I found this a particularly hard post to write. mostly because i'm unsure what kind of answer you were probing for with your 'why'.I may have misunderstood so please forgive me in advance, and feel free to put me back on course if needed.
here goes:
theft is wrong because there is nothing right about it.
essentially its like the old adage. 'ask a stupid question get a stupid answer' only i swap out stupid for moral. j/k.
"ask a moral question get a moral answer". I suppose you may be requiring an a-moral answer. but perhaps those arent to be had.
you yourself knew enough about morality to understand it involves classifying acts as good and bad, right and wrong. and then you ask me why this is so? why not investigate it with me. maybe there arent satisfactory answers...maybe we can discover the power of gravity between objects as a relation between their mass and distances ,but the why, of 'why does gravity hold to a particular mathematical relation' may elude us. is that a similar 'why' or no.?
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
I was pretty much a Rothbardian natural rights theorist up until a few months ago. Then, after doing a lot of reading, thinking, and dialoguing with intelligent people, I realized that notions of "natural rights," and any sort of objective ethics for that matter, are not even a coherent concept. Impossible to truly define, impossible to truly follow, and destined to be outcompeted in the free marketplace of ideas.
I am now a moral nihilist, a la Mises and de Jasay.
"Anticapitalist theories share in common an inability to take human nature as it is. Rather than analyzing man as a complex creature, anticapitalist theories tend to focus on what the theorist wishes man to be." - Isaac Morehouse
Mises was utilitarian not nihilistic...... though some say thats the same thing :-p
his motto , tu ne cede malis, would seem to lose some meaning were the malis to be ripped out...
nirgrahamUK: Mises was utilitarian not nihilistic...... though some say thats the same thing :-p his motto , tu ne cede malis, would seem to lose some meaning were the malis to be ripped out...
"Malis" does not necessarily connote evil in the sense of an objectively definable, universal immorality. Mises had utilitarian notions, but recognized that the ultimate end toward which men strive is beyond human comprehension, and therefore it is impossible to define rights and wrongs applicable to all human action at all times and places. Mises was definitely at least a moral skeptic, if not a nihilist.
laminustacitus:If morality does not exist then the entire natural rights theory dies along with objective ethics.
"Those who have denied the reality of moral distinctions, may be ranked among the disingenuous disputants; nor is it conceivable, that any human creature could ever seriously believe, that all characters and actions were alike entitled to the affection and regard of everyone. The difference, which nature has placed between one man and another, is so wide, and this difference is still so much farther widened, by education, example, and habit, that, where the opposite extremes come at once under our apprehension, there is no scepticism so scrupulous, and scarce any assurance so determined, as absolutely to deny all distinction between them. Let a man's insensibility be ever so great, he must often be touched with the images of Right and Wrong; and let his prejudices be ever so obstinate, he must observe, that others are susceptible of like impressions. The only way, therefore, of converting an antagonist of this kind, is to leave him to himself. For, finding that nobody keeps up the controversy with him, it is probable he will, at last, of himself, from mere weariness, come over to the side of common sense and reason." David Hume, An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals
"Those who have denied the reality of moral distinctions, may be ranked among the disingenuous disputants; nor is it conceivable, that any human creature could ever seriously believe, that all characters and actions were alike entitled to the affection and regard of everyone. The difference, which nature has placed between one man and another, is so wide, and this difference is still so much farther widened, by education, example, and habit, that, where the opposite extremes come at once under our apprehension, there is no scepticism so scrupulous, and scarce any assurance so determined, as absolutely to deny all distinction between them. Let a man's insensibility be ever so great, he must often be touched with the images of Right and Wrong; and let his prejudices be ever so obstinate, he must observe, that others are susceptible of like impressions. The only way, therefore, of converting an antagonist of this kind, is to leave him to himself. For, finding that nobody keeps up the controversy with him, it is probable he will, at last, of himself, from mere weariness, come over to the side of common sense and reason."
David Hume, An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals
Human Action Comics Issues 1-6
nirgrahamUK: theft is wrong because there is nothing right about it. essentially its like the old adage. 'ask a stupid question get a stupid answer' only i swap out stupid for moral. j/k. "ask a moral question get a moral answer". I suppose you may be requiring an a-moral answer. but perhaps those arent to be had. you yourself knew enough about morality to understand it involves classifying acts as good and bad, right and wrong. and then you ask me why this is so?
you yourself knew enough about morality to understand it involves classifying acts as good and bad, right and wrong. and then you ask me why this is so?
The reason why I'm asking this is that it seems you cannot give any defense for why an action is wrong. Surely there is a better answer for why an action is wrong other than saying that there is nothing right about it for the word "right" itself is not an objective measurment, but individuals, often as said above based on cultural influences, have differing criteria for what is "right".
nirgrahamUK:maybe we can discover the power of gravity between objects as a relation between their mass and distances ,but the why, of 'why does gravity hold to a particular mathematical relation' may elude us. is that a similar 'why' or no.?
The question of "why" gravity is has not alluded science: general relatvitiy provides a model that explains the "why" behind gravity. Thus, there is no excuse for any act of discovery not bother to explain why something happens for that is the question that the entire act of discovery revolves around, we don't just want to know that something occurs, we already know that prior to any analysis, but we desire to know why something happens.
I am becoming a Burkean Whig.
- F.A. Hayek
Freiheit:I am now a moral nihilist, a la Mises and de Jasay.
I wonder how all these libertarian moral nihilists cropping up would actually behave if given the opportunity of state power. What happens when "the system that works best" for society doesn't line up with "the system that works best" for the individual? This isn't an argument against the tenability of moral nihilism (although I do think it's untenable): just a curiosity, and an observation that if a revolutionary moment ever does happen in my lifetime, I'm steering clear of the libertarian faction that doesn't believe in right and wrong.
Lilburne: laminustacitus:If morality does not exist then the entire natural rights theory dies along with objective ethics. "Those who have denied the reality of moral distinctions, may be ranked among the disingenuous disputants; nor is it conceivable, that any human creature could ever seriously believe, that all characters and actions were alike entitled to the affection and regard of everyone. The difference, which nature has placed between one man and another, is so wide, and this difference is still so much farther widened, by education, example, and habit, that, where the opposite extremes come at once under our apprehension, there is no scepticism so scrupulous, and scarce any assurance so determined, as absolutely to deny all distinction between them. Let a man's insensibility be ever so great, he must often be touched with the images of Right and Wrong; and let his prejudices be ever so obstinate, he must observe, that others are susceptible of like impressions. The only way, therefore, of converting an antagonist of this kind, is to leave him to himself. For, finding that nobody keeps up the controversy with him, it is probable he will, at last, of himself, from mere weariness, come over to the side of common sense and reason." David Hume, An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals
Your point being? Hume makes no arguments against the position I stated, he merely dismisses it as inconceivable, and proceeds with his rhetoric.
I agree with Lilburne's conception, but why discuss rights on these forums at all, except for talking about how anarchy might turn out? If you agree with Lilburne's conception (i.e., rights are just abilities or conditions whose denial to a person would offend our universal moral sense, and society also happens to work best if these very same rights are upheld), then to make a natural rights argument for anarchy just needlessly complicates things. That is, to say that we should do away with the State "because it violates rights" is roundabout and confusing. It's more efficient just to say, "because the State offends the moral senses."
Talking about rights adds nothing to that statement, except to conjure up mystical, religious, or philosophical abstractions in the listener's mind. As a bonus, hardly anyone even on this forum can agree on what rights are. (I personally don't see how anyone who believes humans have a universal moral sense can improve much on the obvious definition, again: "Rights are abilities or conditions whose denial to a person would offend our universal moral sense," and for the "utilitarian"* conception: "Society also happens to work best if these very same rights are upheld")
By this definition, asking where rights "originated" is a meaningless question. The question is really just, "Where did our moral sense originate?" and although that's a meaningful question, it's outside the purview of our discussions here.
So I think the reason people get worked up about rights is varying definitions (a guaranteed argument starter) and the underlying philosophical/religious/biological/social questions about why we have a moral sense. The moral sense itself may be mysterious, but rights are not. They're just useful legal concepts for ensuring our moral sense is reflected in the law, and for making society work best.
*Utilitarian vs. moral seems a useless and obfuscating distinction. After all, "not having one's moral senses offended" is (highly) useful.
Think outside the monopoly paradigm. Net-based microsecession | Why anarchy hasn't worked
laminustacitus:Your point being?
The point is delivered in this line:
Let a man's insensibility be ever so great, he must often be touched with the images of Right and Wrong; and let his prejudices be ever so obstinate, he must observe, that others are susceptible of like impressions.
Unless you are a monstrosity in the Aristotelean sense (a mistake of nature, which is the general tendency of things), you KNOW morality exists, because you can easily detect it in your own psyche and in the actions of others.
As I've written in a different post from the one I linked to before...
Let us say you witness a little girl being brutalized in a dark alley. Something within you would cry out that that is wrong. You wouldn't deduce from premises that it is wrong. You would just feel it. An urge would well up inside you to do something about it, even if such action would considerably risk your life and limb. For example, you might feel a powerful urge to call for help, even though this might raise a small chance that the brutalizer would hear you and try to violently silence you. That urge is not rationally egoistic. Helping the little girl would not "serve you"; it would endanger you. Yet the urge to do so would be there, nonetheless. That is morality. What aspect of the brutalizer's assault would engender such a potentially self-sacrificing urge? It is not that in a society in which such violence is done with impunity, you yourself or someone who benefits you might end up being harmed. It is a primary urge that cries out, without any argumentative grounding, "it is wrong for him to do that to her body." That natural, internal moral imperative is what I call a property right: the inherent "ought" that lies with all of us regarding what, for example, a little girl can do with her body, and what other people can't. Of course, property rights don't exist as ghostly connections between a human and an object. They are not "natural" in the sense that they are a material body or force. They are natural in that they are not artificial or customary. The same basic principle goes for property outside of one's body. Were you to watch a sculptor, who saved up and bought his own materials, painstaking make a beautiful bust of an Olympian god over the course of several days, and then see another man come up, shove the sculptor aside, and run off with the bust, something inside you would say, "that was FUCKED up." You would feel a strong desire to see the bust returned to the sculptor. In that urge is implied the notion that the sculptor was the bust's rightful owner. Again, the property right resides within your psyche, as it would within most anyone who witnessed such an act. SIDE NOTE: Now obviously these moral urges would not be as strong, if existent at all, within the brutalizer and the thief. They either ignore or sufficiently quiet those moral urges (in which case they are immoral, compared to the general tendency of mankind), are overwhelmed by countervailing passions (in which case they are disturbed, compared to the general tendency of mankind), or are pathologically devoid of empathy (in which case they are amoral and psychotic, compared to the general tendency of mankind). All such instances (and any honest reflection on what one's own feelings would be in such situations) offer a surfeit of evidence of a moral code, written in our nature.
Let us say you witness a little girl being brutalized in a dark alley. Something within you would cry out that that is wrong. You wouldn't deduce from premises that it is wrong. You would just feel it. An urge would well up inside you to do something about it, even if such action would considerably risk your life and limb. For example, you might feel a powerful urge to call for help, even though this might raise a small chance that the brutalizer would hear you and try to violently silence you. That urge is not rationally egoistic. Helping the little girl would not "serve you"; it would endanger you. Yet the urge to do so would be there, nonetheless. That is morality. What aspect of the brutalizer's assault would engender such a potentially self-sacrificing urge? It is not that in a society in which such violence is done with impunity, you yourself or someone who benefits you might end up being harmed. It is a primary urge that cries out, without any argumentative grounding, "it is wrong for him to do that to her body." That natural, internal moral imperative is what I call a property right: the inherent "ought" that lies with all of us regarding what, for example, a little girl can do with her body, and what other people can't.
Of course, property rights don't exist as ghostly connections between a human and an object. They are not "natural" in the sense that they are a material body or force. They are natural in that they are not artificial or customary. The same basic principle goes for property outside of one's body.
Were you to watch a sculptor, who saved up and bought his own materials, painstaking make a beautiful bust of an Olympian god over the course of several days, and then see another man come up, shove the sculptor aside, and run off with the bust, something inside you would say, "that was FUCKED up." You would feel a strong desire to see the bust returned to the sculptor. In that urge is implied the notion that the sculptor was the bust's rightful owner. Again, the property right resides within your psyche, as it would within most anyone who witnessed such an act.
SIDE NOTE: Now obviously these moral urges would not be as strong, if existent at all, within the brutalizer and the thief. They either ignore or sufficiently quiet those moral urges (in which case they are immoral, compared to the general tendency of mankind), are overwhelmed by countervailing passions (in which case they are disturbed, compared to the general tendency of mankind), or are pathologically devoid of empathy (in which case they are amoral and psychotic, compared to the general tendency of mankind).
All such instances (and any honest reflection on what one's own feelings would be in such situations) offer a surfeit of evidence of a moral code, written in our nature.
AJ: That is, to say that we should do away with the State "because it violates rights" is roundabout and confusing. It's more efficient just to say, "because the State offends the moral senses." Talking about rights adds nothing to that statement, except to conjure up mystical, religious, or philosophical abstractions in the listener's mind. As a bonus, hardly anyone even on this forum can agree on what rights are. (I personally don't see how anyone who believes humans have a universal moral sense can improve much on the obvious definition, again: "Rights are abilities or conditions whose denial to a person would offend our universal moral sense," and for the "utilitarian"* conception: "Society also happens to work best if these very same rights are upheld")
That is, to say that we should do away with the State "because it violates rights" is roundabout and confusing. It's more efficient just to say, "because the State offends the moral senses."
Superb points, AJ.
Natural rights in my view are a concept that have a sound basis, but not for what its initial proponents claimed. In this case, the idea that rights are some how inborn in each person makes little sense on its own, but when considers the rights of each person in a social context, then they become something that will be a given for that social context. Whether it's the rights inborn in terms of ownership (and its accompanied responsibilities) or whether it's right 'given' as part of a contract of membership (like in a home owner's association).
In any case, rights are as natural as humans are natural, but much like traits and features of human existence (or that of non-human entities for that matter) they don't exist as atomic properties like mass or momentum. They exist as emergent properties, dependent on the identity of the individuals (and their groupings) involved. They cannot be said to exist independent either, thus one can't just point out "over there are natural rights." But one cannot equally state the opposite "I cannot see natural rights, so they must not exist." Just as one cannot argue gravity doesn't exist due the lack of non-sightedness. To perceive rights, one must perceive them in human matters, human conditions, and human contexts. Any other argument in itself is fallacious as it either espouses a naive reductionist (or mechanicist) view of human beings and the Universe or it espouses an equally naive notion that the whole of humankind and the Universe is non-sensical (as to have no governing laws or principles).
"The power of liberty going forward is in decentralization. Not in leaders, but in decentralized activism. In a market process." -- liberty student
Lilburne: laminustacitus:Your point being? The point is delivered in this line: Let a man's insensibility be ever so great, he must often be touched with the images of Right and Wrong; and let his prejudices be ever so obstinate, he must observe, that others are susceptible of like impressions.
But there is no evidence that Hume gives in the above statement that man is "touched with the images of Right and Wrong", and he does not define what are the "Right", and "Wrong" he speaks of.
Lilburne:Unless you are a monstrosity in the Aristotelean sense (a mistake of nature, which is the general tendency of things), you KNOW morality exists, because you can easily detect it in your own psyche and in the actions of others.
So if I derive a different ethical code than someone else I am a derivation from nature? In addition, who are we to decide whether, or not a phenomena is a "monstrosity"? Just because the Europeans never knew of the existence of black swans before they set foot upon Australia does not mean that black swans are a monstrosity.
Lilburne: Let us say you witness a little girl being brutalized in a dark alley. Something within you would cry out that that is wrong. You wouldn't deduce from premises that it is wrong. You would just feel it. An urge would well up inside you to do something about it, even if such action would considerably risk your life and limb. For example, you might feel a powerful urge to call for help, even though this might raise a small chance that the brutalizer would hear you and try to violently silence you. That urge is not rationally egoistic. Helping the little girl would not "serve you"; it would endanger you. Yet the urge to do so would be there, nonetheless. That is morality. What aspect of the brutalizer's assault would engender such a potentially self-sacrificing urge? It is not that in a society in which such violence is done with impunity, you yourself or someone who benefits you might end up being harmed. It is a primary urge that cries out, without any argumentative grounding, "it is wrong for him to do that to her body." That natural, internal moral imperative is what I call a property right: the inherent "ought" that lies with all of us regarding what, for example, a little girl can do with her body, and what other people can't. Of course, property rights don't exist as ghostly connections between a human and an object. They are not "natural" in the sense that they are a material body or force. They are natural in that they are not artificial or customary. The same basic principle goes for property outside of one's body. Were you to watch a sculptor, who saved up and bought his own materials, painstaking make a beautiful bust of an Olympian god over the course of several days, and then see another man come up, shove the sculptor aside, and run off with the bust, something inside you would say, "that was FUCKED up." You would feel a strong desire to see the bust returned to the sculptor. In that urge is implied the notion that the sculptor was the bust's rightful owner. Again, the property right resides within your psyche, as it would within most anyone who witnessed such an act. SIDE NOTE: Now obviously these moral urges would not be as strong, if existent at all, within the brutalizer and the thief. They either ignore or sufficiently quiet those moral urges (in which case they are immoral, compared to the general tendency of mankind), are overwhelmed by countervailing passions (in which case they are disturbed, compared to the general tendency of mankind), or are pathologically devoid of empathy (in which case they are amoral and psychotic, compared to the general tendency of mankind). All such instances (and any honest reflection on what one's own feelings would be in such situations) offer a surfeit of evidence of a moral code, written in our nature.
Moral urges? Is that what you're going to base your thesis on? Of course, you are going to easilly dismiss anyone who disagrees about your own moral urges as a "monstrosity" so I suppose there's no reason to even argue here.
laminustacitus:The natural rights crowd can never prove why natural rights exist
Well, suffice it to say one cannot ascertain whether something exists until one knows what the hell one is looking for in such an inquiry. So the question is not so much "do rights really exist?" so much as "is 'right' a meaningful notion?" What moralists need to explicate is, given that someone has some generic right (or that some other real, moral claim is true), what effect does this fact have on the world, i.e. how are things different than if he did not have this right?
Diminishing Marginal Utility - IT'S THE LAW!
Freiheit - nicht ! :I was pretty much a Rothbardian natural rights theorist up until a few months ago. Then, after doing a lot of reading, thinking, and dialoguing with intelligent people, I realized that notions of "natural rights," and any sort of objective ethics for that matter, are not even a coherent concept.
February 17 - 1600 - Giordano Bruno is burnt alive by the catholic church. Aquinas : "much more reason is there for heretics, as soon as they are convicted of heresy, to be not only excommunicated but even put to death."
Lilburne:Let us say you witness a little girl being brutalized in a dark alley.
BTW, I take on objections to my "natural moral urges" theory here.
AJ:...why discuss rights on these forums at all, except for talking about how anarchy might turn out?
Because a) I don't care about anarchy, and b) we live, and will live in a non-anarchistic world; plus, intellectual debates need not be spun according to one's own political views.
AJ:It's more efficient just to say, "because the State offends the moral senses."
If the state offends the "moral senses", why is not the world completely disgusted at the idea of a state? Your argument falls to pieces once it is applied to individuals who do not agree with your own judgments of value.
I'd like to take a moment to point out how it is plausable that the NAP is a universal standard for morality. we may ask, who would refute the NAP ? anyone who considers it tolerable has in essence rendered the question irrelevant to them and simply answered, that they can not be initiatorily aggressed, as such they will not be aggressed. they invite any invasion. so, there is no invasion.
so we have two classes of people in this world. 1) that acknowledge that initiation of aggression is the act that is morally prohibited2) those that deny that particular knowledge but have so defined themselves as to never consitute moral victims of those who might breach the law (persumably other 2s)
this is , it seems to me, (i admit i could have sneaked in some fallacies in this thread since i do not profess to be a confident philosopher) that for all concerned moral agents, NAP is the fundamental moral rule to be observed. (objection : but the people in 2 disagree . rebuttal : the people in 2 have told us they are not moral agents, and according to our moral standard, we can't be immoral to them, theref to reiterate : for all concerned moral agents, NAP is the fundamental moral rule to be observed.),
Instead of replying with an ad-hominem, I'll ask for elaboration: how are objective ethics, let alone natural rights, not coherent, in your view?
(I apologize if my query ends up derailing the topic a little)
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nirgrahamUK:I'd like to take a moment to point out how it is plausable that the NAP is a universal standard for morality. we may ask, who would refute the NAP ? anyone who considers it tolerable has in essense rendered the question irrelevant to them and simply answered, that they can not be initiatorily aggressed, as such they will not be aggressed. they invite any invasion. so, there is no invasion.
You have yet to actually give a reason for why the NAP is a universal standard. That is what so many natural rights advocates miss: they must substantiate their claim before they apply it. Before we answer the question: how would the NAP be applied to society, we must first answer the question why the NAP is the correct yardstick for morality.
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