That’s my point: our notions of “rights” or “moral reasons” actually mask customs and instincts that are only in practice due to efficiency and welfare-maximization (e.g., property rights are only praised in this world contingently, in accord with their consequent benefits). If property rights diminished efficiency, then I very much doubt we would line our yards with fencing.
Using the “guns” argument is a red herring and an appeal to emotion that tries to invoke fear to persuade someone to your side of the argument. Unless someone already is already politically inclined towards small government or no government, it’s not going to work.
I could use gun arguments and spend my time theorzizing in my freetime, but unless I use data to back up my claims. I’m hardly going to convince or raise doubts in critiques. Take for example private roads. I could argue until i’m blue in the face that would be be most cost effective and less congested compared to public roads, but if I can’t back it up with examples(which there are) then i’m running into a dead end with critques.
It’s really pretty simple - if pointing out that what someone is saying amounts to shooting people for something trivial doesn’t work, then I’m not particularly interested in getting along with the group it doesn’t work with, and certainly not inclined to discuss political theory with them.
You could point about examples about public/private roads also you’re blue in the face also, but unless you provide some reason to think those examples should be generalized, you’re welcoming “yea, well, elect different people” and that kind of response.
Theory and evidence go hand-in-hand.
For all the hooplah Austrians give about their “apodictically certain truths,” I believe that if those models were never linked to data (viz. thymology), then no one would ever take Austrian economics seriously–not ever. The current resurgence of interest in Austrianism is a consequence of its perceived strength in explaining our recent financial crisis, not in a recent reconsideration of its logical imperviousness.
It’s a question for psychology why a person chooses to believe in something. It’s not necessarily the same question as what the logical conditions are that would suggest it is true.
I agree with Neoclassical. A good theory is practical and can be shown to work percentage wise, a bad theory, now matter how logical it may sound is a bad theory if it has no practicality.
As for what you are saying in regards to guns, if it’s just: the FDA should be abolished because they are forcing companies to put nutrition facts on their foods, then I would consider that to be a weak argument against the FDA and regulation in general and I imagine most people would.
That’s actually not what I’ve argued here, but it turns out it’s what I believe. I think it’s bad to hit and shoot people, and institutionalized violence is bad in particular.
Regarding theory - as I’ve said a few times in this discussion itself, and no one has responded to - it takes a theory X to decide if the data fit a theory Y or not. Then you need to verify X, which requires Z, and so on. This notion of “go where the data lead you” is simply a chimera and a cover for introducing some other theory, just as the claim that ideology is bad is just a cover for importing your own ideology.
This is not how the term coercion is used in libertarianism. Nor does it make much sense to use it in this way.
It is certainly not this type of “coercion” the advocates for free markets argue against, so i don’t see the point of what you’re trying to make here.
If you want to discredit my use of the term, then you should re-define it according to your sensibility, not merely allude that you have a different definition.
Essentially, I was proposing that the Austro-libertarian use of “coercion” is narrowly defined to suit ideological interests, even though coercion / aggression is much more fundamental in social affairs (somewhat akin to Foucault’s philosophy).
yes, its narrowly defined so as to exclude rape.
…
sheeesh.
Let me make sure I have this clear.
You: Someone with guns should step in and force people to label stuff because of consumer/producer information assymetry.
Me: If consumers cared then information assymetry can be solved without guns by an entrepreneur. If consumers don’t care, well they won’t read your labels anyway.
You: Screw entrepreneurs, that first group isn’t providing all of the information I want and the fact that a second one is willing to do it isn’t good enough.
Is that correct? What’s wrong with a Consumer Reports or [H]ardOCP for food?
No, you were not arguing over proper/improper user of terms. Here is what you said:
"coercive measures that violate the Austro-libertarian NAP will be produced by private law. I actually even believe business regulations could form within an anarcho-capitalist society. Of course, my fundamental prediction is that laws would, more often than not, be economically efficient.
I tend to endorse all welfare-maximizing private law, and I believe all law is necessarily coercive insofar as it limits possible behavior."
Is there anybody in this forum that thinks or even advocate a sort of NAP that rejects all use of violence?
So you’ve set up an obvious strawman here by conflating libertarianism with pacifism in your own definition of NAP, and then proceed to argue that private law will sometimes produce non-libertarian laws.
Do Austro-libertarians consider business regulation, prohibition of drug use, etc. transgressions of the NAP?
A simple “Yes” or “No” would work.
nirgrahamUK, I obviously have no problem with that prohibition! My main point is that the participants of society use aggression to order the community, coercively managing the participants according to generally-liked rules (e.g., “Don’t trespass,” “Don’t murder,” etc.).
Whenever your behavior is involuntarily limited by other humans (and not the laws of nature per se), then I contend that coercion is being used.
But I hope that you realise that libertarians oppose initiation of aggression (a particular subtype of coercion).
self defence is legitimate coercion etc.
But I hardly need to tell you, who are yourself a libertarian
Yeah, I know, but I still think social order ultimately depends upon coercion. I’m quite fond of the NAP, even though I don’t take it too seriously and never preach it; nevertheless, to limit the actions of another human being (for whatever reason) seems inescapably coercive: “If you desire to do x, we will stop you due to our moral code.”
due to our moral code that permits self-defence?
Besides you aren’t thinking like an economist 
however problematic you may find a philosophy that justifies self-defence, in isolation; you ought to be contrasting that philosophy against the problems of philosophies that don’t, or worse.
opportunity cost.
No! The aggression stems from the illegitimate monopoly ownership by the government over the economy. Not from the regulations. Private property owners setting their own rules is not aggression.
Just to be clear, DD5: in a township with private law-making and enforcement, if a person is arrested (or fined, etc.) for possessing marijuana, then that does not violate the NAP–is that right?
If that person then states that he has “self-ownership” over his own body, what would you say?
I presumed that Rothbard (et al.) would have considered even that private law to be illegitimate, since it transgresses upon the inviolable right of self-ownership (or so is claimed).
I’d say he’s full of it. You don’t have any such right that necessitates the violation of somebody else’s rights. If you did, then we’d be talking about the form of anarchy that really does result in chaos.
You don’t have the right to the property of others. So if you walk into a restaurant that bans smoking, you don’t have any legitimate claim to smoke on the basis of some self ownership. That’s not libertarianism.
No he would not. I suggest you reexamine this topic, as well as what Rothbard would presume.