Well, if skepticism is directed against the validity of libertarianism itself, then I as a libertarian don’t see much value in skepticism.
I don’t like skepticism per se either - philosophical skepticism is different from being tolerant and open-minded - rather it’s just the opposite. Skepticism is a dogmatic belief in the impossibility of knowing any sort of truth.
Not sure why. Why shouldn’t skeptics be given their own medicine ?
Well, that wouldn’t annoy me much because you sometimes seem to be holding position X and position non-X…simultaneously.
There’s no is-ought gap. That’s just an article of faith of the skeptical church.
i have no desire to spend a lifetime defining the word jumping off word, ‘moral’, with you - just so that we can get started on discovering moral knowledge in depth and clarity through moral debate.
Obviously you value skepticism towards natural law more then natural law itself. Yet my claim still stands, the burden of proof is on you to show that what we deem to be true is actually false for it would be absurd to claim that we need to suppose something is false until we can prove it is true to you.
So, it’s generally accepted is-ought are definitionally distinct? And that in terms of using them in ‘linguistic logic’ it’s not possible to merge them without making a stealth moral imperative? If so, then what other threads do you think we should start up on the nature of ethics then? Objectivity vs subjectivity in ethics? Intentionalism vs “rationalism” in ethics?
People have stated natural law has been proven. Either they back up that assertion or they back away from it. If and only if they back away from that assertion, I would have no need to assert or prove anything and would gladly drop this.
To AJ, can anyone prove that causality is purely incidental? Or more properly, can anyone show the non-incidental nature in causality in terms of humans?
Why does this matter when we haven’t even gotten over the issue of what natural rights proponents mean by the words “ought,” “right,” “wrong,” etc.? I suggest that we cannot meaningfully proceed with any discussion related to the OP until such terms are rigorously defined. For those that think this is sticklerish or annoying, hey, I am not the one making the claim that natural rights theories can be logically “proven.”
but you know what moral oughts mean, they mean you are obliged to do them, that you would be wrong to not do them.
it can hardly be reduced further.
im not sure what you even want to discuss, logically foolproofedly proving whole systems is impossible, we can only do our pure deductions in pure hypotheticals,. if we are to say anything substantive , meaningful, insightful about the universe or ourselves, we need to combine deductions with empricism and introduce the possibility of making errors in our conclusions. we adopt tactics to fight off, to minimize error.
are you still wanting to go on about the proving of the system?, or are you willing to adopt the moral project and try to reduce whatever errors might be in it,out of it?
I don’t understand what those who say they can prove natural rights/law mean by “obliged” and “wrong.” Just because meanings for such words exist and I know all the meanings, doesn’t mean I know which meaning they intend to imply.
If they were serious about making a logical argument, I think we would see more effort at precision, similar to how mathematicians take pains to define what they mean. Even mathematicians may not be able to do so 100%, but at least they make a hearty effort to define their terms with enough precision for whatever they are trying to prove.
The issue I have with natural rights “proofs” is that I am not seeing essential terms defined with nearly enough precision to be useful in logically proving what the proponents seek to logically prove.
