there are no grounds to say that one claim is more ‘conventional’ than the other.
both claims start out absolute but in aggressing other peoples property you open yourself to legitimate self-defense
then do you admit an asymmetry in the opening phase of the scenario?, or must the land owner pay damages if the ball gets ‘dirty’ or lands on ‘pointy stones’ ?
It is either:
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Ball and lawn collide through natural disaster.
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Ball and lawn collide through my accident.
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Ball and lawn collide through my own aggression.
By the laws of physics there can be no other options.
Through a natural disaster, no one pays for damages. (Unless I had the ball in a particularly unsafe place to begin with.) I am referring to if I kick the ball and it accidentally goes in, say, his prized rose garden. It is still my fault, but it does not call for self-defense.
aggression is not to be confused with the force of phsyics. as you say , in physics forces truly oppose.
aggression is a directed concept. one thing aggresses another. so there can be a passive aggressed party, that in being aggressed, does not itself aggress. you have assumed this away.
you kicked it, but its not your fault?
yeah, says you
Sorry, I have corrected myself
I will simplify this:
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Ball and lawn collide through natural disaster.
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Ball and lawn collide through my accident.
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Ball and lawn collide through my own aggression.
I am saying only 3 is valid to take the ball. 2 and 3 are valid for restitution by me.
let us consider an example from common law practice to see if common law is defective in light of natural law (perhaps through having been co-opted by the state ) or whether it has things to teach us about justice.
a man enters a china shop. alone at the back, the store keeper watches the man pick up a fine piece. it falls. it smashes. does the man owe anything to the storekeep?
Bounded by proportionality, but that’s not the point here, is it ?
The ball owner was not attacking anyone so I don’t see how self-defense gets into the picture ?
The ball owner has no right to trespass even in order to get his ball back BUT the owner of the garden has no right to keep the ball, so he must return it.
I’m not sure what this hypothetical case illustrates tho. Let’s say a diamond ring worth $100,000 lands on your property. I ask you to return it and you say no. Well, next thing I do is call my PDA and ask them to get it back. You can’t prove it’s yours but I can.
Yes. It was the man’s fault the china broke. That is #2 on this scale:
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Natural Disaster
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Accident
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Aggression
2 & 3 demand restitution by the causer. 3. allows for self-defense.
yes, i agree that the pda’s will solve boundary problems well.
may i recommend a long net on a hook with which the ball might be retreaved from afar. or the prior negotiation of a contract ‘what if my ball goes into your yard’, to anticipate the problem so that the two parties arent confused about their legitimate avenues of action.
at the end of the day, its not my fault that a diamond landed on my property. was it entrepeneurialism on my part that i bought property on which diamonds fell. lets disincentivivies the pollution of others property with diamons. its fairly obviously bad strategy to leave your diamonds in the safe keeping of other peoples lawns
you have a practical problem in distinguishing 2 from 3, since it would seem that only the ‘man’ could claim to truly know, and sometimes people know not themselves. this ambiguity about which case obtains could be solved simply by conflating them. thats where i prefer to start. not least because it incentivise individuals who own balls and lawns to involve and hire PDA’s and the like, private law producers etc, tocreate voluntary behaviour contracts, and judges of talent to have a role in ,what i call, ‘damping down’ cases of 3 (aggression).
Well, the ball went over to the yard first. The yard didn’t walk over to the ball and take it. I’m talking about property violations. Do you like to throw that word around (straws) or something like it means anything of significance without a qualifier? I mean you either can apply a rational or you can’t.
The idea that a ball accidentally landing on a garden entails ‘coercion’ is “grasping at straws”. I don’t think I’m misusing the expression.
Mingo has jumped around on this ball scenario. I think we are talking about two different scenario’s. I’m talking about the scenario in which the ball owner could have avoided having his or her ball go into the neighbors yard. If it was an accident, and therefore it can be shown that the ball owner didn’t do it on purpose, then you’re, Juan, scenario works. Yet, Juan, I think what you misunderstand as well, is that Mingo is saying that just because the ball owners ball is in the yard that ball owner can now own the yard. Mingo’s stuck. That’s why he’s/she’s saying, “Why can’t the yard be on the ball?” I’m a bit done with this thread. Mingo needs to study more instead of whining about how we don’t help him/her enough. Shows a lack of responsibility and irrationality on Mingo’s part to put the blame on us for not helping enough, but hey, that’s my opinion.
My original post stated it was a “gust of wind” that did it. I have just been responding to each criticism as they came along. Once again, there are three scenarios:
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Natural disaster
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Accident on my part
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Aggression on my part
#1 was my original scenario. In this situation, it is neither party’s fault that the ball and yard are in contact. Me wanting my ball back and my neighbor wanting the ball off their yard are both valid claims. It is when one of us elevates our property rights over the other that it becomes aggression.
#2 is the same as #1, except that it is my fault and my neighbor deserves restitution from any damage caused by the ball.
#3 is the only time my neighbor is justified in keeping the ball.
I see this as a very rational way of dealing with the issue, and I hope it clears any misconceptions up.
Let me also state my reason for differentiating between accidents and aggression.
Aggression occurs when one claims higher ownership rights over another’s ownership rights. If I push someone on the ground voluntarily, I have claimed higher ownership of their body by using physical force to control them. They would be justified in physical self-defense and I would owe for all damages.
An accident occurs when one physically infringes upon another’s property, but does not do it out of aggression. If I am walking behind someone, trip on my own feet and topple them over, I have not claimed higher ownership of their body. Because it was my fault, I would still have to pay for all damages. However, they would not be justified in physically beating me back.
I do not think it would be a problem for people to differentiate between the two, and in tricky cases they could be reviewed by PDA courts.
You’ve just created the bizzarro world where a shop keeper can shoot a child who steals a candy bar, the one that Rothbard used proportionality to avoid.
Entering the property of another person does not negate the ownership over yourself or your property. It can only grant specific liability proportional to the extant of the trespass. Ownership is not an on/off button.
You have literally created a scenario where walking across someone’s lawn makes you their slave for life.
I’m very certain you don’t understand liens. If a mechanic fixes you car and you later refuse to pay him for work done, he does not get to keep the car. He can sell the car and keep an amount equal to what he is owed along with a small fee, the rest he must return to the car’s owner. The law does not exist to benefit one person at the expense of another.
The car trespass would work in the same way. The neighbor could hold the car to ensure his trash cans are replaced, but once they are he must return it. If the neighbor refuses to return the car, he is then trespassing on the car and the car owner is free to engage in a proportional trespass on the neighbor’s property in land to retrieve it.
Back to scenario: If the neighbor gets to keep the car, I have no obligation to further compensate him for any damages, assuming they are less than the value of the car.
I am defending the idea that the ball owner still owns the ball and the lawn owner still owns the lawn in the case of natural disaster or accident. What I am not defending is the idea that one can claim that their rights trump another’s.