What do you think about Mike Huemer?

[teo123]

@Woarna, you said you like Michael Huemer. What do you think about his anarcho-capitalism?

I like Huemer because of what he's written in terms of ethical vegetarianism and a paper I read by him on the Repugnant conclusion, otherwise I'm not an anarcho-capitalist and not a fan of it. Though I do think his Phenomenal conservatism is interesting. So overall I like some of his stuff and think he's smart but I do disagree with the libertarian tendency.

So, you think we should have a government. But what kind of government do you think is the best?

Do you want a democracy? To be honest, I am having trouble understanding why some people think democracy is the best form of government. Democracy is obviously not based on good principles (two wolves and a lamb voting on what's for dinner) and it obviously has a horrible track record of bringing malevolent dictators (such as Hitler) to power.

Do you want a technocratic dictatorship? Well, I think that will probably work if human beings were perfect, or at least a lot more conscious than they really are. I think a crucial problem with a technocratic dictatorship is that social sciences are not yet advanced enough to allow us to base a government on that. Modern-day social sciences usually just give governments false confidence that their policies are correct and, to quote Clive Staples Lewis, forbid wholesome doubt.

[teo123]

They typically use "coercion" as a red herring and argue that their system is not coercive because it's based on volountary exchanges... but this ignores the fact that you will still die of starvation if you don't accept the terms of their system.

But maybe you will not die of starvation. If you go live in a forest, there is a good chance that you will survive, just like our ancestors did. It's just that it's easier to live if you accept the terms of their system.
But even so, what should a government do? Perhaps guaranteeing Universal Basic Income will make things less coercive, but real-world governments don't do that. Real-world governments, as far as I can tell, always make things more coercive.
By the way, do you think it is a bad thing that people in poor countries are "coerced" into working in sweatshops? Do you think sweatshops are a bad thing?

Most people simply lack the resources to live freeer and happier lives, and this could be changed with more postive rights.

Positive rights are a very lousy concept, and I explained why here:

It is often stated good conditions at work are human rights that capitalism infringes onto. But, as Milton Friedman said, for something to be a human right, it has to be applicable wherever humans may be. And if you put the laws about work conditions from a rich country such as the USA into Bangladesh, you would make almost every job in Bangladesh illegal. Clearly, they are not applicable there, so they are not human rights.

Being "free to choose" has no value if your choices are severely limited because everything is monopolized and worker exploitation is through the roof.

Monopolies in the real world almost always happen precisely because of government intervention. Worker exploitation also wouldn't be much of a problem if governments weren't stopping people from starting their own businesses with regulations that crash small businesses.

[teo123]

Libertarians are silly, and this guy seems to be no exceptions.
For me, most of it boils down to their bad conceptualizations of coercion and freedom.

Can you elaborate on that?

They typically use "coercion" as a red herring and argue that their system is not coercive because it's based on volountary exchanges... but this ignores the fact that you will still die of starvation if you don't accept the terms of their system. Seems pretty coercive to me All forms of governance are coercive, it's a matter of finding the best one.

Another common theme is they believe negative freedom (i.e. absence of rules and regulations) is all we need to be fulfilled, but in reality this mostly applies to a small subset of people. Most people simply lack the resources to live freeer and happier lives, and this could be changed with more postive rights.

Being "free to choose" has no value if your choices are severely limited because everything is monopolized and worker exploitation is through the roof.

Also, I feel like you are straw-manning here. Michael Huemer is not using those arguments. His basic argument for anarcho-capitalism is that governments are in the position of medieval physicians. Modern-day social sciences are proto-sciences at best. Governments posess some pre-scientific ideas about how the society works, and anything they can do in an attempt to solve societal problems, just like bloodletting and other common treatments in medieval medicine, will turn out to either have no effect or be counter-productive. Michael Huemer is not saying anarcho-capitalism would be some kind of eutopia. Societal problems will still exist, but medieval physicians that are politicians will not be making things worse.

[Avskum]

If unchecked, corporations will do anything to maximize profits at the expense of the environment and employees. If CEOs had it their way, we would just return to feudalism. They would be kings and we would be serfs working 16 hours per day. The only way to stop this is through a (democratic) government that actually cares about its citizens interests'. The "free market" without government intervention tends towards extreme wealth concentration and oligopoly where a few corporations in a given sector own and control everything, and thus ends up not making people very free at all.

The answer? For a start, look at what the Nordic countries are doing. More democratization of the workplace, unions, more regulations, etc. Most Americans are in favor of these things.

[teo123]

If unchecked, corporations will do anything to maximize profits at the expense of the environment and employees.

Corporations destroying the environment is a problem, but you need to understand that all environmental regulations do is push those problems into foreign backyards, particularly to poorer countries. Like I've written on my blog:

In response to environmental regulation, multinational corporations often respond by outsourcing the work that pollutes the environment the most to countries where those laws do not exist, and those tend to be poorer countries where air-cleaning and water-cleaning technology is not available, and healthcare for people who get ill from the pollution is also poorer. So, even as the politicians in rich countries feel like they are protecting people in poor countries by passing environmental regulation, in reality, they are probably doing the opposite.

If CEOs had it their way, we would just return to feudalism.

Now you sound just as ridiculous as meat-eaters when they talk about the "vegetarianism gene" that will supposedly activate when we are vegans/vegetarians for a long time and make us more vulnerable to heart disease. That's not at all how it works, and you are making wild empirical claims with no evidence to back them up.
In feudalism, everybody is poorer than in a free market. There is no obvious reason why reasonable CEOs would want feudalism. And how exactly would they implement feudalism without a government? Feudalism, just like slavery, had to be enforced by the government.

They would be kings and we would be serfs working 16 hours per day.

If some business tries to force their workers to work 16 hours a day, somebody will start another business which will not do that.

The only way to stop this is through a (democratic) government that actually cares about its citizens interests'.

Absolutely not, what is needed is competition in a free market.

The "free market" without government intervention tends towards extreme wealth concentration

Then how it is that wealth inequality tends to be lower in countries with more economic freedom? How it is that wealth inequality has decreased as governments have stopped constantly intervening in the economy? In ancient times, wealth inequality was a lot bigger than it is today.

oligopoly where a few corporations in a given sector own and control everything

Sounds to me more like what governments are doing. Governments adding more and more regulation that only the biggest corporations can comply to is causing oligopolies and monopolies. Remove the government regulation, and new small businesses will emerge.

unions

What unions accomplish is a complicated issue. It's possible they actually decrease employment, as Milton Friedman suggested.

more regulations

What are you talking about? There is a significantly less regulation in Nordic countries than in the US.

[Avskum]

Will respond some time next week

[teo123]

Will respond some time next week

It's been more than a week and you did not respond?

[FredVegrox]

Corporations are ruining the environment, there is the issue that no one who could do so is fixing environmental issues.

If you're rational you don't get to believe whatever you want to believe. Voters, activists, and political leaders of the present day are in the position of medieval doctors.
Michael Huemer

[teo123]

Corporations are ruining the environment, there is the issue that no one who could do so is fixing environmental issues.

My views have changed slightly since I opened this thread. I am not a radical anarchist anymore. I now think there are some good regulations. Probably any regulation that reduces the amount of antibiotics used in the egg industry is a good regulation. Radical anarchists seem to operate under the assumption that corporation that does some wildly unecological things will be boycotted. However, I don't see that happening with the egg industry. Most of the people don't boycott the intensive egg industry (which is where the vast majority of antibiotics today goes) because they are ignorant of the problem. Or at least the seriousness of the problem. Governments tend to at least not be that ignorant of global problems.

I still think that life in Somalia is slightly better than life in the USA, and that life in Croatia is a lot better than both.

[FredVegrox]

Corporations are ruining the environment, there is the issue that no one who could do so is fixing environmental issues.

My views have changed slightly since I opened this thread. I am not a radical anarchist anymore. I now think there are some good regulations. Probably any regulation that reduces the amount of antibiotics used in the egg industry is a good regulation. Radical anarchists seem to operate under the assumption that corporation that does some wildly unecological things will be boycotted. However, I don't see that happening with the egg industry. Most of the people don't boycott the intensive egg industry (which is where the vast majority of antibiotics today goes) because they are ignorant of the problem. Or at least the seriousness of the problem. Governments tend to at least not be that ignorant of global problems.

I still think that life in Somalia is slightly better than life in the USA, and that life in Croatia is a lot better than both.

I am not against regulations, anarchists are not often understood about that. There can be community regulations, government isn't needed for that. Communities do need to change, we should be focused on reaching others in our communities for change that is needed anyway.