> It's all well and good that you believe you have the faculty to distinguish improperly prepared fish from properly prepared fish, but many people do not,

No, I don't believe that I neccessarily have that faculty. I just want to be able to bet on it anyway.

> and improperly prepared fish will be sold cheaper than the prepared variety, which means that people who want fish but can't afford to pay much for it will be the ones buying the improperly prepared stuff.

Yup. I remember my mom and dad arguing about whether it was okay to serve us rotten broccoli (she'd cut most of the rotten parts off, he only noticed because she missed some). I think that was something she'd done out of ignorance, and if she understood how bad it is to serve rotten broccoli she wouldn't have bought it even at a discount. I wish she had been better educated, but I don't wish that the government had enough power to uniformly enforce the food laws they already had in place. They were right in this case, but sometimes they're wrong. I've bought homemade food from some individuals that I trusted more than I trust the vast majority of government-licensed restaurants.

> You can already see this at some level today when poorer people tend to buy a lot of junk food that's cheaper (speaking in terms of opportunity cost here too) than healthier alternatives, and a variety of other unhealthy things (cigarettes, alcohol).

Uhh, yeah. Being poor sucks. People do drugs about it. You want to deny those who are denied everything else the solace of escapism?

> If you want to take the risk of killing yourself (it's absolutely absurd that you mention this) then there are probably more fun ways to do it than arguing the government should allow people to sell potentially deadly food.

This is both literally and figuratively a matter of taste. Why should your views of absurdity and fun affect my ability to enjoy a cullinary experience?

> Even then, you've selected a weird subset of dangerous food - everyone knows pufferfish is dangerous, far fewer people know which specific compounds that may be in food sold in an unregulated food market can lead to cancers and other diseases in the long term.

Yup, I selected an example that would clearly demonstrate my point. You caught me.

> You need to ask what the advantage of an unregulated food market is outside of a very specific conception of freedom which entails "I should be able to do anything I want to and you can't stop me.", which is (1) not the only conception of freedom around

I said I should be able to do anything I want to myself. I understand freedom-ofs and freedom-froms, you're welcome to share the word freedom with me. Just don't take my freedom of self destruction. It's an important one to me, whether or not you feel the same.

> (2) is unworkable in a society with rich and poor, educated and uneducated, critical and uncritical, disabled and able bodied, etc.

I'm just trying to eat a hypothetical pufferfish, maaaan. Yes, society has problems. No, that isn't a good reason to arrest me for buying or selling a fish. The most ridiculous laws you people make are the ones that make parts of nature illegal, like fish and flowers and fungi. Such oppression, much wow.