Irixmark wrote:

But now I can't resist any more... about libertarians: being a libertarian is not equal to thinking about the greatest good for the greatest number of people, or about equal opportunity or social mobility. It means that you consider it a moral principle that the free market dictates what a person's outcomes in life will be.

Right, it may not be about those things to libertarians. But you should be willing to explain what reason there is for considering that to be a moral principle in the first place, and why it is more important to you than, say, empathy. You should also explain how it creates a "better" society than other options, and what exactly "better" would mean here. We are talking about which option would make the best kind of society to live in, right?

The answers for what constitutes "better" that i've heard people say so far talk about freedom, efficiency, or fairness. They don't just reply "better at having the free market dictate what a person's outcomes in life will be", because it doesn't seem like a particularly beneficial aim in itself. It also relies on other assumptions (e.g. what constitutes a "free" market).

Your argument that free markets have given us great things mixes up the concept of "free markets" and "markets" as a whole. I don't think anybody here is arguing that trade itself is bad, or something we shouldn't do.

And while there are quite a few hereditary plutocrats, there are also plenty of others who get there because they have inherant advantages in other ways, or because the "free" system means that the owner of a business treats their workers like costs, meaning that they then should then try to pay them as little as possible, rather than partners in business with whom they must share their profits.

The share of the total wealth owned by the top 1% is rising rapidly. If anyone watched the plutocracy show i posted, there was an interesting point in it about the fact that there is a similar thing going on within the top 1%, and that that fact points to some deeper economic forces going on. It seems that this is a direct, inevitable result of the type of economic system we have. Now, unless you're going to stick to the moral precept argument, you're going to have to explain how this is a beneficial outcome for society.

Last edited by IceCream (2012 November 16, 4:07 pm)

IceCream, I didn’t respond to your earlier post (#335), so I’d like to do that first. I actually came across that wikipedia page years ago when I was pondering metaphysics. It didn’t make sense to me then, and now I see that they are not talking about what I discovered. What I’m saying is that debating morality and debating observable facts are different things. When discussing a human action, two people can agree on the facts while disagreeing on the morality, and vice versa. When the two people debating forget this, the debate goes in circles and never gets resolved. One person will have a moral view held by the majority and might assume his opponent also holds that view. I agree that’s just an assumption, not a fallacy. But! What often happens is one person realizes his opponent disagrees with his moral view and he tries to change her mind with statistics and facts as if, if the facts are true, they prove his moral view is correct. I still think there’s an actual logical fallacy in there.

Tzadeck, in regards to that hypothetical debate between A and B, if both started by expressing their moral views, and B bases his moral views on facts, then yes, B would have to change his mind along with the most recent facts. If, however, B stubbornly holds onto his original moral views and starts presenting his own set of fishy counter-facts, that’s your clue that his moral views are not really based on facts, despite what he said before.

Finally I have time to talk about climate change/global warming. I didn’t read Ayn Rand’s views on this, but I can assume it’s just the logical extension of the ideal I wrote about in Reply #354. Basically, people should spend their money in such a way that they receive a product or service of greater value than the money they spent. If, in your opinion, the value of an iPhone 5 + the value of a polluted Chinese river is equal to or greater than $300 (or whatever it costs), then feel free to buy. If the value of cheap tomatoes grown in irrigated crops in the desert + the value of the extinction of a local endangered lizard/fish/bird is equal to or greater than $3 a pound (I’m really not good with prices), then feel free to buy. In other words, nadiatims, Ayn Rand, oil companies and all libertarians have been searching frantically for any evidence they can find to deny climate change because they don’t know how to attack people for hypocrisy.

In the Randian ideal (as I outlined it previously, not as libertarians state it), it is easier to spot hypocrisy. Think about it: if so many people believe it is morally bad to contribute to climate change, why do so many people buy the products and services of polluting companies? Doesn’t it seem strange that so many people say the right things (“I care deeply about the environment”, “global warming is real and man-made”), yet they never participate in boycotts of polluting companies? The way they spend their money proves they act hypocritically.

IceCream, listen closely. I am telling you the reason the Randian ideal is “better” than “empathy”. Can you define “to feel empathy” in such a way that it can be scientifically proven to occur? If you can’t define it, what’s the point of declaring “it is morally good to feel empathy towards others”? How are we supposed to know if even you actually feel empathy towards others? If you really felt empathy for starving people, wouldn’t you be crying right now because of all the starving people in Africa? No, don’t answer that—answer this one: If you really felt empathy for starving people, wouldn’t you be working day and night, working your fingers to the bones, struggling to start your own company using your unique skills and abilities so that you become extraordinarily wealthy, then spend all that money teaching Africans how to build wind turbines out of trees, how to smelt rocks to make metals, how to irrigate crops in the desert, and ultimately, how to build solar panels that blanket the desert, making Africa the largest source of solar power in the world? It’s easy to type “it is morally good to feel empathy for starving people” because that moral view is worded in terms of an action that can’t be proven to actually happen. If you only make moral statements in terms of scientifically-observable human actions, you’ll realize you can’t make very many without exposing your hypocrisy. (Don't be upset by my tone here. I'm actually quite glad you have remained so patient with me and haven't resorted to all-out name-calling.)

Irixmark wrote:

But being a libertarian also logically implies lots of other things: that parents should not be allowed to give their children an advantage over others, and in particular, that wealth cannot be passed on to the next generation at all, because that's not earned wealth.

This isn't necessarily true. In Rand's view, you can give money to those you love because they give back something you feel is of equal/greater value: their love. She also said that the duty of an heir is to work hard so the amount of money is at least doubled by the end of his life. If you don't like either of those, feel free to create your own ideology by making the moral statements you feel are important to you. Labels like "libertarian" are superfluous anyway. All libertarians have different moral views, just like everyone else.

Eikyu, the fact that Ayn Rand acted hypocritically does not prove the ideal (as I stated it) is logically flawed.

To add to Tzadeck's point, asking for observable, scientific evidence for each and every claim would mean that things such as love, society, and government do not exist. Surely these things do exist and we do not need scientific evidence to account for their existence. They're self-evident via our experience.

Furthermore, it is not morally imperative for people to devote all of their efforts and resources to saving starving people if they subscribe to the moral claim that "it is morally good to feel empathy for starving people." Moral goodness and moral imperativeness are not the same. Moral imperativeness is all or nothing, e.g. do not murder under any circumstances. On the other hand, moral goodness comes in degrees. Claiming that "it is morally good to help starving people” is equivalent to saying "it is morally good to help starving people in some way."

Last edited by vileru (2012 November 17, 3:27 am)

Tzadeck, it’s precisely because people don’t try to define the words they use that people think they understand each other when they really don’t. This leads to arguing in circles. The person debating needs to define his terms just to the satisfaction of his opponent. Endless question asking (“what does ‘what’ mean?”) is not really needed. This would be so easy to explain if you ever made any moral statements. Just humor me and make a few.

I’ll go first. These are my actual moral views:
It is morally bad for a person to act hypocritically. It is morally good for a person to work hard at work. It is morally bad for a person to make more money at work than someone he says is working hard at work. It is morally bad for a person to hide the existence of a problem (from some people) that he admits exists (to other people). It is immoral for a person to punish someone while not allowing the debate with him to continue (i.e. don’t imprison people while not letting them try to convince you that the law should be changed, don't refuse to talk to people you disagree with, etc).

vileru, I’m saying there’s no point in making moral statements using human actions that can’t be proven by your opponent to exist. Looking back at your previous posts, you kind of already understand what I’m saying.

Reply #74. Therefore, claims about the importance of health care or minimum wages are invalidated by the lack of action taken by individuals.
Reply #195. This assumes there's an absolute value for labor. However, absolute values are nonexistent. All values are determined by the market.

In other words, you said “your feelings about the importance of health care and reasonable wages are nonexistent because they never cause you to take the appropriate actions.” I realize you never said you actually hold these views and you were explaining the perspective of a libertarian.

vileru wrote:

Claiming that "it is morally good to help starving people” is equivalent to saying "it is morally good to help starving people in some way."

Look at that! You changed the sentence from "to feel empathy for starving people" to "to help starving people". The difference is "to help starving people" is something others can actually observe you doing. "To feel empathy" is completely mental and no one can tell if you're actually doing it without asking you if you are.

You are completely right that there are different levels of morality between complaining online about rich companies not helping starving Africans, and practically killing yourself in an all-out attempt to save every last African from starvation. This is the next stage of debate and can only be had between people who already agree "it is morally good to help starving people" and who aren't hypocrites.

nadiatims, you contradicted yourself. “It may be in the starving man's interest to offer his labor at a low price, but theft is just as legitimate (albeit more risky) a survival strategy.” Reply #188. Governments and other groups that rely on coercion steal. This is a moral issue. Capitalists can steal but it is not a part of being a capitalist.

“Likewise I don't think a lion is morally obliged to not eat a zebra, or a herd of zebra is obliged to offer up one of their kind to feed a lion.” I covered this in Reply #351, but those aren’t human actions.

“So I guess we should focus on facts and actions and consequences instead of morality because as HiiroYui rightly suggests, it's a little too easy to point out the other side's hypocrisy.” This is where the fun begins. Look over my moral views above and try to find my hypocrisy. It’ll be harder than you think because my actions match my words. Let the competition to be the least hypocritical begin.

HiiroYui wrote:

IceCream, listen closely. I am telling you the reason the Randian ideal is “better” than “empathy”. Can you define “to feel empathy” in such a way that it can be scientifically proven to occur? If you can’t define it, what’s the point of declaring “it is morally good to feel empathy towards others”? How are we supposed to know if even you actually feel empathy towards others? If you really felt empathy for starving people, wouldn’t you be crying right now because of all the starving people in Africa? No, don’t answer that—answer this one: If you really felt empathy for starving people, wouldn’t you be working day and night, working your fingers to the bones, struggling to start your own company using your unique skills and abilities so that you become extraordinarily wealthy, then spend all that money teaching Africans how to build wind turbines out of trees, how to smelt rocks to make metals, how to irrigate crops in the desert, and ultimately, how to build solar panels that blanket the desert, making Africa the largest source of solar power in the world? It’s easy to type “it is morally good to feel empathy for starving people” because that moral view is worded in terms of an action that can’t be proven to actually happen. If you only make moral statements in terms of scientifically-observable human actions, you’ll realize you can’t make very many without exposing your hypocrisy. (Don't be upset by my tone here. I'm actually quite glad you have remained so patient with me and haven't resorted to all-out name-calling.)

Yes, empathy is a scientifically observable event. It's based on a sort of mirror system in our brains that means that we feel pain ourselves when we directly observe other people suffering. It also allows us to feel happy when we see someone else being happy. It's part of that network which makes emotions contagious for humans. It's also something very central to human action, and, I believe, to humanity and our development itself. I don't think we would even have anything resembling "society" without it.

btw, "it is morally good to feel empathy" is a misrepresentation of my view. Feeling empathy or not isn't a moral event. If you are a psychopath, you probably have something wrong with this neurological network. Otherwise, as a normal human being, you do have the response. So, that's not a moral act. It's not something you could have chosen differently (although i do think it can be trained to be sharper or duller too).

Neither is it that i necessarily think you should always act along with empathy, because empathy is a physiological response... it doesn't tell you what the correct action always is. Suppose my cat catches a mouse, and the mouse is bleeding on the floor. I look at it, and i can see that it is suffering, and i feel pain. All my empathy response does is tell me that i don't want it to suffer. It doesn't tell me what i should do now. A child would probably choose to try to nurse it back to health, wheras an adult would probably bash it's head in and kill it, because they understand that sometimes a quick death is the better option.

So, in a way, empathy is simply a kind of aesthetic response to a situation. It's the closest we can get to why some things seem to be inherently good or bad (although there is obviously no absolute base for morality). There are other responses like this too, for instance, our sense of justice, which is very strong in humans even as small children. Sometimes these are going to have to be traded off against each other... you might want to accept a little suffering in order to have a bigger gain in justice, for example. So making reductive statements about morality isn't always helpful.

I also don't think any of this obligates you to act. It does give you a good reason to act, but it doesn't obligate you to do so. And in fact, i wouldn't want it to obligate you. Suppose someone writes beautiful music... i don't necessarily think they must stop doing that and go to Africa and help feed starving children just because they also believe that starving children in the world is a bad thing. Neither do we have the type of freedom of choice, or the information necessary in the world to act in line with all our moral choices. In fact, i think we often simply should just agree on our aims, and then just make it law. Why must i inform myself about every piece of seafood i eat when we can simply make it law to fish sustainably? Why must i have the choice between a product that has exploited someone and one that hasn't? Am i not allowed to disagree with these things, but still have other priorities as to how i would like to spend my time than figuring out all the information about this stuff?

I also don't think that your personal actions are relevent to a discussion about which form of society will better match our goals. If we can agree on our goals, we can still disagree on which type of society will better fulfill those goals. I think this is closer to the problem we've been discussing with nadiatims than the moral one. Though yes, it is a bit confused at times. I think you already get this though...

p.s. I'm not as hypocritical as you think. In fact, i've been saving up for ages, and am going to go and volunteer in Africa, hopefully starting in January (unless i see a better option to increase my skills 1st). I doubt i will be able to help anything to start with, but hopefully i'll learn skills relating to sustainable development so i can then use them for good. I'm not going to start a company and give money instead because i have neither the skills nor motivation to carry it through, and i have nothing to secure a loan against, although i have also thought of that option. But i don't see how any of this is actually relevent to the discussion. Does it make a difference now you know that? Does that make my arguments stronger?

Last edited by IceCream (2012 November 17, 1:23 pm)

That site is really interesting, thanks.

Yeah, the decision right now for me is what the best path to take is to get the skills i'd need to effect any kind of change. I don't have a degree in the sciences, so if i'm going to effect change in some way, it has to be more on the social side of things. I can either do that at a small level, helping individual people or groups of animals by learning about issues in climate adaptation and sustainable development, or at a big level, say, working in the climate change or development department of the government.

Not sure which one i really want to do yet, but i don't think i have all the skills i would need to work in government yet either, so i may as well go and do something on a smaller level that might help me learn and gain those skills and then decide afterwards.

I also, of course, like travel, and have always wanted to see Africa. There's all sorts of bad stuff going on all over the world, so, there's no particular reason to choose there apart from that.

Last edited by IceCream (2012 November 17, 3:46 pm)

IceCream, this brings us to emotions in general. If I say “it is immoral for a person to kill someone unless he is emotionally distraught”, and then I kill someone, how will you determine if I acted hypocritically or not? What scientific test will you use?

I used to believe that it is morally good to care about others. Not just to say the words “I care”, but to actually care…to feel that thing in your chest whenever you see a person in pain. But then I realized that I can’t make myself teary-eyed when watching the news of yet another terrorist being killed by American soldiers. Then I realized something even more shocking: it’s not just that I didn’t truly feel for terrorists when they were killed—I didn’t feel any tears coming when I heard of Iraqi civilians being accidentally killed by American soldiers. Yes, I feel emotions, but they are not activated at logical times. I cannot force myself to be angry every time someone hits me (“it could have been an accident”). I don’t feel happy every time I see someone smiling (“she could be laughing at me”). I can’t force myself to feel sad every time I step on an ant (“oh well”). I don’t laugh every time someone tells a funny joke (“people shouldn’t joke about stuff like that”). In short, emotions are not logical. This statement is important and I need you to tell me if you agree or disagree because it leads directly to the next point.

If you act on your emotions, your actions will not necessarily be logical or consistent. Your actions will make you act hypocritically. If you restrain yourself from being controlled by your emotions and act within the boundaries of your moral views, your actions will be consistent. If your emotions cause you to act in a way that contradicts your moral views, you should either not hold those moral views or accept the punishment that comes as a result of your contradictory actions and practice restraining your actions further. Either way, saying “but I was feeling strong emotion at the time” won't reduce your punishment.

You contradicted yourself. “Sometimes these are going to have to be traded off against each other... you might want to accept a little suffering in order to have a bigger gain in justice, for example.” Reply #335: Because after all, if someone really did think that human suffering is totally fine for whatever reason, there's no good reason to discuss anything at all with them.

“I also don't think any of this obligates you to act… And in fact, i wouldn't want it to obligate you.” If you say an action is morally good, but you never do it, you are acting hypocritically. If you don’t think of that as hypocritical, what do you call it when your non-recycling friend says “The planet is dying. People should do something about it and stop lying about climate change” while sitting on the couch, watching TV, and leaving the A/C on while the window is open? If you get him to say all the right things, is your mission complete? Are you satisfied with the people who are liberal Democrats, but only pay lip-service to climate change? You care about climate change and yet you don’t want them to feel obligated to get off their butts?

The reason you shouldn’t just pass a law is that you will be punishing people for having different moral views instead of trying to change their minds with logic. Suppose I believe it is morally good to work hard at work and you believe it is morally bad because I am allowing my employer to exploit my labor. You punch me, saying “it is bad to let them exploit you, right?” I start saying “but it’s really not that bad…” and you punch me again, saying “right?” I say “right. It is morally bad to work hard at work.” I walk off and punch others, telling them to slow down because I fear that if I don't, you’ll hit me again. Suppose you believe it is morally bad to fish unsustainably and I think it isn’t because an iPad app exists that allows people to absorb sunlight and convert it directly into nourishment that is injected into our blood so we really don’t have to eat. You punch me, saying “it’s bad to cause species of fish to go extinct because we will run out of food, right?” I say “but there’s an app…” You punch me. I say “Okay, okay. It is morally bad to fish unsustainably” as I start punching others so they stop catching too many fish. You say, “Good. And while you’re at it, conduct research into how many of each fish species are left and inform me of which species I’m allowed to eat so I don’t become a hypocrite.”

I think it’s time for you to make a clear moral statement. If you say “it is not morally bad for a person to not help a starving person”, then you have no obligation to help. However, you are acting to help in Africa, so don’t you want to encourage others to follow suit? How does “it is morally good for a person to do volunteer work in a third-world country” sound? If you want to help in Africa, but you really don’t want to encourage or discourage others from doing the same, you could say “it is neither morally good nor bad (it is morally neutral) to do volunteer work in a third-world country”.

Irixmark, you are unique. You don’t agree completely with any other libertarians. Whether passing on wealth to the next generation is contradictory or not depends on your specific definition of “to undermine individual responsibility” (and whether that’s morally bad). If I leave my wealth to my heir and he works hard and doubles it, does that mean if I had burned my wealth so that he had to start from scratch, he would have ended up with more than double the inheritance? Did I spoil him by giving him a head start?

Eikyu wrote:

HiiroYui wrote:

It is morally bad for a person to make more money at work than someone he says is working hard at work.

So if Bill says "Steve is working hard at work" and Bill makes more money at work than Steve, that is morally bad?

Yes, Bill shouldn't make more than people he thinks are working hard. In what way can Bill say he deserves more than Steve? Ideally, he should give the difference back to the company.

This is a pretty interesting discussion. Would be more interesting if it were in Japanese.

vix86 wrote:

I'm just waiting for the link to Hiiro's website where he tries and sells us the "secret" to his "how to beat ANYONE in an argument" for ONLY $29.99. After all he's said multiple times "If you just follow my method..." like its some kind of crappy infomercial.

The "An Hiiro" method!

vix86 wrote:

I really still don't know where you are going with your issue with the people on stopping/slowing global warming. Is it that govts. are stepping in and telling companies they can't do what they want, how ever they want, about energy. Be that building solar plants or burning millions of tons of coal.

Governments around the world (Australia for example) are interfering with the market by introducing things such as carbon taxes. This taxes will ultimately jack up energy costs and these cost will be born by consumers. Attempting to meet emissions targets will ultimately cost complying nations 100s of billions of dollars. This will also affect the developing world as first world consumers have less money to spend on manufactured goods. If coal mining operations in resource rich nations such as Australia have to pay a carbon tax, importing nations such as China will have to pay more to import that coal thereby jacking up energy costs in china. Everything is connected.

vix86 wrote:

3rd world countries don't have any issue with dirty energy vs clean energy because its not a issue to them. No third world country is going "Gosh, we can't build this coal/oil plant, because burning it will add more CO2 to the atmosphere. Oh darn, guess we'll just stay poor." No freaking way. They are building these coal and oil plants and burning like there is no tomorrow. Third world countries put out tons of CO2 every year. Last I heard, it was a pretty big talking point with the environmentalists because third world countries don't have environmental laws like the US, hence why places like China became huge for off-shored manufacturing.  So, developing countries are being industrialized.

Actually according to wikipedia, China plans to introduce a carbon tax and India has done so already.

nadiatims wrote:

Actually according to wikipedia, China plans to introduce a carbon tax and India has done so already.

It could be related to the sweeping environmental laws that will probably be coming into play here in the next few years. China is starting to realize that maybe letting companies do whatever they want isn't a good idea for the environment. Left to do what they want, companies will dump their waste wherever is convenient (usually in a river).

I suspect air pollution from cars, plants, factories; became a visible issue to many after the Summer Olympics were held there. I don't know if you recall but they had to postpone a few events because the air quality was so bad (smog) that it was a risk to atheletes. Chinese govt. then forced city wide car bans based on license plate numbers. Air quality got better. I even recall a few articles talking about how many Chinese were amazed to see blue sky again and liked it. Govt. even talked about maintaining the rolling ban on car drivings because of the public wide reaction; whether that stuck I don't know.

Carbon taxes don't exist just for curbing CO2; they also exist to reduce general air pollution -- much of which leads to illness and cancer. Coal is some of the worst.