Predation: Virtue Or Vice?

[HaloNoble6]

Did you read this reply of mine? I think a rereading of VoS is in order (assuming you've already read it, since you are a patron).

I can't help you beyond this.

[daniel]

Hi,

Someone i was cyber communicating with said that in an objectivist society murder would be permissible because objectivists reject remorse as it is a form of altruism.

This is his argument:

'So if society wasn't concerned with altruism (i.e. if we were all objectivists), we wouldn't be remorseful when we murdered someone, so there'd be no remorse to stop us being ambitious and planning fortunes, so murder wouldn't stop us achieving our selfish ends, so murder wouldn't always be wrong.

So when it comes down to it, in an objectivist society murder is okay, so long as you don't get caught'.

What do others think? What are your counter arguments?

[RationalBiker]

Someone i was cyber communicating with said that in an objectivist society murder would be permissible because objectivists reject remorse as it is a form of altruism.

First, I think the premise that remorse=altruism is a flawed premise. Remorse is an emotion, altruism is a philosophical issue. Apparently your friend did not read much about Objectivism, initiation of force, the nature of man living qua man in a society of other men, etc. It sounds like he's taking one word, selfish, using it in a context that Objectivists do not, and extrapolating a flawed argument from that.

Aside from that, there are plenty of altruists in this existing society who won't confess to murder.

[studentofobjectivism]

Hi,

Someone i was cyber communicating with said that in an objectivist society murder would be permissible because objectivists reject remorse as it is a form of altruism.

This is his argument:

'So if society wasn't concerned with altruism (i.e. if we were all objectivists), we wouldn't be remorseful when we murdered someone, so there'd be no remorse to stop us being ambitious and planning fortunes, so murder wouldn't stop us achieving our selfish ends, so murder wouldn't always be wrong.

So when it comes down to it, in an objectivist society murder is okay, so long as you don't get caught'.

What do others think? What are your counter arguments?

What he presents is not an Objectivist society, but some sort of Nietzschean hedonistic society where the Ubermensch rules. In an Objectivist society murder would be OK only in self-defense - if force was initiated against an individual. Objectivism does not preach altruism - sacrificing others to our own gain - but this is the whim-worshipping society your friend presents.

It sounds like your friend is setting up a straw-man of Objectivism (but hardly even that!).

Edited June 19, 2005 by studentofobjectivism

[daniel]

I argued that that murder can never be in one's interests because it destroys self-esteem and is a rejection of reason.

His response was this:

'the very concept of self-esteem is an evaluative one; you can't define what is moral in terms of self-esteem, becuase morality is prior to self-esteem. Something isn't bad because it destroys my self-esteem, I loose my slef-esteem because I know I've done something bad.

In fact, if the ability to destroy self-esteem were an objective property of murder, and that was what made it wrong then every single person who commited a murder would have their self-esteem destroyed. But this simply is not true; indeed, there are some for whom it would be a boost to their self-esteem, say, gang memebers, for example. We do not percieve the loss of self esteem as something that is 'forced upon' us by a certain action. Instead, we make an evaluative judgement about an action we performed, and if we judge that it was wrong, we then hold ourselves in lower esteem. The loss in self-esteem comes after the moral judgement, not before.'

What are the counter arguments for this?

Edited June 19, 2005 by daniel

[ex_banana-eater]

The counter-argument is that violating the virtues of rationality and justice are not a means to long-term self-esteem. Since they are virtues, every act of disregarding them is a means to self-destruction.

[y_feldblum]

A gang member with self-esteem?

Gang members hold strongly to the faith that they can knock the other guy out, or else if they can't, the other gang members will. That's not self-esteem.

[daniel]

I got a response from the person who thinks objectivism legitmises murder. Here it is:

Okay it destroys self-esteem because it is a violation of rationality. Is rationality therefore the ultimate criterion for chosing moral principles? If so, in what sense is murder irrational? You can't say its irrational because its bad, because then you are making a moral judgement thats prior to rationality. Equally, you can't say it's irrational becuase life is good, because again you are making a value-judgement that is prior to rationality. Your challenge, therefore, is to explain why murder is irrational without making any moral judgements about it.

I don't even know where to begin with him!! He just dosent understand objectivism at all!! Reject morals!!

[JMeganSnow]

Only a person that imagines morality can be divorced from rationality would think to ask such a question as "which comes first". The answer, of course, is that it is bad because it is irrational. The irrational being that which is divorced from reality. Since men must live in reality, and must perceive and understand reality in order to survive, anything that is divorced from or anti-reality is a threat to his life. And since life is the source and measure of values, of good and bad, anything that threatens his life is evil.

[BurgessLau]

Someone i was cyber communicating with said that in an objectivist society murder would be permissible because objectivists reject remorse as it is a form of altruism.

What do you mean by "objectivist"? How does the meaning of that idea differ from the meaning of "Objectivist"?

[BurgessLau]

Only a person that imagines morality can be divorced from rationality would think to ask such a question as "which comes first".

I am not sure that is correct. Does rationality as a virtue have any meaning if the concept of morality hasn't already been established? Isn't this a question of relative place in a hierarchy of objective knowledge?

The answer, of course, is that it is bad because it is irrational.

If you are saying that every murderer is irrational, then I doubt that is true. Steven Mallory attempted to murder Ellsworth Toohey. Does that make Mallory irrational -- or horribly misguided in how to deal with evil ideas in a semi-free society?

The irrational being that which is divorced from reality.

This deserves further discussion. I think the essential nature of irrationality is evasion. (See Peikoff, Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand, pp. 224-226, for discussion of the virtue of rationality versus evasion.)

True, evasion results in ideas, if any, being divorced from reality. But, an innocent error in logic also results in an idea being divorced from reality. Anyone can make an error in logic. That is not a vice, even though it results in a divorce from reality, at least for a particular conclusion.

[DPW]

Okay it destroys self-esteem because it is a violation of rationality. Is rationality therefore the ultimate criterion for chosing moral principles? If so, in what sense is murder irrational? You can't say its irrational because its bad, because then you are making a moral judgement thats prior to rationality. Equally, you can't say it's irrational becuase life is good, because again you are making a value-judgement that is prior to rationality. Your challenge, therefore, is to explain why murder is irrational without making any moral judgements about it.

You should have taken the advice of a previous poster and looked up my posts in a thread where I discussed the basis for concluding that violating the rights of others is not in one's self-interest.

To address the above, yes, Objectivism does state that rationality is the ultimate criterion for choosing moral principles (it is the basic moral principle). Reason, after all, is the criterion for choosing anything. It is reason that tells us that if we choose to embrace life as a goal, we must embrace rationality as the means of achieving that goal.

So what does rationality imply about murder? The same thing it implies for any form of sacrifice: human life doesn't require sacrifice but the exact opposite. It requires the creation, defense, and achievement of values.

[daniel]

Could somone explain how I should counter this:

'How is murder divorced from/anti-reality? What about a murderer who knows he will not caught and will gain great wealth? This murder was not in any way divorced from reality- it was a rationally selfish act based entirely in reality'.

He also writes in response to my point that we can't separate morality and rationalism with this:

'No there is not a separation- the wrongness of the act is based on its irrationality. But you cannot explain its irrationality in terms of it being worng, because then you are arguing in a circle. It is because there is a relationship (morality being based on rationality) that rationality is neccesarily prior to morality'.

What do you think?

Edited June 20, 2005 by daniel

[DPW]

Could somone explain how I should counter this:

'How is murder divorced from/anti-reality? What about a murderer who knows he will not caught and will gain great wealth? This murder was not in any way divorced from reality- it was a rationally selfish act based entirely in reality'. 

He also writes in response to my point that we can't separate morality and rationalism with this:

'No there is not a separation- the wrongness of the act is based on its irrationality. But you cannot explain its irrationality in terms of it being worng, because then you are arguing in a circle. It is because there is a relationship (morality being based on rationality) that rationality is neccesarily prior to morality'.

What do you think?

These points have already been answered for you, by me and by other posters (not to mention Ayn Rand). For instance, that first set of questions was addressed at length in my posts to which you have already been referred twice.

The second point I answered in my last response to you: your opponent is saying that you can't argue, "Murder is immoral because it is irrational," if your reason for claiming it is irrational is that it is immoral. That's true, but as I pointed out, the reason murder is immoral is because it is opposed to the principles of human survival. To claim that murder is in one's self-interest is to claim that it is in one's interest to sacrifice others to oneself. It is to claim that sacrifice is a proper principle of human survival.

So my question for you is this: does human life require sacrifice? If you don't know the answer to that question after having read Rand's work, there's not much else to say.

One addtional comment. You begin your post by saying, "Could somone explain how I should counter this?" Objectivism is not a tool for secondhanders more concerned with winning debate points than understanding reality. Your first concern must always be, what is the truth? Next time you have a confusion, say so.

Don Watkins

[Capitalism Forever]

In an Objectivist society murder would be OK only in self-defense

You mean killing would be OK only in defense of the rights of an innocent individual (possibly oneself).

[daniel]

Only a person that imagines morality can be divorced from rationality would think to ask such a question as "which comes first".  The answer, of course, is that it is bad because it is irrational.  The irrational being that which is divorced from reality.  Since men must live in reality, and must perceive and understand reality in order to survive, anything that is divorced from or anti-reality is a threat to his life.  And since life is the source and measure of values, of good and bad, anything that threatens his life is evil.

In what sense is murder 'divorced from' reality?

[LaVache]

Would this imply that breaking (immoral) laws is unethical? For instance, consider someone who engages in tax evasion - he will also have to spend the rest of his life 'at war with reality', engaged in elaborate rituals in order to cover up his lies. But I would not say this was immoral, if the amount of money he saved justified the inconvenience.

You still need to factor in the chance that you will be prosecuted for violating the immoral law. Yes, I'm sure that if you are going to commit tax evasion you will have a perfectly airtight plan to get away with it, but I'm sure that anyone else that got caught thought that their plan was airtight, too. Even if your part is perfect, I'm sure it would be difficult to hide your money by yourself, and if any part of the chain of deception breaks you are the one that will get screwed.

If Al Capone could find a way to run a criminal empire without leaving enough evidence to encriminate himself, but still got nailed on tax evasion then it can't be as easy as it sounds.

[JMeganSnow]

However, on the individual level, it is quite possible to engage in thievery and prosper.  As long as parasites don’t out-number the hosts, parasitism can be profitable.

How do you define prosperity? It certainly doesn't mesh with the Objectivist definition thereof. How you define and achieve "prosperity" is more important for your long-term happiness and survival than sitting upon a pile of ill-gotten loot.

If you respect others rights for anything other than selfish reasons, you destroy the entire rational basis of rights, which means that really you're saying there IS NO REASON to respect human rights. I predict that eventually you will come to the conclusion (or at least implicitly act upon it) that rights are matters of convenience for the "smooth operation" of society, and that "higher" concerns can override them.

Rights are absolutes. They must be respected as absolutes, and for specific reasons. Any attempt to circumvent this will result in the annihilation of rights.

And the reason why parasitism is not conducive to ANYONE'S survival, including that of the parasite, is contained in Francisco's Money speech in Atlas Shrugged:

"Then the race goes, not to the ablest at production, but to those most ruthless at brutality. When force is the standard, the murderer wins over the pickpocket. And then that society vanishes, in a spread of ruins and slaughter." Could ANYONE imagine that this is in their self-interest?!

[ingok]

This is one thing I have trouble agreeing with.  If I want to rob a bank, knowing that I can get away with it completely free, it's still immoral.  Yeah, I might have to live in secrecy.  But suppose the US congress makes a federal law saying "it's okay for David Kahn to rob a bank."  So I rob the bank and I don't have to live in secrecy or fear of retribution.  It's still immoral.

Yes, it is indeed still immoral. If congress made a federal law saying you could rob a bank, it would still be immoral for you to rob it--the bank has not lost its right to its property, no matter what the federal government says.

Whether you live in fear and secrecy or not is not the sole criterion of your choice whether or not to respect others' rights. Even if you can get away with it totally clean, with no possibility in the world of being caught, it would be rational and selfish to continue respecting that bank's property right. A selfish person deals with others through free trade and mutual benefit, rather than coerced trade and mutual degradation. If you rob a bank, you are hurt as much, if not more, than the bank is. You now have a guilty conscience, because you know you have done something immoral; you now have a pile of money that is not yours, that will bring you no happiness, and that will only remind you of the method by which you got it every time you look at your wallet. If, however, you deal with the bank and receive money from it by mutual consent, you've nothing to worry about. Money is not an end in itself, and a robber does not want to be rich, but only to make others poorer.

Parasitism can never be profitable, because that which is taken from others unearned is only a temporary mirage of actual benefit, which will evaporate into thin air as soon as the host shrugs the piggy-backer off. Physical values, such as paper money, are only the physical manifestations of implicit values. If this physical value has been earned, if it is backed by a true value, then it serves as a value in itself. If little slips of green paper are backed by real values--traded goods--then they are genuine currency, and will bring happiness. Otherwise, they are only slips of little green paper, no more valuable than monopoly money.

Don't take this to mean that I think material objects are only "distortions" of actual truth, temporary placeholders of "higher" values. Let me clarify: unbacked by internal values (happiness, integrity, etc.), physical values are counterfeit values, used to fake value rather than to create it. Unsupported by physical values (money, sex, art, etc.), internal values are daydreams, convictions one holds, but does not support through action (see Ayn Rand's short story, Ideal). Both are one half of a painting, with a crude copy of the other half painted on a canvas and glued on. Together, they form the original image, fitting together so perfectly they do not even leave a crack. Apart, only a fool can pretend he is holding an original, non-ersatz piece of art, and usually, to prevent himself knowing this, he makes sure to remain a fool. This is difficult for anyone to do, even the worst of idiots cannot hoodwink himself for long before he finally realizes his error. They need someone to repaint the missing half of the picture constantly, to keep themselves in ignorance. They become parasites, relying either on producers to make their abstract ideals physical reality, or on philosophers to assign a meaning to their random movements. But this does not work. What the parasite does not know, or does not want to know, is that, as a human being, he must be the artist of both halves of the artwork. Life cannot be faked; the human mind is too powerful to trick itself into, or be tricked into, happiness.

A robber like that in your example relies on others to create his own physical values for him. He has a set of convictions (wanting money, for example) that he is not willing to carry out on his own. He needs to steal the products of others and use them as the other half of his life. It will not take such a person long to discover that stolen jigsaw pieces do not fit together, i. e., stolen money and the desire for wealth are incompatible in any person.

(Afternote: Rational One writes: "It is in you interest to uphold other's rights and support a government that does the same so that your rights have a better chance of being upheld also." This is false, because it is a categorical imperative. Just because you violate someone's rights, doesn't mean that your rights will be violated. Men aren't held together by strings, they do not move each other's limbs like marionettes.

By Categorical Imperative logic, it is wrong to turn left on 31st street, because if everyone did that, there would be a major traffic jam.)

Edited June 22, 2005 by ingok

[JMeganSnow]

I am not sure that is correct. Does rationality as a virtue have any meaning if the concept of morality hasn't already been established? Isn't this a question of relative place in a hierarchy of objective knowledge? 

Pardon me, you're right, I should have said "morality divorced from reason" which would have been a bit better.

True, evasion results in ideas, if any, being divorced from reality. But, an innocent error in logic also results in an idea being divorced from reality. Anyone can make an error in logic. That is not a vice, even though it results in a divorce from reality, at least for a particular conclusion.

If an idea is based on flawed reasoning, does that then make it rational? I admit that there is a difference between irrationality-by-accident and irrationality-by-moral-default. The first one is correctable, but it is no less irrational.

[JMeganSnow]

In what sense is murder 'divorced from' reality?

Murder is the sum total of morality? The only question ethics needs to answer is, "should I murder someone or not?!"

I said that morality cannot be divorced from rationality. (I should have said it can't be divorced from reason, but anyway). Asking this question replaces an entire conceptual field (morality) with one teeny tiny particular it happens to deal with (murder). It is anti-conceptual in the extreme.

The reason why murder is irrational is because the source of morality is values. Values are only possible to a creature faced with a fundamental alternative, that being: existence or non-existence, life or death. Man's life is the standard of value.

In asking a question about morality, you are not just asking "should I be allowed murder someone?" but "should ANYONE be allowed to murder someone?" If you answer this question in the affirmative, you are accepting the destruction of life as a valid method for men to live. Applied consistently, it would mean the institutionalization of a war of "all against all", the destruction of civilization, of values, and of man's ability to live on earth.

Could you live if any random stranger could come up and murder you for any reason or no reason? Every human being on the planet would be a deadly threat; your only choice would be to hide and slaughter indiscriminately anyone you came across, striving to keep your own life while depriving them of theirs, while they struggle to do the same. Wouldn't leave much time for the business of creating food, shelter, clothing, medicine, and all the OTHER things you need to live, all of which you would have to create ALONE, BY YOURSELF, knowing that any achievement you happened to make would increase your threat; drawing hordes of looting savages that seek to benefit at the price of your destruction, all of which would have to be slaughtered.

Imagine, instead, living among men who respect, as an absolute, the principle of rights. Other men are no threat to you, allowing you to live in the open, unafraid, and every bit of new knowledge they create improves the condition of your life, extends the sum of your years.

The destroyers of morality now would say something like, "but we don't have to go to extremes! I was only asking whether I should murder this PARTICULAR man, not whether everyone should murder each other!" That is how principles operate. A SINGLE breach brings the entire edifice crashing down. If you violate principles, you are not choosing some half-corrupt middle-of-the-road where survival is sort of possible, for a while, you are choosing a destruction, saved ONLY by the forebearance and respect of other men . . . a respect you have refused to grant them.

Why shouldn't you murder someone? Do you want to live? Ultimately, these are the same question. Reason is man's means of survival. Anything that clashes with that survival is anti-reason, is irrational.

[The Guru Kid]

I pretty much came up with a similar reasoning behind that but i always concluded that even though murder should be illegal, it isn't immoral.

Your post made it clearer as to why it's also immoral (becuase it ultimately threatens your own life).

Thanks

Edited June 26, 2005 by The Guru Kid

[nimble]

Hi,

Someone i was cyber communicating with said that in an objectivist society murder would be permissible because objectivists reject remorse as it is a form of altruism.

This is his argument:

'So if society wasn't concerned with altruism (i.e. if we were all objectivists), we wouldn't be remorseful when we murdered someone, so there'd be no remorse to stop us being ambitious and planning fortunes, so murder wouldn't stop us achieving our selfish ends, so murder wouldn't always be wrong.

So when it comes down to it, in an objectivist society murder is okay, so long as you don't get caught'.

What do others think? What are your counter arguments?

That has to be the dumbest thing I have ever read. He argued that murdering is okay if the goal is wealth? I wouldn't even bother arguing with a moron like this; your best bet is to just leave him alone.

You cannot murder someone because the non aggression axiom dictates that you cannot. His right to life, supercedes whatever whim a person might have to kill him. I do not see what selfishness or altruism have to do with this problem.

[BurgessLau]

You cannot murder someone because the non aggression axiom dictates that you cannot. His right to life, supercedes whatever whim a person might have to kill him. I do not see what selfishness or altruism have to do with this problem.

The libertarian view, which you are revealing here, is that the non-aggression principle is an "axiom" of ethics or politics or both. The Objectivist view, which you reject, is that politics stands on ethics and ethics stands on metaphysics and epistemology, all in a hierarchy of logically related concepts and principles.

The decision to murder or not depends on context, not contextless "axioms" that "dictate" behavior. In a civilized society, murder is wrong because it is not in the long-term, rational self-interest ("selfishness") of traders living in society (which is where the idea of "rights" comes from), but in uncivilized times or in emergency situations, murder may be necessary to save one's own life.

[DavidOdden]

That has to be the dumbest thing I have ever read. He argued that murdering is okay if the goal is wealth? I wouldn't even bother arguing with a moron like this; your best bet is to just leave him alone.

Maybe, but another possibility is that he is mistaken; or even, looking for a rational person who actually understands Objectivism. You advanced the patently false idea that non-aggression is an axiom, but being a generous guy, I don't automatically assume that you are a moron who should be banned from civilized society. If you take away the spurious axiom, can you solve the Prudent Predator problem? Maybe "that guy" was posing a challenge, to see if you or someone could actually refute the argument. In which case, you've effectively declared that the argument is not refutable, and that your belief to the contrary (I am assuming that you don't believe that murder is moral) is based purely on faith, and not reason.