This is a bit oversimplified, but it does bring some clarity to matters governmental:
Society should be goal-oriented. At present, the only goal of society is to have no goals -- or to allow everyone to be "free" enough to establish their own goals for whatever reasons they see fit. However, you can't predicate your political philosophy on "freedom," because:
1. Where do you decide to draw the arbitrary line? How free should people be allowed to be? If you concede that there should be some limitations, then how is anyone under the guidance of the proposed system free in the first place, and why is freedom the goal touted?
2. There is no such thing as freedom without context; we can only be free from specific things. Evaluate each potential constraint on its own terms, define its qualities, determine the value of those qualities, and then issue a decree regarding the necessity of freedom from the constraint.
3. Freedom from constraints is a means to an end; it can be used for any number of ends, all with their own pros and cons. Why not cut out the archaic Enlightenment rhetoric altogether and define some real goals for your society -- per its ideals?
The "real goal" IS freedom, with all that this entails. Any other "real goal" not compatible with freedom would represent an imposition of harm.
ReplyDeleteThere is no arbitrary line: it's either all or nothing. Either total freedom, or no freedom at all. No stable middle ground can exist.
So if it's all or nothing, that means that we should be free to rape and torture, yes? If not, then do you have a special definition for "all or nothing"? Better to use the commonly accepted terminology than to make a special case for yourself -- lest things get convoluted.
ReplyDeleteFurther, what differentiates having children from other forms of imposed harm? If it really is a good thing to coerce people into not killing each other, then why can't we coerce people into not reproducing?
The value, here, is not in imposition versus lack of imposition, but rather, the mere elimination of negatives. If an imposition eliminates a negative generated by another imposition, then the former imposition is acceptable for pragmatic purposes; this has to do with what one could refer to as a value equation, which seeks to reduce suffering. It really doesn't matter whether a plus sign makes its way into the equation at some point -- just that what's on the other side of the equals sign is less than the number that we started out with.
A simple equation:
ReplyDeleteLet imposition A = -50
Let imposition B = -25
imposition B - imposition A = 25
We have thus generated a positive value of 25, meaning that, while suffering occurred, the amount negated was so great as to push the result into the positive.
"So if it's all or nothing, that means that we should be free to rape and torture, yes?"
ReplyDeleteNope. Rape and torture are impositions on someone else's freedom.
"Further, what differentiates having children from other forms of imposed harm? If it really is a good thing to coerce people into not killing each other, then why can't we coerce people into not reproducing?"
And why the hell not? Is it not criminal to impose harm? If you disagree, you better explain why.
"The value, here, is not in imposition versus lack of imposition, but rather, the mere elimination of negatives. If an imposition eliminates a negative generated by another imposition, then the former imposition is acceptable for pragmatic purposes;"
Utilitarian bullcrap.