From: anderson@macc.wisc.edu (Jess Anderson)
Subject: "Rational" Humans vs ?? (was Re: On Banning Private Discrimination)
Organization: Madison Academic Computing Center, UW-Madison
Date: Wed, 22 Jul 92 23:03:22 GMT


In article <1992Jul22.205623.23453@gordian.com>
mike@gordian.com (Michael A.  Thomas) writes:

>In article <1992Jul22.183932.520@macc.wisc.edu>,
>anderson@macc.wisc.edu (Jess Anderson) writes:

>>In article <15520@star.cs.vu.nl> fjvwing@cs.vu.nl (FJ!!)
>>writes:

>>>I've finally found what doesn't click with Libertarianism
>>>and me: a belief that people are guided by rationale,
>>>maximalisation of happiness, and concious thinking about the
>>>cutting edges of judgements in life, with total disregard of
>>>things like peer-pressure, basic mine-is-mine
>>>like-me-not-like-me instincts.  People aren't rational.

>>Bingo!

>>Well said and said well.

>Which is to say that the only way people will obey is at the
>muzzle of a gun.  How, um, misanthropic.  Pardon me as I
>barf.

But you're making *yourself* ill by setting up a straw
figure.  To say people aren't at base rational does not mean
reason can't be a factor in people's lives.  FJ's point
wasn't that we're all driven solely by reptilian impulses.
Rather, it was that any attempt to reduce the entire
spectrum of human choices and relationships to conscious
processes -- in effect disregarding our irrational
components -- is unrealistically bloodless.

I can only speculate where you get your guns and misanthropy
charges.  But it's no speculation that they do not figure in
what FJ said nor in my agreement with him.

>Libs do not deny that people can be bad, but the wholesale
>condemnation of man to be some sort of animal to be herded
>by the state, since we are evil by nature, is a bit too much
>to take.

You're the only one mentioning that.  If that's the only
alternative you can see, I feel sorry for you.

It is not a "condemnation" to take our complete natures into
account; on the contrary, it is folly not to.  That nature
includes not only our mental (as in rational) capabilities
but also an immense number of other things.  If anything,
it's the libertarians who are "reducing" people by denying
the pertinence of the fuller picture.

>For better or worse, if we are to have a society which is
>not a slave pen we must work off of the assumption that man
>has the potential of being rational.

In all due respect, that's bloated nonsense.  The "potential
of being rational" states the obvious: clearly we have a
good more than potential, in the department of rationality.
The absence of a completely deterministic, linear,
closed-ended society in no way implies that a "slave pen"
society is the only alternative.

It would appear that since you hold such jaundiced views of
the alternatives, that the misanthropy you perceive is in
fact a projection.

>Putting self interest as the incentive is of primary concern
>since a person will not objectify that which is not
>perceived as good for him/her.

Look, there is a considerable fraction of everyone's life,
goals, aspirations, hopes, activities and the whole kit that
in no way involves "objectifying" anything.  Much is driven
by unarticulated, inchoate impulse and nothing else.  It's
*extremely* likely that the vast majority of things we
identify as in our self-interest are anything but rational.

>Perhaps you can tell us what or other choices are.  This
>misanthropic pap is just too much though.

I guess you better stop, then, Michael. :-)

-- 
Jess Anderson <> Madison Academic Computing Center <> University of Wisconsin
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