Comments on: Exam Question for Bonus Marks

By: robin green

robin green — Fri, 30 Jan 2004 22:51:31 +0000

Andy – I’m not sure you understood Kieran Healy’s post, so I’ll spell it out for you. He believes that if you think Crooked Timber is “socialist”, then you must not know what “socialist” means, and therefore cannot have been a socialist. (When put like that, it’s obviously fallacious – you could have been socialist while still not knowing what the word that described you meant – but his first point could still be valid, in any case.) Personally, I can’t decide whether to agree or not. The word socialist admits of a number of different incompatible definitions.

By: DJW

DJW — Fri, 30 Jan 2004 21:52:34 +0000

Wow, he’s working hard to prove me right. I’ll give Andy this—lefties should read Hayek and Smith—hell, everyone should. Hayek, especially, is great—his central texts are filled with auxilliary discussions that are quite thought-provoking, and in general he gives a much more compelling case for his position than, say, Nozick. While we’re at it, we should all read Marx, too. And Carl Schmitt. And in if we’re doing all this properly, we shouldn’t turn into raving ideological zealots when we’re finished. Time to get back to grading—oops, I mean sucking the life out of the body politic.

By: Stewart Kelly

Stewart Kelly — Fri, 30 Jan 2004 16:38:27 +0000

I’m currently about one third of the way down the first page of Road to Serfdom. No ill-effects yet…

By: harry

harry — Fri, 30 Jan 2004 15:01:44 +0000

Ditto Daniel’s second sentence. And I read Milton Friedman even more.

By: dsquared

dsquared — Fri, 30 Jan 2004 08:33:12 +0000

We go up to Yorkshire and shake the trees and they fall out. On a small factual point, I have in fact read loads of Hayek and von Mises, so Andy’s cure doesn’t work all the time.

By: Jeremy Osner

Jeremy Osner — Fri, 30 Jan 2004 03:37:24 +0000

Hand—it’s simple, they just use the FreakMagnet.

By: Unlearned Hand

Unlearned Hand — Fri, 30 Jan 2004 00:04:00 +0000

Geez, where did you find this guy?

By: Andy Duncan

Andy Duncan — Thu, 29 Jan 2004 22:53:29 +0000

Carlos writes: But some other, boring, interloper. With a crap sense of humor, too. Come on, Carlos. I’m trying real hard here. If you’re going to gratuitiously insult me, could you at least try to use a little more eloquence and style? ‘boring’ and ‘crap’? Is this all I truly deserve, when I’ve been slaving my guts out all day trying to give you people an increased sense of community, in providing you with such an easy non-moving target? It’s an outrage. I’d write to my MP, if I thought involving myself with the political process would make an ounce of difference to anything at all. By the way, just to save another incredibly witty poster the trouble: Andy Duncan writes: Is this all I truly deserve Yes.

By: Andy Duncan

Andy Duncan — Thu, 29 Jan 2004 22:06:11 +0000

Sorry, had to do just one more: Kieran Healy writes: It seems to me that if the state of knowledge implied by (1) is true then (2) must be false, and vice versa. Maybe my definition of the word former is different from yours? It does happen, you know. I know it may be heretical to even think it, but sometimes, occasionally, people realise their dearly held adolescent views are not quite as solid as they ought to be. They investigate why, and pow, they find themselves having to resign from socialist central. The most famous of our happy band is F.A.Hayek, the author of ‘The Road to Serfdom’. You may even want to try my personal Cure for Socialism, just to see how it can be possible. But be careful though. The books it contains are HIGHLY dangerous. Now, I really MUST be going. Ciao, it’s been real.

By: Carlos

Carlos — Thu, 29 Jan 2004 22:06:00 +0000

I take it this isn’t the excellent short story writer Andy Duncan? But some other, boring, interloper. With a crap sense of humor, too. Ah well. C.

By: Scott Martens

Scott Martens — Thu, 29 Jan 2004 21:58:37 +0000

they are smart enough not to seriously tinker too much with the market for strict necessities like food and water (I think). Sebastian, I’m strongly tempted to make you list three countries the import less than 80% of their food where agriculture is left to the free market, or any place with indoor running water not provided by a state sanctioned monopoly. I can’t think of any…

By: Kieran Healy

Kieran Healy — Thu, 29 Jan 2004 21:58:29 +0000

I think you could say that they exhibit a trust for non-Bush big government solutions to perceived problems. I prefer to use the phrase “perceived problem-related program activities.”

By: Sebastian Holsclaw

Sebastian Holsclaw — Thu, 29 Jan 2004 21:51:40 +0000

No you couldn’t say that Timberites are socialist, but I think you could say that they exhibit a trust for non-Bush big government solutions to perceived problems.

By: kevin

kevin — Thu, 29 Jan 2004 21:40:20 +0000

You know, the fact that anyone could say with a straight face that Crooked Timber is a socialist (partriculalrly after listing a group of communist countries as socialist …) website says quite a bit more about their politics than the Timberites’

By: Andy Duncan

Andy Duncan — Thu, 29 Jan 2004 21:38:38 +0000

Robin Green writes: Walt: I’ve noticed for sometime a curious correlation between libertarianism and being an uptight prig. Sorry, had to come back to just this last one. I really will go back to work, in a minute. Promise. To your point above, Robin, when I was a Sheffield Wednesday regular, we always used to call Sheffield United fans ‘pigs’. Remarkably, they always used to call us ‘pigs’, too. Which I always used to find really surprising, because obviously they were pigs, whereas we were angels of infinite majesty and toleration. I’m sure that all opposing groups, with rival mindsets, appear uptight, humourless, stiff-assed etc, to the other, because the things they find hilariously laughable, are serious core views you hold dear to your heart. So therefore you’re never going to understand their sense of humour, because to do so would be to undermine your own important sense of your self. On our part, we find socialists INCREDIBLY humourless, po-faced, uptight, bitter, and twisted, in fact, the very definition of these characteristics. The very word socialist, itself, suggests a straight-mouthed Gulag guard, or prissy do-gooder ranting on about how cigarettes should be banned. I’m sure you find us the same, and the word ‘libertarian’ may conjure up for you the picture of some short-haired stuffed shirt brandishing a machine-gun and demanding you step off their property (or whatever image it happens to be). Having been on both sides, with most of my adult life spent as a committed socialist, I have a slight advantage on most, but fortunately (from my personal perspective), the old socialist who inhabits a cage in the centre of my mind is becoming less powerful, by the month, so I’m less and less able to see the world from your point of view, hence I will appear more and more humourless to you, and will care less and less what you think of me. In the same way, I’m sure, that you have little regard as to my opinion of you. However, you calling me an ‘uptight prig’ is a BIT MORE LIKE IT :-) These are the kinds of insults I can respect, and hold dear, pinning them into my insult collection. And… Do you think I could get a grant to study it? That, is priceless! :-) Nice one :)