Rationality and Morality Under Force

[ReasonFirst]

Ok so I read a quote on ARL that force "paralyzes a man's judgment" and "renders him morally impotent."  So I was wondering if a VICTIM of force can be properly judged as irrational and therefore immoral in a specific situation and also in general.

Let's say that someone is enslaved by force but that the victim doesn't have to worry about being killed, only enslaved (and maybe eventually dying from hard labor).  Freedom is a huge value of his.  And let's say the master tells the slave he will set the slave free if the slave takes an unloaded gun, points it at his own head, and pulls the trigger.  Let's also say the slave is allowed to check to see if it is loaded or not.  The slave would never partake in such an activity if he was free to exercise his own judgment.  Can we judge the slave as irrational and therefore immoral if he cannot make a decision or if he refuses?  Because by not making a decision or refusing, he is not pursuing his freedom which is a huge rational value.  Can we say that his judgment is too paralyzed for us to hold him to certain standards of rationality?  Although, the situation is bizarre and I think that could even be evidence in favor of not trusting the master.

And in general, can a person be judged as irrational or immoral if they choose not to pursue a value if it means doing something that goes against their better judgment while they are under threat of force?

Edited July 18, 2023 by ReasonFirst

[DavidOdden]

A rational man acts according to his nature, which means that he survives by reason. An irrational man does not live by reason: he may behave randomly, in exact opposition to reason, or according to emotion. We have a moral code which we apply to our choices that says what exactly that entails, therefore I know that it would be immoral for me to blow out my brains right now since life is great (that’s a fact about the current context, not the idea of blowing out one’s brains qua absolute). We can apply that moral code to the evaluation of others, and conclude that Putin is, by nature, immoral (not just once, but as a general fact of his character).

I am currently under irrational government compulsion to hand over part of my wealth to the government robbers (multiple governments!). I would not do this if I had a free choice, however, the government threatens me with force if I do not comply. A person’s response to force is by nature outside of the scope of reason – force is the denial of reason. Me paying taxes is not “rational”, it is the best I can come up with in light of reality and my hierarchy of values.

You have drawn a dichotomy between moral and immoral, but there is actually a trichotomy. The actions that another takes when under compulsion cannot be morally evaluated. The slave’s choices are outside the scope of moral evaluation, precisely because of the contradiction created by force. A further problem with your scenario, and with many hypothetical moral philosophy scenarios, is that it isn’t epistemologically consistent, instead it flits between the perspective of the individual and an observer. As an observer, we do not know the slave’s hierarchy of values – his actions cannot be morally evaluated. Evaluating the choices of others in such an epistemologically-impoverished circumstances is not reasonable, I might even say irrational, but I won’t.

The more interesting question is, what would you do in this circumstance, and why? I pay my taxes because even though I value freedom, I also value my life, and I recognize that knuckling under to the demands of government is necessary in order for me to live my life qua me (as opposed to living off the grid in the Sahara desert, where the weather sucks). I recognize that surviving purely by reason is impossible, but I have discovered that living is still possible. That means that the choice to exist, the primary choice, still remains at the very top of my hierarchy of values.

Your scenario adds a strange complication, that the master will free the slave if he engages in a silly symbolic act that he would never otherwise engage in. Equally “applicable” would be the mandate to drink a cup of kombucha in order to gain freedom. At this point, I am starting to think that the slave is not simply “failing to act purely by reason”, I think he is positively insane, in refusing to rectify his enslavement because he has been the victim of force. Change the scenario just a little: a person is subject to improper government compulsion, and he is given the choice of replacing the existing dictatorship with a less-cruel but still not perfectly rational government which still uses improper force. He would ordinarily not choose an irrational government which employs improper force. Since my hierarchy of values is different from that of the slave whose highest value is to not be the victim of force, I have a hard time evaluating this guy.

Since one’s hierarchy of values is chosen, I would conjecture that the person is indeed irrational because he bought into a contradictory philosophy which makes “be free from compulsion” be his primary choice. I would try to get the guy to read Galt’s Speech, to see if that might straighten out his crazy hierarchy of values.

 

[InfraBeat]

3 hours ago, DavidOdden said:

drink a cup of kombucha in order to gain freedom

 I wouldn't do it. Kombucha is too disgusting.

Edited July 18, 2023 by InfraBeat

[Leonid]

Morality is a code of values accepted by choice. Where is no choice there is no morality. All actions which are performed under duress, use of force or threat of it therefore beyond the realm of morality.

[ReasonFirst]

@DavidOdden Ok so I think we are all in agreement that the actions of the slave cannot be morally judged.  Now I would like to turn all attention to whether or not the slave can still be judged as irrational.  You mentioned "what would you do in the situation?"  I would never play with a deadly weapon in real life because I can only be contextually certain that it is safe.  I can never be absolutely certain that it is safe.  I would say that being in such circumstances and then being mandated to do something I would never do with a weapon in order to gain freedom is enough to be uncertain about the what the master's true intentions are and even about the safety of the weapon he gives me to do the act.  So I would not do it.  And that's why I would also not say that the kombucha scenario is equally applicable.  One scenario involves playing with a deadly weapon and the other involves having a drink.  Is it irrational of me to come to this conclusion?

Edited July 23, 2023 by ReasonFirst

[DavidOdden]

I’m not sure, because I don’t entirely understand your reasoning. You would not play with a deadly weapon because you can only be contextually certain that it is safe, but likewise you should not be in the presence of a deadly weapon for the same reason, and you should not play with a carving knife or a pit bull for the same reason. Never drive.

You have abandoned reason in a specific and important way. It is impossible to exist, while being absolutely free of all risk (to life, limb or property, in that order). You therefore refuse to live (an active process, not just the absence of death) because you want to live, a contradiction. This is the epitome of irrationality, or, unawareness. The problem with your model is that you assign an infinite cost to an action when actually the risk is finite, and you don’t consider the associated benefit.

Let’s rephrase the scenario a bit. You earn a piece of gold for digging a ditch, and you don’t have to spend it on immediate survival, so you consider options for increasing your wealth – investment. You might put it under your mattress, or you could put it in a low-yield interest-bearing insured account, or a medium-yield uninsured mutual fund, or a wildly risky venture in cold fusion. I vote in favor of the middle two options. It is irrational to be paralyzed by a negligible risk, just as it is irrational to ignore a high risk. I’ve described the extent of my knowledge of investment instruments, which determines I will do. I am only contextually (quasi-)certain that the FDIC will guarantee my savings accounts, but I am contextually quite certain that stuffing money under the mattress is a very irrational economic plan.

I accept that you may be contextually ignorant of the mechanics of a given deadly weapon. I think I could inspect a revolver and determine that it is not loaded, and I know enough about physics to know that a demon won’t suddenly cause the revolver to be loaded. I think I am ignorant enough about the workings of an electric car that I would never ever ever consider doing any repairs on one myself. It would be irrational for me to work on an electric car, and it would be irrational for the local Toyota Zero mechanic to refuse to work on one for fear of being electrocuted.

If you have a concrete, articulable reason for believing that you could be harmed by some action, then it is necessary to compare risks and benefits. It is standard irrational gun safety hyperbole to declare that you should never … something with a weapon. A semi-automatic pistol is complicated enough that you have, or should have, conceptual knowledge of great danger. Even though a revolver has a more “you can see everything” design, you still may not know how to uncock the hammer (if necessary, and how would you know?), and open the cylinder. It’s irrational to declare a gun to be an absolute threat, but it may be contextually rational to find the gun to be very risky. Then the next question is, can you mitigate the risk (don’t point it at your head! point it at the slaver’s head!), and is your freedom worth some risk? As far as I know, kombucha is a deadly poison, and in my knowledge context, I’m unwilling to gamble with my life by taking a drink. The essence of rationality is integrating what you know with logic. Your fear of guns should not be based on what you don’t know about guns, it should be based on what you do know about guns, which includes awareness of your ignorance important facts. Like the concept "one in the chamber".

You are also correct that in this ferkakte scenario that you should expect something devious from the slaver who set up this ethics trap in the first place.

[InfraBeat]

On 7/19/2023 at 5:46 AM, Leonid said:

Where is no choice there is no morality. All actions which are performed under duress, use of force or threat of it therefore beyond the realm of morality.

One may still have choices under duress or threat.

Edited July 24, 2023 by InfraBeat

[ReasonFirst]

 

@DavidOdden

Quote

It is impossible to exist, while being absolutely free of all risk (to life, limb or property, in that order).

I agree with this completely.  Whenever it comes to safety, the best we can be is contextually certain of safety in whatever situation we are in.  But this is also why I would say we should not "test" our contextual certainty of safety unnecessarily.  If I play with a deadly weapon that I am contextually certain is safe, that would be an unnecessary action that could have devastating consequences if something goes wrong.  It would be different from getting in a car or flying in an airplane even though the best I can be is contextually certain of safety in those situations as well because those actions I take to pursue my values.  So it's not that I forgot that existence unavoidably comes with some finite risk, I just want to take rational risks, which exclude playing with weapons.  Maybe I am thinking of it as an unnecessary negligible risk that could come with an infinite cost (my life).

I think that may be the reasoning behind the gun safety hyperbole.  It's based on the very very general fact that humans can only be contextually certain of safety and humans are fallible, so deadly weapons shouldn't be played with.  It is almost like a principal.  If someone wants to play with something they should play with toys.  I agree with you that this should not be interpreted to mean that guns are an "absolute threat."

And in a situation in which I am enslaved through force and I am presented with a bizarre choice to gain my freedom which involves a deadly weapon, I think I would be too suspicious that something is wrong to go through with it.  Like you stated, it could be "contextually rational to find the gun to be very risky."  I am sure that there are plenty of people who would go through with it though.  I just do not think I would.  I also didn't know kombucha was poisonous, I thought it was just a normal drink.

Edited July 24, 2023 by ReasonFirst