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A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
The following is a chapter from David Friedman's (Milton's son) first anarcho-capitalistic book, "The Machinery of Freedom".
So far as i can tell, this critique seems very directed at the Rothbard school of thought rather than anything strictly Austrian. Mises, from what i understand, was a consequentialist in similar ways as Friedman. Do any of the supporters of Rothbard's ideas on natural rights and libertarinism want to provide a rebuttal or point towards one provided by someone else? I personally agree with his overall conclusion but think some of the problems he presents have more of an objective answer than is given credit for. Here's the argument: http://daviddfriedman.com/Libertaria...hapter_41.html [ QUOTE ] Article deleted for copyright reasons. [/ QUOTE ] |
Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
If you want a truly free society you have to let go of the property rights, you can't have both. I don't see how property rights beyond right of use can be defended principally in anything claiming to be a free (as in anarchist) society. |
Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
A very interesting chapter of a very interesting book, and I'd love to see how the ACists (at least the ones who believe in natural rights) respond.
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Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
[ QUOTE ]
The following is a chapter from David Friedman's (Milton's son) first anarcho-capitalistic book, "The Machinery of Freedom". So far as i can tell, this critique seems very directed at the Rothbard school of thought rather than anything strictly Austrian. Mises, from what i understand, was a consequentialist in similar ways as Friedman. Do any of the supporters of Rothbard's ideas on natural rights and libertarinism want to provide a rebuttal or point towards one provided by someone else? I personally agree with his overall conclusion but think some of the problems he presents have more of an objective answer than is given credit for. Here's the argument: http://daviddfriedman.com/Libertaria...hapter_41.html [ QUOTE ] Article deleted for copyright reasons. [/ QUOTE ] [/ QUOTE ] Zygote, An interesting read, and I've been meaning to read this book for a while. Friedman's points echo some of my own thoughts. I need to read it more carefully before I respond further, but I would say some of the AC folks and libertarians on this board would do well to take Friedman's admonition to heart. |
Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
It's great to see a prominent libertarian state what normal people instinctively recognize and debunk what certain ACers on this board (pvn, Nielsio) unreasonably claim as absolutes when they're losing a debate.
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Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
i read the first third and so far, as i understand it, people can't be free b/c someone might point a laser with the intensity of a flashlight at your house.
pretty compelling stuff. |
Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
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i read the first third and so far, as i understand it, people can't be free b/c someone might point a laser with the intensity of a flashlight at your house. pretty compelling stuff. [/ QUOTE ] Yeah, also it shouldn't be hard to see why pointing a partially loaded gun at someone is coercive while flying a plane over someone's property isn't. The draft example was also pretty poor. If people do not want to spend the money necessary to defend themselves it does not mean they have the right to steal the money and enlist from the same people who are against defending themselves int he first place. I'd be surprised if the people praising this article actually took the time to read it. There was nothing in there that was especially troubling for natural rights ACists. |
Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
[ QUOTE ]
The following is a chapter from David Friedman's (Milton's son) first anarcho-capitalistic book, "The Machinery of Freedom". link [/ QUOTE ] The man makes sense. |
Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
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i read the first third and so far, as i understand it, people can't be free b/c someone might point a laser with the intensity of a flashlight at your house. [/ QUOTE ]It's obvious you got to read it again a couple of times. Friedman is not saying that "you can't be free" if someone shines a laser beam at your ranch. He is saying that when someone shines a laser beam at your ranch, it becomes evident that the supposedly very straight-forward notion of private property needs to be re-visited by libertarians, because it has been abused by some of them. As the author states, "Although we give some value, perhaps very great value, to individual rights, we do not give them an infinite value." Friedman's other example of a society (even a libertarian society) being invaded and proclaiming a military draft is spot on -- and another heart breaker for some ACists round these here parts. Yep, definitely, you should read it again a couple of times... [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img] |
Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
this seems like a bunch of nitpicky what-if's to me... it's almost... well, childish really.
Instead of looking for ways that we can't be free let's start looking for ways that we can be. It's very possible that this is over my head though as I am a simpleton compared to the better minds here so I'll leave it to pvn, borodog etc to answer. Maybe this article does point out something important and I've missed that essence but it doesn't seem that way to me. |
Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
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If you want a truly free society you have to let go of the property rights, you can't have both. I don't see how property rights beyond right of use can be defended principally in anything claiming to be a free (as in anarchist) society. [/ QUOTE ] Pssst : What you're advocating is pure ANARCHY. These guys are advocating anarcho-CAPITALISM. A world of difference- |
Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
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Pssst : What you're advocating is pure ANARCHY. These guys are advocating anarcho-CAPITALISM. A world of difference- [/ QUOTE ] ooohhhh.. I see the difference now! [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img] |
Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
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riedman is not saying that "you can't be free" if someone shines a laser beam at your ranch. He is saying that when someone shines a laser beam at your ranch, it becomes evident that the supposedly very straight-forward notion of private property needs to be re-visited by libertarians, because it has been abused by some of them. [/ QUOTE ] You seriously can't see the difference between shinning a laser beam at someones house and lighting a candle in your house? It is not the act of emitting light that is the problem it is the damage to the person's property that needs to be protected. Lighting a candle does no damage to your property. A high powered laser beam that destroys your house is obviously coercive and should not be allowed. The article is full of poor analogies like this that aren't really a critique of property rights. |
Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
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You seriously can't see the difference between shinning a laser beam at someones house and lighting a candle in your house? Lighting a candle does no damage to your property. A high powered laser beam that destroys your house is obviously coercive and should not be allowed. [/ QUOTE ]Again, you are going to extremes - and Friedman's piece is, if anything, a plea to libertarians to avoid absolutes and notions of infinite. E.g. what if the laser beam is NOT destroying your house but is BOTHERING you? It would not bother me, if I were in your place. But it would provoke extreme anger in my uncle if HE were in your place! Friedman argues that limitations are bound to exist, i.e. the notion of an absolute and infinite value of "private property" is ultimately false. |
Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
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[ QUOTE ] Pssst : What you're advocating is pure ANARCHY. These guys are advocating anarcho-CAPITALISM. A world of difference- [/ QUOTE ] ooohhhh.. I see the difference now! [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img] [/ QUOTE ] I see it every day. ANARCHO-CAPITALISM is my monthly finances. ANARCHISM is my garage. OK? [img]/images/graemlins/smirk.gif[/img] |
Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
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You seriously can't see the difference between shinning a laser beam at someones house and lighting a candle in your house? It is not the act of emitting light that is the problem it is the damage to the person's property that needs to be protected. Lighting a candle does no damage to your property. A high powered laser beam that destroys your house is obviously coercive and should not be allowed. The article is full of poor analogies like this that aren't really a critique of property rights. [/ QUOTE ] The two only differ in degree. If rights are absolute, either both are allowed or both are outlawed. The author then asks--and you seem to know the answer--where is the line drawn? |
Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
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[ QUOTE ] You seriously can't see the difference between shinning a laser beam at someones house and lighting a candle in your house? It is not the act of emitting light that is the problem it is the damage to the person's property that needs to be protected. Lighting a candle does no damage to your property. A high powered laser beam that destroys your house is obviously coercive and should not be allowed. The article is full of poor analogies like this that aren't really a critique of property rights. [/ QUOTE ] The two only differ in degree. If rights are absolute, either both are allowed or both are outlawed. The author then asks--and you seem to know the answer--where is the line drawn? [/ QUOTE ] Bah I tried to respond to your other post, this is one is much better. The two don't only differ in degree. One interferes with your ability to use your property the other doesn't. I suppose one could make the point that there could be subjectiveness in terms of damage to property, but I don't think that makes property rights any less absolute. It is still valid to say that damaging other people's property is wrong even if there is some disagreement of what actually causes damage. |
Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
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Pssst : What you're advocating is pure ANARCHY. These guys are advocating anarcho-CAPITALISM. A world of difference- [/ QUOTE ] Well someone slapped anarcho in front, and the use of anarchist rhetorics is pretty high from ACists so they'll have to live with the question. [img]/images/graemlins/smirk.gif[/img] |
Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
This is just a string of ridiculous, nonsense, pointless, grey area null zone scenarios designed to hurt the cause of freedom. Why does anyone anywhere care about the possibility of a photon hitting my door when there are millions dying through the corruption of a bloated evil violent coercive state, trillions of dollars in debt and wasteful spending forcing people to spend half their time working for no pay and hundreds of thousands in gulags being beaten and raped for the mere "crime" of setting fire to a plant and putting it in their mouth. [censored] your stupid laser crap.
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Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
I really get the impression people here are missing the point; Friedman knows his examples are ridiculous, and that in practice no one will have any trouble deciding that a candle is fine while a laser beam is not.
But that's not his point. His point is that if you take a natural rights approach there is no dividing line between the two cases. To take his aeroplane example: no one here seriously questions that you should be able to forcibly disarm someone playing russian roulette with you against your will (1 in 6 chance of dying), just as no one here questions that someone flying a plane over your land is legitimate (say a 1 in 10 000 chance of dying). The problem that Friedman raises is that this seems entirely arbitrary if you look at it from a natural rights point of view. |
Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
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[censored] your stupid laser crap. [/ QUOTE ] lol...I agree with this sentiment, but I think it is important to establish natural rights as absolute. All of the things you mentioned can be justified if we say even though we are ignoring the rights of people it is necessary because it will make society better. His draft example is the most obvious case of such disregard of people's rights. He is basically saying a draft is wrong unless we REALLY need one. How do we know if we really need a draft? While I guess that his point is that such decisions are completely subjective, it does nothing to protect natural rights. |
Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
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I really get the impression people here are missing the point; Friedman knows his examples are ridiculous [/ QUOTE ] The problem with his examples aren't that they are ridiculous, it is that they are not analogous. A laser that will damage your property isn't the same as a flashlight. And it has nothing to do with the concentration of the light. Shooting a gun at someone is a violent act. Flying a plane over someone's land isn't. |
Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
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A laser that will damage your property isn't the same as a flashlight. And it has nothing to do with the concentration of the light. [/ QUOTE ] Do you believe in the subjective theory of value (like, I would've thought, all the ACers on this board do)? Because if so, please tell me how you can objectively tell whether something is damaging my property? If the STV is right, all value is in the eye of the beholder, and so if I decide that a couple of photons spilling over to my land is damaging it, who are you to say any different? [ QUOTE ] Shooting a gun at someone is a violent act. Flying a plane over someone's land isn't. [/ QUOTE ] Again, missing the point - the violence isn't what matters, the risk of death is. I'm sure I can come up with other examples of non violent situations which cause a 1 in 6 chance of you dying - do you think you are within your rights to stop these occuring? If so, your violent/non violent dichotomy won't help you one bit. |
Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
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This is just a string of ridiculous, nonsense, pointless, grey area null zone scenarios designed to hurt the cause of freedom. Why does anyone anywhere care about the possibility of a photon hitting my door when there are millions dying through the corruption of a bloated evil violent coercive state, trillions of dollars in debt and wasteful spending forcing people to spend half their time working for no pay and hundreds of thousands in gulags being beaten and raped for the mere "crime" of setting fire to a plant and putting it in their mouth. [censored] your stupid laser crap. [/ QUOTE ] This guy has written countless articles about the feasibility of private enforcement agencies and various ideas that appeal to ACists. He's making an honest point, and your post just makes you look like another robotic libertarian, spouting slogans. I think he makes a good and simple point. He's just pointing out reducto Rothbardian libertarianism doesn't square with our instinctive moral intuition at all, and to pretend so leads to philosophical contortions. I personally don't think absolute natural rights should be enforced. But the market mechanism seems the only tool humans have ever invented for positive-sum gains. As it's so useful, it makes sense to guide our morality by that tool, just as a Native American might have his morality guided by his way of life. That might be a better case for legal libertarian absolutism. EDIT: I have repeatedly made this point several times. [ QUOTE ] Perhaps we should replace a statement about what one should do ("never initiate coercion") with a statement about what objective one should seek ("do whatever minimizes the total amount of coercion"). [/ QUOTE ] |
Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
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Shooting a gun at someone is a violent act. Flying a plane over someone's land isn't. [/ QUOTE ] What if it's a helicopter, meant to intimidate the owner into selling their land to the local monopolist? The point which all you fine AC intellects are missing is that a million scenarios can be thought of (many of them realistic) where your absolute rights mantra gets shown up as a logical and practical farce. |
Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
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Because if so, please tell me how you can objectively tell whether something is damaging my property? [/ QUOTE ] I can't. But there are certain cases where I can tell for sure that you are damaging my property. Eliminating all cases where it is obvious that my property is being damaged or interfered with would be a good start. For those other subjective cases a reasonable man argument would be a decent solution. [ QUOTE ] non violent situations which cause a 1 in 6 chance of you dying - do you think you are within your rights to stop these occuring? [/ QUOTE ] Of course I am, as those infringe on my right to live. You are free to do what I want as long as it doesn't interfere with my rights. I don't see why I am not allowed to defend myself because you decide to do something incredibly dangerous. I suspect you will comeback with something about what probability is acceptable. And the answer is I don't know, but this isn't a natural rights problem. It is a subjective question for any society. [ QUOTE ] Again, missing the point - the violence isn't what matters [/ QUOTE ] Yes, it is. In Friedman's article he asks what if the gun had a million chambers and then switches to the plane example. This is why it is a bad example, he should have stuck with the gun. If he had, it would be quite clear that it is still not right to shoot the gun at someone. I think we are stuck on different things. You are saying since what constitutes damage to property is subjective it means that it is ok to damage people's property sometimes. While this may be true it does not mean that it is ok to damage people's property in cases where it is not subjective. Friedman uses the stealing of a gun to stop a madman as an example of when it is ok to steal (which would always be wrong according to absolute rights supporters). |
Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
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What if it's a helicopter, meant to intimidate the owner into selling their land to the local monopolist? [/ QUOTE ] That would seem pretty coercive to me (and not that realistic). In any case, nothing brought up in this article seems that compelling to me. Of course people are going to have different ideas of what affects their property, these all seem like trivial disputes that would arise between individual property owners that could be settled by arbitration. I think that would be the whole purpose of arbitration in the frist place, to settle these "grey area" disputes. I know the article was about absolute property rights, but I wouldn't consider it too damning if the best argument someone can come up with against this idea is that there is a 1 in 1 x 10^10 chance that a plane flying overhead might crash into your property therefore your rights aren't absolute! |
Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
For those of you who arent getting the poin:
[ QUOTE ] A second problem is that simple statements of libertarian principle taken literally can be used to prove conclusions that nobody, libertarian or otherwise, is willing to accept. If the principle is softened enough to avoid such conclusions, its implications become far less clear. It is only by being careful to restrict the application of our principles to easy cases that we can make them seem at the same time simple and true. [/ QUOTE ] [ QUOTE ] The obvious response is that only significant violations of my property rights count. But who decides what is significant? If I have an absolute property right, then I am the one who decides what violations of my property matter. If someone is allowed to violate my property with impunity as long as he does no significant damage, we are back to judging legal rules by their consequences. [/ QUOTE ] [ QUOTE ] I am not claiming that libertarians who argue from rights rather than from consequences believe that you cannot light a match on your own property, or fly an airplane, or breathe out; obviously they do not. My point is that simple statements of libertarian rights taken literally lead to problems of this sort. One can avoid such results by qualifying the statements: saying that they apply only to "significant" violations of my rights, or violations that "really injure" me, or that by breathing and turning on lights and doing other things that impose tiny costs on others I am implicitly giving them permission to do the same to me. But once one starts playing this game one can no longer use rights arguments to draw clear conclusions about what should or should not happen. People who believe in taxes can argue just as plausibly that taxes do not really injure you, since the benefits they produce more than make up for the cost, or that everyone implicitly consents to taxes by using government services. [/ QUOTE ] [ QUOTE ] Our response to such questions demonstrates that we do not really believe in simple single values. Most libertarians, myself among them, believe that a libertarian society is both just and attractive. It is easy enough to claim that we are in favor of following libertarian principle whatever the consequences--given that we believe the consequences would be the most attractive society the world has ever known. But the claim that we put individual rights above everything else is, for most of us, false. Although we give some value, perhaps very great value, to individual rights, we do not give them an infinite value. We can pretend the contrary only by resolutely refusing to consider situations in which we might have to choose between individual rights and other things that are also of great value. My purpose is not to argue that we should stop being libertarians. My purpose is to argue that libertarianism is not a collection of straightforward and unambiguous arguments establishing with certainty a set of unquestionable propositions. It is rather the attempt to apply certain economic and ethical insights to a very complicated world. The more carefully one does so, the more complications one is likely to discover and the more qualifications one must put on one's results. [/ QUOTE ] |
Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
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This is just a string of ridiculous, nonsense, pointless, grey area null zone scenarios designed to hurt the cause of freedom. Why does anyone anywhere care about the possibility of a photon hitting my door when there are millions dying through the corruption of a bloated evil violent coercive state, trillions of dollars in debt and wasteful spending forcing people to spend half their time working for no pay and hundreds of thousands in gulags being beaten and raped for the mere "crime" of setting fire to a plant and putting it in their mouth. [censored] your stupid laser crap. [/ QUOTE ] But whose gonna run the lighthouses!!?!?!?? Seriously I dont get the statists in this thread. If property rights are a problem for AC then its an ever bigger problem for statism. If there are no property rights then we should be satisfied with the madmax type anarchy. Obiously the statists wont go this far. They just want their particular preference of property rights enforced, but there is nothing more inherantly objective in the statist definition of property rights. |
Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
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But that's not his point. His point is that if you take a natural rights approach there is no dividing line between the two cases. To take his aeroplane example: no one here seriously questions that you should be able to forcibly disarm someone playing russian roulette with you against your will (1 in 6 chance of dying), just as no one here questions that someone flying a plane over your land is legitimate (say a 1 in 10 000 chance of dying). The problem that Friedman raises is that this seems entirely arbitrary if you look at it from a natural rights point of view. [/ QUOTE ] And the answer is the exact same as it is now. Its determined by how much people value the enforcement of their property rights. So some guy shines a light at my house, am I gonna pay the $100 to call the cops up and get him to stop? Or would I do what most people do now when minor infractions occur to their property? I'm going to go over to his house and have a discussion with him, and since most people dont have a incessant need to annoy their neighbours he's probably going to stop. To say that there are some grey areas to property rights and therefore there are no property rights is pretty insane. We need to spend our time on the real important areas of property rights. Where people are stealing and murdering are far more important than some theoretical that is never going to happen in real life. |
Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
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[ QUOTE ] This is just a string of ridiculous, nonsense, pointless, grey area null zone scenarios designed to hurt the cause of freedom. Why does anyone anywhere care about the possibility of a photon hitting my door when there are millions dying through the corruption of a bloated evil violent coercive state, trillions of dollars in debt and wasteful spending forcing people to spend half their time working for no pay and hundreds of thousands in gulags being beaten and raped for the mere "crime" of setting fire to a plant and putting it in their mouth. [censored] your stupid laser crap. [/ QUOTE ] But whose gonna run the lighthouses!!?!?!?? Seriously I dont get the statists in this thread. If property rights are a problem for AC then its an ever bigger problem for statism. If there are no property rights then we should be satisfied with the madmax type anarchy. Obiously the statists wont go this far. They just want their particular preference of property rights enforced, but there is nothing more inherantly objective in the statist definition of property rights. [/ QUOTE ] But "statists" entire belief system, at least in the political sense, isnt based on an a concept of absolute, inviolable property rights. Anarchists/libertarians do believe in that. Get it now? |
Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
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[ QUOTE ] Shooting a gun at someone is a violent act. Flying a plane over someone's land isn't. [/ QUOTE ] What if it's a helicopter, meant to intimidate the owner into selling their land to the local monopolist? The point which all you fine AC intellects are missing is that a million scenarios can be thought of (many of them realistic) where your absolute rights mantra gets shown up as a logical and practical farce. [/ QUOTE ] Well mabey you could provide a positive theory of property rights. Or do you just want the government to own everything and control everyone? The problem with you example and many of the abstract examples that come up is there is no cost to the actors in abstract land. Whos gonna pay for the pilot and helicopter in your example? At some point the owner is going to sell his property and at some point it doesnt make economic sense to do rediculous things. Its when you have the state to externalize the cost of the rediculous things that you want to do that we get massive amounts of violence. Why dont you go have a discussion with those poor people in Iraq about property rights. |
Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
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But "statists" entire belief system, at least in the political sense, isnt based on an a concept of absolute, inviolable property rights. Anarchists/libertarians do believe in that. Get it now? [/ QUOTE ] But the value of the protection of property rights isnt absolute. Nobody is going to go shoot someone because there was a light put on their house. Retribution is still going to be a case of degree. But I dont see what bothers you about absolute property rights? Does the idea of the welfare state being immoral bother you? |
Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
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[ QUOTE ] [ QUOTE ] Shooting a gun at someone is a violent act. Flying a plane over someone's land isn't. [/ QUOTE ] What if it's a helicopter, meant to intimidate the owner into selling their land to the local monopolist? The point which all you fine AC intellects are missing is that a million scenarios can be thought of (many of them realistic) where your absolute rights mantra gets shown up as a logical and practical farce. [/ QUOTE ] Well mabey you could provide a positive theory of property rights. Or do you just want the government to own everything and control everyone? The problem with you example and many of the abstract examples that come up is there is no cost to the actors in abstract land. Whos gonna pay for the pilot and helicopter in your example? At some point the owner is going to sell his property and at some point it doesnt make economic sense to do rediculous things. Its when you have the state to externalize the cost of the rediculous things that you want to do that we get massive amounts of violence. Why dont you go have a discussion with those poor people in Iraq about property rights. [/ QUOTE ] A simple no would have sufficed. Why do I need to provide some theory of private property rights. Im pretty satisfied with how it works now. Im not the one advocating radical change. I love the nitpicking of the analogies. I admit I have done it in the past, but only when it actually matters. It doesnt matter here. And LOL Iraq, I stand in awe of your rhetorical genius. I appreciate the attempt at shifting the debate though, but Im not going to be sucked off into a ridiculous digression. BTW, helicopter example wasnt mine. |
Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
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Well mabey you could provide a positive theory of property rights. [/ QUOTE ] http://www.daviddfriedman.com/Academ.../Property.html |
Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
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Why do I need to provide some theory of private property rights. Im pretty satisfied with how it works now. [/ QUOTE ] So your theory of property rights is that some people have the right to take others property? Yes my Iraq line was a little rhetorical, but seriously what do you think is going to happen when you let one group in society define property rights? You are going to get massive amount of theft and violence as these people define property rights to be whatever resources they want for themselves. Iraq was one example I could have stated countless others of corruption in the American government so I hope it didnt distract you from the core point I was trying to make. |
Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
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A second problem is that simple statements of libertarian principle taken literally can be used to prove conclusions that nobody, libertarian or otherwise, is willing to accept. If the principle is softened enough to avoid such conclusions, its implications become far less clear. It is only by being careful to restrict the application of our principles to easy cases that we can make them seem at the same time simple and true. [/ QUOTE ] [ QUOTE ] One solution to this problem is to reject the idea that natural rights are absolute; potential victims have the right to commit a minor rights violation, compensating the owner of the gun afterwards to the best of their ability , in order to prevent a major one. [/ QUOTE ] vulturesrow, The author is not at all softening his stance on property rights in this article, as he seems to think he is. The above quotation is evidence of that. The fact that he admits that a person would have to compensate the misanthrope for the use of his rifle is evidence of the fact that the author believes in personal property rights. The issue he misses is that Rothbard never said that natural rights should never, ever no matter the circumstances, be violated, but that when they are violated the victim is due compensation proportional to the violation. The recognition of this distinction invalidates all of the authors absurd examples. Sure, I violated my neighbor's property rights by shining a flashlight on his door, and I owe him compensation for the damage caused. If I have caused damage I owe him, if not I don't, from a practical standpoint this is where arbitration steps in. |
Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
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[ QUOTE ] Well mabey you could provide a positive theory of property rights. [/ QUOTE ] http://www.daviddfriedman.com/Academ.../Property.html [/ QUOTE ] Thanks for the link, the schelling points seem particularly relevant to the type of nit picky criticisms that plagued the OP. But I dont get why friedman brought them up in the OP when he clearly refutes them in this link. Is there something I'm missing. |
Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
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[ QUOTE ] If you want a truly free society you have to let go of the property rights, you can't have both. I don't see how property rights beyond right of use can be defended principally in anything claiming to be a free (as in anarchist) society. [/ QUOTE ] Pssst : What you're advocating is pure ANARCHY. These guys are advocating anarcho-CAPITALISM. A world of difference- [/ QUOTE ] No, it's not different at all. |
Re: A Critique of Rothbardian Natural Rights (sorta long)
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But "statists" entire belief system, at least in the political sense, isnt based on an a concept of absolute, inviolable property rights. Anarchists/libertarians do believe in that. Get it now? [/ QUOTE ] Anarcho-capitalists do, most anarchists don't. |
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