I think this is wrong. I think the primary purpose some socialists think for taxes is that the rich have too much and they need it robbed of them. Still other more extreme socialists think that rich people and especially those in control of corporations are somehow sub-human (why do some socialist anarchists think destroying property indiscriminantly is ok?). They think these people and capitalism in general are responsible for wars, starving, disease, income disparity, imperialism, etc. I’ve not understood any connection, but I think this sentiment is definitely expressed. That is basically the crux of Marxian polylogism, anyway, that there is an irreconcileable difference between the proletariat and those in the bourgeois. That doesn’t always transfer so clearly into socialist thinking (as compared to communist thinking), but I think there is a sense not only should the rich’s money make a better society… but it should be taken from them regardless, because they are not the same type of people nor do they use the same logic as everyone else (it seems there is a fallacy that rich people somehow horde money to make others poor instead of spending it, hiring people, or giving it to charity like the non-capitalist pigs). In this way taxing and regulation is somehow a victory over these capitalist pigs just because they get a mere dent in their wealth.
I agree with Fred. It’s the same with the Mises blog; a lot of the idiots who complain about the articles have next to no familiarity with the Austrian School, and instead of asking and learning, they prefer to act like imbeciles.
-Jon
Same here. I completely agree also.
I think we can learn some lessons from the OP’s misconception of us. His view of libertarianism is, sadly, the view most people have of it. The more radical, anarchist/extreme minarchist wing of libertarianism is virtually unknown to most people. What is known, is watered down “conservatives who smoke pot” vulgar libertarianism. This needs to be changed.
Furthermore, the type of sentiment expressed in your rantings against the left are very dangerous, and in my opinion contribute to an unnecessary level of “conservafication” in libertarianism. You say “They think these people and capitalism in general are responsible for wars, starving, disease, income disparity, imperialism, etc. I’ve not understood any connection” Really? I’m sure you would agree that governments cause a lot of these things. You don’t think that a wealthy elite (military industrial complex, medical industrial complex etc.) influences government policy?
Methodological individualism is as applicable here as it is anywhere. One of the most striking differences between libertarianism and many other political philosophies is that it looks at government as composed of individual actors rather than a quasi-mystical abstraction. The same applies to the private sector. There are plenty of elites who profit from government intervention (that they have lobbied for), and when they do you should hold them almost if not as much responsible as the government.
The difference between liberals and libertarians that we want to stop all government granted privelege rather than reorganize the distribution to the benefit of the common man. It does not follow that we have to worship the existing unfree market just because some of it is free or defend big corporations that rest on government priveledge because we don’t want increasing intervention. We should acknowledge the existence of wealthy capitalists who are fleecing the rest of us through government priveledge and hold them responsible.
We are NOT defending a rich, superior elite class from the doltish proletariat who would bite the hand that feeds them-- we are seeking an end to the system that many of these elites feed off of.
Liberterians do not believe that individuals act entirely for “profit”, the difference between revenue and cost above what other comparable folks make in the same busines. Austrian Economics requires only that individuals act with a purpose, and clearly you outlined the purposes of each of the listed inventors. A purpose could be anything as long as the individual intends to do something. Other folks may not even consider the purpose rational. Some people invent things for the satisfaction of others using them. Some do it just to get their names in text books or news papers.
One moral reason to invent things is to acquire profits. Folks invent things to make profits from other people in mutually beneficial exchanges trading money they value less than the invention to the inventor who values the money more than the invention. These exchanges are what makes society run.
Edward, a few of the posters here were not very polite in response to you.
Allow me to be a little more civil.
I think the problem here is that you don’t realize who frequents this board. You said that “you guys voted for Bush” but most of the people here probably didn’t vote for Bush, and in fact are anarcho-capitalists. Besides, Gore would of went to war with Iraq if he was elected instead, so the point of paying off the excesses of “conservatives” is moot. There is no conservativism in the Repub party anymore, only neo-conservativism.
Finally, giving examples of things that were invented under the purview of goverment does not prove that government is required for the inventing of those things. For all anyone knows, if there was a more free market those things could of been invented sooner. Also, I’m not sure where you got the idea that free marketers are against altruism. Giving examples of inventions done purely for altruim and not profit has nothing to do with showing some sort of fault in the market so far as I can tell.
I think if you look back you’ll find that “respect” ended well before he was corrected many times…or even once.
If you define profit as “the difference between revenue and cost above what other comparable folks make in the same business”…but if it only means to gain something, every act is done because it’s perceived by the actor at the time to be better - i.e., more profitable - than any other act he might choose, so of course every individual acts entirely for profit.
The patent system is not capitalism, it is a government program. Almost everyone here is against the patent office, and many are against the entire idea of intellectual property(Me, for example).
Some people help others with no thought towards self benefit. However, the system that will maximize how much people help each other is the one that rewards people for helping others. That is what capitalism does. In the market, you can only help yourself by helping others. You have proven that you can help others without helping yourself, but that does not disprove that the market is based on mutual gain.
Lets say I want one of your apples. Maybe you will give it to me out of charity, but since you have a limited number eventually your capacity for charity will run out. If you don’t give it to me I have two options available. I can convince you to give it to me in exchange for something else you want, or I can steal it.
Governments use the latter option when it taxes Peter to give to Paul; that is why it is known as the political means. When I convince you to give me an apple in exchange for fixing your car, that is the economic means.
Some believe that the political means resembles you having given me the apple out of charity. However, it is the economic means that resembles it more closely, and even improves upon it. If you had given me the apple, a single good would have come out of it; I would have had lunch. But if we employ economic means, two goods are created: I have lunch and you can use your car. This outcome is even better then if you had simply given me the apple, as it resembles two acts of charity!
Have you seen this book? We spent lots of time bookmarking and scanning the thing, and it can’t be printed because it would be too expensive and it has too many photos. You need the original plates for that. Anyway, it is a great answer to the claim that government is responsible for the best inventions. This book is a joy. I sure as heck wished we could print it again! We even got the permissions but the price is too high and it wouldn’t be possible. So at least it lives on the internet. Flatter me please by clicking on the link and looking around at this treasure.
Which is worse?
Bill Maher calling himself libertarian,
or Glenn Beck calling himself libertarian?
With regard to the Internet, I’m pretty sure Bell Labs already played with computer networks in Multics and all. I believe some simple networks were already used to avoid going physically to the mainframe to put a program in queue and get the result. What government did with Arpanet was to standardize it and get it going. Nowadays, of course a lot of the Inernet Backbones are maintained by big companies like IBM and SUN, not governments.
Tesla was a genius. Smarter than Edison. But he was terrible at marketing. But luckily there was George Westinghouse…a guy who saved countless lives with the invenion of the airbrake…who realised that more money was to be had more conveniently with Teslas AC power.
Better products don’t always win, but thanks to Westinghouse they did.
Tesla did invent radio but he never tried to sell it like Marconi did. Tesla had a natural genious and Marconi had a tireless work ethic, and the work ethic made Marconi wealthy and Tesla fed pigeons in a park. If there was no Marconi, Edison, Westinghouse and only the genius of Tesla to bring us into the modern world we would have been stuck with a few demonstrations and theories locked away somewhere.
If the better product done for just the love of technology always won we would be writing these posts now using OpenVMS on a 64 bit Alpha processor. But the really smart people at DEC never promoted or developed thier systems to be used by regular folks and they were shockingly expensive (and still are). But a terrible operating system on a flimsy chip is what brought computing to the world due to budget conscious consumers and nerds with a love of technology and profit.
ITYM Genera-derivative on a 96 bit Ivory-derivative or something 
Now I have. I just skimmed it and it would be a good book to print again but the internet will have to do. Thank those who did the scanning and bookmarking for me.
I cannot wait to read about Buck Duke. His chapter would never be included if this book was written today.
I bow to your superior geekiness since I have no idea what you are writing about. You would do well in an IT job interview. Very well.
I started it, and wow. I’m going to print it off in sections at my school’s computer lab and put it in a big binder. Fantastic read; I hope you can print it again soon. I’d definately buy it.
Ahhh..thanks for the link. I cannot believe I never heard of it. I had hear of SLUG and now it makes more sense.
I looked, I am impressed. Does the LvMI hold the exclusive rights to it? Or is something we can disseminate? I think it would be a cool project to get it shared around…