What else would Libertarianism (political philosophy) deal with? lol.
No such thing exists.
had to erase this one
Damm!
That’s what I get for not doing my research. The Block article is here:
here’s a piece from it:
There was a case in Canada where a father “mercy” killed his severely handicapped daughter. Under libertarian law, he would be treated as a murderer. His mistake was not first offering his child up for adoption. Were there anyone else willing to care for her, he would not have been entitled to kill her. It is only if no one else were to step forward in this regard that his action would then be considered legitimate.
I think the Prof made a mistake here. The father has a right to say “I wash my hands of the whole affair”, but not to get up and kill her. That’s called deliberately harming a human being. And since he says that stem cells are little people, there goes stem cell research. You can’t deliberately harm them, even if nobody wants them.
So Fleming just caught Block in an error. Libertarian philosophy doesn’t say you can turn people into hamburgers if nobody wants them, as seems to be what the prof is saying.
An article that is nearly 10 years old. A decade.
Is some how considered, recent?
Fleming - February 22nd, 2010, “In a recent online editorial…”
eh…?
Regardless… most amusing how they leave out the ‘good’ parts and only highlight the ‘bad’:
*“*Suppose a parent wishes to abandon a child, makes this wish publicly known, but finds no one else willing to take on this responsibility. Then and only then may this child be killed. This does indeed sound cruel and heartless, but it is the only way to consistently apply the libertarian stricture against positive obligations. The only time a child can be legitimately consigned to death is if there is no one, absolutely no one in the entire world, willing to take care of it. If a parent wants to stop homesteading his child, e.g., caring for it, then he loses all rights to it; the rights of any other would be adoptive parent supercedes his own, even if he is the “natural” parent. “Use it or lose it,” would be the libertarian motto for child abandonment.”
Nope.
in all fairness, the original Fleming article was publiushed in 2002. says that somewhere at the bottom.
It is a dangerous world indeed if anyone can be killed cause nobody wants them. I still think I’m right that if nobody wants the kid, he can be kicked out of the house, but to get up and kill him? nope.
Solium, I started writing a line by line critique of the article. But since you are a young man making his way in the world, and I’m lazy, I’ll point the way for you to do the work.
- Make sure you know what AE is and what Libertarian philosphy is. They are not the same thing at all. Main difference: AE is a science, like physics or Math, with no moral judgements. Physics says what will happen if you drop an atomic bomb. It doesn’t say if it’s a good or bad thing to do. Same with AE. Libertarian philosophy is the exact opposite. It quite explicitly says what it thinks is good and bad.
Of course, knowing that difference doesn’t mean you know what they actually say. Read up on them, plenty of help on this site with that.
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Make sure you know what constitutes a logical argument, and how to detect fallacies in an argument. There is a thread here about books that teach this.
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Armed with potent weapons 1. and 2., go forth and see if Fleming’s article is cogently reasoned thinking, or a hodge podge of nonsense. I won’t give away the answer, LOL.
In all fairness, it should be at the top when re-publishing already printed / oldschool articles.
When is that ever likely to happen? You think every single pro-lifer is a hypocrite? Where are all these kids going to come from when there is no welfare system? (doesn’t subsidize irresponsibility i.e get more of it) When folks don’t have easy credit due to the boom and bust (i.e malinvest)?
“but to get up and kill him? nope.” - You missed steps. Thus doesn’t follow.
It’s the state that distorts the natural order. The Ethics of Adoption in Haiti: A Libertarian Approach
I think we agree that it doesnt follow, by which I mean no one should be allowed to kill him. But Prof Block disagrees and says if nobody wants the child, then go right ahead and kill him, it’s ok. I quoted a portion of his article in another post here that states it explicitly. Not to mention that his whole argument to allow stem cell research depends on this crucial step that we agree doesn’t follow.
Believe me, I’m very surprised. I usually totally agree with the Prof.
I sent him an email about this. Maybe he’ll answer.
When I used the expression “well-written,” I was merely communicating my opinion of the author’s writing abilities. I wouldn’t have bothered to ask for opinions here if by “well-written” I meant it was so blindingly logical that it was the end of the matter. Something can be well-written but be entirely disagreeable.
Jackson LaRose: Not sure I agree that ideology must necessarily be crystallized and inflexible, but I see your point.
Conza88: I would contend your definition of political philosophy is too narrow. I believe it deals with much more than just ethics and morals. You may argue that political philosophy’s foundation is the consideration of ethics and morals, I suppose. In any case, my statement was merely an admission that my own moral standard is often different from that of my libertarian friends. In hindsight, I shouldn’t have mentioned it.
Smiling Dave: Thanks for taking the time to reply, and multiple times at that. In particular, I appreciate the differentiation between Austrian economics and libertarianism philosophy. They seem joined at the hip in many of the things I’ve read here, but I understand your explanation.
Regarding the use of logic, what led you to deduce that I was a young man? I ask somewhat rhetorically because you’ve most certainly arrived at the wrong conclusion as much as I wish you were right 
Well spotted. And this error is actually one that goes against what Block himself went on to write in Compromising the Uncompromisable where he insists on strict separation of ‘the act of eviction’ and ‘the act of killing’ so it is not relevant anymore.
I think William James said something like “Most people are mentally dead at 21.” You seemed to still be thinking. Ergo you must be young.
Touche! I’ll accept your flawed, but flattering logic!
I’d say this is Fleming espousing the nationalist hypothesis of cultural origins of freedom. Firstly it thinks of freedom as being just one more great mounument a culture can build. And therefore good to have around but ultimately just one more achievement testifying to that culture’s greatness comparable to reputation of military proves, a renowned musical composition or a tall building. So given the right circumstances he is perfectly willing to scale down this freedom if in return he expects the culture to receive a greater benefit in some other aspect and be ‘improved’ in a different way. Secondly it rests on what amounts to mysticism as to how freedom comes about. It does not spring about from the power of ideas and an uncompromising love of freedom, it sprouts up from some inherent, but never clearly defined, qualities of a culture, its people and its traditions. So it is only traditionalists like himself who can aid and continue to build up this freedom (but only if it does not interfere with some other worthy goal of theirs like guarding the social order and cultural conservatism, of course). Whereas others, “liberals” who demand freedom on philosophical grounds but do not care for the traditionalistic or nationalistic arguments are a danger to the whole foundation of a culture and therefore to its accomplishments including naturally then its level of freedom. Decline into barbarity and slavery is according to this view always to be found in such shifts where the populace turned its back on tradition. Ie, Rome fell when Romans ceased to be Roman enough.
To us instead freedom is the natural state of man. In the sense that any curtailment of freedom is abhorent, constitutes aggression and is to be fought tooth and nail, just like common crime. Also to us culture only exists within society but never within a state. The more freedom is curtailed the less room there is for culture to sprout. Voluntary interaction of people can tell you something of their culture, but state’s action are fully arbitrary and tell you nothing about their culture or traditions. Only about the whims of their power elite. So by putting the cart before the horse Fleming is actually working against the culture he professes to value. It can easily be observed that erosion of aspects of American life closely followed an increased role of the state and ever greater boxing in of naturally occurring culture by its senseless and arbitrary projects. (In the US state interference into culture probably started in earnest in the 1920s or thereabouts with the state getting involved in assimilation of immigrants.)
And value is STILL subjective. So, what’s his freakin problem?
Yes, we do have an aprioristic system. No, this does not mean it’s closed. What an amusing, (and I am going to say it) stupid argument by a Christian of all things.
No he doesn’t. The only way you can get to that conclusion is by ignoring what he has said in the paragraph directly before your quote of his. Which is what you have done.
And you have explicitly ignored what was said in the preceding paragraph. Taking the quote of context, then drawing fallacious conclusions from it - isn’t valid.
No doubt he made it clearer, once writing on the topic 3 years later.
For relevance:
Compromising the Uncompromisable: A Private Property Rights Approach to Resolving the Abortion Controversy - http://www.walterblock.com/wp-content/uploads/publications/block-whitehead_abortion-2005.pdf
Libertarianism, Positive Obligations and Property Abandonment: Children’s Rights - http://www.walterblock.com/wp-content/uploads/publications/block-children.pdf
Too narrow? No. Just right.
“Political philosophy is a subdivision of the philosophy of ethics.” -
Libertarianism (a political philosophy): -
“For we are not, in constructing a theory of liberty and property, i.e., a “political” ethic, concerned with all personal moral principles. We are not here with concerned whether it is moral or immoral for someone to lie, to be a good person, to develop his faculties, or be kind or mean to his neighbors. We are concerned, in this sort of discussion, solely with such “political ethical” questions as the proper role of violence, the sphere of rights, or the definitions of criminality and aggression. Whether or not it is moral or immoral for “Smith” — the fellow excluded by the owner from the plank or the lifeboat — to force someone else out of the lifeboat, or whether he should die heroically instead, is not our concern, and not the proper concern of a theory of political ethics.[5]”
“Legal prohibitions, therefore, far from being in some sense value-free, actually imply a set of theories about justice, in particular the just allocation of property rights and property titles. “Justice” is nothing if not a normative concept.” -
I do however, know what you are getting at with (personal ethics / morality, being individual) - and would recommend this. Norms of Liberty: A Perfectionist Basis for Non-Perfectionist Politics - David Gordon review
A recap.
Me: But Prof Block disagrees and says if nobody wants the child, then go right ahead and kill him, it’s ok
Conza: No he doesn’t. The only way you can get to that conclusion is by ignoring what he has said in the paragraph directly before your quote of his. Which is what you have done.
Me: I quoted a portion of his article in another post here that states it explicitly.
Conza: And you have explicitly ignored what was said in the preceding paragraph. Taking the quote of context, then drawing fallacious conclusions from it - isn’t valid.
So much for the recap. Conza says I drew a fallacious conclusion by taking a quote out of context, and had I but read one lil paragraph above it carefully, the scales would have fallen from my eyes.
OK here is the paragraph before, and the original paragraph:
Suppose a parent wishes to abandon a child, makes this wish publicly known, but finds no one else willing to take on this responsibility. Then and only then may this child be killed. This does indeed sound cruel and heartless, but it is the only way to consistently apply the libertarian stricture against positive obligations. The only time a child can be legitimately consigned to death is if there is no one, absolutely no one in the entire world, willing to take care of it. If a parent wants to stop homesteading his child, e.g., caring for it, then he loses all rights to it; the rights of any other would be adoptive parent supercedes his own, even if he is the “natural” parent. “Use it or lose it,” would be the libertarian motto for child abandonment.
There was a case in Canada where a father “mercy” killed his severely handicapped daughter. Under libertarian law, he would be treated as a murderer. His mistake was not first offering his child up for adoption. Were there anyone else willing to care for her, he would not have been entitled to kill her. It is only if no one else were to step forward in this regard that his action would then be considered legitimate.
I think it says quite clearly in both paragraphs, but especially the second one, that if nobody wants the kid, it’s ok to kill it. That was the case in Canada. Papa KILLED the girl. Killed. Killed her dead. With his own two hands. In fact Block says he’s a murderer. And it’s ok, had he but found out first that nobody wants her.
Hope we are in agreement now.
I’m still yet to see how “Fleming just caught Block in an error.” ? That’s what doesn’t follow.
But I’m also rejecting your attempts at characterization.
“Would it ever be possible, under libertarian law, for a baby to be abandoned by its parents, for there to be no other adult willing to care and feed it, and the baby be relegated to death? Yes. However, this could occur only under the condition where the entire world in effect was notified of this homesteading opportunity, no roadblocks were placed against new adoptive parents taking over, but not a single solitary adult stepped forward to take on this responsibility [16]. Since there are no positive obligations in the libertarian lexicon [17], it is logically possible for such a sad state of events to take place [18].”
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This is of course is exceedingly unlikely, at least in the economically developed nations, since there are numerous churches, orphanages, adoptive agencies, who stand ready to support all unwanted children they cannot place with families.
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The Canadian Robert Latimer killed his severely handicapped (cerebral palsey) daughter, Tracy, 12, by carbon monoxide poisoning (see Rrepot Newsmagazine, 2001; Vancouver Sun, 2001). He was properly sentenced to prison insofar as he did not first determine that no other person on earth was willing to take on the trusteeship of this child
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An interesting question arises. Suppose there are no people willing to care for a baby. No one in the entire world. There are only two options: a quick mercy killing (which, we posit, someone is willing to do), or allowing it to die a lingering painful death. The libertarian position is clear: killing a human being without his permission is murder. This baby is too young to give any such permission it would thus be murder. As libertarians, we have no positive obligations to keep it alive, but may not kill it either. However, this would be a very special case, and, presumably, leniency could be accorded such a mercy killer.
What would be your position then? Would you force someone to take care of it? Would you impose a positive obligation on another? Would you subject them to partial slavery? No? So you would let the baby starve to death?
And this all gets back to my earlier point; in a stateless society (which we are assuming here, i.e Libertarian law), with no taxes, thus prosperity etc. it is going to be even more likely that there would be individuals / families willing to look after a dying baby… I find it hard to imagine any women / mother / man standing by, in a non emergency situation and just walking away from a starving baby. Yet, you contend that this is likely / remotely possible? (i.e more than a lifeboat situation).
Well, he is wrong.
“If you presume that something is the case, you think that it is the case, although you are not certain”
Oh, so you know the future for certain? How quaint.
I’m assuming you don’t disagree with the rest of it though? Considering you didn’t respond to the questions..?
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Take any moral premises you like.
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Apply perfect logical reasoning to them to deduce logically valid conclusions.
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Do this for long enough and I can guarantee you will reach a conclusion that is morally abhorrent even to YOU yourself.
This is an unsubstantiated claim, but keep it in mind as you read more works by objective ethicists. Why is this so? Because reality is complicated. From here: