The Gun vs. The Plowshare

Economics Political Theory
1

I’m sure it’s been said before, but the Political Technology seems to trend toward legitimizing theft, violence and destruction of wealth (The Gun) because it’s a quick way to a solution. Kind of like beating your child. Yeah, he shut up, and he’s more afraid, so he’s going to listen more.

A mature mind, prefers sustainable solutions, the Plowshare. “Give a man a fish…, teach a man to fish…”

Drop food from the air vs. build infrastructure and capital investment in a community to enable it to engage in production and accumulate wealth.

etc., etc.

There’s a passage from a Taoist interpretation of Tao Te Ching that I read when I was in the military. “The Tao of Leadershp”

"Making people do what you think they ought to do does not lead to clarity and consciousness. While they may do what you tell them to do at the time, they will cringe inwardly, grown confused, and plot revenge.

This is why your victory is actually a failure."

Another interpretations says:

all decent men detest them.

I would argue all political action should be entered into with such soberness of thought and humility.

2

Thats a good post. As an aside, do you realize that the effectiveness of a weapon (in terms of its effect on changing human behavior) is roughly inversely proportionate to the weapon’s frequency of use?

3

That’s an interesting comment, I hate to do this, but I’m guessing it’s anecdotal from it’s form, not analytic or empirical.

Even so, part of the reason for my post, is that I think the libertarian position on government is simpler to sell when one recasts arguments in this way. Effective rhetorical framing of discussions and arguments is a huge part of the social dialog. Point out the guns and how their used, demonstrate how it turns production into slaves and thus destroys the options available for consumers. The Plowshare instead results in more of the goods available for consumption, reducing the marginal costs.

4

Rather than anecdotal I would say its just a way of looking at things. For example, weapons are designed to wound and kill people and damage and destroy things. So if you wanted to run around destroying your own wealth, you wouldnt necessarily see your effectiveness start to decline as you used your weapons more. However if you applied those weapons effects to other people and their property, they would react and this would change the situation. Consider a hostage-taker. Most people havent thought about this scenario, but the aggressor with a single hostage doesnt have much leverage, if he carries out his threat, then he loses all of his negotiating power (because he killed the hostage), however if this inescapable fact causes him to be reluctant to kill the hostage, then his threats are less credible, therefore he loses most of his negotiating power. Its kind of the same thing in a police state or military occupation. If the guys with the guns use their threat of violence to intimidate people and coerce them into doing things they otherwise wouldnt, then it works. But the more that those threats are carried out, the more people will say “why would I listen to those guys, they are going to shoot me no matter what.”

5

Guns dont kill people,

people kill people.

6

True, it would have been more correct to say that “guns are designed to enable people to incapacitate people and break stuff”

7

So in reality…

Should we all fear ourselves???

8

Malachi, you’re full of crap. Who in their right mind uses a gun to break stuff? We have perfectly acceptable bombs for that.

9

I assume youre joking. But surely you all are curious:

Its used to blow up stuff like radios, computers, antennas, vehicles etc. because sometimes its easier, faster, and cheaper for a highly skilled infantryman to destroy equipment, or at least make it stop working, from half a mile or more maybe. Thats the funny thing about these technology-driven militaries, the technology necessary to counter the advanced stuff is oftentimes much simpler and cheaper. The age of the private air force is at hand, diydrones.com

10

Or an artillery shell. Which is just a huge gun.

Now that i think about it, a hollow point .50 cal… that would be a killer right there.

11

Yah that would wreck somebody’s shit for real.

12

Not everyone’s reaction to the “gun” seems to be the same.

I don’t detest the government for taxing me.

I don’t secretly plot revenge or seek freedom.

I simply want to wield that power myself.

The problem, from my point of view, with being too concerned with sustainability is that life itself is (at least at present) unsustainable.

One way or another we’re all going to die. And while some percentage of our genes may come to live on in our grandchildren or great-grandchildren, our individual genetic profiles will be diluted through reproduction and the neural processes known as “David B” or “Bloom” or whoever might just end when our brains stop working. Memories are not passed on genetically.

So while it may be more sustainable to teach a man to fish, who really cares? You’re not going to live forever and neither is he. Wouldn’t you rather just take a percentage of the fish from him and call it a day?

I think I would. And frankly I think the fisherman might want that too (or at least be willing to tolerate it) if he knew that in return for a percentage of his fish he could partake in a percentage of some banker’s salary. Or if he knew that in return for his loyalty and deference to authority his children might be assured work or whatever.

This is the world I see and while I may not approach politics from as humble a place as you do I do feel sober.

13

thatsfunny, it seems like life could be defined as a process of continuous sustainment. You appear to be defining “sustainment” as opposition to change of any sort.

I guess I would like you to explain the migration patterns of monarch butterflies then

14

I think of the long term sustainment of human life as the sustainment of the basest replicators, not the vessels of the replicators themselves.

The vessel, as you and I both know, has a shelf life.

He seems to be talking about the continuation of human life over successive generations which is what our genes do, not what the genetic vessels do.

EDIT: As an aside, our individual bodies (the genetic vessels) are highly resistant to change. The word I’m thinking of is “homeostasis.” I remember reading in your post about failure modes (i think?) all the different ways that homeostasis can be interrupted. I learned a lot from that post, very informative.

I suppose I should have said “Autobiographical memories are not passed on genetically in humans.” I just assumed that since we were talking about human affairs, everyone would know I was talking about human memory and autobiographical memory in particular. But I should’ve been more specific.

I don’t know anything about monarch butterflies, but I’m pretty sure I’m not a monarch butterfly and I don’t think you’re one either and I don’t think the OP was talking about the politics of monarch butterflies in his post.

I’m sure that whatever biological mechanism evolution has crafted to guide butterflies through their migration cycles is quite amazing but human brains don’t come prepackaged with autobiographical memories of their genetic forebears. I cannot recall a single experiential first person recollection of living through my grandparent’s eyes, my parent’s eyes or, for that matter, of my great-grandparent’s eyes. Can you?

This is not to say that I don’t think we pass on genetic hardwiring by the way. I am not an advocate of what Steven Pinker would call the ‘blank slate’ it just doesn’t appear to be the case that autobiographical memory comes pre-packaged. Autobiographical memory does seem to be written over a lifetime for each particular lifetime.

The point of me even saying what I said was to point out that I perceive a space between where I end and everyone else begins even those I’m related to. This distance is punctuated by my own mortality and my awareness of it. I know that I will only be around for just so long. While I suppose at some level I’m programmed to think about my progeny, I can’t help but also consider myself in a more immediate timeframe.

15

Excellent, my vocational analysis of your skills, talents, and desires is that a life in Politics would be a good career move for you. I’d work on your rhetorical skills, and get a Public Relations advisor, but seems like you’re on your way. (sarcasm intended).

I’d focus on the “at present” part of that statement. All action of men, is aimed at removing scarcity, and yes the limit of a man’s lifespan is one of the scarce means we have at our disposal. Do you have a desire one way or another about whether you would prefer a longer lifespan or a shorter one?

You are right, our specific memories don’t pass on, but our theory and technology do. Our culture, knowledge, institutions, our techniques and specific technological devices pass on to our children. Unless we don’t pass them on. In which case their ongoing battle to achieve for themselves happiness is set back behind our own. Which is what’s happening btw.

It depends, do I want to get fish from him tomorrow?

We have a way for that to happen, the banker gives the fisherman money in return for a portion of his fish. That’s just as easy, in fact, easier than using a gun to take it.

I see how you see the world, it’s a bit depressing. I’d struggle to want to survive if this was the only world available to me. Humility can in fact be honest assessment of the world as it is. I think you’ve done this, but only on one side of the balance sheet. In your analysis you are honestly appraising part of the reality as we encounter and experience it, but you leave out any reference to the cases where two men willingly and cooperatively exchange wealth to the betterment of each. Those social phenomena count too, and they vastly outnumber the other class of property appropriation.

That would be my humble suggestion, think equally soberly about the nature of voluntary exchanges as well as government redistribution (or theft).

16

Lol. Somehow I don’t think I have much of a future in getting elected anywhere. But thankfully there are other ways to work for the government.

Longer or shorter than what?

I think he might keep producing fish as long as we don’t tax him too hard. If he won’t do it odds are another fisherman will. That’s the art of taxation really. Taking as much as possible while getting as little complaint as possible. It is ofcourse a delicate balance. Some people seem to have a higher tolerance for taxation than others. For my part I can tolerate my current level of taxation, I feel I get plenty in return. I’m sure you feel differently.

But then the fisherman can only get as much as his fish are worth to the banker. With the gun he can theoretically get much much more and the banker will only be able to give just so much protest as long as the current social order is willing to tolerate or basically go along with the aggressiveness of the fisherman. The aggressive fisherman’s strategy is particularly effective because the fisherman himself may never have to lift a finger he just has to watch someone else do the taxing for him and not complain too much.

Perhaps. I actually find it…highly intriguing.

Available when?

The social phenomena of cooperation counts to you and it counts to me too. But I find the exercise of power much more fascinating if I’m to be honest. People basically are naturally cooperative and they generally avoid conflict. But not everyone. Some people are willing to use force and coercion to attain things. They’re usually the people who end up in charge. Why? My hypothesis is that the natural docileness of most humans (let’s call them the sheep) makes them all the more vulnerable to the more aggressive varieties (I like to think of them as the wolves.) I think there’s also a natural deference to authority. I know I find myself awed by people in power and I don’t think I’m the only one.

I feel like I have.

I just really struggle with the idea that somehow I own stuff just because I got to it first.

Doesn’t really seem to be how things actually work in real life.

17

I don’t think we’re very far away from each other. I agree at a theoretical level with pretty much all you’ve said. The Docileness you refer to would be IMO a risk aversion metric. The ideas you’re talking about are ones that you find in books like The 48 Laws of Power and The Art of Seduction. My only problem in reading books like them is in being very careful to not fall prey to the techniques themselves, because while they are effective, they are also destructive. The refreshing part of your comments is the frank openness about the nature of the use of power, intimdation, theft, etc. in ways which the victim chooses not to fight back. This type of discussion is extremely valuable IMO.

Btw, in your fisherman, banker example, the uneven distribution of power is actually weighted to the banker. Thus it’s the banker who can in fact steal more effectively (and invisibly) from the fisherman. If I think of using the tools and techniques of power, then my goal would be to use specific events to wrest power from the banker via a different vector, information, disinformation, etc.

Yes Praxeology has things to say in this realm of human action also. I think it’s long past time for it to fill this gap in it’s coverage of human action.

18

As an aside, taking over the education of children in the US has allowed those in power to propogate sterile knowledge.

Understanding the Political and Economic forces in society is a vital tool for any child. However, if we make sure that what they actually get when we teach them is effectively memorization of propoganda then they are more easily lead around by the ring through their noses.

I’m making the point, not quite explicitly, in another thread that Marxism is a mechanism for reordering the balance of political power. But in the end, the “laws of power” will still result in a class of citizens that lives off of the productive endeavors of the rest without actually producing anything of value themselves. Marxism results in the same structure. Just with different names, and a shorter lifespan for the social institutions that implement the political policies of that doctrine.

A well educated polity, given tools with which to accurately comprehend the political combat (struggle for power) would be better prepared, to engage in such combat themselves. This would lead, I imagine to a greater level of decentralization of power. The same is true for better educated consumers, they would in fact be better prepared to engage in negatiation for goods and services, and in evaluating them.

19

Things do seem to generally end up that way. Perhaps not for every banker but definitely for the ones with money enough to buy influence.

Perhaps. But wouldn’t that also mean that government just has to maintain a monopoly on education or at least what’s taught in schools to maintain power?

20

So then the question for each man who would embrace the logically necessary conclusions implicit in conflict (and the sources of power when thus engaged) would be, 1) how can I avoid being the victim and then secondly 2) How can I in fact become the victimizer.

If a theory of conflict, is present to allow effective analysis, my guess is victim’s would decrease, and victimizing would be come more difficult and the scale or scope of “exploitation” would shrink.