So we'd be entitled to shoot the pregnant woman dead to stop her jumping off the building?

My reason tells me that this would not be permitted. Whereas it would be permitted to shoot the suicidal driver dead in order to stop them from crashing the car and killing the innocent passenger.

My reason represents the cases not to be moral equivalents. Yet they would be moral equivalents if a fetus was a person. The implication is that the fetus is not a person.

Yes, good point - I think using a child versus fetus example would probably have been better.

Imagine a fully informed adult wishes to kill themselves. Are we entitled to stop them from doing so? I think most would say not. Remonstrate with them, yes. But not actually stop them. Not assuming they're in their right mind and so on. A person is entitled to take the exit if they really want to.

Now imagine the person is pregnant. Are you now entitled to stop them? My reason delivers the same verdict: no. That person is just as entitled to kill themselves, it would seem (if my reason is accurate).

A person is not entitled to kill themselves if doing so would kill another, however. For example, if a person is driving a car with an innocent passenger and decides to drive it into a tree at speed, that would be wrong precisely because it would kill another innocent person.

So, if the fetus is a person, then we would predict that a pregnant person would not be entitled to kill themselves. If our reason tells us that a pregnant person is entitled to kill themselves, then it is thereby telling us that the fetus is not a person.

Another variation: going back to teh suicidal driver with a passenger case - if a third party can stop the suicidal driver from killing both themselves and their passenger by shooting dead the driver before the driver has a chance to drive the car into the tree, then they're entitled to do that. And what justifies them in doing this is saving the passenger's life.

But now imagine that a pregnant woman is about to kill herself by jumping off a building onto an empty street below. Would a third party be entitled to shoot her dead if by doing so this will stop her jumping off the building? My reason says 'no'. Yet we'd predict that the third party would be entitled to do this if the fetus was a person, for then it'd be morally no different from the passenger case.

If your reason concurs, then we have evidence that the fetus is not a person. What our reason tells us about the morality of abortion implies that abortions do not involve the destruction of a person.

'Intuitions' are what all cases appeal to.

It is by intuition - which is used by philosophers to mean something very specific, namely a representation of our reason, not some arbitrary assumption - that we are aware that arguments are valid, for instance.

So, if you reject intuitions then you're rejecting the one and only source of evidence. Nothing else can possibly qualify as evidence unless we 'intuit' it to count as evidence, which just goes to show that all appeals to evidence are appeals to intuition.

i also pointed out that whether the mind is immaterial or not has no bearing - none - on the abortion issue.

I made a CASE for the immateriality of the mind.

If the mind is material, then slowly transferring the bits of material constituting it to another place would move the mind. That's a premise. It says 'if P, then Q'

The next premise is that transferring the bits does not transfer the mind, for one can in principle transfer the bits without interrupting functioning - as in the valuable machine case - and yet unlike in the valuable machine case, it is self-evident that the mind remains where it is.

That says 'not Q'

The conclusion that follows is "not P", or "the mind is NOT material".

That's called a 'case'. You must deny a premise, yet both premises seem true.

It's one of loads and loads of cases that can be made for the immateriality of the mind.

Ironic. I wasn't arguing. — AmadeusD

That was the point. I made a case. You didn't.

And no doubt another. This barely improves on a youtube comment section tbh.

Ah, another person who doesn't know how to argue

No, that's just plain untrue. There are lots of arguments for the soul - philosophy is full of them - and no good one against the view.

if the mind is the brain, then when we gradually remove the brain parts and reassemble them, then the mind would 'be' the reassembled brain. For that is what happened in the valuable machine case. In teh valuable machine case it is not in dispute that what has value is the parts of the machine, and thus when we gradually remove them and reassemble them it is the reassembled machine that is valuable, not the original one that is still functioning but has no parts in common.

When we perform the same exercise with a person - so, we gradually remove their brain without interrupting their consciousness - then the mind does not go with the parts we removed. Thus, the person is not their brain. That is what our reason tells us. If we respect what our reason tells us about cases, then it is telling us our minds are souls.

There are a whole stack of other arguments for the soul. There are no good ones for the idea that the mind is the brain, it's just a working hypothesis. But that's not evidence.

But given this thread is about abortion, how does it bear on the matter?

It seems that most of those who believe in the soul seem to think this implies that the soul is present from conception. That's bizarre. Why think that? It's not implied at all (and historically this has not been what people have thought). Whether the mind is material or immaterial makes no difference to the reasonableness or otherwise of assuming the fetus has a mind (for the issues are distinct - there's what has a mind, and then there's what a mind is made of). And yet that is the main issue that's going to bear on whether abortions are right or wrong.

I believe in the soul, yet it seems to me that the evidence indicates (but does not establish) that that fetuses do not have souls.

Yes, i agree that consciousness's continuation is not necessary for a mind to remain where it is, for we are unconscious every day and yet the same mind occupies my body after I wake up as was there before I went to sleep.

It seems sufficient for a mind to remain where is that there has been no interruption of consciousness. If we can maintain consciousness yet replace the matter of the brain, then that would seem to show that the mind isn't the brain.

I think Parfit was one of those who saw puzzles where there was actually just evidence for the soul.

This is a conclusion for a different thought experiment, on my view. — AmadeusD

I think it's about the one described as there seems to be a radical difference between what our reason tells us about where the valuable machine goes, and where the mind goes, even though we have exactly the same replacement process at play in both.

If our minds are our brains - a view I think is false - then our minds would, like the valuable machine, go with the matter. That there was uninterrupted consciousness in the other place - like the uninterrupted functioning of the machine - would be irrelevant.

But my reason anyway represents my mind to stay with the uninterrupted consciousness.

But it can't plausibly be that the consciousness was uninterrupted that explains why my mind stayed where it was (even though it assures us of it), for clearly a mind can be unconscious for a stretch and still be the same mind afterwards (just as a machine can stop functioning for a while and still be the same machine afterwards).

It's this combination that then implies that the mind is not the brain, but a bearer of conscious states that is associated with brains. That the consciousness was uninterrupted assures us that the mind was present there the whole time, but the consciousness is not the mind, but simply a state the mind was in.

Here is a thought experiment - I do not think it is mine, but I cannot remember whose it is - that seems to imply something important about the nature of the self or mind.

I should say, in my limited experience most people seem to start out with a view about what the self is and then just stick to it, rather than trying to extract the implications of our intuitions about cases. I take it to be obvious that this is a wrong-headed approach as, by hypothesis, we are trying to find out what kind of an entity the mind is and so shouldn't start out thinking we already know.

Imagine there's a machine made by someone famous. Turing, say. As such it is worth a fortune. Imagine we start the machine working. And now imagine that, without interrupting its functioning, we start gradually replacing its parts (the machine has some redundancy built in, so this is possible - that is, we can remove individual parts without stopping it working, so long as we do so bit by bit, replacing them as we go).

Eventually all the parts have been replaced. There is still a functioning machine there. All the parts that were removed were then reassembled. So now there are two machines side by side, and one of them is functioning away and has never ceased functioning.

There's an auction coming up. Which of the two machines is worth a fortune? The second one, obviously. The one that is made of the parts crafted by Turing. So, not the machine that's functioning, but the one beside it.

What can we conclude? That the 'valuable' machine is the one made of the parts that Turing crafted. That's why the value tracks the bits, not the functioning.

Applied to brains and minds, if our minds are our brains, then minds track brain matter. And that would mean that if we engaged in the same procedure as that outlined above - so gradually removed parts of a brain without interrupting its functioning and reassembled them beside it, so that eventually we have two brains - then it would be the reaassmbled brain that would be the mind that was previouisly in the position of the functioning mind.

On the other hand, if the mind stays with the functioning, then the mind stays where it is and the reassembled brain is either just a lump of meat or another mind, but it isn't the original one.

I don't know about you, but my reason represents - and represents very clearly - the original brain whose functioning has not been interrupted to remain the bearer of the mind. That seems to me to imply that my mind tracks my consciousness, not the matter of my brain.

But it also seems clear that whether consciousness is interrupted or not also makes no difference, for it seems counter-intuitive to suppose that if there was an interruption the mind would suddenly go with the material of the brain and not stay where it is.

In that case, this seems to imply that my mind is not the matter of my brain, nor is it my consciousness, but is instead something that (sometimes) has consciousness

I don't really see how this illuminates the abortion issue, however, as whatever the mind is - whether material or immaterial - the question of whether the fetus has one remains.

It's not as if belief in the soul commits one to thinking that the soul is in the fetus from the moment of conception, or at any other point, up to and including birth.

This is something that puzzles me over the abortion debate. Those on the 'soul' side seem to think they're somehow committed to thinking the fetus is a person....why? Whatever kind of a thing the mind is, this doesn't seem to me to shed light on the morality of abortion...

Safety and the perception of safety in a community is one. This is why it's not anymore just a service that an individual can decide to have or disregard. For example, you can go on a trip without travel insurance, but what about your car insurance? That's also for when you drive lousily and wreck somebody else's car. Of course, you can opt not to have a car. — ssu

Yes, the state's existence depends on fear and people's misguided assumption that there are some things - protecting our basic rights - that the state does best. Upon recognizing that this is simply false - that the state police are really awful at their job (due to lack of competition) - as well as unjust is the first step.

Most people have no idea just how bad the police are at solving crimes, for we rarely if ever need them. When was the last time you phoned the police? I've phoned the police once - once - in my entire life thus far. That's not thanks to the police doing a good job. It's due to the fact most people freely respect one another's rights. (How many times have you had the opportunity to get away with stealing something and been tempted to steal it? Personally, virtually never.....and even when I have, I've typically resisted it).

They're appalling at their job and there's no one else to go to, because the state - by virtue of being one - prevents anyone competing to do what they do. Even as individuals we are not allowed to protect our own rights if we so wish. I have a right to punish those who violate my rights, but the state prevents me from exercising that right. It insists that it will do that on my behalf. It does that without asking me, and it does it appallingly badly, and it insists I pay for it.

No, some people aren't worth discussing things with. For example, someone who only attacks strawmen or who thinks everything is just a matter of opinion or someone who doesn't understand the basics of good argumentation. People like that aren't worth the bother because they're just a lot of work - one has to try and educate them, which isn't why I'm here - and are not going to make good and insightful and troubling criticisms of one's view (which is what I'm after). They can discuss among themselves, but I'm not obliged to engage with them, except for sport.

It's in the opening post. It's not mine, it's a published and respected one.

Did you read my post? I didn't say anything about competing supermarket chains, or banks. I said something about individuals who hire competing private security companies for private interests. — Metaphysician Undercover

Omg! Apply it to them. As I said, I can't really discuss things with someone like you.

Price wars is what you'll get. Those are a lot nicer than bullety ones. And they drive down prices and drive up efficiency. But you run to big daddy state and hope he sorts things for you. The track record is excellent!

Battles are expensive. The private sector hates them. Politicians love them.

Yes, I'll hire my private security company, you hire yours, Moliere will hire another, ssu another, etc.. Then these companies will each be operating for different private interests and a street battle will be inevitable. — Metaphysician Undercover

yes, because those street battles between competing supermarket chains and banks are really common

Nothing. But nothing stops someone else setting up a company that doesn't do that - and they'd mop up all the business.

It's the government that allows monopolies to develop by being one itself and then delegating monopoly status to others.

When it comes to financial crises, governments stepped in. They gave gamblers giant amounts of other people's money. Was that a good thing?

Such crises are caused by, or at least amplified by governments. If I own a bank I am going to gamble much more recklessly if I know that if I'm reckless enough the government will bail me out.

And, regardless, you've ignored the point I've made about firms enforcing rights -- even if we "gradually" get there your reliance upon private property and contracts makes it such that the state will be reinvented. How else do you enforce contracts other than threatening jailtime? — Moliere

I am not really sure I understand the question. The private sector will provide all of those things. Anything a government provides, the private sector can provide. There is no invisible obstacle preventing private companies from building prisons. If enough people want to pay a company to imprison some people, a private company - private companies - will emerge that will bid for their business. Or, chances are, some much more efficient way of dealing with rights transgressors will be developed.

It's people who come up with solutions, not governments. And violence is something people are capable of using. The point is that it will be used more sparingly and justly in an anarchy than it will be if we all decide instead that just one tiny group of people get to determine when and where to use it.

Imagine there are two supermarkets near you, one is run by a really nasty piece of work. It pays its employees poorly and has a reputation for treating them badly and for treating customers badly as well. The other doesn't. Which one would you shop at? The nice one, of course. Most nice people would, anyway.

Nice people will even pay a bit of a premium if they think they're supporting niceness. Moral virtue is itself a selling point. In an anarchy virtue will be much better rewarded than it ever is with a government.

Well upon realizing that governments are unjust and bad at everything they do, this changes one's attitude. If that happens in enough people, then governments will just evaporate, for no longer would they have any authority. The people in power would cease to have any power and would just be people barking orders that no one cares to enforce.

It doesn't need to happen all at once, but gradually - and anarchy would evolve. Nobody now thinks serfdom is a good idea. But they used to. Now we have democratic governments and virtually nobody under one wants to go back.

The proof of the pudding is in the eating. Where government butts out, things improve. We don't have state issued shoes. If we did, they'd be awful and the contract would go to cronies and a pair of shoes would cost tens of thousands despite being awful. And they'd all be the same.

So nobody now lobbies for state issued shoes. nobody argues that the poorest need shoes and therefore to protect the vulnerable all shoes should be state produced.

The more the government is pulled-back, the more apparent it will become that it is unnecessary and actually counter-productive: that it facilitates the very things we - the people - think it's needed to prevent.

I don't think that private companies and the state are easily separable. I'm more or less saying that as soon as you abolish the state someone will re-invent the state — Moliere

Nobody is lobbying for there to be one mega supermarket that has a monopoly on selling us food.

The state's power rests in the hands of individuals and in the misguided idea that we 'need' it. To overcome that, people need to see that the government is a) unjust by its nature and b) does an appalling job at everything.

How would the private security companies' policies be backed? Would they not imprison people? — Moliere

If one privatized the police, then the police would simply become a private company bidding for business.

Let's say I am a private security firm and my people are rubbish - they're all weak and meek. Well, I'd go out of business in no time for someone else would do a better job and they'd get my business.

If I didn't have to worry about that - if I had a state mandate to be hte exclusive provider of security in a region - then I could continue being rubbish and taking payment for doing so, as no one has any other option and are not even invited to pay.

What if, as a private security company in an anarchy, I decide to extract payment with menaces? That is, I operate like a mafia? Well, those whom I threaten would hire another security company to protect them - to protect them from such menaces.

Consider, supermarkets do not force people into them to buy their food. And no supermarket boss thinks that'd be a good idea. If someone set up a supermarket that operated like that, everyone would avoid going near it and would go to the ones where force is not involved. And the supermarkets that do not use force would employ people to protect their customers from the agents of the other supermarkets. And so on.

It'd all sort itself out in no time.

Whatever malevolent forces you think are at play in private companies are amplified - not reduced - at the level of the state.

The logic is very simple. If it's bad on a small scale, it's worse at a large scale. Note, there's no starry-eyed idealism at work here. There's just common sense and a keen sense of justice. It's not healthy or right to concentrate power in one individual or some tiny group.

You don't solve the problem of mafias by having one mega mafia. That's like solving the fact you've got a cold by giving yourself cancer.

Incidentally, you know how mafias really survive? State corruption. The most successful mafia in the world is THE MAFIA. And how are they so successful? (They're the most successful organisation in Italy accounting for 7% of GDP) Corrupt government officials.

nce you "privatize" the army the warlords move in and take what is theirs and enforce what they want thereby reinventing the state. — Moliere

So having one mega-warlord is better than lots?

Food's really important. We die without it. There are loads and loads of food providers. Would it be better if there was just one mega food provider? No, that'd be terrible.

Private security companies would be a much better job - and do do a much better job - than the state. Try and steal something in a supermarket and see who stops you first - a private security guard or the police.

The solution: let's say we agree that all governments are fundamentally unjust as they are all composed of people who've decided they are entitled to protect our rights for a fee (or worse, to go beyond that and impose their conception of the good life on the rest of us) and extract it with menaces - so they're all mafias - then what's the way out?

Well, the solution lies with individuals recognizing that government is not needed - recognizing that government is unjust and unjustified - and withdrawing their support from it. That could be achieved overnight if just everyone had this realization all at once, for then no one would pay their taxes or see any special reason to obey the state or enforce the state's policies - and in one fell swoop all governments would just disappear, as they have no magical source of power beyond individuals deciding to obey them.

That's not going to happen all at once though. So the alternative is that it happens gradually as libertarian-esque governments pare back what the government is involved in and everyone starts to see that where government involvement stops, things improve.

For instance, food production and distribution is almost entirely conducted by the private sector, at least in first world countries (and that's partly what makes them first world). And everyone in countries where that is the case, recognizes - one hopes - that the diversity, quality and cheapness of food, and its efficient distribution, would all be considerably worse if the government decided to take over those matters. Nobody here who lives in a 'free' country surely thinks government should own all the supermarkets and produce all the food - you'd recognize that the instant it did that, the food quality and range would reduce and costs would go up.

All it requires is for people to recognize that exactly the same would happen in every other area. For all one is doing is removing an obstacle to efficiency: bossy do-gooding individuals who think they know better how to distribute things than individuals.

Privatizing the police and army would be the last step....

So the solution is to elect libertarian anti-regulation governments in the hope that the more that is taken out of the public sector and shown to improve in every way when subject more directly to the will of individuals improves exponentially. And the more that happens, the more it will dawn on people that the dwindling government is doing nothing - or nothing but issuing threats. It'll die a natural death

I think all the anarchist conclusion really requires is that it is wrong to extract payment with menaces for deciding - without being commissioned to do so - to protect another's rights.

It's not in dispute that we have rights and not dispute that we're entitled to use violence if necessary to protect them.

But the defender of the justice of any government needs to argue that, somehow, those in power are entitled not just to defend our rights (which isn't in dispute - they are entitled to do that, for we as individuals are entitled to do that and those in power are just individuals), but to extract payment with menaces for having decided to do so.

The point can be made another way: are the mafia in the wrong when they threaten others with violence in order to extract protection money? I think the answer is clear to all reasonable people: yes.

Well, a government is no different from them apart from being more successful at it. So, if the mafia are wrong in behaving in taht way, then so too are those in government.

Ironically most of those who think governments are not unjust think this because they think without them they'll be in the hands of mafias. So they confusedly think that the best way to protect against the injustice of being subject to mafias, is to have a mega-mafia!

It seems like a perfectly fine policy to limit the ability of everyone to do violence to each other and hand it to some professional and accountable institution. — Echarmion

Does this site have anyone on it who can actually read what someone says rather than attack strawmen of their own invention?

Here's my problem: are you willing to pay anything for services provided by others? If you need an electrician, is it OK for the electrician to ask for fee that basically feeds himself and his family? Or is that also unjust. — ssu

Yes. I 'hire' electricians. If an electrician just decides to change a lightbulb - without asking me - and then bills me and threatens me with violence if I do not pay, then that's UNJUST. This isn't hard, you just have to read what I argued and not replace it with something silly.

If I say that it is wrong to kick to death a dog, don't respond "so, you think it is wrong to treat a dog well?!"

It's actual contracts that count, at least when it comes to being entitled to extract payment with menaces for a job done. — Clearbury

Engage with the arguments I make and not strawmen.

Yes, I think so. But it doesn't really matter for my purposes here, for if he never intended it to operate as a justification for the state, then it presents no challenge to my view, and if he did intend it to be a justificaiton for a state, then it is a rubbish one.

oes Rawls call this a "hypothetical contract"? How does he describe it? And how does he use this thought experiment to justify the formation of the state? — Srap Tasmaner

Yes, he doesn't suppose us actually to have signed such a contract. It's just a thought experiment called 'the original position'. It's designed to provide us with insight into what fairness requires. And I think it does. But it doesn't do anything to show the state to be justified. The fact we 'would have' agreed to certain rules doesn't a) mean we have, b) entitle others to treat us as if we have agreed to them.

So, as a thought experiment designed to give us insight into fairness, it has something to be said for it. As an attempt at justifying the state, it's rubbish

Rawls argues that we gain insight into what rules it would be fair to make us live by, by imagining what rules-of-the-game we'd agree to prior to knowing our fate in the natural lottery. The rules we'd agree to under those conditions of ignorance are the ones it is then fair to make us live by once our hand has been dealt. For though it is by luck that some of us have marketable talents and others not, the rules are - by hypothesis - ones we'd all have agreed to prior to knowing such matters. So, just as it is fair to hold us to the rules of a game if we all agreed to those rules prior to knowing what hand of cards we'd be dealt, likeewise it is fair to regulate our lives by rules that we'd have all agreed to prior to knowing what hand of talents and disadvantages nature would deal to us.

The problem is that this is a hypothetical contract and hypothetical contracts are worthless and do not justify treating others in the hypothetically agreed-to ways. You would have commissioned me to fix your car, but you didn't. The hypothetical contract you'd have entered into with me does nothing at all to justify me demanding payment with menaces. And with that, Rawls's view goes down the toilet, I think. It may provide us with a useful thought experiment to gain insight into what's fair, but it does nothing to justify the state.

I was some kind of Rawlsian.

And here too, you might consider looking at arguments for the state. There's obviously lots of writing there, but two I can recommend that I find interesting because they're not just theory are Timothy Snyder (whom I quoted on the Holocaust) and Acemoglu and Robinson, Why Nations Fail. — Srap Tasmaner

Well, haha, I suppose my point in presenting what I take to be a powerful case for anarchism is to extract from others arguments for the state that can overcome the one I presented.

Because Huemer's anarchist conclusion follows from his premises, then by hypothesis his case refutes all other cases. Someone who thinks there's a good case for the state would need to show how it challenges the assumptions that Huemer's argument makes.

I am familiar-ish with the sorts of case people make for the state. And to date I have been unimpressed by all of them.

For example, appeals to beneficial consequences have already been dealt with. A) such appeals are misguided given that rights operate to place constraints on the extent to which violence can be used against people to secure good consequences. Can violence be used against me to make me eat more healthily? No. I eat unhealthily. If you used violence against me to make me eat more greens, you'd definitely improve my health. That's irrelevant, though, isn't it? For I have a right to eat what I want and you have no right to prevent me, even for my own good. So those who appeal to beneficial or harmful consequences are missing the point. Their empirical claims are false - the state is terrible at everything (again, the police are absolutely rubbish - and rubbish the world over - at solving crimes). But it wouldn't matter if they were true, for again, rights constrain what can be done to an individual in the name of securing good consequences.

Others - Hobbes and Locke and Rousseau - appeal to the notion of a hypothetical contract. They point out, on different grounds, that we - or our ideal selves - 'would' have agreed to commission the state to do as it does, and so because of this that somehow justifies it in actually doing it.

That's a terrible argument though. Imagine your car has an engine problem. I decide to fix it for you (you did not ask me). Then I bill you. And my bill is low. So low, in fact, that you would have hired me to do it for that price. Ok - well, do I have a right to extract payment from you with violence if necessary? No. Perhaps you ought to pay me, but I don't have a right to the money for you didn't commission me. The fact you would have done so had I asked is neither here nor there.

I think that serves to undermine all those cases for the state that appeal to hypothetical contracts. It's actual contracts that count, at least when it comes to being entitled to extract payment with menaces for a job done.

One is whether rights are better conceived as natural or positive. You believe natural, but you ought to at least look at the case for treating rights as positive. — Srap Tasmaner

That doesn't seem correct to me. I am assuming people have moral rights. But I am not assuming that they are natural (not that I am quite sure what that means) or that they are negative (I take it that the opposite of a positve right is a negative right, not a natural right, and the opposite of a natural right is a non-natural right).

I take the very notion of a right to have the justification of violence built into it. If I have a right to something, then that just means that violence can be used, if necessary, to provide me with it or, if it is a negative right, to prevent someone else from depriving me of what i have a right to.

My (or rather, Huemer's) case for anarchism doesn't depend on how many positive versus negative rights we have, for it is sufficient for the case to go through that we do not have a right to extract payment with menaces for deciding to police the rights or others. So long as it's clear - and I think it is - that a mafiosi is wrong in demanding protection money with menaces, then the case goes through, I think. For if we accept this, then it should be clear that the state is not entitled to claim for itself a monopoly on protecting our rights (some or any of them) and is not entitled to bill us for then doing so.