Posted on 08/16/2011 11:28:05 AM PDT by Freeport
Pay Pal founder and early Facebook investor Peter Thiel has given $1.25 million to an initiative to create floating libertarian countries in international waters, according to a profile of the billionaire in Details magazine.
Thiel has been a big backer of the Seasteading Institute, which seeks to build sovereign nations on oil rig-like platforms to occupy waters beyond the reach of law-of-the-sea treaties. The idea is for these countries to start from scratch--free from the laws, regulations, and moral codes of any existing place. Details says the experiment would be "a kind of floating petri dish for implementing policies that libertarians, stymied by indifference at the voting booths, have been unable to advance: no welfare, looser building codes, no minimum wage, and few restrictions on weapons."
"There are quite a lot of people who think it's not possible," Thiel said at a Seasteading Institute Conference in 2009, according to Details. (His first donation was in 2008, for $500,000.) "That's a good thing. We don't need to really worry about those people very much, because since they don't think it's possible they won't take us very seriously. And they will not actually try to stop us until it's too late."
The Seasteading Institute's Patri Friedman says the group plans to launch an office park off the San Francisco coast next year, with the first full-time settlements following seven years later.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
I don’t think $1.25 million is going to get you much of a “floating island”. Maybe just enough for a big boat.
Will it be called Utopia? Truly, history repeats itself. The 19th century commune is reborn.
It’s possible, but even the Costa Rican navy would be sufficient to seize such a structure...what makes this investor think the rapacious IRS backed by the USMC would ever allow such havens to exist?
If you think your homeowners association is run by nazis. . .
The difference between men and boys......the price of their toys.
Those Disaster movies come to mind
Hopefully those Somali pirates won’t stop by for a visit.
Waterworld was a disastrous movie. Lost million$...
He forgot one of the Liberaltarians primary goals.
Enough for a garbage barge maybe.
“Free from moral codes” is a moral code itself.
Named: Amoral Islands
Crazy bell-ringer was right. There's money to be made in these parts.
Reminds me of “The Man Without a Country.” Sad, in its own way.
I kind of like the idea of just being left alone. The constant harrassment of government is a bit wearing to say the least. Imagine no gov’t—not a bad idea. The only down side is no moral code—this leads to many problems that will ultimately infringe on the rest of the colony. There must be some kind of enforcement group to prevent others from infringing on individuals. The other big concern is public health—the activities of a few people can affect the health of the entire colony—homos and iv druggies come to mind when spreading infectious diseases become issues for all others.
I’m holding out for Galt’s Gulch.
And how big of an army are they going to have to defend the island? Sitting ducks more like it.
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