Imagine that you are on a mountaineering expedition. One of your fellow climbers is involved in an accident that requires immediate medical attention. However, you are almost all the way up the mountain and there is no way that you can get back down in time to get this person to the hospital. Furthermore, a rescue chopper cannot be notified because the batteries in the satelite phone have malfunctioned.
Unexpectedly, one of the other climbers announces that he has a Star Trek like transporter that can easily transport the injuried climber to the hospital. Of course everyone cheers and says thats great. But not so fast. The owner of the transporter says that he doesn't want to help the injured climber.
They question why and he says he just doesn't feel like it. It only costs about $.03 in energy for each transport, and the expected life of the transporter is 100,000 transports. So far he has used 5.
So, how many anarcho-capitalits out there would use force to take the transporter and help the injured climber? If you do, you are breaking the non-agression principle.
To up the anty, let's say that the injured climber is someone you love.
What I think this thought experiment shows is that sometimes it is ok to initiate force, and therefore the non-agression principle is false.
Thoughts?
Why would the man with the transporter tell you all of these things? To be an ***?
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Your thought experiment is based on emotion, not reason. It doesn't show anything besides the fact that you would likely use force despite your better moral judgement.
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Stranger, I suppose. Does it make a difference as to why? I would beat the guy up and take his transporter and use if for teh injured person. Of course, I would give him his transporter back, but never the less, I would initiate force against this person.
krazy kaju, what would you do? If you would not initiate force, why is someone that would wrong?
I would use trickery, then bribery, then mindfuck, then emotional blackmail, and then 'reasonable' force.
An angel I am.
Trianglechoke7: Stranger, I suppose. Does it make a difference as to why? I would beat the guy up and take his transporter and use if for teh injured person. Of course, I would give him his transporter back, but never the less, I would initiate force against this person.
Do you really think it is a good idea to attack someone with access to supernatural technology? It is probable that he also possesses similarly advanced weapons and protection.
Wow! You have not only created a 'crisis' scenario, where normal rules don't apply, you've also added a deus ex machina in the form of the transporter.
Statism Defeated?
If it is sometimes okay to initiate force, when is it NOT okay to initiate force? Are you going to judge on a case-by-case basis? I would much rather have a principle that works 99 times out of a 100 than have to stop and rethink the issue every time it comes up. And if you DO get an extreme case such as the one you've come up with here, then maybe that's the time to stop and think about it, and not the 99 other times when it's pretty obvious and trivial.
Stranger, for the sake of the example, let's just say he doesn't have advanced weapon technology. All I need to do is show an logical possible scenario where the non-agression principle does not apply in order to show the principle is false.
macsnafu, it may very well be the case that you shouldn't initiate force 99 times out of 100, but that one time shows the principle to be false. If it is false, then we need to get thinking on a principle that allows us to discern the times we should initiate force and the times we should not. This may or may not allow for a state. Perhaps it will only allow for isolated individual intiations of force and not government, but perhaps it will only for minarchism, or perhaps we will fall into justification of socialism.
The non aggression principle is just that, a principle. In emergency situations, society breaks down and you may act in violation of your principles.
What do you mean by "that one time shows the principle to be false"? How can a principle be shown false? What does that mean?
You have created a variation on the old "lifeboat scenario". Let us know when you are in such a scenario. The chances of being in such a situation are so remote as to not warrant much attention frankly. What would I do? I may indeed pull a Jean Valjean. Is this a violation of the NAP? Perhaps in a strict sense, but if that person has such little regard for human life he is no better than a politician in my book. I would feel no guilt about commandeering his machine temporarily. I think any reasonable person would understand. Again, such scenarios are very, very, very rare. Also, I would not willingly hang around such an a_+hole. Such a question of morality in a rare emergency scenario has next-to-no impact in the question of economics.
I am an eklektarchist not an anarchist.
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Trianglechoke7:Stranger, for the sake of the example, let's just say he doesn't have advanced weapon technology. All I need to do is show an logical possible scenario where the non-agression principle does not apply in order to show the principle is false.
You are doing neoclassical economics, assuming impossible conditions in order to arrive at irrelevant conclusions.
In reality, you are going to attack a man with god-like technology without truly knowing that he has the ability to achieve the end you seek. If he retaliates and kills you, no court will find him guilty, as no one will know that you were trying to help your friend.
macsnafu:If it is sometimes okay to initiate force, when is it NOT okay to initiate force? Are you going to judge on a case-by-case basis? I would much rather have a principle that works 99 times out of a 100 than have to stop and rethink the issue every time it comes up.
I think a case-by-case basis is exactly how it should be considered, and to wish to do otherwise is mere intellectual laziness. Was the use of force brave, compassionate, necessary? What it brutal, random, cruel? Any action, including the use of force, can be characterized, and we should characterize it individually. Anything else is trying to force too much order, too much collectivism, onto individuals. Only individuals can truly make the individual judgements of actions. Social structures, on the other hand, face a far higher ratio of issues to decision makers (these latter being collectives and therefore fewer), and so the larger and more complex the structure, the more it must work by rule and principle.
Little messy, this. I'll refine it.
krazy kaju: Your thought experiment is based on emotion, not reason. It doesn't show anything besides the fact that you would likely use force despite your better moral judgement.
Yes, but I think it is an emotional response that most would have.
Would I personally use force to make the man use the transporter? Yes. I would also accept the repercusions if he wanted to press charges against me.
I think in these situations, it is a matter of retribution afterwards that solves the problem.
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This might be of some help: http://libertarian-left.blogspot.com/2008/04/rights-and-entitlements.html
Oh, and a better version of the same basic thought experiment:
You are standing at the edge of a lake, and you spot a child drowning in the center. Unfortunately, the child is too far out to to reach by swimming without putting yourself in mortal danger of drowning. There is another individual standing by the side of the lake, and this individual has a motor boat which he could easily use to save the child. But rather than saving the child, this individual turns to you and says, "Hey, I've never seen a child drown before; this is great!" In horror, you reply, "You're really going to just let that kid die out there for your sick amusement?" "Yea, why not? It's not my problem," the boat-owner replies, "and besides, what's it to you?"
TBH, there are some far more interesting criticisms of the NAP than this. The entire premise is that it is somehow a moral imperative to rescue the injured climber, which is no imperative at all, she could simply die. (Assuming she is female, and that the individual who is her love is male, which is your described example). Libertarian ethics is not broken, because it isn't forced to contradict itself, unless you can find a reason why saving the injured climber is an absolute moral necessity. Also, technically I could knock the guy out, use the teleporter for all given climbers, and simply pay for the damages according to the victims demands. (Correct this statement if it is incorrect)
Please, base your criticisms of of CONTRADICTIONS within the NAP, not emotive pleas.
Simply put, you have to create a possible senario in which it is IMPOSSIBLE to act in accordance with the NAP, or engage in INACTION for that matter.
I retrogressed into being a Republican recently after watching the Superman movie.
If and when General Zod attacks planet Earth, I think we'd have to use nuclear weapons against him and probably most of the people who have kneeled before him.
Seriously, though, the transporter is somehow extremely scarce, extremely cheap, and extremely in demand at the same time -- making little economic sense. If all people don't have them at those prices, then they are probably either Amish or jehovahs witnesses that won't accept medical treatment anyway.
Add to this the unlikelihood that he would
1) Bring something along he had no intention of using.
2) Purposefully then throw himself in front of a possible violent situation and/or social ostracism.
3) Allow any harm to come to himself thereof if he could transport himself immediately to safety.
Where is this supposed defeat? I see none.
-Jon
Freedom of markets is positively correlated with the degree of evolution in any society...
Mlee, why would it be necessary to demonstrate an internal inconsistency in order to reject the non-aggression principle? Wouldn't the rejection of one of the premises be sufficient?
Jon, what the original poster was trying to show was that we have good reason to question the truth of the non-aggression principle, so ostensibly his argument would need to be that the legitimacy or desirability of anarcho-capitalism is contingent on the truth of the non-aggression principle, and that the principle is false.
Yes, a big opps, however, he did not do this, or demonstrate internal inconsistancy.
I know what he was trying to do. My question remains.
Um...what about consequentialist arguments like David Friedman's?
Yours in liberty,Geoffrey Allan Plauché, Ph.D.Adjunct Instructor, Buena Vista UniversityWebmaster, LibertarianStandard.comFounder / Executive Editor, Prometheusreview.com
Trianglechoke7: Stranger, I suppose. Does it make a difference as to why? I would beat the guy up and take his transporter and use if for teh injured person. Of course, I would give him his transporter back, but never the less, I would initiate force against this person. krazy kaju, what would you do? If you would not initiate force, why is someone that would wrong?
So you're not a libertarian either I take it?
It's as good as saying that forcing social behavior is necessary (which assumes it is only by chance that humans are social at all). I think that the unsocial and unhelpful can still be moral. Who knows or even cares what his reasons are for not wanting to help? It is hardly worth beating him up. He did not injure the person after all.
Anarchism reduces the incentive for such behavior: social ostracism, eliminating moral hazards of the state, total private ownership of land, the wider availability of Star Trek transporters (that would also probably remove the need for dangerous climbing the way better gear does currently or perhaps reduce the overall novelty of hard to reach mountains), etc.
Mlee, exactly how would you have him object to the principle if you won't accept an argument of the form:
"The NAP entails that the use of force is unjustified in the example offered. But many people would see no problem with using force in the example, and indeed, even you accept that you probably would use force, even though you think it would be wrong to. Accordingly, we have some reason to believe the NAP to be false."
I think that's a perfectly legitimate way to argue. To attack the argument, it seems like you'd need to either show that the NAP does not entail that force would be unjustified in the example, or argue that the intuitions being referred to either don't exist or should be disregarded as evidence for rejecting the NAP.
Now, to answer Jon and Geoff, I agree that advocacy of anarcho-capitalism need not be reliant on the non-aggression principle, but that's not how people have been arguing here.
Why bother coming up with this scenario? It would have been no different to say "some people commit acts of aggression, therefore the NAP is invalid". But in fact, so long as a person can be compensated for whatever losses they incur as a result of the aggression, the principle maintains.
Pro Christo et Libertate integre!
Donny with an A:Now, to answer Jon and Geoff, I agree that advocacy of anarcho-capitalism need not be reliant on the non-aggression principle, but that's not how people have been arguing here.
It's relevant to point out that the case for anarcho-capitalism does not rest entirely on the non-aggression principle.
However, my pithy response to the hypo is the same as Socrates': It is better to suffer injustice than to committ it.
Well no, if the NAP actually maintains that it would be morally impermissible to use force, then its defenders would need to account for what the original poster takes to be a common intuition that we would not object to someone using force in the example. Alternatively, defenders must show that the NAP does not actually forbid the use of force. It's a very worthwhile exercise, even if the example is a little far fetched (I offered a more plausible alternative on the previous page).
Thankfully I never go mountain climbing with technologically advanced sadists.
Extreme situations are always the worst at determining morality so why not use a more conventional one? Like if you were really poor and hungry and you violated a baker's property by stealing bread to feed yourself.
Morally wrong? Yes, theft of private property is always morally wrong.
Understandable? Yes, a starving person feeding themselves is an understandable response, so perhaps the nature of the crime would not be denied but the circumstances that lead to the crime would likely mitigate punishment for the bread thief (unless the techno-space sadist was also the baker).
So on to the improbable....Use of force against Spacey DeSade would be wrong. Appropriating Spacey's property would be wrong. But use of agression against Spacey and appropriating his property would likely be still wrong, but mitigated by circumstance (like with the starving man stealing from the baker). The circumstance would be two fold. First Spacey was just being a ***: Announcing he has technology to save an endangered person only to then announce that he had no intention of doing so.
I am thankful that I live in a world where these bizzarro Philosophy 101 type riddles never happen. Going grocery shopping would just be too stressful in a world like that. Imagine just about to walk out the door to buy some celery and suddenly you have to worry about if today you are going to run into the armless and legless person with a very contagious fatal incurable disease who is about to be run over by a truck and you left your latex gloves at home...or if today will bring the space alien with two hostages..a nice old lady who is ill or a healthy young woman who is a criminal and you have to choose who the space alien killls...is it the healthy menace to society who may have a chance at redemption or do you kill the person whose life is almost over but is always pleasant and would be missed.
Not to mention the dilemas that could happen on places like the city bus, a crowded restaurant, a first date or going bear hunting.
In a world like that the answers would not even matter anymore as life would be such a burden of improbable events as commonplace I really think I would have to violate my anti-suicide principle and hope that the mitigating circumstance was taken into account.
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Donny with an A: Well no, if the NAP actually maintains that it would be morally impermissible to use force, then its defenders would need to account for what the original poster takes to be a common intuition that we would not object to someone using force in the example. Alternatively, defenders must show that the NAP does not actually forbid the use of force. It's a very worthwhile exercise, even if the example is a little far fetched (I offered a more plausible alternative on the previous page).
Sounds like Kierkegaard's telelogical suspension of the ethical.
Again, I contend that it may in fact be ethical to violate someone's self-ownership, but that will only occur when there is a telelogical suspension of the ethical. When that telelogical suspenion occurs is unknowable to us though and regardless of whether or not it is ethical, violation of self-ownership creates a material deficiency with the one violated and that violation should be repayed.
I just think that in these situations most people will bite the bullet and accept any punishment that occurs afterwards - or at least, they should. I would.
Trianglechoke7:What I think this thought experiment shows is that sometimes it is ok to initiate force, and therefore the non-aggression principle is false.
How does this prove that the non-aggression principle is false? The non-aggression principle states that you do not have the RIGHT to initiate force. It does not state that it is IMPOSSIBLE. All your little "thought experiment" proves is that people have free will and are free to exercise it as they see fit. Your "thought experiment" doesn't change the fact that taking the transporter by force is still theft and violence and those who do it are violating the non-aggression principle, even if it is for saving another persons life. The owner of the transporter can rightfully withhold the use of their property even if by doing so another person dies. They cannot be held liable because they are not the ones that caused the person to die. That persons death process would have happened if someone would have been there or not. I see no reason why anyone should be legally obligated to protect anyone from dying. That is impossible.
The anarcho-capitalist up on that mountain, according to your "thought process", know and understand the non-aggression principle. With a dying friend they might choose to ignore it and initiate force against the owner of the transporter. Now, one of two things can happen afterwards. The owner of that stolen transporter could have them brought up on charges of theft and could be compensated for his loss or he could forgive the trespass and forget the whole thing ever happened.
Your "thought process" does nothing to defeat the theory of anarcho-capitalism but does wonders for showing how individuals are free to chose to adhere to the non-aggression principle or violate it. Of course, those who violate it must necessarily be punished for the violation of the non-aggression principle.I think that you don't really understand what the non-aggression principle is otherwise you would not have made such a ridiculous posting and exclaim that you have irrefutable proof that you can violate another persons rights and get away with it.
"It does not require a majority to prevail, but rather an irate, tireless minority keen to set brush fires in people's minds. " -- Samuel Adams.
It's an interesting example. It shows NAP is not an absolute but it does not prove ancap to be defeated though since ancap does not rely on NAP.
The moral guide I use is not NAP but rather survival. The way I see it, the common denominator of man (or every living thing for that matter) is survival or at least that's the closest word to what I mean. Not just a live or die survival but getting a better job, having a kid, and everything else. Not just limited to the body either since a person who commits suicide does it because they believe life is too dangerous or whatever and that they will be better off dead. The word is not the thing so nobody kill me with semantics ;)
The problem with my moral system is that you often don't have enough information, since you can't read everyone's mind, to make the correct moral decision all the time. You can't always know what the "survival" value of something is to someone else. You can't always predict the future and know all the unforseen consequences. So you come up with principles like NAP that people can follow in order to get it right more often than if everyone just did their own guesswork on what is most moral in any given situation. So following NAP will not result in the absolute most moral decisions possible every time but it is the best replacement for guesswork that anyone has come up with so far. NAP is a tool, not an absolute.
Now ancap will not necessarily result in the official modus operandi being NAP. It will probably be very very close but not necessarily dead on. Ancap would instead result in more ethical or moral decisions than if you elected people to do moral guesswork for you (statism). It wouldn't bring about the absolute most moral decisions in all situations but overall it would be more dead on than anything else. If anything were to bring to light a better principle that is just as practical as NAP, it would be ancap.
The confusion you show, I think comes from anarchists trying to convince people that ancap is the way to go because of the moral issue, with NAP then being perceived as the lynch pin that the entire argument is based on and so being percieved as though it is thrown out there as an absolute. This is why I've never liked taking the moral approach with someone new. The moral argument is not air tight. The pragmatic approach is far more effective and doesn't even need to be air tight.
Imagine a world where nanomachines have invaded the bodies of all living people on earth. If any human attempts to help another person the nanomachines will set off a bomb that will destroy the whole world and all the humans with it. Would you try to help another person? Does this mean the principle of being nice and helping other people has now been proven false?
What if in the process of trying to recover the transporter you pushed the owner of the transporter off the cliff and killed him and the other climber died anyway? Would this change the morality of attempting to steal the transporter?
"I cannot prove, but am prepared to affirm, that if you take care of clarity in reasoning, most good causes will take care of themselves, while some bad ones are taken care of as a matter of course." -Anthony de Jasay
gigaplex:It's an interesting example. It shows NAP is not an absolute but it does not prove ancap to be defeated though since ancap does not rely on NAP.
I don't think it show that at all. The NAP is very much absolute. No man, no matter the cause, has the right to violate another persons rights or property. The situation presented by the original poster does nothing to disprove the NAP or show that it is not an absolute. All it shows is that four people were put in a position to either adhere to the non-aggression principle or violate it. Those guys who would steal that transporter from its owner are totally and completely in the wrong. Though their friend might be dying that is no excuse for violating another persons rights. You could extend that argument to this extreme:
The people in Darfur are being butchered by their own government and rebels. In order to save their lives the government must now conscript me into military service and send me over there to fight and possibly die so that the people of Darfur would be safe from their own government. That extreme example is the same basic premise as the one presented above. In order to save a life you have to assume that it is acceptable to violate the rights and property of another person. I do not believe that it is any more morally justifiable to steal from me than for me, who has the resources to save this mans life, to allow him to die. Both are bad, both are wrong, except one can be punished as a violation of property rights (the theft of my transportation device). Since I am not legally obligated to save the life of anyone I fail to see how I could be rightfully deprived of my property to save this persons life.
The NAP holds true as an absolute. You do not have the right to violate anothers person or property. But that does not mean you cannot violate that principle of your own free will knowing you are liable to prosecution and punishment. There is no situation wherein it becomes legally or morally justifiable to deprive another of their property against their will.
Ok, there's been lots of responses since I last got on. Let me say some things about the general criticisms.
(1) Some people said that what I was trying to do was improper because it was not the methodology of Austrian econ, or it was not a good economic principle or something along those lines. But I am not doing econ here, I am doing ethics. I am doing the same process (thought experiments) that philosophers use to elucidate all kinds of topics/principles/whatever.
(2) If showing that NAP is false does not disprove anarcho then I was confused since it always seems like people use anarcho as a logical conclusion of NAP, and that's the only reason to believe in anarcho. If not, then I stand corrected.
Donny with an A had another good, more realistic and simple example. His example can be perfectly substituted with what I said.
I do not understand kingmonkey's criticism that all I have shown is that it is not impossible to act against the NAP. Obviously it is not impossible, physically or logically, to act against the principle. What I am trying to show is that there are situations in which intiating force is not morally wrong, and therefore, NAP, which states, "it is NEVER ok to use force except in self-defense," is false.
Take donny's example. How could you not steal the boat from the man in order to save the child? Not only would I steal it, but if I had to go to court over it I would argue that he should not be compensated in any way, and I should not be punished in any way. That is my intuition.
What happens if the person in possession of this transporter decides to fight back? Do you advocate killing him?
"You don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows"
Bob Dylan
I'd have to actually be in the situation to know whether or not I could take it that far. Killing someone is scary. For sure though, I would choke the person unconscious with a triangle choke.
I'm not asking that, I'm asking whether or not you think it'd be morally correct to kill the person in possession of the transporter.
I would replace the malfunctioning batteries in the satellite phone with another battery pack I had remembered to bring.