Mnrchst

First, s/he hasn't made much of a case for why reputation counts. Second, it implies that someone is violating my property if they damage my reputation without their spreading what they believe to be falsehoods, but by just saying the truth about me. You could argue that I've already damaged my own property by doing whatever, but I haven't because I'm not telling people about this. The other people are ultimately responsible for their volitional actions. If a few ex-girlfriends of Obama tell us he likes yogurt up his ass and a popsicle in his mouth, then they are the ones damaging his reputation by telling people, not Obama. Furthermore, their telling people and has no direct relationship to whether or not what they're saying is true: they could tell people either way. So, apparently, it's a crime if you tell people this and "enough" people believe you unless it's actually true. But if no one ever told anyone about Obama's fetishes, then his reputation is fine. So how could it be Obama's fault if other people make their volitional actions to tell people about this. If reputation is property, then the implication is that you're damaging your own property because of the actions of others. It's true that the accusation would need to be true in order for this to not be a crime, but it's also true that people have to tell others about it, so there's no reason to pin it all on the person being accused. As far as I can tell, if reputation is property, then that would mean that it's a crime to damage someone's reputation for any reason. Yes, it's true that if a bunch of people spread lies about some guy, then that guy will be worse off. However, if it's proven that these lies are lies, then the problem has already been solved. Those who spread the lies have gotten punished because their reputation will be damaged (basically for the rest of their lives, which is bad enough). As for the person who was accused, it's true that they lost their reputation for a while, but once it's restored, they're going to get paid back interest (so to speak) because of the wave of sympathy which will come. "Oh, you're that guy who got accused by 100 people of doing X and it's been proven that they were all just trying to screw up your life because they're jerks. Is there anything I can do for you?" It will then be up to the people who actually made the choice to stop trusting you whether or not they want to make up for it. And if they don't, then perhaps the accused will think less of them. I'll add that this is all contingent on people being idiots. If I make an accusation and no one believes me, not much happens. If I make an accusation and a lot of people believe me, then apparently I've committed a crime. But in both cases, I've done the exact same thing, so apparently, my punishment is determined by other people's actions. This makes no sense to me. If I believe lies, it's on me, not the liars. You can just look at the historical patterns when making a judgment (just like you can look at the historical pattern of determining if someone's reputation was indirectly damaged by the spreading of falsehoods) and determine how you want to make choices. If one kid accuses a teacher of molestation, you'd be an idiot to decide to not let your kid be taught by him/her because there's virtually no basis for the accusation being true (probably just as much as a simple demographic profile). If several kids say so, that's a different story. Finally, I'll make a pithy point: someone no longer thinking highly of you isn't damaging you--they're withdrawing their valuing of you. You aren't tangibly harmed when your reputation goes down, you've simply lost something you like which wasn't yours to begin with--it always belonged to those who were giving it to you.

No.

If you can't demonstrate what would have happened if X hadn't happened, then you can't say X is bad. You're basically saying "Person A spreads falsehood about person B, and as a result, persons C and D stop buying stuff from person B, therefore, person A committed a crime against person B, but, if no one stopped buying from person B, then person A didn't commit a crime." The problem with this argument is that person A's actions did not damage person B, even in the sense that person B is less well off, because what actually made person B less well off were the actions of persons C and D. Persons C and D made a choice based off their available information (including person's A falsehoods). There is no objective crime by person A against person B--how can you demonstrate it? Persons C and D are ultimately responsible for the business effects on person B. Furthermore, if the crime is doing things that diminished person B's business, then I don't see why this couldn't include straight-up competition with person A. You might argue that it's the damage to the person's reputation that is the crime, and not damage to their business. Well, if a bunch of people stop thinking highly of you because of a bunch of falsehoods, the blame ultimately lies with them--they don't have to believe it. Furthermore, I certainly don't think those people have committed any crime--no one owes anyone else a high opinion of them (politically speaking). Finally, I see no objective means of measuring one's opinions of another. As for your point on historical patterns, it doesn't matter--you have to demonstrate the damage. You can't demonstrate it if it's possible (however unlikely) that persons B and C would have believed the accusations of person A even if person A never actually made them--people can believe all sorts of things for any variety of reasons. I never said it had to be explicit. Anyway, where's the implicit contract between me and everyone else in society that I'm going to always tell them what I believe to be the truth? The examples you gave are obvious examples of implicit contract violation because they involve sales and/or threatening law and order (i.e. impersonating a cop). Why do I owe it to everyone else to not attempt to damage someone's reputation by spreading what I believe to be falsehoods (at least when it's "successful enough")?

I've already made it clear that I'm talking about when an entire society is at risk of being enslaved by an invading force, not when one guy starts acting irrationally. In other words, I don't want taxes just because there are a few terrorists out there.

In the sense that their government doesn't want to kill them, sure. However, everyone in this O-ist society has been thrust into the law of the jungle because they're being invaded. Just because the Nazis aren't marching into New York doesn't mean there isn't a war on. You can look at the concrete of the government not wanting to initiate force against its citizens, but there's also the abstract context of how for everyone in that society everything is now at stake. They're in the process of being thrown into the jungle, so to speak.

I think force can be initiated by nature (or whoever is responsible for putting you out into the ocean in the first place). True, but it does mean that there are some actions which used to be initiations of force and no longer are. No--you can only take actions which will be effective at defeating the enemy (i.e. outright slaves aren’t going to be effective workers), otherwise, you are doing harm by making enemy victory more likely. No--I said they’re doing harm, not initiating force. They’re doing harm because by not funding the war effort, they are making defeat more likely. As I've said, it's now no longer possible to initiate force, but you could still do harm by overreaching and making the citizenry into ineffective workers (i.e. because taxes are too high or they are de facto slaves, etc). Correct--but you’re responsible for your own defense. If you don’t want to take that responsibility in this situation, then you’re also making it less likely that others will be able to defend themselves. Even if you're not initiating force because it's impossible, you're still doing harm. Within the "law of the jungle" context, you can still create situations which are not preferable to others.

Wouldn't this mean that if people believed such things, that those who published the material should be punished even if it's incredibly stupid. And wouldn't damage be done if just one person behaved irrationally as a result? And how can we prove they wouldn't have behaved exactly the same anyway if the info wasn't published? I definitely agree fraud is a crime, but I think it only applies when there's a contract. In other words, if I sign a contract with someone where they're obligated to tell me what they think is the truth, fine. Otherwise, where is the fraud if I tell people things I believe not to be true? Also, just so we're on the same page, we're only talking about when people know they're telling things they don't believe (and when there's the "reputation damage"), right? Like, if someone actually thinks X is true, then it's OK for them to tell people? Or is it fraud if they spread lies they think are true?

I'm not sure if I totally agree with ZSorenson's post, but it's definitely at least close to what I'm advocating. As for what 2046 just said, remember that governments are just abstractions. If it's valid for a government to initiate an attack against another government under X circumstances, then I see no reason why it isn't valid for individuals to do so against others under such circumstances as well (because, in the end, we're always talking about individuals). When there's two people and one lifeboat, force has already been initiated against both people--they can't initiate force against each other. If the USA were O-ist in the 1940s and Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan are determined to enslave the world, the fascists have already initiated force against everyone in the USA. Under that context, I see any O-ist society taxing its citizens to win the war as appropriate--they aren't initiating force because it's already been initiated. Someone might object "But those getting taxed aren't harming anyone", but I see that as analogous as saying "States are an initiation of force because someone setting up their own private police force doesn't mean they're necessarily harming anyone." In these situations, those getting taxed/private police aren't obviously/visibly/tangibly doing harm by not paying taxes/submitting to a monopoly police force, but they are because of context: you have to defeat the fascists to have freedom for the future, and having private police compete implies that the non-aggression principle is optional.

No, only IF it's clear that there's a third party which is capable of killing and/or enslaving you and your buddy.

" If the dentist did not have a disease and lost business due to the defamatory reports then the cause can only be those people who spread the false reports, and the dentist should win the suit. " That's the only thing which appears to justify this. I don't see that as making sense. The problem isn't that people spread false reports--it's that people believed them. Let's say I'm a popular newspaper columnist and I write that the newest line of cars from a major manufacturer are going to explode after a couple years of use. Should I be punished for this? Where do we draw the line? How outrageous does the claim have to be before we stop caring? And why should I be punished if a lot of people believe me and not be punished if no one does? Either way, I did the same thing. Therefore, my punishment depends on what OTHER people did.

EC, what if only 99% of the people want to donate to the military, and it's highly likely that their contributions will make the difference between victory or defeat?

This has nothing to do with quotes. Your response doesn't address our arguments. You say "you're initiating force" and our argument is that there are very different rules when we're in a "lifeboat scenario/similar".

I like the first one. I don't like the second one--it doesn't look as cool, the words aren't as compelling, and "you" are the most important person in the universe...? You mean to yourself? Sure, but that isn't mentioned.

Grames, you keep telling me what this is without telling me why you think it should exist. I don't see how reputation can be considered property. How do you argue that is?

Grames, what, then, do you think are the requirements of speech/communication in the general defamation as a tort violation and why? Is it just if they violate a contract? I'm asking (I shouldn't made this more clear, I'm sorry) about speech which is illegal under any circumstances (regardless of contracts). The only ones I can think of are which seem bad to me are threats, and distribution of information which involved a violation of privacy and/or child pornography. Should there be more? (i.e. Yelling "fire" in a crowded theater, which I have no problem with, unless there's a rule by the owner not to do that).

Grames, you're not attempting to persuade me that slander should be a crime--you just provided a link that goes over the concept without attempting to justify it. What are your responses to my arguments that slander is not a crime?

I think threats are probably force (I'm open to persuasion here). If someone calls you up and says "I'm coming to kill you!", then you're going to worry about whether or not that's true, thereby forcing you to react. I think you can argue threats are force along the same lines that fraud is force: (this is from a pro-Rand website) " Suppose a man reads an advertisement for a used car and goes to check it out. The owner assures the man that the car’s odometer reading is correct; this, however, is not true, and the owner knows it because he turned back the mileage himself. As far as the man can tell, though, the owner is being honest, and everything seems to be in order; so he buys the car and drives it away. But notice that the man is not driving the car he bargained for; he is not driving the car he was willing to buy. Unbeknownst to him, he is driving a different car—one with higher mileage than the one for which he was willing to pay. By lying to the man about the car’s mileage and by selling it to him on the basis of that false information, the crook has defrauded the man. Because the man’s willingness to exchange his money for the car was based partly on the crook’s lie, the crook has gained and is now keeping the man’s money against his will. In so doing, the crook is physically forcing the man to act against his judgment. By fraudulently taking and keeping the man’s money, the crook is physically preventing him from spending or saving it as he otherwise would. Fraud, the act of gaining or keeping someone’s property by means of deception, is a form of indirect physical force. It is physical force, because, although indirect, it physically impedes the victim’s ability to act fully on his judgment. Other types of indirect physical force include extortion, the act of gaining or keeping someone’s property by distant threat of force; copyright and patent infringements, acts of misusing someone’s intellectual property (and thus impinging on his ability to act on it); slander, the act of making false statements that damage a person’s reputation (and thereby retarding his ability to act on it); unilateral breach of contract, the act of refusing to deliver goods or services one has agreed to deliver; and so forth. In all such cases, although the force is indirect, it is still physical: When and to the degree it is used, it physically prevents the victim from acting according to his judgment. Whether direct or indirect, physical force used against a person stops him from living fully as a human being: To the extent it is used, it prevents him from employing his means of survival—the judgment of his mind. " As for slander, I convinced that is not a crime. First of all, there's not necessarily going to be harm to a person's reputation if someone slanders (it's possible no one will believe him/her). And second, suppose your reputation is diminished. So what? It's only because a bunch of people believe the slanderer, but you're not forced to change your behavior and injured in a tangible way. If slander in the conventional sense is wrong, then what about any opinion expressed that diminishes your reputation (for example, getting demolished in a public debate, or someone saying "I think so-and-so is a terrible person because of X statement we all already know they made".

Atlas, numerous people have already responded to this argument in this thread. You should read those and respond if you want to contribute.

This is definitely true with respect to transportation. However, it's not for direct subsidies--it's far easier to avoid those than the transportation subsidies.

From my first post: "I'm definitely undecided on this though." That's your opinion. You said "nothing is learned from answering that sort of question" and I'm saying "Yes, you do learn something by answering that question (if you've got the correct answer), and what you've learned is the answer to the question. And even if we don't find an answer we can convince ourselves is the correct one (like ethical egoism, which is much easier to prove than a specific policy in the complex real world), that doesn't mean there isn't a correct answer (i.e. just because picking a sexual consent/voting/drinking age is somewhat arbitrary doesn't mean we should pick one). Right, which means that in emergency cases you can figure out that a rule which would apply to other situations doesn't apply to this one, and we can figure this out by applying our minds to the issue and get an answer. This is my whole point. Yes, she explains how there's no initiation of force in that situation (if you kill someone when you're ordered to with a gun to your head) because of the context. This is essentially what I'm saying, there are SOME situations where taxation is moral. I'm not sure what you're saying--taxation is not killing. Yes, because the whole point of this thread is "Do you support taxes IF they are/are highly likely to be necessary to fight a foreign invasion?" That's not relevant. The issue is whether or not taxation is moral in this situation. However, I'll add that if you might be able to/will be able to fight them off by using your factories to make weapons, you'd be happier, because you'll have your liberty without threat of invasion later. Yes, we obviously can't come out with a rule that can be applied to all situations. I never said we could (it would be practically infinitely complex). What we can do is come up with the rule "If there's a nominal chance that taxing will save our nation, we should do it." You're then applying that rule to the reality you live in--you do your best to interpret it as any judge would. Technically, this is true, however, everything that follows the induction is deductive. In other words, if we assume (through induction) that humans are rational, then we can deduce from there. If we accept self-interest is moral, then determining that taxation is moral in X situation and moral in Y situation is determined through deduction.

Why should there be any restrictions on speech (or, more appropriately, communication/expression)? By what standard do you judge when someone should get forced used against them for their expression and when they shouldn't? Why is it aggression/similar if I write a letter to the president saying I'm going to kill him?

Actually, we've learned the answer to the question, which is something that we've learned from it, regardless of how unusual it is. Sure there is, it's just that it's impossible for us to determine where the line between "enough" and "not enough" is. But that doesn't mean that these don't exist and/or that we shouldn't attempt to assign where they are (for example, even though selecting a sexual consent age is somewhat arbitrary, that doesn't mean we shouldn't). It seems you're thinking I introduced the topic of "where do we draw the line?" Actually, I started a topic on "Is X moral on Y circumstances?" which does have to be approached deductively, because I'm presenting the issue as a matter of principle, as in, is taxation ever justified, not when it is justified assuming that we've already determined that there are some circumstances where it can be.

There's a pretty standard convention on this forum: when people start a thread and ask for people's opinions on something, we're also implicitly asking for justifications for those opinions. So far, all Grames has said (other than informing me of the fact that there are laws restricting speech, which I never asked about) is "This is correct and good."

But you're not liberating it unless you've gotten the law changed to reduce taxes. If you take that money, then, ultimately, it's not going to "the government" (an abstraction), but to other people. This means you're effectively saying "I deserve money I didn't earn more than the people who actually did earn it" (because they are being taxed more than subsidized) or "I know how better to spend money than you do, so I'll let the government take it from you by force." I think it's moral to not take more money from the government than what it gives you, because you're otherwise ensuring that more people will send more money to the government than they get back/increase the discrepancy for many people. Of course, it's possible that the government will take the extra billion and give it to some guy who gets 5 billion from the government despite paying only 100 million in taxes. However, that would be up to the people in government--you're not sanctioning this by refusing it. But by taking more than you send to the government, I'd say you are sanctioning the notion that you deserve to profit from the initiation of force.

We could, but then they're taking more territory (power) to use against us. Sure. To be specific: A fascist foreign nation is invading our O-ist nation and we have every reason to believe they will take over our entire nation (and more) if they have the opportunity, and we are pretty certain they will win unless we tax people in our nation. Therefore, we have to tax people in order to preserve our capitalist tax-free way of life. No one inherently owes you anything, except to not initiate force against you, sure. However, in this context, people do owe you their property and we should take it from them by force because it's the only life-affirming thing to do. As far as the draft goes, I'd say it's pointless, and possibly counterproductive, to draft people into the military because you can't force them to want to fight (they might just try to kill the other soldiers on "their side").