Political Theory

Re: Actual Logical Proof of Natural Law

nirgrahamUK — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 09:36:54 GMT

social 'contract' theory is an abomination of thought.

it involves assuming that people have formed contracts without evidence that they did.

are these -title transfer- contracts or 'promise' contracts?

Re: Actual Logical Proof of Natural Law

nandnor — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 08:55:15 GMT

Damn, no opinions on this idea? gonna bump it.

Re: Actual Logical Proof of Natural Law

nandnor — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 12:04:37 GMT

The idea I have about natural law is that of a social contract. I read this article about Narveson's book where a similar idea is in: http://mises.org/daily/3755

Everyones ultimate preference is to have the NAP apply to them. Every ego in the universe has the same ultimate idea. So as far as any universal cooperation between egos can go, it can only go as far as to construct a system which takes care of that preference of egos. And since its the highest preference of egos, itis the first on the list of actions the ego does to take care of it.

Re: Actual Logical Proof of Natural Law

Live_Free_Or_Die — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 01:52:41 GMT

liberty student:

Live_Free_Or_Die:
I see this thread being moderated now since I got a message making my last post before I seen this reply....

When you post too many links, posts get automatically moderated.

Thank you for explaining that. I will refrain from including links that are not important in future posts.

Re: Actual Logical Proof of Natural Law

Live_Free_Or_Die — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 01:28:29 GMT

AJ:

Live_Free_Or_Die:

Natural law is knowledge of human actions involving bodily movement resulting in existence or non-existence of human life perceived by the five traditional human senses.

-or-

Natural law is a subset of knowledge.

Knowledge about human actions that involve bodily movement.

Actions that result in existence or non-existence of human life.

Existence or non-existence of human life that is perceivable by the traditional five human senses.

Thank you, this is a quite a bit clearer. Do you mean that natural law is knowledge concerning the question, "Which human actions result in creation or destruction of human life?"?

I can't understand "resulting in existence or non-existence" to mean anything else, so I assume creation or destruction (killing?). Further elaboration is welcome. Perhaps you mean contributing to or diminishing human life (flourishing)? Your definition points to the use of the word "life" as in life vs. death (i.e., state of being alive vs. being dead), which is why I interpreted it as creation or destruction of human life and not in terms of flourishing.

Yes, I was referring to a state of being alive vs. dead.

Re: Actual Logical Proof of Natural Law

AJ — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 21:58:14 GMT

Live_Free_Or_Die:

Natural law is knowledge of human actions involving bodily movement resulting in existence or non-existence of human life perceived by the five traditional human senses.

-or-

Natural law is a subset of knowledge.

Knowledge about human actions that involve bodily movement.

Actions that result in existence or non-existence of human life.

Existence or non-existence of human life that is perceivable by the traditional five human senses.

Thank you, this is a quite a bit clearer. Do you mean that natural law is knowledge concerning the question, "Which human actions result in creation or destruction of human life?"?

I can't understand "resulting in existence or non-existence" to mean anything else, so I assume creation or destruction (killing?). Further elaboration is welcome. Perhaps you mean contributing to or diminishing human life (flourishing)? Your definition points to the use of the word "life" as in life vs. death (i.e., state of being alive vs. being dead), which is why I interpreted it as creation or destruction of human life and not in terms of flourishing.

Re: Actual Logical Proof of Natural Law

Angurse — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 21:49:00 GMT

Live_Free_Or_Die:

Natural law is knowledge of human actions involving bodily movement resulting in existence or non-existence of human life perceived by the five traditional human senses.

Natural law is acquired expertise of particular bipedal primates bodily movement resulting in existence or non-existence of said bipedal primates self-sustaining biological process understood by the five traditional bipedal primate senses.

Re: Actual Logical Proof of Natural Law

liberty student — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 20:10:22 GMT

Live_Free_Or_Die:
I see this thread being moderated now since I got a message making my last post before I seen this reply....

When you post too many links, posts get automatically moderated.

However, the level of debate in this thread is now embarrassing with people arguing over definitions. Let's aim for a debate on substance and ideas, not semantics and grammar.

Re: Actual Logical Proof of Natural Law

Live_Free_Or_Die — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 20:00:57 GMT

Angurse:

Live_Free_Or_Die:

I will be sure to use that argument in the future.

I am sorry you are being vague and therefore your statement is invalid despite my inability to articulate the reasons it is vague.

Calm down. 1. Saying "please elaborate" isn't an argument. 2. Nobody said your statement was invalid, rather it couldn't be validated, hence the requests.

Live_Free_Or_Die:
I am sorry Austrian economics is invalid because it is vague despite my inability to articulate the reasons it is vague....

Austrian economics has a well written history, where the terms are extensively defined.

Live_Free_Or_Die:
Knowledge is a clearly defined concept.

No, it is a very complex concept.

Live_Free_Or_Die:
Human action is a clearly defined concept.

No, in fact Mises even had to define human and action to fully explain what he meant by human action. (Generous as he was he didn't just say human and action are clearly defined concepts and leave it at that)

Live_Free_Or_Die:
Life is a clearly defined concept.

Hardly, "life" has been used to mean a multitude of different things.

Live_Free_Or_Die:
Human senses are a clearly defined concept

No, how people perceive phenomena is hotly debated.

Live_Free_Or_Die:

Existence or non-existence of life perceivable by human senses is a clearly defined concept.

I am being vague?

Quite.

I am not upset. You mistake bluntness for emotion. I questioned the original reply asking if word definitions or sentence structure was in question and the reply was a re-post. Your reply clearly articulates the source of vagueness and it appears the source of perceived vagueness is contained within the definition of words. That is something a person can respond to.

I see this thread being moderated now since I got a message making my last post before I seen this reply....

Re: Actual Logical Proof of Natural Law

Live_Free_Or_Die — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 19:51:39 GMT

AJ:

Honestly, you are being almost caricature-level vague. Is there some reason you're adverse to paraphrasing or elaborating? You say I haven't pointed out what is vague in your sentence, but I have: the three questions you still haven't answered (one you hinted at in a roundabout way, which I suppose is good enough for now, but what about the other two?).

Are you under the impression that stringing together a bunch of well-defined English words in a sentence automatically makes a well-defined and understandable sentence? Just try saying it in a different way, or unpacking some of the concepts. For instance, "life" can mean all sorts of things. Flourishing, existence, survival, human life, etc.

I had to look up caricature to understand what you meant by caricature-level vague.

By looking at the caricature wiki I still do not understand your meaning of caricature-level vague. Defined in the wiki as a description of a person using exaggeration of some characteristics and oversimplification of others I am assuming you are making a reference to a person I do not know.

My point here is that I am able to convey why I do not understand your meaning. My initial lack of understanding of your meaning was because I was not familiar with the word. My present lack of understanding to your meaning is because I do not know who you are describing and how they relate to me.

I am not adverse to paraphrasing or elaborating. I simply do not know how to respond to "I don't get your meaning". Such a comment provides no opportunity for discussion. I am not under the impression stringing together a bunch of well-defined words automatically makes an understandable sentence. I elaborated on that. I said a sentence can be true or false or contain errors. Beyond that the only opportunity for conversation is discussing the definition of words, sentence structure or how clauses relate to one another, etc.

I can respond to your citation life can mean all sorts of things. The definitions of the words I am using.

Knowledge is defined by the Oxford English Dictionary as (i) expertise, and skills acquired by a person through experience or education

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knowledge

Life (cf. biota) is a characteristic that distinguishes objects that have self-sustaining biological processes from those that do not^[1]^[2] —either because such functions have ceased (death), or else because they lack such functions and are classified as "inanimate.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life

Humans are bipedal primates belonging to the species Homo sapiens

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human

The traditional five senses are sight, hearing, touch, smell, taste: a classification attributed to Aristotle

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sense

Some would prefer to define actions as requiring bodily movement

Perceive - to attain awareness or understanding

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/Perceived

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Action_%28philosophy%29

After review of common wiki definitions I will rephrase my original statement to reduce the assertion of vagueness due to certain words having multiple definitions.

Natural law is knowledge of human actions involving bodily movement resulting in existence or non-existence of human life perceived by the five traditional human senses.

-or-

Natural law is a subset of knowledge.

Knowledge about human actions that involve bodily movement.

Actions that result in existence or non-existence of human life.

Existence or non-existence of human life that is perceivable by the traditional five human senses.

Re: Actual Logical Proof of Natural Law

Angurse — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 19:25:19 GMT

Live_Free_Or_Die:

I will be sure to use that argument in the future.

I am sorry you are being vague and therefore your statement is invalid despite my inability to articulate the reasons it is vague.

Calm down. 1. Saying "please elaborate" isn't an argument. 2. Nobody said your statement was invalid, rather it couldn't be validated, hence the requests.

Live_Free_Or_Die:
I am sorry Austrian economics is invalid because it is vague despite my inability to articulate the reasons it is vague....

Austrian economics has a well written history, where the terms are extensively defined.

Live_Free_Or_Die:
Knowledge is a clearly defined concept.

No, it is a very complex concept.

Live_Free_Or_Die:
Human action is a clearly defined concept.

No, in fact Mises even had to define human and action to fully explain what he meant by human action. (Generous as he was he didn't just say human and action are clearly defined concepts and leave it at that)

Live_Free_Or_Die:
Life is a clearly defined concept.

Hardly, "life" has been used to mean a multitude of different things.

Live_Free_Or_Die:
Human senses are a clearly defined concept

No, how people perceive phenomena is hotly debated.

Live_Free_Or_Die:

Existence or non-existence of life perceivable by human senses is a clearly defined concept.

I am being vague?

Quite.

Re: Actual Logical Proof of Natural Law

AJ — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 18:44:40 GMT

Honestly, you are being almost caricature-level vague. Is there some reason you're adverse to paraphrasing or elaborating? You say I haven't pointed out what is vague in your sentence, but I have: the three questions you still haven't answered (one you hinted at in a roundabout way, which I suppose is good enough for now, but what about the other two?).

Are you under the impression that stringing together a bunch of well-defined English words in a sentence automatically makes a well-defined and understandable sentence? Just try saying it in a different way, or unpacking some of the concepts. For instance, "life" can mean all sorts of things. Flourishing, existence, survival, human life, etc.

Re: Actual Logical Proof of Natural Law

Live_Free_Or_Die — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 18:25:33 GMT

I will be sure to use that argument in the future.

I am sorry you are being vague and therefore your statement is invalid despite my inability to articulate the reasons it is vague.

I am sorry Austrian economics is invalid because it is vague despite my inability to articulate the reasons it is vague....

That is not intellectual dialogue.

I do not find the sentence vague. I defined natural law as a type of knowledge. The specific knowledge of human actions that result in existence or non-existence of life perceived by human senses.

Since concepts of existence and non-existence are vague I conditioned existence and non-existence of life with the ability to perceive them by human senses.

Knowledge is a clearly defined concept.

Human action is a clearly defined concept.

Life is a clearly defined concept.

Human senses are a clearly defined concept

Existence or non-existence of life perceivable by human senses is a clearly defined concept.

I am being vague?

Re: Actual Logical Proof of Natural Law

Angurse — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 17:52:20 GMT

This is going nowhere. (He can't articulate an objection as you are being too vague)

Re: Actual Logical Proof of Natural Law

Live_Free_Or_Die — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 17:36:08 GMT

AJ:

How is law knowledge?

Traffic law is the knowledge of human actions eligible for economic penalty or infringement of liberty when traveling public property.

AJ:

What do you mean by "existence of life" - the existence of surviving humans? What is perceived by human senses - life or the existence/nonexistence of life?

AJ:

I'll respond once someone actually articulates an objection rather than just hinting at one.

I will respond when you articulate an objection. Please refer to my previous post.