Objections to the non-aggression principle - page 2.

Hawker

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Quote from: chrisrico on February 22, 2012, 02:41:43 PM

...snip...

First of all, can you please provide a citation for your claim that riots began after "word got out that the police were not going to protect private property"? My understanding is that the riots began after police killed Mark Duggan.

Second, in what way is this not a condemnation of the state? These are individuals educated in the state's educational system, taught implicitly and explicitly that it is sometimes acceptable to initiate violence against others. Is it any wonder that when faced with socio-economic hardship, they turn to violence?

Quote from: Hawker on February 22, 2012, 01:38:37 PM

If you want to remove the state, you have to offer a way to protect people from this violence and chaos first.

So how do you do it?

You are convinced that a violent monopoly is necessary in order to maintain peace, and that chaos is in fact order. I have no idea how to convince you that this is completely self-contradictory if it is not immediately obvious.

What we have now is orderly societies all over the democratic world. If these states are not peaceful orderly societies, then there has never been an orderly society and I dread to think what you would call societies like Syria or Iraq.

If you define what we have now as "top down chaos" then its a bit pointless talking with you. Why not agree to use words as they are commonly understood?

chrisrico

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Quote from: Hawker on February 22, 2012, 01:38:37 PM

OK. Point taken. there is nothing worse than an analogy that is meant to make things clear but actually obfusticates; my leaky roof analogy did that so please ignore it while I try to myself clearer.

I appreciate your willingness to concede that the analogy is unfit.

Quote from: Hawker on February 22, 2012, 01:38:37 PM

I think we are both agreed that society is far from perfect.

Yes. I would say it is fundamentally flawed.

Quote from: Hawker on February 22, 2012, 01:38:37 PM

We both know that there is violent chaos if the present system breaks down.

Actually, I believe that the present system is chaotic, and that you mistake top-down chaos for order.

Quote from: Hawker on February 22, 2012, 01:38:37 PM

In London, a city that has been at the heart of a strong state for over 1000 years, it took all of 30 minutes for riots and mayhem to start once word got out that the police were not going to protect property last summer.

First of all, can you please provide a citation for your claim that riots began after "word got out that the police were not going to protect private property"? My understanding is that the riots began after police killed Mark Duggan.

Second, in what way is this not a condemnation of the state? These are individuals educated in the state's educational system, taught implicitly and explicitly that it is sometimes acceptable to initiate violence against others. Is it any wonder that when faced with socio-economic hardship, they turn to violence?

Quote from: Hawker on February 22, 2012, 01:38:37 PM

If you want to remove the state, you have to offer a way to protect people from this violence and chaos first.

So how do you do it?

You are convinced that a violent monopoly is necessary in order to maintain peace, and that chaos is in fact order. I have no idea how to convince you that this is completely self-contradictory if it is not immediately obvious.

FirstAscent

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Quote from: NghtRppr on February 22, 2012, 02:23:13 PM

Quote from: Hawker on February 22, 2012, 01:38:37 PM

If you want to remove the state, you have to offer a way to protect people from this violence and chaos first.

I have to? No, I don't.

Correct. You won't have that responsibility. And you might not have the resources. In fact, you almost certainly won't have the ability or resources to protect even yourself from certain individuals and their followers. You'll just hope that such individuals don't take a liking to your neck of the woods.

NghtRppr

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Quote from: Hawker on February 22, 2012, 01:38:37 PM

If you want to remove the state, you have to offer a way to protect people from this violence and chaos first.

I have to? No, I don't.

Hawker

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Quote from: chrisrico on February 22, 2012, 01:23:37 PM

Quote from: Hawker on February 22, 2012, 12:37:15 PM

That is an even worse analogy. Rape is a clearly understood concept and all are agreed its bad. Living in a democracy is also a clearly understood concept but no-one really thinks its bad.

Your analogy had nothing at all to do with the morality of human interaction. Our analogies have everything to do with the morality of human interaction. Government is an entity which mediates human interaction, and claims to be moral doing so. How is it possible that our analogies were worse than yours?

I also dispute the claim that rape is a clearly understood concept and all agreed it is bad (rape is common in many places of the world, and the line between rape and consensual sex is fuzzy in many cases). I would agree if you had made that claim about slavery, except that is a fairly recent development. There was a time when many people considered slavery to be necessary and perfectly moral. Did that make it so?

OK. Point taken. there is nothing worse than an analogy that is meant to make things clear but actually obfusticates; my leaky roof analogy did that so please ignore it while I try to myself clearer.

I think we are both agreed that society is far from perfect.

We both know that there is violent chaos if the present system breaks down. In London, a city that has been at the heart of a strong state for over 1000 years, it took all of 30 minutes for riots and mayhem to start once word got out that the police were not going to protect property last summer. The same is true for every city.

If you want to remove the state, you have to offer a way to protect people from this violence and chaos first.

So how do you do it?

chrisrico

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Quote from: FirstAscent on February 22, 2012, 01:29:49 PM

That sounds like an admission that NAP is not realistic. It's one thing to pine for a society where it will work, and in theory it could work if the society was small and all were fervent NAP believers, but it simply isn't workable in the real world.

So, we've been asking the same question to you guys over and over. How do you make NAP work? And we finally got an answer: it won't work, accept in small isolated communities.

You're reading too far into it. It merely means that right now most of society has accepted the state's proposition that it is acceptable to initiate the use of violence. This, of course, is because that acceptance is necessary in order for the state to exist. However, the state's use of violence always comes back to bite it's citizens, and the hope is that by spreading the message of NAP, eventually people will say "enough", and refuse to tolerate a state any longer.

FirstAscent

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Quote from: EhVedadoOAnonimato on February 22, 2012, 10:43:33 AM

Oh, the fact that we are "hostages" to authoritarian people like you, we already know very well.

All we can do is complain, argue, try to move to less authoritarian places, try to support ideas/projects that might reduce the power of such people (like bitcoin, seasteading, Free cities etc) and so on.
I have no hope - and I believe most libertarians neither - of ever become a truly sovereign individual. Maybe in a very distant future that will be a possibility, but we'll be all dead by then. I have much less hope of ever seeing a world without intentional murders. That does not mean I will support a "minimum rate of murders" because "it has always existed", "society can't be organized without it" etc.

That sounds like an admission that NAP is not realistic. It's one thing to pine for a society where it will work, and in theory it could work if the society was small and all were fervent NAP believers, but it simply isn't workable in the real world.

So, we've been asking the same question to you guys over and over. How do you make NAP work? And we finally got an answer: it won't work, accept in small isolated communities.

chrisrico

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Quote from: Hawker on February 22, 2012, 12:37:15 PM

That is an even worse analogy. Rape is a clearly understood concept and all are agreed its bad. Living in a democracy is also a clearly understood concept but no-one really thinks its bad.

Your analogy had nothing at all to do with the morality of human interaction. Our analogies have everything to do with the morality of human interaction. Government is an entity which mediates human interaction, and claims to be moral doing so. How is it possible that our analogies were worse than yours?

I also dispute the claim that rape is a clearly understood concept and all agreed it is bad (rape is common in many places of the world, and the line between rape and consensual sex is fuzzy in many cases). I would agree if you had made that claim about slavery, except that is a fairly recent development. There was a time when many people considered slavery to be necessary and perfectly moral. Did that make it so?

Hawker

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Quote from: NghtRppr on February 22, 2012, 12:28:46 PM

Quote from: Hawker on February 22, 2012, 10:56:23 AM

its not enough to say the roof on a house is leaky; you have to offer a way to fix it or a way to replace it with a better roof

A leaky roof is a poor analogy because there are no moral or ethical implications. As chrisco correctly points out, saying we should stop doing something immoral, even without suggesting an alternative, does make sense. I don't need to tell a rapist how he's going to get laid. I do know that he should stop raping though.

That is an even worse analogy. Rape is a clearly understood concept and all are agreed its bad. Living in a democracy is also a clearly understood concept but no-one really thinks its bad.

NghtRppr

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Quote from: Hawker on February 22, 2012, 10:56:23 AM

its not enough to say the roof on a house is leaky; you have to offer a way to fix it or a way to replace it with a better roof

A leaky roof is a poor analogy because there are no moral or ethical implications. As chrisco correctly points out, saying we should stop doing something immoral, even without suggesting an alternative, does make sense. I don't need to tell a rapist how he's going to get laid. I do know that he should stop raping though.

chrisrico

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Quote from: Hawker on February 22, 2012, 10:56:23 AM

If I might offer an analogy, its not enough to say the roof on a house is leaky; you have to offer a way to fix it or a way to replace it with a better roof. You rightly point out that modern societies are not perfect. The problem is that you don't offer an alternative that is better.

Unfortunately for you, repeating the same thing over and over doesn't make it true.

The alternative we offer is a society organized from the bottom-up. I'm sorry that you are unable to wrap your mind around that.

Let me offer an analogy for why your criticism is flawed. In the time when slavery was a widespread institution, it was a valid criticism to say that slavery should be abolished, even if you did not offer any alternative to how the things slaves did would get done. In the same way, anarchists of various stripes say that the state should be abolished, even though we do not (and cannot) tell you exactly how the things government does will be accomplished. To think that one person or one small group could tell you that is the pretense of knowledge, and is one of the reasons that centralized institutions like states fail at their goals.

Hawker

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Quote from: EhVedadoOAnonimato on February 22, 2012, 10:43:33 AM

Quote from: Hawker on February 22, 2012, 10:15:08 AM

Quote from: NghtRppr on February 22, 2012, 09:56:12 AM

Quote from: FirstAscent on February 20, 2012, 11:33:14 AM

So funny. For about the hundredth time in about the past six months, who exactly agrees that you may use proportional force? What if your neighbor doesn't buy into NAP?

Then either the neighbor believes one of two things:

1. He can use aggression whenever he wants but nobody can use aggression against him.
2. Anybody can use aggression on anyone at anytime.

If he believes (1) then he's just trying to set a double standard for himself and his wishes have no merit. If he believes (2) then he can't consistently object to anything I do to him, including responding proportionally when using violence.

There are lots of people in category 1. Charismatic individuals who have followers and thus unless you have an army, you can't do a thing to him.

Oh, the fact that we are "hostages" to authoritarian people like you, we already know very well.

All we can do is complain, argue, try to move to less authoritarian places, try to support ideas/projects that might reduce the power of such people (like bitcoin, seasteading, Free cities etc) and so on.
I have no hope - and I believe most libertarians neither - of ever become a truly sovereign individual. Maybe in a very distant future that will be a possibility, but we'll be all dead by then. I have much less hope of ever seeing a world without intentional murders. That does not mean I will support a "minimum rate of murders" because "it has always existed", "society can't be organized without it" etc.

If I might offer an analogy, its not enough to say the roof on a house is leaky; you have to offer a way to fix it or a way to replace it with a better roof. You rightly point out that modern societies are not perfect. The problem is that you don't offer an alternative that is better.

EhVedadoOAnonimato

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Quote from: Hawker on February 22, 2012, 10:15:08 AM

Quote from: NghtRppr on February 22, 2012, 09:56:12 AM

Quote from: FirstAscent on February 20, 2012, 11:33:14 AM

So funny. For about the hundredth time in about the past six months, who exactly agrees that you may use proportional force? What if your neighbor doesn't buy into NAP?

Then either the neighbor believes one of two things:

1. He can use aggression whenever he wants but nobody can use aggression against him.
2. Anybody can use aggression on anyone at anytime.

If he believes (1) then he's just trying to set a double standard for himself and his wishes have no merit. If he believes (2) then he can't consistently object to anything I do to him, including responding proportionally when using violence.

There are lots of people in category 1. Charismatic individuals who have followers and thus unless you have an army, you can't do a thing to him.

Oh, the fact that we are "hostages" to authoritarian people like you, we already know very well.

All we can do is complain, argue, try to move to less authoritarian places, try to support ideas/projects that might reduce the power of such people (like bitcoin, seasteading, Free cities etc) and so on.
I have no hope - and I believe most libertarians neither - of ever become a truly sovereign individual. Maybe in a very distant future that will be a possibility, but we'll be all dead by then. I have much less hope of ever seeing a world without intentional murders. That does not mean I will support a "minimum rate of murders" because "it has always existed", "society can't be organized without it" etc.

Hawker

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Quote from: NghtRppr on February 22, 2012, 09:56:12 AM

Quote from: FirstAscent on February 20, 2012, 11:33:14 AM

So funny. For about the hundredth time in about the past six months, who exactly agrees that you may use proportional force? What if your neighbor doesn't buy into NAP?

Then either the neighbor believes one of two things:

1. He can use aggression whenever he wants but nobody can use aggression against him.
2. Anybody can use aggression on anyone at anytime.

If he believes (1) then he's just trying to set a double standard for himself and his wishes have no merit. If he believes (2) then he can't consistently object to anything I do to him, including responding proportionally when using violence.

There are lots of people in category 1. Charismatic individuals who have followers and thus unless you have an army, you can't do a thing to him.

NghtRppr

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Quote from: FirstAscent on February 20, 2012, 11:33:14 AM

So funny. For about the hundredth time in about the past six months, who exactly agrees that you may use proportional force? What if your neighbor doesn't buy into NAP?

Then either the neighbor believes one of two things:

1. He can use aggression whenever he wants but nobody can use aggression against him.
2. Anybody can use aggression on anyone at anytime.

If he believes (1) then he's just trying to set a double standard for himself and his wishes have no merit. If he believes (2) then he can't consistently object to anything I do to him, including responding proportionally when using violence.

Hawker

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Quote from: FredericBastiat on February 21, 2012, 06:57:28 PM

Quote from: Hawker on February 21, 2012, 03:52:05 PM

Are you really saying that we all get to assert our own ideas about rights but all the ones that you don't agree with are not valid?

No. Just saying that you can assert any right/idea/liberty, of which there are an infinite number, in such a way that doesn't willfully impart a significant force (F = ma) or change the condition of my person or things, since increasing or decreasing the mass or energy of the system of my person/property may be interpreted as aggression. To wit, don't violate 4.1 or 4.2 and we should be just dandy. It explains it quite concisely and uses physics constructs to boot. Cool huh?

I can dislike your assertions all I want, but merely disliking them isn't sufficient justification to prevent you from exercising them (lawfully proscribe). It's only when they affect me significantly (using the laws of physics to measure them) that we might have an issue.

Of course, everything we do imparts some change in other objects in the universe and vice versa, but how much, where, and with what intent, matters. Whatdya say we keep the unwarranted physical intersections to a minimum; and when we can't find a way to resolve them, try to apply the least amount of violence?

The physics thing is odd.

You are still saying that your rights are better than other people's so they should accept your rules are better. For example, I can say that property rights are a human creation and that they are used to make a more stable prosperous society. You can say that God made the rights or whatever and that all we can hope to do is discover them. Do my property rights have equal value to yours?

FredericBastiat

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Quote from: Hawker on February 21, 2012, 03:52:05 PM

Are you really saying that we all get to assert our own ideas about rights but all the ones that you don't agree with are not valid?

No. Just saying that you can assert any right/idea/liberty, of which there are an infinite number, in such a way that doesn't willfully impart a significant force (F = ma) or change the condition of my person or things, since increasing or decreasing the mass or energy of the system of my person/property may be interpreted as aggression. To wit, don't violate 4.1 or 4.2 and we should be just dandy. It explains it quite concisely and uses physics constructs to boot. Cool huh?

I can dislike your assertions all I want, but merely disliking them isn't sufficient justification to prevent you from exercising them (lawfully proscribe). It's only when they affect me significantly (using the laws of physics to measure them) that we might have an issue.

Of course, everything we do imparts some change in other objects in the universe and vice versa, but how much, where, and with what intent, matters. Whatdya say we keep the unwarranted physical intersections to a minimum; and when we can't find a way to resolve them, try to apply the least amount of violence?

Hawker

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Quote from: FredericBastiat on February 21, 2012, 03:44:03 PM

Quote from: Hawker on February 21, 2012, 03:19:40 PM

1.2 is an assertion that everyone can make their own version of. For example, I see your compatriot Rick Santorum saying that rights come from God and that the Constitution merely frames them. Marxists would say rights come from dialectal materialism and so on.

Is it your position that rights are simply rules that we assert and that everyone has his own set of rights to assert?

Sure, to an extent (these are 'is/ought' philosophies after all). The only caveat being that it not infringe upon others from doing the same (equivalent supremacy to act or to own). Which is to say, you can act upon yourself and your things, but not upon others without their express permission. This assumes there is some tangible distinction between what is yours, mine, and ours (in the contractual sense of the word).

A reasoned and logical definition using physical descriptions of discernably separable and divisible objects (aka physical property) is helpful. And anything that makes it difficult to separate these concerns (reified concepts, or unconstrainable spaces and objects) results in things that are either not possessable, or in the commons -which might create potential conflict- conflict best avoided I would think.

Simply speaking if I may, it would seem an excellent ideal that your assertions shouldn't violate my assertions otherwise they aren't valid assertions (unless you believe might makes right). In which case, who needs laws, or property, or justice?

Are you really saying that we all get to assert our own ideas about rights but all the ones that you don't agree with are not valid?

FredericBastiat

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Quote from: Hawker on February 21, 2012, 03:19:40 PM

1.2 is an assertion that everyone can make their own version of. For example, I see your compatriot Rick Santorum saying that rights come from God and that the Constitution merely frames them. Marxists would say rights come from dialectal materialism and so on.

Is it your position that rights are simply rules that we assert and that everyone has his own set of rights to assert?

Sure, to an extent (these are 'is/ought' philosophies after all). The only caveat being that it not infringe upon others from doing the same (equivalent supremacy to act or to own). Which is to say, you can act upon yourself and your things, but not upon others without their express permission. This assumes there is some tangible distinction between what is yours, mine, and ours (in the contractual sense of the word).

A reasoned and logical definition using physical descriptions of discernably separable and divisible objects (aka physical property) is helpful. And anything that makes it difficult to separate these concerns (reified concepts, or unconstrainable spaces and objects) results in things that are either not possessable, or in the commons -which might create potential conflict- conflict best avoided I would think.

Simply speaking if I may, it would seem an excellent ideal that your assertions shouldn't violate my assertions otherwise they aren't valid assertions (unless you believe might makes right). In which case, who needs laws, or property, or justice?

Hawker

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Quote from: FredericBastiat on February 21, 2012, 02:01:15 PM

Quote from: Hawker on February 21, 2012, 01:36:23 PM

Fred, why not make a thread where your effort to create your own law can be discussed?

I can see its been revised and improved it over the first draft I saw; is this something you created yourself?

It is my writing. I wouldn't call it my creation per se. I claim the word combinations but none of the individual concepts.

Quote

1.2. Rights exist because man exists (consequent to Life).

1.2 is an assertion that everyone can make their own version of. For example, I see your compatriot Rick Santorum saying that rights come from God and that the Constitution merely frames them. Marxists would say rights come from dialectal materialism and so on.

Is it your position that rights are simply rules that we assert and that everyone has his own set of rights to assert?

Topic: Objections to the non-aggression principle - page 2. (Read 5906 times)