Figleaf

Without implying any commentary on your subject matter, I gotta say, that's pretty awful. Therefore it'll probably win a major poetry prize.

Marriage laws exist to serve the perceived needs of the society that promulgates them. As we all know, there has been much debate lately about what those needs are, and what the laws should be. As it exists now, marriage is about providing special status for indefinite term pair-bonding. It is specifically conceived to apply for life-time planning. Access to divorce doesn't change the purpose, it just lets those who made a mistake recover from it. I would suggest that defined-term marriage would not serve any particular purpose, and so making a legal accommodation for it is unnecessary.

Religious insanity.

I voted 'no'. But in fact, I trust the police more than I trust many other groups. It's just I don't trust the police implicitly. While I believe our police in Canada are probably better than 80-99% of police in other parts of the world, I nevertheless perceive worrying aspects of the record of our police here. The RCMP have several recent black marks on their credibility including Arar, the death of Ian Bush, the seemingly groundless search of that reporter in Ottawa. Various city police forces also have more than merely occasional problems, such as the Jamma Jamma case, the case of the woman left alone in a police holding cell over the weekend in Brampton, Ontario, or the Toronto drug squad scandal. Then there is the very worrisome record of wrongful convictions across Canada. The whole justice system seems implicated in those problems, including the police. So, 'trust'? Only to a degree.

It's a classic case of 'beware of what you wish for'. It's funny, because when the parties joined, many people thought it was the PC's that were being submerged. Surprise, surprise, they're all just tories now. But is it so surprising? Harper never really bought into Preston's populism. Steve's more of a Leo Strauss kind of politician -- elitist and paternalistic.

Figleaf, I am going to stop addressing the other points because responses to the others are meaningless unless we have some concensus on this one. Fair enough, though we may then end up returning to them. I wouldn't call it 'whim', but I would say that all 'rights' are societal constructs. Here's why: -In the total absense of any society at all, that is, for the person alone in the wilderness, the concept of 'rights' means nothing as nature takes no cognizance of the concept or any claim to it. Tell the freezing wind of your 'right' to live or tell the grizzly of your ownership of the berry bush. It avails you naught. -Among persons without a pre-existing social structure, that is, two or more people meeting in the wilderness for the first time, 'rights' won't mean anything until they are claimed and accepted. If they are not accepted, they remain claims. The stronger can enforce her claim, but that's not a 'right' as we mean the concept. If the stronger is merely forcing the others, she creates thereby no expectation that the others will do anything but force her to acquiesce to them, if and when they gain an upper hand. Accordingly, 'rights' only arise in the context of a society, and they constitute the foundation of a social contract.

If by "justice" you mean dispute resolution mechnisms, then I agree. If by "justice" you mean a system of broader redressing of inequities then I disagree. Maybe you can specify which you mean. I think the the one folds into the other. Termination of disputes based on whim or power is not the same as 'settlement' of them. The latter necessarily implies a view of what the right or wrong of the situation is. (That view may or may not be 'just' by our lights, but it is neither here nor there.) Even if we accept this statement at face value, the issue remains that those who are force to fund the equality of opportunity are not necessarily the ones who are the beneficiaries of the wealth enhancing activities. So why should they agree to do so? The proposition can be demonstrated by a simple model if you need me to. As to the issue of why persons holding privilege should agree to greater equity, there are two answers: A- possibly, a sufficient portion of the increase in overall wealth would accrue to them to offset the cost to them; and/or B- their agreement need not be considered necessary. First, you assume that everyone if provided the opportunity will choose a course of action which makes the best possible use of their potential. No. We have been over this. I need only assume that SOME would choose a course of action that makes a BETTER use. And I've already noted that this can be assumed based on the known incentives related to consumption and production. Both the kid who steals and the principal would have used coercion in your example. Okay, so should the principal return the backpack to the first kid or not? This is the nut of the matter isn't it? My view is that earned wealth is the personal property of the earner. Your view is that it somehow belongs to society. All conclusions stem from that presumption. How do you prove which one of us is right? That's not quite it. My point is that the very meaning of 'belong' is defined by society. There may be better or worse ways for society to define it, and for practical reasons society will want to avoid changing its definition lightly. But it is society's artifact, and amenable to society's needs.

I don't see any factual basis for your claim that available evidence comes from political history. History of society has been a history of communities which have provided unequal access and that was accepted as the norm. Check the social structure of monarchies, of feudalism, of societies which condoned slavery, of imperialism. In fact virually all societies and their political structure have been based upon class hiercharcies which have provided unequal access. My original comment was: "Providing an acceptable level of justice is one of the primary roles of society. If it doesn't, it invites conflict that disrupts safety and prosperity. Greater sensitivity to justice generally characterizes morr successful societies, while injustice pervades failed states. Consider the ineluctible fact of the WIIFM principle." The evidence in support of that comment is: A- every society known to history has had a method for determining disputes, ergo it is one of the primary roles. In fact, agglomerations of people without such methods scarcely qualify as societies at all. Dispute resolution/accommodation of interests is practically a sine qua non of a society. B- the clear trend of economic development co-incides with improvements in both the consistency of the rule of law, and the accessibility of justice for every member of society. Past societies (with substantially lower wealth levels than we experience today) we less accomplished in the measures of consistency and accessibility of justice. Societies today with lower levels of wealth (e.g. Somalia) are also characterized by less reliable and accessible justice compared to wealthier societies (e.g. Luxembourg). Economic theory explains why improved justice (and improved equality of opportunity) yields more efficient and wealthier societies. The main economic issues are: -more reliable justice allows traders to trust the outcomes of their transactions, thereby inducing more transactions at lower transaction cost. -equal opportunity increases the potential number and quality of participants in wealth enhancing activities. It doesn't completely clear things up. "observed to have been acceptable" to whom? eveyone in society or just some? Observed to have been acceptable enough to that the society could function persistently for some meaningful period of time. People in society may have goals other than wealth accumulation. (For example they may value happiness, they may value freedom). If you justify the structure of society simply along optimization of wealth, you will ignore those other goals. You asked a specific question and I gave you the specific answer. Your reply is a change of direction. I don't justify the structure of society entirely on economic grounds. If denied their opportunity of choice, people don't just sit around and do nothing. They maximize the opportunities available to them. You need to show that their production in what they end up doing, is significantly less than the opportunity they are denied. Your statement above is based upon an assumption that they otherwise would sit idle. It is not based on them sitting idle, it is based on them being denied the best possible use of their potential. If they are denied the best use, any other use is second best (or worse) and represents a loss. OK, I can accept that, but your answer shows that the ends are subjective. I consider it an injustice to extort money to fund programs. My desireable end would be to minimize the coercion involved in society. Well, I wonder what you mean by coercion. If one kid steals another kid's backpack, is it coercive if the school principle forces its return? I didn't phrase that well. I mean they "should have the right". Of course since the money is forcibly taken from them, ... I don't think your change clears up the problem. For it to be wrong to take the money, there must be some right for them to retain it. What or who says the money is theirs at all?

Good point, Thelonius. I think you're right that the two categories are assimilable with eachother. In a sense, the law is simply a redefinition of my aforementioned 'partisans' to include society at large. I used to find anarchic theories like Charles espouses attractive, and believed that the only drawback was the difficulty of implementation. But further reflection on any of the many descriptions of anarchic societies in practice reveals they end up indistinguishable from one or another type of governmental system. Usually they fall into either collectivist (communist) utopias, OR highly permissive liberal democracies, but occasionally some may fit within the rubric of corporate or feudal oligarchies. Anarchists, of course, insist otherwise, but just ask them what their plan would produce and it becomes obvious that anarchy is a theory that evaporates immediately in practice. Unfortunately Charles seems to have gone missing on this topic, so we'll never know exactly which category his vision would fall into.

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Two problems with that: 1. Religious morality is not in fact absolute, but merely pretends to be. God's will cannot be validly demonstrated by human means, and human means are all we have at our disposal. 2. Hitler can be shown to be wrong pragmatically, irrespective of Hitler's acquiescence to the question.

Crap. The US defends North America for its own reasons, not out of generosity. If it really cared about Canada's interests it wouldn't dispute our arctic territorial sovereignty.

Everyone knows what Pinocchio Mackay said. The pretense that it's all good because Hansard missed it may sell okay at the Tory Youth wine & cheeze, but Canadian voters know a weasel when they see it.

Now we are talking! Is that all you have to say?

So to summarize: -it doesn't matter to anyone whether Belinda is a dog or not; and -everyone knows Mackay is (twice) a liar. The question that remains is does Harper condone lying? I think the answer is (especially based on the Grewal fiasco), SURE HE DOES.

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Whoa, that's pretty shocking. I keep hearing Likudists assert how free and democratic Israel is, but this kind of thing certainly seems to detract from those claims.

What respect, that non English speaking countries are also developed? That the English language is irrelevant to economic achievement? That an island nation like NZ is well developed, and happens to speak English, and there are many other island nations which are basket cases, but this has nothing to do with language? Oh, and I shall pay better attention in the future. lol. I guess I can hope you'll begin to pay attention sometime, although so far you've missed the same point twice. The point of that particular comment is that the anglosphere countries are not unique in achieving high levels of socio-economic development.

Background material?? How about you just try to talk over my head. You are the one who studied economics, right? I have studied economics, yes. I'd prefer not to talk in circles with you, but since you won't answer simple queries to establish the basis of a conversation I guess I'll have to assume the need to be fairly basic. In a market economy, people tender goods and services to the market because they expect to realize a return that exceeds their input costs (including their required return on time/effort and the opportunity cost of forgoing other activities/investments). So far so good? This works fine for most goods and services, but there are some things which though their value would exceed the cost, by their nature or situationally, a private provider cannot secure payment of the value from private exchanges in the free market. These are called 'public goods', and it is generally acknowledged that there is merit in having a government or collective entity provide the good so that everyone can gain the value that otherwise would be forgone for lack of being privately supplied. Why?? To give you more things to look up on the internet before answering any of my economics questions?? Is there something bothering you, Charles? I've already told you that studying economics provides valuable insights, and that's why I suggested you study it. I don't understand why you're beating that internet line. The net is useful, of course, but FYI my comments here are generated from memory of the subject. The ownership of the money is asserted by the same principle which bars me from claiming you as my slave. You are barred from claiming me as your slave in two ways I can think of. A-the law prevents it, and B-I (along with any partisans I can muster) won't allow it. Do you refer to A or B?

In answering this, it would be helpful to know if you understand the economic concept of 'public goods'?How would that be helpful??? It would tell me how much background material I need to cover for you before we can proceed. Not if you know what a free market is. Have you ever heard of a security guard? A security guard is not a police ofiicer. By definition and by necessity a police officer is a public official. It teaches introductory basics about the market. I hope you follow my advice and study further beyond that. BTW, here is an important part of our discussion you should give some thought ... Who (or what) says whose money it is? On what principle is the ownership of the money asserted?

The issue is language and population. Japan has a very different language than any in Europe. Even Norway and Sweden speak a different language. At this time, English is the international language. French was a one time. Someday maybe Manderin or Hindi. No, pay attention. The issue I addressed with that comment was the contention that the anglosphere countries held unique status at the summit of socio-economic development. The facts show they are not unique in that respect.

No. There is no argument with people who think they know everything about the "method of economic analysis" as you put it, after opening their high school home economics book. Know 'everything'? I didn't suggest that. I can only guess that your histrionics here arise from the frustration you feel from having your ideas punctured. Modern economics is carried out scientifically. Thinkers may differ, but a broadly agreed theoretical method has arisen and the field has accumulated a range of concepts that are generally considered proven. Rather than highschool textbooks, I'd refer you to some of the high quality encyclopedias of economics available in a reference library. You are doing the same thing that Myata did above: coming up with a disconnected example and saying that it is connected. You then expect me to go for a spin. I answered your question quite adequatley. As it's clear you have no response I'm not surprised you choose to cut and run. Who (or what) says whose money it is? On what principle is the ownership of the money asserted? You need to reread the thread to better follow the purpose of that comment. ??? What 'property'? I answered that in the same post from which you just quoted. I detected no such answer. You are free to leave Canada if you wish. Again it appears you're not reading carefully enough. I said, 1. political theory does not prevent a state from providing shoes; and 2. that economic theory suggests it's more efficient for private goods to be provided thru the market. If you'd care to deal with what I actually said, I'll be happy to discuss it with you. In answering this, it would be helpful to know if you understand the economic concept of 'public goods'? But anyway, 'private police' is an inherently contradictory notion. Great. You're clearly a bright guy. Keep your mind open and you'll surprise even yourself with the insights the science of economics can give you. Read what the true technicians of the field write, and avoid the political case-pleaders who claim to be economists.

The "duty" issue was the continuation of the Legislature's business in the face of the panic that a solar eclipse caused. I understand that; my comment was intended to apply more generally.

So, I for one am expecting a rush of last-minute votes for Peter Mackay's long nose, following his performance in Parliament yesterday.