Are we "parasites"?

[John Edward Mercier]

Very true.

I think most people believe the CEO of a corporation to be its owner... when in reality the shareholders are the owners... and the officers may/may not be owners.

There seems to be some weird mental perception that causes individuals to readily concede power to those that have no authority to such.

[Free libertarian]

 If it walks like a duck..."The government" is parasitic in my understanding of the parasite / host relationship.  I am bending the defintions a bit perhaps but if there is a host (tax payers, citizens, sheep, me, you) and there is a blood sucking infestation I'd term that parasitic.  I suppose some would say the relationship is symbiotic, but they probably want "free healthcare".

To further expand the definiton who's to say all of us aren't parasites and this big old world isn't just a piece of cosmic lint in some great beings belly button and we're all just microscopic parasitic units? Time and space are relative I've heard.  I'll stop now, I've got to go throw my daily quota of trash and bottles in the street or I'll be drummed out of the pot smokers club.    

[srqrebel]

There seems to be some weird mental perception that causes individuals to readily concede power to those that have no authority to such.

Indeed... it is the obsolete and faulty -- though incredibly tenacious -- AMOG paradigm.

People don't think... that is, the average person is not inclined to exert more mental effort than is absolutely necessary to get by. This is a very important law of human nature -- one cannot successfully resist it; one must work in harmony with it. As a result, the criminal elements who do think, are easily able to manipulate the masses through reasonable sounding, feel-good platitudes. They have mastered the art of acting in harmony with human nature to market their paradigm -- so must we. The good news is, we have the edge: The paradigm we seek to market to the masses is itself in harmony with human nature. If we can get our marketing strategy to do the same, we're all set.

If one can just refine the rationally sound, accurate paradigm down to concise, emotion-packed soundbites, the sheer rationality of the accurate paradigm will quickly outcompete the faulty AMOG paradigm, and replace it permanently. The trick is communicating the paradigm so concisely as to avoid tuning out the audience, while at the same time engaging them emotionally.

...still working on it -- though I'd sure welcome a little competition (like Caleb's fabulous essay, Why I Am An Anarchist)

[memenode]

The new paradigm is taking me over like a flood. I am still quite a young anarcho-capitalist and only in the recent few days I've come across certain incredible realizations which make me increasingly convinced that indeed the government is the real parasite. It's existence is unscientific, uncalled for by nature and therefore utterly harmful.

I read about capitalism itself and realize the flaw - it allowed government to exist, albeit a minimal essentially libertarian one with only limited democracy - the fact that Ayn Rand, Adam Smith (don't quote me on that) and others who formed the basic ideas of capitalism allowed government to be a part of a capitalist system was the Big Mistake they made. In thinking that force must be regulated by force from someone outside they called in the burglar and government essentially ruined the chances of capitalism ever succeeding as much as it really could have.

And now, the relatively "few" of us are realizing this mistake, in the midst of the US recession and possibly even a consequent global recession, we are saying why are these instabilities happening every now and then - bubbles and bursts, extreme growth and sudden collapses.. It's because something is in our system poisoning our blood and disrupting its flow. We are constantly experiencing symptoms of that sickness.

Well.. I'd like us to start planning an antidote in an organized fashion. I've started another topic about that not to diversify this one too much (it'd go too offtopic). It's here: http://nhunderground.com/forum/index.php?topic=13706.0

[memenode]

I just wanted to add that I greatly agree with srqrebel's comment. Indeed, we need a mass paradigm shift and we have our essentially scientific and empirical compliance with human nature on our side as an advantage that can help us do what is rarely done in human history - spread a paradigm shift rapidly. The fact that today, unlike in prior paradigm shifts, we have the internet, only helps our cause.

I've also read some of your other comments in the thread about the Somalian example (where government was shattered while people were still in the AMOG mentality and it resulted in power struggles to fill the void). In one of the comments you even said something that reinforces my point about agorism in the thread I linked above. The sooner we start establishing the infrastructure of freedom (essentially an agorist alter-market) while at the same time trying to influence the paradigm shift in the minds the sooner we'll have the elements needed to replace the government successfully. And agorism actually reinforces the paradigm shift spreading, because it actually makes us more powerful and builds something we can point to as positive fruits of anarcho-capitalist pursuits.

[John Edward Mercier]

Bubbles and bursts are a natural cycle. A perpetual steady state would be unnatural.

[srqrebel]

  Awesome... gu3st definitely gets it!

[dalebert]

Bubbles and bursts are a natural cycle. A perpetual steady state would be unnatural.

On some scale and in particularly in certain markets, sure. There's even bound to be some ripple effects because a lot of stuph is inter-related economically. However, you can see government policy connected to the really big booms and bursts that we tend to treat as "normal".

[memenode]

I'm glad you approve srqrebel. 

About bubbles and bursts, I wouldn't indeed deny they'd happen in a fully free market, but I also can't deny that by their special regulations, taxing and various economic pressures they create disruptions which wouldn't otherwise exists, probably even creating some boom/busts which wouldn't exist either or just make existing ones worst as Dale pointed out.. It's like weighing two objects on a balancing device. Once you put the two objects there it will take a little bit of time before the device stabilizes into an equilibrium. But if you keep touching and pushing it with your hands, you'll be constantly preventing an equilibrium no matter how much the law of gravity strived to attain it.

I guess it's hard to argue with 100% certainty about how much more stable a market would be without a government when we have so few actual examples to point to, but at the very least we can look at what is happening now and focus on what government does about it and what are the consequences. In fact, we have a material for a case study evolving right now in this latest recession.

Cheers

[Landon Jeffery]

Time and space are relative I've heard.  I'll stop now, I've got to go throw my daily quota of trash and bottles in the street or I'll be drummed out of the pot smokers club.    

You forgot about how violent you have to be too.

[John Edward Mercier]

I'm glad you approve srqrebel. 

About bubbles and bursts, I wouldn't indeed deny they'd happen in a fully free market, but I also can't deny that by their special regulations, taxing and various economic pressures they create disruptions which wouldn't otherwise exists, probably even creating some boom/busts which wouldn't exist either or just make existing ones worst as Dale pointed out.. It's like weighing two objects on a balancing device. Once you put the two objects there it will take a little bit of time before the device stabilizes into an equilibrium. But if you keep touching and pushing it with your hands, you'll be constantly preventing an equilibrium no matter how much the law of gravity strived to attain it.

I guess it's hard to argue with 100% certainty about how much more stable a market would be without a government when we have so few actual examples to point to, but at the very least we can look at what is happening now and focus on what government does about it and what are the consequences. In fact, we have a material for a case study evolving right now in this latest recession.

Cheers

You could just chart the US GDP rate or some other measure over the last century or more.
The first time that I saw an example was an MIT professor using a computer to visually illustrate the process. He used quote marks to represent grass, and gave it a specific replenishment cycle, with 'O's representing an herbivore. By changing the grasses replenishment rate, and the herbivores life and reproductive period... the cycles could be extended or shortened. But always remained the boom-bust of the sine curve.
Of course it doesn't work perfectly in the real world, because no one controls all the variables.
And though the AMOG doesn't recognize it... never will. New yet undiscovered variables will arise.