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Kinsella on Liberty Podcast: Episode 456.
[Update: see various biographical pieces on my publications page, including Alan D. Bergman, Adopting Liberty: The Stephan Kinsella Story (2025).]
This is my appearance on Adam Haman’s podcast and Youtube channel, Haman Nature (Haman Nature substack), episode HN 109, “Stephan Kinsella Expounds on Philosophy And The Life Well Lived” (recorded Feb. 6, 2025—just before the Tom Woods cruise). We discussed philosophy and rights; my legal and libertarian careers (see Adopting Liberty: The Stephan Kinsella Story), and so on.
Grok transcript and shownotes below.
Adam’s Shownotes:
Adam interviews patent attorney, philosopher, legal theorist and libertarian anarchist Stephan Kinsella about his life, his works, and what’s next for the great man!
00:00 – Intro.
01:21 — Does Stephan believe there is a level of technology required for “Ancapistan” to “work”.
07:42 — Adam has issues with the “is/ought” gap and asks Stephan for help on the matter.
25:42 — The life and times of Stephan Kinsella. Great stuff!
50:55 — Have questions about legal careers? Reach out to Stephan with questions!
52:02 — Outro. Thank you for watching Haman Nature!
Shownotes (Grok):
Haman Nature Episode 109: Revised Show Notes
Aired: March 24, 2025
In this episode of Haman Nature, host Adam Haman interviews libertarian theorist and patent attorney Stephan Kinsella, marking his third or fourth appearance on the show. The discussion explores Kinsella’s views on anarcho-capitalism, libertarian legal theory, philosophy, and intellectual property (IP), intertwined with biographical insights into his life, career challenges, and intellectual evolution. The episode offers a blend of deep philosophical inquiry and personal reflection, highlighting Kinsella’s contributions to libertarian thought.
Technology and Anarcho-Capitalism
The episode begins with a discussion on whether advanced technology is required for an anarcho-capitalist society (“Ancapistan”) to succeed. Kinsella clarifies a misinterpreted comment, stating he no longer sees liberty as dependent on mass economic literacy but on cultural absorption of libertarian values, as seen after the Soviet Union’s fall. He envisions technology reducing theft incentives in a post-scarcity world, where resources are easily replicable, making state coercion ineffective. Breakthroughs like AI or Bitcoin could accelerate this, though a free society remains possible without them, emphasizing productivity and voluntary institutions.
The “Is/Ought” Gap and Objective Rights
Haman raises the “is/ought” gap, referencing Kinsella’s prior podcast on objective versus subjective rights. Kinsella argues norms must be universalizable and grounded in reality, rejecting arbitrary distinctions like race or strength. Drawing on Hoppe’s transcendental argument, he explains that peaceful discourse presupposes equality and peace, forming a foundation for libertarian norms like body ownership and homesteading. These objective rights minimize conflict and enable prosperity, rooted in human nature rather than divine or forceful edicts.
Religion, Ethics, and Practical Norms
The talk extends to religion’s role in ethics, with Kinsella critiquing dismissals of natural rights while noting that ethical “oughts” often derive from some “is,” including God. He aligns with Peterson’s view of God as a hierarchy of values for human thriving through iterative processes, similar to libertarian principles fleshed out via common law precedents. As an atheist, Kinsella values religion for encoding practical morals but prefers it over statism, which perverts decency. He stresses that norms evolve pragmatically to foster peace, rejecting utilitarianism for principled consistency.
Kinsella’s Personal Challenges and Early Influences
Kinsella shares his life story, reflecting on a tough year with prostate cancer recurrence, sepsis leading to a stroke and kidney issues, his brother’s death, and surgery recovery. Now 59 and recovered, he’s prioritizing family, health, and writing, pausing libertarian travels. Growing up in rural Louisiana, he attended Catholic schools and discovered libertarianism through Ayn Rand’s The Fountainhead in 10th grade, becoming an objectivist and atheist. Early bullying experiences amplified his hatred of injustice, aligning with Rand’s anti-force ethos, while comics and philosophy shaped his worldview. He pursued electrical engineering at LSU but found it limiting, leading to law school.
Law School Education and Legal Theory Benefits
At Louisiana State University (LSU), a top civil law school due to Louisiana’s unique civil law system, Kinsella studied Roman and civil law alongside common law, providing a rare comparative framework. This education deepened his understanding of legal systems, which he now sees as serendipitously beneficial to his libertarian work. It enhanced his analyses of contract theory, property rights, and intellectual property, allowing him to draw on historical precedents like Roman law. Without this foundation, Kinsella believes his writing and theorizing would have been significantly less robust, as it fostered a systematic approach integrating legal history with Austrian economics and political philosophy.
Career Beginnings, Law Firm Deferment, and London Experience
After law school, Kinsella secured a job at a Houston oil and gas law firm in 1991, coinciding with his wife’s engineering move there. However, a legal recession—possibly tied to economic downturns or oil industry fluctuations—left firms short on work, leading some to rescind offers. His firm instead proposed deferring 10-15 incoming associates for a year, paying partial salary (one-third to half). Kinsella eagerly accepted, viewing it as an opportunity. He used the funds to spend a year in London pursuing a master’s in international business law, which he describes as a great experience that he loved. This international exposure broadened his legal perspective, aiding his later writings on global business, contract theory, and anarchy, making his career more intellectually fulfilling.
Shift to Patent Law, IP Opposition, and Future Plans
Kinsella switched to patent law for national mobility, initially supporting IP due to Rand but concluding by 1994 it should be abolished, as it contradicted property rights. His vocal opposition never harmed his 30-year career—spanning law firms, general counsel roles, and private practice—instead positioning him as an expert. Now retired, he focuses on writing, including Copy This Book, to critique how IP stifles innovation like AI. He invites legal career questions via stephankinsella.com or @NSKinsella on social media. Haman wraps up by encouraging support at hamannature.substack.com. Note: The transcript does not mention any accident in 1983 while working construction, so no elaboration is provided here.
TRANSCRIPT (From youtube; cleaned up by Grok).
Haman Nature Episode 109: Interview with Stephan Kinsella
Adam Haman interviews patent attorney, philosopher, legal theorist, and libertarian anarchist Stephan Kinsella about his life, works, and thoughts on anarcho-capitalism, legal theory, and more.
Originally aired: March 24, 2025
Intro
Adam Haman: Hello and welcome to Haman Nature. I’m Adam Haman, and on today’s show, I have an interview with the great libertarian theorist and patent attorney, Stephan Kinsella. I believe this is his third or fourth appearance on the show. I asked him some probing questions about anarcho-capitalism, libertarian legal theory, and philosophy. In the back half, I talk to him about his life, which is very, very interesting. So, please enjoy Haman Nature, a journey in search of a peaceful and prosperous society with human nature as a guide, led by your host, Adam Haman.
Adam Haman: Hello, Stephan, welcome back to Haman Nature.
Stephan Kinsella: Hey, Adam, it’s great to see you again.
Adam Haman: Today, I’d like to ask you a couple of questions about philosophy and anarchy, and then I want to hear the story of Stephan Kinsella, if you’d indulge us.
Stephan Kinsella: Sure, okay.
Does Stephan believe there is a level of technology required for “Ancapistan” to “work”?
Adam Haman: My partner on this show, Tyrone the Porcupine Hobo, mentioned something surprising from a conversation about you. He said he learned from you—either from something you wrote or said on a podcast—that our species won’t achieve anything close to “Ancapistan” unless we reach a high enough level of technology that we haven’t yet attained. Did he hear you correctly, or what are your thoughts on that?
Stephan Kinsella: That’s not exactly what I think, but I’ve made related comments over the years. When I was younger, I believed the only way to achieve liberty was if enough people became economically literate, like reading Economics in One Lesson. I thought intellectual activism was about spreading the word. But I no longer believe that. Handing out books to people who aren’t intellectually curious won’t achieve liberty.
Stephan Kinsella: Also, despite our technology, we’re still a primitive species. We figured out some things too early—came out of the trees too soon, as I’ve said. We have atomic weapons but remain superstitious in many ways. I don’t think a free society is impossible, though. A free society could happen sooner than we think, with some breakthroughs—maybe AI, post-scarcity, or Bitcoin.
Stephan Kinsella: What I meant by the technology comment is that liberty might be achieved if people absorb libertarian values culturally, not necessarily through education. The fall of the Soviet Union in 1991 is an example. After that, people generally recognized that central planning doesn’t produce goods as well as capitalism. They don’t deeply understand free markets, but they see that too much government planning fails.
Stephan Kinsella: I envision a society so wealthy due to technology that the incentive to steal diminishes. If I can make a car for a dollar, why steal yours? Property rights would still exist, but the need to violate them would decrease.
Adam Haman: Tyrone interpreted your comment as suggesting we need to be rich and isolationist enough to hit a replicator button and pop out a car, eliminating the need for a state or associations. But I pushed back, arguing that a free market society is valuable regardless of technology level, maybe even more so when we’re not rich and need to come together with the right institutions to maximize prosperity.
Stephan Kinsella: I may have been fantasizing about technology making us invulnerable—like having an army of robots or a force field—so we can’t be coerced by the state. If individuals had technology and wealth on par with the state, the state would become irrelevant. I wasn’t saying we wouldn’t have society, productivity, or division of labor.
Adam Haman: That’s a great point. We aim to evolve in our private lives to make the state redundant, and what better way than force fields or robot armies?
Stephan Kinsella: I was also making a point about the difference between descriptive and prescriptive statements—between “is” and “ought,” or between causal laws and moral laws. Physical laws, like gravity, can’t be violated. But prescriptive laws, like rights, can be disregarded because we have free will. I imagined a benevolent satellite or personal force field that makes rights violations impossible—a thought experiment.
Adam has issues with the “is/ought” gap and asks Stephan for help on the matter
Adam Haman: I struggle with the “is/ought” gap. In your podcast episode 444 with Alex Anarcho, he asked about objective versus subjective rights. You said that distinction is wrong but brilliantly derived objective, non-arbitrary rules based in reality that satisfy the purpose of people coming together to avoid conflicts. That aligns with the premise of my show, Haman Nature, which is about finding rules and norms appropriate for our species. How do you address this?
Stephan Kinsella: I don’t recall the exact exchange, but when justifying a norm with an ethical component—what people should do—you propose a rule and justify it argumentatively. The argument assumes a proto-peaceful stance: we’re sitting down, not hitting or threatening each other, willing to agree to disagree. That presupposes a meta-norm of equality, where both parties are capable of engaging in argument.
Stephan Kinsella: If I propose a rule like “I own everyone because I’m me,” that’s arbitrary, devolving to brute force. A rule must be universalizable, grounded in reason and the nature of things. For example, claiming superiority based on race or strength lacks relevance to rights, as rights don’t stem from skin color or physical power.
Stephan Kinsella: Natural law argues we have rights because of our nature, but it struggles with the “is/ought” gap. Hans-Hermann Hoppe’s transcendental argument sidesteps this by starting with oughts, pointing to a grundnorm—a base norm presupposed in any argument. Argumentation inherently assumes norms like peace, so you build political norms from there, grounded in human nature.
Stephan Kinsella: Objective rights are those that, according to human nature, satisfy the purpose of rights: permitting peace and resource use. This requires norms like original appropriation or homesteading.
Adam Haman: People often scoff at natural rights arguments, saying you can’t derive an ought from an is. Yet, they believe in ethical truths, often pointing to an “is”—like God as the ultimate source. How do you respond?
Stephan Kinsella: Even God is just another “is.” People assume life’s purpose must come from God or the state, but that’s just God’s values, not yours. What if God is evil? When people engage in civil discourse, they presuppose common norms, like peace and prosperity. If they challenge you to prove why peace is valuable, you can ask them to prove their stance. We already agree on these goals, so the debate is about reasoning, not mathematical proof.
Adam Haman: I think part of the problem is smuggling in mathematical language. It’s about arguments and reasons, not proofs.
Stephan Kinsella: Exactly. There’s also hostility toward natural law due to its religious associations, like Robert Anton Wilson’s critique of Catholic prohibitions. But natural rights reasoning can be grounded in reality without being silly. Hoppe’s approach sidesteps the “is/ought” gap by focusing on shared norms in discourse.
Adam Haman: People who reject morality as derivable from nature often hide arbitrary edicts based on force, claiming it’s just a game of power. Milton Friedman, for example, argued for tolerance due to ignorance of true morals, implying force is justified if we know the “right” way to live. What’s your take?
Stephan Kinsella: Friedman was wrong. You can know a good way to live—like a productive, peaceful life—without using force to impose it. Libertarians use force only against aggression, with a broad conception of the good life.
Adam Haman: Jordan Peterson recently described God as “the hierarchy of values that allow humans to thrive in an iterative interpersonal process over time.” That sounds like how we should think about ethics, morals, and norms in Ancapistan.
Stephan Kinsella: That aligns with libertarian principles, like the non-aggression principle, which applies to body ownership. Other principles include homesteading and contract. These are abstract, so disputes are resolved by arbitrators, creating precedents that flesh out the law iteratively, accounting for human nature.
Stephan Kinsella: Religion, as a primitive philosophy, encodes practical morals to survive. It takes credit for evolved norms that allow peace and prosperity. Even as an atheist, I’m not hostile to religion because it transmits common-sense morals, unlike statism, which perverts morality.
The Life and Times of Stephan Kinsella
Adam Haman: Let’s take a hard left turn and talk about you. I saw a social media post where you reflected on your incredible, productive life. You’ve impacted me and many others. Can you share your story?
Stephan Kinsella: I recently worked on a memoir for my kids, which made me introspective. I’m 59 now, and last year was tough. My prostate cancer returned, leading to a biopsy, infection, sepsis, and a stroke. I ignored symptoms, thinking it was stomach flu, and my kidneys shut down. I was in the hospital for seven days but fully recovered, though I occasionally stutter. My brother also passed away, and I had prostate cancer surgery, but I’m past it now.
Stephan Kinsella: This year, I’m taking a break from libertarian traveling to focus on family, writing, and health until September, when I’ll attend Hoppe’s Turkey conference. I’m a retired attorney, and my avocation has been libertarian theory and writing, which is now my main focus. I have several book projects planned for retirement.
Stephan Kinsella: I grew up in rural Louisiana, attended private Catholic schools in Baton Rouge, and studied at LSU. I loved philosophy and science. In 10th grade, a librarian suggested The Fountainhead, which blew my mind. I became an objectivist and atheist, later an anarchist influenced by David Friedman, Rothbard, and the Tannehills.
Adam Haman: Our paths are similar. I didn’t think about politics until college, assumed I was a Democrat, then briefly a Republican after listening to Rush Limbaugh, until someone gave me The Fountainhead.
Stephan Kinsella: I was a registered Democrat because my parents were blue-dog Democrats, but I voted for Reagan in ’84 and libertarian ever since. I studied electrical engineering because I loved technology but found it constricting, so I went to law school after my wife encouraged me. I loved law school’s reasoning style, which suited my personality.
Adam Haman: Did your engineering studies influence your argumentation style?
Stephan Kinsella: Yes. Engineering, combined with my passion for legal theory, Austrian economics, and political theory, made me systematic. Studying Roman and civil law at LSU, a civil law state, also helped my libertarian analysis, especially in contract and property theory.
Stephan Kinsella: I was small and scrawny until 17, bullied in school, which made me hate injustice. Reading Rand reinforced my belief that initiating force is wrong, making me ripe for libertarianism.
Adam Haman: I was a comic book nerd, sensitive to injustice. It’s like we’re twins.
Stephan Kinsella: I was a comic book nerd too, but never got into D&D.
Stephan Kinsella: In 1991, a legal recession hit, and my Houston law firm job was deferred. They paid me a partial salary to delay starting, so I got a master’s in international business law in London, which helped my writing. I later switched to patent law to move to Philadelphia with my wife, as it’s a federal practice area.
Adam Haman: Studying international law seems related to theorizing about anarchy.
Stephan Kinsella: It was serendipitous. My legal education helped my intellectual pursuits. In 1992, I started writing on rights theory and questioned intellectual property (IP). Rand’s arguments for IP didn’t make sense, so I became a patent attorney to understand it better. By 1994, I concluded the patent system should be abolished.
Stephan Kinsella: I wrote cautiously at first, worried it might hurt my career, but it never did. Clients saw me as an expert. I only did patent prosecution and defense, avoiding enforcing patents, which would have been a moral quandary. I viewed my job as providing defensive “ammunition.” After 10 years, I became general counsel for a high-tech company, handling various legal areas, then ran my own practice from home.
Stephan Kinsella: In retirement, I focus on libertarian writing and conferences, giving me purpose. Unlike many retirees, I won’t fall into despair.
Adam Haman: Being vocal about IP opposition could have made you more valuable in your field.
Stephan Kinsella: It never hurt me and may have helped. My next book, Copy This Book, will be consistent with my anti-IP stance, offered free online.
Adam Haman: Are we close to abolishing IP, given technological challenges like AI and digital content?
Stephan Kinsella: IP is deeply entrenched due to propaganda linking it to innovation. Most people see its problems but think it’s fixable, not inherently bad. AI, hampered by copyright lawsuits, highlights issues, but people resist abolishing IP, preferring tweaks. My upcoming book will comprehensively address how IP strangles productivity.
Have Questions About Legal Careers? Reach Out to Stephan!
Stephan Kinsella: Some listeners might want to email me about being a lawyer or law school advice. I’ve collected advice for prospective law students on my website, stephankinsella.com, under a section like “Advice for Prospective Law Students.” I’m always open to questions via email or messaging on Twitter and Facebook at NSKinsella.
Adam Haman: We’ll link to your website and X/Twitter. Your website is stephankinsella.com, right?
Stephan Kinsella: Yes.
Outro
Adam Haman: Thank you so much for coming on, answering my questions, and sharing your life. What you’ve done is admirable, and more people should look up your work.
Stephan Kinsella: I appreciate it. I’ve enjoyed being an academic without the politics or low pay of academia.
Adam Haman: Thank you, Stephan, and thank you, ladies and gentlemen. Please visit hamannature.substack.com to support the show. Become a paid subscriber to get my articles and links to Stephan’s work. We’ll catch you next time on Haman Nature.
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