2016-10-20 at 3:29 AM UTC
Sophie's top anarchism book recommendation of the day is Anarchy and Legal Order: Law and Politics for a Stateless Society. By Gary Chartier. In which Chartier argues the fundamental immorality of the state. His neo-Thomist views on natural law are controversial and not an adequate theory of ethics in my opinion and his anti-utilitarian stance and attempts to undermine the public goods argument for the state are sure to piss Lanny off. And, are at best unpalatable to a more rationalist view of the state of things. Where he shines however is in his application of legal order in a stateless society. There is a long literature on how the common law or merchant law developed and was enforced without state assistance. Chartier cites an important literature in experimental economics which provides evidence that assurance contracts can solve the problem of public goods. He cites arguments and cases in legal theory that may tend to show that tort law can be as good or perhaps better than top-down state-enforced regulation.
All in all, an interesting philosophical work, the best part of which arguing for the Capitalist part of Anarcho-Capitalism.
7.2/10 Would recommend.
2016-10-20 at 5:52 AM UTC
Gonna be a read dick here so if you dont want to have another showdown like when I was christ-trolling you you may want to skip this but...
I simply cannot view anything anti-utilitarian as legitimate. In three sentences I will give my view.
1. Utilitarianism, specifically related to man, is designed to be useful and pragmatic rather than attractive.
2. If you are not useful or of a pragmatic nature you are not beneficial to the species.
3. As such, survival is inherently utilitarian.
Of course, you are welcome to change my mind. My stance on this issue is by not means concrete but ever evolving.
I do like aquinas, though I could read up much more on him. Since I have been studying the philokalia I have been largely ignoring the Catholics. 9 years of Catholic School will do that to you though.
