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The Face Behind Bitcoin?

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Re: The Face Behind Bitcoin?

#431

Post by anigbrowl »

bane wrote: post #101

Topic other than discussing the irresponsibility of "outing" a guy using the clever tricks of using his name and public records look ups. > A libertarian, Nakamoto encouraged his daughter to be independent, start her own business and "not be under the government's thumb," she says. "He was very wary of the government, taxes and people in charge." > What you don't know about him is that he's worked on classified stuff…

It's the same in local government. I know a firebrand Tea party fellow who not only works for the city of San Francisco as a legal administrator, he's a member of the AFSCME (white-collar public sector union) and brags about clocking out on the dot of 5pm. I think the attitude is that other people are getting this great deal, so why shouldn't he?

Mind you, I'm not exactly consistent either. I'm quite liberal but I far prefer working in the private sector or even freelance and have never joined a union. Perhaps our political views are an expression of frustration with the negative aspects of our life choices.

Re: The Face Behind Bitcoin?

#432

Post by bane »

mseebach wrote: post #391
bane wrote: post #308

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm going to take you at your word that you're actually curious. I actually do find it curious, but frustrating. I have a great many friends, who I quite like in normal face-to-face interaction, who I've FB friended, and found I had to unfollow their feeds because in private they turn into rabid ideologues...from every part of the political spectrum. In this case I'm isolating conservative/libertarian folks, but I…

> Yeah that's true in theory. But it can get out of control. It's like attending a rally about having too many strip clubs in your neighborhood, then chilling out after the rally in your local neighborhood strip club. It's a strained analogy, as strip clubs are fundamentally about the thing people who are opposed to them find objectionable - the stripping. Most things government is about these days isn't the thing li…

Yeah it's a strained analogy, but aren't they all?

>Nothing about libertarianism compels you to move to a less government-y place just so you can work a more ideologically pure job.

True, but it does compel you to work in a non-governmental job as much as possible. Or at least be honest about the situation:

"I hate working for the government and all the waste, but I applied to 100 jobs and this is that only one I could get. I'm looking to get out as soon as possible into the private sector."

I'm not fighting for ideological purity, but for ideological honesty. To me at least, it's okay to be a hypocrite or inconsistent, just so long as you are aware of the situation and can acknowledge it. Sometimes shit just happens and you end up in places, doing things you'd rather not be.

The specific thing I'm curious about are the all-too-common cases of people who do not possess the meta-cognitive awareness that they are engaged in hypocritical behavior.

Re: The Face Behind Bitcoin?

#433

Post by acheron »

fivethree wrote: post #353
cgore wrote: post #302

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think a lot of people seem to be confusing Libertarianism with Anarchism. Libertarians typically do see roles for SOME government, and those roles are typically the military, judges, roads, police, and the like. Not other things though, so no Social Security, no Obamacare, no National Endowment for the Arts, and no space program (other than for space weapons, so get rid of NASA and establish some sort of "US Star F…

Libertarians view of government is, 'I want to be allowed to do whatever I want while everyone else is restricted to doing what I want them to do.' It's a dumb ideology that falls apart with literally any amount of thought.

Ouch, that straw man must be hurting now. Can you throw in something about roads and Somalia?

Re: The Face Behind Bitcoin?

#434

Post by arh68 »

bane wrote: post #393
3pt14159 wrote: post #324

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well bane let me, a libertarian, explain to you why I worked for the government while I was a libertarian. Sometimes the solutions that are government mandated or subsidized would appear in a different form if the government didn't run them. So, for example, mass transit, like subways would still exist if the government didn't use coercion to fund and run it, it would just be owned by private individuals. Just becaus…

> When you live in a system that coerces you into giving up half of your income it doesn't mean that you are in the wrong for working for it or even taking things like subsidies. I'm positing that it does. In fact, there's only one case where I can find working for the government while thinking it shouldn't exist is workable, and that's working for the government in a capacity where you can dismantle the government.…

>sometimes people do hypocritical things. I'm not condemning you for it.

Thank you for understanding.

>I do think it's more useful to call a thing what it is and proceed from there.

It's welfare, okay? It's all a giant welfare program. Gravy train. Uncle Sugar. Call it what you will. It's all very contradicting on paper, but it's not so bad when you're in it.

What's curious to me is the meta-cognition and self-awareness that goes on as a change-the-world startup like Google metamorphoses into Big Evil. It's usually a very gradual decline, like a glacier slide. Is it like the frog-in-water, where nobody notices? Does everybody know, and rationalize it? Or are people honest?

Re: The Face Behind Bitcoin?

#435

Post by johngalt »

jdjb wrote: post #307
johngalt wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If anti-government and inexperienced then: 'These libertarians are just backwards and don't understand government' If anti-government and experienced then: 'Hypocrites!' else: more government It's a stronger position to oppose something you are experienced with and benefit from. Imagine a nuclear engineer who's advocating that the new plant she's working on is being built dangerously by the people in charge. Would yo…

I wouldn't refuse to listen her but I'd question her morality if she continues to knowingly put the lives of people in danger just for her pay cheque.

You've sidestepped the primary point. If anyone experienced in the field is classified as a hypocrite. Then where should the detractors legitimately come from?

Re: The Face Behind Bitcoin?

#436

Post by mzs »

selmnoo wrote: post #156
Blahah wrote: post #16

The author of the piece can be reached in these ways: http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/1zpmo8/the_face_beh... If you think this article is a dangerous invasion of privacy, tell her and her employers (Newsweek).

> If you think this article is a dangerous invasion of privacy, tell her and her employers (Newsweek). How adorable! You think Newsweek is going to give Leah a talking to, because of the piece constituting a 'dangerous invasion of privacy'? That's just really too cute. We live in the age of the Facebook. We live in a place where dollar rules, and folks like Zuck and Jobs, and other actors of questionable ethics excel…

Total agreement, Newsweek is so tenuously even a magazine at this point, but in the recent past I emailed the editors of a very large newspaper that did something similarly irresponsible to someone living in an arguably more dangerous place - and heard back nothing.

Re: The Face Behind Bitcoin?

#437

Post by mr_spothawk »

leigh_t wrote: post #100
Blahah wrote: post #16

The author of the piece can be reached in these ways: http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/1zpmo8/the_face_beh... If you think this article is a dangerous invasion of privacy, tell her and her employers (Newsweek).

Well, she's also rather helpful in giving us things like these: http://leahmcgrathgoodman.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/Jer... Which may or may not be out of date http://leahmcgrathgoodman.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/vis... Which has other useful info on it.

I really don't think this is appropriate material in the comments of an article about Satoshi Nakamoto. If you want to write an article about the Author's important contribution to the history of Bitcoin which includes her home address, you might have a leg to stand on.

Re: The Face Behind Bitcoin?

#438

Post by patrickaljord »

glenra wrote: post #419
fivethree wrote: post #353

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Libertarians view of government is, 'I want to be allowed to do whatever I want while everyone else is restricted to doing what I want them to do.' It's a dumb ideology that falls apart with literally any amount of thought.

Where on earth did you find the "while everyone else is restricted to doing what I want them to do" part? Libertarians who don't themselves do any drugs (eg, Penn Jillette) still want drugs to be legal for other people. Libertarians who are themselves pacifists still want gun ownership and self-defense to be legal. And so on. It seems to me that this view you think "falls apart" with so little thought doesn't have mu…

No idea why you're being downvoted. Parent's comment is completely false.

Re: The Face Behind Bitcoin?

#439

Post by prostoalex »

bane wrote: post #101

Topic other than discussing the irresponsibility of "outing" a guy using the clever tricks of using his name and public records look ups. > A libertarian, Nakamoto encouraged his daughter to be independent, start her own business and "not be under the government's thumb," she says. "He was very wary of the government, taxes and people in charge." > What you don't know about him is that he's worked on classified stuff…

> their salaries are paid for by the same taxes they rail against incessantly

1) It's possible to be employed by an institution and maintain an independent opinion about its value. Many employees in the private industry are critical of their employers, smart companies encourage that. You can also be part of a herd, which is a reasonable option as well.

2) It might not be as much of an opposition to taxes per se, as per specifics of such taxation. Watching personal income tax rise as highly-connected corporations carve out new loopholes to keep their rates at a minimum is probably discouraging. If United States personal income tax rate dropped to 0% across all brackets, we'd return to Clinton-era budget spending, and a lot of government institutions were funded back then.

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