The Decline of Violence

[moda0306]

It gains me nothing to hate, Kshartle. Hate is a weakness. It's a way you can be manipulated.

Ok. Well I didn't use that word in my questions. I hate the use of violence and theft by people to acheive their goals. I'm ok saying that.

Again though, I didn't use that word in my questions. I'll ask them again:

How do you feel about aggressive violence against people who haven't done anything to you or anyone else?
How about stealing?
How about borrowing money and ordering someone else to pay?

We torture and slaughter animals every day in the pursuit of our goals, but you've made it clear that animals don't have rights (in your opinion), because they can't understand right from wrong (your conclusion of observable facts).  You may have addressed these and I just missed them, but:

- What if I can prove that I have no ability to understand right from wrong?  Do I have ANY rights?  Do sociopaths have rights?

- Your logic is circular:  You claim (correct me if I'm wrong) that it's immoral to force a person to do something against their will because they "own themselves," and even "their property," and that they derive this right by being able to tell if something is morally right or wrong.  This seems awful circular and convenient to me.  People have instincts about right and wrong, but sometimes those instincts differ greatly.  Further, most animals that are mothers have a similar instinct towards their children.  A lot of this stuff is just chemicals in our brains, Kshartle... we're just able to use logic/reason a bit better than animals, but often it's used to justify an action that our emotions led us to in the first place.  Your attachment to your child is an emotional one.  To a puppy.  To your wife.  You FEEL a degree of responsibility and love for certain people, and act (hopefully, logically) in the interest of those FEELINGS.  Animals are no different.  A mother wolf or bear defends her children at her own risk, because she's got the same chemicals rolling through her brain, triggering the same instincts as us.  We aren't as different as we think.  In fact, I'd say that a lot of dogs are "better people" than most people .

- If humans not only own themselves, but "their property," then do I have the moral right to take a basket full of puppies out into my front lawn and torture them while kids try to play outside and see what I'm doing?  If your assertion is that 1) it's my property to do with what I want, and 2) animals don't have rights, then by logical deductive conclusion I should be able to do any number of horrible things to animals on my property, and tough luck to all the kids that might have nightmares because of it.

[Kshartle]

- Establish a defense for negative rights against individuals by other individuals.
- Enforce property "rights," to a degree... understanding these are a social preference and economic tool rather than a 100% legitimate moral claim over the world around us.
- Provide a safety net so that there is a minimum level of human dignity that includes healthcare, shelter, food, education, emergency services, etc..
- Provide infrastructure, as left too loosely-enforced, property disputes become toxic to a productive economy and some public goods are better run by government (sewer, roads, freeways, etc).

But these are based on my moral code, as well as observations of history and the nature of the world around us.  If yours are different, I'm not going to accuse you of violence while absolving myself.

Those aren't moral codes.

Those are outcomes or goals.


From the stanford encyclopedia of Philosophy (just googled):

The term “morality”? can be used either

1. descriptively to refer to some codes of conduct put forward by a society or,
    a. some other group, such as a religion, or
    b. accepted by an individual for her own behavior or

2. normatively to refer to a code of conduct that, given specified conditions, would be put forward by all rational persons.

A moral code is a code of conduct, not an outcome or goal. When the outcome or goal is put ahead of the means or the conduct.....this is the absence of a moral code.

So what you're really saying is you think violence and theft and threats (government) is neccessary to acheive some people's goals or desired outcome.

I would agree with you there. Let's not pretend it's moral though.

In a Democracy this only means the liar or theif needs to convince a majority of voters by appealing to their goals and desires. So the democracy thing is DEFINATELY is not moral. Please let's stop pretending that it is.

[moda0306]

- Establish a defense for negative rights against individuals by other individuals.
- Enforce property "rights," to a degree... understanding these are a social preference and economic tool rather than a 100% legitimate moral claim over the world around us.
- Provide a safety net so that there is a minimum level of human dignity that includes healthcare, shelter, food, education, emergency services, etc..
- Provide infrastructure, as left too loosely-enforced, property disputes become toxic to a productive economy and some public goods are better run by government (sewer, roads, freeways, etc).

But these are based on my moral code, as well as observations of history and the nature of the world around us.  If yours are different, I'm not going to accuse you of violence while absolving myself.

Those aren't moral codes.

Those are outcomes or goals.


From the stanford encyclopedia of Philosophy (just googled):

The term “morality”? can be used either

1. descriptively to refer to some codes of conduct put forward by a society or,
    a. some other group, such as a religion, or
    b. accepted by an individual for her own behavior or

2. normatively to refer to a code of conduct that, given specified conditions, would be put forward by all rational persons.

A moral code is a code of conduct, not an outcome or goal. When the outcome or goal is put ahead of the means or the conduct.....this is the absence of a moral code.

So what you're really saying is you think violence and theft and threats (government) is neccessary to acheive some people's goals or desired outcome.

I would agree with you there. Let's not pretend it's moral though.

In a Democracy this only means the liar or theif needs to convince a majority of voters by appealing to their goals and desires. So the democracy thing is DEFINATELY is not moral. Please let's stop pretending that it is.

I've said 100 times that force is inevitable, and it's about directing and containing that force rather than trying to eliminate it.

If you want a personal moral code, rather than that of a government, then my personal moral code is this:

- Don't harm others unless I'm being harmed.
- Do what is in my and my family/friend's best interests, as long as I'm not doing deliberate harm to someone.  This means obeying laws moreso because it's in my best interest to, or because I would be doing deliberate harm to someone by disobeying.
- Be honest.  Do what I say and say what I've done.

I'm sure there's more... I haven't really constructed it to perfection.  And it is qualified for the fact that I know that by polluting, occupying land, eating meat, and simply consuming, I'm imposing indirect force on others, so I have to balance that moral conundrum with advancing my own personal interest.  Maybe this makes me an immoral person... maybe it's just acknowledging the reality that the rock I've been placed on makes it IMPOSSIBLE to have a 100% consistent moral code.

That last sentence drives a ton of my philosophy and premises on the moral legitimacy of government.

[moda0306]

That's why government needs to monopolize things with the threat and deployment of violence. To expose itself to competition would expose just how bad of a job it does at so many of the things we all believe it's necessary for.

I'm not saying this isn't possible, but 1) we do have 200 competing "protection/infrastructure agencies" throughout the world competing, and 2) if it were so, wouldn't you see a trend where societies that have rejected government are remarkably more:

- Productive
- Prosperous
- Peaceful
- Secure

While societies that embraced government were just cesspools in comparison because they're embracing an inadequate tool for the job?

I'm not saying there aren't some lovely countrysides or some cess-pool cities, but for some weird social reasons, countries that have found a good mix of government and private roles and activities seem to have found a pretty awesome balance between cooperation and competition.

If the only world where corporations and churches could fulfill that role is one where there is NO big government out there to be afraid of (including an internally-developed one), then aren't we kind of proving the necessity of government in the first place?

[Kshartle]

Kshartle... we're just able to use logic/reason a bit better than animals, but often it's used to justify an action that our emotions led us to in the first place. 

A bit better? Please show me the animal that uses logic and reason.

Humans have free will. We have the ability to choose between right and wrong, even if we disagree with someone else on what that is.

Since we have the ability to choose between right and wrong, we are responsible for our actions. We own our actions and the effects of our actions because we are able to choose our actions based on a moral code (ours or societies). We can choose between doing what we and what other people choose as right and wrong. Even a sociopath can choose. An animal cannot choose. We don't say a lion that kills another lion is wrong and should be punished. We don't try to teach the lion that it's wrong, it can't understand language and is incabable of understanding the concept.

If we kill a lion because it is dangerous to humans or our cattle, it's not because the lion is bad, it's because it's dangerous.

A mentally retarded person or a baby or small child is incapable of choosing. They are still humans though....they are not animals and killing and eating them or owning them is not an option. Caring for them and being responsible for them (particularly the children by those that created them and took them home from the hospital) is the right thing to do.

Really, I truly believe you are feigning that you don't understand this stuff to support your demolished arguments supporting government (violence and theft by some against others). I have shown over and over how many holes and contradictions and falsehoods there are in every single claim or argument supporting that garbage.

Everyone on this board (even if they refuse to admit it) knows:

Stealing is wrong
Slavery is wrong
Attacking people is wrong
Murdering people is wrong
Children and retarded people are still people
People have the right to own property


Animals are not people. *They don't have these rights.

*There may be some people who believe incorrectly that animals have rights. This argument is easily destroyed when they admit animals aren't responsible for themselves or anything they do so it certainly can't be extended to responsibility of anything else (key component of ownership). Ask them who they think is responsible when the neighbor's dog bites their kid.

[Pointedstick]

That's why government needs to monopolize things with the threat and deployment of violence. To expose itself to competition would expose just how bad of a job it does at so many of the things we all believe it's necessary for.

I'm not saying this isn't possible, but 1) we do have 200 competing "protection/infrastructure agencies" throughout the world competing,

But they aren't really competing, that's my point. The only time when they really compete is when they declare war on one another. The sort of soft international political competition with diplomacy and such mostly concerns things that benefit the governments themselves, not their citizens.

and 2) if it were so, wouldn't you see a trend where societies that have rejected government are remarkably more:

- Productive
- Prosperous
- Peaceful
- Secure

While societies that embraced government were just cesspools in comparison because they're embracing an inadequate tool for the job?

I believe that the conditions weren't right during most of the history of governments. Their citizens were too poor and too bloodthirsty, protection from other governments required one of your own, and a lack of meaningful international trade reduced the consequences for invading other countries. In an awful lot of the world, those are becoming less and less true, and I think eventually, once some society has a prosperous, peaceful, well-armed people who trade with most of the rest of the world, they're eventually going to start, slowly but surely, wondering why they need prisons and armies.

If the only world where corporations and churches could fulfill that role is one where there is NO big government out there to be afraid of (including an internally-developed one), then aren't we kind of proving the necessity of government in the first place?

In the past, yes. In the present, I believe that the current--and future--level of weaponry makes defense against government exponentially easier and cheaper for people who are not professional soldiers.

[Kshartle]

PS, arguing from effect....(we have more wealth with or without government)...or agruing minutia (does 1 murder = 5 rapes)......these are and always will be losing arguments for libertarians or people with a moral code.

When people get that humans have the rights of self-ownership and property and that all the so-called government "solutions" are violations of these rights (and morality), then things will get better.

Moda & Doodle appear to be arguing that humans don't have rights, so there is nothing to violate. Ok. That's their position. Since 99% of people know intuitively that is completey false, don't you think it's better to just point out the violent violation of rights when you see people support them?

See, 99% of people realize it's morally wrong to steal and murder and threaten people with kidnapping and all that crap. Even the ones that engage it for the most part get it, they just rationalize or go against their moral code. They still know they were wrong.

Many people don't understand why government is always a failure and it's solutions are always shitty and create more problems and lowest scumbags rise to the top or want to be in politics. They watch the Daily show and comedy and tragedy of government across the world and never connect the dots that it's completely immoral. The concept is based on the violation of human rights so nothing good can come of it.

Help me point that out man if you can. Arguing the details about caveman murders vs. genocide or whether roads are less bumpy in a communist country or libertarian........those arguments never get anywhere. As far as I can tell.

[Pointedstick]

PS, arguing from effect....(we have more wealth with or without government)...or agruing minutia (does 1 murder = 5 rapes)......these are and always will be losing arguments for libertarians or people with a moral code.

I dunno, I think moda's listening a lot more to my functional arguments than your moral arguments.

I think a major problem in the libertarian world is that we are often too theoretical. We talk in terms of axioms and fundamental truths and the origin of moral rights and it just goes way over a lot of people's heads. It's so much more effective IMHO to give examples, to tell stories. Logic and reason are great at convincing people who are also fans of logic and reason, but we're not all like that. Some people prefer stories and examples. Logic and reason will never convince these people. That's not to say that they are illogical or unreasonable… just that the route to their hearts and minds resides elsewhere.

[Kshartle]

Let's stop pretending that anyone needs to prove that murder, stealing, threatening to kidnapp or steal or murder is wrong.

Everyone worth knowing knows this stuff and doesn't question it. I've asked 100 times....why can't you guys just admit that it's wrong? Ohhh I forgot....I didn't prove it. Well I'll never prove it to you. By all means though go act it out (theft, murder, violent threats) and try to convince someone they haven't proved it was wrong.

If you think you can turn that around and say "Try to prove to someone that they're violating your rights when they rob you"; and that proves anything....it doesn't. They are violating my rights regardless of what they think or you think. It's the same as the bolded example. Just because you think it's ok to steal or murder it's not, and thinking it doesn't make it ok, even if the person can't stop you.


Now you guys might not have come out and flat out say that this behavior is A-ok, but you've had enough opportunities to deny it.

BTW - how can feeding a hungry person be a good thing unless some things are good and some are bad? What's a bad thing, not feeding them? How about robbing them or murdering them?

[moda0306]

Kshartle... we're just able to use logic/reason a bit better than animals, but often it's used to justify an action that our emotions led us to in the first place. 

A bit better? Please show me the animal that uses logic and reason.

Humans have free will. We have the ability to choose between right and wrong, even if we disagree with someone else on what that is.

Since we have the ability to choose between right and wrong, we are responsible for our actions. We own our actions and the effects of our actions because we are able to choose our actions based on a moral code (ours or societies). We can choose between doing what we and what other people choose as right and wrong. Even a sociopath can choose. An animal cannot choose. We don't say a lion that kills another lion is wrong and should be punished. We don't try to teach the lion that it's wrong, it can't understand language and is incabable of understanding the concept.

If we kill a lion because it is dangerous to humans or our cattle, it's not because the lion is bad, it's because it's dangerous.

A mentally retarded person or a baby or small child is incapable of choosing. They are still humans though....they are not animals and killing and eating them or owning them is not an option. Caring for them and being responsible for them (particularly the children by those that created them and took them home from the hospital) is the right thing to do.

Really, I truly believe you are feigning that you don't understand this stuff to support your demolished arguments supporting government (violence and theft by some against others). I have shown over and over how many holes and contradictions and falsehoods there are in every single claim or argument supporting that garbage.

Everyone on this board (even if they refuse to admit it) knows:

Stealing is wrong
Slavery is wrong
Attacking people is wrong
Murdering people is wrong
Children and retarded people are still people
People have the right to own property


Animals are not people. *They don't have these rights.

*There may be some people who believe incorrectly that animals have rights. This argument is easily destroyed when they admit animals aren't responsible for themselves or anything they do so it certainly can't be extended to responsibility of anything else (key component of ownership). Ask them who they think is responsible when the neighbor's dog bites their kid.

I'm not fiegning anything, K.  I do believe human beings have a moral right to individual sovereignty, but I don't use circular logic to get there.  I just feel that it must be true.  I can't prove it.  I also definitely can't prove that it links to any amount of property I deem as mine in a fundamental way.  I also believe that our rights are automatically usurped, unfortunately, by all being stuck on this big island together, so we must work within the bounds of reality that we have, and whether it's a government of one, or a government of 300 million, we're both arguing for force... the only difference is I'm able to see our conundrum for what it is, and you think you're on a moral high-ground.

If anyone's conveniently ignoring anything, it's your ability to completely gloss over the fact that property can be inherantly very difficult to define and establish in one person's name or another's, especially if the damn stuff was there in the first place.  In some ways, intellectual property is far more directly linked to my individual sovereignty than vast amounts of land or resources.  You keep glossing over details about how we should define what is our property, and ignoring the fact that disputes are going to arise around something that is 1) useful, and 2) was there before any of us were.

I ask you what your basis for your assertions of morally valid rights, and you say it's because we know right from wrong that gives us morally valid rights.  This is circular logic.  You haven't even established a moral truth yet... just an assertion that or ability to "feel" a moral truth means we're intrinsically morally valuable.

So while I "feel" that theft is wrong, I need to first establish that a morally valid link between someone and some sort of "ownable property" has occured.  This is no simple task.  You seem to bounce between it being something you can SHOW is has been claimed, something you can DEFEND as yours, something you found first, and something you modify enough to be able to claim it as your own.  These. Are. All. Different. Things.

Laslty, you conveniently ignored my question about having the moral right to torture puppies on my front lawn... Do I have the right to do that?  Am I in a good moral position if I do that?

You're telling me that 99% of people "realize it's morally wrong to steal and murder."  This is probably a bit smaller a number, but I'd agree that it's a big one, and I'd probably agree in almost all cases (though I'm not about to try to prove it with circular logic).  I feel that it's wrong.  I can't prove it with logic.  I think every human life is valuable (short of the Hitlers out there), even if it's raised in a society that deems it to be trash... even if 99% of the society it's raised in thinks it's not worthy of life.  But you refer to this 99% rule.  However, 99% of people also think government of some form is a morally valid entity.  In one breath, you claim that we can't let the majority rule, but in another, you refer to the majority to back your argument (most likely due to it failing on deductive grounds).

But in a world where China is a balanced econom that's going to trounce the USA in innovation since the USA is a state-controlled, over-regulated, socialist, crony-capitalist nightmare, I guess contradicting yourself is probably the norm as well.

[Kshartle]

I dunno, I think moda's listening a lot more to my functional arguments than your moral arguments.

I think a major problem in the libertarian world is that we are often too theoretical.

Well I guess what I'm getting at is Moda isn't likely to be convinced either way and he's just one guy so who cares. Trying to talk people into personal responsibility and how freedom and how the free market will give them better lives than the violent government-run society is a complete loser. The record is clear that the communists/socialists/fascists lies are WAY more effective than libertarian truth.

That's why I go with the moral argument. People know what is right and wrong. If you can convince them to stop advocating for what's wrong with an appeal to morality....that might actually effect social change.

Slavery wasn't abolished anywhere because plantation owners were convinced that they could make more money by hiring workers rather than whipping them. The people finally accepted that what was going on was immoral and put an end to it, in this country and others. Direct human ownership slavery that is...now everyone is a slave to the state through an appeal to the "collective" good. 

[Mountaineer]

Logical and reason are great at convincing people who are also fans of logic and reason, but we're not all like that. Some people prefer stories and examples. Logic and reason will never convince these people. That's not to say that they are illogical or unreasonable… just that the route to their hearts and minds resides elsewhere.

Amen.  Wonder what that route is, through what orifice? 

[Pointedstick]

Slavery wasn't abolished anywhere because plantation owners were convinced that they could make more money by hiring workers rather than whipping them. The people finally accepted that what was going on was immoral and put an end to it, in this country and others.

In this country at least, not the people who owned slaves. Unless my impression of history is totally wrong, I believe that slavery was ended in the USA because other, non-slave-owning people thought its spread westward was so immoral that they killed enough of the slave owners that the rest surrendered and grudgingly agreed to end the practice.

[Kshartle]

Laslty, you conveniently ignored my question about having the moral right to torture puppies on my front lawn... Do I have the right to do that?  Am I in a good moral position if I do that?

I ignore it because it is a lifeboat situation-type. It is a false argument, not a geniue one. Here's how it goes:

"Is it wrong for a man to steal bread to feed his starving child"

Yes = "You are heartless and think children should starve to death"

No = "Ah-ha, theft is acceptable in some situations based on whatever you think is ok, subjective, yada yada".

Such a question does nothing to explore what is right and wrong, or provide any useful basis for a moral code that people should live by, that we all should embrace as true. It gives you a choice between two negatives, ignoring all context and other possibilities like appeals to family, friends, charity, the baker, getting a loan to buy the bread, working off the debt...so many things.


With the puppy question, you want me down to these two options:

Yes -"Ohhhhh wow your sense of right and wrong doesn't extend to the public torture of helpless cute animals, you are obviously a whack job libertarian nutcase"

No - "Wait wait, I thought I OWNED the puppy and it's my PROPERTY and no one has a right to tell me what to do with my PROPERTY"

Obviously if you're the type of sick twisted pervert that would torture puppies on your front lawn....it's doubtful you'll even have a lawn or puppies at all. More likely you would have already shown to everyone what a sick and twisted person you are and they would have dealt with you. This act would certainly do it. The state (since it's immoral) would try to protect you. Absent the state you would be dealt with and everyone would be well within their right to do so. You would be like a dangerous wild animal and they would not be safe nor would their children.

And everyone would know that.

[moda0306]

Let's stop pretending that anyone needs to prove that murder, stealing, threatening to kidnapp or steal or murder is wrong.

Everyone worth knowing knows this stuff and doesn't question it.

Odd statement from Mr. Deductive Logic, himself.  "Everyone worth knowing" also knows that some form of government is valid and necessary.  "Everyone worth knowing" also thinks the government needs to tax to fund its operations, and sometimes fight a war.

I've asked 100 times....why can't you guys just admit that it's wrong?

I DO feel it's wrong, but:

1) It's near-impossible to prove a moral assertion.  Ask PS... he doesn't even like talking about morals because it's just a big cluster-f of unprovable assertions.

2) We're all locked on this island together, so the world has usurped our "rights" on day one via natural laws.

3) Theft implies ownership.  Ownership is a moral concept that stretches your individual sovereignty to something outside of your body.  There are a lot of different ways this could be measured, and is significantly more difficult-to-prove/agree-on than the existence of individual sovereignty to begin with.

If you think you can turn that around and say "Try to prove to someone that they're violating your rights when they rob you"; and that proves anything....it doesn't. They are violating my rights regardless of what they think or you think.

I'm getting dizzy with your circular logic.  You first have to establish a moral principal before you can claim it was violated, and you're just telling us "it's a principal because it is.  It's right because 99% of people think it's right and their ability to think something is right or wrong makes things right or wrong.  This is true because it is."



For the record, based on internal instinct, not some logical rule-set, I DO believe in individual sovereignty.  I just think it's been usurped by nature putting us all on a rock together.  We're not just entities floating through space.  We have natural laws to contend with and each other to compete with.  This means that we MUST take from the earth simply to survive.  We must occupy the earth simply to survive.  We not only NEED the earth, but can modify its elements to our benefit... sometimes in ways where an ecosystem barely notices, and others could do the same as well... and other times in vast, eco-disturbing ways.  This NEED to interact with nature and ability to modify it to our advantage creates a sort of link between us and the world we modify around us.  We eat an apple, build a tree fort, or accidentally forge a path through the woods as we hunt over the years.  Further, we can claim vast amounts of property as our own, and shoot trespassers, so we can build cool stuff that we like.  Where does this link stop? Are there limits to it?  How is it modified by events? 

These aren't obvious to 99% K... People understand land disputes.  People acknowledge that we can't own oceans or lakes or rivers, or at least that its natural that they remain "unowned."  People disagree on the link between our individual sovereignty and the world around us, and your attempt to not only act like this link is logically/morally obvious, and that 99% of people agree with this (oh but majorities don't matter).  Nomadic groups disagree with Western civilizations.  Environmentalists disagree with anarchocapitalists.  So if we can't establish a 100% (or 99%) agreed-upon framework of when morally valid property claims exist, we can't establish theft has occured.

[Pointedstick]

If you think you can turn that around and say "Try to prove to someone that they're violating your rights when they rob you"; and that proves anything....it doesn't. They are violating my rights regardless of what they think or you think.

I'm getting dizzy with your circular logic.  You first have to establish a moral principal before you can claim it was violated, and you're just telling us "it's a principal because it is.  It's right because 99% of people think it's right and their ability to think something is right or wrong makes things right or wrong.  This is true because it is."

But he's right. We're talking about memes here. They only exist in our heads. You might as well try to prove the truth of a religion... it doesn't actually matter. We are so acculturated to believe in property that even most of the people who strenuously decry it not only engage in property-based transactions every day but actually enjoy doing so. I have never met anyone who was anti-property who gave up everything they owned to live the especially free yet especially austere life of a monk or earth wanderer. Your actions reveal your true beliefs.

[Kshartle]

So while I "feel" that theft is wrong, I need to first establish that a morally valid link between someone and some sort of "ownable property" has occured.  This is no simple task.  You seem to bounce between it being something you can SHOW is has been claimed, something you can DEFEND as yours, something you found first, and something you modify enough to be able to claim it as your own.  These. Are. All. Different. Things.

Tech and I already explained all this stuff with help from PS and I believe Simon.

Going over it again is a waste.

Everyone else knows when something belongs to someone else and why while they are still kids. Property rights are so basic and well understood by humans (because we express them constantly, even more than we express concepts like math) that to lay out line by line precisely what they are and make sure we agree on the nuance of every word and statement lest you claim there is still some doubt........that is to legitimize a non-sense argument.

There are enough nonsense arguments here that get legitimized already.

i sometimes wonder what is going on when i see the same arguments that were answered or refuted clearly on one page or in one thread pop right back up on another..
as for the type of arguments you use to convince your debate opponent, i would say use as many sound ones as you can, the person you are debating will likely never get it, or change their mind, the lurkers reading may be swayed to think more clearly....

[moda0306]

Laslty, you conveniently ignored my question about having the moral right to torture puppies on my front lawn... Do I have the right to do that?  Am I in a good moral position if I do that?

I ignore it because it is a lifeboat situation-type. It is a false argument, not a geniue one. Here's how it goes:

"Is it wrong for a man to steal bread to feed his starving child"

Yes = "You are heartless and think children should starve to death"

No = "Ah-ha, theft is acceptable in some situations based on whatever you think is ok, subjective, yada yada".

Such a question does nothing to explore what is right and wrong, or provide any useful basis for a moral code that people should live by, that we all should embrace as true. It gives you a choice between two negatives, ignoring all context and other possibilities like appeals to family, friends, charity, the baker, getting a loan to buy the bread, working off the debt...so many things.


With the puppy question, you want me down to these two options:

Yes -"Ohhhhh wow your sense of right and wrong doesn't extend to the public torture of helpless cute animals, you are obviously a whack job libertarian nutcase"

No - "Wait wait, I thought I OWNED the puppy and it's my PROPERTY and no one has a right to tell me what to do with my PROPERTY"

Obviously if you're the type of sick twisted pervert that would torture puppies on your front lawn....it's doubtful you'll even have a lawn or puppies at all. More likely you would have already shown to everyone what a sick and twisted person you are and they would have dealt with you. This act would certainly do it. The state (since it's immoral) would try to protect you. Absent the state you would be dealt with and everyone would be well within their right to do so. You would be like a dangerous wild animal and they would not be safe nor would their children.

And everyone would know that.

K,

If you think it's sick to torture puppies, why is that?  Do they have any rights?  If so, how is that, given your premise about the nature of rights (that you have to essentially have a moral compass and/or the ability to choose your actions to have rights)?  If not, why is it sick to torture puppies?

All the rest is distracting bs (sorry to be blunt)... whether I'm likely to own puppies or a home if I like torturing puppies is irrelevent.  I'm trying to test your premise and your logic, and it is failing... or at least failing to be deductive.

You're trying to build your political philosophy on a simple world that simply does not exist.  The existence of how to measure validly owned property is probably the cause of more wars than anything else, yet you're telling me that 1) 99% of people agree on this stuff (which they don't), and 2) that this proves your point, even though "majorities don't matter" so democracies are tyrranical.

I'm not trying to trick you into a statement to which I'm going to reply: "Gotcha! Now surrender all your property, and your life."

So it's ok to say "it's a tough situation that doesn't give us a perfect moral conclusion."  It's ok to concede one, tiny, infantecimile, f*king point that people do all the time: "It's complex with competing moral considerations, and there is no perfect answer."

People do this all the time, man.  It's ok to do the same. I'm not even really winning an argument if you do.  We're just establishing a new premise from which we can debate.

[doodle]

Imagine Kshartle was the landed farmer and I am a rancher. Kshartle comes in and starts staking claim to my prime grazing land claiming that it wasnt being used or whatever and it is now his. Based on the way this argument is going does anyone doubt that we wouldn't need a government to get involved to arbitrate this dispute? I don't think of myself as a violent person, but I don't think I could listen to Kshartle very long before I picked up something heavy and swung it at him. So there you go, I just disproved his whole argument. People (i consider myself one) can't solve problems in a rational way without violence and there better be somebody stronger than both of us that will keep us apart.

[Kshartle]

Let's stop pretending that anyone needs to prove that murder, stealing, threatening to kidnapp or steal or murder is wrong.

Everyone worth knowing knows this stuff and doesn't question it.

Odd statement from Mr. Deductive Logic, himself.  "Everyone worth knowing" also knows that some form of government is valid and necessary.  "Everyone worth knowing" also thinks the government needs to tax to fund its operations, and sometimes fight a war.

Really? Don't ya think maybe they don't have a choice? What choice to have when the robber shows up at your doorstep? When he puts the gun in your face, do you know that he has a right to your wallet or your wife?

Why do almost all the people in Oman "know" Islam is true?

Why do almost all the people in Chile "know" the pope talks to God?

I've laid out all the arguments over and over clearly and concisely. At this point you're trying argument by exhaustion. Well I'm exhausted. I'm satisfied that I've made the case for self-ownership and property rights. You are not. I can live with that. I'm ok if 99% plus percent of people get that without having to ever question it. - that's not an argument though.

[moda0306]

If you think you can turn that around and say "Try to prove to someone that they're violating your rights when they rob you"; and that proves anything....it doesn't. They are violating my rights regardless of what they think or you think.

I'm getting dizzy with your circular logic.  You first have to establish a moral principal before you can claim it was violated, and you're just telling us "it's a principal because it is.  It's right because 99% of people think it's right and their ability to think something is right or wrong makes things right or wrong.  This is true because it is."

But he's right. We're talking about memes here. They only exist in our heads. You might as well try to prove the truth of a religion... it doesn't actually matter. We are so acculturated to believe in property that even most of the people who strenuously decry it not only engage in property-based transactions every day but actually enjoy doing so. I have never met anyone who was anti-property who gave up everything they owned to live the especially free yet especially austere life of a monk or earth wanderer. Your actions reveal your true beliefs.

We're also pretty consistently accultured to look at government as a legitimate moral entity as long as a few aspects are present.  The vast majority of people aren't anarcho-capitalists... yet he ignores that when trying to form a moral case against government.

Why is acculturation (if that's a word) so important when it comes to the moral existence of property rights, and so irrelevent when it comes to whether a government is valid or not.

Libertarian666 even pointed out that "wide acceptence" of a use of force was what separated a gang from a government, but STILL claimed government was illegitimate.

[moda0306]

Let's stop pretending that anyone needs to prove that murder, stealing, threatening to kidnapp or steal or murder is wrong.

Everyone worth knowing knows this stuff and doesn't question it.

Odd statement from Mr. Deductive Logic, himself.  "Everyone worth knowing" also knows that some form of government is valid and necessary.  "Everyone worth knowing" also thinks the government needs to tax to fund its operations, and sometimes fight a war.

Really? Don't ya think maybe they don't have a choice? What choice to have when the robber shows up at your doorstep? When he puts the gun in your face, do you know that he has a right to your wallet or your wife?

Why do almost all the people in Oman "know" Islam is true?

Why do almost all the people in Chile "know" the pope talks to God?

I've laid out all the arguments over and over clearly and concisely. At this point you're trying argument by exhaustion. Well I'm exhausted. I'm satisfied that I've made the case for self-ownership and property rights. You are not. I can live with that. I'm ok if 99% plus percent of people get that without having to ever question it. - that's not an argument though.

Most of those 99%:

1) Don't agree in a ton of the details surrounding morally valid property claims.  They "feel" that the concept is correct, but disagree on a LOT of the details.

2) Think your anarcho-capitalism is a joke, completely unrealistic and would never vote for an anarcho-capitalist in their lifetime. 

So you can keep dancing around the fact that you can't properly define the degree to which we can stake a morally valid claim on the value of the world around us, or that the nature of our conundrum leaves us making questionable claims on the world around us in the first place.  These questionable claims could constitute the use of "force."

Further, if torturing puppies is too extreme an example, how about torturing (non-intentional) cattle and hogs for profit?  How disgusting is that?

Why is that?

[Kshartle]

Imagine Kshartle was the landed farmer and I am a rancher. Kshartle comes in and starts staking claim to my prime grazing land claiming that it wasnt being used or whatever and it is now his. Based on the way this argument is going does anyone doubt that we wouldn't need a government to get involved to arbitrate this dispute? I don't think of myself as a violent person, but I don't think I could listen to Kshartle very long before I picked up something heavy and swung it at him. So there you go, I just disproved his whole argument. People (i consider myself one) can't solve problems in a rational way without violence and there better be somebody stronger than both of us that will keep us apart.

You proved my argument. You state that the only way to prevent the violent settling of the dispute is to have settled with violence. Your statement is self-detonating. 

Believing that disputes can't be settled without violence is insane. Some can't, that's true. The government however settles ALL claims with violence, or just the overwhelming threat. So like I've always said, it's not violence that you have a problem with, you just like it to be so overwhelming that no one can resist it.

What do you think happens when some people organize into an organization so violent and powerful no one can resist it? Take a guess....

"People (i consider myself one) can't solve problems in a rational way without violence and there better be somebody stronger than both of us that will keep us apart." - with a statement like this are you sure about the underlined part?


Ohh yeah.....how can you "prove" that was your land anyway hmmm? (shout out to Moda  )

[Kshartle]

Libertarian666 even pointed out that "wide acceptence" of a use of force was what separated a gang from a government, but STILL claimed government was illegitimate.

Well he's right on both counts then.

If rape had wide acceptence would that make it legitimate?

[Pointedstick]

The funny thing about your herder vs farmer example, doodle, is that it's basically how government-run agricultural societies destroyed the stateless societies over the past 10,000 years. It seems to me that the government's "solution" for solving the property dispute you posed was to exterminate the party it didn't favor (the herders).