Fisking, Economist by M.S.

I think the major failure of this article (HT) is that it does not explain why liberals feel taxation is just, though it appears M.S. thinks it has been explained.

"First, liberals think of taxation as paying one's fair share for the collective goods that make society feasible."

Error one: society requires collective goods. Indeed, the 'collective' status of these good is exactly due to power grabs by a particular group.

"Payment for those goods cannot be left voluntary, as ultimately everyone would welch."

If indeed society needs these things, most would learn not to welch, once they saw the dire results. The problem would be solved - the solution does not need to be imposed by a particular group.

"Not paying taxes means violating your obligations as a citizen"

Error two. I cannot have any obligations I haven't explicitly agreed to. If it were kosher to impose obligations on someone else...well, then I'd immediately impose the obligation on everyone else to stop imposing obligations. Oops.

"How do we know who nicked whose lawn gnome? It's always subject to dispute."

The rabbit hole goes deep here. Estimated errors: three through ten.

"If the case comes to trial, it is the state that will adjudicate the rival claims and impose a decision on the parties. That exercise of state authority feels just as coercive"

I think the heart of the error is here. M.S. simply assumes the state is legitimate, and then concludes that its judgments are legitimate. As M.S. is attempting to debate a libertarian, this is straightforward question-begging.

M.S. knows or should have known about the circular reasoning: look at the clarity and straightforward argument in the paragraph above. Though erroneous, the mistakes are understandable. Compare the paragraph now under scrutiny, which is a grab bag of misdirection. Individually, I largely agree with the statements and implied arguments, but they do not support each other. M.S. is either muddying the water deliberately, or should have recognized that their thinking is muddled and aborted.

I think this is an ignorance situation, based on;

"An attempt [...] to delegitimise the exercise of state authority"

M.S. apparently has trouble consciously accepting the idea that libertarians do not find the state legitimate.

"The existence of the state involves a certain level of coercion to enforce the law."

Error eleven. 'Coercion' has clearly been defined differently by Wilkinson than by M.S. If M.S. wishes libertarians to use his definition, they should define it explicitly and defend that definition. Otherwise, it is fair to demand - since M.S. is attempting to communicate with libertarians - that M.S. understand and use the libertarian definition of 'coercion.'

Since M.S. is unconsciously but deliberately muddying the waters, this is probably unconscious but deliberate equivocation.

"But the existence of the state is a good thing, both because it provides the infrastructure of a prosperous, safe and fair society, and because it enforces property claims such as deciding who has stolen whose lawn gnome."

Error twelve. Very funny. I wonder if M.S. feels they have actually defended these positions? Effectively they are either unadorned tribal signalling or merely taunts.

"It makes me happy to see the state providing a decent education to kids whose parents can't afford to buy them one."

Errors thirteen and fourteen. Tribal signalling. What you feel is not an argument, and should not convince anyone of anything. Also, M.S. thinks the state provides a decent education, which is a sickeningly bad mistake. Those are children you're sacrificing to uphold your false beliefs, M.S. Helpless children.

"It makes me happy to see the state administer justice in a fair and procedurally sound fashion."

Errors fifteen and sixteen. M.S. should not feel happy very often - though that does not seem to be what they're implying. In this case, M.S. is signalling their tribe and supporting criminals against their victims.

"It makes me happy to see the state build zoos."

Error seventeen. If feelings were arguments, then it makes me feel sad when a state wastes resources on building zoos that either the market could provide, or won't only because it's wasteful. Our 'arguments' cancel and M.S. would have to start learning to debate.

"And yeah, we all have to pay our taxes for these things to happen."

A repeat error, plus error eighteen. We all have to pay our taxes to torture children, support criminals, and waste money on zoos? How is this supposed to convince anyone who isn't already in the tribe that agrees?

This is so terrible I'm going to attack it twice.

"But I feel that a broad libertarian claim that "taxation is coercive" is an attempt to legitimise refusal to play by the rules"

Though the liberal acceptance of taxes is not explained, I think M.S. provides enough material to derive an explanation.

We all have to pay our taxes, so that 'these things' can happen. 'These things' are M.S. feeling good. So pay your taxes so that M.S. can feel good. That's it. That's the actual core of M.S's motivation.

There's a second, closely related wrapping of playing by the rules - that is, obeying M.S's tribal norms. While certainly you can voluntarily enter that tribe, and thus agree to and be bound by its norms...it would appear that M.S. cannot provide a single argument why anyone outside this tribe would find adopting these norms effective.

So why does the liberal tribe have this norm? Simple: it's their tax apparatus. They created it, they control it, and they have the benefits from it, such as feeling good. Of course they're going to declare it morally normative. Unfortunately, their attempts defend it logically merely highlight how the system simply does not benefit other tribes.

And, due to the coercive nature of the tax system, it cannot survive without preying on other tribes, which is why liberals see attempts to delegitimize it as a threat. Let me not repeat M.S's error, and define coercion: this norm is coercive precisely because it cannot survive if it were restricted to the tribe. Compare Christian communion; even if there were only one Christian, taking communion would work just fine, and be stable, as a norm. If there were only one liberal, taxation would be pointless, and would be dropped.

It is this point which shows so clearly how society could survive without 'collective' goods. Taxation is pointless unless it takes from one to give to another. If indeed taxes were to pay for roads, the road tax could be replaced by a road bill with absolutely no difference in effective outcome, but a huge difference in morality. Instead of being jailed when I decline a road tax, I would simply be barred from roads when I decline my road bill.

That M.S. declined to mention redistribution does help wonderfully to clarify this point. Unfortunately, it also clinches the inherently predatory, coercive nature of taxation. You, dear reader, I, and M.S. all know that M.S. would never accept a road bill replacing all road taxes. But since the road bill changes nothing but the coercion, it must be the coercion that M.S. values.

QED

Troubling Charity

Chappell has some good points to make about charity.

But...is there a charity that gives out responsibility and initiative? Is there a charity that people would give to if they couldn't tell anyone else that they gave to it? Is there a charity that willfully self-destructs by trying to solve the underlying cause, rather than treating symptoms?

The actual underlying fact is that I can't feel good about giving to any charity I know, which makes me wonder if a product model (warm fuzzies) might be optimal for charities, rather than my naive former understanding. (See also: lotteries. They sell dreams, not odds at cash.)

Having said that explicitly, it makes my former analysis seem so incidental...(Below; possible rationalization warning)

That first one is my biggie. If you're truly committed to utilitarian stranger-welfare ends, in the long term, then the current underclasses will have to support themselves, partly because charity is capricious and unstable, and partly because humans crave independence. Under what conditions is it better to start learning responsibility at a later point than right now?

Oops You Exist

I was thinking about error, and trying to pin down my intuitions on how often humans have succeeded at Y by getting X wrong, when I realized that, you know, natural selection.
Humans per se are just really really really bad non-nuclear mono-cellular proto-life. Literally, physics took a cell, tried to copy it, made a crapton of errors, and ended up with the human species.
Uh...oops you exist.

Just think about that next time you're embarrassed about making a mistake.

Open Season

I don't mind off-topic posts. I sincerely can't see how they're harmful.

Indeed, I'm about to encourage them. This post has no topic. All comments are therefore offtopic. Post anyway!

Here's mine:

All comments are emailed to me, so I don't miss any.

RSS feeds are the reason I don't see any necessity to post regularly, though I will perhaps make the attempt at some point.

I can be a selfish bastard. I'd prefer not to post my email, but you can ask me to email you and I will. Spam filters are pretty good these days...but the best spam filter is just not to have a public email. On the other hand I can easily post and then delete my email, and then nobody has to have it out there publicly (for long).

I wonder if there's anyone who knows in detail the pros and cons of posting their email. It seems to just be the thing to do, without any thought either way.

Earthquake vs. Evolution

This sort of thing (HT) is actually quite a challenge to evolution. Imagine what a species has to go through to select for earthquake detection: either most individuals that can't detect earthquakes have to die, or else the detectors have to breed disproportionately. With the reliability these toads display, the faculty would have to be selected for extremely strongly - earthquakes massacring toads over and over or somehow causing a huge offspring disparity over several generations.

Both are problematic. Toads are small, thus light and can take to the water. An earthquake doesn't have much purchase on particular individuals. Their response to the quake actually takes them away from spawning, so I have a hard time imagining the earthquake-dodging toads breed a great deal more.

Secondly, every generation without an earthquake is going to damage to earthquake-detecting genes. Genetic drift will reliably erode them. Except for places with very frequent shocks like the San Andreas fault, the ability should die out long before it is put to use.

What all this adds up to is that toads are dodging earthquakes without ever having been selected to dodge earthquakes.

A word on anecdotal evidence. It's still evidence. Don't ignore evidence because it's unfashionable.

Factually Incorrect, But What Is the Intuition Getting At?

I have been irritated. Luckily, I have a blog.

""Deductively, we can assert that either Dr. Fukino is lying, or she is telling the truth"
Elizabeth Loftus disagrees. Yet again, philosophy fails to contribute."

No, this is a failure to understand philosophy. Predictably, from someone who thinks that philosophy fails to contribute. The belief obscures any evidence to the contrary, because philosophy is run on the wetware - you need to take philosophy seriously enough to install the programs before you can accurately evaluate its statements.

Either Fukino thinks she's seen a birth certificate, or not. Whether she has actually seen a legitimate document, or used her hypocrisy circuits to invent a memory of such, is quite irrelevant to whether she is lying or not.[1]

Would this small modification have helped?

"Therefore, B.H. Obama and [or] his associates [think they] are actively withholding this historical document (which should not be confused with a database printout on fancy paper) from the public in the face of substantial public interest. Remember, this is a best-case scenario."

I don't think so; I made this change automatically, as part of interpreting writings charitably, but perhaps this is a specialized skill which is more difficult than I realize.


I think there's something more to these anti-philosophy charades (I see them everywhere) that I don't fully understand. The issue of being factually incorrect is blinding me. I suspect that the situation is somewhat symmetrical - they don't understand philosophy, and I don't understand what they're finding objectionable in philosophy. Any ideas would be appreciated.


I should also mention that several commenters suggested that Obama is withholding on purpose. He's already president, so fait accompli, and a lot of his opponents are wasting time with this dead end. A sign of utter unscrupulousness, if so, but pure win for him, strategically.

[1] For the record I don't care either way. Citizenship is just a contrived legal hurdle, the real question is who should be president, for the good of the country, and the real answer is no one.

King and Country Debate

I was researching the general field of debate when I came across "world's most prestigious debating society" and its famous debate.

My prior position is that debating societies reliably disappoint me. However, of the set of all things which at one point disappointed me, I have come to find value in many of them after more thoroughly investigation. Nevertheless, I was confident that Oxford Union would disappoint me.

Soon, I was reading that,

"It is no mere coincidence that the only country fighting for the cause of peace, Soviet Russia, is the country that has rid itself of the war-mongering clique."

Communism: for when you just aren't prestigious enough! Though the resemblance to anarchist rhetoric should not be denied,[1] one should also not deny the how hilariously wrong the dove side already is. Fighting for peace? No war-mongering clique? I can guess that Kenelm Digby had no shame and wasn't the least embarrassed by that little thing we called the Cold War. I wonder how he felt about the Gulags; they weren't dying in war, per se...

It was looking good for my preconceptions. There's of course more amusing absurdities that follow that line, but the real clincher has nothing much to do with Digby.

"What is generally forgotten (but arguably more significant as an example of the Union's commitment to freedom of speech) is that an attempt was made by several prominent Union members (including Randolph Churchill) to expunge this motion and the result of the debate from the Union's minute book. This attempt was roundly defeated — in a meeting far better attended than the original debate. Sir Edward Heath records in his memoirs that Randolph Churchill was then chased around Oxford by undergraduates who intended to debag him (i.e. humiliate him by removing his trousers), and was then fined by the police for being illegally parked."

"We're for peace! And we'll beat up anyone who disagrees with us!"

Just in case you think this is insufficient evidence for hypocrisy, I found more. Focus especially on the last two sentences.

"Speaking after the debate, Digby said: "I believe that the motion was representative neither of the majority of the undergraduates of Oxford nor of the youth of this country. I am certain if war broke out tomorrow the students of the university would flock to the recruiting office as their fathers and uncles did."^[3] He was proved right. [...] McCallum recalled at the outbreak of war two students, "men of light and leading in their college and with a good academic record", visited him to say goodbye before leaving to join their units. Both of them had separately said that if they had to vote on the "King and Country" resolution then and there, they would do so. One of them said: "I am not going to fight for King and Country, and you will notice that no one, not Chamberlain, not Halifax, has asked us to".^[12]"

Yes, the anarchists in the audience can relax. The Oxford Union stands for Stalin, not non-violence, pretences to the contrary notwithstanding.

Oh, and by the way, Oxford Union can go ahead and 'free speech' my ass.


[1] Anarchists; peace is always better than aggressive war and war is the result of a minority with the ability to externalize the costs of war. No coercive minority, no war. (War to defend property within one's borders is not by this definition aggressive.)

Bayesian Regress

I was fascinated to discover that the Bayesian reasoner's probability of Bayes' formula being true calculates to zero.

I should start by mentioning that my probability estimate for Bayes' formula being useful is 100%. At least I hope so, since I often use it.

To calculate the probability using Bayesian analysis requires assuming the Bayes formula - in classical terms, begging the question. But, I thought, perhaps the series can converge? Every run-through changes the probability assigned to the Bayes' formula step of the calculation, so it needs to be run until it settles down. However, any sub-unity number multiplied by itself enough times converges to zero. It's an article of Bayesian reasoning that no priors can be unity. Oops.

Bayes' formula was discovered and proved within the context of classical logic, and indeed even the Bayesian reasoner must use one prior step of classical logic before they go on their statistical voyage. They must assume that Bayes' formula is unconditionally true.

There's a similar problem estimating the odds of yourself being mistaken. If you run the calculation once, perhaps you get a reasonable number, like 2%. But this calculation is reflexive - the odds that you're mistaken about being that mistaken is 2%. Works out to a 3.96% chance of being mistaken. But it's reflexive, so...a Bayesian calculation shows I have a 100% chance of being mistaken on every subject. Therefore, I'm wrong that you can understand the individual words I'm now typing.

Though clearly nonsense, I enjoy this result because I've often suspected that self-doubt in the usual sense can't be logically upheld. Especially if I'm not evaluating evidence, but taking action, the correct course is insensitive to doubt. If I'm faced with a black box with several buttons, one of which will serve my goals if pushed, whether I assume I have a 30% chance of being wrong or a 0% chance, I push the same button. It only changes if I have a higher estimate of being right for some other button - but it changes instantly and entirely, so again my action indistinguishable from one with utter certainty.