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A 3 Islands Experiment - a thought experiment opinion question about which political philosophy would perform the best or worst

What is your opinion of how this experiment would turn out after 5 years?

  • Anarchist island is best and socialist island is worst (libertarian island is in 2nd place).

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Anarchist island is best and libertarian island is worst (socialist island is in 2nd place).

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • Total voters
    11

PureX

Veteran Member
Really? Then how do you explain things like war, crime, poverty, homelessness, and political corruption?
I explain it by humanity refusing to recognize their transcendent nature, and instead insisting on living according their dumb animal nature. All the islands are doomed so long as this continues. Regardless of their government ideology.
 

Koldo

Outstanding Member
It's called "defining the parameters".

But where did those definitions come from?

Anarcho-capitalism is an oxymoron. Something can't be both anarchist and capitalist; they're mutually exclusive to each other.

Anarchism is opposed to having the state and government; capitalism cannot exist without the state and government.

It is not impossible to have capitalism in an anarchy, just extremely unlikely.

Ok, if that's the case, then communists can sign up for the anarchist island.


I never used the word "communist" or "communists" in my OP, so I don't even know how you conjured up this claim.

Communists are anarchists and collectivists at the same time.

Well, I don't agree with this; I think you're wrong.

On what grounds?
Libertarianism is classical liberalism taken to an extreme.

Then we are in agreement, since I'm referring to socialism as the political ideology that prioritizes collectivism over the individual.


Since fascism is socialism, and according to you, communists are anarchists, the answer would be no, they would not be on the same island.

Socialism is about public ownership of capital that becomes no longer profit-oriented. The rise of private companies is incompatible with socialism. FIAT and Pirelli, for example, became huge during the facist regime in Italy and remained private property.

If your definition of a communist is that they're an anarchist, then you're claiming that communism is anarchism. The economic aspect of socialism is state capitalism, and it doesn't do any transitioning to anarchism; it only does things like centrally concentrate political power.

State capitalism has profit as a goal, whereas socialism doesn't. The transition from socialism to communism is lenghty because it requires material conditions that would allow it to be done with.

It's not from scratch in this experiment; as I already explained, they would initially be provided with limited resources.

It doesn't have to "have" socialism; all that's required is for volunteers who sign up for that island to be pro-socialism.

After 5 years, that island will be the product of pro-socialism.


I agree that a republic is necessary for the "middle ground", since something like a monarchy has no equilibrium between the individual and the collective (it puts a certain individual - the monarch - and the individual members of the monarch's family, before the collective), I think I can agree that being a constitutional republic (it's just overall a better form of a republic than any other), I might agree with the idea that it has to be what some might refer to as "some form of welfare state" (depending on what you mean by this - if you mean something like a dividend-based UBI), but I don't agree at all that it has nothing to do with libertarianism.

Libertarianism has everything to do with this, more than socialism or anarchism.

Obviously anarchism has nothing to do with it, and socialism at least appears to be about this, but socialism actually doesn't, since it ignores economic principles (such as the economic calculation problem).

Libertarianism revolves around minimum government intervention. The only welfare that has some support in those circles is UBI (and negative income tax, which is similar), from the likes of Friedman and Andrew Yang. But most of the main prominent figures, like Hayek, Rothbard, and Hoppe, would oppose it. Libertarianism is an excellent example of individualism. If you disagree, what would you label as individualist in political philosophy?
 
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anotherneil

Well-Known Member
I don't think that 5 years is a long time for a socio-political experiment.
What would anything much longer than 5 years reveal that can't be revealed in just 5 years or even less, like 3 or 4 years?

But yes, some difference will be obvious, just not where you expect them to be. Economic differences would be much less than political ones.
Can you elaborate on this?

Political liberty would be high with the anarchists and low with the socialists.
I agree that political liberty would be low with the socialists, and I would agree that political liberty would be high with the libertarians (at least higher than socialists, anyways); however, I don't see how politics can mean anything in an anarchist society, since by definition, politics means that there is a state and government, and with anarchism, there is no state/government.

The socialists will have more collectively owned property
Do you think the socialists will allow for any private property ownership at all?

and the anarchists will have more private "property" - if they have property at all.
Same with the concept of politics - how can anyone have any property in an anarchist society? I don't see how this is possible.
 

anotherneil

Well-Known Member
The anarchists won't like that. It isn't an anarchy when you have external law enforcement.
Ok, good point - so should they just permitted to harm each other and finish each other off, until there's one left standing?

That might serve to provide some rather bad optics for proponents of anarchism.

Maybe instead of starting off with 1,000 people to wind up with one left standing, it should just be 1 volunteer on the anarchist island.

Oh, wait, I forgot about Dunbar's number! It probably won't dwindle to one left standing, theoretically it could dwindle to Dunbar's number of a population (150 volunteers remaining). Aha, that means it might turn into a gift economy! (Maybe? IDK :shrug:)
 

anotherneil

Well-Known Member
Only because that's how your definitions set it up. You presented two extremes and one balanced middle ground between them. Some kind of balanced middle ground is pretty much always the right route in reality (the difficulties come from deciding where to strike the balance). That doesn't mean "libertarianism" is a balance between "socialism" and "anarchy" by any conventional definition though.
It seems like you're complaining about something analogous to X being 4 if X is an integer between 3 and 5.

A libertarian doesn't like socialism and isn't in favor of anarchism either, so what else could libertarianism be?

I wasn't proposing a dictatorship as a good system, I was just highlighting that how efficiently and consistently a system is run is more important than the fundamental principles on which they system is theoretically based.
I think an experiment like this would be very helpful in determining whether or not the fundamental principles behind each system are any good.

Well they wouldn't be operating fully under the systems you list, but under whatever broader system that law enforcement works for.
Yes; you're not the first to point this out. That's a real-world issue & it isn't an issue for this thread's thought experiment.

The whole point of this kind of thought experiment is that the islands are completely isolated from any external influence. If a system on an island would lead to unregulated violence or crime (or any other problems, be they social, economic or moral), you can't just introduce an external force to fix it. The whole point is to reach a conclusion about the consequences of a system without any controlling or mitigating forces. It isn't about declaring any on system the winner, it's about working out the benefits and risks of the systems and thus what limitations, compromises or balances would be needed to implement such a system in the real world.
Sure, but only opinions about the results & outcomes can be made about a thought experiment. Real-world experiment would have to be carried out in order to get factual results & outcomes.
 

Heyo

Veteran Member
What would anything much longer than 5 years reveal that can't be revealed in just 5 years or even less, like 3 or 4 years?
Children. They wouldn't be volunteers, and they wouldn't have a political philosophy from the get-go. Anarchism doesn't do very well with children, and children don't do well with anarchism.
Can you elaborate on this?
The economic goals are the same for all populations (get an economy running) and the methods are pretty obvious (build shelter for all, secure water and food for all, do that cooperatively). Ideological differences wouldn't play a role before that is achieved, after about two years.
I agree that political liberty would be low with the socialists, and I would agree that political liberty would be high with the libertarians (at least higher than socialists, anyways); however, I don't see how politics can mean anything in an anarchist society, since by definition, politics means that there is a state and government, and with anarchism, there is no state/government.
Politics also means policies. Even your unrealistic Stirner-type anarchists would probably agree on a few, like not murdering each other.
Do you think the socialists will allow for any private property ownership at all?
Yes, just on a small scale.
Same with the concept of politics - how can anyone have any property in an anarchist society? I don't see how this is possible.
The same as with politics, mutual, universal agreement to not contest property as long as it doesn't conflict with an other's freedom.
 

anotherneil

Well-Known Member
Ummm, why can there not be democracy, infrastructure, and equilibrium on the socialist island?
I didn't say that there would be a lack of democracy and infrastructure on the socialist island, but there wouldn't be equilibrium on the socialist island because socialism doesn't have this trait, and that's what the socialism island volunteers would desire as supporters of the philosophy that the collective gets priority over the individual.

Hate to break it to you, but a thought experiment is neither scientific, objective, nor impartial.
I don't agree with this.

Coming up with an opinion is considered scientific; this is what physicians, nurse practitioners, dentists, and therapists do as scientific professionals all the time.

Being objective and impartial with a thought experiment is basically a matter of choice, and the interest in trying to correctly determine the outcomes of each island is an incentive to be objective and impartial. A real-world experiment, if conducted scientifically, objectively, and impartially, would yield results; these results are the outcomes that would be compared to the outcomes from a thought experiment.

An individual trying this thought experiment who has no political ideology leanings would have no reason to not be objective & impartial with their opinion

An individual trying this thought experiment who does have a political ideology leaning also has nothing to gain by coming up with a opinion that isn't objective & impartial, either, since a real-world experiment would reveal that it is a bad opinion.

It's irrelevant because I and my family, friends, coworkers and neighbors are not participating or involved.
This is not plausible; you're reading and posting on this online forum, which means you have an internet connection, which means you're not living in complete isolation from the rest of the internet-connected world, and maybe you have some family and friends that are living in complete isolation from the rest of the internet-connected world, but not your coworkers and neighbors.

I'm also reading and posting on this online forum, which is in the internet-connected world, and I know from observation that it's a society of different competing political ideologies and their consequences; this means that you must also be in that same sort of society of different competing political ideologies and their consequences.

If a group of like-minded individuals all decided they wanted to buy a large plot of land and live together in a highly cooperative, highly self sustaining. low environmental impact way, or another group of like-minded individuals wanted to eschew all non-human/animal powered technology and live like the Amish without their integrated religious beliefs, how is my opinion on living in those ways relevant to them and their percieved levels of happiness. Just because I may not be happy there is irrelevant.
It isn't (necessarily) relevant to them; you're attacking a strawman.

Your thought experiment has preselected like-minded individuals, it did not take a random selection of individuals and toss them on three island to figure things out.
That's correct, but this is just more strawman attacking. You and I are both in same sort of society of different competing political ideologies and their consequences, and because of this, it's difficult if not impossible to objectively and impartially figure things out in such a mixture of political ideologies.

By isolating political ideologies, with this 3-island experiment, we may be able to figure things out.


If you want to demonstrate that, then I would recommend some changes to the experiment. Make each island identical with only 10% arable land that would be barely sufficient to susstain 1000 inhabitants at subsistance levels.
Yeah, it might be necessary to resort to something like this, but my anticipation is that it wouldn't be necessary to start off like this. The reason I'm proposing that there's an initial supply of abundance is to let the experiment start off with things being in good condition to let each one maintain that good condition or deplete; it's also to give the volunteers some slack to settle into the experiment so they won't want to bail out; they're not going to be trapped like prisoners on the islands IRL. LOL

I'm assuming that the basic outcomes will be the same regardless of whether they're primed with high or low abundance, and that starting off with low abundance would just make the outcomes more contrasting.

I see no reason for why it wouldn't just be more or less contrasting, but real-life experiments could be carried out more than once & that could include starting off with differences in abundance in repetitions of the experiment to see if that's a bad assumption.

Next, add individuals in groups of 200 at the start of the experiment and annually for the next two years, then add the remaining 400 at the start of year four. No participants are made aware in advance of this scheme, or that there are others on the island if they are in a subsequent group.
Well, the reason I'd prefer not to take this approach is because starting off with a group of 200 is too close to Dunbar's number, and that may have an effect of skewing results away from something that simulates a real world consisting of billions of people. I chose 1,000 volunteers because I think it's big enough to be far enough from Dunbar's number, and I don't want to go beyond 1,000 volunteers because it just makes things more difficult in terms of finding volunteers and funding for things like transporting the volunteers, providing initial resources for them, etc. Don't forget that it's a total of 3,000 volunteers, which makes it 3 times as difficult and expensive.

What would your prediction be regarding the difference between a collective minded group vs an individualistic minded group in the scenario after the five years are up?
I basically covered this in this post:

But since you're only asking about the difference between the collective and individualistic minded groups, I expect the collective minded group to turn out fairly ok and far better than the individualistic minded group.

I think the individualistic minded group will have more to learn about themselves, society, and the importance of having some sort of political infrastructure, than the collective minded group, but the collective minded group will realize that they must to come to terms with the discovery or realization that there are large flaws in a few of their premises.
 

anotherneil

Well-Known Member
It goes beyond a lack of information.

The OP's author has in the past described both the Democratic and the Republican parties of the USA as "too left leaning".

How am I supposed to have any idea of what he means?
Yes, if we're talking about a monotonic political spectrum with socialism (big government) on one extreme (on the left) and anarchism (no government) on the other extreme (on the right); both of those US major political parties are far to the left, but what does that have to do with this thread/experiment/poll? I make no mention of either of those political parties in this thread.
 

anotherneil

Well-Known Member
I explain it by humanity refusing to recognize their transcendent nature, and instead insisting on living according their dumb animal nature. All the islands are doomed so long as this continues. Regardless of their government ideology.
This experiment wouldn't be necessary if humanity didn't refuse that, and by claiming that the islands are doomed, it seems you're claiming that humanity is doomed, but I see no reason to believe that.
 

anotherneil

Well-Known Member
I appreciate the active dialog in this thread, but I've got to go for now & probably won't resume responding on this thread until sometime this weekend.
 

an anarchist

Your local loco.
Anarcho-capitalism is an oxymoron. Something can't be both anarchist and capitalist; they're mutually exclusive to each other.
Wrong again.

Anarcho-capitalists are the only true anarchists. Such as myself.

And now we are back again to the problems of definitions. Oh shoot I said I was bowing out of this debate. Well new day I’m feeling bored and feisty and the above quoted post sparked me to action so lemme see where we left off
 

an anarchist

Your local loco.
Market implies things like trade, buying, selling, ownership, and property rights.
All which can exist absent of a state… yes, even property rights do not need a state to exist. You believe in the big lie that the State is necessary that the State itself perpetuates in order to keep people advocating for it’s existence
 

PureX

Veteran Member
This experiment wouldn't be necessary if humanity didn't refuse that, and by claiming that the islands are doomed, it seems you're claiming that humanity is doomed, but I see no reason to believe that.
We're not dead, yet. So there is always hope. But we are running out of time. Our stupidity remains intractable while our ability to destroy things keeps increasing. There is really only one way for that to end. We are either going to learn to rise above our dumb animal thinking, or we will destroy ourselves (as we would deserve). So far we do not appear to be inclined to learn anything. But people surprise me all the time.

I have had neighbors that I watched over the years getting arrested, jailed, sent to hospitals, rehabs, and the whole nine yards of all manner of insane chemical addictions. I would have bet money on every one of them dying from the insanity of their addictions sooner or later. And yet, now, two of them are completely clean and sober, one of them is just a light drinker, and only one other of them is still lost in the insanity of a meth addiction.

So three out of four humans that were destined to self-destruct managed not to. I would never have expected any of them to EVER sober up, and yet they did. And even the last meth-head is still alive, so who knows? Maybe one more stint in prison will be what it takes for him see the light.

Point being, we just never know. So there really always is hope.
 

HonestJoe

Well-Known Member
A libertarian doesn't like socialism and isn't in favor of anarchism either, so what else could libertarianism be?
You're simply wrong. None of those concepts are entirely mutually exclusive and have often been used together to identify specific groupings throughout history. The idea that libertarianism is simply some middle ground between socialism and anarchy is certainly wrong. It would be perfectly viable to have moderate systems within the concepts of socialism or anarchy and have extreme systems within the concept of libertarianism.

I think an experiment like this would be very helpful in determining whether or not the fundamental principles behind each system are any good.
None of the three terms describe a system though, they describe a concept. A system, even a simplistic abstract one for a thought experiment, needs more than just a singular concept (even if you define all other aspects of the systems to be the same).

Yes; you're not the first to point this out. That's a real-world issue & it isn't an issue for this thread's thought experiment.
Have you considered the possibility that, if multiple people are challenging you on this point, it could be you who is incorrect? :cool:

Sure, but only opinions about the results & outcomes can be made about a thought experiment.
I don't disagree, but you still need more detail about how the systems would be set up and run to reach any meaningful conclusions. Otherwise, you're just basing them on your preconceived ideas about the concepts.
 

PureX

Veteran Member
None of the three terms describe a system though, they describe a concept.
I agree. But I think that was more to the point. As there are various ways that a society of humans might choose to systematize their ethical, moral and social goals once they've been identified. Socialism, for example, can be implemented via a whole range of control mechanisms including anything from democratic communism to representational democracy to political and economic hybrids to who knows what. The goal, however, still being that the people being effected by the decisions and laws being made get a say in the making of those laws and decisions. But HOW they get their say can vary widely. As also might be their recourse when disagreements arise.
 
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Heyo

Veteran Member
Capitalism is the only system in which a centralized state is not necessary. Capitalism is simply voluntary exchange. There is no need to add anything else to the definition of capitalism.
You're as wrong about capitalism as @anotherneil is about anarchism. You're describing a free market economy, which is only one aspect of (idealized) capitalism. Capitalism is private ownership of the means of production, simply by investment, and the subsequent collection of the proceeds. Money magically making money.
 

an anarchist

Your local loco.
You're as wrong about capitalism as @anotherneil is about anarchism. You're describing a free market economy, which is only one aspect of (idealized) capitalism. Capitalism is private ownership of the means of production, simply by investment, and the subsequent collection of the proceeds. Money magically making money.
In the anarcho-capitalist literature I have read/am reading, the authors equivocate “free market economy” and “capitalism” with capitalism meaning nothing more than voluntary exchange. So that’s why I say what I say it’s just what I have learned in books. I’ll change my wordage for this board as I mean what you describe as a “free market economy”. I feel like that is self describing too and doesn’t have all the baggage as “capitalism”.

What do you suppose I call myself instead of an “anarcho-capitalist”? “Free market anarchist”?
 

Heyo

Veteran Member
In the anarcho-capitalist literature I have read/am reading, the authors equivocate “free market economy” and “capitalism” with capitalism meaning nothing more than voluntary exchange. So that’s why I say what I say it’s just what I have learned in books. I’ll change my wordage for this board as I mean what you describe as a “free market economy”. I feel like that is self describing too and doesn’t have all the baggage as “capitalism”.

What do you suppose I call myself instead of an “anarcho-capitalist”? “Free market anarchist”?
I'm fine with "anarcho-capitalist" as long as I know as what you define it. I don't cling dogmatically to textbook definitions, but sometimes it confuses me when the definition in my head contradicts the definition used by someone else. And often the definition doesn't capture the full meaning of the usage.
E.g.: @anotherneil's definition doesn't capture the selfish sociopath he seemingly associates with it.
 
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