Monday, March 26, 2012

On Unpopular Opinions

Hey, Libertarians ! Getting tired of being called "outside the mainstream"? Or too radical?

The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the unreasonable man. - George Bernard Shaw



5 comments:

HeartAttackSurvivor said...

Ah yes, GBS. "...the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself", indeed. Here's another good quote of his:"The moment we face it frankly we are driven to the conclusion that the community has a right to put a price on the right to live in it … If people are fit to live, let them live under decent human conditions. If they are not fit to live, kill them in a decent human way. Is it any wonder that some of us are driven to prescribe the lethal chamber as the solution for the hard cases which are at present made the excuse for dragging all the other cases down to their level, and the only solution that will create a sense of full social responsibility in modern populations?". What's that if not a case of adapting the world to oneself? What a vile man.

Invisible Backhand said...

So this post means you gave up about being right about speculation, and just want to claim it's an unpopular opinion now? The climbdown continues.

The Whited Sepulchre said...

HAS,
Glad you are still with us.
When time permits look at GBS's flirtations back and forth with the eugenics movement of his day. One never knows when the statement is Shavian irony and when he's for real.
If he was for real, well, he was taking his Socialism to the logical extreme.

IB,
Are you still talking about the woman who hoarded more gas than she immediately needed, speculating that she would profit from the purchase later on? That woman? The speculator?

Invisible Backhand said...

Are you still talking about the woman who hoarded more gas than she immediately needed, speculating that she would profit from the purchase later on? That woman? The speculator?

White is black, up is down, expense is profit. How come you don't make money every time you put diesel in your truck, hyuck hyuck hyuck?

You should be a billionare by now from all your speculatin', boy.

Why are you keeping this secret to perpetual motion to yourself? Burn gas, make money, buy even more gas, make even more money, mo money mo money mo money.

Idiot.

Michael Coyne said...

IB - Ok, so I am trying to figure out where you are going with your argument. By definition, that woman was speculating, no way around that argument no matter how much name calling you use. So I am going with the idea that you have dug in your heels for the sake of digging in your heels. So lets get to the heart of your argument.

So is it in your opinion, that the problem is speculation for profit but not for consumption? Or that this woman shouldnt be considered a Speculator but a speculator (uppercase is an investor while lowercase is an individual).
Who knows, she might have become rich burning gasoline by running a taxi service or by converting her movement into production. Maybe traveling by car to soccer practice saves her a buttload of time and time equals money. Maybe we arent luddites anymore and the invention of the automobile freed people from small local proximity and allowed individuals to meet and breed with people that arent their cousins. Unfortunately we are still using gasoline in cars.

Purchasing any good of your own free will and without coercion is not a zero sum principle.
With your logic, this is like telling someone that if they believe that the cost of grain is going up after a flood that they should be wealthy for just eating bread. If that last sentence doesnt make sense, that is because your argument in the first place didnt.