This
It’s been not only the last year or two, but interpretations dealing in the sort of terms that would be praxeologic in the sense of natural rights has been actually happening for over a hundred years. Carl Menger and Franz Brentano come to mind, not that they said “natural rights”, but it’s the thought pattern of marginal utility that Rothbard and Hoppe being praxeologists, and many others realize. I think you’re hang-up is in not understanding what “objective” means. Or what “realist” means. I have tried to engage you on these points for some time but since you haven’t reached out then I can only assume that this part of your philosophy is closed off and not demonstrating an open-minded approach to know the meaningful substance instead of getting hung-up on the labels.
- thank you
First - I never said Hume was a “radical skeptic”. I did say “academic skeptic” which I linked from another source so it is not originally my term. Secondly, I know Hume was a radical empiricist but the debate is well past that: radical empiricist is actually skepticism. This is uncontroversial, well, at least to some people.
Second - Some rationalists based their entire philosophy on common sense which is founded on the acts of experience. Phenomenologists of the 18th century and extant ones of today such as Joseph Seifert have established this is the case. Carl Menger is another case in point. So on that point I disagree with.
Third - The readings I’ve been in touch with point out that Hume made his skeptical assertion of “limitations” psychologically and never was able to make it a logical assertion. On this point, it is not that Hume is wrong. It is simply a case of Hume’s psychological assertion that how a person thinks about the world might not be the actual way the world is. But that in no way makes what we know uncertain. Knowledge is certain. The interpretation of knowledge might be incorrect or correct and as Hume stated, just because a person may hold doubts as to what they know about the world this in no way bars any one person from acting in the world. I think your interpretation of what I’m been saying was superficial, but with discussion on certain points any assumptions you may hold as to what you think I’m saying, instead of what I am actually saying would be the only way to really get to the bottom of this.
As to pure logic not being sufficient basis for scientific induction I refer you to Fenyman. You saying this “not being sufficient basis” is why radical empirical is also skepticism:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X8aWBcPVPMo
Notice Feynman uses logic here (“implies”) in application with inductive processes. Feynman isn’t saying anything new to realists. Hume’s skepticism is what, as you say, asserts “not being sufficient basis”, and meanwhile common sense (logic) is way ahead of the game and has been for a long time even before Hume came along. Realism is further along in its philosophical discourse than I currently believe you realize.
- thank you
Then we are in agreement. It is a preference. I have never said otherwise.
- thank you
I havn’t been met with any objective ethicist who’s intent was to replace subjectivism in it’s entirety. To the contrary, many of them understand the fundamental roll subjective valuation plays in the whole system(including their own). I think it’s a mischaracterization of what the objective ethicists are attempting to do by stating that they seek to replace subjectivism in it’s entirety.
This.
Thanks filc for your, once again, penetrating intellectual insight.
For example all of Ayn Rand’s work in ethics, as well as The Ethics of Liberty, one of the most influential books on libertarian ethics:
“Value in the sense of valuation or utilit is purely subjective, and decided by each individual. This procedure is perfectly proper for the formal science of praxeology, or economic theory, but not necessarily elsewhere. For in natural-law ethics, ends are demonstrated to be good or bad for man in varying degrees; value here is objective—determined by the natural law of man’s being,…”(EOL, p.12)
Here, Rothbard not only claims that in ethics, value is objective, but he clearly states that the procedure of subjectivism is not proper for ethics theory.
Rothbard is arguing that the idea that people might choose or decide their own ethical values (subjectivism), as opposed to economic values (television sets, clothing items, etc.) is not proper. He is arguing that subjectivism in ethics must be rejected, and a theory of objective values adopted.
filc is spot on.
Adam,
When a society determines that the law of private property is to be maintained, in other words, ought to be maintained, as long as a society, ie. an aggregrate of individuals, maintains that, then yes, that is the law and it doesn’t matter what anybody subjectively thinks because society is maintaing that private property is to be maintained and the society is acting on that maintainment.
edit: Additionally, a society that determines that humans ought to exist (nature of man’s being), then such a society that makes a law that maintains that humans are to exist, then yes, it doesn’t matter what anybody subjectively thinks because society is maintaining that humans are to exist and that is to be maintained and the society is acting on that maintainment.
Prove my theory wrong. Prove that my value judgements to maintain my private property and my life are wrong. I’ll be waiting for you to attempt to refute my existence.
But the problem with this, Knott, is that only subjective values motivate action. So either ethics is subjective value (and arbitrary) or it is ‘objective’ value, and therefor not the value of an actual individual; meaning no one has any reason to do anything about it.
Your still thinking in terms where objective valuation somehow replaces subjective valuation. But one is a complimentary code of conduct which promotes the wellbeing of the other. It helps steer and guide the means to obtain a subjectively desired end.
“But the problem with this, Knott, is that only subjective values motivate action. So either ethics is subjective value (and arbitrary) or it is ‘objective’ value, and therefor not the value of an actual individual; meaning no one has any reason to do anything about it.”
Liberte:
We may not be speaking about the same things.
When I refer to subjectivism, I’m referring to a theoretical approach that conceives “value” as a category of the theoretical construct of the individual subject.
The idea that value is arbitrary is foreign to this concept, and strictly speaking, the idea that value is subjective is superfluous.
Wilderness said:
"As to pure logic not being sufficient basis for scientific induction I refer you to Fenyman. You saying this “not being sufficient basis” is why radical empirical is also skepticism:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X8aWBcPVPMo
Notice Feynman uses logic here (“implies”) in application with inductive processes. Feynman isn’t saying anything new to realists. Hume’s skepticism is what, as you say, asserts “not being sufficient basis”, and meanwhile common sense (logic) is way ahead of the game and has been for a long time even before Hume came along. Realism is further along in its philosophical discourse than I currently believe you realize.
- thank you"
You are dead wrong. Feynman was a pragmatist in both science and philosophy. While one of my intellectual heros, he was simply not interested in philosophy of science. His modus operandi was essentially ‘shut up and calculate’. He was an empiricist through and through.
Further, you say that Feynman uses logic in his argument by using the word implies. Surely you know that in logic, ‘imply’ means something very different than its colloquial usage? Imply in formal logic means requires, whereas in casual language it means suggest.
Hence why the phrase ‘correlation does not imply causation’ is used in statistics. Correlation does not imply (formally - require) causation, but it certainly does imply (casually - suggest) it!
Feynman was obviously using the casual meaning of the term imply, as his example does not logically require the conclusion he reaches (ontological realism)! Why does he reach his conclusion if it is not logically necessary? A combination of induction, Occam’s Razor and pragmatism.
Hume was certainly a realist. His whole point was that science requires more than the strict application of logical inference, but some form of inductive reasoning to reach conclusions that are not logically necessary yet are believed to be true.
I believe I am right.
I interpreted the video to point out while philosophers like Hume’s psychological skepticism want to argue if the steak is really there, Popper closed the door on Hume’s skepticism and Feynman is doing the same by referring to common sense (axioms). Fynman was most certainly using implies not in the causal but logical means, because as he pointed out, while some people wonder if the steak is here, it is implied that it is very real, becasue if nobody believed that it was real, then they would be dead by now. Yes life is.
You are using skepticism in your last sentence which proves my point. Logical inference is used during implications of contingency. Logic is what determines A is A and is used in every process that a human experiences. Even an illusion believed to be real is made certain by logically believing the illusion is reality, meaning, that A is A. The illusion is inferred to be real. Upon hindsight, or what have you, the illusion then might be seen as the the illusion it is and then once again, reality is understood in another way but it is still A is A. Even Kant thought Hume’s point on skepticism was curious, and I’m not even saying it is incorrect. Think of Hume’s skepticism about causality. But Hume’s assertion was psychological as he never actual refute logically that what a person thinks is certain really is or is not certain. He provided no logical means to suggest that is true at all. It was simply Hume worrying.
You once again fail to understand my point. You have also failed to understand Hume, as you still refer to him as a skeptic as if he really argued that there was no reason to believe in causality or the existence of steak being there. I recommend actually reading Hume rather than whatever rationalist strawman you have been exposed to.
Don’t get too excited Zefreak. I doubt Wilderness is intentionally planting a strawman directed at you or your points. You could argue that he simply doesn’t understand but ignorance is not the same as dishonesty. At least from my perspective his tone towards you thus far has been neutral and considerable. I’d imagine he’d respect the same return in kind.
I’m sorry zefreak. I am only going by critiques by other philosophers namely Barry Smith, some phenomenologists, Karl Popper, etc… I provided sources to what I was saying. i have read some Hume in quotes, but not at book length. So I am not an expert on Hume personally. I am referring to extant philosophers that are not even in association of the Mises Institute, again, my sources were provided. Here is one critique by McCloskey as an example, which is the same critique that I come across by other philosophers not even associated with McCloskey. McCloskey is no libertarian, and no linkage to natural rights theorists, etc…:
“Hence, strictly speaking, according to empiricism, predictions are epistemologically impossible. It is irrational to want to predict, because the very possibility of prediction cannot be rationally established. And this, then, is also the ultimate reason for empiricism’s skeptical stand regarding the
possibility of scientific progress. For if one cannot rationally defend the very idea of causality, how can one expect anything from science but an array of incommensurable observational statements? Progress, as it is commonly understood, is the advancement of predictive knowledge. But surely no such thing can be possible if prediction itself cannot be established as possible.” - Hoppe referencing McCloskey.
I am not going to re-paste and re-link everything that I have said in this thread from all of the other sources. I even included Kant agreeing with Hume on this point. I have even said I don’t necessarily disagree either. I agree with what Barry Smith says here:
“Indeed, great difficulties may be set in the way of our attaining knowledge of essential structures of certain sorts, and of our transforming such knowledge into the organized form of a strict theory. Above all we may (as Hume showed) mistakenly suppose that we have grasped a law or structure for psychological reasons of habit. Our knowledge of structures or laws can nevertheless be exact. For the quality of exactness or strict universality is skew to that of infallibility. Episteme may be ruled out in certain circumstances, but true doxa (which is to say, `orthodoxy’) may be nonetheless available.” - Barry Smith
The empiricalism since Locke and Hume is skepticism and Popper is in a way too when it comes to certain things. The skepticism is in reference to wondering if the knowledge a person ascertains to the facts of this world are true or not. But as I quoted Hume saying in a previous post this should not stop science at all. It should not stop humans acting. What has happened as one article I referenced in another post points out that some people interpret Hume as some kind of subjectivist skeptic but the article said this would be wrong and very different from the kind of skepticism of Hume. Hume was, the article stated, an academic skeptic. The interpretation of Hume caused some subjectivist skepticism though the article points out which is what Karl Popper was addressing.
zefreak. I think we are agreeing to an extent. I would have to think more about this as to what Hume really meant. And I wouldn’t rely only on Hume for my worldview because I do think the is/ought is an invalid imaginary constructive if taken absolutely in all propositions and also there is a way that the is/ought doesn’t even pertain to some philosophic methodology. At times it probably doesn’t hurt, but taken absolutely I think it hides the other methods that do exist that I’ve read that have convinced me. And I’m not talking about simple assertions but step by step proposition outlines that show how an ought is derived from an is and also how “is-ness” nullifies even the need to bring up the is/ought.
I mean even Popper is considered a skeptic, all logical positivists can be, due the focus shifted from propositions and only looking at observational evidence. And what this does is remove some of the certainty that axioms, propositions, and theory in general can provide to affirm observational evidence. Not that science doesn’t do this, but the various philosophies tend to leave this out from their formulations, ie. mainstream economists that are not Austrian economist to name one.
I don’t think I’m disagreeing with you. I think I worded what I said badly. What I meant is how some people may interpret Hume. I agree with what Barry Smith says above. McCloskey and some others make a different argument regarding Hume (Hume is in that same paragraph and that is whom the quote of Hoppe referring to McClosky is talking about).
I’m going by extant philosophers and some that are dead when I say some of these things because I can’t read everything. And I think at times some of these people are more knowledgeable than I am on the subject. I will just concede the point and leave it as is, though, the certainities I have included such as the is/ought imaginary construct in certain instances I still do maintain as I’ve read enough so far to make a valid point I think. Though I am not done with my philosophical inquirying so maybe my mind will change in time when I see the evidence that differs from the evidence that I presently possess.
- thank you.
yes. I am not intentionally strawmanning if I am strawmanning. I have sources for what I am saying. I have conceded in my post that some points, though substantiated by other philosophers even some not associated with the Mises Institute, may involve ignorance as I can’t say I am an expert with Hume and can only link my sources.
Olovetto:
I haven’t read much Reinach. Is there perhaps a particular essay or chapter you recommend? Maybe a link?
I think the last time I read about Reinach was in an essay by Barry Smith, but that’s been a while.
I think Reinach is incredibly important. Here’s his major work, The Apriori Foundations of Civil Law.
See also papers by Block and Sechrest.
I just put in a request at my library (1-6 weeks, ugh) for Judgment and Sachverhalt: An Introduction to Adolf Reinach’s Phenomenological Realism
and I’m getting some of the papers from Aletheia listed here.
Do you know what essay by Barry Smith? He has a minor reference in the last chapter of his book on Austrian philosophy and I didn’t read the earlier chapters yet.
What I’ve sensed recently, in the last year or two, is a movement to try to conceive the libertarian private property ethic more in terms of human action, and less in terms of natural rights or objective values.
The talks here over the past day really crystallized some certain link to human action. Those terms I underlined are bordering on complete uselessness in my opinion. The main idea is very simple, but then explaining it is not at all. Just “law” by itself is 2 distinct disciplines. I don’t feel ready to try to explain it all but am increasingly drawn to try.
For example, I saw a recent article by Justin Michael Altman “Building the Cathedral Sanctuary: Recognizing Action as the Basis of Property.” Another example is Bob Schaefer’s article last year “A Praxeological Look at Intellectual Property Rights” where Schaefer attempted to develop a concept of “cooperative action” as the basis for intellectual property.
Altman’s paper looks interesting. I’d read Schaefer’s before, as well as Kinsella’s response. Reading it again, Schaeffer seems to have completely misunderstood Mises on autistic exchange. I was going to make a thread about this word “autistic” to ask what is the antonym of it but never got around to it.
I’m in support of this kind of approach. I do think this begins the process of taking things in a direction away from the theories of the some of the influential libertarian ethicists of the last century, and obviously toward a more Misesian view of things.
I’m still reading through HA for the second time, very slowly, since I didn’t get it at all before. Where praxeology applies, I’d say Mises work is certainly very important. Mises’ greatest mistake, and this comes out with the “thick libertarian” junk of today, is not being able to separate political economy from legal theory. (or something like that, I’m not up to explaining it now).
I responded to some of your points, then I realized you seemed to care more about one “uncivil” comment I made than what I said about trying to improve these fora. Oh well.
If AE = argumentation ethics, you are terribly mistaken here. AE is about justifying punishment. Since you said you didn’t know about estoppel, here is a piece on it. I actually normally link Kinsella’s other piece about punishment, and you ought to read that too.
What you are doing is deduction, but this particular form is a tautology. That there exists a universalizable theory of human rights or human action is a priori. Tautologies aren’t senseless, but they don’t say anything about a particular instance. They just are the substance of reality. For more on this, I suggest Wittgenstein’s Tractatus from 4.1 on.
No, I meant Austrian Economics.
At some point I will get to reading those Kinsella estoppel articles.
Subjective value is arbitrary because it ultimately reduces to elements beyond (or, perhaps more appropriately, beneath) rationality. Ultimately things are ‘valued’ simply because they are expected to relate to satisfaction, which is ultimately non-rational.