Should protesters respect private property?

[Caleb]

So then you agree in principle that I am right, but you are saying in practice no one will back me up?  Cause I'm willing to be that some people, even, if you will consider for a moment, yourself, an avowed pacifist has stood up for the rights of others.  Because they saw it was in their own best interests to fight for liberty, even the liberty of others.
Lazy =/= greedy. That is to say that Sloth and inaction are not the equivalent of rational self-interest.

I agree in principle that you are right about what? Right that people shouldn't aggress against you? Of course you're right about that! What I am saying is that the sort of thinking that proceeds from that truth "people shouldn't attack me, I have rights" to the thought that those rights ought to be defended by force if necessary is exactly the sort of thinking that has led to government. "He who wishes to save his soul, shall lose it."

Laziness may not equal greedy, but in the context I was using it, it does. Because I meant lazy in the sense of "Hey, the government is messing with that guy. What should I do about it?" And then doing nothing. That is inaction, and it is caused (mainly) by the fact that people are less concerned about you than they are themselves. That is "rational self interest". You can argue with them about it, but good luck. We see what that has done. Even among people who realize what the government is, and realize that something has to be done, it is a BIG GIGANTIC step to even get them to choose to stop funding the aggression with taxes. And what is their reason? Rational self-interest. "I realize the government does horrible things with the money, but I don't want to go to prison and it isn't immoral if it's given under duress." I know of only one antidote to the apathy and inaction that comes from fear:  Love. "Perfect love casts fear aside, for there is no fear in love."

Then where do the extermal objects in your earlier statement come from?  They can only be manifestations of a delusional mind, as all minds must be delusional, if there is no outside world.

No, they are real, and you prehend them directly through your mind. There is most definitely an outside world in my viewpoint. Here is a good article which describes the process perspective when it comes to prehension. http://www.websyte.com/alan/prehen.htm

Our minds are our houses and the senses are the windows through which we can view the world outside.  Each of our sensory organs are wired directly into the brain. Olfactory Bulb, Spinal Cord, Aural Canal, Optic Nerve.  If they don't interact with the world as subsets of our brain, I don't understand how the world works at all.

I would say that is true. You don't understand how the world works at all. I really hope you take the time to read the article that I posted above. The sense organs give information to the brain, it is true. But the brain has to process that information, and decide what to push forward to your conscious experience. What you perceive, therefore, is a highly edited, incomplete, and sometimes just plain wrong version of reality.

Are you the type to claim that all of this is only an illusion, we are only brains existing independant of our bodies?  Our bodies are an extension of our brain, and on the other side the brain is completely dependant on the body for nourishment and life.  We could not live without the two halves of our selves.

No. Not an illusion.

[Jacobus]

There is one objective law of human interaction.  The zero-aggression principle.  And the supposed-existence of a State is a violation of that law, so there is no conceivable way that belief in that law could ever lead to Statism.

Who determines what exactly aggression is?  Who enforces the law?  Who enforces penalities for defying the law?

[Eli]

Caleb,

The thinking that you are expounding on here, about the perceptual nature of existence (prehensive just seems like a silly word to me) makes a lot of sense.  But your specific ideas about which perceptual constructs (you said archetypes I think) are damaging and which are valuable are what puts distance between your thinking and mine.  I think independence and self reliance perceptions of reality create better people than your pacifist constructs.  I think your archetypes devalue the self and for some people, with already damaged self perceptions, makes some feel worthless, helpless, powerless.

BTW are you working this weekend, I'm driving from Ventura, North of LA, to San Diego?  Can I stop by and buy you lunch?  We can swap memes.

[srqrebel]

No, I oppose the State.  I don't want any Statist nonsense.

There is one objective law of human interaction.  The zero-aggression principle.  And the supposed-existence of a State is a violation of that law, so there is no conceivable way that belief in that law could ever lead to Statism.

Joe

I agree completely, and just want to clarify the definition of the term 'State' for the sake of other readers.  The fact that two competing definitions are floating around became clear in a previous discussion, and it is important for everyone to understand which definition is being used:

The original usage of the term 'State' is meant to imply a 'supreme collective' of individuals within a specific geographic area, which purportedly 'possesses' a 'higher authority', and has the 'right' to override the authority of any one person (the individual).

This premise is a direct contradiction of the sovereign nature of the individual.  The only valid authority is within.

This is worth repeating: The only valid authority is within.  Any claim to the contrary is a violation of the sovereign nature of the individual.  This is why the concept of a "supreme collective", or State, is decisively rejected as fraudulent by all who honor their natural and eternal birthright of inherent sovereignty.

[srqrebel]

You cannot open that door, without creating the same system we have now (or one much worse).  Most everything the government does, they claim to be doing to you "for your own good."

No.  What leads to the system we have now is this idea you have (and most others have) that there are objective laws of proper human interaction that may be justifiably enforced.  Once you believe that, you would necessarily allow (and likely encourage) a government that enforces those laws.  You don't oppose the state, you only oppose its means of funding and some of the particular laws it enforces.

Actually, one must reject the entire concept of 'State' as the fraud that it is, in order to make the transition to a social model where objective laws of proper human interaction are justifiably enforced.  The only such model is the Free Market Model of Government.  Unlike the 'State', whereby the inherent authority of the individual is fraudulently usurped by others, free market-based government operates strictly on a take-it-or-leave-it contractual basis.  Such free market government entities would operate strictly at the pleasure of the individuals they serve, hence under the direction of the valid authorities of those individuals.

While it may appear from our current perspective (from within the aggression-based anti-civilization) that such entities might violate the sovereignty of other individuals at the direction of their customers, such violations would be prevented by (at least) two things:  1) The transition to the Free Market Model of Government can only occur when there is a sufficient demand for it, i.e. enough people understand and wish to honor their inherent sovereignty as individuals, and 2) Anyone who truly understands and honors their own sovereignty, implicitly understands that the only way to secure their own sovereignty is for it to be held in equal status with all fellow sovereigns.  The 'invisible hand' of the free market would ensure that any free market government entity that aggresses against a sovereign individual would quickly go out of business, for they operate at the pleasure of sovereign individuals.

In fact, once the Free Market Model is established, aggression against a sovereign individual by a government entity would be about as ridiculous as a the specter of a contemporary restaurant owner demanding your business at gunpoint!

[sandm000]

I agree in principle that you are right about what? Right that people shouldn't aggress against you? Of course you're right about that! What I am saying is that the sort of thinking that proceeds from that truth "people shouldn't attack me, I have rights" to the thought that those rights ought to be defended by force if necessary is exactly the sort of thinking that has led to government. "He who wishes to save his soul, shall lose it."

Laziness may not equal greedy, but in the context I was using it, it does. Because I meant lazy in the sense of "Hey, the government is messing with that guy. What should I do about it?" And then doing nothing. That is inaction, and it is caused (mainly) by the fact that people are less concerned about you than they are themselves. That is "rational self interest". You can argue with them about it, but good luck. We see what that has done. Even among people who realize what the government is, and realize that something has to be done, it is a BIG GIGANTIC step to even get them to choose to stop funding the aggression with taxes. And what is their reason? Rational self-interest. "I realize the government does horrible things with the money, but I don't want to go to prison and it isn't immoral if it's given under duress." I know of only one antidote to the apathy and inaction that comes from fear:  Love. "Perfect love casts fear aside, for there is no fear in love."

OK, but why are you saying they are apathetic and you are right, when I am saying they are lazy to which you respond that I am wrong?  As for not wanting to go to prison, true that it is rational and in one's self interest, but mostly because they are afraid <-.  Fear, and not rational self interest are controlling the decision making.  Because who wouldn't argue if the tax collectors came? Who would lay down for them? That is which of us here?

No, they are real, and you prehend them directly through your mind. There is most definitely an outside world in my viewpoint. Here is a good article which describes the process perspective when it comes to prehension. http://www.websyte.com/alan/prehen.htm

I would say that is true. You don't understand how the world works at all. I really hope you take the time to read the article that I posted above.

Firstly, I did try to read the article, got as far as "It is the element of pure givenness in this act; experience as the having of an object. " I can't get past it.  I started over and got to this part "What we take to be solid things are, as science recognizes, only collections of bursts of energy, or activity or process, which Whitehead interpreted as living experiences (occasions of experience, actual entities). " I didn't realize that as a scientist all matter was experience.  This is the problem with his philosophy it is too difficult to prove to the non-believer.  It's full of hyped-up rhetoric and undecipherable semantics.
I also wouldn't say that "I don't know how the world works", when in fact I don't know how your personal philosophy works.  Especially if you are trying to convince me of the rightness.

The sense organs give information to the brain, it is true. But the brain has to process that information, and decide what to push forward to your conscious experience. What you perceive, therefore, is a highly edited, incomplete, and sometimes just plain wrong version of reality.

I can agree with how the sense organs work and how the brain can edit any information on its way in, or after retrieval from storage.

[Jacobus]

The 'invisible hand' of the free market would ensure that any free market government entity that aggresses against a sovereign individual would quickly go out of business, for they operate at the pleasure of sovereign individuals.

In fact, once the Free Market Model is established, aggression against a sovereign individual by a government entity would be about as ridiculous as a the specter of a contemporary restaurant owner demanding your business at gunpoint!

But the business of government is precisely to enforce laws at gunpoint. 

I agree that the scenario you describe is much preferable to what we have now.  I would love for all exercises of force to be funded on a voluntary basis, so that people only paid for the laws and prisons they wanted.  But even in such a world, I would still oppose the use of prisons and the enforcement of laws.

What happens when pro-life and a pro-choice free market governments meet?  Ultimately, moral questions would still be decided by violence.

People are always going to have different opinions on when defensive force is justified, how much force is justified, and the proper punishment (or restitution, if you prefer) to enforce.  People who have strong opinions would pay to have a government enforce their ideas of justice (think of what this means to the promoters of "social justice").  People who don't have strong opinions would hop on to the strongest government available for defending their interests.

[MaineShark]

There is one objective law of human interaction.  The zero-aggression principle.  And the supposed-existence of a State is a violation of that law, so there is no conceivable way that belief in that law could ever lead to Statism.

Who determines what exactly aggression is?

Aggression is defined as the initiation of force against a person.

Who enforces the law?  Who enforces penalities for defying the law?

The individuals being aggressed-against.

But the business of government is precisely to enforce laws at gunpoint.

Indeed.  However, you can't just assume that the converse is true.  Not all of us who would enforce our rights at gunpoint would ever even think of supporting a government.

But even in such a world, I would still oppose the use of prisons and the enforcement of laws.

As would we, I expect.  I would kill a man who forced me to do it, and not lose a moment's sleep over his death.  I would never lock a man up in a cage.  That's inhuman, degrading, and sociopathic.

People are always going to have different opinions on when defensive force is justified, how much force is justified, and the proper punishment (or restitution, if you prefer) to enforce.  People who have strong opinions would pay to have a government enforce their ideas of justice (think of what this means to the promoters of "social justice").

Why?  That's not rational behavior.  I agree that there are certain individuals who would attack others, and even who would gang up to attack others.  Just look at Caleb's "I can attack you to help you" nonsense, which is an unlimited license to do whatever violence he can dream up excuses for.  But the "good guys" will always have them outnumbered.  Or, if that ever fails to be the case, the odds are overwhelming that this world would quickly cease to be capable of sustaining higher-order life forms in a very short time.
Joe

[Caleb]

OK, but why are you saying they are apathetic and you are right, when I am saying they are lazy to which you respond that I am wrong? 

I'm sorry. I wasn't trying to say that you were wrong. In a discussion like this, sometimes I lose track of who has said what. I thought that it was ME who had used the word lazy, and I was clarifying that that may not have been the best word choice. People are lazy, sure, but that wasn't the direction I was really wanting to go, I was wanting to focus more on their fear of the government.

As for not wanting to go to prison, true that it is rational and in one's self interest, but mostly because they are afraid <-.  Fear, and not rational self interest are controlling the decision making.  Because who wouldn't argue if the tax collectors came? Who would lay down for them? That is which of us here?

Sure, but in both cases it comes down to rational self-interest. They set up the government because it is in their own (perceived) rational self-interest, and then they cower to it, because of fear, yes, but yielding to fear is their own rational self interest all over again. They believe that by cooperating, their life will go easier.

And there ARE people who stand up to the taxman, and are willing to take the lumps if they come. I know a lot of them, but it takes courage, and usually it takes a belief in something higher than just my own rational self-interest, although in fairness I do know Randites who don't pay taxes. Even then, I think they are being human despite their Objectivist philosophy, and not because of it.

Firstly, I did try to read the article, got as far as "It is the element of pure givenness in this act; experience as the having of an object. " I can't get past it.  I started over and got to this part "What we take to be solid things are, as science recognizes, only collections of bursts of energy, or activity or process, which Whitehead interpreted as living experiences (occasions of experience, actual entities). " I didn't realize that as a scientist all matter was experience.  This is the problem with his philosophy it is too difficult to prove to the non-believer.  It's full of hyped-up rhetoric and undecipherable semantics.

Whitehead was a physicist. His work with quantum physics influenced him to try to come up with a philosophy that could interpret the data from quantum physics in a worldview that acknowledged the reality of the physical world, thus avoiding the pitfalls of both Materialism on the one hand (which has been dealt a death blow with current scientific discoveries) and Idealism on the other hand (which denies the reality of the physical world, and thus is contrary to what Griffin calls "hard core common sense"). I note that a lot of the other physicist/philosophers end up being Idealists of some sort. (David Bohm?)

There is a strand here that I have been noticing. I've been reading Process thought for quite some time now, and lately I have been finding authors who refer to Whitehead as a "Platonist".  Even earlier in my life, I caught on to Jung, but hadn't read him in awhile, and now that I've been reading him again, I find that other writers classify Jung as a "Platonist", so I sought out some of Plato's writings (I had never really been interested in him before), and have been really amazed at how modern his ideas really are. I think the modern world is beginning to witness the ultimate triumph of Plato over Aristotle. And that may bode well for our society. Jung said at one point that he believed that the ultimate fate of civilization rested in how well mankind was able to address our common inner psyche, and I think Platonic thought is a much better forum for doing that.

I would say that all of philosophy is "hyped-up rhetoric and undecipherable semantics" because the ultimate task of any philosopher must be precision. The philosopher cannot afford to throw words around lightly, and thus often ends up creating his own vocabulary. Some philosophers communicate better than others. And you are correct: Whitehead is practically unreadable. I own Process and Reality, but I don't use it because I can't make heads nor tails of it. Fortunately, some of Whitehead's students have done a better job of communicating his ideas. At some point in any philosophy, you get to a point where it cannot be "proven", because it involves axioms. That is true of any system. It has even been demonstrated that mathematics are not internally verifiable. The only way that we know that any system works is to put it to the task of real life, and see how well it is able to function through our experience. For me, Process philosophy functions because it is the only philosophy that has been able to address the world knot problem and come through successfully on the other side.

[Caleb]

Caleb,

The thinking that you are expounding on here, about the perceptual nature of existence (prehensive just seems like a silly word to me) makes a lot of sense.  But your specific ideas about which perceptual constructs (you said archetypes I think) are damaging and which are valuable are what puts distance between your thinking and mine.  I think independence and self reliance perceptions of reality create better people than your pacifist constructs.  I think your archetypes devalue the self and for some people, with already damaged self perceptions, makes some feel worthless, helpless, powerless.

Prehension was Whitehead's word that he made up to describe his viewpoint.

I'd have to go into Jung's work a little more to fully understand his thinking about how to determine a positive archetype from a negative.

My own little guide is this: Without having to indoctrinate someone else in a philosophy or thinking pattern, what emotions do I want them to experience to be better people?  It doesn't work if they have to feel this way PLUS also accept this intellectual indoctrination. I'm not going to get to instruct everyone in libertarian thought. I have to meet them where they are at right now. And I'm dealing with people of all different ideologies. And true, genuine love is the only thing that, in my experience, makes just about everyone a better person, no matter what their ideology is.

BTW are you working this weekend, I'm driving from Ventura, North of LA, to San Diego?  Can I stop by and buy you lunch?  We can swap memes.

I am working Friday until around 6:00 pm. Then I have Saturday, Sunday, and Monday off. You can call me. I pm'd you my phone number earlier, but if you lost it I can send it again. I could probably head on down the 210 and meet you somewhere more convenient if you like, cause Riverside is probably a pretty long haul for you.

Caleb

[dalebert]

They're just going to do what is easy.

That's immediate gratification. That's an animal drive. Rational self interest takes intelligent thought and effort.

[Caleb]

i think you are parsing words. wouldn't rand say that everyone naturally acts in their rational self-interest? Even people of naturally low intelligence? It doesn't require thought. They just do it, according to Rand.

Introspection certainly requires thought. Not rational self-interest.

[Pat McCotter]

The sense organs give information to the brain, it is true. But the brain has to process that information, and decide what to push forward to your conscious experience. What you perceive, therefore, is a highly edited, incomplete, and sometimes just plain wrong version of reality.

I can agree with how the sense organs work and how the brain can edit any information on its way in, or after retrieval from storage.

A good read from the physical - rather than philosophical - nature of humans is The Feeling of What Happens: Body and Emotion in the Making of Consciousness by Antoni Damasio.

================================================================
As you read this, at some level you're aware that you're reading, thanks to a standard human feature commonly referred to as consciousness. What is it--a spiritual phenomenon, an evolutionary tool, a neurological side effect? The best scientists love to tackle big, meaningful questions like this, and neuroscientist Antonio Damasio jumps right in with The Feeling of What Happens, a poetic examination of interior life through lenses of research, medical cases, philosophical analysis, and unashamed introspection. Damasio's perspective is, fortunately, becoming increasingly common in the scientific community; despite all the protestations of old-guard behaviorists, subjective consciousness is a plain fact to most of us and the demand for new methods of inquiry is finally being met.
These new methods are not without rigor, though. Damasio and his colleagues examine patients with disruptions and interruptions in consciousness and take deep insights from these tragic lives while offering greater comfort and meaning to the sufferers. His thesis, that our sense of self arises from our need to map relations between self and others, is firmly rooted in medical and evolutionary research but stands up well to self-examination. His examples from the weird world of neurology are unsettling yet deeply humanizing--real people with serious problems spring to life in the pages, but they are never reduced to their deficits. The Feeling of What Happens captures the spirit of discovery as it plunges deeper than ever into the darkest waters yet. --Rob Lightner --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
================================================================

[dalebert]

...wouldn't rand say that everyone naturally acts in their rational self-interest?

No, I don't believe she would. In fact she expends a lot of effort demonstrating how many people don't and the problems that ensue. I'm not expert on Rand so I may not be the best to answer this. Someone else feel free to jump in. I'm still reading Atlas Shrugged.

It's instinctive for all creatures to try to survive and thrive, and she acknowledges that people do that as well. But you can't keep ignoring the "rational" part of that expression. Without that word, you completely miss the point. Without that word, we're just animals. Rational self interest is what makes a person a valuable member of society instead of just a looter, as she called them. The looters are animalistic and irrational.

[Caleb]

...wouldn't rand say that everyone naturally acts in their rational self-interest?

No, I don't believe she would. In fact she expends a lot of effort demonstrating how many people don't and the problems that ensue. I'm not expert on Rand so I may not be the best to answer this. Someone else feel free to jump in. I'm still reading Atlas Shrugged.

Well, if that's the case then her philosophy is even more irrelevant than I gave it credit for. Because "rational self interest" would then have a dangling subject.

I mean, "rational self interest" would be subjective to begin with, no? Since a critical part of "rational self interest" is the "interest" part, which interests, needs and desires vary depending on the individual. It would seem that it would only have meaning as each individual interprets his own actions. But if a person cannot be said to be acting rationally if others can critique his actions and find some premise why the behavior is not rational, then there is no true subject of the "rational self interest" philosophy. The ultimate arbiter of both "interest" and "rational" ought to be the "self", but if not, then who? No one? Or, more appropriately, everyone. And in such cases where everyone can critique behavior as irrational, whose decisions cannot be labeled irrational?

I guess that would explain, though, why Randians expend so much energy to explain to me how my actions (which I otherwise assumed to be altruistic) are in fact selfish. Because apparently under Rand's system, the subject is the only one who doesn't get a say in what his motivation is.  If I'm looking at it wrong, let me know, but it would seem that for "rational self interest" to have any value as a motivation (a questionable assertion to begin with) it must be the person himself who determines it. And if not, isn't it merely a forum for others to second guess other people. What do you call it, "mental masturbation" ?