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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It will be obvious that this post was prompted by Perry Metzger’s post “A Sad Anniversary”.
Regarding the undoubted fact that the net result of the First World War was almost wholly bad, consider this analogy: your home is invaded by a gang, who have given ample evidence of their lawless nature as they rampaged through your neighbourhood before reaching you. Maybe you have not always been a blameless citizen yourself, but, by God, you won’t take this lying down. So you resist, calling in your family and neighbours to help. They pay a high price for their solidarity. At
…continue An analogy about World War One
Over the last few days (this is 1914 we’re talking about just in case anyone was in any doubt) a large number of articles have appeared in the German press on the threat posed by Russia. And still they come:
There is, if anything, an increase to-day in the Press discussion of present and future and possible and probable Russo-German relations. The Berlin Bourse, which was troubled last week by the beginning of the campaign in the Cologne Gazette, was disturbed again to-day – chiefly by the spreading of the infection to the Radical and “pacific” Berliner Tageblatt. This journal
…continue Germany readies its people for war
A great deal longer ago than I now enjoy remembering, I rashly promised the authors of America 3.0: Rebooting American Prosperity in the 21st Century – Why America’s Greatest Days Are Yet to Come, James C. Bennett and Michael Lotus, that I would, very soon, write something here about this book. But this is not a regular book review. I have an agenda of my own to plug with regard to America 3.0, which is, in two words: Emmanuel Todd.
I have greatly admired Emmanuel Todd, the French anthropologist and historian, ever since, in a 1980s remainder shop, I first
…continue First thoughts on America 3.0 – the Emmanuel Todd connection
What follows is based on a talk I gave at the end of August at one of Brian’s Fridays. See also Parts I, II, III, V & VI.
Drugs. When I was preparing this piece I was under the illusion that drugs were legal. That’s not quite the case. Since as long ago as 1868, only pharmacists could sell opium. In 1908 cocaine was put onto a similar footing. As far as I am aware there are no restrictions on cannabis. At the 1912 International Opium Convention most European states agreed to end the trade although Germany, Austria and Turkey
…continue The World in 1913 – Part IV: Regulation
What follows is based on a talk I gave at the end of August at one of Brian’s Fridays. See also Parts II, III, IV, V & VI.
In modern popular culture there seem to be two distinct images of the period immediately before the First World War. The first, exemplified by Upstairs, Downstairs [I believe Downton Abbey is the modern-day equivalent] is of well-dressed people being nice to one another; and the second, one of a rigid class system with the ruling class fighting a desperate rearguard action to preserve the vast differences in wealth and privilege between them
…continue The World in 1913 – Part I
I do not claim to be an expert on the Balkan Wars which were fought in 1912 and 1913. If I understand correctly, in the First Balkan War Turkey was almost completely thrown out of Europe while in the second Bulgaria embarked upon a war of conquest and ended up with rather less than she’d started with.
The Times 23 July 1913 p8
The significance of all this, as Eric Sass points out, lay in how it altered Russia’s relationship with Serbia. Russia, Serbia and Bulgaria were Slavic states. Russia, being the biggest, wanted to be the leader.
…continue Bulgaria loses the Second Balkan War
Rob Fisher’s posting here a while back entitled Open source software v. the NSA reminded me that on April 26th, in my home, Rob Fisher gave a talk about open source software. I flagged this talk up beforehand in this posting, but have written nothing about it since. I don’t want to get in the way of whatever else Rob himself might want to write here on this subject, but I do want to record my appreciation of this talk before the fact of it fades from my faltering memory and I am left only with the dwindling remnants of
…continue What I learned from Rob Fisher’s talk about open source software
The End of the World Club (there seem to be quite a few – can’t find a link to the one I mean) is a bunch of Austrianist-inclined people who meet at London’s Institute of Economic Affairs every few weeks to talk about the state of the world, and than afterwards maybe drink and/or dine locally, to try to cheer themselves up again.
Simon Rose, the guy who runs the End of the World Club, has asked me to kick off the discussion on the evening of May 28th. The following is a hastily typed summary of what I have
…continue Thoughts about optimism and pessimism for the End of the World Club
This story has suddenly hit the attention of the Big Media – there were several reports about in the weekend – and it is true that the outbreak of a disease that kills ash trees is alarming. As a reminder of how virulent such diseases are, the UK was once full of elm trees and then the Dutch Elm Disease outbreak wiped them out, although some species of elm can, it is hoped, be bred to resist it. (Elm is a wood once used in things such as rudders and keels of boats). Ash has considerable uses in the furniture
…continue Another example of useless state-run organisations and a warning
Charlie Stross writes great science fiction and a blog which usually leaves me wondering how I can enjoy so much the novels of a man with whom I agree so little. In a recent post he linked to an article by UCSD associate professor of physics Tom Murphy to explain why space colonisation will not happen. Since the site is called “Do the Math” I was expecting some numerical analysis of space colonisation. Instead the article contains lots of reasons why space travel is hard and slow and requires lots of energy and is not likely to be done much
…continue Doing the math backwards
Take these for instance:
[The British] rifle at the present moment was the worst among those used by civilised powers.
…the opinion of most Infantry officers was that our rifle was inferior both to the French and German rifles.
It was clear, therefore, that if our soldiers had to fight troops armed with the German weapon they would do so under very great disadvantage.
…our rifle is inferior to the German and French rifles…
So what is this Austin Allegro of the military world? Why, the Short, Magazine Lee Enfield (SMLE) of course – Britain’s main infantry weapon in the
…continue Making predictions about war is a tricky business
As was flagged up by this recent SQotD, I have been reading The Last Crusaders by Barnaby Rogers, the point of this posting being that some of these Last Crusaders were also the first global explorers. This can’t be a review, because I have only reached page 50 out of 481, but I will be very surprised if my good opinion of this book now is in any way challenged by the experience of reading the rest of it.
A question that had always vaguely puzzled me, in a very not-thinking-about-it-carefully way, was: why Portugal? How come Portugal, of all
…continue How Portugal led the world past the Cape Bojador barrier
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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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