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Rejecting The Natural/Synthetic Dichotomy
I reject the natural/synthetic dichotomy. The natural/synthetic dichotomy is manifested in two fundamental ways: (1) the assumption that humans and/or human constructs are separate from nature and (2) the assumption that certain human constructs are "natural"...
Posted 11 October 2008 10:34 AM by Brainpolice | with no comments
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Is self-ownership a misnomer?
If something is owned, then by definition there is something external to it that is doing the owning. Likewise, something that is owned is by definition something external to the agent that owns it. Taking this very basic point into account, does it really...
Posted 16 September 2008 11:47 AM by Brainpolice | 8 comment(s)
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Anarchism As Skepticism
"The government is necessary. The government is legitimate. Democracy is representative of the people. Democracy is the best form of government. Majority rule is legitimate. Checks and balances actually function. Voting is meaningful or even an obligation...
Posted 29 August 2008 09:19 AM by Brainpolice | 2 comment(s)
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Objects Are Morally Neutral
I've always been a stickler for the notion that objects are morally neutral. This notion usually comes to play in debates about gun prohibition, to counter people essentially claiming that guns are causal determinant for violence in and of themselves...
Posted 17 July 2008 05:45 AM by Brainpolice | with no comments
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False Realism and Utopianism
Conservatism is a defense of the existing order or past existing orders as "natural". Any potential alternative to the existing order or to the romantisized past order is immediately brushed aside as "unnatural" and "utopian"...
Posted 25 June 2008 10:26 PM by Brainpolice | 7 comment(s)
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Judeo-Christian Morality vs. The Free Society
I'd like to explain why I think that traditional judeo-christian morality does not synch up very well with the principles of liberty and does not provide a beneficial cultural framework for a free society. In many ways, I'm not going to be saying...
Posted 21 June 2008 10:21 PM by Brainpolice | 8 comment(s)
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Walter Block: Wrong on Religion
Walter Block recently wrote an article at LewRockwell.com on the topic of religion and state. He critisizes what he considers to be an irrational hatred of religion that many libertarians have apparently inherented from Ayn Rand. While he is an atheist...
Posted 19 June 2008 11:13 AM by Brainpolice | 5 comment(s)
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Morality, Rationality, Survival and the Law
I was having a bit of a debate with an Objectivist and we got into some questions about morality and rationality. It related to the question of suicide, and I maintained that suicide is irrational but not immoral and that the individual has the liberty...
Posted 03 June 2008 08:27 PM by Brainpolice | with no comments
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Politics Is The Opiate Of The Masses
Theism is not the only kind of mysticism. Collectivist and political ideologies are also forms of mysticism. The nature of politics involves blind faith in a "highest essence". The abstractions of these "highest essences" function...
Posted 03 June 2008 06:38 AM by Brainpolice | 3 comment(s)
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Resolving Anarchist Conflict
Conflict between the socialist oriented and market oriented camps within anarchism can get very tedious. Many anarcho-communists and anarcho-syndicalists appear to emphatically claim that market anarchism isn't truly anarchism, that opposition to...
Posted 05 May 2008 08:57 PM by Brainpolice | 6 comment(s)
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The Nail in the Coffin of "The Right"
It is common for many libertarians, especially those in America, to assume that they have a natural alliance with "the right". This is based on certain assumptions, such as the notion that contemporary libertarianism grew out of the old American...
Posted 25 April 2008 04:54 PM by Brainpolice | 5 comment(s)
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Definitions
So I put together some relatively witty definitions of my terms. If you're not offended by at least one of these, then you are awesome! Constitutionalism - The belief that a piece of paper drafted and signed by a tiny aristocracy of men is a legitimate...
Posted 18 April 2008 01:08 AM by Brainpolice | 4 comment(s)
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Two Philosophies of History
Political philosophies often involve views of history. There seems to be two fundamental views of history, as I have touched on in " Traditionalism as Stagnation " and " Radicalism and Moderation ". These two views are what I would...
Posted 12 April 2008 04:02 PM by Brainpolice | with no comments
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Secular Deities and the Problem of Humanism
An atheist criticism of contemporary secularism Most atheists and agnostics still have a religious mindset, only they have replaced the formal concept of a god with other concepts. In the absence of faith in an all-knowing and all-loving god outside of...
Posted 03 April 2008 12:17 AM by Brainpolice | 1 comment(s)
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Political Philosophy Is Dead
Clearly, conservatism and liberalism have become anti-concepts, devoid of any objective meaning. They used to have fairly clear definitions, but now they are meaningless terms that change with the context and times at the drop of a hat. The people refering...
Posted 30 March 2008 09:30 AM by Brainpolice | 1 comment(s)
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