Topic: European Union is robbing its citizens' bank accounts. 9.9% to be confiscated. - page 2. (Read 33197 times)

I hope for the sake of humanity that you are right that we are in a transition from irrational to rational.

There is a way to make ethics rational. Read about universally preferable behavior.

So how about taking the life of someone who tries to take your phone?
Would it be murder if you killed me because i took a match out of your matchbox or not?
And if not, how big should the property be before you are moraly justified to take someones life over it?
And who is going to evaluate it? And what if the person trying to take your property is threatened with his life to do so? Will you give him a chance to explain his situation and if so how will you make the corpse talk?

It's actually not difficult once you understand what ethics actually are. (I'm going to use ethics from now on because morality is a subset of ethics)

People use ethical arguments to influence the behavior of other people, either that the other person should or shout not take an action. Ethical arguments differ from other means of persuasion in that they appeal to some universal standard instead of the personal preference of the speaker. If you can convince other people that it is consistent with a universal standard of "good" to give you their best lamb every Sunday, they will be more likely to do so that if you just tell them that you want them to give you their stuff for free. We appear to have an instinctive understanding that the personal preferences of other people do not create obligations in us, but universal principles apply to everybody.

Once you know what an ethical argument is, you can examine it rationally. If somebody proposes an ethical rule that can not reflect a universal principle without creating a contradiction then the rule is false. Weeding out all the false arguments will leave behind the truth by elimination, just like how the scientific method is used to weed out incorrect hypotheses.

I'd say we're in a transition from less rational to more rational.
At the very least we have the capability of empathy so there has been some ratio to this whole morality thing for some time now.
Whatever the reasons for its evolution, it allows us to think of ourselfs as if in the shoes of another. We even anthropomorphize, which brings us into trouble when we project our moral delineators on unsuspecting systems.
And i think that this kind of reflection is realy the basis for any rational moral structure. Reflection being, in a way, a simulation where you analyze the situation from someones viewpoint.
But it somehow seems to me that there is no way to make morality perfecty rational. It will always require a viewpoint and choosing the viewpoint is a moral choice in itself. Is it good, per se, to decide what is good?

Yes, we find lots and lots of chaos in the universe. Even in the movement of stars. But in the case of orbits the chaotic component is usually small compared to the stable component.
It is the stabilizing force of gravity that creates our solar system, but it is the semi-chaotic nature of atoms driven by photons that makes life possible. This balance between order and chaos is underpinning the whole of the known universe, on all levels.

As i explained above, this is hardly a notion exclusive to our part of the universe.
The only sense in which we 'have' to have these larger structures in society is to contain the information flowing at that level. If you don't define some overarching rules (or if these rules are not somehow in place, like they are in nature) then there is no game at that level and the process becomes chaotic there. Good luck getting others like yourself to share resource. Can you imagine how our world would look russia suddenly decided on their own to stop exporting energy and saudi arabia single handedly decided that crude price is now 5x the previous price?
I mean, you can try to negotiate without the help of an overarching structure but both russia and saudi arabia will laugh in your face. You know why? Because they have something you need and it is more basic than anything you have that they may need.
It is exactly my trust in humans to operate along certain enthropic principles that makes me say this. Survival of the individual is programmed to take precedence over survival of the group, which is programmed to take precedence over survival of the species.

Well, there's yer problem.
Or in any case, a very likely place to find the current problems.
The problem is that these global interactions are pretty new to us and we are still finding out what the best balance is.
Parasites will roam freely, but they do so everywhere in nature so there is nothing new there. If anything, we need to learn to survive despite the parasites. Sometimes parasites can become usefull to the goal of survival. Sometimes even necessary. That is the reality we humans must deal with. You can't have meat without killing an animal. You can't have a computer to type on without chinese slave workers. The chinese slave worker cannot get a better house without you buying the stuff they make.
It all is dictated by enthropy and that is what forces out hierarchies of energy (most basic resource). Energy is what makes life possible. Denying someone energy means killing them. But energy, at the rate we are consuming it, is not abundant. The world contains and receives only a certain ammount of energy. All life somehow competes for this limited resource and humans are particularilly good at it within their own class (multicellular animal life). And because we are good at it we outcompete other species in our branch of the energy hierarchy. Effectively we have become the most elite top predator on earth. And these energy hierarchies continue throughout our social structures as well. We evolved along many levels of hierarchies. We can classify the universe because there are hierarchies.
But can we become the top of the piramid of life?
Well, no, because we need the plants. Plants sustain a relatively stable substrate of oxygen and nutrients that is needed by most non-plant life to exist. But not all plants are good for all of life. Plants can act pretty egotistically. If a pond has too many nutrients and a water plant grows over the whole of the surface most of the life (including other plants) in the pond dies away. So the situation is, we need this overarching system of plants to even begin thinking about our own structure in any sense. Without plants all modern life would be destroyed to a primordial state. But plants are systems of their own and allow dynamics that are not necessarily benefitial to the whole. That is why humans have learned to control plant life (one can argue that we control it too much).
And we have a similar situation within human society.
We need a structure to somehow manage the logistics of resources on the biggest scale applicable (in our case, the world) so that a certain balance is maintained. The question is not if this structure is needed but rather where you want to put the balance and how you can achieve that. And if i make the comparison to our relation with plants, maybe we have let the garden overgrow a bit too much. Time to pull out the weeds.
To resolve to this equilibrium you would need to let the participants compete over energy again. I can already tell you who the winners will be and that the losers will fall so far behind that our global society will rip apart.
The thing is that we, as a world, need this to resolve to cooperation. Any other resolution will involve a lot dead people.
Competing for energy is not a good way to ensure cooperation.
You can even say that competition is a pretty dubious way of cooperating if not for a larger overarching structure that ensures a basic security (this also involves a basic division of resources) for the parties involved.
Anarchy trivially allows for feedback loops that have a degenerate effect on the system as a whole. Trust is somethig that does not work automatically on a large scale and the pressure of competing over resources will lead to deception (humans, compared to other lifeforms, are particularilly good at deceiving. It servers the same purpose as aggression but is non violent in its operation) and aggression. These factors in turn make the system lose cohesion over time.
Anarchy can only work on a very small scale where everyone already has enough resources. Then you can have enough trust. They are your neighbours and you know they won't take your stuff. But even in these small more or less personal level situations things get ugly when resources are limited. A neighbor would steel your chicken if it means he can survive. This is just how humans work. And to remind you, it is because we evolved along enthropic hierarchies that make our universe move.
Morals are something typically human and play only a secondary role. If you have no food your moral standards tend to become less important.
Efficiency is maybe also not the right term to define these things. Sometimes you need to put up with some inefficiencies to achieve a certain goal. Evolution operates in this way. We still expend energy to grow an appendix but yet we are pretty successfull.
I think that human society is pretty inefficent as a whole. We waste a lot of energy (in fact, we waste a HUGE amount of energy) on things that are not realy needed. We piss away energy for fun. No other lifeform does this to such a degree.
But at the same time, we are the top multicellular species on the surface. So how could we have become so dominant while throwing away all this energy? So i have a problem with this notion of efficiency.  

How does murder include anything else than elements of wrongfulness? Murder is always wrong, only exception is when it is used in defense of life or property. I cannot think of any other situation in which murder would be right.

How does self-defense include any other elements than rightfulness? Self-defense is always right. I cannot think of any situation in which self-defense is wrong.

I don't get the point you are making that the claim "murder is wrong, unless it is used in defense of life or property" is problematic.



You just made sense of it. Murder/killing is wrong if you shoot someone that is trying to take his own car. If he tries to take your car, you are allowed to defend your property.



No. The prerequisite is problematic. How can you know for sure if he is going to die if he doesn't get the job at your store? If it is a fact, you can voluntarily choose to save him, but if you don't you haven't murdered him.

You are introducing another moral argument, which is if people have an obligation to help each other. This is preferable behavior, but only if it is voluntary.



No. Your kidney is your property. If him going to die is a fact, you can voluntarily choose to donate your kidney and save his life. But if you don't you haven't murdered him.



So you're arguing that the NAP is not valid because we won't be able to define property rights? And because we don't have a scope of moral authority?

I agree there is much more philosophical enlightenment necessary to define what universally preferable behavior is. But I think the NAP is the best starting point. If you don't have an alternative and we are not even able to agree on the most basic principle of non-aggression, there is no further use in discussing it.

Iam very dis pointed was hoping for bank runs in Italy and Spain today 

You made no mistake. Self-defense includes defense of others and defense of property.

The problem with claims like "murder, unless in self-defence, is wrong" is that "murder" already includes elements of wrongfulness in it and self-defence already includes elements of rightfulness in it.

For example, I shoot someone because they were trying to take a car. Is that "murder, unless in self-defence"? Well, yes if it's his car but not if it's my car. So you can't even make sense of "murder, unless in self-defence" until you already have a full theory of rightful ownership of property.

Someone needs a job at my store or else they'll die of starvation. I don't hire them because I want them to die. Is that "murder, unless in self-defence"?

Someone needs a kidney transplant or else they'll die and I have the only matching kidney. I decide not to donate it. Is that "murder, unless in self-defence"?

This is the problem with the NAP. It seems simple and seductive. But you can't actually determine what is or isn't "aggression" until you already have both an absolute notion of property rights and a notion of a scope of moral authority.

I agree. If humanity evolves and still exists in hundreds of years, they will look back at the state like we look at slavery and increasingly at religion.

I made a mistake. What I meant to say was: Murder unless in defense of life and property is wrong.

I see no moral objection against the mother killing a person that is threatening the life of her baby.



Same here. No objection against killing a serial killer in defense of someones life.


imo NAP should be the center of society and not a centralized authority called the state.

The principles behind chemistry have always existed, unchanged, since long before humans discovered them. A thousand years ago people thought it was possible to turn lead into gold by reading chicken entrails while smoking peyote, but the fact they were wrong doesn't mean chemistry is flawed.

Morality is the same. Everything that has been put forward historically is self-serving and uselessly contradictory. All that means is we're in a pre-rational state with regards to morality.

OK I think I should just take on a mission of explaining to people why equating anarchy with chaos might not be the best way to describe anything and why it's probably just repeating decade-long doublespeak fueled propaganda.

Anarchy doesn't mean chaos. Chaos comes from trying to control that which by its very nature cannot be controlled from a single place. Look anywhere in nature. Look to the stars or to the biosphere - do you see a ruler there? (you might say that you believe in an all powerful God controlling these things - in that case this line of reasoning is not for you) I don't. Yet do you see chaos in the movement of stars or in the behavior of nature? How come that it's fine with everything else but when it comes to humans and their business, suddenly we have to have centrally enforced rules or everything slips into CHAOS?! Is it our cultural viewpoint, which views humans as something distinctly apart from nature (thus allowing humans to ravage their environment in search for quick personal gain)? Or is it a fundamental distrust of other humans (instilled by governments imo...remember divide and conquer?) which makes one scream in horror at the thought of what might happen if people were free to do what they saw fit?

Even putting all this aside, it seems hilarious to me that the proposed solution to the problem of not trusting people in general to behave cooperatively and non-aggressively seems to always be: install a government and put some of those people (which cannot be trusted, remember?) in charge. Not even any people. But the corrupted sociopaths, which are attracted to power as flies are to shit and which only get further corrupted by the power they gain? Very weird.

To reiterate: anarchy is NOT chaos. imposition of order = escalation of chaos. Anarchy just means letting any system find its equilibrium without imposing rules on it. I get why this might be tough for many - it requires trust in other people, in nature, the world and life in general. Trust which has been abused for centuries by institutions like the church and government.

PS: I see some discussion about morality here. You don't need to drag vague moral concepts into the discussion of whether government should or shouldn't exist. Taking a look at what's efficient and what's not seems to be sufficient.

Basic morals is a loaded term.  'Basic Morals' have been fluctuating since humans have been alive.  There is very little static 'truth' in the world, if any.   If there is it's probably only that 'things change' -- including 'Basic Morals'.

But if we are talking about Basic Morels, they are very tasty when butter is applied along with a hot pan.

So, how would you classify a mother that killed a person that she perceived as threatning the life of her baby?
What are the basic morals that apply here?

The truth is that these morals are a human notion and not written in stone.
What you think of as morally justified is not well defined and will be different from person to person.
Of course things like murder are obvious, but what if a serial killer is murdered?
Morals too have their static and dynamic parts.
And both statist and anarchist children will need to learn how to both play nice and stand their ground to be able to survive as a species.

But what i was actually talking about is the way JoelKatz argues for some extreme position by taking the consequenses of the opposite to the extreme. This extreme is not a natural balance and in fact does not represent reality in any way.
Society is a dynamical emergent system. It cannot exist without structure and it cannot exist without degrees of freedom.
Both chaos and order are required so this type of reasoning seems counterproductive.
These 'principles of non-agression' are only possible because some bigger structure assures a basic security for JoelKatz.
Were he to live in a true anarchy he would find out that agression is the defacto standard of securing resources in nature.
By securing resources you secure the survival of the individual, then the social group and finaly the whole species.
Securing resources, by any means necessary,  is the only way an individual, group or species can survive.
Sometimes this can be done most efficiently by cooperation. But other times the only way to ensure your own survival and even the survival of our species is to use agression.
I think it is naive of JoelKatz to think his ideal of non-agression is a viable strategy outside of (by now) global control structures.
It would fall apart the very instant humans lose the cohesive forces of the bigger structures.

@zeroday

You know now what people are doing at Cyprus now that the banks are open again?
Huge waiting lines of course, but are the most of them you talk to speaking about getting there money out of those banks?
Even if its just 300 per day, everyday? Let us know whats really going on there and what the people are planning to do.

Basic morals are not negotiable.

Murder unless in self-defence is wrong, no matter how you look at it.

It is not extreme to argue that it is wrong to use violence to get what you want against others who do not harm you in any way. That is even taught by statists in the education of children. But when they become adults it is suddenly okay to bully and force others.

My point is, that I think it is just not possible to build an honest society when we don't agree on the basic principles of ethics.

Arguing extremes seems a fruitless path to walk when defining relations.
I have tried to explain a few times on this forum that any system inside our universe needs to have both static-like and dynamic-like components to be able to interact with the environment and not have it's structure dilluted.
When you take either the static or dynamic component to its extreme the system will stop functioning.
It is all about the right balance in a given situation.
Taken to the extreme the statist view becomes too static and the anarchist view too chaotic.

Thinking in singular extremes is a poor way to define systems.

So what is happening in most countries is that in effect 80-90% of the people through the mechanism of the state can take as much money from the other 10-20% and spend it on whatever they want. Just call it democracy and it is legitimate and fair and all.



Of course people that still earn money and build society are increasingly waking up and wonder why they should still bother contributing to the greedy, uninformed, ineffective and unthankful collective.

In Iceland the government did make a difference between itself and the banks, saying: "the banks fucked up, we didn't and won't insure anything, the people lost money, so we help them sue the bankers, we don't socialize the losses".

In Cyprus, allegedly: "the banks fucked up, we insured some of the deposits, we don't want to make good on our obligation (to insure all losses up to $100k), so we twist the rules to make sure the other depositors pay as much as possible, and taxpayers as little as possible".

Of course this is wrong. If you guarantee my loan to a third person, you cannot demand my other lawful creditors to take the hit before you cover the losses on the part you guaranteed. At least here in Finland. I can understand why your government wants it this way, though. I even believe it is fair as a principle, but wrong because it breaks the agreement that was in force at the time.

To think of it further, you can even say it is right. After all, government has an obligation, so they are "taxing" people who have money in the banks. They call it tax, right. Of course taxpayers pay, in one way or another. Hint: in most countries, only about 10-20% of people actually are taxpayers. Others either work for gov, or earn so little that they get more from the state in return.

The bottom line is, Cyprus is small, and if the government accumulates "enough" debt, the entrepreneurs move away as they don't want to pay the interest via taxes. Otoh, if the government hits them hard one time, they will move away in disgust. So no matter what happens, the same people will not trust the government any more.

Finland was a net creditor in the 1980s. Then the politicians wanted us to integrate to the western financial system. Of course there has been some progress during the 25 years (as well as the previous 25 years 1963-1988 also saw some progress which would have happened regardless of the welfare socialist tendencies) but the net result is that gov now owes 86 billion, which is more than 100,000 eur per taxpayer. I would rather take financial liberty. And I will, there is no chance in this world that I would pay the taxes on my global businesses to Finland. My limit is 10% of realized profits. If some country wants it, I can consider. If not, I will not realize the profits in any country.