26h.net

2007-02-18T19:23:00.001Z

Jack: I didn't used to live anywhere.

Arbitrary Suspicion

2006-11-10T15:00:00.000Z

So, here’s Former Foreign Secretary Malcolm Rifkind proclaiming that he believes the US government intentionally delayed the verdict of the Saddam trial to coincide with their mid-term polls. He readily admits to having no evidence to support this accusation but instead seems to have based it on the idea that the timing is “deeply suspect”.

Presumably then, given the lack of any evidence, the only way the timing could be thought of as suspicious is if we’re to accept that there’s a certain kind of probability relationship between good news for the Republicans and the mid-terms. One that means that as the mid-terms grow closer the natural occurrence of this kind of news becomes significantly less likely. But, of course, there’s no sensible reason to accept that such a relationship exists; unconnected world events do not naturally align themselves to avoid occurring at times when the US happen to be holding their elections. There is simply no need for a conspiratorial explanation for this kind of phenomenon. This sort of unreasoned proclamation by a politician in the media is far from unique, but it’s less common, apart from perhaps in the religious sphere, to see such an overt and unapologetic example of irrational belief. Now, none of this is to say that the Republicans haven’t pulled this particular stunt, and I certainly wouldn’t put it past them, but if Rifkind is right, it’ll be through sheer luck rather than anything approaching intelligent thought.

Senseless on Sensibilities

2006-11-04T17:20:00.000Z

Well, here’s yet another article in the Comment is Free section of the Guardian, “Think Before You Speak” by Imran Waheed. He’s the media representative of the delightful Hizb ut-Tahrir Britain. Here, he responds to where Peter Tatchell accuses Waheed’s organisation of hypocrisy in “Respect is a Two-Way Street”. I didn’t like it much.

The crux of the argument about "free speech" is not, as Peter Tatchell has suggested in his comment piece Respect is a Two-way Street, that Muslims want to censor criticism of Islam, but rather, as the late art historian Lord Clark asserted, that courtesy is the defining quality of civilisation. Most people do not need Hobbes to tell them that absolute freedom is for "newborn savages" and even Tatchell has conceded that, "A harmonious, good natured society is one where people are civil and courteous to each other." The suggestion that causing religious offence should be a tribute to the mettle of western society is repugnant.

Now, this sets the tone for the article nicely. Tatchell, remember, pointed out that it’s hypocritical of Waheed’s organisation to demand people stop insulting Muslims while insulting Jews and gays themselves. And Waheed is going to respond to these allegations by demanding people stop insulting Muslims. Nice.

Indeed, absolute freedom may well be for newborn savages, but in saying this, Hobbes, of course, was referring to absolute freedom of action and not absolute freedom of speech. But even if he were, being as serious proponents of free speech don’t actually advocate it as an absolutist notion this still wouldn’t communicate anything relevant about the issue at hand.

It seems that it has become easy to descend the slippery slope from freedom of speech to freedom to insult and then freedom to persecute. Following the comments of Jack Straw on the veil, verbal and physical attacks on the Muslim community have increased, Muslim organisations have received threatening emails, women who wear the veil or the headscarf have been on the receiving end of verbal and physical aggression and the Imam of a mosque in Glasgow was brutally attacked.

Well, firstly, and most strikingly, the “freedom to persecute” still doesn’t exist. Each of those acts of persecution are still firmly illegal and it doesn’t seem sensible to think that they’re going to be legalised any time soon either. So, that slippery slope doesn’t seem like one we have to take all that seriously. That should hardly need saying.

But forgetting that for a moment, according to Waheed, freedom of speech means the freedom to mock the beliefs of others and what invariably follows from that is the freedom to persecute. So let’s have a look at some of the evidence provided to bolster this claim.

Firstly, have these kinds of attacks actually increased? If they have, the article Waheed links to is no evidence of it. In fact, the closest thing to such evidence I can find is, in one case, one Mohammed Shafiq of the Ramadhan Foundation simply claiming it is so. Secondly, even if we have seen an increase in reports of attacks against Muslims since Straw made his comments, it’s not as if this alone means that this increase is because of those comments. And lastly, from the way Waheed included it as evidence, the attack on the Glaswegian imam is made to sound like it was carried out by some right-wing thug. Well, there doesn’t seem to be any reason to think it was motivated by religious or racial intolerance at all. In fact, it looks more like it was carried out by a fellow Muslim who was suffering from acute mental health issues.

But OK, let’s forget all that as well. Are we to think Straw’s rather temperate comments on the veil were nothing more than an example of someone indulging in a nefarious freedom to insult? And that consequentially they were little more than an incitement to violence and persecution? Surely pushing for the prohibition of, or at least the cessation of, these sorts of comments is exactly what wanting to censor criticism of Islam might entail. If this category is so broad as to include comments as moderate as these then seeking to curtail this kind of freedom seems not only draconian but positively malevolent.

But perhaps Waheed didn’t mean that. Perhaps he meant that Straw’s comments were not merely insults, but the aforementioned slippery slope came into play, they led to insults and then led to persecution. He hasn’t said that directly, nor provided any evidence for it, but I suppose it’s possible that’s what he’s implying. Either way though, this seems to put us in the same position; because, as Waheed would have it, even these non-insulting comments would eventually transgress into persecution, but we can’t have persecution, so, again, we shouldn’t allow or should choose not to make these sorts of comments to begin with.

As someone who grew up in an Australia in the 1960s, during a period of McCarthyite-style red baiting, some would have expected that Tatchell would have recognised the growing hysteria against British Muslims in recent days. Over the last year, we have seen the furore over the Danish cartoons, the Pope quoting descriptions of Islam as "evil and inhuman", aspects of Islam labelled an "evil ideology" by Tony Blair and the use of the term Islamo-fascism by George Bush. On the domestic arena, comments by a succession of cabinet ministers seem to have fuelled an anti-Muslim frenzy - Jack Straw has alleged that the wearing of the veil by a small number of Muslim women affects community cohesion, John Reid has suggested that Muslim parents spy on their children and Ruth Kelly has made unsubstantiated allegations that some Muslim schools are breeding isolationism and extremism.

Well, yeah, Blair and Bush described certain aspects of Islam as “evil ideology” and “Islamic fascism”, but it’s worth bearing in mind that in both cases they were referring to aspects of Islam that influence people to carry out suicide bombings on trains and commercial airliners. So, in using those terms they were, what, just attempting to whip-up hysteria against Muslims were they? And this is because those terms are inappropriate? Or is it that, yes, they are appropriate, but they should have just shut up about it anyway?

It’s strange indeed that Waheed should even mention the “furore over the Danish cartoons”. It’s not as if it were a case of Islam being sneered at and innocent Muslims being attacked as a result. In fact, it was quite the opposite. The responsibility for any bad press Islam may have received from the whole cartoon saga, I’d say, would lie with the fanatics who rioted, burned down embassies and killed innocent people. And also, with the Danish Muslim leaders who travelled to the Middle East to publicise the cartoons and added another, potentially far more offensive picture. In this case, one that was never printed by Jyllands-Posten nor even intended to be one of Mohammed. Growing hysteria indeed.

We have become accustomed to bemoaning the rise in anti-social behaviour, the loss of a sense of a community and the culture of disrespect in the classroom. However have we questioned whether the "freedom to insult" culture is contributing to these wider societal trends?

Presumably, Waheed has questioned it. And he thinks it is. Well, one unsubstantiated idea deserves another, I suppose.

Although Tatchell has "supported the right" of newspapers to publish cartoons satirising Islam, even he does not advocate free speech without restrictions, arguing for restrictions to free speech "when it involves incitement to violence or libel/defamation". In reality there is no such thing as absolute free speech. Editors do not publish cartoons ridiculing the Holocaust, pictures of dead British soldiers in Iraq or articles promoting paedophilia. Paying someone a salary and giving them a Fleet Street office does not change the reality of what is, in all but name, censorship.

So, some editors choose to publish cartoons satirising Islam whilst choosing not to publish cartoons that ridicule the Holocaust or articles that promote paedophilia. And this shows, errr, that those editors consider an irrational belief system with some decidedly nasty elements to be a more appropriate target for ridicule than an act of mass genocide? Or acts of child abuse? Well, so what? No matter how much Waheed wants to equivocate on the term “censorship”, newspapers, in simply choosing not to publish certain things, are never going to be a meaningful example of it.

The real question is not whether Muslims should respect freedom of speech but rather whether society is able to accommodate people whose values and religious beliefs are different from our own. Those who wish to insult the beliefs of others should not hide away from robust debate under the façade of freedom of speech. However, there is a very real recognition from Muslim organisations, including Hizb ut-Tahrir Britain, for the need to intensify our engagement in discussion and dialogue with wider society.

Why is that the “real question”? I mean, that’s a fairly revolting thing to say. “Westerners value freedom of speech and Muslims [apparently, according to Waheed] value censorship – so westerners need to change”. And how exactly are people using freedom of speech to protect themselves from debate? How does that idea even work? Freedom of speech is a concept inherently at odds with that of censorship. So, how could anyone be using it to stifle debate? That’s like trying to stifle a fire by spraying paraffin onto it.

Why I Mildly Dislike Julie Bindel

2006-11-04T14:09:00.000Z

Yesterday’s publication of the guardian saw this article printed in the Comment is Free section by Julie Bindel. Depressingly the standard of the article comes as little surprise. I’m starting to think this section of the paper would be better off entitled 'Comment is free and you get what you pay for' as Ed has appropritaley joked.

In the article Bindel tells us why she hates men. Well, actually, its not men she hates but:

only the men who perpetrate these crimes (rape, violence, torture, molestation and other cases of sexual harassment) against my sisters, and those who do nothing to stop it.

Now, the first part of the conjunction is something of a banality since nearly everyone is in agreement about the distastefulness of the behavior of those individuals who commit these crimes; all are criminal acts punishable by law. The interesting question is why Bindel hates those that do nothing to stop these acts and why it is that only men fall prey to her contempt.

So what does ‘doing nothing to stop these acts’ consist in? Does she mean men present when these acts are perpetrated but who fail to intervene or men who simply are not generally active in the attempted curtailment of these crimes? If it’s the former that are the objects of her derision then there is nothing to quibble over; if it’s the latter then there probably is. For men to be morally blameworthy here would require that the requisite activism be one of our pressing moral duties. Yet that seems something of a strong demand since it would overload us with positive duties.

Furthermore, why does this duty befall men and not women, and why does Bindel not also hate those women that do nothing to stop it? Bindel can’t exclude women who perpetrate these crimes or acquiesce in their occurrence without relying on an implicit sexist premise; the idea that culpability has something to do with being a man. Yet maybe this is being uncharitable, maybe these women are as much the object of her derision as the men in question. Were this to be the case, however, Bindel would again be broadcasting her sexist presuppositions since the article would have nothing to do with men or manhood but only those people who commit these crimes and who fail to act. In which case the article should be titled “Why I hate those people who commit terrible crimes and who fail to act in preventing these crimes”. Then again, it's more than likely such a banality would never have got published in the first place.

Sticking it to the Rationalist Man

2006-11-01T14:48:00.000Z

In her article “The Sickness of Secularism” Soumaya Ghannoushi claims that:

We are witnessing the rise of an arrogant secularist rhetoric founded on belief in the supremacy of reason and absolute faith in science and progress, dogmas which arouse ridicule in serious academic and intellectual circles nowadays.

Of course, since it’s obviously the case that we should resist people in the grip of dogmas that are the object of ridicule by serious academics and intellectuals it follows we should resist this perverted secularism, especially if these secularists are arrogant bastards. And they certainly are; a brief read of Dawkins and Grayling, two of the high priests of the secularist movement, will leave one with the bitter taste of epistemic intolerance.

Unsurprisingly, I think there is very little agreeable with Ghannoushi’s nugget of fallacious rhetoric. The most striking fact, I suppose, is that it is simply a monumental question beg; an assumption that in being arrogant and intolerant the relevant kind of secularism is hopelessly misguided. But this is exactly the issue since evidence that certain epistemic practices or tools are ill-conceived is, ipso facto, support for their exclusion from any adequate epistemology. Ghannoushi provides us with nothing but an argument from (misplaced) authority and an assertion that we are to disavow the methods professed by the likes of Dawkins and Grayling. But this is not enough. We want to know why we should employ epistemologies that to us seem wrongheaded. This, however, is not something we are provided with.

But maybe it’s because I’m an arrogant bastard in the grip of a secularist fever whose symptoms include epistemological hallucinations that I’m looking for a decent argument in the first place.

Lotto’ Cobblers

2006-10-27T21:15:00.000+01:00

Oh Christ. Here goes this all over the ‘net. Apparently a “University Lottery Syndicate Wins £5m Jackpot After Devising Formula”. Have they shite. I mean, sure, I believe they won the jackpot, but their “formula” had sod-all to do with it.

Stupid story. Looks like a bit of this and that to me.

On Holocaust and Rape Analogies

2006-10-27T14:30:00.000+01:00

Being a moral vegetarian is a phenomenologically weird affair. Sitting in a restaurant is to be, more often than not, surrounded by people complicit in a serious crime. Yet not only are these people unashamed and unabashed by their complicity, they are laughing, flirting and talking about inane matters. Walking down the street is to witness members of the public feeding themselves with bits of flesh; to see them discard the chunks that they no longer want on the floor or the bin; to see a shop full of carcasses, organs and lumps of congealed blood. On being invited to dinner or a barbeque, not only is one expected to attend, but to also refrain from discussing the issue for fear of impoliteness or of fostering a social dolorosa.

To the newly converted vegetarian these experiences often prove overwhelming. In her eyes the perpetrators will seem morally and epistemically deranged. How can they not see this wrong? Why, when the issue is brought to their attention, are they not interested in reflecting on whether or not what they are doing actually is wrong? Why, when asked to defend their position, do they brazenly churn out the same fallacious arguments they’d refrain from using in different contexts?

Having once shared in carnivorous exorbitances provides little interpretive comfort since your past self is also the target of the same questions. Moral conversion is accompanied by a shift in the phenomenology, and this shift piggybacks hermeneutical difficulties.

It’s the difficulty in bridging between these two perspectives that makes Holocaust and rape analogies philosophical tools for the moral vegetarian. Yet it’s often the case that the intention behind deploying these tools is misunderstood.

Most people have likely been subjected to, and offended by, the analogy between intensive farming and the mechanized murder of six million Jews. In fact, some academics have even gone so far to class the Holocaust as an ontologically unique or sui generis event, incomparable, in principle, to anything else. But these analogies offend, not because someone is making an ontological blunder in comparing them, but because they are taken to assume that animals are like Jews; because killing an animal is no worse than killing a Jew. In other words, even if the mechanized slaughter of billions of animals is wrong, it’s on a morally different spectrum than the Holocaust. Drawing the analogy confounds the different spectrums and it’s because of this that is offensive. With rape analogies it’s much the same. Their deployment is most often met by replies that “it’s not the same” or “you can’t compare rape to killing an animal” followed by the summary dismissal of the broadcaster as a kind of fanatic or extremist, ironically, as if there were something a priori and categorically mistaken about extremism, irrespective of what it is extremist about.

However, the purpose of deploying the analogy is not to suppose or argue that killing animals to eat is, in the relevant sense, the same as killing other humans or raping people, for this would be to blatantly beg the question. Rather, it’s simply a request that the non-converted attempt to see the animals issue in the same light as they would see cases of rape or of killing other humans; a demand that they shift phenomenological perspective. If those requested to affect this shift were successful in doing so they would see that life from the other side, with regards the issue in question, is exactly like life for them with regards the original target of the analogy. After all, one does not attend dinner parties where people are raped or feel constrained to not mention the issue for fear of generating social discomfort. In fact, most people would agree that someone’s failure to prevent such a dinner party would constitute their complicity in a serious wrong.

Finally, although the sharp end of the analogical wedge is a request that someone see in a different light, the blunt end forces on us the substantive issue, which, in this case, is the question of whether animals actually have moral value.

Deer Me

2006-10-22T18:41:00.000+01:00

Here’s another strange and meandering article in the Guardian, “Happy Hunting” by Tristram Stuart. In fairness, he calls for a radical reduction in meat consumption and highlights just how environmentally destructive the meat industry has become. But he also says vegetarians should concede that the alternative methods of hunting and meat farming he espouses are ethically acceptable. Unsurprisingly though, I find that idea somewhat problematic.

With regards hunting, the idea is that animals killed during culls, even though the meat in question would seem rather uncustomary by today’s standards, should be served up to us rather than going to waste. And yes, if animals are being culled it doesn’t make much sense to refrain from eating them if we find the idea appetising, but the real problems arise when we start to question whether or not those culls are justified in the first place. This isn’t to say that culling can simply never be a legitimate practise, but the justifications on offer here seem dubious at best. For instance, he cites how we need to kill grey squirrels as they’re a threat to the native reds and a “pest to forestry”. Now I’m no ecologist, but that doesn’t sound like much of a need to me; I mean, how are red squirrels so preferable to greys that it warrants actually killing the latter en masse? And then killing the latter en masse again a few years later when their numbers reach the same point, and so on and so on. Furthermore, apparently, ethical vegetarians shouldn’t have too much of a problem with killing rabbits because, errm, well, there’s lots of them. As for meat farming it’s more of the same depressing point-missing stuff: As long as it’s sustainable – kill as much as you like.

Until meat is produced in [an ecologically] sensible fashion, vegetarians will continue to occupy the higher moral ground.

If we could think past the idea that meat is murder, we would see that raising animals in this way actually reduces humanity's heavy ecological footprint.

Well that’s key, and that’s just it. For one thing, as I’d have it, whether or not animals are being killed in a sustainable fashion a vegetarian diet would still be a morally preferable to an omnivorous one. Simply due to the fact that I consider killing animals to be morally unacceptable in itself, at least in circumstances like these where it’s just unnecessary for human survival and health. If you completely remove the idea that animals deserve any direct ethical consideration from the equation then perhaps these alternative methods, solely due to their ecological benefit, could be considered justifiable. But suggesting that ethical vegetarians should “think past” (which seems to be a slightly insidious way of saying “ignore”) the issue is a bit much to ask really – it’s absolutely central to why many of them (if not the vast majority) take issue with meat eating to begin with. In fact, Stuart only mentions animal suffering and death in any detail when vegetarians are to blame, indirectly, through their reliance on arable farming. When referring to his own involvement in animal slaughter, he switches to more euphemistic terms such as the rather mechanical “another way of turning waste into food” or skips the unpleasant parts entirely and talks only of “the resulting pork” and how “thoroughly good” it was. While I’d be the first to admit that we need to reduce our ecological footprint, if Stuart were to have his way animals would pay the price.

How - when I gazed down my rifle-telescope at the exquisite animal grazing in the woods, twitching the flies away with its ears - did I manage to pull the trigger that ended its life? Although I have been culling deer for 13 years, it is still hard. But I did so by contrasting that one direct individual kill with the innumerable less visible victims of arable agriculture, and by remembering that at the last big party I attended there were barbecued prawns - farmed on bulldozed mangroves, fattened on over-exploited fish stocks, transported away from a hungry part of the world and served to an overfed elite. That I pulled the trigger no doubt came as a shock to some. But I hope that even the most dedicated vegetarian can withhold their fury, while hardened carnivores learn, as a matter of urgency, to limit their wanton destruction of the world's ecologies

Well, I’m not all that sure I can withhold my fury. I think my fury is entirely appropriate given this depressingly real consequence of making such a basic logical mistake. “Hey, shall I kill this deer? Well, I’ve done a load of other bad stuff this week so, fuck it, why not?”

Another Great Example of Evolutionary Thinking

2006-10-20T11:40:00.000+01:00

In a recent report, Oliver Curry, an evolutionary theorist at the London School of Economics, claims that the human species may split into two separate sub-species. There seems to be quite a bit of internet hoo-ha over this story, which often tends to be the case when someone makes outlandish claims about human evolutionary trajectories past or future. However, as far as I can tell the original report is unavailable, so there is no telling whether or not it was undertaken in all seriousness. Although, perhaps the fact that the report was commissioned by Bravo, who also brought us shows like “My God, I'm My Dad” and “Costa Del Street Crime”, should imbue us with a good measure of reassurance. After all, it would hardly be surprising to find out that Curry had taken this as an opportunity to feed Bravo a hammed up version of Gattaca and run off with a lump of cash. Furthermore – it’s not as if science journalism is free from shoddy reporting, so the clumsiness may well have been written in afterwards.

Anyway, Curry’s report claims that the human population will diverge into two sub-species, a genetic upper and lower class. Apparently, those lucky enough to be born into the upper class will be healthy, intelligent and attractive whereas those born of genetically plebeian parents will be dim-witted, short, ugly and unhealthy.

He also says that assortative mating will be the mechanism responsible for this speciation event (the evolutionary point at which two species diverge). Assortative mating happens when organisms select their mates based on certain characteristics. In this case, he’s claiming that a speciation event will result from the tendency of healthy, intelligent and attractive people to mate with other healthy, intelligent and attractive people and dim-witted, short and ugly people to, in turn, mate with their respective counterparts.

Now, this is a particularly surprising claim. And here’s why. All these traits are know as continuously varying traits, (i.e. traits that vary continuously between two extremes). This means that for assortative mating to lead to this kind of speciation event, those with intermediate trait values (niether especially attractive or ugly, dim-witted or intelligent, etc.) would have to somehow be prevented from breeding whilst those at the two extremes ‘got busy’, so to speak. By preventing intermediate phenotypes from breeding whilst encouraging the mating of those at the two extremes it’s possible we could see a speciation event in the far-future. However, unless Curry has reason to believe that some pretty weird eugenic policies are going to be implemented he has no reason to make this prediction.

The second outrageous claim is that in ten thousand years time our increasing reliance on technology will have caused substantial deterioration in our ability to communicate with other humans, as well as in our ability to love, trust and feel sympathy. Now, if this is simply a assertion about the causal relationship between technology and these human abilities then it is simply an empirical issue (albeit likely a false one) – for it could be the case, for example, that growing up with technology really does impede one’s ability to communicate, love, trust and feel sympathy. None of this, however, has anything to do with evolutionary trajectories, so if this is Curry’s claim, it is, at best, irrelevant.

If however, intead, this is a claim about the evolutionary relationship between increased use of technology and these human abilities then it's particularly odd; he would be committing himself to the idea that those worse at communicating, loving, trusting and feeling sympathy will be those that tend to have more offspring. So unless this technology is technology to prevent loving, caring and trusting people from having children then Curry has given us no reason to believe his claim. But then again, maybe he has a patent pending.

What is Slavoj Žižek up to in the Guardian?

2006-09-11T16:38:00.000+01:00

I’ve unfortunately just read a Guardian article called “On 9/11, New Yorkers Faced the Fire in the Minds of Men” by Slavoj Žižek
and thought it was cobblers. Here are some bits I disliked marginally more than the other bits.

This lack of "cognitive mapping" is crucial. All we see are the disastrous effects, with their cause so abstract that, in the case of WTC, one can easily imagine exactly the same film in which the twin towers would have collapsed as the result of an earthquake. What if the same film took place in a bombed high-rise building in Beirut? That's the point: it cannot take place there. Such a film would have been dismissed as "subtle pro-Hizbullah terrorist propaganda". The result is that the political message of the two films resides in their abstention from delivering a direct political message. It is the message of an implicit trust in one's government: when under attack, one just has to do one's duty.

Now, the important phrase here is “would have been dismissed as”. For all I know, Žižek could be perfectly correct in this, such a film could well have been dismissed in such a way (although dismissed by whom is rather unclear). But we can't safely infer from this that said dismissal would necessarily be a valid one. Nor can we infer that since an apolitical film about a Beirut bombing would have been dismissed as propaganda then a similarly apolitical film about 9/11 actually is propaganda. And if by abstaining from delivering a political message, a film about 9/11 delivers a political message anyway, then it would be impossible for such a film not to deliver a political message. This, although seemingly quite debatable in itself, may be exactly what Žižek is trying to say. But it makes me wonder why he didn’t just come out and say it. Perhaps it’s because without a cognitive association with the insidious veiling of political messages which subliminally program their audience to unquestioningly obey the whole thing seems rather more benign.

This is where the problem begins. The omnipresent invisible threat of terror legitimises the all-too-visible protective measures of defence. The difference of the war on terror from previous 20th-century struggles, such as the cold war, is that while the enemy was once clearly identified as the actually existing communist system, the terrorist threat is spectral. It is like the characterisation of Linda Fiorentino in The Last Seduction: most people have a dark side, she had nothing else. Most regimes have a dark oppressive spectral side, the terrorist threat has nothing else.

Seemingly then the threat of terror is invisible. Furthermore it is spectral. Now I would think that the most charitable reading of this would be that the threat of terror is difficult to obtain a holistic picture of or something like that. Fair enough. Even though by using that term we may unfortunately create an association with the things of superstition – ghosts and spooks – i.e. stuff that doesn’t exist. But (of course!) I’m not one to be pedantic – so, sure, OK, fine. But to also directly contrast the threat of terror with something you make a specific point of describing as “actually existing” doesn’t seem to leave much room for misinterpretation – the threat of terror doesn’t exist. That would explain it being invisible then I suppose. And what is that comparison at the end trying to say? What does he even mean by “terrorist threat” anymore? Perhaps Žižek has simply lapsed into poetry. Who knows.

The power that presents itself as being constantly under threat and thus merely defending itself against an invisible enemy is in danger of becoming a manipulative one. Can we really trust those in power, or are they evoking the threat to discipline and control us? Thus, the lesson is that, in combating terror, it is more crucial than ever for state politics to be democratically transparent. Unfortunately, we are now paying the price for the cobweb of lies and manipulations by the US and UK governments in the past decade that reached a climax in the tragicomedy of the Iraqi weapons of mass destruction.

Unfortunately, the enemy are no longer non-existent but merely invisible again. Does he actually mean “non-existent” by “invisible” now? Errr, hard to tell. But one thing we can apparently know for sure is that any power fighting such an enemy is in danger of becoming manipulative. Presumably by “danger” he means “relatively real danger” and by “manipulative” – Machiavellian? Up to a point? I’d best go with that. So – is such a power in that kind of danger? Well I don’t really know but I suppose it could be, yes – if and only if we’re talking about a genuinely fictional enemy – and so far the only way Žižek’s managed to get that idea into the equation is through semantic slight of hand. Talking of which – what does that “thus” think it’s playing at? “Can we really trust those in power? Thus we must have this!” I mean, it’s bit odd to put a “thus” directly after a question. Well, if we think Žižek has put forward a strong enough case already (and frankly, who wouldn’t?) one might just take that question to be rhetorical. It’s difficult to tell specifically which lies and manipulations constitute this “cobweb” or why it’s parsimonious to think of them (and their climax) as such and not just fucking stupid mistakes but anyway every tip has an iceberg. Consequents affirmed while you wait.

Recall August's alert and the thwarted attempt to blow up a dozen planes on their way from London to the US. No doubt the alert was not a fake; to claim otherwise would be paranoiac. But a suspicion remains that it was a self-serving spectacle to accustom us to a permanent state of emergency.

So, we’ve established that to doubt the authenticity of last Augusts alerts would be paranoiac, but – a suspicion remains! Presumably then suspicion can only remain in the minds of the paranoid, for how can you not foster any doubt about an authenticity yet still be suspicious of it? But what a weird thing to say! The minds of the paranoid are suspicious about all kinds of things – the authenticity of the moon landings, whether governments are really comprised of humans and not reptilians from another world, mind controls devices and so on. It wouldn’t be prudent to go around mentioning whenever paranoid people are suspicious of something, so why has it been mentioned here? Perhaps Žižek wished to smuggle in some evidence-free credibility to the idea that the August alerts were a conspiracy while leaving himself some (but seemingly not enough) wiggle-room for denial were the issue ever raised. Perhaps not – but a suspicion remains.

What space for manipulation do such events - where all that is publicly visible are the anti-terrorist measures themselves - open up? Is it not that they simply demand too much from us, the ordinary citizen: a degree of trust that those in power lost long ago? This is the sin for which Bush and Blair should never be forgiven.

Well hold on. Let’s first be clear that the “events” in question here are not fake security alerts. Although you’d be forgiven for thinking they were seeing as how it followed so swiftly on from that hand-wave of a previous sentence. So – what space for manipulation do such events open up? I’ll try not to dwell too much on yet another claim of terrorisms apparent “invisibly” being loaded into the question because I’m nice like that. And because mercifully, Žižek then chooses to break with habit and answers with a moment of unparalleled crystal-clarity. Yeah. Fat chance.

September 11 is the symbol of the end of this utopia, a return to real history. A new era is here with new walls everywhere, between Israel and Palestine, around the EU, on the US-Mexico and Spain-Morocco borders. It is an era with new forms of apartheid and legalised torture. As President Bush said after September 11, America is in a state of war. But the problem is that the US is not in a state of war. For the large majority, daily life goes on and war remains the business of state agencies. The distinction between the state of war and peace is blurred. We are entering a time in which a state of peace itself can be at the same time a state of emergency.

Is he saying that walls on national boarders like the Spain/Morocco one are examples of apartheid or isn’t he? Don’t know. But unless he’s referring to any other apartheids that have sprung up both since and because of 9/11 I guess he must be. I suppose strengthening boarder security could be thought of as a “new form of apartheid” but only if you somewhat arbitrarily redefined the term. He could have used a more appropriate word, but then again that would have come at the expense of losing all the precious rhetoric that “apartheid” carries. Besides, it wasn’t like Mexicans were allowed to merrily waltz into the US or Moroccans into Spain before these walls went up. But anyway – just because George Bush goes around using a lot of scary quasi-fundamentalist rhetoric (which no one has to convince me he does, and you can take it from me, it’s hardly admiration for the current US government that motivated this post) this doesn’t give us logical carte blanche to wilfully misinterpret any old thing he says in order to bolster our own arguments. Two wrongs don’t make a right and all that. When there is talk of a “state of war [with terrorists]”, I’d have thought the most charitable way to take it is in a more metaphorical sense, like the “war on drugs”. In using that term, obviously no one's trying to make us believe that submarines piloted by Heroin are approaching, that crack is trying to annex part of Guernsey or that we must permit the government to look in all our bums whenever they feel like it for our own protection. It simply means “we are emphatically against drugs/terrorists and we are going to fight them”. Now, in the name of said state of war freedoms might well be getting frustrated to a worrying degree; possibly even with sinister aims – but I’m not about to go into all that now. And in claiming a state of war exists Bush is undoubtedly guilty of rhetorical low-redefinition but this isn’t good reason to think that he is trying to conjure-up some sort of Orwellian phantom war in order to keep the population receiving the face stamping treatment – forever (or for any other duration for that matter). Nor does it seem very sensible to try to attach to his statement that rather contrived “emergency/peace” bit of quasi-doublethink. Now Žižek may genuinely not have intended to say any such thing. But again it’s hard to say as he doesn’t seem to be a great fan of simply saying what’s on his mind. And I wonder why that might be.

Now if you wanted to present an argument in favour of a conspiracy theory, why would you use a whole load of equivocation, sly-winking implication and plain old dishonesty to try to con people into believing you? Why wouldn’t you at least have the balls to just say what you meant? Perhaps because you’d fool less of the people less of the time? Well that’s ironic.

A Critique of "Animal Rights are Anti-Human" - A Response by Alex Epstein

2005-09-09T15:24:00.000+01:00

You are obviously schooled in—or at least enamored of—the method of modern, analytic philosophy. Since I promised at least an indication of my view of your arguments, here it is: I totally disagree with the view of ethics and philosophic methodology that underlies your arguments. If you wish to know my view of the nature and purpose of ethics—including the objective basis of ethics--read "The Objectivist Ethics" in The Virtue of Selfishness by Ayn Rand.

A Critique of "Animal Rights are Anti-Human"

2005-09-02T18:06:00.000+01:00

This post contains my critique of an article called "Animal Rights are Anti-Human" written by one Alex Epstein that was posted on numerous websites. I actually emailed the editors of one such publication, in the case the Louisville Courier-Journal, with the same critique but received no reply.

Firstly, I would like to address the use of the terms necessary and vital at certain points throughout the article.

Consider the following statement:

"We have found that it was necessary for Mr. Smith to shoot Mr. Jones".

What we might naturally infer from this statement is that Mr. Smith was justified in shooting Mr. Jones. This seems to be how you have been using these kinds of terms – to imply justification. To simply assert that a certain action is necessary and therefore justified and consequentially cannot be ethically wrong would simply be to employ circular reasoning. It may of course be that you did not wish for a reader to infer justification from necessity – but informally I cannot think an example of something that is necessary but cannot be ethically justified. In light of this – I will take the term to mean "necessary to prevent at least some disease and/or death in human beings". Furthermore, the use of sneer quotes when referring to Animal Rights arguments or the movement itself, amongst other things, may be a useful way of expressing personal contempt for or incredulity at the subject matter but is counterproductive when moving towards a reasoned conclusion – as are descriptions which employ prejudicial terms such as deadly and evil.

I will continue by breaking down the article into separate points and addressing them in turn.

The “animal rights” movement has pulled off a deadly deception: promote a vicious, anti-human policy, while feigning benevolent, compassionate motives. The deception takes the form of opposing life-saving medical research—in the name of opposing cruelty to animals.

You seem to be asserting here that the Animal Rights movement really has no interest in animal rights at all; but its sole interests are in the increased aggregate disease and death in human beings and in emphatically halting life-saving medical research irrespective of the form it takes. It would mean that the Animal Rights movement would oppose such research were it to be carried out by computer simulation or other methods involving a non-sentient subject. I cannot imagine any rational person could believe such a thing. It would make no more sense than accusing Oxfam of having little interest in relieving famine but simply wanting to reduce the disposable income of affluent westerners.

Consider PETA’s ongoing campaign against Covance, a company that conducts vital medical research on animals to fight diseases such as breast cancer, diabetes, and Alzheimer’s. PETA is staging an elaborate, heavily backed PR effort claiming that Covance engages in gratuitous and unnecessary torture of monkeys. The centerpiece of the campaign is a 5-minute video allegedly proving PETA’s accusations.

In fact, PETA’s effort is a classic smear campaign. Many of the “abuses” it documents, such as the use of restraints or delivering drugs through nasal tubes, are necessary to effectively administer drugs to animals. And the few examples of seemingly inappropriate behavior they find, such as the bizarre taunting of monkeys by a few Covance employees, are treated as pervasive industry practice, even though it took a PETA operative (operating illegally within Covance) over 10 months to cull a mere handful of such instances.

Even if the footage of the introduction of tubes into the monkey's mouths and noses is the most humane way of performing these experiments (which given the way in which the procedure was performed seems fairly doubtful in itself) it simply does not address the core concern – whether or not these experiments are ethically justified or even some cases required. It is difficult to imagine, for instance, what possible purpose inducing insanity in a monkey would have in working towards a cure for a human disease.

No sane person seeks to inflict needless pain on animals. Such practices, where they exist, should be condemned. But anyone concerned for human life must unequivocally endorse the rightness of using animals in medical research.

This is a fairly clear example of a false dilemma; it is quite possible to have concern for the lives of human beings and also for the lives and rights of animals – consider the following parallel:

Anyone concerned for the lives of men must unequivocally endorse the rightness of using women in medical research.

After all, human subjects would produce far more reliable and accurate results than testing on animals – countless men are dying of diseases while we hold back from the necessity that is the experimentation on women! The only way an ethically relevant distinction could be made between the original statement and its parallel is if you presuppose the truth of the premise "if the use of animals in experimentation benefits humans it is therefore justified". But this has a serious problem of its own – it begs the very question at issue – as simply to assume an opposing view is false while attempting to show as such cannot result in a valid argument. What you would need to do in order to show that animal experimentation is ethically justified whereas human experimentation is not, rather than simply reassert that it benefits humans, is to specify a rational and ethically relevant distinction between human beings and animals.

Animal research is absolutely necessary for the development of life-saving drugs, medical procedures, and biotech treatments. According to Nobel Laureate Joseph Murray, MD: “Animal experimentation has been essential to the development of all cardiac surgery, transplantation surgery, joint replacements, and all vaccinations.” Explains former American Medical Association president Daniel Johnson: “Animal research, followed by human clinical study, is absolutely necessary to find the causes and cures for so many deadly threats, from AIDS to cancer.”

While I understand this assertion to be somewhat debatable in itself I would not like to address its empirical claim as it would require a wider scope than the piece allows; thankfully though I do not have to do this as it is also open to the objection above.

Millions of humans would suffer and die unnecessarily if animal testing were prohibited. But this is exactly what PETA and other “animal rights” organization seek. They believe that all animal research should be banned, including research conducted as humanely as possible (the declared and scrupulously practiced policy of most animal researchers).

The founder of PETA, Ingrid Newkirk, has declared unequivocally that animal research is “immoral even if it’s essential” and that “Even painless research is fascism, supremacism.” When questioned what her movement’s stance would be if animal tests produced a cure for AIDS, Newkirk responded: “We’d be against it.” Chris DeRose, founder of the group Last Chance for Animals, writes: “If the death of one rat cured all diseases, it wouldn’t make any difference to me.”

You seem to be using the actions and arguments of PETA as the best that the Animal Rights movement has to offer; but this would seem no less of a straw man fallacy than to judge worth of Christianity by the actions of the Westboro Baptist Church.

The goal of the “animal rights” movement is not to stop sadistic animal torturers; it is to sacrifice human well-being for the sake of animals. This goal is inherent in the very notion of “animal rights.”

This is a particularly puzzling statement. Consider the following two hypothetical options:

Minimise or stop animal suffering due to experimentation.
Minimise or stop animal suffering due to experimentation and increase human suffering.

Should your statement be accurate, then an Animal Rights advocate would choose the latter of the two. But I cannot imagine you truly believe this. You may have meant that since in giving animals ethical consideration we will invariably slow or complicate research aimed at curing human diseases – but simply because Animal Rights advocates move for implementation of the antecedent it by no means follows that they actively desire the consequent.

According to PETA, the basic principle of “animal rights” is: “animals are not ours to eat, wear, experiment on, or use for entertainment”—they “deserve consideration of their own best interests regardless of whether they are useful to humans.” This is in exact contradiction to the requirements of human survival and progress, which demand that we kill animals when they endanger us, eat them when we need food, run tests on them to fight disease.

The Animals Rights stance PETA are reflecting here in no way prohibits the possibilities you mention; arguments in favour of animal rights, and certainly the better ones of these hold that in certain situations we are justified in killing animals, just as when certain extreme conditions manifest themselves we are able to kill human beings without breaching any Human Rights principles. Furthermore neither human survival nor progress depend upon us being free to eat animals when we need food, but only on where they the only source of food available to keep us alive and reasonably healthy. In these cases such arguments again assert that killing at least some animals would be permissible; this condition, however, is simply not applicable to the vast majority of those living in the developed world. When employing a non-speciesist policy of equal consideration of interests it can be determined where reasoned exceptions to this kind of general rule can be employed without inconsistency.

To ascribe rights to animals is to contradict the purpose and justification of rights: the protection of human interests.

To suggest that a necessary condition of a correctly attributed right is that it must protect human interests would beg the very question at issue. An ethical theory stipulates certain attributes which must be met in order for a certain subject to be granted rights. Such a theory would seem somewhat faulty were one of its required attributes that of being biologically human, as this would be arbitrary and speciesist; precisely what Animal Rights arguments emphasize.

Rights are moral principles governing the interactions of rational, productive beings, who prosper not in a world of eat or be eaten, but a world of voluntary, mutually beneficial cooperation and trade.

This, presumably, cannot truly be what you believe. If this were the case, then those beings that lack reason and/or the ability to cooperate or be productive should not be the subjects of ethical consideration, or would at least be rendered valid subjects for experimentation in the interests those who do hold those attributes. This, prime facie, would appear an ideal solution to the problem of an ethically relevant distinction, but has the unfortunate consequence of removing ethical consideration from a significant group of human beings – those with extreme cognitive disabilities, even young babies and ironically enough those with advanced Alzheimer's disease, etc. Furthermore, we cannot simply remedy this issue by appealing to the fact that such marginal cases are human without further petitio principii.

The death and destruction that would result from any serious attempt to pretend that animals have rights would be catastrophic—for humans—a prospect the movement’s most consistent members embrace. Newkirk calls human beings “the biggest blight on the face of the earth.” Freeman Wicklund of Compassionate Action for Animals declares: “We need a drastic decrease in human population if we ever hope to create a just and equitable world for animals.”

There is no need to pretend that animals have rights or anything of the sort – they simply fulfil or do not fulfil the requirements our accepted ethical theory specifies for those who are to be granted them. And without wanting invoke the problems we have just seen, those of human marginal cases, it seems difficult to deny that they must be attributed with at least some rights. To suggest that recognising such an attribution itself would be catastrophic for human beings, while merely an appeal to consequence, would seem to be something of an alarmist empirical claim based simply on the fact that you think it is true – and it is difficult to see why such recognition would necessitate anything at all being destroyed.

Having not seen the Wicklund quote in it's full context it is difficult to know whether he is, say, urging for measures to curb human population increase in the interests of reducing animal suffering and the benefit to the environment or if he is espousing the mass-genocide of human beings as seems to have been delicately implied.

The central issue in the “animal rights” debate is not whether it is acceptable to torture animals, but whether it is proper to use them for human benefit. The “animal rights” movement’s emphasis on the senseless torture of animals, in the rare cases where it actually exists, is a red herring. It is a way of promoting opposition to life-saving animal research companies, and sympathy for themselves, so as to further their evil agenda of subjugating human beings to animals.

You seem to have intentionally misrepresented opposing arguments in order to render them more easily refutable. No prominent argument in favour of Animal Rights has any intention of lowering the ethical status of human beings to one beneath than that of animals. Furthermore, the motives responsible for such arguments being raised is perfectly irrelevant to the validity or truth value of those arguments.

They must not be allowed to get away with such dishonesty. What is needed is a principled, intellectual defense of the absolute right of animal experimentation, against the deadly notion of “animal rights.” Anything less is cruelty to humans.

I would whole-heartedly agree – I would like to hear a principled, intellectual defence of why animal experimentation is absolutely ethically justifiable; sadly, in the last thirty years of the philosophy of ethics nothing even approaching this has been produced.

In conclusion, it seems that the main crux of the article rests on the following – the problem with which is clear:

Animals Rights arguments claim animals should be valued in their own right and not merely as objects to be used for the benefit of human beings.
Acceptance of this argument would not benefit human beings.
Therefore this argument should be dismissed.

The Jack Shit Paradox – A Deductive Contradiction

2004-11-22T11:19:00.000Z

The nature of the Jack Shit paradox is most prominently highlighted by the outcomes produced when truths or even merely propositions pertaining to the subject of Jack Shit are used as premises for a basic form of Modus Tollens reasoning. The major concern this example raises is not specifically that either of the premises themselves can be false but simply that this form of argument, held almost universally as objectively and necessarily valid, can, even if both premises are true and their conclusion follows from them, allow that conclusion to be incorrect.

To elaborate a little further on Modus Tollens for those who may not be familiar with the concept – it is a form of logical argument which states that should the consequent of a conditional variable be false then it is must be the case that the antecedent is also false.

Structural Example of Modus Tollens:

If P, then Q.
Q is false.
Therefore, P is false.

Observable Example of Modus Tollens:

If I am travelling in a motor-car then I am travelling in a vehicle.
I am not travelling in a vehicle.
Therefore, I am not travelling in a motor-car.

This form of reasoning is widely held within the fields of epistemology, formal logic and as far as civilization and humanity as a whole to be constantly valid. And seemingly with good reason – not simply that there has never been an example of it’s failure to produce a sound conclusion given true premises but because it does not seem possible for, given that prerequisite, an unsound conclusion to result.

The problem itself can be exemplified by using the following two premises

If one knows nothing then one knows Jack Shit.
One doesn’t know Jack Shit.

The conclusion that naturally follows from these is:

Therefore one knows something.

The falsehood here is self-evident. For it is quite plain that if one doesn’t know Jack Shit then it is necessarily true that one knows nothing; yet standard form Modus Tollens gives us the exact opposite conclusion.

Quick Question

2004-11-02T11:59:00.000Z

I was just thinking about another rather unstructured seminar on ethics that I had yesterday, and I had a couple of questions that people on here may be able to answer, firstly can utilitarianism escape the charge that at first glance it seems to allow slavery within its ethical sphere, and secondly a similar one, how does contractualism deal with the issue of prostitution?
Any ideas?

Rhetoric

2004-09-12T16:48:00.000+01:00

I was reading Ed's post on Fahrenheit 9/11 and read this website about logical fallacies. The site lists and defines (with examples) various fallacies which people use in debate etc. Anyway, it reminded me of this site which gives rhetorical terms, structures and strategies – to some extent they cover similar ground, but as rhetoric is so central to the way we argue, I thought you might like a look.

Fahrenheit 9/11

2004-09-09T13:24:00.000+01:00

I was basically hoping I could “weather out the storm” with regards to Fahrenheit 9/11 [TRAILER]; but it just doesn’t want to go away. It seems that every few days I’m asked what I thought of the film and it’s a question I never really know how to answer. I suppose that is what this post is for; so I can link people to it in an effort to avoid repeatedly covering the same ground. It’s not going to be very novel to those familiar with the online debates on the subject but may be of interest to those who have seen some of Michael Moore’s TV Nation series, caught Fahrenheit 9/11 at the cinema, but haven’t delved much deeper into the issue. In fact, I’m normally fairly concerned at how, at first, most of those I talk to on the subject have not questioned any aspect of the film at all, which is especially troubling when considering how popular it has been – breaking records in the US and UK. A possible cause of these phenomena is that Michael Moore is held to be something like a modern day concept of Che Guevara and almost wields as much student kudos. Anyway, I’m digressing to some extent. For a very convincing critique of the film you may want to have a look at the “Fifty-nine Deceits in Fahrenheit 9/11” website by Dave Kopel of the Independence Institute. An in-depth and well researched account of, as Kopel argues, a plethora of misleading and false statements and assertions in the film. It’s a fairly long piece but you can get the basic idea of what’s being said by looking at the summary [PDF or HTML version via Google]. Of course there have been objections to the project, some first-hand by Moore (which are actively addressed within the piece itself) and others by third parties (although the latter I found to be highly dubious in its claims to have debunked the Kopel piece, not to mention it getting it’s first argumentum ad hominem circumstantial down before even finishing with the preamble). “One controversial film deserves another” – this is the tagline for a forthcoming film called Farenhype 9/11 [TRAILER: MPEG4 or WMV]; made, unsurprisingly, in opposition to Moore’s and although this does seem to revolve around a political ideal from which I am far removed, I feel committed at least to watching it. This isn’t the first time an objection of such depth has been raised against one of Moore’s films, and, cliché of clichés, I’m sure it won’t be the last.

So to answer what I think, reading between the lines, I am really being asked – “would you recommend Fahrenheit 9/11?” – the answer would be “no”. I think it would be much more productive to look at a level-headed and honest critique of the Bush administration. For example the excellent “The President of Good and Evil” by Peter Singer.

Idiolects

2004-08-29T23:51:00.000+01:00

Well, hello. Thank you for the invite.

I thought long and hard (five minutes... Including a few spent admiring a massive spider) about what I should write... So here goes.

I was trying to assess the tone of the site a few weeks ago, with the vague notion of using my critical reading skills to analyze the idiolect used on this site, and wherever the other contributors congregate... Anyway, abandoning that as too ambitious I got to thinking about idiolects, and malleability

Every now and then I try to take up a pen and write something, hoping that I’ll create the next literary masterpiece and live out my days in excess and sycophantery (if anyone knows what the real word for being flattered is, please tell). However I normally find that the style of my writing is heavily influenced by the novels or poets I have recently read. So I have work that reads like Kafka, Seneca, Orwell and now to my amazement I seem to be (at least in my 'fiction') picking up elements of Joyce.

If you listened to a conversation at the Swan House (gym), you’d probably notice that the longer somebody has stayed there the closer to Jim and Leo’s idiolect their speech has become... So Chris and Leo are now the same person in all but matter, and I’m sure they're working on that. This is of course true in most social groups – to my annoyance one of my girlfriend’s mates has begun to pick up on my idiolect, which gives a slightly creepy Single White Female undertone to our conversations now.

So my question is then, how do 'original' authors, like Joyce, Kafka or Seneca escape from this attraction to our compatriots’ idiolects? Post-modernism, at least in literature, encourages us to embrace the cliché, accepting that it is impossible to say anything new now. Is it our fate now to just ventriloqiuse the geniuses of the past? Anyway, that last line sounds a lot like Sarah Jessica Parker in Sex and the City, and if I am forced to adopt other people's idiolects I would rather adopt somebody good, I call that an opening piece and hope it stirs some interest.

Yet Another PETA thread

2004-07-23T14:15:00.000+01:00

Yet another PETA/Animal Rights thread on Metafilter that I felt the need to stick my proverbial oar into. It became even more erratic than the last, if such a thing can be believed. This time it was concerning the abuses captured on video [250Kbp/s] at a Pilgrim’s Pride (a main supplier for KFC) chicken processing plant. Unpleasent.

Famine, Affluence and Apathy

2004-07-16T16:03:00.000+01:00

“I open up my wallet and it's full of blood” – Godspeed You! Black Emperor

After having had a brief conversation among a few friends about the ethics of charity, or to what level of humanitarianism we are ethically commited, in a horribly noisy and unsuitable environment I thought it might be a good idea to mention it here where it's possible to think a little more clearly. The main question was this: Can we justify choosing to do nothing at all towards charitable causes which affect human life or death? – and if not – Are we presently doing enough?

I think it is all but certain the answer to the fomer is “no” and, for the vast majority of us, I believe that the same is applies to the latter.

If you are not convinced though, you may want to read through what I believe to be a very strong argument for why the majority of us are commited to do more; Famine, Affluence and Morality by Peter Singer. This paper was written in 1971 and uses as its case study the famine which affected East Bengal at the time – the famine itslef, along with the civil conflict which caused it, was repsonsible for at least a million deaths.

Of course, this subject matter is directly analogous or at least predominantly applicable to certain problems the world faces at present. Most notably, there is the situation in Sudan, which is currently the main concern of Oxfam; and the AIDS epidemic affecting Sub-Saharan Africa along with a number of other developing countries. UNAIDS (The Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS) predicts that by 2010 there will be 45 million new infections; of which 29 million are avoidable if the necessary preventative measures are taken now. Exactly what is necessary for such prevention is by no means prohibitive; simply money, money that is not vital to the lives of those who have it.

For further information about organisations related to these matters, or to look for those which deal with a specific issue, the UK Charity Commision hosts a very useful website where charities can be searched by name, number, objetive or area in which they operate, along with plenty of information to assure even the most cynical; income, expenditure, trustees etc.

The Life's not Fair Fallacy

2004-06-28T15:08:00.000+01:00

Last night a friend of mine was telling me a story about, what seemed to me, a particularly nasty character. The story was followed by his, the character in question’s, justification for his behaviour, which was simply:

‘Well life’s not fair either.’

Presumably the intent for such a statement is to show that, since life is generally not fair, certain unfair practices are justifiable.

Given that this statement is used relatively often as a justification for unfair practices or behaviour, when it really is nothing of the sort, seems to call for its classification as a fallacy.

The Life’s not Fair Fallacy.

The fallacy is committed when an appeal to the ‘unfairness of life’ is used as a justification for some act or practice. However, the normative status of the practice in question obviously stands irrespective of whether or not similar instances of unfairness happen in the world.

An example:

Lenny bought a car with an engine full of sawdust yesterday. He took it back to the dealer and protested that this was simply not fair. The dealer replied, “well that’s life for you”.

Note: The Life’s not fair fallacy is a variant of the two wrongs make a right fallacy, however, the former uses a fallacious appeal to common unfairness in life, the latter to another wrong action.

Although it may seem that, an appeal to the unfairness of nature, such as earthquakes, hurricanes, disease and other natural disasters can be used as a reminder that one should not protest at their car being crushed by falling trees, it must be remembered that this is because nature is not in the business of fairness. An appeal to the unfairness of nature, however, may be used in an attempt to justify some human practice or act, in which case, the fallacy is committed.

A Critique of the Freenet Philosophy - A Response to the Reply by Ian Clarke

2004-06-25T16:52:00.000+01:00

It could very well be the case that to indulge in child pornography may satiate the sexual desire of a paedophile and consequentially render that person less of a threat to other people; however, my argument is neutral to this. It merely relies on the fact that if there is greater consumption of such materials and therefore greater production, people will be harmed inherently by this production if not necessarily its consequences.

It is true that bad people could use any tool, absolute liberty included, to do bad things. Yet rational persons would never argue in favour of absolute liberty as it essentially entails a return to the Hobbesian state of nature. The prevention of the negative factors that it is possible for a state of affairs to bring about, by no means necessitates prevention of the positive. This is quite aside from the point that the Freenet tool itself is not specifically what is being challenged here, but the idea that the total and absolute negation of censorship will result, both directly and indirectly, in harm to people. If a tool is created specifically to further this end, then that action is ethically indefensible; or so the argument goes.

The examples of actions given, and asserted as showing the harm principle as unworkable, are, ironically enough, the very kind of actions that this principle seeks to protect. If harm is thought of, as you seem to suggest, as an almost infinitely broad and causally irrespective concept, of course it will be unable to offer rational ethical guidance; but the concept is far more specific, and relates to ideas such as the frustration of autonomy, security, basic human rights etc. So, under the harm principle, as long as your actions do not frustrate these interests in Bill or George (presuming you are not, by these actions, actively and directly defending your own such interests from frustration by these specific individuals), they are perfectly permissible. But of course, a means whereby child pornography, terrorism and other similarly harmful activities are able to operate relatively unhindered, does, directly or indirectly, violate some or all of the core tenets of this principle. It is also worth noting here that the harm principle is neutral to law, politics and economics; it is strictly a foundation of ethics.

I neither hold nor assert that all forms of government control should be tolerated. However, in an attempt to clarify my argument let me ask you to consider the following consequence:

C1: The unintentional provision of an authority with the ability, but not necessarily the intention, to abuse a power in such a way as to suppress legitimate free speech and distribution of content; two of the most vital means of effective democracy.

And secondly, the following two sets of circumstances:

Sc1: This set of circumstances harms people. In allowing an authority to prevent Sc1 we unavoidably invoke the consequence C1.
Sc2: This set of circumstances harms people. In allowing an authority to prevent Sc2 we unavoidably invoke the consequence C1.

If we simply hold that the consequence C1 is absolutely unacceptable, then one should assert that both Sc1 and Sc2 be tolerated despite the harm they cause to people. However, if one does not believe that such harm to people is worth such an absolute guarantee of free speech and distribution of content then one should assert that both Sc1 and Sc2 be authoritatively suppressed.

The following are descriptions as to what these two sets of circumstances are:

A: Child pornography, terrorism, etc. operating through electronic channels.
B: The acts of rape and murder.

I will let it remain unclear however, as to which set of circumstances (Sc1 or Sc2) definitions A or B pertain.

A Critique of the Freenet Philosophy - A Reply by Ian Clarke

2004-06-25T16:45:00.000+01:00

P1: Total and absolute free flow of information will result in some amount of harm to people. This result will be indirectly causal in some cases, such as the case of child pornography - It would be difficult to argue that the existence of an undetectable method of distribution for such material would not increase the demand for it, and this demand increase supply; a supply which inherently harms people.

Its not central to my argument, but have you considered the possibility that the existence of child pornography might act, with a pedophile, in a manner similar to that in which methadone acts with a heroin addict?

In other words, have you considered the possibility that access to child pornography might actually reduce the likelihood that a pedophile will assault a child?

I do not claim that this is the case, but I do not take it for given that it isn't either - and it demonstrates that even this most emotive of issues is not black and white.

In other, more direct cases, for instance those of free flow of information for terrorists, drug cartels, prostitution rings, etc., such a channel would make these activities feasible to entertain without fear of legal consequence and infinitely more difficult if not impossible to detect and effectively suppress; again resulting harm to people.

It is true that bad people could use any tool, Freenet included, to do bad things. You have not shown that the harm caused by these bad things is greater than the good that comes from good people using that tool to do good things.

P2: [The Millsian harm principle:] is that the sole end for which mankind are warranted, individually or collectively in interfering with the liberty of action of any of their number, is self-protection. That the only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others. - John Stuart Mill - On Liberty (1869)

I don't find this principle particularly persuasive.

If one was to accept this principle, or at least the application of this principle as you seek to use it, George W Bush (for example) can legitimately take action against any individual that criticizes him - since such criticism could be said to harm him (specifically, harm his chances of reelection).

There many ways one could harm someone that are perfectly legal. For example, I could harm Bill Gates by creating software that competes favorably with his software and giving it away. Despite this, it would not be appropriate for the government to prevent me from harming Bill Gates in this way.

What P2 misses is that there is no universal "harm", often one person must be harmed to protect another. The question is which will lead to the least harm overall. My argument is that the benefits of making government censorship impossible far outweigh any disadvantages.

E1: The only way rape and murder could be suppressed is by providing an authority with the ability to monitor and control behaviour.
E2: Since supplying such an ability will invariably provide that authority with the opportunity to abuse it, by controlling arbitrary behaviour (including free speech and distribution of content), it cannot be allowed.
EC1: Therefore, rape and murder should not be suppressed.

You are correct that some forms of government control are tolerable, but it does not then follow that all forms of government control, including control over our ability to communicate, must be tolerated.

Government control over the means of communication is different to other forms of government control due to the nature of how governments in democratic countries acquire the right to exercise any control in the first place.

Governments in democratic countries gain their legitimacy from the fact that they were chosen and are answerable to those they govern. If such governments have the ability to control the ability of those they govern to acquire and exchange information, then they have the ability to prevent the population from holding them to account, and indeed, prevent the population from knowing that they are being prevented from holding them to account.

Thus, to safeguard the legitimacy of a democratic government, that government must be prevented from controlling the information its citizens have access to.

B: Reject the harm principle and in turn reject all forms of effective controls of liberty.

No, I reject one form of effective control of liberty for reasons outlined above and in Freenet's philosophy document. You cannot imply from this that I reject all forms of control on liberty, and thus your argument collapses.

A Critique of the Freenet Philosophy

2004-06-24T15:49:00.000+01:00

From the Freenet FAQ, Section 1: "Freenet is free software designed to ensure true freedom of communication over the Internet. It allows anybody to publish and read information with complete anonymity. Nobody controls Freenet, not even its creators, meaning that the system is not vulnerable to manipulation or shutdown. Freenet is also very efficient in how it deals with information, adaptively replicating content in response to demand. For more information, please read What Is Freenet."

This afternoon I wrote an email to Ian Clarke, the main developer of Freenet and the author of the philosophy behind it. This message included the argument below; in which I highlight what I believe to be fatal problems with the justifications presented for such a project. I suggest you at least read the Freenet Philosophy page before continuing.

Preface: To move for the total and absolute removal of censorship or to directly provide a means to cause censorship to be unenforceable, as with the Freenet philosophy, is an ethically indefensible stance, or so I will argue.

"Belief in democracy, however, like any other belief, may be carried to the point where it becomes fanatical, and therefore harmful."
Bertrand Russell - Ideas That Have Harmed Mankind (1950)

P1: Total and absolute free flow of information will result in some amount of harm to people. This result will be indirectly causal in some cases, such as the case of child pornography - It would be difficult to argue that the existence of an undetectable method of distribution for such material would not increase the demand for it, and this demand increase supply; a supply which inherently harms people. In other, more direct cases, for instance those of free flow of information for terrorists, drug cartels, prostitution rings, etc., such a channel would make these activities feasible to entertain without fear of legal consequence and infinitely more difficult if not impossible to detect and effectively suppress; again resulting harm to people.

For the sake of argument I will take the Millsian approach to liberty, an approach which seems to be the most liberal, generally accepted and closest to the Freenet philosophy from which it is possible to work. Although it is worth noting at this point that there are also strong arguments for even stricter controls on liberty. The basic framework of the Millsian model is the harm principle:

P2: "[The Millsian harm principle:] is that the sole end for which mankind are warranted, individually or collectively in interfering with the liberty of action of any of their number, is self-protection. That the only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others."
John Stuart Mill - On Liberty (1869)
C: At least some control of liberty, including that of free speech and distribution of content, by a government, is necessary.

Of course, if you accept P1, which I do not think it would be reasonable to reject since the Freenet website itself makes connotations to these consequences being necessary evils, you certainly do not agree with P2 and C. This would seem given as you hold that in providing an authority with the power to uphold the harm principle, one must take the unacceptable risk that such an authority may abuse that power. These objections can be summarised with the following argument:

F1: For an authority to uphold the harm principle it is necessary for that authority to be attributed the power to successfully monitor and control behaviour.
F2: The attribution of these powers would, by necessary consequence, make it at least possible for such powers to be abused to prevent legitimate freedom of speech or distribution of content.
FC1: Since this is an unacceptable risk, the harm principle should not be upheld.

The problem with such an argument seems to stem from the fact that any authority given the task of upholding the harm principle must, consequentially, have at least the ability, if not necessarily the intention, to suppress legitimate speech or distribution of content; two of the most vital requirements for effective democracy. But in rejecting the harm principle for the reasons stated in F2 and FC1, and given that you hold that some level of human harm to be an acceptable factor as a means to the end of absolute assurance of legitimate liberty, it would be very difficult to reason as to why you do not subscribe to the following:

E1: The only way rape and murder could be suppressed is by providing an authority with the ability to monitor and control behaviour.
E2: Since supplying such an ability will invariably provide that authority with the opportunity to abuse it, by controlling arbitrary behaviour (including free speech and distribution of content), it cannot be allowed.
EC1: Therefore, rape and murder should not be suppressed.

This seems to leave you with two very distinct alternatives:

A: Support the harm principle (to some extent if not absolutely) and in turn the attribution of powers to an authority, powers that it is at least possible will be abused to prevent legitimate freedom of speech or distribution of content.
B: Reject the harm principle and in turn reject all forms of effective controls of liberty.

If you choose A the problem for the Freenet philosophy is self-evident. If you choose B, as a means of affirming the principle that an absolute guarantee of free speech is all important and overrides the rights of some people, it is not possible for a society to enforce any conventional models of human rights. To do so would require an authority to be granted the necessary power to achieve this end; a power that such a principle of absolute guarantee deems unacceptable.

Another PETA thread.

2004-04-14T12:51:00.000+01:00

A thread on Metafilter about PETA which I couldn't really resist getting involved in; ever get that feeling when you're the only one left at a party?