The concepts of rights is confusing to a lot of people. You can’t see them, you can’t feel them, and they are very often violated. As far as most people are concerned they simply don’t exist. Or, if they do, they are only something that the government “grants” and as such they can be “taken away” whenever that same government sees fit. But the writers of the Declaration of Independence thought that rights were “endowed by [Man's] Creator” and “inalienable”. What did they mean? Who is this Creator? And what does “inalienable” mean?

Now, when it comes to the laws of physics, there is no debate that they are “God-given” or “Nature-given”. It is clear to everyone that something much more powerful than Man determined what those laws would be. Those laws are the work of whatever it is that created the universe, whether you want to call that thing God, or Nature, or Truth, or whatever other name you might apply. And they are beyond the power of Man to change. Man can certainly disregard them. But what he can’t do is avoid the consequences of disregarding them. Nature, to be commanded, must be obeyed.

Rights are Creator-given in just the same way. Yes, a man can disregard them, just as he can disregard the laws of physics. But, just as with the laws of physics, he cannot avoid the consequences of doing so. But what are the consequences of doing so? We’ll get to that in a minute.

Now, what does it mean that rights are “inalienable”? Inalienable (or unalienable as it is also written, both words have precisely the same meaning) means simply something which you cannot give away. It does not mean that the senators have legislated that they will not allow you to transfer them to someone else, like a non-transferable coupon. It means that it is a priori impossible to do so, i.e., to talk of transferring them would be to contradict yourself.

In order to understand why this is true let’s consider the nature of consciousness. Consciousness certainly is “inalienable” isn’t it? It is beyond your power to give it away to someone else. And this has nothing to do with any man made law. It’s simply a given. You could say it is “God-given” or “nature-given” or you could say that you’re “endowed by your Creator”, however you state it, the fact remains, try as you might, you simply cannot give it away.

This certainly does not mean that you can’t kill yourself. What it means is that as long as the particular consciousness that is you exists, it is you and not someone else. It is inalienable.

Looking at this from a slightly different perspective brings us to the concept of responsibility. The word responsibility is used here to mean that you are the one who suffers whatever consequences come with your actions. It has nothing to do with blame which is an entirely different concept. For example, if the plane you are traveling in crashes, you are responsible in that the consequences of having gotten on the plane are suffered by you, but you are not necessarily to blame for the crash. When responsibility is defined in this manner, it’s easy to see that it’s inalienable, right? It is inalienable because consciousness is. Wherever you go, that’s where you are, so to speak.

Now, when we talk of rights being inalienable, we are discussing a political ideal. That means that we have a particular goal in mind. If we are to achieve that goal, then we have no choice but to follow the laws laid down by nature (or God), hence you may have heard that the concept of rights comes from an ideal called Natural Law. Natural Law is no less natural and no less law then are the laws of physics. Again, you can disregard the laws of physics if you like, but in no way can you avoid the consequences of doing so. The responsibility for doing so is yours, i.e., the consequences are suffered by you.

The purpose of the political ideal which the Founders espoused was to create a civilized society, i.e., one in which each man had the maximum potential to further his own life. They recognized that each man was ultimately responsible for his own life that this responsibility was inalienable. Hence, rights, which are simply those responsibilities restated from the perspective of a third party, a government, must be inalienable, too. For example, you are responsible for your life in that it is you who experiences it, so any society that you are a part of, if it is to be a civilized society, must recognize this fact. This recognition is the right to life.

So, to come back to our question previously asked, what are the consequences of disregarding rights? As we have seen, rights are the foundation of a civilized society, that is, one in which each man’s potential is maximized. The consequence, then, of violating rights – Natural (or Creator-given) Law – is the loss of a civilized society. This loss is suffered by everyone. It is suffered by you. Hence, the responsibility for ensuring that rights, your neighbor’s as well as your own, are not violated, rests firmly with you. And that responsibility is, of course, inalienable.

And, it is with this article that I attempt, with what little power I have, to convince my fellow man not to give up his rights, the consequences of which I find devastating. May God, Nature, and the Universe, help me to do that!

There are quite a few so-called “libertarian” groups touting so-called “anarcho-capitalism”. To my mind this term is nothing but an oxymoron that serves to confuse people who have otherwise correct instincts. This might be because one of the apparent proponents of the idea was none other than Murray Rothbard. It’s possible, then, that this is just a case of guru-worship. At any rate, these are my views on the subject.

Before getting into a debate about complex philosophical topics like this, it is always a good idea to carefully define terms, so here are my definitions. Keep in mind that, as I will be discussing an ideal, I am using terms in the normative sense, that is, for example, law as it should be not law as it currently legislated. In other words, we are discussing theory and not practice.

• Politics – the study of the proper structure of a collective such that each individual within that collective has the maximum freedom to act ethically[1]
• Law – the body of ideas which delimit the manner in which individuals may act within society such that the political goal is achieved
• Government – the organized enforcement of law. A proper government is, in essence, a collective form of self-defense (and self-defense is the only lawful use of force.[2])
• Anarchy – the absence of organized law enforcement
• Capitalism – the economic ideal under which anyone may aspire to ownership of the means of production. Capitalism is the natural development of a proper political system.

Now, it should be clear from the above definitions that anarchy and capitalism are incompatible. Capitalism is the result of a proper system of government – i.e., it develops from a political (collective) system under which the individual’s rights to property are respected and the recognition of those rights is enforced. Without such enforcement, there is no means of dealing with criminals other than for each individual to engage in war each time he encounters one.

Now the so-called “agency-theorist” will argue that through freedom of association individuals are “free” to band together to protect themselves. This is true, however, the moment they do, organized law enforcement is born, at least within the collective, and there is no longer a state of anarchy. Everything external to that collective, however, is still potentially in a state of war – only now it is war between tribes.

Now, the same anarchist may argue that these “small” governments are preferable to the large centralized one. Again, this depends upon the state of the “small” government. If it is a criminal government, the same problem exists – the potential for tribal warfare. If they are not criminal then of course there is a consistency of law and so which “tribe” you belong to is largely irrelevant. It is for precisely this reason that there will always be a natural tendency towards centralization. Any proper government which encounters a criminal one is justified in removing the criminal government if it is within its power to do so. In fact, if it were possible to ensure that criminals could never gain control of the machinery of government, a world government would be ideal. Yet of course, this is impossible – the very thing that makes a proper government necessary is the very thing that threatens it – the existence of criminals.

It is because of this fact that government can only ever approach the ideal, it can never reach it. This is not a defect specific to Man – it is a defect of life itself. All living things are subject to ignorance and uncertainty and it is ignorance and uncertainty which breed crime, on the parts of both the perpetrator and the victim. Only a state of perfect knowledge would allow for a perfect government – but of course in a state of perfect knowledge no government would be needed.

That life is subject to ignorance is a priori true and from this it follows that there is no such thing as Utopia. The “agency theorists” make the same error that the socialists and globalists make. They assume that a “fool proof” government is possible. But fools make excellent criminals and even better victims. For this reason, neither world government nor anarchy will ever prevent tyranny, injustice or war. As many wise men have pointed out, liberty requires constant vigilance. This is not idle talk. There is no short cut.

The belief that a short cut exists and talk of the means to achieve it serve only to facilitate the eventual decline of a proper government. The populace becomes complacent, believing they cannot be victimized, and greater and greater ignorance of political matters becomes the norm. It is this ignorance that eventually leads to the criminal takeover of the machinery of government and so governments, like the population, have a life cycle with a difference only in the relative length of time they persist.

Does this mean that Man should not strive for ideals? After all, they are only approachable, and never fully realizable. This is a little like saying that one should not attempt to prolong his life because he must inevitably die. As with the question of life and death, recognizing these truths can only help us to better approach the ideals.

Some means of preserving a proper government do exist and are generally attempted. Democracy, for example, minimizes the ignorance of any one man, federation, i.e., the maintenance of local governments, checks the power of the central government, separation of powers limits the effects of any one arm of government, representation sets up a system of local responsibility, etc. Even so, these ideas can only maintain a proper government when the people are vigilant. None of them is “fool-proof” and none of them ever can be.

It should now be clear that our personal values are inextricably linked with and dependent upon the knowledge and vigilance of our fellow man. It is of this fact that criminals are least aware. They imagine that slaves can approach the productivity of free men. They confuse relative wealth with absolute wealth and imagine that there will always be a supply of able men to plunder, even as they murder all the able men. All man can hope for is to stamp out such ignorance whenever he encounters it. No one wants to hear this. But burying one’s head in the sand is exactly what needs to be avoided. Anarchy, which is essentially the return to a primitive existence, is certainly not the answer.

Notes:

[1] a discussion of this is a bit outside the scope of my article, but I will try to make this a little clearer for those who are new to the subject. Because knowledge remains unalterably dispersed among individuals, no man or group of men will ever be in a position to determine what action is for another man the ethical action. This determination must always be made by the acting individual alone and therefore he must always be as free as possible to make that determination – even if he may ultimately err. It is to ensure this freedom that laws are instituted which prohibit to men those acts which interfere with his neighbor’s identical freedoms. This is the basis for the ideal known as Natural Law.

[2] Please note that government is NOT defined as a “monopoly on the use of force”. This idea contains within it the notion that government rightfully exercises some power that is forbidden to the people. Under a proper government the citizens retain the individual right to self-defense and the only purpose of government is the defense of the collective. A proper government might under certain conditions err and imprison an individual who has exercised this right because it is often difficult determine that an act was performed in defense. It is for this reason that citizen are generally expected to leave law enforcement to the government. Nevertheless, I think it’s important not to confuse this with a “monopoly” on force.

On the path to enlightenment there are a lot of people who, for whatever reason, want to keep you from the truth and they have a few ingenious techniques for doing so. One of these goes like this:

Present a little bit of truth along with a lot of falsehood and the truth will easily be ignored.

Present a little bit of falsehood along with a lot of truth and the falsehood will easily be accepted.

A spoonful of sugar…

An example of something like this would be to combine the true history of an elite banker class with the absurd notion that the world’s political leaders are not really human beings, but are a species of reptilian alien. See how beautifully that works? If a single person is spouting both of those ideas, you will likely imagine that you can safely ignore both. This device relegates all discussion regarding the elites and their plans for a New World Order to the New Age section in the bookstore, where everything is assumed to be pseudoscience and no self-respecting college graduate would be caught dead.

A very similar method is used in the development of political parties. It goes like this:

Package a position on issues of emotional importance to the common man, but of little political importance, with the politically important, but likely to be ignored, doctrine that you wish to bring to pass.

Package the opposite position on those emotional issues of importance to the common man, but of little political importance, with the VERY SAME politically important, but likely to be ignored, doctrine that you wish to bring to pass.

Pit these two against one another and you will pass the doctrine you wish to pass with the blessings of the masses.

Examples of this would be the abortion issue, the gay marriage issue and of course the ever-present ”science” of global warming, which, fraught as it is with so much nonsense, is easily swallowed by those who attach to it all the truths that science has ever uncovered.

Together the principles are part of a kind of dialectic which is really just a fuzzy equivocal term (another important technique for confusing people) for the fallacy of false alternative. These are, among others, some of the tools used by the “sagacious lawgiver” to ensure his particular rules will be followed. Speaking of equivocation, which I discussed in a previous post, if you are going to use the above techniques, make sure that whatever doctrine you wish to pass is named using words that evoke positive emotions, but mean precisely the opposite of whatever you are doing. This gets people used to using these words in conjunction with your ideas and prevents anyone from using them with their true meanings. You know, freedom is slavery, war is peace, and liberals are people who want more government (and hence less freedom).

With these techniques in mind, you’re well on your way to despotism.

From my high school years to the years I spent at Rutgers University studying biology, I have been told that “evolution has no direction.” At first, I accepted this notion, although I always felt that there was something wrong with it. While it’s true that beings do not evolve to a specific end, they most certainly tend in a direction. No creatures can ever be said to “devolve”. A single celled organism evolves to a multi-celled organism – the reverse never happens. But it is not simply complexity that increases over time. Complexity could theoretically be lost – if such complexity did not increase the organism’s overall power. Certain powers may be lost, too, but such losses will always be matched by a gain elsewhere. This is my reasoning, anyway, for believing that despite the depressing assumptions that everywhere entropy is increasing – life in the universe in fact tends towards supreme beings.

This is very well done and it will definitely get you thinking about our place in the universe. I have no doubt there are civilizations galore out there. To me this is simple statistics. Seeing all of these galaxies out there is very humbling and I think it serves well as a step in the process of beginning to think outside the current paradigm. There is so very much we have yet to discover. What we do know is but a scratch on an all but infinite surface.

This is such a positively priceless blunder, one has to wonder… can it really be a coincidence?

For those of you who might not get it, here is the relevant scene from the Matrix. It’s true, you have to see it for yourself.

This is a just pet-peeve of mine. I sometimes hear arguments regarding the ‘consent’ clause of the Declaration of Independence that seem to imply that one must consent to a just government and from that follows the idea that anything goes as long as one consents.

I have to weigh in on this.

In a truly just system there is no such thing as ‘consent’. Consent is implied by the fact that the system is just. I need no signatures, I need no approval. Justice is justice – period.

Now I understand that this might be confusing to some people. Especially those who believe in the concept of relativism, i.e., the idea that there is no independent or objective truth upon which ethics or politics is based. Proof of an objective reality is a bit outside my scope at the moment (although my recent post on Descartes’ Proof of the Existence of God might interest you if you are looking for this). I imagine, though, that the vast majority of my readers take the existence of an objective reality for granted except when normative sciences are involved. In other words, most people’s epistemologies are hopelessly split. Nevertheless, I’m going to make an attempt to show that true justice does not require consent by creating an example from a law that practically no one would find unjust – the law that requires men to abstain from murdering one another. Let’s suppose that for the sake of argument a group of individuals develop a society and all consent in writing to abide by this rule.

Shortly thereafter a stranger comes into town. He murders a citizen in town and is brought to trial for the murder. His defense? Well, he never consented to such a law!

Absurd? Of course it is. This notion follows for ALL just laws. Just is of course an important distinction. If you have a wily relativist view of things, justice will have utterly no meaning and you will not be able to create anything remotely like a just society. You will be busy trying to uphold all kinds of crazy and unjust laws. (If you’re interested in discovering just what justice is and how we know it, I recommend reading some of Ayn Rand’s work. As I mentioned in a previous post Rand is one of the very few philosophers who have a full and consistent understanding in this area.)

Some time ago a friend of mine attempted to counter the above argument with precisely the opposite approach; that anything goes as long as one consents. (This is really a very good thing to do when you are trying to understand a new concept. Take whatever it is you are trying to understand to its logical extreme.) He was imagining that there could exist a society of people who together agreed that to be a part of their society one must consent to never defend himself. Could such a society even exist without breaking it’s own rules? Of course not. The first time someone DID defend himself the society would either need to take action (i.e. defend itself thereby breaking it’s own rule) or else ignore the law, at which point, it ceases to have any meaning.

The point here is, don’t get hung up on the idea of ‘consent.’

The Declaration of Independence and the US Constitution are by no means perfect – even as originally written. Nevertheless, when you are reading something that was written at some point long in the past, I think it’s important to remember that languages change and evolve. Words that had one meaning then have a different meaning now, and if you read those works understanding only the current meaning, you are going to be confused. (This problem is compounded when a work has been translated from a foreign language written centuries ago! Remember that when you are studying ancient religious texts that weren’t even written down until centuries after they were conceived!)

Here is the original passage from the Declaration of Independence that includes the ‘consent’ portion:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

I recommend that when you read such terms as self-evident, creator, created, unalienable, just powers, and consent, you immediately try to define them and put them into a coherent whole. No small feat, admittedly, but if you are arguing about the use of the word ‘consent’ you are clearly at this level. The trick is not to get stuck there!

From The Ayn Rand Lexicon:

Prior Certainty of Consciousness:

Descartes began with the basic epistemological premise of every Witch Doctor (a premise he shared explicitly with Augustine): “the prior certainty of consciousness,” the belief that the existence of an external world is not self-evident, but must be proved by deduction from the contents of one’s consciousness —which means: the concept of consciousness as some faculty other than the faculty of perception—which means: the indiscriminate contents of one’s consciousness as the irreducible primary and absolute, to which reality has to conform. What followed was the grotesquely tragic spectacle of philosophers struggling to prove the existence of an external world by staring, with the Witch Doctor’s blind, inward stare, at the random twists of their conceptions—then of perceptions—then of sensations.

When the medieval Witch Doctor had merely ordered men to doubt the validity of their mind, the philosophers’ rebellion against him consisted of proclaiming that they doubted whether man was conscious at all and whether anything existed for him to be conscious of.

In a recent post I mentioned that I am reading René Descartes’ Discourse on Method and Meditations on First Philosophy. As I was reading, I vaguely remembered a passage from Rand’s For the New Intellectual (which also appears in The Ayn Rand Lexicon) where Rand was critical of Descartes. Now that I am reading Descartes for myself, I decided to go back and look up that criticism to see if I agreed with it.

Well, it seems pretty clear to me that Rand is wrong here. (Gasp!) It seems to me that without consciousness the external world can exist all it wants; I’m certainly not going to know it. Rand does not explain with what faculty she discovers that existence exists, she simply accepts it as a given or “self-evident” but I suspect that Rand herself would tell you that nothing is self-evident (except maybe that if I’m thinking I must exist!) And if in fact Descartes starts from the same point as “every witch doctor” he certainly doesn’t end up there. On the contrary, at least as far as I can see in my readings thus far, he ends up right where Rand begins – Existence Exists. In this regard I think Descartes is clearly more complete.

As far as Rand’s defining consciousness as being solely the perception of an external world, I think Descartes makes it perfectly clear that perception is useless without the faculty of understanding.

…the sense of sight assures us no less of the truth of its objects than do the senses of smell or hearing, whereas neither our imagination nor our senses could ever assure of us anything if our understanding did not intervene.

If perception were all that was involved we would have no means of deducing anything at all and would essentially be unconscious machines.

Now I do expect a disagreement with Rand will bring out either a lot of complaints or a lot of hallelujahs, nevertheless, if you are not familiar with Ayn Rand’s works, I do suggest you read them. (And read them yourself. One thing I’ve discovered when it comes to philosophy is that you cannot rely on anyone else to get it right for you!) Where Rand really makes her mark is in the understanding of ethics, and as far as I know at this point she is really one of the only philosophers that properly defines ethics as being in relation solely to the individual himself. She is so obviously correct on this matter that I am still amazed to see how much more prevalent the opposing view is. So although I find her incomplete in her understanding of epistemology and metaphysics, at least as far as how the axioms that she chooses came to be deduced, she begins her ethics with the right axiom nonetheless and is really unparalleled in this area.

I’ll have more to say on Descartes as I continue my readings. I’ll be sure to link back here, so check the comments for pingbacks.

Recently I wrote a post called Pondering the Universe in which I laid out some ideas regarding consciousness and metaphysics that I have been examining. In that post, I mention Descartes’ views about the nature of consciousness or the ’soul’. To get a better idea of exactly what his views are on this topic, I decided to read for myself René Descartes’ Discourse on Method and Meditations on First Philosophy. I am very much enjoying my reading, but it is by no means easy. If you are interested in picking up a copy, make sure you get a good translation. I recommend Donald A. Cress’ translation, which you can buy following the above link.

I have only finished reading Discourse on Method and still have Meditations to go. Nevertheless, I’m going to throw my ideas out there in the hope that I can start up some conversation. By all means comment with your thoughts.

Here, so far, are my understanding of one of Descartes’ most famous proofs – the proof that God exists.

1. I think, therefore I exist
2. I doubt, therefore I am not perfect
3. That I am not perfect implies the existence of something that is perfect upon which I depend – i.e., God

That’s the proof in a nutshell. It is really quite elegant, but I think rather misunderstood. The problem isn’t the proof, but rather the use of the term “God”.

The term “God” is an equivocation. It has so many connotations packaged into it that it is all but useless for communication today. Two people discussing “God” may have such entirely different ideas about what they are talking about in the first place that agreement on anything related is utterly impossible. Today, any philosophical use of the word is shunned because it implies a religious viewpoint (i.e., a viewpoint based on faith rather than on reason). At the time when Descartes was writing his philosophy, the religious environment was even more strongly charged. The Roman Catholic Church was particularly powerful and defying it could cost you your life. To make the proof easier for modern readers to understand it is probably worth it to replace the word God with “truth” or “external reality” or simply “another being”. The point is really that something other than me exists and my own existence is dependent on that thing. So we can rewrite the proof thus:

1. I think, therefore I exist
2. I doubt, therefore I am not perfect.
3. That I am not perfect implies the existence of something external to me upon which my existence depends

Breaking this proof down a little bit in order to understand it better:

1. I think, therefore I exist

This is pretty straightforward and even Descartes remarks that he has never had any problems with anyone arguing otherwise. 

1. I doubt, therefore I am not perfect.

Now, here there can be some issues. What exactly does Descartes mean by “perfect”? We can avoid that, I think, by saying something like this:

1. I doubt, therefore there is something I do not know.

To make this a little clearer realize that the act of doubting itself is an admission that one does not know something, if only that he does not know that he knows!

1. That there is something I do not know implies there exists something external to me upon which my existence depends

Descartes argues that in order for me to have a concept of something that I do not know, there must indeed exist something to be known, i.e., there must be something besides me in existence. If I were in fact the only being, I would have no means of obtaining such a concept from myself because as the only thing in existence I would, by necessity, be all-knowing.

Now because there is something to know and I do not know it, there must exist something else, but what’s more, this other thing must necessarily be superior to me, i.e., it must be something upon which my existence depends. Why is this necessarily so? Because if I were in fact superior to this other being, I would not lack what it represents.

Descartes seems to be saying also that all things of which I have can have any clear idea (a clear idea is anything non-contradictory) but that I am unable to produce for myself are ideas that I must have received from an entity other than myself and they must therefore exist in that entity. (Keep in mind that Descartes’ idea of God is not all-powerful in the sense that he cannot contradict himself – i.e., he cannot “create a rock too heavy for him to lift”.)

Think about that a bit if you’re not seeing it right away. Remember that Descartes starting point is I think therefore I exist and realize that this is the only axiom at this point.

Now, I am still in the process of reading and parsing this stuff, so I may revise this as time goes on. I will post my thoughts as they come to me so check the comments section for pingbacks. In the meantime, I do hope to see some discussion.

The Freeman is a magazine published by the Foundation for Economic Education, a non-profit organization founded by Leonard Read in 1946. I’ve attended lectures at the Foundation’s mansion in Irvington-on-Hudson, NY since 2002. Lately, however, I have been a little bit disappointed with some of the things I’ve been reading in the Freeman. I’m not sure if it’s just signs that I’m outgrowing FEE or if it’s something else. One of the recent articles that I happened to come across is an article by Gene Callahan in which he introduces us to Michael Oakeshott (Michael Oakeshott on Rationalism in Politics, Jan/Feb 2009), a philosopher who, I must confess, I had never heard of.

Apparently, Oakeshott’s best-recognized work is his essay “Rationalism in Politics” which Callahan feels is not “appreciated widely enough.” Callahan explains that according to Oakeshott’s views, the philosophy of “rationalism” ought not be used in politics. To him, the “primary feature of the rationalist approach is the belief that the essentials of any human practice can be conveyed adequately by means of a ‘guidebook’ comprising explicitly stated rules, formalized technical procedures, and general abstract principles.” Oakeshott instead believes, according to Callahan, that the “rationalist, in awarding theory primacy over practice, has gotten things exactly backwards: The theoretical understanding of some activity is always the child of practical know-how and never it’s parent.”

Now, by the time I reached that statement in the article, I was already pretty confused. But, I really could not imagine how anyone could believe that practice precedes theory. Honestly, that makes no sense at all to me. What exactly qualifies as a “theory” to Oakeshott? What qualifies as “practice”? To my mind, practice is defined by theory. After all, what exactly are you “practicing”? I can’t think of a single human endeavor that doesn’t require abstract thought on at least some level in advance. What could Oakeshott possibly mean?

I don’t like to think that people are purposefully obfuscating. I know it happens. But people also make honest mistakes. Therefore, I’ve made some effort to try to see how someone could think that practice precedes theory. Perhaps what Oakeshott means is that humans must have some sort of experience before they can develop a theory or be in a position to reason, i.e., no idea is truly a priori, that is without some reference to sensory experience. Still, to simply experience something is not the same as practicing something.  If I burn my hand on a hot stove, I haven’t practiced anything yet. Almost immediately, however,  I will develop a theory of hot stoves and I will begin practicing that, namely, I will use that theory to avoid burning myself again.

It occurred to me that some people might be confused by the fact that as children we are often taught things without knowing where they came from – hence we learn from practice – and only at some later date do we work backwards to reveal the theory behind our actions. It’s important to realize, however, that our practice ultimately develops from someone else’s theory. Sometimes, we ourselves have done the theorizing, we just don’t remember that we’ve done it. Thanks to our big brains, this sometimes happens faster than we can realize – for example, we often pick up concepts sub-consciously. Think of many of the words you use on a daily basis. You know what they mean, but could you define them? One of my favorites is the word “game”. Everyone knows what qualifies and what doesn’t, but a definition usually requires running through examples in order to pinpoint the essentials.  In this case, it might seem like you are working backwards to discover the “theory” behind the word, but you already did the work, you just don’t remember doing it.

Another issue that might confuse people with regard to this idea is that evolution has endowed human beings with emotions which often seem to follow no theory. But in fact even emotions develop from a theory. They just eventually become so automated that we don’t remember how or why we have them. Emotions are in fact very raw versions of normative sciences. For example, vengeance is the emotional raw form of the normative science of law and compassion is a raw form of the normative science of ethics. Our understanding of these subjects occurs at such lightning speed that we don’t realize that the theory was ever there. But we ignore the fact that there is a theory at our own peril. Our so called “intuitive” theories – i.e., emotions, can sometimes be in contradiction with one another – if we don’t fix that we end up acting on our emotions to our own detriment.

It’s important to realize that theories exist on all levels of abstraction and like every other human endeavor, they are subject to human failings. What Oakeshott doesn’t realize is that his own position on practice preceding theory is in fact a theory. There is only one way a person gets away with not using a theory – and that brings me to Oakeshott’s view of practice.

Oakeshott asserts that “rationalists” believe that the “essentials of any human practice can be conveyed adequately by means of a ‘guidebook’ comprising explicitly stated rules, formalized technical procedures, and general abstract principles.” These don’t sound like very rational rationalists. They seem more like pragmatists to me. To my mind, a “guidebook” or list of explicit rules, or “formalized technical procedures” do not a theory make. These are, in fact, attempts to put a theory into practice. Theories, especially the normative kind (which is the kind that a political theory would be) are not really reducible to a list of rules because the context under which they are to be applied is constantly changing. We do it anyway, but only because there are many people who either can not or will not theorize and in order to help them practice the theory, we need rules. Hence, the normative science of law is put into practice as a list of legislated or concrete rules. The normative science of ethics is boiled down to ten commandments, and so on. But, do not mistake these “rules” for theory. They are practice pure and simple. And, as far as “abstract principles” go, these are but the starting point of a theory. In fact, there’s much more to it and that brings me to Oakeshott’s next issue.

According to Callahan, Oakeshott once criticized F.A. Hayek because he felt his ideas represented a “rationalist system” in their own right and, in Oakeshott’s words, “this is, perhaps, the main significance of Hayek’s Road to Serfdom – not the cogency of his doctrine, but the fact that it is a doctrine. A plan to resist all planning may be better than it’s opposite, but it belongs to the same style of politics.”  In fact, as I understand it, Hayek points out that central planners lack information regarding “time and place.” Theories, being abstractions that are supposed to apply to all contexts, come necessarily with variables. A theory can be thought of as a kind of equation if you will, with variables (Hayek’s “time and place”) that need to be supplied in order for the equation to be useful at all. Hayek is essentially saying that central planners lack context and with that he hits the nail right on the head. This is exactly what they lack.

If central planners were indeed attempting to implement a “theory” they would quickly realize that they were lacking context. That this never occurs to them is a clue that they are NOT operating theoretically. Central planners are in fact hopelessly lost in practice, the very place Oakeshott thinks they ought to be!

That of course brings me to the REAL abstract principles that a free society is based upon. The theory upon which a free society is supposed to be based is known as “Natural Law.” You know, all those deducible principles like the one about men having property in themselves (a right to life) and all that logically follows from that? Central planners forget all that stuff, yet this is the theory upon which a proper government is based. It is also the theory that libertarian readers of the Freeman should recognize. Why then are they being asked to throw all that away and contemplate the pragmatism of Oakeshott? I think that’s a really good question.

Picturing the universe as a really just a bunch of infinite loops

The death of a loved one can send you into a metaphysical tailspin, so to speak. You want so much to believe that you will one day see them again. At the same time, if you’re like me, you want to puzzle it out with reason. But this is a question that is pretty close to the limits.

In my studies at this point, I’ve come across a lot of ideas that are impossible to integrate. One, which I’ve tried to depict in the painting above, is the concept of infinity. Infinity is really something you just have to accept because you can never really get your mind around it. Time, for example, and space, just ARE. There is no before, no after, no inside, no outside, and no cause. Everything else, though, has all those things. Reconcile that one. I’m still trying.

Recently, I saw a number of television shows on time, space, and on Einstein’s theory of relativity. One small bone I have to pick with them. They say Einstein didn’t want to believe that the “universe had a beginning” and so he didn’t accept his own discoveries. Well, to my mind Einstein, and the physicists that came after him, have only proved that the universe is BIGGER than we originally thought, not that it “had a beginning.”

With that aside, on the subject of consciousness, there are a lot of opinions. The study of the subject is unfortunately, like a lot of things, hence the painting above, an infinite loop. There are some things you must accept in order to say anything about consciousness, but you are sometimes later tempted by science to disgard what you had to accept in order to do the science. For example, I’ve heard people say meaningless things like “consciousness is an illusion” which of course makes you ask, who, exactly, is being illuded? To my mind, in order to do any science at all, one has to accept the reality of consciousness, the efficacy of one’s senses, and one’s power to reason. If consciousness were an “illusion” of course, all of science would crumble – and yet it is apparently from science that this idea comes. Oops!

I personally think that Descartes was right when he said that the only thing he could be sure of was his consciousness. His body, he said, might not be real, but the fact that he was thinking meant that he was. I think this is an essential starting point. Wherever and whatever the “you” that you experience is, it’s safe to say that it is. Descartes, in my opinion, took this a little too far and assumed that if his body might not be real, then his mind had to be something distinct. The problem with this is that his body might also be real with his mind being a creation of it.

I have a thought experiment that I haven’t yet seen discussed in the few sources I’ve perused (although I have seen it mentioned in terms of consequences AND on an episode of The Outer Limits!). It is the basic Star Trek transporter thought experiment. I have seen the question asked “Would you be transported by this device?” The answer basically tells you whether you believe there is some ingredient unique to you that will not be reproduced when the transporter “recreates you.”  In other words, you are not just a particular arrangement of atoms, but particular atoms at least in some area of your brain. My thought experiment is similar to the Outer Limits episode. Suppose a person is transported and his or her atoms are reassembled identically on the other side, but the original copy is not destroyed. The question is – will these two copies “see” out of each others’ eyes? If you think they won’t, then don’t get into the transporter! The irony is of course, that no one will ever know that “you” have ceased to exist.

But what is this unique element that is required as part of the  recipe that creates “you”? I can’t say whether it’s atoms, a particular arrangement of particular molecules of atoms, a quark, an electron, or what. I can’t say whether they are spread out over the brain or are in one place, or if in fact, they are simply a continuity of particular atoms that once a connection is made to other particular atoms are free to be replaced. All I can say is that some element must be unique. Anthony Martino, the other author on this blog, has dubbed this unique element the “consciousness particle”. (Well, he decided to change that to “perceptitron” by I personally still like “consciousness particle”.)

Another interesting thought experiment, but one that fails miserably in my opinion, is one postulated by David Chalmers, a philosopher with a particular interest in consciousness. He claims that being able to conceive of a zombie version of himself – a being that behaves exactly as he does, but does not possess consciousness means that consciousness must be something extra. This doesn’t quite work, because it might be impossible to create a being that behaves exactly the same way without consciousness. In fact, I think it’s better just to accept that it is.

Chalmers had another thought experiment though that I found very interesting. In this one, he postulates what a scientist stuck in a computer simulation, similar to what happened to Neo in the movie The Matrix. To Chalmers, that scientist could do all the science wants, but he will never discover where his “mind” is. That’s because his mind lies outside the system. This gets really interesting when you realize that if our (smaller version of the) universe had a beginning and is expanding, then there must be something outside of it. Spooky.

I’m sure as my studies continue, I’ll have more to say on this topic. I find that this type of discussion can get very emotional, not only because of the psychological aspects – and there are many – but because our language is lacking in concepts to discuss these things. Equivocations are everywhere. The word “consciousness” for example, is itself a huge one. It could mean simple awareness, or it could mean the products of a lifetime of study (what I would call, things you are conscious of.) Then of course, there’s the simple use of the term “I” or “you”. What represents you. Is it the entire content of you mind plus your awareness? Is it that continuity you feel as you learn and grow? Is the “you” of two seconds ago dead? (Not to say anything of the you of 5 years ago?)

I have a lot more questions. What are the basic necessities for a consciousness? I would say at least a rudimentary memory and some sensory input. We have computers that can do this now. Are they conscious? We would say they are not, but we can’t actually know because being conscious does not necessarily mean being able to report that fact.

All of these things may seem kind of futile. But at least some of what you accept here dictates what kind of life you are going to lead. In that respect, it might be worthwhile to pursue. At any rate, right now I have no choice. My mind is in an infinite loop. Hopefully, at some point, I will discover that I have the free-will to hit Ctrl-C.

What exactly does it mean to be a “soft science”? Over the holidays I got into a discussion with a relative about just this topic. Economics, he told me, is a “soft” science, unlike physics which is a “hard” science. What exactly is the difference?

The word “science” itself is a somewhat fuzzy term. It can be defined as any form of rational inquiry, but it can also be used to describe a particular type of rational inquiry, that of inductive reasoning – i.e., the scientific method. For the purposes of my article, I would like to define science as any form of rational inquiry. Why will become clear a little later on.

So now, having defined that, we can ask the question, what is a “soft” science?

The idea of a “soft” science is, of course, even fuzzier. When people use the term they rarely know what they are trying to say. In the end, the term usually evokes a list of what the person believes are soft sciences and a definition has to be obtained by working backwards and figuring out what they all have in common. A “soft” science is almost always a science that is impacted in some way by human motives, aspirations, and emotions. The list usually looks something like this (depending on what the person includes in the term “science”):

Economics
Politics
Psychology
Ethics
Aesthetics

And of course, all the sciences that deal with human motives and emotions rarely predict anything and are subject to endless debate. It is assumed that the topics are either too complex – as is the case with economics – or that they are relative to whatever opinion you might hold – as is the case with all branches of philosophy. This is not a coincidence. People have powerful motives to obfuscate and confuse both themselves and others with regard to these topics and the reason for that is obvious. Continued…

I really am feeling these days that I am living in a matrix. Not just a system created by elites… a real cosmic joke.

The absurdity here of course is that it took a ban on FOX HUNTING for the British people to realize that they wanted their guns back. That anyone EVER accepts the idea that banning guns will reduce crime is just amazing. A little deductive reasoning will tell you that it won’t. It’s easier reasoning than most geometry problems. The politicians are not banning guns to reduce crime and then discovering that it doesn’t work. It was never their intention to REDUCE crime at all. The intention is to INCREASE the ability to commit crime – especially for a particular brand of criminals – who are somehow never noticed.

I used to love Court TV. I learned a lot about law and political philosophy from studying cases presented there. But one of the problems with all of these “crime” shows is that they are focused on a really irrelevant brand of criminal. The guy who robs a liquor store is a lightweight. If he kills a few people, he’s STILL a lightweight. Despite all the machinations of a serial killer and his seemingly perverse motives – HE’S a lightweight. The REAL criminals are much bigger and they enslave, torture and kill MILLIONS. But no one ever notices them. The focus is always on the little guy.

The real criminals are the ones who take your guns and tell you it’s for your safety that they do so. Don’t be surprised when it backfires. It was never meant to work. The purpose is to disarm you so that THEY can control you. This is not some grand conspiracy theory. It is simply how the world works. It’s not new, it’s how it has always worked.

Recently I watched a show on the History Channel about the Berlin Wall and all the people who tried to escape from East Germany. The absurdity of keeping people inside a country they simply wanted to leave never entered the heads of the border guards. Those who imagine for one moment that the 2nd Amendment in the United States is meant only for the “armed forces” are less than children – they are zombies.

This topic is not even worth a “Basics” article. If you can say 2+2=4 you have the basic reasoning skills to figure this one out for yourself.

For a good definition of the term “injustice” check out what happened to Tony Martin.

Laying in bed this morning I realized just how insignificant I am to the vast majority of living creatures. Of course, there are a few among them to whom I am extremely significant, but if you were to consider them percentage wise, they wouldn’t even register. The number would be something like 0.000000000…01% with the number of zeros being some large undefined number. A strange thought, but this is what happens to you when someone who was not insignificant to you dies.

Mitchell Jones, who wrote an excellent book called The Dogs of Capitalism, once wrote an equally excellent forum post called Ego Identity and the Mechanical Universe, which I periodically return to and think upon. Of course, now, it is coming again to mind.

I used to think the argument had a flaw – namely the idea that there could be an infinite amount of matter in the universe or an infinite number of combinations of said matter. But I don’t actually think that argument works anymore. At least there is no axiomatic necessity. Time and space are necessarily infinite, but matter is not and the potential combinations of matter seems necessarily finite given the laws of physics as we know them – a point clearly made in Mitchell’s original post with reference to gunpowder.

The next question of interest to me was whether an individual is just an arrangement of matter or if in fact there has to be some unique particle in order to form him. The question is a side argument and does not negate the original deduction, but it’s kind of interesting and given my current state of mind, it seemed relevant. It seems to me that there would have to be such a particle (or wave, or soul if that be what you want to call it) based on the fact that there is the potential for the existence of two separate beings with the exact same arrangement of matter. Would they see through two different sets of eyes at the same time? If not, then a unique aspect must exist. Of course if that’s the case, another question arises. Could that unique aspect ever be destroyed?

None of this is particularly comforting, although if you read Mitchell’s original post, it is so beautifully crafted that it feels that way at least for those of us for whom faith yields little. So, I started wondering an entirely different question. What exactly would be comforting?

So far, the closest I can come up with is something similar, but not quite exactly like the Buddhist idea that each life led well leads to a better starting point in the next one. Since this is pure fantasy at this point, we could make this work by assuming that the (at least) one unique particle necessarily included in the recipe that makes you, could be changed with each incarnation by all that you learn and discover in life and that the more you learn and discover, the more that particle changes and puts you on the fast track, so to speak, in your next life.

Comforting? I don’t know. At one point, while conversing about this with my cousin, he said “I’m not sure it’s even necessary.” No, it really isn’t – unless of course you are grieving.

You do not have a RIGHT to medical treatment. That’s right, you heard me. You do not have a RIGHT to medical treatment, PERIOD.  Let that sink in a bit.  We’ll come back to it.

Now, there is a whole lot wrong with socialized medicine. Economically, of course it is a disaster. However, the economics of it can be somewhat difficult for the average person to understand, so I’m going to start with the more fundamental reason why socialized medicine is in the words of my old biology teacher “WRONG! WRONG! WRONG!”.

Unfortunately, public education teaches us next to nothing about those subjects that are the most important for our survival in a civilized society. Philosophy (ethics, politics) are taboo in school (and also at work), economics is not taught at all (not even how to balance a checkbook), history is not taught or is made so boring as to torture the students.  The problems with socialized medicine (really socialized anything-at-all) are related to two of these taboo areas – philosophy (politics) and economics. History would also teach us that socialized anything-at-all is a complete failure, but that would be a statistical analysis and we can do better than that. Philosophy and economics will provide the answer a priori, i.e., solely through logic.

Politics is the study of the best way to live with other people. If you want to live only by yourself, you do not need to study politics (but you would need to study ethics.) Some great thinkers have done a lot of the work for us with regard to how best to live with other people. They have discovered a concept called “rights.” Rights are a negative concept. That means that you have a right to be left alone, not a right to be taken care of. (One way to remember this is to realize that everyone has the same rights. If we all had a right to be taken care of, who would provide the care? If it turned out to be you, what about your right to be taken care of?) Rights are not granted by Washington. They are not granted by anyone, period. Rights are an idea, a concept, that one must follow if one wishes to live in a civilized society.  They are not someone’s opinion. They are not granted by majority rule and they cannot be taken away by majority rule or any other rule. They are absolute. I know, this sounds crazy. Bear with me. Continued…