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The Voluntary Life

The Voluntary Life

Jake Desyllas 437 Episodes Jun 28, 2026

A podcast about living a life of your choosing. Topics covered include financial independence, productivity, entrepreneurship, peaceful parenting, minimalism, and rational thinking.

Episodes

Children Do Not Have Obligations to Their Parents Jun 28, 2026 05:41 An AI narration of the article 'Children Do Not Have Obligations to Their Parents' by Jake Desyllas. In a libertarian legal order, parents owe positive obligations to their children — to feed, shelter, and protect them — because the parents' own actions brought the child into existence. But does the relationship run the other way? Do grown children owe their parents care in old age? In this short
The Theory Of Acquired Rights Violates Hoppe's Specificity Principle Jun 21, 2026 09:49 An AI narration of the article 'The Theory Of Acquired Rights Violates Hoppe's Specificity Principle' by Jake Desyllas. Do we have rights because of what we are, or because of some capacity we later acquire? Libertarians are split, and the stakes run straight through the hardest questions about children, abortion, and self-ownership. This episode tests the two rival theories against one of Hans-He
Three Questions Philosophers Do Not Want To Answer About Parenting Jun 14, 2026 06:41 An AI narration of the article 'Three Questions Philosophers Do Not Want To Answer About Parenting' by Jake Desyllas. Why are books on the ethics of parenting so consistently dull? In this episode, Jake Desyllas argues that the blandness is no accident — it is the product of strategic omission. Philosophers of the family routinely skirt around questioning the practices that most urgently deserve s
The Cost of Bad Street Design Jun 10, 2026 28:18 An AI narration of the article 'The Cost of Bad Street Design' by Jake Desyllas. In this article, Jake Desyllas examines the hidden costs of a design ideology that came to dominate twentieth-century traffic planning: the idea that pedestrians and vehicles must be physically segregated, with streets re-engineered as conduits for through traffic. Drawing on his work in a pedestrian movement consulta
A Critique of Nozick's Comments on Parental Obligations and Children's Rights Jun 7, 2026 13:11 An AI narration of the article 'A Critique of Nozick's Comments on Parental Obligations and Children's Rights' by Jake Desyllas. Robert Nozick's commentary on Locke's theory of homesteading contains two genuinely sharp insights into the problem of children's rights: that Locke's God-as-creator argument conceded the principle that children are ownable rather than refuting it, and that Locke's same
What Is The Libertarian Theory of Parental Obligations? JLS Article Jun 3, 2026 43:19 Article only version An AI narration of the article 'What Is The Libertarian Theory of Parental Obligations?' by Jake Desyllas. This article examines four competing philosophical theories of the parental role within a libertarian framework: parental ownership, parenting as charity, parenting as voluntary social contract, and causal parental responsibility. It critically analyzes each theory, evalu
You Cannot Give Up Parental Obligations May 31, 2026 13:12 An AI narration of the article 'You Cannot Give Up Parental Obligations' by Jake Desyllas. Parental obligations exist because creating a child places that child in a state of peril, and the parents are the ones causally responsible for that peril. From this foundation, Jake draws an unsettling conclusion: those obligations cannot be legitimately given up. Through carefully constructed thought expe
A Critique of Rothbard's Theory Of Parental Ownership May 24, 2026 16:50 An AI narration of the article 'A Critique of Rothbard's Theory Of Parental Ownership' by Jake Desyllas. Self-ownership is a foundational principle of libertarian philosophy — but does it extend to children? Murray Rothbard rejected outright ownership of children, yet defended a "limited" parental ownership on homesteading grounds. This essay traces the contradiction in Rothbard's position and arg
The State's Drive to Destroy the Family May 17, 2026 18:32 The State's Drive to Destroy the Family: Institutional Logic and Time Preference A presentation by Jake Desyllas at the 2026 Austrian Economics Research Conference held at the Mises Institute in Auburn, Alabama.
Justifying Parental Authority Without Ownership May 10, 2026 13:51 A presentation by Jake Desyllas at the 2026 Libertarian Scholars Conference held at the Mises Institute in Auburn, Alabama.
Interview: A Libertarian Theory of Parental Obligations May 3, 2026 47:30
What Is the Libertarian Theory of Parental Obligations? Apr 26, 2026 18:52 A presentation by Jake Desyllas at the 2025 Libertarian Scholars Conference held at the Mises Institute in Auburn, Alabama. The article of this talk is at https://jls.mises.org/article/141458-what-is-the-libertarian-theory-of-parental-obligations

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