So if someone decided to buy up all the land around my house, then told me that if i encroached upon their private property i would be shot, what could i do?
Similarly, what if for some reason i no longer had any money to pay the toll, would i be unable to travel across the country to either work or the grocery store? What would my options be? Would you be made to pay to walk down a sidewalk? What if i wanted to visit my relatives in the nearest city but couldn't afford it? Would this not be restricting my freedom?
I have read your exchanges. I should have done that first. Sorry for the trigger-happy response. I got too eager to respond to what I already read. I have tried to re-write my thoughts below but they aren’t as well thought-out as I initially thought they were. Chaos Theory by Robert Murphy is a book that goes more in depth on private courts/insurance companies.
I think the subjectivity of how to defend the property in question changes with the situation.
Ok, so we agree that “trespassing” is not the same in every instance, and thus it would be based upon a fallacy to force a broad law on people that says “You may use reasonable force to get them off of your property, but you can't kill them.”
I do mention the word reasonable, which is different under different circumstances. The example you gave is an appropriate circumstance under which the term "reasonable" would come into play. Is there a history of flag-hangers murdering the people? And so on. … I myself am a bit unclear on this and would like to know how a system of appeals c/would work in AnCap (for example, going to another private court).
I do mention the word reasonable, which is different under different circumstances. The example you gave is an appropriate circumstance under which the term "reasonable" would come into play. Is there a history of flag-hangers murdering the people? And so on.
… I myself am a bit unclear on this and would like to know how a system of appeals c/would work in AnCap (for example, going to another private court).
I tried to re-write the example below without the mistakes/vagueness it had before. The problem (one that you have both brought up) is: who defines “reasonable”? If you have a state-run law system that is funded via taxes and applies to everyone whether they like it or not, the state will define “reasonable.” But it’s a clear violation of the NAP. So let’s start to think about how it might work in the absence of a state. I’m not claiming to be an expert in this, but the idea of a privately run system of courts and insurance companies sounds very feasible to me now, and one of the ways I understand it is in the context of the example below.
Let’s consider a more specific “flagpole hanger” situation. A 60 year old woman is hanging on the flagpole outside the apartment of an NFL linebacker and expresses that she wants to slide down the pole into the window and walk out the front door. Instead, the NFL linebacker takes a firearm and shoots the woman. For simplicity, let’s assume this is all caught on video camera.
Government court system:
In the government-run court system, the government will go through their process to find out who did what “reasonably.” They may come to the conclusion that the NFL linebacker acted “unreasonably.” Then they will try to determine who is “rightfully” owed what, and who will be forced to pay what damages and/or go to which prison.
Private court solution:
Here is my insight as to how it would work without a government monopoly over the law. It’s not completely thought out and does not explain certain contingencies, but I think this could give you a first indication as to how it might work better than a government court system.
Supposing that there is no state, let’s assume the NFL linebacker entered into an agreement with an insurance company, call it Prudential. The agreement essentially says that Prudential will underwrite (vouch for) the NFL linebacker for certain liabilities/wrongdoings, up to certain amounts, under certain circumstances. The agreement would be very detailed, but of course we can assume that it does not have the hypothetical “flagpole hanger” situation written out as part of the agreement.
Now, after the “flagpole hanger” incident, the husband of the 60 year old woman who was shot by the NFL linebacker wants to receive monetary damages for what has happened. Let’s assume he and his wife have an agreement with a different insurance company, call it Metropolitan. He would contact Metropolitan and tell them that he “claims” a certain dollar amount for this incident. If it is determined from his agreement with Metropolitan that he is “covered” for a certain dollar amount under a situation like this, Metropolitan will contact Prudential and ask for that dollar amount in monetary damages from Prudential. Based on previous agreements between Prudential and Metropolitan, Prudential will analyze the situation and will pay Metropolitan the damages. Metropolitan will give the damages to the husband of the 60 year old woman.
Prudential will now re-examine the NFL linebacker as a client. They may raise his premiums, they may drop him as a client, they may rewrite his agreement, they may offer him a new agreement contingent upon his entering a correction facility for a certain period of time, etc.
The point I was trying to make earlier is that if Prudential refuses to pay the damages to Metropolitan, i.e. own up to previous agreements, other individuals and insurance companies will be less likely to do business with Prudential in the future. It will be difficult for Prudential to stay in business at all if they continue to build a track record like this.
This situation with private insurance companies is in agreement with the NAP. Government law and court systems are not.
Now, I’m sure it seems like I have taken a ton of things for granted, and for simplicity in this example, I have. I’m guessing the first reaction is “You don’t take into account how self-interested people are. Not everyone will behave in such a reasonable way.” And I think on the surface it seems like a valid concern. We could further explore the consequences of Prudential refusing to give monetary damages to Metropolitan. Or we could explore the consequences of Prudential refusing to work with/acknowledge Metropolitan at all, or the consequences of one of the individuals not having an insurance underwriter. But all that my be better addressed in previous or separate threads. But before even exploring those consequences it would go a long way for us to ask why those things were happening in the first place.
Either way, my response to those claims about self-interest is that I agree that people are always self-interested, however, I draw a different conclusion. I think that, because people are so self-interested, it is crazy to give them the power of a government official, who gets funding via force and is in a position to make very important decisions that affect other people’s lives without their consent. People do not become less self-interested upon becoming government officials. I think it is more logical to let self-interest (i.e. profit, the free market, individuals making their own choices for themselves) be the guide for individual behavior, rather than orders from a government official or system of government officials. To the person who says to me that private courts will not work because of human self-interest, and proposes a government court system as the solution, I say that it is in fact his conclusion which does not take into account the self-interest which is inherent in all individuals.
Also, defenders of government court systems typically fall victim to the nirvana fallacy, which would say that just because you can imagine something imperfect in a private court system, it does not mean that the government court system is therefore better. Comparing one of the concepts to perfection doesn’t get you anywhere. You must compare them to each other. And the more you compare private court solutions to government court systems, I think you will see that private court solutions are better than government court systems for the same reasons why private grocery stores, schools, hospitals, and post offices are better than government-run grocery stores, schools, hospitals, and post offices. Chaos Theory by Robert Murphy is a book that goes more in depth on this.
“You may use reasonable force to get them off of your property, but you can't kill them.”
I agree that this is unacceptable. Drop the last clause and you're good: “You may use reasonable force to get them off of your property"
I like your insurance example.
To the person who says to me that private courts will not work because of human self-interest, and proposes a government court system as the solution, I say that it is in fact his conclusion which does not take into account the self-interest which is inherent in all individuals.
In fact, self-interest is also pretty predictable, which is good. Furthermore, the court system today works not because there is some "law of phyics" in the constitution which says that it will work. It works because 1) the judges view themselves as the knights of justice and thus try to act unbiased 2) the "customers" believe in the justice system. Thus, we see that the whole situation now works on psychology anyway and that there are no black and white rules that the judges invariably follow.
nirvana fallacy
Accusations of nirvana in the argument of state vs. AnCap is always dubious to me (besides in the NAP sense), as nirvana addresses practical concerns which are essentially known in the state, while no one actually knows what AnCap would look like.
But yes, I agree with you. And don't worry, I also sometimes don't read the whooole thread (like in the emergence AnCap and pro-life threads). But good that you went back later and re-read it.
I'd like to say that I think the original example constitutes a form of imprisonment. This would be a infringement on your basic liberties and is agression against you. A prison isn't a prison if you can leave, so you must be able to get through. Most importantly this example is bad because it is ridiculously unlikely to happen. It is important to show how these hypotheticals are very unlikely. It's not as if this is a major problem.
I also only think it is unreasonable to shoot a treaspasser unless there is reason to believe the treaspasser is dangerous. If someone comes on your propety waving a weapon of their own, then yes, shoot the intruder.
A road toll, well you have to at least pay for fuel and your vehicle anyway. It's an odd question. You could ask a similar question today. What if you have no money to get transport to somewhere you want to go now? Often people ask for favors and it works most of the time.
What if you have no money to get transport to somewhere you want to go now? Often people ask for favors and it works most of the time.
You can always just walk there on public roads, though.