We are developing the social individualist meta-context for the future. From the very serious to the extremely frivolous... lets see what is on the mind of the Samizdata people.
Samizdata, derived from Samizdat /n. - a system of clandestine publication of banned literature in the USSR [Russ.,= self-publishing house]
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If you want a glimpse of the future, here is a truly astonishing article that I must say confirms many of my views about spontaneous networks.
The online fantasy game EverQuest lets players create and control characters – or avatars – within a fantasy world called Norrath. Characters gain skills and possessions that they can then trade with other players using the game’s currency of “platinum pieces”. However, many EverQuest players have found this process too complicated and have instead opted to sell their assets for real money though trading web sites such as eBay
Read the whole article, it is thought provoking stuff with real-world implications.
Over on Little Green Footballs (also see link under ‘posh blogs’ section in sidebar), there is a lengthy series of entries in the comments section under an article about globalization and the people who are heading to New York to protest against it. Someone called Michele stated that she was “strongly against world trade”. This astonishing remark was something that had to be answered and so I will repeat my remarks here:
To be “strongly against world trade” is to be in favour of poverty and against free association. It is to favour force over choice. It is to favour death and famine in the third world. Anyone who actually wants for the peoples of South America, Africa and Asia to prosper should be demanding not an end to world trade but the removal of all barriers to entry to the US and EU markets. At a stroke that would result in cheaper products for common working western people as cheaper African, South American and Asian goods become available. Immediately the economies of third world nations would improve as they could sell their products without immoral grotesque discriminatory tariff barriers.
Also, as a laissez-faire capitalist libertarian, I am strongly opposed to the World Bank, the WTO and the IMF… these are institutions that support crony capitalism and big-government. They subsidise neo-national socialist stupidity like that in Argentina and despotic kleptocratic regimes across the globe.
I am in favour of true free association and therefore laissez-faire and true globalization. I reject collectivism in all its coercive left and right wing forms and the violence and poverty they always lead to. Individualism and laissez-faire capitalism without borders is the only moral option and the only option that can actually work at all in the long run.
I have a slightly sore throat so I am drinking what I always drink at such times. Take one large mug into which put:
· Fresh squeezed juice of one medium lemon
· One large teaspoon of English heather honey
· One hefty shot of Kentucky bourbon (Bulleit Bourbon)
· Fill with boiling water
· Stir
· Drink
But what makes this unusual tonight is the large mug in question, for on the side it says: I’m a BITTER Princess. www.bitter-girl.com
And the bitter Princess in question can be found here. She may be bitter, but she is also rather splendid in my not so humble opinion.
Manly philosopher Will Wilkinson over on The Fly Bottle has posted a picture of himself getting in touch with his, um, feminine side.
Over on the excellent blog Flit, Bruce has done a good ‘back of the envelop’ bombing survey that highlights some interesting facets of ‘smart’ bombing vs. ‘dumb’ bombing vs. ‘real indiscriminate’ bombing (i.e Al Qaeda). The article pointing to Bruce’s survey “U.S. Aerial bombing: a statistical summary” provides a simple interpretation of what the numbers mean.
This sort of short but thoughtful factually based commentary really does the blogosphere credit and is an excellent example of high quality original content blogging.
There is a much better obituary for Robert Nozick in the Telegraph that the rather pallid official Harvard one I linked to before.
The Daily Mail, a newspaper that if I ever do link to it will be filed under the “Havens of fluorescent idiocy” section, had as its front page headline on monday:
TERROR SNUB FOR BRITAIN
America poured scorn last night on British concerns over the treatment of Al Qaeda suspects in Cuba
So in spite of the fact no less than five polls in Britain show support of about 90% for US actions in Cuba, somehow “Britain” is being snubbed. Not “the British Government” or “elements of the British media” but “Britain” is being snubbed.
So presumably the 90% of people in Britain who appear to support the US are, well, not Britain. The 10% that supports the anti-American media elite and establishment and who were presumably ‘snubbed’…that must therefore be “Britain” according to the Daily Mail. Interesting.
And so then just who the hell are the 90% of people in Britain that don’t feel in the slightest bit snubbed by USA?
There is a story on ABC Online that claims US Attorney General John Ashcroft has ordered a rather cool art deco statue of a semi-nude ‘spirit of justice’ covered up. What is it about any hint of overt sexuality that sends otherwise moderately rational conservatives into such bizarre mental wobbles?
This is me conferring with my political advisor. I have often been accused of being a libertarian hawk, but perhaps an owl might be more accurate (which presumably means I am wise… or then again perhaps it means I hunt at night and eat mice)
Update: In response to all the e-mails, yes, of course I went to Hogwarts.
If Dale can get away with an old picture then so can we…so that you (sort of) know what we look like, here is Walter Uhlman and Perry de Havilland back in 1986, before we got older and fatter.
Walter and Perry This was back when we both worked as henchmen for some guy with a white cat called Bloefeld. The pension plan was great but then SPECTRE was involved in a merger with ENRON and the rest is history.
I was perusing Bill St. Clair’s most worthy End the War on Freedom blog and was so inspired that for no reason in particular I felt like posting this pictures of myself doing what comes naturally.
Note the AK-74 style muzzle brake… makes the weapon very controllable even on rock and roll but everyone sure as hell gets to see where you are firing from! Photograph was taken by excessively tall good buddy and would-be evil world ruler Willi Zahn.
…very different things to different people. Let us consult the Oxford English Dictionary:
patriot /n.a person who is devoted to and ready to support or defend his or her country. ../patriotic adj. //patriotically adv. //patriotism n. [F patriote f. LL patriota f. Gk. patriotes f. patros of one’s father f. pater patros father]
Of course this also rather depends on what you mean by ‘country’
country n. (pl.-ies) 1 a the territory of a nation with its own government; a State. b a territory possessing its own language, people, culture, etc. […] 3 the land of a person’s birth or citizenship; a fatherland or motherland.
And therein lies one of the problems with Patriotism. When some one says ‘I am a patriot’, what the hell does that actually mean? Let’s take me, for example. My mother was American and I have lived about one quarter of my life in the USA. My father was British and I have lived a little under half my life here. For purely accidental reasons, I was actually born in the Netherlands. I feel both/neither British and/or American. So much for the complicated heredity and biology. Now for some ideology: I personally reject as illegitimate any function of the state which is not related to the defence of the individual liberty of people within their area of control, within a broad reasonable definition of those terms. I see the State as, at best, a provider of a service (security) in much the same way as I see the Pepsi-Cola Beverage Company as a provider of cans of fizzy brown liquid. I do not accept the very notion of ‘citizenship’ as I regard that as tantamount to denying me free association with non-citizens and implies the State somehow owns me in some way.
So can I be ‘patriotic’?
To the State? Absolutely not. Try to make me pledge allegiance to Old Glory or the Union Jack or the Tricolour with the intention of extracting an admission of loyalty to the state and I will set it on fire instead. And if it is on a tee shirt saying “Try to burn these colors asshole”, the wearer might just get their wish. Try to conscript me and the state will discover that I am not a pacifist and have no problem with using force against someone who tries to impose servitude upon me: starting with the guy who tries to serve call up papers on me.
And yet…
I live in London at the moment but I have ‘Old Glory’ displayed in my front window for all to see. Try walking down Upper Cheyne Row in Chelsea and you will see which is my house. It has been there since September 12th 2001. I do indeed feel an affinity for what James Bennett aptly calls The Anglosphere. I regard myself as a member of a cosmopolitan, English speaking global community, a civil society far greater than any mere nation state. For all its flaws, that extended society is the best hope for freedom and liberty the world has ever known and that is something worth defending. Unlike British society, which has a myriad cultural and regional symbols redolent with meaning, only Old Glory, the Stars and Stripes, the Star Spangled Banner, truly represents not just the American state but also American society, warts and all. Truth is I much prefer the Gadsden flag (see side bar of this blog) but most people would not know what it means. And so that is why the Stars and Stripes is stuck in my window for all to see. It was not just the people of New York who were wounded, it was all of us and that is a point I think well worth making publicly.
So is that ‘patriotism’? Opinions vary.
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Who Are We? The Samizdata people are a bunch of sinister and heavily armed globalist illuminati who seek to infect the entire world with the values of personal liberty and several property. Amongst our many crimes is a sense of humour and the intermittent use of British spelling.
We are also a varied group made up of social individualists, classical liberals, whigs, libertarians, extropians, futurists, ‘Porcupines’, Karl Popper fetishists, recovering neo-conservatives, crazed Ayn Rand worshipers, over-caffeinated Virginia Postrel devotees, witty Frédéric Bastiat wannabes, cypherpunks, minarchists, kritarchists and wild-eyed anarcho-capitalists from Britain, North America, Australia and Europe.
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