RE: Thoughts on Anarchism and Capitalism. Looking for Input and Critique.

You are viewing a single comment's thread from:

Thoughts on Anarchism and Capitalism. Looking for Input and Critique.

in anarchism •  7 years ago 

Much of your reply indicates that you interpret the "should" in this sentence differently from me:

Rather, the individual should be free of oppressive influence which may hinder the individual from meeting needs freely.

I will interpret the "should" as if you were saying something similar to what you said at the end of that paragraph:

It is immoral and unethical to do otherwise.

Let's first look at your reply to me in the paragraph where you say "I am making the claim that this is how life perpetuates its self." I say no--you are making a bigger claim on top of that claim.

Let's assume that the biological argument in your reply is 100% accurate: that being free helps people be healthy and live and reproduce. There is then no law of the universe that says that we should WANT to do that or that we SHOULD take that course. I know this sound odd to you and you can talk about how it is good to reproduce, but there no law of the universe that says that we should WANT to grow our family tree today (especially with 7 billion+ people on the planet). The scientific part of evolutionary explanation is descriptive, not a discovery of what animals should do (prescriptive).

First consider that many Russians would say something like "what we need to "maintain genetic integrity of not only the population, but the individual" is to have STRONG LEADERSHIP to keep us from hindering each other's progress.

Second, consider that most environmentalists that I have known think that the #1 problem facing the planet is overpopulation of humans, and they would see your post as a plan to "encourage people reproduce effectively," and that would sound like a nightmare to them.

Third, regardless of whether you or the Russians or the environmentalists have picked the best goal for humans, they are all subjective choices based on subjective preferences.

Now here is the part that is confusing for you: When you make an unqualified claim that people "should" do something ("the individual should be free of oppressive influence which may hinder the individual from meeting needs freely"), and you do not preface it with a qualifier (something like "If people want to live and reproduce a lot, then they should do...") then you would appear to be making some kind of moral claim or claim that all people should do it.

It sounds to me that you are asserting that you discovered something in the universe that is MORE THAN YOUR SUBJECTIVE PREFERENCE TO HAVE A BIG FAMILY TREE. It would appear to a scientist who reads your claim that you turned over a rock and discovered where in the universe it says that people should WANT to make a big family tree and therefore something in the universe MORALLY PRESCRIBES to humans to take that path (or however you want to put words to the idea that all humans are compelled by something to take that path).

If you had made that discovery, then you could point to that evidence and objectively indicate to the Russians that they are wrong. The truth is, you have no objective basis to support your "should" statement (not matter how obvious it seems to you or how appealing your statement is, it is subjective).

The difficulty you will have with my post here might be something like the difficulty that I had, as I described here.

Let's set aside the discussion of "common good" at this point. The stuff in this reply is first.

Authors get paid when people like you upvote their post.
If you enjoyed what you read here, create your account today and start earning FREE STEEM!