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Peter Thiel's Rise to Wealth and Libertarian Futurism

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Re: Peter Thiel's Rise to Wealth and Libertarian Futurism

#41

Post by potatolicious »

tomjen3 wrote: post #23
chrismealy wrote: post #6

And no girls: http://gawker.com/5231390/facebook-backer-wishes-women-could...

Thiel is arguing, congruently with the facts, that females are more likely than males to vote for a larger government and a bigger social safety net and you believe that nobody has the right to take others stuff (through taxes) then it is understandable that he would prefer they didn't have the right to vote. I don't think anyone ought to have the right to vote, except on matters of the military (which cannot work if…

> "then it is understandable that he would prefer they didn't have the right to vote."

Woah, that's a big leap. I disagree vehemently with pretty much every stance of the American religious right, but I wouldn't dream of depriving their free speech rights or their right to vote for whoever they damn well please.

Disagreeing with someone and condoning their muzzling are two entirely different levels.

It's funny that, further up the thread, someone suggested than Libertarian arguments against the seatbelt center around the notion that, once legislated, nothing potentially better than the seatbelt could ever be tried, thanks to the heavy hand of government. It's egregiously incongruent to hear that argument, and hear another that suggests the permanent muzzling of 50% of the population would lead to a better world.

Re: Peter Thiel's Rise to Wealth and Libertarian Futurism

#42

Post by loudmax »

tjic wrote: post #33
ExpiredLink wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He is rich in terms of money but incredibly impoverished in his personal world view.

> incredibly impoverished in his personal world view Translation: I think X is important, he thinks Y is important, therefore it's not merely a matter of having different priorities, but "he is wrong" and - worse than that - "his worldview is impoverished". I love how "tolerant people" can't tolerate people.

Moral priorities will always be subjective. There isn't much sense to prepending "I think" to a sentence when it's implied by the context.

Being tolerant doesn't mean that one cannot be critical.

Re: Peter Thiel's Rise to Wealth and Libertarian Futurism

#43

Post by praxeologist »

Florin_Andrei wrote: post #40
hindsightbias wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The day a libertarian realizes the world is not comprised of sets of well meaning rational actors is the day they get a clue.

They would need empathy to do that, or at least a basic understanding of human nature. That's pretty unlikely, given that they seem to lack the hardware for that. > Someone who has known him for more than a decade said, “He’s very cerebral, and I’m not sure how much value he places on the more intimate human emotions. I’ve never seen him express them. It’s certainly not the most developed aspect of his personality.”…

You are mistaking what he is saying. People say things like "France's gold", but France doesn't have gold. Only the individuals who also identify themselves as French, or are determined to be French by law, do.

Re: Peter Thiel's Rise to Wealth and Libertarian Futurism

#44

Post by darrellsilver »

The author's follow up to this article a couple weeks later is pretty excellent. By some fluke of timing, the Thiel article was published shortly before a fantastic profile on Occupy Wall St.

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/comment/2011/11/the-po...

Re: Peter Thiel's Rise to Wealth and Libertarian Futurism

#45

Post by qdog »

no_flags wrote: post #35
qdog wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most people I've met who claim to be Libertarians seems to be very confused about how the world works. Usually, they have a pet idea (guns, pot, taxes, property rights, police forces, something) they are very hot about and fail to extend their logic out to the endpoint, ie: get rid of all law enforcment some magic is going to happen and criminals won't be criminals (I suspect life would be a lot like the show Deadwoo…

Many of us do follow the logic to its necessary conclusion. We don't assume criminals will magically disappear, we just would like law and order to be provided by the free market. See below before you dismiss it as impossible. http://faculty.msb.edu/hasnasj/GTWebSite/MythWeb.htm Edit: And I apologize for the background of that link!

A marketized law and order system would not solve any of the current problems with corruption. Perhaps you have heard the term "hired gun" or "mercenary". As always, the flow of money would still allow corruption, and those with money and no scruples would influence the law to protect themselves.

For the mots part, that article was tldr, but I skipped down to find his discussion of this free market law, it's...mediation! The only enforcing mechanism for mediation I know is the backing of law. Also, I, as a matter of principle, will attempt at all costs not to pre-sign anything that required binding arbitration requiring me to give up my right to seek redress in court. It is my understanding the entity that goes through these 'pay for courts' the most form relationships with the mediators/arbitrators and have a much higher chance of winning cases.

Also, the forced mediation is a remedy suggested by the courts themselves, so I don't really think that's the market version. Many companies already attempt to require binding arbitration, which is what empirically appears to be the preferred form of 'marketized law'. So far in the real world, it appears to be heavily weighted against the rights of individuals seeking redress against wealthy corporations. Also, it is always backed up by the force of law, not just good will.

That said, there are times when I might enter into binding arbitration, but not unless I have decided it's better for me than the courts, I don't care to have the companies I do business with deciding that for me.

Re: Peter Thiel's Rise to Wealth and Libertarian Futurism

#46

Post by lupatus »

praxeologist wrote: post #39
tomjen3 wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thiel is arguing, congruently with the facts, that females are more likely than males to vote for a larger government and a bigger social safety net and you believe that nobody has the right to take others stuff (through taxes) then it is understandable that he would prefer they didn't have the right to vote. I don't think anyone ought to have the right to vote, except on matters of the military (which cannot work if…

>except on matters of the military (which cannot work if it was subjected to market forces) Why? This is a huge subject and text to dump on you, so sorry about this: http://mises.org/etexts/defensemyth.pdf

Read the section of the book _Catch-22_ where the Syndicate's pilots bomb their own airport because the Nazis outbid the Allies.

Re: Peter Thiel's Rise to Wealth and Libertarian Futurism

#47

Post by Florin_Andrei »

praxeologist wrote: post #43
Florin_Andrei wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They would need empathy to do that, or at least a basic understanding of human nature. That's pretty unlikely, given that they seem to lack the hardware for that. > Someone who has known him for more than a decade said, “He’s very cerebral, and I’m not sure how much value he places on the more intimate human emotions. I’ve never seen him express them. It’s certainly not the most developed aspect of his personality.”…

You are mistaking what he is saying. People say things like "France's gold", but France doesn't have gold. Only the individuals who also identify themselves as French, or are determined to be French by law, do.

This is what happens whenever I debate "libertarians". I mention overarching tendencies, only to get replies about fine logic minutiae. I'm guessing obsession with details, and blindness to the big picture is also a trait of Ayn Rand fans.

Re: Peter Thiel's Rise to Wealth and Libertarian Futurism

#48

Post by vecinu »

dxbydt wrote: post #22
joshuahedlund wrote: post #3

How many digits does the number 125100 have? Two hundred and ten. They mean 125^100. http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=125%5E100

In Indian high schools, you are supposed to memorize a ton of "useless" shit like atomic weights of 50+ elements in the periodic table, logs upto 20, exponentials, factorials, avogardo constant & tons of physics constants like g and speed of light & sound & diffraction constants & the like. So from the age of 12,I happen to know that log 5 is 0.7 Ergo, log(125^100) = 300log(5) = 210, hence 210 digits in 125^100. But…

I would argue that memorization for a lot of 'useless' constants is in fact, useless. We had the same curriculum in Romania during the communist era, where Ceausescu forced everyone to memorize as many trigonometric functions as possible and physics constants.

I personally don't see the need for memorizing items I will not use more than once. It clogs my brain and impedes my memory.

Re: Peter Thiel's Rise to Wealth and Libertarian Futurism

#49

Post by tedunangst »

loudmax wrote: post #42
tjic wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> incredibly impoverished in his personal world view Translation: I think X is important, he thinks Y is important, therefore it's not merely a matter of having different priorities, but "he is wrong" and - worse than that - "his worldview is impoverished". I love how "tolerant people" can't tolerate people.

Moral priorities will always be subjective. There isn't much sense to prepending "I think" to a sentence when it's implied by the context. Being tolerant doesn't mean that one cannot be critical.

Being critical doesn't mean that one cannot be respectful.

Re: Peter Thiel's Rise to Wealth and Libertarian Futurism

#50

Post by godarderik »

dxbydt wrote: post #22
joshuahedlund wrote: post #3

How many digits does the number 125100 have? Two hundred and ten. They mean 125^100. http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=125%5E100

In Indian high schools, you are supposed to memorize a ton of "useless" shit like atomic weights of 50+ elements in the periodic table, logs upto 20, exponentials, factorials, avogardo constant & tons of physics constants like g and speed of light & sound & diffraction constants & the like. So from the age of 12,I happen to know that log 5 is 0.7 Ergo, log(125^100) = 300log(5) = 210, hence 210 digits in 125^100. But…

Current high schooler in the US here. I feel that today the trend is definitely more towards looking things up as opposed to memorizing them. For example, in my chemistry class, we always got a periodic table (with weights) and were given things like Planck's constant. We did, however, have to memorize some of the more basic ones such as speed of light and Avogadro's number. With regards to math, all tests involving more than trivial amounts of math you get a calculator, so I have never even thought of memorizing logs or exponents.
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