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From: torek@umich.UUCP (Paul V. Torek )
Newsgroups: net.politics.theory
Subject: Re: Pollution: no libertarian solution
Message-ID: <395@umich.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 15-Jan-86 00:54:51 EST
Article-I.D.: umich.395
Posted: Wed Jan 15 00:54:51 1986
Date-Received: Fri, 17-Jan-86 03:38:17 EST
References: <2694@umcp-cs.UUCP> <28200546@inmet.UUCP>
Reply-To: torek@zippy.UUCP (Paul V. Torek )
Organization: University of Michigan, EECS Dept., Ann Arbor, MI
Lines: 49
Summary: 

In article <28200546@inmet.UUCP> janw@inmet.UUCP writes:
>If the right is all on *one* side and if the violation is in  the
>*future*  ("would-be  polluter")  then  you are absolutely right.

Thank you.

>Both conditions are necessary.

Granted.

>Now consider two people breathing in a stuffy  room.  *Both*  are
>polluters,  both  victims  and  by the same process. None holds a
>moral trump card. If, for whatever reason (say,  a garlic  diet),
>one  pollutes  *more*,  there  is  still  no trump card - it is a
>matter of degree; he has a right to breath;  finite  compensation
>is appropriate.

How did they get in that room; who built the room, etc.?  Perhaps the
following sort of case is what you want:  two people breathing in a stuffy
natural enclosure (cave, say) where both were born.  In that case, I'd say
that libertarian principles require each person to choose between:
a)  living in the (a) way that inflicts minimal possible discomfort on the
other;
b)  meeting the other's price for deviations from a).

>"A right not to be imposed upon" is ambiguous.
>You interpret it as "right not to be harmed or inconvenienced".
>By your definition, if the *existence* of someone gets on
>my nerves and shortens my life, that person owes me whatever
>I ask (such as to terminate his existence). 

Wrong.  Your reaction to his existence is self-imposed.  He owes you only for
discomforts he *causes* you.  Or at any rate, that must be the distinction
libertarianism would rely on here.  If such a distinction cannot be drawn, so
much the worse for libertarianism.

>And for some reason you consider this bizarre position libertarian.

Your straw man, not mine.  The fundamental concept of libertarianism is the
"right not to be imposed upon".  If you feel that I have misinterpreted what
it means to "impose" upon someone (I don't think I have), I invite you to
supply a better interpretation.

>See above. Pollution is morally superior to confiscation. 

See above:  no it's not.  Pollution, like confiscation, is an imposition.
Mere existence, even if someone else chooses to react to it, is not.

--Paul V. Torek							torek@umich