I think you correctly understood the point of my question. Abusing the language I used and attempting to divert the discussion does no one any good. Not too mention it doesn’t make you look to friendly.
My apologies, I just thought it was a poor choice of words.
My definition of axiom is a self-evidently, undeniably true statement, from which other true statements can be derived using deductive logic.
My definition of a principle is a statement which forms the basis of a certain system (of laws, or of ethics, or whatever).
Homesteading, to me, is a principle, not an axiom. It is the principle on which libertarian ethics, and libertarian laws, are based. It doesn’t make sense to ask whether homesteading is “true”. It is a choice among principles; choosing between principles is a matter of personal taste.
Self-ownership is certainly not an axiom, and it is not an independent principle of libertarianism either. It is derived from the homesteading principle. Self-ownership means an individual has ultimate decisionmaking jurisdiction (ownership) over the body which his will is directly linked to (“his” body). This ownership right comes into being when an individual homesteads the body. The act of homesteading the body takes place gradually during childhood.
The homesteading principle, and the abandonment principle (and when these two are combined, the principle of voluntary exchange) are the ONLY principles of libertarianism. The whole system of libertarian ethics, and libertarian law, is based on these two principles for how property is justly acquired and given up.
How the hell does an individual homesteads a body? What does that even mean?
How We Come To Own Ourselves, by Stephan Kinsella.
It’s the absurdity that results from overextending metaphors about property to a context in which it makes no sense.
Everyone seems to forget that homesteading is just one method by which we can acquire property. There are many other methods, others being far more common. Accepting homesteading as the only way we acquire property is a fallacy. The argument neither confirms nor negates self-ownership, it’s just a simple strawman. Some people are just confusing terms or using them too loosely perhaps, which makes them easy targets.
I’d argue that, particularly in a western urban context, the vast majority of people’s property aquisition has absolutely nothing to do with homesteading over the course of their entire lifetimes. In a context in which the property most people are interested in is already transformed in some way, the concept of homesteading simply has nothing to do with it.
The more dense urbanization there is, the less the concept seems to apply to a contemporary context at all, perhaps with the exception of survivalists or something in that general direction. So aside from the myriad of philosophical issues surrounding the usage of the concept, it seems somewhat inapplicable anyways. I don’t think many urban people are willing to abandon their cushy cosmopolitan lifestyles to engage in some homesteading adventure. Certainly not me.
I can understand why you’d take “homesteading” to refer to “roughing it” out in the wilderness, trying to farm virgin land, etc. But I don’t think that’s what Rothbardian libertarians mean by the term. It’s really used to refer to how something becomes property in the first place. You’re absolutely right that, as the degree of urbanization increases, fewer and fewer unowned things exist, but for things that are owned, I think it’s useful to know (or have a good idea of) how they came to be owned to begin with. What do you think? Hope this helps.
The way I understand “self-ownership” is that basically it means “you” (your consciousness, your brain, the neurons in your brain blab blah..) and you alone are in control of your actions/body. Nobody can force you to perform an action that you wouldn’t voluntarily perform (well not yet anyway). Really the only way someone might compel you to do something you don’t want to do is through coercion. When someone says “lift your arm or I’ll break it”, he still can’t get you to comply if you refused to yield. Even if he were to physically grab your arm and try to lift it, it doesn’t diminish your ability to control your body and actions in any way, ultimately you still have command over your arms and hands and you can will them to strike him in the face. I dislike the term “self-ownership” for the reasons you’ve alluded to in your posts. I prefer the terms “self autonomy” and “individual sovereignty” instead. Rather than wrestling with the whole mind/body, chicken/egg thing, It’s much easier to think of each individual as a self contained “unit”, with the brain being the “command center”. I doubt you’ll find anyone who would argue that it is in fact your liver, and not your brain, that is in control of your actions.
Libertarian arguments need not to be made on ethical grounds at all. Having established that each individual is sovereign, we can then move on to the question of property. If you were to accept Locke’s labor theory of property, that mixing your labor with something that’s unclaimed makes it yours, then you have libertarianism. On the other hand, if you think that no, mixing your labor with an unclaimed object doesn’t make it yours, it belongs to everyone, then essentially, you have communism. It’s silly to say that people “ought” to have liberty or people “ought” to be able to own property. You can’t derive ought from is, people have liberty, nothing more can be said about that. Arrow’s impossibility theorem and Sen’s liberal paradox had shown that pareto optimality and liberty are mutually exclusive when people have more than 2 preferences about an issue. Since people differ on so many things, the only way for us to avoid conflict is to respect each other’s liberty when our choices don’t coincide; or alternatively we can voluntarily sign away part of our liberty through a contract. We can talk about libertarianism on purely logical and mathematical grounds. You shouldn’t really bring ethics into the discussion unless you’re dealing with tricky issues like when it’s ok to violate someone’s liberty etc etc, that way you avoid the whole moral skepticism vs moral realism debate and give detractors one less straw man to attack.
I read it somewhere that Locke claimed he accepted Locke’s theory of property. Why was he not a libertarian, let alone anarchocapitalist?
filc, I don’t think anyone here is committing fallacies. It’s just that we (you, Brainpolice and I) are all using different definitions, so we’re talking past each other.
My point was that homesteading is the only way that (currently unowned) property can be justly acquired, according to the libertarian conception of just. Which is to say that it cannot be justly acquired any other way, say by verbal decree. According to libertarian (i.e. normative) principles, there must be an objective, intersubjectively ascertainable link between an individual and the property, and the process of establishing this link is what we call homesteading.
Brainpolice, if I find a newspaper abandoned in a trash can and pick it up, then it becomes mine (according to libertarian principles). Presuming you agree with this (let me if you don’t), would you say that I have homesteaded the newspaper? Or would you use a different term for this?
Nir, since in your first post you said “previously unowned by anyone else”, I would also be interested in your answer to the above question.
bro story cool
Locke’s “life, liberty, and property” form the basis of libertarianism just like the rejection of private property form the basis of communism.
I read it somewhere that Smith claimed he accepted Smith’s labor theory of value and the invisible hand. Why was he not a economist, let alone capitalist?
Smith was an economist of course. My point is Locke did not believe in absolute property rights. Almost nobody does.
I’ve never even mentioned the word “absolute” anywhere in my post so I don’t know why you’re bringing it up. Smith wasn’t an economist for the same reason Locke wasn’t a libertarian - economics and libertarianism did not exist in their time. Terms like economists, capitalists, libertarians etc are Enlightenment/post-Enlightenment conception.
I meant unowned prior to the moment of you homesteading it; I’m totally cool with things being abandoned and up for re-homesteading. I do it most days with the free(advertising paid for) newspapers at the station on my way to work
I definitely understand that it’s relevance is supposed to do with how things have been aquired in the past, as a normative standard of legitimacy. But I don’t see what “homesteading” could possibly mean other than original appropriation of land in either a colonial or survivalist context. If we’re talking about how something becomes property in the first place, then we’re talking about a scenario prior to all transformation and use - which the crude and somewhat outdated examples that come to mind are the best approximations of.
Indeed, essentially all of Rothbard’s own examples in his work are fairly primitive, non-urban examples that make the most sense in an 18th century-and-before context. Since Locke wrote during this period, this kind of makes sense but raises the question of its contemporary relevancy. In a context in which this legitimacy test largely cannot possibly apply, as exchanges and transformations ensue into the future to the point where “original ownership” either is not tracable or ceases to be relevant, it seems odd to insist on inquiring about origins.
For sure, there are completely untouched areas of land in the west that could be “homesteaded”, but I don’t see why most people would be interested in such land unless they were already rich enough to seriously develope something on it or if they were willing to give up the benefits of urban commerce to start a more “self-sufficient” lifestyle that requires them to sacrifice the ease of access to resources that an urban lifestyle would grant them.
I would call that reappropriation of abandoned property. I think “homesteading” signifies something being previously unowned and generally refers to land rather than specific physical objects.
That then becomes somewhat semantical, not a technicality worth getting hung up on IMHO.