Posted on 12/02/2002 7:47:54 AM PST by u-89
November 14, 2002
?Men quarrel because they do not know how to argue,? wrote G.K. Chesterton. One of the pleasures of this job is that I get into so many arguments with readers. Intelligent arguments keep me on my toes and help me sharpen the points I?m trying to make. Sometimes they force me to eat my words. (The taste is awful.) In any case, I usually learn something.
One recent correspondent takes issue with my argument that society would be better off without the state. She argues that the state is a natural institution, found even among animals, and offers the provocative example of the beehive, with its queen bee and elaborate social organization. She calls this a kind of ?invisible state.?
But I think this example supports my case. The beehive is an instance of spontaneous order and cooperation. It doesn?t rely on organized force, as the state does. And unlike the rulers of states, the queen can?t commit mass murders of her subjects. That wouldn?t help her produce honey anyway.
The animal kingdom (why kingdom, by the way?) is very violent, but animals use violence only for particular objects: food, sexual rivals, menacing enemies. The leader of a wolf pack doesn?t kill his own followers. Animals don?t have Stalins.
Man is the only creature disposed to kill huge numbers of members of his own species, and his instrument is usually the state. I often cite the research of Professor R.J. Rummel, who reckons that in the last century alone more than 160 million people were murdered by their own rulers. This figure by itself calls into question the whole idea that the raison d?être of the state is to protect its subjects from violence. To the contrary, it suggests that the state is highly unnatural.
Another of my readers argues that anarchism, the absence of a state, must inevitably terminate in the rule of thugs. But thugs can only rule by terror, and such rule is usually brief. The most successful states are those ruled by a subtle combination of force and cunning, persuading their subjects of their right to command.
The belief that a state rules by right is called legitimacy. This is variously ascribed to popular will, inheritance, a constitution, or mere success in overthrowing a previous state. There is no single agreed-upon rationale, but as a practical matter it is usually ensured by the acceptance of other states. The Soviet Union was widely rejected as a criminal regime until Franklin Roosevelt gave it diplomatic recognition in 1934; thereupon it became ?legitimate? in the eyes of states that had refused to acknowledge it. But it claimed legitimacy as the representative of the ?working class,? urging revolution everywhere else and denying the legitimacy of states formed on any other basis.
In America the Federal Government?s legitimacy was first based on a constitutional agreement among the people of the states. After the Civil War, which has been rightly called ?the Second American Revolution,? the United States became an essentially different thing ? a single consolidated and centralized state. Even our grammar reflects the change: the Constitution calls the United States ?they,? but we now call them ?it.? Americans are still confused about their political identity. The transformation from confederation to consolidation is hard to square with the Constitution, but most Americans accept the legitimacy of the centralized state and submit to it, even though the very grounds of that state?s alleged legitimacy have changed.
Aristotle long ago observed that most men are ?slaves by nature,? and perhaps this helps explain why they are so ready to submit to the state, whatever it claims to base its legitimacy on. They have proved ready to kill each other at the state?s behest, provided it assures them that they are ?defending freedom? ? even if they are conscripted to fight! Few of them see that conscription itself is a violation of their own freedom.
By now we are so inured to the rule of the state that we confused the terms state,law, and society. The state is the enemy of both true law and normal society.
?But what would you replace the state with?? another reader asks. Well, I see no pressing need to ?replace? an organization that kills and enslaves millions. But if I have to answer the question, I guess I?d say: ?With a beehive.?
Sorry, Joe. Animals do indeed have their Stalins.
The leader of a wolf pack does kill his own followers -- especially if they happen to be the offspring of the pack leader he just killed to gain his position.
Silverback gorillas will also kill their predecessor's offspring, as will a lion.
And, far from the peace-loving non-coercive beehive Joe portrays, it's worth noting that the first thing a newly-hatched queen bee does is sting her un-hatched rivals to death in their cells.
Some animals apparently kill for the fun of it, too.
Sobran's animal analogies might have some problems, and I continue to differ with him about the optimality of anarchism, but he has some strong points here.
Freedom, Wealth, and Peace,
Francis W. Porretto
Visit The Palace Of Reason: http://palaceofreason.com
I am beginning to think that this nation as founded was not meant to be by natural design. It was an anomaly. What we see today is more the natural order of things -a strong central government. And war and killing of oppostion to power is a natural state of beng as well. The Bible says there will be nation rising against nation and kingdom against kingdom. Nations are extended tribes, kingdoms are political entites. As the old saw goes birds of a feather flock together. People by nature want to be with their own kind and have their tribal values reflected throughout society and in their childrens education. Multi culturalism will therefore naturally lead to balkanization and war. Perhaps every aspect of our foundings was an aberation of human nature. I find it appealing though. Guess that says a lot about me. And so we have a mystery. Man by nature wants to part of a herd and by nature wants to be free. It seems in the end herd wins, particularly if folks get hyped about safety and security. As Machiaveli advised the prince, convince the people the enemy is at the gate.
I wasn't saying that the examples I gave were of animals killing "for the fun of it." My only point was that Sobran's claim was wrong -- as, alas, is all too common for him these days. The point is that these animals "[make] sure the job is done right" by employing Stalinist methods.
As for the other, some animals do kill for the fun of it -- IIRC, dolphins, tigers, and jackals will do this.
What Sobran overlooks is the existence of bad people who wish to oppress and do evil to others. It's strange that Sobran, a born-again Catholic, doesn't take evil much into account. Of course he sees evil in the evil actions of governments, but he overlooks that the problem goes much deeper than that. St. Augustine saw this. So too, did Calvin and Hobbes (they left it out of the cartoon, though).
Individual consciousness didn't develop in bees or ants. There is no individual consciousness of oneself as separate from the group in the beehive or the ant-hill. When one's own pain or advantage or loss is felt separately from that of the group, one begins to act in one's own interest and against that of the group.
Individual consciousness among people has been a given for centuries and millennia. We can't go back to what was before. Perhaps some hyperrational or genetically engineered post-human beings of the future might have no other horizon than that of group survival and collective fulfillment, but we can't.
Sobran, more or less a libertarian or even a philosophical anarchist, doesn't consider that the need for government has grown up with individual self-consciousness. To be sure, individual consciousness long preceded modern libertarianism, but so long as there is the consciousness of me and you, mine and thine and so long as this consciousness rankles in some people, there will probably always be some necessity for government.
And doesn't the barnyard rooster take steps to ensure that his possible replacement is not being raised in the henhouse?
IIRC is shorthand for "if I recall correctly."
Other than that it seems we can conclude peace and harmony are not a natural state of affairs for any of us in this world. Doesn't mean I can't construct such a place in theory and aspire in reality.
It does make for interesting conversation. It also points out the fatal flaw in Ayn Rand's objectivism, which forms the basis of much libertarian thought. Rand claimed that her principles can be derived from observation of reality -- which, as you've noticed, does not support her philosophy.
I don't know if Sobran overtly subscribes to Rand's principles or not, but his positions do suffer from many of the same weaknesses, most particularly the idea that humans will play nicey-nice were it not for governments.
Indeed, some speculate that the state originated in this necessity. Most often the bandits or raiders or warriors from the highlands conquered the settled agriculturalists of the valleys and became their monarchs and aristocracy. To avoid this, lowland farmers would have to band together to defend themselves. In the fullness of time, lowland states would become powerful enough to subjugate highland tribes and bring them under their own control.
Another thing to take into account is what Fukuyama, following the Greeks, calls thymos. It's the desire for recognition, glory, or acknowledged greatness. You can see this at work in marginal groups, whether in the deserts of Arabia or the inner cities of the Western world. The question Fukuyama deals with is whether western commercial civilization provides outlets for the hunger for thymos of the young, especially those who aren't prepared for or adapted to commercial life.
Sobran has a particularly sunny view of human nature. It doesn't go well with his pessimism about government and politics. He'd probably tell you that it does, that people work together well when they aren't compelled to, but it's not entirely convincing. There's an overconfidence in anarchy that's not so different from the overconfidence of socialists.
Yes, but Rand rejected Libertarianism because it was flawed. To say "Rand claimed that her principles can be derived from observation of reality" is to simplify what she said beyond recognition. The following, "which, as you've noticed, does not support her philosophy" is an opinion that is no more than an Assertion Without Proof that you are going to have to back up to have taken seriously.
suffer from many of the same weaknesses, most particularly the idea that humans will play nicey-nice were it not for governments.
This is also something that Rand did not say. Rand saw a role for government so it contradicts what you say here. The issue was the basis for that government.
This is where I disagree with the author of the article and don't have much use for it. Animals don't have governments, they have structure, or they would live in chaos and not survive, but they don't have governments.
That some men, like Stalin, don't rise above animals doesn't mean all men are animals. Because Jeffery Dahlmer ate people doesn't mean all men are cannibals. You have to understand what separates the one from the other. One has to be willing to identify what this is for oneself. Or one is no better than Stalin.
Alas, I haven't got the time to go into a detailed refutation of Rand, but I trust that you'll be able to flesh it out from the following sketch. To begin with, look here for Rand's words on the topic, paying particular attention to points one and two -- on which my "observation of reality" statement is based.
Rand's big claim was that reason would allow a person to make the leap from points one and two, to points three and four.
Her third point does not in any respect follow from her first two points, and her fourth point is flatly contradicted by the first two, as can be easily seen when we objectively apply reason to reality as we can observe it with our senses.
IMHO, Rand's real problem was that her real starting point was her atheism, and that she was trying to "objectively" justify the last 6 Commandments without having to deal with the difficulties imposed by the first 4. The approach doesn't work, of course -- there's nothing in nature that says "might makes right" is morally wrong, and plenty to support the concept that it's a workable moral alternative to "non-initiation of force." So Rand's got problems right out of the box.
If "might makes right" is, nevertheless, morally wrong, then the reason it's wrong has to come from something other than what reason can derive from reality as we sense it. There are two reasons for this: first, we have to have a way to distinguish humans from the rest of nature; and second, we need something other than the obviously contradictory lessons of nature on which to base our moral claims.
Ironically, the only logical basis for certain elements of Rand's objectivism is for God to have edicted them -- which causes some obvious difficulties for certain other of Rand's claims.
FWIW, Rand's basis of government (the consent of the governed) is doomed by her own claims. It's difficult to reconcile "man being an end in himself" with the constraints imposed by living under a government with which one does not always agree. The necessary condition for a government such as ours is that the people consider themselves to be subject to something larger than the government and the laws it enforces.
As John Adams put it, "We have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion . ... Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other."
As for the rest of your comment, I agree. Men are not animals. They're different from animals. But for them to be really different from animals requires them to have been made so by God. Otherwise, it's all just a matter of evolutionary optimization, and the only real moral absolute is "whatever works."
Alas, I haven't got the time to go into a detailed refutation of Rand, but I trust that you'll be able to flesh it out from the following sketch.
Then you shouldn’t have brought it up. one and two -- on which my "observation of reality" statement is based.
Her third point does not in any respect follow from her first two points,
That is an opinion, which I do not support. It follows directly from the first two. My existence and my reason are not the means for you to exist. Your existence and your reason are the means for your existence. You just weren’t willing to think it through. her fourth point is flatly contradicted by the first two, as can be easily seen when we objectively apply reason to reality as we can observe it with our senses.
This statement says nothing, absolutely nothing. It is merely an Assertion Without Proof. It directly derives from the first three if taken together. IMHO, Rand's real problem was that her real starting point was her atheism, and that she was trying to "objectively" justify the last 6 Commandments without having to deal with the difficulties imposed by the first 4.
The problem you have with Rand is that she didn’t base her system upon your Mythical basis. There was no evidence in reality to do so, so she didn’t. That’s all. She started from the basis of existence and reason, both of which are verifiable and absolute for every human being. The approach doesn't work, of course -- there's nothing in nature that says "might makes right" is morally wrong, and plenty to support the concept that it's a workable moral alternative to "non-initiation of force." So Rand's got problems right out of the box.
But there is plenty for human beings who use reason to understand their existence to conclude that ’might makes right’ isn’t in one’s own best self interest. Your ignoring the use of reason by human beings on this very point. If "might makes right" is, nevertheless, morally wrong, then the reason it's wrong has to come from something other than what reason can derive from reality as we sense it.
This is a contradiction in terms. There is nothing you can sense outside what you sense from reality, anything else is logically absurd. Reason is the only means by which one can determine the morality of ’might makes right’ since all these concepts are derived from and are concerned with reality. Since we have a concept of morality, we got this from the use of reason in perceiving that reality. You haven’t proven it ’has to come from something other.’ There are two
Many unproven assumptions here. That reason is axiomatic to any explanation, including yours, is why I marked that in red. You are absolutely dependent upon reason to explain why reason is insufficient. Reason is how we distinguish humans from the rest of nature. The ’obviously contradictory’ lessons of nature are only ’obviously contradictory’ to you. Nature is very clear, you follow the rules or you die. Ironically, the only logical basis for certain elements of Rand's objectivism is for God to have edicted them -- which causes some obvious difficulties for certain other of Rand's claims.
Opinion stated as fact. There is no basis for this statement. You need to read more than an occasional synopsis of Rand’s work and you wouldn’t make mistakes like this. Rand’s derivation of morality from the fact of existence is quite carefully drawn and is predicated upon the use of reason as the means to human survival. Morality is imposed by reality as a condition of existence. Rand's basis of government (the consent of the governed) is doomed by her own claims. It's difficult to reconcile "man being an end in himself" with the constraints imposed by living under a government with which one does not always agree.
Rand’s basis is much closer to Locke’s ‘social contract’ than it is to ‘the consent of the governed.’ It isn’t difficult to reconcile if government isn’t imposing constraints that is shouldn’t be imposing in the first place. The necessary condition for a government such as ours is that the people consider themselves to be subject to something larger than the government and the laws it enforces.
Then why didn’t we acquiesce to the God Given King? He fulfilled this prescription. Because we held that the individual was more important than the institution, not the other way around. This government, for the first time in history, existed to protect the rights of the individual, not as a slave to the state or something larger than the state. But for them to be really different from animals requires them to have been made so by God. Otherwise, it's all just a matter of evolutionary optimization, and the only real moral absolute is "whatever works."
Why, because you say so? There is no evidence for this and plenty to support the opposite, since we exist and we are aware of the fact we are different from animals. Your ‘really different’ is distinction without a difference. We are different, by virtue of reason. That we use that reason to determine when an action is moral or not, and we have no other means to determine this, means that there something more that ’whatever works.’ Rand defined why.
This is a contradiction in terms. There is nothing you can sense outside what you sense from reality, anything else is logically absurd.
If I properly understand this muddled sentence, I believe you've made my point for me. What we can sense from reality -- as you and Rand would acknowledge it -- is that very often, might does make right, in contradiction of Rand's claims. This is certainly true among animals. It is also lamentably but demonstrably true among that certain class of animals called humans. Indeed, in Rand's atheist view, we cannot be anything other than an evolutionary branch of animals, and can therefore claim no special moral status above other animals -- it would not be logical to conclude otherwise. What our evolved reason is to us (here at the top of the food chain), the leopard's evolved claws and fangs are to it. Yet despite the lessons of reality, Rand makes contrary claims. Either reality is false, or Rand's conclusions, and therefore her philosphy, are logically absurd. Reality is not false. Therefore Rand's objectivism is false. QED.
Now I suggest you stretch your LogicWings a bit and see what sort of reality would make some of Rand's conclusions logically sound: some, but not all,of them are logically defensible if you start from the right spot.
The problem with Rand is that one has to accept her four premises as absolute in order to get her conclusions. But despite your (unsubstantiated) claims, her four premises cannot be reconciled, nor are they the only possible starting points for a logically consistent moral system. As such, even the basis for Rand's philosophy does not withstand scrutiny.
Start with Rand's premise #2: It is more than a bit presumptuous to assume that reality is as we, alone, observe it. It is entirely possible and reasonable to suggest that there are aspects of reality that we may never be able to fully sense or prove. So right away poor Ayn's got herself into a pickle.
Or take her premise #3: if a pharoah dies old, rich, and happy after a lifetime of egregiously violating Rand's principles, why is he wrong? He has, after all, achieved Rand's stated "highest moral purpose" of happiness, has exercised rational self interest, and has lived a life fully consistent with the observable reality that he's acting as the alpha male ought to act. Yet Rand (and you and I) would claim that he's wrong. You ought to try to obtain a nice, rigourous, objective, and observable proof of why he's wrong. Give it an honest try, and I'll guarantee you cannot do it through reason alone: you're going to find yourself having either to define problems away (a no-no), or follow questions endlessly back. Eventually you're going to have to choose between saying, "because I said so," or "because God said so."
I think you'd agree that your say-so is not a very good basis for an objective philosophy. Your objection to God's say-so is duly noted, but that merely means you're wrong about the existence of either God, or of objective philosophy.
I will deal with this one bit of silliness directly:
Your existence and your reason are the means for your existence.
This sentence is stunningly off-base. My existence is the means for my existence? I exist because I exist? God is able say that -- and He did -- but you or I cannot. My reason is the means of my existence? Oh, please. Yes, reason is a useful thing. But my reason did not cause me to come into existence, nor did it cause my parents to shelter, feed, and educate me, and thereby keep me in existence. And despite the obvious utility of reason, both of us will inevitably die, and undoubtedly be forgotten, regardless of how reasonable we are. So reason is not sufficient as a "means for" existence, either.
What you've given us is a typical Randian oversimplification, which sounds great until you poke it a bit. The statement is useless except as an intellectual fraud -- which Rand was.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.