Depends on what they mean by “objective”. Most people, when pressed, seem to come up with something like “objective = consensus.” It really depends on the sphere of knowledge: morality, reality, logic? As far as morality, it’s very easy to see the connection: languages evolved in much smaller geographical units and more close-knit and insular groupings of people than currently exist. In such settings, I suppose that morality gains virtual consensus status, or at least “in public” it does - and it’s “in public” where language gets formed.
Hence the moral words on English are structured around “objective = consensus” morality. That’s why one can say things like “you OUGHT to do that” without referring to any purpose behind it.
“Why ought I do that?” Answer: “Because!” or just ಠ_ಠ
No it isn’t, its the framework of the dream is reality. Whomever perceives it most accurately would be correct. If three people are way off and two are closer, the two would be “crazies” but not incorrect. If its even and there is a big dispute we’ll leave it up to Bayes to decide.
I don’t think he does, but the implication seems to be, “You don’t want to be wrong and contradicted, do you?” Of course most people have developed a heuristic that says something like, “Being wrong or contradicted leads to pain.” As I mentioned, in many or most cases it does, but in the case Hoppe lays out it is entirely unclear how it would impair happiness at all. An uncritical reader may conclude, “I’d fall into a contradiction…and it’s about ethics…and ethics are important…so I’d better get with the libertarian program (or some unknown pain will visit on me).”
You happen to agree with it, well that’s odd, as it is nothing more than observations. What is there to agree with about math, particularly given that is made up?
I don’t remember thinking up math, I was taught math.
Math is a construct thought up to help people explain the world they observed. Hence, if observation is limited (I hope we agree on that), our concept of mathematics must also be limited.
Math makes sense to me. Although I don’t desperately cling to the notion that just because I observe something, or it makes sense, that it is true or real. You can have it both ways. Unless you are certain about everything at once, which I think we both concede is a fairly tall order.
When we speak of “justifying libertarianism,” we are referring to a particular theoretical approach, namely, the objective ethics approach. The term “justification” is one used within the framework of objective ethics theories and related theories. You can see this, for example, if someone were to write: “the Misesian project is unable to bless libertarianism.” At once, you would realize that the term “bless” refers to an entire corpus of Christian ethical teachings, and only makes sense within that system.
In the same way, the idea of “justification” only makes sense in the context of theories that utilize this interlocking web of concepts. Generally, this is the objective ethics system or theory you are advocating.
Misesian praxeology cannot justify libertarianism, and, Misesian praxeology cannot bless libertarianism, because justification and blessing are concepts foreign to its system.
I have been reading in the area of ethics theory for several years, and I have yet to come across an ethical theory that did not explicitly state, or imply without explicit statement, a constant relationship between specific conduct, and some state of affairs that an actor may want to attain or avoid.
All ethical theory that I am aware of----and this definitely includes the theories you are advocating----expresses a constant relationship between conduct and some state of affairs an actor may want to attain or avoid.
Consider these statements of constant relationships:
Doing X is wrong.
Doing X is immoral.
Doing X is evil.
Doing X diminishes your flourishing.
Doing X diminishes your eudaimonia
All of these are expressions of a constant relationship (a regularity in the phenomena of action, i.e, in the phenomena of “doing”), that give the actor information on how to avoid something he/she may consider harmful to his/her self-interest or well-being.
To avoid being wrong, abstain from X
To avoid being immoral, abstain from X
etc., etc.,…
Sage, I don’t know whether you realize that the quote you provided from Mises regarding the Buddhist applies to the constant relationship between entities that any ethical theory may assert. (see #2 just above) What Mises is saying is that no matter what you tell the Buddhist will be the consequences of his actions (that he will be “wrong,” “immoral,” “evil,” that he may “diminish his flourishing,” “diminish his eudaimonia,” etc..), there is nothing you can do, theoretically, if he is willing to suffer those consequences.
No theory, praxeological or natural law, can overcome this. That is Mises’s point. Thus, all we can do by means of theory is assert what the consequences of his (the Buddhists) actions will be. If he is willing to suffer those, then we cannot stop him by theory.
Rothbard’s natural law does not solve the problem by telling the Buddhist: “If you do X, you will be evil, wrong, etc…”
Nor does Rothbard’s natural law solve this by telling the Buddhist: “If you do X, we are “justified” in doing Y to you…”
I know of no ethical or moral theory that does not rely on statements of constant relationships (between conduct and some result) that enables the actor to “utilize” (utilitarianism) this information for his/her own well-being.
See #2 above. An actor can avoid being wrong by abstaining from X. An actor can avoid being immoral by abstaining from X. These are all ways an actor can improve his welfare and well-being by taking advantage of (by utilizing) the knowledge of a constant relationship asserted by the theory in question.
Praxeology is also of this form. Praxeology says that if you do X, then Y will be the result. To obtain Y, do X. To avoid Y, abstain from X.
In this sense, praxeology is not different from the theories you advocate.
What Rothbard failed to notice or consider, was that praxeology could do for ethical actions, what praxeology does for catallactic actions: establish a necessary consequence between an act X, and an apodictically certain consequence Y.
I think that more and more, people are coming to the recognition that Rothbard failed to consider that praxeology could be applied to actions of an ethical nature. Praxeology can do for ethical actions, what it does for catallactic actions. But since praxeology is purely formal, this enables praxeology to make formal and necessary propositions, propositions that, according to Menger and Mises cannot be made in the context of “empirically full” or “empirically real” (i.e., “objective”) theories of phenomena.
As an indication to the skeptical that the idea of ethical actions has merit, here is a passage from de Soto, whom I consider to be a Rothbard supporter:
In discussing the School of Public Choice, de Soto writes that it…
“…fits in perfectly with the broad praxeological conception of economics developed by Mises, who considered that the goal of our science was to build a general theory of human action in all its varieties and contexts (including, therefore, political actions).” (emphasis added)
(Essay: “Ludwig von Mises’s Human Action as a Textbook of Economics” p.55)
Thus, in this 2004 essay, de Soto is already talking about a class of actions called “political actions,” and this is obviously intended to differentiate such political actions from other kinds of actions, especially those having to do with the market economy (roughly, catallactic actions).
As we all know, praxeology deals with apodictically necessary consequences resulting from definite kinds of actions:
“Praxeological knowledge makes it possible to predict with apodictic certainty the outcome of various modes of action.” (HA, 3rd. rev. p.117)
Thus, praxeology can do the same thing that the ethical theories you advocate can do:
Formulate a constant relationship (invariant regularity) between ethical conduct (ethical action) and a necessary consequence.
This is essentially the same thing that prof. Long and his followers are trying to demonstrate, at least as I understand it. They are trying to show that conduct which they will define as moral, results in, or is constitutive of, an actor’s eudaimonia. By contrast, they are trying to show that conduct which they will define as immoral, results in, or is constitutive of, a diminishment or negation of an actor’s eudaimonia.
The essential idea is that a specific mode of conduct X has a necessary effect Y, such that if you want Y, you can obtain it by doing X, or if you want to avoid Y, you can do that by abstaining from X.
Praxeology can do the same essential thing, except as praxeology is avowedly formal, this allows praxeology to formulate propositions of apodictic certainty. Materially full concepts such as those recommended by Rothbard on p.12 of EOL, are incapable, in principle, of yielding apodictically necessary statements:
“Strict (exact) laws of phenomena can never be the result of the realistic school of thought in theoretical research even if this were the most perfect conceivable and its fundamental observation the most comprehensive and most critical.”
(Menger, Investigations Into the Method of the Social Sciences, Book 1, Chapter 4)
Something like this is/was recognized by Hoppe, and given by him as the reason why Rothbardian natural law ultimately must fail:
"It has been a common quarrel with this position, even on the part of sympathetic readers, that the concept of human nature is far “too diffuse and varied to provide a determinate set of contents of natural law.” (A Theory of Socialism and Capitalism, p.235) (emphasis added)
What this means, is that if the natural law social theorist is going to formulate his theory in concrete, objective, contentual, non-formal terms, (see EOL, p.12), then the theory will not be able to provide, as Hoppe writes, a determinate set of contents.
If we formulate our theory in terms of concretes, then we cannot arrive at a statement connecting a concrete activity to a universal ethical or moral principle. The advisability of eating poisonous mushrooms (EOL p.32) depends on Crusoe’s purpose (which is the point Mises was making).
Eating poisonous mushrooms is not universally to be avoided. It depends on the actor’s purpose. This is means/ends analysis, i.e., praxeology.
In summary, praxeology can do for ethical actions what it does for catallactic actions: formulate apodictically necessary relationships between various modes of acting and a necessary consequence.
All any ethical theory can do, it seems, is to assert a relationship between an actor’s conduct, and some result the actor may want to attain or avoid.
However, praxeology, due to its approach, can assert apodictically what the result of various modes of action will be:
"The aim of this orientation, which in the future we will call the exact one, an aim which research pursues in the same way in all realms of the world of phenomena, is the determination of strict laws of phenomena, of regularities in the succession of phenomena which do not present themselves to us as absolute, but which in respect to the approaches to cognition by which we attain to them simply bear within themselves the guarantee of absoluteness. It is the determination of laws of phenomena which commonly are called “laws of nature,” but more correctly should be designated by the expression “exact laws.”
(Menger, Investigations Into the Method of the Social Sciences, Book 1, Chapter 4)
This implication only comes, and the lack of happiness-correlation is only a “problem”, if one begins with a preconceived idea that ethics has to be about increasing one’s own happiness. But whether or not an action increases the actor’s happiness is not the only useful thing that can be said about the action, and restricting the domain of ethics to this aspect renders it incapable of resolving conflicts of terminal values (which do in fact occur, or else everyone’s goals would align, and one could resolve any dispute by reasoning it through scientifically/praxeologically until the disputants agree; in any case, this would make any non-happiness-oriented conceptions of ethics practically irrelevant but not theoretically invalid).
Given a very broad definition of ethics as “a way of assigning attributes to actions,” the body of any ethical theory will consist of statements such as [1] “Action X has attribute B.” Such statements can always be reformulated (to incorporate what you call a “constant relationship”) as [2] “If you want to avoid doing actions with attribute B, then you’ll want to avoid doing action X”. However, [2] is a direct implication of [1] and adds no new information. So you’re right that an ethical theory cannot avoid making statements of constant relationship (thereby providing information that can be used to maximize utility), but that doesn’t mean that such statements must be the fundamental elements of an ethical theory. (Indeed, strictly speaking, [2] does not imply [1], and [2] is therefore a weaker claim than [1].)
That isn’t an explanation, its just falling on intuition. Its only an observation, user-perception. You could have avoided page after page of questioning Bayes, reality, and whatnot.
That’s all anyone can do. That’s what I’ve been trying to say this whole time. It’s impossible to prove that one individuals perception of reality is any more or less valid than another’s, because there is no way of determining what the “true” reality is.