Political Theory

Re: Saving someone's life

Zavoi — Sun, 17 May 2009 04:37:51 GMT

wilderness:
Zavoi, are you asking pablofrancisco these questions cause you don't know, or are you simply wondering what pablofrancisco thinks? curious...

I was asking rhetorically to find out what Pablofrancisco thinks. I am already sure (perhaps not absolutely, but almost) that universal ethics exist, and that the belief that "ethical questions should be decided by the free market" is contradictory and meaningless. I just wanted to find out if that is Pablofrancisco's position.

pablofrancisco:
Those that don't agree, will be secluded from doing most (if not all) things by the market itself, not by some 'objective' moral code. Not accepting the NAP is still an option, but if one does not want to accept it, they are severely limited. They will have a very difficult time finding sympathizers for their aggression when they are thrown into prison.

Obviously that isn't true at the present time—massive, institutionalized aggression can and does exist. What do you mean when you say "They will have..."? What will need to happen before this statement becomes true? In this hypothetical society, on what basis are individuals ("market participants," if you like) to decide which behaviors to exclude and which to allow? They can't just say "Leave that up to the market to decide," because they are the market.

Re: Saving someone's life

wilderness — Thu, 14 May 2009 02:42:33 GMT

pablofrancisco:

I can say that 'free' and 'unfree' markets exist. I must simply define my words. A 'free' market or as I reference by the term 'market' is one that exists without accepted initiation of force, while the 'unfree' market or 'state intervened market' is one that exists with it. Thereby, you could say anyone agreeing to the NAP is participating in a 'free' market, while anyone not agreeing is in an 'unfree' market. Someone else may define their terms differently, but this only means that the idea I am referencing is different from the idea they are referencing, not that my term is objectively incorrect.

I like your perspective here. I have a round about way of putting this that is very similar to what you said. I think all societies everywhere are a free market, but instead of saying "unfree", as was brought up in this discussed exchange, I think the degree of freedom in a market would be less.

In other words, an "unfree" market of total coercion would involve no market at all. People would die and nobody left even the last coercer would be left not knowing how to produce, cause I perceive coercion to be against any production/creativity. Even for this last coercer to try to pick fruit from a tree to eat would be opening the path to production, but in a completely unfree market it would be a total implosion upon human nature so even this would not occur.

Free markets can become less-free to the point of almost complete stagnation and that's when famines and rampaged civil disorder is occurring, hardly any exchange whether of product or social relation would be around. Lots of kill or be killed.

On the other end of the spectrum, the free market can be with less-coercion. Though, I don't know if a complete and never again to happen coercion event would be the order of the day. Yet, lots of people actively trading, peacefully negotiating, and plenty of helping hands to sustain the harmony would be around.

I get the gist of what your saying, and I see truth.

Re: Saving someone's life

wilderness — Thu, 14 May 2009 02:25:32 GMT

Zavoi:

pablofrancisco:
When one attempts to achieve a universally enforced law, it generally means, bad things are right around the corner.... The market will (and is very capable of) solving every problem you throw at it- sometimes it is very difficult to see, but that is precisely WHY we should leave it up to the magnificent minds of the market to solve.

Aren't all ethical principles necessarily universally applicable? And do you believe that the current statist status-quo is a satisfactory solution to the problems thrown at it? If not, why not? As I said before, one cannot say that some markets are "free" and others are "unfree" without some universal ethical principle(s) to distinguish between the two.

Zavoi, are you asking pablofrancisco these questions cause you don't know, or are you simply wondering what pablofrancisco thinks? curious...

Re: Saving someone's life

Pablo — Thu, 14 May 2009 02:02:45 GMT

Zavoi:
Aren't all ethical principles necessarily universally applicable? And do you believe that the current statist status-quo is a satisfactory solution to the problems thrown at it? If not, why not? As I said before, one cannot say that some markets are "free" and others are "unfree" without some universal ethical principle(s) to distinguish between the two.

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I don't believe in a universal ethic. This includes non violence. I believe this is a false protection. The fact is, many people use violence to achieve their ends- and they think it is perfectly moral. In my viewpoint, the initiation of violence (and a number of other things) are perceived as unethical. The natural occurrence of things will be that the attacked will defend itself. Either by fleeing or fighting. This is the case for all life. Groups will form with similar ethical principles, and overlapping circles of agreement will allow those that agree with NAP to participate in society. Those that don't agree, will be secluded from doing most (if not all) things by the market itself, not by some 'objective' moral code. Not accepting the NAP is still an option, but if one does not want to accept it, they are severely limited. They will have a very difficult time finding sympathizers for their aggression when they are thrown into prison. This is especially true if they do not have a resolution or protection agency. (Which will be very difficult to find, due to market forces)

I can say that 'free' and 'unfree' markets exist. I must simply define my words. A 'free' market or as I reference by the term 'market' is one that exists without accepted initiation of force, while the 'unfree' market or 'state intervened market' is one that exists with it. Thereby, you could say anyone agreeing to the NAP is participating in a 'free' market, while anyone not agreeing is in an 'unfree' market. Someone else may define their terms differently, but this only means that the idea I am referencing is different from the idea they are referencing, not that my term is objectively incorrect.

Re: Saving someone's life

Zavoi — Thu, 14 May 2009 01:30:56 GMT

liberty student:
You refuse to acknowledge that your theory is not objective. It is based upon the outcome of the intervention to validate the intervention in the first place.

I suppose you could say that all ethical claims lack objectivity in the sense that it's not always possible to determine with certainty whether action X caused outcome Y, but that doesn't mean that statements of the form "Actions which cause outcome Y are moral/immoral" are meaningless. The ethical validity of an action can be judged only on the basis of what outcome happens as a result of that action.

liberty student:
It also relies heavily on the unprovable, namely intent...

As I mentioned, a determination of intent is not necessary to determine whether or not the "performative contradiction/estoppel" argument applies.

liberty student:
...and a negative proof (if I did not save you, you would have died).

In all the scenarios I assume for the sake of argument that this is true. It is an empirical claim that must be supported with evidence in any real case.

pablofrancisco:
When one attempts to achieve a universally enforced law, it generally means, bad things are right around the corner.... The market will (and is very capable of) solving every problem you throw at it- sometimes it is very difficult to see, but that is precisely WHY we should leave it up to the magnificent minds of the market to solve.

Aren't all ethical principles necessarily universally applicable? And do you believe that the current statist status-quo is a satisfactory solution to the problems thrown at it? If not, why not? As I said before, one cannot say that some markets are "free" and others are "unfree" without some universal ethical principle(s) to distinguish between the two.

Natalie:
Why from Bob and not from home or personal insurance?

We're assuming there are no contractual relationships to complicate the matter.

Re: Saving someone's life

Natalie — Wed, 13 May 2009 16:28:43 GMT

Zavoi:
For example, suppose Alice's house is burning down and she is trapped unconscious inside. She will die unless rescued. Bob comes along and decides to save her, but in order to do so he must break down Alice's fence. Can Alice recover from Bob the costs associated with the fence?

Why from Bob and not from home or personal insurance? Or from (private) firefighters because he did their job for them.

Re: Saving someone's life

Pablo — Wed, 13 May 2009 06:24:23 GMT

One of the (many) foundational arguments for anarchic law comes from the reputation of individuals. If Bob saves Joe from his burning home, and Joe sues Bob in retaliation, Joe will have to live with the reputation of his action. Family, friends, and community peer pressure will more likely than not convince Joe not to sue Bob.

Though if in the unlikely case that it is brought to court, Joe should be held accountable for destruction of any property which was damaged in the rescue of Bob.

There is ATLEAST one exception to this premise that I can think of off the top of my head. If Bob and Joe's resolution organizations both included an 'Emergency Rescue Situation Clause' which would allow for violation of property rights in specified scenarios. Joe might not have the right of retaliation. More likely than not, most contracts would allow for this. This however, MUST be left up to each individual to decide, as it becomes VERY dangerous if it is left up to any sort of collective or third party (ie, the jury, the community, the state, etc). This is in part due to the arbitrary nature of words with relation to the ideas they are referencing. When one attempts to achieve a universally enforced law, it generally means, bad things are right around the corner.

In short- let each individual decide for themself when their property can be violated. After all, I can decide what is in my best interest better than anyone else on this earth.

I agree with LS on this. No amount of aggression is necessary. You don't solve it by leaving it up to a mandatory third party, you will only make it worse. You also kick open the door for all sorts of statism. The market will (and is very capable of) solving every problem you throw at it- sometimes it is very difficult to see, but that is precisely WHY we should leave it up to the magnificent minds of the market to solve.

Re: Saving someone's life

liberty student — Wed, 13 May 2009 05:48:17 GMT

You refuse to acknowledge that your theory is not objective. It is based upon the outcome of the intervention to validate the intervention in the first place. It also relies heavily on the unprovable, namely intent and a negative proof (if I did not save you, you would have died).

I relent because I am just repeating myself.

Re: Saving someone's life

Zavoi — Wed, 13 May 2009 05:35:10 GMT

JackSkylark:
One example that I can think of is... Imagine there is a diver on the edge of a pool who, in the act of diving, hits his/her head on something - causing terminal damage... now in that very instant that person is drowning and the terminal damage won't mean much in about 60 seconds, but someone comes in and saves the diver.

After the fact, the diver is upset about being saved and claims rights violation. My question then is as follows "is the rescuer only guilty of moving someone against their will, or are they now culpable for the terminal damage as well?"

Are you saying that the terminal damage happened before the rescuer decided to act? If so, then obviously the rescuer isn't responsible for it, because causation can only proceed forward in time. (Correct me if I've misinterpreted your scenario.)

JackSkylark:
Secondly, what aspect do property rights play into this? If the diver is at a private pool and someone saves him/her - isn't it up to the owner of the pool whether or not there was a violation of rights?

The pool owner might stipulate conditions for admittance such as "You agree to let the lifeguards save you" or "You agree not to save any other swimmers in danger." But in the absence of such conditions, the pool owner's preference is not important to the dispute between the diver and the rescuer.

liberty student:
And the rescuer cannot first take action without committing a rights violation.

Well, that's the matter at issue. I'm saying that the act of rescuing is not a rights violation.

liberty student:
it requries removing arbitration from the sphere of what happened, to what the outcome and intent was.

What's the difference between "what happened" and "what the outcome was"? And how is a determination of intent necessary to determine whether or not Bob's actions caused Alice's survival?

liberty student:
I'm curious to know how your performative contradicition works with regards to restitution for murder? If the party in question is dead, then how could they possibly claim a rights violation from a murderer?

The dead victim of course cannot literally open his/her mouth and object, but this is not a condition that the victim preferred. Other people can argue in the victim's name and say that at the time of the murder, the victim did not want to be killed. There is no contradiction here because it is not being claimed that the victim preferred death. (If the victim did in fact prefer death, then there is no rights-violation, and the killing is not murder but euthanasia.) If the murderer tries to say that no living person has the right to argue on behalf of a dead victim, then this simply gives everyone else permission to kill the murderer with impunity.

liberty student:
What happens when I push the man from the path of the boulder, and he falls and bangs his head, leading to death? That is to say, what happens when I kill someone trying to save them? Does the contradiction still cover my ass when things don't work out to plan?

You would be covered if (A) the action you took was one without which the boulder-stander would surely have died, and (B) this action presented ex ante a risk of killing the boulder-stander no higher than was necessary to prevent their death.

For example, suppose Dave will die unless someone points a randomized six-chambered revolver (loaded with one bullet) at his head and pulls the trigger. Carol does this, and as it turns out, the bullet is shot, and Dave dies. Carol is innocent of any crime, because Carol's action cannot be objected to in Dave's name without claiming simultaneously that Dave both did and did not want to die. (This is the same contradiction that estops Alice from objecting to Bob's intervention.)

Now this is an extremely abstract and contrived example, and in any real situation you would have to satisfy the very heavy burden of proving both (A) and (B).

Re: Saving someone's life

liberty student — Tue, 12 May 2009 03:22:00 GMT

Zavoi:
I understand why you might have this gut reaction, but it doesn't suffice as an argument.

No, it's the indicator than an argument stinks.

Zavoi:
At best, it should cause us to look upon such claims with skepticism, not dismiss them offhand.

I didn't dismiss your idea offhand. I explained why it erodes the notion of rights, seeks to redefine rights on the fly, diminshes the victim while protecting the rights violator, and that it requries removing arbitration from the sphere of what happened, to what the outcome and intent was.

Zavoi:
The rescuee cannot object to the rescuer's actions without engaging in a performative contradiction.

And the rescuer cannot first take action without committing a rights violation.

I'll repeat. You are validating the aggression by the outcome and the supposed intent. Since we can never truly prove intent, we are left with outcome. Which is an ends justifies the means argument.

I'm curious to know how your performative contradicition works with regards to restitution for murder? If the party in question is dead, then how could they possibly claim a rights violation from a murderer?

What happens when I push the man from the path of the boulder, and he falls and bangs his head, leading to death? That is to say, what happens when I kill someone trying to save them? Does the contradiction still cover my ass when things don't work out to plan?

Re: Saving someone's life

Zavoi — Tue, 12 May 2009 02:03:57 GMT

liberty student:

Any time, any one proposes what seems to me to be an excuse to violate rights, whether it is you in this thread, others in the Animal cruelty thread, Danny in the Sterba thread, or Wombie in our discussions on property redistribution, my spider sense goes off like a fire alarm.

Perhaps I am too radical, or too absolutist but if rights are so easily compromised in theory, before we have won our rights, then we're sunk. We're sunk like the Constitution starting out as an enduring social contract based around property redistribution.

I understand why you might have this gut reaction, but it doesn't suffice as an argument. At best, it should cause us to look upon such claims with skepticism, not dismiss them offhand.

liberty student:
But if we start out with the premise that rights violations with positive outcomes and perceived good intentions are automatically beyond the understanding and forgiveness of the violated, then we're screwed. This is PRECISELY the rationale the state uses. Violate rights for a greater good or better outcome, with the claim of good intentions.

This is a far more general claim than the one I have made. Again, I'm only talking about a case where a person's property is used to save the life of that same person. The rescuee cannot object to the rescuer's actions without engaging in a performative contradiction. The case where one person's rights are violated for the benefit of a third party is another matter entirely.

Re: Saving someone's life

JackSkylark — Mon, 11 May 2009 17:16:05 GMT

Well, let's bring in culpability and the extent of that as it pertains to rights violation. One example that I can think of is... Imagine there is a diver on the edge of a pool who, in the act of diving, hits his/her head on something - causing terminal damage... now in that very instant that person is drowning and the terminal damage won't mean much in about 60 seconds, but someone comes in and saves the diver.

After the fact, the diver is upset about being saved and claims rights violation. My question then is as follows "is the rescuer only guilty of moving someone against their will, or are they now culpable for the terminal damage as well?"

Secondly, what aspect do property rights play into this? If the diver is at a private pool and someone saves him/her - isn't it up to the owner of the pool whether or not there was a violation of rights?

Re: Saving someone's life

Thedesolateone — Mon, 11 May 2009 08:32:10 GMT

liberty student:
Perhaps I am too radical, or too absolutist but if rights are so easily compromised in theory, before we have won our rights, then we're sunk.

I agree - I can't help thinking - and I'm not sure if I'm correct here, that rights are worthless if they aren't absolute.

Re: Saving someone's life

liberty student — Mon, 11 May 2009 07:39:51 GMT

Zavoi:
By the way, what do you find problematic with my line of reasoning?

That you ignore action and allow for rights violations without consequence based upon (1) outcome and (2) intent.

I think it is another spin on lifeboats.

As for the rest, I don't have the endurance tonight to go through it in even more detail. Any time, any one proposes what seems to me to be an excuse to violate rights, whether it is you in this thread, others in the Animal cruelty thread, Danny in the Sterba thread, or Wombie in our discussions on property redistribution, my spider sense goes off like a fire alarm.

Perhaps I am too radical, or too absolutist but if rights are so easily compromised in theory, before we have won our rights, then we're sunk. We're sunk like the Constitution starting out as an enduring social contract based around property redistribution.

I understand in the real world, there will be compromises. Someone will jump my fence, save my life and I will thank him, not charge him with trespass. But if we start out with the premise that rights violations with positive outcomes and perceived good intentions are automatically beyond the understanding and forgiveness of the violated, then we're screwed. This is PRECISELY the rationale the state uses. Violate rights for a greater good or better outcome, with the claim of good intentions.

Guess I found some moxie after all.

Re: Saving someone's life

Zavoi — Mon, 11 May 2009 05:35:17 GMT

liberty student:

But how can they choose an arbiter when regardless of whether or not there was a rights violation, your claim is that proximate cause already eliminates responsibility and restitution? Seems to me that the fact that rights were violated never come into question, only whether or not rights may be violated.

Do you see the difference? The victim has nothing to gain where someone can decide his rights do not apply and yet this is the likely aggrieved party.

...

Zavoi:
any more than someone who says that murder is wrong has to know the answer to the question "Who will decide whether or not murder has been committed?".

Again, that is different. We're not gathering evidence to determine if rights were or were not violated, as they would be in determining if a murder was committed and by whom. You're proposing to redefine rights as impotent based on circumstance. It's completely separate from the material facts of the event.

Could you rephrase that? I'm afraid I don't understand what you mean.

liberty student:

Ultimately, you propose an agency which can decide when rights apply and do not apply.

It's an added layer of subjectivity which is the premise of the state. Rights are not sovereign, or delegated, but defined by a legal body which reserves the right to change the definition of rights arbitrarily.

I'm not saying that there can or should be any agency with the power to decree rights into and out of existence. The proper function of any legal agency is to discover truths that exist independently of the agency itself, not to determine right and wrong by arbitrary fiat. The objectivity of ethical principles is in no way diminished by the practical fact that eventually some human is going to have to decide how to apply those principles to a certain case.

liberty student:
I already said your claim was incorrect.

By the way, what do you find problematic with my line of reasoning?