blazingtruth

I'm personally not opposed to the building nuclear plants, especially in a laissez-faire O'ist society. To say that you cannot build nuclear plants because a meltdown may occur and harm a wide range of individuals is the same as saying you cannot build a skyscraper because it may collapse, or any other invention because there's the possibility of malfunction. In the hands of private individuals, the cost of building nuclear plants and the liabilities in the event it does malfunction would be the responsibility of the private individuals/corporations. The economics would all work itself out because the individual would ensure it gets worked out, working in his rational interests. Further, it's not as if the corporation would necessarily be alone and fully liable in rebuilding the nation because of a natural disaster. Victims of a natural disaster realize it's not the fault of the nuclear plant owner if a meltdown occurs because of an earthquake, and they will take it upon themselves to rebuild their own households. When it comes to natural disasters, no single individual can be held accountable. When it comes to accidents like the BP oil spill, BP must be held accountable since it was a fault of their own; however it may very well be in the interests of the direct victims to assist in rebuilding.

Given the context, I do agree that privately owned roads will not result in anarchy. Nor should the concept of "competing governments" be evoked in this thread, especially when it is being discussed Here. First, I do understand the point being made that given that all roads be privately-owned, does it not follow that an individual may decide to set bizarre or perhaps irrational standards for traffic in his property? Perhaps he orders all traffic to travel backwards, on the opposite side of the road, on wet/rocky terrain, or maybe he intentionally places nails out on his roads, makes his property a trap, etc. I feel as if this is the crux of the counter-argument to privately-owned roads - that it may serve to be impractical. However, this argument is very ill-seated, because the general premise of ensuring and individual's right to liberty still remains. I think philosopher's quote was absolutely amazing and outlines that objective procedural standards for which traffic rules for private property can and should be made without violation of rights. If one does not abide by these procedural standards, he can be taken to court and punished proportionally. This prevents the gun-loving, crazed and paranoid old man who adores his privacy from destroying the functions of other individuals. Moreover, given that it is indeed a fully laissez-faire capitalist society, it may not generally be in the individual's interest to actually own and provide maintenance for his private road. He is better off selling the rights to his road to a company which will do that for him, under a contract. In fact, this may serve to be very profitable.

Welcome aboard Dionysus!, I'm 18 years old myself and still have yet to shed my faith (hey, I'm a preacher's kid, what can you expect?). It's really awesome to see people my age actually MOTIVATED to do something other than sit around on their butts all day. I find insightful people to be worth getting to know.

I've been reading up on several sources on this debate, and have ultimately decided that I do agree that an anarcho-capitalist system is not necessarily the way to go since it essentially forces men to deal with force, or at the very least they *must* be prepared to do so. Thank you Mark K for distinguishing a "market in force" for me, that was the most convincing argument. Another key factor was the distinguishing between retaliatory force and defensive force. Retaliatory force, meaning 'retribution' or 'revenge', cannot be a right rationally given to the individual. In essence, 'retaliatory force' is a form of initiatory force in reverse (truly, a counter-initiatory force), and must be legally limited and objectively verified. Whereas, defensive force is preemptive and is a right of the individual. I'm now taking a holistic look at the O'ist Minimalist governing style. The necessary components are a police force, military force, and court system. I do have further questions though. Perhaps this is what nanite was starting to get into. My primary concern is who decides how it is that these positions are established? By vote? Would that not lead to the largest subjective whim winning an election? And further, what are the possible checks and balances which can be placed on each of those three governmental roles. Is it necessary for the police and military to be separate? Is there an executive branch? A legislative branch? Etc. Thank you all for your patience and assistance, it has now been well-received.

This I find to be quite depressing. It's a shame how emotional arguments against ill-versed, self-proclaimed O'ists can attempt at ruining the rest of us. What's that they say about "one bad apple"? :X

What about Mr. Darcy from Pride and Prejudice before he lost himself to altruism/love? He appeared to be properly prideful and rationally self-interested for a while...

"The retaliatory use of force requires objective rules of evidence to establish that a crime has been committed and to prove who committed it, as well as objective rules to define punishments and enforcement procedures. Men who attempt to prosecute crimes, without such rules, are a lynch mob. If a society left the retaliatory use of force in the hands of individual citizens, it would degenerate into mob rule, lynch law and an endless series of bloody private feuds or vendettas. If physical force is to be barred from social relationships, men need an institution charged with the task of protecting their rights under an objective code of rules." -- Ayn Rand from The Virtue of Selfishness, my emphasis added Ayn Rand does not directly address the issue of objective vigilantism in this excerpt. The above quote "without such rules" implies: 1) that men do need an objective rule of law (to which we have all agreed), and 2) it does not outlaw the possibility of men who attempt to prosecute crimes with such rules. I would correct the following phrase as: "...it would degenerate into mob rule [provided that individuals could not naturally live by such objective rules]". It appears as if Ayn Rand presupposes that man cannot be his own arbiter of justice because a man cannot be fully objective as an end to himself. Therein she continues "If physical force is to be barred...", which is a logical connection following from the idea "physical force is to be barred because men cannot be fully objective". However, I believe the assumption made by Ayn Rand in this particular excerpt is invalid. The underlying premises which must be proven to defeat my argument are that "a man cannot be fully objective", and "that courts are more objective than a man". Further, and perhaps more importantly: "That which cannot be formulated into an objective law, cannot be made the subject of legislation—not in a free country, not if we are to have “a government of laws and not of men.” An undefineable law is not a law, but merely a license for some men to rule others." -- Ayn Rand from an article "Vast Quicksands" in The Objectivist Newsletter It is impossible to hold as a subject of legislation that "only one monopolized court system/police force is permitted". Doing so gives a license for some men of authority to hold greater importance of the individual. My power is only checked by that of other individuals.

I agree with everything Mark mentioned: However I do have a few concerns which I will address: Everything khaight said was very well-stated, and accurate. However, the connotation implies that vigilantism (while illegal in present society) is inherently wrong. I beg to differ on this. By popular dictionary definition, "a vigilante is someone who illegally punishes someone for perceived offenses, or participates in a group which metes out extrajudicial punishment to such a person". It follows that it is only illegal because it is extrajudicial. However, I see nothing wrong with objective vigilantism, wherein if and only if somebody has the ample evidence founded in reality, and has checked his premises throughly. Why can an individual NOT be his own arbiter of justice, in matters which concern him? What standard is more rationally-grounded than that of a a rational objective man? If he can maintain an objective perspective and obeys the rule of law objectively, justice need not be a matter solely provided by courts. Yes, courts may be more pragmatic at times, but they (like even rational individuals) are fallible. Ideally, judges should be rational robots in order to be consistent in dealing justice.

To what extent must morality be conceptualized? Morality is not automatic, but must an individual confer with a Congress to produce moral results? Decidedly not. If the guy witnesses a murder, sees the murderer running away with the gun, eliminates with full certainty the possibility that his murder was neither in self-defense nor retaliatory in any way, and shoots the murderer, I do not see anything immoral about this. Yes, it may be more pragmatic to apprehend the murderer and call the police. They are constantly keeping each other in check through competition. The minute a true monopoly is established, no checks can be applied in any way. I do not see how a monopoly-type government can be more efficient except by making the populous subordinate to the state or law enforcement. In doing so, individual rights are violated. Remember that threat of force IS initiation of force. A monopolized state which has the possibility of being corrupt without having checks on its power provides a threat to the populous. Whereas, a denationalized law enforcement will always be checked by other law enforcement agencies and by the public. Same concept applies to courts -- in fact, courts might even be easier to check because there already is a lesser likelihood of irrationality. Just because the concept is alien to civilization and history, and is difficult to conceptualize, does not mean that it will not be pragmatic. I'm trying to see how this concept works with a non-monopolized military force. This scenario may prove to be a tad tricky. It is pragmatic to have one large standing military, rather than several separate entities. Although in reality the fighting is done by smaller operational units which work on smaller missions -- they might as well be separate. I guess the important factor is communication, but you cannot force they communicate. Simply, it is in their interests to do so. The bottom-line is that the rule of law can not prescribe a monopoly on anything besides itself without violating the rights of an individual. I cannot monopolize another individual or group of individuals and claim them as my own. Yes, there is a pragmatic issue which must be addressed between "rights v. results". But there is something inherently wrong with a Huxley-esque World Order where rights are regulated to produce results (also see China). So the pragmatic issue fails if and only if individuals value rights as king, which Objectivists do.

Yes, there ought to be an objective codified set of laws. Each individual is therefore subordinate to the rule of law. This indicates that the police force (a group of individuals) is not in a position of authority compared to the average citizen. Consider Police Institution A, a group of individuals who enforce the law. Unfortunately, they are slow in reaction times and generally inefficient. An individual decides he has had enough with this and he and his buddies form Police Institution B, a group of individuals who decide they can do a better job than Police A. There are no formal ties between both organizations and they may not even be aware of each other. Or, they can be aware of each other and Police A can say "Oh shoot, we're not getting anymore donations or contract signings and have no source of income because of the competition by Police B, we should step up our game". Thus Police A and B enter into competition which will result in better quality (if possible) and better reaction times to criminal activity. Police A and B cannot differ much in distribution of justice, because they are obligated to follow the objective law. The same premise may hold true for court systems, military, and monetary systems. Essentially, why can't police forces and courts be run like a business corporation, except with a moral obligation to uphold the law? There should not be, as determined by law, any monopoly on the enforcement of an objective rule of law. The objective rule of law cannot state that it is illegal for Police B to be established, nor can it state that Police A is the only legitimate arbiter of retaliatory force. The necessity in having an established institution (called the Police) is to guarantee that there is an OBLIGATION to uphold the law. Individuals by their own merit cannot be forced to protect the rights of others from criminals (just as Peikoff argues that doctors should not be obligated to help others by the Hippocratic Oath).

Retaliate in accordance to the Objective law, that is. If a guy steals a piece of candy, retaliation cannot objectively be murder in self-defense. A police force is essentially a legal 'gang' of good guys. If they get over powered by the criminals, well that just sucks.

I'm not 100% clear on what you mean by moral objectivity. Two or more organized retaliatory forces can produce and ensure the same result under an objective law. Is this not an accurate interpretation of "there can be no conflicts of interests amongst rational men"? I suppose your key word is subordination. In a business contract, the laborer is subordinate to the employer; likewise each individual is subordinate to the rule of law. Why is it necessary that the enforcers of law have more authority (by law) than the criminals? Surely, they should have more physical force at hand. As of right now, if a single criminal can overpower the police, military, and society he can commit whatever crime he wishes (despite the authority of the officers). In essence, how does legal authority have any bearing on physical force? My argument here is that under an objective law, there would not be any differing interpretations of the law: it would be crystal clear. Again, no conflicts of interests. Yes a third party is absolutely needed, but what is wrong with having a fourth party, fifth party, sixth.... Given they all will say the same thing because they have an objective interpretation of the objective law. A policeman is no different than another layman, and is no different than myself. His job is to ensure the law is being followed. I do not believe this to be true, could you explain this further? And I agree completely with your last point, the greater force can never lose. In an society with competing police forces, with all the police agreeing on the Objective law, it would take a revolution to overpower them -- as is the case with all societies.

This is true, and I do realize I may have suggested that everybody will abide by it. I stand corrected. Why ought we consider a police force a necessary authority? After all, it is merely a group of individuals. I've seen critiques of anarcho-capitalism and the competing police forces compared to lynch mobs. What difference is a recognized police force different than a lynch mob? Isn't the police simply an accepted form of a lynch mob? There are no conflicts of interests among rational men, and likewise there is no disputes among objective lynch mobs, if you will.

Perhaps I'm no good at conveying the thought, but I'll give it another shot. Beyond "no individual may initiate force against another individual", why does it follow that there can only be one police force? Any laws which suggest anything beyond that are effectively regulating my individual liberties. An individual is only limited by his own capabilities in accordance with his environment. There is nothing which permits the possibility of competing police forces from coming to fruition so long as an objective implementation of the law is enacted. That is to say that it doesn't matter WHICH police force gets there first, as long as they fulfill the obligation of following the objective law. In short, to claim that since there are two police forces that one would not be objective is completely unfounded in reality. Same applies for court systems. Other possibilities such as alternative police forces cannot be limited by a government whose sole aim is to prevent initiatory force, if they are not illegal in operation.

"In this context -- the argument goes -- there is value in adhering to the law, while objecting to it and trying to change it peacefully, rather than have everyone do whatever he likes. " - sN To clarify on softwareNerd's explanation, the value of abiding by an improper or unjust law is usually determined by the consequences of not following it. According to Objectivism, any law regarding taxation is inherently immoral; however, many (if not all) Objectivists pay taxes anyways because they value NOT going to jail OVER the value of the money they save by not paying taxes.

I do apologize for bringing up an old thread, but it is better to do this than to start a new one. Consider a society with an O'ist Constitution wherein the use of initiatory force is prohibited by an objective rule of law. Initially, this rule of law is not intrinsically monopolized by any individual or group of individuals. However, this rule of law is agreed upon by each individual living in the society. It follows that since a society consists of solely individuals, it is ultimately up to the individuals to ensure that the rule of law is objectively enforced so that natural rights are guaranteed. Provided that there are no conflicts of interests among rational men, two separate rational individuals can objectively enforce the rule of law without conflicting interests. Given a crime is committed and an individual initiates force, it is the responsibility of an individual (not necessarily the victim) to report that crime and take action to prevent it from occurring again. An objective rule of law applies to all individuals at all times. It is reasonable to suggest that all men are equally limited under an objective law, lest it is not objective, but rather subject to the whims of subjective influence. This likewise suggests that we are each individually responsible for its enforcement as it concerns the individual, since no one individual is allocated more authority by law than another. This fact indicates that each individual is responsible for sustaining his own life and ensuring that justice is served by his own available resources; he is ultimately his own arbiter of justice, his own protector of his own life. It is unreasonable to suggest that somebody else is obligated to act by law or otherwise to preserve my life. In some cases, however, an individual cannot fend for himself through his own defensive/retaliatory force. A victim can not rationally expect any aid to come running to the rescue unless they are first called. In an instance where an individual's personal retaliatory force is not enough to overcome the initiatory force by the aggressor, the individual can call for assistance (if given the opportunity). The objective of this call is to provide more force to counteract the aggressor. With that being said, that call can be to any other entity -- be it a bystander, family member, or police force. This fact alone shows that a centralized and monopolized institution of force is not necessarily needed. However, this is very simplistic and a fault occurs wherein nobody chooses to reply to that call. Thus police institution(s) NEED to be established because they are OBLIGATED, by law, to deal with reports of crime and follow the objective law. An ordinary individual is only OBLIGATED to follow the objective law. There is nothing wrong with having more than one police force, and to say otherwise is to effectively regulate an individual's options in emergency situations. There cannot be a justified objective law which states: "Only one police force is permitted". After the immediate situation has flat-lined, the individual has the right to ensure that all personal damages are remedied (at the expense of the aggressor, to the greatest extent possible) and the aggressor is punished further (depending on the severity of the crime). To do so requires an objective third party, as it is reasonable to conclude that the victim will not willingly accept the aggressors suggestions and the aggressor will not willingly acquiesce the demands of the victim by contract alone. Thus a court system must be established. Following the same logic as with the police force, courts are OBLIGATED to handle these disputes and it is not reasonable to assert that only one court system is permitted by law. In handling both of these scenarios, it appears as if two or more identical courts (in quality only) and two or more identical police institutions can exist simultaneously. They are limited only by the rule of law. Due to factors such as location, it may be preferable to call one police force over another for reasons such as to time response, which is crucial in sustaining life when threatened. It may be beneficial to have several competing police forces, or a single police force with several locations. This is because quality of service can be limited by environment. The interesting factor is the competing court systems, wherein quality of service cannot be modified. Here competition can only be conducted through price of court fees and subjective likability of the court setting. With regard to fees, these cannot be attributed through taxation, and so voluntary donations and contracts will provide the costs. Thus popularity/reputation of courts becomes important, while terms of payment for fees can be attributed differently (short term, long term, interest rates, etc). This is the only possibility of competition. It may turn out in the end that one court or one police force does achieve a monopoly, just as one business may achieve a monopoly through their efforts. And so the other competitors may go out of business, but it is not rational to immediately limit the enforcement of an objective rule of law to a monopolized institution. The most important concept in this is that governments, courts, and the police are no different -- in essence -- than a group of individuals.

At least his influence is relatively scarce...

To answer directly your question: "But my question can someone be part of a faith and still be an Objectivist?", the answer is absolutely no.

"To sense that behind anything that can be experienced there is a something that our mind cannot grasp and whose beauty and sublimity reaches us only indirectly and as a feeble reflection, this is religiousness. In this sense I am religious." - Dawkins "I am a deeply religious nonbeliever. This is a somewhat new kind of religion." - Einstein "I have never imputed to Nature a purpose or a goal, or anything that could be understood as anthropomorphic. What I see in Nature is a magnificent structure that we can comprehend only very imperfectly, and that must fill a thinking person with a feeling of humility. This is a genuinely religious feeling that has nothing to do with mysticism." - Einstein ---- Yes. Objectivists can be religious; HOWEVER this is only a feeling of reverence for material existence. It could be argued that Ayn Rand herself had a 'religious' formidableness towards the New York skyline, but she was clearly an atheist. I'll stress it again: Objectivists must necessarily be atheists. The quotes above are stated by atheists, whom have had religious feelings for the natural order of existence and science. However, for an atheist to call himself religious is misleading, and thus should not be stated so explicitly, as religion generally implies faith.

Glenn Beck said the same thing, essentially. (Source) Waiting on the Pope...

@Dante, I understand that, but the difference now becomes one of morals and ethics, wherein it was immoral for Zimbardo to neglect his self-interests and become emotionally engulfed by the nature of the experiment, but it may still be an ethical experiment. Or am I mistaken? @Tanka, all they had to do was say "I want to leave" and then Zimbardo would come and ask "Are you sure?" and if they said yes they could leave freely. When did Zimbardo use the threat of force to uphold his contract? The prisoners were made aware that they could leave, yet they choose, on their own token, to believe that they couldn't leave. They held false premises on whether or not they could leave. They were not rationally thinking. The fact was only doubted because of themselves.

@Leonid - that is Stanley Milgrim's experiment. Nyronus brought up the potential for a flawed experiment design in both of these experiments, which I have yet to think about. I'm mostly concerned with the experiments as they were run, if they were ethical or not. In the case of Milgrim's, the man with the electric dial had a CHOICE, and no physical force was exerted. This is the foundation for my question: "I'm asking: from a strictly O'ist perspective, at what point does psychological harm equate to physical force, if ever? At what point does deception equate to fraud?"

@Summer: What are you inclined to believe on this issue? Is a human being capable of re-programming his or her subconscious?

@CapitalistSwine: at least with adults who have presumably fully-developed, adult brains -- say, the prisoners (college students at Stanford) in the experiment: (1) they KNEW what they were getting into. They COULD decide to ignore completely the verbal attacks and resist the verbal commands (prisoners were TOLD to do push-ups and sit-ups). Some prisoners locked themselves in their cells and refused to acquiesce the guards commands. The moment they decided to take seriously their threats was the same moment that they could possibly develop emotional trauma. In essence, the fact that they had a CHOICE to begin with negates the absolute possibility of developing psychological trauma when exposed to it. (2) With regard to those whom did not choose to ignore commands, they understood the consequences and STILL maintained (and were informed of) a CHOICE to leave at anytime they felt stressed or harmed in any way. By no means was this truly a prison. In fact, Prisoner 8612 told researchers he "faked" psychological trauma and was released in 36 hours (Source). Moreover, none of the prisoners have trauma today. Perhaps I am not versed in understanding emotions, and am as a result more stoic than many of my peers, but I feel as if individuals can, essentially, 'regulate' their own emotions. For example, I feel you can continue telling yourself "I am happy, I am happy, I am happy..." until you ARE genuinely happy, or at the very least are no longer sad. In the case of this experiment, no physical harm was done to anybody and the choice ALWAYS remained present, beyond the 'surprise arrests' at the beginning.

I don't care what the populous or even Zimbardo himself say about the ethical nature of the experiment, though I've seen the video before and understand both sides. I'm asking: from a strictly O'ist perspective, at what point does ("lasting") psychological harm equate to physical force, if ever? At what point does deception equate to physical force? I have a hard time understanding the concept of psychological trauma as something an individual cannot overcome himself. I've been told before that "threat of force" IS "initiation of force". However, Zimbardo himself did not initiate force (despite taking on the role of warden). Did Zimbardo have a moral obligation to stop his experiments when he saw they were getting out of hand (mind you, he did just that after 6 days; the experiment was planned for 2 weeks)? Is it not a fair exchange of values? Participants WERE paid $15 per day and DID have extensive debriefing.