Underneath the pro-science, pro-logic, pro-business, no-nonsense, brass tacks pragmatism, what is a Libertarian? Having flirted with it and knowing quite a zealots, here’s my take.
His library contains mostly Stoic philosophy and how-to, which could be enough to end this note. He cares not for holism, but rather anything purporting to extend human potential cognitively or materially, and that of a select few, further. His outright contempt for the liberal arts, a shared fate/government/NGOs, and pragmatic masking of the complications of sexuality suggests that he is an anti-holist, a compartmentalist, of a fixed nature, in short everything that reality is not subjective/messy, collective, integrated, open, fluid.
Only such disintegration would enable this prolifically immature politics and cosmology – fixed upon the tiny realms of matter and reason. It is as if the Libertarian credo is blind to cosmological implications of the subsequent philosophical and scientific developments of post-modernism, quantum entanglement, comparative religion and integral theory. The Libertarian is trapped in his teens, the perpetual science geek trying to impress/become the homecoming king.
This is not to say that I cannot appreciate Libertarianism’s contributions. I love science, the natural world and economics. I think his thoughts on merits/detriments of graduate education and political correctness are spot on. I agree with him on the need to rescale (though not descale) and rethink the public sector. I admire his pushing of the possibilities of human excellence.
However, I believe this pushing is only vertical. He neglects his own nature, the complex ecology of humans and environment that nurtures his existence, and more importantly the meaning of, and conventions of, the mythology in which he is participating. If he understood these, he would necessarily have to abandon his cosmology. He thusfar has neglected the left side of Wilber’s AQAL model, and as such, he is a relic of the pro-science, pro-freedom 1950’s, just recast in today’s technologies (but with yesterday’s thinking).
To escape from his teens, he must develop a contemplative practice, a metaphorical intelligence practice (writing, study of myth, etc.), a emotional fluency practice (psychotherapy, journaling, NVC, mirroring, etc.) and avail himself of the last 60 years of comparative religion, philosophy and psychology (Wilber, Jung, Maslow, Eagleman, etc.), through which he become and adult and learn to ask better questions.
Because there are many libertarians for whom everything that you say is true, sometimes I avoid the term. That said, I still tend to describe myself as a "libertarian" because it remains a more accurate term for me than "progressive" or "conservative," and insofar as almost everyone still thinks along a two dimensional political reality, adding a third dimension is progress.
That said, my primary interest in "libertarianism" is precisely to achieve a far more peaceful, humane world in which mass poverty has become a historical phase that has been transcended, and in which humanity going henceforth is primarily focused on ever-deepening ways to experience reality and to delight other human beings in ever more profound ways. I am, if you will, an anti-materialist libertarian, or a communitarian libertarian, who is actively working to create trust funds that provide the poor with their own income streams.
Perhaps all of this makes me no longer "libertarian," and as mentioned sometimes I prefer to leave the term behind as well. That said, if the only other boxes that I am allowed to check are "progressive" or "conservative" then I will continue to check the "libertarian" box because the power of innovation to improve humanity in many dimensions is profound, and a Schumpeterian/Hayekian framework, that includes the freedom to innovate, is crucial to improving the human condition. Indeed, I am most interested in innovating in education, health, law, and community formation, all realms that are currently dominated by the state. See Be the Solution: How Entrepreneurs and Conscious Capitalists Can Solve All the World's Problems,
http://www.amazon.com/Be-Solution-Entrepreneurs-Conscious-Capitalists/dp/0470450037
for the big picture or my blog "The Purpose of Education is Happiness and Well-Being for All" for a glimpse of my perspective on innovation in the realm of human development,
http://thepurposeofeducation.wordpress.com/
Posted by: www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=719550481 | December 02, 2011 at 11:11 AM