Richest 1% will own more than all the rest by 2016

The people who believe property rights are "natural" aren't saying they aren't a human creation at all. Just that they are a human right, like other rights that are also human creations.

The justification for this is something like you own your labor and slavery is wrong, and if you use your labor to produce something, it's unfair for anyone to take it from you. Likewise it's your right to trade it for something someone else made, or do whatever. And from that you get capitalism and property rights as we know them.

However this argument doesn't cover property rights over natural resources or land. There are some arguments for that like the homesteading principle. But in general there is an argument to be made that natural resources should be publicly owned, or at least rented with the profits going to the public.

Also this argument is deontological. A consequentialist would say if violating someone's rights helps more people than it hurts, you should do it anyway. And an economist would point out that pure property rights don't work in the first place, because of market failures like public goods, common goods, information asymmetry, natural monopolies, etc. So everyone is better off if we violate them at least a little.

Startups already distribute wealth a lot. Investors invest in many startups in order to get to that 1%. So even though they make a lot of money on Uber, they've also lost a lot of money on 99 other startups you haven't heard of.

Some investors do only invest in one startup, but no one is making them do that. So if they lose it is their own fault, and if they win it's only fair. They agreed to enter the lottery, that's a lot different than someone being born poor and stuck there. No one agreed to the lottery of birth.

People want to, and agree to, give him that money. What other measure of 'deserve' could there possibly be?

>Or that the world is better off with that money going to him instead of someplace else?

It doesn't matter. The world will be fine either way. People though? Tom Cruise is a person. The people paying him are people. They evidently think the arrangement is pretty good.

- the meaning of words - the specificity of the argument (say, actor income versus a country versus the global economy) - the ethical assumptions underlying our argument - the actual facts

Personally I've been raised, developed my thoughts and occupy an environment that can be considered strongly on 'the left' of the spectrum (yes, also vague). That said, I really try to properly understand the 'other' side(s).

But it's difficult, considering that my entire world view is built on assumptions, arguments, lines of reasoning that are built on 'facts' and 'knowledge' that is 'leftist'. My left-wing viewpoint is like a realist painting while my right-wing viewpoint is more like a crude child's drawing. So obviously I'm more likely to reject the latter, and judge its proponents harshly, because it seems so stupid and primitive.

So I guess my question is... How would I best go about developing a more nuanced picture of the 'other' side(s) so that I can try to find 'truth' that is not conveniently aligned with my upbringing and current viewpoints, however difficult (or impossible) that might be?

I've been trying to subscribe to blogs that don't align with my views. I've also been trying to look into philosophical views that seem to further this, but I find it difficult because I don't really know what axioms underly these views so alien to me. So I don't always know where to look. I've been trying to respectfully read economic or social arguments (including pg's recent essay) that I have some fundamental issues with, but it all falls apart through sheer complexity and ambiguity (see: the discussions here where half the time people seem to discuss what pg actually said). And whenever some discussion does go into 'facts', I'd really have to read the sources where half the time I would need to study that particular field to even understand the abstract, not to mention that I can't really check the accuracy of these facts in the first place (and we all know that the further we get from the 'natural' sciences, the more ambiguous and slanted these facts become).

Here's the thing. I was raised an Evangelical Christian, and now I'm (basically) an atheist. The difference between these two paradigms is huge. I've believed both these sides with full conviction, so I know in quite a bit of detail how to defend many beliefs from either side. I feel that as a result, I can often pinpoint at which point in an argument things diverge, and I also feel I can reasonably choose in which direction to go. It also feels a bit schizophrenic and uncomfortable.

But the only reason I can do this is that I've basically studied theology and I've been immersed in this now-alien point of view for about 25 years, not counting the period of overlap where I was very confused about matters.

Obviously I cannot do that with an issue such as this. So what can I do, aside from try to assume that the viewpoint alien to my own is probably not as stupid or superficial as it seems? How can I assess a commenter's viewpoint when I don't have any knowledge of their background, honestly, or expertise as a person (which I do feel is important. we need to take shortcuts at some point).

It's incredibly frustrating, but I don't want to get stuck in convictions that I just happen to have chanced into, basically.