"Sounds like his solution would be to make flipping the switch compulsory."
You got it! Us evil "statists" are all about compulsion. And I would be chuckling maniacally while I was doing the compelling!
Yes, as Socrates said, "The examined life is not worth living."
But it was examined. And I found any reason to devote myself to an ethical system, much less one considering externalities that I have no business wasting hours on end thinking about as not worth it, much less judging other people in such a situation on their actions. Also, if you are in a traumatic experience that you are not used to, your entire state of being changes.
Ethical systems can not calculate what is best for the individual. The past few centuries of bloody revolutions with "rational" moral systems is a testament to that very fact. I think custom, division of labor, self interest, and a generally decent human empathy that exists is enough to not get too worked up over things of this nature. l think taking the path of theoretical dead men in theoretical trollys is a dead end.
Not only that, Socrates made a very subjective value statement. I would not care to tell those with "unexamined lives" that their lives are not worth living.
The person who recommended just washing one's hands of the whole situation, because "It's not your fault." Moral cowardice.
The person who recommended just washing one's hands of the whole situation, because "It's not your fault." Moral cowardice.
how can you say that? A person do not wish to initiate force against innocents. It's not cowardice, but rather a rational moral action. Or non-action to be correct.
(english is not my native language, sorry for grammar.)
I don't understand why in the first situation getting the single person killed on the alternate track to save others is unintended. Is that supposed to be part of the scenario? Does the chooser not know that the single person is there? If not, then the chooser is simply switching the tracks to save the five, the correct act out of ignorance. However if the chooser has knowledge of the fact that saving the five by switching the tracks he will have caused the death of a single person, whatever one may think about the morality of the chooser, the chooser makes the choice to knowingly kill the one person, the obvious foreseen consequence, and therefore intended to kill him and in doing so save five others.
I guess i just don't see how you can separate foreseen from 'intended' or 'unintended', particulalary when the consequences are unambiguous and surely to happen. If a clear consequence of saving a a group of people is the death of a single person, then to save the group requires the intent to kill the person as well as the intent to save the five.
I'm not sure the distinction you found is actually meaningful, but this may be an issue of semantics, so perhaps you could attempt to explain it by someother means.
Gene: "Spoken like a true statist" Name calling -- the ultimate argument!
"Spoken like a true statist"
Name calling -- the ultimate argument!
Right. Kinda like how you just jumped into a two year old thread just to call someone a moral coward without providing any argument for why they are so. However, seeing how you are a statist, double standards are the norm.
Here's an argument for why it is immoral to pull the switch. It's the ultimate form of wealth redistribution. It's taking away all future consumption from one person to add to the future consumption of six ppl. And it's just plain evil to play god and decide who should live and who should die. Unless it's you on that track, you have no right to force the person on the track to pay the cost for your moral beliefs.
There. Now I have an argument.
Yeah and the accusation that it's "just wipe your hands and have nothing to do with it" is bs.
I'd assume pretty much everyone here, who associates themselves with the label of libertarian (bar the stirnertards etc.) would endeavour to stop it from killing anyone... (a possibility in reality), and yet this fictitious scenario forbids such an outcome. The scenario fails, not folks who are now some how considered "moral cowards".
Would I throw the switch? Morally, I feel no obligation to. I would only throw the switch if I expect a psychic profit.
For example, in the USA, if I threw the switch, I'd expect to be imprisoned and sued for causing a murder, while receiving nothing for saving five lives. I wouldn't consider it worthwhile. But if it were a loved one among the group of five, I would probably pull the switch anyway.
I don't think my position is changed at all whether it be human beings tied to the tracks, or inanimate property. For example, if five large rubies are on one track, and someone's pet rock is on the other track, I would not bother pulling the switch unless I expected some kind of reward for saving the rubies. With no reward expected, I cannot assign any value to the act of saving other people's property. And any utilitarian argument is clearly impossible: for all I know, the pet rock could have immense sentimental value to the owner, while the owner of the rubies may be rich already and not care much about them.
Because I would want other people to preserve my property in this situation, I'd want a free market solution to emerge where people could band together and agree to give each other rewards for saving property and lives. Then I'd also be more likely to pull the switch. This solution is more likely to appear, the longer this evil train track villain runs amok.
There are a lot of complications with every option. There is no right answer. Only wrong answers.
By switching the lever, the man is comitting murder. Because he performed an action that resulted in the deah of a person. By not hitting the switch, he is letting nature take it's course. You can be legally free and let the trolley kill 5 people. Or, you can move the trolley and kill just one man. Possibly suffering future legal issues. In light of the extreme situation, one may choose not to press charges.
Another aspect. If one can contact the one man ahead of time and alert him of the situation. Ask him to save the lives of the people by consenting to kill himself.
"how can you say that? A person do not wish to initiate force against innocents. It's not cowardice, but rather a rational moral action."
Well, I can say it because it is true, and you have shown why nicely: "a person does not wish to initiate force against innocents" -- it's all about this guy's "wishes," his desire to keep his own hands clean and pat himself on the back afterwards, rather than doing what he can to save some lives.
Let's say it is an asteroid, and it is going to strike India, killing hundreds of millions. You have the authority to give a command that will divert the asteroid northward, into a remote part of Siberia, where it will kill a few hundred people. It would be morally depraved not to give the command, and yet you suggest that one's "wishes" not to "initiate force" should trump the chance to save hundreds of millions of people.
Moral cowardice.
"I'd assume pretty much everyone here, who associates themselves with the label of libertarian (bar the stirnertards etc.) would endeavour to stop it from killing anyone..."
Yeah, fine, but let's say you can't?
"(a possibility in reality),"
In some real situations, yes. No in others.
"and yet this fictitious scenario forbids such an outcome."
So do some real ones. (For instance, often in war.)
"The scenario fails..."
Because it does not live up to your dreamworld in which tradeoffs are never necessary?
>>You have the authority to give a command that will divert the asteroid northward, into a remote part of Siberia, where it will kill a few hundred people. It >>would be morally depraved not to give the command, and yet you suggest that one's "wishes" not to "initiate force" should trump the chance to save >>hundreds of millions of people.
The interesting part is how you arrive at that conclusion
Where there is no property there is no justice; a proposition as certain as any demonstration in Euclid
Fools! not to see that what they madly desire would be a calamity to them as no hands but their own could bring
What if that person is a relative? Close family.
"The interesting part is how you arrive at that conclusion"
The interesting part is that you think this is a conclusion that should take some work to arrive at! People not infected by rationalist morality would "arrive" at this is as quickly as they "arrive" at the fact that smashing babies heads in is wrong.
"What if that person is a relative? Close family."
Yes, I think it is clear that that should make a difference -- and should make it clear why it is ridiculous to think there is some formula, calculation, or deductive system that will yield the right answer to such a question.
Gene Callahan:The person who recommended just washing one's hands of the whole situation, because "It's not your fault." Moral cowardice.
Is moral cowardice criminal?
How did Mises miss all that?
I'm not sure. Like the X-Files poster slogan, "I want to believe"... that Mises, at some point, realized that the provision of justice and security is no different than any other service. I'd have to go over my notes (and there's numerous examples related to this error), but I know that he states that these services deserve a special status and then never justifies his statement. Then there is his famous denouncement of "anarchy", but he is speaking of leftist ideologies which contend that a wholesale change in Man's nature will allow for a lawless society to maintain order.
I think it's more likely that he just didn't conceive of how a stateless society could thrive, so he stuck with the now outmoded and utopian minarchist doctrine of classical liberalism. I owe an enormous intellectual debt to Mises, but he is wrong on this subject. As with any scientific theory, it's open to improvement by following generations.
[I'm reminded of the quote from Adam Knott's signature of Mises: "It would be preposterous to assert apodictically that science will never succeed in developing a praxeological aprioristic doctrine of political organization..." (Mises, UF, p.98)]
An ideology.
Mises made a similar mistake as the advocates of "thick libertarianism" or you (and countless others) do now by conflating political philosophy with legal philosophy. We can illustrate this difference by comparing "anarcho-capitalists" with "voluntarists". Both agree that the existence of a state is unjust (that if we could speak of something as "purely evil", the state would embody this concept), but the "anarcho-capitalist" accepts electoral politics as a means in establishing anarchy as law. As libertarians, the anarcho-capitalist and voluntarist share the same legal doctrine, as obtained from rigorous deduction from the non-aggression principle, but adherents diverge in terms of their prescriptions qua political ideologues.
"Communitarians" like yourself, other worshippers of democracy, supporters of a certain dictator or king, all differ from the consistent libertarian in that they lack a cogent legal doctrine guiding their ideology. Their perception of correctness in the law flows from the ruler's divine right, or the correctness of legislation is guaranteed by elevating the winner of episodic popularity contests to a temporary position of rule. The law is a byproduct of people's ideological faith in the political system of rulers and ruled. It's no wonder why the anti-libertarian often attacks with the bogeyman of "subjective, personal preference" near at hand. The consistent, moderate libertarian, on the other hand, is guided by the apodeictic certainty of praxeological legal principles in his political doings.
Yes, but ACTUALLY he asked how to answer a moral question, not a political one. (I love that snotty little "actually.") So what was the point of your lecturing me on how libertarianism is not a moral philosophy, again?
I love how you think your position gives you license to act just like our other forum trolls. I love how you bumped a two year old thread to blurt out some vague accusations. You're right, the OP asked "what libertarians think", but he is also asking legal questions. Now I've set the record straight on the difference between the subjective "moral" preferences of people who self-identify as "libertarians" versus a genuinely "libertarian" answer. No appeal to the quantity of Indians and the "intrinsic value" of their lives lets you wash your hands of the legal responsibility of the murder of innocent Siberians.
Democracy means the opportunity to be everyone's slave.—Karl Kraus.
Gene Callahan sounds as if he thought that trying to avoid moral culpability is sometimes immoral. I think this position is incoherent. Successfully avoiding moral culpability is, by definition, never immoral, and I have a hard time seeing how trying to do something that is not immoral can be immoral. Of course, one can argue that failure to kill innocents sometimes doesn't count as successfully avoiding moral culpability (and that sometimes it's killing innocents that counts as successfully avoiding moral culpability), but that's a different claim.
>>The interesting part is that you think this is a conclusion that should take some work to arrive at! People not infected by rationalist morality would
>>"arrive" at this is as quickly as they "arrive" at the fact that smashing babies heads in is wrong.
an even more interesting part is that you think that you can have a session of moral philosophising where the discussants maintain rational stances without ... philosophising and applying standards of rationality.
It seems a consequence is that you have hereby lambasted those with an interest in philosophy for not simply intuiting a certain moral proposition that you think they should have intuited; yet intriguingly you have quickly entered into contradiction. You have come on record saying that it is not wrong to smash a few babies heads in if it would save hundred of millions of lives.
You can have all the "sessions of moral philosophizing" you want. What they can't do is tell you what you should do in a particular situation.
There is no "contradiction" in holding that something that, as a general rule is wrong, may be right in some situations. It is only if one thinks the general rule is an "axiom" from which one can "deduce" an action that there would be a contradiction involved.
Man, rationalism sure makes people irrational!
"Then there is his famous denouncement of "anarchy", but he is speaking of leftist ideologies..."
No, Mr. Olevetto, he was speaking of *Rothbard*. He inserted that into the 1966 version of HA in his shock at what Rothbard and his cohorts were doing with his ideas.
"Is moral cowardice criminal?"
Depends on the law!
"Gene Callahan sounds as if he thought that trying to avoid moral culpability is sometimes immoral."
No, choosing the easy way out because you want to feel pure can be immoral, though.
"No appeal to the quantity of Indians and the "intrinsic value" of their lives lets you wash your hands of the legal responsibility of the murder of innocent Siberians."
Yes, axiomatic libertarians have, in fact, rendered themselves moral nincompoops.
Mr. Callahan,
Is there any way in which one can call something "cowardly" which is not simply an expression of one's own personal value judgments?
Hahah, the asteroid joke :D
Consider this:
Siberia has 500 people and India has 501. Now what? Utilitarianism again or something different, maybe, no-action? What is the "right number" or limit (to be precise), to kill one group of people instead of another? You see, playing with numbers very interesting in such scenarios because it usually shows a contradicion in one's morality.
Maybe it's ok so kill Siberian people if India has 510 people? Or 1000? Where is that limit?
P.S.
Mr. Callahan, Is there any way in which one can call something "cowardly" which is not simply an expression of one's own personal value judgments?
oh, QFT.
Can you cite this?
Here's what I am talking about from the 1963 4th edition pg. 148-149 (172 of 930 in the PDF):
Of course, there will always be individuals and groups of individuals whose intellect is so narrow that they cannot grasp the benefits which social cooperation brings them. There are others whose moral strength and will power are so weak that they cannot resist the temptation to strive for an ephemeral advantage by actions detrimental to the smooth functioning of the social system. For the adjustment of the individual to the requirements of social cooperation demands sacrifices. These are, it is true, only temporary and apparent sacrifices as they are more than compensated for by the incomparably greater advantages which living within society provides. However, at the instant, in the very act of renouncing an expected enjoyment, they are painful, and it is not for everybody to realize their later benefits and to behave accordingly. Anarchism believes that education could make all people comprehend what their own interests require them to do; rightly instructed they would of their own accord always comply with the rules of conduct indispensable for the preservation of society. The anarchists contend that a social order in which nobody enjoys privileges at the expense of his fellow-citizens could exist without any compulsion and coercion for the prevention of action detrimental to society. Such an ideal society could do without state and government, i.e., without a police force, the social apparatus of coercion and compulsion. The anarchists overlook the undeniable fact that some people are either too narrow-minded or too weak to adjust themselves spontaneously to the conditions of social life. Even if we admit that every sane adult is endowed with the faculty of realizing the good of social cooperation and of acting accordingly, there still remains the problem of the infants, the aged, and the insane. We may agree that he who acts antisocially should be considered mentally sick and in need of care. But as long as not all are cured, and as long as there are infants and the senile, some provision must be taken lest they jeopardize society. An anarchistic society would be exposed to the mercy of every individual. Society cannot exist if the majority is not ready to hinder, by the application or threat of violent action, minorities from destroying the social order. This power is vested in the state or government. State or government is the social apparatus of compulsion and coercion. It has the monopoly of violent action. No individual is free to use violence or the threat of violence if the government has not accorded this right to him. The state is essentially an institution for the preservation of peaceful interhuman relations. However, for the preservation of peace it must be prepared to crush the onslaughts of peace-breakers.
Of course, there will always be individuals and groups of individuals whose intellect is so narrow that they cannot grasp the benefits which social cooperation brings them. There are others whose moral strength and will power are so weak that they cannot resist the temptation to strive for an ephemeral advantage by actions detrimental to the smooth functioning of the social system. For the adjustment of the individual to the requirements of social cooperation demands sacrifices. These are, it is true, only temporary and apparent sacrifices as they are more than compensated for by the incomparably greater advantages which living within society provides. However, at the instant, in the very act of renouncing an expected enjoyment, they are painful, and it is not for everybody to realize their later benefits and to behave accordingly. Anarchism believes that education could make all people comprehend what their own interests require them to do; rightly instructed they would of their own accord always comply with the rules of conduct indispensable for the preservation of society. The anarchists contend that a social order in which nobody enjoys privileges at the expense of his fellow-citizens could exist without any compulsion and coercion for the prevention of action detrimental to society. Such an ideal society could do without state and government, i.e., without a police force, the social apparatus of coercion and compulsion.
The anarchists overlook the undeniable fact that some people are either too narrow-minded or too weak to adjust themselves spontaneously to the conditions of social life. Even if we admit that every sane adult is endowed with the faculty of realizing the good of social cooperation and of acting accordingly, there still remains the problem of the infants, the aged, and the insane. We may agree that he who acts antisocially should be considered mentally sick and in need of care. But as long as not all are cured, and as long as there are infants and the senile, some provision must be taken lest they jeopardize society. An anarchistic society would be exposed to the mercy of every individual. Society cannot exist if the majority is not ready to hinder, by the application or threat of violent action, minorities from destroying the social order. This power is vested in the state or government.
State or government is the social apparatus of compulsion and coercion. It has the monopoly of violent action. No individual is free to use violence or the threat of violence if the government has not accorded this right to him. The state is essentially an institution for the preservation of peaceful interhuman relations. However, for the preservation of peace it must be prepared to crush the onslaughts of peace-breakers.
I fail to see how this relates to Rothbardian ethics. We don't advocate a lack of police forces, just that they are private. The same passage of the scholar's edition (remake of 1st edition) seems the same. I have no clue what you are talking about him adding.
edit: Also on Hoppe's refutation of utilitarian ethics see pg. 11 of this PDF.
>>You can have all the "sessions of moral philosophizing" you want. What they can't do is tell you what you should do in a particular situation.
>>There is no "contradiction" in holding that something that, as a general rule is wrong, may be right in some situations. It is only if one thinks the >>general rule is an "axiom" from which one can "deduce" an action that there would be a contradiction involved.
>>Man, rationalism sure makes people irrational!
There is so much I could say in response to this its hard to know where to start. I'll content myself with..
Given that you think its possible to know what you should do in a particular situation, what is the mechanism by which this knowledge becomes known to you?
(p.s. I am glad to note that despite your claiming that moral philosophers with a rationalist bent are far removed from your notions of morality (ungrounded as they are by such trivialities as reasons and principles) and that this is in someway a bad thing, presumably because it might lead to disconcerting statements about the smashed heads of babies, you yourself are quite capable of making disconcerting statements involving the smashed heads of babies. It seems we are all in it together.))
The idea that value judgments are "purely personal" was the worse idea Mises ever had. There is no such thing as the "purely personal" or "purely subjective."
"Maybe it's ok so kill Siberian people if India has 510 people? Or 1000? Where is that limit?"
There is no "limit" or "roght number". One must use one's best moral judgment. There certainly is no "rule" that deductively yields the right answer to every practical moral dilemma.
"Given that you think its possible to know what you should do in a particular situation, what is the mechanism by which this knowledge becomes known to you?"
One's intelligence and experience?
Your PS is so childish I'm not going to bother responding.
are there right answers that could be known but no rigourous methodology that is known which can make them known ? or what is this methodology?. it seems 'immoral' of you not to share it....
we are just talking about how things 'seem' or so it seems.
seems!
>>Your PS is so childish I'm not going to bother responding.
I'm sorry, I am not aware of any pre-teens that might have written what I wrote. Perhaps you know a different class of child.
I'd be interested to hear a substantiation of this claim. Thanks.
"I'm sorry, I am not aware of any pre-teens that might have written what I wrote. "
I stand corrected. I ought to have said "infantile."
Well, Grayson, suggest something that is "purely subjective" -- values certainly are not, since a value always points at something outside the subject.
"are there right answers that could be known but no rigourous methodology that is known which can make them known ?"
I think you mean "method" not "methodology." But in any case, of course there is no "rigorous" method that makes practical truths known, if by that you mean makes them capable of deductive certainty. You might read Aristotle on theoria versus phronesis, or consider whether there is a "rigorous method" for deciding what is the right thing is to say in a conversation, or the right brush stroke to make in a painting, or the right ingredient to add to a dish.
Gene Callahan:There is no "limit" or "roght number". One must use one's best moral judgment. There certainly is no "rule" that deductively yields the right answer to every practical moral dilemma.
So then why is it moral cowardice to exercise best judgment to refrain from interfering?
Gene Callahan:Name calling -- the ultimate argument!
Et tu?
Gene Callahan:I stand corrected. I ought to have said "infantile."
The idea that value judgments are "purely personal" was the worse idea Mises ever had. There is no such thing as the "purely personal" or "purely subjective." -- Well, Grayson, suggest something that is "purely subjective" -- values certainly are not, since a value always points at something outside the subject.
--
I think this is wrong even though I see what you are saying. This is something I'm working on right now (sorry I'm slow Lilburne). People confuse the psychological episode of valuation with the social acts of informing, such as of one's preferences, or commanding, or enacting, as in stipulation, issuance, or Bestimmungen (legally issued norms). Only the social acts have objectual correlates and an other-directedness (fremdpersonal).
What would it even mean for valuation to not be "purely personal", some sort of "hive mind" experience?
Mises never claimed that values do not point at something outside the subject. That is not the meaning of "subjective value" as he used it.
I'm still not clear how calling something cowardly can be anything more than an expression of one's own value judgments: value judgments which can neither be verified nor refuted, and thus are of no use in questions of truth and falsity.