Comments below.

"There are no economic systems that innately correct just as there are no mathematical axioms that are more than an agreed set of rules."

Economic sytems are all about trading. So someone with sack of potatoes trades it to someone for a bootle of wine is innately correct if both parties are happy with the trade.
Free trade is "innately correct". In same sense that being able to talk to people is "innately correct".

G. That's just an assumption. There are plenty of transactions that are not a win for both parties, clearly you haven't bought a used car or a vacuum cleaner from a door to door salesman. The implication of this line of argument is that since everything is based on uncoerced trading that the sum of it all must be a system in which everyone is happy or has not right to complain. The trouble is people have been taking this line for thousands of years and every time some tries to makes this system work it falls apart and needs some regulation to put it back together. After all this time we know it doesn't work so the assumptions must be wrong. We know it works sometimes and often quite well, but not enough to stabilise itself. This is simply the verdict of history and experience, which shows the ideology is nonsense somewhere. That's inconvenient to a lot of idealogues but people have to eat, and need a system that works in reality not just looks good on paper.

"Everyone used to think for example parallel lines never met until Gauss started to question it. All economic systems work to some degree, communism worked, socialism still works, fascism works, dictatorships work, but all have various flaws that can make them unstable or inefficient."
Probably more accurate to say people can "work", and are capable of working despite various screwy systems.

G. Exactly. People will try under any system to feed their families, etc. No mathematical system describes the human psyche, it is just a matter of mixing ideologies together to find a working balance.

"So which is the "right" system and who gets to decide what is "right"? The idea that private property and one's possessions are one's own is not a principle it is a made up rule of a game one decides to play."

If the culture is hunting & gathering or herding animals, then land ownership doesn't make much sense. But if you are farming or mining, or building permanent homes then land ownership makes sense- you are investing time into improving the land so you can "make a living".
Obviously hunting & gathering or herding animals isn't going work very well if the land occupied by a bunch of farmers.

G. That's where the two systems of socialism and capitalism evolved. Both work quite well in their niche and quite badly outside it. When you have societies based on hunting and farming then you need to mix the two systems so both can prosper. This has been the way of history. Nobody has ever been able to make pure captialism work, because it is only part of an overall system.

"So your real question is, why doesn't everyone prefer the system I prefer? Ayn Rand of course asked the same question and tried to imagine a society that ran that way. Perhaps that leads to the next question, if this is so self evident and correct why has no society in the history of man ever been run completely that way?"

Because using armed force trumps other "economic systems"?
Armed force controls the wealth, but doesn't generate it.

G. Capitalism and socialism can't be seperated. As soon as you have public roads and parks you have socialism. If you want to make private roads then you are at the mercy of who owns them. Once you decide to make laws so the owners of the roads can't exploit others too much you've just reinvented a government again. By forcing the owners to let all use their roads you just make them the equivalent of a publically owned road so we are back to socialism. People worked this out thousands of years ago when they first started to put cities together, and they found greedy people couldn't be trusted to own important resources like water, roads, etc. Capitalist idealogues don't know anything new and their so called truths are no different than the nonsense being put about ever since then. It is has never ever worked int eh history of civilisation. Capiltalism isn't a proven system like calculus that can't be wrong. It's just a system of agreed rules and conventions that works well for some and not so well for others.

"You would think if it was so obviously true then somewhere everyone would have preferred it.
In fact the principles you are saying are simply radical to all known civilisations so far. There have been many cases where people have accumulated wealth through trade in peace, and then when there is enough of an imbalance then the poor take some of it back by voting or force."

Accumulation of wealth has never been a real problem, it's usually poor management and overtaxation. Or external warfare- people to take the wealth.

G. Agreed.

"The thing is the poor know that they will do better under some socialism and see know reason to pick the rules of a game that guarantees they lose. Unrestrained capitalism doesn't work for the poor, it never has in the history of man and it never will. "

Generally, in a free society, people will form into groups which will represent their interests- co-ops for instance, or they form union type groups. It is this behavior which was studied that lead to the invention of Socialism. Socialism as a govt system has never worked.

G. Socialism cannot work by itself any more than capitalism can. Lenin recognised this, he believed capitalism was needed to fund socialism and socialism to stop the excesses of capitalism. The hard part is finding the right balance. Socialism works very well in parts. Unions work well for their members and often quite well for the companies, stopping exploitation and poor safety standards. Coops work well for many people. Capiltalism dovetails with it, historically it always has. That's why no one has a prayer of convincing Europeans to give up their mix of socialism and capitalism, because it works very well for them. Marx didn't invent socialism, he just looked at the lessons of history and how at the time capitalism was wrecking a lot of economies by being unchecked.

"The system that does work is a mix of socialism and capitalism. Knowing as we do that that works the question then is why do you prefer a logical system that doesn't work for everyone? "

Socialism can be supported by capitalism. That socialism seems to work is illusionary.

G. It seems that the idea that socialism doesn't work is the illusion. No one can prove that socialism doesn't work in its niche. No one has ever been able to prove this.

"You give the example of someone being robbed here is a counterexample. A few people have accumulated all the money and food and the rest of the people have none. Why should they starve because of a so called moral property right, and what is so moral about them all starving?"

Because the "few people" have worked to get the food and money. Why were all these other people unable work and get food and money?

G. The lessons of history show that the smartest sooner or later end up with most of the goods, just like in a poker game. History also shows that people are usually unwilling to go home and quietly starve to death as a result. This has always happened throughout history, and the end result has always been a redistribution by force or by agreement. That's because unchecked capitalism in every case through history has led to disaster and a form of socialism had to be made to balance it. On the other hand too much socialism has also led to stagnation and it often had to be loosened up to allow more capitalism. In all of history capitalists have never ever had an example of pure capitalism working. You'd think with that record they would think twice about asserting their system is innately correct or self evident. You don't build bridges with that kind of reasoning. You build with what doesn't fall down.

"There is no Robin Hood principle involved, it is setting up an arbitary set of economic rules that favor one group, namely the smartest, the strongest and the sneakiest. The rest of the population has no obligation to prefer that system."

That's why the "smartest, the strongest and the sneakiest" better have a police force and army- because there we always be people who think, "those guys cheated, therefore it's ok if I steal their stuff". In other words, there are people who "make a living" by being theives- and these people are never rich.

G. That's the way it always worked. If a small percentage of the population gets too much and the rest are two poor (these are not the same thing) there will be a redistribution one way or another. Another way is the rich bankrupt themselves spending on defense to keep their money.

"Zoning officials are a good example, when there is no control over zonings you end up with slums and a complete disaster. How could this be possible if the principles you are saying are logically impossible to be wrong?"

I don't think Tom was objecting to the idea of city planning, but rather the discretionary power of the offical.

G. I think he was making the point that government regulation is wrong in zoning and that laissez faire would make better city zonings. Any view of history would show just what utter nonsense that is, and shows how the assumptions of pure capitalism are completely divorced from reality.