Living without a government - do you think it would work?

Posted: Fri Dec 25, 2009 9:35 pm

invixxtus wrote:

For my criticism of your argument to be valid it is not necessary that you believe that governments are THE cause of ALL ignorance, but that they be, at least, a big cause of it. The reason you have given for there being a positive relationship between the involvement of the state and the level of religiosity is the notion that governments prop up ignorant people who would have to be smart and productive- thus not ignorant, thus not religious- in order to survive in a country without heavy state involvement. Clearly in the case of Afghanistan we have a population that has been without a functional government for quite some time. Moreover , they have been, by in large, without the aids of modernity, as you say. If anything this fact should make survival more difficult for ignorant people. We should expect, then, to see low levels of ignorant, religious people. The opposite is true. Your analysis is deeply flawed. Maybe the amount of state involvement is not related to levels of ignorance (at least not positively related, it would seem). Maybe ignorance is not the primary cause of religious belief.

First of all, yes, my claim is that states are causing a LOT of ignorance (if it was possible to put it into percent, I'd put it at around 30% - purely subjectively of course).
Secondly, it is also my claim that ignorance is the root cause of religion. If we knew "everything", we would understand that religious ceremonies of any kind are largely a waste of time and that there can be no such things as gods, etc. Religion can only be *believed* in so long as you don't actually *think* about the propositions that it makes.

Your claim that Afghanistan should be secular because it has been without a functional government - and that it should be even more secular because its people had to endure enormous hardships - is of course completely hilarious and has nothing to do with my thesis.

People have a hierarchy of basic needs. If the most basic needs aren't fulfilled, the rest also won't be.
The needs for safety, food, medicine, etc. are *obviously* more important than the needs for intellectual satisfaction, self-fulfilment and so on.

In other words, so long as you have a society that is poor, violent and undeveloped, you will never get rid of ignorance, because that is one of its smallest problems!

On the other hand, if you have a developed, healthy society *with* a state, it will never become completely secular so long as the state remains, because ignorance is being encouraged.

You will only get a truly secular society if it is both developed and does not have any form of government.

Posted: Fri Dec 25, 2009 11:35 pm

elusive_elf wrote:

hey ali, i appreciate you taking the time to address the issues i presented in my previous post, although at one point you did seem to be a bit condescending. no worries, i don't think that was your intention, and i take no offense.

Thanks. I assure you, that really wasn't my intention, but we sometimes can't avoid it in discussions ^^' ...

elusive_elf wrote:

as m.g. has stated in one of his post, humans have a tendency to group themselves and create affiliations. a likely component of our social instinct which eventually led to culture and our ability to accumulate knowledge with each generation. some groups are peaceful and some aren't. i thought invixxtus made a good point when he stated...

invixxtus wrote:

...it would seem that a stateless society would be unrealistic because it would always be susceptible to invasion by countries with central governments and standing armies.

without some type of government, what's to stop the non peaceful groups from taking land or resources from the peaceful, who in order to defends themselves, would have to fight back. wouldn't this essentially be a war?

Yes, but isn't it interesting how you have to concede that governments are the main (and I would argue only) reason why we have wars in order to make this argument XD ?
However, it IS a valid point. Even if we had a perfectly peaceful and functioning stateless society, it would be no good if some foreign government could just march in and take it over.
But the way to avoid that in fact isn't that hard.
You just make use of the same invention that keeps all other superpowers from attacking each other: the atomic bomb!

States never invade countries that have the potential to seriously harm them. They are cowardly in their nature, despite their flamboyant rhetorics... It they can make no profit, they won't act.

elusive_elf wrote:

in order for this to work wouldn't everyone in the world have to agree to this ideology?

This isn't an "ideology"... This is simply how human nature works. It is provable historically, empirically and logically.

elusive_elf wrote:

without taxes, how would public services be supported and maintained? perhaps through donations, but that would seem to require extreme benevolence on the part of many.

Well, that's a very common objection, but if you really think about it, it's a complete non-issue.
You have to keep in mind that productive societies are only possible if people specialize and share their goods and services with the rest.
Therefore, in order to "want" to share, you don't need to be benevolent, but *selfish*. If YOU want to have something, you have to give something back to OTHERS.
Because people *want* things, it is the reason why you can be absolutely certain that they will want to *give*.
Again, this is simply how human nature works, it's a testable and provable hypothesis.

elusive_elf wrote:

true, we don't have a utopian society with current and past governments, but that's not to says in the place of organized warfare we wouldn't have violence through chaotic anarchy without government.

Why? You could be right of course, but I can't think of how that would be possible. In the absence of a state, using coercion and violence is the most ineffecient and illogical thing to do, because you will be quickly banned from the society.
But perhaps you do have compelling arguments and I would certainly like to hear them.

elusive_elf wrote:

what's to keep the rogue defense force from simply looting and pillaging to get what they want? the civilians would have to take up arms and defend themselves. this would require leadership and a command structure, essentially, a type of government, which has the potential for expansion. it just seems to me, based on the current state of human nature, some type of government seems inevitable. also studies on our closest relatives, chimpanzees , show that our warlike nature may on some level be instinctual.

Well, here's why that wouldn't happen: remember that the defense forces would have to be "hired". In other words, they could only get arms and troops so long as they got paid.
If they decided to go against their bosses, they would have nobody to pay their checks!
In the absence of a government, it is logically completely impossible for any kind of organization to grow without the "agreement" of the rest of the society.
And when I say agreement, I of course mean that if you don't act in the interest of the society, you won't get the benefits that it offers and hence will never be able to grow.
But so long as you *do* have a state, even the most horrid manifestation of our nightmares may continue to exist so long as the state considers it to be a good idea to pay it with the money of the population.

elusive_elf wrote:

without this benevolent congruence, how do you deal with the hitlers, stalins, hussiens, those truly intent on monopolizing power at the expense of the people? true, our current democratic governments aren't flawless, but so far they are the best we have.

A stateless society is in essence nothing but a direct democracy. People will get what they want, even if it's a Stalin or a Hitler.
That's why I said before that the population isn't quite ready to govern itself. There need certain memes to be in place which currently are not widespread enough.
But once they are, reverting back to a government will appear just as ludicrous to us as going back to slavery, public stoning and similar such horrors.

elusive_elf wrote:

here you misquoted me, i didn't say that people aren't benevolent, that's a far too general statement. of course there's benevolent people in the world.

i'm one, and i get the impression that you are as well, although we're probably not saints Laughing

. my point, is unless this benevolence is mutual among all, there are going to be those that are going to try to amass power and wealth at the expense of others, any way they can.

No, no, it was of course not my intention to make you appear as if you only believed in the bad within humanity XD .
I simply tried to affirm that, yes, there is considerable "evil" present in us.

I would argue, though, that all these things could be almost eliminated if we had no governments, because people usually don't go bombing each other for reasons other than political or religious disagreements - which in my opinion are two sides of the same coin...

elusive_elf wrote:

it would seem to me instead of just abandoning government all together, that a more feasible approach would be to improve upon the best system currently available and go from there. i don't believe all politicians are liars and smoothtalkers. i think some of them really believe in the ideals they convey.

I agree, but unfortunately that is completely irrelevant. It's obviously a complex problem, but allow me to explain it this way:
Within a statist country, there are two basic elements:
1) the ruling party (the people who have the power to control others through force)
2) the party that is being ruled (the population, which is *not* allowed to control others through force)
All governmental systems come down to these basic two elements, hence, they are fundamentally all the same.
Now, if a government in its core was "moral", one could argue that it is sensible to try and improve upon our systems.
But unfortunately, governments are innately immoral.
Morality requires that a proposition should apply logically and consistently for all people.
But governments are built upon an innate moral double-standard. You have different rules for one class than for the other.
Because of this simple reality, all governing systems will always be problematic, no matter how much you may try to tweak them.

elusive_elf wrote:

it seems to me that america has had a few presidents that, although not perfect, had a genuine will to exemplify democracy to the best of their ability for the good of the people.

As I said, it really doesn't matter, because the corruption runs so deep that nobody can truly withstand it. The really scary thing is that we are so used to mediocrity within politics that we are happy to get the "lesser of two evils" and are content with every little bit of improvement we get. If the employees in a company were as incompetent and unable to make fast and sensible decisions as our political elite, whether in the US or Europe, the companies would have gone bankrupt within minutes (unless there was a government to bail them out, lol).
The real problem, though, is that the trend always keeps getting worse and never truly improves. The only reason why a country like the US has made it this far is because of its relatively free market which guarantees that there is always someone to tax...

elusive_elf wrote:

o.k., here's where the condescension comes into play. first of all, my understanding of psychology isn't so inaccurate, that i'm not aware that both environment and genetics both play a part in human behavior. second, your reference to the traits i mentioned being a result of some event in their past seems to be over simplifying the issue. obviously most people are going to have normal expressions of certain traits, but through education and proper socialization, learn to behave and act rationally according to societal standards, but there are those that seem to lack this ability.

not all sociopaths have a bad childhood or traumatic past. trying to redesign their environment without removing the biological cause would be in vain. and do you really think mental disorders and birth defects should just be casually accepted as a part of "human nature"? i'm certainly not suggesting "amputating" anyone, and i'm not saying that eugenics is the only answer, but given our current state of technology and its rapid increase, the ability for an unstable individual or individuals to do great harm, is also increasing.

I can certainly see your point better now, but I hope you would allow me to give my argument another try...

This is a complex issue of course and very hard to argue because we simply don't fully understand the human mind.
Nevertheless, I would like to try and make a logical argument as to why I would categorize things like birth defects, disorders, etc. as irrelevant for an argument against a self-governed society.

First of all, let's make sure that we agree on the basics:
-birth defects are very rare. Birth defects that cause people to be dangerous in any way are extraordinarily rare, in fact I've never heard of such a thing (but tell me if you know of such cases and how frequent they are)
-disorders are almost always caused through violence, abuse, etc., hence there are direct causes which can be taken care of. Disorders that have *no* environmental causes are extremely rare; again, I've never heard of such a thing, ever

So my point is - unless you have evidence of the contrary - that people practically never develop destructive traits unless there has been some direct cause for it in their history.

Even if there were a couple of such people, they could easily be found and taken care of (uh, I don't mean "killed" of course XD).
As for the rest, one would have to take care of the causes, and again, there would be little to no point in trying to get rid of the people that have developed the traits.
You have to remove the underlying cause of a sickness and not the symptoms if you want to truly "heal" the population (I've learned that from Dr. House, so it must be true XD ).

Another thing: Try and compare how many people are being killed by insane individuals, by gangs (which I would argue are direct products of government regulations) and by governments.
I think you will quickly see who truly are the masters of killing...

elusive_elf wrote:

imagine if hitler had the nuclear arsenal of present day u.s. or russia. surely it would behoove our species to take a more proactive approach to reproduction. this seems like a legitimate issue for contemplation, especially considering overpopulation and the fact that due to medical advancement, we have removed some of the evolutionary pressure on our species. an ethical eugenics program would seem like a humane way to strengthen our species and reduce the suffering of natural selection.

Well, either that, or we could advance to self-governance and thus ensure that appropriate, natural evolutionary pressures get back into place and no tyrants ever get the chance to rise to power.
The problem with your approach is that it requires a government to exist in order to decide who basically gets to live and who gets to die. If you think that they won't *royally* abuse such kind of a program, you must have not been paying attention when W. was in charge...
But perhaps you can think of ways how to ensure that it won't be abused?

elusive_elf wrote:

some might argue that some governments do this intentionally through their understanding of human nature.

Which would be even worse, so yeah...

elusive_elf wrote:

lol, dude, you make good arguments, but i'm still not convinced. Smile

Thanks... well, let's keep it up. There can be only one truth and I would bow down to anyone who can demonstrate to possess it =D .
Let me also tell you that I *enormously* appreciate your participation. You make great points and questions and manage to keep your cool even when someone like me gets snotty XD ! Kuddos for that!!

Posted: Sat Dec 26, 2009 12:15 am

I haven't read the entire thread beyond my last post, but I found this interesting on a brief read through.

AliTheBandit wrote:

Even if we had a perfectly peaceful and functioning stateless society, it would be no good if some foreign government could just march in and take it over.

If we had a peaceful, functioning, stateless society there would be no human "governments" that could march in a take over. The only way it could work is if humanity as a near whole gave up the idea of nationalism and rejected the idea of state and country, otherwise what we'd end up with is a group of stateless states surrounded by government ran states, which would probably be an untenable situation much the same as what we are currently experiencing.

Posted: Sat Dec 26, 2009 11:42 am

MockingGods wrote:

I haven't read the entire thread beyond my last post, but I found this interesting on a brief read through.

AliTheBandit wrote:

Even if we had a perfectly peaceful and functioning stateless society, it would be no good if some foreign government could just march in and take it over.

If we had a peaceful, functioning, stateless society there would be no human "governments" that could march in a take over. The only way it could work is if humanity as a near whole gave up the idea of nationalism and rejected the idea of state and country, otherwise what we'd end up with is a group of stateless states surrounded by government ran states, which would probably be an untenable situation much the same as what we are currently experiencing.

I agree. "Getting rid" of states can only work once the majority of all humans understand that governments are just as immoral as slavery was...

Newbie Joined: Nov 07, 2009 Posts: 10

Power corrupts...
Absolute power, corrupts, absolutely...!

The problem with a self governed society lies in the basic character of human nature.

The less superior will always determine that their needs can be met by electing or appointing "leaders" who are to to regulate the inferior and displeasing aspects of society (creating law enforcement and a body who is meant to maintain the status quo...) And the people who choose to contribute less to the well being of the society, as a whole, will be more than willing to pay someone else do their portion of the work... furthering the sepperation of class... (the distinction between the elite and workers will be established...)

Until, humans decide that "all Men (and women) are created equal..." societies will always segregate toward the "superior and inferior" mentality of a class structure. And, from the need to regulate social needs, some form of government will emerge...

Posted: Sun Jan 31, 2010 8:02 pm

GateWatch wrote:

Until, humans decide that "all Men (and women) are created equal..."

Well said GateWatch... and welcome to the forums. Very Happy

The problem of course is our current ideas of economics do not promote equality; I fear it's actually quite the opposite.

The Learned Joined: Jan 11, 2008 Posts: 109

invixxtus wrote:

FMJ, I agree with most everything you wrote, especially what I quoted above. That said though could life in a stateless society be any better. It seems to be a fact of human nature that whenever you have a large group of people and finite resources you will have a power vacuum and if there is a power vacuum then the power vacuum will be filled, either by a religious regime, a dictatorship, or by democratically elected representatives. The last choice seems best but it requires a system of government. And you seem to be telling us that this type of system must inevitably slip into one of the other two choices, or something worse.

Well I do believe democracy is impossible and that society cannot act, or society really has no will. Will is contained in the individual and while we are socialized (imbued with cultural information, or imprinted with information necessary for survival) this abstract entity called society doesn’t make decisions itself.

I think government is the archaic residue of tribalism that we have yet to shake off and because we demand order in society and force works to restrict competitive outcomes government emerges as the primary supplier or order and maintainer of public goods. I believe the bigger it gets the more inefficient and exploitative it gets. It manages to thrive bcs exit costs are still high.

invixxtus wrote:

Also it would seem that a stateless society would be unrealistic because it would always be susceptible to invasion by countries with central governments and standing armies.

Also we exist in a global anarchy. There is no supervening global authority over the planet and yet America does not invade Switzerland. Also America’s will (if there is such a thing) is often rejected by powerful and weak nations e.g. Vietnam, Somalia, China, Russia.

Also having a monopoly on force over a geographic area prevents other competitors from providing external defense. We already see private armies emerging like Blackwater, and intelligence agencies like Stratfor. Also much military equipment is created by private entities like Lockheed Martin, or Sarcos Raytheon. Even the communist employed private entities like Automatic Kalashnikov and Sikorsky.

I think private entities can provide defense and do it cheaper than the state that often overpays because the state is using other people’s money. This results in 700 dollar toilet seats or paying 1 million for 2 washers to secure a bolt. Ideally I think this would make a private army more effective bcs they wouldn’t have perversities in cost and would be able to get more out of their resources then a publically provided army.

Also a publically run military might be more likely to engage in aggression because its commanding elements don’t realize the cost of war like it’s soldiers. This would be adverse selection and would economically weaken the nation that is constantly at war.

MockingGods wrote:

The problem of course is our current ideas of economics do not promote equality; I fear it's actually quite the opposite.

I’m not sure why economics should promote equality? People do not provide equal value to society. Some have very useful skills others do not. Others have very useful information, others posses information that is possibly only useful to a small few in the social order. If those with valuable skills or information are denied subjectively adequate compensation for those assets then why should they deploy them? In fact what is even more clear is when you disrupt the price structure your devaluing highly valuable information. Those wages are signals that represent a need for those services or information. By setting a neurologists salary lower then a market clearing rate you are sending a signal into the market to produce fewer neurologists or that neurologists are consuming to many resources that are needed elsewhere for things other then neurology. Neurologists must now economize their services, sacrificing equipment or expertise or something.

What could be easily argued is your fostering inequality if you expect person A to serve others in society to an extreme degree while getting compensated the same as person B who serves others to society to a marginally reduced degree.

The only way for economics to be purely egalitarian is to return to a pastoral or hunter gatherer existence, where life-expectancies where fewer than 35 years.

It is obvious poverty has a positive supply elasticity which results in “need” becoming an economic output. Human’s will use lack of foresight and incompetence to actually get things from other people(Szasz). The Peltzman effect argues when you reduce the cost of failure or injury you will get more behavior that results in this.

Also there is a structural inconsistency in the welfare state. Democracy allows you to redistribute income to yourself from somebody else in society. However the liberal state allows you to decide how you will provide value to society or what amount you will provide. So I’m free to give myself somebody else’s money yet also free to decide how much value I will contribute to society. Even if you can provide tremendous value to society your free not to do so. Is it any wonder why the NHS system in Great Britain has fewer and fewer indigenous Dr’s and more Dr’s from 3rd world countries. Society expects Dr’s to produce value at a discounted rate, evidence of schizophrenia in democracy.
One thing I can be sure of though, having a state is antagonistic to fostering equality.

Just Arrived Joined: Jul 21, 2010 Posts: 1

Hello. I just dropped in here.

I don't think an anarchist revolution is possible. You can't force anarchy on people like you can a government because coercion is the MO of government.

However, I'd like to see an anarchist Evolution. The transition has to be a voluntary choice by every individual that wants to live free. People have to voluntarily choose to not use violence to solve social problems. We do this every day. Despite the ever expanding size and reach of government (and the corporations that are protected by the government) many of our choices and interactions are still voluntary and free. Right?

Here within the geographical boundary referred to as the "United States", government is claimed to operate with consent of the governed. I've never expressed consent. I've never signed the Constitution or voted for a winning representative. Why am I obligated to follow their rules or pay for their 'services'? What function of government is so important that you personally would go to your neighbors house and forcibly extract the required funds?

When is violence is an acceptable way of solving social problems?

Posted: Thu Jul 22, 2010 8:17 pm

Quote:

I’m not sure why economics should promote equality?

Perhaps that's why we need a non-economic system, if that's even possible.

Quote:

People do not provide equal value to society.

I agree

Quote:

Some have very useful skills others do not.

Now here's the big question. Could everyone be trained to have equal, useful skills?

Posted: Thu Jul 22, 2010 8:35 pm

Welcome to the forums WreadeRong Very Happy

WreadeRong wrote:

Hello. I just dropped in here.

I don't think an anarchist revolution is possible. You can't force anarchy on people like you can a government because coercion is the MO of government.

However, I'd like to see an anarchist Evolution. The transition has to be a voluntary choice by every individual that wants to live free. People have to voluntarily choose to not use violence to solve social problems. We do this every day. Despite the ever expanding size and reach of government (and the corporations that are protected by the government) many of our choices and interactions are still voluntary and free. Right?

Here within the geographical boundary referred to as the "United States", government is claimed to operate with consent of the governed. I've never expressed consent. I've never signed the Constitution or voted for a winning representative. Why am I obligated to follow their rules or pay for their 'services'? What function of government is so important that you personally would go to your neighbors house and forcibly extract the required funds?

You've written some interesting ideas here. It's sounds like you'd like to live without government and at times, I've expressed similar thoughts. But what would it mean to live without government? How would we come to consensus on which roads will be built, which fires will be put out, which social actions are inhibited and how? I believe I'd like to live without nationalism/patriotism, but am still having problems with how exactly we'd organize 7 billion people without some type of overarching governance. This is a difficult conundrum.

Quote:

When is violence is an acceptable way of solving social problems?

The problem is that violence is conditionally acceptable in human culture, not that I necessarily agree it should be.

Posted: Mon Jul 26, 2010 4:39 pm

WreadeRong wrote:

Here within the geographical boundary referred to as the "United States", government is claimed to operate with consent of the governed. I've never expressed consent. I've never signed the Constitution or voted for a winning representative. Why am I obligated to follow their rules or pay for their 'services'? What function of government is so important that you personally would go to your neighbors house and forcibly extract the required funds?

Funny enough, we are having the exact opposite thing happening here in Canada.
Until recently, one in every seven tax forms have been delivered with a "long census form" for the individual to complete under power of lawful confinement. I have had it delivered twice in the past eighteen years or so. It is easy to fill out, and collect information about race, religion, etc. for the national stats office. This private info is separated from your identity, but I forget now how they do that.

Our current prime minister has given many indications that he is a libertarian ideologue. His methods lean toward the autocratic. This past month he has opted to make the long-form census voluntary – starting in 2011 – rendering it a much less accurate data-collection tool (ie. you only get information from the kind of people who voluntarily fill out long written polls). Public reaction to this has been furious! No one can do their jobs without accurate information to act on. No one can make accurate predictions to aid the poor and needy. Etc. It's a funny thing that one nation should scream for less government involvement, the other for it. Perhaps we are just a contrary animal, we human beings.

The anarchist viewpoint is not a popular one these days, it would seem for good reason. We manufacture, hire, and pay our governments to care for our nation, and lead and organize us so that we do not spend our lives doing this enormous task. Imagine one thousand anarchists trying to organize a picnic! What a babel! So despite my wishes and tendencies to steer away from systems of conformity and irresponsible inaction, I say let us use our politicians like we would any other tool. If they choose to violate their social contract – if they don't fulfil the requirements of their job posting, then we should fire the lazy S.O.B.s.

I short, I am agreeing with MG's position, and I echo that it is patriotism and nationalism which serves as a blind for demagogues. We live in a time wherein people have lost connection with the social contract, and voting carnivals have become mere popularity contests. The prospect is frightening, yet we live in its midst.


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