Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/5/84; site randvax.UUCP
Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!bonnie!akgua!sdcsvax!sdcrdcf!randvax!edhall
From: edhall@randvax.UUCP (Ed Hall)
Newsgroups: net.politics
Subject: Re: Libertarianism: Anarchism, Schools, Defense, Society
Message-ID: <2207@randvax.UUCP>
Date: Sat, 22-Dec-84 15:22:49 EST
Article-I.D.: randvax.2207
Posted: Sat Dec 22 15:22:49 1984
Date-Received: Mon, 24-Dec-84 03:17:44 EST
References: <399@ptsfa.UUCP>
Distribution: net
Organization: Rand Corp., Santa Monica
Lines: 53

>      Even if you could come up with some expression for "the good of society"
> in quantitative terms, it might not be right to maximize it. Suppose you
> have incontrovertible proof that sacrificing unwilling virgins to the great
> lizard-god is the only way to preserve the lives of others. Do you have a right
> to perform the sacrifice? Moral philosophies differ here, but I think not.
> 
> 				J. Bashinsk>i<

This is a straw-man argument.  As a libertarian, I suspect you believe
in a rational world in which an ungoverned order is inherently fair to
individuals.  I doubt that the existance of a lizard-god fits into your
view of the world--or in the view of the people here you are arguing
with.  Use more real-world examples if you want your argument to hold
water.  Generally accepted examples of the good of the many overiding
the good of the few are incarceration of criminals, military defense
against an invader, and other cases in which ``the good of society''
is considered.  (These things have been amply argued here, I might add,
and haven't seemed to yield any ``easy'' answers.)

Let's re-write the ``formula'' a bit.

maximize +

In other words, there is something which I call ``society'' that needs
to have its ``good'' considered as well as that of individuals; this
is that part of the whole that is greater than the sum of its parts.
To use a metaphor, we are all part of a ``body'' comprised of individuals.
Culture, language, and, yes, government, all form the interrelationships
that constitute this ``body''.  When I speak of the good of society,
I'm speaking of this UNITY, and not the simple sum of the PARTS that
make it up.

Extreme libertarians want to focus solely on the individual, and not
consider society in any separate way at all.  Extreme socialists want
to focus on society, and not consider the individual at all.  My own
feeling is that a middle course is by far the best (though like anything
balanced between two extremes, it is more complex and difficult to
define).

What J. Bashinski seems to be arguing is that since good is hard to
quantify, and since the good of the ``many'' is even harder to quantify,
that we should forget about ever considering it at all.  Excuse me, but
that's a coward's line of reasoning (or perhaps that of someone so
caught up in the quantization of the world as to not see that much of
it is not quantifiable).

We shouldn't let the difficulty of a problem force a false solution.
I find libertarianism attractive because of its simplicity, but then
again, socialism is simple, too...  And neither has the balance needed
to further the cause of civilization, in my view.

		-Ed Hall
		decvax!randvax!edhall