Does the takedown of Molyneux likewise takedown Hoppe? Or would Gordon simply retreat to the position that Molyneux’s failure is one of method: i.e., he is simply an amateur unacquainted with the necessary rigors to make philosophically valid arguments?
Interestingly, Molyneux rejoinder might mimic the last one he aimed at his critics in the libertarian academic class(over Molyneux’s criticism of Ron Paul). It was not a so subtle jab that his method was being presented in the free market whilst his critics were hiding behind protectionist academic tenure. Laissez Faire…
Personally, I simply discount the methods of meta-ethics/meta-moral foundations. Gordon’s undoubtable retreat to method(in favoring Hoppe while rejecting Molyneux) to me seems silly. Humans act on reasons but the proper rules discerned from reason can only be logically constructed/verified/understood by the Alfred Tarski’s of the world?
Kant perhaps came the closest to formulating universal rules regime of morals with the categorical imperative– act only in those ways that you would wish everyone else to act in the same way. But the universal rules regime runs into moral dilemmas if you consider context(could there be a dialectical Kant?).
In the modern treatment, a meta foundation, meta-X, of something, X, that relies on the semantics of X will run into a liars paradox, which is a way of stating that no formal system F can consistently and completely describe itself. If F makes that claim, then that is equivalent to F being able to prove any statement S.
In meta-ethics, then, the universality is that any system F that claims to fully describe itself can “prove” anything. If ethics is a means of conflict resolution, then systems F,F1,F2 …that claim universality, cannot resolve anything in a dispute. I.e., the universality of “universality” is no peaceful conflict resolution.
You can get out of the paradoxes by moving up into higher order analyses and employing different semantics. But I don’t think you are really saying anything when you resort to that. That’s what the professional mathematicians do(to escape Godel’s incompleteness theorems), but I don’t think the same avenue is open for political and moral philosophers. You have to remain in the 1st-Order world.
If you are looking for a connection between liberty and science, the best avenue to me is the “critical rationalist” approach that advances a “presumption of liberty” as a condition necessary for an epistemology of a Popper method of science. We give up trying to “prove” stuff. Instead, we have to be content with falsifying claims. But this turns out to be a pretty powerful weapon against Statist moral obligations((a la de Jasay).
To me, it is rather self-evident that humans are going to operate from a plurality of moral foundations. And that reasons are subjective. Reason applies to the means to achieve the subjective ends. So, you are not going to divine a universal, 1st-order moral rules regime from the human condition. The Libertarian Principle, interpreted as the revised Lockean proviso, is a first-order moral constraint against moral claims derived from the varied moral foundations.
Note: I used this method of argument to address David Godon’s question whether libertarians must be “Social Liberals.”
Does the takedown of Molyneux likewise takedown Hoppe?
Hard to say. They’re similar, but Molyneux is sloppier.
It was not a so subtle jab that his method was being presented in the free market whilst his critics were hiding behind protectionist academic tenure.
That strikes me as a silly argument. If both sides are making their case in an open forum, how does the fact that some of the participants have tenure and some don’t affect the content of the arguments?
Humans act on reasons but the proper rules discerned from reason can only be logically constructed/verified/understood by the Alfred Tarski’s of the world?
Well, “constructed/verified/understood” is a bit of a package deal. Both Aristotle and Kant said that although their theories explain why certain things are right, you don’t necessarily need them (except perhaps in hard cases) to know whether those things are right.
In the modern treatment, a meta foundation, meta-X, of something, X, that relies on the semantics of X will run into a liars paradox, which is a way of stating that no formal system F can consistently and completely describe itself. If F makes that claim, then that is equivalent to F being able to prove any statement S.
In meta-ethics, then, the universality is that any system F that claims to fully describe itself can “prove” anything. If ethics is a means of conflict resolution, then systems F,F1,F2 …that claim universality, cannot resolve anything in a dispute. I.e., the universality of “universality” is no peaceful conflict resolution.
I think the sense of “meta” you’re working with here is not what most philosophers mean when they talk about metaethics.
That’s what the professional mathematicians do(to escape Godel’s incompleteness theorems)
Though if Wittgenstein is right, they needn’t.
but I don’t think the same avenue is open for political and moral philosophers. You have to remain in the 1st-Order world.
And again, I think they are. Metaethics, these days at least, is rarely an attempt to describe ethics from the outside. (Sorry, John Cooper.) These are no longer the days of logical positivism.
We give up trying to “prove” stuff. Instead, we have to be content with falsifying claims.
The (well, a) problem with Popperianism — as Popper himself virtually admitted — is that once you acknowledge the Duhem-Quine point that no theory has testable results apart from auxiliary hypotheses, the asymmetry that Popper thought he’d found between verification and falsification melts away.
I also think Popper’s whole method is driven by a fear of skepticism that just isn’t livable, and therefore not worth fearing, so that Popper’s method turns out to be unnecessary.
To me, it is rather self-evident that humans are going to operate from a plurality of moral foundations. And that reasons are subjective. Reason applies to the means to achieve the subjective ends.
There’s something a bit incongruous in a Popper fan’s starting off a claim like that with “To me, it is rather self-evident that ….”
Of course I think your “self-evident” claim is false. But suppose, arguendo, that it’s true. Is it a falsifiable hypothesis? What would falsify it, for you? If it’s not falsifiable, then what is it, for you? As a Popperian?
What do you mean by this? Are you talking about that whole “notorious paragraph” stuff that putnam and floyd wrote about or something else?
Btw, I’ve never seen you talk about Gödel, so I’m very curious about your take on him, and whether his incompleteness theorems: 1)Are correct 2)Are philosophically relevant (and if they are, what are their phisolophical implications) 3)Apply to praxeology (indeed I was disappointed when I didn’t find a discussion of this in your praxeological investigations draft that I read online)
And one final question: Do you think saying “falsificationism is not falsifiable” is a good objection to falsificationism, or the popperian has an easy counter to that claim?
What do you mean by this? Are you talking about that whole “notorious paragraph” stuff that putnam and floyd wrote about or something else?
I don’t mean W.’s specific remarks about Gödel so much as his general account of the nature of mathematics (in the Lectures and Remarks).
Btw, I’ve never seen you talk about Gödel, so I’m very curious about your take on him, and whether his incompleteness theorems: 1)Are correct
Well, on a Wittgensteinian approach the answer is “if they don’t make any difference to how math is done, it’s not clear that they’re actually saying anything.”
2)Are philosophically relevant (and if they are, what are their phisolophical implications) 3)Apply to praxeology
No and no, for the above reason.
And one final question: Do you think saying “falsificationism is not falsifiable” is a good objection to falsificationism, or the popperian has an easy counter to that claim?
I think the Popperian has an answer. Unlike the positivists (mutatis mutandis), Popper doesn’t treat falsifiability as a criterion of meaning (and so isn’t committed to regarding his own view as meaningless — though actually there are moves the positivists can make here too); it’s a criterion of scientificness, and Popper never claimed that his methodological proposals were themselves part of empirical science.
There’s something a bit incongruous in a Popper fan’s starting off a claim like that with “To me, it is rather self-evident that ….”
Of course I think your “self-evident” claim is false. But suppose,arguendo, that it’s true. Is it a falsifiable hypothesis? What would falsify it, for you? If it’s not falsifiable, then what is it, for you? As a Popperian?
It is “self-evident” in this sense: conduct a public opinion random sample of n trials. A trial here would be a given respondent’s preferred option from a list of “moral foundations.” If each trail resulted in the same outcome, that is, the exact same preference, then I would suspect a biased sample in the same sense that if we tossed a pair of dice that resulted in the same outcome for each trial, then we would immediately suspect “loaded dice.”
We can certainly subject the hypothesis H= “the human race subscribes to a plurality of moral foundations” to a fallibility test. We can use the same experiment above to construct a null Hypothesis that the preference is not biased to a “loaded result.”
The (well, a) problem with Popperianism — as Popper himself virtually admitted — is that once you acknowledge the Duhem-Quine point that no theory has testable results apart from auxiliary hypotheses, the asymmetry that Popper thought he’d found between verification and falsification melts away.
I’m not really familiar all that much with Duhem. Quine I’m a bit more familiar with. But I don’t think Quine’s argument against Popper is the most effective one. I would suggest Kuhn’s argument presents the better counter-factual. Kuhn would say that Popper’s method only holds in special circumstances–in the context of revolutions–and that in normal times, scientists/philosophers/… follow the established paradigm. I can’t really dispute that. That fact, however, doesn’t impugn the method, it just means the method isn’t the normal mode of inquiry in the every day world of “professional inquirers.”
And again, I think they are. Metaethics, these days at least, is rarely an attempt to describe ethics from the outside. (Sorry, John Cooper.) These are no longer the days of logical positivism.
There might be a certain misunderstanding over the use of the word “meta.” I’m using the term in the sense of the inability of a Formal System F to completely and consistently describe itself. In practical terms, this means that there are statements S in F that F cannot evaluate to true or false.
But this is not just residue from from a now discarded “logical positivist” era. Today, the “Halting Problem” is equivalent to Godel’s Liars paradox. I can make a definite analogy to the impossibility of writing a program to prevent a computer from crashing(without violating the definition of a computer; the trivial solution, to halt all input, would thusly violate it’s definition) to the problem of any formal moral system being complete and consistent.
Both Aristotle and Kant said that although their theories explain why certain things are right, you don’t necessarily need them (except perhaps in hard cases) to know whether those things are right.
To be honest Dr. Long, I’ve read a number of your political writings, but I haven’t read much of your professional philosophical work. I don’t really know what your official method is. So, I don’t want to ascribe views to you that are not yours. And, admittedly, I’m a rank amateur when it comes philosophy beyond politics. But I would ask which Aristotelian or Kantian Schools when it comes to the interpretation and explanation of their theories?
A fairly poignant example: Many communitarians, for example, Michael Sande, point to Aristotle’s view of human nature and “The Polis” as a foundational element of their view regarding the “good life” and “the common good.” But I can’t think anything more opposite political philosophy-wise to the communitarian view of the Polis than the libertarian model of class conflict. Completely opposite poles.
So what does Aristotle tell us about the Polis? Does it simply depend on which Aristotelian you ask?
I also have extreme skepticism regarding anything related to teleology. I don’t think history or humanity or the universe is directed toward any final purpose. And I don’t think you can “a priori” make judgments regarding a science of human action without the knowledge of the sociological and institutional context. Human action is a function of that context.
In particular, I would point to “path-dependency” as a problem for a praxeological method. An example that I recently discussed on my blog is the consequences of “small network” resulting from a high degree of network standardization that was, in many respects, artificially imposed. But the reality of this small network radically changes economic models and models of human action. And there is no way you can predict this type of path dependency.
That strikes me as a silly argument. If both sides are making their case in an open forum, how does the fact that some of the participants have tenure and some don’t affect the content of the arguments?
To be fair to Molyneux, that “charge” was only a component of lengthy video “rebuttal.” And the motivating factor with regard to that not so subtle jab was the fact that Walter Block stated that because he didn’t support Ron Paul, he didn’t actually “hate the State.” In that context, I think it is fair to give as good as you get
It is “self-evident” in this sense: conduct a public opinion random sample of n trials. A trial here would be a given respondent’s preferred option from a list of “moral foundations.”
And how exactly would that be relevant to the topic in dispute here? We’ve known for quite a while — ever since Socrates demonstrated it in detail — that what answers people are ultimately committed to by the totality of their beliefs and preferences, and what answers people give off the tops of their heads when asked some question about their beliefs and preferences, have little to do with each other.
Ask someone some time to define “bachelor.” The odds are good that they’ll give some such answer as “unmarried male.” Does that mean they really regard male goldfish, and two-year-old boys, and His Holiness Pope Eggs Benedict Arnold, as bachelors? Or does it just mean they haven’t done much reflecting on their own practices and commitments?
But I don’t think Quine’s argument against Popper is the most effective one.
So how do you respond to it?
I’m using the term in the sense of the inability of a Formal System F to completely and consistently describe itself. In practical terms, this means that there are statements S in F that F cannot evaluate to true or false.
Well, if you define “meta” in such a way that nothing counts as “meta” unless it’s subject to a certain problem, then indeed anything “meta” will have that problem. But it doesn’t seem to have anything to do with “meta” as used in, e.g., metaethics.
Today, the “Halting Problem” is equivalent to Godel’s Liars paradox.
Again, what does that have to do with metaethics?
I don’t really know what your official method is.
Official method for what?
But I would ask which Aristotelian or Kantian Schools when it comes to the interpretation and explanation of their theories?
Which Aristotelian or Kantian Schools what? I’m not sure what you’re asking. I was referring to what Aristotle and Kant themselves said, not to schools.
But I can’t think anything more opposite political philosophy-wise to the communitarian view of the Polis than the libertarian model of class conflict.
Okay. But I’m not sure what you’re getting at. Is the idea that being an Aristotelean means agreeing with everything Aristotle ever said on any subject? If so, then AFAIK there’ve been no Aristoteleans other than Aristotle, ever. But this is not what being an Aristotelean means.
I also have extreme skepticism regarding anything related to teleology. I don’t think history or humanity or the universe is directed toward any final purpose
Aristotelean teleology has nothing to do with purpose.
And I don’t think you can “a priori” make judgments regarding a science of human action without the knowledge of the sociological and institutional context. Human action is a function of that context.
Well, you just made a statement about all human action across all contexts. That seems inconsistent.
But the reality of this small network radically changes economic models and models of human action.
Praxeology is not a model of human action.
And the motivating factor with regard to that not so subtle jab was the fact that Walter Block stated that because he didn’t support Ron Paul, he didn’t actually “hate the State.” In that context, I think it is fair to give as good as you get
Molyneux’s use of the idea that engaging in debate carries with it normative commitments is odd. He discusses this idea and mentions it in his summary of the book’s argument; but it doesn’t really play a role in how he develops his account of morality.
“I also think Popper’s whole method is driven by a fear of skepticism that just isn’t livable.”
But you respond to my “fallibility test” with an appeal to the failure of agents to subject their moral intuitions to the Socratic Method. The necessity of agents living the examined life is not the way most people live, either.
If you mean “not livable” in a strict sense, then, obviously those two statements don’t mean the same thing. But I would then suggest you need to rephrase you earlier critique of the Popper method because “not livable” is much too strong of a statement.
I don’t mean W.’s specific remarks about Gödel so much as his general account of the nature of mathematics (in the Lectures and Remarks).
Well, on a Wittgensteinian approach the answer is “if they don’t make any difference to how math is done, it’s not clear that they’re actually saying anything.”
I’m very interested in a more detailed explanation of how the wittgensteinian approach refutes Gödel (or shows that his theorems are meaningless, which should count as a refutation).
From what I’ve found, the only thing remotely resembling that is the putnam/floyd discussion of the notorious paragraph, and I’m not sure whether it gets the job done (though it would be very interesting to read your take on it, since I’m not sure it says the same thing you said here).
So, if you would care to ellaborate on the explanation, or point me to someone who has done something like that, it would be great.
I think the Popperian has an answer. Unlike the positivists (mutatis mutandis), Popper doesn’t treat falsifiability as a criterion of meaning (and so isn’t committed to regarding his own view as meaningless — though actually there are moves the positivists can make here too); it’s a criterion of scientificness, and Popper never claimed that his methodological proposals were themselves part of empirical science.
Ok. But isn’t this just a word play? Doesn’t it make the “criterion for scientificness” completely arbitrary?
Suppose that being falsifiable is a criterion for a proposition being true (or for us being able to ascertain that a proposition is true), instead of merely scientific. Then my objection couldn’t be countered, could it? (Or would you say that I turned falsificationism into verificationism?)
What I mean is: If being “scientific” is not related in a fundamental way with being true, or with being knowledge, then what’s the point of calling a proposition “scientific”?
I really would like an answer, at least to the Gödel one, because everyone makes such a big fuss about him. I’d like to know how to counter their claims.
Although the question is not directed to me I’ll give it a try anyway…
Basically what Gödel says is that in any formal system which is capable of expressing proofs for basic arithmetic you can construct a statement which says “this statement is not provable (in this system)”.
Now either the statement is provable (contrary to what it says), which means it is false, which means a false statement can be proven in the system, which means the system is inconsistent, or the statement is not provable, which means it is true, which means you have a true statement which cannot be proven.
So a consistent system of this kind contains true statements which cannot be proven within it.
However the kind of unprovable but nevertheless true statement it contains is imho not very interesting, because it is not about the (supposed) subject of the system.
I’m really thankful for your reply, but I’m afraid it doesn’t really answer my question, since what I want know is where to find a detailed argument showing how the wittgensteinian approach to mathematics would refute gödel.
I guess Roderick doesn’t know either, or maybe he thinks I’ve made a stupid question, since he hasn’t answered yet.
Of course a take down of Molyneux (who is sloppy as hell) is not a take down of Hoppe.
Hoppe presents one coherent argument that is epistemologically grounded. Moly’s book (136p…) is jam packed of eclectic and silly arguments.
Gordon has reviewed Hoppe argument in quite a favorable way, which says all the difference. I think he tends to agree with Hoppe. http://mises.org/daily/2313
Of course a take down of Molyneux (who is sloppy as hell) is not a take down of Hoppe.
I commend the following passage to your attention:
“If you are trying through argument to discover the truth, you need not be engaged in a debate with an actual opponent, who holds mistaken views that you prefer to correct. You can argue entirely alone, by trying to find out the consequences of premises that you think are true.”
For the reason this might pose a problem for Hoppe, see here.
Yes, I saw this. If you think this has any bearing on Hoppe’s argument- I respectfully suggest you don’t understand it at it’s most basic core.
Regarding your critique, I once wrote so:
“1. No position is rationally defensible unless it can be justified by argument
[…]
Is premise (1) true? Not obviously so. It depends, I suppose, on what counts as an argument.”
Hoppe’s argument, being hypothetical (If norm X is assumed than NAP, norm X being argued to be a presupposition of a certain action) starts with the context of people acting to engage in justificatory discourse (a certain action) directed at conflict resolution. In that context it seems obvious both must necessarily except that positions must be justified (notice- a normative claim), unless, they can not hope to resolve a conflict via discourse which is what they are doing. This is why the “arguing alone” in reference to Hoppe (not molyneux) shows a misunderstanding of the argument. So precisely stated rejecting the need for justification stands in contradiction to their praxeologicly demonstrated preference (this is the starting point) of resolving the conflict via discourse- i.e such a denile is a performative contradiction. and so in the context of Hoppe’s argument (1) is irrelevant.
(1) […] But presumably the premises themselves must be rationally defensible too;
The premise of (1) is inherent to the actors interaction of justifacatory discourse (as is shown- logically presupposed), and so is necessarily held to be true by both engaging in argument. argumentation is not a random act, to ignore the presupposition is incorrect.
“2. No position can be justified by argument if it denies one or more of the preconditions of interpersonal argumentative exchange.
[…]
Is premise (2) true? It seems not. Consider the statement “I am the only person left alive.” One can certainly imagine circumstances in which one would be warranted in endorsing this statement on the basis of the available evidence. (The last astronaut left on the space station watches the Earth explode ….) Hence the statement could in principle be justified by argument. Yet it certainly denies one of the preconditions of interpersonal argumentative exchange – namely, the existence of other arguers. ”
Still a matter of context, and you, I belive, confusing AE with some natural rights argument. In the context of conflict resolution (the context of any political discussion as Hoppe argues in the problem of polliticlal order) there must be two actors, and so, this is a valid and undeniable assumption. Againg, the objections is irrelevant. As far as only one man exists no norms for conflict resolution, capitalistic or socialistic, are required and no ethical problem arises.
“3. Interpersonal argumentative exchange requires that each participant in the exchange enjoy exclusive control over her own body.
[…]
Is premise (3) true? I don’t see why. Do you really have to have exclusive control over your entire body in order to engage in argument with me? Couldn’t I, say, have your body shackled yet leave your mouth free? ”
Argumentation ethics examines which norms are consistent with conflict resolution during discourse. Since argumentation requires control of your body any norm proposed denying an arguer right to control his body involves a performative contradiction. Therfore, only a norm of 100% self ownership can be shown to be non contradictory, and so must be choosen.
As for the distinction between “mouth” and “body”, this is nothing but a semantical distinction, not a real one. In the course of argument, as Hoppe states in Theory of Socialism and Capitalism, participants necessarily assumed the existence of objective and intersubjectively ascertainable borders. i.e we recognize the car as distinct from the road, a ball as distinct from the air around it and my body as distinct from yours. otherwise reality is nothing but subjective moosh and no argument could usefully or coherently take place. The object a man utilizes during discourse is a solid chunk of matter called it’s body. No objective border differentiates the mouth from the kidney. therefore, I think, Hoppe is correct to state that only a self ownership of body norm is consistent with the very act of argumentation.
This might also answer the ambiguity of premise 4 (“What does it mean for me to deny your exclusive control over your body?”). It means that the very proposition of any other norm intended for the resolution of conflicts over the human body involves a performative contradiction, if that makes sense.
Since argumentation requires control of your body any norm proposed denying an arguer right to control his body involves a performative contradiction. Therfore, only a norm of 100% self ownership can be shown to be non contradictory, and so must be choosen.
This seems to be simply a repeat of the original claim without addressing the objection.
Since argumentation requires control of your body any norm proposed denying an arguer right to control his body involves a performative contradiction. Therfore, only a norm of 100% self ownership can be shown to be non contradictory, and so must be choosen.
This seems to be simply a repeat of the original claim without addressing the objection
Why is it too strong? It doesn’t seem so to me. People can pretend to live according to radical skepticism, but no one really does or can.
I don’t agree with the “Radical Skepticism” characterization. There are certain attendant presumptions, e.g, for example, “the presumption of liberty,” that allow for epistemological “livability.”
In the end, I agree with you that the Socrates demonstrated that most common moral intuitions fail under examination. However, I have yet to read of a philosopher who has resolved the problem of making the “examined life” an enforceable obligation. In that sense, the “fact,” not the “truth,” of moral pluralism is a problem that still stands.
However, the only problematic aspect of moral pluralism is the potential set of moral obligations that arise from the varied set of foundations as a constraint against your liberty.
I find the “critical rationalist” method well-suited to combat this problem. The only short-coming of this method is the problem of enforcing the cessation of the “debunked moral claims.” This to me defines an outstanding enforcement problem in libertarian social theory.
On the political side, I think the problem is a bit different. I don’t see unexamined moral intuitions serving as the foundation of the State. Here, the problem is moral legitimacy wrapped around political economy. This is a problem of the State as a separate moral agency.
I don’t agree with the “Radical Skepticism” characterization. There are certain attendant presumptions, e.g, for example, “the presumption of liberty,” that allow for epistemological “livability.”
How does that solve the problem of crossing the street? You can say that a person crossing the street is just making a falsifiable conjecture, but then why not step in front of a bus? That too is a falisifiable conjecture.
In the end, I agree with you that the Socrates demonstrated that most common moral intuitions fail under examination.
I didn’t think that was quite what I’d said.
However, I have yet to read of a philosopher who has resolved the problem of making the “examined life” an enforceable obligation.
I’m not sure what you mean.
In that sense, the “fact,” not the “truth,” of moral pluralism is a problem that still stands.
What’s the difference between “fact” and “truth”? You haven’t been watching Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, have you?
How does that solve the problem of crossing the street?
Ok, I think part of the problem here is that we may be talking past one another. My thought plane is concentrated on scientific inquiry and the application of such a method to things like the logic/justification of political obligation.
However, by “livable,” it appears you are actually referring to “is the stove hot?,” meaning the practical, mundane stuff of daily life. I was not thinking about it in that sense. Honestly, that level of argument is not particularly interesting to me. I realize relating a method of how you best learn with regards to the body of human scientific knowledge to how you actually learn to go about your daily life perhaps may be a major problem in philosophy. I suppose that is what separates the professionals from the rank amateurs(like myself).
I may have to go and brush up on my Popper. But off the top of my head, (1) the method of scientific knowledge and (2) “crossing the Street” seem like two entirely different things. One usually requires an institutional context(e.g., the university, peer review, etc) to advance; but you don’t need a university to learn how to cross the Street.
Does the takedown of Molyneux likewise takedown Hoppe? Or would Gordon simply retreat to the position that Molyneux’s failure is one of method: i.e., he is simply an amateur unacquainted with the necessary rigors to make philosophically valid arguments?
Interestingly, Molyneux rejoinder might mimic the last one he aimed at his critics in the libertarian academic class(over Molyneux’s criticism of Ron Paul). It was not a so subtle jab that his method was being presented in the free market whilst his critics were hiding behind protectionist academic tenure. Laissez Faire…
Personally, I simply discount the methods of meta-ethics/meta-moral foundations. Gordon’s undoubtable retreat to method(in favoring Hoppe while rejecting Molyneux) to me seems silly. Humans act on reasons but the proper rules discerned from reason can only be logically constructed/verified/understood by the Alfred Tarski’s of the world?
Kant perhaps came the closest to formulating universal rules regime of morals with the categorical imperative– act only in those ways that you would wish everyone else to act in the same way. But the universal rules regime runs into moral dilemmas if you consider context(could there be a dialectical Kant?).
In the modern treatment, a meta foundation, meta-X, of something, X, that relies on the semantics of X will run into a liars paradox, which is a way of stating that no formal system F can consistently and completely describe itself. If F makes that claim, then that is equivalent to F being able to prove any statement S.
In meta-ethics, then, the universality is that any system F that claims to fully describe itself can “prove” anything. If ethics is a means of conflict resolution, then systems F,F1,F2 …that claim universality, cannot resolve anything in a dispute. I.e., the universality of “universality” is no peaceful conflict resolution.
You can get out of the paradoxes by moving up into higher order analyses and employing different semantics. But I don’t think you are really saying anything when you resort to that. That’s what the professional mathematicians do(to escape Godel’s incompleteness theorems), but I don’t think the same avenue is open for political and moral philosophers. You have to remain in the 1st-Order world.
If you are looking for a connection between liberty and science, the best avenue to me is the “critical rationalist” approach that advances a “presumption of liberty” as a condition necessary for an epistemology of a Popper method of science. We give up trying to “prove” stuff. Instead, we have to be content with falsifying claims. But this turns out to be a pretty powerful weapon against Statist moral obligations((a la de Jasay).
To me, it is rather self-evident that humans are going to operate from a plurality of moral foundations. And that reasons are subjective. Reason applies to the means to achieve the subjective ends. So, you are not going to divine a universal, 1st-order moral rules regime from the human condition. The Libertarian Principle, interpreted as the revised Lockean proviso, is a first-order moral constraint against moral claims derived from the varied moral foundations.
Note: I used this method of argument to address David Godon’s question whether libertarians must be “Social Liberals.”
http://rulingclass.wordpress.com/2011/09/07/a-reply-to-david-gordon/
Hard to say. They’re similar, but Molyneux is sloppier.
That strikes me as a silly argument. If both sides are making their case in an open forum, how does the fact that some of the participants have tenure and some don’t affect the content of the arguments?
Well, “constructed/verified/understood” is a bit of a package deal. Both Aristotle and Kant said that although their theories explain why certain things are right, you don’t necessarily need them (except perhaps in hard cases) to know whether those things are right.
I think the sense of “meta” you’re working with here is not what most philosophers mean when they talk about metaethics.
Though if Wittgenstein is right, they needn’t.
And again, I think they are. Metaethics, these days at least, is rarely an attempt to describe ethics from the outside. (Sorry, John Cooper.) These are no longer the days of logical positivism.
The (well, a) problem with Popperianism — as Popper himself virtually admitted — is that once you acknowledge the Duhem-Quine point that no theory has testable results apart from auxiliary hypotheses, the asymmetry that Popper thought he’d found between verification and falsification melts away.
I also think Popper’s whole method is driven by a fear of skepticism that just isn’t livable, and therefore not worth fearing, so that Popper’s method turns out to be unnecessary.
There’s something a bit incongruous in a Popper fan’s starting off a claim like that with “To me, it is rather self-evident that ….”
Of course I think your “self-evident” claim is false. But suppose, arguendo, that it’s true. Is it a falsifiable hypothesis? What would falsify it, for you? If it’s not falsifiable, then what is it, for you? As a Popperian?
Some questions:
What do you mean by this? Are you talking about that whole “notorious paragraph” stuff that putnam and floyd wrote about or something else?
Btw, I’ve never seen you talk about Gödel, so I’m very curious about your take on him, and whether his incompleteness theorems: 1)Are correct 2)Are philosophically relevant (and if they are, what are their phisolophical implications) 3)Apply to praxeology (indeed I was disappointed when I didn’t find a discussion of this in your praxeological investigations draft that I read online)
And one final question: Do you think saying “falsificationism is not falsifiable” is a good objection to falsificationism, or the popperian has an easy counter to that claim?
I don’t mean W.’s specific remarks about Gödel so much as his general account of the nature of mathematics (in the Lectures and Remarks).
Well, on a Wittgensteinian approach the answer is “if they don’t make any difference to how math is done, it’s not clear that they’re actually saying anything.”
No and no, for the above reason.
I think the Popperian has an answer. Unlike the positivists (mutatis mutandis), Popper doesn’t treat falsifiability as a criterion of meaning (and so isn’t committed to regarding his own view as meaningless — though actually there are moves the positivists can make here too); it’s a criterion of scientificness, and Popper never claimed that his methodological proposals were themselves part of empirical science.
It is “self-evident” in this sense: conduct a public opinion random sample of n trials. A trial here would be a given respondent’s preferred option from a list of “moral foundations.” If each trail resulted in the same outcome, that is, the exact same preference, then I would suspect a biased sample in the same sense that if we tossed a pair of dice that resulted in the same outcome for each trial, then we would immediately suspect “loaded dice.”
We can certainly subject the hypothesis H= “the human race subscribes to a plurality of moral foundations” to a fallibility test. We can use the same experiment above to construct a null Hypothesis that the preference is not biased to a “loaded result.”
I’m not really familiar all that much with Duhem. Quine I’m a bit more familiar with. But I don’t think Quine’s argument against Popper is the most effective one. I would suggest Kuhn’s argument presents the better counter-factual. Kuhn would say that Popper’s method only holds in special circumstances–in the context of revolutions–and that in normal times, scientists/philosophers/… follow the established paradigm. I can’t really dispute that. That fact, however, doesn’t impugn the method, it just means the method isn’t the normal mode of inquiry in the every day world of “professional inquirers.”
There might be a certain misunderstanding over the use of the word “meta.” I’m using the term in the sense of the inability of a Formal System F to completely and consistently describe itself. In practical terms, this means that there are statements S in F that F cannot evaluate to true or false.
But this is not just residue from from a now discarded “logical positivist” era. Today, the “Halting Problem” is equivalent to Godel’s Liars paradox. I can make a definite analogy to the impossibility of writing a program to prevent a computer from crashing(without violating the definition of a computer; the trivial solution, to halt all input, would thusly violate it’s definition) to the problem of any formal moral system being complete and consistent.
To be honest Dr. Long, I’ve read a number of your political writings, but I haven’t read much of your professional philosophical work. I don’t really know what your official method is. So, I don’t want to ascribe views to you that are not yours. And, admittedly, I’m a rank amateur when it comes philosophy beyond politics. But I would ask which Aristotelian or Kantian Schools when it comes to the interpretation and explanation of their theories?
A fairly poignant example: Many communitarians, for example, Michael Sande, point to Aristotle’s view of human nature and “The Polis” as a foundational element of their view regarding the “good life” and “the common good.” But I can’t think anything more opposite political philosophy-wise to the communitarian view of the Polis than the libertarian model of class conflict. Completely opposite poles.
So what does Aristotle tell us about the Polis? Does it simply depend on which Aristotelian you ask?
I also have extreme skepticism regarding anything related to teleology. I don’t think history or humanity or the universe is directed toward any final purpose. And I don’t think you can “a priori” make judgments regarding a science of human action without the knowledge of the sociological and institutional context. Human action is a function of that context.
In particular, I would point to “path-dependency” as a problem for a praxeological method. An example that I recently discussed on my blog is the consequences of “small network” resulting from a high degree of network standardization that was, in many respects, artificially imposed. But the reality of this small network radically changes economic models and models of human action. And there is no way you can predict this type of path dependency.
To be fair to Molyneux, that “charge” was only a component of lengthy video “rebuttal.” And the motivating factor with regard to that not so subtle jab was the fact that Walter Block stated that because he didn’t support Ron Paul, he didn’t actually “hate the State.” In that context, I think it is fair to give as good as you get
And how exactly would that be relevant to the topic in dispute here? We’ve known for quite a while — ever since Socrates demonstrated it in detail — that what answers people are ultimately committed to by the totality of their beliefs and preferences, and what answers people give off the tops of their heads when asked some question about their beliefs and preferences, have little to do with each other.
Ask someone some time to define “bachelor.” The odds are good that they’ll give some such answer as “unmarried male.” Does that mean they really regard male goldfish, and two-year-old boys, and His Holiness Pope Eggs Benedict Arnold, as bachelors? Or does it just mean they haven’t done much reflecting on their own practices and commitments?
So how do you respond to it?
Well, if you define “meta” in such a way that nothing counts as “meta” unless it’s subject to a certain problem, then indeed anything “meta” will have that problem. But it doesn’t seem to have anything to do with “meta” as used in, e.g., metaethics.
Again, what does that have to do with metaethics?
Official method for what?
Which Aristotelian or Kantian Schools what? I’m not sure what you’re asking. I was referring to what Aristotle and Kant themselves said, not to schools.
Okay. But I’m not sure what you’re getting at. Is the idea that being an Aristotelean means agreeing with everything Aristotle ever said on any subject? If so, then AFAIK there’ve been no Aristoteleans other than Aristotle, ever. But this is not what being an Aristotelean means.
Aristotelean teleology has nothing to do with purpose.
Well, you just made a statement about all human action across all contexts. That seems inconsistent.
Praxeology is not a model of human action.
To answer one bad argument with another?
Molyneux’s use of the idea that engaging in debate carries with it normative commitments is odd. He discusses this idea and mentions it in his summary of the book’s argument; but it doesn’t really play a role in how he develops his account of morality.
Dr. Long, you wrote:
“I also think Popper’s whole method is driven by a fear of skepticism that just isn’t livable.”
But you respond to my “fallibility test” with an appeal to the failure of agents to subject their moral intuitions to the Socratic Method. The necessity of agents living the examined life is not the way most people live, either.
“Not livable” and “not the way most people live” don’t mean the same thing.
If you mean “not livable” in a strict sense, then, obviously those two statements don’t mean the same thing. But I would then suggest you need to rephrase you earlier critique of the Popper method because “not livable” is much too strong of a statement.
Why is it too strong? It doesn’t seem so to me. People can pretend to live according to radical skepticism, but no one really does or can.
I’m very interested in a more detailed explanation of how the wittgensteinian approach refutes Gödel (or shows that his theorems are meaningless, which should count as a refutation).
From what I’ve found, the only thing remotely resembling that is the putnam/floyd discussion of the notorious paragraph, and I’m not sure whether it gets the job done (though it would be very interesting to read your take on it, since I’m not sure it says the same thing you said here).
So, if you would care to ellaborate on the explanation, or point me to someone who has done something like that, it would be great.
Ok. But isn’t this just a word play? Doesn’t it make the “criterion for scientificness” completely arbitrary?
Suppose that being falsifiable is a criterion for a proposition being true (or for us being able to ascertain that a proposition is true), instead of merely scientific. Then my objection couldn’t be countered, could it? (Or would you say that I turned falsificationism into verificationism?)
What I mean is: If being “scientific” is not related in a fundamental way with being true, or with being knowledge, then what’s the point of calling a proposition “scientific”?
No answer to this one?
I really would like an answer, at least to the Gödel one, because everyone makes such a big fuss about him. I’d like to know how to counter their claims.
Although the question is not directed to me I’ll give it a try anyway…
Basically what Gödel says is that in any formal system which is capable of expressing proofs for basic arithmetic you can construct a statement which says “this statement is not provable (in this system)”.
Now either the statement is provable (contrary to what it says), which means it is false, which means a false statement can be proven in the system, which means the system is inconsistent, or the statement is not provable, which means it is true, which means you have a true statement which cannot be proven.
So a consistent system of this kind contains true statements which cannot be proven within it.
However the kind of unprovable but nevertheless true statement it contains is imho not very interesting, because it is not about the (supposed) subject of the system.
I’m really thankful for your reply, but I’m afraid it doesn’t really answer my question, since what I want know is where to find a detailed argument showing how the wittgensteinian approach to mathematics would refute gödel.
I guess Roderick doesn’t know either, or maybe he thinks I’ve made a stupid question, since he hasn’t answered yet.
I’m waiting because I want to refresh my memory by rereading the Floyd/Putnam piece first to see if it makes the points I have in mind or not.
Sorry for pressuring you, then. Take as much time as you need. 😛
To anyone interested, here are the relevant links of the discussion I’m talking about:
http://www.jstor.org/stable/2678455?&Search=yes&searchText=notorious&searchText=paragraph&list=hide&searchUri=%2Faction%2FdoBasicSearch%3FQuery%3Dnotorious%2Bparagraph%26acc%3Don%26wc%3Don&prevSearch=&item=2&ttl=4226&returnArticleService=showFullText
https://philosophy.nd.edu/people/all/profiles/bays-timothy/documents/wnp.pdf
http://philmat.oxfordjournals.org/content/9/3/257.full.pdf+html
http://www.jstor.org/stable/3655544?&Search=yes&searchText=notorious&searchText=paragraph&list=hide&searchUri=%2Faction%2FdoBasicSearch%3FQuery%3Dnotorious%2Bparagraph%26acc%3Don%26wc%3Don&prevSearch=&item=1&ttl=4226&returnArticleService=showFullText
http://epistemology.xmu.edu.cn/picture/article/16/b0/b0/f21958bf418a952cbf570a793b27/a59422cd-1e84-47ad-be52-94cc76daba30.pdf
I’m wondering whether your memory has already been refreshed…
Haven’t had a chance yet. I haven’t forgotten ….
Of course a take down of Molyneux (who is sloppy as hell) is not a take down of Hoppe.
Hoppe presents one coherent argument that is epistemologically grounded. Moly’s book (136p…) is jam packed of eclectic and silly arguments.
Gordon has reviewed Hoppe argument in quite a favorable way, which says all the difference. I think he tends to agree with Hoppe.
http://mises.org/daily/2313
You’re welcome to think so.
Now that you’re answering other people’s questions, could you please answer mine?
http://aaeblog.com/2012/07/04/universally-preferable-refutation/comment-page-1/#comment-378473
Yep. Do you know anything else? I much appreciate Gordon’s opinions and would be interested in seeing a critique or defence of AE by him. (?)
I commend the following passage to your attention:
“If you are trying through argument to discover the truth, you need not be engaged in a debate with an actual opponent, who holds mistaken views that you prefer to correct. You can argue entirely alone, by trying to find out the consequences of premises that you think are true.”
For the reason this might pose a problem for Hoppe, see here.
Yes, I saw this. If you think this has any bearing on Hoppe’s argument- I respectfully suggest you don’t understand it at it’s most basic core.
Regarding your critique, I once wrote so:
“1. No position is rationally defensible unless it can be justified by argument
[…]
Is premise (1) true? Not obviously so. It depends, I suppose, on what counts as an argument.”
Hoppe’s argument, being hypothetical (If norm X is assumed than NAP, norm X being argued to be a presupposition of a certain action) starts with the context of people acting to engage in justificatory discourse (a certain action) directed at conflict resolution. In that context it seems obvious both must necessarily except that positions must be justified (notice- a normative claim), unless, they can not hope to resolve a conflict via discourse which is what they are doing. This is why the “arguing alone” in reference to Hoppe (not molyneux) shows a misunderstanding of the argument. So precisely stated rejecting the need for justification stands in contradiction to their praxeologicly demonstrated preference (this is the starting point) of resolving the conflict via discourse- i.e such a denile is a performative contradiction. and so in the context of Hoppe’s argument (1) is irrelevant.
(1) […] But presumably the premises themselves must be rationally defensible too;
The premise of (1) is inherent to the actors interaction of justifacatory discourse (as is shown- logically presupposed), and so is necessarily held to be true by both engaging in argument. argumentation is not a random act, to ignore the presupposition is incorrect.
“2. No position can be justified by argument if it denies one or more of the preconditions of interpersonal argumentative exchange.
[…]
Is premise (2) true? It seems not. Consider the statement “I am the only person left alive.” One can certainly imagine circumstances in which one would be warranted in endorsing this statement on the basis of the available evidence. (The last astronaut left on the space station watches the Earth explode ….) Hence the statement could in principle be justified by argument. Yet it certainly denies one of the preconditions of interpersonal argumentative exchange – namely, the existence of other arguers. ”
Still a matter of context, and you, I belive, confusing AE with some natural rights argument. In the context of conflict resolution (the context of any political discussion as Hoppe argues in the problem of polliticlal order) there must be two actors, and so, this is a valid and undeniable assumption. Againg, the objections is irrelevant. As far as only one man exists no norms for conflict resolution, capitalistic or socialistic, are required and no ethical problem arises.
“3. Interpersonal argumentative exchange requires that each participant in the exchange enjoy exclusive control over her own body.
[…]
Is premise (3) true? I don’t see why. Do you really have to have exclusive control over your entire body in order to engage in argument with me? Couldn’t I, say, have your body shackled yet leave your mouth free? ”
Argumentation ethics examines which norms are consistent with conflict resolution during discourse. Since argumentation requires control of your body any norm proposed denying an arguer right to control his body involves a performative contradiction. Therfore, only a norm of 100% self ownership can be shown to be non contradictory, and so must be choosen.
As for the distinction between “mouth” and “body”, this is nothing but a semantical distinction, not a real one. In the course of argument, as Hoppe states in Theory of Socialism and Capitalism, participants necessarily assumed the existence of objective and intersubjectively ascertainable borders. i.e we recognize the car as distinct from the road, a ball as distinct from the air around it and my body as distinct from yours. otherwise reality is nothing but subjective moosh and no argument could usefully or coherently take place. The object a man utilizes during discourse is a solid chunk of matter called it’s body. No objective border differentiates the mouth from the kidney. therefore, I think, Hoppe is correct to state that only a self ownership of body norm is consistent with the very act of argumentation.
This might also answer the ambiguity of premise 4 (“What does it mean for me to deny your exclusive control over your body?”). It means that the very proposition of any other norm intended for the resolution of conflicts over the human body involves a performative contradiction, if that makes sense.
This seems to be simply a repeat of the original claim without addressing the objection.
Oh.. not at all. See here.
Molyneux strikes back.
I don’t agree with the “Radical Skepticism” characterization. There are certain attendant presumptions, e.g, for example, “the presumption of liberty,” that allow for epistemological “livability.”
In the end, I agree with you that the Socrates demonstrated that most common moral intuitions fail under examination. However, I have yet to read of a philosopher who has resolved the problem of making the “examined life” an enforceable obligation. In that sense, the “fact,” not the “truth,” of moral pluralism is a problem that still stands.
However, the only problematic aspect of moral pluralism is the potential set of moral obligations that arise from the varied set of foundations as a constraint against your liberty.
I find the “critical rationalist” method well-suited to combat this problem. The only short-coming of this method is the problem of enforcing the cessation of the “debunked moral claims.” This to me defines an outstanding enforcement problem in libertarian social theory.
On the political side, I think the problem is a bit different. I don’t see unexamined moral intuitions serving as the foundation of the State. Here, the problem is moral legitimacy wrapped around political economy. This is a problem of the State as a separate moral agency.
How does that solve the problem of crossing the street? You can say that a person crossing the street is just making a falsifiable conjecture, but then why not step in front of a bus? That too is a falisifiable conjecture.
I didn’t think that was quite what I’d said.
I’m not sure what you mean.
What’s the difference between “fact” and “truth”? You haven’t been watching Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, have you?
Ok, I think part of the problem here is that we may be talking past one another. My thought plane is concentrated on scientific inquiry and the application of such a method to things like the logic/justification of political obligation.
However, by “livable,” it appears you are actually referring to “is the stove hot?,” meaning the practical, mundane stuff of daily life. I was not thinking about it in that sense. Honestly, that level of argument is not particularly interesting to me. I realize relating a method of how you best learn with regards to the body of human scientific knowledge to how you actually learn to go about your daily life perhaps may be a major problem in philosophy. I suppose that is what separates the professionals from the rank amateurs(like myself).
I may have to go and brush up on my Popper. But off the top of my head, (1) the method of scientific knowledge and (2) “crossing the Street” seem like two entirely different things. One usually requires an institutional context(e.g., the university, peer review, etc) to advance; but you don’t need a university to learn how to cross the Street.
Yes, but Popper’s claims about what we can and cannot know aren’t confined to science.
David Gordon responds.