Hello everyone! Please bear with me as I am new to Austrian Economics and Rothbardian libertarianism…I come from (gulp) another “school” of “libertarian thought” that is not thought so highly of in these circles…but I am here to try and properly understand deontilogical libertarianism.
I am NOT here to try and prove you wrong…on the contrary, I am here because I crave answers to my questions so that I can be a libertarian without any rational doubts about these ideas.
After that (probably annoying) prelude, here is my question.
Rothbard, in The Ethics of Liberty (a brilliant book, beyond this issue I am not understanding), paraphrases natural law ethic and says that “‘goodness’ is the fulfillment of what is best for that type fo creature.”
From this he somehow leaps to the conclusion that the fulfillment of life “life” is an objective ultimate value, and bases this on the fact that when one argues against “life” he is alive, therefore he is self-contradicting himself, because CLEARLY he values life.
I just don’t understand how life can be inherintly valuable simply because a person needs to be alive in order to express it’s non-value.
I don’t understand the leap made that because one needs consciousness in order to place value (positive or negative) on consciousness, therefore consciousness MUST be valued as “GOOD.”
In other words, is Rothbard saying circularly that Life is Good because one needs to be ALIVE in order to reason that life is good. Why does reason tell us that life is good? Because one needs to be alive in order to reason that life is good. WHy does reason tell us that life is good? Becausee on needs to be alive, etc… etc… ad infinitum?
I don’t get how the fact that people carrying on living proves that life is good?
And how is it a contradiction.
One can live and argue that life is “bad,” but subjectively value convincing other people of the “badness” of life, higher in priorities than ending one’s own life.
The fact remains, you cannot argue against life being good without performing a contradiction. It’s that simple.
Same applies for action, you can’t argue against it without proving what you’re trying to disprove. What you’re saying is that somebody sitting down on purpose trying not to “act” isn’t acting, but they are. Likewise, somebody trying to convince others that life isn’t good reveals otherwise by merely being alive.
All valuation is “subjective”, but this is more subtle than that. Rothbard’s argument is an assertoric hypothetical (since you value X, you should do Y; compare this to a problematic hypothetical: if you value X, you should do Y and a categorical hypothetical: do Y) Since you value life (and if you do not, please prove it by ending your life), then you should also do whatever follows from that. If you do not believe life is a means to any further ends, then again, go ahead and prove it.
And I can jabber on about how logic is evil and ought not to be used - so what? I’d still contradict myself and still be using logic as a means to proving something (which is my end.)
Actually, this is really helpful…I am beginning to understand…thank you for being patient.
Hopefully you don’t mind my asking one more question.
If I’m understanding you right, you are saying that Rothbard is assuming that one values life, and therefore should do whatever follows from that.
But if someone (again, not myself) did NOT value life, and were to end theirs or to start the process of ending theirs (such as taking poison mushrooms, his example from the book) then this is not “immoral” because that person does not subjectively value life?
Because people that don’t value life are dead and are no longer “people” Rothbard’s ethics do not apply to people not in existence, therefore, he is only addressing this question to people who value life…which is everyone…becuase someone that does not value life is no longer a “someone”
seriously, thank you very very much for helping me out with this…it was relaly bugging me
If one is taking action to end their life, I don’t think one could say they’re being immoral. There are arguments against suicide, but none that I’m familiar with and none that I think Rothbard could advance. I might be wrong though. Another thing to remember is that this argument is Ayn Rand’s, not Rothbard’s.
It doesn’t. It proves life is good for people who are alive - if you’re alive and you believe life is bad, there’s a simple solution: kill yourself; therefore if you fail to take that solution, your (in)action is evidence of your true belief: i.e., that you in fact prefer life to death, no matter what you claim to prefer.
Life does not have inherent value. Nothing has inherent value. All value is subjective.
You seem to recognize the inadequacy of natural law theory and rightly so. Many libertarians go on advocating natural rights laws as if they are laws of physics or objective provable facts – they are nothing of the sort. Respecting natural rights is an article of faith or simply a preference.
I will refer you to an excerpt of a similar discussion that was carried out by one of the brightest libertarians on the internet, in my opinion. I wish he would post more often. You can learn a lot from his writing if you want. Here it is: