The Ethics of Lawsuits

The BBQ Pit
81

Gaudere

Forgive me, but I disagree.

Your sister has a right to live, given to her by God or nature. If you believe that your father will kill her, you are entitled to lie, not because it will save your sister’s life (you don’t really know whether it will or not!) but because she has the right to be free from coercion, even if that coercion is a “mere” threat.

Consider, for example, that you are being robbed at gunpoint. Though the mugger has not yet pulled the trigger, you have already been coerced. The threat of force is tantamount to the use of force. Both are what von Mises called “praxes”, i.e., free and volitional actions or inactions.

Retaliatory force is for use when defensive force is too late. You need not wait for a thief to be headed away with your wallet before you can give chase to him. You may, if you are capable, stop him from taking it, in defense of your property.

Hey, Gauderia is your country!

Okay.

Yep, you’re right. You really don’t have it yet, and here’s where it shows. So could we just work with this a little bit?

Have a look at the presumption, and you’ll see that you are mixing the metaphors. You ahve said that RoJ and Gauderia are libertarian, and yet here you have their governments contracting with other governments. Libertarian governments are not sovereign entities. Their sole legitimate function is to secure the rights of individuals who have given their consent, whether by contract, as in the case of Libertaria, or by some other means.

You have heard the expression in math and logic, “if and only if”. That term expresses what is called a biconditional implication; that is, it is an implication that is true both ways, forward and backward. Like this: “Saturday and Sunday are always on weekends”. Gauderia is libertarian if and only if it secures the rights of its citizens (and does nothing else). Likewise, any government that secures the rights of its citizens (and does nothing else) is a libertarian government.

You see now that this sort of anthropomorphizing of Gauderia is strictly prohibited by the noncoercion principle. That is why I always cringe when people talk about “the needs of society” or “the rights of society”. It is easy to lose the focus, as you have done, and begin ascribing attributes belonging to human beings to the things that we anthropomorphize ostensibly for convenience.

Soon, if we’re not careful, we begin ascribing things like rights and consent to governments, as you have done. You speak of Gauderia “agreeing” to respect RoJ’s “judgements”. These are metaphors that are all mixed up. Gauderia cannot “agree” to anything except to securing the rights of Gauderians. RoJ’s “judgements” apply to nothing except citizens of RoJ. If RoJ prosecutes a coercion, and RoJ is libertarian, then what it is really doing is not anything concerned with the coercer, but with the coercee. That’s always the context. The only people with rights are people who are peaceful and honest.

[quote]
Then I wonder about countries that have not contracted with anyone to respect judgments.

[quote]

Well, at least that aspect of those countries is libertarian.

With respect to A, if Gauderia is libertarian, then its governors must decide whether, in their opinions, its citizens have been coerced, without any regard to other considerations, including the opinions of other governors.

And with respect to part B, Gauderia must invade, if invasion is the force necessary to defend, or retaliate on behalf of, its citizens. Failure to invade, if invasion is required, would be breach.

Well, by now, hopefully it’s all coming together for you.

Gauderia, if it is libertarian (and we are anthropomorphizing here using due care and caution), wouldn’t contract with Psychotica anyway — for anything. It has no “right” to invade if Psychotica hurts its citizen; rather, it has an obligation (in the case of Libertaria, a contractual obligation) to use whatever force is necessary, including invasion if invasion is required.

Well, you’re sort of getting there. Think frame of reference, just like Einstein.s relativity thought experiments. The proper ethical frame of reference is always the individual — YOU — so long as you are peaceful and honest, because your “youness” was given to you, and to you alone, by God Himself or nature itself. You alone are entitled to stewardship of it. Governments are not entitled to your youness, unless you give them your consent willfully and voluntarily.

Take your sister, for instance. The question, libertarianly speaking, does not turn on society’s “rights” or considerations, but upon hers because life, consciousness, and rights were given to her, not to societies. Neither your father, nor all the powers on earth have any “right” to take it without her consent.

It also might help you to associate the Noncoercion Principle with the Categorical Imperative, something like this: if every person is secure from coercion, then no person is prohibited from his own maximum potential. No one but himself (and God or nature) can hold him down. And by applying noncoercion universally, you have an imperative that is best for everyone, i.e., no one is held down by anyone else.

82

i always go with free market knowledge and cybernetic :slight_smile:

if you dont know whati am talking about play alpha centauri… its a good game :). Personally id go for a goverment that either let me choose who id put in charge or let me be a all powerful emperor… that system would be better. and for when i die… i say direct scientific research to eliminating age… so i dont die :slight_smile:

but if i couldent do that id go with liberteraia

83

Edlyn noticed something as she was looking all this over, and has asked me to address it before it might mislead someone. I agree with her that these two assertions, one by Gillian,

and the other by me,

The entity that Gilligan describes is a libertarian entity. It’s just that it isn’t a government. It’s a sort of co-op, or venture, undertaken by volunteers, who contract for a variety of services, including security. I do not oppose this sort of anarcho-capitalism, or any other system, so long as all are volunteers.

If you have hired an agent to make contracts on your behalf with other agents (who represent volunteers), and you have done so volitionally and freely, then you are operating in a libertarian context, but with an entity that is something other than (or more than) a government.

I think that the imperialist hegemonist, Thomas Jefferson, for all his flaws, had it right when he observed, “It is to secure our rights that we resort to government at all.”

84

Call it a co-op, or a venture, or an entity - I always say, if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck… Really, a large part of any disagreement is over the use of the language. So I see why you are concerned and careful about the use of anthropomorphizing in talking about governments. I always assume that when someone says “Gauderia thinks…” or “Libertaria contracts with…” they are simply using a shorthand way of saying “the people who make up the government of Gauderia think…” Saves on ink and bandwidth and all that.

Thanks for the compliment and vote of confidence. (Although I thought we were in the Pit.) As to Gaudere’s question:

A similar question came up in another thread, about whether in a libertarian society there would be an overarching entity in place that oversees the relationships between Gauderia and DoJ and Psychotica. The answer could be yes or no, depending on the circumstances. Let’s say the scenario you describe plays out. If the US fragmented into these separate divisions, whether or not an “overarching US government” would remain in place depends on whether or not the divisions let it. Gauderia, DoJ, and Libertaria might all want such an entity in place, and fund it. Or perhaps only two of the divisions would. Its role would perhaps be like the World Court of the United Nations. In a way, the UN is sort of like a libertarian entity in one aspect (only one), in that member nations are free to secede from it. (Apalling anthromorphism here, I know.) In the example, though, there would probably be no higher-level arbitrator for Gauderia to take a matter to, and they would be “stuck” with the rulings of DoJ only to the extent they allow themselves to be stuck. You say they have a “right” to invade; Lib insists it’s an “obligation” to invade.

There is another important consideration. “Invading”, even when right, just, obligatory, and non-coercive, is impossible to be precise. “Collateral damage” to innocents on both sides, who may have had nothing to do with DoJ’s coercion of Gauderians, cannot be avoided. I think the damage would have to be considered coercion on the part of the invader. I think that’s why it is important for the agreements (treaties) to take place between the governments themselves, rather than between individuals, as Lib suggests. Maybe it would be better to say that individuals should allow their government to make contracts on their behalf with other governments. This is because, as Gaudere noted earlier, governments are more likely to be “cool-headed” about things, not being subject to emotions. So in the real world, sometimes even a libertarian nation has to let a little coercion slide. Call it political expedience, or a bad means to a good end. Or just call it reality.

85

You don’t know he’ll even threaten her–you just think he will. He hasn’t threatened anything yet. So you are taking into account that he likely will threaten her, at the very least, if you tell him the truth; you are taking into account a likely “end”. Are you saying that if I think someone is a threat to someone else, that person has no rights because they are being coercive due to the fact that I think they might threaten the other person? If I think someone might drive drunk and might therefore kill someone, that person is coercive?

I cannot see how one can have a meaningful definition of “threat” without taking into account a belief that harm will be done if it is not prevented–an “end”. I think the concept of “threat” itself necessarily includes a belief that that person will in fact follow through on that threat. You are not justified in lying to someone if you do not think they will do any harm with the truth; for example, if the father was kidding and said he would kill her jokingly, you would not have the right to lie to him. To state that a “threat” is coercive in and of itself and has no relation to an actual likely deed seems disingenous. Plainly, it is not threat unless some harm being done is a possibility; when you’re kidding, harm is not actually a possibility, and thus it is not really a threat.

I think to dismiss as irrelevant the possible consequences of your actions is not a moral act.

So, Gauderia can invade the country of Psychotica if a citizen of Psychotica enforces an “unjust” punishment (in Gauderia’s arbitrators’ eyes, not Psychotica’s)? I thought that was a thing that Libertarians were against–the suffering of citizens who have done no harm, simply because their government (in this case, arbitrators) has taken an action. How can Gauderia invade Psychotica without infringing on the rights of peaceful, honest Psychotica citizens? Are the citizens of Psychotica assumed to be coercive if they do not allow Gauderia to punish one of Psychotica’s citizens? Why should they allow it, after all; by their lights, the punishment was just, and Gauderia is being unjust to coerce one of Psychotica’s citizens out of his reparation for it. So if Gauderia does invade Psychotica and “rescues” the person who is being unfairly punished, wouldn’t the citizen of Psychotica have the right to demand Psychotica invade Gauderia to punish those who denied him his reparation “unfairly” (by his and Psychotica’s lights)?

86

Hey Lib,

I appreciate your replies and the discussion. However, I do think that you missed replying to my latest post, which is about third from the top of this page. It the post I summarize what I understand to be the justice system with respect to the law pertaining to activities wholly within the jurisdiction of Libertaria. Although all of this discussion of issues relating relations between entities is interesting, I’d prefer to explore the internal justice system of Libertaria. So, if you don’t mind, I’d be interested in your thoughts on my post.

Thanks.

87

Billdo

I’m sorry.

You have it essentially right.

Libertarianism doesn’t give you the “right” to blow people away. It gives you the right to defend yourself and your property, and the right to retaliate against those who have assaulted it.

The hypothetical about the boy did not involve the boy attempting to murder you, but rather involved the boy trespassing. What you have the right to do is evict him from your land, using whatever force is necessary. Defensive and retaliatory force are, by their nature, measured force, intended to mitigate or ameliorate.

Inappropriate force is neither defensive nor retaliatory.

Gaudere

Neither do you know the mugger will shoot you, but you have good reason to think he will. Assuming you have good reason to think your father will murder your sister, if you tell him where she is hiding, then you are complicit in his praxis.

At any rate, it is his coercion, no matter what his intentions — to kill her, to rob from her, to rape her — that is, no matter what the end might be, that matters. If you defend your sister’s rights you are doing the right thing, and the end, whatever it is, will be right.

You don’t even know what the end might be no matter whether he kills her or not. If he kills her, he might spare the world from a tyrannical Hitler that she would have given birth to had he let her live. And if he doesn’t kill her, she might give birth to the woman who discovers the cure for the common cold.

Considering the end to justify the means risks always that you will get it wrong, that you will mispredict which end, out of an infinite number of ends, will surface eventually. You might reason, for example, that people would be safer (the end you seek) if you were to disarm everyone by law (the means you will apply). But disarming everyone by law can lead to any number of different ends, including the one where those who disregard your laws anyway will wind up being the only ones who are armed.

Certainly. Assuming, of course, that you are thinking rationally. If Charles Manson asks me for your e-mail address, may I not assume that he intends you harm?

Doing harm is not an end; it is a means. Praxes are means. Ends are the results of the praxes. In the case of our disarmament example above, passing the the law is your means, not your end. Exclusively arming criminals was your (unintended) end. In the case of your sister, defending her life is not your end, it is your means. As I said before, you can no more predict the outcome (the result set) of defending your sister (perhaps she will kill you if she lives) than you can predict the outcome of disarming the populace.

It is simply wrong to help murderers find their prey, just as it is simply wrong to disarm people who are peaceful and honest. It is wrong to mug somebody, even if your intention is to use the money to feed poor children. (Which, incidentally, is exactly how taxation is rationalized.)

I agree.

There is no “right” to lie. The matter at hand is your sister’s right (assuming she is peaceful and honest) to live.

It looks to me like you are describing your father’s means as your end. “I cannot tell him because, in the end, he might kill her.” Likewise, you might reason about the mugger, “I must stop him because, in the end, he might pull that trigger.” Just because B follows A, that does not mean that A is a means and B is an end. They might both be means. Praxes, even in serial sequences, are not ends.

The means are things that are done; the ends are what things have become. Given a sequence of (pseudo) computer instructions, consisting of “Read file, Print file,” the printing instruction is not the end; that is, the end isn’t the action of printing in the abstract. The end is the report that you retrieve from the printer.

I disagree.

Well, is it a threat, or isn’t it?

Surely you are not establishing that it is a threat based on your powers of fortelling the future, but on your powers of discerning past patterns. You should base your decision, not on what you think will become of your sister (her destiny is her own concern, her life is her right), but on what you think your father might do to her — what his action will be. That action is not an end, but a means, just as printing a report is not an end; the report itself is the end. Your consideration as far as your sister is concerned ought not to be what will become of her, but what already has become of her, namely that she is already a rights bearing entity, who has a right to live.

So do I.

Gauderia, if it is libertarian, is concerned with the rights of Gauderian citizens.

You h

88

Much as we enjoy watching this exhibitionist display of mutually-pleasurable mental masturbation, this orgy of intellectual intercourse, the writhing-groping-stimulating wordplay, and the multiple orgasms of insights, I’ve got to wonder–“hey, why don’t you guys get a room”.

Or more precisely, a thread, in the forum created especially for those with huge, heaving, swelling, throbbing intellectual talents, who have exceptional endurance, and want to “do it” with groups until their fingers cramp–the Great Debates message board, where you can figuratively “dance naked in the woods” and engage in your verbal couplings without worrying that your copious emissions and/or earthshattering, climaxing, passionate outbursts overstimulate the commoners who frequent this lesser board, while eliminating the fear of contacting a diseased thought or a pregnant pause from same. Hope to see you there.

89

I’ll have to think about that last part little bit, Lib. But I did just notice two things - All through my last post, I typed DoJ instead RoJ, like I meant to. I don’t know why I did that - subliminal, maybe. Also, jab1 unleashed a Giant Squid on you.

90

Looks like this might be my last hurrah this week.

By Friday, I have to write an automatic web-site replicator, design a database, write new VBScript/ASP validation logic to supercede old, poorly documented, CGI Perl script, and design and test on-line credit card authorization involving a third party concern with resentful customer service (sic) handled by snotty nouveau technoclerks. That is to say, I will have my hands full. Though Edlin and I work at the same place now, we seldom see each other at there, and then for only a minute or so at a time, so evenings are for her.

I might could squeeze in an hour or so, but even if I ignore questions like what my rant asserted or who owned pre-cambrian North America, I still wouldn’t have time to do justice to the questions that remain. Besides, Gilligan is capable of answering any of them, or at least, as I do, refering you to where you can get answers. I know that if I were truly interested in art, say, I might ask Gaudere a few questions about the topic, but after those few introduction/orientation type questions, my next question would be, “Where can I learn more?”

For those who have that question in mind, you can learn more at Free-Market about libertarianism and its sister ethics from a wide variety of viewpoints. There also you will find thousands of implementation schemes to satisfy (or at least address) even the wildest scenarios. (I never looked, but you might even find Giant Squids. I think I recall finding the man who owned all the water on earth.)
Finally, you will also find introductory/orientation pieces as well.

For everyone else, see you this weekend. (Unless I don’t finish by Friday.)

91

BTW, for everyone who was rating my criticism of Whitetho, those last 3 paragraphs were generated by Scott Pakin’s automatic complaint-letter generator at http://www-csag.cs.uiuc.edu/individual/pakin/complaint

Gilligan,

Yes; that’s exactly what the US government normally does.

And when, exactly, has this happened as a result of an American who willingly entered said country being convicted of a crime under that countries laws and recieving a punishment the US thought was too harsh? This ‘ohhh, ohhh, dissing sovereignity’ business is a non-sequitor.

So what would your ideal Libertarian government do in that situation? As the kid had consented to be bound by Singapore’s laws as part of the process of going into the country, he had already agreed to accept such punishment should he choose to break the laws of Singapore. Or does your ideal Libertarian government not respect the right of people to enter into agreements that Libertaria doesn’t like?

And what about the American woman more brutally whipped in Iran for prostitution at the same time as the Singapore kid? Should the US (or Libertaria) have militarily intervened there too? It sounds like the military of Libertaria is going to be awfully busy, invading other countries every time they attempt to enforce their own laws.

His military adventures have been made under at least the pretense of following international law regarding military intervention. I’m not getting into some bizzare discussion of Clinton’s military jaunts when they are completely irrelevant to this discussion.

But ‘Excessive’ is not a well-defined term. Singapore’s laws are not made by dictators holding their position by military force, they’re made by elected representatives and such laws are actually quite popular in the country. What about the Japanese student who decided to charge an openly armed homeowner while screaming loudly and wearing a mask after having been told to leave the man’s property, and got shot for his stupidity? A lot of non-Americans seemed to think that that was excessive force on the part of the homeowner, so do you think those other countries are now justified in invading the US to arrest the man?

It sounds like the alleged ‘non-coercion’ principle, the idea that government is by consent of the governed, and the idea that people can consent to any government they choose are not actually held by the libertarians on this thread. If you attempt to create a different government, and someone from Libertaria consents to be bound by that government’s laws, Libertaria will lauch a military assault on the other government for the horrible crime of it enforcing it’s own explicitly detailed agreements.

In response to a similar question from Jodiah, you said:

You’re either contradicting yourself or setting aside a special status for Libertaria. If a citizen of Riboflavia enters some property of Libertaria and commits a crime, is Libertaria justified in convicting and punishing him under Libertaria’s laws? If a citizen of Libertaria enters Riboflavia and commits a crime, is Riboflavia justified in convicting and punishing him under Riboflavia’s laws?

But if you go to another country you CONSENT to be governed by that country’s laws, thus the other country enforcing their own laws (no matter how distateful) on people who have consented to be governed by those laws, is not coercion by any sane definition.

Also, this seems to be a big break with Libertarian’s idea that if you don’t like the government of Libertaria, you can just choose another government; Libertaria will attempt to enforce it’s laws against me even when I have not consented to be governed by Libertaria’s laws and when I am not on property owned by one of Libertaria’s citizens.

If Libertaria decides that shooting someone who has broken into my home is excessive force, then I can expect jackbooted thugs from Libertaria to be breaking down my door even though I have never consented to be governed by Libertaria’s laws because one of Libertaria’s citizens decided to initiate force against me. That doesn’t really seem to fit with the principles you and Lib have been advocating.

Back to the first message:

While I’m not that familiar with San Marino, I suspect that they pay tarrifs to Italy on all of their trade, thereby contributing to the funding of the Italian Army that defends them. Also, how long do you think San Marino would exist if it started using military force against Italy anytime a San Marinan was convicted of a crime under Italian law that was not illegal under San Marino’s laws as you advocate a libertarian government should do?

So there are two entities (SMOM and Palestine) that do not control territory yet get some recognition from other countries; the fact that there is one special case(The Vatican actually controls territory and Palestine is really more of a government-in-exile, claiming that Israel is illegally occupying the territory they should be sovereign over) doesn’t prove that the concept wou

92

Lib,

Alright, I’m going to drop that whole issue. I disagree with your use of the word, but it’s a silly thing to argue over now that your usage is established.

But you’ve also said that it can cost a lifetime of imprisonment if a citizen of Libertaria initiates force against me and I retaliate with a level of force considered appropriate in Riboflavia but not in Libertaria. Also, since Libertaria will try me for crimes not committed on property owned by a citizen of Libertaria and without me having consented to be governed by Libertaria (and so not having paid the fee required), where will the money come for my defense against the charges leveled by Libertaria.

But, even if I accept your idea that a legal system based entirely on precedent counts as having one law, how do you prosecute me for shooting the kid on my lawn under this one law? According to the definitions you earlier gave me, there is no way that excessive defensive force can be considered initial force. If we accept your definition of ‘excessive defensive force’ as ‘initial force’, then you no longer have a clearly defined underpinning for your legal system. ‘Defensive’ vs ‘Initial’ force is pretty clear-cut, but ‘excessive’ force is widely variable between individuals, cultures, and times.

And your one law doesn’t even mention retalitory force; if Jim attacks me and breaks my arm, and I find him, accost him, and imprison him for 60 days (or whatever the normal term for assault and battery is), it doesn’t appear to be outside of your one law at all.

For that matter, your one law doesn’t address the issue of reasonable levels of punishment; you and Gilligan appear to think that chopping off a hand for stealing is unreasonable, and I bet you think a term of 30 days of house arrest for what would now be 1st degree murder is also unreasonable. How are these things decided other than at a judge’s whim?

But if a citizen of Libertaria initiates force against me and I respond with force considered appropriate by the government I have consented to but not by the government they have consented to, then I will be visited by the jackbooted thugs of Libertaria for defending myself. And this doesn’t just happen with my deliberately extreme example of shooting a kid for trespassing. If I wake up and find someone has broken into my house, am I justified in using lethal force against them? If I hear someone kicking in my door and threatening to kill me, am I justified in using lethal force against them by shooting through the door? (BTW, I consider both of these examples reasonable use of deadly force, and they are both considered reasonable under the laws of North Carolina).

What gives Libertaria the right to subject me to Libertaria’s interpretation of excessive force when I have not consented to be governed by Libertaria (I’m a Riboflavian citizen) and a citizen of Libertaria initiated force against me?

That’s exactly what Common Law is, and to the best of my knowledge researching precedences established by previous judicial rulings is the main piece of research that takes up a lawyer’s time. (Admittedly, my knowledge of this comes from chance discussions with lawyers about what they’re doing, Law & Order, and talking with a reporter who spends a good bit of time in a courtroom).

[quote]
And I won’t fight you over that; in a way, they do. But the essential difference as I see it is that the rulings are descriptive of the law, rather than prescriptive of it. This allows coercion to be interpreted liberally.

[QUOTE]

This also prevents legislative correction of bad precedent, such as making a specific action that was judged illegal at one point legal by a specific law. What checks and balances are in place to prevent the judiciary from writing bad laws? Remember that you’ve already stated that one is required to abide by the judgements of Libertaria if a citizen of Libertaria initiates force against you whether or not you yourself are a citizen of Libertaria (thus, you can’t just choose a different government).

But you’re not talking about voluntary human relations at all. If a citizen of Libertaria initiates force against a citizen of Riboflavia, then (according to what you and Gilligan have been saying) the citizen of Riboflavia must submit to the laws of Libertaria despite never having agreed to said laws. (Look back at the ‘shotgun and trespassing kid’ bit). I never agreed to be bound by Libertaria’s laws, and being the victim of the initiation of force is not voluntary, yet according to you I’m still required to abide by Libertaria’s laws.

But what if I HAVEN’T signed a contract with Libertaria, and instead signed a contract with another government yet end up hauled into a Libertarian court? Do I still get a free lawyer, or does Libertaria coerce money out of me?

Your doctrine of consent is broken by your claims for what Libertaria would do, though. If I shoot a kid on my lawn (and, to make it less extreme, let’s say the kid was large for his age and carrying a toy gun that looked pretty real at night) and that kid is a citizen of Libertaria, then according to you I will be brought before a court in Libertaria despite the fact that I have not initiated force against anyone and have not consented to be governed by Libertaria.

(I consider the redefinition of ‘excessive defensive force’ as ‘initial force’ to be nothing more than doublespeak, BTW. The definitions you yourself gave me do not support that interpretation.)

[quote]
Let’s paraphrase your question with substitutions: “What if the United States disagrees with the previous arbitration about what reasonable punishment is, and chooses punishments for a trespassing Mexican that Mexico thinks is unfair?”

Does the answer to that question, whatever the heck it is, serve to in

93

So, if I think that anyone using drugs will likely harm someone else (say, by stealing), this person is coercive and should be subject to defensive force? You seem to have wandered closer to what our government does: if we think someone will cause harm, we have the right to imprision them; the only thing we can argue about is how “rational” that judgment is. It seems that Libertaria could quite possibly end up with the same drug laws we have here. If you say that the drugs cannot be reasonably seen as very likely to cause harm, I would agree; but that is the only argument effective in either Libertaria or here–I do not think there is anything to bar a pure Libertarian government from banning drug use, even if not all consent, since if using the drugs were seen as a “threat” to someone, the drug user would automatically be coercive and thus would not have rights. (I suppose the drug user could seceed once his contract was up, if he was out of jail by then.)

Ow. Head hurts. Of course I can’t tell the future, but can only discern past patterns and extrapolate–but I think we are morally obligated to do so, and to take that into account. If you determine from your experience that the father is acting in a manner that makes you think he will do harm or threaten, you are morally obligated to take that into account when deciding whether to tell the truth, right? If–and I am not arguing this, but simply bringing it up–your version of pure Libertarianism, if implemented, could be determined from past patterns (about the nature of people and governments) to likely cause thousands to starve to death, shouldn’t you consider this? (Or are you advocating a pure “social Darwinism” ::shudder:: where the weak and poor die to strengthen the herd?) What if the Libertarian government would likely be so weak that it could be taken over by a dictator, who would coerce like mad? Now, if you wish to argue that pure Libertarianism is likely (as far as we can determine from past patterns) to be a better government than our current one, and less people will suffer because of it, I will gladly listen–but to completely discount what is likely to happen because you are doing what is “right” seems as short-sighted as telling the truth to a likely murderer.

Ok, fine–we should take into account what is likely to happen to another person when we make moral judgments, it’s just we’re concerned with the father hurting the sister, not the sister being hurt. And I’m concerned with a pure libertarian goverment being so impractical that it fails to be able to maintain itself and falls apart, thereby harming all the people associated with it–by, say, allowing them to be severly coerced by powerful countries once they have no goverment and they are too geographically scattered to resist effectively (but I can’t be concerned with the people being hurt, since that’s an “end”). :wink:

Ok, did we just go through all of this because what I define as a “likely end” is what Lib defines as a “likely mean”?

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They ramble on. Guests who’ve overstayed their welcome, impassioned congregating Kafkaist cockroaches, the “Jehovah’s Witnesses of the Teeming Millions”, their stubby fingers, numb from endless typing, trying to transcribe every last word dictated by the voices in their head, voices that say one more post, one more paragraph, you will save the world from the error of its ways!, locust-like, swarming, heedless, relentless.

After years of struggle and torment, Odysseus finally made his way home. There is a children’s book, about a railroad engine–a “choo-choo train” if you will–which had to learn it was usually best to stay on the tracks, and not to wander off into other’s fields. The common moral from these two great works of literature: remain true to your roots.

Now, who is willing to be a modern-day Moses, and lead this lost and derailed thread back home to the Great Debates forum where it belongs?

95

So what’s your point? Odysseus is a hero, and had many exciting adventures. David B is patiently weaving and unweaving back in Great Debates, awaiting my return. :smiley:

96

Happens every time. The new guy always gets stuck with the work.

Riboflavin, I’m not a “copy, paste, rebut” kind of guy, so you’ll have to bear with me. I think you hold some misconceptions about what libertarianism entails, but at the same time you correctly point out some of the practical problems with the particular implementation of it that Lib prefers for his Libertaria.

Here are the points that I think are incorrect:

“As the kid had consented to be bound by Singapore’s laws as part of the process of going into the country, he had already agreed to accept such punishment should he choose to break the laws of Singapore. Or does your ideal Libertarian government not respect the right of people to enter into agreements that Libertaria doesn’t like? …Singapore’s laws are not made by dictators holding their position by military force, they’re made by elected representatives and such laws are actually quite popular in the country. …But if you go to another country you CONSENT to be governed by that country’s laws, thus the other country enforcing their own laws (no matter how distasteful) on people who have consented to be governed by those laws, is not coercion by any sane definition.”

This is all talking about one single case, and is a totally different situation from the earlier described one about psychos shooting up kids for wandering onto their property. It may surprise you to find out I happen to agree with you here. This person consented to be so bound to those laws when he went there. MY libertarian government would not go rescue him. (Lib will have to answer for his own.) You see, my lib gov’t did not make any agreement with this guy to protect him from the consequences of his own voluntary actions. We only agree to protect him from coercion that he had no control over. Here is the situation in which we would rescue him: He goes there, and while he happens to be there, their government secretly decides that “being American” is a crime punishable by immediate execution, no trial needed. (This is more like Psychotica.) In this instance, our guy hasn’t “consented” to be governed by this law; thus he has been coerced, thus it is just and “libertarian” for us to defend him. You might argue that simply by being there, he has given some kind of “implied consent” to anything that Singapore might do, but I think it would be a bad misuse of the word “consent.” It would mean that every time we step off our own property, either physically or metaphorically, we’ve consented to everything that might happen to us, making the word “crime” meaningless.

“If you attempt to create a different government, and someone from Libertaria consents to be bound by that government’s laws, Libertaria will launch a military assault on the other government for the horrible crime of it enforcing it’s own explicitly detailed agreements… this seems to be a big break with Libertarian’s idea that if you don’t like the government of Libertaria, you can just choose another government; Libertaria will attempt to enforce it’s laws against me even when I have not consented to be governed by Libertaria’s laws and when I am not on property owned by one of Libertaria’s citizens…If Libertaria decides that shooting someone who has broken into my home is excessive force, then I can expect jackbooted thugs from Libertaria to be breaking down my door even though I have never consented to be governed by Libertaria’s laws because one of Libertaria’s citizens decided to initiate force against me. ”

Here again, it’s all about the meaning of “consent.” Neither my gov’t nor Libertaria will do anything for one of our citizens who “consents” to be bound by the additional laws of whatever foreign nations. Especially if he’s done so with “explicitly detailed agreements.” Neither of us has any interest in allowing or fostering criminal behavior, so if one of our citizens chooses to break into your house, coercing you, we will agree with you that he’s consented, in a sense, to being shot at. Lib put it this way: by his actions, this guy has “given up his right.” I’m not sure yet exactly how I would put it. We would, however, insist on one thing – that you be able to demonstrate that you felt your actions were justified. Nations like the US put such clauses in treaties with one another.

“It sounds like the alleged ‘non-coercion’ principle, the idea that government is by consent of the governed, and the idea that people can consent to any government they choose are not actually held by the libertarians on this thread.”

Um, yes they are.
Here is what I have come to understand about the non-coercion principle, or more accurately, its application to law. Law, libertarianly speaking, is an inner-directed concept, not an outer-directed one. What I mean is that when a law is “applied”, it isn’t applied to the subject, but for the object. This is why it’s incorrect for you and Jodi to keep saying, “you’re applying a law to us, and we haven’t consented.” If you are the subjects in this sentence: “X coerced Y”, then your consent, your choice of government, or for that matter any other attribute of you, is irrelevant. The law is all about the object “Y”. As Lib might put it: “Y is the proper ethical frame of reference.”

Now here is where you correctly point out a problem with Libertaria:

“It sounds like the military of Libertaria is going to be awfully busy, invading other countries every time they attempt to enforce their own laws”

I see it with you, that Libertaria will pretty much have to be the most powerful nation in the world if it’s going to do what Lib expects it to. He’s told us that it would be, in other threads (this has been going on for a long time), but still there are huge practical obstacles to becoming the most powerful. The biggest obstacle, of course, is the Rest of the World, who probably won’t put up with it for very long.

97

Actually, I seem to understand Libertarianism better than you and Lib do. For example, I’m familiar with the actual definitions of initial force and defensive force, which do not include ‘defensive force that party X thinks is excessive’ with ‘initial force’. (See http://www.libertarian.org/libphilo.htmlwhich Lib offered to ‘educate’ me on the difference between the two.) The critical difference is that initial force and defensive force are objective definitions, while your ‘excessive defensive force’ is a subjective definition.

What I’m arguing with here is the system that you and Lib are putting forth and calling ‘Libertarianism’, without worrying about whether it fits with anyone else’s definition of Libertarianism. All of my points are related to what you and Lib have claimed, and are not intended to be directed against some abstract concept of Libertarianism. The biggest problem is that you and Lib have decided to change the definition of defensive force, which renders your appeal to any outside ‘Libertarian’ sources rather suspect.

This statement contradicts the one you made earlier, to wit:

Which is it? Is the person subject to the laws they consented to when they went into the other country, or will Libertaria be permitted to defend because the other country is killing one of you for a petty offense?

But let’s modify your example just slightly, and say that Psychotica (the country you’re talking about above) made a law through it’s legislative system that makes ‘being American’ illegal, then arrests and tries your person for for this crime, and lets him appeal it all the way to their supreme court, which finds it legal. Do you intervene now?

This is not just a silly question - if you say yes, then you’re saying that you WILL rescue the person “to protect him from the consequences of his own voluntary actions,” as the law in question, while distateful, was put into place by the legal system he agreed to put himself under and which has not broken it’s agreement with him (for example, by removing his right to a trial). Furthermore, if you say that you will intervene here, it seems to me that the exact same principle will apply to ANY law passed after he has agreed to follow the laws of Psychotica. That is, if Psychotica passes a law that Libertaria doesn’t like, then Libertaria will be justified in helping him break his agreement.

(I don’t know why anyone would go to psychotica, but I don’t see why anyone would go to Iraq in today’s world either. Some people do.)

By the principles you and Lib have set forth, you don’t have the right to step onto someone’s property without their permission, and you don’t have the right to refuse conditions they set on said permission and still set foot on their property. If you join up with a governmental organization (like Libertaria or Riboflavia), then you can be assured that people will follow the limits set forth by the government you’re a part of and so don’t have to worry about outrageous conditions. If you CHOOSE to gain benefits from property owned by people who have thrown in with psychotica, then you have to accept THEIR conditions on the use of their property.

Again, you contradict your earlier statement that:

So, does Libertaria claim sovereign rights over the whole planet to determine what is and isn’t a petty offense, what is and isn’t excessive force, and what is and isn’t appropriate punishment?

Hell, what if I’ve decided that (because of the convenient position of my property) the fee for crossing my property is $10,000 (there’s a big mining operation nearby that is willing to pay that much for the convenience of not going around my land), and a citizen of Libertaria crosses my property (which has large signs warning of the $10,000 fee), and is promptly warned off, then arrested by the police of Riboflavia when he tries it a second time, tried, and then given the choice of paying me $10,000 in restitution or being sentenced for grand larceny (a prison sentence of 5-10 years). Does the government of Libertaria intervene then?

If you say that that $10,000 is excessive (and that Libertaria would intervene), then you’re adopting the rather un-Libertarian doctrine of eminent domain from the US and claiming that your government (which I have not even consented to be governed by) has the right to set the fees for usage of my property without my consent.

[quote]
Neither of us has any interest in allowing or fostering criminal behavior, so if one of our citizens chooses to break into your house, coercing you, we will agree with you that he’s consented, in a sense, to being shot at. Lib put it this way: by his actions, this guy has “given up his right.” I’m not sure yet exactly how I would put it.We would, however, insist on one thing – that you be able to demonstrate that you felt your actions were justified.<

98

Whiteho

Well, we won’t hold that against you. Perhaps if you post just once more, we’ll get your point.

The pit is a good place for me to work on my skills. I’ve come to the conclusion (thanks to a friend’s insights) that I have a lot of faults in debate. I’m impatient and bombastic, for one thing. I assume that everybody who asks me questions hates me and disagrees with everything I say. I don’t reveal my underlying assumptions and axioms (which I could easily save in a boilerplate text file). Then suddenly, I ambush people with them when they unwittingly contradict something they haven’t even heard yet.

Personally, I’m looking forward to the weekend when I can answer Riboflavin. Other than getting fitted for a tux, I’ll have plenty of time. And this is fun.

Besides, we’ve kept this pitworthy. Have you not seen our “damns” and “hells” sprinkled liberally here and there?

99

This earlier statement of mine: “Now if you are punishing one of us appropriately, we have no problem with it; after all, we have no interest in allowing criminal behavior. But if you’re killing one of us for a petty offense, then you’ve initiated the force, so we are permitted to defend” was rash and incomplete. It omitted any consideration of consent. So while it does contradict later statements, the contradiction wasn’t intentional, but a mistake made in haste.

If you think Lib and I are not being “libertarian” by considering excessive defensive force to be coercive, can you at least tell us of some libbers that think the other way around? No links necessary, but maybe a name or book or something where some libertarian claims that killing a kid who happens to walk on to his property is just fine because it counts as “defense” and is therefore justified. I would be interested in hearing of anyone of any political or ethical philosophy who thinks this a good thing.

100

So if a citizen of Libertaria comes into Psychotica and initiates force against one of their citizens, they will be subject to military intervention from Libertaria (which, as we all know, is much harsher than Libertaria’s law with hands liberally being chopped off and the death penalty for jaywalking) because he has not consented to the laws of Psychotica? But why is his consent to the laws of Psychotica relevant? Didn’t you earlier state that:

[quote]
Here is what I have come to understand about the non-coercion principle, or more accurately, its application to law. Law, libertarianly speaking, is an inner-directed concept, not an outer-directed one. What I mean is that when a law is “applied”, it isn’t applied to the subject, but for the object. This is why it’s incorrect for you and Jodi to keep saying, “you’re applying a law to us, and we haven’t consented.” If you are the subjects in this sentence: “X coerced Y”, then your consent, your choice of government, or for that matter any other attribute of you, is irrelevant. The law is all about the object “Y”. As Lib might put it: “Y is the proper ethical frame of reference.”[./QUOTE]

So, is X the proper ethical frame of reference or is Y?

Ummm… the LP homepage with the definitions of initial force and defensive force, which does not include anything stating that excessive defensive force is initial force perhaps? I presume that if it made it to the LP pages, there are at least some libbers who think ‘the other way around’.

Can Riboflavia intervene to defend that strawman against your viscious attack? I never said that I considered such an act ‘just fine’, or that I thought you thought such an act ‘just fine’. I used shotgunning the kid as an example of something that was not initial force by the definition you were apparently using, and then went on to examine the problems with the new definition you began using after I pointed out the problems with your initial definition.

BTW, what exactly is ‘excessive force’? There’s at least one person on this board who feels that using deadly force against another person is NEVER justified, and another (me) who thinks that using deadly force is justified in response to anyone who enters your dwelling without your permission. Where on the spectrum is Libertaria’s definition of excessive force?

I am trying to show you and lib that the system you are both trying to explain and defend is either contradictory at it’s core or doesn’t prevent the problems you and Lib would like to prevent. If Libertaria accepts the objective definition of initial and defensive force that you and Lib earlier advocated, then it doesn’t prevent the ‘shotgunning the kid’ situation. If Libertaria adopts the non-objective definition that you have now put forth, then someone cannot actually choose another government to live under, since Libertaria still claims the right to subject you to trial if a citizen of Libertaria initiates force against you and you defend yourself against said force (the trial being held to determine if you met Libertaria’s arbitrary standards on the use of force).

What gives Libertaria and not Riboflavia or Psychotica the right to determine ‘excessive’ and ‘not excessive’ force? Is it merely that Libertaria is more militarily powerful, or is there something else here?

I think you and lib are using circular reasoning; you state that something is bad if and only if something is an initiation of force, then decide that since the guy killing the kid is bad it must have been an initiation of force, and don’t see that that contradicts with the definition of initiation of force that you normally claim. Both of you claim that you want to put into place a pure Libertarian government, but back out when what a pure Libertarian government actually means is pointed out to you. Absolute property rights mean that wandering onto the property of someone who has not entered any kind of agreement with you is extremely dangerous.

If I decide to fill my property with deadly traps and have not entered into any agreements with anyone not to do so, then I have not initiated force or fraud against anyone, I have merely chosen to use my own property in a particular manner. If a kid chooses to walk into my yard and gets skewered on my Spear Of Death, under a pure Libertarian system I have done nothing wrong. I personally think that the situation I described is a bad thing, but it is not an initiation of force.

Kevin Allegood,

“At least one could get something through Trotsky’s skull.”

  • Joseph Michael Bay