Political Theory

Re: Is Libertarianism Compatible with Subjective Morality?

Physiocrat — Thu, 08 Nov 2012 17:48:42 GMT

Of course taking the entirely subjective approach anything goes by definition. What I meant to say is that you'd have no real grounding in discussion means and ends with others, it would be on a purely pragmatic basis. Treating something as it is true but not actually true is uncompelling. I remember listening to a podcast in which the speaker wanted to promote Judeo-Christian morailty to the youth since he saw the decay in society but he didn't want to take theological grounding for it. Any system without solid foundations will crumble when any of the adherents find short cuts to gratify their immediate desires.

This is what would happen if you propagandised a burgeoning libertarian movement with a solely subjectivist basis, it would not last.

That said I think your correct that most people aren't libertarians because their economics is awful and don't understand the nature of the state.

Re: Is Libertarianism Compatible with Subjective Morality?

gotlucky — Thu, 08 Nov 2012 17:05:51 GMT

I think there is at least one other option:

Morality/eudaimonia is entirely subjective, and individuals discuss means and ends with other individuals and often seek those of like mind.

One could make the suggestion to not drink hydrochloric acid, and so long as other people share similar enough ends, people would actually follow this advice. Consider veganism. If a vegan tries to convince a nonvegan of the immorality of eating meat or wearing a down coat, and the nonvegan doesn't share similar enough ends, then the vegan's words will pretty much fall on deaf ears. But if the nonvegan does share similar enough ends, such as notwanting to see any animal suffering or the death of a sentient life, then the vegan's arguments may cause the nonvegan to become a vegan.

The same applies to libertarianism. I think that the vast majority of people share similar ends with libertarians. No one wants to be aggressed against, but more importantly, the vast majority of people seek voluntary exchange and cooperation in their personal life. I think there are two main reasons that most people aren't libertarians:

They are ignorant of economics.
They don't understand that the state is entirely about using conflict as a means.

So I think that it is pointless for libertarians to try to preach to people who do not share similar ends - social cooperation and a peaceful and prosperperous society. There is little reason to preach to murderers, rapists, or even people who want to use the state to take advantage of others. But to the people who value cooperation, then there is a real chance of them understanding that the state is actually counterproductive to their ends.

Re: Is Libertarianism Compatible with Subjective Morality?

Physiocrat — Thu, 08 Nov 2012 16:21:48 GMT

GotLucky,

Here's my actual position regaridng morality.

The core of the argument I think is the problem of question of the one and the many.

“Think of a cloud—just one cloud, and around it a clear blue sky. Seen from the ground, the cloud may seem to have a sharp boundary. Not so. The cloud is a swarm of water droplets. At the outskirts of the cloud, the density of the droplets falls off. Eventually they are so few and far between that we may hesitate to say that the outlying droplets are still part of the cloud at all; perhaps we might better say only that they are near the cloud. But the transition is gradual. Many surfaces are equally good candidates to be the boundary of the cloud. Therefore many aggregates of droplets, some more inclusive and some less inclusive (and some inclusive in different ways than others), are equally good candidates to be the cloud. Since they have equal claim, how can we say that the cloud is one of these aggregates rather than another? But if all of them count as clouds, then we have many clouds rather than one. And if none of them count, each one being ruled out because of the competition from the others, then we have no cloud. How is it, then, that we have just one cloud? And yet we do. (Lewis 1993: 164)” http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/problem-of-many/

Put mathematically the options are as follows-

All is one 1+2 = 1 (no distinction are possible we and the cloud are one)
All is unique: 1 + 2 = 1 + 2 since 1 and 2 are just words, they are qualitatively different to each other, as apples are to oranges and as such cannot make 3. (We can’t even assign the word water droplet to each of them since each “droplet” is unique)
There’s oneness and uniqueness: 1+2 = 3. 1 is not 2 but we can add them together to give 3.

It seems to me when it comes to morality it is a similar type of problem. As such we have three options.

Morality/ eudaimonia is entriely subjective and thus it is pure hubris to suggest means to another individual.
Morality/ eudaimonia is entirely objective so much so that to truly flourish everyone ought to act in exactly the same way.
Thirdly and finally, morality/ eudaimonia is objective and subjective, particular actions are in fact wrong in all cases, for example murder, yet there are multifarious courses of action whose rightness depends on the individual in question.

Option 1 has the obvious retort that people believe murder (or better rape) is intuitively wrong. Further it also follows that no rules or suggestions for a flourishing life can be made to someone else in any circumstance when it is clear that you can- don't drink hydrochloric acid. Option 1 doesn't recognise the similarity of each person. I can understand why an Austrian may hold this line because of the rejection of interpersonal comparisons of utility however the praxeological method does not subsume all of ethics and the social sciences.

Option 3 is clearly absurd as it doesn't recognise the individuality of each person.

Option 2 has the clear advantage that it allows absolute statements regarding morality but also allows a huge scope for different right actions depending on the individual. It recognises both the similarity and the difference of persons, or the unity and diversity of mankind.

The question now is what gives grounds for the possibility of option 2. A naturalist can only give a pragmatic justification for this which is no justification at all. A strict monotheist, such as a Muslim, has little basis since Allah singularly one which would imply a movement towards option 2. IMO the Trinitarian God of the Bible (each person of the Trinity is divine in the same way that we are both human but are distinct in the same we are- apart from the divine part they are also inextricably united, you can’t have a Father without a Son) provides a solid foundation as you have unity in their essence but diversity in their persons.

Further, creation by a good and loving God provides a foundation for a good design for mankind. Consequently we can move from an is (the design) to an ought (man’s final end- eudaimonia/ max preference since the is in fact good; however I would temper this by saying that our design is now faulty due to sin but it doesn’t mean we can’s extract the good parts.

With Euthyphro dilemma I don’t see why can’t have a subject who is absolute goodness. I don’t see why it is necessary to entirely divorce action from being.

Re: Is Libertarianism Compatible with Subjective Morality?

gotlucky — Thu, 25 Oct 2012 19:49:23 GMT

Physiocrat:

My suggestion could be interpreted in that way but I was going for something more "inherent". Concieve of it this way- Man has a shared nature in the same way all cars, despite being different, are in fact cars. Consequenlty given their design it follows that there are universally bad ways of using a car, such as attempting to drive it under water, in the same way drinking hydrochloric acid is bad for all humans. Thus it follows from man's nature what is good and bad for him. Now you may then throw is/ought at me but it's actually quite is to navigate if man is created good. As such moral fabric is embedded in his existence. As such I wasn't just saying that people almost universally prefer it but that it is embedded in their nature.

I think that we can talk about the nature of various things, but humans are tricky because we act. I would refrain from saying that drinking hydrochloric acid is bad for all humans because not all humans have the same goals. If one's goal is to harm or kill oneself, then drinking hydrochloric acid is good, not bad. I think man's nature is best summed up as wanting to satisfy ends. This makes it very different from the nature of a rock or flower.

Physiocrat:

I thought you might go with this line. As you conversed with Mikachussets you argued really differences in the means used to achieve the end can only be the result of assymetry of knowledge. So in this case the lack of knowledge of the cliff could be argued to be injurious to his maximumisation of preferences. But as Mika pointed out we don't always act on our knowledge. Further, if we both attempt to achieve the same internal state ofthe maximisation preferences clearly it would be absurd to say we couldn't use different means to achieve that end since we are clearly different and for us to both use the same means probably wouldn't result in the max pref of either of us.

After thinking about this, I think what has been missing from our evaluations is ranking ends. It's not enough to just talk about ends alone, we must know also how each person values that end. For example, there might be a lot of high school kids interested in becoming basketball stars. If your goal is to be a basketball star, then you must do X, Y, and Z. However, not everyone wants to be a basketball star as one of their main ends. Some people just like to dream about being a basketball star. Others might just want to play without really practicing. Others might be willing to practice with the ball, but they might not want to train their bodies for the other necessary skills for basketball.

So, they might have the knowledge that X, Y, and Z are necessary to be a basketball star, but they might not rank the end of being a basketball star high enough on their list of ends.

Physiocrat:

Further, if we both attempt to achieve the same internal state ofthe maximisation preferences clearly it would be absurd to say we couldn't use different means to achieve that end since we are clearly different and for us to both use the same means probably wouldn't result in the max pref of either of us.

We all want to satisfy our ends. What those ends are may be very different. But if we share the same, identical end, then the means ought to be the same. If we both want to be economists, that's not necessarily the same end. It's a pretty general end, and under scrutiny, we will probably see differences in how we want to be economists. Maybe you want to study Austrian economics, and I want to study mainstream economics. Maybe we both want to study Austrian economics, but if we break down that further, we can see a lot of specialization within AE. Eventually we will see how our general end of wanting to be an economist really isn't the same as the other's. And then there is also how we rank that end in comparison to our other ends. Maybe I value partying or videogames (or my actual profession) more than being a Austrian economist.

Physiocrat:

I was wondering how your conception of the morality could deal with divine command theory.

Well, I'm an atheist, so I don't think about the divine all that much. My response to God and morality is the typical: "Is it moral because God said so, or did God say so because it was moral".

My actual views on morality have to do with the golden rule. The way I see it, you can either cooperate with others or not. If you desire, as I do, to cooperate with others, then there are certain actions that go along with that goal (such as conversation or trade), and there are actions that act against that goal (such as theft or murder). I understand that murderers and thieves value their ends, and those ends conflict with mine. If someone aggresses against others, I consider that wrong. I don't see it as objectively wrong, just that their actions run counter to my goals, and I prefer my goals to theirs.

For the people that prefer conflict as a means to their ends, obviously they think aggression is good for their ends. All I can say is that I prefer cooperation to conflict, and I think most people do too. I also think that most people don't understand that the state is not cooperation but aggression.

Re: Is Libertarianism Compatible with Subjective Morality?

Physiocrat — Thu, 18 Oct 2012 16:29:04 GMT

Sorry, I too have been somewhat busy the past few days also.

GotLucky:

Right, I think you summed up my point accurately. What you go on to describe after sounds more like universal (or near universal) qualities of morality or value, but not inherent qualities. In other words, most people prefer life to death for themselves (as the people who actually prefer death for themselves commit suicide). But this does not mean that life has an inherent quality of goodness or value. It's just near universally preferred. People tend to like being alive, but this doesn't mean that they would like being alive under all circumstances. Some people prefer death because of severe depression, shame, physical pain, etc.

My suggestion could be interpreted in that way but I was going for something more "inherent". Concieve of it this way- Man has a shared nature in the same way all cars, despite being different, are in fact cars. Consequenlty given their design it follows that there are universally bad ways of using a car, such as attempting to drive it under water, in the same way drinking hydrochloric acid is bad for all humans. Thus it follows from man's nature what is good and bad for him. Now you may then throw is/ought at me but it's actually quite is to navigate if man is created good. As such moral fabric is embedded in his existence. As such I wasn't just saying that people almost universally prefer it but that it is embedded in their nature.

GotLucky:

Regarding the person driving on the icy edge of a cliff, does he not enjoy the risk? Falling off is not his intention, but the act of driving on an icy cliff seems like the sort of thing a daredevil would do. But even if he is doing it because he wants to go from A to B (and the icy cliff is inbetween), we can still say that he preferred the risk (even if he didn't "enjoy" it) over not taking the risk. So if he drives off the edge, he probably didn't want it nor does he consider it a good thing, but he still considered the risk to be worth it.

I thought you might go with this line. As you conversed with Mikachussets you argued really differences in the means used to achieve the end can only be the result of assymetry of knowledge. So in this case the lack of knowledge of the cliff could be argued to be injurious to his maximumisation of preferences. But as Mika pointed out we don't always act on our knowledge. Further, if we both attempt to achieve the same internal state ofthe maximisation preferences clearly it would be absurd to say we couldn't use different means to achieve that end since we are clearly different and for us to both use the same means probably wouldn't result in the max pref of either of us.

GotLucky:

Do you mean the difference between children and adults, between humans and chimps, or between anarchists and statists, maybe something else?

I was wondering how your conception of the morality could deal with divine command theory.

Re: Is Libertarianism Compatible with Subjective Morality?

gotlucky — Mon, 15 Oct 2012 18:25:00 GMT

Mikachusetts:

And we agree that at any given moment we can determine whether or not some object is money. But the point that you seem to ignore is that no one subject's attitude changes the fact of whether or not some object is money.

Ah, but money to whom? The Euro is not money to me while I'm in America, but when I travel to EU countries, that changes fast. And regardless of where I am, the Euro is money to the citizens of the EU. What if there were some people in the EU who might say "Your money's no good here!"? Well, the Euro would not be money to them (after all, if they don't use it as a medium of exchange, then it can't be money), but that doesn't make it cease being money to the rest of the EU. Money is money only to people. It is intersubjective. This does not make it objective, inherent, or nonsubjective.

Mikachusetts:

A grain of sand doesn't become money becuase I desire it to be money.

This is because money is intersubjective. It requires more than one person for it to even be considered money. If there is only one person, then there can be no medium of exchange.

Mikachusetts:

To be clear, here's what I'm saying:

Despite an individual's attitude towards it, an object can be money without having an intrinsic quality of moneyness.

Despite an individual's attitude towards it, an action can be moral without having an intrinsic quality of moralness.

Does this make sense? Here's another:

Despite an individual's attitude towards it, a word can mean X without having an intrinsic quality of X-ness.

Morality does not have to be intersubjective. Intersubjective morality only implies agreement amongst individuals about morality. You and I might agree that murder is wrong. Physiocrat, Neodoxy, and Malachi might also agree with us too. All 5 of us would have intersubjective agreement about murder being wrong. Suppose I change my mind, and I no longer believe murder to be wrong. Then the 4 of you would still have intersubjective agreement, but this does not change the fact that I would have a subjectively different viewpoint regarding murder.

The 5 of us might use the US dollar as money. But suppose I go ahead and say that I refuse to use the dollar as money. I will never pay for anything in the dollar and I will never accept payment in dollars. Well, as far as the 4 of you are concerned, the dollar is money. You all use it not only as a medium of exchange, but it's also the generally accepted medium of exchange. But what about me? Well, at least so far as the Austrian definition is concerned, an essential characteristic of money is that it is a medium of exchange. If I refuse to use the dollar as a medium of exchange, then it cannot be money in relation to me. This does not change the fact that it is money for the 4 of you. But it would mean that it is not money for me.

Regarding words, language is primarily an intersubjective phenomenon. To go ahead and say that a word means X despite an individual's attitude is to say that language is not intersubjective. The sounds that make up the word murder do not somehow imbue it with any meaning in particular. Let's look at another word: gay. Does gay mean cheerful or homosexual?

Consider the following passage from The Adventures of Tom Sawyer:

This was satisfactory, and so these adventures were carried out. Then Tom became Robin Hood again, and was allowed by the treacherous nun to bleed his strength away through his neglected wound. And at last Joe, representing a whole tribe of weeping outlaws, dragged him sadly forth, gave his bow into his feeble hands, and Tom said, "Where this arrow falls, there bury poor Robin Hood under the greenwood tree." Then he shot the arrow and fell back and would have died, but he lit on a nettle and sprang up too gaily for a corpse.

Did the corpse jump up cheerfully or homosexually? Well, sure, you might find some kid who is not familiar with the older meaning and he might read it as the kid jumping up homosexually. We must read the passage in terms of what Mark Twain meant when he wrote it if we want to know what he meant by it. The word "gay" does not have some meaning separate from what individual's think. If I think that Twain meant homosexual, that doesn't change the fact that Twain didn't mean that. This does not mean that the word has a nonsubjective meaning. It means that if I ascribe the meaning homosexual, then I would be reading something other than what Twain meant.

Either way, the word has a subjective meaning. When we say that reading the word gaily as homosexually in that context is "wrong" or "incorrect", what we are actually saying is that Mark Twain himself did not use that meaning. He meant something else. If we say that reading the word gaily as cheerfully in that context is "right" or "correct", what we are actually saying is that Mark Twain himself meant it that way. If you want to read the book as Twain intended it, then you ought to understand the meanings that he used. If you don't care as to what Twain meant, then it doesn't matter.

And just consider the Constitution. Sure, you will probably find general agreement that you really ought to read Tom Sawyer as Twain intended it, but good luck with that when it comes to something as emotionally charged as the Constitution. You might find this almost entirely unrelated essay to be interesting. The point is that people who can agree that gaily ought to be read as cheerful when reading Tom Sawyer suddenly disagree as to the meaning of words such as "no, Congress, and speech". Suddenly the Constitution becomes a "living document" whereas Tom Sawyer remains fixed (or does it?).

Re: Is Libertarianism Compatible with Subjective Morality?

mikachusetts — Mon, 15 Oct 2012 17:34:49 GMT

No one has made a case as to why there is a rightness or wrongness as an essential characteristic of homicide.

Because no one is claiming this. Just because someone rejects that right and wrong are matters of personal opinion does not mean that they think that right and wrong are intrinsic qualities of action. The example I gave to illustrate this, was money. But you totally missed the point!

Mikachusetts:
A dollar bill is money because people value it as a medium of exchange; it doesn't have an intrinsic quality of "moneyness." However, we do not generally call money a subjective matter. If any given person ceases to use the dollar as a medium of exchange, it doesn't stop being money.

gotlucky:
The dollar or euro are not money in some absolute sense. They are money because of intersubjective agreement. Social norms are also the result of intersubjective agreement. I might think that we all ought to drive on the left side of the road on a two-way street, but that would be my own personal opinion.

Its the bolded part that I mean to emphasize. We both agree that there is nothing intrinsic in money that makes it such. And we agree that at any given moment we can determine whether or not some object is money. But the point that you seem to ignore is that no one subject's attitude changes the fact of whether or not some object is money. A grain of sand doesn't become money becuase I desire it to be money.

To be clear, here's what I'm saying:

Despite an individual's attitude towards it, an object can be money without having an intrinsic quality of moneyness.
Despite an individual's attitude towards it, an action can be moral without having an intrinsic quality of moralness.

Does this make sense? Here's another:

Despite an individual's attitude towards it, a word can mean X without having an intrinsic quality of X-ness.

Re: Is Libertarianism Compatible with Subjective Morality?

gotlucky — Mon, 15 Oct 2012 16:28:05 GMT

Mikachusetts:

Correct me if I'm wrong, but this seems to be your general argument:

Right and wrong are simply peoples attitudes towards behaviors

Attitudes towards behaviors are subjective

Therefore, morality is subjective

That looks right to me.

Mikachusetts:

First off, the initial premise is the very point of contention. When people are arguing about whether morality is subjective or objective, they are really arguing about what it means for actions to be right or wrong. You haven't really made a case why it must be a matter of personal opinion.

No one has made a case as to why there is a rightness or wrongness as an essential characteristic of homicide. Homicide is merely the killing of another human. That is all homicide is. Rothbard considered some homicides to be right, whereas Gandhi considered all homicides to be wrong. But the only characteristic of homicide is that it is the killing of another human. Homicide is not limited to killing another person under condition X. That extra condition might make it murder or self-defense under certain definitions. But those would still be homicide.

If we look at murder, we can see that people have all sorts of views as to what ought to constitute murder. Pinning down a useful definition of murder can be tricky. Some people like to define it as a wrongful homicide. Others as a wrongful homicide where the killer had intent to kill. We can see that the first definition is really open to interpretation - one person might say it is okay to kill another for honor, and another person might say that it is wrong. The second definition is better, but it still leaves the possibility of calling any homicide in self-defense to be a murder. Now, some people might like that outcome, but it doesn't sit well with me (except for when the killer went overboard in the use of violence in self-defense). My definition has gotten more precise over time, and it is: Murder is an unjustified homicide where the killer had intent to kill. I use the word justified to separate the concept of legal justice from personal morality. So while any particular person might find it morally okay to kill someone who has lied to them, they would not be legally justified in doing so. Of course, they might actually be legally justified if the law system allows for it, so what I really mean is that they ought not to be legally justified. I think you know what I'm getting at, so I'm not going to continue to refine how I define murder, as it's not really the point of the thread.

Moving on, the point is that if someone says that A murdered B, we can be almost entirely sure that person is saying that it was wrong for A to kill B. But the actual act of homicide has no inherent characteristics of rightness/wrongness. When that person calls it murder, we know that he is demonstrating that the homicide was wrong. He is saying that the homicide was done under X conditions, and homicides done under X conditions are wrong.

Mikachusetts:

Second, I think even if we accept that right and wrong are subjective is some sense, it doesn't follow that morality is subjective in all senses. Consider money, for example. A dollar bill is money because people value it as a medium of exchange; it doesn't have an intrinsic quality of "moneyness." However, we do not generally call money a subjective matter. If any given person ceases to use the dollar as a medium of exchange, it doesn't stop being money. At best you might say it ceases being money for that individual, but what if I'm the only person who values sand as a medium of exchange -- does that make sand money, for me? Of course not, because it is still not actually a medium of exchange.

Like language, money is an intersubjective phenomenon. There are plenty of inherent characterists of gold, but none of those characteristics are "moneyness". Historically, people have valued gold as money because of those characteristics. Language is intersubjective because it requires two or more subjects to agree to meanings of words. The only exception I can think of is when a person might create a language as a type of code for their own personal use. But it would almost make more sense to call it a code than a language, but maybe it would be a language.

Anyway, when people typically talk about languages, they are not referring to the remote possibility of someone creating an entire language to be used as a personal code. They are referring to the intersubjective agreements regarding the meanings of words and rules of syntax. In a language such as Latin, the form "boy ball kicks" would make sense structurally, whereas in English it would only make sense if the verb were in between the subject and object and we add an article before the word "ball". But it really doesn't matter where any of these words go in any absolute sense. So long as people understand what others are saying, placement isn't important. But with language, we have rules and principles so that we don't have to define or explain what we are trying to say everytime we communicate. There is an intersubjective agreement amongst English speakers that verbs go between the subject and object. That's just the rule. Other languages are not necessarily like that. The speakers of those languages have different intersubjective agreements.

Mikachusetts:

I think its clear that there is a diference between something being money and being considered money. So the question is whether there's a difference between something being right and being considered right? And additionally, what kind of facts would we need to actually answer this question?

The dollar or euro are not money in some absolute sense. They are money because of intersubjective agreement. Social norms are also the result of intersubjective agreement. I might think that we all ought to drive on the left side of the road on a two-way street, but that would be my own personal opinion. The norm in America is that we drive on the right side. The right side of the road is not inherently good and the left side bad. People agree to one general rule and sometimes make exceptions in specific cases.

People typically have stronger feelings regarding murder. In America, we do have laws prohibiting murder, and even if we didn't we would have norms against it (I think it actually makes sense to say that we have both norms and laws against murder, but that's another discussion). But even if there is intersubjective agreement (norms) saying that murder is bad and murderers will be punished, that doesn't make murder wrong in an absolute sense. It only happens to be near universal, as there are people who murder, so obviously they considered their actions to be right at least at the time.

If we say that their action is inherently wrong, what we are doing is this: The act of killing another person is the act of killing another person plus wrongness. But that isn't the case. Homicide is homicide. It is not "homicide = homicide + wrongness". That is adding a characteristic that is not actually part of the act of killing another. After all, murder is only us giving a meaning to the context of the action "homicide". Someone might define murder as "murder = homicide + wrongness" or "murder = homicide + intent = wrongful homicide". Whether or not those are accurate or useful definitions is another discussion. The point is that a root action does not have a characteristic of rightness or wrongness. We ascribe rightness and wrongness to actions in certain contexts. "It is good to give to charity". Well, giving money to someone else is giving money to someone else. It does not have an inherent quality of goodness. We might say that in a certain context, it is good to give money to someone else. But it is entirely subjective as to what that context is or should be. Is it good to give money to a beggar on the street or to the Red Cross? Maybe the beggar is an addict who will just buy more drugs and the Red Cross has its problems too. So some people might consider the act of giving money to a beggar or the Red Cross to be classified as good, but others might not and maybe for reasons other than just being stingy.

I think I've rambled long enough. My main point is that actual acts per se do not have any inherent qualities other than the act itself. We ascribe extra meanings to these acts, often because of context but not necessarily. Lying is purposely telling a falsehood. Whether or not someone ascribes the extra idea of right or wrong depends upon the subject. But lying per se has not quality of rightness or wrongness.

Re: Is Libertarianism Compatible with Subjective Morality?

gotlucky — Mon, 15 Oct 2012 14:22:37 GMT

Sorry I took so long to respond. Last week was really busy for me, and I only had time for a couple of short posts throughout the week.

Physiocrat:

Is your main point that only agents can value and as such saying anything has value independent of actors is nonsensical? Even if this is the case it does not follow that morality is necessarily subjective as there could be norms which have value to all actors in the long run which they do not at present recognise. Analgously an agent may well like driving his car on ice near a cliff edge so much that he fails to notice the cliff and as such falls off which he didn't want to.

Right, I think you summed up my point accurately. What you go on to describe after sounds more like universal (or near universal) qualities of morality or value, but not inherent qualities. In other words, most people prefer life to death for themselves (as the people who actually prefer death for themselves commit suicide). But this does not mean that life has an inherent quality of goodness or value. It's just near universally preferred. People tend to like being alive, but this doesn't mean that they would like being alive under all circumstances. Some people prefer death because of severe depression, shame, physical pain, etc.

Regarding the person driving on the icy edge of a cliff, does he not enjoy the risk? Falling off is not his intention, but the act of driving on an icy cliff seems like the sort of thing a daredevil would do. But even if he is doing it because he wants to go from A to B (and the icy cliff is inbetween), we can still say that he preferred the risk (even if he didn't "enjoy" it) over not taking the risk. So if he drives off the edge, he probably didn't want it nor does he consider it a good thing, but he still considered the risk to be worth it.

Physiocrat:

Further, is it possible that some agents are qualitatively different, apart from agency of course (it seems you are treating all agents equally which you haven't yet justified)? If so would this have any bearing on your moral theorising?

Do you mean the difference between children and adults, between humans and chimps, or between anarchists and statists, maybe something else?

Re: Is Libertarianism Compatible with Subjective Morality?

Physiocrat — Mon, 15 Oct 2012 10:09:22 GMT

Bump. This thread was getting interesting then everyone kind of disappeared.

Re: Is Libertarianism Compatible with Subjective Morality?

Autolykos — Sat, 13 Oct 2012 04:13:22 GMT

Conza, what are your definitions of "objective" and "ethics"? I'd very much appreciate it if you answer in your own words rather than quoting someone else at length.

Re: Is Libertarianism Compatible with Subjective Morality?

Conza88 — Sat, 13 Oct 2012 03:16:39 GMT

The above post is how I would have responded previously when I was entrenched in natural rights. I like Rothbard, don't see a conflict. As such though, I prefer to adopt AE as it is a stronger argument (per Rothbard's opinion as well).

Re: "The argument that most of us use to advocate libertarianism as a political philosophy is the Non-Agression Principle, that no individual can initiate force against another individual. However, on the surface this seems to rely on the idea of objective morality, that everyone can agree to universal ethical principles. My question is if the existence of objective morality is necessary for libertarianism to be a valid system?"

This is how I'd quickly respond now. Ethics has nothing to do with libertarianism. So it's irrelevent.

Deductive legal theory, when properly applied in a given context, objectively and descriptively defines the parameters of what justice is in relation to questions of property rights, contracts, torts, and other legal matters. This yields a deeper-than-expected foundation for the traditional libertarian insistence on not mixing law with morality and the corollary opposition to “legislating morality.” Legal theory is a discrete field that, like Mises’s conception of economic theory, can provide descriptive, categorical input for use in “ought” considerations, even as legal theory and ethics remain distinct in foundations, scope, and method.

The above is an excerpt from:

"If you’re just starting out it is probably best to study the classics and introductory books. However, understanding the framework of knowledge, praxeology — the science of human action — and where the two important fields of economics and jurisprudence (political philosophy) reside is very helpful. This is the most cutting edge article out there that exists today.

“Action-Based Jurisprudence: Praxeological Legal Theory in Relation to Economic Theory, Ethics, and Legal Practice” by Konrad Graf

Action-based legal theory is a discrete branch of praxeology and the basis of an emerging school of jurisprudence related to, but distinct from, natural law. Legal theory and economic theory share content that is part of praxeology itself: the action axiom, the a priori of argumentation, universalizable property theory, and counterfactual-deductive methodology. Praxeological property-norm justification is separate from the strictly ethical “ought” question of selecting ends in an action context. Examples of action-based jurisprudence are found in existing “Austro-libertarian” literature. Legal theory and legal practice must remain distinct and work closely together if justice is to be found in real cases. Legal theorizing was shaped in religious ethical contexts, which contributed to confused field boundaries between law and ethics. The carrot and stick influence of rulers on theorists has distorted conventional economics and jurisprudence in particular directions over the course of centuries. An action-based approach is relatively immune to such sources of distortion in its methods and conclusions, but has tended historically to be marginalized from conventional institutions for this same reason.

I don’t think the above will be bested in a very long time. It is a big read for a journal article, but do not let that put you off. It is well worth it. If you’re not a fan of reading online, I would suggest printing it out - which can be done very easily for around $5. It’s something you will come back to often. A one stop shop for understanding Austro-Libertarianism in one read."

Re: Is Libertarianism Compatible with Subjective Morality?

Conza88 — Sat, 13 Oct 2012 03:11:43 GMT

"Do you happen to think that political philosophy is objective, while personal ethics is subjective?"

No. This gives an outline really.

"Rasmussen and DenUyl are not satisfied. The view just canvassed confines ethics to rules that apply to everyone. Questions about the good life have no objective answers: here mere preferences reign supreme. In brief, the right is prior to the good:

"The general tendency has been to consider the good as essentially privatized and the right as universalized. The good. . .has come to be regarded as the object of one's own interest, the object of one's desires, or those things one regards as beneficial. It is said to stand in contrast to what one may do with any right. What one may do by right is what is allowed to, or demanded of, or required by, all agents equally and universally. . .there is an inevitable tendency in the distinction between the good and the right to deprecate the moral nature of the good to the enhancement of the right. In other words, what is impartial and universal tends to take precedence over goods, which are, almost by definition now, partial and particular."(pp.22, 26)

They defend instead an Aristotelian view. The good for a person does not consist of his whims and desires, whatever they may be---far from it. Rather, each person has a natural end or function: his leading a flourishing life. This view, which they term perfectionism, "holds that eudaimonia [happiness or flourishing] is the ultimate good or value and that virtue ought to characterize how human beings conduct their lives."(p.111)

Does not a problem at once threaten them? They deny that the good life reduces without remainder to preferences: the good is objective. Yet they are also favor a political system in which people are free to act as they please, so long as they do not initiate or threaten force or fraud. But are there not many actions that fall within these bounds that an objective ethics would condemn? Suppose that I spend most of my days drinking myself into a stupor. I threaten no one with force, but surely I am not living in accord with my Aristotelian natural end. I am doing what is objectively wrong: how then can I have a right to do it?

Many supporters of natural law view matters exactly as these questions suggest. There can be no right to violate the demands of morality. Thus, Heinrich Rommen, a distinguished historian of natural law, remarked that rights are: "the sphere of right that is 'given' with the nature of a person."(p.64) Your rights are defined by your duties, and there cannot be a "right" to do what is wrong.

The authors answer with their key thesis: The mandates of personal ethics do not directly determine the nature of political arrangements. Liberalism is not "a 'normative political philosophy' in the usual sense. It is rather a political philosophy of metanorms. It seeks not to guide individual conduct in moral activity, but rather to regulate conduct so that conditions might be obtained where moral action can take place. To contrast liberalism directly with alternative ethical systems or values is, therefore, something of a category mistake."(p.34)

The combination of an objective personal ethics with a political system of freedom is, then, logically consistent. But why should we adopt it? Why not, rather, enact a political system whose metanorms require that people conform to their objective end?

The authors' version of ethics excludes this suggestion. They embrace "individualistic perfectionism." There is no fixed pattern to which every individual, in his pursuit of eudaimonia, must conform. Rather, "the generic goods and virtues that constitute human flourishing only become actual, determinate, and valuable realities when they are given particular form by the choices of flesh-and-blood persons. The importance or value of these goods and virtues is rooted in factors that are unique to each person, for it is not the universal as such that is valuable. . . Human flourishing is not simply achieved and enjoyed by individuals, but it is individualized."(pp.132-33)"

Re: Is Libertarianism Compatible with Subjective Morality?

Autolykos — Fri, 12 Oct 2012 17:53:08 GMT

shazam:
The argument that most of us use to advocate libertarianism as a political philosophy is the Non-Agression Principle, that no individual can initiate force against another individual. However, on the surface this seems to rely on the idea of objective morality, that everyone can agree to universal ethical principles. My question is if the existence of objective morality is necessary for libertarianism to be a valid system?

If that's how you're defining "objective morality" (i.e. "everyone agreeing to universal ethical principles") then objective morality certainly can exist, because everyone can agree to universal ethical principles. But that in no way means everyone will.

Aside from that, what do you mean by "valid system"?

shazam:
If on the other hand morality is subjective, individuals could each have their own moral attitudes toward certain subjects. One person could extend the NAP only to adult humans, another could extend the NAP to animals, another could define mutually consentual actions between two others as against their ethical system, another could have no moral regulations whatsoever. As an obvious consequence of this, conflicts will arise between competing ethical systems. The person killing livestock will be in violation of the animal rightist's ethical system, the gay couple will be in violation of the devout Christian's ethical system, the mugger will be in violation of the property rightist's ethical system. Clearly there must be some dispute resolution system to arbitrate in conflicts arising from competing ethical systems, whether this be simply might-makes-right, NAP, or some other method to settle disputes. This seems to leave us right back at square one, and having conceded that morality is not objective, this would also leave us without an objective way to settle disputes. Thoughts?

In theory, everyone can agree to a particular way to settle disputes, but again that doesn't mean everyone will. However, I think one advantage that voluntaryism has over other ways to settle disputes is that it's more abstract and therefore more encompassing. For example, if two people decide to settle a dispute by waging a duel, that's fine with me. They clearly agreed to it in advance, they're aware of the risks, etc. I may not want to resolve a dispute that way, but how they resolve their dispute between themselves isn't my business.

Re: Is Libertarianism Compatible with Subjective Morality?

Jack Roberts — Thu, 11 Oct 2012 21:02:57 GMT

I would say it is compatible.

Morality is subjective but I do think that some basic forms of ethics are universal or objective. I refer to Stefan Molyneux universally preferable behaviour. An example, where he uses logic to show that stealing is universally perceived as a bad or wrong. By definition if someone does not mind an item being "stolen" then the item is not actually stolen. Libertarianism is quite clear about the non aggression principle and the right to self ownership. These are not so much as objective but universal. Even if someone is born in a muslim family and believes that culture but one day suffers trauma due to the culture, that person is free to seek arbitration and security in a liberation society. Conflicts between two parties with different sets of ethical value systems, would be forced in to finding a middle ground or the conflict would remain unresolved. Over which form of ethical values would eventually turn out to be dominant would be subject to the region and historic culture of that area. But that variation in values can be observed in the current legal system between different countries and between different regions within countries. So it would be reasonable to presume that this would be the case within a libertarian society.

In some ways though it would be incompatible as types of cultures or ethical value systems that violated the nap would not be tolerated within the region where libertarianism is present. Especially if it started to create a lot of conflicts. So it is compatible but only to some extent, I would say it is lenient or broad or not petty. Libertarianism only needs a few basic principles, god needed 10, the government needs 35608.