Daniel, Thanks for taking the time to reply. I’m glad we agree on governments, although how we come to that conclusion may be different. I am working on a longer article addressing some of your points in more detail, but here is a brief response to them:

Exploitation - I don’t believe in any trade which involves someone owning resources another needs is voluntary, or that necessitates them having to work for someone with such resources in order not to starve or be homeless isn’t coercive.

Poverty - I addressed this briefly, it is only by using very narrow metrics which were changed to come up with this positive result that such a conclusion is possible. (I read a different Pinker book which touches on this and found it unconvincing. Please see - jacobin.com/2020/07/int…

Money - I agree, technically, that Capitalism isn’t necessarily about money, although during its relatively short history it has been inextricably intertwined with money, either in capital investment, capital exchange or capital profits, so it seems to be a technical distinction without a practical difference.

Can you give me some examples of exchange since the advent of capitalism which does not involve the state guaranteeing the value of currency or protecting the capitalists property? (Does Caplan give evidence of this?)

Utopian Villages - there are hundreds, if not thousands, of examples of communes and cooperatives currently. However, when they get bigger, such as starting to make an economic difference in larger regions they have usually been persecuted, scattered or killed off (although there are larger successful examples with hundreds of thousands or millions or people too, when they have avoided such fates for a while).

Tribal Life - You prefer the Huxleyan Social Darwinist view of ‘nature red in tooth and claw’ / ‘nasty, short and brutish’ I guess (makes good poetry, not good history). I don’t think that it is supported in biology or anthropology today (can you giver me references?), at least by those scientists and scholars who I find compelling, but undoubtedly you’d find support for your view too. Maybe it comes from a difference in life experience (I grew up near a 500 year old communal group and was later part of a different commune myself).

Capitalist Progress - I believe that most of what Capitalism takes credit for can be attributed to the Enlightenment and Scientific progress, which began before Capitalism, and many of its greatest breakthrough were made by Socialists (Einstein for instance).

Villagers - I’m not sure you really addressed my argument that many people are worse off working under capitalism than they were living in tribal (or even feudal) villages where there needs were guaranteed. This goes back to the Enclosure Acts (and similar changes in other countries) in which people lost common resources, were made homeless, and then had to enter workhouses (now sweatshops) to survive. It is what made Capitalism possible. (& Walmart has failed in some Western European countries precisely because workers there have come to expect something more than it can offer its workers)

Finally, I take great exception at your remark, ‘Anyone who is poor in a first world country has given up on their life—not my problem’. I’m sorry and deeply sad that your experienced something that left your proverbial heart so unwilling to open up and be sympathetic to such people. Maybe you have luckily never needed help from anybody, never benefitted from any help from family or friends, never relied on any government benefits, have had the money for insurance to cover any ill health or accident, or just never had one. Yet if this your choice to feel this way about others then I am even more horrified, as it is a very sheltered, condescending, callous and uncompassionate view. I hope I have somehow misunderstood your views on this.

Sincerely, Nate