What is the strong version of “taxation is theft”, for example?
Simple: “taxation is theft and is also just as wrong as mugging because 1) the supposed benefits of government programs aren’t really there and 2) majority voting doesn’t make mugging any better than theft by a gang of robbers is better than theft by a single robber.” All of these arguments can be made stronger by specifying the reasons you should ignore the major differences between the moral issue in question and the archetypal example’s.
(1) and (2) are two distinct arguments. (1) is stronger than, but not related to the original argument by categorisation. (2) is itself a conjunction of (i) “taxation is theft” hidden as a tacit assumption and (ii) a counter-argument to the unsaid “but this instance of theft is legitimated by majority voting”. I don’t find it useful to call X and Y and Z a strong version of X when the only thing Y and Z have in common with X is their being used to support the same conclusion.
Edit: (1) is in fact also a counter-argument to the (yet) unsaid “this theft is legitimised by its positive benefits” and doesn’t address the question of why taxation is bad in the first place, besides categorising it as theft.
Simple: “taxation is theft and is also just as wrong as mugging because 1) the supposed benefits of government programs aren’t really there and 2) majority voting doesn’t make mugging any better than theft by a gang of robbers is better than theft by a single robber.” All of these arguments can be made stronger by specifying the reasons you should ignore the major differences between the moral issue in question and the archetypal example’s.
(1) and (2) are two distinct arguments. (1) is stronger than, but not related to the original argument by categorisation. (2) is itself a conjunction of (i) “taxation is theft” hidden as a tacit assumption and (ii) a counter-argument to the unsaid “but this instance of theft is legitimated by majority voting”. I don’t find it useful to call X and Y and Z a strong version of X when the only thing Y and Z have in common with X is their being used to support the same conclusion.
Edit: (1) is in fact also a counter-argument to the (yet) unsaid “this theft is legitimised by its positive benefits” and doesn’t address the question of why taxation is bad in the first place, besides categorising it as theft.