity that is materially beneficial. Its only practical use emerges when we acknowledge that it informs a libertarian approach to economics; it relies on the fact that most individuals act according to external environmental conditions. If such correlation didn't exist, praxeology wouldn't be of much use.

EDIT: Getting there...

http://www.nbcnews.com/technology/f...-gun-fires-6-shots-then-falls-apart-1C7404226

The idea of using a 3-D printer to create a gun is controversial and interesting, but it seems to still be a ways off from equaling the quality of machined parts. A gun with a major part printed that way failed after just six shots when some enthusiasts decided to give the tech a try.

 

[Dak]

It doesn't explain anything that I can see. All it does is evaluate whether a subject engages in activity that is materially beneficial. Its only practical use emerges when we acknowledge that it informs a libertarian approach to economics; it relies on the fact that most individuals act according to external environmental conditions. If such correlation didn't exist, praxeology wouldn't be of much use.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marginal_utility

This is what I couldn't think of earlier in regards to how more than 1 CD would be of less use to you, and therefore less valuable.

EDIT: Getting there...

http://www.nbcnews.com/technology/f...-gun-fires-6-shots-then-falls-apart-1C7404226

Have you heard about "Matternet"?

 

[Einherjar86]

Just watched their video. Pretty awesome.

 

[Jimmy... Dead.]

Why Do Intellectuals Oppose Capitalism?

by Robert Nozick


http://www.cato.org/pubs/policy_report/cpr-20n1-1.html

 

[Dak]

Seems as good a hypothesis as any.

 

[Einherjar86]

And total bullshit.

 

[Dak]

You would say that .

 

[Einherjar86]

Haha, yeah.

 

[Dak]

It is my understanding/experience that your average intellectual considers himself a "natural superior". How this manifested in Marx was anger at mechanisms that both equalized and measured, often completely aside from "intellectual acuity". It was no doubt a source of constant irritation for Marx that he did not have the "unlimited wealth" at his disposal that he imagined merely appeared through no legitimate process (read: because of inheritance/intellect) in the accounts of "capitalists", when obviously he was a 'natural superior'.

This critique pretty much lines up with that article from Nozick. I think my observation in the military lends strength to Nozicks methodology re: institutions.
Whatever institution a person finds the greatest personal reward in tends to be the one that person deems "the most legitimate". This happens to the military man the same as it happens to the student/teacher.

 

[Einherjar86]

I'm not deluded about Marx "the man." He was an idealist, despite his claims to "dialectical materialism."

However, citing this "superiority complex" in Marx does not make it endemic to the Marxist tradition. Furthermore, not all leftists consider themselves Marxist. Foucault was critical of capitalism, but he wasn't a Marxist.

 

[Dak]

Of course you don't have to be Marxist. I specifically referred to intellectuals (with Marx as a part of that subset), and I think Nozick's definition works without me being more hyperspecific.

Obviously, anarchist and capitalist writers would fall into the subset as well. It's just a minority, and always has been. Intellectuals generally have their bread buttered by others by necessity (pondering life and all it entails does not transfer well into a consumer good), and so generally support the buttering of bread by other than earned means.

 

[Jimmy... Dead.]

I do think Intellectuals see the benefits and costs to everything, but they also think that capitalism isn't the best system for addressing every one of humanity's problems.

Whether watching lectures or reading articles I notice most fanatical devotion to anything is really a rare thing amongst intellectuals which is why its a bit dishonest for Nozick to imply that someone who lacks a fanatical devotion to capitalism "opposes capitalism."

As much as I like some of the articles points and reasoned views, it does read like dogma and/or propaganda.

 

[Jimmy... Dead.]

A look at how a Marxist views the NAP

The Poverty of Ethics: Dissecting the Non-aggression Principle

http://www.gonzotimes.com/2012/12/the-poverty-of-ethics-dissecting-the-non-aggression-principle/

 

[Einherjar86]

Of course you don't have to be Marxist. I specifically referred to intellectuals (with Marx as a part of that subset), and I think Nozick's definition works without me being more hyperspecific.

Obviously, anarchist and capitalist writers would fall into the subset as well. It's just a minority, and always has been. Intellectuals generally have their bread buttered by others by necessity (pondering life and all it entails does not transfer well into a consumer good), and so generally support the buttering of bread by other than earned means.

But Nozick claims that general intellectual opposition to capitalism is the result of "resentment." This is an ad hominem, and it completely ignores any of the specifics of anti-capitalist argumentation. It's just ridiculous.

 

[Dak]

But Nozick claims that general intellectual opposition to capitalism is the result of "resentment." This is an ad hominem, and it completely ignores any of the specifics of anti-capitalist argumentation. It's just ridiculous.

It's an apt reply (resentment) when anti-market arguments are usually little more than veiled or sometimes unveiled appeals to emotion. I really dislike blanketing it all under capitalism since I don't agree with the typical "capitalist" pundits and writers.

 

[Einherjar86]

Justifying his argument by saying he's responding to "appeals to emotion" is unfounded since he doesn't actually cite any Marxist arguments. All he does is make blanket statements about intellectuals.

Dismissing all Marxist arguments as appeals to emotion is even more ridiculous since the best of them often avoid moralizing language and target what they see as mechanically corrupt components of a larger system. It isn't that "there are masses of poor and helpless people, and we should be giving more to them"; it's that "there are masses of people that are pissed off, unemployable and living below the poverty line." This isn't an appeal to emotion; it's addressing a real and specific problem.

@Jimmy: heading out now, but I'll read that second article later today.

 

[Dak]

Justifying his argument by saying he's responding to "appeals to emotion" is unfounded since he doesn't actually cite any Marxist arguments. All he does is make blanket statements about intellectuals.

Dismissing all Marxist arguments as appeals to emotion is even more ridiculous since the best of them often avoid moralizing language and target what they see as mechanically corrupt components of a larger system. It isn't that "there are masses of poor and helpless people, and we should be giving more to them"; it's that "there are masses of people that are pissed off, unemployable and living below the poverty line." This isn't an appeal to emotion; it's addressing a real and specific problem.

As we have debated before, there is a big difference between a mere disparity in wealth, and someone who is unable to maintain existence in their current situation. Whether or not they are pissed off about the situation is really irrelevant. I won't even reference the "poverty line" because market processes + central banking inflation continually move the standard of what constitutes the "poverty line". AFAIK, My family and I are currently living below the official US poverty line. I'm still living better than most people in the world. Could I be angry? Sure. I could also be a millionaire and be angry I'm not a billionaire.

The unemployable aspect is an interesting point, but one that certainly warrants a separate discussion, although I would point out that focusing on employment IE, laboring, is to focus on an effect vs cause.

 

[Dak]

A look at how a Marxist views the NAP

The Poverty of Ethics: Dissecting the Non-aggression Principle

http://www.gonzotimes.com/2012/12/the-poverty-of-ethics-dissecting-the-non-aggression-principle/

Typical. This guys pulls the same guilt by association shit that Migchels pulls.

E.g. Murray Rothbard was a chief proponent of the NAP, he also co-founded the CATO Institute with billionaire Charles Koch who continues to use both CATO and libertarian ethics to justify things like sweat-shops.

He leaves out that the two had a falling out over the direction Koch wanted to go (for obvious reasons, if anyone has done research on Koch), and Rothbard (and Mises by necessity) has been virtually scrubbed from CATO. Fortunately, CATO is slowly dying due to internal politics and a conflicted agenda, while the Mises Institute is growing internationally.

The other thing is the insistence/implication that if you support market processes, you are automatically "bourgeois", (and that if you do not, you are not) regardless of educational and socioeconomic status.

 

[Einherjar86]

As we have debated before, there is a big difference between a mere disparity in wealth, and someone who is unable to maintain existence in their current situation. Whether or not they are pissed off about the situation is really irrelevant.

This is one place where we disagree; I think it's entirely relevant because whether or not people are pissed off indicates relative tolerance of the politico-economic system in which they're constituted. You continually posit a form of "capitalist ethics"; but this matters very little next to the nearly infinite variety of individuals whose ethical framework reinforces the belief that they're being exploited, or ignored.

That Marxist article is pretty typical. I agree with plenty of his criticisms, but he loses me when he starts talking about the teleological sublimating moment when the proletariat supersedes the bourgeoisie. Historical relations aren't dialectical.

 

[Dak]

This is one place where we disagree; I think it's entirely relevant because whether or not people are pissed off indicates relative tolerance of the politico-economic system in which they're constituted. You continually posit a form of "capitalist ethics"; but this matters very little next to the nearly infinite variety of individuals whose ethical framework reinforces the belief that they're being exploited, or ignored.

That Marxist article is pretty typical. I agree with plenty of his criticisms, but he loses me when he starts talking about the teleological sublimating moment when the proletariat supersedes the bourgeoisie. Historical relations aren't dialectical.

Ironically, I think most of us are being exploited and/or ignored. This reality has nothing to do with market processes though. The market is the one place where I have a high element of control.