Where do you draw the line? Two people can't both use the same axe to cut down a tree at the same time, but two people can both drink from a lake or a river, two people can both forage from the same woods, two people can both eat of the same animal carcass, two people can plough the same field, and two people can harvest it. Two people can live in a land. These things, these are the foundations of human civilization-
It's the possibility of mutually incompatible uses, not the claim that every use results in conflict. Many cases are compatible (like drinking from a large river, foraging in a vast forest, using a field at different times). Libertarian ethics only needs this:
whenever uses are incompatible or congestion makes incompatibility likely, you need a rule in advance to decide who gets to control the next action. That rule can specify boundaries by space (plots, lanes), time (turns, seasons), quota (catch limits), function (easement) etc, as long as it is a property rule (exclusive control per the rule) to remove conflict without arbitrariness.
The examples you made fit this. The lake is non-rivalrous at low demand but becomes rival at the margin. The field can be ploughed sequentially, but not by two incompatible acts at once. An animal carcass can be divided (corresponds to post-facto exclusive shares). All of these things illustrate why norms specify who does what, where, and when.
in most cases throughout human history, we have trended towards cooperation as opposed to conflict. Conflict is not a given
I agree. What matters for ethics is not the inevitability, but the possibility of conflict. A single possible clash is sufficient to require a conflict-resolving rule if the goal is peaceful coexistence.
Also, cooperation itself presupposes property. To share, trade, promise, or operate a commons, participants must know whose permission is needed for which action.
Furthermore, by attempting to snuff out external factors and just say "Do you agree with the principles?", you paint an incredibly simple picture of the world, and to my eye, are yet another victim of ideology. Anybody can say, "hey those principles sound nice to live under" or "hey those principles are sound under these particular assumed circumstances", but few people can make it practicable. Most people in this world who aren't psychotically online psychopaths agree with most communist ideology, but communism is a difficult system to implement (Just like anarcho-capitalism) because everytime the revolutionaries overthrow the government to build a new utopia, they accidentally return to the status quo but worse. Oh, and frankly, it's next to near impossible to establish a social contract without some type of hierarchical system of governance, be it state, tribal, religious, community, etc.
I insist that the thread is focused on ethics and normativity (which rule is right?). Description (what happens?) and implementation (how to make people comply?) are not immediately relevant to that. Calling that focus "ideology" is just a label. If the rule is incoherent, show the contradiction. If it's coherent, but hard to implement, that's a sociology issue, not an ethics issue. Regarding hierarchies, they're permissible when they're voluntary, like HOAs, firms, monasteries, covenant tribes etc. The state is not acceptable because of its non-consensual control.
Why risk your life fighting some assholes for a couple nice fields when there's plenty of good fields somewhere else that don't have to be fought over?
Avoidance is a
tactic, not a
rule. It only makes sense if there is already an established fact on the matter of whose field you're avoiding. The point you made later, "take their land and women" is a concession of the point, it describes aggression. That is identified as unjustified, regardless of how often it occurs.
The crux is the universalizable rule. The claim I am defending in this thread is that the only rule that resolves potential conflicts without contradiction is libertarian ethics (exclusive control to the first emborder/use or via consensual transfer). That rule scales to commons by explicit co-ownership covenants determining space/time/quota/function.
If you believe another rule does better, say so explicitly and I'm looking forward to testing it for universality and non-contradiction across the same metaphysical circumstances (volitional agents, rivalrous means).
If your point is merely that many goods are low-congestion some of the time, we agree, that's compatible with libertarian ethics. If your point is that
no property rule is needed, please offer a procedure that resolves incompatible uses peacefully without smuggling property back in.
Good high-quality engagement
[Miracle Hair] hypothetical
is a good scenario for showing how the theory I outlined distinguishes ethics from every other kind of "ought"
Ethically
the girl's body is her property. Taking a hair without consent is an invasion of that control. Ethics as delineated by ontology is about which actions can be justified universally without contradiction. For instance, if someone claims "anyone may violate property if the outcome is beneficial enough", that rule cannot be universalized, because every actor could come up with their own emergency, rendering conflict endemic. Hence, within its boundary, the girl's right is absolute. Violating it to save others would make "rights" contingent, at which point they would cease to be rights.
Morally (in the loose sense)
you could
wish that she would consent, you might even
be upset at the fact that she refuses. However, those are moral or psychological responses, not ethical permissions. Within the sphere of permissible (non-conflict-generating) actions, ethics does not tell us who deserves admiration.
So it seems that "ethics" and "morality" aren't interchangeable in libertarianism
In the framework I posit, the distinction between ethics as ontologically grounded norms of non-conflict, and everything beside that as morals/taste/prudence/virtue/character/empathy (as in, a domain outside of ethics) is an interesting, but coherent byproduct. For instance, moral discourse is allowed, but non-universal preferences may never override universal rights.
If you have prior experience in normative disciplines, you should see the advantage of this clean separation right away. Most other approaches and systems collapse because they blur the line between universalizable rules and non-universalizable preferences.
If the hair on the girl's head is anyone's property, it's probably hers. So it seems she's exercising her rights within proper bounds. Unless she's causing new conflict. But just saying no to a request doesn't seem like causing new conflict, even if it makes some people very angry. If it was, that would be really bad news for libertarian property rights. And we already established that there's never a good reason to violate property rights that are exercised within their proper bounds.
Is there a way to get around this that doesn't just amount to introducing defeasible rights through the backdoor?
Introducing exceptions is nothing but redefining ethics as consequentialism, which would collapse normativity into preference (whoever claims the "greater good" gets to commit aggression). This is obviously rejected by libertarian ethics because it destroys the very precondition of agency (secure control over one's body and effects).
In short, the claim is not "the girl
ought not give the hair", but rather "no one else may
rightfully take it". The tragedy of this situation is in nature, not in ethics.
@Rainbow Child I'm getting two distinct points from your post, the bread theft/mercy template and the ethics vs morals distinction - I'll address the two. If you think I missed a crucial detail, feel free to mention it and I'll respond.
Emergencies and "lesser evil" mercy
The Catholic "steal the bread, lessen the guilt" story is about
culpability, not
permission. The gist is "the act remains wrong, but we judge the sinner more gently".
In the position I outlined, you need to separate ethical permissibility (what may others rightfully do to you?) and moral appraisal (how do we view your character?). That is to say that emergencies don't create new rights. Taking the bread/hair of another without consent is and remains an invasion. Your desperation may (and likely will) affect how we treat you after the fact (restitution terms, social forgiveness), but it does not make the act permissible or grant you the right to do it.
Now if you think emergencies
do generate exceptions, then please state the universalizable rule that allows A to violate B's control "for a greater good" and show how it avoids contradiction when B (or C, or a majority) cites
their own emergency in turn. Because that's very precisely the point where consequentialism collapses into permanent conflict.
"Morals are the whole house" + "ethics = ethnic mores"
Philosophy can't be decided by etymology. The terms I use are technical because the everyday terms are equivocal.
Ethics is thus ontologically grounded universalizable norms that prevent conflict among volitional agents (property/conflict boundaries). And morals are culture- or psyche-driven ideals (virtues, sentiments, preferences) that
may be admirable, but are not universally binding as claims against others.
Calling ethics "ethnic mores" is just a relabel of relativism. Whichever "house" is bigger defines right and wrong. I reject that because it turns justification into a headcount. The test is not "what does my ethos prefer", but "what can any agent will as a rule without contradiction"
To reiterate where it leaves the cases (Miracle Hair / bread theft), ethically a non-consensual taking is a violation of rightful control, morally you are free to praise charity, beg for mercy, or mitigate sanctions (but none of these create a right to violate rightful control). Rights protect everyone's agency in all cases, virtues ideally result in better choices in particular cases.
If you think there
is a rival principle that permits taking in emergencies + is universalizable without inviting reciprocal abuse + still prevents conflict better than first-use+consent, please spell it out. That's the target of this thread.
