Jack, I too was assuming that Tom wasn’t around. But what he would think about the whole thing is definitely an important issue. Within the conception of rights that I’m working with, Klemm “infringes” upon Tom’s right if Tom has the right that X be the case, and Klemm actively makes it so not-X is the case. Klemm “violates” Tom’s right if and only if he infringes upon Tom’s right and is morally blameworthy for doing so. So if Tom has the right that his cabin not be broken into, and Klemm breaks into his cabin, then he infringes Tom’s right. If we think that he is morally blameworthy for this, then we would say that he violates Tom’s right.
In assessing moral blameworthiness, it seems like we would want to focus only on the decision that Klemm made. Whether Klemm’s actions are morally permissible or impermissible would seem to depend on what Klemm should have done in the situation he faced. Accordingly, it seems difficult to say that Tom’s retroactive consent could determine whether or not Klemm acted wrongly. Klemm’s couldn’t have possibly known whether Tom would later offer his consent, and it seems like we would want to say that the rightness or wrongness of Klemm’s actions was determined at the time of the decision to act, not later.
I do think that it’s important to distinguish between issues like the appropriateness of compensation and those relating to moral blameworthiness, though they are surely related. Under some conceptions of law, we might want to say that Klemm should have to pay for the damage he did if Tom wants him to, whether or not what he did was morally blameworthy (these standards are generally based on a notion of “strict liability”). According to other views, Klemm would have to pay only if what he did was morally wrong (these standards are typically built around a notion of a “duty of care”). But this legal aspect is separate from the issue of whether or not Klemm would be justified in breaking in. This, I think, can most clearly be demonstrated by the obvious falsity of the statement, “Whether or not the rapist acted immorally depends on whether he is held accountable for the rape.”
So Klemm violated Tom’s cabin/property. I don’t see what your argument is. Klemm breaks in and faces repercussions. Your argument is about repercussions and not rights. See this thread.
Jon, I agree that the conceptions of strong rights are most unproblematic when they are the products of contractual agreements. But I’m not sure I agree that involuntary strong rights would necessarily violate (or infringe) negative rights – a right doesn’t need to be enforced in order to be a right, no?
Donny, in your view would the individual breaking into the cabin have to pay restitution to the cabin owner? If so I think the question here is largely semantic concerning the “strong view of rights”.
Also where does this fit in with your defense of moral nihilism?
Wilderness, there are over 100 posts on that thread. Was there a particular point you wanted to make?
My argument is that Klemm does not act wrongly when he breaks in. This is a separate issue from whether or not he faces repercussions. If Klemm does not act wrongly, then he does not violate Tom’s rights, though he clearly infringes upon them.
Wouldn’t an easier terminology be to say that a rights negation is when “Tom has the right that X be the case, and Klemm actively makes it so not-X is the case.” Then a rights infringement is a negation where we do not act wrongly, whereas a rights violation is a negation where we do act wrongly. I find Thomson’s formulation to be unnecessarily convoluted.
Also, what do you think of Christopher Wellman’s theory of samaritan duties? The idea is that we have duties to rescue others from peril when it is not unreasonable costly to ourselves.
Giles, questions relating to compensation are difficult, and turn strongly on what you think restitution is for. Some people (who embrace strict-liability standards) think that restitution should restore the integrity of property whether or not the person who was responsible for damaged it was wrong. According to this view, Klemm would have to pay. Other people (who embrace duty-of-care standards) think that restitution should fix the damage caused by wrongful acts. According to this view, Klemm wouldn’t have to pay. I’m not sure which standard I think makes the most sense.
My metaethical position is fictionalistic, and that view underlies my position here. I don’t think it’s literally true that Tom has “a right” that his cabin not be broken into, such that there is a literally “right” or “wrong” thing for Klemm to do. But if Klemm projects valuing attitudes onto people, such that he comes to the belief that all people are intrinsically valuable individuals who deserve to be treated according to certain standards of respect, then we can talk about Klemm’s decision in terms of rights and duties – these are built on values that we think it is reasonable for Klemm to recognize and pursue. If Klemm is a selfish egoist, then clearly he’s not going to care what we think of his actions. But in talking about rights and the like, we place ourselves in a humanistic mindset, and from this mindset the rest should fall into place. Does that help, or just make things more confusing?
Sage, that’s fair; it’s just not how people normally use the terms. If it helps make sense of things, Thomson’s point was built on Nozick’s language of “boundary crossings.” The idea is that you infringe a right if you cross the boundary, and you violate it if you are wrong in doing it. If you’re morally in the clear, we’d say that you “merely infringed” the right – you didn’t violate it. Your way of putting it makes some sense, but unfortunately when these ways of speaking become entrenched, it can be tough to change them. If I said that I “negated” someone’s right to something, people would probably look at me funny and maybe even think that I made it so they didn’t have the right to it (that is, removing the boundary rather than crossing it).
Read the whole thread if you want to understand the argument on repercussions. I don’t think the repercussion argument is universal and your recognition of rights shows you are actually talking about repercussions.
Does not violate but infringes? Same thing. You clearly have to recognize rights in order to even make the comment, “My argument is that Klemm does not act wrongly when he breaks in?” “Breaks in” to what, cause if it’s not Tom’s property, then it’s not even called a “break(s) in”.
If you don’t recognize rights, then this isn’t about Tom’s property right at all, yet, we both know it’s about Tom’s property (a right), and what we are now going to do about this event, in other words, what kind of repercussions come back on Klemm. These repercussions that come back on Klemm encompass Tom’s moral inclination to absolve Klemm from any repercussions, if, Tom so happens to decide.
If Klemm would be nice when Tom shows up, and not arrogant, maybe Tom can even line Klemm up with a job. If Klemm had any moral inclination he may want to thank Tom for any inconvenience and pay Tom for any damages that occurred (call it restitution or call it Klemm being a responsible person that wants to not just lay down and hope apples fall from the tree and roll into his mouth).
Nirgraham, rights are shorthand for the notion that people deserve to be respected and to be treated as separate and valuable individuals with their own lives to lead. We say that Tom has the right to not have his cabin broken into because normally, we would disrespect Tom if we broke into his cabin. The cabin belongs to him, and we uphold as legitimate his claim to govern what goes on there and who gets to use it. But in some situations, there are more important things than Tom’s right to his cabin. The same way that we think that Tom is a valuable individual, so too is Klemm a valuable individual. And it seems to me that if we insisted that Klemm die so that Tom could keep the integrity of his cabin, we would be taking too much account of Tom and not nearly enough account of Klemm. Tom’s rights are important, but they aren’t all-important, and in this case, we’re confronted with a situation where something that I think is clearly more important – Klemm’s life – depends on infringing Tom’s right.
(To preempt an obvious objection, I’m not committed to utilitarianism or any other teleological view in saying that. I’m only saying that moral decision-making sometimes involves taking account of multiple considerations, and in some cases, these considerations will conflict and require us to subordinate one value to another.)
Sounds like a free market inquiry, in other words, repercussions are not naturally universal (as far as we, or I, know). Yet, we both recognize rights. It’s this question of repercussion that is being investigated now.
Walter Block’s classic flag-pole scenario seems to cut to the heart of this a bit better. If someone is hanging on to a flagpole on your window sill for their very life, is your property right in a window sill more so important that their right to life can be negated and you can consequentially stop them from saving their life (or ensure their death by not opening the window or by prying their fingers from your window sill)? Just let the guy fall to his death in the name of property rights? This is when deontological property rights start to conflict with common sense. Of course, perhaps it would make sense to say that the person is liable for restitution for damages they cause by breaking the window, but that question seems irrelevant compared to the question of someone’s very life; they are separate issues. In contradiction to common sense, Block seems to want to tell us that the NAP requires us to let the guy die in the name of one’s property right in a window.
(a) How does Klemm know she will die? How does she know that the contents of the cabin will provide her with sustenance? How does Klemm know that Tom isn’t in a similar situation to her?
(b) Why does a “need” for something imply one can take it?
Let’s try a reductio:
(1) I am dying of cancer
(2) I need $10bn to buy the drug which will cause me to survive
(3) Bill Gates has $60bn or so
(4) I can ethically steal his money in order to survive
Danny, how does your position not commit you to this?
Wilderness, I’m not reading six pages of forum discussion by people who almost always disagree with each other in order to try to figure out which side you think was right. I’ve read Hoppe’s book on argumentation ethics, so if you want to make a point built on it, I’ll probably understand.
The issue of repercussions, as I’ve said, is entirely separate from the issue of whether Klemm is right or wrong in breaking into the cabin. It is still wrong, for example, to rape and kill someone even if no one will ever find out and you will never be held to account for it. It is still permissible, for another example, to speak your mind even if you live in an oppressive society where you will be punished for it. Repercussions often are constructed to enforce morality, but they are not morality itself and they do not determine what is right or wrong.
I think Danny is correct to categorically separate the initial question of right/wrong with the separate question of restitution or liability. To completely reduce the question to the latter seems to misunderstand the nature/purpose of morality.
The way the scenario is usually described, the guy fell from the building and managed to hang on to a flagpole, and it is established fairly clearly that they have no negative intent towards the owner.
The realisticness of the scenario is irrelevant to answering the question, as the question is predicated on the scenario occuring. Does the person’s property right in a window negate the hanger-on’s right to life? Is it reasonable to insist that the hanger-on die in the name of preserving a property right in a window? Is the hanger-on morally obligated to let go of the flagpole? If so, then one’s conception of property rights potentially negates the right to life and leads to absurd conclusions in various circumstances. If not, then one must have a more nuanced take on rights.
Whether Tom is home or not is irrelevant to the issue of violating property rights. Just because Klemm cannot ask for consent, doesn’t mean there was never an issue of consent.
Danny, if Tom was home, could Klemm enter the cabin without consent, or would he have to ask first?
This new wrinkle about Tom being home was not brought up by Danny before when someone questioned about the possibility that there is only room in the cabin for one, and Tom was already occupying it. I suspect it is being brought up now because I introduced consent as proof of a property right.