If redistribution maximizes total happiness (pleasantness, pleasure) and minimizes total pain, that is, maximizing pleasure minus pain, then even a classical utilitarian like me would have to agree that redistribution is good. You don't even need rights to justify a poor person who is unable to find work with no fault of their own and unable to escape poverty with no fault of their own is justified in stealing bread to survive.
In my view, open borders is basically a form of global redistribution to address global absolute poverty and reduce global inequality. Let people move and find work and settle where-ever they want. Except conservatism (which includes nationalism), the two major ideologies of enlightenment liberalism - Socialism (all its forms) and liberalism (social democracy, social liberalism, classical liberalism) all support a universal moral system, so the rights or happiness of any individual anywhere is intrinsically no less and no more important than the happiness of a rich man in a developed country.
So, both liberalism and socialism should support open borders.
Technically or strictly, Utilitarians don't believe in rights. My point was that if you are a consequentialist, then you don't need this rights talk to justify redistribution.
Do utilitarians believe in obligations? Can’t have obligations without rights. Whoever can give consent has a right (which they can waive) and whoever needs consent has an obligation.
A pure consequentialist doesn’t really need much of anything to excuse anything. At best, it is a confusion among levels of abstraction, or object level and meta. Consequences might give good reasons for adopting a legal system or set of norms, but you can’t run a legal system on the basis of consequences. Courts have enough trouble as it is when laws are relatively clear and simple. Making judgements on the ultimate consequences of an act could only be done badly.
I appreciate the recommendations. I've been subscribing to Chappell for a while now, specifically to give the other side their best opportunity to persuade me. So far, they have failed. I don’t think I’ve read Adelstein yet, perhaps he will have more to offer.
Or maybe redistribute borders on a continuum to meet personal needs. One thing the late David Graeber use to offer was that anthropologically speaking, human migration often had as much to do with the ability to divorce oneself from a community.
The problem became when expansive borders that excluded some and prevented those included from departing turned human migration into a threat against stability when in fact it had been a stabilizing factor.
“where it is necessary for a dignified existence, one has the right to steal, at least in the sense that the government has no right to punish you for it.”
Does this mean that the victim of the theft is obligated to provide it, and cannot prevent it during the act, or seek redress after the fact? If so, it might be a slight exaggeration to say there is no more point to having private property. I suppose one could say that the obligation only exists toward persons who can demonstrate their necessity.
I appreciate the thought experiment bear presents, but the problem is always that these things never play out in the clean way we'd like them to when we talk about them. As you said above, no rights = no obligations. The whole point of the western structure of law is that people are equal **before the law**, but they are equal in NO OTHER WAY.
I feel zero obligation to immigrants, legal or otherwise. I feel no obligation to the poor in my community. Why is that? Because the state has FORCED me into obligation via rapacious taxation. I'm not allowed to decide if I care or not. I'm forced to care and they will take my things away from me if I don't pay the danegeld.
When you force people to care, they stop caring in the ways that are actually best for society.
exactly. but Jean Valjean learned to give and so the principle he learned might have come from the priest who turned the theft into a gift of sharing. Perhaps the pay-it-forward principal, the gift is greater and what is taken creates more taking,while what is given creates more giving.
Well, that's his _second_ theft -- the earlier theft of bread was ruthlessly punished, leaving his family to starve... But yes, your extension of the idea makes sense.
Also worth noting, the theft of the silver _wasn't_ motivated by pure survival -- that's more like, he has learned the idea that nobody can really be trusted, the world is going to beat him down, so he might as well grab what he can and run, even though Myriel has been kind to him. When Myriel forgives not only the theft, but the abuse of hospitality, he could just read it as the bishop being a sucker, but he doesn't -- he recognizes his own culpability, and that breaks through, making him resolve to be better.
This is why care for the individual must be devolved down to the lowest possible level of law/order/power/governance. Only a small community (or neighborhood in a larger community) can understand the needs of the indigent that live amoungst them. It is kind of the village idiot theory -"yes, he's an idiot, but he's OUR idiot and you don't get to throw apples at him if you don't live here amoungst us." Only the village knows if the idiot really *is* trying to find work or really *does* need bread so badly he'd steal for it.
My point being that no poverty program can ever or will ever scale. Needs are individual and only individuals who understand the needs can meet the needs.
If redistribution maximizes total happiness (pleasantness, pleasure) and minimizes total pain, that is, maximizing pleasure minus pain, then even a classical utilitarian like me would have to agree that redistribution is good. You don't even need rights to justify a poor person who is unable to find work with no fault of their own and unable to escape poverty with no fault of their own is justified in stealing bread to survive.
In my view, open borders is basically a form of global redistribution to address global absolute poverty and reduce global inequality. Let people move and find work and settle where-ever they want. Except conservatism (which includes nationalism), the two major ideologies of enlightenment liberalism - Socialism (all its forms) and liberalism (social democracy, social liberalism, classical liberalism) all support a universal moral system, so the rights or happiness of any individual anywhere is intrinsically no less and no more important than the happiness of a rich man in a developed country.
So, both liberalism and socialism should support open borders.
If there are no rights, there are no obligations, and hence the previous owner is not obligated to allow the theft.
Technically or strictly, Utilitarians don't believe in rights. My point was that if you are a consequentialist, then you don't need this rights talk to justify redistribution.
Do utilitarians believe in obligations? Can’t have obligations without rights. Whoever can give consent has a right (which they can waive) and whoever needs consent has an obligation.
A pure consequentialist doesn’t really need much of anything to excuse anything. At best, it is a confusion among levels of abstraction, or object level and meta. Consequences might give good reasons for adopting a legal system or set of norms, but you can’t run a legal system on the basis of consequences. Courts have enough trouble as it is when laws are relatively clear and simple. Making judgements on the ultimate consequences of an act could only be done badly.
I recommend reading this - https://www.goodthoughts.blog/p/bleeding-heart-consequentialism
Also, read Matthew Adelstein's articles on Utilitiarianism and human rights.
Is Adelstein the author behind Bentham's bulldog? I've been subscribing there for a while also.
Yeah, Matthew Adelstein is the author of Bentham's Bulldog and he has powerfully defended Utilitarianism and argued against rights.
I appreciate the recommendations. I've been subscribing to Chappell for a while now, specifically to give the other side their best opportunity to persuade me. So far, they have failed. I don’t think I’ve read Adelstein yet, perhaps he will have more to offer.
Or maybe redistribute borders on a continuum to meet personal needs. One thing the late David Graeber use to offer was that anthropologically speaking, human migration often had as much to do with the ability to divorce oneself from a community.
The problem became when expansive borders that excluded some and prevented those included from departing turned human migration into a threat against stability when in fact it had been a stabilizing factor.
“where it is necessary for a dignified existence, one has the right to steal, at least in the sense that the government has no right to punish you for it.”
Does this mean that the victim of the theft is obligated to provide it, and cannot prevent it during the act, or seek redress after the fact? If so, it might be a slight exaggeration to say there is no more point to having private property. I suppose one could say that the obligation only exists toward persons who can demonstrate their necessity.
I appreciate the thought experiment bear presents, but the problem is always that these things never play out in the clean way we'd like them to when we talk about them. As you said above, no rights = no obligations. The whole point of the western structure of law is that people are equal **before the law**, but they are equal in NO OTHER WAY.
I feel zero obligation to immigrants, legal or otherwise. I feel no obligation to the poor in my community. Why is that? Because the state has FORCED me into obligation via rapacious taxation. I'm not allowed to decide if I care or not. I'm forced to care and they will take my things away from me if I don't pay the danegeld.
When you force people to care, they stop caring in the ways that are actually best for society.
Call it the Jean Valjean principle.
exactly. but Jean Valjean learned to give and so the principle he learned might have come from the priest who turned the theft into a gift of sharing. Perhaps the pay-it-forward principal, the gift is greater and what is taken creates more taking,while what is given creates more giving.
Well, that's his _second_ theft -- the earlier theft of bread was ruthlessly punished, leaving his family to starve... But yes, your extension of the idea makes sense.
yes, it was the second theft, after escape.
Also worth noting, the theft of the silver _wasn't_ motivated by pure survival -- that's more like, he has learned the idea that nobody can really be trusted, the world is going to beat him down, so he might as well grab what he can and run, even though Myriel has been kind to him. When Myriel forgives not only the theft, but the abuse of hospitality, he could just read it as the bishop being a sucker, but he doesn't -- he recognizes his own culpability, and that breaks through, making him resolve to be better.
Speaking of Emma Goldman, I'd like to share this song from the now defunct band from Las Vegas, Pan De Sal: https://pandesalband.bandcamp.com/track/red-emma
This is why care for the individual must be devolved down to the lowest possible level of law/order/power/governance. Only a small community (or neighborhood in a larger community) can understand the needs of the indigent that live amoungst them. It is kind of the village idiot theory -"yes, he's an idiot, but he's OUR idiot and you don't get to throw apples at him if you don't live here amoungst us." Only the village knows if the idiot really *is* trying to find work or really *does* need bread so badly he'd steal for it.
My point being that no poverty program can ever or will ever scale. Needs are individual and only individuals who understand the needs can meet the needs.