Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!ucsd!swrinde!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!wuarchive!udel!princeton!phoenix!roger
From: roger@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Roger Lustig)
Newsgroups: alt.individualism
Subject: Re: Phil Ronzone's stereo
Message-ID: <13022@phoenix.Princeton.EDU>
Date: 17 Jan 90 21:28:07 GMT
References: <2310@odin.SGI.COM> <12569@phoenix.Princeton.EDU> <2356@odin.SGI.COM> <1990Jan13.090428.25775@agate.berkeley.edu> <2818@odin.SGI.COM> <8ZggXmy00W0TM96LF=@andrew.cmu.edu> <2847@odin.SGI.COM>
Reply-To: roger@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Roger Lustig)
Distribution: usa
Organization: Princeton University, NJ
Lines: 48

In article <2847@odin.SGI.COM> pkr@maddog.sgi.com (Phil Ronzone) writes:
>In article <8ZggXmy00W0TM96LF=@andrew.cmu.edu> jb3o+@andrew.cmu.edu (Jon Allen Boone) writes:
>>I suppose that means you.  Why is that so?  Why are *you* the one who
>>gets to decide who has property rights and who doesn't?  I,
>>personally, prefer a more utilitarian approach - if i need to utilize
>>it, i do so, irregardless of who "owns" it.  However, if i am not
>>using it, i will either "lend" or "give" it away to others who can or
>>will use it.  Also, there is a difference between wanting to use it
>>and needing to use it.

>As the above posting shows, communism lives on in the hearts and minds ...

Oh, the horror: somebody puts dire need above property rights in certain
circumscribed cses, and for violating the Holy Concept of Property, gets
labeled an icky, evil Commie.  No need for discussion of tough issues
such as the collision of rights.  Just stick on a label and walk away.

So let's say I DON'T have the right to steal food to save my life when
I'm in extremis, or to use a vehicle without permission to get an
emergency case to the hospital.  

Will you fault me for doing so anyway?  

Is the idea of "rights" (defined in purely propertarian terms) even
applicable to moral/ethical issues in these extreme situations?

Let's say I HAVE violated a right.  What measures should be taken
against me?

Are you willing to argue that rights as you define them are never to be
violated?  That it is never right to do so?

>I DON'T decide WHO has property rights. That may be the burning
>issue in your mind, but not mine.

But you DO decide just what they are, it seems.  How do we know what IS
your proerty, and what is not?  If you coerced somebody into handing
something over to you, does that make the thing your property?  If you
purchased a thing that somebody else obtained by coercion, what then?
How do we assign original rights to things that have never been owned,
e.g., the floor of the sea or Antarctica?                

>I ASSERT that my property is my property and that no one has
>the right to take it without my permission.

Bully for you.  Asserting things is easy.  Does your assertion include a

Roger