How do you think settlements should be settled?
For example if i have a house, and it gets destroyed by x...
Should x give me a sum of money = to house value?
Or a littlebit more?
Or a little less?
and if so, how about murder?
if man x murders y then should man x be killed (pay an equal sum for only a life = a life?)
pay more, be killed along with a payment to y.
Or a little less (only a sum of money/imprisonment)?
“Since people are concerned that ‘X’ will not be provided, ‘X’ will naturally be provided by those who are concerned by its absence.""The sweetest of minds can harbor the harshest of men.”
http://voluntaryistreader.wordpress.org
If nobody else will comment...
Settlements (disputes?) should be settled however they are (or aren't), in fact, settled. I'm not smarter than the universe; incalculable, unfathomable forces combine to produce a dispute/settlement (or lack of settlement), who am I to say the universe made an error.
Would it be just if x were to murder y for x to be killed also?
I'm tending to think less and less in terms of absolutes. So there may be a degree of justice in it, and also maybe a degree of injustice; or it may be considered in relative terms. Of course, without derailing your thread I need to qualify that whether and the extent to which something is just/unjust is a concept in a person's brain, and any other person may have different (or may even have no) thoughts aoubt the justice of the situation.
Kelvin Silva,
The Rothbardian formula is two teeth for a tooth, that's what you'll find most libertarians advocating, including myself. The logic of it is that the aggressor must return/replace whatever property he stole/damaged, and then must pay compensation equal to that property once over again.
hashem,
So you've given up on ethics altogether?
Settlements (disputes?) should be settled however they are (or aren't), in fact, settled.
...whatever is is what ought to be?
Kelvin Silva: Would it be just if x were to murder y for x to be killed also?
I don't think that would be just enough. Perhaps, almost kill x then bring him back to life, then -- when he least expects it -- finally kill him again.
It depends, z. If they are a vampire you might have to stake and behead them. That might count twice.
So in an ancap society you think that private courts would be carrying out executions? Or at least issuing them instead of the pay X amt of restitution(money) to family member.
It depends how decentralized the law. In a completely decentralized law society, executions would be extralegal. But in a common law society, maybe they would be legal. Who knows? We live in a statutory society, and executions are legal in some areas and not in others.
Minarchist:So you've given up on ethics altogether? ...whatever is is what ought to be?
Yes in a sense, to a degree, but not according to the common misconception which is the second part of your question. To be clear, an ought doesn't derive from an is. And to be sure, shoulds and oughts and justice are concepts—they're models formed by individual brains. They're subjective, prescriptive, normative. They don't necessarily reflect absolute truths about reality..
The foundational problem with ethical propaganda is the fallacy that concepts can be not-subjective, that they're somehow intended to describe objective laws about reality. The realization that they're simply concepts ranks among the most valuable realizations I can think of. Included among them is the corollary realization that concepts about "morally right" or "morally wrong" only have relevance when and to the extent that people acknowledge and value them. Further, moral propaganda is perpetuated to control people—specifically, to limit competition for power. It's hard to accept that you have one life and it could have been magnificently more satisfying if you didn't impose such psychological limits on yourself, so you form a myth about how you didn't restrict yourself, about how it's the way things are "supposed to be". Humans are uniquely vulnerable to being psychologically and emotionally manipulated, and morality has been THE product salesmen-elite have sold us to keep us under control. It's the perfect product; it keeps us controlling ourselves and restraining ourselves from gaining power, and it allows us to experience a comforting myth to deal with the fact that we gave up so much opportunity for power.
So I just try to acknowledge reality as much as possible. I realize that while my experiences have made me uncomfortable causing others to suffer to certain degrees, it isn't necessarily bad to act in ways that result in the suffering of others. I avoid gaining power at the expense of people who aren't in my in-group because of my emotional condition, not because of some moral absolutes. And since I've come to terms with that, I'm freed from the further-limiting chains of immaturity of having to delude myself with some comfortable self-righteous myth about how I don't hurt others due to being "above that" or whatever.
It's a maturity thing, really—not that all the power-elite are mature by every standard; but they're not immature in the same way that have made the masses fodder and livestock throughout history. Certainly from an evolutionary perspective, they carry the most successful genes, the genes that have resulted in them having the most power and therefore the best chances to persist. Like Clayton said, one of the key driving motives for the elite is the drive to be the last man standing, and that's a gene thing if there ever was one.
To be clear, an ought doesn't derive from an is. And to be sure, shoulds and oughts and justice are concepts—they're models formed by individual brains. They're subjective, prescriptive, normative.
That's right. What I'm asking is: don't you have any such concepts? In other words, to make ethical an claim is to express a certain kind of subjective valuation (those concerning certain kinds of interpersonal relations) - don't you have any such subjective valuations? I find your position somewhat odd, because I can't understand why the recognition that ethics is subjective would make someone abandon ethics - no more than the recognition that artistic taste is subjective would make someone abandon having artistic tastes.
Minarchist:to make ethical an claim is to express a certain kind of subjective valuation...don't you have any such concepts?
Well hold on, ethics is about systems of rules—ultimately, it's about when the rules can be enforced with violence. That's more than a subjective valuation about when, from one's perspective, violence has value to him. Please excuse my interpretation of you, but it seems you're conflating subjective valuation per se with subjective valuation as an impetus for action determining when violence will in fact be used.
Yes, I can fathom scenarios where violence would have value to me, with or without respect to rules which I may or may not acknowledge or value. I can imagine forming subjective valuations in that regard. But let's be clear, ethics, ought statements fundamentally about when violence should be used, and determining when violence will be used, is a wholly different matter than me imagining when violence would have value to me.