That’s not what I said to you.
I’m talking about the subject of this thread. Do you think there is a Misesian science of “ought”? Do you agree with wilderness regarding the thesis implied in the title of his thread?
Did you go back and add more to your post?
I doubt not noting the author of your quotes pleases anybody.
You seem to think Mises might see a Nazi about to bayonet a Jew and object, “Don’t do that; it’s unscientific!” No. He’s not saying that violent actions are “unscientific”. He’s saying that, since there is no such thing as a scientific “ought”, central planners are incorrect in assuming that their plans are not subject to disagreement. A plan may be completely sound regarding questions of fact. But someone STILL might disagree with the plan, due to an issue of value.
Again, Roderick Long…
“By “utilitarianism” Mises means something like simply giving people advice about how to achieve the goals they already have. So you’re not necessarily endorsing their goals, but utilitarianism says that really the only real role for any kind of evaluation is simply to talk about means to ends, because you can’t evaluate the ends.”
Alcoholism, cocainism, and morphism are vicious, not absolutely, but relative to anyone who happens to have certain ends. The utilitarian simply advises that alcoholism, cocainism, and morphism run counter to the ends of just about any auditor; he does not refer to absolute ends irrespective of the individual’s own ends.
Every thing in the remaining two paragraphs fit the same bill as this last one. By “vices” and “evils”, Mises obviously means things that are destructive (counter to individual ends), not wicked (counter to some universal/metaphysical end).
I hope this makes Mises’ position even more crystal clear:
“There is no such thing as a normative science, a science of what ought to be.”
Ludwig von Mises, Theory and History, Chapter 3
Furthermore, Rothbard himself recognized Mises’ denial of any “science of ought”. Rothbard disagreed with Mises; but he knew he had no interest in misinterpreting or misrepresenting the man. In fact, he published a paper which aggressively denounced another scholar for claiming Mises accepted normative science:
In an article on Ludwig von Mises,’ Professor R. A. Gonce has performed a
remarkable feat: (…) he has attributed a fusion of the is and the
ought to one of the most uncompromising champions of Max Weber’s stern
call for Wertfreiheit in the social sciences.
[…]
In several chapters on “value”, Mises offers a virtually running attack on
the concept of natural law and of the idea that science or reason can know
the good.
I think you’ve allowed Long to sweep you away with him. Mises was intimately aware of what ‘Utilitarianism’ means to moral/ethical philosophers. Does anyone doubt that fact? So he classed himself openly as a Utilitarian, though Long says he is not that kind of utilitarian. why?
Are we to believe that Mises was the first of a new movement of utilitarian who were so not utilitarian that to say they were utilitarian leads you to foolishly believe they have a philosophical approach to ethics other than complete denial?
No. I haven’t. It’s in black in white. All I did was requote Mises. Your argument is with Mises - not me.
Also:
Transcending ones own prejudices, opinions, and preconceptions. Curious thought.
That link is exactly why I have advocated that I am not of the objectivist nor the subjectivist stance and to say otherwise is a red herring. There an intellectual way around that red herring debate. I’ve been saying that and it would be suggestive to take heed and maybe even wonder how that is possible.
Good thing Conza gave the context to that, because it might have appeared that Mises contradicted himself when he said this taken from my OP:
“Liberalism does not say that men always act intelligently, but rather that they ought, in their own rightly understood interest, always to act intelligently. And the essence of liberalism is just this, that it wants to have conceded to reason in the sphere of social policy the acceptance that is conceded to it without dispute in all other spheres of human action.” [Mises; p. 5]
Liberalism says men ought to always act intelligently.
“Liberalism is not a completed doctrine or a fixed dogma. On the contrary: it is the application of the teachings of science to the social life of man.” [Mises; p. 3]
Liberalism is a science.
Liberalism is therefore a science that says men ought to always act intelligently. Liberalism is about natural rights which is a science that is intellectual because that’s what natural law recognizes. Natural law of human nature is about reality, and is intellectually comprehensible by all people.
"As the liberal sees it, the task of the state consists solely and exclusively in guaranteeing the protection of life, health, liberty, and private property against violent attacks. Everything that goes beyond this is an evil." - Mises
Spot on!
Wilderness, I’m no Lilburne in terms of being well read or whatever but it does look like you’re bending these words over themselves to make them say what you want them to say.
Because look, he uses the word ought, ok. He says people ought to act intelligently. Then he says liberalism is an application OF science to the social actions of man. Ok, so you’ve taken these two and conjoined them and now he’s saying “men ought to act intelligently and acting intelligently is what liberalism is all about and, by the way, liberalism is a science (which isn’t what the quote says) so clearly it’s scientifically shown that men ought to act intelligently.”
What I think he’s saying is that people who believe in liberalism also believe that man acts intelligently (for the most part) and that because of this, all men (or at least most) are capable of recognizing certain basic things about human social activity. I don’t think that he’s saying that morals and science become fused though. In other words, I think he’s saying that liberalism takes the scientific approach to trying to ask “how should man act towards his fellow man?” but isn’t itself a science. It’s a creed. It’s a set of beliefs that at least tries to be scientific.
Then Mises disagrees with Hume. Or maybe there are misconceptions. I go for the latter.
Politics is not personal oughts, and Mises liberalism is a political stance. So I suggest taking a leap out of the personal and not derail the thread and consider what the OP is about which is liberalism - a political stance.
Liberalism being a science that can benefit from the advances of science to attain deeper and better insight into interrelationships, ie. ethics, because liberalism is a policy in the interest of all mankind.
Nobody is arguing against “an issue of value”. Nobody has. To think otherwise is the continual misrepresentation of anothers argument, especially when the misrepresentation has already been point out, and such a misrepresentation follows obviously from misconceptions:
A liberal is an individual of liberalism which Mises states is a science of ought (already quoted that), and he states here “peace is always better”. Mises being the intellectual that he is is familiar with logic, including Cohen’s intro. to Logic book in which Mises promoted as the first book an individual ought to read before getting into economics. “Always” is logically understood as a universal. It doesn’t mean that war never happens. But the ethical proposition of peace is always better is Mises pointing out that ‘peace is universally better’. It is a logical deduction based on reality, ie. prosperity is better than destruction, peace is better than war, property is better than property violations, etc…
Shifting from personal to political topics is a shift in conceptual apprehension. It is a logical category error to conflate or philosophically confuse the two.
That’s all it could possibly mean. Natural law is only individually realized, because only individuals possess an intellect that is not only able to comprehend but to conceive. Here is your continual major misconception about what another person is stating in their argument.
Yet. Saying that, the individual is not living in their own bubble and is partaking of a reality that is more than the individual. There is a reality of exchanges and relationships, a natural world even, that exists outside of the individual. Therefore I do not go as far to say that what an individual says or does is isolated and buffered from a larger reality. The individual is part of a larger reality, but all interpretations of this larger reality obviously only happens within the intellect of any singular individual.
ok. I see what you are saying. When I say liberalism is a science, I am not being very clear, I concede that. But what I am saying is obviously this:
Liberalism is not a dogma but applies science. That’s why I say liberalism is a science. All sciences, including the natural sciences, ALL OF THEM are open to revision. That’s what science does. It changes with new knowledge. The principles don’t change, but the theories to interpret the principles and facts do change. I discuss that in the next post more.
And to ask what liberalism is, this ‘thing’ that applies science, is to therefore take note of all that liberalism, even according to Mises as that is the center piece here in this thread. And what is liberalism. It is a ‘thing’ that applies science to the social life of man. It states that all mankind ought to act intelligently. When all mankind acts intelligently what will they do according to liberalism. They will adhere to natural rights. They will know peace is always better than war. This is not to state that individuals don’t have choice that is human action, and that’s what liberty is essentially defined as too for in liberty humans essentially do act with mechanical, non-choice extorted forces applied to their actions. And therefore all mankind ought to act intelligently, as opposed to what? Brutish. Or in ways that adhere to the evils of war or promote the violations of property. All counter to what Mises states liberalism is supposed to be about and advocates. So when all mankind acts the way Mises says they OUGHT to act and apply science, even the advanced sciences that will benefit interrelationships, ie. ethics, then such an individual is not running counter to liberalism but is heeding and practicing as much as contingently possible.
indeed
should is ought
Science in Aristotelian terms is knowledge. Liberalism saying all mankind ought to be intelligent is synonymous with saying all mankind ought to acknowledge the science when it is present. Mises himself, I quoted, stated that with the advances in science interrelationships can benefit and that’s what liberalism is all about, it’s part of it’s stated agenda.
Will all political action be able to follow logical deductions to the end when confronted with all situations? Will a court of law be able to premise a principle and then logically deduct from that premise in a way that doesn’t change over time? Of course not. With new knowledge principles are interpreted differently. The principles do not change. They never change. It is the knowledge and therefore the theory that interprets the extant circumstances in the real world and applies the principles in accord with what people know at that time in history. That, I didn’t expect, to be quarrelsome, but it seems to be. But why? What is the counter-argument to that?
It’s not really that I’m trying to counter your argument per se I just already see where you might be going with this. This is going to turn into a anarcho capitalism is clearly the only system compatible with a scientific understanding of how man ought or should relate to his fellow man and as such, liberalism must inevitably progress to anarchism and thus Mises would’ve been an anarchist today had he lived this long and been able to continue to see the progression of “knowledge” to its logical ends.
If, however, you are simply stating that liberalism (or classical liberalism) as it’s called now, is a smart political platform because it tries its best to be consistent with what we can understand through a scientific approach to understanding human action then I really have no problem with what you’re saying.
But somehow I see this ending up as an argument against the state because the state ought not to exist scientifically speaking because it’s necessarily an impediment to constructive human behavior.
I also see this as the ongoing effort by anarchists to prove that Mises was an anarchist or at least would have been.
throw that out. this thread isn’t about that really.
well, that’s all I’m saying.
this thread is really not about that.
Alright well then I agree with you.
I knew Mises was no simple-and-pure Benthamite before reading Long’s quote: it is obvious from Mises’ insistences throughout his works that he doesn’t believe in scientifically discoverable ends.
For the reasons which both Long and I have marshaled. I think you’ve allowed the popular conception of a word to sweep you away with it. Mises uses very non-common definitions of many words (“causality” as only mechanistic, non-teleological causation; “entrepreneur” as acting man with regard to ANY degree of uncertainty; “rational” in the sense that all actions, even rain dances, are rational; etc) So it should be no surprise that he has his own distinctly Misesian conception of utilitarianism.
Furthermore he has outright explained that " the writings of many earlier champions of Eudaemonism, Hedonism, and Utilitarianism are in some points open to misinterpretation" because they insert material, specific ends into the notion of happiness, while, to Mises, the properly scientific conception of happiness is purely formal (“that which one desires” or “relief from felt uneasiness”), a notion which Mises believes the early writings of Eudaemonism, Hedonism, Epicureanism, and Utilitarianism were groping toward.
Human Action:
“In this sense we speak of the subjectivism of the general science of human action. It takes the ultimate ends chosen by acting man as data, it is entirely neutral with regard to them, and it refrains from passing any value judgments. The only standard which it applies is whether or not the means chosen are fit for the attainment of the ends aimed at. If Eudaemonism says happiness, if Utilitarianism and economics say utility, we must interpret these terms in a subjectivistic way as that which acting man aims at because it is desirable in his eyes. It is in this formalism that the progress of the modern meaning of Eudaemonism, Hedonism, and Utilitarianism consists as opposed to the older material meaning and the progress of the modern subjectivistic theory of value as opposed to the objectivistic theory of value as expounded by classical political economy. At the same time it is in this subjectivism that the objectivity of our science lies. Because it is subjectivistic and takes the value judgments of acting man as ultimate data not open to any further critical examination, it is itself above all strife of parties and factions, it is indifferent to the conflicts of all schools of dogmatism and ethical doctrines, it is free from valuations and preconceived ideas and judgments…”
I take it by quoting and responding to this…
…that you take issue with it. However, what Long says above about Mises’ conception of utilitarianism is proven completely correct by this from Theory and History:
“Utilitarianism, on the other hand, does not deal at all with ultimate ends and judgments of value. It invariably refers only to means.”
Natural law? Are you now saying that Mises not only accepted normative science, but that he also embraced natural law doctrine?!
Mises says that utilitarianism doesnt involve judging whether people ‘ought’ to get pleasure from (or ought to desire) various ends that they do. but it does involve judging what they do (or propose to do) in light of what will give them pleasure, or more formally, what they really want.
so yes, he does deny a science of oughts of value (or ultimate ends). that people should value prosperity, that people should value health, that they should value freedom etc. bunk he says. that doesn’t mean he is not a utilitarian in the classic sense.
asno, he does not deny a science of political or inter-personal oughts. he is a classical liberal. and a utilitarian moralist. He says given that he values prosperity and health, and given that others do to, (or profess to, he notes they always propogandise their political schemes with reference to these) his wertfrei knowledge of economics leads him to diagnose bad acts from good acts.
I think that is oversimplified, but yes natural rights are metaphysical no doubt. It is an ethics question, and ethics are subjective. Some ethical models bring about slavery, some bring about liberty, some bring about melancholy. The natural rights argument boils down to the same thing all arguments of this nature boil down to. Why am I alive and what should I do with my time?
Non-aggression makes the most sense to me. Don’t force me and I won’t force you. If I try and prove my way is right and ought to be, then I am a hypocrite. My way is mine and your way is yours. I only need to follow one rule to remain consistent. Coercion is not allowed.