Are you entitled to exist on this planet?

[cthulu2016]

It seems that a human being must have some right to, at very least, a 3'x6' area of earth to lie on. We cannot stand 24/7 and we cannot levitate.

Yet when we were born every yard of the Earth was already spoken for.

Those who were born first got dibs. They are then able to rent out the land to latecomers. (In exchange for owning all or part of the latecomer's life -- labor, for instance.)

In John Rawls parable of justice the souls of those unborn must decide how to structure a just society before any of them know into what circumstances they will be born. They know that most of them will be poor. Most of them will have only modest talents. Some will be sick. But since any of them might be born with talent or inheritence they would like a world where such good fortune counted for something. (Not surprisingly, the optimum result is strong human and individual rights and a safety net in the context of a euro-style mixed economy.)

Would any unborn soul have ever voted for a set-up where all land on Earth was claimed before they were born?

No economic-libertarian I have ever spoken to has seemed to understand any of this.

[msongs]

1. plants and other animals vote....NO :-) nt

[kenny blankenship]

2. Every human being on the planet draws breath at the sufferance of the US President.

That is settled law.

[Jack Rabbit]

3. Living on this planet as opposed to what?

Compared to Captain Kirk, we're rather primitive. We still think it's hot stuff to have landed on the Moon, which will take a bit of work before it could support life. The nearest planet that can support life is light years away.

[MineralMan]

4. Exist? Sure. Like all other mammals, humans give birth

to live young. I'm not sure your question is a good one. You seem to be asking if humans are entitled to the requirements for continued life. As millions discover soon after being born, apparently not. I do not know of a way to provide the necessary elements for survival to a random human on another continent, for example.

[cthulu2016]

5. Yes, the headline is poorly chosen.

But it seems wrong to edit the headline once folks have commented on it.

I guess I am talking about the "If you don't like it then go..." as if there was anyplace to go.

It seems that we cannot sensibly demand that extant people cease to exist, though our treatment of the homeless often does just that.

And when libertarians talk about owning property it puzzles me in the case of land since there can be no legitimate original legal claim. The claim preceded the law.

Yet they yammer about property rights in a way that suggests to me that they need to give their land "back to the indians" for consistancy's sake.

[Laelth]

6. k&r for exposure. This is interesting. n/t

-Laelth

[cthulu2016]

14. thanks

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

7. The estate tax at least tries to even things out a little

If it were up to Republicans, the oligarchy's share of the planet would continue into perpetuity.

[cthulu2016]

9. Yes, though it turns personal property into mass-property.

A person with nothing would prefer that the government have money because the government is liklier to give them some of it than the average estate is.

But it is funny, given that we set such stock in ownership, that there is no provision for new souls born onto this planet to own something.

Am I proposing forty acres and a mule for newborns? Not speciffically, but a newborn does face a problem similar to the newly emancipated slave. Everyone else has a head start on claiming property.

[snooper2]

8. So what you propose, as soon as somebody dies next available baby gets that house or maybe nothing?

That would be a hella beeyatch to keep track of


Or are you saying we just have plots across the Earth like a cemetery, everyone gets his box to start with and go from there? Kind of like starting Monopoly

[cthulu2016]

10. That's an interesting analogy

How far would one get in Monopoly if starting with nothing but their game piece? No real possibility of owning land and the first time you hit a fee or land in jail you're done.

There are small opportunities for luck and gifts, like winning a beauty contest.

Sounds like a very accurate picture of being born without an ineritance.

[MrDiaz]

11. all land

isn't spoken for already just the good land that is habitable... just saying

[cthulu2016]

13. Yes, though on paper I think it is all land. (Nations count)

Someone says, ""I was born into a system I don't like."

Someone else says, "If you don't like it then go..."

Where?

If there was any overlooked piece of land found somewhere that was unowned then some nation would claim ownership of it.

Even nomadic tribes in the most inhospitable dessert found their usual pathways blocked when the middle east was divided up into straight lined nations. Same for a lot of African tribes.

Maps don't have any areas of unclaimed wilderness where a person can go live in a lean-to. You cannot go live in national parks and preserves... even ones where few would want to live.

I don't know of anywhere on Earth where you could go that someone doesn't claim the authority to displace you. (Even Antarctica has weird national demarcactions all over it. I don't know that that territory is all owned per se, but mostly because it's Anarctica)

I grant you the practical distinctions -- a person living under a rock in the Gobi desert might well never be told to "move along" in practice. But only if, as you note, there was no possible use to it.

But if oil was discovered in the worthless desert you would be out in a flash.

[ileus]

12. Yes

Pretty much sums it up.


I didn't own land when I was birthed. I worked for it and then bought land, 4th tract so far....My kids on the other hand have been deeded plots/tracts of land on my fathers farm if they want it.

[Zorra]

15. I'll have to ask the 1% about this.

(They're the owners)