DavidOdden

When the government willfully refuses to perform its proper rights-protecting function and flagrantly tolerates the initiation of force against individuals, the government has lost its legitimacy. In that case, the society has slipped back to its primitive pre-civilization state. This occurred in Somalia, Central Africa, South Sudan, Libya, Yemen. When the fundamental premise of “civilized society” is false, Rand’s moral prescriptions are different, because they are predicated on a society where man acts according to his proper nature, not a society where men act like savage beats. One cannot morally condemn a man for using whatever means necessary to survive, in such a society.
However, we are referring here to objective facts – willfully refusing to function, flagrantly tolerating initiation of force. A government may also fail in an instance to punish an initiation of force, for example because there was insufficient evidence to objectively establish that there was a crime (dispute over the actual property owner) or to establish beyond reasonable doubt that the accused did the deed. To be concrete, we can know for certain that Smith did the deed, but because the evidence against him was secured by beating a witness, Smith cannot be convicted: we say that Smith “got off on a technicality”. In that case, is vigilante justice against Smith morally proper? Following Rand’s statements on the matter, it is not, because in a civilized society we cede the right to use retaliatory force to objective law, and the objective law says that a man cannot be convicted by evidence illegally and immorally obtained by governmental initiation of force.
Depolicing is, in fact, sort of legal, which is in my opinion a huge problem. The courts have deemed that the government is never compelled to enforce the law, though if some action of depolicing were to systematically run afoul of the 14th Amendment – i.e. refusing to investigate crimes against black people – that action would be deemed illegal. To the extent that the circumstances are the same, the government must treat all people the same way. This does mean that the government can refuse to investigate property crimes involving less than a $500 loss, since that defines an objective “circumstance”. Police discretion to ignore crimes is, frankly, egregious, and it is a substantial political issue in some places. At the same time, some $%(*#@ hacked my credit card, and the police have not done anything about it because, realistically, there is nothing they can do, this was not a willful and flagrant refusal to protect my rights.

I cannot even begin to imagine how you reach that conclusion. Retaliatory force is where you beat someone as punishment for having violated your rights. Self defense is different from retaliation. Self defense is force that is immediately necessary to terminate an act of violence, retaliation is post-hoc and applied when the threat of continued force no longer exists.

Objectivism is in the hard atheism school of thought, provided that you agree that I am not God. Given the defining properties of said God, particularly omnipotence, no such entity can exist – that entails a logical contradiction.
Objectivism is agnostic as to the existence of life on other planets. It is conceptually possible, after all life exists on this planet and we are not hyper-concrete-bound. You left out a significant third category, namely the class of arbitrary claims, for which there is not even conceptual supporting evidence. A number of mystical beings such as Superman and Thor do not entail logical contradictions, but there is not a shred of evidence for their existence, hence claiming that Thor exists (other that "as mythical construct") is arbitrary. We also reject claims lacking in evidence, in other words you have to subdivide “insufficient” evidence into “not enough” vs. “none at all”. Also bear in mind that all evidence is grounded in perception of reality, so the ability to say “I can imagine…” does not constitute evidence.

Objectivism is in the hard atheism school of thought, provided that you agree that I am not God. Given the defining properties of said God, particularly omnipotence, no such entity can exist – that entails a logical contradiction.
Objectivism is agnostic as to the existence of life on other planets. It is conceptually possible, after all life exists on this planet and we are not hyper-concrete-bound. You left out a significant third category, namely the class of arbitrary claims, for which there is not even conceptual supporting evidence. A number of mystical beings such as Superman and Thor do not entail logical contradictions, but there is not a shred of evidence for their existence, hence claiming that Thor exists (other that "as mythical construct") is arbitrary. We also reject claims lacking in evidence, in other words you have to subdivide “insufficient” evidence into “not enough” vs. “none at all”. Also bear in mind that all evidence is grounded in perception of reality, so the ability to say “I can imagine…” does not constitute evidence.

I direct your attention to this thread which bears on your question. Let me also remind you that while we tend to take all of Rand’s writings as interchangeable without regard for time context, Rand started writing The Fountainhead in the mid-30’s whereas her non-fiction works built on Atlas Shrugged decades later. The question of what you call the act is irrelevant, the right question is “Was the act morally proper?”. Rand is very clear in her later philosophical writings that in a civilized society, man cedes his right to defensive force to the government, and a government holds a legal monopoly on the use of physical force. Roark should have sought forceful government intervention, as required by law.

There are numerous imaginary scenarios that could be applied to the effect that this principle does not apply. For instance, one could conclude that Roark was not living in a civilized society, he was living in the wild, wild west of Medieval Mongolia where dog eats dog. The same can be said about all stages in US history, that we are not and have not ever been an Objectivist utopia, yet it remains invalid to argue “Because society is imperfect, all forms of force are sanctioned”. A more realistic argument would be based on the reality of civil judgments and breach of contract – I pointed this out earlier. A money judgment would not result in justice, only removal of the offending object would.

It is not obvious to me whose property rights were violated, since we are dealing with a subcontract. Keating breached his contract with Roark, as well as with Cortland (the contract was for a building, not a pile of rubble). Roark’s action was against Keating, who remains responsible for the creation of the final building. If we take Cortland out of the picture, Keating had to right to the building that he created, but this is an extrajudicial act of force, of taking the law into your own hands. The law is not a suicide pact. My opinion is that the trial outcome is as implausible, in the real world, as the alternative where the court orders the demolition of the building.
The issue that is not clearly worked out in Rand’s philosophy is under what circumstances may we properly assume that we are not living in a civilized society – when is it proper to ignore the law?
The public safety regulation argument is a red herring. There is no evdence that blowing up the building threatened anyone’s safety. FYI, no legislative solution would have been valid (it would have at most created an avenue for blowing up future buildings). The courts could have insisted on specific performance, but that is a purely surreal legal possibility, not one that actually exists. Also, “rights” and “force” are not the same thing (or, exact opposites), your argument should be focused on what Rand said about an individual using force. Roark’s rights were patently violated. Roark used force in response to Keating forcefully violating his rights. It is correct that individuals do not have the right to retaliatory force.

This is where the futility of the urge to embrace a contradiction becomes clearest. De-policing exists because of the growing demand for legally-sanctioned improper use of force and the demand to not use force when proper. A lack of law enforcement encourages chaos, which is the precursor to death (the ultimate goal of evil). When it becomes official policy that police do not even address "little crimes", it is hard to avoid the conclusion that certain rights are unimportant, or don't even exist.

There is an important distinction between crimes and civil wrongs. A crime is a precisely-defined prohibited act with a particular punishment, which preemptively limits an individual’s actions “against” society. The government, charged with protecting the rights of individuals, promulgates laws saying “If you violate an individual’s rights in manner X, you will receive punishment Y”. This punishment amounts to justice, that a person who behaves like an animal in violating the rights of an individual is treated like an animal, and get locked up or whatever.
Intent figures into the determination of whether the accused has committed a crime, and not whether someone’s rights have been violated. Regardless of intent, if you violate a person’s rights, you may be required to compensate that person for the (actual) damage you have done to them. In addition, if you intentionally violate rights in a pre-defined way, you are also subject to punishment. Intent becomes relevant in sorting out the consequences of rights violation, by limiting punishments to chosen acts. The underlying principle is that a person should only be punished for their evil choices.
The concept of physical force remains useful because it is a characteristic of (properly-defined) crimes. It’s not that every act of physical force (including speaking) is thereby a crime, rather, every crime is the choice to use physical force in order to violate an individual’s rights. Minimal technical force is frequent in human interactions when it does not violate rights (interfere with a person’s existence), and does even constitute a compensable civil wrong – no damage arises if you speak. Sometimes, more-substantial force is applied unintentionally resulting in damage, for which the actor should compensate the harmed person. When such force is applied intentionally, for the purpose of violating rights, then we have a crime deserving punishment.
The discussion may spin out of control when we factor in police use of force. The primary prohibition is against the initiation of force, but we need to also consider retaliatory, defensive and administrative force. Retaliatory force is exclusively the purview of government, it is judicial punishments (let’s leave out nation-on-nation retaliation for aggression). Any person may rightfully use force to defend their lives, and this requires no special permission (but it is subject to judicial review to determine that the force is truly defensive and not, e.g. retaliatory). I also added in a category of administrative force, which is the force used by police when they arrest a person suspected of a crime. This is not the same as retaliatory force (police cannot directly administer retaliatory force, they do so only under the direction of the courts), it is not defensive (the immediacy of stopping the criminal act of force has passed). It is force required to adjudicate the question of whether the suspect has committed a crime, and covers searches and seizures – it requires a certain elevated level of proof that there has been a rights violation. This is where I would place court orders to enforce a judgment, where for instance, a person’s property is seized to satisfy a court judgment that the defendant must compensate the plaintiff.

Don't forget Brazil, South Africa, Syria and most recently, Niger. The latter is tired of being resource raped by France, especially of uranium. With Russian help they have kicked out the French and the Germans and are tightening security relations with Russia. This is happening all across Africa.

Correct, contracting for mutual profit. And that is what Niger is now doing with Russian companies. No more being raped by their French colonial overlords who were taking whatever they wanted, by force.

So then this ideological accusation of “resource rape” is nothing more than standard socialist whining about companies making a profit. The only thing special about African countries – and not unique to them – is the idea that the wealth of a nation belong to “the people”, to be administered for the greatest common good by the benevolent government. Which leads to such obscenities as the idea that “our jobs” are being exported to nations that do not have the obscene pro-labor anti-capital laws that you find in the US and Europe.

I don’t agree, because you haven’t argued for your claim. It’s not obviously wrong, nor is it obviously right, so I reject the claim pending necessary support – therefore I disagree. [Fill in the argument as necessary]. I would agree that the refusal to comply with the court order is a wrongful act, I reject the position that such refusal retroactively changes the nature of the initial act, especially when this conclusion is derived automatically from the fact that the final court has rendered a particular judgment, and does not consider the court’s rationale for rendering that judgment. As we know from the substantial number of cases where SCOTUS has overruled itself, the notion of a “final” ruling itself has a dubious pedigree. The concept of “initiation of force” requires a firm objective definition and should not be operationally defines as “an event where an accused is found by a court to be at fault”. The act of a court ruling that a person is liable for an act does not convert that initial act into “initiation of force”, nor does refusal / failure to comply with a court-ordered remedy convert an accident into initiation of force.
I do understand the interest in converting all instances of legal enforcement into responses to “initiation of force”. In my opinion, the correct path of reasoning centers around the concept of “right”. If a person interferes (in a suitably-defined manner) in another’s right to his life, then in justice it is proper that he be required to compensate the other. In some situations, the interference is sufficiently evil and knowable in advance that we properly classify the act as initiation of force, analyzing the act as a crime deserving of punishment and not merely compensation. I recognize the desire to simplify the concept of “right” to “non-initiation of force”, but attempts to reduce all rights-violations to “initiation of force” renders the notion of initiation of force incomprehensible. Instead, we have rights, which can be infringed by evil means (therefore punished) or by innocent means (therefore compensated). Compensation for infringement of rights remains enforceable by the court, since the duty of the courts is to protect rights, not just punish for initiation of force.

The act of maintaining the function of the organ. Organs do not remain healthy and properly functioning on their own, they do so only in response to the proper choices of the person who has those organs. Similarly, a person must properly train their mind in order to function as a doctor, and it is right that a person who has so trained be compensated for the value that he has created – a right that society should protect. Rather than compelling the person to receive less than proper compensation for his actions, or prohibiting a person from engaging in the actions.

 

A kidney is very different from a lump of dirt, yet there is no controversy over the propriety of exchanging dirt for money (unless you also disapprove of selling dirt). A kidney requires a life-long effort to maintain proper function qua vital organ, though less effort to maintain as something fit for dinner. That enters into the question of how much a person may be willing to pay for a kidney (for example “OMG you are on the verge of complete kidney failure, why would I pay you anything for that useless pile of meat?”). In choosing to live and therefore doing those things necessary to exist in the most primitive sense, one has earned the right to dispose of one’s life as one sees fit, according to your values. You are rejecting the value of the myriad choices one must make in order to continue existing, rejecting the positive consequences of those choices as “unearned”. I am baffled by your concept of “earned”. How exactly does one “earn” a right, in your philosophy? Is selling dirt monetizing the unearned, is this an application of the Obama principle that “You didn’t make that”?

I suppose that “all well and good” means “Oops, yes, my kidney is my property, I may rightfully do what I want with it, as long as I do not initiate force against another”. Given that much, it is unnecessary to translate anything into a market dynamic, that is just fancy econ talk. Now, just to correct a small error, you own your kidney, and I cannot make sense of the idea of “owning the value of my kidney”. I value my kidney, my kidney is a value. I guess what you mean is “I own the thing that is a value”, and you are treating “the thing” and “the value of a thing” as the same.
Given that you understand that you and I have the right to engage in this transaction, then I suppose what puzzles you is how the transaction could be a value to me and to you. Since you interject “other individuals” as though that is an impediment, I guess that you are assuming that a trade always involves exactly two people. But that is plainly false. You cannot buy my house without the consent of both me and my wife, since it is joint property. I cannot contract with a surgeon to repair my brain without the surgeon involving others such as an anesthesiologist, or the owner of the operating theater. In the surgical case (my brain or your kidney), the immediate transaction is between me and you, however someone may have to sub-contract with others in order to fulfill your part of the bargain.
There is no single precise description of the nature of an organ sale, just as there is no single precise description of the nature of a real estate sale, or sale of chattel (such as cattle). Perhaps I offer a kidney for $50,000 with the exchange to take place next week, perhaps the exchange takes place contingent on some other transaction (my receiving a cornea) or event (I die). The transaction is that each party transfers their right to specific property, under the provision that the other party transfer their right to some other specific property. I would be happy to elaborate on how third parties enter into the matter if you think it is necessary, however it should be obvious that if I contract with you to supply a kidney in exchange for $50,000, it is metaphysically self-evident, Chev Chelios movies notwithstanding, that I should secure the services of a surgeon to perform the organ transfer. You presumably have an similar interest in involving a competent surgeon. Unless you are Hannibal Lector and you interest extends to a meal with fava beans and chianti.
The “transaction” is a contingent exchange of property: I transfer right A to you if and only if you transfer right B to me.

Let me just give you a few quotes from Rand which should enable you to figure this out.
The right to life is the source of all rights—and the right to property is their only implementation. Without property rights, no other rights are possible. Since man has to sustain his life by his own effort, the man who has no right to the product of his effort has no means to sustain his life. The man who produces while others dispose of his product, is a slave.

Bear in mind that the right to property is a right to action, like all the others: it is not the right to an object, but to the action and the consequences of producing or earning that object. It is not a guarantee that a man will earn any property, but only a guarantee that he will own it if he earns it. It is the right to gain, to keep, to use and to dispose of material values.

(VOS p. 94)
Any material element or resource which, in order to become of use or value to men, requires the application of human knowledge and effort, should be private property—by the right of those who apply the knowledge and effort.
(CUI p. 122)
Just as man can’t exist without his body, so no rights can exist without the right to translate one’s rights into reality—to think, to work and to keep the results—which means: the right of property.
(Galt’s Speech)
It is true that Rand did not directly say whether one owns one or both of one’s kidneys, that specific conclusion follows from applying logic to the general principles which she identified.

This discussion squarely relates to the career quandry of @HowardRoarkSpaceDetective, and the problem of technical arcana in philosophy. Without a shred of supporting evidence for this belief, I assume that there is such a thing as “realism”, and that it is distinct from something else – something relevant. So not “different from ‘horse’” (completely wrong ballpark), but perhaps “different from solipsism”. In the Objectivist epistemology, we seek to identify defining criteria that distinguish concepts which are partially similar, thus we would first define what makes realism and solipsism similar (and distinct from horse), then we sub-classify realism and solipsism in terms of what makes them different. Next we recursively sub-sub-classify kinds of realism – I guess there are sub-brands of metaphysical, naïve, indirect, immanent and scientific realism (no doubt other terms exist). By condoning the idea that certain concepts are a sort of immanent realism, that first implies that said concepts are not metaphysical, naïve, indirect or scientific, and that there is still the possibility of measurement omission within the realm of immanent realism.
Now, I know just enough about epistemology that I know that one cannot characterize Objectivist epistemology especially the concept of perception using the idea that there is a miniature humanoid in the brain who views the world and thus explains human vision. However, I have no idea whatsoever about the various sub-types of realism. I do know that in order to correctly identify an existent as being of subtype A versus subtype B within an over-arching class Σ, there must be crisp defining features, and the concepts must have been correctly applied to the existents in question. Which brings us to the problem of faith-based acceptance. First, I have to assume that there are accepted defining criteria that distinguish sub-types of realism (just as there are accepted defining criteria that distinguish tables from chairs or beds). Then of course I have to assume that discussants understand the relevant existents (concepts, such as the various types of realism, also “tropes” and “modes”), and correctly apply those definitions in their sub-classification.
Needless to say, my head is spinning at this point. I see the assertion that
It is clear that we do not have a well-constructed dichotomy here, we have two orthogonal propositions. A trope is a literary figure of speech, no aspect of Objectivism is a “trope”, and that cannot be seriously in question by anyone with a smattering of familiarity with Objectivism. Of course, the original claim made here was that Objectivists do not think of properties as tropes. This leaves us with two questions to address: how does Objectivism think of properties, and is there a reasonable relation between tropes and universals such that one either believes in tropes or one believes in “immanent realism”, and there is no third path? The Objectivist concept of “property” is rather simple. A property of a thing is a fact about its physical composition that determines what it does. We refer “property” to the broader concept “fact”, if there is unclarity as to what “property” means in Objectivism, I claim that this must stem from not grasping the nature of the concept “fact”.
As an article of philological faith, I will assume that a mode is unquestionally and universally defined by all true philosophers as a “particularized property whose identity depends on the entities that it is a modes of”, although I accept that with tongue firmly planted in cheek (philosophers do not agree what “logic” is, why in the world should they agree what a “mode” is?). However, I cannot identify an existent which is a “particularized property” (what is the distinction between a “particularized” property and a “non-particularized” property? What even would count as one versus the other?). What does it even mean for an identity to “depend on” an entity? I suspect that this definition of “mode” is not really a definition, it is a literary trope whose true meaning must be discovered. That is, the fundamental reality in this way of looking at the universe is the terminology that we use, and “mode” and “trope” are core realities (I guess the universe speaks English though it used to speak Greek), and we must somehow discover the nature of tropes and modes – “trope” and “mode” are not man-made graspings of existence, they are fundamental universals.
Alternatively, maybe I just don’t understand that philosophical people “really” mean when they use terms such as “trope” and “immanent realism”. This is simply a matter of terminological arcana, a matter of concern for Howard. There is a bit of jargon in contract law, that of “consideration”, which historically arose from the requirement to judge “What led this party to a contract to consider making that promise?” – i.e. the promise to receive something of value such as money, goods or labor. It seems to me that the level of historical conceptual arcana in law is trivial, compared to the mountain range of arcana that defines philosophy. I don’t see how philosophers ever reach the nirvana state of “certainty” or even “probability” regarding the classification of ideas in philosophy.

As they say, YMMV. I was a member for two years. Officially speaking, YAF was unquestionably opposed to the draft and supported an all-volunteer army. There might be some deviant statist running a local chapter, but the organization was substantially pro freedom and individual rights. Their main problem in the 60's was (a) opposition to abortion rights and (b) the fact they had no philosophical grounding for their admiration of individual rights, other than “God-given” and “the American tradition”. Insofar as they are enablers and advocates of the religious right they are not allies of Objectivism, but it’s important to not mis-state their positions (at least historical positions, it’s difficult to identify any current positions – economic issues used to be prominent in their activism, not on the current radar it seems).

No such thing as the freedom to defraud millions of investors by conspiring with fellow marxists to suddenly change your “economic decisions” to silence political opponents. SEC giving a pass to that and DEI and all the rest means all bets are off. As Musk said, he “tried being nice for two years. Now it’s war.”

The Democrats went truly insane when Trump won in 2016, comparable to 1860. Not immediate secession if the country’s first Republican merely wins election insane, but treason nonetheless — attempting to frame him with “Russian collusion” and a hundred similar actions against the will of the people since.
Nothing since the first Republican took their slaves away has upset them as much as Trump.

The New Republic contends that Trump is racist. So let’s repeat that vicious and counterfactual smear over and over and try to make it stick. Objectivism!!!

An article at The New Republic contends that Donald Trump chose J.D. Vance as his running mate on the same basis for which he ridiculed Joe Biden's selection of Kamala Harris:It immoral and impractical to make hiring decisions on the basis of race, which is why I oppose "affirmative action" hiring quotas just as much as I oppose Jim Crow laws politically -- and it angers me to see pandering like this (including Joe Biden's past selection of Kamala Harris) on the part of aspiring office holders whom one would ideally see opposing such measures.

This is especially true when I see someone like Trump (or any number of other modern Republicans) who holds himself out as the opposite of the left, while emulating it -- except for which group is the target of the pandering.

Nobody can speak for the aggregate preferences of any particular demographic group, but it is possible to make an educated guess. Trump's pick of this walking electoral liability makes it all the easier, because my guess is that Vance represents a doubling-down on many things that surfaced during and after Trump's term that could alienate someone who is receptive to a decent alternative to the Democrats.

Vance is a religious nut -- whose views come across as weird because they're alien to most Americans. He's an anti-abortion fanatic, unlike the solid majority of Americans who want it legalized at least up to a point. And his Ivy league background understandably both puts off less educated voters (who've been primed by Trump's own indiscriminate attacks against "the elites") and fails to convince more educated voters (who won't be bullied by it as Trump apparently hopes they will).

One would hope in this day and age that it wouldn't be necessary to tell an adult that just because two people might look alike doesn't mean they think alike, but I guess that proposition entails a level of mental development that many people never achieve.

-- CAVLink to Original

Oh, is that not so believable?
I will keep that in mind a few months from now.

We can’t nail jelly to a tree, you need to make a concrete claim, support it with evidence, then we can tell you what Objectivism has to say about the claim. Apparently DNA difference was a red herring, so was the supposed “aggressive” trait of mammals being inherited. Now we move to an assertion about crows and rights. Point me to an author who is a crow, or an engineer who is a crow. Plainly, you cannot. Your argument reduces to the illogical claim that since a crow has more advanced cognition than a tardigrade, crows have the same “rights” as humans. You fail to understand the unique nature of human cognition. Yes, we are speciesist, blame the crows for failing to evolve adequately. Name-calling is not a valid argument. Try to make a concrete claim that has a relationship to Objectivism: spell out your logic, don’t just blurt out your conclusion.

That “percentage similarity” figure is highly misleading, a better statement is that there are 35 million differences. Darwin had absolutely nothing to say about DNA, he only spoke vaguely of gemmules, particles of inheritance, which in fact was a theory developed by the Greeks millennia earlier. Philosophically-speaking, the specific mechanism is irrelevant, what matters is that traits are inherited from parents. From which it follows that two beings with the faculty of reason will by nature have an offspring with the same trait. It is equally self-evident that there is some mechanism of change of traits: Darwin set forth a scientific basis for understanding how that happens. His was a scientific theory of history (one not correct in all details) whereas Objectivism is a philosophical theory of the nature of man. For which reason (different subject matter) Rand would not have addressed your implication. As I explained above and as is well known in evolutionary science, there are massive substantive differences between humans and apes especially in cognition.

Have we been here before?
Why do I feel déjà vu?
Anyway, I look forward to your blog pieces in fifteen weeks decrying the enemies of democracy who doubt that the biggest turd of all time really did receive the most votes for president in all American history.