This is Nick Roberts' "Libertarian Jackals" essay, which I haven't read so far.
http://www.libertarian.co.uk/sites/default/lanotepdf/forep015.pdf
"How can free men and women defend themselves cheaplyand effectively against
the depredations of tyrants? Howcan this result be achieved morally? These
questions arevery important, I believe, to the cause of liberty. This isbecause
they are among the “toughies” - those problemswhich seem insoluble when arguing
for anarcho-capitalism.Take the scenario that anarcho-capitalism comes about in
aspecific territorial area. Say that certain parts of HomeCounties England, and
some areas of Highland Britain declare UDI. Let’s call them the “Free Shires”,
where no government exists between Kent and the Fens, or fromLancaster to
Berwick. How will the people in these placeskeep out the armies of pre-existing
dictatorships?The reasons for a government to invade the Free Shires
areobvious. They will contain new, profitable, highly advancedfactories. Their
labour force will be excellently educatedthanks to competitive schooling. The
Free Shires will provide havens of liberty and achievement for the most
enterprising, the most productive and determined professionalsand businessmen.
The people and property of a free societyare attractive prizes for any
latterday Alexander to seize.Part-time militia and imported mercenaries may
prove toofew or too expensive to resist determined statist assaults.Besides,
who wants a war on their home territory?Yet the rump of the United Kingdom, (or
the People’s Republic of Britain), the Soviet Union and even an expansionist
France may threaten the newly liberated free British.What is to be done? The
libertarians cannot rely upon conscription or tax-funded armies. Is defence
possible?MORALITY AND DEFENCEThe answer is yes. Firstly, however, the moral
values whichunderpin liberty must be applied to any question of policy
-including defence. Morality and effectiveness, I believe,must be the
justifications and the attractions of anarchism.Morality in this case means
that the libertarians’ defence..."
[end of partial quote]
On Sunday, August 1, 2021, 10:53:54 PM PDT, jim bell <[email protected]>
wrote:
On Sunday, August 1, 2021, 10:09:43 PM PDT, professor rat
<[email protected]> wrote:
>Many great inventions were co-discoveries - calculus - evolution by
>natural-selections, etc.
>I have to wonder if APster markets isn't another one. Clearly Mongo knew
>about them though regarding them as a bug rather than a feature.
I wasn't aware of the existence of the Cypherpunks list until
early-mid-February 1995. I had put Part 1 of my Assassination Politics essay
on a mail list Digitaliberty, by Bill Frezza, in early February 1995. Somebody
(I don't recall who; perhaps I never knew) copied it to Cypherpunks about
February 14, 1995, and I was invited to CP. (Bill Frezza soon enough found
my AP idea 'too hot to handle', and I understood that.)
That record does not seem to reliably exist, however: A few years ago, I
discovered that the 1995 archive of Cypherpunks had been enormously
tampered-with, removing almost all references to me, or "AP", or "assassination
politics", etc. This should have been quite obvious to anybody who perused the
list, at least anybody who remembered some of the list events of 1995. Looking
at the archive, there were extended periods (months!) in which no emails
appeared, presumably because ALL of them were about AP.
This is the first I've heard about Nick Roberts, and his "Libertarian Jackals".
I'll have to contact him...
If, in early January 1995, somebody said to me, "Tim May", I would have
immediately remembered (only) his very famous (at least among electrical
engineers!) work, discovering that alpha particles (helium nuclei) seemed to be
the cause of 'soft errors', data retention errors in dynamic RAMs (DRAMs). Tim
May apparently worked at Intel at Santa Clara, California. When I began
working at Intel, it was in Aloha, Oregon, at "Aloha 3", an engineering
facility attached to Fabs 4 and 5. I never met or communicated with him;
perhaps he never came to Oregon, and I never went to any other Intel facility
than those in Aloha or Hillsboro Oregon.
I later (mid-1995 or 1996) discovered that May and a few others had postulated
the existence of 'assassination markets', about 1989 and 1990. But, I didn't
know about that until 1995. And, my understanding was, their idea amounted to:
"Anonymous person A anonymously hires anonymous person B to kill person C".
It was certainly a idea worth discussing. What I "brought to the party", with
my AP essay, were two concepts that only later were given these names:
1. "Crowdfunding". The idea that instead of only one person hiring to see a
politican dead, thousands or more such people could pool their money and donate
to a fund. Without this idea, it would be extremely unlikely that only one
person would be willing to donate 'enough' money to see someone else dead,
especially a prominent politican or government employee.
2. "Crowdsourcing". The idea that instead of hiring ONLY ONE potential
assassin, in principle everybody in the world would be offered the prize. One
big advantage to this is that it would be an enormous advantage to the target
to know that ONLY ONE person is coming for him. Rather, why not let him know
that everyone in the world might be interested in this bounty? How would he
protect himself against...everybody?
>Then STIFFS dotcom started sometime in the 1990's.
>Jim Bell's deathly silence every time they get mentioned is beginning to look
>suspicious.
I had, and have, nothing against your STIFFS idea. Nor did I ever object to
it. Anything that works, I say.
Jim Bell
