Samael wrote:
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Terry Donaghe <tdonaghe@yahoo.com>
> To: extropians@extropy.com <extropians@extropy.com>
> Date: 11 December 1998 16:51
> Subject: Re: Re: The Education Function
>
> >I further posit that there are no services "inappropriate or
> >impossible" for the private market to provide. Please list examples.
>
> Defence against bombing raids.
>
> If you decide to pay for defense and your neighbour does not, how do we cope
> with this eventuality?
Well, if he is really your neighbor, then you go over and say,"Hey neighbor,
remember how I used my guns to save your ass last week?"
"Yeah", your neighbor says.
"Well, I'd like to be able to save your ass again next week too, but I'm just
about all out of bullets and missiles. Howsabout helping me pay for some more
ammo?"
The neighbor says,"OK" and that is that, especially if he wants to remain on
neighborly terms with you. If he says, "no" he should have a decent reason,
like:
"well geez, you may have saved me from getting nuked, but the inert warheads still hit my house and wrecked my hot tub, my garage, my car, and mashed my wife's prize petunias. So I'm not totally satisfied with the work you did."
or:
"well, I'm too much of a pacifistic lazy socialist prick to actually go out and earn any money, but I'm willing to do some work for you. You look like you need some yard work done, those shell casings dug up your turf something fierce, oh, and I'm a great dog walker, too, dogs like me cause I do nothing but talk about Marx and Engel and the dialectic method. They really find me entertaining."
or
"well, you know my son billy just got his liver transplant and finished chemotherapy before that, so we are kinda hard up, especially since we're gonna have another kid soon. But I'll tell you what, I'll be your marketing dude, I'll talk up what a great job you did, and how nice you've been to my family seeing as how hard up we are, and how we need more people to support the great work you're doing intercepting those bombers."
>
>
> Similarly, if you decide to pay for fire insurance and your neighbour does
> not, do we allow his house to burn down, taking yours with it, or do we save
> his house to save yours, giving him something for nothing?
Usually neighbors have no trouble working out such exchanges, and neighbors are the easiest people to do favors for with no expectation of being repaid, because you know that someday is gonna come when the tables are turned. Its when some dope down in Texas builds a piss-ant house that gets blown away by the first tornado and wants me to pay for it that pisses me off.
Mike Lorrey