Ayn Rand Philosophy, Objectivism, Science, Self-interest

[CoccoBill]

Science is decentralized and unregulated.

Rilla already covered this bit, but aspects of science are both centralized and regulated. Also, decentralization and unregulation are not principles of free markets.

The bold are mutually exclusive. Who conducts the oversight? Who keeps their power in check?

The party tasked with oversight duties. It's much better to have limited oversight than no oversight.

This dilemma is why even the most theoretically egalitarian government tried -- communism

I've said this a few times before, there was nothing egalitarian about communism. It was pure oligarchical tyranny masquerading as socialism.

The only way I've found to keep powers in check is the kind constructed in the United States Constitution: explicit prohibition of government intrusion into citizen space. This is where ideals of freedom of speech, assembly, the press, and religion come from. These ideals became a part of civilization through the idea that liberty does not come from government granting it, but that liberty comes from governments prohibiting themselves from infringing upon natural liberties of humans. Today, we take these liberties for granted. I hope that instead we would learn the lesson that since liberties that we today take for granted came from government prohibiting its own intrusion, we should make government further prohibited from intrusion for other things.

A society will always have its elite, those with more power than others. Human greed and self-preservation will take care of that. Wealth tends to concentrate through oligarchy, meritocracy and plutocracy. If a society does not have an elected government, one will be provided for them by the powerful. The only known solution that even tries to ensure the "government" acts in the best interest of it's members, is a democratically elected government. To guarantee the government does not step into the territory you describe above, it needs to have some sort of collectively agreed contract to not do so.

Are you arguing that the Kochs currently wield similar power to top powers in the government or that if there was no government then the Kochs would start acting like a government? Those are two different things.

Both.

The Kochs do not hold power; they only have some ability to lobby. Do you think it would be better if the Kochs had no ability to lobby and those with power had only to answer to those with power? Many have the ability to lobby, many rival the Kochs, and the lobbying done by organizations representing "the people" have even more influence that people like the Kochs. Us having voices is not what's wrong, but the government having the ability to favor one voice over another is. It is still the case that no Koch and no NRA put people in prison, raid homes in search of weed, nor fine people for working without paying licensing fees.

A citizen's way to affect the government is by voting, each person has one vote. On top of that the Kochs of the world can throw millions into lobbying. I'm sure you would agree that's hell of a lot more powerful than one vote? I would call that much more direct power than a single senator or congressman has, since it can swing several votes.

Fortunately money equals speech only in the US and some other rampantly corrupt societies. Optimally voting should be the way to affect the government, not bribery.

Governments receive revenues from taxes; this is fundamentally different than entities that receive revenues from consumer choice. Governments hold their tax power by legitimacy, i.e., they are viewed legitimate in the eyes of the citizenry at large, so there is little revolt. In the absence of government, the Kochs wouldn't come close to having this. This topic can go a lot of directions, and I don't really want to go into them, but the point I want to make is that the idea that the Kochs would be the de facto government in the absence of government is assuming something that isn't there. If the Kochs did become a government, it would be by way of them and entire regions of people deciding to set their businesses aside and instead become government. It's not the Kochs we'd have to worry about in this scenario; it's large swaths of people who want to take other peoples' stuff and are afraid of their stuff being taken. The Kochs would actually be primary targets. Governments tend to arise from populism, and populism typically targets the rich.

Money (or what ever currency there would be without governments) can buy favors, goods, violence etc. The person with the most currency will have the most power. Without a government maybe Kochs would have less than now, I don't know, but someone would have more than others, with no government to keep them in check.

Do you think it is reasonable that those who should have regulatory power should also have familiarity with the topics at hand?

Yes, obviously. Currently the way to do this is by using government advisors, who research and prepare materials for the decisionmakers.

If so, does this suggest that only those affected by decisions should have say in decisions?

Absolutely not. Decisions should be based on objective scientific data.