by hilzoy
This is the second part of my response to Mona’s post on Libertarians and Democrats at QandO. (First part here.) As before, the following caveats apply:
(1) I am not an expert on libertarianism. I will try to depict it accurately, but I have not done a huge amount of research on the foundations of libertarianism before writing this. If I misrepresent libertarianism, it’s unintentional, and I hope people will correct me. (2) In this post, contrary to my usual practice, I will use ‘Democrats’ and ‘Republicans’ to refer not to all registered members of those parties, but to those who presently hold power within them. Mona’s post is, after all, about which party to support, and this presumably depends a lot more on the nature and views of the people in power than on whether, e.g., some members of a given party are reasonable and nice.
In this post, I want to lay out some fundamental points about justice and property rights. This will involve noting one point at which libertarians might, but do not have to, disagree with me. In my next post (and yes, this post does keep splitting apart), I will get to what I take to be the main difference, to which this is all background.
Rules
Once upon a time, Robert Nozick (following Hayek) made an argument against what he called “patterned” views of justice: views according to which a society is just insofar as its distribution of stuff approaches to some supposedly ideal pattern. One example is egalitarianism: the pattern is an equal distribution of everything, and the most just society would realize this pattern. But patterns don’t have to be particularly leftist. Thus, the “everything to hilzoy” view of justice, according to which a just society is one in which I own everything, is also a patterned view.
Nozick’s objection was this. Suppose that the allegedly ideal distribution exists, and everything is perfectly just. And suppose that you want to give me a present. You go out and buy it, wrap it up, and give it to me. This seems nice, right? Not according to patterned views: according to them, you’ve just upset the pattern, and if society cares about justice, someone will have to return the present to its original owner, and your money to you. I don’t even get to keep the wrapping paper. And this seems completely nutty.
In addition, Nozick and Hayek argue that patterned views deprive us of freedom. In such a society, I wouldn’t have the freedom to give my property away. Moreover, I wouldn’t have the freedom to enter into contracts in which I pay someone to do something, or she pays me to. For if the government were perennially swooping in and taking away the money people are paid in order to restore the just pattern, then no one would enter into those contracts. This would not only make everyone worse off; it would deprive us of the freedom to voluntarily contract to buy and sell things, and generally to adjust the existing distribution of stuff in ways that all parties find advantageous.
Nozick concludes that “patterned views” are wrong, and so far I agree with him. Justice should not be about the state constantly swooping in to produce some preferred outcome. Nozick and Hayek think that if patterned views are wrong, then the justice of a given distribution of stuff depends not on what that distribution looks like (what its pattern is), but on its history. Suppose we all start from a fair starting point, whatever that is, and we then engage in transactions that conform to some set of just rules, whatever they are: then the resulting outcome is fair, and the participants are entitled to whatever they end up owning. (For those of you who are mathematically inclined: fair starting point + transactions according to fair rules = fair outcome.)
This means that you cannot assess the fairness of a situation just by looking at the distribution that it leads to. You have to look at the history that led to that distribution. Suppose that everyone on earth voluntarily decides to give me all their earthly goods: in that case, the resulting distribution, in which I own everything on earth, is fair. Suppose, instead, that I go out and steal everything. In this case, the same distribution results, but because it doesn’t have the right history (being the result of theft, not voluntary gifts), it’s unfair. I agree with that as well.
Thus far, I’ve said that justice requires rules. This rather obviously leads to the next question, namely:
Which Rules?
Nozick seems to have identified ‘a historical conception of justice’ with one specific set of rules: you can own pretty much anything; you can give or sell what you own at will; you are entitled to all the proceeds of any voluntary transaction you enter into. But this is wrong. There are all sorts of sets of rules. You might not be allowed to own certain things: your children, say, or all the water that flows through your property. You might not be allowed to do anything you like with your property: e.g., pump poisons into the groundwater. You might not be allowed to sell certain things that are yours: e.g., your liberty or your kidneys. And you might not be entitled to all the proceeds of voluntary transactions you enter into. They might, for instance, be subject to taxation.
Varying these (and other) things yields different sets of rules, none of which will be vulnerable to Nozick’s objection to “patterned” principles. If, say, voluntary transactions are subject to a 5% sales tax, that does not deprive me of the ability to give things away, or to enter into voluntary transactions; nor does it interfere with my freedom in any of the ways Nozick objects to. A 5% sales tax might be vulnerable to other objections, but it is not vulnerable to that one.
One might think that any set of rules other than one in which I can do whatever I like with my property and transfer it without being subject to taxes would violate my freedom. After all, one might think, it’s my property, and I am entitled to do whatever I want with it. And any constraints on what I can do, or taxes placed on ownership or transactions, are violations of that right.
This argument assumes that we should take a system in which I am entitled to do whatever I want with whatever I own, and to all the proceeds of any transaction I enter into, as a sort of baseline. This system is presumed to be legitimate, and any deviation from it has to be justified as a constraint imposed on me, or a taking of my property.
I don’t think that this argument works. This is not because I don’t think that there can be any objections to the justice of various constraints and/or taxes. It’s just that I don’t think that this particular argument against them works. Unrestricted property rights are not a neutral baseline that we can start from. They are one among the many forms that a system of private property might take, and have no privileged status.
Property is a social construct. By this I don’t mean that we can make it any old way we want without criticism. (For what it’s worth, I am inclined to think that math is a human construct, but that obviously does not mean that I think that in math, anything goes.) The whole point of asking what rules should govern a just society is to try to figure out the right answer to the question: how should rules like those governing property be constructed? This would be pointless if I thought that any old answer was as good as any other. When I say that property is a social construct, all I mean is: it is an institution constructed by human beings in society, and it does not exist apart from the rules those human beings set up.
So, for instance, suppose that Mona and I are wandering about the savannah, separately, in the state of nature, and I kill an antelope. What is my relation to my antelope carcass? In the state of nature, I might have my antelope carcass under my (physical) control. I might guard it, or hide it, or make threatening noises at anyone who tries to take it. But I do not own it in the absence of the sorts of rules that define a system of private property.
Suppose I am preparing for a nice antelope dinner, when Mona (who is, let’s suppose, bigger and stronger than me) comes and takes my antelope carcass away. What can we say about her? She might be mean. She might be selfish. But in the absence of the sorts of rules that define a system of private property, she is not a thief. She has taken my antelope away from me, but she has not stolen it. I am not entitled to compensation from her, or to anyone’s assistance in recovering my antelope carcass; she is not in possession of stolen property; and anyone she chooses to give the antelope to stands in exactly the same relation to it that I did. Namely: that person can guard it, or hide it, or make threatening noises at people who try to take it away; but he or she will not own it.
Now suppose that Mona, I, and a bunch of other people get together and try to work out rules for a system of property. We might prefer one set. or we might prefer another. But there is no obvious reason that I can see to think that we would have to start with unrestricted property rights as our default position, and justify any deviation from it as a form of coercion or theft. At this point, unrestricted property rights are just one among the many sets of rules that we might adopt.
Suppose, for instance, that we decide that we can all own land, but that owning a piece of land does not entitle the owner to the entire flow of any river or stream that flows through that land. After all, that would make all the people who live downstream, and rely on that river or stream for water, irrigation, etc., hostage to their upstream neighbors. In adopting this set of rules, we need to think that it’s a better system of property than its alternatives. But we do not have to justify it as a collective theft of water from people who have rivers flowing through their property, using unrestricted property rights as a baseline; any more than we have to justify unrestricted property rights as a theft of water from the people downstream, as though some other system were our baseline and any departure from it involved coercion or theft. Different systems of property are, at this point, on a par, and none of them has a privileged status.
It’s important to note that this does not mean that society or the government really owns, or is entitled to seize, private property. There are, I think, two different things we might mean by ‘entitled’ here. On the one hand, we might mean that society is entitled to my property under our current rules. In this sense, the owner of my property is not society or the government, but me. It is just false to say, for instance, that the government can just up and take my property, absent special circumstances like eminent domain or a court order for the seizure of my assets.
On the other, we might use the claim that the government owns or is entitled to my property to mean: under whatever system of rules turns out to be just, the government will end up owning it. If true, this obviously requires a specific answer to the question: which set of rules is just?, and this is a question we have not answered yet. However, I think it’s extremely unlikely that any answer according to which the government actually owns everything will turn out to be the right answer.
What I think the right answer is, and how I think my answer differs from libertarians’ answer, is the subject of the next post. In this post, I have only tried to argue for two points: first, justice requires a set of rules governing (among other things) property, rather than ad hoc interventions to bring about some favored outcome; and second, no specific set of rules is the presumptively legitimate baseline from which we have to start. Property is a social construct, and when we construct it, all the different sets of rules that would define different systems of property are logically on a par.
hilzoy- 🙂 Enjoying this so far. I think there is a significant difference between a system where the rules are mutualy agreed upon and a system where the rules are an artifact of past agreements, but bind people who have not been consulted. But you were probably going to get to that.
Frank: yes; part of the answer to the question ‘which rules?’, I think has got to be some sort of explanation of how they come to bind us. Here I was just trying to get to that question, but ended up having to do all these preliminaries.
This is a fools discussion. Remember, we Republicans own everything. All three branches. Do you really think we are going to let it go now?
I like your thinking, hilzoy.
One comment – people who do mathematics often say they “discover” things, not create them. If math is not created, but found, it cannot be a human construct.
Perhaps math is tied to this one specific universe – or maybe it is multi-universal, and unlike rules governing property, there actually are foundational rules – rules with a privileged status.
If actions and consequences (cause and effect) are multi-universal, then math, too, applies everywhere equally.
Jake
On reflection, here’s something I left out: I argued that in the state of nature, we do not get to assume that a system of unrestricted private property has to be our starting point. I probably should have added: we don’t get to assume that in our present circumstances either. After all, it’s not as though our present system of property is unrestricted (no taxes, no constraints on what I can own or sell or do with what I own, etc.) Nor is there any other reason that I can see to think that we have to assume a system of unrestricted private property as our baseline.
That’s an interesting point, hilzoy, in that any system one is born into can’t be completely voluntary. I disagree vehemently with my handful of anarchist friends, who dismiss our political process with the simplistic “Voting is violence” bumper-sticker. It is interesting to note, though, that there are no easy ways for someone in our country to completely opt out — renounce citizenship, set up a floating delicatessen in international waters, and stop paying taxes, for example.
Jake: this is a very interesting philosophical question. Suppose for the sake of argument that the following things are true:
(1) we created basic mathematical concepts (e.g., numbers, the concept of addition, etc.) for our own purposes; and it would have been possible for us not to do so.
(2) given those concepts, at least some results in math are necessary (e.g., basic arithmetic) in all universes.
Should we say: (a) we created math, since we created the concepts, and without them, no mathematical conclusions could be stated, let alone justified? or (b) we discovered those truths, on the grounds that they are true in all possible universes whether we created the concepts or not?
I suspect that this turns on the answer to the question: suppose a universe in which there are no beings who employ mathematical concepts. Do we want to say (a) that numbers exist in that universe, on the grounds that if there were beings who employed mathematical concepts, they would necessarily reach certain conclusions about numbers, and thus in that universe those conclusions are true of numbers, which therefore exist? Or should we say (b) since there are no such beings, no one has constructed the concept of a number, and since numbers, unlike rocks, do not exist in the absence of people formulating claims about them, in that universe there are no numbers?
I was actually using ‘human construction’ to cover both cases, since in either case the existence of numbers depends on the formulation of mathematical concepts and the derivation of true claims using them. The difference is just that in the ‘discovery’ case, we take our having constructed it as giving us reason to talk about mathematical objects even in hypothetical worlds in which (hypothetically) there are no people using mathematical concepts (but we, who are doing the imagining, still do); whereas in the other, we do not, and thus say: if there are no number-users in this imaginary universe, there are no numbers.
I will, however, leave the philosophy of math aside for now; it’s not my field.
If Mona takes the antelope you killed in the state of nature, can we say that she is wrong or that she is acting immorally?
Blar: I think so, but her immorality would not consist of stealing, but of selfishness or meanness or something.
Superb. I really, really liked this one.
IIRC, Nozick’s (libertarians,conservatives) greatest vulnerability has been on the origin of property rights, and has had to rely on a reification of process and “rights” divorced from history or contingency.
“However, I think it’s extremely unlikely that any answer according to which the government actually owns everything will turn out to be the right answer.”
I am anticipating Rawls, and maybe will have to run to Will Wilkinson who has been attempting to reconcile Rawls and Nozick/Hayek.
I do think the “government” usually does own everything, but distinguish between “government” and “governed” less often than most. The ancient Egyptians were able to maintain a system considered reasonably just with Pharoah owning or controlling most resources, as far as we know; the Bourbons were eventually less successful.
I have thoughts about the degree to which “unjust” and inequitable distributions are still consensual, but they might be off-topic and controversial.
Forgive my ignorance, but what is this “in the state of nature” refer to?
Slarti: the state of nature is: the state we were in before there were any social rules or institutions. (Chimpanzees are in the state of nature.)
In a state of ‘nature’ one can probably say that there is no such thing as ‘acting immorally.’ That in turn raises the scary boogeyman of relativism.
‘Morality’ is all about ‘mores’ — when you get down to brass tacks, our basis for saying she is wrong or immoral is our conception of property rights. Some form of those ideas go back a long, long time in human history, so there’s a lot of traction for the basic idea that someone deserves to keep something if they worked to get it. But the details are terribly varied.
So, the implication here is that even (for example) chimpanzees don’t have rules?
I’m kind of skeptical on this point.
Now, if you were to postulate the state of nature as a wholly artificial construct, I can take that as a given.
Thus: in the state of nature, there are no constitutional amendments, since constitutional amendments just cannot, by their nature, exist in the absence of a constitution and recognized amendment procedures. That’s an easy case. I’m arguing the same about private property (as distinct from my having and guarding something, the way my cat guards a dead mouse. My cat does not own the mouse. Likewise, I do not own my antelope carcass in the absence of rules defining a system of property, nor does Mona “steal” it.
Oh, I think the concept of mine far predates things like written Constitutions and such.
Not trying to be nit-picky, here, just interested.
As long as you guard it, hide it, or make threatening noises – and this works – you do own it.
The sorts of rules you’re talking about that are performed by the State are to relieve us of this burden, and they do exactly the same thing on our behalf – that is to say, guard it (Police) and make threatening noises (Sirens, I guess ;-)).
The idea that Government defined ownership is somehow “real” and state-of-nature de-facto ownership is “not real” requires Government to be some sort of metaphysical force. Government enforced ownership has far more heft behind it in terms of force versus poor Hilzoy in the forest with the antelope, but that’s the only difference.
Again, now this presumes that the immorality of theft only exists in when a Government exists to provide the moral rules by which you operate. That’s pretty damn close to divine powers being dispensed to the State now.
Going a bit further, could not the concept of private property be considered to be state-condoned mine?
And since the state is us, it’s pretty much a consensus on what mine means, exactly, and what happens to those who violate it.
The State Of Nature, as hilzoy seems to be referring to it, seems to be: “What you have the ability to do, you can do.” Rules may evolve from that, especially in pack animals, but it’s certainly fair to say that they are built on a baseline of Might Makes Right, rather than Absolute Property Rights or any other system of protected ownership.
Which are all just ways of introducing timewise-correlation into the rules, I’d say.
“(a) we created math, since we created the concepts, and without them, no mathematical conclusions could be stated, let alone justified? or (b) we discovered those truths, on the grounds that they are true in all possible universes whether we created the concepts or not?”
This is a good question and it sheds light on the trouble I have with your antelope example.
I would say that we discover mathematical principles or mathematical relationships between things. Yes math (as a method of describing certain relationships) is a human construct, but the relationships they describe exist independent of human description. Even if you want to say that math is really just a particularly useful tool used often used to describe certain relationships, the accurate description of underlying phenomena is very useful and involves at least as much discovery as contruct.
So back to the antelope. You seem to be saying that Mona can’t be engaged in ‘theft’ because the antelope can’t be ‘property’ in a state of nature. I’m not convinced that is true. Even in a state of nature you will tend to treat it much the way we treat property now. You will try to use it. You will try to protect its use from others. You will feel bad if it is forcibly taken from you. Could it not be that the social construct of “property” is an attempt to describe the interaction? Couldn’t it be that Mona is engaged in theft and our legal construct is an attempt to describe it?
Slarti: leave aside the chimps and treat it as an artificial construct, devised for the purpose of separating those things that depend on social agreements from those that don’t.
That said, I don’t think chimps have rules, though maybe it depends what you mean by a rule. Consider an easier case. My cat Nils does not like it when you stroke him on his lower belly. If you do it, he hisses and (if that doesn’t work) bites. Does he have a rule against people stroking him there? I don’t think so, since (it seems to me) he can’t formulate rules, or think of them as rules (even in the way in which, say, a three year old can. “She doesn’t get to use my stuff!”, as said by most three year olds, refers to a rule. My cat’s hissing does not.)
Whether you think chimps are like children or vastly more complicated cats on this respect is a matter of primate psych. My sense is that they are more like cats — unlike, say, dogs, who I think do recognize some rules as such. (I do not think that dogs that have been raised well are in the state of nature; they have a sort of society with us that includes e.g. rules about the non-availability of the dinner table as a resting place, but does not include rules about voting rights or intellectual property.)
Slarti,
State-regulated mine, is the way I always conceived of it. And ask anyone living in anarchy how much fun that is to do by yourself…
Jeff Eaton,
Problem is, Might Makes Right can always beat Social Contract Property Rights. Ask a mugger!
“…in that any system one is born into can’t be completely voluntary.” …Jeff Eaton
Hmmm… Are there non-consensual or implicit societies? Robinson Crusoe has no rights, but if both Mona and hilzoy both believe that who kills the antelope eats the antelope, does that shared belief create a rule, even tho no political relationship exists?
I am actually think of Kant’s and Rawls problems with int’l justice, and the Bush administration’s (can’t I just use “Bushco”?)current position that terrorists are outside any system of justice.
I didn’t see Slarti’s comment before I posted (ahem, before I posted mine).
I think it raises an important issue which complements my comment.
Chimpanzees most definitely live within the bounds of social rules. Chimpanzee communities also have institutions.
Homo Sapien is FAR, FAR, FAR from the only species with social customs and rules.
Any system that starts with a requirement that given fair initial conditions and fair rules the outcomes are fair is both true and utterly irrelevant. The initial conditions aren’t fair except under a might makes right system. No amount of fairness in the rules can ever produce a just outcome from unjust initial conditions unless the injustice of the initial conditions is recognized and allowed for in the rules. Conservatives (when they acknowledge this problem at all) tend to assume some kind of statute of limitations applying to the proceeds from theft, murder, genocide, slavery and so on. This seems a little sketchy to me, but something like it is required to deal with the initial conditions problem.
Eek! So many interesting comments!
Sebastian: I think there’s a distinction between math and property rights here. Math depends on someone coming up with mathematical concepts, but once someone has those concepts, they can be applied to imaginary worlds with and without persons who have those concepts. If mathematical claims are true in worlds without number-users, that’s because (a) given (some) mathematical concepts, there is a determinate answer to (some) mathematical questions; and (b) the application of those concepts does not depend on the actual existence, in the world in question, of people with those concepts.
Property is, I think, different. As regards (a), it remains to be seen whether there is a determinate answer to the question which system is best. (There might be some that are clearly unacceptable, but several others that would be OK.) In this case, we couldn’t say ‘X owns Y’ in a given world without stipulating which of those several systems we were using. As regards (b): Again, I think property is unlike math in that it does require that people actually have adopted the rules for them to come into force. If so, then asking who ‘really’ owns what would be like asking who, in a group of chimps, is ‘really’ the President. You could use that concept metaphorically or loosely and say, it’s the alpha male, but if you were being strict and literal, the answer would have to be: no chimp in a given pack is the President.
Construct it is. I think the example works far better if any context is removed.
Chimps are highly tribal. I can see that you might not think of tribal norms as rules, but if you’ve ever watched any sort of tribe/pack animal socialize, you’ll realize that there are strictures on behavior. I think (but of course haven’t an elegant proof at hand that I’ll publish lat-)the primary difference between us and primitive tribal societies is a) we codify our rules, and b) said codification introduced (or, probably more correctly, is introducing) previously unrealized concepts of consistency across society and time.
This, by the way, is very similar to my tripping point with Rousseau: that his observations on how things got to be the way they are were based on a highly flawed (and, as it turned out, completely backward) picture of what went before.
Back to our regularly scheduled construct.
Bob,
The shared belief does indeed create a rule, and that in itself is a very simple form of “political” relationship. The difference between a modern state and Mona and Hilzoy is a matter of scale (two people with one rule vs. millions of people with thousands of rules.)
And togolosh: I think you’re right that Nozick et al have a huge problem with the question: so what if the initial conditions aren’t fair? And it would be nice if that were a hypothetical problem, far removed from our world, but alas no.
My point was just: they also have a different problem, namely a failure to justify their identification of ‘historical principles’ with ‘a system of unrestricted property rights’.
State-regulated mine, is the way I always conceived of it
I think sanctioned was the word I was going for (but missed) but some combination of all of these would have been better.
On the subject of morality:
Jonas, you contend that Mona’s taking of the antelope should be considered intrinsic “theft” otherwise this sets the state up as the ultimate arbiter of morality. Ergo viewing Government as Divinity.
However, what should we say of Hilzoy’s murderous preceding act? Did the Antelope not of right possess his own life? Can we judge Hilzoy’s act as anything other than intrinsic “murder”?
The history of all human civilization comes down to Might Makes Right Indeed, the history of life itself is one long lesson in Might Makes Right.
When discussing morality in situations like this it is important to recognize an overwhelming a priori exception: killing is not morally wrong when conducted by one species upon another.
Of course, most would argue that any killing of a homo sapien is wrong when carried out by any species.
A quite convenient caveat considering homo sapien is the dominant predator on earth.
Here’s what I meant, basically.
There are some things we can do in the absence of any sorts of rules. We can throw things, or eat things, or hop up and down, or do any number of things.
There are other things that we cannot do in the absence of some set of rules. For instance, we cannot strike someone out in the absence of the rules of baseball. We can do things that resemble striking someone out. Slarti and I might, in some pre-baseball world, be messing around with a coconut and a stick, and he might throw the coconut at me three consecutive times, and I might swing the stick and miss each time. Then we might decide: OK, that’s enough. But I would not have been struck out. I cannot, logically, be struck out in the absence of the rules of baseball.
We might say: strikes are a social construct. While any number of unhit thrown ball-like things might exist absent the rules of baseball, none of them would be strikes.
Likewise, I want to say, in the absence of rules governing property, no one owns anything. At best, they guard those things, and other people leave them alone.
Again, thanks all for the wealth of interesting and meaty comments. I don’t think I’m ‘arguing’ any particular point here, just thinking-and-talking. A dangerous combination, to be sure.
I can see the points Slarti and company make about ‘nature’ providing examples of tribal and pack norms and rules. Things like who-gets-to-eat-the-best-parts are complex questions, even for a gang of wolves, and ‘alpha male’ requires the consent of the rest of the pack as much as it requires sharp teeth and fast legs.
When it comes to ownership, though, part of the problem also seems to be the ‘initial state.’ In that rules-free starting point, does everyone own a little parcel of something? Does no one own anything? At what point does the antelope transition from ‘unowned’ to ‘owned’? When hilzoy kills it? When she singles it out as her target, thus claiming it? Or when she feels hunger?
What if Mona declares that all antelope are hers? hilzoy is welcome to go out and chase down an emu, but antelope are off limits. Is mona’s claim legitimate? Or does she have to do some work to make it ‘stick?’
This is, I think, one of the questions about property rights that I never hear addressed by libertarians. (This is not to say that they don’t address it, I’ve just never heard it dealt with.) The idea is put forth that property rights are a ‘fundamental,’ and that people should be allowed to trade and give and receive things without interference. Treating private property as sacrosanct ignores the question of how the antelope (or the tract of land, or the patch of ocean, or the rain water, or the astroid) becomes private property.
At some point in time, however, it was necessary for all ‘not-property’ to become ‘property.’ The only way around this is to declare absolutely everything in the universe to be privately owned, without exception — and divvying up that pie gets us back into questions of what-rules.
“If mathematical claims are true in worlds without number-users, that’s because (a) given (some) mathematical concepts, there is a determinate answer to (some) mathematical questions; and (b) the application of those concepts does not depend on the actual existence, in the world in question, of people with those concepts.”
True that (b) can’t work in a social setting, but I don’t think that necessarily means that we aren’t ‘discovering’ things about social relationships.
If you want to say that ‘property’ is defined as the social rules we use to govern the interaction between mine and what other people want to do with what I see as mine, that is fine. But you are not accurately describing what libertarians are talking about when they talk about “property rights”. A libertarian talking about property rights tends to suggest that the idea of mine is legitimate for some set of things. Property laws tend to regulate what that set of things is and how it interacts with other people’s idea of theirs. So when you talk about property you are talking about property laws or customs. But “property rights” are about the idea of mine being a legitimate idea (at least for certain things).
hilzoy’s “strikes” analogy, and manyoso’s noting of the antelope’s right to roam around free and unkilled, captured what I was trying to get at far better than the above ramblings. Thanks.
I think everyone is circling around the same point.
The initial conditions are such that whatever property system(s) evolve out of them will necessarily be rendered ‘unjust’ by applying the self-same rules to the initial conditions. Save anarchy of course.
A “Godel” theorem for property systems if you will 😉 (heh, we ARE comparing mathematical systems to property systems)
Jonas: “The idea that Government defined ownership is somehow “real” and state-of-nature de-facto ownership is “not real” requires Government to be some sort of metaphysical force.”
First, note that I did not say ‘government-defined’. I said: defined by social rules. There’s a difference.
Second, I do not think I am requiring the government or society to be some sort of ‘metaphysical force’. (I’m not sure I understand what you mean here; apologies if I’m missing your point.) Consider the baseball analogy above: it implies that by creating a game, baseball, with determinate rules, we can create a whole bunch of things that did not exist before. Balls, strikes, sacrifice flies, bunts, stolen bases — the list goes on and on. And that’s without even getting to our amazing creation of the lateral pass, threats to someone’s queen, etc., let alone such non-game creations as: sonnets, legal standing, valid nomination papers, marriages, handicapped parking spaces, the ability of music to resolve into a particular key, and so on and so forth.
Does this mean that we have awesome metaphysical powers? I don’t think so. I think it just means that when you construct a set of rules or an institution, you can define roles and actions within that institution/set of rules/ etc that would not exist beforehand. I do not see why this is in any way controversial or strange or “metaphysical”.
Manyoso,
Only if you accept (as most do) that theft is immoral. If not, well, now we are in a big mess.
Depends on any number of assumptions. Right to possess your own life? Well, that’s one way to put it. Most of us humans recognize in each other the fact that we do want to preserve our own lives. Therefore we respect it through our morality – at a base level, I won’t kill you if you won’t kill me.
Note that a ignoring that compact forfeits the agreement – hence, self-defense is not murder.
Now, the antelope is incapable of understanding, and completely unconcerned by, our own moral agreements. The antelope isn’t concerned with whether Mona or Hilzoy starve to death for lack of food in the brutal state-of-nature. We are to grant it unreciprocated rights, now? The antelope should be protected by the moral system we use to manage our relationships with each other? Nahhh…
Unfortunate, yes. Morally wrong? Absolutely not.
Seb: “If you want to say that ‘property’ is defined as the social rules we use to govern the interaction between mine and what other people want to do with what I see as mine, that is fine. But you are not accurately describing what libertarians are talking about when they talk about “property rights”. A libertarian talking about property rights tends to suggest that the idea of mine is legitimate for some set of things. Property laws tend to regulate what that set of things is and how it interacts with other people’s idea of theirs. So when you talk about property you are talking about property laws or customs. But “property rights” are about the idea of mine being a legitimate idea (at least for certain things).”
— What I meant to say here was: (a) property is a social construct. You can ask what system is best/most just/whatever, and if libertarianism is right, then the answer will be: unrestricted (or: minimally restricted) property rights. Nothing I have said thus far rules out this possibility.
All I wanted to say was: there is no reason at all to assume that this answer should be a privileged default position when we ask what system of property rights to accept. There might be such a reason if we did, in fact, start out owning things, and any other system had to take the place of natural property rights. But we don’t, and it doesn’t.
Hmm, I agree that the state of nature (in social relationships) shouldn’t always get a privileged position. But the problem you assert about social constructs exists for an any claim of ‘rights’ not just for claims of ‘property rights’. In a state of nature there isn’t any ‘right’ to not get killed by someone stronger than you. By your argument, ‘murder’ cannot exist in such a state, only ‘killing’. I’m not totally sure I agree with that. I agree that we have refined a number of laws to describe what murder is, but I’m not sure I agree that if Mona killed you to get the antelope that I would agree that wasn’t murder.
The antelope should be protected by the moral system we use to manage our relationships with each other? Nahhh…
and yet, that’s one of the two big reasons people become vegetarians: either for health reasons; or because it’s immoral to kill animals.
I would say that’s true. I think the problem here is not that we define murder and treat it more harshly than just ‘killing.’ Rather, the problem is that some people pick and choose which rules and rights (and, in particular, their take on those rules and rights) get treated as the ‘absolute baseline.’ The real point of hilzoy’s post, I think, is not to disregard those rules or rights but to say, “Those are fine ideas you’ve got, but you’re going to have to support them and convince other people in the same way that other ideas have to be supported. Simply asserting that your preferred model is nature’s default doesn’t cut it.”
Jonas,
“Only if you accept (as most do) that theft is immoral. If not, well, now we are in a big mess.”
Of course, I accept theft as immoral. It does not follow that I accept that a platonic ideal of “theft” actually exists irrespective of the mind of a social animal.
Depends on any number of assumptions. Right to possess your own life? Well, that’s one way to put it.
Indeed. Look at the actual language we ordinarily use. One speaks of his or her OWN life as opposed to the life of another.
“Most of us humans recognize in each other the fact that we do want to preserve our own lives.”
Indeed. In fact, most recognize in all life forms the basic fact that life strives to exist.
“Therefore we respect it through our morality – at a base level, I won’t kill you if you won’t kill me.”
Which is exactly equivalent to all tribal/pack animals. Of course, exceptions occur. The young one trying to usurp the throne of the alpha male. Petty grievances. War…
“Now, the antelope is incapable of understanding, and completely unconcerned by, our own moral agreements. The antelope isn’t concerned with whether Mona or Hilzoy starve to death for lack of food in the brutal state-of-nature.”
Not sure what you are getting at here. Of course, the antelope does not concern itself, day to day, whether Hilzoy is getting enough food to live. Neither does Hilzoy concern herself, day to day, whether Mona, or any number of other animals, are getting enough food to live.
“We are to grant it unreciprocated rights, now? The antelope should be protected by the moral system we use to manage our relationships with each other? Nahhh…”
I don’t understand. If murder is intrinsically immoral, as opposed to a construct that societies devise with numerous exceptions and caveats, then it follows that the antelope’s acceptance of the moral order is in every way, irrelevant.
“Unfortunate, yes. Morally wrong? Absolutely not.”
Oh? I can think of countless circumstances where humans are killed by large meat eating predators and the forementioned predator is subsequently described as ‘murderous’, ‘evil’, a ‘devil’, and all manner of morally stained appellations.
Hilzoy,
Okay, I kinda agree. The degree to which private property is honored is defined by social rules, the acceptance of which vary widely from person to person.
My argument is you didn’t create anything but the rules. If no one follows them, or if everyone changes them when they perform the action of playing Baseball, the rules become meaningless.
Sure, but these rules only “exist” to the extent that people honor them. If you argue that the rules do exist outside of their practice, then it becomes “metaphysical.”
Therefore, whether the ownership of the antelope is protected by a large and powerful state or your grunting and threats, it makes no difference. You “own” the antelope either way.
“Those are fine ideas you’ve got, but you’re going to have to support them and convince other people in the same way that other ideas have to be supported. Simply asserting that your preferred model is nature’s default doesn’t cut it.”
That is ok as an argument, but it needs to be understood that this is an argument against the idea of “rights” as commonly used in political discussions. It argues against “human rights” just as much as “property rights”.
Nature’s default is the set of NULL societal rules. The history of natural life far precedes the history of societies.
Does anyone seriously contest this?
Yeah, that’s a point that I think is important and often overlooked. To use the chimp-tribe example that was mentioned earlier, do chimps behave as they do because they work out arrangements to keep things peaceful? Or do they behave that way because they have an abstract, platonic ideal of ‘chimpanzee rights’ that should not be violated?
Obviously, we can’t get inside the mind of the chimp to see for sure. But I would suggest that the latter model is a relatively recent development in human history. I think it’s arguably a much BETTER model for protecting people than approaches like ‘enlightened self interest on the part of the king.’ But it is always dangerous to pretend that the model one believes is best should be treated as nature’s default.
Hey, what the heck; I’ll give it a shot.
Nature’s default is NOT a null set of societal rules. It may have been that way at the beginning, but in the beginning there was no universe: things were very different. Even speaking in context of the Earth’s existence, in the beginning things were very different. The time at which there were NO societal rules was many, many millions of years ago.
But, sure, we made it all up. Whether invented deliberately or inherited from the context into which homo sapiens came into being, our notion of morality and law is entirely artificial.
So I guess it all depends on what your definition of “is” is.
Great thread. I have nothing clever to say–just wanted to applaud and tell everyone else to keep it up. I have a moral right to intellectual entertainment.
Apologies if I’m persistently being Mr. Obvious, here. Just let me know.
Jeff: “The real point of hilzoy’s post, I think, is not to disregard those rules or rights but to say, “Those are fine ideas you’ve got, but you’re going to have to support them and convince other people in the same way that other ideas have to be supported. Simply asserting that your preferred model is nature’s default doesn’t cut it.””
This is, in fact, what I meant.
Seb: one difference between math and baseball, as I said somewhere, is that with math, once you get the basic concepts, some conclusions follow necessarily. There’s room for saying, in a case like that, that those conclusions are true even when no one is actually using them, on the grounds that it’s true that: [if someone were to use the basic concepts of arithmetic, then they would necessarily conclude that 1+1=2] These concepts can be applied in the absence of social practices; we just won’t use them unless we define the relevant concepts.
Strikes in baseball, by contrast, don’t exist without both: the concept and an actually existing practice. If I, from a baseball-playing universe, consider an imaginary country in which no one has thought up baseball, but two kids are playing with a stick and a ball, then it would be wrong of me to say: she struck him out — even if she threw the ball three times, he swung each time and missed, and then they left the field.
Personally, I think that some moral concepts are more like math than like baseball, while others (including theft) are more like baseball, since they necessarily require the existence of an institution (property). The situation is complicated by the fact that while, if I drag you off and force you to clean my cave, I will be acting wrongly even if we haven’t really thought up morality yet (just as, if I put my antelope skull next to yours, there will be two of them even if we haven’t thought up numbers), I won’t be culpable in the same way as I would if I dragged you off in this present world, since both my knowledge and my intent would necessarily be different.
(Compare: if I deliberately throw something very like a baseball at your head in the state of nature, I cannot possibly have the same intentions as I would if I threw a baseball at your head when you were up at bat in the World Series. Iw will be wrong for hurting you, but not for e.g. violating the rules, trying to knock you out of the game, etc., etc.)
I don’t think beings can “be” without mathematical concepts. Just the act of being a single specific and possibly unique being imposes math, in the sense of classes of beings – there is “me” and then there is everyone else. In that sense, most mammals and many birds are math users. Somewhere between 3 and 5 is the limit for counting for the smarter birds, for example. People too. 🙂
I don’t recall who said it first, but property rights probably do arise from “might makes right”. First the might to kill the antelope, robbing it of it’s life, then then might to hold the now dead antelope – or to steal it from another in the first place (or second – that is after the antelope first lost ITS property rights).
Then we have communal organization – orginally, and for primates, probably groups a lot like troupes of monkeys. Evolution in action would modify the might makes right rule to include the troupe, as the troupe is mightier than the individual. So you still have a mightiest, but you also include the less mighty because even the mightiest is still but one, and in one vs many, the one often loses.
I get this tickling intellectual sensation that says evolution and tribal influences play a role in how property is defined, even now.
Because even now, if you can’t hold it, it ain’t yours for long.
As for mathematical constructs, if cause and effect are features of all universes, then math is the same everywhere. Or so I think. I think that because cause and effect in an absolute reqt for this universe, and because it shows up in everything. Without it there is no learning, no change, no evolution, no entropy, no direction. No if-then constructs at all. Even in this universe, cause and effect are only probabilistically related. That is clearly true at the quantum level and at the human interaction level. Probability is more certain (really? 🙂 at the macro physical level.
If might makes right underpins all property, then libertarians have squat to go on.
Jake
Oh, I get it. You all figure that if you talk enough about the social construction of mathematics, I’ll just leap in and threadjack this whole conversation out from under you. Well, nope. Nuh-huh. Not gonna work. I’m going to remain pure and unsullied here and you. Can’t. Make. Me!
manyoso,
It’s that platonic ideal I’m arguing against here. Apologies if I’m not making sense.
Kinda true. We are both accepting that Mona is a thief when she takes Hilzoys antelope it is because if we killed an antelope, we’d rather someone not take it as well. I’m asking, if I respect the antelopes desire to live, what respect is the antelope showing me in return? None. Therefore calling killing the antelope murder is outside the construct of “respecting rights as social compact,” and instead, as you put it, “a platonic ideal of rights.”
I’m arguing against murder as objectively immoral: these are the depths I plunge to as a devil’s advocate!
Jake,
I’d say that might makes right is the uncomfortable underpinning of nearly everything that humans do.
I would also say that the core of ‘civilization’ is everyone getting together and figuring out how ‘collective might’ can best prevent ‘individual might’ from going around cracking skulls and grabbing antelopes willy-nilly.
In that sense, most mammals and many birds are math users. Somewhere between 3 and 5 is the limit for counting for the smarter birds, for example
Animals can’t count. They may be able to distinguish, say, between two of an object and three of an object, or between two chirp and three chirps, but they have no sense that there’s something in common between “two objects” and “two chirps”, or “two pears” and “two predators”; and they have no conception of a numeric sequence, no sense that one of something comes before two of something comes before three of something.
Playing Devil’s Advocate:
Is this true? Given the basic concepts of arithmetic, yes, 1+1=2… but baseball can be simulated very well with mathematical systems. Go pick up a copy of Major League Baseball 2k6 for the XBox 360.
Arithmetic is defined by it’s rules just like baseball. Mathematical systems can be as varied as the human imagination. Consider Euclid’s geometry as opposed to Riemann’s. They depend upon a priori assumptions and rules just as much as other formal systems.
I don’t think this is necessary. You are placing to much emphasis on colloquialism. Suppose an independent observer, familiar with baseball in your universe, were looking in on the two kids with a stick and a ball, not told beforehand that he was witnessing a different universe, that independent observer would likely conclude he were witnessing a game of baseball and the kid STRUCK OUT!
A german kid in gymnasium and an american kid in middle high school are both learning geometry even if they use entirely different words to describe the various theories. Similarly with alternative universe baseball playing kids.
hmmmm. I am not sure I agree, ken. There are many, many stories about crows and counting. They can count in a very real and practical sense.
3 hunters go into a barn, 2 come out. Crows stay out until the 3rd hunter comes out.
6 hunters go into a barn, 5 come out, crows go in, get shot. If that isn’t counting, then what would YOU call it?
If I recall the story correctly, the hunters can come out one at a time and it doesn’t change the outcome. It is not a “size of the groups’ thing.
Jake
manyoso: I think that the observer who said the kid struck out would be wrong, since you can’t strike out in the absence of the game of baseball, which is in turn constituted by its rules. The fact that we recognize those rules isn’t enough; those playing have to know about them as well. The case is different with numbers: there can be, e.g., two rocks, even though rocks can’t recognize anything at all.
While the issue of mine has been discussed, no one seems to have mentioned the issue of ours (other than indirectly, as for people born into a set of rules they may or may not have agreed with if given the option). Different groups will disagree on the scope of their social rules. A lion will confescate an antelope carcass from a cheetah, but will then follow the pride rules about feeding priorities. If Slarti and Mona agree that killing the antelope establishes ownership for them, but exclude hilzoy, are they acting in any kind of consistent manner? Certainly many of the great tragedies of history involve who is protected by the rules, rather than the rules themselves. Or perhaps that’s just another category of rules?
Jonas,
That is truly funny. I was also arguing against murder as intrinsically immoral. The concept of ‘immorality’ can not be divorced from the mind of a social animal.
Hmm, I think you go too far. Just because I believe morality is a social compact does not mean that the antelope, of necessity, has to “buy-in” to be secured by the compact. This is an unwarranted assumption that also fails in reality. Many moral people do not believe that people who’ve expressely violated the compact are therefore exempted from protection. Example: the Catholic Church’s opposition to the death penalty.
I do not agree that ‘property’ is a social construct. I believe we create various social constructs, including ‘government’ and ‘theft,’ among others, to safeguard something that we would still understand to exist in any case.
Property arises when someone works at a thing. Because he has sacrificed time upon it, it becomes his own — at least until he sells, trades, or gives it away. It’s entirely natural that we would want this to be the case for all of the things we spend time on. We’d want that whether we lived with or without a government. We’d even want it if we lived alone and never once encountered another human being. (Perhaps some intelligent crows would steal our antelope or something?)
This is why property exists, why it’s real and not a social construct.
Jason: I have worked on the earth. Is it therefore mine?
“Just because I believe morality is a social compact does not mean that the antelope, of necessity, has to “buy-in” to be secured by the compact.”
If it did, that would be a quick and dirty argument showing that there’s nothing wrong with abortion, or for that matter infanticide.
Hilzoy,
Reminds me of the Turing Test, but I wonder WHY you would:
1. Assume that the kids did not know the rules of baseball? It stands to reason, that if they are following the rules, as demonstrably observed, they might be aware of them. Couldn’t the kids have ‘created/discovered’ the rules of baseball on their own?
2. Were the kids not aware of the rules, but nevertheless followed them anyway, would this not count? If it wouldn’t count, then what do you make of the case of Ramanujan? His mathematical genius is not seriously questioned, and yet, he intuited much of his mathematics absent awareness of the formal proofs
Look at what Hardy said about him:
and
Tell that to Paris Hilton.
If you planted a garden on unowned, unimproved land, then yes.
Keep in mind that we are talking about the theoretical origin of property. In the time since then (and that ‘time’ may well be lost in the mists of the purely hypothetical), property owners have permitted you, through an implicit contract, to walk over their property. You most certainly have not left a trail of footprint-shaped patches of ownership in your wake.
(This leads directly into a discussion of Native American property rights that is, indeed, too awful to contemplate. Nozick mentions this subject too, suggesting, but not strongly if I recall, that ancient injustices can sometimes be too far gone to rectify.)
Never happen. I’d keep it for myself. Or, since I’m a typical enabler of male hegemony, I’d give it to them and make them cook it for me. And get me a beer! They can eat what I cannot stuff into my gaping maw, and then kill me while I sleep.
Ok, that was completely unserious.
Pfft. How about, politics? My tickling sensation has to do with why we assassinate our leaders, and with the neverending struggle for political dominance between Faction A and Faction B, and maybe whether it even matters what Faction A and Faction B are comprised of.
Fine, we’ll muddle along without you, and consider how number theory might have arisen in beings that weren’t equipped with a reliable number of fingers and toes. Or why we’d have gotten so damned good at calculus and geometry if we didn’t have this drive to be more efficient about killing each other. Ever notice how you get introduced to trajectories? A shell is fired from a cannon at an angle of X degrees above level and at a muzzle velocity of Y meters per second. Describe the trajectory to impact.
And of course they screw up by having the right answer be a parabola. Frigging high school calculus texts.
manyoso,
True, because actually you and I can form a social compact that “we will not kill antelopes because we think they are cute and that’s mean” and presto! Antelopes are thereby secured, albeit through no fault or virtue of their own.
I don’t think the death penalty necessarily the expression of the violation of compact – I previously mentioned killing in self-defense, and I think that’s the better analogue. Meanwhile, if you’re against the death penalty, you’re just taking the “you don’t kill me, I won’t kill you” compact very, very seriously – which I recommend heartily.
Oh no… the labor theory of value!
Oh no… italics be gone.
Property arises when someone works at a thing.
“Oh no… the labor theory of value!”
Bzzt. The labor theory of value is the belief that how hard someone works must (or should) determine the value of the product in the market. If I work twenty years to make a paperclip, I should be compensated for twenty years of (probably unskilled) labor. But if I discover the cure for cancer one morning while I’m shaving, I shouldn’t be paid at all, since it wasn’t very much work for me.
That’s the labor theory of value. What I offer is Locke’s theory of property, which is entirely different.
Jonas,
No, I mean that the people on death row have, presumably, violated the social compact and are now no longer subject to the societies protection. Isn’t that the very definition of a death penalty? I was saying the Catholic Church believes even death row inmates should be afforded protection.
So, Jason, you’re saying that until you’ve improved something, it’s not property?
Interesting. Ok, say I have worked on something that’s previously been unowned. How far down does my property go? How far up? Do I own stars that happen to pass overhead, and if so, for how long (and, I’m chuckling here, when?). Do I own, as hilzoy says, the water flowing across my property? All of it?
And, conversely, what if I fall ill, and my property reverts to its former unimproved state. Do I no longer own it?
Jason,
Ok, so you like Locke’s theory. Doesn’t mean his theory explains current society. If you insist that it does, then you have to explain Paris Hilton.
It has always been stressed to me that the “state of nature” is an ahistorical concept meant only to evoke “the state of no societal rules”. For isntance, before international organizations existed, it was generally accepted that nation states are in a state of nature with each other or else only barely into the rudimentary stages of having international societal rules. It was invoked heavily by Hobbes in Leviathan, after which it got pretty heavy play all around in the philosophical world.
Jeff said: “I would also say that the core of ‘civilization’ is everyone getting together and figuring out how ‘collective might’ can best prevent ‘individual might’ from going around cracking skulls and grabbing antelopes willy-nilly.”
This also happens to be the premise of Hobbes, and one I am pretty convinced on. For what it is worth, his attempt to justify initial property rights is that they come about through the “mixing of labor” with an object. However, this runs into a ton of problems (like the fact that, if mixing of labor is coherent at all, by picking up someone else’s stuff and running off with it, I am mixing my labor with it).
I tend to side with hilzoy on this, myself. Property is a social construct that allows us to escape the headclubbing stage and move on to a society where I can recognize that you have a right to that antelope, not just a desire to keep it.
Also, counterxamples about mugging and whatnot only seem to me to draw attention to the fact that many individuals still exist in a state of nature. One of the best formulations of a groundwork for understanding criminal punishment relies on thinking of the criminal as having removed themselves from society by violating the contract. At this point, the society is merely protecting itself from an outside force. If the criminal reforms and earns back goodwill or if the violation is minor, the society may allow her to reintegrate, but that is at the discretion of the society. This, I believe, comes from Locke, but I could be off on that one.
(Note: It just occured from me that this creates an interesting cut against the adage that the death penalty is state sponsored murder, depending on whether murder is a construct only applicable between members in a specific society.)
Lastly, it doesn’t necessarily follow that all rights must be dependant on any specific society. For instance, it makes sense to say that true blood communists do not forsake their individual property rights, but rather have none. On the other hand, there may be rights that are attributable to a person merely for being a human being, regardless of the societal structure in which they are enmeshed. A right to life, for instance, might follow here. I am not necessarily saying that this is the case, merely pointing out that it certainly seems reasonable to at least attempt to generate rights on the basis of what one is and not push all rights into the realm of social constructs.
I don’t think Paris Hilton has an explanation, manyoso.
Jason,
My apologies. I look forward to seeing you defend it rigorously 😉
manyoso,
Protection from being killed, yes. No one is arguing against the gigantic rights forfeiture that happens when one is sent to prison because they violated the contract, right?
The Hilton family “improved” property by building hotels. They therefore owned it, and as is their right they gave it to their children. Again, there is no depth to which I won’t sink to be devil’s advocate…
P.S. Am I the only one that sees the italic problem I created?
Slartibartfast —
These are theoretical explanations; just as we do not ask ourselves “ok, so when did we actually _agree_ to the social contract?”, so too we do not honestly believe that all property was created in the manner I describe. (I alluded to this in my first comment.)
As to owning the stars, no, you don’t. You’ve done no actual work with them. For a good description of the limits of property, see this comment at Jim Henley’s.
http://highclearing.com/index.php/archives/2006/06/05/5168#comment-10964
Ok, so you like Locke’s theory. Doesn’t mean his theory explains current society. If you insist that it does, then you have to explain Paris Hilton.
I don’t even pretend to understand what this means, or why she presents a problem.
Jason,
As I mentioned above, really Hobbes’ theory that Locke ganked. And I think Jonas gave the standard explanation the the Paris Hilton case brings.
She did not earn her property herself, so why should she get it? Becaus her parents did earn it through their work and they gifted it to her.
Jonas,
Ahh, but Locke’s Theory insists that if you ‘waste’ or ‘horde’ your property that you must forfeit it. Again… PARIS HILTON! 🙂
The ‘stars’ bit was only the most extreme example he cited. To put it in easier to digest terms, if I find a piece of entirely unowned land, and I start gardening on it and doing some spiffy landscaping, this model holds that it becomes mine. If, later, I someone else comes along and discovers that there is gold under the surface of my garden, and digs it up, have they stolen from me? They put the labor into obtaining the gold, even though I put the labor into building the garden that sits atop the gold.
And this doesn’t even begin to touch on the wacky world of intellectual property, where everything is pure labor and one cannot steal actual substance, only ‘opportunity to profit.’
Jason K: “Keep in mind that we are talking about the theoretical origin of property.”
OK; is this supposed to have justificatory force? Also, any evidence that it did arise in this way?
I’m not wild about Locke’s theory myself, for a variety of more or less familiar reasons. (And the question about ‘the earth’ was serious: for most plots of land one acquires, one has not ‘mixed one’s labor’ with all of it — every molecule. One gets some land along with the bits one has actually worked. How does one decide how much comes with the stuff one has actually worked? And why not say that I get the whole earth?)
More generally, though, Locke’s positive argument for his theory of property was (imho) premissed on the existence of God. He did not think it was obvious that when you mix your labor with something, it becomes yours. What he did think was that it made no sense to think that God had put us on this earth, with all its abundance, but had left us with no legitimate means of appropriating it (e.g., of legitimately eating an apple without consulting everyone else on earth.) This being the case, there had to be some way of rightfully claiming things (if God was not to be malevolent or an idiot), and this was it.
It doesn’t make nearly as much sense without the theistic backdrop, like the rest of Locke’s political theory, much as I adore the rest of it.
Jonas: I saw the italics, and fixed them. For the record, Typepad Does Not Like It if you do: italics, blockquote, text, close italics, close blockquote; or in some other way fail to close tags in the reverse order of the way you opened them. It seems to fail to acknowledge the existence of italic tags under those circumstances.
Probably it’d have been better to refer to Locke from the beginning, not that I’m well-read in that area.
THAT said, though:
Are you sure? I’m an avid astronomer, for the sake of this discussion. Sure, I’ve never touched a star, but you’ve never touched an idea.
Hilzoy,
Thanks, I’m just clumsy today I guess.
Slarti,
Me neither, clearly. So, who gets the antelope in Locke’s formulation?*
*I hope it’s me
The ‘stars’ bit was only the most extreme example he cited. To put it in easier to digest terms, if I find a piece of entirely unowned land, and I start gardening on it and doing some spiffy landscaping, this model holds that it becomes mine. If, later, I someone else comes along and discovers that there is gold under the surface of my garden, and digs it up, have they stolen from me? They put the labor into obtaining the gold, even though I put the labor into building the garden that sits atop the gold.
It’s an interesting question. Not one that comes up very often, but interesting nonetheless.
In our present system, property deeds and property law in general describe what rights you have and do not have to your plot of land. Arguably, it was all the ambiguous cases like these that brought about their creation in the first place. In a state of nature, I freely admit I am not sure what I would do here. I don’t think that this disproves the justification of why we have property.
Hilzoy: As an atheist, I am not bothered that Locke believed property to be a grant from God. I believe instead that it is a grant we make to ourselves, or rather, a grant that our past selves have made to our future selves. I’ve never written about this at length, nor seen it argued by others, but I think the justification holds: Each of us wants to be able to provide four ourselves at some future time. Property allows us to do so, by ensuring that tomorrow we will still have use of the same things that we have today.
In this sense, property facilitates the one thing that sets us apart from the animals, which is our ability to create and execute complex plans. Property, as an ethical directive, is rooted in what it means to be human. We therefore make institutions, like governments, to ensure that this directive is respected.
Slarti–
On owning stars, please take the trouble to copy and paste the link I offered above. There are entirely logical limits to what can be called property, and you’re just barreling right past them if you think you can own the stars.
Slarti: the basics:
Let’s figure out whether there are any limits to what kings can legitimately do. How? We weren’t around when our forbears agreed to be ruled by them. But — aha! — if there are some things we couldn’t have agreed to and then been bound by, then either our forbears didn’t agree to them or they did and it’s not binding.
God created us. Clearly He had something in mind. What could it have been? Well, we are free and able to reason, so that must have something to do with it. We get to use our freedom in reasonable ways. Do we get to do just anything? No. God didn’t just give us our lives and our freedom free and clear; he gave them to us so that we could do his will. It’s as though he invested them with us, and we are his financial agents: we get to use this stuff he has deposited with us for his purposes, but we do not get to do anything we want with it.
For instance: we can’t kill ourselves. That would be throwing away God’s gift; and that’s inconsistent with our fiduciary obligation to Him. Also, we can’t give away our freedom.
(More stuff, including property….)
So suppose we want to form a government. We can give it certain powers, in order to make our lives better and allow us to do more interesting stuff and spend less time fighting Mona off when she wants to steal our antelopes. But just as we cannot throw away our lives, since they are not ours to dispose of freely, being God’s, so we cannot just sign away our freedom — it’s God’s too. We can only give up certain freedoms in exchange for stuff we need — greater freedoms in other areas, protection, etc.
(Because giving up some rights to gain others can be a way of getting good returns on the freedom God invested us with, but just giving it up in perpetuity, for nothing, is not. It’s as though my financial advisor gave all my retirement money to the Hare Krishnas.)
So: if our forbears did agree to this, they had no right to, and it’s invalid.
Thus, when some King, call him, oh, James II, goes beyond the limits that our forbears could have agreed to accept, we have a right to revolution.
See how easy?
Oh, I looked at the link, Jason. Read it right up.
It bore almost zero resemblance to your initial comment on this topic, but if the highclearing comment is what you meant to say, it’s pretty silly to continue picking apart what you did say. Not being adversarial, here, but one of those things was emphatically not like the other.
So, is Intellectual Property property? Clearly it gives you some legal recourse, but so does having property rights.
For the record, Typepad Does Not Like It if you do: italics, blockquote, text, close italics, close blockquote..
Pedantic FYI: HTML is the offended party here, not Typepad.
Excellent summary, hilzoy. That said, I need to point out that the Great Antelope War makes me giggle every time someone posts, and it should appear as the basis for more discussions of philosophy and economics.
Oh, and one more thing:
I have not ever said I could own stars, I just questioned how I could NOT claim to own them, given your initial formulation, which was:
Many of us (including me) found that notion to be logically unsound, and here we are.
Again, if this isn’t what you meant to propose, we’ll let it be.
Oh, and hilzoy: you and Jason have something in common, assuming you didn’t already know. Click his link to his weblog, then click the link to his name.
Jeff: a staple of my classes. I pick students on the front row who look sort of up for it, and construct ludicrous situations like this, in which, hey, anything can happen.
Also, I have (after it occurred to me that this would be a useful skill to have) perfected the art of picking students for examples without noticing their gender- or other appropriateness at all, so that I can find myself saying, to a huge linebacker sort of guy: and then, unfortunately, you get pregnant…, and be as close to genuinely surprised as it’s possible to be.
Jason,
Please post them! Or are you inferring that logical limits exist even though you do not actually know them, because that would be rather useless.
All of that said, I’m laying claim to Betelgeuse, because it’s cool. In more than one sense of the word.
Boy, this thread moves fast. Responding to Jake:
3 hunters go into a barn, 2 come out. Crows stay out until the 3rd hunter comes out.
Yes, and similar results were used to suggest that infants could “count”. Here’s the thing, though — where’s the evidence that the crow is considering these hunters as three members of the same type, as opposed to separate, individual entities? We people see that they have something in common (i.e. they’re all ‘hunters’) and so we say “there are three hunters”, but how can we say that the crows aren’t just saying “OK, I saw individual X and individual Y and individual Z enter the cave, and only individual X and individual Y came out”? If a hunter, a bear, and a falcon went into the barn and only the bear and the falcon came out, do you think the results would be different? Would you still think that counting to three had anything to do with it?
“It is interesting to note, though, that there are no easy ways for someone in our country to completely opt out — renounce citizenship, set up a floating delicatessen in international waters, and stop paying taxes, for example.”
Thus — you knew the name was going to come up when discussing the “l” word — Heinlein’s notion of “Coventry.”
(In some of his stories, Coventry is a [large, about the size of a small country] place sealed off by a forcefield from the rest of the world, in a world in which everyone accepts certain mutual social obligations and rules of behavior, but which those who choose not to accept them, whether on their own initiative, or by being found guilty of a court of violating the rules/laws, is exiled to Coventry; inside Coventry, well, people have variously organized themselves, or not, in various ways, but that part really isn’t relevant. However, thus Heinlein rounded the square of providing for a just society [aided by futuristic knowledge of psychology and ethics], but that also allows for an opt-out if you don’t like it.)
“Slarti: the state of nature is: the state we were in before there were any social rules or institutions. (Chimpanzees are in the state of nature.)”
It’s my understanding that chimps distinctly have social rules.
Jonas Cord: “As long as you guard it, hide it, or make threatening noises – and this works – you do own it.”
According to you. But what pre-existing framework would you cite in the state of nature? Absent such a framework, what entitles you to make up the rules? From where do you derive said authority?
Jason,
Aha! I see this at the link you provided:
That is an interesting set of qualifiers for ‘property’. Of course, one can’t immediately help but note that this IS NOT the definition of property that our society acts upon.
As the comment notes, patents, trademarks, copyrights, trade secrets, and any manner of other goods that our society regularly treats as ‘property’ do not meet these criteria.
What IS interesting is that a star would definitely meet these criteria. It is rival, to the same extent any piece of real estate is rival. It is excludable, to the same extent any piece of real estate is excludable. The size of the fence never enters into it. And it is alienable, to the same extent any piece of real estate is alienable. Just pass the deed, buddy. 🙂
There were a few fascinating threads on MetaFilter about that question (among others). There’s plenty of evidence, both anecdotal and experimental, to suggest that crows recognize individuals as individuals rather than as Number n of a group.
ken, I used hunters because they ARE a type – specifically a type that is inimical to crows. If two dogs and a hunter go in, the hunter comes out but not the dogs, the crow goes in. Crows care. They are smart and they know trouble when they smell the gunpowder (not that crows can smell).
Anyway, the main point was the juxtapositioin of the ideas of being and math. It may be that all creatures use math at one level or another, even if it is just set theory. 🙂
Jake
Whew, I think I’m going to bow out of this discussion; I just can’t keep up. But a few points before I do:
Slarti —
Yes, the URL I gave offered a different definition of property. What I’ve been giving here is why property exists; that URL offered what I think is a good limit to the extent of property rights. The question “well, gosh, don’t I own the stars and the atmosphere and stuff?” was, to me, a question about the limits, not the derivation, of property rights, so I posted a good recent discussion of those limits.
In other words, you ask about justification, I offer a justification. You ask about limits, I offer limits.
As to intellectual property, the URL includes an argument against it. I’m not interested in opening THAT can of worms right now. (I think that these three norms, rival, excludable, alienable, can be made to apply to intellectual property, albeit through an artificial means. Perhaps then intellectual property is a social construct, but not real or personal property.)
As to saying that a star is “excludable,” no, it’s not. Or, not yet, anyway. So it cannot yet become property, at least not to humans.
Nor is a star even “rival,” since no one’s use of a given star can (yet) prevent anyone else from using it.
Gary Farber,
I’m just saying if Hilzoy possesses the antelope and is able to defend that possession, she defacto owns it, regardless of any rules, morality or philosophies you and I might devise. It’s hers and she’ll eat it, case closed, no framework has anything to say about it. I’m not claiming any authority – Hilzoy apparently has and has successfully brought it to bear.
I was outside smoking and I realized a precise way of summing up the point of contention between myself and Hilzoy on this matter. I believe that possession is private property; Hilzoy believes having others respect your possession is private property. So maybe this is merely a semantic argument, I don’t know.
I’ve got to concur with Jonas. If hilzoy brings down the antelope, it is her property until such time as someone takes it away from her. The fact she doesn’t have a concept for property doesn’t change the fact it is hers. Government and society provide norms and rules for how property is treated and protected, but they do not create property itself.
If two dogs and a hunter go in, the hunter comes out but not the dogs, the crow goes in.
Not to belabor this, but even given that the crow can separate predators from non-predators (which I don’t doubt at all), that doesn’t mean that it’s grouping individual predators into a set and counting them, rather than distinguishing them individually.
My point is that math is about abstractions, and so it’s not so simple (if indeed it’s possible at all) to deduce the presence of truly mathematical knowledge based only on observed behavior.
Jonas, you don’t seem to be getting it. There can’t be “theft” outside of a set of social rules that creates “theft.”
That’s Hilzoy’s entire point, of course.
You seem to be starting from the axiom that property rights are inherent and axiomatic, and Hilzoy’s point is that, no, they’re not, what generates the axiom? (Which makes it no longer an axiom, of course.)
Now, there are various theories, very popular with, perhaps essential to, libertarians on this, and if you’d like, you can make your case. But you can’t simply assume it, and beg the question.
Minor note: I’ve made the same argument about property rights, and “rights” in general, since childhood, as Hilzoy is making here, save that, of course, I’ve always made it far less elegantly and clearly, and far more stumblingly and semi-articulately. But the point has always been inherently clear to me.
Sebastian: “But the problem you assert about social constructs exists for an any claim of ‘rights’ not just for claims of ‘property rights’. In a state of nature there isn’t any ‘right’ to not get killed by someone stronger than you. By your argument, ‘murder’ cannot exist in such a state, only ‘killing’.”
Yes, of course. You can’t have a given constructed concept until you’ve constructed it. That is axiomatic, by the rules of logic.
“I agree that we have refined a number of laws to describe what murder is, but I’m not sure I agree that if Mona killed you to get the antelope that I would agree that wasn’t murder.”
Sure, because you’re operating within our construct of ethics and morality. But if an asteroid strikes another, is it “murder”? Of course not.
Or, if you prefer, a cell absorbs a mitochondrion, has it committed murder?
You can’t have “murder” until some entity constructs the concept. “Murder” is not a concrete, non-constructed, object. Without humans, and their rules, it doesn’t exist.
That’s an interesting way of putting it, and when stated that way I think there’s no way to argue that humans aren’t born with the inherent right (ability?) to possess things.
But doesn’t this, when all is said and done, turn ‘private property’ into discrete instance of ‘might makes right?’ The societal construct of ‘private property’ means not just that you can hold onto your antelope, but that you can walk away from it, do some work, and come back — and expect your antelope to still be there. If it isn’t, you can expect whoever took it to be punished in one form or another, even if they are bigger than you and stronger than you.
I think libertarians would not be happy if the government taxed income at 100%, and said ‘If you’re strong enough to fight us off, you can keep it.’ By your description, they could still claim to ‘respect property rights.’
Which brings to mind the fact that Christian narrative of the fall of mankind and the emergence of sin involves Adam and Eve eating from the tree of knowledge of good and evil, and then realizing that they were unclean. The implication, in my mind at least, is that ‘the fall’ opened a pandora’s box of classification and construct that had previously been unknown.
Jeff,
I think what you’re looking at is the difference between property and property rights. In hilzoy’s example, she has property, but because there is no government or society, her property rights extend only so far as she can defend her property. Government is required for property rights (like most, if not all rights) to be protected.
Jason:
Ok, let’s let that go.
Of course, if some moistened bint lobs a scimitar at you, is it yours?*
Gary, I’m thinking that in the sense that one cannot be charged with theft without laws against it, sure. But in the sense that one would feel deprived of what one considers one’s own, absolutely not. We could reformulate that to “rape” or even murder (or killing, if the difference between legal and moral violation is a problem) if that’s not clear.
*Not a serious question.
Do you have a research cite to establish this claim? Or is it just something “everyone knows”?
Jeff~
Your parenthetical formulation is more correct. There is an inherent ability to possess things. No right comes into being until someone constructs the concept of “Right”. When a lion eats a zebra, it is merely a question of survival, not a question of rights.
Andrew, you’re correct. I got a bit tangled up in that. One can ‘have property’ even if one has no ‘property rights,’ and one can have ‘property rights’ even if one has no property.
“Property arises when someone works at a thing. Because he has sacrificed time upon it, it becomes his own — at least until he sells, trades, or gives it away.”
Why?
“It’s entirely natural that we would want this to be the case for all of the things we spend time on.”
Sure. And it’s not unnatural that I’d like to take home most of the pastries I see in the bakery window. Does that make them mine?
I don’t think “‘I want’ generates a property right” will get you far, and I think even you agree.
But I’d like to see you generate a justification for “Property arises when someone works at a thing” beyond, ultimately, “because!” And absent religion.
Gary,
We agree 100%. We apparently also misunderstand each other!
I’m not claiming property rights are inherent, rather that possession of property is, to the extent that at any time any human being can lay claim to anything as his/her property. Property rights emerge when you and I agree not exercise our ability to claim anything when the other has done so already.
Andrew,
Yes! That’s it! If only it hadn’t taken me so long to figure it out.
No. If Mona & Hilzoy work out an arrangement property rights can be enjoyed by both. If they respect the arrangement, of course.
I would submit that property rights began with possession. If I have an antelope, it is mine. In the state of nature, if someone bigger than me decides to take that antelope away from me, I have no recourse but to fight or give up. Doubtless I would consider it highly unfair that I had to give up my antelope (and I think we’re all asking: Where’s my antelope?) simply because I’m not stronger than the person who decided to take it from me, and that is the kind of thing it is probably pretty easy to convince others of as well. Since one purpose of government is to protect rights, property rights likely grew out of that.
Working at a thing seems a similar issue. Someone…let’s call him G. Farber…no, that’s too obvious…let’s call him Gary F….Gary F. creates an apple pie. I think it’s fair to say that somebody owns that pie, since it is a man-made object with specific utility. Logically, initially the pie will belong to Gary F., since he made it and possesses it. I don’t see that as ‘just because.’ It logically follows from prior actions.
Now, when it comes to land, things get a little more complicated, but I would be willing to bet that property rights as applied to land grew out of property rights as they applied to objects.
I suppose their property rights are now protected from one another, but I’d submit that doesn’t help them much in the absence of some larger body, as Slartibartfast comes along and, not being a signatory to their agreement, grabs the antelope out from under them both.
Doubtless I would consider it highly unfair
Doubtless you’d be bummed about it, but why consider it “unfair”? Absent some sort of norm, why would you believe that someone else *shouldn’t* take it from you?
kenB, that requires a universal construct of ‘fairness,’ which is how the whole antelope killing business got started in the first place. Some would say that ‘fairness’ is ‘everyone has an antelope’ while others would say that fairness is ‘only people who can catch antelope get to enjoy antelope,’ and so on.
At the base ‘state of nature’ level we’re talking about, I do think concepts of ‘fairness’ are perhaps premature. They imply a projected ideal that is to be worked towards.
Well, that gets us into the whole ‘fairness’ question, which is a different kettle of fish. Still, I don’t think it’s unreasonable that, if I expended the effort to bring down the antelope, I would consider it unfair that I wasn’t able to enjoy the fruits of my labor. Assuming someone doesn’t steal every antelope I bring down (a reasonable assumption if I’ve survived any length of time), that seems to be an established norm for me.
Andrew,
You would be right. My objection to your statement about government is that this formulation still holds with a government in place. One government decides to invade another, and it’s no different that Slarti violating Mona & Hilzoy’s compact.
Your post that begins with “I would submit that property rights began with possession…” seems 100% spot on to me.
Steven, “No right comes into being until someone constructs the concept of “Right”. When a lion eats a zebra, it is merely a question of survival, not a question of rights.”
You are right that when a lion eats a zebra it isn’t a question of rights, but that is what of the things that is supposed to separate us from the animals. What you have defined isn’t the common political concept of basic ‘right’. “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights…”
Gary, you write:
I’m not ready to initially conceed that in humans “murder” is a constructed concept. Of course it isn’t murder if an asteroid hits randomly and kills someone. That says precisely nothing about whether or not it is murder if a person kills another person.
Property exists. Property Rights are a social construct.
If I go back 1 million years the hominid Hilzoy may not have words for property or theft, but somewhere in her mind she “knows” she “owns” the antelope.
When Mona steals it, Hilzoy “feels” a loss. She has lost her Property. Is was real and now it is Mona’s Property.
Whatever that feeling of property/ownership is was put into Hilzoy’s brain by 1 billion years of evolution and the myriad complexities that arose hence in social mammals.
As rational beings we are just trying to define a system that explains this natural phenomena.
This almost never works perfectly. Math is only a model for reality. Similarly philosophical systems are only models for naturally evolved behaviors. Even in cases where we want rules to mitigate natural behaviors, we do so because of some other overriding principle that we feel because we evolved to feel that way.
Not that we shouldn’t try hard to create an internally consistent system, but at some point we enter into areas where one is hard pressed to prove a view in the traditional sense.
And another thing – what is this “natural state” stuff? What about human beings says that we are NOT in some natural state?
‘Cause I kind of think we are. It’s just that our natural is more complex than other critters’ natural states.
I’m not even sure how anyone could act NOT naturally. Can one stop being human and be something else instead?
Jake
I’m not ready to initially conceed that in humans “murder” is a constructed concept.
Sebastian, how do you define “murder”? Doesn’t it basically just mean killing someone you *shouldn’t* have killed? Absent a social norm, how can you define “should” and “shouldn’t”?
so, when the Republican-chosen Supreme Court asserts its right to enter your home without knocking, do libertarians feel a little used ? or do they still hold onto the hope that someday the right Republican will make it better ?
s/its/the government’s/g
Maybe the idea of owning something arose as an intermediate step between not-captured and eaten – the not-yet-eaten stage we call property. So around the whole concept of not-yet-eaten has grown this expectation of mine-to-eat-in-a-bit that we call ownership.
Maybe the not-yet-eaten stage is also an intemediate step in internalizing the outside in the self.
So stars cannot properly be called property except in a very limited sense because they are not yet captured, and will never make the not-yet-eaten stage, much less the “eaten and therefore part of self” stage. Cars or land or children, unlike stars, are all part of someones not-yet-eaten idea of nearly self.
Jake
Sebastian~
” What you have defined isn’t the common political concept of basic ‘right’. “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights…”
But that doesn’t mean the Founders were right. Let’s remember that the Founders and the political philosophers of the time were arguing primary against the divine right of kings…that rights flowed from God to the kings and then to the people by the grace of the sovereign. Their argument was that certain rights (the inalienable ones) flowed directly from God to the people and could not be denied by the sovereign. And then THEY decided which rights were inalienable, so I think we are back to Hilzoy’s original question: are these rights a social construct?
Also, I think that in the “natural state” possession would be the biggest determinant of a sense of ownership. This could be because you made or found an object or regularly tend to a piece of ground. This probably what Jason was alluding to earlier.
Thus owning the stars would be thus impossible as one could not make or acquire a star.
Owning all the water that flows through a property would also be impossible. Assuming one could defend a few acres of land (or as a group a larger area) – it would be impossible to store all the water that flowed through that land in those few acres.
As for dumping toxins/waste into the water — that would not have been a concern for people in the “natural state” either because the volume of waste would not be an issue to those downstream or because they did not understand the relationship between waste and dangerous microbes.
At any rate there probably was (even before there were words to describe it) an intuitive feeling that one could not own all the water that flowed downstream, but that you could do whatever you wanted with the water in your temporary possession. And when the downstream folks got pissed off enough about what the upstream folks were doing with the water I’m quite sure that stones and clubs came down upon heads until some mutually beneficial agreement was reached.
This goes back to the comment that property rights were created to codify and civilize those concepts which we simply instinctively understood as social animals.
I apologize for the atrocious grammar above.
That is what I get for rapidly typing comments while on a conference call. And why I almost never comment.
“Absent a social norm, how can you define “should” and “shouldn’t”?”
The answer to this question depends on whether or not you believe there are some universal moral precepts. I believe there are.
“But that doesn’t mean the Founders were right.”
Of course not. But what I’m trying to point out is that the idea of right as a social construct is not what most people mean when they talk about rights.
In the context of this thread I’m trying to point out that this formulation undermines to some extent not just the state of property rights, but the state of all human rights. I would be interested to see how we end up grounding human rights in a purely social construct setting.
Sebastian,
If there are, then how come everyone disagrees about what they are? The “should” VS “shouldn’t” debate rages on in families, societies, countries, nation states, religions, across all bounds.
No one recognizes a universal should.
No one recognizes a universal shouldn’t.
Just because ones ideal posits something universal, doesn’t mean it truly is.
“In this sense, property facilitates the one thing that sets us apart from the animals, which is our ability to create and execute complex plans.”
Depends on what you mean by “complex.”
There’s been a lot of fascinating research in animal behavior and social patterns in recent years.
“All of that said, I’m laying claim to Betelgeuse, because it’s cool. In more than one sense of the word.”
Be careful about saying the name of your property three times fast.
Jonas: “I’m just saying if Hilzoy possesses the antelope and is able to defend that possession, she defacto owns it, regardless of any rules, morality or philosophies you and I might devise.”
But you can’t own something with no concept of ownership in existence. You’re applying knowledge from outside the example, and that’s a foul. [blows whistle]
Andrew: “If hilzoy brings down the antelope, it is her property until such time as someone takes it away from her.”
Again, one can’t have something that doesn’t exist. Without the concept of property, property doesn’t exist, and thus nothing can be someone’s property — not until the concept of “property” is brought into existence first. The antelope is just an antelope; it’s just an object.
This is the point. This is also the flaw at the heart of the notion that there’s something absolute and axiomatic about individual property rights. (I’m all for said rights, mind, but it’s something that we humans have constructed as a concept, not something sacred or immalleable.
“The fact she doesn’t have a concept for property doesn’t change the fact it is hers.”
It can’t be “hers” with no concept of property or ownership.
“Government and society provide norms and rules for how property is treated and protected, but they do not create property itself.”
Yeah, they do. Again, that’s the point. (Though government isn’t necessary; just a society.)
Slart: “Gary, I’m thinking that in the sense that one cannot be charged with theft without laws against it, sure. But in the sense that one would feel deprived of what one considers one’s own, absolutely not.”
Feeling deprived doesn’t create the concept of ownership or property. One can feel deprived of endless number of things that one doesn’t own or without the concept of ownership. “Use” doesn’t require ownership,to point out the obvious. Neither do feelings generate rights, to point out another obvious.
And laws are irrelevant; we’re talking about basic concepts, which come endlessly before constructing laws, or a given society.
“We could reformulate that to “rape” or even murder (or killing, if the difference between legal and moral violation is a problem) if that’s not clear.”
Sure. They don’t exist before they’re conceptualized, either. It’s entirely simple: nothing abstract exists before it is conceptualized. It’s. Just. That. Simple.
“Property” is a relationship, not an object. But before it’s a relationship that we conceive of as “property,” we have to invent the concept of “property”.
I don’t find this distinction between “property” and “property rights” wholly convincing. What hilzoy has is physical control of the antelope carcass. She keeps that control only until someone takes it away by strength or cunning, or until she gives it up.
But having physical control of something does not make it your property. If I borrow a car I have physical control of it, and I will similarly retain that control until I surrender it, voluntarily or otherwise. But no one would say it was my property.
Indeed, isn’t “property” simply a set of rights and powers, rather than some mysterious relationship between an object and a person? Maybe the fact that both rights – constructs – and powers – physical possibilities – are involved leads to some of the confusion.
Hilzoy can eat the antelope, or skin it, as a matter of physical ability – a power. She cannot expect others to leave it alone while she is gone – a right.
So I do have some of what would make the car my property, as does the lender.
Murky.
Sebastian~
“In the context of this thread I’m trying to point out that this formulation undermines to some extent not just the state of property rights, but the state of all human rights. I would be interested to see how we end up grounding human rights in a purely social construct setting. ”
I agree that the formulation undermines the state of human rights, if you believe that human rights arises from a source other than social construct. But if not social construct, then what? They reside in the DNA? They are bestowed by God? But if by God, then which God? And to take the point to its logical conclusion, although God may ultimately exist, our past and present conception of God is certainly a human construct. So to your point, I find it hard to conceive that rights are not grounded purely in a social construct.
Jonas: “I’m not claiming property rights are inherent, rather that possession of property is, to the extent that at any time any human being can lay claim to anything as his/her property.”
Possession of an object exists without, and prior to, the concept of “property,” though. “Ownership/property” is entirely distinct from possession.
A honeybee for a time possesses a bit of pollen; does it “own” it, or merely carry it?
A cat lays a dead mouse at your feet; it’s a gift, but is it a gift of something it owns?
Glad we otherwise agree.
Andrew: “I would submit that property rights began with possession.”
Sure. But any number of possible concepts of “property rights” might flow after possession, or none at all might. There might be clan rights, or family rights, or rights-for-a-day, or rightsby the member of the tribe who proves best able to use the object, or pure might-makes-right rights by the strongest in the tribe.
“I think it’s fair to say that somebody owns that pie, since it is a man-made object with specific utility.”
You can think it, but why should anyone else accept your arbitrary construct? (Other than voluntarily, or if you coerce them, that is.)
“Logically, initially the pie will belong to Gary F., since he made it and possesses it. ”
Logically, how? Why? Why doesn’t it belong, say, to the leader of the tribe? Or to my mother? Or to theone we believe our gods tell us it belongs to? Or any other arbitrary set of rules we construct?
Jeff Eaton: “At the base ‘state of nature’ level we’re talking about, I do think concepts of ‘fairness’ are perhaps premature. They imply a projected ideal that is to be worked towards.”
Exactly.
“Still, I don’t think it’s unreasonable that, if I expended the effort to bring down the antelope, I would consider it unfair that I wasn’t able to enjoy the fruits of my labor.”
Yes, but what you think is irrelevant. What or why does it matter more than what the next member of the tribe thinks?
Your argument so far is that things should be the way you think things should be. That’s a tautology.
Geez, y’all were busy while I slept. Apologies if I missed something in reading down the thread.
this formulation undermines to some extent not just the state of property rights, but the state of all human rights.
But at some point, pragmaticism has to kick in. A major reason we protect the weaker members of society because diversity represents a strength. I don’t want to fashion a strawman out of anyone’s point here, but a society that operates on some sort of meritocracy acknowledges that merit can arise within any member of the society is going to be stronger than one that feels some sort of blood relationship dictates merit. The balance is tricky, but I have no problem with the notion that we assign rights to protect the weaker members of society because we don’t have a clear notion of how merit arises. Property rights are extensions of human rights because a certain level of ownership is necessary to survive and thrive. That these levels of protection differ from society to society does not mean that some underlying universal doesn’t exist. What it does mean is that it’s social instantiation will vary from place to place and from one period of time to another.
its not it’s. What I get for trying to comment before a first period class.
Sebastian: “I’m not ready to initially conceed that in humans ‘murder’ is a constructed concept.”
Okay. Go ahead and derive it from…?
Alan: “Property exists”
No. Objects and matter exist. “Property” doesn’t exist until human beings (or other creates) conceptualize the possibility of such a relationship.
“If I go back 1 million years the hominid Hilzoy may not have words for property or theft, but somewhere in her mind she ‘knows’ she ‘owns’ the antelope.”
I think you’re confusing desire with the complex concept of “ownership.”
But if you feel this is a fact, I’d invite you to give a cite on the notion.
“The answer to this question depends on whether or not you believe there are some universal moral precepts. I believe there are.”
What do you mean by “universal”? If you mean “that I think we would all be best off if we all maintained everyone should agree to live by,” than I’m in agreement, though we might argue about specifics.
If you mean “granted by God,” than I can’t agree.
If you have a third source of derivation, other than mutual agreement, or God, by all means, bring it forward and don’t hide it, please.
“I would be interested to see how we end up grounding human rights in a purely social construct setting.”
By mutual agreement. And, I suppose, otherwise by the use of force when necessary on those who don’t agree.
I’m sure there are more elegant answers, but my grasp of formal philosophy is next to nil.
Whew, I’m caught up for five seconds!
“I agree that the formulation undermines the state of human rights, if you believe that human rights arises from a source other than social construct. But if not social construct, then what? ”
No, it undermines the state of human rights especially if you believe they arise from social construct. If we are reevaluating “property rights” as a social construct we are also revaluating non-property rights.
Universal morality transcending culture is at least a theoretical basis other than social construct. Manyoso suggests there is no such thing, but I don’t agree. I also don’t agree that a lack of agreement about the particulars of universal morality proves that it doesn’t exist.
But if ‘murder’ is just a social construct and not based in any underlying fact, there is no point in talking about rights to life. There really isn’t any point in talking about rights at all–at least not in the traditional sense of having rights whether or not governments choose to respect them. You can’t fight for your rights, they don’t exist.
“If you mean “that I think we would all be best off if we all maintained everyone should agree to live by,” than I’m in agreement, though we might argue about specifics.”
How could you possibly agree with that statement? You have no independently grounded basis for “best off”.
“Universal morality transcending culture is at least a theoretical basis”
No one has been able to write one down after 2.5 kyears of effort. No one’s even made any progress, as far as I can tell, except to show appeals to divinity don’t help.
Rilkefan~
I don’t agree. If one accepts that the Ten Commandments are straight from God, for example, then Sebastian is quite correct that there are universal laws that transcend culture. I don’t believe that, but it is theoretically possible.
Sebastian,
If everyone can not get together and agree on what shape this “universal morality” will take then what sense is there to calling it “universal”?
And as for demoting disagreement about MURDER to mere particulars… what else are you left with?
non sequitur
Money is also a construct of the human mind. Would you now despair of any meaning to your bank account? Does it not exist? Does it no longer matter? Will you not fight if the bank manager tells you your account is kaput?
If you say that fighting for your rights is a nonsequitur, you are very far removed from typical political discourse. That of course isn’t saying that you are wrong. You could be right. I just doubt it.
What? what? What?
An animal needs nothing more than simple experiment to ascertain what is “best off”. The pack animal, through evolution, has determined, through direct life and death experience, that living in packs accompanied by the associated rules and moors, has undisputed survival benefits.
Sebastian,
I’m afraid you misunderstand. I’m not saying that fighting for human rights is a non sequitur.
What I AM saying:
Concluding human rights do not exist, or that they are unworthy of struggle, merely because they are a social construct, DOES NOT FOLLOW.
“No one has been able to write one down after 2.5 kyears of effort. No one’s even made any progress, as far as I can tell, except to show appeals to divinity don’t help.”
Actually there is an astonishing agreement on all sorts of moral principles across cultures. This could be “discovering basic universal principles” or it could be “emergent order” or it could be “nothing”. But the idea that there is no cross-cultural agreement on moral priniciples is not correct. Not to drag math into it again, but the Mandelbrot Set has a definite volume but the measurement of the length of its border is entirely dependent on how long your yardstick is. The border is difficult to precisely figure out by looking at it, but it still exists. And there is still a large part that is clearly inside and an even larger part that is clearly outside. I don’t buy for a second that just because we have trouble precisely defining the border that cross-cultural morality does not exist.
“Concluding human rights do not exist, or that they are unworthy of struggle, merely because they are a social construct, DOES NOT FOLLOW.”
If they are construct of the society, it makes no logical sense to fight the society to secure them.
And I didn’t say they were unworthy of struggle. I said that if they are mere social constructs they have no more intrinsic worth than property rights or any other social construct.
“An animal needs nothing more than simple experiment to ascertain what is “best off”. The pack animal, through evolution, has determined, through direct life and death experience, that living in packs accompanied by the associated rules and moors, has undisputed survival benefits.”
Why do you define “undisputed survival benefits” as “best off”? Survival for whom? When? If you are talking about reproductive fitness, what if they can’t reproduce? If you are talking about group survival, what if they can’t contribute to anyone’s survival (see for example someone with moderate Down’s Syndrome). Your basic animal principles won’t help you much there.
The Mandelbrot Set is a precisely DEFINED mathematical fractal. The definition is universally agreed upon.
This “universal” set of human morals is no where defined. There is no universal agreement.
And the disagreement about human morals is not just cross-cultural. Within subsets of subsets of subsets in our culture moral absolutes are disputed.
I understand the equation by which the Mandelbrot Set is calculated. And you can look at the graph of it and clearly see lots of things inside and outside of the set. But the border is very difficult. And that would be especially true even if I gave you the graph and you didn’t know the equation. I’m not saying I have the equation for universal morality, I’m saying that we can look at a rough map.
Sebastian,
Money is a construct of the society yet every segment of society constantly fights to secure it.
Absolutely in agreement. Moral precepts can not be divorced from the mind of a social animal.
Because mammals strive to survive. It is innate. From birth, we innately struggle to survive. It is very nearly THE singular occupation.
The wolf has learned to live in a pack as a means of survival? Do you dispute this?
Sebastian,
Where is this Map?
Note, I have no problems finding map(s) of morality. Or compasses if you will 😉
The existence of moral creeds is not in dispute. I simply wish to know from which creed do you discern a universal creed.
Sebastian,
This is very true. If a morality presumes that most people want to survive and not be killed, and that’s 99% true, you’re close to universal. The 1% is interesting and will keep philosophers from sleeping, but 99% is a good start.
But this…
You do have rights whether governments choose to respect them. You can say whatever you want, whenever you want. The fact that some forces, social or formally governmental, would try to interfere with this is immaterial. You still have the right. To bring it back to the Founding Fathers – did Britain recognize their right to what they were doing? No. But they had it, didn’t they? Even if they had not won.
With fractals, I believe a better analogy would be the set of all fractals.
Serpinski, Mandelbrot, the border of France, … they have definite mathematical properties. They are self-similar. They are beautiful. Many exist in the natural world.
However, looking at all these different unique fractals, noticing similarities, and then concluding that there must exist some universal fractal…
Doesn’t follow 🙂
“If we are reevaluating ‘property rights’ as a social construct we are also revaluating non-property rights.”
I’m not “reevaluating” anything; I’m talking about what I’ve always believed.
“No, it undermines the state of human rights especially if you believe they arise from social construct.”
Nonsense: have I ever shown any sign of not valuing human rights?
Sebastian, this is precisely on par with the reasoning of the fundamentalist Christians who argue that evolution can’t be true, because it would undermine all morality.
We can choose to value rights on whatever basis we desire to, without need for citing God, or your non-reason, which you don’t cite (which I’m starting to assume is because you can’t, and don’t have a rational reason — if I’m wrong, show your reasoning, please; if not, try admitting that you’re literally being irrational).
“Universal morality transcending culture is at least a theoretical basis other than social construct.”
I don’t know what that means.
“Manyoso suggests there is no such thing, but I don’t agree.”
That’s nice. Some people believe in ghosts. Others in telepathy. Others in the validity of astrology.
Others believe in that which can be demonstrated by reasoning or by proof. You?
“I also don’t agree that a lack of agreement about the particulars of universal morality proves that it doesn’t exist.”
Exist? I don’t know what that means. It’s physical? It’s reasoning? What’s the reasoning, then?
You’re not making sense, Sebastian.
“There really isn’t any point in talking about rights at all–at least not in the traditional sense of having rights whether or not governments choose to respect them.”
Nonsense. We have rights because we grant ourselves rights.
“How could you possibly agree with that statement? You have no independently grounded basis for ‘best off’.”
Sure I do: it’s what I think. It reflects the world I desire to live in. That may not work for you, and that’s fine, but it works fine for me, and you can’t tell me otherwise. And my beliefs in rights aren’t in the least undermined by my beliefs and reasoning.
manyoso: “Concluding human rights do not exist, or that they are unworthy of struggle, merely because they are a social construct, DOES NOT FOLLOW.”
Exactly.
Sebastian: “Actually there is an astonishing agreement on all sorts of moral principles across cultures.”
Indeed; these are principles that human beings have generally found work best to produce maximum happiness and satisfaction.
“If they are construct of the society, it makes no logical sense to fight the society to secure them.”
That’s absolutely ludicrous.
We fight for our construed rights because they’re in the foundation for how we wish to live our lives, and because we believe they are the best principles for the lives of people in the future.
There’s still a big fat NOTHINGNESS in your explanation of what rights are, other than concepts. If you can’t explain that, and your reasoning, you aren’t making an argument, Sebastian; you’re just recoiling at ideas you’ve apparently not considered before.
“Indeed; these are principles that human beings have generally found work best to produce maximum happiness and satisfaction.”
You asked me to independently derive my definition of murder. You derive your definition of “maximum happiness and satisfaction” from where?
“Sebastian; you’re just recoiling at ideas you’ve apparently not considered before.”
Nice Gary, I would normally expect that line from Jesurgislac.
“There’s still a big fat NOTHINGNESS in your explanation of what rights are, other than concepts. If you can’t explain that, and your reasoning, you aren’t making an argument, Sebastian; you’re just recoiling at ideas you’ve apparently not considered before.”
I presume you have heard of axioms? Just because the axioms you prefer are not the axioms I use doesn’t mean you can pretend I’m not using logic. You are using unprovable axioms as well. You just aren’t being clear about them.
“You derive your definition of ‘maximum happiness and satisfaction’ from where?”
My observations of the world.
I said “apparently.” Perhaps you’ve written before about your consideration of these ideas; pointer?
One last time, before I give up: from what do you derive your own proof that rights are more than a human construct?
If you can’t answer this, I give up trying to discuss this further with you, because you’re insisting on something without presenting any reasoning behind it, as I’ve now pointed out many times. So: present your reasoning, please.
“You are using unprovable axioms as well.”
No, I’m not. I’m using personal preferences, and being clear about it. So, it appears, are you, but you’re apparently denying it, and insisting that your preferences aren’t just preferences, but something more, and are “universal,” to boot, and that they must be more than personal preferences, or one has to give up on them.
I’m satisfied, on the other hand, with my own preferences as to what I think is best for humankind, which I believe includes various human rights.
You, on the other hand, are insisting that there is some larger, provable, inherency, but you can’t present any proof of this concept.
I don’t have to, to hold my position. You do, to hold yours.
I hold that rights are a social construct. You insist they are not. To hold my position, I merely have to point to the fact that humans hold these beliefs. To hold your position, you have to prove that there is another, non-human, foundation.
Go ahead.
Sebastian,
Ahh, but THAT IS THE RUB!
Gary, (I’ll speak for him 😉 is not positing the existence of some universal ideal of “maximum happiness and satisfaction”. His idea of “maximum happiness and satisfaction” probably looks very different (or maybe not) from you would consider “maximum happiness and satisfaction”. And that is ok.
You, on the other hand, ARE positing the notion of some universal definition of murder. One that everyone can get behind. Sorry, but no such universal definition exists.
To state it another way, lay down any working definition of murder and you’ll inevitably find disagreement.
Let’s try it shall we? Here is my working definition of “murder”:
I do not have any qualifiers for self defense. I do not have any qualifiers for the death penalty. I do not have any qualifiers for war.
I can absolutely guarantee that many other members of the species disagree with my definition.
Now, you go!
“I’m satisfied, on the other hand, with my own preferences as to what I think is best for humankind, which I believe includes various human rights.”
And you are willing to attempt to impose those preferences on others, no?
“And you are willing to attempt to impose those preferences on others, no?”
Up to a point, in some circumstances. (Although in practice and reality, this simply means that I hold pretty much the normal default views of human rights that most people in our society generally agree upon, although we might quibble on the margins about how to best address given specifics.)
manyoso: “Murder is the act of one homo sapien directly killing another homo sapien.”
I’d have to add the modifier “unjustly” before “directly,” myself. Thus I prove you correct!
“Let’s try it shall we? Here is my working definition of “murder”:
Murder is the act of one homo sapien directly killing another homo sapien. Here homo sapien is defined as a living individual of the species after the second trimester of conception.
I do not have any qualifiers for self defense. I do not have any qualifiers for the death penalty. I do not have any qualifiers for war.”
Is that your actual working definition or merely the definition you would currently like to use for the sake of this argument?
I think you have entirely missed the idea behind the Mandelbrot analogy if you think that disagreement means that there is no right answer.
You definition of murder would clearly encompass nearly everyone else’s definition. That is to say that the set of killings that other cultures would define as ‘murder’ lies within the set you would define as ‘murder’. You did not try to define ‘murder’ as “laying in the sun tanning.” Why didn’t you? Wouldn’t that have made your argument even more forceful?
See, I myself would not add that qualifier. I do not believe that murder is just. Period.
Given circumstances:
It can be understandable. It can be impossible to resist. It can be tragic. It can even be wanted.
However, I would fundamentally disagree with a definition of murder that considered it ‘just’… whatever the circumstances.
Gary’s pretty well posting everything I’d want to say, but I would add this: I do think that there are ways of organizing a society that work more harmoniously than others and of behaving as individuals that are more conducive to survival, health, prosperity, and the like because of the physical organization of our bodies, including our brains. But these seldom resolve into anything really deeply specific; they’re more useful for broad-stroke overall assessments like “keeping slaves gets harder and harder once they learn of the feasibility of any alternative way of living” and “lying ends up taking more of a physical toll than honesty until/unless people manage to deliberately suppress conscience”. I’d say “meta-ethics” except I’m fairly sure that’s a term of art for something much more specific.
Steven Donegal: “If one accepts that the Ten Commandments are straight from God, for example, then Sebastian is quite correct that there are universal laws that transcend culture.”
Look up “Divine Command Theory” and the “Eurthyphro Dilemma” for why this is wrong. Or see here.
manyoso: “Concluding human rights do not exist, or that they are unworthy of struggle, merely because they are a social construct, DOES NOT FOLLOW.”
Of course it follows. But what does it matter? We have the constructs programmed into us, and we live by them, and we struggle because of them – they are sufficient to themselves.
s/Eurthyphro/Euthyphro above.
There really isn’t any point in talking about rights at all–at least not in the traditional sense of having rights whether or not governments choose to respect them. You can’t fight for your rights, they don’t exist.
Aside from echoing manyoso’s comment that something being (merely?) a human construct does not make it not worth fighting for, strolling onto a lawless portion of the African savannah and asserting your right to life in the face of a charging lioness will get you et up, son.
Sebastian,
Yes, that is the actual definition I came up with while sitting here contemplating my true feelings.
Then what IS the right answer? If not mine, then who possesses it? And if that can not be determined then what the hell point is there to posit some undefinable “right answer” that NO ONE can lay claim to?
And it is NOT true that ‘nearly everyone’s’ definition of murder would be encompassed by mine.
Mine does not include any qualifiers for just. Mine does not include any qualifiers for self-defense.
The nominal leader of our society would disagree vehemently with my definition. He believes that “murder” (according to my definition) can be just. He believes that some things are “murder” (not according to my definition).
As for why I didn’t say that my definition of “murder” is “laying in the sun tanning”:
1. Because that wouldn’t be true.
2. If you’re whole argument is that it is universally understood that “murder” involves killing in one manner or another… Ok. That means VERY VERY little. And it is absolutely NOT a moral precept.
1. Some people rely on god for a moral code. Athiests argue that those who do are simply substituting their own judgment by those of people who claim to have spoken to go.
2. “property” is almost meaningless. “thing” is a pretty good synonym.
3. lawyers generally refer to property rights as a bundle of sticks. the sticks represent divisible interests in the property. Fee Simple Absolute is supposed to mean that one owner has every single stick. Unfortunately, ever since people have conceived of property rights, people have been arguing about their scope.
frex, under English common law, does a landowner have the right to dig a trench so deep along his property line that his neighbor’s property collapses into it? Answer: No. Your neighbor “owns” the “right” to have lateral support.
Can you build a dam on your property? Can you divert the natural flow of water on your property even if it damages someone else? Can you discharge contaminants into the water? Unlimited amounts?
Moving to the code system, we have largely eliminated the requirement that your neighbor be the one to complain that your use of your property exceeds your rights. now, the state regulates your property, subject to the constitutional limitation that the regulation not constitute a “taking”. (If the regulation is a taking, the state may still regulate, but it must pay just compensation.)
are zoning laws a taking? changes in zoning laws? how ’bout the federal endangered species act? etc. etc.
Here’s the point. Ever since two people became neighboring farmers, there have been disputes. Disputes have been resolved through history mostly by fighting. Common law put one judge in charge. Code law put a bunch of elected people in charge.
The value judgment reflected in fighting was that might made right. Common law and code law have attempted to reflect other values, like balancing one person’s right to use his land with another person’s right not to be harmed by that use.
Having the strong concede that the rule of law is more important than their own particular outcome is the essence of modern civilization. We’re still working on it.
first para. should be spoken to god, not spoken to go.
“I do not believe that murder is just.”
Neither do I. By definition that I offered.
If you are talking about group survival, what if they can’t contribute to anyone’s survival (see for example someone with moderate Down’s Syndrome).
???????????????
Sorry . . . what I meant to say was “WTF?” In what way is someone with moderate Down’s Syndrome precluded from contributing to anyone’s survivial?
Gary, before I go off the deep end completely I should ask for clarification on a point [why start now you ask? :)].
When you say “socially constructed” do you believe that through some (possibly emergent evolutionary) process cultures get to answers about morality, or that pretty much any outcome of the social construct process is ok.
For example, for some people sadism produces quite a bit of happiness. I will avoid human vs. human analysis of happiness by positing a society which encourages torturing animals for sport. If this society made a sport of seeing how many times you could strike a dog and break all of its major bones without it dying is that ok? There might be rules about where you could hit the dog. There might be penalties for failing to break certain bones. A particularly good player might be able to keep the dog alive for hours. If lots of members of the society got pleasure from that would that be ok?
Perhaps I’ll toss my two cents in and propose, “Deriving pleasure from the non-consensual pain of another living thing is in some fundamental way broken.” But, that’s another one of the things that I have no equation to prove, no set of universal principles that I can use to wave my logic-stick at others and convince them I am right.
I believe that it is an absolute, however, something that cannot be broken without the individual being somehow broken themselves.
If lots of members of the society got pleasure from that would that be ok?
Apparently it would be OK according to them. It wouldn’t be OK to most of us.
Probably the question you’re really asking is, would Gary be willing to forbid these people from engaging in that sport if he had the power, and if so, with what justification?
“When you say “socially constructed” do you believe that through some (possibly emergent evolutionary) process cultures get to answers about morality,”
I guess you could say that.
“or that pretty much any outcome of the social construct process is ok.”
In terms of the world I want to live in? Absolutely not.
“If lots of members of the society got pleasure from that would that be ok?”
Not with me, no. And I don’t think it would be with anyone I respected, and I don’t think it would be with most people in our society (which I think is generally far more of a “good” society than not, though it’s obviously imperfect — but I like to optimistically think that over the long run, we’re moving in the direction of fewer imperfections, even if we sometimes take backward steps, too).
I’m sorry if I’ve seemed rude; that’s not my intent.
“Deriving pleasure from the non-consensual pain of another living thing is in some fundamental way broken.”
Don’t enjoy dinner.
Manyoso, “And it is NOT true that ‘nearly everyone’s’ definition of murder would be encompassed by mine.
Mine does not include any qualifiers for just. Mine does not include any qualifiers for self-defense.”
I’m sorry I may not have been clear enough. You have a set of things you call murder. I’ll call that ‘A’. There is a set of things other people call murder. It might be “Humans killing other humans except in self defense.” I’ll call that ‘B’. B is a subset of A. All things B are in the definition of A.
Phil, “Sorry . . . what I meant to say was “WTF?” In what way is someone with moderate Down’s Syndrome precluded from contributing to anyone’s survivial?”
This was very unclear and made worse because the definition of moderate used by my friend who has adopted such children is almost certainly way more severe than you are imagining when I said ‘moderate’. There exist children (at least one that I personally know) who could not help out anyone’s survival. I believe that they have certain human rights. These rights could not be grounded in the survival of the species or in the survival of a tribe.
Hypothetical conversation:
X: “Y, are you saying it’s wrong of people to say they shouldn’t have to worship you?”
Y: “X, in terms of the world I want to live in? Absolutely.”
I think we’re stuck saying “here’s how we’ve organized things, and here’s what we were thinking, and if you have ideas for improving the setup we’re all ears”. Talking about right and wrong is going to lead to incoherence.
“I believe that they have certain human rights. These rights could not be grounded in the survival of the species or in the survival of a tribe.”
Sure – tribes that treat their weakest members well might be happier and stronger. It’s part of the reason for believing society should provide a safety net to handle fluctuations in fortune.
“These rights could not be grounded in the survival of the species or in the survival of a tribe.”
Sebastian, I’m wondering if you’ve read Dawkins’ The Selfish Gene, or The Blind Watchmaker; if you had, you’d perhaps better understand how the survival of others is genetically and evolutionarily beneficial to the species (all species, that is).
What a fun conversation 🙂
Sebastian,
Why conjure a society when that society exists? What is cock fighting? What is dog fighting? What is fox hunting? Seems to me all of these exist and examples can be found all over the world?
Hell, when I was a kid, we lived on a farm. My brothers and I would shut all of the doors and entrances to our barn and trap helpless pigeons inside. Then we would take our daisy (see low powered) BB guns and shoot that pigeon tens of dozens of times. Finally, it would die. We considered that fun. Today, I consider it absolutely disgusting.
These kinds of sadism are judged “OK” by a large part of the world’s population. They are condemned by another large part. Again, morals are a social construct and differ from society to society, individual to individual.
Jeff,
Most every elementary school kid that has been bullied or been a bully can tell you that “deriving pleasure from the non-consensual pain of another” is an absolutely BASIC human experience.
Sebastian,
It is not a subset, because A expressely excludes groups for which B does not. For instance, abortions before the third trimester. You can say that the two sets intersect, but one is not a subset of the other.
Sebastian,
To put it another way, if you took every definition of “murder” from every individual on the planet, and chopped them up into sets such as you did with my definition and some other possible definition… you would be left with a huge pile of sets; some would be subsets of others, some would intersect, some would not…
But the universal intersection of all those sets would be miniscule and would hardly be anything that could properly be used as a working definition of “murder”. It would likely be along the lines of: “murder involves killing in one way or another.”
Imagine the intersection. Imagine how small.
Back from doing other things: alan: “When Mona steals it, Hilzoy “feels” a loss. She has lost her Property. Is was real and now it is Mona’s Property.
Whatever that feeling of property/ownership is was put into Hilzoy’s brain by 1 billion years of evolution and the myriad complexities that arose hence in social mammals.”
— Surely the fact that I feel the loss of something does not mean I own it. If it did, then I would have owned lots of my sister’s toys when we were growing up, a couple of my exes (the ones I didn’t break up with), not to mention my chair’s vintage Jag, which I covet. And I’m not even particularly greedy.
Seb: as I said earlier, I think: to say that something is a human construct does not imply that any answer is as good as any other. For some human constructs, something like this is true; for some not. (Math, again.)
Also, there’s a distinction that Hume, among others, used, between the ‘natural’ and ‘artificial’ virtues — the natural ones being ones that one can have outside society, the artificial ones being ones that require the existence of a society (with institutions and rules) in order to exist. (Artificial here doesn’t mean phony; it means ‘involving human artifice’. I think that when Charles I first saw St. Paul’s cathedral, he’s supposed to have said: “It is awful and artificial!”, and both words were complimentary. (Awe-inspiring and involving a great amount of human artifice and skill.)
Justice was the primary example of an artificial virtue, since it presupposed a variety of social institutions. And calling into question the idea that it, or property, or any other moral concept that requires social institutions, might exist outside society, does not call into question the idea that those moral concepts that do not depend on social institutions might exist outside society.
Francis’ point illustrates why I take property to be a social construct. To those who disagree: recall that the reason we’re arguing about this is that I want to say: no specific conception of property (= no specific bundle of rights) is the baseline from which we have to start. Suppose you disagree: can you adduce not just a feeling or something, but a conception of property specific enough to answer Francis’ various questions? Because if not, then I don’t see why we shouldn’t conclude that even if there is a natural conception of property, it’s sufficiently vague that it does not yield determinate conclusions; and thus that it doesn’t help when we try to argue for one or another specific conception of property.
Sorry to butt in like this, but so far I’ve been agreeing with Gary Farber all the way. He may well not agree with my further points, but we’ll see, I guess..
Probably the question you’re really asking is, would Gary be willing to forbid these people from engaging in that sport if he had the power, and if so, with what justification?
(a) Yes. (b) None whatsoever, so?
I can’t prove that, say, torturing dogs is wrong. That’s pretty close to being axiomatic.
However, given the absence of an objectively justifiable moral outlook, I may as well try and act in accordance with my own. If there’s no objective way of determining the “right” moral action, then I may as well act in a way that satisfies my own intuition.
If someone’s axioms (say, those of a mass murderer) disagree with mine, I can’t logically argue that they’re incorrect. I can accept their axioms, agree that each of us act independently, or force them to accept mine. None of these actions are “justified” in any but a subjective sense.
There exist children (at least one that I personally know) who could not help out anyone’s survival. I believe that they have certain human rights. These rights could not be grounded in the survival of the species or in the survival of a tribe.
To follow up on Gary’s point, I don’t believe that this is necessarily the case. While you can’t imagine how those children could help out, it is quite possible that in specific circumstances, they could. Even with profoundly handicapped children, what we learn about their condition can help us understand other instantiations of that condition and provide potentially wideranging benefits. This was a theme (one of about a billion or so) of Phillip Dick, with the notion being that some handicaps often disguise true gifts.
Take, for example, Temple Grandin, (This site is a bit more matter of fact, both are worth checking out), who, though, or perhaps because she is autistic, presents us with special insights that no “normal” person would be able to pick up.
You may argue that on the African plains, a child with autism might be a burden and it is only with progress that we can consider this. However, in working with small indigenous communities, it is often quite striking how a person who might not ‘fit’ in an industrialized, urban world, is able to be an essential cog in a smaller community where his or her gifts make a difference. The challenge is to identify those gifts and create a niche for that person that is meaningful and respected. One can reflect that many of our terms for those who lack intelligence originate not from long standing etymologies but trace to Henry Goddard (though ‘moron’ traces back to a character of Molière’s).
This discussion is starting to remind me of an essay I scribbled out a while back, in which I argued that the concept of ‘rights’ is a free-standing moral framework unto itself, one that is useful primarily as a mechanism for compromise when multiple conflicting moral frameworks bump up into each other.
To take the example of the much-fought-over antelope, things are very simple when hilzoy alone is hunting and gathering. When mona enters the picture, it gets more complicated. But if both of them agree that sharing is good, however, no conflict. If a second gaggle of antelope-eaters wandered by, however, with a different set of values (say, ‘Anyone who kills an antelope must sacrifice half of it to the sky-gods’), we’d have trouble. This forward-thinking group of four antelope hunters might reach a compromise: some think saring is good, others think sacrificing is good, but the person who got the antelope gets to decide what to do with it.
‘Rights’ as a meta-morality to prevent conflict. Thoughts?
It is interesting to note that there exists a country and a people for whom the cow is sacred. In fact it is one of the largest countries and most populous peoples on earth.
Here? Not so much. For us, it is pretty much axiomatic that the cow is nothing but a bag of milk and meat.
It is interesting to note that there exists a country and a people for whom the cow is sacred.
As a sidenote, I would point out that one reads lectures that Tagore, the Bengal poet and polymath who traveled extensively to the West, gave, what seems to be the main preoccupation of his Western listeners is why don’t Indians eat beef? There is never an idea that it might be possible to keep cows sacred and still provide enough food for people. If all you are thinking about is cows, every dish looks like hamburger, I guess.
Nice thread. I actually empathize with Seb. To that in a moment.
First, down on the Savannah. we have talked about hilzoy’s possession of the antelope, but if Mona comes along and is very very hungry, does she feel right, and feels she has a right to take the antelope? And on this primordial level, why should we think hilzoy’s possession more important than Mona’s hunger?
….
Now I agree with Gary Farber 99%. But the 1% is this. It is all about my preferences, I abhor dogfights and want them abolished. But if it is only about my preferences, I really have no logical argument against those who preferences include dogfights. It might be accurate philosophy, but it is ineffective rhetoric and politics. So I must try to ground my argument in some imaginary shared universal, I must fool my opponent into believing that my preference has more authority than his.
And so the Founders said that Rights flow from God to the people without mediation of the King. This was not a fact or natural law. This was a rhetorical strategy. And that is really all we have to ensure our preferences rule.
It makes no sense to me to say:”The Chinese have a right to a free press.” I want the Chinese to have that right, I will work to help them create or find or install it, and it helps in that effort to say that a free press is a right that transcends societies or that the Chinese belong to a larger society bigger than China or whatever. But it ain’t the truth.
And this is why I have some compassion toward the other side of the “culture wars” and a little antipathy toward the Enlightenment. If it is all about preferences and rhetorical strategies, the privileging of empiricism and reason over transcendental sources of authority is a direct attempt to devalue and make useless some very important and ancient tools and rhetorical strategies. Using reason to attack traditionalism and religion by simply saying “Reason is just better” don’t quite work for me. And we are still too early in this Brave New World to claim vindication.
“Was the French Revolution a good idea?” “Too soon to tell.”
For Sebastian: here’s a way to explain why I think that nothing I’m saying has implications for moral claims and/or rights generally:
Suppose we are playing baseball, and I am at bat, and you throw four balls. I am then entitled to go to first base. This entitlement only exists within the game of baseball: no baseball, no walks (also, no balls in the baseball sense, no first base, etc.)
Now: the fact that this entitlement depends on the existence of the game of baseball is, I think, (a) manifestly true, and (b) devoid of implications about, e.g., human rights. This entitlement depends on a particular game, but it doesn’t in any way follow that all entitlements are.
What I’m arguing about ownership, and the entitlements that come with it, is: it depends on the existence of an institution of property, which is, like baseball, a human construct. This, if true, would have no more implications about rights and/or moral claims generally than the analogous claim about my entitlement to go to first base if you walk me.
Does that make sense?
(I mean: I believe in objective moral truths — even universal ones! — so obviously I don’t think there’s any incompatibility.)
“I believe in objective moral truths — even universal ones!”
I don’t, but I am willing to listen. Persuade me.
I said:
“If I go back 1 million years the hominid Hilzoy may not have words for property or theft, but somewhere in her mind she ‘knows’ she ‘owns’ the antelope.”
Gary rightly rebutted:
“‘Property’ doesn’t exist until human beings (or other creates) conceptualize the possibility of such a relationship…”
I guess I am trying to say is that humans even in our earliest forms probably did conceptualize the possibility of that relationship long before it was articulated in language or philosophy.
Hilzoy said: “Surely the fact that I feel the loss of something does not mean I own it. If it did, then I would have owned lots of my sister’s toys when we were growing up, a couple of my exes (the ones I didn’t break up with), not to mention my chair’s vintage Jag, which I covet. And I’m not even particularly greedy.”
You are of course correct, but I wasn’t articulating myself well.
Lets try another example since the antelope example is about food which brings into play other perhaps more primitive emotions. Lets say you created a unique tool or jewelry that manifested your early human creativity. Then you carried that tool/jewelry with you for years and it became very special to you. Until one day when Mona took it. Sure you will feel a deep loss, but I think there would also be some emotional response that (in the absence of a word for it) would scream “that was mine!”.
Furthermore it is difficult to talk about the development of social constructs as separate from the development of our species. They had to evolve together since we are social animals. It wasn’t as if early humans didn’t feel as though they owned something until one magical day when an ancient philosopher or legislator announced it from on high.
Again, I think that philoshophy and laws are imperfect attempts to codify and civilize the interactions that we as a social animals have evolved. Its a very difficult proposition as evidenced by the fact that after 10,000 years of civilization we are still arguing about it.
hilzoy, I’m not buying it.
What I’m arguing about murder, and the punishments that come with it, is: it depends on the existence of an institution of legal justice, which is, like baseball, a human construct.
Bob McManus,
Come on! You are placing way too much importance on the value of argument from authority. Just because we can reason that moral truth is, part and parcel, a human endeavor does not mean that our moral conclusions are vacuous.
You are horrified that some societies/individuals are entertained by dogfights. So am I. Just because I fully understand that morals are a fundamentally social system does not mean I can’t logically and passionately argue against dogfights. It doesn’t suddenly render me incapable of agitating for the abolition of dogfights.
Moreover, why despair that you can’t channel Spock when it comes to arguing against such an emotional issue. I’m fully confident that if you dig deep and examine the reasons you dislike dogfights you’ll find a very human emotional/aesthetic repulsion to it. When you look within, do you really find an appeal to logic or the argument from authority very compelling?
Why do so many enter such a discussion emphasizing the imperative of Stage 1 of Kohlberg’s moral ladder? Moral reasoning based on authority is the crudest form.
This nonsense is nothing more than moral apathy. Why on earth would you say this? A free press is a fabulous societal virtue to defend. Read the founders. You don’t need to rhetorically invoke God to argue for a free press.
Sure you will feel a deep loss, but I think there would also be some emotional response that (in the absence of a word for it) would scream “that was mine!”.
It’s always difficult and fraught with danger to make assumptions about what other people feel (this cuts both ways), but I get the impression that there is much much less of an emotional response within ‘less-developed’ cultures (the scare quotes mean that I use this as a marker, but don’t believe it) Ian Frazier’s non-fiction _On the Rez_ (interview with him here) hints at this when he discusses some interactions he has with one of the main characters (Le War Lance). When Frazier is by himself visiting the Rez, he can alter his way of thinking to deal with this, but when Le turns up to visit him in New York, he can’t. I would try to explain it better, but I’ll just urge you to read it and the book. (also, if you get the chance to read any of Frazier’s humor books, do it. You’ll thank me when you are thru)
“When you look within, do you really find an appeal to logic or the argument from authority very compelling?”
I don’t need logic or authority to dislike dogfights, but my emotional distress and aesthetic revulsion will not be compelling to the person who does not share them. They are not powerful convincing arguments. Peta has not moved me from leather, and I am not yet Vegan.
“This nonsense is nothing more than moral apathy”
A free press is a good thing. The right written in the Constitution is a good thing. I like it. I, or my nation, has that right because it is written in the Constitution and because the citizens revere and protect it. China does not have that right, under any meaning of “have” that makes sense to me.
To say China has that right seems actually counterproductive, for if they already have it, they don’t need to write it down or otherwise make it explicit..
When I see PETA (or other animal rights groups) handing out pamphlets on the corner, I’ve noticed the pamphlets emphasize emotional appeals, not appeals to authority… Why do you think that is? How did you arrive at your personal revulsion to dogfights? Why does realization that moral codes are human constructs fail to blunt this revulsion?
Ah, I see the game now. Because under the inherent rights paradigm, Chinese citizens would have the right to a free press, except they would be forcefully bound from exercising it.
Heaven knows how long this discussion will be by the time I get my entry typed in.
Putting on my Evolutionary Biologist Hat, I say:
The “state of nature” for Homo sapiens is social. We are social animals, so our state of nature is one where we live, forage, and raise our young with other members of our species. The philosopher’s state of nature is not just a theoretical construct, but untrue: it is an attempt to describe human nature in a way that is not our nature.
When I use a word, it means just what I want it to mean, and so when I say “state of nature” I mean: small groups of hunter-gatherers, related by blood and marriage, moving around a lot and interacting with other small groups from time to time. That is the human state of nature.
I agree completely with Hilzoy that Nozick and Hayek are mistaken in postulating that their concept of property is in some way the most basic, logical, or fundamental. On the contrary, it is highly derived and specialized, dependent on a particular set of social & historical constructs.
Now you see why in the other thread I described libertarians as “people who don’t believe humans are social animals”.
In the human state of nature we can expect ideas about property not to be based on a simple principle (such as the “labor theory of value”) but on a system in which the concept “ours” is at least as important as “mine” — because we are social animals.
Hilzoy kills the antelope and Mona comes to take it. In the human state of nature, *everything* depends on the relationship between Hilzoy and Mona.
If they are part of the same family unit, the antelope may belong to both of them regardless of who killed it, and Hilzoy may be considered immoral or thievish if she doesn’t give Mona at least half.
If Mona is Hilzoy’s mother or grandmother, it may be Mona’s obligation to take the antelope from Hilzoy for redistribution, and Hilzoy might be a thief if she tries to hang onto it.
Or the antelope may be thought of as belonging to a goddess, and now that it is dead Hilzoy has the right to use certain parts of it, but others must be given away or burned.
None of Nozick & Hayek’s views of property are found in nature.
1. you can own pretty much anything
If you look at any basic ethnography overview (the one I grabbed first is Indians of North America by Harold Driver) you see that in most societies what can be owned by individuals is restricted: tools and ordinary clothes are the most common individual property. Houses, different kinds of land, different kinds of food, ceremonial or fancy clothes and chattels, the right to farm, hunt or gather in a particular place, even songs and other incorporeal property — all these things are usually owned by groups, anywhere from a couple to a whole tribe of tribes.
2. you can give or sell what you own at will
This is almost never the case. Even if the chattel is one you own directly, you may not have the right to sell it, exchange it, or allow others to use it. Frequently, a group will own land and have the exclusive right to use it, but not to give it away: it’s basically entailed, and *must* be inherited.
3. you are entitled to all the proceeds of any voluntary transaction you enter into.
This situation doesn’t correspond to much that happens in the human state of nature, but when it does the individual who makes the transaction almost never gets to keep all the proceeds.
Here’s an example of modern property that is held in a way typical of the human state of nature, but doesn’t correspond at all to Nozick & Hayek’s views:
“My” wedding dress was made by my grandmother’s sister for my grandmother’s wedding. A generation later, it was worn by my aunt, and then by my mother, at their weddings. Still later, I wore it at my wedding. It is currently in storage, waiting for my daughters to grow up.
Who does this dress belong to? I wore it most recently, so N&H might say it’s mine. But if you think I or anyone else in the family can give it away or sell it “at will”, you’re psychotically mistaken. The dress is the collective property of all the women in my family line, both living and dead. Everyone gets to use it, but no-one gets to sell it, and delicate negotiations would be required if someone else wanted to use it, e.g. a woman who married in to the family.
This dress is property, but it is about *relationships*, and property rights are really about what sorts of human relationships you think are most likely and important.
Constructing Rightful Property
It won\’t do to have just any old system of property. We want to have rightful property: property such that its theft would be morally wrong. My claim, in short, is that society constructs only the \”property\” component of \”rightful property\”…
Doctor Science, that rocked. Thank you.
I’m reminded of a crucial factor in my moving away from libertarianism – and note that I’m not claiming anything super broad or deep from it, just reflecting on my experience with the ideas and their advocates. The key word here is “certainty”. I found myself reflecting that I had, several times, been thoroughly convinced of my evidence, axioms, and reasoning…only to end up making major changes to my worldview. Now, revision once in a while is one thing. But I felt that if I had to do it multiple times, then something was wrong. And since I was and am pretty sure the world hadn’t been changing behind my back, the problem was likely in my head – I was being sloppy somewhere.
I am much more cautious about big conclusions now, and much more prone to checking what I think I know about the evidence. I simply don’t feel the confidence it takes to tell people “you should all want to live this particular way”. I likewise lack the confidence it takes to say “your present pain is worth bearing for the sake of some future gain”, which is crucial to any minarchist approach. I look at people suffering and see the possibilities for present relief, and simply don’t feel up to saying that it’ll pass by and by if we all stand by. Same with a bunch of other issues – I’ve seen that there’s a plutocratic class that hasn’t yet given up its dreams of restoring the Gilded Age, and I’m not prepared to tell myself or others that it’s okay now and we should just wait htem out.
Libertarianism is a set of ideas for the confident, and I feel too broken by encounters with the world to be that sort of person anymore.
I’m having a bit of problem tracking everyone’s exact stances, so apologies if I am misreading something, but just as many people have a revulsion to dogfights, there are people who are attracted to them. There are still iirc several states which have legal cock-fighting. The appeal of the WFC no-holds barred (though actually there are some things barred, one should note) suggests that whatever arouses strong emotions in us is not necessarily always going to be considered revolting.
And Bob’s hesitation at forcefully demanding say, a free press in China, might be (as it is for me) a hesitation borne of the current mess we are in now where it is asserted that we have to bring freedom and democracy to various chosen spots around the world.
Property is a social construct.
Chimpanzees understand property. If chimpanzees are in a state of nature, doesn’t that mean that property is a natural function?
Wow. Hilzoy, excellent post. I’m kind of blown away by the amount of controversy over what strike me as clear, simple, and unexceptionable points. Also, what Dr. Science said (not that I could have said it, but I like it an awful lot). But I started reading the thread just before leaving work and finished at home after a beer or so, and I gotta admit that large chunks of it go down more smoothly if you imagine that some participants are 19, on their fourth or fifth beers, and feeling profound. Because otherwise, oh my. The people around here are more thoughtful than the vast majority of the population, and we were supposed to be clear on this stuff by the time we finished our college bull sessions (and maybe even classes), and if we still have to go back to first principles and recoil at the idea that some of those necessary truths we grew up with might not be necessary and that there’s no Big Book of True, that’s kind of depressing.
we were supposed to be clear on this stuff by the time we finished our college bull sessions
I tend to think that we realize that there’s not actually going to be an answer to any of this, and we get on with our lives. ;^)
“Seb: as I said earlier, I think: to say that something is a human construct does not imply that any answer is as good as any other. For some human constructs, something like this is true; for some not. (Math, again.)”
I guess I don’t understand the distinction from my axioms because I think of math as the specific human interpretation (construct) of something true about the universe. The fact that the expression is a construct doesn’t change the fact that we discover math and in doing so discover something true. I feel the same thing about morality, we just are really crappy at it.
More generally I think that human beings are really prone to two types of errors (lots of other errors too, but especially these). First we are profoundly selfish. We let our selfishness skew our investigations into morality. Second we are stubborn. We tend to be come wedded to the ideas the initially capture us, even if further examination hints that we are wrong. These two things combine to obscure investigation into morality. Every now and then we can get past it, but usually we can’t. I feel the pull of those tendencies even in myself during this very discussion. (Though maybe it is just me.)
But lets try this from another angle.
And the reason I worry that it does invoke human rights is this (and I worry because most of the people on the thread seem to be reacting this way to my dog-sport hypothetical): are the societal rules about what happens when I murder somebody like the rules in the baseball game? More fundamentally is the wrongness defined by the culture like the baseball game. I think you (hilzoy) would say no, but it sounds to me like Gary and manyoso would say yes.
Now I think I understand your distinction hilzoy. It seems to be that property rules are like a baseball game while human rights and such aren’t. (I’m going to assume I’m right about what you think here, but only for this one post so if I’m wrong please correct me). The punishments for being a murderer and the trial you go through to be named a murderer are like the rules to a baseball game. That is our society’s construct. But it reflects a more basic moral wrong in murder.
This is where you are going to find that you are at great odds with libertarians. They may agree with you that the specific customs for dealing with property are societal constructs. But ‘property’ for a libertarian is a more basic thing–it demands moral consideration, just like murder or rape.
I tend to think that we realize that there’s not actually going to be an answer to any of this, and we get on with our lives. ;^)
The very definition of clarity, innit?
I’d just like to note that while you were all arguing over whom the antelope belonged to, I snuck in, dragged it off, and ate it with fava beans and a nice chianti.
And the reason I worry that it does invoke human rights is this (and I worry because most of the people on the thread seem to be reacting this way to my dog-sport hypothetical): are the societal rules about what happens when I murder somebody like the rules in the baseball game? More fundamentally is the wrongness defined by the culture like the baseball game.
Most emphatically yes, the wrongness is defined by the culture. Otherwise you’re just dead. If I get struck and killed by lightning, I’m dead, but the atmosphere has done no wrong. If I get struck and killed by a drunk driver, the result for me is the same, but the culture has something to say to the drunk.
Now, the available evidence strongly suggests that human societies work better with very strong rules against killing people on purpose absent good reason to do so (what counts as good reason is, of course, disputed, and some would say there’s no such thing as a good reason). Nobody’s saying otherwise. Nor is anyone saying that the rule against murder isn’t a whole lot more important than the infield fly rule. But ultimately, they come from the same place. And there’s nothing scary about that.
It’s worth noting that talking about social rules as constructed things doesn’t rule out believing in a more innate moral foundation. I do myself – I think that there are moral rules older than humanity built into the fabric of things. But experience shows me that it’s not practical to convince everyone to share my faith, and part of my faith is that forcing people to fake belief in it is undesirable. So I look at justifications that can work on a wider range of foundations.
I just flashed on a movie I saw in 7th grade English class. I don’t remember the name, but it was a short film that starts off with a number of people dressed as would be typical for a suburban location is a field that doesn’t seem too much out in the wild and they are having some drawing for what seems to be some sort of prize. A woman’s name is called and while all the participants look at her, she gets this look of horror on her face and starts to try and run, but stumbles, and all of the people start picking up rocks and stoning her and the film ends with (iirc) her screaming ‘it isn’t fair, it isn’t right!’ another thing in the film that I remember quite clearly is, as the woman is trying to stumble away, they cut to a grandfatherly like figure giving a little girl a rock.
Of related interest, there’s this article
LJ, that would be the short film adaptation of Shirley Jackson’s classic, “The Lottery.”
I just flashed on a movie I saw in 7th grade English class. I don’t remember the name
It sounds like a film of The Lottery by Shirley Jackson. Probably the 1969 version, which I have never seen.
not to mention my chair’s vintage Jag, which I covet
If it’s a V-12 Jag E-type, that’s mine.
You, perhaps. Me, I was busy a) squeaking past the weedout courses, of which there were at least two per semester, b) swimming in most of my “spare” time, and c) having a beer.
It seems that by hanging out here, I’ve gained a whole new appreciation for how truly stunted my education is. I’m considering that I may want to compose a reading list, and go through it in order. Literature, philosophy, history. I know I cannot undo four and a half decades of neglect all at once, but certainly doing something is better than doing nothing.
Or there could be something to that “ignorance is bliss” notion.
I haven’t contributed much to this discussion, but have enjoyed it greatly.
Sebastian,
“Now I think I understand your distinction hilzoy. It seems to be that property rules are like a baseball game while human rights and such aren’t. (I’m going to assume I’m right about what you think here, but only for this one post so if I’m wrong please correct me). The punishments for being a murderer and the trial you go through to be named a murderer are like the rules to a baseball game. That is our society’s construct. But it reflects a more basic moral wrong in murder.”
I disagree. Think of the issue of slavery. I suspect the vast majority of those present would view holding people as slaves to be a violation of their human rights. But a century and a half ago in this country it was not. And nearly every society in the world’s history held slaves. Slaves who could be killed without provocation, raped and have the fruits of their labor taken from them without recourse, because that was permitted under the rules of the society which they lived in.
Jes and Phil, thanks, that’s it. Still a very sobering story.
I realize I left off the conclusion of my earlier entry.
So if a society can have rules which provide that neither unprovoked killing nor involuntary sexual assault are crimes and that certain people are not entitled to the fruits of their labor (because they are slaves), then there is nothing about these concepts which makes them universal human morality which transcends all cultures. To the contrary, it shows that cultures, even those which we may esteem highly such as the ancient Greeks and Romans, can have very different rules by which such actions are viewed.
Doctor Science,
Terrific comment. Thanks.
“To the contrary, it shows that cultures, even those which we may esteem highly such as the ancient Greeks and Romans, can have very different rules by which such actions are viewed.”
Sure, my sadism psuedo-hypothetical came from that.
As I said before I don’t expect any cultures to get it right on all details at any given time.
But objecting to my argument in this way proves too much. It doesn’t exactly help the case that argues I should be unconcerned by “rights” as a mere construct does it? Doesn’t it suggest that slavery was in fact ok? Doesn’t it suggest that in a culture that accepts it dog beating for sport is in fact ok?
Jared Diamond’s Guns Germs and Steel contains a very interesting story about murder.
the short short version of which is that people get angry when one person causes the death of another and different societies have different ways of mediating that conflict.
law school is a long way away now, but iirc german courts first sprang up to resolve property disputes. Personal wrongs, like murder, were resolved between the clans without involvement of the judiciary.
i really liked Dr. Science’s post. It’s great at showing the limitations of our legal system in defining cultural / tribal aspects of property. The american legal system is so strongly built around the individual that it has difficulty encompassing the idea that the dress is the collective property of women not yet born.
great and touching story, btw.
Sebastian, could you restate your argument? I’ve gotten a bit confused if you are arguing that there are no universal norms, so dog beating is socially conditioned or there are norms, so we can join stop dog beating now without any serious problems.
As an unrelated side note, I tell my students that using a bare singular noun is marked and give the example of ‘I like dog’ in hopes of making them worry a bit more about getting their articles correct. Usually take the form of a student writing ‘I like dog’ and I say that I do too, do you have a secret recipe?
“It doesn’t exactly help the case that argues I should be unconcerned by “rights” as a mere construct does it? Doesn’t it suggest that slavery was in fact ok? Doesn’t it suggest that in a culture that accepts it dog beating for sport is in fact ok?”
On some level, yes. That is why what I take to be hilzoy’s next step, creating consensus on which conduct is forbidden, is so critical. If you believe that a society should include any specific conduct as forbidden to be viewed as moral, then you need to persuade people of it, not just assume it (as most libertarians do for property “rights”).
Dantheman: To the contrary, it shows that cultures, even those which we may esteem highly such as the ancient Greeks and Romans, can have very different rules by which such actions are viewed.
True, slavery has existed in most human cultures in recorded history.
But the form of slavery that existed in North America and the Carribean islands was one of the most extreme forms of slavery human cultures have sanctioned.
In general, it seems that once a culture begins to acquire slaves via trade rather than because a person has become a slave by capture in war or by debt or because they were born of a slave mother, that culture becomes more extreme in its attitude towards slaves. (For example, in Roman law, slaves did not begin to be referred to as if they were things until after the Punic Wars when Rome began mass exploitation of slaves.)
And in North America, specifically, slave status was racial – any person of color might be assumed to be a slave, no white person would be assumed to be a slave. This distinction would have only widened the gap between slave status and free status.
A culture may assume (as North American culture did until the mid-1970s) that involuntary sexual assault was not a crime providing it was committed by husband on wife, and that certain people are not entitled to the fruits of their labor (traditional marriage meant that everything a wife earned or owned was her husband’s property) without allowing chattel slavery (in traditional marriage, a husband owned his wife’s body, and could rape his wife at will, and was often legally permitted to beat his wife and his children) and still have laws protecting the status of the person who is legally property: a husband could not murder his wife, or sell her.
Regarding some human beings as property of other human beings has never been a straightforward on-off situation. In a culture where a man could be enslaved for debt and forced to work for his owner until he had paid off his debt, and in which the laws of marriage made a woman effectively the property of her husband, may still have laws protecting a debt slave from rape or a wife from murder.
Jes,
Can I take it by giving examples of the varieties of ways different societies treated their slaves, you are agreeing with my point, but using the forum to take us off-topic into bashing the US (albeit prior generations this time)?
Say again? What does this mean?
Can I take it by giving examples of the varieties of ways different societies treated their slaves, you are agreeing with my point
I thought I was disagreeing with it, or at least expanding on it by pointing out that while the vast majority of human cultures have had slaves, the legal status of those slaves has varied from culture to culture. (In Athens, for example, it was a criminal offense to strike a slave that did not belong to you – apparently because freeborn Athenians could not easily be told apart from slaves by dress or manner alone. And traditionally in classical Greece, a slave being mistreated had the right to take refuge in a temple and petition to be sold to some other owner.)
but using the forum to take us off-topic into bashing the US (albeit prior generations this time)?
Actually, I assumed people would accuse me of “man-bashing” by pointing out that the legal status of husband and wife was in many cultures – including the US and the UK until late in the 20th century (marital rape was legal in the UK until 1991) – bearing a strong resemblance to the legal status of owner and slave in cultures where slavery is not pure chattel slavery. But if you see only “US bashing”, have it your way.
The fact that different societies have vastly different conceptions of what it means to be moral… is the point.
Thank you, maynoso.
Thank you, maynoso.
Sorry about the doble post.
Slarti,
I think I meant non-consensual, not involuntary.
Although we here in America did all of the things that Jesurgislac describes and more, it’s simply not accurate to say that Europeans didn’t do the same things. They just did them abroad, where the general populace wouldn’t see them. As in this, for example. And that’s just scratching the surface.
So: perhaps not as guilty in the wide sense, but not entirely innocent either.
Slavery in modern times has not confined itself to black Africans, either. That accounts for the bulk of it, but Irish Catholics have been slaves, as were the Huguenots.
Ah. I first noticed it in Jesurgislac’s post. I googled the phrase and got four unique hits, which means (for the most part) that it’s not widely in use. I figured that’s what was meant, though, even though “consensual assault” seems to me to be a bizarre concept.
So if a society can have rules which provide that …. certain people are not entitled to the fruits of their labor (because they are slaves), then there is nothing about these concepts which makes them universal human morality which transcends all cultures. To the contrary, it shows that cultures, even those which we may esteem highly such as the ancient Greeks and Romans, can have very different rules by which such actions are viewed.
Different attitudes towards slaves need not be regarded as simply arbitrary differences in culture. For example, as Jes’ point about Athens illustrates, some of the variation stems from the relative ease or difficulty of identifying slaves. In addition, the rules may be influenced by the likelihood of being enslaved. In a world where there is considerable risk of being forcibly enslaved, free people will tend to make rules about slave treatment that are more lenient than they would otherwise be. These two factors combined, of course, to make the situation of African slaves in North America particularly awful.
Similarly, the abolition of slavery need not be viewed solely as the recognition by society of the human right not to be enslaved. A slave system, like other property rights, requires enforcement. When enforcement becomes onerous slavery may end.
(These ideas are largely taken from Yoram Barzel’s Economic Analysis of Property Rights)
Dr. Science,
No, it’s not untrue. We’ve been speculating about various different types of social relations Mona & Hilzoy could have in the state of nature. Depends on the philosopher, I suppose, but I don’t think us amateurs have been doing that.
For the sake of semantic clarity, I will argue that possession is basic, logical and fundamental. And that “property” are the socially constructed means we deal with the problems that arise from possession.
And they’ll describe you as a “person who doesn’t believe humans are individuals.” We’re not getting anywhere.
Just because we a social animals does not mean a person can be anti-social and only care about mine. In fact, their perceived fairness of the property system will contribute greatly to whether they do or not.
If we’re going to focus on the relationship and ignore possession – which I find odd because it is the root of the conflict.
This doesn’t mean individuals can’t possess something their society doesn’t want them do.
What if you did sell it while it was in your possession? Your family will still believe that it was not yours to sell, but you did anyways. Possession is the foundation of property.
It depends on whether you are viewing rights as granted or rights as inalienable. We talked earlier about social norms acknowledging rights for the sake of social harmony. That does not mean that social norms brought rights into being. Human beings, being ultimately autonomous, can choose to obey or disregard social norms at will. Therefore, rights are inalienable.
So, a philosopher, a lawyer, an engineer, a mathmetician, an evolutionary biologist, a logician, a libertarian, an accountant, and an autodidact walk into a bar, and begin to argue about what an elephant (antelope in the wild) looks like….
So, a polymath walks into a bar…
Sebastian: “The fact that the expression is a construct doesn’t change the fact that we discover math and in doing so discover something true. I feel the same thing about morality, we just are really crappy at it.”
You feel there’s a platonic moral ideal embedded in the universe?
Sebastian, you seem to be talking religion. Perhaps not formal religion, or consciously, but that seems to be the nature of such an unprovable, un-falsifiable, non-rational, belief.
(In which case, no wonder you can’t explain yourself, present a rational defense or even explanation of your ideas, but instead always refer back to your “feelings.”)
Bernard,
I don’t think I was saying (and did not intend to) that the differences between cultures was purely arbitrary, or unrelated to calculations by the parties involved (such as your likelihood of becoming a slave example), only that they have existed, even on what we think of as the most basic of values, contrary to both Sebastian as to murder and libertarian dogma as to property rights.
Well folks, I just answered Bernard Yamatov and hilzoy in Part I re: Rand and ‘tarians. I cannot imagine also explaining to hilzoy why I took her antelope which did not belong to me.
Among the reasons I cannot explain it is that, dammit, I deny placing one thieving finger on hilzoy’s kill.Please let this blogospheric smear stop here and now.
“Doesn’t it suggest that slavery was in fact ok? Doesn’t it suggest that in a culture that accepts it dog beating for sport is in fact ok?”
Only if you see good reasons for believing these things. Are these, in fact, beliefs you wish to hold? Do they tempt you? Do you not, in fact, find them abhorrent? Is your personal sense of morality, in fact, so shakey, that absent a belief that you’re reflecting God’s views, or The Inherent Structure Of The Universe, or whatever other un-named-by-you justification you’d like to believe in, you’d lose all sense of morality, and run amuck with the dog-killin’, cheatin’, lyin’, slave-ownin’, and wearing garments made of two different kinds of thread?
Perhaps the last, to be sure.
But is it not enough for you that you personally hold the rest of these things to be wrong, and see good reasons for those beliefs in terms of the world you desire to live in?
Do you depend on external validation to hold onto those beliefs?
Which brings me to my [current] favorite abuse of an old joke:
Scene: on top of the monument marking the London Fire, Half-Cocked Jack, two of his sons, and assorted crew of the Minerva, ca. March, 1714.
From Stephenson’s The System of the World
“I figured that’s what was meant, though, even though ‘consensual assault’ seems to me to be a bizarre concept.”
Perhaps not to those involved in the BDSM subculture. (Though I’ve certainly not noticed any of them using the term “assault”; I’m just thinking that whipping and spanking and other popular painful acts could fairly be construed under that heading; not that I’m more than an outsider who knows a little on this stuff.)
“Do you depend on external validation to hold onto those beliefs?”
Nope. And that is great for me.
But under you system that is merely an expression of personal preference. I do not believe that an objection to slavery is an expression of personal preference. I do not believe that it is a legitmately moral statement to say “My culture is ok with slavery, therefore slavery is ok for us”.
I just knew that someone would go there, but I’ve always thought of assault as being extremely objectionable to at least one of the parties involved.
But that’s not important.
Sebastian,
“I do not believe that it is a legitmately moral statement to say “My culture is ok with slavery, therefore slavery is ok for us”.”
Then how do you describe the US before 1865? Ancient Greece? Or any of the universe of other cultures throughout history which disagreed with that statement? Are they all inherently immoral?
Jonas: “Just because we a social animals does not mean a person can be anti-social and only care about mine.”
You meant “can’t,” right?
“Possession is the foundation of property.”
According to one set of customs, or system of thought. The question is, is this something inherent to the universe (as Sebastian seems to maintain), or one of many possible customs/systems, as most of the rest of us are maintaining?
Sebastian: “I do not believe that an objection to slavery is an expression of personal preference.”
There doesn’t seem to be much point in my again pointing out, for the nth time, that you apparently can’t explain what you do believe it is, other than “universal” for some unknown, inexplicable, reason. I’ve given up asking you to explain, as I said I would. You know what you’re against, but you can’t justify what you’re for, other than by saying it’s what you “feel.” Is it your expectation that others should find your feelings persuasive, and that that‘s a way to get to adoption of a universal moral code?
(Note: I don’t mean any of this as personal, or as attack on your personal beliefs; I’m merely trying to question, and elicit, what it is you are trying to say, okay?)
Gary,
Yes!
No. You have no way to explain why there are customs and systems of thought about property if possession does not exist.
I’m not saying possession is inherent to the universe, only that possession happens in the universe, which should be non-controversial.
Jonas,
The argument here is that possession is something that does not happen in the universe except as a social construction. Unless by possession you mean “have on or about one’s person”. At this point, I think the question about the bee and pollen stated above by who-the-heck-knows (possibly even you) comes up. If we use the term posession to mean the bee has the pollen on its person, does that mean the bee owns it or merely is carrying it? Does it have any implication whatsoever? If it doesn’t automatically mean that the bee owns it, why should it mean that hilzoy owns the antelope carcass?
Danetheman,
“Then how do you describe the US before 1865? Ancient Greece? Or any of the universe of other cultures throughout history which disagreed with that statement? Are they all inherently immoral?”
What is this totalizing ‘inherently immoral’? No culture is perfect in every possible way. So yes, slavery in the US before 1865 was immoral. The US was inherently immoral on the moral point of slavery insofar as it enforced slavery.
Since when is that a shocking statement?
Gary,
“You know what you’re against, but you can’t justify what you’re for, other than by saying it’s what you “feel.” Is it your expectation that others should find your feelings persuasive, and that that’s a way to get to adoption of a universal moral code?”
I think I could have a discussion with someone else who believes in a moral code and we could talk about justifying certain beliefs. But even if your characterization of my position is completely true, you find yourself in no better position if you say that morality is a social construct but you want to criticize how a particular culture acts.
You have no basis for criticism other than your personal feelings which you are not going to be able to independently justify.
Sebastian,
“What is this totalizing ‘inherently immoral’?”
Because you are the one saying there are moral absolutes, that, for example “I do not believe that an objection to slavery is an expression of personal preference.”
Since other people, and even entire societies, over history clearly have held different beliefs by not objecting to slavery, I am trying (as is Gary) to figure out what is the effect of such disagreement.
“The US was inherently immoral on the moral point of slavery insofar as it enforced slavery”
So what is the effect of being inherently immoral? Does that mean that the people who supported slavery should not be afforded any deference in other political views (which would truly destroy the concept of original intent as a means of interpreting the Constitution)? If not, does it mean that a society can be inherently immoral in one sphere and entirely moral in another?
socratic_me,
That’s kind of what I mean by possession. “Under the control of a person” might be more apt.
How does a social construction “happen,” by the way?
Gary brought it up, I think.
If the bee meets my definition of possession, that it to say “the pollen is under the control of the bee,” that does not cause any human social problems – unlike, say, someone taking control of someone elses beehive.
If we’re assuming that human social constructs apply to bees, only silly implications. The queen bee is an immoral despot with no right to rule.
What does the bee have to do with hilzoy and the antelope? Are we developing property systems to solve social problems of possession, or are we devising a universal ideal philosophy of ownership that applies to everything?
“If not, does it mean that a society can be inherently immoral in one sphere and entirely moral in another?”
Well of course they can. Just like people they can be good in some areas and bad in others. Just like people some of them may have a larger number of bad characteristics than others. Just like people, we might overlook some of the bad characteristics because they aren’t that important or because they complement our own bad characteristics so we don’t see those characteristics as bad.
Sebastian,
You have no basis for criticism other than your personal feelings which you are not going to be able to independently justify.
Merely asserting that your personal feeling is a “universal moral truth” gives you no extra basis for moral judgment, unless you can somehow prove it. Absent proof, you and Gary and I all have the same options when confronting people who disagree with you: let them be, try to convince them based on shared assumptions, or try to force them to stop.
As for moral judgment of past societies, what’s the point? They’re not in a position to care what we think, and we’re not in a position to retroactively change them.
DTM,
I don’t think I was saying (and did not intend to) that the differences between cultures was purely arbitrary, or unrelated to calculations by the parties involved (such as your likelihood of becoming a slave example), only that they have existed, even on what we think of as the most basic of values, contrary to both Sebastian as to murder and libertarian dogma as to property rights.
Yes, but it’s worth asking why these differences exist, and if we find compelling reasons, apart from cultural differences, then it may be that there really are not any differences as to the values.
If differences in behavior with regard to slavery, across time or space, are caused by differences in other factors, then those behavioral differences do not stem from different moral values at all. A society might not wear fur clothing simply because it has a warm climate.
I don’t want to claim that this sort of thing explains all differences, but I do think it explains a lot.
Sebastian,
We may be getting somewhere. Since we are in agreement that some societies can differ on their convergence with your moral absolutes without being otherwise immoral, let’s take the next step.
Let’s postulate 2 societies which hold some similar and some differing views on the items you consider to be moral absolutes. Other than “because I say so”, how does one determine which society’s views are morally correct? Or in other words, what is the underlying basis for your statement that slavery is inherently wrong is a moral absolute?
Bernard,
“If differences in behavior with regard to slavery, across time or space, are caused by differences in other factors, then those behavioral differences do not stem from different moral values at all.”
Or there may not be absolute morals at all, merely values which derive from the consent of society as a whole. Therefore, when a society chooses an answer to a moral question, it is because they have decided that it is the right answer for that society, and by doing so says nothing about the right answer for the society across the mountains.
“Absent proof, you and Gary and I all have the same options when confronting people who disagree with you: let them be, try to convince them based on shared assumptions, or try to force them to stop.”
One of the shared assumptions of a vast portion of the world is that there is in fact something independent about the idea of morality. I can attempt to use that to convince people, you and Gary can’t. Also the type of proof Gary might accept is very different from the type of proof other people would accept.
And I’m confused about “try to force them to stop”. On what basis would you do that? If it is true that moral forms are social constructs, you have no reason to prefer the social constructs of your own society over the social constructs of other societies other than the fact that yours are comfortable to you. You have no basis to call them “right”. You have no basis to call them “better”. You can only say “I personally prefer them”. You have no basis to call the social constructs of other societies “unjust” or “wrong”. You can only say “I personally do not prefer them.”
This is perfectly coherent and perfectly amoral. Under this formulation slavery isn’t wrong, your culture just doesn’t prefer it. Rape isn’t wrong, your culture just doesn’t prefer it.
And if a country prefers rape and slavery, so what? Merely a different preference. Right?
Dantheman: as it happens, I agree with Seb about the existence of true moral claims. I also agree with him that it’s wrong to describe a society that is, as a whole, mistaken about one of these claims as “inherently immoral”. For one thing, I can’t see where ‘inherently’ comes from — it’s not (is it?) that this society is intrinsically, of its very nature, immoral. For another, the fact that it’s wrong about one thing doesn’t mean it’s wrong about everything. It’s like describing our present society as ‘inherently unscientific’ on the grounds (surely true) that we are mistaken about at least one point of science.
I also think that while it might be nice (at least for me, but there’s a reason I do this for a living) to have a thread about the entire justification of morality, it might be difficult for anyone to do this topic justice in a comment. For that matter, I’m not sure how many of us could fully explain our confidence in the justifiability of mathematical or scientific claims in a comment.
Fwiw.
But Seb: to repeat myself, I don’t think this follows:
“If it is true that moral forms are social constructs, you have no reason to prefer the social constructs of your own society over the social constructs of other societies other than the fact that yours are comfortable to you. You have no basis to call them “right”. You have no basis to call them “better”. You can only say “I personally prefer them”.”
Slarti: Although we here in America did all of the things that Jesurgislac describes and more, it’s simply not accurate to say that Europeans didn’t do the same things.
And when you can find a claim from me that “Europeans didn’t do the same things”, this comment will have a point, Slarti.
hilzoy,
“I agree with Seb about the existence of true moral claims. I also agree with him that it’s wrong to describe a society that is, as a whole, mistaken about one of these claims as “inherently immoral”. For one thing, I can’t see where ‘inherently’ comes from — it’s not (is it?) that this society is intrinsically, of its very nature, immoral.”
I will disagree. If there is such a thing as “true moral claims” and one society does not accept the complete set of them, then what can such a society be other than immoral? To me, that follows entirely straight-forwardly from the proposition that there are absolutes in morality.
Yeaaaaaaaaaah, but it would be fun, wouldn’t it?
Dantheman: if by ‘immoral’ you mean ‘mistaken, culpably or not, about at least one moral claim’, then sure. But normally, when we say that a person or a society is immoral, we are judging them overall, the way we do when we say that someone is a lousy athlete or student. One missed serve does not make me a bad athlete, and one mistake on a math test does not make me a bad student. Likewise, I don’t think that one missed moral claim makes a society immoral.
Of course, slavery is not just some tiny mistake. But before I’d call the entire society immoral for it, I’d want to know more.
hilzoy,
I remain in disagreement. To me, that is the only way I can process the concept that there is such a thing as a moral absolute — to say that its absence means one is immoral. Otherwise, if one can violate a moral absolute, but still be generally moral, then it is not much of an absolute.
One of the shared assumptions of a vast portion of the world is that there is in fact something independent about the idea of morality. I can attempt to use that to convince people, you and Gary can’t.
That’s a consequentialist argument, it says nothing about the actual existence of an objective universal morality. And Gary and I can argue from that if we want to, why couldn’t we? To convince someone, you need to start with their assumptions, not your own.
And I’m confused about “try to force them to stop”. On what basis would you do that?
Same reason as you, really — we find some actions so horribly offensive to our sensibilities that we’re willing to force them on others. Are there any “universal moral precepts” you’re ready to enforce that you don’t personally find very compelling?
hilzoy, I feel very confident in many mathematical and scientific claims because I observe them to work, or observe devices work that are based upon the claims. It is a very pragmatic confidence.
As for morals, I kind of think the same thing. Some morals work better than others, tending to persist longer in practice. Slavery, once moral, hasn’t persisted, at least to any great degree, because – well, I think, because of the advent of things like guns. In real life, power does flow from the barrel of a gun, and might does make right – but guns are quite good at leveling the playing field. I think Korea and Iran and Iraq are perfect examples of what I mean. Iraq is now a vassal state, Iran is threatened and bribed, and Korea is bribed. The progression is clear. If you got guns, you get respect.
So morals, too, have their roots in practicality. Ones that work, last, those that don’t, don’t. Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord, but in practice, it’s your neighbor who slits your throat. So don’t piss your neighbor off unnecessarily. With any luck, and a few guns, he won’t piss you off unnecessarily.
We are a very calculating species.
We have to be. We’re still here, and I don’t think the odds were on our side. Naked, feeble, slow, and delicate – no, I don’t think the smart bettor would have put money on homo sapiens sapiens lasting a few 10’s of years, much less 100k years or so. Our ancestors were much more robust, in myriad ways.
There is only what works. All else is sophistry.
Jake
“Same reason as you, really — we find some actions so horribly offensive to our sensibilities that we’re willing to force them on others.”
So let me see if I can get this straight. You believe that morality is socially constructed and not based on any independent preecept. You embrace your own beliefs but also believe that other people will have their own beliefs (which may differ from yours). You have no independent reason to believe that your beliefs are better than theirs. You in fact deny the capability of judging whether or not your moral beliefs on any given subject are ‘better’ than anyone else’s. You nevertheless are willing to forcibly impose them on other people in some circumstances? Why? You specifically deny the ability to judge whether or not a specific custom is ‘good’ or ‘bad’.
Slavery, once moral, hasn’t persisted, at least to any great degree, because – well, I think, because of the advent of things like guns.
There are millions of slaves worldwide today, Jake. “Things like guns” don’t seem to have prevented that.
Even looking only at European culture and European colonies and traders, I know of no correlation in the seven or eight centuries since gunpowder was introduced into Europe, between gun technology and disappearance of slavery.
Slavery tends to exist where it is economically profitable. It tends to disappear where it is no longer highly profitable.
Jes, we are saying the same things, really. You say millions, I don’t dispute it, but in the not so distant past, it was a far, far higher % of the total world population than “millions” of billions..
All I am saying is that to a large degree, slavery is not as useful as it once was because SOME slaves have ways of getting even. Ways that were not part of the picture long ago.
And you are taking the guns thing way too literally. I meant “guns” as in levelizing power. That comes in many varieties – guns, votes, Americans with credit cards, whatever.
I don’t think anything can be prevented, simply reduced in effectiveness, and even then there will be local circumstances that argue for the continuing applicability of almost anything.
Do you think that in most places where slavery still exists it is considered moral? With few exceptions, I don’t think it is.
Morals work to benefit those who can enforce them, not the other way around.
Jake
You believe that morality is socially constructed
Well, not just socially — there’s a personal level and a social level. I have my own moral norms, and I enter into a normative community with others who share those norms. And obviously my personal norms are going to be strongly affected by the society or societies I’ve been a member of.
You embrace your own beliefs but also believe that other people will have their own beliefs (which may differ from yours)
As do you, I assume.
You have no independent reason to believe that your beliefs are better than theirs
If by independent you mean having nothing whatever to do with humans and their societies, but somehow written into the fabric of space, then correct. But I can engage in moral reasoning, assign more weight to moral precepts that are held by more societies, etc. — in short, pretty much everything you would point to to say that a precept is “universal”, I could point to to support my desire to enforce it on others.
You in fact deny the capability of judging whether or not your moral beliefs on any given subject are ‘better’ than anyone else’s
“better” full stop, or “better” given some commonly shared assumptions? See my previous response — I’m not abandoning all moral reasoning, just not resorting to a fiction of “universality”.
You nevertheless are willing to forcibly impose them on other people in some circumstances? Why?
I believe I already answered this — I’m not sure what continues to be unclear. Perhaps you could answer my question — are there any moral precepts that you would identify as “universal” that aren’t also very important to you personally?
Another busy evening. Hats off.
Just picking at a single point, kenb wrote
As for moral judgment of past societies, what’s the point? They’re not in a position to care what we think, and we’re not in a position to retroactively change them.
True, but one can use their beliefs to sanction behaviors that they wish to see and maintain in society (arrgh, what is the antonym of retroactive?)
I have a feeling that this is where Sebastian is coming from. If we are able to make a judgement on the past, then he feels that everything and anything would be socially constructed. This means that there are no absolute morals in the universe and if we could create a consensus that might agree to some thing that one would find horrible, one would have to accept that this was ‘good’ and not be able to judge it.
It is good to avoid the blanket truth of the notion that progress=good and just because we are doing it today means it has to be better when that when our ancestors were doing things differently. But in trying to toss out that bathwater, the baby seems to go right out with it. We have to acknowledge that progress is inevitable (though this may be arguable in cases that involve some students I have had) and that we want to guide it in a direction that is good. Thus, I think an important part of the conservative message, that we need to wait before rushing in, is important and valid. F’rex, when we were discussing the HPV vaccine and OCSteve expressed his doubts about a mass program of vaccinations and probably to his surprise, a number of the liberal stalwarts of the list said ‘yeah, that’s a good point’. (OCSteve dropped off after that, I hope the shock wasn’t too much for him)
But when the resistance is not to carefully examine whether what we are going to do is nudge progress towards the good, but instead to avoid examination and criticism, it is not so good.
If you look at Sebastian’s most recent 4:42, it revolves around not being able to judge.
You in fact deny the capability of judging whether or not your moral beliefs on any given subject are ‘better’ than anyone else’s. You nevertheless are willing to forcibly impose them on other people in some circumstances? Why? You specifically deny the ability to judge whether or not a specific custom is ‘good’ or ‘bad’.
I think anyone must acknowledge that the loss of authority, of agreed upon norms, is a very dangerous thing. Certainly, I believe that because it is realized (this is a bit tricky because I am now referring to people’s beliefs rather than making a point about what is actually out there) that morals are social constructs, a loss of certainty about what norms are to be followed arises. One could look at this as the old man in the Shirley Jackson story (h/t to Phil and Jes) says, where after one person hopes that someone else would be chosen, says
“It’s not the way it used to be.” Old Man Warner said clearly. “People ain’t the way they used to be.”
I think there are a lot of intentions for wanting that kind of moral certainty, both good and bad. Bad might be wanting that certainty because it allows you and yours to retain power, even if that power is perceived and was really illusory rather than actually possessed. Good might be wanting things to be clear and set out. I know I, living in a culture that isn’t my own, long for some more clear rules of the road (as well as less hypocritical enforcement of many norms). I empathize with this, as Bob does, and I suspect that almost everyone on this list would, if given their druthers, want a system that is clear and set out and also represents a true moral good that we can all agree to. But usually, one can’t construct a philosophical apparatus to generate the world they want, they have to take what is out there and try to explain it. If there is anything that human history has taught us, it is that when we start going down the road of moral absolutes, we find ourselves in a place we definitely do not want to be. Those moral absolutes could be rooted in the past, as they are in Fascism, or rooted in the future, as they are with Communism, but wherever they are from, they are potentially fatal.
People have given up on moral certainties for a number of reasons, both good and bad. And certainly, tossing aside all currently standing moral certainties, in the way that some ‘libertarians’ have done (I remember a story about people trying to buy land in the Southwest and then take over the elections to permit the repeal of all laws, f’rex) In fact, this appeal to progressivity (google libertarian and ‘repeal all laws’ and you will get an interesting blend of websites)
But the reason we cannot return to that notion or moral certainties is not that those certainties represent the musty old thinking of people who were unable to shake off their superstitions, but that by rejecting those certainties, we increase the possibilities within us and within our society.
Unfortunately, if one is in the minority, the process is not simply of offering the better of two choices, the process is can often be, as Seb notes, one of forcible imposition. Thus, we look to have a way to create a core of rights that protects minority opinions and ideas from being tossed out willy-nilly. This system will look like a kludge, but it will be the best we can do. We can long for a bolder approach, but if we are lucky, we won’t ever get it.
Nonsense. I have no problem whatever pointing to the judgments of our culture as a whole, of many various authorities in the culture, such as moral philosophers, as well as myself, as well as to simple pragmatic, I believe the term is “consequentialist,” reasons as grounds for condemning, say, human slavery, or genocide, or waging war with 9-year-olds, or what-have-you.
It’s what people always do. We don’t going around saying “you should stop engaging in genocide in Darfur because God commands it,” and neither do we say “you should stop engaging in genocide in Darfur because there is some inexplicable reason inherent to the universe for you to stop.”
We say “you should stop engaging in genocide in Darfur because it is wrong to engage in genocide.”
It’s unnecessary to say “in our opinion,” because that’s entirely clear.
And, strangely, while various responses are made by the authorities are Khartoum, I’ve yet to notice any of them saying “you’re wrong to tell us that genocide is wrong — it is our cultural way to engage in genocide, and we believe it’s right to do so.”
They don’t challenge our moral basis, and no one asks whether there is some inexplicable inherency to the universe involved.
On other matters, such as, say, China’s right to be in Tibet, the Chinese rulers do object to our criticism, more or less on the grounds that it’s none of our business, and again, alleged inexplicable inherency to the universe of moral issues doesn’t aid convincing them, either.
It is a matter of a cultural clash of opinion, to some degree, although some might say that that’s a mere excuse from either side to substitute for a power or political struggle, though unsurprisingly, I would deny that that’s the primary source of our objections to Chinese rule in Tibet (but some would disagree with me). But, still, inexplicable inherent morality embedded in the universe doesn’t enter the conversation so far as I’ve noticed. Or when it does (“God says it is wrong”), it’s not persuasive to the Chinese.
“At this point, I think the question about the bee and pollen stated above by who-the-heck-knows (possibly even you) comes up.”
Me. It’s unclear what the implications are if the bee carrying the pollen stings the antelope before Mona takes it away from Hilzoy.
“One of the shared assumptions of a vast portion of the world is that there is in fact something independent about the idea of morality. I can attempt to use that to convince people, you and Gary can’t.”
Could you give two or three real world examples of this having taken place in, say, international examples, please? Or elsewhere? So we can see the relevance directly in the real world? I assume you can easily give examples, since you seem to feel this is an important truth.
Drat. Apologies for not having previewed.
kenB’s comments have probably been better than mine.
Sebastian:
moral objectivism has been pretty much discredited not because suddenly some frivolous cultural relativists turned up, but because it’s pretty hard to defend this position against the rigour of modern philosophy (I’m referring to the critical analysis of language and the rejection of metaphysics) – your best bet nowadays might be some anthropological or neurological foundation, but that’s tricky stuff;
on the other hand e.g. Richard Rorty shows that throwing pretensions of objectivity out of the window along with all sorts of other baggage philosophy has amassed over the centuries (even though I’m not quite willing to follow his epistemology all the way to the bitter end, but that’s another story)doesn’t preclude people from doing ethics or being moral beings – in fact I think it’s the only way to seriously tackle such problems, everything else is quasi-religious blablah
just ask yourself when you speak about objective moral values, what exactly are you referring to?
“Nonsense. I have no problem whatever pointing to the judgments of our culture as a whole, of many various authorities in the culture, such as moral philosophers, as well as myself, as well as to simple pragmatic, I believe the term is “consequentialist,” reasons as grounds for condemning, say, human slavery, or genocide, or waging war with 9-year-olds, or what-have-you. ”
Calling something “consequentialist” doesn’t save your argument at all. How do you decide which consequences are to have policies that favor them and which consequences are to have policies that disfavor them? You have to decide that certain consequences are “good” and certain consequences are “bad”. If you can’t do that you can’t engage in that you can’t judge the pragmatic reasons for condemning what-have-you. All you are doing are pushing the values behind the curtain.
“Slavery being wrong because it is unjust and immoral in our opinion doesn’t mean it’s any less unjust or immoral.”
But in your system you have absolutely no way of judging the opinion of “slavery is unjust” against the opinion of “slavery is just”. They are both opinions, and you have left yourself no way to judge which opinion is correct. They are both opinions and the only reason you prefer yours is because it is yours. That’s great if you are infallible.
They don’t have to tell us anything. They continue the genocide and that is their answer.
You’ve probably read about Hudson v. Michigan.
This is a perfect example of an issue for an alliance between libertarians and liberals. Here is what both a liberal (more or less — me) and a writer for the Cato Institute think, as well as the NY Times editorial board.
“They don’t have to tell us anything. They continue the genocide and that is their answer.”
And the relevancy of this to your position is?
“Could you give two or three real world examples of this having taken place in, say, international examples, please? Or elsewhere?”
I can think of one really good one. The abolitionist movement went from sidenote to sparking the Civil War in less than 100 years. A similar movement went from pathetic to getting the British Empire to crack down on the slave trade all over the world in less time.
“How do you decide which consequences are to have policies that favor them and which consequences are to have policies that disfavor them?”
The way I decide everything. With “thinking” by my “brain,” rather than by appeal to something you can’t explain how I can reference or check.
I prefer my whole “thinking” thing. What do you suggest I do instead?
“You have to decide that certain consequences are ‘good’ and certain consequences are ‘bad’.” If you can’t do that you can’t engage in that you can’t judge the pragmatic reasons for condemning what-have-you.”
Indeed. Good thing that’s not a problem, isn’t it?
“But in your system you have absolutely no way of judging the opinion of ‘slavery is unjust’ against the opinion of ‘slavery is just’.”
This turns out not to be true. Gain, you’re now claiming, it appears, that I and everyone who disagrees with you are immoral. Is that, in fact, what you are saying?
You didn’t respond to this so I’ll repeat it:
And this:
And lastly, this:
Thanks.
“And the relevancy of this to your position is?”
They don’t tell us “culturally speaking genocide is ok ( in our opinion ” because they illustrate that fact by engaging in genocide for more than three years.
You brought it up as if their lack of argument meant they saw some force to our argument. They don’t. They dismiss it as ridiculous and continue. Same with the Chinese and Tibet. Americans make noises about the moral problems of invading and continuing to occupy Tibet and the Chinese don’t need to say “by our culture it is acceptable”. They merely do what is acceptable in their culture. And you have left yourself absolutely no basis to assail that.
Gary you might want to try ‘preview’ before you get whiney about me failing to answer you.
Now you are just being flip.
Thinking about what? When you engage in this ‘thinking’ what criterea does your ‘brain’ use to sort the consequences that you want to favor from the consequences that you disfavor?
“I can think of one really good one. The abolitionist movement went from sidenote to sparking the Civil War in less than 100 years. A similar movement went from pathetic to getting the British Empire to crack down on the slave trade all over the world in less time.”
So you’re saying that the only way to be moral is to appeal to God? That’s your example? Any others?
“You brought it up as if their lack of argument meant they saw some force to our argument. They don’t. They dismiss it as ridiculous and continue.”
That’s simply not true. They deny engaging in genocide because they would be ashamed to admit to it. Instead they claim that what’s gone on is merely the act of isolated bandits. What they think is another matter, but they clearly know that they can’t stand up and defend genocide.
“They merely do what is acceptable in their culture. And you have left yourself absolutely no basis to assail that.”
Stop calling me immoral, or amoral, please.
Your basis for assailing them, is, God? Or? What, exactly, do you cite, Sebastian? I’ve already explained what I cite.
“When you engage in this ‘thinking’ what criterea does your ‘brain’ use to sort the consequences that you want to favor from the consequences that you disfavor?”
This is becoming tedious, as I already answered that:
And
And, lastly:
If we’re just going to repeat ourselves, we might as well agree to disagree, and move on.
What do you think of my post about Hudson v. Michigan?
“Stop calling me immoral, or amoral, please.”
I’m not. I happen to think you are highly moral. I don’t, however believe that you ground it as ‘logically’ as you think.
“Why? Because it offends our sense of justice.”
Is that a rational set of criterea or, how did you put it, (some inexplicable reason inherent to the universe)?
What happens when other people’s sense of justice is offended by women showing their ankles in public?
“We fight for our construed rights because they’re in the foundation for how we wish to live our lives, and because we believe they are the best principles for the lives of people in the future.”
What criterea does your brain use in the thinking process to determine “best principles for the lives of people in the future”? How does it sort those from “horrific priniciples for the lives of people in the future”?
When thinking you have to sort and weigh consequences. How do you know which ones to put in the good consequences section and which ones go in the bad?
Gary, I’m a little surprised by some of your views in this thread and trying to get a better grasp on them. So,
Can moral statements be true or false? You’ve answered no, I take it.
Can logic be applied to moral statements (If A, then B. A. IA and B are both moral statements, B?)
If someone says to you, “the only reason I have to be moral is societal and/or legal censure,” do you simply tell them that living according to that quote doesn’t appeal to you, or something more than that?
Oh, the question I started reading this thread in order to ask was: Hilzoy, have you read this book? If yes, is it any good?
I was being taught contract law by one of the authors a year and a half ago, meant to read it, and then forgot about it until I was reading this thread.
moral objectivism has been pretty much discredited not because suddenly some frivolous cultural relativists turned up, but because it’s pretty hard to defend this position against the rigour of modern philosophy
This appears to suggest either that contractarianism isn’t an objective moral theory or that there aren’t a good number of modern philosophers who defend it. Having only been a lazy undergrad in philosophy, I’m open to the idea that it is not in fact widely supported, but I’d surprised to hear it.
I just saw that I was really unclear about this question:
“What happens when other people’s sense of justice is offended by women showing their ankles in public?”
I don’t mean “Do they herd them back into a burning building until they get dressed properly.” I mean to ask: if other people’s sense of justice is offended by women showing their ankles in public, can they be wrong about that?
If I’d been refuting what you said rather than simply adding to it, this might be something I’d want to look into.
Actually I’d like to revise this. I still happen to think you are highly moral. And I believe you ground it logically, but not in the manner that you think. You observe morality and immorality and are able to identify it.
That can get complicated, but I doubt it’s very different than your process. I measure the situation in question against various criteria I hold on issues such as freedom, justice, fairness, and so on. This should be unsurprising.
“What happens when other people’s sense of justice is offended by women showing their ankles in public?”
“I don’t mean ‘Do they herd them back into a burning building until they get dressed properly.’ I mean to ask: if other people’s sense of justice is offended by women showing their ankles in public, can they be wrong about that?”
That, I think, actually is more of a question of culture. I don’t actually oppose the right (in my view) of people
to have such a culture, or to have a country with such a culture, or even to pass laws in their country to punish violation of such cultural taboos.
I do, however, believe that such countries should allow free emigration (and in practice, as well as in theory), for anyone, particularly any woman, who disagrees with such laws and customs, and who wishes to emigrate so as to escape them.
And I believe such laws should exist without having been produced by a real democracy.
And I believe people inside and outside such a country should have legally protected rights to protest such laws and taboos, and to engage in boycotts and such.
And lastly, I would not want to live in such a country myself, and would certaintly oppose any enforcement of such customs or laws in my own country if such customs were to be attempted to be enforced by any use of force or coercion against anyone who disagreed or objected.
There’s a hierarchy, in short, I’d make of things that violate my sense of morality absolutely, and that I desire to have be illegal, and have the world make universally illgeal: slavery, genocide, cliterectomy, etc.
And things that I disagree with and don’t recommend, but believe people have a right to choose for themselves, if it’s truly a free choice, and so long as they don’t cross certain lines into coercion or force, and that I would oppose being put into law in my own country, and grant a right to other countries to enact into law, but with the caveats I previously gave: believing all women must wear a chador, attempting to demand everyone to engage in sex-segregated worship, being a bigot, insisting that everyone must believe Ayn Rand is the greatest writer in the history of the world, insisting that Marx is the greatest thinker in the history of the world, etc.
And things I merely disapprove of and dislike on a purely personal basis, and desire nothing more than that society should join me in frowning on it: chewing gum loudly, misusing ellipses, shouting into cell phones in public, believing Ayn Rand is the greatest writer in the history of the world, etc.
Sebastian,
You seem to be stuck on something that I want to clear up for you… Those of us, like Gary, who do not believe that morals are somehow stitched into the fabric of spacetime, still have internal criteria by which we judge RIGHT from WRONG. You want to know what some of these criteria are? Fair enough. I’ll try and elucidate, but please keep in mind that my thought process in this matter is complicated.
First, I have (or like to think I have) a sense of fairness. This sense is probably genetic in part, but it also erupts from many life experiences wherein I’ve felt compassion and empathy for other living beings. Compassion and empathy are two emotions that most people are gifted with and they serve as an excellent tutor in principles of fairness.
So, for a given moral precept, one criteria I use is to ask: is this fair.
Another important quality I find important in developing my own morals is if they inspire. Jesus moral statement to love one another as you would yourself… well, I find it incredibly beautiful. It fills my heart.
Conversely, certain immoral acts (in my own estimation) I find disgusting, tragic, sad… This is a deeply felt belief. Take for instance dog fighting. I grew up on a farm where I always had a dog. Dogs were my companions. They were my friends. I see something beautiful in the personality of a puppy. So, I don’t like see them tortured for sport.
These are just a few examples. I hope you get a sense of how things go for me. In fact, I trust that if you examine your own thought process when it comes to moral decisions, I think you’ll find something similar.
******************
Now, notice I did not ONCE invoke God or appeal to an independent authority. And yet, I was able to reason my way into a diagnosis of RIGHT and WRONG.
Now, will you say that my moral reasoning is baseless because no infallible authority figure COMMANDS my beliefs?
“You observe morality and immorality and are able to identify it.”
Thanks. Isn’t that enough? Well, and to act on said beliefs, of course?
“And I believe such laws should exist without having been produced by a real democracy.”
“Should not exist,” of course.
Manyoso,
Who said anything about an authority figure? Certainly not me.
Why should we value fairness? Why should you allow your moral decisions to be guided by the emotions of compassion and empathy instead of anger and sadism?
Gary,
Why do you value freedom, justice, and fairness? Why do you devalue slavery, injustice and arbitrariness. What is justice anyway? What are you saying when you say “A is just, B is unjust”? If someone said “Oh no, B is just and A is unjust” can you both be right?
I’m not sure you understand what I’m saying. You see morality and immorality and you recognize it. You look for the moral dimensions of a problem or situation and discover them, like a mathematician looks at a problem and discovers the answer. You use your mind in an attempt to discover truth. Or at least that is what I think we do.
Sebastian,
Probably because through hundreds of thousands of years of evolution my genes were formulated to value fairness otherwise I would not be able to survive very well in a human society. That’s the biological evolutionists answer anyway.
Another way to say it is because I’m a likeable guy whose predilection is for fairness. It wins me friends and respect. Those are pretty good things to have when living with other humans.
Now here is a question for you Sebastian… Let us grant, for the sake of argument, that RIGHT and WRONG are indeed written into the fabric of the universe. How do you go about judging that RIGHT is better than WRONG?
Your appeals to an independent justification are exactly that. You believe RIGHT and WRONG are “right” and “wrong” because it is written into the fabric of the universe, ostensibly because you fear that these terms lose all meaning unless something outside of yourself reassures you they have meaning.
One cause of so much confusion in this thread appears to be that some seem to believe that morals can be derived through pure logic. This is absurd.
Our morals are part of who we are because of our genetics; because of our experiences; because of our emotions; because of our conscious. This is not a process of pure logic.
“Our morals are part of who we are because of our genetics; because of our experiences; because of our emotions; because of our conscious. This is not a process of pure logic.”
Isn’t that true of people who value sadism and hatred over compassion and empathy? Other than personal selfishness about the values you experience, why would you devalue their values?
Because sadism and hatred are selfish? And I would not be devaluing them just by holding opposite values.
If you are still being serious, then yes, of course it is true that sadistic and angry people arrive at their morals through genetics, experiences, emotions, and personal conscious (or lack thereof).
Now, will you awnser my question?
“…why would you devalue their values?”
THE WILL TO POWER My values are the bestest values, and a world in which the Miami Heat won the Finals would be a teleogical and ontological impossibility. I will a Maverick victory.
…
I prefer the appellation “Immoralist” even the book really sucked. “Faux Monneyers”(sic, too lazy to google) was pretty good. If you think “immoralist” pretentious, “nihilist” or “clown” are ok.
…
In honor of Bloomsday, I am trying to think of a pertinent Joyce quote:
“Why did you not become a Protestant?” Joyce:”I could not renounce a coherent logical system simply to take up one incoherent and illogical.” …capable of extension
Or, better suiting my mood, when Joyce was told of a dire Hitler speech, he said:”I don’t care about the politics, tell me about the man’s style“.
“You see morality and immorality and you recognize it. You look for the moral dimensions of a problem or situation and discover them, like a mathematician looks at a problem and discovers the answer. You use your mind in an attempt to discover truth. Or at least that is what I think we do.”
I don’t know if I discover it or create it, and I don’t care. I don’t see why I should. I don’t see the relevance. It’s not something that worries me.
That’s one difference between us.
I observe moral distinctions, and apply them. To rephrase my question: is it unsatisfactory to you that people do that? Do you believe it’s morally, or otherwise, insufficient?
“Who said anything about an authority figure? Certainly not me.”
You cited the abolitionists as being inspired by God. That was you.
I asked you about that: “So you’re saying that the only way to be moral is to appeal to God? That’s your example? Any others?”
Also:
washerdreyer: “Gary, I’m a little surprised by some of your views in this thread and trying to get a better grasp on them. So,
Can moral statements be true or false? You’ve answered no, I take it.”
Wrong, I’m afraid.
“There’s a hierarchy, in short, I’d make of things that violate my sense of morality absolutely”…GF
There is a reason that I don’t like to use the word “morality” here, made obvious in this thread, in that there seem to be so many darn personal meanings to the word. If I substitute “sense of aesthetics” purt near everyone understands what I mean, and it seems to work in much the same way, and as well. And, I think, is more honest.
I and a conservative debate tax policy. There is maybe a “moral” dimension at the extremes, and perhaps a small moral component pervading the discussion, but mostly we are talking aesthetics:what we personally value, find pleasing, what kind of world gives the least emotional pain. We do quite well, summon arguments, joke or yell and scream, all without invoking universals or demanding independent backup.
I don’t like “honor killings”. I don’t like them a lot, enough that my dislike of them contributed to my support for the Iraq invasion. (Boy, was my support hoping for an improvement in that area that a mistake.) Are they wrong according to my system of justice and morality? Back me into a corner, I will say sure, they’re wrong. Why not? Are they wrong according to Jordanian traditions ands culture. I couldn’t care less, I don’t like them. Will “I don’t like them” be an effective argument to change the practices of some Jordanians? Well to the extent any argument works, a rephrase as “Honor killings are really ugly.” or some such variant will likely be as effective as any other.
The rhetorical strategies most commonly and effectively used in arguing against third-trimester abortions are not appeals to a universal morality but pictures and descriptions. Abu Ghraib pictures were effective. No arguments or appeals based on logic, ethics, or law have helped the Gitmo residents much.
People are first of all (and IMO, only) aesthetic critters.
Pleasure, pain, beauty.
Jes wrote–
“Slavery tends to exist where it is economically profitable. It tends to disappear where it is no longer highly profitable.”
I think there’s some debate about this. Some historians, for instance, argue that slavery was highly profitable in the American South–it ended because the Northerners forced it to end.
On the Seb-Gary (and KenB and maybe others) debate, this is one of those rare cases where I’m on Sebastian’s side. I think we’re both Christians and so it’s in these philosophical sorts of threads where this agreement comes out. But I don’t have the background or ability to argue about these kinds of things–someone mentioned Richard Rorty and his “Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature” has been sitting on my shelves unread for years now. But it makes me feel smarter knowing it’s there.
C.S. Lewis took the position that I think Sebastian is defending in his “The Abolition of Man”. I suppose there are probably more philosophically rigorous defenses written up somewhere (I’m guessing by Catholic philosophers), but I can’t give references.
Bob,
Exactly!
I have to run out the door, but Nietzsche’s “Nihilism Of Strength” seems apropos to this discussion…
In fact, “Honor killings are really ugly” is likely a more effective argument than “Honor killings are really wrong”. Maybe the Koran says honor killings are not wrong. But according to what I have read, even those who commit honor killings think they are ugly or distasteful.
Similarly, trying to grant “personhood” to a fetus based on science or morality has been a mess, because the logic leads to places the pro-choice crowd does not want to go. But a 8 month fetus looks like a kid to me, and the procedure is horrible. Hasn’t worked so far, but has better chances for a compromise. Maybe not with me, but I’m evil.
Gary quoting me:Gary, I’m a little surprised by some of your views in this thread and trying to get a better grasp on them. So, Can (sic, my typo in original)moral statements be true or false? You’ve answered no, I take it.
Gary: Wrong, I’m afraid.
Me, now: I’m glad to be wrong about that, unless you mean either that moral statements are true insofar as the person saying them believes them, or insofar as they’re correct statements of the morals of the culture the speaker is a member of, or insofar as the person hearing agrees with them. But if you mean they can be true or false in the same way that many other every-day propositions can be, I don’t know how that’s consistent with many of your previous statements in this thread. E.g.,
+a number of the statements in your 8:28 and 8:44 comments.
If I were to make a statement about the universal moral truths under discussion (e.g., “Killing infants purely for pleasure is extraordinarily wrong”) I’d believe, with some degree of confidence, that I’m making a true statement about the world. I don’t read you as thinking this, and remain confused.
“If I were to make a statement about the universal moral truths under discussion (e.g., ‘Killing infants purely for pleasure is extraordinarily wrong’) I’d believe, with some degree of confidence, that I’m making a true statement about the world. I don’t read you as thinking this, and remain confused.”
No, I think that. I must have been unclear that you read me as somehow saying otherwise, and I don’t understand how you read what you quoted as saying otherwise.
In my view, and understanding of my own views and words, there’s nothing at all contradictory in saying that things “that I think we would all be best off if we all maintained everyone should agree to live by,” can be, and often are, things that I think are right, and things that are otherwise may be, and sometimes are, entirely wrong.
You seem to be projecting some sort of excessive cultural relativism claims into what I’ve been saying that aren’t there. (At least, the author didn’t put them there.)
Washerdreyer: The Myth of Ownership is an excellent book. I mean, it’s really, really good. If you happen to be interested in tax policy and its philosophical underpinnings, I can’t think of a better one.
Everyone else: there is a difference — a large one — between moral claims being objectively justifiable (meaning: right or wrong for everyone, not just for me, and capable of being shown to be so) and being ‘an inherent part of the universe’, let alone ‘inexplicably’, which comes up a bunch in Gary’s version of Seb.
One way to see why is this. Moral reasoning is primarily about what we should do, or what sorts of lives we should live. The ‘should’ is essential: morality is not about what actually exists, but about what should be: e.g., what our conduct should be like, what kinds of people we should be, etc.
Something that’s “written into the universe”, or whatever, would seem instead to be something that we’d have to observe in order to know about it; and it would be something that exists ‘in the universe’. To get from such a thing to a moral value, you’d have to move from a claim about what is the case, with respect to some observable property/object, to a claim about what should be the case*.
Or to put it another way: what discovery about the universe would justify our concluding that we ought to do something? Suppose we discover some new (observable, detectable) property that some actions have. How would we get from the claim that some actions have that property, whatever it is, to the claim that those are the actions we ought to perform?
That’s what discovering observable values written into the universe would be like. Whence I conclude that if moral reasoning yields objectively justifiable conclusions, it won’t do so in that way. Figuring out what other way is available is not easy, but it seems to me that looking for moral properties in the observable universe is a non-starter.
* For philosophy types: I think you can move from ‘is’ to ‘ought’ when the ‘is’ claim is already morally loaded. (E.g., “that is wrong” implies “I ought not to do that.) And I also think that if you want to say that any property or object that figures in justifiable claims exists, then if moral claims are justifiable, then some moral objects or properties exist; so I’m not denying that possible move. The ‘observable’ in the para. this is a footnote to is meant to ensure that we’re talking about what Kant would call theoretical (=descriptions and/or explanations of the objects of our observation and experience), rather than practical (=concerning what we should do), claims.
“Something that’s “written into the universe”, or whatever, would seem instead to be something that we’d have to observe in order to know about it; and it would be something that exists ‘in the universe’.”
I’d be satisfied by a mathematical proof. That is, write down the class of metrics on (human) societies and show it has certain properties.
I think I agree with rilkefan.
I’m heading for the claim that those properties tell us nothing of interest, though – that when arbitrary factors are removed there’s nothing to a priori distinguish the metrics, or (equivalently) societies.
If someone gets me a MacArthur or similar, I think I can come up with a disproof of morality.
Moving from Is to Ought…or even further. An amateurs reading of Kant, backwards, and likely upside down.
3rd Critique:Only a comprehensible world could be pleasing, and the world pleases. Therefore the world is comprehensible.
2nd Critique:In order for the world to be comprehensible and pleasing, it must be just. This requires the necessary postulates of God, immortality, and free will, which we use to order the world without understanding them. The postulates implicate the categorical imperative(close to Golden Rule, as a test).
1st Critique:In order to postulate those postulates, knowledge must both be possible and limited. “Limited” implies some thing that exists but not knowable. Demonstrating that knowledge is possible and limited confirms the 2nd Crit postulates.
These steps are necessary, sufficient, and mutually dependent. Dostoevsky has a physics:Without God, water flows uphill and apples return to the tree. Everything is possible, except knowledge, reason, structure.
The logical order in Kant is aesthetics => ethics => epistemology. It can be considered a proof.
I think that by the end of our last thread on moral relativism I admitted the theoretical possibility of “objective” moral precepts, in the sense that perhaps we could come up with a minimum set of assumptions without which it would make no sense to talk about morality *at all*, and if we could reason our way from those assumptions to a given precept. At the same time, I voiced my skepticism that we would really be able to generate any “interesting” objective moral precepts from that project.
However, regardless of its prospects, when Sebastian and others argue for objective moral truths, they don’t seem to be thinking about a philosophical project such as the above. It seems to me that they want to assert the existence of moral truths just because they feel that without such, no one would ever be justified in telling anyone else how to act, and the result would be a world of either moral anarchy or moral tyranny.
The response to that is simply that in the absence of any proof that a given moral precept is universal, we’re already living in such a world. The assertion that a given moral precept is “objective truth” is merely one more weapon that the subscriber to that precept can use to either try to convince a disagreeing other or justify his own moral tyranny.
I think Gary made an important point above that our moral values assume a hierarchy, and it’s the ones at the top that we’re most inclined to force on others. For non-philosophers, saying “X is an objective truth” is really just a charged way of saying “X is really important to me, way up there in my hierarchy, and it’s also really important to a whole bunch of other people, so I’m willing to impose it on those who don’t accept it”.
“…let alone ‘inexplicably’, which comes up a bunch in Gary’s version of Seb.”
Well, I’ve asked Sebastian to explain a dozen times or so, and he appears unable to explain. So clearly it’s inexplicable, at least for him.
As for “my version of Seb,” it was he who brought the universe into it, which is why it’s been thrown back at him.
He goes on further here about the universe and then back to the antelope.
Here he again claims that we are “discovering things” about the universe about social relationships:
Then again the denial of construction being involved:
And thus to:
And finally to:
Hilzoy: “Figuring out what other way is available is not easy, but it seems to me that looking for moral properties in the observable universe is a non-starter.”
I agree; thus one of my points of disagreement with Sebastian.
Sebastian maintains that rights that are socially constructed are meaningless and can’t be argued for or defended:
I disagree; my understanding is that so do you, Hilzoy.
Most of all, Sebastian insists that rights not only aren’t social constructs, but inherently “true,” and that we merely discover them.
Perhaps this is correct; I make no bones that, as I’ve said, my grasp of formal philosophy is next to nil, and that’s why I typically stay out of these sorts of discussions. But herein I’ve been discussing nothing other than that which I believe; I’m happy to learn from those who know more.
hilzoy, you draw a bright line where none, to my mind, is necessary.
Just because moral laws make claims on what the universe should be, rather than what it often is, does not absolve us of the question of whether they are a construction of the human mind or something humans merely observe with varying degrees of success.
The generalized principle of relativity, stated in one way, says that all inertial observers, anywhere in the universe, will experience the effects of the same laws of physics. We don’t create the laws, we observe them.
The idea of a universal moral creed is similar. This would render the individual human mind as merely observing, regardless of location in space or time, immutable moral laws rather than playing a hand in constructing them.
Seb and others would seem to believe that the conscious is just another imperfect sense organ.
“Seb and others would seem to believe that the conscious is just another imperfect sense organ.”
Did you mean “consciousness” or “conscience”?
conscience. sorry.
Would I be out of line in noting here that I think oen of the real challenges is finding a way to run a civil society that doesn’t require a shared agreement on what the answer to this kind of question is?
Hilzoy: Thanks for the book advice.
On is/ought:, I’ve been convinced by Anscombe’s (at least I think it was her’s originally, but I could be wrong) account of “brute relative facts” and the ease of getting from an “is” to an “owes” with same that the problem is overstated.
Gary- Everything is now cleared up.
washerdreyer: I think that ‘no move from is to ought’ is way too simple; thus the caveats above, which were themselves oversimplifications. On the other hand, I think that the distinction between theoretical and practical reason is crucial. (Nb: as before, theoretical reasoning attempts to describe and explain the objects of experience; practical reasoning attempts to figure out what we should do. There’s no implicit claim that this distinction is exhaustive.) I also think that something like the following is true:
No practical claim can be justified without the use of practical reasoning. Theoretical claims can of course figure in the justification of practical claims, but you need practical reasoning to justify them.
Back on topic, that is, about libertarianism and Democrats, Jim Henley writes about Hudson. Sample:
So read the rest, why doncha?
I think there has been a lot of confusion about “in the universe” the way that Gary discusses it. I’m completely aware that morality doesn’t exist unless you have creatures that make choices (it is actually more than just “make choices” as animals make choices and I don’t think those choices have moral implications, but that is a long sidenote which I’m not going to get in to). So objecting that it isn’t ‘murder’ when a meteor hits me or when a lion kills a lamb doesn’t get at anything I’m talking about unless you believe that moral choices are wholly illusionary (that they are only ‘choices’ in the sense that we wrongly believe we have the will to change our choices but in reality we are 100% captive to our training and genetics. This ‘morality as illusion’ isn’t what I think we are talking about).
I also think that ‘justification’ as used in the thread above is way to strong of a claim. I would never claim that moral observations are so obvious that every single person in the world would be convinced by even the relatively easy ones. But I don’t think that is an objection to the logic and strength of moral observations in the real world because there are lots of real, physical things that you can’t convince people of–sometimes even with demonstration. There are still flat-Earthers, there are still people who believe in astrology, there are still people who don’t believe the moon is real rocky thing in the heavens. I also don’t think the fact that many people just rely on (for routine use) whatever moral culture they grow up in–without much independent observation or reasoning–is an objection. People with no understanding of electricity use the discovery of their culture all the time.
This brings me to hilzoy’s comment:
“No practical claim can be justified without the use of practical reasoning. Theoretical claims can of course figure in the justification of practical claims, but you need practical reasoning to justify them.”
I think that this is true, but the most basic underpinnings of practical reasoning must be either considered morally observational or axiomatic. At the bottom level of them, Gary’s objection of “where do you see that”, “where does that come from”, “how do you prove that” undermines the whole system of moral reasoning and reduces it to mere (and I really mean ‘mere’) personal preference. You cannot say “I value happiness” and think that is any more impervious to the “why” than anything else. You cannot say “I value the survival of the species” and think that is any more impervious to the “why” than anything else. You cannot justify, in the way that Gary is demanding, the basic moral principles. When you try to separate the good principles from the bad you must have a sorting mechanism.
At some level of the sorting mechanism you can either say that all sorting mechanisms are valid and they just come to different results depending on which you arbitrarily use or you can say that one or more of the sorting mechanisms is ‘better’ than one or more of the other ones. You can’t avoid it. Starting from a point where sadism is a basic value is not going to get you a structure similar to one where general happiness is a basic value. If you can’t distinguish between the two I’m not impressed with the logical structure of your moral reasoning.
And to be super-clear it is the stated logical structure that I’m not impressed with. I perfectly well believe that people here can distinguish between moral systems where sadism is a prime virtue and those where it is not. Which kind of encapsulates my whole point.
uh oh, I see an infinite regress raising its ugly head …
Have we really gotten this far without raising the spectre of utilitarianism, or were the references to consequentialism supposed to have covered it?
Sebastian,
I’ve answered your questions, now will you please answer mine?
“…spectre of utilitarianism, or were the references to consequentialism supposed to have covered it?”
I consider utilitarianism and consequentialism as much moral philosophies as I consider Unitarianism a religion, or Lego sets architecture, or GTA autoracing, or Civilization political science, or an inflatable doll a woman.
Or something. I am trying to find some analogy sufficiently emphatic.
No offense to unitarians or those with plastic friends. Just kidding.
I bounce her in the kitchen. I bounce her in the hall.
My goodness, what a thinky bunch.
Jonas:
We are not merely on different pages, but seem to be reading from different books, so I’m not sure it’s worth either of our times to try to understand each other better right now, especially given the stunning length of the comments here.
In general, as I think about this so very thought-provoking post and discussion, it emphasizes for me how absolutely critical it is to avoid leaping to postulates.
Nozick’s postulates are deeply libertarian, so he’s bound to come up with some pretty libertarian conclusions. He (and other libertarians) talk about radically individual humans, who enter only into voluntary associations, who mostly deal with strangers, for whom property is completely alienable in exchange for completely fungible money.
I’m arguing that none of these conditions are met by humans in a human state of nature (who are born into extended families, who encounter few strangers, who possess very little in the way of stuff, and who have no money at all). Because the human state of nature lasted far, far longer than our libertarian present day, thought experiments based on that state are likely to given results that fit our unconscious emotional needs, they will feel “right”.
My gut reaction to Hilzoy’s discussion of the “patterned view” of justice versus the “process view” is to go all Jewish-prophet-y and say, “Justice will come when you pay less attention to your damned stuff, and more to other people!”
Example: the story of Solomon and the two mothers with one baby (1 Kings 3:16-28). The evidence does not permit the King to judge which is the mother, so he says he’ll do the “fair” thing and chop it in half. One mother says, “OK, that’s fair”, and the other says “No, give the baby to her, just don’t hurt it!” By this Solomon knows that the protesting mother is the “real” one, and deserves the baby.
Solomon’s threat is the threat of fairness; Solomon’s justice is that he restores right human relationships. “Property justice” is not measured by a pattern — of uniformity or otherwise — *or* by a fair process which must logically produce fair results. “Property justice” occurs only when it supports just human relationships. It doesn’t matter how fair the process, if a beggar starves while a rich man feasts *this is not justice*, because justice is about having the right human relationships.
Libertarians are extremely principled people, but my own philosophy is closer to “persons before principles” (quote from the works of Lois McMaster Bujold).
Dr. Science,
Ha! I do appreciate the response. You’re pessimistic about our disagreement – I’m pessimistic about this “what is morality” discussion. Different books, I suppose.
You do make a good point about how doctrinaire the libertarian philosophy can be. I’m not familiar at all with Nozick so I can’t speak to it.
But, and this is very important – individual humans who enter into voluntary associations is the very definition of society, I’m afraid. The whole money and property being fungible is a whole other matter I’m not quite ready to deal with.
I’m merely arguing, that these property issues that those are defining as exclusively socially constructed are in fact rooted in the damn horrible issues one encountered in that state of nature – or to a lesser extent, today. Any further reform – and I’m not a conservative so I’m not for standing still necessarily – has to take this into consideration otherwise we’ve lost the plot.
I don’t mean to be completely in opposition to what you say, but I don’t think your “human relationship” theory helps the damn near intractable dilemmas that come about in morality. Valuing human relationships mean that the good of hiding Jews from the Gestapo by German friends occurs; it also means that people sign up for the Nazi party because they respect and love their friends and familiy who already have. I’m not seeing the way out, maybe you can help me.
Don’t worry, I’m not hung up on process at all. I have no idea what the process should be. I’ve got some dumb hacks I’m partial to, but I can be persuaded. Property justice? Now there’s a challenge. I’m merely saying that property is going to exist whether anyone likes it or not.
All I’ve been arguing is, if we’re developing processes or if we’re developing moral principles, we have to take into consideration the bare naked fact that human beings have big conflict problems with possession, property – whatever you want to call it. If we pretend it’s a social construction we’ve conjured out of thin air for our own entertainment, I don’t think we can approach a decent solution – whether it be purely process-based or relationship-based, or a combination.
Generally, when I sympathize or even wholesale adopt libertarian notions, it’s because it seems that the principle protects the most people possible. For instance, something we’d consider non-controversial, like freedom of speech. I’m guessing that we share that, if I’m wrong, I’m sure we have a value in common that demonstrates my point.
“But, and this is very important – individual humans who enter into voluntary associations is the very definition of society, I’m afraid.”
All societies, everywhere? Samoa, 1910? Northeastern U.S. 1310 A.D.? China, 1422? Wales, 100 A.D.? Etc.?
Don’t mean to take sides, but I did enjoy Dr. Science’s comment. It reminded me of something my Greek teacher said about the Iliad, which is that both sides were right. Achilles was right to point out that he was scorned, while Agamemnon was correct that he was the high king and what he ordered was law. So many of the Greek classics depend on this tension between what is laid down in the law and what the characters heart’s tell them. Of course, the Greeks weren’t so big on worrying about babies split in half, so Solomon gets the call. But there is always going to be a tension, the Furies are turned into the Eumenides. Rather than seeing some sort of clear moral framework, it seems like it’s the human condition not to have one.
Doctor Science, I have enjoyed reading your posts and I agree with much of what you write. I have to take issue with this, though:
In my view, Solomon’s threat is simply a trick to expose the real mother, not in any sense fair. It cannot be fair to take the baby’s life and divide its body. That process destroys the baby. Even regarding living beings as property, some of the value in such property is life. Of course, in disputes about property sometimes the legal process destroys part of the value (even just in the delay it imposes in coming to a decision), so you might call that “fair” since a fair process may require this delay. I think it is a stretch past the breaking point to describe Solomon’s threat as that of fairness.
In ancient literature wars are fought over wronged individuals as liberal japonicus points out. The damage wrought seems to me way out of proportion to the crimes. Civilized societies, young though they are, and with all their many faults, have devised processes to deal with the conflict inherent in human nature that I think are an improvement. Civilization has also produced much greater capabilities for destruction, though, so the jury is out as to whether this was a net plus.
Hmmm… I first wrote “modern” and changed to “civilized.” Of course, the ancient Greeks were civilized, so … oops.
Gary,
Voluntary isn’t necessarily the right word, it’s more like individuals inherently have the free will to accept or reject associations with others. And yes, this would apply to all of your examples.
“Voluntary isn’t necessarily the right word, it’s more like individuals inherently have the free will to accept or reject associations with others. And yes, this would apply to all of your examples.”
So you would say it’s more important to recognize the right of a daughter or son in a society with a family-oriented idea of property to “voluntarily” give up property to their parents than to recognize the custom that property belongs to the family, or father, or mother?
And the same for a society where property is shared by the tribe, or regarded as owned by no one?
Isn’t this projecting an alien concept, not held by such people at such times, into their heads, when they didn’t, you know, actually believe that?
And if it’s something they don’t believe, and alien, how can it be “the very definition of [their] society,” exactly?
Gary,
Well, they did consent of their own free will to the family-oriented property structure, clearly. I’m not speaking to whether they should or shouldn’t, merely that they did and that’s the basis of their society actually existing and working.
And if an ideal system of property doesn’t take into consideration that individuals can dissolve it at any time by no longer complying with it’s rules if they find it unjust, it doesn’t stand much of a chance of success.
A society where property is regarded as owned by no one is their way of dealing with the problems of possession.
They can believe whatever they want, and they’ll probably make a society based around that belief. Without possession, there is no reason for these beliefs about property to emerge in any form.
Gary, societies are formed by individuals of their own free will. If they aren’t, where did the societies come from?
Penal colonies, I’m guessing.
Penal colonies, I’m guessing.
No Australian jokes, please.
“Gary, societies are formed by individuals of their own free will. If they aren’t, where did the societies come from?”
You find that most tribal societies are formed “by individuals of their own free will,” do you? And you, Slart?
Okay. I’m sure you can find cites describing such tribes in anthropology journals with great ease, then, this being so common. I look forward to seeing a few. It should be very interesting reading, indeed, reading about these libertarian tribes, undoubtedly found throughout South America, the Pacific, and Africa, that have come together out of “free will.”
I’ll just wait right here. I’m sure you’ll both be right back with cites on these tribes, which probably make up the majority of tribal — no, wait, they have to be all tribal cultures, don’t they?
Cool.
“And if an ideal system of property doesn’t take into consideration that individuals can dissolve it at any time by no longer complying with it’s rules if they find it unjust, it doesn’t stand much of a chance of success.”
I’m not clear what you mean by “ideal” here. Do you mean the platonic version of a family or tribal oriented practice of property? Or what?
And, again, do you have any cites from an anthrological source on such societies on how it works “that individuals can dissolve it at any time by no longer complying with it’s rules if they find it unjust”?
Or are you just projecting this belief that this is how all societies do and have worked out of, forgive me, dogma, rather than actual study of anthropolgy?
Gary, you are at the point where your comments are nothing but questions. That give the impression, regardless of what your true intentions are, of badgering.
society n 1. A group of people joined together by a common purpose or by a common interest.
association n 2. A group of people joined together for some purpose; society.
I see two choices: a voluntary joining, or an involuntary joining. Which one are you choosing, Gary? Not saying this is the only line of division, but it’s one. And no, no cite. This one is pretty much by definition.
Oh, source is Thorndike and Barnhart World Book Dictionary, 1968.
granfalloon n 3. A group of people who outwardly choose or claim to have a shared identity or purpose, but whose mutual association is actually meaningless.
Slartibartfast & Jonas,
Ever hear the phrase, “You can’t choose your family?” Because most societies are groups of families. Which society you are born into is involuntary. It is not a product of free will.
Tell it to the Mexican by birth that he is free to choose his society. It just doesn’t work in the real world like you would have it in your ideal world.
Sure, there are asocial individuals who’ve opted out of society. However, this is not always the case. Can a man born as the heir to the British royal throne just choose his society? Society is not composed of individual adults who look at a menu and choose. For an adult human, yes, sometimes free will comes into play more or less, but this is far from the rule.
But whether one continues to live in the society one is born into; that is entirely voluntary. One doesn’t have to opt out of all societies to exercise one’s free will.
Trying to make lemonade here, one of the points of a libertarian stance is that a lot of associations are only such because we think that we have to remain a member. All of the psychological studies of various group behavior. Frex, whether people will cross against a light. Here in Japan, if they see someone with a perceived higher status do it, they will, but someone with perceived lower status, they won’t. The libertarian critique has us ask ‘do we really need to be a part of this group’. But, like the semanticist who, on learning a new language, says ‘well, you say that word means the same as dog, but what does it really mean?’, this sort of thinking can put enough grit in the wheels that things start to fall apart. Given that so much in society is based on the health club paradigm (in that if all the members of a health club actually used the facilities, there would not be enough space for them), there is a point where this thinking becomes counter productive.
Not. True.
You can not choose your family. Yes, SOMETIMES, an adult is able to leave his family behind forever. Yes, SOMETIMES, an adult is able to leave his country behind forever. Yes, SOMETIMES, and adult is able to leave his society behind forever.
But, this is not ALWAYS the case. A man born as heir to the British throne does not have the same choices as you do. A Mexican national who is stuck in extreme poverty does not have the same choices as you do. Children of the former Soviet Union did not have the same choices as you do. A North Korean national does not have the same choices as you do!
I suppose that humans always have the choice of suicide. That’s a pretty permanent way to leave society. However, having to choose between living under North Korean rule and suicide is not what I’d describe as free will.
You can un-choose them. You can choose not to associate with them.
Sometimes an adult is not able to leave his country forever? Which times? East Germany, before the wall came down? USSR?
You mean, he cannot just leave? Who says?
Which is not the same thing as a refutation. No one, anywhere, said choices had to be the same everywhere. Certainly the notion that I cannot choose to be king doesn’t in any way imply that I have no choices.
I guess we’re now back to involuntary. Maybe not technically a penal colony, but arguably close enough.
“I see two choices: a voluntary joining, or an involuntary joining. Which one are you choosing, Gary?”
I’m quite sure I didn’t join my biological family voluntarily. Few people do. (Other sorts of families, yes.)
I was unaware this was controversial.
Similarly, few people join tribal cultures voluntarily. I was equally unaware this was controversial or little-known.
Are the Hmong Hmong “voluntarily”? Or the Nukak-Makú? The Kubaisat? The Karabila? The Zagawa? The Yupik?
But probably all these people don’t exist, and neither do biological families, and neither do any tribes throughout history. Instead, we all live according to Hayek, and libertarian theory.
“But whether one continues to live in the society one is born into; that is entirely voluntary.”
Sure. Plenty of 5 year-year-old and 8-year-olds divorce their families all the time. It’s commonplace.
And in the 18th century and before, it was just common to leave your South Sea island.
Because, after all, the only society that has ever existed is modern society; it’s what human history has mostly consisted of. When we describe it, we describe the entire history and circumstance of humankind.
Of course not. It’d have been silly of me to say so, if I had.
Same here.
So you agree that claiming that “But, and this is very important – individual humans who enter into voluntary associations is the very definition of society, I’m afraid” is nonsense?
No, you’ll deny it. And deny you’ve been arguing with anything.
I’m tired of this game you play, Slart. When you want to get around to making a positive argument, do so.
Completely fabricated, Gary. I was just turning your own argument, such as it was, around on you. Which ought to have been obvious.
You can always choose not to, Gary. Whatever game you imagine I’m playing, that is.
Gary: The quote in this sentence here…
So you agree that claiming that “But, and this is very important – individual humans who enter into voluntary associations is the very definition of society, I’m afraid” is nonsense?
… is from Jonas Cord, not Slarti.
“Whatever game you imagine I’m playing, that is.”
The one where in response to other people writing lengthy exegeses of what their position is, you offer none, but only sit back and offer cryptic questions and statements.
I don’t believe anyone will be apt to back up your belief that I’m imagining that.
But please refute me. Write up your position on the matters under discussion on this thread and post it, please.
I apologize somewhat for expressing myself with exasperation; it’s not entirely fair to snap at you for a long-standing annoying technique/style/approach of yours in a given instance, but it’s not entirely unfair, I think, either.
Notice, not incidentally, that in response to this:
You didn’t respond. Typically. As I predicted.
Try, instead of “turning around my argument,” making one of your own. Please.
“Gary: The quote in this sentence here…… is from Jonas Cord, not Slarti.”
Yes, I’m perfectly aware of that. It’s the point I was responding to that Slarti was responding to.
Slartibartfast,
You said:
Fact is: a North Korean national can not voluntarily choose to leave his country.
You are wrong.
Of course I didn’t respond, Gary. If I’d thought it was nonsense, would I be making the point in the first place? Really, you’re imagining that I’m doing all of this as a…really, I can’t imagine what you’re thinking.
Yes, typically. Just like every other time we’ve had this argument.
Ok, then. You’re an ace prognosticator. Hope that’s served you well in other areas of life.
Look, this is not difficult. I am not going to submit a friggin’ thesis to you to back this up. Don’t like it? Fine, don’t have these discussions with me.
Now, anyone that’s read past that point: consider that the fact that there are only unpleasant choices doesn’t mean there are no choices.
Gary,
Do tribal societies consist of people? Yes. Do they all have free will? Yes.
The concept of free will does not mean you are free to do whatever you want at no cost and with no consequences. Free will does not make you God. Free will does mean you are free to try. Anyone in any culture can do that at any time. Period.
I’m not making any claims about “libertarian tribes,” Gary. If people truly cannot bear their own culture they will either act to change it or leave. I cite “all of human history” as my anthropological source.
Upheaval, unrest, revolution, mass migration, war – these are my citations of human history that demonstrates the extremes of what happens when people choose to no longer comply with a culture.
If you have a problem with individuals existing and having free will, just say so. You’ve challenged the metaphysical beliefs of others, it’s time for you to defend yours.
No one ever left a tribal culture? No one ever broke their rules? No culture ever changes when people no longer believed in it? I had no idea that anthropology had discovered cultures so omnipotent that people were the mere teeth of the gears that the machines of culture operate to serve it’s own ends.
Societies are created by people, Gary. Your appeals to anthropological authority in no way changes that fact.
manyoso,
How did the North Koreans in China or South Korea get there?
Jonas,
Bullshit. The slaves that were brought from Africa to America did not have a choice. They were forcefully taken. You are defining ‘free will’ downward so as to take all meaning away from the term. I suppose you’ll say the African slaves could have ‘tried’ to jump off the ships into the open ocean. That is a shamefully ludicrous definition of ‘freedom’ or free will.
And what will you tell the women born in Afghanistan or Saudi Arabia? What do you make of the women who don’t ‘try’ and leave? I suppose all of them choose out of their own free will to stay and be subjected to the oppression.
How about the people in darfur? After all, don’t you wonder why the rest of the world is getting all upset? I mean if the people of darfur don’t like the genocide then why don’t they exercise their free will and choose not to live in that society anymore!
And what will you say about the peoples of the American south? They exercised their free will and decided to secede from the union. Look how that worked out for them! Did they succeed at voluntarily leaving their society?
How about all the various American separatist groups… how many of them have been successful at informing the American government they won’t be paying taxes any longer?
All the folks in Iraq? Are they also free to choose to leave Iraq? Could everyone that is dissatisfied with the political situation in Iraq just choose to exercise their free will and leave the country? How do you think that’d go over with the bordering countries.
And what do you make of the people born into India at the height of the caste system? You think they had a chance to exercise their free will?
The examples go on and on of human beings born into this world within societies with a decidedly antagonistic idea towards them just up and leaving. All throughout human history as you said… You act like a society voluntarily created and maintained is the rule rather than the exception!
No, your idea of voluntary societies is so vacuous and empty when applied to the real world that it is laughable that you’d say this is the default position in the human state of nature. It is not. People are born into this world and are often completely constrained by the society they live in from following their own inner predilections.
Just saying that everyone can at least ‘try’ to change their lot in life is callous in the extreme and arrogant. A choice between life and death is not a real choice. Maintaining otherwise is heartless.
Jonas,
Are you being serious? They were born there, Jonas.
I think you’re getting a little overly worked up, manyoso.
The few hundred thousand NKs in China were born in China? What on earth can you possibly mean by that?
Wow. Yet more thinking!
After Jonas said
various people talked about how important voluntary associations are, in the scheme of human life.
I was more taken aback by Jonas’ restrictive usage because I as a biologist frequently speak of societies of many other animals, and we generally rank the insect societies as the most social of all. Bees, ants, and termites are complex & fascinating creatures, but they do not enter into voluntary associations IMHO, nor do they have whatever it takes mentally (spiritually?) to do so. Or at least so we hope — though I for one welcome our new eusocial overlords.
Coming up from the evolutionary bottom as I do, it seems to me that the vast, vast majority of human associations from around 1700 back into the Cro-Magnon mists, at least, must be mostly unvoluntary or of limited volition. People associate with their blood relatives, their neighbors, their neighbors’ relatives, and only rarely in life have a chance to make a true free-will choice of society — and they tended to call such choices “duty”, not “volition.”
Slartibartfast,
Yes, I am getting heated. Sorry, but the idea that societies on earth are by default voluntary associations where individuals can dissolve them at any time by just exercising their free will and opting out… well, it is insulting to the billions of people on earth who suffer through oppressive regimes.
Looking back, I find this is how this discussion on voluntary societies began.
Given all the examples, will you please concede, that while this romanticized ideal would sure be nice, it is not how the world, you know, actually works?
Sorry. Bad reading comprehension on my part.
However, just pointing out that some individuals are able to escape is a pitiful way to argue that North Korea is a voluntary society where everyone can just decide to up and leave thereby dissolving the country.
Who’s romanticizing? I don’t think either Jonas or I are glorifying disassociation from society via suicide, or putting pastel tones on the reality of escaping from Cuba by converting one’s automobile to a boat. No, these are choices. Sometimes the choices are as brutal as cutting off your climbing buddy in order to survive, because otherwise you both die. Like it or not, real life can involve unpleasant choices. Like it or not, real life can involve unpleasant choices without any alternative pleasant ones.
Just as, y’know, it’d be objectionable to characterize the choice of whether to have an abortion as something one arrives at via a coin-flip, or on a whim.
Choice does not ever imply no consequences.
This just galls me so much I suppose because it is so far removed from human experience. Societies throughout all of history were not created, much less maintained, by the voluntary association of humans, unless you mean by voluntary, at the point of a sharp stick.
I don’t know what history books everyone else is reading from, but Rome was not built upon voluntary cooperation amongst differing peoples. It was conquest where the conquered peoples were given no real choice.
Here is a short list, please pick the societies that were ‘voluntarily’ created:
The history of the world is society created through conquest. The history of the world is society created through familial and ethnic ties.
It is a utopian idea that societies are created by a bunch of humans getting together and voluntarily negotiating the set of rules, structure, and geography wherein they wish to live.
Slartibartfast,
And not everyone has such choices. Some people don’t have automobiles to convert into boats. Some people have nothing!
Anyway, it is beside the point. This discussion began with an over emphasis beyond all degree and good taste the importance of freewill and voluntary associations when it comes to creating and maintaining human societies.
I don’t see how defining the concept of freewill downwards to ‘escape or die trying’ helps you maintain that societies are, by and large, a voluntary thing.
Societies throughout all of history were not created, much less maintained, by the voluntary association of humans, unless you mean by voluntary, at the point of a sharp stick.
Hmmm…I don’t believe I said anything at all about creation, although I might have. Nor did I insist that, as Farber would have you believe, one chooses one’s parents or the society into which one is born. No, this is about ongoing participation in society. Certainly one cannot choose to participate in society that one is not part of; voluntary association provides for that others in the association may not want to associate with you.
So there’s a whole lot of counterarguments being presented that simply don’t apply, and the dressing-up of this argument in appeal-to-emotion drag that’s based on nothing I’ve said.
But of course you and Gary are free to be angry about this. It’s a free world, isn’t it?
Again, missing the point. This is not, and never has beem, about equality of choice. I’m not sure how many times I have to say this, but it’s not until you do understand that, that you’re going to be able to even hear any of the responses I have to your various other statements. To me, it appears that you’re repeatedly presenting a list of situations where the only choices are “bad” ones as refutation.
I don’t see how that defines free will downward. The refusal to be coerced is, to me, the ultimate expression of free will.
That’s all I have time for right now, sorry. I imagine hilzoy will show up in a bit and show how everything Jonas and I have said is not only incorrect but morally reprehensible, but do so without accusing me of making bad-faith or otherwise shoddy arguments, or sneering at the plight of the disadvantaged. Which would be a nice change.
Manyoso,
I don’t want to gang up, but the point that Slarti and Jonas are trying to make is the same one that Victor Frankl made
“Everything can be taken from a man but …the last of the human freedoms – to choose
one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.”
This page gives some more details. His book ‘Man’s Search for Meaning’ (the English title is strangely much broader than the German original Ein Psychologe erlebt das Konzentrationslager or ‘A Psychologist experiences the concentration Camp”) I would highly recommend.
Why are you going back to some hypothetical state of nature in an African savannah in the distant past. Libertarians are so ridiculous because they pretend that property ownership is some natural right that has existed since man first descended from the trees. Nothing could be further from the truth. The concept that someone could own property free and clear of control of the government is a completely modern concept, even in the west.
It has only been a few hundred years since the entire island of England was owned by the King, and everybody who lived on it merely lessees. The King could take your land anytime he wanted.
Your example about the antelope is perfectly applicable today in the United States. You have no property interest in wild animals on your land, and the state tells you what animals you can or cannot kill, even on private property.
Thanks for that, LJ. I’d missed, somehow, that this was pretty much along the lines of what Frankl was saying; it has been quite a while since I read that last.
I had wanted to say some things, too, about how society and government (or even empire) are all different things, but this is a line of argumentation in which I am less sure of my own footing. Which, someone could get hurt. Certainly there are ways in which one’s choices can be curtailed (even to severe extent), but I think that as those curtailments grow more severe, what one is living in is less like society and more like prison.
Which sounds like tautology, I know, but I did note upthread that society and voluntary association can (and do, I submit) have the same meaning. Of course, one can take Society as an exception, but that’s not what we’re talking about.
Manyoso,
I’m going to make an attempt to be more clear so we aren’t talking past each other. I think our point of contention is that you are speaking of “voluntary,” which I may have sloppily used at one point, but “free will” is not a matter of being voluntarily allowed to do something. I’m not defining free will downward – every time I’ve encountered it in philosophy it means you have the ultimate power of agency over your actions.
And I do not maintain that free will somehow diminishes the crimes of those who have committed egregious crimes against human freedom. Slave traders did not allow Slaves any liberty, but the slaves still did have free will. If they didn’t, it is hard to explain slave rebellions, isn’t it?
They do choose to stay, because the uncertainty, and danger, and personal loss involved in leaving or revolting does not seem like a better option. This does not in any way reflect poorly upon these women, in fact, it is at the core of why we should consider these injustices against them so immoral.
Yes, they did do that all right! Free will does not mean you exert your will and it will be successful.
I think I see exactly what you’re saying, and it’s not what I mean. Choosing between life and death is a real choice, one that people make every day, and that is part of free will.
I agree that It is heartless to say that people should merely choose to die to revolt against people who oppress them. I do not mean to imply that. The blame for these sorts of predicaments lies squarely at the feet of those who are doing the oppression.
Jonas, Slartibartfast,
You both seem to be backing away from what you original maintained. This entire discussion began with the following argument advanced by Jonas and subsequently seconded by Slartibartfast:
Link here.
Link here.
Link here.
This is the classicly naive libertarian notion of a society creation. No matter the countervailing examples I give of societies created at the end of the sharp stick you hang on arguing that you only meant some people voluntarily choose to live rather than die in the face of such pointy sticks.
All of the societies I’ve cited above were created by forced coercion which you would now redefine as voluntary association to suit your thesis. It’s absurd and it flies in the face of your statement that societies are inherently prone to immediate dissolution where individuals disobey the rules.
LJ,
I understand they are repeatedly trying to make this argument when confronted with the examples of societies cited above.
However, it is not consistent with their original thesis that the very definition of society is voluntary associations that can be dissolved at anytime where individuals fail to comply with societies rules.
Ah think what we have hyuh is a failuah to communicate.
Manyoso,
I backed away from “voluntary,” because that’s sloppy terminology. See here:
But I stand by:
You go on to say:
In my last post, I tried to explain that we are having an argument because you have defined “free will” as being deprivable by force. It is not. Liberty is deprivable by force. I think everyone is conflating “free will” with what we generally call “freedom.” Every statement you have made about “free will” I agree with if you replace “free will” with “freedom” or “liberty.”
How has any society ever changed if that is the case?
Jonas,
They are formed by war. By conquest. By one group of people physically imposing their will upon another. The American Indian is not a part of our society as a result of free will. They are here and present because they were conquered.
Please explain how individuals form a society when they have no liberty or freedom. No, society is imposed upon them. And then children are born into it and the society maintained in the same way it was created: by forced coercion.
Jonas, you did not begin this argument by stating that societies are formed in spite of an individuals free will and yet that is what I’ve pointed out has happened time and again. You said a society doesn’t stand a chance of success if individuals exercise their free will and choose to dissolve it. This is just not true. Our society still exists and the people of the south are still a part of it in spite of the fact that they tried to dissolve it.
By individuals forcefully imposing their will upon others. And many times it is the minority forcefully imposing their will upon the majority.
Look at the history of the current societies in central/south America. They underwent a huge change in society as a result of a small band of foreigners forcefully imposing their will upon the majority. And the society has been irreconcilably changed as a result.
Jonas,
It wasn’t just terminology. You used the hypothesis of voluntary associations as the basis for setting up your claim about property VS possession. The example was of hilzoy capturing the antelope, thereby possessing the antelope, but nevertheless voluntarily giving it to Mona in accordance with their societies rules where the family jointly owns the antelope.
I keep coming into this conversation after days away, so if it seems like my posts are disconnected and not really arguments for any position then well, it “seems” correctly.
Jonas,
I think the problem with Societies are formed by individuals of their own free will. is that it is meant to be the starting off point for a further argument about how we evaluate the consensus societies come to about values/property etc. If “with free will”, as understood in a basic philosophical texts, is used here instead of “voluntary”, it seems like the entire argument falls apart.
What do I care if societies are made up of people who have the free will to make choices that suck either way. The point is that such choices are coerced and, thus, that the property structure model might not be something we can take as agreed to. If the whole world is property structured, it is damned near impossible to opt out of that world if you still intend to have any social interactions at all.
As a last note, my studies have shown me how much of our selves and personalities are pretty strongly determined by our youth and our environment. While I think we have free will, certainly, I also think that it only rears its head in rare situations and that, as a general rule, we are literally creatures of habit. Most of this I take from extenxsive arguments and whatnot had in discussion with Robert Kane, both in and out of class, as well as various readings of his material. While I believe he has various points incorrect, this is one he seems to be right on. So when I hear people talk about how we are “free” to opt out of society, I always think of the limit of even that freedom and hear my father, a devout Methodist minister, telling me one day that “If I were born in the middle east, I would be an awefully good/devout Muslim.”
Nobody is disagreeing on facts here as far as I can tell. It sounded to me (and to Gary and manyoso) that Jonas and Slarti were taking the silly position that all societies formed in some utopian voluntary contractual way, but as the rhetorical chairs and fists started to fly it became clear they don’t really think that. I suppose we could argue about whose fault it is that some of us misunderstood their position, but if so, I think I’ll just go back to spectating.
Somalia has been a libertarian paradise for decades. No government, no gun control, everyone “freely choosing” their associations and decisions. Now it’s re-organized and people are still Freely Choosing. Just as North Koreans Freely Choose what to do, and whether to stay or go.
The American Indian is not a part of our society as a result of free will. They are here and present because they were conquered.
Manyoso, I challenge you to show up at any of the many places where native americans are gathered and tell them they are ‘part of’ white man’s society. If you were lucky, you’d simply be laughed out of the place. If you weren’t so lucky, well, I hope you have health insurance. Or perhaps not. But I know that I have never told and would never tell any of the native americans I worked with that they were ‘conquered’ and that they were now ‘a part of my society’.
I understand why you are taking this line, and in some ways, it is admirable, because it seems to grow out of concern for those who may not have the choices that we have. But it is a double edged sword, because by suggesting that they have ‘nothing’, you are taking away the only thing that they do have, which is their dignity. I can understand that you might feel that Slart and Jonas are giving a ‘s**t happens’ sort of view of human history, and dismissing the true barriers that someone might have in a hopeless situation. But ‘knowing’ them, I don’t think that is the case. I would also point out that even in a place like Guantanamo, where they are taking every precaution to prevent suicides, it is still possible for prisoners there to do so, forcing the government to suggest that this is ‘asymmetric warfare’ and ‘publicity’.
Slart: “Hmmm…I don’t believe I said anything at all about creation, although I might have.”
No, you’ve been arguing with me arguing with Jonas on that point. (Which is why it’s pointless to argue with you when you won’t state your own position, since you then deny that you’re taking a position in an ongoing debate, but also refuse to take a position.)
As manyoso linked to, the argument has continued from what Jonas ludicrously claimed: “Gary, societies are formed by individuals of their own free will. If they aren’t, where did the societies come from?”
If you’ve not noticed what argument you are arguing about, I suggest backing up and rereading, and that you outline your own position.
Meanwhile, I back everything manyoso and Dr. Science have said that I’ve noticed.
Manyoso,
They could still choose to fight us. They apparently would rather not.
Society is imposed upon people in most cases. This can be horrible, this can be good. They do have the choice to resist that imposition, or comply. Free will encompasses both.
I’m realizing that “choice” is another term that is probably contributing to our inability to communicate. I do not mean that the “free will” choice we have in any situation is a choice akin to being in your kitchen and choosing to eat an apple instead of a pear. Far from it.
My definition of “free will” encompasses the individuals choice to comply with a coerced society; yours does not. The problem you describe arises under your definition of free will, not mine.
You once acknowledged that the choice does exist – and it is a bad choice, and one that is not fair to insist that anyone make. We agree about that.
I think through this anecdote we can actually speak the same language.
1. I was taking as a given that Mona & Hilzoy are in a state of nature, and therefore any culture that exists between them would not be externally coerced upon them. (In the manner you’ve recently described in your many anecdotes.)
2. Therefore if Hilzoy is able to forcefully possess the antelope, and Mona can not bring enough force to bear upon Hilzoy that she can take it, it would be fair to say that if Hilzoy gave it to Mona anyways, she did so voluntarily.
3. If there was an externally imposed society, and Mona was able to call the police, Hilzoy would have a choice to make out of her own free will. Fight to maintain her possession, run away and hide with the antelope, simply give up – any number of choices really. I’m guessing that she’d choose “give up” in the face of overwhelming force – but it was still a choice. And a society where people aren’t choosing to give in to their cultural forces isn’t going to last long.
“So there’s a whole lot of counterarguments being presented that simply don’t apply, and the dressing-up of this argument in appeal-to-emotion drag that’s based on nothing I’ve said.”
No, they’re about what Jonas has said, which we’ve disagreed with, which you’ve then objected to and disagreed with. Over and over again.
LJ,
I do not intend an affront on the dignity of Native peoples when I say they’ve been conquered. I know Native Americans, personally, who are a part of our society in every way that I am. They pay taxes. They fight in wars. They work, breathe, and live in this society. And it is arrogant to state that our society is a white society. I am not stating that.
Regarding free will as exercised by suicide: this is not the kind of free will, as socratic me has said so very well, that people have in mind when stating that societies are voluntary associations.
“Societies are formed by individuals of their own free will. If they aren’t, where did the societies come from?”
Biology, traditional, cultural evolution.
HTH.
The notion that you could go back in time to 10,000 B.C., and assuming you could speak the language, do interviews anywhere on earth, and find people who would agree that their tribal society, or families, were formed by “individuals of their own free will” is ludicrous. If you seriously believe that, you’re either just ignorant, or allowing dogma to over-ride what knowledge you have.
Instead you’d hear that this is the way it has always been, or that the gods command it, or that this simply is the way of the tribe, or any of many variants of that sort of thing.
Projecting alien beliefs into people who didn’t hold them, and then claiming they did, is inane. It’s false. It’s not true. Your thesis that this is how societies were formed is simply wrong. Any first-year anthropology student could tell you that.
Hell, anyone with the faintest knowledge of non-modern societies can tell you that.
Gary,
You seem to be itching for a fight with a libertarian in this discussion. I am unable to provide it. In fact, if anything, this conversation has made it more difficult for me to see how libertarianism is supposed to logically follow from the concept of free will.
Are they choosing without external interference? No. Do they have a choice? Yes, and that’s true of everyone.
Jonas: “Society is imposed upon people in most cases.”
So you now agree that “Gary, societies are formed by individuals of their own free will. If they aren’t, where did the societies come from?” is historically, anthropologically, and descriptively, wrong?
Because both things can’t be true. Societies can’t be primarily imposed and primarily formed out of free will. You have to pick one.
You did knock.
That about wraps it up for me. When pleasant discussion is unnecessarily turned into heated argument, I lose interest.
Slarti: That’s all I have time for right now, sorry. I imagine hilzoy will show up in a bit and show how everything Jonas and I have said is not only incorrect but morally reprehensible, but do so without accusing me of making bad-faith or otherwise shoddy arguments, or sneering at the plight of the disadvantaged.
FWIW, as a relatively uninvolved observer, I actually have no idea what your arguments are. Should you have the time, it might be worth laying them out explicitly.
“You seem to be itching for a fight with a libertarian in this discussion.”
No. I started out pointing out many areas of alignment between liberals and libertarians, and discussing issues we were in agreement upon, and I subsequently attempted to return to that theme, several times, in attempting to discuss the SCOTUS decision of the other day, which no one, including you or Slart, took the faintest interest in.
I am annoyed at the way you guys took a right turn into fantasyland with your talk of how “societies are formed,” and where they “come from,” since you’ve been making assertions that are utterly contrary to basic science about early and disparate human societies. I mean, anthropology is a real field; and what you’ve been saying simply isn’t so.
Of course, I have no idea how well-read either you or Slart are on anthropology (not that I’m a great expert; but I’ve read enough to know when nonsense is being talked).
…or, um, maybe not. nm.
Jonas,
Not the point. You said societies are formed by individuals of their own free will. Native Americans are individuals in this society yet they did not form it of their own free will. It was imposed upon them in spite of their own free will. You are implying societies are created as an act of positive assent on the part of the individuals who comprise it. Further, you have stated that societies are inherently fragile systems that can be easily dissolved where individuals no longer obey the rules.
Again, this is not true. All of human history stands in opposition to your contentions.
This is a direct contradiction to your earlier maxim that societies are created by
voluntary associationindividuals who assent to their creation.Individuals who comply under threat of death can not be said to be actively creating society. It is imposed upon them.
I realize that you would broaden your definition of free will to include coercion, but I question whether this is correct usage. Free will implies freedom. When one does not have the freedom to choose then one does not have a real choice.
This is our fundamental disagreement, I think.
You maintain that the default position, the state of nature, does not involve coercion. Again, all of human history undermines this idea. Our societies and associations are, by in large, coerced and not subject to a free choice. Where we are born and to whom is not a free choice. The societies that humans have lived in thoughout history have been, by in large, created by force.
This does not follow, because you are assuming the very thing you believe you are proving. Your argument goes like this: societies in the state of nature are by default voluntary, therefore Hilzoy must have voluntarily given the antelope to Mona. Once again, your assumption is undermined by the course of human history.
But, this says absolutely nothing about possession VS property. Like you said, Mona can also choose to use the power of the state to subdue Hilzoy, kill her, and take her possession even if Hilzoy does not assent of her own free will. And we are back to might makes right.
This is false. I don’t know how many ways we can go around and around this, but the United States society doesn’t give you a free choice whether to pay taxes. The United States society doesn’t give you a choice about whether you can own slaves. A great many individuals in this country disagreed vehemently with that last one, exercised their free will and yet here we are. They still can’t own slaves and the society the is still lasting.
Slartibartfast,
Well, I did say sorry for getting so heated and explained from whence it sprang. At the risk of repeating myself… again, sorry!
However, I question whether you are terribly interested in the discussion to begin with. All I know about your position, really, is that you’ve expressed agreement with Jonas on various points.
I don’t think any less of you or Jonas for your ideas, but I strongly disagree with them.
I understand neither of you are intending any kind of belittlement of oppressed peoples by implying they are oppressed of their own free will… you are just adopting a very odd definition of free will to suit your take on the world.
manyoso,
It is the point! Native Americans have chosen to accept our coercion. There were times in the past that they did not. Both are examples of free will.
I’m using the state of nature as a thought experiment, mostly. Clearly, if it only Mona & Hilzoy in the state of nature, the only coercion that can exist is from the two of them, as they are the only ones involved.
It’s easier for us to have a discussion about Mona and Hilzoy and the issues that exist merely between the two of them, than it is to discuss the hundreds or thousands or millions that make up most societies. As this conversation about society clearly demonstrates…
Not a “free choice,” one that is free from any external influence, but you do have free will to pay, or not to pay. That’s all free will means!
I doubt you are saying that people never make that choice, which would be absurd. I certainly do not mean “freely & easily choose” or “voluntary” or “a choice guaranteed to be successful” or that they are enjoying “freedom.”
I would never say might makes right. I would say that might can indeed win, and a combination of resolve and power greater than an opponent is darn well guaranteed to win. In fact, that’s what you’ve been saying in regards to social coercion.
Jonas,
You don’t seem to get it! You originally insisted that societies are created by mutual agreement. Now you are backing off this entirely.
They have not chosen any such thing. They were killed and slaughtered and beaten down into submission. Their lands were taken away. Their food was taken away. Forcefully, and not as a result of choice! You’re sole point seems to be that societies are entirely voluntary because people could always just up and off themselves.
Which is exactly what the same thing as saying Native Americans accepted our society by their choice not to leap off a cliff or impale themselves on a soldiers bayonet. They accepted our society by choosing to starve and die of disease.
Bound, gagged and rendered immobile, the beaten man accepts of his own free will the nature of his situation by choosing not to will himself to death.
And what of the antelope in all this? The creature must have accepted of his own free will to die at the hands of hilzoy. After all, he could’ve run off a cliff instead. He could have run into the arms of another hungry predator, but NO, instead he chose to let hilzoy kill him.
Gedanken experiment or not, you are still assuming your point a priori. It was suggested that Hilzoy and Mona might belong to a tribe that did not believe in individual property. You still maintained that Hilzoy was in a special state with regards to Mona in that she possessed the antelope. You then went on to assert that the nature of Hilzoy and Mona’s relationship must be voluntary since all societies were voluntary. You are a far cry from that original assertion now.
No. You. Do. Not.
If you refuse to pay, then according to the rules of our society that payment will be extracted from you by force and you will be deprived of the liberty necessary to choose not to pay.
Free will implies freedom. Freedom can be denied and everything you have can be taken away from you except perhaps your internal attitude. Actually, this is not true either. A man’s internal attitude can be taken away as well –> LSD, torture, mind control, lobotomy…
You and Slartibartfast, keep trying to remind me that you don’t mean everyone has good choices, but you absolutely refuse to see that a man can have even less than bad choices. A man can be deprived of any choice… at. all. No choice whatsoever.
“And we are back to might makes right.”
Did we get away from it at any point in the conversation? If the culture says that might makes right can you say that they are wrong?
🙂
“You originally insisted that societies are created by mutual agreement. Now you are backing off this entirely.”
Well, if he is, fine, let him. It would be nice for Jonas to clarify, though. (Ditto Slart, but for Slart to decline to, alas, doesn’t surprise me.)
“You’re sole point seems to be that societies are entirely voluntary because people could always just up and off themselves.”
Actually, I think you’re now missing Jonas’s point about free will, which, if discussed in a vacuum, absent his previous claims about how societies are formed, is valid, if beside the point. (You’re probably missing his point because his point is now, absent the previous discussion of how societies form in reality, abstract and pointlessly irrelevant to the discussion, but it is a valid point/usage, in abstract.)
“If the culture says that might makes right can you say that they are wrong?”
Sure.
The thread seems to be creaking under the weight of the comments. Perhaps we should all step back from it?
We’re only at 422. That isn’t so many is it? 🙂
Loading is getting a bit funky, plus I think it makes a difference if the comments are one liners versus long disquisitions.
Gary,
Well, I think Jonas and I understand each other. I don’t accept his definition of free will and he doesn’t accept mine. I’m willing to call it a day on that one.
Anyway, I am waiting for hilzoy’s next installment as I’ve really enjoyed this conversation. Thanks Jonas, Slartibartfast, Sebastian, Gary, LJ, Doctor Science, Hilzoy, all…
Somalia has been a libertarian paradise for decades. No government . . .
Cute, Gary, but aside from the absolute anarchists, every libertarian I know expects at least a “night watchman” government that protects our rights and our property. I would accept that you were engaging in hyperbole, but that’s exactly the sort of, er, “detail” from others that you generally use as the opening for assuming the mantle of Grand Inquisitor and High Badgerer of the commenters ; so I’ll assume for the nonce you actually think that libertarians consider Somalia “paradise,” and simply tell you that you’re, as the saying goes, not even wrong.
LJ,
Do you enjoy being the voice of reason or something? 😉
Gary,
You have to understand why I’ve been so stubborn in the conversation. It’s not to make you come around to my point of view, necessarily, but that quite frankly, having to vigourously defend my presuppositions has in fact helped me discover all of the nuances in it.
So, I’m not talking about a vacuum, I’m talking about a baseline. Free will is there, it most cases it’s morally irrelevant (I’m not making a claim that North Korea is A-OK because some people make the dangerous decision to leave.)
Manyoso,
The only reason I haven’t stopped is because we pretty much agree! I am putting forth a definition of free will that I’m hoping you’ll acknowledge – but I am not saying that any of the caveats you’ve brought up are not important. Of course they are, in fact they are crucially important, because the case I’m referring to is in fact an outlier, statistically speaking. That doesn’t mean it doesn’t happen, or that it’s not possible.*
And you’re welcome, and thank you for putting up with my stubbornness.
*I’ve known enough people who haven’t paid taxes to know that is indeed a choice, if one that most of us aren’t stupid enough to make.
Yikes! The thread that would not die! And the next installment still only half written — I decided to organize and put away the CDs, DVDs, and videos, which required fixing some petite issues with the relevant shelves….
libertarianism seems to be an awfully shallow and unphilosophical affair