StephanKinsella.com

Podcast (kinsella-on-liberty): Play in new window | Download (77.7MB)

Kinsella on Liberty Podcast: Episode 433.

This is my appearance on The Big Questions with Big John. From his shownotes:

Libertarian Stephan Kinsella shares his background as an engineer turned lawyer. A conversation on IP rights delves into arguments against patents & copyrights.

Podcast (kinsella-on-liberty): Play in new window | Download (Duration: 40:26 — 37.0MB)

Kinsella on Liberty Podcast: Episode 432.

My appearance on Adam Haman’s podcast and Youtube channel, Haman Nature (Haman Nature substack), episode 27. I have previously argued against “school choice” (KOL419 | Soho Forum Debate vs. Corey Deangelis: School Choice). Adam wrote an article promoting school choice and I objected to it. He invited me to come back on his show to discuss and I did and, well, he kinda sorta changed my mind, or at least softened my opposition.

I love these kind of real conversations when people actually listen to each other with the shared goal of promoting liberty and reaching the truth, and with no ego or other investments involved that could prevent you from seeing reason or truth or the other guy’s position and even being willing to change your mind. And I like when I lose! I mean it rarely happens, but I like it–it means I learned something. Which is also increasingly rare. Enjoy!

[continue reading…]

Update: As noted below, this piece was originally intended to appear in Elvira Nica & Gheorghe H. Popescu, eds., A Passion for Justice: Essays in Honor of Walter Block (New York: Addleton Academic Publishers, forthcoming), but I withdrew it and published it here. However, I have published this paper under a CC0 license so that my permission is not needed for republication or reuse, the editors of this book decided to use it in the book, so apparently a version now will appear in Elvira Nica & Gheorghe H. Popescu, eds., A Passion for Justice: Essays in Honor of Walter Block (New York: Addleton Academic Publishers, forthcoming 2025).

Note: in this piece I forgot to mention Walter’s defense of suing some parties under defamation law, even though in principle he is against it: see Walter Block Defends His Libel Suit Against The New York Times; A Libertarian Analysis of Suing for Libel (“How … can I justify suing the New York Times for libel? It is simple. The libertarian case against suing for libel applies only to innocent people, and this newspaper does not at all qualify. Rather, this organization is a member in good standing of the ruling class, and all bets are off for criminals of that ilk.”); and Randy Barnett, “What’s Next for Libertarianism?”

One other update: re my mention of his “two teeth for a tooth” rule: I criticize it in KOL020 | “Libertarian Legal Theory: Property, Conflict, and Society: Lecture 3: Applications I: Legal Systems, Contract, Fraud” (Mises Academy, 2011):

And then there’s caveat emptor, which is the buyer beware. Was he defrauded, or did he—should he have known better? And then Walter Block and Murray Rothbard’s idea where they say, well, there should always be the two-teeth-for-a-teeth punishment rule. I mean I understand the sympathy there and the reasoning, but it seems to me a little mechanical and a little bit armchair. We can’t say it would be exactly two teeth for a tooth.

This is similar to some other criticisms I have made of Walter and also Rothbard for being too ad hoc. See, e.g., the section on “Incitement” below; Kinsella, “Causation and Aggression,” in Legal Foundations of a Free Society, p. 182 et seq.; also in ch. 24.

Also, on others who support voluntary slavery, e.g. Gerard Casey and Nozick, see KOL442 | Together Strong Debate vs. Walter Block on Voluntary Slavery (Matthew Sands of Nations of Sanity).

❧

A Tour Through Walter Block’s Oeuvre

Stephan Kinsella[*]

[Note: This piece was originally intended to appear in Elvira Nica & Gheorghe H. Popescu, eds., A Passion for Justice: Essays in Honor of Walter Block (New York: Addleton Academic Publishers, forthcoming), but it has been withdrawn for various reasons so I am posting it here. This article is not a comprehensive overview of all of Walter’s publications, and does not include his pro-covid lockdown writing or more recent Israel-Gaza related publications. This is part of the reason for my withdrawing the piece. I could not in good faith omit discussion of these issues, but since I strongly disagree with Walter on these matters, it would be inappropriate to include such criticism in a book of essays in his honor.] ¹

I dare say no single person has ever read all of Walter Block’s massive corpus of publications. There are just too many. Walter’s writing spans a large number of topics in Austrian economics and libertarianism as well as in other areas, published over a more than fifty year period. This includes innumerable popular articles, 32 or so books, and hundreds of scholarly journal articles. His first articles were published in 1969; his first piece in a refereed journal was published in 1971,[2] a year before he received his Ph.D. As Walter tells his friends, one of his goals is to publish 1,000 articles in refereed journals and law reviews,^[3] and by his count, he’s currently at about 700. So he is on track to meet his goal in about twelve years. He’s only 82 now, after all. [continue reading…]

1. For his pro-lockdown and related writings, see Walter Block, “Forced Vaccinations,” LewRockwell.com (Feb. 4, 2013); see also Libertarianism and Compulsory Vaccinations and others listed here. And more recently, Walter Block, “A Libertarian Analysis of the COVID-19 Pandemic,” J. Libertarian Stud. 24 (2020): 206–37. Jeff Tucker criticized Walter for some of these views here; a few days later the same program had Walter on to defend his pro-Covid lockdown/mandate views he had expressed at the height of the pandemic lockdown period. Tucker also rightly called out Block for his illiberal and unlibertarian views on infectious diseases, including his bizarre defense of jailing “Typhoid Mary,” in The Downfall of the Gurus. See, e.g. ; Walter Block, “My Response to Jeffrey Tucker on COVID,” Epoch Times (Feb. 8, 2023; substack version); Jeffrey A. Tucker, “The Downfall of the Gurus,” Epoch Times (Jan. 23, 2023); Block’s appearance online talking about the Typhoid Mary issue. And Walter Block, “Rejoinder to Slenzok on COVID,” J.Libertarian Stud. 25 (1) (2021): 264–68. For the Israel stuff, see Walter E. Block & Alan G. Futerman, “Rejoinder to Hoppe on Israel vs. Hamas,” MEST Journal (2024) which is a response to Hans-Hermann Hoppe, “An Open Letter to Walter E. Block,” LewRockwell.com (Jan. 31, 2024). See also David Gordon and Wanjiru Njoya, “The Classical Liberal Case For Israel,” LewRockwell.com (Feb. 2, 2024; Mises.org version) and Walter’s response, Alan G. Futerman and Walter E. Block, “Rejoinder to Gordon and Njoya on Israel and Libertarianism,” MESTE Journal (Position Paper) (2024). Again, as noted above: I agree with Tucker, and with Hoppe, on the substance of the covid/infectious disease lockdown and Israel-Gaza issues, but it would be inappropriate of me to include this, with the necessary criticism it would entail, in a book of essays in his honor. [↩]

Podcast (kinsella-on-liberty): Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:09:43 — 63.8MB)

Kinsella on Liberty Podcast: Episode 431.

My appearance on The Rational Egoist: Exploring Hoppe’s Argumentation Ethics with Stephan Kinsella. (Spotify)

[continue reading…]

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (35.8MB)

Kinsella on Liberty Podcast: Episode 430.

This is my presentation, “An Insider’s Introduction to Austrian Economics,” Bastiat Society—Houston, American Institute for Economic Research, The Briar Club, Houston Texas (May 2, 2024). From their shownotes:

Join AIER’s Bastiat Society program in Houston for an event with Stephan Kinsella, libertarian writer and registered patent attorney in Houston.

Mr. Kinsella is both an internationally recognized scholar on libertarian legal theory and a former Senior Fellow with the Mises Institute. The Mises Institute’s purpose is to promote teaching and research in the Austrian school of economics in the tradition of Ludwig von Mises and Murray Rothbard. In the foreword to Stephan’s most recent book, Legal Foundations of a Free Society, the great Austrian economist Hans-Hermann Hoppe said, “Henceforth, then, all essential studies in the philosophy of law and the field of legal theory will have to take full account of the theories and criticisms expounded by Kinsella.” Stephan will be introducing Austrian economics that is in part shaped by the rare insights one can only get as a scholar and insider.

This is my first talk on a purely economic topic. I tried not to dumb it down but also not talk over people’s heads, but I only had 45 minutes. This is the recording I made on my iphone. [continue reading…]

“Q – can you have a valid contract over things that don’t exist?

and especially if there’s no property title being transferred?

like it’s buying the idea of a kilometre? or a ‘rare sat’?”

Okay here’s how others might say: there is no thing to transfer so the contract is null and void, or something like that. That is because they think of contract as some kind of independent thing—a relationship, a legal “obligation.” And that one of the effects of a contract is that someone gets title to something that they agreed to, etc etc. This view of contract also thinks of the parties as being obligated to each other, and if they don’t perform their obligation they are in breach and owe damages, etc. [continue reading…]

Q: If I sign something that says “this person is allowed to kill me under xyz circumstances and he is owed $10 from my estate if he fulfills this” and, assuming I never renege, those circumstances arise and the person kills me, would the thing I signed be a valid defense against murder charges in a free society and/or an enforceable claim against the estate?

Kinsella:

I think in a free society, it would be a defense because it would indicate consent. (And yes, the estate owed the $10.)

Of course, in today’s world, it will still be murder [continue reading…]