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Comment by ryandrake | Hacker News Reader

I have the pleasure of living in a pretty "red" part of the country, and everyone I know who is a self-described libertarian (or otherwise worships at the altar of self-sufficiency) lives utterly dependent on societal systems. They're on Medicare, Disability or Social Security, live in neighborhoods with solid public services, rely on the rule of law for protection from crime, and enjoy clean air and drinking water, safe food and medicine, that they only have access to due to strong environmental and safety regulations. They were the first ones to freak out on Social Media during COVID when they had to actually rely on themselves for a bit.

As someone else put it on Twitter, they are like house cats: absolutely convinced of their fierce independence while utterly dependent on a system they don't appreciate or understand.

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That's not entirely their fault. Those programs were designed and instituted to make as many people as possible dependent on them so they would become a captured voting bloc.

It took thousands of years of technical and social progress to produce people that think they can survive alone.

Cognitive dissonance, lack of critical thought, and self-introspection is an outcome of the Conservative push for education elimination.

This is exactly why Conservatives feel educators are evil; they work to enable the ideals/traits in individuals which run counter to what’s most successful for following Conservative ideology.

Do you feel that the department of education is responsible for your ability to think critically?

Do you feel that it would be impossible to think critically without the department of education?

Do you feel that folks from other countries, who grew up without our illustrious department of education, lack critical thought?

You literally put words in my mouth; I said nothing about the DoE.

> Conservative push for education elimination.

I assumed this was a reference for the conservative push to eliminate the DOE.

Or do you believe that conservatives actually want to eliminate the abstract concept of education?

They are openly attacking university and public school educators; calling them liberal agitators with agendas which indoctrinate students to ideologies counter to Conservative values.

> Or do you believe that conservatives actually want to eliminate the abstract concept of education?

What do you mean by conservatives? Do you mean my fellow citizens in arms, or certain people who happen to hold power right now?

The department of education is not a service provider.

It is a conduit through which funding flows and is a standards and enforcement body.

They (or at least, they used to) insure that "state's rights" advocates don't implement curricula that teach children that the world is 6,000 years old and flat. They are in the process of being dismantled.

One's local school district is responsible for a vast majority of one's critical thinking skills and it has been this way in the United States since at least the early 1800s when people realized that only wealthy parents had the time, energy, and money to hire private tutors to impart critical thinking skills on their children.

I imagine that in other countries, especially western countries, the story is the same.

We can look back far into history to see that people have used state-run or sanctioned institutions to teach critical thinking skills since well before the Platonic Academy, from which much of our modern system is derived, based on evidence of organized vocational education ranging from Siberia to Ancient Egypt to city states that dotted the land prior to the Old Babylonian Empire.

The main difference between those ancient systems and today is that, for now, all children get the chance to have a formal, standardized education, instead of just the children of the wealthy, well-connected, or lucky.

> They (or at least, they used to) insure that "state's rights" advocates don't implement curricula that teach children that the world is 6,000 years old and flat. They are in the process of being dismantled.

That is, in my view, a good thing. We should not be a monolithic nation and were never meant to be. If the people of (insert state here) wish to teach their children things I don't agree with, or even things which are outright false, that is their right. Nor does it hurt me in any way.

One of the great problems with our country today is people trying to get the federal government to control more and more things. That is directly responsible for much of the division in our country, as federal elections (especially for president) turn into this big fight over who is going to get to impose their dramatically differing way of life on others for the next 4ish years. To reduce tensions, we need to return to the original design: decisions about government should be made as locally as possible, so that the government can reflect the very diverse needs and cultures that exist across our country.

> That is, in my view, a good thing. We should not be a monolithic nation and were never meant to be.

What we absolutely should be is a nation with a minimum standard of education that all American children capable enough are expected to have by the time they leave school. That standard should include the fact that the world isn't flat.

Providing a minimum standard of quality education is critical to the security and success of the nation because a democracy doesn't function when the population is made up of uneducated people who are easily fooled, can't read, and whose heads are filled with lies that will often conflict with what's been taught to the children one state over.

> If the people of (insert state here) wish to teach their children things I don't agree with, or even things which are outright false, that is their right. Nor does it hurt me in any way

If you don't think that it is possible for you to be harmed by the votes or actions of people who are uneducated, intentionally misinformed, and unable to think critically you obviously still have some learning to do yourself.

Nobody should be teaching anyone things that is not factual. That is detrimental to society and definitely affects everyone.

Look at what happens in poor areas of less developed countries. Honor killings, deification of dictators, rampant scamming and crime, cartels and gangs... all still things.

Your questions betray an ignorance of how a significant plurality of the world still lives to this day. You need to get out more, and not just at the resort towns.

And new problems are cropping up in the foremost developed nations, like depression due to social media addiction, that we'll also need to think critically about, instead of reverting to medieval religious remedies.

Alternatively, maybe you just think we're better off because we're intrinsically better kinds of humans? Gods chosen few? No doubt many people actually believe that.

To be clear on my intentions- the OP said that conservatives wanted to eliminate critical thought. I assumed this was related to the elimination of DOE. My questions intended to dissect why exactly he thought that the DOE was responsible for critical thought.

I am not a fan of the DOE- I think that the relationship between standardized tests and funding mean that schools prioritize skill development and memorization more than they prioritize critical thought / reasoning.

I am not sure where your line of criticism comes from- it doesn't seem like we're understanding each other

You asked a bunch of specious questions about the DoE. The DoE is part of a complicated and fragile system. It isn't as simple as turning off a light switch for a part you don't like, and chances are you probably don't fully understand the thing you don't like in the first place. Chesterton's fence.

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Now, to your point about standardized testing of skills vs reasoning, I would love to hear a proposal for ensuring "correct" critical thinking is assimilating into student populations. This doesn't scale and is subject to severe bias. Standardized testing measures more objective traits that are indicators for critical thought. IMO a solution must build on top of that foundation, not throw it away. You add a compass, you don't throw out the map.

Ayn Rand herself was on social security too fwiw.

https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/ayn-rand-social-security/

"In her later years"....well, yeah! I will structure my finances that way too. I get money stolen from me yearly by force for "SS TAX", and i surely plan to get every cent back out of it that i can. I will not get even 10% back, but that is better than 0

This is not how it works.

Did you ever use the streets in front of your house? Ever went to a public park? Ever relied on police to protect your property? Ever needed the help of public health services? Firefighters?

It's funny that you get money stole from you (while you certainly use a ton on infrastructure society provides), but never once considered leaving it behind and go live as a hunter gatherer in some remote place.

After all, you are posting here.

How much of the budget is police, parks, and roads?

When the budget is questioned the response is always the most popular examples and ignore everything else.

When was the last time you used a sociology research grant? Or an ICBM?

The reason we pay for ICMBs is to prevent warmongers like Putin from invading countries which would be bad for the whole global economy. So you get advantage from ICMBs all the time indirectly.

I personally don’t lose sleep over what Putin might do because it’s outside of my circle of influence.

Interesting to hear the military budget is now completely necessary from HNers.

I use them daily, in not being some poor serf, by not risking famine every year, and not living in a land beleaguered by war.

Those things are sort of like having competent IT security. If they are doing everything right, they will seem like they aren't doing anything at all, but when they are gone all of a destruction and doom is always just a day away.

Sometimes I think that the libertarians should be condemned to live in their dream society, without laws, regulations, public service, etc.

It gets tiresome listening to their "taxes are theft" bullshit.

Why are they not collected through consent?

No one would consent.

There are many community groups historically funded through consent with seemingly no direct kickbacks, including churches.

We're not talking about communities, we're talking about modern countries. Most people aren't willing to pay out of pocket for anything that doesn't benefit them directly, which is why the reason most people give to charity is that its tax deductible. A few might give out of the kindness of their heart or some sense of civic duty, but not enough.

I agree that the primary function of taxation is to fund things that have serious free rider problems otherwise.

But part of the problem is the lack of community structure and expectation that we can centrally fund and manage problems. There are whole communities in the US that lived for generations on civic duty and kindness of heart.

>There are whole communities in the US that lived for generations on civic duty and kindness of heart.

But not entirely. Living in the US means they take advantage of the American capitalist system and infrastructure to some degree, which means they benefit from taxation. And obviously they pay their taxes otherwise the men with guns would have shown up.

And again, the free rider problem is intractable at scale. You can't simply build "community structure" and expect everyone to buy in. If that were possible, we wouldn't need laws at all, we could just expect everyone to play nice. And the fact that most people play nice by default doesn't imply laws aren't necessary.

And we can centrally fund and manage problems. That does work. Look at the numerous public work projects in the US like Hoover Dam, NASA, interstate highways, modern agriculture, the internet. None of that happens if all you can depend on is kindness of heart.

All good things come from God and God’s greatness shines of all the earth, and anything that ever happens is because of God, but for you it’s the State.

Just because a good thing exists does not mean I’m indebted to it. The city may build a really nice park on the other side of town. That doesn’t mean I’m being subsidized or dependent.

The people of Maine did not benefit from the Hoover Dam.

> You can't simply build "community structure" and expect everyone to buy in.

You’re right that we can’t magically recreate communities that were destroyed, but this is actually the default human behavior. Small community cooperate together for common good.

> If that were possible, we wouldn't need laws at all

This doesn’t follow. People’s short term behavior may not align with their long term values.

Crime/sin is traditionally when your passions get the best of you.

What kind of consent? On an individual basis? Because the assholes won't pay putting more burden on those who do while the assholes use the further power/capital disparity to corrupt society in their favor. Governmentally we have many times, every time a new government is formed, and there is always the option of the people tearing it all down when it stops doing what it is suppose to when all the other alternatives are made impossible.

Also every society that concentrates power into a larger government through taxation will inevitably invade and destroy or subjugate those who decided they wanted the smallest bare minimum of community support and collective services that leaves them vulnerable.

Yes, on an individual basis. I don't think I like the sound of group consent. Hi! Your peer group has decided that you consent to xyz.

Someone never understood the tragedy of the commons.

Nobody ever understood the tragedy of the commons.

So you’re taking the position that the government budget mostly consists of good things that most people would agree are good value?

Why did you lead with police and parks instead?

What exactly is the problem with sociology research? Is it not a valid field of study? Or are you just against research grants as a whole?

I think it benefits society to fund academic research.

> I think it benefits society to fund academic research.

see how you mentally group all these things under one umbrella. No I don’t think sociology research is on the same standing as physics research and I also don’t think all physics research is equal.

Based on the reports coming from Doge I think there are a lot of bad studies funded in the name of science or academic research.

> Based on the reports coming from Doge

Is this supposed to be a humorous comment, or are you seriously using the reports coming from doge in an argument, as if they were honest reports?

I realise that this comment might come off as antagonistic, and I apologise. But since I guffawed when I read it, as I interpreted it as the former, I'm now curious to find out if I'm correct.

All the reports are fake? These projects weren’t actually being funded? I have grad school friends who lost funding. Was that fake?

You misunderstood me, I think. I'm not calling doges actions fake, but the reports about how much money they saved. And I call into question the pretense that the projects they defunded were all complete wastes of money, as the head of that department is known to be a habitual liar.

Ok, and I didn’t say any of that.

Regardless of money saved the content of the material is a sampling of the kind of research we are funding - grouped under well intentioned labels like “science” or “academic research”.

> Based on the reports coming from Doge

Ah nevermind. You are one of those people.

"SS TAX" does not pay for roads or parks, you know

When you understand the immorality of taxes, there’s nothing immoral about getting your money back from a government that took it while repudiating the taxes.

It's all fun and games until you don't have paved streets anymore.

I love capitalism and am a former Rand fan.

But I don't think taxes are in and of themselves immoral.

A human being is a social animal, and each gets a lot of value from the people around us.

These are nice to have:

- clean streets

- police

- non-corrupt judges

- a stable legal framework

- living among educated people

- fire department that just shows up

- not getting bombed and invaded by a foreign army

- much more

These are "true expenses" in that if you didn't pay for them... you'd eventually pay the price for them when you're the victim of crime, fire, or exposure to the illiterate.

If you lived in Galt's Gulch or some gated community in an anarchic society, you'd pay a regular fee for these services, like voluntary taxes.

Taxes are infamously as inevitable as death because the expenses it's meant to pay for are also inevitable. We might as well set up a system.

Government waste is held up as an example of immorality, and some/most governments certainly should be leaner, but some waste & inertia would happen in any large organization, public or private. The only other time a government could be straight-up immoral is if it's persecuting innocent citizens or foreigners for no reason. Thinking through the implementation details of Galt's Gulch makes me think taxes aren't so bad after all.

What makes taxes immoral? People want their government to provide certain services. Those need to be paid for. What services should be funded depends on who you ask. It's interesting how the Nordic people are fine with paying more for strong social safety nets. They see it as an investment in society.

Ayn Rand didn't write novels about homesteading- none of the characters in her books are self sufficient.

I don't think that participation in society as it exists should prevent anybody from holding their philosophy of choice.

You're right, Ayn Rand wrote about a fantastical world, full of make believe people and things.

AKA fiction

Always a good time to remember this fantastic quote:

“There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old’s life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs."

Who's the source of this quote?

https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/366635-there-are-two-novels...

Her non-fiction isn't any more rigorous or convincing, incidentally.

As someone who has read most of her non-fiction. I thoroughly disagree.

Read some better authors, jfc.

Love it or hate it, her novels, over and over again could set generations of young minds on fire, which her essays could never do. I think it's fair to say the non-fiction was a lot worse.

>Ayn Rand didn't write novels about homesteading

Galt's Gulch seems to fit that description.

>none of the characters in her books are self sufficient.

I think they were in the sense that they, within the fiction of the books, had irreplaceable economic skills that made them fortunes. They were (again just in the logic of the books), more than pulling their weight.

Doesn't mean I agree with it as a system but I can see the internal consistency in this respect at least.

Aside from Galt's Gulch, there's also Dagny's brief stint on her own, during which she more or less magically automates everything that needs to be done.

Yes, it's all magical for her heroes. There was no homesteading in the gulch or whatever. There was only magical abundance and sterile happiness.

Also, in Anthem, the two main characters end up living self-sufficiently in secluded wilderness.

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