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From: MotionFur
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  • What are your thoughts on late term abortions? Certainly, you must find it morally wrong if you have a respect for personality. I'm pretty much okay with abortion on demand up to the third trimester. If you've ever seen a premature baby, you know their is a point where abortion becomes a violation of a person's life. I may push my personal cutoff day earlier, only if it can be shown that brain activity exists prior to the third trimester. Brain activity seems like a good marker for personality.

  • Well, I'd say the violinist arguement presents some interesting ideas to this point. But, if I had to draw a line somewhere, to say that if women aren't at fatal risk for whatever reason, they shouldn't have abortions,I'd say the 3rd trimester is a decent time. Lots of things happen around there, including being able to sustain fetus' outside of the womb at about 22+ weeks with medical aid.

  • I think if their is a sensible cutoff point like your 22+ weeks (precluding health complications that necessitate abortion), you'd probably get a lot of "lifers" on board. I think what they object to most is abortion on demand, no exceptions.

    Right now, it is virtually unrestricted, and those organizations who appose any and all restrictions site a slippery slope argument (a little restriction will eventually turn into a total ban), and I just don't buy that. It sensibility to much to ask?

  • We need more atheist free market types. We don't need an intelligent designer for our economy for the same reason we don't need an intelligent designer for biology. I guess it doesn't help that everyone's view of the free market is based on fallacy and straw man arguments.

  • This is true. When people think of the term "free market" or "capitalism" they bring in so much baggage with their concept it's pretty much impossible to work with at times. Many people seem that they can't continue to step back and remove themselves from the situation to see the bigger picture.

  • I know and it confuses me how fellow "freethinkers" can hold such strong dogmatic views. Like when Agman started talking about economics my jaw hit the floor. None of it was based on any form of logic, and it seemed like it was based purely on emotion and not logical deduction. It was his (and Thunderf00t, and TJs) creationist moment. How do we reason with these people?

  • Well, part of the outreach will have to appeal to the emotional mechanisms that allow them to hold the views they do, and then otherwise clearing up the mud from their thinking by defining terms well and proving real world examples and reasoned arguments...

    Easier said then done. :P

  • That sounds rough, I knew I moved away from the creation/evolution debate for a reason!

  • Hey, I've been gathering the portrait videos in a playlist as ppl are not all leaving them as replies to Agman. Have added you to the list.

  • Abortion would be like anything else that has ever been outlawed. It's going to happen. While I personally am somewhat on the fence I see the moral objection. I lean somewhat more towards the pro-life idea that it's not the right thing to do. Your actions have consequences and I think that you're robbing something of a chance to live, however, I think in no way should you be forced at the point of a gun to suffer those consequences. Same is true for any prohibition.

  • "There's a huge up-front investment in any utility-like infrastructure"

    Yes, some businesses are less flexible then others, that can change the rules of the game, but I don't think it breaks the game.

  • "then I have to pay whatever he wants! This is the power of monopolies"

    Kind of like the over bloated and inefficient first class mail monopoly mandated by law that is billions of dollars in debt that we're forced to pay for? Man, I would hate to be forced to pay for monopolies. Almost all "monopoly" abuses come from government.

  • Coal mining towns are some of the classic examples of companies abusing people, but was only able to do this with the help of the government. I don't normally dump links on people, but this short video by shanedk is relevant. watch?v=EeW3QVDaS1k

    "Big corporations are a major reason why we need big government as a counterweight."

    Corporations and corporatism is created by big government.

  • Small businesses are mostly being killed by corporations because corporations control government, and lobby for barriers to entry [regulation.]

    I have a lot of small business owners in my family, and I work in small town with lots of them, do you know [this is an honest question] how many asinine hoops you have to jump threw to get useless government mandated licenses and whatnot? Those were lobbied for by corporations to destroy competition.

  • Many of these hoops are very expensive, and can simply mean you will never start your business. Mission Accomplished for the corporations.

  • I was with you 100% until the free market issue, and my biggest problem with the video was the childishly patronizing way you stated your position. It's not about taking people's money, it's about people paying for the privilege of living a society with an infrastructure that was paid for by the labor, and taxes of their predecessors. If they want to try to get rich, and be tax free in Antarctica, more power to them.

  • I accidentally gave the video 1 star, I meant to give it 3. It was a 5 until the immature section.

  • And I think what I was talking about, was at least in part, about the exact position of "taking people's money." As this video came after agman's video, and that was his position.

  • "It's not about taking people's money, it's about people paying for the privilege of living a society that was paid for by the labor"

    You mean they should have to pay for their corporate advantages that the state supplies them with? But who would they pay? Oh, the state? Bureaucrats?

    Surely you don't mean to the labor, as they were already paid in wages, and may have gotten more wages if people people didn't call for money to be taken away from people in the first place.

  • Yeah, to the state. The state provides a LOT of infrastructure, not least the rule of law, which is the foundation upon which business can grow.

    One problem with the "free market" is the failure to capture all costs and properly reflect them in the price. For example, how much was the cost of the creation an maintenance of the roads used to transport the raw materials and final goods?

    How about preventative costs? Defense of the country, police protection, fire protection?

  • That depends how you define law.

    "For example, how much was the cost of the creation an maintenance of the roads used to transport the raw materials and final goods?"

    I'm not really sure what this means. Raw materials for what, the road? What are the "final goods?"'

    I think private businesses do very well in "capturing" costs and reflecting them in the price. I also think they have huge incentives to try and innovate and reduce expenses when it's practical. The government, not so much.

  • Say I run an ice-cream shop. I even have a farm at the edge of town. But I need to bring the milk/cream from my farm to the shop. To do this, I use a road. How much do I pay for the use of the road? None -- it's infrastructure.

  • "None"

    Well, wealth doesn't just fly out of the government's asshole, the farmer/shop-owner does pay for roads. You can pay for something threw taxation, or threw purchasing. To say that the farmer pays "nothing" is just false. Government can provide a service kind of like how a company does, the only difference is the government can force you to pay for it, even if you don't want it, and even if it's poor quality. Government does not have any super special powers for making things like roads.

  • No, that's my point. THIS is the sort of thing taxes are for.

    And you're right. The free-market feedback doesn't work the same for government, and government power is frequently abused.

    BUT imagine the scenario where there was no government; no common ANYTHING. No laws. Pay for your own cops, or defend your land yourself. No trial courts. No government roads. Pay a toll to someone new for each mile you drive.

    (more)

  • Government is what you need to have when you have a society of any size. That means, before my little ice cream shop can have access to a reasonable number of customers, there likely needs to be a government, poor as it may be.

    That's all I'm saying. Even if government is redistributing the wealth, that's a GOOD THING, because it's just fatuous to believe that there can be a society built exclusively upon an upper class.

  • "No laws."

    Depends how you define laws. I don't think a society where the state does not force a monopoly on trial/civil courts necessarily means that the society goes without that. Pay a toll every mile...?

    Well, if you're defining 'government' as the state, then I don't think you need it to have a society.

    "fatuous to believe that there can be a society built exclusively upon an upper class."

    I'm not even sure what you're saying with this point.

  • "Pay a toll every mile". If the roads aren't a resource that the government owns/controls, then I'm using someone else's property when I transport my milk from farm to shop. So, if I'm accurately reflecting the entire cost of my business in the price I charge, I have to be honest and pay the landowner for the use.

    You can't have a society where everyone is "upper class". The upper classes must pay a disproportionate share of the costs to maintain society, because that's where the money is.

  • The pay a toll every mile thing was just me pointing out an exaggeration, You're making it sound like toll roads would be very expensive/inconvenient. But no one is going to put a toll every mile, that would be extremely cost inefficient. But yeah, private roads are going to have to pay for themselves somehow. Billboard and other possible advertising may take part or all of the cost, depending on the area, and of course tolls are an option as well, and there's all kinds of ways to collect tolls

  • "The upper classes must pay a disproportionate share of the costs to maintain society"

    If road usage is sold to people, I see no reason that it needs to be sustained by the "upper class." There are businesses that run completely on the useage of lower/mid class. Roads right now are so heavily subsidized and overbuilt, it's kind of hard to tell how useful roads actually are. Maybe if we didn't have a government that didn't build roads, we might have a lot more rail travel.

  • Yeah, it was an extreme example on my part, too. I can see having some -- clearchannel -- of roads where you pay some annual subscription to use any of their roads. But once their network of roads becomes dominant, then they can charge whatever they want.

    "Free" market economics depends on freedom of supply, freedom of demand, and transparency. As such, it rarely exists. But I agree it's a good ideal.

  • "But once their network of roads becomes dominant, then they can charge whatever they want."

    I don't think this is necessarily true. I only have 1 cable provider for my area, but they're not charging me thru the nose. If they started to, then it would immediately become a very good investment for competition to enter the market. And when it comes to transportation, it's not only the competition of the same type of company, but as I said, if roads become cost inefficient, there's rail.

  • There's a huge up-front investment in any utility-like infrastructure. I'm thinking water pipes, cable runs, power wires, etc. At least in my area, there are two roughly equivalent providers - Cox and Qwest, who both provide similar services. There's also satellite, etc. But land ownership is a clear zero-sum game, and it's not at all clear that an "alternate" set of roads might be created. (more)

  • In Phoenix, the major roads are on a one-mile grid. If someone bought all four miles of road around my house, then I have to pay whatever he wants! This is the power of monopolies, and it's one of the major factors that distorts a "free" market. We know for a fact that, back when we had laissez-faire (spelling?) government, we had HUGE abuses in this regard. Big corporations are a major reason why we need big government as a counterweight.

  • Excellent points jagmarz. As a person who works at home, and lives in an apartment I don't need many police, or a fire dept (that would be my landlords responsibility) A Corporation however would need security for EVERY truck that transports their good, they would have to pay for the roads to get the goods where they want them. I don't technically even need a road. Why should I pay the same percentage of my income as a wealthy person to support what's making him rich.

  • Why not just let the roads be paid for by charge, rather then tax, and allow people the freedom to allocate their own resources?

  • Because, in the end, some things are natural monopolies (for efficiency reasons, or resource reasons), and in those cases, it's much better for the functioning of society AT LARGE for those services to be provided by a non-profit.

    Government may not be great at this, but, on the whole, society benefits.

    Personally, if we could get by with a "small-business" model for all commerce, I'd be happy to get government out of the picture. Look around. Small business is being killed by corporations.

  • I'm going to start a new column, because this one is getting jumbled up.

  • "wealth doesn't just fly out of the government's asshole, the farmer/shop-owner does pay for roads."

    Yes they pay for the roads, BUT the rich get considerable more per dollar use, and benefit from them than the average Joe which is why they need to pay higher taxes. Likewise the police, and fire dept. Who gains the most from crime being prevented, and fires being put out. Obviously those with the most property, and money to lose.

  • To be honest if I had to spend even 10 years in prison, even if I was innocent, I'd want to die. Unless it was because I was a political prisoner and was using the time to inspire other people outside. Even if they find out that it is a crime that you didn't commit, thats 10 years of your life gone. Society, the economy and business have changed. Your job skills are now extremely poor if not non-existent. You aren't used to dealing with a healthy society anymore. I am pro-death penalty.

  • Well, I'd have no problem with prisoners killing themselves. Making that easily available would be a benefit to the current system most likely, as some of the people who we were having to feed for decades would off themselves. But, you could understand that an innocent person may want to wait it out and try and prove/wait for proof of their innocence [or a pardon possibly.]

  • I would agree. Freedom of choice in prison would be good. I actually wanted to discuss other points but I ran out of room. Prison of course is stealing from the people as it is and a life sentence is basically stealing from other people adding to that person's original crime. I think that if someone ends up getting a life sentence, then a charity needs to cover the cost if they want to keep that person alive. This person committed a crime and now he's going to take more from people.

  • You mean how lifers drain society by us having to sustain them? Yes, ways to deal with criminals is a very interesting topic, for sure, not a straight forward one. I certainly don't think people should be forced to shoulder the burden of feeding child-rapists. I've generally imagined possibly self-sustaining prisons that would essentially be businesses, kind of like a textile factory. Would only work with certain inmates, [mentally ill would be trouble] but it's an idea I've toyed around with.

  • Sadly on the issue of prisons there is no straight forward answer. I have toyed around with trying to make the "perfect" prison system and and it tends to run into ethical issues or areas that society doesn't want to think about. There was actually a prison that was set up to run a power plant, that taught the inmates job skills and would give them a trade after they got out of prison. But unions got mad and had it shut down because it was taking jobs from their workers.

  • I recommend the book, "Whatever happened to Justice"  Its an eye opener and recommended by Ron Paul.

  • "But unions got mad and had it shut down because it was taking jobs from their workers."

    lol, figures.

  • i've hugged a tree on mushrooms.  great video btw.

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