Inside the cold, calculating libertarian mind
Perhaps more intriguingly, when libertarians reacted to moral dilemmas and in other tests, they displayed less emotion, less empathy and less disgust than either conservatives or liberals. They appeared to use “cold” calculation to reach utilitarian conclusions about whether (for instance) to save lives by sacrificing fewer lives. They reached correct, rather than intuitive, answers to math and logic problems, and they enjoyed “effortful and thoughtful cognitive tasks” more than others do.
The researchers found that libertarians had the most “masculine” psychological profile, while liberals had the most feminine, and these results held up even when they examined each gender separately, which “may explain why libertarianism appeals to men more than women.”
All Americans value liberty, but libertarians seem to value it more. For social conservatives, liberty is often a means to the end of rolling back the welfare state, with its lax morals and redistributive taxation, so liberty can be infringed in the bedroom. For liberals, liberty is a way to extend rights to groups perceived to be oppressed, so liberty can be infringed in the boardroom. But for libertarians, liberty is an end in itself, trumping all other moral values.
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Honey, make a cogent argument worthy of facts. As it is, you are content with your ignorance.
cozmo on September 29, 2012 at 11:25 PM
“Honey” eh?
I’ll stay on the side of Jim DeMint and the “ignorant” social conservatives, and you stand over there with your progressive buddies.
Now we know where we stand, isn’t that great?
Rebar on September 29, 2012 at 11:31 PM
And just what progressive views do I hold oh wise one?
cozmo on September 29, 2012 at 11:35 PM
Using Alinsky debate tactics, for one. Being a pedantic little troll, for seconds.
Rebar on September 29, 2012 at 11:40 PM
Ain’t you the one screaming for facts? Yet, you have none.
cozmo on September 29, 2012 at 11:43 PM
I posted facts, you posted ad hominems.
But I do look forward to you trolling my next topic though, don’t be discouraged because this one made you look silly.
Rebar on September 29, 2012 at 11:46 PM
each person is allowed to live their own personal way so long as it does not interfere with any other’s liberty. Each person is responsible for their actions even though many actions they are allowed to do make it impossible for them to be responsible. Responsible people being responsible will want to make sure the irresponsible do not die while the irresponsible will take advantage of the responsible in order to remain irresponsible. The laws will restrict the responsible from making the irresponsible responsible.
They really think this will work. Yeah, they are cold calculating people that come up with RIGHT answers… Sure.
astonerii on September 29, 2012 at 11:49 PM
If that is what you think…bless your heart little one.
cozmo on September 29, 2012 at 11:53 PM
The way I see it is that there are three main issues that Libertarians and social conservatives disagree on: gay marriage, drug legalization, and abortion..
Here is my social conservative take:
Gay marriage is NOT a libertarian position. Getting the government MORE involved in personal lives and PROTECTING select sexual orientation groups is NOT small government.
Second abortion is a philosophical disagreement, because social conservative believe without life there is NO other rights.
Drug legalization is fine with me if you can find a way to make DEMOCRATS disappear. If you can’t, then I can guarantee that lazy drug addicts will be considered victims and I WILL HAVE TO PAY FOR THEIR A$$ES.
I don’t know many social conservative other than your libertarian boogie man Santorum who cares about pornography and even Santorum has said that he doesn’t want to make contraceptive illegal.
I agree with him that there is no absolute right to privacy in the constitution. And almost ALL laws are founded on the principle that thing in private can be illegal. Chief Justice Thomas agrees with this sentiment.
That being said, I would be more than happy to let the above issues be decided by the states. Unfortunately AGAIN short of getting rid of all liberals- ain’t gonna happen. So I remain in direct opposition of policies that will cause my wallet to shrink via Democrat legislation.
melle1228 on September 29, 2012 at 11:57 PM
So I took their little moral foundations quiz. Anyone else? Apparently I value everything much less than liberals or conservatives except liberty (nearly maxed out) and property. Woot?
Figured they could use more data, especially from a female libertarian. A libertarian without the interest in drugs and hookers, iow. I actually consider myself very empathetic, just a bit more circumspective. And logical, apparently.
VerbumSap on September 30, 2012 at 12:04 AM
It depends on the libertarian. Rabid libertarians tend to not get elected. Ron Paul being the exception to the rule, and when it comes to pork, he ain’t exactly libertarian.
Contrary to the ignorant who try to define libertarianism, most libertarians do not support laws for gay marriage. they just don’t have a problem with gay couples being able to take advantage of the perks of marriage. Most libertarians are not for across the board drug legalization and realize that even small steps in that direction can lead to problems. A large percentage of libertarians see a child in the womb as a person, with rights, who is the responsibility of the persons who created that child.
cozmo on September 30, 2012 at 12:06 AM
First, if a person wants to destroy or kill himself, he will.
Second, laws aren’t really solving the drug or prostitution issues, are they?
John the Libertarian on September 30, 2012 at 12:08 AM
Not so long as the federal government back stops bad choices and pays people to be degenerates.
astonerii on September 30, 2012 at 12:10 AM
Here is the thing. It used to be shame was a VERY POWERFUL force. If you were shamed, it was not just in internal feeling. You were also shunned. Being shunned meant a very miserable life alone if not death. Not so much anymore with uncle sam paying them to be degenerates. Shame no longer works.
astonerii on September 30, 2012 at 12:15 AM
There’s nothing touchy or feely about it. It’s absolute faith in free markets without restriction, which is far to the right of your position. You’re confusing liberty with libertine. Liberty requires a lot of personal responsibility.
Pot is a weed that grows naturally. Opium poppies grow naturally. Cocao grows naturally. If people want to take them, they’re going to take them. No law is going to stop them.
Marriage should be a contract between two individuals, and the State should have no business in it.
Abortion is a touchy subject, because it depends on the definition of at what point the baby is considered a human life. So blame the courts.
John the Libertarian on September 30, 2012 at 12:19 AM
I agree. And it’s a shame, no pun intended. But historically, going back to the Roman empire and even further back, the fertility cults were rampant and bad behavior was rampant and there has always been a sordid underbelly of society that cannot be reasoned with. I sure as hell don’t want to support or underwrite profligates.
One of the key problems is lack of education. Blame the liberals once again. Girls MUST be taught that if they get pregnant outside of wedlock, they are in for a world of hurt. Instead, our compassion says “let’s take of the poor souls who are just too stupid.” And because we’re taking care of those single moms financially, it encourages more of them to go that route.
John the Libertarian on September 30, 2012 at 12:26 AM
I am a rare bird: a female, pro-life, libertarian. The government should protect us from those who would illicitly infringe on our lives (thus pro-life), our liberty and our property. The government should also provide for the common defense and basic infrastructure. Everything else is the realm of the private sector.
That is the ideal, but I am not naive enough to think that we will ever see that type of government.
darcee on September 30, 2012 at 12:28 AM
That is the thing. It was kept underground. Thus it did not spread far and wide and was not a major influence on children at an early age. For the most part, I agree with much of what you talk about. The problem is that it cannot work from where we are now, and never worked the way you see it working.
I think people should be allowed to smoke and take coke and what ever…
I do not care what two people do behind closed doors.
I do think that life begins at conception. So, that one I cannot budge on.
But the libertarian way says that those two people should not be forced to only do it behind closed doors.
I dunno how libertarians deal with drug users, but my idea is that allowing companies to discriminate against them would be enough to deter most people from doing it. Freedom of association. I also do not think that pot should be allowed to be smoked in semi public semi enclosed spaces, it is well known you can get high off second hand pot smoke. Again here, if you can do it and not screw with people out in public, great and fine.
I want the deviant behavior left behind doors, I do not want it out on the street or on public digital airwaves. If they offend me and corrupt my child, that is damaging my liberty. Raising a child with my values has always been considered such a basic liberty it was not even written down. Those that were written down were fears people had of the government…
astonerii on September 30, 2012 at 12:42 AM
Not so underground. The Romans had massive orgies and routinely raped children. The Canaanites and Phoenicians were far worse when they wanted a healthy harvest.
You hit the nail on the head that private employers can and should test applicants and employees. And, hey ho!, let’s bring back the work requirement for welfare recipients, Obama!
I don’t want profligacy shoved in my face, or my child’s face, either. Fortunately, with the exception of San Francisco and Amsterdam, most of this behavior is kept very private. Once in awhile you’ll see people smoking pot at rock concerts, but good grief, it was far worse 30 years ago than it it today.
John the Libertarian on September 30, 2012 at 12:52 AM
We know where the Romans are. All those orgies were not for the masses, but for the privileged who frequently had their way with their slaves, male and female and likely of the civilians they had dragged in for their pleasure. The indulgences led to apathy and their sins became the end of them. Those in power did not learn, did not study, did not better themselves. The populous lost faith in them, and did not produce well for them. Eventually they led to the arena to entertain the people to get their minds off how bad things had become and give them enemies to place blame for their hardships. Each deprivation led to an even worse one, until they were defenseless against an Army that a few generations prior would have been laughed off and torn asunder in a a few weeks time.
The societies that brought us through to the present age were based on judeo christian morals. In fact, they set the foundation for our nation. It has been the ever departure of our heritage that has caused the perpetual degradation of liberty.
You insult a mans woman today, you can walk away or even earn a nice paycheck with a lawsuit. In our nations founding years, you might find yourself beaten with several people holding you down if not more rarely called to defend yourself in a shootout.
I am quite positive that libertarians today would argue that an insult is not an infringement on your liberty allowing you to beat the man up. But the glory days of libertarianism (the founding years) most certainly left that as a possibility. It was not so much libertarian back then, people were having their liberties trampled on all the time by other people. Liberty was freedom from oppression by the government. You still had to stay on the good side of the good people of a good community to remain at liberty.
astonerii on September 30, 2012 at 1:09 AM
I guess I don’t draw much of a distinction between this behavior and rabid Muslims rioting because their “prophet” was insulted.
Unfortunately, and I will be the first to admit this, libertarianism is predicated on the idealistic notion that people tend to behave rationally. That is not often the case. Which is why it will forever be an “ideal” to strive for, never attained.
And, as I get older, I realize that even though legalizing something does not necessarily condone it, the fact is, this is precisely the societal reaction to said legalization.
I have seen personal stories in which the only thing stopping a heroin addict from robbing his family blind is that heroin use is illegal. The family had no other recourse.
Just for the record, the patron economic system of Rome was widespread. Anyone who had financial superiority could indulge, and they did. But more than that, fertility religions believed that promiscuity was good for the harvest. They used to toss babies into the garbage. It was the Christians who would care for them.
John the Libertarian on September 30, 2012 at 1:21 AM
You expect facts from the Retar?
You’ve a better chance of getting facts from the horse that kicked the the Retar in the head when he was a child.
JohnGalt23 on September 30, 2012 at 1:25 AM
I know you mean well with libertarianism, and as you said, it requires everyone act a certain way. Many liberals mean well with the government as welfare provider. People are not perfect.
Like I said, I agree with many of your positions. I just do not see how some of them work.
Remember a while back my equation…
diversity = conflict
larger diversity = larger conflict
This is your argument that you see it like rioting muslims…
In order to keep parties from having those riots, you need to use the violence of government force to make them do what they do not want to do, tolerate one another.
This why we have so many laws. Because people are so diverse. If you could get rid of much of the diversity by maybe having them move to one state or another based on their personal culture, many laws could be avoided. But then you have family ties that prevent people from wanting to separate.
astonerii on September 30, 2012 at 1:30 AM
Libertarianism in today’s society requires people to be educated and rational.
I retreat to the libertarianism of our founding documents. We never had a welfare state back then. I would argue that everyone on the frontier and pushing westward were libertarians.
John the Libertarian on September 30, 2012 at 1:36 AM
I agree with you to the point that once a man laid an insult down, he was no longer at liberty, the other person was free to exact a punishment of his choice and the rest of the people accepted this as acceptable. The act was considered an engagement if you will. The aggressor was freely taking himself out of protection of his liberty perhaps?
astonerii on September 30, 2012 at 1:42 AM
I really don’t know how this relates to libertarianism. But as a man, if someone disrespects my woman or my child, they’re going to spitting teeth after I’m through with them, the law be damned.
John the Libertarian on September 30, 2012 at 1:50 AM
Okay then … when is the last time a “social conservative” infringed upon bedroom liberty?
On the other hand, when government involvement in personal relationships is expanded to include homosexual marriages (to the cheers of progressive libertarians), will those same libertarians rush in to defend the rights of parents who don’t want their kids to be taught in their public schools that homosexual marriage is morally equivalent to heterosexual marriage?
Why should conservatives worry about what libertarians think anyway? Libertarians ride conservatives’ coattails because so many of them are nasty and irascible team players who they can’t accomplish much on their own — as evidenced by their perennial failure in elections.
RightKlik on September 30, 2012 at 1:50 AM
Ah, my other personal troll, same Alinsky tactics though.
You never did explain how Romney beat Paul 3-1 in his own district, btw.
Rebar on September 30, 2012 at 1:58 AM
That is how the law came into being. People determined that an individual who was insulted or defending their woman might exact more revenge than warranted. In many cases back in those days, while the people allowed the insulted leeway to attack the insulter, they would also have to sometimes pull him off in the end. People are not rational, particularly at all times. Even educated ones. particularly drunk or high educated ones. Something has to be there as a deterrence.
You do not want to go from an insulted party to a murderer. Now society has moved the post all the way down to where the person insulting you not only cannot be held to account, but if he is, then you will end up owing him money. The law went too far in favor of free speech. The government may not infringe on freedom of speech, I am looking for the clause that says that speech has to be 100% perfectly protected from consequences.
You would be right to defend your woman. If it was left to a black eye and sore stomach and no broken bones, I think society should leave you be. We need decency.
astonerii on September 30, 2012 at 2:00 AM
Exactly. I still haven’t seen an answer to this question.
Baerwulf on September 30, 2012 at 2:13 AM
Fighting words. It’s not protected speech. Unfortunately, the libs are trying to apply this to anything critical of Islam, which perverts the intent of this free speech exception. If you insult my woman or my child, I will beat the sh!t out of you, period.
John the Libertarian on September 30, 2012 at 2:14 AM
So your argument is that I don’t think the way I think?
And you demand proof from me that I think how I think, and if I can’t prove that to your satisfaction, what? The claim is therefore that I don’t think the way I think?
Do I also have to prove water is wet and fire is hot?
I mean since we’re making me prove things that are self-evidently true to me?
Consider me less than impressed with your “proof” that both you and Jim DeMint don’t think I believe the way I believe… if you think that will persuade me I’m wrong you clearly don’t understand the inner workings of my mind as well as you imagine you do.
As for proving that I believe the way I believe… yeah, I could work at proving 2 + 2 = 4 or proving that water is wet too… but I’ve spent enough time on nonsense already.
Call it another victory for you and only you knowing the inner workings of the minds of all human beings. Oh wait, you and Jim DeMint knowing how all people must and therefore do think on every topic.
Amazing telepathic power you’ve got there… don’t abuse it.
gekkobear on September 30, 2012 at 2:16 AM
So, we see eye to eye on many things it looks like.
astonerii on September 30, 2012 at 2:19 AM
Apparently there isn’t one.
I think it’s very unfortunate that most libertarians don’t seem to understand that their hostility to social conservatives is counter-productive and unnecessary.
RightKlik on September 30, 2012 at 2:23 AM
Liberals think that we can spend money and give away free stuff and its never going to be a problem.
You cannot prove they don’t think that way… because they do.
That doesn’t make it true, it just means they think that way.
Social liberalism and fiscal restraint cannot co-exist.
sharrukin on September 30, 2012 at 2:26 AM
The problem is that if you claim to be a fiscal conservative, but promote permissive social freedoms, those freedoms come back to destroy your fiscal conservative policies.
Ok, you want to have a society that is low cost on the government side and allows people to act as socially depraved as each person wants to.
Ok, you get people who fail to keep themselves from addiction, others who have kids out of wedlock or just divorce thinking they can do it on their own better. Then you have people who work 10 hours a week to get by, barely and have no kids and save no money. Yeah for social freedoms.
These people, and their families and community members all group up and vote themselves money from the pockets of other people. With a very permissive society, you will quickly build up to these people being in majority status. How do you stop it with a democratic process?
Its not fair! Who cares, life isn’t fair. The whole concept that you can have a fiscally responsible socially permissive society is an ideal that human nature simply will never allow to materialize for longer than a generation or two.
astonerii on September 30, 2012 at 2:29 AM
What on earth are you going on about?
The fact is it’s the socially liberal programs that are the big budget busters, the ones that have put America on the edge of bankruptcy. Liberal programs will always cost the most, because they always start and end with redistribution. You cannot divorce liberal programs from liberal spending, no more than you can remove cause from effect.
Rebar on September 30, 2012 at 2:32 AM
I will also add to my earlier remarks that there is a segment of people calling themselves Libertarians (big L) who really aren’t. These are the Occupy types who are attempting to disrupt the Republicans and get Obama re-elected. You can usually spot them pretty quickly as they are the ones who generally say stuff like “Romney and Obama are exactly the same” and use words like Obomney or Robama. They are highly emotional, too. Like the other extremists of any group, when you disagree with them you are likely to get insults, foul language, and eventually blocking if you insist on disagreeing with them.
crosspatch on September 30, 2012 at 2:33 AM
As you never explained how Ron Paul won his 2008 and 2010 primaries, even though you swore up and down the pike he was going to lose.
But you really don’t need to explain it. We all know that people who have suffered brain damage are likely to make outrageous predictions, and blame someone else when they get them wrong.
Pitiful, really…
JohnGalt23 on September 30, 2012 at 3:14 AM
Civil discussion is the too-seldom-realized ideal of a site like HA. Your conversation has been a pleasure to read.
DrMagnolias on September 30, 2012 at 4:30 AM
I think most of my criticism of hard line libertarianism is that (much like liberalism) it is centered around society as it exists under current law, and them makes a number of first order type extrapolations about what things could be like that are well outside of convergence and completely ignore a number of unintended consequences.
Count to 10 on September 30, 2012 at 7:06 AM
Thanks. Was a pleasure to have had it. I learned more in that one conversation I think about libertarianism than I have in hundreds of others on this and several other sites.
It makes a bit more sense, even though it is not a realizable end from the point we are.
astonerii on September 30, 2012 at 8:27 AM
This explains our current educational system which medicates boys and favors girls’ behavior. The liberal teachers’ unions want to produce future liberal voting children/young adults.
Fallon on September 30, 2012 at 9:50 AM
This is the essence. A duel was carefully avoided by politeness and social rules of Etiquette. People knew their place and avoided trouble. Heinlein’s famous quote about “an Armed society is a polite Society” applied. This works only in a homogeneous society where the rues are inculcated from birth. Somali tribesmen in Wisconsin and Saudi “students” could care less, they simply attack a woman because she is insulting Islam because she is exposing her hair. Importing other races and expecting them to become little Englishmen has proven itself to be a failure. Diversity is not a Strength, but a terrible source of conflict where the most aggressive (Blacks/Islamists) win and the accommodating Whites lose ground.
Libertarianism was the society of the past, but current Libertarians are unwilling to come to terms with the fact that it can only be accomplished in a racially homogenous society of educated adults, which means the low I.Q. violent blacks and browns need not apply.
Conservatives hope that such a society can be forged out of the current population, despite all evidence to the contrary, which explains why they grovel to any black that says Conservative things, while 99% of blacks vote Liberal. The delusion of IKAGO (I Know a Good One) is strong with these people.
Liberals do not care, they are either voting in a new population to rule or are trying to foment revolution to reach that goal, so the tools do not matter. The more violent the Turd Worlder’s are the better, as the Conservatives will give ground all the faster for fear of being “racist”.
There you have it, Libertarians pine for that which they could have, but they would have to declare themselves in favor of being White. At the present time, Whites have let themselves be convinced that it is racist merely to object to dispossession, much less to work for their own interests.
Never before has a people been fooled into thinking that there was virtue or nobility in surrendering its heritage, and giving away to others its place in history, only whites have been tricked into thinking that love for their own people is somehow “hatred” of others.
Conservatives pine for the same thing, with few changes, but are convinced that the IDEA of Conservatism is Universal, despite all evidence od Islam or Rev. Wright. (How is that 99% for Obama vs 0% for Romney working out for ya?)
Liberals simply see “people” as tools to power, the stupider and more easily led the better.
I close with”
“No one may be indifferent to the racial principle, the racial question. It is the key to world history. History is often confusing because it is written by people who did not understand the racial question and the aspects relevant to it… Race is everything, and every race that does not keep its blood from being mixed will perish. . . Language and religion do not determine a race–blood determines it.”
—British Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli
Bulletchaser on September 30, 2012 at 10:46 AM
“Race” is relevant only insomuch as it also happens to run in families with culture and acts as catching point for group identification. One of the great accomplishments of the US was the melting pot, where the negative aspects of cultures are washed out of bloodlines.
Count to 10 on September 30, 2012 at 11:12 AM
A lie, I explained it fully and at length – he bought those votes with his $31 Billion in pork.
But lying is nothing new to Ronbots in general, and you in particular.
Rebar on September 30, 2012 at 11:23 AM
Have met plenty of blacks who prove you to be wrong. It is not race, it is culture.
I have met hundreds of the nicest people in the world, they have IQ’s about half that of a normal person. I have met some of the cruelest people in my personal experience (obviously there are meaner people in the world I have not met that also meet this) who were also supposed to be the smartest.
You have confused culture and race. It shows that you would fail your own test on the merits of your own intelligence. Our American experimentation was working well, until the liberal and libertarian argument of diversity came up. A new group of people would come to the country, their culture did not match those who lived here at the time. There was much conflict, but as time went on, the new comers became more like those who were here before, and those who were here before learned a few things from the new comers. Eventually everyone was getting along pretty well.
The culture in the south that pitted race against race was built on Democrat ignorance desire for power, rather on inherent differences in the races, for which there are many. I agree with that one guy who did a study and determined that some races have different intelligence bell curves. But many people in the same bell curve, based on their culture also present a different bell curve.
Judeo Christian values of the last 500 years have been the bedrock of the most successful nations in the history of the world. Even China owes much of its current success to Judeo Christian values, which proved what works best in industry. They are imitating the actions we live by, and getting good and poor results because of it. Their society is becoming bleaker and evil because their souls are not nourished.
It would do you some good to go out and learn the difference between culture and race.
astonerii on September 30, 2012 at 11:26 AM
This is completely untrue.
Some cultures desire power (socialism and Islam) others freedom.
Christian cultures allow people to be secular.
Secular cultures do NOT like Christians, although they like Islam. This has to do with both socialists and Islamists both wanting power to force others to behave the way they want.
GardenGnome on September 30, 2012 at 12:07 PM
There are many whites who adopted the ghetto culture and they get the same ghetto result.
It is the culture not color.
Progressive culture leads to destruction regardless of color.
GardenGnome on September 30, 2012 at 12:13 PM
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