Natural Rights Justifications

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pauled replied on Thu, Feb 28 2008 8:28 PM

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Donny with an A:

I'm sorry, but I can't see how you can talk about justice without making any value statement.  The claim "Action X is unjust" seems to entail "Action X is bad."

Well, if you study AE, you will see that Hoppe does exactly that. He keeps the entire discussion in the realm of what "is" and must be in play during an argumentation. And this includes certain logical assumptions regarding norms as well as facts. So via an entirely logical and praxeological application of reason to the act of argumentative justification, he deduces the validity of the libertarian ethic.

So, anyone who thinks justice is good, will agree that the libertarian ethic and all that it entails is good. But there are certainly those who do not always think justice is good. They're not libertarians though.

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pauled replied on Thu, Feb 28 2008 8:36 PM

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Inquisitor:

The real problem with AE (and one that Geoffrey has pointed out elsewhere), and the one that shook my confidence in it, is that it accepts the ought-is gap and the fact-value dichotomy. As Geoffrey has mentioned, what exactly is the status of norms if this is taken to be true? Subjective preferences? And here is where AE will run into a problem similar to that that faces emotivism as well as quasi-realism, i.e. that the contradiction involved is neither a logical one nor a performative one, because norms are not truth-apt (should one accept the ought-is gap.) Geoffrey can better elaborate this than I can, but it is a grave problem for it - if the proponent of AE rejects the ought-is gap it is useless, and if they accept it, it fails.

It transcends the is-ought gap. It ignores and side-steps it. It succeeds regardless of what side of it one comes down on. All AE does is acknowledge what facts and norms are logically implied in the act of argumentation, and observes that no one can deny these facts or norms, without falling into contradiction one's self. All things implied in the act of argumentation must be understood as ultimately justified.

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Geoffrey Allan Plauché replied on Thu, Feb 28 2008 9:41 PM

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pauled:

It transcends the is-ought gap. It ignores and side-steps it. It succeeds regardless of what side of it one comes down on. All AE does is acknowledge what facts and norms are logically implied in the act of argumentation, and observes that no one can deny these facts or norms, without falling into contradiction one's self. All things implied in the act of argumentation must be understood as ultimately justified.

Paul, once again, it can't transcend, ignore, or side-step the is-ought gap and fact-value dichotomy. If these are true, and Hoppe thinks they are, then AE is sunk. The status of norms don't allow for the performative contradiction that is necessary for AE to work. If they aren't true (and I think they aren't), then AE is unnecessary and elaboration of an actual ethical theory is possible.

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Stephen replied on Fri, Feb 29 2008 12:41 AM

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Check out the last paragraph in page 19 of Theory and History. Mises says that value judgement are facts of the universe. When a person says "I like chocolate cake", they may be telling the truth, or they may be lying. They may actually like chocolate cake, or not. So existentially, they are subject to the same validification and falsification as any other description of the state of affairs within the universe.

Similarily, if one proposes that they ought to act in a particular manner, they act in accordance with their proposed norm, or they don't. If they do, we can say that they hold their proposed norm to be true. If they don't, then we can say that they do not hold it to be true. We can conclude that existentially, it is false.

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Geoffrey Allan Plauché replied on Fri, Feb 29 2008 1:07 AM

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Stephen Forde:

Check out the last paragraph in page 19 of Theory and History. Mises says that value judgement are facts of the universe. When a person says "I like chocolate cake", they may be telling the truth, or they may be lying. They may actually like chocolate cake, or not. So existentially, they are subject to the same validification and falsification as any other description of the state of affairs within the universe.

Similarily, if one proposes that they ought to act in a particular manner, they act in accordance with their proposed norm, or they don't. If they do, we can say that they hold their proposed norm to be true. If they don't, then we can say that they do not hold it to be true. We can conclude that existentially, it is false.

Stephen,

The problem is this. Sure, even accepting the fact-value dichotomy and the is-ought gap one can say that value judgments are facts of reality - in this sense, it is a fact that people make value judgments, that person P has value judgment X about Y. This isn't enough to support any ethical theory, however. And it isn't enough to support Argumentation Ethics. Why? Because from the fact that "I like X" or "I think X is good" it doesn't follow that "X really is good." With strict fact-value dichotomy and the consequently insurmountable is-ought gap, it simply cannot be the case that X really is good as a matter of ontological fact. I just like X. I think it is good. That's it. These subjective preferences, emotions, or what have you, have no truth-value regarding whether X really is good or not. Hence, it is impossible from the perspective of Hoppe's AE to engage in performative contradictions with norms of this kind.

For more on this, see chapter 10 of Roderick Long's book draft Wittgenstein, Austrian Economics, and the Logic of Action, especially from page 149 onward. Roderick specifically addresses your remarks about holding something to be true. Holding something to be true is not the same thing as its being true; the former does not necessarily entail the latter.

There are other problems with AE as well, but this one in particular is utterly devastating.

P.S. As I've noted in a previous discussion with Paul, Roderick does mention Hoppe's AE as an attempt to develop an objective ethics but Roderick could and should apply his arguments against Mises's ethical subjectivism against Hoppe's AE as well.

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pauled replied on Fri, Feb 29 2008 2:16 AM

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gplauche:

The problem is this. Sure, even accepting the fact-value dichotomy and the is-ought gap one can say that value judgments are facts of reality - in this sense, it is a fact that people make value judgments, that person P has value judgment X about Y. This isn't enough to support any ethical theory, however. And it isn't enough to support Argumentation Ethics. Why? Because from the fact that "I like X" or "I think X is good" it doesn't follow that "X really is good." With strict fact-value dichotomy and the consequently insurmountable is-ought gap, it simply cannot be the case that X really is good as a matter of ontological fact. I just like X. I think it is good. That's it. These subjective preferences, emotions, or what have you, have no truth-value regarding whether X really is good or not. Hence, it is impossible from the perspective of Hoppe's AE to engage in performative contradictions with norms of this kind.

But AE does not merely observe that an arguer may happen to value say, the truth, for instance. It observes that a commitment to truth is implicit in argumentation. A person who argues, implicitly commits to the pursuit of truth and cannot deny this is the case without implicitly demonstrating his denial is false. It is a contradiction to propose that one is not interested in the truth, because the mere stating of any truth proposition implies the opposite - that one is interested in the truth. AE does not simply deal in subjective preferences; it deals with norms that are essential and implied in the act of argumentation. So the question is not whether truth or any other value or norm that one commits to during argumentation "really is good or not", the question is, can one participate in argumentation without implicitly committing to this and other such values or norms. The answer is no; they are unavoidable in argumentation. And therefore, it is impossible to justify norms which contradict these norms.

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Stephen replied on Fri, Feb 29 2008 2:50 AM

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I think that we are arguing past each other, and missing each other's main points. A judgement of value can neither be true or false. I agree with you on that point. Whether or not a person holds any particular value judgement, is a matter of truth.

I don't agree that whether a persion holds value judgement is not a matter of truth. Long's example of an "invalid argument" is actually a valid argument,

I disapprove of robbery.
Taxation is robbery.
Therefore, I dissapprove of taxation.
(pg. 151, Wittgenstein, Austrian Economics, and The Logic of Action)

First of all, approval and disapproval are actions. Secondly, the law of non-contradiction applies to actions. I cannot be both typing and not typing this sentence. So unless I think of taxation and robbery differently, disapproving of one is disapproving of the other.

A declares that he ought to go to church on sunday. Now, if he actually does go to church we can say that he actually held this belief. If he does not, than we can say that he did not actually hold this belief.

 AE only serves as a negative critique of justifiable norms. It bounds the scope of norms that can be consistently justified without pain of contradiction.

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a_goedker replied on Fri, Feb 29 2008 3:52 PM

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 I highly recomend John Locke's "Second Treatise on Government".

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pauled replied on Fri, Feb 29 2008 6:52 PM

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Stephen Forde:

I think that we are arguing past each other, and missing each other's main points. A judgement of value can neither be true or false. I agree with you on that point. Whether or not a person holds any particular value judgement, is a matter of truth.

I don't agree that whether a persion holds value judgement is not a matter of truth. Long's example of an "invalid argument" is actually a valid argument,

I disapprove of robbery.
Taxation is robbery.
Therefore, I dissapprove of taxation.
(pg. 151, Wittgenstein, Austrian Economics, and The Logic of Action)

First of all, approval and disapproval are actions. Secondly, the law of non-contradiction applies to actions. I cannot be both typing and not typing this sentence. So unless I think of taxation and robbery differently, disapproving of one is disapproving of the other.

A declares that he ought to go to church on sunday. Now, if he actually does go to church we can say that he actually held this belief. If he does not, than we can say that he did not actually hold this belief.

 AE only serves as a negative critique of justifiable norms. It bounds the scope of norms that can be consistently justified without pain of contradiction.

I agree with all of this. Take two chapters of Aristotle, and call a philosopher in the morning. :) 

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Stephen replied on Fri, Feb 29 2008 11:55 PM

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pauled:

I agree with all of this. Take two chapters of Aristotle, and call a philosopher in the morning. :) 

Sorry, I'm kinda new with the whole quoting other ppl thing. This was supposed to be a response to gplauche. The posting right before your posting. Sorry fot the confusion. I agree with everything you've said on this forum.