Hat tip to F. Stupidity, Jr. for the brilliant idea.
jesse.in.mb
Leaning, not doctrinaire. I’ll keep a bug-out bag handy for the next round of purity purges.
Swiss Servator
Minarchist. I previously wielded government power over other people’s life, liberty and property. The experience was…enlightening. Now I shun any dominion over my fellow man, and would hope to see government power limited, severely, over everyone’s life liberty or property.
Brett L
I have an idea of what is Good for me, I have no way of proving it is Good for anyone else. I believe that every human is equally valuable and there is no “fair” way to determine which individuals or groups “deserve” something from our society (whether that be help or to be on the wrong end of the “Trolley Dilemma”). Being a somewhat social animal, people are eventually going to contend in their quest for their Good. I believe that: strong protections of property are vital, people can’t be property, intentional or negligent taking of life is the worst rights violation, and a small, impartial, rigidly process bound entity for settling rights disputes is probably necessary. I have resigned myself to the fact that taking principled stands on this will forever put me on the side of assholes and bigots — so long as they are doing so in a way that doesn’t harm anyone physically or defraud another person. I don’t know what that makes me.
Heroic Mulatto
Recognizing that in current usage the term encompass several different but related schools of thought, I do identify as libertarian. Indeed, much like a Gold Star Lesbian, from the age of 13 when I first developed some semblance of a political conscious, I have never been outside of the libertarian umbrella. My journey has taken me from Objectivist, to card-carrying member of the Libertarian Party, to where I sit now: the Voluntaryist school of anarcho-capitalism.
SugarFree
Small-l libertarian, for lack of a better term. The LP is like watching clowns slapping each other with their own dicks, but I do support them out in The Normal World because, once again, there is a lack of a better alternative. I don’t think of myself as an anarcho-whatever because I don’t believe anarchy is truly self-sustaining–some form of government is inevitable because of The Irritating Asshole Problem–so you better constrain it as long as you can, keep it weak and beaten-down. Like Nietzsche, I look for reasons not to be an out-right nihilist but often fail and slip into the blackest sort of cynicism about the nature of man.
Riven
I consider myself a libertarian. Turn-ons: property rights, contracts, limited government, free market solutions, incentives. Turn-offs: drug and firearm laws, meddling foreign policies, government contracted infrastructure, taxes, preemptive and violent action.
Old Man With Candy
Let’s see… Bill of Rights absolutist, check. Delimited government powers, check. Free market economics, check. No special privileges or restrictions on unions, check. Anti-intervention and antiwar other than defense, check. Freedom of association, check. Freedom of contract, check. No desire for “leaders” and an attitude that elected officials are the hired help, check.
Yeah, I guess I’m a libertarian.
Gojira
Far be it for me to disagree with my esteemed colleague Heroic Mulatto, but I personally don’t consider voluntaryist anarchists (which I am) to fall under the umbrella of libertarianism. I consider anarchism to be aspirational, an overarching philosophy to guide moral decision making, even if it quite possibly can never be perfectly/completely realized.
That having been said, drawing any attention to or harping on the differences between us all is like the leftists and rightists within the CPUSA duking it out in…1901. The distinctions between all anti-government thought are so slight in comparison with the differences we have with the 97% of humanity that believes passionately in CONTROL that infighting is pointless right now. Anyone who wants less government is a potential ally. We can worry about these other details after the Tsar has been overthrown.
Sloopyinca
Yeah, I think I am, in principle. I’m probably leaning a lot more conservative than most of today’s libertarians because I’m probably a little more religious than most libertarians are. And certainly more than most Libertarians are. I hate pubsec unions. I hate compelled participation in government programs. I hate the “progressive” tax system. I hate the welfare state. I hate any government spending that’s not related to protecting life and property (both militarily and police-wise), or for operating our criminal and civil court systems and jails. I’m not a big fan of drugs but don’t think it’s “society’s” business to regulate what someone puts in their own body. I don’t think we should have a federal government that regulates markets or negotiates trade policies. I believe in the natural rights of self defense, freedom of expression, free association, private property and due process and think they’ve been all but demolished by the state.
I’d be open borders if the above were implemented but realize it will continue to create massive problems if not curtailed until then.
So before I ramble on too long, I’ll just say yes, I’m as libertarian as I can be in the current climate. And if certain things our government does with its money were ended, I’d be even more libertarian.
There is a Romanian phrase, used when someone abuses a certain issue, which can be paraphrased along the line of, “Easy with the Western Culture down the stairs.” If you rush too much, you may break whatever you are rushing with, is the meaning. I feel that recently this is the case with Western Culture in the Culture/Social Justice/Whatfuckingever wars that do not seem to go away.
There are two facets to this. Well let’s not go to binary, like gender there are a million facets to this. One is that the CW/SJW thing is often little more than a massive distraction, a lot of noise to drown the signal, keep the participants busy while corrupt politicians keep doing corrupt politician shit. On the other hand, it cannot be fully ignored, because aspects of it are very dangerous. One of the main components of this was/is the late/great Western Culture. I will address this, sort of, kind of, with plenty of to be sure and wimpy language.
So let’s get ready to a-rumble… in the ehm Red (Pinko sometimes) corner we have the Progressive Left. In the Other Red corner we have the various flavours of the alt right. In the middle we have the enlightened alt centrist; the self-described non regressive left; the modern right; the cosmotarians; and a few odds and ends. In the end, we have the battle of progressives versus literal Nazis. And western culture is at the forefront, it is the gloves, if you will.
Culture or a pile of rocks?
To start with, let’s go to Wikipedia, because why not. “Western culture, sometimes equated with Western civilization, Occidental culture, the Western world, Western society, European civilization, or Judeo-Greco-Christian civilization, is a term used very broadly to refer to a heritage of social norms, ethical values, traditional customs, belief systems, political systems and specific artifacts and technologies that have some origin or association with Europe.”
So, as we can see, Western Culture is a very expansive category. It can mean many things to many people (for some The Sistine chapel, for others The Chive and the invention of the bikini), then and there, now and here. This is why I am rather wary of overusing it as some generic all-encompassing term in a debate. We must defend western culture is the rallying cry. Which one? Which parts of it? To what ends? These are questions I feel we need to keep in mind.
Just as a side note, I find the construct Judeo-Greco-Christian rather silly, and one of the things that annoys me about some modern conservatives. For most western history this was not a thing, as Christians were highly divided until recently and Jews have a long history of not being on the best terms with the mighty western culture. There is no single unified Judeo-Greco-Christian tradition. Yes, various flavors of Christian and Jew contributed to the development of the ideas behind the West, and the culture obviously developed in the context of religion. But this is not enough for this construct.
I might state that I am not religious and I see little worth to attaching so called western values to a religion or other in the present, especially since a number of the enlightenment people who developed these values, while most likely being religious themselves, did not approach philosophy from a religious angle. Judeo –Christian means in modern speak not Muslim and sometimes not secular, and it is an attempt to try to co-opt all sorts of people as a collective. It is, as we say in Romania, an ostrichcamel.
Good church need not be huge. Mind the hellfire.
Now, for a second side note, let’s get subjective, as the various warriors are wont to do. You may not have noticed, but I am a Romanian. As such, I am somewhat at the fringes of western culture. Romania was not traditionally part of it, or not fully, at least. Always scurrying along the edges, looking in. An eastern orthodox nation heavily influenced by Russian and the Ottoman Empire, the habits, mores, traditions are different. We were of course part of Christendom in the premodern era, and had elements of western and eastern culture. And many a times the leaders wanted more, Romania was always on a long slow path to being more of a part of the West. When joining the EU many said we joined Europe.
With all that said, I can say I admire many a thing about western culture, and as a modern Romanian I consider myself part of it. But I do not like to look at it as a uniform thing. As a libertarian, I like liberty and individualism. As a human I like security, prosperity and everything that comes with that. And I like the parts of Western culture that promoted those things, many then, most if not all, other human cultures. I am also critical of elements of Western Culture that did the opposite.
I do not like mindless worship of anything, including culture. And I do not like nostalgia about some long lost ideal past. There was never such a thing. All cultures need improvement and everything needs criticism. Humans, and their societies, are hardly perfect. And it looks to me like all these western culture warriors only use it as a rhetorical tool and little else.
The free speech war is a good example in this regard. One should not think rightists want to preserve free speech when they did not in the past. Just like the true face of the left free speech movement was seen after they thought they could get speech they didn’t like banned. It is also good to notice that, while free speech was a value of Western Culture and vigorously defended by many in the past, it needed vigorous defence precisely as it was constantly under attack by elements of the same culture.
One issue is that, as a libertarian, you often are accused of wanting to go back to sometime in the past because you want a reduction in taxes regulations and general involvement of the state in the economy. This is due to the fact that leftist arguing 101 is to scream racist at people, and they constantly try to equate thinking that the regulatory environment was better in the past, that the whole society was better, and that you want all aspects of that society including the racism and discrimination. This is false and should be countered, which why it is important to phrase arguments properly beyond the western culture thing.
I often sample western culture myself.
Me, I do not want to go back. I do not like the phrase going forward either to be honest. But, to take the standard analogy, going forward on the wrong road is not a good idea. I want to go down the road to more liberty. If this implies certain aspects to be more like they were in the past, it is not going back, it is going toward liberty. If I find things wrong in the past, but OK now, I want to keep them. If there was something wrong then and wrong now, I do not want to “move forward,” I want change towards liberty. But I do not appreciate keeping things as they are just because that’s how they are. If they are wrong, they must be changed.
Everyone thinks repealing laws they don’t like is progress, but repealing laws they do like is regressive. Which is natural, let’s not stop progress towards my goal. But switching targets is not regressive in itself, even if I don’t like the targets. The trick to improvement is to keep the parts that are good and change the ones that are not. Change for the sake of change is not always desirable. And not everything new is good.
With all the previous caveats, I do believe that western culture is up there with the best that human achieved, lacking as it may be. I do not judge the past based on the future, and while there are things in 1800 I find wrong, it does not in any way invalidate western culture or the achievement of those people, mostly white men who sometimes owned slaves or maybe didn’t think women should have equal rights.
Free markets and capitalism brought the biggest increase in human prosperity in history. Of course this does not mean that some industrialists did not treat their employees poorly, although governments did have something to do with constant meddling. But this does not take away the achievements of capitalism, nor does it mean that without the big government of today, conditions would have remained like in the 1800s. Society and ideas evolve, views and attitudes improve. And above all, economic and technological growth moves things in the right direction, despite what government or some of the worse industrialists would want. You do not need the benevolence of the capitalist to improve worker conditions; the market does that just fine if you let it be. But I do not glorify the 1800s.
I believe that the best development of the West was individualism and individual negative rights. This led to liberty and values that lead to a successful life. Through the tumultuous past, I see ideals of liberty as a fine wire weaved through, moving things the right way. There probably is an English expression for this but I can’t figure it out.
Be a good person. Educate yourself. Earn your keep, have stable relationships, raise you children right (should you have any), and be charitable to the less fortunate. Help your neighbours, family and friends – as long as they deserve it. Be fair, be just. Do not initiate violence. Drink good scotch. Don’t dress like a clown. This is all a part of western culture that must be not only kept but enhanced. We don’t have enough of it. But it is not necessarily exclusive to western culture and it was not, sadly, an overwhelming component of it.
The height of Western political though has been achieved
And here lies the problem that makes me somewhat more favorable towards the pro west-cult people than The Others. The right try to make of western culture something that it was not, and some sort of sacred cow. The progressive left, and even worse the postmodern left (yeah yeah I know the word postmodern gets thrown about a lot, but I believe it applies), the SJWs of the world are in fact a much bigger threat. They do want to tear down all elements of western culture. Which is stupid. It is more than stupid, it is insane. Tearing down everything means there is nothing worth keeping. This is utterly ridiculous, as they were quite obviously the most successful nations, even when it comes to the stuff leftist claim to care about such as tolerance, secularism etc. And being collectivists, they want to tear down individualism. This can only lead to disaster.
Why are these people so suicidal insane? It is hard to tell. Human nature one would suppose. They are so desperate to push their idiotic economic ideology, that they just don’t care what they destroy doing so. How someone may think this is a good idea is baffling. Fiat Socialism, pereat mundus, I suppose. Red or dead. Communism or bust.
The moderate left is timidly fighting back, and more and more. This is not just the YouTube sphere of the so called non-regressive left, but more of the mainstream. There is of course the vestige of the non-prog left, which does admit some value to western culture. These people are, of course, literally Nazis.
It’s been a full year since Donald Trump was elected by Russian hackers to be President of the United States. As the country has plunged headlong into the darkest time anyone who’s never read a history book can imagine, being to the right of a ‘center’ that to the #resistance drifts inexorably leftward has become increasingly dangerous. Punching Nazis, white supremacists, and anyone who disagrees with Karl Marx has become in vogue, as has shooting at Republicans, and lately, one more person to the right of Lenin has been sent to the hospital. Rand Paul was attacked by an irate neighbor, suffering broken ribs and bruised lungs. Major news outlets will tell you this involved some sort of long-standing personal matter between the two neighbors that had nothing to do with their differing political viewpoints. The neighbor’s lawyer has made similar assertions in an attempt to protect his client from likely harsher charges. Fortunately for seekers of truth, Elie Mystal, the Executive Editor of the website Above the Law, has sussed out the real culprit: Libertarianism itself.
In his piece Libertarian Hero Meets The Justice Of The Streets (Err.. Suburbs), Mystal engages in victim blaming so obvious that he himself admits to doing so towards the end of his piece. He shrugs his self-acknowledged hypocrisy off because in his view the natural, inevitable outcome of a libertarian society is that people will physically attack each other over matters their lawyers will later describe as ‘trivial,’ because there will be no other options for people to settle disputes. The ignorance of libertarian thought he displays throughout his article is as garish as a neighboring barn painted hot pink accented with neon green lightning bolts; It’s ugly to look at, and one wonders what the person who created it was thinking, or even if they were in their right mind to begin with.
Mystal describes the atrocities Paul was allegedly committing that would, were it not for the benevolent hand of laws that would mysteriously be absent in Libertopia, naturally cause one to resort to physical violence to solve. Rand Paul allegedly grew pumpkins on his property, you see, and sometimes pumpkins smell bad. He also perhaps liked to compost on his property, which can also (if not properly done) become noticeably malodorous. And if that weren’t enough to drive perfectly normal people into fits of violent rage, there may have been lawn clippings where Paul’s neighbor thought they shouldn’t be. In Mystal’s view, the only available options someone living in Libertopia would have is to either move away or start cracking ribs. Libertarianism just leaves people with no other options, he presumes.
Anyone with even a passing familiarity with anything other than the grossest stereotypes of libertarian thought knows this to be false. Paul’s home, and his neighbor’s are part of a Home Owner’s Association, which would certainly still be permitted to exist in Libertopia. Home Owners’ Associations represent a great example of an entirely voluntary exercise in collectivism. People who buy or inherit a house in an HOA know of its existence before moving in. But if you’re in the market for a house but don’t want to be in an HOA, you do research and avoid looking at homes under an HOA. If you inherit a house in an HOA and you don’t want to be part of it, you sell the house to someone who doesn’t mind being in one. The formation, operation, and dissolution of HOAs are a valid exercise in the freedoms libertarians recognize.
This particular libertarian lives in a condominium and is the president of the association. HOAs and condo associations have rules that owners are expected to abide by, but the association cannot force compliance. What associations can do is levy fines for noncompliance until the property is no longer violating established association rules. If the problem persists and fines left unpaid, the association can, through the court system, place a lien on the offending owner’s property until such time as outstanding fines are paid up. This is something that happens pretty regularly depending on how bad an owner is regarding paying their dues to the association. The association also has some discretion in when fines should or should not be assessed, and that is laid out in rules that every owner has the right to peruse at any time. By contrast, an association representative cannot, for example, force entry into a unit to confiscate an unapproved decoration on the owner’s balcony. The association cannot call the police to have them do it unless the owner or occupant is violating the law in some way–for example, if someone is cooking outside on a grill too close to the building, the association can call the police because it violates a city ordinance. If a dispute cannot be resolved this way, owners and the association can take each other to court and have the court render judgments. But if a unit owner simply pays the assessed fines along with regular fees, the association cannot do anything further concerning rules violations unless laws or ordinances are also being violated.
My condo is on the second floor of a two-story building, with windows facing east and south. It tends to trap heat, which is great in the winter, but awful in the summer. Each unit has a permanent wall mount for a window-mounted air conditioner in the living room, but nothing in the two bedrooms. The layout of the unit makes having a cross-breeze all but impossible. So in the summer months, my unit is often hotter on the inside than it is on the outside.
I have tried to solve that by buying the most powerful A/C I could find that will fit in the wall mount, buying sun-blocking drapes for the windows, and having double-paned windows and a triple-paned glass sliding door. The sliding door did not come in an exterior color approved by the association, but I wanted triple-paned so I painted it myself after installation. I have literally spent thousands of dollars trying to fix this problem in a way that doesn’t run afoul of association rules. The problem is better, but no one who comes by in the summer thinks it’s been solved.
So I purchased a portable AC that goes up in a window. This is a violation of association rules; because they strive for the exteriors of the units to be consistent and fairly uniform, they prohibit hanging air conditioners in windows. My air conditioner is of the type that sits on the floor, with a penal for the exhaust that hangs in the window. I’ve been open with the Board of Directors about having the unit there when it’s hot. They have the option to fine me for noncompliance, and I’ve told them that I value my health and the health and comfort of my guests over the monthly fine. I wouldn’t complain or abuse my power as president to avoid paying the fine if the BoD decided to assess it, but in four or five years it hasn’t even come up. I’m aware that this may not be the norm for HOAs, as they tend to attract the sort of petty tyrant who couldn’t be elected in a one-person race, but that’s not my point.
My point is that, unlike the presumption espoused by Mystal, Paul’s neighbor had a recourse other than blind-side tackling someone who doesn’t follow HOA rules, and that recourse would have existed in Libertopia. If Paul’s neighbor has addressed his grievances to the association directors, their legal option was to assess Paul fines based on noncompliance. If Paul is paying those fines, and assuming he is breaking no local laws, there’s nothing more the association can do, and neither is there anything Paul’s neighbor can do. In this case, Paul would be complying with association rules by paying fines as directed for noncompliance. The neighbor’s next option is to see if Paul were violating any local ordinances and pursue matters with the local authorities. Those ordinances may or may not have existed under Libertopia, but the court system involved would remain.
Mystal really needs to do a bit more research into libertarianism.
THERE NO DENYING THAT STEVE SMITH UNDISPUTED CHAMPION. OF RAPE.
BOW TO YOUR RAPESEI!
HARVEY WEINSTEIN TRY TO TAKE CROWN, BUT FAIL… STEVE SMITH STILL SEE MANY WHO ASPIRE TO TITLE. STEVE SMITH SHAKE HEAD SADLY AT THEM. PERHAPS STEVE SMITH SHOULD GIVE THEM PERSONAL DEMONSTRATION OF SKILLS. SEE WHAT STEVE SMITH MEANS:
AFTER BREAKFAST AND FIRST RAPE OF DAY, STEVE SMITH PONDERING OVER SITUATION HE READ HERE.
PONDERING
AT FIRST, STEVE SMITH LAUGH AT SILLY AMATEURS…THAT NO REAL RAPE!…STEVE SMITH SHOW YOU SEXUAL ASSAULT!… BUT THEN GET TO WONDERING. OF COURSE RAPESQUATCH HAS TO BE TRUE TO SELF AND CONTINUE HIKER, CAMPER, FOREST RANGER, ANYTHING ELSE RAPE… BUT FOR SILLY PEOPLE (OR AS STEVE SMITH THINK OF THEM – “PREY”) STEVE SMITH WONDER HOW LONG THIS FALLOUT GO ON? WHO NOT GET NAMED? STEVE SMITH ONLY WANT REAL COMPETITORS NAMED! IF NOT GUILTY, THEN IT NO HELP STEVE SMITH KEEP IT REAL.
STEVE SMITH ASK FUNNY GLIBERTARIAN PEOPLE TO LOOK IN FUTURE AND TELL…WHEN STOP? WHAT LONG LASTING EFFECTS? DOES STEVE SMITH NEED TO MOVE FROM WOODS TO NEW YORK OR LA?
As a noobie libertarian, in the olden days of 2010, I was all about natural law, as a fairly objective way of looking at ethics. Now I can say that I believe in liberty, which in my view should not need justification, although sadly it does.
Note: Morality and ethics – I never know if the words are interchangeable, not unlike freedom and liberty. So I use them interchangeably.
Thus spake the almighty Wikipedia: “Natural law is a philosophy that certain rights or values are inherent by virtue of human nature, and universally cognizable through human reason. Historically, natural law refers to the use of reason to analyze both social and personal human nature to deduce binding rules of moral behavior. The law of nature, being determined by nature, is universal.”
Remember cheetah, sharing is caring
When philosophers talk of natural law, they don’t mean how things happen in nature. If you drop a rock, it falls (hopefully not on someone’s head). The hyena eating a cheetah’s kill cares not that the cheetah worked hard for that, although it probably thinks it is getting its fair share. The gazelle tax, if you will. Natural law is about human nature and how humans ought to behave within the constraints of human nature – animals or planetary movement when we talk about natural law. Human nature is not the same as hummingbird nature – nice bird, lovely plumage. But the plumage don’t enter into it.
Natural law theory looks for universal concepts, or as dead, white, possibly slave owning American males – basically shitlords – said, self-evident truths. Without this, you have little more than might makes right – the actual law of the jungle, and you can’t really define morality as might makes right, because there is no need for debate or definitions if simply the strongest gets the stuff.
While I am cautious of moral absolutism, I can’t help but be more wary of excessive moral subjectivism or moral relativism. Some things must be clear cut, otherwise what’s the point of discussing ethics? Can one say that Hitler or Stalin or Pol Pot were objectively evil? I believe so. Can there be a moral argument for child rape? Ehm… ! If we admit this, we can determine some general objective rules. Not everything is relative, and you need a paradigm of some sort. Unless we can create an objective standard, we cannot weigh one thing versus another. The scales must be calibrated. Preferably in metric. I fully understand that trying to explain your rights to Genghis Khan would have been tricky. But the Khan was not really moved by morality and I would assume getting slaughtered is objectively bad.
Up can be down
Although ethics differed widely through human history, there is also an abundance of common threads and principles, just inconsistently applied. And the whole point of a principle is consistency; otherwise you can change your views depending on how the wind blows. Principles but– especially the ones which sound good – can often be found in many a culture, and the but is where problems begin. Nobles lorded over indentured peasants but were sensitive about their liberties when the king came a-knocking. I would say that if someone admits a right exists for him, he cannot refuse to extend same to others. Otherwise it can’t be to universal.
But humans rationalize exceptions all the time, when it suits them. An easy way was to consider some humans inferior to others, maybe even less than human. It was a way for the noble to justify oppressing the inferior peasant, while this not being inconsistent with his rights. Another way was basically my people versus the others, the in-group versus the out-group. Same was extended to gender, race, and whatever the hell else was convenient. But if you want to have a somewhat objective principle, it must be universally applied to all homo sapiens. Otherwise it is not really objective.
You can think of asking a question to a person about himself. How many people would have the same answer? I think if you ask someone, “Do you agree that someone can just come and kill you with no repercussion,” I think the vast majority would say no, so we can agree the murder is bad mkay is universal. So then it should be universally applied to all Homo sapiens. I would say that any moral philosophy needs to have axioms, let’s call them the fundamental principles, the paradigm. No exceptions can be made, lest everything becomes an exception. You can’t have math if 1+1 changes value, the formalism should be constant. And there should be a set of clear and logical steps between axioms and theorems that do not change; higher level should be derived from lower level. There should be some level of consistency, not it’s A when it suits me and B when it doesn’t.
Never compromise. Not even in the face of Armageddon
In the previous part, I talked about the basics of human nature and the question of morality. I avoided giving any opinions and just set up things a bit. Now I am going to contribute my 2 satoshi to the debate.
First, I don’t do the religion thing when it comes to morality and do not really see the debate that interesting if one brings the big G into it. What is there to debate if Deus Vult? So I look at things outside the scope of the divine.
Second, I am a believer in objective ethics – as objective as possible would be a better way to phrase it – as it should apply to all humans, and such independent of each person’s subjective opinions.
Third – to clarify the second – I believe there are two spheres for ethics or morality. And these are quite different.
The inner sphere is the personal – what you think is right when it mostly affects you and no other. This is subjective, as the only judge is you. Eating meat or not on a Friday, drinking, drugs come in this sphere. Basically your personal liberty. This can also be fuzzy at parts. Is it OK for one to lie to one’s parents? Well yes, if the car just hit itself with the tree, tricky these cars are.
The second sphere, the outer one, the one where humans interact and where your actions affect others. As others are involved, I believe this is much less subjective. This is, or in my view should be, the main topic of debate.
Fourth, I am for deontological ethics and against utilitarian, because I believe in fundamental principles, a paradigm, a foundation if you will.
This is what libertarians want
Utilitarian ethics I find to be flawed in several respects. They can go down the road of the ends justify the means, and they cannot be anything but subjective, as desired ends differ between people. Of course, inside each human there is a bit of utilitarianism, as many deontologists believe that a good foundation leads to a solid building, good results. Few if any want to live in the world of Mad Max. I mean the cars are cool, but it seems very hot, especially given the leather clothes and lack of showers. That is a recipe for chafing.
On what do I base my so called objective belief in liberty? The fact that humans are unique, autonomous creatures, endowed with free will (I wrote a post on that). I believe only an individual can act, decide the actions, and bear their consequences. Your actions are the one thing that is in your control and the thing you should be judged on. Also, as I can not control others actions directly, I should not be too much affected by them as there is nothing I can do about it, nothing I can change or improve. Due to this I am an individualist. Society is a general term describing groups of humans, it has no substance, one cannot say it exist in the way a rock (or The Rock, for that matter) exists. Societies cannot act, only individuals composing them can. Similarly societies can’t have rights or responsibilities, only individuals can. Human societies are not like ant colonies or other eusocial creatures – like the mighty naked mole rat, which is not, in fact, a mole or a rat-, where individuals are practically indistinguishable from one another and the colony works almost as a single organism. I find these things pretty objective.
I will leave you with some words of C S Lewis as food for though, which I may or may not fully agree.
“If a man will go into a library and spend a few days with the Encyclopaedia of Religion and Ethics he will soon discover the massive unanimity of the practical reason in man. From the Babylonian Hymn to Samos, from the Laws of Manu, the Book of the Dead, the Analects, the Stoics, the Platonists, from Australian aborigines and Redskins, he will collect the same triumphantly monotonous denunciations of oppression, murder, treachery, and falsehood, the same injunctions of kindness to the aged, the young, and the weak, of almsgiving and impartiality and honesty. He may be a little surprised (I certainly was) to find that precepts of mercy are more frequent than precepts of justice; but he will no longer doubt that there is such a thing as the Law of Nature. There are, of course, differences. There is even blindness in particular cultures – just as there are savages who cannot count up to twenty. But the pretence that we are presented with a mere chaos – that no outline of universally accepted value shows through – is simply false and should be contradicted in season and out of season wherever it is met. Far from finding a chaos, we find exactly what we should expect if good is indeed something objective and reason the organ whereby it is apprehended – that is, a substantial agreement with considerable local differences of emphasis and, perhaps, no one code that includes everything.”
“Nihilists! Fuck me. I mean, say what you want about the tenets of National Socialism, Dude, at least it’s an ethos.” – Walter Sobchack
Throughout history, among the various Big Questions of Philosophy – of Life, the Universe and Everything – were the Questions of ethics, morality and human nature. These may or may not have been supplanted by the query “are traps gay” in present, more enlightened times. But ehm… let’s focus on the older questions. What’s all this then?
There once was a saying, in some old language no one cares about anymore, “Homo homini lupus est”, which either had to do with aspects of human nature or was a warning against having wolves as pets. Either way, it gave me ideas for the title of this post.
What is human nature? What is wolf nature? How similar are the two? Is human nature immutable or does it evolve in time – if so, in which time-frame? Can it be change at will – just one gulag away from the New Man? Do some things never change? How many questions in a row can I ask before it gets annoying? How much wood would a woodchuck… Hell, if I knew all that, I’d be teaching at Oxford or Cambridge – whichever one is cooler and with hotter students. In the meantime, here we are.
The debate of how static human nature is revolves around the never-ending discussion of nature versus nurture in human development. Trying to fully answer this would achieve little, as it is as old as philosophy and yet to be resolved. Long story short, it’s a combination of both, and how much of each varies from person to person, society to society, time to time, in unknowable ways. Sociologists will investigate this further –whether we want them to or not – although, being sociologists, they are highly unlikely to find anything worthwhile. Also Steven Pinker and Nassim Taleb had a spat about it over the Better Angels of our Nature book. At least it keeps them occupied.
I am not a social constructionist, so I believe there are strong elements of human nature that are clearly innate, genetic. They may change over long periods of time, with the evolution of man and maybe human society; they may be softened by education or experience. But they are forever lurking in the shadows of the human mind. This is the nature part. Frankly I find the notion that human behavior has no significant genetic component ridiculous. Everything about humans has genetic influence – height, the color of various external components (and implicitly whether you have a soul or not), or liking coriander (or is it cilantro… anyway I sort of like it, but I don’t love it). Everything, it seems, except the brain. What amuses me is that people who claim that nurture is everything are also people who claim to believe in evolution and mock religious creationists. There is no way, after all, that evolution shaped behaviour.
Conan! What is best in life?
By human nature, of course, I do not mean characteristics of a certain individual, but general characteristics of most humans. But can we truly know which parts of humans are nature? While there are differences between brains of humans, there are also similarities. This is to do with what the immutable part of human nature is, basic facts like response to incentives, wishing to increase satisfaction and decrease unease, wanting to achieve goals, needing friends and family, sex, drugs and rock n roll (since caveman time people have gotten high and created art, often at the same time).
Some things about human nature can be positive, others decidedly not so. This should be understood and fought against by each of us – the darkness within. Fighting it is hard and often useless, but fight we must. You will not eliminate these things, try as you might. Can you truly change your nature? Well, it depends on what nature is. An alcoholic can stop drinking, but is human nature to be an alcoholic? Probably not.
The ridiculous thing is that the Old left understood this on some level. They wanted to create the New Man, the Socialist man. Bigger, better, sexier, more obedient. They realized that the nature of the Old Man was not what they wanted. But did they truly believe they could do this, or was it demagoguery? Probably a bit of both.
Of course there are elements which greatly differ between individuals and which are also biologically determined – height, athleticism, intelligence, personality, socializing. They are, of course, a clear combination of nature and nurture, meaning they can be influenced and shaped by nurture, but not completely. In basketball you are either an explosive athlete or you are not, no amount of training will make old Pie into Russell Westbrook.
Artist’s representation of Pie playing ball
One should not be afraid to admit there both human nature and some difference between individuals. It is just that morality should not be based on such difference.
Now, assuming human nature exists, can we get a coherent system of ethics out of it, especially given subjectivity is inherent in human nature? We can at least try, which is precisely what I plan on doing.
Now in regards to ethics the million silver dollar (screw inflation) question is – can a universal, objective system of ethics be derived directly from human nature? Not an easy question – this depends on where one stands in investigating the classics, like Hume’s is–ought problem or Moore naturalistic fallacy – writing tip: randomly name calling past philosophers makes you seem smart and well read. I sort of agree with C. S. Lewis on this on, that nature is about what is and ethics about what ought to be. But maybe you can use some solid facts as a starting point.
One thing is certain: ethic systems are generally based on a first premise – some basic axioms – which, cannot be easily claimed as universal. Not without extremly well though out arguments. This should be obvious by simply analyzing human civilization and finding wildly different systems.
The fact that there are different systems of ethics does not mean they are all equally valid. Is it that ethics is subjective, or that some people are just plain wrong? Are all systems equal, or are some better than others? The tendency is to say that, obviously, some are better – expecially the one the person holds, if we believe something we think it is correct.
Some axioms will be better than others, more rational, logically consistent and easier to apply universally and leading to better results, but in the end some things have to be asserted.
Ethics systems have changed. Has human nature evolved in time? Or did it reflect a changing world. I don’t think it changed substantially, and me it seems to me that systems who tried to change some very basic facts of human nature have failed to take hold. Humans have the need to eat and to do that they hunted, but after some time they learned how to satisfy hunger through agriculture – though some still claim we were better off as hunter gatherers. This often made humans much less nomadic then they were as hunter-gatherers – can this be considered a change in human nature? I think not.
Also Conan
As society evolves, some types of violence tend to decrease, but not disappear – is violence human nature or is it just one of several means to an end? Some people are inherently aggressive and that does not change, but as society evolves that aggression can be channeled differently or kept in check by isolation. Culture matters obviously, children learn from parents, society or religion affects people, and these evolve faster than the human creature.
A strong influence in modern times is availability of information. When people lived isolated in small town and villages, they didn’t know much about foreigners, so it was easy to view different as dangerous or evil, but as people learn that the inhabitants of other lands are people just like them, they may be inclined to more tolerance of The Others.
So the conclusion thus far: Humans have various views on morality, some better than others, and the views change in time. I will more clearly present my personal views in a future installment (should it be published).
Now, I feel every glib saying to itself, this is a pretty pointless article. Does not say much really. Which is true. But this here is a blog post, not a scholarly work, so the point is to basically do a survey of the audience. The question being “what is human nature” and how does it balance with nurture (50/50 60/40 that sort of thing). Discuss …
Things in Catalonia could be coming to a head, soon. Actually, tomorrow. The central government in Madrid has not been shy about making somewhat pointed threats. As with any political strife, there are lots of stresses involved, beyond borders, laws and trade. Rumblings from some news sourcesare pinning this recent drive on the Left. But a small far-Left movement would not be enough to push this over the line, into a full blown secession. There appears to be a sizable part of the populace in the region does appear to want out of Spain.
What this will end up looking like will have a possibly large impact on “Europe” – the EU, NATO and the like. I will be watching for several things:
Will Madrid use force to prevent any formal breakaway? If so, in what manner – send in the Army and National Police, or just arrest the political leadership and lay off the ordinary people?
If force is used, what do the Catalan people do in response?
If force is employed, what will France do? [keeping in mind that the Basque ETA used to cross the border and hide in France]
If Catalonia does break away – would the EU, NATO, et al ask them in? [Slovenia, as an example, comes to mind].
Will crazed soccer fans demand that FC Barcelona continue to play in the Spanish League?
Here is hoping the whole thing ends up a non-story and there is no violence…but that ain’t the way I am betting.
A “hot take” on Catalonia and the recent crackdown by the Spanish central government.
The central government in Spain decided to use force to disrupt the independence referendum held by the Catalan regional government. Exact figures on the vote are not available – partially due to Spanish police seizing ballot boxes, and the lack of independent verification or accounting of the votes. However, the regional prime minister claims victory for the “yes” vote.
The stance of the EU, normally ready to moralize at the drop of a hat, was muted at best. At worst, it was quite unhelpful. Worrying about the EU’s integrity camefirst. Unsurprisingly, France backed Spain. The US said something similar(NOTE: this was a bit ago, but current events have absorbed all attention here).
The most interesting reactions, I figured, would be from Italy. Two of their regions are going after greater autonomy this month. There appears to be a bit of a split of opinion amongst the figures moving for autonomy in Italy…while the central government was quite silent.
No official statement was made on the referendum by Italian Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni, who told journalists the week before the vote that he considered it “a question for Spain”, or Foreign Minister Angelino Alfano.
So we see little to no support from governments, or the extragovernmental bureaubehemoth EU. This leads me to some questions of you, the resident libertarians (or close enough to it).
Should the Catalans (or Kurds or Lombards) be able to vote themselves out of the country?
If their vote is not recognized, disrupted or such – what do they do next? Civil disobedience? Guerrilla warfare? Full on revolt? Grin and bear it?
What would you do if you were a Catalan, Kurd or Lombard who wanted out?
There once was a saying, in some old language no one cares about anymore, “Homo homini lupus 
