Socialist States of America still not learning the lessons

Skybird, as I have already pointed out, I have a degree in anthropology (A first-class honours degree, from a leading British university, to be specific). Economic relations in hunter-gatherer societies are of course very much a subject of anthropological interest - and if any societies could be described as 'natural' (a questionable proposition), it is those of hunter-gatherers. And though there is considerable debate on the subject, I can assure you that one thing that is entirely certain is that such societies did not function on the basis of the simplistic 'trade between individuals' that Hoppe describes. But don't take my word for it - do some research for yourself, and discover how such societies actually functioned. Hoppe is simply projecting his own ideas backwards, to justify them by making them out to be the 'natural order', without evidence. He isn't the first to do this, of course - Marx famously described such societies as living under 'primitive communism'. Though he at least bothered to look at what little evidence there was available at the time, and even after all these years, appears not to have been entirely wrong. But like I say, don't take my word for it. Learn from those who study the subject, rather than those who make up complete bull***t to justify their ridiculous utopian fantasies.

[Skybird]

I already had my share of history, you know. Rome. Greece. The Italian city states. The British empire. The Dutch empire. Th Spanish empire. And so on.

Trade was key to their rise and collection of knowledge and developement of new thoughts.

The issue here is not so much one of anthropology, but of history, and politics, and that is not the same. From the far east and Polynesia, over the deserts in africa, to the Western/European sphere, you could see that tokens that turned into a standardization method for abstract trading processes (establishing trading and complex production lines that in direct 1:1 trade without such tokens was not possible) emerged from more primitive trade-exchange. As I said: money is just ordinary trading goods which are seen by people as vlauable, desirable, and are available in sufficient quantity to really penetrate and become omnipresent in the market.

"Natural order" has nothing to do with primitive tribes of hunter gatherers living in a jungle just because the word "natural" appears in the term. It refers to a most basic interaction only that must not get regulated by an artificial, unnatural authority, between two unregulated free individuals, where both have an item and agree to exchange the one for the other. Money allowed more complex sequences of trades: A is traded for B that allows to buy C in order to get D that was the real desired item from beginning on. My god, that is so basic and elemental that Hoppe really is not the first one having pointed out this .

It may or may not have been like this in most societies. But it has been like this for most of those societies that made themselves known for huge power and influence, leaving a mark in history that lived far beyond their reign. And if some local tribe in a prairie stayed for themselves and lived in an early form of a kibbuz without trading beyond their borders, what difference does that make? they get overlooked today, and also back in their time.

This German Wikipedia entry is better than the English pendant, it lists several of the early primitive currencies that were used to standardise the value of items in an indirect way so that things could be calculated in their value to each other and trading became able even if you needed to accept to trade for something that weas not immedioately offering you the thing that you originally wanted. Yolur cow does not help you if the other needs no cow or you only need three planks of wood, sine your cow is too vlauable to trade it for just thjree pansk of wood. But by trading it for coins, you get the market-agreed value of the cow, and can use that to pay a craftsman and to buy a piece of wood so that he makes three planks from it for you. That is the difference from primitive to complex trade, and wothout this expanding of trading complexity you cannot hope to form a huge and influential civilization, culture, empire.

And in my understanding this is not so much some sub-branch of anthropology, but simply history lessons. But maybe that is just me.

http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Primitivgeld

They used: salt, cacao and plant semen, tealeafs, seashells, peas, teeth, hair, bones, textiles, "Spangengeld" (bronze era 1200 B.C.), "Axtgeld" (middle America until 1500), Messergeld (knife coins, China 12th-3rd century B.C.), Larin (16th-18th century from the Persian gulf to the Bengalian sea, kind of a metal wire), "Hackgeld" (bars of precious material where slides got cut off when needed to pay something), and then the wide variety of natural produce. Trading with these intermediate tokens allowed complex trade. When rare metals like silver and gold entered the trading scheme, these primitive forms of a currency transformed into the money currency that we knew until last century. But in principle a currency until today, no matter what currency it is, always means: a certain quantity/weight of a material that is agree by the market to serve as a carrier material for standardizing these quantities: by forming them into coins with a certain specified amount of that material, or bars.

Skybird, I'm not the slightest bit interested in your 'history'. Hoppe made a specific claim (or you say he did), regarding the 'natural order' - and I have shown that it simply isn't true. Like so many other armchair social theorists, he projects his own biases backwards, and then claims them as evidence for his pet theories. As such, his arguments are worthless.

Hoppe is like Marx, some people look at it, swallow it and spout it as the new truth they have discovered. Others look at and look at it and the more they look at it they realise the less sense it makes.

[Skybird]

You showed nothing. You claimed.


Maybe I share some responsibility by not being precise enough in this paragraph:

Natural order is what has run human interactions for the most of mankind'S time. It means direct trading between two private people who exchange items, because what you give away you value as lesser than what you negotiated to get in return. The other side sees it the same way, just it'S value-attribution is just 180° around.

Maybe I should have worded it like this:

Natural orders are what has run human interactions since most of mankind'S history. In the context of libertarian economic school and the Austrian school to which Hoppe belongs, it means that in the cultural settings of the past 3000 years the most basic scheme of social interaction between foreigners was that of changing things between two unregulated, free people (trading). People need no administration to judge by themselves what of their items they value less so that they give it away in exchange for an item that they value more so that they want to own it. where the other side sees the hierarchy of value in items just the other way around, a windows of opportunity for trading opens.

If that clears it up, then it was my fault when I lacked needed precision, but I have several times in the past weeks now linked to original texts by Hoppe and other authors close to his thinking, so who would have wanted it could have dealt with the original by now already, easily.

"Natural order" and "private law society" are used synonymous in Hoppes thinking and to some parts in the thinking of authors from his direction as well. It means the natural principle by which to do something, in this case: trading. that has nothing to do with Green policies, more with not making something more complicated and regulated than originally it must be in order to function well. Why you think you must go back to hunter gatherers when reading that terminology, is slightly beyond me. Fact is that trade, the ability to establish complex production chains by using higher forms of value-money, is key for civilizations becoming great and influential and blossoming, that trade is what earned civilizations the knowledge and the wealth to grow and blossom and become string and influential, and that this is directly linked to the question of freedom being understood to ground and base on guaranteeing the right to own private property and do with it and live by and on and in it as long as this use does not damage the rights of others to possess their own private property. where this principle of the right for private property gets attacked and reduced, freedom gets limited, no matter whether the limit is established by state's taxes, general laws regulating how you may and may not use your property, and forcing you to give up rights to use your property.

Money tokens get used since 3500 years in some parts of the world.

So, to clarify, when Hoppe uses the word 'natural' he doesn't mean 'natural' at all. He just means 'how he thinks things should be done'. No surprises there...

[GT182]

Until we get jobs back that went overseas, we will stay in a semi permanent recession. Yes there will be ups and downs but it's still a recession. We cannot have an economy without jobs to support it. Just as working at 7-11, Wendy's, Pizza Hut and the like will not generate the income needed to be a home owner, or even be semi self sufficient.

Our goobernment wants everyone to believe the economy is better but it's not. Yes, they are a bunch of goobers running the show. How can an economy be better when prices keep rising, and income either stays the same or drops... as in no jobs? Sure Obummer says 200,000 jobs were created, but 300,000 jobs have disappeared that he's not telling about. He's an idiot to think we're better off now than 2 years ago. When he took office in January of 2009 Regular gas was 2.81/gallon. Since then it has risen as high a 4.20/gallon.... average gas prices mean nothing. Yeah, the economy has gotten better according to him and his cronies. But then in all actuallity, oil and diesel fuel is what's controlling the economy.

[Skybird]

Before you continue to spill your intentionally misleading rants, you may want to read Hoppe himself on what it is about, and why. Peaceful coexistence, trade, cooperation and higher productivity by labour division during the production process. Without that, humans stay isolated, limited in their reach, doomed to stay in smallest almost tribal groups, excluded from participating in civilizational development. Where humans live like this, civilizational development and improvement is impossible to grow beyond certain very limited standards. Because two hands alone always can do only so and so much, and not more.

The links are still valid and lead to the according libraries.

[Platapus]

Originally Posted by GT182

Our goobernment wants everyone to believe the economy is better but it's not.

All I know is that my meager investments have been growing in value over the past 5 years, where previously, I cringed every time I opened up the statements and saw those big minus signs.

Something must be getting slowly better. We have a long way to go, but we seem to be slowly heading in the right direction.