From: Sean Lynch On Thu, Sep 1, 2016 at 10:47 AM, juan <[1]juan.g71@gmail.com> wrote: On Thu, 1 Sep 2016 22:35:47 +1000 Zenaan Harkness <[2]zen@freedbms.net> wrote: > On Thu, Sep 01, 2016 at 02:47:08AM -0600, Mirimir wrote: > > How about we implement a working AP system? > > As I said in a previous thread, I now believe that to be fundamentally > flawed - that it will not achieve anything resembling justice, even in > the long term. The idea of finishing off criminals like cops, soldiers, politicians, corporatist 'business' men, etc is pretty sound. The problem is of course how to implement it. If AP can be turned against honest people then it's obviously not a good implementation. >Of course AP can be turned against "honest people." It's a system for turning money into death without knowing where the money came from. >Rich people make out like bandits in such a system, because they can hire bodyguards non-anonymously and pay to have their enemies killed >anonymously. You didn't think you could say that without arousing my defensiveness of my 'baby', AP? I think your error is that you are mixing pre-AP reality with post-AP reality. In today's world (pre-AP) in order to make a societal change, ordinary people generally have to speak up, to yell, to protest, and (sometimes) to vote. And usually the former hasn't been easily done anonymously, so arguably the big, powerful people learn who these trouble-making little folk are. In principle, this would allow the important people to kill the ordinaries: Except that it is generally expensive and risky for such a thing to occur, and the protestors usually greatly outnumber the rich ones, so the typical protestor is relatively safe from harm, today. In an AP-functioning world, it would seem that the important, rich people would be able to kill off the complainers. But remember, in an AP world it would no longer be necessary for little ones to loudly complain: A donation by AP (and those of thousands of other 'poor' people?) would provide the 'convincing' necessary, and do so anonymously. Further, modern technology will allow, relatively easily, anonymous complaining, so people will be able to rouse others and solicit assistance with little risk of identification. The Cypherpunks list is a fair example of that, despite the fact that some of us choose to post under our own, true names. For these reasons, I am convinced that 'the rich' would not have any great power over the far larger number of ordinary people. 'The rich' wouldn't know, precisely, WHO their enemies are. They have more money, rhetorically similar to having more bullets to shoot, but if they can't see the targets that advantage matters little. >Ironically, AP would work best in a society with a high level of wealth equality. If there's high inequality, it just makes that worse. Well, I don't see that. Perhaps you would care to explain this. 'Rich' people die as readily as the rest of us, and unless they somehow know who their 'enemies' are fairly powerless to prevent us from if they genuinely trespass against what we consider are our rights. At the same time, I don't object merely because somebody gets rich, as long as he does so in a fair, unbiased fashion: Put another way, I don't object if somebody gets rich selling Epi-pens, as long as many other people are free to enter the same market, generally without government restriction. The patent for Epi-Pens probably ran out years ago; the current restriction is simply that the FDA has arrogated the power to decide if any given manufacture should be allowed to sell his version of the Epi-pen, or not. Too many 'nots', and what you have is not a free market at all, but twisted version of that. (Clearly, if Mylan Labs is able to jack up the price for a pair of Epi-pens from $100 to $600 over a period of 6 years, there is no way that a true 'free market' can be operating.) This doesn't mean that I object to the current patent system. In her book Atlas Shrugged, Ayn Rand came out on the side of private intellectual property, objecting to the theft by government of metal-maker Henry Reardon's special metal alloy, "Reardon metal", by means of blackmail. Of course, I understand that by citing Ayn Rand's reasoning (and I am by no means a Randian, having learned I was a libertarian years before knowing about Ayn Rand and her books) it may seem I am committing the rhetorical sin of 'appealing to authority'. And, I realize that there is something of a conundrum about advocating a 'free market' and yet implicitly supporting the one remaining control, that of a patent system somewhat akin to what the world uses today. (Who enforces such a patent system, except a government?) Let me propose an outline of a solution which could square the circle: At some early point, say age 18, each person would be asked whether he wishes to live his life WITH Intellectual Property rules, or not. He can choose either way, but if he refuses, manufacturers can band together to agree to sell only to people who agree to those rules. Correspondingly, those who sign the pro-Intellectual Property agreement agree thereby to bar themselves from buying products from non-intellectual-property agree-er manufacturers. Violations could be policed by an AP-type system. This wouldn't have to be a permanent decision, for any person. Other manufacturers may make products that are made for sale to non-Intellectual Property agree-ers, but they will be shut out from dealing with what I expect will be the majority, let's call them "Pro-Intellectual Property" people and manufacturers. I am fairly confident that the advantages of dealing with what I believe will be the majority, those that comply with Intellectual Property rules, will be sufficient to keep all but a small minority of the public willing to live voluntarily with such rules. Put simply, I suggest that there are some rather powerful advantages to having a system which rewards inventors. Jim Bell References 1. mailto:juan.g71@gmail.com 2. mailto:zen@freedbms.net