A Thinking Reed

Author: Lee M.

  • Render Unto Caesar

    Josh Claybourn has a “Christian libertarian” take on the apparently now-deceased Federal Marriage Amendment:

    At the root of Christian libertarianism is the biblical conviction that God grants men the freedom (never the permission) to sin. It allows Christians to transform the culture through the church and the family. This transformation is no business of the state’s. The early Christian church, and America’s Founders, saw this and kept the church and state in two different spheres, permitting the church to influence the populace (and the state) freely. The church best flourishes in that sort of environment. The virtuous life cannot be brought about by government.

    I would add that the Christian emphasis on humankind’s proneness to sin also speaks in favor of limiting state power (it speaks in favor of limiting economic and social power too; balancing these is the trick).

    As C.S. Lewis put it:

    I am a democrat because I believe that no man or group of men is good enough to be trusted with uncontrolled power over others. And the higher the pretensions of such power, the more dangerous I think it both to the rulers and to the subjects. Hence Theocracy is the worst of all governments.

  • Fighting with One Hand Tied Behind Your Back

    Bill Vallicella at Maverick Philosopher posts an excerpt from the 1942 George Orwell essay “Pacifism and the War” (link via Bill at Bill’s Comments) in which Orwell accuses the pacifists of his day of being “objectively pro-fascist.”

    Orwell writes:

    Pacifism is objectively pro-Fascist. This is elementary common sense. If you hamper the war effort of one side you automatically help that of the other. Nor is there any real way of remaining outside such a war as the present one. In practice, ‘he that is not with me is against me’. The idea that you can somehow remain aloof from and superior to the struggle, while living on food which British sailors have to risk their lives to bring you, is a bourgeois illusion bred of money and security.

    Now, there are (at least) two kinds of pacifists. Some pacifists believe that non-violence will, on balance, bring about better consequences than violence. According to this view, non-violent means stand a better chance of achieving our objectives than violent ones, and without the costs associated with violence. These are the kinds of pacifists that Orwell derisively (and accurately, for all I know) characterizes as believing “that one can somehow ‘overcome’ the German army by lying on one’s back.”

    Whether or not pacifism “works” in this sense is an empirical question that will, presumably, have different answers in different situations. Did the pacifism of Ghandi and Martin Luther King “work”? Would violent methods have been preferable? Would non-violent methods have “worked” against the German army?

    Putting this question to one side, there is another form of pacifism, the kind of pacifism that holds that violence is wrong irrespective of the consequences. For this kind of pacifist, it is worse to be guilty of committing violence than to have violence committed against oneself (it is, obviously, possible to simultaneously hold that pacifism is right and it will work better than force). This kind of pacifism accepts, in principle, that pacifism might not “work,” but that it is nevertheless right.

    So, is this kind of pacifism “objectively pro-Fascist”? That is, is it responsible for hindering a just cause, and therefore deplorable? Well, if it is, then it seems to me that the same could be said of just war theory. After all, just war theory, in its classic form, holds that there are certain jus in bello criteria (criteria for the just prosecution of a war) that cannot be violated, no matter how expedient it might be to do so. For instance, it is usually held by theorists of just war that it is always wrong to intentionally target civilians (not that this has stopped many governments from doing just that). But, clearly, there are cases where a war effort would be hindered by refraining from targeting civilians. So, is just war theory also “objectively pro-Fascist”? (or “objectively pro-Communist,” “objectively pro-Islamist,” etc.)

    Necessarily, moral rules restrain our actions. So long as we recognize these restraints, there is always the possibility they will conflict with our goals. Even a good cause does not, at least according to most moral theories, give us carte blanche in pursuing victory. Pacifism and just war ethics agree that committing a grave evil is worse than even defeat.

  • Thanks Part Deux

    Bill of Bill’s Comments has also graciously linked to this humble site. I’m hoping to put together the beginnings of a blogroll sometime this week, of which Bill and Keith will be charter members.

  • Thanks

    to Keith Burgess-Jackson for kindly mentioning this site at his blog Anal Philosopher. He offers an eclectic mix of, among other things, animal rights, philosophy, and conservative politics. He also runs two other “boutique” blogs: Animal Ethics and The Ethics of War (which are exactly what they sound like). Good reads all.

  • Thought for the Day

    “I propose that voting, like cheering at a football game or sending a get-well card, should be understood as primarily an expressive rather than an instrumental activity. One votes for Alfred E. Neuman rather than Pat Paulsen as an act of expressing support for Neuman rather than as a deliberate attempt to raise the likelihood of Neuman’s victory. Rational individuals will indeed vote provided that the value they assign to the expressive returns obtained through a vote is greater than the costs thereby incurred. Despite the exceedingly remote chance of swinging the election, voting is as rational as attending football games and cheering lustily for one’s team (and sitting out an election is as rational as spending one’s Saturday gardening if one prefers flowers to football).” — Loren E. Lomasky, “The Booth and Consequences: Do Voters Get What They Want?”

    (link via Gene Healy)

  • Voting and Universalizability

    Occasionally I will suggest to friends and acquaintances (from somewhat puckish motives I have to admit) that they shouldn’t vote, or at the very least that it doesn’t matter whether they vote or not, or who they vote for, especially in large (national or state-wide) elections.

    My reasoning is fairly simple: whether you vote or not will make no difference to the outcome of the election. Suppose you vote for candidate X and she receives 5,497,385 votes while candidate Y receives 5,326,792 votes. Now suppose you hadn’t voted at all. Candidate X would’ve won by 170,592 votes instead of 170,593 votes. Wow! Your vote really counts! (For simplicity’s sake, I’ll ignore the fact that in the U.S. there are no truly national elections. In the case of presidential races we all vote in statewide elections, which then determine which candidate the state’s electors vote for. But the point stands.)

    Even in those (extremely rare) cases such as in the presidential election in 2000 where the margin is relatively small, it still never comes within spitting distance of a single vote. And, as we saw, as the margin of victory approaches a small number of votes, the chance that the election will be decided in a courtroom rather than the voting booth increases significantly.

    But wait, some will say (if there was anyone reading this), what if everyone acted like that? Then no one would vote and where would we be??

    The intuition underlying this protest is that we ought to act in such a way (at least, in so far as our moral duties are concerned) that we would want anyone (or everyone) to act in circumstances that were relevantly similar. Philosophers call this the “universalizability principle” (hereafter, UP). As Kant put it, we should act in such a way that the maxim guiding our action can consistently be willed as a universal law.

    If this is right, then I should refrain from voting only if I am willing to say that everyone else should do the same. Since I’m not willing to say this (because it would spell the end of democratic governance, which I regard as a good thing), I should not refrain from voting, nor should I advocate that others refrain from voting. Q.E.D., right?

    Well, I’m hesitant to embrace this conclusion, because it seems to me that we can use similar reasoning to proscribe other kinds of voting behavior – kinds of behavior that most people would, intuitively, regard as perfectly acceptable, even commendable.

    Take, for instance, third-party voting. Many people vote for third-party candidates, not because they actually want their candidate to win, but because they want to “send a message” of dissatisfaction with one or both of the major parties. Maybe it’s because the major parties are not addressing some issue they deem important, or because they want one of the major parties to move further to the right or left, or whatever. I imagine there are people who voted for Ralph Nader or Harry Browne in 2000, not because they wanted either of those esteemed gentlemen to actually become president, but because they wanted to send a message of protest to the Democrats and/or Republicans (this is not to deny that there were people who voted for Nader or Browne who did want them to become president; I’m just stipulating that there was some sub-set of third party voters who were voting primarily to send a message, not because they wanted their guy to win).

    But, if we apply UP, it looks like these third-party voters are behaving irrationally or immorally, just like someone who refrains from voting altogether. After all, by hypothesis, these folks didn’t want the candidate they voted for to win. But, according to UP, one should always act in such a way that one would will everyone to act. So, in voting for a candidate they didn’t actually want to win, they are running afoul of this principle, since if everyone voted as they did, their candidate would have, in fact, won.

    Now, that might not seem so bad, since you can always say that, yeah, you should only vote for the guy you really want to win. But it gets worse. It looks like we can get an even more counterintuitive result when we apply UP to voting for someone whom we actually want to win. Suppose I really and truly in my heart of hearts want John Kerry to win the upcoming election and so I vote accordingly. Now, according to UP, I should be willing to say that everyone should vote for John Kerry, since that’s what I think is best all things considered.

    But I’m not so sure I’m willing to say this. Even if I want John Kerry to win, would I want everyone to vote for him? Wouldn’t that create a situation in which the winner had an overwhelming (unanimous!) mandate, and couldn’t that lead to him running roughshod over all opposition? The problem with this is that I think a vigorous opposition is essential to a healthy democracy, so I want there to be a significant amount of support for the opposition party in any given election. But this means that I can’t will that everyone act as I do in voting for John Kerry, even if I want Kerry to win. So that means that I shouldn’t vote for Kerry, even if I want him to win!*

    The upshot of this is that it looks like the consistent application of UP rules out not only abstaining from voting, but also voting for any candidate unless you want him or her to win with 100% of the vote. This suggests, to me anyway, that UP may not be the self-evident principle it has often been taken to be, since it seems to lead to some extremely counter-intuitive conclusions. But, if we reject UP, then at least one argument against non-voting appears to be without foundation.

    ———————-

    *Now, there may be fanatical party loyalists who think that a 100% vote tally for their guy would be just dandy, but I take it as nearly self-evident that, other things being equal, a one-party state is a bad thing.

  • Thought for the Day

    “There is no good trying to be more spiritual than God. God never meant man to be a purely spiritual creature. That is why He uses material things like bread and wine to put the new life into us. We may think this rather crude and unspiritual. God does not: He invented eating. He likes matter. He invented it.” – C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity

  • Thinking Outside the Box

    I like people who defy easy stereotypes and flout established categories. For instance, here’s the website of John McColgan, a Democrat running for a congressional seat in Oregon. Here’s his platform:

    1. Defend the Constitution, the UN Declaration of Human Rights, and the rules of the Geneva Convention;

    2. Restore American credibility abroad by respecting international law and cooperating with the United Nations;

    3. Promote long-term national security by converting some military spending into aid to underdeveloped countries, and by reducing our dependence on foreign oil;

    4. Challenge any threat to the sanctity of human life, including war, euthanasia, cloning, abortion, and capital punishment;

    5. Stimulate the economy by reducing tax rates and health care costs for the self-employed, by promoting fair trade and unionization, and by demanding stiff penalties for corporate fraud;

    6. Promote a balanced budget through progressive tax reform;

    7. Develop a national health care program supported by employers, employees, and investors;

    8. Stabilize social security by removing the current ceiling on taxes for the wealthy and by taxing investment income;

    9. Support public education by opposing mandatory federal testing and promoting local control;

    10. Defend the environment by protecting national parks and wilderness areas, and by employing selective harvesting in federal forests.

    Notice that Mr. McColgan seems to be to the “left” of someone like John Kerry on, for instance, health care and taxes, but to the “right” of most liberals on abortion, euthanasia and cloning. He’s also opposed to capital punishment – something almost no major party candidate is willing to do, lest they appear “soft on crime.” (Remember Bill Clinton’s trip home to Arkansas while on the campaign trail in ’92 to preside over the execution of a mentally retarded man?)

    Anyway, I have no idea what his chances are, but I hope the good people of Oregon’s second district give this guy a look.

  • Tom Regan on Contractarianism

    In this essay, Tom Regan, the philosopher best known for his writings on animal rights, argues against “contractarianism” in a fashion similar to that of my argument below. Here’s Regan:

    Here, very crudely, is the root idea [of contractarianism]: morality consists of a set of rules that individuals voluntarily agree to abide by, as we do when we sign a contract (hence the name contractarianism). Those who understand and accept the terms of the contract are covered directly; they have rights created and recognized by, and protected in, the contract. And these contractors can also have protection spelled out for others who, though they lack the ability to understand morality and so cannot sign the contract themselves, are loved or cherished by those who can. Thus young children, for example, are unable to sign contracts and lack rights. But they are protected by the contract nonetheless because of the sentimental interests of others, most notably their parents. So we have, then, duties involving these children, duties regarding them, but no duties to them. Our duties in their case are indirect duties to other human beings, usually their parents.

    Regan points out that the status of animals under contractarian theories is analogous to that of children since they, obviously cannot be parties to a contract – implied or otherwise. But he doesn’t think this is a problem for his theory of animal rights since, according to him, contractarianism is far from being an adequate theory of moral duties with respect to humans, and so doesn’t even make it out of the gate. He says:

    When it comes to the moral status of animals, contractarianism could be a hard view to refute if it were an adequate theoretical approach to the moral status of human beings. It is not adequate in this latter respect, however, which makes the question of its adequacy in the former case, regarding animals, utterly moot. For consider: morality, according to the (crude) contractarian position before us, consists of rules that people agree to abide by. What people? Well, enough to make a difference – enough, that is, collectively to have the power to enforce the rules that are drawn up in the contract. That is very well and good for the signatories but not so good for anyone who is not asked to sign. And there is nothing in the contractarianism of the sort we are discussing that guarantees or requires that everyone will have a chance to participate equally in framing rules of morality. The result is that this approach to ethics could sanction the most blatant forms of social, economic, moral, and political injustice, ranging from a repressive caste system to systematic racial or sexual discrimination. Might, according to this theory, does make right. Let those who are the victims of injustice suffer as they will. It matters not so long as no one else – no contractor, or too few of them – cares about it. Such a theory takes one’s moral breath away…. A theory with so little to recommend it at the level of the ethics of our treatment of our fellow humans cannot have anything more to recommend it when it comes to the ethics of how we treat our fellow animals.

    Regan goes on to consider more sophisticated versions of contractarianism, such as the version propounded by John Rawls. Nevertheless, it suffers, according to Regan, from the same fundamental defect – by excluding certain individuals from the original bargaining position, it denies that we have direct duties to those individuals who lack a sense of justice.

    I think Regan here puts his finger on a central defect of contractarianism. Its circle of moral concern – who it considers agents worthy of moral consideration and obligation – will have to be determined in advance of determining the rules of morality (which is what the contract is supposed to do). But specifying to whom we have moral duties is itself a crucial and central aspect of morality. By excluding entire classes of beings in advance, contractarianism appears to beg a central question of morality, despite the fact that the contract is supposed to determine morality’s content.

  • Part IV: The Road to Serfdom?

    (for earlier posts in this series see here, here, and here)

    I realize that the foregoing will have put me well beyond the pale in the eyes of most libertarians, but for what it’s worth, I remain convinced that the present day State is far larger and more intrusive than is necessary. Libertarian critics are right to point out that an expansive state tends to undermine private initiative, crowd out the voluntary sector, and drain the vitality from communities, families and civil society. Not to mention the important fact that the State often makes claims of loyalty for itself and demands sacrifice in a way that can only be called demonic.

    But, it will be objected, what principled reason do I have for saying “this far and no further” to Leviathan? Haven’t I placed myself on a slippery slope to totalitarianism, on the proverbial road to serfdom?

    I don’t think so, mainly because what might look like a slippery slope in logical terms is often nothing of the sort in the real world. In the real world, we draw lines, even if they seem arbitrary from certain theoretical perspectives. What prevents government over-extending itself is usually not our political theory, but people’s common sense and their commitment to a particular way of life. We don’t need a theory about “limited government” so much as we need people with the virtues and practices that enable them to resist the blandishments of ever-expanding government. How much government intervention is appropriate is a judgment that can only be made by citizens employing the virtues of prudence and justice. What kind of political regime we have, I think, ultimately depends on what kind of people we are.