DISQUS

You gave two hypothetical claims and said if morality/rights are meaningless they are equally valid, which is to say not valid at all.

That's not what I said. What I did say was that if all moral/rights assertions are thought to be equally reasonable, that leads to a contradiction -- but of course that's only true if you think that any moral/rights assertions are reasonable at all. In your case, then, you can at least escape the contradiction. Whether you can escape harm from the state or anything/one else, being unable to claim protection or help, is another matter.

The argument that a particular belief entails an absurdity is a refutation of that belief for everyone who's moved beyond Dada.

You can, of course, believe or disbelieve in anything you like. But what you can't do, if rights, like morality, are meaningless absurdities, is make any claim. You're on your own, TG.

Has anyone seen an extended argument for doing nothing at all about global warming other than offering huge prizes for technological fixes?

Be happy to offer an argument, though I'm not sure whether or where I've seen it, and it may not be sufficiently "extended":

The central point has to do with the cascade of uncertainties that continue to surround the issue:
- is it actually occurring?
- if so, are the models associating it with human-forcing correct?
- if so, do its costs outweigh its benefits?
- if so, do we know the costs and the likelihood of success of any attempted amelioration, and how they would compare with the net cost of doing nothing?
- and even if we know or think we know both those costs and probabilities now, do we know how they will be affected by another 50 to 100 years of scientific, technological, and economic advance (which is the sort of time scale involved here)?

Given these uncertainties, particularly the last, I'd say it's clear that the best policy at this time is to do nothing apart from ongoing research on technological fixes and/or adaptation. I'd be cautious even about the size of those "huge" prizes.

TGGP: Yes, there is no reason at all for any of it.
Micha, what rights-enforcement mechanism is capable of protecting me from the state?

"Rights"? What "rights"? "Any of it" would have to include "rights" too I'm afraid.

Maybe the problem here is that you think the argument from absurdity (reductio ad absurdum) is a fallacy.

Mencius: The proposition that modern human populations are, like dog breeds, the product of strong recent selection - I have even seen the word “domestication” deployed - is essentially established at this point.

Okay, when I asked, skeptically, for examples of actual racism here I hadn't seen this. And I'll agree that "calling RACISTS racist" is a good and honest thing to do. What's not so good or honest is to use them as blunt instruments with which to bash those who oppose the elimination of state borders, or those who make the crucial distinction between race and culture.

You are confusing legal rights with moral rights

No, I'm simply talking about what the Constitution, as you point out, refers to as secured rights, or, as I said, viable rights.

But then Larry goes on to say that “there are no states without defensible borders, and definable citizens,” thereby implicitly assuming that a state is the only enforcement mechanism of rights.

I didn't actually say that a state was the only enforcement mechanism for rights, but I probably should have stated explicitly that it's the only just -- i.e., morally reasonable -- mechanism, since alternatives either involve attempts at private enforcement (see Nozick) or are reducible to a state in any case.

... might it be the case that all moral assertions are equally reasonable given that all moral assertions are equally unreasonable, if we reject the possibility of cognitively meaningful moral assertions altogether?

In which case it hardly makes sense to speak of "rights" at all, whether as discussed by the Constitution or by Roderick Long.

First, contra JA, moral reasoning is in fact possible, and not all moral assertions are equally reasonable.
Could you provide some support for that statement?

Argument from absurdity: if all moral assertions are equally reasonable, then it's as reasonable to assert that it's immoral to do that which I've agreed to do as it is to assert that it's moral -- which is absurd. Hence, not all moral assertions are equally reasonable. QED.

Will: I do think there is likely such a point [ at which the rate of immigration is too high]. I think we are miles from it.

Well, fine. Then it's a question of assessment or judgment, not principle, and then I think you really should apologize for calling people who have a different judgment racists. I don't, for example, agree with everything Mencius writes, but I don't see the sort of racial -- as opposed to cultural -- superiority you impute to him. If, as you assert, everything is just fine at present levels of immigration, both legal and illegal, then fine, Will -- you really are the White Hat arguing with bad people and phantoms. But perhaps we're not "miles from it" after all -- perhaps we're already at or approaching levels of cultural change that are not sustainable, within any culture or "race".

Well, first, maybe you'd like to actually point to the people "openly asserting European racial superiority". I'm afraid I missed that.

And then perhaps you could clarify "the point of the post" -- are you saying that, yes, there IS a point at which higher rates of immigration become counterproductive", but we're just not there yet? Or are you saying that there's no such thing as too high a rate of immigration? And are you saying that economic damage is the only measure of "counterproductivity"? Whatever happened to happiness? Last, but not least, are you really saying that a state's borders should be just a cartographic artifact, or are you just fooling around?

My comments are teeming with racists clearly terrified by the prospect of the breakdown of Anglo-European cultural hegemony in America.

When in doubt, or, worse, in defeat, cry racism. Works like a charm among the rubes in the coastal backwaters....

In fact, of course, there are two distinct, though related, issues being conflated here: on the one hand, there's the "we don't need no stinkin' borders" position, which effectively undercuts the existence of any state. If a "border" has no more meaning than just a line on a map, then all the libertarian rectitude in the world will not avail when there's no longer any substantial way to distinguish between those whose rights a state must protect from those it cannot.

On the other hand, there's a simple issue of the rate of change of a culture (not, it's tiresome to have to add, a "race") -- regardless of the skin color of those currently occupying an area, there is a limit to the rate at which they'll accept fundamental change to their symbols, language, way of life, practices, values, etc. Those who routinely and mindlessly haul out the "racism" canard at every instance of this sort of resistance are merely displaying an unpleasant combination of ignorance and moral preening.

First, contra JA, moral reasoning is in fact possible, and not all moral assertions are equally reasonable. Hence, there can be, and are, moral obligations even without your agreement (and if there were not, then your agreement itself would be irrelevant). But, second, contra Will, there are no viable "rights" without a mechanism -- such as a state -- to protect them against violation; and there are no states without defensible borders, and definable citizens.

Just to be clear, you think Americans ought to get a better shake in life just because they’re Americans?

Just to be clear, you think that American citizenship is meaningless?

What justifies state-imposed limits on the human rights to movement and free association?

The necessity of the existence of the state itself, which, without such limts, would be dissolved altogether and unable to protect any rights at all, much less the vacuous notions of a planet-wide "rights rights to movement and free association".