uFollow has created a page to index and follow my articles and blogs at Mises and my personal page here: http://www.ufollow.com/authors/stephan.kinsella/. Nice service. I have asked them to update some info and add feeds to my blog posts at C4SIF and The Libertarian Standard too. I dimly recall that I also occasionally blog at other places (Libertarian Papers, Against Monopoly, HansHoppe.com, Property and Freedom Society, KinsellaLaw.com), but let it pass.
[From my Webnote series]
For reasons why, see my post Happy We-Should-Restore-The-Monarchy-And-Rejoin-Britain Day!.
Related: Hans-Hermann Hoppe, “Introduction” to Democracy: The God That Failed
See also my related posts:
See also:
This post from the “Absurd Results: Econ, Law, Sports, and Politics” blog picks me as the top choice for a Ron Paul Supreme Court nominee (others: Richard Epstein, Alex Kozinski, Randy Barnett, Janice Rogers Brown). I’m honored, and in some alternate reality, I’m getting impeached for my first “unconstitutional” ruling 🙂
See also: Andrew Napolitano for Chief Justice; Kinsella for Associate Justice; Higher Law.
I’m working on a book containing an edited collection of my essays on libertarian theory. The working title is The Ethics of Action: Fundamentals of Libertarian Legal Theory–the main title borrows from the titles of two Rothbard books: The Ethics of Liberty and The Logic of Action (a remaining permutation was taken by Buchanan in his The Logic of Liberty). The title evokes a recurring theme or goal of my writing—of libertarian theory in general: an exploration of the ethics that guide action, and of ethics implied by certain classes of action.
Trusted friends advise me it’s a bad title–dull and pompous. I think I need a better title: something more exciting. The title Hoppe’s Democracy: The God that Failed is an example of a nice title, as is the title for Jeff Tucker’s books It’s a Jetsons World: Private Miracles and Public Crimes, as well as his Bourbon for Breakfast: Living Outside the Statist Quo.
I already have an image I want to use for the cover, discussed here. But I need a better title. The book is basically an edited collection of my articles about foundations, extensions, and applications of libertarian theory and basic principles. Most of the articles involve arguments about the nuts and bolts of libertarian theory and principles, informed by Austrian, Rothbardian, and anarchist principles, and all heavily revolving around property rights, justice, and the non-aggression principle.
Suggestions welcome!
This is how I feel when I argue with liberals, opponents of nuclear power, conspiratoids, and IP advocates:
From the Mises blog (archived comments below):
Slate’s Culture Gabfest is one of my favorites, even though the main host, Stephen Metcalf, on occasion lets his noxious, smug statism leak out. Witness his recent essay about libertarians and Robert Nozick. It’s already been roundly thrashed–see Will Wilkinson, The Economist, When the levee breaks; Matt Welch, Some Factual Errors in the Latest Slate Attack on Libertarianism; Gordon on Nozick on Slate. In his article and in the podcastdiscussing it, Metcalf claims Nozick recanted his libertarianism. This is not true. He merely said he thought parts of it were inadequate. And later he made clear he had not recanted it at all (see Gordon’s piece).
There are so many errors in Metcalf’s piece it’s difficult to know where to begin, but thankfully the bloggers noted above or linked in their posts have made a good start. But for instance he mischaracterizes the brilliant Wilt Chamberlain example that demolishes the case for egalitarianism, and, if I read him correctly, even seems to insinuates a racist aspect to the example:
“Wilt Chamberlain” is an African-American whose talents are unique, scarce, perspicuous (points, rebounds, assists), and in high demand. We feel powerfully the man should be paid, and not to do so—to expect a black athlete to perform for (largely) white audiences without adequate compensation—raises the specter of the plantation.
I cannot be sure Metcalf is indeed insinuating the example only has appeal to racists, or that Nozick had hidden racist messages here–I don’t want to accuse someone even of race-baiting unfairly; but detect a bit of this here. Yet there is nothing racist about the example. As Gordon explains,
Metcalf’s understanding of the Wilt Chamberlain example is flawed. The example doesn’t assume that Chamberlain has negotiated with the team’s owner to receive part of the ticket price. To the contrary, those who want to see him play voluntarily pay 25 cents to do so. The point of the example is that to preserve a pattern of distribution—say equality—requires substantial interference with the free choices that people make from a distribution that according to the patterned theory itself is a just one. The example doesn’t at all depend on assuming perfectly competitive markets. Rather, it aims to show that patterns upset liberty.
As for other problems with Metcalf’s essay, other than those handled by other critics already: first, he assumes Nozick makes the most respected case for libertarianism, the one that has to be taken down–thus, showing he recanted is important. Well maybe Nozick is the only one taken seriously in academia, but so what? There’s a reason for this, Radical libertarians do not see him this way. In fact Nozick was a somewhat the dilettante, not that radical, and Anarchy, State and Utopia was an argument for the legitimacy of the state (albeit a minimal one), not an argument for radical anarchy. See, e.g., Murray Rothbard’s Robert Nozick and the Immaculate Conception of the State. Rothbard was the real libertarian radical; Hoppe does great job comparing and contrasting the approaches of Nozick and Rothbard in Murray N. Rothbard and the Ethics of Liberty:
Nozick’s method rather made for interest and excitement of a particular kind. Rothbard’s The Ethics of Libertyconsisted essentially of one successively and systematically drawn out and elaborated argument, and thus required the long sustained attention of its reader. However, a reader of Rothbard’s book could possibly get so excited that he would not want to put it down until he had finished it. The excitement caused by Anarchy, State, and Utopia was of a very different kind. The book was a series of dozens of disparate or loosely jointed arguments, conjectures, puzzles, counterexamples, experiments, paradoxes, surprising turns, startling twists, intellectual flashes, and razzle-dazzle, and thus required only short and intermittent attention of its reader. At the same time, few if any readers of book likely will have felt the urge to read it straight through. Instead, reading Nozick was characteristically done unsystematically and intermittently, in bits and pieces. The excitement stirred by Nozick was intense, short, and fleeting; and the success of Anarchy, State, and Utopia was due to the fact that at all times, and especially under democratic conditions, there are far more high time-preference intellectuals—intellectual thrill seekers—than patient and disciplined thinkers.[18]
Despite his politically incorrect conclusions, Nozick’s libertarianism was deemed respectable by the academic masses and elicited countless comments and replies, because it was methodologically non-committal; that is, Nozick did not claim that his libertarian conclusions proved anything. Even though one would think that ethics is—and must be—an eminently practical intellectual subject, Nozick did not claim that his ethical “explorations” had any practical implications. They were meant to be nothing more than fascinating, entertaining, or suggestive intellectual play. As such, libertarianism posed no threat to the predominantly social-democratic intellectual class. On account of his unsystematic method—his philosophical pluralism—Nozick was “tolerant” vis-à-vis the intellectual establishment (his anti-establishment conclusions notwithstanding). He did not insist that his libertarian conclusions were correct and, for instance, socialist conclusions were false and accordingly demand their instant practical implementation (that is, the immediate abolition of the democratic welfare state, including all of public tax-funded education and research). Rather, libertarianism was, and claimed to be, no more than just an interesting thought. He did not mean to do any real harm to the ideas of his socialist opponents. He only wanted to throw an interesting idea into the democratic open-ended intellectual debate, while everything real, tangible, and physical could remain unchanged and everyone could go on with his life and thoughts as before.
(Metcalf also implies Nozick was the only respected academic who argued for libertarianism–oh? what about Hayek (LSE), Richard Epstein (Chicago) and Milton Friedman (Chicago)?)
In the podcast, Metcalf also says he views libertarianism as “hateful.” Oh really? Tolerance for others, a willingness to respect their rights to their bodies and property is hateful? In the podcast he also implies libertarianism was ascendant in the 70s–hello, Nixon severed the tie to gold in the 70s. He also seems to imply that the failure of Keynesinianism to explain stagflation in the 70s helped undermine libertarian thought–what the libertarian-predicted failure of Keynes’s socialist ideas has to do with the failure of libertarianism is anyone’s guess. Likewise, Metcalf’s insinuation that the 2008 financial crisis showed the breakdown of libertarianism is confused; this was a culmination of state interventionism, of course, not the fault of human freedom and free markets. And in his piece he holds up Margaret Thatcher as some avatar of libertarianism, and mangles her comment about society:
Take Margaret Thatcher’s infamous provocation—”There’s no such thing as society”—with its implication that human beings are nothing more than brutishly competitive atoms.
This does not imply this at all. It merely recognizes that society is just a concept denoting the activities and interrelationships of actual individual human beings; that individuals do exist and are the primary social unit. It is a call to not be misled by metaphors or sloppy philosophy into overriding the rights of human beings in the name of higher-order concepts like “society.”
In essence, Metcalf’s arguments are just like those of conservatives (which is why I’m a libertarian). The basic argument (of both Metcalf and conservatives) is: “well of course we believe in individualism, individual rights, property rights, free markets–it’s just that it’s not our “only value.”” By this trick they are able to argue for state violence against innocent people. Libertarians are the ultimate liberals because we are tolerant of differences, and respect individual rights. We will never condone physical violence used against innocent individuals. Talk of “other values” “in addition to” “individual rights” is a smuggled, dishonest, indirect way of saying that in some cases it’s okay for the institutional violent force of the state to be brought to bear on innocent people. Obviously, that is not liberal. It’s illiberal. That’s why it has to be disguised. Instead of saying “normally I’m against the commission of violent criminal aggression against peaceful, innocent individuals, I condone it in some cases for the purpose of what to me is a higher value”–which is what the private criminal and the sociopath and the genocidal tyrant also say, of course–they word it differently, to cover this up, just like a cat with his mess in the litter box or a politician on the stump: “We’re in favor of individual ‘autonomy’ but we are ‘also’ in favor of ‘other values.’ We need to ‘balance’ these values for the overall good.” I.e., to make an omelet, you have to break a few eggs.
My basic view is a libertarian is a liberal who is not economically illiterate, and who is not overly caught up in loosey-goosey non-rigorous liberal arts “metaphors” (eg about “society” and “individuals” etc.).
Update: For more commentary:
And the best response so far: Daniel Jepson, A Review of Stephen Metcalf’s critique of libertarianism. Excerpt:
And the most devastating response so far to Steve’s attempt to criticize libertarainsism: “Thus far, we have seen that with his article’s main thesis, Mr Metcalf has managed to achieve the rarely-seen Triple Crown of rhetorical failure: his central (indeed, titular) fact – that Nozick “abandoned” the libertarian movement – is simply wrong; his implication that this fact, were it true, would deal a significant blow to the libertarian edifice rests on a risibly shallow understanding of the history of libertarian ideas; and finally, his attempt to drive further nails into the coffin of ASU via his own analysis is based entirely on a misunderstanding of the Nozick’s argument.”
See also Jepson’s A Response to Stephen Metcalf’s Critique of Libertarianism, Part 2.
Metcalf’s response to critics: Responding to the critics of my essay on Robert Nozick, the philosophical father of libertarianism.
Sheldon Richman’s devastating reply: Of Malice and Straw Men: Another empty attack.
***
Comments:
June 22, 2011 at 8:28 pmGreat piece, and: I agree. But…
The “but” applies to H.H.Hoppe’s long quote, which has patent nonsense in it. The whole business about Nozick’s argument not having “practical consequences” is absurd. I mean this. It runs against the grain of things we know Nozick said. It stands in stark contrast to the whole point of the book: people have rights, the state is justified if it defends those rights, and it is admirable and praiseworthy and, well, glorious, to defend such a state, which has a major social function: providing a framework for utopian experimentation in human betterment.
I have an idea of why Hoppe would write what he writes, in part because of Nozick’s playful style. Which he misunderstands. But it is nevertheless the case that Nozick took liberty quite seriously, and he thought his argument clearly made a case for something with a great deal of ethical weight.
June 22, 2011 at 9:58 pmI slipped; it is “liberty upsets patterns”, not “patterns upset liberty”.
June 23, 2011 at 8:51 amMy reply to MEtcalf on the Culturefest Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/Culturefest
Metcalf:
Slate’s Culture Gabfest
Heya –Stephan, as always, great to hear from you, and delighted we didn’t lose you on this issue. I’ll be addressing the “factual error” meme on Slate later today/tomorrow. In the meantime, YES, I don’t think Nozick was necessarily a big inspirer of the movement –correct me if I’m wrong, but he is vastly secondary to Hayek. (I will be writing an essay on Hayek.) However, I have to add, the idea that Nozick did not repudiate libertarianism in ’89 is going to make people look foolish for promoting it. That essay is thoughtful, not short, and unequivocal; and though he may have tacked back in a later interview, he was quite definite in print in The Zig Zag of Politics. Anyone who thinks they have me in a gotcha ought to read it before they pipe up. (SM)
Steve, of course you didn’t lose me. I already knew your politics. And we libertarians are a tolerant bunch…
I think what bothered me most was your comment in the podcast that you find libertarianism “hateful.” This is extremely unfair, I believe, and uncharitable; the rest is more of a substantive disagreement. But libertarians as one of your critics pointed out work tirelessly to defend the rights of others–those in jail for drug crimes, those impoverished by state policies, victims of war, etc. So the “hateful” comment boggles the mind.
Re Nozick: I am aware he somewhat repudiated libertarianism, but you seem to exaggerate its extent, and its relevance, and ignore later recantations of the “recantation.” In any case it does not matter; it’s like a reverse appeal to authority.
I think you are wrong to say he was secondary to Hayek. I think he is very very low on the spectrum of libertarian influences. I agree w/ Payne who writes “I’ve been active in libertarian circles for nearly a decade now. I work for a free market think tank. I probably know around 1,000 libertarians personally. Yet I have not heard even a single person credit Robert Nozick for making them a libertarian. I’ve heard all the others–more times than I can count–but Nozick comes up only occasionally as an influence and never as the decisive one.”
That is my experience too. Especially among radical libertarians, we OPPOSE Nozick’s attempt to JUSTIFY the state. And remember, Nozick nowhere even argues for libertarian rights: he starts out assuming there are rights (side constraints). So his whole case is hypothetical: assuming there are rights, even this does not stop a state from emerging (albeit a minarchist one). So it is not a defense of libertarian rights at all, and not even a defense of libertarianism. It’s a defense of the state.
As I mention in my post about this http://blog.mises.org/17383/slates-metcalf-on-libertarianism-and-nozick/ , Rothbard, the key libertarian, levels a devastating critique of Nozick in Robert Nozick and the Immaculate Conception of the State. Rothbard was the real libertarian radical; Hans-Hermann Hoppe does great job comparing and contrasting the approaches of Nozick and Rothbard in Murray N. Rothbard and the Ethics of Liberty, which is the introduction to the 1998 version of Rothbard’s seminal book. (links are in that post).
As you can see in Brian Doherty’s fantastic book Radicals for Capitalism, http://www.amazon.com/Radicals-Capitalism-Freewheeling-American-Libertarian/dp/1586483501 , the main libertarian influences have been Hayek, Ayn Rand, Ludwig von Mises, Milton Friedman, and Rothbard. And last century, people like Henry Hazlitt, Albert Jay Nock, Leonard Read; of late, people like Lew Rockwell and Ron Paul. I mean Nozick simply does not rate as a major influence. This is just empirical and factual. Yes, I read ASU in my early libertarianism but partly that is b/c I’m into scholarly and academic stuff; most libertarians I know have not.
In short, you took the wrong libertarians to attack. You should have gone after Rothbardians.
as for recanting–it is rare among libertarins, as you may konw; far more often do liberals see the light and move in our direction–if ideological movement has any relevance.
Finally–for another interesting libertarian “recanting” story, see that of Roy Childs http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roy_Childs — he wrote a famous letter to Ayn Rand in the 70s about why she should be an anarcho-capitalist; later he recanted of his anarchism, but without explaining why.
Other libertarinas I’ve heard of somewhat recanting include Morris Tannehill, who wrote the famous The Market for Liberty; and Victor Koman, libertarian sci-fi author. And of course the Objectivists, many of them are more war-mongers than “libertarians.”
June 23, 2011 at 4:42 pmIt seems to me that the non-initiation of force is a necessary precursor to civil society. The suggestion that it is “hateful” is just silly and suggests a complete incomprehension of its implications.
June 26, 2011 at 11:52 amI couldn’t resist joining in the fun: http://danieljepson.blogspot.com/2011/06/review-of-stephen-metcalfs-critique-of.html
June 26, 2011 at 1:16 pmIf you haven’t done this yet, listen to the accompanying Slate Podcast with Metcalf here:
http://www.slate.com/id/2295829/?wpisrc=obinsite
The Nozick discussion starts at the 14:15 mark. It’s clear from this discussion that Mr. Metcalf and his lady pals are clueless. He doesn’t write about Rothbard or the ABCT because he knows absolutely nothing about them. I’m shocked.
June 29, 2011 at 11:08 amThanks for the very kind plug, David. Here is part 2: http://danieljepson.blogspot.com/2011/06/response-to-stephen-metcalfs-critique.html
***
Update: Jason Kuznicki:
“Even Robert Nozick gave up on libertarianism,” says Stephen Metcalf, more or less. “So what’s wrong with you?” (Aside, of course, from the fact that Nozick didn’t give up.)
I probably should hesitate before declaring my allegiance to the evil league of evil. But you’re reading this at the Cato Institute, so it may be too late for that. Metcalf’s piece falls into a large and (sadly) growing category for me, one labeled “People Condemning Libertarians for Strange Things That Never Occurred to Anyone, Let Alone to Us.”
It never occurred to me, for example, that by citing Wilt Chamberlain as someone who became wealthy in a morally blameless way, Robert Nozick was playing the race card. Metcalf writes:
“Wilt Chamberlain” is an African-American whose talents are unique, scarce, perspicuous (points, rebounds, assists), and in high demand. We feel powerfully the man should be paid, and not to do so—to expect a black athlete to perform for (largely) white audiences without adequate compensation—raises the specter of the plantation.
Raises the specter of the plantation? Does it now? Let’s generalize: Your forcing anyone to perform without what they consider adequate compensation should raise that same specter. If someone is going to perform for you, they must do it for a wage that they consider adequate, whether their “performance” is a show of basketball prowess or just working on an assembly line.
If they don’t like the wage, they should be free to seek a better one. If the employers pay a giant wage, and if they do so because they really, really like the work, then that’s also their right.
Those who want to interfere – to tax wages, to restrict entry or exit, or to prohibit whole lines of work – they are the ones who bear the burden of proof. Not the willing buyers and sellers of labor. That’s what Wilt Chamberlain’s example is supposed to show.
Maybe you’re not ready to go whole-hog and declare that taxation is theft. Eh, fine. Still, taxation should make all of us pretty uncomfortable, especially when we look at its philosophical implications. The arguments that justify taxation might actually be unavoidable—truthfully, I wouldn’t know how to run a government without them—but that doesn’t make them any less dangerous.
Of the many errors in a long and error-ridden article, I think the worst has to be the idea that libertarians hold all concentrations of wealth to be good. As long, I infer, as we gather it in sufficiently large heaps. Metcalf writes:
But being a star athlete isn’t the only way to make money. In addition to earning a wage, one can garnish a wage, collect a fee, levy a toll, cash in a dividend, take a kickback, collect a monopoly rent, hit the superfecta, inherit Tara, insider trade, or stumble on Texas tea. For each way of conceiving wealth, there is at least one way of moralizing its distribution. The Wilt Chamberlain example is designed to corner us—quite cynically, in my view—into moralizing all of them as if they were recompense for a unique talent that gives pleasure; and to tax each of them, and regulate each of them, according to the same principle of radical noninterference suggested by a black ballplayer finally getting his due.
This is simply wrong. For a libertarian, it’s only Wilt Chamberlain’s particular type of wealth that is morally blameless, not all the rest. Which kind is his? The kind acquired through voluntary transactions, without coercion or fraud. The kind that comes from Nozick called capitalist acts between consenting adults.
Some wealth is blameless. Some isn’t. And yes, some cases are truly hard to judge: Is Wal-Mart a free-market success story? Wellll…. kind of. But what about all those special tax privileges? What about that eminent domain abuse?
Wilt Chamberlain makes a good example not because he’s a black man struggling sympathetically in a white man’s world. His example is useful because it strips away every possibility of force, fraud, corporate welfare, and government favoritism. When we do that, we can see that it’s still possible to grow wealthy through honest, voluntary methods. That’s a valuable insight, even if you don’t necessarily agree with everything else Robert Nozick ever wrote. (Don’t sweat it; I don’t either.)
Finally, Metcalf strangely neglects Chamberlain’s fans. When we talk about Wilt Chamberlain’s right to collect a paycheck, it’s partly because he’s highly visible. But we should not forget that when we take away that paycheck, we also take away an entertainment choice for millions of ordinary people.
If we remove enough choices like these, we won’t merely have made life less cushy for the talented. We’ll also have made it a lot poorer for the rest of us. We could be taking away not just basketball, but breakthroughs in science, technology, and the arts. And why? Because someone found someone else’s voluntary transfer of wealth distasteful. That shouldn’t be much of a reason.
Me in a robe, 1991
Walter Block has a LRC article up today, Andrew Napolitano for Chief Justice, where he lists lots of libertarian lawyers he’s aware of who would be potential candidates for Ron Paulian Supreme Court nominations, and his favorites, which include Judge Andrew Napolitano, Professor Richard Epstein, and yours truly.
See also my previous post, Reason on Who Should Reign Supreme?–or, Justice Kinsella.
[From my Webnote series]
From the Appendix to my post Objectivist Law Prof Mossoff on Copyright; or, the Misuse of Labor, Value, and Creation Metaphors, quoted below. See also “Objectivist Law Prof Mossoff on Copyright; or, the Misuse of Labor, Value, and Creation Metaphors”; “Hume on Intellectual Property and the Problematic “Labor” Metaphor”; “Thoughts on Intellectual Property, Scarcity, Labor-ownership, Metaphors, and Lockean Homesteading“; also Intellectual Freedom and Learning Versus Patent and Copyright, text at note 21.
See also Kinsella, “KOL044 | ‘Correcting some Common Libertarian Misconceptions’ (PFS 2011),” Kinsella on Liberty Podcast (May 2, 2013), at slide 7; idem, “KOL049 | ‘Libertarian Controversies Lecture 5’ (Mises Academy, 2011),” Kinsella on Liberty Podcast (May 4, 2013), at slide 15; idem, “KOL092 | Triple-V: Voluntary Virtues Vodcast, with Michael Shanklin: Can You Trade Something You Don’t Own?,” Kinsella on Liberty Podcast (Oct. 30, 2013); idem, “The ‘If you own something, that implies that you can sell it; if you sell something, that implies you must own it first’ Fallacies,” StephanKinsella.com (June 1, 2018).
See also related comments in Stephan Kinsella, “Libertarianism After Fifty Years: What Have We Learned?”, in Legal Foundations of a Free Society (Houston, Texas: Papinian Press, 2023), in the section “Danger of Unclear Language and Metaphors.”
Update: Fritz Machlup, Economic Semantics 2nd Edition (Transaction 1991), p. 73:
The existence of homonyms in scientific as well as in everyday language raises no problem when the separate meanings of the same word are sufficiently different to make confusion impossible in the context in which the word is used. If we economists, for example, use the word “labor,” no reader or listener will ever think of the painful muscle contractions preceding childbirth, and if we say “capital” he may not know precisely what we mean, but he will rarely confuse it with the seat of government in a state or country.
If the separate meanings of the same word are closely related, overlapping, or otherwise ambiguous so that the context be relied upon to indicate which meaning is intended, the writer or speaker has a moral duty, I would say, to state what he means.
Update: From Julian Baggini, “‘Ludwig Wittgenstein’ Review: An Attack on the Abstract,” Wall Street J. (Nov. 18, 2025), reviewing Anthony Gottlieb, Ludwig Wittgenstein: Philosophy in the Age of Airplanes (Yale, 2025):
In one of his many arresting metaphors, Wittgenstein claimed that the aim of philosophy is “to show the fly the way out of the fly-bottle.” The bottle is the trap philosophers inadvertently create for themselves by abstracting concepts such as “knowledge,” “being” and “object” from their ordinary usage and analyzing them as though each has some kind of independent essence. Wittgenstein demanded that whenever we find ourselves puzzling over the meaning of such terms, we should ask, “is the word ever actually used in this way in the language in which it is at home?” His answer was, usually, no. “Philosophical problems arise when language goes on holiday,” he wrote, and philosophy is full of vacationing abstract nouns.
The philosopher’s task is therefore not to solve philosophical problems but to dissolve them, showing why the questions they pose are illegitimate. Philosophy thus leaves the world as it is—or at least as it was, before philosophers raised a dust and then complained that we cannot see, as Bishop Berkeley put it in 1710.
Appendix: On the danger of metaphors in scientific discourse
The following observations and quotes assembled from previous email and other conversations re same:
See the following, from Mark Thornton’s The “Market” for Academic Research: this is a great quote; I think it would be a useful project to collect various comments on dangers of the use of metaphors into one place:
“For it would be an absurd undertaking to banish from the language of economic theory every manner of speaking that is not literally correct; it would be sheer pedantry to proscribe every figure of speech, particularly since we could not say the hundredth part of what we have to say, if we refused ever to take recourse to a metaphor. One requirement is essential, that economic theory avoid the error of confusing a practical habit, indulged in for the sake of expediency, with scientific truth.”
–Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk, (1881), “Whether legal rights and relationships are economic goods.” In H. Sennholz (Ed.), Shorter classics of Böhm-Bawerk, Volume I. Spring Mills, PA: Libertarian Press, 1962, p. 135. As Mark noted on a list: “Bohm Bawerk took up this issue [of misuse of metaphors] in Shorter Classics. I quote him at the opening of this paper (attached). The whole public choice agenda is based on the use of market metaphors for government institutions.”
NSK:
I’ve long noticed the over- and mis-use of metaphors. For example Paterson or Lane’s use of “energy circuits” …. very scientistic. Similar to the way people talk about the “momentum” of a football game or the “energy” of a crowd or a crystal.
Or in the idea of mixing or owning labor, or owning ideas, or in the idea that prices “convey knowledge”.
Also, as I noted elsewhere: “Mixing labor” is horribly misleading and a sloppy metaphor: if I turn a piece of land into a farm, did I *actually* mix my labor? I mean, is there like an amount of labor “in” the soil? It’s really sloppy and imprecise.
I’ve always liked this observation of Huelsmann’s:
Only in a metaphorical sense could one say that prices reflect or contain information on present conditions. …
… It is asserted that prices communicate abridged relevant information. This, however, is only a metaphorical expression.
It is not prices that coordinate the actions of sellers and buyers of tin; prices are the outcome of (coordinated) action, not its coordinators. It is property, rather than knowledge, that coordinates the separate actions of different people. The terms coordination and communication rather obfuscate than adequately express this fact. This is another example of the dangers linked to the use of metaphors in scientific discourse.
From p. 29 of this article
And Rothbard:
“The term “consumers’ sovereignty” is a typical example of the abuse, in economics, of a term . . . appropriate only to the political realm and is thus an illustration of the dangers of the application of metaphors taken from other disciplines. “Sovereignty” is the quality of ultimate political power; it is the power resting on the use of violence. In a purely free society, each individual is sovereign over his own person and property, and it is therefore this self-sovereignty which obtains on the free market. No one is “sovereign” over anyone else’s actions or exchanges. Since the consumers do not have the power to coerce producers into various occupations and work, the former are not “sovereign” over the latter.”
On Mises:
“Mises rightly criticised treating imaginary things (collectives, analogies, metaphors, etc.) as real and warns us to be very cautious when using fictitious auxiliary constructs to explain things” —Benjamin Marks
Also, from others’ comments about this on an email discussion list:
Roderick Long:
“Ironically, in his memoirs Mises accuses Bohm-Bawerk (in their dispute over Cantillon effects) of being led astray by the idea of “friction” and other metaphors from the physical sciences.”
On a thread, I had written: “Right, and this is the danger of metaphors (BTW I wonder if anyone has examined this issue in any detail–? The dangers overuse of metaphors in scientific discourse?).” Roderick Long replied: “Right, such a study might be called “How Scientific Discourse is Being Savagely Bitten to Death by Rabid Metaphors.” Tom DiLorenzo’s reply:
“A fun paper (Vedran, are you listening?) would be to ridicule the metaphors in macroeconomics with all the talk of “injections,” “Leakages,” shocks,” etc. I would start by comparing it all to the movie Young Frankenstein, where they tried to “shock” the monster to life, just as “infusions” of money or tax dollars supposedly shock the economy out of a recession. Then when shock therapy didn’t work, Gene Wilder pulled out a giant needle and “injected” the monster, just as money is supposedly injected into the economy by the Fed. The possibilities are endless.”
John Brätland:
In this connection, I would put in a strong plug for Peter Lewin’s paper: “Methods and Metaphors in Capital Theory.” (Advances in Austrian Economics, vol. 2B).
I might add that important parts of Mises’ “Ultimate Foundations… ” and “Theory and History” deal with the issue of inapt and misleading metaphors in economic science.
See also The Problem with “Fraud”: Fraud, Threat, and Contract Breach as Types of Aggression, discussing problems resulting from uncareful use of concepts like “fraud” in libertarian reasoning.
Update: See also:
It is not particularly helpful to think of real and intellectual property as structurally unified. The differences matter significantly and resorting to rhetorical metaphors distracts attention from critical issues. As Judge (later Justice) Cardozo cautioned in 1926, “[m]etaphors in law are to be narrowly watched, for starting as devices to liberate thought, they end often by enslaving it.”
–Peter S. Menell, quoted here
For more on Böhm-Bawerk, as quoted in my book Legal Foundations for a Free Society (ch. 24).
Böhm-Bawerk makes a similar point about the necessity of continuing to use some inaccurate terms in economics. As he writes:
[We do aught but recognize that, from the economic viewpoint, such “goods” as family, church, love and the like are merely linguistic disguises for a totality of concretely useful renditions of service. …
No matter how clearly I may have proved that payment-claims and good-will relationships are not genuine goods, no matter how clearly I have therefore proved that, whenever, in practical economic life rights and relationships are bought and sold, it is not, in truth, those intangibles that are meant and are valued and transferred, but that actually it is material goods and renditions of service that are so dealt in; no matter, I say, how clear my proof, I am not going to pretend to believe that economic practice will submit to any slavish accuracy in the matter. It will in the future continue to be the custom, and rightly so, to say that A’s wealth consists in payment-claims, that B sold his good will for $50,000 to C, and that the state, the church and the family are valuable “goods.” Yes, I believe even economic theory will, quite properly, continue talking that same language because it is the language that all the world talks and understands. For it would be an absurd undertaking to banish from the language of economic theory every manner of speaking that is not literally correct; it would be sheer pedantry to proscribe every figure of speech, particularly since we could not say the hundredth part of what we have to say, if we refused ever to take recourse to a metaphor.
One requirement is essential, that economic theory avoid the error of confusing a practical habit, indulged in for the sake of expediency, with scientific truth. 1
He goes on:
I do make the request that economic theory, when it speaks ex cathedra about goods and categories of goods, substitute the two underlying associates, material goods and renditions of service, for the figurative appellations, “intangible rights” and “relationship-goods.” And I make the further request that, whenever it does employ figures of speech in mentioning these things as goods, it remain at least tacitly conscious of the figurative nature of its expressions. To put it briefly, I think that economic theory should always retain the exact truth in its armory and bring it forth at all times when there is any real necessity for doing so. If it does that, it may be permissible to retain the accustomed terminology of an outmoded error, just as we do in other fields. For do we not still speak of the sun “rising” and “setting,” of its “coming up” and “going down”?
[From my Webnote series]
Note: This issue is discussed in Stephan Kinsella, Legal Foundations of a Free Society (Houston, Texas: Papinian Press, 2023). See, e.g., ch. 5, at n.16; ch. 8, at n.17; ch. 23, at n.27; ch. 25, at n.36. See also discussion of defamation law in my forthcoming chapter “Defamation Law and Reputation Rights as a Type of Intellectual Property,” p. 286 et pass. and “Aggression” versus “Harm” in Libertarianism.
Update: See Hoppe, Hans-Hermann and Walter Block, “Property and Exploitation,” International Journal of Value Based Management 15, no. 3 (2002): 225–36 (also in Walter Block, Iulian Tãnase & Bogdan Glãvan, eds., Building Blocks for Liberty: Critical Essays by Walter Block [Auburn, Ala.: Mises Institute, 2010]). Abstract:
The authors contend that what can legitimately be owned in a free society is only rights to physical property, not to the value thereof. You are thus free to undermine the value of our property by underselling us, by inventing a new substitute for our property, etc. But you cannot legitimately physically agress against our property, even if its value remains constant despite your efforts.
See also: Hoppe, “The Justice of Economic Efficiency,” in The Economics and Ethics of Private Property: Studies in Political Economy and Philosophy (Mises, 2006 [1993]), at 337–38:
Such proposals are absurd as well as indefensible. While every person can have control over whether or not his actions cause the physical integrity of something to change, control over whether or not one’s actions affect the value of someone’s property to change rests with other people and their evaluations. One would have to interrogate and come to an agreement with the entire world population to make sure that one’s planned actions would not change another per- son’s evaluations regarding his property. Everyone would be long dead before this could ever be accomplished. Moreover, the idea that property value should be protected is argumentatively indefensible, for even in order to argue, it must be presupposed that actions must be allowed prior to any actual agreement because if they were not, one could not even argue so. Yet if one can, then this is only possible because of objective borders of property, i.e., borders which every person can recognize as such on his own, without having to agree first with anyone else with respect to one’s system of values and evaluations. Rawls and Nozick could not even open their mouths if it were otherwise. The very fact, then, that they do open them proves what they say is wrong.
Update: see also
From Rand on IP, Owning “Values”, and “Rearrangement Rights”:
By viewing “values” as things that we create, Objectivists then think there should be property rights in values. They are things, after all, right? But this is a fundamental mistake. As I noted in Objectivist Law Prof Mossoff on Copyright; or, the Misuse of Labor, Value, and Creation Metaphors, a common mistaken belief is that one has a property right in the value, as opposed to the physical integrity of, one’s property. For elaboration, see pp. 139-141 of Hoppe’s A Theory of Socialism and Capitalism; also see my comments re same to Patents and Utilitarian Thinking. This assumption sneaks into or lies at the basis of many fallacious notions of property rights, such as the idea that there is a right to a reputation because it can have value. It ties in with the (especially Randian) notion of “creation” as the source of rights, and the confusing admixture of the “labor” idea, when we talk about using our labor to “create” things of “value” (like reputations, inventions, works of art). As Hoppe notes in The Economics and Ethics of Private Property: [continue reading…]
Related:
My article, “Read Hoppe, Then Nothing Is the Same,” discussing my upcoming Mises Academy course, “The Social Theory of Hoppe” (Mondays, July 11-Aug. 21, 2011) was published on Mises Daily last Friday, June 10 2011. The article has also been translated into Spanish: Tras leer a Hoppe, nada es lo mismo. Archived comments below. The course is on my site beginning with KOL153 | “The Social Theory of Hoppe: Lecture 1: Property Foundations” (Mises Academy, 2011).
From the Mises Blog; archived comments below.
Austrolibertarianism begins with Murray Rothbard. His mentor Ludwig von Mises systematized Austrian economics and put it on a modern, rigorous foundation. Rothbard built on, and extended, this Misesian-praxeological Austrian framework, and he integrated it with his own radical anarchocapitalism to produce the superstructure of modern Austrolibertarian thought.
Professor Hans-Hermann Hoppe, who studied under and worked with Rothbard from the 1980s until Rothbard’s untimely death in 1995, was Rothbard’s greatest student. After Rothbard’s death, Hoppe became the editor of the Journal of Libertarian Studies, a coeditor of the Review of Austrian Economics, and then a coeditor of the Quarterly Journal of Austrian Economics. His important books include A Theory of Socialism and Capitalism, The Economics and Ethics of Private Property, Democracy: The God that Failed, and The Myth of National Defense.
Combining Misesian praxeology with Rothbardian insights, Hoppe has developed a magnificent, integrated edifice of rational thought. This edifice includes work on sociology, economics, philosophy and epistemology, libertarianism and political philosophy, and history. Hoppe is now the world’s leading Austrolibertarian social theorist.
It is no surprise, then, that Professor Hoppe’s writing has inspired scholars all over the world to follow in his footsteps and to provide a scientific foundation for individual freedom and a free society (his works have been translated into at least 22 languages). His influence was extended when he founded the international Property and Freedom Society (PFS) in 2006 as a more radical alternative to the now-watered-down Mont Pèlerin Society.
The video below is a good demonstration of the power of Hoppe’s ideas. This is a talk Professor Hoppe gave in April 2011 at the Second Austrian School Conference, Mises Institute Brasil, in Porto Alegre, entitled “State or Private Law Society?”1 It’s a truly masterful presentation of the Austrolibertarian defense of what Hoppe calls the “private-law society.” For example, Hoppe here brilliantly and succinctly argues that there is but one correct answer to the problem of social order: the libertarian-Lockean rule (starting at 7:30 in Part 1; see also Parts 2, 3, 4, 5). He explains why the only answer to the question of who owns your body is you — who else would own it? All other competing rules are either incoherent, contradictory, or obviously unfair. And furthermore, when you appropriate an unowned resource, no one else can have a better claim to it than you, the person who had it first.
Fernando Chiocca, of Mises Brasil, told me that the audience was riveted and loved it; he got standing ovations,
and one reaction in particular was pretty interesting. We have only a couple of Austrian professors in Brasil, and one of them wasn’t acquainted with Hoppe’s work. (He is what we used to call “old-school Austrian,” whose ideas were shaped in the era before the modern Mises Institute website, and mainly influenced by Hayek.) In a matter of seconds after Hoppe’s speech, he was in our bookstore buying all Hoppe’s books that we had for sale, requesting autographs from Dr. Hoppe, repeating how marvelous Hoppe was, and declaring to everyone his instantaneous conversion to “Hoppeanism.”
I am reminded here of what Lew Rockwell wrote of Hoppe in the festschrift written in Hoppe’s honor (Property, Freedom, and Society: Essays in Honor of Hans-Hermann Hoppe):
This same Hoppean effect — that sense of having been profoundly enlightened by a completely new way of understanding something — has happened many times over the years. He has made contributions to ethics, to international political economy, to the theory of the origin of the state, to comparative systems, to culture and its economic relation, to anthropology and the theory and practice of war. Even on a subject that everyone thinks about but no one really seems to understand — the system of democracy — he clarified matters in a way that helps you see the functioning of the world in a completely new light. There aren’t that many thinkers who have this kind of effect. Mises was one. Rothbard is another. Hoppe certainly fits in that line. He is the kind of thinker who reminds you that ideas are real things that shape how we understand the world around us. …
Often times when you first hear a point he makes, you resist it. I recall when he spoke at a conference we held on American history, and gave a paper on the US Constitution. You might not think that a German economist could add anything to our knowledge on this topic. He argued that it represented a vast increase in government power and that this was its true purpose. It created a powerful central government, with the cover of liberty as an excuse. He used it as a case in point, and went further to argue that all constitutions are of the same type. In the name of limiting government — which they purportedly do — they invariably appear in times of history when the elites are regrouping to emerge from what they consider to be near anarchy. The Constitution, then, represents the assertion of power.
When he finished, you could hear a pin drop. I’m not sure that anyone was instantly persuaded. He had challenged everything we thought we knew about ourselves. The applause was polite, but not enthusiastic. Yet his points stuck. Over time, I think all of us there travelled some intellectual distance. The Constitution was preceded by the Articles of Confederation, which Rothbard had variously described as near anarchist in effect. Who were these guys who cobbled together this Constitution? They were the leftovers from the war: military leaders, financiers, and other mucky mucks — a very different crew from the people who signed the Declaration of Independence. Jefferson was out of the country when the Constitution was passed. And what was the effect of the Constitution? To restrain government? No. It was precisely the opposite, just as Hoppe said. It created a new and more powerful government that not only failed to restrain itself (what government has ever done that?), but grew and grew into the monstrosity we have today. It required a wholesale rethinking of the history, but what Hoppe had said that shocked everyone turns out to be precisely right — and this is only one example among many.
If you are interested in the ideas of Mises and Rothbard, it is essential to study the work of Professor Hoppe. Starting on July 11, I will be teaching a six-week online Mises Academy course to present and discuss Professor Hoppe’s most important ideas and theories, including his brilliant critique of positivist methodology as applied to the social sciences, his groundbreaking “argumentation-ethics” praxeological approach to political philosophy,2 his encompassing comparative analysis of socialism and capitalism, his profound critique of democracy, and a host of other insights and contributions to areas such as monopoly theory, the theory of public goods, the sociology of taxation, the private production of security, the nature of property and scarcity, immigration, economic methodology and epistemology, and the evolution of monetary institutions and their impact on international relations.
I decided to teach this course for a few reasons. First, as noted above, there was a need for this course because of the growing interest in Hoppe’s ideas and the increasing number of younger or newer Austrolibertarians just beginning to absorb the thought of the masters. Second, while I did not enjoy teaching mainstream law when I served as an adjunct law professor at a local law school a few years back, I have greatly enjoyed and benefitted from the three online Mises Academy courses I’ve taught so far (Rethinking Intellectual Property twice, and Libertarian Legal Theory once). And based on student feedback, the students have enjoyed the Mises Academy format in general and my courses in particular (see, e.g., the comments I noted in my articles “Teaching an Online Mises Academy Course,” “Introduction to Libertarian Legal Theory,” and “Rethinking IP”).
Third, aside from Hoppe himself, I felt uniquely qualified to present this overview of Hoppe’s work. I’ve been a close associate and (informal) student of Professor Hoppe since 1994 — I served as book-review editor of the JLS for five years under Hoppe’s editorship, I founded and edit Libertarian Papers, the successor journal to the JLS (Professor Hoppe serves on its editorial board); and, with Guido Hülsmann, I was editor of the festschrift in Hoppe’s honor, Property, Freedom, and Society: Essays in Honor of Hans-Hermann Hoppe. I have also built on Hoppe’s work in my own libertarian theorizing (e.g., Against Intellectual Property, “Punishment and Proportionality: The Estoppel Approach,”
“A Libertarian Theory of Contract: Title Transfer, Binding Promises, and Inalienability”).
When I proposed this course to Professor Hoppe, though he was humble in reaction, he fully endorsed the idea. He has graciously offered to provide a written response to submitted questions near the end of the course.
The reading material will consist primarily of A Theory of Socialism and Capitalism and The Economics and Ethics of Private Property (both free online in ePub and PDF formats), several other selected articles by Professor Hoppe, and articles by others commenting on Hoppe’s thought (such as my own “Argumentation Ethics and Liberty: A Concise Guide,” “New Rationalist Directions in Libertarian Rights Theory,” and “Defending Argumentation Ethics: Reply to Murphy & Callahan”), which are also available for free online.
This will be a fun and intellectually stimulating course. I am looking forward to it.
Hi, thanks for the comment. Let me say a few things in response. First, IP was never my strongest interest. It always was, and remains, other things like rights theory, Austrian economics, epistemology, and various applications of libertarianism. (If you check out my publications you’ll see that IP is only one subset of things I am interested in. https://stephankinsella.com/publications/)
The IP issue nagged at me as one among many little things, but I started to turn my attention to it in the early 90s when I started practicing patent law and thus thought more about it, and gradually saw the increasing importance of developing a solid view on this issue, and because of others increasingly urging me to write about it. Initially I sought a way to justify IP, b/c I thought it must be valid (Rand favored it-but Rand’s argument for it was obviously shaky).
As I have explained, I was by no means the first on the IP issue, see http://blog.mises.org/16319/the-origins-of-libert… . But I wrote a fairly systematic piece, and one more informed by knowledge of the actual law than some preceding ones because I was actually practicing law in that field. A few years later the Internet continued to grow in importance, and the IP issue could no longer be ignored by most people so my and others’ anti-IP ideas spread among libertarians because of the growing importance of this issue. At first I resisted being Mr. IP b/c as I said it’s not my favorite issue–to practice, or to write about. But I kept seeing a need to write and to be hones in the last few years there aer so many growing IP abuses and outrages that I have to comment on them. And to be honest I think the case against IP, once one really looks closely at it, is pretty clear, so it is pretty obvious to most thoughtful and principled (and Austrian-informed) libertarians. And I do think it’s probably now in the top 6 or so worst statist threats to liberty. So it’s not a trivial issue. see http://c4sif.org/2011/06/masnick-on-the-horrible-… . And we are one of the only groups actively opposing IP, from a principled and PRO-private property perspective, and the time is right to do this, so we must.
BTW Hoppe is against IP too. http://c4sif.org/2010/12/hoppe-on-intellectual-pr…. The Hoppe course will touch on IP but only a bit.
So, I hope you see why I write about IP as much as I do.
I agree, it is certainly an important issue, and you’ve made a lot of progress towards solving the problem from a libertarian perspective. The problem that I have is that I’m not quite convinced that a complete free-for-all is a just and ideal situation. Certainly people need to find a way to market their own ideas to make money off of them, but it’s too easy to think of circumstances where it benefits big business at the expense of the inventor.
From what I’ve heard, the guy that invented the calculator was from around here, and he paid Texas Instrument to manufacture it for him, but didn’t get IP protection for his ideas. TI snubbed him and became the TI we all know. I’m not quite sure what stops that story from being repeated in a truly libertarian society. I know the guy should have been more cautious with who he trusted and gotten everything in writing, but at some point, you have to trust *someone* to develop your ideas, or ask if they think it would work. My sense of justice tells me that TI did something criminal, but what law did they break in a libertarian society? They haven’t been physically aggressive.
I guess that’s my biggest problem with IP from a libertarian perspective . . . it doesn’t quite seem to satisfy my sense of justice.
Having questions is not an argument. Being uncertain, being confused, is not an argument.
Not clear what you mean by “free for all,” but it seems wanging this phrase out there as you did, is not an argument either.
Seriously?!? This is another reason I don’t like reading your stuff; in your comments you make almost no effort to understand what people are trying to say. I realize you’re a lawyer and therefore naturally combative about words, but you need to put that aside if you’re going to engage people and not push them away. I was showing that lack of IP can lead to instances that the average person instinctively feels are unjust. If you can show that this isn’t really the case, then I don’t have any further conscientious objections to your theory. I’m not willing to accept it without further consideration, but I think over the course of a few weeks I could become comfortable that I won’t find any more major objections.
“Free for all” in this instance means that a person can use information no matter how it is obtained.
I guess my big problem is when a company could undermine someone who has a great idea and is requesting their help to develop it. Presumably, there’s an implied contract to not develop the idea without crediting and compensating the inventor. But how do you make that contract explicit? Sign something that says “The stuff (which we don’t yet know what ‘stuff’ means, yet) we’re about to talk about will not be used for the next year without the expressed consent of X.”?? X could then claim that he talked about *anything.* Have a 2 part contract that if they sign the first part, they are obligated to explain the idea in a second part after having heard the idea?
Seriously?!? This is another reason I don’t like reading your stuff; in your comments you make almost no effort to understand what people are trying to say.
I do understand and did make an effort, and I was not impolite or incivil at all.
I am pointing out to you that use of fuzzy words is why your ideas are not making sense. It lead to equivocation and/or sloppy reasoning.
I realize you’re a lawyer and therefore naturally combative about words, but you need to put that aside if you’re going to engage people and not push them away.
I was not combative.
I was showing that lack of IP can lead to instances that the average person instinctively feels are unjust.
I don’t think you were showing it, but it was not a bad effort. The reason people thinks these cases are unjust is a combination of acquiescence in the status quo and susceptibility to statist propaganda, compounded by economic and political illiteracy.
“Free for all” in this instance means that a person can use information no matter how it is obtained.
Of course, socialists deride the free market as a free for all. As a free market proponent, I don’t take “free for all” as a critique, but as a compliment.
I guess my big problem is when a company could undermine someone who has a great idea and is requesting their help to develop it. Presumably, there’s an implied contract to not develop the idea without crediting and compensating the inventor. But how do you make that contract explicit? Sign something that says “The stuff (which we don’t yet know what ‘stuff’ means, yet) we’re about to talk about will not be used for the next year without the expressed consent of X.”?? X could then claim that he talked about *anything.* Have a 2 part contract that if they sign the first part, they are obligated to explain the idea in a second part after having heard the idea?
Reasonable questions but these are the questions an entrepreneur would ask. The fact that you have questions, as I said before, is not an argument for IP.
“I am pointing out to you that use of fuzzy words is why your ideas are not making sense. It lead to equivocation and/or sloppy reasoning. ”
It’s only sloppy thinkers like Socrates who sit and puzzle over things. Decisive thinkers like Lenin are always clear on what must be done!
Drigan:
The best way to see the damage caused by IP law is to look at industry that does not have IP law or look at an industry that began without IP law and then what happened when IP law was instituted.
The Fashion/clothing industry does not use IP law to “own” a new style or design of clothing. There is a TED video on this which I think best presents the case.
The software industry began without patent protection. It had enourmous progress in its early years, despite (or because of) the lack of patent protection. Once patents were allowed, and the government patent office was in charge, we began to see absurdities such as “one -click” buying.
Today large companies, which can afford the patent process, patent every conceivable idea and use this to deter competition. Open source groups are fighting back by creating their own war chest of patents – to fight off the large companies that patent such trivial ideas as license key tests which inform the user they can buy a license if the software detects that they’ve moved their program to another computer. That one might cost Microsoft half a billion. Once you get into the courts there’s no telling what you will get.
Yes, I agree that IP has hurt the IT industry. I really don’t have any defenses of IP; I think it’s *probably* always bad . . . but until I hear an explanation about my remaining objection to intellectual freedom, I can’t embrace it.
Somewhat off topic, but also related to censorship, and very annoying to me:
Since when have we had censorship on this site? I get a -1 on one of my dozens of posts and now my replies to Kinsella need to be approved by an admin? That system needs to change. I’m clearly not just trolling. Maybe if I had -5 on average for my postings.
I have a comment on the Hoppe’s speech at Mises Brasil. Hoppe says that the rules that he specified (self-ownership and aquiring property though homesteading or voluntary exchange) are the only rules we can use to avoid conflicts, while other sets of rules make conflicts permanent.
Now, Hoppe’s rules only effect in avoiding conflicts if everyone follows them. This is something he implicitly admits; he says that if these rules are universally respected, then there cease to be conflicts. Of course, if these rules are not respected by everyone, the conflicts still exist; if I don’t respect someone’s homestead and want to use a good he homesteaded, a conflict emerges that needs to be settled.
But this of course applies to every imaginable consistent set of rules. If they are respected by everyone, conflicts are avoided, if they’re not, conflicts arise. If the rules are, e.g., that every resource will be allocated by decision of a democratic council, or that I own a homesteaded resource for a week and then I have to pass it on to the first person I meet, or that I can’t lift my left hand unless someone orders me to, so that my self-ownership excludes the right to lift my left hand—then, if these rules are universally respected and followed, conflicts cease to exist.
I can see that Hoppe’s set of rules is the most efficient for prosperity, I just don’t agree with the notion that it’s the only set of rules that we can use to avoid conflicts. Although I’m aware that this is purely academical point and has no practical consequences to the theory, I’d like to have the theory put nice and clear. Is this maybe analysed more in depth in one of Hoppe’s books?
“But this of course applies to every imaginable consistent set of rules.”
Very good, Sonny. You’ve seen through the verbal mist about private property being “voluntary” and states being “coercive.” All sets of rules are “purely voluntary” to everyone who follows them voluntarily, and they are all coercive to those who don’t.
Hoppe is working together with german neo nazis and holocaust-deniers. enough said. those guys arent the ones youre supposed to support.
liberalism and totalitarism just dont fit together. Hoppe does not understand this. he welcomes every party that hates the state. in his logic, the enemies of his enemy must be his friend.
[From my Webnote series]
Related:
In Hans-Hermann Hoppe’s classic article In Defense of Extreme Rationalism: Thoughts on Donald McCloskey’s The Rhetoric of Economics, he has some very interesting observations about falsificationism and empiricism:
Popper would have us throw out any theory that is contradicted by any fact, which, if at all possible, would leave us virtually empty-handed, going nowhere. In recognizing the insoluble connection between theoretical knowledge (language) and actions, rationalism would instead deem such falsificationism, even if possible, as completely irrational. There is no situation conceivable in which it would be reasonable to throw away any theory—conceived of as a cognitive instrument of action—that had been successfully applied in a past situation but proves unsuccessful in a new application—unless one already had a more successful theory at hand. And to thus immunize a theory from experience is perfectly rational from the point of view of an actor. And it is just as rational for an actor to regard any two rivals, in their range of application overlapping theories t1 and t2 as incommensurable as long as there exists a single application in which t1 is more successful than t2 or vice versa. Only if t1 can be as successfully applied as t2 to every single instance to which t2 is applicable but still has more and different applications than t2 can it ever be rational to discard t2. To discard it any earlier, because of unsuccessful applications or because t1 could in some or even in most situations have been applied more successfully, would from the point of view of a knowing actor not be progress but retrogression. And even if t2 is rationally discarded, progress is not achieved by falsifying it, as t2 would actually have had some successful applications that could never possibly be nullified by anything (in the future). Instead, t1 would outcompete t2 in such a way that any further clinging to t2, though of course possible, would be possible only at the price of not being able to successfully do everything that an adherent of t1 could do who could successfully do as much and more than any proponent of t2.
On a related note, he also has some interesting comments about apriorism in the physical sciences: in his “On Praxeology and the Praxeological Foundation of Epistemology” (text at notes 60-62, and note 62; from Economic Science and the Austrian Method), which references Lorenzen, Dingler, Kambartel, et al., regarding an entire body of “protophysics” – [continue reading…]
Related:
Two favorite (and oft used) quotes by Spooner, both from No Treason No. VI: The Constitution of No Authority, the first, regarding the Constitution and its supporters:
there is not the slightest probability that the Constitution has a single bona fide supporter in the country. That is to say, there is not the slightest probability that there is a single man in the country, who both understands what the Constitution really is, and sincerely supports it for what it really is.
The ostensible supporters of the Constitution, like the ostensible supporters of most other governments, are made up of three classes, viz.: 1. Knaves, a numerous and active class, who see in the government an instrument which they can use for their own aggrandizement or wealth. 2. Dupes – a large class, no doubt – each of whom, because he is allowed one voice out of millions in deciding what he may do with his own person and his own property, and because he is permitted to have the same voice in robbing, enslaving, and murdering others, that others have in robbing, enslaving, and murdering himself, is stupid enough to imagine that he is a “free man,” a “sovereign”; that this is “a free government”; “a government of equal rights,” “the best government on earth,” and such like absurdities. 3. A class who have some appreciation of the evils of government, but either do not see how to get rid of them, or do not choose to so far sacrifice their private interests as to give themselves seriously and earnestly to the work of making a change.
Regarding the difference between common criminals like a highwayman and the state:
The fact is that the government, like a highwayman, says to a man: “Your money, or your life.” And many, if not most, taxes are paid under the compulsion of that threat.
The government does not, indeed, waylay a man in a lonely place, spring upon him from the roadside, and, holding a pistol to his head, proceed to rifle his pockets. But the robbery is none the less a robbery on that account; and it is far more dastardly and shameful.
The highwayman takes solely upon himself the responsibility, danger, and crime of his own act. He does not pretend that he has any rightful claim to your money, or that he intends to use it for your own benefit. He does not pretend to be anything but a robber. He has not acquired impudence enough to profess to be merely a “protector,” and that he takes men’s money against their will, merely to enable him to “protect” those infatuated travellers, who feel perfectly able to protect themselves, or do not appreciate his peculiar system of protection. He is too sensible a man to make such professions as these. Furthermore, having taken your money, he leaves you, as you wish him to do. He does not persist in following you on the road, against your will; assuming to be your rightful “sovereign,” on account of the “protection” he affords you. He does not keep “protecting” you, by commanding you to bow down and serve him; by requiring you to do this, and forbidding you to do that; by robbing you of more money as often as he finds it for his interest or pleasure to do so; and by branding you as a rebel, a traitor, and an enemy to your country, and shooting you down without mercy, if you dispute his authority, or resist his demands. He is too much of a gentleman to be guilty of such impostures, and insults, and villainies as these. In short, he does not, in addition to robbing you, attempt to make you either his dupe or his slave.
The proceedings of those robbers and murderers, who call themselves “the government,” are directly the opposite of these of the single highwayman.
In the first place, they do not, like him, make themselves individually known; or, consequently, take upon themselves personally the responsibility of their acts. On the contrary, they secretly (by secret ballot) designate some one of their number to commit the robbery in their behalf, while they keep themselves practically concealed. They say to the person thus designated:
Go to A_____ B_____, and say to him that “the government” has need of money to meet the expenses of protecting him and his property. If he presumes to say that he has never contracted with us to protect him, and that he wants none of our protection, say to him that that is our business, and not his; that we choose to protect him, whether he desires us to do so or not; and that we demand pay, too, for protecting him. If he dares to inquire who the individuals are, who have thus taken upon themselves the title of “the government,” and who assume to protect him, and demand payment of him, without his having ever made any contract with them, say to him that that, too, is our business, and not his; that we do not choose to make ourselves individually known to him; that we have secretly (by secret ballot) appointed you our agent to give him notice of our demands, and, if he complies with them, to give him, in our name, a receipt that will protect him against any similar demand for the present year. If he refuses to comply, seize and sell enough of his property to pay not only our demands, but all your own expenses and trouble beside. If he resists the seizure of his property, call upon the bystanders to help you (doubtless some of them will prove to be members of our band.) If, in defending his property, he should kill any of our band who are assisting you, capture him at all hazards; charge him (in one of our courts) with murder; convict him, and hang him. If he should call upon his neighbors, or any others who, like him, may be disposed to resist our demands, and they should come in large numbers to his assistance, cry out that they are all rebels and traitors; that “our country” is in danger; call upon the commander of our hired murderers; tell him to quell the rebellion and “save the country,” cost what it may. Tell him to kill all who resist, though they should be hundreds of thousands; and thus strike terror into all others similarly disposed. See that the work of murder is thoroughly done; that we may have no further trouble of this kind hereafter. When these traitors shall have thus been taught our strength and our determination, they will be good loyal citizens for many years, and pay their taxes without a why or a wherefore.
It is under such compulsion as this that taxes, so called, are paid. And how much proof the payment of taxes affords, that the people consent to “support the government,” it needs no further argument to show.
And see:
“it cannot reasonably be supposed that any one will voluntarily pay money to a “government,” for the purpose of securing its protection, unless he first make an explicit and purely voluntary contract with it for that purpose. It is perfectly evident, therefore, that neither such voting, nor such payment of taxes, as actually takes place, proves anybody’s consent, or obligation, to support the Constitution. Consequently we have no evidence at all that the Constitution is binding upon anybody, or that anybody is under any contract or obligation whatever to support it. And nobody is under any obligation to support it…. The constitution not only binds nobody now, but it never did bind anybody. It never bound anybody, because it was never agreed to by anybody in such a manner as to make it, on general principles of law and reason, binding upon him. It is a general principle of law and reason, that a written instrument binds no one until he has signed it. … The laws holds, and reason declares, that if a written instrument is not signed, the presumption must be that the party to be bound by it, did not choose to sign it, or to bind himself by it. . . . Inasmuch as the Constitution was never signed, nor agreed to, by anybody, as a contract, and therefore never bound anybody, and is now binding upon nobody; and is, moreover, such an one as no people can ever hereafter be expected to consent to, except as they may be forced to do so at the point of the bayonet, it is perhaps of no importance what its true legal meaning, as a contract, is. Nevertheless, the writer thinks it proper to say that, in his opinion, the Constitution is no such instrument as it has generally been assumed to be; but that by false interpretations, and naked usurpations, the government has been made in practice a very widely, and almost wholly, different thing from what the Constitution itself purports to authorize. He has heretofore written much, and could write much more, to prove that such is the truth. But whether the Constitution really be one thing, or another, this much is certain — that it has either authorized such a government as we have had, or has been powerless to prevent it. In either case, it is unfit to exist.”
Spooner, No Treason. No. VI. The Constitution of No Authority (1870)
Stephan Kinsella is a libertarian writer and retired patent attorney in Houston, Texas. He has published widely on various areas of libertarian legal theory and on legal topics such as intellectual property law and international law. His publications include Legal Foundations of a Free Society (Papinian Press, 2023), Against Intellectual Property (Mises Institute, 2008), International Investment, Political Risk, and Dispute Resolution: A Practitioner’s Guide (Oxford, 2020), and The Universal Principles of Liberty (2025).
My Failed Libertarian Speaking Hiatus; Memories of Mises Institute and Other Events, 1988–20192025
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