It seems that you are skipping a step in the epistemology, or else I've misplaced part of your argument.
Shouldn't the question in the case of Iraq not be "Does it look now like it is a threat?", but rather "Did it look at the time of invasion like it was clearly a threat?"
And also, the question of whether to stay in Iraq or not might well be a different argument...though based on the same types of criteria as the original, but now with a very different situation?
At least as I see it...though the particular libertarian hawk argument you are combatting seems weak, we have the stronger one of:
Before Iraq, it looked dangerous to us, and was from that location justifiable...even though in retrospect we turn out to have been wrong, because our evidence pointed the other direction.
Now, the question is: "Is the marginal danger of leaving Iraq great enough to justify the cost of staying?" And again, that answer may well be a yes from the lib. hawk perspective.
Anyhow, been great reading your blog this past several months. I enjoy your thoughts and directions...especially your Rawlsian musings.
Micha Ghertner
· 5 years ago
Before Iraq, it looked dangerous to us, and was from that location justifiable...even though in retrospect we turn out to have been wrong, because our evidence pointed the other direction.
I'm not sure how you get from "it looked dangerous to us" to it "was from that location justifiable." Did we know that Iraq lacked WMDs prior to invasion? No. I won't even try to argue that the administration should have been more skeptical. Let's assume their analysis was appropriate given the limitations of their intelligence gathering abilities. Heck, I'm even willing to grant the possibility that we will find the WMDs tomorrow.
Does any of this make the war justified? Not until we can show how the presence of WMDs represents a clear and direct threat to the U.S. And I'm sure everyone is already familiar with the argument that many other countries are more dangerous and more likely to be a threat to the U.S. than Iraq. Are we comfortable applying this same argument to Iran and North Korea? Is the consistent application of this argument compatible with any form of libertarianism?
Luka Yovetich
· 5 years ago
Micha,
I know this discussion has been had and had and had. But I don't think a person who supported going into Iraq to get the WMD would necessarily need to support going into Iran or North Korea, if that's what you're implying. I might be the case that Iraq was enough of a (potential) threat to justify going in but not enough of a threat to make it too dangerous to go in. And it's easy to believe that Iran and North Korea were/are too dangerous to attack.
Kyle Aretae
· 5 years ago
Sorry my name didn't appear on the last one.
I wasn't yet intending to make arguments about whether or not the attacks were justified. The intent was to discuss what justification criteria would be, from the POV of a libertarian. And it seemed to me that the line was a little more complex than what came through in Will's post.
--Kyle
McClain
· 5 years ago
If your philosophy gives the wrong answer, then there's something wrong with your philosophy. "Overthrowing evil dictators is always good" is the right answer. "Overthrowing evil dictators is sometimes bad" is the answer your philosophy gave. Where did it go wrong? I don't know, nor do I much care, but I suspect some sort of shell game whereby the Individual gets all the rights & no responsibilities, the State has all the responsibilities & no rights, and Humanity is left holding the bag, with neither rights nor responsibilities.
Will Wilkinson
· 5 years ago
McClain, Your "right answer" is certainly wrong. Suppose overthrowing an evil dictator had the hydra-like consequence of causing three more evil dictators to pop in his place?
Who is this Humanity of which you speak?
aeon skoble
· 5 years ago
Will- Not that I'm a prima donna, but I've replied to you and to other respondents on my blog. It's here (hope I did the html correctly - if not, it's at http://hnn.us/blogs/entries/7333.html) Best, Aeon
McClain
· 5 years ago
3 new dictators? This isn't a hypothetical math problem. Life divided by language does not equal math.
Individual, State, Humanity: positing 3 nodes on a continuum. Brought it up because: U.S. Libertarians haven't shown any solidarity with Iraqi Libertarians.
McClain
· 5 years ago
Sorry if that last was a bit cryptic.
At length: If Libertarians were debating how best to overthrow evil dictators in accordance with Libertarian principles, and loudly advertising to all'n'sundry how their solutions were more cost-effective and aesthetically pleasing than Bush's methods...that would be cool. But all I hear is (self-proclaimed) "Libertarians" making up excuses for NOT overthrowing evil dictators, and then complaining that Bush (and/or anyone else with more spleen than sense) is going about it all wrong. "What if" taking out 1 tyrant generated 3 more? Gee, I dunno..."what if" taking out 1 tyrant prevented any other tyrants from ever achieving power? Infinity being greater than 3, my fake math problem trumps yours. Therein lies the rub. This ain't no fake math problem. "Overthrowing evil dictators is always good" is an axiom which, in practical affairs, all true friends & partisans of Liberty will gladly embrace.
As for Humanity...if I have no moral need nor cognizance of it, what moral need (or cognizance) have I of the proverbial State? You can work out the rest of that Reductio yourself, but you-know-that-I-know-that-you-know it doesn't end well for anyone but Solopsits, Nihilists, Anarchists, and other such Crack-Whores.
Luka Yovetich
· 5 years ago
McClain,
I think Will's point is that there are som imaginable situations where it would be better to not overthrow an evil dictator. Overthrowing a particular dictator is not of infinite value. If we can reasonably expect that taking him out will make matters worse, then we should not take him out.
If you think that Iraq was a situation where taking Saddam brought about more good than bad, then just say so. But don't act like it's always okay to take out any evil dictator NO MATTER WHAT. That's just silly.
McClain
· 5 years ago
Well, Luka, I do believe taking out Saddam has brought about more good than bad. And this good will reverberate into the indefinite future. I’m calling “overthrowing evil dictators is always good” an axiom because: though we may not, in this fickle and poorly-lit world, always be sure what results our actions will bring, we may yet be sure, so long as we are overthrowing evil dictators, that soldiering on with sanguine confidence is, at the very worst, an act of courage in the face of evil. Must Libertarians pretend to know the future before they decide if fighting for Liberty is good?
Luces
· 5 years ago
"Though we may not, in this fickle and poorly-lit world, always be sure what results our actions will bring, we may yet be sure, so long as we are overthrowing evil dictators, that soldiering on with sanguine confidence is, at the very worst, an act of courage in the face of evil."
But what good is virtue if it promotes evil? Is courage just intriniscally good? If so, how did you learn that? Noetic rays? Revelation from God? C'mon. Go back to the 17th Century! Overthrowing evil dictators is not always right; I submit that NO act-type is ALWAYS right.
Rhetoric like yours - rhetoric like is contained in your pompous and diversive anti-moral-mathematics screed - would be good for motivating Germans to pump bodies into furnaces, etc. It isn't good for much else.
Luka Yovetich
· 5 years ago
McClain,
It's not enough to be courageous in the face of evil. It's about being courageous in the face of evil when doing so can be expected to bring about more good than bad. Or something like that.
And no, people don't have to KNOW the future before they fight evil. But they should be thoughtful about the consequences of their actions and if it seems that fighting evil in a particular situation in a particular way will bring about more harm than good, then they should choose another course.
All Comments
It seems that you are skipping a step in the epistemology, or else I've misplaced part of your argument.
Shouldn't the question in the case of Iraq not be "Does it look now like it is a threat?", but rather "Did it look at the time of invasion like it was clearly a threat?"
And also, the question of whether to stay in Iraq or not might well be a different argument...though based on the same types of criteria as the original, but now with a very different situation?
At least as I see it...though the particular libertarian hawk argument you are combatting seems weak, we have the stronger one of:
Before Iraq, it looked dangerous to us, and was from that location justifiable...even though in retrospect we turn out to have been wrong, because our evidence pointed the other direction.
Now, the question is: "Is the marginal danger of leaving Iraq great enough to justify the cost of staying?" And again, that answer may well be a yes from the lib. hawk perspective.
Anyhow, been great reading your blog this past several months. I enjoy your thoughts and directions...especially your Rawlsian musings.
I'm not sure how you get from "it looked dangerous to us" to it "was from that location justifiable." Did we know that Iraq lacked WMDs prior to invasion? No. I won't even try to argue that the administration should have been more skeptical. Let's assume their analysis was appropriate given the limitations of their intelligence gathering abilities. Heck, I'm even willing to grant the possibility that we will find the WMDs tomorrow.
Does any of this make the war justified? Not until we can show how the presence of WMDs represents a clear and direct threat to the U.S. And I'm sure everyone is already familiar with the argument that many other countries are more dangerous and more likely to be a threat to the U.S. than Iraq. Are we comfortable applying this same argument to Iran and North Korea? Is the consistent application of this argument compatible with any form of libertarianism?
I know this discussion has been had and had and had. But I don't think a person who supported going into Iraq to get the WMD would necessarily need to support going into Iran or North Korea, if that's what you're implying. I might be the case that Iraq was enough of a (potential) threat to justify going in but not enough of a threat to make it too dangerous to go in. And it's easy to believe that Iran and North Korea were/are too dangerous to attack.
I wasn't yet intending to make arguments about whether or not the attacks were justified. The intent was to discuss what justification criteria would be, from the POV of a libertarian. And it seemed to me that the line was a little more complex than what came through in Will's post.
--Kyle
"Overthrowing evil dictators is always good" is the right answer.
"Overthrowing evil dictators is sometimes bad" is the answer your philosophy gave. Where did it go wrong?
I don't know, nor do I much care, but I suspect some sort of shell game whereby the Individual gets all the rights & no responsibilities, the State has all the responsibilities & no rights, and Humanity is left holding the bag, with neither rights nor responsibilities.
Who is this Humanity of which you speak?
Not that I'm a prima donna, but I've replied to you and to other respondents on my blog. It's here (hope I did the html correctly - if not, it's at http://hnn.us/blogs/entries/7333.html)
Best,
Aeon
Individual, State, Humanity: positing 3 nodes on a continuum.
Brought it up because: U.S. Libertarians haven't shown any solidarity with Iraqi Libertarians.
At length:
If Libertarians were debating how best to overthrow evil dictators in accordance with Libertarian principles, and loudly advertising to all'n'sundry how their solutions were more cost-effective and aesthetically pleasing than Bush's methods...that would be cool.
But all I hear is (self-proclaimed) "Libertarians" making up excuses for NOT overthrowing evil dictators, and then complaining that Bush (and/or anyone else with more spleen than sense) is going about it all wrong.
"What if" taking out 1 tyrant generated 3 more?
Gee, I dunno..."what if" taking out 1 tyrant prevented any other tyrants from ever achieving power? Infinity being greater than 3, my fake math problem trumps yours. Therein lies the rub. This ain't no fake math problem.
"Overthrowing evil dictators is always good" is an axiom which, in practical affairs, all true friends & partisans of Liberty will gladly embrace.
As for Humanity...if I have no moral need nor cognizance of it, what moral need (or cognizance) have I of the proverbial State?
You can work out the rest of that Reductio yourself, but you-know-that-I-know-that-you-know
it doesn't end well for anyone but Solopsits, Nihilists, Anarchists, and other such Crack-Whores.
I think Will's point is that there are som imaginable situations where it would be better to not overthrow an evil dictator. Overthrowing a particular dictator is not of infinite value. If we can reasonably expect that taking him out will make matters worse, then we should not take him out.
If you think that Iraq was a situation where taking Saddam brought about more good than bad, then just say so. But don't act like it's always okay to take out any evil dictator NO MATTER WHAT. That's just silly.
And this good will reverberate into the indefinite future.
I’m calling “overthrowing evil dictators is always good” an axiom because: though we may not, in this fickle and poorly-lit world, always be sure what results our actions will bring, we may yet be sure, so long as we are overthrowing evil dictators, that soldiering on with sanguine confidence is, at the very worst, an act of courage in the face of evil.
Must Libertarians pretend to know the future before they decide if fighting for Liberty is good?
But what good is virtue if it promotes evil? Is courage just intriniscally good? If so, how did you learn that? Noetic rays? Revelation from God? C'mon. Go back to the 17th Century! Overthrowing evil dictators is not always right; I submit that NO act-type is ALWAYS right.
Rhetoric like yours - rhetoric like is contained in your pompous and diversive anti-moral-mathematics screed - would be good for motivating Germans to pump bodies into furnaces, etc. It isn't good for much else.
It's not enough to be courageous in the face of evil. It's about being courageous in the face of evil when doing so can be expected to bring about more good than bad. Or something like that.
And no, people don't have to KNOW the future before they fight evil. But they should be thoughtful about the consequences of their actions and if it seems that fighting evil in a particular situation in a particular way will bring about more harm than good, then they should choose another course.
Oops, Godwin's Law: you lose. ;-)