Government v. Anarchism

[PavlovianModel146]

Don't worry, I realize the Debate is over.

We have a third Judge, but Judging debates takes time, so don't worry too much. It is often anywhere from 1-2 weeks after completion.

[_________]

Much thanks, and no rush.

[Tab]

Ah, so we've finished. Oops.

Pav, Pm me what kinda scoring scheme you're using, we may as well be compatable.

[PavlovianModel146]

Will do, either later tonight or tomorrow.

[Tab]

Anyway, I'm gonna judge this sucker tonight - just to put the two of them out of their all too ILP'ian "what the fuck is up with this nothing happening shit anyway..?" misery.

[Pezerocles]

Anyway, I'm gonna judge this sucker tonight - just to put the two of them out of their all too ILP'ian "what the fuck is up with this nothing happening shit anyway..?" misery.

No, you can't use that as an excuse! If it takes you weeks, it takes you weeks. Unless you only said that for funny-making purposes. I'm just sayin'...

[Tab]

Lol, true to form, I got hung up watching Cowboys and Aliens. Oops. Not bad, could've been better.

Anyway, upon the morrow. Where's the promise-smiley..?

[Tab]

Okay, let's get this party started. I'm marking on three broad criteria:

1) Grammar/presentation/style.
2) Content/expolitation of possible arguments.
3) The "Was I convinced" factor.

First up, Pezer.

1) Okay, having gone through your posts, I stumbled over a total of 23 outright boo-boos grammar-wise, and two cases of clumsy phrasing. Which ain't all that bad considering you wrote (quotes included though I ignored those) a whacking great 4523 words, working out at about a 0.55% whoopsies-to-word ratio.

Presentation-wise we had frequent line-breaks, always an internet plus, and generally reasonable structure throughout.

Stylistically, we had decent linguistic flourishes in places, and some classic rhetorical questions along with a decent balance of formal phrasing and outright swearing, which though perhaps frowned-upon in more polite circles is completely suited to internet philosophy, anarchic beast that it is.

Fucking good job mate.

Score: Grammar: 0.55% (will be used in the event of a tie-breaker). Overall: 7/10.

2) Content/argument: To be honest, it's a pity you didn't go second, because that first post of yours screamed "Er - I don't really know what the fuck I'm doing out here on the stage all by myself". Reading it I could see the sweat running down your collar. Once your opponent had replied, your posting grew in confidence by several orders of magnitude. Putting your arguments on a historical basis was an excellent idea, helping to make real what is essentially a somewhat unintuitive and abstract concept. Using PK as a gueststar to back up your arguments was also inspired.

However, I feel your dependence upon historic examples was a bit of a double-edged sword. As I was reading I was drawn into thinking "Er... Okay, but all these collectives you mention were eventually superceded by conventional governments..." Admittedly you yourself mentioned this, and cited conventional government's monopoly and expertise in large-scale violence as the bug-bear of anarchic social groupings, but (and to me it was a big old fatal but) failed to really highlight why this wasn't a problem to your overall argument, beyond trying to shove the whole topic under the rug.

You left one argument you could have tried untouched, or at least unemphasized I think, which was the argument for the future. Afterall, we are experiencing right now huge upheavals socially - all based around people's dissatisfactions with conventional modes of government - you could have tried a strategy of saying "Gee well, okay, anarchy didn't really work out all that well in the past... But here's how it will out-pace conventional governments in the future...

Also, I didn't get much of a sense of narrative, a building of arguments from a foundation out to a speculative peak - you kinda plateaued-out early on.

So, scores on the doors: Overall: 6/10 - that first post really didn't do you any favours, sorry.

3) Was I convinced..? Toughie. I liked the examples from history, they made me sit up and think - "Wow, this anarchist shit actually worked at some point..!!!" But then I kinda slumped down again after realizing they all got knocked over by guys with big boots and the mediaeval equivalent of tasers and tear-gas back in the day. Also I thought you were forced into a corner by having to admit that anarchic societies would still be heavily dependent upon systematic cooperation - and the hierarchies this would entail - in order to preserve any semblance of the modern world and its obvious benefits to lifestyle (all products of conventially-governed societies) afterall, who wants freedom if it means no reliable internet porn..?

Overall: 5.5/10

Grand total: Pezer - 18.5 (0.55%)

[In true cliff-hanger style, I'll do "the guy with a line for a name" tomorrow, happy nail-biting]

[Pezerocles]

Yeesh... I knew I'd like you as a judge.

I agree with everything, though the 5.5 did sting a little bit. I would probably give myself the same.

And, to paraphrase a famous anarchist:

A revolution without internet porn is a revolution not worth having.

[Tab]

Hokay, enough with the suspense already, let's get to it.

The man whose name was ___________. Same criteria.

1) Grammar/presentation/style: Grammatically the count stands at 8 outright massacres of the Queen's English, and 3 incidences of sentences tripping over themselves and spilling their drinks. Word count was 4587, giving a rough 0.28% boob/word ratio. So far, so good.

Presentation-wise we had denser paragraphs interspersed with fewer line-breaks, a good display of vocabulary, and an overall erudite feel. Interestingly, at least to me from a pure English perspective, like Pezer, your first post supplied most of the mistakes - all of them concerned with the definite and indefinite articles: "the" and "a/an" - this is a typical hazard of complex sentences with compound nouns. Gotta watch that what you start with suits what you ended up saying.

The styles of the two participants were almost diametrically opposed - formal vs. informal - both have their advantages and pitfalls with regard to philosophy on the net. The informal approach works well in capturing attention, and also in achieving transparency and accessability for the average punter, but stumbles, if strictly adhered to, in managing to assume the appearance of authority - afterall, there is a small voice inside us saying "jeepers, I can understand this shit - it can't be philosophy..."

The formal approach rectifies this - imediately assuming a certain patrician-like stance of authority - but it does so at the price of sacrificing accessability. A toss-up, do you want people to simply agree out of respect for how you say things, or to understand you..? That aside, I felt that in your opening post you kinda pushed the "Lookee - I can write just like Hegel !!!" boat out just a little too far, and settled down to a much more conversational tone in later replies.

Overall, great writing, and a solid 7.5/10, with a tie-breaker of 0.28%.

2) Content/expolitation of possible arguments.

Reading through I made a few notes of what I liked, and didn't like.The arguments toward the utilization of organized violence, problems with policing and the necessity of hierarchies in large-scale projects/technical facillities were spot-on. Some great lines: I loved "squatters of political philosophy" for example and the appendix of referrences was particularly impressive - if only there were a greater number of people on ILP who read more and pontificated out of their backsides less.

Violence again was a double-edged sword, because smaller egalitarian groups do to some extent suffer less in-group conflict simply by virtue of their size - recidivism is a vice of the state, rather than the cooperative.

I thought some of the things you said displayed a serious amount of stretching: The laws of physics... Hmm. Plus some quibbling over definitions - always makes me crazy.

This is nit-picking however, overall, argumentation was both excellent and well-chosen.

I thought, however, you kinda described the trees in great detail, and missed the wood. Institutionalized heirarchies come into existence not so much to supply nuclear power stations and hadron colliders, but to provide, or reinforce perhaps, cohesion between ever growing populations of people - one horse can pull X tonnes, eight horses can pull Y more, the trick is to harness them - something that anarchy cannot do, and this is the fundamental reason why they fail, not their lack of armies and police, but their lack of ability to get their collective horses pulling in the same direction for long enough to form them.

To be honest, this debate was a bit one-sided from the word go - there are so many arguments against anarchy available, and reading through, though you presented those you chose very well, I was left with a longing for something new, shiny and original. A "fuck-me I ain't never seen that before" moment. Pezer here, was at the advantage, simply because his end of the argument forced him to make a lot of new shit up. Which leaves me with a dilema: I can't really fault you overmuch on straight argument, but neither can I in all conscience give you a spotless 10/10.

So - hacking off points mercilessly for originality-failure and wood/tree syndrome I give you: 7/10. Horrible of me I know.

3) The "Was I convinced" factor.

Here again, I suffer pangs of conscience, simply because I was already completely convinced of anarchy's failings, at least past and present - outside of the aforementioned future egalitarian Zietgeist™ utopia. So, in fairness, this criteria changes slightly to:

3a) The "Was I convinced more than I already was" factor.

And to be honest, I wasn't, admittedly I have done a lot of thinking and reading around the subject of organization - from eukaryote cells, to ancient China, to game theory-based virtual populations, so I was always going to be a tough choir to preach to. I mean, hell, I sang along anyway, but I knew all the hymns in your book.



A (drastically undeserved had it been anyone else but me) 5/10.

"______________"'s grand total: 19.5 with 0.28%

Winner: The Man with A Line For His Name



Thanks to both of you for your obvious efforts, and an enjoyable debate. I wish you many more.

[_________]

Thank you for your time and for pointing out what I can improve upon.

Now we wait on Pav's decree?

[Pezerocles]

Thank you for your time and for pointing out what I can improve upon.

Now we wait on Pav's decree?

Aye. (how can there possibly not be a smily that's biting its nails?)

[PavlovianModel146]

Greetings,

This has been a well-fought Debate, as expected between ______________ (The Philosopher formerly known as MathIsACircle, which handle will be used for these purposes) and Pezer. In a rather anarchical fashion, the Rules of this Debate have been dispensed of (by agreement of the parties), so a more generalized form of Judging will be used by me.
I will award up to ten points in three different categories (for a possible 30 points) including Grammar, Clarity of Thought and Argumentation/Convincing. I will Judge each Participant one at a time, but both Judgments will be in this post.

Let’s get started:

PEZER-Grammar:

“And it is that. But more so, it is a historical tradition.”
-I’m not a fan of beginning a sentence with a conjunction, but I don’t believe it is technically incorrect.

“Absolutist monarchy, parliamentary monarchy, direct democracy, representative democracy, and many others.”

-This is a fragment. -0.25

“But the begginings of government where empirical instead of theoretical.”

-Beginnings is misspelled, which a simple Spell Check would have resolved. Please consider using a word processor to make your posts in a formal Debate, and then you can copy/paste the posts to ILP. There is no excuse for an error of this nature. -.5

-You should have said, “Were empirical,” not, ‘Where.’ -0.25

“Tribal rule happened because it was an evolutionarily stable strategy, because one man or group of men forcing others to obey them was a model that helped in the evolutionary battle for resources, propped up by insntinctive behaviour. As concious thougth progressed, some of these leaders where able to figure out ways to subjugate other groups, and the model grew in scale. But this new model was dependant on concious thought, it went beyond instinct.”

-I count four misspellings, and the word, ‘Where,’ was used in place of, ‘Were,’ again. I’ll not penalize for the latter error, but the misspellings will be penalized. -1


“If he argues that government covers necessities, the burden of proof will be on me to show that those necessities could be adressed just as well or better without it.”

-Addressed has two, ‘D’s.’ -.25

“As far as human rights go, they are a metaphysical concept that I don't put too much stock on.”

-Subject/Verb agreement, “They are metaphysical concepts…” -.25

“In practice, many ways.”

-Fragment. -.25

“Rapings…”

-Not a word. -.25

“Who knows? a group of people might decide in its majority to do without government, and voluntarily form a militia to make sure that happens.”

“A,” begins a new sentence and should be capitalized. -.25

“adress”

-Same mistake as before, no deduction.

“First, the infamous nuclear facility.”

-Fragment -.25

“engeneers”

-Spelling -.25

“There is any number of ways that don't include a government.”

-Subject/Verb agreement. “There are…” -.25

“comunes”

-Spelling -.25

“community”

-Spelling -.25

“admittedly”
Spelling -.25

“Because ownership would not be a forced, artificial institution concocted by senators.”

-Fragment -.25

“naturaly ocurring”

-Spelling x2 -.5

“couldnt”

-Needs an apostrophe. Generally speaking, abbreviations should be avoided in formal Debate. -.25

“Lets”

-Needs an apostrophe, as used. -.25

“amish”

-Should be capitalized. -.25

“increase”

-Spelling -.25

“disortions”

-Spelling -.25

“eachother”

-Spacing -.25
“undoubtetly”

-Spelling -.25

“Sure, its not perfect, but its better than living like a savage…”

-Apostrophes needed x2 -.5

“inmersed”

-Not a word. -.25

Given that I am only at your third post in this Debate, I have quickly skimmed the remainder and determined that it is mathematically impossible that you will survive the Grammar/Spelling Judgment with any points. I will provide more examples, if necessary. Thus, you are awarded 0/10 points for Grammar/Spelling.

In the context of a formal Debate, and to the extent that, ‘form,’ is the root word of, ‘formal,’ you will find that what separates, ‘formal Debate,’ from, ‘really good argument,’ is form. The majority of your errors could have been avoided via a spelling and grammar check. Unfortunately, in my opinion, that makes said errors inexcusable in the context of a formal Debate.

Spelling/Grammar: 0/10

PEZER-Clarity of Thought

“Eventually, the groups-with-leaders became so large that those leaders were able to depend less and less on a direct appeal to basic instinct for obedience and some rationalization had to be engaged in to arrive at the instinctive mind.”

-How does engaging in rationalization result in an instinctive mind? Are not rationalization and instinct opposites? -.5

“What I do know is that there is an anarchism that doesn't disallow systems.”

If it disallowed anything, how could it be anarchism? -.25

Otherwise, excellent clarity of thought, I understood everything else that you said or were trying to say perfectly.

CLARITY OF THOUGHT: 9.25/10

PEZER: Argumentation/Convincing

-Post 1: No argument, just a brief (and informal) history of how Government was developed and an attempt to define the terms/arguments for the Debate. No deductions for this post.

-Post 2: The, “Laws of Physics,” argument was dispatched quickly, as it should have been.

-An example of people coming together for a common purpose while not being governed, per se, was effectively espoused upon. I guess the only problem I have with this is that it seems the argument Pezer is making is, “The difference between Government and Management is one of intent and location/purpose.” I would suggest that some sort of hierarchy would eventually develop (even within the power plant) and that the head(s) of the hierarchy would not want to be displaced due to pride, should such displacement be found necessary by others. In short, I believe the argument would have been better if it had been explained what separates the hierarchy from a Governmental hierarchy, and it being confined to a specific objective really doesn’t do it for me. -.25

-What are now considered crimes could be defended against by groups and with arms.

-Finally, Pezer brings up the possibility of voluntary militias, because when I think of institutions that do not have a hierarchy of command, the military is the first that springs to mind!

-Pezer argues in his next post that the same people who once managed the nuclear facility are now Anarchists. Personally, I don’t see how he can assume they are Anarchists unless the existence of AN anarchy automatically eliminates all a priori knowledge of political science. -.25

-I don’t think Pezer should have been the first to have pointed out that an Anarchical society would be piss-poor at defending itself against an organized threat. -.5

-Pezer then argues whether how hard Anarchy is to maintain is relevant to the Debate, and states that it is not. At the risk of inserting my own counter-argument as to whether or not society is more benefitted by Anarchy, I’ll take the one where I am more likely to die of natural causes, any day of the week. -.5

-Pezer then argues that there is nothing that couldn’t be done just as well or better without Government, apparently, because he says so. I see no support for that position. -.25

-Government is an artificial system that creates constraints and distortions which otherwise would not exist. My problem is with the word, “Artificial,” how can Government be any more or less artificial than the humans who created it, brought it into being, and maintain it? -.25

-The next argument is that Al Gore is an exception to the rule because he is a politician who did something useful. Many politicians have done useful stuff, namely, correcting the errors of other politicians. -.25

-The rest of this post, except the very end, is quotes from Kropotkin. If I wanted to Judge a Debate between MathIsACircle and Kropotkin, I’d just read Kropotkin. I want to read Pezer, even if it is just Pezer paraphrasing Kropotkin. -.5

-“They are responsible for the destruction they supposedly protect us from.” Home run. You get 1.5 points back for argumentation.

-Closing post. Government creates large-scale wars that would otherwise not happen, Government artificially promotes the welfare of a few where many would effectively trade with one another, and Government discourages innovation. The second and third points are points that with which disagreement can rightfully be had. With respect to trade, Government orchestrates and enables trade of base goods that would otherwise be inaccessible in large quantities. With respect to innovation, Government collects the means (read: tax dollars) and often puts them into R&D for inventions that greatly benefit society where such large-scale orchestration and collection of goods might not otherwise be had. -.5

-There is no true land ownership in a governed system, as the land is owned by the Government, ultimately. This point hits home very well, just look at property tax, if I own it, then why should I have to pay the Government for it? +.5

-One of the last paragraphs again concerns the inability of the Anarchical community to defend itself in a large-scale attack. I wouldn’t hold this against Pezer, normally, but HE keeps bringing it up! -.5

Argumentation/Convincing: 8.25/10

OVERALL: 17.5/30


NOTE: I hope it doesn’t come down to Spelling/Grammar, especially since Pezer is so adept at quality argument, but I fear that it might. I suppose this will just re-emphasize the difference between a formal Debate and a quality argument if it does.

MATHISACIRCLE-Grammar:

“So perhaps a more universally applicable question would be: By the definition agreed upon, does anarchy not violate its own terms?”

-There should be a comma after, ‘So.’ -.25

“(i.e. racial, sexual, religious).”

-There should be an, ‘and,’ before, ‘religious.’ -.25

“communitites”

-Spelling. -.25

‘Demockracy’

-Spelling -.25

Grammar: 9/10

NOTE: I wanted to read MathIsACircle’s posts more critically than those of Pezer to balance the scoring to some degree, but it would not be fair. Therefore, I went with a, “First time through,” approach for both participants.
NOTE (2): MathIsACircle is an incredible writer, in my opinion. I beg the pardon of any potentially offended party if this sounds biased, but I find that MIAC writes much in the same style as me, just much better.

CLARITY OF THOUGHT:

“If all other arguments fail, I feel obliged to raise the issue of the ‘laws of physics’. Seeing as the drafter(s) of the rules and regulations is not specified (in fact the method by which these laws are arrived at is designated as irrelevant), I feel I am within the context of the debate to suggest that the laws identified by physics are not only universally present but that they are inescapable. I trust upon reviewing the definition agreed upon, physics will be confirmed as an applicable government. If nothing else, this illustrates the inevitability and necessity of the emergence of complex, regulated governing bodies.”

-What? -1

With respect to clarity of thought, the balance of MIAC’s posts are impeccable.

MIAC-Clarity of Thought: 9/10

MIAC-Argumentation:

“If all other arguments fail, I feel obliged to raise the issue of the ‘laws of physics’. Seeing as the drafter(s) of the rules and regulations is not specified (in fact the method by which these laws are arrived at is designated as irrelevant), I feel I am within the context of the debate to suggest that the laws identified by physics are not only universally present but that they are inescapable. I trust upon reviewing the definition agreed upon, physics will be confirmed as an applicable government. If nothing else, this illustrates the inevitability and necessity of the emergence of complex, regulated governing bodies.”

-What? -1 (Sorry, but this deserved to get knocked twice)

-In his second post, MIAC indicates there is nothing to ensure proper security and procedures in a nuclear reactor, absent Government.
-MIAC then relates the organization that must go into a comparatively simple waste water treatment plant.
-MIAC states that protecting communal property borders on territorial rule, and he is being very generous to Pezer, here.
-MIAC states that everyone being armed increases the possibility of manslaughter and murder.
-The rest of the post is dedicated largely to stating that Anarchy is not self-sustaining and its very existence, at least in today’s world, relies on the inventions of Government.

-MIAC indicates that politicians/politics often bring aspects of life into the collective consciousness that were previously ignored, or ill-addressed.
-Society is currently too complex for anarchy to survive.
-Being enslaved by an invading army does not benefit society.
-The public having grenades is not a good idea.

-For the next post, I don’t care about MIAC’s arguments against Kropotkin. I care about arguments against Pezer.

-The conclusion is a brief summary of previous arguments containing no new material. The conclusion even directly states th
at reading the actual arguments is more beneficial than reading the conclusion, true enough.

Argumentation: 9/10


OVERALL: 27/30

PEZER: 17.5/30
MathIsACircle: 27/30

-With respect to argumentation, what you have is a very close Debate. Two different games were being played, and while Pezer hit a few home runs out of the park, I felt that MathIsACircle was content with stringing together a bunch of singles and advancing base runners.

-Ultimately, MathIsACircle would have won 18/30 to 17.5/30 in a grammar-independent Debate, so that shows you how close this one was. For Pezer to have used spell check and grammar check would have made the Debate closer, but MIAC would have still been victorious in the end.

-Or would he? If Pezer could have hit just one more home run, it might have been enough.

[Tab]

Well, with two to zero, a third judge becomes uneccessary. The debate goes to the man with the line. Comiserations to Pezer and congrats to his opponent.

Wow, Pav was even more grammar-anal than me. Ouch. Who'da thunkit..?