Fake experts

It really bothers me when someone speaks as though they are an expert-- "authoritatively"-- about something it's obvious they don't understand.

It's one thing to have a different opinion, but when someone misrepresents what they are arguing against it gets under my skin in a way few other things do.

This happens a lot in science topics, with gun rights, and with libertarianism in general. I expect it happens even more with things I don't know enough about to be annoyed by people getting the facts wrong.

And I'm certain I'm guilty of doing the same; I've been called out for it a few times. But I still bothers me.

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Education needs separation from state

(My Eastern New Mexico News column for August 7, 2019)

Once again we approach that saddest time of the year: when the majority of parents send their kids back to school; back into the local government concentration day-camps.

If you're someone who mistakes schooling for education you probably believe this is good.

School is a socialist babysitting system funded by your neighbors. If you're OK with forcing others to fund things you want then go ahead and support the government schools. I can't support socialism.

Schooling is also a system where organized bullying is cheered while the freelance competition, provided by the victims' peers, is officially frowned upon. I oppose all bullying.

I'm not saying education doesn't happen in schools, but when it does it's in spite of the schooling, not because of it. Kids are automatic learning machines and it's almost impossible to short-circuit their hunger to learn. They'll usually manage to learn everything they need to know, and more, even under the worst conditions. The fact that many people still believe schools educate-- because kids come out knowing more than they knew when they went in-- is evidence of this.

The real goal of schooling is to train kids to be useful, and not too dangerous, to politicians. Don't question too much, and only within approved boundaries. Sit down, be quiet, obey the bells, and be force-fed authoritarian propaganda.

This style of training-- called the Prussian Model, after the country America copied-- creates adults who are unlikely to break free from this early indoctrination and will largely comply with arbitrary orders from politicians and their attack dogs. This is very useful to governments and is why governments everywhere want to control schooling. They use the unsupportable claim "it's for the children"; if they can also fool the adult population into believing it's about education it works even better.

This isn't to say the teachers are bad. Most have good intentions, they are just saddled with a toxic system. A system which shouldn't exist. The teachers are victims almost as much as the under-aged inmates, but at least they get paid.

There are good teachers, but there are no good schools. If this claim angers you, congratulations-- you are showing symptoms of Stockholm Syndrome, where captives (and former captives) begin to relate to their captors, even taking their side, defending them from criticism. Stockholm Syndrome makes people loyal to "their" school.

My appreciation for education explains my opposition to schooling. It is essential to separate education from the state before the damage is irreversible.

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"If only they'd pass some gun laws!"

Scott Adams is mistaken about anti-gun "laws".

One tactic he uses when discussing (and pretending he isn't advocating for) more anti-gun "laws" is to say it's reasonable to enforce anti-gun "laws" by pointing out that we already have "laws" concerning other dangerous things. He says, for example, that cars are regulated, and that seat belt use is mandatory, and he's OK with that. He doesn't feel oppressed at all by losing that bit of freedom when he puts on a seat belt.

But by making this argument he's implying that guns remain unregulated, and they aren't. Not even close!

If there were zero anti-gun "laws" being enforced he might have a point in comparing them to cars-- he would be wrong for a lot of reasons, but you could admit that some other dangerous things besides guns are subjected to "laws", so why not guns, too?

But there are anti-gun "laws". Thousands of them.  It is dishonest to pretend there are no anti-gun "laws" so this is an idea that needs to be "tried". It's been tried. These "laws" keep failing and making things worse everywhere they are tried. It's time to stop doing what doesn't work and to try something different.

It is dishonest to pretend that there need to be "laws" regulating guns "for safety" when those kind of "laws" are already suffocating us.

Check out all his other superstitious beliefs about guns at the tag Scott Adams on guns.

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Glorious perfection... or not

Trump Derangement Syndrome is a real thing. Anyone who dislikes Trump more than I do is suffering from it, just as anyone who likes Trump more than I do is afflicted with Trump Approval Delusion. How did I get so smart and lucky as to be the only person finding the perfect balance?

I'm joking, of course, but doesn't it usually feel that way when comparing yourself to others?

That's why every driver who is driving faster than you is a "maniac" and every driver going slower is just in your way.

We all seem to believe we are at the perfect position and everyone in front or behind, left or right, or above or below us, is the problem. They are "extreme" in some way.

Well, maybe they are and maybe they aren't. But I know I'm not perfect and can only guess about you.

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Why do good people do evil things?

I understand why some people habitually do evil things. They are self-centered and entitled and don't care who they hurt while getting what they want. It's not hard to see.

The same sort of thing goes for good people doing good things. They want to be a positive part of society; want to help people.

I can also understand why people who easily choose to do evil things sometimes do good things-- it's to their benefit. No one could survive long only doing evil things all the time.

But why do otherwise good people commit evil? How can they rationalize what they are doing?

"For good people to do evil things it takes religion." ~ Physicist Steven Weinberg.

No religion is more convenient for this purpose, or illustrates this fact better, than Statism.

It's what causes good people to become cops and then start to commit evil acts as part of the "job". It's what causes good people to get a "job" with the IRS and start stealing property and ruining lives. It takes a belief that committing evil acts is OK under the circumstances, and is approved by the "higher power" flowing from the courthouse, city hall, the capital, or the bureaucracy. Or that this approval makes the act which would be evil otherwise not evil.

Statism is the most popular religion in the world. It usually comes before any other religion the believer may have. When combined with other religions it can become even worse-- just look at the Muslim world, the old "Moral Majority", or "Focus on the Family" if you have any doubt about this danger.

Don't trust any belief which causes you to rationalize violating others "for their own good" or for society or for "the common good". Do the right thing, even if you feel you could win approval and rewards by doing the wrong thing.

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Added "friction" does greater harm to good people

In my continuing "Scott Adams (is wrong) on guns" series (that's a new tag), I have looked at many of his "halfpinions" (his word) concerning guns.

Here's the next installment. Yes, this is something I've brought up before, but it bears repeating since he's still misrepresenting the issue.

When people object to his anti-gun ideas by reasonably pointing out that bad people will still get guns and suicidal people will still kill themselves he likes to say that of course they will, but any new "law" will add "friction" to the process, and "add friction; get less of that behavior (crime/suicide)".

Again he's acting on the faulty premise-- the assumption-- that guns are bad; that they are the problem; that cutting back on their availability even a little is generally a good thing. They aren't, and it isn't. Starting from a flawed premise, he arrives at a dumb "halfpinion" of his own.

Yes, you might "add friction" to a bad guy getting a gun with which to violate innocent people but those aren't the only people to whom you are adding friction. You also add friction to the good, innocent people looking to get a gun for defense at the same time you add friction to the bad guys looking to violate the innocent. You are adding friction to the girl whose crazy ex is promising to kill her. I lost a friend to this added friction about 26 years ago as she waited for governmental permission to buy and carry a gun for self-defense. Guess who didn't bother following the friction-causing "laws".

Who is more accustomed to dealing with added friction on a daily basis?
Who has the connections to do an end-run around your added friction? It's not usually the good people.

It's always going to affect those who want a gun for self-defense more than it will affect the bad guys who want a gun for offense. Add friction, you get less self-defense.

You might "add friction" to a suicidal person's attempt to get a gun with which to end his own life. This might save a few lives-- the lives of those who don't have some other method immediately available and who will soon change their mind about committing suicide-- but how many innocent lives are you sacrificing in the process? Do you really believe it's worth the cost to trade one person who wants to die for one person who wants to live-- even if those wants are temporary whims?

He pretends he's already considering net "gun deaths", but he can't be. There is no way to record how many lives are saved with guns, so how can you credibly consider them? Very few of those cases ever get reported-- to government or the media. Most cases of self-defense don't result in the gun being fired. And even in the small number which do, unless a shot is fired and you're in a town where the gunshot will attract unwanted attention, who's dumb enough to call the cops on themselves? Even if you are in town, I'd bet in most cases the sound of a gunshot isn't currently pinpointed if no one reports being shot. No one can know even a reasonable estimate of how many lives are saved with a gun, so there is no possible way to calculate the net "gun deaths".

He's only looking at half of the picture and ignoring the inconvenient part-- just as he does in all his "gun control" [sic] ideas. This is his definition of a "halfpinion" which he claims everyone else is exhibiting while he's the only one who isn't...while he does it right in front of the world. And it's because he starts with the predetermined assumption that guns must be bad, that guns are a problem, even as he paces gun owners by claiming to be "pro-gun; pro-Second Amendment".

If you start with a faulty premise you'll come to dumb conclusions because you're thinking of the topic incorrectly.

I've tried to get his attention, but he ignored my attempts. He probably blocked me if he saw my tweets since I wasn't kind or gentle with my criticism, and yes, I did make it personal because he's personally advocating this toxic mindset. I didn't expect to change his mind, anyway, but I want to give you the mental tools to refute the claims of anti-gun bigots whenever they crop up. They are wrong, even if they are popular and believe they are smarter than you and me.

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Announcing a new tag on the topic of guns

Since Dilbert's Scott Adams keeps talking about guns and advocating for more anti-gun "laws" (while pretending that's not what he's doing) I've added a new tag: Scott Adams on guns.

Each time I respond to one of his anti-gun claims or one of his anti-gun ideas, I'll tag that post with this new tag. I've gone back and added the tag to the previous posts, including a few where I didn't mention him by name even though he was the person I was talking about. Feel free to browse through them.

Let me explain something here-- the only reason I'm harping on this topic is because he's harping on it. If he'd stop preaching on this subject, where he has zero credibility or understanding, I would drop it immediately. But because he keeps talking about it as though he's an expert, spreading this toxic disinformation far and wide, it is vitally important for me to show why (and how) he's wrong on guns.

I don't know how much of an audience he actually has or how influential his ideas are, but he dwarfs me on both metrics, so I don't expect to have much of an impact, but I've got to try.

If he's had an idea or believes something which isn't true I'm going to assume other anti-gun people have had the same idea or believe the same falsehood. So I'm speaking to them, too. I hope you'll steal my arguments and use them wherever you think they'll help.

Stay tuned. There's more to come.

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The morality of "taxation"

If someone considers "taxation" moral, their morality is worthless
Or worse.

I've actually seen people make this vacuous claim-- that theft is moral if you call it "taxation"-- and it's shocking to consider the amount of ignorance required to say it with sincerity.

And if you manage to contort your mind enough to believe "taxation" isn't really theft, then you'll fall for anything.

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The downside of guns

I am a fervent supporter of gun rights-- of all human rights. This doesn't mean I don't know there's a downside to guns. It's just that I know the drawbacks are vastly outweighed by the benefits.

Recently Scott Adams was caught pretending he is the only person with an actual opinion about guns because he pretended no one else ever considers both the benefits and the downsides, and because no one else will say how many "gun deaths" they are willing to accept in order to preserve the right to have guns.

He's wrong about guns... again.

He stated a willingness to accept 20,000 "gun deaths" per year to "keep" the right to own guns. He says this means he's the only person with a real opinion because unless you're willing to put a number on it you're only experiencing half of an opinion. He's being misleading. Intentionally?

Putting a number on it as he did pretends that guns only kill innocent people, and ignores all the innocent people saved by guns-- most of whom never make the news. Many innocent lives are saved, and many more gross violations which wouldn't necessarily result in death are also prevented. His is a sneaky, dishonest tactic that I've seen used many times in the past; he's not the first. Unless you can say with certainty how many lives (and bodies) are saved by guns, saying how many deaths you'll accept is lying, because your numbers are meaningless. It's less than half of the picture.

But back to the bigger topic. There have been many times I have talked about the costs and benefits of guns, and other people have been doing so since before I was born and it continues to this day. That someone like Scott has managed to avoid this information for 60+ years doesn't mean it's not out there. I can't relate to the arrogance required to imagine no one else has thought of this before.

Everything has costs and benefits. Nothing is immune to this natural law.

But, for the record, here's another list (and analysis) of the downsides to guns.

• Bad guys use guns to intimidate and murder. Bad guys include muggers, cops, rapists, IRS agents, inner-city gangs, the military, bank robbers, kidnappers, evil loser mass-shooters, and other archators.

This drawback is negated by the fact that good guys can use (and often require) guns for a real chance at stopping the bad guys without being hurt in the process. To save lives. Wouldn't you rather have even the hope of a chance to fight back and win than no option better than cowering and waiting to die?

• Suicidal people use guns to kill themselves.

This is negated by the fact that suicidal people can-- and do-- use other methods to kill themselves. Look at Japan if you doubt this. If someone wants to kill themselves there's probably nothing you can really do to stop them. Yes, they might be slowed down if there's not a gun available-- and some of those might then change their minds about killing themselves. But how many? And will that number exceed the number of lives saved with a gun?
Plus, suicide is a human right, even if you don't like it being exercised.

• Guns scare people.

This is negated by the fact that someone, somewhere is scared of any object you can think of. I knew a kid who screamed in terror every time she saw a balloon, and working in pet stores I was astounded at how many people are deathly afraid of birds.

Plus, the fact that guns scare people is part of their utility. That way you don't usually have to shoot the bad guys; just let them be scared by the sight of a gun so they'll run away or surrender.

• People have accidents with guns-- which results in tragic injury and death.

People have accidents. No further words are necessary. Education and familiarity are the best way to reduce the rate of accidents with guns and other tools-- as has been happening for decades now, even as the number of guns goes up. Education and familiarity are even more important where kids are concerned. It's a bad idea to regulate or ban something just because a certain number of people will always manage to have accidents. Everything would be banned if that were a legitimate criterion.

There may be others I'm not thinking of right now, but if so I'd be willing to bet I've considered them in the past, and probably even discussed them. Maybe even on this blog.

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I try to err on the side of liberty

(My Eastern New Mexico News column for July 31, 2019)

There are many things I don't know. There are things I think I know but I get wrong. There are also things people may believe I'm wrong about, but I'm not-- a topic for another day.

When I'm wrong, I want to be wrong in the least harmful way possible.

I'd rather make the mistake of allowing you the liberty to live your life within your rights than to make the mistake of violating you for your own good. Or for the good of society. Since I'm going to make mistakes either way, I'd rather make the mistakes which won't make me into the unethical twin of those I dislike.

I don't know the best way for you to live, the best way for you to make or spend money, or the best way for you to pursue your own version of happiness. It would be a mistake for me to try to rule over you.

It might be a mistake to let you carry a gun. It's definitely a mistake to allow government to make and enforce rules which make it harder for anyone to carry one.

It might be a mistake to respect your decision of what to ingest-- food or drugs. It's definitely a mistake to allow anyone the power to cage or kill you in the name of a War on (some) Drugs.

It might be a mistake for you to not wear a seat belt. It's definitely a mistake to allow armed officers of the government to infringe your right to travel and to extract money from you for failing to do so.

Honestly, it's not my place to "allow" or forbid anything you choose to do until it violates someone else's rights. Since it isn't within my rights to do so I have no right to send hired guns to do this on my behalf. And neither does anyone else. No one can delegate a right he doesn't have.

As much as I don't know, there are some things I know for certain. I know you have the right to make your own mistakes and the obligation to pay restitution when your mistakes harm others. I know that all humans everywhere have equal and identical rights and deserve the liberty to exercise them to their fullest, regardless of the opinions of the political class.

To err is human. To err on the side of liberty and human rights is to make the ethical choice. It may not even be a mistake at all.

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Weapons!

Everything is a weapon.

Only cowards and other idiots are bothered by that fact.

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Are people just trying on principles?

Principles, for most people, seem to be something you try on and wear for a while, then toss aside and try on something else. Like trying on a hat.

I guess there's some point to that. If you try on some principles that are uncomfortable and don't fit-- or are dangerous-- then, by all means, discard them and look for something better.

For most people, principles seem like an annoyance. They just get in the way of doing what they want to do. Those principles then get swapped out for some other, less consistent "principles" that leave room for those things they want to feel OK about doing.

That's how people can pretend to be principled while archating. It's how you end up with cops and politicians lecturing better people about principles.

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Triggered into archation

People get triggered easily when an issue affects a loved one. Drugs, health, sex, crime, etc., etc.
Principles get tossed.
Reason goes out the window.

That's when, suddenly, "there oughta be a law" sneaks out of the closet where it had been buried years ago and gets treated as a reasonable response to the situation. As if archation is ever OK.

I've tried to avoid that trap in my own thinking, but I know it's not easy, and I understand why some people can't avoid it.

When I see it happening to someone else in a conversation I try my best to just walk away without a final shot. It would be pointless. No argument will cut through. Once triggered, most people are unreachable.

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Rights as a human construct

Are rights a human construct? Yes, obviously. As are ethics and empathy and many other things humans value to some degree. You might see those constructs expressed in similar ways in some other animals, especially among the Great Apes, but they only truly reach their human form in humans.

Rights are a human construct in that they only matter between humans, or between humans and something humans want to treat in a human-like way.

Rights don't exist apart from sentient beings. They only exist within the brain, while still having consequences, with regard to interactions between those bearing the brains, in the physical world. The Universe doesn't have rights or respect rights otherwise.

A rock will never respect anything's "rights", nor will a mosquito. The rock has no consciousness or will (free or otherwise) and a mosquito just does what it must to survive long enough to reproduce-- it doesn't concern itself with anyone else.

Being a construct doesn't mean rights are imaginary. They are real-- at least when you are speaking of human interactions. Life doesn't turn out well if you don't respect the rights of others at least a little bit. If you didn't, you'd be worse than the worst psychopath, and you wouldn't survive long. You'd be everyone's enemy and everyone would be doing all they could to end you.

So, rights are a useful construct. And as long as I'm dealing with other humans (or creatures I want to treat humanely) I will respect rights and will expect mine to be respected by other humans as well.

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Could I have been wrong all along?

Photo by Jason D on Unsplash

Here's a rare kind of post. I'm looking at what might be a crack in the "standard" libertarian/abolitionist/Voluntaryist/anarchist view.

First, the argument:
If no individual has a particular right to do a thing, that right can't be created out of thin air by any number of people joining together or by calling yourselves "government". If theft is wrong, you can't make it right through a majority opinion to call it "taxation" and decide it's OK in this instance.

And I agree.

If you have no right to do a thing to another person, how can you believe that by joining with another person who also has no right to do it, the two of you now magically have the right. Or, perhaps this previously nonexistent right only pops into existence when a dozen people who have no existing right to do it come together. Or a thousand or a million of them.

How can a right which doesn't exist individually suddenly exist just because people joined together?

I've always said it can't.

There's one problem with this reasonable view: Sometimes the whole is more than the sum of the parts. Spontaneous order-- also known as self-organization-- can arise spontaneously after a certain point of more and more of something being added, and create a completely new quality or property no part had before the parts were combined and reached a certain quantity. Yes, that's usually the result of combining somewhat differing parts, rather than more of the same-- but not always. Are rights a property of individual humans? Can new rights which didn't exist before emerge from spontaneous order?

Maybe there is some way you can take a number of people who have no right to commit ritual human sacrifice ("capital punishment") but when they join forces in sufficient numbers this right springs into existence. It sure seems the majority of people believe this is the case.

I don't think so, but I do wonder. And, even if you have the right to steal in the name of "taxation" because spontaneous order created a previously non-existent right from a mob opinion, I can't support it. I won't support it.

So what do you think?

This may just be yet another case of my thinking getting me in trouble with those on my own side, and why I'll never be palatable to the majority-- even the minor majority of liberty lovers.

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Voluntary-- even when it's frustrating

It's frustrating to know how to help someone, but not be allowed to help.

Saturday I went to a relative's house to see what was wrong with her dishwasher. I'm pretty sure I found the problem and I offered to order the part and install it. I'm not a great handyman, but it wouldn't have been stretching me beyond my competence level to replace that part. The problem is, I don't have a good way to be certain the part is defective-- although through a process of elimination I'm about as sure as I can be.

The replacement part was under $30, so to me it seemed like a good gamble. But she decided against it.

Then I went to check out her toilet that she said had broken. A very simple fix. But she didn't want me to, saying her improvised "fix" was good enough for now. Even though she admitted it would quickly rust and fail.

If she hadn't been hovering I would have just quietly fixed it anyway.

She gave me a little money for my time-- an hour or so-- and that was that.

In the long run, she'll probably hire someone to fix her dishwasher for many times what it would have cost to have me do it.
And, I'll probably end up going back to fix her toilet later-- when I could have just done it while I was looking at the problem.

But I won't impose. All human interactions should be voluntary, even if I believe I know better.

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Politicians shouldn't be so important

(My Eastern New Mexico News column for July 24, 2019)

President Trump makes people crazy. Or maybe he magnifies the crazy already present in people. It's like a superpower.

His supporters seem desperate to defend and support just about anything he does; even things they would have opposed had any other president done them---- his anti-gun edicts, for example.

At the same time, his detractors foam at the mouth over every little thing he does; always interpreting them in the most negative way possible. It's obvious he knows this and pokes them just to get an overreaction.

His critics see racism in everything he does. Yet, even one of the congressional economic illiterates he recently targeted admitted it had nothing to do with race, She said “If I was [sic] wearing a MAGA hat, if there was [sic] a Somali person wearing a MAGA hat, they would not be deported. But because I criticized the president, I should be deported." You can't be more clear about the real issue than this.

People on both sides-- if you consider them different sides-- are angry. They see the crazy on the other side and overlook their own.

Meanwhile, I watch, bewildered by the craziness I see all around me.

How can people let politicians become this important to their lives? Whether it's a provocative president or a squad of trendy socialists, these people shouldn't have any hold over you. It's embarrassing to see people defending politicians from other politicians. It's as though they take politicians seriously.

The insult game is part of what they signed up for when they decided to abandon the productive sector to become politicians. They knew what they were getting in to. Let them pull on their politician pants and get over it. Don't let them drag you into it and get you upset over a game you aren't playing. There are important things for you to focus on. Political drama isn't one of them.

Politicians can't hurt you with their inconsiderate words about other politicians, but they can and will hurt you with laws. If you get upset over things they say about each other but want them to focus on making up new laws, you're encouraging them to make life worse. They distract you with their infighting while they attack your remaining liberty. This is how they win.

It is said of politics, "it's a big club, and you aren't in it". This isn't a bad thing. You don't need their club, nor to lower yourself to their level. You're better than that.

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Be libertarian

Be libertarian. Even if you don't change the world, you'll change. You'll be a better person. You won't be part of the problem anymore. So do it for your own sake. 

And who knows... maybe you'll change the world after all.

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An infusion of funds would not go amiss.  And would be appreciated.

Identical where it matters

Things can be different, yet have some identical properties.

Say you are standing around minding your own business, Suddenly, without warning, something falling from a great height lands on your head, splattering you over a wide area. In one scenario it was a massive 1960s era computer and in an alternate reality it was a large boulder. Either way, you are dead. A boulder falling on your head will have the same effect on you as the giant computer if either one falls on your head. They are different in nearly every way but you're just as dead. That's the only property they have that matters in that situation.

All humans differ from each other in so many interesting ways, yet they all have equal and identical rights. Male, female, every "race" or religion, wherever they happen to live (or visit), no matter the opinions of the local gang of bullies, and even if they imagine they are something they demonstrably aren't; their rights are exactly the same as everyone else's. People are different in so many ways but they remain the same in the only way that matters.
Their rights are equal and identical.
Respect that.

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