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So you've been attacked on Extropia...

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Thu, 2014-04-03 19:50
#1
Cerebrate Cerebrate's picture
So you've been attacked on Extropia...
...you had a security provider, right? At least I hope you had a security provider, given the giant "EXTROPIA RECOMMENDS YOU GET A SECURITY PROVIDER" banner hanging in the spaceport with maybe a hundred different security provider advertisements stacked on the mesh around it. But maybe you didn't take that advice. Or wanted to save money. Or plain didn't have the money, rep, or whatever else. And no-one was around at the time? 'Cause, I mean, not having a security provider doesn't mean that no-one's watching your back - it just means that no-one's being paid to officially watch your back for you, and what you mostly have to watch out for are con artists and other relatively subtle kinds of fraud. Okay, well, maybe not that subtle, if you played the shell game with that dude who hangs around on Helix just down from the northern cap. But, c'mon, it's a whole habitat full of people who worship regularly at the altar of Non-Aggression and Consent. If someone tried to attack you on the main drag, half the people around'd shoot him on general principles, and the other half'd shoot him for what the judge'd award them once she got done stripping the assets off his bones. But maybe they got to you when no-one was around. That's when you call these guys. Triple-G Eleemosynary Retributionists, Inc. "We make crime not pay." Most security providers concentrate on before-the-fact protection. It's nice easy work, inasmuch as most of their job is deterring crime just by existing insurancewise, also known as "getting paid for nothing", and at least half the rest is handled by the friendly software that warns you about known cons, bad contract terms, and that sort of thing. Triple-G, in the form of Giulia, Giusepped, and Guido, are the other kind of security provider, that specializes only in dealing with crime after the fact. If you didn't have a security provider and someone committed some fundamental, universally-recognized, force-and-fraud crime against you on Extropia, you can go to them. You don't need to pay - their expenses get paid out of the judgment against the criminal, and they'll split the rest with you. Hell, you don't even have to be alive - judgments for murder pay the bills nicely, and they'll pay a bounty for any cortical stack with a case to bring brought to them, no questions asked. Giulia is the thin blonde in the bouncer with the four degrees in psychiatry, cog sci, and related subjects. She deals with the client end of the business, which is to say, with comforting the distraught victims, and getting all the information needed to catch the victimizers. Giusepped ("the d stands for 'daemon'") is the AGI who runs the back-end. He's got fingers all over Extropia's mesh and spimes everywhere that doesn't reach, which he uses very effectively when it comes time to track down the responsible party. He's also, through long practice and his habit of taking private cases on the side, one hell of an effective lawyer. Guido is in charge of hauling the criminals they catch up in front of the nearest judge, preferably only mostly dead. His beetle-browed custom morph is about as close to being a neo-gorilla as anything still of human origin is likely to get - and naturally, it's a complete lie. Luring people into a sense of overconfidence by putting on his best dumb thug act makes his job so much easier. Together, they fight crime!
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Thu, 2014-04-03 21:23
Steel Accord Steel Accord's picture
Potential Advertisement
You could market these guys as a "Saturday morning" cartoon! Earth nostalgia, and heroic tales make for great memes you want your customers to have and spread.
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Thu, 2014-04-03 23:13
ShadowDragon8685 ShadowDragon8685's picture
The problem I see with this,
The problem I see with this, Cerebrate, is that under the Extropian system, there is no crime. There are only actions which carry penalties according to the contracts you've already signed. For instance, attacking someone who doesn't have a security contract in place is not a crime. The closest it gets to "criminal" is the fact that your own security contractor won't protect you if you have an outstanding judgement against you for breaching a contract and you refuse to pay whatever penalty your contract proscribes. If you attack a guy who has no security contract, none of the reciprocal contract breaches come into place. [i]It is not a "crime" to attack someone who does not have a protection contract.[/i] Ergo, you have not breached any of your own contracts. Triple-G gets as far as the first time they go after a guy who murdered a no-protection guy who actually has protection of his own. Now, [i]they're[/i] the aggressors, and Gorgon Defense drones fill them with more lead than a pencil box, because they initiated a violent action against someone who has a valid protection contract. [e]Also, I should point out that their business model is flawed. If they're going after guys who haven't breached any contracts, no Extropian judges have jurisdiction to assign penalties to them. [i]Because they haven't breached any contracts[/i], ergo, there are no bounties for bringing them in.
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Thu, 2014-04-03 23:59
Steel Accord Steel Accord's picture
Not contractual
Cerebrate has said at many points that not all Anarcho-Capitalists, or however one wishes to name us, necessarily hold the written contract as the final letter of authority. It's more the agreement, the spirit and intent of the contract that's truly important. More to the point, Triple-G Eleemosynary Retributionists, Inc. have in their mission statement that all people without security coverage, they treat as their clientele. So the victim essentially has a volunteer service that requires nothing from them to act as their representative in light of whatever slight was visited upon them. So "a contract" was indeed breached. By the very mission of the Retributionist trio, all initiation of force against the otherwise unprotected persons of Extropia are breaches of the contract they have with them. The obvious flaw is that it would be extremely difficult for just three specialist to protect that many, but you get what you pay for or for what the charitable are willing to give in the case of these three heroes. This is actually a pretty good example of Voluntary-Capitalist principle. Markets abhor a vacuum, and as Retributionists Inc. gain more rep, others will want to compete with them and more people who aren't protected will be served.
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Fri, 2014-04-04 00:52
Cerebrate Cerebrate's picture
ShadowDragon8685 wrote:The
ShadowDragon8685 wrote:
The problem I see with this, Cerebrate, is that under the Extropian system, there is no crime. There are only actions which carry penalties according to the contracts you've already signed. For instance, attacking someone who doesn't have a security contract in place is not a crime. The closest it gets to "criminal" is the fact that your own security contractor won't protect you if you have an outstanding judgement against you for breaching a contract and you refuse to pay whatever penalty your contract proscribes. If you attack a guy who has no security contract, none of the reciprocal contract breaches come into place. [i]It is not a "crime" to attack someone who does not have a protection contract.[/i] Ergo, you have not breached any of your own contracts.
I've heard that version of Extropia, and I can even see how you got there from the core book description of the Extropians, but I've got to tell you, I'm not buying it. Literally the first thing we're told about Extropia is that it's anarcho-capitalist. I've been hanging out with libertarians and ancaps and actual extropians for years, and none of them think anarcho-capitalism works that way. Even the dogmatist loony fringe of Rothbardians and Randites don't think it works that way. More and mostly to the point, the here-and-now people and groups mentioned as inspirations for Extropia in EP, from what they've said in print and publically, don't think it works that way. Even Wikipedia begs to argue! I could cite, but I'd be citing basically everything I've ever read. Which is to say, perhaps the one single thing that all the argumentative schools of ancap agree on, even over and above - and specifically over and above - the obligation of contracts and howsoever they justify it, is the non-aggression/consent principle. Violate that, and you're in a world of ancap shit and PPL-unprotected whatever contracts you might not have signed. (There are some arguments over precise interpretations, but I have never, ever come across anyone who just plain throws that out.) In at least my quick look through the books I can't find anything that directly contradicts this interpretation (I welcome corrections if I'm wrong); and in-universe, I think it's also validated by the fact that Extropia is, canonically, a member of the Autonomist Alliance. If I can't see 10,000,000 Extropian residents deciding to throw the core principle of their philosophy overboard one day without my suspension of disbelief snapping, I really can't see the rest of the Autonomist Alliance, or the mutualists (who live on Extropia) letting them in if they did - especially as that's a primary principle they share with the Extropians - any more than I can see them suddenly proclaiming Nine Lives or the Night Cartel a model of anarchist virtue. It plain doesn't make sense. And if they have thrown it out, the one thing they aren't is anarchocapitalists by any accepted current-day definition. -c
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Fri, 2014-04-04 00:54
ShadowDragon8685 ShadowDragon8685's picture
Steel Accord wrote:Cerebrate
Steel Accord wrote:
Cerebrate has said at many points that not all Anarcho-Capitalists, or however one wishes to name us, necessarily hold the written contract as the final letter of authority. It's more the agreement, the spirit and intent of the contract that's truly important.
No it isn't. Not when you bring judges into the situation. That's the whole point of having a written agreement: so there is an unambiguous record of exactly what the agreement says, an unambiguous record which a third party can later review and determine whether or not a breach has occurred.
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More to the point, Triple-G Eleemosynary Retributionists, Inc. have in their mission statement that all people without security coverage, they treat as their clientele. So the victim essentially has a volunteer service that requires nothing from them to act as their representative in light of whatever slight was visited upon them. So "a contract" was indeed breached. By the very mission of the Retributionist trio, all initiation of force against the otherwise unprotected persons of Extropia are breaches of the contract they have with them. The obvious flaw is that it would be extremely difficult for just three specialist to protect that many, but you get what you pay for or for what the charitable are willing to give in the case of these three heroes.
Uh, no. No contract has been breached. Guy A has no security protection. Guy B decides to attack him, knock him out, and feed his body into a recycler. Unless Guy B has previously signed a contract with anyone stating he won't attack people and feed their bodies into recyclers, [i]he is not in breach of contract.[/i] "Social contract? I didn't sign shit." Security providers aren't acting as "DA LAWWWWW!" when they come down on someone who attacks you like the wrath of God, they are no more and no less than [i]mercenaries.[/i] As mercenaries, they take your money to shoot people right in the god damn face, and the limitation on that is that they're only willing to act in defense, not in offense. (That's an entirely separate contract.) The only thing that prevents your attacker's security contractor from protecting him against [i]your[/i] security contractor is that they likely have a clause in their contract with him stating that they will not intervene if you initiated hostilities and then become imperiled yourself.
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This is actually a pretty good example of Voluntary-Capitalist principle. Markets abhor a vacuum, and as Retributionists Inc. gain more rep, others will want to compete with them and more people who aren't protected will be served.
No, no it isn't. The very first time they go after somebody in retribution who has a contract with them, without a judicial breach-of-contract order, that person's security contractor is going to rip Retributionists, Inc, to shreds.
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Fri, 2014-04-04 01:52
Steel Accord Steel Accord's picture
Reply
Well as Cerebrete pointed out, the Extropia strictly depicted, with physical contracts as paramount is a slightly skewed perception. Perhaps the writers of the book wanted to make a pointed differentiate between the Extropians and their more pure Anarchist allies. The Triple-G Eleemosynary Retributionists, Inc. could be said to be acting on a variation of the social justice system in an anarchist habitat, just with a brand attached to it. The aggressor broke "the rules" as defined in the Anarchist section of Rimward, the general agreements made by those who live within the habitat. The Retributionists are acting as responsible citizens, looking out for their fellow transhumans. You are right in that their client's attacker will certainly have defenses of his own, legal and otherwise, but the three of them wouldn't take the job if they didn't feel like they could succeed at it. "Social Contract? I didn't sign shit!" Funny, that's exactly what many An-Caps say. XD All they need to do is prove to an arbiter, or to the general population, that the aggressive party acted as an initiator of force against a party with no practical means to compete or defend himself. Flying right into the face of Extropian principle, Sir Jackass's rep would plummet and more than likely his stocks would suffer as well.
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Fri, 2014-04-04 02:02
Steel Accord Steel Accord's picture
Then what . . .
Shadow does have a point in that how would the Retributionists actually enact the reparations against the culprit? How would this security service address a hostile act ex post facto? The whole "my right to swing my arm, ends at your nose" argument seems like it would work, but how would you personally see a reparation service fit into the Extropian interpersonal market interaction structure?
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Your passion is power. Focus it. Your body is a tool. Hone it. Transhummanity is a pantheon. Exalt it!
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Fri, 2014-04-04 03:47
Erulastant Erulastant's picture
I'm willing to bet that if
I'm willing to bet that if someone shoots you on Extropia, you'll wake up to the sight of a SC representative informing you that they nailed the perp on breach of the NAP, and are deeply sorry that this happened to you, and out of the generosity of their hearts they are offering you a free one-month subscription to their service, and they paid the fee for your healing vat recovery (Paid for by part of the bounty they collected for the idiot who broke the non-agression principle). After all, there's no better way to hook a customer than proving that you can do the job better than their competition, and also giving them free stuff. So every SC would probably be more than willing to do work after the fact. Eager even. (Since bounties for NAP violators are probably pretty high) So while a specialist group is certainly a viable business model, they already have competition from all the other SCs around.
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You, too, were made by humans. The methods used were just cruder, imprecise. I guess that explains a lot.
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Fri, 2014-04-04 11:37
Cerebrate Cerebrate's picture
It's just good business
Yeah, I can pretty much see that happening, too, when an SC happens to catch someone in flagrante. I'm less sure as to whether they'd want customers coming to them after the fact, though - after all, that only encourages people to not buy coverage until something happens - but either way, I think there's probably market room for some specialist services in there. -c
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Fri, 2014-04-04 16:09
ShadowDragon8685 ShadowDragon8685's picture
Who, exactly, is paying this
Who, exactly, is paying this "mystical bounty" on people whose only "crime" said in full quote marks because [b]the very concept of crime can only exist in the presence of a vertical hierarchy which sets up laws and imposes them on those who are below them[/b], of breaking the non-aggression principle? That's all it is. [b]A principle.[/b] Not a law, not a [b]rule[/b] voted upon by the majority ala a Collectivist habitat. What you're saying, then, is that on Extropia, your security contractor will abandon you at the first hint of public opinion turning [i]against[/i] you, breaking their contracts with you and leaving you at the mercy of the howling mob. I'm sorry, isn't that the [i]exact opposite[/i] of what a security contractor is supposed to do?
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Fri, 2014-04-04 17:16
Cerebrate Cerebrate's picture
The "bounty" is paid from the
The "bounty" is paid from the penalty that the judge you drag the erstwhile violator before realizes out of said violator's assets. Depending on the magnitude of the violation and what he's got to pay it off with, this could include anything between half his investment portfolio through the cash in his pockets and his left kidney through a long-term indenture up to and including the total realizable value you can strip-mine out of his biomass and memories. And you don't need vertical structures to have laws, or even voting on them. All you need is social consensus (which is also, incidentally, what makes contracts have force in ancap habitats). It's enforced peer-to-peer, everyone on everyone else, not server-client. At least as I understand it, you don't need to hold a vote before you and your posse toss Johnny the Serial Rapist-Murderer out the airlock on an ancol habitat, inasmuch as anyone seriously identifying as an anarchist understands perfectly well that that shit is breaking pretty much the one rule they do have without speakin' it. Likewise, anyone seriously identifying as an ancap understands perfectly well that Thou Shalt Not Initiate Force Against Anyone, And If You Do, You Have It Coming. Which is also why your security contractor won't protect you. They know the rules as well as anyone else, and so in that contract you signed is going to be a clause to the effect of "We do defense, not offense; and offense includes defending you if you decide to start a fight." A security contractor that offers to help you break the non-aggression principle is by doing so basically declaring war on everyone around them, which is when the Extropia Association of Responsible Security Contractors turns on 'em and throws them out the airlock en masse. -c
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Fri, 2014-04-04 17:45
Cerebrate Cerebrate's picture
Possibly relevant
From Panopticon:
Quote:
Extropian legalities are entirely based on mutual contracts. According to the legal precepts adopted by Nomic and similar Extropian legal AIs, however, no sapient being may be enslaved by another. This means that in Extropian holds, hypercorps are not allowed to enforce indentured service on uplifts they raise.
So, one does rather have to ask how that works, if the hypercorps could bypass all Extropian legalities simply by not allowing the uplifts to purchase security contracts, or indeed by just not giving them any money? Seems to me, then, that per Nomic et. al., the NAP must have force even for people who don't have explicit contracts to enforce it for them.
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Fri, 2014-04-04 18:25
Steel Accord Steel Accord's picture
Campaign idea
That would actually be a pretty cool campaign setup! A hostile group or idividual tries to impose their autocratic rule on Extropia and the Retributionists are the first to find out. They work to expose them, and from their it becomes "gang up on the evil guy!" Zero-g gunfights, alterable terrain in Extropia's environ scape, perhaps the Commonwealth and Anarchists coming in to assist. Sounds exciting to me.
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Fri, 2014-04-04 18:51
ShadowDragon8685 ShadowDragon8685's picture
Cerebrate wrote:The "bounty"
Cerebrate wrote:
The "bounty" is paid from the penalty that the judge you drag the erstwhile violator before realizes out of said violator's assets. Depending on the magnitude of the violation and what he's got to pay it off with, this could include anything between half his investment portfolio through the cash in his pockets and his left kidney through a long-term indenture up to and including the total realizable value you can strip-mine out of his biomass and memories.
Violation of [b]WHAT?![/b] Did he [b]sign[/b] a contract with the guy whom he fed into a recycler stating "I will not attack you and feed you into a recycler?" No. Did he violate any other contracts of his stating that? Probably not! He is not in violation of any contracts, because he has not signed any contracts stating that he will not behave in such a manner! [i]Ergo,[/i] he is not a violator of [i]anything[/i], and anyone coming after [i]him[/i] will be subject to his security contractor's violent rebuff.
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And you don't need vertical structures to have laws, or even voting on them. All you need is social consensus (which is also, incidentally, what makes contracts have force in ancap habitats). It's enforced peer-to-peer, everyone on everyone else, not server-client.
The only thing that gives contracts on an AnCap habitat is the same thing that enforces behavior on those who might otherwise be inclined to misbehave elsewhere: [i]Overwhelming force[/i]. Take away the coercive power of "if you attack me, my security company will fill you with more holes than swiss cheese," and every predator on the hab is free to sharpen their long knives and go hunting. [i]Because there are no laws that say they can't, and they haven't signed any contracts which say they can't.[/i] Not that contracts, themselves, absent the violent ability to coerce someone into compliance, have any power behind them whatsoever. Absent the ability to leverage coercive force, the only thing keeping anyone from saying "Meh, whatever," is their own honesty.
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At least as I understand it, you don't need to hold a vote before you and your posse toss Johnny the Serial Rapist-Murderer out the airlock on an ancol habitat, inasmuch as anyone seriously identifying as an anarchist understands perfectly well that that shit is breaking pretty much the one rule they do have without speakin' it. Likewise, anyone seriously identifying as an ancap understands perfectly well that Thou Shalt Not Initiate Force Against Anyone, And If You Do, You Have It Coming.
You've already held a vote: you and your posse voted to grab the guy and airlock him. That's why you're a posse. (Or, more likely, to grab him and forcibly remove him from the morph.) And the hilarious thing is that your entire ancap society falls apart, because it's built on a hypocracy. There are rules, yet there aren't rules? There are laws, but there is no legislature? Anarcho-Collectivists don't make any bones about it: there are rules, voted upon by the majority. That's the way it works. But you're saying that Anarcho-Capitalist society, which is [i]founded[/i] upon the fetishization of enshrined, signed contracts, somehow has social contracts (to wit, the "Thou Shalt Not Initiate Force Against Anyone, And If You Do, You Have It Coming" contract,) which nobody needs to sign and yet will be enforced against them, [i]despite it not being a signed, enshrined contract.[/i] The hypocrisy is staggering.
Quote:
Which is also why your security contractor won't protect you. They know the rules as well as anyone else, and so in that contract you signed is going to be a clause to the effect of "We do defense, not offense; and offense includes defending you if you decide to start a fight."
Ah, but you didn't start the fight! You started the fight against the guy whom you fed into a recycler, fair enough, if you get your ass handed to you in [i]that[/i] fight, so be it. [b]But[/b], you didn't start the fight with guys who decide to come after you in retribution for that fight. [i]They[/i] did, and now your security contractor had [i]better[/i] intervene, or else it's in breach of contract. And they don't want that, and here's why. Suppose Guy A feeds Guy B into a recycler because B had no protection contract and thus it was open season on him. Guy C comes after Guy A, and SC A decides not to intervene, because "he had it coming." Now Guy J gets worried, because he [i]really[/i] screwed Guy Q over on a contract - entirely signed and codified, but a massive screwing nontheless, to the tune of "I have the thing you need to continue existing and I'm going to gouge you for everything imaginable because you can't get it from anyone else" screwed. Guy Q has as legitimate a grievance against Guy J as Guy B had against Guy A, [i]despite the fact that Guy J is not in violation of any contract by so doing.[/i] So now Guy J is worried that SC A won't protect him when Guy Q comes after him for revenge, and switches to SC B, who promise that they will protect you against any violence as long as you didn't start [i]the specific encounter in which the violence is occurring,[/i] regardless of the merits of the grievance against you, and of course with all the usual yadda yadda "won't protect you if you have a judicial order out against you."
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A security contractor that offers to help you break the non-aggression principle is by doing so basically declaring war on everyone around them, which is when the Extropia Association of Responsible Security Contractors turns on 'em and throws them out the airlock en masse.
Right, because declaring war on entire mercenary bands entrenched with heavy weapons and entirely commingled with your habitat is such a [i]great[/i] way to have everything go smoothly. Oh, no, wait, the other thing, it's a great way to start a shooting war [i]inside[/i] the place where everybody lives.
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Fri, 2014-04-04 18:54
ShadowDragon8685 ShadowDragon8685's picture
Steel Accord wrote:That would
Steel Accord wrote:
That would actually be a pretty cool campaign setup! A hostile group or individual tries to impose their autocratic rule on Extropia and the Retributionists are the first to find out. They work to expose them, and from their it becomes "gang up on the evil guy!" Zero-g gunfights, alterable terrain in Extropia's environ scape, perhaps the Commonwealth and Anarchists coming in to assist.
More likely not, because most [i]non-[/i]Extropian anarchists would feel "those lunatics have this coming," and of course, the whole non-interferance thing. This is an [i]Extropian[/i] dispute, it doesn't concern us. Also, the people imposing autocratic rule on Extropia are already there, and everybody loves them. They're Extropia's 1%, and they're the ones who are rapidly going to go Koch Brothers on the place, where everybody is ultimately owned by one of them or the other.
—
Skype and AIM names: Exactly the same as my forum name. [url=http://tinyurl.com/mfcapss]My EP Character Questionnaire[/url] [url=http://tinyurl.com/lbpsb93]Thread for my Questionnaire[/url] [url=http://tinyurl.com/obu5adp]The Five Orange Pips[/url]
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Fri, 2014-04-04 20:11
Steel Accord Steel Accord's picture
Non-interference
I understand the whole idea of not getting involved with other peoples business, but you don't think ONE anarchist out of all of you would step in to help?
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Fri, 2014-04-04 20:15
ShadowDragon8685 ShadowDragon8685's picture
Between those who hardcore
Between those who hardcore cleave to the "don't interfere with others" bit and those who hate the presence of Extropians in the Autonomist Alliance and thus actively wish harm unto Extropia and all who hold to its ideals, the number of anarchists willing and able to send resources to help stabilize Extropia is going to be very low. Remember, any schmuck may be able to egocast in and volunteer to help in whatever way they can, but if you're talking about actually sending materiel, you have to convince an entire hab.
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Fri, 2014-04-04 20:19
Steel Accord Steel Accord's picture
Not hypocrisy
Again, Cerebrate and I have both made it clear that Extropian and Anarcho-Capitalist thought does not necessarily revolve around the contract as a holy scripture. It's a tool we can use, widely even, but it's not the final word. I would submit that we aren't that different. We have similar underlying principles, the one dispute and a MAJOR one at that, is that Extropians hold the right for the individual to own property as paramount. While your guys consider it anathema. I would still extend my alliance to the Anarchists over the Consortium any day. Why can't you do the same? (Your response is, of course, welcome, but any follow up from me will happen on the proper AnCap discussion thread. I just don't want to stray too far from the topic here.)
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Fri, 2014-04-04 20:23
Steel Accord Steel Accord's picture
Friends
I would consider a single transhuman to call friend, a more valuable asset than near anything else in the 'verse. Although, I would ask, if that many anarchists have that much of a hatred of us, would a group of them actively attack or sabotage us?
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Fri, 2014-04-04 20:31
ShadowDragon8685 ShadowDragon8685's picture
Steel Accord wrote:Again,
Steel Accord wrote:
Again, Cerebrate and I have both made it clear that Extropian and Anarcho-Capitalist thought does not necessarily revolve around the contract as a holy scripture. It's a tool we can use, widely even, but it's not the final word.
And yet, the book makes it quite clear that the letter of the signed contract is [i]paramount[/i], and absent any contracts explicitly forbidding anything, nothing is forbidden. So either you're not talking about Eclipse Phase Anarcho-Capitalism, in which case your arguments are invalid, or you're currently failing to grasp Eclipse Phase Anarcho-Capitalism. Because on Extropia, your contracts are everything. The contract you have with a security company is literally the only thing between you and a violent hijacking, because there is no law that says "It is illegal to attack someone, and you will be punished if you do." Your security contractor isn't there to punish someone, it's there to [i]stop them from attacking you[/i] through force of arms. Because they haven't signed a contract with you stating that they will not attack you, therefor the vaunted Extropian Mediators have no grounds on which to issue a judgement against them for breaching a contract. [b]They haven't signed one.[/b]
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I would submit that we aren't that different. We have similar underlying principles, the one dispute and a MAJOR one at that, is that Extropians hold the right for the individual to own property as paramount. While your guys consider it anathema.
Don't. you. [b]DARE.[/b] to say we aren't that different. I could give less of a damn about whether people own stuff or not. My problem is with the [i]inherent[/i] imbalance of money, and the fact that in an unregulated, monetary economy, all that power will go to the richest, most souless motherfuckers, and those who have little or nothing will, as always, get shafted. Only worse than usual; we're already up to Turboshafting in the modern day, so I'm not going out on much of a limb to say that on Extropia, it will be [b]hypershafting[/b]. Case in point: If you don't hire a mercenary to watch your back, there is literally nothing beyond your own skill with a gun to prevent someone from preying physically upon you.
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I would still extend my alliance to the Anarchists over the Consortium any day. Why can't you do the same? (Your response is, of course, welcome, but any follow up from me will happen on the proper AnCap discussion thread. I just don't want to stray too far from the topic here.)
Because at least the Consortium isn't lying through their teeth when they state their goals. Extropians are either blinked in the head, fetishize money and contracts so much they can't let go of them, or they're the worst kind of capitalist raiders that even the Consortium's regulations are too restricting for them to do what they want to do.
—
Skype and AIM names: Exactly the same as my forum name. [url=http://tinyurl.com/mfcapss]My EP Character Questionnaire[/url] [url=http://tinyurl.com/lbpsb93]Thread for my Questionnaire[/url] [url=http://tinyurl.com/obu5adp]The Five Orange Pips[/url]
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Fri, 2014-04-04 21:31
Cerebrate Cerebrate's picture
...and this is where I walk
...and this is where I walk quietly away from this subthread because I'm really not looking to start a fight here. But seriously: if your interpretation of anarchocapitalism is one that's unrecognizable to pretty much every anarchocapitalist ever, then isn't it maybe time to consider that you might just be mistaken? -c
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Fri, 2014-04-04 21:40
Steel Accord Steel Accord's picture
Sincerest apologies
I really didn't mean to turn this into a debate. I really do like the idea of these three and what they do. They fit into the setting and would make great protagonists or incidental allies alike.
—
Your passion is power. Focus it. Your body is a tool. Hone it. Transhummanity is a pantheon. Exalt it!
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Fri, 2014-04-04 23:47
ShadowDragon8685 ShadowDragon8685's picture
Steel Accord wrote:I really
Steel Accord wrote:
I really didn't mean to turn this into a debate. I really do like the idea of these three and what they do. They fit into the setting and would make great protagonists or incidental allies alike.
They don't fit into [i]Extropia[/i], though. They're assuming unto themselves some sort of authority of law which they do not have, breaking the principle of Extropia that contracts are everything. I'm not saying they don't fit into Eclipse Phase. If anything, they sound more like some literal social justice warriors, a small group of some other brand of Autonomist who thinks Extropia sucks, and wants to strike a blow on behalf of everyone who gets victimized for the "crime" of not having enough money to hire mercenaries, by getting some extra-contractual revenge on the perpetrators of said non-contract-breaking actions. Or even a memetic special operations group working for the Consortium, to turn the opinion of Extropians towards the idea that retributive law and order is a keen idea, one that can't be easily enacted in their contractual society.
—
Skype and AIM names: Exactly the same as my forum name. [url=http://tinyurl.com/mfcapss]My EP Character Questionnaire[/url] [url=http://tinyurl.com/lbpsb93]Thread for my Questionnaire[/url] [url=http://tinyurl.com/obu5adp]The Five Orange Pips[/url]
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Mon, 2014-04-07 21:59
Undocking Undocking's picture
ShadowDragon8685 wrote:
ShadowDragon8685 wrote:
Violation of [b]WHAT?![/b] Did he [b]sign[/b] a contract with the guy whom he fed into a recycler stating "I will not attack you and feed you into a recycler?" No. Did he violate any other contracts of his stating that? Probably not! He is not in violation of any contracts, because he has not signed any contracts stating that he will not behave in such a manner! [i]Ergo,[/i] he is not a violator of [i]anything[/i], and anyone coming after [i]him[/i] will be subject to his security contractor's violent rebuff.
Since the non-aggression principle is important to ancaps, it could be resonable to assume that ancap habitat societies view entering an ancap hab equal to agreeing to the social contract of the same principle and voluntaryism. Even if a 'pop-up' window appeared to any who entered displaying: you are now entering Extropia! By entering Extropia you mutually agree to the non-aggression principle blah blah blah. Extropia requires contracts to enter, and a payment for life-support fees and rent, so there could be an actual contract agreeing to the non-aggression principle on ancap/extropian habs.
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Mon, 2014-04-07 22:47
bibliophile20 bibliophile20's picture
Undocking wrote:Since the non
Undocking wrote:
Since the non-aggression principle is important to ancaps, it could be resonable to assume that ancap habitat societies view entering an ancap hab equal to agreeing to the social contract of the same principle and voluntaryism. Even if a 'pop-up' window appeared to any who entered displaying: you are now entering Extropia! By entering Extropia you mutually agree to the non-aggression principle blah blah blah. Extropia requires contracts to enter, and a payment for life-support fees and rent, so there could be an actual contract agreeing to the non-aggression principle on ancap/extropian habs.
At which point, if there is a universal contract of agreement to the NAP as being contingent to entering, and a statement that violating the NAP will be met with commensurate force, congrats, you've reverse-engineered citizenship (in an odd way, but citizenship nonetheless)
—

"Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch. Liberty is a well-armed lamb contesting the vote." -Benjamin Franklin

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Mon, 2014-04-07 23:40
Steel Accord Steel Accord's picture
Reasonable
Such a thing would not surprise me. And as a Voluntarist. (I think that's what we're calling ourselves now. XD) That sounds reasonable.
—
Your passion is power. Focus it. Your body is a tool. Hone it. Transhummanity is a pantheon. Exalt it!
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Mon, 2014-04-07 23:41
Steel Accord Steel Accord's picture
"Citizenship"
I would say almost every Autonomist habitat has an odd definition of "citizenship." You could be lightyears away from your actual Scum Barge and still be a "citizen" of it.
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Your passion is power. Focus it. Your body is a tool. Hone it. Transhummanity is a pantheon. Exalt it!
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Tue, 2014-04-08 00:01
ShadowDragon8685 ShadowDragon8685's picture
bibliophile20 wrote:Undocking
bibliophile20 wrote:
Undocking wrote:
Since the non-aggression principle is important to ancaps, it could be resonable to assume that ancap habitat societies view entering an ancap hab equal to agreeing to the social contract of the same principle and voluntaryism. Even if a 'pop-up' window appeared to any who entered displaying: you are now entering Extropia! By entering Extropia you mutually agree to the non-aggression principle blah blah blah. Extropia requires contracts to enter, and a payment for life-support fees and rent, so there could be an actual contract agreeing to the non-aggression principle on ancap/extropian habs.
At which point, if there is a universal contract of agreement to the NAP as being contingent to entering, and a statement that violating the NAP will be met with commensurate force, congrats, you've reverse-engineered citizenship (in an odd way, but citizenship nonetheless)
Not only have you reverse-engineered citizenship, you've also reverse-engineered the concepts oflaw and order, and [i]de facto[/i] hierarchy, because there is a power higher than you (the one you have to agree with in order to enter,) which is enforcing its rules on you, like it or not. Which is kind of, you know... Hypocrisy for anarcho-capitalists. Because they're all "Agreeements!" and "Contracts!" and "Nobody has the right to tell you what to do!"
—
Skype and AIM names: Exactly the same as my forum name. [url=http://tinyurl.com/mfcapss]My EP Character Questionnaire[/url] [url=http://tinyurl.com/lbpsb93]Thread for my Questionnaire[/url] [url=http://tinyurl.com/obu5adp]The Five Orange Pips[/url]
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Tue, 2014-04-08 09:46
Undocking Undocking's picture
ShadowDragon8685 wrote:
ShadowDragon8685 wrote:
Not only have you reverse-engineered citizenship, you've also reverse-engineered the concepts oflaw and order, and [i]de facto[/i] hierarchy, because there is a power higher than you (the one you have to agree with in order to enter,) which is enforcing its rules on you, like it or not. Which is kind of, you know... Hypocrisy for anarcho-capitalists. Because they're all "Agreeements!" and "Contracts!" and "Nobody has the right to tell you what to do!"
Technically, Extropy Now owns Extropia as private property. Stepping foot in it and asking for anyone who voluntarily enters Extropia to sign such a contract to ensure the requirement of ideological commonality would be well within the contractual nature of Extropians. Ancap writers/thinkers have rarely been opposed to law. In Man, Economy, and State, Rothbard opts for a libertarian legal code that considers participation as mutual agreement, but not all ancaps agree with statutory law. The Market for Liberty advocates for natural law involving a heavy involvement of free-market arbiters who must take into account their reputation as a defense against coercion. Both agree that law and government are not exclusive ideas, though EP leans more ot The Market for Liberty in its practice of ancap.
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Tue, 2014-04-08 19:27
uwtartarus uwtartarus's picture
What's the point of
What's the point of purchasing coverage by a SC if the NAP (implicit or explicit by the habitats owners) prevents violence? And who enforces the NAP in the event of lacking coverage by an SC firm? The habitat owners? Because that sounds like a state with a police, unless its a collectivist-esque posse? Just curious. If I was some visitor to Extropia, could I trust the NAP to cover me if I declined an SC? It seems coercive to require SC coverage or I could get blasted?
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Exhuman, and Humanitarian.
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Tue, 2014-04-08 20:12
uwtartarus uwtartarus's picture
Reading through Rimward, it
Reading through Rimward, it sounds like indentured servitude is a form of punishment for extreme crimes like torture or brainhacking. P. 165 RW "Extreme crimes (brainhacking, torture) can result in indentured servitude, exile, or even time in a virtual prison. This latter option is rare, but several private prison concerns have contracts with legal services on the larger Extropian stations." A lack of state doesn't keep people from using terms like crime. I think that the concept of state implies a public 'monopoly of force' organization, and that Extropians with their privatized everything system merely have a marketplace of legal systems but they are legal systems. Laws can be created by non-legislature bodies, in this case, private judges and private organizations that specialize in legal matters. Just something to add to the mess about contracts and laws and such.
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Exhuman, and Humanitarian.
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Wed, 2014-04-09 01:47
Cerebrate Cerebrate's picture
Giant portmanteau reply here,
Giant portmanteau reply here, 'cause my day job has been full of intense debugging and that ain't going away for a while:
bibliophile20 wrote:
At which point, if there is a universal contract of agreement to the NAP as being contingent to entering, and a statement that violating the NAP will be met with commensurate force, congrats, you've reverse-engineered citizenship (in an odd way, but citizenship nonetheless)
In a manner of speaking, you might say so. I don't believe it's necessary. As I've said, just because there are no hierarchical monopolistic enforcement structures in ancap society doesn't mean that there are no rules. It just means that they're enforced peer-to-peer instead of top-down. In actual practice, there are two, which are generally agreed upon by 99 out of 100 ancaps [1]: 1. The obligation of contracts, obviously. Which can't be a contractual matter itself, because if it was, you'd get caught up in an endless ouroboros-circle of whether or not you had agreed to abide by your agreement to agree to abide by your agreement to... and disappear in a puff of circular logic. 2. The non-aggression and/or consent principle, by whichever name you call it (myself, I prefer the latter formulation) and however you derive it. And more to the point, these aren't mutual agreements, they're a universal ethic. The entire ancap critique of bodies as disparate as the Planetary Consortium, the Night Cartel, and and the Democratic People's Republic of North Korea as being a bunch of tyrannous slaving assholes is dependent on the notion that no-one is entitled by any means whatsoever to violate these.
uwtartarus wrote:
What's the point of purchasing coverage by a SC if the NAP (implicit or explicit by the habitats owners) prevents violence?
What you get from purchasing SC coverage is backup. Your SC has you and your property's back all the time, and provides the equivalent of a lawyer on retainer, and friendly advice about dangerous areas and activities, and AR highlighting of dubious contract terms, and other assorted value-added security services - including, if need be, scraping your stack off the street and having you resleeved. If you have money, and you don't have SC coverage, what you're saying is that you're the baddest motherfucker in the valley, and can look after yourself just fine . Which may well work for you... if you can back it up. You can, after all, "legally" shoot back at anyone who attacks you without having to worry about their SC, 'cause initiating force ain't covered by anyone. Otherwise, though, you're basically trusting to the goodwill of your fellow men or charitable retributionists. In most situations, like walking down the street, this will probably work well, 'cause you're in a society full of ancaps who, by definition, think people who initiate force against their fellow men are assholes and who'll happily shoot at someone who breaks that rule for you [2]. (They may or may not try to collect from someone afterwards.) If, on the other hand, you plan to get all entangled in complex cases of multiple-jurisdiction financial law, or some such, then you are really going to regret not having hired a security company first. But on the other hand, if you can't afford to hire a security company, you probably can't screw up in quite so dramatic a manner anyway.
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And who enforces the NAP in the event of lacking coverage by an SC firm? The habitat owners? Because that sounds like a state with a police, unless its a collectivist-esque posse?
A mixture, I suspect, of annoyed passers-by, charitable retributionists, mutual-defense militias, SCs doing some pro-bono work by way of advertising, etc., etc. Anyone who wants to can, after all, so it's a bit hard to sum up everyone who does. But all these people and more might.
uwtartarus wrote:
Just curious. If I was some visitor to Extropia, could I trust the NAP to cover me if I declined an SC? It seems coercive to require SC coverage or I could get blasted?
I look at it as like some kinds of insurance policies, here-and-now. You don't need them, technically, especially if you don't have any particularly complex or extensive needs, because you can engage in self-protection, navigate the legal system(s) yourself, etc. - but they sure make life easier, and the more stuff you have, or the riskier the activities you engage in, the more useful it is to have them. Which is to say, you probably don't need one if you're coming to Extropia just as a tourist and stay out of the bad parts of town, but on the other hand, you can probably get cheap subsidized coverage from the Extropia Tourism Promotion Association that comes with basic coverage (gussied up for tourists), the option of a simulated bar brawl and Extropia-style lawsuit at any convenient point during your stay, and three dozen discount coupons for Honest Achmed's Virtual Grill and Knocking Shop. -c [1] I'd say all 100, but that last guy's a jerk. [2] If, on t'other hand, you plan to walk right into the local Nine Lives franchise and make demands, or even just wander through the bad part of town waving bundles of cash around, this will probably fall under the category of Death By Stupidity, per the local judges. On the other hand, "normal" SC coverage probably won't cater for this sort of thing either. Buy the premium package!
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