The Problem with Libertarians...

[David Floyd]

It assumes that lack of action against the immoral is moral.

Realistically, I have no way of knowing the "moral status", if you will, of any other person, just by looking at them. I have to have some sort of insider's knowledge, or be a mind-reader.

Thus, your "flaw" is possibly relevant in a thought experiment, but not nearly as relevant in the real world.

[Ned]

David, But this helps explain why your are against war per se. The same philosophy means you are against LAW as well, not so?

[David Floyd]

The same philosophy means you are against LAW as well, not so?

No. Once someone commits an immoral act, it can be reasonably determined that they are in some way an immoral person, and should be punished for that act in some form not relevant to our discussion.

However, don't try to apply this to international relations. It's all well and good if everyone consents to some world government and gives authority to that governing body, but if they do not, that body does not have the authority to punish the wrongs that might be committed.

That is, of course, if you believe that consent of the governed is important. If you believe that might makes right (as most non-Libertarians ultimately do), your conclusion will be different.

[Ned]

II assume, David that you believe that states have the inherent right to secede – given the primacy of “consent” of the governed.

Also, if you believe in LAW, how can you be a Libertarian? LAW implies denial of freedom to an individual by others. As you said earlier, you have no right to interfere in the liberty of others.

[Ramo]

In our own case, we are a representative government of the people. Recent attempts at legalizing marijuana, for example, were shot down by the people. The Libertarian though would probably disagree and say something along the lines of freedom, liberty, etc. I believe we are representative of the people while the Libertarian does not. But I believe the people of this country have made their decision.

The anarcho-syndicalist would say that democracy is the idea that people own and control themselves, not that the state owns and controls the people. As such, the anarcho-syndicalist would say drug laws, and any other statist laws, are obstacles to democracy, i.e. not of the people.

Personally I would see that as one of the most outrageous and destructive ideas I've heard.

I believe we have the right to ban and control things that will damage our society as a whole.

I would say that drug laws, particularly those similar to the laws enforced in the US, are outrageous, destructive, and damage our society as a whole. Not only are half a million non-violent drug users locked up in our prisons, the crime caused by these drug laws gives us a crime-rate unparalleled in the Western world, comparable to the likes of Russia. It is tyranny.

I agree with this, but with the addendum, that the Opium deals were part of those agreements, and Opium was often lumped together with what we would considered "normal" goods.

That's why the Chinese had some much trouble and why it led to confrontation, because the boats they went after had other things on them in addition to the Opium on board.

I'm not sure I'm following you... Are you saying that the agreements force the Chinese to buy the opium? If so, I'd appreciate a source.

though remember we are judging him by 2003 standards, and during this same time in America, we practiced institutionalized slavery

He was no less than a murderer and a thief on a massive scale who caused unthinkable amounts of suffering. I really don't see why you're arguing the point.

However, the point I was trying to make was this particular revolution failed because more people side with the Emperor than against him.

Actually, the revolution failed because of poor political and military leadership... The actual feelings of the people are pretty much irrelevent. What's relevant is supporting which side keeps you and your family alive.

I just don't see how having a nation with 2 million addicts strung out is a good thing.
One final thing, is that Opium abuse was across all classes, not just poor peasants.

Drug abuse is almost invariably centered around the poor and oppressed members of society (as long as the price isn't prohibitively expensive) even it spreads across all levels of society. Opium abuse in China was no different. There's a reason why opium addiction exploded in the early 19th century; that's when poverty exploded...

[Kontiki]

Without taking sides (pro- or anti-Libertarian), it seems to me that a great deal of the problems in this debate have been semantics. It seems that David et al are interpreting "murder" as the killing of a completely innocent person (ie: someone who has done no wrong, and certainly isn't threatening or on the brink of killing five people), whereas Agathon is looking at it more of a "someone is going to kill five people, and you can stop that one person by killing them" angle.

I think this is actually an interesting debate, and wonder what the Libertarian position on the latter interpretation is. I should think it would be that since that situation is not technically "murder", it is a different beast and therefore ok. Am I wrong?

[Agathon]

Originally posted by Kontiki
It seems that David et al are interpreting "murder" as the killing of a completely innocent person (ie: someone who has done no wrong, and certainly isn't threatening or on the brink of killing five people), whereas Agathon is looking at it more of a "someone is going to kill five people, and you can stop that one person by killing them" angle.

No S*** Sherlock!

BTW - in this example the person who you kill to stop the five being killed is not the person who is going to kill them (although David's argument rules that out as well).

OK then...

If someone is going to murder(David) five people and it can be prevented with another murder(David), should we allow it?

Semantic issue over.

[Kontiki]

Originally posted by Agathon


No S*** Sherlock!

BTW - in this example the person who you kill to stop the five being killed is not the person who is going to kill them (although David's argument rules that out as well).

OK then...

If someone is going to murder(David) five people and it can be prevented with another murder(David), should we allow it?

Semantic issue over.

Hmm....I think you may be wrong, but I won't speak for David. Personally, I think Libertarianism is wrong simply because I do believe in the "greater good" that David has explicitly said Libertarians don't buy into. However, I do have to side with David if you think that killing a person totally at random to prevent someone else from killing five people is a good thing. If you are talking about the would be killer him/herself, then by all means, blow the MFer away, but a random killing does not really make sense. My original point is that I'm not sure Libertarians would have a problem killing the would-be killer, but would killing a totally unrelated person. Then again, maybe I'm wrong.

[Agathon]

Originally posted by David Floyd

All right, I understand the concept of "lesser of two evils". And when one is deciding something relevant to themselves only, I agree with its application.

Do you thus agree that five violations of the right to life is worse than one?

However, in our example, my decision affects other people, in fact, other innocent people. If I can save five innocent people by murdering one innocent person, I wouldn't do it - murder is wrong. Look at it like this (and I'll get to your war example in a minute, let's finish up this example).

Let's say a would-be killer calls you up. You are 100% certain of the fact that he is a killer, and the fact that he will kill. Let's say he gives you an ultimatum - he says that he has five innocent hostages, and that he will kill them unless you pick up a handgun, walk out to the park, and shoot someone at random. What would your response be to that ultimatum?

It's hard to see how one could be certain in this particular case, but if the case is exactly as you described, I'd do it.

Here's what I would do. I would know that I am not responsible for his actions. I would further know that if I don't kill the one innocent person, I will not be held legally responsible. I also know that if I agree, and kill an innocent person, I WILL be held legally accountable.

There are two points to make in response to this.

(1) Just because you won't be held legally accountable does not mean that you are not morally accountable. The law is not necessarily moral and vice versa.

(2) I would say that my killing someone in this case was the lesser of two evils. I am not responsible for the situation but I have the power to determine whether it turns out to be just bad or really horrible. I'd take just bad.

Therefore, I don't kill anyone. If the killer ends up killing the five people, that is a terrible tragedy, but EVEN THOUGH he gave me a chance to prevent it, I am not morally responsible for the deaths of those five people. Only the trigger man is (or, I suppose, the person who ordered it, etc. - we're both intelligent enough to know what I mean, so let's leave it at that). Objectively speaking, five deaths are indeed worse than one death, and if I can prevent those deaths - ANY of them - in a moral way, I should.

Are you sure you aren't responsible? After all you have the power to make the difference here? I don't think that you should be punishable for killing one to save five, but it is clear that if he kils the five he is to blame and you are to blame for not minimizing the harm done when you could have.

I have no way to act morally and at the same time prevent the deaths of five people. However, I DO have a way to act morally and prevent the deaths of one person. Therefore, I am morally obligated to prevent that one person from being murdered, and that's exactly what I would do.

This assumes that choosing the greater of two evils is the moral thing to do - and that just seems absurd since the greater evil is, by definition, the worse outcome.

What you are saying, in effect, is this: "We should always prefer the better and avoid the worse. A murder is a very bad thing, and more murders are always worse, but there are some situations in which we should countenance more murders than less, so there are some situations in which we should prefer the worse to the better."

I understand what you're saying, but we aren't talking about preserving my rights over those of anyone else, we are talking about me making a decision about whether or not to murder someone.

On what basis is this decision made? How can it be made on the basis of what's morally best when you are choosing the worst?

If you knew as much about Libertarianism as you purport to know, you would know that Libertarians (and especially Objectivists) don't believe in the concepts of societal rights, the common good, etc.

I know this and I've carefully avoided attributing it to them (I hope).

Likewise, we don't believe in a concept of "net morality" or "net liberty". We simply believe that the rights of individuals should be respected, and that we should do nothing to violate those rights.

They say they don't and this is the core of the problem. They say (or are committed) to the following:

(1) We believe in rights the violation of which constitutes moral wrongdoing. These rights are the basis of morality and are the only things in the world that bestow moral obligations upon agents (i.e. if X has a right, I ought to respect that right).

(2) We believe that one person's rights do not matter any more than anyone else's: that is, we must respect the rights of all persons equally (i.e. people of different races have a right to life).

Now they must believe:

(3) Given violation of N number of rights, violation of N+1 rights is always worse from the moral point of view.

Or:

(4) Given violation of N number of rights, violation of N+1 rights is no worse from the moral point of view.

Does anyone really believe (4)? After all it would amount to saying that all crimes have the same moral status (e.g. stealing a packet of crisps is no worse than stealing a million dollars).

If Libertarians take (3) they are still not agreeing that there is such a thing as a "social good" or the "common good"; nothing has been mentioned other than individual rights.

All I am suggesting is that if (3) is accepted then Libertarians are committed to a maximising principle that says more rights respecting behaviour is better and more rights violations are worse. There is no "common good" here over and above the maximisation of respecting individual's rights. In other words what looks like a "common good" is in fact identical to an aggregate of individual rights.

So if you want to call this a "common good" you will perhaps slightly mislead, but you would only be saying, "I believe that more violations of individual rights are worse than less violations."

This is the contradiction - they say that five murders are worse, yet their own principles also entail that it is good to choose the worst. How can it ever be good to choose the worst? I

If someone else infringes upon a person's liberty, then that person should certainly be punished or restrained in some way, but I myself cannot infringe upon the liberty of another in the pursuit of some "common good" that I don't even believe in.

There is no common good here which is different from the rights of individuals. You show me where the "common good" in my thesis exists separately from individual rights?

That's not my position at all. My position is more of something like this: I value liberty, and as such I will not knowingly violate the liberty of any individual, even if it means someone else violates the liberty of other individuals.

In what sense do you value liberty since your valuing of it is consistent with behaviour that produces less of it (again - no common good here - we are only talking about numbers of rights violations).

[b]I cannot control the actions of others, only my own, and I have an obligation to behave morally]/b]. That is the crux of my position, with regards to that example.

No one said you could control the actions of others. If you could, this sort of situation wouldn't arise. If you have an obligation to refrain in this situation, you are saying you have an obligation to refrain from what you acknowledge is better in favour of what is worse - because five murders are worse than one.

The only way you can avoid this conclusion is to say that there is something special about you not doing something and this seems like a concern for the purity of the agent rather than the liberty of the victims. What is it?

There's another mistake. War is not that simple. Every major war the United States has ever fought has been, in some way, the result of the United States behaving immorally or wrongly in its foreign policy.

I'm no friend of the US but this is a bit too much. What about WW2?

I can give examples and explain myself if you like, but the point is that if the United States did not behave so aggressively, and if it did not piss people off, then we wouldn't be at war - wars don't just come out of nowhere.

True, but what if I am the victim of US aggression and I know that the US is developing WMD's - all that changes is that the boot is on the other foot - the example is still sound.

Wrong. I committed murder, which is by definition unjustified. If you want to justify killing an innocent person, you're not going to be able to use the word "murder", because murder is NEVER justified. But killing an innocent person IS murder, so I'm not quite sure how you can reconcile that.

This is a piece of sophistry. It begs the question of what counts as a murder. If murder is by definition "wrongful killing" then what I have described is either not murder (i.e it is manslaughter or something like that); or, the term "murder" means "killing: usually wrongful" in which case I would describe my case as being one of the exceptions. Whether what I have described is wrong or not does not depend on the term we invent to describe it, but on the nature of the act itself. Looking in a dictionary is not sufficient to solve our moral dilemmas.

No, all that is is an attempt by someone else to shift responsibility for their actions onto you. Since they are responsible for their own actions, and you for yours, if they kill the five people and claim you could have stopped it by committing murder, they are full of ****. If you committed murder, you would have been just as in the wrong as they are.

I would say, again, that they are responsible for killing the five people and you are for letting them. Is there a real difference between this case and one in which he tells you he's going to do it and you don't tell the police (are you not responsible in part in this case?). The only difference is that, in the case we are discussing, the means of preventing the five murders are a lot worse than a phone call to the pigs.

There is no conflict. If I desire no/few murders, I must not commit murder.

But you will actually fulfil your desire few fewer murders by committing one in this case. So either you don't really desire fewer murders or you really don't desire that you do them, whatever the consequences.

If someone else commits murder, they should be punished in some form as to discourage murder. We should not ENCOURAGE murder by murdering one to save five - that will only result in more murders, in the long run, because it opens the door to any psycopath who can kidnap people.

But people could do this now.

I'm sorry, you are incorrect again. If I murder someone, the "amount of evil in the world", even as you define it, by definition increases, because murder is an evil act. If someone else murders five people, the "amount of evil in the world" also goes up. But those are two separate acts, and by not murdering anyone, I am doing my part to keep down the "evil rate", if you want to think of it in those terms.

I don't disagree that these are separate acts, but whichever one is chosen will have an effect on the total evil in the world (measured in violations of the right to life). It is the same world. So the consequences are:

(1) You kill. Result: he doesn't. Amount of evil in the world +1.

(2) You don't kill. Result: he does. Amount of evil in the world +5.

True, you can set up any contrived, outlandish scenario that you want.

What's outlandish about either situation. The five for one situation is one that could easily be encountered as a form of psychological torture by prisoners of war. Similar situations to my war example happen almost every time there is a war.

I've already granted that, objectively speaking, five deaths are "worse" than just one. But that doesn't give me the right to commit murder.

So you have the obligation to promote the worse over the better, knowing it is better. That's perverse.

Wrong. I can't make a difference to the outcome. Only the person holding the innocent people hostage can make the difference, by either murdering them or not. He can base his decisions on what I do or don't do, if he wants, but that doesn't mean anyone is responsible but him.

So you are saying that you can never have good reason to be sure of what someone is going to do, are you? My case is about what you do, if you are sure he's going to. Saying that we are never sure is just lies - I'm sure my wife won't try to kill me today. I have no reason to believe that she will. I am sure that George W Bush won't streak across the White House lawn. These are beliefs that would stand up as reasonable in a court. Prove to me that we can't say the same about every single death threat of the kind I've described.

I've also pointed out that if I go ahead and kill the one person, and use your justification to escape punishment, it'll just happen again and again. Sure, lot's of single people will die to "prevent" five others from being killed, but once we hit the sixth person who is killed, doesn't that, by your logic, outweigh the five at once? And, also according to your logic, if I had simply "allowed" the five to die the first time, the situation probably would not have arisen again, and thus there would be a greater "level of morality" in the world.

I find this bizarre. Why would it happen again? You need to be sure in order to make this claim. If we were sure then you would be right. But it is very unlikely that this would be the case in every single case of us having to violate rights to ensure a lesser amount of evil. It's like saying all men who read pornography will become rapists.

I once read about a serial killer who got some perverse pleasure out of forcing other people to kill. As far as I know this hasn't become the norm.

How is it not clear that only the "trigger man" bears final responsibility for someone's death?

Because you have power over the outcome.

I'm not sure I'd say that. Death is a fact of life. It can be tragic, and it can also be a good thing for the person. If one has a disease, or is in a lot of pain, sometimes death is preferable. But don't try to morally equate death with murder.

This doesn't answer the question of why killing someone is bad. It might be good for them (euthanasia). In the cases we are considering it is assumed for the sake of argument that it is bad in these situations. Again, in these cases, is death bad because it is caused by killing or is killing bad because it causes death.

OK. I was just curious. Personally, I've had one undergrad level political philosophy course, and done a lot of independent thinking. As for me, I'm certain you have. As for Berzerker, I have no idea.

I'm not bragging but let's say I've done a lot more than that. I'm surprised you didn't come up against thought experiments in that course - it is a standard tool taught in first year. As for berzerker - I'd be surprised if he'd ever done anything other than read Ayn Rand paperbacks as though they contained the solution to humanity's problems.

[Agathon]

Originally posted by Kontiki


Hmm....I think you may be wrong, but I won't speak for David. Personally, I think Libertarianism is wrong simply because I do believe in the "greater good" that David has explicitly said Libertarians don't buy into. However, I do have to side with David if you think that killing a person totally at random to prevent someone else from killing five people is a good thing. If you are talking about the would be killer him/herself, then by all means, blow the MFer away, but a random killing does not really make sense. My original point is that I'm not sure Libertarians would have a problem killing the would-be killer, but would killing a totally unrelated person. Then again, maybe I'm wrong.

In the case considered it is a random killing, but it doesn't have to be. I don't see how it makes a difference. My point is that the random killing makes sense if it prevents what would have been more killing. And Libertarians seem to believe in a sort of greater good "The rights of the many outweigh the rights of the few".

[Ben Kenobi]

"I cannot control the actions of others, only my own, and I have an obligation to behave morally."
-David Floyd

Ned, I agree. I think you have hit on a very significant flaw within libertarianism.

How can one have an obligation to behave morally if you cannot influence other people? Part of moral behavior includes defending your own position and trying to convince other people that this is a moral action. Libertarians cannot do so, without fear of superceding other people's choices.

Libertarians can tell you why something is right for them, but cannot say why it is right for you as well.

[One_Brow]

Originally posted by Agathon
Do you thus agree that five violations of the right to life is worse than one?

I don't know about him, but I'll chime in with this: the murder of one random person is just as heinous, just as evil, just as immoral as the killing of five, five hundred, or five million random people (note the importance or the word random).

They say they don't and this is the core of the problem. They say (or are committed) to the following:

(1) We believe in rights the violation of which constitutes moral wrongdoing. These rights are the basis of morality and are the only things in the world that bestow moral obligations upon agents (i.e. if X has a right, I ought to respect that right).

(2) We believe that one person's rights do not matter any more than anyone else's: that is, we must respect the rights of all persons equally (i.e. people of different races have a right to life).

Now they must believe:

(3) Given violation of N number of rights, violation of N+1 rights is always worse from the moral point of view.

Or:

(4) Given violation of N number of rights, violation of N+1 rights is no worse from the moral point of view.

Does anyone really believe (4)? After all it would amount to saying that all crimes have the same moral status (e.g. stealing a packet of crisps is no worse than stealing a million dollars).

If Libertarians take (3) they are still not agreeing that there is such a thing as a "social good" or the "common good"; nothing has been mentioned other than individual rights.

All I am suggesting is that if (3) is accepted then Libertarians are committed to a maximising principle that says more rights respecting behaviour is better and more rights violations are worse. There is no "common good" here over and above the maximisation of respecting individual's rights. In other words what looks like a "common good" is in fact identical to an aggregate of individual rights.

So if you want to call this a "common good" you will perhaps slightly mislead, but you would only be saying, "I believe that more violations of individual rights are worse than less violations."

This is the contradiction - they say that five murders are worse, yet their own principles also entail that it is good to choose the worst. How can it ever be good to choose the worst?

I don't disagree that these are separate acts, but whichever one is chosen will have an effect on the total evil in the world (measured in violations of the right to life). It is the same world. So the consequences are:

(1) You kill. Result: he doesn't. Amount of evil in the world +1.

(2) You don't kill. Result: he does. Amount of evil in the world +5.

All of these arguments are based on a horribly evil premise: that human life has a finite value. This would mean that if you add up 2, or 12, or 50 thousand, or 50 billion violations of free speech, you eventrually get up to the moral equivalent of murder.

However, if human life is considered to be of infinite value N, and the removal of it of value -N, than 5* -N is still -N, when N is infinite. IOWs, a five-fold infinity is no larger than the original infinity. Further, by killing an inocent yourself, your tarnish your own self to that degree, while removing none of the stain from the man who creates the threat.

While I might be wrong, I have the feeling David Floyd also sees human life as having infinite value, and has gotten to the right conclusion without the mathematical training.

[Berzerker]

Ned -

The above illustrates a flaw in Libertarianism. It assumes that lack of action against the immoral is moral.

The alternative in that hypothetical was David having to murder an innocent to prevent the murders of 5 people who are innocent. David didn't say it was moral to sit by and allow a murder to occur. So much for this "flaw"...

[orange]

One_Brow - that assumes that, if forced to choose between killing one person and killing two people, you'd choose randomly.

I don't know about you, but I'd choose killing one in such a situation. Why? Becuase it is better to have two survivors than one.

[Kontiki]

Originally posted by Agathon


In the case considered it is a random killing, but it doesn't have to be. I don't see how it makes a difference. My point is that the random killing makes sense if it prevents what would have been more killing. And Libertarians seem to believe in a sort of greater good "The rights of the many outweigh the rights of the few".

I think the difference lies in the fact that it's nearly impossible to imagine the killing of a random person saving the lives of five other people. In principle, you may be right - IF there were ABSOLUTE GUARANTEES that your killing someone at random would stop it. The trouble is, there are no absolute guarantees, and most sane people would realize that someone putting you in that position is hardly likely to keep their word. You're other examples make sense, and I'm well versed in game theory and PDs, so I fully agree with you there.

I'd say perhaps the biggest problem is that Libertarianism is an unattainable position and counter to what the vast majority of people would actually like. See, Libertarians (hard-core ones, anyway) don't really like democracy because they don't like the fact that the majority can "subjugate" the minority, as they like to see it. I can't even fathom how a society of Libertarians could function given that there couldn't really be any leaders. There would be no point to having an election since there could be no differing views on how to run any level of government, so how would people get into what few offices would be left and why would they bother trying to get there in the first place?