CDR: Re: Shunning, lesbians and liberty
Sampo Syreeni writes:
On Tue, 26 Sep 2000, Gil Hamilton wrote:
This certainly gives one good reason not to piss off one's neighbors, eh?
And if your neighbours are simply malignant? Since when did people need a reason to harm each other?
Then, too bad. They haven't *done* anything to you.
This is of course the whole point of shunning. It is a way of getting people to behave in ways that are approved of by their community.
Yep. That would be my point. This sounds deceptively like holding someone at a gunpoint. It has little to do with liberty.
It has everything to do with liberty. The kind of society you envision is nightmarish: where everyone is required by law to act in certain defined ways (not merely to refrain from acts which harm others).
becomes precisely as 'violent' as physical violence. Even if psychology isn't the hardest of sciences, it does suggest that isolation does significantly more than simply 'bug' people.
Complete bullshit. In other words, "Violence is whatever I say it is."
Well, just debunk it. The point was, really, that even while I do have great reservations about treating shunning and physical violence as equivalent, I do not accept the notion of specific liberties being absolute, either.
Indeed, you seem to be quite comfortable with police-state tactics so long as the particular set of rules being enforced are those that you approve of.
I doubt that. Besides, that someone can be offended all s/he wants, s/he just shouldn't be allowed to do anything about it. (Except, of course, what the freedoms of expression/thought/association/whatever guarantee.)
So, people should be allowed the freedom of expression, thought and association, yet they are prohibited from shunning? You simply can't have it both ways.
Nor do I intend to. The point about shunning is simply about laying out some of the well known problems of thorough libertarianism. I do not think such a wide application of basic freedoms is automatically the best alternative.
It seems that you're really not at all interested in freedom of any kind. Indeed, you share much with the so-called "liberal" elements of US society. Lots of lip service to compassion for other people, equality and brotherhood, all enforced at the point of a gun.
Either one is free to not associate with someone or they are not (in which case, their "freedom of expression and association" are nothing but lip service).
There is no essential reason why those freedoms couldn't be defined in some more limited form. It's not like these concepts are black and white.
Go to a dictionary and look up the several meanings of "freedom". Then come back and tell me which one of those squares with your notion of people being forced to do things they don't wish to do.
I don't see it quite like that. In order to have meaningful freedoms one needs to have the possibility of enjoying them.
Even if it requires *forcing other people* to do things they don't want to do.
Perhaps. Just as we force people not to do some things, like engage in physical violence. If we give people full control over all aspects of their association and on any conduct on their property, as you would probably like, you will most likely end up with the same restrictions (or even more), only this time enforced by way of lynch mobs.
A complete non sequitur. Indeed diametrically opposed to anything I have said. A lynch mob, almost by definition, is an imposition of brute force against others. (It must have been a tortured mental path indeed that led from the exercising of one's rights to association and enjoyment of one's own property to lynch mobs. Someday maybe you'll take the rest of us along for the ride, eh?)
Look at it this way: if for some reason the survival of each and every human being is conditioned on some part of the population doing thing x, wouldn't you say it is fair to demand that x be done even if the individuals would not want to? It's not a huge leap from this to limiting such 'inalienable' rights as the right to property.
I reject the premise as ridiculous and contrived. But in a word, no, I wouldn't say it is fair. (Nor am I interested in striving for "fairness", about which more below.)
People must behave exactly as you define "playing nice". Otherwise, you think they must be forced to "play nice". Clearly, you're right and everyone else is wrong and everyone else must be forced to do things your way.
Not really. I have no essential trouble giving certain parts of my freedoms away if that gains me the actual possibility of applying the remaining parts. And yes, this is the point where you cue in the talk about expanding governments, Big Brothers and whatnot.
It's quite apparent you have no trouble giving up your freedoms. Worse, you have no trouble giving up mine too.
"Oh, but if they'll just 'play nice' then everyone is free to do as they please!"
Free as in having certain freedoms, which in this case have been more narrowly tailored. Besides, I've not quite committed to actually advocating such a model, yet. I'm just asking questions.
"When I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean. Neither more, nor less." said Humpty Dumpty. However, for the rest of us, "freedom" has a certain meaning which you are not "free" to redefine. In Sampo's Orwellian world, "freedom" apparently means something else.
Except somehow merely refusing to associate with someone is categorized by you as physical violence. And apparently as a shop-owner I cannot exercise rights over *my own property* if what I choose to do is inconvenient for someone else.
If we, for some reason, have an (in)action, some damage and a strong proof of causality, it is difficult to justify differential treatment based on whether the damage comes from action or inaction.
Absent a clearly established obligation or responsibility to perform some action, it is quite easy to justify differential treatment. And our legal system at least has always done so.
And as for *your own property*, it simply isn't given that 1) all things can/should be privately owned (scarce resources, like the radio spectrum, are a classical example) or 2) owning certain things or using them in certain ways shouldn't perhaps come with extra obligations (like using RF communication with extra responsibilities to minimize interference).
I don't consider the radio spectrum to be particularly scarce, nor do I support the necessity for it to be government-controlled. Nonetheless, such a shared resource is not at all the subject that was being discussed.
The shop owner must be *forced* to tolerate behavior he doesn't approve of? What happened to his right to his own property? Must he also allow people to have sex in his shop? Or masturbate? Or curse? Or insult his customers? Or slander the shopkeeper? Or sing loudly?
Some of the above, perhaps. If people are indeed dependent on shopping for their survival, I do think their right to live sort of preempts the shop owner's property rights.
In other words, the shop owner *has* no rights. Only responsibilities. And if he behaves well, Sampo's world will let him keep some of the benefits of his property and his labor. (Not too much though! He might start to think he has a right to it!)
Which set of things must he be forced to accept? And if he throws someone out for engaging in one of these behaviors, which things will cause the Men With Guns to come and arrest *him* for "violating their right of expression"?
Those are particulars of the social contract in effect in the corresponding society. They need not be universal.
"Er, I really don't like to get too specific."
Since food and the like are necessities of life, isn't anyone free to come in and just take whatever they like from the shop? After all, "What if you do not have the means? You just die?" No, clearly the shopkeeper would be "doing violence" to me if he tried to prevent me from taking what I need to live.
That is an extremely good question. In fact a central one to liberal theory. I most certainly do not have an answer.
Your answer is already quite clear.
Life is unfair. Get over it. Those that depend on others for their well-being or continued survival would do well to be more polite to them.
So, essentially, if somebody can oppress others, why not? Especially if there's profit or fun to it? Again this has little to do with liberty as I understand the concept.
"Oppress"? Where did that come from? Again, your words are slippery and seem to mean whatever you want them to mean from moment to moment. I don't consider my failure to do as you wish I would "oppression".
If you live at home with Mommy and Daddy, then you'd better behave as they specify. Likewise, if you must rely on commerce with others for your survival, you'd better think twice about offending them.
But even when you're *real* nice to them, they still have the incentive to exploit you. If you go this way, all the nice talk about liberties and freedom don't matter squat.
First "oppress", now "exploit". You've been reading your Marx again, haven't you? Again, my failure to satisfy your every whim does not constitute "exploitation".
Could you explain how this differs from fascism?
Fascism? I don't see the relationship. Indeed, it is your notion that people must be forced to act in certain ways by an all-powerful government, not mine.
In Sampo's world, it's okay to force someone to provide service to those who insult them or offend them. I wonder whatever happened to *their* liberties.
They got limited. That is what happens when you live in a society. Whoever said life is fair?
Certainly not I. Liberty is another word you could stand to look up. Liberty does not equal equality. Nor is equality a goal I would espouse for the kind of society I believe in, since that inevitably means taking from those who have more and giving to those who have less (without regard to whether they "deserve" it or not). - GH _________________________________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com. Share information about yourself, create your own public profile at http://profiles.msn.com.
On Wed, 27 Sep 2000, Gil Hamilton wrote:
And if your neighbours are simply malignant? Since when did people need a reason to harm each other?
Then, too bad. They haven't *done* anything to you.
A distinction without a difference, I say.
Yep. That would be my point. This sounds deceptively like holding someone at a gunpoint. It has little to do with liberty.
It has everything to do with liberty. The kind of society you envision is nightmarish: where everyone is required by law to act in certain defined ways (not merely to refrain from acts which harm others).
I think it is a workable argument that it is better to have such social rules encoded in law instead of having people come up with them at will and imposing them on others through shunning, lynching or whatever. In theory at least you will then know in advance whether something you have done will be 'illegal'. Besides, current law in most countries holds precisely that sort of stuff. Probably the best Finnish example is conscript duty. (No, I'm not saying that isn't nightmarish.)
Well, just debunk it. The point was, really, that even while I do have great reservations about treating shunning and physical violence as equivalent, I do not accept the notion of specific liberties being absolute, either.
Indeed, you seem to be quite comfortable with police-state tactics so long as the particular set of rules being enforced are those that you approve of.
anarchy, injustice and immorality as long as the particular set of rules leading to them is the one you approve of. This doesn't lead anywhere.
There is no essential reason why those freedoms couldn't be defined in some more limited form. It's not like these concepts are black and white.
Go to a dictionary and look up the several meanings of "freedom". Then come back and tell me which one of those squares with your notion of people being forced to do things they don't wish to do.
The dictionary definition is simply one end of a whole spectrum. Besides, if I wanted to nitpick, the Webster definition, 'Exempt from subjection to the will of others' strictly interpreted sort of rules out shunning and other forms of extortion.
Look at it this way: if for some reason the survival of each and every human being is conditioned on some part of the population doing thing x, wouldn't you say it is fair to demand that x be done even if the individuals would not want to? It's not a huge leap from this to limiting such 'inalienable' rights as the right to property.
I reject the premise as ridiculous and contrived.
Let the part of population be those that own farming land. Let x be farming it.
But in a word, no, I wouldn't say it is fair. (Nor am I interested in striving for "fairness", about which more below.)
You agree, then?
It's quite apparent you have no trouble giving up your freedoms. Worse, you have no trouble giving up mine too.
Who said you had any in the first place? That is something you have to justify separately.
If we, for some reason, have an (in)action, some damage and a strong proof of causality, it is difficult to justify differential treatment based on whether the damage comes from action or inaction.
Absent a clearly established obligation or responsibility to perform some action, it is quite easy to justify differential treatment.
Do the honors.
And our legal system at least has always done so.
Which some people could consider odd in the extreme. I do not take such things for granted.
I don't consider the radio spectrum to be particularly scarce,
If we look at specific applications (like mobile data transfer), we would like to use bands which are below 1-2 GHz because line-of-sight communications limit the usability of any equipment. We would like to get by with a minimum investment of physical resources, implying large coverage for a single antenna installation. In metropolitan areas, this hardly suffices for high bandwidth applications alone - nothing left over. This is what a sane person would do provided no scarcity exists. Now consider what happens when two independent parties do this in the same city. A mess. There is considerable scarcity.
Nonetheless, such a shared resource is not at all the subject that was being discussed.
But if you acknowledge the existence of shared resources, you will have to explain why, for instance, food, services, whatever really, aren't shared but private.
Some of the above, perhaps. If people are indeed dependent on shopping for their survival, I do think their right to live sort of preempts the shop owner's property rights.
In other words, the shop owner *has* no rights.
Explain. This simply does not follow from the above. In the above situation the existence of a right demands less than in your ideal universe.
"Er, I really don't like to get too specific."
No. I mean what I say - the specific set of behaviors which have to be tolerated even though they infringe on your rights is to a degree arbitrary and subject to change. It's a gray area and should be left as such. There will always be such a gray area, though. E.g. you cannot expect to shut people up based on the acoustics of their speech violating your right to be left alone. Not even when you have no way to escape the sound.
"Oppress"? Where did that come from? Again, your words are slippery and seem to mean whatever you want them to mean from moment to moment. I don't consider my failure to do as you wish I would "oppression".
A hypothetical: I own everything around you for some 100 miles. Let's say that 100 miles happens to be desert. Your failure to comply with my wish of transportation the hell out of there or sustain me is equivalent to killing me. I call such incompliance oppression. Webster for oppression: 'To impose excessive burdens upon; to overload; hence, to treat with unjust rigor or with cruelty'.
First "oppress", now "exploit". You've been reading your Marx again, haven't you? Again, my failure to satisfy your every whim does not constitute "exploitation".
Webster for 'exploit': 'To utilize; to make available; to get the value or usefulness out of; as, to exploit a mine or agricultural lands; to exploit public opinion'. I'm not talking about satisfying whims, but basic needs. If you have in your power to fulfill such a need, I cannot myself, and I will be rid of a fundamental right (like the right to life) otherwise, you should satisfy the need. If you take this as a premise, as I try to, not complying fits the above description.
Could you explain how this differs from fascism?
Fascism? I don't see the relationship. Indeed, it is your notion that people must be forced to act in certain ways by an all-powerful government, not mine.
Who said anything about a government. Or all-powerful. Who said anything about forcing (persuasion can have equivalent results, as the Drug War demonstrates). What I'm talking about is oppression by majorities, which can very well happen with or without a government.
Certainly not I. Liberty is another word you could stand to look up.
Webster: 'The state of a free person; exemption from subjection to the will of another claiming ownership of the person or services; freedom; -- opposed to slavery, serfdom, bondage, or subjection.' Nothing here to suggest certain limitations cannot be made.
Liberty does not equal equality. Nor is equality a goal I would espouse for the kind of society I believe in, since that inevitably means taking from those who have more and giving to those who have less (without regard to whether they "deserve" it or not).
In my books, freedom/liberty also does not equal the right to limit other's respective freedoms/liberties. Both words are defined as the absence of a condition which in all practical situations to so degree applies. They cannot be interpreted absolutely. You will also have a lot of explaining to do if you assume that those who have automatically deserve to. I'm not going to turn Marxist on you, here, but I consider inequality something that should be limited (though not abolished). Sampo Syreeni <decoy@iki.fi>, aka decoy, student/math/Helsinki university
Sampo A Syreeni <ssyreeni@cc.helsinki.fi> wrote:
Then, too bad. They haven't *done* anything to you.
A distinction without a difference, I say.
Not at all. The distinction is in the same vein as the distinction between talking about something and actually doing it.
anarchy, injustice and immorality as long as the particular set of rules leading to them is the one you approve of. This doesn't lead anywhere.
You can't draw this parallel, though. You see, he is only proposing the _lack_ of certain forces compelling you to do something. This is not advocating "anarchy, injustice, and immorality," but simply rejecting regulations on how one should associate with the rest of society. Further, setting a precedent whereby it is acceptable to legislate "proper behavior" is obviously flawed, because you can't provide a valid distinction between nice fuzzy laws compelling you to behave in a certain way and the laws of an Orwellian nightmare as you'd certainly like to. On the other hand, making a distinction between laws that compel behavior of one sort and laws that simply prevent certain behaviors is perfectly acceptable, and necessary. The argument is really, I think, about laws which limit positive actions (shooting someone) versus laws which limit negative actions (not associating with someone). The latter are, for Gil, for me, and for most people on this list, unacceptable.
The dictionary definition is simply one end of a whole spectrum. Besides, if I wanted to nitpick, the Webster definition, 'Exempt from subjection to the will of others' strictly interpreted sort of rules out shunning and other forms of extortion.
Please admit that you just used a squirrel definition so we can kill the worms in this can quickly. Restrictions on the negative liberty in question (that is, _not_ to associate with someone) are obviously more intrusive than laws that limit positive liberties (e.g. the liberty to kill your neighbor).
Who said you had any in the first place? That is something you have to justify separately.
This statement tells me that there is no common ground between you and Gil, or between you and me. Gil and I start from the assumption that you have liberties that the government cannot take away, while you seem to be coming from the perspective that the government gives its people certain liberties, but that liberty comes from nowhere else but government. Perhaps it's not even worth it to argue any more.
But if you acknowledge the existence of shared resources, you will have to explain why, for instance, food, services, whatever really, aren't shared but private.
I put forth this explanation: shared resources are those resources to which it is impossible to restrict access. A lighthouse built on the coast and the radio spectrum are both examples of shared resources. Food is not. I can keep you from eating my food without too much trouble--I can lock it in a safe or I can eat it. I can discriminate as to whom I will provide services, et cetera.
Explain. This simply does not follow from the above. In the above situation the existence of a right demands less than in your ideal universe.
No, not at all. A shopkeeper who owns a private shop has the right to sell only to certain people and not to others, and the distinction the shop owner makes between those he will sell to and those he will not is his alone to make.
No. I mean what I say - the specific set of behaviors which have to be tolerated even though they infringe on your rights is to a degree arbitrary and subject to change. It's a gray area and should be left as such. There will always be such a gray area, though. E.g. you cannot expect to shut people up based on the acoustics of their speech violating your right to be left alone. Not even when you have no way to escape the sound.
But why not? Why is this different from forcing a shop owner to sell to people he would not otherwise serve? It seems that if I cannot limit your right to speak, even if I can't escape the sound of your voice, you can't limit my right not to sell food to you even if it means you will starve.
A hypothetical: I own everything around you for some 100 miles. Let's say that 100 miles happens to be desert. Your failure to comply with my wish of transportation the hell out of there or sustain me is equivalent to killing me. I call such incompliance oppression. Webster for oppression: 'To impose excessive burdens upon; to overload; hence, to treat with unjust rigor or with cruelty'.
Neither Gil nor anyone else is your caretaker; thus, you are imposing upon him by asking him to transport you out of there. This is again a distinction between positive and negative action. You say his _in_action is an undue burden on you. I say that your request for his action is an undue burden on him.
Webster for 'exploit': 'To utilize; to make available; to get the value or usefulness out of; as, to exploit a mine or agricultural lands; to exploit public opinion'. I'm not talking about satisfying whims, but basic needs. If you have in your power to fulfill such a need, I cannot myself, and I will be rid of a fundamental right (like the right to life) otherwise, you should satisfy the need. If you take this as a premise, as I try to, not complying fits the above description.
You have a right to life. You do not have the right not to die. There is a difference. Neither I nor anyone else have to sustain your life; all that is required of our respecting your right not to die is that we don't kill you. -- Riad Wahby rsw@mit.edu MIT VI-2/A 2002 5105
On Wed, 27 Sep 2000, Riad S. Wahby wrote:
Sampo A Syreeni <ssyreeni@cc.helsinki.fi> wrote:
No, not at all. A shopkeeper who owns a private shop has the right to sell only to certain people and not to others, and the distinction the shop owner makes between those he will sell to and those he will not is his alone to make.
A hypothetical: I own everything around you for some 100 miles. Let's say that 100 miles happens to be desert. Your failure to comply with my wish of transportation the hell out of there or sustain me is equivalent to killing me. I call such incompliance oppression.
I call such incompliance evolutionary pressure. Let us hope that you are not really such a complete nincompoop as to get into the middle of a 200-mile diameter stretch of desert without having provided for your own sustenance or transport the hell out of there. Freedom entails not just the right, but the *RESPONSIBILITY*, to take care of yourself. As the sole posessor of the right to get yourself into such a situation, you are also the sole posessor of the responsibility to make sure you can get out of it. Of course, as a believer in the free market, I support the right of anyone to charge "whatever the traffic will bear" in such a situation for sustenance or transport - and it seems to me that unprepared traffic might be ready to bear some extreme prices. And worth every penny for the object lesson in preparedness.
You have a right to life. You do not have the right not to die. There is a difference. Neither I nor anyone else have to sustain your life; all that is required of our respecting your right not to die is that we don't kill you.
It can be a subtle concept to those not accustomed to sole responsibilities going with autonomous rights -- but this is exactly correct. When you have the right to do as you please, the only way to not die is to not please to do really stupid things. If nobody has the right to stop you, nobody should be expected to put themselves out to rescue you either. If I were expected to rescue all the idiots I've seen throwing their odds of survival or success away by doing idiotic things, I'd have gone mad long ago. Ray
On Wed, 27 Sep 2000, Ray Dillinger wrote:
I call such incompliance evolutionary pressure. Let us hope that you are not really such a complete nincompoop as to get into the middle of a 200-mile diameter stretch of desert without having provided for your own sustenance or transport the hell out of there. Freedom entails not just the right, but the *RESPONSIBILITY*, to take care of yourself. As the sole posessor of the right to get yourself into such a situation, you are also the sole posessor of the responsibility to make sure you can get out of it.
Oh but it is quite possible to put people in similar trouble if we grant that the right to property is absolute - if somebody owns on a sufficiently wide scale the basic commodities one needs to survive in the modern world (like fresh water, farming land, employment opportunities), others are born right in the middle of the proverbial desert. Sampo Syreeni <decoy@iki.fi>, aka decoy, student/math/Helsinki university
On Thu, 28 Sep 2000, Sampo A Syreeni wrote:
On Wed, 27 Sep 2000, Ray Dillinger wrote:
I call such incompliance evolutionary pressure. Let us hope that you are not really such a complete nincompoop as to get into the middle of a 200-mile diameter stretch of desert without having provided for your own sustenance or transport the hell out of there. Freedom entails not just the right, but the *RESPONSIBILITY*, to take care of yourself. As the sole posessor of the right to get yourself into such a situation, you are also the sole posessor of the responsibility to make sure you can get out of it.
Oh but it is quite possible to put people in similar trouble if we grant that the right to property is absolute - if somebody owns on a sufficiently wide scale the basic commodities one needs to survive in the modern world (like fresh water, farming land, employment opportunities), others are born right in the middle of the proverbial desert.
Hmm. I see your point. Freedom among equals means that neither has the right to place a burden upon the other. A can't command B to do anything, and B can't command A to do anything. If A wants to wander out into the middle of the desert, A knows damn well he'd better provide for himself, because, while he can *ask* B for help, and if B isn't a jerk he'll probably provide it, A has no right to *command* B to help. Classic case; A didn't plant anything on his fields, didn't work the land, didn't do any food gathering or hunting -- does A now have the right to *command* B to feed him, just because he'll starve if B doesn't? If so then what motive does anyone have to get their own food, as long as their neighbor has enough to feed them? At what point does A stop looking like a victim to you and start looking like a leech? --- Freedom among unequal people is a very different matter. Or is it? It *looks* like a different matter, when, as you point out, one person can be born in the middle of another's desert. But people can only be born to parents who are somehow surviving in that environment. The implication is that the environment is survivable after all, and your life does *NOT* in fact depend on the power to make a burdensome demand. And if you can survive there, then you have some kind of power that you can probably use to work your way out of it with sufficient skill, planning, and hard work. I come from a family of mostly disenfranchised people. Persecuted religious minorities living in poverty and isolation on my mom's side, hillbillies living in poverty and isolation on my dad's side. I had a pretty serious "desert" to work my way out of, so I know what you're talking about in a way that most americans won't. And I still say that private ownership and freedom, in most things, is a better path. I believe in enough government to provide elementary education for all who want it, to break up monopolies occasionally when there is really egregious abuse of monopoly power, and to stop people from stealing from one another or killing one another. To the extent that governments do other things, they are exceeding the authority I'd have assigned them. I don't believe in protecting idiots from themselves. If you protect idiots from themselves, it's very *VERY* expensive unless you also take away their freedom to get into trouble. And that means taking away the freedoms of reasonable men to do something of their own choosing as well. Ray
On Thu, 28 Sep 2000, Ray Dillinger wrote:
If so then what motive does anyone have to get their own food, as long as their neighbor has enough to feed them? At what point does A stop looking like a victim to you and start looking like a leech?
Pretty soon, I suppose. I would have a hard time drawing the exact line. This is, I guess, the thing that most bothers people with current models of welfare, especially when somebody perceived as being an outsider is taken within such a system.
can be born in the middle of another's desert. But people can only be born to parents who are somehow surviving in that environment. The implication is that the environment is survivable after all, and your life does *NOT* in fact depend on the power to make a burdensome demand.
The Western civilization supports individuals to such a degree that the above does not apply. People can indeed be born to parents which could not survive in the ideal libertarian society. In other parts of the world, and in earlier times, I believe death precisely of the kind described above do/did occur (e.g. the famines in Africa, often caused by those responsible for the production of food acting purely in their own interest) and are perceived as barbarian by us. That is one of the reasons why we measure a society by, e.g., its infant mortality. As for what this means purely within our hypothetical world of absolute ownership and slim governments, we get proles dependent on the owning class for survival. It is never in the best interest of the owner to kill the dependent one, just to extort him/her. I perceive this as a very concrete threat to liberty.
I had a pretty serious "desert" to work my way out of, so I know what you're talking about in a way that most americans won't.
That is a powerful argument against any personal motives I may have. But it is still well documented that financial inequality is on a rise all over the world, that is, the deserts are getting bigger. Might be that in a hundred years, you would have been awarded a life of financial slavery.
I believe in enough government to provide elementary education for all who want it, to break up monopolies occasionally when there is really egregious abuse of monopoly power, and to stop people from stealing from one another or killing one another. To the extent that governments do other things, they are exceeding the authority I'd have assigned them.
I mostly agree. I do not like broad governments or legistlative bloat either. I just can't seem to shake some of the less humane consequences of liberalism.
I don't believe in protecting idiots from themselves.
Agreed. Paternalism *is* Bad. Sampo Syreeni <decoy@iki.fi>, aka decoy, student/math/Helsinki university
On Wed, 27 Sep 2000, Riad S. Wahby wrote:
Not at all. The distinction is in the same vein as the distinction between talking about something and actually doing it.
I.e. you both evaluate actions as such, I tend to evaluate them based on their consequences. [Snip on intrusiveness of regulation of action and inaction]
The latter are, for Gil, for me, and for most people on this list, unacceptable.
I know and I appreciate the viewpoint in question. I raised some mild doubts about it and apparently have to bear the consequences, now...
the worms in this can quickly. Restrictions on the negative liberty in question (that is, _not_ to associate with someone) are obviously more intrusive than laws that limit positive liberties (e.g. the liberty to kill your neighbor).
I do not see the essential difference. I see that as an axiom which need not hold. OTOH, no point in debating axioms...
This statement tells me that there is no common ground between you and Gil, or between you and me. Gil and I start from the assumption that you have liberties that the government cannot take away, while you seem to be coming from the perspective that the government gives its people certain liberties, but that liberty comes from nowhere else but government. Perhaps it's not even worth it to argue any more.
Actually I subscribe to neither view. I see rights as something that do not naturally exist, but are purely a societal product, subject to change through redefinition. Whether this happens because the government effects it or if the people start to view something as an inherent right is, to me, immaterial. I also have trouble with argumentation which starts from a clean slate, since such a thing does not exist in reality.
I put forth this explanation: shared resources are those resources to which it is impossible to restrict access. A lighthouse built on the coast and the radio spectrum are both examples of shared resources.
If everybody around you decides your shop is now a shared resource, it will be, by your definition. Since I view rights as highly relative, you cannot even call this thievery.
No, not at all. A shopkeeper who owns a private shop has the right to sell only to certain people and not to others, and the distinction the shop owner makes between those he will sell to and those he will not is his alone to make.
If you do not define commerce as a shared resource, which in some cases just might be sensible.
But why not? Why is this different from forcing a shop owner to sell to people he would not otherwise serve? It seems that if I cannot limit your right to speak, even if I can't escape the sound of your voice, you can't limit my right not to sell food to you even if it means you will starve.
Because I evaluate based on the outcome. In the first case, the sound bugs you if it bugs you. (And yes, in some cases the damage could be enough to regulate the speech. This is, thankfully, rare.) In the second case you die. There is a conflict of interests and I rank. Admittedly you could place the value of the right to exist below that of not having to listen to someone and resolve this particular problem. I think it would be problematic elsewhere.
You say his _in_action is an undue burden on you. I say that your request for his action is an undue burden on him.
Yep, this is the difference in viewpoint. I do not view regulation of inaction as fundamentally different from the regulation of action, relying instead on the consequences of each to resolve possible conflicts. Perhaps we will get to burying this thread before I acquire the reputation of being a troll beyond rescue...
You have a right to life. You do not have the right not to die. There is a difference. Neither I nor anyone else have to sustain your life; all that is required of our respecting your right not to die is that we don't kill you.
And again. I am, under some circumstances, ready to regulate inaction whereas you are not. Sampo Syreeni <decoy@iki.fi>, aka decoy, student/math/Helsinki university
Sampo A Syreeni <ssyreeni@cc.helsinki.fi> wrote:
I.e. you both evaluate actions as such, I tend to evaluate them based on their consequences.
I think this is the fundamental difference. The only argument I can put forth is that legislating based on outcomes is nearly impossible. How am I to know that X will happen? If it does, and I am being held accountable, can I say that I didn't know it was going to happen? If so, then how do you enforce the law? If not, what protection do I have from a government that seeks to persecute me?
I do not see the essential difference. I see that as an axiom which need not hold. OTOH, no point in debating axioms...
The essential difference is that restricting positive liberties tends to have the effect of restricting a narrow range of actions (you cannot murder someone), whereas restricting negative liberties cuts a wide swath (you cannot shun your neighbor, or, equivalently, you must associate with your neighbor).
Actually I subscribe to neither view. I see rights as something that do not naturally exist, but are purely a societal product, subject to change through redefinition. Whether this happens because the government effects it or if the people start to view something as an inherent right is, to me, immaterial. I also have trouble with argumentation which starts from a clean slate, since such a thing does not exist in reality.
True, but it is at least useful. Starting from, for example, Nozick's "state of nature" can be helpful as, at the very least, a thought experiment.
If everybody around you decides your shop is now a shared resource, it will be, by your definition. Since I view rights as highly relative, you cannot even call this thievery.
Perhaps I was not as clear as I should have been. The word intractible may have been a better one to use. It is tractible to keep theives from getting into my store in all but the most extreme circumstances. It is wholly intractible to make it impossible for a given person to see the light from a lighthouse. I can see that we have basically two differences in opinion from which all of this stems. First, you are willing to evaluate based on outcomes, whereas I say it is impossible to do so. Second, you are willing to impose restrictions on negative liberty, and I am not. -- Riad Wahby rsw@mit.edu MIT VI-2/A 2002 5105
participants (4)
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Gil Hamilton -
Ray Dillinger -
Riad S. Wahby -
Sampo A Syreeni