That’s pretty much the reason that I don’t do hypotheticals anymore. If you can suppose that a man produces gizmos in such a way that he renders his land uninhabitable for a thousand years, then I should be able to suppose that his neighbors have super-powers and can clean up the property with their thought waves. I mean, even Hiroshima was not inhabitable after only 5 years or so. And Three Mile Island was already being repopulated as early as 1990 (although government was offering it mainly to poor people.) But aside from that, I’ve already offered, not hypotheticals, but real world events, where government has itself polluted or facilitated the pollution of whole communities to the extent that people are dropping dead like flies. There is therefore no pertinent point to be made about an unfit parcel of land that has harmed, and will not ever harm, anyone. I don’t know, maybe the community can build a wall around it and commission a nice mural or something. After all, they’re the ones who voluntarily purchased the guy’s gizmos.
I agree. I’m sorry about the hyberpole. I was really only trying to ask about pollution which does not necessarily affect property other than the polluter’s. Surely libertarians would require some sort of disclosure (although not necessarily a preemptive requirement).
I agree. Again, sorry about the hyperbole.
I assume you mean “has not harmed”. What I was trying to get as is the possibility that property exists long after the actors in any scenario are gone. The effects that those actors leave on the property, however, may not be gone. In general I think this is a force for good. I am certainly not proposing that any and all possible effects of a person on his property should be vetted through some government agency. I’m just curious about how a libertarian society would deal with the situation of a piece of property which was abandoned. Presumably the absense of property taxes means that they can not simply sieze it.
You answered the question with your usual thoughtfulness. Let me see if I understand.
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The possibility of a piece of property being actually harmful to a community (and not owned by a punishable individual) is very remote indeed.
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If such a piece of property were a community problem, the community in question could handle it as a community.
No problem. Always glad to help a fellow noncoercer. 
If property is somehow abandoned or unowned, then it’s fair grabs for whoever takes claim of it. After all, libertarian government responds to requests from property owners — no owner, no request. It is unclear from your hypothetical whether there is a temporal demarcation such that people can go, “Hey! Nobody owns that place! I’ll race you to it!” The picture I got was more along the lines of a groggy group of people kind realizing, after a few generations had passed, “You know what? Haven’t seen anyone around the Smith property since my grandfather used to read to me.” But yeah, if the society is both libertarian and capitalist, then entrepreneurs will handle it — someone who might hire the services of Dr. Michael Daly from the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences in Maryland, for example. He’s the guy who invented “superbugs”, genetically modified bacteria that can digest toxins and make them less toxic. At the very least, I don’t see why a bureaucratic solution would necessarily be better. As Samuel Broder, former director of the National Cancer Institute once said, “If it was up to the NIH to cure polio through a centrally directed program, you’d have the best iron lung in the world but not a polio vaccine.”
Liberal: At the very least, I don’t see why a bureaucratic solution would necessarily be better. As Samuel Broder, former director of the National Cancer Institute once said, “If it was up to the NIH to cure polio through a centrally directed program, you’d have the best iron lung in the world but not a polio vaccine.”
I’m not sure that something like Roosevelt’s National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis (later “March of Dimes”), which was founded and publicized by a sitting* President, using his special opportunities as chief exec of the government for access to the public, and using government staff to process the millions of donations that were sent directly to the White House, really counts as a “non-bureaucratic” solution. Yes, private citizen action can accomplish great things without any assistance from government, but the March of Dimes-funded development of polio vaccines is not an example of such an accomplishment.
*No tacky wheelchair jokes, please.
Well, yes, it does. The program was not created by congress. It did not have bureaucratic oversite. Specifically, the only involvement was the President who founded it and used the Bully Pulpit to promote it. It was not a governemnt program in any sense of the word.
I realize that the March of Dimes did not reimburse the government for those workers who processed the dimes. But I find it difficult to believe that it is your position that this work was necessarily un reimbursable. If huge numbers of private citizens volunteered money, time, and talent to this cause while the government provided a little paper pushing and a convenient central gathering point for the funds, how can you say that this was not a private enterprise? Just because some government workers were involved does not mean that the program was suddenly a bureaucratic program.