Fav quotes

[dallen68]

And very important to Say's Law is the idea that production must precede consumption. How are you going to buy something that hasn't been produced yet? As near as I can tell, to say Say's Law isn't true is to completely deny causality altogether!

While true, the absence of [thing] has never once stopped me from wanting [thing]. In fact, sometimes shortage of [thing] sometimes makes me want [thing] all the more, making me willing to pay more when [thing] becomes available.

[Travis Retriever]

[Travis Retriever]

"We owe the origin and development of human society and, consequently, of culture and civilization, to the fact that work performed under the division of labor is more productive than when performed in isolation."

— Ludwig von Mises, in Epistemological Problems of Economics

Ludwig von Mises: "Despots and democratic majorities are drunk with power. They must reluctantly admit that they are subject to the laws of nature. But they reject the very notion of economic law . . . economic history is a long record of government policies that failed because they were designed with a bold disregard for the laws of economics." - Austrian Economics: An Anthology

[Travis Retriever]

[Travis Retriever]

[Travis Retriever]

[yt]BpVaxl99AOk[/yt]
In short, let the schools and universities go bankrupt.
Okay the bit about "convince the republicans; let's do it using them!" is massive fucking fail.  Yeah, go ask Ron Paul how well that worked out, Schiff.

[MrBogosity]

While true, the absence of [thing] has never once stopped me from wanting [thing]. In fact, sometimes shortage of [thing] sometimes makes me want [thing] all the more, making me willing to pay more when [thing] becomes available.

How does that desire get expressed in the market if [thing] isn't being produced?

[dallen68]

How does that desire get expressed in the market if [thing] isn't being produced?

I guess it could provide an incentive to invest in some R&D. Provided of course there's sufficient demand for [thing].

[Travis Retriever]

http://www.cracked.com/article_20556_5-animal-rights-campaigns-that-managed-to-screw-over-animals.html
This.  This is why "Animal Rights" can go die in a fucking fire.

[Travis Retriever]

Molyneux's definition of "law" is a good one: "Law is an opinion with a gun"; but this one is more succinct and accurate:

    Law is an excuse to do harm. (DBR)

Law, after all, does not wield the gun, and the ones who write it do not wield it themselves; they write it and codify it. Written, without any force to back it up, it is merely an excuse to do harm: to chase someone, invade their home, bind them, kidnap them, and lock them up for an extended period of time in a facility where they are likely to be killed, raped, or otherwise harmed by other inmates.

Many, if not most law and regulation is for "victimless" crimes or activities. If there is no victim, there can be no crime; "the state" is not a person, and convenient appeals to "society" fall on deaf ears. They are merely excuses to harm someone for peaceful activity. Most drug laws and traffic regulations fall into this category, as do licensure laws. (One might say, "But if an unlicensed doctor practiced on someone, he could do harm!"; but it is wrong to do harm to someone for mere distant potential harm they might do; it is a free individual's right to enter into the risks and contracts they choose.)

What of "good" laws, i.e., laws about actual harmful activities? Even then, the harm threatened frequently is unjust, i.e., does not call for restitution to the victim (insofar as is possible) and equal retribution to the criminal; instead, it demands arbitrary penalties, and any payments go to the state. So when we eliminate victimless laws/regulations, those with non-commensurate penalties, and repetition, we are left with very few, if any laws; I acknowledge it is possible that there may be one or two such laws, although I can't think of any.

One does not need arbitrary decreed "law" to know that killing is wrong and that the rightful penalty is to do the same to the killer (they may negotiate for something else with the survivors if they can reach agreement, such as payment or incarceration: that is up to the victim or heirs).

-- http://v.i4031.net/LawIsAnExcuseToDoHarm

Makes sense too.  How many cops (read: thugs in uniform) say, "It's the law ma'am/I don't make the law, I just enforce it."

[Travis Retriever]

http://pokemon.alexonsager.net/108/73
Because it made me laugh.

[Ibrahim90]

http://pokemon.alexonsager.net/108/73
Because it made me laugh.

I created a new Pokemon: Mr. Ape (Mr. Mime + Primeape). I can cross one more thing off the bucket list.

btw, Myles Power comes out on top again:

[yt]3-XFeClWlWY[/yt]

seriously, I might as well post all his videos here.

[Travis Retriever]

"Your car is Japanese. Your Vodka is Russian. Your pizza is Italian. Your kebab is Turkish. Your democracy is Greek. Your coffee is Brazilian. Your movies are American. Your Beers are German. Your shirt is Indian. Your oil is Saudi Arabian. Your electronics are Chinese. Your numbers -Arabic, your letters -Latin. And you complain that your neighbor is an immigrant?"

[evensgrey]

I guess it could provide an incentive to invest in some R&D. Provided of course there's sufficient demand for [thing].

Keep in mind the relevant formulation of the basic principle of developing a really lucrative invention:  See the demand for [thing] people don't even realize they want.

[MrBogosity]

Keep in mind the relevant formulation of the basic principle of developing a really lucrative invention:  See the demand for [thing] people don't even realize they want.

Exactly. It wasn't as if a bunch of people said, "Hey, Apple, how come you aren't making iPhones?" and Apple said, "Hey, that's a good idea!" They made the product first, and THEN people realized the benefit to their lives.