Francisco Ferrer

Fromthe Ludwig Von Mises institute website: Link: http://mises.org/austecon/chap4.asp It doesn't matter what statistics show when the subjective theory of value is in question. Whether or not people behaved erratically, whether or not they want to be tortured and murdered or not, the subjective theory of value could "explain" any behavior at all by saying that that's simply how they prefer to behave at that moment. The subjective theory of value cannot be used to explain the starvation of seven million Ukrainians, as you have claimed, because there is zero evidence that Stalin's victims died by their own choice. The subjective theory of value is not even necessary to demonstrate that without a profit/price mechanism, a centrally planned economy cannot prevent shortages in one area and oversupply in another. If values are not subjective then they must be objective. They cannot be both. And they cannot be neither without the word "value" losing meaning entirely. Now if the value of a thing is not subjective, its value must be based on some observable criterion. What do you suppose that might be? The amount of labor put into the thing? If it's labor, then how do we explain how people become rich by virtually no labor? In 1992 a British farmer stumbled upon a horde of Roman gold and silver coins. He became over a million dollars richer for less than a day's work. No buyer asked the farmer how much labor he put into the gold coins before purchasing them from him. The value of a coin for the new owner had nothing to do with how hard the farmer worked to extract it from the ground. Is the value of a thing based on its usefulness? How useful is a Rembrandt painting? We cannot eat it, wear it or use it for housing. Thus for many items, value is not derived from any objectively measurable criterion but rather from the satisfaction of our wants, which vary from individual to individual and circumstance to circumstance. “But wait,” you ask, “isn’t the water still more useful than the diamond?” The answer is, “It depends.” It depends entirely on the valuation of the person who must choose. If a man living next to a clean mountain stream is offered a barrel of water, he may not value it at all. The stream itself provides him with more water than he can possibly use, so the value of this extra quantity to him is literally nothing. (Perhaps it is even negative—it might be a nuisance having the barrel around.) But this fellow may not have any diamonds, so the possibility of acquiring even one might be enticing. It is clear that the man will value the diamond more than the water. But even for the same man, if we change his circumstances, then his valuation may change completely. If he is crossing the Sahara, with the diamond already in his pocket, but he has run out of water and is on the verge of dying, most likely he would trade the diamond for even a single cup of water. (Of course, if he were a miser, he might still value the diamond more highly than the water, even at the risk of dying of thirst.) The value of goods is subjective—the exact same diamond and barrel of water may be valued differently by different people, and even valued differently at different times by the same person. Callahan, Gene. "Economics for Real People." 2004, page 42. To return to the point at which I entered this discussion: there is no basis on which to describe the industrialization of the Soviet Union as "successful." It was purchased with a police state that took the lives of many millions of people and sent those who survived into economic stagnation and near poverty.

Only if one assumes a view of free speech that is absolute, which almost no one does. If we did, then they're couldn't be any laws against fraud. Fraud is a violation of rights not because it is a form of offensive speech but because it is breach of contract. Suppose, X sells Y a yellow metal disk which X claims is a solid gold coin. In fact it is solid brass. X has taken Y's money (or other form of property) without abiding by the terms of the contract (written or verbal) to deliver unto Y a gold coin. By taking Y's money without fulfilling the terms under which Y parted with that money, X is trespassing on Y's property. Seriously? Laws against defamation assume ownership of opinions and reputation? When a person files a slander or libel suit, his basis for action is that words written or spoken by the plaintiff have damaged his reputation. FindLaw's legal dictionary defines "libel" as "a false published statement that injures an individual's reputation (as in business) or otherwise exposes him or her to public contempt." Now where is the plaintiff's reputation stored? Does he keep it in a sock under his mattress? In a bank safe deposit box? In a heavily guarded mine shaft in Nevada? Hardly. Again from FindLaw: "Reputation: overall quality or character as seen or judged by people in general within a community." In other words, the item that the plaintiff asserts is damaged is something he holds no real title to. Any claim to ownership over one's reputation is in effect a pretense to own/control what other people may think. Now by what action did one come into legal ownership of another's thoughts? Did he buy them? Discover them? inherit them from Grandpa? Well, to some degree, yes. A criminal by reason of having violated the rights of another has forfeited his own right to freedom. Until his debt to the victim is repaid, he is temporarily and within strict limits owned by the victim or the victim's surrogate.

Innocent liberty? Liberty to do what? Shoot a man's barking dog? Take fruit from the vines he planted? Confiscate shirts from his clothes line? Not even the best system of law can serve society unless we first define--through ethical principles--what rightfully belongs to Citizen A.

Feel free to make all the unsupported claims you wish. You may say that Stalin's victims asked to be starved, Hitler's victims asked to be gassed, or Ted Bundy's victims asked to be decapitated. When assertions are not bolstered by historical data, the sky's the limit. Of course, such false statements don't serve as an argument against the subjective theory of value--or anything else. Fine, then prove the opposite. Prove that my favorite color should be red, not green. That I should like football better than baseball. That blondes are more fun than brunettes. Subjective value theory holds that individual preferences are not subject to second guessing or counter-argument. Example: I cannot prove you should like Vermeer more than Picasso. Nothing about subjective value would lead to the conclusion that individuals will behave in a highly erratic manner. Statistics show that the vast majority of people live stable, rather predictable lives. Subjective value theory does not argue against the obvious scientific fact that the human body has certain physical requirements that must be satisfied in order to survive. But we cannot leap from that well-established datum to the conclusion that human values are objective. Keeping oneself in condition for longevity is not a choice everybody makes. Or, to take another example, while the vast majority of people prefer the regular company of other human beings, certain individuals do not. Some people are perfectly content being isolated from the rest of society. Yet there is simply no way to logically demonstrate to a person who does not want friends that he should have friends, that it is unhealthy and anti-social and creepy not to have friends. Back to the Soviet Union. Possessing scientific data about the caloric requirements of the average man of 5'10", 160 lbs. cannot serve as a basis for centrally planning the food requirements of a society of several hundred millions. Average does not equal individual. The nutritional requirements of individuals are widely varying . Two men starting at the same weight may need vastly different qualities of food just to stay at that weight. Vegetables that agree with A's digestive system do not necessarily agree with B's. C can handle large quantities of gluten, but D cannot. Frying in lard works for me, but not for you. E likes the same meal every night; F does not want a repeat meal in a season. Without a pricing system to encourage greater production of food in high demand and to reduce production of food in low demand, shortages and wasteful surpluses are inevitable. The tragedy of socialism is that it posited an ideal Socialist Man that did not fit the description of very many people at all.

Not ownership, not utility. Justice, determining what is properly mine and yours, is a first principle.

Those are all laudable goals for the law. But we must first ask why mob violence and statist tyranny are immoral. And to do that we have to have first principles, a theory of individual rights. Nope. Mob violence and tyranny frustrate due process. Honestly, I don't even know why I try. The basic principle is plain, and I get tired of explaining it. Legal philosophy addresses impersonal administration of public justice, litigation among parties in dispute, the combined might of a community, and custodial guardianship of certain individuals who are unable or legally prohibited to conduct their own affairs. [Preamble, The Freeman's Constitution] Due process is an essential foundation of law. It is not an ultimate end, however, but a means to an end.

Let's say that that the 7,000,000 people who died in Stalin's forced famine in the Ukraine died of their own free will. Why was it necessary for Stalin to order the Red Army to seal off the borders of the Ukraine? Do suicides normally hire armed guards to make sure they cut their wrists properly or swallow all of the poison or hang themselves with the right noose? I do not argue that it is an objective fact that the Soviet Union was a less preferable place to live than the United States. I argue that it is an objective fact that millions of inhabitants of that captive state risked their lives and all else they had to get out. I do not believe the U.S. ever had such a mass exodus problem.

Those are all laudable goals for the law. But we must first ask why mob violence and statist tyranny are immoral. And to do that we have to have first principles, a theory of individual rights.

Granted, self-ownership is a theory. However, it has the advantage of being more reasonable and feasible than the alternatives: 1. One person or a few people in society own everybody else 2. We all own our own bodies and every other person's body 3. No person owns his own or any other person's body The alternatives lead to dictatorship; a chaos in which rape and murder would have to go unpunished; or a society in which starvation would quickly ensue. As to the alleged exceptions, everyone, regardless of age becomes emancipated when he declares himself so. Criminals (and by that I mean real, property-violating criminals, not outlaws in a no-free speech dystopia) have forfeited their rights (short or long-term) by trespassing on the rights of others. Involuntary jury service, like the draft, should be abolished.

Mises defined "well-being" in the linked article: well-being, that is, add something to the wealth available without impairing the satisfaction of wants which [one] considers more urgent. No, there is no yardstick for determining what socialists and fascists place such great store in: national pride, sense of community, brotherhood, inner glow, etc. But given that the by-products of Lenin and Stalin's large scale experiment included torture, Siberian prison camps, and mass murder (20 million), we can well wonder if the average Soviet's citizens inner glow exceeded the average American's to such an extent that a drop in and stagnation of standard of living were worth it.

I don't think you're interested in the answer. A sues B. A jury decides whether to award damages. Trial by jury is an excellent system for settling disputes. But before a case can be sent to a jury, it has to have cause of action, i.e. some basis in rights. For example, Reader A could not reasonably sue Author B because B killed off A's favorite character. Even if the jury were sympathetic to him, A has no legitimate claim to how another person's novel is written. Similarly, we have no moral authority to ask a jury to decide whether X should be compensated for Y's loose talk about X's sexual preferences. Individual rights are logically derived from self-ownership and the property one further acquires through labor and trade. X cannot claim a right to control what the public may think of him or his alleged non-conformist sexuality, unless he has through previous voluntary agreements been granted legal control over the separate opinions of each member of the public. I suppose it might be possible to create a society which is free in every respect except speech. It's just that my limited imagination is having trouble envisioning it.

I am not at all sure what polycentrism has to do with questioning the legitimacy of libel and slander codes. The case against defamation laws is the logical outcome of an attempt to arrive at a legal system grounded entirely in individual rights. To be clear, laws protecting a person's reputation are incompatible with free speech. No doubt some may not be entirely comfortable biding adieu to our venerable anti-defamation laws. But can they answer this question, how do we arrive at a law that preserves reputation against falsehoods unless we grant one man ownership over another's opinions?

Ever the optimist and futurist, Wilson had his daughter's brain frozen by the Bay Area Cryonics Society.

Libel is a published false statement that is damaging to a person's reputation; a written defamation. Examples: Francisco Ferrer abducted, raped and murdered a child. Ayn Rand approves of child abduction and murder. Present law notwithstanding, X cannot morally collect compensation for damage done to something X does not own. If Y breaks X's front window, dents the fender on X's car, or knocks over X's mailbox, X is entitled to have his property restored. However, X cannot demand restoration of his reputation damaged by Y simply because X never owed it in the first place. Reputation is nothing more than the opinions others hold of X. A person held in low regard by others is not entitled to see those opinions rehabilitated into a certain shape or form, even if some opinions are based on falsehoods. Opinions, beliefs, prejudices and notions are entirely the property of other people. All X can do in a truly free society is employ persuasion in an attempt to change those thoughts. Thus under pure laissez-faire, people would be free to rely on mere statements or statements coupled with evidence. In the long-run, which would better serve them? Further discussion here.

Sorry to intrude. Common law recognizes the criminal defense of "fighting words" and equitable relief for disturbing the peace. Obscenity has evolved from antiquated notions of blasphemy, to the secular doctrine of "community standards." A law's ancient pedigree does not give it automatic validity. Libel, for example, which has been said to be a breach of the peace, has been part of common law for many centuries. However, the premise of libel is absurd. A man cannot own his reputation for the simple reason that he cannot own what others think of him. Ownership of thoughts goes no further than one's own mind.

I do not know of a single reputable economist or entrepreneur who treats "consumer wants [as] an unquestionable given." Anyone who has had experience in the restaurant business, for example, understands the fickleness of customer preferences. Promoting specials, additions to the menu, and wholesome ingredients are attempts to keep the customer from going elsewhere or eating at home. "What is the problem?" is what the admirers of the great "workers' paradise" in Russia are still asking themselves. Why would the proletariat of Russia, Poland, Hungary, Czechoslovakia and elsewhere demand the luxury goods of the decadent West, when the commissars were giving them Sputnik and quarts of thin gruel? In fact, socialist planners do not use anything like the logic of the entrepreneur. The latter works at maximizing his customer base by improving the value of his products. The former have a guaranteed customer base. The Soviet store manager gets the same wage whether the stock moves or gathers dust. If only someone had explained that to East German citizens, there might have been no need for the Berlin Wall. You have to pay attention to prices--and to consumer preferences. Their inability to satisfy consumer preferences is why the Soviet Politburo is now in the dustbin of history.

I don't follow you. In Post #155, you wrote, "There is no such thing as 'well-being' in an objective sense." But now you write, "In a soviet style economy, the planners would decide how much to produce and what to produce with reference to their objective goals." So "well-being" cannot be objective, but apparently certain other goals can be, depending, I suppose, on whether you approve of those goals or not. While the "well-being" of the typical comrade was of no importance in the U.S.S.R, the "well-being" of the inner party members was held to be one of utmost national importance. Business plans are based on market research, and real markets exist only where there are prices which respond to supply and demand. Estimates of profit and therefore decisions to invest are based on a mechanism of prices free to rise or fall depending on conditions. No such price feedback exists under socialism where prices don't have to respond to economic conditions because there are no profits to be made. Again see Mises and Hayek. Really? Do the socialist planners know in advance how many sirloin steaks, strawberries, and bottles of brut champagne to put on every comrade's table each month? How do they know this? Does the socialist-designed super-computer give them a detailed list of what to put into production? Or perhaps the only goal is to keep the population from dropping like flies. In which case, perhaps a diet of one quart of thin gruel per comrade per day would suffice. Who needs more when the "well-being" of the proletariat has been shown to be entirely subjective and illusory? Yes, as I indicated earlier, the achievement of the much-vaunted Soviet industrialization of the 1920's-30's was not an improved society or standard of living but stoking the ego of the dictator and his commissars. Okay, if we've got a command (i.e., planned) economy here, how many plasma TV's, jet-skis, sets of golf clubs, and Hawaiian airfares have I been allotted in the current five-year plan?

So what? Not all laws have a basis in property rights nor do they necessarily need to have a basis in them (i.e., cyberbullying minors). Well, obviously, existing laws that regulate drugs, guns, pornography, rent, equal employment, and a thousand other commodities are explicitly against individual property rights. But if a law does not rest on the principle of protecting a individual's ownership of himself and what he has rightfully made his own, why should we treat that law as legitimate? Cyber-bullying is vile and hateful. But so are a great many other examples of unpleasant, "loathsome" (to use Rand's word) speech which people in a free society will engage in from time to time. If a man claims a right to control what another man says or writes, then he is presuming ownership of that man's hands and mouth. By what means did the controller acquire that right?

If your point is that computers can do the calculation for the socialist planners, then show that there is a computer or group of computers extant that can perform that kind of calculation even for a medium-sized economy. Name one computer program that has proven itself able to achieve this. How many refrigerators and in what capacity, color and dimensions should the socialist planners of Country A order to be produced in Years X, Y, and Z? How will the planners gain this knowledge? Through a poll of heads of households in Country A? Will the poll include alternate consumer goods such as televisions, computers, and saunas? Since well-being is a fictitious abstraction, what exactly will be the goal socialist planners pursue? The glorification of the supreme Leader? The economic planners' own job security? The Soviet Union was infamous for failing to produce washing machines. But if there no such thing as "well being," the country that produces one million washing machines is objectively no better than the country that produces zero. For that matter, the U.S. would objectively be no better a place to live than Syria or Burma. For that matter, New York in the 1930s was no better a place for a Jew's "well being" than Berlin. If "well-being" is a hopeless objective, why did so many people in Eastern Europe reject socialism in the 1970's-1980's? What was the matter with them, putting their imaginary "well-being" above other, greater yet undefined goals? Yes, that is precisely why the military should be privatized.

"Successful" from whose point of view? Reaching higher production levels of iron and coal may have pleased Stalin and his yes-men, but it provided no benefit to the average Soviet citizen. "In real terms, the workers' standards of living tended to drop" during the drive for industrialization. This is the calculation problem that Mises and Hayek showed would make it impossible for a socialist economy to function without shortages or surpluses. Lacking the information provided by market prices, socialism has no feedback system to rationally allocate resources. The result is mountains of I-beams and near empty plates on the typical Soviet table.

The Seven Stages of Interventionism 1. There is a humanitarian crisis. Bombing must commence immediately to help the good guys. 2. Bombing is not enough. U.S. forces are required on the ground, albeit temporarily, to ensure a stable government. 3. We're making progress, but U.S. troops cannot leave until the occupied country's army is well trained. 4. If we pull out now, the thousands of American losses will have been in vain. 5. U.S. forces performed heroically. We saved a country from tyranny. 6. It's not our fault the local government is so damned corrupt. 7. There is a humanitarian crisis. Bombing must commence immediately to help the good guys.

Robin Wiliams once discussed depression with interviewer Terry Gross and, imitating a suicide hotline operator, said, "Life isn't for everyone." In this therapeutic society of ours, every deviation must be corrected, managed, controlled. But, the fact is, life isn't for everyone.

I couldn't find any position Peikoff took on the matter, so I turned to a lesser authority: Only one aspect of sex is a legitimate field for legislation: the protection of minors and of unconsenting adults. Apart from criminal actions (such as rape), this aspect includes the need to protect people from being confronted with sights they regard as loathsome. (A corollary of the freedom to see and hear, is the freedom not to look or listen.) Legal restraints on certain types of public displays, such as posters or window displays, are proper—but this is an issue of procedure, of etiquette, not of morality . . . The rights of those who seek pornography would not be infringed by rules protecting the rights of those who find pornography offensive—e.g., sexually explicit posters may properly be forbidden in public places; warning signs, such as “For Adults Only,” may properly be required of private places which are open to the public. This protects the unconsenting, and has nothing to do with censorship, i.e., with prohibiting thought or speech. --Ayn Rand, “Thought Control,” The Ayn Rand Letter, III, 2, 2 [bold added] Of course, Rand's call for protecting individual sensibilities has no basis in property rights. May I call for the banning of politicians from parades and outdoor rallies because I find the sight of them loathsome? On what basis? That I own the light waves that emanate from someone else's park or street?

Ending a sentence with a preposition is something up with which I will not put. See http://www.objectivistliving.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=6897&p=67422 in this thread.

J.. Interesting perceptions, as you pretty much do here on OL. The first time I watched the Fountainhead, before I ever heard of Ayn Rand,[i am a Lou Gehrig, psychotic Yankee fan], so the translation of Cooper's "wooden" speech to the jury impacted me at a very personal and early place. Moreover, every word that came out of Cooper's mouth "fit" my personal beliefs. That film led to me exploring Ayn's exceptional mind and led to me fundamentally changing every aspect of my life... Pretty cool lady ... A... The Fountainhead is a terrific film, beautifully designed, acted and photographed.There is nothing naturalistic about the sets, the dialogue, or the delivery of the lines--which makes it a rarity of its time and place. It's about as close as you can get to a major studio project running on pure style. I'm certain I would have fallen in love with the film even if nothing in Rand's philosophy appealed to me. The only argument critics offer is Cooper's inability to inhabit Roark. It's true that Cooper doesn't connect in the scenes involving theoretical dialogue. But just as often he's excellent. The quarry/Francon mansion scenes are perfect. Aside from age, he was the ideal physical type. And what was the alternative? Bogart? Ray Milland? Glenn Ford? Alan Ladd? Dana Andrews?