Who owns my body?

Adam Haman?

After selling myself into slavery to Adam Haman just to pay off the debt I racked up buying Magic: The Gathering cards, I began to think: Who actually owns my body?

Thankfully, my master is old and arguably wise. He compelled me to write this article, so I did some research into body ownership, contract theory, and voluntary slavery. Here is what I gathered.

Ex Machina

Minor spoiler warning

In the movie Ex Machina (2014), Caleb, the main character, is called to perform a Turing test on a new AI robot named Ava, created by the CEO Nathan. Over the course of the movie, we realize that Ava’s psyche/demeanours is indistinguishable from a human’s. This raises the question: Who owns Ava’s body?

Nathan programmed and built Ava. All the resources used were acquired by Nathan, so he should be the owner, right? Maybe not. In Chapter 4 of Stephan Kinsella’s Legal Foundations of a Free Society, there is a passage discussing children and how they come to own themselves. Kinsella argues it isn’t homesteading; it’s a special type of ownership. He claims that because a person has direct control over their body, they are the owner. The body was never an “unowned resource” to be homesteaded.

Kinsella also suggests a mother might initially own the embryo. I personally think the embryo is a self-owner from the start—like a person in a coma. Libertarians don’t believe property is conditional on time, but we do believe in the abandonment of resources. When I buy a cigar and smoke it, I am abandoning the cigar as I consume it. I believe that in the act of conception, both parents abandon their gametes (sperm and ovum), and the new person being formed becomes the owner of those resources as their body.

This isn’t homesteading because there is no point where the gametes are “unowned.” It is a transfer from parents to child that is being formed. Therefore, when Nathan “conceived” Ava, he was—perhaps unknowingly—abandoning his claim to those resources. Ava cannot be Nathan’s slave, assuming she is a subject entitled to rights.

This reading is even consistent with the Garden of Eden. God is the creator and owner of all things, but by giving man free will, He makes man a self-owner. Even God rested on the seventh day. But what if you could never rest?

Severance

In the TV series Severance (2022), employees enter an agreement where their brains are split so the “work-self” and “true-self” are completely separated. They swap personalities upon entering and leaving company property. The work-self is in a perpetual state of labor, while the true-self is in a perpetual state of leisure.

In this case, two personalities share control of a single body. But there are rules for the body’s use. Did Mark Scout sell his body? Is this contract enforceable? How do they quit? Should the work-self be able to quit without the primary self’s consent? Is this voluntary slavery?

Voluntary Slavery

Kinsella argues that voluntary slavery isn’t just wrong; it’s impossible. You cannot alienate your will. Even if you “sold” your body, you would still have direct control over it. The “new owner” wouldn’t be able to exclude you from yourself. Since ownership is defined by the right to exclude others from a resource, you cannot have two owners at once.

This seems like a knockout blow, but I think the term “voluntary slavery” is the real problem. It’s a contradiction in terms, like a “square circle.” There can be no such thing as voluntary slavery, just as there is no such thing as voluntary assault. Or is there?

When people enter a boxing ring, they agree to be punched. It isn’t assault because they’ve consented to specific rules: use gloves, no hitting below the belt, no hitting a downed opponent. This isn’t “voluntary assault”; it’s a sanctioned match. Kinsella himself (KOL004) concedes that we can have contracts very similar to voluntary slavery that function almost identically:

STEPHAN KINSELLA: The hard part is this. I believe you can alienate title to acquired objects or even future acquired objects. So let’s suppose I agree that every piece of property that I ever come to own in the future is yours, and you’re my master.

In the end, we could have something like voluntary slavery, but not exactly. The more interesting discussion lies in breach of contract and aggression. And there are some examples that are worth going through.

Debtor’s Prison

Imagine Bob lends Tom $1,000, and Tom agrees to pay back $1,100 by the end of the year. If Tom can’t pay, did he commit aggression? Bob lent the money on the condition of future payment, but the future is uncertain. Most would say “tough luck” for Bob; Tom didn’t “steal” the money.

However, if Tom had the money the day before and gave it to his son just to avoid paying Bob, most would agree that is theft. If Tom signs the contract in bad faith with no intention to pay, that is also aggression. So why is Tom allowed to walk away in the first case?

Kinsella argues this isn’t stealing by asking: “What was stolen? The original $1,000 or the promised $1,100?” If you say the $1,100, he argues that is impossible because that money never existed. If you say the $1,000, he says it can’t be theft because you gave it away freely. In a free society, there would be some easements so Tom wouldn’t walk away scot-free.

Defecting Pilot

Oftentimes, when libertarians discuss edge cases, there is an instinct to say, “The market will handle it.” While true, this is often a cop-out to avoid developing theory. I want to discuss two cases that reveal what libertarian theory actually aspires to solve.

The first is the Defecting Pilot. An airline hires a pilot to fly a plane from point A to point B. Under a strict Title-Transfer Theory of Contract (TTTC), the pilot cannot alienate his body. In theory, he could refuse to fly mid-air. While the market might solve this with co-pilots or fines, I don’t think the theory ends there.

I believe it is legitimate to coerce the pilot to fly the plane in extreme situations—and this doesn’t mean voluntary slavery is proven. Let me walk through how I think the pilot situation works.

The way I see it, the company transfers the property of the airplane to the pilot conditionally. This way, if the plane crashes, the pilot is to blame, and if people die, it’s also on the pilot. So, by refusing to fly the plane mid-flight without other recourse, the people can force the pilot to keep flying. We could say that the pilot is threatening the passengers. If there is another person that can safely and is willing to fly the plane, there is no harm, no foul.

You could also say that the passengers also alienate part of the property of their bodies to the pilot, the same way we do when going through surgery or boxing matches. So the pilot also has this responsibility. This would solve the issue with the defecting pilot without giving up on the will/body inalienability. The pilot can’t give up flying the plane the same way you can’t give up a bullet after you shoot it. But probably what you are all wondering about is: where is this plane going?

Taylor Swift Concert

Final example: If you go to a Taylor Swift concert and she refuses to perform, that is her right. She will owe a fine, but no one can force her onto the stage.

But what if Taylor shows up and the sound company doesn’t, even though they have a contract transferring the equipment to the organizers for that time? The sound company pays damages, but did they steal the equipment from the organizers? In a sense, they did.

Can they go to a Sound Equipment debtors’ prison? I don’t think so. Following strict TTTC, they stole the equipment from the organizers. Unfortunately, I don’t have the time to solve this one; I got to land this plane.

Landing the Plane

After diving through these articles and podcasts, I’ve become much more sympathetic to Kinsella’s view, especially regarding how we come to own ourselves and the TTTC. I used to be firmly on Walter Block’s side, and I still think something analogous to voluntary slavery is possible—though neither desirable nor expected.

The debate isn’t completely solved, but for now, I’m telling Adam Haman to pound sand. He can take any complaints to my lawyers.

Keep Laughing,

Joker

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References:

https://stephankinsella.com/2025/11/block-binding-promises-voluntary-slavery/

Legal Foundations of a Free Society → https://cdn.nakamotoinstitute.org/docs/legal-foundations-of-a-free-society.pdf