{"id":100749,"date":"2026-02-07T04:00:14","date_gmt":"2026-02-07T09:00:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/?p=100749"},"modified":"2026-02-06T16:47:22","modified_gmt":"2026-02-06T21:47:22","slug":"the-probability-broach-l-neil-smiths-libertarian-fever-dream","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/2026\/02\/07\/the-probability-broach-l-neil-smiths-libertarian-fever-dream\/","title":{"rendered":"<em>The Probability Broach<\/em>: L. Neil Smith&#8217;s libertarian fever-dream"},"content":{"rendered":"<p align=\"center\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"854\" height=\"480\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/BfUFh7VAKEI?si=3Y0-t4L69lceK9Cj\" title=\"YouTube video player\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<blockquote><p><strong>Feral Historian<\/strong><br \/>\nPublished 6 Feb 2026<\/p>\n<p>Equal parts political manifesto and wacky adventure story, <em>The Probability Broach<\/em> is usually not the first title people think of when they hear &#8220;libertarian sci-fi&#8221; but it almost always makes the list after further reflection. While ideologically-motivated fiction tends to preach more than entertain, L. Neil Smith makes his world so bonkers and whimsical that we almost can&#8217;t help seeing our own in a similar light, and in so doing reminds us that things are as they are ultimately because we chose to make it this way.<\/p>\n<p>There&#8217;s some jumpcuts in this due to lack of good b-roll, but I suspect that most people who make it past the half-way point on this one are just listening anyway. <\/p>\n<p>The artwork is from the graphic novel adaptation from Big Head Press <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bigheadpress.com\/tpbtgn\" target=\"_blank\">https:\/\/www.bigheadpress.com\/tpbtgn<\/a><br \/>\nI ordered a copy but the government-run postal system didn&#8217;t get it to me in time to use its illustrations of later chapters.<\/p>\n<p>00:00 Intro<br \/>\n01:05 The Setup<br \/>\n03:15 Whiskey Rebellion<br \/>\n05:36 Confederacy<br \/>\n07:50 Property, Culture, and Capitalism<br \/>\n15:01 Cultural Assumptions<br \/>\n19:20 Interventionism<br \/>\n21:04 Choices, not Systems<br \/>\n<!--more--><\/p>\n<p>\ud83d\udd39 Patreon   | patreon.com\/FeralHistorian<br \/>\n\ud83d\udd39 Ko-Fi     | ko-fi.com\/feralhistorian<br \/>\n\ud83d\udd39 and Merch! | feral-shop.fourthwall.com<br \/>\nStill plugging Ninti\u2019s Gate &#8211;  Book 2 coming very soon<br \/>\n\ud83d\udd39 amazon.com\/dp\/B0CYXH9BWD<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Feral Historian Published 6 Feb 2026 Equal parts political manifesto and wacky adventure story, The Probability Broach is usually not the first title people think of when they hear &#8220;libertarian sci-fi&#8221; but it almost always makes the list after further reflection. While ideologically-motivated fiction tends to preach more than entertain, L. Neil Smith makes his [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[32,10,28],"tags":[898,1593,550,1382,85],"class_list":["post-100749","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-books","category-liberty","category-media","tag-alternativehistory","tag-feralhistorian","tag-libertarianism","tag-lneilsmith","tag-sf"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2hpV6-qcZ","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100749","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=100749"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100749\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":100750,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100749\/revisions\/100750"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=100749"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=100749"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=100749"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}