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From: franka@mmintl.UUCP (Frank Adams)
Newsgroups: net.philosophy
Subject: Re: The Principle of Non-interference
Message-ID: <653@mmintl.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 13-Sep-85 20:10:42 EDT
Article-I.D.: mmintl.653
Posted: Fri Sep 13 20:10:42 1985
Date-Received: Mon, 16-Sep-85 21:08:58 EDT
References: <588@mmintl.UUCP> <1525@pyuxd.UUCP> <617@mmintl.UUCP> <1624@pyuxd.UUCP> <637@mmintl.UUCP> <1664@pyuxd.UUCP>
Reply-To: franka@mmintl.UUCP (Frank Adams)
Organization: Multimate International, E. Hartford, CT
Lines: 80

In article <1664@pyuxd.UUCP> rlr@pyuxd.UUCP (Rich Rosen) writes:
>> All I can get out of this principle, taken alone, is that anything one
>> person wishes to do, which does not interfere with *anything* that
>> *anyone* else wants, is permissable.  This has some content, but not
>> very much.  It doesn't let you wear a red shirt in public, because someone
>> may not like to see it.  It doesn't even let you appear in public. [ADAMS]
>
>Is seeing something you don't like an act of interference?  Do you have the
>right to destroy anything that "offends" your sensibilities?  Of course not.
>Not liking something isn't an act of interference against you.  You are free
>to continue living your life as you wish regardless of the presence of one
>person's religion, another person's sexual preference, or my red shirt.
>
>> Now, you may respond, "but my wearing a red shirt is clearly my right, and
>> someone stopping me is clearly interfering."  But it is only from a pre-
>> existing moral system that you can make that claim.  Thus you can't use
>> the principle of non-interference to derive a moral system.
>
>Nonsense.  It would seem that you must first show how my shirt (or any of
>the other examples I offered) "interferes" with you.

It causes me to have experiences I do not wish to have, which I would not
have had without your actions.  How do you define interference?

>> While I'm at it, there's another problem with the principle.  It is
>> possible for person A to interfere with person B in a way that person
>> B does not want, such that person B is better off for it.
>
>"Wait a minute.  '*WE*' decided???   *MY* best interests????

I had hoped to forstall this response by making it obvious it was expected.
Obviously, I failed.

>How do YOU
>know what my best interests are?"  Just thought I'd make it clear.  You don't.

(I assume you mean I don't know what your best interests are, not I don't
make it clear.)

>Can you give a real example of where such interference, even if, as you say,
>it makes someone "better off", is justified?

All right.  A family lives in a house which is about to be destroyed by a
forest fire.  They do not wish to leave.  The police forcibly evict them.
In my opinion, this action is justified.

Also, a person stands on the top of building a threatens to jump.  He is
forcibly restrained.  This I would also consider justified.

>> Now if, as you seem to, you are arguing from a basically utilitarian point
>> of view, you may argue that it is better off over all to apply the
>> principle,
>> at least to adults, since the errors of commision will override the errors
>> of omission.  This may be true, but it is far from obvious.
>
>What's not obvious about it?

Well, if it's obvious, why does only a tiny minority of the human race
believe it?

>Any regulatory system you can think of that
>has ever come about has eventually become a bureaucracy interested at least
>as much in its own perpetuation as in its supposed intended purpose.

That does not imply that such systems do harm on balance.  A bureacracy may
spend 99% of its effort perpetuating itself, and still do enough good with
the other 1% to justify their existence.

Also, one should judge by the total contribution over the life of the system,
not by the final state.  Chances are, in the final state, the system *is*
doing more harm than good -- that is why such systems get abolished.  Human
institutions aren't static.


In any event, this is a bit beside the point.  If you justify non-interven-
tionism on utilitarian grounds, then the morality is utilitarianism, and
the rights are derived from the morality, as I stated.

Frank Adams                           ihpn4!philabs!pwa-b!mmintl!franka
Multimate International    52 Oakland Ave North    E. Hartford, CT 06108