GE Morton wrote: ↑May 24th, 2022, 12:29 pm
Well, you just seem to be ignoring the arguments previously made. Property laws --- most of them, in the common law tradition --- are not "artificially instituted." They have a clear and compelling moral basis. You're also ignoring the implications of the
reductio ad absurdum concerning lost opportunities. The "opportunities" you imagine cannot be seized, which is absurd.
I haven't ignored your arguments. I disagree, and since I've explained why many times, I needn't do it again.
Well, no. An absurd scenario is not a reductio ad absurdum argument. The latter is an argument showing that a proposition, plausible on its face, leads to absurdities when applied consistently.
What are you talking about? The logical consequences of property rights are (or could be) exactly the scenario I proposed. I correctly called it a reduction ad absurdum.
Oh, surely you can recognize a difference between those. Yes, a customer is a "partner," in a sense --- someone with whom one intentionally enters into a relationship pursuant to mutual or complementary interests.
That is true, of course. And it is reasonable for the legal system (which, after all, regulates the entire economy through, among other things, property law) to regulate economic relationships distinctly from social ones.
Well, whether a purported right is a "fiat right" is not a matter of opinion. The latter is a legal right which has no basis other than the whim of some lawgiver. Property rights (as understood in the liberal and common law traditions) have an objective and morally defensible basis, which precedes any laws. And, in fact, they don't vary much from culture to culture. What may count as private property (as opposed to communal property) varies somewhat, but the first possession principle determines ownership nearly everywhere, for personal/private as well as communal property. Notions such as "Our ancestral lands" rest upon that principle.
My grandson, (First grade, in public school in Portland, OR) engages in a ritual "land acknowledgement" pledge. It has, apparently, replaced the Pledge of Alliegance. I wish I had a copy, because, althought he recited it for me, I can't remember the exact words. But it goes on about thanking the Multnomah and Clackamas Indians for the Land surrounding Portlands. "They lived here peacefully for tens of thousands of years..." is the part I remmeber, or something close to it. It's ridiculous First, the Natives were not peaceable, and secomd.they didn't live there for "tens of thousands of years". In fact, they probably usurped the land themselves, from whoever lived their previously. I mention this because property exists only in as much as it can be enforced. "First Possession" means nothing, unless it can be protected. All those castles in Europe testify to this reality. Raiding was once considered a respectable occupation.
IN modern America, the property rights are protected by the state. Great! We don't need all those castles and private sstanding armies. But property rights are simply those that the state chooses to legislate and protect. If the state chooses to honor "first possession" -- so be it. But it's nonsense to suggest that because common law -- from the days of slavery -- defines ownership that way, we must do the same.