andre_sanchez

The more land this entity owned, the more expensive every other piece of land would become. You can only buy land that someone is willing to sell. Even if this corporation had a trillion dollars, that doesn't mean it will be able to buy the land it wishes to. As such, those who did NOT want to live as "virtual slaves" would form their own corporations and set up colonies in the unbought pieces of land BEFORE this corporation is able to buy everything. Since these people would not be willing to sell the land for any amount of money (after all, if they did they would end up having to pay their earnings back in rent), the corporation would never be able to acquire their property. Until this corporation owns everything, it would be suicide for it to charge "slave" rents, since it would just make the unbought land that much more valuable and harder to get.

If I cut off your eyes, are you then not a human being? A bee has eyes, is it a human being? Please stick to essentials. Having an eye is irrelevant. A bee has a brain and eyes. Is it a human being? This element however is at least essential (so far as we understand the mind). If I cut off your legs, are you then not a human being? Bees have legs, brains and eyes, are they human beings? Please stick to essentials. While I think it would be incorrect to make "breathing" an essential component of being human, I suppose the claim is fair in the sense that humans need oxygen in order to power their bodies. Bees breathe, have legs, have brains and have eyes, are they human beings? In the sense that they perceive the world through their senses, yes, it's fair to say that is an essential requirement of being human. Bees observe, breathe, have legs, have brains and have eyes, are they human beings? You are defining a human being as a non-fetus. Birth is an event, not an attribute. Nonetheless, bees are born, observe, breathe, have legs, have brains and have eyes, are they human beings? Can you please define "think" in a way that applies to babies, yet not to animals or a fetus. If you believe an 8 month old unborn fetus is still to be regarded as a fetus, please use him and if not, please use the highest level of development you believe a homo sapiens can reach while still being classified as a fetus. My dog has a name, and in fact, bees are born, observe, breathe, have legs, have brains and have eyes, and if someone names them (babies do not name themselves, do they?) they have a name, are they human beings? Bees make sounds, are born, observe, breathe, have legs, have brains and have eyes, and if someone names them (babies do not name themselves, do they?) they have a name, are they human beings? The only attribute you have listed that bees are unable to meet, is think. In a certain sense, bees even meet that. You would have to define "think" so that it is above the capacity of bees, and once you manage to get over that, there is a large number of other non-human animals with greater capacities. In fact, a baby does not seem to be any more capable of "thought" than a grown monkey, dolphin, or any number of animals. If you have evidence to the contrary, please provide it. Is a comatose human being NOT a human being? So to be clear, babies, young children and comatose patients all meet the definition of a human being, correct? Indead, it does not. This is about separating at a fundamental level, a fetus from a baby. Otherwise, they need to be treated the same. What rights a baby has is not relevant to the question of a fetus being, or not being, fundamentaly the same as a baby.

You have to explain why a "baby/young child/comatose patient" is a human being, and why the term does not apply to a fetus. It's not enough to make a statement.

DarkWaters, A couple of questions: 1. Can you tell me what the fundamental difference between a fetus and a baby is? 2. Can you tell me what the fundamental difference between a fetus and a young child is? 3. Can you tell me what the fundamental difference between a fetus and a comatose (not braindead) person is? I have seen no answer to this. The morality of abortion aside, I believe your argument in favour of it is contradictory, and therefore incorrect. Do you support the right to commit infanticide? If you do, then we can discuss the matter with that in mind. If not, you have to explain the difference. Specificaly, you have to explain what grants babies and young children rights and why that does not apply to a fetus.

Returning to the subject of vigilante justice itself, if the moderator will be so kind as to allow my thoughts to be seen by you, how do those of you who claim it is illegitimate reconcile the fact that it is an integral part of Rand's work? It's almost as if you people haven't read "The Fountainhead". It is a perfect example of the vigilante process at work. Howard Roark took the law into his own hands, was subject to judicial review, and then was released. Not to mention Ragnar Danneskjold, the philosopher-pirate. By your standards, he has no right to "use force", yet he was one of the book's heroes.

Responding to strawmen gets old you know? What do you mean by "at all costs"? Man should not pursue survival at "any" costs, he should pursue survival at the cost that he actually has to pay for it. Most of the time, the cost is what Rand calls "reason". Sometimes, it is not. Reason is not a primary. Reason is justified by survival, not the other way around. You do not live so you can practice ethics, you practice ethics so that you can live. Indeed. That was not my example. I was very clear on my example. In fact, it would. Not using force on the other hand, would not. If he is dead already, which is what the example is based on, he would have no plans for dinner. Only the living can plan. If however he lives, he can have a wide variety of plans for dinner. You need to remember why force is justified under those conditions. It is the same reason force is justified in the conditions I have set up. Indeed, he has not. I'll bite. Please explain exactly what they are determined by, either in your own words, or through a link or quote. I realize Ayn Rand made such a statement, but her statement had a context which yours lack. It is injustice to remove a man's freedom for him having done what was required for his survival. If you do so, you are a threat to me, and to society in general. As such, you must be removed from it. As I am not your slave to provide you with care, this removal does not involve prisons, it involves graveyards. It is my sincere hope that you do not make such a choice at any time in your life.

What you are saying is that man is not a sacrificial animal, unless RIGHTS, as floating abstractions, is the altar on which he is to be sacrificed. Rights have a source. What is it? He in fact is. I do not see this contradiction. Ethics is not based on collective identity. The means you use to support life are secondary. They are not unimportant, but they are not the primary from which they are derived. When the primary conflicts with the secondary, it has primacy over it. Rand herself realized that lifeboat situations required a different standard. She realized that, if you put a gun to a person's head (and that gun does not need to have a human agent behind it), his actions are not in concert with reason, as the term is used by her. If a man with a gun to his head shoots another, she did not believe that he had acted in contradiction to ethics.

Is there a right to enforce this right? Notice that I am not asking who has this right, I'm merely asking if it exists.

Courts. Well they aren't, but within the context of the rape itself, they are. An action due to sickness is not liable to punishment any more than an involuntary nervous response of your muscles. If you are tased by a police officer and that triggers your leg to kick him, you are not commiting assault. Ethics requires choice. A sick person may have its range of choices limited, but he is still responsible for the choices he makes.

What if? How is that using another person's life as a bargaining chip? Accidents are not subject to ethics (and therefore law), choices are subject to ethics (and therefore law). You may incur a debt towards a person by accident, but a debt is not a crime, and a crime is not a debt. Even the non-payment of a debt, in itself, is not a crime. Only if you choose not to pay the debt, are you commiting a crime.

I'm not sure about that, nor do I think it is relevant. I would think a raped baby would be severely traumatized, but I do not have any evidence of it. As a matter of fact, yes. Damages are irrelevant. You cannot calculate the damages caused by rape or any other crime and any attempt to do so is entirely arbitrary and subjective. You can calculate part of the damages objectively, in financial terms, but there are always intangibles involved as well. The reason rapists should be put to death is because they have violated the fundamental law of human society, that of not using another person's life as a bargaining chip to get what they want out of them. It is not because their crime demands the "payment" of their lives, but because they have forfeited the right to them by the choices they have made. Have you ever wondered why there is such a strong link between murder and rape? It's not a coincidence. I think it's fair to say. Rapists are not sick, they are evil. I don't think raping adults is more acceptable. It isn't. I agree with you, the idea that a younger person is somehow more entitled to life is pretty absurd. Good point. The point is that it is not extra punishment.

So you're a sadist? How much would you contribute towards this? I suppose we could work out some sort of "Pay Per View" scheme. A paid TV channel that finances the stay of such monsters in prison, by selling footage of them raping each other (Live!). That might work.

While I am not a member of the global warming cult, for temperatures to drop this or that year has pretty much zero relevance to the global warming debate. Ultimately, global warming is irrelevant, regardless of the theory being correct or incorrect.

Are you against the use of force in self-defense? Are you against the use of force by the state? That does not seem to be the case. It's interesting that you ignored the only question in my post. You are purposefuly evading the fact that yousupport the right to use force in order to preserve one's life. The right to use force is not the right to use force arbitrarily. You put up a strawman when you implied that this was my position. If you wish me to deal with your example, okay, let's do it. In fact, man does have a right to use force against the grocer IF the only alternative is death (as opposed to trade or production), because life is the standard of morality, not property rights or the respect for other men. Man is not a sacrificial animal, ethics does not tell him to die, ever. Ethics aids man's survival, and that is the source of its legitimacy.

Who is going to feed him while he is in prison?

Absolutely.

Oh yea, definitely.

It's actually quite funny. I laughed out loud. Not exactly "OMG THIS IS HILARIOUS", but it's a decent cartoon. People don't get paid based on how smart they are, they get paid based on how productive they are. A "capitalist" (the term is incorrect, since he is actually describing a manager) that does not produce, that wrecks his company, may legitimately own the money he got paid, but he does so as a sort of second-hander. As such, it's not offensive.

That would imply that the state cannot use force. Is that the case? That's an obscene strawman.

Why is that relevant? More important, why is that a determining factor? That is precisely the state of a fetus. That is precisely NOT the state of a fetus. Further, in the case of Terri Schiavo, it WAS murder, because while the husband has no responsibility to take care of her, he has no right to determine if others can or cannot do so. The reason brain dead people do not need to be helped is not because "they are already dead", but because there is nothing you can do to help. You do not have a right to actually inflict harm on them, merely to withdraw support. Exactly! What?! That doesn't make any sense. We are not used aberrations to have a discussion about rights, we are using appropriately contextual examples to have a discussion about rights. Rights are not intrinsic. They are objective. They are based on concretes, not floating abstractions. If your argument is not based on hedonism, I have misunderstood it. Please restate it in a different manner. It's only safe for her, it is fatal to the fetus. There is a risk in driving that you might hit someone. You cannot avoid this risk unless you don't drive. It is not a gross injustice to make people choose between driving, and accepting the risks involved in driving. What -is- a gross injustice is to make the actual victim, the one being killed, into a sacrificial lamb. It is, in fact. She began her life as a fetus. If her mother had not helped her, she would be dead. You would be dead. I would be dead. All human beings require this. I repeat, ALL human beings, require this. It is not a freak occurence. I have, actually. The fundamental nature of a fetus is the same as that of any other human. While the nature of an isolated egg or sperm is to die, just like skin cells, when they join they become something else. The nature of a that something else is to grow into a healthy human being, and this does not even require the active cooperation of the mother, she could be asleep the whole pregnancy. The fetus is merely using the only resources it has available. If after an earthquake you were stuck in someone else's apartment, unable to leave, with nothing but their food to eat, you are being neither a parasite nor a thief by eating it in order to stay alive.

Indeed, I agree with all that. A fetus is not a brain dead person. The fundamental requirement of being brain dead, as opposed to being comatose, is that it is irreversible. Being in the state of a fetus is NOT irreversible. That is precisely the point. The fetus will grow and develop into a full grown adult, the brain dead person will not. YOU used to be a fetus. It is only because you were one, that you are now what you are.

The reason man has the right to take the law into his own hands is the same reason man has the right to farm with his own hands. Reason guides his actions so that he is able to survive. Man's survival require that he act, not only to produce food and shelter, but to secure his life and his liberty, to secure justice. The law is the particular field of ethics that deals with retaliatory force. Ethics is not collective. It does not require the approval of a "higher body", of a corporate board, in order to be objective. In fact, only individuals can enforce the law, because only individuals can practice ethics. That individuals practice ethics in the field of law collectively, using corporate structures (such as through the State), does not mean that only this practice is legitimate, just like the use of a corporate structure to manufacture cars does not mean that man needs to work in a corporation in order to be a productive human being. There are sometimes gains to doing so, but it is not an ethical imperative.

A legal judgement is something that can be made by individuals. States are not magic entities with the power to make laws. They are merely the most able to enforce them. That was the point I was attempting to make with the questions you marked as "non-sequitur".

Ok. Couple of questions: - How would you characterize the hanging of a man for homosexuality? - Does it matter if it is performed by the government of Iran, or the guy down the street? What, precisely, is the difference? - If two states compete for sovereignty in an area, which legal system is the one that decides if something is or is not a crime? - Do you realize that it is illegal for you to critize the "Prophet" Mohammad, no matter where you live, as per the legal judgement (fatwa) of certain clerics? - Does a group need to be able to enforce its legal judgements in order for them to be considered trully "legal", and if they do, does bombing an abortion clinic make abortion illegal? - "I am the state." That is a famous quote, though nobody is quite sure who was the first person to say it. Most say Napoleon. Do you understand what it means, in fact?

Ok. You are right, strictly speaking. It should either release the person or execute it, based on his ideas of why he thinks he should kill a person. It should not toy around with the terms of the sentence. Yes, it should. His killing. Murder implies that you have already made a moral, that is a legal, judgement on the matter. It is always permissible to punish a man for murder. It is not always permissible to punish a man for killing. You are wrong. That is precisely what it means. If you reject it, you are rejecting the very notion that -individuals- have rights. Why? A proper vigilante has violated the rights of absolutely nobody. If the person has witnessed the other person's crime, he is in fact better able, objectively speaking, of judging the criminal's guilt than a law of court. The use of courts is not meant to protect the accused, in any way, shape, or form. It is meant to protect the justice enforcer, be he a vigilante or the state, from retaliation. Even a state, if it acts in a way that people judge to be arbitrary, if it is seen as being murdering instead of punishing, will be held accountable by the people. You assume that the vigilante's standard of proof is lower than that of the courts. Such is not necessarily the case. In many cases in fact, a vigilante is the only one capable of objectively determining that a person is guilty, or as the case may be, innocent. Everyone has the right, in principle, to take the law into their own hands both to punish and to prevent punishment. Their actions merely need to be judged, they do not need to be outlawed.