Life and self-ownership

Mark Humphrey “I don’t want to precipitate trench warfare with devoted Rothbardians, but I strongly suspect that Rothbard owed his insight about “life as the standard of moral value” to Ayn Rand. I can’t prove this, of course. Sadly, in “The Ethics of Liberty”, (published in the early Eighties) Rothbard chose to, in a sense, blacklist Rand by claiming that NO ONE, other than himself, in the libertarian movement was working to develope a system of rationally defensible ethics. (Maybe Rothbard meant “at the moment I am writing this statement”.)”

Björn That life is an axiomatic value and functions “as the standard of moral value” in an ethical system, Rothbard could, alternatively for example, have gotten this insight from Mises himself through analyzing his statement in his book, “Human Action”, page 11:

“We may say that action is the manifestation of a man’s will.”

http://mises.org/humanaction/chap1sec1.asp
I am not saying that Rothbard did get his insight from Mises; I am only saying that it was possible. Surely, many other possibilities exist which we do not know anything about.

Mark Humphrey “It has been awhile since I’ve read Hoppe, and Rothbard; but I suspect Hoppe’s reasoning goes: either we all own ourselves, or everyone owns everyone else. Since the first proposition is clearly more defensible than the latter absurd proposition, one can affirm self ownership as valid. But if this is the argument, it fails. For that argument assumes that which it sets out to prove, namely that an ethical concept, “ownership”, exists. But on this basis, ownership remains unproven, so that one could just as well assert: “no one owns anything, and anything goes.””

Björn Self-ownership is a natural fact, since a man in his very nature controls his own mind and body (natural disposition), that is, he is a natural self-owner of his own will and person (having a free will) and if this was not true, neither could he effectively control any property and, therefore, not own it. In other words; “nothing could control and own something”.

Naturally, praxeology the science of human action, by itself logically confirms the natural fact of self-ownership, since praxeology is based upon “the acting man consciously intending to improve his own satisfaction” and I quote from answers.com:

“From praxeology Mises derived the idea that every conscious action is intended to improve a person’s satisfaction. He was careful to stress that praxeology is not concerned with the individual’s definition of end satisfaction, just the way he sought that satisfaction. The way in which a person will increase his satisfaction is by removing a source of dissatisfaction. As the future is uncertain so every action is speculative.

An acting man is defined as one capable of logical thought — to be otherwise would be to make one a mere creature who simply reacts to stimuli by instinct. Similarly an acting man must have a source of dissatisfaction which he believes capable of removing, otherwise he cannot act.
Another conclusion that Mises reached was that decisions are made on an ordinal basis. That is, it is impossible to carry out more than one action at once, the conscious mind being only capable of one decision at a time — even if those decisions can be made in rapid order. Thus man will act to remove the most pressing source of dissatisfaction first and then move to the next most pressing source of dissatisfaction.

As a person satisfies his first most important goal and after that his second most important goal then his second most important goal is always less important than his first most important goal. Thus, for every further goal reached, his satisfaction, or utility, is lessened from the preceding goal. This is the rule of diminishing marginal utility.

In human society many actions will be trading activities where one person regards a possession of another person as more desirable than one of his own possessions, and the other person has a similar higher regard for his colleague’s possession than he does for his own. This subject of praxeology is known as catallactics, and is the more commonly accepted realm of economics.”

http://www.answers.com/Praxeology?gwp=11&ver=2.0.1.458&method=3

Further:

The Ethics of Liberty, page 45:

Footnote:

“[1]Professor George Mavrodes, of the department of philosophy of the University of Michigan, objects that there is another logical alternative: namely, “that no one owns anybody, either himself or anyone else, nor any share of anybody.” However, since ownership signifies range of control, this would mean that no one would be able to do anything, and the human race would quickly vanish.”

http://mises.org/rothbard/ethics/eight.asp

Or in my own words:

Why must anybody own anything?

In accordance with our objective test to find out if something is a condition for something else, we grasp a state of things where the following principle is none existent anywhere and at all:

“The existence of property rights”:

In a world without any property rights nobody would be able to do anything, since nobody has the right to control anything. Not even themselves (see below about property rights in your own person).

This question is not only a contradiction it is also silly. You ask a question which means that you control yourselves (natural disposition), that is owning yourself (see below the excellent writing of Hans-Hermann Hoppe). The other contradiction is that if nobody would own anything, nobody would be able to hinder anyone to own anything either since they would otherwise have an invalid control (having the disposition to) of everyone else, that is having an invalid ownership to everybody else (see below about valid property rights in your own person).

Ownership itself is, therefore, an objective condition for the preservation of human life.

Please read some of Hans-Hermann Hoppe´s excellent writing from the book “The Ethics and Economics of Private Property”:

http://mises.org/etexts/hoppe5.pdf

And to:

ON THE ULTIMATE JUSTIFICATION OF THE ETHICS OF PRIVATE PROPERTY:

http://www.hanshoppe.com/publications/econ-ethics-10.pdf

Björn Lundahl

Murray Rothbard, “Fundamentals of human action” (praxeology)

An axiomatic Justice

In the political debate all political parties proposes some different ends (values or goals).

These ends or, alternatively, values are subjective such as “building more motorways”, “women’s liberation”, “social equality”, “social security”, “prosperity”, “making America great again”, “combating inflation”, “joining the EU” etc.

To accomplish those goals there are also debates on how to accomplish those goals (debates about the means). The means are almost always subjective i.e. the ends can be accomplished in different ways.

To accomplish an axiomatic Justice I have chosen, in my essay “Normative principles”, life as a value as an end by itself.

I have also shown that this end “life as a value” or alternatively, human life, is preserved objectively by the mean “that no man shall have the right to use physical violence and theft”.

As this objective mean preserves an axiomatic value and as this mean is derived from an axiomatic value, the whole system is an axiomatic system.

The final result is: “an axiomatic end (human life) is preserved by an axiomatic mean”.

As we cannot, logically, deny life, as long as we chose living, we cannot either, logically deny its axiomatic condition i.e. its axiomatic mean.

Björn Lundahl
Göteborg, Sweden

Thank you very much!

Björn Lundahl

By the end Prohibition the savages had control of the large cities but only exercised their life style in specific areas of the cities that were avoidable by most of the civilized people. This raised the cost of city life but not the death rate of people who avoided the downtown areas at night and stayed out of bars and taverns.

The Big War created the Great American Dream of a house in the country and a job in the city. The Eisenhower Highway System made the dream a reality.

The Civil Rights Act of ’64 destroyed the public school systems in most large cities. The rich people put their children into private schools and the middle class escaped to the suburbs.

In this century the cities are unfit for people with children. The poor people, the retired people, and the single people are moving into/staying in the cities and the shrinking middle class owns the suburbs. The joke is that for the school age population, the cities are safer than the suburbs.

I’d like to think that you are really trying to figure these things out and promote discussion, but you’re quickly heading towards simply being ignored as a troll.

And since critical thinking begins with questioning your assumptions, you need to step back and, in this case, ask yourself what your assumptions are about concepts like good, evil, human nature, liberty, property, society, the state, money, etc, as they are the foundation upon which the Austrian School of Economics is built. And insofar as your assumptions about such things are un- or ill-defined (i.e., muddleheaded), it behooves you to define them so that you can examine them — i.e., think critically about them — vis-a-vis the world as it presents itself and others who do the same. In this way, instead of potshots about snuffing children’s bad genes, you can level your intellectual firearms at a legitimate target and pull the trigger in a constructive manner.

Granted, this high standard is rarely met even here, but such is the nature of the Austrian School and of libertarianism (not to be confused with the politics of the Libertarian Party) that both can be examined quite literally on principle, such that if one doesn’t agree with this or that one and/or the conclusion(s) drawn from it, we can at least understand why, with the possibility of being persuaded accordingly.

That, to me, is the “sensible thinking position.”

At least please try to enlighten a retard in a few lines of simple small words what a sensible thinking position is?

But thanks for continually reminding us that there’s no substitute for critical thinking.

All I can surmise it if society is going to be wonderfully better off if we were all Libertarians then (in Libertopia) why not inspect children from birth to detect signs of either aggression (future warmongers and criminals) or dependency (future dole bludgers, Socialist and all-round slackers) and snuff their bad genes ASAP? Problem solved.

Libertarianism needs too the support of an amount of people in society that is great enough to be powerful.

The difference is not that.

The difference is that Libertarianism is based on ultimate principles of justice and economics.

Not because of the reason that I have said so, but of the reason that Libertarian ethics and economics (Austrian economics) are based on logically true valid principles.

Or as Hans-Hermann Hoppe puts it in his book “The Economics and Ethics of Private Property”, page 234 and 235:

“In the present situation of a world-wide crisis of governmental legitimacy, of the collapse of East Bloc Socialism and enduring stagnation of the Western Welfare States, the chance for Austrian rationalism to fill the philosophical vacuum that has appeared with the retreat of positivism and to become the paradigm of the future is as good or better than ever. Now as before it requires moral courage as much as intellectual integrity to propound the Austrian social theory – the opposing statist battalions still represent a formidable majority and are in control of a far larger share of resources. Yet with the total breakdown of socialism and the concept of social ownership staring everyone in the face, the antithetical Austrian theory of private property, free markets and laissez faire cannot but gain attractiveness and win support. Austrians have reason to believe, then, that the time has come when they may succeed in bringing about a fundamental change in public opinion, by reclaiming ethics and economics from the hands of the positivists and the engineering powerful and restoring public recognition of private property rights and free markets based on such rights as ultimate, absolute principles of ethics and economics”.

Björn Lundahl
Göteborg, Sweden

A pure free market is based upon the axiomatic principle “that no man or group of men may aggress against the person or property of anyone else”.
This is the very principle which the courts and the legal system should follow.

How do we know that this principle is an axiomatic principle?

I quote from the book “For a New Liberty”, written by Murray Rothbard, page 45:

“THE CENTRAL THRUST of libertarian thought, then, is to oppose any and all aggression against the property rights of individuals in their own persons and in the material objects they have voluntarily acquired. While individual and gangs of criminals are of course opposed, there is nothing unique here to the libertarian creed, since almost all persons and schools of thought oppose the exercise of random violence against persons and property”.

http://mises.org/rothbard/newliberty3.asp

So, generally, all persons and schools of thought oppose the exercise of random violence against persons and property.

Above statement is an answer why the principle is an axiomatic one. But this is not the only reason. There are rational ones as well.

Life as a value is an axiomatic value that no one in a debate logically can deny as this value is the very condition for the debate and the participators existence.

I quote from the book “The Ethics of Liberty”, written by Murray Rothbard, page 29:

“It may well be asked why life should be an objective ultimate value, why man should opt for life (in duration and quality). In reply; we may note that a proposition rises to the status of an axiom when he who denies it may be shown to be using it in the very course of the supposed refutation. Now, any person participating in any sort of discussion, including one on values, is, by virtue of so participating, alive and affirming life. For if he were really opposed to life, he would have no business in such a discussion, indeed he would have no business continuing to be alive. Hence, the supposed opponent of life is really affirming it in the very process of his discussion, and hence the preservation and furtherance of one’s life takes on the stature of an incontestable axiom”.

http://mises.org/rothbard/ethics/six.asp

This is also confirmed with Ludwig von Mises statement in his book, “Human Action”, page 11:

“We may say that action is the manifestation of a man’s will.”

http://mises.org/humanaction/chap1sec1.asp

Which principles are an objective condition for preserving the human race and human life?

To objective examine if something is a condition for something else, we have to mentally grasp a state of things, where the supposed condition doesn’t exist anywhere and at all.

For example, if we suppose that the existence of oxygen is a condition for the preservation of the human race, we grasp a state of things, where oxygen doesn’t exist anywhere on earth. If we would let some oxygen exist somewhere on earth, then we couldn’t make a valid conclusion. We wouldn’t know if oxygen were a condition for preserving human life. To make a valid conclusion we have to grasp where oxygen doesn’t exist anywhere and at all. Under this condition we can, naturally, conclude that no human life would exist. We can, because of this reason conclude that oxygen is a condition for the preservation of the human race. We can also conclude that when we objectively examined as we just did, if oxygen was a condition for preserving human life, we would be bound to take under consideration the whole reality and not only some parts of it. We wouldn’t let oxygen exist somewhere on earth, because if we had done so, we wouldn’t have grasped the effects, under consideration, to the whole situation (the whole reality), and our conclusion would therefore have been invalid.

We can only make one choice, either we take under consideration some parts of reality or we take under consideration the whole reality. Reason and logic tell us that if we take under consideration the whole reality, this will reflect the truth, because we can’t consider anything more absolute and perfect. This procedure is an axiomatic procedure.

Is “the principle of physical violence” a condition for the preservation of the human race?

To examine this principle under consideration of what has already been said about the procedure of finding out conditions, we have to grasp a state of things where the principle of none physical violence doesn’t exist anywhere and at all. If we let some people live by the principle of none violence, a procedure which we have just discarded, then we wouldn’t make a valid conclusion. Logically we are bound to let all people live by the principle of physical violence. Because of this fact the human race and life would immediately exterminate.

We can therefore conclude “that the principle of physical violence” is a condition for the preservation of human extermination and that “the principle of none physical violence” is the condition for human preservation.

We can also conclude, that human life wouldn’t exist, if the principle of “not to have the right to use threat of physical violence” didn’t exist.

If we grasp a state of things where this principle doesn’t exist, anywhere and at all, everyone would be threatening everyone else. Nobody would be able to live and fulfil their needs and dreams. Action to preserve ones life would be an impossible mission.

Not anybody would dare to act because if this anybody did, someone would always be threatening this anybody. A perfect static situation would occur and the human race would immediately exterminate.

Our conclusion will therefore be that “the principle of threat of physical violence” is a condition for the human extermination, and “the principle of none threat of physical violence”, is a condition for the preservation of human life.

As life is an axiomatic value which we want to preserve, it is also logically true that we axiomatically want to preserve the principle which is a condition for life, namely “the principle of none physical violence (including not to have the right to use threat of physical violence)”.

Let us now examine if “the right to steal” is a condition of the preservation of human life.

If we want to define what objective theft is, we will have to define property rights, based on an axiomatic Justice.

If we consider what has already been said in this document, we can also understand that an axiomatic Justice is those principles which are a condition for the preservation of the human race. Unjust are those principles which are a condition for the preservation of the human extermination.

Just property rights are, therefore, those property rights which are conditions for the preservation human life. Unjust are those property rights which are conditions for the preservation of human extermination.

In order to survive, man cannot live alone in an environment which is free from physical violence. To survive and prosper man has to use his reason and energy to transform nature into useful things. Man lives and prospers because he is a creative animal.

We can therefore conclude that creation in itself is a condition for the preservation of the human race.

We can therefore conclude that Just property rights are those rights which preserve man’s creative efforts.

In order to define these property rights we will have to grasp a state of things when man, for the first time, enters this world of ours. This because we want to define original property rights based on Justice. In order to define property rights based on Justice, we don’t want either to be deluded by existing potential unjust property rights. Only, in a state of things where no man, yet, has owned anything, we don’t take the risk of being deluded.

When the first man, for example, broke a branch and made himself a bow, the title of property of this creation was also his. Why does the title of the property (the bow) belong to this man? Because man is a purposeful agent and if man doesn’t own his original creation and the results of his actions, he won’t act.

Let us examine if the last statement is objective and true.

We examine and grasp a state of things, in accordance with the mentioned procedure to examine objectively if something is a condition for something else, through not letting the examined principle be existent anywhere at all.

We grasp a state of things where the following principle is none existent anywhere at all: “the originators right to the objects which he through action, has created”. Everyone would be stealing anyone’s creation and the human race would immediately exterminate.

This proves that man is a purposeful agent and when his motivation exterminates, he stops acting at once.

This is also the objective reason why theft is a condition for the preservation of human extermination, and that the principle of none theft, the originators creation in accordance with the above reasoning, is the condition for the preservation of human life.

Let us now define Justly owned property rights to land.

Man doesn’t create land but he acts and creates on, in and out of land.

Also here we examine a state of things when man for the first time, enters this world. When, then, the first man enters the untouched land, and creates by action on or in or out of land, then this part of the land which he has now touched, belongs to him. Why the first man? If the first man doesn’t have the property right to this part of the land, nor does individual number two, three, four, five etc have the right to the land, and while they are waiting for the last man who hasn’t yet entered this world, man will quickly perish.

If we grasp a state of things, where the following principle is none existent anywhere and at all (this objective test is, of course, in line with our reasoning about such a procedure for finding out a condition for something else):

“When someone creates by action on or out of land, then this part which he has now touched belongs to him”.

This would mean that everyone would be stealing anyone’s Justly owned land, that is as soon as someone starts creating by action on or in or out of land, someone else would have the right to the land in question and the human race would immediately exterminate.

We can conclude that the condition for the extermination of the human race is to preserve the principle “the right to steal the land which the first man has touched and created on or in or out”. Our conclusion will also therefore only be that the condition for the preservation of the human race is that no man ever should have such a right.

Why must anybody own anything?

In accordance with our objective test to find out if something is a condition for something else, we grasp a state of things where the following principle is none existent anywhere and at all:

“Everybody owns themselves and their Justly owned property rights”.

Nobody would be able to do anything, since nobody has the right to control anything. Not even themselves (see below about property rights in your own person).

This question is not only a contradiction it is also silly. You ask a question which means that you control yourselves (natural disposition), that is owning yourself (see below the excellent writing of Hans-Hermann Hoppe). The other contradiction is that if nobody would own anything, nobody would be able to hinder anyone to own anything either since they would otherwise have an invalid control (having the disposition to) of everyone else, that is having an invalid ownership to everybody else (see below about valid property rights in your own person).

Ownership itself is, therefore, an objective condition for the preservation of human life.

Now, then, we haven’t ended our definition of Justly owned property rights until we have analyzed the right to make contracts. We will have to examine the right to make contracts, because, sooner or later the owners of Justly owned property will trade with each other. Sooner or later disputes will occur among the trading partners and then, we will have to know, the rights the trading partners have to the property and which the dispute among them is all about.

Some economist argues that the Justification for the right to make contracts is that the right promotes economic prosperity.

It is true that most of us want economic prosperity, but this is not an axiomatic Justification for the right o make contracts. “Economic prosperity” is not an axiomatic value. As we want to be objective, this argument is not good enough.

Some individuals argue that trading partners have an “agreement” and this is the reason why contracts should be legally binding. Why should such an agreement be legally binding if one of the partners wants to change his mind? Why shouldn’t we respect such a change of man’s will? Why should an earlier manifestation of a man’s will be considered proper and Just and a later manifestation of a changed will be regarded as improper and unjust? Where is the objective Justification? Where is the logical point of view? To argue that the trading partners “knew what they got into and that is why “agreements” should be legally binding”, is, of course, nonsense. It only proves that agreements are artificial constructions which haven’t anything to do with axiomatic principles founded in the nature of things.

The Justification for binding contracts is not that they are “agreements or for that reason are contracts”, but for the reason that we can derive, because of them, Justly owned property titles. “The right to make contracts” is not a right in itself which can objectively be defended as such, but is an expression which symbolizes the interpretations to derive Justly owned property rights and if theft has been done or not.
This is the title transfer theory of contracts, see also Murray Rothbard´s excellent book “The Ethics of Liberty”, chapter 19:
http://mises.org/rothbard/ethics/nineteen.asp

On what base can this interpretation be related to contracts and Justly owned property titles? This we can conclude because of the reason that contracts only confirm exchange of original Just titles to property (in accordance with above definitions of original Just titles to property), that is the transferring of Just property titles between the trading partners.

The reason that a property title will be transferred from one person to another is that the original property owner has renounced his Justly owned property title to be transferred to another person, and we can only, because of this, make the interpretation that the property title has been transferred. In other words, it is the renunciation of the Justly owned property title in itself, which is the very cause to the ending of the original property owner’s title to the property and the transferring of the title to the new owner, which the original property owner has renounced his property title to.

Logic and reason tells us what has been renounced and transferred, in fact, also is renounced and transferred. For what has been done cannot be undone.

Logically a man cannot renounce his right to self-ownership, since a man in his very nature controls his own mind and body (natural disposition), that is, he is a natural self-owner of his own will and person (having a free will) and he will still be so even if he has “tried” o renounce his natural self-ownership to another person. He cannot renounce something which is a biological and physical fact of his very own life and which will never, as long as he lives, leave him.

In other words, we cannot interpret with the help of reason that the supposed slave’s natural self-ownership has been transferred to another person which the supposed slave has tried to renounce his self-ownership to.

We can therefore conclude that this fact of natural self-ownership, always, logically, neutralizes every attempt to renounce it.

Another logical confirmation of this fact is that when we in this document concluded that none physical violence and none theft preserves human life, we wouldn’t make such a conclusion if we didn’t control our minds and bodies. We wouldn’t be able to make such a conclusion, since we wouldn’t control ourselves and either would life exist, in a state of things, when everyone had the legal right to fully use his self-ownership, that is, in other words, in a state of things where physical violence and theft is none existent at all.

In regard to what has now been said we can conclude that it is objectively true that every man is a Just property owner in his own right. Because of this, slave contracts should not be legally binding, as their existence is only a” legalization” of physical violence. If we would neglect this fact, we would violate the principle of self-ownership and be using physical violence and also, because of this, violating the condition for the preservation of human life.

It is true that the possibility to make contracts and to trade is the very foundation for specialization and spurs creative processes which accounts for a very large part of man’s creative efforts. To “legally” hinder the enforcement of contracts and therefore also trade, would not only mean extreme poverty, but also death to most individuals on earth.

The enforcement of contracts, in accordance with our definition, we can conclude, is the condition for preserving these creative processes among individuals. Other definitions of contracts, which are only some sorts of agreements, (really, only different grades of slave contracts) should not, as have been pointed out, be legally binding. These illegitimate contracts include only those destructive seeds that violates the condition for the preservation of the human race, namely the “principle of none physical violence and none theft”, and because of this fact alone, they don’t include those productive processes which account for a very large part of man’s creative efforts.

We have now ended our definition of Justly owned property rights.

We have established that human life is preserved by the condition “that no man shall have the right to use physical violence and theft”.

Our conclusion will therefore be that the principle “that no man shall have the right to use physical violence and theft” is synonymous with our definition “that no man shall have the right to violate the rightful ownership in person and property”.

We can establish that the absolute and perfect condition for the human extermination is the none existence of the principle “that no man shall have the right to violate the rightful ownership in person and property”, and we can also conclude that the absolute and perfect condition to preserve the human race is the none existence of any violations.

Isolated violations of the principle are therefore absolutely perfect, destructive actions which undermine the condition and the preservation of the human race, since the very existence of these destructive actions deviate from the absolutely perfect condition for the preservation of the human race.

As life is an axiomatic value which we want to preserve, it is also logically true that we axiomatically want to preserve the principle which is a condition for life, namely “that no man shall have the right to use physical violence and theft” or in other words,” that no man shall have the right to violate the rightful ownership in person and property”.

Alternatively, an axiomatic end (human life) is preserved by an axiomatic mean (“that no man shall have the right to use physical violence and theft”).

If we take under consideration what has been concluded in this document, we can also conclude that another meaning of the principle of none violations, is that the principle also brings an absolutely perfect opportunity for the survival of human life. This means that the principle brings a totally perfect opportunity for the survival of all human beings.

As it is true that the principle is a totally perfect condition and a totally perfect preservation of human life, it also logically follows that the principle brings a totally perfect opportunity for the survival of all human beings.

This can also be proved by the fact that everyone’s violation of the principle (total physical violence and theft) brings an absolutely perfect impossibility for the survival of any human beings.

In the “philosophical debate” Liberty, as all values, is seen as a subjective value. This opinion may seem as a confirmation of the reality. There are vast political values. Liberty seems to be only one of these subjective values. But it is a superficial believes.

The reason for this is that we have established that everyone’s violation of the principle brings an absolutely perfect impossibility for the survival of any human beings. This means that we all would be, by objective means coerced to die that is objectively coerced to not “value and wanting to preserve our own lives”.

Isolated violations of the principle are totally destructive because they totally undermine by objective coercion our possibilities and opportunities to “value and wanting to preserve our own lives”.

Ethical conclusions in this document, I believe, are in agreement with some ethical conclusions that the giant Hans-Hermann Hoppe has done.
Please read some of his excellent writing from the book “The Ethics and Economics of Private Property”:

http://mises.org/etexts/hoppe5.pdf

And to:

http://www.hanshoppe.com/publications/econ-ethics-10.pdf

Principles derived from the ethics concluded in this document, are exposed in the masterpiece that I have already mentioned and that is “The Ethics of Liberty” written by Murray Rothbard, please read his book:

http://mises.org/rothbard/ethics/ethics.asp

Björn Lundahl
Göteborg, Sweden

Don’t be silly, how it would be possible that I could be “offended” by your supposed arguments, I cannot imagine. You are just ignorant. Your questions reveal that all the time. You are missing the points!

The link you have posted will only lead to a man’s opinion not worth more than a parrot’s blathering.

There are a lot of people in history that were against the concept of a natural law. It is nothing new. Arguments against it, are not either new. It is silly to believe that we are not aware of this. Mises himself, for your knowledge, was also against the idea of a natural law.

Human Action:

“But the teachings of utilitarian philosophy and classical economics have nothing at all to do with the doctrine of natural right. With them the only point that matters is social utility. They recommend popular government, private property, tolerance, and freedom not because they are natural and just, but because they are beneficial.”

“Bentham, the radical, shouted: “Natural rights is simple nonsense: natural and imprescriptible rights, rhetorical nonsense.””

“In rejecting the illusory notions of natural law and human equality modern biology only repeated what the utilitarian champions of liberalism and democracy long before had taught in a much more persuasive way. It is obvious that no biological doctrine can ever invalidate what utilitarian philosophy says about the social utility of democratic government, private property, freedom, and equality under the law.”

http://mises.org/humanaction/chap8sec8.asp#p175

Mises statements do not logically, though, prove anything. As I have shown above, utilitarianism is instead a logical fallacy.

What is relatively new is Rothbard’s book The Ethics of Liberty:

http://mises.org/rothbard/ethics/ethics.asp

And Hoppe´s proof of an objective ethics:

http://www.hanshoppe.com/publications/econ-ethics-10.pdf

It is the logical arguments in those writings that are convincing.

I do believe that you cannot see the difference between a logical proof and a subjective opinion.

Naturally, Mises and people in the past did not know anything about this material that Rothbard and Hoppe (when he wrote Human Action) have produced.

I think that it would be better if you studied this material before criticizing and you will find all the answers that you cannot find through the link that you have posted. Ignorance does not convince anyone.

The Austrian Economics Newsletter

Austrians and the Private-Property Society

An Interview with Hans-Hermann Hoppe

AEN: In applying this a priori approach to ethics, were you attempting to supplant natural rights.

HOPPE: No, not at all. I was attempting to make the first two chapters of Rothbard’s Ethics of Liberty stronger than they were*. That in turn would provide more weight to everything that followed. I had some dissatisfaction with rigor with which the initial ethical assumptions of libertarian political theory had been arrived at. Intuitively, they seemed plausible. But I could see that a slightly different approach might be stronger. Murray never considered my revisions to be a threat. His only concern was: does this ultimately make the case? Ultimately, he agreed that it did.

*Now I know Hoppe’s motive, before I guessed it. He has confirmed my speculation. Hoppe is really something!

http://mises.org/journals/aen/aen198.asp

Björn Lundahl
Göteborg, Sweden

“society can grant rights because society already has rights…so where do they come from? That’s the question you’re supposed to be addressing!”

A good comment too! Constructive!

Björn Lundahl

Likewise if I was a slave in a slave-owning society in a world of slave-owning societies, my claim that no-one has the right to own slaves would be laughed down.

P.S. I used the term ‘society’ rather than ‘State’ if that helps.

“The fact that people mostly deny it does not change the fact of its existence – no more than majority opinon regarding flatness of the Earth had any bearing on correctness of heliocentric theory).”

Very true and well said. That is the point!

Björn Lundahl

I’m not offended (except in the sense that claiming to answer a question without actually providing an answer offends me). Don’t you see that what you’re saying simply makes no sense? To say that “‘Rights’ are simply privileges bestowed by Society on everyone in the society to act in a way that benefits everyone in that society” is either avoiding the question (“society” cannot be the source of rights, since “society” is just people who, you’re saying, have rights only by virtue of society – i.e., society can grant rights because society already has rights…so where do they come from? That’s the question you’re supposed to be addressing!), or supporting a “might makes right” ethic (in which case why talk about “rights” at all? And why bother about “benefiting society” when you start from a position that can be shown to be antithetical to society?)

> Rights’ are simply privileges bestowed by Society

You’re making a logical mistake of attributing to the Society (which is merely a class of people) the features it does not have – such as a singular will and ability to act.

The Society (being a class, not an individual) cannot bestow anything on anyone. It is an abstraction, a non-entity. Individual people may have beliefs about justness or unjustness about other people’s actions – and that is it.

Thus, your entire argument depends on the logical fallacy of confusing class with entity (or, which is the same in this case, antropomorphising the abstraction) – and, threrefore, your argument is completely invalid.

(BTW, the system of the “natural” rights does exist – there’s a proof by existence, found in Rothbard’s books. The fact that people mostly deny it does not change the fact of its existence – no more than majority opinon regarding flatness of the Earth had any bearing on correctness of heliocentric theory).