Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Pastimes : Let's Talk About Our Feelings!!! -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Father Terrence who wrote (37276)	5/9/1999 11:53:00 AM
From: Edwarda	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 108807

Subject 21768

To: Father Terrence who wrote (37276)	5/9/1999 1:53:00 PM
From: Chuzzlewit	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 108807

Terrence, I accuse you of the crime you so freely accuse others of: hopeless romanticism! Let's examine the premiss of your argument -- that a truly free society can exist (even in concept if not in fact). Free of what? Laws and governments? Clearly impossible, because the existence of society in any form requires the acceptance of certain norms of behavior, and those norms are dictated by the society itself. In other words, the concept of society is antithetical to your construct of freedom. What is to stop the emergence of a war lord in your free society? Let me move from the theoretical to the actual. If you take the time to actually observe animal populations you will find that behavior is highly regulated, particularly in mammals and birds, although you will also find evidence of it in fishes and reptiles. Much of this behavior is innate. The implication, of course, is that it is a manifestation of the genetic code of the organism. It is inseparable from the organism, not an adjunct to it. Arguments to the contrary remind me either of the vapidity of Marxist science in their attempts to re-engineer human behavior (because it negated the role of genetics in behavior) or Utopian socialism. If we move up one hierarchical level, we find the population or the deme. There is a considerable body of evidence to indicate that this is the true unit of evolution -- not the individual. And therein lies the explanation for tribalism and altruism. Evolutionists have long noted that intraspecific competition was the basis for evolution, but it wasn't until a few decades ago that biologists took cognizance of the fact that in many species the competition was two-pronged. One of the prongs was based on individual fitness, but the second prong was based on the fitness of the deme. These observations are completely inconsistent with the libertarian world view you espouse. If we were to take your argument to its logical conclusion we would argue that either there must be a duality between human behavior and the physical entity we call man, or we must deny science altogether. But these are the very arguments you correctly hurl at some of your opponents. You argued against the "soul" on that very basis -- an argument with which I agree. And you argued against romantic notions of human behavior in past posts. Arguments with which I also agree. But then you proceed to fashion your arguments in the same flawed form as your opponents. If consistency is the bane of small minds, then I must plead guilty, because I find your arguments hopelessly inconsistent. Give me an argument for a practical libertarian society that takes science into account and I will give it considerable thought. TTFN, CTC