Kevin Beal

Why do you seem so relieved? Like "men are worse, whew! That was a close one!" Haha. There are things that women socially need to do something about, just as there are things that men need to do something socially about. That it's not just gender independent problems, which of course, there are those too. Men, for example, cannot do much about the entitlement and hypergamy talked about in the show except to turn down opportunities to be with those kinds of women. But as he showed, it's not just romantic partners, and neither is it visible to most men.

Welcome Tanja! How did you come across the show? What was it that appealed to you?

People generally accept that high rates of men do immoral things. The idea that women are just as capable if not bigger offenders in some areas is still considered shocking and offensive to people. The aim is to have a general view of women which is consistent with reality, and to shake off the excuses we make more for women than we do men, partly because it's unjust for men, and also because it infantilizes women, absolving them of responsibility (which is terrible). Unless it were shown that people generally had the same defensiveness around men as they do around women in the particular areas that he mentioned, Stef is probably not going to post the new male statistics. Why should he? He's come down hard on men before too, and nobody was offended. It's such a stark contrast in fact that most people don't even notice. Nobody ever goes "you just criticized men, so now you need to go criticize women to be fair!" Nobody says that kind of thing except a few men's rights activists, whose message is typically ignored by most people. Stef is not responsible for your frustration. You are.

The objects (properties) of the general theory "property rights" have a subjective mode of existence, and therefore any statements which constitute property rights are subjective. Therefore any propositions which require they be objective are false by definition. This is exactly equivalent to: The objects (value of a good) of the general theory "economics" have a subjective mode of existence, and therefore any statements which constitute economics are subjective. Therefore any propositions which require economics be objective are false by definition. which is exactly equivalent to: The objects (prescriptive statements) of the general theory "ethics" have a subjective mode of existence, and therefore any statements which constitute ethics are subjective. Therefor any proposition which requires objective ethics, is false by definition. (Technically, economics is a collection of general theories, but you get the idea). The fact that we can discover things new about the social sciences of which the objects discussed are subjective in their mode of existence should blow anyone's mind, and give anyone who doubts the power of subjective phenomena pause. We take it for granted, but we get observer independent truths from analyzing mind-dependent (ontologically subjective)(subjective mode of existing) phenomena, constantly. It's happened about a billion times in this thread already (not always accurately). If the argument against ethics or property is that they have a subjective mode of existence, then you do away with economics, psychology, all the social sciences, the philosophy of language, philosophy of mind, everything but the most superficial of metaphysics, any relationships we have, any negotiation around values, and everything you take for granted every single day. Debate itself would be meaningless, since the semantics of our language has a subjective mode of existence. Considering what this line of thinking can do to such a fundamental and important phenomena like property rights, imagine how corrosive to our thinking it can be, generally. What effect it would have on responsibility, relationships, mental health, happiness. And maybe that's why we associate nihilism with depression and a shallow intellectual cynicism. It's hard creating a general account of things in the world. It's easy to sit back and criticize and nitpick. I can pick arguments apart into the component atoms, too. Once you get how fallacies and logical form work generally, it's not that hard. The true test of the philosopher, I believe, is to build, not tear down.

Just a general tip for anyone debating this issue: if you feel like things have been going in circles or you get fogged, that might be a good time to take a break. Not to worry, it'll be here when you get back. There is always a UPB thread going.

Nevermind. Have fun with this guys!

She's a moral nihilist. She ain't gotta justify nuttin'.

Dangit! You beat me to it

The fact that I have exclusive control over my body is not the definition of self ownership, it's the basis. The definition of "ownership" or "property" is actually the same in both instances. It's because I have exclusive control over my own body that I have the greatest claim over it. The basis on which I can be said to own my computer is different from my body, which is different from my paycheck, which is different from my boogers, which is different from a gift someone gives me. The definition in all cases (including my body) is an exclusive responsibility over objects which awards you the products of that responsibility, as recognized institutionally. That's my definition, anyway. The fact that I own myself is only an issue in relation to other people. If I were the only person existing, it wouldn't really mean anything to say that I own myself. I control my body, but so what? If you are willing to grant that I own myself, the only thing stopping you from accepting property rights generally are very specific methods by which we go about acquiring things. That is to say that you have a standard you are working from (that is epistemic in nature), and thus you absolutely accept property rights. You're acceptance of self ownership is an acceptance of property rights generally, plus a very specific subset of it. Also, simple agreement over things is enough for many institutional facts, like the value of a field goal in american football, but with other things, we don't take agreement to be enough to satisfy us. With property rights, a common theme can be seen with a person's causal relationship with the objects they own. There are exceptions of course, but like how we can say that a person homesteading can eventually become the owner of that land, so do other exceptions find ways of coming back to that causal relationship. Even if it's to preserve the land as a habitat or something. Of course it involves agreements, as does money, as does marriage, any contract implicit or explicit, and you probably wouldn't say that those things are arbitrary, would you? Plus, just because you brought it up and because it's a pet peeve of mine. To say "you cannot get an ought from an is" is to get an ought from an is. It's saying "you ought not say that you can get an ought from an is" or "you ought not attempt to get an ought from an is", and you derived those from the statement "you cannot get an ought from an is". The ought is in satisfying some standard. In other words "if you want to get to Broadway, you ought to take 52nd st". The condition of satisfaction of an action (it's fulfillment) is described prescriptively. If you want to be moral, then your moral propositions that inform your actions ought to be UPB. The form you took was "if you want your statements to be true, then you ought to not try and derive oughts from is's".

I choose to take this as a compliment

Victory!! ;P

Haha, my sentiments exactly

No, (1) giving an account of property rights and (2) explaining why the violation of property rights is immoral are two different things. I was doing the first, the video is about the first, the OP was addressing the first. You are focusing on the second and the first together as if they were the same question.

I just re-read it as you suggested, and it's not a complete quote. The moral proposition is regarding the violation of property rights, not the validity of property rights itself. My arguments were designed specifically to address the false premise in saying that any account of property rights and self ownership must be based in ontological objectivity. And I provided definitions for all (or most) of my terms. I also gave an account given these new explicit premises and definitions. You still haven't addressed the inherent ambiguity in your challenge or my account with the distinction in mind. And I don't blame you for having trouble with this distinction. It's advanced metaphysics. Professional philosophers make the same mistake often. (For further reading read: Mind, Language and Society by John R Searle). You just insulted me. Which I guess I can't complain too much about since I did the same thing earlier. That was really stupid of me. The thread is regarding the video Stef did on the validity of property rights, but more specifically about self ownership in particular (which you already agreed with), and not as it relates to UPB. So, I guess it is actually you who is off topic... awkward!

I didn't misinterpret. I said "you'd defend the defense of spanking".

Here are two videos where stef talks about environmentalism as a religion: and

Alex, If anything should be on the table to talk about in order to be considered consistent with philosophy, then that still doesn't why you would want to argue about this topic specifically: why you'd defend the defense of spanking. Surely there are more important things to argue about, right? At some point it just becomes mental masturbation and I don't think anybody wants to nearby when that spunk goes flyin', haha. They might resent being your love doll :S

I agree. There is a standard by which we can agree upon these things. You've just proved me right I'm going to ignore all of the stuff about morality since it has nothing to do with anything I said and will only serve to confuse the issue. You can start a new thread if you like. And you commit a fallacy of ambiguity when you say that institutional facts are subjective. And in doing so, you missed the whole point of what I was saying Let's try it again: they are ontologically subjective, not epistemically subjective. The value of a dollar is ontologically subjective, it's actual representation as being a one dollar bill or a ten dollar bill etc, is not epistemically subjective. Society decides collectively what money is and it's parameters. The same is true for jobs, marriage, property, nation states, football games, etc. The irony is that you want to make it entirely arbitrary and subjective, but then you say in exactly what way my claim to my ukulele could be invalid using our shared conception of property rights. You yourself conceded that it's not all arbitrary. And if it were all arbitrary, then you wouldn't have to accept it in order to argue against it. That would be sort of ridiculous to suppose in that event, right? And if you agree with self ownership, you agree with property rights generally. It's the exact same basis. The proposition that I function as the owner of my body is ontologically subjective. There is no deed signed in my heart with my cosmic signature written on it. The claim "I own my body" is itself an institutional fact. And further, this only comes up in relationship with other people. All functions are put there by human minds. They all must already assume some held values. If I say that the heart's function is to pump blood, that already assumes that I value life, and getting blood to the rest of my body is healthy. If I regarded these things as a pathology, the fact that my heart pumps blood would be seen as unhealthy and "dysfunctional". The fact that it can be said to be functional or dysfunctional is proof that it relies on human minds to be sustained as (epistemically) true. Similarly, this connection between our idea of "self" and our body as being owned by it is all in your head. If you couldn't control your body and someone or something else was controlling it, you would rightly think that something was terribly wrong. But if you grew up and that's all you knew, then for you to be able to control your own body might seem like the thing that's wrong. You assume the same things I do. And you must in order to be comprehensible at all. That's the proof.

One reason that human languages are setup to describe concepts as existing is because these statements are meant to describe "institutional reality". We cause certain institutional facts to "exist" by representing them as existing. If I say (for example) that I'm giving my ukulele to you, I am representing the institutional reality of your private property over what was my ukulele. I have a desire for you to have my ukulele, which is an intentional state with the condition of satisfaction that you come to have my ukulele. In telling you through language that I want you to have it and that I intend to give it to you, in order for it to mean something, you have to acknowledge what is meant. That is, you recognize and represent objects as being my property and soon to be yours. Institutional reality does not exist. Money does not exist. The United States does not exist. When we refer to these things as real objects, what we are talking about, really, is our collective representation of their existence. Property specifically refers to responsibility. "You've got the job!", for example, means that you are responsible to the commitments involved in carrying out the job. And if you do not take responsibility, you may very well lose the job. We are responsible for cars, houses, our land, pets, etc. If you leave what is publicly considered your car on the side of the road, abandoning it, you will probably be fined after it's been impounded because you function as the one responsible: the owner. It may turn out that they were mistaken and you had signed it away already, or they misread the VIN # or something, in which case they can be said to be mistaken. But if you say that private property is an invalid, null concept, then you cannot say that the statement "this is your car that we impounded" to be false. At least not for the reason stated (wrong VIN # or whatever). Further, many statements necessarily imply other things. If I say that I'm giving you my ukulele, it already implies that it's mine to give, that "to give" means something, that there is a ukulele that exists, etc. A statement like "when I said this, I meant that" implies that you were the one who said it, that you believe someone mistook your meaning, that you have a claim over what you said that other people don't, and so on. What you imply is ownership over what you said. You are responsible for it and are committed publicly to it's veracity. You are representing it as being your own, and so it is. You could say "what if someone else represents my statement as being their own?", in which case we can say that it's false for reasons that we've empirically observed. It has your name attached, written in your style, toward your own position, etc. And what this means is that we both agree that simple representation isn't enough. There is a standard necessary, and you are conceding that private property is not completely arbitrary, and that any seeming arbitrariness has at least some relation to these basic empirical facts we observed. Therefore, property rights are valid!

Concepts do not exist. "Property rights exist" is a false statement. Property rights describe an epistemic social "reality" that uses "status functions" (see my previous post about this) and more or less valid claims to the ownership of objects as understood socially. This in the same way that money serves a status function, and it's relationship to our subjective value of goods. Property, in this sense, means responsibility and superior claim over objects (as compared to other people). You own your argument, your actions, things given to you, things you earned contractually, etc. The proof is the social recognition. It's not an ontological issue. You aren't going to find a stamp that says "Kevin" written in aether on the molecules that compose my computer that I'm typing on. If they can get you to ask the wrong questions, then it doesn't matter what the answer is. It's important to know what property rights actually are, first. Because if you don't know, then what in the h-e-double-hockey-sticks are you arguing against? Certainly not property rights

I figured as much. Just nitpicking.

This is totally nitpicking, but premises are themselves conclusions. It's just that either the premises are first principles, are supported by other premises or are otherwise taken as not needing justification, like if we've already gone over it, or if denying it makes you look crazy or something, haha. The form is simply "if you accept X, then you ought to accept Y".

I don't see how that's contrary to what I said. I completely agree with what you said...

This human guilt for consuming resources, greedily exploiting the Earth goddess's productivity, and potentially killing her as a result is just the new original sin. The rib woman talking to a snake for a new generation. And it's awful that the incentive given to act like a good person is out of guilt for imaginary sins. What kind of effect this could have an a child's self esteem, for example. Not good... Environmentalism is the new state religion and this way they can combine religion and state.