Re: Wages, Inflation and Social Security

From: New Dark Ages (nda_at_ignorance.is.bliss.invalid)
Date: 01/20/05 

Date: Thu, 20 Jan 2005 18:09:34 GMT

root@localhost. wrote...
> On Thu, 20 Jan 2005 06:32:17 GMT, New Dark Ages
> <nda@ignorance.is.bliss.invalid> wrote:
> >
> >root@localhost. wrote...
> >> On Thu, 20 Jan 2005 04:06:39 GMT, New Dark Ages
> >> <nda@ignorance.is.bliss.invalid> wrote:
> >>
> >> >root@localhost. wrote...
> >> >> On Wed, 19 Jan 2005 15:48:44 GMT, New Dark Ages
> >> >> <nda@ignorance.is.bliss.invalid> wrote:
> >> >> >
> >> >> >> It remains for you. For me, it doesn't. For me it's a matter of first
> >> >> >> principles, namely, that I have the following rights: life, liberty
> >> >> >> and property.
> >> >> >
> >> >> >Well, you're certainly entitled to your little ideology.
> >> >>
> >> >> It's not an entitlement, it's a right.
> >> >
> >> >Heck, maybe we agree. How do you define "property" and "liberty" ?
> >>
> >> Property (strong sense): whatever one creates and does not relinquish
> >> control of. Derives from the Principle of Self-ownership.
> >
> >What's the "Principle of Self-ownership" ? The idea that we're the
> >property of ourselves?
>
> Yes, the very simple idea that we have full control of ourselves at
> all times.
>
> >> Property (weak sense): whatever one controls exclusively through the
> >> threat of use of force.
> >
> >Land ownership is immoral, then? (Natural resource, controlled
> >exclusively through the [threat of the] use of force?
>
> To be immoral, it would have to violate some principle. For the life
> of me, I cannot think of one it would.

You don't have any principles about when it is moral or immoral to
use force--i.e., it's always moral to use force? Particularly when
you're using it to exclude others from something that isn't yours in
the first place, by your own definitions?

You've said that no one owns natural resources, and your definition
of property extends the idea that natural resources cannot be
property, by definition. Natural resources are not something any
person has created, and they predate our individual existence so
claim to them cannot be extended from your 'Principle of Self-
ownership' without saying that, in any case, 'ownership' of a natural
resource cannot be passed down to descendants since they are
individuals and not extensions of your selfhood. They are their own
persons, in other words, and specifically they are not 'you'.

Your 'inalienable rights', claimed by virtue of your existence, are
for life, liberty, and property. Are you now claiming an additional
right to exert force to exclude others from things that are not your
property?

The use of force to exclude others from natural resources (ie,
something that is not and cannot be your property) is not immoral in
principle?

Why don't you just say you don't HAVE any principles! Or, that you
abandon them for personal gain (which is the same thing as saying you
don't have any).

> >> Liberty: the freedom to do as one pleases as long as not infringing on
> >> the equal rights of others.
> >
> >Excluding others from access to natural resources is intrinsically
> >infringing on the liberty of others, then?
>
> Given that the others are free to do exactly the same, I don't think
> so. Because land ownership is based on force, we end up having either
> war (ex: Israel vs. Palestine) or some kind of fair agreement.

It can hardly be a fair agreement if it's coerced. I'd like to walk
across that piece of land to get to the river, but if I do you'll use
force to wound or kill me. So I agree to pay you a toll, and you
agree to give me access to something you have no right to exclude me
from in the first place. And my only options are: Paying the toll in
perpetuity; removing you by force; finding another route to the river
and being subject to another toll from you or whomever has the
ability to threaten force over that area of natural resource.

Is that the kind of 'fair agreement' you're thinking of? It doesn't
sound very fair to me. It sounds like the kind of thing street thugs
do when they muscle money out of people to walk on "their" street.

> Here's something very interesting from David Friedman to consider:
> http://www.daviddfriedman.com/Academic/Property/Property.html

I'm much more interested in how you resolve these raging
inconsistencies in your core definitions.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: Wages, Inflation and Social Security
    ... > to exclude others if others have no moral claim to what I am holding? ... > ownership of natural resources. ... And you have yet to describe your principles around the use of force. ... It can hardly be a fair agreement if it's coerced. ...
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