Is Libertarianism Compatible with Subjective Morality?

The argument that most of us use to advocate libertarianism as a political philosophy is the Non-Agression Principle, that no individual can initiate force against another individual. However, on the surface this seems to rely on the idea of objective morality, that everyone can agree to universal ethical principles. My question is if the existence of objective morality is necessary for libertarianism to be a valid system?

If on the other hand morality is subjective, individuals could each have their own moral attitudes toward certain subjects. One person could extend the NAP only to adult humans, another could extend the NAP to animals, another could define mutually consentual actions between two others as against their ethical system, another could have no moral regulations whatsoever. As an obvious consequence of this, conflicts will arise between competing ethical systems. The person killing livestock will be in violation of the animal rightist’s ethical system, the gay couple will be in violation of the devout Christian’s ethical system, the mugger will be in violation of the property rightist’s ethical system. Clearly there must be some dispute resolution system to arbitrate in conflicts arising from competing ethical systems, whether this be simply might-makes-right, NAP, or some other method to settle disputes. This seems to leave us right back at square one, and having conceded that morality is not objective, this would also leave us without an objective way to settle disputes. Thoughts?

Well I’m thoroughly subjectivistic and I’m a libertarian… So I’m going to go out on a limb and say that my answer to your question is “no”.

Even if morality is objective, whatever this ultimately means, the fact is that there is nothing to stop people from believing that morality is subjective. This means that it ultimately comes down to could a libertarian society survive if everyone decided to fight over their different ethics, the ultimate answer being “no”, but neither could the state exist under these conditions. With this said, the fact is that we have relatively little reason to believe that if libertarianism was a generally supported system of organization, that even if individuals believed that their ethics were superior to those employed by other people, then the law and an understanding of the disadvantages to themselves if they were to engage in violent action would cause the vast majority to think twice before violently enforcing their morality.

This is to say, what are the things that we can all agree on? There must be some property norm in society, this is something that 99.99 percent of all men agree upon, even if they disagree over the interpretation of what property should be. This means that ultimately the system which is easiest to maintain, and what society will necessarily gravitate towards if an understanding of libertarian-leaning economics is generally reached, is libertarianism, because it is the easiest to enforce.

The biggest thing that libertarianism has going for it is the economics behind it. If most of the propositions of AE are right then the fact is that the vast majority of all moralities instantly gravitate towards the support of the libertarian system.

Morality is necessarily subjective. Subjects (people) value. Communists and anarcho-capitalists have entirely different values. Neither is objectively right, as it would be nonsensical. Don’t think of it in terms of morality. Let’s look at humor. We might say, “That joke is funny”. But what do we mean by that? Someone might try to say that the joke is objectively funny. But what does that even mean? The joke values funniness? The joke must be valued as funny by all people? The only way to make proper sense of that statement is in terms of subjectivism. “That joke is funny to me”. There might be some universal or really common traits of good humor, but it is literally nonsensical to conceptualize humor as objective.

It’s the same with any value, morality included. We might say, “Aggression is wrong”. But what do we mean by that? Aggression values wrongness? All people ought to view aggression as wrong? Again, the only way to make proper sense of that statement is to understand it as: “I consider aggression to be wrong” or “Aggression is wrong to me”. Again, there seem to be really common values about morality among humans. The vast majority of people seem to not like aggression in their personal lives. And they certainly don’t want to be aggressed against, but that is a tautology, as if they wanted the coercion, it wouldn’t be coercion.

So, libertarianism absolutely makes sense through subjectivism, as morality doesn’t make any sense through objectivism. That doesn’t stop people from claiming objective morality, but their statements are essentially nonsensical.

This has more to do with the role of law than morality. I suggest you read What Law Is and A Praxeological Account of Law by Clayton, and I recommend Crusoe, Morality, and Axiomatic Libertarianism by Nielsio. Feel free to ask more if you feel those don’t answer your questions.

“Morality is necessarily subjective. Subjects (people) value. Communists and anarcho-capitalists have entirely different values. Neither is objectively right, as it would be nonsensical”

Very well said.

I’ve been working on a critique of objectivism lately and I found a contradiction which pretty much destroys the very concept of ethics as an objective or all-encompassing system. This is that if we define ethics as “The science of what man should value” then we run into the problem that the very concept of “should” within this definition necessitates that there is a reason why someone believes that something should be valued in the first place. Thusly the very existence of ethics as a science necessarily depends upon preexisting values, and cannot exist devoid of these values, because devoid of values there is no standard by which we could possibly say someone “should” do something over another in the first place. This means that ethics presuppose value and therefore what ethics are theoretically “optimal” to any individual depend upon his preexisting values, which inevitably vary from person to person.

Btw, this is quite a good article on ethics. Whoever wrote it has a pretty good breakdown of subjective vs objective morality, among other things.

I like it. My only criticism is about how you define ethics. There are typically three categories of ethics, and your criticism applies to normative and applied ethics. But it seems metaethics is where it seems some people try to make morality objective. In other words, “Murder is wrong and that’s an objective fact!” Treating it as objective is nonsensical, and as you pointed out, even if it were the case that it were an objective fact, so what? Some people still murder. So where does it get you that “murder is wrong” is objective?

Anyway, do you see a way to make your criticism work against the people who just claim “X is moral/immoral and that’s an objective fact!”? I mean, whenever someone says that “X is objectively wrong”, it seems like they are adding in an implicit premise that everyone ought to agree with that statement, and that anyone who disagrees is wrong. So maybe that is how your criticism would stick against the metaethics category? By talking about objective morality, these people are adding in an implicit premise that presupposes value? After all, if they aren’t trying to describe how people ought to act, then why are they studying ethics?

No, because libertarianism says that libertarianism is correct, and that statism is wrong. If we say that morality is subjective, then libertarianism – or any other position — becomes meaningless. Since one is as good as the other. One can follow certain libertarian positions, but they should not consider themselves something or give themselves a name that traps them into a particular position. What they really want is to be nameless.

Ethics is about the means. Values are about the ends. So Libertarianism is compatible with subjective values, but not subjective morality. But ethics is only necessary for two reasons: because of the conflicts in social reality, and because of competing ideas about right and wrong behavioral means. Both of which call for an objective epistemology/investigation into a matter. So it cannot be subjective. If it is subjective, then there is no reason to talk about ethics at all. Likewise if values were objective, it would mean that praxeology is pointless.

Values and ethics are both subjective and objective, in some sense, but in different ways. This is where the confusion arises. Since there is ontological subjectivity and objectivity (existence), and epistemological subjectivity and objectivity (whether or not it can be investigated). These are different categories, and cannot be confused with each other.

I want a banana is about a value. This is subjective from an ontological point of view, but it can become objective through epistemology. That is, by my statement to another and the acknowledgment that my brain is producing this thought in material reality. This then reifies the statement into social reality via a medium like writing or speech. The problem here is that we demonstrate that objective does not equal ’ truth’, but it is objective nonetheless. Once we get rid of this confusion, it is more easy to say that it is objective. Objectivity comes before the statement about whether it is true or not. For instance, 2+2=5 is an objective statement that we can explore through proofs within the language of mathematics. But it is also false by the way of the investigation into that equation. 2+2=4 is equally objective, but it turns out to be true.

‘I can steal a banana’ is about ethics. This is subjective from an ontological point of view, but it can become objective through epistemology as well. For instance, we can investigate the legal, social, or logical legitimacy of the statement. It might not be against the law to steal it, the man might not care if you steal it, or it might contradict logic if he can simply steal it back. All of these can be demonstrated objectively. Here we are looking at only the means to obtain the banana, instead of the value of the banana or if one should value bananas. We only look at the banana (or the actor), if we want to say see if it changes the type of means. And then we go back to talking about the means.

Ethics itself is not about the means and ends of itself, because it itself is not something that has an object outside of itself. For instance, it is not the case that one can kill in order to find the truth about ethics or steal it. We also do not justify it based on a value, but based on the acceptance that it is right inherently to accept ethics. Since nothing seems to contradict it, and it is necessary to so much of language and social reality. If it were a value, it would be a value for something other than ethics or the resolving of certain conflicts themselves. Which isn’t necessary, even if other conclusions such as liberty and peace coincidentally rely on them. It’s true that it is necessary for something other than ethics, but this isn’t necessary to prove in order to have ethics. It could also be said that values require ethics. That is, we must say that having values or working towards them is good. Because for instance there is altruism which says that sometimes, or all the time, one must do the opposite of what one values.

We can’t take it for granted that we have a right to values. First of all, we must investigate this very right, so to speak, via ethics and the acceptance of ethics. That is that the means to values must be good and not bad, and others’ means to prevent our obtaining the value is good or bad. Some values will not be our right because of the problematic of the means. While others might be our right if the means are ethical. At other times, values can be both our right and not our right depending on the means. So a statement about a banana waits for the justification about the means I imagine for obtaining it. It is my right if I pay for it, but not if I steal it – that is probably more likely to be the case. But not both. And the means do not always justify the ends, obviously.

Objective:

  • not influenced by personal feelings, interpretations, or prejudice; based on facts; unbiased
  • dealing with things external to the mind rather than with thoughts or feelings
  • of or pertaining to something that can be known, or to something that is an object or a part of an object; existing independent of thought or an observer as part of reality

Clearly, morality isn’t objective. Whether behavior is evil or righteous is perfectly not objectively right or wrong, being manifestly dependent on the various feelings of people. This also alludes to the manipulation used by moralists who talk about behavior being “right” or “wrong”. If they were honest, they’d say evil or righteous, or at least “morally right” or “morally wrong”, or if they were entirely honest they’d say “moral” or “immoral” in their opinion—but that will never happen since it would beg the question: who gives a shit about your opinion on what’s immoral in a world where aggression isn’t institutionalized by so-called “libertarians” or statists. But they want to force the association between emotional feelings about morality with objective words like right and wrong, these are the same people who want to use aggression so long as some people voluntarily buy their court or police service or, in there wet dream where their favorite libertarian mafias are institutionalized, people have no choice but to buy into some such scheme.

As for my thoughts, I’m coming to the conclusion that libertarians scare the hell out of me. They think Statism is evil because it permits some people to use aggression against people who are opposed to it, but they turn around and support the use of aggression against people who are opposed to it so long as SOME people willingly pay for the “service”. I’m for liberty, the FREE market. Liberated and free from institutionalized aggression of all colors.

What is the definition of 'evil and ‘righteous’?

I’ve not seen them used in a discussion about ethics. I don’t know the significance of these terms, or why it is different from right or wrong. I’m guessing wrong is evil, and right is righteous.

I don’t think ethics is my opinion, or my feelings. I think it requires an impersonal investigation into certain claims.

I’m not sure what you mean when you talk about libertarians supporting aggression because people pay for a service. I don’t know the meaning of this sentence. Or what you are referring to.

But you are afraid of libertarians. So I assume you are not one. So at least we have an example towards the thesis that ‘libertarianism is not compatible with subjective ethics’.

Gotlucky,

OMG is that Ron Paul without his makeup on?

I don’t know what “the” definition is, but evil and righteous seem primarliy to be understood explicitly in regards to morality, whereas right and wrong are generally understood as referring to objective facts, except when discussing morality.

To borrow from your very well written last post, it’s as important as the distinction between ethics and morality. Ignorant people may not care about the difference, but it might also said that they don’t care about the difference precisely because they’re ignorant.

I think you’re lying; you do know. With 950 posts and judging by your last post, I’m confident you know quite a bit about popularly proposed libertarian solutions of free market courts and police. But I’ll address this for the sake of those lurking.

Libertarians think aggression is “wrong”, which is to say they feel it to be immoral, except when used in accordance with their morals. So State courts and police are illegitimate, but “free market courts” or “free market police” are fine, and may have authority over people who don’t buy their services. Or, libertarians like Stefan Molyneux may support a “contractual society” where insurance agencies run everything, so you ultimately either need to buy into an insurance scheme and go along with whatever rules are popular or you can’t really live in that world.

So I am afraid of libertarians in the same sense that I oppose any radical aggression-supporting movement which proposes violent solutions to violence.

Neodoxy, how did you know? I thought Ron Paul tried to cover up his zombietarian conspiracy!

Well yea but I’m in the evil libertarian circle of doom, I know these things. I’m just surprised that you actually managed to take a picture of him in that form. He usually only takes off his disguise at night in order to go hunting for statist flesh.

My main problem is not that it addresses libertarian positions, more that it seems like a long and awkward sentence.

“They think Statism is evil because it permits some people to use aggression against people who are opposed to it, but they turn around and support the use of aggression against people who are opposed to it so long as SOME people willingly pay for the “service”.”

By the time I got to the end of this sentence it was difficult to tell what I just read.

I presume you think that there should be no service or anything else to stop or punish rape, fraud, theft, or other crimes? Because these are only subjectively bad? And possibly good in someone’s opinion? And this opinion is as valid as anyone’s. And thus there is no objection in your mind about any of these things. And yet you believe aggression is ‘wrong’, which is why you say that you oppose it in every institution. And you think it is ‘wrong’ to hold the views of libertarians, and wrong to have libertarian services. This seems to be self-detonation in your argument. The free market depends on protection of private property and life, and hence services to protect them. That is all libertarians argue for. Not for services to arrest people who go against what is popular. No one ever argued for that.

This vindicates what I’ve been saying. Libertarians say, “Crimes should be punished,” and they base it on their moral values. As for myself, I’m a rationalist; I’m not pompous or arrogant enough to claim to have bridged the is/ought gap, and that people should do anything, especially not based on my limited subjective perspective of the world. That takes care of the ‘should’ portion of your question. Being a rationalist, I also acknowledge there’s no objective standard for what deserves punishment, that’s the second part of your question. Neither do I claim to classify behavior as criminal, implying either or both: that it is immoral, or that it should be punished.

But I love knowledge and consistency. I’m learning a lot about anthropolgy, biology, psychology, and similar things. I don’t claim to think homo sapiens will live non-aggressively until we reach such a point where technology unites us in some sort of a hive mind—that is, a state of technology where communication is so efficient that humanity as a species acts effectively as a single organism. Like social insects, or picture a school of fish.

What ****ing free market??? By the time a free market exists, it will exist because technology will have us communicating so unimaginably efficiently that our daily experience will be as a hive mind, and nobody will be attempting to aggress against others because in such a world aggressors would effectively be aggressing against their own future, with effectively immediate ostracism—if the communication wasn’t so effective as to prevent any aggression altogether.

Until then, aggression and dominant hierarchies are fundamental realities of the psychology of homo sapiens. Nobody is going to eradicate them before technology limits them to such a point that they become effectively moot anyway.

What then, services to arrest people who act in accordance with what is popular?

This seems to be just an argument from ignorance. Knowing something to be true does not require a higher quantitative ‘perspective’ than is given. And limitation is relative. You are using this word, which describes some things, but cannot be true in an absolute sense. For instance, because we cannot do anything and everything, that we are limited in an absolute sense. But only some things are outside our limitation, but not all of them. You also seem to indicate that some omniscience could solve such a problem, but that neither exists nor is necessary.

Basically, your morality comes down to saying that one day immorality won’t exist so there is no point in talking about it or preventing it. This would obviously require the omniscience you claim you do not have. But yet you claim it for yourself here in order to make such a prediction. This seems to be a replacement for the eschaton in Christianity, except expressed in secular terms. That man is inherently sinful, but he will be redeemed in some imagined future. And again, the previous argument against moral knowledge relies on ‘omniscience’, which is eerily similar to the Garden of Eden myth and Biblical definition of justice.

You have said that you support free markets. And then you reneg on this position. If you oppose hierarchies and protection of property, and advocate, the so called hive-mind. Then we are dealing with something other than free markets, called communism. Which of course emerges out of the technology of capitalism.

Right and wrong are not objective in any way, shape, or form. The meanings of the words are intersubjective.

Well, on the one hand you state that right and wrong are objective, and on the other you state that you are not pompous enough to state such a thing.

Quotes or it didn’t happen. It seems like you are equivocating on the definition of aggression.

Morality is subjective because it is Mind Dependent, some take the subjectivity of morality to the extreme, using subjective to mean “Each person decides what is right or wrong.” The latter being downright absurd, for understanding morality in that way would mean each person’s morality is correct, which just isn’t so since morality is a social construct. Morality also has a “objective” element to it, you can see for instance that murder is wrong, not because of any “moral object” but because of the concrete affect murder has on a society.

Is Libertarianism Compatible with Subjective Morality? Yes, more compatible than objective morality if you think about it.

Youre getting somewhere but you need to be more rigorous. Murder is wrong by definition, orin other words a priori. Wrongness is a property of murder, not necessarily so with all deaths or all killings.

If you quote something I actually said you wouldn’t be guilty of oversimplification and would probably be less confused. Beyond that, I apologize for not understanding what you mean by your entire first paragraph.

Your view of fantasy is that one day the pink unicorn won’t exist so there’s no pointing in talking about or preventing it.

Objectively, the pink unicorn doesn’t exist, and action isn’t immoral. There is no point in talking about morality as though everyone should agree, and since everyone isn’t bound by the same moral views, nobody should be punished according to anyone’s morals. Moral views don’t provide objective grounds for the use of aggression—initial or retaliatory.

Libertarians say, “X is immoral (e.g. initiating aggression), and therefore should be punished.” I’m saying that’s inconsistent and dangerous, probably more dangerous than statism which is at least transparently and obviously ridiculous.

I don’t know what you mean by the rest of that paragraph. It seems like a red herring and doesn’t appear to have anything to do with what I said.

I support that theoretically markets free of aggression are certainly the most efficient, and probably the closest to any universally acceptable view of being consistently “morally right”. Note, a free market is by definition free from aggression. It is therefore a theoretical model. Further, to be consistent, it’s free of initial and retaliatory aggression.

Like the theory of free markets, so also I believe ostracism is the most efficient form of punishment, and probably the closest to any universally acceptable view of being consistently “morally right”. I don’t accept that anyone is justified in using aggression—that doesn’t mean society shouldn’t allow some forms, because I don’t claim to have solved the is/ought dichotomy (neither does it mean they should allow some forms). It just means if they’re honest and consistent then they’ll admit they don’t have any objective grounds for aggression, intitial or retaliatory.

To be clear, I’m opposed to claiming that one has objective grounds to use aggression, initial or retaliatory. That doesn’t mean I’m opposed to aggression, just to people using manipulation to convince others that aggression can be objectively justified.