From: Rafal Smigrodzki (rafal@smigrodzki.org)
Date: Wed Sep 10 2003 - 18:22:38 MDT
Robbie wrote:
>>> Example: if I fail to deliver a piece of equipment to you on monday
>>> because some troglodytes were cutting off the road and I didn't feel
>>> like running the gauntlet, then according to your moral system I
>>> should be blamed because obliged due to contract?
>>
>> ### Of course.
>
> then your moral system has no basis. My life is more valuable than
> the fulfillment of your contracts.
### As Alex noted in a recent post, it is useful to state what one means by
one's "morality". I did it some time ago, and in the paragraph above I
provided an interpretation of your question within the ethical system I
espouse. Of course, since your moral system, and the whole Weltanschauung,
are different than mine, my system has no basis from your point of view.
However, as Alex writes, we can compare notes and try to point out internal
inconsistencies in each other's systems.
Do it.
Randall Randall made an excellent comment in this context, too.
---------------------------
>>>> A contract must be explicit to be enforced. ...
>
>>> ### Ashamed, perhaps. Blamed - well, it depends on the local customs
>> regarding the duties of guardians of prepersons. Such customs should
>> be sufficiently simple and well-known to allow expectations to form,
>> and at the same time they should be subject (largely) to choice, by
>> both parents and (to a lesser degree) their children, e.g. by the
>> expedient of polycentric law.
>
> Directly contradicting your statement above.
### I do not understand how the paragraph above contradicts my previous
statement. Tell me more.
------------------------------
>
> Rafal - Contracts are pretty far down on the morality chain.
### Maybe for you. In other words, if I was to ever consider buying
something from you, I would have to worry that you will default on the
contract, because, as you admit, you don't care about your word. Well, this
needs to be remembered.
----------------------------------------
>
>>> Similarly economic contracts tend to
>>> be backed by force and coercion either explicitly or implicitly.
>>
>> ### See medieval merchant law. Ostracism is not coercion, but is very
>> effective at enforcing many contracts.
>
> Ostracism is a form of coercion - "Leave your house OR ELSE".
### Maybe I used a term which could be interpreted as something else -
banishment. The sanction in merchant law is not banishment, it is avoidance,
expulsion from the community, but not expropriation. Also, merchant law is
first voluntarily accepted by its users, in contrast to king's law. It is
not coercion.
-------------------------------
>
> If you want to redefine coercion for your little moral system, go for
> it, just don't expect anyone else to follow you down the road.
>
>> ### This would not be coercion, unless you are talking about
>> non-market, monopoly situations - such as a communist economy, or a
>> statist plutocracy.
>
> Word games, entertaining to children, annoying to adults.
### Now, you are saying I am infantile. Well, this makes an exchange of
arguments somewhat more difficult, doesn't it?
Basically, you apply the word "coercion" to the outcomes of large numbers of
people making decisions without use of fraud or non-contractual use of
physical force (=the definition of the free market). In this way, the
previously rather precise term (coercion = the use of non-contractual
physical force against a person, or threat thereof) becomes rather vague, a
term of abuse, and an expression of dislike. You may dislike the free
decisions of other people, and define any influence you disagree with as
"coercive", but redefinition of common terms only interferes with
discussions, and as I wrote, makes exchange of arguments more difficult.
--------------------------------
>>
>> ### My statement goes "Social goodness is whatever tends to get me
>> and others most of what I and they want". For most well-informed,
>> low-emotional persons this will mean absolute (not relative)
>> economic success under conditions of personal liberty.
>
> The project of defining morality by "what most people want" is
> hopeless and silly, you can see yourself going down that path here.
### Ah, another put down. Poor little me.
-----------------------------
>
>> ### Nah, most people want to gain. Whether it occurs at other
>> people's expense, is a minor secondary consideration. In fact, with
>> the exception of egalitarians, who see the gain of others as an
>> affront to themselves, and would prefer to even personally lose if
>> it's needed to ruin others, most people would rather gain *and*
>> profit others at the same time. It feels better, I can tell you that.
>
> "Most People" are smart enough to know that if you take someone else's
> job, they lose it. That's called gaining at someone else's expense.
> If they're ignorant of this rule, they were poorly brought up. You
> may ignorantly think that you can acquire billions and billions of
> dollars without actually hurting anyone, but that just makes you
> ignorant, certainly not moral.
### You have a difficulty envisioning positive-sum interactions. Did Elvis
Presley hurt an inordinate number of people (ignorantly? :-), in the course
of earning his billion dollars?
-----------------------------
>
>
>>> "Most People" don't agree about what they want - shoot, most people
>>> don't even know what they want themselves. But just about EVERYBODY
>>> can tell you whether or not you should torture children. Good is
>>> much more concrete than this abstract "what people want" thing.
>>
>> ### Certain procedures are good at finding out what people want. This
>> includes the free market, demarchy, Borda count and a few other
>> tricks. These define good much better than whatever you or I could
>> elaborate on our own. Nothing abstract about it.
>
> Well, we clearly don't agree on what most people want, do we agree
> that it's bad to torture children?
### Yes, in most cases, the procedures I mentioned come up with an
enforceable injunction against the torture of children.
BTW, since you think that the use of free market, and democracy to build a
morality based on getting people what they want is a silly and hopeless
project (as you wrote a couple of paragraphs back), do you have suggestions
for alternatives?
------------------------------
>
>>> Definitely. On the part of a few very wealthy and powerful people
>>> who have had and continue to have extraordinary power.
>>
>> ### This world is not made for and by elites. Masses of all kinds of
>> humans labored for centuries to build what we have, and AFAIK there
>> are no Illuminati, effective conspiracies, and worldwide cabals.
>>
>> I guess we differ here.
>>
>> No Elders of Zion, either.
>
> Stop being stupid.
### Ah, but I can't! :-)
---------------------------
>
> Is there a Queen of England? A Bank of England? A Barclays? An FMR
> Corporation?
>
> I don't know anything about kabal/illuminati/etc. I do know that the
> wealthy use their power to keep their power and that has NEVER EVER
> CHANGED. Has it?
### They keep trying - but they are losing, century by century, decade by
decade. Today's advanced capitalist societies have a dramatically lower
level of power concentration and inequality (although some are plagued by a
proliferation of mass special interest groups opposed to long-term economic
growth, like labor unions, or the retired).
The Queen of England has hardly anything to say outside her castles, poor
lady.
Don't be so envious and angry at the rich. Relax. They are human, too. You
are not necessarily poorer because somebody gets rich. Positive-sum games do
exist.
Rafal
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Wed Sep 10 2003 - 15:53:44 MDT