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https://nautil.us/the-kekul-problem-236 ... dd9cb5d1d9

The Kekulé Problem
Where did language come from?

BY CORMAC MCCARTHY

Cormac McCarthy is best known to the world as a writer of novels. These include Blood Meridian, All the Pretty Horses, No Country for Old Men, and The Road. At the Santa Fe Institute (SFI) he is a research colleague and thought of in complementary terms. An aficionado on subjects ranging from the history of mathematics, philosophical arguments relating to the status of quantum mechanics as a causal theory, comparative evidence bearing on non-human intelligence, and the nature of the conscious and unconscious mind. At SFI we have been searching for the expression of these scientific interests in his novels and we maintain a furtive tally of their covert manifestations and demonstrations in his prose.

Over the last two decades Cormac and I have been discussing the puzzles and paradoxes of the unconscious mind. Foremost among them, the fact that the very recent and “uniquely” human capability of near infinite expressive power arising through a combinatorial grammar is built on the foundations of a far more ancient animal brain. How have these two evolutionary systems become reconciled? Cormac expresses this tension as the deep suspicion, perhaps even contempt, that the primeval unconscious feels toward the upstart, conscious language. In this article Cormac explores this idea through processes of dream and infection. It is a discerning and wide-ranging exploration of ideas and challenges that our research community has only recently dared to start addressing through complexity science.

—David Krakauer


I call it the Kekulé Problem because among the myriad instances of scientific problems solved in the sleep of the inquirer Kekulé’s is probably the best known. He was trying to arrive at the configuration of the benzene molecule and not making much progress when he fell asleep in front of the fire and had his famous dream of a snake coiled in a hoop with its tail in its mouth—the ouroboros of mythology—and woke exclaiming to himself: “It’s a ring. The molecule is in the form of a ring.” Well. The problem of course—not Kekulé’s but ours—is that since the unconscious understands language perfectly well or it would not understand the problem in the first place, why doesnt it simply answer Kekulé’s question with something like: “Kekulé, it’s a bloody ring.” To which our scientist might respond: “Okay. Got it. Thanks.”

Why the snake? That is, why is the unconscious so loathe to speak to us? Why the images, metaphors, pictures? Why the dreams, for that matter.

A logical place to begin would be to define what the unconscious is in the first place. To do this we have to set aside the jargon of modern psychology and get back to biology. The unconscious is a biological system before it is anything else. To put it as pithily as possibly—and as accurately—the unconscious is a machine for operating an animal.

All animals have an unconscious. If they didnt they would be plants. We may sometimes credit ours with duties it doesnt actually perform. Systems at a certain level of necessity may require their own mechanics of governance. Breathing, for instance, is not controlled by the unconscious but by the pons and the medulla oblongata, two systems located in the brainstem. Except of course in the case of cetaceans, who have to breathe when they come up for air. An autonomous system wouldnt work here. The first dolphin anesthetized on an operating table simply died. (How do they sleep? With half of their brain alternately.) But the duties of the unconscious are beyond counting. Everything from scratching an itch to solving math problems.

Problems in general are often well posed in terms of language and language remains a handy tool for explaining them. But the actual process of thinking—in any discipline—is largely an unconscious affair. Language can be used to sum up some point at which one has arrived—a sort of milepost—so as to gain a fresh starting point. But if you believe that you actually use language in the solving of problems I wish that you would write to me and tell me how you go about it.

I’ve pointed out to some of my mathematical friends that the unconscious appears to be better at math than they are. My friend George Zweig calls this the Night Shift. Bear in mind that the unconscious has no pencil or notepad and certainly no eraser. That it does solve problems in mathematics is indisputable. How does it go about it? When I’ve suggested to my friends that it may well do it without using numbers, most of them thought—after a while—that this was a possibility. How, we dont know. Just as we dont know how it is that we manage to talk. If I am talking to you then I can hardly be crafting at the same time the sentences that are to follow what I am now saying. I am totally occupied in talking to you. Nor can some part of my mind be assembling these sentences and then saying them to me so that I can repeat them. Aside from the fact that I am busy this would be to evoke an endless regress. The truth is that there is a process here to which we have no access. It is a mystery opaque to total blackness.

There are influential persons among us—of whom a bit more a bit later—who claim to believe that language is a totally evolutionary process. That it has somehow appeared in the brain in a primitive form and then grown to usefulness. Somewhat like vision, perhaps. But vision we now know is traceable to perhaps as many as a dozen quite independent evolutionary histories. Tempting material for the teleologists. These stories apparently begin with a crude organ capable of perceiving light where any occlusion could well suggest a predator. Which actually makes it an excellent scenario for Darwinian selection. It may be that the influential persons imagine all mammals waiting for language to appear. I dont know. But all indications are that language has appeared only once and in one species only. Among whom it then spread with considerable speed.

There are a number of examples of signaling in the animal world that might be taken for a proto-language. Chipmunks—among other species—have one alarm-call for aerial predators and another for those on the ground. Hawks as distinct from foxes or cats. Very useful. But what is missing here is the central idea of language—that one thing can be another thing. It is the idea that Helen Keller suddenly understood at the well. That the sign for water was not simply what you did to get a glass of water. It was the glass of water. It was in fact the water in the glass. This in the play The Miracle Worker. Not a dry eye in the house.

The invention of language was understood at once to be incredibly useful. Again, it seems to have spread through the species almost instantaneously. The immediate problem would seem to have been that there were more things to name than sounds to name them with. Language appears to have originated in southwestern Africa and it may even be that the clicks in the Khoisan languages—to include Sandawe and Hadza—are an atavistic remnant of addressing this need for a greater variety of sounds. The vocal problems were eventually handled evolutionarily—and apparently in fairly short order—by turning our throat over largely to the manufacture of speech. Not without cost, as it turns out. The larynx has moved down in the throat in such a way as to make us as a species highly vulnerable to choking on our food—a not uncommon cause of death. It’s also left us as the only mammal incapable of swallowing and vocalizing at the same time.

The sort of isolation that gave us tall and short and light and dark and other variations in our species was no protection against the advance of language. It crossed mountains and oceans as if they werent there. Did it meet some need? No. The other five thousand plus mammals among us do fine without it. But useful? Oh yes. We might further point out that when it arrived it had no place to go. The brain was not expecting it and had made no plans for its arrival. It simply invaded those areas of the brain that were the least dedicated. I suggested once in conversation at the Santa Fe Institute that language had acted very much like a parasitic invasion and David Krakauer—our president—said that the same idea had occurred to him. Which pleased me a good deal because David is very smart. This is not to say of course that the human brain was not in any way structured for the reception of language. Where else would it go? If nothing else we have the evidence of history. The difference between the history of a virus and that of language is that the virus has arrived by way of Darwinian selection and language has not. The virus comes nicely machined. Offer it up. Turn it slightly. Push it in. Click. Nice fit. But the scrap heap will be found to contain any number of viruses that did not fit.

There is no selection at work in the evolution of language because language is not a biological system and because there is only one of them. The ur-language of linguistic origin out of which all languages have evolved.

Influential persons will by now of course have smiled to themselves at the ill-concealed Lamarckianism lurking here. We might think to evade it by various strategies or redefinitions but probably without much success. Darwin of course was dismissive of the idea of inherited “mutilations”—the issue of cutting off the tails of dogs for instance. But the inheritance of ideas remains something of a sticky issue. It is difficult to see them as anything other than acquired. How the unconscious goes about its work is not so much poorly understood as not understood at all. It is an area pretty much ignored by the artificial intelligence studies, which seem mostly devoted to analytics and to the question of whether the brain is like a computer. They have decided that it’s not, but that is not altogether true.

Of the known characteristics of the unconscious its persistence is among the most notable. Everyone is familiar with repetitive dreams. Here the unconscious may well be imagined to have more than one voice: He’s not getting it, is he? No. He’s pretty thick. What do you want to do? I dont know. Do you want to try using his mother? His mother is dead. What difference does that make?

What is at work here? And how does the unconscious know we’re not getting it? What doesnt it know? It’s hard to escape the conclusion that the unconscious is laboring under a moral compulsion to educate us. (Moral compulsion? Is he serious?)

The evolution of language would begin with the names of things. After that would come descriptions of these things and descriptions of what they do. The growth of languages into their present shape and form—their syntax and grammar—has a universality that suggests a common rule. The rule is that languages have followed their own requirements. The rule is that they are charged with describing the world. There is nothing else to describe.

All very quickly. There are no languages whose form is in a state of development. And their forms are all basically the same.

We dont know what the unconscious is or where it is or how it got there—wherever there might be. Recent animal brain studies showing outsized cerebellums in some pretty smart species are suggestive. That facts about the world are in themselves capable of shaping the brain is slowly becoming accepted. Does the unconscious only get these facts from us, or does it have the same access to our sensorium that we have? You can do whatever you like with the us and the our and the we. I did. At some point the mind must grammaticize facts and convert them to narratives. The facts of the world do not for the most part come in narrative form. We have to do that.

So what are we saying here? That some unknown thinker sat up one night in his cave and said: Wow. One thing can be another thing. Yes. Of course that’s what we are saying. Except that he didnt say it because there was no language for him to say it in. For the time being he had to settle for just thinking it. And when did this take place? Our influential persons claim to have no idea. Of course they dont think that it took place at all. But aside from that. One hundred thousand years ago? Half a million? Longer? Actually a hundred thousand would be a pretty good guess. It dates the earliest known graphics—found in the Blombos Cave in South Africa. These scratchings have everything to do with our chap waking up in his cave. For while it is fairly certain that art preceded language it probably didnt precede it by much. Some influential persons have actually claimed that language could be up to a million years old. They havent explained what we have been doing with it all this time. What we do know—pretty much without question—is that once you have language everything else follows pretty quickly. The simple understanding that one thing can be another thing is at the root of all things of our doing. From using colored pebbles for the trading of goats to art and language and on to using symbolic marks to represent pieces of the world too small to see.

One hundred thousand years is pretty much an eyeblink. But two million years is not. This is, rather loosely, the length of time in which our unconscious has been organizing and directing our lives. And without language you will note. At least for all but that recent blink. How does it tell us where and when to scratch? We dont know. We just know that it’s good at it. But the fact that the unconscious prefers avoiding verbal instructions pretty much altogether—even where they would appear to be quite useful—suggests rather strongly that it doesnt much like language and even that it doesnt trust it. And why is that? How about for the good and sufficient reason that it has been getting along quite well without it for a couple of million years?

Apart from its great antiquity the picture-story mode of presentation favored by the unconscious has the appeal of its simple utility. A picture can be recalled in its entirety whereas an essay cannot. Unless one is an Asperger’s case. In which event memories, while correct, suffer from their own literalness. The log of knowledge or information contained in the brain of the average citizen is enormous. But the form in which it resides is largely unknown. You may have read a thousand books and be able to discuss any one of them without remembering a word of the text.

When you pause to reflect and say: “Let me see. How can I put this,” your aim is to resurrect an idea from this pool of we-know-not-what and give it a linguistic form so that it can be expressed. It is the this that one wishes to put that is representative of this pool of knowledge whose form is so amorphous. If you explain this to someone and they say that they dont understand you may well seize your chin and think some more and come up with another way to “put” it. Or you may not. When the physicist Dirac was complained to by students that they didnt understand what he’d said Dirac would simply repeat it verbatim.

The picture-story lends itself to parable. To the tale whose meaning gives one pause. The unconscious is concerned with rules but these rules will require your cooperation. The unconscious wants to give guidance to your life in general but it doesnt care what toothpaste you use. And while the path which it suggests for you may be broad it doesnt include going over a cliff. We can see this in dreams. Those disturbing dreams which wake us from sleep are purely graphic. No one speaks. These are very old dreams and often troubling. Sometimes a friend can see their meaning where we cannot. The unconscious intends that they be difficult to unravel because it wants us to think about them. To remember them. It doesnt say that you cant ask for help. Parables of course often want to resolve themselves into the pictorial. When you first heard of Plato’s cave you set about reconstructing it.

To repeat. The unconscious is a biological operative and language is not. Or not yet. You have to be careful about inviting Descartes to the table. Aside from inheritability probably the best guide as to whether a category is of our own devising is to ask if we see it in other creatures. The case for language is pretty clear. In the facility with which young children learn its complex and difficult rules we see the slow incorporation of the acquired.

I’d been thinking about the Kekulé problem off and on for a couple of years without making much progress. Then one morning after George Zweig and I had had one of our ten hour lunches I came down in the morning with the wastebasket from my bedroom and as I was emptying it into the kitchen trash I suddenly knew the answer. Or I knew that I knew the answer. It took me a minute or so to put it together. I reflected that while George and I had spent the first couple of hours at cognition and neuroscience we had not talked about Kekulé and the problem. But something in our conversation might very well have triggered our reflections—mine and those of the Night Shift—on this issue. The answer of course is simple once you know it. The unconscious is just not used to giving verbal instructions and is not happy doing so. Habits of two million years duration are hard to break. When later I told George what I’d come up with he mulled it over for a minute or so and then nodded and said: “That sounds about right.” Which pleased me a good deal because George is very smart.

The unconscious seems to know a great deal. What does it know about itself? Does it know that it’s going to die? What does it think about that? It appears to represent a gathering of talents rather than just one. It seems unlikely that the itch department is also in charge of math. Can it work on a number of problems at once? Does it only know what we tell it? Or—more plausibly—has it direct access to the outer world? Some of the dreams which it is at pains to assemble for us are no doubt deeply reflective and yet some are quite frivolous. And the fact that it appears to be less than insistent upon our remembering every dream suggests that sometimes it may be working on itself. And is it really so good at solving problems or is it just that it keeps its own counsel about the failures? How does it have this understanding which we might well envy? How might we make inquiries of it? Are you sure?
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Re: article of the day (post 'em when you find 'em)

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https://fee.org/articles/john-locke-natural-rights-to-life-liberty-and-property/

John Locke: Natural Rights to Life, Liberty, and Property

Jim Powell

A number of times throughout history, tyranny has stimulated breakthrough thinking about liberty. This was certainly the case in England with the mid-17th-century era of repression, rebellion, and civil war. There was a tremendous outpouring of political pamphlets and tracts. By far the most influential writings emerged from the pen of scholar John Locke.

He expressed the radical view that government is morally obliged to serve people, namely by protecting life, liberty, and property. He explained the principle of checks and balances to limit government power. He favored representative government and a rule of law. He denounced tyranny. He insisted that when government violates individual rights, people may legitimately rebel.

These views were most fully developed in Locke’s famous Second Treatise Concerning Civil Government, and they were so radical that he never dared sign his name to it. He acknowledged authorship only in his will. Locke’s writings did much to inspire the libertarian ideals of the American Revolution. This, in turn, set an example which inspired people throughout Europe, Latin America, and Asia.

Thomas Jefferson ranked Locke, along with Locke’s compatriot Algernon Sidney, as the most important thinkers on liberty. Locke helped inspire Thomas Paine’s radical ideas about revolution. Locke fired up George Mason. From Locke, James Madison drew his most fundamental principles of liberty and government. Locke’s writings were part of Benjamin Franklin’s self-education, and John Adams believed that both girls and boys should learn about Locke. The French philosopher Voltaire called Locke “the man of the greatest wisdom. What he has not seen clearly, I despair of ever seeing.”

It seems incredible that Locke, of all people, could have influenced individuals around the world. When he set out to develop his ideas, he was an undistinguished Oxford scholar. He had a brief experience with a failed diplomatic mission. He was a physician who long lacked traditional credentials and had just one patient. His first major work wasn’t published until he was 57. He was distracted by asthma and other chronic ailments.

There was little in Locke’s appearance to suggest greatness. He was tall and thin. According to biographer Maurice Cranston, he had a “long face, large nose, full lips, and soft, melancholy eyes.” Although he had a love affair which, he said, “robbed me of the use of my reason,” he died a bachelor.

Some notable contemporaries thought highly of Locke. Mathematician and physicist Isaac Newton cherished his company. Locke helped Quaker William Penn restore his good name when he was a political fugitive, as Penn had arranged a pardon for Locke when he had been a political fugitive. Locke was described by the famous English physician Dr. Thomas Sydenham as “a man whom, in the acuteness of his intellect, in the steadiness of his judgement, ... that is, in the excellence of his manners, I confidently declare to have, amongst the men of our time, few equals and no superiors.”

Family Background

John Locke was born in Somerset, England, August 29, 1632. He was the eldest son of Agnes Keene, daughter of a small-town tanner, and John Locke, an impecunious Puritan lawyer who served as a clerk for justices of the peace.

When young Locke was two, England began to stumble toward its epic constitutional crisis. The Stuart King Charles I, who dreamed of the absolute power wielded by some continental rulers, decreed higher taxes without approval of Parliament. They were to be collected by local officials like his father. Eight years later, the Civil War broke out, and Locke’s father briefly served as a captain in the Parliamentary army. In 1649, rebels beheaded Charles I. But all this led to the Puritan dictatorship of Oliver Cromwell.

Locke had a royalist and Anglican education, presumably because it was still a ticket to upward mobility. One of his father’s politically connected associates nominated 15-year-old John Locke for the prestigious Westminster School. In 1652, he won a scholarship to Christ Church, Oxford University’s most important college, which trained men mainly for the clergy. He studied logic, metaphysics, Greek, and Latin. He earned his bachelor of arts degree in 1656, then continued work toward a master of arts and taught rhetoric and Greek. On the side, he spent considerable time studying with free spirits who, at the dawn of modern science and medicine, independently conducted experiments.

Having lived through a bloody civil war, Locke seems to have shared the fears expressed by fellow Englishman Thomas Hobbes, whose Leviathan (1651) became the gospel of absolutism. Hobbes asserted that liberty brought chaos, that the worst government was better than no government—and that people owed allegiance to their ruler, right or wrong. In October 1656, Locke wrote a letter expressing approval that Quakers—whom he called “mad folks”—were subject to restrictions. Locke welcomed the 1660 restoration of the Stuart monarchy and subsequently wrote two tracts that defended the prerogative of government to enforce religious conformity.

In November 1665, as a result of his Oxford connections, Locke was appointed to a diplomatic mission aimed at winning the Elector of Brandenburg as an ally against Holland. The mission failed, but the experience was a revelation. Brandenburg had a policy of toleration for Catholics, Calvinists, and Lutherans, and there was peace. Locke wrote his friend Robert Boyle, the chemist: “They quietly permit one another to choose their way to heaven; and I cannot observe any quarrels or animosities amongst them on account of religion.”

Locke and Shaftesbury

During the summer of 1666, the rich and influential Anthony Ashley Cooper visited Oxford where he met Locke who was then studying medicine. Cooper suffered from a liver cyst that threatened to become swollen with infection. Cooper asked Locke, apparently competent, courteous, and amusing, to be his personal physician. Accordingly, Locke moved into a room at Cooper’s Exeter House mansion in London. Locke was about to embark on adventures which would convert him to a libertarian.

Cooper was born an aristocrat, served in the King’s army during the Civil War, switched to the Puritan side, and commanded Puritan soldiers in Dorset. But he was dismissed amidst Puritan purges. He was arrested for conspiring to overthrow the Puritan Commonwealth and bring back the Stuarts. King Charles II elevated him to the peerage—he became Lord Ashley, then the Earl of Shaftesbury—and joined the King’s Privy Council.

Soon Shaftesbury spearheaded opposition to the Restoration Parliaments, which enacted measures enforcing conformity with Anglican worship and suppressing dissident Protestants. He became a member of the four-man cabinet and served briefly as Lord High Chancellor, the most powerful minister. Shaftesbury championed religious toleration for all (except Catholics) because he had seen how intolerance drove away talented people and how religious toleration helped Holland prosper. He invested in ships, some for the slave trade. He developed Carolina plantations. Locke is believed to have drafted virtually the entire Fundamental Constitutions of Carolina, providing for a parliament elected by property owners, a separation of church and state, and—surprisingly—military conscription.

Shaftesbury’s liver infection worsened, and Locke supervised successful surgery in 1668. The grateful Shaftesbury encouraged Locke to develop his potential as a philosopher. Thanks to Shaftesbury, Locke was nominated for the Royal Society, where he mingled with some of London’s most fertile minds. In 1671, with a half-dozen friends, Locke started a discussion group to talk about the principles of morality and religion. This led him to further explore the issues by writing early drafts of An Essay Concerning Human Understanding.

Shaftesbury retained Locke to analyze toleration, education, trade, and other issues, which spurred Locke to expand his knowledge. For example, Locke opposed government regulation of interest rates:

The first thing to be considered is whether the price of the hire of money can be regulated by law; and to that, I think generally speaking that ’tis manifest that it cannot. For, since it is impossible to make a law that shall hinder a man from giving away his money or estate to whom he pleases, it will be impossible by any contrivance of law, to hinder men ... to purchase money to be lent to them. ...

Locke was in the thick of just about everything Shaftesbury did. Locke helped draft speeches. He recorded the progress of bills through Parliament. He kept notes during meetings. He evaluated people considered for political appointments. Locke even negotiated the marriage terms for Shaftesbury’s son and served as tutor for Shaftesbury’s grandson.

Shaftesbury formed the Whig party, and Locke, then in France, carried on a correspondence to help influence Parliamentary elections. Shaftesbury was imprisoned for a year in the Tower of London, then he helped pass the Habeas Corpus Act (1679), which made it unlawful for government to detain a person without filing formal charges or to put a person on trial for the same charge twice. Shaftesbury pushed “exclusion bills” aimed at preventing the king’s Catholic brother from royal succession.

Countering Stuart Absolutism

In March 1681, Charles II dissolved Parliament, and it soon became clear that he did not intend to summon Parliament again. Consequently, the only way to stop Stuart absolutism was rebellion. Shaftesbury was the king’s most dangerous opponent, and Locke was at his side. A spy named Humphrey Prideaux reported on Locke’s whereabouts and on suspicions that Locke was the author of seditious pamphlets.

In fact, Locke was contemplating an attack on Robert Filmer’s Patriarcha, or The Natural Power of Kings Asserted (1680), which claimed that God sanctioned the absolute power of kings. Such an attack was risky since it could easily be prosecuted as an attack on King Charles II. Pamphleteer James Tyrrell, a friend whom Locke had met at Oxford, left unsigned his substantial attack on Filmer, Patriarcha Non Monarcha or The Patriarch Unmonarch’d; and Tyrrell had merely implied the right to rebel against tyrants. Algernon Sidney was hanged, in part, because the king’s agents discovered his manuscript for Discourses Concerning Government.

Locke worked in his bookshelf-lined room at Shaftesbury’s Exeter House, drawing on his experience with political action. He wrote one treatise which attacked Filmer’s doctrine. Locke denied Filmer’s claim that the Bible sanctioned tyrants and that parents had absolute authority over children. Locke wrote a second treatise, which presented an epic case for liberty and the right of people to rebel against tyrants. While he drew his principles substantially from Tyrrell, he pushed them to their radical conclusions: namely, an explicit attack on slavery and defense of revolution.

Exile in Holland

As Charles II intensified his campaign against rebels, Shaftesbury fled to Holland in November 1682 and died there two months later. On July 21, 1683, Locke might well have seen the powers that be at Oxford University burn books they considered dangerous. It was England’s last book burning. When Locke feared his rooms would be searched, he initially hid his draft of the two treatises with Tyrrell. Locke moved out of Oxford, checked on country property he had inherited from his father, then fled to Rotterdam September 7.

The English government tried to have Locke extradited for trial and presumably execution. He moved into one Egbertus Veen’s Amsterdam house and assumed the name “Dr. van der Linden.” He signed letters as “Lamy” or “Dr. Lynne.” Anticipating that the government might intercept mail, Locke protected friends by referring to them with numbers or false names. He told people he was in Holland because he enjoyed the local beer.

Meanwhile, Charles II had converted to Catholicism before he died in February 1685. Charles’s brother became King James II, who began promoting Catholicism in England. He defied Parliament. He replaced Anglican Church officials and sheriffs with Catholics. He staffed the army with Catholic officers. He turned Oxford University’s Magdalen College into a Catholic seminary.

In Holland, Locke worked on his masterpiece, An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, which urged people to base their convictions on observation and reason. He also worked on a “letter” advocating religious toleration except for atheists (who wouldn’t swear legally binding oaths) and Catholics (loyal to a foreign power).

Catholicism loomed as the worst menace to liberty because of the shrewd French King Louis XIV. He waged war for years against England and Holland—France had a population around 20 million, about four times larger than England and 10 times larger than Holland.

On June 10, 1688, James II announced the birth of a son, and suddenly there was the specter of a Catholic succession. This convinced Tories, as English defenders of royal absolutism were known, to embrace Whig ideas of rebellion. The Dutchman William of Orange, who had married Mary, the Protestant daughter of James II, agreed to assume power in England as William III and recognize the supremacy of Parliament. On November 5, 1688, William crossed the English Channel with ships and soldiers. James II summoned English forces, but they were badly split between Catholics and Protestants. Within a month, James II fled to France. This was the “Glorious Revolution,” so-called because it helped secure Protestant succession and Parliamentary supremacy without violence.

Locke resolved to return home, but there were regrets. For example, he wrote the minister and scholar Philip van Limborch:

I almost feel as though I were leaving my own country and my own kinsfolk; for everything that belongs to kinship, good will, love, kindness—everything that binds men together with ties stronger than that of blood—I have found among you in abundance. ... I seem to have found in your friendship alone enough to make me always rejoice that I was forced to pass so many years amongst you.

Locke sailed on the same ship as the soon-to-be Queen Mary, arriving in London, February 11, 1689. During the next 12 months, his major works were published, and suddenly he was famous.

A Letter Concerning Toleration

Limborch published Locke’s Epistola de Tolerantia in Gouda, Holland, in May 1689—Locke wrote in Latin presumably to reach a European audience. The work was translated as A Letter Concerning Toleration and published in October 1689. Locke did not take religious toleration as far as his Quaker compatriot William Penn—Locke was concerned about the threat atheists and Catholics might pose to the social order—but he opposed persecution. He went beyond the Toleration Act (1689), specifically calling for toleration of Anabaptists, Independents, Presbyterians, and Quakers.

“The Magistrate,” he declared,

ought not to forbid the Preaching or Professing of any Speculative Opinions in any Church, because they have no manner of relation to the Civil Rights of the Subjects. If a Roman Catholick believe that to be really the Body of Christ, which another man calls Bread, he does no injury therby to his Neighbour. If a Jew do not believe the New Testament to be the Word of God, he does not thereby alter any thing in mens Civil Rights. If a Heathen doubt of both Testaments, he is not therefore to be punished as a pernicious Citizen.

Locke’s Letter brought replies, and he wrote two further letters in 1690 and 1692.

Locke’s Two Treatises on Government

Locke’s two treatises on government were published in October 1689 with a 1690 date on the title page. While later philosophers have belittled it because Locke based his thinking on archaic notions about a “state of nature,” his bedrock principles endure. He defended the natural law tradition whose glorious lineage goes back to the ancient Jews: the tradition that rulers cannot legitimately do anything they want because there are moral laws applying to everyone.

“Reason, which is that Law,” Locke declared, “teaches all Mankind, who would but consult it, that being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in his Life, Health, Liberty, or Possessions.” Locke envisioned a rule of law:

have a standing Rule to live by, common to every one of that Society, and made by the Legislative Power erected in it; A Liberty to follow my own Will in all things, where the Rule prescribes not; and not to be subject to the inconstant, uncertain, unknown, Arbitrary Will of another Man.

Locke established that private property is absolutely essential for liberty: “every Man has a Property in his own Person. This no Body has any Right to but himself. The Labour of his Body, and the Work of his Hands, we may say, are properly his.” He continues: “The great and chief end therefore, of Mens uniting into Commonwealths, and putting themselves under Government, is the Preservation of their Property.”

Locke believed people legitimately turned common property into private property by mixing their labor with it, improving it. Marxists liked to claim this meant Locke embraced the labor theory of value, but he was talking about the basis of ownership rather than value.

He insisted that people, not rulers, are sovereign. Government, Locke wrote, “can never have a Power to take to themselves the whole or any part of the Subjects Property, without their own consent. For this would be in effect to leave them no Property at all.” He makes his point even more explicit: rulers “must not raise Taxes on the Property of the People, without the Consent of the People, given by themselves, or their Deputies.”

Locke had enormous foresight to see beyond the struggles of his own day, which were directed against monarchy:

’Tis a Mistake to think this Fault [tyranny] is proper only to Monarchies; other Forms of Government are liable to it, as well as that. For where-ever the Power that is put in any hands for the Government of the People, and the Preservation of their Properties, is applied to other ends, and made use of to impoverish, harass, or subdue them to the Arbitrary and Irregular Commands of those that have it: There it presently becomes Tyranny, whether those that thus use it are one or many.

Then Locke affirmed an explicit right to revolution:

whenever the Legislators endeavor to take away, and destroy the Property of the People, or to reduce them to Slavery under Arbitrary Power, they put themselves into a state of War with the People, who are thereupon absolved from any farther Obedience, and are left to the common Refuge, which God hath provided for all Men, against Force and Violence. Whensoever therefore the Legislative shall transgress this fundamental Rule of Society; and either by Ambition, Fear, Folly or Corruption, endeavor to grasp themselves, or put into the hands of any other an Absolute Power over the Lives, Liberties, and Estates of the People; By this breach of Trust they forfeit the Power, the People had put into their hands, for quite contrary ends, and it devolves to the People, who have a Right to resume their original Liberty.

To help assure his anonymity, he dealt with the printer through his friend Edward Clarke. Locke denied rumors that he was the author, and he begged his friends to keep their speculations to themselves. He cut off those like James Tyrrell who persisted in talking about Locke’s authorship. Locke destroyed the original manuscripts and all references to the work in his writings. His only written acknowledgment of authorship was in an addition to his will, signed shortly before he died. Ironically, the two treatises caused hardly a stir during his life.

An Essay Concerning Human Understanding

Locke’s byline did appear with An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, published December 1689, and it established him as England’s leading philosopher. He challenged the traditional doctrine that learning consisted entirely of reading ancient texts and absorbing religious dogmas. He maintained that understanding the world required observation. He encouraged people to think for themselves. He urged that reason be the guide. He warned that without reason, “men’s opinions are not the product of any judgment or the consequence of reason but the effects of chance and hazard, of a mind floating at all adventures, without choice and without direction.” This book became one of the most widely reprinted and influential works on philosophy.

In 1693, Locke published Some Thoughts Concerning Education, which offered many ideas as revolutionary now as they were then. Thomas Hobbes had insisted that education should promote submission to authority, but Locke declared education is for liberty. Locke believed that setting a personal example is the most effective way to teach moral standards and fundamental skills, which is why he recommended homeschooling. He objected to government schools. He urged parents to nurture the unique genius of each child.

Locke denounced the tendency of many teachers to worship power.

All the entertainment and talk of history is of nothing almost but fighting and killing: and the honour and renown that is bestowed on conquerors (who are for the most part but the great butchers of mankind) further mislead growing youth, who ... come to think slaughter the laudable business of mankind, and the most heroic of virtues.

Locke was asked by his new patron, Sir John Somers, a member of Parliament, to counter the claims of East India Company lobbyists who wanted the government to interfere with money markets. This resulted in Locke’s first published essay on economics, Some Consideration of the Consequences of the Lowering of Interest, and Raising the Value of Money (1691), which appeared anonymously. He explained that market action follows natural laws and that government intervention is counterproductive. When individuals violated government laws like usury laws restricting interest rates, Locke blamed government for enacting the laws. Locke warned against debasing money and urged that the Mint issue full-weight silver coins. His view prevailed.

Locke helped expand freedom of the press. He did this by twice opposing renewal of the Act for the Regulation of Printing. The second time, in 1694, he was successful. He stressed the evils of monopoly, saying “I know not why a man should not have liberty to print whatever he would speak.”

Despite his love of liberty, Locke supported the establishment of the Bank of England in 1694. Its aim was to help the government finance wars against Louis XIV. It loaned money to the government in exchange for gaining a monopoly on dealing in gold bullion, bills of exchange, and currency. Locke, financially comfortable thanks to Shaftesbury’s investment advice, became an original subscriber.

In 1696, King William III named Locke a Commissioner on the Board of Trade, which included responsibility for managing England’s colonies, import restrictions, and poor relief. As far as the poor were concerned, according to one friend, "He was naturally compassionate and exceedingly charitable to those in want. But his charity was always directed to encourage working, laborious, industrious people, and not to relieve idle beggars.” Locke retired from the Board of Trade four years later.

Locke’s Final Years

Sir Francis Masham and his wife, Damaris, had invited Locke to spend his last years at Oates, their red brick Gothic-style manor house in North Essex, about 25 miles from London. He had a ground-floor bedroom and an adjoining study with most of his 5,000-volume library. He insisted on paying: a pound per week for his servant and himself, plus a shilling a week for his horse.

Locke gradually became infirm. He lost most of his hearing. His legs swelled up. By October 1704, he could hardly arise to dress. He broke out in sweats. Around 3 o’clock in the afternoon, Saturday, October 28, Locke was sitting in his study with Lady Masham. Suddenly, he brought his hands to his face, shut his eyes, and died. He was 72. He was buried in the High Laver churchyard.

During the 1720s, the English radical writers John Trenchard and Thomas Gordon popularized Locke’s political ideas in Cato’s Letters, a popular series of essays published in London newspapers, and these had the most direct impact on American thinkers. Locke’s influence was most apparent in the Declaration of Independence, the constitutional separation of powers, and the Bill of Rights.

Meanwhile, Voltaire had promoted Locke’s ideas in France. Ideas about the separation of powers were expanded by Baron de Montesquieu. Locke’s doctrine of natural rights appeared at the outset of the French Revolution, in the Declaration of the Rights of Man, but his belief in the separation of powers and the sanctity of private property never took hold there. Hence, the Reign of Terror.

Then Locke virtually vanished from intellectual debates. A conservative reaction engulfed Europe as people associated talk about natural rights with rebellion and Napoleon’s wars. In England, Utilitarian philosopher Jeremy Bentham ridiculed natural rights, proposing that public policy be determined by the greatest-happiness-for-the-greatest-number principle. But both conservatives and Utilitarians proved intellectually helpless when governments demanded more power to rob people, jail people, and even commit murder in the name of doing good.

During recent decades, some thinkers like novelist-philosopher Ayn Rand and economist Murray Rothbard revived a compelling moral case for liberty. They provided a meaningful moral standard for determining whether laws are just. They drew the clearest possible line beyond which neither a ruler, nor a majority, nor a bureaucrat, nor anyone else in government could legitimately go. They inspired millions as they sounded the battle cry that people everywhere are born with equal rights to life, liberty, and property. They stood on the shoulders of John Locke.

-----

Jim Powell, senior fellow at the Cato Institute, is an expert in the history of liberty. He has lectured in England, Germany, Japan, Argentina and Brazil as well as at Harvard, Stanford and other universities across the United States. He has written for the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Esquire, Audacity/American Heritage and other publications, and is author of six books
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https://fee.org/resources/not-your-to-give/

https://fee.org/media/14953/notyourstogive.pdf

Not Yours to Give

[The following story about the famed American icon Davy Crockett was published in Harper's Magazine in 1867, as written by James J. Bethune, a pseudonym used by Edward S. Ellis. The events that are recounted here are true, including Crockett's opposition to the bill in question, though the precise rendering and some of the detail are fictional.]

One day in the House of Representatives, a bill was taken up appropriating money for the benefit of a widow of a distinguished naval officer. Several beautiful speeches had been made in its support. The Speaker was just about to put the question when Davy Crockett arose:

“Mr. Speaker–I have as much respect for the memory of the deceased, and as much sympathy for the sufferings of the living, if suffering there be, as any man in this House, but we must not permit our respect for the dead or our sympathy for a part of the living to lead us into an act of injustice to the balance of the living. I will not go into an argument to prove that Congress has no power to appropriate this money as an act of charity. Every member upon this floor knows it. We have the right, as individuals, to give away as much of our own money as we please in charity; but as members of Congress we have no right so to appropriate a dollar of the public money. Some eloquent appeals have been made to us upon the ground that it is a debt due the deceased. Mr. Speaker, the deceased lived long after the close of the war; he was in office to the day of his death, and I have never heard that the government was in arrears to him.

Every man in this House knows it is not a debt. We cannot, without the grossest corruption, appropriate this money as the payment of a debt. We have not the semblance of authority to appropriate it as a charity. Mr. Speaker, I have said we have the right to give as much money of our own as we please. I am the poorest man on this floor. I cannot vote for this bill, but I will give one week’s pay to the object, and if every member of Congress will do the same, it will amount to more than the bill asks.”

He took his seat. Nobody replied. The bill was put upon its passage, and, instead of passing unanimously, as was generally supposed, and as, no doubt, it would, but for that speech, it received but few votes, and, of course, was lost.

Later, when asked by a friend why he had opposed the appropriation, Crockett gave this explanation:

“Several years ago I was one evening standing on the steps of the Capitol with some other members of Congress, when our attention was attracted by a great light over in Georgetown . It was evidently a large fire. We jumped into a hack and drove over as fast as we could. In spite of all that could be done, many houses were burned and many families made homeless, and, besides, some of them had lost all but the clothes they had on. The weather was very cold, and when I saw so many women and children suffering, I felt that something ought to be done for them. The next morning a bill was introduced appropriating $20,000 for their relief. We put aside all other business and rushed it through as soon as it could be done.

“The next summer, when it began to be time to think about the election, I concluded I would take a scout around among the boys of my district. I had no opposition there, but, as the election was some time off, I did not know what might turn up. When riding one day in a part of my district in which I was more of a stranger than any other, I saw a man in a field plowing and coming toward the road. I gauged my gait so that we should meet as he came to the fence. As he came up, I spoke to the man. He replied politely, but, as I thought, rather coldly.

“I began: ‘Well, friend, I am one of those unfortunate beings called candidates, and–’

“‘Yes, I know you; you are Colonel Crockett, I have seen you once before, and voted for you the last time you were elected. I suppose you are out electioneering now, but you had better not waste your time or mine. I shall not vote for you again.’

“This was a sockdolager . . . I begged him to tell me what was the matter.

“‘Well, Colonel, it is hardly worth-while to waste time or words upon it. I do not see how it can be mended, but you gave a vote last winter which shows that either you have not capacity to understand the Constitution, or that you are wanting in the honesty and firmness to be guided by it. In either case you are not the man to represent me. But I beg your pardon for expressing it in that way. I did not intend to avail myself of the privilege of the constituent to speak plainly to a candidate for the purpose of insulting or wounding you. I intend by it only to say that your understanding of the Constitution is very different from mine; and I will say to you what, but for my rudeness, I should not have said, that I believe you to be honest. . . . But an understanding of the Constitution different from mine I cannot overlook, because the Constitution, to be worth anything, must be held sacred, and rigidly observed in all its provisions. The man who wields power and misinterprets it is the more dangerous the more honest he is.’

“‘I admit the truth of all you say, but there must be some mistake about it, for I do not remember that I gave any vote last winter upon any constitutional question.’

“‘No, Colonel, there’s no mistake. Though I live here in the backwoods and seldom go from home, I take the papers from Washington and read very carefully all the proceedings of Congress. My papers say that last winter you voted for a bill to appropriate $20,000 to some sufferers by a fire in Georgetown . Is that true?’

“‘Well, my friend; I may as well own up. You have got me there. But certainly nobody will complain that a great and rich country like ours should give the insignificant sum of $20,000 to relieve its suffering women and children, particularly with a full and overflowing Treasury, and I am sure, if you had been there, you would have done just as I did.’

“‘It is not the amount, Colonel, that I complain of; it is the principle. In the first place, the government ought to have in the Treasury no more than enough for its legitimate purposes. But that has nothing to do with the question. The power of collecting and disbursing money at pleasure is the most dangerous power that can be intrusted to man, particularly under our system of collecting revenue by a tariff, which reaches every man in the country, no matter how poor he may be, and the poorer he is the more he pays in proportion to his means. What is worse, it presses upon him without his knowledge where the weight centers, for there is not a man in the United States who can ever guess how much he pays to the government. So you see, that while you are contributing to relieve one, you are drawing it from thousands who are even worse off than he. If you had the right to give anything, the amount was simply a matter of discretion with you, and you had as much right to give $20,000,000 as $20,000. If you have the right to give to one, you have the right to give to all; and, as the Constitution neither defines charity nor stipulates the amount, you are at liberty to give to any and everything which you may believe, or profess to believe, is a charity, and to any amount you may think proper. You will very easily perceive what a wide door this would open for fraud and corruption and favoritism, on the one hand, and for robbing the people on the other. No, Colonel, Congress has no right to give charity. Individual members may give as much of their own money as they please, but they have no right to touch a dollar of the public money for that purpose. If twice as many houses had been burned in this county as in Georgetown , neither you nor any other member of Congress would have thought of appropriating a dollar for our relief. There are about two hundred and forty members of Congress. If they had shown their sympathy for the sufferers by contributing each one week’s pay, it would have made over $13,000. There are plenty of wealthy men in and around Washington who could have given $20,000 without depriving themselves of even a luxury of life. The congressmen chose to keep their own money, which, if reports be true, some of them spend not very creditably; and the people about Washington , no doubt, applauded you for relieving them from the necessity of giving by giving what was not yours to give. The people have delegated to Congress, by the Constitution, the power to do certain things. To do these, it is authorized to collect and pay moneys, and for nothing else. Everything beyond this is usurpation, and a violation of the Constitution.

“‘So you see, Colonel, you have violated the Constitution in what I consider a vital point. It is a precedent fraught with danger to the country, for when Congress once begins to stretch its power beyond the limits of the Constitution, there is no limit to it, and no security for the people. I have no doubt you acted honestly, but that does not make it any better, except as far as you are personally concerned, and you see that I cannot vote for you.’

“I tell you I felt streaked. I saw if I should have opposition, and this man should go to talking, he would set others to talking, and in that district I was a gone fawn-skin. I could not answer him, and the fact is, I was so fully convinced that he was right, I did not want to. But I must satisfy him, and I said to him:

“‘Well, my friend, you hit the nail upon the head when you said I had not sense enough to understand the Constitution. I intended to be guided by it, and thought I had studied it fully. I have heard many speeches in Congress about the powers of Congress, but what you have said here at your plow has got more hard, sound sense in it than all the fine speeches I ever heard. If I had ever taken the view of it that you have, I would have put my head into the fire before I would have given that vote; and if you will forgive me and vote for me again, if I ever vote for another unconstitutional law I wish I may be shot.’

“He laughingly replied: ‘Yes, Colonel, you have sworn to that once before, but I will trust you again upon one condition. You say that you are convinced that your vote was wrong. Your acknowledgment of it will do more good than beating you for it. If, as you go around the district, you will tell people about this vote, and that you are satisfied it was wrong, I will not only vote for you, but will do what I can to keep down opposition, and, perhaps, I may exert some little influence in that way.’

“‘If I don’t,’ said I, ‘I wish I may be shot; and to convince you that I am in earnest in what I say I will come back this way in a week or ten days, and if you will get up a gathering of the people, I will make a speech to them. Get up a barbecue, and I will pay for it.’

“‘No, Colonel, we are not rich people in this section, but we have plenty of provisions to contribute for a barbecue, and some to spare for those who have none. The push of crops will be over in a few days, and we can then afford a day for a barbecue. This is Thursday; I will see to getting it up on Saturday week. Come to my house on Friday, and we will go together, and I promise you a very respectable crowd to see and hear you.’

“‘Well, I will be here. But one thing more before I say good-by. I must know your name.’

“‘My name is Bunce.’

“‘Not Horatio Bunce?’

“‘Yes.’

“‘Well, Mr. Bunce, I never saw you before, though you say you have seen me, but I know you very well. I am glad I have met you, and very proud that I may hope to have you for my friend.’

“It was one of the luckiest hits of my life that I met him. He mingled but little with the public, but was widely known for his remarkable intelligence and incorruptible integrity, and for a heart brimful and running over with kindness and benevolence, which showed themselves not only in words but in acts. He was the oracle of the whole country around him, and his fame had extended far beyond the circle of his immediate acquaintance. Though I had never met him before, I had heard much of him, and but for this meeting it is very likely I should have had opposition, and had been beaten. One thing is very certain, no man could now stand up in that district under such a vote.

“At the appointed time I was at his house, having told our conversation to every crowd I had met, and to every man I stayed all night with, and I found that it gave the people an interest and a confidence in me stronger than I had every seen manifested before.

“Though I was considerably fatigued when I reached his house, and, under ordinary circumstances, should have gone early to bed, I kept him up until midnight, talking about the principles and affairs of government, and got more real, true knowledge of them than I had got all my life before.

“I have known and seen much of him since, for I respect him–no, that is not the word–I reverence and love him more than any living man, and I go to see him two or three times every year; and I will tell you, sir, if every one who professes to be a Christian lived and acted and enjoyed it as he does, the religion of Christ would take the world by storm.

“But to return to my story. The next morning we went to the barbecue, and, to my surprise, found about a thousand men there. I met a good many whom I had not known before, and they and my friend introduced me around until I had got pretty well acquainted–at least, they all knew me.

“In due time notice was given that I would speak to them. They gathered up around a stand that had been erected. I opened my speech by saying:

“‘Fellow-citizens–I present myself before you today feeling like a new man. My eyes have lately been opened to truths which ignorance or prejudice, or both, had heretofore hidden from my view. I feel that I can today offer you the ability to render you more valuable service than I have ever been able to render before. I am here today more for the purpose of acknowledging my error than to seek your votes. That I should make this acknowledgment is due to myself as well as to you. Whether you will vote for me is a matter for your consideration only.’

“I went on to tell them about the fire and my vote for the appropriation and then told them why I was satisfied it was wrong. I closed by saying:

“‘And now, fellow-citizens, it remains only for me to tell you that the most of the speech you have listened to with so much interest was simply a repetition of the arguments by which your neighbor, Mr. Bunce, convinced me of my error.

“‘It is the best speech I ever made in my life, but he is entitled to the credit for it. And now I hope he is satisfied with his convert and that he will get up here and tell you so.’

“He came upon the stand and said:

“‘Fellow-citizens–It affords me great pleasure to comply with the request of Colonel Crockett. I have always considered him a thoroughly honest man, and I am satisfied that he will faithfully perform all that he has promised you today.’

“He went down, and there went up from that crowd such a shout for Davy Crockett as his name never called forth before.

“I am not much given to tears, but I was taken with a choking then and felt some big drops rolling down my cheeks. And I tell you now that the remembrance of those few words spoken by such a man, and the honest, hearty shout they produced, is worth more to me than all the honors I have received and all the reputation I have ever made, or ever shall make, as a member of Congress.

“Now, sir,” concluded Crockett, “you know why I made that speech yesterday.

“There is one thing now to which I will call your attention. You remember that I proposed to give a week’s pay. There are in that House many very wealthy men–men who think nothing of spending a week’s pay, or a dozen of them, for a dinner or a wine party when they have something to accomplish by it. Some of those same men made beautiful speeches upon the great debt of gratitude which the country owed the deceased–a debt which could not be paid by money–and the insignificance and worthlessness of money, particularly so insignificant a sum as $10,000, when weighted against the honor of the nation. Yet not one of them responded to my proposition. Money with them is nothing but trash when it is to come out of the people. But it is the one great thing for which most of them are striving, and many of them sacrifice honor, integrity, and justice to obtain it.”

Holders of political office are but reflections of the dominant leadership–good or bad–among the electorate.

Horatio Bunce is a striking example of responsible citizenship. Were his kind to multiply, we would see many new faces in public office; or, as in the case of Davy Crockett, a new Crockett.

For either the new faces or the new Crocketts, we must look to the Horatio in ourselves!
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https://fee.org/articles/john-adams-on- ... overnment/

John Adams on the Purpose of Government

Gary M. Galles

John Adams, who has become “virtually an asterisk in history books today,” in one writer’s words, is inadequately celebrated. He played a leading role in our revolution and the beginnings of constitutional government. He wrote a Stamp Act protest that became a model for other protests. He outlined principles of liberty for Americans on the cusp of independence.

He helped write the resolutions of May 10, 1776, declaring America independent, and defended the Declaration of Independence before Congress. He composed most of the Massachusetts Constitution (the oldest still in use in the world), acclaimed for its bill of rights. His A Defense of the Constitutions of Government of the United States was often cited in the Constitutional Convention.

John Adams's Advocacy

Given Adams’s importance in establishing our country on the basis of liberty, we should remember his advocacy of the rights, or property, that is the content of our liberty and whose defense is the central reason our government was instituted.

"Liberties are not the grants of princes and parliaments."

"[People have] rights...antecedent to all earthly governments—rights that cannot be repealed or restrained by human laws."

"Each individual of the society has a right to be protected…in the enjoyment of his life, liberty, and property...no part of the property of any individual can, with justice, be taken from him, or applied to public uses, without his own consent."

"In a free state, every man…ought to be his own governor."

"To be commanded we do not consent."

"Liberty is [government’s] end."

"In order to have this liberty, it is requisite the government be so constituted… that one citizen need not be afraid of another citizen."

"Property must be secured, or liberty cannot exist."

"The end of…government is…the power of enjoying, in safety and tranquility, [individuals’] natural rights and the blessings of life."

"[Government]...should be...for the preservation of internal peace, virtue, and good order, as well as the defense of their lives, liberties, and properties."

"The moment the idea is admitted into society that property is not as sacred as the laws of God, and that there is not a force of law and public justice to protect it, anarchy and tyranny commence. If 'Thou shalt not covet' and 'Thou shalt not steal' were not commandments of heaven, they must be made inviolable precepts in every society before it can be civilized or made free."

"Nip the shoots of arbitrary power in the bud is the only maxim which can ever preserve the liberties of any people."

"Trust no man living with power to endanger the public liberty."

"Liberty must at all hazards be supported."

"A free constitution of civil government cannot be purchased at too dear a rate, as there is nothing on this side of Jerusalem of equal importance to mankind."

"Be not…wheedled out of your liberty by…hypocrisy, chicanery, and cowardice."

John Adams, because he recognized “an enemy to liberty [as] an enemy to human nature” and that “nothing is so terrible as the loss of their liberties,” wrote that “It has ever been my hobby-horse to see rising in America an empire of liberty.”

A Monumental Debate

Reflecting the central importance of liberty, Adams called the debate over the Declaration of Independence “the greatest question…which ever was debated in America.” Thomas Jefferson described his defense as having “a power of thought and expression that moved us from our seats.” Delegate Richard Stockton called him “the man to whom the country is most indebted…who…by the force of his reasoning demonstrated not only the justice, but the expediency of the measure.”

Adams also saw the importance of America’s revolution for the world:

Objects of the most stupendous magnitude and measure in which the lives and liberties of millions yet unborn are intimately interested, are now before us. We are in the very midst of a revolution the most complete, unexpected and remarkable of any in the history of nations.

And he made it clear why founding America on liberty was monumental: “Her cause is that of all nations and all men, and it needs nothing but to be explained and approved.” At a time when we often forget that liberty is both America’s rationale and its greatness, Americans would profit from Adams’s wisdom.

-----

Gary M. Galles is a Professor of Economics at Pepperdine University and a member of the Foundation for Economic Education faculty network. In addition to his new book, Pathways to Policy Failures (2020), his books include Lines of Liberty (2016), Faulty Premises, Faulty Policies (2014), and Apostle of Peace (2013).
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https://www.culturcidal.com/p/6-reasons ... mistake-to

6 Reasons It’s Always a Mistake to Think of Yourself as a Victim

John Hawkins

Sociologists Bradley Campbell and Jason Manning came up with a useful way of explaining how America’s culture has changed over the decades. Essentially, they believe we initially changed from a culture that revolved around honor to one that revolved around dignity. Now, we’re in the process of becoming a victim-centered culture. Here’s a short, but sweet explainer of the differences.

An honor culture revolves around the idea of being strong, brave, tough, and unwilling to accept even small insults to your good name. You still see a lot of this sort of culture in the Arab world and perhaps ironically, it shows through in the culture around rap music as well. The notorious Hatfield vs. McCoy feud and dueling fit into this sort of mindset very well.

On the other hand, a dignity culture expects people to be civilized, not particularly sensitive to slights, and to possess a sense of their own self-worth that is bigger than a petty insult. Being quick to violence, insult, or complain is looked down upon. Think of Frederick Douglass saying, “A gentleman will not insult me, and no man not a gentleman can insult me” or “sticks and stones may break my bones, but words can never hurt me” and you start to get a sense of it. If there’s a dispute, then it should ideally be talked out and if that’s not possible or it’s too severe for that, let the “authorities” handle it.

Today, America seems to be moving towards a victim culture, which borrows the sensitivity to the slights of the honor culture without any of the virtues that went along with it. It also borrows the willingness to go to the authorities of a dignity culture, without the restraint or willingness to work through problems that are part of it. In other words, it’s cowardly, weak, soft people getting offended and immediately running to the “authorities” and asking them to fix their hurt feelings. It’s essentially the same dynamic as a small boy crying to his mom after his bigger brother does something to him. In a victim-centered culture, he who is perceived as the weakest, most aggrieved, outraged, and victimized “wins.” Think about the sort of people who claim to be upset by microaggressions, cultural appropriation or that claim “words are violence” and you will get the general idea.

There are a multitude of problems with embracing victimhood, but as you are about to see, one of the biggest is that there are very few people who think of themselves as victims that end up having a good life. After you read this, you will understand why that’s the case.

1) It stops you from fixing your problems: One of the biggest advantages of taking full responsibility for your own life is that you always know exactly who has to fix what’s going wrong. It’s that person you look at in the mirror every morning when you get up. On the other hand, if you attribute all your problems to “society” or some “ism,” you have a very big problem because those are mostly out of your control.

Changing yourself can literally happen in a single moment of decision, but changing the world is an extraordinarily difficult, unpredictable process that may take decades or lifetimes if it ever happens at all. If you’re only going to be happy when you decide that “racism no longer exists,” straight men like transwomen,” or the imaginary “patriarchy stops repressing me,” you’re going to spend your whole life waiting.

2) It spurs you to create oppressors: If you have to be a victim, then you need to come up with someone or something that’s victimizing. Maybe it’s “structural racism,” “Trump fans” or “Christians.” Why, if it wasn’t for those people, life would be great!

Except, the reality is that there is no conspiracy to keep you down because very few of us are that important. White people aren’t secretly conspiring to keep minorities poor. The Jews aren’t looking to get you. There isn’t actually a patriarchy plotting to keep women down. On the contrary, the world is full of human beings ruthlessly pursuing their own interests and unless they’re given a reason to, they don’t care enough about you, me, or somebody with a victim complex to put time and energy into keeping us down.

Still, even victims need to feel like the heroes of their own stories in their minds, so they invent oppressors. This is why places like Twitter are full of angry failures railing against things other people are supposedly thinking or doing that have no basis in reality. At the end of the day, isn’t life already hard enough without creating millions of imaginary enemies in your mind that are conspiring to keep you down?

3) It traps you in a cycle of failure: Victim culture is essentially one big oppression Olympics. It encourages you to actually COMPETE WITH EACH other to be the biggest victim.

“Maybe a CIS, white woman like you shouldn’t be talking about oppression. What do you know about it compared to someone gay like me?”

“It must be so hard (snicker) being gay for a WHITE MAN like you. Try being Latino in America sometime, buddy!”

“Try being a black trans woman if you think that’s tough! Did I mention I was misgendered this morning? But, no, no, tell me how bad you have it!”

This may not be exactly the way the conversation goes, but this dynamic plays out millions of times per day in the real world and on social media these days. It puts people under never-ending pressure to find a way to claim to be the most oppressed, the most put-upon, the most victimized person – and you know what? You get what you look for in life. I promise you, if you try to spot as many red cars as possible on your way to work tomorrow morning, you know what’s going to happen? You’re going to see a lot more red cars than normal. Know what you’re not going to remember after the trip is over? How many blue cars you passed because that’s not what you’re looking for.

If you spend your whole life obsessively trying to find ways to make people pity you, you will get really good at finding them, but you know what you won’t find? Success, happiness, and reasons to succeed.
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Re: article of the day (post 'em when you find 'em)

Post by Walker »

henry quirk wrote: Sat Nov 19, 2022 6:35 pm
6 Reasons It’s Always a Mistake to Think of Yourself as a Victim

John Hawkins
Woke victimhood is why so many folks, even God deniers, need to be victims of God, and so assert that they are victims.
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vegetariantaxidermy
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Re: article of the day (post 'em when you find 'em)

Post by vegetariantaxidermy »

.
Last edited by vegetariantaxidermy on Mon Nov 21, 2022 9:18 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: article of the day (post 'em when you find 'em)

Post by henry quirk »

Walker wrote: Sat Nov 19, 2022 6:59 pmWoke victimhood is why so many folks, even God deniers, need to be victims of God, and so assert that they are victims.
👍

See... viewtopic.php?f=5&t=33261 ...for many examples.
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Re: article of the day (post 'em when you find 'em)

Post by henry quirk »

https://www.michaelzwilliamson.com/poli ... words.html

800 Years of Firearm Techie Talk in 4000 Words

Michael Z. Williamson

Jake cradled his magnum as he dove across the doorway and rolled to his feet. He shoved a fresh clip into the Glock and clicked off the safety. A dithering shadow in front of him was the zombie, and he pumped slugs into it, the casings dinging on the floor around him as the kickback beat his hand with every shot.

If you don't spot the seven errors in this paragraph, you probably aren't a gun nut.

If you know the difference between .223 and 5.56 mm, and why H&K discontinued experiments on spoon tip ammunition, you probably are.

So how to handle readers who are the latter when you're a writer who's the former?

Here's a down and dirty summary. It is not complete, but hopefully a good starting point to narrow down the research.

-----

The earliest firearms were "hand gonnes" or small cannon mounted on sticks. These were simple tubes with a touchhole for a hot match or ember.

Quickly, these developed into matchlock weapons, where a primer pan filled with a finer powder to hasten ignition was placed at the breech (rear), and a serpentine mechanism with a slow match - a cotton cord soaked in saltpeter - ignited it. This mechanism evolved to spring the coal into the pan for more precise fire. Almost none of these weapons had sights to speak of.

Sights were added early on when some target muskets were rifled - equipped with spiral grooves to grip the patch (and later the lead ball directly) to spin it for improved accuracy. Basic physics says that certain weights, speeds and lengths of bullet work better with certain rifling rates. It is possible to have bullets fly all over the place if they are not properly matched to the weapon.

Further development led to the wheellock - a clockwork sprung wheel to strike sparks against flint. Next came the snaphaunce and flintlock - the lock snapped a flint into a hardened steel frizzen, which also covered the pan containing the priming powder. These weapons consisted of lock, stock and barrel, hence the phrase.

Then someone developed the concept of a paper cartridge with pre-measured powder. Bite off the end, pour in the powder, the paper becomes wadding, and ram the ball down. Occasionally, a stray spark or coal will cause a discharge while loading. There are ways to minimize this, but in battle, sooner or later it will happen. Hopefully, it will just cause a puff and a scorch. It can sometimes mean a ramrod whistling through the air or a ball in the wrong place, meaning anywhere you don't intend for it to go. For combat loading, the ball was dropped down loose to speed the process. Accuracy lacked, but 4-6 ranks of musketeers firing in volley kept up a steady rain of lead.

The next step was the percussion lock, using stamped copper caps containing a sensitive explosive such as mercury fulminate. The rate of fire with percussion rifles was actually slower than with flintlocks, down from about four to about three aimed shots per minute. However, the reliability increased dramatically. Instead of fouling after 4-5 shots, a musket might last a dozen or two. Pointed bullets that functioned better than balls came along as well.

If the weapon was built with a rifle barrel, it was called a rifle musket. If the existing smoothbore barrel was "scratch rifled," it became a rifled musket. A short rifle, typically for cavalry, was called a carbine. A short musket might also be called a musketoon. Early muskets were approximately 60 inches long, with the carbines 4-6 inches shorter. This is a massive plot hole in "The Highwayman." If Bess's hands were bound behind her with a musket under her breast, reaching the trigger is an utter impossibility, unless she has arms like an orangutan.

Single shot breech loading rifles came in the mid 1800s, and had one of two mechanisms, either loaded after opening the breech with a lever, or later by "breaking" the weapon open at the breech. The former was more common for military weapons, since the weapon was stronger for bayonet and club use.

From then on, firearms used fixed cartridges of ammunition, consisting of a cartridge case (not "casing"), a primer, propellant, which changed from black powder (gunpowder) to cordite and other nitrated celluloses to modern smokeless propellant (not "gunpowder"), and a projectile or bullet (not a "slug" except in the case of certain shotgun loads). Rifles and pistols are measured in caliber, which is the diameter of the bullet in inches and will usually have a designator (.460 Weatherby Magnum, .600 Overkill, .30-40 Krag, .38 Colt). If there is a second number after a dash, it generally refers to propellant load (.30-30 Winchester). If there's a decimal after a slash, that's usually the bullet size and the first number is case diameter (.500/.465 Nitro Express). Caliber may also be expressed in millimeters (9mm Luger, 8mm Lebel, 7mm Mauser). Some rounds are referenced by length (7.62X54R Russian. The 54 is cartridge length in mm and the "R" means a rimmed cartridge). Light ammunition may be rimfire - the case contains primer in a soft rim. These are generally very low power and not reloadable. Centerfire is often Boxer primed - with a central hole for the primer flash. These can have the primer punched out and can be reloaded. Some is Berdan primed - several holes around the primer perimeter. These require special tooling to reload and generally are just disposed of.

Rimmed cartridges are generally used for shotguns, revolvers, lever actions. Rimless cartridges with a groove for an extractor to hook into are generally used for autoloading pistols and rifles, and modern hunting rifles. Rimfire ammo is rimmed. Rims can get in the way of the mechanism, but make proper seating in the chamber easier.

Around this same time (1860s-1870s), bolt action and lever action rifles came along, with a tubular magazine under the barrel. Round nosed bullets must be used, because pointed bullets resting on the primer of the cartridge ahead are potentially disastrous. Lever actions have the traditional lever underneath as seen in Western movies. The advantage is not having to remove the weapon from the shoulder and affect sight picture to cycle the action, so they are fast. However, the action is generally not as strong. Bolt actions require raising and pulling a handle on the bolt to the rear and forward again, which is harder to do without affecting sight picture, but the rotating lugs on the bolt lock into recesses in the receiver or barrel and are much stronger.

Repeating rifles contain a magazine to supply ammo and a bolt to seal the breech with the cartridge inside the chamber of the barrel. The firing pin is usually inside the bolt and strikes the primer after being struck by a sprung hammer, released by the trigger. The core part that everything attaches to is the receiver.

Pump or slide actions with the slide under the barrel can combine some positive attributes of both, but the sliding action affects certain stances.

The next development was a magazine that fed ammunition vertically from a stack. These were initially loaded by "en bloc" clips inserted down into the magazine. A clip holds ammunition. A magazine feeds ammunition. A clip goes into a magazine. Typically, an empty clip falls loose or is ejected as the last round is fired. With rare exceptions, such as the US Garand and Italian Carcano, en bloc clips fell out of favor before WWI. A charger, or stripper clip, fits into a recess so loose ammunition can be pushed down into the magazine, either while it is mounted on the weapon or detached. The charger is then manually discarded.

Detachable magazines consist of a body, follower that follows the last round, a spring and a base plate. They are not clips (though commonly referred to as such), as they contain springs to feed the ammunition. They usually latch into the bottom, more rarely the side or top of the weapon, and are removed with a lever when empty. Detachable magazines aid in quick unloading for safety and maintenance. Early magazine rifles continued to be loaded by chargers. Eventually, generals concluded that multiple magazines made loading faster. Modern troops typically carry magazines of 30-45 rounds capacity, and carry 6-10 of them. We've gone from a potential dozen rounds for a muzzle loader, to 50-70 rounds for early breech loaders, to 210-300 rounds or more for current troops.

Less common magazine types include rotary, coiled drum and flat drum. These can be treated similarly to box magazines for purposes of loading and using.

Self-loading rifles, also called semi-auto, use the power from firing to load the next round by cycling the bolt back against a spring. This can be done by recoil action, gas pressure in the barrel against the cartridge (blowback), or by bleeding gas off into a tube or piston thrown back against the bolt. The latter is more common with more powerful cartridges. The mechanism in a self-loader absorbs some of the recoil, which is the correct term for the force opposite the discharge.

Automatic rifles continue to fire until the trigger is released or ammunition depleted. Select fire rifles can fire semi or automatic by switching a lever.

Battle rifles are generally powerful enough to take large game (cow or elk sized), or people at 500-1000 meters, and may or may not be select fire. Assault rifles are less powerful, intended for people at under 500 meters, and are generally select fire and fed by detachable magazines. The irony here is that iron sights are almost never good beyond 500 meters anyway, and 90% of military engagements are under 100 meters.

Modern carbines are short, light rifles (20-30 inches overall) that may fire assault rifle or pistol cartridges. If select fire, they may be categorized as submachine guns. There is some leeway in these terms depending on who's defining them.

There are folding, collapsible and detachable stocks for many weapons, and interchangeable grips, slings, mounts and accessories. Earlier weapons and modern hunting guns are often sculpted or customized for a given owner. The former is more versatile and cheaper than the latter.

Nomenclature varies. In the US Army, a gun is a support weapon such as a machine gun or artillery. In the US Air Force, anything that shoots a projectile from a barrel is a gun, whether it's a GUU-5P carbine or a 105mm howitzer in an AC130 gunship. In the US Navy, guns are typically deck or shore mounted cannon. Check what's appropriate for the group you are writing about.

Machine guns are automatic-firing support weapons. Early ones loaded from a feed tray, or a cloth or metal belt with loops for cartridges, or from box or drum magazines. More rarely, they fire from a flat drum atop the receiver, or a belt which may be in a box or drum. Most modern platforms use a disintegrating link belt. The links separate from the cartridge as it is fed into the chamber, and could be gathered and reused, if necessary. Some will of course get stepped on or mechanically bent if there is a malfunction. Machine guns typically fire from the open bolt, meaning the cartridge does not get fed until the trigger is pulled. This reduces "cook offs" of ammunition firing from residual heat in the barrel. Machine guns typically are heavier than rifles - 20-35 pounds - early ones may have a water-filled jacket for cooling, and often require a crew of two to three. They may be mounted on vehicles or tripods, and usually come with extra ammunition belts, spare barrels to change when they get hot, and tools. At firing rates of 400-1400 rounds per minute, and ammunition costing 20-70c per round, machine guns are very expensive to operate as well.

Shotguns started as muzzle loaders, and can be break action with one, two, or very rarely, three or four barrels. They can be pump action (very common), revolving, lever or bolt action (unusual), or self-loading (common). Lever and pump guns are usually tube magazine fed. Bolt action usually have a detachable box magazine. Self loaders are usually tube or box fed. Shotguns are generally smoothbored, not rifled. They fire a cartridge consisting of hull or shell (the only time "Shell" is appropriate short of artillery), primer, propellant and a mass of shot, or a single large slug. Shot varies by size and density depending on the target. Dedicated slug guns are sometimes rifled to shoot more accurately, but are still shotguns, not rifles, as long as they use shotgun ammunition. Shotguns are typically hunting weapons, but are also used for police or military use for breaching doors, or for close quarters combat. They are usually measured in "Gauge," which was the number of round lead balls per pound. Gauges use to range from 4 down to 32, but 12 and 20 are standard now, with 16 and 10 being unusual. 28 gauge is reserved for certain bird hunting. .410 bore (not gauge), is used for very light game or for small shooters.

Early pistols operated as early rifles did. In the 1830s, the revolving pistol, with multiple percussion chambers in a cylinder was invented. This evolved into the single action cartridge revolver, requiring cocking an external hammer for each shot, then the double action revolver that also allowed direct trigger pulls to fire. Some modern ones are double action only with no external hammer. A self-loading handgun is categorized as a pistol. Pistol and revolver are no longer interchangeable terms technically, with a very few exceptions. There are single-shot break action and cannon breech pistols for hunting and target shooting, and bolt action single shot and repeating pistols as well. These are generally not small. Autoloading pistols are usually recoil or blowback operated. Revolvers generally don't have external safeties, nor do GLOCK pistols and some concealable pistols.

Watch your thesaurus. Revolver, pistol, automatic, magnum and other terms may all refer to a handgun, but likely not the same handgun. The basis of a handgun is called a frame, and self-loaders normally have a slide around the barrel instead of a bolt inside.

Typical handgun fights take place under 10 meters, often under 3. The very short sight radius and lack of supporting mass greatly affect the range. Nor are handguns as effective as rifles. Dirty Harry's .44 Magnum is about as powerful as a standard assault rifle. At 400 meters, an assault rifle is as powerful as a .45 Auto is at the muzzle. Remember that assault rifles are light and low power as far as rifles go.

Sights have advanced from a simple bead at the muzzle. Open sights with adjustable ramps and notches at the rear and a friction fit front sight are popular for many hunting rifles. You adjust them with a light mallet. Modern military and hunting rifles usually have a rear aperture "peep" sight and a post front sight. These are adjusted with screw threads. Increasingly, optical sights are popular, and many commercial rifles are sold without any sights so the user can add their own. The common telescopic sight has a cross reticle, and may also have marks for estimating size and range. Reflection off the objective lens can be reduced with a metal mesh or pantyhose. Head up display sights display a reticle on a screen that makes targeting very fast. This allows one to keep both eyes for better awareness. There are adapters for these for magnification or night vision. Laser sights place a red, green or infrared dot on the target, but there is a risk of being observed in return. All sights have to be zeroed for a pre-chosen distance, and rise and fall accounted for at other distances. Most modern military and many civilian weapons have standardized 1" rails, also called 1913 or Picatinny rails after the US Army arsenal that invented them. These rails have numbered slots to make mounting optics or accessories consistent.

Flash suppressors reduce flash, and more importantly, direct it away from the shooter's sight plane. Muzzle brakes help reduce recoil and muzzle climb by directing gases to the sides or rear. Suppressors, commonly called silencers, reduce muzzle flash, and can reduce muzzle noise by 35 dB or so, but rarely actually silence a 110-150 dB report. Subsonic ammo helps by eliminating the supersonic crack of travel. Tuning the propellant to ensure it is consumed in the barrel reduces flash.

Firearms malfunction. Revolvers are less prone to do so, but if they fail, they generally cannot be fixed without tools, especially if a bullet jams between cylinder and barrel, and may be beyond repair depending on the problem. They are fitted to tight tolerance and hard to work on, except for minor things such as replacing springs, sights and grips. Autoloaders may fail to feed (cycling the action will usually fix this), fail to eject (remove the magazine, cycle. If that fails, push the empty out with a cleaning rod), stovepipe - empty case stuck in the action (Cycle the action). They are usually easier to fix than revolvers. Modern spare parts are readily interchangeable with minor fitting. In any firearm, the magazine and feeding mechanism are the usual failure points. It is rare but not unheard of for barrels to fail catastrophically (explode), bolts to rip out of receivers, cartridges to burst.

Guns do not "go off." No matter how broken it is, outside agents must cause it to fire. Certain guns can fire if jarred or jolted. Most modern guns have multiple safety mechanisms to prevent this. If someone has a gun "go off," it means they screwed up.

Maintenance involves cleaning first and foremost. Black powder and early propellant, as well as some primers, leave corrosive residue. Mechanisms require cleaning and oiling. Eventually, springs and sear surfaces wear out. Precision firearms will need retuned to keep them to spec. Earlier firearms will suffer wood warpage from heat and humidity. Wood can rot, plastic can be affected by solvents, wear and tear will damage finishes. Surfaces can be blued by heat or chemical action, oxidized or phosphated, or painted with various lacquers, varnishes, epoxies. Anodizing, powder coating and hydrographic transfers are common these days.

Cartridges tossed into a fire or crushed will burst like low-grade fireworks once the primer is heated or deformed enough. The case almost always fails before the bullet ejects, and damage is minimal.

Ammunition can be reloaded to save money, for greater precision, for specific qualities, or when unavailable and not in production. The tools needed are fairly simple, and dies exist to shape a number of cases from existing blanks. Modern cartridges will fire in a vacuum; the oxidizer is in the propellant. Most military rounds are lacquered and will withstand considerable immersion in water. Firing underwater is not advised, due to increased pressure in the barrel.

Bullets follow a parabola when fired, as they are unpowered in flight. Unless the muzzle is pointed above plane, the bullet will only drop. Spun bullets precess slightly in flight, and the longer they are, the faster they must be spun for stability. Longer bullets tend to be more massive, but it is the length that matters, not the mass. If the bullet is supersonic, it will oscillate as it drops through transonic, and lose accuracy. Wind, rain, intervening material all affect accuracy.

Pretty much all modern bullets can be stopped by 6" of sandbag (the exception being a few heavy machine guns that are effectively light cannon). Modern rifles can shoot through cars, unless they hit an engine, transmission or differential. Much sentiment is bandied about regarding certain rounds "turning cover [barriers] into concealment," but it is largely sentiment. At moderate range (100 meters or less) most military rifles of any caliber will shoot through body armor unless it contains hard plates. Modern armor will stop most pistol rounds. However, soft armor will have backface deformation which can be up to 4" with some shotgun loads. This will cause critical injuries.

Bullets do not throw people back. Demonstrations exist that a .308 battle rifle at under a meter will move a person in armor a couple of centimeters. Any such reaction to being hit is neurological, not physical.

Bullets kill in four ways. By hitting the central nervous system - brain, brain stem. This is effectively instantaneous. They can hit critical organs - heart, liver, kidneys. This can take several seconds to several minutes. Trauma from energy applied to target is lethal if the cartridge is powerful enough, or if enough bullets hit. Finally, blood loss is fatal and may take seconds to hours.

The basics of firearm handling and safety can be taught in a few hours. It's not rocket science, and children are capable of learning supervised firearm handling before learning the balance necessary to ride a bike. Precision shooting depends on the individual and the type of shooting involved, from days to years.

Proper safety dictates that the first and last actions are to check the chamber, and to always unload a weapon before cleaning or maintaining. For mechanical tests, dummy cartridges and "snap caps" exist, or empty cases can be used.

Any machine shop with proper blueprints can build firearms in short order. A well-equipped garage can serve for slow production. Hand tools take longer, but it's been done. In the US, it is legal under federal law to manufacture a weapon for personal use, not commercial resale, as long as it complies with length and type restrictions. Registration is not required. States and cities have their own laws, however.

Various countries have various laws. Often, firearms before a given year - typically 1898-1900 - are exempt from regulation. Regulation may vary from licenses and taxes to prohibitions. Do your research. As with anything, there is a black market, but very few licensed dealers subject to inspections will go along with the cliché of selling to someone with "an honest face" without paperwork. The penalties include jail, loss of license, business and inventory. Likewise, no one buys a handgun in a gun store or pawn shop in Chicago, for example. Handguns are prohibited there (this is being challenged legally as of this writing). Using these clichés will cause your knowledgeable readers to throw the book across the room. Online sales must be transferred through a dealer. Dealer sales at a gun show, as at a store, are run through the NICS system (National Instant Criminal Background Check System), despite what may be reported elsewhere. Face to face sales between private citizens making occasional personal sales are permissible within state, but the state may have additional requirements. Again, criminal elements will do as they wish, but legitimate buyers and sellers will abide by the law. Be prepared to justify your story.

Currently, 48 US states have some provision for personal open or concealed carry of firearms. Rifles and shotguns are generally easier to carry, though hunting laws come into play even for non-hunters. Rural and agricultural states tend to be more lenient.

Generally, criminals tend to prefer readily available and concealable firearms - about what armed citizens and police carry. Assault rifles and machine guns are expensive, bulky and not very discreet or useful for holdups, and are thus very rarely used in crime.

Currently, good rifles start at $70 for surplus Russian Mosin Nagant 91/30s. Shotguns range from $70 for used single shots. The high end of both can run to tens of thousands for custom target or hunting guns. Junk handguns start at $70. Reliable ones run used from $150 on up. Does your character know which ones are good? What resources does he have for buying, and what time frame does he have?
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Re: article of the day (post 'em when you find 'em)

Post by Walker »

We’re Thankful for Our Abortions

"Many people who have abortions celebrate their experience. Here’s why my colleagues and I at We Testify are thankful."
By Nikiya Natale

NOVEMBER 24, 2022
https://www.thenation.com/article/socie ... abortions/


Commentary: Giving thanks for an abortion, on Thanksgiving Day, is The Left's true Spirit of Gratitude! It's time for them to start developing rituals and traditions for this Woke Celebration. Possibilities abound for expressions of their true, heartfelt gratitude. I wonder if they light candles? They even bear witness and testify, like in the bible.

A possibility is the new perfect gift for the Thanksgiving celebration! A charm bracelet with the little skulls and bones of the aborted. Not the zygote stage of development. The stage where they have a little skull. You know what they say about charm bracelets. The more charms, the more charming.
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Re: article of the day (post 'em when you find 'em)

Post by henry quirk »

https://ncc-1776.org/tle2022/tle1183-20221120-04.html

On the Militia Part 1

by D. McKenzie Smith

This article will explore the subject of who controls the country. It will be a lesson in the Constitution and fundamentals of freedom. Most people have no concept of their own history. This is largely the responsibility of the public school systems and the major media. This ignorance is intentional. We will have to go through a fair amount of basics before looking at any specifics.

I have been a history student and a student of legal history in particular for well over four decades. I have also been a Corpsman in the Army, a Red Cross instructor of Basic and Advanced First Aid, and an NRA firearms Safety Instructor, aside from working in several professions, from managing high rise apartment buildings to precision manufacture of printing machinery.

One of our first tasks is to define some terms that people have come to misunderstand.

The United States was created as a Republic. The quick proof of that comes from the National Anthem, "The Battle Hymn of the Republic", from the pledge of allegiance to the flag, "...and to the Republic for which it stands...", and from the Constitution itself. The Constitution guarantees a 'republican' form of government in Article IV, Section 4.

So why do people think the U. S. is, or is supposed to be, a democracy? Because that is what lots of uninformed people and liars say it is.

The outstanding attribute of a Republic is that it guarantees to every individual and to any minority that their natural rights may not be interfered with. In fact, the Declaration of Independence charges government with the task of protecting rights. This means that, if there is a right in usage or recognized by the courts, the government must defend those rights against any encroachments.

In a democracy, on the other hand, the majority makes the rules. If 51% of the people decide to make private property into State property, or to force everyone to work on their birthday, that becomes the law of the land. There is no protection for the individual or for any minority.

The founders of the U. S. called democracy 'mobocracy', and considered it to be completely unstable. Benjamin Franklin compared democracy to two wolves and a sheep, discussing what was on the menu for dinner.

Another term most people have been miseduacated on is 'rights' There are basically two kinds of rights: natural and civil.

Natural rights are a part of being human. The founders considered natural rights to be given to people by God Himself. Samuel Adams put it exactly that way, "You have rights antecedent to all earthly governments; rights that cannot be repealed or restrained by human laws; rights derived from the Great Legislator of the universe." The government they fought our war of independence against did not recognize, much less protect, these rights. According to the Declaration of Independence, these are the rights that governments were created to protect.

It is natural rights that the government may not alter or interfere with. This maxim has been confirmed many times over the centuries. Miranda v Arizona, 384 US 436 is a comparatively recent (1966) acknowledgment of that fact. It states, "Where rights secured by the constitution are involved, there can be no rule making or legislation which would abrogate [rights]." That's pretty clear. If there is a natural right, the government may not make any 'law', rule, regulation or otherwise that would interfere with the right.

Civil rights, on the other hand, are created by government. They are government 'privileges', and therefore not real 'rights' at all. The universal understanding of such things is that the creator of something controls that thing. If government created a 'right', is may control, regulate, condition or remove that 'right' if it wishes.

The difference is quite clear, once one recognizes the origin of a 'right'. In the case of natural rights, the government, as the servant of the people, is tasked with protecting us in the enjoyment of our natural rights. That same government is not allowed to interfere with any natural right. Civil 'rights' may be changed or removed at any time.

So, when someone talks about regulating a right or removing it entirely, they are either talking about a civil 'right', or they are talking treason: violation of the Constitution.

Here's another important issue that most people have never heard expressed or explained.

The North American colonies were originally created by people seeking either religious freedom or economic freedom, or both. The government in Britain at the time also used the colonies as a place to send 'undesirables'. We were British subjects who had some rights that had been fought for over centuries. The king and Parliament basically left the colonies alone, until they became richer and more productive.

Then 'our' government began managing us as assets. We had been largely left to govern ourselves for a hundred and fifty years, and resented being controlled or taxed without our input into the process. The 'children' had grown up.

What we 'colonists' resented and resisted was not taxation. It was 'taxation without representation'. When the colonies resisted being regulated without any say in the matter, King and Parliament did what most governments do; they applied force. We colonists fought off the most powerful military in the world at the time. Our revolution was against 'our own government'!

The 'take away' from this little bit of our history is that free people, or people who believe they are and ought to be free, will resist being treated like children or property.

After fighting the war of independence, the founders were not about to create another powerful central government. Keep that fact in mind. It is pivotal. The men who formed the new union through the Constitution made it quite clear that they were creating a federal government with very few, very limited powers.

Remember also that, after that war, the States were separate nations with all the authorities of thirteen fully fledged nations. They also had no intention of giving up all authority to any new central government.

Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution is the list of the powers 'We the people...' and the States granted to the new national government.

The Bill of Rights is a statement of things the feds must do or may not do. The Second Amendment even uses the term 'infringed', which means the federal power is not allowed to touch upon the subject, much less materially interfere with it.

Of the ten items in the Bill of Rights, the last two make this concept absolutely clear. Powers (authorities) not granted to the federal government were retained by the States and the People.

The courts have agreed with these principles many times. An example is, "The government of the United States is one of delegated powers alone." (U. S. v Cruickshank, 92 US 542)

Another concept that people are not educated in is 'sovereignty'. That means ownership and control. Sovereigns rule; subjects obey.

As noted above, after the war for independence, the States were 'sovereign' over their internal and external operations.

As far as their personal lives were concerned, the People were sovereign. Consider this early ruling on the matter. "The people of this State, as the successors of its former sovereign (King George III) are entitled to all the rights formerly belonging to the king." (Lansing v Smith, 4 Wend 9, New York) Many other courts have restated that maxim over the years. One stated that sovereignty remains with the people. (Yick Wo v Hopkins, 118 US 356)

Many of the State constitutions clearly mandate that the people are the owners of government; not the other way around. Pennsylvania is one good example. "All power is inherent in the people, and all free governments are founded on their authority and instituted for their peace, safety and happiness. For the advance of these ends, they have at all times an inalienable and indefeasible right to alter, reform or abolish their government in such manner as they may think proper." (emphasis added)

West Virginia's Constitution agrees in its section 3.3; Rights Reserved to the People. Virtually all the State Constitutions carry similar statements. The federal government received all its powers from the People and the States. I will state the maxim again for emphasis: neither the States nor the People intended to give the federal government much power.

Literally all the founders intended the Constitution to limit what the federal government they were creating could do.

Our first President, George Washington, explained what governments are with this statement, "Government is not eloquence. It is not reason - it is force! Like fire it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master." Bottom line: governments are force. And the founders intended to prevent much of that force at the federal level.

Thomas Jefferson put it this way, "Let no more be heard of confidence in man (humans in powerful positions), but bind him down from mischief by the chains of the Constitution."

Many people are of the mistaken opinion that, if something is made' law', it must be obeyed. The Constitution says that the government may not make laws that violate rights.

American Jurisprudence is a compilation and simplification of tons of legal rulings that explain or define 'laws'. Here is what Am Jur says about unconstitutional 'laws'.

"The general rule is that an unconstitutional statute, though having the form and name of law, is in reality no law, and in legal contemplation is as inoperative as if it had never been passed..."

"Since an unconstitutional law is void, the general principles follow that it imposes no duties, confers no rights, creates no office, bestows no power or authority on anyone, affords no protection, and justifies no act performed under it. No one is bound to obey an unconstitutional law and no courts are bound to enforce it, because only the valid legislative intent becomes the law to be enforced by the courts." (11th Am Jur, Constitutional Law Section 148, p. 827)

Abraham Lincoln, though he often did the opposite of what he said, made some accurate statements on sovereignty and power. He said, "Our safety, our liberty, depends upon preserving the Constitution as our fathers made it inviolate. The people of the United States are the rightful masters of both the Congress and the courts - not to overthrow the Constitution, but to overthrow the men who pervert the Constitution." One should ask, how would a people overthrow a tyrant with lots of power, unless the people had greater power, and were not afraid to use it?

Many of the States included statements of supremacy in their State Constitutions. Here is one example. "Right of Revolution: Government being instituted for the common benefit, protection, and security of the whole community, and not for the, interests or emoluments of any one man, family or class of men; therefore, whenever the ends of government are perverted, and the public liberty manifestly endangered, and all other means of redress are ineffectual, the people may, and of right ought to, reform the old, or establish a new government. The doctrine of non-resistance against arbitrary power and oppression is absurd, slavish and destructive of the good and happiness of mankind." (Article X of the Constitution of New Hampshire) Another is from Tennessee, which says largely the same thing.

The common sense question must be asked, 'How can people control 'their servants' in government, if they have no power to control anything, because they have been disarmed?' Those with the guns make the rules. Everyone else just hopes the ones in control will be good guys.

The Germans found out the hard way that slick talkers like Hitler had no real concern for the people. Under the Nazis, if the German people did not do as they were told, they were thrown into the concentration camps. Stalin and Mao simply killed off any dissidents. Most other governments have been less 'unkind', but still control what people can do.

One thing the founders feared and intended to prevent was federal control of an army. They set up the militia system instead.

Alexander Hamilton noted, in one of 'The Federalist Papers, "..if circumstances should at any time oblige the government to form an army of any magnitude that army can never be formidable to the liberties of the people while there is a large body of citizens, little if at all inferior to them [the army] in discipline and use of arms, who stand ready to defend their own rights and those of their fellow citizens."(The Federalist Papers, Alexander Hamilton, p. 210)

Noah Webster, another of the founders agreed, making this statement, "The supreme power in America cannot enforce unjust laws by the sword [force]; because the whole body of the people are armed, and constitute a force superior to any band of regular troops that can be, on any pretense, raised in the United States."

The militia was created to protect the People and the States from the federal government.

If the federal government needed troops to repel an invader, they could call upon the States for manpower. If the governors of the States agreed, they could send troops. If they did not accept the federal 'reasons', they could and did refuse to allow their militia troops to be used in a federal army. During the War of 1812, most of New England refused to let the federal government have their militias, because the feds planned to invade Canada. The States refused to have their troops involved in invading 'a foreign nation'. Several States actually gathered for a convention i(n) Hartford to discuss secession from the union, if the federal government began involving them in 'foreign wars'.

Art. I, sect. 8, para. 12 makes it abundantly clear that the federal power was not to keep up an army of its own. Armies controlled by large central governments have historically been used against the local and regional governments as well as against the people.

But the federal government now has all the conventional military power under its direct control. This includes the Army, Navy, Marines, Coast Guard, Reserves and the 'National Guard'. Yes, even the 'Guard' has been mislabeled as the militia. For one thing, it is not under the control of the State.

When Reagan was President, he took some bad advice, and ordered Guard units to Nicaragua for 'summer training'. Several governors noted that the Guard was (supposedly) for use only within the U. S. and refused to allow State troops to go. But the President threatened to arrest several Governors for disobeying him, so they relented and let the troops go outside the country. This is one more example of usurpation by the federal government: the taking of power it was never granted.

Further, the U. S. Senate noted a few years ago that the 'National Guard' consists of federal troops. We have been told that the "Guard" is another name for the militia. But that was another lie. It has nothing to do with the militia. "That the National Guard is not the militia referred to in the Second Amendment is even more clear today. Congress had organized the National Guard under its power to 'raise and support armies' and not its power to 'Provide for organizing, arming and disciplining the militia'. The modern National Guard was specifically intended to avoid status as the Constitutional militia, a distinction recognized by 10 USC 311[a]." (Subcommittee on the Constitution of the Senate Judiciary Committee, 1982)

This statement proves both that the Congress understands what the real militia is, and that the Congress that created the 'Guard' knew it was violating the Constitution by creating one more permanent federal military force.

Next week: On the Militia Part 2, the Second Amendment
Copyright D. Mckenzie Smith, 2022.
promethean75
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Re: article of the day (post 'em when you find 'em)

Post by promethean75 »

henry's a gun techie then. that article was a good speed-read. alright everybody list all the guns that u have ever owned or shot or both.

here's mine in actual chronological order. Note the gradual increase in caliber as the young prom grows to become an avid hunter and sportsman.

0.  water gun
1.  BB gun
2.  break barrel single shot 4-10 shotgun
3.  bolt action .22 caliber rifle
4.  20 guage semi-automatic shotgun
5.  12 guage semi automatic shotgun
6.  12 guage pump action shotgun
7.  .30-30 lever action rifle
8.  .30-06 semi automatic rifle
9.  muzzle loader black powder rifle
10.  .22 snub nose revolver
11.  .44 'blackhawk' magnum revolver
12.  .380 semi automatic pistol
13.  9 mm semi automatic pistol

never shot a machine gun, assault rifle or bazooka.
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vegetariantaxidermy
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Re: article of the day (post 'em when you find 'em)

Post by vegetariantaxidermy »

What a vile dog turd of an excuse for a human being.
Puke. I'm so over hearing about moronic yanks and their revolting gun obsession. Y'all need to just go fuck yourselves.
And that's not the reason for the endless mass shootings. Never encountered a nice American yet. Their TV shows consist almost entirely of people being incredibly nasty and vicious to each other, and this is what passes as 'comedy' over there. You know, the fat/bespectacled/nerdy ones who are mercilessly tormented and bullied by the allegedly 'hot', popular ones, to the point where the only shocking part is how they manage to NOT commit suicide. This is the diet that children are fed from a young age, so it's no wonder you end up with young people wanting to shoot up schools. When you are fed shit like that from birth then something is going to give (and it clearly 'gives' quite regularly). It's easy to see what's likely to happen when they have access to 'mom' and dad's beloved collection of dild.. um...I mean guns.
FFS. Learn how to parent, and maybe you wouldn't bring forth such obnoxious brat children who grow into homicidal ones.
Last edited by vegetariantaxidermy on Sun Nov 27, 2022 6:42 am, edited 1 time in total.
promethean75
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Re: article of the day (post 'em when you find 'em)

Post by promethean75 »

the fat and/or nerdy guy/girl that everybody picks on is a stock character in drama and all cultures use it in their media.
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vegetariantaxidermy
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Re: article of the day (post 'em when you find 'em)

Post by vegetariantaxidermy »

promethean75 wrote: Sun Nov 27, 2022 4:12 am the fat and/or nerdy guy/girl that everybody picks on is a stock character in drama and all cultures use it in their media.
Bullshit. It's a way of life over there. I remember reading about Janis Joplin and her devastation at being voted the 'ugliest man on campus'. What other countries have 'awards' at school for things like 'most/least likely to succeed'? How the fuck would anyone know that? And what does 'succeed' mean anyway? 'Most likely to become a billionaire arms dealer'? I don't recall the term 'popular' ever being used at school. That's straight from American culture. And it doesn't even mean what it's supposed to mean. What a surprise. Just because that shit has poisoned other countries doesn't mean it originated in them.
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