From: utzoo!decvax!harpo!npoiv!hou5f!ariel!houti!trc Newsgroups: net.politics Title: Re: Re: Property Rights and justice Article-I.D.: houti.226 Posted: Tue Mar 8 17:14:08 1983 Received: Thu Mar 10 02:13:49 1983 Mr Sher: I dont think that the two quotes you gave were contradictory. The first says merely that the starting point of an argument must be valid, and that I think that valid starting points must be based, at the bottom level of argument, upon an appeal to reality. Reality is everything that really exists, can be sensed, and remains consistant with itself. This is simplistic, but I think you know what I mean. The second quote says that there are valid starting points for examining a life to determine its quality or self-worth. One of these IS morality, though I do not agree that altruistism is the correct moral system. I believe self-interest is. You make a good point about kings and such. It was not my intention to convince anyone that no one ever gains *anything* from crime - merely that the self-harm out-weighs the benefit. And even if this is not true for a few, for humans in general it is - there can only be so many kings! The likelihood of succeding by criminal actions is so small that crime is not a rational course of action. (Again, I wish to emphasize that I am not just speaking of material gain, but of the net effect on one's life.) I made a poor word choice in the third quote, though I think that it was clear from the context that I should have used "self-consistent" rather than self-supporting. That is, no paradox or contradiction arises in the elements of the argument when it is extended to cover the cases of theft and so on. You state that altruism is self-interest in the long run. While it is true that there are cases where self-interest and altruism dont result in conflicts, I do not see any basis for saying that they are the same, or even that altruism might be based upon self-interest. Altruism means always choosing that which is best for others, at the expense of one's self if necessary. This cannot be the same as self-interest. In the final quote, I said that you stated that one has to give up something if the other needs it more. On re-reading what you said, I would agree that you meant that the other has to need it a lot more. But where do you draw the line? At what point does need cross over into right? As I mentioned before, altruism and self-interest do not always conflict. In some cases, such as the one you describe, the benefits gained from living in a society are often sufficient to make one wish to support that society by abiding by certain conventions of benevolence, kindness, or politeness. And under self-interest, the cross-over point is exactly that point that the individual chooses as being in his rational self-interest. Tom Craver houti!trc