What’s Wrong with the World

The men signed of the cross of Christ go gaily in the dark.

About

What’s Wrong with the World is dedicated to the defense of what remains of Christendom, the civilization made by the men of the Cross of Christ. Athwart two hostile Powers we stand: the Jihad and Liberalism...read more

To whom do we belong?

I present the following deliberate overstatement to provoke discussion:

If a man does not believe that his body belongs to God, he ends by believing that his body belongs to the state.

Now, since I said that this is a deliberate overstatement, why would I say it? I don't actually think that everyone who starts out by denying that his body belongs to God ends by believing that his body belongs to the state. I'm not even sure that it could be shown statistically that the majority of individuals who start out by denying that their bodies belong to God end up believing that their bodies belong to the state.

The thought was sparked by this post and thread on Secondhand Smoke, though at the time I didn't have time to blog it. There WJS documents the recent suggestion of "organ conscription"--if we can't get "enough" organs from voluntary organ donation, the state should have the power to take them, either without permission or even against the wishes of unwilling donors.

This is yet another example of the phenomenon I refer to as "choice devours itself." The pattern goes like this: Secular liberals begin with the assumption that it is tremendously important that some area of life be under the exclusive control of the individual. The watchwords, at first, are "freedom" and "choice." They make sure that it is legal for individuals to be able to "control their own bodies" in this particular area. Then it begins to emerge that people are not actually choosing to do the thing freely. Stories emerge of private coercion, conflict of interest in those who counsel, exploitation of minors or those who are desperately poor, and even (in the case of forced abortion in China) of direct coercion from the government. Conservatives wait for the chorus of condemnation from the Left. After all, this was all about owning your body, about your right to choose, about freedom. Right? And all we hear is crickets chirping. Sometimes, we hear worse--leftist defense of the policies in question.

Now, I'm not going to claim that organ donation is something that conservatives are opposed to qua conservatives. But I think it's fairly clear that abuses in organ donation situations are things conservatives are somewhat more likely to talk about than are liberals. And now this: The same type of people, even almost certainly some of the very same individuals, who tell us all about the "right to control your body" when it comes to, say, suicide, are now telling us that the state should have a prima facie right to take parts of your body when you die. Or even something more than a prima facie right: A right to override your "harmful" and "selfish" wishes against donation and take the organs willy nilly.

Here the Christian conservative faces an interesting situation. I do not believe that it is correct to say that my body is my property, if one means that strictly and literally rather than as a weak metaphor or a mere manner of speaking. I believe that my body is God's property. An atheist's body is God's property, too. An enormous amount of harm has been done by the notion that one's body is really, literally one's own property.

But one would think that if someone did believe that a person's body is his property, he would be consistent. And it would follow from that notion that a person's body cannot be used, yes, even after his death, against his wishes. That's what wills are for, right? To tell people how you want your property used. Even if a person dies intestate, the state doesn't get his property unless there are no kin to inherit and dispose of it. Nobody "presumes consent" to have your SUV donated to a cause determined by the government solely on the grounds that you died without a will!

(All of this, of course, is setting aside the rather urgent worry that the dead donor rule is being, shall we say, bent or flouted in a number of cases and that some people may either have their organs taken when they are not dead or may be neglected or actively killed in the urgent drive to obtain their organs.)

But one does wonder, where did the idea that one's body is one's property go? For the advocates of organ conscription, or even, for that matter, of "presumed consent," it has disappeared into thin air.

So I feel rather like someone who says, "Marriage is not merely a contract, but in law it should not be treated more shoddily than a contract is treated." Similarly, a man's body is not his own property, at least not in any absolute sense, but in law it should not be treated as something less than his property--as a piece of unclaimed meat to be taken and used at will by the guys in power.

I suggest that people who really believe literally that one's body is one's own property are at some level treating the human body and the human person reductively--i.e., as a piece of meat. They may start, therefore, by making the individual's will (as what Zippy calls one of the free and equal Supermen) and his control over that piece of meat the highest goods. But because they have a fundamentally reductive view of his personhood, that commitment even to his freedom of choice is brittle. Under pressure from other utilitarian considerations that seem to them of more importance, it snaps. In fact, this set of facts--about reductive ideas and brittleness--may have a lot to do with the "choice devours itself" phenomenon in all of its manifestations.

Comments (110)

I suspect that the alacrity with which the self-ownership crowd slide from advocating autonomy to advocating outright coercion owes to something more than the brittleness of a reductive anthropology. The advocacy of autonomy is always merely instrumental, a tactical expedient the logic of which can be expressed more completely as, "autonomy for these people in these circumstances as over against these other people and institutions." It is never, ever about autonomy per se, but about some third thing, usually unspecified; once that third thing has been disposed of - let's say, the traditional family, marriage, sexual ethics - then, the raison d'etre of autonomy having evaporated, it can be dispensed with, replaced by the (perverted) hierarchy of values the "reformer" envisioned all along.

But one does wonder, where did the idea that one's body is one's property go?

We consider ourselves the sources for ourselves. The State and the Market are the instruments for protecting and extending this definition in the most expedient, efficient and equal means possible. Once the warranty on an originating source expires, it is only rational for the State to facilitate the retrieval of various parts, which the Market can then distribute at the going rates. This understanding conforms to the economic and social arrangements already in use by civil society.

As for any inconsistencies in the "hands off my body" ethos, no mythology is without some inner-contradictions. A mechanical view of man unleashes powerful currents that are impossible to corral into a perfectly harmonious set of principles. Individuals who see themselves as flawed or imperfectly functioning beings will consent to the next logical step and check out at the assisted suicide center, and either magnanimously dispose of their parts, or leave it to the State to adjudicate and the Market to allocate. The important thing is as they depart, they appear to do so willingly. Given the gaping void that a technological anti-culture produces, this shouldn't be too difficult for most.

But one does wonder, where did the idea that one's body is one's property go?

We consider ourselves the sources for ourselves. The State and the Market are the instruments for protecting and extending this definition in the most expedient, efficient and equal means possible. Once the warranty on an originating source expires, it is only rational for the State to facilitate the retrieval of various parts, which the Market can then distribute at the going rates. This understanding conforms to the economic and social arrangements already in use by civil society.

As for any inconsistencies in the "hands off my body" ethos, no mythology is without some inner-contradictions. A mechanical view of man unleashes powerful currents that are impossible to corral into a perfectly harmonious set of principles. Individuals who see themselves as flawed or imperfectly functioning beings will consent to the next logical step and check out at the assisted suicide center, and either magnanimously dispose of their parts, or leave it to the State to adjudicate and the Market to allocate. The important thing is as they depart, they appear to do so willingly. Given the gaping void that a technological anti-culture produces, this shouldn't be too difficult for most.

I would say that your fundamental conceptual problem lies in these two sentences:

I believe that my body is God's property. An atheist's body is God's property, too.

Secular conservatives don't believe that bodies are property. So it sort of solves the false dilemma you create.

Cheers,
-Andrew

Frank: Thanks for the documentation.

Andrew: I'm not sure what you mean by a false dilemma, but let me put it this way. Anybody who says that it is deeply wrong to prevent people from committing suicide because people should "have the right to control their own bodies" but who believes that it is legitimate for the state to confiscate bodily organs against people's wishes to the contrary has at least a prima facie problem. Perhaps you do not have this problem, because perhaps you wouldn't say _either_ of these things. If so, great. You are to that extent part of the Sane People of the World club. But if you say both of them, then it seems to me there is some tension, to put it mildly, in your overall position, and this is so even if you do not use the term 'property', though there is a fairly blatant inconsistency if you do.

Kevin: I think you're pretty much right on regarding inner contradictions in any mythology. This is made evident by the phrase "appear to do so willingly." I would think that a really consistent advocate of the "hands off my body" idea would think the reality far more important than the appearance. But the truth is, they usually don't. For example, they never seem very bothered by the fact that disabled or elderly people feel a duty to die.

Maximos: I think there certainly are people, as you say, who advocate autonomy in bad faith as a way to lure hoi polloi towards a favored brand of totalitarianism. It may be hard to nail them on it, though, however much one may suspect it. But I also think there's a big group of people out there who just have a bunch of conflicting ideas bouncing about in their heads and never realize it. The average college sophomore is probably a good example.

One thing that I've wondered about for a long time is what I might call surprisingly selective outrage. Here are people who, for example, will go on and on about how personal, intimate, private a thing sex is--this, by way of defending the legality of abortion. But point them to a story about women whose bodies are trafficked into prostitution and who are given no help by international aid workers who are in league with the pimps and just want to pass out condoms, and you get a shrug. Why? It could be that they were in bad faith with all those paeans (sp?) to the privacy of sex in the first place. But surely nobody _likes_ sex trafficking. It's not likely that they want to set up a totalitarian paradise in which sex slavery is the open norm. So what gives? That's just one example among many. In that case, I suppose my analysis in the post would apply in that "preventing the spread of STD's" (which they erroneously think is furthered by the aid workers' actions) turns out to be the utilitarian trump card over "freeing women from sex slavery."

Lydia, is that a real person who shrugged or is it a made up story that sounded good. I don't know anyone who is pro-choice on abortion and pro-compulsion on prostitution. In an ideal world those who exploit the labor of others would be stood up against a wall and shot but that's not the world we have at present.

You may be conflating two separate issues; ending sex trafficking and ameliorating the conditions under which those forced into prositution labor. If the latter is possible while attempting the former will only get one killed, just what is the harm in doing the latter?

At least one person who posts on this site has no problem with the state banning contraception. Four of the Supremes dissented on Lawrence. We lock (some) people up for their personal decisions on (some) chemical substances. Prostitution as a voluntary occupational choice will also often lead to incarceration.

Social conservatives on the whole seem to be untroubled with the (some) states kidnapping (some) folks and sending them off to be tortured or engaging in unnecessary wars and thus wounding, killing, and displacing millions yet we find them troubled greatly over the fate of what is merely an otherwise useless bag of bones.

Compulsory donation may encourage murder and hence is problematic but it seems to me to be one of our smaller problems.

You start out by assuming too much of liberalism in its modern form. Modern liberalism is a hodge podge of conflicting values and interests. All one needs to do to prove this is merely to analyze the base of the Democratic Party to realize how much liberalism is at war with itself in America, if not in the rest of the world. All of the violations of alleged principle make perfectly good sense when you consider that many liberal goals actually end up canceling each other out if they are left uncompromised.

As I said in the previous discussion of this topic, there is a false dichotomy here between God's ownership of your body and your exclusive right to it on this side of eternity. This dichotomy may work for the sake of your argument(s), but it is simply one created for the sake of argument nonetheless. The biblical model is one of stewardship, which is a compromise between man and God, with the state not being party to the contract. The state's authority over the body is limited to those areas where God has ordained it to have authority. For that reason alone, it's wrong for the state to assume ownership of organs without the consent of the individual who was the steward of those organs in this life.

Still, we know from the Bible that we are the stewards of our bodies. That is an exclusive role for any adult. You, Lydia, are responsible to God for how you handle His property, just as I am responsible for my affairs. It is not your place to regulate my handling of those affairs, since you have been given no authority over them by God. This is part of what Jesus meant when He said that only the master may judge his servant.

One thing that I've wondered about for a long time is what I might call surprisingly selective outrage. Here are people who, for example, will go on and on about how personal, intimate, private a thing sex is--this, by way of defending the legality of abortion. But point them to a story about women whose bodies are trafficked into prostitution and who are given no help by international aid workers who are in league with the pimps and just want to pass out condoms, and you get a shrug. Why? It could be that they were in bad faith with all those paeans (sp?) to the privacy of sex in the first place. But surely nobody _likes_ sex trafficking. It's not likely that they want to set up a totalitarian paradise in which sex slavery is the open norm. So what gives? That's just one example among many. In that case, I suppose my analysis in the post would apply in that "preventing the spread of STD's" (which they erroneously think is furthered by the aid workers' actions) turns out to be the utilitarian trump card over "freeing women from sex slavery."

On the other hand, conservatives tend to overestimate female virtue (a holdover from the childishly naive Victorian Era view of female psychology and sexuality) and not realize that there are quite a few women who would be willing to whore themselves out in red light districts. Certainly not a majority or a very large minority, but a minority sufficiently large enough to meet the supply needs of the market. After all, the pornography industry is not exactly having a hard time attracting beautiful women who are willing to have sex for money as an alternative to a more moral, mundane job.

Al: I consider this of yours a semi-shrug already--

ending sex trafficking and ameliorating the conditions under which those forced into prositution labor. If the latter is possible while attempting the former will only get one killed, just what is the harm in doing the latter?

Take that a little farther and we get, "Well, if they had to promise not to talk to the girls about how they might get out in order to be allowed in to ameliorate their conditions, then I guess that was better than nothing, so it was okay." Which is what I call a full shrug. And it fits perfectly with my analysis regarding the trump-card nature, to the liberal, of (supposedly) preventing the spread of STD's--they'll justify cooperating with anybody for that purpose.

No, as one might guess from your comments, I had a very, very long thread in which exactly these arguments were made, on a now-defunct blog. I don't feel like looking up the post and thread on the way-back machine just at the moment. Nor am I going to let this thread turn into another. But I think you should watch it lest you turn into Exhibit A of "choice devours itself" right here. I prefer that you keep hold of that insight of lining slavers up against a wall and shooting them. That's a much better spirit on the subject, as far as I'm concerned. Forget about ideal worlds. In the real world, you don't make that sort of deal with the devil for utilitarian ends. If you would, then you simply illustrate my point.

Mike T, I'm not sure exactly what your point is about conservatives and Victorians, but sex trafficking and slavery are a real thing. These were real slavers, real girls, real slaves. Indeed, if the girls were in the trade willingly, the slavers wouldn't have had to ask for that promise from the aid workers! Obviously. And guess what one of the worst places in the world is, a place where girls enslaved by Albanians in the UK are threatened with being sent if they are uncooperative in the UK? Germany. Where prostitution is legal. Perhaps this should make you rethink that uninformed comment about how easy it is to supply the "market" with willing women.

But I won't spend this entire thread discussing sex slavery. I'm not sure exactly where you are coming from, Mike T; I haven't had time to do any research. I'm guessing you are some sort of Christian libertarian. I agree with what you say about stewardship. I just don't think you and I draw the same conclusions from that.

Oh, and back to Al again: No, compulsory organ donation is an obscenity. In itself. Not only because it would encourage murder. If you think about it, if we're worried about the encouragement of murder, signing a donor card may do that. Compulsory donation would just make it impossible to escape that risk by withholding consent. Which is bad, but not the heart of the problem. This would not be a small thing in the grand scheme--at least, not to those of us with a non-reductive anthropology.

I would think that a really consistent advocate of the "hands off my body" idea would think the reality far more important than the appearance.

Lydia, the reality is the daunting problem for "self-owners". Ideological constructs are typically masking something deeper and hard to articulate, even for true believers. In the case of a system that reduces the person to the status of an object - with the person's consent no less, despair is the common, wide-spread and natural state. Your most strident advocates of abortion will, as the advancing years take a toll on their tennis games also "feel a duty to die". Those few who don't, will like those who refused the cup at Jonestown, merely prove that when it comes to perfect suasion, ideology has its limits. The only way for total assent and the complete overcoming of systemic inconsistencies is through tyranny. Liberalism naturally tends in that direction and in overcoming the divide between complete freedom and perfect equality, is already well on its way to a soft totalitarianism of court edicts, speech codes, the stigmatization of dissent and other tools of the administrative state.

But point them to a story about women whose bodies are trafficked into prostitution and who are given no help by international aid workers who are in league with the pimps and just want to pass out condoms, and you get a shrug.

Unfair exaggeration, but here are 2 explanations. First, the advocates for the sacrosanct Autonomous Self believe prostitution a consensual activity, whose real flaws are the commission rates charged by pimps and the inequitable legal sanctions aimed at hookers instead of johns. The sex slavery part does not compute. Kind of like the grisly work in the abortuary, it is out of sight, out of mind. Since coercion is not seen, it is non-existent.

Second, any belief system that holds we are our own originators and sole owners of our selves, is such a soul-deadening, unnatural anti-human fiction that it can only be be maintained through enslavement (anti-depressants, random sex, alcohol, etc etc)and ultimately end in death. Talk of sex-slave trade is jarring, but not likely to rile someone voluntarily submitting to their own objectification.

One must unravel the various systems of thought that occur within Modernity, but in the end all fall under the rubric of a denatured reductionism ("what is merely an otherwise useless bag of bones"-AL) that can only create kind of a mass psychosis. It cannot be cured nor treated by reason alone. Only Love can do so.

Lydia:

Andrew: I'm not sure what you mean by a false dilemma, but let me put it this way. Anybody who says that it is deeply wrong to prevent people from committing suicide because people should "have the right to control their own bodies" but who believes that it is legitimate for the state to confiscate bodily organs against people's wishes to the contrary has at least a prima facie problem. Perhaps you do not have this problem, because perhaps you wouldn't say _either_ of these things. If so, great. You are to that extent part of the Sane People of the World club. But if you say both of them, then it seems to me there is some tension, to put it mildly, in your overall position, and this is so even if you do not use the term 'property', though there is a fairly blatant inconsistency if you do.

This is kind of a weird challenge. It strikes me that the conservative (and even the classical liberal) position is yes on voluntary suicide and no on forced confiscation of organs. Right? That's my position, anyway.

On the other hand: I suppose that there may be some contemporary nanny-state liberals who want anti-suicide laws and are pro-confiscation, although that'd be weird, even for liberals. And on the flip side, there may be religious conservatives who are anti-suicide and anti-confiscation. But I seriously can't think of a single group of people who would fall into the category you describe (pro-suicide, pro-confiscation). So, again, this strikes me as a very weird argument.

And again, the answer is easy: bodies aren't property. They don't belong to some "God" and they don't belong to Caesar. Just read your Locke!

Francis Beckwith: fair enough. They're wrong, though. :)

yes on voluntary suicide

Must be the twitching of an uneasy conscience. The "right to die" movement assures us all suicides are "voluntary", and always downplay the coercive aspects; "Gee Mom, your medical bills are a burden and we'd hate to remember you in this condition". Any society that accepts a utilitarian view of human life is going to foster suicide as an obligation, but dress it up as a right.

can't think of a single group of people who would fall into the category you describe (pro-suicide, pro-confiscation)

According to your philosophical taxonomy above, which school of thought said; But once we are dead, our organs cannot benefit us, while they could save the lives of up to 6 others. Perhaps it is time to contemplate mandatory organ donation after death?

Just read your Locke!

Making a Lockean case for the sanctity of life seems impossible and not sure why anyone would try.

Perhaps it is obvious, but just to make more explicit what "God owns me" means to me, let me put forth an analogy (or three). By doing so, however, I am speaking for myself. Other "God owns me" persons might wish to argue it another way. If so, I hope they do.

(1) People normally say that what a person makes belongs to that person. If you make a little red wagon, for instance, it's yours to do with as you please. Perhaps you'll keep it for yourself; perhaps you'll give it to the little boy who lives down the block. It's up to you. You made it. We were made by God. Indeed, "made" is a shrunken way to say it; "created" is more accurate and more profound. We are his. He can do with his property, us, as he pleases. Ownership entails for him at least what it entails for us when we make something: the right both of usage and of disposal. We, therefore, must not expropriate from God what's his by creation, and use it for our own -- or the state's -- alien purposes, as if we or it (the state) owned the thing in question, namely us. We do not belong to anyone but God. We are "ours" only by the obligations of stewardship, not ownership, that he places upon us, and for which we are accountable.

(2) We say that what a person buys belongs to that person. If you buy a little red wagon, it's yours. Keep it or give it to the boy down the block, whichever you please. God purchased us at the price of his own Son (when we were forfeit by justice to death). We are his to do with as he pleases. He bought us; he redeemed us; he owns us. We are not our own; we are not the state's.

(3) We say that we must not bespoil a person of his or her proper domicile, even if he or she did not make it or purchase it -- the so-called squatter's rights. God the Spirit lives in us. We are, so to speak, his domicile. Rather than in houses of stone, God prefers to dwell in what Milton called "the upright heart and pure." We must not evict God, so to speak, from his proper dwelling place.

We are triply God's -- by creation, by purchase, and by dwelling. Neither we nor the state should bespoil God of what is rightfully his -- as if we actually could.

I'm on the fly here getting ready for church, but whoa--I didn't bring Locke into this myself deliberately, but I can cite chapter and verse as soon as I look them up: Locke _expressly_ argued that we belong to God. Very, very, expressly. And used it as the basis for arguing that we may not murder each other.

As for who is pro-suicide and pro-confiscation--follow the links to and in the Smith thread.

Kevin: I think you misunderstand. I'm not making a Lockean case for the sanctity of life; I'm making a Lockean case for the definition of property. Since bodies are not "a thing with with we mix our labors," they're not property.

In terms of compulsory organ harvestation, it's pretty easy to see that as not among the powers delegated to the state, so the case on that is pretty spot-on, too.

Michael Bauman: Notwithstanding the fact that your God doesn't exist, your conception of property is wrong on both the philosophy and the law. (Go pick an apartment and live there for a while, then stop paying rent, and claim "squatter's rights" when your landlord starts eviction proceedings. Let me know how that turns out for you.)

Lydia:

1. Locke's god is not your God.

2. I still don't think you're making a case. Okay, some people are pro-suicide and pro-confiscation. They're wrong. So what? The solution isn't to invent another, bigger problem.

Andrew T,
Yes, I understand why you invoked Locke, but I think his thought has served the termite-like function of eating away at the moral foundations of our civilization. Yet, I won't let it side-track us from the point of this post.

Indifference to religion has become indifference to truth, and living as if God does not exist has caused men to abandon the search for truth all together. We have a mythical moral neutrality that serves as the accelerant for Social Darwinism, since we lack an appreciation for man's intrinsic dignity. Witness your cold-hearted support for suicide as just another "choice".

Compulsory organ harvesting is the logical next step for an instrumentalist regime that views the human person as an object and for a sensate culture so soaked in quiet despair that it sanctions killing at both the beginning and later stages of life on the grounds of personal expediency.

Good luck maintaining your bodily integrity after forfeiting your true spiritual nature.

Kevin: Let's leave aside your unwarranted slam at Locke; it's best left for another thread.

Outside of that, I count serious errors and/or evidence-free assertions in virtually every sentence of your post. I'll number them for convenience.

[1] Indifference to religion has become indifference to truth, and living as if God does not exist has caused men to abandon the search for truth all together.

Where to begin? First, this sentence is a run-on of fact-free fragments: we are emphatically not living in a nation that is "indifferent" to religion; indeed, the rise of the so-called "New Atheists" is proof that we care very deeply about religion, and in particular, whether it is true.

Second, the conclusion is equally false: while there is a tiny (and diminishing) segment in academia that has "abandoned the search for truth all together" by embracing subjectivism and postmodernism, it strains even hyperbole to say that "men" have abandoned it. Classical philosophy is alive, healthy and kicking -- even at Harvard and Yale.

I know it's a popular Christian conceit to claim that without fundamentalist biblical inerrancy there can be no objective reality, but four hundred years of philosophy speaks to the contrary.

[2] We have a mythical moral neutrality that serves as the accelerant for Social Darwinism, since we lack an appreciation for man's intrinsic dignity.

Again, this is three parts of silliness in a single sentence. You don't define what you mean by "moral neutrality"; there's no serious movement for Social Darwinism today (and certainly no 'accelerant' over its heyday in the first quartile of the 20th Century!), and the fundamental theory of the "intrinsic dignity of man" stems from a wholly secular philosophy articulated by Immanuel Kant.

[3] Witness your cold-hearted support for suicide as just another "choice".

Adjectives are not a synonym for argument. Why is it "cold-hearted" to let people do what they want, so long as it doesn't hurt you?

[4] Compulsory organ harvesting is the logical next step for an instrumentalist regime that views the human person as an object and for a sensate culture so soaked in quiet despair that it sanctions killing at both the beginning and later stages of life on the grounds of personal expediency.

You're the people who view the human person as an object, remember? I'm the one saying people aren't property! Sheesh.

[5] Good luck maintaining your bodily integrity after forfeiting your true spiritual nature.

Ah, there's the spirit of Christian love and charity. I won't respond in kind.

cheers,
-Andrew

"the rise of the so-called "New Atheists" is proof that we care very deeply about religion,...Why is it "cold-hearted" to let people do what they want..."

You begin with the premise God doesn't exist and end up touting suicide as a right. Just as I said.

The Sage says "perhaps it is time to contemplate mandatory organ donation after death". Over and above the wishes of any benighted family to lackadaisical to express a desire for a chosen internment, against this any pother about what property is or isn't slips into vulgarity. If the distinct post-mortem positions or arguments of the relatives can be dismissed by government fiat, and who or what else would do the dismissing, this surpasses the usual rapaciousness that increasingly marks the reformist breed.

One may wonder at least about the extent or revisions of said mandates, those who mandate are not usually constrained by either modesty or even a temporary satisfaction. All in all a ugly business.

Mike T, I'm not sure exactly what your point is about conservatives and Victorians, but sex trafficking and slavery are a real thing. These were real slavers, real girls, real slaves. Indeed, if the girls were in the trade willingly, the slavers wouldn't have had to ask for that promise from the aid workers! Obviously. And guess what one of the worst places in the world is, a place where girls enslaved by Albanians in the UK are threatened with being sent if they are uncooperative in the UK? Germany. Where prostitution is legal. Perhaps this should make you rethink that uninformed comment about how easy it is to supply the "market" with willing women.

But I won't spend this entire thread discussing sex slavery. I'm not sure exactly where you are coming from, Mike T; I haven't had time to do any research. I'm guessing you are some sort of Christian libertarian. I agree with what you say about stewardship. I just don't think you and I draw the same conclusions from that.

My point is pretty clear. Legalize prostitution, and sex slavery will start to quickly go into decline in that jurisdiction because there are enough women out there who would freely become prostitutes. Conservatives often trot out the "not enough labor to meet sex supply and demand" argument, but that is naive and based on Victorian-era notions about female virtue. On average, women are just as sexual as men and there are a number of women out there who would prefer screwing for a living as an alternative to working in an office as witnessed by the fact that the pornography industry has no problem recruiting women willing to whore themselves out on camera.

Lydia,

Look at Romans 13. It defines the role of the state, which is a peace-maker and maintainer of public order. It does not exist to represent God's interests in this world except as an arm of God's vengeance upon those who inflict harm and evil upon others. If it were something beyond that, it would have its own stewardship claim to your body and that of your children which would be a license for unlimited socialistic control of society.

I think the tendency to meddle in the affairs of others that was condemned in Matthew 7 is often on display when conservatives invoke the state to limit what others may do with their bodies. If you truly believe in a sovereign God, you believe that His government is not only real, but governing the world right now. The secular state can easily maintain its role as a keeper of the peace and a limited agent of God's wrath because even now the king is representing His own interests in Heaven, preparing a case against those who abuse His rights with abandon. Why do we need to act, to make them stop? Who gave us authority to do this? Will the master not make them account for their investment of the talents He gave them in His own time?

Yeah, Mike T, don't let a few facts about trafficking in countries where prostitution is legal get in the way of theory. Theory uber alles.

More later, for the rest of y'all.

Kevin:

You begin with the premise God doesn't exist and end up touting suicide as a right. Just as I said.

These aren't arguments. You do know that, right?

Andrew T., responding to Lydia, writes:

And again, the answer is easy: bodies aren't property. They don't belong to some "God" and they don't belong to Caesar. Just read your Locke!

This thread is not primarily about Locke exegesis, but it is always mildly annoying when someone displays this sort of aggressive incompetence concerning the history of philosophy. So, for the record --

But though this be a state of liberty, yet it is not a state of licence: though man in that state have an uncontrolable liberty to dispose of his person or possessions, yet he has not liberty to destroy himself, or so much as any creature in his possession, but where some nobler use than its bare preservation calls for it. The state of nature has a law of nature to govern it, which obliges every one: and reason, which is that law, teaches all mankind, who will but consult it, that being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty, or possessions: for men being all the workmanship of one omnipotent and infinitely wise Maker; all the servants of one sovereign master, sent into the world by his order, and about his business; they are his property, whose workmanship they are, made to last during his, not another’s pleasure: and being furnished with like faculties, sharing all in one community of nature, there cannot be supposed any such subordination among us, that may authorize us to destroy another, as if we were made for one another’s uses, as the inferior ranks of creatures are for ours. Every one, as he is bound to preserve himself, and not quit his station wilfully, so by the like reason, when his own preservation comes not in competition, ought he, as much as he can, to preserve the rest of mankind, and may not, unless it be to do justice to an offender, take away or impair the life, or what tends to the preservation of life, the liberty, health, limb, or goods of another. -- John Locke, Two Treatises of Government, Book 2, ch. 2, §6

Andrew T:

1. Locke's god is not your God.

2. I still don't think you're making a case. Okay, some people are pro-suicide and pro-confiscation. They're wrong. So what? The solution isn't to invent another, bigger problem.

On 1, I must conclude that either you don't know much about Locke, you don't know much about me, or you don't know much about God. It could, of course, be more than one of those, but only one is required for the statement to be false. On 2, the "case" I'm making is simply that we need an explanation for the phenomenon I am noting. There are other examples of the phenomenon. It's true that the organ conscription movement is just getting started and isn't widely accepted. But there are other examples of people who use libertarian-style language in arguments against social conservatives about various policies but who are surprisingly unmoved by examples of coercion in those same areas--death, abortion, and sex, to name three. Either they try to deny overwhelming evidence that such coercion happens (which is curious in itself) or else they excuse or defend the coercion or various forms of cooperation with the coercion. My "case" is that I have the beginnings of an explanation for this phenomenon in terms of an impoverished anthropology. You, on the other hand, claim to be a _consistent_ libertarian in these areas, and you want me to argue with you that suicide should be illegal. But that really wasn't my intention just here and now. I also don't plan to do another thing that would be a bit interesting--to test you to see how you respond to evidence of coercion in these various areas and to see how consistent your libertarianism really is. But you will notice that I did in the main post acknowledge the possibility and even existence of more consistent libertarians. That was why I called my statement a deliberate overstatement.

Mike T: You must realize, but just in case you don't--quoting that passage from Romans hardly constitutes an argument that people should be allowed to commit suicide. There is nothing in that passage or anywhere else in the Bible that says that attempting suicide is _merely_ and _no more than_ a failure to be a good steward of one's body, as opposed, say, to an attempt at self-murder.

Tim: Uh, try to be less of a jerk, particularly when you're making a semantic argument with zero actual content.

One: Locke's god is not your God, as I've said.

Two, I was explicitly talking about Locke's definition of property. From the Second Treatise, ch. 5, sec. 27:

Sec. 27. Though the earth, and all inferior creatures, be common to all men, yet every man has a property in his own person: this no body has any right to but himself. The labour of his body, and the work of his hands, we may say, are properly his. Whatsoever then he removes out of the state that nature hath provided, and left it in, he hath mixed his labour with, and joined to it something that is his own, and thereby makes it his property. It being by him removed from the common state nature hath placed it in, it hath by this labour something annexed to it, that excludes the common right of other men: for this labour being the unquestionable property of the labourer, no man but he can have a right to what that is once joined to, at least where there is enough, and as good, left in common for others.

So I would be a bit more careful before tossing around accusations of "aggressive incompetence." Jerk.

And what exactly is a "mandatory donation", which he who is so free with the bodies of others wishes upon us ?

Hayek and Orwell thought they saw the perversion of language, little did they know.

Tim, thank you BTW for your 2:05 post.

May I point out also that the person is prior to property, that what is prior and in this case primary, both creates and gives or adds value to property. But if fussy semanticists balk at a misuse of the word as applicable to the self, as well as potential horrors such as "self-ownership", imagine the distaste one with less ghoulish desires feels at the use of harvest, as in harvesting organs, or and again, the latest entry "mandatory donations".

So may the semantically fastidious tend to their own home grown weeds and let others use "property" in a sense which is at the least connected to one's self and his own.

Yeah, Mike T, don't let a few facts about trafficking in countries where prostitution is legal get in the way of theory. Theory uber alles.

I never said that it would go away. In fact, my comment specifically said that it would go into decline. Part of Holland's problem is that their government has never been very aggressive at fighting the organized crime elements responsible for that and other serious crimes. I would like to know whether those statistics factored in all of the law enforcement variables that apply to opposing organized crime. My guess is that they did not, since Europe is hopelessly lax in dealing with serious crime compared to the United States.

Lydia:

[1] On 1 [that Locke's god is not your God] I must conclude that either you don't know much about Locke, you don't know much about me, or you don't know much about God.

Well, I'll let my Locke knowledge speak for itself. As for the God you believe in, it appears to me from reading this site that it's the standard fundamentalist Christian inerrantist God. If I'm wrong, please feel free to explain where you deviate from say, Frank Turek. If I'm right, then Locke's use of the word "God" is absolutely no argument for the deity you favor.

In philosophical terms -- if knowledge is a justified, true belief -- then I'm not sure it's possible to "know" anything about God, him being imaginary and all.

[2] It could, of course, be more than one of those, but only one is required for the statement to be false.

Again, respectfully: this is not an argument. This is an insult. If you think John Locke supports your brand of fundamentalist Christianity (despite predating it by two centuries), then make an argument. Don't just say, "oh, you must not know God."

[3] On 2, the "case" I'm making is simply that we need an explanation for the phenomenon I am noting.

No, that's not the case you're making. Go back to the top of the post. The argument you've made is that: "If a man does not believe that his body belongs to God, he ends by believing that his body belongs to the state."

I've shown that's not true. You've countered that some people believe dumb things. That, I submit, is trivially true.

[4] There are other examples of the phenomenon. It's true that the organ conscription movement is just getting started and isn't widely accepted. But there are other examples of people who use libertarian-style language in arguments against social conservatives about various policies but who are surprisingly unmoved by examples of coercion in those same areas--death, abortion, and sex, to name three. Either they try to deny overwhelming evidence that such coercion happens (which is curious in itself) or else they excuse or defend the coercion or various forms of cooperation with the coercion.

Well, then let's talk about that. I would agree with you that there are libertarians who are surprisingly indifferent to the nature of real coercion. I don't see how this supports the case you're making, though.

[5] My "case" is that I have the beginnings of an explanation for this phenomenon in terms of an impoverished anthropology.

And I'm saying that you haven't proven that.

[6] You, on the other hand, claim to be a _consistent_ libertarian in these areas, and you want me to argue with you that suicide should be illegal.

0-for-2. First, I don't think I ever claimed to be a "consistent" libertarian, and my main argument here has nothing to do with consistency. Second, I could care less about your views on suicide -- you brought that up, not me. My point is, and remains, pretty simple: people are not property, so they don't belong to either "God" or the state.

[7] But that really wasn't my intention just here and now. I also don't plan to do another thing that would be a bit interesting--to test you to see how you respond to evidence of coercion in these various areas and to see how consistent your libertarianism really is. But you will notice that I did in the main post acknowledge the possibility and even existence of more consistent libertarians. That was why I called my statement a deliberate overstatement.

Fair enough.

Mike T: You must realize, but just in case you don't--quoting that passage from Romans hardly constitutes an argument that people should be allowed to commit suicide. There is nothing in that passage or anywhere else in the Bible that says that attempting suicide is _merely_ and _no more than_ a failure to be a good steward of one's body, as opposed, say, to an attempt at self-murder.

And I never said it was a defense of legalized suicide. What I said was that it shows that the state has no ordained, legitimate role except as the keeper of the peace. The state is not God's representative on Earth, but rather an extension of God's wrath against evildoers and grace for peaceful people.

If the state were charged with protecting God's property rights in us, the state would have a claim to our bodies through its duty to protect God's property right, thus in effect making us owned, to some extent, by both the state and God.

WRT suicide, I see no reason why this wouldn't fall under the state's peace keeper role. No one in their right mind would commit suicide.

Andrew,

Perhaps I am remembering this incorrectly, but didn't Locke disagree with the doctrine of original sin in favor of Tabula Rasa?

No, that's not the case you're making. Go back to the top of the post. The argument you've made is that: "If a man does not believe that his body belongs to God, he ends by believing that his body belongs to the state."

Which is a false dichotomy. All it takes to break this dichotomy is to take a position which expands the biblical role of the state from peace-keeper into regulating how we use our bodies, talents, etc. Once the state crosses over into that, it starts to assume the role of representative for God's property rights in us.

Mike T: You're absolutely correct, among many other major differences.

The quotation from Locke was relevant to what you said, Andrew. And as an historical bonus, it even includes an implicit condemnation of suicide from Locke. Please, tone down the aggression.

What the deuce is a fundamentalist inerrantist God? How can God be an inerrantist God? I mean, that's just incredibly strange. The term 'inerrantist' describes a person who takes a particular position about the Bible. I'm assuming you don't mean that according to me God says the Bible is inerrant! And what in the world can you possibly know, Andrew, about my position on the inerrancy of Scripture? It's a very complicated topic, and as far as I know, I've never blogged about it once, ever, anywhere. I don't think I've even said anything about my position on that subject in a combox. And didn't you know that even quite square-rigged, creedal, traditional Christians _differ_ in their take on that topic? And what does that whole topic have to do with the price of tea in China, much less our discussion here? You are just wildly throwing around terms.

Mike T:

If the state were charged with protecting God's property rights in us, the state would have a claim to our bodies through its duty to protect God's property right, thus in effect making us owned, to some extent, by both the state and God.
That doesn't even follow. The security guard doesn't own the hotel. Not even to some extent. But, hey, if your "keeper of the peace" role extends to preventing people from committing suicide, I'm not sure _exactly_ what we're arguing about. Is it that you are a libertarian on abortion and prostitution, or what? And once more, you're going to have a hard time getting "prostitution and/or abortion should be legal" or even for that matter "heroin use should be legal" out of any biblical passage. The Bible just doesn't address these kinds of details. "The punishment of evildoers and the praise of them that do well" _could_ cover a lot of ground. I think it's absolutely obvious that these things have to be fought out on the basis of other arguments.

For everyone, I want to emphasize again that my statement at the beginning of the post was a deliberate overstatement. I have indeed noticed that some people seem to move along these lines. I think this is because of an impoverished anthropology, but I am not saying that the following of that track is psychologically or even logically inevitable. In fact, in some ways it seems to me _illogical_. That is one reason I find it so curious. But when Kevin says,

Good luck maintaining your bodily integrity after forfeiting your true spiritual nature
he isn't wishing ill on anyone, contrary to the way Andrew took him. Rather he's saying that when you just see your body as a bag of bones or yourself as a machine or an animal, it's difficult to see why you or anybody else _should_ care about your freedom and well-being as an overwhelmingly important thing. Here Kevin and I agree, happily enough, as we don't always do so.

Lydia:

[1] The quotation from Locke was relevant to what you said, Andrew. And as an historical bonus, it even includes an implicit condemnation of suicide from Locke. Please, tone down the aggression.

I objected (explicitly, mind you) to the following insult from Tim: "...it is always mildly annoying when someone displays this sort of aggressive incompetence concerning the history of philosophy."

Now, that's just an out-and-out insult, and it's false to boot. But do you chastise Tim for gratuitous insults? No. Instead, you chastise me for calling him on it, when my sole sin appears to be being an atheist. Well, if disagreeing with you counts as "aggression," then I'll happily leave this blog.

[2] What the deuce is a fundamentalist inerrantist God? How can God be an inerrantist God? I mean, that's just incredibly strange.

I don't think it's strange. I perceive -- from your arguments about the historicity of the Biblical resurrection -- that you're a Biblical inerrantist. If you're not, feel free to correct me. Indeed, I invited you to do so, and even gave you a baseline (Frank Turek) against which to compare. So I'm not sure why you're deciding to read my words in a deliberately obtuse way. If I'm reading you wrong, tell me.

Describing your God as a "fundamentalist inerrantist God" was my shorthand for saying "the kind of God that contemporary Christian fundamentalists who believe in the inerrancy of the Bible believe in." My way was a little shorter and you understood it perfectly. So again, I'm not sure where the criticism comes from.

[3] The term 'inerrantist' describes a person who takes a particular position about the Bible. I'm assuming you don't mean that according to me God says the Bible is inerrant! And what in the world can you possibly know, Andrew, about my position on the inerrancy of Scripture? It's a very complicated topic, and as far as I know, I've never blogged about it once, ever, anywhere. I don't think I've even said anything about my position on that subject in a combox.

Again, if you're not, tell me that. Since we're talking about how Locke's god differs from yours, I would think the particulars of yours would be relevant. So why not share those in the interest of discussion as opposed to just firing off defensive criticisms?

[4] And didn't you know that even quite square-rigged, creedal, traditional Christians _differ_ in their take on that topic?

Why yes, and again, that's why I gave you a baseline and invited you to draw distinctions. If you have them, I'm sincerely interested. But given the arguments I've seen from you, I think I've drawn a reasonable inference, subject to my willingness to be corrected. Isn't that as fair as someone can possibly be during a discussion?

[5] And what does that whole topic have to do with the price of tea in China, much less our discussion here? You are just wildly throwing around terms.

Well, no. It explicitly has to do with this sentence, by you, discussed at my [1] above:

"[1] On 1 [that Locke's god is not your God] I must conclude that either you don't know much about Locke, you don't know much about me, or you don't know much about God."

In response, I shared what I believed about you based on your prior arguments, and explicitly invited to correct you if my assumptions were wrong! That seems... pretty darn fair to me. But again, if disagreeing with you counts as "aggression" (while insults from those who agree with you do not), then I'm not really sure what to say.

[6] But when Kevin says,

Good luck maintaining your bodily integrity after forfeiting your true spiritual nature

he isn't wishing ill on anyone, contrary to the way Andrew took him. Rather he's saying that when you just see your body as a bag of bones or yourself as a machine or an animal, it's difficult to see why you or anybody else _should_ care about your freedom and well-being as an overwhelmingly important thing. Here Kevin and I agree, happily enough, as we don't always do so.

Uh huh. Well, I'll set aside the armchair psychoanalysis. It certainly comes off nasty.

As an argument, it's silly. The whole point of government is that people don't "care about [my] freedom." People care about themselves. Government stops them from caring about themselves at my expense.

-Andrew

Oh, my heart: Believing that Jesus rose from the dead means you believe Scripture is inerrant? No, actually, it doesn't. And what does that have to do with even the attributes of God as Locke took them to be, anyway? Nothing. Oh, and if you _read_ my co-written article on the resurrection, Andrew, you would know that it explicitly disclaims assuming, for the argument in the paper, inerrancy.

It was calling a fellow commentator a "jerk" for which I chided you. Please don't do that. And yes, I will enforce the "no calling the other guy 'jerk'" rule even-handedly. At least in this thread. :-)

Lydia:

[1] Oh, my heart: Believing that Jesus rose from the dead means you believe Scripture is inerrant? No, actually, it doesn't.

Your arguments parallel those of the contemporary Christian fundamentalist inerrantists, particularly Frank Turek. From that, I presume you share that view of God. If you don't, I invited you to explain otherwise (three times, now). Having not done so, I surmise that my initial guess was probably correct.

[2] And what does that have to do with even the attributes of God as Locke took them to be, anyway? Nothing.

Well, Locke wasn't a fundamentalist, and didn't believe in inerrancy, so that seemed to be two pretty good places to start.

[3] It was calling a fellow commentator a "jerk" for which I chided you. Please don't do that. And yes, I will enforce the "no calling the other guy 'jerk'" rule even-handedly. At least in this thread. :-)

Fair enough. I think it's a worse insult to call someone "aggressively incompetent," but hey: your place, your rules.

-Andrew

Andrew T. wrote, high-handedly:

And again, the answer is easy: bodies aren't property. They don't belong to some "God" and they don't belong to Caesar. Just read your Locke!

Now that it has been shown by direct quotation from Locke that he was flat wrong about the history, he writes:

Tim: Uh, try to be less of a jerk, particularly when you're making a semantic argument with zero actual content.

Andrew, you were the one who told Lydia to read Locke (as if she hadn't), so the responsibility for raising that particular historical point rests squarely on your shoulders. If you're going to say things like that, you have to be prepared to take your lumps when it turns out that you are the one who hasn't done your homework.

Tim:

Oh, please. If you're interpreting the phrase "Just read your Locke!" as an insult, I can't imagine how you manage to navigate the internet without wilting. Next time I'll add a "smiley," I guess. Sheesh.

And for the actual content: I was talking about the definition of property, not "the history" (whatever that means). And I'm still right.

Andrew,

So, "Just read your Locke!" was supposed to mean "Just read your Locke, and you'll see that he agrees with you and disagrees with me"? Mmm hmm. No wonder you think you're still right.

I'm sorry you don't know what "the history of philosophy" means. It might help, in that case, if you would stop making false statements about it.

While you're at it, you might try staying on topic instead of trying to drag the discussion onto other topics like fundamentalism or inerrancy that are irrelevant to the OP. These may be burning issues for you, but they clearly aren't for Lydia. Your repeated attempts to deflect the discussion onto those topics are out of place. Surely you have your own blog ...?

Yep, Locke's view of God was already OT. My view of Biblical inerrancy is an epicycle on an epicycle. Threadjackers will be prosecuted.

Back to something resembling the topic at hand: A view of man that gives no one any reason to care about what happens to anyone is dangerous inasmuch as it gives lawmakers no reason to pass laws that protect people against each other. It gives us no reason for protecting justice or freedom.

That doesn't even follow. The security guard doesn't own the hotel. Not even to some extent.

If the state were merely a security guard, then it would only be charged with ensuring that no harm comes to us from outside. The moment it steps in and begins regulating our behavior and what we do with our lives, it becomes something a lot more like that. It would be like having a financial planner charged with directing the servants with how they will invest the talents and having an override on their every decision.

But, hey, if your "keeper of the peace" role extends to preventing people from committing suicide, I'm not sure _exactly_ what we're arguing about. Is it that you are a libertarian on abortion and prostitution, or what?

I'm sure this will come as a shocking surprise to you, but there are a number of libertarians who, like me, are pro-life. Human life is defined genetically, not based on high falutin philosophical arguments about consciousness and other rubbish. Truth be told, I am totally down with even executing teenage girls for homicide for willingly seeking an abortion.

And once more, you're going to have a hard time getting "prostitution and/or abortion should be legal" or even for that matter "heroin use should be legal" out of any biblical passage.

And once again, you're just jumping the gun and attacking arguments I'm not making.

Granted, if you want to go there, here's a challenge to you. Why don't you advocate the immediate execution of Richard Dawkins for this? What conservative, biblical principle can you make for why that shouldn't carry a terribly swift execution because it is incitement to sin so far above and beyond prostitution and even abortion that it makes the other two seem like nothing.

Personally, I would point to the fact that Jesus demonstrated a remarkable habit of leaving people to live their own lives, and then pay for their failure to repent in due time. Luke 9 has a good example of how Jesus was perfectly happy with deferring punishment for the sin of non-belief to His father rather than any earthly authority.

I'd also point out too that people are bound by their sin-destroyed natures to sin, and that the state cannot ever take any actions which will cause a person to repent because repentance is a fruit of the Holy Spirit. Therefore no meaningful good can be done by actions that go beyond keeping the peace. As Christians, we must recognize that good behavior brought on by regulating people until they seem good and virtuous, as opposed to merely punishing behavior that does measurable harm to others, is conducive to making people have a false sense of righteousness that will make them have less of a chance of appreciating how much they need to be saved.

The Bible just doesn't address these kinds of details. "The punishment of evildoers and the praise of them that do well" _could_ cover a lot of ground. I think it's absolutely obvious that these things have to be fought out on the basis of other arguments.

But it does provide a framework. For one, it is much more closely aligned with the libertarian view of the night watchman state than any form of welfare state.

The initial question, of this thread, brings to mind the historic reformation faith starting point; which was to ask and answer the question of to whom do we belong.
Heidelberg Catechism [1563]
Question 1. What is your only hope in life and in death?
Answer. That I with body and soul, both in life and death am not my own but belong unto my faithful Saviour Jesus Christ, who with His precious blood, has fully satisfied for all my sins, and delivered me from all the power of the devil, and so preserves me, that without the will of my heavenly Father, not a hair can fall from my head; yea that all things must be subservient to my salvation, and therefore by His Holy Spirit, He also assures me of eternal life, and makes me sincerely willing and ready, henceforth to live unto Him.

You know, Lydia, if the church would focus more on the beam in its own eye on matters like sex and drugs, rather than worrying about how others are using their bodies and other blessings from God, it might be more effective at witnessing to the outside. My wife, who sounds a lot like you from time to time, commented that if we had a libertarian government, we would certainly know who had God's blessing and who didn't pretty quickly because the false righteousness veils would be lifted from our collective view of society.

Lydia, one does the good that one can. If an aid worker can facilitate escape they have a duty to do so, consistent with their risk toleration level. As I see it helping a woman avoid STDs(and sterility and death - remember AIDS)at least gives her a chance at a real life at some point in the future as well as protecting the innocent partners of her customers.

An analogy would be the JAGs whose clients are those held at Gitmo. Full justice would involve trying those responsible for violations of U.S. and international law as war criminals and executing those found guilty.

Meanwhile, it constitutes no deal with the devil to use what means they do have in order to end the torture, ensure due process, and free the innocent.

BTW, is "opt out" as opposed to "opt in" really the same as mandatory?

Mike T: I'm thrilled to hear that you're pro-life. Haven't had time to look up the Dawkins link yet. I don't know quite what you're inveighing against in terms of "telling people what to do with their lives" since you've just agreed with me on abortion and suicide, unless it's prostitution. I mean, it would be helpful if you would get to brass tacks as to exactly what you think so particularly objectionable about my position. (By the way, indeed, I had known for a long time about the small but good band of libertarians for life. May there be more of them. They might even become less libertarian as time went by. :-) I have enjoyed the LFL web site in past years.)

Al, I'm not sure whether or not you are defending the promise made to the pimps or not. Sometimes it can be hard to get people to take a clear position, especially when they, like you, are too involved in general talk about "doing the good one can."

Your last sentence is unclear. Are you talking about organ conscription and drawing the distinction between the policy of "presumed consent" and the policy of outright conscription? There is indeed a distinction. There are people who advocate outright conscription even if the person has clearly stated that he does not want his organs donated. I maintain that even the policy of "presumed consent," besides being wildly imprudent, is inconsistent with the idea that one has the right to do as one likes with one's body (a phrase frequently heard on the lips of liberals and many libertarians), as it is not the way we treat other things that are "one's own." I pointed this out in the post.

Thomas, thanks very much for the Heidelberg quotation. And I had meant to thank Michael Bauman for his "three reasons" for God's ownership of my body. Your quotation highlights his reason #2--that God has bought us. "For ye are bought with a price, therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God's."

I would give a slightly different meaning to Michael's reason #3. Those in whom the Spirit of God dwells are thus indwelt, in my opinion, because the Lord of life has been invited. So He is not a squatter. But neither is he a tenant who can be evicted at will. God living in you is a Big Deal with capital letters.

I find the idea of organ confiscation horrifying. I'm not sure, however, that the problem with the idea has much to do with whether one sees ones body as belonging to oneself versus seeing it as belonging to God. Everything belongs to God. Trees and cows and oil and iPods, and everything else. Clearly, though, the fact that everything belongs to God is not inconsistent with their being private property. I can own a piece of land or a factory or whatever, and even though it all ultimately belongs to God and I ought to recognize that fact, this does not preclude me from having property rights in said land or factory. So while taking people's organs against their will is certainly wrong, the reason that it is wrong can't simply be that a person's body belongs to God. If I had to offer my own suggestion, I would say that it has more to do with man being made in the image of God. But whether that's right or no, the main point still stands.

By the way, not to be a bore about this, but the demand for organ conscription would disappear overnight if there were some mechanism for legally compensating organ donors, at least in the case of kidneys. I understand the concerns about the possibility of abuse and coercion, but there is quite a bit of abuse and coercion going on now, both in the black market, and among the legal dead donor system (wherein grieving families are often subject to an enormous amount of pressure and emotional manipulation by doctors and social workers to get them to sign over their beloved's organs). If more people were willing to donate, such that there wasn't the severe organ shortage that we now have, the desperation that drives many of these abuses would disappear.

Of course, one may view the prospect of paying organ donors with greater horror than the idea of organ confiscation. Or one may see the choice between the two options as a false one. Still, the more one is worried about the possibility of organ conscription, the more thought one ought to give as to whether at least some form of compensation system was an acceptable second best alternative.

"Good luck maintaining your bodily integrity after forfeiting your true spiritual nature." Ah, there's the spirit of Christian love and charity. I won't respond in kind.

Andrew,
I appreciate Lydia knocking the victim's mantle out of your hand, as it is so unbecoming for a rugged individualist like yourself. My point was fairly obvious; once the state sanctions the killing of the unwanted, the "useless" and the despairing, it will not be so particular about the retrieval and distribution of organs. Nothing in your discourse suggests you could ever mount a sufficient argument against the state from taking liberties with the deceased, since it already, with your approval, does so with the living. Your response to moral questions is to invoke thin legalisms and rights-laden rhetoric. Libertarians mistake the means of politics and economics for ends in themselves. Unable to articulate a vision beyond the individuals material advancement, they are doomed to serve as useful tools for a State anxious to act as the best conduit for that advancement.

Another member of the right-wing Nietzschian camp lays it our here with the obligatory shrug;

"...it seems to me highly probable that the world of 50 or 100 years from now will bear a close resemblance to Huxley’s dystopia—a world without pain, grief, sickness or war, but also without family, religion, sacrifice, or nobility of spirit. It’s not what I want, personally, and it’s not what Huxley wanted either (he was a religious man, though of a singular type). It’s what most people want, though; so if this darn democracy stuff keeps spreading, it’s what we shall get, for sure."

John Derbyshire
April 7, 2005
NRO

Lydia,
Wow, "Christian Libertarian" never sounded like an oxymoron as much as it does after reading this thread! Let the free market decide the price and set the condition for everything from organs to prostitution. Give me John Galt without any
religious accretions over this nonsense.

Tim:

So, "Just read your Locke!" was supposed to mean "Just read your Locke, and you'll see that he agrees with you and disagrees with me"? Mmm hmm. No wonder you think you're still right.

No, "Just read your Locke!" was shorthand for: "I presume, given your previous posts and intellectual background, that you are familiar with Locke's definition of property as 'that with which we mix our labors.' Because our bodies do not fit that definition, they are not property under the regime that undergirds the entire concept of property rights in Western Civilization." I thought Lydia would get it (and indeed, I think she did; I think you're just looking for a fight).

I'm sorry you don't know what "the history of philosophy" means. It might help, in that case, if you would stop making false statements about it.

Yet another stupid, ill-informed, petty insult from you is allowed to pass without criticism (shocker). You can't really be this dense. Obviously, I wasn't saying that I don't know what the words mean, but rather, that the phrase made no sense in the context of the discussion, since I wasn't talking about the "history" of Locke but rather the content of his philosophy. Which again, you knew already and eschewed in favor of the cheap insult.

While you're at it, you might try staying on topic instead of trying to drag the discussion onto other topics like fundamentalism or inerrancy that are irrelevant to the OP. These may be burning issues for you, but they clearly aren't for Lydia. Your repeated attempts to deflect the discussion onto those topics are out of place. Surely you have your own blog ...?

I have explained three times that it is relevant to answer Lydia's argument to me -- "I must conclude that either you don't know much about Locke, you don't know much about me, or you don't know much about God." The fact that you two keep ignoring it doesn't make it "off topic," it just makes it an argument you're not willing to answer.

Put simply: Locke was neither a fundamentalist nor a believer in biblical inerrancy. Lydia appears to be so. Thus, when I said "Locke's god is not your God," I was correct, notwithstanding the above-quoted riposte by Lydia. This didn't have to "derail" the topic if Lydia (and you) had simply conceded the point rather than tried to argue to the contrary.

Mike T: I'm thrilled to hear that you're pro-life.

Is he really?

Human life is defined genetically, not based on high falutin philosophical arguments about consciousness and other rubbish. Truth be told, I am totally down with even executing teenage girls for homicide for willingly seeking an abortion. Mike T.

For crying out loud, Andrew, the quotation from Locke _says in so many words_ that men are God's property because they are his workmanship. But you said "our bodies don't belong to any god" and attributed this view to Locke. You've been decisively refuted on that historical point. Bag it.

Kevin, yes, some of the oddities of libertarianism are certainly on display here. I often think that really die-hard libertarians (refreshing as it is sometimes to meet one) are incredibly naive. For example, I think it's completely obvious as an empirical matter that the demand for more organs would _not_ cease even if we started buying and selling them like meat. Blackadder thinks otherwise. This parallels Mike T's claim that sexual slavery would gradually wither away (like the State in Marx's paradise) if prostitution were legal. Counterexamples roll off his back because he just adds an epicycle to his theory having to do with the continued existence of the mafia and other organized crime, which somehow is supposed to make the continuation of slavery in countries where prostitution is legal not a counterexample.

I think somehow human evil doesn't get factored into the libertarian theory. And I say this as someone who has some sympathies for some aspects of libertarianism.

Lydia:

Since I've said it four times already, I doubt saying it again will make it any more clear, but here goes: I am not making an "historical" point about Locke; I'm making a philosophical one. I'm saying that by the Lockean definition of property -- which I quoted, in full, and which undergirds all of Western Civilization -- bodies aren't property.

From there, I argue that if bodies aren't viewed as property at all, then the question "to whom does one belong, God or the state?" becomes moot. So rather than have the silly and supposedly unresolvable dilemma you pose in this thread, you have a neat solution. Given that, I conclude that it probably makes sense not to conceptualize of bodies as property.

Now, you're free to disagree with this point, of course. But I don't really see that you've taken on my central argument.

Incidentally, the passage Tim quotes has nothing to do with the discussion of Lockean materialism, and you both know it (or at least, ought to know it). Moreover, you've objected to my pointing out that your efforts to appropriate Locke's view of god as your own is theologically (and historically!) preposterous as somehow "derailing" the thread, despite the fact that it answers an argument you made to me.

So I'm at an impasse. I kind of wanted to discuss the point that you posted to, in your words, "provoke discussion", but, oh well.

Wow, "Christian Libertarian" never sounded like an oxymoron as much as it does after reading this thread! Let the free market decide the price and set the condition for everything from organs to prostitution. Give me John Galt without any religious accretions over this nonsense.

It isn't, if you follow a reformed protestant theology. Unlike the majority here, I'm more in agreement with the Presbyterians about human nature than the Roman Catholics and Orthodox. The central problem of the latter faiths, which gives them a fundamentally flawed view of human nature is their child-like belief in true free will. We possess no such thing, rather our freedom to act is determined by our nature. It is either a sin-nature or a grace-nature granted by God through the Holy Spirit.

The reason I take this seemingly extreme stance of separating out matters of morality that are intimately tied to public order from those that aren't is because I reject the notion that man is able to choose a good that is an objective good, without God's intervention. As much as it pains me to believe in it due to its ramifications, I can't escape the fact that the Bible speaks very clearly that in his natural state, man has no capacity for goodness and that attempts to reform his nature are utterly impossible.

You see, from a Reformed Protestant perspective, it is useless to pretend that telling a man that he cannot use drugs will make him do anything good because chances are, his very nature rejects the good of keeping his body clean of harmful substances. Therefore, what good can the state do in this matter that is of no importance to the public order? None.

Is he really?

Why would you doubt that I am pro-life? Is it because I harbor no grace and mercy toward teenage girls that want to slice, dice and hoover up the remains of their babies? Or is it because I define life genetically, meaning that I recognize any life form, in any state that naturally leads to or is a full human organism, as being sufficiently human to constitute a life with rights? I reject philosophy on this matter because it's almost always pure sophistry, and science has given us a simple, straight-forward basis to say "this is life, period, no more debate is needed."

Well, actually, Andrew, according to Locke, God did labor to make us--that's the thrust of the term "workmanship." Besides, if what you're trying to say is that nothing that grows or develops naturally can be property, that's nonsense anyway, and I'm not inclined to get involved in whether Locke believed it. If you own a piece of ground and find to your delight that there are apple trees on your property, the apples are, in law, your property. So as far as "mingling one's labor" goes, it is certainly _possible_ for our bodies to be someone-or-other's property aside from the question of how they got here. I contend that they are God's property in part because God did make them. But once more, what I would be inclined to press with you would be, rather, the question of why we ought to have laws that protect people from one another if people are just animals, machines, or pieces of matter.

Mike T, I don't really see how an uber-Calvinist view of free will is helpful to the question of what the state should try to prohibit. Look at it this way: From your perspective, an axe murderer is just as deterministically unfree as a drug addict. So the Calvinist idea that no one can do any good really doesn't tell you whether the state should prohibit drug dealing or possession of drugs, etc., anymore than it tells you whether the state should prohibit axe murder. Again, I just don't think these things can be decided theologically or by biblical texts.

Lydia:

Besides, if what you're trying to say is that nothing that grows or develops naturally can be property, that's nonsense anyway, and I'm not inclined to get involved in whether Locke believed it. If you own a piece of ground and find to your delight that there are apple trees on your property, the apples are, in law, your property.

According to sec. 27, original acquisition of property occurs when we mix our labors with that which is originally unowned (i.e., naturally occurring). Thus, when you plant the apple tree, you come to own the fruits of your labors. When I sell the land with the apple tree on it to you, you have a property right in the apples via acquisition and transfer. I'll move on, now.

But once more, what I would be inclined to press with you would be, rather, the question of why we ought to have laws that protect people from one another if people are just animals, machines, or pieces of matter.

Because we're self-aware (and self-interested) "animals... [and] pieces of matter," and we're the one who pass the laws? That seems pretty straightforward to me.

Okay, Andrew, suppose that you were paralyzed from the shoulders down and were talking with a lawmaker. Let's suppose that you aren't , for some reason, smart enough to make a very big contribution to society. He says to you, "Y'know, I think people like you are just useless mouths and should be eliminated. Yeah, I know we're self-aware animals and make the rules. And I'm one of the people making the laws, and fortunately, I'm _not_ a useless mouth. I want to pass a law eliminating useless mouths." If you agree with him that humans are just material entities, and if you agree with his utilitarian approach to right and wrong, what answer would you give him?

"When I sell the land with the apple tree on it to you, you have a property right in the apples via acquisition and transfer. I'll move on, now."

This is so wrong.

It is possible that in the acquisition and transfer of the land itself, the assignee would not have a property right to those things that occupy it.

Mike T, I don't really see how an uber-Calvinist view of free will is helpful to the question of what the state should try to prohibit. Look at it this way: From your perspective, an axe murderer is just as deterministically unfree as a drug addict. So the Calvinist idea that no one can do any good really doesn't tell you whether the state should prohibit drug dealing or possession of drugs, etc., anymore than it tells you whether the state should prohibit axe murder. Again, I just don't think these things can be decided theologically or by biblical texts.

That's because in this case, you ignored the distinction I made between immoral acts that are intimately tied up with public order and those that are not. Murder is an example of the former. The state simply cannot tolerate its existence because society literally cannot function for very long with murder being allowed to happen.

Drug use, for example, is a different matter. There are a good number of people who have used drugs recreationally without ever having become soulless addicts, criminals, abusers of their loved ones, etc. It's also true that on matters like prostitution, the real danger comes in when the state allows those prone to criminality, such as sex slavers, to operate. Even today, the state has to stop people who traffic in black market alcohol and tobacco, and other vice markets are no different.

If my neighbor has five wives, is self-sufficient and cares for his family, that is no public order threat to me or my property. Thus, the state has no legitimate role in shutting down my neighbor's family life. There are many things which may be immoral, but they do not fall under the aegis of the state. If they did, then surely general lying and all sins of the heart would have some regulation.

Where the Reformed Protestant take shifts things is that it puts a dampener on talks about "the Goodtm" by making us accept that our own conception of goodness is useless. What does it benefit us to speak of encouraging men to behave virtuously if Hell is their only natural destination by being locked into a sin-nature? I see no reason to encourage them to seek a false righteousness, especially if they are prone to just hurting themselves and no one else.

Once you accept the fact that man is incapable of saving himself, and that any conception of good divorced from Jesus Christ is no good worth encouraging others to even consider, you realize that society really is better off with a limited government that keeps the peace. Everything else is just a waste of time, and bound to create more misery than happiness for society.

I should point out that I'm not actually a Calvinist, despite being generally in agreement with the five points of TULIP. The practical disagreement is that I see no inherent conflict between God's sovereign hand and free will. God's sovereignty is a characteristic, not a thing that God does. Therefore, God is sovereign and in control, His plan never foiled, even when He allows us to live our lives on a daily basis without making us do this or that.

No, Mike, I didn't ignore that distinction. I was implying that that distinction and the conclusion you wish to draw from it are not implied by any theological doctrines about free will or whether man can save himself. I can definitely see the relevance of the idea that man is by nature a sinner (for example) to attempts to bring about utopian paradises. In this sense, all utopianism, including Marxism, is inherently contrary to Christian doctrine. Well and good. But if I tell you that, for example, my reasons for favoring anti-drug laws have nothing to do with bringing about a utopian society or making the world a beautiful and wonderful place but rather have to do with "public order" (a nice, broad category) and with restraining the extent of the harm that the viciousness of man does both to an individual himself and to those around him, we'll just be back to arguing over drug laws using the usual arguments on both sides. The theological discussion won't be contributing anything.

Andrew,

You wrote:

bodies aren't property. They don't belong to some "God" ... Just read your Locke!

Locke wrote:

... men being all the workmanship of one omnipotent and infinitely wise Maker; all the servants of one sovereign master, sent into the world by his order, and about his business; they are his property, whose workmanship they are, made to last during his, not another’s pleasure ...

Your attempt to pretend you didn't say this -- and that you weren't wrong -- is an insult to everyone's intelligence. We can all see the words

some "God"

in there.

Your attempt to drag inerrancy into the discussion is uninformed and silly. Nothing in Lydia's argument (here or elsewhere) depends on this as a premise. This fact is obvious to everyone else, and it sufficiently addresses your attempt to engage with Lydia's argument on that front. Give it up, or at least go write a post on the subject on your own blog. Then everyone from this discussion who thinks your comments on this post have been insightful and intelligent can go over there and talk about it.

I laughed out loud at the notion that prostitution and drug abuse have no connection to the public order. Plenty of intelligent people really seem to genuinely believe this stuff. What kind of bubble would you have to live in to believe it?

I think it's completely obvious as an empirical matter that the demand for more organs would _not_ cease even if we started buying and selling them like meat. Blackadder thinks otherwise.

Well, first off, I don't propose that we start buying and selling organs like meat. So that's a strawman.

Second, on what evidence do you say that it's "completely obvious as an empirical matter that the demand for more organs would _not_ cease" if we allowed some form of compensation for donation? The demand for kidneys is pretty inelastic. Unless you have a kidney ailment, paying for one is pretty useless. The current kidney shortfall in the U.S. is a couple thousand a year, which means that if just one out of every hundred thousand people donated a kidney, the shortage would evaporate.

I can understand not liking the idea of a kidney market, but this does not entitle one to make whatever assumptions one wishes about the effect such a market would have on the demand for kidneys.

I think it's completely obvious as an empirical matter that the demand for more organs would _not_ cease even if we started buying and selling them like meat. Blackadder thinks otherwise. This parallels Mike T's claim that sexual slavery would gradually wither away (like the State in Marx's paradise) if prostitution were legal..

Lydia, it is surprising that those who take special pride in both the exclusive rationality of their program, and in their own advanced intelligence, can cavalierly dismiss obvious contradictions within their systems. Yet, libertarianism is a shrunken ideology of self-interest, so it is not shocking. Above we read how to subsume the pent-up demand for sexual experiences and human organs within the legal, lightly regulated "open market" and presto; the less savory aspects of the black market will vanish, a better sort of prostitute will result and organs can be painlessly transplanted and purchased at market rates. A side benefit is that tax coffers will swell.

Removed from the shadows of criminality, state-licensed procurers of prostitutes and officially authorized brokers of body organs will perform as any other socially acceptable, for-profit service providers. How any of this will eliminate the economic coercion or personal confusion that causes a woman to sell herself, or an impoverished man to mutilate himself, is unclear. But then, according to the libertarian’s Catechism, exploitation is a contrived concept and justice a vague abstraction brandished by class-conscious demagogues. Such is life in the hot-house of ideology.

Why would you doubt that I am pro-life? Is it because I harbor no grace and mercy toward teenage girls that want to slice, dice and hoover up the remains of their babies?

That would be a big part of it, yes. The complete absence of mercy is evident in your blood curdling ejaculation of; "I am totally down with even executing teenage girls for homicide for willingly seeking an abortion" Such a deformed sense of justice is part and parcel of the culture of death and capable of only extending its reach. If you're the guy from McLean Baptist Church, my guess is they won't be organizing a trip to the March for Life, and having endured your argumentation, the prolife movement can take heart in your absence.

Okay, buying and selling them like something other than meat. (My point, of course, is that buying and selling human body parts is by its nature treating them at an important level "like meat"--that is, degrading them.) Here's one piece of evidence on the consequential point: There is already an organ market from third-world countries, a fairly brisk one, as far as I can tell, with compensation being given, yet we still are told that we have a major shortage.

Of course you're right, Blackadder, that I would object even if creating an organ market would stop the shortage. I just don't think that it would. And I think that one does see a lot of really strong libertarian claims about the great effects of unleashing the market on some area that is currently not regarded as purely a market matter, which claims seem dubious on their faces.

My _guess_ is that the temptation to do this arises from the fact that in areas to which market approaches are appropriate, we really do see really wonderful effects of free market economics and also dreadful effects from non-market mechanisms. A centralized economy is really bad for the efficient growing, transporting, and distribution of bananas, for example, but a free market economy prevents banana shortages and huge unwanted piles of bananas. That's great for bananas. One reason it's less plausible for kidneys or sex is because the very human motivations and human nature that are causally relevant do not work the same way for kidneys and sex as they work for bananas. It seems to me that since one of the great claims to fame of market economics is that it takes human nature and human motivations for human action (!) into account, that same fact-based and humane approach should be carried over to the consideration of whether the economic laws of human action work the same for bodies as for bananas.

"...whether the economic laws of human action work the same for bodies as for bananas..."

Let us assume they do. All the more reason to be repelled. The libertarian holds liberty to be the end ultimate good to which their system is ordered. That it ends in the slavery of self-commodification ("how much do you think fleeting access to my reproductive organs, or permanent ownership of my body part are worth") should be obvious.

The libertarian holds liberty to be the end ultimate good to which their system is ordered.

Correction: "dis-ordered".


That it ends in the slavery of self-commodification ("how much do you think fleeting access to my reproductive organs, or permanent ownership of my body part are worth") should be obvious.

Isn't this a question best left to life insurance agents?


There is already an organ market from third-world countries, a fairly brisk one, as far as I can tell, with compensation being given, yet we still are told that we have a major shortage.

I thought this matter was already covered in a previous entry, in which thread I submitted for Blackadder's inspection several articles noting this & more.

Needless to say, folks in those third world countries are suffering not only the ill effects of that market but also the indignity of the status of "subhuman".

Here's one piece of evidence on the consequential point: There is already an organ market from third-world countries, a fairly brisk one, as far as I can tell, with compensation being given, yet we still are told that we have a major shortage.

It's a black market. Black markets typically don't right shortages, as their underground nature means that a lot of people are either unwilling or unable to utilize them.

A limited kidney market is allowed in Iran. Iran has no kidney shortage. Singapore is also considering allowing some sort of kidney market. If they do, then one can expect waiting lists for kidneys in Singapore to decline and ultimately disappear entirely.

The libertarian holds liberty to be the end ultimate good to which their system is ordered.

Some do. I do not.

Aristocles,

The abuses that occur in black market organ sales tells us no more about how a legal kidney market would function than stories about Al Capone tell us about the workings of Anheuser-Busch. Not only that, but just as the best way to stop the abuses of the black market in alcohol sales was to repeal Prohibition, so to the best way to stop the abuses of the black market in kidney sales would be to allow some form of legal kidney market.

There may be good reasons to oppose a legal kidney market. Pointing to the negative effects of prohibiting such a market, however, is not one of them.

Well, if a utilitarian solution is what's for here, I suggest folks invest in my upcoming startup that will engage in the manufacture of kidneys through biotechnological means and ultimately relieve the horrendous backlog.

We'll even cut the middleman (or woman) from the picture -- kidneys not from actual humans but from cells themselves! Plus, no disease and what not!

Blackadder,

You committed the very same error as you did in the previous thread -- you neglected once again the articles concerning the legal kidney market where unfair compensation was being given to poor families while they suffer the agonies of this subhuman treatment -- both monetarily and bodily.

Lydia:

Okay, Andrew, suppose that you were paralyzed from the shoulders down and were talking with a lawmaker. Let's suppose that you aren't , for some reason, smart enough to make a very big contribution to society. He says to you, "Y'know, I think people like you are just useless mouths and should be eliminated. Yeah, I know we're self-aware animals and make the rules. And I'm one of the people making the laws, and fortunately, I'm _not_ a useless mouth. I want to pass a law eliminating useless mouths." If you agree with him that humans are just material entities, and if you agree with his utilitarian approach to right and wrong, what answer would you give him?

1. I don't agree with his utilitarian approach to right and wrong.

2. But if I did, I suppose I would argue from the perspective of the rule-utilitarian John Stuart Mill, as opposed to act-utilitarians (like Jeremy Bentham). My argument would go something like this:

"Right now, you might not be a 'useless mouth,' and so you might (for the sake of argument) gain a temporary advantage by eliminating me against my will. But someday, someone might consider you to be a 'useless mouth' and will try the same trick. The marginal disutility to you by being involuntarily killed at some point in the future vastly exceeds the short-term utility you'll gain in the present. Therefore, the best way to maximize your own personal long-term utility is to set up a rule whereby nobody gets to declare anyone a 'useless mouth' and kill them."

===

Now, let's try it in reverse. Suppose you find yourself living in a society in which the inherent dignity of humanity is thought to be predicated upon a belief in Almighty Zuzu, and you (as a good Christian) cannot profess such belief. So the lawmaker says to you, "The only reason we respect people is because Zuzu made them and Zuzu imbued them with dignity. If you cannot profess belief in, and love for, Zuzu, then you obviously don't deserve our respect and should be killed if the greater good demands it. May Zuzu have mercy on your soul."

What's your answer?

What kind of bubble would you have to live in to believe it?

A bubble where drug use and prostitution were not widespread.

Aristocles,

I just looked again and none of the articles you linked to appear to deal with legal markets (so far as I know, the only place that currently has a legal kidney market is Iran, though Singapore will soon be joining it).

As for using biotechnology to create kidneys, so long as the process doesn't involve destroying embryos or some such thing as that, I have no objection. Such technologies are still a ways off yet, though. People are dying and being abused right now.

Suppose you find yourself living in a society in which the inherent dignity of humanity is thought to be predicated upon a belief in Almighty Zuzu

Well then, that "dignity of humanity" couldn't very well be "inherent" now could it? Of course, the pagans might nevertheless believe such a thing, i.e., patently self-contradictory, and I s'pose the Christian answer would have to be, "Kill me." Of course, so ought everybody else who refuses to profess patently self-contradictory statements.

MikeT. is right on!

Illegal drugs and prostitution should be made legal --

Doing so will only provide but the highest benefits to our beloved American society and are the very things we should take pride in offering our children and our children's children.

Why bother with morals?

Such a concept is outdated.

Besides, those destined for Hell will go regardless.

If they should happen to take the innocent with them, it will also be for the good: population control.

Actually, Andrew, I would never say that all those who do not believe in God should be killed. So that should be cut right out. What I _would_ say, however, is that materialism leads to a view of man that makes it very hard to make any sort of absolute argument against killing the innocent. I suppose it might be possible to be a non-materialist agnostic--some sort of Platonist who believes in a non-personal absolute Good. I haven't yet decided whether the moral argument for the existence of God works by itself or whether it has to be routed through the argument from mind. But I do think that materialist views of man are a major problem for any sort of workable deontological moral theory. And since deontologism is _obviously_ right... (Btw, the lawmaker might not agree with you if he had overwhelming evidence that he would never become a "useless mouth" and be eliminated against his will. Say he's an incredibly healthy 60-year-old who plans to commit suicide painlessly next week right after passing the useless mouths bill. Then he wouldn't have to worry about that disutility for himself, personally.)

Lydia,
You neglected to mention that the state has a death tax, which can remove a sizable portion of a person's property. One of the main objections to your anti-donation proposal at RR, if I recall correctly, was that the original choice of organ donation was viewed as heroic. So despite the various problems that are involved with implementing that decision, it was considered somehow disrespectful to ignore that bit of sacrifice. Without that choice those problems become much more serious, to the point that I would absolutely require an opt-out provision in any proposed law as well as closer scrutiny of the overall process.

The Almighty Zuzu reminds me of a quote about Zeus:
"Zeus, who sets mortals on the path to wisdom by enacting as fixed law that knowledge cometh by suffering. And o’er the heart in sleep trickle drops of torturing recollection of woe, and thus does discretion come to men even against their will. And this is surely a boon of the gods, who sit in might upon their awful thrones." - Aeschylus

What's the point of organ confiscation anyways? Is it to live longer? But why would anyone want to live in such a world? It's like being a vampire. Sure, you live forever. But you're still a vampire.

Actually, Andrew, I would never say that all those who do not believe in God should be killed. So that should be cut right out.

I didn't say you did. I asked you to engage in a thought experiment.

What I _would_ say, however, is that materialism leads to a view of man that makes it very hard to make any sort of absolute argument against killing the innocent. I suppose it might be possible to be a non-materialist agnostic--some sort of Platonist who believes in a non-personal absolute Good.

Wait, you just ignored my rule-utilitarian argument (other than to quibble with the example)! To repeat: killing innocent people is bad, because in general, you have no certainty that won't someday be you or someone you care about. Because the tremendous disutility of that outcome (even if multiplied by a low probability) outweighs the marginal utility of killing innocents for fun and profit, overall utility is maximized by a rule prohibiting killing innocents.

No mysticism needed. And we haven't even gotten to Kantian arguments (such as those adapted by Robert Nozick) that have an entirely secular justification -- although, to ward off any more nits, I do acknowledge that Kant himself was a theist.

But I do think that materialist views of man are a major problem for any sort of workable deontological moral theory. And since deontologism is _obviously_ right...

(1) "Obviously"? I mean, Hegel's objections to Kant seem to be at least worth addressing.

(2) As I suggested above, deontology does not necessarily imply theology.

(Btw, the lawmaker might not agree with you if he had overwhelming evidence that he would never become a "useless mouth" and be eliminated against his will. Say he's an incredibly healthy 60-year-old who plans to commit suicide painlessly next week right after passing the useless mouths bill. Then he wouldn't have to worry about that disutility for himself, personally.)

Sure. But presumably even the suicidal 60-year-old has people or things that he cares about. Let me guess: what if it's a healthy yet suicidal, 60-year-old narcissist nihilist with no family, friends, or worldly possessions?? I guess I'll take my chances on the unlikelihood that such a specimen of humanity could get elected to office, (although perhaps in Massachusetts.)

Seriously, though: the argument is probabilistic, so one admittedly silly counterexample doesn't defeat it.

What's the point of organ confiscation anyways? Is it to live longer? But why would anyone want to live in such a world? It's like being a vampire. Sure, you live forever. But you're still a vampire.

Organ confiscation is to treat human life as nothing more than a commodity.

IF that is the view you are advocating by your rhetoric, then you do not give human life the dignity it is due nor do you the God who created it.

Imagine the only things standing in the way of a nascent dystopia is dorm-room sophistry and philosophical pedantry punctuated by glib assurances like; "some people are pro-suicide and pro-confiscation [of organs]. They're wrong. So what?" Or comforting insights like this one; "...In terms of compulsory organ harvestation, it's pretty easy to see that as not among the powers delegated to the state,..."

Who isn't reassured by a moral consensus with shallow roots in the top-soil of social contracts (sorry Tim, Locke won't suffice and Andrew's ruminations are long-winded and Lockean)the separation of powers, utilitarianism and some "let the market decide" bluster? Who could possibly want a better, stronger defense standing between civilization and a post-human regime?

Ari, Frank was mocking, not advocating the secular substitution of a scientifically derived immortality for spiritual eternity.

Kevin's right, ari.


Kevin:

Who isn't reassured by a moral consensus with shallow roots in the top-soil of social contracts (sorry Tim, Locke won't suffice and Andrew's ruminations are long-winded and Lockean)the separation of powers, utilitarianism and some "let the market decide" bluster? Who could possibly want a better, stronger defense standing between civilization and a post-human regime?

Social contractarianism isn't utilitarianism, and -- as I've said repeatedly -- I'm not a utilitarian. (Most utilitarians, pace Bentham, are left-liberals.)

In any event, this strikes me as a very weird thing to say. Maybe the moral consensus in our society today is shallow and maybe our society would be "better and stronger" if held together even more tightly with more Christianity. Even if this proposition were correct (and obviously, I strongly disagree with it!), it would prove only that Christianity is useful -- not that it's true. And heck, even Karl Marx would agree with that.

Andrew,
This post isn't about the truthfulness of Christianity's claims, but whether man can long survive, let alone flourish under a system with a "fundamentally reductive view of his personhood". So far the answer is not encouraging and I think you are, like Derbyshire, Theodore Dalrympl and others on the "secular right" just beginning to grasp the unpleasant fate that awaits a society that gathers around an empty altar.

Lydia,
You said from the beginning that this was an overstatement and not wanting to labor this comment with my opinions I just wanted to clarify some things for my personal processing.

Is your overstatement based on the following?

(1) If bodily autonomy is a natural right and as natural rights will properly be derived from a transcendent source so our own bodily autonomy will be granted by that source and so therefore that source is the rightful owner of our bodies.

a. Natural rights grounded in abstractions similar to Plato’s forms do not adequately account for the universal nature of the rights or for the specific nature of the rights as applied to humans so non-theistic explanations of objective moral values and natural rights fall short.

(2) If bodily autonomy is a positive right then as self aware beings pursuing the system that is most advantageous to us all we have established law and bodily rights to protect society and ultimately our own interest in society. The rights, though, are derived from the state and so therefore the state can change the rights given proper incentive or agreement. Therefore in this view one’s body is ultimately a product of the state.

Is that what was intended by your overstatement or am I missing the point?

Correction - I meant property of the state not a product.

"Social contractarianism isn't utilitarianism"

It depends. There's a case to be made that Rawls' theory is in fact utilitarian, despite his denials to the contrary. According to Rawls’s version of political liberalism, a state (or government) is just if it is the result of principles people would have arrived at if they knew nothing about what they are or what they will become (i.e., whether they are rich or poor, black or white, homosexual or heterosexual, short or tall, male or female, etc.). To employ Rawls’s terminology, the principles of justice are those agreed to by parties in “the original position” (an imaginary time and place where there is no government) behind “a veil of ignorance” (an imaginary situation in which nobody has any personal knowledge of themselves or their futures). In other words, the principles of justice are those arrived at by means of a social contract that all the “unbiased” parties would agree on so that they can receive full political and social freedom and a minimum standard of financial entitlement just in case it turns out that one is, for example, not well-off, not naturally gifted, or holds unpopular political, religious and/or philosophical opinions. This means that Rawls’s principles of justice have little or nothing to do with the good, the true, or the beautiful in any metaphysically robust sense. They are political principles for ensuring economic entitlement as well as for preventing conflict between free and equal individuals each pursuing his or her own vision of the good life.

Jay,

I think you're giving me too much credit. My overstatement was based on something like, "I have observed that some people who start out by denying that our bodies belong to God end up denying (or brushing off egregious violations of) the bodily autonomy that they at first profess to hold dear."

I think your analysis is a very interesting explanation of _why_ this is so. Part of the issue is that of materialism. It seems to me that a materialist anthropology has no resources for defending actually _banning absolutely_ egregious violations of freedom, autonomy, bodily integrity, etc. One can make pragmatic or utilitarian arguments that allowing such violations across the board is more or less a bad idea, but it's always possible to imagine scenarios where, on a reductive view of the human person, exceptions could or even should be made. That is, materialism seems to me to lack the resources for saying "X is wrong for us to do to one another all the time, no exceptions." Of course, in our own day and age, noble pagans are thin on the ground. Most unbelievers are materialists. This may have something to do with the phenomenon I've observed.

Francis Beckwith: I take your point, but Rawls himself vehemently denied that he was a utilitarian. From A Theory of Justice (and my apologies for not being able to link to the original source online):

Each person possesses an inviolability founded on justice that even the welfare of society as a whole cannot override. For this reason, justice denies that the loss of freedom for some is made right by a greater good shared by others. It does not allow that the sacrifices imposed on a few are outweighed by the larger sum of advantages enjoyed by many.

Now, certainly many have criticized Rawls on the grounds that the difference principle (and the redistribution it implies) is incompatible with this view of humanity. But ~100 pages in Theory are devoted to a neo-Kantian analysis and another ~50 pages to his extensive critique of utilitarianism.

It just goes to show that the secular view of man, morality, and justice is far more complex than many recognize!

Lydia: In my response to you, I've shown how it's perfectly encouraging.

Andrew, This post isn't about the truthfulness of Christianity's claims, but whether man can long survive, let alone flourish under a system with a "fundamentally reductive view of his personhood".

Contrary to to Andrew's risible views and abysmal sense of morality, it doesn't take a Christian to know such things are morally wrong:

...no country in Western Europe has as yet legalised the sale and purchase of human body tissues, this is due to the fact that most politicians and bioethicists in these countries uphold the human body as ‘the locus of absolute dignity […]. [This] [d]ignity is destroyed if any part of the body is assigned a market value and rendered alienable’(2006, p.19). Citing Paul Rabinow, Waldby and Mitchell explain that such an understanding of dignity as an inalienable human right is derived from Kant’s distinction between dignity and price:

"In the kingdom of ends everything has either a price or a dignity. Whatever has a price can be replaced by something else as its equivalent; on the other hand, whatever is above all price, and therefore admits of no equivalent, has a dignity." (Kant, 1981, p.40, cited in Waldby and Mitchell, 2006, p.19)

The most trenchant critiques of the commoditization, be it illicit or legalised, of human body parts, spring from a similar conception of the dignity of the human body. Nancy Scheper-Hughes (2000) describes organ market proposals as being founded upon utilitarian and neo-liberal principals that consistently undermine the fundamental dignity of the human body. Furthermore, these libertarian arguments emphasize the right of every individual to choose whether or not to sell what she owns. However, as Scheper-Hughes points out, the very idea of choice becomes problematic in most third-world contexts:

"Bio-ethical arguments about the right to sell are based on Euro-American notions of contract and individual ‘choice’. But social and economic contexts make the ‘choice’ to sell a kidney in an urban slum of Calcutta or in a Brazilian favela anything but a ‘free’ and ‘autonomous’ one (2001, [n.p.])."


Whereas the moral bankruptcy of AndrewT may serve as some form of pitiable excuse, that even a Catholic as Blackadder is not even cognizant of the above is beyond pity.

Each person possesses an inviolability founded on justice... It just goes to show that the secular view of man, morality, and justice is far more complex than many recognize!

Perhaps, or convoluted, abstract and self-contradictory might apply, too.

In anticipation of a corpse, we’ve been performing a preliminary autopsy by arguing the merits of suicide, the ethics of organ extraction, and the benefits to legalizing drugs and prostitution. Modern man’s journey towards self-deification, which began when he rejected his status as a creature dependent on God, is ending in a degrading and humanizing state of self-destruction. Rawls implausible attempt to reinstall brakes made-up of his selective absolutes on a relativistic vehicle will not suffice for averting a tragic collision. Some will choose stoical resignation, or rely on the anesthetics of sensual diversions and sophisticated fictions, while others will return to walk the long road back home. Get your walking stick, Andrew and join us.

Kevin, as I said in the paragraph above, "There's a case to be made that Rawls' theory is in fact utilitarian, despite his denials to the contrary." So, I don't dispute your point that Rawls said he was not a utilitarian.

As far as being a neo-Kantian, I don't see it, despite how often Rawls claims that he is. If there's one thing about Kantian ethics we can be sure of is that it is not a "social contract" theory. Hobbes, yes. Locke, yes. Unless the participants in the original position discover fundamental principles that are not the result of choosing them based on their own perceived post-original position self-interest, Rawls' view is utilitarian.

I think Professor Beckwith meant to refer to Andrew T., not Kevin, for those following at home!

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/kant-social-political/#SocCon

Kant did propose a social contract theory. Where Rawlsian ethics differs the most from Kant is in presupposing a bounded pluralistic society of citizens. Kantian ethics presupposes plurality without shared citizenship, which explains his wider range of considerations beyond justice.

I put "social contract" in quotation marks for a reason. Kant, of course, did offer a "social contract theory," but not in the way Rawls (let alone, Hobbes) offered it. For Kant, political morality is a deliverance of reason on which the social contract is based. In Rawls, the social contract delivers the political morality. And the basis for this political morality comes from the bet-hedging rootless abstracted persons with no ends or natures. "Reason" is purely instrumental as a means to arrive at an agreement. These principles are only "good" because we would have negotiated for them with our fellows in a pristine state, not knowing anything about ourselves, our natures, our patrimony, or our posterity. We get to create ourselves and think we discovered it. it is the original sin minus the apple, but the promise remains the same.

I thoroughly disagree with that assessment. Rawls took Kant's generic system (social contract based on reason) and applied it to a specific place and time (modern Western democracy). Of course there will be differences between the two, similar to how there are differences between the generic word fruit and a specific example like strawberry. The appropriate question to ask is whether or not Rawls preserved the basic architecture of Kant's social contract which includes such pillars as practical reason, freedom, and justice.

Since his main focus is justice, Rawls delivers a thought experiment that satisfies reasonable standards for that pillar by removing obvious bias from consideration. Unless Frank has a new definition whereby justice includes exploitation and blanket discrimination the description he offers is hopelessly confused.

Rawls delivers a thought experiment that satisfies reasonable standards for that pillar by removing obvious bias from consideration.

Did his thought experiment account for his bias? How does his pillar of justice protect the unborn from termination or experimentation, or prevent the exploitation of the financially destitute from the emerging organ marketplace and the diseased and despairing from assisted suicide? Or is Rawls just raw self-interest wrapped-up in a security blanket of philosophical sophistication, lest we become alarmed at the sheer absence of mercy in his social construct?

Kevin,
The audience for Rawls is a citizen in a modern Western democratic state. If you are not a member of his audience his social contract will have little or nothing to offer. Further, if you are looking for the ideal of mercy in a social contract you are looking in the wrong place. Although in my opinion Rawls provides a defense for a social safety net that is merciful compared to most other systems, it is not perfect nor does it claim to be.

Step 2:

Could the contract in the original position in the Rawlsian scheme be wrong? If "yes," then he is Kantian. If "no," then he is Hobbesian. But since "right" and "wrong" are themselves are derived from the contract in the Rawlsian scheme, then it must be the second.

"The audience for Rawls is a citizen in a modern Western democratic state. If you are not a member of his audience his social contract will have little or nothing to offer."

Then all that Rawls is doing is constructing a thought-experiment to confirm what he already believes. But, as you know, there are two Rawls. There is the Rawls of the Theory of Justice and the latter Rawls of Political Liberalism. The latter Rawls would agree with your assessment. (But the early Rawls wouldn't). Nevertheless, the latter Rawls--by the end of his life--was almost indistinguishable from Richard Rorty, "reason" becomes a mask for what we and our friends already believe ought to be.

The audience for Rawls is a citizen in a modern Western democratic state.If you are not a member of his audience his social contract will have little or nothing to offer.

I guess if you're a member of his audience who due to circumstances of age, physical health, mental state, personal circumstances, might be vulnerable to the whims of others, then his application of “justice” may not be so gentle.

Further, if you are looking for the ideal of mercy in a social contract you are looking in the wrong place.

Agreed, so why would anyone interested in establishing a civilized, humane order brandish a “social contract” as the basis for that order? Sounds like the contract is best suited for a culture thoroughly converted to the Sermon on the Mount. Yet, that isn’t his audience, is it? I could see where the rich, powerful and well-organized might find his system a very agreeable means for achieving their ends. No wonder he's popular.

Could the contract in the original position in the Rawlsian scheme be wrong?
In the context of the type of society for which he developed the contract it would be extremely unlikely. Maybe the citizens don't like the type of society they live in, but that is a different question.

Rawls constructed his thought experiment to demonstrate how Kant's generic format for social coherence and cohesion would apply to a specific case.

I guess if you're a member of his audience who due to circumstances of age, physical health, mental state, personal circumstances, might be vulnerable to the whims of others, then his application of “justice” may not be so gentle.
So the problem in your view was that Rawls wasn't inclusive or authoritarian enough. Laws against age discrimination, disability protection, and poverty relief programs are insufficient especially when limited to citizens. I think you've set the bar way too high, nearly Utopian in fact.

Step2, the problem with Rawls is that his system is so denatured, abstract and "logical" (with some "inviolability" throw in) that he thinks state-mandated wheel-chair ramps and the immense damage wrought by the War on Poverty as forms of genuine compassion. But then a scientific, objective system like his has little room for the non-rationale, subjective factors like love, transcendence and custom that come with the human person.

Rawls aims low since his system is designed for machines or concepts. His selective, coerced form of charity ends in soft tyranny and spectacle. Behold the handicapped spouse being wheeled up to a well-appointed assisted suicide center, or the ravaged urban underclass being warehoused in Soviet-style concrete enclosures.

Rawls is more than "authoritarian enough", thank-you.

But then a scientific, objective system like his has little room for the non-rationale, subjective factors like love, transcendence and custom that come with the human person.

Ah yes. Just the sort of point I was making in another thread.

Here is the new link to the article by Smith linked in the main post. His archives have been moved to National Review since this post.

http://www.nationalreview.com/human-exceptionalism/324076/call-organ-conscription-begins

Post a comment


Bold Italic Underline Quote

Note: In order to limit duplicate comments, please submit a comment only once. A comment may take a few minutes to appear beneath the article.

Although this site does not actively hold comments for moderation, some comments are automatically held by the blog system. For best results, limit the number of links (including links in your signature line to your own website) to under 3 per comment as all comments with a large number of links will be automatically held. If your comment is held for any reason, please be patient and an author or administrator will approve it. Do not resubmit the same comment as subsequent submissions of the same comment will be held as well.