At the very least Jasays argument should be presented, predictions aside.
You dont have to predict it, you can read it :
http://www.dejasay.org/bib_journals_detail.asp?id=21
I Quoth the end:
An answer - albeit only an answer of sorts - is again provided by liberty’s good friend, epistemology. Consider this sketch of a simple theory of alternative rule systems. Imagine all of a society’s feasible acts ranged side by side and forming what shall serve as a baseline. Move some of them off the baseline by making them differ from the others, i.e. by prohibiting them. The residue left on the baseline is the set of acts over which the presumption of liberty prevails unless they are shown to be exceptions. Imagine next that all feasible acts are ranged along a different baseline. Some will then be moved off it by permitting them. The residue on the baseline is the set of acts to which the presumption of unfreedom, i.e. of prohibition, applies unless they are proved to be exceptions. Clearly, the second baseline has a property the first baseline lacks, namely that acts along it are prohibited acts while acts along the first baseline are jest that, acts without any restrictive lien upon them. For the theory to be coherent, we need the assumption that acts along the second baseline are all prohibited to start with, that being prohibited is, as it were, every act’s state of nature bar only the exceptions. The second baseline, in other words, requires that the nature of the acts along it be specified as being lien-bearing. If we are to take it that all acts bear a tag around their necks that reads `forbidden’, we must also take it that someone has hung the tags on them, or that all acts come with such a tag that must first be removed before they can be performed. Needing more elements of knowledge than the first, the second baseline is epistemologically on a weaker footing. Moreover, for the theory to be valid instead of merely coherent, a universal prohibition applying to all acts bar the exceptions must actually exist, which is of course nonsense.
This article argued that rightsism, besides being a product of thorough mental confusion. is also a defence mechanism against the very presumption of unfreedom that it engenders and invigorates. `Rights’ are demanded, among other and less excusable reasons, because, being really permissions, they provide immunity against the very presumption of prohibition that a system of explicit permissions calls forth. In the face of the seemingly irresistible rise of rightsism, the presumption of liberty, itself promoted by a system of explicit prohibitions, may for now be in retreat.
It is perhaps no more than a matter of sheer good luck that the contest between permissions and prohibitions, and consequently between the presumptions of unfreedom and of liberty, is also a contest between muddled thought and clarity. Muddled thought usually wins all the battles, but one should nonetheless back clarity to win the war.
on second points, maybe that essay isnt as easy to parse for the relevant info as others:
http://www.dejasay.org/bib_journals_detail.asp?id=33
The Presumption of Freedom
The presumption of freedom should be understood to mean that any act a person wishes to perform is deemed to be free - not to be interfered with, regulated, taxed or punished - unless sufficient reason is shown why it should not be free.
Some deny that there is, or ought to be, such a presumption . However, the presumption is not a matter of opinion or evaluation that can be debated and denied. It is a strict logical consequence of the difference between two means of testing the validity of a statement, namely falsification and verification.
There may be an indefinite number of potential reasons that speak against an act you wish to perform. Some may be sufficient, valid, others (perhaps all) insufficient, false. You may falsify them one by one. But no matter how many you succeed in falsifying, there may still be some left and you can never prove that there are none left. In other words, the statement that this act would be harmful is unfalsifiable. Since you cannot falsify it putting on you the burden of proving that it would be harmless is nonsensical, a violation of elementary logic. On the other hand, any specific reason objectors may advance against the act in question is verifiable. If they have such reasons, the burden of proof is on them to verify that some or all of them are in fact sufficient to justify interference with the act.
All this seems trivially simple. In fact, it is simple, but not trivial. On the contrary, it is of decisive importance in conditioning the intellectual climate, the “culture” of a political community. The presumption of liberty must be vigorously affirmed, if only to serve as an antidote against the spread of “rightsism” that would contradict and undermine it, and that has done so much to distort and emasculate liberalism in recent decades. “Rightsism” purports solemnly to recognize that people have “rights” to do certain specific things and that certain other things ought not to be done to them. On closer analysis, these “rights” turn out to be the exceptions to a tacitly understood general rule that everything else is forbidden; for if it were not, announcing “rights” to engage in free acts would be redundant and pointless. The silliness that underlies “rightsism”, and the appalling effect it exerts upon the political climate, illustrates how far the looseness of current liberal thought can drift away from a more strict structure that would serve the cause of liberty instead of stifling it in pomposity and confusion.
Got it, actually not what I was expecting at all. However, that actually works against your case.You see, the liberty of action that Jasay is referring to in this instance is not equivalent to that espoused by libertarian or propertarian ideologues. In fact, killing, theft (a misnomer, as exclusive property may not apply), indeed all action as you might expect in an amoral society is allowable, with the burden of proof for restriction being on the entity desiring to curb or disallow those actions.
You argue that “I have to prove to you that violence against you is justified”
This is contrary to Jasay’s premise!
Jasay would (according to his ideas above) argue that aggression, violence, or any activity is allowed unless proven to be an exceptionto the first baseline, the burden of which is on you.
edit: I do not mean to argue that this was Jasay’s intent. It does not change that fact that his methodology of placing the burden of proof on the one asserting prohibitions, consistently applied, works against your argument.
no, initiating violence against me impacts my freedom. did you miss that?
Thank you for your long and thoughtful reply Adam.
I would like to understand your post but I believe I’am having difficulty comprehending the difference between a general and a specific is-ought syllogism.
the presumption is i am free to live and let live.
your challenge is to rationally argue without contradiction that you are free to abuse me. well given that i am presumed free and that the norms of argumentation are peacefull norms, the burden is on you, and you are going to have to argue veryyyyyyyy hard in favour of your case.
The presumption is that you are free to act. Actions are free unless justifiably prohibited, but the burden of justification is on the prohibition of action.
You need to unpack a lot of your terminology, IE freedom of action vs. freedom as expressed in libertarian philosophy.
The concept “freedom” which you use includes such normative premises as “freedom from harm” “freedom from aggression”. However, these freedoms are not self-evident.
If Jasay were consistent, he would argue that the harmful action, aggressive action, etc must be presumed allowed unless justifiably prohibited, the burden of which is on the prohibit-or.
no, you are the one being inconsistent. you put it on me to demonstrate why i should not be your slave. why i should not lose my freedom to you. how were you presupposing freedom?. you admit that you were not presupposing freedom… you admitted that coercing me is to invade my freedom as you understand it.
i expected more from you.
Ha, of course you would fall back on my cute, but ultimately irrelevant example. The second paragraph of that post is the one that is important.
Sorry, the burden of proof is on the one asserting a moral obligation. Otherwise, prove to me that you don’t have a moral obligation to be my sex slave? (The universability test is no help, as any moral statement can be phrased in such a way as to make it universal)
To reiterate, you are merely asserting the existence of a moral obligation that you are unable to provide evidence of, after asserting that it would be a contradiction to argue against it (which it obviously isn’t) and then hoping that others reading will not be intelligent enough to understand that lack of proof against a clueless assertion does not equal proof for said clueless assertion.
I’ll be honest, I expected more.
And how do you respond to my post about Jasay defending all action against prohibition without cause, and not just your concept of freedom, which is burdened with several normative presumptions?
ha, of course you dodge the issue that hurts your case…
look at it this way. there are two people that dont interfere with each other property or person. then one person goes to attack the other. there is an aggressor ,there is a victim. the aggressor has set on a path of interference with the freedom of the victim. this is antecedent to the acts of the victim which would be acts of defence they necessarily come after the attack. who is the first to udnermine the freedom of the other. the victim??? or the aggressor…
the burden of proof is always going to be on the aggressor (i.e. the one against freedom) to demonstrate that the presumption of the others freedom is to be overturned due to special circumstances, or what have you.
now you can pretend you don’t understand what freedom is. but that would be your problem if you did… it must also make it hard for you to be a libertarian, whether you are a subjectivist or otherwise… ( i have come to terms with subjectivist libertarians that still understand freedom and endorse it un-objectively, but libertarians that are confused about what freedom is are a subset of libertarianism that i am still not reconciled with)
sorry the burden of proof is on the one who would infringe anothers freedom.
actually im not sorry [:P]
I’ve got to go to work, but I think it will be very easy, working from Jasay’s argument, to show that you are equivocating freedom of the sense of “freedom to act” with freedom in the libertarian sense. Later!
ok, well i want to hear more about these different freedoms.
i totally understand the difference between {political/moral/human action}-freedom on the one hand and freedom {in the physical sense} (ie. ‘free’ axis of rotation etc). on the other.
l8r alligator.
Ah the little troll.
Prove that your amoral position is justified…or get lost ?
Nice assertion. And the proof for that is ?
So do deontological ones. Especially when they precede that quote.
"In either case, the aggressor imposes his will over the natural property of another—he deprives the other man of his freedom of action and of the full exercise of his natural self-ownership.
Let us set aside for a moment the corollary but more complex case of tangible property, and concentrate on the question of a man’s ownership rights to his own body. Here there are two alternatives: either we may lay down a rule that each man should be permitted (i.e., have the right to) the full ownership of his own body, or we may rule that he may not have such complete ownership. If he does, then we have the libertarian natural law for a free society as treated above. But if he does not, if each man is not entitled to full and 100 percent self-ownership, then what does this imply? It implies either one of two conditions: (1) the “communist” one of Universal and Equal Other-ownership, or (2) Partial Ownership of One Group by Another—a system of rule by one class over another. These are the only logical alternatives to a state of 100 percent self-ownership for all.[1]
Let us consider alternative (2); here, one person or group of persons, G, are entitled to own not only themselves but also the remainder of society, R. But, apart from many other problems and difficulties with this kind of system, we cannot here have a universal or natural-law ethic for the human race. We can only have a partial and arbitrary ethic, similar to the view that Hohenzollerns are by nature entitled to rule over non-Hohenzollerns. Indeed, the ethic which states that Class G is entitled to rule over Class R implies that the latter, R, are subhuman beings who do not have a right to participate as full humans in the rights of self-ownership enjoyed by G—but this of course violates the initial assumption that we are carving out an ethic for human beings as such.
What then of alternative (I)? This is the view that, considering individuals A, B, C . . ., no man is entitled to 100percent ownership of his own person. Instead, an equal part of the ownership of A’s body should be vested in B, C . . ., and the same should hold true for each of the others. This view, at least, does have the merit of being a universal rule, applying to every person in the society, but it suffers from numerous other difficulties.
In the first place, in practice, if there are more than a very few people in the society, this alternative must break down and reduce to Alternative (2), partial rule by some over others. For it is physically impossible for everyone to keep continual tabs on everyone else, and thereby to exercise his equal share of partial ownership over every other man. In practice, then, this concept of universal and equal other-ownership is Utopian and impossible, and supervision and therefore ownership of others necessarily becomes a specialized activity of a ruling class. Hence, no society which does not have full self-ownership for everyone can enjoy a universal ethic. For this reason alone, 100percent self-ownership for every man is the only viable political ethic for mankind.
But suppose for the sake of argument that this Utopia could be sustained. What then? In the first place, it is surely absurd to hold that no man is entitled to own himself, and yet to hold that each of these very men is entitled to own a part of all other men! But more than that, would our Utopia be desirable? Can we picture a world in which no man is free to take any action whatsoever without prior approval by everyone else in society? Clearly no man would be able to do anything, and the human race would quickly perish. But if a world of zero or near-zero self-ownership spells death for the human race, then any steps in that direction also contravene the law of what is best for man and his life on earth. And, as we saw above, any ethic where one group is given full ownership of another violates the most elemental rule for any ethic: that it apply to every man. No partial ethics are any better, though they may seem superficially more plausible, than the theory of all- power-to-the-Hohenzollerns.
In contrast, the society of absolute self-ownership for all rests on the primordial fact of natural self-ownership by every man, and on the fact that each man may only live and prosper as he exercises his natural freedom of choice, adopts values, learns how to achieve them, etc. By virtue of being a man, he must use his mind to adopt ends and means; if someone aggresses against him to change his freely-selected course, this violates his nature; it violates the way he must function. In short, an aggressor interposes violence to thwart the natural course of a man’s freely adopted ideas and values, and to thwart his actions based upon such values."
Have you read Ethics of Liberty? That is the book he’s writing about. It’s within there. lol [:)]
At this point, either Rothbard means
- “He has the right, or it is not the case that ‘he has the right’ [in second half of the statement, there is no presumption that rights are valid].” (A or not-A, which is a universally logically valid observation.)
OR
- “He has the right, or he does not have the right [but rights are presumed valid].” (A or opposite-of-A, which is not universally logically valid)
Hopefully Rothbard does not mean 2, as that would be assuming what he’s trying to prove!
Uh-oh, here he makes clear that he does mean 2: the concept of a right of ownership is presumed valid either way. He seems to hope the reader will interpret his first statement as an “A or not-A” statement, which is irrefutable, but then he equivocates over to “A or opposite-of-A” for the remainder of his argument. He assumes rights are valid in his attempt to show that rights are valid. At best he has shown that if ownership rights of some kind are valid, then only self-ownership rights can be valid, but that’s again deriving a value from a value, not a value from a fact.
Such errors are easily caught, and are being used to “prove liberty wrong,” as well as to trip up people new to libertarianism - a phenomenon frequently in evidence whenever new posters come to this forum. We don’t really have the luxury of using simple semantic fuzziness to make our arguments anymore (if we ever did). I am indebted to Rothbard for many things, but here he overreached and gave us a perfect example of why a bad argument is worse than no argument. All he had to do was phrase his argument as a persuasive entreaty rather than a logical proof, and his argument would have had equal force with no downside.
Thank you A.L.
In your original quote, Rothbard makes the general statement: “But a conclusion follows from both premises taken together; the “ought” need not be present in either one of the premises so long as it has been validly deduced.”
This is a general statement or general assertion without specific content. Rothbard is saying that generally, and in abstract terms, a validly deduced “ought” statement can be deduced from two “is” premises taken together. He is making the general assertion that this type of syllogistic argument is possible, but without pointing to any specific examples of this type of argument.
Here is an example of the general syllogistic form, but with content (referring to a specific example):
-
A house can be built from straw (is statement)
-
A house built from rocks will outlast a house built from straw (is statement)
-
Therefore, one ought to build a rock house (ought statement)
Here, the syllogistic form is applied to a concrete example.
Have you been able to find Rothbard’s concrete examples where he takes two premises together and validly deduces an ought from an is as he indicates is possible in the original quote?