LS, here you can learn the technique proof by vigorous assertion.
You actually made me laugh for once.
Winner.
I know you had plans. You told me you did. I don’t know why you strawmanned me and then gave up. I guess you didn’t know how to dialogue appropiately anymore. And I don’t see why you thought any “nastiness” was about to happen. short fused? I’ve noticed those that call themselves ‘subjectivists’ are over-emotional and get angry very quickly. I guess that would explain the unnecessary strawmans. But ok. It’s good to know when you need to walk away.
lol. Imposing your values…lol
If libertarianism means moral objectivism, then of course moral subjectivism can’t do that. I think of libertarianism as more of a heuristic than a fully well-defined concept. Voluntarism, anarchy, panarchy, anti-monopoly - those are more clearly defined, and each of those can be grounded in subjective morality.
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Re: Conza, I’ve already answered your question. You dodged my answer by asking me to define “racket.” Remember? I have neither the time nor the inclination to respond to such lines of discussion. If you think you’ve made a good point, I’m happy to let it stand and let others decide.
Everyone by definition goes around enforcing their subjective preferences.
Yes, that is the Misesian project, in contrast to the Rothbardian project, which also tries to assert “universal” ends.
“The liberals do not assert that men ought to strive after the goals mentioned above. What they maintain is that the immense majority prefer a life of health and abundance to misery, starvation, and death. The correctness of this statement cannot be challenged. It is proved by the fact that all antiliberal doctrines–the theocratic tenets of the various religious, statist, nationalist, and socialist parties–adopt the same attitude with regard to these issues. They all promise their followers a life of plenty. They have never ventured to tell people that the realization of their program will impair their material well-being. They insist–on the contrary–that while the realization of the plans of their rival parties will result in indigence for the majority, they themselves want to provide their supporters with abundance.” (HA chapter 8, emphasis added)
Do you deny the existence of any such universals in human nature?
No. For example, it is universal, by definition, that all men have ends. In other words, I believe in praxeology. But I deny the existence of any universality in the content of those ends.
But that is not imposing my values. That is working from the action axiom, which is value free. Now we can debate whether the action axiom is valid, but it’s a scientific statement, not an ethical one.
How did I strawman you?
This is the sort of passive-aggressive stuff which you do, and then it leads to full blown conflict. You were doing it to AJ, and I knew from your last post where you started mocking what I was saying, that we were headed in the same direction.
It’s similar, although you are not as blunt as Juan, when you’re being condescending, and then claim someone won’t discuss with you further. It’s because we’re not stupid and can tell when you’re not debating in good faith anymore. When you’re consistently communicating a disdain not just for our ideas, but for us for writing them.
I don’t know what else to say. Time is incredibly short for me. I don’t want to spend it in conflict with you. I don’t want to spend it in conflict with others.
More passive-aggressive condescension, where none is necessary.
I thought maybe over time, we could start somewhat fresh, but while it seemed positive at first, we’re right back to one or both of us not having respect for the other, and I don’t see how good will come from that. If you feel good about the things you’ve written to me, if you feel good about the way you treat AJ, that’s fine, but when people start to consistently back off from discussing you, maybe it is not their ethical system that is the lowest common denominator, but your approach to communication.
WRT to backing off, I think something AJ and I do have in common, is the subjective ethicist approach to seeking positive rather than negative outcomes. NR people seem to be constantly criticizing and I include the big boys as well, Hoppe, Rothbard, Kinsella etc. What NR folks don’t seem to be as interested in, is generating positive ideas and positive outcomes. I think that is the risk of having an objective perspective on ethics. One doesn’t have to do any self-inquiry because they have already reached a point where all of the premises are assumed to be checked.. I believe Adam Knott alluded to the lack of internal analysis by Austro-libertarians of Austro-libertarians and how stultifying that lack of rigor can be to the checking and development of ideas.
The part of what LS wrote immediately after what you quoted is crucial:
Obviously LS is not talking about Benthamite utilitarianism (I don’t see Liberty Student ever volunteering to man the panopticon), much less is he seeking to impose any such Benthamite values on others. He’s making the praxeological observation that all men, from business tycoons to missionaries, from philosophers to joe six-pack, from fratboy hedonists to ascetic monks, and from Rothbardian libertarians to Hegelian etatists, by definition, seek to maximize utility.
This is EXACTLY how I feel about discourse with wilderness.
Are you familiar with the science of Evolutionary psychology, which is precisely the study of such universals of the kind that you are denying? There are also other fields such as behavioral genetics that reinforce the idea that there are universals and they are a product of evolution.
The reason that I ask is because I personally cannot accept this complete subjectivist view only in light of what I have learned in the past from these other fields. I could be mistaken in my approach, but I cannot see how these particular sciences of human nature can be separated from the philosophy of human nature. Great progress in these fields has been made over the last few decades. The progress has been largely ignored and denied by mainstream but for precisely the same reasons that praxeology and Austrian economics has been ignored. Much of it rejects the compatibility of social engineering and planning with human nature and it is a complete slap in the face to the socialist doctrine. This makes it very unpopular in the academia. It doesn’t outright embrace libertarianism (at least not yet), but for me, in a twisted way, this is how I found Hayek, the libertarian philosophy, and eventually Austrian economics.
LOL. So you are calling me dishonest ? Maybe a moderator should ban you for insulting me. Lilburne please ?
Btw, what does sincerity mean to you ? Isn’t sincerity a moral concept and so, basically, just a subjective opinion ?
And are you going to answer my question ? What is the false moral system you alluded to ?
But wait! Again, how can anything moral be true or false in your world ?
Well, if you don’t understand what libertarianism is, and you can’t recognize people who fit the definition, it’s not my fault.
I didn’t say ‘model’ libertarian. I say that you, as a moral nihilist/relativist, are simply not a libertarian. But I don’t really care about you. It’s your propagandizing that bothers me.
Now that’s a meaningless question.
Irrelevant. Irrelevant.
Irrelevant, but if it makes you happy : I always hated authority. I wasn’t interested in politics though, and didn’t pay attention to it until I was around 30. And when I looked into political theory, the first system I chose was libertarianism.
Now, how are those facts related to your flawed theory on morality ? They are, of course, totally unrelated.
I’m not caught and I’m not attacking you
I am simply highlighting your ridiculous contradiction. As a ‘moral subjectivist’ you must admit that your opinions on morality are just your opinions and irrelevant to anyone but you.
Do you like/hate vanilla ice-cream? Who cares.
You dodged answering the question again Juan.
I think it’s obvious what that says about your arguments. There is nothing behind them. You make claims you won’t support, and then if questioned on the support for your claims, evade, evade, evade.
Thanks for making my point again.
As you can see from my mini-manifesto which I link to above, I think evolutionary psychology has a lot of explanatory power regarding moral commonalities. But preponderant commonalities are not universalities. And to derive ends from evolutionary psychology, I think, would be to commit the genetic fallacy.
LOL. I made a lot of questions you dodged. They are there for all to see. Anyway, all you can do is ignore criticism you are unable to counter.
And yet, I NEVER mocked you. And never thought we were heading in that direction. YOU DID. I mean practice what you preach and understand you don’t know what other people are saying sometimes and therefore why I advocate dialogue. That’s I said “we’re cool”. I mean what the HELL happened!
practice what you preach cause you really are confused. I never was being condensing and communicating disdain. And now you’re trying to tell me I think you’re stupid. Practice what you preach and stop imposing your feelings on the reality of what I’m saying.
There’s nothing wrong with walking away when you get angry LS.
And yet I’m not doing that. See why I advocate dialogue cause you went off the deep end when I thought all was cool. What the hell is a matter with you?
And maybe it’s because you get angry and lack the ability to dialogue and actually know what I’m saying. Maybe it’s because you like to impose your values on others and only hear what you want to hear because you really made up a lot of crap here in this post all based on an over-emotional muddle.
And your totally wrong. But you’ll never believe your wrong. And you’ll simply say that’s your subjective navel gazing. But I’ve been positive the whole time until you flew off the handle here for no reason and therefore lack thereof. Because it’s obvious you are imposing your values on what you think I’m doing. But I’m here telling you - you’re completely confused about what I said. I really don’t know what your problem is and why you got like this. I thought we were having a good discussion and then bam, you start making stuff up. I’m the one being positive LS. You’re simply deluded.
Ethics is a science.