I’ve been asked quite a few times what I mean by “calculation.” My editor, among others, has stated that I’m not clear. So I’m going to try to put this in context.
CALCULATION
The English word derives from the [...]
The horrid natural impact of laws was something surprising to me. We have for well over two thousand years been subject to a method of thought and a political tool that was designed for managing slaves: law. And slavery is [...]
Capitalism 3.0
http://economistsview.typepad.com/economistsview/2009/02/capitalism-30.html
Over on the Economist’s View there are a whole series of comments that negatively reflect on capitalism. This is my response.
All,
I am amazed reading these comments. What is it about this blog that [...]
This is the abstract for the paper I’m working on.
“ABSTRACT
The success of the Rothbard-Hoppe research program as demonstrated by the explanatory power of the ethics of property is offset by the failure of the three major philosophical [...]
In response to Felix Salmon on Portfolio.Com’s Market Movers:
Economic reasoning (actually all philosophical reasoning) is the study of processes from first causes to last causes. Any cause that is not first-cause is simply making assumptions. A practical person [...]
An awful lot of talk, debate, argument, and out-and-out violence over methods of governance tends to occur because people talk past each other, and it’s usually because they are each making assumptions about the properties of government that aren’t true. [...]
You know, we argue about good and bad intentions all the time, from the left and from the right. We argue about technical or historical methods all the time. Everyone presses his little agenda.
The “corporeal error” in that ‘there [...]
In response to Michael Mandel’s article for Business Week.
Is Social Security a Ponzi Scheme? Response to Comments
I’ve read through all the comments on my previous post, and I wanted to see if I could respond [...]
About

Curt Doolittle
Seattle, WA, United States
I am an independent theorist of Political Economy in the Conservative Libertarian tradition. And as a methodological Propertarian I attempt to complete the work of Rothbard and Hoppe by suggesting post-democratic political solutions for heterogeneous polities.Purpose
"De Philosophia Aristocratia"
Anglo Conservatism is the remnant of the European Aristocratic Manorial system and the Classical Liberal philosophy of the Enlightenment, combined with our ancient tribal instincts for group persistence and land-holding. It currently consists as a set of sentiments rather than as an articulated rational philosophy. And without that rational articulation, conservatives lack the ability to create and promote a plan that is a positive and rhetorically defensible alternative to the hazards of accidental bureaucracy and purposeful socialism.This lack of an articulated philosophy leaves conservatives vulnerable in the public debate with Schumpeterian public intellectuals whose advantage in both volume of production, and simplicity of argument poses a nearly insurmountable challenge.
Libertarianism by contrast, is a rational philosophy of an articulate but permanent minority. It is based upon a solid, rational and critical methodology, even if it is flawed in its initial assumption: the principle of non-violence.
Unfortunately the Rothbardian Anarchist movement has appropriated the term "Libertarian", and left Classical Liberals and Conservatives alienated from the only system of thought with which they need to articulate their political sentiments in rational and empirical rather than moralistic and sentimental form.
By repairing the flaws in Libertarian philosophy we can use its methodology to provide a rhetorical solution for conservatives - a language which in turn may become an articulated philosophical body of argument and advocacy for the frustrated conservative majority.
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Recent Posts
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Kinsella’s Criticism of Locke, and My Explanation of Locke’s Reasonable Mistake, and What To Do About It.
66 days ago -
Liberty Isn't Inherent. It's unnatural. We create it with Organized Violence.
70 days ago -
Propertarian Definition: REVOLUTION
70 days ago -
Giving Rorty Another Try
70 days ago -
An Skeleton Argument In Defense Of Rorty From Hoppe
70 days ago -
A Propertarian Definition of Ruthless
70 days ago -
The Self Deception Of The Enlightenment View Of Man
70 days ago -
On Rent Seeking
70 days ago
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Kinsella’s Criticism of Locke, and My Explanation of Locke’s Reasonable Mistake, and What To Do About It.