In the Face of Totalitarians

In the face of totalitarians one cannot retreat into one's private life for they, being totalitarians, won't allow any private life.  So the conservative is forced willy-nilly to become an activist against his natural tendency.  He must draw a line in the sand and say "This far but no farther."

A minor example.  My friends Peter and Mike who teach at community colleges in Maricopa County, Arizona, were on the rant once again yesterday morning over the smoking ban that went into effect on 1 July.  This draconian ruling forbids smoking anywhere on campus, including parking lots and closed cars in such lots.  Bear in mind that reasonable smoking restrictions were already in effect and that my friends, only one of whom smokes, had no objection to them.

Now what is behind the new ruling?  Nothing but lust for power and a desire on the part of its promoters to outdo themselves in pursuit of PC thereby earning 'brownie-points' with the higher-ups.  (I intend 'brownie-points' as a double-entendre with an allusion to brown-nosing.)

And so the breakfast conversation turned to means of combating the insanity: massive disobedience, smoke-ins, and libertarian 'flash mobs':  the tweets go out, the students and faculty assemble quickly to blow some smoke and then just as quickly disperse.  Imagine several such mobs assembling and dispersing at different open-air campus locations on a single day.

The people charged with enforcement would be overwhelmed, the ruling would be flouted into risibility, and then ignored.

Mockery and derision are powerful weapons and perfectly legitimate when one is dealing with willfully stupid and morally stunted Pee-Cee power-heads.

Companion post:  The Conservative Disadvantage

Epicurus in One Sentence and the Comforts of Materialism

When we are, death is not; when death is, we are not.

Some say people hold to religion because of its comforts.  A superficial way of thinking  given religion's moral demands and  the fears it inspires.  It was precisely such fears for which Epicurean materialism  was prescribed as anodyne.

Materialism has its comforts too.  Will you then say that people believe it because it is comforting?

Materialism has its comforts but it also renders human life meaningless. That goes on the debit side of the balance sheet.

A Reason Why Germany Had to Lose the War

Theodor Haecker, Journal in the Night, tr. A. Dru, Pantheon, 1950, p. 172, entry #579 of 10 September 1941:

A year ago today the official propagandist, Fritsche, talking on the wireless, said of the bombing of London: 'Once upon a time fire rained down upon Sodom and Gomorrha, and there only remained seventy-seven just men; it is very doubtful whether there are seventy-seven just people in London today.'  I already know many reasons why Germany will not win the war.  Fritsche's speech is one.

See the eponymous category for more from his pen.

Concluding punctilious postscript:  I added a hyperlink to (Dru's translation of) Haecker's text.  That bit of contextualization enriches and thus modifies the sense of his text.  Worth noting if not worth worrying about.

Photo ID: Eric Holder’s Assault on Common Sense

I was shocked (shocked!) to hear over breakfast a while back that my friend Peter L. will vote for neither Obama nor Romney.  All my posts about how politics is a practical business, how it's always about the lesser of evils,and about how foolish it is to let the best become the enemy of the good have fallen on deaf ears.  But I won't give up on old Peter: he's worth saving from the remnant of his liberal folly.

When you vote for a president, you are not voting for just that one person.  You are voting for his entourage as well.  And for Obama that entourage is a sorry  lot including as it does Eric Holder who became Attorney General.  Remember the outrageous suit his Justice Department brought against Arizona re: S. B. 1070? (See my Arizona category for 1070 posts.)  Now the issues raised by S. B. 1070 are complex.  But the issue raised by photo ID laws is not.  It's a very simple issue and there ought not be any dispute about it whatsoever.  And yet our esteemed Atty Gen'l is going after states with photo ID laws making irresponsible accusations of 'disenfranchisement' and comparing the requirements to poll taxes.

Anyone with common sense ought to be able to appreciate that voting must be conducted in an orderly manner, a manner to inspire confidence in the citizenry, and that only citizens who have registered to vote and have satisfied the minimal requirements of age, etc., are to be allowed into the voting booth. Given the possibility of fraud, it is therefore necessary to verify the identities of those who present themselves at the polling place. To do this, voters must be required to present a government-issued photo ID card, a driver's license being only one example of such. It is a reasonable requirement and any reasonable person should be able to see it as one.

Suppose you don't have a driver's license.  How hard is it to get a photo ID?  Not very hard.  In Arizona it costs only $12 and is available at any DMV office.  And it's good for 12 years.  That comes to a dollar a year.  That's a hell of a deal, especially when you consider all the other things you can do with that nifty photo ID such as open a bank account, cash checks, use credit cards, buy alcohol and tobacco products, apply for store credit, secure a library card, etc.  You can now start doing all the things that normal citizens do.  Ain't that grand? You can stop being a nonentity.  Remember what your Uncle Quine taught you, "No entity without identity." If you tell me you don't do any of those things, and don't have any desire to do them, then why are you so interested in voting?  You don't have a bank account, or cash checks, etc., but you have a burning desire to vote?

If you are 65 or older or a recipient of Social Security disability benefits you can get the ID for free.   So what's your excuse for not securing a photo ID?  If you  are that lazy, how informed will you be about the issues on which you have such a burning desire to vote?

Liberals feel that the photo ID requirement will 'disenfranchise' many blacks and other minorities.  This shows that we conservatives have a higher view of you minorities than do your 'keepers,' the Dems. 

Some people want to play the 'numbers game.' They claim that there have only been a few cases of voter fraud.  If you think that, then I refer you to the work of John Fund and Larry Sabato of the University of Virginia.  And please note that the number of convictions in courts of law for voter fraud is bound to be much much lower than the actual cases of voter fraud.  And if there are. contrary to fact, very few cases of voter fraud, then, by the same token, there are very few people who lack photo ID. 

But there is no need to play the numbers game at all.  It's matter of principle. Will we have a election system that is credible and worthy of respect or not? 

Those who oppose photo ID have no good reasons, but they have plenty of motives, and I fear that they are of the unsavory kind. 

Existence and an ‘Open Question’ Consideration

G. E. Moore famously responded to the hedonist's claim that the only goods are pleasures by asking, in effect: But is pleasure good?  The point, I take it, is that the sense of 'good' allows us reasonably to resist the identification of goodness and pleasure.  For it remains an open question whether pleasure really is good.  To appreciate the contrast between open and closed questions, consider Tom the bachelor.  Given that Tom is  a bachelor, it is not an open question whether Tom is an unmarried adult male.  This is because the sense of 'bachelor' does not allow us reasonably to resist the identification of bachelors with adult unmarried males.    It is built into the very sense of 'bachelor' that a bachelor is an adult unmarried male.  But it is not built into the very sense of 'good' that the good is pleasure.

It occurred to me while cavorting in the swimming pool the other  morning that a similar Open Question gambit can be deployed against the thin theorist.

Suppose a thin theorist maintains  the following.  To say that Quine exists is to say that Quine is identical to something.  No doubt, but does the something exist?  The question remains open.  Just as 'good' does not mean 'pleasurable,' 'something' does not mean 'something that exists.'  Otherwise,  'Something that does not exist'  would be a contradiction in terms.  But it is not.  Consider

1. A matter transmitter is something that does not exist.

It follows from (1) that

2. Something does not exist.

I am not claiming that (2) is true.  I hold that everything exists!  My claim is that (2) is neither a formal-logical contradiction, nor is it semantically contradictory, i.e., contradictory in virtue of the senses of the constituent terms.  Here is an example of a formal-logical contradiction:

3. Something  that does not exist exists.

Here is an example of a sentence that, while not self-contradictory by the lights of formal logic, is semantically contradictory:

4. There are bachelors that are not unmarried adult males.

'Some cat is fat' and 'A fat cat exists' are logically equivalent.  But do they have exactly the same meaning (sense)?  This is an open question.  And precisely because it is an open question, the two sentencces do not have the same meaning, pace London Ed, van Inwagen and the rest of the thin boys.  For there is nothing in the very sense of 'Some cat is fat' to require that a fact cat exist.  Compare 'Some unicorn is angry.'  Does that require by its very sense that an angry unicorn exists?

Am I getting close to the point where I can justifiably diagnose van Inwagen and the boys with that dreaded cognitive aberration, existence-blindness? Or is it rather the case that I suffer from double-vision? 

Death, Where is Thy Sting?

We are concerned that life is short and that its end approaches.  But there is consolation in the contrary thought that we are getting through this life, that a time will come when we can lay down its burdens of pain, disappointment, ignorance, and moral failure.  The end is the end of the goods of this life but also the end of its evils.  And this whether the end is final or a new beginning.

So death, where is thy sting?  If this world is but a shadow-play of phenomena, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing; if all the world's a stage in the theater of the absurd, then to be quit of it is no great loss.  But if it  is prelude, then new adventures await and you can look forward to them. To live well one must hope, both in this life and beyond it.

But suppose you believe that this world is ultimately real, and that life in it is unqualifiedly good.  Then you have a problem.  For then death is a great calamity: it deprives you irrevocably of the ultimate in reality and value.

The solution to the problem is to abandon the twin presupposition that this world is the ne plus ultra of being and value and that life in it is unqualifiedly good.  There are fairly weighty reasons for both abandonments.

What I don't understand is the attitude of Philip Larkin on Death.  He seems in the grip of the twin presupposition.

Government Did Not Build Your Business

A very good Reason magazine article.  The author, Ronald Bailey, explains a distinction between tangible and intangible wealth.  Human, social, and institutional capital are forms of intangible wealth. 

And while you are at Reason.com, read Sheldon Richman's article on the right to self-defense.  It makes a number of obvious points that liberals seem incapable of understanding.  Part of the problem, of course, is that liberals live in enclaves in which the truths Richman enunciates are simply not heard.  Liberals hang too much with their own ilk.  They need to get out more and 'expand their horizons.'

Conservatives are not 'sheltered' in the same way.  There is no way a conservative or a libertarian can avoid liberals.  Liberals dominate the mainstream media, the universities, the courts, the other branches of government,  the entertainment industry, and many mainstream churches.  Conservatives and libertarians cannot help but confront liberal ideas.

But what happens when conservative and libertarian ideas are presented to the public via an outlet such as Fox News Network? Liberals  scream their pointy heads off in protest.  That is clear proof that they are not 'liberal' in any classical  sense.  They would be better described as left-wing fascists.

How can anybody object to a John Stossel simply presenting his ideas and his arguments?  Most of what he says makes good sense.  I disagree with his open borders policy and his ideas about drug legalization.  He and libertarians generally are dead wrong on those two points.  But I don't want to shut him down — or up.  I want to hear his point of view.

One night Stossel hosted a discussion between Pat Buchanan and Reason magazine's Nick Gillespie. Paleo-conservatism met  libertarianism. Great discussion.  Are you going to find something like that on MSNBC?  They dumped Buchanan.  Leftist scumbaggery!

A Second Van Inwagen Argument for the Univocity of ‘Exists’

I discussed one of the Peter van Inwagen's arguments here and found it wanting.  He has a second argument:  ". . . 'exists' is univocal owing to the interdefinability of 'there exists'  and the obviously univocal 'all.'  But this is a powerful argument, for, surely, 'all' means the same in 'All natural numbers have a successor' and 'All Greeks are mortal'?" (484).  The argument could be put as follows:

'Every' is univocal.

'Exist(s)' and 'every' are interdefinable:  'Fs exist' is equivalent to 'It is not the case that everything is not an F.'

Therefore

'Exist(s)' is univocal.

I accept this crisp little argument — but with a restriction: 'exist(s)' is univocal across all affirmative and negative general existential sentences.  But what about a singular existential such as 'Peter exists'?  Does 'exist' in the latter have the same sense that it has in 'Rabbits exist'?  I say it doesn't:  'exist(s)' is not univocal across all existence sentences, general and singular.

To warm up, what are we saying when we say that rabbits exist? On Frege's approach, we are saying that the concept rabbit is instantiated.  So 'exist(s)' in general existentials means 'is instantiated.'  But 'Peter exists' does not say that Peter is instantiated.  So is it not spectacularly obvious that 'exist(s)' is not univocal across singular and general existentials? 

But we needn't follow Frege is holding that 'exist(s)' is a second-level predicate.  And van Inwagen does not follow him in this.  Perhaps it would not be unfair to characterize van Inwagen as a half-way Fregean: he likes the notion that "existence is allied to number" but he does not take that characteristic Fregean thesis to entail that 'exist(s)' is a second-level predicate, i.e., a predicate of concepts, not objects.  Van Inwagen could and would say something along these lines:

1. Rabbits exist:  It is not the case that everything is not a rabbit.  ~(x)~Rx.

2. Peter exists:  It is not the case that everything is not identical to Peter.  ~(x)~(x = Peter)

I will now try to show that, even on van Inwagen's preferred translations, there is still equivocity as between general and singular existentials. (1) and (2) are equivalent to

1*. Rabbits exist: Something is a rabbit. (Ex)Rx.

and

2*. Peter exists:  Something is (identically) Peter. (Ex)(x = Peter).

Now it seems to me that we are still stuck with equivocation.  The predicate in (1*) is 'something is (predicatively) ___.'   The predicate in (2*) is 'something is (identically) ___.'  Now the 'is' of predication is not the 'is' of identity.  So the equivocation on 'exist(s)' remains in the form of an equivocation on 'is' as between the 'is' of predication and the 'is' of identity.

The equivocation ought to be obvious from the notation alone.  The immediate juxtaposition of 'R' and 'x' in '(Ex)Rx' signifies that x is (predicatively) R.  But in '(Ex)(x = Peter)' we find no such juxtaposition but a new sign, '=.'  

My thesis, then, is that while 'exist(s)' is univocal across all general existentials, it is not univocal across all existentials.  This reflects that fact that — to switch over to material mode — existence cannot be reduced to or eliminated in favor of any thin logical notion or combination of such notions.

Gun Laws and the Supposed ‘Politicization’ of the Aurora Massacre

Last year, when Republicans were being accused of 'politicizing' the national debt crisis I made the point that one cannot politicize that which is inherently political:

The Republicans were accused of 'politicizing' the debt crisis.  But how can you politicize what is  inherently political?  The debt in question is the debt of the federal government.  Since a government is a political entity, questions concerning federal debts are political questions.  As inherently political, such questions cannot be politicized.

If to hypostatize is to illicitly treat as a substance that which is not a substance, to politicize is to illictly treat as political what is not political.  Since governmental debt questions are 'already' political, they cannot be politicized.

Then I was criticizing Democrats and liberals.  But now I find that some Republicans and conservatives are making the same mistake.  They are accusing liberals of politicizing the Aurora massacre.  Example here.

But as I said, you cannot politicize what is already political.  Now guns are not political entities, but gun laws are, whether federal, state, or local.  Whether there should be gun laws at all, and what their content should be are political questions.

Now we all agree that we have to have laws regulating the manufacture, sale,  transporting, and use of firearms.  So we all agree that we have to have 'gun control.'  Gun control is not what I display or fail to display at the shooting range, but is a phrase that refers to gun control laws.  Since we all want gun control, we all want (enforceable and enforced)  gun control laws, even the dreaded NRA.

It is a liberal lie to say that conservatives are against gun control.  It is similar to the liberal lie that conservatives are anti-government.  If I am for limited government, then I am for government, whence it follows that I am not against government.    (Anarchists are anti-government, but no conservative, and few libertarians, are against government.)  Likewise, if I am for laws that prevent the sale of guns to felons, and for other such laws, then I am not against gun control. 

By the way, the preternaturally obtuse Bill Moyers got a nice and well-deserved slap-down from Bill O'Reilly the other night for his idiotic remarks about the NRA.  Bill Moyers is a one-man argument for the federal defunding of PBS and its affiliates such as NPR. (See National Public Radio Needs Your Support!)  Listen to the whole of O'Reilly's speech.  He is a moderate on gun control, too moderate perhaps.  He is moderate on many issues.   Is that why the Left can't stand him?

But I digress.  We  all agree that we need enforceable and enforced gun control laws.  But we don't all agree about the content of these laws.  Now that is a political question the answering of which presupposes a political theory, a theory of man in his relation to the state. The gun debate is political from the ground up.  It is silly so speak of 'politicizing' it.

Here is what I say.  I have a right to life, a right to defend my life, and a right to appropriate means of self-defense.  No government has the right to interfere with these rights.  This is nonnegotiable.  If you disagree, I have to put you down as morally and intellecually obtuse, as beyond the pale of rational debate.  I will do my best to make sure that you and your ilk are defeated politically.

What's an appropriate means of self-defense?  The tactical shotgun is the most effective  tool of home defense.  Holmes, the Aurora shooter, had one of those.  It looked like a Remington 1070.  He misused it for evil ends.  That is chargeable to his moral and legal account, not to the gun's.  Guns lack such 'accounts.'  No gun is a free agent.  No gun ever lilled anybody.  Killing is an action (action-type); actions are actions of agents.  Pay attention, liberals.

There will always be massacres and murders regardless of the stringency of gun laws.  Norway.

Can anything be done?  Yes.  Enforce existing gun laws.  Execute miscreants such as Holmes, after a fair trial, in a speedy manner.  There could a be a judicial fast-track to expedite the execution of such people within a year, at most.  Put limits on the quantities and types of vile and soul-destroying rubbish that HollyWeird liberals dish out.  Stop attacking religion, that most excellent vehicle for the delivery of moral teachings.  If Holmes had internalized the Ten Commandments as a boy, could he have done what he did?  Do you think he would have been less likely to do what he did?

But liberals are morally and intellectually obtuse.  So they will fight against all reasonable proposals.  A liberal would far rather violate the rights of decent citizens than mete out justice to vicious criminals.