Self, ownership, and control

[ImprobableJoe]

You almost nailed it, but didn't take it to it's rather reasonable conclusions. Libertarianism is most certainly about one's interactions with peoples and societies. And Libertarianism values "Individualism". In the case you describe, it would be more prudent to simply say that the "Libertarian" philosophy states that one has the right to dictate the actions of one's self, and not to be commanded to do so. It can be considered distinctly anti-totalitarian in that sense too. BUT: before someone brings this up, I cannot see how such a position is incompatible with a belief in laws, for instance. I've never met a single libertarian who does not agree that we all as individuals, ought to have equal rights under the law for pragmatic reasons. But for the most part, you are right. It's about the right of individuals to not be "dominated" by others. But seriously. I think it's pretty hard to reduce it to simply "You can't tell me what to do".

It is pretty easy if you actually look at what libertarians say and do, and expect from the government. Childish selfishness and an almost pathological need to remove all restrictions on their behavior.

 

[Laurens]

In Libertarian philosophy they're big on property rights are they not? To the point at which tax is considered theft...? And nobody has the right to tell you what you can and can't do with your money/property?

If that's the case then, what if I were the owner of a really successful company, and I had hundreds of billions to my name - all earned legitimately - and I decided that I wanted to spend billions on buying up all the penicillin stocks and manufacturers in the country. They would then legitimately be my property would they not? And therefore I could do with them what I wanted, right? So what happens if I decide to cease the manufacture of penicillin and sit on all the stock without allowing it to be distributed? Is it within my rights as the legitimate owner of that property? Is it within anyone else's rights to stop me?

Would my property rights trump the rights of the masses to have their needs?

If I can't do what I wanted with my own property, such as sit on it and stop it being distributed, then doesn't that mean there are serious flaws in the libertarian philosophy?

 

[devilsadvocate]

Right libertarian would probably say that free markets will solve the problem. If all the penicillin was suddenly in high demand, existing manufacturers you do not own would ramp up the production, build bigger factories, run them 24/7, raise prices etc. and new manufacturers would emerge exploiting the lucrative business until you run out of money from buying them off.

It's at least plausible that this would happen and markets would recover from the anomaly in reasonable time-frame, but that isn't to say right-libertarianism doesn't have it's problems. What for example, if all the land and produced artifacts are already owned (as they probably already are)? One couldn't do anything before asking for consent of others. And we do not know what they'd want in return. Profit motive would say their best action could be along the lines of making a deal where the non-owner gets minimum sustenance by becoming essentially the land-owners slave. Negative rights in themselves aren't sufficient to ensure non-coercion.

 

[ImprobableJoe]

Right libertarian would probably say that free markets will solve the problem. If all the penicillin was suddenly in high demand, existing manufacturers you do not own would ramp up the production, build bigger factories, run them 24/7, raise prices etc. and new manufacturers would emerge exploiting the lucrative business until you run out of money from buying them off.

And if the prices get so high that tens of millions of people die of previously minor infections because they can't afford penicillin, right libertarians think that is the moral outcome people their freedom to make a buck trumps human lives every time.

 

[devilsadvocate]

That's basically what the deontologist right libertarian would have to say on the subject. For them it isn't about consequences (though they certainly could put forth arguments about the responsiveness of free markets vs. planned markets), but about inalienable rights and freedoms of moral agents. If you introduce consequentalist moral considerations to the idea, libertarianism certainly loses a lot of it's logical and intuitive appeal.

 

[ImprobableJoe]

I don't see how you can have a system that will actually work in a modern civilized country that isn't based on consequences on some level. Or, for that matter, how someone can not expect people to consider them to be heartless sociopaths when they put their almost pathological need for free action ahead of the lives of other human beings. The consequence of libertarian thought put into action is a bunch of people dying and even more people suffering so that some small amount of people are free from certain inconvenient rules.

 

[The Felonius Pope]

I can't tell you whether or not we technically own ourselves, but I can ask you another question. Does anyone really

own anything or is the concept of ownership simply a delusion of the mind?

 

[Laurens]

I can't tell you whether or not we technically own ourselves, but I can ask you another question. Does anyone really

own anything or is the concept of ownership simply a delusion of the mind?

I think its a delusion (although that's a rather strong term). We might acquire things and claim them as our property, but there's nothing that objectively says they are ours - it's just a concept that we hold, and thankfully most others hold to as well.

 

[The Felonius Pope]

I agree that mild vocabulary might be better suited to my post. Perhaps instead of a delusion of the mind I can call the

concept of ownership a construction of the mind.

 

[being]

well done gentlemen..

 

[Dragan Glas]

Greetings,

Laurens, I think that the thread's moved away from the concept of your original post.

It seems to me that you're talking about two different things - self-ownership and self-control.

The first is more to do with the right to one's own person: hence why murder, rape and slavery are considered crimes against the person.

The latter has more to do with whether we are really in control - consciously - of ourselves, if not our lives.

These are two quite distinct concepts.

Self-ownership
In America, at least, this is very much tied-up with the Constitution.

The Libertarian perspective epitomises the concept of the citizen, as the basic unit of society - as against the community.

Thus one has the idea of the individual vs the state - or, more extremely - the citizen vs "Big Government". On a larger scale the idea of statism vs federalism is a reflection of this.

Their concept of society is based on property rights and contracts between citizens and group-entities (for- and non-profits, local/state/federal government, etc) and "free-market solutions". The Pauls - Ron and Rand - along with Ayn Rand's "philosophy" are seen as the current "champions" of this ideology.

In America, at the moment, this has all been taken to extremes - the Tea Party, "Tenthers", etc.

Personally, I find the American take on this completely untenable in a modern civilized society.

They appear to see "Big Government" everywhere - and treat "Washington" as if they're still dealing (fighting!) with British colonialism of King George.

Indeed, those who are promoting the "Tenther" movement's position don't seem to realise that, in attempting to promote statism over federalism, they're abrogating the very rights of self-ownership that they're intent on protecting. :facepalm:

Self-control
Interestingly, there was a Horizon programme on BBC2 last night about this very thing, called "Out of control".

Essentially, it showed how little of our daily lives are under the control of our conscious "self", as against the unconscious processes underlying the "self".

Our lives are run on (evolved) "algorithms", which are processed unconsciously, to allow us to deal with the information overload of environmental stimuli - otherwise our conscious minds would not be able to cope at all.

If you missed it, Laurens, you should be able to "catch up" with it on BBC iPlayer - along with others in the UK.

Kindest regards,

James

 

[Cyril]

I can't tell you whether or not we technically own ourselves, but I can ask you another question. Does anyone really own anything or is the concept of ownership simply a delusion of the mind?

Getting back to the original topic of ownership of the 'self', property in general. Asking whether anyone 'really' owns anything is kind of a slippery question; what do you mean by 'really own'? I could say that something is 'really against the law' (of such-and-such country), but this doesn't make it any less of a social convention. So it's not a 'real' thing made up of atoms, but to say that something is illegal can still be true or false. It's just true or false relative to a clump of people rather than a clump of atoms.

Ownership is something like this. Ownership is something that arises to avoid 'the tragedy of the commons'. For example, say there's a car that I use. In order to use that car, there are certain things that have to be done: it needs to be filled with gas, it needs constant maintenance work, &c. &c. If I 'own' that car, then there's a very simple reason why I should do these things: because if I don't, then I can't drive the car. Now imagine that I don't 'own' the car; it just exists independent of anyone's claim on it. What then? Well, suppose I fill it up with gas and someone else comes and drives it around. Then I've just wasted my gas money with no benefit. If the car is communal property, then I have no reason to pay for its upkeep (let someone else foot the bill!) but every reason to use it. This is why private property is so important: by dividing up different things into little chunks of 'private property', we make sure that the link between 'I make this usable' and 'I use this (or give someone else permission to use it)' remains resolute.

Is that 'real'? Again, not in the atomic sense. But if you want to have any large-scale societies, it's a fiction (or 'delusion of the mind' or 'social construct' or...) that you're going to have to invent eventually.

Or at least that's my take. I'm kind of a Hobbesian that way