If you have the time I wanted to ask for some clarification regarding your views on positive obligations and their relationship with aggression and bringing children into the world.
In your article “How we come to own ourselves” you argue libertarianism is not inherently against positive obligations just unchosen obligations. You say one can incur positive obligations by commiting aggression. You use the analogy of pushing a person into a lake (aggressing against them) that creates a positive obligation to rescue them. You then say bringing an infant into the world with certain needs is akin to pushing a person into a lake.
My question is, does this mean bringing an infant into the world is aggression which then creates a chosen obligation to feed the infant (rescue them from the situation you’ve put them in)? Is this an accurate reading of your argument? [continue reading…]
Adam Smith developed a theory of the ‘four-stage’ advancement of society as England was entering the Industrial Revolution (the fourth stage) and becoming the leading commercial centre in the world. That transition was raising new and novel legal issues that required legal solutions more complex than the earlier three stages in human advancement, as innovation gave rise to new technologies and ways of working. He and other juridical thinkers saw the debate about whether legislation could effectively drive that transition as the central question of their time, the answer to which would, in the long run, affect the fate of nations and Empire. They had a clear view on this, informed by the study of thousands of years of human history. For them, the common law was vastly superior.
This article examines the debate that took place on these issues, the Benthamite revolution that followed and the modern basket of rights that obfuscate the key question that policy-makers should be asking in our generation: if the common law was so successful in driving the Industrial Revolution, what confidence can we have in a legislated approach as we move into the fifth stage, the Technology Revolution? This is one of the most important issues facing the world as societies decide what legal framework(s) will regulate humanity’s move into a digital society and the efforts to discover and invent the technologies that will support us on that journey.
Stephan Kinsella, “Legislation and the Discovery of Law in a Free Society,” in Legal Foundations of a Free Society (Houston, Texas: Papinian Press, 2023)
“Now, I don’t care to discuss the alleged complaints American Indians have against this country. I believe, with good reason, the most unsympathetic Hollywood portrayal of Indians and what they did to the white man. They had no right to a country merely because they were born here and then acted like savages. The white man did not conquer this country. And you’re a racist if you object, because it means you believe that certain men are entitled to something because of their race. You believe that if someone is born in a magnificent country and doesn’t know what to do with it, he still has a property right to it. He does not. Since the Indians did not have the concept of property or property rights—they didn’t have a settled society, they had predominantly nomadic tribal “cultures”—they didn’t have rights to the land, and there was no reason for anyone to grant them rights that they had not conceived of and were not using. [continue reading…]
There is no such thing as “intrinsic value” in economics. Value exists only in the eyes of the beholder. The concept of “value” is made possible by being valuable to a specific person, for a particular purpose. The only thing in the universe that is intrinsically valuable is human beings.
TLDR: Stop with nonsense like “Bitcoin has no intrinsic value”
My recent appearance on The Rational Egoist. (Spotify)
Shownotes:
Debating the Nature of Rights with Stephan Kinsella
In this episode of The Rational Egoist, host Michael Liebowitz engages in a stimulating debate with libertarian writer and patent attorney Stephan Kinsella on the nature of rights.
Drawing from his book Legal Foundations of a Free Society and his extensive work on legal and political theory, Kinsella offers his perspective on the origins, scope, and application of individual rights.
Together, they examine differing philosophical interpretations and discuss how rights function in a free society.
This thought-provoking conversation invites listeners to question and refine their understanding of one of the most fundamental concepts in political philosophy.
I was interviewed by Logan Hertz, of Hazeltine LLC, about attempts by the Nelson Nash Institute, they of the poorly-named “Infinite Banking” concept, to use trademark to bully competitors. I discuss the general problem with IP and then apply it to trademark, and provide suggestions as to more “ethical” ways of using trademark and IP in an IP-world. See also Logan’s LinkedIn post.
This is my discussion with European patent attorney David Pearce, of the Tufty the Cat European IP blog (twitter). He and I were co-founders and members of the Advisory Council for the Open Crypto Alliance (2020–22). We discuss Craig Wright, nChain and bitcoin related patents, and so on (see video below).
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