You Can’t Inoculate Yourself Against My Logic
I am in a debate on State-mandated vaccinations at FEE. Don’t bother voting for me, though; there’s a greater chance you will be struck by lightning than changing anyone’s mind. An excerpt from my side:
This is a crucial point, and it shows why the case for mandatory vaccines is so much weaker than, for example, the case for mandatory restrictions on carbon dioxide emissions or mandatory contributions to the national military. When a person gets vaccinated, the primary beneficiary is himself. And this benefit is all the greater the lower the rate of vaccination in the population at large. In other words, among a population of people who all believe that a vaccine is effective, the individual cost-benefit analysis of taking the vaccine will only yield a temptation of “free riding” once a sufficient fraction of the population has become vaccinated, thus ensuring “herd immunity.”
I’ll be fair and say that I had no idea what to think of mandatory vaccinations at first. I read Meyer’s argument first and thought it was very strong, but then i read Bobs. It made the case predictably until i got near the end and there was just one very subtle point that can’t be stated enough. The people who decide not to get vaccinations are the only people who are at risk for contracting the diseases. I don’t know how i personally have missed this painfully obvious point for over a year now, but it’s the key to the argument and i did not see it addressed in Meyer’s case. Good debate.
The people who decide not to get vaccinations are the only people who are at risk for contracting the diseases.
That’s not true. Vaccines are not 100% effective, so even if you are vaccinated there is a chance you can still get the disease if exposed to it. That’s why maintaining herd immunity is so important.
And also, we do not receive all our immunizations the minute we are born. Infants are some of the most vulnerable victims of those who do not vaccinate themselves.
Infants are also some of those least likely to come into contact with someone who is sick or not immunized, so “what about the wee kiddies” is a weak argument.
Oh really? Do you have some kind of data to back that up? Because I have an infant, and I take my infant everywhere I go, coming into contact with everyone I do.
Unless you’re smearing your infant across the mouths of every person you meet, he’s coming into contact with far less sick people than you are.
…Because I’m smearing myself across the mouths of every person I meet?
Vaccines not being 100% effective is good reason to question their efficacy. I don’t see how it is sufficient reason to coerce the unwilling to take them.
From Meyer’s argument: “Vaccines do not always and in every case protect individuals who receive them.” This seems to undermine Bob’s argument.
Anti-vax counter-argument: So you want to force me to take a dangerous vaccine that you yourself admit might not even work???
The evidence suggests it will work if taken by enough people, but may not work if taken by too few. The evidence also suggests that it is only a tiny bit dangerous. So yes, your phrasing is technically correct.
Mises and Rothbard point out that people may make the wrong action to achieve their purpose. Given the response to newspaper articles about vaccines it seems likely that this is one case where that happens on a large scale. People choose to avoid a tiny risk of side effects and accept a much greater risk from illness.
Supporters of strong liberty will say they should be left to make those choices. Consequentialists will say that the very strong evidence of a better outcome in terms of fewer deaths and disabilities is worth the infringement of individual liberty.
As far as I am concerned, there is no way to say one is right and one is wrong.
“Evidence Suggests it will work if taken b enough people” – So force is the appropriate response?
I suppose the question is like always one of results. If your goal is to make sure people are less likely to get sick forcing immunization is a great idea. If the idea is to allow people to choose what they want and then you need to use persuasion to ‘sell’ the idea then you have a different battle.
By the same token lets make it so that none can have a child until they choose to. It is all for the greater societal good of course.
You can justify any amount of tyranny by saying it is for the good of the people who you are doing it for.
“You can justify any amount of tyranny by saying it is for the good of the people who you are doing it for.”
Yes, always.
I’m convinced there is no line that cannot be crossed.
Ninety percent of a population can be killed because they weren’t sufficiently “other minded”, because self-interest is considered the chief cause of man’s ills.
When, in fact, self-interest is the ONLY basis upon which all men can logically act – even when it is their interest to serve another person.
But since there are only so many people each individual can logically help, and only so many opportunities one can forego in the service of others at his own expense, eventually, you have to take care of yourself.
And the moment you start doing anything for yourself is the moment you reveal preferences the satisfaction of which another person can make a profit off of in return for what you have.
Since only specific individuals are in a position to trade with one another profitably, given their preferences, the benefits of the division of labor accrue only to the specific individuals involved.
This turns more people into a possible resource for others; I can mine ore myself, or I can just buy metal in some form from someone who has ended up, through a series of trades, with the ore in an already processed form.
It’s like more mines have been made available to more people. But instead of mining it from the Earth, I “mine” it from people, using money as my “pickaxe”.
It is in this sense that free trade turns people into resources for others.
Please site your sources of “evidence”. I’ve been doing a lot of research on this issue lately and the more I learn the more I find out that the science is far from settled on it and that in reality very little actual safety tests have been done and the efficacy rates have been exaggerated or fudged in many cases.
Good work, CC. I was astonished when I began researching this.
One interesting thing to note is that the safety studies for vaccines are not conducted with true placebos. Instead of comparing new vaccines to inert injections of water or saline, the vaccines are compared to existing vaccines (ie. “This new vaccine is no more dangerous than existing vaccines!”), or to injections that also contain adjuvants such as aluminum, which we know are immunogenic.
You’re absolutely correct Carrie. They use the prior vaccines or substances like aluminum as the placebo/control group. I’ve learned they are working on a new gardisol vaccine and the old one will be the placebo. I’m convinced that if anyone actually takes the time to learn about this stuff they would not want to force these drugs on anyone.
This has been hashed and re-hashed so often. Have a look here if you think there is no evidence.
http://www2.aap.org/immunization/families/faq/vaccinestudies.pdf
One (of these many) study included 476,000 people. That is not “very little” testing.
Of course recent studies compare vaccines to other vaccines – it is considered unethical to deprive children of the benefits of vaccination for a trial. This is because there such a high confidence in the effectiveness. We know they work, the only question is whether they are safe.
How do we know they work? How about the following:
http://jama.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?articleid=209448
“Results: A greater than 92% decline in cases and a 99% or greater decline in deaths due to diseases prevented by vaccines recommended before 1980 were shown for diphtheria, mumps, pertussis, and tetanus. ”
You don’t get much more evidence than that for effective medical treatment.
The evidence is overwhelming that vaccines are effective and pose very little threat. Not zero threat, bbecasue nothing is 100% safe, but so little that we willingly take much greater risks daily without a qualm.
The evidence you site (JAMA) study is showing correlation. If that’s the case then the evidence is equally strong that vaccines also cause autism, increased allergies and autoimmune diseases. It also doesn’t account for the drastically falling rate of deaths from those diseases prior the vaccines becoming widely used.
The excuse that it’s wrong to withhold a vaccine so that a study can be done is completely bogus as is the use of prior vaccines and adjuvant’s like aluminum as the placebo. Doesn’t that raise a massive red flag to any supporter of forced vaccines?
If vaccines are so safe, why is there a special vaccine court that exempts the vaccine manufacturers from liability? Why are there various whistle blowers about how merk and the CDC have deliberately fudged numbers on both side effects (such as autism) and efficacy rates that don’t live up to the 95% needed for herd immunity?
It’d be really nice if we could actually have real scientific debates about the safety and efficacy of vaccines. At this point it’s career suicide for medical professionals and researchers to speak out about the lack of studies or the risks associated with vaccines.
” If that’s the case then the evidence is equally strong that vaccines also cause autism”
Show me the studies that have found a correlation please.
You mistook my point. Correct me if I’m wrong, but the JAMA study you linked to basically shows that deaths from the 13 diseases they followed went down after widespread use of the vaccines was used. Autism has gone up in that time too, so by the same logic we could say that vaccines cause autism. I’m not making that claim, I’m just trying to point out that the studies haven’t been done to show that vaccines are safe or even that effective.
However, there is one whistleblower right now. Dr. Thompson or something like that, who says that the CDC (or maybe Merk) hid the fact that their studies showed over a 300% increase in autism rates for African American boys with the MMR vaccine. Why are we putting so much trust into the CDC and pharmaceutical companies that have a history of deception?
For the record, I’m used to go get my flue shots. Having a child and doing some research has lead me down this road. Try and find the studies that show it’s safe to give a 1 day old baby a hep B vaccine. There aren’t any.
Oh, I see your point now. It would apply if that study were the only evidence. That is only just a tiny part of the whole.
Anti-vax counter-argument: So you want to force me to take a dangerous vaccine that you yourself admit might not even work???
Wearing a seatbelt doesn’t guarantee you won’t die in a car crash, but it does make it less likely. Same goes for vaccines.
Of course, if you don’t wear a seatbelt, that doesn’t increase the chances of other people dying in car crashes. Whereas if you’re walking around with a communicable disease that can end up killing other people.
I thought libertarians were against hurting other people.
Libertarians are against the initiation of force.
Not getting a vaccine is not an initiation of force.
Matt,
Is infecting someone with Ebola initiation of force?
Depends on how you infect them. If you just happen to wander around in a space that you have just as much right to be in as they do, then no.
If you hold them down and smear your blood all over their face without their permission, then yes.
Matt,
So it’s okay to deliberately infect someone as long as you don’t hold them down?
Deliberately? No.
If it could somehow be proven that I went to a shopping mall for the sole purpose of trying to infect people with Ebola, that would be an act of aggression.
If I went there to buy a pair of pants, and the mall didn’t have any official “No Ebola carriers allowed in our mall” policy, it would not be.
Of course, this is already our general policy when dealing with disease today. When you get the flu, do you sue your co-worker who sneezed on you the day before?
Matt,
Why would it matter whether it was deliberate? After all, you’re in a place where you have a right to be.
Criminal intent matters a lot – even today. In a libertarian society, all cases would be civil cases, and it would matter all the more.
Consider something like slander. I have the right to say bad things about you. But I do not have the right to say false things about you for the sole purpose of harming your reputation.
Or fraud. I have the right to sell you a house with a leaky basement… unless I know that the basement is leaky and I withhold that information from you for the purpose of deceiving you into buying a house you otherwise wouldn’t have bought.
Conversely, if you’re the type of person who just assumes all basements are leaky and that the existence of a leaky basement wouldn’t influence your buying decision at all, in that case, I haven’t done anything wrong – as it wasn’t a material factor that I withheld.
If you beleive in individual liberty, free speech means I am entitled to say whatever lies I want about you. You have no right to repuation, which is contained in other people’s minds.
Josiah,
There is no “right to never get sick with a disease”. Viruses and bacteria do not respect “rights”. You certainly could require anyone entering your property (home, business, whatever) to be vaccinated. In public, well that’s one of the problems with public property, but forcing your drugs into other people hardly seems like something compatible with liberty. Besides, you’d never be able to guarantee that taking all these vaccines would keep a person free from illness. There aren’t vaccines for all sicknesses, they aren’t 100% effective, and viruses mutate. Good luck with all of that.
Harold,
See Walter Block regarding slandering. I think it’s his “Defending the undependable” book that has a chapter on that subject.
It was Walter that inspired my comment. Some think he has undermined his arguments by suing for libel.
What if you are ejected from your car because you weren’t wearing your seatbelt? What if your body collides with another car? It seems like the risk increases for causing accidents if you don’t wear your seatbelt.
Who is responsible for setting the appropriate risks in your example, and why?
If I don’t wear a seat-belt, I risk becoming a property-invading projectile in the event of an accident.
………………………………..
An unbuckled MF’s vehicle collides with a buckled Josiah’s vehicle. MF is ejected from his vehicle.
Ben B is driving down the road listening to Tom Woods interview Bob Murphy. MF’s body lands on Ben B’s windshield; Ben B swerves and his car rolls over multiple times; Ben B bleeds out from a shard of broken glass that made its way into his neck.
Josiah awakes from his two week coma and learns of this horrific accident. He then gets on Bob Murphy’s blog and posts, “Well, I guess not wearing one’s seat-belt can increase the chances of other people dying in car crashes.”
The End.
………………………………….
Unrelated, but interesting….
Is it the responsibility of each member of the vehicle to make sure that his body isn’t ejected from the car in the event of an accident so that his ejected body doesn’t invade someone else’s property? Or does it depend on whether or not the non-seat belt wearer was solely responsible for the cause of the accident?
Do the property owners of the road and their customers have no say in whether seatbelts must be worn in your example?
“If I don’t wear a seat-belt, I risk becoming a property-invading projectile in the event of an accident.”
If you don’t use a device that keeps you from walking freely about the sidewalk, you risk tripping someone so they fall into the street, causing cars to swerve …
guest,
Yes, good point, the existence of sidewalk rails would definitely help lower the risk of those types of accidents.
Here, let me rephrase: There is a greater chance that I will become a property-invading projectile in the event of a car accident, if I am not wearing a seat-belt.
MF,
I understand what you are getting at in regards to liability and the nature of the contracts involved when it comes to property rights violations.
However, my original comment’s purpose is served without having to get into the nature of property rights.
Seat belts prevent individuals from being ejected out of their cars. The lower the number of projectiles within a given area, the lower the probability that two or more projectiles will collide with each other.
I’m just saying: If I was an insurance assessor, then I would assign a greater chance for car crashes, ceterus paribus, on a road where individuals did not wear their seat belts.
I would imagine that the owners of roads (at least very busy ones), and as well as insurance companies, would want to make ‘buckling up for safety’ mandatory in order to help minimize any property damage to no more than the initial collision.
In hindsight, I shouldn’t have made the comment, because now I am having to discuss roooooaaaaads. I mean, I went through all this when they first initiated me into libertarianism: “Ok, first and foremost, you’ve got to know your roads inside and out, or they [the statists] will eat you alive.”
“I’m just saying: If I was an insurance assessor, then I would assign a greater chance for car crashes, ceterus paribus, on a road where individuals did not wear their seat belts.”
True. And individuals make the same kind of assessment with regard to their own safety.
They have voluntarily chosen to bear the risks associated with driving or walking down the sidewalk because they believe they will profit by doing so.
To centrally plan safety laws is simply to impose a different arrrangement of risk that people will just naturally factor into their decisions as before – except now people are being coerced into subsidizing others’ safety.
If people don’t feel sufficiently safe around you or your property, they will avoid you and it, or they will learn from the mistakes of others (or themselves if they survive).
(Aside: It’s funny how gigantic public works projects have an expectation that a certain number of people will die on the job.)
And to say that others are being forced to take more risks without mantatory safety laws is simply to say that if they want to continue doing what they were doing before, there are more risks that must – and naturally will – be taken into consideration.
If the risks are too great for some, they will voluntarily stop doing what they were doing. Their rights end where the rights of others begin, so they don’t have the right to force others to pay for lower risks.
“I’m just saying: If I was an insurance assessor, then I would assign a greater chance for car crashes, ceterus paribus, on a road where individuals did not wear their seat belts. ”
Wearing seatbelts induces riskier driving, so probably increases the number of crashes. It is possible that damage to third parties is greater if seatbelts are worn. This effect will probably swamp the damage caused to third parties by human projectiles.
Evidence, Ben B. There is no evidence that seatbelt wearing reduces risk to other road users, whatever conjectures you may come up with for how it may increase risks
Studies have shown that wearing a seatbelt causes the driver to drive more aggressively because the driver feels safe at higher speeds, with less attention paid, etc.
So wearing a seatbelt is an implied aggression and is therefore unlibertarian.
Josiah,
It’s the vaccinated crowd that sheds the live virus vaccines for a few weeks after they are inoculated. Please do some research.
I’ve heard from young mothers the argument that some children for other health reasons cannot take the vaccine, and therefore are subject to dying of otherwise vaccine controlled diseases. Now, obviously in a libertarian society “right to life” doesn’t mean right to be protected from the natural world. But try selling that to moms.
Frankly, I think the weight a mother’s lame moral argument carries is not necessarily based on anything more than other men and women with no backbone.
the elderly and immunocompromised are particularly at risk by decreased herd immunity.
Same principle as with lights.
We have to be clear on who is forcing who and where. We have to make clear property rights.
Any vaccination attempt that violates property rights is incompatible with liberty. Any vaccination attempt that does not violate property rights is compatible with liberty.
For example, if I threaten you with aggression against your person or property in the course of me attempting to have you vaccinated, then that is incompatible with liberty. If on the other hand I don’t let you onto my property unless you get vaccinated, but you don’t get vaccinated and you nevertheless enter my property, either through deceit in lying about this vaccination or through trespassing, then you have the ultimate choice to get vaccinated, and should you choose to do so, it was not because your liberty was violated, it was because my liberty is being protected and you value dealing with me.
Now since that which vaccinations are meant to stop have a definite range of influencing other people with that virus, the boundary is not where the infected are standing, it is the extent to which they are sending out those viruses, if they are airborne.
The same principle for the lights applies. I can’t stop you from emitting viruses into the air, which is to say I can’t force you to get vaccinated. But, I can stop you from sending your viruses into my body. If that means the protection of other people’s property rights results in you being effectively quarantined to your own property with a bubble surrounding your property, then that is compatible with liberty. Nobody is forcing you to stay where you are, they are just forcing your viruses not to enter their property. Similar but different. If you owned a lineup of property lands that stretch from one side of the country to the other, then as long as you don’t send out viruses to anyone who doesn’t want them, then you can go from one side of the country to the other.
When it comes to whether this or that is libertarian or not, we always have to have an active mindset and find out and inquire as to specifics about property rights.
“If that means the protection of other people’s property rights results in you being effectively quarantined to your own property with a bubble surrounding your property, then that is compatible with liberty.” Would this apply to the un-vaccinated, or only to someone proven to be infected?
I guess anyone can prevent anyone form entering their property, so if people chose to it would apply to the un-vaccinated.
This brings us back to the discussion elsewhere about proving harm. If you need to prove harm, then only the infected could be actioned against as there is no transgression without infection. However, by the time you can prove infection it is too late to prevent the transgression. The only way to implement this is to have a rule that does not depend on harm – i.e. absolute property rights.
” Would this apply to the un-vaccinated, or only to someone proven to be infected?”
Both, because what is happening here is that the other property owners are saying “We don’t want you on our lands.”
If that is the case, then you’re stuck on your own land.
Since this would likely be a problem for anyone considering moving to any location, or setting up a new homesteaded land, it would be up adjacent property owners to choose an agreement that will enable some movement over each other’s lands according to whatever criteria they set up. One possible agreement could be that each property owner agree to get inoculated, and for those who do not want it for whatever reason, which correct me if I am wrong are in a small minority today, and likely would be in a libertarian soviety , I think the overall outcome would be almost everyone chooses to get inoculated and thus become able to move freely over each other’s lands (freely meaning viruses are not a concern), whereas those who choose not to get inoculated, will be constrained to their own lands by way of other property owners saying “Just don’t go on my land”.
I believe this alone would be a very strong incentive for those who initially did not want to get inoculated, to get inoculated and thus take part in a greater scale division of labor, along with a higher standard of living. They will feel and experience the costs of not getting inoculated, but their property rights will always be respected. Nobody can force an injection in them, but they can say don’t come here if you don’t get the injection.
If they choose not to get inoculated, then because it is their choice, the resulting limited ability to move is due to others defending themselves as they see fit. The refused would have to live with the libertarian consequences of their own actions. Yes they have the freedom to not get inoculated, but others also have the freedom to effectively quarantine them by way of protecting and defending their own property rights.
“I guess anyone can prevent anyone form entering their property, so if people chose to it would apply to the un-vaccinated.”
Yep.
“This brings us back to the discussion elsewhere about proving harm. If you need to prove harm, then only the infected could be actioned against as there is no transgression without infection. However, by the time you can prove infection it is too late to prevent the transgression. The only way to implement this is to have a rule that does not depend on harm – i.e. absolute property rights.”
BINGO. You understand that introducing the criteria of proof of harm is not only flawed because it denies the individual his own pure liberty to be wrong (but not violent!), but it also has consequentialist implications that creates undue high risks, precisely because the individual property owner does not, in this conception, have ABSOLUTE property rights. There is a hesitancy there, a wait and see, let us us test this out framework. As you point out, to implement a “test” makes real world human beings effectively lab rats and subjected to others who have the privilege of violating other people’s property rights as long as and until such time some arbitrary person can convince everyone that there is some harm being committed in HIS opinion.
I had a conversation the other day with Sumantra about consistency. He claimed consistency is not a virtue, but I think there is such strong and persuasive arguments and conclusions that can be made with consistency in liberty, that I hope at some point he realizes yes it is a virtue, and can help us answer ALL problems of liberty as new technology (knowledge) accumulates about the world.
I followed your discussion with Sumantra. Sumantra is not prepred to totally dissociate consequences from his ethics. You are happy for everyone in the world to get sick and die if property rights are respected, but Sumantra is not. He sees consistency as folly in the face of certain consequences.
By certain I meant some kinds of rather than guranteed consequences.
If property rights are respected, the only threat people would face is the relatively (compared to humans) less threatening rocks, bugs, trees, dirt, water, and the lower animals.
Incidentally, respecting property rights is benevolently and precisely what allows for us to use our minds (our primary tool) to reduce and/or eliminate sickness and famine.
Folly? What is folly is the faith based belief that pointing guns at each other to steal and exploit, is somehow consistent with health and well being.
And again, as I already pointed out to Sumantra, his ethics are grounded on an unflinching consistency as well, namely, that HE, Sumantra’s passions and opinions of the day, not reason, be the ultimate arbiter and judge of the proper approach to ethical dilemmas.
He is asking me to put faith in his passions and opinions of the day as my consistent principle, when I reject that because it puts his opinions over and above my own when it comes to my own person and property.
You two are the misguided ones, not me. Follow your consequentialism to its logical conclusions and you will at some point realize, hopefully, that it is impossible to act on consequentialist considerations without us putting our faith in and subjecting ourselves to arbitrary people’s passions and opinions.
Sickness and reduced health you want to be caused by human interaction, aggression, as long as the people who are hurt are not the special interest of the day, either yourself or whoever you are whoring out to push your own agenda.
“less threatening rocks, bugs, trees, dirt, water, and the lower animals.”
In the context of this discussion it is the bugs we are talking about. They killed more people than humans at the end of WWI, so I don’t think we can say they are less threatening.
Another classic example for human extinction is an asteroid, or rock, so that is hardly less threatening either.
And have you not read Day of the Triffids? Gotta worry about those trees, man.
You have no theoretical basis for believing that action will lead to health and well-being either.
“In the context of this discussion it is the bugs we are talking about. They killed more people than humans at the end of WWI, so I don’t think we can say they are less threatening.”
Wait, why are you using the words “ARE less threatening” there, given your example is from 100 years ago?
I can inoculated myself from viruses with relative ease,as compared to a government army or police force.
Humans are the bigger threat, including using viruses as a weapon.
And even if viruses ever were to become the biggest threat, that would not suddenly justify violations of property rights. Nobody has to be subjected to any viruses that they do not want to be subjected to, in a world of private property rights.
The very assertion of “I want to stop people from infecting me” presupposes you declaring and defending your property rights!
“Another classic example for human extinction is an asteroid, or rock, so that is hardly less threatening either.
And have you not read Day of the Triffids? Gotta worry about those trees, man.”
I don’t see how you pointing a gun at me will stop a humanity destroying asteroid.
And even if you could save yourself by shooting me dead, you will never find any non-flawed inter-subjective argument that defends it.
I am not to be sacrificed for any number of other people, it doesn’t matter how numerous the population is. If the human race ends because of an asteroid, then it ends. It is not like you’ll feel any remorse or miss anyone. The world will have come to an end for you and everyone else.
“You have no theoretical basis for believing that action will lead to health and well-being either.”
Actually I do thanks.
Deny that asteroids, infection and pandemics are threats to humans all you like. They will remain threats. Incidentally, focusing on the “biggest” threat is a diversion.
“And even if viruses ever were to become the biggest threat, that would not suddenly justify violations of property rights” I did not say they would.
“Actually I do thanks.” Really? Can you point me to somewhere that health or well being are involved in your ethical derivations. We had a discussion a while ago where you argued strenuously that anything human action is directed towards is not necessarily either of these. Even if it was, we could not possibly know that the result of the action would be succesful. You need further assumptions to arrive at such conclusions.
“Deny that asteroids, infection and pandemics are threats to humans all you like.”
I am not “denying” these events are threats.
I said humans are a bigger threat, and even if those things were to be a bigger threat, that still does not make it a premise for inter-subjective arguments for an ethics.
“They will remain threats. Incidentally, focusing on the “biggest” threat is a diversion.
“And even if viruses ever were to become the biggest threat, that would not suddenly justify violations of property rights” I did not say they would.”
I did not say you said they would. I was making a statement that I cannot help but notice you did not agree with or disagree with. Just to ol’ sly “I never said that.”
“Actually I do thanks.”
“Really? Can you point me to somewhere that health or well being are involved in your ethical derivations.”
Well being can only be increased for an individual if that individual is at minimum not subjected to violent harm.
That is obvious.
“We had a discussion a while ago where you argued strenuously that anything human action is directed towards is not necessarily either of these. Even if it was, we could not possibly know that the result of the action would be succesful. You need further assumptions to arrive at such conclusions.”
Right now I am taking about the necessary condition that people are not aggressed against.
There is nonaggression that you can levy against me that makes ME better off. It could only at best make me what YOU believe is better for me, or for you, or for some other not me reason.
Autocorrect typo.
Meant to say “There is no aggression…” in that last paragraph.
Harold what you are likely thinking is that ethics are like a theory to be judged by “outcomes”.
But an ethic must answer for what we can and cannot do NOW. If the only thought, the only means you have, to decide what we can do NOW is based on some opinion, or belief, or hope, that the outcome will be what you expected, then you are not engaging in ethical thinking at all, but rather “humans-are-lab-rats-ology.”
Your actions are unethical or ethical when you engage in those actions, not some arbitrary time in the future when you can pretend that the counterfactual world that otherwise would have occurred, is worse for me, despite what I think for my own person and property.
Even consequentialist are forced to admit in their justification that “Yes I violated your property rights by pushing you, but if I didn’t push you, then you would have gotten hit by the train.”
By framing the action in this way, the consequentialist is admitting the only thing that a priori ethics ever claimed, that at the time, the pushing was an aggression.
Finally, I have no qualms with saying “Harold, never push me away from a moving train that you believe might hit me, never grab me if you believe I am drowning, without first getting my expressed consent.”
If you are as humanitarian as you make yourself to be, you would accept that.
“Well being can only be increased for an individual if that individual is at minimum not subjected to violent harm.
That is obvious.”
That is not at all obvious. A miniscule threat of very minor harm need not diminish well being to a significant extent. Unless you want to indulge in circular definitions, that is.
Well being IS an outcome. I do not say you must base your ethics on outcomes – I understand that you do not do so. I am saying that if you do not base it on outcomes then you cannot expect there to be a particular outcome. Since health and well being are outcomes any system that does not consider outcomes cannot have anything to say about them without extendeing the theory with further asumptions.
This is demonstrated here: ““Harold, never push me away from a moving train that you believe might hit me, never grab me if you believe I am drowning, without first getting my expressed consent.”
Well being and health cannot be increased by being killed by a train. That is not to say I should push you out of the way, only saying that the outcoms of health and well being are not increased by the ethics you propose. That is fine too- no particular reason why health and well being should be the goal of your ethics, but lets recognise it for what it is.
Harold:
“That is not at all obvious. A miniscule threat of very minor harm need not diminish well being to a significant extent.”
That does not stand as a rebuttal to what I said. All you are saying there is “A little harm is not a lot of harm.”
Well that is true by definition of little and a lot.
I am not disputing that a little harm is not a lot of harm.
I am disputing the contradictory claim that harming people by aggression is not harming them by aggression.
That we must somehow ignore the harm by aggression, and focus instead on a future state and make the conclusion that the future state of affairs somehow eliminates or negates or refutes the harm by aggression.
“Unless you want to indulge in circular definitions, that is. ”
Ummmm…..
“Well being IS an outcome. ”
The reduction in well being THAT IS the aggression itself, is not an outcome. It is a factor of the aggression itself.
“I do not say you must base your ethics on outcomes – I understand that you do not do so. I am saying that if you do not base it on outcomes then you cannot expect there to be a particular outcome”.
Expected outcomes are not present harms by aggression. And they are not actual outcomes.
What you expect to be the outcomes of initial harm by aggression not only do not negate or eliminate the harm by aggression, which is itself the only actual range of events that ethics has anything to say, but it is also not equivalent to actual outcomes.
The last thing I want is for uninformed, nonspecialist, potentially psychopthic thugs, whose expectations are chronically, or even potentially, directly contradictory to the qactual results, to rule my life by way of what they “expect” the outcomes of their activity to be.
I don’t want your expectations. I want your respect for my life and my consent for my own person and property, in the present, at every present, at each moment in time you even dare think of aggressing against me, to abide by the libertarian ethic of don’t tread on me.
Your expectations, fear based or as far fetched as they are, be damned.
“Since health and well being are outcomes any system that does not consider outcomes cannot have anything to say about them without extendeing the theory with further asumptions.”
Ethics deals with what you can and cannot do NOW. If you can’t tell me if what you do now is ethical or unethical until some future indeterminate date, then you can’t tell me anything about ethics.
“This is demonstrated here: ““Harold, never push me away from a moving train that you believe might hit me, never grab me if you believe I am drowning, without first getting my expressed consent.”
That is not saying anything about future outcomes. It is telling you what I consent to and do nto consent to, in the present.
“Well being and health cannot be increased by being killed by a train.”
You are not the decider of my well being, I am.
I could very well be intentionally putting myself in front of the train, you don’t know.
“That is not to say I should push you out of the way, only saying that the outcoms of health and well being are not increased by the ethics you propose. That is fine too- no particular reason why health and well being should be the goal of your ethics, but lets recognise it for what it is.”
Which is?
You say you are the decider of your well being. I also used health. Do you say your health is increased by being killed by a train?
“That does not stand as a rebuttal to what I said. All you are saying there is “A little harm is not a lot of harm.”
You said “Well being can only be increased for an individual if that individual is at minimum not subjected to violent harm.
That is obvious.”
I pointed out that well being can be increased if an individual is subject to violent harm. That is a direct rebuttal and not saying that small harm is not large harm. I say small harm can be consistent with increased well being. You avoid that conclusion by saying that we can not even consider outcomes. That is wrong, as we can consider them if we want. Just because you choose not to is your business and your ethics, but not one I feel persuaded to share from your expositions.
“You say you are the decider of your well being. I also used health. Do you say your health is increased by being killed by a train?”
I am saying I am the decider of my own well being AND health.
The question of whether my being hit by a train suits my preference or not, is I am glad to reveal this to you, is also up to me.
The fact that I have choice in wanting or nor wanting to be hit by a train, and the fact that I have choice in whether or not I want to continue living or dying, means your tacit presumption that my getting hit by a train is ipso facto at that moment in time something I do not prefer, implies that you are saying that you are willing to put your preferences for my life, over and above my own, for you know there is a probability, however remote you believe it is, that your presumption is false.
What if I was infected by a new strain of virus that will kill everyone else in the world if I were to live for another day? What if I am killing myself to stop that?
These scenarios may seem far fetched, but they are designed to show you that you actually adhere to an absolutist, unflinching, consistent norm, which is “Always and everywhere no matter what, push people out of the way of danger”.
Your devotion to the absolute consistency in always and at all times pushing people away from an oncoming train, “doesn’t always work in all circumstances”, to paraphrase Sumantra.
“That does not stand as a rebuttal to what I said. All you are saying there is “A little harm is not a lot of harm.”
“You said “Well being can only be increased for an individual if that individual is at minimum not subjected to violent harm. That is obvious.”
“I pointed out that well being can be increased if an individual is subject to violent harm. That is a direct rebuttal and not saying that small harm is not large harm.”
But you didn’t give an example of my well being increasing. You gave an example of you initiating “a little harm”.
By your own words, you understand that you are at that moment in time, at that place, harming me by aggression.
At that moment in time, you are reducing my well being.
The outcomes according to your absolute consistency basis expectations are irrelevant to this.
“I say small harm can be consistent with increased well being. You avoid that conclusion by saying that we can not even consider outcomes. That is wrong, as we can consider them if we want.”
We? Don’t you mean YOU?
You did not give an example of you increasing my well being. You gave an example of you reducing my well being, if only by a little.
“Just because you choose not to is your business and your ethics, but not one I feel persuaded to share from your expositions.”
But it is my body. I do not care if you are not persuaded about me demanding you gain my consent before harming me.
What you are telling me, in effect, is that you don’t care about harming me by aggression, that you said explicitly you will harm me by aggression, that my consent is irrelevant, that your absolutism trumps all.
Well, good day sir, and pray we do not meet, because you are clearly of the misguided notion that harming people despite their consent, is ethical.
Welcome to fascism and communism bitchez.
“You say you are the decider of your well being. I also used health. Do you say your health is increased by being killed by a train?”
I am also the decider of my health.
Whether getting hit by a train suits my interests or not, does not depend on your absolutist, unflinchingly consistent ethic of “I Harold am acting ethically by pushing people away from a train”, but actually on MY choice.
What if I want to kill myself?
What if I were infected by some new, incredibly dangerous virus, not yet matured, that would kill the entire human race if I didn’t die then and there?
These “outcomes” are, much like your “earth destroying asteroid” example, designed solely to expose the very same “flaw” you claim absolutist libertarianism suffers from, namely, that the absolutist “push people away from trains” will “not work” in all scenarios.
But this is neither here nor there actually. My argument, which you have not even engaged, let alone refuted, is that at the time you push me against my consent, you are by your own admission causing me harm by aggression.
You have faith the “outcome” will be something that I come around to realizing was you doing well. You have an “expectation” that I would have wanted to be pushed if there was enough time for us to communicate and me saying to you “Yes, please help!”
But this is irrelevant to whether or not you caused me harm by aggression at the time.
My only argument has always been, that whether or not you acted unethically by pushing me, does not depend on YOUR learning process of what I actually think or did think at the time. Your future ideas do not determine the characteristics of past events. The past is instantly totally over and done with. Nothing of what you come to know about the past, has any bearing on what actually took place in the past, nor whether or not what you did in the past was ethical or unethical in the past.
Imagine the period of time between you pushing me, and right before you make a judgment about what you learned since the push.
During that time, it is not the case that what you did in the past is in some sort of Schrodinger fuzzy state of maybe ethical maybe not. That it becomes ethical or unethical only once YOU come to make some judgment about what happened.
You either did act ethically or you did not, at the time, and then THAT becomes crystalized so to speak into history of behavior that was ethical or unethical.
Since you harmed me by aggression, by your admission by the way, my argument is that at that time, you reduced my well being and health.
I should mention that even my own future thoughts of what happened, does not affect whether you acted unethically or ethically. I am not one to do what you do, and not practice what I preach. The same applies to me. If you push me without my consent, it does not even matter if at some future time, I myself thank you and say it is a good thing you did what you did. For here, what I am doing is NOT determining the past, but rather, I am thinking yes you did aggress against me, yes you did harm me, and even though I have the choice to seek retribution, I choose not to do so.
Choosing not to seek retribution does not change the past. Even if I did seek retribution, it still would not change the past.
Your absolutist, unflinching consistency in the ethical norm “Always and everywhere you go, it is moral for you to push people out of the way of an oncoming train”, is as I explained the very same ” this absolutism doesn’t always work” that you believed exposed some flaw in absolutist libertarianism.
“That does not stand as a rebuttal to what I said. All you are saying there is “A little harm is not a lot of harm.”
“You said “Well being can only be increased for an individual if that individual is at minimum not subjected to violent harm.
That is obvious.”
“I pointed out that well being can be increased if an individual is subject to violent harm.”
That is a contradiction. You are saying that reducing someone’s well being is increasing their well being.
“That is a direct rebuttal and not saying that small harm is not large harm.”
No, it is not a rebuttal at all. It is a statement that cannot be true. It is saying up is down.
“I say small harm can be consistent with increased well being. You avoid that conclusion by saying that we can not even consider outcomes. That is wrong, as we can consider them if we want.”
We? Don’t you mean YOU?
I am not avoiding that conclusion, I reject it. I reject conclusions that consist of rank contradictions.
You are by the way totally ignoring the very type of extreme, low probability “asteroid hitting the Earth” type scenario of me WANTING to get hit by the train.
You did not even consider it, because your absolutism is designed not to accommodate the existence of other individuals, and is blinding you from what it does not consider.
It is better for me that you change your absolutism to include always respecting my liberty and refraining from harming me by aggression.
If you “disagree” with that, then you are essentially telling me that my consent does not matter, that you should be the decider for my own life.
I am the decider for my life, not you.
“Just because you choose not to is your business and your ethics, but not one I feel persuaded to share from your expositions.”
I do not care whether you are or are not “persuaded.” You being persuaded has nothing to do with whether you did or did not act ethically at the moment you pushed me.
It is not my obligation to persuade you to refrain from harming me by aggression, even if only a little. It is your obligation to persuade me whether you pushing me is to my liking or not. It is my body, not yours.
To make it clear for you, no, I do not, ever, want to be subjected to your opinions or passions or absolutist aggression principles as the final arbiter over what happens to me in history. I would rather you be absolutist in never harming me at all without my explicit consent, even if YOU have the oh so intense urge and passion to harm me “for my own good”.
You don’t seem to realize that because the subject is my body, that it is you who has to convince me whether what you will do to me is to my preference or not. It is not my obligation to convince you. If the subject matter is your body, then it would be my obligation to convince you that I won’t push you unless you give me your consent, and which time, at that time, I will have acted ethically.
Harold,
The question of whether or not it is right or wrong to push Major.Freedom out of the way of a train is a religious matter that is separate from the questionof whether or not it violates his rights as an individual.
MF may even, deep down, want you to push him out of the way in such a scenario, but to base public policy on morality is to claim the authority of God over others.
You may or may not be right, but then no one should be forced to join such a union.
This is why we’re of the opinion that if your public policy is trying to be moral, then just leave us alone because you can’t centrally plan morality unless you’re God.
And you can’t centrally plan an economy because all economic activity begins with the individual pursuing his subjective ends, and we all have different subjective ends which are also subject to change for reasons that are subjective to the individual.
“I am also the decider of my health.”
I disagree, and we will never get any further if you insist on a humpty dumpty approach to definitions. One may choose to smoke, it may even be in your interests, but it will not improve your health.
Guest
“The question of whether or not it is right or wrong to push Major.Freedom out of the way of a train is a religious matter that is separate from the questionof whether or not it violates his rights as an individual.”
I don’t agree that it is necessarily religious, but it is a separate issue from whether his rights are violated. MF defines everything in such a way that there can be no discussion about the consequences, which makes further interaction pointless.
“You may or may not be right, but then no one should be forced to join such a union.” How do you know?
““You may or may not be right, but then no one should be forced to join such a union.” How do you know?”
Because I could just say that you should be forced to live the way I want you to live. Then where would we be?
If you find someone who voluntarily agrees to live in a similar manner as you, the libertarian position is that we don’t want to stop you on property that we, as individuals, don’t own.
But it is also the libertarian position that if we don’t like the way you live, we each have the right to prevent you from doing so on our own property.
Given that a certain virus concentration exists in the air and on surfaces, how could we prove which person transmitted the virus?
In cases where there is no vaccine available– or where vaccines are ineffective (such as the flu shot which the CDC acknowledged was only 18% effective this year, or the mumps component of the MMR vaccine for which Merck falsified efficacy data)– can we also hold the virus-transmitter legally responsible?
When a person (“recipient”) gets sick and accuses an anti-vaxxer of transmitting the illness, would any of the following defenses be admissible? Was the recipient wearing gloves; was the recipient washing his hands; was the recipient taking a vitamin D supplement; was the recipient a smoker in poor health? This is meant to be a bit silly, but there are many more factors to disease than mere exposure. Two people in the same environment with the same exposure have very different health outcomes. Some students in a classroom have every cold and flu they are exposed to; others in the same classroom seem to never get sick. I don’t see how we can blame a sick person for anyone else getting sick when immunity is so complex.
“Given that a certain virus concentration exists in the air and on surfaces, how could we prove which person transmitted the virus?”
This is a question I am not informed enough to give a satisfactory (to me) answer. But I believe, and this is speculation based on things I may have read about, but the concept of “Patient Zero” I believe can be identified for any virus by way of gene and DNA analysis. I believe scientists have a way to figure out who a particular virus came from, at least the initial victim.
However, for subsequent victims, I don’t know if there is a way. Like if A gets sick, and in the area where they live, there is B, C, D, and E who are known to also have “the” virus, I don’t know if there is a way to identify that A was infected by say D but not the others. This would be a question a biochemistry or geneticist would be in a much better position to answer.
“In cases where there is no vaccine available– or where vaccines are ineffective (such as the flu shot which the CDC acknowledged was only 18% effective this year, or the mumps component of the MMR vaccine for which Merck falsified efficacy data)– can we also hold the virus-transmitter legally responsible?”
Socratic reasoning leads me to say yes. I don’t think anyone should be able to harm others and given a pass based on lack of knowledge or technology. Maybe the just punishment or recompense might be a little less for those who don’t have the technological opportunity to help themselves, but it should be totally zero restitution.
Let us consider the conclusion “No, they are not responsible.”
OK, if that is the case, then is there anyone responsible? If we then propose “No, nobody is responsible”, then we would have to say that the newly infected was so infected by ” nature”. But then suppose a person in a totally poor country with no access to vaccinations, knew that by coughing on someone, they can infect them and possibly kill them. Technology here I think we would all agree has nothing to do with the ethical question.
But if this action is aggression, then so should unintentional infection. After all, I think we have laws against manslaughter because intent is not, and should not, be the only consideration for justice.
“When a person (“recipient”) gets sick and accuses an anti-vaxxer of transmitting the illness, would any of the following defenses be admissible? Was the recipient wearing gloves; was the recipient washing his hands; was the recipient taking a vitamin D supplement; was the recipient a smoker in poor health? This is meant to be a bit silly, but there are many more factors to disease than mere exposure. Two people in the same environment with the same exposure have very different health outcomes. Some students in a classroom have every cold and flu they are exposed to; others in the same classroom seem to never get sick. I don’t see how we can blame a sick person for anyone else getting sick when immunity is so complex.”
Yes, it can get very complicated. Liberty is the most complicated ethics there is, because it has to answer for, and provide detailed justified actions and detailed unjustified actions for literally every conceivable social problem, or two person dispute, that implicates every field of science!
Isn’t is soooooo much easier to say and think “There should be a state to deal with this.”? If humans tend to use the easiest “solution”, easiest in terms of mental effort and practical considerations, then the existence of states has a pretty good explanation.
Libertarians have to encourage complexity if it is going to spread. I think.
Being sick is not equivalent to not being vaccinated. As Carrie pointed out (and I agree) there’s various layers to the immune system, and anyway you might never get exposed to the pathogen. I’ve come to the conclusion that taking regular zinc and vitamin C supplements is a really good idea… wish I’d started when I was younger but no one told me. Should we punish people with poor nutrition because they weaken “herd immunity”? Should we punish people who don’t get enough sleep?
This is kind of similar to driving over the official blood alcohol limit or driving over the official speed limit, but never having an accident — are you guilty of anything? No victim no crime. Then we could get into weird statistical crimes which cannot be measured directly, like the Americans who will die due to Fukushima radiation crossing the ocean.
Where does it lead? Well, here’s an example… the doorway to insanity:
http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/opinion/claire-harvey-anti-vaxers-you-are-baby-killers/story-fni0cwl5-1227272923247
Now this yanks my crank. I’m convinced that Sydney has a high level of adult infection with whooping cough bacteria, and I can produce evidence that at least someone amongst the government health numpties is aware of this. Anyhow, just catch a train during winter peak hour and people are coughing and hacking all over the place (trust me, I know).
Go to a doctor with a persistent cough and they will fob it off, but they won’t actually take any samples to send for testing, and they won’t ever take whooping cough seriously in adults… even though it won’t kill an adult, it isn’t exactly good for you, and anyway you might pass it on to someone else. Something I learned long and hard from years in the business of technical fault finding: it’s amazing what you don’t find, when you don’t look; and people simply won’t look because they can’t be bothered. That’s exactly what Sydney doctors do, they don’t look, and they don’t find.
This is basic proof that doctors and government do not really believe in “herd immunity” unless it happens to be convenient right now to bash some anti-vaxers. When effort and/or money is required they all stop believing real fast.
Whooping cough is an excellent example where the immunization is nowhere close to 100% effective, and what’s more, protection fades in adults and requires a booster every 10 years if you want to keep it up to strength. Not a single doctor will mention this, government don’t advertise this, and most people have no idea. If herd immunity mattered, this would be the place where it matters most, but the dingbats writing newspaper articles about this don’t understand what they are dealing with, and that’s in a situation where anyone can look it up. Journalists are just so damn lazy.
But then, this never was about protecting babies, it’s about smashing nonconformists.
Not sure about Govt not advertising it.
http://www.ncirs.edu.au/immunisation/fact-sheets/pertussis-fact-sheet.pdf
Version from 2013:
https://web.archive.org/web/20130617060909/http://www.ncirs.edu.au/immunisation/fact-sheets/pertussis-fact-sheet.pdf
No mention of “herd immunity” there, and not really any suggestion that mainstream adults should even bother with vaccination.
They recently edited the second paragraph:
Still no particular emphasis on “herd immunity”, but at least they recognized there might be some case for adult protection. It does not make clear that the vaccine generally fades out after 10 years but you could conclude this from the fact that healthcare workers need boosters every 10 years (if you dug though the fine print, which no one does).
At any rate, I don’t regard making a small edit to a fact sheet sometime last year exactly a public information campaign. Hardly anyone even knows that adults can catch it, and very few people know that the vaccine is not 100% effective and fades over time.
At the same time we have ignorant journalists (who obviously have not read the fact sheet) whipping up threats against some tiny percentage of parents who don’t immunize their kids. That’s the stuff people actually read. Also, where are the statistics about the level of immunization in the community as a whole? Where are the doctors taking measurements of the rate of infection in the community as a whole? No one cares, just bash the anti-vaxers.
If your point is that we should not follow the press agenda when it comes to health scares, I agree with you 100%.
As an example, the Daily Mail in the UK ran a series on why the HPV vaccine should not be administered to schoolchildren because it was so dangerous. SImultaneously in Ireland they ran a series on how terrible it was that the Irish Govt was witholding HPV vaccine from schoolchildren because of the clear benefits. Take all newspaper reports with a bucket of salt.
“Should we punish people with poor nutrition because they weaken “herd immunity”? Should we punish people who don’t get enough sleep?”
Should we? No.
But you bet they’re going to.
Socialized medicine is the perfect gateway to stuff like this. The lefties will argue that we have to do it because of herd immunity and to protect the children. The neocons will argue that we have to do it because these damn freeloading poor people with bad nutrition are costing the rest of us money.
The reasonable libertarian doesn’t stand a chance.
Carrie,
It looks like we’re about to find out.
http://reason.com/blog/2015/07/08/immune-compromised-woman-dies-of-measles#.7dxqfz:v7r4
This bothers me coming from “Reason.”
From what I consider to be very good analysis:
“The woman who died was not among the unvaccinated. On the contrary, she not only had been vaccinated, but reportedly was tested and found to have a protective antibody titer. She nevertheless became infected with measles while seeking medical attention in a clinic. She died from pneumonia, which can be caused by any number of other bacterial or viral infections besides measles, including the common cold and flu. The reason her immune system couldn’t handle the infection was because doctors had her on immunosuppressive drugs. Hence, medical intervention was a contributing factor in her death.” – http://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/2015/07/05/a-measles-death-vaccines-and-the-medias-failure-to-inform/
On a practical level, I don’t see how we can legally prove causality of unvaccinated person A making another person B sick. For example, according to mainstream data, 90-95% of people infected with polio show no symptoms and don’t even know they are carriers! Further, since our immune processes are complex, we currently have no way of knowing whether person A is at fault, or whether person B is at fault for eating Skittles instead of kale last week, or for having smoked one cigarette 20 years ago, or for taking other pharmaceuticals that affected her digestion which affected her absorption of vitamin A which would have prevented measles… Our knowledge and predictive ability is nowhere near this level of determinism!
How can we prove causality if someone shoots another in the head? It is possible that the victim died of an aneurism just before impact. All such conclusions are tentative. We just have to decide what level of “proof” we are prepared to accept.
Carrie already explained the answer:
Newtonian ballistics on the other hand have been in good shape for over a hundred years. Comparing this to immunology is pretty weak IMHO.
Thanks Tel, I see the point more clearly now. The “legal” proof is not absolute proof. In the recent measles case, there are very few people with measles the victim came into contact with – she was in a hospital, so her movements were unusually well defined. In that specific case we might be able to prove beyond reasonable doubt who infected her.
But generally it would be almost impossible to attribute specific infections to specific sources. I don’t buy the smoking and skittles bits – the law deals with this sort of thing already and only finds liability if the cause is faily direct. Eating skittles last week is too indirect to be a feature in most cases.
There would be no legal way to get redress for the harms caused by the unvaccinated, so the cost / benefit swings a little more to the compulsory vaccination. The unvaccinated would directly bear none of the costs they cause.
The whole debate seems misconceived. For example, Bob says he’s against mandatory vaccination, but if schools, etc. want to say that you have to be vaccinated to go there then that’s fine. But that’s typically how “mandatory” vaccination rules are enforced: no one is going to hold you down and forcibly give your kid a shot if you say no, but they will not be able to go to school where they could infect others.
I’m quite suspicious that this sort of enforcement mechanism will satisfy the progressive worldview for very long.
Let’s also keep in mind that the collectivist impulses that lead someone to support mandatory vaccinations are the same impulses that cause people to support mandatory public schooling.
I know that the anti-vax community is, “diverse” (to put it mildly), but I’m guessing there’s a HUGE amount of crossover between “people who support mandatory vaccinations” and “people who want to ban home-schooling.”
So will that group be satisfied if the only way to achieve the vaccinations is to incentive people to leave the public school system they love and support so very much? If the result of stricter enforcement on vaccinations for public schools results in huge numbers of home-schooling and religious schooling, will they not demand a “better” solution?
Well, yea, of course, and that argument is true of all collectivist views. One property-right-violating policy change always begets another, and so one. The end game for those with this mindset is always total and complete tyranny since that is the only way to completely impose their views on the whole population.
I know that the anti-vax community is, “diverse” (to put it mildly), but I’m guessing there’s a HUGE amount of crossover between “people who support mandatory vaccinations” and “people who want to ban home-schooling.”
You guessed wrong. 78% of people think vaccines should be mandatory [Source</a.], whereas only 16% think homeschooling should be banned. [Source]
This is a laughable comparison. In no way did you show that he guessed wrong.
How many of the 78 percent that believe vaccines should be mandatory believe home schooling should be banned? In addition, how many of the 16 percent that believe home schooling should be banned believe that vaccines should be mandatory? You cannot answer those questions based on these two polls. These polls are not related in any way.
To show that he “guessed wrong”, you would have to take a poll asking those two questions together and then compare.
How many of the 78 percent that believe vaccines should be mandatory believe home schooling should be banned?
Let’s assume for sake of argument that everyone who thinks homeschooling should be banned also thinks that vaccines should be mandatory. In that case, 79% of people who think vaccines should be mandatory think that homeschooling should *not* be banned.
Math: it can be useful sometimes.
Being in favor of a ban is the most extreme position possible though.
There’s probably a wide middle ground between “ban homeschooling now!” and “I want to do as much as possible to encourage the use of public schools as opposed to private/homeschooling, and would oppose any initiative that incentivized people to stay away from public schools”
Josaih, you are using two DIFFERENT samples to draw these conclusions.
Math: it can be useful sometimes, but only if you know how to use it.
Math: it can be useful sometimes, but only if you know how to use it.
I didn’t look carefully as I’m in a hotel, but I was worried that might have happened. I am almost afraid to check it myself. It’s so awkward when someone is smug and wrong. (Which is why I wanted to be sure before zinging Josiah myself on this.)
i think the 79% number is his worst case scenario not the excact number
Both surveys say it is Americans they are sampling – same population. Different samples does not mean you cannot compare if they are frm the same population.
Huh?
No that is wrong. Check your assumptions.
By my calculation Josiah is correct. Think of it as a Venn Diagram. The population in circle 1 is those believeing vaccination should be compulsory. We know this is 78% of the total population, so this circle needs 78 dots inside. The population in circle 2 is those believing home schooling should be banned. There needs to be 16 dots in here. We shall ignore the 22 dots outdside both these two circles for now. Josiah is describing the extreme case where all the dots in circle 2 are also in circle 1. That is, there are 62 in circle 1 only, No dots in circle 2 only, and 16 dots in the overlap. There are thus 79.5% of people who believe that vaccination should be compulsory who do not believe that home schooling should be banned (62*100/78). The other extreme would be no dots in the overlap, 78 in circle 1 only and 16 in circle 2 only. Not promising I have this right.
Ha! Talk about taking a safe bet.
Just try to name three things that could satisfy the progressive worldview for very long.
Heh, fair point 🙂
I’ve just had a couple debates with friends recently where they’ve been bloody insistent that the ONLY thing anyone is asking for and ever will ask for is that vaccines be mandatory for public schools.
Needless to say I am quite suspicious.
Indeed, there are already calls to make vaccination mandatory even for those who are trying to opt out of the system:
“States should encourage parents to get their homeschooled students vaccinated through enacting the same laws as those used for public school students.”
From http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17714256
You forgot the bit about how parents don’t get a whole lot of choice about which schools are available, and you also forgot the bit about these regulations tend to be imposed down from above, not voluntarily agreed to by schools and the local parents working together. That’s current practice at any rate, it doesn’t need to be that way.
http://www.edchoice.org/The-Friedmans/The-Friedmans-on-School-Choice/What-s-Wrong-with-Our-Schools-.aspx
Sure, there’s still a few private schools, if you want to pay double (once with your tax, and again with school fees) and there’s also homeschooling but a bunch of restrictions apply to that as well, such as if several families want to collectively school their kids sharing the work with each other they get told they don’t have the very necessary union memberships.
I voted for Bob. He had the better argument. But there was one point left out of the debate that I feel completely refutes the case for mandatory vaccinations:
It is possible for a government to provide incentives to individuals to become vaccinated (e.g. tax incentives) without having to make vaccines mandatory. If the incentive is strong enough, this will be all that is needed to ensure sufficient vaccination rates to ensure herd immunity.
Since achieving the “vaxxers'” desired result is possible without a mandate, the mandate is unnecessary. And since the mandate is unnecessary, we can conclude that it is incompatible with liberty, since such a mandate incurs a restriction of liberty to confer no benefit that could not be achieved through non-mandatory means.
And note that this is the case for any set of conditions in which the state exists, from minarchy all the way up to totalitarianism. Since there is no anarchistic case to make for mandatory vaccines, my point holds for any set of conditions, libertarian or otherwise.
🙂
Since achieving the “vaxxers’” desired result is possible without a mandate, the mandate is unnecessary. And since the mandate is unnecessary, we can conclude that it is incompatible with liberty, since such a mandate incurs a restriction of liberty to confer no benefit that could not be achieved through non-mandatory means.
By “non-mandatory means” you mean mandatory taxes?
I gave tax incentives merely as an example. If you would like me to dream up alternate possibilities, they might include: discounted user fees, transfer payments funded through non-coercive public finance options, preferred or free parking in public lots, reduced national park or museum fees, etc. etc.
I mean, there are literally thousands of ways to provide incentives to people without marrying those incentives to mandatory taxes. You might suggest that some of these aren’t sufficiently attractive, or that they are too unrealistic, but that’s because the single most attractive and realistic incentive is a tax credit. That’s why I mentioned it, and framed my argument from the perspective of the most realistic real-world scenario we have.
In other words, if I can make the case against mandatory vaccinations while assuming a large central government, then I assume it is far easier to make that case in a less-restrictive environment. I started at the worst-case scenario and still managed to make my point. My guess is that my rationale will also endure under the many less-restrictive hypothetical scenarios we libertarians are fond of concocting to prove our own points. 😉
I am staunchly anti-vaccine on a personal basis due to scientific reasons, and staunchly anti-mandatory-vaccine on a public basis due to the reasons Bob explained so well in his article. I also want to mention that my career is a microbiology professor at a mainstream public college– not to use the argument from authority, but to show that I have thoughtfully considered the alleged scientific merits of vaccination. I didn’t even realize there *was* an anti-vaccine perspective until 5-10 years ago, and now I am baffled as to how anyone who has researched this topic can believe the vaccine propaganda.
A lot has already been said in these comments so I will try to offer something new
1. Almost all of the published studies on vaccine safety and efficacy are funded by the government and/or pharmaceutical companies that both lobby and are subsidized by the government. These companies have a proven history of dangerous and unethical experimentation on humans, often as part of military programs. There is a current whistleblower case against Merck for falsifying efficacy data on the MMR vaccine. Most libertarians seek out independent sources of information on issues that the mainstream considers resolved, such as climate change, American history / Civil War, economics, etc., yet I do not see that same degree of questioning on the vaccine issue. I encourage libertarians to investigate the vaccine issue as well.
2. One of the arguments put forth by libertarians for mandatory vaccines is that non-vaccinated individuals are violating property rights by infecting other people. I am not going to address this argument directly, but ask you to consider this: So-called “live” or attenuated vaccines can be shed to others via normal viral transmission routes. Vaccine proponents cite this as an advantage for using this type of vaccine. In third-world countries, many people who are never directly vaccinated receive the vaccine indirectly via the fecal-oral route. This is why the Oral Polio Vaccine rather than the Inactivated Polio Vaccine is still used worldwide, and why people who get the flu mist are not supposed to be around immunocompromised individuals for a period of time. So if you assert that we should hold non-vaccinated people responsible for transmitting viruses to other people, can the non-vaccinated also sue for property rights violation and damages if they are infected by a vaccine?
For those interested in investigating the science of vaccines, here are some things to research:
3. Data shows that the decline in transmissible illnesses was largely due to improved nutrition and sanitation. Isolated non-vaccinated communities showed the same historic downward disease trends as did the vaccinated world. The data is available from original sources. One reason for the apparent historic decline in transmissible diseases is government re-definition of diseases. Prior to the polio vaccine, all types of infantile paralysis were classified as “polio.” Simultaneous with introduction of the vaccine, “polio” was re-defined as coming only from poliovirus with a set of specific symptoms for a longer period of time, thereby semantically eliminating most cases of “polio.” And what of the decline in polio in underdeveloped countries right now? Again, this is an illusion. Look up the decline in “polio” in India concurrent with the devastating rise in “acute flaccid paralysis.”
4. Lastly, vaccines cause serious harm, including allergies, autoimmunity, chronic fatigue, and yes, autism—which the government and medical associations call “encephalopathy” in such cases—and for which they acknowledge and pay out damages each year through the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program. If you say that vaccines ought to be mandatory, you must do so with the knowledge that some people actually die from vaccine reactions.
I, meanwhile, only discovered the existence of an anti-vaccine side 5 years ago and can’t believe how anyone believes the anti-vaccine propaganda.
“So if you assert that we should hold non-vaccinated people responsible for transmitting viruses to other people, can the non-vaccinated also sue for property rights violation and damages if they are infected by a vaccine?”
-One means is rarer than the other.
“Data shows that the decline in transmissible illnesses was largely due to improved nutrition and sanitation.”
-Sometimes, yes, other times, no:
http://www.iayork.com/MysteryRays/2009/03/31/baffling-vaccine-quiz/
“Lastly, vaccines cause serious harm, including allergies, autoimmunity, chronic fatigue, and yes, autism—which the government and medical associations call “encephalopathy” in such cases—and for which they acknowledge and pay out damages each year through the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program.”
-Again, it’s a matter of frequency: such cases simply happen less often than infectious disease injuries.
E. Harding,
1. If we zoom out a bit more, the trend becomes clearer. Here’s an example. http://www.dissolvingillusions.com/graphs/#13 It is also interesting to note the same decline in diseases for which there were no vaccines!
2. Even if I concede that vaccine injuries are rare– which I don’t– they do exist, so making vaccines mandatory means sentencing someone’s child to death without that parent having any say in the matter. There is no certainty that any person will get a contagious disease or die from it, but there IS certainty that some percentage of people are harmed by vaccines. So, as I see it, proponents of mandatory vaccines are saying it is okay to kill a few children for the supposed greater good. To me, this utilitarian view is not compatible with individual rights.
From the graphs, we can conclude five things:
1. Measles is the least ambiguous case of vaccination leading to a decline in deaths.
2. Deaths from third-world infectious diseases declined fast before the introduction of vaccines, and incidence of those diseases somewhat slower.
3. By the late 19th century, the smallpox vaccine had little impact on the incidence of smallpox pandemics.
4. By the mid-19th century, the application of the smallpox vaccine in the First World had clearly hit diminishing returns.
5. Vaccine introduction has hit some infectious diseases harder than others.
Again, it’s a matter of proportions. And the most deadly vaccine, the smallpox one, isn’t given in the U.S. anymore.
Carrie, great points.
I am looking to find some resources to research the science side of this debate. Any suggestions for objective sources?
Sorry that I am not adding to conversation – having a child soon and having trouble finding credible, objective sources. Seems like a lot of emotion and government involved in this issue, both of which are bad for truth…
Jim, this is the third time I have tried to post this comment but it seems that the blog is eating it. So I will try again with the links removed, and hopefully you can find the resources from a quick search.
The book “Dissolving Illusions” does a marvelous job of documenting the history of vaccines from pre-1800s-1900s. It does not focus on the physiology of the immune system, but it references original sources, newspapers, and historic physicians records tracing the development of vaccines, government manipulation of data, etc., and I believe it is extremely convincing in showing that vaccines are not effective. Since you are primarily interested in the science I would not necessarily recommend buying this book, but perhaps you can find a library copy and read it as time and interest allow.
The main resource I recommend is any work by Tetyana Obukhanych. She holds a PhD in immunology and trained at Harvard and Stanford. She used to be pro-vaccine but now focuses on innate immunity. She has some hour-long lectures on Youtube that explain in technical detail antibodies, herd immunity, etc. I highly recommend these. She also has a downloadable book on Amazon that I have not read, but I would recommend it without hesitation given the quality of her lectures and other articles.
Dr. Suzanne Humphries was a pro-vaccine nephrologist who began noticing vaccine damage in her kidney patients. I highly recommend her long Youtube lectures on polio and alternative treatments. I also recommend any articles she wrote.
I do like Dr. Sherri Tenpenny, though in recent months she’s become more sensational and political. She operates the Vaccine Research Library which has hundreds of mainstream peer-reviewed articles showing the dangers and ineffectiveness of vaccines. These articles are published in mainstream medical journals. I have not paid for the site subscription since I can access most of these journal through the college where I work, but it might be worth your while to do a trial subscription.
Best wishes in your search.
I’m pretty sure the quota is one link per comment.
However, if you are patient Bob often restores lost comments eventually… although by then the initiative in the discussion is often lost. On occasions I follow up my own comment with an additional link in order to remain within the one link per comment limit.
Personally I’ll add that I’m happy enough to take a vaccine for most things, except flu because I tried that for a few years and found the product ineffective, now I can’t be bothered going back to it. Small risks don’t bother me that much.
What does piss me off is people selling a product [A] with government trying to bully people into buying, and [B] with limited information and not explaining to the buyers what this product it. A contract requires a meeting of the minds, that means informed consent when it comes to products like these.
I’m certainly NOT a supporter of mandatory vaccines, I think there’s probably enough advantage in most cases for a “rational” individual to take them, but I understand that some individuals will choose not to take them. If the sellers want to improve their sales they should improve their product, and be scrupulously honest with their customers. Dishonesty merely trades short term advantage for long term disadvantage.
I, as always, recommend the good David Gorski, who lives a few miles (at most) from Scott Alexander.
Another recommendation is to obtain a mainstream microbiology or immunology textbook. The current books acknowledge vaccine failure, bacterial and viral mutation, etc., and point to vitamins as contributing factors to health.
These books will also describe innate immunity (skin, enzymes, white blood cells, fever and so forth) that are considered our bodies’ primary defenses. Only once these barriers are breached does our so-called adaptive immunity (antibodies) activate, and it is only the adaptive immunity that is stimulated by vaccines. So you may look into developing a strong innate immunity such that adaptive immunity need not be relied upon as much.
I also recommend looking into the “danger model” of immunity, which is the idea that the body distinguishes not so much between self- and non-self molecules as is proposed by this antigen-antibody theory, but responds to damage. This theory explains some things that the standard view cannot, including why inactivated vaccines need adjuvants (immune-system danger signals such as aluminum) in order for the body to respond to them.
If you want a good book, Immunology by Kuby is good current (7th edition) is most up to date.
Adjuvants are useful for inactivated vaccine but are rarely useful in the absence of antigen. Placebos frequently incorporate adjuvant in order to demonstrate specificity and show that random inflammatory responses are no although that is almost never seen.
an incredible amount is known about the adaptive immune system. If you have a link that shows where the standard view comes up short please share.
While aluminium based adjuvants are the only adjuvants used for human vaccines, this is a regulatory artifact imposed by the FDA. Most modern animal vaccines have moved on from such archaic adjuvants.
“Almost all of the published studies on vaccine safety and efficacy are funded by the government and/or pharmaceutical companies…”
If you reject all research by Govt and companies as suspect you will have little left to rely on. Many of the studies are authored by medics and are from many different countries. It seems a stretch to write all these off as tainted.
Massive trials have failed to show connections between particular conditions and particular vaccines that have been trumpeted in the press. It is also very telling that vaccine scares are very prevalent in lots of countries, but each country has its own variant. France was in a panic about hepatitis B vaccine causing multiple sclerosis that did not spread beyond France. UK paniced about MMR causing Autism, whereas in the USA the panic was about Thiomersal, which is not a concern in the UK despite the same preservative being used. There are many ather examples. As Ben Goldacre says:
“The diversity and isolation of these anti-vaccination panics helps to illustrate the way in which they reflect local political and social concerns more than a genuine appraisal of the risk data: because if the vaccine for hepatitis B, or MMR, or polio, is dangerous in one country, it should be equally dangerous everywhere on the planet; and if those concerns were genuinely grounded in the evidence, especially in an age of the rapid propagation of information, you would expect the concerns to be expressed by journalists everywhere. They’re not.”
http://www.badscience.net/2013/04/how-vaccine-scares-respect-local-cultural-boundaries/
I would have thought that anyone studying economics and incentives should have at least a few alarm bells ringing, just thinking about the implications of that.
Not sure what you mean.
The point is, there is no other source of information on these topics. The only parties with any incentive to fund any kind of clinical research whatsoever are stakeholder groups, all of whom have a vested interest. So what information is anyone willing to accept at all?
Kaiser Permanente co-authored one – they seem to have an interest in establishing what will reduce costs rather than pushing a particular view, although I don’t know that much about them so i may be wrong. I don’t see why doctors have a vested interest in pushing vaccines that are ineffective and harmful. It is not clear that different governments’ interests align with large pharmaceutical companies.
By all means question the evidence, but we cannot reject all evidence.
You and I are in agreement. 🙂
I like David Friedman’s trick of looking for reasons to believe Position X in articles written by those who are hostile to Position X, and vice-versa. All studies have value, but that doesn’t mean the value is in believing 100% of the claims they make.
You left off the last part of my sentence: “…pharmaceutical companies that both lobby and are subsidized by the government.” Private companies and individuals can carry out trustworthy studies. In a free-market system, it would be a long-term advantage for manufacturers to produce safe, effective products. However, in this mixed / corporate welfare system we have, drug companies buy politicians. They fund university research, or lobby the government to fund university research with a certain slant. The government is the largest customer of vaccines. Vaccine companies have ‘immunity’ from vaccine damages backed by the federal government. This is why most studies are suspect.
That “Bad Science” article does not make sense to me. From what I see, similar vaccine concerns are expressed worldwide. Japan banned MMR for the same reason that American anti-vaxxers are concerned about it. There are current lawsuits in numerous countries regarding Gardasil– UK, Spain… So I don’t think that the content of anti-vax arguments differs significantly on a regional basis. However, given that anti-vax groups are made of individual people doing their best to sort through reams of information, it makes sense to me that different individuals would choose to specialize in different elements of the anti-vax perspective.
On would not expect zero overlap – it is the vast difference in scale within boundaries that is surprising. So if you look for similar things in each country you will find it, but if you look at the number of articles about each one there will be vast differences. In the UK there was a massive scare about MMR and autism, but very little mention of Thimerosal.
“…pharmaceutical companies that both lobby and are subsidized by the government.” So are you happy with the medic lead studies, such as the massive ones in Scandanavia? The one with 715,000 children by Klein et al of Kaiser Permanente, who have no particular axe to grind for vaccines. The 3 million subject study by Peltola et al of Helsinki University Hospital.
I am pro-vaccine, but I’m not a libertarian. Bob’s reasoning is not too specious this time around.
“In other words, any “free riding” would only take place at the margin, if most of the population had gotten the vaccine and thus an outbreak of the relevant disease was unlikely.”
-That sounds about right, but may well break down if the free-riding reaches 30-40% of the population, where there would be large outbreaks, but not mass pandemics.
Also, I think Bob is too theoretical. A move towards empiricism helps everyone.
I think what Bob is arguing is that the “free riding” problem is self limiting, so we can safely ignore it. The obvious retort is that problems that don’t reach civilization-destroying levels are still problems, and if we can fix it easily and painlessly, why not?
Because giving government power to control people’s lives is not painless.
I keep reminding other libertarians that our most basic message just isn’t getting anywhere, and I think you have proven that pretty convincingly.
That’s pretty much exactly how I see it, Tel. Personal liberty tends to be a principle that everyone wants to apply only when it affects them or perhaps until it confilcts with something they really want to see changed.
It’s also not the case that some group of people who pass a mandatory law can have perfect knowledge. The individual should have the final say even apart from the “control is not painless” reason because the experts may be wrong.
I’m quite pro vaccine, but think people should have that right to choose. Apart from that there are also significant differences in the efficacy, safety and risk profiles between vaccines.
Tended to be.
Not
Tends to be.
Doesn’t have to be that way.
Longest. Comment thread. Evah.
Please, take 9:28 minutes to watch this video.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LUduiwgHMQs
“Former Merck Rep Says Mandatory Vaccination Is For Profit and Not Public Health”
Now, please, someone explain to me why so many libertarians all round the world do not trust Government to manage properly things like money, theology, war or security, but, at the same time, blindly trust Government with drugs, public health, food, water supplies, or scientific research. Many libertarians need to get a grip on these topics. you don’t need to become an anti-vaxer, just a Consistent Libertarian. It is so easy.
Science, all science, have to be totally separated from the State. I know that many scientists, like many religious leaders before, would not like this, but society must be protected from bad science and bad religious practices, and if a Government enforces any one of those, well, we can easily get in deep trouble. For instance: freakin’ Federal Reserve system.
Thou shall not force medicine on people!
How can this be contentious among libertarians. How can libertarians demand that people become more responsible, and then defend such absurdities as forced vaccination.