Property is the only way that we can build complex things.
We couldn't have airplanes if property didn't exist. Anyone could just walk away with parts off the airplane if they felt like it. And in fact that's exactly what happens if you leave an airplane unprotected for too long.
Hydroelectric dams would be impossible. You couldn't even have light bulbs or computers because their production methods require so much coordinated effort as well as protection from theft and damage.
Without property, all you'd have are bands of foragers because without the ability to control access, any group efforts could be undone overnight by anyone.
I wasn't talking about about stuff you can walk off with, nor was the article author, nor was Proudhon in 1840. This is about the difference between owning things made my people versus owning people who make things.
Used to be that the people themselves were property, then it was the machines they used, now it's some abstraction related to shares and companies, but it's all the same: what you're doing belongs to me not because I bought it from you but because of something to do with my position in society as it relates to yours.
> Property is the only way that we can build complex things.
This assertion needs to be substantiated, even if it is true. You give an example of how property "allows us to build complex things", but you don't prove that it's impossible for any other system of ownership or of mediating access to resources/"things" to allow that.
> but you don't prove that it's impossible for any other system of ownership or of mediating access to resources/"things" to allow that.
You can’t prove a negative, so the onus is actually on you to show an example of a working alternative that does not rely on property.
And it has been tried in the 20th century. Several times, in fact. Despite all the industrial espionage committed by the Soviet Union (which saved them the resources to do the research themselves) and the slave labor of people who spoke or wrote about the “wrong” ideas (which surplus was given to the rest of the population), ordinary people in the USSR had much worse lives than those in the West.
The Soviet Union won the space race, but I'm not sure if they had property or not. They were a dictatorship, anyway, so we probably don't want to repeat that.
Yes, it did[1]! Because they rather quickly discovered that you can’t build complex things without it. Which brings us back round to the original point!
[1] But… they did make a go of it without property before discovering that it wouldn’t work. It turns out (shockingly!) that indentured serfs (who make the food) like the idea of land reform when it means they own the land. But they don’t like it so much when it means nobody owns the land. And when they are not happy then you have no food. And then those quotes about “x meals until y” start to have some salience. And then you start to think about the most effective way to use the number of bullets you have on hand (which is smaller than the number of mouths you need to feed).
Fine. It's the only way we know of that unlocks the potential of building complex things. If you know of an alternative that is better, please tell us!
Please look up the difference between private property and personal property. When people decry "property is theft", they're not talking about personal property, they're talking about private property.
Also, socialist states with advanced economies built airplanes, hydroelectric dams and all kinds of complex things. This is a joke of an argument. Say what you will about the living conditions, fairness, corruption or other issues with socialist states, but to pretend they "didn't build complex things" is ridiculous when you look up the number of scientific achievements made first by the USSR.
We couldn't have airplanes if property didn't exist. Anyone could just walk away with parts off the airplane if they felt like it. And in fact that's exactly what happens if you leave an airplane unprotected for too long.
Hydroelectric dams would be impossible. You couldn't even have light bulbs or computers because their production methods require so much coordinated effort as well as protection from theft and damage.
Without property, all you'd have are bands of foragers because without the ability to control access, any group efforts could be undone overnight by anyone.