I’m just interested in knowing this since the two origins of libertarianism are just polar opposites. Natural rights justice theory and subjective theory of value had it’s roots in the Catholic church. Ayn Rand also became a popular starting point in the 20th century.
Nope, neither.
Yes on the Bible, no on Atlas Shrugged, though the Bible has absolutely nothing to do with any belief I carry. Ayn Rand I just don’t find a very good writer, though I very little sci-fi or fantasy to be good.
Catholic Church?
Until today I thought that Thomas Sowell was the one that convinced me of libertarianism, but after seeing todays article on Machiavelli I realize that without reading the Prince I wouldn’t have been open to Sowell’s arguments in the first place. Reading Machiavelli removed the rose colored glasses from my eyes when I looked at politics. Politics stopped looking like the quest from the common good and started looking more like the simple struggle for power over others. Rothbard had mostly nasty things to say about Machiavelli, but I am comfortable describing myself as a Machiavellian Libertarian.
I only discovered the Natural Rights tradition though Rothbard and Rand after I was a libertarian. I no longer consider myself a believer in Natural Rights, but am a still an anarchocapitalist.
I am as atheistic as they come
I’m confused on “Natural rights justice theory and subjective theory of value had it’s roots in the Catholic church”.
I do consider Rand’s Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal to be a favorite, though.
Both, actually.
Natural rights theory cannot come from a supernatural source.
People may claim so, but it’s a non sequitur. Even if everything was made by a guy with a beard, we would still have to develop a moral theory.
And if your theory is that Jesus divinely received this moral theory, then you may as well give up on studying reality because anything would be possible; like Bob Murphy claims ( http://consultingbyrpm.com/blog/2010/02/a-snapshot-of-my-conversion.html ). He says anything could happen as long as you really want it to, which would enable Keynesian economics (creating endless booms, raising minimum wage AND lowering unemployment, etc) to be true.
Maybe there was no solid theory but at least the foundation was set. The Spanish Jesuit Juan de Mariana is considered the forebear of John Locke’s defense of property(includes life and liberty).
Correlation is not causation. A moral theory must be developed like any other theory about reality. Supernatural beliefs cannot inform a theory about natural beliefs.
If Catholics developed homesteading principles it was despite being Catholic, not because they were Catholic. Now, it might be because they had more time and resources to spend on these ideas than others, but that doesn’t make Catholicism the source of their ideas; it just makes Catholicism the source of their wealth.
Well maybe it had something to do with them being Catholic. I mean Christianity was one of the first religions to focus on the individual. I agree with your first statement though about reality and not supernatural.
I think you have to be a little more careful in what you consider an origin of a school of thought. The Scholastics might have done something worthwhile, at least with subjective theory of value, but that’s no guarantee that they got it from the Bible. The Church itself is surely not a bastion of libertarianism, look at Juan’s signature for an example. Ayn Rand seems to come, oh, a few centuries too late to be an origin.
If these are the origins, how do you explain Cicero being quite close to a classical liberal? Was he influenced by Rand, or the Church?
Maybe. All I’m saying is that Catholic Church definitely nurtured libertarian ideas.
I want to correct you in saying individuals developed libertarian ideas DESPITE being Catholic. Saying ‘despite’ means that Catholicism negates libertarianism. It’s more accurate to say being Catholic and developing libertarian ideas have no relation at all.
You use because when there is a causal relationship. Despite when something happens in the face of opposing forces. The third is no relationship at all. And that is probably the accurate phrase to describe what we have here.
Catholicism is a belief in the supernatural. Belief in miracles is an absolute obstruction towards the understanding of reality. Yes, Bob Murphy may be a great Austrian economist, but it has to be despite his beliefs described in that post I linked.
[..] the selective forces that scrutinize scientific ideas are not arbitrary and capricious. They are exacting, well-honed rules, and they do not favor pointless self-serving behavior. They favor all the virtues laid out in textbooks of standard methodology: testability, evidential support, precision, quantifiability, consistency, intersubjectivity, repeatability, universality, progressiveness, independence of cultural milieu, and so on. Faith spreads despite a total lack of every single one of these virtues.
http://cscs.umich.edu/~crshalizi/Dawkins/viruses-of-the-mind.html
Nielsio,
Where do you base you belief in time invariant natural laws?
For me, it’s the bible and human action. But the stuff outside of the gospels is a little wonky to me. I prefer the gospels best. I’d have to say that my studies of the parables as a kid helped to sew the seeds of some ideas that are compatible with libertarianism, such as having a mutual respect for the common person and the importance of individual responsibility.
Where do you base your belief in time variant causality?
Same here.