greekredemption

This is the argument as I understood it, actually. And that is only true for a conception of reason that relies on free will. Perhaps both are simply complex systems (a computer could of course say 'I don't have free will', if given the correct inputs). Anyway as we discussed earlier it seems to me that qualia do not preclude a non-free will position; I would say that the reasoning process, just like any other, has an input and an output, although I, or you, may not experience it that way (well evidently we don't). Actually, I tend to agree with this. What I've argued doesn't necessarily suggest determinism (although it may imply it) but instead asserts any given not-free will position. Also your summary of my position is well put, I can't really disagree with it. Okay, so how can you claim to have free will if all its inputs are from previous causes? What's free about it if what is you is simply the sum of various inputs along the causal chain? The post of yours I replied to seemed to confuse complex systems (e.g. memories, the perception of our own mortality, reason itself, etc) with free will. These things do not in themselves support a free will view, as it seems to me they all have inputs and outputs along the causal chain just like anything else complex.

He's probably more socialist than either of you, but less socialist - much less so - than those who self-identify as 'socialist'. This to me suggests he's not actually a radical socialist. I mean, obviously he isn't. Yeah, sure, he's a statist 'progressive', slightly left of centre, but 'radical socialist'? Get a grip!

Alright, so if you make the assumption of free will then my saying "I don't have free will" is a performative contradiction. But free will is not necessarily required for that outcome to be correct. Therefore there is no necessary contradiction. Rejecting an argument on the basis of a performative contradiction may be correct in some cases, but oftentimes it just lacks rigour. Not wanting to be provocative, but to me it is lazy philosophy.

It's pretty simple, really. Every thing that occurs in the universe, from an exploding supernova to my apparent decision in 6 words' time to use a comma, is part of this causal chain. In order to be consistent, we cannot exclude ourselves from the causal chain we observe. It doesn't matter how much forethought you think you can put into something, all those thoughts, all those firing synapses, are just part of a single causal chain. Unless, somehow, the essence of what is 'you' is somehow able to inject a thought from outside that causal chain. Basically, unless you can magic inputs into existence, you cannot possibly have free will. So, yeah, your argument is easy to understand, but is inconsistent with the universe as we understand it. And as I've said before, determinism does not preclude complexity, again as is evident from the universe itself. Complexity exists all over the universe without any apparent 'will' to control it. Why would we be so different? And yes I know this is superficially a performative contradiction or whatever. But, y'know, there can be truth beyond performance.

No, the arrogance and carelessness comes from assuming an apparent contradiction invalidates an entire argument. It may well transpire that the argument is in fact a poor one, but might I suggest that your approach is a little hasty? I mean, for instance, using this approach nobody would have read anything of Rousseau's. In hindsight, perhaps that would have been a good thing, but his follow-up arguments are more than a little interesting.

It's the combination of arrogance and lack of rigour.

I managed to study classics without really reaching anything approaching 'fluency' in latin, but I can work my way around inscriptions and burials. If you need someone to tell you how to say "the cook whips the slave" in a variety of tenses, I'm your man.

Wut

Something about the way you use these terms suggests you don't understand them.

I'd argue you can't tell from one line that the writer "cannot think". There are a multitude of other possibilities, not least of which is that perhaps the writer "cannot think [in the same way you think]". As I say, you can't really come to the conclusion that the writer "cannot think" without considering her argument as a whole. It may transpire that the argument is amateurish and not to be taken seriously, but until you've done that... well. All you can say is that it doesn't pique your interest or that you couldn't be bothered (both of which are fine, we all do this with all sorts of things), but to say the writer "cannot think"? No.

To completely rip off and totally bastardise a concept from the late Ronald Dworkin... I think it is not possible to consider a theory until it has been considered in its best light. An early contradiction does not necessarily mean later arguments won't be interesting or in some way valuable; perhaps the contradiction as apparent is not in fact a contradiction, or perhaps it is reconciled later. Maybe it's an inherent part of the argument, a la Rousseau. I suppose that is one of the things that annoys me.

Sure, but in terms of differentiating between mere preferences and what Wazzums describes as 'UPB' we can draw a rough comparison with, respectively, hypothetical and categorical imperatives. As you say it is a little more complex than that, in that, for instance,, unlike UPB the CI also allows for duties to oneself as well as to others. But anyway I think it is sufficient to say that Molyneux's philosophy is thoroughly Kantian. As an addendum, lying to a murderer cannot be a categorical imperative for the following reasons: 1) The physical details are irrelevant (i.e. the conditions of the act are not relevant to evaluating its morality, says Kant). "To save my children, I must lie" is a valid hypothetical, but the details outside of the idea of "I must lie" are redundant when considering categoricals. 2) You cannot will that lying be universal law 3) You cannot use the murderer as a means to an end I'm not saying I think Kant is correct, but this is just how I understand the CI. Admittedly it's been a while since I've read Kant and, being honest, I don't really fancy reading him again...

Kant does differentiate between categorical and hypothetical imperatives, which I suppose roughly correspond with the dichotomy you've identified. And honestly I don't think the difference between lies and deception is a huge problem for the CI; anything which involves treating a person as a means rather than an end in herself is, well, not allowed.

I don't think you realise how very similar UPB is to the categorical imperative. You say, "If I'm a sadist..." and so on, but in Kant's conception of the categorical imperative this clearly does result in a contradiction by the very same test Molyneux describes in UPB. Kant's view on lying is not necessarily binary. So in the classic example of the axe murderer asking somebody the location of his next victim (which that somebody knows), it would run against the categorical imperative to lie - that is, to deceive the murderer by giving the wrong answer, or a half truth - but it would not be immoral not to answer. So you have: Telling the truth = Moral Saying nothing = Neutral Deceiving = Immoral Although Kant may well phrase it as "it is immoral to lie" rather than "it is moral to tell the truth". But there is still secret option number 3, which is morally neutral. I understand UPB suffers from this problem of binary morality, but the CI does not.

Which book? And no. For my part, I was more interested in addressing Rainbow Dash's misunderstandings around evolution than discussing the starchild a deformed human skull (which only really became a topic of discussion in the last page or so). edit: a word

What does this mean?

Isn't this what we call liberty?

So let's be clear. Are property rights descriptive or normative?

I think Noesis makes an important point (one I've made myself, but, being honest, she said it better) that, really, 'ownership' is a semantic trick, and jumping from 'self ownership' to 'this is an account of property rights' is not entirely valid. And I don't think you are misunderstanding Molyneux's argument, or the argument of Locke on which it is based. Look at the definitions Noesis provided. It seems clear that these do not lead necessarily to the next. To take your example of the painting. 1) You own yourself (so you have exclusive use over yourself, necessarily. This is descriptive). 2) You own your actions (so you have exclusive use over the creation of your painting. I think this is reasonably tautological, but let's allow it as another descriptive statement). And then the contentious one: 3) You therefore own your painting But clearly you don't own it in the same way, do you? In a descriptive sense you obviously do not have exclusive control over it. Somebody else could easily claim the same, and demonstrate that claim. Descriptively, you do not own that painting in the same way you own your body. Ah, but perhaps you have a moral claim to it? Maybe. So perhaps it's a normative statement - you ought to have control over that painting, because you own yourself and your actions. Now, to me, these seem to be different things. I mean not only are you deriving an ought from an is, but, as Noesis detailed, you're using two different meanings of 'own'. In essence, the way it seems to me is that the only accurate way to describe property rights is either in terms of societal acceptance (everybody agrees you own that painting) or force (you stop other people wanting to have exclusive use of that painting).

I discussed earlier why I think the performative contradiction is not a relevant rebuttal, so I won't go over that again. However, regardless of demonstrating the complexity of human experience, the point still stands. Your definition of free will simply is determinism! You describe it as an emergent property of simpler particle interactions, one part of a causal chain, which is exactly what it must be if it is to be consistent with the rest of the universe. Free will is not apparently the genesis of causal chains, therefore it is part of existing causal chains (read: the universe) and therefore we are merely partaking in a deterministic universe*. It doesn't contradict it, it just means we don't know the first cause; to be honest, not being a cosmologist, I can't even be sure that's a relevant question. * re: Non-causal events... well according to Lawrence Strauss this does occur at a quantum level (i.e. shit pops in and out of existence without any apparent cause). So it may be that the universe is not deterministic but is random. Maybe. In any case, I would suggest the argument is between 'free will' and 'not free will', where the latter could imply either determinism of randomness. Or supernatural explanations, perhaps.

I agree with this part specifically. The basic point is that anarcho-capitalists do not provide a very good argument in terms of how we'd deal with negative (or even positive) externalities.

I think there's a compatibility issue with IE 11 and the software this forum uses (this knowledge is a few months old, so may now be wrong). As I recall, there's no real workaround from the user's end except to work in bbcode...

(emphasis mine) As time is a property of the universe, this is nonsensical.

Maybe you, as you, don't exist as you think.

I suppose in the case of a nightwatchman state, proponents reason that there is a universal preference among rational people to escalate disputes to an accepted authority instead of resolving those disputes arbitrarily.