The benifts of freedom?

[Element4ry]

The only limit there should be on freedom is to ensure one person's freedom doesn't infringe another person's.

I've read the thread, and was about to say the same thing in general, but the topic of freedom is much more complex than blacks and whites. There is always grey matter inbetween derived from people itself as everyone is different than other. As what mumblemumble said - total freedom is anarchy which will produce some kind of ruling power or oppressor sooner than later. I agree with mumblemumble in general.
There should be some vague lines drawn as law based on the principals, describing where ones freedom ends and the others begin.

[Listen1]

Yeah, the gray areas are the ones we must take care of. But before we enter in it, let me try to screetch the extremes:

If you put the black and the white on the paper, what would turn out better for a society?

A rigid controlled method scheme that infringes in your freedom.
or
A total freedom with no rules, duties or anything, an anarchy.

On my look, both will be controlled by an authoritarian dictator that chooses what is right and wrong. I believe every society is bound to end in this way, from a small friendship of 5 guys who peek at the womans bathroom to a country with over 2 billion peoples.

What would be the best way to blend this two?

[Element4ry]

I think we don't need to "take care of" this grey matter - we need a grey matter to take care of itself. Both of extremities you mentioned will end up with some kind of dictatorship, especially the first one (1984, Orwell). Balancing the two isn't exactly possible, but I think the best way is to set boundaries by as few laws as possible. Private property, freedom of speech and independent court (judgment) are most important things that should be protected by law.

[b0rsuk]

The most practical rule I live by is:

Code Select Expand

Freedom of one person ends where freedom of another person begins.

[RickyMartini]

The most practical rule I live by is:

Code Select Expand

Freedom of one person ends where freedom of another person begins.

Word. This one already covers at least 90% of the issues at hand.

[Miner_239]

Wait, wait... So, if someone's freedom ends where another person's starts, then that's not the problem. The problem is the definition of freedom.
I personally believe that freedom should only be limited to the rights that is defined, standardized, and measurable. Freedom of speech is kinda bullshit since anything you say could offend someone's freedom of safety, or whatever, because of their mindset.

So, I think this code:

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One's freedom ends when it violates another's clearly defined rights  would be better than the previous.

I would really hope that someday, eveeything is quantized, so that everything is measurable and thus end all ambiguity contained in summarized words in rules. But, of course, that day would never come.

[RickyMartini]

Freedom of speech is kinda bullshit since anything you say could offend someone's freedom of safety, or whatever, because of their mindset.

Then I think you're misunderstanding what freedom of speech in most first world countries means.

Freedom of speech, at the very basis, means that speech alone cannot be a reason to detain you and throw you in jail (by the government). That's basically it, it has nothing to do with the quality of speech, or the content, or the target of the speech.

Granted, it gets way more complicated in real life because most countries still have a defined limit where "speech oversteps their boundaries". This is incredibly hard to define.


As an example, in Germany, you are free to criticize the government and everything the government does. You're free to assemble and protest any decision the government does etc. because that is freedom of speech.

However, it is illegal to assemble and call for violence to others or the government. Go to a public place and yell "all black people and their children should be killed" and you'll immediately be arrested and go to trial. Why? Because the German government considers this to be hate speech, so for the German government, you "overstepped your boundaries with free speech."

So all in all, freedom of speech can be summarized and it can be well defined:

"Freedom of speech is the right to communicate one's opinions and ideas without fear of government retaliation or censorship. "


Governments restrict speech with varying limitations. Common limitations on speech relate to libel, slander, obscenity, pornography, sedition, incitement, fighting words, classified information, copyright violation, trade secrets, non-disclosure agreements, right to privacy, right to be forgotten, political correctness, public security, public order, public nuisance, campaign finance reform, perjury, and oppression. Whether these limitations can be justified under the harm principle depends upon whether influencing a third party's opinions or actions adversely to the second party constitutes such harm or not.

[Miner_239]

"Freedom of speech is the right to communicate one's opinions and ideas without fear of government retaliation or censorship. "

I agree, but there's no one stopping someone else from feeling offended and cause a risk of personal, off-the-law retaliation. I think I'm biased because of all the feminazi memes in memecenter, but if someone thinks of an example, then, as my literature teacher say, it's a representation of what our society might be.

My point is that speech should not be spoken if it harms. If you (and you alone, since talking to others about it is also opining) consider your opinion alone does more harm than good, then you should either change the mindset of the would-be offendee first, or stay in silence. I try to always adhere to this principle in hope that people would never share an offending belief without a previous discussion or brainstorm.

As I'm currently not in my school's dorm and almost all my reference for my novels are there, I can't elaborate more on how rights and freedom should work in my ideal world for fear that I'll mislead someone here. That is not what anyone wanted.

[RickyMartini]

I sure agree, basically this is called the "Freedom of speech, but not freedom of consequences" kind of "rule". Basically, FOS grants you the protection from the government when it comes to your personal opinion, however, this does not apply to your fellow neighbours and society in general.

[Kegereneku]

- Freedom of one person ends where freedom of another person begins.

I've always considered this quote to be a thought-terminating clichés, the sort of thing you say when you have nothing to say or when it serve your personal interest.
Someone do something you don't like consider harmful ? <INSERT QUOTE>
Someone keep you from doing something they don't like consider harmful ? <INSERT QUOTE>

Anything else is statism.

And this remark make me analyze it.
The opposite of Statism would be Anarchism, but I don't think Anarchy actually exist.

Don't look at me like that, I mean that Anarchy is by definition "not a system" yet a system appear as soon as a Entity interact with another Entity with a huge chance of negative "punch in your face" feedback. So any anarchic state is simply a succession of States with no definite power structure, and adding more peoples in the mix simply cement it those to last longer.

Oh I'm sure some Libertarian "figured it out" and say the objective is a process toward maximizing freedom.
The flaw I see is that it's fundamentally incompatible with short-term technology (until AI and universal fabricator) and long-term : a finite universe (unless you are the only life-form in it). At some point you'll have to negotiate, make agreement, write rules...

So, anything else might be StatismPolity but we will eventually find some that is more enjoyable than all the previous ones.


Last :
Quoting a wonderful website about making SF (including imagining the laws of a colony) that should eat up your free time :

[...]the point is that Libertarian rule only works in an area where the the population is One. Things get tense where there are two people.
And if you get a small Libertarian community, you will have either

    [a] Open warfare
    A cohesive group who will hunt you down like the dangerous non-conformist mad dog you are
    [c] A community of sheep enslaved by the biggest meanest sociopathic thug who just happens to be quicker on the draw than anyone else. Probably quicker than you, too.

Or [d] A cry by the community to get rid of Libertarian social Darwinism and replace it with the rule of Space Law so as to establish a place where "decent people" can live. Which means it'll suddenly have rules, laws, lawyers, treaties, politicians, and everything else you fled from on Terra.

[Miner_239]

Kegen made me look up on what libertarian is. That was indeed a good read. I fully agree with Kegen's post right there, although that remark made me think that if freedom need to end, then who would stop it? If it is the goverment, then is that not statism, too?

[sadpickle]

I don't know what that site Kegereneku linked is (rockets?), but I wouldn't use it as a dictionary for libertarianism in any case. The Wikipedia article is a pretty good start: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libertarianism

Keep in mind that Libertarianism dovetails neatly with Objectivism, the two having much in common (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Objectivism_(Ayn_Rand)). You could think of Libertarianism as the political expression of Objectivism's philosophy and ethics.

I disagree with the idea that Libertarian rule is fundamentally impossible with a population >1, if that is the point of the "Space Law" author. The assumption seems rooted in the notion that Anarchism = Libertarianism which is simply false. Libertarianism absolutely requires a government of limited size and scope, or, clearly enumerated powers and unenumerated rights. A Rimworld colony is NOT a libertarian paradise (neither is Somalia, thanks). Any colony is a loose collective of individuals with little regard for laws, little in the way of private ownership, perfectly capable of initiating violence... all the antithesis of libertarianism. If a Rimworld colony were libertarian, you would see pawns NEGOTIATING with each other for what they need, instead of collective ownership of nearly everything.

The only "reason" that "libertarianism doesn't work" is because it requires subordinating that most basic of human impulses (tribalism) to the intellect, in a rigorous application of logic, which is more effort than most people can be persuaded to.

[PotatoeTater]

I have only one comment to really make, this is my personal belief and in my honest opinion how the framers of our nation wanted us to be. We have freedom to do what we want without prosecution until your individual freedom takes away someone else's freedom. IE, I have the freedom to own a gun and uses it as I see fit; however, when you uses that gun to take someone else's life, you just used your freedom to take their freedom away. That is the line right there. You cannot uses your freedom to take someone else's freedom of anything. It sounds like a circle, but it is a concept that has to be described that way.

[mumblemumble]

Then I think you're misunderstanding what freedom of speech in most first world countries means.

Freedom of speech, at the very basis, means that speech alone cannot be a reason to detain you and throw you in jail (by the government). That's basically it, it has nothing to do with the quality of speech, or the content, or the target of the speech.

Granted, it gets way more complicated in real life because most countries still have a defined limit where "speech oversteps their boundaries". This is incredibly hard to define.


As an example, in Germany, you are free to criticize the government and everything the government does. You're free to assemble and protest any decision the government does etc. because that is freedom of speech.

However, it is illegal to assemble and call for violence to others or the government. Go to a public place and yell "all black people and their children should be killed" and you'll immediately be arrested and go to trial. Why? Because the German government considers this to be hate speech, so for the German government, you "overstepped your boundaries with free speech."

So all in all, freedom of speech can be summarized and it can be well defined:

"Freedom of speech is the right to communicate one's opinions and ideas without fear of government retaliation or censorship. "


Governments restrict speech with varying limitations. Common limitations on speech relate to libel, slander, obscenity, pornography, sedition, incitement, fighting words, classified information, copyright violation, trade secrets, non-disclosure agreements, right to privacy, right to be forgotten, political correctness, public security, public order, public nuisance, campaign finance reform, perjury, and oppression. Whether these limitations can be justified under the harm principle depends upon whether influencing a third party's opinions or actions adversely to the second party constitutes such harm or not.

there's many problems with this. First, you say screaming "kill black people"  will get you arrested.. This is true,  but groups who advocate KILLING cops,  white people,  and other groups... Do they face the same often? It happens,  but nowhere near as much.

Another is where exactly is the line.  Europe and Germany is a good example. You say people cannot criticize government,  but people who VERY POLITELY express concerns are slapped with hate speech,  when they mention theft,  rape,  sexual assault,  assault,  and other issues which are very real.

So this presents a VERY big problem : which is more important? Open dialog,  or protecting feelings?  If you have open dialog,  anyone can discuss anything,  no topic is taboo or off the table,  but feelings will get hurt.

Where as if you protect EVERYONE'S feelings,  any speech or action which someone CLAIMS to be offensive is then immediately under fire,  and possibly shut down.

Lets look at a hypothetical scenario : group of former drug addicts complain about drugs in rimworld,  claim it gives them ptsd thinking about days of addiction. They DEMAND rimworld either remove all drug references, or shut down.... Should this group prevail? My guess is no.  Why? They aren't physically being hurt,  pressured to use drugs,  and the representation of drugs is mostly truthful.

Now really,  this logic should be applied to all cases,  and if you will do this,  you see censorship is a big problem.

Even direct criticism shouldn't be stifled. Anytime you block ANY criticism under hate speech,  you make it illegal to point out flaws and problems ..

[Kegereneku]

I don't know what that site Kegereneku linked is (rockets?), but I wouldn't use it as a dictionary for libertarianism in any case. The Wikipedia article is a pretty good start: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libertarianism

[...]

I disagree with the idea that Libertarian rule is fundamentally impossible with a population >1, if that is the point of the "Space Law" author. The assumption seems rooted in the notion that Anarchism = Libertarianism which is simply false. Libertarianism absolutely requires a government of limited size and scope, or, clearly enumerated powers and unenumerated rights.

Although I never said that website was a source to define libertarianism, it doesn't get its definition wrong.

I did said "Oh I'm sure some Libertarian "figured it out" and say the objective is a process toward maximizing freedom." because to me the problem is that the stated objective enter in conflict with the mean supposed to achieve it : More freedom, using as little rules (or decentralized at least) as possible, since rules are not easy to define in quality & reach rather than quantity.
You could follow 10 000 longingly-worded laws and have more freedom and choices than following a dozens shortly-worded laws.
Said another way : Libertarianism is the belief that if you don't try to facilitate cooperation on a large scale, it will (somehow) happen on its own.

What the "Atomic Rocket" website (which is about SF storytelling) pointed out, is just that (to make a good sf story) you can't have your cakespace-colony without setting up a reason/system that make it work as a colony (for how long and how well is left up to your imagination) and demonstrating it with the flaws in the "no laws" logic that is in fact held by many young "libertarian".

As for "Objectivism" (stupid autocorrect), let's say it's not really a ...logical philosophy. No really, Ayn Rand is a loony who try to sell a self-fulfilling fantasy that "happiness will happen" if everybody somehow bow in front of "obviously great people" or people claiming to have more merit (and need) than others. Her thesis-novel "Atlas shrugged" is basically a bunch of reality-warping super-genius against moronic peoplebot that have less sense of self-preservation than actual parasite, and it's supposed to stand for the real world.
Or said another way, it's in my opinion a fancy and sophisticated as hell way of saying "I believe that people who can pursue their self-interest shouldn't feel bad for exploiting other weakness for that"

It's anybody's choices to believe that, but as far as I know letting an human obtain unchecked power over other peoples never led to maximizing individual happiness (at least without mass drugging or killing which is a bad sign).


Aside, I wouldn't say a Rimworld colony demonstrate any sort of polity, for there is no actual AI, only predictable bot mimicking life, not actually living. If each colonist had it's own AI motivated by survival/self-interest I don't say, but until then...

[...]
So this presents a VERY big problem : which is more important? Open dialog,  or protecting feelings?  If you have open dialog,  anyone can discuss anything,  no topic is taboo or off the table,  but feelings will get hurt.
[...]

I don't think you realize, but Skissor was making a statement of what is being done and the common reasons for why, not telling what should be done (based on personal belief) as you are doing.
Also, I see red flag in your logic as it amount to denying that word alone can hurt someone, it can and do.
I'm not taking position on your specific drugs example (this isn't the point). Just stating that if a (relatively)specific beliefs or hateful rhetoric is actively harming society (by targeting people who are part of it), then this is a motive to forbid it.
To take an absolutely random example : if -say- someone spread claims that homosexual are depraved and dangerous, this person may believe to be right (even if wrong) he will still be harming some peoples, peoples part of a polity system that may decide whether or not they should prevent such claims from spreading to "improve society".

This is not a "you should do that" statement.
Just a demonstration of why the process of improving society by censorship protecting factual accuracy is difficult.
Some people will claim that a minority should have the right to pretend their belief are held by more people that it actually is.
Other will claim that everything that is said should only be "factually correct", never misleading.
And other will claim that it's ok for a minority to have "more voice" as long as they say "good things" (usually as defined by them).
...etc

No need to go on whether or not any the above is feasible or good.


EDIT : I saw that a few lines ended up at the wrong place and in the wrong order, rectifying.