LOL, are you done congratulating yourself?
Even this first example is bogus. You steal the boat, save the child, return the boat, pay the fine to the owner for stealing his boat, and then live happily ever after. What is the problem? Is saving a child not worth paying a fine for stealing a boat now?? Do you need stealing of boats to be made legal, before you will be willing to save a drowning child? Are you such a horrible person?
Actually, I think the boat example is a stronger example.
Take my argument above and substitute the boat in for suicide.
Now, I readily admit that my only proof that the boat example is proof that it is ok to agress against a persons property, is intution.
Just like in the Gettier problem the ONLY proof that a Gettier example is proof against the traditional definition of knowledge is a persons intution. There is no other proof.
The only way out of this is:
(1) Stick to your guns and say that it’s wrong to take the boat, and the person that does deserves to be punished.
(2) Say that the agression is not a violation of property rights. Perhaps non-action can be construed as a form of agression and therefore justified on self-defense (or defense of others) grounds.
Irenicus already gave you the anwser, before you asked. To show NAP is not valid you must think of a scenario where punishment for its violation is not in order. In the boat scenario the thief hero should stil be punished for stealing. It is wholly irrelevant that everyone would be happy to steal the boat to save the child. In fact that is what enables us to speak for NAP with a clear conscience.
Morality? NAP concerns itself with law and justice. With legislature. But as we know morality can not be legislated. That is because morality is built as much as on justice which can be translated into law, because it can be enforced as on goodness which can not translated into law because it can not be forced upon people.
In short stop confusing morality and justice.
Marko,
The problem I have with your argument is that your trying to have your cake and eat it too.
You make it sound as if the person who takes the boat has done something morally laudable, yet at the same time derserves to be punished (paying a fine). How can it be justified to use use force (paying a fine) against a person for committing a morally good deed?
There is no room for intuition in justice. Justice is blind, cold, logical and immovable.
I think it’s wrong to punish the man who takes the boat.
Law, justice and morality are intertwined.
Specifically, ALL illegal things should be immoral things. And NO moral things should be illegal things.
K, now what?
Stefan Molyneux addressed this topic in his book Universally Preferable Behavior. The scenario he brought up was you have somehow become stranded high up in the air on a flagpole. If you were to jump down, you would die on impact. But there is a house next to you, and if you jump through one of its windows(breaking it) you can save yourself. This hypothetical is very similar to the one you proposed, and they are both answered the same way. Would pretty much everyone swing into the window to save themselves? Would pretty much everyone steal the boat to save the child? The answer to both of these questions is yes. That is entirely irrelevant to the point, however. The point is, do you, as the homeowner or the boat owner, have the right to not be aggressed against, and having been aggressed against, do you have the right to be reparated? The answer to both of these questions is “yes” universally. In every situation. The motive for the aggression has no barring on this.
Shame to start off 2009 like this. Boo on you trianglechoke. This example has been beaten to death numerous times, it’s a joke that you congratulate yourself, for claiming to own an argument used by thousands of people before.
Lame.
“Hey everybody, I just proved the world is round! Ha!”
Now we are getting somewhere, and I can see where the disagreement lies.
I do not agree that the person who owns the boat derserves to be reimbursed in anyway. I also do not think the person who takes the boat should be punished in anyway.
Why? Intuition, that’s it. Now what? How do you fight intutition, because I cannot see any reason why someone would think the opposite other than inutition as well?
Maybe you haven`t noticed, but there is a victim in all of this. Whose property has been agressed upon?
I haven’t missed it. The boat owners property has been agressed upon.
But like I said above, I don’t think he deserves to be reimbured or other agressor punished.
Now you are just talking out of your arse. It is moral to forgive murderers.It is extremely applaudable to be such a good person to be able to forgive even a murderer. So maybe we should just have murders walk free? Lets just put it in writting, eh?
So if I stole a loaf of bread to feed my family, not only would that action not be wrong, but the person who got his bread stolen should have no recourse to restore that which he lost?
Deserves? What has deserving have to do with anything? Only god in his infinite wisdom is qualified to make a value judgement like that. We can only consistently apply law in such a way that acts of transgression against another are proporionaly punished or “righted”.
Maybe a person who in his youth caused a death of another through neglect, but has since changed into a better person and is right now taking care of six little orphans with special needs does not deserve to be dragged into jail, certainly the orphans do not deserve to be stripped of their only provider and caretaker, but stil justice demands and loudly that the man be punished for his past crime. Failing to do so would be commiting a further injustice towards the original victim.
What is this strawman you’re always creating? Ok to aggress? It’s not ok. Doing it knowing the consequences and being willing to accept them doesn’t make it “ok”.
Do you have any clue?
Justifying aggression in the saving of the child would seem to justify aggression in all cases. If there is ever a man that has less than anyone else, then that man and his supporters should be allowed to aggress.
There are millions starving in Africa, can I take from you to save them?
There are 1000’s of incurable, terminal diseases, should your income be taken to finance their cures?
Others are saying they would take his boat and bear the cost. But who determines that cost? The value of goods and services are subjective. What if the boat owner says the boat thief must be his slave for the rest of his life? How can another determine the value of his boat? If YOU determine the value of HIS boat, then aren’t you usurping and aggressing against his property rights? Isn’t that eminent domain?
No it doesn’t. What you’re saying is that your subjective emotions have the power to determine objective ethical truth. In other words, you just used an appeal to emotion.
Your argument can be basically summed up like this:
P1: I see a child drowning.
P2: I must use violence to save the child.
∴ NAP, natural rights, argumentation ethics, and other property right respecting ethical systems are wrong.
As you can see, your argument ultimately makes no sense. It is a giant exercise in non sequiturs and appeals to emotion.
If they’re doing something that THEY want to, and you prevent them, you are using aggression and coercing against them. That is no different from you being thrown into prison just because you decided to be a normal human being. Now, if they’re about to fall accidentally off of the bridge, you can save them by pulling them back, which would not be considered aggression.
Either way, your appeal to emotion at the end is no conclusive proof that the NAP is wrong.
Only because they wouldn’t adhere to it doesn’t mean that it isn’t true.
It is time to put logical fallacies to rest. That would include locking this thread.