"If no property is rightfully owned, that is if nothing is property". This is the heart of your (or N.B.'s) fallacy.
1st, the concept of ownership, and the term for this concept, "property", is imposed on something (let's say rain falling from the sky) by someone who wants to control this something.
So, the term property is synonomous with "rain falling from the sky".
So, it's not a stolen concept if someone claims that control of rain falling from the sky is theft and/or agression, is it?
If u want to understand the real claim when someone who's serious says "property is theft" or "property is agression", you (or they) have to distinguish between types of so-called property (e.g. "possessed resources" vs. "non-possessed").
So, if everyone has equal claim to something (e.g. water falling from the sky), then it's theft and/or agression if one person treats it as if it is 'their property'.
Conflating types of property or inserting the word "all" in front of it is a vulgar move.
What if the statement only refers to private property? And what if all things belong to the whole of humanity? This idea is at the root of all leftist ideologies, anarchism and libertarian socialism included. So this clearely coherent and logical argument doesn't really go to the root of the issue.
The first man who,having fenced in a piece of land,said "This is mine,"& found people naïve enough to believe him, that man was the founder of civil society.From how many crimes,wars &murders,from how many horrors & misfortunes might not any one have saved mankind... Beware of listening to this impostor; you are undone if you once forget that the fruits of the earth belong to us all, and the earth itself to nobody." Jean-Jacques Rousseau
@oldwisetale Hi, I don't think IP is justifiable. Ideas are not scarce resources, so they're not candidates to become property. Enforcing IP means breaching real property rights (in scarce physical things).
By adopting a different meaning to a word (e.g. aggression) than the generally accepted one, it does not follow that those using the standard definition "make no sense". It simply means that you are no longer able to have any meaningful discussion with those outside your movement. The reason for changing the definition, I presume, was to try to embed the legitimacy of property rights into language as they are so central to the libertarianism, yet there is no rational way to justify them .
@daveeggersly "it does not follow that those using the standard definition "make no sense""
Did I claim that using the common definition of aggression makes no sense?
The advantage of a propertarian definition of aggression is that it allows a coherent model that integrates force and property, and avoids the arbitrariness inherent in the standard definition. I wrote a post explaining this further that you can find if you google: The non-aggression principle Weaknesses and strength
@cbau338 "There is no "all" in the phrase. Proudhon was talking about a certain type of property, "
"Property is theft", unqualified, is an implied claim about all property. Just as "Squares have four sides" is a claim about all squares. "Cats are black" is not equivalent to "Black cats exist". If Proudhon meant only certain kinds of property he misspoke.
@bergweg "so let's take a piece of land and the first owner. Who did this so called owner acquire the land from, and how? "
He didn't aquire the land from anyone, according to the homesteading principle at least, by mixing his labour with the land he become its original owner.
@bitbutter That's one case, but then there is land that was conquered in wars, conflicts, etc... Another thing is that ownership is not possible witout an enforcer (government or a similar organization).
@bitbutter If I "agree" to "steal" "your" chair,then will you attempt to kill me?(Private property is an irrational idea never to sanctioned by natural law.Thomas Reid - the so-called common-sense Realist - wrote that!)
@anarksee "If I "agree" to "steal" "your" chair,"
An agreement needs more than one person. Private property is an agreement shared by many people: almost everyone believes that they have the exclusive right to dictate the terms of use of their body, provided that that use doesn't interfere with another persons property rights.
@bitbutter You're perpetrating semantical legerdemain!I don't play word games;I recommend you look study the history of the word "argument" (etymology,anybody?)
Proudhon's words are used to show us that individual property is illegitmate because it has been stolen from a community. The reason you see it as a fallacy and get lost in a meaningless circle, is because you instantly base your idea of property on a Libertarian concept, and not on an anarachist one.
@MrBobbillo "Proudhon's words are used to show us that individual property is illegitmate because it has been stolen from a community."
This video isn't for people who like to say that "individual property is theft". This video is aimed at anyone who believes that "property is theft" makes sense without qualification. It doesn't.
@bitbutter your qualification doesn't make sense, doesn't mean that "property is theft" doesn't make sense. It doesn't make any sense if you believe in Libertarian property rights (which you mention), but for me life and liberty don't have any neccessay connection to property =)
The fallacy here clearly lies with the speaker. Think about indian lands before the british took them. That land was property of the natives in that it was being used by that community. This definition of property is protected by British Law even as "squatter's rights". Then the british came and declared that land for themselves as a saleable property. What part of that is not theft?
@MrBobbillo Nothing you said helps rescue 'property is theft' from incoherence. If you want to actually address the content of the video, you're welcome to do so.
@bitbutter all I'm saying is that your concept of property that you use in your argument in the video presupposes the concept of property as individual property. This is the argument of the commons vs. property. I should have said that the land was 'common' to the natives before it was turned into property through theft. Hence property and theft are not one thing then the other but a simultaneous occurrence. Your logic (in the video) sounds temporal, when the statement isn't.
@MrBobbillo "your concept of property that you use in your argument in the video presupposes the concept of property as individual property."
No it doesn't.
"I should have said that the land was 'common' to the natives before it was turned into property through theft."
Communally owned => communal property.
You're still not appreciating the problem: Property is when an entity has a legitimate title to a thing. Theft is meaningless unless there's such a thing as legitimately owned property.
@bitbutter perhaps we are talking past purposes? I think that to think of the commons as 'property' is not valid. Any 'legitimacy' is a creation of power through law and military might mostly.
Communally used is not communal property for me. People that believe in property rights normally accept that it is a violent process, but that it is ultimately for the good of mankind, the so-called "tragedy of the commons".
@MrBobbillo "Communally used is not communal property for me. "
If something communally used is not communal property then there is no possibility of it being stolen. This is because theft describes taking possession of another person's (or group's) property.
I see the statement "Property is theft" as an attempt at a reductio ad absurdum. However if the concept of property is absurd, so is the concept of theft. If one truly believes that property is theft, if someone breaks into and drives away in your car, don't call it theft.
I don't think that anyone who states that Property is Theft confuses it with the idea that Theft equals Property - which is the idea you've just dismantled
Also, the claim doesn't assume that property exists prior to the theft at all - that's simply frame biasing to make it easier for the so called debunkers.
It's not a concept I beleive in but yours is not a very good rebuttal I'm afraid.
@billburns2 "Also, the claim doesn't assume that property exists prior to the theft at all"
I explained in the video why the existence of theft necessarily means that legitimately owned property exists too. Ignoring that explanation isn't the same as refuting it.
@billburns2 'you're concentrating on the "property" aspect, whereas a proponent of PiT is more concerned with the "legitimately owned" aspect.'
It doesn't matter in the slightest which of the words a person is more interested in. The phrase is incoherent for the reasons explained in the video. Address them if you're able to.
@billburns2 "The bottom line is that you have attempted to dismantle the assertion that A=B by starting with a declaration that B=A."
False. I explained not that theft _is_ property, but that the concept of theft is genetically dependent on the concept of property. And that a concrete instance of theft necessitates a concrete instance of legitimate ownership. Please pay closer attention.
When Proudhon said "property is theft" he was basically saying that it s an act of denying everyone else access to the item/land that the propertarian is claiming ownership of.
@SecularNumanist Of course it's true that to claim property means to exclude everyone else from an equal say in the use of the object. Whatever proudhon had in mind (could well be that there was a tongue-in-cheek aspect to it) the phrase is incoherent.
In the same way as the statement rebutts all aspects of the law of theft, but also all aspects of the crminal law if you look for deeper meaning. It is true to say that each one of us has rights of autonomy and rights to our own persons. These rights could arguably be seen as property in the same way as information and copyrights are property. The criminal law aspects involving physical harm or the threat thereof rely on this completely. Thus it can rebutt criminal law.
@skunkwerksrc Yeah I think Molyneux's wrong about that: there's no performative inconsistency in saying 'Property is theft', it's wrong for a diff reason (see my replies to zalida100 in this thread).
I've recently been debating some classical anarchists (the ones that are against private property). They make a distinction between possessions (things you need for direct personally use, e.g. a toothbrush, a house) and private property (things you don't directly need, e.g. means of production or a 2nd house). The enforcement of PP then is seen as a form of theft.
Although I understand the distinction from an social standpoint, this all seems quite arbitrary to me.
There was a time when no one owned anything. Now we do. Some say there is legitimacy in the transition from one state to the other, some say there isn't - so they use words like "theft" or "force" to imply that illegitimacy. Pointing to the limits of that analogy does nothing to address the thrust of its argument.
@EquitoErgoSum I've seen this claim used several times in the last few days without qualifiers. If the people making this claim don't mean what those words traditionally mean, then the burden is on them to explain the definitions they're using. This video assumes non-idiosyncratic definitions of the terms used.
@bitbutter That would preclude any possibility of ever arguing by analogy at all. All human language need analogy to function. Finding problems with analogy is easy and pointless.
You could try actually trying to understand what people mean and going from there. As long as you take the stance that all words used must be perfect and complete in their usage you make meaningful communication impossible beyond A=A statements.
@EquitoErgoSum Although it is true that analogy is necessary, I believe that this chap's correct in his ridicule of the phrase.
The phrase is no longer used in the way that Marx would have used it himself, instead it has been extracted and taken out of context to act as a Communist slogan. If we look for deeper meaning, it will be a pointless exercise, as its purpose in modern times is to try to convince people to support a political party. It is as useless as "a future fair for all".
I wouldn't say that theft is necessarily taking someone's property. I think theft is the act of denying the owner exclusive control over his property. e.g. Maybe someone deliberately blocks your car in your driveway or something like that.
As you said, the "property is theft" is just a self detonating statement.
In order to make the statement, the claimant has to have control (property rights) over his own body to make the statement.
@zalida100 Thanks. I should make clear though that I disagree that there's a _performative_ inconsistency in saying 'property is theft'. A person does not have to assume, tacitly or otherwise, that they have the exclusive right to determine how their body is used in order to say that (of course they're still wrong though).
@bitbutter Cool - a disagreement. If they are making the statement, surely that is exercising control of their body, which implies ownership/control? Otherwise they require the permission of whomever else may own their (the speaker's) body. Can you tell me where my assumption is not quite right? - Ta
@zalida100 "surely that is exercising control of their body, which implies ownership/control?"
imo it doesn't follow that it implies ownership in the sense typically used in libertarian discourse.
If the body was their property, then they'd have sovereign right to determine acceptable uses of that body. But they could exert control over 'their' body to utter a phrase even if this was not the case (even if someone else had the right to legitimately beat the body they inhabit, without consent).
@bitbutter Ah. I think I get what you mean. They don't necessarily have exclusive right to control of all of their body at all times? i.e. They may have ownership of the vocal chords, but that doesn't mean they have the right of the whole body? They may have even been coerced by the actual owner (master) to say "property is theft", but since the person in the body has ultimate choice of uttering the phrase or not, he still has final control, doesn't he?
"but since the person in the body has ultimate choice of uttering the phrase or not, he still has final control, doesn't he?"
Not sure what you mean by ultimate control. imo the relevant question is whether his utterance proves that he assumes the sovereign right to decide how that body is used. I don't see how it does (he may believe that others have the right to use his body however they like, without permission, on the last day of every month ;)).
@bitbutter "..Not sure what you mean by ultimate control..." I think I mean that someone can beat the crap out of him until he utters the phrase "property is theft", but the guy doing the beating, doesn't have 100% control of the other guy's body. e.g. the victim/slave has the final choice of what he ends up saying. e.g. The slave may choose to die, rather than say the words. (I know I'm kinda nit-picking here).
"..on the last day of every month.." Yes, I think you're right here - I see that :)
@zalida100 "..(he may believe that others have the right to use his body however they like,..." I just noticed this. Aren't we arguing about subjective & objective reality here? Certainly if the "slave" guy believes someone else has the right to use his body, then I agree with your argument. I was thinking more along the lines of, the guy with the stick cannot control everything the slave does, without the final cooperation of the slave. Hence he doesn't have complete ownership.
"If no property is rightfully owned, that is if nothing is property". This is the heart of your (or N.B.'s) fallacy.
1st, the concept of ownership, and the term for this concept, "property", is imposed on something (let's say rain falling from the sky) by someone who wants to control this something.
So, the term property is synonomous with "rain falling from the sky".
So, it's not a stolen concept if someone claims that control of rain falling from the sky is theft and/or agression, is it?
ElDukerino1 1 month ago
If u want to understand the real claim when someone who's serious says "property is theft" or "property is agression", you (or they) have to distinguish between types of so-called property (e.g. "possessed resources" vs. "non-possessed").
So, if everyone has equal claim to something (e.g. water falling from the sky), then it's theft and/or agression if one person treats it as if it is 'their property'.
Conflating types of property or inserting the word "all" in front of it is a vulgar move.
ElDukerino1 1 month ago
If I understand Proudhon correctly, "private property" refers only to state granted privilege of property title.
mikemat3307 1 month ago
What if the statement only refers to private property? And what if all things belong to the whole of humanity? This idea is at the root of all leftist ideologies, anarchism and libertarian socialism included. So this clearely coherent and logical argument doesn't really go to the root of the issue.
AtheistRightWing 1 month ago
The first man who,having fenced in a piece of land,said "This is mine,"& found people naïve enough to believe him, that man was the founder of civil society.From how many crimes,wars &murders,from how many horrors & misfortunes might not any one have saved mankind... Beware of listening to this impostor; you are undone if you once forget that the fruits of the earth belong to us all, and the earth itself to nobody." Jean-Jacques Rousseau
Hasshasser 2 months ago
what are your thoughts on intellectual property?
(if i may ask)
oldwisetale 3 months ago
@oldwisetale Hi, I don't think IP is justifiable. Ideas are not scarce resources, so they're not candidates to become property. Enforcing IP means breaching real property rights (in scarce physical things).
bitbutter 3 months ago
By adopting a different meaning to a word (e.g. aggression) than the generally accepted one, it does not follow that those using the standard definition "make no sense". It simply means that you are no longer able to have any meaningful discussion with those outside your movement. The reason for changing the definition, I presume, was to try to embed the legitimacy of property rights into language as they are so central to the libertarianism, yet there is no rational way to justify them .
daveeggersly 8 months ago
@daveeggersly "it does not follow that those using the standard definition "make no sense""
Did I claim that using the common definition of aggression makes no sense?
The advantage of a propertarian definition of aggression is that it allows a coherent model that integrates force and property, and avoids the arbitrariness inherent in the standard definition. I wrote a post explaining this further that you can find if you google: The non-aggression principle Weaknesses and strength
bitbutter 8 months ago
There is no "all" in the phrase. Proudhon was talking about a certain type of property, one that needed a state to exist.
cbau338 8 months ago
@cbau338 "There is no "all" in the phrase. Proudhon was talking about a certain type of property, "
"Property is theft", unqualified, is an implied claim about all property. Just as "Squares have four sides" is a claim about all squares. "Cats are black" is not equivalent to "Black cats exist". If Proudhon meant only certain kinds of property he misspoke.
bitbutter 3 months ago
so let's take a piece of land and the first owner. Who did this so called owner acquire the land from, and how?
bergweg 8 months ago
@bergweg "so let's take a piece of land and the first owner. Who did this so called owner acquire the land from, and how? "
He didn't aquire the land from anyone, according to the homesteading principle at least, by mixing his labour with the land he become its original owner.
bitbutter 8 months ago
@bitbutter That's one case, but then there is land that was conquered in wars, conflicts, etc... Another thing is that ownership is not possible witout an enforcer (government or a similar organization).
bergweg 8 months ago
Private property is a fallacy.Theft implies private property,therefore,theft is a fallacy.Hoarding is another process alltogether.
anarksee 10 months ago
@anarksee Private property is an agreement/norm.
bitbutter 10 months ago
@bitbutter If I "agree" to "steal" "your" chair,then will you attempt to kill me?(Private property is an irrational idea never to sanctioned by natural law.Thomas Reid - the so-called common-sense Realist - wrote that!)
anarksee 10 months ago
@anarksee "If I "agree" to "steal" "your" chair,"
An agreement needs more than one person. Private property is an agreement shared by many people: almost everyone believes that they have the exclusive right to dictate the terms of use of their body, provided that that use doesn't interfere with another persons property rights.
bitbutter 3 months ago
@bitbutter You're perpetrating semantical legerdemain!I don't play word games;I recommend you look study the history of the word "argument" (etymology,anybody?)
anarksee 3 months ago
@anarksee "You're perpetrating semantical legerdemain!"
No i'm not. If you disagree can you spell out how?
"I recommend you look study the history of the word "argument""
Why? (did you misread agreement for argument?).
bitbutter 3 months ago
@bitbutter Yes for the final question;There you go again!for the first question.I don't play word games.
anarksee 3 months ago
@anarksee B: "If you disagree can you spell out how?"
A: "I don't play word games."
So explaining yourself is 'word games', and you don't play 'word games'. I'm not sure why you're even commenting here.
bitbutter 3 months ago
@bitbutter Oh?Really?And who is doing the agreeing?
anarksee 10 months ago
Proudhon's words are used to show us that individual property is illegitmate because it has been stolen from a community. The reason you see it as a fallacy and get lost in a meaningless circle, is because you instantly base your idea of property on a Libertarian concept, and not on an anarachist one.
MrBobbillo 11 months ago
@MrBobbillo "Proudhon's words are used to show us that individual property is illegitmate because it has been stolen from a community."
This video isn't for people who like to say that "individual property is theft". This video is aimed at anyone who believes that "property is theft" makes sense without qualification. It doesn't.
bitbutter 11 months ago
@bitbutter your qualification doesn't make sense, doesn't mean that "property is theft" doesn't make sense. It doesn't make any sense if you believe in Libertarian property rights (which you mention), but for me life and liberty don't have any neccessay connection to property =)
MrBobbillo 10 months ago
The fallacy here clearly lies with the speaker. Think about indian lands before the british took them. That land was property of the natives in that it was being used by that community. This definition of property is protected by British Law even as "squatter's rights". Then the british came and declared that land for themselves as a saleable property. What part of that is not theft?
MrBobbillo 11 months ago
@MrBobbillo Nothing you said helps rescue 'property is theft' from incoherence. If you want to actually address the content of the video, you're welcome to do so.
bitbutter 11 months ago
@bitbutter all I'm saying is that your concept of property that you use in your argument in the video presupposes the concept of property as individual property. This is the argument of the commons vs. property. I should have said that the land was 'common' to the natives before it was turned into property through theft. Hence property and theft are not one thing then the other but a simultaneous occurrence. Your logic (in the video) sounds temporal, when the statement isn't.
MrBobbillo 10 months ago
@MrBobbillo "your concept of property that you use in your argument in the video presupposes the concept of property as individual property."
No it doesn't.
"I should have said that the land was 'common' to the natives before it was turned into property through theft."
Communally owned => communal property.
You're still not appreciating the problem: Property is when an entity has a legitimate title to a thing. Theft is meaningless unless there's such a thing as legitimately owned property.
bitbutter 10 months ago
@bitbutter perhaps we are talking past purposes? I think that to think of the commons as 'property' is not valid. Any 'legitimacy' is a creation of power through law and military might mostly.
Communally used is not communal property for me. People that believe in property rights normally accept that it is a violent process, but that it is ultimately for the good of mankind, the so-called "tragedy of the commons".
MrBobbillo 10 months ago
@MrBobbillo "Communally used is not communal property for me. "
If something communally used is not communal property then there is no possibility of it being stolen. This is because theft describes taking possession of another person's (or group's) property.
bitbutter 10 months ago
I see the statement "Property is theft" as an attempt at a reductio ad absurdum. However if the concept of property is absurd, so is the concept of theft. If one truly believes that property is theft, if someone breaks into and drives away in your car, don't call it theft.
DKshad0w 11 months ago
who defines "legitimate" ownership??????
oldwisetale 11 months ago
I don't think that anyone who states that Property is Theft confuses it with the idea that Theft equals Property - which is the idea you've just dismantled
Also, the claim doesn't assume that property exists prior to the theft at all - that's simply frame biasing to make it easier for the so called debunkers.
It's not a concept I beleive in but yours is not a very good rebuttal I'm afraid.
billburns2 11 months ago
@billburns2 "Also, the claim doesn't assume that property exists prior to the theft at all"
I explained in the video why the existence of theft necessarily means that legitimately owned property exists too. Ignoring that explanation isn't the same as refuting it.
bitbutter 11 months ago
@bitbutter
Quote: The concept of theft depends on the concept of legitimately owned property".
Yes, but you're concentrating on the "property" aspect, whereas a proponent of PiT is more concerned with the "legitimately owned" aspect.
It would be like me trying to prove the legitimacy of the state by demonstrating a definition of what "state" means.
billburns2 11 months ago
@billburns2 'you're concentrating on the "property" aspect, whereas a proponent of PiT is more concerned with the "legitimately owned" aspect.'
It doesn't matter in the slightest which of the words a person is more interested in. The phrase is incoherent for the reasons explained in the video. Address them if you're able to.
bitbutter 11 months ago
@bitbutter
This is a topic that YOU have chosen to adress and unfortunately the words matter a great deal.
The bottom line is that you have attempted to dismantle the assertion that A=B by starting with a declaration that B=A.
What's the difference? Well if I declare that bunnies are mammals, I can't therefore declare that mammals are bunnies, can I?
billburns2 11 months ago
@billburns2 "The bottom line is that you have attempted to dismantle the assertion that A=B by starting with a declaration that B=A."
False. I explained not that theft _is_ property, but that the concept of theft is genetically dependent on the concept of property. And that a concrete instance of theft necessitates a concrete instance of legitimate ownership. Please pay closer attention.
bitbutter 11 months ago
@bitbutter
LOL
Sad little ad-homs won't cover your errors I'm afraid.
QUOTE: "I explained not that theft is property, but that the concept of theft is genetically dependent on the concept of property"
But it isn't. It's dependent on the concept of LEGITIMATE property.
If I declare the sky as being my property and show a bill of sale to prove ownership, would you accept my claim?
If not, then does that challenge the very definition of property per-se?
It's a daft argument.
billburns2 11 months ago
@billburns2 "But it isn't. It's dependent on the concept of LEGITIMATE property."
Property == legitimate property silly.
bitbutter 11 months ago
"property is theft" self destructs. theft assumes property exists prior to the theft.
AnarchoCapitalistTV 11 months ago
@AnarchoCapitalistTV yes exactly.
bitbutter 11 months ago
When Proudhon said "property is theft" he was basically saying that it s an act of denying everyone else access to the item/land that the propertarian is claiming ownership of.
SecularNumanist 11 months ago
@SecularNumanist Of course it's true that to claim property means to exclude everyone else from an equal say in the use of the object. Whatever proudhon had in mind (could well be that there was a tongue-in-cheek aspect to it) the phrase is incoherent.
bitbutter 11 months ago
Why do Marxists drink peppermint tea? Because proper tea is theft.
xknowledgeisfreex 11 months ago
@xknowledgeisfreex ha!
bitbutter 11 months ago
In the same way as the statement rebutts all aspects of the law of theft, but also all aspects of the crminal law if you look for deeper meaning. It is true to say that each one of us has rights of autonomy and rights to our own persons. These rights could arguably be seen as property in the same way as information and copyrights are property. The criminal law aspects involving physical harm or the threat thereof rely on this completely. Thus it can rebutt criminal law.
Fierypeanut 11 months ago
awesome man!
you have gained my respect
keep up the videos
they are very interesting
oldwisetale 11 months ago
Stefan Molyneux defines these statements as "self-detonating".
skunkwerksrc 11 months ago
@skunkwerksrc Another example would be the statement, "Language is meaningless."
skunkwerksrc 11 months ago
@skunkwerksrc - That's probably the best analogy of what the "property is theft" slogan actually implies.
HexTest 11 months ago
@skunkwerksrc Yeah I think Molyneux's wrong about that: there's no performative inconsistency in saying 'Property is theft', it's wrong for a diff reason (see my replies to zalida100 in this thread).
bitbutter 11 months ago
What's the source of the Nathaniel Branden quote?
bryanperf 11 months ago
@bryanperf I added the link to the info box.
bitbutter 11 months ago
This has been flagged as spam show
@bryanperf
"What's the source of the Nathaniel Branden quote"
er... Nathaniel Branden maybe??
LMFAO
billburns2 11 months ago
its as coherent as saying "consent is rape"
wizkid2000 11 months ago
I've recently been debating some classical anarchists (the ones that are against private property). They make a distinction between possessions (things you need for direct personally use, e.g. a toothbrush, a house) and private property (things you don't directly need, e.g. means of production or a 2nd house). The enforcement of PP then is seen as a form of theft.
Although I understand the distinction from an social standpoint, this all seems quite arbitrary to me.
janc71 11 months ago
cont.
"theft" is an analogy here.
There was a time when no one owned anything. Now we do. Some say there is legitimacy in the transition from one state to the other, some say there isn't - so they use words like "theft" or "force" to imply that illegitimacy. Pointing to the limits of that analogy does nothing to address the thrust of its argument.
EquitoErgoSum 11 months ago
This strikes me as a linguistic argument rather than a genuine attempt to engage with the substantive content of the issue. It's clever, but so what?
EquitoErgoSum 11 months ago
@EquitoErgoSum I've seen this claim used several times in the last few days without qualifiers. If the people making this claim don't mean what those words traditionally mean, then the burden is on them to explain the definitions they're using. This video assumes non-idiosyncratic definitions of the terms used.
bitbutter 11 months ago
@bitbutter That would preclude any possibility of ever arguing by analogy at all. All human language need analogy to function. Finding problems with analogy is easy and pointless.
You could try actually trying to understand what people mean and going from there. As long as you take the stance that all words used must be perfect and complete in their usage you make meaningful communication impossible beyond A=A statements.
EquitoErgoSum 11 months ago
@EquitoErgoSum Although it is true that analogy is necessary, I believe that this chap's correct in his ridicule of the phrase.
The phrase is no longer used in the way that Marx would have used it himself, instead it has been extracted and taken out of context to act as a Communist slogan. If we look for deeper meaning, it will be a pointless exercise, as its purpose in modern times is to try to convince people to support a political party. It is as useless as "a future fair for all".
Fierypeanut 11 months ago
Comment removed
Fierypeanut 11 months ago
Very well put. Thanks.
I wouldn't say that theft is necessarily taking someone's property. I think theft is the act of denying the owner exclusive control over his property. e.g. Maybe someone deliberately blocks your car in your driveway or something like that.
As you said, the "property is theft" is just a self detonating statement.
In order to make the statement, the claimant has to have control (property rights) over his own body to make the statement.
zalida100 11 months ago
@zalida100 Thanks. I should make clear though that I disagree that there's a _performative_ inconsistency in saying 'property is theft'. A person does not have to assume, tacitly or otherwise, that they have the exclusive right to determine how their body is used in order to say that (of course they're still wrong though).
bitbutter 11 months ago
@bitbutter Cool - a disagreement. If they are making the statement, surely that is exercising control of their body, which implies ownership/control? Otherwise they require the permission of whomever else may own their (the speaker's) body. Can you tell me where my assumption is not quite right? - Ta
zalida100 11 months ago
@zalida100 "surely that is exercising control of their body, which implies ownership/control?"
imo it doesn't follow that it implies ownership in the sense typically used in libertarian discourse.
If the body was their property, then they'd have sovereign right to determine acceptable uses of that body. But they could exert control over 'their' body to utter a phrase even if this was not the case (even if someone else had the right to legitimately beat the body they inhabit, without consent).
bitbutter 11 months ago
@bitbutter Ah. I think I get what you mean. They don't necessarily have exclusive right to control of all of their body at all times? i.e. They may have ownership of the vocal chords, but that doesn't mean they have the right of the whole body? They may have even been coerced by the actual owner (master) to say "property is theft", but since the person in the body has ultimate choice of uttering the phrase or not, he still has final control, doesn't he?
zalida100 11 months ago
@zalida100 Yeah that's what I'm getting at.
"but since the person in the body has ultimate choice of uttering the phrase or not, he still has final control, doesn't he?"
Not sure what you mean by ultimate control. imo the relevant question is whether his utterance proves that he assumes the sovereign right to decide how that body is used. I don't see how it does (he may believe that others have the right to use his body however they like, without permission, on the last day of every month ;)).
bitbutter 11 months ago
@bitbutter "..Not sure what you mean by ultimate control..." I think I mean that someone can beat the crap out of him until he utters the phrase "property is theft", but the guy doing the beating, doesn't have 100% control of the other guy's body. e.g. the victim/slave has the final choice of what he ends up saying. e.g. The slave may choose to die, rather than say the words. (I know I'm kinda nit-picking here).
"..on the last day of every month.." Yes, I think you're right here - I see that :)
zalida100 11 months ago
@zalida100 "..(he may believe that others have the right to use his body however they like,..." I just noticed this. Aren't we arguing about subjective & objective reality here? Certainly if the "slave" guy believes someone else has the right to use his body, then I agree with your argument. I was thinking more along the lines of, the guy with the stick cannot control everything the slave does, without the final cooperation of the slave. Hence he doesn't have complete ownership.
zalida100 11 months ago