How many robots would he have to send to complete a single advertisers logo? Keep in mind that it would have to scratch areas large enough to make anything visible. NASAs rovers travel but a mere few kms per day. The terrain of these vast areas which are necessary are not going to be smooth enough as they are littered with rocks, craters and vary in altitude.

Sure, it can’t be bought or sold, but until a mining colony or whatever changes that premise, I don’t see how anyone can claim to change it’s looks based on homesteading!

T’was me. I say a homesteader can’t engage in ‘postive’ damage, i.e. his actions cause direct damages to others’ property unless they’re ready to compensate the victims. However, I don’t believe a homesteader has to worry about ‘negative’ damage, i.e. someone else has lost personal access to the commons which they didn’t bother to homestead (or alternatively couldn’t).

For example, in the case of ‘Moon-moving’, I would regard any (literal) tidal waves that was caused by the gravitional shift would be ‘positive’ damage and would require compensation. (Or deter someone from wanting to homestead and move the Moon.) Yet if the gravitional shift caused no damage as such but the tides cease to operate and all those who benefitted from tidal action (e.g. a tidal power station, surfers) would suffer from ‘negative’ damage and tough luck to them.

“No. He would not be able to buy it unless someone else already owned it, and hence already held the right to move it. But nobody else does, so he can’t. the question is moot. ”

What if somebody else “homesteaded” it, and “improved” it by putting a huge … oh, I dunno, AT&T logo on it. Then somebody who didn’t like the moon looking like the Death Star bought it from the previous owner. He did a cost / benefit analysis and decided that if he bought up a bunch of land that would become prime ocean front property after the tidal waves (ala the Superman movie with Gene Hackman), it would be cheaper to just move the moon than to erase the logo.

I can’t see how anyone who follows Rothbardian libertarian principles could object to this. The moon was properly homesteaded, then properly sold. The owner simply moved his property, which he surely has every right to do. Other people claiming the right to the gravity produced by the moon means that they are claiming control over somebody else’s property, at least to the extent that it cannot be moved. They could claim that they have “homesteaded” the gravity by relying on it before, but homesteading traditionally involves adding labor to something, not just relying on it.

If this kind of obviously ridiculous outcome is what can come of pure Rothbardian theory, I would have to agree that it serves as a proof of the fundamental absurdity of the theory.

This is simply an intellectual debate, an interesting topic to explore.

This idea, outside of government intervention, will never happen because, as many have mentioned, the cost will be too great. By cost, I mean the actual dollars, euros, etc. poured in to such a huge project and the extreme negative goodwill and lost sales that would be created on the balance sheets of participating companies.

Also, while I agree with homesteading in relation to property rights, I think some people on here miss a crucial point. As the great philosopher John Locke stated in his Treatise on Government, an INDIVIDUAL only has the right to homestead what he can materially use. In other words, I can’t possibly justify a claim of 100,000 acres if I am only going to farm 100 acres. Same concept applies to the moon; no individual (or company) has the right to claim (even if they arrive first) the expanse of lunar surface that it would take to create a visible logo from earth. I mean what would stop the first arrival from claiming the entire moon? Simply a ludicrous idea…I don’t care what political beliefs you hold.

With ideas like this, why don’t we just start selling off the ocean or atmosphere to individuals? Not 100% the same concept, but pretty close.

There is/are already a/some company(s) out there selling moon real estate to ready and willing buyers.

http://www.lunarproperties.com/

On another note, just out of curiosity, if I purchase a piece of property on earth, why is it that I have not “purchased” the air and space rights above it. Now, I know some of you real smart people posting here will say that my “space rights” change on a continuing basis as the earth rotates and revolves through space. But, in simplistic terms, by “space rights” I mean my view of space at any given time. Yes, I know; this post needs to be developed more, and contains a fallacy or two, but…..

Given the likelihood of the latter (apparent even on these pages) it`s hard to see any firm making the investment any time soon.

What’s so silly about double arches, or a Windows logo, on the Moon??? You’re joking, right?

Here’s another possibility for the sci-fi/David Bowie fans amongst you. What if somebody *bought* the moon, and then *moved* it? That would possibly cause horrible tidal waves. Would this be permissible, according to libertarian doctrine?

No. He would not be able to buy it unless someone else already owned it, and hence already held the right to move it. But nobody else does, so he can’t. the question is moot.

Someone else mentioned the question of a new high-rise blocking a neighbour’s sunlight on his solar panels, and declared that the neighbour has no right to stop him. I disagree. The neighbour was ALREADY enjoying the use of sunlight on his solar panels before the high rise came along. the neighbour therefore has the right to block the construction or claim compensation for the loss of what he already had. If the high rise was erected first, and then the neighighbour bought the plot next door, he can’t demand the high rise’s demolition because he now wants to erect solar panels.

On the same principles, all the inhabitants on earth already enjoy the moon’s gravitational effect and have come to expect its continued presence. If anyone wanted to buy the moon and move it, he would have to negotiate with every single inhabitant on earth to get all of them them to agree to his proposal to move it. ONly then could he be said to own the right to move it. The sheer impractibality of this likewise makes the question moot.

As for the idea of advertising on the moons surface and leaving it in its current orbit, why not? who has any right to stop whoever gets there first?

However, before anyone contemplates doing so, they would do well to consider the colossal cost of getting there, and the cost of earthmoving, (moonmoving?) on a large enough scale to make the results visible to th enaked eye from earth. And having quantified that, square it against the return it is likely to generate in increased sales.

If the responses on this forum are anything to go by, I rather suspect that it would manifest itself in DECREASED sales. Hence,possibly the biggest single example of mal-investment in history, dwarfing even NASA’s shuttle programme.

Having now considered this possibility, I find myself almost hoping that someone will do it , so we can see what the outcome will be. I’d just hope its something clever like johnny walker’s elegantly dressed silhouette, and not that awful M or the dreadful tick.

A simpler trade off is that those who use the commons don’t directly physically interfere with another person’s private property. A person has no right to complain about the noise about an airliner as it’s not his atmosphere. If the same person’s house is getting physically damaged by extreme vibration or the person is showing early signs of hearing loss caused by an airliner flying too close then the same owner has the right to intervene.

How would this money be used? It could only be used to pay off whoever was threatening to cause the damage, or to restrain them from doing so through force.

The concept of homesteading serves as an objective basis for initiating property rights, but it depends on the assumption that unclaimed (or unmodified?) resources are owned by nobody.

The validity of homesteading ultimately relies on public acceptance of this assumption, regardless of how justified you think your actions are. As long as your claim doesn’t conflict with someone else’s, you will be viewed as in the right and left alone. But if people feel that you are claiming a resource that is commonly owned – whether by a group of people, a state, or even an ecosystem – expect a fight.

If enough people regard something as part of the commons, they will aggress against whoever threatens it in the near term since this will be cheaper than buying and protecting it over the long term. Most likely they will be able to convince their populist government to do the dirty work through coercion.

If there is any legitimate role for government, protecting such common resources over the long-term is it. Too bad no government on earth (or the moon) will ever get this right – mainly because it is difficult to justify the extent to which resources are commonly owned. And historically, governments have been the first ones to profit from “selling” these resources.

Whether such protective measures are “right” or “wrong” in an absolute natural rights sense depends on whether the raw resource is truly “unowned” to begin with. “Mixing labor with the land” is vague enough to allow many interpretations, as seen in the comments here. This makes homesteading necessarily subjective and relativistic.

“Collapse” by Jared Diamond discusses these issues intelligently (although not from a natural rights standpoint). He shows how private ownership of resources tends to foster better long-term protective policies, even in the case of oil and some mining companies. Although he also advocates some top-down governement initiatives, it’s probably the most balanced view you’ll get in a book about environmental destruction. There is thankfully little discussion of climate change since it was written before the hysteria started. In fact, it illustrates how many other problems, such as deforestation and soil destruction, are more noteworthy.

‘That factory is ugly, we shouldn’t allow people to build it. At least, keep me from seeing it.’

This might actually serve as a defensive device against hostile alien species – “Oh crap, they have hippies. Let’s enslave a different planet.”

There are thousands of observatories and stargazing tourism groups around the world that set up telescopes etc. to view the sky for profit. Does this constitute homesteading?

Don’t even think about altering the lunar landscape in any way. If I look up and see the Double Arches above me, I’ll never eat another French fry again.

Is Space Exploration Wasteful And Used For Propaganda Purposes?

In a classical liberalism society there will be no behemoth government with control of vast resources to enable it to conduct stellar boondoggles!

In a classical liberalism society individuals will have various degrees of wealth and may be able to form some kind of contractual agreement with others to use their wealth to mobilize resources for experimental enterprises in space, not for pomp and ceremony but because it serves the consumers on our planet.

In a enlightened classical liberalism society the greatest arena of endeavor will be for the advancement of civilization on this wonderful planet.

Are there ‘scientists’ who object to this? Your pet projects are no more valid than any of the other special interests that need coercion to fund it.

Peace and prosperity cannot ever be achieved from coercion. If your scientific mind cannot understand this than it is very obvious that funding any of your self-serving ideas would be harmful.