tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5204863782883637837.post1674684123982045931..comments2024-03-19T02:55:44.021-04:00Comments on Accepting Ignorance: Code_of_Laws AND ~Code_of_LawsAlrenoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11119846531341190283noreply@blogger.comBlogger5125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5204863782883637837.post-40589253810716738622009-12-15T16:24:16.340-05:002009-12-15T16:24:16.340-05:00I should make explicit that it's clear that th...I should make explicit that it's clear that the question has been answered; taxation is not theft. <br /><br />It may still be immoral, but theft is a legal concept within a legal framework, and all existing legal frameworks pre-suppose taxation of some form.Alrenoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11119846531341190283noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5204863782883637837.post-31233627636993405142009-12-15T14:55:16.427-05:002009-12-15T14:55:16.427-05:00Alright. I think you've successfully shown me ...Alright. I think you've successfully shown me I'm bad at reading code. The murder code really is better. Not good, but better. <br /><br /><i>"(not really anarcho-capitalism, under which there is no legal monopolies over territories)"</i><br /><br />Very well, then we can agree that anarcho-capitalism is not only unstable, but will collapse within a week or so. Upholding property rights always allows properties to accumulate. <br /><br />Perhaps this is why I don't really consider myself an anarcho-capitalist. I just have a thing for property rights and contracts.<br /><br /><i>(the awful problem of ex post forum shopping, for example, i.e. the plaintiff or prosecutor shopping for the judge who will screw the defendant the most)</i><br /><br />Things like this is why AC needs a limited trial run. It depends on the details. <br /><br />I don't want to go too far, though, as the whole point of AC is to provide a profit motive for someone else to work out the details for me. The problem is whether this situation is obtainable or not, as opposed to the question of what such a situation would appear to be if obtainable. <br /><br />That is, I interpret you to mean that profit motive is insufficient to drive organizations to produce outcomes their customers want. <br /><br />I have two responses. First, nobody has tried putting security under the profit motive to see if it can really work. If indeed traditions are computationally intractable, then the only way to surely determine this is simply to try it. <br /><br />Second, I have yet to see clearly explained, if the profit motive is corrupting, what do we currently give to our security providers that overrides the profit motive?<br /><br />I think my verbosity is about to get the better of me, though.<br /><br />But basically, since an individual would have to pay a court system for protection,* offending against that individual will bring the suspect into trial with that system. <br /><br />*(Or rent to a city which would, as we have now, employ a police force and judges.)<br /><br />In practise, I think the plaintiff's court would petition the accused's court for a release for detention. (I understand cell phone companies manage to use each other's networks, as well.)<br /><br />Put another way: plaintiff has contract with one court system for prosecution of wrongs. (So they don't have to do it themselves.) Court system has contract with separate court system, which has contract with defendant. The committed wrong transmits a contractual obligation to the defendant through this chain. <br /><br />The form looks different, but the actual result will most likely be very similar, because it's similar people solving a similar problem, just with different tools. (If it's exactly the same, it defeats the purpose of changing, though.) <br /><br />Before potentially committing an offence, (before doing business, or visiting) it would be wise to check that relations between your own justice subscription provider and your counterparty's have cordial relations. It is not entirely the responsibility of the system to prevent all abuses, simply because it cannot be. <br /><br />Alternatively, the court in question could be specified in writing beforehand and signed off on. It is not strictly necessary to subscribe to a tort system to do business, for example. (Though I think people would learn not to risk it.) <br /><br />Finally, for someone with no subscription to a security firm, there would be no protection against simply seizing the individual and essentially enslaving them. This would be immoral, but morals don't exactly enforce themselves - this is simply an incentive to not live off the grid, or not to offend if you do.Alrenoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11119846531341190283noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5204863782883637837.post-92105900074545071972009-12-13T04:22:03.389-05:002009-12-13T04:22:03.389-05:00There's no prohibition against killing in gene...There's no prohibition against killing in general. Killing by accident, for example, except under the narrow conditions where it is specified in the code, is not murder.<br /><br />Working out your city-state (not really anarcho-capitalism, under which there is no legal monopolies over territories) procedure may seem like "details", but I assure you the devil is in the details. There are even more devils if there are no legal monopolies over territories (the awful problem of ex post forum shopping, for example, i.e. the plaintiff or prosecutor shopping for the judge who will screw the defendant the most). I assure you nobody has ever obtained a very good grasp on these details. It would be very nice if somebody would try, but they haven't.<br /><br />My comparison to computer code is simply that reading it and reading code are both arts, professional kinds of knowledge that have to be learned to do it properly. Obviously they are not the same kind of code. Programmers have it easy to have it run exactly on the computer -- lawyers have to run it on judges. :-)nicknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5204863782883637837.post-59017797355034315892009-12-09T21:46:12.576-05:002009-12-09T21:46:12.576-05:00"don't let me discourage you."
I...<i>"don't let me discourage you."</i><br /><br />I'll let you in a secret: I fully expected to be wrong about this. <br /><br />On the other hand, I'd recommend tempering your happiness. I've yet to outwardly demonstrate more than passing interest. <br /><br /><i>"In (b)..."</i><br /><br />Ah, I see my mistake. For some reason I misinterpreted 'another.' <br /><br /><i>"meaning the definition (c) is another possible way to commit murder"</i><br /><br />And that is indeed how I'm reading it, which means it looks triply redundant. <br /><br />There's already a prohibition against killing in general, plus the prohibition against killing by accident, plus killing someone is automatically an unlawful object - notwithstanding the exceptions you mention below. <br /><br /><i>"Anarcho-capitalism doesn't avoid the problem of how to do this and reconcile it with the general prohibition against theft."</i><br /><br />To be allowed into a city, you sign a contract waiving your right against theft to those various property holders within the city. To be honest, when properly worked out, it's just a few details difference in procedure. Anarcho-capitalists who think the system would remove courts and the like simply lack imagination. <br /><br /><i>"Like reading computer code or engineering blueprints, it is an art."</i><br /><br />The art of reading computer code is qualitatively different.<br /><br />Doesn't this mean that if the art changes, the law would also change? When reading an engineering blueprint, this would just mean e.g. the resultant building would differ somewhat. <br /><br />With law, the changes would be a lot more problematic for me. <br /><br />This doesn't apply to computer code because there's an objective test to reading it right - you run the program and see what happens. However, like philosophy, the art of reading law <i>is</i> running the program. <br /><br />I believe you refer to this as wet code. For this code, neither the compiler nor the chipset instructions are fixed.Alrenoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11119846531341190283noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5204863782883637837.post-25309998429176204492009-12-08T20:10:58.751-05:002009-12-08T20:10:58.751-05:00I'm very happy to see folks dive into law, don...I'm very happy to see folks dive into law, don't let me discourage you. But legal code has to be read carefully. Like reading computer code or engineering blueprints, it is an art.<br /><br />In (b) above the first reference is to "a human being" and the second is to "another human being", so there is no contradiction. For example if you point the gun intending to shoot Alice and accidentally hit Bob instead, and kill him, it is still murder because of (b).<br /><br />If you look at how (a), (b), and (c) are joined, it is by "or", meaning the definition (c) is another possible way to commit murder, not a narrowing of the definition of (a) or (b) as you seem to be interpreting it.<br /><br />Writing legal code is hard and there are almost always ambiguities. When in doubt, lawyers look up precedents, long lines of cases applying the code to actual cases. You often know very little about how the code applies to your case until you've read the analogous precedents. In the case of theft via fraud, it's almost all based on precedent and not on the language of the code itself, for reasons you have discovered.<br /><br />"Without colour of right" is the out to cover legal procedure and taxation, even when done erroneously. To know more than that about what it means one must consult the other statutes and cases that define procedural confiscation and taxation. BTW, this language covers not just legal acts of government officials but also repo men, house foreclosures, and the like, so it's not just about government officials. In days of yore it would have covered a wide variety of political property rights that included rights to confiscate goods with proper procedure, for example to satisfy legal judgments of a private court. Anarcho-capitalism doesn't avoid the problem of how to do this and reconcile it with the general prohibition against theft.<br /><br />(Another bit of knowledge of the legal art: "general" means "a rule with exceptions", a description that applies to practically all legal rules).<br /><br />I highly encourage you to continue your legal studies by getting a first-year case book from the local law school's bookstore and reading it cover-to-cover, on a common-law subject like torts or property, to learn how the precedent system works and how to read cases, the two most important skills of law. After that you can dive into a code subject like criminal law or civil procedure, to learn the third important skill, how to read code. You can't read code very well without knowing the first two.<br /><br />Like I say, it is great to see people diving into actual law instead of just pontificating about politics.nicknoreply@blogger.com