WEBVTT

NOTE The Moral Standpoint

1
00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:06.000
Topic for this section is, why should I care about anyone else but myself?

2
00:00:06.000 --> 00:00:10.000
Why should I care about anyone's interests but my own?

3
00:00:10.000 --> 00:00:15.000
So far, everything I've said about having an ultimate end and so forth

4
00:00:15.000 --> 00:00:17.000
leaves that question entirely open.

5
00:00:17.000 --> 00:00:22.000
I'd have some ultimate end which is to satisfy, you know, the maximum satisfaction of my own preferences

6
00:00:22.000 --> 00:00:26.000
or however you want to define it.

7
00:00:26.000 --> 00:00:35.600
but we haven't yet seen much about its content well over the next few sessions

8
00:00:35.600 --> 00:00:42.180
we'll be trying to specify more of that content and ultimately the specified in

9
00:00:42.180 --> 00:00:48.360
libertarian direction but just starting off now with question why should I care

10
00:00:48.360 --> 00:00:53.800
about other people's interests and this connects to the issue I mentioned

11
00:00:53.800 --> 00:01:01.480
yesterday of agent relative versus agent neutral value. So the question is, when

12
00:01:01.480 --> 00:01:07.120
you say that something is good or right or valuable or something, is that

13
00:01:07.120 --> 00:01:12.600
simply a relational claim, a claim that it's good for, let's say for me, good from

14
00:01:12.600 --> 00:01:18.440
my point of view, or is it somehow an endorsement of some kind of shared or

15
00:01:18.440 --> 00:01:22.020
or a Common or Commonly Accessible Value.

16
00:01:24.160 --> 00:01:25.760
So you wanna think of it this way.

17
00:01:27.720 --> 00:01:30.860
When I say the word I, you're referring to me.

18
00:01:33.560 --> 00:01:36.040
But if, when you say the word I,

19
00:01:36.040 --> 00:01:37.480
you're referring to yourself.

20
00:01:38.440 --> 00:01:40.680
I just wanted to give a joke we heard at the lunch, but.

21
00:01:41.960 --> 00:01:46.960
And so, it's not that the meaning of the word I

22
00:01:46.960 --> 00:01:50.360
I is subjective in some odd ways.

23
00:01:50.360 --> 00:01:52.280
Now, in some sense, which we all mean exactly the same thing

24
00:01:52.280 --> 00:01:54.560
by the word I, but nevertheless,

25
00:01:54.560 --> 00:01:55.760
the reference is all different.

26
00:01:55.760 --> 00:01:56.880
When I say I, I mean me.

27
00:01:56.880 --> 00:01:58.760
When you say I, I mean you.

28
00:01:59.760 --> 00:02:01.400
So you might think, someone might think,

29
00:02:01.400 --> 00:02:03.040
well, maybe good is like that.

30
00:02:03.040 --> 00:02:07.960
When I say good, I mean good for me.

31
00:02:07.960 --> 00:02:11.340
When you say good, you mean good for you.

32
00:02:11.340 --> 00:02:13.280
Now, praxeology might seem to favor

33
00:02:13.280 --> 00:02:15.520
this agent-relative conception,

34
00:02:15.520 --> 00:02:20.520
because praxeology talks about the fact that the values you pursue are always your own values.

35
00:02:22.520 --> 00:02:28.520
Classical eudaimonism also might seem to favor that view because classical eudaimonism says we each have our own eudaimonia,

36
00:02:28.520 --> 00:02:33.520
we each have our own flourishing that we're pursuing.

37
00:02:33.520 --> 00:02:39.520
In fact, Aristotle even suggests that good is sort of a relational concept.

38
00:02:39.520 --> 00:02:42.520
He attacks Plato's form of the good as some sort of good in itself.

39
00:02:42.520 --> 00:02:51.520
No good is always the perfection of something. My good is to perfect my nature, your good is to perfect your nature, and so on.

40
00:02:51.520 --> 00:02:57.520
And you look at cases like the squirrel eating the acorn. You might say, well, is good or bad thing?

41
00:02:57.520 --> 00:03:02.520
Well, it's good for the squirrel, bad for the acorn. It seems like there's an Asian relative conception there.

42
00:03:02.520 --> 00:03:14.520
On the other hand, you know, when we think about justice and rights, it seems like it's awfully tempting, at least, to think you need something like an agent-neutral conception there.

43
00:03:14.520 --> 00:03:26.520
Unless you want sort of a purely kind of egoist contractarianism or something, where you say, well, I decided it's in my interest to make this agreement with other people that we're all sort of agreeing not to violate each other's rights.

44
00:03:26.520 --> 00:03:33.240
Rights, but you might think, well maybe you want something more robust than that. Maybe there's

45
00:03:33.240 --> 00:03:38.800
some reason I ought to respect your rights apart from the fact that it's simply a strategy that

46
00:03:38.800 --> 00:03:44.120
serves my ends. If it is, if I'm, you know, should somehow adopt respect for your rights or for your

47
00:03:44.120 --> 00:03:48.240
interests or whatever, you know, some kind of inherent value, then that might seem to push you

48
00:03:48.240 --> 00:03:51.000
in the direction of agent-neutral value.

49
00:03:54.880 --> 00:03:57.080
So there's the question, why should we care about other people?

50
00:03:57.080 --> 00:03:58.520
And then there's this other question,

51
00:03:58.520 --> 00:04:00.160
is all value agent relative?

52
00:04:00.160 --> 00:04:01.960
Is all value agent neutral?

53
00:04:01.960 --> 00:04:04.620
How are these two kinds of value related?

54
00:04:06.880 --> 00:04:09.440
So here's a question you might ask.

55
00:04:09.440 --> 00:04:11.480
If you think of, Nietzsche makes this distinction

56
00:04:11.480 --> 00:04:13.880
between master morality and slave morality,

57
00:04:13.880 --> 00:04:21.120
where master morality, I'm going to oversimplify a bit in the long tradition of oversimplifying

58
00:04:21.120 --> 00:04:30.000
Nietzsche, master morality involves values, people who go around dominating and going

59
00:04:30.000 --> 00:04:34.920
after what they want and imposing their will and being aggressive and self-assertive and

60
00:04:34.920 --> 00:04:42.700
slave values or servile values involve being meek and not putting yourself forward and

61
00:04:42.700 --> 00:04:47.500
and being humble and gentle and doing what other people want rather than what you want

62
00:04:47.500 --> 00:04:49.420
and so on.

63
00:04:49.420 --> 00:04:57.700
So slave values or survive values are self-sacrificial and what you're supposed to admire, not just

64
00:04:57.700 --> 00:05:01.540
what you're supposed to do for yourself but what you're supposed to admire in other people

65
00:05:01.540 --> 00:05:04.700
is sort of self-abasiveness.

66
00:05:04.700 --> 00:05:10.740
Of course, for master morality you're supposed to, not only what you're supposed to pursue

67
00:05:10.740 --> 00:05:35.740
But you might ask, well, why shouldn't I endorse master morality for myself and for other people I care about, if any, and why shouldn't I endorse servile values for everyone else?

68
00:05:35.740 --> 00:05:41.740
What I should endorse for myself and my friends is bold self-assertiveness.

69
00:05:41.740 --> 00:05:46.740
What I should endorse for everybody else is meek self-abasiveness.

70
00:05:46.740 --> 00:05:49.740
I want other people to be helpful to me.

71
00:05:49.740 --> 00:05:53.740
So I like it when other people are really helpful and they sacrifice their interests to me.

72
00:05:53.740 --> 00:05:57.740
But I don't want to do that stuff. I want to go after what I want.

73
00:05:57.740 --> 00:06:03.740
So is there any reason not to adopt a double set of values?

74
00:06:03.740 --> 00:06:07.740
One set of values for you and your gang and another set of values for the rest of the world.

75
00:06:07.740 --> 00:06:17.740
If you think value is agent-relative, you might think that nothing would rule that out.

76
00:06:17.740 --> 00:06:26.740
Now, the existing evaluative terms we actually use seem to be agent-neutral, I claim.

77
00:06:26.740 --> 00:06:31.740
Well, I'm claiming that they seem to be. I'm not claiming that they are, but I'm claiming that they seem to be,

78
00:06:31.740 --> 00:06:34.380
which by itself could still be a disputable claim.

79
00:06:35.260 --> 00:06:38.220
But what I mean by that is that when we say

80
00:06:38.220 --> 00:06:40.260
that something is good or right,

81
00:06:40.260 --> 00:06:44.420
we're generally not merely endorsing it for ourselves

82
00:06:44.420 --> 00:06:46.180
or expressing our own desire for it,

83
00:06:46.180 --> 00:06:48.280
but generally we're also endorsing it for others,

84
00:06:48.280 --> 00:06:50.720
saying that other people ought to want it

85
00:06:50.720 --> 00:06:52.880
or respect it or whatever.

86
00:06:53.860 --> 00:06:55.260
And the fact that our evaluative terms

87
00:06:55.260 --> 00:06:58.320
actually work that way doesn't by itself prove anything.

88
00:06:58.320 --> 00:07:03.720
we might have, you know, our evaluative terms might conceal some sort of confusion.

89
00:07:03.720 --> 00:07:08.960
But nevertheless, I'm claiming that in fact our evaluative terms do tend to work that way.

90
00:07:08.960 --> 00:07:12.800
Not only do they express our own desire or approval for things,

91
00:07:12.800 --> 00:07:17.440
but they also tend to suggest that other people should feel similarly.

92
00:07:17.440 --> 00:07:25.720
Now, you might think, well, this isn't true generally.

93
00:07:25.720 --> 00:07:29.160
You might think, well, what about cultures that have a double standard?

94
00:07:29.160 --> 00:07:34.480
Nietzsche, for example, talks about cultures that had master morality for the in-group.

95
00:07:34.480 --> 00:07:39.000
You're not only supposed to behave self-assertively yourself,

96
00:07:39.000 --> 00:07:44.320
you're supposed to admire self-assertion among your fellow gang

97
00:07:44.320 --> 00:07:46.480
and want them to be like that too.

98
00:07:46.480 --> 00:07:50.120
But you're not supposed to admire it in the rest of the world.

99
00:07:50.120 --> 00:07:54.240
You're not supposed to want the rest of the world to be self-assertive.

100
00:07:54.240 --> 00:07:57.360
You want the rest of the world to be meek and humble.

101
00:07:57.360 --> 00:07:59.280
You're perfectly happy with the fact

102
00:07:59.280 --> 00:08:00.520
that the rest of the world is meek and humble

103
00:08:00.520 --> 00:08:02.280
and you're self-assertive.

104
00:08:02.280 --> 00:08:05.620
And so Nietzsche thinks that,

105
00:08:05.620 --> 00:08:07.920
at least in cultures like that,

106
00:08:07.920 --> 00:08:12.480
evaluative terms aren't universal in that way.

107
00:08:12.480 --> 00:08:13.640
That evaluative terms,

108
00:08:13.640 --> 00:08:15.720
although they may involve a recommendation

109
00:08:15.720 --> 00:08:18.080
for someone other than just you personally yourself,

110
00:08:18.080 --> 00:08:21.240
they don't involve recommendations for everyone.

111
00:08:21.240 --> 00:08:28.240
Well, I shouldn't agree that that's how things often work in many cultures, and I think that

112
00:08:28.240 --> 00:08:32.480
particular way of thinking is not entirely dead in our culture for that matter.

113
00:08:32.480 --> 00:08:39.840
But I'm not convinced that that is sort of the dominant, uncontested way that evaluative

114
00:08:39.840 --> 00:08:50.920
terms work in any culture, even in cultures like the very chauvinistic ones that Nietzsche

115
00:08:50.920 --> 00:08:59.400
is talking about these cultures still if someone from outside the privileged class starts behaving

116
00:08:59.400 --> 00:09:04.920
in the way that the privileged class is supposed to admire among themselves being bold and aggressive

117
00:09:04.920 --> 00:09:13.480
and self-assertive and so forth you know although that may awaken disapproval and dismay often it

118
00:09:13.480 --> 00:09:22.920
And it can also awaken admiration, the Romans were, the Romans admired the Celtic leaders

119
00:09:22.920 --> 00:09:26.520
they found hard to defeat, they still went and happily defeated them and dragged them

120
00:09:26.520 --> 00:09:31.400
in chains to the streets of Rome, but nevertheless they'd rather fight, even though in some sense

121
00:09:31.400 --> 00:09:36.400
they might rather fight a weak and wimpy foe, they felt greater respect for the cool and

122
00:09:36.400 --> 00:09:42.840
admirable strong and brave and intelligent foe, and you feel more respect for that one.

123
00:09:42.840 --> 00:09:50.840
And so even in chauvinistic cultures, I think there is some extent for evaluative terms to extend beyond just the end group.

124
00:09:50.840 --> 00:09:55.840
But anyway, whether or not, as a matter of fact, any culture has them.

125
00:09:55.840 --> 00:09:58.840
Suppose, as a matter of fact, that our evaluative terms do work like that.

126
00:09:58.840 --> 00:10:06.840
Suppose, as a matter of fact, when we use an evaluative term, we commit ourselves to it being valuable not just for ourselves, but for everyone.

127
00:10:06.840 --> 00:10:08.840
That doesn't mean that that's right.

128
00:10:08.840 --> 00:10:11.840
You might ask, couldn't we revise our moral terms?

129
00:10:11.840 --> 00:10:17.840
Sometimes we, you know, we do revise moral terms and we don't like what they imply.

130
00:10:17.840 --> 00:10:20.840
Now who are we revising the mean?

131
00:10:20.840 --> 00:10:27.840
Well, I don't think it could mean that we could, you know, simply take the very same moral terms

132
00:10:27.840 --> 00:10:32.840
and start applying them in a way that they no longer apply universally anymore.

133
00:10:32.840 --> 00:10:36.840
Because if it's part of the meaning of our terms and the way, you know, the way the terms are used

134
00:10:36.840 --> 00:10:38.840
is part of what determines the meaning.

135
00:10:38.840 --> 00:10:42.840
the meaning of the moral terms that they apply to everyone universally.

136
00:10:42.840 --> 00:10:47.840
Then we can't start using them in a different way without abandoning the term.

137
00:10:47.840 --> 00:10:51.840
It's not the same term anymore. It's another term that sounds like it.

138
00:10:51.840 --> 00:10:56.840
But it's not the same term if it doesn't have the same meaning.

139
00:10:56.840 --> 00:10:59.840
So we couldn't use the terms differently.

140
00:10:59.840 --> 00:11:04.840
But the question is, could we abandon our terms and substitute other ones?

141
00:11:04.840 --> 00:11:09.700
Sometimes we do that. Sometimes there are terms that necessarily carry certain evaluative

142
00:11:09.700 --> 00:11:13.080
commitments with them. If we decide we don't like those evaluative commitments, we just

143
00:11:13.080 --> 00:11:17.480
stop using the term and racial epithets are being the obvious example. You can't use them

144
00:11:17.480 --> 00:11:21.800
with their original meaning without committing yourself to certain evaluations. If you don't

145
00:11:21.800 --> 00:11:25.200
want to commit yourself to those evaluations, either you have to use the term with a different

146
00:11:25.200 --> 00:11:32.200
meaning or you have to stop using the term. Could we do that? Could we give up the universal

147
00:11:32.200 --> 00:11:38.200
So how do we give up the universal implications of our evaluative terms?

148
00:11:38.200 --> 00:11:40.200
Well, I want to argue that we can't.

149
00:11:40.200 --> 00:11:45.200
Again, as is often the case this week, I don't claim to have an absolute knock-down argument against it,

150
00:11:45.200 --> 00:11:49.200
but I'm going to give what I think are some reasons against it.

151
00:11:49.200 --> 00:11:56.200
But first I want to talk about a different reason for thinking we can't give up the universal evaluative terms.

152
00:11:56.200 --> 00:11:59.200
And I want to think of that argument that doesn't quite work.

153
00:11:59.200 --> 00:12:01.960
So some have what you might call a consistency argument.

154
00:12:01.960 --> 00:12:10.240
You often see this argument in moral philosophy, that you have to take universal terms,

155
00:12:10.240 --> 00:12:13.080
you have to treat those applying to everyone.

156
00:12:13.080 --> 00:12:18.040
Because if I regard my pursuit of my well-being as legitimate for me, I have to regard your

157
00:12:18.040 --> 00:12:20.080
pursuit of your well-being as legitimate for you.

158
00:12:20.080 --> 00:12:28.680
It doesn't make any sense for me to treat it as okay for me and mine, but not for you.

159
00:12:28.680 --> 00:12:35.600
Unless I can point to some actual relevant real difference between us and when we're

160
00:12:35.600 --> 00:12:39.040
telling whether it's a real relevant difference is you know suppose you know suppose it's

161
00:12:39.040 --> 00:12:43.120
like the the snitches in Dr. Seuss where the ones with the stars on their bellies think

162
00:12:43.120 --> 00:12:47.200
they're the the best and the ones without the stars aren't and so they might say well

163
00:12:47.200 --> 00:12:50.760
the reason that these just apply to us is we have the stars but as soon as you take

164
00:12:50.760 --> 00:12:55.640
the stars away they don't say oh well all right now we should you know we should be

165
00:12:55.640 --> 00:12:56.640
in a subordinate position.

166
00:12:56.640 --> 00:13:01.000
Now they've suddenly decided that not having the stars is the important feature.

167
00:13:01.000 --> 00:13:07.840
So you have to find some feature that really is relevant, not one that you're just pretending

168
00:13:07.840 --> 00:13:08.840
is relevant.

169
00:13:08.840 --> 00:13:15.280
All right, fair enough, but I don't think this will get you everything you want.

170
00:13:15.280 --> 00:13:19.520
We have to distinguish between weak and strong universalizability of values, and here's what

171
00:13:19.520 --> 00:13:21.520
I mean.

172
00:13:21.520 --> 00:13:29.520
Suppose that, think about the way that two sports teams that are playing against each other, regard each other.

173
00:13:32.520 --> 00:13:38.520
So team A is doing everything it can to win against team B, and team B is doing everything it can to win against team A.

174
00:13:38.520 --> 00:13:44.520
Well, does team A think that team B is wrong to be trying to win against team A?

175
00:13:44.520 --> 00:13:48.520
No, team A thinks it's perfectly legitimate for team B to be trying to win.

176
00:13:48.520 --> 00:13:53.520
But that doesn't mean that Team A thinks that it should thereby be committed to letting Team B win.

177
00:13:53.520 --> 00:14:00.520
You know, the attitude you have in sports is, or in any kind of, you know, sort of competitive situation like this is,

178
00:14:00.520 --> 00:14:05.520
it's perfectly appropriate for you to be trying to win, but it's perfectly appropriate for me to be trying to stop you.

179
00:14:05.520 --> 00:14:08.520
Now, in that sense, you've got a kind of universalizability.

180
00:14:08.520 --> 00:14:15.520
It'd be different if you said, you know, I should be trying to win and everyone else should let me win.

181
00:14:15.520 --> 00:14:19.680
If you had said that, then you'd sort of have a view that makes yourself special and different from everyone else.

182
00:14:20.020 --> 00:14:26.160
But if you don't have that, you would just say, well, I should be doing all I can to win, you should be doing all you can to win, and, you know, we'll see who wins.

183
00:14:27.700 --> 00:14:31.100
That would be a kind of your universalizability, but it's not going to be the kind that gets you

184
00:14:31.940 --> 00:14:33.860
what you want morally.

185
00:14:33.860 --> 00:14:36.160
Now, of course, in the case of the sports teams,

186
00:14:37.260 --> 00:14:43.700
there is a common background of shared values that licenses this conflict. Although,

187
00:14:45.520 --> 00:14:51.520
Each of them wants a different situation. Team A wants Team A to win. Team B wants Team B to win.

188
00:14:51.520 --> 00:15:02.520
Nevertheless, they both agree on the shared background rules of sports. It's a good thing that we allow this conflict or promote this conflict or have this conflict happen.

189
00:15:02.520 --> 00:15:08.520
And so they both agree that it's a good thing that there's this institution of the sport.

190
00:15:08.520 --> 00:15:15.160
and you would say both sides are better off for having this conflict the game

191
00:15:15.160 --> 00:15:20.280
would be no fun if one if if both sides agreed that team a ought to win if team

192
00:15:20.280 --> 00:15:24.040
B didn't do anything to stop team A from winning you know not only would team B

193
00:15:24.040 --> 00:15:27.040
get no fun out of the game but team A would get no fun out of the game so there

194
00:15:27.040 --> 00:15:32.320
are lots of cases where we have what looks like a departure from from strong

195
00:15:32.320 --> 00:15:35.760
universality it looks like case we've got these these kinds of conflicts but

196
00:15:35.760 --> 00:15:39.440
If they're licensed by something stronger in the background.

197
00:15:39.440 --> 00:15:42.440
But is that always going to be the case?

198
00:15:42.440 --> 00:15:46.160
You can imagine someone who thinks, well, life is like the sports teams, except there's

199
00:15:46.160 --> 00:15:50.720
no shared, there are no shared norms in the background that justify this.

200
00:15:50.720 --> 00:15:53.280
It's just this is how it is.

201
00:15:53.280 --> 00:15:58.120
I, you know, I go after what I want, you go after what you want, and that may not be the

202
00:15:58.120 --> 00:16:03.720
best situation we can imagine, but that's nevertheless what is in fact legitimate.

203
00:16:03.720 --> 00:16:06.760
Hobbes seems to have in mind something like this.

204
00:16:06.760 --> 00:16:11.440
Hobbes says that in the state of nature, everyone has the right to do whatever they want, but

205
00:16:11.440 --> 00:16:17.120
what he means by right is simply it being okay for them to do it, but it doesn't imply

206
00:16:17.120 --> 00:16:21.600
that anyone else has an obligation to let them do it, so according to Hobbes, I have

207
00:16:21.600 --> 00:16:25.600
a right to kill you and you have the right to stop me.

208
00:16:25.600 --> 00:16:30.280
So when Hobbes says I have a right to kill you, he doesn't mean a kind of right that

209
00:17:00.280 --> 00:17:14.280
One of the arguments for rights is it seems to me they often presuppose strong universalizability when they think they're establishing it or they often presuppose it when really all they've got is weak universalizability.

210
00:17:14.280 --> 00:17:23.280
For example, there's an argument in Rothbard early on in the Ethics of Liberty where he's trying to argue for property rights.

211
00:17:23.280 --> 00:17:34.280
I think it's a perfectly good argument. It's an argument that works only if you already presuppose this one thing that I'm asking you how to prove, of strong universalizability.

212
00:17:34.280 --> 00:17:41.280
It's an argument where Rothbard says, well look, suppose you've got, how do we prove that anybody owns anything? What are the options?

213
00:17:41.280 --> 00:17:52.280
Well one option is that nobody owns anything, but he says well that means that no one would have the right to use anything, because ownership is the right to use stuff.

214
00:17:52.280 --> 00:17:56.280
and so no one would have the right to use any material object including their own bodies

215
00:17:56.280 --> 00:18:01.280
and so they'd all immediately have to die and that doesn't seem to make much sense.

216
00:18:01.280 --> 00:18:05.280
So we should assume that there is such a thing as ownership.

217
00:18:05.280 --> 00:18:08.280
So what about ownership of our own material bodies? Who owns them?

218
00:18:08.280 --> 00:18:11.280
And Rothbard says there are three main options.

219
00:18:11.280 --> 00:18:17.280
Could be that each person owns him or herself, which is obviously the option Rothbard wants to argue for.

220
00:18:17.280 --> 00:18:30.280
Or it could be that everyone owns an equal share of everyone else, you know, so if there are 300 people, each person owns one 300th of every other person, and so on.

221
00:18:30.280 --> 00:18:34.280
If there are 4 billion people, each one owns one 4 billionth of everyone else.

222
00:18:34.280 --> 00:18:45.280
And Rothbard argues against that on the grounds that there's no way to implement that, because you'd have to get permission from all the other 4 billion people before you could raise your arm or inhale.

223
00:18:45.280 --> 00:18:47.280
That's obviously not going to work out.

224
00:18:47.280 --> 00:18:49.280
Then Rothbard leaves with the other option,

225
00:18:49.280 --> 00:18:51.280
some people own other people.

226
00:18:51.280 --> 00:18:59.280
He says, well, that's not going to work because it's not universalizable.

227
00:18:59.280 --> 00:19:01.280
It's not a principle universally applicable.

228
00:19:01.280 --> 00:19:04.280
Ethical systems should apply to everyone.

229
00:19:04.280 --> 00:19:08.280
Well, I think those are good arguments as far as they go.

230
00:19:08.280 --> 00:19:12.280
However, I don't think that it settles this foundational question

231
00:19:12.280 --> 00:19:18.280
The computational question of whether there are any, whether there is such a thing as universalizability at all.

232
00:19:18.280 --> 00:19:21.280
Because imagine what a Hobbesian would say to these examples.

233
00:19:21.280 --> 00:19:28.280
A Hobbesian would say, well, my view is, there's perfectly legitimate, you know, whatever you mean by ownership,

234
00:19:28.280 --> 00:19:32.280
it's perfectly legitimate for me to do whatever I want with my body.

235
00:19:32.280 --> 00:19:35.280
But it's also perfectly legitimate for you to do whatever you want with my body.

236
00:19:35.280 --> 00:19:40.280
And you want to cut off my arm and cook it and eat it, it's perfectly legitimate for you to do it.

237
00:19:40.280 --> 00:19:47.280
This is also one of the worries I have about Hans Hoppe's argument that by engaging an argument, you're thereby committing yourself to the legitimacy of that person, using their money to do something that's not your obligation to do it.

238
00:20:10.280 --> 00:20:14.200
Mind and Body in order to engage in an argument.

239
00:20:14.200 --> 00:20:16.640
Because once again, is this legitimacy

240
00:20:16.640 --> 00:20:19.640
in the weak universalizable or the strong universalizable sense?

241
00:20:19.640 --> 00:20:22.400
Because you could say, yeah, by engaging you in an argument,

242
00:20:22.400 --> 00:20:25.000
I've granted it's perfectly legitimate for you

243
00:20:25.000 --> 00:20:30.640
to use your mind and body to argue,

244
00:20:30.640 --> 00:20:33.920
but it's also perfectly legitimate for me to cook and eat you.

245
00:20:33.920 --> 00:20:36.640
So we need the strong universalizability

246
00:20:36.640 --> 00:20:39.220
in order to make these arguments work.

247
00:20:42.180 --> 00:20:43.660
Can we get it?

248
00:20:43.660 --> 00:20:45.120
Now, of course, you could say in one sense

249
00:20:45.120 --> 00:20:46.660
we already have it because I'm claiming

250
00:20:46.660 --> 00:20:48.920
that the evaluative firms we already have

251
00:20:48.920 --> 00:20:50.280
are ones that already have this commitment

252
00:20:50.280 --> 00:20:53.120
to strong universalizability built into them.

253
00:20:53.120 --> 00:20:54.880
But still, and the question we have to ask is,

254
00:20:54.880 --> 00:20:57.920
what do we say about someone who thinks we should give it up?

255
00:20:57.920 --> 00:20:59.920
Can we coherently give it up?

256
00:20:59.920 --> 00:21:02.680
And I'd like to be able to show that we can't

257
00:21:02.680 --> 00:21:05.460
coherently give up the strong universalizability

258
00:21:05.460 --> 00:21:07.640
that's built into our evaluative terms.

259
00:21:08.960 --> 00:21:10.100
Okay, why not?

260
00:21:10.100 --> 00:21:15.100
Well, a number of philosophers have stressed,

261
00:21:16.200 --> 00:21:19.460
as part of their argument for why we should care

262
00:21:19.460 --> 00:21:21.500
about other people, a lot of them have stressed

263
00:21:21.500 --> 00:21:24.140
that we have a need to admire oneself.

264
00:21:24.140 --> 00:21:26.500
You find this in Socrates and Aristotle

265
00:21:26.500 --> 00:21:28.940
and David Hume and Adam Smith.

266
00:21:28.940 --> 00:21:32.300
Hume talks about being able to bear our own survey.

267
00:21:32.300 --> 00:21:35.060
And part of what they mean is that

268
00:21:35.060 --> 00:21:40.360
When you step back and look at yourself, you want to be able to find in yourself the same

269
00:21:40.360 --> 00:21:47.680
traits that you admire in others. But you could ask why that's the case. You can imagine

270
00:21:47.680 --> 00:21:54.200
someone saying, look, what I want to see in other people is slave values. What I want

271
00:21:54.200 --> 00:21:58.520
to see in myself is master values. When I step back and look at myself, I have very

272
00:21:58.520 --> 00:22:03.520
There are very different standards from what I want when I step back and look at other people.

273
00:22:03.520 --> 00:22:11.520
Now what human smiths do is they try to base strong universalizability on certain innate psychological tendencies we have.

274
00:22:11.520 --> 00:22:18.520
It's just a fact about human beings that we have these natural sympathies, that we just have this natural tendency to put ourselves in other people's shoes,

275
00:22:18.520 --> 00:22:26.080
to see ourselves from other people's point of view and or ultimately to see

276
00:22:26.080 --> 00:22:29.600
ourselves from a kind of objective or neutral point of view and that therefore

277
00:22:29.600 --> 00:22:34.320
they think there's a reason that we want me to harmonize the kinds of traits we

278
00:22:34.320 --> 00:22:37.040
want to see in other people with the kinds of traits we want to see in

279
00:22:37.040 --> 00:22:44.080
ourselves. I think there's something to that and I wouldn't agree with all the

280
00:22:44.080 --> 00:22:49.960
details, but I do think that they're on the right track there. The problem is, if

281
00:22:49.960 --> 00:22:54.920
you make this purely a psychological claim, it's just a psychological claim

282
00:22:54.920 --> 00:23:00.400
that we have this tendency. You know, it's, I have the same kind of worry about it

283
00:23:00.400 --> 00:23:04.080
that you might have about, you know, in Austrian economics you might

284
00:23:04.080 --> 00:23:08.800
have about basing an economic principle on empirical data rather than trying to

285
00:23:08.800 --> 00:23:13.860
defend it conceptually. You know, because it may be true that we have a natural

286
00:23:13.860 --> 00:23:22.860
natural tendency to step outside of ourselves and view ourselves objectively and try to bring into harmony the traits we see in ourselves or the traits we treat in others.

287
00:23:22.860 --> 00:23:35.860
We have a lot of natural tendencies. We have a tendency towards interpersonal objectivity, but also we have tendencies toward bias and toward ignoring other people's viewpoints and just doing whatever we want to do.

288
00:23:35.860 --> 00:23:40.860
Clearly human beings have both those tendencies. You see both those tendencies around all the time.

289
00:23:40.860 --> 00:23:52.860
So, why should we pursue one of those rather than the other? If they're just sort of psychological facts, it's not clear where does their normative punch come from.

290
00:23:52.860 --> 00:23:57.860
So it would be nice to have something more like a conceptual argument.

291
00:23:57.860 --> 00:24:13.860
Well, here's at least part of the move I want to make as to why I think we can't get rid of this strong universalizability in our evaluative terms.

292
00:24:13.860 --> 00:24:20.860
So first I want to claim that rational agency requires language, that you couldn't have rational agents without language.

293
00:24:20.860 --> 00:24:36.860
Now, you might doubt that. You might say, well, we need language to communicate our thoughts, but we could think perfectly well without language, or even thought perfectly well, we could think well enough to count as rational agents without language.

294
00:24:36.860 --> 00:24:48.860
I'm not convinced of that. Part of the reason I'm not convinced of that is what I was talking about this morning, where you don't count as a mental state unless you're capable of expressing it in certain ways.

295
00:24:48.860 --> 00:25:03.860
And I have trouble seeing how you could have thoughts that you didn't have any means of expressing in language.

296
00:25:03.860 --> 00:25:10.860
So I tend to think of language not just as a means of communication, but actually as a vehicle of thought.

297
00:25:10.860 --> 00:25:16.860
Now that's a philosophically controversial claim, but anyway, it's the one I do sign on to.

298
00:25:16.860 --> 00:25:22.360
All right, although I don't think that language is merely a means of communicating thought you already have,

299
00:25:22.360 --> 00:25:26.360
I think that it is, that language is, it's also a vehicle thought,

300
00:25:26.360 --> 00:25:32.860
I do think that the communicative dimension is essential in the following sense,

301
00:25:32.860 --> 00:25:37.860
that speaking language involves acquiescing in essentially shareable norms.

302
00:25:37.860 --> 00:25:42.360
Now this touches on what's in this called Wittgenstein's private language argument,

303
00:25:42.360 --> 00:25:45.360
and there are a lot of different interpretations of exactly what it means.

304
00:25:45.360 --> 00:25:50.360
I think he's right, but let me say a bit about what I think that means.

305
00:25:50.360 --> 00:25:55.360
By a private language, I don't mean a language that only one person knows.

306
00:25:55.360 --> 00:26:00.360
When Tolkien created Elvish, or actually two strains of Elvish,

307
00:26:00.360 --> 00:26:05.360
before he published any of that, he was the only person on earth who knew Elvish.

308
00:26:05.360 --> 00:26:10.360
The original speakers of it, having died out many ago.

309
00:26:10.360 --> 00:26:13.360
The original speakers of it, having died out many ago.

310
00:26:13.360 --> 00:26:21.360
Whoever it was who developed Klingon, I don't know if that was one person or group, but let's say it was one person.

311
00:26:21.360 --> 00:26:28.360
The first person who came up with Klingon was, at one time, the only person on earth who spoke Klingon.

312
00:26:28.360 --> 00:26:33.360
So there's a sense of private language, which those are private languages.

313
00:26:33.360 --> 00:26:41.360
That's not the sense I mean, because although they were languages that no one else actually spoke,

314
00:26:41.360 --> 00:26:46.860
they were languages the rules of which were generally applicable.

315
00:26:46.860 --> 00:26:56.360
In other words, the rules are such that anyone saying,

316
00:26:56.360 --> 00:27:26.360
Saying Ay Elbreth Gilthaniel means the same thing as anyone else saying Ay Elbreth Gilthaniel even if there was a time when Tolkien was the only person on earth who had ever said Ay Elbreth Gilthaniel and I forget what it means you know something like oh Elbreth you're really cool but or something like that but there was it you know to say that the language was not private is not to say that you know it couldn't have been the case that only one person might ever have spoken it. Tolkien could have died before and his notebooks could have been burned before anyone ever else

317
00:27:26.360 --> 00:27:34.360
The rules were essentially shareable. The norms of language were essentially shareable.

318
00:27:34.360 --> 00:27:41.360
You could say, could you construct a language where the rules of it are such that only you can mean, only you can understand the meaning of it.

319
00:27:41.360 --> 00:27:52.360
So that when I say grobsik, that means table for me.

320
00:27:52.360 --> 00:27:57.720
But not only will it not mean table if you say it, but it won't even mean table to you when you hear it.

321
00:27:57.720 --> 00:28:02.520
You can't, you know, you can't understand it as meaning table. It's only something in my own little little world.

322
00:28:03.560 --> 00:28:08.880
It's a language you in principle could not learn. It's only my language. Well, I don't think that makes sense. I think that

323
00:28:10.960 --> 00:28:15.080
language by its very nature involves a shareable norm.

324
00:28:17.560 --> 00:28:19.560
Now what follows from that?

325
00:28:19.560 --> 00:28:26.560
Well, some thinkers have thought that something about morality follows fairly directly from norms governing language.

326
00:28:26.560 --> 00:28:30.560
You can find this in Habermas, you can find it in Hans Hoppe.

327
00:28:30.560 --> 00:28:36.560
Take norms governing language or governing interpersonal linguistic communication

328
00:28:36.560 --> 00:28:40.560
and try and build ethical or political norms directly out of that.

329
00:28:40.560 --> 00:28:47.560
That's not what I'm going to recommend, but what I am recommending is something in common with the spirit of that.

330
00:28:47.560 --> 00:28:58.560
Here's why I don't want to recommend that approach. First of all, I don't think it's a promising approach. I don't think it's going to get you what you want in the way of content.

331
00:28:58.560 --> 00:29:05.560
Because the norms governing linguistic communication are much more permissive than the norms governing ethics.

332
00:29:05.560 --> 00:29:14.560
I think that I can succeed in having a conversation with you while I'm torturing you to death.

333
00:29:14.560 --> 00:29:19.560
The conversation wouldn't be that fun for you, but it would be a conversation.

334
00:29:19.560 --> 00:29:28.560
I could follow all the norms necessary to succeed in having a conversation with you,

335
00:29:28.560 --> 00:29:35.560
without obviously doing anything particularly moral.

336
00:29:35.560 --> 00:29:46.360
I don't think that this is going to get you something ethical, but also I don't think it's necessary.

337
00:29:46.360 --> 00:29:55.560
I don't think you need to get ethics out of the norms of language per se, the particular content of linguistic norms,

338
00:29:55.560 --> 00:30:01.560
but rather I want to get something of the fact that they are, in some sense, agent-neutral.

339
00:30:01.560 --> 00:30:07.860
If part of what it is to speak a language is they have norms that are in some sense agent-neutral,

340
00:30:07.860 --> 00:30:19.460
and if any rational agent has to be a language speaker, then any rational agent has some agent-neutral norms.

341
00:30:19.460 --> 00:30:24.260
Now, the norms might just be, you know, stuff about governing language use. They're not moral norms yet.

342
00:30:24.260 --> 00:30:28.760
But there is an agent-neutral dimension to their value.

343
00:30:28.760 --> 00:30:36.560
Now, you needn't necessarily think of this agent neutral as being in conflict with or opposed to or contradistinguished from agent relative value.

344
00:30:36.560 --> 00:30:43.960
You could see it as something that's already built into agent relative value or wherever you want to put it, but there it is.

345
00:30:43.960 --> 00:30:55.860
Which means that once you've got such a thing as agent neutral value, even if thus far it only applies to things about language,

346
00:30:55.860 --> 00:30:59.660
Then you've got a perspective you otherwise wouldn't have.

347
00:30:59.660 --> 00:31:06.560
You've got an agent-neutral perspective from which you could raise questions about the evaluation of action from an agent-neutral perspective,

348
00:31:06.560 --> 00:31:10.860
even though you haven't as yet gotten that far. So far you're just talking about language.

349
00:31:10.860 --> 00:31:17.160
But now there's sort of a standpoint from which to raise those questions, and otherwise there wouldn't be.

350
00:31:17.160 --> 00:31:22.260
Because I think the real worry a lot of people have is there's just no such thing as an agent-neutral standpoint.

351
00:31:22.260 --> 00:31:25.260
We can't find any basis for thinking there could be such a thing.

352
00:31:25.260 --> 00:31:32.260
And what I'm suggesting is, well, for any being that speaks language, there is such a standpoint.

353
00:31:32.260 --> 00:31:37.260
We already have agent neutrality on the table.

354
00:31:37.260 --> 00:31:43.260
Well, why should we care about that ethically? Why should we think that that would get us anything?

355
00:31:43.260 --> 00:31:51.260
Well, here I am inspired by a point that Socrates often seems to be making.

356
00:31:51.260 --> 00:32:06.260
Socrates thinks that once you recognize a category of value, you're committed to wanting to integrate it in with your other values.

357
00:32:06.260 --> 00:32:17.260
I don't have a full-fledged argument for that. I hope to have, but I find the view plausible and attractive.

358
00:32:17.260 --> 00:32:47.260
An example that Socrates gives is a bit different from this one. The example Socrates gives is, in Plato's Gorgias, for example, he's arguing with this guy, Polis, about which is better, justice or injustice, and Polis in effect says, well, justice is morally better than injustice. It's more admirable, sure, but injustice is more advantageous, so injustice is more

359
00:32:47.260 --> 00:32:51.660
of Having, even though justice is more worth admiring.

360
00:32:51.660 --> 00:32:55.020
But the point Socrates pushes him on is, can you really

361
00:32:55.020 --> 00:32:57.980
regard something as more worth admiring,

362
00:32:57.980 --> 00:33:00.460
and yet regard it as not worth having?

363
00:33:00.460 --> 00:33:02.620
Can you really recognize a certain kind of value,

364
00:33:02.620 --> 00:33:05.260
and yet still regard your life as worth having

365
00:33:05.260 --> 00:33:07.940
without that kind of value in it?

366
00:33:07.940 --> 00:33:09.820
Well, this is a somewhat different kind of case,

367
00:33:09.820 --> 00:33:11.740
but this is the kind of case where

368
00:33:11.740 --> 00:33:13.380
I want to push something analogous.

369
00:33:13.380 --> 00:33:16.580
Say that once you recognize that there is such a thing

370
00:33:16.580 --> 00:33:21.980
is agent-neutral value, even if you see it simply as an aspect of agent-relative value

371
00:33:21.980 --> 00:33:27.220
rather than something as a sink. Once you've got that, then you've got a standpoint from

372
00:33:27.220 --> 00:33:34.660
which questions can always be asked about the justification of this from other people's

373
00:33:34.660 --> 00:33:39.580
standpoints. Now, agent-neutral value, I don't mean some sort of platonic good floating off

374
00:33:39.580 --> 00:33:45.540
independent from what anyone wants, if that's what Plato meant. You could think of it as

375
00:33:45.540 --> 00:33:51.720
There's maybe sort of a more of an intersubjective value rather than simply a value that leaves

376
00:33:51.720 --> 00:33:52.720
agents behind altogether.

377
00:33:52.720 --> 00:33:55.900
That's a shared value or a shareable value.

378
00:33:55.900 --> 00:34:01.900
But it seems to me once you've got this shared value perspective, once there is such a thing

379
00:34:01.900 --> 00:34:13.380
as this way of viewing the world, then you can't logically be indifferent to questions

380
00:34:13.380 --> 00:34:22.260
about the evaluation of your actions from a shared perspective.

381
00:34:22.260 --> 00:34:27.420
So take, for example, the standard line that people often use when they're, let's say,

382
00:34:27.420 --> 00:34:29.540
raising children and teaching them to be moral.

383
00:34:29.540 --> 00:34:30.540
They don't do that.

384
00:34:30.540 --> 00:34:33.620
You wouldn't like that if someone did it to you.

385
00:34:33.620 --> 00:34:40.260
You can imagine why a Hobbesian might say, well, why on earth is that relevant unless

386
00:34:40.260 --> 00:34:46.260
Unless you just mean, you know, they better watch out that, you know, they don't come back with, you know, with stronger friends.

387
00:34:46.260 --> 00:34:52.260
Why should I, you know, you might say, well, of course I sure wouldn't like it if they did it to me.

388
00:34:52.260 --> 00:34:55.260
I'm sure I'm glad it's me doing it to them instead.

389
00:34:55.260 --> 00:34:58.260
So why is there any force to this question?

390
00:34:58.260 --> 00:35:02.260
You know, you wouldn't like it if they, how would you like it if they did it to you?

391
00:35:02.260 --> 00:35:05.260
It seems as though that question has some kind of force.

392
00:35:05.260 --> 00:35:07.260
It seems as though it makes sense.

393
00:35:07.260 --> 00:35:22.260
It doesn't mean it's always effective, and saying it to someone doesn't necessarily make them recognize or change, but it does seem as though it makes sense to ask that question.

394
00:35:22.260 --> 00:35:32.260
And what I want to say is that any being that speaks language is open to that question.

395
00:35:32.260 --> 00:35:43.260
Because there's a foothold for stepping outside of this sort of solipsistic perspective.

396
00:35:43.260 --> 00:35:48.260
Again, none of that adds up to a knockdown argument for anything.

397
00:35:48.260 --> 00:35:53.260
If I can work any of that into a knockdown argument, I certainly will, but I haven't yet.

398
00:35:53.260 --> 00:35:56.260
But that is what I'm tempted by.

399
00:35:56.260 --> 00:36:00.260
Now, there was a time when I thought I didn't need any of that stuff at all.

400
00:36:00.260 --> 00:36:14.260
There was a time when I wanted to go purely agent-relative and then try and build concern for others out of some purely agent-relative thing.

401
00:36:14.260 --> 00:36:19.260
But again, that was all pretty Wittgenstein, and Wittgenstein affected me in various ways.

402
00:36:19.260 --> 00:36:28.260
For better or for worse, I can't judge, but since I am within the perspective that that created.

403
00:36:28.260 --> 00:36:38.420
but certainly this sort of private language thing has influenced me in thinking well maybe there's

404
00:36:38.420 --> 00:36:50.540
something to this agent neutrality after all. Well so what I want to claim is that once you recognize

405
00:36:50.540 --> 00:37:10.540
as Agent Neutral Value, then that enables you to take an agent neutral perspective on your own actions and on your own character and then you're going to want to integrate what can be agent neutrally endorsed into your conception of your own edimonia.

406
00:37:10.540 --> 00:37:26.540
You know, so that if you can't find fully satisfying a life that can't be endorsed from the agent neutral standpoint, then you're going to regard agent neutral endorsement as something to, you know, want to make part of your audimonia.

407
00:37:26.540 --> 00:37:35.540
I suppose this, you know, I suppose it's not just Wittgenstein that influenced me on this, it was on, I guess I'm reading Adam Smith's theory of moral sentiments.

408
00:37:35.540 --> 00:38:05.540
where I kept resisting the psychologicalism of it, trying to boil everything down to these innate psychological impulses, natural sympathies we have, and I didn't like that, but it kept striking me there was something right about this idea of stepping outside of our own solipsistic perspective and seeing something from another person's point of view, and someone who started off as a quasi-Randy and I figured well how do I reconcile that with

409
00:38:05.540 --> 00:38:09.620
sort of my Udiministic sympathies and so I'm trying to cram all these different

410
00:38:09.620 --> 00:38:21.180
things together into a single theory. My theory is rich but you know it seems to

411
00:38:21.180 --> 00:38:23.820
me there's something right about Smith there's also something right about the

412
00:38:23.820 --> 00:38:29.540
about the Udiminist view and it's you know it's your own you know it's sort of

413
00:38:29.540 --> 00:38:37.540
about your own flourishing that you are promoting and I want to make sense of how I can have it all.

414
00:38:39.540 --> 00:38:50.540
Alright, so suppose I want to integrate this agent neutral perspective into my own conception of my own good.

415
00:38:50.540 --> 00:38:56.540
So somehow, concern for others' interests has to be integrated into my own good.

416
00:38:56.540 --> 00:39:12.540
Well, how do I do it? Well, you can imagine different ways it could go. I might just hold fixed because I'm trying to construct my conception of my own good by building other people's interests into it.

417
00:39:12.540 --> 00:39:19.540
But remember, I'm also trying to construct my conception of what other people's interests are, the fact that they're sort of in reciprocal determination with my own.

418
00:39:19.540 --> 00:39:25.700
I'm trying to come up with a conception of self-interest, both of mine and of other people's,

419
00:39:25.700 --> 00:39:30.100
that will allow them all sorts of being integrated into each other.

420
00:39:30.100 --> 00:39:43.100
Now I could just start off with sort of a prima facie account of self-interest, and

421
00:39:43.100 --> 00:39:55.100
And then just say, well, then we'll just integrate that and say that what everyone ought to do is, you know, some sort of master morality without any slaves.

422
00:39:55.100 --> 00:40:01.100
It would be where everyone goes around being self-serve and aggressive because I want that for myself.

423
00:40:01.100 --> 00:40:04.100
And so I then from the agent perspective, I'm committed to wanting that for everyone else.

424
00:40:04.100 --> 00:40:08.100
So everyone goes around, you know, pushing and shoving. It's like New York.

425
00:40:08.100 --> 00:40:19.100
And, you know, that could be what you do. You hold fixed, the initial prima facie conception of self-addressed and then you go from there and everywhere else.

426
00:40:19.100 --> 00:40:26.100
You could go the other way, you know. Think about the way I like other people to treat me and think, well, I should be more like that.

427
00:40:26.100 --> 00:40:37.100
And so I start off with, you know, some prima facie account of the way I want other people to treat me, which is just, you know, their, you know, being really, really helpful to me and putting what I want first.

428
00:40:37.100 --> 00:40:44.100
I think I should be like that too and I try to build that into my conception of happiness.

429
00:40:44.100 --> 00:40:48.100
So then you get a situation where everyone is sort of deferring to everyone else and everyone is being really nice

430
00:40:48.100 --> 00:40:53.100
and no one ever pushes for anything but everyone is constantly deferring to everyone else.

431
00:40:53.100 --> 00:41:00.100
It's sort of like what Herbert Spencer thought would be the ultimate pinnacle of civilization.

432
00:41:00.100 --> 00:41:03.100
Nietzsche read that and reacted with horror.

433
00:41:03.100 --> 00:41:06.100
But it seems to me that neither of those is going to be quite the right story

434
00:41:06.100 --> 00:41:11.780
story because each of them involves, you know, holding one conception fixed and sort of adapting

435
00:41:11.780 --> 00:41:17.780
everything else to fit it. So in one case I hold my conception of self-interest fixed and then, you

436
00:41:17.780 --> 00:41:22.180
know, how people are supposed to treat other people gets completely adapted to fit that. In the other

437
00:41:22.180 --> 00:41:26.900
case I hold my prima facie conception of how you ought to treat other people, how other people ought

438
00:41:26.900 --> 00:41:31.460
to treat me fixed and then I adapt my own conception of self-interest to fit that. But it's even more likely

439
00:41:31.460 --> 00:41:41.960
I think that it would be a matter of mutual adjustment that if I'm trying to bring my conception of my self-interest in line with concern for others' interests,

440
00:41:41.960 --> 00:41:48.460
I'm also trying to bring my conception of their self-interest in line with my thinking that they also should be concerned for mine,

441
00:41:48.460 --> 00:41:59.460
it's not going to be all one way. It's going to mean some kind of reciprocal determination where it's not going to be all pushing and shoving,

442
00:41:59.460 --> 00:42:05.460
It's loving, but it's also not going to be complete self-abnegation.

443
00:42:10.460 --> 00:42:22.460
Now, the fact that I'm trying to give a conceptual defense, or praxeological defense, or a priori defense, or something like that,

444
00:42:22.460 --> 00:42:52.460
of this concern for others by trying to do it along the same lines that Hume and Smith did except that they did it by appealing to these natural sympathies and I'm trying to say no we don't need that we can go a priori you might think well that's odd because well it might be odd for more than one reason but the main reason you might think it's odd is it suggests that our natural sympathies are irrelevant you know Hume said and Smith said look look at these natural sympathies we have look at the fact that you you naturally wince if you see someone hit in the face with a shovel just your natural reactions to

445
00:42:52.460 --> 00:43:01.460
We just have this natural tendency to put ourselves in other people's shoes, and that explains where this comes from.

446
00:43:01.460 --> 00:43:09.460
Now if I come along and say, well, no, it's got nothing to do with those natural sympathies.

447
00:43:09.460 --> 00:43:15.460
It's really this a priori argument that any rational agent is committed to taking up an agent-neutral perspective.

448
00:43:15.460 --> 00:43:28.460
Then, you get the odd result that here, in fact, we obviously have these natural sympathies.

449
00:43:28.460 --> 00:43:34.460
I mean, if you read the things that the human smith say, it certainly seems right to say that we do have these

450
00:43:34.460 --> 00:43:40.460
sentences they talk about, and it does seem as though beings with tendencies like those would tend to develop something like

451
00:43:40.460 --> 00:43:46.460
moral norms, or humanly looks at least kind of like moral norms as a similar shape.

452
00:43:46.460 --> 00:43:50.460
And then I come along and say, well those natural sympathies are irrelevant.

453
00:43:50.460 --> 00:43:56.460
You know, I can get these moral norms purely out of the a priori.

454
00:43:56.460 --> 00:44:00.460
The reason that might seem odd is you might say,

455
00:44:00.460 --> 00:44:05.460
well here we have all these natural sympathies that tend toward what you're talking about.

456
00:44:05.460 --> 00:44:07.460
And you want to say it's just a coincidence.

457
00:44:07.460 --> 00:44:11.960
The content of morality would be exactly the same if we didn't have these natural sympathies.

458
00:44:11.960 --> 00:44:14.960
Isn't that suspicious? Isn't that unlikely?

459
00:44:15.960 --> 00:44:22.960
Well, I think what I would prefer to say is that I don't think it's irrelevant,

460
00:44:22.960 --> 00:44:30.460
but what I think is that it might be that only beings that had those natural sympathies would be capable of rationality.

461
00:44:32.460 --> 00:44:35.460
Any rational agent has to be able to take up an agent-neutral perspective,

462
00:44:35.460 --> 00:44:41.460
But maybe only beings that have capacities for sympathy could take up the agent-neutral perspective

463
00:44:41.460 --> 00:44:50.460
so that maybe there couldn't be a species of Hobbesian language users,

464
00:44:50.460 --> 00:44:52.460
a purely Hobbesian attitude toward other people.

465
00:44:52.460 --> 00:44:58.460
And again, that's simplifying Hobbes. Hobbes doesn't actually advocate what we call a purely Hobbesian attitude toward other people.

466
00:44:58.460 --> 00:45:08.360
there's more complicated but the so it might be that the right thing to say is

467
00:45:08.360 --> 00:45:12.260
that only beings that are capable of putting themselves inside of the shoes

468
00:45:12.260 --> 00:45:16.740
could get the kind of degree of impersonal perspective could enable them

469
00:45:16.740 --> 00:45:19.980
even to grasp language you couldn't grasp language unless you were capable

470
00:45:19.980 --> 00:45:23.560
of stepping outside of yourself and that only if you have certain kinds of

471
00:45:23.560 --> 00:45:45.560
Okay, so I've said that we're committed to taking up some sort of Asian neutral perspective on ourselves and not endorsing anything unless it can be endorsed from an Asian neutral perspective.

472
00:45:45.560 --> 00:45:52.560
Well, you might think this would generate utilitarianism. You might say, all right, well, then we have to treat our old people's interests equally.

473
00:45:52.560 --> 00:46:00.560
We all have to count equally. If we all count equally, then you just do whatever maximizes most of them, since you can't satisfy all of them, and therefore you get utilitarianism.

474
00:46:00.560 --> 00:46:12.560
Why isn't that the upshot of this? Well, more than one reason, but one reason at least is this.

475
00:46:12.560 --> 00:46:23.560
I've said a bit about this before, but I'll say it again. I think that utilitarianism is praxeologically unstable.

476
00:46:23.560 --> 00:46:27.560
And here's why.

477
00:46:27.560 --> 00:46:31.560
I've got, you know, this is the standard distinction.

478
00:46:31.560 --> 00:46:39.560
Whenever I make a distinction that's not on the handout, I try and offer some.

479
00:46:39.560 --> 00:46:55.560
There's a distinction that's often drawn between rule utilitarianism and act utilitarianism.

480
00:46:55.560 --> 00:47:08.560
The way this distinction works is sometimes the best way to get what you want is not to aim at it directly.

481
00:47:08.560 --> 00:47:16.020
not to aim at it directly. For example, here I have a digital watch. Suppose I went back

482
00:47:16.020 --> 00:47:23.800
in time to the 17th century and handed someone this digital watch, assuming they didn't burn

483
00:47:23.800 --> 00:47:27.880
me at the stake, I need to choose my company carefully. They might be really impressed

484
00:47:27.880 --> 00:47:31.960
and say, oh, well, we want to do scientific and technological research. We want digital

485
00:47:31.960 --> 00:47:37.880
watches too. We want to pursue some line of research which would bring that about. Well,

486
00:47:37.880 --> 00:47:43.400
What line of research would they pursue and what line of research should they pursue?

487
00:47:43.400 --> 00:47:49.000
Well if you wanted this line of scientific research that is going to end up with little

488
00:47:49.000 --> 00:47:54.240
watches like this, with this liquid crystal display and so on, what you really need is

489
00:47:54.240 --> 00:47:59.680
an understanding of electronics and to get that you need an understanding of electromagnetism

490
00:47:59.680 --> 00:48:05.280
and to get that you need to be studying lightning and stuff like that, you need to be doing

491
00:48:05.280 --> 00:48:14.280
Whatever it was Benjamin Franklin was doing with lightning, apparently the traditional story that he was running around with a kite and a key is dubious.

492
00:48:14.280 --> 00:48:22.280
The best evidence against it is that he survived that period of his life, but I don't know whether that's what he did or not.

493
00:48:22.280 --> 00:48:28.280
Anyway, that sort of thing, whatever it was he was doing, is the sort of thing you need to do in order to end up with stuff like this.

494
00:48:28.280 --> 00:48:36.280
But in the 17th century, no one looking at this watch would guess that studying lightning would be a useful way of getting this watch.

495
00:48:36.280 --> 00:48:38.280
Instead they thought of something to do with, you know, clock making.

496
00:48:38.280 --> 00:48:43.280
And there was a lot of study of clock making and gears and so forth, and they would have studied clock making more, and that would have been a dead end.

497
00:48:43.280 --> 00:48:46.280
That wouldn't lead to this at all.

498
00:48:46.280 --> 00:48:49.280
So, there's a famous point made by Francis Bacon.

499
00:48:49.280 --> 00:48:56.280
Now, Francis Bacon was one of the first philosophers of science to think that the point of science is the technological goodies it brings us.

500
00:48:56.280 --> 00:49:02.280
Before him, the dominant view was the Aristotelian view that the point of science is just knowledge for its own sake.

501
00:49:02.280 --> 00:49:08.280
Bacon said, no, no, who cares about knowledge for its own sake, the benefit of science is technological goodies.

502
00:49:08.280 --> 00:49:19.280
Given that, you might have thought that Bacon would have said that we should change the way we do research,

503
00:49:19.280 --> 00:49:23.280
and that we should direct our research more toward practical ends.

504
00:49:23.280 --> 00:49:32.280
But he didn't. He thought that you should do scientific research as though you cared about knowledge for its own sake.

505
00:49:32.280 --> 00:49:37.280
And the way he put it is you should look for experiments of light, not experiments of fruit.

506
00:49:37.280 --> 00:49:45.280
By which he meant not a preference for optics over horticulture, but do experiments that will shed light on general principles,

507
00:49:45.280 --> 00:49:49.280
as opposed to experiments that are designed to yield some specific practical result.

508
00:49:49.280 --> 00:49:53.520
and his argument for this was it's difficult to know ahead of time

509
00:49:53.520 --> 00:49:57.120
exactly, since you don't know the principles involved, it's difficult to know ahead of time

510
00:49:57.120 --> 00:50:00.480
exactly which experiments will lead to which practical results

511
00:50:00.480 --> 00:50:05.440
but in the insight in general principles it's more likely in the long run to lead to more

512
00:50:05.440 --> 00:50:09.760
useful applications even if you don't know ahead of time exactly what they are

513
00:50:09.760 --> 00:50:13.040
and so although he thought that the point of science was technological goodies

514
00:50:13.040 --> 00:50:15.760
he thought you shouldn't do science aiming at technological goodies

515
00:50:15.760 --> 00:50:23.760
You should do science as though you cared about the research for its own sake.

516
00:50:23.760 --> 00:50:36.760
Well, applying this issue to utilitarianism, a lot of people have suggested that even if the element of good,

517
00:50:36.760 --> 00:50:43.760
even if you think the point of morality is to promote the common welfare,

518
00:50:43.760 --> 00:50:47.760
doesn't necessarily mean that you should be trying to promote that directly.

519
00:50:47.760 --> 00:50:51.760
Suppose you're a referee in a game, and you're a philosophical referee,

520
00:50:51.760 --> 00:50:54.760
and you start reflecting on your role in the game, and you think,

521
00:50:54.760 --> 00:50:57.760
well, what's my point here? My point is to facilitate the game.

522
00:50:57.760 --> 00:51:00.760
Well, what's the point of the game? Suppose you decide that the point of the game

523
00:51:00.760 --> 00:51:03.760
is to provide pleasure to the spectators.

524
00:51:03.760 --> 00:51:06.760
I don't know whether that's quite the right story. It's probably oversimplification.

525
00:51:06.760 --> 00:51:10.760
But let's say that's it. I decide the point of this game is to provide pleasure to the spectators.

526
00:51:10.760 --> 00:51:17.880
So I might then conclude, all right, when I make my calls, I decide if someone is safe or out or whatever,

527
00:51:17.880 --> 00:51:23.880
I should be guided not by the rules of the game, but by whatever ruling will give the most pleasure to the spectators.

528
00:51:23.880 --> 00:51:29.680
And so when I'm trying to decide something, I don't look in the rule book and say, I think, well, is this a home game or a way game?

529
00:51:29.680 --> 00:51:36.720
It's a home game, all right, so most of the people, most of the spectators are favoring Team A, so I should make a rule that favors Team A.

530
00:51:36.720 --> 00:51:41.720
Well, that may maximize the pleasure of the spectators in the short run.

531
00:51:41.720 --> 00:51:54.720
But in the long run, the spectators will pretty quickly realize that whether a team wins or loses has nothing to do with actually how it plays.

532
00:51:54.720 --> 00:52:04.720
And then you'll easily predict who's going to win just by counting how many people in the stands are for a particular team.

533
00:52:04.720 --> 00:52:07.840
and then you have not maximized the pleasure of spectators quite the

534
00:52:07.840 --> 00:52:15.580
contrary or take another famous example suppose that you know suppose that you're

535
00:52:15.580 --> 00:52:19.360
a doctor and you've got five patients and each one needs a different organ

536
00:52:19.360 --> 00:52:22.240
transplant one needs a lung and one needs a liver and one needs a heart and

537
00:52:22.240 --> 00:52:28.960
so on and they're all in desperate need you don't have any donors and then a

538
00:52:28.960 --> 00:52:32.980
perfectly healthy patient walks into your clinic for routine checkup and it

539
00:52:32.980 --> 00:52:37.980
If you kill him, you can redistribute his organs to the other five, and you save five lives at the cost of one.

540
00:52:37.980 --> 00:52:44.980
You might think utilitarianism recommends this, because you try and maximize as many people's interests as possible.

541
00:52:44.980 --> 00:52:49.980
But, many utilitarians will point out, in fact, utilitarianism doesn't recommend this,

542
00:52:49.980 --> 00:52:55.980
because in general, if you adopt a general policy that the few can always be sacrificed to the many,

543
00:52:55.980 --> 00:52:59.980
well, although everyone's a member of the many, everyone's also a member of some few or other,

544
00:52:59.980 --> 00:53:03.980
So everyone is a potential object of sacrifice.

545
00:53:03.980 --> 00:53:08.980
And so if there's a general rule in society that any individual can be sacrificed to the group,

546
00:53:08.980 --> 00:53:13.980
the whole group is going to be less happy. They're going to be much more nervous thinking that any one of them could be next.

547
00:53:13.980 --> 00:53:20.980
And so therefore the whole group will be more happy if you adopt a general rule saying that no one can be sacrificed.

548
00:53:20.980 --> 00:53:26.980
So this is the idea of rule utilitarianism, which is that you don't simply choose your actions on a case-by-case basis.

549
00:53:26.980 --> 00:53:40.980
You try to figure out which general policies are the most, you know, are the most beneficial and you stick to those general policies as though you thought that they were valuable for their own sake.

550
00:53:40.980 --> 00:53:54.980
Now in fact I think praxeology shows, because Austrian economics shows, that you produce more total prosperity for society if you stick to certain general principles like voluntary exchange and so on.

551
00:53:54.980 --> 00:54:11.980
So, act utilitarianism is praxeologically incoherent, I think, because praxeological analysis itself shows that if you act on act utilitarianism, you end up making everyone worse off, which is the opposite of what you wanted.

552
00:54:11.980 --> 00:54:23.980
So, rule utilitarianism seems the only defensible version of utilitarianism, but I claim that rule utilitarianism is also praxeologically incoherent. Why is that?

553
00:54:23.980 --> 00:54:41.980
Well, because in effect, what real utilitarianism is advocating is that there are certain things that, in order to gain some good or other, you should treat certain means as though they were ends in themselves.

554
00:54:41.980 --> 00:54:46.980
But my question is, what does it mean to treat something as though it's an end in itself?

555
00:54:46.980 --> 00:54:49.980
I mean, either you treat it as an end in itself or you don't.

556
00:54:49.980 --> 00:54:53.980
Either you adopt it as an end or you treat it as a mere means.

557
00:54:53.980 --> 00:55:02.980
If you treat it as a mere means, then you're always going to be open to arguments for departing from the rule.

558
00:55:02.980 --> 00:55:09.980
Because here you have a patient who walks into your clinic and your first thought is,

559
00:55:09.980 --> 00:55:12.980
hey, I can kill this patient and redistribute his organs.

560
00:55:12.980 --> 00:55:18.980
And your next thought is, oh no, a general policy of doing that would be bad for society.

561
00:55:18.980 --> 00:55:23.980
But your third thought could be, well, I'm not enacting a general policy here.

562
00:55:23.980 --> 00:55:26.980
I'm just doing my one little action.

563
00:55:26.980 --> 00:55:30.980
As long as I can do it and I can make it look like an accident and no one knows about it,

564
00:55:30.980 --> 00:55:33.980
I'm not undermining the general respect.

565
00:55:33.980 --> 00:55:36.980
So I might as well do it.

566
00:55:36.980 --> 00:55:44.980
Of course, if all the real utilitarians reason that way, then they're just going to act exactly like act utilitarians and the bad results won't sue.

567
00:55:44.980 --> 00:55:54.980
So this seems like a case for saying that you should commit yourself to treating these things as though they really aren't in themselves.

568
00:55:54.980 --> 00:55:58.980
Well, fine. But once you do that, I claim you're not a utilitarian anymore.

569
00:55:58.980 --> 00:56:04.980
Because if you've really committed yourself and you really do care about these means for their own sake now,

570
00:56:04.980 --> 00:56:09.100
now maybe your reason for carrying your reason for getting yourself to care about them with a

571
00:56:09.100 --> 00:56:13.980
utilitarian one but that was sort of a ladder and you picked it away I mean some of the ancient

572
00:56:13.980 --> 00:56:21.500
Epicureans had this argument about friendship people said to them oh well you Epicureans are

573
00:56:21.500 --> 00:56:28.900
egoists you only you know you only regard your friends as means to your own happiness which I

574
00:56:28.900 --> 00:56:33.300
think to some extent might be right because the Epicureans didn't really have the same kind of

575
00:56:33.300 --> 00:56:51.680
I don't really include the Epicureans in my gang of Platonists and Aristotelians and

576
00:56:51.680 --> 00:56:55.780
Stoics and Scholastics, although they had some of the demonist aspects.

577
00:56:55.780 --> 00:57:01.560
Anyway, some of the Epicureans responded by saying, no, it's true that we ought to care

578
00:57:01.560 --> 00:57:04.560
I don't care about the friend for the friend's own sake, but here's why.

579
00:57:04.560 --> 00:57:09.560
You'll get much greater pleasure out of the friendship if you value the friend for the friend's own sake.

580
00:57:09.560 --> 00:57:16.560
So therefore you have a perfectly good egoistic reason to get yourself to care about the friend for the friend's own sake.

581
00:57:16.560 --> 00:57:19.560
And I would say, all right, fine.

582
00:57:19.560 --> 00:57:25.560
You've got an instrumentalist reason for trying to get yourself into a certain frame of mind.

583
00:57:25.560 --> 00:57:30.560
Once you've got yourself into that frame of mind, it seems to me that your attitude toward your friend is no longer instrumental.

584
00:57:30.560 --> 00:57:40.560
You had instrumental reason for adopting non-instrumental concern, but once you've got a non-instrumental concern for your friend, you're not an egoist in the narrow epicurean sense anymore.

585
00:57:40.560 --> 00:57:47.560
So likewise, I want to say, yeah, there are good utilitarian reasons to get yourself to be committed to certain principles of justice for their own sake.

586
00:57:47.560 --> 00:57:55.560
Once you've committed yourself to those principles of justice for their own sake, then you've waved bye-bye to utilitarianism.

587
00:57:55.560 --> 00:58:09.560
Now, as I mentioned before, and as I will go into more detail again, that doesn't mean that I think consequentialist reasons are irrelevant or unimportant in ethics.

588
00:58:09.560 --> 00:58:19.560
On the contrary, I think that there's once again something to integrate into a larger picture.

589
00:58:19.560 --> 00:58:26.600
that consequentialist considerations can play a role in specifying the content of

590
00:58:26.600 --> 00:58:31.400
some of our moral duties. But it goes the other way around too. What counts as a

591
00:58:31.400 --> 00:58:37.400
good consequence should be influenced by some of our views about moral duties.

592
00:58:37.400 --> 00:58:47.360
Now there was a time when I thought that consequences were largely irrelevant for

593
00:58:47.360 --> 00:58:59.120
the content of libertarian rights held regardless of the consequences and the

594
00:58:59.120 --> 00:59:01.600
reason I came to change my mind about that it's not the reason you might think

595
00:59:01.600 --> 00:59:06.280
you might think you know so you might think well here's someone who used to

596
00:59:06.280 --> 00:59:10.400
think that you could defend you could or should defend libertarian rights on

597
00:59:10.400 --> 00:59:14.560
sort of purely non consequentialist grounds and now they start bringing

598
00:59:14.560 --> 00:59:22.560
I'm not bringing consequentialist considerations in, that must mean that they think that the non-consequentialist arguments aren't so good and so they need help from the consequentialist ones.

599
00:59:22.560 --> 00:59:32.560
But actually it wasn't that, it wasn't that I became less impressed by the non-consequentialist arguments, it's that I became more impressed by the consequentialist ones.

600
00:59:32.560 --> 00:59:38.560
In the sense that I thought these consequentialist arguments for libertarian rights are really, really good.

601
00:59:38.560 --> 00:59:46.560
And it would be really weird if the fact that they're so good were totally irrelevant to why libertarian rights are correct.

602
00:59:46.560 --> 00:59:59.560
It would just be sort of an amazing coincidence that although the fact that they bring about peace and prosperity and progress in society is just a happy, useful fact,

603
00:59:59.560 --> 01:00:04.560
it's got nothing to do with why libertarianism is right.

604
01:00:04.560 --> 01:00:34.560
The same kind of worry that I said someone might have about natural sympathies, where, you know, we've got all these natural sympathies and they support a certain viewpoint, but in fact the viewpoint is right for a reason that has nothing to do with the natural sympathies. I wanted to avoid saying that, so likewise, you know, if the, you know, it would be really weird if, you know, here you have the fixed volumes of human action and man economy and state and they give all these reasons why you get much, much better consequences, much more, you know, much more better social cooperation and prosperity and so forth if you have a libertarian

605
01:00:34.560 --> 01:00:40.280
in the libertarian system, but if it turned out that all that is irrelevant to why libertarianism

606
01:00:40.280 --> 01:00:45.800
is right, it's just a happy coincidence, but that human action and man economy and state

607
01:00:45.800 --> 01:00:49.820
have nothing to tell us about why libertarianism is a good idea, I think that would just be

608
01:00:49.820 --> 01:01:01.860
odd. So it's not that I loved deontology less, but that I loved consequentialism more. Not

609
01:01:01.860 --> 01:01:05.300
Not more than deontology, but more than I had before.

610
01:01:05.300 --> 01:01:09.160
So it seems to me that it would be odd if consequentialist considerations weren't part

611
01:01:09.160 --> 01:01:12.420
of the story of why libertarian rights are correct.

612
01:01:12.420 --> 01:01:17.060
Of course, I also don't think that they are the main story.

613
01:01:17.060 --> 01:01:29.220
I think that they're just concern for consequences is part of our moral point of view, but not

614
01:01:29.220 --> 01:01:30.500
the whole thing.

615
01:01:30.500 --> 01:01:34.500
and I'll have more to say about that tomorrow.

616
01:01:34.500 --> 01:01:35.980
Okay, questions?

617
01:01:35.980 --> 01:01:36.820
Yes.

618
01:01:36.820 --> 01:01:41.820
On the thought that thought requires language,

619
01:01:42.620 --> 01:01:45.540
what would you say about a cake such as

620
01:01:45.540 --> 01:01:49.780
your dog goes over to the door to indicate that he wants out,

621
01:01:49.780 --> 01:01:52.660
you get to let him out and then he hops in

622
01:01:52.660 --> 01:01:55.540
his favorite chair which you had been sitting in?

623
01:01:55.540 --> 01:01:58.300
I mean, it seems like there's some level of thought

624
01:01:58.300 --> 01:01:59.700
going on there.

625
01:02:00.500 --> 01:02:04.820
Yeah, no, certainly, I mean, again, it's gonna depend exactly what you mean by thought.

626
01:02:04.820 --> 01:02:10.620
What I said was, you know, specifically rationality, but of course, you can then say, what do you mean by rationality?

627
01:02:10.620 --> 01:02:17.940
There's a sense of rationality where if you do X because you want Y and X is the most efficient way of getting to Y,

628
01:02:17.940 --> 01:02:24.740
then there's a sense in which the dog is acting rationally. There's some sense of rationality.

629
01:02:24.740 --> 01:02:30.740
Actually, I think animals are a tricky thing in general for philosophy.

630
01:02:30.740 --> 01:02:33.740
Philosophy would be much easier if there were no animals other than humans.

631
01:02:33.740 --> 01:02:37.740
Because when we try to figure out what to say about animals,

632
01:02:37.740 --> 01:02:39.740
there's two temptations it's always easy to fall into.

633
01:02:39.740 --> 01:02:41.740
One is sort of the Cartesian temptation,

634
01:02:41.740 --> 01:02:47.740
where if anything that falls short of the human conceptual status

635
01:02:47.740 --> 01:02:50.740
can't really have any mentality at all.

636
01:02:50.740 --> 01:02:53.740
So they're just like robots, and that clearly is wrong.

637
01:02:53.740 --> 01:03:01.740
And the other temptation is to go the opposite direction and think, well they must be like little people, they must have reasoning like ours.

638
01:03:01.740 --> 01:03:12.740
Now I think that, yet another thing I've been convinced of by, partly by Wittgenstein, partly by things sort of related to Wittgenstein.

639
01:03:12.740 --> 01:03:20.740
And part of becoming more Wittgensteinian is that I'm more friendly to Kant than I was back when I was more Randian.

640
01:03:20.740 --> 01:03:23.740
But I'm still more Randian than Kant, but I'm more Kantian than Rand.

641
01:03:23.740 --> 01:03:28.740
But I've been convinced by this.

642
01:03:28.740 --> 01:03:47.740
But there's a certain Kantian tradition that emphasizes that you can't really make sense of perception or of our perception without concepts.

643
01:03:47.740 --> 01:04:17.740
and also Rand obviously would have disagreed with content in fairly strong form which I wouldn't quite want to endorse but it seems to me that when you try to make sense of perception as we have it without concepts it's hard to make sense of it but then it's hard to say about animals because clearly animals have perception there's some sense of concepts in which I don't want to say they have concepts and so it's very hard to know what to say about this and but

644
01:04:17.740 --> 01:04:47.740
And whatever is the right thing to say about animals, it seems that there's some kind of conceptual capacity or rationality or some sort of ability to, you know, not just to move from one thing to another, but to see it as a move from one thing to another, to see, you know, not just that the dog can, you know, can go to the door and use your example, which I forgot to repeat the question, but your example was, isn't an example of rationality when the dog goes to the door to get you to open it so the dog can really run back and jump on your chair.

645
01:04:47.740 --> 01:05:02.740
It's one thing for the dog to go to the door as a means of, it's one thing for getting into the chair to be the reason the dog goes to the door, it's another thing for the dog to sort of be able to see that connection and to grasp it.

646
01:05:02.740 --> 01:05:12.740
It seems like that, it's hard to say that's what the dog does, although it's in general hard to say, it's hard to, you know, we can't really put our minds into the dog's minds very easily.

647
01:05:12.740 --> 01:05:14.740
Again, it's not clear that telepathy would help.

648
01:05:14.740 --> 01:05:16.740
This is a typical Vic and Shane example.

649
01:05:16.740 --> 01:05:20.740
You peer in and it's not clear what it is you want to see that would answer your question.

650
01:05:24.740 --> 01:05:32.740
And there is this question more broadly in Austrian economics about exactly who praxeology applies to.

651
01:05:32.740 --> 01:05:36.740
The title of Mises' book is Human Action, not Animal Action.

652
01:05:36.740 --> 01:05:38.740
Well, what do we say about animal action?

653
01:05:38.740 --> 01:05:45.740
There's some sense in which the category of means and ends clearly applies to animals, to non-human animals, not just to us.

654
01:05:45.740 --> 01:05:56.740
Nevertheless, it seems right that there's something about us that Mises is talking about that we don't find with the animals.

655
01:05:56.740 --> 01:06:07.740
So what's the difference between sort of the much more limited version of praxeology that applies to animals and the kind that applies to rational agents?

656
01:06:07.740 --> 01:06:11.740
There are various things here and there I can say, but I don't have a full story.

657
01:06:37.740 --> 01:06:49.740
Libertarian, the kind of stuff that Hoppe wants to get out of that, you know, you can't get libertarian rights, that sort of thing, just from what it takes to count as communicating the candidate.

658
01:06:49.740 --> 01:07:01.740
But I mean, you know, Habermas and Hoppe are both, aren't they both going to be saying something that, you know, the norms they're interested in are going to be something a bit more restrictive than that, right?

659
01:07:01.740 --> 01:07:09.740
It's not just what it takes to count as speaking in a language with someone, but to the norms that govern specific parts of language,

660
01:07:09.740 --> 01:07:22.740
like norms that govern argumentation or deliberative rationality or standing in a dialectical relationship with someone or something like that.

661
01:07:22.740 --> 01:07:38.740
And, you know, it's basically a case, at least, to say that, you know, a lot of, you know, there are a lot of cases in which you're kind of communicating with someone, but not in which you're kind of, you know, trying to convince them of something and trying to argue with them about something in some sense.

662
01:07:38.740 --> 01:07:59.740
If you're torturing someone on the rack and saying, retent your sins, retent your sins, you may get them to say, I retent my sins, but insofar as that's because of the torturer, and not because of the free choice of their will, that's not a matter of convincing them to do so.

663
01:07:59.740 --> 01:08:27.740
Okay, so the question is, I said about thinkers like Habermas and Hoppe and so forth, that they're trying to construct moral or political norms directly out of the norms governing language, and the question is, well, isn't it not just language per se, but more specific applications of language?

664
01:08:27.740 --> 01:08:33.940
say but more specific applications of language like argumentation in the case of Hoppe or

665
01:08:33.940 --> 01:08:38.020
deliberative rationality or dealing with people in a face-to-face relationship in the case

666
01:08:38.020 --> 01:08:43.060
of Hoppe and of us.

667
01:08:43.060 --> 01:08:47.380
And then the example is given that if you're torturing someone you can be talking to them

668
01:08:47.380 --> 01:08:54.460
but not necessarily engaging in argumentation or convincing them since just torturing them

669
01:08:54.460 --> 01:08:59.260
and saying we can't, we can't isn't a way of convincing them.

670
01:09:00.380 --> 01:09:01.620
Okay, a couple of things.

671
01:09:01.620 --> 01:09:04.180
First, it's true that you can't,

672
01:09:05.680 --> 01:09:07.100
it's true that just, you know,

673
01:09:07.100 --> 01:09:08.860
just torturing someone saying we can't, we can't

674
01:09:08.860 --> 01:09:10.600
isn't engaging in an argument with them.

675
01:09:10.600 --> 01:09:11.940
But I think you can torture someone

676
01:09:11.940 --> 01:09:14.360
while engaging in genuine argument with them.

677
01:09:17.820 --> 01:09:19.420
In fact, you can, you know, you can,

678
01:09:20.660 --> 01:09:22.880
well, not even go into the details.

679
01:09:22.880 --> 01:09:28.180
But anyway, you could, I mean, you could genuinely, you know, as you're torching them, you can genuinely say,

680
01:09:28.180 --> 01:09:31.780
here are my premises and conclusion, which, you know, if you don't like conclusion, which premise do you reject?

681
01:09:31.780 --> 01:09:33.980
And they can tell you, and you can say, all right, why?

682
01:09:33.980 --> 01:09:38.080
And as you're torching them, then you go back and you change your argument to fit what they're saying and so forth.

683
01:09:38.080 --> 01:09:40.080
It seems like it's in principle possible.

684
01:09:40.080 --> 01:09:43.180
I don't think that, you know, that doesn't cut one way or the other.

685
01:09:43.180 --> 01:09:50.880
I don't think that is, you know, a direct objection to anything, but just a point.

686
01:09:50.880 --> 01:09:58.920
It's true that Habermas and Hoppe both have something narrower in mind than just language,

687
01:09:58.920 --> 01:10:05.680
but I'll take the case of Hoppe because I don't know Hoppe and Mises as well.

688
01:10:05.680 --> 01:10:16.640
Still, Hoppe is fairly broad because the idea seems to be that you can't rationally believe something or assert something

689
01:10:16.640 --> 01:10:21.640
Unless you could justify it in an argument or defend it in an argument.

690
01:10:25.640 --> 01:10:28.640
It seems as though you can say things without arguing.

691
01:10:28.640 --> 01:10:32.640
It's not that you can't justifiably say things without arguing,

692
01:10:32.640 --> 01:10:39.640
but you can't justifiably say things without being the kind of thing you could defend in an argument.

693
01:10:39.640 --> 01:10:53.640
And there again, I do want to say that's still going to be too permissive because you can, you know, while you're torturing someone you can defend them, so I guess that argument, that point I said was relevant after all.

694
01:11:53.640 --> 01:12:09.640
Yeah, so the question or comment is, the term agent neutral can be ambiguous, it can mean independent of any agent whatsoever, something that's just valuable and independent of anyone who does or would value it.

695
01:12:09.640 --> 01:12:18.640
People often think Plato's form of the good is supposed to be like that, I don't know if it is or not. It wasn't the last time I glimpsed it.

696
01:12:18.640 --> 01:12:28.640
There's another sense of agent neutral where it just means it's, you know, it's not tied to any one particular agent, it's, you know, sort of inter-subjective or shared or something like that.

697
01:12:28.640 --> 01:12:33.640
And so the suggestion was that maybe there should really be, you know, two, three terms rather than two.

698
01:12:33.640 --> 01:12:44.640
In addition to just, you know, agent relative and agent neutral, the agent neutral should be split into two terms and the suggestion was we could keep agent neutral for the one that's shared or shareable

699
01:12:44.640 --> 01:12:49.540
and then the agent independent could be the one that doesn't apply to, you know,

700
01:12:49.540 --> 01:12:55.520
that is completely apart from any agent at all and that the suggestion was that's more like what RAND meant by intrinsic

701
01:12:55.520 --> 01:12:57.480
is something that is

702
01:12:57.480 --> 01:13:04.480
a value that's apart from any value.

703
01:13:14.640 --> 01:13:44.560
yes, well you would have read the wrong, yeah it was the wrong one, well all right the question

704
01:13:44.560 --> 01:13:57.560
One of the background readings was an article by Christine Korsgaard called The Reasons We Can Share and then the source that was listed on the website ended up being the wrong source for it.

705
01:13:57.560 --> 01:14:10.560
So the question is, what does that article say or how is it relevant?

706
01:14:10.560 --> 01:14:16.520
Well she was arguing in that and I think I would say the way she uses the term

707
01:14:16.520 --> 01:14:20.880
agent neutral is the way that Jeff was just suggesting that we should that it's

708
01:14:20.880 --> 01:14:26.320
it's not independent of any agent at all it's more shareable but she was saying

709
01:14:26.320 --> 01:14:29.720
and to some extent now what she says in that article blurs together for me with

710
01:14:29.720 --> 01:14:33.240
what she says in some other places but anyway she thinks she also thinks

711
01:14:33.240 --> 01:14:36.360
although she's not trying to embed it in a Udiametis framework the way I am but

712
01:14:36.360 --> 01:14:51.360
She also thinks, and she's sort of a, she's a kind of a Kantian, but a kind of a, watered down doesn't sound too pejorative, she's a, I don't know, kind of just a Kantian, a more expansive Kantian.

713
01:14:51.360 --> 01:15:05.360
But she thinks that the, that we can't make sense of a purely agent-relative value, that we can't, you know, that in evaluating something we're necessarily,

714
01:15:05.360 --> 01:15:13.360
that we're necessarily treating it as a reason that's open to, that's accessible to others.

715
01:15:13.360 --> 01:15:21.360
Whatever reason we offer for what we're doing is something in principle where we're inviting other people to see it that way too.

716
01:15:21.360 --> 01:15:27.360
She has this one famous weird example, which is not in that article, it's elsewhere.

717
01:15:27.360 --> 01:15:31.360
In fact, it might have been in the book you actually got, but it's...

718
01:15:31.360 --> 01:15:37.360
She says, think of the yellow spot on the wall, and then she points out that you all did.

719
01:15:37.360 --> 01:15:40.360
Maybe one of you didn't, but duh.

720
01:15:40.360 --> 01:15:51.360
And then she shows, she thinks that shows that what we say binds other people in a certain way.

721
01:15:51.360 --> 01:15:58.360
And she thinks that likewise when you say, you know, think how you'd like it if it happened to you, that somehow makes you think of it.

722
01:15:58.360 --> 01:16:03.560
I was never able to quite figure out how that argument worked, so I don't want to endorse the yellow spot on the wall.

723
01:16:03.560 --> 01:16:06.860
I mean, it's an interesting example, but I don't know what to do with it.

724
01:16:08.460 --> 01:16:08.960
Yeah.

725
01:16:28.360 --> 01:16:51.360
If you understand the situation correctly, given the conventions, then I've just placed an obligation on you to respond, say, hey, Charles, and either hang around or else do something to explain that you've got to move on before you move on.

726
01:16:51.360 --> 01:17:15.360
I don't think it's intended as sort of a decisive argument that here are these reasons that I've just proven we can place on each other, but it looks like the content reading situation is that we can sort of fire actions, we can enter into the reasons that others don't have.

727
01:17:15.360 --> 01:17:25.360
Because the act is not responding to my reading at all, it's just walking by without acknowledging it.

728
01:17:25.360 --> 01:17:38.360
That would be the normal course of affairs that I hadn't read to you, but it would be specifically disregarding the claim that I just put on you, for whatever reason.

729
01:17:38.360 --> 01:17:54.040
Charles offers a different example from Korsgaard, a less weird one, where I'm walking down the street and he comes along and says,

730
01:17:54.040 --> 01:18:01.720
Hey Roderick, and by saying that he has given the ordinary norms of our society and our understanding of those norms and so forth,

731
01:18:01.720 --> 01:18:08.520
He has placed some claim on me, not necessarily a decisive claim, but some claim on me to respond in kind.

732
01:18:08.520 --> 01:18:18.520
If I could just walk on and ignore him, and there might be some justifiable reason for me to do that if I find out he's just become a neocon or something.

733
01:18:18.520 --> 01:18:33.520
I always fear that for you. But if I did that, I would necessarily be ignoring or disregarding a claim that I somehow,

734
01:18:33.520 --> 01:18:41.520
given my understanding of what the norms are in our society, I can't help but recognize that he's placed a claim on me by doing that.

735
01:18:41.520 --> 01:18:45.480
suggestion is well this isn't sort of decisive or anything but it's a way of

736
01:18:45.480 --> 01:18:51.240
of seeing how how hard it would be to give up that perspective maybe I'm sort

737
01:18:51.240 --> 01:18:55.880
of going now from from his paraphrase to do what I'm saying maybe but it's a way

738
01:18:55.880 --> 01:19:03.720
of showing how how difficult would be to really rid ourselves of of any kind of

739
01:19:03.720 --> 01:19:15.040
Agent Neutral Value. I think that's what that reminded me of is there's an argument in in

740
01:19:15.040 --> 01:19:20.560
Cavell about aesthetic value where someone one person says oh I really love that song wasn't

741
01:19:20.560 --> 01:19:27.600
it beautiful the other one says oh it was very you know it was very monotonous and it was sung

742
01:19:27.600 --> 01:19:38.840
without any expression, and the tune was very simplistic, and the whole delivery was wooden.

743
01:19:38.840 --> 01:19:42.440
You say, yeah, I know all that, but wasn't it great?

744
01:19:42.440 --> 01:19:47.840
You could say that, but somehow your grasp of the relevant concepts involved, somehow

745
01:19:47.840 --> 01:19:51.960
once this objection has been made, you can't just grant the objection and then go ahead

746
01:19:51.960 --> 01:19:54.060
and say it's good.

747
01:19:54.060 --> 01:19:57.540
Maybe there's some countervailing consideration you have to make, but it just doesn't make

748
01:19:57.540 --> 01:20:04.100
any sense for you to, you know, there's something at least often puzzling about

749
01:20:04.100 --> 01:20:07.740
sticking with your previous evaluation despite the fact that a claim has been

750
01:20:07.740 --> 01:20:11.940
put on you now to, you know, at least to revise it.

751
01:20:27.540 --> 01:20:39.540
It would be this weird sort of phaser of you, to me, actually, to say, hey, what's up, etc., because, you know, it's not something that I'd like to claim on you for, it's just something you're gratuitously deciding to do because it would be nice.

752
01:20:39.540 --> 01:20:53.540
And that seems like the wrong sort of reading about reciprocal social interactions like that word. It's not just you being nice, it's that if you didn't do that, you'd be treading on, maybe justifiably, maybe not.

753
01:20:53.540 --> 01:21:22.540
I'm just going to ignore that question. The point is that if he says, if we try to imagine a situation in which he's saying, hey, Roderick doesn't place any sort of prima facie claim on me, you have to be a case where my responding in kind would be some sort of favor shown. And now I forget what happened after that.

754
01:21:22.540 --> 01:21:29.540
and now I forget what happened after that.

755
01:21:29.740 --> 01:21:36.740
Yeah, yeah, it doesn't seem like the right description situation.

756
01:21:52.540 --> 01:22:21.540
I'm just wondering if you can go back and give your arguments for that claim, and also maybe answer, because it seems to me, whatever commitment we do get out of recognizing the value from the sort of language argument, our commitment would be sort of the same, however, our commitment is a certain linguistic convention, right? And so that doesn't seem as robust as the sort of commitment that we want for ethical, you know, our ethical considerations, so.

757
01:22:21.540 --> 01:22:31.780
Okay, so two questions. One is, what was my argument for saying that once we

758
01:22:31.780 --> 01:22:35.500
recognize the existence of agent-neutral value, we're thereby committed to

759
01:22:35.500 --> 01:22:43.140
integrating it into the rest of our values? And the other question is, and

760
01:22:43.140 --> 01:22:47.220
even if so, given that the civil rights on the basis of language isn't going to

761
01:22:47.220 --> 01:22:51.340
be of the category of our commitment to linguistic conventions, it seems that's

762
01:22:51.340 --> 01:23:10.340
Well, the answer to the first question is I did not give an argument. I said this seems plausible to me and I tried to say some things to make it seem attractive, but I don't have a fully worked argument there, that's the point where I'm just waving my hands about.

763
01:23:10.340 --> 01:23:40.340
When I have sort of an analogy, it's not a perfect analogy, I had this example in mind of Socrates saying that once you recognize that something is worth admiring, you can't be fully satisfied unless you integrate it into your life, you can't be fully satisfied regarding your life as lacking this kind of value, but that's not an exact analogy, it's just sort of what inspired the thought,

764
01:23:40.340 --> 01:23:48.340
But although I don't have a precise argument for that, the idea that I was waving around on was

765
01:23:48.340 --> 01:23:56.340
there's a certain kind of question that to a being that had no access to agent-neutral value at all,

766
01:23:56.340 --> 01:23:58.340
it's a question that just wouldn't make sense.

767
01:23:58.340 --> 01:24:02.340
The question like, how would you like that if it happened, if they did it to you?

768
01:24:02.340 --> 01:24:06.340
And if you're just sort of completely blind to any sort of agent-neutral value,

769
01:24:06.340 --> 01:24:08.340
you wouldn't even see why that's a relevant question.

770
01:24:08.340 --> 01:24:10.340
No, I sure wouldn't like it if it happened to me.

771
01:24:10.340 --> 01:24:12.740
Thank God it's me doing it to them instead.

772
01:24:12.740 --> 01:24:18.820
And there'd be no standpoint from which to ask that question.

773
01:24:18.820 --> 01:24:25.060
And once you accept the existence of any sort of h-neutral value,

774
01:24:25.060 --> 01:24:28.460
even if it's only about language, my suggestion, and again,

775
01:24:28.460 --> 01:24:29.380
it's only a suggestion.

776
01:24:29.380 --> 01:24:30.460
I don't have the argument.

777
01:24:30.460 --> 01:24:35.620
I just, this is sort of what seems to be an attractive way

778
01:24:35.620 --> 01:24:37.660
of doing research to try and work out an argument here.

779
01:24:37.660 --> 01:25:01.660
So the suggestion is that you've now got a foothold from which considerations about how you'd like it of someone else that it can now be raised, that there's now a perspective, a lens, you know, I haven't got an argument yet that you're somehow forced to look through the lens, but there's now a lens through which you can look at your actions from an agent-neutral perspective.

780
01:25:01.660 --> 01:25:09.660
On the other question of whether this is just a commitment to certain linguistic conventions,

781
01:25:09.660 --> 01:25:17.660
well, I think it's stronger than that, because it's the nature of the commitment to having any linguistic conventions at all.

782
01:25:17.660 --> 01:25:21.660
Any particular linguistic convention you got, you could change.

783
01:25:21.660 --> 01:25:30.660
But that wouldn't change your commitment to having some linguistic convention or other.

784
01:25:30.660 --> 01:25:37.660
And of course you could give up language entirely. You could stop talking, you could stop thinking in language, you could just go about grunting.

785
01:25:37.660 --> 01:25:42.660
I suppose that's a possible option, but that would be the cost.

786
01:25:42.660 --> 01:25:55.660
So I think that our commitment to agent neutral language, I mean to agent neutral value, I think that is pretty robust.

787
01:25:55.660 --> 01:26:06.660
But the question is, well, do I have a decisive argument for saying that once you've got it, you have to look at your other values through it? No.

788
01:26:06.660 --> 01:26:19.660
But it seems to me that now that there's a standpoint from which this question can be asked, it's going to be hard to see how you can really find your life satisfactory when there's that sort of that nagging gap.

789
01:26:19.660 --> 01:26:24.940
gap. There's always this position that you just don't dare ask yourself a

790
01:26:24.940 --> 01:26:27.940
question from.

791
01:26:49.660 --> 01:27:19.580
So the question is, does agent neutrality imply that any value you've got, you know,

792
01:27:19.580 --> 01:27:31.580
No, even things you might think are matters of taste, like music, and I think music is a matter of objective taste, but oh, it's a, I don't know, succotash or something, maybe something like succotash, and are they thereby committed to universalizing that for everyone?

793
01:27:31.580 --> 01:27:44.580
No, but remember the out I gave myself, which is, there are cases where conflict is licensed, but only if the conflict is endorseable or justifiable from each and every point of view.

794
01:27:44.580 --> 01:27:56.580
So, if I'm on team A and you're on team B in a game, it's perfectly alright for me to prefer team A's winning and you're to prefer team B's winning, but there is a background that licenses that.

795
01:27:56.580 --> 01:28:00.580
From an agent-neutral perspective, we can endorse people having those divergent values.

796
01:28:00.580 --> 01:28:12.580
So, likewise, from an agent-neutral perspective, there are all sorts of reasons we could endorse some people eating Succotash and some people not, and there's no sort of drive to say that everyone has to do that.

797
01:28:12.580 --> 01:28:17.580
So we can have differing values and even conflicting and competing values.

798
01:28:17.580 --> 01:28:25.020
One thing that I thought about is, no matter how attractive you might be to notions of

799
01:28:25.020 --> 01:28:29.980
sort of harmony of interests, if two people are in love with the same person, there's

800
01:28:29.980 --> 01:28:34.460
no way you can apply sort of a pure rigid harmony of interest to that.

801
01:28:34.460 --> 01:28:41.300
But you could say, nevertheless, from an agent perspective, even though you can't endorse

802
01:28:41.300 --> 01:28:58.300
You can endorse someone else marrying the person you love, but you can endorse generally people having different people they love and you can endorse a situation where there is the risk that two people love the same person and you endorse a person being able to marry the one they want even if it's not you and so forth.

803
01:28:58.300 --> 01:29:16.300
So there can be plenty of diverging and even conflicting, but not all diverging values are conflicting, but both diverging and conflicting values can be okay, but there has to be an agent of a standpoint from which it's okay, it can't just be sort of ground level Hobbesian.

804
01:29:19.300 --> 01:29:21.300
Time for maybe one more.

805
01:29:21.300 --> 01:29:28.300
Thank you very much, Robert.